#not something I think anyone should read unless they have like zero triggers (and-- as I learned the hard way-- definitely not before bed)

[jokerfic]

helloooo do you have any book recommendations that are quite similar to your work? 💓

oh this is SUCH a good question! also a bit difficult to answer because the better the book, the more up-my-own-ass I look for making a comparison. I'm just going to offer a little selection with very brief summaries/bullet points and hope that you guys understand that most of this list is aspirational and I'm not claiming to be a peer to any of these writers particularly. putting it under a readmore because I know myself.

the very first one that sprang to mind is Badger by C. M. McKenna. A recovering addict forms a mutual, deeply unhealthy obsession with a ruthless vigilante. even though they connect with one another on a level that they can't seem to reach with anyone else, the relationship is volatile and unsustainable. trigger warnings for sadomasochism and brief details about past child abuse and CSA.

Sunshine by Robin McKinley - a career baker is abducted by a gang of vampires and left as prey for one of their own. When dawn breaks and he still hasn't touched her, the tables quickly turn. (I haven't read this one in a while, but remember it as being very in keeping with the kind of romantic relationships I write--prickly, complicated, slow-burning, maybe a little unsatisfying in that you never get quite what you want? Robin McKinley's romances were definitely a huge influence on my taste in general, so her bibliography is worth checking out. The Blue Sword is also good)

Helpmeet by Naben Ruthnum - a woman brings her dying husband to his childhood home to care for him in his final days. Romantic, grotesque, a novella about devotion and obsession. A quick read at under 100 pages, but not always an easy one. cw for body horror and some generally gross descriptions of a guy who's basically falling apart, but absolutely worth it, I think. I read this in one sitting and have been recommending it since. I'm getting increasingly interested in blending horror and romance, and this project marries the genres perfectly.

I'm going to pivot slightly and lean harder into the "aspirational" side of things-- the following books don't so much have things in common with my writing (or my writing with them) but they scratch my brain every which way, I love them, I've reread all of them at least 3 times, and they're definitely in mind when I think about how to plot a story or set a scene or progress through a romance. (you'll forgive that the first 2 options are YA-- I have a whole lecture about YA's stranglehold on marketing and how lots of books that are by every other marker "adult fiction" get sucked beneath the YA umbrella even though they don't belong there just so they'll sell better, but we won't get into it now)

The Folk of the Air Trilogy by Holly Black - fae court intrigue, scandals, treachery, and backstabbing + a central couple that hates each other so much that they just have to do some smooching about it. you love to see it. A lot of stuff billed as "enemies to lovers" is fangless because they're worried about making the "enemies" too unsympathetic or too mean-- not here. Here, there are several times when I was worried either half of the couple was actually going to kill each other, lol. Violent mutual obsession. Difficult to put down once you've started.

The Six of Crows Duology by Leigh Bardugo - mean, nasty criminal wunderkind Kaz Brekker is out for revenge, and also to take over the city's underworld entirely. Heists on heists, thousands of plates spinning at once, a crew full of misfits, and a girl that has become his right hand, his confidante, and his conscience (entirely against his will). we love a high fantasy crime romp, especially with such a complicated relationship at its center.

The Secret History by Donna Tartt - I can't ever put together a books rec list without adding this. If there's a single person out there who missed the early 2010s tumblr craze and doesn't know what this book is about: a California misfit finagles his way into an elite private college in New England, where he becomes fascinated by a small, elegant clique of Classics students. He manages to infiltrate the clique, and slowly becomes involved in their personal entanglements, quarrels, secrets, and-- eventually-- murder. Everything that has ever branded itself "dark academia" is trying to do what TSH did and has failed miserably. It is the blueprint and incomparable. Tartt's lush prose seduces you as quickly as the clique seduces Richard, and, like Richard, you don't want to leave, don't want this charmed existence to end. At least half of what I do is trying-- pretty unsuccessfully-- to be in conversation with The Secret History. It accomplishes everything it's trying to accomplish, and it's a privilege to read.

The Library at Mount Char by Scott Hawkins - do you like found family? You won't for long. A fucked-up array of found siblings are being groomed to mysterious purpose by a father figure who has kept them locked away from the world at the Library, where they are raised and trained and tortured in turn. Carolyn, one of the more unassuming of these siblings, has a plan to get free-- a plan that quickly puts the whole world in serious peril. Like most of the rest of the books on this list, this one is un-put-downable, setting a breakneck pace and with compelling characters, and I'm just in so much awe at the way this is plotted-- it's a masterclass in compelling storytelling, and by a guy who's only ever written Linux manuals! I don't know how you write a debut novel like this. I think about it all the time.

Howl's Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones - this is tumblr, everyone knows about Howl's Moving Castle, I won't belabor the point, but the book is different from the movie in a way that makes it very worth reading, and it's kind of the champion of bicker romance, a couple whose love language is low-level (to high-level) quarreling nonstop. they drive each other crazy and would also die for each other. so romantic <3

okay I've lost the plot. here's a bite size book rec blast to wrap it up and the points where I think we overlap: Piranesi by Susanna Clark (faith, optimism, gratitude and awe for the world you live in), The Blue Castle by L.M. Montgomery (taking the frightening step to build intense intimacy with a stranger), obviously the Thomas Harris Hannibal books (complicated romance with a killer). Set This House in Order by Matt Ruff (sometimes, your protagonists have a rich inner life that you have to navigate carefully-- some more than others). The Checquy Files by Daniel O'Malley (sometimes your female protagonist is pitched headfirst into a dangerous and mysterious world she's not prepared for and has to wing it the best she can. this one is a reach because that applies to thousands of books, I really just wanted to include it because these are fabulous books and fun to read). Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy (figures of great evil are vastly seductive, difficult to escape, and ultimately suffocating), Wise Blood by Flannery O'Connor and The Devil All the Time by Donald Ray Pollock (try as you might, you can't outrun God). (SERIOUS trigger warnings for the last three-- violence, sexual abuse and assault, all the grotesqueness that comes with southern gothic-- basically assume if there's something bad, then it's in one of those books.)

I think I'll call it there. Sorry I quickly abandoned answering your question and instead spent most of the ask on "here's a book you should read. here's another book you should read" but in my defense. you should read some of these. what you read ripples out into what you write, and these are some of my favorites, so that should count for something, right? lol maybe not but thank you for asking anyway because this was fun.

[migila]

Okay, fuck it. No matter what anyone else says, Tokyo Revengers was a hit until the end! Of course, there are parts towards the ending that I don't like and parts that don't make sense, but overall, I love it. I mean, everyone we came to love during the series (plus Kisaki) is alive and happy at the end, so what's there to complain about? I mean, I get it that it makes the story we read seem meaningless since everything just got overwritten, but... what's important is the journey, not the destination, right? I mean, we got the best of both worlds; the emotional, difficult journey that somehow resulted in the best future imaginable! ...Is what I wrote at first, but now, few days later, I think it's not that simple. I mean, the characters haven't gone through the things we saw them go through, and may have gone through completely different things instead, so are they even the same lovable (or in Kisaki's case, not so much) characters that we know? I feel like I'd need a new story entirely to get to know the characters again, especially Koko and Inubi who ended up not having a traumatic loss like they did in the timeline that we knew. Anyway, on to the details!

To be honest, I thought that there'd be a final time leap that would go further back in time, which would make saving Emma and Baji possible. The reason for this is that at one point, I don't remember what for, I went to check something from Tokyo Revengers wiki and saw Baji's profession listed as a vet, and I was like "Wait what? That's not possible! ...Unless..." so I kinda got super spoiled and it wasn't the huge shock it could've been, but I didn't expect them to go far enough to save Shinichiro too, so that definitely didn't get spoiled. Neither did him being a time leaper, which came out of nowhere for me. I mean, it was hinted at earlier by Kisaki and later by Sanzu that there was another one, but I never expected it to be Shinichiro. Didn't like that plot twist at first, but in a way, it started to make sense... in a way that a time travel story can, anyway. It was a good way to explain Mikey's "darkness", though honestly, that one could've also been explained away by a traumatic childhood event and a need for a lot of therapy. Speaking of which, how come no one ever suggested that?

Mikey and Takemichi both time leaping is a bit of a stretch; either one or the other should've had the power, but I'll let it slide. Like, maybe Takemichi leaped, and somehow his body moved the power to Mikey while he was leaping? Or something. What I don't understand is how the heck did Chifuyu end up remembering all the shit from the main timeline! Like, in a way, I love it that he did, 'cause without it the beautiful bond between him and Takemichi would be gone, but plot wise, it makes zero sense... I mean, guess he could've kind of become the "trigger" for leaping, but... how? Why? What? ...Then again, I don't really get it how it happened with Sanzu either, so maybe there's a logic somewhere in it all? ...It might be for the best if Takemichi and Mikey never shake his hand, just in case. Seriously.

I would've liked to see how they built up the New Toman. Like, we saw the founding, with the six founding members becoming nine, but after that? There's no way, just no way, that the duo just went "hey join my gang" to everyone and they just agreed; there had to be conflicts with lots of people. I kinda would've loved to see that, but I also understand that all that would've dragged the story on somewhat needlessly. But I do think that Takemichi reuniting with Chifuyu should've been shown; imagine the big boss' surprise when his right hand actually remembers being his right hand! I hope someone's written a fic about that. I wanna read it. And I also wanna write a fic about that. And about lots of other stuff that has come up along the way; lots of my ideas have hit the trashcan after new plot twists, but some should still be usable with some fine tuning, plus I have lots of new ideas, too... okay, now I'm getting sidetracked too much.

Details, details... Why is Naoto not a cop!? I mean, I know why; it's because he wasn't inspired to be one in this timeline, and so he took up a work more in line with his childhood interests, but but... I still want Cop Naoto. I got used to Cop Naoto. And since we're speaking about careers, what is Takemichi doing? I'm guessing Hina's a teacher, but her hubby? Still in that video rental store? That'd be hilarious, especially since the place will probably go under real soon with all the streaming services around. Takemichi's job really really really should've been mentioned. Oh, and let's talk about Future Kazutora's hair! Like, he looks great, fabulous in fact, but... so weird. Just so, so weird. Also, Akane's alive. First, I noticed Inupi's scar missing, and then there was this woman next to Koko... who else could it have been other than Akane? Somehow, they either stopped the fire from happening, or got the Inui siblings somewhere else during it. How the fuck did they pull that off? Pure luck? Anyway, since Akane survived, what made Koko study money making so hard? 'Cause he obviously did, being rich and all, but what motivated him? I sense a plot hole! Speaking of which, why is our adrenaline addict Hanma a freaking photographer? How about a stuntman or a little sketchy guard? But no, dude's a photographer. That one should have a story behind it, too. And what about Emma? Sure, she's a housewife and marrying Draken must've been her plan since at least middle school, but surely she studied or worked at something before marrying the guy? Surely she had something else in mind, too? But no, the only title she gets is a housewife. Boo!

...Ahem, yeah so, I first got interested in Tokyo Revengers in the summer of 2023 in an anime convention during a lecture about anime delinquents and decided to watch it, but something always came in the way of that. That was until my sister and I booked a trip to Japan for February of 2024 and I realized I should finally watch it 'cause if I find some stuff about the series in Japan but won't buy any 'cause I don't really know the show and it turns out to be good I'll regret it (that's what happened with my trip to New York and SpyXFamily last year), so I gotta watch it. In the end though, I only managed to watch season 1 before the trip. I did get some stuff, but I definitely would've gotten more if I'd watched, and read, the whole thing in time for the trip... and in case someone's wondering why I'm writing that... just getting it out of my system 'cause I'm annoyed? Should've bought those Chifuyu badges I saw.

Anyway, I'll probably re-read the whole thing at some point and comment about pretty much anything I feel like is worth commenting on. I considered doing it already after I reached the point where the anime left off, but then thought that nah, it'd be annoying to make a long post and then realize all the questions were answered within the next few chapters. But damn, wish I would've started reading this while it was still being published.

[riddle-me-ri]

BTAS, Arkham, ZY Riddler S/O has trust issues and doesn't really do flavors for rogue unless he can give something back. When they're more serious he finds out it's because she gave her ex a kidney since he was sick and he still cheated on her later.

I'm actually not making this up, some girl shared her story on TikTok and everyone was asking if she can get refund.

A/N: Oh no, I know you’re not making it up, lol. I’ve seen that EXACT TikTok, it’s so fckin’ terrible that happened. I was just thinking it as I read your rq and then you confirmed it, when I was like “isn’t that a tiktok?” I don’t blame her if she developed trust issues after that. I have trust issues when my ex admitted he didn’t actually mean it when he said he “loved me” the last four months of our relationship…no one out here is safe! Also I wrote these as headcanons cause they sorta came to my head as headcanons…I hope that’s okay. The ideas just seem sorta cut short to be turned into drabbles, but if it reads awkward I can change it…

Trigger Warnings: none really, other than some sleaziness on Zero Year Riddler, but that should be the norm by now

Riddlers x F!Reader - Trust Issues

Batman The Animated Series Riddler: 

Eddie was content with how things worked in your relationship. You helped him when he needed gear for his contraptions or needed an upgrade in the latest technology, and he rightfully compensated you for it. Whether that was with money or information from highly secured corporations.

Suffice it to say, the Riddler wasn’t expecting to catch feelings for you, but he was very impressed with your vast knowledge. You were like him and had a sponge for a brain and you wanted to know more. Plus you were pretty good at his riddles. 

He was taken aback by your hesitant response, but was happy you accepted his invitation to develop a more intimate relationship. However, even with this new development you were insistent that his services come with a price. 

“If I fix this for you, Ed what do I get out of it?” You asked examining a busted trap mechanism in one of his false toys. 

Edward blinked in confusion. Romantic relationships were new to him, but he was fairly certain people that cared for each other did things for one another because…they cared. 

“My dear, I…I must say I-I don’t know…I thought you could do it to help me…because you care about me? Am I wrong in that assumption?” 

You sighed exhaustedly. You really didn’t want to bring it up, but it was only fair. Edward was so patient and kind to you. Thoughtful, gentle, and leagues smarter than your ex.

“I-I’m sorry Eddie…um…I-I just..it’s hard for me to do a favor and not make sure I get something in return, because I gave something to someone I loved and I can never get it back..”

Edward’s eyes furrowed in concern. “May I ask…what favor did you provide them?” His eyes practically widened into tea saucers when you told him you gave your ex one of your kidneys so they could have life changing surgery, only for them to cheat on you not long after they recovered.

Ed lifted your chin so you could look him in his green eyes. With a single finger he wiped away the small droplets of tears that fell from your eyes. 

“My darling, Y/N…my sweet, intelligent, brilliant, Y/N…I-I would never, ever take advantage of you, your skill, your heart, and…y-your organs.” He smiled sheepishly. You couldn’t help but giggle. 

“I know there’s nothing I can do to get your kidney back, but I can promise you. I will never take you for granted. And I’ll protect you and your heart from anyone that tries to use you.”

Arkhamverse Riddler:

Needless to say you both have trust issues. 

After his falling out with Catwoman, it was hard for him to trust another thief, but he would be a fool not to utilize one. He may be a genius but he was aware that subtlety and sneakiness weren’t his forte.

Therefore he enlisted you to help him. You got whatever materials, valuables, information he wanted and he paid you tenfold than what you would make from other rogues. “As ever generous as I am brilliant, you should thank me, most would kill to get to work for me!” 

Yeah right, like you’d do something for someone just for posterity sake. Even when the two of you got closer. Despite his protests, you checked on him occasionally even if there wasn’t a job for you. 

You meddled in his projects and assisted him, not that he’d ever outright gratify your support and presence…deep down he did begin to appreciate you. He looked forward to seeing your face and hearing your voice. It kept what little sanity he had left grounded to something tangible. 

Because of this, he has made attempts to open up as did you. However neither of you did something for the other, not without certainty there was compensation for it. 

“I don’t see why I have to do something in return? Ha! I thought you actually cared about me…” Edward tried not to sound defeated at that last statement, but he failed. 

“Because last time I did something for someone I cared about I had something taken I can’t get back!” You snapped. 

“Oh, please. I was foolish to trust an ally like Catwoman and she stole every penny to my name and destroyed everything I worked and slaved over!”

“I gave my kidney to my terminally ill partner and they cheated on me!” You almost screeched, hot tears dripping down your face.

Edward dropped the screwdriver he was using on a circuit board. He turned back around on his workstool to look at you. 

“I-I…uh…wasn’t expecting that..” He cringed. 

“Yeah, well…neither did I..” You crossed your arms, but not before wiping your nose and eyes with your sleeves. 

Edward gulped. He didn’t know much about romantic partnerships but…he knew enough to know he screwed up. He just had no idea how to fix it. He took off his gloves and his goggles and made his way towards you.

“I-I…I’m not sure what to say, but…I can assure you I would never ask for anything more than you’re willing to do. I would never ask you to give up..an organ…besides my brain is already finely tuned to the skeleton, muscle, and intestinal structures of my body.”

You quirked your eyebrow at him. He shrugged with a tight smile. You couldn’t help but chuckle, that’s as best of a reassurance you were going to get out of him. Even for an egomaniac like him, that wasn’t so bad, you could believe his word. 

Zero Year/Capullo Riddler:

Okay so, like, you shouldn’t trust this man. Like period. 

I mean, you kinda can because he’s blunt and honest, he won’t lie to you for the most part. Unless he's manipulating you, but that's beside the point...

You were the cute new rogue on the block. You were revered in the underworld for your vast hacking capabilities. Anything and anyone from Wayne Enterprises, Daily Planet, Lex Corps. You were impressive. 

Of course any person with that skill wouldn’t sell their expertise for free. Ed was willing to compensate you for your services and the information you gathered for him. However, it didn’t take long for him to take a more carnal interest in you. 

