#most of them are just kinda begrudgingly trying to get him to go to therapy

[beeceit]

"every f!leo hates their little leo" is a misconception. MNMC Leon who said he wouldn't care if Leo died (BLUFFING) is a statistical outlier and shouldn't have been counted

[maniacwatchestheworld]

Harvey and Two-Face Twitter headcanons

I feel like following Harvey Dent's Twitter would be a WILD time!

Like at first, Harvey's Twitter is probably a pretty decent thing to follow if you're living in Gotham or are interested in Gotham-related current events or politics. As a public figure, Harvey feels obligated to help people in his community that follow him on Twitter to know what's going on and how to make informed decisions on it, and so posts information on events happening in Gotham with as little bias as he can. When he does say his opinions online, he's very succinct, and usually makes a good point even if you don't agree with his opinions. Mix that in with a few personal posts, and it's not a bad account to follow at all, and for that he gets a decent following (more than you'd expect for a public figure at his level at least). But every once in a while he would post something that seems to come completely out of left field or things that would make everyone following him think, "Is... Is he okay...? Did someone hack his account...?" But most of those posts would get deleted and no one would think anything of them...

That is until the days leading up to the acid attack. Harvey just seems to be making some of the most unhinged posts out there during what is clearly a very stressful time of his life. And then the attack happens and it is A Time watching Harvey literally go insane in real time (thankfully everyone can tell that Harvey isn't actually reading anything going on on Twitter as he's starting his criminal career and is only posting, probably too busy to actually respond much and therefore isn't paying attention to the wide array of assholes who want to encourage his mental breakdown). If he responds to anything during this time, it's mostly to people trying to heckle him into telling everyone his supervillain schemes which he responds to in the equivalent of a "lol nope!" He goes completely silent for a time as he gets caught and sent to Arkham for the first time.

Eventually things settle down for him, and after he makes a proper return to Twitter, he apologizes for worrying anyone, and surprisingly things kinda go back to normal as far as his feed is concerned. It's a lot more personal posts these days, but he still does occasionally discuss politics and current events... That is until Two-Face decides that he wants to start posting too!

There's a whole saga as Harvey and Two-Face go back and fourth with whether Two-Face should be allowed to post on there or not! Two-Face posts something absolutely random/unhinged, only for Harvey to later delete it. Two-Face complains, Harvey snaps back. And all of it is public on their Twitter! After a while people start calling for Harvey to let Two-Face post! The posts might be unhinged, but hey! Sometimes he makes a good point! Harvey should let him speak!

After a LONG back and fourth of Harvey refusing, he eventually agrees to let Two-Face post on his Twitter. (Two-Face REFUSES to make his own account to post on because he wants to be verified.) He's not happy about it, but as long as Two-Face doesn't do anything that breaks Twitter's TOS, he begrudgingly lets him post.

But it's not like the ride gets any less wild just because they're not constantly fighting about whether or not Two-Face should be allowed to post on here anymore!

For a while people would complain that it's hard to tell when Two-Face is posting vs when Harvey is posting. Sometimes it's easy to tell. like if the post is exceedingly boring, that's probably Harvey. But sometimes it's not as clear-cut. On the ones where it's harder to tell, people would make comments betting on who it is. A reliable way to tell used to be that Two-Face would write his tweets entirely in CAPS LOCK, but after he got some anger management therapy, he started doing it less. And the fact that Harvey would sometimes post in caps lock when he's excited or very upset (like most normal people do) did NOT help things. So they started signing off with either their names or a shortened versions of them. But they quickly got bored of that, and with the limited characters, Two-Face didn't like that he would have to sign off with two letters instead of 1 like Harvey. (Harvey would sign off with "-H" while Two-Face would sign off with "-2f") These days, they tend to sign off with different emojis, sometimes matching with the theme of the post. (If it's a white circle, it's probably Harvey. A black circle, it's probably Two-Face. A full moon, it's probably Harvey. A new moon, it's probably Two-Face. Something pointing up, it's probably Harvey. Something pointing down, probably Two-Face. If it's anything that has two things in it, it means that they co-wrote and posted the tweet.)

It's an ongoing inside joke of sorts on their Twitter that the other rogues try picking on them because they're jealous of the fact that he's verified and they aren't! (Harvey was a District Attorney and may have run for Mayor. He was a public figure and is therefore verified. He's been verified since before he became a supervillain.) It is not uncommon for other rogues to complain about not being able to be verified and for Harvey and Two-Face to slide into the replies to laugh at them for it. It's also not uncommon for people to just go onto Twitter just like, "TWO-FACE IS VERIFIED!??? HOW!????" and the people following them are always surprised to see that Harvey always seems to have some new snide comment to say to such people.

[trainer-sean]

So, Here's My Pokemon And How I Met Them.

-I First started my Journey at 14, but i received a Litten from Prof. Carver, the same jerk that signed me up into his travels to Paldea as his Assistant, when I was Ten, due to the two ages being different, for a starter pokemon, and traveling on a journey.

-Marshall, my now Incineroar, is a mighty fella, and kinda flamboyant, but he's mostly stoick and calm, he really took after me, some times I'm unreadable with a resting b-face and people think I'm upset, other times I'm kinda hyper and restless, Marshall took that up as well.

-My Turtonator, Gamala(at grandpa's, went looking for a turtle pokemon due to Turtle fixation, found a Turtonator that was released by a trainer, struggling to get up after a fight with local water types, shes mostly just there, observing, sitting, and anticipating i think)

-Picto the Smeargle(had a fixation on being a Artist, and happened to run into a Smeargle painting on the back wall of a restaurant. IT. HAD. LEGENDARY. ATTACKS, SECRET SWORD AND SPACIAL REND, AND EVEN INFERNAL PARADE, AND THAT AN EXTINCT MOVE FROM AN EXTINCT REGIONAL VARIANT! No clue how, no clue why, sketch metronome tactics? saw the legendarys in question? He's also a smug little guy, ticks me off at times with how he behaves)

-Fuuma the shiny Ninjask(Nincada outbreak, Ninjask kept messing with me, accidently flung a Luxury ball at one, a shiny, no less. He's a stinker if I've ever known on, always messes with something, I've have berry's launched at from dive bombs more times then I can count)

-Sami the shiny Purrloin(went to find a wild cat pokemon due to liking cats, found a rather Troublesome Purrloin, a shiny that was causing a mess with local dog pokemon, did not end well, two weeks in the pokemon center, lifesaving treatments. was grateful, but begrudgingly, changed her tune when she was given free housing, food, water, and a warm spot to sleep, broke down crying, given a Friend ball. Really Tsundere if I've ever known one)

-Varian the Sylveon(one of dads Jolteon's kids, very troublemaking, gets very aggressive and sadistic in battle, will disable an opponent swiftly and mercilessly, but demanding of attention, he's an attention hog, and I'm pretty sure its not because he's lonely)

-Hyde the Hydreigon(due to a previous incident that involved a pokemon hunter and Rayquaza, one of the Hunters Pokemon was accidently freed when it pokeball broke, and ran wild for a bit, quickly disabled it with Varian, and caught it in a spare Friend ball after helping Rayquaza by using my Dad's Keystone to help it mega evolve. It has calmed down, as much as a Hydreigon can be calm, but he behaves, mostly when Sylveon is keeping an eye on him. he was most likely Competitively bred from what I can tell. Though he had to go through some body therapy due to be drugged, along with the Hunters other pokemon, so they could even fight Rayquaza. He tries to not show affection, even snarls when I try petting him, but he's never actually attacked, even when I continue petting, he'll just stare at me until he starts to fall asleep.)

I caught everyone besides Hyde before I even set out on my journey. They've all been great companions and family. I am now 22, and am being forced to act as Prof. Carver's assistant because he thinks I'll do great as a Professor one day. I didn't even finish my Gym Circuit in Unova, I only collected 5 badges before I got bored and started exploring, before heading home.

[sugaruapologist]

Ok these are my Levi headcannons HAHA. It's not organized by any means and its a mix of post war Levi and Survey Corps Levi. Most of these are baseless, just things that i think he would like or do.

• All SFW!!

* really likes to collect art pieces and candles he stumbles upon

* is interested in learning to play music. I see him with a piano and violin

* loves cats.

* bc he loves cats, he cares for the strays he finds and leaves food out for them if he can

* would probably try his hand at painting if he had the time

* better at decorating than people give him credit for. he'd be into the darker decor but knows just where to put things to keep it neat yet interesting. never looks cluttered or out of place

* would probably have loved to live in a cottage after the war had they not discovered the existence of the rest of the world

* would probably even love gardening

* spends a lot of time post war in his garden and tending to it if his leg allows him

* if not his garden, has lots of plants that he waters

* secretly names his plants

* rescues plants that arent being nurtured correctly at a shop and nurses it back to health himself

* can see him being a fantastic cook

* but not a very talented baker. maybe just the basics like simple cookies and brownies

* in his garden, grows strains of tea leaves to make his own tea blends

* after the war, spends SOOO much time reading, especially science and history.

* because of him reading science books, learns the names and positions of constellations and stargazes frequently

* may even invest in a telescope

* takes trips to the beach with the other survivors every year, even if all he does is sit in the shade and read with tea

* gripes about how messy the beach is but secretly loves the memories made every year and how his friends (family) are happy and excited

* loves to go out in public and people-watch

* maybe now that the war is over, he can try his hand at painting even more

* if he gets good enough at it, would do portraits of his fallen friends (incl. Eren)

* very good at fixing clothes and refitting them

* shoes too

* extremely prestigious about keeping his hands and nails neat and clean at all times

* wears gloves when hes cooking because he doesnt want his hands to get messy

* may write a book about his life and the things hes experienced

* talks in great detail about the friends he made in the Survey Corps

* still goes horseback riding if he can, but struggles because of his leg, so doesn't go as often as he wants to.

* Tends to the local horses sometimes though, because he kinda misses the stables at HQ

* takes Gabi and Falco to museums "to give them something to do out of the house" but really because he wants to learn about the world that has now been opened up to him

* kept his survey corps gear and uniform as a keepsake to remind himself where it all started and what had to be sacrificed.

* keeps said gear in pristine condition

* does eventually go to therapy!!! but only bc everyone forced him to

* begrudgingly goes but will never admit that it helps

* of he doesnt write a book about his lived experiences, he writes in a journal every day as a way to talk to Hange and Erwin. It keeps him grounded

[ectonurites]

idk how to quote tags on mobile where is the conner kent essay i NEED it

ALRIGHT OKAY! here’s 5k+ words plus panels & screenshots of me comparing and contrasting the two drastically different versions of Superboy (comics vs young justice cartoon) and going over what makes them such distinctly separate characters. someday i’ll refine this a bit more its kinda just a word dump that’s been living in my brain that i wanted to actually articulate after i read through Reign of the Supermen but here we go:

--

Pretty frequently I see the question “Why is Superboy so different in the Young Justice cartoon?” float around in DC circles. I think there are two main approaches to answering this:

Why did the writers of the cartoon decide to create a very different version of Superboy?

What factors make this Superboy so different from the comic version?

For the first approach the answer is relatively straight-forward, from the start Young Justice as a cartoon was never meant to be a direct adaptation of the comics. They just used the title and a few elements so they could create their own approach to the DC universe with a focus on younger heroes. For example, Artemis Crock in their show is also COMPLETELY different from her comic counterpart, Zatanna is aged way down to be a member of the teen team, and Kaldur’ahm was created for this show (and integrated into the comics as Jackson Hyde). They were always trying to do different things than the main comics universe, so them making a different version of Conner also makes sense. Their approach to him is also very clearly influenced more by how he appeared in the Teen Titans comic run that was still coming out as Young Justice started airing (his design, and some other elements we’ll discuss along the way), as opposed to his original version from the 90′s/the Young Justice comic.

So the basic “why” is that from the start they wanted to create something unique to their universe, which they definitely did accomplish.

The much more interesting subject to dive into, though, is looking at the differences in Superboy’s story that contribute to him becoming such a different person. 

The drastic changes made to the following factors are what I view as the main source of his differences in personality/outlook/characterization:

The conditions and history of the world at the time he is introduced

The circumstances around him being introduced/leaving Cadmus

The reaction Clark has to him and how their relationship starts

The people he first interacted with & became close to, and how he interacts with the world

The timing of him finding out about his connection to Luthor

The State of the Worlds

In the comics, Superboy is first introduced in Adventures of Superman #500 by iconically saying “Don’t ever call me Superboy!” 

during a 1993 event called “Reign of the Supermen”, a follow up to the 1992 event “The Death of Superman”. Based on the title of the 1992 event, I think you can, uh, guess what one major difference in the setting here was vs. the state of the world at the time he was introduced in the cartoon. Obviously Clark didn’t stay dead forever, but Superboy first comes onto the scene as a young clone of Superman who insists he is the new Superman (one of the four characters trying to do so during the event). This is in the main DC universe in the early 90’s, which means that heroes in general, including teen heroes, aren’t a new thing! Not only has the Justice League been around for a while but so has the Teen Titans. Once Clark is alive again, Superboy goes off on his own to establish himself as an individual teen hero. 

So how is that different in the cartoon?

In the cartoon, Superboy is first introduced in the pilot episodes “Independence Day” and “Fireworks” 

on the 4th of July in (what most people consider to be) 2010. This was supposed to be the day that Robin (Dick Grayson), Speedy (Roy Harper), Kid Flash (Wally West), and Aqualad (Kaldur’ahm) would get to see the true Justice League HQ at the Hall of Justice, which... doesn’t go exactly as planned. 

In this world, superheroes are a newer thing, this is something that the creators have talked about before. At this point, while there is an established Justice League, there are no known teams of teen superheroes. Just the fact that as of season one Dick Grayson is still Robin is a pretty good indicator that this world is early in it’s time with a Batman. Now, the sidekicks aren’t a secret, as they appear very publicly in this first episode, but they are almost always seen acting with their mentors at this point. Again, there is no Teen Titans in this setting, and there never has been. 

So when they do form the first teen hero team? It is kept covert-ops. They do not publicize that they act as a superhero team, and the members who weren’t already publicly known heroes (mainly Miss Martian and Superboy) end up being pretty… unknown to a lot of the world outside the hero/villain community! Again their existence is not strictly kept a secret, but they keep the fact that there’s a team of minors who are heroes going on independent missions VERY under the radar on purpose. Thus, those who aren’t going around doing super public hero activities just don’t have nearly as much of a presence.

So to summarize:

In the comics, Superboy is immediately put in a spotlight (he befriends a reporter and is all over tv and literally trademarks the name Superman) becoming known to the world and establishes himself as a solo acting hero YEARS before joining any teams.

In the cartoon, Superboy is kept relatively out of the spotlight, immediately becomes part of a covert-ops team and doesn’t act solo very often. The well known teen heroes in this setting are sidekicks working under a mentor, and Superboy does not actually act as a sidekick.

What does this mean for Superboy?

Superboy in the comics gets to, right away, act on his own and get a taste of what being Superman is like. In the cartoon, he’s brought into the world at a time where there already is a Superman. I think back to this bit from the therapy episode, where he says:

“See, from the moment I first opened my eyes in that Cadmus pod, there’s been one thing I’ve wanted, and feared. To know what it is to be Superman.”

Comics Superboy started out getting to do that! He immediately got a shot at filling that role, and he then makes the choice to relinquish it back to the original once he’s alive again. He (begrudgingly at first) understood that it wasn’t yet his time to be Superman, and knows he’ll someday fill those shoes for real- but in the meantime being Superboy is gonna be his own thing and he’ll embrace it and make it work.

Cartoon Superboy is left in a shadow, not ever truly knowing what it’s like to fill those shoes (except in a doomsday scenario training exercise gone awry that he then just feels intense guilt over). This leaves him a lot more frustrated and lost, and I think is a major contributor to how angry this version of Superboy is compared to his much more ‘chill go with the flow’ attitude in the comics.

Cadmus

In the comics, in that same issue he’s introduced, we find out that Superboy broke out of his cloning tube prematurely and left Cadmus with the assistance of the second Newsboy Legion, who also gave him his first leather jacket, before the programming that would allow Cadmus to control him was implemented.

He quickly gets up to speed with the situation, that Clark is dead. So he comes on the scene starting to save people and saying he is Superman, or at least the clone of the original one. A major thing that does influence his character here is the fact that… this is the 90���s. He is designed around the idea of what is ‘cool’ back in 1993. (look, even his original character design sheets call him cool)

So right off the bat he’s got a stereotypical ‘cool teen guy in that era’ personality, which is often played for comedy to add a little lightness to some of the dark things happening during this event. 

Anyways, he has left Cadmus, he’s acting on his own, and he starts realizing that his powers aren’t exactly the same as Superman’s over the course of the Reign of the Supermen story.

After the main conflict is settled and Clark is fully alive and acting as Superman again, the two of them end up going back to Cadmus to find out what the exact deal is with him. I’ll go into this more in a later point, but they find out he’s not exactly a clone of Superman (or Lex- him being actually involved as a DNA donor is a retcon that happened a decade later). They agree to let someone from Cadmus (Dubbilex- the grey guy with the horns in this pic) leave Metropolis with him, as he sets out on a press tour to establish himself as Superboy now that he relinquished the trademark on the Superman name back to Clark. 

Let’s pause and look at how this is different in the cartoon.

In the cartoon, when the trio of Robin, Kid Flash, and Aqualad decide to prove themselves to their mentors they run off on their own to attend to a fire at Project Cadmus when the Justice League got called off to do something else. Upon arriving, they accidentally uncover some weird things about Cadmus, like the crazy amount of sublevels, the creatures roaming around, and the fact that it’s not on the main power grids. They eventually find Superboy, still in his cloning tube. They break him out, but then get captured themselves.

When they are then put into tubes by Cadmus personnel, they manage to convince Superboy to help free them by promising him things like getting to meet Superman, and see the moon. The group of four now working together manages to escape from the building and it topples down, where they are then greeted by the Justice League who are Not Happy.

Superman flies away shortly after, and the group of kids explain to their remaining mentors that sure, they disobeyed orders, but they accomplished something good here, and they are going to keep doing it, whether the League likes it or not. The compromise is the formation of The Team, to be covert-ops while the Justice League acts publicly, and the boys are joined by Miss Martian.

So to summarize:

In the comics, Superboy leaves Cadmus pretty independently (with some assistance) to go act on his own as a hero immediately. He returns to Cadmus later for more information, and they reveal truths to him about his existence. After he knows his truth, he goes off to continue establishing himself as a solo hero but lets Cadmus still supervise what he’s doing through Dubbilex.

In the cartoon, Superboy is rescued from Cadmus by Robin, Kid Flash, and Aqualad, without knowing pretty much anything about himself besides the fact that he is a clone of Superman, and is immediately put on the covert ops team. 

