#need to do a drawing where you could see a lot of his freckles

[frosty-tian]

“Enjoying the fresh air, Emmy?”

“Kade, I don’t think she can speak yet.”

(Been a hot minute. Fun-fact: Ember’s smaller than average even for a hybrid, and only grew into a more ‘normal’ size when she turned ‘16’.)

(Oh, of course, tagging @windydrawallday and @azula-nyx!)

[ultravi0lence14]

Snow Bunny

dean winchester x angel!reader

895 | fluff

summary: you love the snow, and dean isn’t just getting flushed cheeks from the cold.

dean watched as you trotted through the snow like an overtly hyper bunny, bouncing on the balls of your feet as you twirled around in the blizzard.

you’d never been down to earth before, so when your first snow storm hit, dean couldn’t ignore the squeal that filtered through the bunker halls from your lips. you had run outdoors so quickly that the eldest winchester had to remind you about putting on layers.

ever since the weather had dropped, you’d been outside everyday. a striped scarf tightly wrapped around your neck as sam’s old carhartt jacket adorned your upper half. dean didn’t like the sight of you in his younger brother’s clothes, but it was all they had, and dean would rather little flints of jealousy than you freezing to death.

dean heard your giggles of excitement from where he stood by the bunker entrance, watching you adjust the crème earmuffs on your head. the strangest thing wasn’t dean’s massive boots on your feet so you wouldn’t freeze, it was the fact that you didn’t even want to play in the snow, just admire it.

attempting to get you to at least throw a snowball, dean stopped trying after the copious amounts of questions about snow angels and why they were named after you. so dean just watched, a genuine smile on his lips for the first time in a while.

he admired the snow that decorated your hair, making you look like a renowned painting. the way your denim skirt and white tights clung to your legs had his mouth watering, remembering all the things you had let him do to you last night.

the thoughts running around dean’s mind was halted by the sweet sound of your voice calling his name. he immediately looked over to you, watching as you excitedly waved him over to where you stood.

his strides were quick, a harrowing feeling in his gut that needed your body close to his. when he reached the place you stood, dean’s arms brushed out in front of his body; wrapping one arm around your waist so he could pull you to his chest, the other delicately brushing the side of your face with the back of his hand.

“what is it, my love?” dean breathed out, the softest his voice has possibly ever sounded. but he realized it did that a lot around you. soften. the thrones usually wrapped around his rough and hard voice pruned and delicately trimmed just for you.

a dazzling smile broke out across your face, prompting dean to almost buckle at the knees. “dance with me, dean.”

your request sent his eyebrow shooting up in mock surprise, but he didn’t mutter a single complaint as he gently took his hand off your face and rested it on the middle of your back. he held you tightly, the only sound being the crunching of snow beneath your feet as dean swayed both of your bodies side to side. your face was close to his, a breath away, and dean couldn’t help but admire all the features you could only see up close.

the mesmerizing allure of your eyes, drawing him in with the kaleidoscope swirls that adorned your irises. the light freckles that dusted your cheeks and swept over the delicate slopes of your nose like stars. he even noticed your fluttering eyelashes, flakes of snow stubbornly getting caught in them above your eyelids and making you look like a goddess in the snow.

dean found the hand plastered on your back moving from it’s place, delicately bringing it to your face before he softly brushed the fallen snow from your lashes. a giggle burst from your lips, and dean’s heart ached in a way only true love could achieve.

the pads of his fingers moved from your eyelids down to the slope of your nose, brushing the point in a sad attempt to rid it of the redness brought by the harsh air. his nimble fingers than moved to your lips, brushing your cupid’s bow with his pointer finger before swiping your bottom lip with his thumb.

he was enthralled by you. the way you looked up at him through your lashes and pouted your lips as his fingers ran over them sending his brain into a frenzy. dean had never felt like God had created someone specifically for him, but he was silently thanking the man upstairs for the creation of his precious angel.

in a silent plea of love, dean brushed his lips across the expanse of your forehead, his mouth moving with words that sent another flurry of snow in your stomach.

“i love you, angel.” he murmured, moving his head to rest on top of yours. “i thank heaven everyday that you came down to me.”

a solemn and peaceful look danced across your face, hands grappling at the fabric around dean’s waist as your hands rested there. you couldn’t think of any possible words that could express your love for dean winchester, so you just settled on resting your head against his chest, lips pressing a kiss above his heart as a way to declare your love for him as well.

for a little while longer, the two of you stood in the snow, swaying back and forth in each other’s embrace like two loving displays in a snow globe.

tags: @a1ecmcdowell @cosmicanakin @titsout4jackles @haunteres @ariasong11

[alllgator-blood]

I have ten billion WIP sketches I need to finish, but for some reason I stayed up from 9 PM to 4 AM conceptualizing, making patterns, sewing, painting and applying makeup on this stupid fucking felt squid......the detailing needs to be cleaned up cause there's only one coat of paint so far, but he's pretty much done

my neighbors probably think I'm insane because I was running around the yard clenching this toy kallamar in a death grip and flying him around like an airplane/putting him in the barbecue/poking him with a stick. I want to tie him to a string and recreate the opening of napoleon dynamite >:) ALSO I MADE HIM SMOKE OUT OF A STUPID CRYSTAL PIPE BUT PLEASE DON'T ACTUALLY USE THOSE, THEY ARE SUPER TOXIC LMAO MINE IS FOR DECORATION

I don't have any process pics because I had tunnel vision autism style and forgot the rest of the universe existed while I was working on him. BUT if you're curious I'll ramble below the cut

Okay I am not a seamstress by any means. I've sewn my entire life but very, very infrequently. I've done plushies, clothes, cosplays, fursuits, accessories, etc. but I only do one like once a year, so while I planned to make all 5 bishops, I'm not really sure I'll get them all done. The material cost was like 20 bucks tops so I'm not too upset if I don't finish them. I AT LEAST WANT TO GET SHAMURA OR HEKET DONE.

here is the concept sketch ft. heket's toes and shamura's fingers. I decided to do his pre-schism version so I could fit him with jewelry! I did him first because like I said I sew infrequently and don't know wtf I'm doing, everyone else seemed a lot more complicated.

So I basically just traced this drawing on a printer paper-sized canvas in SAI, and guesstimated how everything would look in a 3D space. His head is four pieces, one triangle identical to the one in the picture, two wide triangles that are sewn together in the back, and a circle for his chin. You can't really see it in any of the pics but he's literally like a black cylindrical stick with little tentacles sewn on where his mantle connects to his cloak. The leg tentacles are one piece of felt that look like tassels, where they're connected by a rectangle but branch off into individual pieces. He can't stand up very well, so his cape keeps him up (that's gonna be an issue for every other bishop too except heket cause she's gonna be ROUND). Mostly everything like the crown, cloak, head, etc. are cones so I just had to make a lot of wide triangles.

For the details, I just used acrylic paint that was watered down so he's not especially crunchy, and for the blush tone I used a makeup palette my mom bought me 10 years ago in hopes I'd get in touch with my "feminine side", but I grew up into a nonbinary butch lesbian so OOPS. Kallamar looks better with makeup than me anyway. I'm kinda sad I couldn't get his freckles as lopsided as I draw them but it probably looks better in plush form to have them even anyway....

I could just post the pattern so I don't have to explain this but 1. I am mentally ill about the thought of my kallamar being in someone else's house and 2. the original pattern had to be tweaked while I was working on him so the final pattern straight up doesn't exist, I winged it the whole time

OH and the jewelry is just scrap pieces I had laying around, I might repaint it all to be gold instead of silver + bronze. I used 20g aluminum wire for his armlet thing, jumper rings for his earrings + ring (+ a diamond dot from my mom's kits for the gem) and chain for the bracelet. I made him an amulet as well but it felt like overkill so I took it off. I'm probably gonna make him a plague doctor mask and medicine bag sometime because I think about nurse kallamar more than I probably should :') I've already sewn one as a prop for a toy raven before so it shouldn't be too hard

[waynes-multiverse]

hello ! hope your having a great day, wanted to ask your thoughts (maybe a dirty drabble??) on Soldier Boy or Beau having an s/o that is artistic or draws/paints a lot? 👀 Currently working on pieces for my uni and in dire need of motivation to get it done😭 anyways i love all your work !!!! 🖤🖤🖤🖤

A/N: What a fun idea! Couldn't resist to write both of 'em, so I hope those two idiots bring you enough motivation 🎨💪😂

Pairing: Beau Arlen x Artist!Reader // Soldier Boy x Artist!Reader

Warnings: +18/NSFW, super light smut, tons of fluff, SB typical behavior, crack

Word Count: 1.1k

Main Masterlist || Dirty Drabbles Masterlist

French Boys

Beau Arlen:

As his car stopped in front of your house, Beau could see the lights still burning brightly in the garage, knowing you were still hard at work.

“Hey,” he greeted you as he stood by the door, watching you with a warm smile.

Your gaze drifted from your canvas to him with a smile before spying the brown paper bag in his hand.

“Brought you something. Figured you were gonna burn the midnight oil and needed some fuel,” he said with a knowing smile.

“You’re a godsend,” you said with a happy sigh and took the bag from him, inhaling the smell of its delicious contents. “I’m sorry I’ve been locked up here so much. It’s just… I’m really nervous about the gallery opening this weekend, and it’s stressing me the fuck out and–,” you rambled before you were stopped by his large palms on your cheeks.

“Hey, it’s okay,” he soothed you, chuckling, and pecked your hairline sweetly. “I get it. You’re gonna do great, alright? Amazing, in fact.”

You let out a deep, calming breath and smiled up at him. How did you deserve such a good man? And where the hell have you found him?

“I love you,” you said and draped your arms around him, crashing your lips against his and entangling him in a searing kiss that showed your gratitude. But as you pulled back, your eyes widened in shock. You clasped your mouth.

“What?” Beau looked at you confused before he caught your gaze locked on his shoulders and saw the red-painted handprints on his jeans jacket.

“I’m so sorry,” you gasped, embarrassed. You’d been working with paint everywhere all day. Of course it was all over you at this point.

To your surprise, though, Beau broke into loud laughter and shook his head at you. “Honey, it’s okay,” he told you before his freckled face was overtaken by a mischievous look. “In fact…”

He leaned over to one of your paint cans and dipped his finger inside a white one before booping your nose. You could feel a wet, cold blob on your tip as you gaped at him.

“You did not just do that.” You were speechless, but his playful laugh was contagious and intoxicating.

“Oh, it’s so on,” you announced and dunked your hand in a shade of blue, splattering it graciously on him.

“Oh yeah? Hope you’re ready ‘cause this means war, darlin’,” he countered with a wide grin, his hands finding green and yellow.

He chased you through the garage until he caged you in his arms, your mouth erupting with giggles until he filled it with kisses. Paint was everywhere, your clothes soaked and his beard and hair sprinkled like a cupcake.

“We’re never gonna get clean again,” you noted through giggles, looking at the beautiful mess in front of you as you brushed your fingers through his locks.

