#maybe i just Don't make a reference to being a teacher in the notes right

[mqfx]

all my little fujo protegé knows is that I write fic (bc she writes fic too and I wanted her to feel seen) but not what's IN it. chat I'm afraid she's gonna find my work on ao3 what should I do

[dwaekkicidal]

The Meeting

˚ʚPerv!Emo!Han Jisung x Cutesy!Fem!Readerɞ˚

˚ʚ♡ɞ˚ summary: Based off of this ask.

˚ʚ♡ɞ˚ word count: 1.9k

˚ʚ♡ɞ˚ warnings: told from his pov, jisung is a huge perv (lowkey a creep but we dont talk about that), public masturbation(m), exhibitionism, kinda iconifying? (f)

˚ʚ♡ɞ˚ notes: Italics are Han's thoughts! also the picture is just a reference for the outfit i had in mind :) Part 2 maybe coming out this weekend

The Incidents Masterlist

DO NOT republish or translate+post my work!

It's Jisung's English Composition class. He sits at the farthest back table on his own, tapping away at his laptop as the teacher discusses some concept he couldn't care less about. He hears some ruckus past his airpods, but ignores it in favor of listening to the music that's playing. That is, until, a figure covered in pink and white stands directly behind his screen. It's very obvious that the person is looking at him, but he tries to ignore it hoping that they will just go away.

It's not until the person's hand reaches out and waves in front of his screen that he finally looks up. As his eyes trail up the person's body he slowly realizes who it is. When their eyes meet, it finally clicks. Y/N L/N. The popular girl who is friends with "everybody" and dresses in short, short skirts with thigh highs and her stupid Hello Kitty pendant necklace that falls perfectly between her boobs. It should be my face there.

His eyes move to the top of her head, glancing at the fluffy pink scrunchie that holds her hair together in two pigtails. Then they move lower, catching her shiny eyes that are risen at the edges from her smile. And- oh. Her smile.. The one that is created from those pretty plump lips covered in a pinkish-red tinted gloss. He starts to picture what they would look like wrapped around his-

But then she's tilting her head and mouthing words at him. Oh, fuck that's right. His hands bolt up to his ears, yanking the earbuds out and completely forgetting about the music that bleeds out. He holds them away from his ears and meets her eyes again, almost moaning out loud when she bites her lip bashfully and speaks up again. Her silky sweet voice finally meets his ears and he can feel his dick twitch in his jeans.

"My group was being loud so we got separated for the rest of the semester.. Is that seat taken?" Her short charm-clad acrylic nails catch his attention for a moment as she points to the seat occupied by his bag. Fuck.. what he would give to see them also wrapped around- Ok ok calm the hell down Jisung.

"Uh.. yeah?" His voice comes out pathetic and he almost explodes from embarrassment when he realizes that he answered the wrong way. The corners of her shiny lips turn downwards and she goes to take a step back. But somewhere in that horny brain of his, he grows the balls to shoot out his hand to grab her wrist, "Wait! Sorry, I meant it's not taken. It's my bag. Let me move it out of your way. Oh- fuck sorry I didn't mean to grab you all of the sudden I-"

He starts to ramble, his pink cheeks jiggling as he desperately moves to throw his bag on the floor. She giggles at the sight and he malfunctions, accidentally dropping his bag as he looks up at her dumbfounded.

She makes her way around the table and he gets a whiff of her vanilla-strawberry perfume as she sits. His dick twitches again in his jeans and he inhales again, then he looks over at her from the corner of his eye. Her nails clack against her laptop as she pulls it out and opens it. Of course it's fucking covered in Sanrio stickers. Hello Kitty stickers being the most of them. He doesn't think he's been so envious of a 2D pixelated character in his life until the day he laid eyes on her.

Her hair bounces as she turns to him, those pretty lips taking all his attention again as he watches them move with every word. "My name's Y/N L/N. You're... Han! Right?" He nods slowly, no longer trusting his voice in the slightest. How does she know my name?!? I don't even talk to anybody in this class.. "Yeah.. Han Jisung."

She smiles widely, then those nails are moving around in his field of view again. This time her hands go up to her necklace, fiddling with it as she leans back into her chair and her shiny lips part again. "It's nice to finally meet you, by the way. We had statistics together last semester, but we didn't get the chance to talk at all." 

"Oh. You remember that class?" He grimaces and rubs the back of his neck, zoning out after she nods. He suddenly remembered the presentation for the final his group had to do in that class, And he vividly remembers the hard-on he had during it. It was only because of her and that stupid sundress she had on that day. Fuck you mother nature for the summer heat that day..

When her eyes turn to the whiteboard, he looks down at his crotch and rolls his eyes when he sees an evident bulge. He pulls the hem of his sweater down to cover it up and looks up at the clock hopefully, but is quickly shut down. God damn it.. It’s only noon and this class ends at 3:30.. I'm so fucked.

He gets through the next 2 hours before his hard on becomes too much to handle. His hand sneaks from the touchpad to his crotch, palming it lightly to relieve some pressure. Just real quick, he swears. It hurts like a bitch, so just this for now until I can go home. But all too easily he gets addicted to the feeling and pushes harder until he’s full on stroking himself through the fabric.

Shit.. she won't notice.. right? A sudden movement in the corner of his eye grabs his attention and he stops like a deer in headlights, in fear that she already figured out what he was doing and that he would get told off for being a freak in front of the entire class.

He glances over, watching for a moment as she instead mindlessly twirls her hair. Eyes still completely forward and focused on the professor. Then his eyes trail a little lower. Her lips are puckered in a cute pout. She eventually un-puffs her cheeks in favor of poking her tongue out slightly, in what he can only assume is focus as she types away at her laptop.

He watches for a few more seconds before slowly trailing all the way down, taking in her outfit and every curve of her body that he can see. When his eyes finally meet her thighs, he thinks his eyes are gonna pop out of his head. The skirt, that was already too short to be appropriate for a place of education, was ridden so far up her thighs that he swears if she just spread her legs even the slightest he could get a glance of her panties. Speaking of her thighs, the plush, bare skin there looks so soft. So biteable.. He licks his lips at the sight.

Before he realizes what’s happening, his eyes peek around to make sure nobody is in the neighboring tables. Then his hand moves on its own, sneaking out of the arm of his thankfully oversized sweater and sliding over his shirt to his pants. He clears his throat to cover up the noise of his jeans unbuckling and unzipping, and then his hand finally slides into his boxers. It was a tight fit but god was he going to make it work.

He strokes himself slowly, angling his dick upwards in hopes that the sweater would cover up the movements. He looks down for a few seconds and bites his lip, biting back a victorious smile as the sweater does just that. 

Feeling a little more relaxed, he allows his eyes to flutter closed. Immediately images of her flood his mind. Images of those pretty, glossy lips wrapping around his dick, those pretty big eyes looking up at him all watery while he shoves his dick down her throat. Images of her pretty pink nail-clad fingers wrapped tightly around his dick. He starts to stroke himself a little faster, imagining that it's her hand instead of his. Fuck. Now images of her jerking him off in the middle of class fill his head. 

His entire body shivers at the thought and he leans forward, resting the elbow on his free arm on the table as he speeds up again. He glances down once more to make sure he’s hidden well, then sighs a little too loudly. He tilts his head down slightly, pulling his hoodie down to cover his face. He knows damn well how expressive his face can be and if that is what gives him away, he would never forgive himself. ‘M so close….

He basks in the pleasure for about a minute before a hand on his shoulder startles him. His hand immediately stops. His eyes shoot open and he snaps his head to his left, looking at the girl as if he’s disoriented. The face he was just fantasizing about looks at him worriedly, eyebrows furrowed and head tilted.

“Are you okay, Hannie?” His hand subconsciously squeezes his dick at the sound of her hushed voice and the new nickname. He breathes heavily for a moment, stuttering slowly as he racks his brain for the best excuse he could think of when she speaks up again. “Do you have a headache or something? You look like you’re sick, and your face is all sweaty!” She giggles at the last part and he watches as her eyes trace a drop of sweat down his forehead to his chin.

He nods his head, gulping as his hand slowly begins its movements again. She mocks his nod, eyebrows still furrowed. He feels her hand caress his biceps through the sweater. She means it in nothing but a soothing way, he’s sure of it. But the warmth of her hand on his skin after the thoughts he just had only made him twitch in his grasp.

He whines and leans forward, resting his arm flat on the table and resting his head on the fat of his forearm. To anybody else looking it seems like he was sleeping, and the way her hand moves to skim his back, also soothingly, just encourages him to move his hand again.

Her worried voice is suddenly close to his ear as her hand slows to a stop, and as his own hand continues to move along his length. “If you want me to stop, let me know please. I’m super touchy and I just wanna help.” His eyes roll into his skull and she can see his head faintly shake ‘no’. “It’s f-fine. I don’t mind it.” He misses out on seeing her smile as she hums and moves her hands once again, this time more confidently and down his spine.

It doesn’t take him very long to build up his orgasm. The feeling of her nails raking down his back, the imagery of her below him that floods his senses, and the feeling of his tip rubbing along his boxers join together to create one of the craziest orgasms he thinks he’s ever had. He moves his head slightly and latches onto his forearm, biting down roughly to stop himself from moaning out loud as he cums right then and there.

He strokes himself through it, waiting until he feels the cum stop spilling out his dick to pull his hand out and release his poor arm. He softens against the wet spot in his underwear and desperately wipes the excess that got onto his hands on his shirt. Fuck.. I just washed these too.

The post-nut clarity hits too fast, the charmed nails that are still raking up and down his back make sure of that. When he peeks out to look at the girl, he watches her type with her free hand, eyes focused on her laptop screen. And completely unaware of what he just did to the thought of her.

His now unoccupied arm wiggles through the sleeve of his sweater, meeting his other arm on the desk as he rests against it.

This is gonna be a long semester.

Taglist:

@jiminssluttyminx @changisworld @juskz @linohumina @rylea08 @grandma143 @caught-in-the-afterglow @yaorzu-blog

[wintersera]

study date? || futa!wonyoung x f!reader

notes: first time ever writing futa and i feel like a hentai loving freak for doing so- anyways “hermaphrodite” futanari especially refers to pornographic characters in erotic manga or anime, known as hentai. basically wy has a pussy and a dick 😭 also happy belated birthday @wonysugar this was for u

cw: futanari, sub!wonyoung, dom!reader, dacryphilia, strap on (i say cock as well), overstimulation if you squint, praise(?), 100% not proofread leave me alone 😭

wc: 5k

“you know you’re about to be kicked off campus if you don’t pass right?”

“what…”

your teacher had summoned you a mere 5 minutes ago to drop the most devastating news you had ever heard in your half assed school life. obviously you knew your grades weren’t the best- they were shit.

you had joined the university to get away from your annoying ass parents, and you were very VERY lucky to have been accepted into such a prestigious one, a university that would make your parents proud. only skimming the entry requirements by a passing grade.

anyways, you couldn’t have the risk of losing the good friends you had made, so you started thinking... if you were to study hard you could stay, maybe fuck around at parties and whatnot, but then again you and studying don’t go hand in hand, unfortunately. even if you tried to sit down in the lecture hall with a notebook and your laptop on the side you’d most likely forget the content in as soon as you step out.

groaning in frustration, you throw your hands up into the air dramatically “ughhhh… okay, i’ll make it up to you somehow. please don't kick me out just yet”

—

stumbling into your next class like the dramatic person you are, you mumble under your breath with a displeased look on your face obviously shown by furrowed brows and your persistent frown.

“fuck this class, this is so shitttt” uttering as you take your note book from out of your bag to scribble down some barely readable half assed notes, since your teacher was rambling about some topic you didn’t quite grasp.

it was extremely obvious that you had no clue on what was being taught. instead of embarrassing yourself in front of the whole entire class by extending your arm up in the air, it was only natural for you to ask the person next to you for help. the girl next to you was known as the most intelligent person in the class, maybe the most intelligent person on campus if you say so yourself.

“…hey” whispering while poking her shoulder “what exactly are we learning?” the girl carefully placed down her pen to turn her head in your direction, her hair doing that cliche slow motion sway as she adjusts her glasses, making sure that it was tucked behind her ears. it took her a while to speak up, maybe it was nerves. people often depicted you as an outgoing ‘popular’ person, but you didn’t believe that at all- i mean who uses school hierarchy at your big age. sure, you have a couple of close friends here and there and you easily become acquainted with people, yet that doesn’t really make you popular… you think. just a few drinks and you’re already chatting to everyone at the club.. you wouldn’t call that being popular, right? or maybe she was repulsed by you instead, you dont know why, but maybe she just didn’t fuck with your vibes- your personalities clashed severely, and although you weren’t a believer of those cliche stereotypes where the nerd is absolutely terrified of the avid partygoer- those cliches almost felt too real.

her eyes widened and it seemed like all the blood had rushed up to her cheeks as she stared at your face for a few seconds, completely forgetting what you had asked her before “uh.. um… what did you ask me again?” by her body language alone, you could sense that she was tensing up. okay maybe you were a little bit intimidating, who wouldn’t think you were by the way you waltzed into the lecture hall all dramatic like that.

“i’ve been behind on everything and i’m about to get kicked out so could you maybe help… please?”

“um- well, it’s kinda impossible to learn all the content in one sitting, since our professor kinda just talks for hours on end. so… uh if you’re okay with it, do you wanna do a little studying together?”

“yes?! oh my god perfect, you’re a lifesaver. just say where and i’ll be over” immediately accepting the offer just like that. you’d think that she would be more timid considering that she was literally paralysed when you poked her, but luckily enough, she had the balls to speak to you. god bless confident ass nerds.

being too enthusiastic about studying with her, she was a little bit caught off guard by the way you beamed “w-we could do it after class. i’m not busy and no ones gonna be in my dorm today apparently…” you thought about it. even though you were fine with studying at a local cafe, or the university library, a change of environment could possibly help you “that’s if you want to of course” fiddling with her pen as she softly added the last sentence.

“sure, why not. a change of environment wouldn’t hurt- and plus i might study better with someone as smart and cute as you”

“h-huh? what?”

you felt a little pang in your heart, her confused face made your pulse race a little too fast for your liking “ah… i didn’t mean that in a flirtatious way” sureeee “i meant it more like- you know what… i'm digging myself a hole. i meant you’re very very smart and i’d love for you to help me study” flashing her a quick smile.

“uh- um yeah.. ahaha. so my place is fine?”

“sure”

—

after another painful hour of sitting impatiently in your seat, class finally ended with you still not understanding a single thing that came out of your professor's mouth.

“i have no idea what she was yapping about”

“it’s because you sleep at the back sometimes. you better stop taking naps or else she’s gonna kick you out for real”

“…you pay attention to me sleeping in class?” interrogating her seemed fun. she was always so quick to answer your questions with a funny flustered response. something along the lines of stuttering profusely everytime you ask her a simple question. it was like you knew her for a while, being so comfortable in her presence that you can easily toss banter around.

“NO- i mean.. it’s because you sleep so soundly and so obviously, probably because you’re partying almost every night, r-right?”

“you’re so cute when you stutter- also yes i do go out a lot but not that much” teasing her a bit more as you walk out of the lecture hall “so where’s your dorm at pretty girl?”

“oh! uh.. it’s just a 10 minute walk away”

you called her a pretty girl? out of nowhere? it was involuntary but it came out smoothly and without you thinking, plus it really messed with her head. score. what you failed to realise is that she walked a little funny, shuffling as she walked beside you. the tent in her pants being so obviously apparent that she covered it up with her bag, that was thankfully big enough.

that 10 minute walk to hers felt oddly familiar, until you realised that you lived in the same accommodation. what a shocker.

what's even more funnier is that she lived one floor above you

“wonyoung”

“y-yes?” she jumped in place as she reached for her keys in her bag, the keys almost falling out of her hands.

“it’s kind of funny how i live right below you” giggling about how silly you thought it was “how come i’ve never seen you around?”

“hmmm… too busy studying i guess”

“ah, that would make sense. anyways why are you just standing at the door, are we gonna go in or nah”

you waited as she lowkey struggled to insert the key into the door. watching her closely as she curses under her breath, she must’ve thought that she looked like a complete and utter loser. she was right. she was a mess in front of you-

“take your time babe”

“s-stop don’t call me that. you’re gonna make me mess up again” panicking as she missed the key hole.

the door finally opened and you were in. her room was, well, basically the same size as yours of course, but it was definitely much more organised in contrast to your hell hole of a room “god damn, i’m glad you didn’t offer to go to mine”

as you sat down on her bed, you scanned across her walls and other stuff, taking note of what types of posters she had on her wall just in case you felt generous one day and decided to give her a gift. not like you had any money for that though. it wasn’t surprising when you glanced over her desk to see a couple of shoujo anime figures still fresh in the box “hah wow you really are nerdy”

“s-shut up and come sit here”

—

“alright so that’s how you finish off this part… are you okay… you look out of it” she questions you while you slide down her conveniently placed extra chair that was placed right next to her.

“that felt like a fuck ton of cars just crashed simultaneously into my brain. wonyoung i know you’re smart, but can you dumb down the explanations plea-” you pause as she got up from her seat- your jaw swung wide open in shock laying your eyes upon something you guess wasn’t meant to be seen.

“how about we take little break. let me get you some.. um y/n? helloooo- are you good? is your brain fried?”

yeah it was. your focus was shifted onto something else. no thoughts, no words just..

cock?

you responded to her question with a nod- yeah yeah your brain was definitely fried, you even questioned if it was because the studying REALLY did fuck your head up, but my god it was as clear as day. the print in her pants was certainly real, there was no way that it was fake. her bulge being so unrealistically big that it looked like her pants were restricting all the space in there- no room for her cock to breathe at all.

“i… i uh- i don’t wanna be a creep or anything but… wonyoung i think you might have an issue down there”

“down where?” HOW did she not realise that she had a massive hard on right in front of you.

luckily she was cute, and thankfully you had a huge thing for nerds like her. you take a deep breath- praying to the skies that she doesn’t find you weird for asking this specific question.

“need help?” you breathe shakily, the sight of her cock begging for it to be released from her tight pants made you almost drool. heat spread to your face while she looked at you confused for a second until it hit her.

“ah, you meant t-that? aha i don't know how it got there um uh.. it’s definitely not because- i mean it’s like… well it seems like i have a hard on ahaha” there was an awkward silence that washed over the both of you.

“i- sorry i didn't mean to get turned on by you” shyly admitting whilst attempting to cover her hard on with her note book.

“oh, so i turned you on?” a smirk slowly appearing on your flushed face, a teasing hand brushed her cock ever so slightly as you crossed your legs.

“fuck… y-yeah you did.. sorry” she began to lose her balance as you cupped your hand around her bulge.

“no need to apologise” once again, silent washes over you- collecting your thoughts on how to approach her again “…wonyoung”

“mhm?”

“take your pants off for me” you eyed her down like a predatory animal, crossing your arms as she slowly takes her pants, then her boxers off. her cock sprung out and hit her stomach with a thud. damn, she was hung-

telling a cute girl to strip in her own dorm room wasn’t really on your to do list today, or at all, but here you were. the cute girl in question having a massive cock and what seems to be the lack of balls.

wait pause? she doesn’t have any balls? interesting- now you’re equally intrigued and horny.