You weren’t budging on the proposition. ���No thanks, Nygma.” 

“Aw, c’mon, don’t be like that…I’ll make it worth your while!”

“Somehow I don’t believe that, what exactly do I get out of this…arrangement?” 

Edward looked at you rather puzzled. A quirk to his brow and a sly grin, his hands went down to his waist and he dragged them up to his chest. He repeated this motion, gesturing that he was the great prize to be hold. 

You blinked uninterested, but not before you muttered. “Right, I’ve already given a kidney to an asshole that cheated on me, like I’m gonna give you my body…”

“I’ll have you know…wait what?” 

“Yeah, my last…intimate relationship, I gave them my kidney so they could have life altering surgery. They cheated on me not long after they recovered.” Your eyes darted between your computer screen and your feet. Not sure what moved you to indulge Edward to such personal information. 

“Damn, um, look…I-I like you, anything we do between you and I, I intend to make it mutually beneficial for both of us.”

“So you respect my decision to decline? Since you like me?”

“Sure, doll, you should know by now there’s nothing I love more than a puzzle.” He winked and you proceeded to cringe, but not without smiling fondly.

[maxwell-grant]

Cass wouldn’t even begrudingly tolerate [the Black Bat], because she’s even less lenient than Bruce on killing and far more willing to throw down.' - THANK YOU for remembering that.

Cass is my favorite Batfam member, the only one really that I have an active interest in reading about. I'd be incredibly ignorant to not bring bring up such a crucial aspect of her characterization. And even if I didn't personally care for her, well, last thing I'd want is to be another source of frustration for Cass fans. Lord knows there's enough of those to go around.

mousebrass also asked: On that note, how do you imagine a meeting between Cass and the Shadow going?

Fair warning: This one took me 6 hours to write, and it became a hell of a lot longer than I imagined. I liked Cass a lot, but I never quite realized I had this many feelings regarding her until I was tasked with writing this, and a lot of things clicked for me regarding my plans for The Shadow thanks to this ask. @mousebrass, thank you. I mean it. I think I may have found something here I've spent years looking for. Hope you enjoy the post.

I'm thankful that this scenario is only really taking place in a hypothetical fanon where both characters can get a fair shot, because I wouldn't trust DC with this premise. I don't trust DC with either of them as is.

There's a lot of ways that this crossover could go on about taking place naturally, initially because Cass is already connected to some of Batman's pulpier elements, due to her connections to Lady Shiva and the League of Assassins, and one could connect Cass to Myra Reldon (who really should just be race swapped if ever brought back so she can stand out as the cool character she is, without the yellowface gimmick holding her back). There's two things I think are crucial to making the most of this idea, and the first of which has to do with the subject of killing. I usually don't like to come up with hypothetical team-ups for The Shadow that focus too much on the fact that he kills, because it's far from the most significant aspect of his character to focus on, much of it is written from a wrong understanding of the character, and it never amounts to anything other than perfunctory. But here, not only is it completely unavoidable to discuss, here there is actually a very, very substantial grounding as to why this has to be such a big part of the story.

The first and foremost thing that's gotta be established to everyone reading that doesn't know already is this: Cassandra Cain, more so than Batman, more so than any other DCU hero, has a tolerance towards murder lower than zero, and this is completely non-negotiable. She will throw herself on the path of an assault rifle to stop men trying to kill her from accidentally killing each other. The defining moment of her incredibly grim backstory is that she was trained from birth to be the world's greatest murderer, and her first kill traumatized her so badly that she has pivoted as far away from that as possible. I stress a lot that the Shadow should not be written as the trigger-happy maniac comics made him into and that the pulp version killed mostly to defend himself and others, generally left criminals to the police if possible, offered plenty of second-chances, had stories dedicated to the rehabilitation of criminals and so on, but none of this would matter to Cass.

Cass has literally chosen suicide over the prospect of living with murder on her hands time and time again, and The Shadow kills. When he kills, he does so without remorse, with unshakeable certainty. He hates death, he doesn't want lives to be at risk in the first place. But people will die if he doesn't do anything, and what he can do, what he exists to do, is turn the tools of evil against evil, and murder is the oldest tool of evil there is. He doesn't kill because a war scarred him, he doesn't kill because he's got a demon in his soul, he doesn't kill because he's mentally off balance, he doesn't kill because he's evil or sadistic or arrogant or anything of the sort. He kills because the men he fights chose death when they sought to harm innocents and fire guns at him. He kills because he is Death itself.

Regardless of how compassionate he is or can be, regardless of the fact that he's motivated by a desire to protect people, regardless of how justified he is, he is still dropping corpses and laughing maniacally doing so. Cass's real arch-enemy isn't Shiva or David Cain, it's Death, it's the thing that she's fundamentally most opposed to. And guess what The Shadow gets compared to often enough? Literally the very first line of the very first book where we get to see him, this is how we are introduced to him:

So the premise here is that we are taking a character who is defined by her fundamental opposition to death with every fiber of her being, who understands death on a level no other human being does, who is traumatized and hard-wired to detest death at all costs and to choose suicide over it, and asking her to team up with The Grim Reaper.

Even if he received the most abject lesson conceivable on the sheer wrongness of murder, even if he does put down the guns around Cass out of respect for her, he cannot protect his agents and others if he cannot shoot or kill those who try to harm them, and the protection of the agents is absolutely non-negotiable and not at all something he's willing to fuck around with by trying out gadget kung fu superhero alternatives. The Shadow has chosen to throw his life away for their sake time and time again, and no matter how appaling or disgusting Cass finds his deeds, even if he concedes that she's right and should be right on all accounts and that he is fundamentally a monster who has no right to judge others, he would not concede on his mission and he would make it very clear she would have to put him down violently to stop him from protecting others this way, and death has not stopped him before.

And to be upfront in case there's anyone who doubts it, Cass would kick The Shadow's ass, if they had to fight. She is the strongest fighter in the DCU, she lives and breathes fighting and combat in a way no one else does. And The Shadow's not one of those characters who is supposed to be invincible and the best at everything all the time always, he can and does lose fights and scrapes to people far less adept at it than Cass. He's a great fighter, obviously, he hauls bigger men than him through doors and was disabling people with Vulcan neck pinches decades before Spock, and he would definitely have an edge in other areas, but he's out of his league here. Frankly, I don't see The Shadow raising a finger against Cass unless she's been brainwashed into killing people by bad writing. Not because she's a woman, that doesn't really stop him from dealing with evil. But because, for one, she's practically a child compared to him age-wise. Two, he'd obviously know beforehand of her capabilities and how futile it would be to fight or even provoke her. And three, the Shadow's whole thing is knowing. The Shadow Knows and all that. Knowing comes with understanding.

He'd understand very quickly that there is no way someone this young could grow so quickly into the world's greatest fighter without horrific treatment that no one should ever be subjected to. He'd see the movements too practiced and quick, the self-control, the strength and speed far beyond even the trained warriors he's seen, the places where she's been scarred and is good at covering it up. Assuming he doesn't already know about her life story, any meeting between the two would lead to him very quickly figuring out that there's something much deeper about her opposition to killing than just moral reservations, something deeper than Bruce's own gun trauma.

Denny O'Neil's 2nd Batman and Shadow story was about The Shadow secretly helping Bruce overcome gun trauma, and Bruce rejecting The Shadow's intentions to hand him a gun. And to make it clear, people tend to assume that The Shadow only helps people for utilitarian reasons, which is not true as I've tried to demonstrate many times now. I don't want to convey that he would want to help Cass overcome her trauma just so she could be more efficient or something, absolutely no, he'd help her because he helps people in any way he can. I think a story with The Shadow and Cass might involve a similar premise, The Shadow understanding that she has been traumatized very deeply by death and refuses to accept it on any terms, trying to help her overcome it, only to learn that she does not want to "learn" anything she doesn't already know, that she has weaponized her trauma into a source of strength, and wishes nothing more than to help others with it.

And here's where we get to the part that allows the two to be on less antagonistic terms, because one thing that also very strongly defines Cass, at least the Cass I like reading most, is her stubborn, almost desperate need to believe in the best of people, that people can and will change for the better. Like The Shadow, her strength too is knowing, it's perception, the things that she knows about people that words cannot convey. Just as there are many things The Shadow would grow to understand about her that others would not, there would be many things that The Shadow would not be able to conceal from her. Things that no one but her would figure out. Things that, despite her age and lack of experience compared to him, he would have to defer to her knowledge on, which reverses the usual dynamic The Shadow has with people. And perhaps one aspect of that reversal, it's that maybe it's she who winds up secretly manipulating The Shadow into overcoming a deeper issue.

Cass's perspective on killing is shaped not just through trauma, but from a painfully intimate understanding of not just what happens to someone at the time of death, but the cost of murder upon the human soul, the ways it warps people into things they never should have been. Killing is a deeply, deeply serious matter, much more so than fiction seems ever willing to go into. Of course we suspend disbelief for fiction, there's nothing wrong with that, but if a story starts asking questions, starts poking holes into fantasies, they should not be disregarded.

And so it begs a question: How has it affected The Shadow? Is he really as remorseless as he appears to be? Is the fact that he's only killing evil people really of that much use? What's the cost of living as someone who has to know so much about so much evil in so many hearts? Knowledge never comes without price, and knowing evil is his tagline. When he enlists Harry Vincent, he makes it very clear that he has lost lives as he has saved them. From when is that regret coming from? What lives did he lose then? Is he saving people by damning his soul or merely prolonging the inevitable by piling corpses on another end of the scale?

If there's a character that could meaningfully start bringing these questions forth, who could ever truly get The Shadow to stop and reveal things to the audience he never would otherwise, maybe Cass could be that character. A girl who was raised to be a monster, who is treated as a monster and an aberration in-universe (and even outside of it), and turned that into a strength she uses to help others, who cares about everyone and refuses to let others be dehumanized as she was. Who better to know what lurks in the Shadow's heart?

Sometimes when I get an ask, I bullshit my way through infodump walls of text until I can structure it into something vaguely resembling a point. And sometimes, and I know it sounds crazy, but sometimes I get a very, very clear word on my mind related to it before I start writing, that almost seems to be a beacon pointing where I need to get to, and I work my way into getting there. Once you sent me an ask about crossing over The Shadow with Cassandra Cain, the word that came to mind the very second was Language.

It's an interesting relation the two have with language. Language is of course a very substantial part of Cass's character, who does not process language and linguistic development the way most people do, and instead reads body language to the point of superpower. Many stories revolve around Cass's relation to the concept of language, the help she may require from others in getting around things beyond her upbringing, and ways in which she has mastered beyond anyone's scope. Though she is mute, language is her power, what makes her what she is, and she is someone that Batman freely admits could kick his ass if she ever felt like it.

For The Shadow, language is also his power. He speaks all languages and connects allies all over the world, he is an expert ventriloquist, he is able to project his voice beyond what's physically possible, he can imitate voices perfectly to the point of being able to conduct group conversations single-handedly well enough to fool even the people whose voices he's imitating, much of his presence and terror and manipulation are done through his voice, arguably the very reason he exists in the first place is entirely because a radio actor's voice performance was so good and captivating that it tricked people into thinking the character was a real star and not just a glorified narrator. The man you cannot see, but only hear, the perfect hero for radio. And then of course the laugh, which I have a whole separate post on and which, in many ways, acts as a substitute for language in the novels. He uses the laugh so often as a substitute for statements or words, even to himself, that it's pretty much his own personal language. And language is at the core of how he deals with people, as he knows the right language to use to manipulate and move and help them. He knows what to promise, what to reveal, what to omit. He knows what to say, how to say it, when to say it. Language is the strings by which he puppeteers the world around him (and he can talk to animals, at least of one kind).

The Shadow and Cassandra Cain have mastered two different types of Language as throughly as anyone can possibly master them. The Shadow can talk a group of hardened criminals into killing themselves, Cassandra can punch a heart into stopping without killing it. The Shadow echoes his voice "through everywhere and nowhere at once" to whip crowds of thugs into frenzies, Cassandra outraces missiles and was tanking bullets as a child. The Shadow can lie and usurp lives so masterfully to fool even the families of those he's passing off as, Cassandra is a living lie detector who gleams inner conversations from miniscule reactions. The Shadow can speak every language known, Cassandra is the greatest master of the world's most universal language other than music. The two are supposedly human, but every now and then, something comes along to call that into question because of the things they can achieve. They cannot hide secrets from each other the way they do to everyone else. They are driven by a deep desire to help others, to make something out of the circumstances of their lives. To weaponize that which dictates they should be evil and monstrous into a relentless force of good.

Language is the root of understanding. And if nothing else, as impossible as a conciliation of their approaches to crimefighting may be, I think there could be an unique understanding between the two. Perhaps, and this is a bit crazier a concept but one that seems to be where I might have been heading towards all along, even Cassandra Cain finding a calling away from the frayed dynamics of the Batfamily, away from the Bat's looming presence, to become The Shadow's successor, swearing to uphold a mission of justice through non-lethal tactics while he stays on the backseat guiding her. If The Shadow could trust the safety of his agents and the protection of the innocent at the hands of someone as capable and selfless and good-natured as Cassandra, I think he'd be all too happy to be able to trust someone in such a manner, to no longer be the Master of Darkness, but instead to serve the next generation that's weaponized darkness without submerging in it. To achieve, and perhaps return, to his strongest, highest self: A disembodied voice heard, but not seen. Once again the narrator, not the star.

It's a concept I've thought about very extensively for the years I've been a Shadow fan, but now it occurs to me that, if I had to appoint a successor of The Shadow, someone who could take up the mission but shine on their own right, even improve it with the right guidance and circumstances, it would be Cassandra Cain. The Orphan, The Shadow of the Batgirl. Daughter of the greatest assassins, meant to be the world's most lethal murderer, instead pivoted to being one of it's greatest heroes, but never allowed to shine as she should. But in the darker, less restrictive and wilder world of pulp heroes, in The Shadow's world, a beacon would shine all the harder. Perfect strengths attached to perfect opposites, joined together for a greater good, unstoppable after together having weaponized that which most take for granted: the power of language to move worlds.

[karasu-hieis-dragon]

Closer - Tech!Reader Fic

                                                    Closer

Summary: THIS IS 18+ Please KEEP SCROLLING IF YOU ARE UNDER 18.

EXPLICIT.

You are a medic who was hired to take care of Clone Force 99 also known as The Bad Batch. You knew it was going to be an adventure but what you didn't know was that you would fall in love and end up in a relationship with the teams Engineer, Tech. You end up helping on a mission that ignites a feeling in Tech that he has never felt before when a flirtatious Senator gets too close to you. Smut ensues.

This could be seen as dub/con so I want to be very clear if you are triggered by aggressive men please don't read this. The premise of this fic is sweet, gentle Tech goes primal because he is jealous and he doesn't know how to handle it.

This is my first time writing smut.

Like, this took a lot for me to do.

Should I feel ashamed?

Ah screw it just enjoy the show.

CLOSER

Jealousy wasn’t a feeling Tech ever felt, it wasn’t an emotion that was ever necessary. Not until this very moment and he wasn’t sure how to handle it. You were a medic that was brought on to assist with the special ops clone team, it has been an adventure to say the least, but Tech wouldn’t have expected anything less, it was normal life for Clone Force 99. Now, what he didn’t expect was to fall in love with you and he absolutely never thought you would fall in love with him. Yet, here you both are, on a special ops mission that Tech felt you never should have been asked to be involved in. It was a special dinner party hosted by a Separatist Senator who had sensitive intel that the Republic needed, and the Bad Batch were brought in to retrieve it. Hunter assured Tech you would remain safe by his side and you, always head strong and caring, wanted to help. You had promised him you would stay safe; besides, you had been trained by the best for the last year and if trouble started you would be prepared.

Yet, it was Tech who wasn’t prepared, for the first time in his life, he didn’t know how to handle a situation. Tech and Crosshair were posted on a hill keeping watch through their sniper scopes and listening through the comms, ready to take out anyone who posed a threat. The evening was going smoothly so far that was until a drunk, handsy Senator decided to start flirting with you. He had zero care that Hunter, who was supposed to be your husband, was standing right there. Hunter, not wanting to blow the mission tried to keep his cool trusting you would know how to handle the situation and you did. You being the ever so calm one decided to play right into it. The Senator then took it a step too far by wrapping his arm around your waist and pulled you in close.

Crosshair could feel Tech tense up, he looked over and his finger was on the trigger, hand trembling. He reached over patting Tech’s shoulder knowing damn well he had that scope trained on the Senators head. “Trust her” Crosshair whispered. Tech took a deep breath, taking his finger off the trigger and it was at that moment you pushed away the Senator playfully saying “Now, now Senator, my husband is right here” flashing him a toothy smile. The Senator let out a hearty laugh “My apologies my hands have a mind of their own when a gorgeous woman is around” slapping Hunter on the back as he walked away yelling “You’re a lucky man!”.

The rest of the evening went without a hitch, you and Hunter were able to slip away, steal the data chip with the damning intel and slip out of the party unnoticed. All in all it was a perfect mission and you felt good about how you and Hunter handled everything, you couldn’t wait to get back to the Marauder to see Tech and to celebrate. When you and Hunter walked into the ship Crosshair, Wrecker and Echo were waiting with smiles and cheers.

But no Tech. Your smile dropped.

Hunter immediately felt the tension looking at Crosshair then to you. Crosshair motioned his head towards their rooms. “You may want to go talk to him.”

When you reached the door to his room your heart was pounding out of your chest. You weren’t sure what was actually wrong, and you were nervous to find out. You knock with shaky hands and a nervous voice which wasn’t like you but not knowing what the issue was had you on edge.3.

