#next drabble will be a real beast but here's the last one before all the dominoes fall over and explode

[cloudbattrolls]

Moment in the Light

Jastes Verdan | Civitrecce | Present Night

On the top of a skyscraper, Iber music played loudly from a crackly speaker and lowbloods of various ages whooped and shouted as they chased each other around the rectangle. All of them were kept safe by the translucent forcefield around the edge, even as they veered close while playing games, shoving one another, or being held back by their lusii’s various extremities.

A small flock of tiny floating robots patrolled the building’s perimeter, just outside the forcefield. Not enough for any passing drone to be suspicious, but enough to keep an eye on anything attempting to spy on or interfere with the party. 

Periodically, they stopped being tech and turned partially or fully to flesh and blood, going from mechanical to biotech construct and back in seconds.

A perfect way to throw off anything trying to attach a tracking signal to them, except for sheer location-based or space-involved tech; those could be solved by the second aspect of the force-field: its disruption routine that only paired with anything genetically related to the inner biotech workings of its generator.

The robotics’ genetics belonged to one troll only, and all of them had a variety of sensors and LED lights - or eyes, depending on their state - glowing green.

Not ones that could see overly far, they were too small for that but enough that Jastes could use his augments to process all the data efficiently and have his subroutines ping if they detected anything that required his attention.

He hoped they wouldn’t. He was currently trying to win a game of ring toss, and the noise from the others was already a mass of chatter and whoops in his ears.

He took a breath, trying to focus on the stick several feet away from him, weighing the plastic ring in his hand and mulling over what angle he’d choose.

“Throw it already!”

The resistance leader did…and it fell short to the laughter and a few boos of the others. 

He sighed. The problems of playing fair. 

This would be a cinch if he was more tech at the moment, but it would also be more boring, and he’d get more questions. 

He stepped back with his hands raised in an ‘I tried my best’ gesture and a few younger trolls tussled over who would go next. He smiled as they argued and walked over to his old friend, the maroon leaning against a railing away from the others while smoking a cigarette.

“How’s Civitrecce’s most eligible noodle arm?” Asked Xineck by way of hello.

“I’m not that weak.” Said Jastes with slight annoyance. “I just don’t have a good hand.”

“That’s what she said.” Muttered the lower caste man after taking a drag, but even he didn’t seem to find it very funny, and Jastes rolled his eyes at him. 

He pointedly fanned the air to make the smoke go away. Xineck ignored him.

“Is it just reflex by this point?” Asked the yellowblood. “No one except the six sweep olds is going to think that’s clever.”

“No one except your lusus is gonna think you’re funny.”

Jastes huffed softly. “People think I’m funny. Sometimes.” He added.

“Yeah, when you fall off the couch. Not ‘cause of your jokes.”

The cyborg elected not to comment on that.

“You know what I’m here for - ”

“My dick.”

“Amazingly, no.” Said Jastes, fighting the urge to pretend to gag. It would only fuel the maroon further. “Can you be serious for five seconds?”

Xineck raised an eyebrow. 

“Depends. What if I don’t know what you’re here for?”

“You’re not that stupid.” Said the yellowblood with somewhat forced patience, his eyes narrowing. “You just don’t want to talk about it. I get it. We still have to.”

The lower caste troll rolled his eyes, but relented slightly, his shoulders slumping.

They both looked out over the resistance and non-resistance trolls alike, watching a game of anti-grav twister with hoops stacked in the air get played as trolls clambered on the metal rings and tried not to fall off. Jastes had encouraged people to invite their friends, despite a few objections.

One of the most vocal had been the man next to him.

Xineck was silent for a few moments, taking another drag.

“I fucking worry, Jas.” He said in an unusually concerned voice, low and hard, his pointy ears lowered. Xineck rarely let any emotion show, too used to it being seized upon as weakness.

“A lot of these kids don’t get it. They might have a grumble or two, but they don’t get how bad things really are. They don’t want to - shit, they’d probably want to hang themselves if they realized just how much we’re all watched, all the time.”

He shook his head, eyes tired as he continued in a rougher tone.

“I don’t want them to have to get it. The youngest here is what, five? Too fucking young. I don’t want them to be me, getting threatened for trying to keep their data private. Getting fired supposedly for tampering. Tampering. Fuck’s sake. I turned a camera away when she was crying. She didn’t want anyone to see, to start getting fucking ads about psychic counseling, have our boss prying at her. That’s all it took. That’s all it ever takes.”

He had red tears at the edges of his eyes.

Jastes looked away. 

“What happened to you and Atarem was horrible.” He agreed softly. “They need to know things like that, Xin. It’s the only way they’ll understand. The only way they’ll fight back.”

The maroon looked at him, his face hardening again as he wiped his eyes with a sleeve.

“Easy for you to say. Untouchable Jastes, can disappear as a robot whenever he wants. What about the rest of us?”

The resistance leader took a deep breath. 

“I’ll never pretend you all don’t take risks.” He said with forced calm. “I do too. Every time I fix one of you. Every time I make someone a new limb or part, praying there’s not some imperial bot or sensor I missed watching me. I can’t even tell anyone. But I want to. I want to.” He said, his voice cracking slightly. 

The maroon chewed his dry bottom lip, looking his friend over.

“You need a plan for if they find out. When, more likely. The more members we get, the harder it’ll be.” 

Jastes sighed. “Hopefully most of them wouldn’t care, right? Technopaths exist, helms are common, I’m not much different from either. It isn’t a big deal.” He said, sounding more like he was trying to convince himself, palms pressed together as he wrung his hands slightly. 

The taller man gave him a dead-eyed, frustrated look as he turned his cigarette in his fingers.

“You are every Civitrecce lowblood’s fucking daymare, what they worry the highbloods will do to us. What they’ve already done to plenty of us. Who the hell hasn’t been tempted to accept more and more ports to pay off their debts? Who hasn’t watched someone lose themself to behavior mods in their tech, hidden in the contract’s fine print? 

Fuck, sometimes I’ve wished I could do that. Me, Jastes. I’ve wished I could sell my psi and my body just so I could buy some food that isn’t dirt fucking cheap, fix my rotting ceiling before it falls in and I get fined, or take my lusus to the vet for his teeth. He keeps losing them.” The dragon troll shook his head.

Jastes paused. Then sighed.

“That isn’t me.” He said firmly. “I don’t turn other people unless I have to, and I turn them back as soon as I can. If we flinch from tools that can help us, the highbloods have already won.”

“Yeah, you sure are a tool.” Said Xineck with a rare grin, and Jastes had one of his robots zip over to steal his cigarette, which caused a fresh burst of swearing.

Jastes’s eyes gleamed a mischievous green as he directed the bot to fly just out of the redblood’s reach as he flailed to catch it.

“You give that the fuck back!” Xineck demanded, pointing at him. “I will throw your metal ass off this building, bulge eater.”

“Hmmmm…no.” Replied the yellowblood calmly, slender hands folded behind his back. “I’m looking out for your health.”

“Go gargle some more dicks for your own, you -“

Whatever the other lowblood said next was a blissful mystery to his friend’s ears, as he had temporarily muted the space around him with a sound-seal force-field. Always handy to have that capability.

It didn’t stop Xineck from grabbing his arm, though luckily the maroon wasn’t strong enough to shove him over; his arms might not be internally tech at the moment, but he almost always had some in him, though he intentionally made it lightweight to reduce the strain on his flesh. 

Jastes’s wrench appeared in his free hand and quickly - a little too quickly, a little too accurately - he gently tapped Xineck in exactly the right spots by the base of his arm to make him let go, then jumped out of range, turning and ready to counter anything else in an instant. He dropped the sound-seal.

A few trolls nearby noticed and laughed, a few clapping and calling to Xineck that he could do better. 

Xineck muttered curses under his breath.

Jastes’s eyes gleamed green again, his smile amused. 

“I hate when you do that.” The maroon muttered. “We should’ve never grabbed those medical and combat scanners. You held them for five seconds and suddenly you’re twice as insufferable.”

“I don’t need my special eyes to fend you off, but it helps.” Said the yellowblood cheerfully.

The raptor-dragon troll raised a hand like he wanted to flip off the higher caste, but noticed a few six sweep olds watching and dropped it with more muttering. 

“I could do it for you too.” Jastes continued with the hint of a grin, well aware he was pushing the envelope. “So you could keep up.”

Xineck looked at the kids.

“Tackle him and I’ll give you each five caegers.” He said, making the silver coins appear between his fingers as they shone teasingly in the moonlight. 

Three six sweep olds launched themselves at the yellowblood, who went down in a laughing, scrabbling pile of children. 

Psiionically tailored cyborg augments had met their match: kids with cash on the line.

Jastes politely rolled on his back to play dead, then got sat on, which wasn’t kind to the slim cyborg’s ribcage or spine. He looked at Xineck - what of him he could see past the kids - the six-horned man now very smug.

“Next time don’t yoink my cigarette.” He said, taking out another and lighting it.

“Point taken.” Sighed the resistance leader, as the younger trolls got off him to claim their money. 

He got to his feet and made a vain attempt to get his hair back in order, but he suspected it was going to need more help than he could provide on his own, the tightly coiled curls now out of array.

“Jastes! Get over here and eat!” Called Abbeth impatiently, a few other trolls adding their voices to the request.

The robots continued on their rounds, and Jastes watched the city through their eyes - his own eyes - as he sat down to enjoy tamales and jerk chicken. 

He could taste the food, watch the trolls around him, and see buildings and passing lusii and drones all at once. He felt the rush of air as those robots - sometimes biotech constructs, always extensions of himself - floated freely.

It was just another psiionic power. The real danger was the empire finding out, taking him and using him to turn lowbloods into unthinking robots. Or worse.

Maybe not the empire, he thought darkly. That blueblood…

But Abnale didn’t know. He might suspect, but he couldn’t know for sure.

No one except Xineck knew that he could make himself into whatever technology he touched, for as long as he wanted, and suffer no ill effects.

With a touch, he could do it to anyone else.

He took his mind off it, determined to enjoy his meal and his company. 

He could worry about it tomorrow night. Right now the moons were shining, the empire was barely watching, and the food was delicious. 

Surrounded by young lowbloods chattering freely, by Xineck wearing a rare smile, Jastes thrived in the moment.

All of them together. 

All of them happy, even if for just a little while.

[justrainandcoffee]

Home (Alfie Solomons x fem!oc)

Alfie Solomons x Rose Coldwell (ofc) masterlist

Summary: Alfie is staying at the distillery while the men from Birmingham are there. He doesn't trust them around his place. In consequence, he feels tired and grumpier than usual. The visit of his wife, maybe can make him change his mind.

Warnings: None, except some veeeeeery slightly mentions of sex. The return of the king: Beast. I missed this little creature.

Words: 650.

Supposedly this was going to be just a moodboard plus a little blurb and it ended up as a whole drabble 💁‍♀️.

Those were hard days for more reasons than one. Alfie was not able to go to home because of extra work. Tommy Shelby's men were there at all hours and Alfie simply didn't trust them. In consequence, the last week he barely had time to see his wife.

It's late when Alfie heard voices and laughs. Fuck them. He sighed trying to focus on the papers on the desk.

Next to him, Beast, the feral chihuahua who lived there, was sleeping. Alfie looked at the animal. The man liked him, there was something on its personality -fearless, vicious, with no sense of self preservation...- that reminded him of himself. But now, sleeping, no one could say that Beast was indeed a beast. The ankles of everyone there were safe for now.

Few days ago, one of the Brummies ended up with a bruise on one of his eyes because he tried to touch Rose when she was entering the distillery, thinking she was a some random woman. It wasn't Alfie who caused the bruise. Now, no one said a word nor looked at her when she walked into the bakery. Except the Jewish men, who knew her, and greeted her amicably.

Alfie lifted his eyes from the paperwork when he heard the door opening. Finally something good on his awful day.

"Luv, what are ya doin' 'ere?" It's too late. I thought ya were already sleepin' at home."

"I'm visiting you, Al. I need to know you're okay, sweetheart. You look tired and I miss you."

"I miss you too, luv. I look tired and I'm tired. Have ya seen them? All they do is laugh and talk all the fuckin' time. Fuck them."

His wife approached him and started to massage his shoulders. "You need to rest, Al. How many more days do you think you're going to handle this situation? Sleeping here, eating badly... You need to trust your men, they can control the Tommy's ones."

"Mmh."

"I miss you, Alfie. And I need you, too. I understand the situation, I support you. You know that, but... You're my husband and I can't see you overworking and stressing yourself because of it." She put her arms around his shoulders and rested her head on his. "I miss you," she repeated, whispering in his ear.

"I know, Rosie. Fuck, I know. I miss you too, miss home, our evenings, your company..." Alfie left the pen on the desk and stroked her hands. "But..."

"I know."

Alfie couldn't say that her voice sounded angry but disappointed. She kissed his temple, "I know. Do you at least have five minutes for me?"

When Alfie nodded, she sat on his lap and put her lips on his. After all the stress, feeling her, kissing her it was like a day in the paradise. She was using the perfume he liked it the most, Alfie knew she was trying to persuade him to left his place to go to their home and as she was unbuttoning his trousers, apparently, she was going to succeed.

Not for the first time they had sex on his office. And in this case it was exactly what Alfie needed. He was kissing her neck, while the hands were still on her waist caressing her skin.

"I love ya," he said against her neck. "Let's go home."

"For real?"

"For real."

Alfie wasn't there when Ollie arrived at the distillery before the sunrise. There was a note on his desk saying that he was at home with his wife, he was planning to return after midday. Finally, Ollie thought.

On Alfie's chair, Beast was contemplating his surroundings. Ollie wasn't that stupid to try to remove him from there. The dog seemed proud of himself. And it seemed, too, that Alfie had left in charge the only one, besides him, capable of keeping the order in Camden Town. And he wasn't wrong.

[redrikki]

2024 Pride Month Masterpost

I've written a bunch of queer stories in a bunch of fandoms. Enjoy!