Beau lifted you up on your workbench, your legs locking around his waist. He kissed you deeply, feeling his excitement growing between your thighs.

“Guess we’ll just have to stay dirty then,” he said with a smirk and claimed your lips.

Soldier Boy:

You were curled up on the couch in your apartment, your eyes flickering between the bowl of fruit on the coffee table and your sketch pad in your hands.

Your concentration, however, was broken when a loud thud echoed off the walls and almost shattered the coffee table in a thousand pieces, sending the bowl of fruit flying across the room.

Your eyes lifted from your sketch pad and to your boyfriend in front of you, propped up with one muscular leg on the small table, elbow resting on his thigh with a bulging biceps and a painfully hard cock.

Annoyed, you huffed a sigh but weren’t surprised. You had been working on your assignment all day and wondered when your needy-ass, attention-seeking supe boyfriend would get bored with watching TV and smoking weed in your room.

“Ben, what the hell are you doing?” You looked up at him and saw the broad and proud smirk on his freckled face.

Cocksure didn’t even do him justice.

He wiggled his eyebrows. “Figured I’d give you something better to draw than a fucking boring-ass banana.”

“Uhm… that is so sweet and considerate of you. But I really need to draw fruit this week. That’s the assignment,” you said wryly before pushing him out of the way.

Well, as best as you could. He was a supe after all, but he budged and bent to your movement.

Pursing his lips, he threw his arms up in upset. “Oh, really? And what the fuck is all this shit, huh?”

Dramatically, he tossed one of your art maps on the table and crossed his arms over his broad chest, waiting for an explanation. As you peeked at the scattered sketches of naked men (and women), you knew what this was about.

You rolled your eyes back with a deep sigh. Of course he snooped through your stuff when you left him unsupervised in your room. “Ben, I told you already. We were drawing human models last month.”

“You never fucking said they were naked!” he argued, his deep voice trembling with jealousy and fury. “So, what? You’re just off, drawing cocks all day at that art school of yours?! I won’t fucking allow it, Y/N!”

You stifled a snort and tried to remain calm. He was honestly cute when he was greener than his suit. “Honey, you don’t have to be jealous. You know I love you... and your giant-ass dick.”

Biting the insides of his cheeks, he blushed slightly as he calmed down. “Yeah, well, you fucking better. ‘Sides, I’m not jealous. My cock’s way better than whatever those crooked-ass dicks are. Can’t even see them without a fucking magnifying glass…”

“Oh, yeah, for sure,” you feigned your agreement and hid your amused smile, nodding heavily. You stood up from the couch and locked your arms around his broad shoulders. You pulled his lips to yours, kissing him passionately until all his worries faded. His dick twitched between your legs. “You know, sometimes I’m surprised how you don’t explode with that giant ego of yours, welling from every pore.”

“Oh, you want me to explode?” Ben looked challengingly at you, smirking. “I can arrange that. In fact, how about I make you my fucking canvas and splatter my paint all over you, huh?”

“Ben, what–…” You burst into laughter, which was swiftly turned into a giggling shriek of protest as he grabbed you and threw you over his shoulder, carrying you to the bedroom.

What do you guys think? Which mess was harder to clean in the aftermath? 😂💚

TAGS:

Everything Jensen:

@alwaystiredandconfused @xlynnbbyx @lyarr24 @deans-spinster-witch @blackcherrywhiskey @deansbbyx @foxyjwls007 @ladysparkles78 @roseblue373 @zepskies @agalliasi @yvonneeeee @hobby27 @imsapphine @globetrotter28

[costracan]

Do you have any Elwin hcs?? :)

yes!!!! :-D this is going to be a bit long and rambly, hopefully it’s not too hard to read 😭

i think elwin and keefe already had a semi meaningful relationship before keeper! obv it got deeper throughout the events of kotlc because of they interacted way more and also the whole almost dying thing, but i think elwin could tell that keefe was being abused in some way and would feel a little protective of him.

he really likes kids and teenagers. elwin is very compassionate and shows so much respect for the kids in canon and i think he would show that level of care even for the kids he doesn’t treat frequently.

that being said, i definitely think he has favorites among his most frequent patients (sophie and keefe, lol).

he’s old. not bronte old, but old. probably just a little younger than forkle.

he knows how to whistle and hum, and will do so rather tunelessly while working/concentrated. his humming is soft and pleasant, but the whistling can get kind of annoying. he doesn’t listen to human music, but he’d seen humans do it in the past and wanted to teach himself how.

he runs his fingers through his hair a lot, which is part of the reason why it always sticks out in every direction. the other part of the reason is that he thinks it looks cool and he ruffles it up on purpose in the morning.

he has freckles!!! i love drawing him with freckles!

i don’t think he’s super interested in romance. he’ll occasionally get a crush on someone but never really acts on it. he feels too busy to be a good partner and doesn’t think he’s “cut out” for that type of life (at least not yet), so he doesn’t bother.

that being said! i do think he knows for a fact that he’s bisexual but doesn’t care/think too much about it considering he can’t really see himself being in a relationship in the foreseeable future. he feels awful for other queer elves who want to find love without being a bad match, though.

speaking of, he thinks the matchmaking system is absolute bs (except for the part where it ensures you don’t accidentally pair up with your distant relatives). this one might actually be canon i can’t remember LOL.

elwin is sooo empathetic and gets those phantom pains people can get when they see other people in pain. which kinda sucks for a medical professional who regularly treats people on the verge of death, but what can you do?

he used to dye his hair with elixirs to match his tunics but it made him look too crazy amd made some kids (and adults!?) scared of him so he stopped 😔

when taking care of people who are in critical condition, he pretty much just lives on squelchberries. he doesn’t have time to eat properly. he needs to make sure his patient is going to make it.

he just. cares so much about sophie and keefe. this one isn’t really a headcanon but it is so important to me elwin loves those kids oughh 😿

[mudisgranapat]

III. Where the sun doesn't reach

Word count: 3,2 k

Pairing: Simon "Ghost" Riley X F!Reader Content: zombie apocalypse, children, enemies to lovers, slow burn

Taglist: @poohkie90 @gaida-511 @synthe4u @beebeechaos Let me know if you want to be added to the taglist!

Note: Sorry it took so long to update, I'll try to be more consistent. This one was hard to write because there is a lot of information i needed to put out there and i wanted to make sure it made sense. if it doesn't, please let me know so i can explain better on the next chapter. Enjoy :)

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There was something alien about seeing life growing in a rotting world. Her soft baby skin was a contrast to everyone around her, who wore their skins dirty, scarred, and calloused. He hadn’t truly noticed the baby at first. He had seen her, because soldiers like him were trained to see everything: a child, around a year old, with dark hair and dark eyes. 

As the Humvee hit a bumpy road, he noticed how her curly brown hair was secured in place by two pink elastic bands, the locks on the pigtails moving side to side. She held a pink stuffed dolphin with her chubby hands and swung her feet, making the pink socks go back and forth. She wore a pink jumper that seemed a number too big and was covered in drawings of pink unicorns and rainbow clouds. In Simon’s opinion, it was an obscene amount of pink. He didn’t know if he was more astounded by the combination or by the fact that it had been put together in the middle of an apocalypse. 

Her eyes were hazel, and they bore into Simon’s skull with innocence he thought he would never see again. Especially in a vehicle like that, made for war and destruction. They sat on the back of it, on the seats that faced each other, like he used to do when going on missions, and ‘odd’ didn’t even begin to describe seeing Cami there. Cami. It felt weird to know her name when all the other boys didn’t. Like it was their secret to share. As if she could read his mind, Cami giggled, somehow not fazed by his mask. He was used to people cowering in front of him, children hiding behind their mothers and peeking at him from behind their legs. The opposite seemed to apply to the baby in front of him, as she grinned showing her scarce teeth. 

“Stop staring at my baby.” He rolls his eyes, redirecting his stare to her with a new layer of hardness. The woman looked like she was in her early twenties, but she spoke with the authority of someone who had lived a dozen lives. Her nose and cheeks were covered in scarce freckles from the sun exposure, and her hair was tied in a ponytail, with loose strands now matted to her face in dried blood. Unlike Cami, she hadn’t escaped the crash unscathed. There was a large gash on her forehead from when she probably hit her face on the steering wheel, now covered in gaze from the medkit. Her lip was split and her nose bleeding. During the crash, the instrument panel from the car had collapsed, causing a gnarly knee injury. “Stop staring at me”. He didn’t. She rolled her eyes. 

“Oh, don’t mind Ghost. He does that sometimes.” Johnny said in a joking tone, but lightly kicked Simon’s foot, secretly telling him to quit it. “I think it’s about time we do some proper introductions around here, don’t you think?” She gives him a small smile of approval, moving Cami in her arms. “My name is John McTavish, but you can call me Johnny or Soap, since the old man behind the wheel is also John. We usually call him by his last name, Price. Or Captain, but I feel like that won’t be exactly your vibe” 

“I’m not old, Johnny.” Price says behind the wheel with a sigh. 

“Sure, Grandpa.” Soap retorts, and Price lets another defeated sigh, focusing back on the road. Y/N laughs, and Cami laughs too, even though she has no idea what she is laughing at. 

“I’m Kyle Garrick, but you can call me Gaz. We still use our callsigns from when we served together.” He explains, poking his tongue out at Cami and making her laugh even more. This time, she even claps, letting her pink dolphin fall to the floor. She immediately frowns. Not even the car crash had been able to separate her from the toy, her little hands crushing it as she cried in the backseat, and now her face was starting to contort like the crying was going to start again. 

Simon reaches out to it at the same time Y/N does, but grabs it first due to his longer arms. “Ghost.” He introduces himself shortly, looking her in the eye. Neither of them breaks eye contact until Cami stretches her hands out towards the toy. 

“Dodo!” she screams, shaking a demanding hand in front of Simon. He’s taken aback by the sound of her voice, not expecting her to be able to talk. He hands her the dolphin and she gives him a big smile. He smiles behind the mask in return, a secret infatuation that he buries under the skull. He notices her gaze on him now, studying his reaction, and he has the urge to say ‘Stop staring at me’.

“Kamila is just learning how to talk”. At the mention of her name, she turns her head to Y/N, and shows her the stuffed animal with excitement. Kami wasn’t the only one to hang onto her personal belongings; Y/N had managed to grab a backpack she had taken with her from the house. “She is a bit shy, but once she gets used to you she can be quite the talker, although most of it is in her own language.” 

“It’s a beautiful name. Suits her well.” Soap says, smiling at them. 

“It’s Arabic, spelled with a K. Means ‘perfect’.” She kisses Kami on her nose. “What about ‘Soap’? What does it mean?”

“Let’s just say I’m pretty good at what I do. Clean with it.” He says with a smug grin on his face. “What about you? Any nicknames?”

“Well, there was a crackhead near my house that used to call me ‘strawberry’, because I liked to wear red lipstick. Until one day I got hit by a bicycle in front of him so he changed it to ‘smoothie’, since ‘I got mushed’.” She says using air quotes. 