What it means for Superboy:

Comic Superboy goes to act on his own, even after he admits he’s not the real Superman anymore. Yes he’s not 100% alone in terms of ‘he’s got people (Rex, Roxy, Dubbilex, Tana) around him’, but as a hero he’s a solo act and ends up taking residence in Hawaii. In the cartoon, by joining a team right away, he’s taking on a very different style of being a hero, especially because the team itself is covert-ops. Rather than regularly saving the day all on his own much like Superman, which can help comic Superboy feel like he’s still living up to the name more, cartoon Superboy is working under the radar in a group setting, while still wanting to desperately fill those Superman shoes. 

He is overconfident in his abilities and wants to be the hero he was created to be, so him being put into this very different type of superhero situation is another major contributor to the frustration/anger. Even later on when comics Superboy is part of forming the Young Justice team, they were never a secret covert-ops team, they were always publicly known. (hell, a reporter is the one who gave them the team name Young Justice because he’d misheard Bart)

Superboy & Superman

In the comics, as we have established, Clark was dead at the time Superboy first came on the hero scene. Clark comes back to life, during a little bit of a lull in the middle of the huge conflict. He immediately accepts that Superboy is one of four who came forward to try to replace him, and one of the only two (Superboy & Steel) who genuinely only had good intentions in doing so. Clark, Steel, Supergirl, Hal Jordan, and Superboy then all work together in the big battle against the Cyborg Superman.

Once things are settled, Clark is curious about him, and where he came from and his origin, so they end up going to Cadmus together with Guardian and learning more about him, as I previously mentioned. Once it is established that Superboy is in fact a metahuman clone who was created to mimic Superman, but is not actually a clone of him, Superman still accepts him and thinks he’s earned his right to continue using the ’S’ shield and have the name of Superboy. 

They part ways so Superboy can go on his press tour, but in general they have pretty positive interactions where they mutually respect each other! Not too much later in the comics even (I forget exaaactly when this happens but it’s definitely before the 1998 Young justice comic), Superman is the first one to give Superboy a real name, “Kon-El”, something he is so happy about he literally cries.

How is this different in the cartoon? 

When the boys first escaped, and Superboy first meets the Justice League, Clark is standoffish. Other members of the league need to nudge him over to go actually talk to Superboy, and it’s not much of a conversation before he flies off and away, leaving Superboy frustrated and alone.

This… turns into the standard for almost the entire first season. Other characters constantly telling Clark that he needs to reach out and be support for the boy (like in this iconic diner scene with Bruce and Clark), but Clark consistently being too freaked out by the fact that someone made a clone of him without his knowledge to properly accept Conner. While this does over time get better, this being the immediate reaction when Superboy is brand new in the world definitely… has an impact! 

He is rejected by the person he idolizes, and feels neglected and abandoned, and definitely kinda overcompensates with ego to try to make up for it. 

So:

In the comics, Superman and Superboy work together from the start, not falling into a hero/sidekick situation but rather acknowledging each other as individual heroes with respect for one another. They grow to see each other as family much faster, and little tension between them. A crucial difference in situations, though, is that at the time these versions first meet Superboy is not actually a clone of Superman.

In the cartoon, Superman at first avoids Superboy, and does not offer guidance or mentorship or anything the boy needs. It is clear that he wants to work with Superman and be like him, since it was what he was created to do. It takes a lot of time for Clark to accept Conner in this setting, and there is a lot of tension for the first several months Conner exists. (they seem to settle this towards the end of season 1/during the gap between season 2, but it still has it’s impact on who Conner is early in his life)

What does this mean?

I feel like this is another major factor that contributes to Conner being so angry all the time in the cartoon, he feels immediately rejected by the person he’s supposed to be someday, rather than accepted by him. Again, very different from how comics Superboy got a chance to be Superman, and a chance to then work with the real deal as equals. 

Friendships, Relationships and Identity

When Superboy is freed by the second Newsboy Legion, it’s primarily out of a ‘we’re clones who are stuck here, but you need to be out there, you’re what Metropolis needs right now!’ kind of idea. The first person he actually becomes close to is a reporter named Tana Moon.

Tana and Superboy’s relationship is… bad once it actually becomes romantic due to their huge age difference (she’s around 23, he is for all intents and purposes 16), but during the Reign of the Supermen where they’re still just friends for the most part, it’s not as bad. Tana becomes the GBS correspondent who focuses on everything Superboy (at this time still insisting he is the new Superman) is doing as a hero, and they become close friends.

GBS then also brings in Rex Leech (and his daughter Roxy) to be his agent, to promote Superboy and manage things for him. Rex is exploitative as hell, but Roxy does become another really important person to Superboy. These characters along with Dubbilex are his main supporting cast at the start of his solo comic when he’s in Hawaii.

In this whole era, Superboy is pretty much a celebrity. He’s cool, he’s a superhero, and I think it’s very notable he does not have a secret Identity. For a decent chunk of time, he is always just ‘Superboy’ (until, as I mentioned earlier, Clark gives him the name Kon-El. Even so, he doesn’t adopt a regular secret identity [Conner Kent, although he actually used a different one, Carl Grummett, before that!] until he begins living with the Kents in the early 2000s). By the time he joins any teams, Kon is pretty damn confident in who he is as a hero and has a relatively good grasp on who he is in general, if anything he’s a little too confident.

Young Justice was created in the aftermath of World Without Grown Ups when the trio of Superboy, Robin (Tim Drake) and Impulse (Bart Allen) had teamed up. After they saved the day they realized they worked well together and formed their team, utilizing the old Justice League base in Mount Justice. They were eventually joined by more members, especially relevant here is Wonder Girl (Cassie Sandsmark) who Kon later dates for a portion of the Teen Titans run that these four are in after Young Justice ends. 

The four of them become close, and when Kon dies during Infinite Crisis it rips a hole in everything they had established growing up together over the past several years (Cassie joins a cult dedicated to bringing him back, Tim tries to clone a new Kon, Bart got aged up and took on the mantle of the Flash, etc) and Bart’s death that followed similarly shook the remaining Cassie and Tim. This group eventually does get to reunite, with Kon and Bart coming back during Final Crisis, solidifying how even things like death don’t keep them apart for long. It’s hard to look at the comic book versions of these four characters and imagine how they would be without their connections to each other... until you look at the YJ cartoon and see a world where they’re not even all part of the same generation, let alone a friend group.

Now in the cartoon…

The first people Conner primarily interacts with are Dick, Wally, Kaldur, and M’gann, along with the League members who interact with The Team pretty regularly, Red Tornado, Batman, and Black Canary. He’s shown to be friends with the other memebers of the team and get along with them relatively well, but in general he’s not much of a social person. 

Much like in the comics, Superboy is considered very attractive, and immediately upon their meeting, M’gann is interested in him. Very, very interested in him.

At first it definitely does seem more just like an innocent crush, but it’s later revealed to be a little more… concerning than that. As in ‘Megan subtlety influencing Superboy to become her dream boyfriend based on a TV show she likes’ concerning. Like… she literally gives him the name ‘Conner’ after the TV show character that was the boyfriend of the character she bases her human self and entire identity on. The two date and once that becomes a thing, a lot of their plot lines in the following seasons revolve around the ups and downs of their relationship.

In general in this show, Superboy doesn’t really get much of a chance to establish himself on his own terms. Within months of him leaving his cloning pod, he and M’gann start going to high school with secret identities, so he’s already having to hide who he truly is to blend in with other people, before he even knows who he truly is. 

So to compare:

In the comics, Superboy gets to figure out who he is as Superman’s Clone/Superboy very publicly, has multiple love interests and a celebrity status, and over time becomes part of a tight-knit group of friends. He doesn’t use a regular secret identity for the first several years he’s active.

In the cartoon, Superboy has one love interest with a very large impact on him, not nearly as much focus is given to his other friendships, and he immediately adopts a secret identity meaning he needs to hide who he is from the start. 

What it means:

These factors play a big difference in his attitude, particularly highlighting how extroverted his comic version is and how introverted his cartoon version is. Comic Superboy never really needed to hide who he was until years into his career, vs being told to do so early on in his life. When you get used to needing to hide things so early, that can definitely lead to being more private/disconnected from others. Also somewhat related- in the comics, when Kon is given knowledge in his cloning tube, more pop culture got included. He mentions knowing Star Wars without having seen it, and references a ton of TV and Movies, vs the cartoon version of him that seems to have been given a lot of history of the world but not the current fun stuff. It’s the difference between knowing what’s going on in the world and what’s popular, vs only knowing the past and what’s fundamental. Not knowing pop culture like this can also really contribute to feeling alienated and lead to introversion. (I just... I think about how in the comics Kon’s favorite TV show is Wendy The Werewolf Stalker, in the cartoon Conner just... watches white noise static)

Also, having a completely different set of friends with different personalities has a big effect, people are always gonna be influenced by the people they’re close to to some extent. Bumping Conner up to Dick’s generation of heroes instead of Tim’s not only gives him completely different friends, but it also puts him in this position of being one of the ‘Original Team Members’. By this I mean, a member of the first iteration of the only teen team, one of the people that younger heroes coming onto the scene and joining the team in later seasons see as an experienced and older team member to look up to (despite the fact that cartoon Conner is permanently 16- they never fixed that for him like in the comics). That just creates a different dynamic entirely, because in the comics even when the Tim/Kon/Cassie/Bart group are more experienced on their team late in the Teen Titans run, they are still always going to have heroes like Dick Grayson, Donna Troy, Wally West etc as the older generation of ‘original teen heroes’ who came before them.

Also, while I am talking mostly about in-universe reasoning here, I do wanna bring up one slightly more meta reason that might also have contributed to them choosing to go for a more ‘introverted brooding hero’ characterization with him: the fact that their version of Wally already filled the ‘flirty jokey’ archetype original Comics Kon fits into. Having two characters like that in the show from the start would definitely get... overwhelming. And at the time this show was first airing, in the comics, he was relatively devoted to Cassie and not nearly as flirty anymore anyways.

Lex Luthor / Details of Cloning

In the comics, as I have already mentioned and will now actually explain, when Superboy was first introduced he was not the clone of Superman and Lex Luthor as we know him to be today. Kon was a metahuman clone, made with the DNA of Paul Westfield who worked at Cadmus, that they genetically altered to look like Superman, and gave powers based on the energy aura they discovered to exist around Clark’s dead body. This telekinetic field gave Kon the distinct powers he had for his first decade of existence: His Tactile Telekinesis (often referred to by him as TTK)

Lex Luthor was originally not directly involved in his creation, but he was aware that it was going on as is revealed during the Reign of the Supermen arc. Kon’s TTK allowed him to mimic Superman’s flight and strength, but not all of his powers. TTK also gave him powers Superman DOESN’T have, such as his ability to dismantle machinery or mold materials he is touching into different shapes. (The reason this is called Tactile Telekinesis is because there needs to be a tactile element, he needs to be touching the things) 

It is not until 2003, a decade after Superboy was created, that writer Geoff Johns in his Teen Titans run decided to alter Superboy’s origin. He established that Lex Luthor had been the real human DNA donor and that Superman’s Kryptonian DNA was actually used in the cloning process. Around this time, Conner also begins to exhibit more of the typical Kryptonian powers, like Clark did around this age. 

This information is at first only known by Conner and Tim, because the email had actually been sent to Tim directly. The two keep it a secret as Conner was not ready to tell the rest of the team, because he fears the implications it has, and is afraid of becoming evil or being rejected. This revelation about Lex being one of his ‘parents’ DNA-wise coming years into his hero career changes a lot of things for Conner, and makes him begin to question who he is. Unfortunately, Lex does at one point take control of Conner and force him to break Tim’s arm and attack Cassie directly (as well as the rest of the team, but these two specifically are what Conner expresses the most guilt over after the fact). This era of Conner in the comics is where he’s definitely closest to his cartoon counterpart, because he’s very troubled and dealing with a lot of heavy stuff regarding himself as a person. Yet there’s still traces of who he has always been in there. I mean, if you’re only familiar with cartoon Conner, can you really imagine his final words as he’s dying after saving the world being “Isn’t it cool?”

Now, looking at the cartoon…

Conner finds out about his connection to Lex in November, only a few months after having existed outside of a cloning tube. He finds it out on his own, from Lex speaking to him directly, after Conner went back to investigate the remains of Cadmus and ended up having a fight with Match (another clone who is able to pass for Conner’s duplicate who they… their version of Match is another thing they drastically changed from the comic version but as we’ve established that’s something they like to do so I’m not gonna dwell on it).

In the cartoon, Conner’s powerset is, from the start, different from both Superman and comic Superboy. Here he has heightened senses and strength and the ability to leap really far, but he lacks actual flight and some of the other standard Kryptonian powers, and has no TTK. The cartoon explains these gaps in his powers as being due to his half human DNA, and they introduce these patches that are able to suppress his human DNA and give him temporary access to full powers. Lex uses these patches as a way to manipulate him. Much like in the comics, Lex has a code word programmed into Conner that effects him, although it isn’t quite used for the same amount of ‘total mind control’, and he doesn’t get fully brainwashed and turn against the team or anything. Instead, the code word (here “Red Sun” rather than “Aut vincere, aut mori” [Translated as “to conquer or die" / "victory or death”]) just leaves him stuck in a hypnotic trance.

So:

In the comics, Kon finds out after years of believing he was a metahuman clone who was given powers to mimic Superman, that he is actually a clone of Lex Luthor and Superman, which alters his entire perspective on himself! This causes him to become a lot more unsure and anxious about who he is, in stark contrast with how confident he was before. There are still traces of his old self within him, but this is a development in his character that influences him moving forward, making him a bit more serious but still at his core the same person he used to be.

In the cartoon, Conner finds out after months of thinking he was a clone of just Superman, that he has half human DNA and the donor was Lex Luthor. While he always had confidence in his abilities, he was still somewhat lost as a person in knowing who he really was outside of things other people have assigned to him (teammate, boyfriend, superhero, etc), and finding out this information about himself just adds to the uncertainty and frustration.

What it means:

Having this struggle be something Conner has to deal with so early in his existence is one of the most fundamental changes in my opinion. Finding out that Lex Luthor is one of your clone parents is something that will alter your entire perception of yourself and who you are! In the comics, Conner had already been confident in who he was so it shakes his world in a really big way, but in the cartoon he still didn’t know who he really was so it just adds to further confusion. 

I think that even with the more serious characterization Kon starts getting in the 2003 Teen TItans run, his history and past as the fun cool 90′s Metropolis Kid isn’t entirely forgotten, it’s still a part of who he is/was. Sure, maybe he’s sometimes even embarrassed by how he used to be, but it’s not treated as though it didn’t happen. All of his history comes together to create the character and who he is by the time he wears just a T shirt as a costume.

By skipping over the fun era of his life and jumping right into who he was when he started facing these huge changes, it creates such a completely different set of challenges for him and that contributes directly to how he’s characterized. 

Putting it all together

The ultimate point I am trying to reach in all of this is that, beyond just ‘they made a writing choice to make him different’ the environment that Superboy was brought into and the events that took place right when he came into the world greatly influenced the type of character he would become. Every time an adaptation is made of something like comics, there are going to be changes and alterations to fit the world the creators want to make. Sometimes these changes are minor and don’t actually change who a character is (an example for the YJ cartoon’s universe itself: In the tie-in comics [issue 6] it’s established in this universe that the Flying Graysons weren’t just Dick and his parents, but other family members were active parts of it too. One was an uncle also named Richard, who actually survived the fall that killed the rest of his family but was left paralyzed and thus unable to care for him. This uncle already used the nickname ‘Rick’ which is likely why Dick ended up using ‘Dick’ as a name in a modern setting even though it has fallen out of popularity as a nickname because uh, connotations. This is something that is mostly unique to their world and helps to explain some things, but it’s not like tragically losing a few more family members changed their version of Dick and his backstory that drastically. At his core, he still has many similarities to his comic self) but they’re still changes, and that’s okay. Superboy, though, is such an extreme case where they made so many changes that at his core he really does become a completely separate character. Sure he has the name and design, but I was able to write five thousand words about differences here and am struggling to come up with more similarities beyond that.

I think there still could be specks of the original Superboy buried inside cartoon Conner, and that maybe he could have been more like his original version under other circumstances. Looking at these differences and where they come from is, I think, a cool way to begin to understand what elements contribute to who each version of Conner Kent really is. I think it’s clear from how I wrote this that I prefer the comic version, but there are definitely things that are fun to look at and think about with both.

--

if u read all of this UH thanks for listenin to me ramble! sorry if this is incomprehensibe!

[miyosamu]

Giyuu x Male!Hashira: getting injured

upon his return to the hashira’s base, the first thing he noticed was how several officers, he recognized them as the nurses from shinobu’s, were running around in mayhem.

from experience, he knew that this meant that one of the hashira’s was severely injured, and thus a sense of dread he tried to suppress settled into the bottom of his stomach as he thought of who it might be

the only thing that he knew for sure is that he hoped it wasn’t you. 

out of all the hashiras, you’re the only one giyuu can confidently say he has a solid relationship with. 

and lately, he thinks it’s been bordering on something further than friendship

before you guys were sent off on your individual missions you had told him that you wanted to take him to an upcoming festival that’s being held in the next town

he remembers your face when he had told you he’s never been to a festival. you decided to take it upon yourself to show him the joy of mini-games, food stands, and fireworks

the fact that you cared for him and went as far as trying to get him to experience things he never did really warmed his heart

after everything he’s been through, after being in this line of work for as long as he’s been, joy wasn’t something he ever thought he’d experience again

but for a split second, sometimes when he’s with you, like when he heard you were gonna take him to a festival when you got back, he thinks he’ll be able to find joy with you

you gave him hope

but right now 

as he watched the nurses rushing around yelling for medications and herbs, hearing your name in the midst of it all, it numbed him to the core

-well, that was shortlived- he thought

he felt sick to his stomach and got dizzy. he had to numb all his emotions to prevent himself from panicking and reliving what he experienced from a previous loss 

he grabbed one of the nurses and told them to take him to where you were, and despite knowing that he couldn’t get in until their procedure was done, he just wanted to be as close as he could

he was torn, he neither wanted to be optimistic and give himself false hope nor did he want to think about the worst outcome 

so he just blanked out and sat by the door

after an hour passed though he felt increasingly restless and decided that he had to do something

he walked outside and picked up flowers in your favourite colour and hoped you weren’t allergic to them and he’d accidentally kill you 

…

he was stressed ok 

by the time he found a fitting vase for the flowers and returned to where you were, they were done with the procedure successfully and they informed him that you weren’t gonna die but will be bedridden for a while 

which was more than he could ever hope for

the weight that had been threatening to crush him the entire time alleviated and he visibly relaxed

and when giyuu walked into your room, no one could get him to get out 

like ever

he insists he will stay by your side even if you were asleep the entire time 

and again, while he was sitting beside your bed he felt the need to do something again

so he got some cool water and a soft towel that he regularly soaked in said water before placing it on your forehead

did you have a fever? no.

did you need it in any way, shape, or form? no.

but giyuu did it anyway 

he rationalized it to himself as well, convinced himself that it’s been getting more humid so this will help you keep cool

he’s    baby 

please he’s trying his best he just wants you back

you were asleep for three whole days and because he was adamant about staying by your side they just let him have a bed beside yours

he developed this habit of playing with your hands whenever he became absentminded sitting by your side

he’d talk to you too. tell you stories

he’ll tell you about how his mission went

he’ll tell you about this butterfly that for some reason kept chasing inosuke the entire day

giyuu would surprise himself with the amount he’s talked

it made him realise how it was mostly you who carried the conversations that you two had

he really missed you

and as he reminisced on those memories you had woken up and squeezed his hand that had been holding yours

giyuu would jump to his feet at the sight of your open eyes and he’d be so overcome with emotions

he was happy he was angry he was so pent up and his emotions were in a swirl he didn’t know if he should lecture you about being careful or if he should yell at you to never do that again

so the only thing he could do was hug you, mindful of your injury, and say “from now on, we’re going on missions together.”

as you slowly started gaining your energy back and as you were able to stay awake for longer periods giyuu kept getting happier and happier

your health -> improves == giyuu -> happy boi

HE’D BE !!!! SO PROUD !!!