Agent Carter

Because Girls Love Girls (The Soulmate City Remix) - There’s something in the water and the next thing Angie knows, she’s waking up with the name Margaret Carter wrapped around her wrist. (Angie Martinelli/Peggy Carter)

One Last Kiss (The Final Storm Remix) - You never forget your first kiss with your nemesis. Dottie won’t forget her last either. At Howard Stark’s funeral, she puts a few things in the ground. (Peggy Carter/Dottie Underwood)

Avatar: Legend of Korra

Girl, Gotten (The Heroine After Remix) - As long as Asami’s the hero, Korra’s okay being the love interest. (Korra/Asami Sato)

Leaves on the Wind - Korra, Asami, and the next Avatar (past Korra/Asami Sato)

Ten-Thousand Words (Which Once See the Light of Day) -  A series of short stories about the ladies of Legend of Korra. (bisexual Asami Sato/Mako, various het pairings)

Avatar: The Last Airbender

Playing with Fire (The Dubiously Consensual Remix) - People didn’t tell Azula no. (Azula/Ty Lee)

Battlestar Galactica 

Persephone on New Caprica - It’s winter on New Caprica and they’re all Persephone here.  A collection of short stories. (bisexual Felix Gaeta/Eight, various het pairings) Trigger warning: non-con/dub con

Batwoman (TV)

Trapped in the Closet - Kate was never afraid to come out to her father, but she is now. Episode tag to the season 1 finale. (lesbian Kate Kane)

Pride - A small army of Batwomen marched at Pride. Ryan should be marching with them. (lesbian Ryan Wilder)

Black Lightning (TV)

Comic Book Life - Comic book Thunder’s boyfriend knew what his woman did, so why couldn’t Anissa tell her girlfriend? (Anissa Pierce/Grace Choi)

Truth Will Out - Anissa’s in the closet about her superhero life. Three times she thought about telling Grace and one time she actually did. (Anissa Pierce/Grace Choi) 

Maybe Baby - “Ever think about what kind of power’s you and Grace’s kids would have?“ Jen asked, raising possibilities Anissa had never considered before. (Anissa Pierce/Grace Choi, Jennifer Pierce)

Sleeping Beauty - Grace had been in coma for over a month now, but Anissa still couldn’t help thinking each visit that this would be the one where she woke up. Maybe today it would be. (Anissa Pierce/Grace Choi)

Cat Lover - When your wife was a deadly jungle cat, it paid to be cautious but Anissa meant to get eaten. (Anissa Pierce/Grace Choi)

Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Short and to the Mr. Pointy - Collection of drabbles set across all 7 seasons. (Willow Rosenberg/Tara McClay, Willow Rosenberg/Kennedy, Willow Rosenberg/Oz, Larry/Xander Harris, various het pairings)

Cobra Kai

Make a Wish - Tommy has a different confession in episode 2.06 "Take a Right." (Tommy/Johnny Lawrence)

Queer Eye for the Karate Guy - “Our hero this week is Sensei Johnny Lawrence,” Karamo read off the pad. “He’s a 53-year-old, 6-foot-tall master of karaté.” Queer Eye/Cobra Kai crossover. (Queer Eye cast)

DC’s Legends of Tomorrow (TV)

The Beast You Made of Me - The Waverider’s resident shapeshifters compare notes. (Mona Wu, Genderfluid Charile) 

Neither Should You (The Real People Remix) - Rescuing her clones was the right thing to do. They deserved the right to live their lives and make their own choices. Ava just wished they’d stop sleeping with Gary. (Ava Sharpe/Sara Lance, Ava Clones/Gary Green, implied Gary Green/John Constantine)

Army of One - Sara Lance was dead. Sara Lance was a clone. Sara Lance was going to need a minute to process. Tag to "Bishop's Gambit," episode 6.06. (bisexual Sara Lance)

Downton Abbey

The Hedgehog’s Dilemma - Thomas Barrow’s daemon is a hedgehog. Five warnings, four relationships, and one revelation. (Thomas Barrow/Duke of Crowborrough, Thomas Barrow/Edward Courtney, Thomas Barrow/Jimmy Kent)

Snakes and Lions - Hogwarts AU. In Thomas, Jimmy finds that courage isn’t exclusive to Gryffindors.  Now if only he could find some himself. (Thomas Barrow/Jimmy Kent)

Genius Loci - Downton Abbey consumes people and it won’t let Thomas go. (gay Thomas Barrow) Trigger warning: referenced canon suicide attempt

When the Wolf Comes Home - Buggery is legal in the army, required even, for wolf-brothers. Bates, Lord Grantham, and their wolves have a certain history. Thomas can't help thinking about it. Fusion with A Companion to Wolves by Sarah Monette and Elizabeth Bear. (Thomas Barrow, past Robert Crawley/John Bates)

Kipo and the Age of Wonerbeasts

Dream Girls - On the surface, Mulholland had given Wolf everything she had thought she wanted: her and Kipo, the two of them buff and tough and together. Her guilt had kept her from really enjoying it, but it hadn’t been why she fought back. (Wolf/Kipo)

The Hero Was You - Benson likes Troy and Troy likes Benson. Great! Now all Benson has to do is figure out what to do about it. (Benson/Troy)

A Post Post-Apocalyptic Romance - It was kind of wild when he thought about it. Benson and Troy had fallen for each other super fast, but, between the rescue and the other rescue and all the running around with HMUFA, they’d never really gotten to know each other. Luckily, without Scarlemagne and Dr. Emilia trying to capture and/or kill them, they finally had the time to get to know each other as Benson introduced Troy to the city. (Benson/Troy)

Miraculous Ladybug

Better Than Ice Cream - Orange, mint, and raspberry could be a tasty combination. The solution to every love triangle should be polyamory, but sometimes it’s just not that simple. Spoilers for Love-Eater. (Marinette Dupain-Cheng/Adrien Agreste/Kagami Tsurugi)

The Old Guard 

Take What the Water Gave Me - Quynh drowns and wakes and in between are Booker and Andromache. She would take his life if she could. So she does. (Quynh/Andy)

Orphan Black

Portrait of the Artist as a Young Girl - There’s something magical about Uncle Felix’s flat.  Maybe it’s all the art. (Kira Manning, gay Felix Dawkins, lesbian Cosima Niehaus)

She-Ra and the Princesses of Power

She-Ra (Modesty) Shorts - Three very short Catra/Adora stories. (Catra/Adora)

Parting Strands - Looking out for each other had been their thing, but Adora’s starting to suspect that’s over. Her thoughts during that scene in "Promise.” (Catra/Adora)

Sick Leave - Back when they were kids in the Horde, they used to hide when they got sick. It’s a hard habit to break, but things are different now and Catra really should be in bed. (Catra/Adora)

Another First Kiss - Five times Catra thought about kissing Adora and one time Adora kissed her. (Catra/Adora)

Spider-man (Ultimates verse)

Queen of Lower Chelsea - Jessica Drew may not be a real girl, but she’s trying to build a real life. (gender-queer Jessica Drew)

Fingertips That Might Ignite - Peter is straight like a straight thing.  Jessica isn’t sure what she is. (Jessica Drew/Johnny Storm, Jessica Drew/OFC)

We Were Orphans Before - The first time Jessica ran into Peter after the Wave she grabbed him into a hug. (gender-queer Jessica Drew, Peter Parker)

Gonna Share My Tin Man Heart - Kitty moves in and Kitty moves out. Jessica falls in love somewhere along the way. (Jessica Drew/Kitty Pride)

Star Wars

For Amidala - Her handmaidens had all poured so much of themselves into Amidala, it was like they were part of her now. Padmé didn’t know if she had the strength to let one go. (Padmé/Her Handmaidens)

Dateline Felucia - Embedded with the troops on Felucia, a reporter from HoloNet News paints an intimate portrait of the men of the 212th Attack Battalion. (Obi-Wan/Cody, Waxer/Boil)

Tag - Sabine and Ketsu, bounty hunters extraordinaire, argue about how to sign their work. (Sabine Wren/Ketsu Onyo)

When I Was Your Age - Kanan, Ezra, and the fruits of a misspent youth. (Pansexual Kanan Jarrus)

Stranger Things

Date Night - Everyone and her mother seems to think they’re together and Robin’s getting pretty sick of it. (lesbian Robin Buckley & Steve Harrington)

Umbrella Academy (TV)

Iconic - When Vanya learns Klaus is gay from a magazine, she’s angry for more than just one reason. (queer Vanya & Klaus Hargreeves)

White Collar

Eyes on the Target (The Solid Ground Remix) - Peter asked Diana to keep an eye on Neal for him while he’s stuck in jail. It could be going better. (lesbian Diana Barrigan, Neal Caffrey)

[whumpzone]

Tomas and Rowe - Part 17

Masterpost

taglist: @sola-whumping @just-another-whumper @misspelledwitch @looptheloup @briars7 @black-polarf @zipadeedooda-drabbles @just-a-whumping-racoon-with-wifi @rosesareviolentlyread @thingsthatgo-whump-inthenight @kestrelsparverius @whumpsy-daisies @whumpersworld @memoriesneverforget @sky-or-something-idfk @cupcakes-and-pain @frankieswhump @ihaventwritteninsolong @mybrokenlittletoy @kiretto-laorentze @morelikepainsley @lavmars @tears-and-lilies @whump-me-all-night-long @newbornwhumperfly @itaina-anta @whump-it @haro-whumps @simplygrimly @alex-ember @rippedjeansandfadeddreams @mnmlover2002 @jordanstrophe @princessofonward @xmonster-under-the-bed @as-a-matter-of-whump @5boys1house @crystalrainwing @starnight-whump @jasm0307 @lightdrinker @hurting-fictional-people @captainseconds @glamrockgregory @justbreakonme @downrivergirl914 @cdragontogacotar @whumps-up @vaguelyhumanvoid @kim-poce

CW: pet whump, dehumanisation, fingore, amputation, mentions of alcohol/being drunk

-

It was the middle of the night- probably- when Rowe was startled awake. He could hear the sound of the door at the end of the corridor unlocking, impossibly loud against the silence. There was a shuddering bang as it struck the wall. Kasia had slammed it open. He was angry.

The next sound was footsteps, irregular and heavy. Stumbling.

Ice ran down Rowe’s spine. It was stupid, he knew, but the fact that it was night-time made everything worse. It was night. It was dark. He was chained up in his old master’s basement for being a stupid, bad, ugly little dog, and he was going to start screaming in pain very soon.

He tried to focus his eyes. He was here, in the present. He was chained to the floor in Kasia’s personal torture chamber. Not much better. Oh, god, and why had he charged in in the middle of the night?

Was this it?

I’m a person, I deserve, fuck, uh, I deserve to be cared for, I’m, I’m, I have worth, I don’t-

Kasia stepped into view, looking down at Rowe with half-lidded eyes. He had dark, bruised knuckles on one hand. His weight shifted unevenly along his hips.

He grabbed the key to the cell, but before he unlocked it, he leant out of sight and dragged the duffle bag towards him.

It had been there the whole time. Rowe hadn’t realised. Kasia unlocked the door, pocketing the key again, and kicked the bag through roughly. The sound of metal clattering inside made Rowe’s skin crawl. It had only been a few seconds since he’d first woken up and his head was pounding.

He stayed very still, watching, waiting. Not wanting to do anything to piss Kasia off more.

The kicks weren’t too bad- his aim was off, tonight, and Rowe could grit his teeth and take it. Maybe he just needed to quickly let off some steam, maybe this time he wouldn’t bother with his sadistic creativity.

“I hate you. I fucking hate you,” he spat, reaching down to grab Rowe’s hair. He missed, swung again then blanched and pulled himself back up. He took a shaky step back to right himself and a hand came to rest on his belly. “Stand up. Stand the fuck up! I’m not crouching down. Ugh.”

Rowe stammered, words failing him for a few seconds as he tried to push through the fear and reply. “I-I-I can’t, I’m ch-chained to the f-f-f-floor-“

“Fuck,” Kasia shouted and Rowe whimpered, pulling back. Kasia yanked the duffle bag up and began digging through.

A smile spread across his face and Rowe’s heart stopped when Kasia pulled out a pair of bone shears. He hooked them onto his thumb while he continued to rummage until he retrieved a key.

Rowe realised it was the key to his collar. Kasia grabbed his hair successfully this time, pulling Rowe up so effortlessly he could have been made of paper. God, he was still so hungry.

The collar fell open and Rowe stayed where he was, hanging pathetically from Kasia’s hand. His lips parted to ask what he planned to do with those shears, but sick fear kept his tongue clamped down.

“Stand up then,” he snapped, his eyes burning two holes into Rowe’s. He obeyed without a thought, and Kasia locked his fingers around his throat, slamming him against the far wall. It was the hand holding the bone shears, and the thumb hoop pressed against his windpipe like a threat.

Oh hell, Rowe thought, staring up at the ceiling. Is he going to slit my throat?

“I’m going to fuck you up,” Kasia growled, and a few tears slipped down Rowe’s cheeks. Kasia’s free hand suddenly grabbed his left wrist, holding it up, looking at it.

Rowe did he best to keep breathing through his rising terror. “Pl-please, please d-d-don’t, have mer-mercy, pl-“

Kasia pulled his wrist out straight with such ferocity that Rowe’s pleas died immediately, turning instead to gasps of horror. The hand holding the bone shears left his neck, opening wide like a jaw.

It all happened too fast. The bone shears clamped down onto Rowe’s ring finger, only slowing when they struck bone, but within seconds his finger was severed and blood was streaming from the fresh wound.

For a few moments everything was silent; the only sound was the ringing in his ears. His vision splintered, the form of Kasia blurring before him, and bile quickly rose in his throat as he screamed. Oh, god. Oh god oh god my finger he really did it no please no no no no it’s not real it’s not real.

Kasia released Rowe’s wrist and took a step back, admiring his work while Rowe howled. Both pairs of eyes were wide and bloodshot, staring at the empty space between Rowe’s fingers.

“Now,” he slurred, drawing up his weapon hand once more. “I’ll make it symmetrical for you, Pet.”

All Rowe could do was try to get away. He didn’t think about it, he just knew he had to. Kasia filled the entire space before him, a great towering beast. There was nowhere to go except to stumble on his weak legs towards the corner of the cell.

Kasia smiled at this pitiful display and moved forwards, when it happened. His foot landed in the fresh pool of blood and onto Rowe’s finger and he slipped.

Rowe had until Kasia hit the floor to make a choice. As his tormentor’s back struck the concrete, Rowe chose.

He thrust his arms forward and grabbed the duffle bag, and fuck, it was heavy. It must have been adrenaline and the raging thrill of disobedience that imbued his limbs with the strength to heave it up and send it whirling into Kasia’s head. It connected with a rusty clang and Kasia let out a thick groan, collapsing.

There wasn’t a second to lose. Rowe reached out with his good hand, the one with all five fingers, and gripped the chain still attached to the floor anchor. Pulling it up, he twisted towards the dazed and hurt Kasia, and wrapped it around his neck, gritting his teeth and begging silently for this to work. He pulled as hard as he could.

Kasia’s hands shot up to Rowe’s, scrabbling and writhing. His nails easily broke the skin along Rowe’s taut, pale-white knuckles in a desperate attempt to get free, but Rowe was used to pushing through pain. He dug his feet in and summoned his whole weak, malnourished body to help him.

“You- fu- ugh!” Kasia’s words failed as the chain around his throat only tightened. He kept struggling, thrashing his legs until they were soaked with Rowe’s blood. One hand stayed scratching around the chain, while another reached up to claw at Rowe’s face, but Rowe easily evaded it.

It was sickening. He was hurting him, he was being a bad Pet, he was forgetting his place, he was going to become a murderer if he didn’t let up soon.

Kasia’s arms fell limply down. His legs stopped kicking. Rowe loosened the chain just a little, leaning forward and listening. He was breathing- just. Unconscious. Good.

“I hate you,” Rowe whispered.

His skin was still prickling with terror, and he dug around in Kasia’s various jacket pockets until he found what he needed. The collar snapped shut around Kasia’s neck nicely, the click of the lock filling the room.

Finally, he could breathe. He noticed a watch on Kasia’s left wrist- it truly was the middle of the night. Rowe had to go. He had come too far now. It would be cold. There would be people about. He was drenched in blood, old and new, and had burns, sores, bruises, and a neck bearing all the hallmarks of a collar. He decided to take Kasia’s jacket. It wasn’t much, but it would keep him warm, and hopefully make him look less like an escaped Pet.

