#like would it have been nice to have all the mobs? absolutely. am i still bitter about the goddamn GLOW SQUID? you bet your ass.

[laylanatorseventeen]

u know honestly I can understand the frustration with the mob vote but I think it is good to stop and think about all Mojang has given us in the last several years

-bees and honey

-the nether update (including 2 new mobs, 2 new wood types, piglin trading and bastions)

-mountains and goats!

-lush caves and all it's accoutrements, like glow berries and moss and axolotls!

-deepdark update, with the warden and ancient cities! so many new blocks!

-mangrove swamp, including frogs! and MULTIPLE new blocks (mangrove wood, mud + it's variants, roots, frog lights)

-cherry wood! new blocks! new flowers! along with the sniffer and it's flowers! +archaeology! pots and armor trims!

so yeah. I understand wanting all three mobs, I did too. And after reviewing the Minecraft live announcements my first reaction was, "wow that sounds. Really boring." But like Minecraft has changed so much and we've been given so much in the last three years I think we might need to run on a little faith

[creadigol]

Hello i just recently found this blog and i'm in love with your writing.

Can you please continue the hero x villain story with the criminal please?

I am so sorry for the long wait…but here it finally is! Thank you so much for the ask! I hope y’all like part 2! 

*Warning for slight flashbacks of a traumatic event, but nothing bad.

Part One here.

“Once again Detective, I have no answers to your questions, I have no clue where they are, and if you don’t leave my property within the next thirty seconds I claim the right to shoot you for trespassing.” 

 Hero heard the voice below them speak with little attempt at patience. Their eyes were heavy and their body felt like lead, but their ears seemed to awaken with no problem. Why would Villain be threatening to shoot Detective? Hero had thought the two tended to keep out of each other’s way. Wait, why was Hero asleep in the same vicinity as Villain in the first place? 

“I know you have them! All accounts place you following Hero into the house! Dammit Villain! What happened?” 

God, Hero had never heard Detective so worked up before. The man was usually made of stone, even in the face of absolute evil. Hell, Hero once saw the man play a game of russian roulette with a mob boss and win through sheer intimidation. How had Villain got him so worked up? Of course they were enemies, being on opposite sides of a moral code tended to do that…but they had never been outright hostile to each other. 

“Fifteen…sixteen…seventeen…” Villain counted. Hero could just picture them casually looking at their watch while unholstering a weapon. 

“Fine!” Screamed Detective. “But don’t think I won’t be back! I’ll not rest until Hero is found!” 

Hero heard the stomping of boot heels on the walk. 

“Then maybe you shouldn’t have lost them in the first place!” Villain yelled back. 

“Fuck you!” 

Hero fought to open their eyes. They moved their fingers and toes, feeling like they were some kind of mummy awakening after centuries of death. 

What was Detective talking about? Hero was right here. They had just finished up another case for them when…

The memory flashed before their eyes…the Criminal…the knife…that goddamn smile as Hero bled onto the kitchen floor…the fear…Villain!

No amount of lead in their veins could keep them down at the thought. Hero shot out of the plush bed with speed their body was not ready for. 

The window to their right was open, that must be how they heard the conversation at the front door, and Hero stumbled towards it. It took a moment, as their foot got caught in the exceptionally soft bedspread, but they made it. 

Hero stood to the side, not wanting anyone outside to see them in such a state of weakness…nor did they want Detective to see them…and looked out. Sure enough, this was Villains street…at least this was the street of their safe house. Hero had found it six months ago while following Villain after a deal gone wrong. They had just wanted to make sure Villain wasn’t too beat up…they ended up staying all night wrapping the Villains wounds. 

Hero assumed Villain would have changed houses after that. Guess not. 

Hero watched as Detective stomped angrily to his silver sedan. Now how had Detective found the safe house? And why did he not just raid the place? Why put up with Villain’s taunts if he knew Hero was here? 

Hero took stock of the room. It was a nice bedroom, rather typical. Blue walls and a matching white and blue quilt. There was a small dresser, night stand and desk that looked like they were bought together at the local Big Lots. Nothing expensive, like how Villain usually liked. Nothing gleaming of elegance or gilding. Nothing special…but comfortable. Actually really comfortable. And kind of cute. 

Nothing at all like Villain. 

A shuffling outside the bedroom door made Hero stiffen. The door opened revealing Villain, still muttering to themselves about ‘nosy, pain in the ass detectives’. Hero stayed frozen by the window. 

Villain was carrying a tray with a sup and bowl on it, something steaming from the bowl when they glanced at the bed and saw it was empty. 

“Shit!” They swung around frantically, somehow not spilling anything, and immediately laid eyes on Hero. 

“Hero!” Villain gasped. They placed the tray on the nightstand as the tension in their shoulders released. “What in the hell are you doing up? Do you have any idea wha…”

“Where am I?” Hero interrupted them. Villain froze. “What the hell is going on?” 

Villain’s eyebrows scrunched. “Hero…” They started. “Do you remember what happened? I mean, I understand if not…” 

“Of course I remember,” Hero snapped. “But that does not explain why I’m in your safe house or why Detective was here.” 

“Fuck. I knew his voice carried,” muttered Villain. They looked at Hero, seeming to take in their appearance, which Hero felt was probably not great. “You were stabbed Hero. It was bad…really bad. I had to heal you, but…” Villain gestured vaguely. 

“You redirected my body’s energy to heal the wound,” Hero finished. That’s why they were sleeping. That’s why they had no energy to spare. 

“You should still be out,” Villain said as they walked forward. “I estimated at least another week, if not more. Had planned on Doctor giving you an IV tonight.” 

Hero looked down at themselves and took stock of their appearance. Their hair was down, though that had happened during their scuffle with Criminal, and their arms were bruised. Finger prints littered their wrists and elbows. They lifted the front of their t-shirt and glanced at their stomach. Only a slight discoloration showed any sign of the life threatening injury they had received. 

“How long was I out?” 

“Four days. Detective’s been following me incessantly after they couldn’t find you in that damn house.” 

Villain had walked to only an arm's length away. Seeming reluctant to come any closer, yet holding themselves as if to reach out. 

“Followed you here I see,” Hero said. They traced their fingers over the discoloration on their stomach. 

“Unfortunately.” 

Hero let the shirt fall back down and only then comprehended their attire.

“Did you dress me in your pajamas?” Hero asked incredulously. 

Villain laughed, “Well your clothes were ruined and there wasn’t much else here.”

“You didn’t…” Hero gave them a look that promised quick vengeance should they hear the wrong answer to their question. 

“I was perfectly professional, I assure you. Nothing but doctoring on my part.” Villain clapped them on the shoulder. “You should get back to bed though. You still need time to recover.” 

Hero was feeling faint standing, so they agreed and got back into the bed. They got situated under the covers, but sat up by the headboard. Villain stood hovering for a moment before stepping back.

“Why did Detective need to follow you? Why not just tell him I’m here?” Hero eyed Villain as they fiddled with the covered steaming bowl, “Not like saving my life is very illegal. Unless you..you know.” 

Hero didn’t finish as they thought about Villain’s words to them before they passed out. 

Best not to look to your right though…you have too fair a disposition to look at Criminal now.

“Criminal’s alive,” Villain spoke as if reading their mind. “Did my best, but the bastard lived.” 

Hero felt their insides freeze. 

You really are perfect aren't you?

Let’s not prolong this dear. 

“They’re secured in the hospital ward of the prison.” Villain sat down on the edge of the bed and placed their hand over Hero’s pale one. “You got enough for the case while you were undercover. Better than a confession.” 

Villain made eye contact, “They’re never getting out Hero. And if they did, I would finish the job.” 

Hero smiled softly. “I have no doubt you would finish the job now if I asked.” 

Villain chuckled, “Wouldn’t be the worst job I ever took.” 

“But why Detective?” Asked Hero. 

“But why Detective what?” Villain said. They patted Hero’s hand and got up to go back to the tray once more. 

“Why lie about saving me?” 

Villain took the top off the bowl and Hero saw that it contained hot water and a white cloth. 

“Should have known you’d have heard that. Damn hearing.” 

“Why?” Hero pressed. 

Villain handed them a hair tie. “Because I don’t trust him. Or at least I don’t trust who he works for.” 

Hero pulled their hair into a bun. “Why?”

Villain swirled the cloth through the water a couple of times. Hero could smell what they assumed were salts or oils mixed in. 

“They never should have called you in,” Villain spoke.

Hero reached out for the cloth, “They call me in all the time.” 

The cloth stayed in Villain’s hand, submerged in water. “They don’t for the petty stuff.” 

“Well this wasn’t exactly petty. Criminal was the killer we’ve been looking for.” 

“Exactly!” The water sloshed with Villain’s outburst. “All the victims look like you. All the Criminal’s ‘types’ look like you. Every outfit, hair style, and mannerism was just like you. Criminal’s had an obsession for a while Hero and those bastards banked on it.” 

Hero faltered. 

“You’re saying they tricked me to get them?” 

“I’m saying something’s going on and until we figure it out you’re not safe to go back.” 

Hero went silent for a few moments.

“Damn.” They finally whispered.

Villain handed them the warm cloth. “Yeah…damn.” 

The scent infused water felt heavenly on Hero’s neck and face. They wondered if this was how Villain kept them clean while they slept. 

“So what do we do?” 

“You,” Villain pointed, “rest. At least for the next couple of days.”

“And you?” Hero handed the cloth back. 

“I’m going to pay the good Commissioner a little visit this week.” 

[hydrangeapartridge]

My completely biased review and opinion about companions in Veilguard (major spoilers of course)

(Side note : english is not my first langage, I hope I can express myself clearly enough for you all to understand my points)

- Neve

I like Neve, she’s cool. I loved the detail of the noise her metal leg makes when she walks.

Her questline was however a bit bland. We had better portrayals of power hungry blood mages in previous games and Aelia wasn’t that good an antagonist. She lacks charisma and isn’t seen much before the last quest so you don’t really care about her. It could have been more dramatic, like if we had to fight people of Minrathos being controlled, idk. Also not much about slavery.

I get that Bioware tried to make Neve’s quest like detective work, searching for clues and stuff, but for me it wasn’t that exciting, and Venatori are the mobs I like the least, I don’t like the crystals you have to break in order mechanics and stuff.

I chose to make her the hero of Minrathos and it was satisfying.

- Harding

I can’t find it in myself to call her Lace damn it XD

Of course I was happy to see Harding again after Inquisition ! She is a ray of Ferelden sunshine. I really enjoyed her questline with the Titans ; it was mysterious and you really felt the danger in the deep roads, and the potential threat of her newly acquiered magic. I liked the giant oracle and the design of the lyrium caves. It was a nice throwback to the first games.

The end scene of her quest was nicely done, with Rook trying to reach her while the whole cave was collapsing and then a group hug.

I chose the path of compassion.

- Lucanis

His accent was more funny to me than endearing (as is his signature « Mierda ») and I was surprised to find that he was soft instead of suave. I didn’t save Treviso so I feel like I missed a lot of his quest (and the decision at the end) and in the end he was OK but not that interesting to me.

There was also the problem of Illario ; the second he was introduced I smelled the family treason nd so there was no suspense to this quest. It felt like a bad telenovella.

I like that Zara had a literal blood bath in the quest of the same name. It was a cool fight.

I didn’t bring him out much but I enjoyed that he ended up with Neve.

- Bellara

Bellara is adorable. I liked her quirkiness but her dialogues were sometimes terrible. When she talked I felt like she kept repeating the same things phrased differently and sometimes I felt the itch to skip (I usually never skip dialog!).

I had high hopes for her questline because of Anaris and finding that her brother wasn’t dead, but it all flopped in the end when Cyrian got killed by being sent flying away and Anaris didn’t turn out that scary. It felt stupide that Cyrian was not dead and then really dead…

I chose to keep the Archive but that choice felt like the less impactful of all the companion choices.

- Davrin

I didn’t expect Davrin to be so brash ! I enjoyed his banter a lot and the growth of his relationship with Assan. That griffin is an absolute cutie !

His quests were cute for the Arlathan ones and impactful for the one with the Gloom Howler. I enjoyed Isseya’s story and saving the griffins.

I still felt Davrin to be a little too « jock » coded, but his banter with Emmrich and Manfred was perfect ! I enjoyed seeing the wardens again (Antoine and Evka <3) and am glad he was a true Warden this one.

I chose to release the griffin in Arlathan because my Rook was an elven veil jumper.

- Taash

In real life, Taash is the kind of person I would have trouble connecting with. They’re obtuse and a bit rude. I felt like I was intruding during the parts with her mother (it is probably the goal of those moments but it made me uneasy). I wanted to be supportive so I was but I didn’t feel like my Rook and them ended up great friends. The identity crisis wasn’t handled that well I think, but it wasn’t as bad as people make it out to be and maybe I’ll get hate for that but they come out at first more Trans than non binary given their problem is being misgendered as a girl mostly or expected to do girly things? They even say it feels right to be called a man I think I remember? (but I respect whatever pronouns she chose in the end)

I really enjoyed the dragon hunt quests however and their last quest was cool too. Their mother’s death was a sacrifice that made sense and it pained me.

Their romance with Harding was cute (mostly because of Harding’s reactions and that height difference XD)

I chose to push them towards embracing the Rivein life, even if I think they could have made peace with both ?

- Emmrich

Of course my favourite. And not only because he is the handsome older man who swept my Rook off her feet.

To give us a scholar necromancer that was the antithesis of the cliché : a man poised but a tad insecure, nerdy, gentle, kind, a bit posh, extremly elegant and whose favourite colour is lilac ! Genius !

The Necropolis had such a distinct ambiance that every quest there felt special, with amazing details and wonders of finding a wisp, a spirit or hearing a dead’s last words.

To me his personnal quests are the ones with the best handled rythm. The first one in the peace and quiet of the beautiful garden sets the tone : serious but poetic, sad but hopeful, and dares to tackle very real and grave subjects. Death and regret but also life and love are perfectly handled in his story and brought me lots and lots of feels.

There is a great antagonist whose motives are simple but dangerous ; a friend turned rival, similar but so different from dear Emmrich. Johanna is simply iconic (her hand gosh and the fact that you keep her skull in the end, brillant). The fights are well balanced, the cutscenes and dialogues perfect for immersion. And don’t get me started on Manfred… I love this little guy to bits.

