#now i have to wait until new production performs...

[janeya]

wondering .. do u guys consider me the jane ceo or is that just my own wishes..

[memento-morri-writes]

It's been well over a week now (maybe two??) but I'm still plugging away (ever-so-slowly) at this vignette about Zara and Rook. Zara's POV is a lot of fun to write, now that I have a better sense of her character. Writing this has really solidified in my mind the kind of person she is and how she acted when she was Rook's captain and mentor. She's very calm and collected in comparison to Rook, even when under a lot of stress.

Anyways, have a little snippet that I'm proud of from today, featuring the origins of the coin trick!

Pacing back and forth across her cabin floor, she rolled the coin back and forth over her knuckles again and again. The motion was easy, almost mindless, more muscle memory than real intent. The coin trick had been her favorite way to soothe her nerves for years now. She’d picked it up out of idle curiosity after watching a street performer dining in a tavern in Bon Largo, who had chatted with her for over an hour as she fretted about something mundane, never once dropping the coin from their fingers. The same performer had later tried to steal her coin purse and ended up with nothing but a new scar for their trouble, but Zara had learned two important things from the encounter: Not to trust a warm smile and a pretty face, and that keeping her hands moving kept her mind from dwelling too much on worrisome things.

one-time tagging @space-writes because they commented on my tags about Rook learning the coin trick from Zara in one of my other snippets from this piece.

[defmaybe]

Party Police

ITZY's Shin Yuna x Male Reader

1.4k words

Sequel to Sticky

A/N: Let’s do a sequel!!! Again, I really love writing Yuna dominant lol, thanks for reading!!! Also, this one doesn't have the "definitely, maybe" line lol.

—

The plane croaks and cries as its wheels touch the runway. It slows down and turns a few times to park. Then, the seatbelt light above is gone.

—

Narita

As far as a company trip goes, this one should give you bragging rights over your friends until death. A spring trip to Tokyo–where every street and building is photogenic. The air is perfect (a bit cold, really, but it’s definitely better than your home).

Of course, it’s a reward from your generous boss, who fought the higher-ups to death for this trip. Your team’s productivity has soared under her reign, as she always brings snacks for your co-workers every single day. And with her bubbly, optimistic attitude, and such a level of competency you don’t dare to compete, they just had to approve this one-week trip at the price of a car.

The secret sessions between you two remain, well, a secret. Though, there has been a running rumor of your boss having a booty call with an employee, but you’re smart enough to play along with the wave, pulling out the ‘yeah, who could that be’ along with a few chuckles.

—

Shibuya, not so far from the crosswalk

The exit of the station has always been so busy, oh, so bustling in its nature. The chill air welcomes you to the afternoon of Shibuya. In front of you is the crosswalk—that goddamn crosswalk. You follow the wave of the people to the landmark, waiting to reach your sanctuary again.

The red stop signal flickers

1 2 3

You stride through the crowd—some holding their phones to capture the moment, some are just trying to reach their destinations as soon as possible.

You walk on the same path that you did years ago, just walking up north to your terminus, and there it is.

You open the glass door, and you feel another breeze from the air conditioners from inside blowing your face. It looks a bit cramped, but it’s definitely well-planned enough for you to see all the new albums. The first floor is mostly decorated with yellow and red–same as the big sign outside.

—

Tower Records

“Hmm, Alvvays, huh?” 

Yuna suddenly appears by your right shoulder, staring at their debut LP you’re holding.

Into your ears, she whispers, “You have a great taste, baby boy.” Her voice is breathy–hints of depth under it.

“You don’t have to leave. You could just stay here with me~” Yuna sings. Her hands are perching on your shoulder as she performs her little swaying with the hips.

“Forget all the party police. We can find comfort in debauchery~.”

With debauchery, her right hand trails down your lithe frame, down the sides, as you’re trying your best to stifle your own moan. The Alvvays disc in your hand is trembling.

“Oh, baby boy, I just wanna eat you right here, among these CDs,”—she continues—“I just wanna have you squirm, one hand holding on Antisocialites, another holding on Blue Rev.”

“M–Miss Shin, what are you s–saying? I d–don’t think it’s appropriate–”

“Shhh, baby boy, it’s not ‘Miss Shin’ here. You know the word, remember?” Yuna giggles at her own words, as you’re sweating at the fear of getting caught inside your own sanctuary. And she doesn’t let your body find its footing so firmly in the section either. She presses you forward, and you step back in response.

A B

“Say it, baby boy. Don’t keep me waiting~,” she teases. She presses you past Carly Rae Jepsen. Emotion runs high on you.

D E F G

“I–I can’t, Miss Shin. This is n–not the place.” You two are on Hatchie; she’s still without a blush. You must be fucking red as a tomato now, judging from how your whole body feels so damn hot.

I J K

Lorde. “Oh, baby boy, I know you wanna say it so, so bad. You just love being under my domination, don’t you?” 

But you can’t just give her a green light that easily, despite how much you just want her to pump your cock right here and now, in Tower Records Shibuya. There’s a matter of shame in play here. Your breaths are out of rhythm, unlike the music out of speaker right now.

M N O

“Ooh, look who it is here,”—Yuna picks up the Brand New Eyes box with both of her hands, pouting—“It’s Paramore! You… are… the only exception~. Am I your exception too?”

Fuck, why is she so irresistible?

Q R S

Taylor Swift appears in your sight on the left, along the steps back. “Y–Yes, M–M–” The thought sprouts in your head now, but you just can’t form the words. You’re, again, enchanted under her spell.

U V

Wolf Alice. “No hard feelings if you can’t say it, baby boy. I’ll just take the subway to Harajuku or somewhere else if that’s what you want, alone, without you~.”

X Y

“Y–Yes.”

“Yes… what, baby boy?”

“Yes, m–m–mommy. Y–You are my exception.” And on Z, you surrender to her.

“Good boy.” Yuna holds your hand, waking up a few butterflies inside you, before guiding you towards….

—

Tower Records’ Bathroom

“Umm, mmph, I’ve been dying to taste this cock for so long, baby boy.” And Yuna supports her point by dragging her filthy tongue along the underside of your length, glistening you with her saliva. And how can you not shudder with that? “I’d say… it’s worth the wait.”

“M–Mommy~,” you groan, eyes fluttering on top of the toilet.

What a sight. Yuna is kneeling on the floor for you in this stall, aiming to please you with her mouth. You can see her cleavage from the above, with her nipples still covered with the black bra. To ramp up the experience, she starts with taking in your whole mushroom tip with no struggle. God, she’s so good.

Her oral expertise continues to astound you, as she twirls her tongue around your tip, gathering any pre-cum leaking out.

“Hmm, I think I should do a bit more before you cum~,” she says, before diving onto the base of your throbbing length with ease.

“F–Fuck! You’re so t–tight, mommy,” you moan, and your hands are holding on to the lid with your dear life, not wanting to fall. Your head is basically leaning on the wall behind you now.

Yuna says nothing, but you can see her smiling on your shaft despite the cheeks being hollowed out to create such otherworldly suction. Fuck. She bobs her head up and down to bring you to the edge. Her gag reflex starts to make her tears welling up, but that doesn’t stop her from pleasuring her favorite employee with her mouth to his hilt.

Every movement of hers is considered, aiming to milk your cock just like she did that time with her right hand, the other grabbing you by your slutty waist���when you were nothing but a toy for her to play with. She hollows her cheeks, as said, to create such otherworldly suction. And that dreamy eye contact while she blows on your hardness, god, who wouldn’t cum within a heartbeat. 

“M–Mommy, I’m gonna cum,” you say, as your hips buck into her with her frenetic movements.

Yuna doesn’t relent her attempts, still gagging profusely on her baby boy’s needy cock. She makes this little whiny sound with every of your thrust, as the end of your digit reaches as far back as it can. Yet, she’s still determined—so fucking determined to please her number one employee. But now, you want just a bit more.

“M–Mommy, y–your tits, p–please.”

She gives in to your plea too easily, but it’s like you’d complain. She quickly discards layers of fabric until her bra is left. And after a few magic tricks of her hands, her last barrier falls off just for you. You savor in the moment of her bare breasts and the stiff nipples under your impending orgasm. Oh, what a sight.

And it’s there, your seed releasing into her throat.

“M–Mommy~,” you whimper.

Your length twitches inside her tight cavern, wanting to squeeze every drop out of you. She doesn’t let any drop leak out of her mouth either, swallowing any residue down to her stomach.

And as you finish, she has to open her mouth and stick out her tongue to show her clean cavern.

“F–Fuck, mommy, w–why, why are you so good?”

“Just for my favorite employee, baby boy.”

—

[gazetto-no-ki]

2024.12.14 Ruki on IG:

Hoodies are an essential item for me since I wear them all the time, so I created one again.

This piece went through a lot of effort: it was dyed with a distressed finish, bleached, and then printed on top. Each one has slight variations in the dyeing, which makes them all the more special and easy to grow attached to.

The staff at the production company insisted that gray would also turn out amazing, so I gave it a shot—and they were totally right. I’m so glad I made it ⚡️

That’s why I created this hoodie in two colors. Working with the staff and enjoying the process together was another great memory.

#nilduenilun_tokyo #nilduenilun #act11 #ruki

Knit Sweater This is another new item.

I took the design from the one and only original guitar I own and translated it directly into this knit sweater. It took quite a bit of effort to create that pattern on the guitar, and getting the same texture with this knit material was just as challenging. Haha.

One of the highlights is its comfort: no shedding and no itchiness 🎸

#nilduenilun_tokyo #nilduenilun #act11 #ruki

New black shirt.

For the shoot, I dyed my hair black as well to make the contrast with the white stand out sharply. Going all black every once in a while feels great.

What stood out to me during the shoot was how much the model loved this black shirt—she even took her own photos of it.

I think it suits both men and women, so please give it a try.

#nilduenilun_tokyo #nilduenilun #act11 #ruki

New item🕯️ This is a candle I’ve been wanting to create for a long time.

There’s a story from last winter: after Koron passed away, I lit a candle at home every single day until it burned down completely. Afterward, I repurposed the empty jar as a vase for preserved flowers and ultimately offered it to Koron.

That candle brought me so much comfort, and it reminded me how scents can leave a lasting impression.

I’ve always loved candles, but I’m glad I waited until now to create one instead of doing it back then.

I named this candle LAST HEAVEN, the same name as the first perfume I made.

This is NIL’s very first candle.

It smells amazing, so I hope it can bring peace and comfort to everyone.

#nilduenilun_tokyo #nilduenilun #ruki #lastheaven

NIL New Item (shirt) This was the first item I started designing for this collection: an embroidered shirt.

Back in the day, I often wore my own shirts during encores, so I thought about what kind of shirt I would wear now and created this piece.

The white shirt idea came from last year’s Christmas live performance, where I wore a white suit. I realized white could look surprisingly good, so I decided to make this shirt in both white and black.

I’m particularly fond of the black floral embroidery.

This time, I also had a lot of photos of myself taken for the first time, so it became a great memory. I’ve shared a bunch of them, so I hope you’ll enjoy them 📸

I worked hard again this year to create these pieces, so I hope you’ll give them a try!🔥

#nilduenilun_tokyo #nilduenilun #ruki

On Twitter:

“Good job today, everyone 🙏🔥 I spent my day being totally at the mercy of Instagram’s scheduled posts. Haha.”

"And so, this year as well, I was able to announce new items from NIL.

This will be a long one, but I want to leave my thoughts here.

When I didn’t want to listen to music anymore, when I couldn’t create anything, when everything went blank—it was only then that I truly realized how precious it is to have an environment where I can create something.

Slowly but surely, the feeling of wanting to cherish what I’ve built over time began to overflow. With the help of many staff members in a rush, I was able to bring this 11th collection to life.

I poured myself into this project with the mindset that I want to give my all to what I can do and leave behind right now, because I knew I’d regret it if I didn’t.

Now that it’s all been uploaded, I feel once again that this is just one more step toward what comes next.

There were challenges in continuing to push forward and keep updating, but because I decided to create exactly what I love without holding back, I feel like I’ve also relearned the importance of enjoying the process, even amidst the difficulties.

I gave the collection the title "BREATH," with many meanings in mind, including the idea of taking a breath, when you sing.

I think I was able to shape something that I want to incorporate into my daily life.

And this year, which marks seven years since starting NIL, I decided to capture "My Current Self"—Ruki as I am now, with makeup for the first time.

I feel that preserving this moment in some tangible way holds meaning.

I don’t plan on doing this every time, but I’d be happy if people could see me as I am now. And I’m sure these items will suit you all as well, so if you pick them up, it would make me happy.

As always, I personally made everything, from the music to the editing of the promotional videos 🎧

These items are filled with so many thoughts and feelings. I hope you’ll enjoy them 🙏

Please check them out starting tomorrow at 6 PM 📸"

"I'll also post some behind-the-scenes shots so please look forward to them 🐦‍⬛🕊️📸

Good night."

[littleslaywrites]

pas de deux | spencer reid x bau!reader 

summary: you’re a ballet dancer in your spare time. when you get injured, spencer is there to help you recover.

based on ask: “can i request a spencer reid x reader where our reader (who does something like figure skating, gymnastics, cheer, ballet, etc, in her spare time) gets injured on the job and realizes that also affects her hobby? and spencer helps her find a new hobby while she's in recovery and it's just super fluffy and cute” 

word count: 1.8k

cw: f!reader, basically just fluff, slight angst kinda, description of injury (knee hyperextension), boyfriend!spencer, reader is an intern at the bau and becomes a member of the team

Ballet has always been there for you, even when nobody else was. You had been dancing your whole life, from age three all the way until now, spending your time after work in the studio. Although you chose not to major in dance in college, it was your solace, always waiting after a long day.

Spencer was the first person you had met that made you feel like ballet did. When you started your internship over the summer at the BAU, he was there for you without being patronizing. He understood you like nobody else had. You felt free around him, always excited to see him when you got home. Best of all, he was perfectly fine sharing your attention with ballet. When you had your first performance after meeting him, before he even asked you on your first date, he was waiting in the front row with the biggest bouquet of flowers you’d ever seen. From that night on, he was at every opening and closing night you had.