“sit down on the bed for me cutie” the sudden use of a pet name made her whine aloud. you guess she was weak towards those types of words- adorable. she sat down on her bed, legs shut from embarrassment “awww” you coo at her “how cute. come on, spread your legs for me baby”

“mmm.. wait wait you’re gonna be weirded out. i-i don’t think we shouldn’t do this”

“there’s nothing to be ashamed of. be proud of your dick wonyoung, people would die to have a cock this size” lifting yourself outta the chair to kneel in front of her “nowww, i did say i was gonna help- i promise i won’t be weirded out”

even though her dick was out, and you were so ready to suck it off. clearly nervous, you placed a reassuring hand on her thigh “it’s not like i’ve never seen a dick before- you’ll be fine with me, promise”

“it really isn’t about my dick. it’s more about the um… the… okay i don't have balls”

“huh?” you sat there perplexed- she has what? what do you mean she has no balls “n…none at all? well it’s not like i care anyway, dick is dick”

“okay so um- instead it’s just… actually just look for yourself” no words could explain how embarrassed wonyoung felt, her cheeks heated up- actually no, her whole entire face lit on fire. slowly spreading her legs apart, she revealed her sopping wet cunt.

yeah whatever, you weren’t opposed to the idea of nerd girl jang wonyoung having a massive fucking cock and a pretty tight pussy at the same time- more so, it turned you on severely knowing the nasty things you could do to her “you don’t need to worry about it baby, i’ll make you feel so good that you’ll forget about being embarrassed” you say after licking a strip up from the base of her cock to the very tip

“ah.. mhm… your tongue- warm” hands extending to grab your head gently, her long fingers tangling themselves in your messily tied hair.

“first time?” looking up from in between her legs. surprisingly, she shook her head with the bite of her lip “not a virgin? okay so i can do this” swooping one strand of hair to the back of your ears, you make haste, your mouth opening wide as you let her cock slide into your mouth, and a little into your throat.

“hngh s..so deep, sorry i lied ah- i am a virgin” it makes you giddy on how she always gave such honest answers, not a single drop in this woman's body could lie. even through pleasure she was true, her hips jolting upwards and never shying whenever you did something she enjoyed. you played with her tip, attentively listening to her whines gradually increasing in volume. for funsies, you then ease one finger into her needy pussy, her head thrown back- rolling her hips shamelessly.

releasing her cock from your mouth and resting your face next to it “feeling good?” you ask, just to make sure she’s actually good. she doesn’t answer, well she does, but in a series of whimpers and squeals. her response confirmed it for you, she felt more than good.

your pulse quickened, her once tense body relaxed under your control. to be an extra tease, you flashed her a cheeky smile before you take her cock back in your mouth. she gasps again, you watching her face contort; brows furrowing, biting her lip, her eyes occasionally rolling back as you curl your fingers inside- stretching her pussy by adding a second finger just so you can see her mouth fall open.

wonyoung felt like she was crumbling over the edge with your fingers pumping in and out of her hole without any breaks, and your tongue working magic around her throbbing cock. soon enough her legs were wide open for you and in return you giggled a little. an unknown feeling building at the pit of her stomach freaked her out yet it was oddly welcomed. you knew by the way her thighs trembled that she was close to finishing.

she couldn’t help but call out your name. she really tried her best to take her cock out of mouth while she came, but you refused to move even an inch, letting her load paint your throat white as you gulp down every last drop of it. you still kept fingering her until she couldn’t take it anymore, wriggling herself out of your hold and flopping onto the bed “that… felt… too good. i-i think i need to.. catch my breath” she says while blankly staring at the ceiling.

even in a situation like this you found her endearing, unlike the many hookups you’ve had where you’d leave after a good fuck. she was different from rest; a hidden gem “sorry i got carried away, you’re too cute wonyoung” like that her dick sprung back up “really, just by me calling you cute your cock is back up?”

“it has a mind of its own, leave it be” you giggle at her silly antics. with zero hesitation, you pull off your flimsy shirt exposing your bare skin to the air. it’s a little cold

still on the bed lying down, her eyes closed, you straddle over her hips “can we do it again, i didn’t get off. or maybe no… you know i don’t mind, i just wanted to see you flustered, and of course feel good”

she sprang up- which, to be honest, caught you off guard. huffing into the crook of your neck, peppering ticklish kisses alongside. there was a minor look of desperation on her face that you weren’t familiar with when it came to her. you’d usually see her around campus all calm and collected, looking so poised and shit and yet here she was, crumbling over a simple comment you made about her and her dick.

she switched between light pecks to open mouthed kisses, definitely leaving obvious bruises all over “you’re.. so.. pretty… wanna-”

“yeah? you want that dont you baby. wanna fuck my pussy don’t you” poor girl was flustered at your words. her lips grazed your neck again and whimpered as she kissed your jaw.

“yes please” your stomach twisted. so so cute begging to fuck your pussy. you complied, quickly discarding your underwear and tossing it somewhere. a hand took her shoulder, stabling yourself as you gradually let yourself sink onto her cock.

“hnggh… fuck. wonyoung you’re so? haaa- you’re really big” you felt a little lightheaded after fitting the entire length of her inside. you weren’t expecting her to reach that deep into you, maybe to the point of you losing yourself all over her dick. it was insane to you how much you could take. really really insane how she was able to stretch your pussy out so much to the point of your eyes rolling back.

fuck, why was she that big? you started tearing up and she wasn’t even moving “won… wonyoung, please i need you to start doing something” i think you might’ve driven her past processing because tell me why she wasn’t listening at all. she could be pussy drunk for all you care, actually no she was one hundred percent drunk off of your pussy. you were wet beyond comprehension, and the feeling of your walls clenching down on her cock made her moan so loud. thank god her flatmates weren’t because if they were, they’d hear the most filthiest things through the thin ass walls.

you gave her some time to adjust herself accordingly, waiting… for… quite a long time. it really looked like she was basking in the heat of your cunt and you honestly you thought that was quite endearing, but fuck, you needed her to ram into you or at least move around. she still hasn't done that still… good lord she was gone. so taking the situation into your own hands, you lifted yourself off of her hips just a tiny bit and harshly slammed down, both of you moaning at the overwhelming feeling “ah- fuck? wait wait..” you couldn’t wait any longer, you needed to be fucked crazy.

“mhm, just- just stay still like that. let me do what i need to do” you bounced once more, watching as wonyoung threw her head backwards, her mouth agape and everything.

even though you were mid fuck, wonyoungs glasses were still on. she needed to take them off for some reason, but you didn’t let her “hey don’t- keep those glasses on, you look so… mgh.. you look so fucking good” saying all of that while you increasingly sped up. now your thighs began to ache, worth it though. with each time her cock pumped inside, the closer you felt towards coming.

shit, you felt it so much, it was much stronger than usual and you felt like you were about to explode.

“come- fuck. wonyoung baby, are you close too?”

she nodded weakly. she was about to come again after the last- and so quickly too. her head was spinning, her thighs clenched, snapping back up to wrap her arms around your torso to keep you still; and to keep you close “close.. gonna…”

“me too… me too. keep- oh my god” your movements became frantic. then, not so shortly after, wonyoung lets out a long lasting moan. a mind breaking orgasm hits her so hard, her mind blanking out yet again while her thick semen fills you up. you followed straight after, your hand gripping her shoulder tightly until your knuckles turned white. a harsh groan reverberating inside of wonyoungs head as you moan straight into her ear.

awkward and weird as it may sound, but you immediately thought about hmmm… strap. you really wanted to try it. the thought of her with her ass high up in the air, with you dicking her down and jacking her off seemed something almost so pornographic and unrealistic that it excited you beyond comprehension.

why not give her the chance to cum all over you, and then get severely embarrassed about it. something about her just made you want to tease her until she’s crying. well that did sound like an appealing thing to do.

wonyoung laid down again. out of breath “made me… come again… i’m so…”

“cute… haa.. you’re really cute” you were equally as spent as she was but you HAD to try pounding her pussy. sure, your legs weren’t able to support you standing back up, after all you did use them to fuck yourself on her, but you were UP “can i go back to my room real quick? i’ll be back, it’s a pleasant surprise, i promise”

“uh, sure?” she was confused as to why you grabbed your pants and her shirt that she took off to then sprint outside of her room. quite strange don't you think? well whatever.

you hurried to your door, searching for your keys in your back pocket “come on- come onnnn” your thighs were so sore but you had to get that damn pink strap out of your closet. it was a need to fuck her perfect pussy.

there it was in its glory, a small rectangular box that concealed your strap. alright, time to speed back up the stairs.

i guess she wasn’t even bothered to check who it was, but she immediately opened the door as soon as she heard you knock once “hey i’m back, i got you a present” you heaved as you legitimately ran up a flight of stairs not too long ago.

“a present for me?” i mean she was bewildered, you had a box in your arms. no decoration, just a plain ass box.

“yeah- fuck, let me catch my breath… okay yes i know it doesn’t look like all that, but look-“ you opened the box to reveal your unused strap on “can i use it on you?”

you cannot stress this enough, but wonyoung’s face was violently red again. given the fact that you had made her cum twice and she was still this flustered about it had you drooling at the thought of making her a mess all over again.

“y/n do you think that can fit… in me?”

“we can try. i know your pretty pussy can take me whole” and with that she was soaked again. she felt that and got hard once more.

“g-get inside, you’re in the doorway”

“oh shit yeah okay”

wonyoung fell on top of her bed, cushions and blankets were still messed up. you closed the door behind you and opened up the box, a whole eight inches just for wonyoungs pussy “it’s so cute how you’re still soaked, were you thinking about me while i was gone?”

“it was five minutes… yeah, i was thinking about you” hiding her face behind her hands.

“aww cute, lean on your hands and knees for me babe”

“o-okay” she responded obediently to your words. wonyoung got onto her hands and knees and waited patiently for your next order. her back looked way too pretty, so you got up onto the bed, planted a kiss on her lower back making her twitch in response and cooed

“aww still so sensitive?” she didn’t realise it before, but you were behind her with your strap already fitted on you. she unintentionally arched her back, feeling your presence already there “god, you’re so desperate for me aren’t you?”

“please… just- i’m ready. just hurry up and take me” you giggle as you acknowledged her insatiable craving for your cock.

“you’re dripping.. and you’re so hard, tell me how much you want it” telling her just to be a tease “beg for it”

“…please…” her voice low, almost a whisper.

“good girl” you slowly buried yourself inside her cunt, letting her familiarise herself with the new sensation. her hands gripped the sheets tightly, a fist full of cloth was keeping her from losing her control.

“oh my go- so… fuck” she cried out your name a couple of times before spilling out incoherent sentences. something like “good, so good” and a few more unintelligible words followed with high pitched moans.

a girl this cute and needy deserved more than just this. you slowly paced your thrusting, making sure that she felt comfortable, and by also not shoving the entire strap inside of her. all though you wanted to go rough and abuse her tight hole, that was for another day or maybe even in a couple of seconds actually.

“you good?”

“nnghh- s… so good” she couldn’t even form sentences. there was no need to even ask. her body alone showed how much she yearned for your touch.

oh so now you needed to fuck her till she’s dumb. what happened to that little smart brain of hers? so spent out on being fucked till she’s dry made her behave like she’s out of her mind. you started thrusting your strap in even deeper, hoping that she can take the full thing. she did. with how wet she was, it wasn’t surprising that it slid in so easily. a choked moan coming straight from her mouth as soon as you finished pushing it all in “you’re taking me in so well. i knew you could do it babe”

it was like you didn't think but you started to pump in and out of her faster and harder. each guttural moan that came out of that pretty mouth of hers, the faster you went. the more ruthless you got. oh how hard you were going, giving wonyoung no time to settle. the sounds her pussy made were nothing but filthy, the sweet sounds of her squelching pussy was like music to your ears. she loved every single thing you did to her body, although she couldn’t express it through her words.

you grabbed her hips, moving them and slamming them straight back into your cock just to make her scream out your name “you like that? want me to pound into your pretty pussy like that again?” there was a slightly mean tone to your voice.

“mhmmm… again- do it again” she begged and cried for more.

this time you pulled straight out, leaving her whining until you slammed right back into her again, but this time with a twist. you leaned over wonyoung a little, resting almost on top of her back. you slithered your hand across and grabbed her cock, teasing the tip a little before snapping your hips that made her ass push into you. she sharply inhaled as you played with her cock, moving from her sensitive tip to stroking her length gently while you ravaged her insides

“too- too much.. feels so.. haaa… mmmmm” two sensations blending into one could be described as too overwhelming and extremely overstimulating. being fucked dumb made her sob a little, feeling as if her insides were about to collapse, and feeling as if her dick was about to erupt.

shit, it felt way too good.

her entire body convulsed, her hands were balled into a fist, clutching onto the sheets desperately, she screamed profanities into her pillow. her orgasm hit her harder than it did the other two times. you could say it even made her almost pass out. poor girl was seeing stars as you kept stroking her cock to help her ride out her climax. you never knew she could scream that loud… or even cum this much. beds being completely drenched with both her juices and her cum. you’d have to help her clean up for sure…

“stop- stop.. oh god… mmm oh my god”

and maybe you could do this again. another study date.

[shin-meddlesome-hero]

Some of my notes from watching Zeta Gundam very, very slowly (up until ep. 34)

(Needless to say that it contains spoilers and that I get very annoying about the female characters because that's my thing)

-I'm 6 episodes into Zeta Gundam and I still don't know what to make of Kamille. On the other hand, it took me a look at some screenshots of SD Gundam Kamille to know that I'd die for him.

-I was very surprised to see Kamille openly declaring that he's autistic. Why don't we have more of that?

-20 episodes in, now (watching v. slowly). So... Z isn't exactly that great about women... right? 0079 left me gladly surprised on that front, but my expectations were super low. Maybe I should turn off that part of my brain while watching this.

- I hate to say this about a female character but so far Beltorchika is so annoying. Wake up, sis! You can't fix the dude, you barely know him! He's not opening up to you, and please leave the 15 year old out of your problems with Amuro!

-"I learned karate and how to make Mobile Suits to become a man!". Kamille isn't beating the transmasc allegations /J

-It makes sense that Kamille resents her mother for apparently caring more about her job than her family, but this does speak more of that general anxiety about women in the workplace than of anything else. Might be a common cliché at the time, still don't like it.

-She's allowed to be a terrible mom, but maybe for other more nuanced reasons? Also the fact that Kamille mentions that Fa made things that his mother should've done for him... it's gonna be really awkward if Kamille/Fa is the endgame ship.

-So, if both Kamille's parents were responsible for the development of the MK-II, then when he fights in it, one can say that his parents are still protecting him. On the other hand, we could also consider the MK-II as Kamille's little br- *gets shot*

-Ep 21: The titular Zeta Gundam appears. -Male Feminist guy is creepy. -Bright has the vibes of an exhausted High School teacher. - Fa rescues Kamille in space. This two are soo endgame

-Bright: Emma, you should do something about Kamille and Fa. Emma: Nah. I'm not Kamille's mom, besides, teens like to make drama as a form of recreation.

Emma is so cool. (Also, she and Reccoa should kiss)

-If there's a fanfic out there about Bright Noah being a clueless high school teacher/principal, please let me know. That's like the perfect AU for him.

-Girls can also fuck up in the battlefield and get slapped as a form of military disciplinary tactic! Hashtag equality. (But seriously though, I wasn't expecting Fa to become a pilot. Interesting).

-In the comment section of the dubious site where I'm watching this show, people are saying that Zeta is ahead of its time. And yeah, in many aspects it is. On the other hand it took Gundam 40+ years to have a girl protag. Suletta Mercury should've been invented like 30 or 20 years ago.

-Meanwhile, Scirocco is high-key trying to get Jerid killed and failing. They're both huge losers.

-Also, Kamille is slowly and steadily growing on me.

-Kamille becomes more mature and thoughtful. - The story brings Katz to be the new impulsive boy who fucks everything up. -Katz matures after a couple of episodes. -Now there's a pair of annoying kids whose only purpose is to awake Fa's maternal instinct (???) It never ends!

-On the other hand, I did enjoy those five seconds where Quattro was babysitting those kids. Would've preferred more of that.

-I love that in-universe everyone refers to teenage drama as "recreation". Even Kamille at some point admits that he and Fa are engaging in such recreation. At least their relationship is evolving in a healthier way than Amuro and Fraw's in 0079.

-Between Reccoa possibly having feelings for Scirocco and Mauar protecting Jerid, it's evident that in this universe everyone suffers from having Bad Taste in Men. Y'all could do better, queens!

-Also everyone punches and slaps each other so much. And it's not a love language. It's just another language that everyone just use. (There's even a punch compilation in tumblr, it's hilarious).

-I really hope to eventually get an explanation of what's up with those kids that Char brought from Earth, because so far their only purpose is to fuel Fa's maternal instincts.

-Episode 33! We're finally meeting those funny guys from Axis. This is also full of high quality Char moments.

-*Char has flashbacks of him playing with toddler!Mineva and also gets angry when he realizes how much they have manipulated her* Aww, daddy Char.

* Char unnecesarily beats the crap out of Kamille, five minutes later* Hey! What the hell, Char?!

-Char: "I have never betrayed anyone in my entire life! Ever!

lol, a classic.

-Help! Char is starting to have a similar effect on me as the one that other horrible and pathetic fictional white men have on tumblrinas.

-Seriously though, if UC Gundam were more popular in the western hemisphere, Char Aznable would totally be a Tumblr Sexyman. *shudders*

-Me: I see, so Reccoa actually has a death wish, she recklessly jumps into the battlefield on a desperate attempt to find her own demise, but she doesn't know it.

Z Gundam: Actually Scirocco is brainwashing her with space magic and she's sexually frustrated with Char.

Wha-?

-Reccoa has so many death flags that I'm always surprised whenever she survives. Her fake "death" and its consequences were really well done. I particularly liked Kamille's reaction.

-Maybe the most effective death flag in Zeta is being close to Jerid. That's more letal than the birthday song or being near Amuro's range.

And that's all for now. Join me next time as I try to watch Z less slowly so I might be able to watch "Char's Counterattack" before Christmas 2023.

[minkkumaz]

GOOD LITTLE GIRL

sometimes it felt like you were in a completely different world than yungyu. others called him bad, but you could hardly believe that. everything inside of you wanted to figure him out.

DISTANT LANDS AND OTHER ADVENTURES series

PAIRING lee yungyu x fem!reader WC 2.3k TAGS classmates to lovers. school au. bad boy yungyu. minor cussing. OMI NOTE this might be one of my favorite things i've written.. ever? i'm so soft for gyu, and his bad boy persona honestly takes the cake i don't know. this plot kind of reminds me of 'she fell first, but he fell harder.' also i might've snuck a ddlc reference in here w my multifandom ass..

immortality is a concept that defines eternal life, incapability of dying. and while in your world it didn’t exist, word about him never died. there were always rumors, people telling you that getting involved with him would ruin the perfect idea of yourself. despite this, it only intrigued you more.

school was alway the main source of gossip and other immature problems, half of it being completely untrue. word spread like wild fire, even when it didn’t make sense. so why was everyone so sure that lee yungyu was this bad influence? there were times when it was best to stay behind and not involve yourself in the uproar.

though you couldn’t help but stare, unable to figure him out. the corner of his mouth crinkling whenever he smiled, how he’d always do a peace sign when posing for photos. for the most part, maybe it was less about figuring him out, and more about just admiring the boy.

a stupid class crush wasn’t something you’d admit to, he never talked to you; and your closest friends convinced you that you must’ve been a lucky one. 

but out of the corner of his eye, he always saw you staring. it wasn’t a secret to him that there was this odd curiosity peaking out of your skull. if anything, it was the final push to get him to talk to you.

it was an early morning, the trees outside were beginning to bloom this april. you always thought it was the prettiest time of the year, pink and white flowers littering the long branches. a lot of the time, arriving to classes early gave you a sense of responsibility.

the air was calm, and you could focus better on any assignments you might’ve missed the night before. there were a few stragglers here and there, making the classroom less empty on these occasions. yet you appreciated when it was just yourself.

today was no excuse. all of your things were sprawled out on your desk while you busied yourself in your notebooks. responding to questions that were left unanswered on your worksheets, planning out the rest of your day, and listening to the soft knocks on the door in front of you.

wait, knocks on the door in front of you?

the knob turned slowly as lee yungyu poked his head inside to search around. not a single teacher was in sight, though there was a cute girl sitting at one of the desks, staring at him wide eyed. his expression softened upon seeing you with all your stationary spread out.

he let himself in, letting the door quietly shut behind him. at first, you were confused why someone like him was in school at this hour. wasn’t being super late with some comedic timing apart of his whole brand? it was new, but you tried to act like you weren’t shocked.

resuming what you were originally doing, it was in your best attempt to ignore the boys presence. clicking the end of your pen, you continue to scribble nonsense on your paper. though it became almost impossible as you heard the sound of a chair dragging across the floor.

looking up from the desk, his dark eyes met yours. but in retrospect, he was nothing near intimidating up close. he sat himself down and smiled at you before he spoke.