I chose to revive Manfred and for Emmrich and Rook to live the rest of his mortality together. In Undying Love

[lovelypink2005]

OKAY SO TODAY'S UPDATE WAS SOMETHING—–

So lemme break this whole page down because I could never sleep without saying anything about it so spoiler alert for The Glass Scientists Chapter 15 Page 17‼️‼️‼️

So first of all, we need to apreciate how far these two, especially Lanyon, has become. From Robert's point of view, it was as if Jekyll is once again shutting himself down from "the shame. The fear", quoted by Lanyon, because it was just YESTERDAY that the whole exhibition day happened, the day it felt like everything changed, the day he was able to finally TALK to Jekyll and got him BACK. " But not this time. This time, i'm staying right here-" is such a STRONG WORDS. He's trying his best to get Henry back, to made up for all of those years, making up for the day he left him, assuring Henry that he won't leave him again, not this time, not after 15 years of yearning, thinking that it has been one sided, not when he just got him back.

AND THEN WE FINALLY GOT THE "I LOVE YOU" BOMB!!!!

THis one is surely a HUDGE character development, knowing that throughout these years, and throughout the whole comic, he had always been the type of huy to show his affections through action instead of words, hoe it "pains" him to say nice things to people, how it's hard for him to be open about his feelings, especially in PUBLIC. This is Lanyon at his moment of desperation, finally showing his love towards Henry with his words to win him once again, hoping that it'll get through him, hoping Jekyll would let him in once again, Knowing that's what Henry wanted. Honestly. And the fact that he seems like he would BREAK at any second if Jekyll did not respond at all, the face of a man holding back his tears perhaps....

And second of all, I'm sure we all collectively agreed that this was NOT Jekyll. The Jekyll we knew would lock himself out, he can't just see a meltdown as "haha it was silly so nevermind that! Just come in!" In the middle of a crisis he's him, when his body condition is absolutely UNSTABLE with the little things that could trigger any types of transformations. This is most definitely Hyde, especially Hekyll (Green-Eyed Jekyll/Hyde in Jekyll's body), and judging by how quickly Lanyon buys it, I'm pretty sure it was probably still Jekyll's voice, which makes me believe in "Hekyll is behind that door" possibility way more. What concerns Me the most is, what would Hyde want from this? What's his goal out of it?

Well, to me there could be 2 possibilities on what is going to be Hyde's intention.

From Chapter 14 Page 12 and 13, we got these panels where Hyde told Jekyll that Lanyon wanted him instead, wanted the "Doe-eyed sweetheart". In moments of desperation, he could be planning to win Lanyon, to " steal" him from Jekyll. This could ruin absolutely everything that Jekyll and Lanyon had done the other day. As much as I don't want this to happen, I am excited to see where this is going.

On the other hand, a few pages back, we know that Hyde was having his panic attack, wanting to go out, to get out, desperately wanting to run and hide. Jekyll had requested Frankenstein that whatever she heard do NOT open the door, knowing Hyde could take them elsewhere and got into yet another trouble, or getting themselves caught by the police or the angry mobs surrounding their society at the moment. If this was Hyde's intention, he could probably ran out immediately the moment Lanyon opens the door.

On the very last panel of today's update, we can see that Frankenstein was trying to somehow warn Lanyon. Her body language seemingly stiff, probably ready to do something to prevent Lanyon from opening the door, remembering what Jekyll told him, probably knowing that it doesn't sound like Jekyll at all. Or she could just be worried that Lanyon is going to found Jekyll in a middle of a transformation, which would be a disaster.

Hopefully Frankenstein could at least do something, although knowing Lanyon, he would probably insist into going in knowing that "Jekyll" allowed him to go in, saying that he's the one who's close to dear Henry, that they both had worked things out that if Jekyll allowed him to go, he won't let anyone stop him from doing so.

Overall I am just SO EXCITED AND NERVOUS FOR NEXT WEAKKDKDBXKDBXKDJ-💥💥💥

[autumnrose11]

I brushed through A Little Princess today.

It was one of my favourite books when I was younger, and I still quite adore it! I took it down from my bookshelf today and skimmed over it. It was lovely to meet them all again because I’d forgotten the little things, like Melchisedec the rat, Ermengarde, and Lottie. It has been a while since I last read it, and I noticed so many things I didn’t before!

One of the more heartbreaking moments is Sara finding out her papa is dead on her BIRTHDAY. Imagine the pain of an eleven-year-old having to deal with her world turned upside down and losing the only family she has left on her birthday :(

Much as I hate to say it, some parts of the book are a tad racist, although I suppose it’s reflective of the time period in which the book was written (1905).

  “It’s a’ Nindian gentleman that’s comin’ to live next door, miss,” she said. [...] He worships idols, miss. He’s an ’eathen an’ bows down to wood an’ stone. I seen a’ idol bein’ carried in for him to worship. Somebody had oughter send him a trac’. You can get a trac’ for a penny.”

Sara is really good with languages (she is shown to be multilingual), which is a trait I adore because I love learning languages too! She speaks both French and Hindi, and it shows up in two very different situations in the book. One to Monsieur Dufarge, the French teacher, and the other to Ram Dass, the Indian servant. The descriptions of both men’s reactions to hear a child speaking their respective languages are strikingly similar.

“Monsieur Dufarge began to smile, and his smile was one of great pleasure. To hear this pretty childish voice speaking his own language so simply and charmingly made him feel almost as if he were in his native land - which in dark, foggy days in London sometimes seemed worlds away.”

“She thought she had never seen more surprise and delight than the dark face expressed when she spoke in the familiar tongue. The truth was that the poor fellow felt as if his gods had intervened, and the kind little voice came from heaven itself.”

As someone who speaks passable Hindi and is currently studying French, this is so sweet and touching! To be in a foreign land and feeling like an outsider, hearing someone speak the same language as you must be so inexpressibly comforting, like you have a comrade and a friend.

Miss Minchin is literally abusive and has a heart of stone. She puts Sara through hell. She also shows severe insecurity and covers it up with projecting her feelings of inadequacy (on a 7 year old!) The scene in Chapter 2 where she concludes that Sara does not know French is especially telling.

“One of Miss Minchin’s chief secret annoyances was that she did not speak French herself, and was desirous of concealing the irritating fact. She, therefore, had no intention of discussing the matter and laying herself open to questioning by a new little pupil.”

I have met quite a few adults like this, who are in the wrong and know it, and unwilling to admit it. They are nice and willing to praise kids and make them their golden child as long as things are going well. The second they are contradicted or called out in the slightest, they turn NASTY. So Miss Minchin, horrid as she is, is written very realistically. Excellent characterisation, and I always like reading the bit where she gets her comeuppance at the end.

My absolutely favourite passage in the book is:

“If I am a princess in rags and tatters, I can be a princess inside. It would be easy to be a princess if I were dressed in cloth of gold, but it is a great deal more of a triumph to be one all the time when no one knows it. There was Marie Antoinette when she was in prison and her throne was gone and she had only a black gown on, and her hair was white, and they insulted her and called her Widow Capet. She was a great deal more like a queen then than when she was so gay and everything was so grand. I like her best then. The howling mobs of people did not frighten her. She was stronger than they were, even when they cut her head off.”

This is off topic, but I read this book right around the time we were learning about the French Revolution in school. So I’d come across Marie Antoinette, but she was portrayed in a very negative light in my history textbook, with the infamous quote: “If they don’t have bread, let them eat cake.” So my initial notion of her jarred completely with what I read here. And that was how I ended up reading and researching more about Marie Antoinette, and got to know that she was an Austrian princess married off very young to a French prince, and mocked for her foreignness. She had several miscarriages and fertility struggles, and she loved kids and adopted a few! True, she did spend rather extravagantly, but she was not quite the villain I took her for. That’s when I realised that history textbooks, more often than not, show only one side of the story.

[itsmyregularcat]

Visited New York City for the first time last week, so I took the opportunity to visit the Museum Of Broadway because I only wanted to see the Cats display items and literally nothing else.

If anyone is interested, this is what they had for Cats. Two super cool costume pieces from the long running and record breaking production from the Winter Garden, plus a few other items.

First off, an elaborate Siamese costume in all its bright blue eyed glory:

A few framed display items, including an early playbill and six character designs.

Secondly, an absolutely stunning complete Gumbie Tap costume worn by Anna McNeely, originator of Jennyanydots on Broadway.

While both of those costumes were amazing, and I could have stared at them for hours, it was really disappointing to see the museum have so little Cats content given the shows significance to theaters in not only NYC, but in North America as a whole.

The Siamese was relegated to a corner of a non-related room, and the Tap costume was amongst a line-up of other (I believe, Phantom Of The Opera) costumes. I do understand that there is a section encompassing Andrew Lloyd Webber's impact on Broadway, which had a sizable PoTO representation and some pieces from Evita, Starlight Express, and Sunset Boulevard with some other stuff from that time period mixed in, but it was a bit of a letdown.

It is very possible that the MoB could not source more pieces, which if in that case, it is all fair. However, it is tiring to always see Cats made out to be some sort of unimportant or regrettable musical, and even the way the two costumes were shown reflected that. They could have easily had their day in the sun together with an expanded corner of all Cats stuff together, but maybe I am being pompous. Though, being a patron in the museum and hearing all the utter disgust and derision in the looks and voices of others seeing the Cats stuff reinforced the hatred theatre wankers have over the singing and dancing kitties. Plus, maybe just maybe, I verbally pushed back against someone shitting on Cats while I was admiring the Siamese, and let me tell you, he did not expect that at all.

If anyone has any questions about the museum, let me know. I took pictures of every room and every display item (not to the same caliber of the Cats stuff, but still). It was a very nice place with lots of pieces and history, and if I actually cared about any other musical, it would have been like visiting the Heavisde Layer itself. The Siamese and Gumbie Tap costumes were damn cool though.

[thequietmanno1]

TheLreads, Vigilantes ch 100, Replies Part 1

1) “And today was…. Ah, right, Vigilantes. And look at that number! 100 chapters! my oh my, felt much, MUCH, longer than that, that’s for sure. “- Not so long to the finish line now…

2) “oh yeah, because they definitely don’t stand out alright

fine, I suppose that they can pass unnoticed considering that we are focusing on the fact that people are too comfortable due to hero society blah blah blah that doesn’t change the fact they aren’t subtle when causing chaos. How are you expecting people to feel divided and isolated if they are seeing the person causing the chaos and how it doesn’t even look human?”- I guess in the low lighting they assume they couldn’t make out too much of their “facial features” or assumed they wore face-obscuring equipment like balaclavas. Still, it might have been more effective to give the anonymous troops access to Nomura’s own face-shifting ability, especially since they also share the bomber parasite cells, just to sell the sense of division more.

3) “McBee your tulpa is tempting fate right at the start of the chapter, I’m not even going to blame you when All Might does show up to ruin the fun.”- Technically, if it’s part of his own mind, doesn’t that mean that it’s still Nomura tempting fate indirectly?

4) “Hey I want to see the giraffe person on the back! C'mon Furuhashi, you gave us thomas the tank engine but you’re not even going to show a simple furry?”- “checks out Mirko”. I think Horokoshi’s pulling double-duty on that front, and doing a fine job of it too.

5) “OH MY GOD EDGE KITE

C'MON I WANTED TO SEE MORE OF THAT, THAT’S SO ABSURD I LOVED IT”- An actual ninja tool for infiltration, though I guess it took some aid from Jeanest to pull off with his fibre master powers giving it a boost and a grounding line. 6) “My god man, the heroes are really falling into hard times if they weren’t even given a simple table to put their map on, and have to dramatically crouch down to make their plans

This absolutely hurts my knees just from watching”- Gonna need to do some more squats to keep the knees in line, stop them complaining.

7) “Those damn millennials, don’t know how to act without power and internet. Back in my day if we had to call the emergency we just sent a smoke signal after hunting some mammoths.”- True, but with light pollution in a darkened night-time area, would anybody be able to see the smoke from a better-lit section of the city? Ironically, smoke is easier to make out when backlit by light. 8) “Yeah I mean, this situation is far from dire when we have a human missile that can zapt out of here and call for help in less than two minutes.”- True, but a lot can go down in less than two minutes. It’s all a matter of who moves first, and how fast the other side respond. 9) “Edge, we saw you being used a fucking kite, drop the chuunibyou attitude, there’s absolutely no way we ever will take it serious”- I dunno, Tokoyami would be all over that stuff like a pigeon at feeding time…oh, wait. 10) “Oh hey Koichi, nice to see you here. Now piss off, the grown ups are working and they still haven’t forgotten you made them circle around town the whole day long”- He tried, but Aizawa’s here to make him apologise to the nice heroes he made fools of in public, running around and evading them all day and all night. He’s trying to teach Koichi that with great skills, comes great accountability. 11) “oh my god- alright, points for koichi for actually doing what I told him to do, even if it failed miserably.”-  Koichi tried to peace out, but Aizawa came here for war. 12) “…

Yeah Aizawa, sure… Absolutely sure of that… I won’t give five minutes before you have him fighting villains.”- To be fair, with the bombers attacking everybody at once, Koichi would have been mobbed with Anonymous drones regardless of where he went. 13) “Okay now that one I’d love to see Aizawa. I am not sure you have authority to do that as a hero, haven’t you seen what happened to Captain Celebrity when he used a bit too much force?”- And later in life, Aizawa would wind up mentoring a kid who’s so helpful, he breaks his own legs to spare Aizawa the effort! 14) “Yeah, thought so. You fucking tsundere.the ADHD is strong, they didn’t got two blocks away before getting sidetracked, I feel seen.”- Being a hero is merely an example of picking up every single sidequest in a videogame before you progress the main plot. Explains how All Might’s so damm OP actually, he power-grinded even the most obscure quests to reap all those hero points and put them into strength.

15) “Oh it’s McBee talking again? I hope so, because it’s funny to see him realizing that anon hate in the inbox is one of the least efficient ways of causing discord.”- Nomura realised he needed his hate statements to carry more “oomph” and figured the best way was to prepare an explosive delivery system, guaranteed to blow you away! @thelreads

[thetravellingvagrant]

Day 10: In Which I Walk Until I Am On Fire

I awoke without having set an alarm - which I figured may be a mean thing to do to my dorm-mates whilst I was in no substantial morning rush - for what, I think, must have been the first time this trip. The hostel in which I found myself was still very comfortable and quiet and everyone in my room seemed, bizarrely, to match that vibe, too. Just to be sure I wasn't going to be annoyed in the night, though, I had still jammed my gummy earplugs far deeper into my ears than was medically recommended and so spent the first five minutes of my day digging around, attempting to retrieve them from my inner canals whilst silently mourning the word “ow” as I strangled the huge clumps of hair that had become tangled in them during the night.