After graduating, you were promoted from intern to an official member of the team, and Spencer promoted you from crush to girlfriend. That winter, you were doing a production of The Nutcracker in D.C. at the Washington Ballet. Every night after work, you’d make the drive to rehearsal. It was a tight schedule, but the love you had for it ensured it was never a burden. 

It was a routine case, local, so you didn’t even have to fly out. Garcia had traced the unsub’s location, sending the team to a house in some unsuspecting suburb. 

The SUV pulled into the driveway, you sitting in the passenger seat while Morgan drove. Rossi and JJ were right behind you, so you didn’t hesitate to go inside the house. As Morgan kicked down the door, you saw the unsub make a run for it. You followed, but in your hurry, you didn’t realize there was a step up into the room you were rushing into. 

You realized you were tripping as it happened, swearing internally at your mindlessness. You felt your ankle twist, and you tried to save the fall by putting your knee down. You felt it hit the ground, buckling and bending back, pain shooting through the back of your leg. Morgan was ahead of you, already taking down the unsub, so your fall went unnoticed until JJ came through the door.

As JJ came to your side, your first thought wasn’t the injury, but the embarrassment you felt. Within your first three months as an official member of the BAU, you managed to injure yourself because you weren’t paying attention to your surroundings.

Laying flat on your stomach, you heard JJ ask if you were okay. You murmured something, trying to push yourself up to your feet. You’d had little injuries in ballet, so you surely could handle whatever you just did. But as you tried to stand, the throbbing pain in your knee made itself known. You bit your tongue to stifle yourself from crying out in pain. 

Your attempt to stand failing, you rolled over to your back and sat up, looking at the damage. You cringed away as you looked at your knee, bent in the opposite direction as it should be. Biting your lip, you carefully straightened your leg back out to its regular position, sighing as the pain set it. JJ called out for a medic, and you braced yourself for the consequences of your mistake.

Spencer is trailing behind the first two cars, arriving as the unsub is being led to the police car that was waiting outside. When he hears JJ call out for the medic over the radio, he immediately panics, mind going to the worst case scenario about you. As he climbs out of the passenger seat, he sees you hobbling into the back of an ambulance, arm around JJ’s shoulder. He jogs over to you, trying to see around the EMT who’s working on your knee.

“What happened, y/n?” he asks, trying not to sound too concerned but failing. 

“It seems like she hyperextended her knee,” the medic replies for you. “She should try to stay off of it for a month. I’m getting her a brace now.”

You’re looking down at your hands, not wanting to face the concerned look in Spencer’s eyes. Of course, you’re grateful someone cares about you in the way he does, but it makes you embarrassed to know you caused the concern. 

“I have a ballet performance in two months–” you begin, before the medic cuts you off.

“Absolutely not,” the medic says. “You’ll be on crutches for half that time, and you shouldn’t put any excess pressure on it for at least 12 weeks.”

This news shatters your heart. You know the medic’s careless attitude can’t be attributed to cruelty, he’s probably busy and wanting to get onto the next job, but his words still make your eyes water. Knowing the rest of the team is already moved onto wrapping up the case, you let a silent tear fall, still refusing to look away from your lap.

When the medic leaves to fill out some form, Spencer moves in close to you, lifting your chin to make eye contact with you. The look in his eyes is full of concern and understanding, only causing more tears to come.

“Hey,” he pulls you into a hug. “I know,” he comforts as you cry. 

You’re sure your face is burning from embarrassment, both from being injured and now crying in the middle of a crime scene. You bury your face in his neck so nobody else can see you.

He knows what losing ballet means to you, especially losing your role in the show. He doesn’t have to tell you that he understands, the way he holds you says it clearly. 

“You know, just before you started your internship, I got shot in the leg and was on crutches. It’s nothing to be embarrassed about,” he comforts.

“Spencer, that wasn’t your fault,” you sigh out, “I tripped and fell. That’s all on me.”

He looks at you, knowing nothing he says can change your mind. “At least you won’t have to get on the plane for a while.” 

“What if I like being on the plane?” you ask back.

“You don’t,” he answers, a smirk on the sides of his lips as he tries not to smile at your commitment to being miserable.

You see him trying not to smile, and a laugh breaks up your crying. Spencer brushes away a tear that rolled down your face, joining in your giggles. 

“My stubborn girl,” he says lovingly, leaning down to kiss you.

The EMT clears his throat, and you take that as your signal to head back to the station.

Resting at home wasn’t easy for you. Despite your protests, Spencer got Hotch to give you two weeks off. You felt useless sitting around your shared apartment, not even able to clean with your reliance on the crutches. 

Even worse was when you had to call the company to tell them you wouldn’t be able to perform. You knew your understudy would do well, but giving up the role was heartbreaking nonetheless.

Spencer knew how devastated you were losing your passion, your escape from reality. His solution is to scour his bookshelves for whatever he thought you might like. You didn’t mind reading, but you’d lost your enthusiasm for it in college when you were swamped by textbooks and research papers. Spencer made it his mission to overcome that, knowing there had to be something you’d love.

The night before your first day alone on leave, you were laying in bed. Spencer had taken longer than usual to join you. Unable to go through the effort to get out of bed, you call out “Whatcha doing out there, Spencer?”

“You’ll see,” he replies. His secrecy makes you smile. You can tell he’s in this study from where his voice came from. Your curiosity is piqued, but you don’t want to spoil whatever surprise he has in store, so you just lay back down. Eventually, he joins you in bed, snuggling as close as he can while still being careful of your knee. The comfort of his arms pulls you into sleep.

When you wake up the next morning, he’s fully dressed, laying out clothes for you on the dresser. He helps you get dressed, even though it’s completely unnecessary. You’re not as injured as he acts like you are, which frustrates you, even though it comes from a place of love. Still, you're grateful he helps you get ready before he makes his way to the door to leave for the workday.

“You’d think I was as breakable as an egg from the way you act,” you say, crutching over to the door as he picks up his bag.

“I don’t know, y/n, you fell pretty easily,” he teases, soft brown eyes meeting yours to show that he means nothing, simply poking fun at you. You wish you could reach out and run your hands through his hair, but you’re held back by your crutches. Spencer’s probably grateful for that part of your injury, since he isn’t fixing his hair every few hours because you couldn’t resist playing with it.

Rolling your eyes at his quips, he leans down to kiss you. “I’ll miss you, Humpty Dumpty,” he says playfully. You scoff, faking insult, as he walks away and opens the door. “And, by the way,” he stops himself, “I left a surprise on the coffee table to you.” He closes the door, and you remember him in the study last night.

When you go to sit on the couch, you see a stack of books with a note on the top. Setting the crutches lazily on the floor, you pick up the note, reading:

I looked through my books and found a few I thought you might enjoy. Hopefully, they can take you to another world while you’re stuck on the couch. Love you, Spencer.

P.S. Ice packs are in the freezer.

You smile at his words reaching for the stack. Each book has a note placed inside on why you might like them. Anna Karenina because he remembered (of course he did) when you told him you performed in the ballet adaptation in high school. The Grapes of Wrath to remind you of your home state, California. Misery since you loved horror movies as much as he did, so he thought you might like a horror book. Animal Farm if you wanted something shorter but thought-provoking. Jurassic Park because, as he wrote, “everyone loves dinosaurs”. 

You smiled at the gesture, picturing him going through all of his books and choosing the ones he thought would help you forget about what your injury took away. Even with him at work, you felt his love in the stack of books, the notes he left, the coffee he left you on the table. He was your partner in crime, trusting him in the pas de deux of life.

You leaned back on the couch, picking up the first book from the stack, already anticipating discussing your readings with Spencer when he got back from work.

author's note: I absolutely LOVED writing this one. By the end it was totally self indulgent becuase I was having too much fun. It may or may not be totally based on myself. Since it’s nutcracker season I made that the show y/n was performing in. Also the books mentioned are all some of my favs. I pictured season 6/7 Spencer while writing but that has pretty much no impact on the story lol. @kakamixoxo I love you for this request and I literally had so much fun writing it!

[mrs-stans]

Sebastian Stan

Words Natty Kasambala

Beloved for Captain America, I, Tonya, and his recent Emmy-nominated role in Pam & Tommy, Stan reflects on a career shaped by diverse characters. Now, with A Different Man and The Apprentice, he’s exploring deep questions about identity, ambition, and the complexities of portraying one of America’s most influential (and controversial) men, Donald Trump

Sebastian Stan wears Rag & Bone throughout. Photography Jim Goldberg

The first time Sebastian Stan tried acting, he hated it. At 9 or 10 years old, he played a Romanian orphan in an Austrian film called 71 Fragments of a Chronology of Chance (1994). Between the waiting around, night shoots, and general pressure-cooker energy, the whole experience had been pretty anxiety-inducing. “I think the idea of a set was just really terrifying,” he recalls. The 42-year-old mainstay admits to being a Leo, but a rather reluctant one, he says, not that extroverted or hypersocial. “I know my mom always thought I was creative simply because I would impersonate the people in our family, or birds or whatever I would see around me.” Nowadays, when he does speak, it’s with the compelling ease of someone who’s spent equal time commanding impressive rooms and in their own head trying to crack the great questions of the world – sounding off passionately about the perils of social media (“there’s so much noise in today’s world”) or the last incredible film he watched (Sing Sing and it was “pure heart”).

Born in Romania and raised in Vienna until he was 12, it wasn’t until immigrating to America as a preteen that Stan found his way back to the craft at all. Attending Stagedoor Manor summer camp aged 15, in the Catskill mountains of upstate New York, his spark was reignited. “That place was really magical and made me fall in love with (acting again); I couldn’t think of anything else as exciting to me as performing was,” he says. “Some of it was about not ever being sure of what to be when I grew up. I kept thinking that you could be a lot of things if you did this.”

So far, he’s been a wayward socialite, a cannibal, a space surgeon, a ski patrol villain, a heavy metal drummer, a supernatural student and a World War II veteran turned brainwashed Soviet operative, to n ame but a few. He’s not an actor you’ll find in the same role twice. With that said, his name has reached household status through a decade-long Marvel stint, with the two films Stan finds himself at the helm of this year being his most ambitious forays yet. 33 years on from his awkward beginning, the actor’s commitment to film appears to still be very much in bloom. “I think I’m at a point in my life where I’m trying to understand things on a deeper level,” he explains. “I can’t say I know everything, you’re always growing, always having to explore. I think it’s important to stay curious, to stay in a certain degree of healthy discomfort… I want to be part of important storytelling that’s asking important questions and reflecting our time.”

In A Different Man, an A24 production directed by Aaron Schimberg, Stan takes on the role of an aspiring actor called Edward with neurofibromatosis, a genetic condition that results in the extensive growth of benign tumours. He undergoes a clinical trial that cures him of his physical symptoms, but his new life turns out to be far from what he dreamed for himself. It’s a winding surrealist investigation into the social impacts of disability, alienation, representation and self-image: its gaze is unflinching, its narrative self-referential and its humour pitch-black. Stan has already won the Silver Bear for Best Leading Performance at the Berlin Film Festival for A Different Man.

The second release, The Apprentice, follows a wildly different arc. Directed by Iranian-Danish filmmaker Ali Abbasi, it tracks a young Trump as he falls under the nefarious mentorship of infamous legislator Roy Cohn. Dubbed ‘an American Horror Story’, it’s a sobering yet deeply entertaining snapshot of the making of one of America’s most influential men. Yet even within the dynamic, prescient story, the actor’s take on Trump is subtle and human, and the tone of the film is less moralising and more matter of fact.

Though the narratives of these two projects are starkly different, you can’t help but find the common threads. Both are set in New York and document a transformation, and both centre a feverish pursuit of some ideal imagined self. A Different Man was filmed back in 2022, and The Apprentice only wrapped in February of this year, but Stan agrees it’s a curious double-header. “I’m weirdly finding parallels between them that I never thought I would. Identity, self-truth, self-abandonment. This idea that we’re always chasing in America, whether it’s image or status or an inability to accept failure and to take ownership over mistakes.”

For the Trump film, that real-life denial was almost the ending of their work of fiction. After years of false starts, Trump’s legal team attempted to block the film’s release in the US altogether and they struggled to find a distributor willing to take on the risk of pissing off a potential President. “For to edit it and get it to Cannes in some finished version itself in five months was just insane. There was no idea if the movie was going to come out,” Stan says. On an individual level, the task felt equally murky and intimidating at first. “You’re trying to tell a story about somebody that’s so famous, who everyone has an opinion about: either extreme love and adoration or hate and animosity. And everyone’s got a version of the guy, so you think, well what do I…” he shrugs, “how do I find my way into it?” Ultimately, they landed on this film as a means of peeling back the layers of one of the most polarising figures of our time. It’s less caricature and more character study as it explores his relationship with his father, his ambitions, the man he was before the slogans and affectations.

Executive producer Amy Baer has spoken about the choice to call on a non-American director to provide a new lens on the intricacies of American culture, propaganda and patriotism. With Stan’s own immigrant story, his perspective adds another dimension to that prism too. Memories of walking down Fifth Avenue in awe and wonder as a kid, staring up at all the big buildings – he tapped into a hunger and drive to portray early Trump as a young man desperately trying to be a part of The Club. “I guess with my experience coming to this country, it was communicated to me even from Eastern Europe that this is the place where you can make something of yourself, you can have a good idea… and you could just succeed,” Stan says. The Apprentice asks, “but at what cost? What happens to a person’s humanity?”

Throughout the film, you witness Trump espousing about “bringing back New York”, even remarking on Reagan’s campaign slogan ‘Let’s Make America Great Again’ towards the end, an ideology he would go on to repurpose for his own candidacy. It’s a fascinating yet depressing origin story of a nationalistic rhetoric that echoes today as a Trojan horse for corruption and greed. “It’s complicated. That’s why I think there’s value in exploring it,” Stan urges. “This American Dream idea is a really powerful driving force that also comes with consequences.”

Perhaps the most complex part was the toxic relationship with his sometimes-partner-in-crime played staggeringly by Jeremy Strong. “I think he was the best partner I’ve ever had in anything I’ve worked on,” Stan declares with a smile. “You know when you’re standing in front of a fire and you feel the heat of it and there’s crackling in the air? That’s how it felt.” Amidst quite a gruelling, isolating filming schedule, it’s the aspect Stan speaks about most fondly.

