#man I love writing this tv demon there are so many fun things to play with

[sneezingfetishftw-fics]

Insufferable (1/7)

My sick!Vox fic is finally up, or at least part 1 is! Decided to break into what I think will be 2 chapters. Featuring an insufferable bastard, plus caretaking from the Vees.

Next chapters: 2 3 4 5 6 7

Wavs: 1 3

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“Why are the lights so fucking bright in here? Are you trying to give me a headache?” Vox was often a bit of an insufferable prick, but today he was far worse than usual. His interview for Voxtech Angelic Security was just an hour away and he’d already managed to insult pretty much everyone in the room. The lights dimmed, he returned to a previous complaint. “And why haven’t you turned the AC colder already? It’s like a sauna in here!”

“The AC is already as cold as it goes, sir.”

“Then fix it! God, what am I even paying you for?” He paused, then pulled out his cell phone. “Hey Val, are you free right now? I got an employee I’d like you to knock some sense into—or rip the limbs off of, whichever you prefer. I could do it myself, but I know how much you enjoy that thing.”The employee shuddered. “Great, thanks! See you soon.”

Vox looked around. “Where is my water bottle? There should be one on the interviewing desk. Is anyone around here doing their goddamn job?” Another employee rushed over with a water bottle. “Finally.” He took a sip and immediately grimaced. “Where did you get this? Normal water doesn’t scrape my throat like that! Disgusting.” He threw the water bottle aside, pausing only to make sure the lid was on first.

He took a deep breath, which immediately triggered a coughing fit, his voice crackling like a broken speaker. His screen went grey and fuzzy, static flaring with each cough. “Who did the last maintenance on the filtration system?” A sheepish woman stepped forward. “Fix it! Actually, no. Get out. You’re fired. The air is so thick in here I can hardly breathe.” She hung her head and wandered off. It wasn’t like she was the first to be fired on a whim, and at least Vox didn’t literally tear people apart. “I’ll take a look at it along with the AC, then, sir,” the employee from earlier offered.

“You’d better. But don’t think that’s enough to save you,” Vox said, standing so close the employee could hardly hear anything over the fan. “Val’s still on his way.” The employee gulped.

Valentino began shivering the moment he stepped in the door, but he ignored that and made a beeline for Vox. “Where’s the victim?” he asked with a grin.

Vox pointed to the man cowering in the corner. “He won’t fix the AC.” Val nodded, still shivering. “He says it’s already as cold as it can go, but I’m boiling here!” Val raised an eyebrow at that. A loud whirring started as Vox’s fans kicked in.

Val put a hand on Vox’s forehead, and jerked it away almost immediately. “Amorcito, you’re incredibly hot!”

“Save it for later, Val,” Vox chuckled.

“No, I mean it’s hard to believe how much you’re overheating. And in a freezing room, no less. I thought my hand was going to burn!” Vox crossed his arms and shook his head. “I mean it, Vox, you’re obviously running a fever!”

“Shut up. I’m fi… hi…” his screen flickered with each hitch. “Hi’tzzzcht! Fine.”

“Sir?” The employee raised a finger tentatively, regaining some boldness now that neither of them was ripping him apart. “One of the lights just broke.”

“Why the fuck are you telling me? Just fix it! Ugh, it’s a wonder anything gets done around here.” He gave a long sniff, trying to stave off the buzzing tickle. “And send a cleaning crew in. It’s way too du… huh… huh… hut’TZZZZSHT! Dusty in here.”

“We just cleaned yesterday…” the employee said weakly, trying not to look at the speaker that had just popped.

“I didn’t ask you when the last cleaning was, I asked you to clean the damn studio! Now get on with it before I change my mind and let Val rip your arms off.”

“Yes, sir. Sorry, sir.” The employee practically ran off to begin his tasks as Val gave a toothy grin, looking menacing despite the intense shivering.

“There you go. I’ll be back here for the sound check. And this place better be fucking spotless.”

Vox and Val walked out the door. “I’ll catch you at the penthouse,” Vox said, activating his teleportation powers. He only made it a few feet. “Hhh’dzzzzcht!” The hallway lights flickered.

“How about we walk together?” Val offered, wrapping his arm around Vox. Vox sighed, but it wasn’t like he had a choice. Repeatedly teleporting a few feet at a time sounded even more annoying than walking. While they walked, Val pulled out his phone with his free hand to text Velvette. “Meet at the penthouse ASAP.”

Velvette almost dropped her phone when she saw the pair of them walk through the door. “Walk” was actually a bit of an overstatement. Vox was practically staggering, leaning heavily on Val for support. His screen was dimmed, except for a bright spot in the center where his nose would be, if he had one. His fans were still whirring loudly. His normally immaculate suit was wrinkled, as if he’d crumpled in on himself repeatedly. The man was, quite obviously, a mess.

Velvette stared in silence for a moment. “Wow. He really does look awful, doesn’t he?”

Vox glared. “I’m fine. I’m just taking a quick break before the studio’s ready for my interview. Those morons still have a lot to set up.” The pair stared at him.

“Um, Vox? You sure now is the best time for an interview?” Velvette asked.

“I’m fine,” he insisted, his hypnotic eye swirling so slowly it might as well be a broken Ferris wheel.

“Right,” Velvette said, rolling her eyes as Vox’s screen flickered again. “Totally fine, and definitely not about to sneeze.”

“I’m not going to… hih’tzzzzch!” He opened his mouth to protest more, but no sound came out. Damn it, were his audio drivers glitching too? Or was it just his vocal cords? He smacked the side of his head with a grimace. “The interview has to be today. If I delay it, it’ll look like we’re hiding something.” Thank god that worked. Vox without his voice was… well, he really didn’t want to think about that.

Velvette raised an eyebrow. “You literally just smacked yourself in the head cause you couldn’t talk. You really think you’re in a good state to be giving an interview?”

Vox’s screen brightened for a moment. “I’m fine! It’s fixed now.” His screen dimmed again, then started flickering. “I’m perfectly heal… heh… hhh… healthy! Just let me go to the godda… ehh… ahh… hah’TZZZZSHT! The goddamn interview.” Valentino’s phone instantly shut off. Velvette, seeing this, clutched her phone tightly to her chest.

Val tried turning his phone back on, but it was unresponsive. “You broke my phone, Vox. You broke my fucking phone! What else are you gonna break if you go back in there?”

Vox frowned. Loath as he was to admit illness, it really was in his best interest to minimize property damage. Especially with a live audience.

“I’ll do the interview,” Velvette offered.

Vox gave a laugh that quickly turned into a coughing fit, his screen a sputtering mess of static again. “No offense, Velvette, but I’m pretty sure you’re not familiar with the ins and outs of the system.”

“And I’m pretty sure you’re not recognizing you don’t have a lot of options. Would you rather send Valentino?”

The other two recoiled at the suggestion. “God, no!” Vox replied. “Ugh, I guess if you really want to, go knock yourself out. My notes are on that tah… hhh… ahh… hah… hah’TDZZZCHT! Tablet.” Said tablet was now stuck in bluescreen. “Shit.” He rubbed his aching head, trying to think.

“Are the notes backed up like the rest of your files?” Vox nodded, not even trying to speak this time. “I can pull it up on my phone, then. I’ve got this. Backbone of the Vees, remember? You just stay here and get some rest,” she said, blowing a kiss as she left.

Velvette strutted out the door, taking with her the responsibility that had been keeping Vox together, and it was like a switch had been flipped. Vox immediately plopped himself down on the couch, limbs dangling limply. “Everything huuuurts, Val.”

“I know, Amorcito, that’s why I’m here.” He gently stroked Vox’s arm. “Now, is it really everything? Or can you be a bit more specific so I can actually help you?”

Vox’s mouth moved, but no words. A frown. A throat clearing sound. More mouth movement, still no words. A deeper frown. A self-inflicted smack on the side of the head. Still no words. The fans kicked into high gear as Vox was about to spit steam out of his head.

“Shh, gentle, Voxy. Let’s try not to blow out the power grid again, hm?” Val patted Vox’s screen. “I’ll get you something for your throat.” He searched through the fridge for some Gatorade. Electrolytes had to do something for an electric being, right? In the absence of any speech from Vox, the fans were even more noticeable. Better grab a cold compress from the freezer too, then. He placed the cold pack on Vox’s screen and handed him the bottle. Vox took a sip and shook his head. His voice still failing him, Vox made images appear on the screen. Val blinked, trying to figure out what he was looking at.

“Something wrong with the drink?” A nod. “Tastes bad?” Head shake. Val tried to think what could possibly be wrong with a drink. “Too liquidy?” Vox rolled his eyes. “Wrong color?” A facepalm. “Uh… too cold?” Vigorous nodding, and then a wince and a dizzy expression. “I got it. Just rest here, Vox. I’ll find you something.”

Val returned a few minutes later with a steaming mug of tea. Vox’s screen was dim and pale, the colors washed out. His weak fingers could barely grasp the handle of the mug. “Oh, Voxy, you poor thing,” Val said, his wings wrapping around Vox for support. The steam from the drink got into Vox’s vents and his screen started flickering. Val noticed immediately and set the mug on a nearby table, holding Vox through the buildup.

“Hhh… hhhh… hhh… hhht’dzchhht! Hhhh’zzzzch! Hhh’ZZZZZSHT! Htchh’RRRRGZZZZZZT! Ugh.” The demon clawed at his throat, then paused in realization. “Fucking hell that hurt!” He winced. “Talking hurts.” Still, better to have a functioning voice, he supposed. He gestured to the mug, and Valentino handed it to him. He took a sip, grimaced, and then finished the rest of the mug in one gulp. Val surveyed the room and realized that a few of the TV screens were out. “Let’s get you into bed, hm?” Vox raised an eyebrow. “Not like that! Unless you want to, of course…” he added, licking his lips. Vox shook his head, exhausted. Val led Vox to the bedroom, the TV clinging hard to the moth as he took a few shaky steps. Val paused, then nodded to himself. He hoisted Vox over his shoulder, ignoring the spluttering protests. “Amorcito, you can barely walk. Let me carry you for a bit.”

Vox huffed, and Val felt the static shock. “You could at least have the decency to carry me like your partner instead of, I don’t know, a corpse?”

Val chuckled. “Have you seen yourself, darling? You practically are a corpse at this point.” Still, he switched to bridal carry.

After what felt like an eternity, dragged out by Vox’s complaining that he was on death’s door, they finally reached the bed. Val laid Vox down and sat next to him. “Now then, does everything still hurt? What can I get you?”Vox’s lips moved silently, then rapidly into what Val assumed to be a string of curse words. Hard to tell without audio. Val sighed. “You really are feeling awful, aren’t you?” Vox nodded. Val stared at Vox for a while until the moth’s singular brain cell finally came up with an idea. He blew a puff of smoke in Vox’s face. Vox flinched, and his screen flickered rapidly. “Hhh… hih… hhhh’dzzzzzzcht! Hih’tzzzzsh! Hah’TZZZZZCHT! TZZZSH! Tzzzsch’TZZZZZST’dzTZZZZZSSHHT! What the fuck, Val?” He rubbed his throat. “Oh. Uh… thanks, I guess? I don’t know. That fucking sucked.”

“If you’d rather not repeat that, then I suggest you get your words out now before you lose your voice again.”

Vox scowled, but he knew it was a valid point. “I just… I’m sore all over. It’s not fair! What did I do to deserve this?” Val raised a finger. “Besides everything that got me into hell.” Val shrugged. “Ugh… my throat hurts, my head hurts, all my muscles ache, there’s this constant buzzing in the back of my head that won’t go away, everythig is blisterigly warmb whatever I try… oh for fugck’s sake, I get congestiod dnow too? Ughhhh…” He groaned and rolled over, faceplanting into the bed.

Val tutted sympathetically. “You never do anything half-assed, do you?” Vox nodded, dragging his screen across the blanket. “Vox, if you’re feeling so warm, why are you still wearing all those clothes?” A pause. Vox wasn’t sure how to respond to that. “There’s no image you need to keep up right now, Vox. Let’s get you comfortable.” Vox sat up and let Val get to work. The crumpled suit was set on a nearby chair. The sweater and shirt were pulled off and tossed to the same chair, Vox dropping his arms instantly the moment he no longer needed to put in the energy to keep them up. The shoes were removed and the pants taken off and folded up with care. As soon as it was done, Vox collapsed face down into the bed again, breathing heavily from the effort.

“You said you’re sore all over, would you like a massage, Amorcito?” A thumbs up. Val got up to find the massage bar. They’d found that using a more solid form helped avoid any accidents… they did NOT need a repeat of the time poor Vox got massage oil stuck in his vents. Val began massaging Vox’s arms, but paused when he felt Vox’s shoulders shudder.

“Hhhh’dzzzzzzchmp!” The sound was muffled into the bed. Vox slowly dragged himself up until he was facing Val. “Hit’chZZZZZZZCHT!” Sparks flew from Vox’s screen and landed on Val’s arm.

“Keep your sparks to yourself, Vox!” he said, wincing at the static shock. “Hmm… that might explain the electronics failures…”

“Sorry, Val.” He said, rubbing his screen. “Wasd’t expectig it to comb that fast.” He gave a long sniff. “Hhhhh’dZZZZZZT!” He pointed at the massage bar. “Can you put that away? I think the scent is too strong right now, my sensors must be acting up.”

Val switched to an unscented massage bar and resumed the massage. A few soft moans from Vox let Val know that his attempts were effective. Eventually the sound dropped off entirely, except for the occasional sneeze, which Val assumed meant the video demon’s voice had given out again. After a while, there was no sound at all except for congested breathing. Val gently turned Vox on his back, revealing closed eyes. Val breathed a sigh of relief. The man was much less exhausting when he was unconscious. Maybe now both of them could get some rest.

[flippinpancakes64]

Can you write about Bella loving horror movies, but the Cullens don't have a good tolerance to horror?

When Tastes Differ

I had such a hard time coming up with a name for this so… don’t be too harsh

Also sorry I haven’t uploaded in forever, it’s mid-semester exam season and it’s been kicking my butt

And we’re not gonna talk about how this has been sitting in my drafts for like half a year

Anyways thank you for requesting and I hope you enjoy!

Even before being turned, Bella always had a thing for horror movies

When she met Edward, she didn’t really have much time to watch them

Being obsessed with someone tends to take up a lot of your free time

But now that she’s a vampire and Renesmee is grown up, she has more ‘me’ time

Edward:

Tonight is date night, and Bella had asked if she could pick the movie

He said yes of course

But he’s shocked when she puts on an old slasher film that he remembers premiering in theaters

“Bella… what is this?”

“My favorite movie duh.”

“Eugh.”

He’s not a fan of all of the fake blood and guts

He’s a dark and brooding vampire

He has the whole emo ‘my life is darkness why would I want to watch more darkness’ thing going on

Don’t get me wrong though, he does still sit and watch them with her

He just wouldn’t ever choose it on his own

And he makes fun of them the whole time

Alice:

She’s been in the fashion world a long time

I would bet good money that she’s worked on a movie set before

So when she walks into a room and sees Bella watching a horror movie she’s just like ‘omg I was a costume designer for this one’

But she doesn’t really care about blood and guts

They’re not her favorite movies, but she’ll watch them

She loves Bella so whatever she wants to do, she’s happy to do it

She does make a lot of comments about the makeup and hair though

“That girl’s been running from the killer for like an hour now how is her hair still bouncy?”

Jasper:

He doesn’t really… care

He strikes me as the type who can sit and watch anything on the TV and not care at all

So if he’s in the living room and Bella asks if she can put on a movie he doesn’t care

He’s also quiet

Doesn’t complain, doesn’t say he likes it, nothing

He doesn’t laugh if there’s funny parts, doesn’t jump if there’s a Jumpscare

He’s like a statue

But hey at least he doesn’t disturb anyone

Rosalie:

Ok so

She loves horror movies

They’re so fun

But she can’t let Bella know that

They still have that little rivalry going on

So every time Bella puts on a horror movie, Rosalie makes a point of walking in and being like

“I can’t believe you watch that kind of stuff. It’s so gross.”

Of course, Edward told her the truth about what Rosalie’s doing

So she makes a point of putting on all of the newest ones that Rosalie hasn’t had a chance to watch yet

And if Rose happens to stand around at the back of the room silently watching the movie where she think Bella can’t see…

That’s no one’s business but her’s

Emmett:

He will never ever admit it

But this man is a big scaredy cat when it comes to horror movies

No one can explain it

But this big, scary man absolutely cowers at the thought of Chucky

So he’s not too happy to say the least when Bella starts watching horror movies all over the house

He plays the role of being super nonchalant

“Dude, turn that off.”

“Why? Are you scared?”

“What? No…”

No one’s convinced

Bella’s made it her personal mission to catch him as many times as she can

He’s almost home from the store? Time to put on a good old fashioned horror movie

He’s returning from a hunt? Time for Chucky

He wants to watch the game on the big TV? Okay, but Bella needs to finish the Shining first

Esme:

She’s also not a big fan of horror movies

But I feel like she’s way more scared of paranormal horror

Anything with ghosts terrifies her

After all, if vampires and werewolves are real, who’s to say demons and ghosts aren’t?

So if Bella’s watching a regular old slasher film, she’ll complain but hang out anyway

Now if she’s watching something like Lights Out or the Grudge…

Esme suddenly needs to go on a shopping trip

Carlisle:

He thinks they’re fun

He deals with blood and guts all day, and he’s endlessly amused by the fake stuff that movie producers make

Loves pointing out all the wrong parts

“Blood is not nearly that viscous, unless they had *insert medical condition here*”

I think Bella would appreciate the lessons here and there though

Now after a while, it does get a little annoying

But that’s her father in law and I feel like Bella would probably rather shoot her own foot than disrespect him in any way

[possibly-in-mordland]

What They Dress Up As For Halloween & How They Spend The Holiday

Masterlist

Post Type: Headcanons

Warning(s): Drug Use, Alcohol Use

A/n: Just some headcanons for spoopy day

==========

Nathan:

Goes all out on a demon costume and you can't change my mind

Quite a bit of fake blood (obvs)

Eats some candy, mostly eats chips

His favorite movies to watch during this time of the year are Rob Zombie, Stephen King, and Clive Barker movies and you can't change my mind

Doesn't do too much else

Pickles:

It varies, back during his SnB days he dressed as a playboy bunny one year. And then another time he dressed as a pickle (self-explanatory)

But this time? This time he had the bright idea to grab one of those inflatable dino outfits

Probably spends the night getting high and drinking

BUT!

Instead of smoking, he's taking edibles

And stuffing himself with candy

While watching shitty b-list horror movies like Auntie Lee's Meat Pies or I Drink Your Blood (aka two of my favorites)

Skwisgaar:

Either dresses as an elf or a vampire (or The Rum Tum Tugger from Cats 1998)

This time he chose to dress as Lestat

He spends time in his room playing guitar (any surprise?)

But also binges movies like Casper and Hocus Pocus

*Insert Skwisgaar dancing to Get Down Goblin*

Also carves a pumpkin (and fails)

"bUt sKwIs iS sErIoUs!!!"

He's a goofball, just a dignified goofball who pretends to be serious

Secretly gets a pumpkin spice latte from Starbucks

alright im having too much fun with this

Toki:

Dresses up as Mister Mistofolees from Cats 1998

Eats way too many sweets, Charles made sure they were sugar-free, but that didn't stop Toki from getting a major tummy ache

Probably spends the night alternating between Halloween episodes of shows, children's movies, and quality gore-fest horrors

Some notable things he watched: The entire Spongebob Squarepants Halloween DVD, Casper, Hocus Pocus, Earnest Scared Stupid, Human Centipede, Basket Case, etc

Murderface:

THis man doesn't want to dress up too much, so he puts on some devil horns and attaches a devil tail to his belt

Def eats x3 his weight in candy

Does the thing where he watches some jump-scare-filled horror movie and has to sleep in Pickles' room

Charles:

Totally dresses as Westley from The Princess Bride

(omg im imagining it and 💦, i might need to write a smut piece later ft him dressed as Westley)

Doesn't gorge himself on candy, but he does treat himself a little bit

He's one of those people that loves black licorice (aka me) and candy corn (aka not me)

Puts on a horror movie while he works (still dressed as Westley)

Knubbler:

Initially, I was gonna write Toki dressed as Mad Hatter (bc imagine him having a s/o who dresses as Alice omg so cute), but another time

Knubbler dresses as the Mad Hatter (specifically Johnny Depp's Hatter, but I can also see him attempt Andrew-Lee Potts' Hatter)

His eyes make it all the madder

His favorite Halloween candy is Twix, but he also enjoys Sour Patch Kids

Probably watches at least one horror movie

Magnus:

Dresses as a pirate, and you can't change my mind

Of course, this was probably to infiltrate Dethklok's Halloween party

But if he was with someone (or if this was after Doomstar), he probably just stays home and hands out treats to kids

Eats a couple pieces of candy, but then just has one of those microwavable TV dinners

And watches horror movies (Saw, Hellraiser, etc)

==========

[astaroth1357]

request: an MC thats very good w playing games or like,,, is proficiently skilled in all game categories or smrhn

alsp hi xander i love ur writing

and can i giv u a kith? if so: mwah 😚

Well I hate to tell ya, sweetie, but I’m not Xander. I’m Jazzy. Hello! I can see why you’d want something written by Xander, though. He’s mad talented (better at this than I am quite frankly) and he’s on the list of people I wish I could write as well as. I guess we can both take a moment to be sad that I’m not Xander… *sigh*... to be Xander… 😔

Oh well, I am who I am and I don’t begrudge that fact. Meanwhile, I’ve wanted to do more shout-outs so everybody go read @sevendeadlymorons! If you’re not… I mean… why not? He’s more than worth your time. In the meantime, I hope I can entertain you despite my not-Xanderness.

Brothers React to an MC Who’s Good at Games and Stuff 

Lucifer

Honestly couldn’t care less about the MC’s game proficiency in most cases. So they’re good at games? Good for them, he’s sure they’re happy.

But when they’re playing against him on the other hand…

Well, Lucifer may or may not be skilled at whatever game you set him on (he’s a very quick learner so never underestimate him), but he’s whole new levels of competitive when he wants to be. ESPECIALLY if he already thinks he’s hot shit at something.

Video games? Not his forte. Table top games? One word for you: Chess.

Lucifer believes that he can and will whip pretty much anyone’s ass in chess. That includes Satan, Solomon, Levi, and even Diavolo. He is at grandmaster level.

So imagine his shock, no, his disdain to have lost a game of chess to the MC… The moment they said "Checkmate" he stared at the board in front of them for a solid five minutes trying to work out where he went wrong…

And he wasn’t having that.

He and the MC now have regular chess matches in which he wins some and loses some so the tally stays pretty evenly tied. Really it’s all good fun... (but if they think he’s going to let them go home when he’s on a losing count, they’re Dead. Wrong. He’ll drag them back to down just to play chess with him until the score is right again. He DOES NOT lose, you hear? 🤨).

Mammon

Guess who’s found his gambling buddy?? 

No, really. He and the MC can make a KILLING at a Poker or Blackjack table! He’s never seen anyone better at poker than they are!! They have nerves of steel and give nothing away, so he’s lost more than a few hands to them before...

Even past the casinos, they’re perfect for making bets on! He once arranged a Devil Cart competition between the MC and Levi and took bets around RAD for who’d win...

Naturally, everybody assumed the Devildom’s resident Super-Otaku would win hands down, but the MC had this insane last minute save with a blue shell and pulled ahead in the last lap!!

He was like, the only person that bet on the MC and he got soooo much money that MC found HIM crying and hugging a bag of Grimm after the match…

Any time they win a game that gets him money, he’ll treat them like royalty for the next week. Man knows not to bite the hand that feeds him!... and creditors at bay... 😬

It may get slightly annoying that Mammon won't stop telling them about gaming competitions where they can get him more prize money, but hey, at least he's supportive, I guess.

Leviathan

Oh they are either his best friend or mortal enemy… Sometimes both in the same day.

Our boy hates losing, can't stand it any better than Lucifer, you KNOW the second he knows there's someone out there who even has a chance of beating him, he gets serious. This is not a "friendly rivalry," MC.

When they’re playing any game against each other, he'll call them by their gamertag/online persona to keep himself focused (yes, even if they’re playing Monopoly). They can't be his MC right now, they gotta be the person he's going to beat...

He's NOT opposed to dirty tactics to win, either. Saying things that will get them mad or flustered mid-match? Check. Using his tail to distract or tease them? Check. Just being a general nuisance/annoyance in game for the hell of it? Guilty as charged!

He's both a sore winner AND a sore loser, so unfortunately MC, you really can't win here... He'll be obnoxious regardless of the outcome.