“Tech, it’s me.”

No answer.

“Please talk to me.”

Still no answer.

“I’m not going anywhere until you open this door.”

Silence.

Taking a deep breath, you raise your voice this time.

“TECH, I SWEAR TO THE MAKER IF YOU DON’T OPEN THIS DOOR I AM GOING TO HAVE WRECKER BREAK IT DOWN!”

You heard him sigh loudly then heavy footsteps.

The door swooshed open and as you stepped in you were ready to start yelling, your fists were balled up as you were fighting back tears. Tech was standing there staring at you with a look in his eyes that you couldn’t read and it sent chills down your spine. You went to open your mouth, but you never got the chance to get any words out because he was on you, gripping your neck, slamming you against the wall. Tech looked down at you, breathing heavy, pupils shot wide, he looked feral. Suddenly the hand that was holding your hip came up to grip your hair as his lips came crashing down on yours. The kiss was hungry, possessive and completely out of character for Tech and then it hit you.

He was jealous.

He was jealous of what happened on the mission with the Senator.

You should have been mad. You should have pushed him away. You should have fought back. How dare he not trust you!

But you were too busy loving this new primal side.

The heat between your legs proved it.

You wanted more, you wanted him to be possessive if this was the outcome. Yes, it was selfish but having him this feral was intoxicating. Tech let go of your neck and hair bringing his hands down to your ass, lifting you up so you could wrap your legs around his waist. Thankfully, he had stripped his armor off before you had shown up, so he was only in his blacks. You were sure he could feel the wetness between your legs through his pants especially since you were just in a dress and that was currently hiked up past your hips. He pushed you harder into the wall, his fingers dug into your ass cheeks, grinding his hard dick against your soaked panties.

He let out a moan into your mouth before he tore his lips away, bringing them to your ear, whispering in the most guttural low growl you have ever heard come out of his mouth.

“You’re. Mine.”

Then he bit into your neck, marking what was his, licking at the fresh wound, you smelled what you were sure was blood as he lapped it up. You dug your nails into his shoulders, throwing your head back with a yelp.

He pushed you harder against the wall, his hands coming up to the hem of your thin panties ripping them off you. You gasped at the sheer strength he was exuding; he was panting feverishly. He kept you pinned to the wall with his chest as he moved his hands to his pants to quickly yank them down just enough for his throbbing cock to be set free. Tech looked you in the eyes, there was a pleading behind the animalistic desire as we whispered.

“Tell me you’re mine.”  

You could barely speak, there was a lump in your throat, your mouth was dry and all you wanted was for him to claim you against this damn wall. But he had other plans. He brought his hand up to your neck again, he didn’t squeeze but he was letting you know he wanted you to say it, his beautiful hazel eyes still locked on yours.

“I asked you to say something Mesh’la.”

“I – I’m, I’m yours T-Tech” You let out breathlessly.

That elicited a wicked grin to form across his lips, then he leaned forward and whispered in your ear.

“That’s right cyar'ika, you are mine and no one else. Now, tell me, did you like it when that filthy, unworthy Senator was flirting with you? When he dared touch what is mine”

Tech’s voice was dripping with venom and lust and it was the sexiest thing you have ever heard.

He took his free hand and started stroking his dick, bringing it up to your dripping slit. You tried to push your hips down, to at least feel it against your clit but he was having no part of that. He was in control. He was punishing you. He tsked your attempt with a click of his tongue “My love, do you really think I am going to allow you any pleasure until I say?” Your mind was reeling, you couldn’t believe this was the same sweet, gentle Tech who makes love to you so tenderly and kisses you so lovingly. You wanted to answer him but it was difficult to even think clear. He was holding you up against the wall like you weighed nothing, the sheer strength was making you weak. He moved the head of his dick to your entrance but not before lightly rubbing it against your clit.

It snapped you out of your stupor.

“I won’t you ask again.” He was more stern this time.    

You forced yourself to find your voice weakly whispering. “No, I - uh - I hated it Tech b-but w-we were on a mi-on a mission.”

He looked at you in the eyes again “Tell me who you belong to.”

“You Tech, only you! Please, I need you inside me, I need you to mark me as yours, please.” You cried out, begging him to finally fuck you.

The look in is eyes changed, you saw something in him snap and then without warning he was slamming his hard cock into your dripping cunt. You screamed his name as he buried himself inside you, he gave you a moment to adjust to his thick member splitting you open but he only allowed a moment then he was wrapping his hand around your neck again as he pulled almost all the way out only to slam back into you again, this time setting an unrelenting pace. With each hard thrust he breathlessly chanted “You. Are. Mine. Mesh’la.”

It was music to your ears.

You start to feel the familiar twisted heat building in your stomach, your walls clenching around him, you were close and he knew it. Tech slowed to a stop, tightening the grip he had around your neck, you closed your eyes trying to keep the tears from falling.

“Look at me cyar'ika” He coos. You opened your eyes knowing he wouldn’t continue unless you did. The tears starting to gather in the corners of your eyes. He leaned in and kissed them away.

“I love you, mesh’la but you don’t get to cum until I tell you.”

Before you realize what is going on, he has pulled out of you and tossed you onto his bed. Tech removes his blacks in one swift motion tossing them across the room then he starts working on your dress, ripping the silky fabric into two. “As beautiful as you looked in this I don’t want anything on you that was touched by that disgusting Senator” He yanked it out from under you throwing it as far away from your body as he could. Looking down at you completely wrecked he thought you were the most beautiful creature he has ever seen. He did this to you, sweet, shy Tech who couldn’t even look you in the eyes the first few months you joined them has completely destroyed you and he wasn’t even finished with you yet. You should have realized one of these days this would come out of him, he was a clone, he was made with this warrior DNA.

You were snapped out of your thoughts by Tech roughly pushing your legs open and licking a slow and deliberate lick up your slit. You gasped at the sudden sensation, hands flying to his hair, urging him closer.

“Ah, ah, ah, use your words mesh’la”

Bastard

“Maker, Tech, please, I need to cum, please!” You scream, you couldn’t care less that the rest of the guys could hear and I doubt Tech cared either. “Pl-Please, Maker please Tech, let me cum.”

“Good girl, now was that so hard?” He says with a muffled growl. Tech doesn’t give you a chance to respond pushing two fingers into your aching cunt and latches onto your clit with his lips. You scream out his name, clawing at his arms, it doesn’t take much before you are clenching around his fingers crying out his name as you cum so hard you are seeing white. You’re try to buck your hips up against his face. You’re trying to pull away. You’re clawing at his arms. Your screams can’t escape your throat. You are a mess. The efforts are futile though, he is holding you down with his free hand, making you ride your orgasm out on his fingers and tongue. It’s too much and not enough all at once and all you knew is that you wanted him in you.

As if reading your mind and apparently taking pity on you he kisses his way up your body, landing on your lips letting you taste yourself. This kiss was different though, it was gentle and sweet, the usual Tech kiss, it was home. He pushed into you slowly, calculated and it took your breath away. He pulled his face back bringing his hand to cup your face.

“I love you, cyra’ika”

You let out a breathy “I love you too, Tech”

He started moving into you, setting a gentle pace, his eyes never left yours, whispering sweet words, telling you how beautiful you, how good you are for him, how much he loves you. This is the Tech you know, the Tech you are familiar with and the Tech you prefer. Making love to this man, this special Clone is unlike anything you have ever experienced, and you wouldn’t change a thing about him. Tech started to move faster, harder but he never stopped looking in your eyes, he could feel you were getting close again. He reached down to where the two of you met and gently started rubbing your clit.

“Cum again for me my love, I need to feel you soak my dick.”

That’s all it took, you came hard again, you didn’t have the voice to scream his name you just dug your nails into his back as you rode it out.

“Thank you, mesh’la , you are so beautiful when you cum all over my hard cock.” His voice was strained, you could tell he was struggling to keep his control.

“Pl-please cum for me, T-Tech, I need you to cum in me, mark me as yours.”

That’s all Tech needed to hear, he rested his forehead against yours and started thrusting hard into you, incoherent whispers escaping his lips. It didn’t take very long before he was growling your name, shooting his hot cum inside you, coating your tight walls. He lowered his lips to yours and whispered how much he loved you. Softly kissing you between each gentle word he breathed out. You both stayed that way until he was finally soft and your breathing had returned to normal. He gave you one final kiss before pulling out of you and grabbing a towel to clean you up. He kept telling you how proud he was of you for how you handled yourself on the mission as he cleaned you up, reminding you how much he trusted you. He laid down next to you, pulling you close to him.

“I am so sorry I reacted the way I did but when he touched you something in me snapped.”

“I understand, Tech, I really do, if another woman did that to you I can’t say I wouldn’t have reacted the same.”

“I trust you, I hope you know that?”

“I know you do, Tech”

He paused taking a deep breath, you could feel him tense up. “Did I did I hurt you, mesh’la?” He pulls you in tighter to him and your heart broke, you could tell he was ashamed.

“No, my love, I would be lying if I said I didn’t enjoy it but let’s not make the jealousy a habit. You can still be possessive here but out in public I want you to trust me to make the right decisions. I love you and I will never do anything to betray that.”

Then you both were rattled by a hearty banging on the door making you both jump. “ARE YOU TWO DONE MAKING UP IN THERE?!” Followed by Wrecker absolutely losing his shit laughing, followed by Hunter yelling at him to leave us alone, followed by Crosshair threatening to shoot Wrecker from ten clicks away.

You both smiled at each other and laughed, these guys were your life and you wouldn’t change a damn thing.

[khaotic-kitsunes]

I wanna know why you only ever write for female readers? Ones that blush a lot too? POC don't blush and you should know better the way you write erases lgbtq and POC

You know, I really didn’t know how to respond to this at first. I mean, I was angry, sure. Upset that this might be what people thought of my writing...but that was this morning, when I first saw the message.

I took the whole day off writing to cool myself off, didn’t wanna reply thoughtlessly and land myself in shit. I tend to get worked up really easily, something I’m working on actually. Self-improvement and whatnot.

And let me tell you, after an entire fucking day thinking about how I should respond without cursing you out, because maybe. Just MAYBE you were trying to do some kind of good deed? I dunno, don’t really care either.

Also, just gonna chuck it under a “keep reading” because this gets LONG. I have some opinions I’d like the sender of this anon to read but I’d hate to clog up people’s dash.

Now, to get on with my answer because hell, I suppose I should address the question. When I started a blog called Kinky Academia a couple years ago now, way back before I left, I had someone say something similar to you regarding the whole “POC don’t blush” and now I can confidently claim: bullshit.

Absolute fucking bullshit.

I actually remember a lot of the advice I was given way back then because it had genuinely upset me that I wasn’t writing correctly when mentioning the whole blushing ordeal. It’s something that I enjoy adding in my scenarios because people blush for MANY different reasons. Anger, embarrassment and the obvious reason, attraction.

So, taking in a lot of the advice that was sent to me through that blog, I immediately cast out the way I wrote people blushing. There was no more “your cheeks turned a crimson red” or pink, or whatever the fuck I wrote back then.

Instead, I write things along the lines of “your face heated up” or “You could feel your cheeks burning with embarrassment”

Shit. Like. That.

To include people no matter what colour they are, mostly because I don’t give a crap what colour skin you have. Unless it’s sunburn...cause, y’know, sunburn sucks and I’d hate to accidentally touch someone with sunburn. I live in Australia, sunburn sucks fucking arse!

Anyway, moving on with my point. Which was that everyone can blush you absolute twat. Might not be as noticeable but most people can feel when their faces heat up, because humans are amazing and can feel temperatures and shit like that. Cool, right?

So that’s gonna put a screeching holt to the whole “POC don’t blush” bullshit you were spouting.

Now, as for why I write for female readers? Because it makes me comfortable. That okay with you?

I would like to clarify that though because it almost sounds really bad and I don’t mean it in a bad way. I don’t care if you’re a member of the LGBTQ+ community, it’s not my business who you fall in love with or how you identify. Okay? If you wanna fall in love with someone, by all means do so. Find that special someone and love them with everything you have, be happy!

When I say it makes me comfortable to write for female readers, I mean that as a female, it’s easier for me to write for female characters. When I’m writing, the words I write? The scenes I describe? I can picture it all in my head, plays like a movie usually.

It’s impossible for me to write for a trans person because I don’t know how they feel things, what would trigger them, the methods they go through for their um process? I hope that’s the right word...oh, no, transition sorry! The methods that they go through for their transition.

I have absolutely zero fucking clue about all that and while I could go to members of the LGBTQ+ community and ask them about it so that I know, so that I could write it. I don’t feel right doing that. 

Life is a bitch, it’s hard and it can be painful and it is absolutely none of my business what a person has done to get where they are currently. So yeah, rather than run around asking people about their personal business and life experiences, I stick to what I feel comfortable writing.

I write female reader scenarios that generally end up getting dicked down some way or another. I even do my best not to specify eye colour, hair length, what size the reader is (though I’m always happy to write for any kind of body type if it’s specified. No hate, I’m a big girl.)

Basically what I’m trying to say is that you can either enjoy my writing or hate it...and if you hate it, then you should really just move on to another blog rather than come hassle me about shit that I don’t think you fully grasp.

Because if you did fully understand what you said to me, I don’t think you would have sent it. It was crude, misinformed and frankly, not something I deserved to have sent to me? All I do is write scenarios and post about my collections, nothing terrible. I’m not spouting off hate for these communities, I’m not causing anyone any trouble; I’m just having some fun on Tumblr and AO3.

I would appreciate it if you backed the fuck off.

🥃 AO3 🥃

Cheeky Kitsune 🦊💋

[angels-heap]

Okay hello I feel like you are Wise and Know things... it’s kind of hard to explain but is it wrong to just... Enjoy Things? With all the HL pisscourse going around it’s making me nervous about liking things like TF2 and missing something critical and huge in the media I consume and being labelled as a bad person for doing that. ESPECIALLY for liking characters like GLaDOS or Wheatley from Portal. I want to just Enjoy Things but there’s guilt tied to not being critical about every single detail

Thanks for reaching out, friend, and I’m so sorry to hear the current nonsense has you feeling this way. I have a hunch you’re not alone, and although I don’t claim to have all the answers here, I hope hearing my thoughts on this helps alleviate some of that guilt. This got long and I’m not putting it under a cut because it’s important. 

The short answer to your question is no; it is not wrong to just enjoy things. You don’t have to constantly examine all your favorite media under a microscope and incessantly highlight or dwell on its faults to be a good person or a good consumer of media, and here are a few reasons why:

(CW for brief mentions of all the squicky/potentially triggering things that tend to come up in ship discourse conversations.)

1. It is virtually impossible to find a truly unproblematic piece of media.

And that’s okay! Media is both created and consumed by people, and people are notoriously imperfect and complex. Sometimes creators choose to explore dark or taboo themes that are always going to squick some people out, no matter how well (or poorly) they’re handled. Sometimes content creators are actually terrible people who deliberately try to perpetuate their messed-up ideas through media. Sometimes creators’ deeply internalized prejudices seep into a work in a way they may not even consciously realize. Sometimes consumers’ experiences or prejudices color the way they perceive a piece of media and may lead them to a very different interpretation than what the creators intended.

Point is, there are a lot of shades of gray here. We should always strive to do better as creators and consumers, but the goalposts for “perfection” are always moving.

There’s almost always going to be something about your favorite media—no matter how benign it is—that rubs some people the wrong way, or (perhaps unintentionally) perpetuates harmful stereotypes, or starts out okay but doesn’t age well down the line. Period. That’s an uncomfortable truth that we all have to sit with. But don’t despair, because…

2. It is still okay to engage with and enjoy media that you know is problematic. Even if it’s really problematic. For real. I promise. The media you consume does not determine your worth as a person. 

Since you specifically mentioned Valve games, I’ll start out by clarifying that (as of July 2020), Valve games and their fandoms are pretty benign overall. Perhaps in the future, more of the humor will start to age poorly, or Valve will make some extremely questionable design choices with their next game, or Gabe Newell will be outed as a prolific serial killer, or whatever, but for now, there’s really nothing about Valve games that should make the average person go, “holy shit, you’re into that?!” when you bring them up in polite company. (And anyone who insinuates otherwise re: Half Life shipping discourse is either very confused about the definition of certain words or is maliciously trying to stir up controversy.)

That said, everyone has a different threshold for what they do and don’t want to see in media, and those boundaries are totally valid! But it is absolutely possible to enjoy even notably problematic media (e.g., Game of Thrones, the new Star Wars sequels, old movies where the directors were huge assholes to the female cast members, etc.) without being a bad person or a bad social justice activist. Instead of rambling about that at length, I’m going to link you to this excellent blog post on the subject.

The big takeaway here is that you can love a piece of media while also acknowledging its faults. In fact, I’d argue that a key part of loving something is being able to think critically about it and trying to hold its creators to a higher standard whenever possible. However, that doesn’t mean you have to be constantly analyzing it or prefacing every single public acknowledgment of your love for it with an “I know this is problematic and I swear, I just like it for XYZ” disclaimer, because…

3. Tumblr’s black-and-white thinking about media consumption is not healthy, “normal,” or (usually) present to the same degree in other virtual or real-world spaces.

I think most of the people on Tumblr who seem to be on a constant (and ultimately futile; see point 1) quest to find the One True Unproblematic Media have good intentions. I really do. And I applaud them for actively trying to understand and un-learn their own biases while becoming critical consumers of media.

Unfortunately, for a bunch of complicated reasons I still don’t totally understand and won’t get into here, some online communities tend to take these things to such an extreme that, in their quest to create a safe and/or inclusive environment, they actually end up creating an even more hostile one. To reference the recent drama again, nowhere is that more apparent than with “pro-ship” vs. “anti-ship” discourse.

