#m'gumi

[bunnigumi]

cw. megumi x reader , stomach bulge , tummy pressing , size kink

Right now, Megumi has his grab on your thighs, blunt nails digging into soft flesh, thumbs circling pink bites on the inner sides. It's a routine that's starting to become familiar. Your hips are slightly lifted up from the bed, and he really cant explain why, but when he can see the outline of his dick through your stomach, he absolutely loses it.

You were horrified at the sight when you first saw it, but Megumi on the other hand? He was turned on the most he's been in his entire life.

He just loves pressing on the bulge in your little tummy. Its addicting—watching you squirm and whine and protest with little results. Seeing the way you cant decide if you want to stray from his touch or arch further into it. Loving how big his dick is compared to you.

"Fuck baby," he breathes out in awe. "See that? Feel it? Can you feel my cock deep inside you?" He groans as he pulls out all the way just to slam back into you, starting a fast, rough pace that doesn't seem to let up and makes the sound of sticky arousal totally embarrassing.

A hand retreats from where it's holding up your thigh to grab one of your own hands, wrestling the grip you have on crumpled sheets and guiding it down to your stomach.

"Wha- nghh, M'gumi, don't—!" A long, drawn out moan escapes your lips before the rest of your complaint can. Your hand is trembling, and too weak to escape his grab.

"C'mon sweet girl, don't you like how full I can make you feel?" He coos.

Your head falls to the side, attempting to push your face into the soft pillows, "N-noo... feels so weird..." The drawn out nature of your words make you sound unsure. Megumi doesn't believe that you don't like it, because oh, he knows you do.

"Awwh... you sure you don't like it, baby?" He says, faux innocence laced in his sweet tone. You pout. You know what he's doing to you, and hes so wrong for it. He leans in closer, tilting his head, teasing you so you get all embarrased—hot and flustered. "I should just pull out then if it's too much."

You shake your head so fast you almost get dizzy, unable to form any coherent words. Only small uh-uh's make it past your moans.

It's too hot. Megumi is so, very close to you right now. You're able to feel the radiating warmth of his body, his breath against your ear. With the added weight of his teasing, it becomes far too invading. You bury your face deeper into the pillows.

When you get like that, the heat always pressures you into spilling whatever you don't want to say—always. You make for a terrible, terrible liar.

"What about when I do it like this?" You face him again with curiosity. Your brows are furrowed, sweat beads down your hairline. Glossy eyes search his face in confusion in the cutest way ever before dilating in panic.

He adds more pressure and forces your hand harder onto your stomach, closing the little distance seperating the two of you to kiss you sloppily. You make a noise of shock, whining as he continues to knead your hand onto it.

Your cries melt back into the sound of pleasure, moaning into the kiss, your whining dying down.

When he pulls back theres drool collecting at the corner of your mouth. You're red in the face, eyes averting in shame 'cause you really do like it when he presses on your tummy like that. "Tell me how much you love it," he taunts.

When you're like this, you're able to feel all of him. Able feel every single thrust just grazing your cervix, senses going into overdrive as you subconsiously stop trying to fight his hold on your hand with the little to no strength you were using to begin with.

"I, hahh, love it! Love your cock s-so much! Feel so full... hah- aah—!" With one last thrust, your back arches, core unraveling around his length. Walls tightening, spasming in a way that makes Megumi spill all his praises. As your chest heaves heavily, your abdomen flexes and tightens, revealing the silhouette of your boyfriend's cock stuffed inside of you even clearer now.

The corner of his mouth quirks up in pride, "I bet you do, baby. I fuckin' bet."

He really should start doing this more often.

[freyarabbit]

Imagine Megumi waking you up when you doze off in the bathtub after a tiring day...<3

Established relationship ♥︎...

Nsfw ✞...

The fragrance of the Lavender candles you'd lit blessed your senses as you laid tiredly in the bubbly water of your bathtub.

To say you were exhausted would be an understatement... The warmth of the water was just right. Though you felt as if something was missing, you still believed this was about as perfect as your little destressing session could get.

Your thighs peaked out of the foamy water, your body glistening as the candle light reacted with its wetness. The bruises you'd received earlier today while fighting, seemed to have numbed their pain, you couldn't feel much on them anymore.

All the more better.

Beginning to feel yourself slipping away, you adjusted into a more comfortable position, as your eye lids got heavier and shut.

Nsfw below the cut---✮⋆˙

Megumi opened the front door to you both's shared home, his face expressionless and tired as usual.

He knew seeing you is all he needs to change that. He took off his shoes, putting them in the same spot beneath the worn out brown cupboard next to the front door.

As he walked in a little further, he already knew where you were, from the lingering scent of Lavender and the steam seeping out of the gaps in the bathroom door.

Well aware of what to do next, he stripped, quietly going inside shirtless. He was expecting you to look at him with that smile that still gave him butterflies and welcome him back, but instead, he was met with the cutest thing he'd ever seen. You dozing off in the marble tub like a tired little kitten.

The way your wet hair was in your face and your quiet, soft sighs made blood rush to his cock. "Damn it..." He mumbled to himself, as he crouched before you, bending to give you small pecks on your adorable face until you wake up.

Feeling his hot breath and kisses on your sensitive skin, you woke up, fluttering your lashes, as a smile forms on your face. "Mmnh...hey M'gumi..." you greet him, pulling him down to give him a longer and wetter kiss on the cheek.

He looked at you with a gentle smile, before frowning as he saw your bruises. "Do they hurt?"

"Nope...especially not now that you're here, hon..."

You sat up in the tub, causing your pretty little titties to come out of their hiding in a sheet of foam, as they came into his view. God he needed to be inside you so bad.

He got into the tub, with you, or more appropriately, on top of you, getting off of the way you shyly looked away, even though you'd both been together for so long.

His hand rested right beside your left tit, as he looked at you, speaking in low tone,

"Can I...?"