However… when they’re on the same team, it's really something special. They don't just destroy the competition, they bulldoze over them like an armored tank barreling through rush hour traffic!

These two are legends in the online gaming community and have even started a streaming channel on the side. Sometimes your worst enemies also make the best allies... Who knew? 🤷‍♀️

Satan

Is surprisingly impressed by their gaming prowess. Are they just supremely skilled or incredibly lucky, you think…?

That being said, he's not the biggest gaming man on the planet so he's not too competitive with them one way or the other.

When Satan plays a video game, he usually goes for story-based, single-person experiences anyway so it's not like he could compete with them even if he wanted to.

That being said, they do share an informal challenge of sorts when it comes to puzzle/detective games (a not so guilty pleasure of his). He likes to try and beat the levels first, so when they start playing a new one they'll both compare time spent and scores.

He even enjoys playing those Devildom-style AR murder mystery games with them! It’s pretty cute to watch Satan get into it, he dips into his inner Levi and cosplays as some of his favorite TV drama detectives for the occasion and insists they dress as his co-star (best just go along with him. It’s not a bad time, even if they have to carry around an old tobacco pipe for a few hours).

Asmodeus

Good at games? That sounds dangerously like they're another Levi… 🙄 What about party games? Oh oh, or drinking games??

Actually scratch that. How about ANY game while drunk? That sounds pretty fun doesn’t it??

Like Drunk Truth or Dare!! Oh that's a favorite of his… 🤭

To be fair to the MC, the booze does diminish their skills somewhat (because that's kind of what it does in general) but not by all that much… It's pretty impressive.

He once challenged them to a game of Drunk Twister figuring that they'd be too unsteady to actually win for once, but no. If anything, the alcohol must have numbed the stretching pains because they bent over him like a pretzel!

Not that he was complaining or anything… 😏

He likes to take the MC to parties where he knows a game or two will be played just to show off to the crowd and brag that they’re HIS lovely, talented human! You go, MC, beat that competition to a pulp! 😌

Beelzebub

Sports count as games too, right? Well, they aren't half bad at those either.

Beel found it surprising that he found a human who could actually keep up with him. His brothers rarely want to play practice games with him anyway so it’s pretty exciting to have a sports partner at home!

He likes to ask the MC to help him train with practice matches or to go over certain moves or maneuvers he’s having trouble with. It’s not uncommon for the brothers to come home and find the two of them tossing a ball around in the front yard or something.

And the both of them on the same team? Forget it. It takes the dream team of Lucifer and Mammon (who aren’t just arguing with each other for once) to even come close to a challenge for them.

He also enjoys playing the occasional video game with them, though he treats it a lot like playing with Levi and just assumes he’ll never win unless he gets lucky - which does happen from time to time.

He doesn’t mind losing that much as long as he’s having fun, and if nothing else he can always win against them in an eating contest… He’s got those on lockdown. Come at’em MC, he’ll pack away an entire fridge before you’re done with your first plate. Try him.

Belphegor

So Belphie enjoys a good game or two - video-based or otherwise - it comes with the lazy-bastard territory. He may not be as skilled as Levi, but he can hold his own in some genres.

But he’s given up on beating the MC looong ago.

Do you know how much practice it would take? How many hours that he would have to use?? The hours where he could be napping instead???  Yeah, no thanks. They can continue to be the reigning Super Smash Devils champion for all he cares.

Buuuut even he has to admit, it’s pretty relaxing to watch the MC play something in the background... There’s a certain sort of satisfaction to watching someone who’s good at a game just play it straight through.

If they’re set up in Levi’s room or the Common area then Belphie may come over, set his pillow up on the floor, and watch them play. He may even throw in a comment or two like, “You missed a health pack,” or “Better save now,” but other than that he likes to just let them do their thing.

The MC has had many an all-nighter with Belphie spectating until about 4am or so. Then he’s dead to the world and they have to work out how to get his not-exactly-light demon ass onto a couch…

Or they can just leave him faceplanted and snoring on the floor. Up to them, really cause he did it to himself. 🤷‍♀️

[amazingmsme]

Top 22 of 2022

End of the year tag game created by the lovely @otomiya-tickles This was so much fun, you always make the best tag games! Thanks for tagging me!

Part 1: Fandom Faves 

01. Favorite new fandoms of the year:

Our Flag Means Death, The Boys, Moon Knight, Workaholics, The Stanley Parable, (I know I’m super late to the game but this game rocks) Godless, other seasons of critical role, inside job & uh… does Goncharov count?

02. Favorite new ships since this year:

Blackbonnet, not new but still my faves, Namdermo, & Shadowgast & probably some more that I’m forgetting

03. Favorite anime/TV show of the year:

Despite not seeing the new season, my fave anime this year is Demon Slayer. As for my favorite show of the year, I think the latest season of WWDITS wins

04. Favorite movie of the year:

Prey, Pinocchio (Guillermo del Toro), but if I had seen NOPE it would undoubtedly be that, Where the Crawdads Sing, others I’m sure. But this year I have barely seen any new movies & I haven’t seen any new marvel film starting with Spider-Man NWH (I know I know, you’re gonna beat me with rocks & all that jazz)

05. Favorite character of the year:

Caleb Widogast has had me in a headlock ever since I first saw him & he hasn’t let me go since

06. Favorite soundtrack of the year:

I genuinely don’t have an answer xiavaowh I don’t tend to remember what movie soundtracks I like unless it really stands out, & I’ve barely seen any new movies this year. But my favorite soundtracks in general are Wild America, The Kings or Summer and O Brother Where Art Thou

07. Favorite book/manga/comic of the year:

I don’t keep up with what is published that year, but my favorite book I found this year is Night Film by Marisha Pessl

08. Favorite game of the year:

Favorite game actually released this year? God of War Ragnarok. Favorite one I’ve played this year? Either Doki Doki Literature Club or The Stanley Parable

09. Highlight of this year to remember:

Fuckin’ Goncharov babyyyyy!

Part 2: Community Review

10. Favorite Tumblr moments of 2022:

Goncharov obvi, the queen’s death crab rave, Nov. 5th anniversary, & all the memes that came out this year. I have no grip on time so I have no idea which ones came out this year & I’m so dead inside I can’t force myself to remember

11. Favorite fan art of the year:

I don’t keep things organized enough to be able to actually find my favorite fan art specifically, but @fluffomatic is one of my fave artists on here, along with @ssnicker-doodless & @shyticklemonster r, @fluffy-alien alien but of course tons of other blogs as well!

12. Favorite fic of the year:

Bold of you to assume I can pick favorites & actually remember them 12 months later skagdk fr tho, some of my favorites are You Got My Devotion & Temptation, Frustration, So Bad It Makes Him Cry- @nhasablogg A Gentleman's Torture- @august-anon & uh, basically every single critical role fic. But specifically Waiting For My Mind To Go To Sleep & Embarrassing and Undignified- @chockfullofsecrets lightning damage- @spritewrites & something good to celebrate- @sapphicquill

13. Favorite ask game of the year:

Even tho I never really get asks when I reblogged that kind of stuff, I really enjoyed the list of questions on the fic writer ask game

14. My top achievements as a writer/artist/creator/blogger:

I finally managed to participate in tickletober & finish it despite 2 major deaths in the family at that time, can someone say coping mechanism?

15. My own best fic/post of the year:

I gotta go through & actually look but Draw Me Something as Pretty as You did the numbers this year, like ever other steddie fic lol. MY personal favorite tho was Dare to be Bold & actually got over 100 notes.

16. My most underappreciated fic/post of the year:

Too many of my tickletober fics tbh but that’s what I get for writing for microscopic fandoms like new girl, tuck everlasting & wolf 359 which all clock in around 10 notes each. You’d think with only 4 notes my Night Film fic What A Prize would win this category. But my Imposters fic Junk in the Trunk & Workaholic fic Pizza Payback tie with a whopping 1 note!!!

17. A post of mine that got more popularity than expected:

My recent “porn bots want me carnally” shitpost. I guess because it’s so relevant? (Seriously don’t get me started on that, I had close to 10 try to follow me yesterday alone)

18. Something I changed on my blog since this year:

I made a kofi! So if you feel like supporting me or you really want a fic, feel free to commission me!

Part 3: Next Year

19. Something I didn’t post this year but would like to do next year:

Mark my words I WILL make a Goncharov tickle fic, just you wait & see. I also want to write more for new or smaller fandoms I enjoy & get back to writing my chaptered fics. I also have some long one shots I want to make

20. Goals for next year:

Keep writing as much as I can, get back into physical art like oil painting, post more of my chaptered fics that I accidentally. I also want to read more fics because I really fell behind this year due to mental health & school

21. 2023 releases I look forward to the most:

The new season of The Legend of Vox Machina & uuuuhhh yeah I’m brain dead, I have no fuckin’ clue what’s coming out next year

Part 4: Spreading Love

22. Shoutouts to people who made my 2022 a better year: 

I can’t promise to remember everyone, but I can sure try. Thanks to everyone for making this year not suck as much as it could’ve, y’all don’t know how much it makes me smile

@happyandticklish @ticklishraspberries @ticklish-touch @raybidtickles @shunniebuns @sugarfics @hypahticklish @fluffomatic @fluffy-lee-boa @fluffy-alien @a-fluffer-nutter @a-simple-lee @lemonsandstrawberries @tickletastic @anasticklefics @tickle-bugs @tickle-fight-club @rosileeduckie @thebest-medicine @peachytickles @poesparakeet-fics @eldritchtickles @tickly-floof @spritewrites @august-anon @ticklygiggles @sapphicquill @nhasablogg @chockfullofsecrets @sunlitanon @shyticklemonster @ssnicker-doodless

& a ton of others! Love you all & I’m so glad I have y’all in my corner!

[simplee-dreaming]

The Runner

(Part 2 here)

A/N: Okay so I've been writing this for a while and only just finished it but I'd like to know whether you guys would like me to turn this into a series? This part works well as a stand-alone but can easily turn into a series if you would like!

Word count: 3194

Summary: The reader works as a runner on the set of Infinity War and developes a bond with Chris Evans.

(SPOILER WARNING: There is one spoiler for Infinity War in this fic, but I'm sure many of you have seen it anyway)

--------------------------------------------------

“Black coffee for Mr Evans please! Black coffee!” A man called over the radio. Your ears pricked up and you ran into the kitchen to make a black coffee. You came charging back out and headed straight for Chris Evans’ dressing room, but his assistant jumped in your path.

“I’ll take that to him.” He said, snatching it out of your hand.

This was your first time working as a runner and you were starting to get the hang of the job. You had only been working there for three weeks and you had about 8 months to go. You were highly excited to work for Marvel, being a fan yourself, but you hadn’t met any of the cast or even the directors. You had caught small glimpses of them but never had any interactions. You had a lot of responsibilities as a runner - making tea and coffee, handling the paperwork, assisting anyone who needed it - and yet you were just chopped liver to everyone on set.

-------------------------------

Another month had passed and you had grown closer to the other runners, the kitchen staff, the cleaners and even the third assistant directors. You were far more comfortable in your job and you even had the opportunity to stand with the third assistant director and watch them film Loki’s death scene...though not your favourite thing to witness.

You still hadn’t interacted with any of the cast but you were used to that by now. It was mainly running orders for everyone and handling the secretary-type roles, which you didn’t mind doing anyway.

Call after call came over the radio with people demanding all sorts of coffees and teas and hot chocolates and cold drinks. Enough to keep you on your feet during the long days. There was a break in demands when they were setting up ready to shoot another scene so you stood with your work friends for a chat before the room had to fall silent. One of the runners let out a small gasp and directed you with their eyes. You turned around to see Chris Evans walking behind you, heading onto set. He turned to you all and gave a little nod and a smile before carrying on. Your heart fluttered. Chris Evans just acknowledged your existence. A stream of small shrieks and giggles came from your group as everyone tried to compose themselves before filming commenced. That was your day made.

------------------------------------

“Black coffee for Mr Evans please! Black coffee!” A man called over the radio. Same guy every day, always his assistant. You quickly marched into the kitchen to get his coffee ready before anyone else did. Strong black coffee with one sachet of sugar. You grabbed the cup, marked it with Chris’ name and strolled over to his dressing room. Once again your luck had vanished when his assistant jumped in front of you and grabbed the cup.

“The order is absolutely correct, yes?” His assistant asked, like he did every time you brought the coffee.

“She makes it the majority of the time, I’m sure she has the order right by now.” Said a voice from behind you. You turned around to find Chris Evans smiling at you. You gave a shaky smile back.

“You know, you make my coffee all the damn time and I don’t even know your name.” He said. You gave a shy giggle. There was a pause.

“So...what is your name?” He asked.

“Oh, um, sorry, yeah, it’s Y/N”, you responded.

“Y/N. Very pretty name. Well, thank you Y/N for the constant coffee. I’ll make sure you deliver them straight to me next time.” He winked at you and you giggled again. His assistant cleared his throat.

“Mr Evans you’re needed in makeup now.”

“Yes thank you Darren. And how many times do I have to tell you to call me Chris?” He huffed. He gave you one last smile and walked off. You were in heaven.

-----------------------------------

A week had passed and you hadn’t interacted with Chris since. Every time there was a call for his coffee, you were busy doing other jobs. You had sorted out multiple paperwork, made drinks for crew members and you were currently assisting the cleaners in cleaning up a very messy set after they had stopped shooting a scene. You didn’t mind because the cleaners were all lovely people, plus it gave you a bit of a break before running all over the place. You were kneeling on the ground sweeping up the smaller bits with a dustpan and brush until a pair of feet suddenly appeared in your eyeline.

“Missed a spot” came a voice from above you. You looked up to find Chris Evans towering above you. He winked.

“You’re everywhere at the moment. I’m sure this isn’t in your job description.” He said.

“It’s not, but the more hands on deck, the quicker this gets cleaned.” You shrugged. “Plus, I don’t mind, all of these people are lovely to work with.”

Chris smiled at you and bent down to help.

“You’re an A-List celebrity, you shouldn’t be cleaning up this mess.” You said.

“You’re right. I’m far too big of a diva to clean.” He replied. He flicked a tiny stone at you and you gasped.

“Now is that any way to treat your staff?” You teased, throwing a bit of soil on him. He laughed and you continued to throw bits of rubbish at each other until Darren appeared.

“Oi! You there! What do you think you’re playing at?!” He asked you.

“Oh, I’m sorry we were just..”

“Chill Darren, I was helping her clean up and I started the rubbish fight.” Chris interrupted.

“Well, you need to be resting. You have a big scene coming up.” Darren huffed.

“It’s fine, I was resting then I got bored and now I’m having fun.” Chris responded.

“Fun? With a runner? I highly doubt that. You best head to makeup and get yourself cleaned up.” Darren said to Chris. He then shot you a glare and marched off.

“Sorry about him, he’s very pompous.” Chris apologised.

“It’s fine. I’m used to it.” You said. Even though you were used to people degrading you for being a runner, it still hurt when they did.

“Well you shouldn’t be.” Chris said. He reached out to squeeze your shoulder but was interrupted by Darren yelling “CHRIS!” at the other end of the room.

“I better go before Sir Shouts-A-Lot yells at me again.” Chris said. You let out a little laugh and watched him leave.

-----------------------

Two more weeks had passed and you had only spoken to Chris on the odd occasion that he would pass you on set. Every time there was a coffee call, Darren made sure someone else made it to stop you two from interacting. You couldn’t see what his problem was but you chose not to kick up a fuss anyway.

When your break finally came around, you grabbed a cup of tea and decided to walk around the studio...just so happens that along your walk was the caravan park where all the actors stayed on set. You heard a familiar voice behind you and your heart dropped.

“Oi! What do you think you’re doing back here?”

You froze.

You slowly turned around, ready to face the wrath of Darren, when, to your surprise, Chris was standing there grinning.

“Good impression, no?” He chuckled. You let out a long sigh.

“Jesus, Chris, you nearly gave me a heart attack.” You scorned, but you couldn’t help smiling,

“On your break?” He asked, gesturing to the tea in your hand.

“Yeah, only a short one though. I get to finish early today.” You said.

“Oh nice! I’ve already wrapped for the day myself. Say, did you want to do something when you’re finished? It’s cool if not, I just thought it would be nice for us to actually talk and maybe become friends? Without the demon on my shoulder.” He said. You smiled instantly.

“I finish in 2 hours, I would love to do something!” You said, maybe a little too enthusiastically.

“Okay okay, um, I have a few movies back in the caravan if you wanna pick one later?”

“Sure, sounds like a plan. I’ll run over as soon as I’ve finished.” You smiled at him.

“It’s a date.” He winked at you and walked away.

Time was moving slower than ever. You kept checking your watch to see how much time had passed but it was only ever a couple of minutes. You decided not to look at your watch for a while and carry on with your duties. The next time you looked at your watch you had half an hour left. A wave of excitement came over you and you went back to finishing up your jobs.

Finally, the time had come.

You finished the jobs you were doing, collected your belongings and clocked out. Butterflies swarmed your stomach as you walked off set and into the caravan park. That’s when you realised you had no idea which caravan was Chris’. You walked up and down and scanned each one, careful not to look like a creep. Suddenly, the door of the caravan on your right opened and Chris stepped out.

“You’re not lost are you?” He asked, smiling.

“I wasn’t sure which was yours, they all look the same,” you said, shyly. He chuckled and invited you in.

You stepped into his caravan. There wasn’t a lot of stuff as it was only a temporary home, but it was still enough to produce a warm ambience. He gestured at you to sit down on the sofa, opposite the tv.

“I have chocolate, popcorn, sweets...salad...what do you fancy?” He asked.

“They’re all fine...except for the healthy stuff, that ruins movie time,” you said. He laughed and poured the sweets, chocolates and popcorn into separate bowls and placed them on the table in front of you.

“Drink? I’ve got fizzy drinks, water, hot chocolate, tea, milkshake...um...black coffee…” he said, you chuckled.

“A milkshake might be nice if that’s okay?” You asked, he nodded and said he was gonna have one too.

You couldn’t help the mix of nerves and excitement flowing through your body. You were sat in Chris Evans’ caravan...with Chris Evans! It really was a dream come true. You tried to calm yourself before you had a fangirl attack but it meant you came off quite shy and quiet.

“Here we are,” he said, placing the milkshakes on the table. “Are you warm enough?” he asked. You noticed you were sat on the sofa looking quite tense. You nodded.

“I’ll get blankets just in case,” Chris said. He went into his room and came out with two large blankets. He passed the softest one to you. You thanked him and adjusted yourself, taking off your shoes so you could sit cross-legged on his sofa with the blanket draped over you. This made you feel a bit more relaxed.

“So, um, what do you fancy?” he asked. You bit your tongue to stop you replying with “you”, you felt it was far too soon in your friendship to make a joke like that.

“Um, Captain America?” You joked. He giggled.

“Nuh-uh, not happening. Try again,” he said.

You had a small discussion on the types of films you like and you settled on Deadpool. Still a great Marvel film, just one that doesn’t have Chris in it so he didn’t have to stress about watching himself.

Chris put on the film and sat next to you, he grabbed his own blanket and draped it over his long legs. He offered you food and you kindly accepted. You both sat in silence whilst the film began, though you kept having to bite your lip to stop you from smiling so much.

About 45 minutes into the film, Chris started to get fidgety, so he tried to adjust himself without making too much noise. In the process of moving his hand, he accidentally scratched the sole of your foot. You let out a squeak and pulled your foot away.

“Sorry, sorry, that was an accident,” Chris said, apologetically.

“It’s okay,” you said, relaxing a bit but praying that he didn’t notice your squeak. You didn’t notice him giving you a side-eye with a puzzled expression on his face.

He sat still for a few minutes then went to adjust himself again, this time deliberately scraping his nails against your sole. You squealed louder and tucked your foot under your leg. You looked over at him and he had a wicked smirk on his face.

“You’re not ticklish by any chance, are you?” He asked, the corner of his lip curling up.

“N-no, you just made me jump,” you said, unconvincingly. He narrowed his eyes but let out a “hm” and turned back to the film.

You were a lot less relaxed now. You were ridiculously ticklish but only a handful of people knew. The trouble was, you did enjoy being tickled but you were always embarrassed by how ticklish you were. Your heart was pounding at the thought of Chris Evans discovering this weakness.

A few more minutes had passed and you couldn’t properly relax. You were still sat cross-legged but your foot was tucked further under your leg this time. Chris let out a little yawn and stretched, you flinched at his movement but still kept your cool. He noticed and tried to hide his smile. When he put his arms back under his blanket, he casually let one hand slide over and gently tickle your toes. This time you let a small giggle slip out and you clamped your mouth shut.

“I think you are ticklish,” he teased. Your heart did a somersault. He gave you a playful smirk and the nerves washed over your body. You couldn’t even find the words to speak. He reached over and grabbed your foot with one hand, pulling it out from under your leg, and he used his other hand to tickle your sole. You shrieked loudly and tried to tug your foot away but his grip was too strong. You couldn’t even twist that far away because of how you were sitting. You fell backwards into the sofa and kept giggling.

“Chrihihis plehehease,” you giggled.

“Aww look at you, you’re so ticklish,” he cooed. You lifted up your blanket to cover your bright red face.

“Oh no you dont,” he said. He stopped tickling your foot and lunged at you, pinning you down to the sofa. You screamed at the sudden attack and pulled the blanket further over your face. He shook his head and vibrated his fingers into your tummy. You shrieked loudly and used one hand to bat away his hands.

“Come on, I wanna see your face when I tickle you,” he said. Your laughter shot up an octave when he started squeezing your hips.

“Oh? Did I just find a bad spot?” He asked. You kept trying to bat him away with one hand but it was no use.

“Remove the blanket or I’m gonna make this worse for you,” he said, sternly.

“NEHEHEVER!” You shrieked under the blanket.

“Don’t say I didn’t warn you.” He shot his hands under your arms and you screamed loudly. You couldn’t keep holding the blanket over your head with him tickling deep into your armpits. You slammed your arms down and the blanket fell off you in the process.

“That’s better, I can see your face when you laugh now,” he said. The feeling of his fingers wiggling deep into your armpits was absolute torture.

“Surely it doesn’t tickle this much?” He asked. You shrieked loudly and your laughter grew more desperate with every tease.

“Does it tickle more when I mention how much it tickles?” He asked, clearly aware of what he was doing.

“SHUHUHUT UHUHUP!” You cried. He laughed with you which made it worse.

“Ohh, cootchie cootchie coo,” he said in a high pitched teasing voice. That made you scream more and frantically try and buck him off you.

You thought that would be the killer move? Oh no. Not for Chris. He picked up the pace of his wiggling fingers in your armpits and bent down to nuzzle his beard into your neck. His longer hair brushed over your ear too. This was the killer. It was absolute torture. He blew a raspberry into your neck and you fell into silent laughter. You couldn’t cope with him tickling your armpits, his beard tickling your neck and his hair tickling your ear. He laughed into your neck and the vibrations were the final straw. You started hitting his shoulder with as much force as you could and he sat back up, removing his hands.

“Sorry, I went a bit too far. Are you okay?” He asked, getting off of you. You lay there, sucking in deep breaths, and nodded. Your face was the deepest shade of red it had ever gone.

“Are you sure?” He asked, giving you a hand up.

“I...I...” you began, he looked at you with a concerned expression on his face. “I’m okay,” you breathed out. He gave you a soft smile.

You were more in shock at the fact you had just been ruthlessly tickled by Chris Evans. You couldn’t speak, your heart was pounding ten to the dozen.

“You’re quite possibly the most ticklish person I’ve ever met,” he said. Somehow your face went an even deeper shade of red.

“Aww, you’re so cute when you blush,” he cooed.

“Shut...up..” you whispered.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” He asked, shuffling closer to you.

“Yeah, I’m more than okay,” you said. He raised an eyebrow.

“Don’t tell me you liked that?” He asked, a hint of teasing in his voice. You blushed and tilted your head down.

“No. Way. You enjoyed that didn’t you?” He asked. You blushed once again and gave a very small nod.

“Just when I thought you couldn’t get more adorable,” he said. “Little Y/N enjoys being tickled.”

You looked up at him. A wave of playfulness came over you.

“I’m so gonna get you,” you said. Before he could protest, you launched yourself at him and tackled him to the sofa. You wasted no time in squeezing his sides.

The laughter that came out of him was one you had never heard before. It was so warm and genuine and it only made you want to tickle him more. You giggled at his weak state and switched between tickling his sides, armpits, tummy and ribs to see which one made him laugh the most. It was clear that he was enjoying himself too.

“Aww is Chris ticklish too?” You cooed, surprised at your sudden confidence. You were met with a chorus of begs and pleads but you couldn’t stop yourself tickling him.

It was a really cute afternoon with just the two of you. But you were both too distracted to see who was outside the caravan, watching as you both ruthlessly tickled each other.