Before he put it on he ripped a portion of Kasia’s t-shirt and did his best to staunch his wound. It would have to do. He draped the jacket over his shoulders and opened the cell door, taking a last look inside. Kasia was lying in a pool of blood, more similar to a corpse than a living being, the collar trapping him within the confines of the short chain. To the walls, and the tap, but not the door. The duffle bag lay near him and Rowe pulled it out of reach, just in case anything inside could double as a lockpick. Somewhere in the midst of all the gore was Rowe’s finger, but he couldn’t mourn it. Better it was left in there, rather than him.

He shut and locked the door, and turned to look down the corridor, his heart in his mouth. It was short, with only four cells on either side. He walked down it, and-

Yes, oh thank fuck yes, his suspicion had been correct. He had truly heard it. The sound of the door at the end of the hall opening- and nothing else.

Kasia, in his wondrous, amazing, heaven-sent state of drunkenness, had forgotten to lock it behind him. The keypad sat uselessly on the side of the open door.

He reached the exit. This was it.

Rowe pulled the jacket tighter, and ran.

[serasvictoria]

So I was supposed to be writing an incubus Hvitserk drabble and instead I got this beast that’s a little in over 2k long…

Under the moon, the wolves gather

“You want me to do what?”

“Chain me up.”

Ubbe held up the thick chains and a heavy padlock. You looked at them and then up at him again in confusion. Why was he asking you to do this? The two of you had dabbled in some kinky stuff a couple of times before, but asking you to chain him up was new and you weren’t entirely sure if you wanted to subject him to something like that. What if you did it wrong? Besides, the roles were usually very much reversed. Ubbe wasn’t exactly what you’d call submissive. He had always very much been the alpha in your relationship and you liked it that way.

“Did you get this idea from Ivar?” You grabbed one of the ends of the chain and lifted it up. It looked like the kind of chains that people used to tow cars, not like something that people used in sexual games. “I know that he’s into some sick shit, but this is next level…”

“It’s not about that.” He sighed deeply, growing exasperated with your inability to get why he was asking you this. “It’s about that attack.”

“The animal.”

It hadn’t happened that long ago. Ubbe had been in the woods that stretched out at the back of the house. He later told you that he had heard noises and had gone to investigate while you slept. You always slept like a log so you hadn’t even noticed that he had gotten out of bed to begin with. It wasn’t until he stumbled back in later on, crashing against the door that led into the bedroom, covered in blood and using his shotgun as some sort of makeshift crutch, that you had even realised that he had gone outside.

He started rambling incoherently about how there had been something in the woods that had attacked him, something big and black, something that had scratched him and sunk its teeth into his shoulder. Thankfully Ubbe hadn’t just lain down and given up. Not him. Despite the fact that the animal had a firm grip on his shoulder, Ubbe had started throwing punches wherever he could hit it. From what you had heard from others, he had a mean right hook and he had once broken the jaw of some idiot who had decided to hit on Ubbe’s then girlfriend. It was safe to say that something like that had never happened again afterwards.

Somewhere in between hitting the animal’s muzzle, it had released him and howled in pain. Ubbe had launched his full weight into the animal, knocked it against the ground and had run back into the house. You could only assume that his adrenaline had taken over at that point. While you did your best to clean out his injuries, he was pointing the barrel of his shotgun at the door right behind you in case whatever the hell had attacked him followed him into the house.

It never came.

The ambulance came half an hour later and after spending the good part of the following day in the hospital, where they disinfected his wounds and gave him a rabies shot just in case, he was home again. He did nothing but lay in the bed and sleep for the following two days. You assumed that it was because of shock, but you weren’t exactly an expert. Hvitserk came by to check on his brother daily and he reassured you that you probably didn’t have to worry. He checked the injuries with you and despite the fact that they looked horrific to you, Hvitserk had confidently stated that your concerns were unnecessary. According to him they were healing just fine. Apparently. Again, you were no expert.

It wasn’t until Ubbe eventually woke up, got out of bed and started eating again that you could finally breathe easily. He acted the same way he usually did. Just the same caring and sweet soul that you had first fallen for.

But then odd things started to happen. His sense of smell seemed to have gotten better. Even to the point that when he was out in the woods, which he patrolled almost endlessly in case the animal came back, he always seemed to materialise from out of nowhere because he could smell that you were making him a sandwich for lunch. That had actually happened a couple of times. Didn’t matter how far away from the house he was, he could smell food. His wounds also healed at a speed that seemed far from normal. About a week after he had gotten attacked, all that you could see were faint markings on his skin, like they were old scars. And one night you had found him in the kitchen while he was eating a raw steak that you were going to cook him the next evening.

Odd things. Too many things to count. And now this.

“I know what it was.”

“I thought it was a bear?” Despite the fact that Ubbe had sworn high and low that it was some kind of wolf-like creature that had attacked him, you knew that it couldn’t be the case. There were no wolves near where you lived. But there were bears so maybe he had gotten it mixed up while he had been attacked? It had been night after all. “It couldn’t have been anything else.”

“It was a werewolf.”

“A werewolf?” You shook your head. “Even a man who is pure in heart and says his prayers by night, may become a wolf when the wolfbane blooms and the autumn moon is bright?” You instantly recalled a line from a werewolf movie that you had seen a couple of times. “One of those?”

“Not like in the movies.” He held the chain out to you again and you took it with some slight hesitation. “This is real.”

“Come on. Werewolves aren’t real.”

“Just stop arguing with me and do it.” Tired of talking, he grabbed your hand and dragged you down into the basement. There were hooks anchored into the wall down there which one of the previous occupants had installed for reasons that were entirely unknown to you. “Wrap the chain around my chest and arms. Lock them together. Then go back upstairs and don’t come down here to check on me no matter how much noise I make.”

“Ubbe, this isn’t funny.” He wasn’t one to play pranks on you, but there was a first time for everything. “Why are you even asking me to do this?”

“Because I don’t know what I’ll do if I change. Please just…”

“What if I lose the key to this padlock? Am I supposed to just call Ivar and ask him to bring his bolt cutters? How is that going to look?”

“Just do it!” In all the time that the two of you had been together, he had never once raised his voice at you. You dropped the chain out of your hands and stared at it as it lay at your feet. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” He grabbed your hands and angled himself in such a way that you had to look at him. “It’s just… there’s not a lot of time. I don’t know when it’ll happen, when I’ll change…”

“Hey, it’s okay.” You brushed your hand over his cheek and smiled at him. “Do you really want me to do this?” He nodded. “This is definitely one of the weirdest things I’ve ever done…”

Ubbe sat in front of the wall and you picked the chain up off the floor again, but before you could take the remaining few steps in his direction, his face twisted in agony. The chain was instantly forgotten and you made it to his side, cupping his face in your hands to make him look at you, but he pushed at your chest hard instead. You landed on your ass on the hard concrete floor. Swearing loudly, you’d been about to ask him what the hell his problem was, but all words failed you when you looked in his direction again.

He was laying on the floor, back arched, clawing at his chest and tearing at his clothes, like they were constricting him. It wasn’t until he managed to tear the fabric away, that you noticed that his nails had gotten longer and not only that, his hands seemed to have changed. Stretched out and deformed, his palms lengthened to almost inhuman proportions. His shirt gave way and when you saw his chest you started scooting away from him, moving backwards until you were sitting underneath the stairs, your back pressed against the wall behind you.

His claws were tearing at his skin, creating large openings in his skin and fur started poking through somehow. His jeans tore open as the entire lower part of his body started transforming as well, legs getting even longer than they already were. You could hear his bones breaking and he started howling, his own voice turning into something more animalistic the longer he kept going. You slammed your hands over your ears in a weak effort to stop yourself from hearing him, but it was to no avail. Nothing could stop that noise from reaching your ears.

Rolling over, he was on his hands and knees now, his limbs changing to something new, more wolflike. The scream that had kept pouring from his mouth got lower as his rib cage expanded. His face was the last thing to change. His entire skull was shifting. His jaw elongated to properly accommodate his new teeth and where had once been his nose, a muzzle was appearing, pushing itself out of his skull. His ears, longer and pointier, started appearing out of his fur. Somewhere in his howl, his own voice still appeared to be mixed in there, making it sound altogether eerier. Right before he collapsed to the floor, he turned his head in your direction and you saw that his beautiful blue eyes had turned yellow.

You released a shuddering breath when you saw that he wasn’t changing anymore, but when you saw him shift, you were frozen. You found yourself wishing that you could press yourself further back into the wall or that you could get your legs to move. But even if you could make your muscles cooperate, what would you do? He could probably smell you. The fear that was wafting from your pores was bound to be some delicious perfume that he’d be able to follow no matter where you went. On the off chance that you even managed to make it outside, he’d probably pounce on you before you ever got into the car and then he’d tear you limb from limb right there on the driveway.

You didn’t stand a chance.

Where his transformation had obviously hurt him immensely, none of that pain was present now. He got to his feet and shook his head. Where Ubbe had been before, a huge wolf now took his place. A whimper escaped from your lips and he turned himself in your direction almost lazily, big yellow eyes completely fixed on you. His movements were slow, probably not seeing the need to throw himself on you when it was quite obvious that you weren’t going to move anyway. It was almost as if he moved in slow motion and the closer he got, the more that you became aware of the fact that saliva was dripping from his lower jaw. He took in a deep breath, taking your scent in deeply and he blinked once before moving in even closer.

Right before he stuck his head underneath the stairs, you closed your eyes and found yourself silently saying prayers to whichever god you could think of, praying that it would be over soon and that you’d go quickly at least. As soon as his warm breath hit your face, you stopped breathing, too terrified to even take as much as another breath. It wasn’t until your lungs started burning up from lack of oxygen that you finally took in another deep breath. You opened one eye carefully while you waited for him to move. Instead you found him looking at you almost curiously with those new big yellow eyes of his.

Completely out of the blue, he suddenly pressed his muzzle against your neck, taking in another deep breath, before turning his head so he could lick your cheek. You wiped at your cheek when you felt the wetness and he briefly looked down, almost apologetic in his gesture, before fixing his eyes on you again. With shaking hands you reached out, slowly moving towards his head and when he didn’t move, you ran a hand down his jaw. He eased into your touch almost immediately and you saw his back leg move to scratch at his side when you scratched his ear. When you giggled nervously, he fell down onto his side and nudged at your legs with his nose. You stretched your legs out in front of you and he dropped his head down onto your thighs, putting one of his paws over you to make sure you couldn’t pull away.

“What am I going to do with you now, huh?” He cracked open one eye to look at you and you leaned forward to press your lips on his head. “Big bad wolf.”

*****

Tagging: @deans-ch-ch-cherrypie @methotrex8 (I forgot to do it last night, it was late!)

[detectivejigsawpines]

Just a Normal Day

A short drabble about sea grunks having an average adventure, written in honor of their birthday.

Even before they got attacked by the Cthulhu beast, it had been a pretty average morning on the sea for the Pines twins.

Wake up at the crack of dawn (Ford) or closer to late morning (Stan); eat breakfast; reset the spell to ward off the vengeful leprechauns who might still be after them for stealing their treasure in case they’d figured out they were chasing a decoy trail by now; do a little late morning fishing, while keeping an eye out for that golden fish Stan was sure he’d seen swimming under their boat last week, and which he was hoping laid golden fish eggs or something; finally notice what time it was (Stan) and head inside to make lunch.

Just another normal day.

Stan was examining their supplies, trying to decide if it was worth breaking out some of the canned hamburger meat and throwing together sloppy Joes instead of making them eat fish again, when he was knocked skiwampus by the boat being yanked to a halt; as he struggled to regain his balance by grabbing onto the table, a vicious, blood-curdling roar came rumbling through the air from outside.

Stan sighed, and wondered if the kraken was back. In one swift motion he grabbed the spare harpoon they had hanging over the door, and stepped out to see if Ford needed help dealing with it.

It wasn’t the kraken.

It still looked like some kinda big octopus monster, though, with a mass of writhing tentacles where its face should be, and a bulbous head in the back just like an octopus body. The rest of it, at least as far as the torso, was kinda like a human’s but a little bigger (about the size of a baby whale), with slimy-looking green-brown skin and a pair of big, wrinkled, wet wings sticking out of its back. Whatever this thing was, it had grabbed onto the back of their boat, and was looming menacingly over Ford as Stan stepped outside.

“...and you are now my prisoners!” he bellowed, as his piercing golden eyes landed on Stan. “Surrender your weapons now, puny mortals, and I might be merciful!!!!”

“Yeesh, did we trespass on his territory or something?” Stan asked, leaning on the harpoon.

Ford shrugged with one shoulder, since he was trying to write in his journal at the same time. “He didn’t really say; he just jumped onboard and started threatening me.”

“Huh.” Stan looked up at the beast. “You the lord of this part of the ocean or whatever?”

The beast blinked-which looked pretty weird, his eyelids went sideways instead of up and down like humans-before nodding vigorously. “Yes! I am the lord of this part of the ocean, and you must surrender to me now, or else suffer my wrath!!!!” He slammed a fist down against the side of the boat, making it rock up and down so hard he had to scrabble to keep his balance. Stan coughed into his fist to hold back a snicker.

Ford tilted his head. “I could have sworn this was still the primary territory of the Manatee-Merfolk Alliance. Are you sure you haven’t made some kind of mistake?”

“What part of prisoners did you not understand?!” the beast demanded, spreading out his wings and shaking them as his tentacles writhed angrily. “Give up your weapons, now-all of them!!!!”

“...You sure you want that? It’s kind of gonna take awhile-”

“NOW, or I crush your boat in my mighty fist!!!!”

Stan glanced at Ford, who rolled his eyes and nodded. With a small sigh, they began disarming themselves.

********

...A minute passed and they were still at it.

Ford’s pile of weapons was almost as tall as he was, mostly consisting of long-range weapons like guns, but with a few vials of poisons and some handcuffs thrown into the mix.

Stan’s pile was more proportionate, but the number of places that weapons were produced from (including a smoke bomb that he’d somehow managed to keep tucked under his beanie) was frighteningly impressive.

The monster watched their progress with increasingly wide eyes; finally, as Stan produced another set of brass knuckles out of a secret pocket sewn onto the inside of his coat, he spluttered, “...Where were you keeping those?”

Stan just grinned shamelessly. “Trust me, sunshine, you don’t wanna know.”

“Okay, I think that’s everything,” Ford said at last, indicating the pile of weaponry.

“Yeah, well, I’m still workin’, gimme a minute.” Stan produced a switchblade, and tossed it onto his pile. Then, in a brief sleight of hand, he snatched another one from the pile and pretended to draw it out of his coat to toss it on next. “Hey, tentacles-face-ya think you could bring us back by Wednesday? We got a Zoom appointment ta keep, and our niece and nephew hate it when we’re late.” Another sleight of hand allowed him to scoop up another weapon.