LIKE YOU’D BE SITTING UP ON THE BED EATING YOUR LUNCH AND TALKING UP A STORM AND HE’D LOOK AT YOU LIKE THIS:

no one:

giyuu: that’s my boy look at him he has a healthy glow to his skin, he’s eating well, he looks great laughing and talking with me

he’d be at your beck and call the entire time and i say you should take advantage of that

omg he’d show you the flowers he’d picked for you and get so happy with a cute little flush to his cheeks when you tell him you love them

listen

praise him

tell him he did a good job

ok

just do it

tell him the flowers make you happy

tell him the cool towel really helped you

tell him that you‘re happy he stayed by your side and made you feel less lonely

reassurance is sexy

and he needs a lot of it

you had apologized to him about missing the festival you promised to take him in but he brushed it off quickly, telling you that he was just happy with you being here with him

you had told him how you were excited to see him in a kimono and how unfortunate it is that you missed the opportunity because of a stupid injury

and in all honesty, you had kinda said it just offhandedly

but giyuu took it to heart so he stood up and excused himself

just to come back an hour or so later wearing a striped dark blue kimono that he just went to town to buy just for you

hE’S SO CUTE

COMPLIMENT HIM

when you complimented him, he just stood there blushing not really knowing how to respond

he approached your bed and brought a bag that he had hidden behind his back

“i bought one for you too”

giyuu,,, i would die for you

he’d help you into your own kimono and you just had a makeshift date in your room and it was on of the best dates you’ve ever had tbh

giyuu is awkward and hesitant about everything regarding this but it just makes him look adorable

by the end of the night, giyuu, surprisingly, took initiative and gave you a soft kiss on the lips

when he pulled back he asked if that was okay to do and you reassured him by kissing again

a bit harder this time

you’d feel him smile into the kiss and he’d wrap his arms around you to bring you closer

you ended up cuddling that night and giyuu had asked “does this make you my boyfriend?”

and you chuckled softly and ran your fingers through his hair and told him that yes, this means you’re his boyfriend and he is yours

giyuu was asked to go to a mission the day after and he wanted to send someone else to do it but you were like

giyuu no this is a hashira-level mission you have to be the one who does it

he begrudgingly caves and is very pouty about it

the mission took him a week in total; traveling took most of his time than the actual mission itself and he was complaining to himself the whole way to and from

he finished the mission rather quickly because he was pissed at the demon that pulled him away from you at such a crucial time

when he got back he got even CLINGIER than he was before he left

he was just following you around like a puppy with their favourite human

you’re his favourite human

if you developed scars from you injury giyuu would kiss them anytime he saw them

when you’re changing or cuddling he’d just lean in and kiss them

giyuu got too used to sleeping by your side that he now struggles when you’re not with him

your relationship just solidified so much more during this period

now everyone knows that you and giyuu are a thing because of the way he was acting

he’d PDA without really knowing he’s PDA-ing

after you completely heal he’d take you to a hot spring because those feel nice and are super good for you

plus he thinks it’d be romantic

physical therapy to regain your stamina has been brutal so the hot spring felt heavenly to your sore muscles

you stayed the night at the spring’s lodge and it was just such a private and intimate setting

giyuu loves to hold you close to his chest and wrap his arms around you cuz it’s both a protective position and also a “he’s my treasure and i cherish him a lot” position

when you start going on missions again you start doing most of them together

and giyuu loves those missions the most because you two can look after each other but you can also spend a lot of private time when you’re traveling so much

he just he cares you ok

[greasygyeom]

Title: Blame it on Me [Part II: Where Do We Go From Here?]

By: GreasyGyeom

Summary: what is someone supposed to do when they have to choose between the love of their life and the career of their dreams.

Word Count: 9.2k

Yugyeom x Reader / Angst, smut (kinda)..more angst. (i use noona but just pretend it’s y/n)

Warnings: Mature content please read only if 18+

Author’s Note: i am back after two weeks this is a character development guys. hope you like part II !! if you do leave an ask or write in your tags. i love hearing from you guys! tell me if it made you feel something. if there’s spelling errors, let me know hahaha. love you guys and thank you for reading.

Read Part I here

Your night burnt by slowly, filled with explanations and fake acceptances of congratulations that everyone showered you with; that you had no interest in. The only reason you stayed awake was because you were hoping Yugyeom would actually come back. Little did you know he’d been so drunk BamBam had to let him pass out on the couch and keep a bucket right next to him; because if drinking had taught him anything, the amount Yugyeom had, he was bound to throw up. 

You, poetically so, had also passed out on the couch. It was hard to believe that in the afternoon you were in a relationship, getting fucked out of your mind and by night you were single, bawling in your living room.

Still, he had to come back at some point, it was his house after all. How was he going to go to work without his clothes? BamBam for sure wasn’t going to let him stretch out his T-shirts.

Hanging onto that hope, you prepared breakfast in the morning, which unfortunately sat out cold until noon, while you face timed your best friend and let out all your pent up emotions.

She advised you to not hang onto the hope of him wanting to be with you for a few days extra. It wasn’t fair to him, because everything said and done, you were leaving. If there was a way around it, you would have done everything within your control to get that promotion without the transfer. Unfortunately the path you were going to take had been set in stone by your company. There was no space for any alterations left.

You didn’t want this to happen but really, what else were you expecting. This was never going to have a happy ending from the start.

Last week you’d wanted him to act like a douchebag so you could be bitter and cop out of being hurt over having to break up with the best guy you’d ever known. 

You finally understood why ‘be careful what you wish for’ was such a self-fulfilling prophecy. 

After your long distance chat, begrudgingly you got dressed for the office; even though you didn’t have to really go officially—you were off until you started at London next Friday—there was some paperwork that needed your signature. You wanted to get it over with so as to spend the next few days peacefully crying in bed.

Half-heartedly walking to the train station, you wondered if you’d even crossed Yugyeom’s mind since yesterday.

Maybe it was a bit selfish, but you wanted to know if he was thinking about you; or was it just you that was miserable.

He was.

Of course he was.

While he chugged a bottle of water, because his mouth felt like sandpaper, all he could worry about was how you were going to pack all your belongings in such a short amount of time, without forgetting the most important stuff; and how he was going to not lose his sanity over it. 

Ominously so, life had come such a full circle for him; because had your colleague not been a student at the academy, he would have never met you.

The work-life that brought you to him, ultimately took you away too. 

Funny how the universe works, right?

He’d drank so much alcohol the previous night in hopes of forgetting you that even an hour without your face swimming in his head would have been worth it. Yet, all night all he lamented about was how unfair it was that he was going to have to let you go.

His friend circle–that over time had also become your friend circle–had been made aware of the whole ordeal, so they knew what to expect. They were just surprised by the magnanimity of it. 

Yugyeom had never been heartbroken—at least to this extent. In the 10+ years of knowing him, he’d never expressed so many emotions in such little time to any of his friends. It was like witnessing a compressed pack of cocaine burst under high pressure; messy and not a good look for anyone.

When he woke up he already had a text from Jaebeom very sternly asking him to not come in to work until he got his shit together, several texts from Mark asking how he was feeling and to start hydrating his body immediately, and a whole essay from Jackson on how he should drop his tough guy act and be with you till it was time to go. 

He hated being called out like that.

Yugyeom: Hyung you’re supposed to be my friend and tell me I should forget her immediately. His text elicited an immediate response. 

Jackson: Listen you brat. I’m your friend that’s why I’m asking you to spend the last few days she is here with her. Because I know you and you’re going to regret this later.

Yugyeom: Tell me, how does it matter if she’s out of my life today or after five days?

Jackson: You won’t even try to stay in touch?

Yugyeom: No.

Jackson: Is that a mutual decision?

Yugyeom stopped replying after that, because now that he was sober, he was back to not being able to aptly express his feelings and he actually didn’t know the answer to that question. 

He’d thought about this so much yesterday, while in bed next to you. There was no expiration date on your time in London, there wasn’t even any guarantee that after London you’d come back—you could get transferred to anywhere in the world. That particular uncertainty had torn his heart into smithereens and had led him to end the relationship so abruptly. 

It had seemed logical yesterday.

Today? not so much.

You’d zoned out staring at a travel bag while window shopping. After your work was done you thought of giving retail therapy a shot, an endeavour that was proving to be extremely unsuccessful, for the lack of focus you were carrying with you.

A loud, screeching, honking bus on the road snapped you back to reality, but not really. You were still dazed and confused and within seconds wanted to go back home, wondering why you thought this was a good idea in the first place. 

You did buy three pastries and a venti on your way though, to devour your feelings once home. To discover that you’d forgotten how you lived life before Yugyeom and not understand how to combat it, was definitely taking a toll on you. The concept of being without him seemed so outlandish, it felt like a distant dream you might have had in your childhood. For now, until you found a way out of this maze, unhealthy coping mechanisms would have to do.

Truth be told, you were itching to call him. When it came to him, your ego was barely existent.

You were still plenty mad and wanted him to realise how stupid he was for not taking you up on the offer last night, of course, but you also wanted hear his voice equally badly, at the cost of him being unwilling to entertain you.

You had been postponing your urge every hour, since morning, because this time around you were reluctant to lose this battle; even though you’d already lost the war.

At 9am it was ‘Wait for another hour, maybe he’ll turn up.’ At 10am it became ‘Maybe I’ll stop by the studio’– but that was too much effort (and you were in no mood to face Jaebeom). When you were leaving for work, you baited yourself by saying you’ll call him after you were done at the office and currently you were convincing yourself to wait till you reached back home, so that at least when he ignored your calls, you could cry into a cup of tiramisu and feel better about it.

That thought was more comforting than it needed to be.

This awkwardness of not being able to wiggle your way into his life this time, was eating you inside, honestly. It’s not that you’d never had disagreements and fights before, where he’d left for Bam’s because he was too frustrated to even talk to you—in spite of him indulging his anger to a bare minimum, there had been plenty of those. But this was the only one time where saying sorry and promising to buy him chocoshakes for a week wasn’t going to cut it.

Along your route home, you bought more food—a full loaf of strawberry bread from the train station, some chips and a sandwich at the convenience store, a slice from the pizzeria nearby and finally your favourite fried chicken. Clearly, you had a lot of feelings to chew through and some days of solitude to chew them.

You hadn’t anticipated the struggle to get your apartment door to open, with all those packets hanging on your arms, trying not to spill any of the contents. What you also didn't anticipate was Yugyeom opening the door from inside, asking you to hand over some of the things you were holding.

You felt your system shut down like windows 98 being attacked by a trojan.

Was this real? Was this a delusion and you'd really just dropped everything on the floor? 

“Yu….gyeom?” You called out, afraid of not actually hearing an answer.

“Why are you still standing outside, noona?”

“Oh-uhm-I….” you fumbled, before closing the door. “This.. is-uh?? Hmm-what-what are you… doing here?”

“Honestly? I don’t know.” He replied curtly.

You furrowed your brows accompanying it with frown lines on your forehead, indicative of the confusion you were unable to convey verbally. 

However, you chose not to question him further, not wanting to go wherever that interrogation would have taken you. You were more than content to see him move around at close proximity, even if it was in silence. 

There were plenty of places he could have gone, really, he didn’t have to be there if he didn’t want to; but he did want to. Oh god he’d wanted to see you so badly. More so than the hangover, it was a bizarre feeling in his chest, from the way he’d behaved with you last night, that had caused him discomfort all morning. That and Jackson’s messages. 

Was he really not even going to try to keep in touch? But then….. who likes to stay in touch with an ex? 

“Want some cake?” you asked, in an effort to dissipate the elephant in the room. “Or some other food? Pizza? You look like shit, you should probably eat something greasy.”

“You went and bought the whole shop didn’t you?” he raised his eyebrow. 

“I… did not. I was….. craving a lot of things.”

“You know, the only times you’ve bought so much food is when you’re sad about us fighting over something.”

“Well—I am sad,” you paused, “and we are fighting ... and this one seems to be the last one.”

“For now” he added and then immediately retracted his statement 

“I’m...I don’t know why I said that. I shouldn’t have said that.”

“Yugyeom... baby,”

When did you even get close enough to do that, he wondered, as you cupped his face.

“I’m really sorry.”

“It’s not your fault, you know?”

He put his arms around your waist and pulled you into a tender hug, because if he looked into your eyes any deeper he would have either kissed you or teared up; and neither was a good option to choose from.

“Noona will you promise me something?” he then asked, his words heavy and morose.

“Hmm?”

“Please try your best to forget me.”

You weren’t expecting that sentence to knock the wind out of your lungs, because you weren’t expecting to hear that sentence at all.

You broke away from him, tears accumulating against your will. 

“Did you come here to hurt me, Yugyeom?”

It felt like a sword was now ominously hung above your head, when you looked at him; and it could fall at any moment and sever your head.

“Don’t take this the wrong way. I just…. I don’t know. Don’t hold onto some irrational hope or something. That’s all I meant.”

“Irrational hope? Really, of what? Getting back together someday? You wanna get rid of me and move on so fast that you want me to forget you? Is that it?”

“Don’t twist my words. That’s not what I meant. You know that’s not what I meant.”

“You think I don’t understand that this is the end for us?”

“Just ... leave it, I shouldn’t have said anything.”

“Yeah you shouldn’t have.”

“But I don’t want to be the reason you hold yourself back in London. That’s all.” He yielded, not wanting to make matters any worse.

“You know what…. I was wrong to think it would be a good idea to pretend like nothing’s changed until I get on the plane. You win.” 

The anger in your tone and your deadpan face made it very clear that you were not interested in holding a conversation about this, any further. “I’m gonna go start collecting my stuff. I should be out of your apartment and your life, by tomorrow evening.”

Before Yugyeom could react, you slammed the bedroom door shut and locked yourself inside.

One second later he was banging on the door frantically.

“Noona! Come on, open the door please.

Please, baby!”

He must have stood there trying to rotate the knob, begging you to let him inside, for at least fifteen minutes before giving up and sliding onto the floor.

This was turning out to be worse than his worst nightmare.

If he knew you at all, he knew you would want to come out to smoke soon. So he sat by the door, getting annoyed at himself for saying that and at you for taking it out of context.

Before coming here, he’d asked for Jinyoung’s opinion on whether this was a good idea or not; and Jinyoung had replied asking him to not do anything foolish. He had assumed Jinyoung meant going to his house to meet you was the foolish act. Dejectedly, he typed a text.

Yugyeom: Well…. I should have listened to you. I went to see her and you were right, it was a bad idea.

Jinyoung: when did I say that was a bad idea?

Yugyeom: you said not to do anything stupid

Jinyoung: yeah, I meant don’t go there and mess it up. I didn’t mean don’t go there at all. What did you do?

Yugyeom: oh…. nothing. 

Jinyoung: I can call her and ask.

Yugyeom: No! Fuck. please don’t do that. She’s already pissed at me.

Jinyoung: what did you do

Yugyeom: I asked her to move on

Jinyoung: huh?

Yugyeom: I don’t want her to get hung up on me and us and the maybes and what ifs when she's there. Because I know she will.

Jinyoung: and what about you? Are you going to try your best to forget her?

Yugyeom paused and stared at that question for a few minutes. No…. of course not, how could he want to forget you or anything about you. Even if every memory attached to you dug into his organs like shards of glass, he’d gladly take them all to his grave. 

Yugyeom: she doesn’t need to know if I do it or not.

Jinyoung: I’m glad God gave you the gift of dance because clearly intelligence and common sense are completely lost on you. 

Yugyeom: hyung i'm really not in the mood to be insulted right now.

Jinyoung: Jackson asked you to drop your tough guy act didn’t he? She doesn’t need you to protect her. She’s never needed anyone to protect her from anything. You should stop trying to save her from whatever it is that you think you’re saving her from.

Yugyeom: I’m not trying to do anything. I don’t want her to regret going to London.

Jinyoung: How is asking to forget you a solution to that? Say hypothetically she does forget you. In a years time she doesn’t give a fuck about what you meant to her. She meets someone else and starts dating, maybe even gets engaged. Would that make you happy?

Yugyeom: No. But she’ll be happy. 

Jinyoung: that’s your problem. You’re assuming that forgetting you and finding a new life would make her happy. 

Yugyeom: Well won’t it? Idk I just don’t want her to be hung up on us and if she gets stuck on it, I don’t think she will be. 

Jinyoung: You just said you don’t wanna move on so then why the fuck are you forcing it on her?

Yugyeom: hyung she doesn’t need to know how miserable I am. Without knowing that whenever she sees me she apologises to me. if she gets to know how much I want her to stay I’m scared she’ll turn down the promotion. She’s already thought about not going.

Jinyoung: let her make her own decisions? Right now you’re lying to her. I’m 95% sure she’s pissed because you’re trying to act unfazed by all of this.

Jinyoung: Just this one time, try to not bottle up how you’re feeling.

Jinyoung: tell her you have no interest in moving on. Be honest, man.

Jinyoung: and just saying, asking the ‘love of your life’, who calls you ‘the love of her life’, to forget you after 12 hours of breaking up is a shitty thing to do. She should have kicked you in the balls. 

He typed up a stingy reply to that but, before he could send it, the sound of you unbolting the door from inside distracted him. Hurriedly, he stood up, to catch hold of you. 

“Yugyeom, leave me alone. You got what you wanted?”, you spoke frostily.

“Are you going to smoke?”

“Are you going to stop me?”

“No.. But I wish you’d hear me out. Let me say my piece and if you’re still pissed, I’ll leave. I promise.”

After opening the window sill and lighting your cigarette, you waited for him to start. Your face was red and hurting from crying so incessantly, but you were determined to not let your emotions get the best of you, in front of him. At least, not right now. 