Soap and Gaz burst out in laughter and Simon snorts, holding in his laugh out of ego. Price is too focused on the radio with Laswell to listen, probably debriefing her about what happened and the new addition to the group. “Peaceful neighborhood, I see”. Gaz tries to recompose, while the Scot is still doubled over, slapping his own knee. “Whereabouts did you live?”

“At that time, Liverpool, but I moved around a lot. My mother was a Journalist.” Her voice sounded distant at the last part. For most people, it was hard to talk about the past. They had lives that were worth living and never thought that they would have to watch it slip through their fingers. In that sense, being a soldier made things easier. They were always ready to pack their lives into one bag, and most of them had made peace with the thought that they might not come home whenever they stepped foot on the tarmac. Others, like Simon, didn’t have a home to come back to and found solace in the nomad nature of the profession. She coughs in an attempt to clear her voice and continues. “I followed in her footsteps, so that’s how I ended up here. I was investigating a corruption scandal in the Government.” 

“Always chasing a story. Is that how you got in trouble with the Resistance?” Gaz was good at getting information out of people. Like Price, he had a trusting face and a calming voice that quickly tore down people’s walls. 

Although Y/N had been previously reluctant to share information about her past, she knew that she didn’t have a choice now. They had saved her life and jumped into the crossfire to rescue her and Kami. She owed them answers. Taking a deep breath and rearranging Kamila in her arms, she starts talking. “When the first people got infected, I got curious. The story I had been writing had come to a halt after my main source stopped cooperating with the investigation, so I had been looking for a break. The virus seemed unrelated at first, but interesting enough to write a story about. So I started digging and came across some familiar names. The people I had been investigating for corruption had been dislocating funds from the Government for an unsanctioned project on biological weapons.”

The Humvee was quiet, except for the sound of the engine and Y/N’s voice. She looked at Kami again, now fast asleep in her arms. There was a softness in her eyes that Simon yearned for in his darkest thoughts. He dreamed of caring eyes that pulled him out of his nightmares, only to wake up alone, drenched in sweat. During nights like that, he would pour a glass of moonshine and sit on the old kitchen chair in the base. Time would pass as he stared at the glass, each second increasing the burning in his lungs. He ached to scream, to punch, to tackle the thoughts that tormented him and sink a knife in its gut. But he couldn’t, so he would just sit and stare at the alcohol-filled glass, imagining the liquid burning down his throat and numbing the ache in his chest. He would then get up and empty the glass on the sink, because the only thing he could hate more than himself was his father. He relished watching the moonshine go down the drain, a small victory in his demise, a promise that he would never become the man who buries his sorrow with glasses of booze. 

“I found a guy willing to talk to me. His name was Eric Rhodes, a brilliant scientist. He had been working on the project but got fired for asking the wrong questions. He thought that the virus he had been working on before he got sacked was the same one that was turning people into… Well, zombies. I guess that’s the technical term for it. At first, I thought it was just some conspiracy theory, you know? The guy gets angry because he got fired and needs to find someone to blame. But then he showed me solid leads, names, and notes he had been able to keep, detailing what he was doing in the lab.” 

“Did you believe in him?” Price asks from the front, now engaged in the story. Laswell had the same theory, that the apocalypse was a result of a biological weapon gone wrong, but hadn’t been able to prove it. Not that it would change a thing: they were already doomed, and whoever was to blame was probably dead by now.

“I didn’t, in the beginning. But after he showed me the documents… Yeah, I did. He stopped talking to me after that. I figured he got scared that I was going to rat him out. The virus was spiraling out of control by then, so I decided to reach out to him while the phones still worked.” She pauses, looking at Kami again as if to check that she is still safe in her arms. “His younger brother, Killian, picked up the phone. Told me they had sent someone to kill Eric, burn his house down with all the evidence. He said Eric had told him about me and asked for us to meet. He wanted to know more about the reason his brother was killed.”

“Killian Rhodes. That’s the guy who started the Resistance.” Simon points out in a low voice. He knows his tone is suggestive, that she is way deeper into this than they had previously thought. The silence is palpable in the atmosphere by that point. 

“Yes. He did. It wasn’t all bad in the beginning.” Simon scoffs and leans back on his seat. Her voice is more pleading now, trying to resonate with them. “Killian wanted to avenge his brother. I told him about the virus, and how Eric thought it was a biological weapon built by the Government. It was never meant to turn into this, I know it’s not what he wanted.” 

“You’re defending him? He tried to kill you. He sent people out to kill you and your kid!” Soap shook his head, resting his elbows on his knees.

“Killian died protecting me and our daughter!” Her eyes were glossy, but she refused to cry. She was determined not to show any weakness. “Don’t you dare try and blame this on him.” Her tone was angry and bitter. It wakes up Kami, and she tries to put her back to sleep, but to no avail. 

“Mommy sad?”

“No, mommy is fine, love. Go back to sleep.” But she doesn’t, alarmed now, looking at her mom with worried eyes. Gaz, Soap, and Simon also look at her, surprised by the revelation that Killian Rhodes is Kamila’s father. But she doesn’t give them time to digest the new information. “We made it to the first quarantine zone together, when things started to get bad. Killian had always been good at convincing people, talking about how the government was dirty and that they were better off on their own. With the rations and the way the soldiers were treating people, it didn’t take long before an insurgence was formed. We took them over and that’s when we started the Resistance.”

We. Simon couldn’t believe what he was hearing. He wanted to laugh and say ‘I told you so’ to Johnny, but the disbelief on the Seargent’s face was satisfying enough for him. If they thought they were helping an innocent girl, they were wrong. They were harboring the founder of the most prominent and deadly rebellion created in the apocalypse. Not that they were sophisticated criminals before, but they had caused enough trouble to get their reputation: either you were with them, or against them. And now they seemed to be more keen on that policy than ever. 

Price stops the car, looking at the backseats through the rearview mirror. “You have a lot of explaining to do.” Simon recognized that tone, and it meant that whoever it was directed to was in deep shit. 

She huffs. “I never asked for you to take me in. In fact, if I remember correctly, I was dragged here.” She gives Simon a pointed look, that aggravates him even more. 

“Then leave.” Simon stares her down. “But you won’t, will you? You know you don’t stand a chance against them on your own, so start talking.” His voice is low and threatening. He doesn’t look at Kami when he speaks. He knows his voice would falter. 

She bites her bottom lip and shakes her head, looking at the ceiling, trying to find shelter from the prying eyes that stare at her. “People started coming in from other quarantine zones, escaping totalitarian groups and ill-intended people. Other communities began to rise, but they weren’t as strong as we were. They wanted to weaken the Resistance so they spread word that Killian’s brother, Eric, was the one that created the virus. It drove him crazy. His brother had died trying to find the truth and now people were blaming him, trying to use his brother to taint his name. We were forced to step down and give up everything we had built. There was too much invested in the Resistance, too many people with too much to lose. Leadership changed, and we had to sit back and watch as what we stood for was deprived of its meaning. We just wanted to help people. We thought we could stop what would come next but we were wrong.”

“You killed people before that.” John said in a stern voice. 

“That was different. We didn’t start battles, we were forced into them. You can’t blame us for fighting back. There is no revolution without war.” She shifts Kamila in her arms again. “For fuck’s sake, you were in the army. Don’t act like you don’t know what I’m talking about. Don’t act like you haven’t done worse.” She says the last sentence looking directly at Simon. This time, he looks away. He knows he has done worse, much worse. For some reason, the fact that she would assume that of him hurts. 

“You did more than fight back. We’ve heard about what the Resistance has done.” Simon wants to hurt her back, remind her that no one gets to be innocent their whole life. 

“That was after Killian and I were forced to step down. We didn’t know what was going on. We thought that the foundation that we had built would be strong enough to last after we were gone, but things changed completely”

“Look, lass. We want to believe you. We really do. But you have to be honest with us.” Sometimes Simon wants to grab Johnny by the shoulders and shake him, so he would stop being so trusting, so willing. But it is also the reason why they became friends in the first place. Soap never judged him, as broken as he was. Whether he was Simon or Ghost, Soap would crack jokes and share a pint, and for that he was grateful.

“When we were forced to leave the leadership, Lawrence took over. He was ruthless and thought that the Resistance should be more than a safe harbor for people. Those are the stories you have heard, of civilians killing each other for no reason. We didn’t know how bad it was for the people outside, how Lawrence had been looking for groups and attacking them, forcing them to join the Resistance or killing them. He had no purpose, no direction, he just wanted power and he kept us blind to it all.”

“I’ve heard of Lawrence. He was killed.” Price’s voice still carries a somber tone. 

“I left right after that. He had been talking about how they were finally going to rise to their full potential, about how the Resistance was going to control what was left of the world. He was delusional, talking about how they were going to have enough firepower to kill whoever stood in their way. Killian and I knew we needed to leave by then, that the principles we had stood for were long gone and now the Resistance was just a power-thirsty militia. We only understood how serious things were when the military group arrived. They killed Lawrence and took control of what was left. Killian sacrificed his life so I could run away with Kami.”

“But why are they after you and Kami?” Price pressed further. “Why would a military group want to kill two civilians?”

“Because I’m the only one who knows their identity and their plans. I ran away with documents that could compromise them, photos and names of who operates the Resistance now.” She gestures towards the backpack that she had salvaged from the crash. 

“Why would they take over the Resistance but want to hide their identity? That makes no sense” Simon inquires, still skeptical of the story.

“Because they like to operate in the dark. That’s why they call themselves The Shadow Company.”

.

.

.

me writing that plot twist: 🤭😝🤓

[youknowwho-mustnotbenamed]

February 02 - Bad Idea | Jegulus | word count: 655 | @taylorswiftmicrofic

James has had a lot of bad ideas in his life.

He decided to become an illegal animagus at fifteen. He provoked Snape when he could have been the better person and walked away. He missed the Hogwarts Express and tried to fly after it with his broom. He declared he wouldn’t study for any tests in fourth year. He’s had more detention than he can count. He resolved to get Sirius and Remus together while both of them were deep in denial.

But none of them, not one, has enticed him just as much as this one.

He could get hexed. He could get ridiculed. He could get outed. He could get laughed at by the entire school. He could be dragged to the feet of dangerous people. He could ruin important friendships. He could feel good for a while, before ultimately having his heart cleaved in two. There is no happy ending to this, and yet, James cannot convince himself otherwise.

Kissing Regulus Black might just be James’ worst best bad idea.

And yet, James cannot tear himself away from the beautiful, enthrall of the black-haired boy. He finds himself daydreaming in class—not an usual occurrence, but now instead of pranks, he finds himself thinking about what it would feel like to twirl those loose curls through his fingers; about what those stormy grey eyes would look like up close—kissing close—would he be able to see the storm clouds, the light shining through?; about the smattering of freckles that he would draw constellations through, seeing what stories Regulus hides on his face.

He is here now, close enough to see those individual features, but not in nearly enough clarity to answer any of James’ questions. There is far too much distance between them, and yet not nearly enough. He needs somebody else to tell him no. To drag him away and divert his attention before he makes the worst—best—mistake of his life.