“hi, you must be y/n, right?” your name flowed off his tongue perfectly, sending a small shiver down your spine.

“ah.. yes. you’re lee yungyu.” you respond shyly.

“oh? so you know me as well then.” yungyu smirked, crossing his arms atop the table.

“well, you’re nothing short of infamous in school.” you mention, making him quirk an eyebrow.

“word gets around too quickly here. the school year barely started.” he sighed, leaning back in his chair.

“there isn’t much else to expect from our classmates. i could only imagine what you’ve heard about me.” 

“i’ve heard nothing but good things.” he told you, “you’re too innocent to get yourself into any trouble.”

“what’s that supposed to mean?” you question.

“nothing! i was just saying.”

“right..”

“you know, we’re not strangers anymore. so how about friends?” he proposes out of the blue.

“huh? why so suddenly?” you tilt your head like a lost puppy, only earning a light laugh from him.

“i’ve seen you staring at me. it only made me more curious about you.” he admits, making your heart drop to your feet, “it’s cute.”

“cute..?” 

“i said what i said. so, friends?” 

“okay, friends.” you agree hesitantly, tapping your fingers on the desk.

“great. how about you come with me to yoonsung hyung’s party in the woods tonight and hang out? heard it was gonna be pretty cool.” he asks.

“yoonsung? as in student council yoonsung?”

“that’s him.”

“i didn’t think he threw parties like that.” you mumble, thinking about the responsible boy.

“are we talking about the same yoonsung? he loves planning things, and i’d like to say we’re pretty close.” he tells you, picking up one of your pencils.

“that’s interesting then.” you comment, “i didn’t know the two of you were friends.” 

“you must not have been stalking me hard enough then.” he jokes, drawing little stars on your notebook.

“hey!”

“i’m just teasing you. you don’t have to be so tense around me. though i am shocked you agreed to hang out with me.”

“i didn’t exactly agree to anything yet, yungyu.” you claim, erasing his stars.

“i know you’re going to say yes to me.” he looks at you intently, almost as if he’s trying to brainwash you into agreeing.

“maybe if i could get this work done by the end of the day.” you grumbled.

“boring. what are you working on anyways?” he picks up your paper to read the print, it was a rough draft of something you were writing.

“the writing homework we were assigned yesterday. i was just trying to finish it up but i haven’t liked what i’ve made so far.” you groan, snatching the paper out of his hands

“if you try so hard to make things perfect, you won’t make much progress. just write things down and fix it up later.”

“that.. that is actually pretty inspiring. aren’t you supposed to be some bad guy?”

“what did you want me to do? rip up your paper and tell you how shit of a job you were doing?” 

“okay, i didn’t mean it like that–”

“y/n!” a voice called out to you, sounding very obviously distressed.

two girls appeared in the classroom, sliding the door open with ease upon seeing you with yungyu. they look almost scared for you, and after the short conversation you’ve had with your new friend, you see no reason as to why. 

you glance back from your friends to him, and all he does is grin at you. ‘that’s my cue’ he mouths silently, barely peaking a whisper.

he sits up from his seat while the girls rush towards you. in the middle of this, he takes his hand and swipes your pencil pouch on the floor, watching as all the pastel highlighters and pen scatter on the floor.

“see you tonight, y/n.” he slings one of his backpack straps over his shoulder, leaving you with your friends.

“what were you doing hanging out with him?” one frowns, kneeling down to help pick up your things.

“if he was bothering you i can tell a teacher! he’s bad news..” another one whines, squeezing your cheeks to make sure you’re okay.

“i’m fine guys, don’t worry.” you mutter, sliding out of your chair to gather the remains of your materials on the floor.

“i hope you didn’t let him convince you to go to that party.”

“our y/nnie is too kind to turn someone down, but it’s for your own good..”

was all of this for your own good? their words were like knives, only deepening the cut of curiosity. everyone called him bad, but you could hardly believe that. the past thirty minutes were living proof that there was so much more to him.

regardless of their words, you felt determined to go with him to that party. there was a high chance it would help you figure out who he really was behind this twisted persona people made of him.

the forest was dark and empty, only a small beacon of light in the distance that you walked towards. there was no saying why you let a boy you had only met mere hours ago lead you through the towering trees. 

leaves crunched below your hesitant feet, the only evidence that a living body has been through these depths. the grip yungyu had on your hand was almost enough to be scared of him, but it was mostly reassuring. he just didn’t want to lose sight of you.

as the party grew near, sparkling string lights weaved their way through the branches. they glistened in your eyes like stars. the chatter of people grew more audible, and before you knew it, the scene overwhelmed you.

food, drinks, a boom box, and a multitude of your classmates all gathered to have a fun time. your first party didn’t seem as scary as your friends drawn it out to be, and his presence didn’t make it any less intimidating.

“this looks fun, come on.” he pointed out, taking you farther into the crowd. 

“there’s so many people here.” you add, making your way through the large group of party - goers.

“wouldn’t expect much less from yoonsung. he knows everybody.”

you replied with a nod, still holding onto his cold hand. there was a small spot amongst everyone in the middle, where you both stayed put. 

people were dancing along to the music, similar to the way the flowers swayed against the wind in the spring time. suddenly, he unlaced his fingers from yours and placed them on his shoulders, snaking his own around your waist.

“do you dance?” he says quiet enough only for you to hear.

“ahm.. not really, i’ve never been good at it.”

“then follow my lead.”

“oh– okay!” you stammered, making him giggle at your obedience.

“eager, aren’t we?” he mentioned casually, “you know that i’m bad, yet you’re spending the night with me.”

“you’re the one that invited me out, stupid.” you pout, looking away from him.

“but you still couldn’t keep your eyes off of me, could you?” his hold around you tightened, pulling you closer to him. a blush crawled its way across your face.

“it wasn’t even like that!”

“what do you want from my world anyways? you’re just a good little girl.”

“and you’re supposed to be a bad little boy? that’s what you act like, but i don’t buy a second of it.” you argue playfully, “and even if you were like that, why do you want to hang out with me?”

“jeez, picking a fight with me already? i’m bad, but definitely not little.” he bites his tongue.

“not a fight, just trying to figure you out.” you admit, letting your tone turn slightly serious.

“what’s there to know when everything you’ve heard about me is probably true anyways?” he scoffs.

“that you make girls run away sobbing? that you graffitied the principals car over break? that you used to be some kind of bully?” you reply, “or maybe do you have feelings like everyone else and just don’t know how to handle them?”

“god, that got deep.” he laughed nervously, “you might be the realest person i’ve ever met.”

“you’re not so bad, you know.”

“not so bad? you barely even scraped the surface, it’s not something i have to try at. you on the other hand..”

“i’m not trying to be bad, yungyu. i’m hanging out with you because you’re my friend now, right?”

“from stalkers to friends to lovers, sounds like some weird fanfiction.” he teases.

“when are you gonna let that go?!” you grumble, letting your head fall forward into his chest.

“i’ll let it go whenever we get to that last part.”

“pfft.. what…?” you try to play it off.

removing your head from the spot on his chest, he’s already peering down at you; glancing from the plump of your lips back to your eyes. he moves a hand to place on your crown, gently forcing your head to tilt upwards to look at him.

and from all the things you’ve heard about yungyu, the one true thing was that eye contact with him could kill. it made you squirm in your spot against him, feeling a weird tension in your soul.

“you have a thing for me, it’s kind of obvious.”

“oh my god don’t say that out loud! it’s already weird that i’m here with you” you squeal, covering his mouth with your palm.

“so you’re not denying it?” his words are muffled.

“why do you always say such confusing things?! i don’t know if i like you yungyu, we’ve barely been talking for a full day.” you take your hand away with furrowed eyebrows.

“you know, you influenced me to pay closer attention to you. i guess you could say it gave me the crushes, i just wanted to see if you’d admit you had them too.” he confessed.

“you’re crazy, gyu.”

“am i really, though?” he muttered, tilting your chin to angle himself inches away from you. 

it made you freeze up, a weird whirlwind of emotions floating throughout your stomach to make you sick. there weren’t enough synonyms for flustered that you could think of, but you didn’t pull away.

why didn’t you pull away?

the answer was that you couldn’t, after scrutinizing him for months, he was finally in front of you where you wanted him. and that made you realize how simple everything was, laid out perfectly after playing your cards right. 

he was a person, and people are weird. they’re compelled to do crazy shit, and yungyu wasn’t an exception, you understood this.

when you didn’t flinch, nor wiggle in an endeavor to escape, he closed the small gap between you two. it was only a few seconds, not a single person nearby paying any attention. but the spark you felt was so real.

“wanna admit it now?” he smiles, pulling away from the heat of your lips.

“in your dreams, lee yungyu.”

© 2023 minkkumaz, all rights reserved support your writers by reblogging + giving feedback! it is greatly encouraged and appreciated. thank you! → why feedback + reblogging is so important. ~ (´｡• ᵕ •｡`) ♡ if you'd like, donate to minkkumaz !

DISTANT LANDS AND OTHER ADVENTURES series

[bluxb3rry]

❝𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐛𝐚𝐝 𝐰𝐨𝐥𝐟!❞↳෴੭˚ ༘♡·˚₊˚ˑ༄ؘ 💙

Hwang hyunjin x male reader!

he/him pronouns!

english is not my frist language!

── ⋅⋅⋅ ────꒰ ୨ ♡ ୧ ꒱───────

Hwang Hyunjin was someone you could call "perfect" guy, he has the looks, the notes, the charisma, etc, etc. Any girl and boy loves him and drolls for him, everyday having a confess message in his locker, or if the person was confident enough, confess him in person.

In one way or other, it always ends the same "sorry, but no, bye!"

I mean is kinda obvious since everyone that has a crush for him, is mainly because of his looks and Hyunjin is the romantic type, he want to be with someone that know him more than himself, and the only time that it happened, it ended quite......um.

-Yoh! Hyunjin! when we are gonna meet that boyfriend of your's?

It ended quite well, fucking good to be honest, two years, since he had said to his friends "oh, i have a boyfriend btw".

Oh yes, the mystery boy, the man that made Hwang fucking Hyunjin fall in love, some friend that he knew since he remeber.

-oh um, im not sure, i promise you guys are gonna meet him! i promise-

Main reason of why his boyfriend didn't want to be know, is only because he want to keep the relation ship a secret and Hyujin understood that, who really cares when you get 1000 kisses after school?

-uuugh, is been two years already and i haven't meet the guy, is he some mafia guy? that's why you don't talk about him?-Han joked while drinking his coke

-is not that! he just want to keep it private and i respect that-

-is he even real?-

-Hey!-

-c'mon Hyung, if he is from our school we would have noticed that you looked at someone more than normal, yet it didn't happend-Jeongin said beside him, stealing Han coke and drinking it, hearing a "hey" from the guy

-you guys are a pain, i can tell that's real-

The silence in the hall was more noticed when the students started to mutter, the three friend just looked to were the mutter where reffered to, and two of them look suprised to see "the bad guy" walking in the hall, his uniform looking informal, the tie wasn't even tied well, and the loose shirt make look some of the tattoos underneath the clothes, he looked normal and had just some piercings, two in his lips [snake bite] and one in his eyebrow.

-Damn he back-Han said-the bad wolf

-okay, why bad wolf?-said Hyunjin looking at his friend for the dumb reference

-Why? Why not? he litteraly fought with a lot of people, making them have nose blood, some of them needed stitches and a lot of them never came back, he also just ignores all the classes and people but still has good grades-jeongin said finishing the coke

-and he is hot as fuck-a new voice appeard

-Minsug-hyung, ew-said Hyunjin kinda disgusted

-what? oh c'mon, we cannot deny that maybe he IS one of the hottest guys in this god damn school-

-he got suppended for hitting a teacher!-Han replied trying to make sense into the guy

-yeah the teacher kinda deserve it-Hyunjin said

-what?-Han asked surprised

-yeaaah he kinda did, that teacher was a son of a bich, you're just too young-minho replied

-he is still scary to-Jeongin murmurs and Hyujin just looked at him

Yeah scary, he heard all of that, the scary guy with a mistery life, the cold heart, the ice prince, Hyunjin knew about y/n, to be honest he was called a lot of times to the principale office just to take care of him.

With that being said, the y/n walked towards him a smirk in his face.

-the old man said that i have to share all my classes with you now-he said ignoring all the looks from the other guys

-mh really? well, lets get going-Hyunjin said with a small smile and started walking, the "bad wolf" following behind him.

-oh shit-Han mutters looking at his perfect friend leaving with the bad guy

-oh shit indeed, have you looked to that ass?-

-MINHO-HYUNG!-

── ⋅⋅⋅ ────꒰ ୨ ♡ ୧ ꒱───────

-you know i can't save you anymore from classes, right?-

-as if you want to hear the son of a bitch talking again and again of dumb shit-

Hyunjin laughed a little while hugging his boyfriend, then just looked at him making eye contact.

-stop cursing! at this point is just a problem with you-

-c'mooon you heard me cursing since i remeber-y/n said with a smile in his face

-yep, as bad as i remeber-he kissed him with a small smile

Yeaah in case you havent notice, you, you are his boyfriend, y/n, the bad guy, the mistery guy, blah blah, in a relationship of two years with mister Hwang

-we should tell them-y/n said after the kiss

-them? oh you mean the guys?-Hyunjin asked surprised

-yeah, at this point is a pain being unable to kiss you anytime i want-he looked at him again-only if you want to

-i would love to, honey-

They just hugged for a couple of seconds in silence

-Han called you bad wolf by the way-

-ha, thats a fun one-

── ⋅⋅⋅ ────꒰ ୨ ♡ ୧ ꒱───────

[deadmountaindaughter]

Ok! The promised theory post! Shorter than I thought it would be because the document I thought would have had all my notes did not have those notes, so i'm reconstructing this based off messages to a friend who also read pnat, along with a reddit post i made ages ago. Without further ado, twenty theories:

1. the large subterranean insect spirit is Sandman's real form. First off, here's the insect's leg:

And here's Sandman's "head":

these are CLEARLY the same shape. I think the "sandman" we saw was just a chunk of the real thing. Bonus proof:

yeah.

2.One interesting thing I noticed is that throughout the entire time we see Peekaboo, it never shows any spectral energy. We could assume it's orange, like dimitri, but it's weird that out of all the partner spirits we see, every single other one of them has their energy show up at least once. Except...

we never see the Shadow's energy either. additionally, take a look at those drippy bits coming out of the hole on the right side, and compare:

So here's my theory, illustrated incredibly poorly:

given the reveal of davy's locker spirit, which makes the SAME NOISES when he uses it as peekaboo does(the wrrrwrrrwrrr thing), and that cody describes as "squashing and stretching" space- exactly how dimitri explains peekaboo's powers- i think that spirit is another chunk in here. maybe the missing eye on the left?

3. on page 8-49, cody mentions a time he was "caught sleepwalking after a curfew [davy] commanded" and saw these scars, which he thinks are from shrike:

we've seen shrike's hands in werewolf mode. those hands did NOT make those scars. if davy had been hit by those claws, he would have half his chest missing, not just a few big cuts. but what interests me is HOW Cody found out- he was sleepwalking after curfew on a night that just happened to be a full moon. but every other time we see him talking about davy's commands, it's like they're physically impossible for him to break under any circumstances, and i highly doubt sleepwalking would be able to break that effect.

but werewolves and vampires are apparently mortal enemies and opposites, so maybe a werewolf curse could nullify a vampire command. and cody's hands are pretty small in human form...

4. i think eightfold is in a very important book. take a look:

this is what the book looks like in its spirit realm. davy's symbol is pretty clear there, along with the author (a. beaumont or something) and the title: on the birth of gods. if you ask me, that sounds like the name of a manual for making a wight.

5.

i think lisa is a Witch. in fact, I think Witch is not necessarily a name, or a title, but a descriptor of WHAT someone is. we have fauxbia the fear witch, but what if lisa is the...i don't know, the weirdness witch? someone smarter than me can figure that part out. as for what Witch means:

I think in the same way medium means the host to a spirit, Witch means host to one of these parasites. as for lisa, suzy has confirmed this:

it would be SO zack morrison if that line was literal.

6. ok im not going looking for it but sockpuppy's intro card describes them as not a spirit but an "anomalous spectral lifeform". apparently they were created by mina, who also defeated the witch years ago-did she make them out of a scrap of the witch that was left behind? they do share the same aesthetic.

7. razor rex is weirdly childish in a lot of ways, and apparently sometimes asks for video games as tribute. a lot of her cultists are also teachers, so i'm wondering if her hideout when she's not being a goddess is mayview middle. that's not much on its own, but look at this prophecy:

going off theory 5, this could also refer to Lisa as the Witch in the prophecy. But we see from the second line that occasionally the sphinx of truth switches l's to w's, and i guarantee that zack morrison would not have done that without it being plot relevant somehow. we see from "wiffin" that sometimes other parts of the spelling of a word are also changed... so what if it wasn't meant to say witch(fauxbia or lisa) but instead Lich(razor rex)?

8. doorman mentions that "fearsay" was defeated by the activity club. fearsay. fear + hearsay(something not true). fauxbia. phobia(fear) plus faux(something not real). i dont know what this means but i think it's important.

9. so pj is totally davy's son. he died and thats why davy wants to be such a good dad to cody, and why he's so protective. what if pj died BECAUSE OF davy? he says it had to be a meteorite, but he doesnt know for certain- could it have been the blast from killing a wight? and adding on to that, according to zack ghosts can only do one thing with their spectral energy, and it relates to how they died. it would be incredibly zack if pj's power is some absurdly powerful blast that puts him at the top of the power scale. just. imagine that.

10. when angel is talking to cherub, there are several instances where it seems like she's manipulating his emotions to make him trust her. the way it's described seems oddly similar to another emotion-manipulating spirit in the comic. and we haven't seen ventrilobite since the flashback...

11. this one is the hill i will die on even if it gets confirmed false: we know ghosts can kind of stretch themselves into weird shapes(see the faculty ghost from way back in the beginning) so it stands to reason that given enough time dead, their appearance can change radically(has anyone here read everlost? yeah like that).

we also know that ghosts do not have legs, ever. just spectral energy. we see from crush that they CAN make legs out of that energy if they want, but it's still just energy. spirits, on the other hand, ALWAYS have legs. except for one.

he's described as a spirit, but that may not technically be false- after all, ghosts are a subtype of spirit.

conclusion: king c is an aztec/mayan era furry who decided to become really cool in the afterlife, and honestly he was so right. he probably got struck by lightning- the lightning he makes is the same color as his energy, so what we think is a spirit power may just be the spectral energy ability his death gave him.

12. just... this entire page: https://www.paranatural.net/comic/chapter-5-page-228

is so suspicious to me. she doesnt turn around until the end, and when she does- INHUMANLY fast- her eyes are a blur with a single white line- almost like she's trying to hide the glow of spirit trance by closing them almost all the way. i think everything isabel said there was right, just not in the way she thought it was.