Basically, “pro-shippers” believe that fiction is entirely separate from reality and therefore, “problematic” content (up to and including p*dophilia, inc*st, noncon, etc.) has just as much of a right to exist as any other content; this makes some sense on a purely intellectual level, but in the real world, obviously things are much more complicated than that. “Anti-shippers,” on the other hand, claim to be specifically against the aforementioned Big Three Bad Things in theory, but in practice, they’re basically the fandom purity police; they strive to criticize and shut down any media or fandom activity that could be even remotely construed as problematic, because they seem to have a (perhaps well-intentioned but ultimately misguided) perception that discussing anything “bad” in fiction will glorify/condone/promote it in real life and that all creators of “bad” fiction are inherently malicious. Often, they’re willing to twist definitions and jump through some very strange hoops to justify why something is “bad.”

The truth lies somewhere between those two extremes; fiction absolutely can (and does) impact reality, but not in such a clear-cut cause-and-effect way. People can see or read about dark/complicated/problematic things without condoning or enjoying them in real life, and conversely, people can dislike even relatively benign things without having to have an extreme, profound reason for feeling that way. People can also enjoy “bad” media while being fully conscious of what’s wrong with it and taking steps to ensure that it doesn’t negatively influence them, or they may lack the knowledge/context to understand why something is “bad” at first and change how they engage (or don’t engage) as they learn. There’s a lot more nuance to this issue than Tumblr is willing to acknowledge, and as a result, a lot of innocent people who just want to enjoy things in peace get sucked into some truly absurd drama that can be really hard to deal with. And that sucks. A lot.

So, TL;DR: Almost all media is at least a little problematic, but that’s okay, because the media you like does not determine whether or not you’re a good person. (And especially if your primary interests are Valve games... you’re good, mate. Seriously.)

The fact that you’re even asking me this question shows me that you’re being a thoughtful, responsible consumer of media, and that’s all anyone can reasonably ask of you without being a gigantic hypocrite—because whether they’ll admit it or not, everybody who’s perpetuating this discourse both on and offline likes something “problematic.” It’s impossible not to, unless you live under a rock and consume exactly zero media. Take care, and try not to let the discourse get to you! Go forth and enjoy things! (As always, my inbox is open for follow-up questions.)

ETA: Here’s another excellent tumblr post on this topic! And another one! 

[threeletterslife]

chana, what are some of your pet peeves while reading a story? like things such as bad grammar. btw i love your works!!

god i love this question so much. and thank you for reading! 🥺🥺🥺i really appreciate the love!

i’m seriously going to sound like a grumpy ol’ bitch saying this but i have a LOT of pet peeves lol. i have such specific, meticulous taste that it’s hard for me to find stories (internet fics and irl books alike) that pertain to my weirdass standards 😀

quick disclaimer! just because i don’t like some of these popular/infamous/adored tropes doesn’t mean they’re not bad at all! remember, i’m just rEALLy picky! here goes:

fake dating. (i hate it. i can’t stand it when a story’s main idea is fake dating. i just can’t seem to understand why anyone would want to fake date. the scenarios always seem so bs-ed or middle school-esque to me. but someone is always welcome to prove me wrong.)

bad grammar. (this one speaks for itself. i can’t stand bad grammar. this doesn’t mean i’ll jump on you if you make oNE little mistake <because, i mean, we’re all human, you know>. but if the grammar mistakes are consistent... and far too many... i will be pissed 😀😀😀) honorary mention common mistakes: every day vs everyday; your vs you’re; .” vs ”. ; affect vs effect; anymore vs any more; their vs they’re vs there; lay vs lie; except vs accept; then vs than; -- vs —

bland/generic y/n. (i love writing in 2nd pov. but just because this ‘y/n’ character doesn’t technically have a name... doesn’t mean... she isn’t allowed to have a personality. a bland or mary sue-type y/n with zero dimension can single-handedly deter me from reading the rest of the story. remember, y/n deserves a personality too 😭😭)

starting the story with “I woke up in my bed after hearing my eomma call my name from downstairs.” (this is just a very specific pet peeve of mine that triggers my fight or flight. i’m blaming this on wattpad.)

using honorifics and romanized korean. (this is going to be very controversial. but... i think it kinda has to be said. i do not want to read an english story that is very obviously not set in korea and have to go through words like “eomma” “oppa” “jagi” “saranghae” “hyung” “jimin-ah” “taehyung-ie” “unnie” “noona” and sometimes a whole SENTENCE in romanized korean. as someone who is korean, i find it—for the lack of a better word—cringy. because of some of the stories i’ve seen, i can’t even speak my own language sometimes without cringing. you could NEVER catch me calling my older cousins “oppa” anymore even though i’m supposed to out of literal respect and culture. and it’s thanks to the fact that some (thankfully, a minority of) fanfiction authors romanticize/sexualize it. don’t even get me started on my younger cousins/siblings calling me “noona.” i wanna d-word every time i hear it because it’s been so sexualized in the ff community that i just don’t feel comfortable with them calling me that for platonic/respectful reasons. but i digress. if i can tell the author has done research and it is written well and correctly and in a non-sexualized manner, then i don’t have a problem with it. still wouldn’t read though 😭😭)

idol au’s. (also controversial. but this is mainly my fault LMAO. once upon a time, long ago, little chana first stumbled upon bangtan and decided she wanted to venture into the fanfiction world for them. her first fanfiction was a jungkook idol au. and now she will probably never write another idol au again because she is scarred. but seriously. idol au’s make me want to cry inside because 1. they’re unrealistic 2. the writers usually do little to no research on korea/the music industry 3. personal (humiliating) history 😔which again, is totally on me. i feel like this pet peeve of mine is unjustifiable tho lmao. a lot of people adore idol au’s. but i just can’t get into them)

adding photos in the middle of the story. (this just boils my blood for no reason i’m sorry 😭😭to me, it seems unprofessional. BOOKS may have illustrations. but only if the illustrations are showing a SCENE that the writing describes. not necessarily an outfit. usually, when internet authors put photos in their stories, it’s to show the ootd/makeup/hairstyle/what y/n is supposed to look like. i’m personally not into that. i think that should all be up to the reader’s imagination! that’s why we read, isn’t it? to be able to create our own faces and scene layouts from scratch!)

social media au’s. (VERY controversial. and kinda ironic since i’ve actually made a whole ass text fic. but lemme tell you it was not fun and i will never do it again 😭i don’t know. i’m not very big on social media lol. and a possible romance developing from such unauthentic apps like instagram, twitter, snapchat doesn’t sit right with me. i’m more into traditional/authentic romance! the kind where you sit down face to face and talk and giggle for hours—without the presence of devices)

a bad ending. (man this one’s a very personal pet peeve of mine. imagine slaving away reading a 100k+ fic just to find out the ending is abrupt, the strings are left untied and your favorite character just... dies. for no reason at all. i hate that feeling of no closure. a bad ending doesn’t necessarily mean a SAD one. i prefer sad/angsty endings to a happily ever after. but i think the ending makes up the whole story. and to have a good ending, the ending must somehow still connect to the rest of the story.)

character inconsistencies. (i love character development as much as the dude next door but just because a character does a 180 out of nowhere doesn’t mean they actually developed at all. real people take time to change!!)

when there are author’s notes IN THE MIDDLE of the story. (believe it or not, i’ve seen this happen. it interrupts the flow of the plot and it looks unprofessional. and the fact that i used to do this when i first started writing ff’s bYE—)

when the romance escalates from 0 to 100. (i’m guilty of this. but it’s also a pet peeve of mine to read something like this LOL. but i get it. writing subtle developments in romance is hard 😭😭but it doesn’t excuse itself from being one of my major pet peeves 😀😀)

when mental illness, domestic abuse, trauma is romanticized. (this is a given, i think. don’t romanticize someone else’s struggles for your fictional pleasure, please!!)

telling instead of showing. (probably one of the biggest pet peeves of mine. too often, i see writers outright telling me that their oc is ‘independent’ and ‘strong’ or that oc and jimin’s romance is ‘unparalleled.’ but if i don’t feel that from the writing itself, i’m not going to be able to believe it. but if you show me that oc is independent and that oc and jimin are meant to be with little scenarios and anecdotes, that’s gonna be a lot more effective!)

when’s there’s no chemistry between the couple. (this is probably everyone’s pet peeve LMAO)

the “oh no! there’s only one bed!” trope. (i never understood this because. damn just take the couch or sleep on the floor. OR just sleep in the same bed with a pillow barrier. it’s literally not a big deal 😭unless 👀 idk this one 100% depends on execution)

and i saved the worst for last:

when you read 50+ chapters for an ‘ongoing’ fic but when you get to the ‘end’... you realize it’s been discontinued since 2017 😀😀😀(the pain is fucking real y’all)

um.... that was a lot 😭😭i’m sorry. i actually thought i’d be a lot pickier, but i guess i’m actually really lenient on types of tropes and au’s. i’m okay with basically 99.9% of all tropes (yes, including vampire, abo, love triangle, etc) because i believe all tropes depend solely on EXECUTION. so generally, i keep an open mind. (with the exception of fake dating, idol au’s, social media au’s and the tHeRe’S oNlY oNe bEd trope lmaoo) 

basically, i’m quick to give things a chance but quick to leave too 😔😔

i swear i have more penchants than pet peeves 😭😭but that’s a story for another time!!

[thistangledbrain]

Ok y’all, I’m sorry I’m having to catch up! We got a new foster in a few days ago - a particularly broken soul - and my mind has been *entirely* on him. But he’s settling in a little now, so here’s the last 3 days in one post ��️

Autism Acceptance Month

Day 10!

“Sensory Life”

This is sort of hard to describe, but I’ll try! This is different from the next entry about stims, though both are sensory related.

It’s like being on microdosed ‘shrooms *all the time*. If you don’t know what that’s like, I’ll try to describe (this is collaborated with a friend who regularly does this - I don’t...it would probably be far too overwhelming).

Colors are far sharper to me & I emotionally react to them far more than most people. That results in some colors being genuinely offensive - not just “I don’t like that color”, but it will make me intensely angry or physically sick. This makes me curious about chromotherapy, but I haven’t really looked into it that much. My tolerance of certain colors can ebb and flow depending on my emotional state/mindset. (This crap is so sharp, I’m actually getting a twinge of irritation just *thinking* about my most hated colors LOL 😂 🤦🏻‍♀️)

Textures/skin sensations are another big one. (By now you may be asking, how TF did this chick manage Marine Corps training/exercises?!) I guess if you want something bad enough, you can shut down some of the overwhelming aspects of the sensory thing...this ability to disassociate probably isn’t what NT’s would call “healthy”, but it’s quite handy if you’re autistic, and those of us who have been through real trauma seem to be especially skilled with our ability to just shut off all circuits and “embrace the suck”). Like...I’ll nearly panic to get out of a store or something if my underwear starts feeling uncomfortable, but I’ve literally been soaked head to toe, covered in mud and sand in my *everywhere* (and I HATE SAND anywhere but on my feet) AND I pissed myself, because nobody’s gonna stop shooting/training just because you have to go potty 🙄), and I remember literally giving zero fucks about it...so it really is entirely a mindset thing. But let’s talk about when I’m NOT in “Marine mode” (cuz let’s face it, it’s been close to two decades since I got out, and I no longer HAVE to tolerate overwhelming sensations).

Sensory input is just basically dialed to 11 & the knob’s been snapped off. Bright lights, loud discordant noises, too much touching/not touching the right way, things like that. I am particularly sensitive about body hair (my own). I *strongly* prefer to have my head shaved on the back and sides (but I leave the top long). The only time I haven’t done this, was in the Marines (it was considered “eccentric” and not allowed, so they made me grow it out). Even though I leave the main part long, it’s *always* in a bun or ponytail - well, unless I’m super dressed up for something, but even then I prefer some sort of updo. Despite the fact that I like my long hair (well on the top anyway), I can’t *stand* the way it feels on my neck or especially my face - I HATE IT when my hair touches my face. If I wasn’t married...there’s a decent chance I’d just shave it all off and be done with it LOL 😆 My ponytail pulled through the back of a baseball hat is I guess what they’d call my “signature look”.

And you think NT’s have bad misophonia? *I’ve jumped out of a moving vehicle before* to get away from the noise of someone chewing loudly/smacking their lips in the back seat (he was a coworker and punching him in the mouth - which is what I DESPERATELY wanted to do - would have gotten me fired 😕)...but humans eating, or dogs licking their junk, makes me want to crawl out of my own skin. It’s mostly humans though....you have *no idea* the level of self discipline it takes to keep me from either rage crying or actually getting violent around someone smacking their mouth during a meal. I *cannot* be around my husband when he’s eating breakfast cereal even though he’s a very mannered eater - I don’t know why, but it’s *so loud* (and I’m terribly hard of hearing) - it sounds like he’s chewing rocks. It took us years to work this problem out LOL - he thought it was dumb that I had such a deeply emotional reaction. Then he tried to “chew quietly”, which all that did was slow down the rock tumbler inside his mouth 😂...gradually, for everyone’s sanity, we realized that cereal eating should not be done in close proximity to each other lololol....and now, when it’s time for family meals around the table, I’ve learned to either keep the range hood fan going (white noise is definitely my friend), or have the TV on. If it’s just mainly the sound of everyone chewing, I simply won’t eat at the table. I lose my appetite. (And all of my dinner guests/family are very polite diners. It’s MY hangup.) Phone calls are another big one. I could probably come up with several reasons why I hate it...I LOATHE it. This is one sensory hangup some people in my family just refuse to accept. I don’t think they realize I equate unexpected or immediately demanded phone calls to running naked though a mall or getting a root canal. Hissssssssss!! Give me some time to prepare myself for this shit please - you’re actually asking a *lot* from me. (And when I do have a call? Ugh I babble and am so awkward, because I’m so effing uncomfortable, which I also hate.)

But here’s an area where my “sensory overload” serves me very well:

Dogs.

I am usually *intensely* dialed into the energy and body language of an animal, but particularly dogs. I’m *so* sensitive to them, that I often actually can feel things even happening behind my back - can basically sense the energy in the area shift. (Roughly 75% of the time. I’m spacey sometimes too LOL.) The work I do with “behaviorally challenged” dogs is the biggest area where I am *grateful* for my autistic mind. I don’t think I could really do the things I do without it, successfully. (I can do this to a large degree with people as well, as can my youngest son. You cannot lie to that boy about your feelings or mood.)

We all have different levels of sensory sensitivity and different triggers, but every autistic I know has several “sensory hangups”. It often is one of our biggest hurdles to deal with, when it comes to “normal functioning”. So, many of us constantly have headphones (or muffs) on, some of us wear sunglasses *all the time*, etc (I wear a baseball hat - and I genuinely don’t like going anywhere where I have to get dressed up and can’t wear my hat. Been like that since my early teens. That hat shields me from all sorts of real and imagined sensory triggers.) You do what you can to mitigate, you know? But my “microdosing shrooms” and “knob dialed to 11 and snapped off” is really the best way I can summarize. (And that’s not all bad - my trips into a new natural space, like the redwoods, is an absolute *thrill*. I also occasionally love sensory overload - many auties do - like rollercoasters. My youngest son and I can ride till we pass out LOL!) So sensory life is love/hate, really....but I don’t think I’d change much about it.

Except the fucking misophonia. I hate that I go into almost a murderous rage over someone just chewing food loudly 🤦🏻‍♀️ - but seriously. It’s impolite anyway. Don’t do it. 😆

———————————————————

Day 11!

Stims

This is one of the biggest areas where neurotypicals struggle to understand us.

We all have stims. Stims are basically any stimulus that brings us joy or comfort. It could be rocking, flapping, walking in tight little circles, clicking your fingernails together, spinning, making weird sounds or whistling, etc. And it’s usually repetitive - that’s the part that gets on people’s nerves.

I’ve found that most *women* hide most of our stims. We only let go and stim our little hearts out when we’re alone. I do that, because some of my stims grate on my husband. Sometimes I don’t WANT to feel “watched” anyway...I’ve noticed males don’t have quite the same issue with that.

I have quiet stims I do to soothe myself, and happy stims. One of my quieter stims when I’m trying to soothe myself (like in public) is clicking my teeth, particularly my right canines. I also have this silicone bite stick I wear around my neck sometimes, that I chew on (my sons like the bite sticks as well). I carry a little bag of fidget toys in my purse, to soothe myself with when I’m stressed. There’s a thing sort of like a fidget cube, a little cowrie shell and twine bracelet that I fiddle with almost like a rosary, a small stuffed axolotyl (her name is Blossom), and a few other toys. My little stash also comes in damn handy when I encounter a bored child LOL!

One of my sons makes funny little sound effects randomly (and he’s grown & still does it). The other used to randomly shriek when he was younger - then he learned how to whistle, so he couldn’t say a whole sentence without punctuating it with little whistles (we actually thought it was adorable).

My favorite stim is putting my headphones on, putting on some favorite music, sitting with my legs crossed, closing my eyes, and rocking. I’m happy to TELL you about this stim, but it’s one I do alone, because I like to get completely lost in it and I can’t do that if I feel I’m being watched...and you’ll damn near give me a heart attack if you touch me while I’m lost in that world. (And boy does it irritate me to get yanked out of that before I’m ready, for some bullshit non emergency reason.) Better to just isolate myself (except my dogs are always with me). Another one I do alone - and I have no idea why i like it so much - is squeaking my bite stick across my teeth. (This one is weird to me because I usually HATE my teeth being touched...yes dentists are a problem.) This one I enjoy doing kind of mindlessly while I read, but damn would it irritate anyone in listening distance LOL...I mean, it would irritate the shit out of ME if someone else was doing it, because *other people’s* repetition, especially if it makes noise, gets on my damned nerves. 🙄 Figures lmao!