“That’s not how this-now see here!” The monster drew himself up to his full height, nearly falling backwards off the boat. “You guys-you puny mortals are my prisoners! And as such, you need to understand that this is not a joking matter! I could squash you both like sea slugs if I wished! I’m all-powerful, an eons-old abomination whose very name would send you into madness if spoken aloud! So you better start quaking in fear and begging for mercy like proper captives!!!!”

Stan looked at Ford. “Sounds like we’re his first.” He looked back at the monster. “You’re doin’ great, buddy-good job on the whole threatening schtick.” He offered a thumbs-up, while using the other hand to snag another weapon that he pretended to produce from another hiding spot.

Ford winked at him, and looked back at their ‘captor.’ “Is this some sort of coming-of-age ritual for your species?” He produced his journal again, pen poised. “Very clever move, by the way, threatening our boat to get us to disarm ourselves. In the future, though, I would suggest that you try taking one of us hostage first, in order to create maximum-”

“STOP IT!”

The monster abruptly started pounding his fists against the side of the boat, nearly tipping it over before instead pitching him all the way onto the deck. “YOU’RE NOT SUPPOSED TO BE LIKE THIS! YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO-I’M YOUR-IT’S NOT FAIR-!”

It took Stan a moment to realize that the angry noises leaving his mouth (?) were accompanied by the sound of frustrated sobs.

He hissed through his teeth, and shot Ford a guilty look.

“...Oh boy. Looks like we got a little one here.”

********

Stan crossed the boat and crouched down in front of the weeping monster, putting a hand on his back and rubbing the spot right between his wings.

“Deep breaths, in and out. You’re not gonna get anything done like this, so just take a bit ta calm down, okay?”

The monster hiccuped and coughed, shrinking in on himself in a way that was painfully familiar to both of them.

Ford knelt down at his other side. “Maybe if you tell us why this is so important to you, we can provide some assistance?”

The monster shook his head and buried his head in his arms. “I just wanted-hic-to show my friends I could catch the Pines twins all by myself,” he croaked.

The two old men looked at each other in a mixture of surprise and slight alarm. “...You know who we are?”

That was finally enough to get him to sit up, wiping his eyes with his tentacles. “You kidding? Every creature of the seas knows who you are! You’re the guys who beat up krakens and steal gold from leprechauns and then you and your boat vanish without a trace! You’re the coolest cryptids ever!”

It took both of them a moment to digest that. By the time they did, though, they were grinning in equal delight.

“We’re cryptids?!” Ford asked, eyes practically brimming over with overjoyed tears.

“Yeah! And people at school were sayin’ you’re just a myth, but I knew you were real cuz my uncle saw your ship up in the Arctic last winter, and I was gonna capture you and bring you to class to show everyone how wrong they were and then I’d be famous and they’d stop calling me a weird runt all the time!” After a second his wings drooped, and he stared miserably down at the deck. “...Guess it was pretty dumb of me to think I could catch you all by myself.”

Stan put a hand on his shoulder. “...Kid...as much as we wanna help, we can’t just be your prisoners. We got our own lives ta get back to.”

“Plus, neither of us is able to breathe underwater,” Ford added.

The monster sighed, and pulled a strip of kelp from around his neck, turning one of the leaves until it was facing him. He squirted a stream of black ink from one of his tentacles, and dipped the tip of another one into the ink and used it to trace something that looked like a bunch of gobbledygook to Stan onto the leaf. “Humans...don’t...breathe...underwater.”

Awww...he’s a super nerd, just like Ford and Dipper!

That gave Stan an idea.

“Hey.” He nudged the monster. “What about a picture of us instead? Along with genuine proof of a close encounter?”

The monster’s head jerked up. “A picture?! Like with one of those weird magic boxes you humans carry around sometimes?!”

“That’s the one.” Stan grinned. He looked at Ford and jerked his head towards the cabin; his brother took the hint and headed for it, returning with an antique Polaroid camera that Ford had been experimenting on, but still took good pictures.

The monster’s tentacles began writhing around his face like they’d come to life, and he let out a high-pitched squeal of excitement.

“This is the greatest day of my life!!!!”

********

It took a bit of staging and directing and trying out different angles, but eventually they produced a set of photos that appeared to be of an eldritch abomination in training being attacked by, and bravely fighting off, the ferocious monster hunter Pines twins (hopefully nobody would think to ask how and why the monster had managed to get these pictures taken).

Then, while Stan took them into the cabin and soaked them in a special substance Ford had invented that would render them waterproof, Ford sat on the prow next to the young cryptid enthusiast and offered tips on future hunting adventures, comparing notes with him on some of the creatures they’d both seen. He also (with permission) took a few samples from the monster, including a long strip of skin (“Make it look like a wound I got in the fight! Man, this is gonna be so cool, Yog-Sothoth is gonna eat his heart out! Possibly literally!”) and some of the ink from his tentacles.

When Stan came back with the photos, he also handed over one of his spare brass knuckles that had lost a corner. “Have another souvenir, kid.”

The monster’s tentacles lashed out and wrapped around their faces in what felt like a really weird version of a hug before pulling away, leaving them covered in some of the slimy stuff they were coated in.

“Thank you so much! I really really hope the leprechauns don’t catch you-if they come this way I’ll make sure to eat some of them so they won’t!” He waved at them joyfully as he dived back into the ocean and disappeared.

********

After a moment Stan wiped his face on his coat sleeve.

“...Well, that happened.”

He turned away and began gathering up his weapons.

“Such a strange mixture of childlike innocence and barbarity,” Ford mused as he pulled out a jar and gathered the slime into it for yet another sample. “His culture must be fascinating-I almost wish he would have taken us with him so I could have seen it.”

“You would’ve drowned before you could gather any data.”

“...You don’t know that.”

“He literally didn’t know that humans can’t breathe underwater, Sixer. Not gonna happen.”

He ignored Ford’s sulking and kept cleaning, while musing to himself over the possible monetary opportunities being a couple of cryptids could bring...

[parkerlyn]

ROs reactions to the MC going up to them and bowing, hand outstretched, saying "May I have this dance?"

💃🏻🕺🏽🎵🎶 yeeeessss I am soft for dancing!! (sorry this took forEVER it uhhh spiraled into 2k words haha. ROs names are colored for separated drabbles!)

Thank you for the asks! ❤️❤️

*At [insert event here] that involves dancing*

The Healer:

Their face has been lit by the swirling orbits of the dancers in front of the two of you, a slack-jawed awe frozen on their face as they watch the footwork of the closest couple. 

Which is why when you turn and ask them to dance, their expression throws you off kilter. Instead of the enthusiasm you were expecting, a chill falls over the air between you as their face morphs into...fear?

"Oh, uh-" The Healer seems to have dropped their confidence on the ground, by the way their eyes search it. "I'm alright really, I'd rather be a bystander."

"Really?” Your incredulous response brings back the light in their face for just a moment. “You?" 

"I'm..." They search the ceiling and the draped pillars now before muttering, "Imnotverygoodatdancingyoushouldreallydancewithsomeoneelse."

You blink. "Sorry, want to say that again?"

A sigh passes through their lips while they pull idly at their ear. "I'm...a little clumsy at these sorts of dances. Can never get all the steps in the right order."

Your face breaks into a soft sympathy and they can't help theirs relaxing in response. Still, you hold your hand out with resolution.

"We don't have to do the fancy steps, it's enough just to dance with you."

Reflections of you are clearer in their gold irises as their eyes widen, the smile spreading in turn. Finally, they take your hand.

"You do remember I literally crashed into you the first time we met, right?" At your expectant stare, they laugh. "Alright, but don't say I didn't warn you."

With that settled you lead them forward, feeling just the slightest bit of nervous resistance that melts away when you give a quick squeeze. You guide them to the corner of the dance floor away from focus, before turning and tentatively placing a hand on the luscious sash and decorated fabric draping over their shoulder, the other resting in their elevated hand. 

The Healer keeps their gaze locked to yours, uncertain what to do next and finding anchor in your eyes. Deliberately, steadily, you begin to rock to the right, then to the left, swaying your bodies in a gentle rhythm. Their eyes dart once with self-consciousness at the couples around you, before the movement hooks their focus back. Face transitioning into something more at ease, you feel them start to move with you instead of being moved by you.

The smile that illuminates their face practically jumps to yours, and they bring the hand they’re holding to press against their chest. Rumbling bliss echoes against your skin, their heart leaping to meet your palm at each beat.

“See?” you whisper. “You can dance just fine.”

They press their forehead against yours, eyes barely open. 

“Only because it’s with you.”

Oisein:

“Well, hello there.”

The sultry voice comes from your left as Oisein slides into your space. Though they’re wearing their mortalis glamour, the amount of embroidery on their clothes and the delicate jewelry adorning their ears, neck, and arms still gives them an ethereal sheevra-likeness that hasn’t gone unnoticed.

“What’s a gorgeous thing like you doing all alone?” Their eyes narrow, lip turning with a clearly mischievous intent. “Bored by all these stuffy mortalis?”

“Oisein!”

Grinning with no remorse, their lavender eyes cast back to the dancing crowd, the glints of light off their accessories casting shifting reflections on the columns around you.

“We do throw better parties though, you have to admit,” they murmur.

“Maybe... Though I’m not sure the last Equinox counts as a party so much as a...rampage? A riot?”

“What’s a party without a little chaos?”

The two of you laugh quietly enough to seem polite to those around you, almost in mockery of the mortalis niceties. 

As the laughter ebbs away, you just catch the slight shift of weight from one of their legs to another as Oisein fumbles with bracelets along their wrists. It’s clear what their real reason is for shadowing you recently, and you suppose you’ve played hard-to-get long enough.

With a flourish worthy of Oisein’s dramatics, you give a bow as the instruments and Soundweavers begin the next song. 

“May I have this dance?”

You're not sure what happens first, you finishing the question or Oisein grabbing you by both hands and hastily backing up onto the dance floor.

"Finally! I thought you'd never ask!"

"What, you couldn't ask me either?" You tease while they hold one of your hands up and lift your other arm on top of theirs, their palm gently pressing against your back between your shoulders.

"When have I ever made anything easy?"

The smirk is there for an instant before it thaws into something warm and affectionate, and the two of you begin to revolve around each other across the smooth floor. 

Colors swirl like a kaleidoscope as you keep your eyes fixed on them. The lavender, the golden blond, the emeralds and sapphires glittering while resting on their tanned and freckled neck. Compared to the pairs around you Oisein flows as naturally a part of the music as the notes themselves, your movements merging into a harmony between your bodies. 

Your view changes as Oisein dips you backward, your waist nestled and secured in the crook of their arm before they roll your torso back up against them. A low hum of delighted magic reverberates from their chest through yours when you’re fully upright again, and you can just hear them begin to sing with the melody enveloping you. 

Leaning into Oisein as far as you can without disrupting your dance, you catch the small hitch in breath before they reach a warm, steady hand to cradle your neck, saccharine voice continuing a private concert for your ears alone.

The Sage:

Even from a distance, you can see the Sage’s strained smile. To the dignitaries and figureheads around them, it must seem polite, polished, immaculate. But you recognize the tired creases at their eyes and the tightness of their hands, the anxious habit as their fingers brush the braids against their back.

They turn to face someone else, the soft yellow ribbon that usually holds their hair replaced by a brilliant golden clasp that glints against your eyes. It reflects once more as they give a seasoned nod and a bow of acknowledgement, before excusing themselves. 

You smile as you watch them search the crowd for respite, tense politeness loosening into adoring relief when their eyes catch yours. The smile tugs further at your mouth and you give a wave.

“I’m so sorry,” they exhale out as they come to your side. “I thought the conversation with the Ambassador would be much shorter, but I really should’ve foreseen the...” They search around you to make sure no one can overhear them. “-bragging and oversharing that he’s wont to do.”

“Were they at least fun stories, though?”

“Depends on your definition,” they whisper back, trying to control the smirk threatening to spread. “But I know for sure the ‘legendary beast’ he described fishing for off the coast of Han is a creature he stole from his daughter’s imagination.”

“Plagiarising children? Can the mortalis sink any lower?”

“You-!” The Sage tries to wave your words away, turning to make sure no one heard you but beaming with a conspiratorial excitement. You laugh at the reaction, and they cover their mouth to stop from releasing a laugh to match.

“Well,” you continue. “Do you think the Gold Sage might have a chance for a break with a commoner like me?”

With your question, they finally let the laugh loose and bring the base of their palm against the bottom of their eyes, the usual golden swoops under them painted further out and twisting into delicate, intricate patterns over their warm skin.

“I’d hardly consider you ‘common’,” they chide, eyes half-lidded. “But what did you have in mind?”

You hear the music crescendo, before putting on your best impression of a stuffy official, with an equally stiff bow and rigid arm outstretched.

“My dear Sage,” you begin with voice pitched in imitation. They snort at the caricature. “Would you give me the honor of a dance?”

“There's nothing else I’d rather do," they say with a more genuine response, reversing your hand to place a kiss on your fingers before they let you lead them to the dance floor.

Their fingers spread against your palm when you come to an open space, and they frame your body with theirs. A lilting waltz begins and their steps start to move like clockwork, precise and smooth, pulling you into the tides of golden fabric rippling at their waist.

Vivid, lively hazel watches your face, searching over your features with admiration while your feet glide beneath you. Any view of the other mortalis or the ballroom or the band blurs into the background, your eyes caught and tangled in the glow of their unbridled joy.

“...Think we could turn this into more than just a break?” they ask gently as you continue to revolve.

“I’d be happy to help you avoid the Ambassador for as long as possible, yes.”

“Perfect.”

The Magesmith:

You're not sure what you were expecting. Maybe not as much bluntness when you asked them to dance? But still, the crossed arms and resounding "No," stings a bit more than anticipated.

They shift awkwardly at your hurt expression as you draw your hand back, distracting themself by pulling at the tight, velvety dressclothes the Sage shoved in their face just hours before.

"It's not you," they continue softly, almost apologetically. "Just not a huge fan of crowds...and dancing."

“Right, of course," you trail off. You understand, really, but the rejection still burns in your core and in your cheeks.

Neither of you are fully sure where the conversation is supposed to go from here, and small talk has never been the Magesmith's strong suit. When you look up again though, you catch them click their tongue while exploring the area with their eyes.

"Come with me for a second." And now it's their hand waiting for yours.

Skeptical, you still take it, and there's a sweet tenderness as they close their heated fingers around yours and weave the two of you through the crowds to the outer rims of the party. Just beyond the last line of revelers, you see a curtain barely separated to show the balcony hiding behind it, hardly visible past the reflection of the gaudy scene you’re currently caught in.

The Magesmith releases your hand and presses their face against the glass with no regard for your surroundings, before nodding and turning to you.

"Here," they state, as if that's all the explanation they need to give. They press through the door anyway, beckoning you to follow.

Slight humidity hangs in the air outside, both warmth and chill prickling over your skin. In some wild turn of luck, the balcony is empty save for the two of you, and the Magesmith holds out their brass arm as the melody from inside trickles outward in muted cadences.

"You don't have to do this if you don't want to," you finally say into the silence.

"No, I-" They clench their fingers before relaxing them again. Brown eyes melt into their gentle admission.

"I want to," they breathe out. "Of course I want to."