(also- on this page, isabel asks to talk and the principal says "I'm afraid not, child. important meeting to attend. Come by during office hours and-" the VERY NEXT PAGE, lucifer demands to talk with hiSpender, who says "S-sorry, let's talk later. I'm busy right now and-" the parallel here is INCREDIBLY interesting.)

(also why is she so small? it could just be a comic thing...or it could be a medium thing.)

13. The Shadow's power seems to be based on perspective: when the shadow looks like an umbrella, it can become one, and a dark shadow that Mr. Spender sees as a bottomless pit becomes that too. The Shadow is a shard of the Doctors Burger's prisoner, and Dr. Burger tells Spender to "leave Clayview and its darkness far behind". Clayview. Clay-view. Clay(molding, shaping, sculpture) View(perspective). Was the prisoner-the spirit named Clayview- originally able to mold reality based on its perspective, sort of like Superliminal to the extreme? "Its darkness", therefore, would have that only in regard to shadows, and also implies Dr. Burger knows what Spender did.

14. why does zarei have yellow eyes? i don't think she's been confirmed as a medium but that's really weird.

15. Moving in spirit trance is apparently really hard, but Ed just…does full workouts in it without noticing? And runs all the way down the hall without breaking trance? How???

16. More a question than a theory, but how was Polaris captured in the staff without killing the disciples? We know wisped wights absorb everything around instead of tooling up, but Angel somehow got around that.

17. Why was the barrier created? It contains spectrals and spirits, but not ghosts or tools/non-spectral mediums. Theory: it was made to kill a wight twice. If a wight was inside the barrier and killed once, its absorption effect might have been contained by the barrier(while another barrier protects whoever was doing the killing), and if that was still enough to heal it, then there wouldn't be any energy left for it to absorb if it was killed again. Was that how they beat the Great Sphinx, or was it the plan for handling the Doctors Burger's prisoner, except something went wrong?

18. Completely insane theory: Shred Eagle, after leaving his surfing job for TV and leaving that due to the "accident", returns to his hometown and becomes a teacher. Mr. Garcia. I have zero basis for this outside of the "messily dismembered and devoured" thing and their vaguely similar appearances.

19. Flipflop swaps positions. Switchswatch makes me think of color swatches, so maybe swapping energy colors? Hiphop…I don't know, but I feel like they each have one aspect of Polaris's powers.

20. doorman also mentions that "facade" was eaten by the witch. and now we come to the thing that i am 100% certain of and incredibly mad at zack morrison for:

facade sounds like the name of a spirit dealing with disguises. just a wild guess, but what if its power was to make a really bad disguise work as well as a good one?

...

THEY LITERALLY SAW A NORMAL KID. THIS WAS NOT A BIT. SHE WAS USING THE POWER SHE STOLE FROM FACADE TO MAKE A COMEDICALLY BAD DISGUISE ACTUALLY WORK. AND BECAUSE THIS IS A COMEDY WEBCOMIC WE COULDNT TELL. ZACK I AM SCREAMING

i probably have more but these are all for now.

[canmom]

The Flower That Bloomed Nowhere: 013-032

Previously: 000-012, spinoff post about entropy [all Flower posts]

Time for more flower...

...no, not that flower!

Unless...?

Welcome back to my liveblog of sorts for web novel The Flower That Bloomed Nowhere by @lurinatftbn! Shout out to the Flower discord for giving me such a kind welcome. You're making me want to go all out on this liveblog, but, I musn't...! So I'm going to try to just comment on things that jumped out as especially noteworthy rather than write down everything that went down.

Especially since... a lot happened in these chapters. We have a perfect androgyne tree thing! Magical duels! Questionable student/teacher relationships! Steamed hams! Intense political arguments at dinner! Metafictional assurance of fair play! Prosognostic events! Transgender AIs! And of course........

a murder!!!!!

...ok that one was kinda obvious. But the first body has hit the floor! I don't feel like I have nearly enough information yet to start speculating about who might have dunnit.

That's a lie. It was definitely Kinzo Ushiromiya. That bastard.

So, from the top!

We're introduced to a few of the members of the Order, with by far the most screen time going to Su's mentor and ah, kinda-girlfriend? Neferuaten. And like, damn, lot going on there!

Before I get into the meat of that - first the bit where I search a character's name on Wikipedia. Neferuaten's name is most likely a reference to an Egyptian female king/pharaoh (a rank that's apparently distinct, conceptually, from a queen) variously called Ankhkheperure-Merit-Neferkheperure, Waenre, and Aten Neferneferuaten. Most often shortened to just Neferneferuaten.

Her exact historical identity seems to be a little unclear - she may or may not be the same person as Nefertiti for example. Whoever she was, she apparently reigned for a couple of years around 1334–1332 BCE, and was then succeeded by the famous child king Tutankhamun. Or maybe Smenkhkare came in between them? Seems to be a matter of some debate. Girl really needed to leave a few more vast and trunkless legs of stone so we can figure this stuff out.

In any case, this version of Neferuaten goes way back with Su. Her introduction is to launch a magical attack on our poor girl while she's contemplating the 'everblossom'. One of those classic 'master surprise attacks the student to see how much they've learned' deals. This servers as a fine exposition for the exact mechanics of magical duels.

Zettai! Ummei! Mokushiroku!

Let's briefly note how magical duels and magic works here, since it seems like it will be very relevant later.

The more we learn about magic, the more explicit is that this system is not some natural property of the universe, but something that's designed by the mysterious Ironworkers. It seems like it's kind of an API to the Ironworker admin console. The Ironworkers wanted to make it difficult to do magic on human bodies, and therefore they designed a system for detecting what is 'human', based on three heuristics - anatomical, motion and neurological.

Humans, being the freaky little hackers that we are, of course set about figuring out how to bypass this system, and created standardised means, consisting of three spells, termed [x]-beguiling arcana. In a sense the three criteria are something like three 'hitpoints': the primary way to win a duel is to get all three spells off, thus making your opponent vulnerable to magic.

To achieve this, you can either speak the words of a spell or sign them by drawing them with your fingers - i.e. one way or the other express the appropriate string of symbols. This is risky because if you're interrupted at the wrong time, your spell can backfire and blow up, and getting a spell right requires precise pronunciation and also rapid mental maths. So the general 'gameplay' of magical duels involves attempting to disrupt the opponent's focus and aim, while fast-casting the spells that are most familiar to you.

We're introduced to a few spells that could be useful in battle, such as

Matter-Shifting (telekinesis spell with a geometric bent, used to move a cube of dirt to act as a smokescreen),

Matter-Annihilating (deletes stuff),

Entropy-Denying (essentially a shield that freezes objects and fluids in relative motion),

Air-Thrusting (creates a shockwave air blast),

Light-Warping (fucks up the light for visual cover),

World-Deafening (mutes all sound, which can interrupt casts)

Entropy-Accelerating (disrupts coherency, causing rapid aging-like effects - can be used on a 'higher plane' to disrupt all magic in an area)

Entropy-Reversing (rewinds matter along its path of motion - reference to entropy here seems a tad dubious but w/e)

It's clearly a pretty carefully thought out system - I appreciate that it's approached from the point of view of someone trying to exploit the shit out of the system and figure out what the real meta would be. It does kinda seem like if you got the drop on a wizard and shot them with a sniper rifle they'd be toast, but we'll see later that much more powerful weapons than mere chemical firearms exist in this world, and presumably in a combat situation everyone would have entropy-denying (or equivalent) shields up, so maybe that's a moot point.

Anyway, we are later informed by the closest thing to authorial voice that everything we're told here about magic can be assumed to be axiomatically true, similar to the red text in Umineko. Which pretty heavily foreshadows that this is going to be on the test, if you like!

the magical metaphysics

With apologies to Neferuaten, who will get more detailed comments shortly, there are some other big revelations about magic and the nature of this world that I should talk about while we're on the subject of magic!

In the last post I wondered whether casting magic is an innate quality or a 'skill issue' situation. It turns out the answer is sorta 'neither'. In fact, it's something that has to be unlocked, using special equipment and a particular ritual. The cost of this ritual is not yet entirely spelled out, but we definitely get an inkling. It's rather ominously implied by this exchange in chapter 22:

"We're supposed to want to save people, to make the world better. To defend a bunch of people who practically committed murder--" "You're a murderer too, dour girl." I stopped, and blinked. It took me some moments to process the words. They'd come from Lilith, who now seemed to have finished with her dessert. Now she was just slowly swirling her spoon around in the last remnants of the chocolate sludge on the plate and, occasionally, dipping a finger into her cream bowl and licking little bits of it up. Her expression was irritated, but disconnected. "All arcanists are," she said. "It's how it happens. So having fights over moral high ground like this is very stupid and annoying. Please stop."

In the same chapter, Su uses something called an 'acclimation log', in which she records her 'association' with a series of diary entries from her childhood self. It all suggests that Su's present consciousness has somehow taken over the body of another character, who we could maybe call original!Su.

A few chapters later, we find out what's the deal with prosognostic events. In fact we get a pretty extensive exposition. It turns out that iron is magical in this universe, providing access to higher dimensions, FTL and all sorts of shit. However, because the Mimikos and other worlds are running on a 'substrate' of iron - sort of like a simulation - we are told this is why they can't recursively include iron within. And since the human body includes a certain amount of iron (most notably, in the haemoglobin protein in red blood cells), it is not possible to fully realise the human body inside these artificial worlds.

a self-referential quibble

Here's how Su puts it:

A substrate cannot exist within itself. That sounds awkward when I put it so directly, but it's not too hard to understand if you think about it in abstract-- A foundation obviously can't support another foundation of equal weight and nature, because… Well, it would make nonsense of the whole premise. A book is a device for storing information, but it cannot contain within its letters everything about itself and what it contains, because that is already more than it contains. A box cannot hold another box of equal size, unless it is bent or otherwise changed. A mind cannot hold another mind…

On the face of it, this seems on the face of it... not entirely true, at least in some domains? You can run a virtual machine program on a computer, representing any particular combination of hardware and software, which is from the perspective of software 'on the inside', essentially indistinguishable from a computer running on 'bare metal' hardware. The only real difference is that operating the virtual machine has some computational overhead, so it will be slower. The more virtual machines you nest, the slower it gets.

But 'from the inside', the only way to tell which layer of virtual machine you're on would be to refer to some kind of external clock signal (which can trivially be spoofed) and notice that it's running slower than it should!

We could also mention here the subject of quines, which are programs which print their own source code.

Let's consider Su's examples. The book that completely describes its contents might be able to get around this problem in a similar fashion to a quine, by exploiting redundancy and self-reference.

For example, let's try creating a string that completely describes its own content, using a quine-style technique.

This string begins with a sentence followed by its quotation, and then 100 letter ws; the sentence is: "This string begins with a sentence followed by its quotation, and then 100 letter ws; the sentence is: " wwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww

In fact the '100 letter ws' could literally be the entire string that follows. Suppose the length of the 'real content' of the book is S, and the length of the rest of the 'metadata sentence' describing properties of the book is M; then the total length of the book is 2M+3S.

You can add as much additional information to the 'metadata' string as you like, provided you quote it again afterwards. If you don't like having a book be three times the length it needs to be, you could compress the 'real content' string using an algorithm like DEFLATE, and include instructions in the 'metadata' on how to decompress it. (Text tends to compress really well.) This is where we run up into notions probably all too familiar to rats, or indeed anyone who recently read Seth Dickinson's new novel Exordia, such as Kolmogorov complexity.

But... I think this might well be intentional. Given how common notions like 'stacks of simulations' and 'self-reference' are in rat space, I suspect we may be being misled! The 'rules' of the game - more on that in a moment - say that Su won't deliberately lie to us, and won't withold information without saying so, but her perceptions could be mistaken. Maybe she's been given a false explanation of why the world works the way it does.

It's also totally possible that while the general point (you can't contain a thing in itself) may have some edge cases, the specific instance - you can't build a universe on a giant higher-dimensional iron spike and still have that universe contain iron - may still be true. We don't know the first thing about building universes using magic iron after all.

anyway... the Deal with Prosognisia!

The Ironworkers had a hacky workaround to the 'no iron' rule: they had a few tens of thousands of preserved human bodies on board their Tower of Asphodel. Asphodel, incidentally, is a genus of flower, said to carpet the Asphodel Meadows, one of the three divisions of the realm of Hades. (In their game, Supergiant decided to convert it into a lava zone.) It looks rather pretty actually!

So, they were able to instantiate these bodies in their rebuilt worlds by sort of making them into a reference to one of these stored human bodies. Here's Su again, chapter 26:

Some human bodies, or at least the impression of them and the iron within, had been preserved as part of the Tower, frozen in a timeless place. And because of that, it was eventually discovered it was possible for them to exist in the artificed planes as a sort of stable paradox. After all, while a book can't exist within itself, it can still reference other stuff it does contain internally, even if it makes for somewhat awkward reading. A few tweaks and workarounds solved the problem of the iron associated with that human body staying a part of it, and just like that, human beings were walking something at least akin to the earth once again. However, this only permitted replicas of those bodies within the Tower to exist. The creation of new ones remained impossible, and births not incubated by anima taken by the same mechanism would inevitably fail. And there were far fewer preserved bodies than minds; scarcely more than ten thousand or so for each party.

So every human born in the Mimikos is forked from one of these human bodies. For... mysterious reasons, if you recognise that someone nearby is forked from the same body as you, you both straight up die. If you touch such a person (a 'contact paradox') it's even worse, and all the iron in your body disappears, leaving behind a 'greenish sludge', which seems to be a severe enough disaster to cause deaths of nearby people as well.

(This is a little surprising given that the iron in the human body is only about 60 parts per million by mass, but it would kinda destroy your blood's ability to carry oxygen, so it would definitely be pretty fatal.)

The 'distinction treatment' we heard about is able to mitigate the risks somewhat - with quick medical intervention and time magic, it's possible to allow the people involved to make a full recovery. An interesting wrinkle is that it's implied either Ophelia or new character Balthazar is trans, because normally people of the same gender can't share an upstream body.

That definitely leads to a very fascinating fucked up medical emergency scene, but the reason I'm discussing it now is because it's got bearing on this big-deal question of 'what's so fucked up about arcanists anyway'...

so what's so fucked up about arcanists anyway?

Having finally answered one of the major questions, we can start zeroing in on another. In a flashback scene in chapter 30, we learn that the 'original' bodies have innate access to the magic API, but when you're given a distinct identity at birth you quickly lose it. To have your sv_cheats 1 restored, you have to go through a process that, it would seem, downloads a new mind into your head from one of those original bodies...

The man sat back a little in his chair, crossing his legs idly. "It's intimidating in concept, but please do understand that, in the overwhelming majority of cases, there are no observable effects whatsoever. Around half of the individuals who go through it don't even lose consciousness, and of the other, four out of five don't report any abnormalities when they reawaken. And even of the remaining 10%, the symptoms are negligible for nine out of ten-- Fleeting false memories, minor alterations in temperament that self correct, usually in under a day..." "And the others?" I inquired. "The remaining one percent." He considered this question for a few moments, obviously choosing his words carefully. "The technical term for the rare cases where confusion persists in the longer term is pneumaic assimilation failure. We have a program for treatment, using a combination of various phychological and medical means. It's time-tested. It brings people back to themselves quickly, usually within only only a few months at most." 'Confusion.' 'Brings people back to themselves.' I wasn't feeling fond of the way he couched everything in euphemism. It wasn't helping. "What do you mean by 'it brings people back to themselves'..?" I furrowed my brow. "They just... Forget everything?" "Not immediately," he said. "But they lose a sense of association with... Well, with anything that shouldn't be there, and that leads those memories and feelings to fade over time." He smiled. "The human mind is very adept at excising anything it judges to be out of place. All it needs is a push in the right direction."

The new mind tends to rapidly adjust to its new context, connecting to the memories stored in the body and assuming continuity of identity. But in rare cases it fails! Nuts! And we can infer poor Su appears to be one such case.

Presumably this is what Lilith is referring to when she says that all arcanists are murderers. It's not clear if there is continuity of consciousness when you get /mode +o'd - since you (usually) inherit the memories it is perhaps hard to say whether such a thing is meaningful.

In any case, Su's mega-guilt complex, the reason she seems to want to visit the mysterious egomancer Samium, seems to be at least partly that she's evicted the previous consciousness to inhabit this body. I don't think that's the whole story though! Her grandad seems to be involved somehow too. I don't think Su is literally the reincarnation of her grandad, because it seems unlikely that he'd be motivated to carry out ego suicide like this.

introducing teacher mommy

All those major revelations aside, let's get back to the subject of Neferuaten, aka 'Grandmaster', Su's old mentor in entropic thanatomancy. She quickly establishes herself as one of the most likeable of the inner circle of the Order - she's funny, understanding, generally affable and a little self-effacing. Su definitely puts her on a massive pedestal - though other characters such as Ran find her a little more sussy.

I gotta say, the author is really good at writing old academics. Each one of them comes across as strongly believable, distinctive, motivated and flawed characters. I'll talk a bit about the others in a bit but first let's talk age gap yuri! lmao

Anyway, at the end of chapter 20 we get this:

Then she leaned over and, in an impulsive, almost casual gesture, kissed me on the lips. Before turning, heading to the exit.

'Huh!' thinks the reader. 'That sure is an unusual thing for someone's teacher to do.'

It is quite a few chapters later before Su gets round to telling us a bit more about what's going on...

After that, we met outside of the university more and more often, her becoming sort of a source of emotional support. At some point, I became aware that what was happening was probably quite inappropriate. It's not like I was underage, having turned 25 two years prior, but she was my professor. But I'd been bad at making friends in both of... Well, in both my past contexts, and I'd felt so lonely living in Tem-Aphat, away from Ran and any reminders of the resolutions we'd made. And it all somehow felt so natural. Things got out of hand. One day, I'd had a fight with my father over the logic bridge, and had got a little drunk when I was due to see her. I don't know exactly what I was thinking, but I did something uncharacteristic of me. Inappropriate. But she didn't respond in the way I'd expected. To my shock, she didn't act like it was inappropriate at all. It wasn't as if we ended up dating. That would never have worked, and I was pretty sure she was past wanting that sort of thing anyway. On some levels, she always kept her distance. But it became something we did together, an avenue of private expression that became part of her support for me - and mine, eventually for her.

Su then expresses a bunch of guilt over the whole thing. (Not least because it's a 'selfish' thing she's doing in a body that, implicitly, she doesn't think of as hers.)

The issue of age here is interesting lol. Definitely my gut reaction, and probably the one the story is aiming to elicit, is to be a bit 'wuh oh' by all this, maybe think of Makima wrapping Denji round her finger. That said, by vastly expanding the range of human ages, it's definitely poking pretty hard at our intuitions about what's 'appropriate'. The vibes are like... the students are constantly referred to as 'the kids' by the hundreds-year-old wizards. I don't think we're told Su's current age, but if she was 27 in this flashback, and in the present she says a 29 year old computer is close in age to her, so I would guess currently early 30s. Neferuaten's age is not stated at this point but given her position she's def a few hundred years up there.

The vibe though is that Su is infatuated with someone who has vastly more emotional maturity and experience of the world, not to mention social power over her, and that person is all too happy to encourage it.

The way Su tells it, it sounds like this fling went pretty ok for them? But I definitely feel like things are probably not gonna stay ok, given how clearly the 'inappropriate' nature of this relationship has been foregrounded!

Dark yuri is literally one of the things I'm here for, so I'm looking forward to the fireworks lmao.

Anyway, besides that, we get a bit of a sense of Neferuaten's ideology. She actually shares a lot of Su's skepticism about the viability of the whole immortality project. She makes a big point of making sure the gang get a sense of the order's culture and rituals, apparently viewing this as a chance for their project to be judged by outsiders for the first time. On a personal level, she raises the issue of if the project might be able to save only the young - whether they might be the last humans to not become immortal. Nef's attitude seems to be that she'd be good with that - something she clashes with Kam over.