Stims can be damaging sometimes, though. Like I used to twist and twirl my hair when I was younger so much that the areas I usually grabbed were frayed and broken (I also chewed my hair sometimes). One stim I cannot break myself of even though sometimes it’ll make me bleed, is chewing the insides of my cheeks or my lips. That’s my most frequent (several times a day) one, and the one that is both gratifying *and* soothing. It’s also the one that’s hardest to suppress.

Some auties are either unaware or literally don’t care how you feel about their stims, but I am and do. I’d like to think I’m pretty “appropriate” *most* of the time with my stims and other people around, except the lip/cheek chewing. If my husband notices I’ve gotten pretty furious about it (even using my hand to push my cheek into optimal biting position), he’ll gently put his hands on mine to bring me back to awareness - if I’m gnawing away, I’m either super stressed or way lost in thought. Either way, I can accidentally hurt myself, so he gently guides me away/distracts me.

Stimming is an important part of Autie life and should not be discouraged unless it hurts Your Pet Autie ™️.

And if you’re looking for a neat gift for an Autie? They actually make stim toy packs. Get them one, they’re fun. ☺️ (Most stim toys are designed to withstand being put in mouths and bitten/chewed, too - LOTS of us have oral fixations.) And hey, even if you’re a NT, try stimming sometime (lots of normal people have stims, they just don’t realize that’s what they are - like nail biting. Bite your nails a lot? Get a bite stick!! God they’re so satisfying!)....

Happy stimming!

———————————————-

Day 12!

“Favorite Autism Charity”

This one is short and easy: ASAN. Autism Self Advocacy Network.

“The Autistic Self Advocacy Network is a nonprofit organization run by and for individuals with autism. According to its mission statement, the Network’s goal is ‘to empower autistic people across the world to take control of our own lives and the future of our common community, and seek to organize the autistic community to ensure our voices are heard in the national conversation about us.’”

————————————————-

Day 13!

“Family”

Well that’s kinda ambiguous, isn’t it? 😒

I’ll start with this tack:

Being an autistic mom with autistic kids.

I mean for years, none of us KNEW LOL - and maybe that’s what took me so long to get around to pursuing a formal diagnosis for my youngest. To me, for the longest time, he was just sensitive and different like me (same with my oldest, for the most part, but I’m pretty sure that was me buying into the “brilliant people are just fucking weird ok” mindset also), yannow? So it was like, “well mama always told me I’d have one like me & then know what I put her through” 🙄 My oldest got lumped into the “all bright kids are quirky” category - but as I learned about ASD through my youngest and myself, it became damn obvious the oldest was also in our camp. (He’s taken the prelim test now anyway, but is not formally diagnosed.) I genuinely believe that our “shared weirdness” binds us very tightly to each other - and I’m super pleased about that.

It brought a whole new level of understanding and awareness within our little family when we realized it was ASD I guess - and acceptance. (I 100% believe that diagnosis - or even affirmation - is critical to our self acceptance and understanding.) I wouldn’t trade my little family for anything, and consider myself remarkably blessed. I can talk about how complex and brilliant my boys are ALL day (and often do LOL). Hubby is neurodivergent, and can identify with (or at least sympathize with) MANY of our hangups....but he’s “normal” enough that he’s been able to guide us (mostly me) with things like how to use tact (not often a skill we naturally possess lmao). My heart breaks when I read posts by auties whose families either don’t understand or don’t accept them & are constantly trying to basically mute who they are. Auties “live out loud”, and some people find that off putting. I know growing up, I was constantly getting my ass chewed for being “dramatic” or too sensitive, too, so I shut down and hid my sensitivity far, far away. I’m only *lately* (last few years) discarding that silly tough girl mask. (I can still be quite the little wolverine at times, but I’m not afraid to show my soft sensitive actual self anymore...to stay soft in today’s fucked up world takes actual courage - a lot of it - and strength. I was looking at the concept of being “strong” entirely the wrong way.)

I swear my husband has lived with nearly as many phases and facets, as years we’ve been together. Sometimes I ask him if this ever bothers him. He says no, because who I am at my core never changes...and he grins and says “and you damn sure aren’t boring” 😂

But since I’ve known I’m autistic, I’ve given myself more freedom to discover who I am without these socially dictated parameters. And permission to be precisely who I am, without cringing apologies when the real me shines through awkwardly.

And my husband and boys have been there every step of the way, embracing me, as we do with them. ♥️

Yeah. I love my family. We’re some pretty cool people. 😁

[revisionaryhistory]

Three Days ~ 57

~*~Emma~*~

Before jumping in the shower, I pulled up the naked picture, put a peach (I was in Georgia, after all) over my ass, and posted it on Instagram along with one of Amy and I floating and holding hands. I drew a heart around us and captioned it “Sister love”. When I got out of the shower, I had a text.

Sebastian ~ Imagine my sad face when there wasn’t a peach free version in my texts. Nice bikini.

Emma ~ You mean the version with my bikini bottoms that my sister took.

Sebastian ~ Ok, maybe not. Still a sad face.

 I sent him a posed bikini shot.

 Sebastian ~ I’m not going to complain. What a beauty. How is it going?

Emma ~ Five minutes and I'll call you.

Sebastian ~ Should be just enough time... with my new bikini pic.

Emma ~ Now I know why your biceps are so big.

Sebastian ~ Foreams.

 I pulled the towel off my hair, threw on clothes, and opened my iPad. Didn't take him long to answer. "Ce mai faci, Sebasti-an?" <How are you?>

“I was having a good day, now it's even better. How about you?"

I caught him up on the day and plans for the long weekend.

"You're going to be busier than me. I’ve got dinner with the guys. Then Canada. Sounds like our Sunday date may need to be postponed."

Our phone sex date. "Hell, no. Do you think after a day with family I'm not going to need to release some tension?"

Sebastian sighed, "That's all I am to you. Tension release."

"More of a perk than a purpose."

"I can live with that." He shrugged with a smile.

“That’s good because dad introduced to an eligible doctor today. He wanted to invite him to dinner. I told him my boyfriend didn’t like me to go on dates with other men.”

“Damn straight.”

“I call him bait.”

“To his face?”

I snickered and shook my head, "We've got pizza coming for dinner. Wanna meet the fam now? Natural conversation ender."

"Whenever."

I stood up, "Now, then I'll call you later. Unless you're falling back into your hole."

He held his thumb and forefinger an inch apart, "A little hole. I’m all yours whenever."

"Won't be too late." I opened my door and headed down the hall. I could see everyone in the family room. "Hey guys, I’ve got Sebastian. Want to meet him?"

Amy yelled, "Yes."

I put the iPad on the coffee table while they squished together. I stood behind them. "Family, Sebastian. Sebastian, this is Katie, Amy, mom is Andrea, and dad is David."

"Nice to meet all of you."

Katie got very close to the camera like she did when she talked to me, "Do you have a dog?"

"I don't have a dog. Do you have a dog?"

"No, but I want one. What about a cat, do you have a cat?"

He shook his head with a pout, "They make me sneeze. I have a fish. He lives with your Aunt Emma. His name is Mycroft."

"That's a stupid name."

Sebastian crinkled up his nose, "I know. Emma named him.”

Amy pulled her away, "We don't say stupid."

"She's a cutie." Sebastian looked between us. "I’m about to sound like I’m sucking up. All four of you are beautiful and carbon copies. Love the new hair, Amy."

Amy ran her fingers through, "Thank you."

Mom added, "Sucking up or not, always nice to hear. Amy said you're on your way to Canada."

Sounds like Amy had told our parents about our conversation.

"Yes. I have a movie showing at the Toronto Film Festival. I’m doing some advance press and meetings."

"And Rome," from Amy.

"Female spy movie."

My dad spoke up, "I‘m a history buff and have read about the units, mostly in Europe during World War two."

And they were off. Sebastian had been researching and dad directed him to a couple of books. They were animated and their conversation bounced back and forth. Sebastian managed to guide the talk around and asked mom about the mini-family reunion going on Sunday. Mom talked about the menu before she started sharing embarrassing stories. Sebastian told a few on himself. I pulled Amy in and she retaliated with a particularly embarrassing story that ended with me peeing by the side of a road. Maybe this meeting thing was a bad idea.

Sebastian looked at me, "So when we take a road trip you can point out the best places."

His words were teasing, but his expression was adoration. I felt it all over and smiled in return. "I imagine you’d block me from view instead of advertising a roadside strip show like she did.”

“I would.”

Fifteen minutes in the doorbell rang. I was starving but wished it had taken a little longer. I had been a little worried at first when it felt like they were interviewing him, but like he’d told me and I’d seen, after a few minutes they went back to normal and talked to him like he was anyone else. I was still standing in the back and went after the pizza, putting it on the table before returning to my spot. He and Amy were laughing about something.

Sebastian glanced up at me for a second, “I don’t want to keep you from dinner. Emma’s bragged on the pizza place. Go eat while it’s hot.”

Amy and dad said it was nice to meet him and mom said, “Fingers crossed things continue and we get to do this again or in person.”

What the fuck!

Sebastian saw me make a face and throw my hands up. He smiled and spoke to my mom, “I’m not going anywhere.” He glanced up to me, “I’ll talk to you later, Em?”

“Yep, I’ll text to make sure you’re still up.”

I used the time it took me to walk around the couch and close the cover on my iPad to calm myself down. What an absolutely strange thing for my mother to say to my boyfriend. By strange I mean bitchy. I wasn't willing to let it go but now wasn't the time. I'd like to say because I didn't want to confront her in front of the whole family, but it was because I was hungry.

Amy was buckling Katie in her booster seat, mom had the plates, and dad had multiple bottles of beer. I had no function. I sat down and opened the pizza boxes. The first bite was as good as I remembered. The combination of flavor and the happy memories made me smile. I chased the bite with beer and was in heaven.

I was content to sit quietly enjoying my pizza and beer. My twin was not, "Sebastian is nice and funny. He tells great stories. His expressions. I mean I know he's an actor, but this was him as a person. I like him."

"Me too," came from Katie.

"And he is gorgeous." Amy’s eyes were huge, "Gorgeous."

I pulled my lips to the side and nodded, "Yes, he is."

From the end of the table, my dad spoke, "Amy, tell us what's going on at the lake?"

Mom added, "Is Max going to be there?"

The rest of dinner was my parents talking to Amy about tomorrow and asking questions about her and Max. Not one word from either of them about Sebastian. I could tell they knew a lot about Max by the questions they asked. Zero questions about my boyfriend, who they knew next to nothing about. They knew next to nothing about how we met or what we’d done. They were asking about Amy and Max though. I wasn't even included in the conversation. I didn't have a function here either.

I wonder how much beer is in the fridge or tequila in the bar?

I’m angry. Sebastian was charming, self-effacing, and knew enough about them to ask questions. I don't expect them to gush all over about him, but how about a "he seems nice" or even "it was nice to talk to him.". But no. Nothing. Zippo.

One of the first things I learned in rehab was anger is a secondary emotion. Equally as valid, but still derived from another emotion. Something comes first and triggers anger. My feelings are hurt. They can talk to Amy about Max at any time. Literally at any time because she lives here. I'm here for five days and we just had him on FaceTime. Silence. I feel discounted.

I volunteered to take the garbage out. I needed some air. Instead of coming back inside, I sat down on one of the loungers, putting my phone on the side table. Closing my eyes and focusing on my breathing I tried to slip into calm. I was almost there when I heard the doors open and close. The calm disappeared. I was guessing it was mom. Dad wasn't one for confrontation and there was no mistaking there was going to be confrontation. Imagine my surprise when it was both of them.

"Hey, sweetheart." Dad sat on the foot of the lounger next to me. I pulled my feet up, making room for mom.

"Hey, has Katie gone to bed?"

Mom shook her head. "Amy's reading to her."

"We wanted to talk to you about Amy."

"OK." I was a little confused. "She seems really good. The last few months we've been texting and talking more. Today was nice. Laying here in the pool talking like we were teenagers again."

Mom put her hand on my foot, "I’m glad. Amy told us some of it."

My dad had his hands clasped between his knees. "Amy has been doing well. She has a good job, has been going out with friends, and she likes this Max."

“I remember him from high school."

"We'd like to keep her doing well. This is the longest she's been sober. We need you to tone it down a little."

I cocked my head, "Tone what down?"

Dad said, "Talking about Sebastian."

In an interesting twist, mom tried to lessen that blow. Sort of. "In general too. How good things are going at work and your social life. She compares herself to you and we don't want Amy to feel bad about herself."

I needed to know, "Did Amy say something? Have I said or done something for her to feel inferior?"

"No, not all. She said the same as you about how good it felt today."

Amy saying she felt less was completely different than what was going on here. I fought back angry tears. "First, I have barely talked about Sebastian. Amy asked questions from the hospital to here. I was excited for you all to meet him, but did it before dinner so it was time limited. That’s all I’ve said about him. You two don't even know how we met. Your disinterest is pretty clear.” I looked at dad, "I wasn't going to bring him up until after dinner, but you were trying to set me up." I turned my head to my mom, "And you straight up said if you two don't break up maybe we'll talk to you again."

"Emiliana, you're overreacting. Sebastian seems very nice and seems to be quite taken with you. My comment was more for Amy. He's a movie star. Of course, she's jealous, but she needs to remember dating doesn't mean forever."

"But you said it to Sebastian. Why would you say that to either of us?" I had my hand up with all fingers pointing at my chest. "Sebastian is the first relationship I’ve had in forever and you're forecasting the end. I’m happy and you're saying maybe it’ll last. That’s hurtful and mean."

"I’m happy for you. We're just asking you not to rub your sister's nose in your happiness and success."

Had I thought there was the slightest bit of truth to that statement I would have backed down. But there wasn't. "I've done no such thing. I've intentionally not done that. There's so much I could be saying, but haven't."

"Thank you. Please keep it that way."                                                                .

I stared at her. The correct response would have been they wanted to hear all about him.

My dad's voice cut the silence. "I didn't know you were dating anyone. I wouldn't have mentioned Frank coming to dinner if I had. What's so wrong with wanting my daughter to come home?"

He did well until the last sentence. It sucked the anger out of me and left sadness. "But you don't want me home. You want a version of me who isn't excited about a new boyfriend, or celebrates winning a volleyball tournament, or has friends who enjoy hanging out with me, or is proud of how she does her job. Or is at least is willing to pretend she isn’t."

Neither said anything. They couldn't because they knew I was right. I picked up my phone and stood up, "I'm going to go sit by the lake for a bit. Watch the water."

Mom didn't move, but Dad stood up. "Emma, Amy has struggled and worked hard to deal with what happened that summer."

I curled my lips in tight, refusing to cry. "So did I."

I walked along the wooded path and to the end of the dock. I sat dangling my legs off and called my other dad.

Ed picked up on the first ring, "It's too soon for you to call. You haven't been there for twelve hours."

I jumped right in. "I had a fight with my parents. The day with Amy has been great, like we were kids again. We’ve laughed and talked and even had this moment where we connected about what happened. Then my parents literally told me to stop being so happy. I might make Amy relapse."

"I love you, Emma.” He gave me a smile that was more sad than happy. “Tell me what they said. Exactly what they said."

Tears rolled down my face as I relayed the conversation.

Ed was silent until the end. He has always tried to be objective and not say anything negative about my parents. "Fuck them, Emma."

I started laughing. "I knew I wasn't overreacting. It’s not even that they want me tone it down because I do that with Amy all the time. I always check what's going on with her before I tell her what's going on with me. I'm always careful."

"I know you are."

"It's that they don't even consider me. Not a word. Had they said they wanted to hear all about Seb, but things were rough with Amy it would have been alright. But Amy's doing great and I can't be too happy in case she might not be. I have to be half of me so they can hope she'll be whole. I want her to be ok too, but not at the expense of me. To throw out they want me home. Why would I ever even consider moving back here with people who want me to diminish myself? And that she struggled. What do they think I did?”

“You could tell them.”

“Tell them? Are you crazy? So next time Amy is feeling bad about herself they can tell her then she relapses and tells whoever. No, thank you.”

Ed laughed, “I didn’t say it was a good idea. Don’t forget it’s your choice. You always have a choice. Even if it’s the best choice there are consequences. For the record, I think you made the right choice.”

I laid down on the dock. I know it’s not about sides, but I needed somebody on mine. Ed was on mine. “I want to go home.”

“Call an Uber and go to the airport. You need money, I’ll send. Or call Sebastian he’ll fly you home.”

That made me laugh, he was clearing the way for whatever I needed. “It’s my choice.”

“Always.”

I thought a second and Ed was good with the silence. “The only reason I’m not going home is that I don’t think this is Amy and we’re spending a day out with friends tomorrow. I don’t want to miss a good visit with my sister because my parents are assholes.”

“You said that, not me.”

“I read your mind. I love you. Thank you. I’m better.” I groaned, “I’m supposed to FaceTime Sebastian. I’m sure I’m a mess.”

“Don’t lie to him. Don’t pretend everything’s ok. Let him support you. I think he’ll be good at it. Doesn’t mean I’m going to quit giving him shit.”

“He doesn’t think you’re going to kill him anymore.”

“I’ll have to work harder.”

We hung up and I headed back toward the house. It was nearly pitch black out here and I wanted to see Sebastian.

[inorganicone2230]

Purity (Part 2) Yandere!Overhaul x Fem!Reader

Part 1 Part 3

Summery: Overhaul meets a quirkless foreigner who holds some very interesting views on his way of thinking. The more time he spends with her, the more he wants to keep her and her purity for himself. And he has no problem with falling to the depths of obsession if it means getting what he wants.