You nodded quickly, waiting in anticipation as to what he'd do next.

Upon receiving permission, he began getting rougher, the implied gentleness nowhere to be found, as one of his hands played with your tits, and the other slid between your legs under the water.

"hh..A-ah-", sounds of evident pleasure managed to flee from you. God, you always forget how good he is with his fingers. They're so long too-

Him using his fingers alone was enough to satisfy you. But his dick was on a whole new level.

"I'm sorry, but you're always so tight baby...I won't be able to fuck you if I don't do this..."

He ran his tongue across your sweet lips, your jaw line, this gentle gesture turning into aggressive bites, as his teeth ravaged your neck, leaving red marks on it. But as he'd known, this made you even wetter.

Your whimpers turned into loud moans, eyes tightly shut, as you got your first orgasm. Your legs shaking, as you caught your breath again.

"I think you're ready now."

He pulled your legs to wrap around his waist, as his tip teased your sensitive entrance unintentionally. His hands held you down by your arms as he began pushing into you, groaning a little. You threw your head back, in what you could only call ecstasy.

You felt like you'd explode if he moved inside you now. But that, of course, was inevitable.

As he pistoned in and out of you, he bent down, wrapping his arms around you to keep you above the water, his head buried in the valley of your cute little titties while the angelic sounds of your mewls and moans met his ears. He felt like he could stay like that forever, and ever and e-

"M-Meh-gumi-..!" Hearing you scream his name while you climaxed. That pushed him over the edge, as he came inside you.

That warmth, you could never get enough of it.

He breathed heavily against your chest, before catching you in one last rough kiss, holding you close as your walls milked him for what he was worth.

Pulling out of you slowly, he watched the white liquid come out of your little hole in small globs.

He felt like he could go again just at the sight of that, but his attention turned to your fucked out face. "So damn pretty..."

He knew you were exhausted, so a second round wouldn't be very considerate on his part.

His hand held you from the back of you head, gently pulling you towards him, hugging you tightly.

"I love you"

"Mnhhh..l-love you too, Megumi..."

...

Once you two were done bathing, he wrapped a towel around you, carrying you out into the living room in bridal style, making you take a seat on the couch as the TV played some unknown show with little dialog.

"How about we order Chinese today?"

He asked, slipping on a comfortable pair of clothes, and then begining to rummage through your closet to get you a pair of new panties and clothes as you replied with words of approval.

<3

[thanidiel]

Advent

After she and the Captain made it onto the Runner, she had vomited.

The Captain, Nenda? She had been at the wheel, her laughter a drawn-out husk. All four, now five, of those who had departed for this deal-turned-heist were ‘settled.’ And once they were ‘settled,’ she began to shake with a tremendous violence as her nerves eased, no matter how much the braided-haired Miqo’te had rubbed her shoulder and pressed water to her lips - according to Nenda. For Xiaohu had felt nothing, seen nothing, but the echo-light of the moon; reaching for her through the glass insistently, and yet, somehow, always out of reach.

She had vomited.

And after that, her shaking turned into a never-ending shiver as the cold metal of the… control-room? seeped into her body, and as the constantly churning air of the ship dried the gloss of sweat on her bare skin. The red-and-pink silk, the only thing now to her name, was insuffice beyond the comfort of the teahouse.

How long had she huddled there on the floor?

No one remembers, or no one cares to remind her of such weakness.

Nenda stood over her.

Had they already stopped?

No.

The world still rocked beneath her. The moonlight was still grasping for her in waves.

“Will you stand?” Kind, not mothering.

Xiaohu had looked up. Her breath caught.

An image; a mistake.

Something imagined that had squeezed in between the flickering frames of reality.

A killer’s eyes (Ichiro).

A mass of white hair (Ichiro).

A duty to be done - a betrayal to make example of (Ichiro).

Then (Ichiro)... Nenda.

She breathed in again.

“I will stand.”

And she had done so without assistance.

“Good.”

They had shoved another’s clothing into her hands after that, some other crewperson’s, after directing her to their showers. Picked from the most approximate of them, and yet it was still too big. Xiaohu had found a sort of grace in that, covering the endless swath of ink that consumed her body in trousers that had to be rolled up, and a shirt that hung down her thighs.

She had not wanted any of them to witness, but yet they had, earlier, with the way she had tied off her kimono around her hips to run through the darkness with their Captain.

She assured herself in that moment that they would never again.

A towering Roegadyn woman had walked her to where she would lay her head after that. She spoke as little as the Captain spoke much. This ‘Yellow Rose’ had merely unlocked an unused suite, pointing with her head for their ‘guest’ to enter.

Something that she had hesitated with, for never had Xiaohu been presented with both room and bed to herself alone. An epiphany in which sparked an absence of warmth on both sides of her arms, recalling to Yuko and Masae at the teahouse, in the hold of that ship that had sailed her across the Ruby Sea, to Mei and Chenglei sprawled beside her, to her youngest memories of Father and Mother sleeping with her and Jian squeezed between them.

When she eventually stepped through, both women nodded to one another.

The transaction completed.

She saw peonies on the dresser in the dying bar of hallway light; the door closing.

‒ ‒ ‒

“...this is up to you, and you alone.”

In a sort of silent gloom, Xiaohu had merely scooted to one side of the bed, patted the emptied space for Es’mena, and drooped the curve of her face into palm.

They did not speak. For how long that quiet settled between them, Xiaohu did not remember. She only remembered the barest presence of a gap, only closed between a firm, “Well?” from the nearby Miqo’te.

Her breath built in her cheeks, before billowing out in a sighing gust.

She didn’t bother utilising the Eorzean that the Captain’s address had come in. Her thoughts flew forth in Hingan.

“I can’t give you a good answer of where I go from here. I have spent nearly half of my life in that teahouse, ni mingbai? Before that, I was just a girl from nowhere. If I had to be honest, I don’t know how to survive out there. And even if I did, what happens when I’m identified? Who stands between me and them? I can tell you that, right now, that I think your Runner is my best bet, that I can at least do work here, but who are we to predict fate?”