Clothing Fendi, Necklace & Bracelet Cartier, Boots Givenchy

Swinging between dominant and intimate, transactional and paternal, from comical to devastating, both stayed in character throughout the shoot and undertook a colossal amount of research to be prepared for infinite possible improvised routes. “Creatively, makes things interesting is when you’re not in control. You do all this preparation to be prepared to be surprised,” Stan says. Shot documentary-style in moments, Abbasi might give each of them notes in private to shift the tone of a scene, and they’d find themselves responding instinctively within their roles. “The only way you can achieve that is if, to some degree, you find that person in you. And I can certainly tell you,” he pauses briefly to consider his landing. “There is a version of Trump that existed in me. And I’ll make the argument that there’s a version of Trump that exists in all of us. And that part of our job, part of our interest, should be figuring out what that is. I think we have to acknowledge and expose the things in us that are not so easy to admit, in order to further protect the things we need to fight for. You can’t ignore it.”

In that moment, it’s clear that it’s an argument as true of our discourse on Trump as it is of Stan’s other role in A Different Man. His character Edward is driven to obsession and madness when he witnesses the thriving life of a person with the same disfigurement he was quick to shed, the very thing he believed to be the root of all his misfortune. Right before his transformation, Edward has been ignoring a leak in his ceiling for weeks, and the damage is getting worse. When he’s finally forced to call for a repair, the super arrives and is appalled at how bad he’s allowed it to get. He tells Edward frustratedly, “you should have fixed this sooner”. In that moment, it feels as though he’s talking about a hundred things at once. From Edward’s own issues with doubt and self-acceptance that cling to him even when he is no longer ‘different’ to our own society’s discomfort with, and the misunderstanding of disability altogether. We cannot be afraid to look.

“Edward makes a decision that he thinks is going to improve his life, but he’s not making it for himself. He’s making it because he’s watched other people and he’s grown up in a society that’s told him this is what works,” Stan explains. “Essentially, he abandons himself and he spirals down trying to further live with that painful acknowledgement. I think we have to be conscious of when we’re making decisions that go against who we are and what we truly want.”

In true indie style, squeezing in around the schedule of their makeup artist who was on another project at the same time, Stan had some hours to kill most mornings in prosthetics before filming which he’d spend navigating the city he calls home: “one of the gifts that I was given which I’m very grateful for was the experience that I had walking around New York City as Edward.” With reactions to him ranging from invisibility to hypervisibility, it shifted his entire understanding.

“I’ve been there like everybody else thinking, oh, if I had that. Or you see someone on Instagram and you’re like, oh my God, look at that life, they have the best life; you get caught up in these things.” It’s both reassuring and a little disheartening that, unlike his superhuman alter ego, a star like Stan is still not immune to the very human insecurities us civilians face of joy-stealing comparisons. “There’s this idea I’ve been thinking about a lot with my therapist actually,” he laughs. “He was saying ‘I am me and you are you.’ I was like… yeah! But you forget. We have to understand our own experience and then understand someone else’s. But we have to try to understand it not through our own emotional… vomit.”

When I ask Sebastian what he does for fun, to unbecome his characters and shed their existential weight, he cites reading (mostly non-fiction) and travel (to see other cultures). “I always feel like I’m not learning enough,” he laughs. You get the sense that this year is a juncture for Stan, always revered for being grounded and likeable, but perhaps waiting for opportunities like these to enrich and express other sides of himself as an actor and voice within culture. “Both of these films came at an interesting time where I’m thinking about if I’m at mid-life, this second half of my life. What is it that I want to be a part of and one day look back and be proud of?”

And that’s not to say fun is off the table for Stan. He’s passionate about laughter as a release in a difficult world. “I think it’s just as important, we have to protect humour,” he tells me with an urgency. “I love comedies, romantic comedies, action.” In fact, there’s a top-secret action movie passion project that he has in the works and hopes will come together in the right way. “There are also things in Marvel I want to do and explore with ol’ Bucky Barnes,” he smiles, presumably in reference to the new Marvel film Thunderbolts, slated for a 2025 release, in which he stars alongside Florence Pugh, Harrison Ford and David Harbour. “Otherwise I just want to keep learning how to be a human being. I’m telling you,” he laughs, “I feel like it’s pretty hard.”

Photography Jim Goldberg Styling Reuben Esser Production Hyperion LA Hair Jamie Taylor using Augustinus Bader Hair Erica Adams Represented by A-Frame Agency

[beesspacedotorg]

abo skz and their song double knot... just feels like that makes a lot of sense

why else would they have made that song?!? 👀

- 🌵

there's no sex in this, sorry for taking so long bro. there is bang christopher chan though. sorry for the double knot/side effects slander. also this isn't part of the dibsverse

When you first hear the song, you spend the whole of it staring right into Chan’s skull. His ears are bright red and his face is heating and he resolutely avoids your gaze as he stares at the road.

“Christopher,” you start.

“Baby.” “Don’t ‘baby’ me. You did not just make this song.”

“But, did you listen to the lyrics? It’s about finding our own way and-”

“The title of the song is Double Knot, Christopher.”

“It’s about shoe laces!”

“Yeah, I bet it is.”

They don’t perform the song often, they don’t perform songs pre-God’s Menu often, so after a while you let it go. You’re here now, sitting between the Rock Star comeback and whatever comes next, more excited for Nayeon’s new album than anything else, when someone reminds you of it.

“I’m a Double Knot defender,” one of your friends says.

“Do you have ears attached to your head?”

“Yeah, which is why I’ll tell you that the song is straight bars.”

“Yeah, straight un-bar-able.”

“You take that back right now. What next? You don’t like Side Effects?”

“Oh buddy, just wait until you hear this.”

You get back to your table with the drinks when it hits you.

“I fucking forgot about Double Knot.”

“See! Bro’s literally in love with the members and doesn’t even remember the song.” Your friend says. The other one rolls their eyes and starts talking about the amazing production quality in the two songs, you only chime in to stir the pot.

-

“Christopher!” You’re calling through the house when you get home, kicking off your shoes and throwing your bag haphazardly in a way you know is going to get you scolded later.

“In here!” He calls from his room. Your phone’s been blowing up, so he might be flirting with Stays right now. You hope they won’t mind if you steal him away for a bit.

“Chris, Chan, Channie, you’ll never believe what I was just reminded of.” You flop down next to him, bouncing the two of you a little as his mattress recoils.

“That you need to get the oil changed in your car?”

“What? No. You did that for me last month.”

“That you forgot shampoo at the grocery store?”

“Stop guessing, you’re bad at it.” He huffs and rolls his eyes, setting his phone down to face you fully.

“Well, what is it then?”

“Chan. Channie, Chan. I was reminded,” you stop to giggle, “of Double Knot.” He groans and shoves a pillow onto his face.

“I already told you that-”

“That it was about persevering and shoelaces, I know. But,” you giggle, “Channie, do you know what?” He lifts the pillow just enough to squint at you with one eye.

“What?”

“You can give me your double knot.” He hits you with the pillow.

“That doesn’t even make sense.” The pillow is still over your face but you know better than anyone that he’s bright red and smiley right now. Flustered in that way he always is when you flirt with him.

“Yeah, it does.” You shove the pillow down to look at him, you were right, his face is flaming.

“It most certainly does not.”

“It most certainly does.”

“How?”

“It’s very simple,” you lift your finger beside your face and tilt your head up, putting on a terrible British accent to sound smarter than is necessary for the situation. “One must simply fuck me hard enough that-” He hits you with the pillow again.

“Shush!”

“If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you’re a virgin.”

“I’m just shy.”

“You weren’t shy last night when you-” The pillow hits you a third time.

“Shh, shh. No more speaking from you.” His hand gently covers your mouth. You stare at him with wide eyes before biting his palm.

“Channie-”

“Ow? What the fuck?” He’s cradling his hand and inspecting it for marks. You didn’t bite him that hard.

“Channie, listen to me-”

“You just bit me-” He stops when he looks back up and gets an eyeful of your chest.

“Channie,” you coo at him, honey sweet, “don’t you wanna fuck me?”

“Jesus.” You smile at him as you can smell his cinnamon get sharper, turning sweet, like an overseasoned latte. He told you once that Koreans don’t use a lot of cinnamon in their foods, so he was worried people wouldn’t like the way he smelled. You told him you want to cover him in sugar icing and lick it off. He called you deplorable.

“You’re insufferable, you know that?” He shoves the shirt off your body and lays on top of you to attack your mouth.

“You like me anyway.”

“Love, unfortunately.” You smile at him and throw your arms around his neck.

“So, about those double knots?”

[luvymelody]

todoroki shoto - for the first time : mac demarco

todoroki never really understand why he his face seemed to feel more hot as one of his classmates walked into the room. just one specific classmate.

y/n l/n.

she was a pretty girl no doubt, there would be people from business classes to even the hero classes coming to the 1-a classroom everyday just to have a glance of y/n walking out. todoroki found her pretty but he didn't really pay much thought to it.

aizawa had planned a hero exercise where the class were put into a pair or a trio and they were to retrieve the hostage that was kidnapped and bring them back outside. the kidnapper was going to be aizawa and the hostage was just going to be a mannequin.

partners and groups were going to be made by a wheel a day before in homeroom. everyone got their respected partners or groups and then that left todoroki and y/n with no group or partner.

"so that leaves todoroki and l/n together."

"aww no fair i wanted y/n!"

kaminari called out, yelling out as he got shoji, one of the biggest guys in the class and would probably be seen in a second, shoji's face grew red under his mask.

y/n walked up to todoroki as her seat that was on the right near the middle section while todoroki was in the back left of the class.

"hi todoroki! let's try our best okay!"

y/n exclaimed, her fists above her chest and clutched inwards and having a smile on her face. todoroki didn't understand why, but his face grew hot again.

"of course, l/n."

-

the exercise went off without a hitch, no problems whatsoever. some pairs passed the course and some failed. todoroki and y/n were last to perform.

"you sneak though the left side and i'll sneak though the middle corridor. if i get caught you help me and if you get caught i'll help you-"

y/n was explaining on what they should do as their plan but todoroki was too mesmerised the way their lips moved, noticing the new shade of lip product that they had. it wasn't like a lipstick it was more of a lip tint.

"did you get a new lip product?"

y/n paused and took a double take at todoroki's words. then smiled,

"you noticed? isn't it cute! it was only like 1000 yen, but the cashier was looking at me funny so i don't know if he was scamming me or-"

todoroki's heart thumped faster, feeling like it was beating out of his chest infront of the h/c coloured haired girl.

"anyway do you like it?"

y/n asked, her lips puckering up and she closed her eyes in a pose to show off her lips. he stared hard at her lips and he nearly held up his hand to touch them, if they felt as soft as they looked, but she opened her eyes once more, and his hand retracted quicker than ice can melt under the sun.

"yes, it looks beautiful."

y/n blushed and todoroki noticed that that was how he looked at her when she walked into a room. did she find him pretty?

-

todoroki held onto the mannequin as he looked for y/n, he didn't see her as he went down the left hallway, he didn't know if she got caught or was just in hiding.

todoroki walked fast and noticed a noise behind him, trying to shoot off his ice immediately towards the noise but nothing came out of his hands.

"good try, i have your partner by the way."

todoroki whipped his head around and saw that aizawa was holding onto y/n was his rope that was wrapped around his neck, his hair floating and the yellow goggles on his face onto. y/n nervously smiled and mouthed out a 'sorry' towards the heterochromia eyed boy.

todoroki noticed that y/n was growing a thorn out of her hand, noticing the plants and flora that grew out of both, as aizawa didn't notice and just thought that she wouldn't be able to get out of his scarf grip.

y/n mouthed a 'now' as the stem of the flower bent and grew, hitting aizawa in the face as he grunted into surprise. todoroki immediately froze out a large block of ice towards aizawa, freezing him in place and y/n got out of the rope, making a run towards todoroki.

"let's go- todoroki!"

todoroki waited until the girl was next to him, reaching out for her hand and gripping onto her hand as they exited the building. the class outside cheered as they noticed the two coming out.

"good job! you guys made it!"

mina called out, running over the y/n and hugging her tight as the warmth in her right hand left, the one parallel to her was todoroki's left side.

"thanks!"

the girls crowded around y/n, they whispered a few words and that made y/n the same red as before that todoroki saw that mimicked his face aswell.

"why were you guys holding hands?"

midoriya asked, as he walked up to todoroki next to iida.

"the pair of you did a fantastic job!"

iida said, todoroki gave a small smile with the corner of his lips turning up.

"thank you."

-

the class went back to the dorm rooms, they were settling in for the night and todoroki lied in his bed, hands intertwined on his stomach as he thought about the day.

he was so curious about his temperature rise that y/n and him were feeling, so he got up, walking towards y/n's dorm room. he knocked on the door, as it was opened, no surprisingly y/n opened it.

she was doing her skincare and had a headband to hold back her hair and two eye masks under her eyes. she blushed to see todoroki, she thought that mina was the one knocking as she said that she was coming over.

"oh! hi todoroki, this is kinda embarrassing for you to see me like this.."

"it's alright, you're always beautiful in every way."

y/n grew even more red than before.

"that's really kind of you todoroki-"

"i need to ask, why does your face turn red when i compliment you? because it happens to me when you walk into the same room as me and i notice you. i notice you everytime you do and i've always questioned what this meant because i didn't understand. when i was looking at your lips my heart was beating really loud that it felt like it was coming out of my chest and i don't know what it means and i'm nearly desperate to know what it means."

todoroki summarised, y/n took it in slowly and her face still remained red, she reached down to grab onto todoroki's hands and held them between her and todoroki, then it was todoroki's turn to turn red.

"it.. it means that you like me, todoroki. like, like like me, you like me how a couple would love each other but just a little less."

todoroki listened to her words and gripped her hands tight,

"i understand now.."

todoroki stared into her eyes and glanced at her lips once more.

"may i kiss you?"

todoroki questioned once more, y/n's lips started to tremble under her nerves, uttering a quiet yes as todoroki slowly leaned in, closing the gap between the two of them. he finally understood the feeling and emotion that he felt for y/n. love.