“When I asked you to forget me, I didn’t mean… you know, erase me from your memory or whatever. I meant give yourself a proper chance at happiness, when you’re there.”

You gave him no expressions.

“Like… I’m not dying to move on. This is killing me. I don't want us to come to an end. I even thought of giving long distance another shot… or like you know….maybe just keep in touch. But every time I thought about it, it was too painful. So I couldn’t ask you to do that because I…. didn’t wanna do that.” 

Saying that out loud made him realise how selfish he sounded. He continued his monologue when you wordlessly stood still and puffed away.

“I wanted to pretend like this isn’t hurting me, but I’m so miserable, noona. I don’t know how to live without you. I don’t even want to know how to live without you. But, I want you to live your life without me; which is hypocritical, I guess, but that’s why I asked you to forget me.”

“That’s really fucking unfair.” you interrupted. “You’re planning things for me without asking what I want. That’s not how it works. If I want to move on or not, is my decision. If I want to be miserable over you or not, is my decision. If I want to live my best life in London or not, again, is my decision. I have never loved anyone like I’ve loved you, Yugyeom; so what you asked of me was just cruel. I know I want to live in a fantasy until I have no option but to accept the outcome. I know it’s not a good way to deal with things. How could you even think  that forgetting you would ever be an option?

“I’m sorry” he pursed his lips and looked at the floor.

“When I said we have five more days, I wanted to play pretend. I was just trying to live in this denial bit longer. 

“Then… can I live in that denial with you?”

“No, I’m sorry, I gotta pack and hand over the house to the owner by tomorrow.”

“I’m sure the owner will understand if you’re delayed by a day or two or four.”

“I’m tired of running around in circles with you man”, you sighed. “No matter how this turns out, I will never not love you. Maybe in ten years time you’ll be with some other girl and I’ll be with some other dude, even then I will probably, in some capacity, still love you. And I get it if you don’t want to feel the same way, you don’t have to. But don’t ask me not to.”

“Thinking about you with someone else really fucking hurts.” he admitted, feeling a knot tighten in his throat.

“It hurts me too but you’re the one so fucking adamant about moving on like it’s gonna happen in 2 days.”

“Are you still angry?”

“Yeah, of course... but I can let it slide if you promise to forget about me.” 

“Haha very funny.”

You chuckled and he wasted no time in giving you a kiss on the forehead.

“The only thing I can promise you is that I’ll love you till I die.”

“No one is dying, baby.”

“Without you, I just might.”

“Jaebeom won’t let that happen, you’re the second reason his studio has clients.”

“What’s the first?”

“Jaebeom, obviously.”

Yugyeom rolled his eyes at you. “He’s going to have to be the only reason, till next week because I’m stuck to you till you get on that plane.”

“You don’t have to do that.”

“I’m not letting you leave that room for the next 100 hours, starting now.”

He didn’t give you much time to process his words, as he picked you up to take you into the bedroom. You tried to fake-protest to the best of your capabilities, but truth be told there was no better feeling than hiding your face in the crook of his neck; while he effortlessly carried you in.

Making his intentions for the night perfectly clear, he took off his shirt.

“Wait-wait-wait!” you yelped, pinned under his lithe form. “All the food is on the table, I'll be damned if that Tiramisu goes to waste. I’ll be back in five.”

“Make it three.”

“Okay baby.”

Then you kissed him on the nose and ran out.

Since your last reconciliation, you'd spent most of your time in bed, mostly without clothes, wrapped in Yugyeom’s arms; savouring every kiss, every touch, trying to save these ending moments in your memory, so you could replay them over and over again at the end of this week when all this would inevitably be over. Your departure was three days away and the fact that you were still unpacked was beginning to weigh down on you heavily. You were at a point where you couldn’t really avoid it any more; even though it was antithetical to the denial you’d built your cozy house in.

As much anxiety you had regarding leaving and not wanting to deal with that, there was an equal amount of anxiety related to not being prepared ahead of time. It was a lose-lose situation either way, with consequences that weren’t susceptible to change. So, you decided to rip the bandaid completely, to avoid running around like a headless chicken at the last minute.

You didn’t have to deal with the furniture, at least, because even though some of it was bought together, Yugyeom owned the apartment. You just had to sort through your clothes and products.

He wasn't the most excited at the thought of seeing you empty out the house. 

“Do you know your living situation in London?” he asked, trying to hold up a conversation.

“Yeah…they’re giving me a furnished apartment as part of the deal.”

“Wait no rent?”

“Uh-huh”

“Woah that’s amazing.” The lack of excitement completely contradicted his statement. “And who’s gonna help you set up and stuff? Won’t you need help?”

“Uhm... mum’s already gonna be there when I land. Not at the apartment, obviously, but…. in London.”

“Aah. Ok ok. It’ll be good, you haven’t seen your parents in a long time”

“Hmm I guess.”

“And your visas and shit?”

“Yeah my passport’s with the company, they’ll sort it all out and hand it to me on the day of the flight.”A

Yugyeom felt like he’d accidentally stepped on an emotional land mine. 

He was already gutted about seeing his closet empty, and now hearing your monotone voice just upset him even further. But he didn’t want to show how sad this was making him either, because then you would probably cry.

It was really frustrating.

He quickly made up an excuse to leave for a bit. “Is it okay if I go to the studio, Jaebeom hyung needs me to sort through some assessments. But if you need me to stay, I’ll tell him something.”

”No, it’s okay. I have to face time Ishi anyway. I haven't spoken to her in a hot minute. And Jae has been more than patient this past week. I’ll try to be done soon too. It’ll probably take me 4-5 hours.”

Oh.

 “I’ll definitely be back by then.”

“Or… maybe I can meet you at the station and we can go to Naksan?”

He gave you an affirmative forced grin, kissed you on the forehead and headed to the studio to redirect all the aggression he was so suddenly full of.

Just knowing that you’d be leaving a giant gaping hole in his life, was driving him nuts. He wasn’t sure if he could keep up his end of the bargain any longer. You at least would get to start over a new life, in a new place with new faces. But he was going to have to pick up pieces of his life that he knew you were about to leave behind shattered; and never look back at 

Your fragrance lingered in every corner of his apartment. His bathroom smelt like your shampoo, his closet smelt like your body spray and cigarettes, his bed.… how was he ever going to exorcise your memories out of his bed? His king size bed that had not seen a dip on the right side up until you had waltzed into his life. Everything was going to remind him of you. His favourite restaurants, clubs, hideaways—it was overwhelming him. 

“Aah fuck” he mumbled to himself, absent-mindedly walking into the studio - much to Jaebeom’s surprise.

“I thought you weren’t coming in?”

“She’s packing. I’ll break something if I have to sit through it.”

“Don’t break anything here.”

“Maybe my bones.”

“The third room is empty.”

He was barely going to be able to concentrate on whatever choreography he was going to try, but he acknowledged Jaebeom and locked himself inside.

Jaebeom also felt rather incompetent to handle the situation, since he’d never seen this volatile and mostly upset side of Yugyeom. So he just let the kid do whatever he wanted to. No one knows what to do until you actually start doing it, right? Jinyoung would probably disapprove of this philosophy, but he wasn’t there to voice his objections, so too bad!

When dancing, Yugyeom barely ever understood the concept of time, so between choosing a song, researching some new styles, to mentally animating the possible formations, 4 hours flew by. He yelped and hurriedly ran to his phone, hoping he wasn’t already late.

You sighed heavily at the other end of the call “no... I’m still working through the pile. It’s probably going to take me two hours more.”

“It’ll be too dark to go to Naksan then.”

“Yeah…. I guess. Just come home?”

“It’ll take me some more time at the studio though.”

“That’s okay, take your time. It’s a mess here anyway.”

“Hmm… I’ll see you later then, noona.”

And he went back to focusing on perfecting the new moves, even harder than before, because otherwise your voice would keep ringing in his ears. He could hear how disheartened you already sounded and he wanted to be there for you, but he had to take care of his own feelings first, before he could take care of yours.

He didn’t know he could feel such a foul mood, but that’s what his days had recently been made of. All he’d done was get blackout drunk, fight and then fuck; this wasn’t a routine he recognised at all.

It was almost nine in the night when he entered the house, fully expecting to see you still having a rough time with a mountain of clothes next to you. Surprisingly, he found you passed out next to an empty cup of coffee.

He peeked inside the bedroom and his eyes immediately went to the two giant suitcases stacked in the corner and a cardboard box balanced on top of them.

His closet now housed his bare minimum collection of T-shirts and sweatpants and the bathroom was entirely stripped of its former glory. It was depressing. He took a quick shower and considered slumping onto the bed, knowing full well he should wake you up and make you eat something.

Who was going to feed you actual healthy food in London, with him not around? Because if you had it your way, you’d call a bag of chips dinner and call it a day.

He tried with everything he had, to not care about it and went back into the bedroom, fully determined to go to sleep. Perhaps it was his frustration towards the situation that was garnering such a petty reaction. But then he thought about it for five minutes more and felt like an absolute asshole. Why was he taking this out on you? It’s not like you deliberately caused it. It’s not even like he wanted you to stay for him.

He shook his head almost aggressively, as if trying to physically shake off the bad thoughts and went back out, to do what he actually should have done as soon as he came home.

You’d fallen asleep in the most haphazard position; your head resting on your arms on the kitchen island top, and your body stretched out on the chair. It didn’t look comfortable whatsoever.

He nudged you gently, “noona?”

You barely even stirred.

“Wake up, baby”. The butterflies he gave you, at such close proximity, made you open your eyes. 

“What time is it?” you groaned, lifting your head the slightest bit.

“It’s almost 10.”

You did a little cat stretch. “Did you just get back?”

“No... it’s been a bit, I took a shower and everything”.

“Oh… okay. I was planning on taking a bath too” you trailed off, yawning through the rest of the sentence.

“I’ll make something for us till then.”he replied, thinking about what they could eat, but his chain of thought was disturbed by a phone call.

“Oh hyung, yo.” you heard him say. His energy seemed so low.

“Wait right now? I don’t know hyung.”

Inquisitively you tilted your head and he handed you the phone. The quota of patience he had for the day was very low. 

You could see Jackson’s name on the screen and you greeted him accordingly.

“You wanna chill here?” You repeated, simultaneously gesturing to Yugyeom about his thoughts on the matter at hand. 

He shrugged indecisively and you came to the realisation that you hadn’t actually thought of when you’d say your final goodbyes to Jackson, or in fact anyone else except for Yugyeom; so now seemed like as good a time as any.

“Yeah cool, how long will you take?”

With his patience running on thin ice, the man standing in front of you frowned, but you pretended to not notice it. Instead, you stretched and headed for the shower, avoiding his gaze. Yugyeom’s energy was all over the place and you were lowkey glad you wouldn’t have to deal with it by yourself.

You thought about planning your day tomorrow and meeting at least some of the people you cared about. What you hadn’t expected was Jackson bringing most of those people to you.

Half an hour after the phone call, your living room was at full capacity. It wasn’t even that many people honestly, just your usual hang-out group - a mixture of your and Yugyeom’s combined friend list, but your living room looked full. 

Yugyeom was even more displeased than before, but managed to hide it by holding onto a bottle of beer, like it was crucial to his existence.

“He didn’t say he was coming with…. everyone.” You sheepishly expressed. 

“It’s fine. At least you get to meet most of your friends.”

“Yeah I guess, i was just thinking about it.”

You get distracted by a hand on your shoulder, “thinking about what?” Bambam asked

“Meeting some people before leaving.” You repeated.

“Ooh depressing.” 

“That’s one way to look at it.” You gave him a deadpan stare, unimpressed by his poor timing.

Yugyeom took the opportunity to wander off to his other friends, most of whom were gathered around the table of food, in front of the TV.

Some random nonsense movie was playing that Mark and his girlfriend were really invested in. He considered sitting next to them but he was not sure when they’d start making out, so he parked himself next to Jaebeom instead. His head was heavier in that moment than it had been in the morning, when he’d left. He couldn’t leave right now though, Jackson would beat his ass.

So he settled for eating silently and drinking slowly, in his little corner.

Meanwhile, you were trying to keep up a brave face. Jackson had already repeated himself at least thrice, saying how much he was going to miss you and it was getting more and more difficult to hold your tears. 

Taking a large gulp of the wine you had in your hand, you told him you were going to miss him a lot too and gave him a partial hug.

There was no scope of hiding from the reality of the situation anymore.

Two days later no one in this room was going to physically be a part of your life. Just two days. All you wanted to do was find Yugyeom and bury your head in his chest, like the ostrich that you were.

You took in some really deep breaths and poured yourself more booze, in the hopes of turning it around and becoming chipper.

Inevitability should be accepted or else life begins to feel like a drag…. no?

Alcohol made it a lot easier for you to bury the sadness that came with your unofficial ‘bon voyage’ celebration. A part of you was also suddenly scared to approach Yugyeom. You studied his face carefully, discreetly, while seated on the couch. Get togethers usually made him hyper, yet here he was looking into his phone like he was studying for a phd degree.

Even though there was an overwhelming urge to go and talk to him, you decided against it. If he wasn’t feeling some type of way, he would not have isolated himself like that and you knew you were partially to blame for it 

You indulged in more cocktails, talked to your friends and somewhere in the middle of all this chatter, Jackson, for the nth time commenced a relay of toasts addressed to you. Really on brand of him to talk about his feelings like that but because you were caught so off-guard you started crying.You weren’t prepared for this kind of emotional haranguing.

Yugyeom hated every minute of it. He didn’t want to hear over and over again that you were leaving, or see you cry. He should have declined Jackson’s proposition when he had the chance to, but now he had to deal with long speeches almost all of which included him too. He felt his lungs constrict like he was about to drown. Jaebeom gave him a comforting pat on the back and passed him a new bottle of soju. 

From time to time he looked at you but avoided eye contact. He knew he should have been next to you, hugging and comforting you, he just couldn’t bring himself upto the task. It was that same resentment he had felt earlier today that made him respond in this fashion. All he wanted was this night to end and for everyone to leave. But then again, maybe this was better because he didn’t have to be alone with you. 

You cried for a good hour while everyone told you they were going to miss you. There were long hugs and accelerating levels of inebriation involved. You promised to text everyone back because at that moment you had no proper words to say and you wanted to tell them all so much. 

By the time you crossed your threshold of tipsy to near blackout drunk, it was almost daybreak. The sun was just beginning to peek at you from behind the mountains. 

Yugyeom was in a worse shape than you, so Jackson and Jinyoung decided to clean up a bit, as your parting gift; trying to rope in Bambam in.

“No way. I know what’s coming after she leaves. I deserve a break before donning my emotional clean up crew role.”

“Don’t lie, you’re both just going to drink.” 

“Yes and drown him in his sorrows. This is how you clean out emotions. He’s gonna drink and cry.”

“That’s the worst way to deal with anything.” Jackson rolled his eyes

“Hyung…. you work out and write music, he drinks and dances. It’s not really all that different.”

“It’s not the same either though. If I feel something I don’t carry it with me. All he does is let it eat him until he forgets it or explodes.”

Can you debate about this later and help me carry him to the bedroom?” Jaebeom interrupted. 

Jackson handed the empty bottles to Jinyoung and got to the task of shifting Yugyeom’s large body from the couch.

“Just him?” Bambam asked

“I already tucked her in,” Jaebeom replied. “We should get out of here soon.”

“Yeah, I still have to go to work. Can’t believe Youngjae and Mark left me alone.” Jinyoung complained, trying to make as little noise as possible while trashing the garbage.

With a lot of difficulty, Jackson was able to plonk Yugyeom on the bed. Jaebeom studied you both before heaving a sigh. The peaceful look on your faces was not an accurate testament to your respective behaviours prior to passing out. But there wasn’t anything he could do about it. He kept a trash bag and a bottle of water each near your nightstands before leaving. 

At least he could hope that when you wake up, you’d feel better.

... You didn’t.

The splitting headache you were experiencing was really on another level when combined with your sandpaper mouth. Thankfully things were conveniently placed around you because if you had to walk to the kitchen to drink water right now you'd rather die of thirst than get up. Your attention turned to the man next to you, his porcelain skin tempting you to kiss him or at least stroke his face, but you resisted. 

You finished the whole bottle and gently lowered yourself back into the bed, lying awake with throbbing pains radiating from various places. 

Yugyeom made a cute sound in his sleep, making your heart jump. It was nearly impossible to not want to scoot closer to him. He hadn’t given you a hug in all of twenty four hours and you were already about to lose your mind.

How you were going to survive without him was really beyond your comprehension.

You just lightly touched your fingers to his palm and closed your eyes, hoping you’d fall back to sleep. The next thing you knew he had one arm around you and was pulling you into his chest; aligning his body with yours. His soft breaths landing on the back of your neck, making you shiver.

“Feeling okay?” He asked in his hoarse, morning voice. 

“Hmm…”

You could feel his lips moving against your skin as he spoke, making you melt in his embrace. Your heartbeat accelerated and he held onto you even tighter. 

Melancholy hung in the air, much like Christmas decorations in December; he could feel it. Your legs intertwined and he heard a faint sob.

There was nothing he could say that would change the atmosphere. It was time to burst the bubble, so he let you cry, and he cried too.

Head buried in your back, he whispered, “noona…. please will you leave a hoodie of yours with me?”

You nodded and kissed his hand. 

“I love you.” He said and the both of you went back to sleep. 

It was almost evening when he finally woke up. You weren’t in bed anymore, his head was hammering to a tune of it’s own, in spite of having medicated in the morning, and his body was craving water. Staggering, he made his way to the kitchen and found you in a semi-messy situation with cooking paraphernalia all over the counter.

“Oh? What is happening here”. It sounded like he was concerned but he was really only a bit confused. 

“making some sandwiches.”

“Suddenly? Why? We could have just ordered.”

“Yeaaah I don’t know, just felt like it.”

He smiled, because you looked so cute in that apron. His mood was foul but looking at you made it better. He chugged some water while you emptied the pan and he was overcome with the urge to hug you.

You were caught off-guard when he put his arms around you, but you reciprocated his gesture. It was difficult for you to look him in the eyes because you weren’t sure if, for the hundredth time, you'd end up crying. He cupped your face and nudged you to see him, the sincerity in his face…. all the love he wanted to shower you with right then.

He kissed you slowly, taking his time to taste the light traces of your strawberry lip balm. You didn'’t know what spells he used to get you turned on so fast. Threading your fingers with his hair, you deepen the kiss. The urgency that took over him was maddening. He wanted you right now, which he made abundantly clear when he slipped his left hand under your T-shirt and began caressing your boobs; his other hand gripping your hair and pulling it sharply. 

There was air caught up in your lungs as he kissed your neck, like you’d temporarily forgotten how to breathe. Low moans began to escape your lips and you squeezed your thighs together. You were so wet, just with his mildly aggressive kisses.