Having been marginally successful in that task, leaving only a few tightly clumped flecks of silicone still clinging to my ends, I set about getting up and planning my day. Not that I really needed to put too much thought into what to do - everybody to whom I have ever mentioned that I was coming to Granada from my parents, to TripAdvisor has said some combination of the following phrase: “ooh, that will be nice, obviously you have to see the Alhambra” and while usually that level of unanimity would immediately make me avoid whatever has been suggested to a witheringly comprehensive degree, walking, most likely, along a ring road without a pavement in exactly the opposite direction of the attraction while quietly whispering “yeah…I'm a travel rebel” under my breath, the Alhambra did actually sound kind of dope, so I decided to go there anyway.

The Alhambra, which for the uninitiated is a big hilltop fortress complex, made my some Islamic fella in the 1200s and apparently of massive Islamic historical significance, is a cunt to buy tickets for. The website for it (or at least the one that seemed the most trustworthy - there were loads) was pretty broken and unintuitive, spitting my out of the purchasing process about five times and then, when I had finally managed to get tickets in the basket, not allowing me to select an admittance time for the Nasrid palace until I backed out of the process entirely and selected another day for my visit. Unsure if that was because the site was fucked or all the available slots were filled and it just hadn't deigned to tell me or allow me to progress without one, I reassessed my options and instead bought a cheaper, non-palace ticket, saving ten euros in the process. Get fucked Nasrid palace. And Ryanair.

I set out on my walk to the fortress, taking the opportunity to have an actual look at Granada, properly (as opposed to just walking to a supermarket in the dark) and…yeah, it.seems quite nice. I don't think I've quite worked out the vibe of the place fully, but it does seem very pleasant without being too touristy. Except under certain circumstances of course. This is foreshadowing.

After a brief walk through Granada's busy, though not soul-crushingly so, streets, I began my ascent to the Alhambra, winding past a, frankly, insane amount of tatty souvenir shops in the process. I lost count after the first ten or so, but it must have been half a mile of road wherein every building was a souvenir shop of ever-decreasing quality. I obviously went in them all. 

Soon though, the touristy part of the walk started to dissipate behind me and I was permitted to enjoy a stretch of very steep, but also very picturesque walking

Hey, look at that, there.

I was just starting to relax into the relative peace of my surroundings when I turned the final corner to the fortress and fuck me was it ever busy. Absolutely mobbed, it was. Like, a mob so thick you couldn't even pass through the impenetrable wall of flesh without resorting to coughing quietly behind people, which doesn't sound like a lot, but having to do six hundred and fifty small coughs in a row eventually adds up. God, I'm brave.

Eventually, more just wheezing an empty, ragged breath at people more than coughing by the end, I navigated my way through the throng and found myself at the first checkpoint of three. At this one a surly woman checked to make sure I had a ticket and told me to prepare my passport, which I had been told was ABSOLUTELY VITAL to my.visit and I wouldn't be let inside without one and to make absolutely double triple extra sure was with me when I came on pain of death. 

The next checkpoint has another surly woman in it, who then scanned my ticket, thereby making the first surly woman s job entirely irrelevant. She also told me to ready my passport, which I did.

The third surly woman in my checkpoint obstacle course was the passport checker. At least I think she was - I approached her, passport in hand and she just sighed and waved me through. I'm not really sure what happened, but…cool? I guess? Anyway, I was in. Fuck em.

Of the areas which my ticket allowed access to, I opted to have a look around the Generalife gardens first (which apparently is pronounced “genera-lee-feh” and not, as I had been saying it “general life” which is an excellent name for either a herbal supplement or a corner shop)

The gardens were quite cool, as loathe as I am to use that word to describe some plants. They were very pretty and the view was phenomenal to boot

See?

They too, however, as with the aquarium in Seville, were absolutely rammed up the arsehole with slack jawed tourists. The air was less heavy with them than the aquarium but fuck me backwards in a bin, there were still too many people there. All queuing to take selfies in the exact same spot because, honestly, what better augments this beautifully constructed wonder of pre-modern architecture than your fat girlfriend obscuring half the view of it. Absolutely infuriating and grinding slow to make it anywhere, even walking at a leisurely pace which I reserve only for looking around gardens and when I'm very tired (and today I was both).

I continued through the gardens, which, to be honest, are a lot more impressive in pictures rather than prose, so here are a few

Imagine these with fewer fucking people in them, and they'd be good

And eventually, after a couple of hours, found myself back at the beginning of the route. Half of the complex currently available to me explored, I set about doing the other half: the Alcazar (or Islamic castle, I think? Not pronounced as I had been up until then as “Alakazam”)

The short trek to the Alakazam was choc full of both people who didn't know how not to stop every four seconds in the middle of a crowded public thoroughfare, plodding through tiny street after tiny street of additional, now more expensive souvenir shops all of love locally produced artisanal shite. My feet hurt, I was tired and I felt a little queasy from my delicious, though with the best will in the world, quite badly cooked meal the previous night. I started to wonder if it was actually worth having a go at the fortressy bit of the fortress at all, however being nothing if not both incredibly brave and unwilling to spend money on something I won't use, I pushed on, manfully. 

And I was very glad I did. The fortification ran around the northwestern corner of the compound and, despite the climb, offered some absolutely honking views of the city from its various peaks

It was so good, in fact, that it almost - almost - made having to queue to take a photograph of anything other than the backs of other tourists heads worth it. I wouldnt necessarily call it breathtaking, although there had been quite a lot of stairs leading up to it. They can't all be zingers. But that one was. 

With some reluctance, though also, not an insignificant amount of fatigue setting in, I descended, eventually, from my lofty perch above the city and rejoined my place among the shit munching ground-levellers like the scum I was. By this point it was nearly 4pm and I hadn't eaten, so I stopped to wolf down a lunch of sandwiches I was now incredibly sick of and a small doughnut of which I could never tire and considered, very strongly, heading home. It has been a lot of walking and I felt fucked. I knew, though, that my plans for the next day would take me in entirely the opposite direction from the old town and so, begrudgingly, opted to piece together a little walking tour gradually and gently leading me home as I went.

I wouldn't describe the subsequent walk as ‘blogworthy’, to be honest, but it was, for the most part, fairly pleasant, leading me as it did, to various fountains

Like this'n here!

Churches

And this'n too!

And even a Carrefour express, the most impressive of the bunch, to purchase some auxillary ingredients to recreate the salmony pasta from the previous night, only becoming cloying and infuriating towards the tail end of the sojourn when everyone who has ever existed for in my way, one at a time until they had all had a go.

I returned home to the hostel, my pedometer reading a number so high that the background colour of the app had changed to demonstrate how on fire I was

Ahhhh!

to sit in bed, breathing quietly yet deeply in an effort to let all my rage go, before I done the - apparently - requisite late afternoon nap and bibble combo, until around 9pm, at which point I decided to make food. Not because that's when I got hungry; I'd been hungry for ages, but because that's when I assumed the kitchen would be quietest before it closed for the night at 10:30. The salmon, if your are interested (and you are) was fucking excellent this time. I added more lemon, less parsley and burned the garlic substantially less. It was exquisite and you should all be fizzing with jealousy.

Full of really great pasta and empty of all energy, I then returned to my bunk to bibble - not loudly, but definitely more loudly than anyone else in the room, for the remained of the night, before passing out on my laptop, upside down, fully clothed. 

[emptymanuscript]

I think one of the most useful class lessons I ever had as a kid was a math lecture that I absolutely loathed because I could NOT get it.

It boiled down to learning about partial definitions and sets.

All squares fit the definition of rectangles but not all rectangles fit the definition of squares. All rectangles fit the definition of parallelograms but not all parallelograms fit the definition of rectangles. Same for squares and parallelograms. And so on.

This is one step above that.

Not all Zionists are Jews but some are. Not all Jews are Zionists but some are. There’s a large overlap but they’re not equal.

It’s a nice little venn diagram.

The problem is that most people, most of the time, like simple answers. They’re like me when I was a kid, mulelishly staring at the geometric figures on that chalkboard, with my arms crossed, just repeating, “No,” until the teacher just moved on without me.

How can something both be equal and not equal?

That’s dumb.

But, of course, reality doesn’t care about what you don’t like. It is what it is.

Sure, you may not hate us Jews, after all, just the ones who happen to also be zionists. Maybe if my brother (zionist Jew) and I (anti-zionist Jew) walked past you in broad daylight on a peaceful day when everything in your world is going great, you would stop to check and only be angry at my brother and have a heated but civil discussion with him and maybe even try to get my help with your arguments since I know him better than you. Thus proving it’s about zionism and not Judaism.

But you, on that peaceful picturesquely perfect day, are the square. Not all anti-zionists are going to be in that situation. Most of them are back at parallelograms.

It is not a peaceful picturesquely perfect day, they are not busy trying to make sure their fear and pain goes in exactly the right place for exactly the right reasons. They’re me at the chalkboard, just shouting, “no.”

They may also not be anti-semitic on a peaceful picturesquely perfect day but that’s not where they are. They’re not thinking or feeling or being their best selves. Fear and pain tend to make people their worst selves. We just lash out with no No NO!!! We not only paint others in broad strokes, we paint them in the worst light.

Jews = zionists = bad people = THE problem

Because deep down, unless you stop, take a breath, and be careful, that’s what everyone has been taught. And how nearly all the news and think-pieces are still phrased. It’s what comes to mind first. If I tell you to picture a four sided geometric figure, you’ll probably picture a square. This has nothing to do with intrinsic reality or you being bad. It’s simply where the most illustrations in your past have gone. So it comes to mind first.

The way to overcome that is to pause, take a breath, reconsider. Is square the only answer? The most likely? The right one, even if it is all those things.

That takes energy. Work. Exactly what you have the least of when you’re afraid and in pain and just want to lash out so it will all stop.

They can mean anyone they want.

That’s not the problem.

The problem is that one push comes to shove on a dark and stormy night when you feel the pulse of the mob because you are just as angry, just as hurt, as the rest of them, you aren’t going to be able to stop and ask the person next to you, “Hey, are WE the baddies?” It’s too late for that. You’re in it already and already had your worst self unleashed. It’s too late at that point.

The time to ask that question and deal with it is when you do mean zionists and think about what the possible solutions are. There’s where to pause and ask, hey, when I am my worst self, because that happens, how am I going to act on this. Maybe I am sending / endorsing the message that will do bad things when my worst self or people who are worse than me when they get it.

You have to ask, “Am I contributing to the problem,” when you misspeak. When you have time and energy. That you meant zionist but said Jew may be just a cigar but it could even more easily mean something else entirely. Something you need to work through before your worst self acts on it.

You might consciously mean zionist AND your unconscious might really mean Jew. The dark of night of your soul isn’t the time you want to find that out. Because your subconscious is exactly who is going to be flying the plane in the moment unless you already checked it. Even then, it’s probably going to be the pilot unless you have already changed course to avoid the situation.

"You don't understand, they mean Zionists, not Jews!"

They're literally saying Jews though.

[captainsophiestark]

Whom

Elijah Mikaelson x Reader

Masterlist - Join My Taglist!

Fandom: The Vampire Diaries/The Originals

Summary: Y/N and Elijah have been dating for almost a year, yet Y/N still doesn't know their boyfriend is a vampire. Elijah's determined to keep them out of it, but when an ambush comes at the end of a date, he might not be able to hide the truth any longer.

Word Count: 2,678

Category: Angst, Fluff

Putting work into an AI program without permission is illegal. You do not have my permission. Do not do it.

"Alright, where to next?"

I smiled up to at boyfriend, Elijah Mikaelson, as we walked hand-in-hand through the streets of the French Quarter. After a few weeks of barely seeing him because he'd been so busy, we'd finally blocked out the whole day to spend together, doing whatever we felt like. We'd started with a nice picnic lunch before getting ice cream at my favorite spot in the city, and now we were looking for our next adventure.

"I'd be happy to follow you wherever you want to go," he said, leaning over to press a soft kiss to my temple. I smiled.

"I missed you while you were so busy."

"And I missed you. Unfortunately, my family requires my attention more often than I'd like."

I chewed at my lip as we walked a few more steps, then spoke up.

"I wish you'd let me help with some of it," I said. "I know all your siblings pretty well now, and I love spending time with them. I'd be happy to help you and them with whatever the problem is."

Elijah smiled wistfully and looked off into the distance, not meeting my eyes. Whenever I brought up being more involved in certain parts of his life, Elijah always had this same reaction.

"I love how much you want to help, Y/N," he said. "But with some things, there's just nothing you can do."

"E, you always give me that answer," I said, tugging at his arm a little bit to get him to look at me. "I'm not letting you off the hook that easily. I love you, and I want to be a part of your life in every way. I want to help you carry whatever burdens are always weighing on your shoulders."

Elijah sighed heavily and came to a stop, gently pulling me to a stop with him. I leaned back against the brick wall of a storefront, next to the entrance to an alleyway, and stared at my boyfriend as he ran a hand through his hair.

"Y/N... I love you. With everything that I am," he started.

"But?"

"...But there are things about my family and I that you don't know. And that I don't think you'd like to know."

"What, Elijah, are you all secretly part of the British mob or something?" Elijah huffed a laugh and looked away, so I stepped forward and pulled him to me by his lapels. "Come on, I'm serious. There's nothing you could tell me that would change the way I feel about you."

Elijah huffed a humorless laugh. "I don't know about that..."

I stared at him for a few more beats, hoping the silence would encourage him to tell me more. When it didn't, I sighed.

"Alright, you have a right to keep me out of whatever it is if you want to," I said. "But just know I'm here if you ever change your mind."

"I know. And I love you for it," he said, pulling me in close and giving me a soft kiss. I smiled as we pulled apart, then took a deep breath.

"Alright. Where are we going next?"

"How about a walk through the park?"

"Sounds perfect to me."

We shared a smile as Elijah took my hand again, and we headed off down the alley towards one of our favorite parks.

"So... after our walk in the park, I thought we could go through the bookstore?" mused Elijah, his voice a little too fake-casual. My face immediately broke into a giant grin.