And, of course, Nenda came right back in the same fluid tongue, with the confidence that she has always mired every word of her’s with.

"There is no predicting fate. Rather, you could argue that there is no such thing as fate. We can get into the long-winded arguments of if fate is real, if luck is real...but in the end? I say you make your own fate. It does not matter if you were a girl from nowhere, a princess, if you knew how to survive, if you were a blithering idiot - it does not matter. We can go into the hypotheticals: if you are identified, if you are caught, if they manage to find you, but that does not matter either. What matters is this: Do you want to be here? Do you want to learn? Do you want to make your own fate? If the answer for those is yes, then we figure out the rest as we go. And we go wherever the wind takes us."

Again, Xiaohu demanded a sort of silence without gesture nor voice - only in the way that her eyes left the person aside her to stare forward, at that dresser and those doomed, now glassed, peonies. But, subtly, there was a sort of tension working through her body. Her leftmost shoulder squared itself slowly, and her chin drew away from its rest. To a degree, she straightened herself; her gaze traveled up to the lonely window of the suite.

“I told you a saying when this all ‘started’. Opportunity knocks only once. I can either answer the door then, or I can ignore it and let it walk away. And I’ll wonder what could have come of that house-visit had I merely let it inside. So… I don’t think I’m of a mind to refute any of that right now. If a good wind comes, you go with it, not against it.”

“Going with the wind– not refuting me– doesn’t mean you want it, however…”

Their words stretched on, though, eventually, the Miqo’te departed, pulling door shut behind her.

‒ ‒ ‒

Though temporal and uncertain, the decision was eventually meted between her and Nenda.

Xiaohu would be a crewmember of this ‘Runner.’

Es’mena’s first order of business was to put a roll of coloured tape into her hands, pushing her off towards the cargo-hold. Anything that Xiaohu taped in their unused furnishings would be carried over to her new room by that braided haired woman, M’gumi.

That one, that one was a talker from the start. Arrow volleys of words, all rolled around with a too-loose tongue. The Doman pondered to herself, silently, of how Chinatsu would have responded if she had dared to be nothing less but perfect with her own speech. It made her scar ache in memory.

She did not respond in kind. Had not wished to, with the way her head buzzed and her stomache twisted with her nerves. Xiaohu had started off with short, clipped, answers, then dwindled down to none at all during the whole of the process.

Finally, her silence was mimicked by the tanned Miqo’te. The other’s curious, slightly begrudging glances, suited the thief’s tastes much better than conversation as she picked out what little Hingan furniture there was. Her thumb stroked down on each surface, planting dashes of red-tape to indicate each one she desired.

After that business had settled, they had walked in their quiet to the mess-hall. M’gumi was quick to break off - something that Xiaohu had felt to be a blessing at the time. The cargo-loader settled at the same table as the Roegadyn from before, and a trio of Xaela… Jin, there was a lot of Xaela. She spotted two more huddled together into one of the emptier corners of the room.

Two Hyur ate separate, and alone, from everyone else in different parts of the room: one with starkly red hair, and another with black hair and strangely violet eyes. The first broke into a lopsided grin seeing her, the other, the latter, regarded her in a cursory sort of fashion, like the Doman were something to quickly categorise and file.

Then she drew her gaze up to the window that separated this seating from the rear kitchens. A somber Miqo’te in all black, with eyes equally violet to the other woman, stood with his back to the wall aside that opening and his arms folded. He was quiet in a way that made her remember Eisen.

And, leaning out of that window, her arm flush against his, was a tall, pink, Viera. Where he was statue-like, this one was all intensity. She did not hesitate to gesture wildly to Xiaohu the moment their gazes met.

Though it did not show on her face, her heart sank with the weariness of interaction pressed on her weighted soul. For seconds, she did not approach; considering a retreat to one of the emptied suites and locking the door.

Yet, she did walk forward eventually. How could she not? It would not do good for her to reject such an overt gesture, especially with the wide grin spread over the apparent Cook’s face.

In the meantime, the Viera had turned around, rummaging around the counters over that window.

Xiaohu sucked in a breath when the woman she would know later as “E’leyna” had rounded back.

Her hands bloomed open like a lotus.

She felt her teeth drive against one another, her temples throbbing as decrepit memory contributed to the suffocating magnitude of her stress.

Not dabao, but miso, a thick, lava-like, miso, poured over steamed rice with a layer of lard glistening over the broth’s surface. A small bundle of blanched morning glory tucked itself against the side of the bowl.

A meal she’d had hundreds of time with Yuko.

Her wind came out in a sigh, one that E’leyna luckily processed as surprised gratitude.

“Go on, girl, sit down and have your fill! There’s a whole pot where that came from!”

She did not bother to speak much; using her newness as an excuse to simmer in silence. She had taken the bowl, inclined her head to this woman with a murmured “Thank you,” and sat down.

Curious glances from seemingly all corners of the room seemed to burn into her shoulders and back.

She ate slowly.

She had never had that privilege before.

She savoured ziyou more than the meal.

M’gumi had offered to escort her to her room from here once everyone had begun to filter out for their night’s rest. Softly the Doman declined, and threw in another ‘thank you’ with the bit of energy that the hot meal had given her.

After that, once the Miqo’te had disappeared down the hallway - Xiaohu wandered.

Another thing she had never had the privilege to do in Kugane, so confined she was to that teahouse or a man’s side.

There was no eyes on her, no one following her, no one guarding their asset; her. Nothing loomed over her shoulders as they once did. No restrictions, no threats. Just her and the empty halls.

She wandered - explored. Every nook, every cranny. From every crew-facility, to the engine room, the cargo hold, the navigation room, the spanning guest wings and all of those amenities, the viewing deck, and then out onto the open decks of the airship, this ‘Runner.’