“James?” His voice is like a prayer on Regulus’ lips. He wants to hear it forever, he wants to hear it whispered close, a promise the only two of them can hear; he wants to hear it shouted across the room, a beckoning James would gladly chase after; he wants to hear it in a room of friends, a claiming James would happily accept.

“Please?” His voice is barely a whisper.

Regulus shifts closer. “Yes. Please, yes.”

James dives forward, claiming those divine lips for himself. Yes. Yes, this is everything he was missing. His veins sparking, his breath stuttering, his entire being narrowing down to the feeling of Regulus under his lips, his fingertips, against his body. His heartbeat roars in his ears, easily falling into cadence with the one resting against his chest, two hearts beating as one, merging into one being.

When Regulus pulls away—only due to a lack of air—James whines, chasing his lips.

“James… James, wait… James…” Reluctantly, he falls back, but leaves his forehead resting against Regulus’, not willing to split himself into his own being once again. Once he detaches himself Regulus’ being, his life will lose that spark. “This is a bad idea.”

“I know. I—I think it might be the best bad idea.”

“We both know where the other is going after school.”

“...I know.”

“This… this isn’t forever, James.”

“I know.”

“Do you? James. Are you even listening to me?”

“Huh? Yeah.”

But Regulus pulls away, one last spark between them before his body goes cold again. Oh, this one is really going to hurt.

“We aren’t forever, James.”

“Yeah… not forever.” Not in this universe. Maybe there is another where things are different, but in this one… this one only ends with two broken hearts. And the worst part is, James is willing to fling himself off the cliff, even knowing there is no water at the bottom to break his fall.

[eustasskiddsprosthetic]

Hey, remember when I said I shipped Lawlulaw? Yeah, I finally have an idea for them!

As I was fleshing this out, I suddenly felt the need to shove in Acelaw and Sabolaw in there so uh that's fun. I wanted this to be Lulaw centered but the moments of Ace and Sabo can be very easily spun into a romantic direction if I wanted and I wanted to be open to having a Law harem!

Welp, anyways, onto the plot I cooked. Edit: I elaborated more on this au here (x)!

I'm thinking of Law as a scientist who studies marine life. He has a huge lab where he collects specimens and spends a lot of time sketching out the intricate details and labelling them. He loves drawing these because it helps him get a clear, objective view of the world. His ultimate goal is to know just what makes the world tick.

He wants to know the inner workings of everything, kind of to compensate for how he barely knows himself and the depths of his subconscious nature. He believes everything has a place. A creature's ever part, every organ, every component is like a gear that keeps the whole system running and Law loves analysing them.

It may or may not be surprising but he actually believes in things like monsters, aliens and cryptids. From his experience, there's so many interesting sea creatures within the realm of science. It seemed a bit rude to dismiss the possibility. You never fucking know.

So that means when he sees a merman washed up one day in front of the beach near his home. He shrugs and says, "Well, he looks better than a drunk Bepo."

From indifference turned curiosity, Law squats down and starts poking this merman with a bit too much force and said merman jolts awake. Law notices how sharp his teeth and claws were. Law knew he would die if he did not approach him correctly.

"H-hello. I'm Law. Are you okay?"

The merman was visibly confused. Law realised he seemed a bit dehydrated and realised his gills on his neck looked uncomfortable. Law understood. He pointed to the ocean behind the merman.

"I'll take you back," Law said. He did not know how to approach the situation beyond rolling up his sleeves just in case the merman had an allergic reaction to his shirt and very gently trying to carry the creature princess-style.

Law was horrified to feel that this creature was heavy and struggled with carrying him. So much for wanting to be brave. The merman did not do anything to make things difficult—Law just was not the strongest out there. He just stared at Law with literal stars in his eyes. He made a cheerful little sound that was admittedly quite cute.

Law let the merman go when he was just around waist-deep in the ocean. He gently poured some water over his gills, which elicited even more happy sounds. When Law let go, the merman suddenly looked sad and Law felt like a horrible human being.

"Good bye. Take care"

The merman was swimming rather freely in the ocean now and he circled around Law. Law felt anxious. Did he walk into a trap? Was the merman going to attack? The merman did not seem hostile but you never know what these creatures were thinking especially when they were alive.

When the merman stopped swimming, Law took a good look at his features. He was quite cute in the face with large round eyes and an equally large mouth that occasionally broke into a large smile. If he were human, Law would've fallen in love.

"Good bye, it was nice meeting you-"

The next thing Law knew, he was immediately submerged underwater. He could barely breathe and felt himself choke. Meanwhile the merman was giggling like this was all very amusing. Law was knew he would die, if not for something rapidly swimming up and forcibly dragging the merman away.

Of course it was another muscular merman. He looked older than Law's murderer and had dark red accents on his hands and neck. There were spots on his face that looked like freckles. Now this one looked predatory. In human terms, he looked like he was nagging the other merman. Irritated, Law stood up as best he could and punched them both on the head.

Law's murderer seemed annoyed and sad at the violence, while the other one looked mildly impressed. He whistled through his gills. At least Law knew what that meant—it was a fucking mating call.

"Shut the fuck up! You're both annoying me! Go away!"

The black-haired mermen tilted their head to the side at the same time. In the distance, a pale, almost albino merman swam closer. Unlike the other two, he seemed friendlier even with a heavily disfigured face. He laughed as he happily said, "I'm sorry for my brothers, bastard!"

Law was flabbergasted. This was not his day.

"You can talk?"

The blonde merman seemed more surprised than Law. Law would punch him too but he was much faster than the other two in grabbing them by the shoulders and swimming some distance away so they would have to shout at each other. Law's murderer seemed sad that they were separated.

"You can talk, human?" The merman replied. He laughed. "Bitch!" He seemed to say those vulgarities with great childlike amusement. Though, Law would not be surprised to hear that he knew what those words meant and meant them sincerely. He seemed cunning.

Law felt wet, disgusting and thoroughly upset that he did not die. "Why, yes I fucking can! Piss off!"

As Law made his way back to the base, he suddenly heard the blonde merman tell the pervert and his murderer something. They went silent when Law looked back. Three seconds later, they started making loud, hysterical noises.

For God's sake, Law walked away with a ruined morning, wet clothes and the horrible memory of nearly dying. That was annoying, as he walked up the ocean where he was comfortably knee-length. He felt something gently grab his foot.

"What do you want, murderer?"

The merman pouted slightly and fuck isn't that just the cutest thing? He tried to pull Law back but gently this time. Law realised this was kind of like a child trying to make friends. He sighed and squatted down again to meet this creature at eye-level.

"I won't go with you but I'll come back tomorrow morning. Don't pull that shit again, or I'll kill all three of you. Understood?"

That seemed to be what the merman wanted for he smiled brightly and made those happy clicking noises again. He hugged Law's shoulders, licked his cheek quickly, jumped off and swam off with his brothers who seemed more interested in this little guy more than anyone else.

The sight was sweet. Maybe tomorrow morning would be better...

(Also, Law read up on Merfolk. Apparently, they were acknowledged to be legitimate sea creatures only three years ago and there were proper laws to forbid the act of hunting and killing them. Law found it strange that policies viewed them more like an endangered species than human beings.)

(More importantly, Law found out that there were some highly intelligent merfolk could learn human languages. And even more importantly, merfolk use their saliva to mark their territory... Including their mates, whom they usually commit to for life... Huh.)

[dustedbooksandreadingnooks]

It was another peaceful day in their little corner of Etheirys- an island in the middle of the Cieldalaes, gifted by the Chief Admiral, that only her and Tataru knew the location of. (Sound familiar?) And while Kizuna was starting to feel truly rested for the first time in ages, he also felt, antsy. Not to do things(He held firm to the belief that if he was needed, his friends would call) but... he had cut all contact, from everyone. He hadn't heard from anyone in moons, nearly a turn, he thinks- time had blurred a little, with how little the weather changed on their island. He didn't know what anyone was doing- the twins were probably still in Garlemald, his da and Y'shtola in Sharlay, he could probably guess who was where, but what were they... doing? Were they well? Are they... upset? At my choice? Because I haven't called? It was just like when he left for Eorzea, all the way back at the start. He didn't have anything to write about at first to his da, to Krile, to Raha, so he just.... didn't. And by the time he did… he couldn't. It took happenchance to see them again, or perhaps the will of the star(He never did get to ask her about that.) Is he doing well? Is he upset, that I didn't let him know where I was going? That I didn't take him with me? That I broke my promise... That I haven't spoken to him once.... Just like before... Not that he could. He gave his linkpearl back to Tataru. He just hadn't been able to bear the thought of being hailed and having to answer. Because, I would've. I would've answered. I would've gone. Would, still go. His thoughts go round in circles, a snake swallowing it's own tail and biting down not knowing the only thing attacking it was itself. This is why he'd needed space, to be alone, to figure it out- or... as alone as he could bear, with the person he trusted the most to take care of... all of him. The one who'd told him it wasn't selfish to make this choice in the first place-

"-una! Kizuna! Ki-zuuu-naaaaa!" Ishi stands at the base of the tree, hands on her hips as she calls upwards to the thick dark tail she can very much see wrapped around the upper branch. He could be sleeping again, he'd been doing that a lot on their own little slice of serenity(A concerning amount, in the beginning, to the point of worry for her. But less now, these days.) But there's been something on his mind, she could tell. Something he was stressing about. Unacceptable! She even had an idea of what it was. She'd traveled with him long enough- watched him long enough- to be able to see how Kizuna wore his thoughts around the span of his shoulders, how his feelings stuck in the way he held his hands. The way the most bestial parts of him were the most true when he wasn't paying attention to them. She'd watched how the tension of it all had ever slowly unwound the longer they'd stayed here, watched him truly start healing. Well enough to be able to start worrying about others again, anyways. When Kizuna slept- truly slept, deeply- he mumbled in his sleep. Most of the time it was too low or mumbled to make out much, but she'd been able to pick out the shape of one particular name several times over the past couple nights. Ishi scaled the tree, hopping from branch to branch until she was straddling two of them face to face with a startled Kizuna.

"So this is where you were thinking," Ishi huffs, freckled face flushed from the sun and legs dusty from traipsing all over the island to look for him. She had some leaves and a twig or two stuck in her hair- this was definitely not the first tree she'd climbed to look for him, knowing what types of places he preferred to go. "Here.” She thrusts her hand out to Kizuna, an offered closed fist. "....You didn't keep your pearl, but I did. You should call G'raha."

Kizuna starts at Ishi's sudden appearance, and Raha's name- Was it really that obvious? He looks at her hand and then away, guilt weighing heavy in his stomach and drawing his shoulders forward as he curls in on himself. His hands move, a half-formed question. [What if....] What if he doesn't want to hear from me? What if he was upset, or worse, what if he didn't care?

Ishi huffs again, a little overtired from the sunburn she could feel and the tiredness of her feet(These sandals hadn't been the best choice for searching the length of the island over for him.) "I know he'd be happy to hear from you, so Call. Him. You won't believe it until you hear it from him." Or he better be. He's really important to Kizuna. She'd drag him out here herself if it came to it, to have them talk. She wouldn't even need to translate for Kizuna if spoken words failed him as they often did.