They continue to stare into you until all you can do is believe them, and your hand moves without thought. When you do connect, a small noise escapes you at how confidently they pull you forward, and how smoothly their arm flows around you. There's a practiced step to the side as they move you to their hip, before unfurling you out and around, and closing back in so you’re facing them.

They're...good at dancing.

Your feet step in time with theirs as they rock backward, to the side, on the balls of their feet as they rotate you under their arm while keeping your hands connected. In some unfamiliar array of movements, your hand drops from one of theirs, sliding across their collar to the other with another soft spin.

Really good.

"Are you kidding me?" You practically hiss. They just snicker low in response, their lips now close to your ear as they pull you flush against them.

"Please don't tell anyone, it'll ruin my reputation."

The laughter that cascades from your mouth is bright enough to put the stars to shame.

[tundrainafrica]

All the HCs and side materials aside, who do you think was closer to Levi, Erwin or Hange? While there was this acker host thing with Erwin but it was debunked. Meanwhile he hasn't even acknowledged Hange's sacrifice even once so theres that too.

Oh god, so yes I have wanted to answer this ask for a while, thought of pushing it until night time today but I got locked out of the office though thirty minutes before my shift so let me just cope with the stress by giving my feedback on this because I feel like I have already explained my side to a lot of people but I’d rather have it immortalized in my blog at this point. 

Okay first question

Who do you think was closer to Levi, Erwin or Hange?

I find this question thought provoking but I don’t like these types of questions because they tend to start fights? And they tend to cause unnecessary drama both in real life and online. And relationships are so hard to quantify like of course there's a clear line between acquaintance and best friend but the nuances between siblings, lover, best friend and parent are a little more complex because we all have a lot of people we care about deeply but can we easily say who we love more?

(this is still a great question though anon, thank you for asking it.)

It’s literally like the epitome of asking ur parents “who’s your favorite child” or “who do you love more your best friend for so many years or your girl friend of like two years who you met, clicked then realized they were the love of your life.” Who will you save when in a burning building? your wife? Or your parents? Or your siblings? Your best friend?

Such problematic questions which I think a lot of us in our lives would rather never have to answer, especially in front of our loved ones. 

I am not making assumptions about what type of relationship Levi had with Erwin or what type of relationship Levi had with Hange in this post because I don’t wanna start shipping wars in this very peaceful website. (But, I ship Levihan and will probably die with this ship close to my heart so you can make assumptions about my opinions on Levi and Hange’s relationship based on that.) 

But the point is, Erurihan has always been special. Levi held a lot of people close to his heart over the years but I found that trio to have notably been the closest and Erwin and Hange have changed Levi’s lives the most. 

Would Levi have played favorites between them?? NO. Because Erwin and Hange were such different people that putting them side by side and thinking “who did Levi love more”  is like comparing apples to oranges, putting them side by side and thinking which fruit tastes better.

Because Hange and Erwin offered different things to Levi. Literally, Erwin became that next purpose for Levi after he lost his two best friends. He saw wonder in Erwin’s eyes, he saw a leader, he saw someone who can guide him to a bigger purpose and he trusted Erwin so deeply and Erwin trusted him back and even as a Levihan fan, I might actually admit that early on in the series, Levi was probably much closer to Erwin than Hange. Fine I admit it he probably was. 

But Hange offered something else to Levi. While Erwin offered a path, Hange offered wonder, curiosity. She offered Levi things to think about beyond the survey corps job. I mean Erwin was practically married to his job right. Hange was practically married to her job too but I found Hange more... approachable? Warmer overall? I mean if you actually see Eren’s interactions with the three of them or you watch from Season 1, you would realize that Hange was really the most approachable survey corps veteran from the start (other than petra).

And I think Levi really appreciated that part of her and saw it as something worth entertaining. He completely believed in Erwin, Erwin gave him a purpose in life but Hange was the one who added color to it, she actually added something beyond that purpose. She made him feel things he probably wouldn’t have felt elsewhere. 

Annoyance? Anger? Defeat at how someone could be so enthusiastic and dense? Curiosity? Someone who might have made him think that maybe, soldiering and survey corps-ing and almost being eaten by titans everyday wasn’t so bad. And maybe there is joy in the domestic in betweens?  

Another thing, here’s what Hange had that Erwin didn’t have, she had the luxury of time, she also had the luxury of circumstances on her side, of having been the only one left out of the veterans for Levi to cling on to. This made it more natural for a deeper friendship and relationship to develop between the two. So if Hange is closer to Levi than Erwin is, then it’s because of the circumstances that it made it so, post season 3.

If Erwin lived, the dynamics of erurihan would have definitely developed differently. But I never considered the possibiliy of Erwin living instead of Hange since Levi picking Armin just felt really in character and right for me. So yeah, it’ll probably stay a shallow speculation until the end haha.  

And about this second question...

“Meanwhile he hasn't even acknowledged Hange's sacrifice even once so theres that too.” 

Yo. Just a reminder, Hange died like roughly an hour or two ago manga time. Levi is literally internally bleeding, the shit show just never stopped for a second and for some reason people are expecting Levi to give a nod at Hange’s death. 

Okay yes, she did mean a lot to him. But lemme give you the explanation which has been sticking to me for a really long time.  

Levi is clowning. Like literally, I don’t think he has even acknowledged that Hange is dead yet. We have concrete hints that he is. After ‘dedicate your heart’ he just walked away and didn’t look back. It’s in the fact that he didn’t even look out the window to watch her die and in the fact that his last words were “see you later” like I’m pretty sure he’s thinking to himself “Yeah, like I know she is probably gonna die objectively but… Just, what if… she lives?? 

Just like all of us Hange stans in the website yo with our beast titan theory, Levi is just the biggest clown of us all (since he is the biggest Hange stan anyway...).  He decided (unconsciously or consciously) to ‘pretend’ that Hange’s still alive maybe until the end of the war just so that he could possibly function at least (?). 

I mean I’m pretty sure we’ve all done this in our lives. Especially when we’ve lost someone we’ve loved dearly or maybe when we’re saying good bye to someone in the airport where we’re just laughing our heads off with that person all the way until the departure gate when they say good bye and we only break down when we’re home alone. Like I’m pretty sure it’s similar for people who have lost someone, kept themselves busy with funeral preparations and memorial services and only start experiencing the loss when they go back to normal life and realize they have to clean out someone’s bedroom or fix their daily routine to adjust to the loss of that loved one.

Maybe Levi will finally acknowledge it when everything goes back to normal and he finds Hange’s office empty and he realizes he doesn’t have his buddy to have tea with every night. And if Yams decides not to write or insert that, I’ll probably just speculate it myself and keep this theory alive. 

I actually wrote a drabble about this a long time ago. You can read it here.

Anyway, thanks for reading! 

[wafflesrock16]

Shakarian Princess/Dragon AU!

I really enjoy these AU drabbles. Perhaps I’ll turn one of them into a full fledged chapter fic. In the meantime, enjoy Princess Shepard and Dragon Garrus.

Places where beasts and sorcery lurked were far-flung, overcast regions with sparse inhabitants and a pervasive sense of dread hanging in the atmosphere. A storm always loomed on the horizon; the kind which promised thunder and lightning and sheets of cold rain. The fortresses which were built in these places had a weathered, foreboding aspect that practically sang of death and dismemberment. A brave knight or gallivanting hero recognized these keeps as the hold of treasure or captured royalty and would seek them out. A pity Shepard’s captor had realized this too.

Shepard sighed, drumming her fingers on the stone windowsill of the tower. Outside, the warm, summer sky beckoned and below in the gardens butterflies and birds flitted about the rose bushes and olive trees. Flowers were in full bloom and radiant bluebells and kingcups filled the air with a soft, floral fragrance. 

Moving from the window, Shepard lifted the hem of her flowing black and red gown as she made her way down the spiral staircase and out the fortified gateway of the castle. She unconsciously readjusted her crown, settling the slim gold circlet so it rested securely against her hairline. 

Birdsong herald her footsteps as Shepard headed for a solitary wooden bench set in the middle of the garden. She sat with a heavy sigh, eyes taking in the enchanted splendor all around her, before lifting and tracing the turrets of the nearby castle. The castle--her castle--was a radiant fortress. No lichen or moss marred the stone slabs of the thick walls. It looked newly built, with an aim at being impregnable. Its vantage points would allow defenders to deflect even the most ambitious invaders. If there ever were any invaders. Or defenders. No, it was only Shepard here. A solitary princess trapped far from her kingdom and people. 

At least I’m not completely alone, she mused, even as a shadow fell across the flower beds. Shielding her eyes against the sun, she watched the familiar shape descend with steady, precise wing beats. Then, he pulled in his colossal bat-like wings to land with a metallic clang of armor, digi-grade feet splaying to absorb the impact. 

“See anything interesting?” Shepard asked as the dragon solider walked over.

Her guardian was no longer under the sway of the wretched Illusive Man, as the evil sorcerer called himself, but like her, was confined to the castle and its environs. A true curse for a creature of the sky accustomed to soaring over mountain ranges and river valleys. Garrus remained stoic though, and resolute in his search for an escape. Their escape. 

Garrus flared his wings to provide Shepard with shade as he stood next to the bench. “Still nothing,” he said, shaking his head. His subvocals twanged in bitterness. “Whatever glamor or concealment spell the Illusive Man has in place is strong. Too strong for me to break through. But,” he said, turning sharp eyes onto Shepard, “I think its weakening.”

“Weakening?” Shepard parroted, brow furrowing. “You mean, the spell is losing its potency?”

“I think so,” Garrus said, mandibles fluttering in unspoken hope. “I was almost able to push through at the southern boundary. I’ve never been able to do that before, I’ve always been repelled.”

“You said it felt like a strong wind was blowing you away,” Shepard said, recalling one of their earliest escape attempts. 

“Yeah, but today I was able to get an arm through up to the elbow,” Garrus said, crystalline eyes flickering down to his left hand. There had been a time when Shepard found Garrus’ three-fingered hands horrifying. So other and foreign and claws. But those same clawed hands were capable of such tenderness. When they carded through her crimson tresses, carefully caressed her sides, talon-tipped fingers grazing supple flesh and pulling airy gasps and moans. The way they held her as they moved together in carnal rhythm, plate and skin pressed tightly together, wings outstretched and glowing in the candlelight as Garrus moved above and inside her. A dragon ravishing a princess. Two people trapped against their will finding companionship and love. 

When your evenings were monotonous, you found ways to occupy yourselves. Making love to Garrus had perhaps been inevitable, but if so, it was the first time fate had been kind. Shepard blinked away the memory.

“Is the barrier thin everywhere or only in the sky?” she asked. 

Garrus rumbled in thought, bending a knee to kneel in front of her. He was still a head taller, but it brought his gorgeous eyes closer to hers. “It’s thin in patches, but most of those are higher up,” he answered. “We can try pushing through in another few days, maybe. I can carry you, it won’t be a problem.”

Shepard reached out gripping his hands in hers and squeezing. “This is more hope than we’ve had in…” she trailed off. How long had they been here? Time held little meaning anymore. She couldn’t even be sure if the phases of the moon were real in this place. 

“More hope than we’ve had in a long time,” Garrus finished. His mandibles pulled out in a dragon grin, exposing rows of razor sharp teeth. It wasn’t a mystery why the other races feared and respected Garrus’ kind. He slowly angled his head, coming to press his brow against hers in affection. 

Shepard felt herself smile at the gesture. “Once we get free, we’re gathering up an army--humans, dragons, asari--whoever is ready and willing to hold a sword or mace and take on that deranged wizard.” 

Garrus nodded, brow still pressed to hers. “And after that?” he asked, voice teasing but a note of concern still noticeable. 

“After that, Citadel Kingdom gets the royal wedding everyone’s been pressuring me for since I turned eighteen.” Shepard pulled back to give Garrus a confident grin. “They’ll also get their first dragon king. It won’t be an easy role, but you’ll wear royalty well.”

“I wore it pretty well last night,” Garrus drawled. “Especially when it lunged at me over the dining table and I wore royal thighs around my face like--”

“Okay,” Shepard interrupted, pulling her hands back and crossing her arms. “But don’t pretend like you didn’t love every second of it.”

“I never said I didn’t.” Garrus chuckled, rising to his feet and offering Shepard a hand up. “The morning is still young. Might I accompany the lady on a tour of the garden?”

Shepard snorted but accepted his hand, linking her arm with his as they set off through the flower beds, Garrus’ wings folded about his person like a natural cloak.

One day they’d escape this place. The enchanted castle and its grounds would no longer be their prison. Yet, in spite of everything a part of Shepard’s heart was forever glad she’d been put here. No matter what, she had him now. And there’d never be a Shepard without Vakarian.

[land-under-wave]

Burn Away My Hopes

I’ve been poking at three or four drabbles for the last nine months and this is the one that finally sort of cooperated. Please assume this is set before March 2021 - I started this in 2020.

This is pretty late chronologically, so I was going to save this for a later chapter to make things feel more entrenched and established between them, but this was also the closest standalone to being done, and I figured if I was going to update after 10 months of nothing, why not make it a big one?

.

.

.

“I hear you and Akabane Karma are getting married,” says the chairman.

“What,” says Gakushu.

“Congratulations are in order for ensnaring a man with such a bright future,” the chairman continues smoothly. “We at Kunigigaoka have always thought highly of him. I’m sure you’ll have a long and fruitful union —”

“AKABANE IS DESTINED STRAIGHT FOR HELL AND WE ARE NOT GETTING MARRIED,” howls Gakushu, cheeks flushed an angry red, before slamming down the phone. 

Speak of the devil and he appears, he thinks sourly, as Karma pokes his head into the kitchen. “Say, Asano-kun, that’s an interesting conversation you’re having there,” he says far too casually.

“I can’t imagine why you think that,” he bites out. “I suppose you also have no idea how the chairman got this impression.”

“Nope!” Karma says, folding his hands behind his head. His smirk turns devilish as he sings out, “Not at alllll.” And the worst part is, Gakushu can’t tell if he’s toying with him or he’s using that tone to cover up a sincere answer. It could really be either one, and if you asked, he’d probably just say he likes to keep people on his toes. 

Last week, Gakushu told Ren that no matter how much older and how seemingly respectable Karma got, he’d never grow out of the habit of pissing people off. He is very much proving that point right now.

“The chairman should know better than to be taken in by that,” he just grumbles instead. “It’s not even legal here.”

The bastard just laughs. “Like that would stop your father.”

“Please, even the chairman can’t overcome the societal opinions of half of Japan in a workable timeframe,” he mutters, and he thinks it’s a reasonable comment up until he sees the gleeful look spreading across Karma’s face.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Asano-kun,” Karma says. “I just meant that the fact that it wasn’t legally binding wouldn’t stop him from throwing you a fairy tale wedding.” He grins more widely. “Is widdle Gakushu disappointed he can’t make it official? Don’t worry, Daddy will fix it for you if you ask him nicely.”

Gakushu sees red. “Maybe I will,” he says hotly, but catches himself before he can really lose it and realizes — it’s one of those times. Karma isn’t always the kind of person who can be subverted somehow. In that kind of scenario, you can’t win against Karma by trying to go against him. You need to take his victory and turn it into your own, make the things he wanted work for you instead. The real trick to handling him is recognizing those situations when they come.