She examined everything, and touched everything, and listened to the way the airship thrummed in different crooning tunes dependent on where one was, and where they were standing in particular.

She familiarised herself with aching, near-obsessive, intensity to this… residence.

Some were still awake; notably a blonde-haired woman, their engineer, who she had not seen before.

They did not speak nor look at one another.

At this point, the night was on the cusp of shifting towards new light. She made her way down the expanse of the crew quarters all the way to its very end. To the right, that is where that Miqo’te had dragged everything into.

The braided-haired woman had called it cramped compared to her apparent ‘nest’ in the bowels of the ship’s hold.

Xiaohu had nodded softly to that, as though in agreement.

Looking around now, her chest tightened with a queer sort of feeling.

These rooms they had been transferring her around in -  to her they were enormous in their privacy.

In Yanxia, she remembers, her family’s bedding has been strewn across the single-roomed floor of their home. Over the Ruby Sea, they packed people like layers of fish at market within the wooden bowels of the ship. In Kugane, they had a room of the teahouse that was as large as this ship’s lounge, of which tiny futons and small bags of personal effects lined the floor to squeeze a hundred’s half of women.

She did not know what to do with its space, until she had pulled at her shirt with intention to exchange her wear for the fresher articles of clothing that had been scrounged up for her. Instead of her ingrained pattern; of performing such a motion as swiftly as possible and immediately donning the new piece before anyone could truly observe her... Xiaohu paused, and executed the action unhurriedly.

The new crewmember allowed her own nudity - another first, to have herself this way, without another ready to devour her all right then, or in the next room pacing restlessly for her, or dozens of other women at her flanks in the water.

The last time she had been permitted this was years upon years ago. A decade, perhaps? No - even younger, which such a thing was the way of children.

Time waxed on in a meaningless sort of fashion as she turned and shifted constantly in the lantern light. She examined herself. Black swirled endlessly across her: over her breasts, her ribs, her stomache, dipping down past the crests of her hips to where her irezumi continued to lick down all the way to her knees. In her new mirror, she studied how that Tiger amongst blossom blooms raked across her back.

She decided she liked the way that only a part of her flourished in colour; like how tea bled into fresh water. The pink little flowers dotting thin wood, the stark red-lips of tayuu, the golden embroidery, and the jade of silk, stained across her right hemisphere; contained by the black ribs of the bodysuit’s ‘zipper.’

She had never truly been able to examine her soshinbori.

Xiaohu only remembered the agony that consumed her days when she was not entertaining, and the blood glossed over her skin. The sting of when Horigu’s apprentices would wipe at her with warm rags, then replace her bloodcoat with salve. The way clutching hands, and black hair, and shoulders, always covered it from view.

It was beautiful in a haunting way. It twisted her stomache with a keen anxiety even as her fingers stroked along the painstaking lines that had been punctured into her over the course of years.

An artwork birthed from captivity.

Footsteps shuffled along the hardwood floor, her new neighbors apparently retiring from a graveyard’s schedule.

In spite of the solitude provided by the thick curtains of their ‘doors,’ her breath stuttered again.

This was for her; never for anyone else ever again.

She looked across the empty, barren, floor of this little chamber.

This was all hers now, Es’mena had said.

Hers.

A foreign concept.

But not an opportunity she would leave unanswered at the step.

Her irreverence sparking, she dropped every article that had once been on her person right onto the ground than to establish any sort of rigid order.

Started the first engraving scratch of her mark that way.

Hidden, for now, behind the curtained doorway.

‒ ‒ ‒

In the months after, she showed a feline affinity - explorative, and cautious, and aloof. There at one moment, then quick to vanish when the crew’s attention shifted onto her. Those that attempted to coax her out with them to taverns or to speak with all of them at the mess or after meetings were rebuked until the requests all trickled into nothingness.

And then, suddenly, her comfort came crawling into rooms and conversations. Then, later, it stood unto its legs and padded forth. Once its joints were fully warmed, it started to sprint down the hallways of the Runner unabashedly.

It all fit in a way nothing else has before; in which she did not have to consciously think about it, nor had she ever in its earliest developments.

She grew in a fundamental pattern, like it all had been built up in her blood and muscle, and everything knew precisely where to go and how to navigate there like impulses through neural networks.

And it unraveled silently, of course, like how she silently performed every gesture of true note. That was what the Captain picked up on. That what was meaningful in her new crewmember was what she didn’t see at all, or only saw in the minute disturbances of dust; what was void, or if not void, left unspoken.

That much became evident when Nenda, herself, chose to swing into the mess hall one night, many moons into the Doman’s employment.

Some had already sorted out - for work, or rest, or solitude, both old and new.

The rest had all gathered around one of the long-tables pressed up against a wall, emptied of its dishes. Oosra, with tendrils of dreamweed smoke swirling around his head to press up against the wooden ceiling, his frame hunched over and fingers loosely intertwined. Gumi resting against the inside of Rose’s left arm, the Roegadyn straight-backed, but not tense, with that same arm hooked around the Miqo’te, the other arm resting atop her own thigh. Prisa lounging her weight against the table, a glass of liquor in the hand not sprawled across wood. E’leyna standing, leaning over them with her weight pressed into palms spread across the table. And Xiaohu sitting across the surface in front of them, her shoulder propped against the wall, a hip jutted out towards the Doctor, and one leg drawn up with the other foot oriented towards the Xaela at the end of the ‘line-up.’

All of the group present were at a level of ease that could only be familiar. Their varied volumes did not ring in cacophony throughout the soundspace of the room, but with a natural cadance. The quiet were quiet because they wished to, than because it was expected or they were drowned out, and the loud were loud because there was no need for shame in speaking freely and in full spirit.

In the newest of them, this ease seemed plucked out of chrysalis.

The vastness of her ink was bared, the black of it bracketing her belly and engulfing her arms where her half-shirt didn’t tread. Her body language was open, unconcerned, with something she had obsessively kept out of sight before.