"Elijah, have I told you lately how much I fucking love you?" He just laughed.

I was smiling up at him when he came to a stop, the smile instantly dropping off his face. I furrowed my eyebrows in confusion, then turned to look at whatever he was staring down so seriously.

I found three men walking towards us slowly from the far end of the alley, their eyes absolutely locked on Elijah. Elijah clenched his jaw then dropped my hand, taking a step to stand in front of me.

"Y/N, I need you to listen to me very carefully and do exactly as I say," he started, his voice deadly calm and his eyes never leaving the men ahead of us. "You're going to turn around and run out of here as fast as you can, get back to your apartment, and stay there. Do not look back, do not open the door for anyone. Do you understand?"

"Under- no, Elijah, I don't understand! What's happening? Who are those guys, and why are you so freaked out by them? I'm not just leaving you here without any help!"

"Y/N, I promise you I can handle this. But I need you to get out of here, now."

"Elijah, no-!"

I stopped short as the guy in the lead rushed forward, appearing in front of Elijah so fast I must've flinched and not seen him move. He swung at Elijah, but Elijah caught his arm mid-swing and absolutely clocked him in the face.

And his face.... His face...

I stared in shock at the scene in front of me as the other two guys rushed to join the fight. I took a few steps back as all three of them faced Elijah, giving me just as good a look at them.

Their faces weren't human. Their eyes were dark, with black veins running under them and through their cheeks, pulsing unnaturally. And their mouths... their teeth had turned into fangs.

All I could do was stare in horror as the fight continued. My heart stopped in my chest as the three attackers moved with unnatural speed, and I opened my mouth to scream for my boyfriend, but apparently I didn't need to. Elijah caught every punch and kick with unnatural speed of his own, and returned with a blow that sent the men reeling.

I took a few more steps back.

As the whirlwind of blows continued, Elijah turned enough that I caught sight of his face for the first time since the fight had begun.

His face looked exactly the same as the three men he was fighting. Dark eyes, black veins, fangs, and all.

I couldn't hold back a gasp as I scrambled a few more steps away from the fight. Even though it shouldn't have been possible, apparently Elijah heard it. He turned to me, his eyes still that horrifying, unrecognizable color, and I knew he saw the terror on my face.

"Y/N..."

Before he could continue, one of the guys attacked him again, and he was forced to turn his attention back to the fight. My mind reeled as I tried to process the scene before me, but I couldn't.

My heart raced as I backed up faster and faster, my panic quickly slipping the leash I'd been trying to keep it on. Once I reached the mouth of the alley, I turned and did what Elijah'd been asking me to do in the first place. I ran for home.

Even with the bright sun in the middle of the day, every person or hint of movement I saw on the run back to my apartment felt like a threat waiting to pounce. Every time my brain tried to start processing what I'd seen, it couldn't. It just shut down all over again, until I could only focus on putting one foot in front of the other.

Finally, I burst through the door of my apartment, slamming and locking it behind me. I backed away from the door, breathing heavily and trying to make sense of everything racing through my mind at a thousand miles an hour. What the hell had I just seen? This couldn't be real, could it?

After a second, I ran to my bedroom and grabbed my baseball bat. I had no idea what it could possibly do against the strength and speed I'd just seen, but it at least felt like it was better than nothing. I hid behind a wall, baseball bat poised and ready to strike. If somebody came into my apartment, I'd try to catch them off guard and make it out the door before they could catch me.

After minutes of waiting that felt more like hours, still nothing came. I dropped the baseball bat from my shoulder, instead holding it loosely in my hand and taking a few cautious steps back towards my living room.

With the immediate danger apparently gone, my mind finally started to process everything I'd seen. Or at least, it tried to process. Every time I thought about the faces of the men from the alley, the face of my boyfriend-

Any progress I'd made through the haze of disbelief in my mind shattered at the sound of a knock at the door. My heart dropped from my chest to my stomach, and I gripped the bat tight in my hands. I lifted it and crept slowly towards the door, not daring to make a sound even to ask who was there.

The knock sounded again as I crept the last few feet to the door. A familiar voice called out at the same time I gathered the nerve to look through the peephole.

"Y/N, please. It's me."

Elijah, his voice more desperate than I'd ever heard and looking more disheveled than I'd ever seen. His suit was torn up, and I could see blood on his face, hands, and clothes.

Through the small hole in the door, I saw him sigh heavily as he leaned his forearm against the door. His forehead followed, resting just above the peephole while he closed his eyes, pain clear on his face.

"Y/N... I know you're there. I can hear you on the other side of the door." I couldn't help a small gasp and a quick step back. "Please, just open the door. I can't come in unless you invite me, and even if you could, I'd stay out if you wanted me to. I just- I just want to see you."

The break in his voice–coming from my perfect, put together, never ruffled boyfriend–convinced me. It was a reflex, more than anything else, as I opened the door, a little bit against my better judgement.

I opened it slowly, still ready to slam it shut if I had to, but Elijah only took a careful, human-speed step back to give me a little extra space. He still looked devastated, but there was a careful spark of hope lingering in his eyes now, too.

"Y/N..."

"Are you hurt?" I asked, unable to stop my concern. Elijah looked down, a small smile on his face, before looking back at me.

"No. No, I'm quite alright."

I glanced pointedly at the blood on his hands, shirt, and face. He winced.

"I don't know if it's better or worse to tell you most of it's not mine."

I sighed, staring at the ceiling as I tried to focus on taking deep breaths. This had to be some kind of fever dream, right?

"I'll take it as a good sign that you're willing to take your eyes off me for more than a few heartbeats."

Slowly, I dropped my gaze back to Elijah, giving a teasing glare like I would when he made a bad joke. A small smile tugged at the corner of his lips, and I sighed.

"I don't want to keep talking about this in the hallway. Do you wanna co-"

"Stop."

"...Excuse me?"

Elijah sighed heavily and rubbed a hand over his face, like he was already regretting his words. Still, he plowed on.

"You should understand what you're really doing before you invite me into your home."

"Elijah, you've been in my apartment before. We've been dating for almost a year-"

"You moved. I haven't been in this apartment since you moved."

I paused, thinking through the timeline. I'd been fully moved in here for almost a month now, surely he'd been in here at some point-

"I haven't," he said, almost like he'd read my mind. I raised my eyebrows as I realized that might very well be a possibility, and Elijah followed that train of thought too. "No, I can't read minds."

"Okay, you're making a very convincing case for the opposite to be true."

He huffed a laugh and shook his head, then refocused on me, the momentary light in his eyes now deadly serious.

"Y/N... I'm a vampire. One of the original ones, actually."

I just stared at him blankly. I blinked a few times, but his face stayed perfectly serious.

"Honey, now is not the time for you to start cracking jokes about the time I admitted I was into Twilight as a kid-"

"I'm not joking, Y/N," he said. "Please, don't run away. I give you my word, on everything I am, have been, or will ever be that I would never hurt you."

I started to cut in to call him ridiculous or say something else, but before I could, my boyfriend's face changed. Those horrible, black veins returned under his now-dark eyes, and when he bared his teeth, I could see clear as day that he really did have fangs.

I gasped and stumbled back a few steps, and Elijah's face immediately went back to normal. I could see the concern and sadness written in every line as I cautiously closed the distance between us again.

"While not all of the myths hold true, some are very, very real," he said, using his eyes to track every step I took towards him. "No vampire can enter your home unless or until you personally invite them in. You haven't invited me into this apartment yet, so if you're... concerned, it can remain a space where no vampire may tread."

I paused, looking my boyfriend up and down. Because that's what he was, despite the fact that he was apparently also some creature from mythology that I previously thought was fake. He was my boyfriend, and I loved him more than anyone or anything else in the world.

"...Elijah Mikaelson, would you like to come in?"

Relief flooded my boyfriend's face, even as I saw him try to hide how much my words were affecting him. He took slow, cautious steps forward and over the threshold of the apartment, clearly worried about scaring me off again. I just grinned at him.

"You look like Bella trying to pretend to be human in Breaking Dawn Part Two."

"I can proudly and confidently say I've never seen that movie and therefore don't understand your insult."

"But you did understand it was an insult."

"Checkmate," said Elijah, a soft smile breaking out on his face all the same. He hesitated, then asked, "So this really doesn't bother you? Just like that, and you've adjusted?"

"Have you ever watched me sleep, stalked me to a small town I was visiting with my friends, or broken my car so I couldn't go visit a friend?"

"No, no, and no."

"Then yeah, we're cool. Don't get me wrong, this is weird as hell. Neither of us are sleeping tonight, and not for any fun reason, but because I've got a thousand questions and I'm going to need a lot of long, detailed explanations for them. But... you're still Elijah. My crazy formal, crazy sweet, wonderful, amazing, kind, and caring boyfriend. Who I love very, very much."

Elijah smiled, then carefully, slowly, leaned in to kiss me. I didn't lean away, and we smiled into the kiss at the same time. I'd meant what I said. I wasn't planning on leaving Elijah, no matter what. I trusted him.

After a soft kiss, Elijah slowly pulled back, a rare smile on his face.

"It's whom."

"Excuse me?"

"Whom I love, not who."

"Uck!" I yelled, throwing my hands up and storming for the kitchen. "I give you a sweet, tender, wonderful confession of love and support, and all you can do is critique my grammar!"

I heard Elijah chuckle behind me, and although I didn't let him see it, I smiled. We really had a lot to talk about, and I had a lot to learn, but I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that no matter what, we were going to be just fine.

[naffeclipse]

I feel like I might have had the wrong reaction to “The Lost Episode” because the whole time, I was just like:

(But also my heart ripped out at the realization that y/n won’t ever see the sun again ;; at least they still have their Sun)

I owe you so many comments on your fics, and I’m so sorry for taking this long to get to them 😭 Maybe I should make my New Year’s resolution leaving comments on all the fics I haven’t gotten to. I promise I will get to loving on each of them eventually! 💜 It’ll give me a good excuse to binge read new fic and reread some other fics hehe

Also, I have a bit of a research question for SJ for reasons 👀 I might have missed it while reading the series, but is there a time estimate for how long it took Moon and Sun to join the police academy after they left the daycare and Eclipse began running around with gangs? And when would you say Eclipse rose to power and became a mob boss? Were Sun and Moon detectives by that point or still a lower rank?

Typing that out just made me curious about how Eclipse did become a mob boss and how he got a gang, and I’m restraining myself from sending you a bunch of lore questions. So I’ll just imagine him sending out fliers with his face printed on them and a caption that promises a competitive base salary. Just ignore the super fine small print that says there are no health benefits with this job

Hope you had a nice holiday as well, Naff! You’re a freaking powerhouse with all the writing you’ve been getting done, so I hope you’re taking care of yourself and resting too! Much love <3

PFFFT LUMI!!! Nah, I love all reactions, it fuels me and I'm glad you enjoyed hehe ♥

No, don't apologize!! I get it! I'm behind on reading/commenting on fics, too ;-; but ahhh, I do look forward to when you do comment!! You always leave such nice ones ♥

Oh ho! Research you, say? I am gazing directly at you, Lumi!

Okay, I'm really bad with timelines and dates so I'll try my best to keep this coherent and hopefully non-contradictory with the main storyline!

15 years after the boys left the daycare, Sun and Moon were finally able to join the police academy while Eclipse was digging deeper into gang activity. Now mind you, Sun and Moon were attempting to join the academy much earlier, but due to politics and human-animatronic relations still being tense despite animatronics being legally recognized as individuals with rights, they were discriminatorily barred from joining the program. It took Eclipse calling in favors, owing a favor or two himself, and offering a lot of bribes to those in charge of the program to get Sun and Moon in. At that current time, Eclipse was climbing the ranks. He was gaining a reputation and a name for himself, but he was still a thug working under someone else's command.

Eclipse didn't control his own gang until after Sun and Moon were detectives and after the Afton Family's fall, but by then, the brothers weren't in contact with each other. Learning that big brother was a crime lord was something the detectives discovered in their work. It was disappointing, but not surprising—just a lot to think about piled on top of everything else.

Fun fact! Eclipse killed his gang leader and took the man's gang for himself. It happened after he learned the crime lord was conspiring against him (funny enough, this was due to others looking towards and being loyal to Eclipse due to his ruthlessness and efficiency, which spooked the gang leader so he thought it would be wise to act preemptively, but ah, Eclipse was not amused to see his loyalty repaid with betrayal.) Eclipse had no qualms with reigning in control and very little resisted his takeover. Eclipse did take care of those who stay loyal to him, but he ran a tight ship. Great risk, great reward.

Wow, sorry, I just went on a ramble there, but I hope that helps answer your questions! But you're absolutely right, there are no health benefits in Eclipse's gang. *Shrek voice* They don't even have dental.

Thank you, I hope you had a nice holiday as well! Ahhh, thank you so much! I've been taking breaks, don't worry, babe! ♥ Much love *smooch ya on the head*

[sinner-as-saint]

I Am Your Fall.

Mob!Bucky x Ex-Spy!Reader

Run-through: You’re hiding from your past, in Madripoor. You did nothing wrong, other than mix dangerous business with a lot of pleasure. You couldn’t go home because... he would find you and Madripoor was the only place he didn’t do business, or had any allies or friends. But little did you know that the mob boss had finally found you after obsessively looking for you ever since you left, and left him in pieces. He didn’t want revenge, he just wanted the one thing he had hopelessly fallen in love with; who also happened to be the one who had betrayed him and hurt him more than anyone or any bullet ever did before - you. 

Themes: mob!bucky, smut, angst, fluff, Ex-Spy!Reader, slight daddy kink, guns

“The usual?” 

You nodded at the man in front of you with a faint smile as you took a seat at the bar. You kept the hood of your jacket up as you let out a quiet sigh. Moments later the bartender placed a glass half filled with whiskey and ice in front of you.

You whispered a ‘thank you’ and swirled the drink around in the glass before lifting it up to your lips and taking just the tiniest sip. You often came into this bar after work, just to feel normal again. You worked at a diner right around the corner; it was lowkey and shabby and didn’t attract many customers, neither did it pay well but you weren’t there for the money. 

Your last job, the one you had before ending up in Lowtown Madripoor, paid really well. So much so that you wouldn’t have to worry about money for a long, long time but you still had to blend in and pretend to be as normal as you could; hence the job at the diner. 