Otherwise, she's kinda... world-weary, I suppose you could say. She seems to look at the firey youngsters with an attitude along the lines of 'wish I still had that'. She does love to perform to an audience, asking leading questions to set up some lesson or another.

She's a fun character, I enjoy reading her a lot.

Also she seems to have made a sapient AI in the basement! Only everyone says it's definitely not sapient - it is in some sense not agentic, it can't change its motivation, allegedly. Still, it definitely has a 'passing the Turing test' sorta vibe.

don't mention the war

Besides Nef, we get introduced to a few of the remaining members of the class, and also the masters of the Order. Of note is Bardiya, the former revolutionary. He's a very 'speak his mind without preamble' sort of character, which can land him in hot water.

So, returning to Chapter 22, we have a really juicy scene in which a dinner conversation gets very heated after Bardiya mentions his role in the war, provoking a political row with Durvasa, a member of the order. It's a really well observed social dynamics scene - the characters dancing around the topic and the way a row is almost avoided, and then it isn't - Bard's determination, Kam's brown-nosing, Su getting drawn in against her better judgement in a deeply relatable way.

Thanks to this convo, we get a sense of the events of the revolution! So, as @nightpool helpfully informed me, I actually got things a bit mixed up in my rough timeline last time. The 'gerontocrats' were not a feature of the distant-past imperial era - rather it's a figure identified as an oppressor class by a very recent movement, still within living memory for even the youngsters.

The events broadly seem to reflect something like the Paris Commune. There was a famine under the hand of a 'Meritist' city council, killing thousands, which led to a popular uprising let by a 'paritist' movement. The paritists executed a handful of people and redistributed property based primarily on age, intending to break the power of the 'gerontocrats' who had neglected the 'younger generations' by hoarding resources. The Administration overseeing the whole world alliance then cracked down hard - deploying a poison gas that, though it was intended to be nonlethal, turned out to have unexpected lethal side effects.

In the aftermath of the revolution, it seems many reforms were made - besides relaxing the rules on what magic is banned, they changed the equation of scarcity so that food could be replicated more readily? Little unclear on this part. Su mentions that the situation is different now than it was when the Alliance was built, with the material scarcity mostly gone, but clearly there was a famine in recent memory.

Anyway, there is naturally a big generational divide over this. The older generations lived through some pretty fucked-up sounding wars, called things like the 'Great Interplanar War', and in the aftermath built a political system that was supposed to secure peace. (c.f. League of Nations, UN). Although she broadly sympathises with the revolutionaries, Su seems to extends the older generation a fair bit of understanding for having built this system and fearing what would happen if it were destroyed. Though the most relativist view comes from the mouth of Neferuaten:

"I think a common problem with inter-generational communication is an inability to really convey context and scope," Neferuaten said. I noted she didn't actually convey if Kam's understanding of what her point had been was correct or not. "Someone who lived through the Interluminary Strife might tell a young person from the modern day that they have no understanding of hunger, only for the latter to stubbornly retort that they lived through that Ikaryonic famine that preluded the civil dispute… Except that one was a catastrophe that lasted decades and killed tens of millions, while the other slew less than a thousand." She sighed. "People try to relate the experiences of others to their own lives in order to contextualize their understanding of the world and how it might be bettered, but those second-hand experiences inevitably become caricatures, conveying no useful truths. It makes me wonder if human beings, both young and old, are capable of learning from history at all."

Around here is raised the question of a person's political development - the arc from a young person's anger at the state of the world and determination to tear it aside for something better, against the resignation of an older person who fears losing what is already there, however flawed. (We might note of course that there exist young conservatives and old radicals. Circumstances have a lot to do with it.)

Of course, with this whole 'gerontocrat' business at stake already, the mission of the Order hoping to achieve immortality is naturally cast in a dubious light. Fun conflict. On the one hand we have 'can immortality be achieved, and what will it cost', on the other 'who will benefit from it, if it is'! So much narrative force is obtained by politicising this, attaching it to characters with personal motivations and histories, instead of leaving it up to an abstract 'living forever good/bad'.

But it's not all political debates and shagging your teacher...

Over the course of these chapters we get a sense of what the order's been up to!

Let's talk flowers. Just prior to the meeting with Nef, Su comes across an enormous freaky plantlike thing. This turns out to be an experiment to create a being that can survive in even the most extreme environments, like the bottom of the ocean - an attempt to demonstrate that immortality is possible at least in principle. This lifeform is termed the Nittaimalaru or 'Everblossom'. It seems like a pretty good candidate for being the story's eponymous Flower - symbolically, the underwater immortality-granting plant that appears in the Epic of Gilgamesh.

It's worth noting here that 'indefinite lifespan' is actually not entirely impossible in our natural world. I was talking about this with a friend who raised some interesting points:

reading the first post i wanna bring up that while the concept of cancer is fundamental to any multicellular organism the presence of cancer as a problem is actually pretty niche. same with telomere degradation, which is a purposeful anti-cancer measurement. like pretty much all perennial plant life is capable of absolute immortality. while the lobster grows forever until it can no longer use its legs to push its great weight along the sand towards food, if a tree overshoots its growth it's more than happy to break off its unnecessaries, though with both of them at a certain point it's always good to have help after a while. as mammals we're very obsessed with the concept of like ending death as this sort of ultimate goal, prime directive, whatever, when that shit was deliberately turned on in the first place (assigning intent to evolution sue me), because in terms of cost benefit it gave us something in return that we as students of medicine or biology are still not fully grasping.

After a little more discussion:

@play-now-my-lord wrote:

even if humans weren't causing climate change, climactic fluctuations over centuries upend a lot of what is normal in specific areas. if the people on a farmstead in bronze age sweden lived 500 years, the methods and habits they internalized when they were young would habitually be incorrect for the conditions as they existed, the weather, the soil

other friend:

that's how most trees die in the end the root system operates as a weak parallel to the tree's neurons, with a more physiological bent than say our chemical one. patterns around balance, nutrient access, hydrology, and wind are ingrained and learned over centuries and the more regular/consistent that cycle is the more a root will grow. if a tree's roots are built around buttressing from a wind tunnel due to forest conditions and the trees around it fall for whatever reason, it has to relearn what used to be a hundred year old certainty that it needs to lean against the westerly gale every winter, etc. - this is generally a pretty brittle process altogether when it comes to the base of the plant n stuff

some caveats:

should be noted i overlooked a lot of nuance about perennial mortality, like, some plants are more used to investing into survival than others i'm thinking of like how beech bark disease doesn't affect the roots of the beech, so the trunk dies but new shoots continue to grow out and eventually catch the disease and repeat, so the plant is essentially still immortal but forced into a perpetual state of adolescence. but i think for a great number of trees if the tree falls it just goes "eh the rot consumes us all " and dies

Among mammals, we could also note the cancer resistance of the naked mole rat, which loves to defy all sorts of generalisations (also one of the only non-arthropod eusocial animals). They're not exactly immortal, living around 37 years on average, but their chance of dying at any given year is pretty much flat rather than increasing with age.

Of course, longevity and resilience are different things. Nef mentions the resilience of tardigrades as an inspiration. As far as their experiment goes, the 'everblossom' is not an entirely successful experiment, requiring twice-yearly maintenance to address an imbalance.

Given how prominently it features, and the invocation of Gilgamesh, it seems pretty damn likely that the everblossom will in fact be a key to immortality, or something like it.

Religion exists after all!

Other parts of the facility are also pretty funky. We learn that it was patterned after the old headquarters of the Order, which was destroyed when they got found out; that headquarters was built in an old church compound. What sort of thing does a church worship in this world? Actually it's kinda goffic as fuck. Makes Catholicism look downright tame. It's a polytheistic religion and the deities involved are figures like this...

In the center of the circle was a statue, about 8 feet high, and of the kind of ornate-but-formulaic design that characterized art from the Second Resurrection. It depicted a tall, skinny woman, though her two sides, left and right, were very different in nature. The left was beautiful and youthful in a generic, almost ethnicity-less way, dressed in the most delicate of silk peploi, with long and unrealistically tidy curls falling elegantly over her shoulders. Her lip was curled into a gentle half-smile, kind but slightly mysterious, teasing. Her right... Well, her right, to say the least, was very different. On that side, she appeared to be skinless, although it was hard to tell with a statue; I recalled it being a matter of hot debate among the boys in my class back in secondary school. It was possible she was simply incredibly emaciated, or that there were supposed to be growths - like scales - erupting from her flesh. Her hair was made up of hateful, eyeless wyrms, biting and hissing at each other, and her flesh, which was naked save for a tasteful rag covering one area in particular, was covered in numerous stab wounds, bleeding openly. As for her face, it was grim and wide eyed. Mournful and contemptful both. I recognized the figure depicted at once; I passed one of her temples whenever I went to the distribution hall to pick up groceries. This was Phui, Dying Goddess of Love Given Way To Anguish, one of the eleven deities of the now largely defunct Ysaran-Inotian Pantheon.

In the stories, Phui was the third-to-last of the gods to fall during the end of the world, who attempted to take her own life after the death of her lover. But the breaking of the heavens had left her unable to die, meaning that no matter how she much she cut into her flesh, how much she starved herself of food and drink, reprieve would never come. Only relentless, unceasing pain, and grief for that which she had lost.

Metal album cover ass-religion, I'm into it.

The mysterious Ironworkers seem to have really drummed into the population of their new Mimikos that there was a very nice world once, and they'd better be damn sad about what happened to it. However, religion has waned in the present day, and it seems most characters are atheists of some sort.

What did happen to it, anyway? It's referred to as 'the collapse' with a lowercase c; I noticed an author's comment where the author says it's not a case of just a name for the apocalypse. A few people in the comments started speculating about false vacuum collapse. This is a physics thing. Basically, a remote possibility exists in the standard model of particle physics that the existence of matter in our universe could be in a kind of local energy minimum, but it would be possible for it to locally fall into a true minimum, creating a kind of bubble that expands at the speed of light and just deletes everything. We're pretty sure that isn't true though. If it did happen we literally would not be able to do anything... at least in a universe without FTL.

(Curiously, Su mentions special relativity at one point. With all the funky cosmology stuff I kinda wondered if special relativity is still real, but apparently it is! Electromagnetism has been mentioned as still being a thing a couple of times now, so rather than being totally absent it seems like the physics is a bit different, with an electric shock being sufficient to cause radiation poisoning.)

The fair play interlude

In between chapters 22 and 24 we get a curious little interlude called Intermission ∞ 1. The introduction presents it as something that is happening on one of the 'higher planes', translated into terms we can understand, which is grounds for it to get metafictional.

Two entities, calling themselves the Playwright and the Director, discuss the direction of the story so far before laying out the version of fair-play mystery rules this story will be operating under. They are as follows:

THE PERSPECTIVE OF THE PROTAGONIST IS ALWAYS TRUTHFUL

ALL EVENTS FOLLOW THE RULES OF CONVENTIONAL REALITY, UNLESS INDICATED OTHERWISE

ALL SYSTEMS INTRODUCED CANNOT BREAK THEIR OWN RULES AS DEFINED WITHIN THE NARRATIVE, UNLESS INDICATED OTHERWISE

I made them red because it feels like they would be red in Umineko.

Further clarifications and caveats allow that Su can withold information (for dramatic tension or whatever I guess) but she'll always tell us when she does, and an example of 'system introduced' is the magic duel sequence: the characters know accurately how magic duels work.

The two entities are performing this story for some sort of audience, and during their double-act credit themselves with control over the direction of the scenario, sometimes disagreeing. (Another one, the chorus, enters at the end.) Probably best not to think too hard about what that implies for our characters on the 'main' level of the story being 'real', it's probably just a cute bit to take the audience aside without completely breaking the fourth wall. Then again... who knows!

What this means is that my concerns about professed liar Su being an unreliable narrator are unfounded. It's still a limited POV, so Su could fail to notice things or be deceived, but she's not trying to pull one over on us.

I bring this up because...

There's been a mordah!

So, in the last chapter I read - strictly the beginning of a new arc - we find someone dead!

Well, this was kinda foreshadowed earlier. The chef disappeared, the assistant chef was knocked out by magic, and some kinda crazy time magic happened in the pantry - with the heavy implication that someone was trapped in some kinda hyperbolic time pantry for many years. At least they'd have plenty to eat..? The characters don't pick up on the implication of the tally marks and write it off as a stasis field malfunction.

So, it was natural to suspect the cook is dead. Indeed they are: Su finds a mysterious note in the book given to her by an academic at the school as a parting gift, warning her not to trust the inner council - inexplicably written two years prior and warning her to check the archive in a certain position. Investigating this, she and Kam find a secret armoury room. In there is a tunnel, and at the bottom, the cook appears to have committed suicide, leaving a suicide note vaguely implying the Order is up to some seriously sussy shit.

Of course, Kam and Su immediately suspect foul play. But they also both have ulterior motives for coming to this conference, so they agree to keep it hush-hush. This is definitely a great idea that won't get everyone killed by Beatrice... I mean uh. Whoever the murderer is.

The obvious question is, who dunnit? And why? Unfortunately, we don't really have alibis for most of the characters. Many of the inner circle haven't even shown up on screen yet. So there's a lot of people who it might have been.

More suspects! More suspects!

I haven't even mentioned several of the characters. We also have Sacnicte, steward of the house - she's an arcanist, and Su is kinda insanely horny for her aesthetically appreciative, in a way that the other characters notice and are literally like 'I don't see it'... which makes me wonder if we have a situation where someone has fucked with her perceptions. She's very down to earth and casual.

Her name is probably a reference to the Maya princess Sac Nicté, meaning 'white flower', who according to legend was involved in the migration of the Itza people from the Chichen Itza. Mind you the article I'm getting this from is kinda horrendous; the sole source is in Spanish and appears to be some random website from 2004.

Among the older generation, we have Theo's dad, Linos. He is a generally affable chap, kinda socially awkward (he's responsible for prolonging the political discussion by a botched apology) but otherwise not particularly standing out among the Order members.

Linos or Linus is another Greek name with a few referents.

The Order member who really does stand out is Anna, or in full, Amtu-hedu-anna. She's the one who's properly old, having dodged many of the 'kills people around 500' bullets of this setting, and not especially inclined to make nice. Very 'straight to the point' kinda lady. We meet her fairly briefly - Ran seems to have landed in her good books.

This one really took some digging! It seems to be based on Enheduanna, who was a Sumerian high priestess of Nanna and the oldest named author in history, credited for tablets like The Exaltation of Inanna, although it seems there's some debate over whether she definitely wrote them. Her rank in Sumerian was Entu, and I could fully believe 'amtu hedu anna' is a different transliteration of 'Entu Hedu Anna'.

As mentioned above, we're introduced to two logic engines, Sekhmet and Eshmun, built respectively by Neferuaten and (the as yet unseen) Hamilcar. Sekhmet has more biological components and wants to be a human. She wants to be human, and she's also expressed a distinct pronoun preference and gender id, which I suppose makes her trans. Eshmun is a more traditional logic engine with a lot of cogs; Sekhmet calls him 'big brother', so I guess he gets he pronouns from that.

Sekhmet is of course named for the Egyptian lion-headed warrior/medicine goddess. Eshmun is a Phoenician god of healing. Hamilcar was a name used by a number of Carthaginians, mostly generals.

Ezekiel is another one of the student gang. We haven't seen much of him yet, so I don't have a lot to say about him. Abrahamic prophet.

Balthazar is a student from another school - another thanatomancer in fact. He's something like the protégé of Zeno, and his presence is Zeno's condition for having this whole affair go ahead. He's got the same eyes as Ophelia, and Zeno failing to do his paperwork and allowing to happen is a big deal. But Zeno's kind of a bigshot so it might not come to anything. Anyway, Su is kind of suspicious towards Balthazar, but he takes it all in good humour.

Balthazar was one of the three magi in Christian mythology. There were a few Zenos, but the best known is surely Zeno of Elea, who came up with his famous "we need to invent calculus to solve this" paradoxes around infinite sums.

Yantho is a member of the Order staff, who was cooking when whoever did shenanigans in the kitchen... did shenanigans in the kitchen. His roast was ruined, but sadly he was too unconscious to order fast food and pass it off as his cooking. He can't speak and communicates by writing on his tablet.

The name crops up as an obscure Maya deity, part of a trio of brothers with Usukun and Uyitzin, but I can't find any source that seems particularly definitive.

Samium is an old egomancer, whose presence is a secret that only Su and Ran are in on. Su wants to speak to him, for reasons that are probably to do with finding out if he can restore 'original!Su' into her body, or maybe resurrecting her grandfather, or something?

...is that everyone? I think that's everyone. At some point I probably need to make an Umineko-style character screen lol.

can we solve anything yet?

Since this chapter is the beginning of the arc, I suspect there's more info to divulge before we can think about trying to solve this one. And, given the Umineko inspo, the problem to solve probably isn't simply 'whodunnit' but something more fundamental to the nature of this world.

Still, it seems all but spelled out explicitly that current!Su failed to properly assimilate into her body after she became an arcanist. Her grandfather's final 'kindness' is less clear. Her intentions with Samium... I've mentioned the obvious theories about already. She's mega guilty about overwriting this poor girl and has decided the only course of action is to try and restore the mind that inhabited her body originally. But I don't think we have the whole picture just yet, because I still can't figure out what her granddad did.

Given her discussion of 'dragon' vs 'phoenix' resurrection, and of how her meeting with Samium might change the order, I also theorised - before I really twigged the arcanist thing - that she was here to resurrect her grandfather in her own body. Body-hopping is like, the classic immortality strat after all. But... I'm less convinced of that one now? It doesn't seem like Su particularly liked the old man, she definitely doesn't want to follow in his footsteps, and 'saw him die unexpectedly during the revolution' does not seem like it would inspire the same sort of guilt.

Still, he surely did something to her, she's definitely cryptically alluded to that enough times.

Besides that?

Obviously really digging this story! Honestly, this one rules. It helps that the author is clearly into a lot of the same shit I am. All the long discussions and beat by beat narration could potentially feel a little dry, but honestly, I'm pretty hooked, it's definitely pulling me forwards. It's a fascinating, conflict-rich setting, that raises all sorts of interesting concepts. It's confident in knowing what it wants to be. Umineko is a hell of a tough act to follow, but this one has a distinct identity of its own. Can't wait to see what happens now the mystery seems to be about to kick off for real.

With that in mind, I'm sure it won't be long until the next one of these. I may have to dial back the detail a bit, this is kinda having a bad effect on my work right now. There's just so many fascinating corners to follow up ^^'

Anyway, I realise these posts are kinda massive for tumblr, so I'm gonna start copying them over to canmom.art soon. <See you next time>.

[k-s-morgan]

Hello. I think I noticed that in your work, Sebastian, even when speaking to other servants or on behalf of the servants, never refers to Ciel as "our Lord" or "our" anything. Only my Lord or Young Master. It's such a small detail and maybe not intentional, but for me, it is one more proof of how good your character understanding is. (Is it called characterization? I'm not good with english terms).

You are able to write complicated demonic mind with all the nuances and twisted logic so well. It may sound weird, but ALGSTLTH feels real. It's more canon for me at this point than the anime itself or manga.

I can't comprehend how you do it. Maybe you have answered this question before, but how do you plan your chapters? Do you write a structure or a thoughtful plan in advance? Or let the inspiration flow? Did you already have this long-term idea of how the story will go, or do you change and adapt it? I'm just really fascinated.

Hope you are safe and sound♡♡♡

Hi! Thank you so much for your wonderful words, it feels so surreal to hear that you value this story so highly! To think that I started it for my eyes only :D

And yes, I always have so much fun with Sebastian's little displays of inherent possessiveness! I'm happy you noticed it and enjoyed it. I especially like when Sebastian thinks about "their manor," as in his and Ciel's :D He's so hopeless.