Her features were unmuted, no longer suspended in a cautious manner of aloofness with her crewmates, but something animated and complex. The soft arches of her brows shifted in conjunction with tense, glinting, eyes - giving her a wicked, lazy, sort of playfulness sinking right down to sly lips.

And her words were neither hushed, nor clipped, nor politely ceremonial. The formality of her learned Hingan had surrendered for the loose tongue adopted from their Eorzean surroundings. Amidst the lilting chitter of the Viera’s shining warmth, Gumi’s wild laughter, the gravel of Oosra’s observations, Rose’s humoured assents, and Prisa’s dry quips: Xiaohu’s speech sprung out assertively, knowingly (for how could she not be anything but attuned to them) in precise strikes of wit. It all weighed from out of her throat with mellow affection, yet the barbed arrowheads still landed with full mordancy.

Then, when the swaying brightness of Es’mena’s tail drew everyone’s eye, a pause occurred; a dimming of everything, not like their vivacity was being folded and packed away, but like the intake of breath needed when one’s contentedness flushes up to an even more buoyant state.

As the chorus of greetings, silent or shouted, began and died, the brunette amongst them followed up with what was her version of such.

A sardonic drawl of, “Captain on deck,” which found it countered by the sobering sort of way the other woman liked to drag a cursory gaze from one’s head to their toes and mimicked,

“Doman on table.” The amused Miqo’te beckoned her off the furniture with two fingers.

“Why don’t you pour me a drink if you’re going to make yourself so comfy?” Es’mena punctuated with a toss of her head towards the kitchen door.

‒ ‒ ‒

It occurred in passing.

The night was quiet. Not in some foreboding or stifled fashion, but the quiet that blankets true comfort with the ek of one’s existence. The Runner was ‘empty’; docked. Only its crew settled within its ribs.

Xiaohu was awake despite the hour; she always was at the day’s bleariest points. It was in the tranquility of solitude, the world at sleep, where she enjoyed putting herself to busywork. This was the time that she would slip into the med-bay’s back office, running through the paperwork that Prisa had urged her to assist with earlier in the day, or bring to order the wild domain of the mess-kitchen before dawn, and E’leyna, arrived. This was the period on which the vacated suites were restored to frozen perfection, and found ‘goods’ for appraisal slipped into the engine room, to be passed into Es’mena’s office in the daytime.

This time, however, there was a change in the lonely, silent, routine of it all: the Captain was still awake, performing rounds of some sort around the ship’s interior. They had looked at each only briefly, comfortable with the temporal presence of the other.

Then– as she had brushed past the Miqo’te to continue her own activities– Es’mena spoke.

“Xiaohu.”

She stopped where she was, looking over her shoulder to the summer-haired woman.

“O’ Captain?”

There wasn’t a need to remind each other of past conversations, to frame context. They knew each other well enough; had this moment between them more times than they should have. The question proposed, thus, was simplified to its bare essence:

“Are you staying?”

Xiaohu fell into quiet once again. It was not in contemplation. It was not because she saw an endless, unknown, sea spread out beneath her feet and ahead of her. It was the hush of realisation, and retrieving the humour found in that.

She felt her face, involuntarily, break into a smile that crawled through her lips, to her cheeks, all the way to the muscles around her glinting eyes. She turned to face her Captain, moving a hand to perch along her own hip. With the other, she opted to drag its fingers through the soft mass of her hair, pulling the curtain of it away from where it had pooled over her collarbone to move over behind her shoulder.

She answered as though it were the lightest sentiment; the easiest thing in the world.

“Oh, fuck yeah.”

And with the echoing nod and clicking footsteps continuing on their way, the once-stranger moved on her own way, to her own destination.

Opened that door with the last reverberating knock of Es’mena’s presence.

[ @jessipalooza @she-wants-the-d20 @kinari for primary mentions: @rn-rp overall because I threw in most of the ‘preset’ characters we have.]

[jessipalooza]

Run Home

It is night. Stars sparkle in the colorful river that is a far away galaxy. Breeze drifts over and under the home that is never in one place for long. It does as is its namesake: it Runs. But this night, it Runs slowly, inching its way through the sky and over the stretch of sea and land below.

In the heart of that home, the lights are dim. Some are asleep and some are not. Some are wrestling with thoughts and jobs, while others are wrestling with one another and enjoying the fight. Some are in their beds, some are in their rooms, some are in their common areas with a book and cup of hot chocolate or something stronger. But six women are together and not wrestling at all, not with thoughts nor troubles nor people.

They sit in an empty bar with the lights turned low. Three bottles have been taken and opened: one whiskey, one wine, one benedictine. Music plays. Notes pull themselves free from the strings of a mandolin, played by deft fingers that only allow themselves to touch the instrument when they truly wish.

The women are comfortable. They are dressed not for work, whether that work by to placate guests or toe the wrong side of the law. These women are relaxed, especially in this place where it is just them. Especially with no one but each other.

Yellow Rose is in one chair with a smile on her face and her green eyes lidded. Her glass is on the table and in her hand is her namesake. She plays gently with the petals, her large hand soft and careful in this private setting. She does not have to guard and thus, she allows herself to be glass and not stone. She listens to the music, but laughs as the woman across from her makes a sly joke.

That woman, that jokester, is Prisa Fontaine. She is neither concerned nor tense as she often must be in her profession and position. She is not in her white coat and gloves, ready for illness or injury. She is in loose pants and a loose blouse. Her hands do not hold a clipboard or a scalpel; they hold a glass of benedictine. She is not lecturing, she is talking and laughing with a care that is not for patients, but for companions. Her feet are bare and tucked under the woman that sits beside her on the couch.