Warnings: some light stalking and yandere thoughts, but nothing too major... yet.

Meetings and problems with Eri’s security had kept him from being able to see you again for the next two days and he was beginning to get antsy. He just couldn’t understand why it was so hard for the moronic filth that worked under him to follow his orders to his exact specifications.

“How hard is it to keep track of one little girl?” Kai was sitting at his desk, elbows propped up on the immaculate surface with his head set on his gloved hands.

“I’ll see to it that someone much more reliable is placed at her door. She won’t be getting out again Overhaul. I’ll make sure of it.” Chrono said, already making a mental note of who to put in charge of the girl.

“See that you do. I won’t tolerate failure and stupidity, not even from you. I have more important things to do with my time then making sure you all can do your jobs properly.” He said, shooting an icy glare at the silver haired man. “Now is there anything else left for today?”

“No. We’re getting the final shipments of Trigger sent out to our buyers and the League of Villains is currently under our surveillance, so far they’ve done nothing but recruit more members. Nothing else to report, unless you have something you want me to do.”

Good. Now that he had the rest of the day free, he could finally go and find you again. He had missed the sound of your voice and was eager to be in your clean presence once more. “No. I have something to do away from the base, so you’re in charge while I’m gone. Don’t call me unless it’s an emergency.”

“Very well.” He answered, shutting the door behind him. He was curious to say the least, but he knew better than to question his boss’s motives. He was loyal to Overhaul and only to Overhaul and he obeyed without question.

Kai removed his plague doctor mask and replaced it with a clean black dust mask. He would have preferred to keep his face cover of choice as it was better for keeping out the filth, but he had a feeling you might find it to be a bit too much this early on. He hoped you appreciated it when the time came, since he was going out of his way to make you feel comfortable around him. He wouldn’t have done this for just anyone after all.

—————

It was almost like fate, the way he found you again.

You were staring at a bulletin board on a relatively quiet street, a small smile on your face as you attempted to read the postings.

“Not lost again are you?” He spoke up, walking towards you as if it was just a random coincidence that he was running into you again.

You whipped around, a big smiles reaching across your face. “No. Not this time.”

“I suppose that’s something at least. I’d hate to find your mangled body on the side of the road, especially since I went through the trouble of saving you yesterday.” He said, coming to stand beside you.

“Well luckily for both of us, I’ve been doing my best to pay attention to my surroundings today. And my friends made sure I turned my phones GPS on, on the off chance I end up being out too late again.”

He nodded, making a mental note of that little detail, just in case it became relevant again later on. He really didn’t want to have to deal with anymore hassle then necessary when it come to this.

“You pulled quite the vanishing act the other day by the way. I didn’t even get the chance to say thank you for helping me.” You said, turning around back to the board to drot some things down in a notepad.

Your movements caused him to suddenly take notice of what you were wearing, a small black dress that came to the tops of your knees and a loose blue flannel shirt to act as a jacket, unbuttoned with the sleeves rolled up to your elbows. The back of the dress barely covered the curve of your ass and he had an insane urge to grab you and pull you back into his chest, to keep others from seeing what wasn’t theirs. It was a ridiculous notion, the very idea of physical touch usually had him squirming in discomfort, but for some reason, the idea of touching your smooth pale skin didn’t bother him nearly as much as he thought it might

“Yes. Well your companion seemed to be taking you to task for your absence, I figured that since you had made it back I could just leave.” He was grateful that your back was turned, otherwise you would have seen the way he was carefully memorizing the shape and curve of your slim waist and the way it lead down to your ass and shapely legs. You were far too thin in his opinion, not unhealthily yet, but it was something that would need to be remedied in the future.

“Nell was pretty peeved at me for not telling her where I was going. Made me promise to text her every now and then to let her know that I’m okay.” You said absently, shoving the notepad and pen back into your shoulder bag before turning around to give him your full attention.

“So, since we’ve run into each other again, would it be too much trouble to get my savior's name? So I can thank you properly. It’s the least you can do since you left me hanging yesterday.” You teased him, locking your arms behind your back and making direct eye contact with him. It still amazed him that you could do that without flinching.

This was the real reason he had left the other day, he wanted an excuse to talk to you again, one that would be easy to believe, one that wouldn’t make you suspicious. “My name is Kai, Kai Chisaki.”

“Well, it’s nice to officially meet you Chisaki-san. My name is (F/N) (L/N). I would offer to shake your hand, but I’m guessing that those gloves and mask you’re wearing aren’t exactly a fashion statement.” You said, eyeing his gloved hands and sending him another radiant smile as a consolation.

He was right, the sound of your voice speaking his name really was enticing. He felt shivers run through his body and for a brief moment, he wondered how you would sound screaming the name Kai or Overhaul, over and over again till your throat was raw and sore. 

He was also quite pleased that you had taken notice of that little detail about his person. It proved how perceptive and intelligent you were. He valued common sense and intelligence almost as much as he valued cleanliness, and you were proving to have both in spades.

“I was sure I wouldn’t see you again since this is a pretty big city, do you live or work around here?” You said, walking over to a vending machine to pop in a few yen, hitting the button for a bottle of water before taking a seat on a bench and removing your shoulder bag.

“Both. I just happened to be out for a walk when I noticed you.” He followed along behind you, glaring at a few passing street thugs who eyed you up and down and making them flee under the weight of his golden gaze. He supposed it couldn’t be helped, you were an attractive girl, even he could see that, and a foreigner to boot, it was to be expected that you would get some attention. He just hopped you weren’t the type to enjoy attention from the wrong people. That just wouldn’t do.

“I see, well thank you for stopping to say hello. I was certain that after our interaction the other day, you would be a total asshole if I ever saw you again. Turns out you're not too bad.” You took a deep swig of the water you had just purchased and he found himself entranced watching the way your throat moved as you greedily sucked it down. Your lips let go of the bottle, gasping for breath. “Are summers here always so hot or is this day just above average terrible? It’s almost as bad as that time I visited Vegas in the middle of August.”

“Are you not used to the heat?” He asked, hoping to glean some kind of information about you. If he could learn some of your preferences for things, he could better prepare.

You shake your head. “It’s not that I’m not used to it, it’s just that where I come from isn’t a big city like this, so I think all this concrete and asphalt radiating heat is just starting to cook me a little. Still better than the below zero temps we get in the winter time though.” You chuckled lightly, just as your phone started to ring.

“Oh, excuse me for just one sec. Please don’t go disappearing on me again.”

Kai nods his head in affirmation, and watches as you briefly walk away and begin speaking in what he assumes is your native language. It seems it wasn’t just the sound of his own language that he liked hearing you speak, but your own as well. The sound was soft and it was easy to pick up on how much easier it was for you to speak then Japanese. He’ll enjoy hearing you speak it for him every now and then once he’s gotten you better acquainted with Japanese. You needed to be able to communicate with him on all levels first and foremost, how else was he supposed to make this easier on you.

Even with your back turned to him, he could see the way you laughed and smiled at whoever you were talking to, and he didn’t like it one bit. A purity like yours should only be shared with those who are most deserving, and he was the only candidate for that position in his opinion.

He would have continued to stew in his jealousy, though he’d never say that’s what he felt out loud, when he noticed that you had left your bag unattended. He had no shame in making sure you were still completely occupied with your phone call before rummaging through it. There wasn’t much, a few pens, the notepad he had seen in your hand, a book of Japanese writing, but it was your wallet that truly interested him, pulling it out and using his own phone to take a quick picture of your ID and passport before putting it away and stepping back to his original spot.

Just in the nick of time as you turned around and walked back over to him. “Sorry about that. My friends said they found a place for us to eat tonight, so I’m going to get going.” You said, shouldering your bag and giving him another one of those lovely smiles he was beginning to become possessive of. “I’m glad I was able to run into you again Chisaki-san, it was nice getting to talk to you again, even if it was only for a little bit.”

He might have a way to look up information on you now with what was on his phone, but he still felt like he was walking away from this empty handed. How could he ensure that he got too see you again without it seeming suspicious, better yet, how could he get you to be the one to initiate contact with him next time? Then it clicked, he had just the idea, he only hoped you’d go along with it.

“How about I give you my number? You seem to be off on your own a lot despite being in a group, so if you get lost again, or find yourself in trouble, you can call me. I have a fairly loose schedule so I can answer at almost anytime.” He said casually.

You stopped, flustered and little nervous all of a sudden. “I-I don’t… umm… that is to say, I’m not so sure I feel comfortable exchanging numbers with someone I barely know. No offense but I don’t know you from a hole in the wall.”

He had a feeling this was going to be your reaction, it was only natural, after all. But he had an ace up his sleeve to sweeten the deal. “Oh, you don’t have to give me yours, you can just take mine. If you need to use it, you can. If not, then you don’t.” He didn’t particularly like that he was giving you this bit of choice, but it would go a long way towards ingratiating himself to you should his plan work. And it would.

You seemed to think about it long and hard for a few minutes before deciding. “Alright. I suppose that’s alright then. No harm no fowl, right?” You reach into your bag, pulling out a pen and paper for him. He wrote down the number for a secondary, disposable cell phone he carried with him and handed it back to you.

“Well, I should get going, friends are waiting and all. Have a good night Chisaki-san.”

“You as well (Y/N), have a pleasant evening.”

You gave him a small wave and smile before hurrying down the street and back to your hotel. 

He desperately wanted to grab you and drag you back to the base, to keep you secure and safe and with him at all times, but he still wanted time to try and win you over before he resorted to more forceful means. Not that he wouldn’t gladly use force and threats if it got him his way, but he felt like the prize would be all the sweeter if it came to him.

He hoped you would call him on your own here soon, but if not, he could always stage a little something to happen, something to motivate you to seek him out. He would have to send someone to start watching you at all times. These last few days of not knowing what you were doing or who you were with were just too taxing, best to get some extra protection for you.

He had a lot of plans to see too.

————

As soon as he got back, he summoned Chrono and Mimic to his office.

“What do you need Boss?” Mimic inquired, always eager to do whatever was asked of him.

He had printed off the pictures he had taken of your ID and passport, handing them over to his underling. “Find out everything you can on this girl. I want to know anything you can tell me, I don’t care how minuscule or unimportant you might find it. I want it all.” He left no room for arguments or debate.

Mimic was even better about following orders then Chrono, he didn’t even bat an eye at the strange request. “Sure thing Overhaul. I’ll have this back to you ASAP.” He said and was out the door just as quick.

Chrono on the other hand was just a tad bit more curious than Mimic. “What was it you needed from me Overhaul?” He was immediately handed the same copies.

“Until our next batches of Trigger are made or The League makes a move, I don’t need you for anything around here. You are to go to that hotel written down and watch that girl as closely as you can without drawing attention to yourself or making contact with her. She is to be protected by any means necessary. Understood.”

To say he was stunned would be an understatement. Since when did Overhaul have an interest in anything outside the Shie Hassaikai, let alone that something being a woman? “I’ll follow your orders without fail Overhaul, even this one, but I have to ask. This doesn’t have anything to do with the Shie Hassaikai or our oppression's, does it? This is completely personal for you.”

He was sent an icy glare. “You’re treading on thin ice Hari, and if you were anyone else, I would have killed you already.” He sighed and leaned back in his chair. “But since I know that you’re only asking so you can follow your orders better, I’ll tell you.”

Chrono waited patiently for his answer.

“Yes. This is personal. The girl there, (Y/N) is her name, and she’s quirkless. I won’t go into detail about how I met her, but let’s just say that she has some very intriguing ideas on my philosophies. She’s pure, and I desire to keep that purity all for myself.” Kai finished, looking at his computer screen to stare at your images.

“So what’s she going to be?” He asked, not judging, he would never even think to do that, but just out of curiosity. This was by far the most interest he’d ever seen Overhaul show anything outside of his research.

Kai just smirked behind his mask. “If I’m going to rule the Yakuza and the underworld, I’m going to need someone to rule by my side. Every King needs a Queen after all.”

Holy shit you guys! I am having an amazing time writing this story, I hope you all are enjoying it as well!

As Always, special thanks to @talpup for all the help with these ideas! I really appreciate it!

[dimancheetoile]

Rant time (and a fucking PSA too)

(cw: this doesn’t relate to anything personal, mental health-related, or any kind of sensitive content. this is about a fandom thing, so there shouldn’t be anything triggering in here. just to be cautious though, content warnings for strong language, swearing and general angry-ness on my part)

ok so here’s the thing. i know the naruto fandom. i’ve been in it for thirteen years, though not all of it on tumblr. i’m lucky to be part of the older community, where all the people i interact with are adults, mature and sensible, who are able to have constructive conversations about the characters we like, dislike, like despite their flaws and dislike despite their qualities. 

now, i’m writing fanfiction because i enjoy it. i enjoy putting down ideas that make me happy, that make me think hard and deep about what i like about the world and translating that into stories i feel are interesting and thought-provoking. 

most of my stories can be classified as being a part of the meta-fandom, let’s call it that way, where adults are discussing deep subjects around konoha’s government, financial stability, working system, casts and clans and workforce, where you come out of a discussion feeling like you know more than you did before. that’s what i enjoy writing about, that sort of deep worldbuilding. i love writing it like rae loves her fluff, y’know? that’s just my thing.

i can’t control who reads my stories like i can control who i interact with on tumblr. and even then, sometimes i get pos on tumblr, so i’m not safe from them anywhere. but generally, as most of you know with g.o.d for example, the worst offenders are on AO3 and tend to be horrible people in comment sections. and that shit happens:

ok so apparently i am “basing their relationship on hating sasuke”. great. i never did that. learn how to read. this is a crackfick based on a stupid, comedic concept, and ino proposes to sakura in a joking manner. now if you’re allergic to sarcasm, it’s not my problem. but here’s what i have to tell you, and every single person who ever read or will ever read my stories:

IF YOU ARE A SASUKE STAN, YOU SHOULD NOT READ MY STORIES

I REPEAT

THIS IS A PSA

IF YOU ARE A SASUKE STAN, YOU SHOULD NOT READ MY STORIES

aside from a few exceptions, he is rarely treated well in my works because he is a character i dislike greatly. now, here’s the thing. i have taken great care in warning people about this. i have written an entire page, linked on my blog, about the content i write about, and more importantly in this case, a list of characters i don’t like. here’s what it looks like:

this list hasn’t been edited in YEARS. so it’s not my problem if you go to read my stories and don’t find a sasuke fan. and i mean, if it was just the one comment, i would never even consider writing this post. except it’s not.

(yeah, i’m not blurring their name, i regret having blurred the name of the commenter above but i did it a while back and deleted the comment so i don’t know who wrote it. reason why is, this shit is public. i don’t condone harassment, and i don’t need people to defend me, but if they didn’t want people to read their comments, they would have gone in guest mode. however if i see anyone being shitty back instead of engaging in polite discussion, i’ll delete your comment, ok?)

now what do you noticed here? yeah, those are two comments posted ON TWO DIFFERENT STORIES.

my take on sasuke is tired? you’re sad at my treatment of sasuke? on TWO DIFFERENT STORIES? yeah, do you a need a fucking reminder that i dislike the character a real fucking lot? DONT FUCKING READ MY FICS OMFG IT’S NOT HARD TO UNDERSTAND. LEAVE INSTEAD OF LEAVING COMMENTS.

(and btw, those are not the only comments this person left me, and most had the same kind of tone to them)

so let me repeat something real quick.

If you like Kishimoto’s Sasuke, don’t fucking read my fucking stories. If you don’t like my fanon version of Sasuke, be it when he’s the bad guy or when i try to redeem him, don’t fucking read my fucking stories.

there are literally countless stories online of this fandom, where sasuke is viewed in a much more charitable light than i ever will, and that, imo, he will ever deserve. this man is a piece of shit and his tragic past is not an excuse for it. newsflash people, i have chronic depression, i’ve survived sexual assault and i had an abusive childhood, and shocker, i’m not a psychopath with zero capability for remorse, empathy, human decency, healthy relationships and respect, like your precious emo boy. your tragic backstory is not an excuse for horrible, abusive behaviour, and if you think so, you need therapy. slapping that kind of behaviour on a fictional character, then defending it, doesn’t make it suddenly okay either.

i don’t need those kind of comments in my life, i don’t want your fucking concrit and unless it’s been asked, don’t fucking give it to authors unprompted. if you’re not happy with what you’re reading, buy a fucking book, or even better, browse the endless catalogue avaibale for free online, written by passionate people who pour their heart into their stories. next time you feel like being a fucking asshole, shut the fuck up and go write your own stories instead of whining about other people’s works.

ok rant over now.

[cami-chats]

Stranger Things

Written for @marvelpolyshipbingo​

Rating: Teen

Warnings/Triggers: None

Pairings: Tony Stark/Pepper Potts/James Rhodes

Summary: Tony's nicknaming tendencies are given free reign when he learns that their new best friend doesn't have a name-- 'Eleven' didn't count, apparently. Rhodey would've been happier with it if it was a temporary state of affairs, instead of being stuck with it years afterwards, but Pepper doesn't seem to care. 

Square Filled: N3-Stranger Things

Read below or on AO3

"Your name is eleven? Like the number eleven?" Tony repeated. He had his arms crossed over his chest, and a weird look on his face, like he knew what she was telling him and found it to be completely unacceptable and also like he wanted to ask why she was willing to accept it. 

She blinked at him. Glanced at Jim-- Tony called him Rhodey, but his name was Jim, he'd said so himself. Jim gave her a shrug, like 'what can you do' and like he wanted to know what her answer was too. 

"I mean, I know you said that that's what they called you, but I figured that you'd have a real name too." 

"I'm... eleven." It was a number, not a name. She knew that. 