Darren.

[king-mera]

1, 6, 17 and a question of your choice for the ghostbusters asks.

Oh this will be fun, thanks for sending! 💚

Fandom Ask

1 - What originally drew me to it

Back when I was a teenager they played reruns of The Real Ghostbusters cartoon series on Teletoon Retro and that's the piece of GB media I was most familiar with. I think I did watch the movies on TV at some point, but not all the way through. I was mainly hooked on the cartoon then.

GB was not my main interest in my younger years however, as my heart belonged to Alice in Wonderland (especially American Mcgee's games). After a while I depressed and wanted to move away from the tale of a girl who was lost and alone in favor of something more friendly. Queue the announcement of Ghostbusters: Afterlife and me rediscovering my love for nerds chasing ghosts together :)

6 - A character I'd like to frame and hang on my wall and admire like a work of art

Well, it's not in a frame, but I am very fond of my Peoplebusters art poster designed by RichiCrypt.

These are some of my favorite villains from the cartoon for the concept alone. I'm a sucker for evil dopplegangers in fiction. Their designs kick ass and I love Richi's take. His inclusion of a demonic Flip Winston is great too since he was missing from the original episode that introduced them.

(...You thought I was going to be cheeky and put a picture of Vigo's painting, didn't you?)

17 - The line of dialogue I quote most often

This franchise has some great quotes. "He slimed me" "Get her, Ray" and "It's true, this man has no dick" still slay me every time. Although I admit I don't actually quote anything specific that often? My friends tell me I sound a lot like Egon so I've tried to say a few things in his voice for a laugh in VC. Other than that, I was saying a few of Peter's lines on Halloween like "Back off man, I'm a scientist" as a warning to the ghosts in the haunted house (Ironic, since I was cosplaying Phoebe).

20 - Fics/fanart I'd love to see

Right after watching Afterlife I was 100% convinced we were getting a cartoon spinoff to bridge the gap between that and the next movie. This... Does not appear to be happening, much to my profound disappointment. All I really want is to see Pheebs and the gang going on adventures around their haunted town. If anyone out there wants to write more of that in fanfic, I'd be very grateful.

I'd also love to see more art and stories focused on the villains delving into their origins and motivations. This franchise has so many cool ghosts and creatures too offer, I can't get enough!

[starlightoffandoms]

I posted 10,976 times in 2022

23 posts created (0%)

10,953 posts reblogged (100%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@alleiradayne

@coffeebox62

@that-crazy-drummer-chick

@flock-of-paper-birds

@hanaaeri

I tagged 791 of my posts in 2022

#ofmd - 56 posts

#happy tag - 53 posts

#destiel - 46 posts

#the witcher - 37 posts

#write this way - 32 posts

#tora - 25 posts

#goncharov - 24 posts

#supernatural - 23 posts

#dean winchester - 22 posts

#the boys - 22 posts

Longest Tag: 138 characters

#i would love to see demon dean and collecting honey cas bc while completely unhinged demon dean would have been so careful & loving to him

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

Me watching the Batman: *turn away for a second to check on the cat that's being real sneaky like*

Police Captain: *starts talking*

Me: *swings around almost hard enough to give myself whiplash* IS THAT IZZY HANDS?!!!!

Police Captain: *is Con O'Neill*

Me: it IS Izzy Hands!!!

Cat: *runs and hides from insane parent screaming about Izzy Hands*

12 notes - Posted April 20, 2022

#4

Looking for more Witcher blogs for me and my bestie @coffeebox62 to follow. I know I follow several of y'all and want to rec you to bestie but my brain doesn't retain blog names to share and I'm awful at tagging tbh. So if you post/reblog Witcher content please interact with this post. Thanks a bunch!

16 notes - Posted January 4, 2022

#3

I didn't have time to post Friday for the week's fics. Life happened but here we are! Hope you enjoy!

Day 15 – Smoke – Rated T – Sam and Dean retire from hunting and live their best versions of lives that work for them. Destiel and Salieen, Canon Divergence 

Day 16 – Red – Rated E – Serial killer boyfriends. Destiel AU

Day 17 – Muse – Rated T – Cas has performed as Jimmy Novak for years. The last few years have been rough and he hasn't been able to write any new music. To loosen up some, his friends take him out for a fun night. From that night forward he started to write as he'd never done before. Destiel AU

Day 18 – Tattoos – Rated T – Werewolf Dean hadn’t told Cas that he was a shapeshifter. Dean is forced to shift and Cas finds him. Destiel AU

Day 19 – Ladies – Rated G – Ladies night with a little extra. No ship, SPN ladies AU

Day 20 – Spa Day – Rated T – Eileen and Rowena set up a spa day for Cas with ulterior motives. Destiel Canon Divergence 

Day 21 – Haunted – Rated M – Dean remembered lost. Then the one day he had finally decided he'd had enough, the man he loved was back. Destiel Canon Divergence

Day 22 – Rain, Rain – Rated G - Kid Jack shows up on their doorstep. Destiel Canon Divergence

Day 23 – Sleepless Nights – Rated T – Dean and Cas welcome new additions to their family. Destiel Canon Divergence (I had accidentally tagged this as mcd, so if you skipped this I PROMISE it isn't mcd. that was my bad when I posted from my phone.)

Day 24- Fish – Rated T – Sam and Jack are up to no good but it has a happy ending. Destiel AU

Here is the series to stay up to date.

See the full post

18 notes - Posted October 26, 2022

#2

Week two coming at you!

Day 8 – Sober – Rated M - Cas was gone and Dean found himself at the bottom of too many bottles. He knew that he couldn't get the love of his life back if he didn't have a clear head. He'd do whatever it took to get him back. Destiel Canon Divergence

Day 9 – Vintage – Rated G – Cas explodes an ATM b/c it didn’t work properly. Destiel Canon Divergence 

Day 10 – Enchanted – Rated M – Dean buys an antique mirror at a flea market and gets more than he bargained for. Destiel AU

Day 11 – Drag – Rated M – Dean gets caught during a body dump. He is not a very good liar but Cas doesn't care. Two serial killers in the same area and Cas is just trying to protect his territory. Destiel AU Murder Boyfriends

Day 12 – Crossover – Rated T – Cas comes home one day and things are moved around. He checks his wards. They're all still in place. Over the next few days, things are moved, the TV randomly turns on, music plays out of nowhere, and the pie keeps getting removed from the fridge to the counter. Cas reinforces his warding. Then one day there is a man he doesn't know standing in the middle of his living room and he isn't quite corporal. Destiel AU

Day 13 – Morning After – Rated T – Sam wakes up not sure what the previous night after a huge hunt had held. Saileen Canon Divergence 

Day 14 – All for You – Rated M – Dean sees a flyer for an art project that paid $200 a day. Some doctorate student was in need of help with a project. He hoped that whoever Castiel was actually planned to pay. Destiel AU

Here is the series to stay up to date.

See the full post

19 notes - Posted October 15, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

Hey y'all! Back at it again this year. Here's the first week of fics!

Day 1 Maze/Maize – Rated T – Dean cooks Cas’ favorite foods. Destiel AU

Day 2 Pillow Talk – Not Rated – Aftercare. Destiel AU

Day 3 Digital – E – Dean is in heat and Cas is in another country. Destiel AU

Day 4 Wicked – T – Cas practices darker magic and the gov't doesn't like it. They do more than necessary inspections on his facility. Dean is being punished and gets assigned to difficult cases. Destiel AU

Day 5 A Perfect Disaster – M – Stubborn Dean didn't evacuate when he was told to. Luckily Cas has a safe house nearby. Destiel AU

Day 6 Parody – T – Dean had moved away as soon as he could from his abusive father. It doesn't mean he doesn't still end up dealing with bigoted assholes. Destiel AU

Day 7 Fine Wine – M – Dean and Cas had gone to high school together and occasionally ran in the same circles. It'd been over 20 years since they'd seen each other. They reconnect at a work event. Destiel AU

For some reason it's been all Destiel so far🤷🏾‍♀️. Was not the initial plan. We'll see how the rest of the month goes. Here is the series to stay up to date.

See the full post

28 notes - Posted October 8, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

[iclaimedtobethebetterbard]

popcorn & pronouns

Fandom: Sanders Sides Characters: Janus, Remus, Roman Rating: Teen & up Relationships: Dukeceit, Creativitwins  Warnings: Not much to warn for in this one. Language, a little bit of suggestiveness, vague non-detailed descriptions of a horror movie.  Word count: 3402

Read on AO3!

My writing masterpost

Starlight Universe masterpost

Dukeceit Week 2021 start - previous - here - next - masterpost

Summary: A movie night date leads to an important conversation. Already being t4t makes it a lot easier. Or, in Remus's own words, “This is just, like, going to be a week of people coming out to me, I guess. Huh.”

Notes: Day 6 of Dukeceit Week 2021! Almost there! @dukeceitweek Takes place in my Starlight Universe, where each piece can be read without any context. Takes place 9 months after college; at the start of the story, Janus uses only they/them pronouns. 

-- 

“Ooh, popcorn! Can I have some?” Roman popped his head into the kitchen of the apartment he, Remus, and Logan had shared in the nine or so months since they had all graduated college.

“No, Jan and I are having a date in twenty minutes,” Remus said, waving Roman off without looking away from the air popper.

“Okay, I don’t see how that’s relevant to my question.” Roman pushed himself to sit on the counter by the sink. “I mean, that’s really cute, I hope you have fun. But can I have some popcorn?”

Remus rolled his eyes. “Make your own when I’m done.”

“But you make it better!” Roman pouted overdramatically.

Remus raised an eyebrow. “All I do is plug in the machine?”

“Right, which is better than me doing it.” Roman grinned at them. “Less work for me.”

“Hey!” Remus swatted his arm. “The transphobia, honestly—”

“Well, if you making it for me is transphobic to you, then you not making it for me is—” Roman broke off quite suddenly, his expression undergoing several shifts very fast that Remus could not make sense of. Which was… unusual, to say the least. Roman was normally the one person they could always count on understanding. They didn’t like this new development one bit.

“Ro?”

“Iiiiiit’s… queerphobic to me,” Roman said at last, a worried pinch to his eyebrows. He laughed, and it almost didn’t sound forced. “So we’re at a tie, so you should just make me popcorn.”

“First of all, I’m queer too, make your own damn popcorn. Second—” Remus turned away from the popcorn machine and gave Roman his full attention, leaning back against the kitchen island and tilting his head to the side. “Do you wanna talk about whatever the fuck that was?” So far as Remus knew, Roman was bi; that was the label he’d been using for years and years, so long that it practically felt like forever. Since almost the very beginning of high school. Since before Remus had questioned their gender, even. Only last week, he’d called the light switch biphobic without hesitation when it broke.

Whatever had happened to make him so very deliberately not call himself bi just now, it was new.

Roman’s expression closed up very fast indeed, but not before Remus caught a flash of something he was almost certain was fear. “No.”

“You know it’s okay to question, right?” Remus inquired awkwardly. “No matter what specifically, and no matter what the outcome is? Yeah?”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“You know I’d still love you no matter what, right? Even if you were, like, a straight man—like, I would make so many jokes about not agreeing with your lifestyle, but—Ro, you know everything is always gonna be okay, right?”

Roman glared at him. “Remus, I don’t want to talk about it.” He wrinkled his nose. “And I’m definitely not straight.”

Remus blinked and raised their hands. “Alright. I didn’t mean literally straight, I just meant—you could be literally whatever, and it would be cool. That was—like—the most extreme example I could think of, you know?”

Roman let out a slight huff of laughter. “Thanks,” he said reluctantly after a pause. “It’s nothing, though.”

“Bullshit,” Remus said immediately.

“It—” Roman swallowed. “I need it to be nothing, okay?”

“If anyone’s making you feel shitty, I’ll beat them up,” Remus said immediately. “Even if it’s Patton. Just drop the names. I’ll do it. I’ll—”

“Remus, it’s fine. I want to stop fucking talking about it now!” Roman snapped.

Remus hesitated, fumbling for what to do or say next, everything about the conversation feeling just a little wrong and sideways.

Roman sighed. “Sorry.” He pushed off the counter, went to the fridge, and stared into it for a solid thirty seconds, then took a cheese stick out of the door. “I’ll make my own popcorn later,” he mumbled and retreated back to his room.

“Damn, alright,” Remus said to the empty room. “Be like that, I guess.” They flung their hands into the air and went to get the butter they’d been melting in the microwave before Roman’s appearance.

Roman would talk to them about it, whatever it was, eventually. He always did. And whatever was bugging him, Remus would figure out a way to bug it back until it stopped and Roman was all happy and bubbly again. Because that was what Remus always did. It would be fine. It was just a waiting game.

Remus sighed. He always hated waiting.

***

“Mmkay,” Remus said, when Janus had arrived, and they had worked together to move the TV out of the living room and into Remus’s room, and they had settled in on Remus’s bed—Remus sitting up against the headboard and Janus half-laying in Remus’s lap with their long thin legs stretched out along the bed and their head on his chest—and the popcorn had been set beside them where they could both reach it, and the blanket nest had been fluffed once more. “What shall we watch?”

Janus was silent for a long moment. Actually, come to think of it, they had been quiet since they’d arrived at the apartment—even more quiet than usual. But Remus was almost certain they weren’t nonverbal, seeing as they had exchanged a few fond words with him. It just hadn’t been very many words.

“Janny, baby?” Remus leaned forward, over their shoulder, trying to catch a glimpse of their face.

Janus had their fingers knotted in the blanket that was spread over their lap, fidgeting with it anxiously, a thinking-hard expression on their face.

“Baby?” Remus curled one hand lightly around theirs. “You good?”

“Choices are too hard right now,” Janus said at last.

“Okay, that’s okay. Do you know what you need?”

“I want to watch a movie.” Janus frowned. “I just can’t choose.”

“Gotcha. No problem.” Remus pressed a kiss to their cheek. “I’m really good at choosing.” He threaded his fingers through Janus’s long hair, scratching soothingly at their scalp in just the way he knew they liked, and pulled up the library of movies, switching from Roman’s profile to his own.

“How’s some really cheesy horrible horror film we can make fun of sound?” he asked, scrolling with the remote and still playing with Janus’s hair with his other hand. “I know we have a bunch of those, I loved ’em when we were kids and I think they’re funny.”

“That sounds fine.” Janus nodded and relaxed a little further against Remus.

“Good.” He kissed the top of their head. “Do you need anything else?”

Janus shook their head. “I’ve just been kind of stressed lately. Work’s been shit, and all that. It’s fine. I just want to cuddle and things.”

“Ooh, ‘and things,’ I like the sound of that,” Remus teased, sliding his hand gently to their chin and drawing them to twist around far enough that he could kiss them soft and slow.

“I didn’t say what kinds of things,” Janus said innocently, their eyes still closed and so close to Remus that their lips brushed against his as they spoke. “Perhaps I could be persuaded later.”

“I’ll be sure to prepare my best arguments,” Remus said, leaning slightly up to kiss their forehead and then back down to their lips for another lazy kiss, taking his time and exploring Janus’s mouth until they sighed and melted against him.

“A compelling preview,” they murmured, their eyes still closed and the slightest smile curling at their lips.

Remus meant to make some kind of witty quip in return, really he did, but all that came out of his mouth was a quiet, awed, “Holy fuck, you’re so beautiful, Jan.”

Janus’s eyes opened and met his for a moment, soft and vulnerable, before they turned and hid their face in his neck. “Love you,” they whispered against his skin.

“Mm, I love you too,” Remus said happily, wrapping his arms securely around Janus and kissing the top of their head. “Love your pretty eyes and skin and hair and body, love how clever you are, love your scary goth clothes, love your snark, love your stims, love you—”

Janus whined wordlessly into his neck, pressing kisses to it and fisting their hands in the front of his shirt.

Remus chuckled, taking a handful of their hair and gently tugging until they looked up at him once more. “Do you want to watch a movie at all, or do you just wanna make out? Cause I’d be good with either, but if you wanna do a movie, we should get on that before we’re too distracted.”

“Oh.” Janus leaned their head back a little until it was resting against Remus’s hand. “Not that I don’t want to make out, but—”

“Nah, I gotcha. Gotta at least get through the popcorn, am I right?” Remus cast about for the remote, lost in the blanket pile, as Janus shifted about until they faced the television again.

“There it is!” Remus snatched the remote up, clicking through the library on the television until he saw the particular film he was thinking of and pulled it up. “This look good?”

“‘When moving into their new house, little do our protagonists know it is haunted by a demonic serial killer. Will they get out in time? Or will they be his next victims?’” Janus read the summary aloud. “Sounds absolutely thrilling. Extremely original. Love the bad Photoshop on the cover. I’m sure the acting will be of the highest quality.”

“Oh, yeah, it’s so shitty, I love it. So many cheesy effects and fake blood, it’s the actual stupidest shit,” Remus assured them. “I love it, though. Went as the demon thing for Halloween when I was nine. Nobody fucking knew what I was, but I had the time of my life. And got fake blood on Roman when he wasn’t looking. It was great.”

Janus chuckled, reaching up to brush their fingertips against Remus’s cheek. “Well, with such a glowing review from someone so attractive, how can I resist?” they said fondly.

“That’s the spirit!” Remus hit play.

Remus had watched this particular movie more times than they could count over the course of their childhood. He peppered commentary throughout the film:

“This is my favorite part, if you pay attention you can see her real fingertips holding onto the fake hand she’s about to get chopped off!”

“There’s a jumpscare in this scene, I know you hate those—okay, hit the skip-ten-seconds button in three, two, there. Perfect. Dumbass demon movie can’t even trust itself to be creepy without cheap scares.”

“Look, I know the mom is supposed to have some kind of hot blonde thing going on for the horny straight men in the audience, but she’s got nothing on you.”

“For some reason they made a director’s commentary and it actually includes the fake blood recipe they used, I’ll show you sometime!”

Janus, in turn, provided brilliant, extremely snarky roasts, mostly of either the actors’ absolute lack of skill or the gaping plot holes:

“Oh, yes, going alone to the attic at midnight without so much as a candle is a fantastic idea, nothing bad could possibly happen in this scene.”

“Listen, I can excuse the children because they’re about eight years old, but do you think this man has ever even heard of acting? Or even, like, speaking in a non-monotone?”

“I am truly fascinated by the special effects department’s understanding of human anatomy.”

“So, the demon feeds on misery? Why hasn’t it taken up residence in a large office building? I mean, come on, hundreds of souls in an environment designed to grind out constant levels of misery? It’s perfect. The poor thing must be starving out here in the two-point-five-kids-and-a-dog suburbs, every meal it gets is tiny. I would be so much better at its job than it is.”

At last the credits rolled.

“Wanna see pictures of the costume I made?” Remus asked.

“Sure.” Janus sounded amused.

“Lemme just—” Remus scrolled through their camera roll for a minute. “Oh, here they are.” They displayed their phone to Janus; tiny nine-year-old Remus, who sported long tangled brown hair in two ponytails, was draped in a black curtain, donated by his great-aunt, that he had very enthusiastically taken a pair of scissors to to create a tattered effect; the curtain was splattered with bright red goo, and tiny Remus had a pair of plastic knives in his hands, which were blurry in almost every photo because they’d hardly stopped making stabbing motions all evening. To their right, their little sister Gabby, who’d been six at the time, was dressed as Elastigirl and making a punching motion; to their right, Roman—who had already been a full three inches taller than Remus, even at nine—was wearing a Belle dress with a poofy skirt and a sword strapped around his waist and a huge smile that was missing one front tooth.

Remus swiped through the photos; a delightful scene unfolded, as tiny Remus posed for a few pictures, then in one was blurrily turning towards Roman, then dumping something on him, then Roman was screaming and Remus was laughing as red goo dripped down the poofy yellow skirt; Gabby watched with both hands clapped over her mouth, eyes huge.

“You two really have not changed at all, have you?” Janus asked, stifling laughter.

“Absolutely not,” Remus agreed with an answering laugh. “I think the most that either of us ever changed was when I chopped off all that hair and dyed it green.”

“When was that?” Janus asked.

“Sophomore year of high school. I did not have permission to chop it all off, but I did get permission to dye it afterwards, so that was pretty sick.”

“And that didn’t go against dress code?” Janus inquired.

“No, actually. Not sure how. But I bet my parents would’ve kicked up a big stink about it if the school tried and made me change it; they were always super big on self expression and shit.” Remus gestured towards the picture, indicating tiny Roman in his princess dress. “We always got to wear whatever we wanted, and shit like that. It was nice. Made gender shit way easier when that became a thing for me, you know?”

“It sounds nice,” Janus said softly. “I’m happy you had that.”

Remus nodded and pressed a kiss to their forehead, reaching for a handful of the popcorn dregs in the bottom of the bowl.

Janus shifted in their arms, rolling over to face Remus and propping themself up on their elbows. “Actually,” they began.

Something on their face told Remus that whatever this new topic of conversation was, it was important. He swallowed the half-chewed popcorn in his mouth. “Yeah, baby?”

“Speaking of gender.” Janus picked at the edge of the blanket.

“I love speaking of that, go on.” Remus tousled Janus’s hair fondly.

Janus took a deep breath, staring at the blanket in their hands. “I want to start using he pronouns again. In addition to my regular ones. Or.” They wrinkled their nose. “My current ones, I guess. So, he/they.”

“That’s great, he/they pronouns are very sexy,” Remus said at once.

Janus laughed, looking up at him at last. “That’s true, you are the sexiest person I know,” he said fondly. A shadow passed over his features. “But,” he went on slowly, chewing on the inside of their lip and picking at the blanket once more.

“Yeah?” Remus encouraged.

“I really don’t like the idea of telling anyone else about that.” Janus grimaced. “I keep worrying I’ll get asked stupid questions about ‘oh, so are you a man again now?’ when—like—no, and I never was one in the first place. So.”

“Oh, that sounds gross,” Remus agreed at once. “I can see why you’d be worried about that.”

Janus nodded. “I just—I don’t want to explain. And I don’t want people to ask questions. And they might. And I just—I don't want any of it. I want to skip to the part where they know and it’s all how I want it to be.”

“That’s reasonable,” Remus agreed. “But, I mean, if they can get me using he/they pronouns and being nonbinary, they had better fucking wrap their minds around the concept of you doing it too. Yeah? Or I’ll make ’em. Violently, if you want.”

Janus snorted. “I appreciate the offer, darling.” They reached up and touched his cheek. “I… don’t know if I want to tell anyone else yet. But I did want to tell you.”

“You got it, cutie.” Remus booped Janus’s nose once. “Just let me know if anything changes. I’ll punch people for you. Anytime. They don’t even have to have done anything. Just point me at them and consider it done.”

Janus did laugh at that, outright, scrunching up his face and burying it in Remus’s chest. “I should not be this into you offering to punch people for me,” he said wryly.

Remus grinned and flipped their hair. “Nah, I think it’s definitely very sexy of me and should absolutely turn you on.”

Janus smacked Remus’s arm. “I did not say that!”

“You implied it.”

“Not… necessarily. That was one possible interpretation—”

“Oh, right, I see, mmhm, very interesting.”

They smacked his arm again. “You’re teasing me.”

“Only a little bit. You’re so pretty when you get all flustered.” Remus bent their head at a somewhat awkward angle to kiss Janus’s lips gently. “Are there any new words you want me to use, by the way?” they asked. “Besides updating pronouns?”

Janus tilted his head to the side, considering. “I think… I still like all the sorts of things you call me already. Pretty, and partner, and—and baby, and so on.”

Remus smirked. “That’s good, I like calling you baby.”

“Oh my god, shut up.” Janus hid their face in their hands.

“Why, baby?” Remus asked innocently.

Janus made a strangled noise, and after a pause carried on. “I do think I wouldn’t mind adding a little bit of… masc terminology? I guess? If that makes sense? Adding that into the mix. Not all the time, and not as much as the things you already call me, but… just a bit would be nice.”

“Gotcha.” Remus nodded. “I can do that. So, like, my baby is very pretty and handsome?”

Janus’s cheeks went bright red in an instant, and he hid his face in Remus’s chest again, letting out a tiny wordless scream. “Yes. That. That—that’s nice,” they managed after a pause, sounding almost entirely composed.

Remus chuckled and ran their fingers through Janus’s hair. “Good to know,” he said teasingly. “I will definitely keep this in mind.”

“Oh my god,” Janus mumbled. “Are you trying to kill me?”

“Absolutely, but only in a sexy way of making you happy.” Remus kissed the top of their head. “This is just, like, going to be a week of people coming out to me, I guess,” they mused. “Huh.”

“What do you mean?”