That woman that warms the doctor's feet is Xiaohu Cao. She too laughs at the joke and adds one of her own to follow. It is her usual demeanor, jesting at the expense of others, but her smile holds something so much warmer. The smile is subtle and in that subtlety is rarely found honesty. She allows herself to be without her painted face and trained hospitality, even as she looks to the woman beside her with a chuckled thanks as her drink is refilled.

That woman that pours the drinks is E'leyna Summerstorm. Her enthusiasm is dim, but that is the sign of her comfort and trust in this circle of femininity. She does not have to serve, but she does so because she loves the women with her. That affection is clear in her freckle-dusted expression of serenity. She is silently overwhelmed with the companionship that surrounds her and she feels at peace, even - or perhaps especially - as she is nudged by the woman beside her.

That woman is M'gumi Rahz. She is always at ease. It is natural for her to spill joke after joke, but she is not so in this setting. She is not the one joking, she is the one laughing. She allows herself to listen rather than talk. Her walls, built out of the stones of quick-witted conversation and the cement of self-protection, are down and pushed aside. In their place is little more than the fragile thing that is her trust and comfort. She enjoys the women. She enjoys the drinks. She enjoys the music. And so, she looks to the woman playing the mandolin to convey her appreciation.

The woman playing the mandolin is Es'mena Nenda. It is her fingers that are the deft and willful ones, plucking the strings of the instrument and filling the bar with a tune that speaks of the calm night. Though her gaze is down, her ears are forward-facing. She is listening to the jokes, to the conversation, to the laughter. She is not speaking and carrying on as she does when the lights are on and there is work to be done. Her heart is too full for that, and she trusts the women to not ask it of her. Her contribution, her show of this shared care and love, is the music.

Outside, there are stars twinkling and wind blowing. It is magic outside, but it is magic inside this home as well. Music. Laughter. Whispered gossip and jests. The clink of ice. The pour of drinks. The comfort of company as they and their makeshift family Run.

---

@rn-rp | @kinari | @pyrar | @thanidiel | @stormandozone | @she-wants-the-d20 for mentions

[pydoodles]

Commission for @thanidiel of @she-wants-the-d20‘s catte.

Thanks for the waffles. I was starving.

[uppermocns]

Megumi likes to fall asleep with you tucked up against his chest, your nose buried in his skin, so he can feel the gentle puff of your breath as well as hear it. He likes to drape his arm across your waist and often his legs tangle up in your in the middle of the night. This man loves to wrap himself up in you when he is at his most vulnerable, when he has no control. He trusts you to keep him safe, he trusts you to protect that fragile part of him with your boundless love. Megumi loves to wake up to you still nuzzled into him, he loves to wake you up with chuckles and gentle kisses against your cheeks and nose. He loves watching your brow furrow in your sleep and face scrunch at the annoyance. He heart hums in a gentle appreciation when your eyes open and are soaked with sleep and comfort. He kisses you had then, his tongue invasive and the fact that it's barely six am doesn't even occur to him. "M'Gumi," you slur in protest even as you meet every touch of his lips. "Sh, just lemme--," he breaks off because he is kissing you again, because he can't help it with how amazing you look with the weak morning sun painted across your warm skin. -Ramskull

you captured it perfectly… sometimes megumi gets so overwhelmed thinking about how much he loves you and he just has to kiss you, yknow?

[tangled-boughs]

The Staff of the Ashen Enclave would like to graciously thank everyone that attended the Gala this past sennight's end and made the event such a rousing success! It was truly heartening to see so many familiar faces as well as so many new ones come to join us.

To our partner organizations, The White Lotus Inn ( @frczalera ) , the Arcane Circle ( @the-arcane-circle ,)  the Midnight Pearl ( @themidnightpearl,) and the Ruthless Reign--  as well as our guest fortuneteller for the evening Miss Chakori Kha ( @crimson-sunrise-ffxiv ) and our own Sayyida Mol (@yidayidayidamol ) , thank you!  Your generosity of spirit and time is so deeply appreciated. Your expertise and talents made the evening all the brighter, and your displays and exhibitions are such a huge part of what has come to define this event.  We cannot wait to work more with all of you in the future, and are proud to call you friends.

To our generous donors, we are well and truly humbled and grateful. The Enclave is an organization run by the support of the community.for the community. Without our patrons, partners, and donors we would be unable to continue our Outreach, Open Clinic Hours, or Workshops.  With the generosity shown, we are proud to announce that we will be able to expand our medical facilities to a proper surgery gallery, and begin looking northward to establish a permanent Ishgardian Outreach center and outpost.  Particular thanks go to the generosity of F'cannah Yohko, Aulsoix Claimane and M'gumi.

And last but certainly not least, to the staff of the Ashen Enclave itself, thank you. This effort takes an entire organization, and it means the world to me that you all step up and help each turn.  I am truly blessed to call all of you friend -- and family.

Now, to rest a little, Enjoy Moonfire, reflect upon the Rising and regroup before we embark on our next great mission!

Ever humbled,

Milloux Allard

(( Aaaaaaaa THANK YOU EVERYONE! For spreading the word, for helping, for donating, for everything!  Last year, we decided to host the Gala as a celebration of a year of open clinic nights and two of the FC's existence in it's current state.  This year, we wanted to continue the tradition and give back to the community that continues to give us so much.

It's been five years this month since I started playing FFXIV as my main MMO, and four since I created Milloux. There's been a lot of ups and downs since then, but leading this FC has quite possibly been the highlight in my many years rping.

Thank you guys, for hours helping me plan and run the fashion show, for putting together the reign, for helping to man the raffle booths, to putting together a kick-ass playlist ( look @ u Otolin) just...thank you.   You all are the reason I do this. ;.; <3

ALSO, if you took any screenshots during the event, PLEASE SHARE THEM AND TAG US, I was once again too frazzled and busy to get any! ALSO ALSO - if you attempted to speak to Mill during the event and didn’t get much response, I AM SO SORRY. The chatscroll, she was real, and please know it was nothing personal!))