Kizuna flinches, ears pinning back at Ishi's bluntness- she was, right, that calling him would be the fastest way to settle himself, but that heavy feeling in his stomach was quickly gnawing it's way through to swallow the rest of him. He wrings a hand around the other wrist- hard enough scales audibly creak and bones pop.

He takes a shaky breath, throat closing up all too easily so whatever he was going to try to say only comes out as a smoky hiss. Frustrated. He was doing it again, the same thing over again, because he was so selfish-

Weight, as Ishi climbs over him to touch his face, pearl still clutched in her hand. "Hey," she says softly, after seeing how much this was clearly hurting him. Much more than I thought- She shouldn't have been so forward just because she was tired and worried about him. "....What's got you so worried?" Ishi waits for the answer. It takes Kizuna a few minutes, hands flexing as he chews on his lip and works through his thoughts. To pin them down in a straight line, into words- what was he actually worried about? "What if... he doesn't answer me," is what he ends up mumbling, shoulders sagging as the weight of the words leave his mouth with a harsh sigh. His fingers grip so hard his hands shake. It hurts- it grounds him. "What if he doesn't want to hear from me. What if I.... hurt him. By breaking my promise." What if I took too long- what if I'm too late-

Ishi's ears perk forwards to hear Kizuna better. Her face scrunches up in thought, cradling his face better in her hand. "...I think he'll understand, that you needed time," is what she decides on saying, gently petting through his hair(And it's gotten rather long, hasn't it?) "He still cares. I meant it- I think he'll be happy to hear from you, no matter how long it's been."

She climbs into his lap better, detangling Kizuna's hands from each other and pulling them to wrap around her. It's ok to touch me. "And if he doesn't, I'll have words with him." She huffs dramatically, tail and ears flicking up in an exaggerated way to show she was playing it up. Kizuna curls around her, cradling in that gentle way he holds her when he feels extra bad about himself. "But... only when you're ready, honey. He's waited for longer." For You, actually.

---

Feat. Ishi of @candycryptids.

[secretsocietyofgamejumpers]

R-E-S-P-E-C-T—Pt. 2

Inspired by the Hero’s Duty comic from the Comic Zone magazine.

But the next day’s quarter alerts couldn’t help but draw Markowski out from under the covers. After all, he had a duty. A hero’s duty. 

As he hustled to join the rest of the corps, Markowski could already hear them laughing, and he didn’t need to hear a word to know it was about him.

“You get a load of Markowski last night?” Private Marco guffawed.

“Oh, it was prime time viewing!” Lieutenant Loya replied with a hearty chuckle.

“An all-time classic,” Private Maddox concurred with an eager nod.

Markowski felt his cheeks burn red. After the humiliation of last night, he’d accepted that this would always be his lot in life. But that didn’t mean he had to like it.

As the First Person Shooter rolled through the crowd, Markowski could see the goings-on outside the game. A young boy with huge horn-rims and freckles was about to insert his coins when the gun was ripped from his hands by a big-boned brute of a boy, with a face ridden with acne and stubble. 

“Out of the way, you little snot!” The bully elbowed the bespectacled boy out of the way. “Let the best Hero’s Duty player in the county show you how it’s done!”

The boy brandished the gun with an evil smirk. “I’ll bet you all your candy I can finish this stupid game in just one go.” 

In the background of the screen, Markowski could see the other boy backing away, his eyes downcast with shame as he listened to the boastful bully say all those demeaning things. Markowski’s heart broke. For though he was a skinny twig of a boy and Markowski was a mountain of a marine, the private saw himself in the boy—downtrodden, meek, mistreated. 

But he knew the bully’s bragging would come back to bite him. After all, Hero’s Duty had ninety-nine levels, and most kids never made it past the first.

“Follow me!” The FPS robot charged forward as the bully gave a triumphant yell. Feverishly he shot at cy-bugs, with the marines assisting. 

He passed level one with ease, then level two and three. 

Well, Markowski thought as he made short work of some cy-bug eggs on the third floor of the lab. He thinks he’s better than everyone else just because he can beat two more levels.

But the bully forged on. Ten levels…twenty…fifty…

Markowski’s jaw dropped as the bully handled the game with no difficulty. Clearly, he knew Hero’s Duty inside and out. If this kept up, the bully would win, and the poor boy would lose everything. 

He shot a glance at his commanding officer. Calhoun certainly didn’t look happy to be helping this player. But she wasn’t about to go against the program.

Sure, it was the soldiers’ duty to get the player to the top of the tower so they could win the Medal of Heroes. But wasn’t it also their duty to uphold the ideals of bravery, integrity, grace, and dignity—all of which the bully lacked in spades?

He gazed once more at the robot’s screen, at the sighing face of the bespectacled boy, wishing he could do something—anything—to help him out.

Then an idea hit Markowski faster than Calhoun’s fist after he accidentally splattered her with Cy-Bug egg yolk before her first date with Felix. 

If the bully knew the game this well, the only way to make him lose is if something unexpected happened. And Markowski knew exactly where to find that.

As shots ricocheted around the seventy-fifth floor lab, the private hoped he wouldn’t be noticed amidst the chaos as he bashed a hole in the glass window with the butt of his gun. Once it was big enough, he climbed through the hole and escaped. 

Markowski’s breathing was heavy as he scaled the jagged walls of the tower to the top. There was the lever he’d technically not touched…but today he would touch it, and be proud of it. 

The sounds of laser flares and the horrific metal buzzing of the Cy-Bugs began to fade away. General Hologram was beginning his spiel as he prepared to bestow the Medal of Heroes on the bully. 

With a deep, determined breath, Markowski grasped the lever in his hands and gave it a sharp yank.

Instantly the massive cloud of Cy-Bugs descended. Markowski scrambled down once more, bashing another sizeable hole in the glass window leading to the chamber of the Medal of Heroes. 

All the soldiers turned toward the strange sight, mouths agape. Except, of course, Calhoun, whose mouth was pinched in her usual anger.

“What are you nutcrackers waiting for?” She scowled. “Weapons up!”

The soldiers all brandished their guns—but outside the game, the bully had dropped his in shock.

“What the HECK!?” He shouted. “There’s no final level boss in Hero’s Duty!”

As he scrambled to pick up the plastic weapon, there was a horrific screech as the eyes of the Cy-Bugs turned from a glowing green to a blazing red. As they formed the monstrous image of a giant Cy-Bug, the bully backed away in utter terror, not even bothering to put up a fight as the swarm ignored the other soldiers and lunged straight at him.

GAME OVER.

“Markowski.” Calhoun marched over to the private, her rage making her eyes glow even more fiery than the Cy-Bugs’. “What do you have to say for yourself?” She socked him in the jaw, and Markowski peered timidly out from beneath his visor, prepared for the ridicule he would soon receive.

But there was another emotion on the faces of the soldiers—pure amazement and admiration.

Pure respect.

“Ma’am, I’m so sorry…” Markowski‘s voice wavered. “It’s just…I couldn’t let that boy win…”

“Like fun you couldn’t.” Calhoun bared her teeth. “Private, your off-game privileges are revoked until further notice!”

“Aw, c’mon, Sarge!” Loya protested. “This guy deserves a round after that performance!”

“Yeah! C’mon, ‘Kowski! Root beer’s on me!” Marco whooped. 

“Loya! Marco! Shut your chew holes!” yelled Calhoun. She turned to Markowski once more. “Get back to start position before I rip your head off!”

“Yes, ma’am!” Markowski saluted. And for the first time, he did it with a smile.

As the soldiers scrambled back to start position, Markowski could hear the other soldiers cheering.

He didn’t need to hear a word to know it was for him.

[crackers4jenn]

How do I choose just one??? I’ll cheat and say loabc sequel and anchor.

Thank you, thank you. I posted a sneak peek of anchor here, so here's a long looksy at the loabc sequel. I've been having fun writing this one, when my brain cooperates and allows me to string together words in a typed up fashion.

**

Cas turns and nearly collides with a tall man carrying a tray of breakfast desserts, whose reflexes are much quicker than Cas’s own—in the way that they exist at all. Cas does nothing but freeze in place as the man lifts the tray above his head, hoping to fight forward momentum and avoid a mess. From his mouth an instantly familiar voice says, “Whoa, hey,” as he pivots out of the way.

The near-accident already has Cas’s heart hammering, but realizing it’s Dean he almost literally ran into? Suddenly it’s hard to hear past the roar of blood rushing in his ears.

Cas can give up wondering if he’s still in Sioux Falls, then. Here he is.

Dean’s turned to the side so he hasn’t noticed Cas yet, but Cas is rooted to the spot with a feeling like he’s in a bad dream.

The last time he saw Dean, they were 25 and Cas was here to bury his mother. Even though Dean was among the crowd of mourners, Cas skipped town without having any kind of meaningful conversation with him.

It was cowardly, but what do you say to the person who broke you heart at the age of 18?

“Sorry, man,” Dean laughs without looking up, a friendly sound that makes Cas’s chest tighten in a way it hasn’t in too long of a time, “you Edward Cullen’ed outta freakin’ no—” Finally he sees that it’s Cas and his eyes grow impossibly wide. Yeah, same. Very much same. Cas can only stare apologetically back. Dean’s mouth moves wordlessly and then, “Cas?” comes falling out, a little breathlessly. Spooked, like Cas is a ghost he doesn’t believe he’s actually seeing.

Cas feels something hurtling to the surface from the very dredges of his stomach, from his soul. Dean has always been handsome—in fact, you could draw a straight line directly to him and identify him as Cas’s first in a lot of ways, but notably he’s the first person Cas ever noticed being ‘attractive’ in a way his teenage self didn’t know what to do with—but, somehow, in the years since Cas last laid eyes on him, he’s filled out even more. His chest is broader, his eyes greener, his freckles a pornographic constellation of art across his face—

“Dean. Hello,” he says, forcing the runaway thoughts to stop, for the love of god, please.

“Cas,” Dean says again, more earnestly. “Hey. Hello. S'up?” Cas watches Dean close his eyes and make a face at himself, his mouth thinning. Self-reproaching, which is almost painful to see Dean default to after all these years.

Gabe is slow-clapping nearby. It cuts through the roar in Cas’s ears. He only stops when he’s close enough to lob his arm across Cas’s shoulders, saying, “Who’s the underwear model?” while he reels Cas in, jostling him. His leer doesn’t fall, even as Cas shakes him off.

Dean’s eyes are tracking back and forth between Cas and Gabe, confused and picking up an accusation along the way. The name-calling isn’t helping. Dean’s always been sensitive about the way he looks, afraid that he wasn’t masculine enough by John Winchester’s standards.

Before there’s an introduction, Dean curses under his breath and scoots around them, heading toward a table in the back where a burly, bearded man is sitting, watching the interaction with about as much subtly as Gabe. So, zero. None whatsoever. The guy is flashing ‘I am going to need all the details’ eyes at Dean so openly, Cas feels his face heat up. Apparently the run-in had more than one witness.