“Oh, something’s clearly eating at someone else we know, and I think they’re going to tell me about whatever it is within the week. That’s all. It was just funny timing.” Remus kissed the top of Janus’s head again. “So, the movie’s over,” they noted, which, sure, was a blatant and deliberate change of subject, but he felt this was justified, both for avoiding-speculating-about-Roman’s-personal-information purposes and, more importantly, for fun-after-movie-things purposes.

“That it is,” Janus said, a particular innocent tone entering their voice. Excellent, he was of a similar mind to Remus, then.

Remus grinned and drew them up for a kiss. “So, what does the very pretty and handsome and lovely human in my arms want to do now?” he inquired.

Janus made another small, wordless, flustered noise and promptly dragged Remus into another kiss. “You can’t just say things like that!”

“What, about how you’re the loveliest—prettiest—sexiest—” Remus pressed tiny kisses to Janus’s lips with each word, until at last they caught his lips with their own in a proper kiss to shut him up. “Pretty sure I can say it, actually,” Remus murmured against his lips. “Cause it’s true.”

“Oh, like you’re one to talk,” Janus said, sounding very pleased indeed, and kissed them again.

--

Taglist (ask to be added/removed!): @theimprobabledreamersworld @peruviandesertfox

[fu-aki]

Chapter 5

So this is going to be my attempt to summarize part 1 of the beginning part of chapter 5 (episode 1 to 21) of twisted wonderland.

Again, spoiler alert since I’m about to write out everything that happened, and I apologize for my grammar and horrible French in advance.

 You heard someone singing -> it was the scenes from snow white when the evil queen asks the mirror on the wall and snow white singing into the well  -> player choice: a beautiful women was watching from the window…/ I felt like I’ve meet that beautiful person before… -> you woke up from dream -> in the main street, you meet up with Ace and Deuce -> after seeing the statue you realized you’ve seen them in your dreams before

In classroom -> Ace felt it wasn’t weird to have dreams like that when you see those statues everyday -> you mentioned about in your dream “mickey” appeared in the mirror -> Ace and Deuce never heard of that name before -> Ace suggest to take a photo of it with the “ghost camera” you got from Crowley since it can even take pictures of ghosts

Crewel showed up and explained about “nationwide sorcerer training school culture festival” -> it’s a 2 day event with representative students from all the sorcerer training school, a festival with speeches and debates all about magic related music & art topics -> for NRC, all the 4th year students will be send all across country for internship and research study -> they will all come back on that day to share their experience and result -> end of the homeroom -> fight Crewel for the defense magic class

In the dorm leader meeting -> Malleus is not there again -> Lilia mentions how he couldn’t find Malleus anymore after class so he’s here instead -> Idia questions if Malleus is missing meetings on purpose -> Lilia talked about how fairies feels time different from humans, and how Malleus have some troublesome karma on him as well

The meeting starts -> Riddle started reporting everything about the event -> but the “vocal & dance championship” has surprising amount of media focused on it -> Riddle was surprised since he thought it was just a chorus competition -> because of the time change and consideration for different types of music, now it includes singing, dancing, and performance -> and because of how popular it got, it becomes one chance for students to professionally debut -> and now it’s getting extra notice because the famous influencer Vil and Neige are in it -> Lilia commented how Neige is getting really popular online and on TV -> Idia surprised that people in Diasomnia actually go online -> Lilia “kuhuhu, of course, we are still just students in high school, we watch dramas and play games.” -> Crowley “Vila and Neige, 2 world known famous celebrity are going to appear in VDC, it won’t be an exaggeration to call it the highest degree of attention we are going to get in this event.” -> Crowley ask Riddle to make preparation in case of troubles -> Azul offered to help since he learned all about it from magic shift event -> Leona “hey octopus bastard… do you want your flappy tongue to turn into dried food or what?” -> Azul “oh my how scary” -> Riddle refused Azul’s help since he don’t want Azul ask for something later -> Kalim “just tell us if something is bothering you, we’ll help you anytime.”

-> Kalim “I can’t wait for the day of festival~!” ->  Idia “sign~~~… the popular guys just looks so happy everyday. I had to think about the day to announce our research result… if I just step on stage, everyone would be like ‘hey isn’t his hair burning?’ ‘could he be Shroud family’s…’ ‘what kind of dark research is he doing?’ aah I can’t… for person like me to do a speech on stage is just challenge level EX.” -> Riddle mentioned how the rules said student have to go on stage themselves and offer to train Idia for speech after school -> Idia said he’ll manage something himself (whispering) “I really don’t wanna have a farming event with demonic trainer Riddle.” -> end of meeting

In Vil’s room -> Vil “Mira, Mira” -> Mira “what can I help you with?” -> Vil “who is the fairest of them all right now?” -> Mira “the account with the most mention of fair in web currently is… Neige.” -> Vil “Neige…! Finally… this time have arrived.” -> Mira “sorry, I couldn’t quite hear you. Could you please repeat what you said?”

Few days later in cafeteria -> Ace, Deuce, Grim, and you saw the poster for the VDC audition -> the reward for wining the championship is 5 million Madollar to spilt among the members -> Crowley popped up and explained many corporation sponsored this event -> Grim wanted to join for the money so he can buy tuna cans

The song for audition is “piece of my world” -> Ace wanted to try so if he got accepted he don’t need to help set up the places anymore -> Deuce wanted the reward money to help his family -> but he never did singing or dancing before so he didn’t want to join ->

In courtyard you heard someone singing beautifully -> you saw Epel ->Deuce remembered the time he bumped into Epel last chapter -> He asked Epel why is he practice singing here -> it was because Vil told Epel to practice singing to the well so Epel can hear his voice clearly -> Deuce “does Pomefiore have some rules where you have to be good at singing?” -> it was because Epel has to take the audition for VDC and practice for a more lovely voice -> Epel (whisper) “event like that should just disappear…” -> “oh my Epel, are you skipping practice and talking with pigeons now?” -> it was Vil -> Grim “that guy’s leg looks like it’s 1 meter longer than MC’s!” -> Vil “there’s only 2 month left till VDC, Epel have no times play with muddy potatoes like you people.” -> “Epel, you too, if this keep going on you won’t be able to become the ‘red poisoned apple’ let’s go.” -> Epel “…But I actully don’t!” -> Vil “did you forgot the promise with me? Just come here already.” -> Ace and Grim was pretty mad and wanted to fight -> Vil “It’s not bad for a walk after meal. Come at me, I’ll make you into mashed potato.” -> fight time -> you are beat up by Vil -> and he only gives you 5/100 for the fight since you lacked the beauty when fighting -> Epel has to go back with Vil and Vil mentioned how it ends up like this because Epel skipped practice in break

The next day -> Deuce decided to try the audition -> so if they are accepted, Epel might got eliminated and don’t need to practice anymore -> Deuce “as a honor student, I can’t just watch him being forced into the things he don’t like.” -> Ace “I don’t think it’s very honor student of you to call yourself honor student.” -> dance practice time

Kalim and Jamil showed up practice for audition too -> Kalim “honestly you guys are pretty bad at this, you look like a panicked elephant trying to stand on 2 legs! Ahhaha!” -> Deuce “man this really hurts when he’s not even try to be mean.” -> Ace asked Jamil to teach them how to dance -> Kalim “oh sure! Jamil is really good at singing.” -> Jamil “why are you replying for me! … well it is also review for me when I’m teaching someone, fine I’ll do it.” -> teaching time -> Kalim “hey, how about we practice together tomorrow too? Jamil is really good at singing, we’ll show you.” -> Jamil “! You just decided that yourself too…!” -> Kalim “it’ll be fine, besides isn’t it more fun when you have more people for dancing, singing, or partying?” -> Jamil “fine, just don’t expect me to be so kind.” -> Jamil “for now, let’s just clean up, take some mops from the storage room -> Deuce, Ace, Kalim “okay.” -> Jamil “Kalim, you don’t have to do it… sigh.”

Azul showed up -> Grim mentioned how Jamil’s evil plan was streamed worldwide last chapter.” -> Azul “why do you think the merciful me would end my classmate societal life like that?” -> Jamil “…you would.” -> that day Azul was just on phone with Jade -> Azul “different from Leona, I don’t have an interest to beat down someone more than necessary, besides it’s a secret that I’ve finally got, I won’t do anything to make the price fall like that.” -> Jamil “hate to say it, but thanks to Azul’s mercifulness, my parents and Asim family didn’t know the real reason I overblot. But the dorm students…”

Flashback -> Scarabia students questioned why Kalim don’t change the vice dorm leader after what happened

-> Kalim “are you guys worried about me? Thank you! But… he was not the only one wrong this time, I’m also at fault. Besides, is there anyone in Scarabia that have not received help from Jamil?” -> student “that, that is true… if there’s something going wrong we would always just ask him…” -> Kalim “I know right? He is an excellent vice dorm leader. A lot better than me, the dorm leader. His judgements might be clouded back then, but he is still great at his work. He did try to expel me by manipulating you guys but… up till that incident, he has never hurt me even once before. He has many chances to do other much more horrible things to me, but he didn’t. Not once, in 17 years. I won’t call him a good guy but… it’s hard to explain but would you please give us more times?” -> students “…if that’s what you said so…” -> Jamil “…”  -> end of flashback -> Jamil “the chance I had for holiday was once in a lifetime, thought my life would be over if I failed, but in the end it didn’t change that much… surely something to be ‘grateful’ for. So unless I’m fired by Kalim, I’ll continue to serve him. And I’ll continue to show everyone how useful I am.” -> Grim “Jamil… your character really changed a lot after the holiday.” -> Azul “if you are fired by Kalim, Octavinelle will always welcome people like you with open arms.” -> Jamil “thank you for the offer, but no matter what happened I would never go to Octavinelle.” -> Kalim “Hey you guys~ if we don’t head out soon we are gonna be late for class!”

3 days later -> everyone is getting better at dancing and singing -> Jamil reminded them to sign up for audition with Rook in class 3-A -> Grim saw Leona and called out to him -> Leona: angry lion noises -> Grim asked where is Rook Hunt -> Leona “why are you trying to find that weird guy.” -> Rook suddenly popped up from behind -> Rook “hahaha, did I surprised you? Pardon. Conceal my footstep sound was a habit I had. I am Rook Hunt. The hunter of love that set his life theme as looking for beauty, helping beauty.” -> Leona “tsk, there it is, that weird guy.” -> Rook asked where is monsieur dandelion -> Leona “no way we are together 24/7, just take those herbivores and go.” -> Deuce questioned who is monsieur dandelion -> it was Ruggie -> the reason why Rook calls him that is because last spring, Rook saw Ruggie picking dandelion in the sports field. Ruggie plans to eat those since his budget is a little tight this month -> so Rook calls him monsieur dandelion out of respect -> Leona “that guy… is he really fine with eating everything that’s not rotten? He didn’t make me eat dandelions too, right…?” -> Rook “non non, it’s not poison, it’s not good to be picky like that lord lion.” -> Ace brought up the audition for VDC, we almost forgot about that because of what happened -> Rook “I apologize, so you guys are, human species Ace Trappola, height 172cm, from class 1-A with student number 25. Human species Deuce Spade, height 173cm, from the same class 1-A with student number 24. And human species MC with demon beast species Grim, height 70cm. right?”

-> Deuce “how did you know our class and student number!?” -> Ace “and even height too!?” -> Rook “huhuhu. As a hunter, I have to at least know the species and heights about the students.” -> there’s no need to write anything to sign up, you only need to show up to the audition 3 days later in Pomefiore’s ballroom -> Rook ask why don’t Leona try for the auditions too -> Leona “who would go to a game event like that, besides, that annoying Vil is also there. I would never go.” -> Rook “the Vil with the beauty of metropolis, and Leona kun with the beauty of wilderness. If both of you dances and sings together it would definitely be beautiful. The competition between different types of beauty, it’s just tres bien!” -> Leona “this guy really doesn’t listen to other people at all…”

3 days later -> in Pomrfiore dorm lounge, you saw around 50 students who’s also trying for audition -> Cater was also one of it -> since he wanted to go to the event with the famous celebrity Vil -> Ace “isn’t that reason a little too light hearted?” -> Cater “really? I thought everyone is like that, I mean look.”

-> pointed at Ruggie who’s clearly here for money -> Lilia popped up again -> you recognized him as the person who handed you the holiday card -> Grim “he wasn’t the sender?” -> Lilia “the initials are different from mine right?” -> Lilia is here since he’s in light music club and it just makes sense for him to try -> he tried to invite Malleus too but he said he don’t want it to become the exhibition of some kind so he refused -> Lilia “that guy is kind of shy” -> Cater “I feels like that’s a little bit different from shy…” -> Lilia asked why didn’t Cater brought Trey along -> Cater tried but Trey has to help Riddle with all the works

they saw Ortho by himself for audition too and was surprised -> Ace commented on how Ortho looks like an elementary school student -> Cater said Ortho is accepted into this school with Idia, and they always take classes together -> Grim “how much of a brothercon is Idia…” ->Ortho “don’t talk bad on my brother!” -> Ortho explained how everything was approved by the principals, and is not like Idia brought him just because he’s lonely by himself -> Cater “sorry sorry, we kinda got to excited while talking about it since the Shroud brother is like the 7 mysteries of this school.” -> Ortho “I want to apologize for getting too upset as well, I just don’t want you to misunderstand my brother…” -> Cater asked if Ortho is also here for audition -> flashback -> basically Idia made a software with his voice to read out everything he typed -> for the speech since he just can’t talk in front of everyone -> but Idia also got pretty interested in the sound editing world -> Idia “since virtual idol is getting popular, should I put vocal synthesizer in Ortho too?” -> Ortho “sounds fun! I wanted to sing too.” ->Idia “alright~ let big brother handle everything.” -> so to test how far the vocal synthesizer can go, Ortho is here to take the audition -> Ace was surprised that they can just make singing sounds from programs -> Cater said those got quite popular and he likes it too, and wanted to show Grim a video of it -> there was an ad

Neige is promoting in the ad -> Cater mentioned how popular he is getting -> Vil, Rook, and Epel kicked in with sparkling effects -> Vil started introducing himself and explains how he will be the producer for the members appears in VDC

Auditions starts -> Ruggie sung and danced

-> Rook “monsieur dandelion. Such a light step and bright smile. With manliness and loveliness combined perfectly. Beaute! 100 points!” -> Vil “his way of moving isn’t bad, but his dancing and singing is still messy… next!”

Cater -> Rook “monsieur magcam. Your voice sounds just like the elegant sparkling diamond! I wanted to listen to it forever. Beaute! 100 points!” -> Vil “singing and dancing wasn’t bad, but I can’t feel any passions… next!”

Lilia -> Rook “monsieur curiosity. Such a lovely form and singing voice with an alluring aura… Beaute! 100 points!” -> Vil “I don’t know why… but I can’t feel any freshness of a high school student from Lilia. Next!”

Ortho -> Rook “monsieur doll. What a brand-new style…! Your robot dance and singing voice, will be sculpted into my eyes. Beaute! 100 points!” -> Vil “no matter how genre-less this event is, there’s a limit… next!”

Kalim -> Rook “lord gold! Your dance were just like the breeze that blow through the hot sand! And the singing that make me felt like flying. Beaute! 100 points!” -> Vil “hmm, it’s a little bit better than the vegetables that’s just rolling around.”

Jamil -> Rook “monsieur mulch. As expected… I can feel your buring soul underneath your cool mask! Beaute! 100 points!” -> Vil “not bad, he’s the most normal one out of all of them.”

Epel -> Rook “monsieur crabapple. So lovely! Beaute! 100 points!” -> Vil “that kid, misstep again, no matter how good was his rehearse, it would be meaningless if he can’t do good in the real deal. Also, Rook. aren’t you giving out nothing but 100 points? Are you judging seriously?” -> Rook “of course, but it’s so hard to pick a first when everyone are so wonderful. There’s beauty in the neatness, and there’s also beauty in the twisted. Don’t you think so?” -> last group -> Ace, Deuce, and Grim -> Rook “…I see I see.” -> end of the audition -> result will come out tomorrow -> Rook recommend the trio to Vil

Next day, Ace, Deuce, Grim just got off from class -> suddenly an arrow flies across barely missed Deuce’s nose -> Ace realized there’s a piece of paper on the arrow -> Deuce “what!? Is it a challenge to fight!?” -> Ace “stop connect everything to a fight, let me see…” -> both Ace and Deuce are accepted -> you are also asked to go with those two

You all headed towards Pomefiore -> you saw both Kalim and Jamil -> they are accepted as well -> but after going in Pomefiore, students keep showing up asking for fight -> finally you arrived to the ballroom

-> Vil showed up with sparkling effects again -> apparently the students are fighting with you because you are accepted members, it was a warm up Vil prepared for all of you so he can start the lesson right away -> Vil “listen up, start from now on we would be the representation for NRC, and aim for the first place in the VDC. The members that can’t even win a fight like that is not needed. The battle has already started and all of you should be prepared to be whipped to shape!” -> Kalim “I don’t really understand but okay!” -> Grim asks why are him and you here when you are not accepted -> Crowley showed up and explained, in order to practice for the team work, all of the members will live together in Ramshakle dorm -> Grim wanted to refuse -> but Vil and Rook said they will give you all of their reward money since their goal in this event is not money -> which is around 1.42 million -> you decided to accept the deal after all ->Vil “now let’s start the lesson!” -> Ace “I thought the lesson starts when we starts living together?” -> Vil “don’t get a big head, new potato number 1. You are still an amateur at singing and dancing, we can’t waste a single minute.” -> practice time.

 End of this update.

Oh man it tooks me a whole entire day to do this… and to think this is just like part a of part1. The chapters are getting so much longer…

I Honestly felt like I missed up half of Rook’s nicknames since I don’t know French at all, basically got everything from google so please correct me if I’m wrong.

Also, Rook’s nickname for Epel is kinda weird, he call Epel hime ringo which directly translate to princess apple, but it is also a type of apple. In English it’s called crabapple, which kind of feels different then the Japanese text.

Can I just say I love the fact that we can fight Crewel now? And I just love how he call us zasshu while fighting, it probably referenced to like mixed blood dogs and all but it only reminds me of Gilgamesh lol.

Ahhh I really want Crewel to slap me.

[magnusmysteries]

Part 4: The Sixteenth Fear

The Magnus Archives was a horror podcast. It is now completed. Many of the show’s mysteries were never explained on the show. I intend to explain them. Spoilers for the show, but also spoilers if you wanna solve these mysteries yourself.

In part 3 I said every fear has an opposite. But the Flesh didn’t exist before the industrial revolution. So there would have been 13 fears then, an uneven number, and not every fear could balance against an opposite. So how could that be?

The answer is, there were only 12 fears before the Flesh. The Corruption and the Desolation used to be the same fear. 

Diego Molina of the Lightless Flame cult worships Asag. A Sumerian god of disease that could make fish boil. So Asag seems to be of both the Corruption and the Desolation.

In Infectious Doubts Arthur Nolan complains about it: “Not like I can vent to the others about what a prat Diego is. Got a lot of funny ideas. Still calls the Lightless Flame Asag, like he was when he was first researching it. I just really wanna tell him to get over it; I mean Asag was traditionally a force of destruction, sure, but as a church we very much settled on burning in terms of the – face we worship, and some fish-boiling Sumerian demon doesn’t really match up, does it? Plus there’s a lot of disease imagery with Asag that I’ll reckon is way too close to Filth for my taste, but no, he read it in some ancient tome, so that’s that –“

Ancient is the key word. The tome predates the industrial revolution and the Flesh. Asag probably isn’t a thing anymore and Diego is indeed a prat for worshipping it.

In The Architecture of Fear Smirke writes “I know you say the Flesh was perhaps always there, shriveled and nascent until its recent growth, but to grant the existence of such a lesser power would throw everything into confusion. Would you have me separate the Corruption into insects, dirt, and disease? To divide the fungal bloom from the maggot?”

It is not random that Smirke uses the Corruption as an example here. The Corruption is the opposite of the Flesh, so the Corruption is the fear that Smirke believed had no opposite for hundreds or thousands of years.

In part 3 I said vampires where Corruption/Desolation/Hunt. This is a little far-fetched, but I wonder if the vampire’s we’ve seen have been old ones that predate the Flesh. And that’s why they are part Corruption, since Corruption and Hunt used to be next to each other. Maybe there are more modern vampires without the long sucking tongue. Maybe instead of sucking blood, when they bite you begin to burn or boil. Since the Hunt is now next to the Desolation instead of the Corruption-Desolation combo.

In Vampire Killer Trevor says “I have killed five people that I know for sure as vampires, and there are two more that may or may not have been.” There is a missing middle part of Trevor’s statement. Maybe there he talks about killing two vampires that are modern and therefore different so he’s not sure if they’re actually vampires.

Speaking of fears splitting up, why is the Darkness the opposite fear of the Slaughter? In Last Words we hear of the first fear “A fear of blood and pounding feet, a fear of that sudden burst of pain and then nothing.” 

And of the second fear “The fear of their own end, of the things that lived in the darkness, became a fear of the darkness itself.”

I think the first was a general fear of violence. It includes what became the Hunt “Blood and pounding Feet...” and the Slaughter “...Sudden burst of pain and then nothing”, and the End “The fear of their own end…” And the second fear was the Darkness. They were the opposite by default, simply for being the two first fears.

When the Buried became a fear, the Hunt split up from the Violence to oppose it. When the Vast became a fear, the End split up from the Violence to oppose it. All that was left of the Violence was Slaughter, still opposing the Dark. When humans began warfare, fear of war fit nicely with the Slaughter.

The Eye might have been part of the Dark at first. Still from Last Words: “...because they knew the dark held flashing talons and shining eyes…” 

When the Lonely became a fear, the Eye split up from the Dark to oppose it.

So what about the Extinction? Does it have an opposite? Yes! There is a sixteenth fear. And what can be the opposite of the fear of the end of the world? The fear that the world isn’t real. That we’re all just living in a computer simulation. If you think the world isn’t even real, you’re not gonna be so worried about it ending. I’ll call it the Simulation.

Here is how the fears are arranged on the wheel, with the two latest fears added:

Description of image: A circle with 16 spots similar to a clock. On each spot is a number and the name of a power: 1. Corruption. 2 Extinction. 3. Desolation. 4. Hunt. 5. Slaughter. 6. End. 7. Lonely. 8. Stranger. 9. Flesh. 10. Simulation 11. Spiral. 12. Buried. 13. Dark. 14. Vast. 15. Eye. 16. Web.

The Extinction is next to the Corruption. Disease and garbage are both gross. Possessive is an Extinction episode, even if not acknowledged as such by any of the characters. It’s about garbage. And Maggie is creating people out of garbage. She is making the inheritors mentioned in Time of Revelation. There are also creatures made of garbage in Concrete Jungle. And Maggie was full of moving insect legs, showing Corruption influence.

Quote from Adelard Dekker from Rotten Core: “I’ve spoken before about how keenly I’ve watched news of possible pandemics, which is where I suspect the Extinction may pull away from the Corruption during its emergence.” Adelard knows the Extinction is next to Corruption.

The Extinction is next to Desolation. That fits, nuclear weapons cause fire. Quote from Times of Revelation, describing corpses: “They were stiff, and desiccated, mummified by some process Bernadette could not begin to guess at, but that rendered their flesh like tightly packed ash” Ash as if they were burned.

The Simulation is next to the Flesh. The Flesh makes you think humans aren’t people, they are just meat. The Simulation makes you think humans aren’t people, they are just NPCs.

The Simulation is the next to the Spiral. Both make you question what is real. The Spiral makes you doubt your mind, the Simulation makes you doubt your world.

There are four episodes about the Simulation: Binary, Zombie, Cul-de-sac and Reflection.

In Binary Sergey Ushanka uploads his mind into a computer. He becomes a simulation and it hurts. There is influence by the Spiral, the statement giver isn’t sure if she’s going crazy. And there is influence by the Flesh. Ushanka uploads himself into a computer and then he eats the computer. So that’s cannibalism.

In Zombie the statement giver thinks other people aren’t real, they’re philosophical zombies, In other words they like simulations or NPCs. The man that follows her repeats the phrase “Just fine, thank you for asking” and says nothing else. Just like some NPCs in video games will say the same phrase over and over. The man is identical the three times they meet, except for his t-shirt changes color. Sometimes in video games some NPCs will be identical, except for some colors are changed. (Because it’s less work to recollar a character than to draw one from scratch.)

John thinks Cul-De-Sac is about the Lonely. And yes, the statement giver was lonely. But the people affected by the Lonely choose to be lonely, and the statement giver didn’t. His boyfriend broke up with him because of cheating and then he lost his friends because they sided with his boyfriend. 

I think the theme of the statement is unreality, not loneliness. In the Magnus Archives, when someone gets marked by a power it is because they made some wrong choice. The choice the statement giver makes is to return to the place he found dead and soulless. He drives back to his ex-boyfriend to deliver the moose, rather than send it by mail. He specifically wants to meet his ex. Not an act of loneliness, quite the opposite. Also he is returning a moose that is angular and creepy, in other words it is unreal.