[shslskaterstormy]

hey if there's a hopeful/pregaming bandwagon I'll hop on it, even if I'm still not sure if I'll apply to da5 at all incidentally, I'm really busy and can't be bothered to round up a group shot of my characters, but I at least already had this which sort of works

[thanidiel]

Tiger’s Eye

Her first order of business was thoroughly wiping away the thick face of makeup she had applied earlier that evening. And in the expanse of time that took, she indulged herself by swishing her hand through the waters of never-again memories, catching the rare granules of pleasantness.

What she had applied this night was much lighter than the faces she chose back in Kugane, childlike in its simplicity, but warranting no less fondness. She liked the pearl-white and the deep rouge, and the black she outlined her lips and brows with.

It brought her back to the play she would have with the more bold, younger, women at the teahouse when her duties for Lady Chinatsu did not require her subtlety. The maquillage they would apply to one another: theatrical and artistic, brazen and improper, provocative in the way that drew ‘anger’, then later hungry curiousity from strangers when they would perform their work thereafter.

Those were the moments in which she laughed most, Yuko, and Masae, and Hirose, too. Even Chinatsu or the infrequent presence of the Oyabun would come upon them, and chuckle at their antics. There would even be some moments where the dark form of Tsukumogami would settle onto her knees aside them, critiquing a girl’s symbolism of a flower in the way she drew red across her upper lip. Or reaching out herself to thin or widen lines when another sought to emulate the opera face of some infamous queen or concubine of past eras. Or look upon her, and the way she used to emphasise a feline, daunting, sort of welcome in her eyes and brows - and unsheathe a smile that would make her blood chime like crawling ice in retrospect.

It was the sort of activity that most everyone found some form of pleasure from.

But never their elder sisters, oh no! Not the women who walked with a tilt to their chins and tucked their sleeves together as though they could ever be stately. They kept as natural as possible like the geiko would, chastising them that, ah! Brash Little Tiger! Hingan palates will always prefer what is allowed to distinct itself plainly than what is cloyed with detractor upon detractor. Would you not cease waylaying your sisters?

And while they all were outside of the hearing of men, she would slyly carry her reply, heavy with laminated meaning, that no one except the repenting could truly stomache anything ‘pure’ that didn’t have salt and honey doing all of the work.

As the last of the clouded water drained down the basin, Xiaohu was struck by an idle wonder on if her ‘elder sisters’ on the Runner would tolerate such a thing more.

Perhaps Es’mena and E’leyna. They’d fit having that sort of spirit painted clear on their faces.

After that, it was a short walk down the hallway to push through the red-curtain that closed off her room.

She appreciated that she had the foresight to have laid out a long sleeved shirt and loose trousers for herself even when Rose and Gumi were urging her that they ought to leave. Once she sat down on the bed, she had little intention to leave it for any amount of time.

The long-gloves were pulled off first, stacked atop of one another and tossed to fall over the foot of the bed frame for now. Then she eased out of each stocking to crumple onto the dark rug below. After that, it was a swift slide of her thumb and pointer finger to unbutton her vest and loosen it one arm at a time to fall atop of the other articles.

Was she dressing down? Or up? Technically, she’d be ending with about triple the coverage than she started with.

That’d be a joke to file away next time she and Gumi stumble upon any similar topics.

Soon she was unclasping the pearls wreathed around her, to be returned into the jewelry box placed down next to the foot of her silk rack.

Then… ah, the Seeker’s gift.

Her thumb followed along the thin, deceptively strong, links of black metal - from close to the back of her neck, by its clasp, all the way down to the pendant at its lowest point.

Red tiger’s eye framed in the same metal. She liked the way its deep sort of ruddiness and its smooth, striped, surface held a roused and rich sort of energy to its look.

Very Xiaohu, through and through.

So absolutely not a coincidence.

She could even pinpoint the two instances in which the Miqo’te had picked that up, her previous moniker. The bar; the bridge. One enunciation filled with mockery; the other with a fatigued melancholy.

“Little Tiger.”

It had to be that perceptiveness, and those little expressions, that tuned her in. She’d almost never met any foreigner that comprehended the tongue this name was birthed from.

Did she mind?

She couldn’t tell.

So she spent some moments mulling that over, rolling it around her mouth like expensive tea, as she looped the gift to hang down from the head of her bed-post. Then more moments after that while she pushed herself through her sleepwear.

She was certainly surprised - and still found herself so. Surprised that the crew was in such a unanimous spirit to give her gift after gift for the mere sake of doing so. Surprised that Gumi caught onto that seemingly ‘minute’ hint of significance. Surprised that everyone has been paying as much attention to her as they do.

It all served to cement that she’s been forging bonds, much like the older woman has done in interlocking what was once pliable metal - squeezing in a firm permanence with a press of her tools on each malleable link. Which she’s been… accepting, and going with the flow of it, just fine. Why ought she to deny the gravitation she felt towards more than some members of the Runner?

Probably because she’s still feeling conversations with Adrian, and Avenai, and Es’mena, in her hinds, even with the way she’s begun to steady some in her course of action here on out. 

She could stay in the treeboughs, with everyone else. And it’s probably the smartest fucking move she could be making right now.

She could.

She should.

But if that burns, or gets close to, or the trunk shudders and tilts…

Would her landing run go as it should?

Or would she look over her shoulder, for them, and have her legs give out underneath her?

The tiger’s eyes only guards what it gazes towards.

She sought out the stone in the darkness once she felt the sink of her pillow underneath her.

It answered back with a dull reflection.

@she-wants-the-d20 @jessipalooza @stormandozone @kinari @ocarina-of-what

[thanidiel]

Prompt Seventeen: “Obeisant”

She urged Gumi to help her nail a little prayer altar into her wall, a few months after she was onboard.

She liked the look of it; it was fancy, with that lacquered blackwood and the intricate little bronze incense-burner that dragons spiraled out from, and the little polished plates that fruit ought to be held in. Empty, and thus uninhabited, which gave it a sort of strange, ethereal, sense to her.