[invisibleicewands]

If you missed Tom Holland’s starring turn in “Romeo & Juliet” on the West End earlier this fall, now is your chance to get a taste of British theater — this time, for free and without leaving your home.

Enter London’s iconic Olivier stage with a viewing of Michael Sheen-led Welsh fantasia play “Nye” via National Theatre at Home (NT at Home), a streaming service designed to offer theatrical plays to viewers globally. “Nye” will stream for free on the National Theatre YouTube channel from 7 p.m. GMT on Thursday, Nov. 7 until Monday, Nov. 11.

Per the show’s description, in “Nye,” “Michael Sheen plays Nye Bevan in a surreal and spectacular journey through the life and legacy of the man who transformed Britain’s welfare state and created the NHS. Confronted with death, Aneurin ‘Nye’ Bevan’s deepest memories lead him on a mind-bending journey back through his life; from childhood to mining underground, Parliament and fights with Churchill.”

The stage play, which is written by Tim Price and directed by Rufus Norris, will be the second annual title offered as a free stream from the National Theatre.

“I can’t wait for audiences worldwide to watch this incredibly important show,” Sheen told Variety. “It feels particularly appropriate for this play to be available for free as it follows the founder of the National Health Service, Aneurin ‘Nye’ Bevan through his life and fight to make healthcare free at the point of access. The free stream is a brilliant opportunity for theatre lovers and skeptics alike to tune in, be inspired and learn something, too.”

After its free-streaming window, “Nye” is set to join more than 80 titles in the National Theatre at Home library. In a promo tied to “Nye,” NT at Home is offering new subscribers access to their streaming selection for half off of their first two months with the code “NYE50.” The service is currently priced at £9.99 per month (around $13) or £99.99 per year (around $130).

“I’m thrilled that audiences around the world will have the chance to watch ‘Nye’, not just for free, but from the comfort of their homes,” Norris, “Nye” director and co-chief executive of the National Theatre, said. “NT at Home was born out of the restrictions Covid created, when the National Theatre hosted weekly free broadcasts of productions, garnering 15 million viewers. The platform now has subscribers in 184 out of 195 countries. We’re thrilled to be able to continue to make theatre accessible worldwide with the annual ‘Take Your Seats’ free stream initiative, breathing new life into and building new audiences for productions we’re incredibly proud of.”

Callum Stewart, head of National Theatre at Home, explains NT at Home was born out of a desire to make theater available to locked-down viewers during the pandemic. “It comes down to accessibility and it comes down to affordability,” Stewart says. “Theater is for everyone.”

Stewart credits Sheen’s performance in the titular role and Norris’ directorial capabilities with making “Nye” resonate with audiences to the level that NT at Home decided to give it a free window at launch.

“It is almost like you’re in the hospital with [Nye] and you’re looking into his soul,” Stewart says. “The real human emotion when people don’t have long left…It’s touched a lot of personal points.”

For the 60th anniversary of the National Theatre in 2023, the streamer released its first “Take Your Seats” initiative, which was viewed by over 180,000 people, per the organization. “Nye” will mark the latest edition of “Take Your Seats.”

The show will be available with both audio description and British Sign Language on NT at Home. Stewart says that 85% of current titles offered on NT at Home come with audio descriptions and that the streamer is on track to bolster British Sign Language offerings in addition to starting trial runs for Spanish subtitling.

According to Stewart, telling these stories to global audiences is particularly important and filming this production on the National Theatre’s Olivier stage adds extra magic.

“When people go to the theater, it’s a moment in time. You’ve got to be in the play, almost with the actors. You’ve got to be in that story, in that moment,” Stewart says. “It’s so powerful you don’t have anything else like it. It beats absolutely everything.”

[devsgames]

Open-World AI Design: On The Conflict Between Systemic and Scripted Behaviours

I've been playing Skyrim recently, and having not played it for over a decade one thing that has really been standing out to me is how painfully stilted the scripted NPC interactions are in the game. Seeing just how rough these sequences are reminded me of my own experiences designing non-systemic moments in primarily systemic-open world games, and I wanted to reflect on that.

Disclaimer: I recognize that "Why does the AI in this open world game suck?!" is a common complaint The Gamers have and that it's not a new observation by any stretch, and please don't misconstrue me as bashing A Thing You Like. You can still like it. It's fine. I just think it's interesting how the needs and philosophy of open-world AI often encroach upon and affect the execution of highly scripted sequences in open-world games like these.

THE PROBLEM: SCRIPTED INTERACTIONS

Here's a clip of a sequence from my playthrough of Skyrim that illustrates part of the problem. For context, this sequence occurs at the end of a quest chain wherein you help an old and sick alchemist and his apprentice create an ancient artifact he's been trying to make for his entire life:

I think there's a lot of things that are incredibly lifeless (haha!) in the execution here:

The apprentice is standing at the foot of the bed and not next to it, while the mentor is sleeping on his side and not even looking at him.

The transition from Sleeping -> Ragdoll death when the mentor dies looks REALLY goofy.

The phial the apprentice explicitly mentioned as 'filling up' isn't visible anywhere in the scene at all.

The sudden transition from death -> NPC approach -> conversation leaves no room to organically breathe.

The narrative feels incredibly serious and sombre, but the execution is so hard to take seriously.

The ambient music is jaunty and heroic, when tonally the interaction is very sad.

The player doesn't really have much to do here, aside from stare in the corner while waiting for two AI to talk.

The narrative feels incredibly serious and sombre, but the execution is so whiplash-y and abrupt it's hard to take the outcome seriously.

Now first I want to preface that there's a few obvious causes for some of the awkward 'genericness' of this scene, much of which is rooted in more standard production/resources issues with any AAA open-world game. For example, creating an animation of someone holding the phial in question while it fills up would be too expensive to justify creating for just one side quest, only for it to never be used again. While it certainly doesn't help the sequence, I think there's always varying degrees of 'eh whatever it's a video game' plausible deniability that happen here among players too, and it's always understandable that elements like these might fall absent from this scene as a result. It's also a dang video game from 2011, so that certainly doesn't help.

Aside from that, I think a big issue in realizing scripted sequences in open world games like this stems primarily from open-world AI and interactions are often fundamentally at odds with these types of scripted scenes, which in turn reflect poorly on the implementation of the latter.

WHY SYSTEMIC AI?

To understand why scripted sequences can easily feel stunted it's helpful to look at what an AI in an open world context is most frequently expected to do, because it's the baseline of how an AI performs in an open-world game.

In a traditional game a "bandit" AI might only really need to do basic behaviours that have concrete and easily-defined outcomes, such as search for a player and attack them until they die.

In an open-world game like Skyrim an AI primarily has to act believably in an open world where almost anything is liable to happen. A "bandit" in an open-world context would need to keep a running track who is hostile and who is friendly (based on a variety of different changing parameters), pick and choose different locations to travel from organically, travel to potentially unknown locations across a persistent world, use modular systemic behaviours in a way that still appear organic and unique, remember which points it needs to be travelling to and from, what areas it can and cannot go, flee from combat, understand what objects in the world it can and can't interact with, and a lot lot more on top of that. What's more is every AI in the game have to run these same calculations themselves at all time about everything around them - there's a ton of moving parts and AI with different objectives and executions operating at the same time. This is also why systemic AI in open-world games tend to suck - because an open world is inevitably going to write realism cheques that no AI can feasibly cash because there's so much going on in an open-world game.

However there's also good reason why all this complexity is necessary! Killing a bandit who is stationed idly at a guard post in his camp is passable encounter, but killing a bandit who accidentally draws aggression from a patrolling sabre cat from the forest nearby his guard post creates a story out of what was otherwise just an okay encounter. These systemic behaviours are often what people like and expect to see in open-world games to give the world flavour.

On Far Cry there was a name for this sort of concept: the "anecdote factory" - the idea that any sort of emergent experience should make up a fun 'anecdote' for people to talk about and reflect on afterwards, and this approach to AI design is usually built to supports those systemic and organic narratives. This systemic-first AI design is a large draw of what makes open-world games what they are - without this the whole world easily can feel rigid, predictable, and lifeless.

Now this is all well and good, I hear you say, but weren't you just complaining about scripted sequences? Why are you talking about systemic AI? How are these two even related to each other?

Well herein lies the issue: what happens when your immensely systems-based AI needs to do one hyper-specific thing exactly as you planned?

THE FRICTION: SYSTEMIC VS. SCRIPTED

Scripted AI design is often a philosophical counter to systems-driven AI - while a systemic open-world AI needs to calculate many different elements and act out generic AI behaviours on the fly, scripted AI often needs to successfully do a sequence of bespoke behaviours the same way every single time, usually in relation to a larger narrative or sequence.

This causes friction - potentially a lot of friction, depending on the implementation.

The initial assumption most people would have is that if a designer really needs an AI to do one thing perfectly, then they should just force the AI to do it! After all, if it's that important, then why not make absolutely sure it gets done? However, the problem with this approach is that forcing an open-world AI to do just one thing actually makes the AI less realistic in context of an open world game.

In the above scene lets say the player hates the apprentice and decides to blast the apprentice with a fireball while he was speaking to his master. They'd then logically expect the apprentice to react to being hurt by the player and become hostile (as anyone would be, if hit with a fireball). This would be expected to break the sequence as combat would ensue as the apprentice tries to get revenge. This is believable, as it would make the apprentice feel more like an actual human being with the desire to not die. If by contrast the apprentice was forcibly scripted to perform his lines and execute the behaviour like nothing happened, it would feel even worse! This is why most open-world games will actually almost never force AI to perform scripted behaviours if they can help it, because it usually reflects poorly on the intelligence of your AI should anything else happen during the execution of the event.

Unfortunately, the tradeoff to ensuring scripted AI still abide by systemic rules is it means that scripted AI are now expected to perform actions are now operating at the whim of systems, which may choose to override it at any time. For example, if the systemic AI overrides the scripted component of the AI, the apprentice may get distracted by something (a passing enemy, a wandering animal, a stray arrow from nearby combat, etc.) and not complete the sequence as it was intended. This might not seem like a major issue, but keep in mind that a scripted AI failing to perform a task usually results in a sequence break - which in terms of scripted sequences can break a player's entire playthrough. It also reflects poorly on narrative, when scenes of narrative importance might be undermined by systemic nonsense that may happen.

Whenever mission designers witnessed these sort of behaviours on Far Cry the inside joke was that we were just abiding by the "anecdote factory" philosophy. After all, the AI was acting systemically by-design - it just so happened that the anecdote was that a systemic behaviour distracted them. :)

In fact on the production of Far Cry 6 I spent actual months troubleshooting and wrangling AI that just would not adhere to scripted sequences due to the overriding of systemic AI behaviours. For every minute you spend in a scripted sequence you can bet there was hours and hours and hours of unseen troubleshooting behind it!

Now what does any of this have to do with how awkward this conversation looks?

The philosophy of your game design extends downward, and systems-driven is no exception. Instead of using special, bespoke behaviours in quests it becomes cheaper and safer to bank on existing systemic that are widely tested instead of trying to push the limits of what an AI can do. Remember that a sequence failing to execute can block a player's progression entirely, or alternatively result in a ton of work or additional bugs for a level designer putting them together. Safe execution is usually the #1 priority, and that's a tough thing when lots of your scripted implementation is relying on the tech equivalent of shoestring and bubblegum holding it all together.

Even this small scene reflects the drawbacks of a systems-driven philosophy. A good example here is when the mentor dies - he doesn't smoothly transition into a 'death' state, or lie still with his eyes closed, or something more appropriate. Instead, he pops into a ragdoll and plays his generic death sound effect, because his AI is adopting the same generic systemic 'death' actions any AI in the game would. It's how an AI was designed to die from the ground up across the board, so this AI has to die like that for the rest of the game's systems to properly work around it. It could look cleaner, it could look nicer, but for a scripted sequence in a system-driven game it just needs to work.

You'll also notice the apprentice doesn't have any particular uniqueness to his behaviours around the master. He doesn't kneel next to the bed, or do much else for that matter - he just plays his idle on a point until the scripted sequence tells him not to. In fact outside of combat in Skyrim you'll notice that most NPCs use these generic animations because they're built into the AI and are the most likely animation to work in the widest number of cases. In fact, I could probably list the most commonly used animations in Skyrim based on how many times I saw them while playing. A Quest Designer could try to spice a scene up or add variety, but most of the time that would create unnecessary risk around these sequences, so in most instances safe and universal generics are the way to go - which unfortunately limits visual interest because they don't adapt well to unique contexts (like the death of a loved one).

Even something seemingly small like changing music - if we ignore the cost of creating new songs - can bring unnecessary risk. Music is also handled systemically by the game's systems, transitioning based on environment and combat with different enemy factions, so overriding that to play unique songs brings even further risk on a scripted setup - what if combat breaks out during the sequence? Or if the overridden music isn't correctly reverted back by the system? The safer option is to work closer to the bare minimum (i.e. leave the music as-is) than it is to actually push the envelop a bit and bring on further risk.

Conclusion

Thanks for reading! Hopefully this sheds a bit of light on how scripted interactions are uniquely affected by systemic design philosophy and some of the drawbacks surrounding it. I feel fairly confident that any open-world game has had to deal with the friction between these two approaches and needed to meet an awkward middle ground as a result. After all, it's sorta an inevitability when you're making massive games intended to mimic a believable world.

[mysteria157]

Chapter 14

Pairing: Nanami Kento x Black Fem Reader

Word Count: ~13k

CW: explicit sexual content (oral sex), profanity, childbirth.

Summary: A birthday, a confession, and a new baby.

Notes: No more angst for awhile! Thank you to all who have been supportive. It means a lot. Reblogs, likes, or comments are always appreciated but not necessary <3 I hope you enjoy reading!

Divider: @cafekitsune

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It Had To Be You Masterlist

Kento, despite all attempts to prove you otherwise, was a snorer. It was never loud and boisterous as you probably made it seem, but he was never silent when you would wake up to him next to you. It was a common occurrence, a section of your bingo card that you had scratched off with glee, storing it in your memories forever.