When the statement escapes from the nightmare it’s because he got a phone call from his ex. And he says “I love you.” and that fits neatly with the Lonely. But it also fits with escape from the unreal. He escapes because he communicates with a real person.

The road signs says “Road” and “Street”. Generic and unreal. All the houses look the same. Like in a computer game. The statement giver wonders if they are the same house. Like in a computer game where one might reuse the code for a house many times.

The house he enters has stock photos. Unreal.

The people on TV have something wrong with their eyes, similar to the eyes of the zombies in Zombie. And it's a fake cooking show, and a fake infomercial.

The dead woman upstairs was someone who had social media profiles, and that nobody notices had died. Meaning she lived her life online. That sounds like she was lonely. But living online also makes her a good victim for the Simulation. Everyone she talked to was on a computer, she couldn’t know for sure if they were real.

The woman had killed herself with a mirror. I think what happened was she had looked into the mirror and seen that her eyes were wrong, like the eyes of the people on TV. And she had thought she was just a simulation, like everything around her. And therefore she killed herself. Or perhaps she wasn’t reflected in the mirror at all? Like in…

Reflection. Adelard speculated that this statement was about the Extinction, but I don’t think so. The protagonist was in a world that seemed unreal. A fun fair is artificial so that fits the theme. The people were playing games, which fits the theme via computer games maybe.

Adelard says “I can’t quite get past the detail that there was no reflection at all in the mirror he used to return.” It is almost at the end of Adelard’s letter, it’s clearly meant to be significant. The no reflection might be symbolic for the statement giver starting to think he isn’t real, which might be what happened to him after he gave the statement.

Reflection has influence by the Spiral, with the maze of mirrors. There is influence by the Flesh, with the cannibalism.

[danteinthedevildom]

A Royal Pajama Party “Analysis” - Part 3 (of 7) 

Unlike the previous two posts - which were fairly length - this one is a little less of a formal analysis and more of a “holy shit this man’s so fucking cute” ramble. It’s significantly shorter; I would have actually compiled these together with the previous post if Tumblr wasn’t so awful with its image-per-post limit. 

It continues with Diavolo and MC watching a movie together, and once again leads into more Story Key-locked content. So, here is your cursory spoiler warning!

Picking up from the previous post, the movie Diavolo picks to watch with you is a black and white Human World film. A few thoughts come to mind on this.

One: He picked a movie specifically because he wanted to watch it with you. Not just anyone in general, or even just a human in general - specifically you. He spends a lot of time thinking about and noting down things he wants to do with you. 

This, to begin with, is just... impossibly sweet. He’s never had a friend before, so he’s never had someone to think about when he’s looking at things he enjoys. Even the closest demons to him don’t generally like humouring him with his more playful whims. 

Now, however? He has you. Someone willing to spend time with him. Suddenly, he has someone utterly receptive to the things he loves; someone happy enough to listen, someone who might enjoy them just as much as he does. 

We’ve all done it before, after all. As soon as we know someone’s happy to listen to you ramble about something, we take note of things we think they might like so we can share it with them and (potentially) get them into it as well. Make it a bonding experience, because we like the thing and we like them, so why not mix the two? That’s how you deepen a friendship, after all. 

It’s such a normal, human thing for Diavolo to do. He’s sincerely just happy to have you there; to finally have someone he can pick out likes to share with. Just a passing thought - “Oh, MC might like that, I’ll have to save it for our sleepover” - that speaks a thousand words to how often (how casually, naturally, easily) he thinks about you. 

But it’s also a bit more than that. Because while this is just about the movie, we’ve already seen Diavolo admit he’s quite literally written out a list of activities he wants to do with you. 

How long is that list? What sort of things has he got written down? We’ve been given a small glimpse at the list for this Devilgram, but it really is just a small glimpse. How many times has Diavolo seen something that has immediately pinged in his brain as “things I need to do with/show MC”?

(How many things has he never felt comfortable or happy showing anyone else before? 

How many times has he tried to share his interests, only for them to be rejected?)

Two: It’s Human World media. Diavolo’s only recently (in the main game) gotten to see the Human World properly, and considering this is black and white, I’d say it’s fairly old. At the latest? Maybe a hundred years old at this point. 

That’s (possibly) at least 100 years Diavolo’s been consuming Human World media. 

The fact that he’s remembered it this long, too - for you to appear, and him to want to share it with you - either means it’s something he watches frequently, or it’s something that made a big impression on him.  

Diavolo’s infatuated with the Human World, that much we already knew; one of his Homescreen interactions is about wanting to see the sunset, and another mentions how he hasn’t been to the Human World (either at all, or often). It’s something he wants to see more - something that excites him in a very boyish, childish way. Like a kid going on holiday to Disney World after seeing it on TV a thousand times. 

But this isn’t a recent infatuation. The movie (potentially) proves this. Even before the Exchange Programme - before he met you - he’s held this infatuation with humanity. It’s not just about peace; there’s something about the Human World that draws Diavolo in. 

There’s more evidence of this in a later post, so I’ll go over this a bit more then. For now, however... 

We can say with certainty that Diavolo wasn’t kidding when he said the Exchange Programme has been a dream of his for some time. It makes me wonder just how far back he wanted to unite the Three Realms, and why; whether he started with interest in the Celestial Realm or the Human World, and whether or not he hoped the Exchange would branch out his social contacts (considering we already know that demons don’t tend to spend time with him, and Diavolo is horrendously lonely). 

(As an aside: the fact that he’s seemingly so infatuated with the Human World makes it even more special for him to share this movie with you. This is something he adores, something that’s affected him so much, he’s dedicated his life to improving relations across the Three Realms - and he wants you to experience it, too.)

Three: A bit more of a joking point, admittedly. Boy really said “I’ve been wanting to watch this movie with you that I love that also happens to be related to the Human World” with the same vibe as Ariel seeing the Prince for the first time and realising he could tell her what all the crap she’s been collecting is for. 

I just... love the idea that his logic is “well, MC is human. This movie was made in the Human World. Ergo, this is the most appropriate movie to watch with MC for our super special sleepover!”

He’s so determined for everything to be perfect... I wonder if this movie was his immediate choice - something he’s always known from the start he’d do with you first the moment he could - or if he debated over several movies for the longest time, trying to come up with the best possible choice. 

Adorable ramble time!

He’s good, in that he won’t make you do anything you don’t want to - you’re always given the choice of how close you want to be to Diavolo, and if you want to nope out of vaguely (or even overtly) romantic situations even at the last minute - but when given the chance? He will get as close to you as possible. 

He’ll have you sit right next to him, pressed arm-to-arm, thigh-to-thigh. He’ll thread his fingers through yours, and rest your joined hands on your lap. And he’ll savour every moment, because this isn’t something he gets often, if at all. 

That comment - “your hand is so warm...” - has such a sense of awe to it. He’s finally close enough to you to say that you’re warm. He’s finally reached this pinnacle of contact that he’s always wanted - and look at him! He’s so happy! He’s so, genuinely, wonderfully happy to be this close to you. 

He’s been wanting to watch the movie with you for at least months, if not a few years (timeline depending), and he finally has the time to show you this thing he’s genuinely excited for you to see  - and it is totally blown out of the water by the fact you’re snuggled up to him, holding his hand. 

That’s how special you are to him. That’s how special this moment is for him. 

There’s something so sweet - and yet so heartbreaking - at seeing the damn Prince of the Devildom get so flustered over asking to hold your hand. I know that the OM demons aren’t always depicted as your typical demons, and a few of them are fairly sex-shy, but there’s just... something about this scene that hits different. 

He’s so tentative, so hopeful, to be able to hold your hand. He’s so shy about it, too. And, yes, some of that is absolutely him fretting over ruining the evening by asking - fretting over chasing you off if he’s too touchy, when you’re already doing so much just by staying as long as you have - but some of it has to be him not knowing if that’s an okay thing to ask for. Wanting to get closer, but not knowing if it’s appropriate. 

I have a lot of feelings about this scene. It’s just... whether you see it as romantic or not, he’s so happy. He’s so happy just to have you there. He’s so happy you’re humouring him. He’s so happy you’re letting him do these very simple things. 

He’s so lonely. And you just make all of that go away. 

This is actually more of a silly thing, but I just wanted to note that - the Devildom has fucking Jenga and it’s called The Demonic Tower. 

I’m also still not over this for a slightly sadder reason. This is another one of the things that Diavolo wanted to do with you - another activity on his list. And it’s playing fucking Jenga.

He knew/knows so few people and has such little free time, something as simple as Jenga is riveting entertainment for him. 

He’s played so few board games in his life, he actually thought it was worthwhile to write down as something he absolutely had to do with you for your special, rare night of shared time spent together. 

There are so many normal, plain, boring, everyday life experiences he’s never done, and every new thing he presents just hits harder than the last. 

+++

And that concludes our (slightly shorter) part 3! Once again, thank you for making it this far. Hopefully the slightly lighter post was alright- 

Next post, we’re going to skip ahead a bit. The game of Jenga itself is mostly just fun, so there’s no need to focus on it specifically. What is important, however, is the next activity - and what Diavolo does based on certain choices. 

So, if you’d like, head on over to part 4!

[hexalt]

CW for discussion of suicide

- She's the crazy ex-girlfriend - What? No, I'm not. - She's the crazy ex-girlfriend - That's a sexist term! - She's the crazy ex-girlfriend - Can you guys stop singing for just a second? - She's so broken insiiiiiide! - The situation's a lot more nuanced than that!

There’s the essay! You get it now. JK.

Crazy Ex-Girlfriend is the culmination of Rachel Bloom’s YouTube channel (and the song “Fuck Me, Ray Bradbury” in particular where she combined her lifelong obsession with musical theatre and sketch comedy and Aline Brosh McKenna stumbling onto Bloom’s channel one night while having an idea for a television show that subverted the tropes in scripts she’d been writing like The Devil Wears Prada and 27 Dresses.

The show begins with a flashback to teenage Rebecca Bunch (played by Bloom) at summer camp performing in South Pacific. She leaves summer camp gushing about the performance, holding hands with the guy she spent all summer with, Josh Chan. He says it was fun for the time, but it’s time to get back to real life. We flash forward to the present in New York, Rebecca’s world muted in greys and blues with clothing as conservative as her hair.

She’s become a top tier lawyer, a career that she doesn’t enjoy but was pushed into by her overprotective, controlling mother. She’s just found out she’s being promoted to junior partner, and that’s just objectively, on paper fantastic, right?! ...So why isn’t she happy? She goes out onto the streets in the midst of a panic attack, spilling her pills all over the ground, and suddenly sees an ad for butter asking, “When was the last time you were truly happy?” A literal arrow and beam of sunlight then point to none other than Josh Chan. She strikes up a conversation with him where he tells her he’s been trying to make it in New York but doesn’t like it, so he’s moving back to his hometown, West Covina, California, where everyone is just...happy.

The word echoes in her mind, and she absorbs it like a pill. She decides to break free of the hold others have had over her life and turns down the promotion of her mother’s dreams. I didn’t realize the show was a musical when I started it, and it’s at this point that Rebecca is breaking out into its first song, “West Covina”. It’s a parody of the extravagant, classic Broadway numbers filled with a children’s marching band whose funding gets cut, locals joining Rebecca in synchronized song and dance, and finishing with her being lifted into the sky while sitting on a giant pretzel. This was the moment I realized there was something special here.

With this introduction, the stage has been set for the premise of the show. Each season was planned with an overall theme. Season one is all about denial, season two is about being obsessed with love and losing yourself in it, season three is about the spiral and hitting rock bottom, and season four is about renewal and starting from scratch. You can see this from how the theme songs change every year, each being the musical thesis for that season.

We start the show with a bunch of cliché characters: the crazy ex-girlfriend; her quirky sidekick; the hot love interest; his bitchy girlfriend; and his sarcastic best friend who’s clearly a much better match for the heroine. The magic of Crazy Ex-Girlfriend is that no one in West Covina is the sum of their tropes. As Rachel says herself, “People aren’t badly written, people are made of specificities.”

The show is revolutionary for the authenticity with which it explores various topics but for the sake of this piece, we’ll discuss mental health, gender, Jewish identity, and sexuality. All topics that Bloom has dug into in her previous works but none better than here.

Simply from the title, many may be put off, but this is a story that has always been about deconstructing stereotypes. Rather than being called The Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, where the story would be from an outsider’s perspective, this story is from that woman’s point of view because the point isn’t to demonize Rebecca, it’s to understand her. Even if you hate her for all the awful things she’s doing.

The musical numbers are shown to be in Rebecca’s imagination, and she tells us they’re how she processes the world, but as she starts healing in the final season, she isn’t the lead singer so often anymore and other characters get to have their own problems and starring roles. When she does have a song, it’s because she’s backsliding into her former patterns.

While a lot of media will have characters that seem to have some sort of vague disorder, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend goes a step further and actually diagnoses Rebecca with Borderline Personality Disorder, while giving her an earnest, soaring anthem. She’s excited and relieved to finally have words for what’s plagued her whole life.

When diagnosing Rebecca, the show’s team consulted with doctors and psychiatrists to give her a proper diagnosis that ended up resonating with many who share it. BPD is a demonized and misunderstood disorder, and I’ve heard that for many, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend is the first honest and kind depiction they’ve seen of it in media. Where the taboo of mental illness often leads people to not get any help, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend says there is freedom and healing in identifying and sharing these parts of yourself with others.

Media often uses suicide for comedy or romanticizes it, but Crazy Ex-Girlfriend explored what’s going through someone’s mind to reach that bottomless pit. Its climactic episode is written by Jack Dolgen (Bloom’s long-time musical collaborator, co-songwriter and writer for the show) who’s dealt with suicidal ideation. Many misunderstood suicide as the person simply wanting to die for no reason, but Rebecca tells her best friend, “I didn’t even want to die. I just wanted the pain to stop. It’s like I was out of stories to tell myself that things would be okay.”

Bloom has never shied away from heavy topics. The show discusses in song the horrors of what women do to their bodies and self-esteem to conform to beauty standards, the contradiction of girl power songs that tell you to “Put Yourself First” but make sure you look good for men while doing it, and the importance of women bonding over how terrible straight men are are near and dear to her heart. This is a show that centers marginalized women, pokes fun at the misogyny they go through, and ultimately tells us the love story we thought was going to happen wasn’t between a woman and some guy but between her and her best friend.

I probably haven’t watched enough Jewish TV or film, but to me, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend is the most unapologetic and relatable Jewish portrayal I’ve seen overall. From Rebecca’s relationship with her toxic, controlling mother (if anyone ever wants to know what my mother’s like, I send them “Where’s the Bathroom”) to Patti Lupone’s Rabbi Shari answering a Rebecca that doesn’t believe in God, “Always questioning! That is the true spirit of the Jewish people,” the Jewish voices behind the show are clear.

Crazy Ex-Girlfriend continues to challenge our perceptions when a middle-aged man with an ex-wife and daughter realizes he’s bisexual and comes out in a Huey Lewis saxophone reverie. The hyper-feminine mean girl breaks up with her boyfriend and realizes the reason she was so obsessed with getting him to commit to her is the same reason she’s so scared to have female friends. She was suffering under the weight of compulsory heterosexuality, but thanks to Rebecca, she eventually finds love and friendship with women.

This thread is woven throughout the show. Many of the characters tell Rebecca when she’s at her lowest of how their lives would’ve never changed for the better if it wasn’t for her. She was a tornado that blew through West Covina, but instead of leaving destruction in her wake, she blew apart their façades, forcing true introspection into what made them happy too.

Rebecca’s story is that of a woman who felt hopeless, who felt no love or happiness in her life, when that’s all she’s ever wanted. She tried desperately to fill that void through validation from her parents and random men, things romantic comedies had taught her matter most but came up empty. She tried on a multitude of identities through the musical numbers in her mind, seeing herself as the hero and villain of the story, and eventually realized she’s neither because life doesn’t make narrative sense.

It takes her a long time but eventually she sees that all the things she thought would solve her problems can’t actually bring her happiness. What does is the real family she finds in West Covina, the town she moved to on a whim, and finally having agency over herself to use her own voice and tell her story through music.

The first words spoken by Rebecca are, “When I sang my solo, I felt, like, a really palpable connection with the audience.” Her last words are, “This is a song I wrote.” This connection with the audience that brought her such joy is something she finally gets when she gets to perform her story not to us, the TV audience, but to her loved ones in West Covina. Rebecca (and Rachel) always felt like an outcast, West Covina (and creating the show) showed her how cathartic it is to find others who understand you.

Crazy Ex-Girlfriend is the prologue to Rebecca’s life and the radical story of someone getting better. She didn’t need to change her entire being to find acceptance and happiness, she needed to embrace herself and accept love and help from others who truly cared for her. Community is what she always needed and community is what ultimately saved her.

*

P.S. If you have Spotify... I also process life through music, so I made some playlists related to the show because what better way to express my deep affection for it than through song?

CXG parodies, references, and is inspired by a lot of music from all kinds of genres, musicals, and musicians. Same goes for the videos themselves. I gathered all of them into one giant playlist along with the show’s songs.

A Rebecca Bunch mix that goes through her character arc from season 1 to 4.

I’m shamelessly a fan of Greg x Rebecca, so this is a mega mix of themselves and their relationship throughout the show.

*

I’m in a TV group where we wrote essays on our favorite shows of the 2010s, so here is mine on Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, I realized I forgot to ever post it. Also wrote one for Schitt’s Creek.

[snarktheater]

Ready Player Two — Opening Cutscene & Chapter 0

Hello again.

It’s been a while. I haven’t been active on this blog since, fittingly enough, Ready Player One. I was going to do this sooner—even had an alarm set up and everything—but then, it turns out, I’m feeling so much negativity about the world in general that a book just pales in comparison.

Seriously, I had to scrap this post’s entire intro because it’s not even 2020 anymore as I write this. And you know, maybe that’s for the best. I’m not really in the mood for doom and gloom and bitching anymore. I uninstalled Twitter from my phone a while back, I’ve been doing good at my daily writing sprints, my biggest fanfic project concluded on a positive note from people I didn’t even realize had been following it for years.

So I don’t know what this is going to be like. My commentary, I mean; I’ve heard echoes of what the book is like, so I’m not expecting a surprise there.

The book opens right after the end of Ready Player One, in a “Cutscene” where Wade recounts to us what happened after he won Halliday’s contest. It also assumes you remember exactly who the main characters of the book are, which is a bold move for a sequel that came out almost a decade after the original.

Technically, I could just look up the details I’m fuzzy about. But also, I think it’s more authentic if I don’t. I trust my memory enough that if I’m wrong, it’ll be in subtle enough ways that it’ll almost be a private jokes between all of us. An “if you know, you know” sort of error system. And I don’t think there’s anything more true to the spirit of this book than that.

Shoto had flown back home to Japan to take over operations at GSS’s Hokkaido division.

So Wade starts his tenure with nepotism. Wasn’t Shoto really young? Why is he qualified to run anything?

Aech was enjoying an extended vacation in Senegal, a country she’d dreamed of visiting her whole life, because her ancestors had come from there.

You know what, I’m not touching “send the token black character back to Africa.” This isn’t my lane.

And Samantha had flown back to Vancouver to pack up her belongings and say goodbye to her grandmother, Evelyn.

Why is she saying goodbye? Why, she’s moving to Columbus to be with Wade, of course! It’s not like there was anything else in her life. Was there? And why isn’t she referred to as Art3mis? I’m pretty sure Wade found out all of their offline names in the last book, and the inconsistency mildly bothers me.

These three sentences are back to back, by the way. Someone—I forget who—once described Ready Player One as a book that’s fun to write a wiki about, because it’s got fun concepts to summarize about until you realize that all the emotional connective tissue you need to turn a list of things into a story is missing, and that’s roughly how this first page feels.

Hell, the first line of the book is Wade telling us he remained offline for nine whole days after winning the contest, but by the end of the second paragraph we’re already to him logging back into the OASIS to "distract himself from [his and Samantha’s] reunion.

I’ll give Ernest Cline one thing: it feels like he wrote this opening nine days after the first book and did about as much maturing as a teenage boy would do between the two books.

Way more time is spent describing Wade’s OASIS rig, or the in-game planet where the climax of the last book happened, than anything else in this introduction. He is immediately greeted by a crowd of adoring fans who have been waiting over a week for him to come back in the game, because they’re all grateful that our protagonist and his friends restored their avatars after they were annihilated by the Sixers.

You’d think the adoring fans would serve some kind of purpose, or that something would happen, but no. Wade immediately goes “ew, people” and teleports away, since he essentially has ultimate powers within the game. With a caveat: the powers are actually coming from the Robes of Anorak he’s wearing, and I’m mentioning that in the hopes that it will pay off sometime in the book’s future, assuming Cline at least learned to do that. But still, let’s not skip too fast the fact that we introduced that crowd of adoring fans for no other purpose than to tell us they’re out there, because it fits right in with the last book’s attempts at saying as little as humanly possible in as many words as possible.

Anyway, Wade went back into Anorak’s study, where he arbitrarily checks out the Easter Egg he got at the end of the last book, and finds an inscription on it. I was dreading another riddle, but no, it’s just straight-up instructions to a vault in the GSS archives, so Wade logs off and goes to check it out.

Of course Halliday had put [the archives] [on the 13th floor]. In one of his favorite TV shows, Max Headroom, Network 23’s hidden research-and-development lab was located on the thirteenth floor. And The Thirteenth Floor was also the title of an old sci-fi film about virtual reality, released in 1999, right on the heels of both The Matrix and eXistenZ.

I’m equally shocked that it took two whole pages (on my ereader) to get to the first slew of references, and that one of these references is from 1999. I didn’t know we were allowed to think of anything that isn’t the 80s. Speaking of which, I’ll spare you the whole paragraph, but the book does feel the need to explain why it’s vault 42.

Inside the vault, there’s another egg containing a super-fancy and advanced OASIS headset. The egg also has a video monitor that plays a video message from James Halliday shortly before his death.

But despite his condition, he hadn’t used his OASIS avatar to record this message like he had with Anorak’s Invitation. For some reason, he’d chosen to appear in the flesh this time, under the brutal, unforgiving light of reality.

That oh-so-important message? An infodump about the headset’s working. He called it an OASIS Neural Interface, ONI for short. It basically lets you experience the OASIS through all your senses with sensory input just like the real thing, you know, that thing Wade had to get a fancy suit and massive rig to do in the first book. And yes, Wade does spend a paragraph or two comparing it to other works of science fiction. Of course he does.

More importantly, it also records all the sensory input into a separate file, which can then be replayed over to re-experience said sensations, or live someone else’s experiences. Halliday tries to frame it as a tool to generate communication and empathy, seemingly all without acknowledging the potential creepiness of that. But hey. Who knows. Maybe that’s because this is the setup stage, and it’ll pay off eventually.

I also wondered about the name Halliday had chosen for his invention. I’d seen enough anime to know that oni was also a Japanese word for a giant horned demon from the pits of hell.

Add “reducing Japan to anime” to the list of things the book has failed to improve upon. By the way, the narration insisted on spelling out ONI letter by letter earlier, so it’s weird to make that link now. It’s also just kind of inelegant to just tell us “this is the symbolism behind the name”, but that’s just the sort of thing I’ve come to expect from this book.

Anyway, the reason Halliday kept this for his successor to find is he wants Wade to test out the technology and decide if humanity is ready for it. Why Halliday thinks the most glorified pop culture trivia / video game competition qualifies you for such a decision should be a problem, but sadly, a lot of billionaires have said and done a lot of dumb and eerily similar things in the past few years since I read Ready Player One, so actually, I can’t fault the book for that one. Tragically, our fates really are in the hands of people who should rightfully be cartoon villains.

To his credit, Wade does question Halliday’s motives in keeping this under wraps at all rather than releasing it himself. So hey, maybe it really is setting something up.

Wade goes back to his office with the ONI, and we’re treated with this lovely piece of narration:

I was grateful that Samantha wasn’t there. I didn’t want to give her the opportunity to talk me out of testing the ONI. Because I was worried she might try to, and if she did, she would’ve succeeded. (I’d recently discovered that when you’re madly in love with someone they can persuade you to do pretty much anything.)

There’s a lot to unpack about the implications this has for their relationship, but it’s way too early in the book for me to editorialize when one character hasn’t even been on the page yet. So I’ll just leave it here for the record. Hopefully you see the problem without me needing to point it out anyway. If not, feel free to hit my inbox.