With chapters, honestly, I can't say that I plan much. I usually just have a couple of large ideas (in the case of TGSTLTH, these are mostly milestones from the anime) and a couple of smaller ones. Everything else comes when I'm writing, and that's one of the reasons why I love doing it so much. Things slip into their places automatically - I usually call it the magic of writing. It's like my mind knows where I'm going, but I do not, and I learn it very gradually, as more and more words are typed, uncovering more pieces.

As an example, some time ago, I had an idea for a made-up case, and this is how it's described in my notes: "C and S have to allow themselves to be tortured, C plans, S snaps." Beyond this outline, I have no idea what I'm going to be writing about, but I know and anticipate the moment when I start typing and the ideas start being born, shaping a picture even I don't see right now.

I do a bit a more detailed planning right before writing a chapter: I settle on a vague scenario and describe some basic parts in one sentence. Then I follow this very loose outline and watch how it becomes detailed in the process of writing. For instance, the chapters about the teachers: all I knew before I started writing was that Ciel and Sebastian would have this game. I had no idea Ciel would pretend to be blind until the very second it happened or that he would make Sebastian lose his mind by pretending he's dying. It all clicked just at the right moment, like it usually happens. This magic of writing delights me.

The rest of the plot is basically planned to the same extent: some ideas here, some ideas there, but with no links between them... yet.

[bluedalliances]

Heyyyyyyy, could u rec some nb/queer steddie?

Hell yes! Here are some of my favorite wibbly wobbly gendery wimey fics bc I need someone who will yell with me about them. Also, I'll leave the @ of the people who wrote them (at least the ones I could find), so you can follow them.

she likes the boys in the band (i'm her all time favorite) by @formosusiniquis

Oh, boi this fic. I spent a whole night reading because it was just that good. I regret nothing.

So, Steve and Robin go to see Corroded Coffin at the hideout and somehow fall for Eddie and Chrissy. Oh, also, Steve and Robin can read each other's minds. Ft. she/her/he/him Robin and Steve, HOH Steve, flirty Chrissy, Eddie dedicating songs to Steve and making DnD NPCs based on him, and Chrissy as Steve's cousin. Just, so so so lovely.

50k | Rated T

Also by them, since I couldn't choose between two fics I adore:

if you like this you might also like: me

This is a one shot where Steve works in a library and starts exchanging notes with Eddie, who leaves comments on Steve's recommendations. Not only is soft and amazingly written, but the books they reference are amazing at making the narrative move, I even added the ones I didn't know to my TBR. Gender is not heavily discussed or central here, but that's something I personally enjoy so, yeah. 9k | Rated T

Just like Holy Mary by @hellabifurious

A slice-of-life-ish, established relationship, found family fic where Steve explores gender and everything he was taught about being a man. Ft. Nail polish, makeovers, girl's nights, gender discussions, Steve being very, very loved.

28k | Rated T

took you for a working boy by pukner

Where Eddie tells Steve he's gay and, for some reason, that breaks Steve's heart. Ft. The end of the world, radio host Eddie, mutual crush, gender crisis, nb Stevie, just lots of wonderful stuff.

43k | Rated M

I've seen lots of recs for this one and it's really wonderful, another great fic from the same writer ft genderqueer Steve is: off the beaten path (ongoing series)

the queer kids of hawkins series by @locallmann

I've seen people talking about the first book in this series, L is for linoleum (and nothing else), but not so much for the second one, lady stardust, and it's amazing.

On how the older queer kids in Hawkins find each other, their identities, and love. Ft. Trans Eddie, NB Stevie, side ronance, queer solidarity, mom friend Steve, rocky horror as bonding, it has everything. Also, wonderfully tagged, everything you need to know is right there.

36k + 6k | Rated M and T

sit on my lap (tell me what you want) by kaleinope

Where Steve invites Eddie to spend Christmas on a cabin, and he realizes maybe his crush is not really unrequited. Ft. side Buckingham, game night, stolen sweaters, sweet and not angsty misunderstanding.

11k | Rated E | Do not have unprotected sex, children

Espresso Never Tasted so Sweet (Until I Stole it from Your Lips) by SerpentSunrise

Modern au where Steve is a barista and has a crush on one of the regulars. Here, again, gender is not a central theme. Ft. Steve being a little scared of putting himself out, tease Eddie, and lovely references to Icarus. So so good.

The author also has an ongoing work with trans Eddie, where Steve is touch starved. Check it out!

4k | Rated T

take it easy on me by the wonderful @tak-cajaz

Au where Steve is a kindergarten teacher and has a crush on Max's dad. It's a shame he's married. (No, he's not, don't worry). Ft. Supportive Robin, flirty Eddie, absolute sunshine Chrissy and cute kids. Also, misunderstandings, mutual pinning, overthinking and soft encounters.

Honestly, I'd rec everything by Kat, their writing is amazing and heartwarming, I always love every word on her fics. Check their work <3

8k | Rated T

My Favorite Form of Loving by indelicate

This is the first work in their Steddie dads series. It's Steve and Eddie's kid first day at preschool and they support each other through the anxiety of letting her go, it's really, really sweet. Ft. Trans Eddie, accepting enough community, soft dads steddie, dio references and a strong girl.

3k | Rated T

I hope you enjoy these, if you want more just let me know <3

[quandaryqueen]

Riveting torture III

Masters of fear Jonathan Crane X Reader

Breaking news: Man learns something new about himself; He's an asshole and he's in love (fucking finally) more at 9.

Part I, Part II

🧡 Jonathan's mind has been in a haze after what the stunt you pulled, had him staring at the void for firmly, fingers entwined with one another and press under his chin. He has been deep in thought yet none of them coherent. They just ran pass him, make sense for a moment, before it returns to being nonsense.

He is currently the human embodiment of static; unmoving, uninterrupted, uninteractive.

To be disarmed of rationality is something he didn't expect, let alone from you. Empty of thought, reduced speechless, unable to think of anything else.

It's like you've wrung him out. Of sense, of mind... All with a simple gesture. It's something you've done before, but something about this was different.

How come a gesture less worse from the last one, become impactful? It's as if with the feather-light kiss, on the cheek, managed to make a dent out of his mind.

It's all he ever thought about ever since it had transpired.

🧡 From the other side of the coin, there was you, snug in your jacket Jonathan had kindly provided for you when you needed it most, as you stare into the moving scenery of the countryside. Skies tinged with oranges and pink, golden glow cast upon the trees. You cannot stress your gratitude for Jonathan, it was cold and this jacket was the only thing you owned.

Having been woken up early, the others have taken upon themselves to restore their needed zzz's as the bus has yet to arrive at the venue, so it was new to you not to hear your companions fooling around. They'd be in a chorus of singing trending pop songs, Lee happen to have brought her guitar for the trip too, so there's that. But everyone was fast asleep. Maybe you'll be seeing the squad active when you reach the field.

You felt like you didn't need to sleep. Everything about your interaction with him that early morning had you unable to let go of the grin you've had since boarding the bus. It was as if you didn't need to jacket anymore to stay warm.

"Thinking about your boyfriend?"

You almost jumped from your seat. Upon glancing behind you, you find Adonis cheekily grinning with his arms draped atop your seat. Rolling your eyes at him, you dodge the possibility of explaining your lack of label with the suspect of making you smile like this.

"Aren't you supposed to be sleeping?" He was easy to distract, so you opted to answer his question with another question.

"I have energy drinks flowing in my veins." He giggles, before holding out his hand to demonstrate how the caffeine, or rather, the lack of sleep is currently affecting him right now, his hands shaking.

"Bitch, I thought you of all people would know how sleep is important." You squinted at him, holding his hand to feel just how worse were the tremors in his muscles.

"In my defense, I had to submit some assignments and requirements to some of our teachers early. You know how they are with students like us,"

Being reminded of that, you were then faced with the memory of one of the teachers shaming you in front of the whole class. Again, in your defense, you were prepared! You just needed your notes (idiot notes, as she referred to them) just to clarify certain aspects of the report just so you don't explain it wrong.

"Hmm... Yeah..." You can only sigh in agreement. Shaking your head, you faced him again. How about something more light-hearted? A grin rose from your features. "Remember that dare you told me?"

"Which one?"

"If the the squad and I won the cheerleading competition, you and your boys are going to party wearing the cheerleading uniforms. You are going to do that, right?" You searched his face in anticipation.

"Sure, if you win, that is." He challenges with a smirk.

"Oh fuck yeah we will. Just you wait." Oh Adonis and his boys in the cheerleading uniforms... You can almost imagine it. "How about you try to catch some zzz's? We still have a long way to go."

"Yeaaaah, you're right. Need my energy for the field." Looking over your seat, you see Adonis lift his hood up and tugged it over his eyes, before readjusting his blanket to his chest. "You should do the same. Maybe you'd dream about your boyfriend."

You hold yourself back, not wanting to argue with the boy who is going to attempt to sleep. And so, you slip back to your seat and save your remarks for later. You may not find yourself able to sleep, but it would be nice to just relax for a moment, let the scenery pass by with Jonathan in your head.

🧡 He wonders how you were doing...

At this time, it might be possible you've finally arrived on the venue. By now, perhaps you just finished performing. Maybe you were watching the sport unfolding in the field, all the while, waving your pom poms and chanting the school's team. He hopes you wouldn't forget to drink water in the midst of it... You do have the tendancy to get a little too preoccupied in certain events, not to mention, he hopes you remembered to apply sunscreen too.

...

No...

He hopes you forget to drink that you'd collapse in the middle of the heat and you contract skin cancer! He doesn't care whether you're done performing or not, you can go cheer that football player Adonis for all he cares!

Oh that's right, he never forgot about him, that boy you replaced with him the moment Jonathan was out of the picture, how typical! That imbecilic jock you've managed to string along in that cursed charm of yours! My, how fast did you drop him at the sight of an opportunity when Jonathan walked back into your life? He doesn't even see you interacting with Adonis anymore! It's like he never existed!

🧡 "Go Adonis! You can do it!" You cheered, cupping both hands over your mouth.

Behind you, the captain cues the whole team to chant again through a megaphone. Her ever so chipper voice amplified and not easily overpowered by the various of voices joining her to cheer. Under the heat of the sun, who performed your chants, even being joined by your whole school in the stadium.

Adonis is a close friend of yours who was deeply invested in this sport. You find yourself envying him at the fact he can balance his extracurricular with his academic curriculum. It was noticeable how he put the work in, both academics and extracurricular that he sacrifices his own well-being. Winning this game was important to him, as he was under the gaze of possible offerers of scholarship not just for him, but for the whole team.

Upon hearing you, and the whole school cheer for their teams, you find yourself jumping in excitement when he managed to dodge an opponent and score a point.

🧡 He knew he had to move fast, are you even aware of the effects you were imposing on him? Oh you certainly knew, didn't you?

You... Everything about you was compelling, in a way he sees as beguiling, like a mirage of an oasis in a desert. How your presence seems to present him a sense of calm and relief, in which he knows behind that warmth of yours is a hellfire waiting to reel him forward and trap him in the cage of of your embrace. How you melodic giggle is a siren's call, your voice that being Lucifer's serpentine tongue, with all your deceit hidden beneath honeyed words, your reassurances, those compliments...

For awhile it was starting to feel good, how he began to yearn for these, for you— only to be reminded of your underlying want to humiliate him. To be oh so patient when it came to him, you are considered to be a victor to even get close to him whilst wearing the same cheerleading uniform Sherry used to wear, not even her went through the lengths of kissing him several times, nor held him, anything at all. He was tied at the tip of her fingers and had him strung along with her words alone and he has noted you've been in the same team as she was, of course you would know how he ticks.

You have never talked about her, why would you? Why wouldn't you? He has seen you before, holding Sherry up during practice, converse with her and such. Of course you wouldn't, acknowledging her would have made him reminded of her and recognise your motives! He has underestimated you before and he's learnt —acknowledged even— just how conniving of a little snake you are. Time and time again, you do remind him how much of a scheming little thing you can be, my, how much time do you devout yourself to draw intricacies on your little note to ruin his life? How pathetic can you be?

🧡 Everything was going well, you kept a smile so distinct from the pageant smiles your other squadmates upheld during the performance. It was as if Jonathan was watching you from the crowds, you can feel as though if he'd have been there, seated by the bleachers, supporting you. It was a shame he couldn't attend, but having the thought of knowing he supports you is enough.

Thoughts of him reassuring you played in your head whilst you perform, it burned through you and kept you at a high spirit to recall all the times he has taken a time of his day to sit you down for a moment, in your time of lowest, to remind of the others things you are capable of and how you were great at them. He made you better in believing in yourself.

Your friends, of course, knew that kind of smile and where it came from. Friends being friends, of course, proceeded to do what friends do.

"Ooooh~ is that Jonathan I see?" One of them tease, placing a hand above their eyes whilst squinting at the bleachers.

"Where?" You whipped your head around like a dog lighting up at any indication of their owned arriving.

Not wanting to end there, the other members spurred on. "Right there!" One of them points.

"I don't see him!" You squinted your eyes further.

"Oh my god, Y/N. And you're telling me I need glasses? He's right there!"

Upon hearing the others snicker, you glanced over them with a glare, in which they finally broke out laughing.

"Fucken' pricks." You playfully smack the nearest person on your right, before pouting and crossing you arms to your chest.

🧡 When you return, his plan was to unfold. Specifically, at the party. He will have to make the first move before you can even do it, he fucking swears it. It would be all for nothing if you got him first, he might as well tie his own noose at the strings of your fingers, it was imperative he succeeds.

After glancing at a calendar did he realise that the party you mentioned was Halloween... Of course it would be Halloween, fucking hell, do you really intend to make Sherry Squires proud from the grave, huh?

Oh we'll see about that...

If you really like Sherry that much, then he might as well do the same to you. He will personally see to it that your suffering would be as slow and careful as you are with him.

🧡 You practically made a beeline to him when you arrived back to continue with your usual day to school, a weight being lifted off your shoulders. Thank god the tournament was over, now you can get back to focusing on school. You came back with a wide grin, happy from the various achievements from the tournament for yourself, the whole cheerleading team, of course for Adonis' success, and to top it all off, you get to see Jonathan again. Not to mention, since practices are on hold for now, you could spend more time with him!

"So yeah, since we won, Adonis and his gang are going to wear the cheerleading uniforms at the party!" It was almost as if you were happy about winning the cheerleading competition for the sole purpose of getting to see the whole sports team in cheerleading-wear, rather than the win itself. "Speaking of which, are we still going?"

... We, huh? Interesting. Were you going to attend regardless whether he goes or not? You talk as if that were the case.

"Of course, by then I get to see you perform." That was what you told him, didn't you? 'see you perform'... Perform your heinous deeds.

"Awesome! Soooo, as you expect, it's a costume party and the squad pulled me to some scheme to dress up in sexy Santa costumes from Mean Girls and like... That's so fucking ironic, but it's just simply iconic, I couldn't say no, so um... It's okay if you don't have to wear anything— I-I mean, any costume at all."

Is it because I already share semblance with a Scarecrow? Can't you think of something new?

"The gang and I won't be just performing the dance we did at the competition, we're actually choreographing something new... I mean, since the guys are going to be performing the cheer, we might as well just make a new one. I hope that's alright."

Or does you performance include me being the center of the attention? Of humiliation?

"I still can't believe you're actually going to watch me perform! Anyone who's been with me either thinks I'm wasting my time or that they're just plain mean about what I like, but you are just so nice and supporting and—" you took a break to fan yourself with your hand for a moment before resuming to your statement. "— you're the best. Legitimately, you're like the best. I appreciate you so, sooo much."

I... Surely that statement holds no truth to it. It's just another one of your lies to lure me in.

🧡 He knew what you meant by choreographing a new routine to perform. Since it was not something adhered to the school extracurriculars activities, your means of practicing were limited to noons and possibly weekends. Translation, you won't be able to walk home with him...

Unless...

"Oh my god..." One of the girls covers their mouth in shock when they heard the song you'll be dancing to. "That song is dirty. You little harlot you," She looks over the leader with a look so eager, which reminded Jonathan of a little child who finds delight and thrill in disobeying curfew for the first time.

"Alright, people!" You clapped your hands to gain the attention of your fellow dancers. "So the song we'll be using is a bit in the raunchy side of things, is that okay?"

"Hell yeah!"

"Alright, cool! Now let's get some work shall we?" Looking over your shoulder, this prompts the choreographer to clap her hands as well.

"Positions, everyone!"

Jonathan didn't mind to come along with you and watch you practice. It's not like his parents were strict, I mean, he could go home at midnight and no one would be concern about him. Besides, he'd prefer to have you in his sight. Not in that way of course, just so he knows whether you're scheming with friends or not.

🧡 The state of the relationship well... It wasn't official yet, but everyone fucking knew. It doesn't take a genius for one to figure popular cheerleader Y/N has the hots for the mildly interested hostile nerd Jonathan Crane, which was weird, but you do you honey.

Oh there were whispers, it is something Jonathan knew he would not be able to escape whether you are involved with him or not. With your presence, it helped to maximize the volume of what used to be 'whispers' behind his back, as rumours began to circle the entirety of the school grounds like wild fire.

It was something you immediately addressed at the beginning of your 'relationship'. Giving him all sorts of reassurances he pretends to be believe, oh he knows what sick games you're playing, this just prove the lengths of how your serpentine tongue can go.

"Jonathan, I couldn't give less of a fuck about what the others think. If I can't hold your hand without garnering unwanted attention from the others, fuck 'em. I want you and I— I want us to not care about them and what they think."

No matter... In no time, you alone shall be the hot topic throughout the school year. As the poor little fool found insane or critically injured and locked away or the memoir on the front page. Oh Jonathan knows the hand he is playing, it is indirect, in all of this, in his kindness, it is your choice whether to live miserably for the rest of your life with no possibility of recovery or to have your life snuffed abruptly.

🧡 The night of the party finally arrived, Jonathan has yet to see you but he expected you'd be donning a costume matching with your clique. He was told to wait by a spot to pick him up as soon as you and your friends were done doing whatever the fuck you were doing.

He wore no costume, opting to just wear a flannel to warm himself from the cold, October air. And in others words, he has always been parading around like a scarecrow anyways. You yourself had said that as well, no surprise there.

He hears a distant vehicle approaching and as it grew near, he hears the distinctive giggles from within, blaring along with some generic pop music. Sure enough, he recognised the cherry red Camaro as the so-called 'leader' of the clique and the cheer captain's car. Rolling your window down, you stick yourself out to wave at Jonathan, your make-up glimmering under the dim moonlit road.

"Hi Jon! Sorry we're late."

"Yeah, Lee was being a cunt."

"Bitch, you started it!"

"Alright, alright, settle down!" The driver shouted, before looking over you. "And for god's sake, Y/N, do you want him to get in or not?"

"My bad!" You nervously giggled, before sitting back and opening the door for Jonathan.

He promptly takes his seat next to you and the moment he does, he felt the eyes of everyone from within give him a quick glance in a way of expressing distrust. You, on the other hand, made sure your mask never slipped. You were asking him whether or not he's had dinner yet, if he's cold, telling him about what he should do should he feel overwhelmed in the party, etc etc, whilst your friends chime in with some agreements, reminders and tips, finally did they regain their masks again.

🧡 It wasn't difficult to spot which house was the party venue... Located near heavily wooded areas, where the leader decided to park her precious car in.

"Okay, so who among you are planning to drink?" The leader asks and was met with resounding 'me's! from the group...

"Nah, I'm good. Maybe have a little shot, but I do t plan to get shitfaced."

Except for you, apparently.

"Great, so I'll entrust you my spare keys, should you need for..." For a moment, the leader's eyes land on me. "Emergencies."