During the week, you normally woke to the sound of the shower or him in the kitchen, a product of waking before the sun rose to go for a morning jog before he got ready for work. But you caught him in the act on the weekends and on days where he just didn’t feel like it going a jog, or when you would find him leaning his head back on the couch, legs spread and mouth shut tight, you could hear the almost silent rise and fall of his chest, his breath rubbing against his throat, throwing off almost quiet snores into the air.

You had joked that he snored as if he hadn’t slept in weeks, just to see the flicker of annoyance color his features before they were smoothing away and he was throwing you a dramatic eye roll.

But since that day he had finally given in, the day he had pressed his forehead into your skin and collapsed silently for most of that morning, his morning jog schedule became lax and he chose to sleep in as much as he could. Catching up for lost time you supposed and if that is what he needed to heal, you would never question it. Only two weeks of neglect and lack of sleep and it had torn him down until there was nothing left. So he chose to hit snooze on his four am alarm almost every morning, grumbling into his pillow before he would wrap his strong arms around you and pull you further into his chest, burying his face into the soft skin of your neck and sleeping until it was time to get ready for work. He needed the time, needed the peace. Craved it but denied himself for so long and now he was finally giving in.

Including sleeping in on his birthday. With your due date right around the corner, he had finally taken advantage of his gratuitous amounts of PTO and once the baby was born, he would go on paternity leave. Kento never worked too hard because he didn’t need to; he was good at his job, competent and intelligent to the extent that gave him his position that he has today. And while he did take time off occasionally to do what he wanted; he never felt the need to do so for his birthday until this year.

He pulled in a deep breath before exhaling a eucalyptus tinged grumble into the skin on the back of your neck, weaving his much longer and thicker legs in between yours and yanking you closer. You still hadn’t gotten over just how clingy he can be; always wrapping his arms around you in the kitchen. Pulling you flush against him on the couch as you both caught up on The Kardashians. After sex when he performed his vigorous after care routine of pulling you in the shower with him, moisturizing your skin, braiding back your hair before throwing on your bonnet, and massaging the muscles of your body until you were passing out against him in bed. For as quiet and introverted as he was, his hands were always reaching for you.

You felt one of his large hands pull you closer to him, his long fingers splaying along the skin of your lower stomach, cradling the baby that was practically knocking at the door to come into the world.

The first time Kento felt her kick, he had pulled you to bed, yanked your shirt up and spent almost an entire night splayed on his stomach, both of his large hands cradling your belly and his eyes unblinking as he waited for it to happen again.

You didn’t mind really, at the end of the day, you were content to play Animal Crossing on your Switch to entertain yourself while he stroked the skin of your stomach. He had only gotten another kick or two before he began to speak to her, just small things about his day; what he ate for breakfast, musings on what her favorite foods would be, what books he had ready to read to her. It was the low timbre of his voice against your stomach that had your daughter outright extending her legs, pressing against the sides of your stomach and stretching the skin. While it was mildly uncomfortable for you, Kento had widened his eyes in equal fascination and amused horror, concerned for your wellbeing but also hesitating with the urge to see it again.

As he slowly came out of the fog of his grief over the last three months, he found himself immersing more and more with preparing for the baby. He ignored all of your protests of trying to help with the technology that would be needed. He picked and installed the most expensive baby monitors, put together the baby rocker and bouncer, baby proofed the entire house and scoured every crevice of your abode for any signs of contamination or security breaches. It was his own form of nesting you wanted to guess.

He was protective of her just as he was of you, especially considering you had been on bedrest for the past month. You should have known that it was a possibility. You were tiny; only an inch below five feet and with your history of ligament pain, Dr. Williams issued the bed rest order to you for the last month of pregnancy as a precaution and a threat for you to stay off your feet. Kento was the perfect type of person to make sure you complied. He made you take breaks from throwing, ordered you to lay down a few times a day and outright refused for you to be on your feet for more than thirty minutes.

You had tried to rebel at first, the stubborn part of your brain planting hard in your years of independence as you refused to take a break from your throwing the first day of the order. Kento didn’t argue with you, didn’t glare and didn’t pester and it was only forty minutes later when you were wincing in pain and hobbling to the couch, ignoring his knowing looks that you realized he wanted you to learn the hard way.

You hated it but you knew it was for the best.

It was because of the bed rest that you had planned his special day ahead of time.

You rolled over to face his sleeping form, practically plopping over from the heavy weight against your ribs. His eyes were hazy with sleep when you looked up at him, eyelids heavy as he blinked blearily in your direction, his blonde hair disheveled and plastered on his forehead and temple.

“Sorry, I’m sure me moving my large and swollen form woke you up.”

He hummed in reply, the sound deep and gravelly with sleep and warming the place between your legs instantly. You groaned internally, no matter how horny you had gotten recently, you just couldn’t have sex. The bed rest was one thing but with your swollen body the thoughts could be as lewd as they wanted, you hadn’t been in the mood. You both had tried before and the second you hissed in pain from sudden discomfort, he had been too terrified to try again.

Kento stroked a thumb along the skin of your cheek, lifting a sleepy brow before he rolled his eyes and exhaled further into his pillow.

“Stop lying, it’s too early.”

“It’s nine am.”

He threw you a silent glare before shutting his eyes and burying further into his pillow, his blonde hair sliding against the soft skin of his forehead.

“You need to get up anyway.” He grumbled into his pillow in reply, unmoving and refusing to listen, his naked chest rising as he pulled in a breath. “I have things planned for you today…special things.”

Even though his eyes were still closed, and he offered no response, you could tell he was listening, refusing to entertain you in a growing common display of playfulness, but still listening.

You bit your lip, gathering a small bit of courage, your small hand spreading on the hot skin of his chest. The freshly manicured nail of your pointer finger pressed into his skin, pillowing around the relaxed muscle as you dragged it slowly down his chest. You watched with delight as the muscles of his abdominals twitched from the stimulation, your finger sliding along the wispy blonde hair of his happy trail before playing with the hem of his pants. You slid your eyes up to his face, containing a giggle from his already heated and even gaze.

“Are you gonna go back to sleep?” You purred up at him, your fingernail dancing along the thin skin above his hem, slow and teasing, reveling in the sight of his almost unblinking eyes and steady rise and fall of his broad and muscular chest.

Kento had long ago stopped being ashamed of his reaction time to you; only a few seconds of your hands on his skin and he was hard in his pants and ready to get it in whenever you would let him. He could last only a short time before he was perverted and grabbing at you, licking at your skin and reveling in the way you sounded for him.

You hummed at his lack of reply, using your finger to lift the hem of his pants and slide your hand inside, wasting no time fisting his already throbbing cock. You watched the slight twitch of his eyelids as they slowly began to droop, the rising and falling of his chest picking up in speed as you pumped him languidly, the pads of your fingertips sliding along the large vein on the side of him.

Suddenly you were sitting up and climbing off the bed with a pillow, his heart dropping just a little in disappointment from the feel of you leaving him and then picking up again as he watched you gently and carefully sag onto your knees on the floor, the pillow cushioning your knees. You lifted a brow in his direction, beckoning him toward you silently as you threw off your bonnet and let your curls cascade down your back. He followed your call without complaint, scooting to the edge of the bed and allowing you to settle in between his spread legs. You slid your hands up his clothed legs, digging your fingernails into his skin as you trailed them up his shins, around his knees and up the muscular meat of his thighs.

“How about you slide these off for me, hmm?”

He was obeying you almost instantly, the throbbing of his cock pumping all the blood from his brain and taking over all decision making as he watched you throw his pants a few feet away from you and eye the length of him between his legs. It always astounding to you every time you saw his cock, thick and the perfect length, a pronounced vein along the side, connecting to a man who knew how use it to make you a begging, sobbing, moaning mess.

But you had never gotten this far. He never let you even get your mouth close enough.

“Why is it that you never want me to suck you off?” You found the question leaving your mouth as you thought it inside of your head. You slid a finger along the vein of him, reveling in the sight of his abs bunching in response, his fingers digging into the sheets behind him. “You don’t think I’ll do a good job? That’s a little insulting.”

You wrapped your hand around him, your fingertips barely able to touch each other as you stroked him slowly, squeezing just a little and making him shake out a breath, his stomach curling in heat.

“While I love head, I like to give more than—” his voice caught in his throat as you pumped him with a firmer grip, twisting your wrist along his head and bringing a bead of precum down with your hand, lubricating the glide. “more than I receive.”

That wasn’t the complete reason. Kento did love to give, loved the taste of your pussy any day of the week, loved to feel your gummy walls around him and milking him for all he was worth as you dug your fingernails into his back and moaned without abandon into the air. Watching your face pull and twist in pleasure, your back arching and hands digging into the sheets as you took everything he willingly gave you…that brought him the most pleasure, got him so turned on that he had to think of the most boring things occasionally just to keep himself from blowing his load too early.

But as much as he loved to give, he knew his nature. He knew the minute you got your mouth on him, he would be hooked, captivated with the sight of your lips wrapped around his cock and struggling to take him with teary eyes as he came down your throat. He couldn’t handle the thought of it so he tried to keep you away as much as he could. It made no sense, he felt like an addict when it came to you. Even with a normal tryst in the bed, he could get nasty and salacious fast.

He loved to fuck you nice and sweet and slow, loved pulling you apart by the seams as he poured every ounce of himself into the slow thrust of his hips and the heated touch of his lips on your skin, even if the words he whispered in your ears had you blushing red all the way down your neck, shaking your head in embarrassment even though you loved every minute of it.

But he also loved to fuck you rough. Loved to hear you moan without restraint from the force of his thrusts, loved to watch your beautiful brown eyes glaze over as you became delirious from pleasure. It always mystified him with how much you just didn’t care when it came to sex. You could throw that clouded and fierce gaze his way, demanding he fuck you harder, dig into your hips tighter, fuck into your pussy deeper. Or you could gaze up at him filled with unashamed innocence, giving up all control and letting him yank your hair back and dig his teeth into your skin, make you blush and your eyes fill with tears of pleasure as he praised you for being such a good girl, taking this cock just like I knew you would.

Some days he hated just how depraved he could be, but you loved it. And it only made him throb harder in your hand at the thought of knowing this was you while you were pregnant. As soon as you were free of pain and discomfort, as soon as you were a little more relaxed and you had both settled into a routine and your daughter was at a good enough period of development to be babysat, he would take you on a proper date, wine and dine you like he’s always wanted, and then bend you over every surface of the house and show you just how much he thought about you.

And right now, you were right where he wanted you, so close to unlocking a side of him he had tried so hard to keep away.

“I already know you’re a nasty man, Kento. No need to be so coy.”

You stroked him a little faster, collecting each bead of precum to make your grip on him slicker and more wet, the obscene sounds and his heavy breathing carrying through your large bedroom. You caught the slight pinch between his brows and the subtle twitch of his eye, his fingers tightening into the sheets as he leaned back on his hands.

He held his breath as you stuck out your tongue, long and wet and flattening against him as you slid the wet muscle up his cock from base to tip, gliding along his thick vein and moaning softly against him, his head falling back as he hissed harshly into the cool air of your room. You pressed your tongue along the underside of his mushroom tip before you were licking along the top and dipping your tongue into the slit of his cock. He grunted harshly in surprise, his head snapping back down to watch you stroke his shaft and kiss along the underside of him. His eyes were half open, blonde hair from his head shadowing them as he looked down at you, thighs and biceps jerking with barely contained restraint, stomach bunching with every teasing touch as he begged you silently for more.

You answered his plea, giggling softly as you hovered over his cock, extending your tongue and letting saliva slide down the wet muscle and drip onto him. It was absolutely vulgar, the nastiest thing he had ever seen you do, his eyes widening just a little in disbelief. The thought that this was you had him throbbing to the point of pain and groaning long and deep as you finally wrapped your lips around him and sliding down in one smooth motion.

He thought you would need a minute to adjust to the girth of him, even when fucking you had to adjust slowly. But not now. There was no buildup or need to inch your way down, you were opening up your throat and burying your nose at the base of him like a pro, transfixing him and making him think desperately about marketing templates and content schedules just to keep from shooting too early down your throat.

Your mouth was everything he dreamt it would be, hot and wet, your tongue sliding along the underside of him as you worked him in and out of your mouth, your fingers on his thighs jumping from the feel of him twitching beneath you. He fought the nasty thoughts, pushed away the urge to run his hands in your hair and hold you in place while he fucked your throat. But you were making it so hard, moaning against him as you worked him for all he was worth, digging your fingers in his thighs, never faltering as he felt the tip of his dick hit the muscle of your throat over and over.

He moaned softly from the back of his throat as you pulled up and off of him, his cock leaving your mouth with a pop and the saliva from your sloppy work dripping along his shaft. He couldn’t help carding a hand through the soft tresses of your loose curls.

“Keep your hand there.”

You left no room for argument and he tightened his hold in response, squeezing a little more as you smacked his cock against your tongue and went back to work, a hand reaching to grip at the lower part of his cock and twist with each upward stroke, your mouth moving in the opposite direction as you sucked him off.

The pleasure was pooling at the base of his spine, boiling slowly from the wet and sloppy glide of your mouth on him.

“Fuck, yes.”

You let his words wash over you, ignoring the pulsing heat between your legs as you worked him faster in your mouth and deeper down your throat, moaning against him and relishing in the sound of his panting above you, his abs bunching with each stroke. His eyes were locked on you, soaking in the sight of your lips stretched wide around him, the shine of spit along his shaft and down your fingers, the sheen of sweat on your forehead and the baby hairs along your hairline sticking to your skin.

You pulled your hand from him and slowly slid back down to the hilt, peering up at him through thick lashes as you swallowed around him and pulled a sharp groan from his throat as he looked down at you, marveling in the feel and sight of you on him, eyes misty from the stretch, throat closing with every downward stroke, taking him as if you did it every day.

You pulled off of him, using one hand to fist the top of him while you kissed down the rest of his shaft, turning your head and wrapping your tongue around the side of him. He moaned softly at the sight of you, unashamed of how he sounded as his eyes watched your pink tongue wrap and slide down his thick cock.