So Wade, confident in the fact that Halliday would have warned him if there were any risks to using the ONI, decides to try it out. Even though he immediately follows up that statement with this:

According to the ONI documentation, forcibly removing the headset while it was in operation could severely damage the wearer’s brain and/or leave them in a permanent coma. So the titanium-reinforced safety bands made certain this couldn’t happen. I found this little detail comforting instead of unsettling. Riding in an automobile was risky, too, if you didn’t wear your seatbelt…

Wade. My dude. What the fuck is this simile. And why don’t you see that maybe a machine where you’re forcibly trapping yourself inside a virtual reality might be dangerous? Hell, when I said this was setting something up, I was expecting something vaguely interesting about the potential breach of privacy, or how you don’t need to literally walk in someone’s shoes to feel empathy for them, or anything substantial, but now I’m worried it’ll just end up as “man, sometimes science fiction machines will scramble your brain, isn’t that weird”?

Like, I don’t know, to me “it will put you in a coma” sounds like a good reason for Halliday not to release the ONI. Maybe we can still make it into a commentary on how corporations will sell stuff they know is directly harmful if it can make them a profit. Who knows.

The book waffles on about more risks, and the mechanics of how the ONI activates, and the warning disclaimer when it does turn on. Specifically, there’s a time limit of twelve consecutive hours, after which you’ll be automatically logged out, because yes, using the thing for too long can also cause brain damage.

Gregarious Simulation Systems will not be held responsible for any injuries caused by improper use of the OASIS Neural Interface.

See, now there’s the sort of thing that could be a source for commentary, but no, instead it’s thrown in there like it’s nothing and Wade glosses over the entire warning, and instead keep wondering why Halliday didn’t just release the ONI if even the safety disclaimers were in place.

By the way: this whole system has apparently gone through several independent human trials already, so I’m finding it hard to imagine that it’s actually a secret Halliday took to the grave as Wade says. Unless he also had everyone involved in those trials killed afterwards. Or maybe they all ended up with brain damage which rendered them incapable of talking about it.

And before you think I’m being unfair and maybe we’re supposed to understand that ourselves even if the protagonist doesn’t, I’ll remind you that the book didn’t trust its reader to know what the number 42 is a reference to, or what an oni is, even though I don’t think anyone in the target audience wouldn’t know about these two things.

There’s also the fact that, since this book came out, a video game did release with a scene intentionally designed to cause seizures, and it had countless fans flocking to defend it over that fact. So you’ll have to excuse me if I’m not assuming this book’s stance on whether your video game console causes brain damage and possibly coma is actually a bad thing, or just an acceptable risk.

Wade certainly seems to think so, since he agrees to the terms of service.

As the timestamp faded away, it was replaced by a short message, just three words long—the last thing I would see before I left the real world and entered the virtual one. But they weren’t the three words I was used to seeing. I—like every other ONI user to come—was greeted by a new message Halliday had created, to welcome those visitors who had adopted his new technology: READY PLAYER TWO

Well now that’s just silly.

And that’s our opening cutscene. And while this post is already long enough, I feel like I have to go on to chapter 0, because it feels like barely anything has happened so far. We didn’t even introduce any new character motivation or conflict, or a mystery to set the plot into motion, unless I’m supposed to think “why didn’t Halliday release this?” counts.

So Wade is back into the OASIS, and tells us about how much more real it all feels thanks to the ONI. I especially have to question how he can smell or taste anything—both of which he tells us he can. Like, who coded that? Did Halliday implement every single smell and taste himself, without anyone noticing? I hope you don’t need me to tell you that’s not typically how features are added to a large-scale video game.

If it feels like I’m nitpicking at the logic of the book, even though I always say I’m not very interested in that and would rather talk themes, it’s because I am, because there isn’t much else to discuss so far. Wade is happy about tasting virtual fruit. That’s the scene.

He tests out if he can feel pain, but no, the ONI reduces pain (a gunshot is translated as “a hard pinch”). On one hand, good, it would be a nightmare otherwise. On the other hand, I sort of hope there’s a setting for that in there, because otherwise, you just lost an entire clientele of kinksters.

This was it—the final, inevitable step in the evolution of videogames and virtual reality. The simulation had now become indistinguishable from real life.

Ah, now we have some juicy themes. Because if you think this is the inevitable final step in the evolution of video games, I invite you to look at literally any other art form, and what happened to them once hyperrealism became easy. Hint: they didn’t stop evolving, because it turns out realism isn’t the only goal one can achieve with art.

The realism discussion is not a new one in video games, mind you. In case you’re out of the loop: most of the big-budget blockbuster games (“AAA” as they’re known) are aiming for hyperrealism nowadays, and it results in development teams being forced to work in horrible conditions (known with the equally horrible euphemism of “crunch”). And, because it turns out that 1) humans working themselves to the bones isn’t healthy and 2) racing for realism with little to no vision besides it makes for poor creativity, a lot of these games come out as disappointments. Oh, there are hordes of Gamers™ who will defend them to the bitter end, but inevitably, in the months following release, the defense cools off while the criticism keeps on going, because the defense was a knee-jerk reaction born of a mix of people hyping themselves up for a game they hadn’t seen that much of yet, then attaching a part of their identity to liking that thing.

Anyway, what I’m trying to say is that this throwaway line feels like it comes from someone who is so out of touch as to accidentally support a world view that has in fact resulted in the biggest part of the industry stagnating artistically while growing more toxic for the people working in it. All the while, more and more independent games come out every year, proving that that realism is nowhere near the most important thing to making a game good, and that you can achieve much better results with a small team.

What I’m trying to say is: watch Jim Sterling’s channel, they’ve been bleeding out subscribers since they came out as nonbinary and make much better commentary on this topic than I could, and play Hades.

Back to the book, which sadly hasn’t become any more interesting since I decided to go on a tangent. Wade tests the ONI functions some more, all the while musing on how he knows Samantha would disapprove but that he doesn’t care, because what loving relationship doesn’t consist of that?

Among the functions, he tries the ONI files, the aforementioned recordings of someone else’s experiences. Specifically, a woman, which Wade tells us by telling us he suddenly has breasts, I suppose because Ernest Cline saw that subreddit about men writing women and went “I want a piece of that”. Oh, and also, those sample files were recorded from real people, in the real world. And yes, this goes exactly where you think it does.

SEX-M-F.oni, SEX-F-F.oni, and SEX-Nonbinary.oni

Look, I actually started writing a complaint about the boobs thing, and I deleted it, but now Cline is doing it on purpose. So, here goes: I saw a quote from this book on Twitter that looked like Cline attempting to make up for Wade’s casual transphobia in the first book. It wasn’t good, but it at least sounded like he was trying. So to immediately get this is…a lot? Let’s go for a lot.

I can almost excuse the use of “M” and “F”. You gotta name your files and you could excuse a non-exhaustive list. But…nonbinary? On one hand, I want to know what Cline means. On the other hand, I don’t think he can come up with an answer I’ll find satisfactory.

We are thankfully spared from finding out because Wade has just lost his virginity to Samantha a few days ago and he’s 1) not ready for this and 2) pretty sure this counts as cheating. You could make a case that this is more like porn, but I can see that this is more of a personal distinction anyway, and I can respect that one. Plus, you know. I don’t want to find out.

Wade logs off, and he can’t tell the difference between the OASIS with the ONI, and decides this will change the world. And then it’s back to the “how did he do it and keep it a secret”, even though Wade now finds out in the documentation that this had been in development for twenty-five years, basically since the OASIS launched. So it’s not really that it’s a secret, so much as there are a lot of people under very strict NDAs out there. Or, again, they’re all dead and/or otherwise incapacitated.

The ONI is the product of the Accessibility Research Lab, and Wade tells us about other stuff that the lab has produced using similar technology, mostly for medical purposes.

GSS patented each of the Accessibility Research Lab’s inventions, but Halliday never made any effort to profit from them. Instead, he set up a program to give these neuroprosthetic implants away, to any OASIS users who could benefit from them. GSS even subsidized the cost of their implant surgery.

Look, it’s nice that you want Halliday to be the good guy through and through, but it’s kind of hard to take any social commentary seriously when you think this is how a billionaire is made. Hell, even when he shut down the lab and fired its entire staff, he gave them a big enough severance package to set them for life. You know. Capitalism!

Hey, remember when Samantha said she was going to end world hunger if she won the contest, a thing billionaires right now could be doing, but aren’t, and she is now the co-owner of GSS? Yeah, I kind of hope the book remembers that too.

Speaking of the co-owners, the book just completely skips over the debate that our four main characters have over whether or not to release the ONI to the world. All we know is that they voted, and the vote goes in favor of releasing it. I mean, why have characters who could have opinions and feelings that could create a discussion? That might make us care about them! And who wants to care about characters in a story?

We put them on sale at the lowest possible price, to make sure as many people as possible could experience the OASIS Neural Interface for themselves.

What exactly is “the lowest possible price” here? Your company literally owns money. Like, OASIS money is real money. There is literally nothing stopping you from giving them away, especially because what you’re giving away is access to the platform you’re already running for a profit.

It’s almost like, even trying to make “good billionaires” out of its protagonists, the book can’t stop and actually make them significantly good.

Oh, I should mention. If you thought my Ready Player One review was angry at capitalism, wait until you see what the past couple years have done to me.

Anyway, once they his 7,777,777 simultaneous ONI users, a new riddle shows up on Halliday’s website. Because yep: our plot is apparently not about the implications of releasing the ONI, or any of the potential ideological discussions associated with that, it’s another riddle. Oh boy, do I wish I’d known that.

Seek the Seven Shards of the Siren’s Soul On the seven worlds where the Siren once played a role For each fragment my heir must pay a toll To once again make the Siren whole

I cannot wait to have the book give me just not enough information to solve the riddle until it’s solved by the book itself. That was so much fun the other…what was it, five times? Six times? Something like that. Wade already tells us the Siren might be Kira Morrow, because her alias was named after one of the sirens of Greek myth, so I can’t wait for that plot point to stick around. It was so fun to hear all about this man pining for another man’s wife the first time!

So this is the “Shard Riddle”. People are apparently convinced it was made by Wade and his crew as a publicity stunt, but of course, they know that that isn’t the case, and they also don’t know what that riddle is supposed to lead to. So, that’s great. We have a puzzle, and we also don’t know what the stakes are. All we know is that Wade wants to solve the puzzle essentially because it’s a challenge.

We skip over a year, and Wade tells us about how IOI collapses and gets absorbed by GSS because of the ONI’s launch. Remember IOI? They were the bad guys, so I guess we have to cheer?

GSS absorbed IOI and all of its assets, transforming us into an unstoppable megacorporation with a global monopoly on the world’s most popular entertainment, education, and communications platform.To celebrate, we released all of IOI’s indentured servants and forgave their outstanding debts.

On one hand: good for the slave. On the other hand: not gonna cheer for a monopoly, you guys.

Another year’s skip, and now 99% of the OASIS users are using the ONI, and yes, that includes trading their experiences with one another too. And I guess we’re still hand-waving any possible problems associated with that technology, because the technology is made so that all recordings must be shared and played through the OASIS.

This allowed us to weed out unsavory or illegal recordings before they could be shared with other users.

How? Do you know any of the problems associated with content moderations on the current platforms? I don’t know if I want to point to Youtube’s extremely faulty algorithm, Twitter’s complete apathy towards its Nazis, or Facebook doing moderation by making underpaid staff watch all potentially problematic content, which resulted in serious psychological damage to said staff.

You can’t just say that as if it solved everything. The chapter later says this is handled by an AI called “CenSoft”, and as an AI engineer myself, let me tell you: this is not going to work. Again: Youtube is the way it is for a reason.

It also let us maintain our monopoly on what was rapidly becoming the most popular form of entertainment in the history of the world.

And again, monopolies are totally a good thing as long as it’s in the right hands!

When I’m implying that the book does not care for any of these potential problems, I mean it. These enormous ethical issues are sidestepped in cold narratin, and we just keep going on introducing new slang that I hate, but have to quote so help you keep up.

“Sims” were recordings made inside the OASIS, and “Recs” were ONI recordings made in reality. Except that most kids no longer referred to it as “reality.” They called it “the Earl.” (A term derived from the initialism IRL.) And “Ito” was slang for “in the OASIS.” So Recs were recorded in the Earl, and Sims were created Ito.

There. You have been infodumped.

In the midst of all this (still extremely dry) exposition about how this changed media, we also get this tidbit:

You could take any drug, eat any kind of food, and have any kind of sex, without worrying about addiction, calories, or consequences.

Now, I was going to rant about this, but then, a page later, this happens and spares me the trouble:

I’d struggled with OASIS addiction before the ONI was released. Now logging on to the simulation was like mainlining some sort of chemically engineered superheroin.

So, you are aware that addiction isn’t just possible, but extremely facilitated by this. But sure, no worries! It’s perfectly safe! Because our protagonists are good.

Also, remember how the last book ended on a weak attempt at having a moral that maybe the real world is good, actually? Yeah, Wade tells us the ONI helps poor people live enjoyable lives in the OASIS. So. Fuck that message, I guess. It only applies if you’re the literal wealthiest man on Earth.

And me? All my dreams had come true. I’d gotten stupidly rich and absurdly famous. I’d fallen in love with my dream girl and she had fallen in love with me. Surely I was happy, right? Not so much, as this account will show.

Aside from the aforementioned returning OASIS affiction, there’s the Shard riddle that Wade is now obsessed with, to the point of offering a billion-dollar reward to anyone with information about the riddle’s answer.

I announced this reward with a stylized short film that I modeled after Anorak’s Invitation. I hoped it would seem like a lighthearted play on Halliday’s contest instead of a desperate cry for help. It seemed to work.

On one hand: good, Wade finally has a character flaw that the book actually acknowledges as a character flaw. I can work with that. On the other hand: this is all told to me in such a dispassionate that I am dreading how the book will handle this character flaw. Which is to say, I’m not expecting it to be very good.

(For a brief time, some of the younger, more idealistic shard hunters referred to themselves as “shunters” to differentiate themselves from their elder counterparts. But when everyone began to call them “sharters” instead, they changed their minds and started to call themselves gunters too. The moniker still fit. The Seven Shards were Easter eggs hidden by Halliday, and we were all hunting for them.)

Especially when this is something the narration feels is more important to tell me about.

Anyway, skip another year, and a gunter finally leads Wade to the First Shard. Solved that riddle, I guess. And wait, wasn’t part of why IOI was ~evil~ in the first book that they were paying people to find the Easter Egg for them? How is this any different, Wade?

And when I picked it up, I set in motion a series of events that would drastically alter the fate of the human race. As one of the only eyewitnesses to these historic events, I feel obligated to give my own written account of what occurred. So that future generations—if there are any—will have all the facts at their disposal when they decide how to judge my actions.

And that is the end of our chapter 0. And can I just say: what a mess already. I don’t think my snark can properly convey how utterly devoid of emotion this book’s writing is, and that alone is honestly more of a turn-off than anything else in the book so far. Even, knowing that I railed about it in the first book, I still feel newly unprepared for it. And it’s not like this double-prologue is making me hopeful that the book will show an ounce more critical thinking—or decent fucking humanity towards marginalized groups—as its predecessor.

So, that’s a lot to look forward to! For the sake of my sanity and schedule, don’t expect me to do such big posts every time. I’ll probably do one chapter a week from now on, if that. We’re in for a long ride, but I hope it’s worth it, at least.

[monysmediareview]

Shadowhunters (Freeform show) Review

Review #2!!

In case you missed it, I wrote a review on the Mortal Instruments book series books 1-3 (they’re the only ones I read because a chapter into book 4 and I was over it). I had mixed feelings on it, as I do with most things - including the Shadowhunters TV show, which is what this review is about!

Casting

Let’s talk about the casting in this show. First of all, I think the cast matched the physical descriptions of each character in the books and I very much enjoyed that. I do like when shows take liberties with casting, especially for the sake of things like diversity but there’s something very satisfying about seeing the characters exactly as they were written. 

I don’t think all of the acting was fantastic, but it’s FreeForm so I really didn’t expect much. It did get a lot better as the series went on and I think the actors really found their footing with these characters. It’s one of the reasons that I love series so much more than movies for things like this because there’s growth and the chance to really explore characters as they exist. These characters really took on a life of their own in a way, but we’ll get into that as I go through the rest of my points here. 

One thing I will say is, while this show did much better than others in terms of diversity it is not lost on me that the BIPOC characters in this show (and in the book series as well) were all “other” characters. As is often the case, people of color in fantasy media are usually portrayed as animals such as werewolves, or other “undesirable” characters. This is an incredibly complex part of casting, creating, and writing, and I will not get into it here, but I didn’t want to not mention it. 

Gay Pride & True Love

If you read my review of the Mortal Instruments series then you already know that I love love love Alec and Magnus, but that love grew exponentially when I watched the show. Magnus was an interesting character in the books but Harry Shum Jr. really brought the character to life and that show especially in the scenes with Alec. The show also gives Alec a ton more depth than in the books and I love that they didn’t keep him hung up on Jace (a straight man) for most of the story. He fell for Magnus and he fell for him hard. Magnus is the one that broke through Alec’s shell and encouraged him to be himself. By cutting away all the petty teenager shit that was in the books we were able to see this real, complex, but honest and deep love story that rivaled the main love interests immensely. I would watch this show over and over just to watch these two again. 

Representation and diversity are two huge factors when I think about whether or not I liked a piece of media. These kinds of things are what makes media so relatable, real, and ultimately enjoyable in a lot of ways. This show didn’t make the characters gay-ness a main factor of their relationship; they just showed a relationship as they would with a straight couple. They didn’t ignore their gay-ness either, though, and acknowledged the difficulties within that. By making this normal, they took huge strides in showing these kinds of relationships on TV and I adore that. And I just cannot get enough of this pairing in general - there are so many contrasts and compliments in their relationship and it’s what I honestly consider to be a perfect OTP relationship in any kind of romantic plot. 

10/10 would watch the show just for Alec and Magnus. 

I like Clary better in the show than in the books

Clary is by far, not one of my favorite characters in the fantasy genre. I find her to be selfish, martyr-like, and just kind of annoying but I really felt like the show was able to redeem the decent characteristics that she has and shed off most of the aggravating ones. 

As a whole, I am not a fan of how stupid the books make Clary out to be. Clary falls into the category of characters I don’t like because there is ultimately nothing very special about them yet they end up with a guy who is completely out of their league in every way who is head over heels in love with them. It infuriates me so much and Clary is not an exception to this rule. Her character is still this way in the show but it is much less evident because she seems to be more of an active participant in her own life and I don’t have to sit through her endless internal monologues about how attractive or strong or whatever Jace is. Thoughts that she still has while she thinks they’re siblings. At least in the show, these characters seem to draw a strong boundary here when they think they’re related rather than making out in a field like they did in the books. 

Clary also has a much stronger sense of self in the show and often reflects on what her life was and what it has become, how she’s grown. And I think that’s a huge part of it - that she has grown when in the books she was just constantly such a dumbstruck teenager who only thought of herself. I absolutely love the difference in her character here so I’ll give the show a star for that. 

Her relationships with other characters is also so much stronger. I believe this is in part because we don’t know her every inner thought about them and we also aren’t distracted by her distraction that is Jace. Her relationship with Izzy is so much better and stronger. I’ll always give good reviews to strong female relationships! Even her friendship and relationship with Simon is more in depth in the show. Their book friendship is very baseline; they constantly say they’re best friends but that’s not really reflected in the way they act around each other. In the show they have anecdotes about the past we never see in the books, they talk in a comfortable way and even show their relationship with each other’s families a lot more. This plays into her being an active participant in her own life as well. 

The Lightwood Family Drama

This might be something that happens later on in the books (however I don’t think so because of some spoilers I’ve received on my main account) but I really liked the Lightwood family subplot. I would imagine they have some marital problems after Max’s death in the books but considering they don’t kill him in the show, divorcing them earlier and giving Maryse a second chance was a fantastic choice. I kind of wish they had kept Max’s death because to me, it was the driving force between Izzy and Simon, but overall I don’t mind the way they did it. It just felt like a missed opportunity for drama and angst.

Back to the point at hand - families are complicated and the only “normal” or rather, nuclear family we see in this series is the Lightwoods. Clary was raised by a single parent, as was Simon, and no one else really has parents that we’re introduced to to be able to judge their family life. By making their family story a complicated one, rather than the “ideal”, it becomes not only more dramatic, which is fun and interesting, but real. And it may seem counterintuitive to make things seem real in a fantasy genre show/book series but that, in my opinion, is what makes it easier to believe the fake stuff. I can focus more on the magic and the demons and the end of the world as we know it if it’s grounded in something that’s familiar to me. The Lightwoods feel like a very real family with complicated relationships between kids and parents, adopted children/siblings, and marital issues that affect everyone differently, which invites us as an audience to relate to them and doesn’t make the Shadow world so different from ours. 

A scene I loved specifically is when Izzy brings the doctor she’s seeing to the Hunter’s Moon and they’re all messing with each other, eating, drinking, laughing, talking. They really felt like a family there, like adult siblings which can be a really difficult feeling to capture but I think it was done very well. I didn’t want to go through this review without mentioning that part since it was something very special for me. 

Design Choices

Changing topic just a little bit, I wanted to talk about the design of the show. First thing I noticed was that the runes were not at all how I pictured them. Now, that may be a fault of the writer because they weren’t very well described so it all landed on imagination which is different for everyone. The show design gave me kind of Henna tattoo vibes, whereas the books gave me full black ink vibes. 

The clothing was also something very strange to me. Izzy was always described as wearing long silvery skirts. I very much imagined her as wearing borderline rave outfits in most of these scenes but she mostly just wore crop tops and low cut shirts. I also noticed that as the series went on she dressed in a bit more of a conservative way compared to the first half of season 1 when I recall her wearing literally just a sports bra as a shirt in a few scenes. It was apparent to me in the books that the way Shadowhunters dressed was something that separated them from humans, made them stand out, and the show lacked that. I think this also took away the idea that Shadowhunters are a whole race of people with a history and culture separate from being human (they are, in essence mixed raced, but this comes with a lot of implications and is not a complete statement or comparison in any way). My point with this is mostly that I wish there had been more of a separation visually between Shadowhunters and humans beyond their runes. 

I also pictured the Institute to have a very non-human, Catholic type of design and instead just got pseudo-futuristic feel. I didn’t hate it, it just feels overdone in these kinds of shows and movies. For example, the Divergent series or Maze Runner or even Tomorrowland all have this type of vibe and I was hoping for more of a DmC: Devil May Cry approach. 

Jace Wayland is a beautiful character

I had mixed feelings about Jace in the books; he felt stale and like every other straight, white, male, romantic lead. In the show, however, I think Dominic Sherwood did him a great deal of justice and gave him the depth that actually made him a desirable person that I could understand someone being in love with. He’s charming, and a little cocky but we also get to see a deeper side of him than we do in the books. We see his emotions, especially his unconditional love for Clary (whether I agree with that or not). 

The Owl plotline was a waste of time in my opinion, but the scene when Izzy and Alec go to save him from inside his mind and we see him break down is absolutely beautiful. Jace is introduced to us from the start as hard, strong, calloused and here we see him vulnerable and scared with two of the people he trusts most in the world. I will accept the Owl plotline if only to keep this scene because I think it is absolutely essential to his character arc. 

I also found that scene to be indicative of his relationship with Izzy. In the books it’s often alluded to that he and Izzy had been together in one way or another but that’s not the case for the show (thank the angel) and here you can really see them as siblings more than in any ther scene, I think. But this takes me to his relationship with Alec as well. 

Parabatai 

I don’t remember Parabatai being mentioned much in the books but it is a huge deal and talked about quite a bit. I this this is super cool, personally and it’s not something I can really think of too much in fantasy outside of sires or singers or the like in many vampire novels but that has a whole “owner” vibe that doesn’t exist with Parabatai. I am super intrigued by this idea and I loved how much they played with it being a strength and an essential part of their existence. 

The relationship between Alec and Jace is obviously stronger than just brothers, but it also isn’t quite love in the romantic sense. It’s something else and it makes them vulnerable to each other. They feel everything the other person feels, sometimes literally, and while that can weaken them they use it as a strength. It’s really beautiful how honest and open these men are with each other. I feel like the Parabatai bond breaks down a lot of the toxic masculinity traits these characters might have otherwise and I will always be in favor of tearing down those walls. A+ characterization if you ask me. 

I thought Izzy deserved better in the books - the show gave it to her

In the show Izzy is way more badass than in the books, which I wasn’t sure was possible. They made her so much smarter, gave her important roles at the institute like head of weapons and she even did autopsies? In the last episodes we even see her as Head of the Institute. Beauty, brains, and brawn simply can’t be beat. 