Tony rolled his eyes. "You're not eleven years old, we're not letting you call yourself that. You need a name. Red? No, that's not any better." Tony started listing out words that, as far as she could tell, were random. "Pepper!" he declared triumphantly. 

"Tony," Jim groaned, "we're not naming her after a spice." 

"Why not? Lots of people are named after spices." 

"Who? Who do you know that's named after a spice? I know all of your friends, and this town is pretty small. There's no one." 

"I didn't say that I knew anyone who was named after a spice, but I know that it happens." 

"Liar. You haven't heard of anyone named Pepper or Salt or fricking Cardamom." 

"I like Pepper," she said. 

"Really?" 

"Really?" 

She didn't understand why Tony sounded quite that doubtful when it had been his idea to begin with. "I don't like Eleven. Or El. Pepper sounds nice." 

Tony beamed, then turned to Jim and stuck his tongue out. "See, I told you it was a good name." 

Jim rolled his eyes, but he smiled when Pepper laughed. 

*

"I can't believe you're still going by Pepper," Rhodey said, shaking his head. 

"I can't believe you're still going by Rhodey," she replied, and Rhodey glared at her. 

"I'm not choosing to go by that; you assholes won't call me anything else. And when the hell did that start, by the way? You used to call me Jim. I liked it that way." 

"Your family can call you Jim if you're going to be so grumpy about it." 

"Okay but why the hell did you switch?" 

Pepper shrugged. "It's your Tony-name; it's better." 

Rhodey blinked at her, bewildered. "First of all, you used to be fine calling me Jim, and I don't see why that had to change. Second of all, yeah my family's going to call me Jim since it's my goddamn name. Plus Rhodey is based off my last name, which would make it the nickname for the entire family, not just me. Third of all, what the fuck is a Tony-name?" 

"The nickname Tony gives you," Pepper said, as if it was obvious. "My birth name is Jane, but my Tony-name is Pepper. My Tony-name is better, so it's what I go by." 

"Jim's a perfectly normal name," Rhodey said defensively. 

"So's Jane," Pepper said, raising an eyebrow pointedly. Rhodey rolled his eyes but was willing to accept it-- whatever made her happy, right? She'd been in normal society for several years now, but he still felt like they needed to make up for the absolutely horrific first ten years-- or however long she'd been there, he didn't really know. "Besides, it makes Tony happy." 

"Ah, that's the real reason," Rhodey teased. "You ever going to tell him that you're crushing on him?" 

"Are you?" 

Rhodey's smile froze in place. "No." It felt so brittle, like it might snap in half and then he wouldn't be left with a face at all. Pepper was looking at him with a distinct lack of judgement though, so he added, "You might be okay with it, but everyone else isn't." 

"Tony would be okay with it." 

Rhodey sighed, scrubbing a hand over his face as he dropped the smile. "No offense, but Tony never knows what's good for him. I'm not going to make it worse by confusing him." 

"You say that like he doesn't like you too." 

"Unless you know that from your magical mind power, I'm gonna say that you're too optimistic. Why don't you just ask him on a date? Worst case scenario is that he says no." 

"Then why don't you ask him?" 

"My worst case scenario is a lost worse than yours." 

Pepper snorted, clearly not believing him. 

A. She was a girl and wasn't going to have a gender problem with Tony. B. Aforementioned magical mind powers could protect her from anyone else's bad reactions. Rhodey didn't have magical mind powers; he didn't have magic of any kind, and sometimes he wondered if the same was true for his mind. 

"We should ask him together," Pepper said, as if that was a perfectly reasonable solution. 

"What, at the same time?" 

"Yeah." 

"And make him pick? That's a horrible idea. I don't normally get to say that to you, but seriously, what the fuck?" 

"He could pick both of us," Pepper said, unbothered. "All three of us as a couple. That sounds pretty nice," she mused. "I like you." 

"You're absolutely crazy." 

"So you'll do it?" 

It was on the tip of his tongue to say that of course not, this was a suicide mission and he liked his life just the way it was: still going. But then he figured, what did he have to lose? Really, what did he stand to lose in this? Tony would get a little muddled about emotions and how relationships worked before having an answer, but Rhodey knew better than to think that Tony would hit him or something. If-- somehow-- they ended up dating, that's where the problems would arise, but the asking part was relatively risk free in the grand scheme of the world. Rhodey snorted, then said, "Sure. Why not." 

Pepper wasn't one to let it go until he had an answer she thought was acceptable, so it was easier this way anyways. Besides, if Tony turned him down, he'd be able to guilt her into buying him some ice cream. 

*

They'd decided, for simplicity's sake, that when they were in public, Pepper and Tony were the ones dating and Rhodey was the good best friend. It worked most of the time since most people weren't going to jump to the conclusion that they were all dating, but there were times where people got a little suspicious of what was actually going on. Like now, when Tony, with zero warning, took Rhodey's lollipop and stuck it in his own mouth. 

Rhodey didn't give a shit because he'd had his tongue in Tony's mouth an hour ago, but Steve was giving him a weird look for it. 

Of course, Pepper didn't notice the look Steve was giving them when she said, "Hey, that's not fair," and took the sucker from Tony. Then, instead of giving it back to Rhodey like Steve was probably expecting, she licked it. "Ew, grape." She shoved it back in Tony's mouth, and that was the last she thought of it. 

Rhodey pretended not to see Steve trying to catch his eye and slung an arm over Pepper's shoulders. "They're re-showing Star Wars. We should go." 

There was a very loud agreement from Tony and Pepper, and everyone else fell in line. Chances were that Steve wouldn't remember the lollipop thing by the time the movie ended, anyways. 

[ask-the-good-creeps]

You can open up if you'd like

TW: SUICIDE ATTEMPT MENTIONS. DEPRESSION MENTIONS. MENTAL HEALTH MENTIONS. DO NOT READ IF THESE THINGS COULD NEGATIVELY AFFECT YOU.

 Okiedokes, mi amigos. The following story happened years ago, but it still comes up in my mind a lot; and I feel like sharing the experience may benefit someone going through a rough patch and/or yield a bit of insight to y’all about why I think the way I do. If you decide to read further, please read it to the end.

 So, this story begins with my first year of university. I was nineteen years old, fresh out of the Arizona foster care system, and had a history of mental health issues (official diagnoses from the psychologists I saw was PTSD, Anxiety, Depression, and Bipolar Disorder Type II – all of which triggered and fed into each other) that I was medicated for at that point in my life.

 Things were going well for the first year…I made friends, I joined clubs and events, had an on-campus work study job, and was pulling decent grades in my classes. Then, the year ended and summer rolled around. I volunteered to spend my summer on-campus as a Resident Advisor for the university’s honors outreach program (where we brought 7th-9th graders to the campus for 2-week programs to give them a taste of college life and encourage them to come to us after high school, pretty much).

 To anyone on the outside looking in, things looked like they were going great for me. In my eyes, everything was going great. Except for one thing…my grade hadn’t posted in one of my classes for the semester, and I didn’t do to well on the final (in my opinion). I was slightly worried that I was going to fail the class – looking back now, that was a ridiculous worry because I was doing great in the class and the professor was a really cool dude that usually didn’t fail students unless they put in literally zero effort throughout the semester.

 But, I worried nonetheless.

 Even then, it didn’t feel like a big deal to me…what I didn’t realize is that subconsciously it was the straw that broke the camel’s back for my mental health.

 You see, being in foster care as a teen is Hell. Especially in Arizona. One of the things they drill into the heads of teens in “the system” is that we’re absolute failures who will drop off the map and end up leading miserable lives after we age out of foster care (probably because they don’t teach us the necessary life skills to survive outside of their care, but I digress…that’s another story for another day).

 In the group homes, I was the kid that stayed out of trouble and got straight-A’s in school. I was the kid who never smoked, drank alcohol, or tried drugs not even once in my life. I was the one that kept climbing and got accepted into university on full scholarship after high school. So, I was the one that all those adults of the foster care system used as an example…the one who had extremely high expectations on their shoulders as a result.

 So, when the grade for that class finally posted online and was not an A like my other classes (it was a C), it was the end of the world to my mind. I didn’t realize it when it happened, but seeing that grade made a thread of stability quietly snap behind the scenes where I couldn’t see it.

 As a result, I had a rogue thought.

 Now, when it comes to my thinking patterns, there is always a clear…well, pattern. If I’m thinking about my Great Aunt Vickie’s cat, for example, I can recognize that I started thinking about her because I thought of a funny cat story that was something similar to what Vickie’s cat did; and I can recognize that I thought of that funny cat story because I saw a cat meme on the internet yesterday; and so on, and so on, until I find the real-life stimulus that triggered the whole line of thinking.

 Rogue thoughts are a whole different matter entirely. Unlike my usual thinking patterns, these rogue thoughts just show up without any noticeable stimulus or previous thinking…and that makes them dangerous for someone like me, who has learned to control my depression through CBT and recognizing when my thought patterns are starting to get too negative for me.

 I returned to my apartment in between summer outreach programs (we had a few days to recoup between each 2-week session) and that’s when the rogue thought in question appeared.

 “Kill yourself.”

 That was the thought. It was not linked to any depressive thinking patterns, it was just there. It didn’t feel like a big thing, just another item on my to-do list for the short break I had. Had I been more used to rogue thoughts and encountered a similar one to this in the past, I would have thought more about it.

 I would have recognized that this thought may have popped into my conscious line of thought out of nowhere, but seen that it had deep roots in my subconscious thinking.

 But, I hadn’t had a rogue thought like this in the past.

 All of my previous suicidal ideations had patterns to trace back to in my conscious mind that allowed me to work through most of them without incident.

 So, I sat at my desk and started writing out a suicide note. It was very casual in tone, like a friendly farewell to my friends and family as opposed to being a depressing final record. I planned to jump off my apartment balcony the next day. After careful consideration, I decided that I would prefer my body to stay in one piece (my apartment was on the eighth floor, after all) and I opted to overdose on my medication instead.

 I had a little garden at my window, and I set the note there. I sent a quick text to my father that simply read, “My plants know the reason why.” I was prepared to take the pills…then my father called me.

 He was concerned, but I lied and said that I was just spouting random nonsense with the intent to confuse people (easily believable, as my catchphrase at the time seemed to be, ‘the pancakes fly at midnight and the waffles swim at dawn’ for some reason). He asked multiple times if I was alright, to which I always answered affirmatively. Then, the call ended.

 I went to my room and laid in bed. I put in my headphones and turned on my music. Then, I swallowed ten of my prescription pills (which I was only supposed to take one of every 24 hours, for reference). After that, I swallowed a literal handful of melatonin tablets I picked up OTC, because I didn’t want to be awake for the damage the prescription meds would do to my system.

 I laid back in bed with the music going, and passed out fairly quickly. However, the melatonin wasn’t enough to keep me unconscious as my body started trying to purge the pills in an act of self-preservation. I couldn’t open my eyes because every time I did, the room spun. I was throwing up a lot, and at one point when I leaned over the bedside to get it on the floor instead I lost my balance and faceplanted onto the ground (which I found out later had led to a broken nose). I didn’t even feel it, just the pain my insides were going through as I faded in and out of consciousness.

 Here’s where it gets interesting, reader. It was night by now, and the lights in my room were off. The livingroom light was on and it shined in through the crack under my closed (and locked) bedroom door. Even if I could open my eyes, it wasn’t enough light to see by.

 Yet, it wasn’t my eyes that detected anything. I felt a presence in my room with me, there in the dark. It felt like I knew this person, as if they were a close friend, despite the fact that I had no idea who they were. I remember asking this person,

 “Do I still have enough of the poison left in my system to kill me?”

 To which I received their reply:

 “No. You’ve coughed enough of it up. You’re going to be alright.”

 I cracked my eyes open ever so slightly and saw a flashing blue light shining up at the ceiling every so often. It was a notification light on my phone, which I had left plugged in to charge on the dresser next to my bed.

 My goal here was to die, not to suffer. Since this person there with me insisted I wasn’t going to die, I reached out with my eyes still closed a couple times. I managed to grab my charge cord and pull my phone off the dresser and to the floor next to me.

 It took a couple tries to dial emergency services (911) because I couldn’t keep my eyes open very well, but eventually I got an operator on the line and managed to briefly explain why I called in between bouts of vomiting.

 The paramedics came in. They asked me what I had overdosed on, how many pills I’d taken, and when I took them. I answered with the name of my med, that I had taken ten times my normal dose, and that I didn’t check the time but it was still light out.

The paramedics didn’t believe me at first. One of them told me it was almost light out again now, and that taking that amount of that med meant I should not be alive still, let alone able to express semi-coherent thoughts. They didn’t believe me until they picked up my pill bottle and saw how many were gone.

 I was taken to the hospital and spent a few days recovering there. I had my eyes closed and was in and out of consciousness the whole time, so I’m still not sure exactly what they had to do to keep me alive (though I don’t remember getting my stomach pumped, and I think I heard someone say something about charcoal).

 On my third day there, I started to think on what happened and realized something. I still didn’t know who had been in that room with me. The paramedics had to get a key from the front desk when they arrived and go through two locked doors (my front door and my bedroom) to get to me. My apartment was on the eighth floor, so someone coming in through the (also locked) window was out of the question.

 I didn’t recognize the person’s voice, so I chalked it up to my brain treating me to reverse psychology through an auditory hallucination to keep me alive. Though, that is just a theory.

 So, dear reader, you’re probably wondering why I decided to share this story. Well, it’s not really the story that I wanted to share, but what I learned from the experience.

 I learned that suicide is not a proper course of action, no matter the circumstances. 

I learned that we cannot die before it is our time – the universe will intervene. 

I learned that I have plenty of people who care (though very few of them know why I was in the hospital in 2015). 

I learned that stress is not to be taken lightly (subconsciously I had been super stressed about my C-grade and the implications that I was a failure because of it, and also because of everything loaded on my plate) and it must be handled in a healthy way. 

I learned how to say ‘no’ to avoid putting too much on my plate.

 Most importantly, I learned about freeing myself from the expectations of others. You see, my friend, you will meet many people throughout your life that are important to you that have expectations of you. Family, friends, teachers, mentors, and so on…and you may be worried about disappointing them, as I once was. But please understand that only your own expectations for yourself truly matter, and if you try to please everyone else you’ll end up in a really tight spot. Learn to let go of what they want and pursue your own passions and dreams (preferably before you end up going to university for a major you aren’t even fond of, like I did).

 Lastly, If you feel or think in any capacity that suicide is something you should do, I encourage you to think twice, and reach out openly and honestly with what you’re experiencing to someone you trust in your life or to a Mental Health/Suicide Prevention hotline. If you feel like you have nowhere else to turn, I’m here.

 As someone who almost became a statistic, believe me…I understand.

[purplesurveys]

755

Was your childhood wasted by something? It was wasted by the fact that I had to grow up faster than all the other kids so even though I kept up with all the trends, had all the cool toys, and knew which shows to watch, I still spent a great chunk of my childhood silently stressing out about stuff happening at home. Would you rather die during an adventure or die like a normal person? LOL ‘like a normal person.’ I’d want to pass harmlessly, which I guess is under normal. I’d hate to be killed by something that was meant to be an adventure, like skydiving gone wrong or falling off a cliff. Those would hurt exponentially more too, so no thanks. Have your parents ever put you on a diet? No, I’ve never had to be on one.

Have your parents ever tried to commit suicide? [trigger warning] No but one time my mom had a strange breakdown and verbally threatened me and my dad that she was going to do it. It remains one of the weirdest, eeriest few seconds of my life and I don’t really like thinking about it. Do you have a gag reflex? I don’t know, but I probably do. I haven’t...tested it lmao. Do you ever fantasize about trying drugs? No, fantasize is a loaded term. I think about the possibility sometimes, but I’m not obsessed with the idea of acquiring weed or anything like that. Have you ever put gum in someone's hair? Nope. That’s a hilarious prank to do to someone being shitty though, hah. Would you rather have sex before you're married or wait till marriage? I can be eitiher, I’m not picky about this kind of stuff. I've been having sex in my current relationship. Have you ever not gone to school, just because? I only did this in high school because my former school had events that I found irrelevant and that I didn’t want to go to. In college, if I wanted to cut an entire day’s worth of classes I had to have a very good reason why. Do you know anyone who can play the bagpipes? No, but lol this question reminded me of the Friends episode where Ross learned the bagpipes to play for Monica and Chandler’s wedding. Have you ever let someone hit you? [trigger warning] No. In the few times my mom put her hands on me I was always in the fetal position to protect myself. Do you own a hand warmer? A what? I’ve never heard of that but we don’t really need that here. Do you have friends in other states/countries? Used to. When I was in different fandoms throughout my teenage years I gained friends from North and South America and Europe; I also have Filipino friends from grade school and high school who’ve migrated to the US and Canada. As for locally, I do have tons of friends who came from different provinces/islands. My school has a very diverse community and we have students from all 81 provinces, probably. Do you ever pay attention during church? No, unless the priest says something ridiculous then I start listening to see how even more stupid his homily gets. Otherwise I’m daydreaming, fantasizing, and imagining for that whole hour. Do you have self control? Funny you should mention this while the song playing on my Spotify is Hayley Williams’ Sudden Desire which is precisely about self-control, hahaha. Anyway, it depends on the situation and how desperate I am for something. My self-control is probably the worst when it comes to food though; I’ll always end up picking up whatever I’m craving no matter how late it is, how far the restaurant is, or how much money I have left. Have you ever broke a window? Nope. When was the last time you freaked someone out? Idk maybe this afternoon when I was playing with my dog and squishing him and talking to him in all sorts of voices lolol he always looks so freaked out when I do it to him. Have you ever gone on a date with a weirdo? No. I don’t really do dates. Who's the last person you called a bitch? I’ve never called anyone a bitch directly, but I did call my mom that when she was out of earshot yesterday. Do you drink kool-aid? I don’t. Have you ever dropped something hot on your foot? No. I’d hate for that to happen, I’m scared of getting burned. Do you watch porn? Less than before, but yeah I do; though a big reason why I watch it less these days is because the government blocked a whole chunk of porn sites off of our internet networks at the start of the year haha. The content in the remaining sites aren’t as impressive as the ones I was used to, so I stopped watching. Have you ever missed someone you hated? Sometimes I’ll miss the good times I have with Athenna, but I just have to remember that her attitude never improved in college and I’ve heard other people call her weird so I’m guessing she still acts shittily. Is anyone in your family disabled? Yes, I have an aunt with Down syndrome. What do you want for Christmas? That’s a long time from now. It depends on what I need by December. How many moles do you have? I don’t know if I have some that I’ve never seen yet but I’m aware of 5 that I have. Do you make your bed everyday? Yes. It’s much more relaxing to come back to a neat bed after a long day. Do you know how to ride a bike? :( No I don’t. My dad is super encouraging though and will always cheer me on to try getting on a bike again every now and then. Do you own any comic books? I own a couple, from back when I wanted to get into comic books because my favorite wrestlers CM Punk and AJ Lee were both comic book nerds. I tried so hard to like them, but at the end of the day it just wasn’t my thing. What is the nastiest dare you have ever committed? Probably the time I dropped my siomai on the ground and a friend or two told me to eat it while the rest of my friends told me not to. I went with the unpopular opinion and put the siomai in my mouth only to feel the small dirt/rocks that have gotten on it, so I promptly spat it out haha. Do you know anyone who has been raped? I don’t think so. Are you an atheist? Yes.