He knew what he was doing to you when he felt your lower body clench and both his hands slid back down to grab your butt.

The kiss got sloppier as your focus dwindled to his boner, your fingers already caressing it over his sweatpants. He bit your lip in response, pushed you against the kitchen island and aimed to remove your clothes. You were still in your flannel and shorts from the night before, so he fumbled a bit on the buttons. His accuracy was failing him because you weren't stroking him over the sweatpants anymore; he could feel your hand sliding over his skin, purposefully slow and tender. His eyes were barely open, your lips were still locked and he was trying to get you naked without actually seeing what he was doing. He grunted helplessly when you touched the tip of his cock. Wet sounds of you stroking his length, mixed in with his shallow breaths and moans, filled the kitchen. 

He nibbled on your neck, as your movements accelerated. With your non-dominant hand you tried your best to remove his sweatpants, but he stopped you.

“Turn around.” He whispered, pulling your hand away. The way he seduced you with his demanding voice and bedroom eyes, you gave in without a fight. You bucked your hips and grabbed the closest edge of the marble top. He bit your neck, gently sucking at the skin caught between his lips, until it looked bruised and then he moved on further down, while dry humping your ass, one hand firmly placed on your waist. A small gasp escaped your lips when his fingers slipped inside your panties. Automatically, you spread your legs wide, to let him access the delicate parts. 

He could smell your shampoo mixed in with your intoxicating scent and it was sending him over the moon as he played with your wet and sensitive clit.

“Good girl” he praised, when you pushed your ass further into his boner, craving to feel it bare.

You hummed, his thin and long fingers dancing to the tune of your arousal. He fingered you slowly and deliberately, and it was excruciating. 

It was the last time he was going to get to feel you. Tomorrow you'd be gone. It made him angry and sad. It made him desperate. 

You could feel his aggression in the way his lips collided onto yours with force, the way his nails dug into your skin, the way his body was stiff and wrapped around you in a solid cage.

His hold on you tightened and he spun you around again, to face him. He wanted to make sure you never forgot how he made you feel; so that no other man would ever be enough for you because he set that bar up so high. He wanted to spoil the idea of being pleased again by anyone else, for you. Maybe it was toxic to think that way, but he was already letting go of you.

He had no choice but to let go of you. The train of thought he'd gotten on made his brain short circuit and switch off. He wasn't aroused anymore and everything was blurry and confusing. Before he could stop himself, he took a step back.

“Don't leave me, noona.” He said in a small voice, looking at the floor.

The words crash on you like a violent wave. 

You wished he'd stayed looking at the tiles, because when he looked up, you felt the guilt of having accidentally run over a puppy. There was sadness and shame and anger and you didn't know which emotion to address first.

“Yugs….”

So many words swirled in your brain but your lips were sewn shut.

“So, I guess that's a no.”

“What are you trying to do, Yugyeom?”

“Oh well, It was worth a try.” He chuckled, rather bitterly.

What else was he expecting would happen.

Life is not a movie scene; the girl doesn't quit on her career for the boy, in real life. But was it valid for him to feel the sting that persistently worsened as you two stood opposite each other uncomfortably? He knew this was going to happen. He chose it with you. Hell, he chose it for you even. While he was trying to rationalise his own resentments, you straightened yourself up and started putting the buttons of your shirt back in place. 

“I don't know what you want to hear from me, Yugs. You know I don't want to leave you. And you don't want to come with me.”

Shit, that stung him even more.

“I have to leave for the airport in 12 hours so do we have to be like this?” You asked defeatedly. 

He shook his head and you extended your arms, waiting for him to fall into them.

“I'm really sorry we have to end this way.”

In his experience, there was no safer feeling than being held by you, but right now it was the root cause of all the knives ruthlessly jammed in his chest.

Nonetheless, he hugged you and exhaled pure agony.

“I'm gonna go take a shower. Maybe afterwards, if you feel like it, we can go get some drinks?” You asked cautiously.

“Yeah… I’d like that” he lied, as he let go. Truth be told, he couldn't look past the multiple ‘last times’ anymore. The last time he could hug you, the last time he could fuck you, the last time he could hear your voice… he couldn't do any of it. He didn't want to do any of it. He didn't want this for the last time. He heard you close the door to the bathroom and started fixing his appearance however he could, grabbed his wallet and phone and headed out. If he stayed in that house for a second more he felt he'd choke and die. He was trying to run away from the toxic fumes his own thoughts were emitting, and there was nowhere to hide from them, so he tried to leave them behind. 

His brisk walk turned into a sprint and then he ran as fast as he could towards the subway station. And just like that he vanished into the sea of anonymity, nowhere to be found.

Four hours had gone by since you'd come out of your shower to a deserted house and a singular message from Yugyeom. “Sorry noona, I can't do this.”

it felt like a cruel déjà vu.

His phone wasn't reachable. Bambam had no idea, neither did Jaebeom. You were much too confused to react in any appropriate manner.

“He left” You said to Jaebeom, who was equally confused and infuriated.

It seemed like you'd already connected the dots as to Yugyeom’s unavailability but a part of you was holding onto some hope.

“I'm sure he's gonna show up dude.”

“I have to leave in like 3 more hours. He wouldn't have left if he planned to show up.”

“He's definitely not at Bam’s?”

“Jae…. unless I was being lied to, he's not there. And i don't think Bam has any reason to do that.”

“Okay. Keep me posted.”

“Yeah” you sighed. 

You were neither angry, nor sad and you had good reason to experience both those emotions at once, but the way your brain had switched itself to autopilot, everything had just become a matter of necessity. 

You tried Yugyeom’s number once again, and weren't even surprised anymore when you heard the automated switched off message. 

While scanning the room your eyes fell upon your suitcases and your heart dropped 6 feet further than where it was already at.

You had to leave soon.

The silence had already been gnawing at your sanity, now it was overpowering guilt because if you had just said no, none of this would have happened. If you had just said no to the promotion. If you had tried harder for Seoul. If you had chosen to stay when Yugyeom asked you to, then the chain of events would have been different. Maybe, if he'd not run away from this whole situation you could have figured out a solution. But he wasn't here and you were running out of time.

A high pitched buzzer cut through the atmosphere, giving you a jump scare. For a second you thought maybe it was Yugyeom, but why would he need to ring the bell.

You saw Jackson's silhouette in the little alarm system by the door and sighed. 

“You look so unhappy to see me.” He huffed, when you greeted him dryly.

“Gee Jackson, sorry I'm upset about Yugyeom literally bailing on me when I have to leave in an hour.”

“Wait what? He's not back?” 

“No…..i don't know where he is.”

“And he's still not answering?”

“I tried about 50 times, it's off. Anyway, how come you're here?” 

It was comical how distraught you were internally and how inept you were at translating your emotions externally. The way you were talking, no one would think you were in this sad sad situation of leaving your life behind to start a new one.

“You don't remember asking me to drop you off?”

“Was I drunk?”

“Well…. tipsy maybe?”

“I was definitely drunk. I don't remember any of it. But, I'm glad you're here.”

“Are you…. packed?”

“Yeah, I just got the last batch of clothes I need to shove in.”

“Cool. You have anything to eat?”

“I made some sandwiches in the evening. Have at it.”

You were trying your best to be normal. A few minutes later Bambam and Jaebeom arrived as well, both without any worthwhile news of Yugyeom.

“I'm gonna kill him when I see him.” Jaebeom raged.”this is very childish.”

“It's fine man…. i know why he just vanished. It's okay. I'm not mad.” 

“Bro are you…. Hearing yourself?”

“Very clearly. He was never good with confrontational emotions. He didn't want to see me leave so he left. It's not rocket science.” 

“You went through your stages of grief really fast with this one.” 

“I didn't have an option.” you looked at the three of them sitting around you “So…. are all of you taking me to the airport?”

“Yeah, duh.” Bambam countered.

“Okay then wait for me in the car, I need to say bye to the house.”

“And you can't do that in front of us?” 

“Would you rather get uncomfortable watching me cry?”

Honestly, you were just prolonging it, the actual act of leaving. You felt so heavy when Jaebeom rolled your suitcases out. In passing you looked at your two favourite hoodies you'd left on the bed and it took everything out of you to not have an emotional breakdown right at that moment.

It was difficult, leaving was difficult especially without Yugyeom. You were in denial of your feelings but you were so angry at him but also so sorry towards him, your emotions kept cancelling each other out. You just wanted to hug him one last time and get the closure you were hoping to get but he took that option away from you. In your three year relationship, this was maybe the most cruel he’d ever been with you. But it was over now. This chapter was done, even with all of its loose ends.

You took your time saying your final byes to three of the most important people you'd met in Seoul. It was quite impressive that you didn't burst out in tears, even when Bam and Jae almost did. There was a part of you that was distracted by a hope that he'd be at the airport to see you off. When he wasn't at the main gates, you hoped he'd be there at check-in. While walking towards your departure gate you kept an eye out, hoping to catch a glimpse of his smile. You just wanted to say goodbye. But he never came. You sat glued to your spot, because what if he did try to find you and you weren't there. You boarded your flight at the very end. You gave an imaginary him all the imaginary chances you could, to materialise and tie a neat ribbon around your life in Seoul.

But your flight took off and the last shred of hope you had snapped and so did you.

Because life isn't a movie. Just like the girl doesn't leave her career, the boy doesn't run through the airport either. 

[softer-ua]

Two Left Feet, And One In The Mouth

Pt. 1

Lying there catching his breath seething Katsuki became suddenly aware of the feeling of melting iceberg quickly soaking his back, every drop replacing his already spread thin patients

Katsuki knew he need to hurry up and fix things with Deku, that he should go change into the spare clothes he kept in his office, that he had a much better chance of winning Deku over if he played nice with his friends, and he knew Shoto was only turning his hoodie into a impromptu sponge to piss him off and distract him from actually accomplishing any of that.

He also knew that it was fucken working.

Jumping up he felt his hoodie’s new weight pulling on him, the bastard had soaked him all the way through and the hoodie's fluffy inside was only making it worse, gross dirty floor water was fast spreading all the way down his pants and even through to his front.

Kasuki was seeing red, the only thought in his head was a vision of the Icyhot bastards head on a pike.

And that's how 15 minutes later he found himself standing in the meeting room sporting a few new bruises and dripping a puddle onto the floor, as he argued with ‘Lightning Mcqueen in glasses’ that he shouldn’t have to take the sole blame for ‘blowing up half the lobby’ or the charring on the lower branches of the lobby’s new ‘just set up yesterday, took all day to decorate, Sato ate half a snickers cheesecake just to get it in here, Tamaki and Ochako were so excited to put the star on, blah blah blah’ Christmas tree.

Those were clearly fire singe marks, not explosive blowback, and he told Mirio as much as he turned to blatantly ignore Iida. He also told him it was absolutely bullshit they had a tree up in the first week of fucken November!

Katsuki didn’t care to admit most of this blustering was to avoid admitting the main reason ‘a little bit of water set off a top ranking pro’ was because his brand Fucken new, curently one of a fucken kind, limited edition Hero Deku tee was hidden under his hoodie.

It was supposed to be part of the nerds Christmas present. His dad had just given it to him last night for a trial wear before they made the actual order to have enough made in time to be advertised and auctioned off to raise funds for the nerds favorite holiday charities.

Katsuki had planned to show up to dance practice in it after patrol and then do some photos together to boost the word about the dance and the auction.

Now not only was Deku not talking to him, but if he showed Deku this gross wrinkled mess he’d probably never speak to him again. Today officially sucked and all because ChargeDolt and RedRot couldn’t keep their fucken mouths shut... and some other things that were definitely not his fault either.

Eventually Mirio and Iida seem to tire themselves out and let the group go with a warning to expect their already packed schedules to be slammed with several hours of community service and outreach.

And of course Mirio asked Katsuki had to hang back because the universe hated him today. And of course he was given some more bad news because why would anything ever be easy?

Deku had been switched to evening patrol for today with Tokoyami, and Amajiki had agreed to take his place for the first half of the morning and Uraraka would join him after lunch

Katsuki wanted to bitch that they couldn’t reschedule because they had stupid dance practice, but between Deku not wanting to talk to him, no ‘don’t stay mad at me’ surprise, not wanting to explain to Deku what happened to the lobby, and not even a half baked explanation or apology in mind for why he said what he did Katsuki just grunted his acknowledgement and went to change into his costume. If anything he was getting off easier like this. At least Amajiki was on of the few extras he could stand.

_______________________________________________

If Mirios plan for punishment was to guilt him to the core by saddling him with a semi sulking SunEater, then he was an evil genius. Cause it was working, Katsuki hadn’t felt this all around ashamed since.… well probably only like a year but still.

Amajiki was one of the few people who Katsuki actually respected as a hero and a person, not only did the fellow pro have a kick ass quirk that he used creatively but Katsuki had grown to (begrudgingly) admire the hero for how up front he was with his anxiety and how hard he worked through it. It kinda reminded him of Deku and his oddballness and how the nerd used it to his advantage to become the symbol of hope.

Katsuki had been expecting a half mumbled lecture and a maybe even prodding about therapy. The nervous nellies' unusually strong(for them) vendetta with the hero world was it's slacking in mental healthcare or whatever.

So after struggling through about four hours of sullen silence, (that was also infuriatingly familiar, apparently heroing wasn’t all the nerd had learn from his senpais), Katsuki snapped with a screech like an overly taunt fiddle string.

“I’m sorry about the fucken tree! If it’s not replaced by the time we get back I’ll do it my goddamn self, happy?!” Katsuki had been expecting Tamki to give a quiet nod or retreat into himself more, depending on how he took his offer. He definitely didn’t expect to be glared at

“You think I’m upset about the tree?” Amajiki tilted his head in confusion. Maybe they should talk about Katsuki seeing the team's therapist more. Monthly was the minimum everyone on the newly forged Heros Union of Honor had to attend but Katsuki was clearly needing more support right now. Maybe it was the holidays? A good portion of them were going biweekly now for that reason.

HUH was more than an agency. It was a newly emerging code of ethics board. You were expected to be worth the honor of being called a hero when partnered with HUH, and that meant getting your mental health to its peak was a priority.

That didn’t mean everyone (or really anyone) was perfectly mentally fit, just that mental health was a priority. Other agencies had taken notice of how differently they operated even within their first year, and since then a few had even sent their heroes through the HUH program to learn how to operate more like them. They were quickly taking up the void the Hero's Commission had left.

“I’m not upset about the tree, I’m upset because you hurt my friends and fellow hero partners-“ Amajiki was rudely cut off as he caught a gauntlet to the chest, thank god they’d gotten smaller over the years.

“He’s your business partner, he’s MY hero partner, has been since before we agreed to join this agency.” Katsuki thundered.

Why everyone on the board had to call each other partners was something Katsuki didn’t understand, but he refused to let them slip up and start tossing around the phrase Hero Partner. They were all business partners,something anyone could become. A Hero Partner was a major commitment, and Katsuki had the signed legal waivers to prove it.

Amajiki stopped and looked at Katsuki fully, really taking in his teammates' rattled appearance.

Katsuki had been doing well, dare say even flourishing within HUH, so today’s outbreak was nearly out of character at this point and still Katsuki didn’t appear to be calming down any. If anything he was only growing more tightly wound.

Yes, Amajiki was upset with Katsuki but he’d remained silent during their patrol more so the blonde could have some time to think, but it didn’t seem to have done him any good. Amajiki fought through the nervousness that crawled under his skin and begged him to just let the explosive guy be.

Mirio had asked him to talk with Katsuki, under some false impression that Katsuki respected him more, but before this moment he’d figured it was better to not butt in. He hadn’t been around when this morning’s incident happened but he could see another one brewing.

Amajiki shuffled side to side for a second considering his options. He could just send Katsuki home early, even put him on leave until he got cleared by the teams therapist. Or he could do what Mirio suggested and reach out to a struggling teammate.

Therapy was good, but therapy with a support network was better.

“GroundZero, let’s take lunch. I think we need to have a talk-“ Amajiki put up a slightly trembling hand to silence the blonde. Straightening his back and furthering his resolve he pushed forward. “-This isn’t really optional, we neeeed to have a talk, and about more than this morning's incident. I wanna talk about your hero partner.”

Katsuki’s argument died on his tongue.  He shoved his hands in his pockets with a grunt and jerked his head to signal to Amajiki to take the lead.

Katsuki knew he wasn’t gonna like what came next but he tried to reminded himself that he trusted and respected Amajiki, and that meant hearing him out when asked. It’s what Deku would do, so it’s what Katsuki would try to do.

[boogiewrites]

No. 9:”The Body.”

Chapter Four

Characters: Diego Hargreeves & OFC Eve Corpuz

Summary:  Eve feels the pressure of learning about her powers and takes steps to do that when Diego takes too long to respond. She ends up meeting him again, by chance or fate, and they begin to realize that they have more in common than they thought.

Warnings/Tags: Light descriptions of fighting. Flirting. Bonding.Little bit of Luther.

Click on my icon then go to my Mobile Masterlist in my bio for my other works and chapters. Please like, comment and reblog if you enjoyed it! It helps out us writers A LOT! If you’d like added to the tags, just let me know. This is a multi-chapter fic.

Eve sits in the on-call suite with an ice pack on the back on her neck. She’d begun seeing how her power worked while she was at her job. She found it harder, the more she practiced the more drained she became. Being the overachiever she was, she’d passed out cold and gave everyone a good scare. She knew the cause but she couldn’t really say that so she’d had every remedy thrown at her and told to rest. So here she was with an energy drink in one hand and her phone in the other. She just had a few hours, she could make it. But she knew there would be more days like this if she didn’t take some time to figure things out.

As on-brand as ever, Diego had not texted her since the initial number text. She sighed and begrudgingly sent him a message first.

“I’m going to see if I can get my hours lowered. Whenever you can, we need to figure something out. I need to learn how to deal with this before I hurt myself.”

Her impatience for a response led her to take plans into her own hands. She made a few stops before she went home, to her community center to see where her defense instructor suggested she could go for some more intense training.

She settled in for the evening, making it easy on herself. She could probably get some decent info from a good google search on the Hargreeves. What? She was by nature a researcher and this was as close to a book on powers she was going to get. She had a personal training appointment with a new gym on the calendar for her next free day. With a plan in place, she felt better. For now anyway.

————————-

The response of “alright let me know.” Seemed underwhelming but at least it wasn’t only one letter. He’d sent it at 2:37 AM. What kind of sleep schedule was this guy on?

She’d been approved for fewer hours, not by much. But when you throw out the words ’work-related mental episode’ they tend to listen. She'd taken the first few checks she’d received and as she had never done before, she treated herself to new workout gear.

She figured she needed to learn to fight. If Diego, well, the whole family, did it and she was one of them... it made sense. If the wrong person found out about her, she could potentially be in danger, and she was not one that liked to be ill-prepared. Since she didn’t think he was moving fast enough with suggestions for what to do now, she’d found a quaint old gym upon the suggestion of her self defense teacher.