He was losing his mind, his stomach squeezing, pleasure scorching his veins, mind clouding to the point of delirium as he felt the embers of his orgasm begin to roar to life. He should have done this sooner, should have never smacked your hands away every time you tried to grab at him. He was such a fucking idiot.

You knew your panties were soaked and even from the view of him above you, panting with ruddy cheeks, blonde hair fluttering in front of his eyes from his breath, eyes heady and low, steely and locked on yours, you could probably cum just from his cock down your throat.

You pulled away from him, using the small lapse in time to catch your breath, your hand stroking him at a steady pace as you looked up at him, your chin a little wet from your saliva, tendrils of your curls sticking to the sides of your face, a seductive glint in your eyes that had him pulsing against the quickening stroke of your hand.

“Am I doing well?”

You truly wanted to know. Even through the haze in your mind, you craved to hear the praise that naturally fell from his lips.

He groaned in the back of his throat before smiling down at you, reeling against the feel of you pumping him as he leaned down to kiss you deeply, sliding his tongue along your bottom lip before making a home in your mouth and pulling away with a hot smack, the hand in your hair sliding down to stroke the side of your cheek.

“Doing so well, angel. You’re a natural.”

You pressed your free hand against his abdomen, pushing him so that he was leaning back on his hands again and looking down at you with his overwhelming gaze. You slid your tongue back down his shaft, tantalizing and slow before you were teasing a heavy ball and sliding it into your mouth.

He cursed harshly into the air, his eyebrows furrowing sharply and stomach pulling taut as the fire in his veins licked down his spine, the blood pumping hard and fast in his ears, his chest panting harshly down at you as the pleasure had his hands clenching hard and shaking from the force of the orgasm pressing against his lower abdomen. He was almost there, so close, so fucking close to being submerged in ecstasy.

You chuckled as you licked back up and slid him back in your mouth to the hilt, pouring everything you could into what reserves you had left, using the twitch of his muscles, the shake of his arms, and the dark look in his eyes to bring him to the edge that you could practically feel in your mouth. You were unhinged, bobbing up and down his thick length, ignoring the pain in your jaw as you kept gagging from the feel of him deep in your mouth, the tip of his cock bruising your throat.

He could see spots in his vision, his heart thrashing in his chest, blood roaring in his ears and drowning out the sound of you moaning and gagging and slurping. You reached down, using one of your small hands to fondle the balls that had drawn tight against him, ripping the seal off the bag that was holding his orgasm in as he groaned hard and loud into the air.

“Yes, yes, yes—oh fuck!”

You watched with barely concealed delight as he drew taut against you, practically freezing for a second before his stomach was drawing impossibly tight, his thighs spasming and his eyes rolling into the back of his head before he was throwing it back, groaning harshly towards the ceiling as his cock twitched violently in your mouth and he was spilling down your throat. You moaned through it, swallowing every last drop, sliding him out of your mouth and using your tongue to lick any remains off him.

He was still reclined back against his hands, panting up at the ceiling and shaking as his orgasm faded away and the sensitivity of your tongue had him looking down at you slowly. Even with your curls pressed into your sweaty skin, the trail of spit along of your chin and the crease of the skin on your cheek from sleep, you were beautiful.

Absolutely, undeniably beautiful and all his.

You pressed against the bed and carefully stood up on your feet, ignoring the pain in your lower back before you were wiping your chin with the back of your hand and leaning forward to press a soft kiss to his lips.

“Happy Birthday,” you purred at him, relishing in the open aired chuckle that pressed against your skin as he smiled softly at you and pecked your lips in return.

“Thank you, angel.”

***

“It’s been half an hour, time to take a break.”

You rolled your eyes from the sound of Ome in your ears. Your hands were wet and covered with clay, pressing against the side of what would soon to be a vase of your own creation. Your first client, Hina, had thankfully given you free reign of her commission. She only asked for a vase she could have in a minimalist living room, not too big to be overwhelming, but prominent enough to make a statement. You had spent the past three months working through countless iterations, using the opportunity to pull a still grieving Kento into the studio with you to get him out of his thoughts and within your field of vision while you worked. He was a great sounding board, even with his lack of experience with the nuances of ceramics, he was able to point out the finer details of texture and size in a way you were thankful for.

Kento was currently out for his birthday, a plan of your own design that allowed him to enjoy his day with his friends while you rested and used what little time you were allowed to be on your feet to finish your commission.

But that was proving to be incredibly difficult thanks to the narc in the form of your best friend, arms folded across her hoodie covered chest, a curvy hip resting against the door of your home studio. She lifted an elegant brow, silver liquid eyes matching your intensity as she gave you a knowing look.

“Put everything down and take a twenty minute break off your feet. Get up before I come over there and make you.”

You whined at the honesty in her words as you stood slowly from your cushioned stool and made your way over to the sink Kento and Yu had installed.

“It looks really good.”

Her tone was impressed, deep and raspy but you could practically feel the corners of her lips curve into a gentle smile as you washed and dried your hands and waddled behind her out of the studio and to the living room. She helped you onto the cushions, cradling an elbow as you sank down and sighed almost instantly at the release from pressure in your lower back. She tsked, clicked her tongue against her teeth as she fussed over you.

“I know you want to finish this before she is here, but I need you to actually be able to deliver her.”

“Ome I—”

“You wanna have her in the hospital? You want to have those people poke and prod on you, downplay your pain and practically walk you into a coffin? Because if your placenta detaches because you failed to obey Dr. Williams orders, I will kill you myself.”

You sighed in defeat, your eyes misting from her words. You weren’t really that upset with her, you had practically grown up with her way of talking. Direct and blunt was all Ome knew, and while she never intended to hurt, she relied so much more on her ability to cut straight to the point to make people see reason. Especially with you. But the influx in hormones over the past week and the growing, swelling and pain and general anxiety…you were incredibly uncomfortable and ready for her to be out. You loved being pregnant, truly you did. But you had finally reached the stage where the discomfort had outweighed the joyful feeling of bringing life into the world.

“I’m sorry. You know I don’t mean it. I just…I worry and I don’t know what I would do if you weren’t here.” Ome rubbed your shin absentmindedly, her eyes on your leggings as she thumbed and stroked the fabric. “Just thinking about it makes me nauseous so—so I need you to stop fucking around.”

You snorted in response, rubbing the side of your stomach as you felt your daughter kick a little harder than usual. You groaned softly in reply, ignoring the admonishing gaze from the woman across the sofa.

“Why don’t you go check the guest room? Make sure everything is together for me, please?”

You watched her leave, ignoring the urge to groan again as you felt your daughter land another kick to your side.

When you began to really nest, you spent the better part of a week turning one of your guest rooms into a birthing suite. A bed with absorbent sheets, an inflatable pool ready to be filled with water, a kit of medical supplies for emergencies, receiving blankets, clothes for yourself, snacks and even a space for the midwives to relax, you felt as ready as you could be. You had opted to not have your doula at the birth. Two midwives and Kento would be more than enough support and people that you could handle.

It was odd to think about, in only two weeks—if everything went according to plan—you would be a mother. A part of you ached at the knowledge that you had no role model to build anything from. Your mother was excellent at giving you the best money could buy as long as it strengthened your chances of status, wealth, and a man who would give you a child to carry that on to the next generation. You had learned how to work hard, but she never taught you the ability to set healthy boundaries.

She had yet to call you since that day you left Sendai. Had yet to text you or even pass a message through Rory. It hurt. It hurt more than you thought it would at the fact that your daughter would probably never know her grandmother. But it gave you the strength and resilience to realize that you would never leave your children around her. You would never allow her to expose your children to the trauma that you suffered.

But even with the absence of your own, you gained a mother through Chiyo. She was everything you had always wanted, and it brought you peace to know she would at least have one grandmother and grandfather to show her nothing but love.

The vibration of your phone, pulled you from your thoughts, blinking down at the device and smiling gently at the name of the contact. Your greeting was already queued up when you answered the phone.

“Kento, I’m fine. Please no more calling unless you are dying.”

The quiet huff through the phone had your stomach fluttering in response, your chest warming on its own.

“What a very crude thing to say—”

“So you’re not dying then? Impaled on a stick? Your pants fell down and now you’re about to stroke out from the mortification?”

“You’re insufferable.”

You giggled softly, absentmindedly rubbing your stomach as the sound rumbled up your throat and out of your mouth.

“I’ll stop teasing. I promise I’m doing well. Are you having fun—”

“Nanamin, get off the phone!” Gojo’s voice called from the background. Kento sighed deeply into the receiver, his annoyance permeating through the speaker and onto your cheek and ear. He muttered a quick and solemn goodbye, asking you to call the police if he did not return tonight, before hanging up the phone.

***

“How much will you charge for this?”

Ome watched in fascination as you pressed the wooden rib against the side of the wet and quickly spinning clay. While it was marvelous to sit and rest your body every forty-five minutes, it had proved to be a chore that only tired you out. You refused to acknowledge the heaviness in your eyes, even more so when Ome threw more knowing glares in your direction. You had to finish this commission today or you probably wouldn’t have the strength to do so before the baby came.

“I worked out a few quotes with Hina. I’ll make a pretty penny but nothing excessive.”

The low tones of R&B played through the small speaker on your large concrete table in the middle of your studio. Your belly was full from miso soup and egg rolls that Ome had practically dragged you from your stool to eat. The night was drawing to a close and Kento would be home soon.

“I haven’t received one text from Gojo. Kento must actually be having a good time.”

You threw her an eyebrow from her words, smirking softly as you pressed a wet sponge to the side of your clay, the grey brown color shining slowly with each pass.

“Are you going to finally tell me how things are going? I’ve been trying to remain respectful but—”

“Things are going well.”

Her interruption made you look up at her. Her eyes were locked on your spinning work of clay, silver irises watching each rotation and trying not to look up at you. You held back the quip on your tongue as you really took in her expression. For the first time in a while, she looked vulnerable. It wasn’t as if it was rare from her, at least when it came to you. Ome had no problem expressing how she really felt around you, her honesty was the one thing that would never fade or change with time. But when it came to men, that was a different level of openness that was hard for her.

She despised them; she hated their manipulative behavior, the nonchalance to take and take from women who were largely preyed upon and taken advantage of. She hated that every man she had given a chance in her life had stepped on her time and time again. It made it hard to trust them. It made that wall she kept around her heart icier and only fueled her hostile behavior towards them.

And it wasn’t as if they didn’t deserve it. In your honest opinion, men never deserved much. But a part of you had always felt that Ome deserved to be happy, deserved to have a happy marriage and maybe a few children if that’s what she wanted. She was doing surprisingly well, until her ex decided to cheat and cheat and cheat some more without any regard to the world around him.

The back and forth that you saw from Ome and Gojo was comical at best, but deep down you could see that twinkle in her eye grow with each day, with each insult she threw up at him and with each laugh he shot down at her.

So to see her react so strongly, to not even bark at you with an insult with no heat to it, it was unexpected.

She cleared her throat, pursing her lips before flickering her eyes up to you.

“It’s going really well, actually. He’s been—he’s proving to really be someone I can depend on. As obnoxious and fucking annoying as he is, he cares about the people closest to him.”

You hummed softly, caressing the makeshift vase with both of your hands.

“So…do you think he will live up to the mark? For you?”

You kept your eyes on your work, watching the clay bend as a response to the press of your fingers on its sides. The music played softly between you both, gentle notes floating around the room and settling on both of your shoulders.

“Yea…I think he does. Or I think he will.”

“Hmmm, Ome Gojo. That has a nice ring to it—”

“I give you an inch and you take a fucking mile!”

Your giggles pealed through the dense room, ricocheting off the walls and hitting Ome’s back, the force of it causing her own shoulders to shake as her raspy giggles joined yours.

You had used the wire cutter to separate the bottom of your work from the wheel when you heard the lock of the front door turning, the door swinging open and Gojo’s loud voice tearing through the calm atmosphere of your home.

“The birthday boy is here!!!”

Ome rolled her eyes as she washed the remnants of clay from your throwing wheel, loading a curse on her lips as his tall form sauntered into the room. Even disheveled and windblown, his beautiful white hair made him look like the hottest catalog model you would ever see. Round sunglasses had been pushed up, bringing his bangs with it and casting alien blue eyes about the room as he loomed over you and leaned down to press a quick peck to your cheek.

“Beautiful as always, how are you doing?”

You rolled your eyes in reply, a smirk splaying on your face as your eyes took in Yuji and Geto as they walked into the studio as well. Yuji’s already large eyes seemed to bulge from their sockets as he took in your studio, not even offering a hello as he began to walk around the room, pulling a softly chuckling Geto with him as he began to throw out a barrage of questions.

“I’m doing well. I’m sure Kento made you ask me.”

Gojo scoffed playfully, a hand pressing to his chest in dramatics as he spoke loudly.

“Can’t I care about my friend and godchild? Who do you take me for?”

“A whore.”

Gojo gawked down at you, face red and mouth curling into a devious smile as Yuji’s chuckles rang from the background.

“I’m not a whore. Ome wholeheartedly believes in castration as a punishment for insolence. And the last thing I need is someone trying to cut off my hefty, throbbing, veiny co—”

“Finish that sentence and see what happens.”

You heard his voice before you saw him, deep and low, wafting into the room and wrapping around your body. Your eyes caught his form, tall and imposing as he walked into the room and leaned against the door frame. He looked incredibly relaxed, even the threat that he had thrown Gojo’s way was surprisingly without bite. His blonde locks were windswept and carded out of his face, loose tendrils falling from the hold to rest against his forehead. A pair of black jeans and a nice short sleeved shirt that hugged his shirt in the most delicious way, his Cartier watch shining against the bright lights of your studio, the smell of his cologne not even strong but still seeming to drift through the room and slide up your nostrils, and brown eyes filled with a heavy look had your heart picking up in speed.

God he looked good.

Gojo rolled his eyes theatrically, turning around to stick out his tongue at his friend before he was strolling over to Ome to hound her instead.

It only took a few minutes of pestering from Gojo and relentless questions from Yuji before Ome and Geto were ushering them out, wishing us both a goodnight and Kento a happy birthday before the house was empty besides you both.