“You alright?” the man drawls at Dean with a slow, twanging accent, the words rolling out amusedly. “Lookin’ a little flushed there, chief.”

“Can it,” Dean tells him, planting a croissant onto the empty plate in front of him. No tongs or anything, so they must be close with one another.

The man’s eyes are full of mirth. “Might wanna wear a bell. Maybe with a nice leather collar—”

Dean comes sweeping back towards Cas and Gabe before the man can finish, crabby-looking. “You know what you want?” he asks, and Cas has about 3 seconds to feel totally lost and confused by the question before Dean rounds the counter and positions himself, tray gone now, behind the cash register.

So, Dean works here.

That seems obvious now, but he’s no less flustered by this knowledge.

“What d’ya recommend, chief?” Gabe says, rolling it out the same way they heard it, but because it’s Gabe, it sounds perverted and rude, so of course Dean scowls.

“For you?” His voice flattens. “Starbucks. Next door.”

Gabe gets a kick out of that. He waggles his eyebrows at Cas, despite Dean being mere feet away. “Ooh, he bites.”

Before Dean can fire back, and he’s coiled and ready to, Cas has seen that antagonism on Dean’s face many, many times, an even taller man comes from the back room where, Cas assumes, the baking and paper work happens, slapping Dean across the shoulder.

“Dude, again? Don’t harass the customers,” he says, eyes passing over to Cas as a blanket apology—and then, when they both recognize each other, a surprised greeting.

“Cas?!” Sam says, “oh wow, holy shit—”

There’s 6’4” of energy bounding toward him, and Cas has about two seconds to brace himself before he’s being pulled into a warm hug. Sam is more filled out than he looks, and his hair is long enough it falls over his shoulder and into Cas’s face. He feels very small, wrapped in Sam’s arms, and not just because of how tall he’s become. He’s reminded of how growing apart from Dean also meant growing apart from his brother. There was a time the three of them were inseparable.

“Alright, alright, you’re getting mane in his face,” Dean snarks, playing up his disapproval. “Put a net on already.” And then, to break up the embrace that's still going on, “Health code violation, Sam!”

Sam pulls away, beaming at Cas and ignoring Dean. “So, wait. What’re you doing here? You’re back? Whoa, are you at home?”

He hears Dean mutter, “Sure, scare the guy off. He’s only been here two minutes, but go ahead. Freak him out.”

“I’m…” Cas feels himself floundering.

“Rude, for start,” Gabe says, situating himself close enough he can reach out a hand. “Hel-lo. I’m Gabe. You’re tall.”

Sam looks down at the hand being offered. Tentatively he grabs ahold and shakes it, his skepticism passing very briefly over to Cas. “Uh. Hi. Cas’s friend?”

“Something like that.”

Cas is suddenly glad for Gabriel’s usual bravado that often manifests as defiant cockiness. As far as Cas knows, the secret of Chuck’s affair hasn’t made it beyond family. He doesn’t want to explain anything here, now, in a coffee shop with people he doesn’t really know anymore. He doesn’t want the looks, the pity, the realizations.

It’s petty of him, but he feels, too, that they don’t know him well enough to deserve his secrets.

Sam pulls his hand back, smiling big to cover up the dismay Gabriel is typically to blame for. Luckily, he’s just as earnestly cheerful as an adult as he was when they were kids. He eyes Dean and says, “What’re they getting?”

“Haven’t ordered,” Dean gives back shortly, having one of those conversations with Sam that exists only between them, somehow without any words.

Sam seems to win it, because it’s his friendly face that swings around to claim Cas’s eye contact, while Dean droops and walks off to tend to a customer who comes up to the pick-up side of the counter with a question. Cas is admittedly distracted at first, watching him, but then Sam’s words start filtering through his haze. “Look, I don’t wanna sway y’all, I don’t know what you came in for, but our pie? Best around. Right, Dean?”

Dean, still talking to the customer, hears his name and goes, “What?” with an irritated edge.

Sam just smiles like his point’s been made. “Want a slice? Cup of coffee to go with? Hey, on the house,” he adds, all in one overly enthusiastic rush without giving Cas the chance to accept. He passes back through an open section of the counter, saying, “Man, it’s been forever. You been good?”

He’s reaching under the counter, pulling a pie tin out from the case filled with desserts that Cas is still too stunned to pay much attention to.

“Yes,” he answers, with none of the openness or eagerness Sam has shown him. He’s borderline rude about it, but truthfully, his emotions are catching up with the situation and he’s starting to realize he doesn’t want to be here anymore.

The curt tone doesn’t deter Sam, though. He just nods, distracted with cutting the pie, and then plating it, and then the lever of a coffee machine that starts making a foamy hissing sound. “How do you guys like your coffee?” His smile is sincere, overwhelmingly so.

Cas’s face feels hot.

“Um.”

Sam looks up, stopping what he’s doing. His smile fades.

Before Cas is forced to endure his sympathy, Gabe says, “You gonna get that?” with an over-exaggerated nod to gesture at Cas’s coat pocket. His eyes are wide, and they flare in a less subtle copy of what Sam and Dean are capable of optically communicating. “Your phone. Which is vibrating so loud I’d think it was something way more fun if I didn’t know how boring you actually are. Hello.”

Cas’s phone hasn't, in fact, been vibrating, but he appreciates the excuse for what it is: a chance to flee.

“Right. My phone.” And then, to Sam, a barely believable, “I have to go.” He squints. “Sorry.”

“Oh,” Sam says, clearly confused, “okay, sure. Lemme just—”

But Cas is already walking past Gabriel, headed for the exit. A flush is creeping up the back of his neck, behind his ears, and he knows Dean’s the reason for it. He might not have even noticed Cas leaving, but Cas feels his eyes on him anyway. He weaves through the line that had formed behind them, embarrassed to be doing so, ducking his gaze to keep from making eye contact with anyone so he doesn’t catch any judgments they might have, until he bursts out the door with a relieved breath he audibly exhales, louder in his ears than the bell above that jingled as he exited.

He keeps walking until he’s around the building, until he’s sure he can’t be seen through a window, or followed, entering a small alley that’s been turned into a sit-down spot with long concrete benches and landscaped trees.

With the mid-day sun bright enough he has to glare, he leans against the brick wall, tipping until the back of his head thunks against it, and feels frustration well up inside him, chased by anger aimed only at himself.

Was seeing Dean a possibility? Sure. Had he been dreading it? Of course.

But he wasn’t expecting the flutter.

Dean doesn’t deserve a flutter. Dean dumped him on a car ride to his dorm his freshman year of college. Dumped him days before that, if he’s being honest with himself. Gave him a bullshit excuse and fed him bullshit lies—‘I’ll call you, man. Visit over Christmas break, bring Sammy… Email you when I can. You’re my best friend, Cas, that ain’t changing.’

Bullshit.

Dean didn’t call. He definitely didn’t visit. Didn’t bring Sam. Didn’t pick up when Cas called. Didn’t answer any texts.

Two months into that first year, he did drunk dial Cas. And Cas back then was so desperate to forgive Dean, to believe the rush he felt was some kinda proof his feelings were reciprocated, he let Dean confess how sorry he was for not calling sooner, let him say how badly he missed Cas. Believed him, too, when he said he wished they were together. Let him talk until his voice started getting low, started turning into a different type of call.

It was a one-off.

The next time Dean had called after that, weeks later and sheepish about it, Cas was less inclined to listen to Dean or his apologies.

And the thing about Dean—the thing is that he’d rather give up and bail, and then delude himself into thinking he made the hard choice, the right choice, congratulate himself for it even—but the truth is, he’s just a coward.

He could’ve fought for their relationship, but he didn’t. He just backed off and let things dull into nothingness, treating Cas like there hadn’t ever been anything between them in the first place. Until visits back home turned from awkward reunions, to strangers.

Eyes closed, Cas feels inside his coat pocket for his phone. He squints to see his screen, half-expecting a ‘so, this the scheduled psychotic break?’ text from Gabriel, but the only thing on it is a missed call from Hannah at work, from ten minutes ago.

Cas thunks his head against the wall for a whole different reason.

He doesn’t get to wallow very long.

The bell above the bakery door jingles out a faraway warning. Only seconds later, Gabriel is rounding the corner, spotting him. His expression switches from aloof, to sly.

Immediately Cas pleads, “Please just—don’t say anything.”

“About what, Handsome and Handsomer? Wouldn’t dream of it. By the way, Handsome, the tall one, hair like Fabio? He wanted you to have this.”

Cas gets handed one of those clamshell packages made out of recycled cardboard.

Gabriel’s eyebrows dance around a little. “Pie.” He infuses it with a disturbing amount of innuendo, then takes a gleeful sip of the iced coffee he stuck around for. Its straw is a neon green color.

Cas looks down at his phone again, then decides he’ll call Hannah back later. Preferably after he successfully numbs himself.

“Soooooo. I get the juicy deets on Townie Ken and how he obliterated baby Cas’s heart?”

Yeah, he’s not going to talk about this.

He pockets his phone, clutches the pie package, and practically shoulder checks Gabriel out of the way.

Instead of heading back for his car—and passing by the bakery again, with its very expansive open windows—he heads left, toward the other shops lining the street.

“C’mon!” Gabriel follows. “I’ve seen you tripping balls before. You tried to scale the outside of the library, you remember that? Three floors up. Balthazar’s happy time elixir?”

“What’s your point?” Cas asks, distracted for a moment by the hardware store now being a pet grooming service.

“Dude, you thought you were Batman and got tackled by a couple’a Magic Mike segway cops, and THAT was less soul-suckingly embarrassing to watch than whatever you just fled from.”

Well, that makes two public places he’ll never be able to visit again without the heart pounding reminder of shame.

“Ugh, look, you’re taking this all wrong,” Gabriel insists. The sound of ice being vigorously jostled is his first indicator that Gabriel’s speeding up, and then he’s joining Cas’s side, matching his stride. “You think I’m roasting your nuts? Buddy-roll, you just got interesting.”

“I live to entertain,” he drawls back, his humiliation deepening, but Gabe cuts that off.

“For as much shit as I give you—you, at a bar? If this was baseball, you’d be batting goose eggs.”

He sighs. “I don’t know what that—”

“You strike out. You whiff.”

The next building they pass is a book store, one with a chalkboard sign out front with an Instagram handle and a hashtag pun. Cas remembers it being a thrift store.

“Okay, well. Thank you. I didn’t ask.”

“This whole time I’m figurin’ your, ya know, dom-brow daddy thing is just an act, but you’re telling me you actually bagged that closet case?”

Cas comes to a dead stop, with Gabriel following a beat after, nearly spilling his coffee.

He’s used to his brother’s jibes. They come off mean-spirited, but he knows Gabriel well enough to know they’re not meant that way.

But this is landing too close, feeling too real.