The flip side to this is that he’s always been good at turning the tables once he catches on. Gakushu lifts his head loftily, every inch the perfect and arrogant honors student. “June weddings are overly idealized in popular culture and add no real value,” he informs Karma, whose face slackens in the way that says he’s caught him off guard, maybe even confused him. That means this is Gakushu’s win. “I expect a long engagement,” he adds, a little viciously, and then strides off before Karma can try to reclaim the last word from him.

It’s unlikely that it’ll just end here, but there are a few ways this could play out. Karma might yet find a way to twist things, because he’s always been better at filing away a conversation so he can weaponize it once everyone else has forgotten. Or he might concede the ground and decide not to reawaken the beast. The third, rarest option is when Karma decides Gakushu has the right idea after all and runs with it, sometimes because he thinks it’s more amusing this way and sometimes because he actually believes in it. 

Which one he’ll pick is a toss up. Gakushu has his suspicions, but he isn’t about to let Karma catch him off guard because he made an assumption, so he’ll need to prepare for all three. Life will be interesting for the next year or so, he thinks, making a mental note to put some checkpoints into his calendar.

But whatever comes of this, he’s not telling the chairman.

[darkficsyouneveraskedfor]

Silent Treatment

A drabble not for @lokislastlove​

Warning: some arguing, nonconsent sex, threats of violence, biting.

It was almost amusing how long it took him to catch on.

Certainly, Thor had noticed that you were avoiding him, that the bulk of your time in Asgard had been spent with his brother rather than him. You knew it would bother him. Eventually. And you hoped he felt the same way you did.

Was it silly to feel so hurt? Well, how else should you feel. The two-minute video sent you into a tailspin of anger but you’d already arrived and you weren’t quite sure what to say. So you said nothing. You graced Thor with a shrug or the occasional nod but you just couldn’t give much more.

You wouldn’t be so embarrassed if you hadn’t been sent the clip personally. Several friends made you aware of his little flirtation which was now being broadcast everywhere. Headlines called the God of Thunder ‘sweet’ and ‘cute’. You just thought he was ridiculous.

It made you wonder if for the last year he’d just been telling you what you wanted to like he had that girl. Sure, it was just an interview and tried to convince yourself he was merely playing the PR game but why had he kissed her hand like that? Why had he called her ‘sweetheart’?

Sooner or later you would have to say something. Anything. But for now, you were going to let Thor think you would rather listen to Loki expound on how he tricked his own brother into a cave full of giant bats. The idea of a young prince being so easily deceived was amusing, but when it was revealed it had been well beyond Thor’s childhood, it was almost pitiful.

You walked with Loki through the halls, passing the tall pillars, and admiring the extravagant portraits of the Asgardian elite. On earth, no one lived like that anymore. It was more selfies and those dumb wall signs that read ‘live, laugh, love’.

Then you saw the shadow. You had thought you’d spotted him before but weren’t entirely sure. Loki’s green eyes flicked behind you and his little smirk betrayed his own awareness. Thor was attempting to eavesdrop but wasn’t very stealthy.

The dark-haired prince stopped you by a portrait of a mystical creature which resembled an elephant but had porcelain like skin.

“My father saw the last of these beasts,” Loki said as he gestured to the painting. “I always thought it a tragedy. So regal. But they weren’t anything you could tame. Not like...” He glanced towards the far end of the corridor and touched your shoulder. “Some.”

You realised what he was doing. For as conspicious as Thor was, you were just as bad. Surely Loki knew why you insisted on his presence but he didn’t mind being a tool if it was against his brother.

He leaned in and lowered his voice so only you could hear.

“Whatever he did, he probably deserves this,” Loki winked and kissed your cheek.

“Loki!” Thor’s voice boomed around the stone columns and his boots echoed at his advance. “Away from her!”

Loki stood straight but stayed close to you as Thor stormed towards him. You stepped between them and stopped Thor from accosting his brother. He reached past you but you caught his arm.

“Thor,” You said calmly. “What is the meaning of this?”

“I saw what he was doing!” Thor snarled. 

“You were spying on us?” You asked.

“He kissed you!” Thor snapped.

“On the cheek. It was only friendly.” You insisted. “You think I would betray you?”

“I don’t know what you would you do, you’ve not talked to me since your arrival.” Thor retorted.

“Do not worry about her, brother, worry about me,” Loki taunted.

You held back a laugh as Thor’s face contorted with anger and Loki smoothly dodged another grab as you lost hold of his arm.

“Thor,” You pulled him back by his hand. “Let him go.”

“Yes, brother, you should attend to your affairs before mine,” Loki teased. “Or yours shall become mine.”

“Enough,” You warned Loki and he smirked.

He turned and strode away as Thor fumed next to you. When he was gone, you looked to the blond Asgardian and shook your head.

“What is this about?” He asked. “Why do you spurn me? I thought we--”

“I thought we were good too, Thor,” You interjected. “And then I see you hanging off some woman in Times Square.”

“I--” His eyes searched. “It was only an interview. I was having fun.”

“It wasn’t fun for me to see. Did you ever think of that?”

“I didn’t think it was that serious,” He shrugged.

“And all this time I was ignoring you, you never asked me what was wrong.” You said.

“I suppose I didn’t, but you also didn’t tell me.” He returned.

“Don’t do that,” You huffed. “Don’t you think that was inappropriate?”

“It wasn’t real,” He insisted.

“So I don’t get an apology?” You asked.

“What about Loki?” He countered.

“What about him? He kissed my cheek, I didn’t kiss his,” You said. :But if you are upset then I am sorry.”

Thor was silent and looked down. You waited. Nothing.

“You’re not going to apologize?” You asked again.

“I don’t see a reason for it. I was being friendly.”

“Oh?”

“And you weren’t there.”

“I wasn’t there? So what does that mean? That you can do whatever you want?”

“I am a king so yeah,” He scoffed.

Your mouth fell open and you threw your hands up. You backed away from him and shook your head.

“I wanna go home.”

“You haven’t even spent a moment with me and all you do is argue,” He said. “You haven’t given me a chance to make up for it.”

“You won’t even say sorry,” You accused. “What else can you do to make it up?”

“You’re not going anywhere. No one leaves or enters Asgard without my say.”

“I’ll find a way out,” You turned away.

“Loki won’t help you,” Thor was quick and pulled you back by your arm. “I won’t let him and he’s not that type.”

“And what are you then?” You tried to wrench away and he caught your other arm.

“I’m yours,” His voice deepened dangerously. “And you’re mine. That’s what you said.”

“Thor, let me go.” You pushed on his chest. 

“No,” He said evenly. “Why would I do that?”

“Because I’m telling you to. What is wrong with you?”

“You have ignored me for the last week,” He marched you backwards as he spoke sternly, “I have welcomed you to my home, my kingdom, and you’ve treated me like nothing more than air.” You hit the wall harshly. “And you thought you could me jealous by using Loki? I’m not that stupid.”

“Thor--”

“I brought you here because I wanted you to see my home. Your home.” He said tersely. “Because I love you and no one can change that.”

“Please--”

“And know I do love you and if I do stray, I still will, but every wife must accept that they cannot change the nature of man. The nature of a god.” He held you to the wall as he leaned in. “I will take what I want when I want it.”

“Get off--”

He crashed his lips into yours roughly. You grabbed at his chest frantically, almost suffocated by his kiss. You bit down and he pulled away suddenly. He pinned you to the wall with an arm across your shoulders as he touched his lip. You hadn’t broken the skin.

“You don’t tell me what to do.” He snarled and grabbed the front of you jeans. “You must understand that by now.”

He pulled hard on the denim and the button came of as the zipped split. He leaned his weight on you as he forced the pants down past your hips. You kicked out and he easily blocked you. He stomped your foot and brought his large hand to your cheek, resting it there.

“I never wanted to hurt you,” He said. “So don’t make me.”

You quivered and his hand crept back down your body. Your panties were nothing to him as he tore them away. He placed his foot in the crotch of your jeans and forced them down the rest of the way. He freed one of your feet and grabbed your leg. He bent it against him and kissed you again.

His arm left your chest and went around you. He held you to him as he devoured you. You turned your head away from him and he growled. His arm fell lower and he lifted you. He balanced you between his body and the wall as he reached down between you.

His movements grew impatient as you struggled against him. You grabbed onto his arm and tried to wriggle your leg free of his grasp.

“You liked it before,” He purred as his fingers brushed your cunt. “Don’t act so innocent.”

“Please, Thor--”

“You want to play the silence game, we’ll play,” He grabbed his cock and rubbed it along your pussy. “Don’t make a fucking sound.”

He pushed himself back to your entrance and you voice fizzled as he sheathed himself in you. You were breathless as he filled you entirely. He was big and you weren’t used to taking him so suddenly, sometimes not even all of him. You clamped your lips shut before you could cry out and he hummed as he leaned against you.

He rested his head against the wall next to yours and his hand slipped down to your ass. He began to thrust, long, deliberate jerks that made your entire body ache. You let out little whimpers as he rutted against you, your arms pinned between your bodies.

“Shhh,” He hushed you as he nuzzled your neck.

He didn’t let up as the clapping of his flesh echoed down the airy corridors and his grunts interspersed the lascivious noise. You lifted your chin as your eyes rolled back in a mixture of pain and unexpected pleasure. His teeth grazed your neck and sank into your skin as he growled.

He jolted your body violently as his voice rose and his motion grew frantic. Your back was sore from the stone wall behind you and your arms were starting to buzz from being crushed against him. You let out shaky breaths as he gave several violent thrust and peaked with beastly grunt.

He stilled but kept you trapped between him and the stone. His breath lingered on your skin and he slowly lifted his head. He cradled your cheek and kissed your forehead gently.

“I do prefer it more when you’re loud.” He purred.

[bangtan-sinnamons]

Exotic l2l

Part 1

⤞ Paring: Snake!Jungkook x Human!reader

⤞ Summary: When you are stranded on an island full of hybrids, a little someone is excited to meet you.

⤞ Genre: Fluff, Romance, Sprinkle of angst, Action

⤞Warning: Blood, fighting scenes (self defense) , claw marks, possessive behavior (not from kook)

⤞ Word count:  1650

My heart says write fluff, but my brain functions in angst. T-T

As the sun was rising Jungkook tries to stretch his body across the caves’s floor, but is met with you drawing him close to seek out the warmth of his body. In seconds, your body is moulded into his, sharing body heat as easily as Jungkook is willing to share his heart with you. He is so overwhelmed with happiness that he begins to nudge his nose into the crown of your hair.

When he takes a deep breath in, the smell of sweetness tickled his nose. It was no longer the disgusting smell of the bear hybrid or the initial smell of salt water when he first met you. Right now, it smelled addicting. Jungkook didn’t realize how effected, he’d be with you literally clinging on him simply to avoid hypothermia.

He tried so hard not to engulf you with his scent. He deemed mixing scents was too romantic and needed consent for. To you, scenting was probably the equivalent of dating. But in the back of his mind he knew the real reason he was stopping himself from scenting you, he was scared. Terrified that he would get too attached. Once he had scented you and when you left, he would long for you and no matter how much he wishes you to come back his words would reach nowhere, but the seemingly endless ocean that separates the both of you.

You began to stir and he withdraws his arms around you, nervous that he would seem overly possessive with you. To his delight, you roll closer and your hand slowly pats his chest in the process of finding his soft hair. He was left breathless with the constant surprises and affection you gave him. Once you felt his locks, you started to caress it delicately.

“Kook…aren’t you supposed to be sleeping? You said you were mostly nocturnal,” you murmured, stroking his hair. “Last time I did this, you fell asleep really fast,”

The disappointment becomes apparent on his face. Of course you didn’t do this because you loved him as much as he did. He was embarrassed that he thought your touch could possibly mean much more than friends. He suddenly felt shy, even going as far as hiding his redden face with his slender fingers.

“Hey. What’s wrong?” you asked, taking a peak at his face. Your hands stopped for a moment. Maybe he didn’t like you touching his hair you thought.

“I missed this. Do it again,” he pleaded. You begin to play with his hair again, but this time with more confidence that he actually liked the feeling.

“Miss what exactly?”

“This feeling,” he snuggled into your hand. The way you caressed his hair was filled with nostalgia. “It reminds me of my caretaker. She use to do this before they dragged me on this island,”

You couldn’t even describe the heartache you were feeling due to his soft and fragile voice. How long has he been left alone? Maybe you should somehow help him find some other hybrid friends before you left?  But then how could a human help him?

You were interrupted from your thoughts, when Jungkook suddenly perks up and sits on the floor.  His eyes moved with the alertness that comes from anxiety. He heard something, but more specifically someone and he is ready to protect you this time around.

“𝚂𝚑𝚎 𝚜𝚑𝚘𝚞𝚕𝚍 𝚋𝚎 𝚑𝚎𝚛𝚎 𝚜𝚘𝚖𝚎𝚠𝚑𝚎𝚛𝚎,” a voice calls. His eyes widen at how fast they were approaching.

“Hey Y/n… stay here I’m going to check something,” Jungkook says, hesitant to leave you alone in the cave. His hands were clenched in tight fists by subconscious demands. You tilt your head in confusion, but you nod your head in agreement.

He rushes out of the cave giving one last glance at you curling up to go back to sleep. He wanted to settle this problem quickly so he could snuggle back into your arms.

“𝚂𝚗𝚊𝚔𝚎, 𝚕𝚘𝚗𝚐 𝚝𝚒𝚖𝚎 𝚗𝚘 𝚜𝚎𝚎,” the voice penetrates Jungkook’s ear and he growls in response. “𝚆𝚑𝚢 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚜𝚘𝚞𝚛 𝚏𝚊𝚌𝚎? 𝙰𝚛𝚎 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚒𝚗𝚝𝚒𝚖𝚒𝚍𝚊𝚝𝚎𝚍 𝚋𝚢 𝚖𝚎?” he snickered. The lynx was ridiculing him. He could see the lynx’s mouth beginning to form into a vile smirk, a smile that said lets fight.

Jungkook scans the forest and its surroundings, he was worried that this was a part of scheme and it wasn’t just this lone lynx asking for a fight. “What do you want?”

“𝚂𝚒𝚖𝚙𝚕𝚎. 𝙸 𝚠𝚊𝚗𝚝 𝚑𝚎𝚛. 𝚂𝚘𝚖𝚎 𝚋𝚎𝚊𝚛 𝚝𝚘𝚕𝚍 𝚖𝚎 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚠𝚎𝚛𝚎 𝚑𝚒𝚍𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚊 𝚑𝚞𝚖𝚊𝚗 𝚏𝚘𝚛 𝚢𝚘𝚞𝚛𝚜𝚎𝚕𝚏.” Despite Jungkook trying to block his way, the lynx continues approaching closer to the cave, “𝚂𝚘 𝚒𝚏 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚌𝚘𝚞𝚕𝚍 𝚖𝚘𝚟𝚎. 𝚝𝙷𝚊𝚝 𝚠𝙾𝚞𝚕𝚍 𝚋𝚎 𝙶𝚛𝙴𝚊𝚝,” The lynx tried to push him aside, but Jungkook doesn’t budge.