Her love life was even more interesting! She wasn’t boiled down to just a slut who slept with everyone regardless of species: she was a lover who fell quickly and saw the best in people despite what people might tell her about “their kind”. She’s strong and very sure of herself; she doesn’t need a man in her life but she wants love and I think that’s a really amazing trait they gave her that deepens the character. 

They made her an activist, too in a way. She’s found really standing up for her beliefs in the show and challenging the way things are. In the books Izzy is pretty stuck in the way Shadowhunters do things but in the show she speaks up when something isn’t right. Her connections to downworlders does a lot of really great things for the Shadow world as a whole. They certainly could have beefed this up a little bit, but it wasn’t a huge part of the show in general so I’ll allow the pass on it. 

Her Yin-Fen addiction was so interesting! Again, I don’t know if this is something that happened in later books in the series but this is just another layer to Isabelle that I really loved. No one is perfect, even her, and it built her relationship with Rafael (another plot I was a huge fan of) which was incredibly complex. 

All in all, I would die for Izzy. Please give me shows and books about her and more characters like her. 

This series was steamy as hell

I can’t write a review on this series without mentioning all of the steamy scenes with so many of the characters. I mean, of course, I expected as much with Jace and he got a lot but so did everyone else. We got saucy scenes with Alec, Magnus, Simon, Izzy, Maia, everyone. (Not all at the same time, thankfully). But they were all very well directed and acted and I enjoyed them quite a bit. What can I say? Sex sells. 

In conclusion, I liked this series a lot. I really was not expecting to. I was warned that it was bad, and to start off it was but I found myself unexpectedly enjoying a lot of it. There’s still work to be done and it is by no means perfect but it was entertaining and had some really good moments. I also give so much credit to the actors and creative team for doing so much with material that didn’t give them much depth in the first place. 

Would recommend for something to enjoy but maybe not think too hard about.

xoxo

Mony

[schattenjagd]

Hold on

A/N: This Oneshot/Songfic is my contribution to @xxwritemeastoryxx 1K Celebration Writing Challenge. Congratulations again ! I’m so happy for you :) So this has really turned out differently than I thought at first and maybe the length got a little out of hand, but I hope you like it. So, two weeks of work, two root canal treatments and a jaw abscess later we are finally here and you don't believe how happy I am. Oh, and I just have to say that english isn’t my native language. So sorry for any spelling or grammatical mistakes.

Prompt : “Please...stay.” (I will make it bold)

Word Count : 10.6K - Yeah, like I said : It maybe got a little teeny tiny bit out of hand.

Warnings : Angst, major character death, deadly disease Okay, this Fic is like the saddest I have ever written. If you are offended or triggered by any of these warnings, please read at your own risks.

Pairing : Elijah Mikaelson x Reader

This was inspired Chord Overstreet’s beautiful yet so sad song “Hold on”

Loving and Fighting

An icy cold went through Elijah when quietly opened the door to the intensive care unit and entered the room. It almost seemed as if a black veil was suddenly covering him.

His hands were shaking. It was a long time ago since they had last done it, but now they didn't want to stop. His whole body trembled at the thought of what awaited him.

Her quiet and weak heartbeat was drowned out by the shrill, constant beeping of the heart rate monitor and Elijah swallowed hard. Her heart had always been so strong, always so loud. Its tone had given him strength. But now that he heard it only so weakly, it seemed to have drained his strength.

She was no longer wearing the colorful dress she wore in the afternoon. In the shock room, it had been taken off and exchanged for a drab hospital gown. He could hear the rustling of her blood and his eyes fell on the pronule that she had on her left arm and with which she was given strong pain relievers.

He hadn't noticed that he had stopped. He looked at her closely and when he saw her like this, he felt like he had really failed for the first time in his life.

Slowly, he took a few steps across the room and quickly blinked the tears in his eyes away. He had to be strong now; strong for her.

He sat carefully on the edge of the bed and looked at her. Her face looked cramped and sunken. Her otherwise red lips were dry and pale, as was her skin. The sight frightened him. She looked so weak so ... lifeless.

He cautiously reached for her hand and stroked gentle circles on the back of it hand with his thumb. He timidly heard her heart beating faster and saw her move a little.

"Hey," he said softly as he watched her eyelids start to flicker. It seemed to be an act of strength for her and yet he felt her gently squeeze his hand.

,,You are here."

Her mouth was dry and it was difficult for her to even say a few words at all, but she smiled when she could feel his presence and forced herself to open her eyes slowly. Slowly she turned her head and finally looked at him from cloudy, y/e/c eyes.

"Yes," he replied, and the corners of his mouth also rose a little. ,,I wont leave you."

I can‘t imagine a world with you gone

The music was loud. Way too loud.

The courtyard was illuminated by cool blue and purple lamps. People strolled through the courtyard in extravagant robes, waving their overpriced champagne in their hand and chatting with other important people.

The short version was that Y/N wished to be anywhere else, just not here. Parties had never been her thing and never would be. The only reason she was here was her old student friend Cami, whom she had met during her semester abroad in New York. And now that Y/N had recently moved to New Orleans, Cami hadn't missed the opportunity to let her know about its nightlife. However, she didn’t expect that with “nightlife” she meant such an extravagant party for the super rich.

,, Ow, don’t make that face. Come on, have a drink. "

"I don't make a face," denied Y/N and let her friend give her a glass of champagne. "I just should have known where you were going to take me when I saw the dress."

Y/N looked demonstratively down at herself and looked briefly at the long, burgundy and tight-fitting dress with the slit on the side that flattered her figure. She brushed a strand of her y/ h/c hair from her face, which had loosened itself from the elaborate up-do, and sipped on the expensive but extremely bitter champagne.

"I hope this Klaus is worth it," she grumbled and Cami gave her a warning look.

"It's not because of him," she said a little too quickly and Y/N grinned to herself.

"Of course not," she murmured instead and was left shortly afterwards when her friend had spotted said acquaintance and disappeared.

"No, of course it's not because of him," Y/N said to herself as she looked after her friend and sighed. Looked like she was the one to fil the gap for the time when Klaus wasn't there to keep Cami busy.

Instead, Y/N went looking for the bar and was happy that free drinks appeared to be a high priority for the rich.

"Whiskey on ice, please," she ordered from the bartender, put her half-full champagne glass on the bar and smoothed her dress.

"The same for me, please."

She squinted at what she was doing when she heard a deep male voice only a few yards away. He looked good, even she had to admit that. He was wearing a suit, had one hand casually in his pocket, and was leaning against the bar with the other.

"The champagne does not seem strong enough for you", he noted,, looking over at her.

Y/N looked back and sipped the drink she had just received. "Unfortunately not nearly."

"You don't seem to enjoy the celebrations as much as many others here," he said and now turned completely to her, leaning his side against the counter.

"No, you're right," she agreed, taking another sip of her drink. "I'm afraid I'm playing in a different league than yours."

Y/N had already noticed because of his suit and how it flattered his well-built body that he must be one of those super rich who attended such a party every week.

"You accommodated yourself very well for that," he replied, and Y/N could see the slight twitch of the corners of his mouth as he eyed her from top to bottom and let his eyes slide over her dress. She blushed.

"Thank you, then I did everything right, I guess," she laughed softly and took another sip.

"I'm sure of that," he smiled, taking a quick look around the crowd. ,, But I am curious: Others would commit murders for an invitation. Why don't you ? "

,, I ? Murdering for something like this ? Certainly not,” waved Y/N off. ,, So, the music. It is much too loud and ... inappropriate ? I don’t know.  And the champagne. A bottle probably costs as much as my car, and yet it tastes just like the cheap one from the gas station, which always makes me sick.”

In her heated list she didn’t notice how he listened to her attentively, not taking his eyes off of her and the corners of his mouth rising further with each of her words.

"To be honest, I'd much rather sit in front of my TV in my pajamas and watch some junk. Excuse my directness, but it’s just exactly like that. "

When she finally looked back at him after all, she misinterpreted his grin. ,, Oh my god, I didn't mean to offend you. That was totally rude, that ... "

"It's alright," he calmed her down and took a sip of his whiskey. ,,Everyone has their own opinion. I am not a friend of big celebrations myself, my brother sees it differently. But from time to time those are necessary. "

Y/N nodded, she understood. In today's world, splendid parties weren’t only there for fun, but also to make new contacts or maybe find and convince trading partners.

"I am Elijah."

Her eyes darted back to him and he could see the y/e/c flashing briefly. She gave him a bright smile and took his hand. "Y/N, it’s nice to meet you, Elijah."

"The pleasure is mine."

He also smiled sincerely at her and Y/N actually got a little dizzy. Well, the man in front of her was handsome, charming, nice ... What more could a woman want ?

"Mister Mikaelson ?"

And he was the organizer of this party.

Y/N's smile slipped from her face and she couldn't put it back there when she saw another man in a suit approaching Elijah.

Her eyes widened in shock and she looked at him in panic as he turned back to her. ,, It was a pleasure to meet you, Y/N. And thank you for your honesty, ” he replied charmingly and by no means unkindly. As if in a trance, she watched him blow a kiss on the back of her hand and then disappear into the crowd. Frozen, she looked after him.

"I see, you got to know Klaus’ brother. "

"Yes, after telling him that I think his party is shit."

Cami laughed next to her and sipped her champagne glass. "You couldn't keep your mouth shut. I should’ve known," she laughed.

,, He’s one of them. But he doesn’t look like them. "

"Like an Original vampire ?"

Y/N shook her head and watched Elijah talk seriously to the man who had just interrupted their conversation. "Not in the slightest."

Cami just shrugged and emptied the rest of her glass. ,,What can I say ? You are a witch. Nothing should really surprise you anymore. "

Y/N just swallowed and looked at her friend with a frown, turned back to the bar. "Okay, now I need something really strong."

The joy and the chaos, the demons we‘re made of

That evening was a long time ago. When Y/N woke up that morning, she was awakened by the jazz music that flew through the open window from the streets into the bedroom. She blinked a few times and looked around briefly as she opened her eyes fully.

She was lying in a big bed, wrapped in a soft duvet with an even softer pillow.

When she tried to turn on her back, she became aware of the strong arms that were wrapped around her waist and which pressed her tightly against him.

Y/N smiled and turned carefully in his arms.

Elijah was still sleeping, but he didn't seem to want to let her go even in his sleep. Carefully, she raised a hand to brush a strand of hair from his face and looked at the brunette. They had danced around each other for a long time now, had never come closer; the family had always been a higher priority for Elijah. It was a chaos of feelings. Until Esther captured him. She didn't know what she had let him see, but he had been different when he returned yesterday.

Y/N smiled slightly at the feel of his skin on hers and drawed gentle patterns on his chest with her fingers, closing her eyes.

She opened her eyes when she felt him quickly grabbing her hand and stopping her by planting a kiss on her fingertips.

Slowly, she raised her head and smiled. "How long have you been awake ?"

"Long enough to know how you looked at me."

He also opened his eyes at his words, gently looked down at her, which only made her smile wider. She raised her head and squinted at the old clock between the windows. Y/N groaned in agony.

,,What ?"

"My shift in the hospital starts in two hours," she sighed, dropping her head back onto his chest. "I have to go."

,,I do not think so."

Her eyes fell back to Elijah while he wrapped his arms around her and pulled her towards him. Y/N laughed when he let his fingertips dance across her waist and breathed gentle kisses on her neck. "Elijah, I'm serious, as much as I would like to stay here in this bed, I have to go to work."

"Hmh," he just agreed and put his lips on hers and caught her in a hot and steaming kiss. Y/N involuntarily groaned when she let his tongue in and when she could feel something pressing against her stomach.

Half an hour later, Y/N groped barefoot through the old halls of the Mikaelson estate. She had slipped pn Elijah's white shirt from the night before and was looking for her top that she had lost on the way to his bedroom last night.

"So, you're the woman my brother gave his heart to."

Y/N paused at the unmistakable accent. The door next to her was open and she could see Klaus standing in front of an easel with a painting brush in his hand. She swallowed briefly when she remembered that she was actually only wearing panties and Elijah's shirt, but remained confident in the doorframe.

“Seems so. Any problems with that ?"

"Actually, yes."

Y/N involuntarily took a breath and frowned as the hybrid slowly walked towards her. "And that would be ?" She asked bravely.

He just gave her a mild smile. “Even if you witches are very good at nighttime activities - and you are, judged by the sounds you and my brother made last night and just now - you're a pain in the ass. "

Y/N smiled mildly. She knew about Klaus' Mikaelson's aversion to witches and had already been prepared for something like that. From the moment that Cami introduced her to him and he learned what she was, he had been against her. Klaus Mikaelson hated witches even though he his daughter was one.

"I know you aren't particularly addicted to witches," she replied carefully. "But I have no bad intentions towards your family, believe me."

"Yes, if Celeste DuBois had told me, I would have believed her, too."

Y/N's eyes narrowed. She knew who this witch was, had helped to kill her herself, and yet Klaus didn't trust her in the least. She turned to walk away, but his voice stopped her.

"You don't know about the red door, do you?"

Y/N paused. Slowly, she took a step back and looked again from the door frame to Klaus, who smiled contentedly. "The red door," he continued when he saw her look. ,, All my brother's demons; all the people he killed. The victims, all the suffering he has done. "

Y/N opened her mouth and closed it again. She knew what this was going to be. Klaus wanted to unsettle and intimidate her. But Y /N had known who she was dealing with from the start and the man she had fallen in love with.

"I know about all of this," she lied, proudly raising her chin. ,,I know what you're trying and it won't work, Klaus. I'm not one of those gullible, weak, little witches."

When her tone got a little too sharp, he took another few steps towards her. "Is that supposed to be a threat, love ?"

Y/N swallowed and looked up at him. She concentrated, looked him straight in the eye. Satisfied, she noticed how beads of sweat began to form on his forehead. Klaus gasped, his eyes widening slightly as his blood started to boil.

,,No of course not. For such a pain in the ass like me, it's really foolish to threaten the Original Hybrid, isn't it? "

He struggled for words and the two were only interrupted when Y/N heard the footsteps behind them.

,,That's enough now. Niklaus, Y/N. "

Klaus gasped abruptly as he got cool again and Y/N broke eye contact when she looked behind her at Elijah.

The relationship between her and Klaus Mikaelson had always been ... special.

Elijah held the top she was looking for in her hand and she quickly took it from him and disappeared back towards his bedroom. She didn't hear Elijah's words to his brother: "If she gets hurt, she dies, if she catches a fever, if she gets bitten, she gets hit by lightning, anything - anything happens to her, brother, you will pay for it. "

I‘d be so lost if you left me alone

Many months later, Y/N left the hospital where she worked at exhausted and overtired. Her feet ached and killed her. An emergency heart operation had given her a 36-hour shift and she just wanted to sleep.

Exhausted, she climbed up the stairs to her apartment, kicked the now uncomfortable sneakers off her feet after she closed the apartment door behind her and threw her handbag into the next corner. When Y/N took off her jacket and hung it on the coat hook, she paused. It smelled of ... food.

She raised her eyebrows in confusion and groped across the hall into the living room. On the dining table were two plates of pasta that seemed to be still hot. A slight smile crept onto her lips when she recognized Elijah. He was standing with his back to her leaning over the kitchen counter. But when he turned to her, her heart skipped a beat and the smile disappeared. She swallowed hard.

There was pain in his eyes. She could see it, see how hurt and disappointed he was. He lifted the package insert of the pills on the kitchen counter and pointed to it. "I found these when I was looking for matches."

Y/N glanced for a split second to the candles that were on the table and then back to Elijah. Her heart contracted painfully at the sight of him and she could feel the tears coming up.

"When did you want to tell me ?"

Y/N swallowed and took a few steps towards him. She reached for his hands, but he pulled back. A stab in her heart. She could hear the pain in his voice and hated herself for being the source of it. She took a deep breath and didn't know what to say. She wanted to scream and cry at the same time.

She carefully arranged her words. "I got the diagnosis shortly after I met you at the party."

Elijah swallowed, looked at the half-empty pills pack on the kitchen shelf. He kept his eyes down, but he could see the tears that had formed in her eyes.

She licked her dry lips. ,, My mother has already died because of it. Actually, it skips a generation in our family but ... "

"How much time do you have left ?"

Y/N fell silent. She hadn't been prepared for this question and when she became aware of the answer, she pressed her lips together in a thin line. A telltale tear rolled down her cheeks and more followed. She bit her lower lip to keep herself from sobbing and the only thing she could do was shrug her shoulders. "I - I don't know ...", she brought out with difficulty and more tears followed. "It was recognized too late and the only thing that keeps me on my feet are these," she pointed to the pills. ,, There is no cure and ... I don't know, Elijah. I - I have no idea. I don’t know."

"Hush," he said reassuringly, pulling her close as her body began to shake and tears ran down her cheeks uncontrollably. Her fingers reach for his vest for help and she closed her eyes. He could hear her sobbing and every further one was another stab in his heart.

"I didn't want to tell you anything because ...", she started and was interrupted by another sob. "I - I didn't want you to only see this disease in me then."

Y/N looked up when she felt him brush a strand of hair from her face and behind her ear. "I could never do that."

Y/N smiled sadly, but she could see the pain that had cast a dark shadow on his face.

Elijah closed his eyes when he hugged her tightly. He breathed in her smell, that fine scent of lavender and vanilla and he put a hand comfortingly on the back of her head, placed a loving kiss on her head.

The prospect of not being able to do all this anytime soon frightened him. He would never be able to smell her smell again, never again would he feel her soft skin or lips on his, never again could he hold her. He felt that someone had torn his heart out and for the first time in his life he thought he knew what all the victims he had done this to had felt. The woman in his arms would die. He didn't know when yet, but she would and he thought he was cursed. Tatia, Katerina, Celeste ... All the women he loved died. Loving him was a death sentence. And now, the first woman he saw at his side in eternity was doomed to die. With all the dangers like werewolves, Mikael, Esther, Dhalia, the Strix ... A deadly disease seemed almost ridiculously primitive, and yet it reminded Elijah of the incredible vulnerability of humans.

"I'll find a way," he said as he buried his face in her y/ h/c hair, so Y/N couldn't see the tear that escaped one of his eyes.

She smiled at his confidence. ,, There is no way, Elijah. No vampire blood, no back door, no loophole."

"You won't die," he replied firmly. "And if I can't move heaven ..."

"... I will raise hell."

You locked yourself in the bathroom Lying on the floor when I break through

The mood in the past few weeks had been tense. A new force and new enemies of the Mikaelson had risen from the darkness and were now chasing the family.

Y/N had been living in the Mikaelson estate for a long time now, Elijah had insisted that he could "protect" her better this way. But Y/N was sure that there were other advantages that he derived from the fact that they now lived together. She always successfully repressed the thought that it was because they had already been allowed too much time together and instead put it down to the fact that she could help them with her witch skills.

While Elijah and Klaus were out, she was sitting with Freya in the fireplace room over a stack of old grimoires when the two heard a rumble in the courtyard. Both women looked up in alarm and Y/N's eyebrows raised suspiciously. "I thought you’d cast a boundary spell."

"I did."

Y/N swallowed hard and got up - just like her friend -, following her out of the room into the gallery. She walked quietly after the blonde, careful not to make a sound.

,,Find them ! Now !"

Y/N's blood froze in her veins when she heard a man's deep voice and then the steps of the vampires hurrying up the stairs to the first floor.

"Damn it," Freya swore, immediately turned and pushed Y/N in front of her, towards the nursery, in which little Hope had already started to cry.

Silently, Y/N let the blonde allow, pushed open the door to the nursery and Freya locked it behind them.

Y/M immediately turned to the little girl, carefully lifting her out of bed and rocking her to and fro in her arms. "It’s alright, hush," she said reassuringly and gave Freya a troubled look. "How did they break the spell ?"

"I have no idea, but now we have other problems," Freya replied and looked around the room.

"What do you think, how many are down there ?"

Freya shrugged. ,, Maybe a dozen. I couldn't see much. "

,,And what do we do now ?"

"We won't let ourselves be killed until my brothers arrive."

Y/N frowned. ,,You gotta be kidding me."

"We have to get Hope out of here safely. I distract them, you take her and hide. Protect my niece."

Y/N looked suspiciously at her friend. She didn't like her plan and she had a bad gut ffeling, apart from the dizziness that has haunted her since the vampires surfaced and her body was on alert.

Y/N had no way to say anything against the other witch's plan, because in the same second the first vampire burst through the door, that shattered under its weight.

"Now !" Freya called, dodging the attacking vampire and ramming a wooden pole through his back into his heart.

Y/N looked wide-eyed at her for a moment, then took off running when she realized that she had a small, helpless child in her arms.

She disappeared through the side door into Klaus' adjoining bedroom. The rest of the vampires, spurred on by Freya, rushed into Hope's nursery while Y/N ran through the hallways of the property, trying to calm the little girl on her arm and find a safe hiding place.

And then she heard footsteps in the hallway. She cast a panicked look over her shoulder, couldn't see the vampire who was apparently on her heels, and with luck, she hadn't been spotted. Nevertheless, Y/N quickly opened the next best door and found herself in one of the old guest rooms. Looking around in panic, she saw the door to the adjoining bathroom and disappeared into it.

The bathroom was small and old, but at first it seemed safe. Y/N carefully placed the toddler on the floor. She closed her eyes in submission when she heard the door to the bedroom open again.

She was afraid of what was to come and briefly rubbed Hope's cheeks. The little one had become calm now and was looking at Y/N with big gesture eyes, almost as if she understood what was going on.

Y/N took a deep breath, crouched, and left the bathroom.

"I think you took the wrong room."

Y/N looked around. A pencil lay on the old, dusty desk. Maybe it could help her.

The vampire in front of her grinned broadly and slightly shook his head. ,,I don’t think so."

At the same time, his eyes grew darker and the veins under them became visible. Y/N had just enough time to took a step away when he rushed towards her - but he caught her anyway. She flew in a high arc through the room and landed on the desk that gave in under her weight. A sharp pain went through her spine when she painfully hit the floor and the splinters of wood pierced her back uncomfortably. Desperately, Y/N tried to drive the blackness out of her field of vision and gasped. Hope had started to cry again.

Dazed, Y/N had to watch the vampire straighten up and walk slowly towards the bathroom door.

She clumsily raised one arm and made a sweeping, swift gesture, whereupon the vase on the old wooden chest hit the vampire's head with a muffled sound.

Y/N struggled to her feet. "Don't you dare touch her."

The vampire grunted deeply and angrily while the laceration on the back of his head slowly healed and he turned to face her. "That was your death sentence, witch."

Y/N pressed her lips together, could barely raise one hand when the vampire started to attack her again. He cringed painfully when this throbbing pain in his head became unbearable and one aneurysm after another burst.

Y/N quickly took a few steps back, looking around. She would have to get past him to get to Hope's and into the bathroom and to be able to entrench them there. Her eyes fell to the broken desk and the large pieces of wood. But before she even put foot in that direction, she felt a hand wrapping around her ankle and yanking her off her feet. Again, she hit the ground hard and this time it wasn’t so easy to get the blackness out of her sight.

She screamed angrily, turned to her back, but the vampire was already over her. His fist whipped down on her jaw and Y/N’s sight went black again. She gasped as a throbbing pain spread through her jaw.

"A real waste," said the vampire, pulling her into a sitting position, causing Y/N to groan in pain. She could see how he was looking at her, how the pulsating veins were slowly visible under his eyes and she widened her eyes.

"No," she pleaded weakly, and immediately cried out in pain when she felt his sharp teeth pierce the delicate skin on her neck. Her skin burned like fire and she could feel the pressure in her carotid artery as the vampire slowly sucked the life out of her. No, she definitely won’t get killed by a vampire now, certainly not.

Resolutely, she drove the dancing asterisks out of sight, hit the vampire wildly with one hand, and groped for a piece of the desk with the other. And her heart skipped a joyful beat when she actually felt a long piece of wood in her hand. She gripped it tightly, raised it and shortly thereafter the wood pierced the heart of the vampire, who was only gurgling now. His eyes widened, his skin slowly turning gray.

Y/N gasped, pressed her hand onto the bleeding wound on her neck, and tried to control her pulse. Her heart pumped her blood through her body at three times the speed of panic, and it was a miracle that her already weakened body hadn’t given up yet.

Hope. She abruptly stood up, staggered helplessly for a few moments until she regained her balance, and then staggered toward the bathroom door. With a shaky finger, she opened the door and pushed it shut behind her shortly thereafter.

She instantly took the little girl in her arms again. ,, Hush, everything is fine. It’s alright, ”calmed Y/N/N Hope and then turned to the door. While she held the girl with one hand, she directed the other towards the door. "Apné sà mene," she casted the room isolation spell, which was supposed to protect her and the child from the rest of the vampires. ,, Apné sà mene. Apné sà mene. "

Y/N swallowed at the returning dizziness. The spell had worked, she knew that. If their enemies have no witch on their side, she and Hope would be safe in here. She anxiously blinked several times to drive the blackness out of her sight. That wasn’t good, definitely not. This excitement, the fight with the vampire, the loss of blood, now the exertion by this spell. It was too much for her weakened body.