You thought of home as you took your second sip. You grew up in a nice family before joining the organization you worked for, as a spy. You let out a quiet little chuckle as you thought of how ever since you were a kid you wanted to grow up and catch bad guys. Which is exactly what you did as a spy. And you were great at your job, your organization couldn’t be prouder of your work. 

You took another sip. Everything was going great for you, until the day you were assigned to infiltrate the life of and take down the infamous mob boss, James Buchanan Barnes. The day you heard that you were being sent to him, you were excited because James was notorious for a lot of bad things. You couldn’t wait to step inside his evil lair and take him down. What you didn’t know was that you would end up finding love right where it wasn’t supposed to be. 

You felt a strange knot in your gut as you thought of him. Bucky… 

Oh you had loved him despite his mean, dark demeanor. He was a cold-hearted man to the rest of the world, but only you got to see the warmer side of him. And you fell in love, harder, faster and deeper than you ever thought you could. It got to a point where you had to choose between either betraying your organization or betraying the man who shouldn’t have fallen in love with. That’s when you ran away, far from home. Far from your work which you loved so much, and far from him. 

You couldn’t bring yourself to betray him, nor did you have the courage to tell your people that you failed in an important mission all because you fell in love with the enemy. You knew what happened to people who betrayed Bucky, you had seen it. And you also knew what happened to spies and agents who betrayed the organization you worked for. Both of those situations weren’t ones you wished to find yourself in, so in order to save yourself, you ran. 

And now here you were. 

As you took another sip of your drink, you felt the hair at the back of your neck stand up out of nowhere as a shiver ran down your spine. You were being watched. During your training you were taught to absolutely trust your gut, and if you ever got the feeling that you were being watched it meant that there was a high chance that you actually were. 

Shit. 

You set your glass down and placed the money down beside it before slowly sliding off the stool and casually walking out of the bar. You made sure your hood was still up, and you tucked your hands in your pockets. Your fingertips gently felt the hand gun you always kept with you, just in case, secured at your waist under your jacket. 

You looked around, and so far no one was following you. The streets were busy given that it was a Friday night and you were sure that you could make it home safe because no one would attack you or anything in a crowd like this. 

You lived in a modest, 2-bedroom apartment. And you always took the fire escape at the back to get into your apartment because you didn’t trust the rusty elevator at the front, nor did you ever want to run into a neighbor or anyone by taking the stairs inside the building. The fire escape was discreet and lowkey. 

You entered your living room shortly and sensed that something was off. The air was colder somehow, and you never left any windows open. Ever. You shut the door behind you, not locking it. You gently took out your gun and held it out in front of you, at the ready. You moved stealthily, quietly. You knew which spots on the wooden flooring made the most noise so you avoided those. 

Someone was in here, you could tell. The air… it smelt different the further you walked into your apartment. You didn’t switch on any lights, you checked the kitchen first. Clear. The living room. Clear. The spare room. Clear. And your heart raced as you went into your bedroom. The door which normally always remained closed, was wide open. 

You couldn’t even run. Whatever it was, whoever it was you were gonna have to face it. You stepped into your room and with whatever little light was coming through the windows, you tried to scan the room. 

“Lower your gun, babygirl. You don’t need it. I’m not gonna hurt you, and I know you don’t wanna hurt me.” 

The sound of his voice had you frozen in the spot where you stood, a few feet away from your bed. The voice came from behind you. You slowly turned around, not lowering your gun and keeping it aimed right at him. It took you a few seconds to process everything. 

You could make out his silhouette as he stood in front of one of your bedroom windows. Tall, built, his metal arm glistening. He was here. You let out a shaky breath. He was here, he found you. 

You didn’t move from the spot that you were standing on. There was a time when whenever you saw him you’d run into his arms, and despite wanting to do just that even now, you knew you couldn’t. That was back then, this was different, wasn’t it? 

He sighed before moving, walking to the other side of the room to light a table lamp. The soft, golden light illuminated the room just enough. Your heart burned as you took in his appearance; dark suit as always, shorter hair, his metal arm just as intimidating and mean as always and his pretty blue eyes - the same ones you loved, belonging to a man who eventually became the reason why you had to leave your old life behind. 

Bucky was still; calm and composed as always. He was the kind of man who had mastered the art of looking completely steady even when he wasn’t. He could have a storm inside of him, or raging flames of anger but on the outside it would never show. He was as devious and subtle as a predator, moving with the grace and elegance of a ferocious but calculated animal. 

“You seriously thought that moving across the globe and changing your hair color would keep me away from you?” He sounded like he was mocking you. “Took me about almost a year, but I found you.” He walked towards you, making you envy the way he could move so effortlessly. You couldn’t read him. His face was… blank. Void of any emotion. 

He spoke again once he stood right in front of you. “Now, you’re gonna tell me why you ran away.” 

You remained quiet. He could tell you were thinking. He could always tell, he knew you too well. You made a makeshift plan in your head. If you were to shoot him in his arm, just to injure him enough to make him lose his focus, you could grab the emergency bag you always kept under your bed and run. But you didn’t want to hurt him. 

Also, how far would you go? Knowing Bucky, if he had made it to Madripoor he probably had his men surrounding this apartment building right now; all armed and ready to fight. He probably even had people from here all the way to Hightown; which meant that even if you ran from here right now you wouldn’t be able to make it out of Madripoor. 

Like you said earlier, he had found you. There was no way to run anymore. 

“I know you’re thinking about running again.” He teased, shoving his hands in his pockets, letting you know that he had his guard down; which meant that he had thought this through. “Maybe you have an emergency bag somewhere, or you plan on shooting at me to distract me and make a run for it.” He chuckled. “Trust me, you wouldn’t make it out of this apartment, babygirl. And even if by some miracle you did, I will burn this island to the ground to find you again.” 

Despite his tone being all calm, and almost monotonous you could hear the bitterness and the evil promise in his words. He was probably angry, he felt betrayed for sure, he was also frustrated given that he mentioned having searched for you for a year, he was also probably hungry for answers. 

You still remembered that night you left. Your people at work had been pestering you to hand over information and sending you all sorts of threats if you didn’t, but you also could no longer lie and manipulate Bucky, because you loved him. So you left in the middle of the night, leaving your old life, your job, the man you loved, your family, everything behind. 

No notes, no messages, nothing. You and him had been together for a little over a year at that point. And you just snuck out of a one year relationship with no explanation. It was wrong you’d admit, and Bucky had every right to be hurt and angry. 

“Answer me. Why did you run? Why did you leave out of nowhere? And didn’t you go back to your people like the good little spy you are? Why Madripoor?” 

So he knew about your past. You could only imagine what he did to the organization you used to work for when he found them. 

“How did you find me?” You knew how much he hated it when people answered a question with another question. You were surprised when he answered instead of being even more pissed off. 

“It took a lot of people, a lot of bullets and a lot of patience to track you down.” He chuckled. “I must say, you’re good at whatever games you play. But I’m gonna need you to stop for a moment, and give me the answers I need.” He took a small step forward, reducing the distance between you and him. “Why?” 

Such a broad question, why. 

“I had to.” You gave him the most vague answer ever. 

He scoffed. “Okay, let me make this easier for you. Let’s start with, what’s your real name?” 

You almost rolled your eyes, but you couldn’t afford to let your guard down at the moment. Not when you couldn’t even figure out what he was here for. 

“You know my name.” 

Of course he did, he had moaned it so many times in bed. 

He gave you his signature smirk, the one who captured the hearts of many including yours. “I’m assuming that since you’re a spy everything which comes out of your pretty mouth is a lie. So what is your name?” 

You corrected him. “I used to be a spy. I don’t do that anymore. And I didn’t lie about my name. I didn’t lie about many things.” You looked him dead in the eyes when you said so. You wondered if he thought that you lied when you said you loved him. That was real. 

He scoffed. “I’d beg to differ.” 

“You plan on killing me?” You asked, thinking that now would be a good time to know whether or not you would be dying tonight. 

“No.” 

“Then why are you here, Bucky? Why did you look for me for a year, why are you halfway across the globe right now if you don’t plan on killing me for betraying you? What do you want?” 

“You.” 

You rolled your eyes, finally lowering your weapon. You still couldn’t read him. 

He spoke up again, “Why didn’t you lead your people to me? Why didn’t you finish your job?” 

“You might have actually done just that yourself. If you were able to find me, so could they. They probably have eyes on right now. By coming here you just-,”

He cut you off. “They don’t have eyes on you. No one does.” He answered confidently. 

“You don’t know that. You-,” 

He cut you off yet again, he smirked, “Oh I do know, babygirl. I know because I… dealt with each and every last one of them. The people you used to work for, the whole organization, it doesn’t exist anymore I made sure of that. You see, I’ve been quite busy this past year. Between dealing with your people, dealing with my own and playing hide and seek with you.” 

You froze again. Dealt with? “And how exactly did you deal with the organization?” 

“I watched it burn.” He answered, proudly. 

Oh. “You plan on doing the same with me? After your little Q and A, you’re gonna just… deal with me?” 

He fake gasped and placed his metal hand over his chest as though surprised. “I would never do that to you. You see, unlike you I didn’t lie when I said I loved you.” 

That caught you by surprise. You said nothing, pretending like that confession didn’t make your heart race. 

“I’m gonna ask one more time, why did you run?” His tone was cold. 

You scoffed. “I didn’t think you’d be understanding regarding the whole situation. If you ever found out who I was, let’s be real, you’d kill me right where I stood. And I could no longer go back to my people because they would force me to lead them to you.” 

He raised his eyebrows, then chuckled. “You protected me? What for?” 

I didn’t lie when I said I loved you either. “I didn’t want to manipulate or lie. I didn’t want to infiltrate lives and be dishonest. I didn’t want to have to live a double life any longer. I needed freedom, I needed a way out. So I came here.” You paused. “I’m not proud of what I did to you.” You added. 

You lowered your eyes once you finished talking. Bucky moved closer to you, he reached out and grabbed your chin with his metal hand, tilting your head back gently until you looked into his stormy, ocean blue eyes. You hated how you still couldn’t read him. Was he angry or no? 

“Are you lying right now?” He whispered, and smirked knowing it would piss you off. You pushed his hand away. He chuckled, leaning into your ear, his lips brushing against your skin as he spoke and it sent shivers down your spine, “Let’s play a game.” He pulled away and took a few steps back. “You love games, don’t you babygirl?” 

Your heart raced. Oh this can’t be good… 

He took some more steps back and then pulled out his gun; the shiny golden one he loved the most out of the arsenal he owned. He aimed it at you, smirking. “I’m gonna ask you some questions and as long as you answer truthfully, I won’t shoot.” 

You remained very still. You hated to admit it, but there was something so immorally powerful about him when he handled his guns. You remember back when you two were together, you could spend hours watching him clean his guns; his favorite toys he called them. Bucky always told you that he believed that weapons shouldn’t be intimidating, but the person handling them should. 

In his case, it was true. Just looking at him made your body throb for a moment. You tried not to let it show but judging by the smug look on his face you could tell that he knew exactly how you felt. 

You knew he would never shoot you.

Bucky Barnes was, afterall, a cunning man who knew how to toy with one’s head. He could have easily taken your gun away from you, could have tied you down on a chair and interrogated you until you gave in. But no, by doing this he was letting you think that you still had some control over this. He knew he had given you the chance, you could’ve easily shot him the moment you walked into the room. But you didn’t. You chose not to. And he knew that. 

You almost smirked when you put it all together. He wasn’t here for answers, because he already had them. He just wanted to hear it from you. He wanted you to verbally say it. He was here for this dark, twisted game of his. 

“Fine.” You agreed. 

He cocked his gun, the sound rang in your ears and it reminded you of the times you pretended not to know shit about guns and had him teach you how to aim. He had done so with a lot of patience and a lot of kisses. 

“How much did you tell your people about me?” He asked. 

You could tell he was easing into it. “I stopped feeding them information after the first six months. I told them it would be risky to keep meeting up with them in secrecy, and that I would soon come back with everything I can gather about you. But I never did.” 

He seemed pleased with that answer. “Of course you didn’t. Instead you ran away.” He watched you cautiously, “How many people know you’re here?” 

“No one does, except for you.” 

That was true. You couldn’t risk going back to your family, not when you were certain that the moment you stepped foot outside of Madripoor your people would find you. 

“Why Madripoor?” He asked, tilting his head to the side. “You could’ve easily hid in the country itself given your… skills.” He knew just where to poke you to make it hurt. “Then why here?” 

“Anonymity. No one knows or cares about who you are or where you come from here. Also because I knew that neither the organization nor you had any connections here whatsoever.” You paused. “Clearly I was wrong.” 

He got really serious, clenching and unclenching his jaw. “Why didn’t you just tell me the truth then? If you couldn’t trust your people at the time, why not turn to me?” 

His question made you chuckle. “I already told you, you would’ve killed me.” 

“And I already told you that I-,” he cut himself off and took a breath. “Why didn’t you trust me?” 

You stared into his eyes, looking. Searching for something you once saw in them. Love, for you. There was a time when he would look at you with nothing but adoration and love. Now he was angry, hurt, frustrated, his power challenged. 

“Because I’ve seen what you do to people who betray you. I knew how much loyalty mattered to you. And I… I couldn’t have possibly looked you in the eyes and tell you that I’ve been lying and manipulating you for a whole year, and that I was sent to take you down.” 

It hurt to say it out loud. 

“You ran because you were scared of me? Of what I would do to you if I found out?” He didn’t bother hiding the hurt. He wasn’t calm and composed anymore, he was visibly troubled. Jaws clenched, fingers tightening around his gun, eyes shooting daggers at you. “Answer me!” He raised his voice out of nowhere and you jumped. 

You lowered your gaze to the floor. In all those years, be it during training or even while on missions, you had never succumbed in any way when a weapon, no matter the size, was aimed at you. Yet now, you could feel your hands starting to shake just a little. 

“Yes. I ran because I was scared of you.” You answered, not having the courage to look up at him. 

He was quiet for four seconds - you know because you counted them - before he lowered his gun and shot at the wooden floor, several feet away from your legs. The sound made you flinch and groan, not in fear but in annoyance. He was breaking you, he was getting everything he wanted out of you. You were giving in, too easily. You hated it. 

“Liar!” He growled and walked right over to you, quickly. His eyes reflected the anger and frustration he felt inside. He placed the barrel of his gun right under your chin. The cold metal made you shiver, mainly because you still remembered that his metal arm felt the same way against your warm skin. “I said no lies.” 