"Yeah, Lee needs her ass to be looked after a few shots and you can't be the only one sober since we have the whole ass group with us." You didn't catch the suggestive nature of her statement, or perhaps you chose to feign innocence.

"Alright. Now that's settled, shall we?"

And so, the show commences.

🧡 By now, your friends have scattered everywhere, for a moment he has heard the leader's ever so loud voice from the deafening music, shouting at a member of your group not to drink too much as you'd have a performance to put up later. At some moments, you would excuse yourself to tend to some of your friends to remind them not to drink too much, as the leader had ready made it clear, do not get hammered yet.

The scene before Jonathan was something familiar. The flashing lights, the blaring music, drinks at the hand of those who are not allowed yet, costumes, the popular kids, smoke so thick... For a moment he caught the stench of Sherry Squire's perfume amidst all this, with the scent of alcohol in her breath.

His chest started to raise... Fuck, he could have just pulled you aside for a moment instead of entering the house. It was a wooded fucking area, for god's sake, he would've easily gotten rid of you with the loud, blaring music, absence of lingering eyes, the cover of darkness, everything was perfect and he just had to follow you in this party for some ridiculous fucking reason—

"Jon?"

His neck snaps aside when he swore he had also heard the dead Sherry's voice, only to then realise it was you. Just you... The next to follow after Sherry Squire for attempting to deceive him just as she did.

You have just returned after stopping Lee from doing ten seconds of chugging from the bottle of vodka, putting a hand on Jonathan's shoulder.

"Are you okay?" You tilt your head.

"Never better. You should join your friends." He dismissively turns for a moment, shrugging your hand off. For a brief moment he considers getting himself a drink, only to remember he had to fulfill what he needed to for the longest of time whilst sober. He need not liquid courage to commit such a thing, he would gladly do so without any substance to further fuel his already intense abhorrence.

"But... I want you..." He glanced at you again. With a certain grimace on his face, you couldn't help but to retract and edit your statement with flushed cheeks. "I-I mean... I want to spend more time with you... If that's okay..." Either way, there was no difference from what you've said just a second ago.

"You'd be a laughingstock when they see us together."

You blinked at the revelation and realisation. "Was that why you dropped my hand?"

He never even realised you were holding it in the first place... Now he knew why he entered this god forsaken party, god damnit it, he was holding your hand and enjoying it without him knowing... You held his hand the moment you got off the car, lacing your fingers through his, relishing his presence, his warmth, the fact he coming with you and he shall be watching you perform. But when you entered the house party, he suddenly drops your hand when the popular cheerleaders' entrance had inevitably captured the eyes of the school body in the party.

"Jonathan, I thought we already talk about this I..." You nervously fumbled with the end of your costume, by now you were starting to regret for not bringing your jacket with you. "Didn't we?"

"I don't want to embarrass you." Jonathan avoids your gaze, opting to look elsewhere, anywhere just not at the pathetic, teary eyed pretender. He hoped this would be the end of it... But he knows how annoyingly persistent you can be.

"Why would I be?" You took his hands within yours, once again feeling his warmth, a soft smile filling your lips. "I don't care about what they think about us."

You were truly taking this charade all the way here? All this time? Well, what are you waiting for? You're in the party, easily the center of attention where everyone can see, you have him by the strings of his heart goddamn it, he fucking loves the way your hands warm his cold ones, but by fucking god he knows what would happen if he were to relish it.

You were looking up at him with those eyes again... Those damn eyes which made his knees buckle and fail, yet warm and comfortable at the same time. Have you any idea how much power you have over him, how much he had to fight back with the foreknowledge of what someone like you is capable of? God damn it, why did he had to allow you close to him? Why did he grant you the chance to touch him in all sorts of ways, why the fuck did he have to fall for you in the midst of his distrust?

If he had only strangled you when had the chance instead of walking away—

"I love you... Nothing and no one can change that..."

He didn't realise how much distance he himself has closed in until he realised the can smell that one shot of alcohol you took upon the peer pressure of classmates urged you to take was hitting his face. His eyes darts to your lips, then back to yours. All thoughts filling his head suddenly faded for a moment at the realisation of the distance (lack thereof) between you.

He finds himself closing his eyes... All tensions he has held, all the grudges he held against you, finally slipping from his shoulders... When a bright light suddenly points at you. His heart drops to his stomach and he drops your hand and shields his head.

JONATHAN YOU UTTER FOOL! YOU FELL FOR IT AGAIN!!!

"Sorry to distract you, love birds. But we have a show to put." The leader has been calling you on stage after the whole group gathered up to finally perform. So not once did you hear her screaming your name from the stage.

"Oh, my bad!" You shouted after her. The spotlight returns back on stage, once again leaving you in the dark with Jonathan. "Well... This is it!"

He opens his eyes for the first time, only to observe before him the bright slights casted upon the makeshift stage in the middle of the house pointed at your friend group getting to formation. The boy glances at you, tears were welling in his eyes, only to then feel lips against his cheek, before you sprinted for the stage, in your high heels.

"For good luck!" You shouted after him, before you made your way to the stage.

Jonathan stood still for a moment, before he heard the cue of the music for the beginning of your performance.

"WOOOH! GO CROWS!" One of the students cheered, prompting the entirety of the audience there follow his suit to chant the name of the school's sport group.

🧡 After watching the group choreograph, fail at some points from the lack of synchronization, accidents and other mishaps during practice, he couldn't help but to feel a certain chill when he saw your performance. He knew how much of your group worked hard to perfect this dance in a matter of only days and the way you delivered it to the crowd was something he finds admirable.

At some points of your performance, he couldn't help but to flush at the sight of you performing suggestive acts, such as the way you traced a finger between your chest before licking the said finger, the way you sway your hips, how you caress other dancers passionately, even having the whole group pretend as though they were lifting their skirts up only to wag their fingers at the crowd...

At the end of the performance, you were stopped by the leader by getting a hold of your neck before you make a beeline for Jonathan, reminding you of the final bow. After doing so, you were back to sprinting back to your Jonathan.

The thrill still in your veins, you pull him by the collar of his shirt before crashing your lips against his. He had long since let go the notion of you humiliating him the moment you got on that stage to be the center of the cheers, to perform real entertainment, that he had instantly reciprocated your gesture eagerly. Locking lips had never felt so right and to feel all his worries slip away from the euphoric explosions from within his body.

Jonathan found himself disappointed when you pulled away, only for him to realise you were leading him the wrist to go outside to resume the activity away from the eyes of others.

It was a good thing Christine entrusted you her keys... For emergencies.

[tathrin]

If Finrod is Legolas's other dad, explain Lorien.

Reference is to this post, and also I'm tagging @z-h-i-e because this is their ship-baby, I just popped in to sprinkle some additional inspiration because my brain went "ooh hey!" when their post crossed my dash because that's the kind of supportive community fandom is supposed to be made of fyi.

Right, so. There's no sense of tone in straight-text communication on the internet, so I know that it's entirely possible that this ask was sent in the spirit of giggling-with-popcorn delight while you eagerly await the resulting explanation. It's equally possible that you're playing at being The Ship Police and challenging me in the expectation that I won't be able to make this Just For Funsies ship sail without floundering on the rocks of canon.

Either way: buckle up. Because the boats of Lórien don't sink.

Because when Legolas gets to the woods of Lothlórien with the rest of the Fellowship, he's delighted. He's never actually been here before! He's heard all the stories, and listened avidly, but. well. Thranduil and Galadriel both blame the other a little bit for the nasty way Finrod died (they know it's not the other's fault so they don't say anything, either to each other or anyone else but, well. it feels like it ought to be the other one's fault, somehow).

And there's all that tension re: Doriath still, and why Galadriel couldn't just pick-up where Melian her teacher left off and maintain the Girdle afterwards—because I'm not a maia, Thranduil, you ass! Oh, so you couldn't even TRY?—especially because she then proceeds to do basically that for Lórien just a few thousand years later...and of course Galadriel thinks it's Oropher's fault that so many of Lothlórien's elves died in the Last Alliance, because if only he hadn't been so reckless and pig-headed then surely Amdír would never have thought up that idiotic suicidal charge on his own...and if she'd maybe tried a little harder to rein-in the son/nephew of the Kinslayers, maybe Sauron would never have even made the Rings, and Mirkwood would still be Greenwood, which you'll note she can't be arsed to extend her convenient semi-girdle to either...and if he wasn't so damn prideful maybe somebody could help his precious stupid spider-forest...etc etc.

They aren't like. enemies. but they don't really get along anymore, either. They don't talk. (There's a reason the elves of Green/Mirkwood were moving north even before Sauron took up housekeeping in Dol Guldur.) So even though Lothlórien is like maybe a week's walk away, Legolas hasn't actually been here before. And he is stoked! Because he's always wanted to visit, but he didn't want to hurt his remaining dad's feelings by being like "bye, gonna go visit my aunt whom you haven't spoken to in like three thousand years, nbd!" so he never did — but here they are now, and it's part of the Quest, so it's not like Legolas just popped in for a visit, is it? He's doing something that just happened to bring him here, so Thranduil can't take it personally, and...well, here he is! At last! This is awesome! He's so excited to see his aunt's fabled forest!

And then they want to blindfold him!? He's FINALLY in Lórien, and he's not even allowed to look at the place!? This is his aunt's forest, for fuck's sake — he is an elf and a kinsman here, dammit! No wonder he goes from zero-to-sixty re: "golly Gimli don't be so stubborn" => "hOw dARe yOu!?!?!?" when the blindfold is suggested. He's not just pissed, he's taking it personally. Because he's family.

Okay so far so good, but when the Fellowship comes before Celeborn and Galadriel why doesn't anyone say anything about Legolas literally being their nephew, one might ask? Ah! Well, that's because we have Hobbits for our narrators, and they simply don't know elvish family trees well enough to catch that detail. Which is why when Celeborn says "Welcome son of Thranduil! Too seldom do my kindred journey hither from the North," it's perhaps a little more pointed of a statement than the Hobbits know. Celeborn is saying long time no see nephew, how nice of you to visit FINALLY. But Legolas and Thranduil have called themselves "Wood-elves" since moving to Greenwood, so the fact that he's actually half-Noldor just never gets mentioned, because it's not like it's relevant, is it? He doesn't mention being half-Sindar either. He calls himself a Wood-elf because he is a Wood-elf...by adoption. So why would the Hobbits even think to ask?

And we know that Galadriel uses ósanwë on everybody, so why wouldn't she be using it with her own nephew? What better way to have a private family chat, after all? And she doesn't say anything aloud to anyone while Celeborn is greeting everybody else, and it's not like Galadriel really needs to listen to the "hellos" either; perhaps she and Legolas have a little mental confab just the two of them while everybody else is settling in. You could easily write that in, if you wanted to, without breaking any of the existing canon.

After that, we actually have a perfect textural opening for Legolas to go hang with his aunt and uncle some more: while the rest of the Fellowship doesn't see Galadriel and Celeborn again until the Mirror and then their departure, the book says "Legolas was away much among the Galadhrim, and after the first night he did not sleep with the other companions, though he returned to eat and talk with them." So we know that Legolas is going off to hang-out with the Lórien elves...a.k.a. Aunt Galadriel. Probably sleeping in the guest bedroom and pestering her for embarrassing stories about his dads. And maybe asking her for tips on how to talk to dwarves without putting your foot in your mouth since she's clearly got experience.

And no, none of them went in for stuff like gushing hugs when they meet...but if they haven't spoken to one another in a few thousand years, and probably didn't spend all that much time together even before that (Galadriel and Thranduil weren't much in any of the same places after Doriath fell) then they wouldn't likely be all that cuddly with one another anyway, would they? Distant-but-fond seems like the order of the day to me, and you can definitely read their fleeting interactions in the book that way. (A kickass bow potentially strung with your own hair is a great gift for a nephew you don't know well who's about to go off into danger! I bet he could even shoot-down a Ringwraith with a bow like that!) Tense-and-awkward-but-trying-to-be-polite would work too, of course; depends on what kind of drama you want.

So yeah, actually I think it's perfectly reasonable to posit that Galadriel could potentially be Legolas's aunt; I've seen several fics that present Celeborn and Thranduil as cousins or some other close relative, and nobody gets shirty about the canocity of that kinship re: the Lórien scenes, so why wouldn't the connection be just as acceptable to come via Finrod and Galadriel instead? There's nothing in the text that I know of that says it can't be canon.

Anyway, Finrod-as-Legolas's-other-dad wasn't actually meant to be a serious "look how well canon supports this idea, it's definitely a very plausible thing that people should embrace in a wholly serious and canonical manner" theory to begin with. I was just having fun. Somebody said, "hey check out their weird rare ship, it's a lot of fun!" and my brain had a lightbulb moment and went "ooh what if you took that silly fun ship and leaned-in even harder with it, though?" and here we are.

Does a marriage between Thranduil and Finrod actually fit with all the canon of the Silm? I don't know, probably not; then again it might, simply because so much of the Silm is vague, especially when it comes to the elves of Mirkwood who barely even get mentioned once or twice. Personally I prefer having Legolas be born in Mirkwood and to be relatively young for an elf when Fellowship starts (there's no canon about that either way, I just like the vibes of it). However, this ship is a lot of fun too. In fact, I think it's already my favorite idea for an older-Legolas-with-ties-to-important-people take on the character, if that's how you want to take the character, simply because it is so much fun.

Do I think it's canon? No, of course not. But who cares? We're not writing Academic Articles on Accurate Tolkien Scholarship, we're writing fanfiction. We're having fun. So if you're a giggling-with-popcorn anon: good, awesome, glad to have you here enjoying the fun too. If you're a Ship Police Anon...well, acab and farewell because I frankly just do not have the time to give a shit about what somebody else ships or doesn't. Block the tag and move on.

[justanotherpersonsuniverse]

CAP! CAP MY MAIN MAN LITERALLY SCREAMING YOU SURE DO FUCKING LOVE CLIFF HANGERS DON'T YOU? AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

right. right. ok i'll have you know i made fucking notes as i read because i didn't want to miss out on things to scream about

first of all: writing style? yes it is a bit different (and you seem set on making metaphors about boats, i wonder why... has a certain cephalopod game influenced you?? honestly i loved them and it fits nicely because house boat) but i really liked it, dialogue flowed more naturally (not that it was bad in the slightest at all!) so it was interesting to read :))

NOW ONTO MY FUCKING NOTES!

(there is a fucking lot of text after this so be prepared, the "keep reading" thingy doesn't work in asks i checked)

(as a note, whenever i ask very direct questions i am not expecting too many (or any in some cases) answers cause yknow spoilers, i am just very enthusiastically showing all my thought processes because its fun)

"she could feel her powers growing ever day..." ?!?!??! WHAT DOES THIS MEAN?? is there more side affects to the miraculous? is the fact that she literally has the god of destruction constantly near her constantly and uses his powers nearly every day changing how she views things? is she literally growing more powerful in terms strength? multiple powers eg another thing like cataclysm? there are so many things it could mean-

Juleka was legit so fucking sad? the entire time? she is so overwhelmed :( literally talk to someone about it- please- your entire family knows! aaa :(

"so much more than red glitter and black leather" is... is ladybug glittery? does she sparkle? this doesn't matter but i keep imagining her like bedazzled in rhinestones or something else and losing it a little

aww Alix taught small children how to skate! it was in this chapter! also: she swore in a presentation?? i literally cannot swear in front of a teacher, one time i did by accident in a hallway and she legit ran at me

loved Chloes little moment "Wait- was that mean? It was? Oh. I guess I’m- sorry" that was very cute

ah. to quote directly from my notes: "Gabriel used to be Nathalies "best friend" and Emily was her "dearest companion"? Yeah ok that's pretty gay buckaroo, polyamorous relationship, Nathalie and Gabriel are queer platonic, 200k prequel, angst, unhappy ending, major character death" so that amused me greatly

Crows keep showing up... and for a second i wondered if it was related to Rose and was a reference to OM since yknow rose is a grim and crows are also signs of death, but then they popped up again and i'm now suspicious, either i am reading too far into this or they could mean a few things: first thought was they could be related to Juleka and her powers, similar to how cats are attracted to her? or a few other things but i shall keep those theories to myself (see how you like not knowing cap /j) and wait and see for more

"apparently some floats were gonna appear of Paris's heroes. Ladybug, Rena, Queen Bee, Carapace, the lot" i am choosing to believe this is juleka being an unreliable narrator and not that they (the city) forgot about. because that makes me sad.

i also said: "i've decided alyas blog is on tumblr" and something about how that implies the majority of Paris has a tumblr makes me laugh so much

ha, Alix's "SCATTER!" was hilarious, she would do that at the first opportunity, i too would do so at the first opportunity presented

Juleka kicked Horrificators ass?? as Juleka did this with a guitar case?? ain't that thing supposed to be a massive fucker?? either this is just another case of juleka being stronger than she seems to be or this is related to her ominously put growing powers, its always interesting to see how she deals with fights when she isn't in costume, one of the reasons why the drama club chapters were so interesting because Juleka was fighting (maybe not physically all the time but she was fighting) Adam as herself the entire time

"something about it felt different now..." WHAT DO YOU MEAN? HOW DOES THE TRANSFORMATION NORMALLY FEEL VS NOW GIVE ME MORE the real question is it related to "growing powers" (i keep referencing it because it could mean literally so much or nothing) or her attitude, i don't have a direct quote but this isn't my english exam so its fine, it was implied that Juleka is slightly more accepting about the fact that she literally is Panthera (i mean she also said Panthera isn't a real person but like i digress) so maybe thats why it felt different to transform?

panthera just stealing Reversers transport is so fucking funny, all i could think of was the entire hero gang stealing something like idk RogerCops car and just going off in it

that was my last note because i was too invested in seeing what would happen to write thoughts at the same time

agh literally so hype to see what happens next, this chapter was already very action based and very very good :))

WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH IM SO HAPPY YOU ENJOYED!!! THESE NOTES BRING ME SO MUCH JOY!!!!

I love hearing your guys's thoughts, observations, and theories, it brings so much drive and inspiration in my heart. Thank you thank you thank you thank you.

[aspiring-holistic-otaku]

Season 2 Ramble#7 - All About Art

As the title suggests and as you probably guessed, this month's episode is all about art. I'm talking dancing, singing, modeling, drawing, whatever. You name it and surprisingly enough there's probably a manga for it. You can listen in with the link above or check the link in my bio for your preferred platform 🥂

Given the ever growing forms of art, its heavily subjective nature + my very limited perception and so on, I invite my friend Jen onto the show so I don't pigeonhole you all into my views and preferences via my reads.

So how this episode goes down is that the first segment is the usual listicle type beat, alternating between me and Jen, with the usual split of stuff read this month and stuff read before but since it's the two of us I thought I'd save y'all the long talking and have us only give details on the top 1s and kinda just summarize the other stuff we mention. Then for the second segment we'll have a little back and forth interview type beat in place of the usual rambles and then some outtakes from our test calls leading up to the episode to wrap up the whole thing.

Things read this month:

Top 1(me)

Shiori Experience(story & art by Yuuko Osada, ongoing with 66 chapters)

The main premise is that plain Jane highschool teacher Shiori, gets her life flip twisted upside down, when one day she's possessed by the ghost of legendary guitarist Jimi Hendrix. Pretty sweet deal tbh, especially if you're a music fan, which she is, but ofc there's a catch. If she doesn't become a legend before 27 she dies.

Great cast, pretty solid story and the two intersect really well as the main plot is driven by her trying to scrounge up and then develop a band. So it's been pretty balanced so far in that as different members join we get to see them develop individually as well together as a band. Pretty solid story as I said, it draws a pretty good range of emotions out of you but what pushed it to number 1 was definitely the phenomenal art, specifically their illustration of sound. Going from a gentle wave, to an explosive eruption it's really cool to see the different sounds of different bands or even the different songs of the same band. Cannot recommend this manga enough, it truly is an amazing experience.