“They’re very good at what they do but they’re a little rough around the edges. Ask for the big guy, he’s the nicest, the other brother is a dick.”

She was always down to support family-owned small businesses and if they were good then what is some poor bedside manner when she dealt with people spitting on her for saving their life. This is should be nothing.

Good thing she had such an attitude because she’d far overestimated how good of shape she was it when she got winded from the warm-up. She was certainly getting her money’s worth. Extra fees to be seen at a late hour due to her weird work hours, but once she said she was a doctor the polite man on the other end of the line was very accommodating. That polite man turned out to be one of the biggest men she had ever seen. She thought it curious but didn’t want to be rude and assume he was the Luther she suspected he was. Luther sounded like a name any big guy could be called. This guy could just be super jacked on steroids and injectibles. As long as he was a good trainer she didn’t care. And so far he was giving her the most polite ass-kicking she’d ever received.

This night was an introduction to the gym, consultation, and free training session. She was sweating and focused as Luther went over the importance of safety in form.

“I don’t know if you’ve noticed but I am a little bigger than you.” He laughs and she can see it’s a joke he’s used many times before. “Usually my brother helps in this part, he’s… a lot smaller than me. Not a lot he’s not tiny or something he’s… people-sized he’s normal...human man height. So learning with someone closer to your size is better than-“

“I think she gets it, big guy.” She hears a familiar voice coming down the stairs from the offices and apartment.

“Oh! I didn’t know you’d be in tonight.” Luther says with relief.

“Yeah, plans didn’t play out.” As oddly enough, his plans stood right in his gym.

“Eve here is getting her first session in late, she’s a doctor so… weird hours.” As soon as she saw Diego she knew he was the dick brother she'd been warned about. Checked out.

“Who’s stalking who now Doc?” He asks with a smile and a cocky suaveness he carried himself with.

“I didn’t know this was your gym.” She says a roll of her eyes.

“Oh you... know each other?”

“Yeah,” Diego asks without looking to Luther. “We at my part yet?” He asks with a raise of his brow.

“Yeah left it for last.”

“I got her from here.” He says giving him a casual hand of dismissal.

“Oh, you sure? I’ve got her forms filled out-“

“Yeah, I’m sure. Don’t worry about em. Head on out, I’ll close up.”

“You sure?”

“If you ask me that one more time I’m going to demonstrate on this dummy,” he pokes his chest, “instead of these other ones.” He knocks his head to the side of the room where the standing targets were lined up.

“Yep.” A gives a close-lipped smile and a nod. “Nice meeting you Eve, he’ll schedule you for the next one, kay?”

“No problem.” She gives him a warm smile and a nod in return to answer any doubts he might have about leaving her with him.

So Diego kicked off his boots as Luther wobbled around to lock the doors and turn off the lights. With half the room lit now, they stood face to face and sized each other up a moment. “You really didn’t know?” He asks after he hears the click of Luther being out of earshot.

“I swear. I asked my self-defense teacher and they recommended this place. Said you were good at training people to fight so…” she shrugs and offers her hands up.

“We are. I am.” He smiles proudly. “Why are you wanting to fight?” He asked with squinted eyes. She could tell he hadn't expected it.

“Well.. you do. I mean all…the people with powers do. I thought it’d be smart if I could really defend myself if I needed to. In case something goes wrong and... like... I get found and people wanna kill me.” she gives a weak shrug of explanation

He considers it a second. “Yeah, you just didn’t strike me as the type.”

“Why? You knew I took classes you stalker.” she taunts him.

“Well I had to know if you were legit before I came at you didn’t I?”

“And I you.” she quickly quips back.

“See. We have an understanding.” He passes his hand back and forth. “So… fighting huh? What you into? Judo? Jujitsu? Some boxing?”

“Everything.” She says with a self-assured nod and he lets out a dry laugh.

“Everything?” a cocky laugh that came from decades of experience busted out and stayed on his face in the form of a grin for awhile after.

“I wanna be good. I wanna be strong. I wanna win. Or not die and be maimed at least…. So whatever that takes is what I want to do.”

He could see a conviction in her eyes, she meant it. He was inspired for a moment by the rawness she gave so openly. The honesty was refreshing. “Then let’s do some conditioning. Start there and we’ll start discussing styles. Sound good?”

“Yeah.” She offers a supportive nod.

“Then drop and give me 50.” He grins.

She’d never sweat so much in her life. He put on music and had her do every cardio move she could have ever imagined. She left the desire to stay looking nice long ago once the hair started to stick to her forehead. She took everything he gave, and he was once again impressed. She’d yell out when she was trying to push herself and he'd clap and yell right back. She’d crack a smile when he told her to let it out and scream at him. So she did and she collapsed with her last burpee onto the mat. He pulls her up and gives her cheek a good supportive smack as she glares at him playfully.

“Ya did good, kid.” He pats her arm supportively. “Next time we’ll work on some moves too.”

“Good because I really want to hit you after that.”

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

“You’ve not been out for weeks, what’s been your deal?” One of Eve's friends she worked with, Molly asked. Her face always had a glint of sarcasm in her eye and a brow that never twitched. “I’ve had to work with Sean so much it’s been a pain in the ass.”

“Yeah, sorry about that. I’ve just been… busy… going through some weird stuff right now and needed more time for myself. I’ve considered a career change anyway.”

“You what? You aren’t leaving me you bitch.” She says playfully but she means it. “Don’t leave me with those doctor dicks.”

“I’m one of those doctor dicks y’know.” She laughs.

“Nah you’re just a dick.” She grins and taps her glass to her friends. “I’m never very good at being sugar-coated but I'm here if you need to talk about it.”

“Uh...not yet. I’m okay, not sick or anything. Just had some stuff from my past kinda...come up.”

“Ah. The middle of fucking nowhere coming back to haunt you?”

“Yeah, I guess. Some big feelings and stuff came up with...in therapy.” She tries to cover and explain.

“Ah. I get it. It’s dirty work.” She gives a supportive nod. “But for real if you’re leaving let me know where so I can transfer too.” She smiles and knocks the bar to order another round of drinks.

“I need to get out though, just of the hospital and my apartment...so thanks for still asking.”

“No one else we work with is any fun. They don’t wanna go to loud shows they wanna go try out some overpriced bullshit Gastro-pub- whatever the fuck that is- and I’m just...it’s not me.”

“So I’m your only single friend in other words?” She chuckles.

“Nah I actually like having you around, don’t tell anyone that though.” She knocks her arm.

“What about people outside of work?”

“Eh. We have such fucked hours it’s hard to keep in touch.”

“Yeah.” Eve murmurs. “Making friends when you’re old is hard.”

“We sound like two old married birds bitching to each other.” She slides the new drinks their way.

“Here's to acting like we’re much younger women.” They clink glasses.

“Were you much of a slut when you were younger?” Molly asks after looking over the crowded basement of the bar. A small stage shoved in the back corner and the small doorways connecting the string along rooms made the space feel even smaller than it was.

The sudden question makes Eve laugh and almost choke on her drink. “I’ve had my moments.” She shrugs.

“Because there’s this fella that’s been looking at us for a while now and -don’t fucking turn-Christ-“ she laughs and smacks Eve’s knee. “No wonder you're single.” She rolls her eyes. “And if you happened to have been a slut, and in the spirit of our toast wanted to act like your younger self I think you might have a chance tonight.”

“Someones? Looking at me? Are you sure they just don’t want to kill me?”

“Nah, he’s been playing it cool.” She narrows her eyes in the way of the guy. “Here’s what we're gonna do. I’m gonna go to the bathroom, maybe take my own little stroll around this place and see what I’ve got options wise. And we’ll give this handsome stranger a window to come talk to you. I’ll be checking my phone if you need saving.”

“You don’t have to-“

“Hush. When’s the last time you got some?”

Eve opens her mouth then shuts it, defeated with the answer.

“That’s what I thought.” Molly teases. “So tits up and hopefully we won’t see each other until work Hmm?” She pats Eve's shoulder and quickly blends into the crowd of moving bodies.

She began scanning the room. She didn’t have to wait long to find out. She saw him smoothly moving through the crowd, in all black, and not a harness or knife in sight. The moves she’d seen at training with him were reflected in the way he moved, a bit like he was stalking but he hadn’t met her eyes again yet.

He was hurriedly doing a habitual perimeter scan as he moved across the room towards her.

She sat smugly, letting him come to her, feeling as if she finally had the upper hand. They meet eyes and an almost shy but endearing smile was matched and shared between them.

“Who’s stalking who now?” She says as he gets within earshot. “Just so you know it’s always been you stalking me.”

He gives her an easy smile and slides onto the stool next to her. “I knew you’d say that.” He shakes his head. “But I’m actually not here for you tonight.”

“I suppose it was a bit pompous of me to assume.”

“Not with how weird our lives are.” He shares the casual and almost comfortable air between them now.

The training had led to the banishment of that awkward physical barrier between them rather quickly. There wasn’t as much room for chit chat at training so the actual sharing of oneself, something neither were particularly skilled at, was still trying to break through that awkward stage. Luckily they were both practiced in faking it until you made it.

“How do I know you aren’t following me?” He teases

“How would I know where you’d be? I’m not the super boy detective here.”

“Funny” he answers flatly with a raised brow before waving to order a drink. “Then why are you here?”

“My friend wanted me to go out. I had been so preoccupied with… well… y’know all this going on now that I’d been neglecting what little social life I had. So I was due for a night to just see a show and chill but...you had to show up.” She jabs back with a warm smile.

“Lucky for you I’m not here for work.” He says almost proudly as if he were proving something to her. “I have a friend in the band and wanted to have a “chill night” too. But here you are.”

“Can’t get away from me.” She beams cheekily.

“You want another drink?” He offers with a nod towards her empty glass where the ice was starting to clink as she involuntarily moved it while she spoke.

“Oh. Guess I finished it.” She laughs at herself, a short sigh before rubbing a hand through her hair. “Yeah. Why not. Fuck it.”

“What’d you have? Virgin Shirley temple?”

“Oh, he’s got jokes.” She rolls her eyes. “Give me a… Horsefeather.”

The bartender grins. “Alright, Dorothy.” Before slipping away.

“What the hell is a Horsefeather?”

“The drink of my people.” She says as if he should know.

“Are you like a...native American or something?” He asks earnestly.

She laughs and pats his arm. “Be thankful you’ve got your looks hun.” He gives a smile before looking down and trying to figure if he wants to react to the insult or the praise. “No. It’s a Kansas thing.”

“You’re from Kansas?”

She nods and hands the empty glass off to a rapidly clearing and clearly overworked girl behind the bar. “Yeah. Basically.”

“You don’t look like you’re from Kansas.” he narrows his eyes.

“What is that supposed to mean?” She doesn’t feel any hostility from him, as she’d learned he often spoke without thinking.

“You’re not...y’know...White. Wait. Are you?”

She lets out a louder laugh and he enjoys the sound of it. “Honestly Diego, I don’t know. No one ever told me. I don’t think Corpuz sounds white but what do I know?”

“You kinda look Asian.” He muses out loud.

“Stop before you get racist bro.” She warns playfully with a pointed finger. “And what? Asians can’t be from Kansas?”

He pauses and considers it. “You right.” He answers quietly with darting eyes that showed him piecing his newly formed opinion together.

She sees the lull in the conversation coming as he gets distracted. His round dark eyes were still blinking in thought under straight brows that were furrowed in the middle, currently concentrated. The beginnings of a beard, a heavy five o clock shadow covered the lower parts of his face but his lips that she regrettably had noticed were full and soft weren’t hidden from its length yet. A rub of his chin and a scratch through his almost fluffy short hair distracted her as his long and lean hands fidgeted with themselves. She was used to seeing his hair damp and flopped over his forehead from training. Tonight it was dry and styled up, same for his choice of clothes. Just long enough to cover his scalp but not long enough yet to look messy. He was always in black, which she respected as a fashion choice. Although for New York it wasn’t very abnormal as a color of choice.

Eve quickly turns the conversation back to distract him from his self-reflection. “Did you come with anyone tonight? You give off that lone wolf vibe and I don’t think your brother is small enough to even fit through the door.”

His face transforms back to it’s easy-going politeness as it does when he’s with her. “Yeah, I’m alone. Just wanted to not be a shitty friend and try to be supportive by coming to watch them tonight.”

“That’s very nice of you.” She praises. “I was guilt-tripped too.” They both share a small laugh.

“Well, I’m glad we both got guilt-tripped then.” A warm tone she could feel more than hear as he slid her drink her way. “How’s your… y’know...stuff going?” he offers as he wasn’t entirely sure how to conduct himself outside of their usual healing or training.

“It’s…” she sighs and wrinkles her nose. “Going?” she shrugs and presses her lips. “I don’t really want to talk about it tonight if that’s alright. I came out to just be normal for a night. And get back to being… whatever tomorrow.”

He nods supportively. “You wanna go grab this booth and just... be normal? No super shit tonight?”

“I would fucking LOVE that.”

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

Molly, the greatest wingman, stalks the bar and circles, keeping an eye on her friend who was rustier than her when it came to picking up anyone. Besides being busy, which she most certainly was, Molly was lost as to why Eve didn’t have someone. She was attractive and smart and kind. Eve was straightforward forward and most of the time that didn’t ring well with men. Eve also got into her own head too much, preoccupied with the thought of messing up, anxious that someone would take one look at her and deem her not worthy and she’d get fired and lose everything she’d worked so hard for. Perhaps her fear of being vulnerable kept her from branching out. She had a lot going for her but didn’t really see it for herself. She’d spent so long being focused on her education and career, proving herself now against the past she had on paper that she was in fact good enough. Imposter syndrome is a real bitch. Not to mention being a woman, and a minority on top of that. Or at least she assumed she was, her mother was and none of the super-powered people knew who their father was. It was enough to be a woman in the medical world, but being one with slight monolids and an ambiguous face and skin color made it even harder. If she was professional, her face was read as cold and bitchy. A strong jawline and not super soft and feminine features made her unable to pull off the damsel in distress routine to slip under the radar unassumingly with her male colleagues. She’d had a terrible upbringing, rough and wild adolescence and now was trying to find her place in the midst of having powers and navigating adult life.

But Diego understood all that. He was the only person she’d ever met that could even possibly begin to understand what she felt. So as it does, shared trauma can create intensified bonds where other’s never existed before. So perhaps that’s why she felt so at ease as soon as she understood who, or what he was. It was almost as if a built-in trust came with his intense eyes and confident actions. Feasibly, that’s why they spent the majority of the night pressed shoulder to shoulder, shouting into each other ears from inches away in a booth, smashed together by the crowd of people around them. As the number of drinks rose, the inches between their bodies dropped.

They sat together as two ordinary people, sharing musical taste and stories of shows past. They drank and laughed and to anyone else they seemed like a cute couple on a date, sitting close with no show of awkwardness between them. After you’d had someone's head between your thighs, covered in both of your sweat and bruises from your grappling the previous day, sitting together seemed like nothing. And it also felt that way, effortless.

What surprised Eve the most about the night was how easy and fun it was. The conversation kept going despite the noise. There was even harmless flirting that she was realizing was a built-in thing with Diego. He was a professional, he was raised to be able to manipulate and know how to engage with people. But she never once felt like it was fake or forced. The crinkles in the corners of his eyes when she’d be inches from his ear and make him laugh led her to believe this was all genuine no matter how unreal the whole situation that brought them together felt.

“Thanks for getting me home,” she says with no slur but the warm buzz of alcohol being felt in her stomach and face.

“Can’t let anything happen to you now can I?”

“I”m trying to not let anything happen for myself….” her eyes go distant before fumbling with her keys. “Can we do some training that’s like… I wanna be able to hit, y’know?”

“You wanna do some boxing?”

“Yeah. I think I do.” she nods and roughly shuffles into her apartment. “I wanna hit you in the face.” she says seriously before they both snort and start laughing.

“Join the long line, honey.” he says with stretching arms. “I’ll find ya some gloves.” he nods in thought. “Tomorrow, if you’re able to anyway,” he smirks,” We’ll get started on learning what it feels like to take a hit.”

“I’m not that drunk.” she says with a wrinkled nose of playful defensiveness. “I’ll chug a pedialite and be fine.”

“Spoken like a true doctor.”

“Or a true alcoholic.”

“Too bad you can’t heal your own liver huh?” he teases.

“Maybe that’s what I'll work on next.” she says as she sighs, the tiredness setting in. “My brain training. Not the body.” she clarifies. “We’ll do punch kick beat em ups and I’ll try to heal the damage this stress is causing.”

“Punch kick beat em ups?”

“Shut up I'm drunk.” They both laugh and she reaches out to hug him. He didn’t expect it but he certainly didn’t deny it.

“Oh are you THAT drunk?” he smirks and looks down at her.

“You fuckin’ wish.” she snorts into his chest before pulling away. “We were...being like..normal for a minute. For tonight, I mean. I needed it, thanks. That was… the hug, why I hugged you... to thank you.”

“You’re starting to ramble now, go on and get in bed.” he turns her body and pushes her into the apartment. “You’re welcome. I had a good time too. It was nice to just…” he shrugs. “Not be me for a few hours.”

She nods and starts sitting her things on her counter. “I know what you mean.”

“That’s some depressing shit.” he stares at nothing in particular for a moment.

There’s a pause of reflection before they both laugh again. “At least we can bitch to each other?” she offers. “I’m glad you got stabbed Diego.” she chuckles.

“What the hell?” he laughs at her as she pats his arm.

“We wouldn’t have met otherwise ya idiot!” she shoves him back into the hallway lightly.

“Oh. I thought you were having some hella mood swings or somethin’.”

“Hella? This is New York son, not Cali.” she teases. “Get out of here before you say something else stupid and I decide I can’t be friends with you anymore.”

“That's the most solid and hurtful advice I’ve been given in a while.” he tips an invisible hat to her.

“I got plenty more!” she calls out to him as he leaves. “See you tomorrow!”

He raises a hand, a cute spin to face her, and walk backward. “Get some rest. I’m beatin’ your ass tomorrow.” he gave her a big smile that they both kept on their faces long after they were out of sight.

@s-h-e-w-r-i-t-e-s​ @jaegeeeeer​ @diegos-butt​ @anglovesthis​

[thepinkseat-askthemoonbunny]

Alright everybody, meet my baby girl Elisabetta Hellsing-Maxwell...or Lisa for short. She’s supposed to be around 12 in this pic and yes, her primary weapon is a spiked Hello Kitty baseball bat. (I remembered that one post with the hello kitty bat and I couldn’t resist)

Full Name: Elisabetta Dipali Alessandra Hellsing-Maxwell (Dipali from her maternal grandmother, Alessandra after Anderson.