Staring became the only form of communication between the two hybrid. Both of them were not backing down.

“Jungkook? I thought I heard something, so I….” Your voice was a distraction.  A fluttery feeling formed in his stomach and his head buzzed with anxiety, he looked back at you. The urge to make sure you were okay overrode the current stare-down.

The second Jungkook’s eyes left the lynx, the sly hybrid slams his fists into his chin. It was harder than he expected, even stumbling back from the force. “Kook?!” You ran over to him while he wipes the blood that drips from his lip.

The lynx couldn’t help, but burst into a fit of laughter. “𝚆𝚑𝚊𝚝 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚏𝚞𝚌𝚔. 𝚈𝚘𝚞 𝚊𝚛𝚎𝚗'𝚝 𝚊𝚜 𝚜𝚝𝚛𝚘𝚗𝚐 𝚊𝚜 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚛𝚞𝚖𝚖𝚘𝚛𝚜 𝚜𝚊𝚢.” The lynx steals a look at you, while Jungkook contemplates on what he should do next. Although it was very subtile, an arrogant smirk formed as the lynx checks you out and Jungkook hisses. He never felt so hungry for destruction, so ready for his animal instincts to kick in and allow himself to throw punches until this lynx was soaked in a pile of his own blood. “𝚂𝚑𝚎 𝚒𝚜 𝚊 𝚙𝚛𝚎𝚝𝚝𝚢 𝚑𝚞𝚖𝚊𝚗. 𝙿𝚎𝚛𝚏𝚎𝚌𝚝 𝚏𝚘𝚛 𝚋𝚎𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚖𝚢 𝚙𝚎𝚝.”

How dare he.

If you weren’t standing by Jungkook’s side, it was a guaranteed fact that the snake hybrid would have lunged for an attack. “I don’t know what’s going on, but is it really worth getting bloody over that? Cause obviously I’m no pet,”

“If you’re asking, if you are worth it… then yes,”

You were at a loss for words. You stared into his brown slit eyes burning with anger, and fell silent.

Jungkook still wanted to settle this peacefully, despite the strong urge to wield a few hits…

“Leave.” Jungkook demands. “This person is not worth your time and energy. This person is not worth your time and energy,” Jungkook reminds himself.

The lynx steps closer to the both of you, sniffing the air and his smirk only grew “𝚈𝚘𝚞 𝚑𝚊𝚟𝚎𝚗'𝚝 𝚎𝚟𝚎𝚗 𝚜𝚌𝚎𝚗𝚝𝚎𝚍 𝚑𝚎𝚛. 𝙸𝚝'𝚜 𝚕𝚒𝚔𝚎 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚊𝚛𝚎 𝚊𝚜𝚔𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚖𝚎 𝚝𝚘 𝚝𝚊𝚔𝚎 𝚑𝚎𝚛.” He provokes.

Jungkook lost it. Absolutely lost any rationality left. He landed a stern blow on his mouth. This mouth that talked shit about you. A crack could be heard, but he doesn’t care because the lynx deserved it. Once satisfied he starts pounding the lynx’s eyes. These eyes that dared looked at you with such evil intent.

The snake hybrid couldn’t suppress his animal features any longer and his lethal stare brought regret to the lynx.

“𝚂𝙷𝙸𝚃, 𝚂𝚃𝙾𝙿” the hybrid yelps, trying to dodge the attacks, but Jungkook holds him down by the collar. The lynx became desperate to get the beast off of him. The once egotistical hybrid was now clawing Jungkook’s ribs in distraught.

Jungkook hisses, baring his fangs when the lynx tries to jab a knee to his stomach. Whether it was in contact with Jungkook’s old scars or how he despised the lynx, he only knew to respond through his fists.

His punches were relentless. You belonged to nobody. Especially not this bastard.

“Jungkook!” There was something in that shout, was it pain or disappointment, he did not know. His mind was still hazy and intoxicated with darkness.

Despite how overpowering Jungkook seemed to be, he could still feel the stinging pain as the hybrid digs his claws into him, but right now his main focus was protecting you. Yes, protecting you, but why wasn’t he by your side comforting you? Why was he still hitting the hybrid? He already won this fight. As the realization hits him, his punches were no longer hard and fatal.

He had come back to his senses. No longer worried about the lynx and allowing the beaten hybrid to scurry away into the forest without a second thought.

When Jungkook finally comes into full view, you don’t recognize him. He looked so feral. His lip split, the fact that a large tail had even grown from behind and his fists were covered in blood should have contributed to you shaking in fear, but you don’t. Opposed to how intimidating he appeared to be, you notice how his bottom lip trembled.

You weren’t even aware that you were holding your breath until you ran towards him and melted into his form. Feeling his firm torso and the heart that was racing within. His hands wrapped around you, drawing you in closer. “You were so so cool,” you smiled.

“You’re not scared?”

“Never, but we need to get you clean up,”

He pouted “But…I was going to show you something before a certain somebody came,” He wanted to give you good memories before you leave. Not memories of him being violent, but he can’t say no when you were already dragging him by the hand to the creek. Just being with you made his smile complete.

“Hurry up and get undress, look at all this blood” you pointed, a frown forming on your face, when he walks even slower.

He could feel the heat rise into his face and he paused in his tracks. He had to undress and rinse off in front of you?!

(Tell me if you guys want a Drabble for Kook’s “bath” scene b/c it’s not going to be in part 3. I’ll write it if at least 5 people are willing to read it)

Drabble here!!

Part 1

[redrikki]

Pride Month Masterpost

Happy pride month, everyone! Here’s a list of my fic featuring queer characters and relationships.

Agent Carter

Because Girls Love Girls (The Soulmate City Remix) - There’s something in the water and the next thing Angie knows, she’s waking up with the name Margaret Carter wrapped around her wrist. (Angie Martinelli/Peggy Carter)

One Last Kiss (The Final Storm Remix) - You never forget your first kiss with your nemesis. Dottie won’t forget her last either. At Howard Stark’s funeral, she puts a few things in the ground. (Peggy Carter/Dottie Underwood)

Avatar: Legend of Korra

Girl, Gotten (The Heroine After Remix) - As long as Asami’s the hero, Korra’s okay being the love interest. (Korra/Asami Sato)

Leaves on the Wind - Korra, Asami, and the next Avatar (past Korra/Asami Sato)

Ten-Thousand Words (Which Once See the Light of Day) -  A series of short stories about the ladies of Legend of Korra. (bisexual Asami Sato/Mako, various het pairings)

Avatar: The Last Airbender

Playing with Fire (The Dubiously Consensual Remix) - People didn’t tell Azula no. (Azula/Ty Lee)

Battlestar Galactica

Persephone on New Caprica - It’s winter on New Caprica and they’re all Persephone here.  A collection of short stories. (bisexual Felix Gaeta/Eight, various het pairings) Trigger warning: non-con/dub con

Batwoman (TV)

Trapped in the Closet - Kate was never afraid to come out to her father, but she is now. Episode tag to the season 1 finale. (lesbian Kate Kane)

Pride - A small army of Batwomen marched at Pride. Ryan should be marching with them. (lesbian Ryan Wilder)

Black Lightning (TV)

Comic Book Life - Comic book Thunder’s boyfriend knew what his woman did, so why couldn’t Anissa tell her girlfriend? (Anissa Pierce/Grace Choi)

Truth Will Out - Anissa’s in the closet about her superhero life. Three times she thought about telling Grace and one time she actually did. (Anissa Pierce/Grace Choi)

Maybe Baby - “Ever think about what kind of power’s you and Grace’s kids would have?“ Jen asked, raising possibilities Anissa had never considered before. (Anissa Pierce/Grace Choi, Jennifer Pierce)

Sleeping Beauty - Grace had been in coma for over a month now, but Anissa still couldn’t help thinking each visit that this would be the one where she woke up. Maybe today it would be. (Anissa Pierce/Grace Choi)

Cat Lover - When your wife was a deadly jungle cat, it paid to be cautious. (Anissa Pierce/Grace Choi)

Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Short and to the Mr. Pointy - Collection of drabbles set across all 7 seasons. (Willow Rosenberg/Tara McClay, Willow Rosenberg/Kennedy, Willow Rosenberg/Oz, Larry/Xander Harris, various het pairings)

Cobra Kai

Queer Eye for the Karate Guy - “Our hero this week is Sensei Johnny Lawrence,” Karamo read off the pad. “He’s a 53-year-old, 6-foot-tall master of karaté.” (Johnny Lawrence plus actual queer people Karamo Brown, Jonathan Van Ness, Tan France, Bobby Berk, Antoni Porowski)

Make a Wish - Tommy has a different confession in episode 2.06 "Take a Right." (Johnny Lawrence/Tommy)

DC’s Legends of Tomorrow (TV)

The Beast You Made of Me - The Waverider’s resident shapeshifters compare notes. (Mona Wu, Genderfluid Charile)

Neither Should You (The Real People Remix) - Rescuing her clones was the right thing to do. They deserved the right to live their lives and make their own choices. Ava just wished they’d stop sleeping with Gary. (Ava Sharpe/Sara Lance, Ava Clones/Gary Green, implied Gary Green/John Constantine)

Army of One - Sara Lance was dead. Sara Lance was a clone. Sara Lance was going to need a minute to process. Tag to “Bishop’s Gambit,” episode 6.06. (background Sara Lance/Ava Sharpe)

Downton Abbey

The Hedgehog’s Dilemma - Thomas Barrow’s daemon is a hedgehog. Five warnings, four relationships, and one revelation. (Thomas Barrow/Duke of Crowborrough, Thomas Barrow/Edward Courtney, Thomas Barrow/Jimmy Kent)

Snakes and Lions - Hogwarts AU. In Thomas, Jimmy finds that courage isn’t exclusive to Gryffindors.  Now if only he could find some himself. (Thomas Barrow/Jimmy Kent)

Genius Loci - Downton Abbey consumes people and it won’t let Thomas go. (gay Thomas Barrow) Trigger warning: referenced canon suicide attempt

When the Wolf Comes Home - A Companion to Wolves Fusion. Buggery is legal in the army, required even, for wolf-brothers. Bates, Lord Grantham, and their wolves have a certain history. Thomas can't help thinking about it. (gay Thomas Barrow, past Robert Crawley/John Bates)

Kipo and the Age of Wonerbeasts

Dream Girls - On the surface, Mulholland had given Wolf everything she had thought she wanted: her and Kipo, the two of them buff and tough and together. Her guilt had kept her from really enjoying it, but it hadn’t been why she fought back. (Wolf/Kipo)

The Hero Was You - Benson likes Troy and Troy likes Benson. Great! Now all Benson has to do is figure out what to do about it. (Benson/Troy)

A Post Post-Apocalyptic Romance - It was kind of wild when he thought about it. Benson and Troy had fallen for each other super fast, but, between the rescue and the other rescue and all the running around with HMUFA, they’d never really gotten to know each other. Luckily, without Scarlemagne and Dr. Emilia trying to capture and/or kill them, they finally had the time to get to know each other as Benson introduced Troy to the city. (Benson/Troy)

The Old Guard

Take What the Water Gave Me - Quynh drowns and wakes and in between are Booker and Andromache. She would take his life if she could. So she does. (Quynh/Andy)

She-Ra and the Princesses of Power

She-Ra (Modesty) Shorts - Three very short Catra/Adora stories. (Catra/Adora)

Parting Strands - Looking out for each other had been their thing, but Adora’s starting to suspect that’s over. Her thoughts during that scene in “Promise.” (Catra/Adora)

Another First Kiss - Five times Catra thought about kissing Adora and one time Adora kissed her. (Catra/Adora)

Sick Leave - Back when they were kids in the Horde, they used to hide when they got sick. It’s a hard habit to break, but things are different now and Catra really should be in bed. (Catra/Adora)

Spider-man (Ultimates verse)

Queen of Lower Chelsea - Jessica Drew may not be a real girl, but she’s trying to build a real life. (gender-queer Jessica Drew)

Fingertips That Might Ignite - Peter is straight like a straight thing.  Jessica isn’t sure what she is. (Jessica Drew/Johnny Storm, Jessica Drew/OFC)

We Were Orphans Before - The first time Jessica ran into Peter after the Wave she grabbed him into a hug. (gender-queer Jessica Drew, Peter Parker)

Gonna Share My Tin Man Heart - Kitty moves in and Kitty moves out. Jessica falls in love somewhere along the way. (Jessica Drew/Kitty Pride)

Star Wars

For Amidala - Her handmaidens had all poured so much of themselves into Amidala, it was like they were part of her now. Padmé didn’t know if she had the strength to let one go. (Padmé/Her Handmaidens)

Dateline Felucia - Embedded with the troops on Felucia, a reporter from HoloNet News paints an intimate portrait of the men of the 212th Attack Battalion. (Obi-Wan/Cody, Waxer/Boil)

Tag - Sabine and Ketsu, bounty hunters extraordinaire, argue about how to sign their work. (Sabine Wren/Ketsu Onyo)

When I Was Your Age - Kanan, Ezra, and the fruits of a misspent youth. (Pansexual Kanan Jarrus)

Stranger Things

Date Night - Everyone and her mother seems to think they’re together and Robin’s getting pretty sick of it. (lesbian Robin Buckley & Steve Harrington)

Umbrella Academy (TV)

Iconic - When Vanya learns Klaus is gay from a magazine, she’s angry for more than just one reason. (queer Vanya & Klaus Hargreeves)

White Collar

Eyes on the Target (The Solid Ground Remix) - Peter asked Diana to keep an eye on Neal for him while he’s stuck in jail. It could be going better. (lesbian Diana Barrigan, Neal Caffrey)

[airplanned]

Who Does That?

Thank you @intangiblyyourswrites for the writing challenge.

Prompt:

The real reason Zelda initially shows such a abhorrence to Link is because she’s secretly heads-over-heels for him and refuses to show it. Her pride is on the line, after all.

Rules:

Must be set in the BotW timeline

When it’s set is up to you (e.g. Pre-Calamity or post, pre-Blades of the Yiga or post)

No chronology enforced, but I’m interested to see if we can get a somewhat coherent story out of this!

You may do however many posts/drabbles you’d like

Tag #thirsty-and-in-denial-Zelda so we can find your story!

Summary: Speed-run Link is going to give Zelda palpitations.

Zelda kept her excitement under control when Link finally woke from the Shrine of Resurrection.  It wouldn't do for the Calamity to notice, and even though Link was awake, it could take him months--years even to conquer the Divine Beasts, retrieve the Master Sword, and hopefully reclaim his memories.  She would brace herself and wait.

She was not expecting him to come barrelling into the sanctum the very next day.  A mere blink of an eye for her.  But there he was, rocketing in through a high broken window at a hundred miles an hour, wearing nothing but armaments and blue underwear.  Her mind couldn't fathom it.  Her thoughts caught on the way his arms flexed as he held the paraglider, because that was also absurd, but somehow more reasonable than the fact of his presence. 