He used the gun to tilt your head back, making you look up into his eyes. He spoke up again, “You ran because you love me, and you couldn’t live with yourself after betraying me. You chose not to lead your people to me, because how could you? How could you do that when you fell in love with the enemy?” Bucky chuckled, removing his gun from your chin and replacing it with his metal hand. 

He leaned in so close that when he spoke next, his lips brushed against yours. “You chose to run away rather than give them what they wanted, because they wanted my fall. You ran from me because you couldn’t admit, nor accept that you cared too much about me.” He chuckled. “You did all of this not because you were scared of me, but because you were scared of them since you had failed in a mission.” He shrugged. “That’s understandable, given you fell in love with the one they sent you to ruin.” 

Your eyes watered. He broke you, finally. He said everything you’ve been avoiding to tell yourself over this past year. And he was right about everything. You were quiet. You didn’t have anything to say to him. 

He spoke up again. “I know for a fact that you knew I would never, ever hurt you. Betrayal or no betrayal.” 

“Buck…” You whispered, your voice cracked as you held back a sob. You felt a single tear slide down your cheek. 

His hand moved from your chin, down to your waist. He pulled you closer, pressing his body to yours. The feeling of his built, taut body against yours brought back memories you weren’t sure you could ever forget. 

“Say it.” He demanded, looking down at your lips, then back into your eyes. His scent filled your senses. He was all you could, and wanted, to focus on. “Tell me I’m right. Tell me the truth you’ve been running from.” He leaned in, as though he was going for a kiss. “Tell me you love me.”

“Bucky, I…” you almost choked on another sob you couldn’t let out. You wanted to tell that you loved him. But the words wouldn’t come out. Something was stopping you; worry or fear or just guilt. 

It was guilt. 

He scoffed. “Too proud? Too self-righteous to admit that the good little spy fell in love with the bad guy?” He pressed his forehead to yours as he walked the two of you back, towards your bed. You knew what he was doing, and you didn’t stop him. “Admit it, babygirl,” he leaned in to whisper in your ear and you felt goosebumps all over your body, “Or maybe I should remind you…” 

Bucky pushed you down on your bed, and he hovered over you supporting himself with one hand while the metal one held his gun right above your face. “You’ve been a bad, bad girl lately.” He murmured, gently lowering his gun and brushing the barrel against your lips, then slowly dragged it down your skin. “Did you think you could hide from me forever?” 

He dragged the tip of his gun all the way down till your thighs, making you tremble. His eyes stared down into yours as he carelessly tossed his gun aside and brought his metal hand over to your mouth again. 

“Do you know how bad I’ve missed you?” He mumbled, tracing your mouth with his cold fingers. For a moment he forgot why he was here in the first place. 

You shivered under his touch. “I’m sorry, Bucky. I never meant to-,” 

He scoffed, cutting you off. “Shut up, babygirl.” He had a mean smirk on his face. “You’ve been bad. And what did daddy tell you about babygirls who misbehave?” His calm demeanor could fool anyone. Anyone but you. 

You knew him too well. You could tell he was burning inside, agitated. Like a wounded predator, planning his next attack. There was no escaping him now. Not that you truly wanted to. 

“They get punished.” You whispered quietly as he tugged on your bottom lip with his thumb. The simple gesture reminded you of all those times spent with him; the nights you spent in his bed, in his arms… 

He chuckled. “Exactly. Now come on, you have a lot to make up for.” He pulled away, and stood up straight at the end of your bed. “Take your clothes off. All of it.” 

The sound of his authoritative voice had your thighs clenching together to try and alleviate the sweet pain in between your legs. That tone of his was a weakness of yours, and he knew it. 

You hesitated only for a moment, but the longer he stared into your eyes the warmer your body felt, and all you wanted to do was to get rid of all that you were wearing. You took your jacket off first, followed by the long sleeved shirt underneath it. You scooted forward, sitting on the edge of the bed to take the rest of your clothes off; shoes, skirt, stockings which left you in your matching set of black underwear. 

You looked up at him, waiting for further instructions. 

“I said, all of it.” He let his eyes roam your body for a moment and then he spoke up again, “Don’t be shy baby, I’ve seen it all before, haven’t I?” 

He had done so much more than just seeing it all. You held his stare as you took your underwear off and had to fight the urge to throw it at his face just for the hell of it. 

“Good girl.” He whispered. “Now lie down, spread those legs for me. Show me what’s mine.” 

The crudeness of his words would’ve surely made you blush if you didn’t know just how vulgar and dirty he could really get, this was nothing. 

You did just as he asked. You held yourself up on your elbows, still holding his stare. Bucky eyed you like you were a warm meal and he was a starving man. There was nothing but lust and mischief in his eyes. 

“Touch yourself for me.” 

You felt your face get really hot for a moment as your heartbeats rang in your ears. “What?” The question just slipped out before you could stop yourself. 

Bucky smirked. “You heard me. Use your pretty fingers and touch yourself. I assume you thought of me each time you… tended to your needs over these past many, many months. I’m sure you missed me,” he chuckled, just as cocky as you expected him to be, “Or at least you missed having my cock buried deep inside of you. Hmm?”  

You studied his face for a moment. Your emotions were shifting; from guilt to annoyance to shame to lust. And you hated how well he had you figured out. “How do you know I haven’t had someone else tending to my needs instead?” You asked, quickly realizing that this wasn’t an ideal situation to be the brat you used to be back then. 

Bucky let out a little laugh; a hot and evil laugh. “No one will ever satisfy you like I do.” He shoved both of his hands in his pockets. “Even if you did, for some reason, fool around with someone here I assure you they won't be breathing for long.” He responded with a straight face. “You are mine. Nobody touches what’s mine and lives.” 

That speech shouldn’t have turned you on as much as it did. 

“Now come on, be a good girl and do as you’re told.” He spoke softly. “Show me how you touched yourself when I wasn’t here to take care of you.” 

Your hands moved on their own; caressing your inner thighs before placing your fingers right over your clit. The look in his eyes made your walls clench around nothing. Your lips parted and you let out a shaky breath as you toyed with your clit, smearing your wetness around before slowly rubbing down your folds and slipping past your entrance with ease given that you were dripping already. Your other hand toyed with your nipple, twisting and tugging. 

Needless to say, Bucky was hard just looking at you. 

You stared into his eyes as you gasped in pleasure as your fingers effortlessly slipped in and out of you. You whined as you fingered yourself, thinking about the last time he touched you – all those months back, on the same night that you left him. And how lovely his mouth felt against your body. Whining in need and frustration, the palm of your hands rubbed against your sensitive clit over and over again as your middle finger slipped in and out of you. 

“Bucky…” you whimpered. 

He just stood there and smirked. “Faster. And don’t you dare cum.” 

You whined, slipping your finger in and out of your wet hole rapidly. “Fuck…” Your own touch took you higher, and higher, and you were on the edge. 

“Stop.” He ordered, moving closer to you but not touching you yet. “Add another finger.” He waited until you did, whimpering as you pushed another finger in. “Good girl, now fuck your little cunt faster for me.” He leaned over and traced your lips with his cold, metal finger, his touch was agonizingly slow. He was so close, but he still wasn’t touching you like you desperately needed him to. 

You took your bottom lip in between your teeth to keep yourself from moaning too loudly. Bucky smirked when he saw how you were struggling to keep quiet. He noticed the way your body squirmed, and he knew you too well so he could tell that you were so close to coming undone. 

“Poor baby,” he cooed, “Is it hard?” he taunted, his fake concern morphing into an evil, handsome and sly smile. “Is it frustrating to not be allowed to have something you so desperately want? Hmm?” 

“Buck… please,” you whined, releasing your swollen lip from your teeth. Your body felt hot, and you needed to just let go and come undone. 

“Stop.” He ordered, shamelessly ignoring your pleas. You stopped, and pulled your hand away from in between your legs. He knelt on your bed, in between your legs. You tried to look away but he grabbed your chin before you could turn your face to the side. He stared into your eyes for a few seconds, not saying anything. Eventually he spoke up, “What do I do with you?” 

You stared at him, a thousand thoughts in your head. “You’re crazy.” You spat, hoping to rile him up. 

He just chuckled softly. “You did this to me.” He sounded bitter, and hurt. He leaned in to brush his lips against yours, making your heart race, “Thoughts of you were messing with my head for the past year.” He confessed, and you felt your heart hurt. “People think I’m cruel, clearly they haven’t had their heart broken by you.” 

You opened your mouth to say something, or maybe apologize, or perhaps you’d say something which would piss him off even more but before you could, his mouth was on yours. He kissed you with passion, but also pent up anger and frustration. He was conflicted, so were you. Both of your pride were hurt, egos bruised but your hearts still yearned for each other. Nothing could change that. 

Before you could process anything, Bucky was kissing down your body; you were a whimpering mess by the time he kissed along your inner thighs. He chuckled darkly when you let out a loud moan as he kissed your throbbing clit ever so gently. Like he used to when he was madly in love with you. 

“Your body remembers me, babygirl.” He seemed proud of that. 

You hated how you couldn’t resist him. You hated how you didn’t even try to. You melted right under his touch as his tongue gently licked down your folds. His hand found yours and he laced his metal fingers with yours while his other hand rubbed up and down your thigh as he pushed his face further into your wet core. 

You couldn’t bring yourself to look down at him, but you were sure he looked enticing with his plump, pink lips on your wet heat; your arousal dripping down his chin and coating his lips as he devoured you. You heard him growl before he bit down on the soft skin at your inner thighs to get your attention. 

“Look at me.” He mumbled. And when you didn’t obey him right away, you earned yourself a gentle smack on your thigh, which only made you squirm even more; causing you to accidentally grind against his mouth. He chuckled again. “Impatient, are we?” 

You supported yourself up on your elbows finally, and looked down at him. His handsome face in between your thighs was a sight you weren’t sure you would ever get used to. You could feel his warm breath fanning your wet skin occasionally as he stared into your eyes until you couldn’t handle the intensity of his stare. 

Bucky held your stare as he attached his lips to your core again, making you whimper in pleasure. He wasn’t planning on stopping until you beg him to. He had missed you, your taste. He had missed this; your warmth and your soft whimpers as he teased you with his tongue. 

“Do you wanna cum for me, babygirl?” He asked, before pressing his lips back against your wet folds. 

You nodded, quickly. “Yes, please…” your legs had begun shaking just a little as he took his time and dragged his tongue up and down your slit. But the way his lips lifted into a smirk gave away that his answer would only disappoint you. 

“No, you’re not allowed to cum.” He cooed, playfully. “Not so easily.” He whispered before he got back to teasing your sensitive spot with his warm and wet tongue; relishing your taste and humming in pleasure as he ate you out. He let out a little laugh, “I forgot how good you taste.” 

You moaned out loud as your back arched off the bed for just a moment, your eyes closing and your head leaning back as you felt a wave of intense pleasure wash over you. You weren’t sure how long you could take this sweet torture. Your fingers tightened around his and he chuckled against your skin. 

“What is it baby, you can’t take it? Hmm? All that sass, all those mind games and now you can’t even handle my tongue?” 

He taunted you before getting back to teasing your entrance with the tip of his tongue. Your body tingled and you felt a sweet pressure forming in between your legs. You were sure he could see the tears of frustration escaping your eyes, falling down your warm cheeks. 

“Please…” you moaned pathetically. 

He licked around your clit one last time before pulling away and kissing his way up your body again. The twisted side of him loved the way you whined when you realized he wasn’t gonna let you cum so easily. He leaned in to kiss your open mouth eventually, making you gasp and moan and forget how to breathe with just one kiss. 

When he pulled away to look at you he smiled at the mess you were. Lips swollen, and bruised with how many times you or him bit down on it. Red marks all over your neck, bite marks along your inner thigh, and your arousal dripping out of you. He quickly placed his fingers where his mouth had been earlier, teasing your clit before shoving two fingers inside of you and stroking your walls so slowly that you were losing your mind. 

“Why won’t you admit it?” he kissed along your cheek and reached your ear where he whispered, “Are you that proud? That heartless?” Judging by his tone you could tell that his emotions were wavering as well. “I searched the whole world to find you.” His fingers sped up as he spoke, your moans got more frequent and holding them back became much more difficult. “And now you’re still gonna be a stubborn, disrespectful brat?” 

The bitterness in his tone woke something inside of you. Did he not realize that you’re not exactly pleased with what you had to do? Did he not understand? Pissed, your annoyance mirroring his, you pushed his hand away and pushed him down on the bed. He wasn’t expecting it so he went down rather easily. You got on top of him, straddling his waist, ignoring the nudity, and stared down at him. 

“Enough! You can’t just walk in here and do or say whatever the fuck you want.” Your sudden outburst took him by surprise. Part of him had always loved it when you got a little aggressive. “I’m not proud of what I did. That’s why I left, the guilt was killing me. It still kills me, every single day. I haven’t had the best year of my life since I left you either. I had to leave my homeland, my family, and I… I had to leave you.” 

He remained quiet. 

“I moved to a place where I knew no one. I’ve been alone for the past year, living amongst strangers, no friends, no family, nothing! All because I couldn’t let them get to me. You were right, because if my people found me they would somehow find a way to get the information they needed and they would’ve surely taken you down. You would’ve never seen it coming.” You sniffled, realizing that you were tearing up again. 

Bucky had, surprisingly, nothing to say. You went on. 

“You want answers? There you have it then. I couldn’t just stay and watch myself become that reason for your fall. I couldn’t let that happen to you, because I love you too much. When I realized I loved you, I panicked. I ran because I didn’t know what else to do, or how to keep them away from you. And I am so sorry for what I did. I understand if you-,”

He cut your long speech off by sitting up and grabbing you just in time before you lost your balance, pressing his lips to yours. You immediately wrapped your arms around his neck and let him hold you, kiss you like he wanted to for so long. His kiss was gentle this time, careful, loving. His metal hand ran up and down your spine slowly as his other hand grabbed you and pulled you close to him by your butt.  

He slowly pulled away and his heart felt like it tore in half at the sight of your teary face. He had been so busy being heartbroken after you left that he didn’t even take a minute to consider this perspective. He was too hurt to even think properly. 

“You could’ve just told me the truth. I would’ve handled them. I would’ve done anything for you, I… I would’ve done whatever it took to keep you safe. You know that, right?” Bucky finally spoke up, sounding much more emotional than he thought he ever could. 