Nickname: Lisa

Age: 12 (in the pic)

Hair color: Blonde

Eye color: Violet

Skin color: Brown

Personality: Lisa’s actually a really sweet and polite girl and always curious...she’s always getting into new things, usually things she’s not supposed to be getting into (much to her parents’ worry). She tends to be quiet and keep to herself a lot, most take this as a sign of antisocialist behavior but no, she’s just plotting. She’s a planner, she’ll think of three and five plans for things even if they’re impractical in the long run. She has a problem with keeping emotions bottled in until they just erupt, which can get quite ugly and has difficulty asking for help insisting she can handle it herself. Oftentimes she feels torn between her parents...this poor child just needs therapy, somebody please help her.

Bio: So, Lisa’s story...she’s not really supposed to be here, k? Details are covered in the fic (there are only four chapters up so far) but I’ll summarize. Basically Integra and Maxwell got drunk one night and hooked up in a bar. It was supposed to be some one time thing never to be mentioned again, because they LOATHE each other but the sex was bomb as hell so it just kept happening behind their organizations’ backs.

Until one day Integra starts to feel like shit and the doctor is all like “congrats, you’re pregnant” and of course our vampire slaying queen of the universe was like “SHIIIIIITTT! This can’t be happening right now!” but inside her head cuz she doesn’t scream in public. Maxwell finds out (she doesn’t tell him, he just finds out) and he starts freaking out like oh my god oh my god, what do I do, but then his Catholic sensibilities kick in and he goes over to the mansion like “we gotta get married, like right now.” At first Integra’s like “no sodding way” and plans to get an abortion. There is no way that they’re in any position to be parents right now, this is a terrible idea...literally the worst thing that could happen at the worst time, and what would their organizations say?

But she ultimately changed her mind after seeing how screwed both their reputations would be if this ever got out. Plus in his words “she needs an heir and she’s not getting any younger.” So they try to remain civil for the sake of the children but still can’t stand each other (but they keep having hatesex tho cuz I’m a sadist) and eventually Lisa and her twin brother are born. She’s named after both the Queen of England and the Catholic Saint Elizabeth of Hungary (but the Italian version). Since her parents hardly ever see each other, Lisa spends six months in England and six in Italy usually. Growing up, she and her brother were often kept as innocent from the affairs of Hellsing as their mother could possibly manage it, as she wanted them to have a proper childhood. Lisa often spent her time pursuing her passion, music...writing songs or playing her guitar, when school and parents don’t particularly get in the way. Ultimately, the child wanted control over her own soul and grows weary of her parents’ spiritual conflicts over them.

Relationships:

Integra Hellsing: Lisa thinks her mom’s the greatest thing since sliced bread, and she’s not wrong really. They’re very close and she tries to emulate her a lot, Integra at first didn’t think she’d be a very good parent but she turned out to be a pretty great mom and trains Lisa up to be the boss ass bitch she will one day become while running Hellsing..that is, until EJ became the new heir because Lisa’s choice of religion disqualified her. She makes sure that her kids know they can be anything she wants to be. But she also shelters her and keeps a lot of things from her because Integra wants her daughter to have what she never did, a childhood because she was forced to grow up way too fast. And mama bear WILL destroy you if you fuck up. She’s been through some shit, Lisa is her offspring, Integra is hella protective. Safest child in Britain.

Enrico Maxwell: Lisa loves her dad to bits but is kinda terrified of him because well..:he’s a total raging nutjob.. He takes an active role in their upbringing because he was a bastard, he went through hell because of it and by Jove, his kids were NOT gonna go through that shit. Maxwell tries his best, he really does but he hasn’t lost any of that diehard Catholicism since becoming a dad and he often tries to drill that into Lisa. “But Dad, why can’t I have Protestant friends?” He’s probably one of those strict religious dads who won’t let you wear skirts above knee length and who thinks rap and Instagram are “tools of Satan.” He thinks he’s protecting the kids but he’s kinda fucking them up man. But at the end of the day, he does love her with all of the shriveled remains of his black, cold heart. One bonding ritual they have is him doing her hair, Lisa has his bushier hair. Integra can throw on a suit and be ready and can’t really be bothered with it so either Maxwell or Walter end up doing it. Their relationship has simultaneously become stronger, as Lisa has become a practicing Catholic, and a bit shaky as she can tell that there’s a bit of a rift between her dad and her twin.

Enrico Hellsing-Maxwell: Lisa’s younger twin brother by six minutes, and her ride or die. She’s often protective of him as the “big sister” and can go full mama bear when it comes to him, the two of them are like two halves of a whole basically. They’re inseparable, and often get into trouble together...they’ll form a wall so you can’t get information out of either of them, Rico is one of the few people she loosens up around and he knows things about her that a lot of people don’t, even their parents.

Alucard: Alucard is like half-nanny, half-attack dog. He did NOT like the kid at first because she was a reminder that that Italian slimeball “defiled” his master, but over the years she’s kinda grown on him. They have somewhere between a Seras and Integra relationship, he knows she’ll be his master one day but she’s also still small enough that he can kinda intimidate and flex on her. But he’s hella protective of her, he wouldn’t let anything happen. Lisa refers to him as “her scary vampire brother” and when she was little, she used to mispronounce his name as Ally-card so she still calls him that sometimes (which he hates)

Anderson: He’s basically her surrogate grandparent and she calls him Granddad. He may be a scary, Catholic Paladin but he loves the kiddos...and Lisa is kind of special to him. Maxwell is his son, and because of the way he turned out, Alexander feels like he failed. With Lisa, it’s almost a reminder of what her dad could’ve been, so it’s almost like a do-over he’s determined not to waste with her. He and Integra begrudgingly tolerate each other for her sake.

Seras: Lisa’s big sister. While Alucard is the older sibling that will encourage you to get into all sorts of holy hell, Seras will reign her back a little.

Heinkel and Yumie: Maxwell often makes them babysit Lisa while he’s busy, and they get SO ANNOYED by it. But with him, not with her. Heinkel is that “cool auntie” who will buy her beer and teach you her to shoot guns, Yumie is the kinda neurotic aunt who wants to be by the rules only because she’s terrified of what Maxwell will do if they cross a line.

Walter: Her “other granddad”, she often tells him things that she doesn’t tell anybody else because he’s literally one of the few religiously neutral people in her life.

[lifeofroos]

Part 24. 

In short: Nico gets therapy from Dionysus. In this chapter, they talk about Nico’s feelings towards his contact with Hades. The rest can be found on AO3, FanFiction.net and Tumblr tags like Nico di Angelo, writing, trials of apollo etc.! 

This Might be Crazy: Chapter 24: Mogu Mogu Jelly Tea

‘How do you feel about the time you spend with Hades?’ While he said it, Dionysus pushed a small bottle my way. Mogu Mogu jelly tea, it read on the front. I had never heard of it, but was curious to find out how it tasted.

‘You’ve been talking to Hades!?’ Mary paused putting on mascara to give me a surprised look.

I looked at Dionysus, and then to Mary. ‘To first give an answer to Mary: Yes, I have been talking to Hades. I want to have an actual father-son relationship with him.’ 

‘Oh.’ You could see in her face that she had another question. I stayed quiet, while she put her mascara away. 

She closed her hand mirror and walked over to our table. ‘Hm. Well, as he already asked actually,’ she said while waving in Dionysus’ direction, ‘how do you feel about that?’ She made eye contact with Dionysus for a few seconds.

I thought for a a bit, before turning to Mary. ‘There is gradual improvement. He has been trying and learning.’ I shrugged and looked at Dionysus for a second. ‘But I sort of feel like I have to give counseling to him instead of the other way around. Like, I keep saying that it’llbe okay and that he does not need to feel anxious and that we can work it out. I don’t think that is his fault, because it is all a first time for him, but…’ I shrugged.

Dionysus opened his mouth to say something, but Mary was quicker: ‘You sometimes feel like your parent is the kid and you need to tell them stuff about the world instead of the other way around, even though you should not be responsible for the way he acts and should not constantly have to reassure him.’  I looked at her. 

‘I mean, yes.’ 

Mary sighed and put a hand on her small baby bump.

‘Well, eh… what is your experience with Aphrodite?’ I asked. I was genuinely curious. ‘Maybe it helps to compare?’ I shot Dionysus a glance. He did not seem to fully agree with that, but he allowed us to go on. 

Mary stared at the wall. ‘Well… I met her thrice. The first time was pretty regular. You know, your godly parent comes to you to tell you that you need to make them proud, you know it.’ She rolled her eyes. ‘But the second time, it was because I just had my heart broken by some boy I had been dating for a few years.’ She looked at the table. ‘I was pretty broken up about it, but all she said was that I should just forget it. That this was meant to happen and next time I should just break his heart before he could break mine. She said it as if… as if it was that easy. Just say that you are over it and suddenly you are over it. And then make someone hurt the same way you are next time.’ She stroked her bump. ‘I… I explained to her that that was not how it worked, in a way that might not have been the most graceful way to bring it, if you know what I mean. I think… my mother seemed too stunned to understand what I said. She said ‘alright’ and left.’ Mary stopped moving her hand around. ‘I think she has heard it time and time again, but it just does not get through to her. Oh, and the third time was when she heard I was pregnant. She gave me some baby stuff.’ She shrugged. ‘That was handy, I guess.’

She shot a glance at Dionysus, who was looking at the street outside. 

I opened my bottle of Mogu Mogu and took a sip. ‘For Aphrodite, that might be true. But while I agree with the part where they sometimes seem stunned about something normal, I don’t think Hades has heard the things I am telling him hundreds of times before.’ I shrugged and pushed my bottle around. ‘He does not have many children and he certainly does not have many children that actually came to the Underworld before their death. This experience is new for him. He… while it still bothers me, I think I understand why he acts this way. And he seems open to change at least.’

 I looked at Dionysus, who took a deep breath. For a moment, it was as if everything the gods had ever done flashed before his eyes. ‘Nico, your feelings are totally justified. It is not nice to feel like you are the one to coach your father instead of the other way around. And you don’t have to defend him.’ He sighed ‘And about the gods’ behaviour… all I can say is that the gods have always behaved like that.’ He stared at an undefined point. For a second, I looked at Mary. Silently, we agreed to let him come up with more to say by himself, without pushing him.

We made some small talk about the baby, or I tried to (I really did not know anything about babies, but I did learn how crazy expensive it was), but Dionysus did not join in. He was staring off into space. 

‘The gods do need some things spelled out to them because they don’t get it,’ he muttered after some time. ‘But there are also things we do because it’s just… it’s better. Not… not always for the child, but in the long run. Some gods never interact with their children, because they think it is better if the kid can just come to terms with the fact that their parent will never be there. Others will truly try to raise them, mostly the… smaller gods, so to speak. And we’ve got everything in between. Usually… what the god thinks is best is what will happen.’ He stared at the floor. ‘I did not understand that either when I was a demigod, Hestia had to… sort of explain it to me. And even she had difficulty with it.’ 

I took a sip of sweet tea. ‘It is difficult for all of you too? To let go of your children?’

Mary shrugged. ‘Perhaps, but you also seem to say that most gods will interpret better in the long run as better for their own souls.’

His expression darkened after Mary’s words. ‘Hm.’ He swiftly shook his head around, after which he seemed more present in the moment. ‘Anyway, the important thing is that Hades is now willing to be there for Nico. In a way I would agree that he is acting like a child, but he is willing to change century old behaviour for you. But that also does not excuse him from acting like a child. If you understand what I mean. And you do not have to cater to him. If he goes that way, you say you are tired and you come back to camp.’

‘I… yes.’ It was enough for now. Dionysus nodded sternly.

Mary stared at the table. I did not know whether she did not want to comply with what he was saying or if she begrudgingly accepted it. 

I took a few sips of Mogu Mogu. The bottle was almost empty, as a sign that it almost done for now. Yet, Dionysus had one more thing to say: ‘Nico, do you want to go on with it? Aside from my opinion, or your fathers’ behaviour?’

‘Yes. For now at least, I am sure that I want to go on with it.’ 

‘Good. But make sure that you don’t go over your own boundaries.’ 

I nodded. Then I took the last sips of Mogu Mogu, signaling that therapy was over. 

Before we left, Dionysus asked Mary some things about the baby. Although she had already told me some of it before, she seemed more than happy to say it all again. After that, we waved her goodbye and went home. 

When we came back to camp half-blood, I grabbed Dionysus’ hand. ‘Wait. I… I think you try to take more care of the demigods as well, even though…’ I shrugged.

‘That’s different, Nico. I should be way better than I am now. I was a demigod once, after all. Hades just tries, even though he has known nothing except for godhood.’

I shook my head. ‘I don’t think it is different.’ 

He paused, before saying: ‘Go to your cabin, Nico.’ 

I nodded, before turning around and running off. But I must confess I did not go to the Hades cabin before collecting Will from the Apollo cabin. 

A/N: After I was done writing I figured out that Mogu Mogu is a Dutch concept and it has only been introduced in the Netherlands. But Dionysus is magic y’all he can just magic that stuff and give it to Nico. 

I wanted to show more of Mary, because I have something with her planned in a few chapters, but for that she needed to be more of a character first. 

This chapter seems kinda edgy I don’t know. To be upfront: I am thinking of taking a small posting break to sort out my story, because the last chapters feel weird to me. But knowing myself I probably won’t do it.

Also I am thinking about doing a look-into-dionysus-character-as-of-now bonus chapter in the future.

I must sincerely apologize for how long the chapter about Maria di Angelo is taking. I a, going go look further into it, but for now the planning is: first Apollo will become a god again, then Nico will do more with Hades and meet Persephone, and that will trigger him to talk about his mother. There will be a few interlude chapters, to make the story lighter. I hope that’s okay.

[cullxtheherd]

No! For Jacob?

send “NO!” to find my muse dying on the battlefield

oh my god hahahhahghsd this is fiINEee have a tune to go with it: [x]

The nest he’s selected above the Den affords him eagle-eyed protection that is invaluable and he ducks behind the rock ledge, reloading the fifty caliber rifle. Hot mid-afternoon sun nearly blinds him with his back against the playing field like this and, gritting his teeth, he pops up and over life-saving cover. Focusing down the sights he squeezes off a shot that he knows, for a fact, hits it’s target. 

Despite an impressive, flowing spray of blood and audible shattering of bone the Deputy approaches, using their remaining functional arm to begin their ascent. Logically Jacob can depend on the several, painstaking minutes his accuracy will afford him, but? He remains glued and peering down the craggy, sheer rock face. 

A large part of him is in a constant call to action but the tiny, scared voice that he harbors on the inside begs him to stay put; fulfill his destiny. He has been preaching his own end alongside the collapse for so long- would it be right to defect and go AWOL?

The haphazard slide of scattering pebbles rattles him to his bones, bringing him back from his momentary lapse and, on his feet he approaches the fallen log bridging the peaks of the mountain. “There you are!” 

Though he is incensed once again and renewed with adrenaline he hesitates. Doesn’t go for his pistol until it’s too late. Raises his sights when the Rookie is already on him. He falls hard, hands reaching and? By some grace, or miracle the Deputy allows him to ramble on despite everything he has done.

A rookie follows an old, dying soldier down from his perch.

“...Just waiting,” Lungs ragged with mucus and blood he struggles, “For someone to push us and oh, boy, have you pushed us-” Trying to get a breath only affords him a gurgling cough, “You did everything he said you would do,” Swallowing is difficult and ruddy, “And you didn’t even know it.” Letting go the Deputy takes a step back and reality begins to fade, vision bleeding, “You had no fucking clue.” 

Birds rustle in the trees, kicking up their sing-song chorus as if the massacre in the field behind them never happened and, slowly, painfully, Jacob Seed takes his last breath.

---

He feels sodden- as if he is underwater. Something nearby jostles, vibrating his entire body painfully and, on a lungful of blood, he screams. All at once he is very, intently aware that he is not outside any longer and, unable to even begin to control himself, he fights back, limbs flying. 

A dank, metallic, musty smell- burning? There is a sheen of moisture on his skin and it feels? Damp. Bunker. He is most definitely in a bunker.

Somewhere beneath the waves a voice sounds strongly, “Clear!”

---

Jacob isn’t sure if he has lost track of time but he feels as though he is waking from a prolonged, fitful slumber. Every possible inch of his body is heavy and he is dizzy and confused. Trying to move isn’t working in the normal, customary sense and he finds that even building up to opening his eyes is difficult.

“Don’t- uh,” Groggy thirst interrupts his visitor, “Don’t try to move.”

Taking in a breath is impossible and he gags, choking.

“OR take that out- stop!” 

After a great deal of effort he opens his eyes, glaring and partially suffocating.

“You’re on a ventilator.” Hands up as if he is a fearsome beast to be tamed placations come, begrudgingly, “That IV line is- stop! You’ll feel a whole lot worse if you do that.”

A door audibly groans open and footsteps approach to relieve him of his discomfort. Jacob gags but is unable to move a great deal, body weak. “Peaches,” He barely grogs, voice a nuisance, “What-?” He coughs uncontrollably. 

Staci, taking pity on him, pours a cup of water and even helps him with the straw while he relays a highly abridged, bullet points version of The Rundown. With ease he catches a spill down the side of Jake’s face with a nearby cloth and it is such a familiar action he has to wonder: how long- how many times had the kid repeated that action?

“So you, what? Dragged me here,” Breathing is getting easier and, with time, his vocal cords will be on the mend- but, for now, he struggles, tone beyond weathered and ragged, “Out of the kindness of your heart?”

His eyes roll, “Blow me.”

“Only in,” His tongue slides over cracked, dry lips, “Your fuckin’ dreams.”

“You’re as disgusting as ever,” Refilling his seat he grabs a book he’d discarded earlier, “Definitely no brain damage.”

“Yeah,” Using his fists as anchors he hikes himself up a strenuous smidgen higher on the headboard, “Thank God for that.” Winded and exhausted from what should be minimal effort, his brows cross, a gloomy, concerned look overcoming him, “How long I been here,” Partially out of breath and voice sore he has to take several, panting breaths, “Staci?”

Pratt leans forward on his knees and the seat creaks loudly before he considers answering. “Nearly six years- only one more to go.”

“Only one- what do you mm-” Mind like a tsunami everything comes rushing in all at once- sight, sounds, smells; even hazy snippets from the time he’s spent asleep here. “Fuck,” A dry, hitching breath sounds before he finishes, “Me.”

“No.” Seeming wholly unconcerned, Jacob’s favorite tool- spy plants his feet, one over the other, against his bedside and resumes the book he’s been wearing out. “I uh? Kinda’ destroyed the main console a-” 

“You did,” Taking a difficult, tired breath he chooses his words very carefully, “What now?”

Turning a page loudly he continues, “Just a little while convincing the Deputy-” He cuts himself off with good news, “And! I even got them to leave me behind at the entrance- avoided the entire Papa Joe Showdown Extravaganza, but,” He shrugs, blasé about the whole ordeal, apparently, “On the bright side: your resurrection will go swimmingly.”