The altar back in Yanxia was several levels more humble. All it comprised itself of was a clay pot, that in ‘legend’, Mother had made in the sun and river then placed onto the floor opposite of their bedding, on its own straw mat. She does not remember any time in which its belly was not full of ashes and little red sticks where the incense had burned all the way down; much like the zu and other wandering jin that Father would attest for.

She remembers, when little Hui was exceptionally bored as a young child and Eldest Brother pretending he was ‘too old’ to play with her, how she would run her fingers through the cold, silken, ash mound. She would create mountain ranges, valleys, rivers, and plains, with deft strokes of her tiny hands through the soft particles.

The lack of that, the ashes, is probably what makes her current altar feel so alluringly frigid to her; stifling the tingling embers of a decade’s untouched home.

If there were any.

No reverence; no zu.

She has always thought it is the dumbest shit that one’s zu only come out when you feed and house them, and only appreciate it when you do it regularly, at that. ‘else they lose their shit and turn into gui.

Bratty, is what that is, like shriveled ayi. 

Perhaps they are practicing for the afterlife.

She lays sprawled out atop the fluffy white comforter covering her bed, oriented towards its feet and her head half-resting on the mattress. Her hair spills over the side. And she has been in this position for some time, her gaze keeping both that dormant altar, and a pack of incense the drunkard Miqo’te had thought to purchase to match the shrine, in sight.

Xiaohu feels her lips twist into a pout - then relax shortly after from the disruption of Shale’to opening another bottle down the hallway.

Truthfully, it’s not that she doesn’t have deference for the jin. She would call herself a faithful person, at least in thought and theory.

She just isn’t sure it’s worth the hassle to invite them and go the full malm.

The zu would be pissed at her if they weren’t already cursing her name and Mother’s womb up the generations to the first Zhen.

Abandoned filial duties; check. Cuts her hair; check. Shaves everything else; check. Tattooed, practically, her whole body; check. Unabashedly out of touch with nature; check. Doesn’t watch her hot and cold energies; check. Ruined the family name for the next few generations until they all forget Zhen Hui who fucked up everything; big-fucking-check.

She could keep fucking going to herself.

Instead, against everything, she swings her feet off of the bed to stand up. And, almost angrily, she snatches up that incense pack off of the table.

Goes through the whole motions of pulling one out, then ‘clearing her mind’, then lighting it, letting it burn some before carefully moving the delicate stick about, letting its smoke disperse through the room. She was supposed to be conscientiously thinking about their zu now, or any other sort of jin she wanted to revere. But if she had to be honest; she didn’t remember the old names anymore of those who came before. Just vague bits and pieces of their feats.

So she thinks of Father who did this every sunrise and every sunset, and how his loam hair flowed down his person then, for he had not tied it up yet, and his long beard and his strong brows made him look like a dragon that has just burst from the seamist, more than he looked a farmer. She thinks of his prominent, ‘fat’, sun-shaped cheeks and how the way they engulfed his face made his eyes look like he was always humoured. And she thinks of his deeply rich, brown, skin and how her’s was so much shades paler.

She didn’t even know if he is dead or not. That’d be another checkmark, having never performed the needed grieving rituals. But it is what comes strongest. Perhaps it’s intent that matters with this sort of thing, he was dead in practice to her after all.

Maybe he’d feel it.

She wonders if he still loved her memory enough to accept this.

She places that lonely incense stick into the inside of that untouched burner, watches the column of ash that had been precariously balanced atop of the band of traveling heat collapse into the bronze inside.

And then she reaches over, carefully locating that heat between her thumb and finger. 

Extinguishes it.

Despite the brief pain, and the swelling that would send into her soft skin.

She pulls out the stick, tossing it onto the growing paper-trash collected on that roundtable. Then Xiaohu grasps the metal pot by one handle, tilting it to settle onto its side as she reaches in with her burned hand, wiping out every grain of the minute ash offering.

Better not.

[thanidiel]

🎉

Survival of the fittest quickest!

She wasn’t going to pass up the chance; had positioned herself just so to see if Fate would bring this little humour into its home. Let everyone rope their arms around the shoulders of their friends and partners in preparation, let the countdown roar down and tremble from their throats. 

It wasn’t too out of character for her to sometimes pull away, almost alone, much like her feline namesake. So no one questioned the solitary, tiny, thing, amidst the clumps of the Runner.

What was out of character, or perhaps the most characteristic feat of her by far, was the lunge right on the heels of ‘Two…!’ while Gumi was just beginning to lazily cant her head towards her kneeling lover.

Right at the conclusion of the countdown, Xiaohu had timed it to sweep right in, catching the Roegadyn full on the lips as the Miqo’te’s own attempt had been diverted to land on the flowing red of her ink-dragon. 

An action of which had unfurled strangled cries from both women, then bursts of laughter around them as Rose took on a quiet, wry, smile and Gumi had taken to playfully scolding the much younger woman.

“Never said I wouldn’t one day get in the middle of the relationship!”

@kinari @she-wants-the-d20

[thanidiel]

Jumpsuit - Have you ever been arrested/ in trouble with authority?

The young woman offers a sidelong glance to the question, soft brows curving into a sharp mischief. Weight presses onto her elbow as she leans in towards the stranger invited to their table, her voice dipping into a drawling conspiracy,

“Oh, absolutely. You’ve caught me, buddy; I’m all trouble. Gotta put this pretty face away before the streets are all in a tizzy.”

The Roegadyn across the table could be heard offering a quiet, warmly sarcastic, “So modest…” as the much smaller Miqo’te cuts in with a snort,

“Nyeeh. If ya getting in trouble, s’cause ya’re a talky brat.”

[Xiaohu has never gotten in trouble with law enforcement, but could be considered to be in... disfavour with the Hingashi underground.]

@unabashedrebel @kinari @she-wants-the-d20