Truth is, before meeting you he always thought that he was incapable of love. But then you walked into his life and everything changed for the better. So when he lost you, without any explanation, he went insane. 

You sighed. “I was scared. I didn’t understand, I thought I was doing the right thing. I was hurting too. You think disappearing out of your life and leaving you behind without saying a proper goodbye was easy?” Your voice cracked as you fought back a sob. “How many times do I have to-,” 

He cut you off. Once he saw the tears accumulating along your water line again. “Okay, okay shh. I just got you back, I don’t wanna fight.” He mumbled, pressing his forehead to yours. 

You sniffled, your heart skipping a beat as his body heat wrapped around you. “I’ve missed you. Every day. I missed you so much. I couldn’t risk reaching out to you to even apologize, I was so scared. I… I didn’t…,” your sentence ended in a whisper, you didn’t know how to articulate your thoughts too well. 

He tightened his arms around you. “It’s okay, baby. Everything is fine now, I found you.” 

You were quiet for a while, enjoying his calming touch and processing all that happened since you stepped inside your apartment tonight. “Are you mad at me?” you asked, seeking to find some sort of sense in all that just happened. 

He sighed, and kissed your forehead. “I was. When I woke up the next morning after you left, I was confused, hurt. Then you didn’t show up for a couple more days and I had my people look you up, and I was told that you were a spy.” His words made you feel uneasy and ashamed of your past. “I was broken, but I never knew what a heartbreak feels like so instead all I felt was anger. But despite all of it, all I wanted was to have you back. Then I found the organization you worked for, and I made sure to destroy it. Since then I’ve been looking for you like a madman.” 

He pulled away to look at you. You managed to look up into his eyes without tearing up again. “I’m sorry.” You whispered. 

He pulled you closer. “I’m sorry too.” 

“I love you.” 

Bucky smiled at you. “Say it again.” 

You reached up and cupped his face in your hands. “I love you. I love you so much and I’m sorry. For everything. I just… I just want you back, please.” 

He leaned in for a kiss, whispering against your lips, “I’m right here, babygirl.” He gently turned to the side and laid you back down on the bed. “I’ve got you now,” he mumbled, pulling away to take his suit jacket off, then his shirt. He tossed both somewhere on the floor and bent down to kiss you again. He kissed down your neck, leisurely; taking his time on you as he unzipped his pants. 

“Buck…” you groaned as he teased you with the soft, feathery touch of his lips. He had been teasing you for so long now, you couldn’t take anymore. Your body felt burning hot again, you needed him. Bad. You needed him like you needed air. 

“Yes, baby?” He asked, kissing down your cleavage; pretending he doesn’t know that you were practically shaking in need. 

You whined, sliding your finger into his dark, soft hair. “I need you. Please, I need you. Now.” You spoke through gritted teeth by the end, tugging at the roots of his hair. 

He chuckled. “So aggressive.” He murmured, kissing up your neck until he reached your mouth. He noticed the way you had unintentionally, gradually parted your legs to accommodate him; your naked body squirming under him, your bare chest pressing up against his, your body heat mixing with his. “I’m gonna take care of you, baby…” he whispered as he lowered his underwear just enough to free his cock. He was rock hard.

You were a whimpering mess by the time he aligned his erected cock to your entrance. You instinctively spread your legs further apart to give him more room. With a slow, steady push, he inserted his length into you. You shuddered, moaning as you felt all of him filling you up. You heard his ragged breaths as he seated himself completely inside you and waited, giving your body time to adjust to him. 

He could still make you tremble in pleasure just like the first time he touched you. Bucky held back his moans and growls as he felt your warmth wrap around him so perfectly. He clenched his jaw as he relished the feeling of being inside of you, finally. 

“Is this what you needed, babygirl?” he asked, looking down at you, and gently grabbing your face, causing you to look up at him. 

You couldn’t talk given how full you were. You just stared at him with parted lips, breathing heavily. Bucky smirked, pulling out just a little before pushing back into you again. You closed your eyes and moaned, arching your back off the surface of the bed again. 

He smirked as he looked down at you. “You waited, didn’t you? You waited only for daddy to stretch you out like this. I know you didn’t let anyone touch you while I wasn’t here.” He remained still as he leaned into your ear, whispering, “The way you’re clenching around my cock right now gives it away.” He chuckled, proud. 

Your face burned. He knew you too well. 

Bucky leaned in to kiss your open mouth, shamelessly shoving his tongue past your parted lips and stroking the inside of your mouth while he began moving in and out of you. He sped up gradually, rocking his hips against yours; his hand reached up to grab your chin gently. He stared into your eyes, speeding up into you again. You gripped the bed sheets as he pounded into you. 

He stretched you out deliciously, perfectly. Filling you up and reaching all the right places as he went. He couldn’t hold back any longer, so he moaned and growled right against your mouth, clenching his jaw or occasionally biting down on your lip as he pounded into you relentlessly. 

“You have no idea how much I’ve missed you.” He spoke as he sped up into you again. You could whine senselessly, overwhelmed by how good he felt deep inside you. 

He leaned down to push his face into your neck as he lifted one of your legs and hooked it to his waist, pushing himself deeper inside you. “Fuck…” he moaned as you clenched hard around him. He down for a moment just to hear you moan wantonly before he sped up again, fucking you relentlessly. “You’re mine. Only mine, you hear me?” 

You nodded, or at least tried to.  

The louder you got, the closer he felt his release coming and the filthier his mouth got. “Your little cunt is mine. Only mine.” He spoke through messy kisses; growling and causing goosebumps to erupt all over your body. “Only I can fuck you like this, you hear me?” Bucky quickened his pace and pounded into you harder than before; the sounds of your skin slapping one another resonated around the modest room. 

Bucky was all you could focus on. The sound of his voice. His body pressing down on yours. His cock inside you. Your walls began to clench tighter around him. His moans, his hot breath against your cheek, his messy kisses. Just him. You had missed him so terribly, and only now did you wonder how in the world did you survive so long without him? 

He took you higher, and higher, and higher until you felt more tears escape your eyes. “Please, Buck…” you whined, begging pathetically and unable to arrange your words or your thoughts any better. “Please…” 

Your eyes were droopy in lust. His eyes were too as he stared down at you with a handsome and arrogant smirk on his face. “Please what, babygirl?” 

His pretty blue eyes put you under a trance. “Please, can I cum?” 

Bucky caressed your cheek with his knuckles, his metal hand holding him up above you. He didn’t know how he managed to survive without you all these months. He was barely living without you. He looked down at you with nothing but love and adoration in his eyes. 

“Go on, baby. Cum for me.” 

You let the pressure build inside you, before simply letting go. He didn’t slow down as you felt your orgasm wash over you, Bucky kept pounding into you as your eyes rolled back and you moaned out loud as you came. You whimpered at how he kept slamming into you even as you came, and your face burned as you felt a familiar knot forming again right at your core.

He fucked into you relentlessly. “Fuck…” He panted and groaned at how good you felt around him; wet and warm all for him. Your walls clenched around him violently and your body arched off the bed. 

You felt your second release approaching even before you could recover from the first one. Your leg around his waist was numb but you still wanted more of what he had to give. You would take whatever he gave you in that moment, given you had gone so long without him. 

You felt your mind getting foggy again. His large frame hovering above you as he fucked deeper into you, just a little more. “Cum for me again, baby.” He growled, his lips dangerously close to yours as you whined and whimpered under him. Your body trembled as you came for the second time, walls tightening around his length, gushing out around his cock while he still pounded relentlessly into you until he came as well.

You felt his thrust getting sloppy and irregular until he came to a stop and just groaned as he came violently. His warm cum filled you up and some of it trickled out of you when he carefully removed his cock from your entrance.

He collapsed on the bed beside you, catching his breath before pulling you into him. You were slightly shaking as he wrapped his arms around you, kissing your skin wherever he could, murmuring sweet nothings. 

“You okay, babe?” he asked after a few minutes of just holding you in his arms, in silence; both of you just enjoying each other’s warmth and presence. 

You nodded, placing your arm over his chest and scooting closer to him, pressing up against his side. 

You both remained quiet for a while longer. Thinking about the past, and the future. 

“Are you sure you’re not mad at me?” You asked, your brain starting to overthink again. 

Bucky sighed. “Baby I couldn’t stay mad at you even if you intentionally stabbed me through the heart and watched me bleed to death.” 

You took a second to process what he just spoke of, and you made a face at him, showing your horror and concern, which then made him laugh out loud. “You’re sick.” You muttered, placing a gentle kiss to his metal arm. The cold metal against your lips reminded of somewhere you desperately wanted to be - home. 

He shrugged, pulling you closer. “Yeah. Also cruel, devious and pure evil. But you love me nonetheless.” He teased. 

You smiled, your worn out body snuggled up against him. You felt your eyelids drooping as sleep slowly took over you. Today has been a lot. “I do.” You spoke softly. 

Bucky looked down and saw that you were slowly drifting off to sleep. He adjusted the covers so that you were well covered with the warm blankets. He tucked you in and wrapped his arms around you protectively, as though you might slip away from his grasp again. 

“I love you, babygirl. Sleep tight, we’re going home soon.” 

You didn’t respond so he figured you must have fallen asleep. While he hugged your sleeping figure, he thought back on everything you said tonight. Your biggest fear was that you might end up being the reason for his fall. But little did you know that ultimately, you had been the only reason he knew what truly falling in love was like.

[phantomrose96]

oh don’t worry ABoT can definitely be a weekend read, i just read it start to chapter 39 from 2am to now (and still got a solid 8 hours of sleep somehow) ! couldn’t put it down honestly. amazing job at reconceptualizing the characters in this worst case scenario alternate universe in a way that feels believable and not contrived — not pulling any punches (ritsu and teru are … pretty awful, in particular) but not in a sensationalist dead-dove-dont-eat way at all which i really really appreciate. teru and ritsu are awful but ultimately sympathetic because they really do feel like natural extensions of their character arcs had canon played out differently. it would’ve been really easy to take this and make it into either an Everyone Is Evil I Am So Edgy story or a But They All Come Together Through The Power Of Friendship, so thank you for not doing that! while reigen is my favorite, i love ritsu & teru’s relationship — it’s so nuanced but well developed. cant wait to see what happens next!

(ABoT)

Oh you get it

Oh You Get It........

Hahahhahhhhhaaa.............................................

Literally when I saw the first ask before you sent the follow up, my first thought was like "!!!! you get it! gosh I wish that woulda applied to all those people from 2017-2018 who labeled ABoT torture p//or/n" but I wasn't gonna actually bring that up because like even talking about that time always feels like I'm putting myself on the defensive.

But.... god haha yeah..... I didn't write anything for almost 3 years after that. I thought about ABoT every damn day for that almost-3-year hiatus. It was already planned out! It had an ending! It just made me so sad because I believed I couldn't come back to it because I couldn't Do This Again.

It was just... utterly heart-breaking, utterly devastating, downright confusing how this fic which is so focused on the slow and messy and hard work of recovery was being branded "oh it's sadistic twisted fucked-up torture p//or//n of children and the author is a sick fuck".

I know it's dark!! It's dark and no one has to read it and I've tagged it for the things that are dark and I put content warnings in front of every chapter! But it's dark because I care about how much a tiny flicker of light can mean in the darkness.

I... care about media that doesn't just brush traumatic happenings under the rug and go "so that happened, anyway." I care about trauma that isn't ignored. I care about the characters who can't just brush it off - who come out worse because of it - I care about them and what the slow and ugly and sometimes backwards progress of recovery looks like. I care about characters who absolutely Fuck Up and face consequences for it. I care about characters who are messy and need time and cannot be fixed with a single nice word. I care about making the audience care about what the characters have lived through, and how it hurt them. I'm rooting for all the characters in ABoT. They're all trying to find their own flicker of light in the dark. I care so so so so so much about that.

And it absolutely destroyed me to see a whole group of friends in the fandom (who, mind you, were annoyed with ABoT for a while. I saw their posts show up when I searched 'ABoT', and who tried to pin a couple problematic labels on ABoT and couldn't get anything to stick until 'torture p//o//rn") rip apart ABoT's reputation because ALL they needed to say was "ABoT is an au where Mogami kidnaps and tortures Mob for 4 years. It's awful and gross and problematic and don't read it and if you do YOURE problematic."

And I saw it time and time again (again, in the ABoT tags! in MY tag, sometimes.) Someone would make a post like "if you're an ABoT stan don't follow me" and some clueless anon would be like "whats ABoT" and they'd answer the above and that was it. No one wanted to risk getting into "problematic" stuff so people just accepted it. Even more neutral people didn't have the time or reason to investigate that further and just accepted it, assuming whoever was speaking had read it, even if in reality none of them had.

I got death threats. They made hate-blogs of ABoT. They made memes shitting on ABoT. They spammed the ABoT tag and the phantomrose96 tag. They spammed sandflake's tag and drove them away same as me. They raided and spammed the ABoT discord. They made posts celebrating how long it had been since ABoT updated. They made posts trying to accuse me of pe//do//philia (for NO reason. NONE. NO REASON. NO EVIDENCE. It was just an effective word to get people run off the site. and luckily that accusation died because there was literally nothing to base it on.) ALL the while framing what they were doing as totally in the right because they were JUST calling out torturous child-abusing fic.

I really tried. When all this started, I stopped tagging anything ABoT related with m/p/100, so I wouldn't bother people. If I found ABoT art tagged with m/p/100, I'd wait a day to reblog it so it wouldn't accidentally rise high in the tag and bother people. Sometimes I WOULDN'T reblog art because I didn't want the artist to risk getting threatened. I mostly stopped talking about ABoT on tumblr, so I wouldn't bother people.

But it fucking gets to you after a while. I started believing they were right. My mental health was extreme garbage at this time (for reasons unrelated to this all) but that meant I couldn't brush any of it off. ABoT was kinda the one little spark of joy I had at this time and then I just. Didn't anymore. It got taken away.

I would write every sentence through the lens of my worst critic. I tried SO many times to start chapter 25 back in 2018. I could only get a page in at most. (Originally it was going to be the mall movie theater scene that ends up happening in chapter 27) and I'd balk at jokes I was trying to write. There was going to be a joke about the movie being a sort of in-universe Twilight, where the two love interests uncannily resembled Ritsu and Teru. And I froze up because. Was that problematic? If Teru was seeing the movie because Mei wanted to, was that sexist? If Teru himself wanted to see it, was that homophobic? Was the Twilight reference problematic? Was the joke about the love interest resemblance problematic? Would the irreverence of the joke be problematic? Would this be what they get me on? Would this be my undoing? Would this be the final nail in my coffin?