You were beautiful. He probably said it to himself at least twenty times a day but right now it hit him harder than before. You were washing your hands at the sink, your heavy curls pulled up into a messy bun, your body dressed in black cotton overalls and a white short-sleeved shirt, your throat humming a tune to the song playing through the speaker. He recognized it, a song he had heard in passing once years ago that had made him buy the entire vinyl not even an hour later. You turned toward him as you dried your hands, a smile growing on your features as he walked closer to you. The shea butter from your cinnamon skin wafted up his nose, making him a little more lightheaded than what he already was. Your cheek had a smear of clay, something that he was surprised you hadn’t noticed but had his chest thumping in an almost uncomfortable way as his heart soared in his chest.

“Did you have a good birthday?”

Gojo, Yuji and Geto had shown up at your house that morning, dragging a more than reluctant Kento out of his house to at least do something for his day. A small hole in the wall bakery that you had found a few weeks prior and had remained untouched by Kento was his first stop that morning. His eyes displayed his excitement almost as soon as he saw the bread behind the thick glass windows and he showed his enthusiasm by getting more than one melonpan, smacking Gojo’s greedy and sticky hands away at every second.

He was shocked but filled with warmth when he had been surprised with a private tour of a whiskey distillery from his favorite company. An entire hour drinking different notes and tastes of his favorite alcohol had his stomach fluttering and his cheeks tinged pink. His words were a little looser as they dined at the best Korean BBQ establishment in Nakameguro. He had been treated to a private booth for him and his friends, away from the loud and yelling crowd of people but still immersed in the atmosphere of good food, excellent service, and the best whiskey he had ever had. Gojo had been less obnoxious than usual, Geto more boisterous as a way of universal balance, Yuji more loud but always respectful of his sensei. Always questioning, always curious, always loving to everyone and the world around him.

His day had been spent around people he loved doing the things only he enjoyed.

You had planned it all for him, content to make sure he spent his day loved and happy.

By the time he had walked through the door of your house, he was confident and finally accepting of that weird feeling in his chest that he had spent months trying to either decipher or push away.

“I had an excellent birthday. Thank you for treating me to a great day.”

You shrugged in nonchalance, your smile growing and then faltering as he pulled you close to him with what your stomach would allow. He brought your hands up to wrap around his neck, his own falling into the soft flesh of your waist and his feet falling into a step that you realized was a gentle sway to the music in the background.

You looked up at him in denial, an eyebrow throwing up to your forehead as you settled into step with him.

“You know this song?”

“Yes. In fact, I happen to like this song.”

You couldn’t help the bark of laughter, the sound heavy with disbelief. He hummed down at you, playful admonishment rolling off his shoulders and onto your face.

“Why must you be in denial when you find out trivial things about me? As if I am some creature that walks your halls.”

“You’ve always been such a mystery to me.” You giggled to yourself, ignoring his questioning look. “I do this thing when I find out weird things about you. I treat it like a bingo card, each new block is a trait or quirk that I never would have expected. Reality television, your R&B collection, your love of romcoms, and even the fact that you snore. All of those things that would seem ‘normal’ to any other man have always been odd when it comes to you. You carry yourself in a way that makes you a man who likes to stay in the background, but who you are only makes you stand out more. You’re unique and compiled of a web of ropes and knots that would take only the closest to you to help unravel. So no, you’re not some creature. You’re just a man I never expected to know, let alone be with.”

He simply hummed beneath his breath, his lips pursing as he swayed with you.

“It’s a compliment, Kento. So take it.”

“Ah yes, anything you wish. Please forgive me.”

You giggled into his chest, pressing your cheek into the fabric of his shirt.

“I hope you realize that I feel the same when it comes to you.”

You didn’t respond to his statement, choosing instead to listen to the rumble of his words in your ear as his chest vibrated with sound against you.

“You were a mystery to me. I could never understand how a woman as hardworking and as kind and caring as you could have a mother who could never acknowledge your existence. I could never understand how someone who could take command of almost any conference room she walked into, secretly loved to be covered in clay and paint and create the most beautiful things with her hands. You insert yourself in everything you do, and you have an innate talent to always hit the mark.” He chuckled to himself absentmindedly, his eyes flitting about the room as he took in all of your work. “I have this theory…similar to your bingo card. In my mind, I only have a certain amount of chairs for the people in my life. My intern, Kugisaki actually thinks the same way…The seats are already predetermined by me, already situated in my head and dusted off for those to sit. My parents, Aiko, Kaya, and Yu were automatically given those seats. Yuji enthusiastically asked for his and while it took me awhile to accept, I gave him one. Gojo and Geto and Shoko demanded their seats, shook and pestered and annoyed me to the point where I couldn’t deny the care and love they had for me and I relinquished my hold just to appease even though I secretly was happy with my decision…But not you.”

The song had faded away and been placed with another, equally as soft as you both disappeared within each other.

“You pulled up your own chair. It was your own, crafted of your own design with a simple cotton cushion and sleek mahogany corners. You drug it across shiny hardwood floors, scratching the surface and plopping down in front of everyone. In front of my parents, Aiko, Yu, Geto, Gojo, Shoko, Yuji, everyone. You sat right in front of me, demanding my attention—commanding it and only promising me wonderful things if I accepted you. The more I denied, the more I was mean and indignant, the more you backed away and the more I hated how it made me feel. But I’m glad I stopped fighting.”

He exhaled softly against you, your head rising with the movement of his chest.

“You are the very best thing that has happened to me. You love those around you with every fiber of your being. You are the smartest person I have ever met. You have such a beautiful talent that I’m only lucky enough to witness. You are the first person in my life that has made me laugh this much…and—and I think what makes me pull you closer the most is that you’ve made me…decide to finally be me. That night when you yelled at me, when you were so angry and desperate for me to acknowledge myself, I don’t think I’ve ever had someone actually see me. I’ve never had someone force me to eat, force me to bathe, force me look at my grief and my flaws and show me that I could take control of it. It was an overwhelming feeling and you are the only person who has been able to make me see that. I’m sure I sound very sappy saying this but, you mean everything to me. And to know that you also are giving me a child that I’ll soon get to meet…I am unbelievably lucky.”

You were quiet as you let his words soak in, as they fell from his lips and leeched into your skin, making your blood pump faster and your stomach flip and twist in a manner that had your heart racing.

“Careful Kento, such strong words. You talk as if you love me.”

You had meant for your words to be lighthearted, to serve as a distraction as you tried to calm the frantic beating of your heart which was only increasing in pace the longer he didn’t answer, you both still swaying to the music around you.

“What if I do?”

Your heart took a sudden lurch, flipping in your chest painfully as you pulled away to look up at him, your nerves a live wire as you took in the implication of what he was saying. Even though his eyes were dilated from a slight buzz and the ruddiness of his cheeks made him seem more playful than usual, you couldn’t deny the fierce seriousness in his gaze. It was unmoving, unyielding, completely honest and locking you in place. The corners of his full lips curved just slightly.

“What if I am talking as if I love you? What would you say then?”

You opened your mouth to speak, your mouth gaping like a fish as you realized that yes, yes he was saying exactly what you thought. There was no denying it now. There was no need to. Over time, Kento had slowly began to cut himself open for you, letting bits and pieces of himself fall at your feet until only the most personal and vulnerable parts of him were left.

Love.

Your mind was reeling, struggling for the right words, your ears throbbing with the sound of blood thunderous through your veins. You slid your hands from around his neck, trailing them down to rest on his pectorals as you bit your lip harshly and ignored the sting of tears in your eyes. You cleared your throat, relaxing further into him.

“I…I would say—I suppose I would ask that you look at me and say it again. Just so I can determine if you’re truly honest.”

A chuckle; deep and gentle against you, mirth and warmth suddenly pungent and heavy between you both as he silently commanded your attention by placing a finger beneath your chin and tilting your head up to look at him.

“I love you.”

It was effortless. Without nervousness or anxiety or tension. Three words that fell from full lips like water, simple and common place as breathing but still carrying the intensity and deeper meaning of them. You expected it to hit you like a train, to shock your system with force and cold water and make you rigid and anxious against him.

But you found yourself exhaling softly, relaxing further into the gentle hold he had on you, your eyes fluttering as you tried desperately to stop the tears as quickly as they were coming.

“You do?”

The words had slipped out before you could stop them, the last bits of your nerves falling from your lips and down to the floor. He didn’t offer a different reaction to your response, the serious and vulnerable expression on his face had remained unchanged, resolute, and firm.

“Very much so. Do you doubt me? I’ve told you this so many times, you shouldn’t say things that do not make sense.”

The wet giggle shooting from your mouth shook your chest, rattling loose those tendrils of anxiety that had plagued you for years and for once letting them dissolve away to be ignored for hopefully a long time. You shook your head, sliding your arms back up to wrap around his neck and meeting his gaze again. Your real response was surprisingly sitting comfortably on your tongue, ready for what felt like months. However, he interrupted before you could speak.

“No teasing remarks? Quips about my words? I’m shocked, truly.”

You couldn’t help the way you laughed again, the sound wet with building tears as you sniffed softly and gently pinched the skin of his nape.

“I love you too.”

He pulled the words in, let them collect in the back of his throat before sliding down to his belly and settling in a delicious way that had his cheeks a little warmer than before. The corners of his smile grew just a little bit more, hints of pearly whites flashing before he was bending a head down to press his lips to yours, sealing the connection between you both. He had thought it would be incredibly dramatic filled with tears and nauseating and continuous professions of love.  But the interaction was something special that could only represent you both. Simple with a hint of nostalgia, a small trace of teasing to bring you a little closer to him.

“Let’s get you off of your feet. I’ll rub your back, I’m sure its hurting. Would that be alright?”

You bit your lip, your eyes swimming with tears again as you began to realize he had probably felt like this for some time. Every day, every interaction that he had given you had always been filled with care, protection, and just a little bit of love. At first small but still there in his own way until it was everywhere all at once.

You blinked quickly, clearing your vision just a little so you could see him better as you nodded up at him.

“Yes please.”

He pressed another smooth kiss to your lips, the smell of his cologne settling in your bones and reaffirming your tiredness. He pulled away from you and made his way for the door, lacing his fingers in yours and taking you with him.

***

She knocked at your door a day before your due date, an intense contraction that pulled you from your sleep in the early hours on July 14th that grew and grew until you realized there would probably be no stopping it.

The first midwife came when your contractions were pretty far apart and your water had broken, helping Kento fill the birthing tub and get general supplies ready for you as you did your best to breathe and distract yourself from the pain. The contractions weren’t too painful at first, almost like a very intense period cramp that you had familiarized yourself with at a young age. They were manageable, annoying but manageable.

Kento did what he does best, love and support you. He didn’t hover, didn’t obsess over you even though you could tell every flicker of pain made him feel more helpless than ever. He rubbed your back, helped you through each contraction by talking and breathing with you, brushed the curls over your shoulders when they got in the way and even made sure you were walking and moving when you could.

He was spiraling. On the outside, he was cool and collected, offering you every bit of support you needed without being too much. But every grunt and moan of pain, every squeeze of his hand as your face contorted into expressions he never wanted to see, every continued flicker of pain was enough to have his stomach in knots. He knew you wanted to do this unmedicated. In fact, he completely agreed and respected that decision. But he hated that bringing life into the world had to be so much, so hurtful, so risky. He would do anything to take the pain away.

But he had to be strong for you. Because right now, the fact that you were going through immeasurable pain to bring an actual human into the world, you were the strongest of anyone in the room.

By the time your contractions were almost three minutes apart and his hand was almost broken, the second midwife showed up. They took control of the room, offering you the right guidance without overshadowing Kento’s presence as well.

“Kento.” You had practically groaned out his name, your face covered with a light sheen of sweat as you sat in the warm tub of water with only a loose sports bra on. He was already next to you, rubbing your shoulders intermittently as you groaned low and long into the air. “Maybe we can…maybe we can go to the hospital. Ask for an epidural? Ask to be admitted?”

He hummed against your temple, kissing the skin.

“Is that really what you want? We can try, but is that what you want?”

You knew he was right. For as much pain as you were in, you refused medication, refused to have doctors you didn’t know touching you, refused to be neglected. You moaned softly in acquiescence and listened to him chuckle softly as you felt him pull your curls into a high bun and wipe the sweat from your neck.

You were at your wits end, your body riddled with pain to a degree that it was hard for you to even comprehend. Your lower stomach ached, your back was on fire, your thighs felt as if they would fall from your body, you could feel your resolve and strength slipping as you gripped one hand with a midwife next and one hand of Kento’s as he sat outside of the tub on the other side, praising you softly in your ear.

“I can’t. I can’t, I can’t I’m sorry, but I can’t.”  

You shook your head frantically, looking over at Kento with tears in your eyes as your body worked of its own accord. You could try all you wanted to make it stop, she was coming one way or another.

“I can’t Kento—”

“You can. You’re doing so well, angel. So, so well. You’re almost there.” You shook your head in reply, breathing harshly as your muscles began to bunch and twist with what you knew was another god awful contraction. “You’ve spent almost a full day, working hard to bring her here. Don’t you want to see her?” A harsh nod. He smiled softly at you, his own eyes filled with exhaustion and excitement as he wiped your forehead again. “Almost 24 hours and no medication, no hospital intervention, just you and trusting your body. You’re so much stronger than you think. I’ll be right here, I promise. Through every step. Just focus and breathe and she will be here soon. Can you do that for me?”

A wet exhale and moan, your eyes filling with tears as you nodded softly at him and turned back to the second midwife at your waist, her eyes assessing every contraction.

It was probably another hour when those contractions began to shift into the need to push. But you were there now, you could almost feel the end in your body, could practically taste new life in the air even though you were sweating out of this world, shaking in pain and squeezing Kento’s hand in a way you were sure would need a brace later.

“Keep breathing with me, baby.”

“Your hand—”

“Is perfectly fine. The only thing I’m focused on are you and her. My hand will survive.”

You were a sobbing mess, pushing again and again with the midwife’s instruction and growing more desolate as it felt like you were making no progress. You knew you were; the midwife had kept you updated enthusiastically with every push. But god did it not feel like it.

“We’re in the home stretch now. Give me more pushes but bear down a little more, give it your all for me. Nanami, keep doing what you’re doing. Keep her focused for me and she will be here soon.”