Fists under him for support again Jacob is ready to start any physical therapy by any means if just for having the pure, simple pleasure of putting his proverbial foot up Staci’s ass once more. Pressing himself higher up into a leaning, seated position is difficult and, much-too-late and not nearly as loud as he’d like he bursts, roughly, “MY WHAT?!

[apricops]

More Buffyposting

Here’s miscellaneous notes over -- yeesh, about a season and a half. I kinda put this off for a while.

Thoughts from the last 4-5 episodes of season 4:

The whole “aloof and uncaring psychologist” trope is kind of dumb but at least in Maggie Walsh’s case -- and I don’t know if this was intentional -- it actually makes sense and is thematically fitting. She wasn’t in the “help people and give them therapy” branch of psychology, she was in the “understand people in order to effectively break and control them to make more effective soldiers” school of psychology.

Superstar feels like the meta-gloves are coming off and Joss is really starting to realize how fun it is to just fuck with the audience.

No wait, that point was probably the fake Spike-and-Buffy marriage in Something Blue.

 There’s a nice thematic patter to the last third-ish of the season. Adam is, quite literally, amorally taking the “good parts” of different people/things stitched together with the chaff thrown away, and he works with everyone in order to get what he wants. Meanwhile, Buffy’s busy dealing with a treadmill of old acquaintances giving her headaches and feeling weighed down with her friends. Then the penultimate episode flips it: the holistic whole (figuratively and literally) is better than the stripped-down, “streamlined” version because of the human spirit and stuff.

And then I was like “wow, the big bad is dead and everything’s wrapped up nicely, so what the hell is the season finale going to be?” to which Joss cackled and said “what won’t it be?” because wow 45 minute dream sequence.

Season 5:

The show used to have a reliable pattern of heavy depressing episode -> light funny episode -> plot episode but that kind of goes out the window at the halfway point.

Thankfully the BuffyBot episode was basically “hey listen, shit got way real and it’s going to stay real, so here’s 45 minutes of absurd low-stakes shenanigans as a palate cleanser.”

Speaking of, my gf has to pause pretty much every time Spike comes onscreen because inevitably he’ll say something funny and I’ll start laughing too much to keep watching. It’s interesting comparing him to Angel because Spike’s had to pretty much grow a sense of morals starting from less than nothing.

Spike learning how to be a values-haver had a nice setup-and-payoff where Buffy refused to congratulate him for not drinking the blood of unconscious bystanders because he was clearly just doing it because Buffy was nearby and he wanted to put on a nice face for her. Then when he’s captured by Glory, he’s on his own, and he does the right thing at his own expense. Buffy’s “I won’t forget that” shows how she’s begrudgingly realized that Spike is growing a moral backbone without thinking it makes her need to humor his crush.

Completely obvious and planned by the writers of course but Joyce’s death being of mundane natural causes made it hit so much harder because I was fully expecting Brian to reveal himself, twirling a Snidely Whiplash mustache and going “nyehehe, I killed your mom!” and then Buffy could stab him and get catharsis but instead that didn’t happen.

Also my mom dying just 3 months ago made that episode hit a lot harder and the way it bounces back and forth between reality and false hopes is painfully accurate, your mind is just trying to be everywhere at once.

It was a bit cheeky of them to do this, but she show even sort of called attention to itself, by having the art class talk all about the use of negative space to highlight details while the episode itself was full of moments of quiet and inaction to highlight Joyce’s death.

Also, the song Giles was listening to after hearing about Joyce’s death was the same song that was playing when they poiked.

Speedrunning the show really highlights how Buffy’s been forced to grow up really fucking fast. Almost in response, Giles has a pre-serious-half midlife crisis.

I like how Giles buying a magic shop solves a lot of story shoe-leather problems (having a new base of operations, having access to important texts and resources, giving Giles something to do) while also fitting perfectly into Giles’s aforementioned mid-life crisis.

Misc:

“So, if crosses and holy water are the go-to things that repels vampires, does that mean they had pretty much free reign for most of human civilization until a couple thousand years ago, and then they still had free reign over everywhere but Europe? Or is it just a religious significance thing? Could you get the same effects with a gohei or an omkara?” gf: “Maybe it’s a belief thing, like it’s more in their heads. No, wait, that one vampire drank holy water and exploded.” me: “does the tabletop RPG mention anything about it?” gf: “it’s literally never explained or elaborated upon.”

[side-effect-of-the-meds]

Is there a fem!Jean Moreau? (Jeanne Moreau, perhaps?) Can she be friends with Erin? Does she perhaps have a chance to become a Fox?

Okay so this took a long time bc I kept getting distracted. I think I covered most of Jeanie in the long ass Riko post. 

So y'all are up to date on Jeanie' s flight from Evermore with Ania and Cleo. 

The boys return to Palmetto two days after Jeanie and Ania 

Kevin goes ballistic when he sees Cleo bc he thinks he's hers. 

Jeanie just shakes her head and Kevin just kinda frowns. When he pieces it together he shrieks 

He takes baby Cleo into his arms really carefully and curls up in a corner, cradling her in his arms, rocking softly as he bawls his eyes out. 

"Oh, Cleo-" he bursts out in tears over and over again. 

Everyone just kinda stares at him for a while. Ania is the first to go to him, followed by Jeanie. All the Ex-Ravens are curled up in the corner trying to hold Kevin together. 

They won't say anything until all the Foxes are back together. They doubt they'll be able to tell them everything more than once. It's too painful. 

So Ania takes Kevin and the cousins to pick up Erin. They bring Cleo with them. 

Erin walks out to the waiting room with her empty facade up until he sees Cleo. 

"What the fuck have you done, Josten?" She half whispered in awe of the child. Ania offers her the child and Erin takes it. Nicky and Aaron are screaming internally. 

Cleo is literally 6 months old at this point. 

Erin is a monster who's absolutely melted at the sight of this baby. 

She just keeps the baby real close to her chest and lets Ania drive them back. She's just staring at Cleo the whole time. 

They file into the foxhole court where the upperclassmen are already waiting. 

They all surge to their feet when they see Cleo. Erin looks ready to fight anyone who tries to take Cleo from her. 

"I've only had Cleo for an hour but if anything happens to her, I'll kill everyone in this room and then myself." 

Jeanie, Ania, and Kevin stand in front of them. It takes some coaxing from Ania but Erin gives up Cleo. The Ex-Ravens tell them their story. They explain the truth about Kevin and Riko's relationship, the extent of The Master's abuse, and the truth about Cleo's father. 

The Foxes are all horrified but Wymack and Erin look fully prepared to drive out and kill Tetsuji themselves

Erin's barely able to hold her facade together. She's pissed that Riko faced what she did but she also ordered Proust to do the things he did. As a person who knows what it's like to face rape, Erin is struggling to understand how Riko could have done something like that. 

Back in Cali, Erin had nearly been forced to bear Drake' s child. She and her cellmate in juvie had managed some really shitty in-house abortion.

Later on the roof, when Ania tells her what happened to her specifically at Evermore. All of Erin's empathy is gone. Fuck Riko for touching her Ania. Erin is fully prepared to go to war with this thot. Ania stops her. If Erin wants to destroy Riko they have to take Exy from her first. 

Erin doesn't need any other form of motivation for the rest of the year. Anytime she sees Cleo and Ania, she remembers what she's fighting for. 

They're girls worth fighting for :')))

Anyway, because Jeanie isn't enrolled in school, she's now devoting full time to caring for Cleo. These days, Abby and Wymack and even the team are helping her. 

She goes to therapy sessions with Bee once a week. It's hard for her. She isn't ready to go see Bee and she has to leave Cleo to go see her. 

Erin is the one that convinced Jeanie to go. She offers to watch Cleo for Jeanie while she's gone. Jeanie begrudgingly agrees, knowing that Erin would never hurt the baby. 

It takes a few weeks before Jeanie actually opens up to Bee. It's a slow road to recovery but Jeanie' s begun it and that's what's important. 

Kevin wants Jeanie to stay with the Foxes but he also wants Jeanie to be able to come out and live her life as a woman the way she deserves to. South Carolina just isn't progressive enough for her to live there safely. She'll have a hard time making court when she comes out but Kevin just wants her to be happy. 

So that's why he pulls Jeremy aside. He needs a place where he knows Jeanie will be safe and the Trojans are definitely the best choice for her. 

Jeremy is a trans man so Kevin knows that Jeanie will have the support she needs.

Before Jeanie leaves tho, Allison takes her to the mall and gives her a makeover. They buy Jeanie dresses and skirts and make up. Allison teaches her makeup. All the girls are very supportive of her. 

Jeanie ends up being closest to Erin. Erin absolutely adores Cleo and Jeanie sees Cleo as her own child at this point. 

Look, Erin is just hella soft for Cleo okay. Fight me

Jeanie has caught Erin singing softly to Cleo. Sometimes Cleo will babble at her and Erin will sit and nod her head thoughtfully. She'll have full on conversations with her. 

Jeanie has heard Erin laugh one (1) time and it's when she blows bubbles on Cleo' s stomach to make her laugh. Cleo, in turn, tried to do it to Erin on her cheek. Erin has a really soft gravelly laugh and Jeanie is so shook. She doesn't tell anyone tho. It's far too private. 

Bc Erin was in foster care, she knows a thing or two about raising small children so she teaches Jeanie a thing or two on the matter. 

Cleo stays at the Foxhole Court with Wymack and Abby during the day and then goes home with Abby and Jeanie at night. As a result, Erin starts spending a lot of her free time at the court. Which is how she and Jeanie end up being so close. 

When it's time for Jeanie to leave for Cali, she decides that it's probably best that Cleo stay with Erin. It's a teary goodbye bc Jeanie has just made her first set if real friends and now she's leaving them and Cleo. Erin promises to Skype Jeanie once a week so she can see the baby. 

Jeanie arrives in Cali to meet the most beautiful man she's ever met. Looking at Jeremy Knox is like looking directly at the sun. Jeanie doesn't care tho. If she has to burn herself up to stand next to this man, so be it. 

Jeremy is a ball of energy and Jeanie is kind of the silent stoic type. This doesn't change a whole lot once she starts at USC. 

Being quiet is not a character flaw

Being quiet is NOT a character flaw

BEING QUIET IS NOT A CHARACTER FLAW

But Jeanie does smile a lot more. She isn't as tense as she used to be. She gets to go out with the rest of her team and have fun. 

Jeremy loves to skateboard so he tries teaching Jeanie. She falls on her ass all the time. He always laughs at her but it isn't mean so she ends up laughing too. 

He always patches up the little nicks and scratches she gets when skateboarding. One day she gets one on her face. 

Pressing a kiss to the nick, he whispers, "To help it heal faster." 

"I think I've got one on my mouth too." The words are out of Jeanie' s mouth before she processes them. When she does, she goes beet red. Jeremy laughs and presses a soft kiss to her lips. Jeanie is on cloud 9. 

Since they live in SoCal they go to the beach on long weekends. 

The Knoxs have a beach house so they usually head out there. 

CHRISTMAS AT THE BEACH WITH JEREMY, ALVAREZ AND HER GF (I can't remember her name for the life of me) 

There's mistletoe on the door :)))) 

That's how Jeanie ends up kissing Jeremy in front of the girls. 

They come back from break as a couple. 

They dominate the board until they hit Palmetto at finals. 

The Trojans go all out this year but they're no match for the Foxes. 

They have an after party where the Trojans get invited. Jeanie is so happy to have her old and new friends all together

And CLEO 

CLEO IS RUNNING AROUND ANd PLAYING AND TALKING BUT IT MAKES NO SENSE AT ALL BC SHES ONLY A YEAR AND A HALF OLD!!!!!!!!

Jeanie is carrying her when Cleo sees someone and screams, "Mama!!!!" 

Jeanie turns to see where Cleo is pointing. 

It's Erin

Cleo calls Erin mama 

Jeanie hands Cleo over to a blank faced Erin. Her apathy doesn't last tho. When Cleo presses a kiss to Erin's cheek she melts. Jeanie laughs. 

"Shut it, Moreau." 

"Yes, Mama." Jeanie barely dodges the hand Erin swats at her. 

Ania jogs in and Cleo calls her Mommy! 

Ania winds an arm around Erin's waist while pressing a kiss to Cleo's head. 

Jeanie smiles at them. She's glad Cleo has her two moms but she's a little bit sad too.

"We can have a baby too, if you want," Jeremy offers while they're standing alone on the balcony. "I mean, not now but… eventually." 

"You have to marry me first," Jeanie said with a smile. 

"No problem, love," he replied slipping a little box out of his pocket. 

Jeanie cries. It's a bit fast and they both know it but Jeanie knows she doesn't want to spend her life with anyone else. 

They get married on a beach in SoCal and Ania and Erin are there. They hate beaches but Jeanie thinks that it's time they made new memories anyway. 

Cleo is their flowergirl. She's terrible at her job but no one really minds. 

Laying in bed beside her new husband, Jeanie is happier than she's ever thought she'd be

[crazedhopelessromantic]

Slight info dump - I have so many thoughts about Joe

Joe is Australian, left the country when he was in his early 20s and was found by the foundation not much after he arrived in the US.

He lives in Anne's manor most of the time. (Because I've gotten way more attached to him over the year, and this makes up for it) But, sometimes he will leave for weeks on end before coming back.

Although it likes the solitude most of the time, it will drive the 2hs it takes to get to site-17 from her house to cuddle. During this time it'll always want to be around Anne, except during any therapy sessions she's hosting. Joey has to sit in the waiting room until it's over.

Joe has horrible impulse control and is a big kleptomaniac. He's not allowed in museums after stealing a painting. It currently sits in his room.

Anne & Him have not kissed ‼️ YET ‼he's okay with being touched and hugged & bit, but he does not to kisses - they will tho. It's gonna be soooo emotional 💪. He's also trying to be more open and honest about his emotions, it's difficult for him to label his emotions but he's trying.

He does not like silence. There always has to be some sort of noise going on at all times. He'll sleep with a radio playing if it's too quiet outside.

Its pretty artistic. Joe's walls are covered in sketches, its anatomy is so good. Most of its paper is recycled from old documents Anne let it shread, random old drawings or something else that it turned into new paper. He's really good at making sculptures, usually they're just mostly torsos but sometimes he'll add thighs to them. Joe loves making vases and pots just to smash them on the ground or hit someone in the back of the head with.

He's vegetarian.

Whenever he's sleeping with Anne, he'll hold them really close and hold their wrists with one of his hands to make sure they don't go anywhere. He just likes having them close to him, they're warm and they like him. His other arm is usually around Anne's waist. Joe will begrudgingly let go of them if they have to do something, but he expects them to come right back.

This is the kinda aesthetic I have in mind when thinking about his room. His door has police caution tape wrapped around it (a trophy)

He as multiple electric guitars, they all hang on the same wall in his room. He has a mini fridge and a coffee maker in there.

Okay, bye. *dissolves into thin air, never to be seen again*

[s1mpl3sp0ng3]

i'm the worst with those ask memes because i always just want people to answer everything; so just tell me everything about luna and thor /chinhands

i’ll do all the sfw ones because like i don’t know much about what thor is into sexually and i don’t wanna speak for a character that ain’t mine yo

Who cooks?

luna cannot cook to save her life, she burns water on the stove for god’s sake. probably thor, or they just get microwaveable stuff

Who’s the messiest? The cleanest?

i can imagine they’re both pretty disorganized, but nothing horrible. luna leaves her makeup out and her clothes on the floor a lot, tho. probably luna.

Who fixes the vehicle after a breakdown?

if they get stuck on the side of the road i can see thor being like “shit baby we better start hitchhiking” and he does the leg thing that women in the movies do to get a ride

Living space has a leak! Who fixes it?

probably thor. even on a ladder, you think luna can reach any of that? i remember jace said alfred was into carpentry years ago, they probably just bother him until he begrudgingly agrees to take a look at it

Who buys the groceries?

they like to go together! that text post that says “baby, do you want any doritos?” “HELL YEAH, I’M ALWAYS A SLUT FOR DORITOS” is them, interchangeably. when they have kids they love embarrassing the shit out of them by flirting in the aisles and other dorky parent stuff

Going out to eat: Who pays? Who orders the most food? And who has dessert?

luna insists on paying, she will literally snatch his money out of his hand and put her own on the table. thor doesn’t really eat much, so by default it’s luna. she’s also the one who orders dessert, and makes sure she does lewd stuff with whatever whipped cream or fruit is on it.

they like to sit on the same side of the booth so they can snuggle :3c

Would they go to the beach?

yeah, i think they would. thor is insecure about his body so he doesn’t take his shirt off, even if they swim, so luna makes sure she tells him how handsome he is

they’re the gross couple that makes out on the beach in front of everyone

Who knows how to swim? Who doesn’t?

thor probably swims about average, but luna god bless her can only doggy-paddle. she’s not a strong swimmer at all. thor goes into the deep parts just to fuck with her because he knows she can’t touch the ground. he thinks the frustrated scrunchy face she makes is cute

Is someone multilingual? Do they try to teach another language to the other? How does it go?

luna knows conversational russian because her dad taught her. i can imagine she teaches thor so he can bond with her dad

Any pets? Or plants?

i’m not sure, actually? luna’s not a plant person -- everything she touches kinda dies (that’s more perry’s thing anyway). if they got a kitten or something similarly tiny that cat would be spoiled rotten

Baths or showers? Together or separate? Any bubbles or bubble fights?

not all the time, but they like to take showers together. sometimes it’s sexual, sometimes it isn’t. luna would definitely want to take bubble baths together, and thor has long leggys so they’re awkwardly hanging out of the sides of the tub.

Can they stand silence? Who talks the most? Who talks the least?

both of them are incredibly social, so i don’t think they go through a lot of long silences. thor’s probably a little quieter, but not by much. they love to sweet-talk one another and have all these goofy little pet-names like “baby girl” and “lovemuffin” and all other kinds of saccharine bullshit

Who stays up late? Who sleeps the most? Does the other have to force them to sleep/wake up?

luna is a bit of a night owl, and i imagine thor probably is too. they’re both heavy sleepers tho, waking up is a nightmare. luna isn’t a morning person at all

Who is the highest maintenance? Does the other mind?

i would say luna, but she’s not as materialistic as she comes across as. yeah she likes clothes and makeup and she falls into retail therapy at times, but she’s not unreasonable. but she doesn’t need that stuff to be happy, and thor would give her the world if he could anyway

Vacation ideas: who decides them? Where would they go, if anywhere?

luna plans vacations, but thor usually wants to find the weirdest and most obscure places to visit. haunted houses, themed hotels, moshpits, all that kind of stuff. luna usually just wants to stay somewhere by the ocean, she loves the beach. so most of their vacations are probably beach trips or really specific sites. especially haunted places or paranormal sites, they both love that shit