I found these old drafts somewhat recently and they are just. Lifeless. They are so barren of any kind of passion or heart. I re-read it and see just how painful it was to get from one sentence to another. I was burnt out and afraid of every word and those drafts would never ever have worked.

Hell, when I did write chapter 25 for real, in 2020, I gave up entirely on making it the movie scene. Trashed that. Started from scratch. That well was far far too tainted to draw from.

I just. aaa. aaaaaaaaaaaaaa. Sorry for the long post but ahhhhhhh. I gave up my favorite and most meaningful hobby for almost 3 years. This was still happening in 2019 when season 2 aired, when I hadnt been truly active on Tumblr for ages and hadn't touched ABoT in years. JUST so they could be sure to taint the well again and tell any new fandom comers to stay away from ABoT. I had no spoons and no spine for it so I just, let that happen, and unfollowed the ABoT tag. I still haven't seen season 2.

I'm so SO glad I figured out how to come back to it in 2020, and that people have been so supportive, and I mostly try not to talk about this stuff but. it fucks with you. it fucks with you a lot.

I'm just really happy to have been able to come back to it.

[deliciouswastelandgoddess]

Why Porsche's arc as the minor family head unsatisfying for many viewers?

[A case study of film-making techniques]

The way I look at it - this is purely a story writing and screenplay problem. I will elaborate how.

Narratively, they needed Porsche in that position at the end of season 1 for multiple reasons:

- THE CONPIRACY SUBPLOT: Porsche is a key player in Korn's masterplan (whatever the fuck that is now) so he needed both the major and minor families under people who are faithful to him and/or people he can manipulate

- THE ROMANCE SUBPLOT: The showrunners understandably wanted Kinn and Porsche to end up at an equal footing. They have finally reached an equilibrium with balanced powers. The family rings also symbolize their metaphorical marriage

- This is just.....good fodder for season 2

But it is still so unsatisfying to watch Porsche walk through the blue corridor as the family head juxtaposed against the flashback of him walking in their as a bodyguard.

This scene is supposed to make us appreciate his journey, his climb in the mafia world but it falls flat. Because it feels unearned. This arc of Porsche's character is dissatisfying for so many of the audiences because it is unearned*, i.e, we never actually see Porsche grow into this role in the screenplay.

(And no, I don't think Vegas should have made the minor family head either. I may or may not write a separate post on that.)

Forget being a mob boss, we get to see very little of him growing in terms even being a good bodyguard, that could successfully preclude his ascension into becoming a family head. This is basic film making.

There could have been multiple ways in which the showrunners could have turned this around but honestly to give them credit it would have changed the tone of the ending each time. Anyway just to list them out:

Have Porsche showcase his acumen either for business or ruthlessness or any quality that would serve a mob boss. Maybe he helps Kinn in working out a good deal with the Russian mob or something. Maybe he is great at dealing with law enforcement. Maybe he successfully earns the respect of all bodyguards (both from the major and minor families) by just being nice to them and protecting them however way he can, charming his way into their hearts. Maybe he is great at networking with the other clan leaders and their bodyguards. Who knows, the possibilities are endless. This would however not play out very well for THE CONSPIRACY PLOT but I am sure there could have been ways where we could have Porsche have agency and still be a pawn in Korn's plans.

If not talent, have Porsche showcase ambition. We see him time and again feeling helpless and weak, always a pawn for those in power. Rather than Korn or Kinn giving him the ring it would have made more impact on viewers if Porsche came up with the idea himself. He wouldn't even need to earn (talking about narrative!earning here, not screenplay!earning that I talk about earlier* - they are two different things, let me know if anyone wants an explicit explanation on that) the title in this scenario, he would just need to force his way into it because why the fuck not - he has had enough of everyone's bullshit by this point. This would again make it harder to push THE CONSIPRACY PLOT pretty much like point 1 but it would be possible to do it.

Third option would have to change nothing else except to remove the whole montage of Porsche who has happily taken up the mantle. Narratively it would have been more satisfying if we could see Porsche being more reluctant to accept it, or being more suspicious of Korn, or making him look like he's aware that he is in fact a pawn but just not in a position to do anything about it. In this scenario we won't have the flashback scene in the screenplay scene at all (the gif above) - it would have to left for Season 2. It would also absolutely ruin the tone of THE ROMANCE SUBPLOT. The ending would also become a hard cliff-hanger rather than the soft one that we currently have.

Some sort of a combination of all the three points above.

Broadly speaking, I agree with the showrunners for their narrative choices but it could have been written better because it feels screenplay!unearned. Its ridiculously difficult and hard to cut out stuff in the editing room but showrunners make do with the limitation as best as they can. I made this post not to criticise the final product the showrunners served us, but rather an explanation for why so many people are not liking this particular plot twist purely from a film making perspective. The dissatisfaction is logical and valid but also-

To squeeze in all the things I mentioned to make the Boss!Porsche arc more organic and satisfying, they would have to remove some of the other scenes and I honestly don't know which one??? I already love everything that we already have, I wouldn't want to remove anything - so the only real solution is to have more episode which is again a practical issue. I think they could have easily done a 26 episode season with all the different subplots that were going on, but of course, finances and television contracts don't always help in those matters so they made do with the 14 hour runtime as best as they could have.

In conclusion, it ain't much but its honest work.

[heehoothefool]

3 am funny thoughts again so here we go.

Hermits as DnD Classes and Races

Unlike the empires cast, I'll be doing this one based off of generalized knowledge or my favorite version of them, depends on the Hermit. Not restricted by particular seasons.

To be kind to myself, I am only doing Hermits that are active or busy with some other series like Vault Hunters (Mumbo is included here). I won't be doing former Hermits because this list is already crazy long.

Let's go

Bdubs: Light domain cleric gnome. He is a little man of the moss, and have you seen his affinity for animals? He has to be a gnome. And the whole sun thing? Yeah, dude's a light cleric.

Cubfan: This man is a wizard, illusion focus. No other class has enough hubris to build that kind of pyramid just because, and to me, what would a member of ConVex/ConCorp want more out of magic than to trick the eyes of those around them? As for race, I'd pin Cub for the Unearthed Arcana changeling, the one with Unsettling Visage. Seems like he'd get good use out of it.

Doc: Artificer, Maverick subclass. He is constantly working on new reality breaking projects that only someone like himself could pull off. As for race, I think you could do some kind of earth genasi/warforged homebrew combination that would work wonderfully for him. He would be a wild character to play for sure.

Etho: Half elf assassin rogue. Great at pvp, and very pretty, but still very down to earth.

False: Unlike her Empires counterpart, Hermit False to me reads as more of a Monster Hunter Fighter. Protecting her friends from whatever monsters may be nearby, or evil individuals with bad intentions, this class would work for her quite well. Still human for the race though.

Gem: She's only been around for 2 seasons and season 8 was very short, but she definitely seems to have a very Natural theme to her stuff, so I want to call her a circle of the moon druid. And also a faun for the race, probably forest. She is absolutely a fae of some kind and forest just fits her aesthetic so nicely.

Scar: Okay. This man is a college of glamor bard that rolled triple 6s and put that straight into charisma. He will talk you out of the clothes on your back in excahnge for a cactus. He's also 100% a changeling to match Cub, but also because it's the only way I can possibly explain the Many Faces And Forms Of Scar. However, I would say he probably also multiclasses into the Sharpshooter Fighter for his HotGuy persona.

Grian: Aaracokra for the whole avian thing with wings and all, but for his class I'm a little unsure. I'm considering Trickery domain cleric, but I think, all things considered, Great Old One Pact of the Blade warlock might be the best fit, allowing us to incorporate the Watchers as the patron, while also giving him good combat versatility. The charisma focus will be good for his shenanigans too.

Jevin: Seeing as Jevin appears to be very skilled all around, it's hard for me to place his class. With his evident skill in making highly efficient mob farms, and overall mob knowledge, I'm going to place him as a Ranger, monster hunter subclass. As for race, the Slimefolk race on the 5e Wiki seems like it would do just fine for our favorite goopy guy.

Impulse: The scale to which this man makes anything is impeccable. After his soup gang shenanigans, I wanna call this man an Oath of Vengeance Paladin, and I'm so attached to him as a dwarf I'm keeping to it. It's very him, stout little guy sticking up for everyone else.

Joe Hills: With Joe's very chaotic nature and ability to just kinda convince people to go along, I wanna call them a college of glamor bard. I have never been so confused and intrigued by an individual's goals. Also, Joe gives me just straight up fae vibes, the race you can find on the 5e Wiki.

Keralis: Look into those big eyes of his and tell me that's not a wild magic sorcerer. Brimming with charisma, that stuff is running through his veins. He would be the type to get startled and accidentally polymorph into a potted plant for a few seconds. As for race, I think human works just fine. Kinda just some guy (affectionate).

Pearl: Ah yes, the cleaning lady and epitome of go big or go home. With her penchant for keeping objects orderly and the server in a state of upside down chaos, I want to pin her as an Arcane Trickster Rogue. As for race, I think mothkin could be fun.

Rendog: That's a college of glamor bard that multiclassed into lycan order blood hunter. Keeps the whole werewolf thing around, and acknowledges the Red King, while still acknowledging that no other class than a glamor bard is going to commit that hard to a bit. Racewise his base race is probably human.

Tango: Artificer, archivist subclass to play into his role as the Decked Out Dungeon Master while still being very, very aware of his Redstone tomfoolery. As for race, Fire Genasi acknowledges the fire motifs we as a fan base often use for him while respecting his wishes to not be represented with horns by not making him a tiefling. And also fire hair is fun.

Beef: I don't know a lot about Beef but I do know that this is a very dedicated artist of a man. He gives me half elf vibes, and as for his class I wanna say some sort of charisma caster, I'm gonna go bard, College of Creation. Have you seen those maps? Those bases? This man is an artist.

XB: This guy and his underwater thing, I'm calling him a triton for fun. He seems to be very big on games and builds with story, so for this I think I want to actually make him an Illusion Wizard. Give him the stuff he needs to make things look wonderful and tell the story he wants to tell. And also to prank. I think he would enjoy it.

Xisuma: If there was ever a man more suited to play a Wild Magic Sorcerer it has to be him. The Admin with an evil doppelganger? Brother? Whatever Evil X is. X himself is your best, charismatic friend who just happened to also have the Sage Background to explain his very deep knowledge of "the world around him" (Minecraft). A changeling to explain away all of his various looks and also the fact that nobody knows what he actually looks like. Also Wild Magic funny and a good origin for a guy who is as powerful as he is for "no real reason" in lore.

Zedaph: Alchemist Artificer. Satyr. Need I say more? This is a chaotic little goat fey man who makes wacky ass contraptions. And I never stop thinking about that auto-brewer. It lives in my mind rent free at all times.

ZombieCleo: Despite the name, I don’t know that the Zombie race fits. Rather, I think Cleo could be better suited to the Wight race created by u/callmepartario over on r/UnearthedArcana. It plays into her little rivalry with Jevin, I think, that it's the need for vengeance keeping her "alive." As for her class, with her armor stand skills and penchant for head collecting, I think it would be very funny to pin her as a Necromancy Wizard. Why else would she need so many skulls? Why else would she raise so many "bodies?"

Hypno: Another Hermit I don't know much about, but I like his vibes. He gives me Assassin Rogue feelings so I'm gonna go with that, and say his race is blue dragonborn because again. Vibes.

Iskall: Oh look at them. Look at them and tell me that is not a Mastermaker Artificer wood elf. Look at the fun mix of nature and science and tell me I am incorrect I dare you. I love Iskall.

Mumbo: This, my friends, is really quite simple. Mumbo is a Maverick Artificer without a doubt, very skilled in just about all manner of Redstone contraptions. Mumbo is also a man of many projects (some of which get pushed off to the side for a while) so I think this suits him. As for race, this man strikes me as a tuxedo cat tabaxi. Idk I just like it, I think it'd be funny if Grian's bestie was a cat.

Stress: Circle of the Moon Druid she is so friend shaped oh my god. Incredibly friend shaped, incredible flower vibes, what kind of wood elf do you take her for?

Wels: Oath of Devotion Paladin. Stays true to his morals and does his best to do good, what more is there to say on that? He is incredibly human to me, love this man.

And that's all! If you have any alternative ideas go ahead and tack them on! I would love to get further input about the Hermits I'm not super familiar with, so if you disagree with something feel free to put it in the reblogs or tags or even pester my inbox! Oh my god this post took so long.

[stranger-rants]

As much as I love Eddie, I do gotta agree his death was kinda pointless. "I didn't run away this time," could have been a great line to end his arc if they were still going to kill him, if they didn't use it in such a way. Like, this was a situation where you absolutely should have run. Him having guilt over Chrissy is understandable, but so is him running. He was an outcast, someone who was already on thin ice if they were going to take inspiration from the Satanic Panic, he knew what would happen if anyone found him with a dead girl with unexplainable injuries. The demobats was also a situation where not a SOUL would have blamed him for running.

It could have even been a callback to what he said during the dnd session where he said there was no shame in running away. This was one of those times, to the point him NOT running felt stupid and completely undid any potential his death could have had as tragedy like it seemed the Duffers were going for. Like, look at this lower class outcast who was hated by the town but still gave his life to save them and died a hero, but he didn't actually die a hero because there was no reason for him to die here! Him staying behind to fight bats was not heroic because there was no reason for it and he didn't accomplish anything. It felt cheap with the buildup of the stakes when it came to the mob, that Eddie's death came because he didn't have the self-preservation to run from a situation he should have.

The whole set up was ridiculous. I don't even think the whole town really thought about Eddie before all of this, outside of the regular trailer park judgments people make when they see "trailer trash" in public. It was really Jason who jumped to conclusions and turned everyone against him.

I knew Eddie was going to die. That was not shocking. I am more shocked that other fans were surprised he was killed off, especially fans who joke about Billy's death. Like, at some point you have to realize that this show doesn't care about poor kids no matter how nice you think they are...

The only thing that shocked me about Eddie's death was how it happened. It was so underwhelming and it didn't do anything to connect Eddie's conflict to the townspeople. Yeah, he didn't run but who cares when it accomplished nothing. Who did he even die saving? No one.