"We sit down, okay ?" Y/N spoke lazily to Hope in her arms, held her tightly and then went down to the floor, leaning lazily with her back against the bathtub. Suddenly she was incredibly tired. There was nothing she could do about it when her hand, which she had pressed on the bite wound on her neck, fell down to her side. She was just glad that she was holding Hope tightly and that she was safe.

Already when Klaus and Elijah saw the main door, which was wide open, they sprinted into the courtyard. About a dozen vampires lay motionless on the cold ground. Someone must have broken their necks. The two brothers could hear fighting noises from the second floor.

,,For God's sake."

Elijah looked at the lifeless vampires at his feet with his eyes wide open before he heard the sounds of the fight.

"They’re in Hope’s nursery," the brunette stated, when his brother had already let out a deep growl and was gone. Elijah quickly followed him, repressing the panic fear that threatened to spread inside him. Nothing should have happened to her.

When Elijah arrived in the door frame, Klaus was already holding the heart of a vampire, whose head was rolling over the wooden floor, in his hand.

"It's great that you finished your Sunday stroll," the blood-soaked blonde said when she saw her two brothers.

,,Where’s my daughter ?"

,, Y/N fled with her. I don’t know where they are."

Elijah's heart skipped a beat and he and his brother exchanged a look before Klaus burst out of the devastated children's room.

"Y/N !" He screamed so that it echoed through the old walls of the building and trudged off, Elijah was close on his heels.

Elijah swallowed hard, looked around in search. She couldn't have run down the stairs to the main portal, that would have been too dangerous. He knew Y/N, knew that she wouldn't do anything that would endanger Hope’s welfare. No, she must still be in the property, looking for somewhere safe to hide with his niece. And for the first time in his life, he prayed. He prayed that they were alright.

"Y/N !" Klaus called again and was forced by his brother to stop. He glowed at him.

"What is it, Elijah ? ..."

Just when the hybrid wanted to add something, Elijah held up a hand and Klaus fell silent. Now he was listening carefully, too.

A whimper was carried to them quietly, very quietly. Elijah swallowed. It was his niece who made this sound and he closed his eyes for a moment.

,,Here."

Klaus started to move with vampire speed, Elijah followed his brother through the several corridors to the open door of an old guest room.

Perplexed, the brunette stopped in the door frame. The room was completely devastated. The shards of an old vase were scattered all over the floor, the old desk was now just wood splinters and a dead vampire was lying in the middle with a piece of said wood in his heart. There was an unpleasantly penetrating smell of blood in the air and Elijah's heart contracted painfully. He inflated his nostrils. It was her blood, no doubt. He saw the drops of blood that led to the bathroom like breadcrumbs and clenched his hands into fists.

Klaus wasn’t in the slightest interested, his thoughts were all about his daughter, whose whimper was dampened by the locked door of the bathroom.

"Y/N ?!" He called and wanted to bang on the door, but barely touching it, he flew across the room and landed between the remains of the desk. "Tell your girlfriend to break her barrier spell," Klaus growled angrily.

Elijah hurried to the door too, but didn't touch it. "Y/N ?" He asked carefully, listening intently. ,,It’s alright, it’s me."

"Freya !" Niklaus meanwhile called his sister in the background ,whose hasty steps Elijah could already hear.

"Y/N ?" Asked the brunette once again, but he didn't get an answer. His fingernails pierced painfully in the heel of his hand as he continued to clench his hands into fists. If anything had happened to her, she would have been ... He swallowed hard.

"Y/N, I beg you, open the door," he continued to plead and briefly closed his eyes. Something worried him so that he fell silent. Klaus, who misinterpreted his brother's behavior, narrowed his eyes and came up to him, looking at him questioningly.

Suddenly, Elijah's heart pumped his blood through his veins at three times the speed and his chest rose and fell rapidly. No, it couldn't be. Not her, not ...

"I only hear one heartbeat."

Klaus' pushed the pent up air out of his lungs and looked at his brother with wide eyes. He added up one and one. His daughter was crying and alive on the other side of the door, but Y/N’s blood led the brothers straight to the bathroom. That meant ... He closed his eyes, devotedly.

"Freya !" Elijah for the first time cried. He was desperate. He had no way to get to her as long as the barrier spell was working. He wasn’t be able to help her. "Freya !"

"I'm here, I'm here," the blonde hurried into the room.

"I ... I can't hear her heartbeat. She spoke a barrier spell. I have to get to her. "

Freya gave her brother a brief look with wide eyes, but then nodded, carefully pushing him to the side and raising her hands to the door, closing her eyes.

Elijah nervously watched his sister's lips moving, but he couldn't hear what she was saying. His thoughts only revolved around Y/N and this panicked fear of having lost her now. He couldn't think clearly anymore, he could ...

,,Broken."

As soon as Freya had taken a step back, Elijah shot forward, but the door was still locked. He took a few steps back and then threw his entire body weight against the door, whereupon the lock gave way and he stumbled into the room, followed by Niklaus.

When he saw her, he held his breath. Blood kept flowing from the bite on her neck. One of her hands, covered in blood, lay on the floor beside her. She had slid to the side, lay motionless in the corner, but one of her arms were wrapped tightly around little Hope, as if she still wanted to protect her by all means.

Her jaw was swollen and her lip had split open. Her skin was pale and her eyes closed. She didn't move.

I pull you in to feel your heartbeat Can you hear me screaming „Please don‘t leave me“ ?

,,No no no no."

Elijah dropped to his knees, while Klaus picked up his daughter and soothingly stroked her head. Meanwhile, Elijah pushed up the sleeve of his shirt, bit his wrist without another thought. His blood quickly flowed out of the wound and ran down his wrist, dripping onto the cold tiled floor.

He carefully lifted a hand and placed it on the back of her head, pressing his wrist against her pale, full lips.

"Please," he pleaded softly and briefly closed his eyes. He could feel his blood running down her throat, but she didn't swallow. "Please don't leave me."

Quietly, very quietly, he heard her blood roaring in her veins and ... a single heartbeat. Elijah suddenly looked up, looked at her. He carefully brushed a y/h/c strand of hair from her face and hopefully looked at her. He watched how the wound on her lip slowly closed. The swelling of her jaw faded and the bite became smaller and smaller with every second until it completely disappeared.

Hold on I still want you Come back I still need you

,,Please..."

He kept stroking his thumb over her cheek, waiting, praying, pleading. But nothing happened. She didn't move. He could hear her quiet heartbeat, but the silence in between them was still too long.

"The vampire blood is working, why doesn't she wake up ?" Freya asked, also concerned, and Klaus gave her a quick look. He comfortingly weighed his daughter in his arms, gave her a kiss on top of her head, but he had a dark guess. He would never admit it, but his heart ached when he saw his brother on the floor, in front of him, the woman he loved. Elijah had his head down, his eyes closed.

Klaus swallowed. "It healed all the injuries it was able to heal."

Elijah slowly opened his eyes when his brother's words came to him. Niklaus was right. Vampire blood did not heal all injuries. If he was actually right, then ...

Elijah's head immediately went up. He got up, wrapped an arm around Y/N's waist and lifted her into his arms. "We have to take her to the hospital."

"I'll get the car," Klaus nodded, handed Hope to his sister, and then left the room with vampire speed.

When Elijah stepped out of the courtyard with Y/N in his arms, Klaus braked the big off-road vehicle in front of the entrance portal, got out and opened the car door to the back seat for his brother so that he could get in with Y/N. No sooner he had closed the door than his brother depressed the accelerator pedal.

A long endless highway, you‘re silent beside Drivin‘ a nightmare I can‘t escape from

Elijah held her tightly in her arms. None of this was allowed to happen. It was like an inevitable nightmare from which seemed to be no escape and Elijah wanted to wake up. He wanted it so much.

He didn’t hear Niklaus swearing loudly when a small Fiat 500 twitched down the road ahead of them, taking all time in the world, and he did not hear him honking loudly and then overtaking it - to the disapproval of the oncoming traffic.

None of this was allowed to happen yet. The time was not ripe, they hadn't had enough. She was the woman he wanted spend eternity with and now she was going to die ? That was a bad joke. It had to be. Even their enemies couldn’t have imagined anything more cruel than the terrible reality did.

Helplessly praying, the light isn't fadin' Hiding the shock and the chill in my bones

He gently stroked a  strand of hair out of her face and examined her face closely. Everything had to be fine. He couldn't lose her, he couldn't.

The two brothers had been flashed at least twice on the way to the hospital, but they didn't care when Klaus braked hard in front of the emergency room and several paramedics looked up in alarm.

Niklaus got out, opened the door to the back seat and Elijah climbed out of the car with Y/N in his arms.

"We need help !" He shouted as loud as he could and some of the paramedics were already hurrying towards them.

"Everything is going to be fine," he whispered softly as he looked down at Y/N, who was still motionless in his arms. The sight made him terrified. He had never seen her so weak, so lifeless, as if the vampire had sucked all life out of her, despite the vampire blood that had healed the most serious injuries.

They took you away on a table I pace back and forth as you lay still

Meanwhile, Elijah hurried straight to the emergency room. Some nurses met him with a table.

"Put her here."

He did as he was told. He carefully her on it and swallowed hard when he saw her lying there. He was caught up in his personal nightmare from which was no escape. His hands had started to shake and he clenched them into fists to stop them. Y/N was immediately surrounded by several nurses and a doctor.

"What happened ?" the doctor asked. That was the question of all questions.

,, She has a serious disease. Dr. Pace is responsible for her,” Elijah just replied. "I found her like this."

They pull you in to feel your heartbeat Can you hear me screaming, "Please don't leave me"

"Weak pulse," another nurse noted. Elijah's eyes suddenly flew to her and the doctor also turned to the nurse. The brunette didn't notice how his brother pulled the doctor to the side. He only had eyes for the woman he loved.

"Listen," Klaus said meanwhile and his pupils dilated when he made eye contact with the doctor. ,, I want you to do everything possible to keep this woman alive. Everything. No matter how much the drugs cost, you give them to her. "

The doctor swallowed and then nodded quickly. “Of course."

Meanwhile, like in a trance, Elijah watched them push Y/N away. He wanted to go after her, but two nurses stopped him. He didn't have the strength to manipulate them, and frankly, he didn't know if it would be that good. Her life was in the hands of the doctors now.

The large double door closed and the corridor in which they had followed the doctor's staff had become quiet. It was dead silent.

He just stared at the door, tried to hear something, but the doors didn't let a single sound pass.

He weakly dropped into one of the hard chairs at the wall, just staring straight ahead at the gray hospital floor. Only now did he notice the blood on his hands - her blood. His hands trembled uncontrollably and he could only stare at them.

Almost startled, he winced when he felt his brother's hand on his shoulder.

"Elijah ?" It was rare for Klaus' voice to sound so careful and gentle, but his brother didn't respond. His mind was a mess that he was no longer able to organize.

"She is strong," the blonde continued and dropped onto the chair next to his brother. ,, Stronger than most people ... and witches. She won't give up without a fight. "

Elijah just nodded absently and Klaus swallowed hard. He felt a sting in his heart when he saw his brother sitting there; like a heap of ashes and only because the woman he loved was in mortal danger. He was almost surprised, when he heard his voice after some minutes of silence.

"I can't lose her, Niklaus," he said in a rough voice and when he looked at his brother for the first time, his eyes were red. ,, Not her. Just ... not her. "

"You won’t lose her," Klaus assured him, but he also knew that he could not promise anything.

Hold on I still want you Come back I still need you

It took full two hours. Two hours during which the entire corridor in front of the intensive care unit had been occupied by the Mikaelson clan.

After walking uneasily up and down the corridor for an hour, Rebekah had persuaded him and he finally sat down on a chair again, holding his head down and supporting it with his hands. Hayley was sitting opposite him with Freya, Klaus was leaning against the wall next to them with his arms crossed and Rebekah had leaned her head back against the wall beside Elijah and was staring at the white concrete wall.

When the door to the intensive care unit opened again that day, everyone present hopefully looked up. And this time, Elijah's heart beat a little faster when he recognized Y/N's doctor, who was now approaching them.

,,How is she ?"

Elijah immediately got up and expectantly looked at her. He still hoped that anything, any luck, could save her. His siblings had also expectantly sat up and listened intently.

Dr. Pace, however, wiped her dry lips and glanced at Elijah's siblings before turning back to him. She was looking for the right words. "She's not stable, but she's in no pain," she started slowly. ,,Mr Mikaelson, I don't want to lie to you. Her vital signs are miserable and her body is very weak. I am afraid that your fiance will not make it ... "

Elijah inhaled sharply, abruptly looked away from the doctor and swallowed hard. There was nothing he could do about the tears that drove into his eyes by themselves and made his field of vision glaze over. He ran a shaky hand over his face. He felt Rebekah's hand dull on his shoulder and heard the doctor's further words as if through cotton wool, but he no longer listened. His heart was squeezed in the most brutal way he could imagine at that moment and all he wanted was to see her. He wanted to be with her.

Until the very end.

Let me take your hand, I'll make it right I swear to love you all my life

,,How do you feel ?"

Y/N studied Elijah for a moment while he sat on the edge of her bed. She made a face at his words. ,,My head hurts."

,, You lost a lot of blood. My blood couldn't heal everything, ” he wistfully said and Y/N encouragingly and lightly squeezed his hand. Both ignored where the headache really came from.

She turned a little further in his direction. It seemed her whole body was on fire and with every movement she did she felt like every muscle was torning and every bone was breaking.

Elijah forced a smile, but Y/N could see what was really going on with him; of course she could.

She watched him for a while, watching him keep looking at her two hands and not stopping to run his thumb over the back of her hand.

"Hey," she finally said, forcing herself to smile, even if it hurt her heart. "We knew that it has to end at some point. We have already been given more time than it should have been. ”

He swallowed hard at her words. She spoke the truth, but it had never hurt as much as it did at that moment.

She saw it in his eyes, saw it in the way he looked at her and it broke her heart, over and over again, every single second. This broken man had stumbled into her life and had ended with his own centuries before at the same time. Only she had managed to make it back to something worth sacrificing.

,, I have no regrets, Elijah. Just that we didn't make more. "

At that moment it occurred to him. So much had crossed his mind that he hadn't thought about where he was with his brother in the morning before it all started.

With his hand that didn’t hold hers, he reached into his pocket and pulled out the little box from the jeweler. He forced himself to smile as he opened it and looked at the silver wedding rings that were inside. The Mikaelsons emblem engraved on them. His eyes wandered between her and the rings. "There’s no pastor and this is neither a church, but .."

"It's perfect," she interrupted him, and this time the pressure in her hand was a little stronger.

He smiled at her again, and still struggled to hold back the tears that started to form in his eyes every second. But her smile, her happy smile, made him strong. It gave him strength.

One of her hands vaguely moved to the remote control of the bed, blindly groping for it until she finally found the button that would push the head of the bed a little up so she was sitting upright. Meanwhile, Elijah slid a little further onto the edge of the bed and then took her two hands.

Y/N sniffed once and then smiled again as she started to speak. "I hereby take you, Elijah Mikaelson, wholeheartedly to my husband, accepting your weaknesses and your strengths as you accept mine. I promise to trust you and support you in everything, and always make the happiness of our love and our family my number one priority. I will be your partner in wealth and poverty, in sickness and health, in success and failure and in life and death. I always promise to stand by your side, no matter what life has in store for us. I believe in you, in the person you will be and the couple we would have been together. You are my love, my life, my today and the rest of my life."

At her words, a single tear ran down his cheek. A single tear that represented what could have been and what could have become of them; but they were denied it.

He took a deep breath, looked at their hands, whereupon another tear dripped onto the white bed sheet below. He swallowed, then looked up at her, who was also struggling with tears.

"I hereby take you, Y/N Y/L/N, to my wife from this day on. I promise to love and honor you. I promise to give you my infinite love and affection, to always be sincere, to appreciate you and to share my thoughts, hopes and dreams with you. It is an honor for me to be able to spend the rest of my life with you. I hereby promise to love you. Always and forever."

But now it was Y/N, who had to sniff at his last words. Always and forever. That was what it meant to the Mikaelsons. An always and forever was of the utmost importance to her and she knew that Elijah in particular would do anything to keep that promise. She was part of his family now. She had already been a long time ago.

She gave him a sad, yet so happy smile as she reached with a trembling hand for the ring in the box,  carefully removed it, and then took his hand to slide it over his finger.

Elijah did the same with her ring, took her dainty hand and pushed the ring down her ring finger.

She happily looked at the piece of jewelry on her finger. This may be the last minutes of her life, but it were also the most beautiful. Nothing could have been nicer for her.

Now, the tears ran down her cheeks and she looked at Elijah, looked deep into his eyes, as he did. In a shaky voice she said: "You may kiss the bride."

Elijah carefully leaned forward, careful not to pull any of the many hoses or cables while she clumsily raised a hand and finally put it on his neck as his lips carefully touched hers.

It almost seemed as if he was afraid that she would break if he touched her and yet, for Y/N, it was the most beautiful kiss out of all. She could feel the love he put in it, the pain, and the salty taste of tears on her tongue. But she didn't care; it had always been what she longed for in life, he had always been the missing piece of the puzzle in her life that she didn't even know she needed. At that moment she had lost everything and had had everything at the same time.

He leaned his forehead against hers, one of his hands on the back of her head supported her a little. She closed his eyes like he did, could feel his hot breath on her face and the tears he was desperately trying to hold back.

,,I love you so much."

A smile formed on her lips and she tried desperately not to scream and break into tears.

,, I love you too, Elijah. Always and forever."

At those words, he kissed her again and her heart contracted painfully. It had long been clear to her that this would be her last moments and with every passing second the pain grew.

,,Do you lie down with me ?"

There was so much hope and despair in her voice that Elijah felt like someone was zealously tearing his heart out of his chest.

The tears on his cheeks were dry, he had made an effort that no more would flee from the corners of his eyes, yet his eyes had a steady, moist shine.

He cleared his throat, swallowed the lump in his throat. He had taken off his jacket some time ago, the tie was right next to it over the back of the chair. He had rolled up the sleeves of the white shirt and opened the first two buttons of it.

Elijah slowly nodded when Y/N gave him a little space and slid aside so that he could lie down with her.

He carefully lifted the tube of the infusion, lay down next to her and immediately felt her seal up to him and put her head and left hand on his chest and listen to his heartbeat.

He closed his eyes for a moment after putting his arms around her and pulling her closer. He gave her a kiss on the forehead and rested his chin on top of her head. He looked at the heart monitor which recorded her steady and now slowing heartbeat, with mixed feelings.

He carefully grabbed one of her ice-cold hands, gripped it tightly with his, and closed his eyes just like she did.

Hold on, I still need you

Y / n woke up to the sound of the rushing waves and the screeching of a few seagulls. She blinked in confusion, turning to her side.

When she opened her eyes, she was blinded for a moment by some sun ray, but found out that she was lying in a very comfortable bed. Slowly, she recognized the outline of the open bedroom and looked through the opened wooden sliding door to the deserted, untouched beach.

She raised her eyebrows in confusion and looked beside her, but the space was empty. She glanced down at herself, found out that she was wearing one of Elijah's dress shirts and swung her legs over the edge of the bed. Now, she could hear the soft piano music, which was  very quietly carried to her through the open door.

She barefooted tapped over the wooden floor, gazing at the sea and the waves outside and only following the music.

She smiled when she saw him, stroked the y/h/c hair on one side and tapped to him. She finally wrapped her arms around him from behind and watched his fingers continue to dance elegantly over the black and white piano keys. She kissed his neck and shoulder and briefly closed her eyes until the music stopped. But she knew what this was. And she knew this little, cute hut on the island off Brazil too well.

"You proposed to me here," she stated and slightly smiled at the memory.

"The best weekend of my life."

"And that only happened because we fled from your brother," Y/N laughed quietly, remembering how Klaus had barely given them privacy in the New Orleans estate.

"His ego wasn’t too hurt," Elijah replied, pulling Y/N onto his lap so that she leaned back against the piano and could wrap her feet around his waist. She did the same with her arms and his neck. She closely watched the man in her arms and gently ran her index finger down his temple to his jawline.

"I loved it here," she admitted. ,, No one had ever done that for me before. And that just made me love you more. "

Elijah smiled slightly and yet Y/N noticed the dark shadow in his eyes that he was trying to hide from her. But he had never been able to completely hide everything from her.

I don't wanna let go I know I'm not that strong

For a moment, he just closed his eyes and buried his face in the crook of her neck. "I can't do this without you."

Y/N forced a smile and stroked her fingers soothingly through his hair as she felt him take a deep breath. ,, Yes, you will. I know you, Elijah. When you are about to lose your footing, think about how much I love you, whatever you do. "

"Please ... stay."

Y/N devotedly closed her eyes and pressed her lips together in a thin line. She tilted her head back, but couldn't stop the tears. "I can't," she said and her heart contracted painfully at the thought.

Elijah listened to her voice and the sound of the waves. A seagull was screaming a little away from their little hut.

“I should have found a way. It's my fault."

"Hey," Y/N immediately said in a firm voice and leaned back a little to look him straight in the eyes as she grabbed his face with both hands. ,, It's not your fault, Elijah. If you dare to think that, I'm gonna haunt you as a ghost and kick your ass. It's not your fault. Vampire blood doesn’t cure all diseases. "

But he shook his head slowly, trying to blink the tears away. "There has to be another way."

"It doesn't exist," she denied, forcing an encouraging smile. “Stop doing that. You did everything you could do, okay ? When I got the diagnosis ... it was already over for me - until I met you again. Thanks to you, I have weighed my entire life within a few years. You made it worth living and if it should be over now, then it’s okay. "

She gently stroked an escaped tear from his face and gave him another of her smiles before she finally got up and reached a hand out to him. The piano started to play the melody Elijah played before when she pulled him to his feet.

"Am I gonna get my wedding dance ?" She asked with a happy smile on her lips as she led Elijah a little into the room. He also smiled as he took her hand, pulling her by his waist and pressing her against him. She carefully laid her head on his chest and closed her eyes as they slowly began to move to the delicate piano music. Suddenly, she had become incredibly tired and Elijah had been ignoring the slowing, dull beeping that came from far far away and that only he could hear.

He gave her a gentle kiss on her hairline and led her over the old wooden floor.

I just wanna hear you Saying baby, let's go home Yeah, I just wanna take you home

Slowly, very slowly and lazily, she finally raised her head again and looked at him with tired eyes. Still, she smiled.

,,I love you."

The beeping grew louder. And it slowed down.

Elijah closed her eyes and pressed a gentle kiss on her forehead. He gently stroked a strand of hair behind her ear and examined her face closely. Y/N had always loved it when he did that, but now there was a whole different reason: he was afraid to forget her.

He pressed his forehead against hers, closed his eyes. ,,I love you, too."

Y/N smiled happily. ,,Always and forever."

She pulled him down for a last kiss, felt his soft lips against hers, and smiled into it. She could taste the salt of her tears and pressed Elijah tightly against her. She didn't want to go, but she had no choice.

A shrill, continuous beep tore the moment and Elijah's heart at the same time when he realized what it meant. The scenery in the open hut on the beautiful island was gone, faded like fog in the morning sun.

No, no, no, he desperately thought and his eyes widened, the tears now unstoppable. An incredible anger over his inability came over him, but the grief was greater and he didn’t want to believe it.

His breath was faltering and frantic, he almost didn't dare to do it when he propped himself up on his elbows and looked at her.

The tears ran down his cheeks. Her eyes were closed, a satisfied, little smile was on her lips and one could almost think she was sleeping. And in a way she did; she had fallen asleep peacefully and happily.

"No," he whispered as one of his tears dripped onto her shoulder, making the fabric darker there. He carefully raised a trembling hand and brushed a strand of hair away from her face. She didn't move.

The other Mikaelsons had also gathered in front of the window to the hospital room. They too had noticed what had happened. They all had tears in their eyes. Tears to see therr brother there and tears because a part of her family had left them.

"No ...", he sobbed and put a hand on her cheek, but it was clear that she would no longer feel it; she wouldn't feel anything anymore.

And then he broke. He could feel his heart shattering and leaping in a thousand pieces, his tears falling down his cheeks in the event of falls, and he carefully lifted her up and buried his face in her chest. He didn't want to let her go, he couldn't let her go. She was gone and something in him refused to accept it.

He sobbed and cried desperately, still smelling the light hint of her perfume as he buried his face deeper in her chest.

She was gone and he was alone now. He was completely alone. He had no one left.

Hold on, I still want you Come back, I still need you