[starzzach]

Hi 🩵 Can we know more about vamp? 👀

hello ant !!!!!

yes. we can know infinitely more about vamp. in this setting they are both vampires, carlos a lot older than charles. charles is a born vampire, carlos turned and frozen in time. charles is very isolated as a vampire and has only ever consulted extremely stereotypical textbooks from weird libraries but carlos is part of an underground vampire society which he introduces charles to !! (snippet under the cut)

-

charles doesn’t expect to be approached.

he certainly doesn’t expect to be approached by a very handsome freckled stranger in a long black trench coat with eyes so round he almost looks cartoonish. when he opens his mouth, framed by two very full lips, he definitely doesn’t expect to be met with, “you are a vampire.”

charles blinks, then coughs, squaring his posture. he should stand – he is smaller like this, sitting. vulnerable. “what?” he says, furrowing his brows, pretending to be confused. “a what?”

“i cannot hear your heartbeat,” the stranger declares. “you are a vampire. do not try to deny it.”

which, okay, well. charles slumps. this stranger is clearly also a vampire, and he takes a seat away from charles, close enough to talk, but not close enough to make either of them uncomfortable. “how did you know?” he grumbles. “there are so many people here. how did you just– know?”

“i have lived a very long time,” the stranger replies, which is not ominous at all. and charles has lived very long, too, so– the stranger turns his head, and charles unhappily notes he looks just as good from the side as he did from the front. “you were born one, no? not turned.”

charles leans back, now very much put off. “okay, now i am sure you are stalking me– how did you know?”

“because you do not know the first thing about denial. it is clear no one taught you,” he replies drily. “you do not trust your movements. and you did not bring your own blood, so the alcohol is going through your system all wrong.”

if charles could flush, he is sure he would have. “okay, so i forgot,” he retorts. 

charles did not forget. charles did not know that was an option.

the stranger studies him closely while he waits for his drink. now, charles can tell that his eyes are very brown. it is an uncommon colour for vampires, though from what charles has picked up, the stranger was turned, so it was probably the luck of the draw. “you are young,” he says finally. “you cannot be more than half a century old.”

giddiness rises in charles’ chest, because this stranger is wrong. it warms him. he does not feel warm often, cold as he is, so it is a welcome feeling. “i am!” he exclaims, then remembers himself, clearing his throat. “i mean, i am. sixty eight, to be exact.”

the stranger tilts his head. “you are young,” he repeats, then sticks his hand out. “i am carlos.”

charles stares at it. the coat’s sleeve has slipped up, not that it needed to be for him to see the indecent amount of hair covering his body. charles himself has never been able to grow much, another vampire thing he’s read about. his words have confused him, but he takes the offered hand anywhere. it doesn’t end up being something near the intended handshake – more handholding than anything – but carlos has a strong grip. he is not as cold as charles, which is another thing to note. “charles.”

the corner of carlos’ mouth quirks up as he finally drops charles’ hand. “same name,” he acknowledges. charles turns away. he feels branded. “do you have a preference?”

charles frowns into his drink. carlos hadn’t been wrong – he could feel the alcohol going through his system. “what?”

“with blood.” a small flask is slid across the counter, and there is no mistaking its contents. “most don’t like their own type, but that’s where it stops.” a glance out of the corner of his eye tells him carlos hasn’t stopped looking. “but… that’s never been a problem for you, has it?”

“no,” charles replies, pouring some of it into his glass under the counter. he tastes it, miserably noting that it does taste far, far better. this hadn’t been in the textbooks. “i have never minded. i have never been in a hospital to find out my own.”

“you have never tried…” he has given up the pretence now, and finds that carlos is gesturing. towards himself. with slashing motions. “…you know…?”

charles huffs, drawing the glass further into his chest, hunching over it. “i have never tried to slit my wrists or anything like that, if that’s what you were asking.”

carlos hums. “good. it would have been a bad idea.”

he does not elaborate, which succeeds in doing nothing but enraging charles further. how dare this man – though older and wiser – come and sit next to him – though he is a few seats away – and show him up like this?

so charles does not know much more about himself and his kind other than what he has read – so what? it does not mean that he should be subject to this, this mockery. it’s spiteful and disrespectful and rude.

so why is charles not offended?

-

why r u not offended hun. are you too lost in his eyes

i do plan to get back to this after i finish the arranged one 😔✌️ hope you liked it !!

[tubbypeddle]

Hi! I love your writing for jjba, especially your matchups, they're really cute! And so I was wondering if I could perhaps request a matchup for jjba golden wind?

Appearance wise, I'm about 5'4", have thick curly brown hair (absolute nightmare to get neat sometimes haha), hazel eyes, wear glasses, quite pale, freckles, and am quite curvy. Also, I'm a Sagittarius and am INFP last I checked, and also I am female.

More on my personality, I think of myself as a kind person but I have a tendency to be very insecure (both in terms of how I see myself as a person and also insecure physically; I got bullied a lot when I was younger ): ). I'm also quite an anxious and sensitive person and can quite easily experience sudden flips in how I feel (like one moment I'm alright and then the next I'm crying somewhere else), I am also generally a shy person but more in the 'I won't talk to you unless you talk first' way. More positively though, I'm quite smart, I see myself as a compassionate person and I love being able to help anyone wherever I am able to, especially if it involves trying to cheer someone I care about up, and speaking of which I'm fiercely protective of my loved ones.

More about me as a person, I'm autistic, and from this I have too many hyperfixiations of which I love talking about but again, can be quite shy with at first and think that it annoys my peers whenever I start to infodump (I love infodumping). Not just from this but just in general, I don't like loud noises (e.g. yelling, machines, alarms) unless it's in my control like music for example in my headphones (particularly metal; it's a great stress reliever for me and also one of my hyperfixiations of sorts), and sometimes I struggle to focus and process so just need to be gently redirected at times.

My style is typically just comfortable things like baggy band shirts and comfortable skirts or shorts, with nets, but sometimes when I'm feeling bursts of confidence I do indulge myself in more gothic clothes once in awhile.

My hobbies are primarily writing and drawing, which unfortunately for me requires a lot of motivation for me to be able to do at times, but I also like games too, or in cases where maybe my head and heart are racing a bit too fast to my liking, I even just like going out for walks.

My love languages in terms of giving to a partner is physical affection and gift giving; I'm big on hugs and cuddles as they usually calm me down pretty fast and I also just love being able to feel others warmth as it reminds me that I am there and with them, and as for gift giving I love making my partners happy, even if it's the most miniscule of gifts I'm giving them, it makes me even happier to witness their gratitude over something so small from me.

As for my possible preferences in receiving, I also love physical affection as it makes me feel loved, safe and secure, but the other one that I value most in receiving is words of affirmation; validation, patience and reassurance means so so much to me, especially when a partner affirms to me that they truly care about me and see me as equal and not stupid or burdening to them or anyone else.

That's about all I can think of about myself, hope I didn't go too overboard 😅. I'd be so appreciative if you take this ask as I've been having a hard time and it'd cheer me up, but if you're uncomfortable with any aspects of this I completely understand. Once again, love your jjba writing! And thank you!

oh my goshh hii??

usually these would be trades, but I understand the want to be anonymous, so i'll let it slide this time (/j /nm) Also, feel free to infodump on me if you want! I love hearing about people's interests 👀 so if you're comfortable, share with me! I might not respond immediately, but I will eventually. /gen

(author's notes: creds to gif owners, of course <3 you're so cute, this was so fun! Hope you enjoy it!)

Italy is so pretty this time of year isn't it? As long as you aren't a gullible tourist that is, because your first match is...!

Giorno Giovanna!

It isn't your comfortable sense of style that draws him in when he first sees you, or even your pretty cute figure. It's your kindness.

He's lived a life of cruelty, he has seen the horrors the world has to offer since he was very young. And since then, he's only met two people who showed genuine kindness to others. So when he sees you, probably feeding a duck that he himself created, he's blown away.

He comes up to you then, while you're feeding bread to the duck, and he crouches down beside you. "Thank you for feeding Bella," he'd say. "It's such a hassle trying to feed her without her throwing a fit."

It wasn't. He just wanted an excuse to talk to you, really.

Your aversion to loud noises is kind of perfect with him actually, because he isn't a loud person and also doesn't really like loud noises himself. It makes it very easy to allow yourselves to fall into comfortable silences, or have soft spoken conversations. Probably while you're drawing or writing and he's working on whatever paperwork he needs to do as the Don of a Mafia.

Plenty of time for quality time.

He may not be big on physical touch at first, due to his own traumas, but he is capable of warming up to it if you show him how much you love it and how to properly hug someone. Once this happens, he gives the best hugs. He squeezes you just right and won't let go until you do.

But words of affirmation come easy to him. He's very good with his words, and he likes to remind you that he loves you like this. Complimenting you, praising you, expressing his affection to you, reassuring you. He hates seeing you feel so insecure about yourself. Truthfully, if he saw someone else being insecure, he'd think them to be weak. But he's always had a bit of a soft spot for you.

He tells you earnestly how much you mean to him, how crazy he'd go if something happened to you.

He's a little surprised when you stand up to Abbacchio for him. He doesn't need it, but he's never met someone who would even try to stand up for him. It warms his heart as much as it worries him, because if you could go up to Abbacchio without a hint of fear, he doesn't want to see how far you would go against Stand users. He doesn't want you getting hurt.

Also, Giorno is absolutely autistic, and understands that part of you a lot better than anyone else would.

And of course, Giorno isn't the only one who's eye you caught.

One lovely Miss

Trish Una! also quite likes you

She finds you absolutely charming, in that awkward kitten kind of way. Where Giorno would let you take the lead in the pace of the relationship, she's happy to do it.

She sets the pace, though she's happy to wait for things if you think she's going too fast.

Her favorite date activity is dressing you up, honestly. Her love languages are quality time and physical touch, so as long as she can spend time with you, she's happy. Maybe she'll even ask you to draw her. She says she can't even draw a stick man. Trust that she keeps every single drawing you give her, because she is obsessed with your art.

Your number 1 fan, right here.

But she also has no issue with showering you in praises and reassurances. If it makes you feel more loved by her, she's happy to please.

I can just see that she absolutely adores your freckles, because she also has freckles that she usually tries to hide with makeup. She likes freckles a lot more on you than she does on herself.

I also just know she's a big believer of zodiac signs. Her being a Gemini, and you being a Sagittarius, she thinks it's perfect. Fire and air signs are notoriously compatible, and she likes that a lot about the two of you together.

She may seem so so intimidating when you first meet her, she has just endless patience for you and your feelings. She's here for you. She wants you to talk to her about everything you're feeling, even if you think it's dumb. She makes it so easy for conversation to just flow. It's neverending between you two.

Honorary mentions! Narancia Ghirga he just finds you so so cute! You're so sweet, like candy! He could just eat you up! Maybe he still has a chance? 👀 Pannacotta Fugo He absolutely understands the anxiety and the need for words of affirmation. But he doesn't think he'd ever get over his aversion to touch. He believes you deserve better. That doesn't stop him from feeling jealous when he sees you with Giorno and Trish, though.