Have you ever owned a goldfish? Yes, I had several of them as my first pets. Our old house was very crowded and chaotic and definitely not conducive to bigger pets, so my parents would get me fish so I can practice having pets.

Who was the last person to call you beautiful? Gabie, I think. How many times have you been stung by a bee? Zero. I run away from bees when I see one. What was the last flavor of gum you chewed? Spearmint, I think? That’s always the kind JM brings to school and I usually ask him for a piece of gum. When was the last time you used tape? February. My org was hosting an orientation for interested applicants in the college auditorium, so we posted arrows all over the building so guests would know where to go. When was the last time you said fuck? Ooh I’m not so sure. Probably last night when I had a video call with Gabie since I curse around her the most.

Have you ever stolen something? A pen or five, yep. What's the last movie you watched? Two for the Road. Who's the last person you watched a movie with? Just myself. But the last time I did see a movie with someone, it was with Gabie. Where were you yesterday at 5 PM? I was in the dining area, probably. Who would you like to kiss right now? MY GIRLFRIEND

When was the last time you had tic tacs? Ages ago. I don’t get to have it a lot. When was the last time you ate chicken? We had wings for dinner two nights ago. Who was the last person you told to 'Shut the fuck up' to? Probs Gabie, in a joking manner. Why were you last nervous? My parents were fighting last night and I heard some banging upstairs. Whose pants did you last take off? Again, my girlfriend’s. When was the last time you were disturbed? Also last night hearing that ^ Why did you last feel awkward? Been a while since I’ve had a reason to feel that way. When was the last time you got in a fight with your best friend? With Gabie, two nights ago. I haven’t had a fight with Angela in over a decade. Have you ever asked someone for a tampon? Nope, because I don’t use them. Who was the last person you read a book to? I don’t read books to anyone. Who is the person you say the most naughtiest things to? Hahahahaha. Dirty talk isn’t my thing but the last time was Gabie, probs three years ago when I tried it for the last time and still didn’t dig it. Who was the last person to send you a letter? I forgot the last person to greet me on my birthday... I think it was Patrice. How do you feel about war? Not a fan. Do you like cupcakes or muffins more? Cupcakes. Have you ever pushed someone on purpose? Just my siblings when we were younger. Have you ever slapped someone in the face? My brother, after he slapped me first. This was shortly before I stopped talking to him completely.

[yoshichao]

Series: Danganronpa, Detective Conan, Ghost Trick, Devil Summoner, Kindaichi Case Files, Zero Escape

Characters: Conan Edogawa, Saguru Hakuba, Hajime Kindaichi, Lynne, Sissel, Yui Samidare, Raidou Kuzunoha the XIV, Gouto, Heiji Hattori, Raido Kuzunoha the XIV, Goto, Raiho, Kyouko Kirigiri

Summary:  Nine "lucky" guests of DetectiveCon manage to solve a code that showed up in their mailbox alongside their special invitations to the event. But it turns out the "reward" for their efforts is being trapped in a cruel game involving numbered bracelets, a maze of doors, and a ticking time limit. Can these detectives work together to survive the Nonary Game? Or will they be outwitted by their captor - this so-called "Zero"? 

Tags: Crossover, Nonary Game, Temporary Major Character Death, Supernatural Meets Mundane, Amnesiac Character, Puzzles

[As of today’s update (chapter 8), this fic is going on an indefinite hiatus SO I would like to share some previews and teases of later chapters in this fic that I wrote when I was writing out of order. Find it under the cut! Thanks for reading!!]

A few minutes of investigation later, there was a girlish yelp and several metallic rattling sounds, garnering the attention of the others. No one was quite sure how it happened at the time, but somehow Lynne managed to get herself stuck in the chair of a school desk on top of a conveyor belt. Not only that, but she also somehow turned on the contraption she was stuck on. 

In summary: during all her dashing around, she bumped into several inconvenient piles and objects repeatedly, which loosened up several things to cause this catastrophic chain reaction. One shelf she bumped knocked over several planks of wood, blocking off the exit gate to this particular section. While seeing if she could use a long detached chain for anything, she tripped and fell onto the conveyor belt. 

At the opposite end of the irregularly lurching conveyor belt, a large crusher dropped down loudly before lifting back up to repeat the process.

“L-Lynne-san?!” The blond put his hands on the chain-link fence separating the boys from the redhead. He seemed to be in a daze, not quite believing his eyes yet. “What are you doing…?”

“I… I think I’m stuck!” Lynne let out a nervous laugh and tried to lift herself off the chair she was on, but her leg was tangled in the very chain she tripped over. The desk and chair were attached to the belt, apparently. The conveyor belt lurched again, seemingly speeding up for half a second before grinding to a stop. Apparently it was malfunctioning, but whatever was wrong with it wasn’t enough to stop it completely.

Sissel tried to squeeze his small body between a gap in the fence when the belt started moving again, the crusher continuously smashing down at a steady pace. The two humans dashed to the other side of the room to reach the entrance to the area Lynne was trapped in.

“The gate is stuck,” the black-haired boy said quietly, fingers curling against the metal as he stared at the mess of shelves and construction equipment blocking the way. He glanced around calmly for an alternate entrance or something that could help in their situation, but nothing caught his eye, so he settled on scaling the fence instead. The blond hurriedly followed his lead, though he was noticeably less experienced at this sort of thing, as he needed to regain his footing several times in his haste.

Lynne whimpered and inhaled sharply when the shadow of the crusher above her suddenly darkened her space. White as a ghost, she shut her eyes tight when the conveyor belt stopped. The crusher dropped. The black-haired boy vaulted over the fence and landed gracefully on the ground, while Hakuba called out from the other side.

“Lynne-san!!”

Halfway down, the large weight had gotten stuck, and was now looming dangerously over Lynne’s head. The redhead cracked an eye open and slowly looked up, visibly shaking from this horrible, life-threatening experience. The blond, having finally gotten over the top of the fence, stumbled as his feet reached the floor. He turned and called out again, fear and relief clashing together in his voice.

“Lynne-san, are you okay?!”

“I… Y-Yeah, I think--”

Suddenly there was a loud creaking sound, and the chains holding up the weight all snapped. The sound of bones cracking was drowned out by the sound of the crusher hitting the ground, which rang in everyone’s ears long after all was still.

“L.. Lynne… -san…?”

The blond moved past the other boy mechanically, who had stopped moving forward once he realized there was nothing they could do. The Brit stumbled over and placed his hands on the weight, the cold metal icy against his palms.

Breaking the wretched silence was a too-high ding!, which was followed by a small compartment on the death machine opening up to reveal a key. The blond detective just stared at it like it was something alien, while the boy with the cap reached out and took it gingerly, studying it with wide and unblinking eyes, as if he wasn’t really registering its existence at all.

Sissel trotted over and sat himself up against the crusher, averting his eyes from the paint-like splatters around him. The kitten yawned, getting cozy before lying down and closed his eyes. Then the world shifted into reds, oranges, and blues. With a sigh, Sissel reached out and hopped into the yellow core next to him.

“I wonder if you hold some sort of record with all the times you’ve died.”

Before him floating in the red void of the ghost world was Lynne’s spirit, who just grinned cheekily.

“If I did, do you think they’d give me an award for it?”

-

“K… Kyouko-chan…” Yui watches her friend sadly, though despite the situation she can’t help but feel a hint of relief at the implications regarding Kyouko’s behaviour. “Do you… Do you recognize him?”

The ghastly sight that greeted them when they walked into the room was something any detective had come across at least once in their life. A sight so familiar that some of their ilk aren’t even caught off-guard by it anymore.

A dead body.

But the body that the trio found in the study wasn’t just any old person. This was someone both Yui and Kyouko were extremely familiar with - the two of them would recognize this old man anywhere.

Instead of answering Yui’s question, Kyouko silently approached the desk. The room was silent and filled with a palpable dread as unasked questions were left in the air. Once beside the desk, Kyouko slowly put two fingers to the old man’s neck. After a moment, she opened her mouth to speak.

“He’s dead.”

- 

“But… why would they go off on their own like that?!” Lynne asked. “And why would one of them steal the number 0 bracelet? Why not just ask Kirigiri-chan if they could take it?”

“It had to have been Kuzunoha-kun, correct?” Hakuba noted. “Raidou-kun never set foot in the study. But Kuzunoha-kun was there with Samidare-san and Kirigiri-san. He must have taken it before they exited.”

Yui wanted to mention how much sense that didn’t make, because it’s not like Kyouko Kirigiri to miss something like that and the silver-haired detective was the first and last person near the body, but she had no other explanation for how the bracelet could have disappeared. Yui herself didn’t have the bracelet - that was a fact. That would leave either Kuzunoha or Kyouko as the thief. In any other circumstance, Kyouko would seem like the more likely suspect - she did reckless things like this all the time without telling anyone. But when they had two missing persons with a digital root that matched a numbered door...

“As fer why,” Hattori continued, “like th’ 9 bracelet, th’ number 0 doesn’t change th’ digital root. It’s pretty valuable. Maybe he wanted ta have it, jus’ in case.”

“Yeah, it’s not like we had found the number 5 door before now,” Kindaichi said. “I mean, it’s a mighty fine coincidence that those two had numbers that equaled a digital root of 5, but…”

Yui had to think about that. Was it really a coincidence? 

...Well, it had to be, right? Unless there was meaning to the assigned numbers - which she had thought about briefly, but couldn’t come up with consistent correlations for any of them.

“Did they want to work together that badly?” Lynne asked to no one in particular. “Maybe they were just too shy to ask… They were both pretty quiet, after all…”

“To be fair, Yui-chan didn’t really give them a choice the last two times!” Kindaichi said with a grin. Yui huffed at him, but she recognized that he had a point. The only options they would have had this time were door number 5 with Kyouko, 6 with Conan, or 7 with Hakuba. Maybe they didn’t like those odds and figured Yui would want to accompany the lavender-haired woman again, and Conan would want to be with Hattori, and...

“W-Well, whatever!” She childishly stuck her tongue out at Kindaichi, who snickered in response. “Aaaanyways, we should probably go check downstairs to see if they really did go through the number 5 door. If they didn’t and we rearrange the teams, we’ll end up leaving them behind and that door will go unexplored!” Which was something they didn’t have time for. For all they knew, the number 5 door was the key to their escape.

With no arguments, the seven of them rushed down into the basement and through the tucked away door. They came face-to-face with a metal door that had a number 5 painted on it. As some of the boys stepped forwards to investigate the door itself, Yui turned her head towards the RED. 

“Uh, guys? The RED...” Everyone looked over.

On the screen in bright red letters, the word “ENGAGED” confirmed what they had already suspected.

-

“As a reward for your victory, summoner: a parting gift and a word of advice.”

The Pale Rider tossed his scythe to the ground, where it clattered and broke into two separate pieces. 

“When you’ve gone as high as you can go and think you can go no higher, turn your head skyward to find the way forward.”

With that, the horse turned and galloped off, vanishing into thin air with its rider. Silence settled over the basement, and Raidou cautiously approached the broken weapon. The metal had detached from the thin wooden stick, and where they had once been connected, the boy noticed an unusual indent…

He was shaken out of his thoughts by the other summoner, who came up behind Raidou and dropped a hand on his shoulder. He studied the odd gift that was left on the floor in disbelief before opening his mouth to speak.

“...Did Death himself really just give us some ancient wisdom?”

- 

When the door opened, no searching was required. Across the wide and empty room was what they were looking for, bordered by cheap fluorescent lights mounted on the walls.

9.

“We… we did it.” When they all shuffled out of the elevator, Samidare was the first to speak coherently. “We found the number 9… We can get out!”

She whooped and rushed over, putting her hands on the door and experimentally scraping at the paint to make sure it was real. Hajime couldn’t help but grin as he made to join her in inspecting the door. His mirth faded when he realized everyone else remained silent. Turning to face them, none of them shared the smiles the pair of them wore.

“What’s wrong?” He asked, looking between the four of them before settling his eyes on Conan, who wore a thoughtful, serious expression. “Why aren’t you guys happy? This means we can escape, right?”

“There’s only one door, Kindaichi,” Conan said, not even attempting to include the childish chirp he normally used. “That means a maximum of five people can leave.”

- 

“Oi… don’t tell me yer suggestin’ that we split up?”

“Is that not our best option?” Kirigiri crossed her arms. “Would you rather all nine of us die here instead of only four? The five that escape can call for help and potentially save the others before the time is up…”

“K-Kyouko-chan…” Samidare didn’t say anything further, her face betraying how conflicted and confused she felt at her friend’s behaviour.

“H-Hey, let’s not be hasty!” Hajime said, mustering up the most convincing grin he could despite the hollow feeling in his stomach. “Let’s say there is another exit. What if it needs all of us to access it or something?”

“It seems you’re grasping for straws, Kindaichi-kun…”

“He has a point though!” Samidare quickly said. “We should go back and tell Lynne-chan first, and then find the Kuzunohas before we decide on anything.”

“But is that such a good idea?” This had been the most Kyouko Kirigiri had ever said at once during their nine hours together, and every word that came out of her mouth came as a surprise. “The five of you are guaranteed to escape at this very moment, as the only ones who could raise a fuss are yourselves. I have no qualms about staying behind. But if you discuss this with the others, they may not be so… agreeable.”

-

“I-If I had more of these,” Raiho grumbled, hopping on the stool as if to emphasize something, “then I’d be taller than you! Then you’d be looking up at hee, and I’d be a better summoner than you!”

Raidou wasn’t entirely sure what the demon was talking about, but something in his words clicked in the boy’s mind.

“...Raiho, do you mind moving for a moment?”

“Ho? Why? I mean--” The little snowman huffed again, folding his arms over his spherical body. “--Ho way! I’m not gonna listen to you!”

“Raiho, please. Just for a moment.”

“...Give hee your hat first and mayhee I’ll think about it.”

- 

“Hey, Kyouko-chan…”

The beeping had started on Conan and Kindaichi’s persons, but upon turning around, the boys noticed Samidare and Kirigiri were still just outside the door. The brunette had a serious and unreadable look on her face as she planted a hand on her friend’s shoulder. Kirigiri wordlessly studied the brunette, waiting for whatever she had to say patiently.

“Hey, can we get a move on?” Kindaichi asked, nervously gesturing to his bracelet. “You guys need to join us before the door closes…!”

Neither of the girls paid him any mind, staring into each other’s eyes as if they were communicating telepathically. Almost a full nine seconds passed before something happened - Samidare grinned.

“Take care of yourself, alright Kyouko-chan?”

With that, she roughly shoved her friend through the door as it began to grind shut. Taken by surprise, Kirigiri nearly toppled into the two detectives that started shouting at the woman outside simultaneously.

“Oi, Samidare--!”

“--what do you think you’re doing?!”

With the grin still plastered on her face, Yui Samidare gave a two-fingered salute before turning on her heels and running in the opposite direction.

The number 9 door shut between them, three separate sets of ticking bouncing off the stone walls.

- 

They were all horribly out of breath, and only half of them contained enough energy to start stumbling back before the faint sound of an explosion was heard.

“Yui-chan!” Suddenly, Lynne bolted down the way they came, adrenaline revitalizing her. Sissel tried calling out to stop her, but the redhead’s sprint didn’t slow.

- 

“We…” Samidare swallowed, her mouth dry. “We don’t just need a digital root of 9… We also need… nine bracelets…”

The silence was unbearable. Hattori swore again.

“Damn tha’ Kirigiri… She left us here knowin’ this…”

-

“Wait, do you guys hear that?” At Conan’s voice, everyone stopped what they were doing. With the excitement winding down, they all could hear a persistent knocking sound coming from the set of double doors on the other end of the banquet hall. Nobody moved for a moment, but then through an unspoken exchange, they all began to approach the doors as one. Deducing that it was locked, Hattori, leading the pack, cautiously reached out and turned the lock on the door.

Placing both hands on the handles, he looked back at the others for a moment, taking in everyone’s intense expressions. Then, finally, he threw the doors open.