Two Honourable Mentions:

Blue Giant

Basically this kid wants to be the greatest jazz player in the world, he plays a mean sax and you can maybe kinda think of it as equal but opposite to the movie whiplash. As in yh they both have dudes trying to do the virtually impossible, both facing their fair share of hardships and so on but blue giant just has this super contagious uplifting vibe, especially the main character dai. he's a real one fr.

Smile Down The Runway

This is about fashion and the story revolves around 2 folks, chiyuki a model that's too short and ikuto, a designer that's too broke. Both have dreams of one day making it to the Paris fashion week runway (which starts next month irl btw). Read this pretty late in the month but it was so good I pretty much just blazed through it. Won't say much but the art was amazing and the designs were actually flames.

a manga that was surprisingly good:

Wandance

As the name suggests it's about dancing, largely of the hip hop based variety, they make a lot of cool references to modern artists from dj cream to Freddy Gibbs to Kendrick and basically it's about a dude who finds it hard to speak finding joy in being able to express himself through dance. On that note I gotta mention this month apparently makes 50 years of hip hop, shout out the genre and its offshoots fr but let the record show it all started right here in Jamaica. (It was surprising because for me the art style reminded me of a ton of manga I just didn't like)

a manga I didn't get to but looks cool:

Paradise Kiss

Another fashion manga and that's all I can say

[unfortunately Jen had a lot of emergencies at work and didn't type up anything so I had to just summarize her stuff but you can listen in to hear what she had to say in detail]

Top 1(Jen) - Blue period

Two Honourable Mentions - Sounds of life and PPPPPP

Things read before this month:

Top 1(me)

Blue Period (story & art by tsubasa yamaguchi, ongoing with 61 chapters out in English)

Highschool delinquent yatora makes the last minute and arguably terrible career choice to become an artist. can't fight him though as clinging to a long life unable to be authentic to yourself reeks of misery. In any case the story so far follows him from high school to college, and we take a pretty indepth look at art, what it is and what it means to be good at it. Pretty bold move of the author to be honest.

Also want to mention the author has a self titled 4 chapter collection of short stories that you can check out as well, literally just found out and read earlier today, pretty neat read

Two Honourable Mentions:

Bakuman

Spoke on this last episode so I won't say much but it's a manga about making manga and it was the top one of its section last month

Akane Banashi

Something that was an honourable mention last month, really really good and would have been top 1 in its section of not for bakuman. It's about a traditional Japanese art called rakugo which is basically a one man play, because it's in the honourable mention slot I don't speak much on it but honestly really really really good

[Jen hadn't really read much art stuff before this month but she did mention Barakamon and Rakugo Shinjuu ]

Thanks for listening/reading so far and you can listen in for the little interview and outtakes 🍻

[booksandchainmail]

Pale 2.4

One of the things I thought but didn't end up writing about the last chapter was that it felt more light-hearted than the story has been so far. Less focused on the dangers of the supernatural world, more on the potentials of magic.

I think in most stories, especially ones with young protagonists, this would be the "correct" approach. Stop worrying and planning so much, throw yourself into the new world you've been invited into and the wonders of magic.

Unfortunately for the Kennet Trio, this story is written by wildbow.

“The shitty thing about people is that they’re going to judge you by what you do, not by what you intended.  And I’ve had to deal with that a lot.  And that’s pretty usual.  But when you’re slapped with the label of being an outsider, they’re going to flip it around on you when it’s inconvenient.  They’re going to make their assumptions about what you intended.  People are going to find ways to make you the bad guy.  You don’t get the luxury of meaning well.”

Don't really have a comment on this one, just wanted to note it.

“Revising my stance and statement,” Verona said, quietly.  “I didn’t realize this bothered you this much.  I get that you think I messed up and I’m not sure why or how.  I’m listening.  What was I supposed to do?”

I like this! This is pretty similar to the kind of thing I say in similar circumstances. In general, its pretty easy to misread cues and accidentally hit a sore spot, and having a way to back down is good if you don't want people getting defensive and spiraling.

“More!  Do more!” Lucy raised her voice.  “Do you think this is fun?  No, don’t answer that.  I’ll say it different.  Do you think this is fun for me?” [...] It’s the idea that this will be it for the next however many years we’re alive and together.  Me, being the level-headed one, while the two of you fuck around.  Cleaning up messes, or worse, that one of you will do something and I’d regret it the rest of my life, that I wasn’t paying enough attention or steering you in the right directions. [...] “You said Verona was good and on the ball for one part of one conversation, but where does that leave me?  You guys get to have your fun, but what do I get?  What release or relief or casual fuckups do I get to have?  Did you think that maybe I want to cut loose, but I can’t because I have to watch over you two? 

When people have different levels of how much work needs to be put into a shared responsibility, it's easy to fall into the trap of the person who cares the most doing a lot of work, while the others mostly ignore it because it never hits the level of being a problem for them. When this refers to like household chores, I feel that generally speaking the most conscientious person should be willing to compromise on their standards, rather than hold everyone to that level.

That does not work when the shared responsibility is dangerous magic. Here, if they fuck up they could be dead or worse. Part of the reason that Avery and Verona haven't had to be worried so much about safety is because Lucy thinks of things before they could become a problem (ex putting extra conditions on awakening). And it's easy to think of that as her specialty among the group, in the same way that Verona is more focused on the mechanics of magic than the others. But safety isn't an interest for Lucy, it's a need for all of them.

“It just occurred to me,” Avery said, her back to Lucy, a bit of emotion in her voice, “that we have what?  Ten teachers?  People who’ll go over the Practice and the different places and the types of Other, and who’ll hand us gifts.  But there’s nobody really to go to for advice on this stuff.  We can’t trust any of them.”

This has basically been my take the story, so far, that even if someone's motives are benign that a) there's no way to really tell and b) benign doesn't mean their prioritizing the main characters' safety. On a related note, Lucy POV chapters are always validating for the level of paranoia I'm bringing to this story.

“She does this, when things get tough.  Sometimes it’s a positive step away.  Sometimes she forgets stuff ever happens. "

hmmm! Shutting down and stepping away isn't an ideal reaction to conflict, but not exactly uncommon or necessarily worrying. Losing the memories of it... seems a lot worse. Also a potential upside of having Avery in the group: I get where Verona's coming from of needing to process alone after a disagreement, but Lucy's not wrong that that leaves her without support.

I think Lucy is probably venting a lot of her own emotions at Avery's family, but man is it satisfying to see her not get pushed aside for once.

And there’s usually these really easy explanations I could turn to.  Could it be this?  Or are they racist?  Could it be that?  Or are they hateful, or ignorant, or that fucking pathetic? Give me this one.  One time I can be sure, and I can put it to rest.  Or give me another explanation.  Any other explanation would be better than wondering.

Not to over/misuse the term gaslighting, but this sounds like the societal/systematic equivalent, and an absolute mindfuck, especially because you'd basically never get confirmation after the fact of whether you judged something correctly or not.

“You deserve it all, because you wronged my mom!  You shattered her happiness!” she called out after him.  “You wronged my brother!”

The way this sentence feels like it should go, both in terms of flow and to play into symbolism, is that there should be a third part. But Lucy doesn't add in, "You wronged me."

Lucy went to her aunt, hugging her- clutching her and probably getting blood on her shirt, and began to sob.  When Lucy fell to her knees, her aunt dropped down with her. “Don’t tell my mom,” Lucy managed.

:(

[notquitecogent]

look me in the eye (tell me i'm the one)

At long last, I've finished a WIP.

This is another little Hellcheer joint, featuring Jealous & Pining!Eddie. Angsty (angst-ish?), but it's soft at the end because I can't help myself. Author's Note: I don't condone cheating unless it's done to Jason Carver.

(Also any cherry lip gloss and rum-and-coke references are a tribute to @majicmarker.)

If you see any typos no you didn't. Enjoy below or on Ao3.

TITLE: look me in the eye (tell me i'm the one) PAIRING: Eddie x Chrissy (F/M), Stranger Things s4 RATING: Mature WORD COUNT: ~2,400 CHAPTER COUNT: 1/1 WARNINGS: Infidelity, swearing, implied sexual content, being riddled with self-doubt

He should get used to it, he thinks, as he takes another deep drag of the Marlboro he’s been nursing for entirely too long out here behind Hawkins’ dingiest bar. 

Inside, away from the freezing October air, the other guys are making the most of the break between sets – and by that he means sinking beers, taking a shit, maybe chatting up the entirely disinterested bartender who’s mixing rum-and-cokes with all the enthusiasm of a substitute teacher with a lobotomy. 

Really, he should be doing the same. But Eddie’s got a lot on his fucking mind right now, okay? He’s busy out here, smoking and- and wallowing, trying desperately to pull himself together, to think his way out of the lead weight that sits in his chest whenever his brain fills up with Chrissy Cunningham – which these days is pretty much every five seconds. 

He’s been – what would Wayne call it? – carryin’ on with her for months now; so many inglorious weeks of sneaking around behind her dipshit boyfriend’s back. Maybe that part should weigh the heaviest on his conscience, but Eddie finds hurting Jason Carver ’s feelings only fills him with a petulant sort of glee, like the big kid in the playground holding a much-loved toy above the little kid’s head. Like shoplifting from the gas station on Chainey Avenue where they always overcharge him for cigs. 

Except it’s not like that, not really, because in the end Chrissy still goes back to Jason; still slips the ugly ’86 class ring back on after she’s done fixing her makeup in the trailer’s tiny bathroom, after she’s finished wiping away their come and their kisses from her pretty pink mouth. 

She still goes home to the mansion in the nice part of town and calls upJase on the family telephone; still whispers and giggles and says,“Good night, baby, sweet dreams,” to someone who is in every possible way not Eddie, smiling as Carver tells her he loves her through the handset when the only thing slicking her lips any more is the cherry lip gloss that makes Eddie a little bit sick with how much he loves it (craves it, wants to lick it off her every second of every day).

He’s spiralling again. The cigarette has burned down to the filter, and Eddie has the uncanny urge to fucking eat it; swallow down the toxic little stub and poison himself just a little bit more than he already is. 

He’s been in this mood for weeks, ever since the Homecoming game when he’d had to watch Hawkins High’s King and Queen reach their absolute peak All-American-Dreaminess. The Tigers had won, of course, but Eddie wasn’t there to see it. He’d lasted all of about 20 minutes watching Chrissy’s perky ponytail bouncing around as she cheered her heart out for her golden boy, with his blue eyes and his cover-of-Bop hair and his fucking letterman jacket. 

(Even Henderson had noticed. “You think you’re being subtle, Eddie? You made us fight a clone horde of brainless zombies last week."

“So?” said Eddie insolently.

“They were all named Ja’zon.”)

Fuck, does he have any right to be this bitter? This pathetic? 

He’d made the rules, after all – called the shots. Told her she didn’t owe him anything, didn’t have to pretend this was something it’s not – that they are something they’re not. He wasn’t going to say a fucking word about it to anyone, wasn’t in the business of making her already hard life even harder. 

“Just good things when you’re with me, sweetheart,” he’d said into her hair one day near the start, when she’d looked like she was about to cry from guilt, and he’d cradled her against his chest with soft words and easy promises.“Just good thoughts, ok?” 

He’d kissed her cheek and behind her ear, breathed in her perfume – flowery and sugar-sweet, just like her – and bit his lip so he didn’t cry too. 

God, he was such a fucking martyr. And for what? For the tiny scraps of Chrissy Cunningham’s affection he could snatch whenever she had the time. 

No, that wasn’t fair. 

There was something deeper there, the way she felt about him; he was more than just her shoulder to cry on, more than stress relief or escapism or slumming it or whatever the fuck anyone else would say if they knew. 

Because in between the heady slide of lips and teeth and tongue, in between the hours spent with his fingers or his mouth or his cock between her thighs, after sunset but before dawn, there were these moments. These fragments of her he’d cling onto, when she told him secrets and listened to him ramble on about Scott Ian or Lord of the Rings or a thousand other things that were probably boring her to tears – except she never looked bored, not once. 

(Sort of how he looked when she talked aboutThe Breakfast Club or that brother and sister that won the silver at the Winter Olympics for the first time in, like, 20 years Eddie, it was amazing. Chrissy was obsessed with figure skating, and suddenly Eddie was obsessed with how obsessed Chrissy was with probably the most ridiculous sport he’d ever seen – not that he’d seen all that many sports, but still.) 

So, yeah, she’s never called him baby at 9pm on her parents’ phone, but he knows she likes Pop-Tarts raw instead of toasted (what the fuck), and he knows how she chews the end of her ponytail when she’s deep in thought, and he knows her favourite subject is actually Wood Shop, of all things, because she gets to feel useful, gets to make things. 

Ok, so maybe all of that is surface-level shit; Carver probably knows all of that too. 

But Eddie also knows where to put his tongue to make her come so hard she cries; make her say his name over and over and over as she turns boneless and glowing in his arms – and that’s something Jason’s never had, even if he’s had all of her “I love you”s. 

In fact, what Eddie has is almost better, isn’t it?Almost.

In any case, it’s time to head back inside – he can hear Jeff’s mock-announcer voice over the speaker system: Eddie Munson to the stage please, Eddie Munson – so he crushes the butt under the heel of his Docs and tramps up the stairs past the back room where all their shit is lying on the ground next to a bunch of tapped-out kegs, and that’s what he fucking feels like, actually. Tapped out. 

But duty calls; he can’t let down the five drunks, even if he’s never felt less like whipping out a face-melting solo on Julia. 

Except when he slinks out onto the tiny, sticky stage, it’s not five drunks in the audience – there is a sixth person in the, well, he can’t call it a crowd, but in the room, and she’s never looked more out of place perched on a bar stool next to the Hideout’s usuals, sipping daintily from the straw in her bubbly highball glass. 

Her hair is just this side of strawberry blonde. She’s wearing a cropped pink sweater and a pair of acid-washed jeans and her usual pristine white Reeboks – the undersides of which are almost certainly now coated with god-knows-what from the bar’s sticky floorboards. She looks up at him from under mascaraed lashes and purple eyeshadow, and she winks. 

Chrissy Cunningham is in the building. 

* *

He can barely remember the rest of their set. It’s like his body is possessed – like he’s mainlining electricity as his fingers fly over the fretboard, the blood red pick almost splitting with the force as he strums out the chords. 

He does remember right after they finish; he’s dripping in sweat, and he looks up and Chrissy’s clapping and cheering, beaming up at him like he’s Christmas morning, like he’s birthday cake and the first day of summer and a perfectly rolled joint all at once. 

At least, that’s what it feels like. But maybe she’s just smiling because she’s a smiley sort of girl; maybe she’s just nice, maybe she cares about him just enough not to tear his heart to shreds, and instead she’ll gently fray them with all her niceness until they’re paper thin and useless anyway. (Maybe tearing would have been better. Quicker.)

He lifts Julia over his head and sets her gently on the stand, meets Chrissy’s eye and nods his head toward the back room so she’ll know to meet him there. 

When she almost skips through the door five minutes later, she’s holding a beer, which she hands to him as he grabs his spare T-shirt from his moth-eaten backpack. 

“I thought you might be thirsty,” she half-grins as he takes the cold bottle from her dainty fingers, and her nails have little glittery stars glued to them, because of course they do.

Careful to keep his expression neutral, Eddie just nods, takes a swig, sets the bottle down on the floor as he swaps his sweaty Iron Maiden tour shirt for the homemade one with his demon witch illustration. He had to go all the way to Fort Wayne to get it screen printed, and the store had almost kicked him out when they’d seen the design, looking up at him with burgeoning horror. 

“What are you doing here, Chrissy?” he says (but what he means is, “I can’t keep doing this,” only he doesn’t trust himself to say that, because he’d regret it a second after it leaves his lips – no matter how true it is). 

Chrissy licks her lips as she watches him change, and there’s an odd expression on her face now – the little wrinkle between her brows is back, like she can’t quite figure something out. 

“Are you-” she says, hesitant. 

“Am I what?” he replies, maybe a little sharper than he means, but fuck, he’s in his head now; he can’t stop thinking about her and her stupid boyfriend, the man she’s probably going to marry 18 months from now.

Eddie will spend the next hour or so wrapped in her body, chopping his stupid heart up into tiny little pieces for her to eat at her leisure, and then tomorrow she’ll go and meet Carver for Saturday breakfast and he'll feed her pancakes and kiss her in the sunshine, right in front of everyone, and all the town’s old ladies will smile and coo their approval. Ah, young love, now that takes me back!, they will surely say.

(And it’s not like Eddie’s ever needed the approval of the gossipy, God-fearing townsfolk of Hawkins, Indiana, but maybe, for once, it’d be nice to have it.) 

Chrissy’s face crumples a little in the silence. 

“Are you mad I’m here?” she almost whispers.

He sighs, runs a hand through his hair. “Why would I be mad about that?”

“Was it too much, before? I’m sorry, I’m so embarrassing, I-" She looks like she’s going to cry. “I shouldn’t have come.” 

He turns to look at her properly, and all his resolve splinters. She's really broken up; biting her lip, eyes downcast, like she’s hurt him on purpose or something. 

He can’t help it; he closes the distance between them, folds her up in his arms – god, he probably reeks even with the new shirt – and ducks his head so he can rest his cheek against hers.

“I’m not angry, Chrissy, really – I… Why did you come?” he says softly. 

She sniffles a little. “I-I wanted to see you, I couldn’t wait.” 

“Couldn’t wait for what?” he says, pressing a tiny kiss to the corner of her eye, just brushing his lips there, next to the butterfly wing beat of her eyelashes. He’s cupping the back of her lovely head, and it fits against his palm like it was always meant to rest there.

“I had to tell you,” she says, and there’s a desperate sincerity in her voice.

Oh fuck. 

She’s not… She couldn’t be. They’d been careful; God knows Wayne had given him enough lectures about gettin’ a girl in trouble over the years – had left a pack of Trojans discreetly in Eddie’s bedside drawer the day he turned 16. 

Mentally, he’s already calculating how much gas he’ll need for the drive to Indianapolis, to the clinic with the white doors where he’d taken Shayna, their neighbour on the side that wasn’t the Mayfields', last summer (not like that; she couldn’t tell her dad, and she didn’t have any other friends with a car). 

“Being real cryptic tonight, Cunningham,” he says quietly, heart in his absolute throat. 

Except… Chrissy had looked so happy before now; seemed so excited to tell him. His mind races. Maybe they can work it out? He’ll get a job at the plant with Wayne, play more gigs –paying gigs – on the weekends, save up enough to trade the van for something safer, something with an actual back seat where they can clip in a baby carrier. She can still go to college. If the next few words out of her mouth are what he thinks they’ll be- 

They aren’t. 

“I broke up with Jason,” says Chrissy, and there’s a quiver in her voice, but it doesn’t break.  

Oh shit.

It takes a second to sink in, but then Eddie feels like a fucking firework. He can’t believe it. He must have heard her wrong. He exhales shakily over her skin, presses a kiss underneath her ear. 

“Really?” he whispers, and his lovesick heart is tramping a drumline inside his ribcage, like it’s going to burst out of his chest and climb inside hers instead. 

“Really,” she whispers back, and she tilts her chin to kiss him properly – to press her lips against his, to slide her tongue between and make him even more crazy for her than he already is. 

A blissful moment, then he pulls back, rests their foreheads together. “What does that mean?”

“Huh?” says Chrissy, eyes still glassy. She’s staring at his mouth. 

Eddie sighs again, rubs a thumb over her kiss-swollen lips. 

“Are you going to run away to Chicago now, like we talked about? College girl in the big city… ”

She smiles, kisses his fingertip, and her next words make all his dreams come true. 

“Only if you’ll come with me.”