I'm sorry if you don't like it, but I had a lot of fun writing it! Sorry for the wait!

[cowgremlin11]

Romeo and Juliet Vikdecai AU

So I'm seriously considering making a full Romeo and Juliet AU. I was having breakfast with my roommate and he helped me fit in a few gaps that were missing crucial characters, which then snowballed to me being bale to complete fitting in the character list.

I'm tempted to turn this into a large fic or (more realistically considering my schedule) a series of small comics. If I turned it into a fic: it would be very long. I'd either have each chapter be each scene, or 5 chapters revolved around each act (longer to write). It'd be true to the original play to the best of my abilities. If I turned it into a comic: It'd be quite scattered and all over the place.

I may do a mix of both? Write the fic and draw complementary scenes to post here. I'm mostly trying to think about my college schedule and everything I have to write for my creative writing courses. (Maybe I could talk to my short fiction prof about this!)

Here's what I have so far:

Missing characters: Zib, Wick, Lacy, Nina, Gracie, Zulie, Virgil, the pig farmers, rest of the band, Church, Kehoe, Ruby.

Not all of these missing characters need to be filled, and there's a few where I have an idea how to incorporate them (namely the band and Zulie, I have an idea that during the Act 1 Scene 5 party they could be there,) and there's a few that aren't relevant enough to truly be needed for this au (the pig farmers, Gracie, Church, Virgil.) In a perfect world I'd have a place for all of these characters and it would work out with no gaps, but this is a Romeo and Juliet Vikdecai AU. It was never meant to fit perfectly because obviously Tracy never wrote these characters with this sort of AU in mind..

Elaboration for why I cast other characters the way I did under the cut (LOTS OF WORDS):

Viktor as Romeo is... a little tricky. Same with Mordecai as Juliet.Obviously, they're not going to be changed fundamentally JUST to fit the au. I have the plan for Viktor to be more of a sad sack than a romantic, hence why Viktor's canon wife has been cast as the girl who rejected Romeo (also he's bisexual.) Viktor starts this AU in such a sad spot, but the hard part comes in when you remember that there is no war trauma. There is no PTSD. This is my biggest hurdle when writing most aus, not even just Vikdecai aus. (You should see the cowboy au!) Now Mordecai, I have a plan. He's very true to the Mordecai we see in canon, just without the Heller family (as they wouldn't exist here.) There's no Rose, no Esther, and no Mama Tzipporah. But when you think about it, that doesn't quite stop Mordecai from being the way he is! He's still this nerdy, rude, analytical twerp that Viktor grows attracted to. I am most excited to work out the party scene. Perhaps Mordecai catches Viktor's eye not because of his beauty, but because he's the 'brought a book to a club' trope. The other's can wait, why the hell is this guy reading at a party.

Atlas and Mitzi are the Montagues, because this idea revolves around Viktor being of the Montague house, but seeing how Mordecai is part of the Capulets in this AU, I felt the need for Atlas to be dead so it's more true to the canon story. It also saves me on writing Atlas, a character we don't know much about personality wise (we can only theorize and speculate.) Rocky as Mercutio WORKS TOO WELL. I know there are some people who would make this au with a RockyxMordecai focus (I hate that ship too much) BUT IT WOULDN'T WORK! ROCKY IS NO ROMEO, ROCKY IS A MERCUTIO. THE QUEEN MAB SPEECH PEOPLE! Freckle as Benvolio is just very funny to me, and very fitting with Rocky as Mercutio. I have ALWAYS read Benvolio as this nervous little guy following around Mercutio, and if I'm remembering this right Benvolio is good in a fight. This just works!!! Balthasar is Romeo's trusted friend, and the one who tells him of Juliet's "death." I didn't know where else to put Ivy, honestly, and this is the closest we'd get to 'Romeo's trusted friend.'

I don't know what to do about Lady Capulet? She's a very important character in the play, as she speaks with Juliet many times, but there is no canon character who would be Asa's wife, and I don't know if Asa even HAS a wife. Perhaps I could put Nina there, but that would be VERY awkward seeing how Rocky and Freckle are part of the other house. I may make an oc for that role? Someone stuck up and stiff to contrast Asa's dad vibes. THAT OR: since Juliet's gender swapped in this I could cut Lady Capulet altogether and have Asa be the one to come talk to Mordecai about the marriage and such. Might just do that... Mrs. Bapka as the nurse is an idea from my roommate that I love too much to not do. She wouldn't speak a word in english, obviously, and that can cause a lot of issues story-wise, but 1. who else would the nurse be, I'm struggling and 2. THE COMEDY OF IT ALL. And also-I like to think Mrs. Bapka does know Mordecai! He goes to visit Viktor and this tiny little grandma comes over without warning and they know each other! And she's a neutral party who could want the best for them both.

Dom as the Prince is purely because who else would go there, and the Prince is a character who keeps the peace. Almost like Dom is trying to keep the peace in St. Louis by putting an end to the criminal bootlegging? I think it's a good fit.

I think Serafine as Count Paris and Nico as Tybalt is the funniest option. I almost had those characters filled in as Wes and Fish (inspired by @melffen 's Beauty and the Beast fic having Wes be Gaston, and Count Paris is trying to marry Juliet, you can see where my thought process was) but then I realized,

Where do the savoys go

That doesn't QUITE fit the personalities I'm going for (works in the BatB au since Serafine's better as the witch! I loved the subtle casting of her as the with more than you'll ever know)

Wes and Fish as the two Capulet's who get into a fight at the start of the play is a much funnier outcome.

The Arbogasts as the clergy characters is too funny for me to not do. Originally I had the idea of Abelard as Friar Laurence, but I was hesitant due to 1. main couple is gay and 2. HELLFIRE, so I swapped him and Bobby when I remembered Friar John exists. Elsa is a good fit for the apothecary, since you know. Nurse. Quackenbush is a backup who's more like a stunt double just in case something goes wrong when writing her character.

Thank you for coming to my TEDtalk, if you have any ideas ANY AT ALL, please feel free to rb this with said ideas, or just come into my dms if you want to help me with this idea!

[moltensmusings]

Going to ramble for a bit about some alterations I made to team CRDL. I'll put it under the cut for anyone curious:

Cardin first: I wanted to bump up red as a color. I'm fairly certain brown is what they use on his wiki but since I think a Cardinal was his design bird I wanted to draw visuals from that. I didn't change a whole lot because his design is the most unique next to russels but I figured the jacket would give him a feather look. The jacket is also heavily inspired visually from 1860s military jackets which was when the Winchester gun company was founded and since in my rewrite he's the heir to an old money weapons company and I'm leaning into Winchester as a name mattering i thought it could be fun to play with. His hair was more obvious, I wanted to mimic a Cardinals head.

For anyone curious I think he like Weiss would have a genetic Semblance that allows him to lock onto someone or something he sees in a fight and know where they are at all times. But at least at the start he can only do it with one person and it requires concentration.

I think his family would be from Atlas and him and Weiss would've seen each other sometimes at the same parties. Not exactly friends but familiar with each other.

Russels design always bothered me but I couldn't figure out why. I didn't want to completely change it but I did need to alter it. So I thought why not up the punk factor and make him look more like he'd be the one surviving a rougher life style since in my rewrite he's from a mountainous town that deals with a lot of Grimm. He got freckles to match the spots on his namesake bird a long with a more pointed nose. I also altered his Mohawk to have it cover to his hairline.

His semblance was a bit trickier but I thought the ability to silence himself and the things he interacts with to make himself almost undetectable would make sense for his history.

I'd say he's from around Vale and a less notable family.

For Dove his colors were altered and since he's supposed to be the best fighter on the team I thought making him the most militaristic of the group would be a good idea. I shortened his hair to match the headshape if a bronzewing bird a long with changing his nose shape to match how it's beak is. His eyebrows were based off a picture I used for reference from the bronzewing and his heterochromia was to add in some of the rainbow colors you can find on their wings.

By the start of rwby he wouldn't have his semblance figured out yet because he'd be focused on honning his physical skills.

I'd place him from atlas and a military family.

Sky had the least character information but I remembered seeing he was more social so I figured making him a more flirtatious/showy character could round the team. His hair was once more altered a bit to match how a Skylark's feathers lift on their heads. In my rewrite I have him be from a family of musicians since larks are songbirds which adds to why his outfit would be more ostentatious than the rest of his group. His design gave me the most trouble since I enjoy designing more medival/dnd fantasy characters than the more modern that rwby is known for. As such his clothing may change.

His semblance would allow him to shake the vestibular. Which is a part of the ear that helps people keep balance. To do this he does have to sing.

I think him potientially being from a musical family in vacuo could be interesting.

[the-oc-lass]

Nimona OC - Charlotte Swiftheart/Corova

Hi, hello, remember that "something in the works..." post I made a few days ago? Well, the works have set it free and here it is. My own drawing of Ms. Charlotte Swiftheart/Corova.

Original Post about Charlotte

Here she is! I used a lot of colors from Ambrosius, specifically from this picture:

I wanted to make it clear that they were related yet also not clear? Obviously no one knew until they were told (though I'm sure people were suspicious since they are supposed to look kind of alike), and they didn't know, but honestly some people look alike when they aren't related, so maybe it was just one of those things where no one assumed until the halfblood thing became public. Anyway, I'm semi confident that their skin tones are similar, I used a lot of Ambrosius's features as reference when I was drawing Charlotte's face, and her hair is a similar shade as his (and there are strands that are this lighter, almost bleached blond that Am has going on). I gave her a few details that aren't as noticable, so I'll point them out really quickly. So the bracelet on her right (left side of the drawing) wrist is blue and gold. Blue is kind of her color, and gold is, of course, Ambrosius's. It was obviously a gift from one of the children at the sanctuary, probably before she reunited with Ambrosius and Ballister. The ribbon she's using to tie her braid off is Nimona pink (no further comment). She's also wearing a gold ring on her left (right side of the drawing) middle finger. Probably was something left from when she was at the Institute, maybe a gift from Ambrosius or Ballister, and she could never bring herself to get rid of it even if it could've gotten her some much needed money.

Oh, and the whole golden plating looking background with the black brick splashed over it kind of just represents her? She's got that golden blood but it's overshadowed by the commoner part of her. Tainted, I guess. And then the little spray painted KB symbol is obviously for her band of vigilantes and do-gooders.

Close-Up and Symbolic(?) Overlay below the cut:

Close-Up:

I was absolutely delighted when I realized that Ambrosius has little freckles and now I don't even know if you can see the freckles I gave Charlotte. I'm going to throw something (you can kind of see them if you zoom in, but not as clearly as they looked on my drawing software).

Symbolic/Artistic Overlay thing:

I think that these are things that Charlotte has unfortunately internalized since she left the Institute. They define who she is not only to the kingdom, but to herself as well. "She was a mistake, the result of an affair." "She's a stain on the family legacy." "Nothing more than a bastard." "A Gloreth forsaken halfblood."

Lovely tagged people:

@ammonitetheseaserpent @perfectkittystranger @xxlunadrawsstuffxx @floxu