Zelda stared, even as the Calamity spun to face him with a roar, and Link unsheathed a sword that it looked like he'd picked up just outside the hall.  The metal glinted like the determination in his eyes.  Wild.  Intense.  Unafraid.

How--

But--

She nearly screamed.  All the work, all the horror through the whole century she'd held back the Calamity in wait for Link, and he was going to blow it all by riding in completely unprepared.  Completely unprepared!  He couldn’t even be bothered to find pants to cover his thighs.  He was going to be murdered in the next fifteen seconds, and then where would they be?  Doomed.  The whole country.  Forever.

Windblight Ganon appeared in a swirl of malice, and even before it had formed completely, Link was...spinning on his heel and running away. 

Oh no.

Link leapt his way up a column, all the muscles in his back straining and bunching as he climbed, the muscles in his rear-- 

Instead of bolting for an exit, he jumped and paraglided back down to bring his sword over Windblight Ganon's head, knocking him to the ground.  He spun, leaning back against the weight of the sword in his hands, graceful as he wailed against the blight again and again.  She watched the muscles of his arms as he deftly switched mid-spin from one sword to another.  She watched as the blight groaned and Link pulled out a flimsy bow and shoot the beast dead in the eye before beating against it again, this time with a sledge hammer.

Just...

Who did he think he was?  Did he even know what the blights were?  Did he know about the pain they'd caused?  Did he know he should be afraid?

Waterblight Ganon appeared, and when Link knocked him to the ground and did his spin move again, he switched to a long halberd so he could hit the beast twice on every rotation, once against the blight’s side and once against the wrist propping it up, side wrist side wrist. 

When Fireblight Ganon lit his axe on fire, Link brushed his hair from his face and took a second to pull out his slipping pony tail, hold the band in his teeth, tuck his sledge hammer under his arm, and use both hands to pull back his hair.  A hint of a canine flashed beneath his lip.  His fingers dug into his sandy hair as he dragged it back, over his long ears that still had their simple hoops from a hundred years ago, drawing, his chest. 

Just...

Who does that?  He was in the middle of a battle!  How dare he?  He was going to get killed!

He braced his bare feet as Thunderblight Ganon zipped across the hall, and suddenly it was there, before him, in his face and swinging.  And Link back flipped out of the way, moving faster than the eye could follow, his feet padding on the tile floor, darting in to stab at the blight.  In a flash, he ripped its shield from its arm. 

And hit the monster with it. 

His nearness to the blinding blue light of the blight’s weapons made his eyes glow, made all the scars across his flesh stand out. He had no idea what was happening, and he had no armor, and he had dodged every blow thrown at him.  He was so fierce, so fast, that Zelda's breath caught and her heart squeezed, because he might actually win this. 

And how dare he get her hopes up?  How dare he show his face like this when she didn't know if she should celebrate or despair.

Ganon himself fired a laser, and Zelda knew it was over--all her hopes, all her wild dreams of--

And Link pulled out a pot lid and bounced the blue beam back so it exploded against the beast she'd held at bay for so long.  And Zelda couldn't breathe through the emotions tearing at her insides.  As explosions surrounded Ganon, bomb arrow after bomb arrow in blooms of fire so thick she could no longer see their battle, she burned with indignation and shock and hope and, and, and--

How dare he make it look so easy!  How dare he make her feel these things so unexpectedly!

She found her shape again in the field, the sky clearing from the red of the blood moon to the brilliant blue of his eyes.  He wiped sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand and rolled out his shoulders in a way that pushed out his chest, and her fingers itched to...  He sheathed his last sword and beamed at her, his smile like the sun and his breathing slightly labored as he stepped forward.

"Do...do you remember me?" 

He had leaves in his hair and she had no idea why she even asked, because she knew just from his bemused expression that the answer was no.

"Nah," he said.  "A ghost told me you needed me."  Then he grinned at her again, and it was so, so--

A ghost told him to come here?!

Goddess above. 

[dreadwulf]

dogface AU drabble

The car service picks him up in a sleek black Lexus and he settles into the plush backseat gratefully, leaving the driver to stow his rollaway bag in the trunk. Jaime disembarked from his flight only minutes before and walked straight here. It had been a red-eye, not a full flight, and with the lights out as quiet as a tomb, and still he had shifted uncomfortably for hours and hours.  The first international flight he's ever managed without getting absolutely hammered, and consequently he didn't sleep a wink. 

By now he's been awake going on 32 hours straight. The air tastes like burnt toast and his eye sockets feel like exposed wires; he keeps his sunglasses on even though it's 3am and it makes him look like an asshole. Jaime tosses his briefcase on the seat next to him and lets his head fall back against the leather seat. He doesn't make conversation with the driver (again, asshole) because there's nothing to say. The driver knows where to take him. Everything's already arranged, like it always is - the pickup and the destination. Driver gets in and they're off.

Lights streak by dimly through the tinted windows. Headache colors, white and yellow and red.

Even his own birthday celebration tomorrow has been planned out without him. It's convenient, in a way, since he hasn't been home in three weeks. The Singapore trip stretched into the London trip and there wasn't time, and now it's tomorrow. Today. Tomorrow. Jaime is fully of the opinion that it doesn't count as tomorrow until you wake up in daylight. So technically, he's still on yesterday, and he would not have had time to plan something out for himself. But that means Jaime is attending a party in not-enough-hours-from-now and he has no earthly idea who will be there. Coworkers, probably. Family, possibly. Family coworkers for certain. Will there be anyone there he actually wants to talk to? His assistants and no one else, most like.

Jaime procures a tiny bourbon from the tiny barset. He was sober on the flight, and well done him; now he can relax.

Probably it's the second tiny bourbon gives him the idea. 

Brienne Tarth. He hasn't seen her since the Event. There's been no reason to. But a party is a good excuse to contact her. Or would be, if he had her number. Or an email address. Or anything about her, really, except what bar she used to go to and where she works. He can probably find his way back to her apartment, with some amount of wandering around, but knocking on her door is not the best way about it, considering how they left things.

Jaime takes out his phone.

He’s looked up her pen name before. Brienne Blue. He’s read several of her articles as they’ve popped up in his feed. But he’s never looked up her real name before.

It doesn’t get him much. She hasn't got a Facebook account, or Twitter, or even an Insta, unless she has another pseudonym. She's a ghost. There's a professional profile for her nom-de-plume that has clearly not been updated since the last presidency. He'll never reach her there.

The one thing it does get him is a link to a Youtube video. Her name isn’t anywhere in the title or description, but it's mentioned in the referring page. Hey Ron, remember Brienne Tarth? Brienne the Beast? Check this out XD

His stomach drops when he sees the title of the video. “Pull the Pig #18: Dogface Gets Lucky!” He hopes, with a faint and shaky vestige of optimism, that the video isn't what it sounds like, or at the very least isn’t about Brienne.

Jaime watches the video.

He reads the comments.

He stabs the Report Video button, and frowns at his phone when this does not immediately whisk the video away. He pulls up the contacts list and presses the first name. He leans back in the plush leather seat and drums his fingers against the armrest agitatedly while it rings.

“Tyrion. I'm back. Hey, how do you get a video off the internet?”

A groggy voice emits from the phone. “You don’t. Where are you?”

“In a car, on the way back from the airport.” The muffled lights against the darkened windows remind him suddenly that it’s the middle of the night. “Oh sorry, is it late here?”

“For normal people, it’s early.” A yawn. 

Jaime glances up at the driver, who doesn’t meet his eyes in the rearview. As usual, he is doing his best impression of a deafmute. “Real quick, help me out. I need to make this video go away. I hit the YouTube report abuse function, but…”

“That doesn’t do anything. YouTube? If it’s on YouTube it’s probably on Vimeo and Facebook and gods know where else. How bad is it? Tell me it’s not Bran Stark bad.”

“It’s not me.” Suddenly, Jaime doesn’t want to tell his brother too much. “It’s this girl I know, she’s in this prank video and now she doesn’t ever leave her apartment or talk to people and I want to make it go away.”

“Sorry Jaime, once something’s on the Net it’s out there forever. You can pull it down in one spot and it shows up in 4 more. Is it revenge porn?”

“No, it’s a prank. But they got her top off. Video blurred it some, but you can still see just about everything.”

“That’s revenge porn. You can sue for that. Tell her to sue. I’m going back to bed.”

“No, it’s more like - it’s a joke, they’ll say it’s a joke. There’s one of those crying-laughing emojis over it, like ha-ha, this girl thought I wanted to bone her and now she’s got her clothes off and my friends are all here and we’re having a laugh.”

“Oh yeah, I’ve seen those. They’re funny.”

Jaime grabs the bridge of his nose. Tyrion’s taste in internet videos is something he has tried not to learn too much about. “This one isn’t. I want it gone.”

“Send it over, I’ll see what I can do in the morning.”

He has a sudden vision of Brienne glaring at him fiercely. “I’m not sending you the link.”

“Why not?”

“I’m not explaining to this girl why I’m spreading her traumatic video around even more."

"Well, I can send some cease-and-desist letters on scary company stationary to the usual platforms, if it's somehow work related."

Jaime replies without hesitation. "It is." He wouldn't be getting much work done for Lannister Corp if he'd bled out on the floor that day, and she stopped the bleeding. That's related enough. 

He hangs up. Leans his head back and tries to go to sleep. He keeps seeing the look of horror on Brienne’s face, captured on the internet for all time. Hearing those idiots sniggering and holding up her shirt while the poor girl’s locked herself in the bathroom. The video's dated five years ago. She would have been, what, nineteen? Still a kid.

No wonder she said she didn't trust men. No wonder she thought he was making fun of her when he tried to flirt. No wonder everything. 

And now, he realizes abruptly, he’s watched it too. He’ll have to explain that to her somehow. Somehow he doubts the prickly, defensive girl who never even told him her name is going to accept “I was only looking so I could report it” as a good answer.

Fuck.

[tundrainafrica]

First Aid: Post Ch. 135 Levihan Drabble. Hange’s alive and gives Levi first aid. 

Note: I just needed to daydream for my poor soldier. I have a part 2. Will post it soon (Probably)

I promised him.

I must kill Zeke. 

Levi could picture the exact moment Beast Titan appeared on the battlefield. He memorized it down to every last detail, how far down the sun was on the horizon, how small mountains looked next to the sun shining high above it. 

Oddly enough, he didn’t usually remember things like that. It was the frustration, the anger and the excruciating pain which made him so much more finicky and so much more observant of the view in front of him as they flew on the Falco’s back. Somehow, he had to distract himself. 

“The beast titan’s getting closer!” 

The sound of Connie’s voice almost made Levi jump. Of course it would. Connie was right next to him. In fact it was Connie helping him sit up as they flew on Falco’s back. 

“Don’t sleep captain.” Jean said. Levi did not need to ask to understand why. Would he even have had the energy to ask? At first, the pain had been excruciating but overtime, it had dulled into something else entirely. Levi found himself fighting to stay awake, only connected to the world by the horizon that was further dimming in front of him. 

He wondered. If the sun sets before the horizon, if the view in front of him suddenly goes dim and fades into the blackness with the coming of night, would he manage to stay awake? At that point, the only thing keeping him awake were the sights and sounds his body at least allowed him to process. The view was an anchor. As the sky started to dim in front of him, the fine line between the darkness of sleep and the view in front of him started to blur.

“Hey! Stay awake!” 

His wounds screamed in protest as he was gently shaken awake. 

“He’s so pale.”

“There must have been some internal bleeding.”

“Jean, what do we do?”

“Keep him awake!” It was Jean. Levi could sense the fear, the uncertainty in Jean’s voice. With Armin gone, Jean was the next in line to make decisions. 

“What about the Beast Titan?”

“I don’t know. For god’s sake I don’t know!”

“I’ll go.” I promised him. At that moment, Levi was starting to accept that he probably wasn’t going to make it. Hell, he had accepted for a long time that he could end up dying anytime. Although for a split second, he was tired, he was quick to drop it off. There were far more important things occupying his mind than emotion.

He could at least die keeping his promise to Erwin. 

“Captain!”

“The beast titan is mine.” Levi had been fighting for years, the movements were mechanical. He could barely walk but if he knew he put enough wait on his left leg, he could forget his kneecap was even broken. 

He could barely hear the orders Jean gave to Annie and Falco. All he knew as he gently guided his body to a standing position was the Beast Titan running towards them much faster. Or was it Falco who slowed down?

Levi could only thank his military training and years of experience  as he shot the hooks on the ODM gear, right where he wanted them. The beast titan always shot out a hand and Levi only needed to rush through them like he always did. 

He had the body memory to do it. He had the inborn fitness and speed but he did not have a fully functioning body that could meet his expectations. Even before he could launch himself ahead, the beast titan had already grabbed him by the waist. 

“Captain!” 

The grip was surprisingly gentle. Gentle enough at least to allow Levi enough room to cut the beast titan’s hand.

“Levi stop!” That tone of voice was not Zeke.

Then who is it? Levi only continued rushing up the beast titans arm. He was notably slower yet somehow the beast titan was not going for an attack. 

It was with a small yet precise movement did Levi realized that the beast titan was not Zeke. Zeke was larger. The hand that had grabbed at his cannisters were surprisingly smaller. And quicker. Or was he just too slow already?

Regardless, Levi took that as a godsend. He could still finish off the beast titan. He detached the cannister of gas the beast titan had held onto and slowed his pace enough to get used to the unfamiliarity of balancing on one cannister. One cannister was not enough to launch himself up.  

Commander?

A pair hands grabbed Levi who continued to squirm. His chest was screaming and Levi wondered how much of his bruised ribs he had broken in the process. 

He could hear the familiar sound of a whoosh of smoke, the evaporation of a titan body. He could feel the warm winds brush past him. The stench of a titan dissolving was faint, too faint for him to be still near the titan. Someone was carrying him out of the battle field. 

Levi! Are you okay? Is he okay?

The panicked voice was all too familiar. 

"He needs first aid now. We don't know what to do."

Levi focused again on the sun and the view in front of him. He was struggling to stay awake. The sky around him was getting dimmer as the sun sank below the horizon. 

His stomach felt warm, the pain around his chest was only spreading. 

You lost your ODM gear?

I lost it fighting the titans.

He felt an all too familiar touch, running across his chest down to his stomach. 

"A few broken ribs, some internal bleeding. He shouldn't have even been fighting.” The voice was a mixture of panic and authority, maybe even angry and for some reason, Levi was scared. He had seen the owner of that voice flying through the air and burning for a few seconds before settling back down on the seat in the plane.

She shouldn’t be here. Her touch was real though. It was warm. It was familiar.

Levi closed his eyes focusing on that familiar touch and the voice accompanying it, he could not help but think that maybe it wasn’t a matter of her being there. 

She was dead after all. 

Maybe he was the one who had gone to her. 

Is this a dream? Is this the afterlife?  Either way, Levi was sure he did not want to wake from it. At that moment her voice was distant. If he slept then would she be nearer when he wakes up? 

The sky was only getting darker anyway. What difference would it make if he closed his eyes? What difference would it make if he succumbs to the aches, the dull pain, and the exhaustion?

Commander! Why were you in the beast titan? 

Long story. Just hurry and get me something to cut with!