Just those last few words seemed to be the motivation you needed, the pain still there but instead fueling a strength you were surprised began to bud in your bones. You listened to each instruction, bore down with every contraction, soaked in Kento’s words in your ear as you got closer and closer.

“She’s right there! Give me one more honey!”

Kento gripped your hand tighter, kissing your temple before you were moaning harshly in pain and bearing down with all you had without forcing her out.

The feeling was odd, an intense pressure and burning that caught you by surprise and only spurred you on further as you practically felt her leave.

At 12:25 pm on July 15th, she was born.

The first thing you felt was oddly empty, a connection and warmth between you and her almost severed instantly. You collapsed against Kento, crying as you loosened your grip on his hand, your lungs burning as you caught your breath. You could hear the praise against your temple as he kissed it, his words uncharacteristically wet as your mind quickly snapped to the thought of her.

“You did so well. So, so well.”

He pressed a kiss to your shoulder, your neck and then the side of your cheek, his own emotions raging and out of control as he tried and failed to blink away the wetness in his eyes.

The second thing you felt was pure, overwhelming and unbridled happiness as the sound of her cries filled the room. Your eyes darted down to the midwife at your waist, wide and transfixed even though you were still crying as she nestled the screaming baby onto the skin of your chest. You were instantly alert, quickly forgetting about the sharp aches of your body as she wiggled against you.

She was a little pale, her entire body practically wrinkled, but her face as smooth and expressive as ever. She had what looked to be his nose, buttoned and a little blunt at the tip. Her eyes were closed but the eyebrows were long and faint. And her hair, so much hair splattered to her head, wet and damp but still light enough that you could tell would be a lighter brown than yours.

Even screaming, with a set of lungs you were sure would be you and Kento’s downfall, she was everything.

You looked up at him, your eyes filled with tears before offering him a shaky smile. His eyes were locked on her, misty with a large smile on his face before he looked to you and smiled further.

“Look at her, isn’t she perfect Kento?”

He pressed a soft kiss to your lips before he was reaching down to wiggle a soft wet toe on her feet, her cries dying down, only offering a disgruntled whimper every now and then as her senses were overwhelmed with the world she had been thrust into.

“Absolutely perfect, she’s beautiful.”

They let Kento cut the cord, his face the most unguarded you had ever seen as the scissors cut through the umbilical. You had pulled off your bra a while ago, using any opportunity to hold her close and get her as much skin contact as you could. Once the afterbirth was delivered, you gave her up to be assessed and cleaned up, and one of the midwives helped you into the shower. By the time you were clean and wearing a long t-shirt, the pool had been emptied and put away and Kento was waiting for you to guide you back to your room.

You were unbelievably tired. So, so tired. But the pull of her kept you going, kept you walking down the hall and crawling into your bed before a midwife was nestling her now bundled form into your chest, congratulating you softly on a healthy and strong delivery.

You hadn’t realized the midwives had gone until Kento was sliding into the bed next to you, pulling you both close and resting his chin on your shoulder, his brown eyes looking down softly at his sleeping daughter.

“One of them will be back tomorrow to check on you but they left their contact if anything comes up for the rest of the day.”

You were humming in reply, not really listening as you stared down at her, tracing a smooth and chubby cheek with one of your fingers. Now that she was dry you could really see the light brown color of her hair, so much of it that poked out from under the sage green newborn beanie and curled just slightly at the ends. Her skin color probably wouldn’t settle for a few more months and when she did open her eyes, there was no mistaking the deep brown that looked at you. She was you and Kento’s daughter in every way.

“Are you sure you would like them to come see her? You’re not too tired?”

“I am, but I want them to be here.”

You turned to him, offering her silently and watching warmly as he wrung his hands and opened his arms, letting you set her gently in them. He exhaled instantly; his eyes locked on her as he took her in. The sight was almost comical, a baby so small nestled in the muscular arms and large stature of her father. You would probably have to fight the mothers off with a stick if you let him out in public.

“Oh she’s wonderful.”

His parents were the first to show up, tiptoeing into your room quietly and Chiyo’s eyes immediately filling with tears when she saw the bundle that was still in her son’s arms. They washed their hands without you asking, and even Santo was filled with excitement, his odd green eyes practically dancing as he looked down at her. Chiyo walked over to your side of the bed, pulling you in a gentle hug that was warming you instantaneously.

“I’m so proud of you, honey. How are you feeling? Can I get you anything?”

You blinked away the tears again, soaking in the maternal aura from her and nestling it deep inside before you were pulling away and shaking your head.

“I’m tired, but I feel okay. I need nothing I promise.”

You watched as Santo cooed at her from over his son’s shoulder, a large smile on his face as he soaked in the sight of his granddaughter. Santo spent almost twenty minutes holding her, rocking her around the room and talking absentmindedly as Kento collapsed against you, resting his head on your shoulder—a growing trait of relaxed nonchalance that you hoped would follow into fatherhood—as he talked to his mother.

Chiyo was patient through it all, but you could feel the impatience radiating off of her as she glared at her husband. You held in the urge to laugh as you watched her eyes tic before practically holding out her hands and beckoning him to her. Those brown eyes were misting immediately as your daughter whimpered a little in her arms, opening matching eyes to look up at her grandmother before closing them and falling back into slumber.

“Oh my, oh honey she’s beautiful. She’s so beautiful. Of course, she would be. Have you thought of a name?”

Kento elbowed you softly, burying his face into your neck. He had given you full control over her name, content to agree with it no matter what.

“Ulani Chiyo Nanami.”

His mother widened her eyes and looked up at you, shock coloring her features as she took the name in.

“African American families and most American families have a middle name. And…you’ve been someone in my life that has shown me nothing but love and belonging and a care that I should have had from my own mother. I want my daughter to have a name from someone who means a lot not only to me but to others around her and who cares about everyone.” She was silent as she took the words in, the growing silence making you nervous and antsy. “I hope I didn’t overstep—”

“You didn’t. It’s…it’s perfect. I’m honored and so, so happy.”

She chuckled and reached a hand over to stroke the skin of your cheek before pulling away and looking back down to your baby. You felt him bury his nose further into your skin, breathing the natural tones in deeply as his heart swelled in his chest.

Your friends had thankfully not crowded around you when they made their way in your room an hour after Kento’s parents had departed. Yuji, who’s expressive eyes had remained locked on the bundle in your arms, remained quiet and frozen as Ulani was passed around and cooed to. Gojo was practically fighting off a tantrum as Geto talked softly to her, his calm deep purple eyes watching the slight pucker of her lips with a smile.

“You’ve held her long enough, Geto. It’s my turn.”

Geto ignored him, instead walking over to set Ulani back in your arms.

“She’s wonderful. I’m a proud uncle.”

You thanked him, your eyes still on Yuji’s frozen form against the wall. After a little encouragement from Kento at his perch next to you, Yuji made his way over slowly, sinking onto the bed at your side. He held her carefully, stiff and ramrod straight as Ulani nestled further into his chest. He relaxed quickly against her, rocking her small form before he began to shoot off hushed and random questions about her measurements to you and Kento.

Gojo was practically in shambles by the time Ome had walked into your room. Everyone had a turn with her, everyone was able to hold her and gaze down at her softness, but by the time it was his turn, everyone else had gone and only he and Ome remained.

Her eyes were already swimming with tears as she sat down by your waist. Uncharacteristic tears making her silver eyes already luminescent as Gojo sank down next to her, looking over her shoulder as you handed your daughter to her. Ome’s eyes fluttered happily, a large smile breaking on her face as she chuckled gently down at Ulani.

“Look at you…so lovely and you’ve only been here a few hours.”

The pure adoration in her eyes was hard to miss and even Gojo found himself soaking it up as much as he could.

“Kento and I thought…we were wondering if you both would like to be her godparents?”

Ome’s eyes widened to a degree you would have never expected, her soft expression already vulnerable and only beginning to crack more as she shook out a small sob, nodding profusely and unable to produce any words.

Gojo however held a look of confusion, his cheeks rosy in surprise.

“I don’t understand…I’m sure you would have wanted Yu to be the godfather. I’m not upset, I expected you to always choose him. But I know you are only choosing me because Yu is gone.”

Ome threw him a vicious glare but Kento spoke up before she could chastise him.

“While that may be true, the fact of the matter is that Yu is gone now. Even when he was alive, I wanted you to be in her life. But besides Yu, as much as you drive me absolutely insane, I know you would do anything to protect and love her. I understand if you are upset, I can’t take away that feeling. But I want you to know that you are the next person I would have chosen to step up to the plate. If you do not want to, then of course we both understand.”

Ome finally slid your daughter into Gojo’s arms, her small body practically eclipsed by his tall form. His white hair fell down from his face, casting a shadow over his eyes as his full lips grew into a wide smile. He stroked her chubby cheek with a long finger, trailing it up to circle a light brown curl before he was giggling softly.

“Of course, I would like to be her godfather. I know I was only joking before when y/n was pregnant but, I think secretly I wanted to be tethered to her in some way. I’m honored. And Nanamin, I’ll do a good job, I promise.”

“I know you will.”

Ulani chose that moment to yawn, her small mouth opening wide and stretching her squishy face, a whimper and babylike noise gurgling from her throat before she was nestling further into her blanket and falling asleep.

“Obviously I’m the best choice for the job.”

Kento rolled his eyes harshly, shooting him a small noise of indignation.

“Give me my daughter and get out.”

Gojo stuck his tongue out at his friend, choosing instead to look back down at your daughter and disappear into atmosphere of her for the time being. Ome used to lapse in time to fuss over you, fixing your bun, picking at your clothes, and asking if you had eaten. She rejected all words from Kento, insisting that she wanted to help at least a little before leaving and disappeared into the kitchen to make you both lunch.

You weren’t sure if it was from the sudden movement of the bed, the slight increase in volume of voices, or just mother nature’s timing, but Ulani instantly began to fuss in Gojo’s arms. She wiggled in her blanket, whimpered until she was outright crying in his hold. You felt your body instantly react, your stomach twisting and chest practically pulsing in discomfort as Gojo opened her blankets to check her over.

“She’s wet. Let me go change her and I’ll be right back.”

You held back the urge to protest, whining softly in your spot as he disappeared out the door with your crying daughter.

“He’s trying to butter me up.”

You smacked Kento’s chest in response, snorting up at him before shaking your head in admonition. You knew he was joking, could practically feel his euphoria and happiness radiating from him and seeping into the pores of your skin.

By the time Gojo returned with her, she was still crying but not as intensely as before. He brought her to you, gently setting her in your arms.

“Thank you, Gojo. She’s probably hungry.”

“I’ll go help Ome in the kitchen.”

Kento helped you situate yourself in the bed as you pulled out a sleeve and helped her latch onto you. Your midwives had truly thought it latching for you would be a little bit of a struggle, but Ulani of course took to it like a pro, catching on instantly. You relaxed into Kento’s chest from behind you, his warm muscles cradling your back as his large form hugged you closer, molding you both together as your daughter nursed in your arms.

Her expressive eyes shined up at you, trying to make out what she could see in front of her as her eyelids drooped occasionally from being fed.

“We did good, huh?”

He chuckled softly, pressing a smooth kiss to the crease of your neck and resting his chin atop of your head.

“We did great. You did great.”

You scoffed softly, your eyes still locked on the deep brown of her irises as you spoke.

“I suppose your seed helped. Even drunk and wrapped in a condom, you somehow got through my IUD and knocked me up. Your father says that strong sperm runs in the Nanami line.”

“He is as crude as you are.”

You tried to hold in as much of your giggle as you could, careful not to jostle her.

“Thank you…her middle name. My mother is over the moon, as am I. When did you decide on it?”

“I knew her first name after only a month or two. I had an urge to give her your mother’s name as well, but I didn’t actually feel confident until the baby shower. She’s the best mother I could ever have and she’s a wonderful woman. A strong woman. To give that to Ulani was something that felt right to me.”

He hummed appreciatively against you, a large hand coming up to caress the light brown curls that poked from under her beanie. She reacted to the touch, her eyes shifting over to look up at her father, lips puckering quickly as she nursed from you. She probably couldn’t see much, but the thought of her recognizing him had Kento smiling down at her, his heart growing ten times in size as he cradled you both closer to him.

[sandbees]

I don't know if you open, but I love. No. I adore your house of mouse au, I've seen most of it but I wonder, what if the ob gang see Yuu and the great seven chatting then Yuu saw them, pull them and say 'this is the guy I told you back then', now I probably already read one of ask that contain this, but I wanna see only overblot's first reaction that probably quite fascinating

:0 alright!

It's already been a few months since Yuu has introduced their friends to the House of Mouse. Honestly, they were fine with that, until there was a planned Dorm Leader meeting. Sadly, their usual spot was taken by the teachers for another meeting, but hey, the House of Mouse is always there! So Yuu invites them for a meeting.

Thankfully, Mickey was glad to give Yuu time off ("I wouldn't want you to be focused on work all the time! It's important to keep your social life back at home healthy. Enjoy the show! :)")

So, they wait for the other Dorm Leaders before they take them to their mirror upstairs.

Kalim: Oh! Are we having a sleepover!?

Yuu: No, we're going to my workplace. They're giving me time off so we can have a meeting and enjoy their performances!

Riddle: Well, as long as it doesn't distract us from the meeting...Why are we even in your room to begin with? Yuu: 'Cause we can't get in without using my mirror, duh. *Pushes Idia into the mirror*

Idia: WHY ME-

They go through the mirror, and the others are pretty impressed with Yuu's personal dressing room.

Yuu: Yeah, my boss is the best :). Oh, btw, don't be surprised to see the Great Seven.

Azul: Hahaha, WHAT?

As they walk out, Minnie personally greets them and leads them to a table. Goofy comes by a minute later and takes all of their orders. As they wait for their orders to come, Yuu gauges everyone's reactions.

Azul is, unsurprisingly, writing things down, muttering about "new ideas for Mostro Lounge. Kalim is looking around the whole dining room, his eyes sparkling. Riddle and Vil are talking quietly, commenting on the decor. Idia was grossed in his video game he brought, glancing at anyone who passed by the table. Leona was messing with the center piece, looking absolutely bored. And Malleus just looked happy to be there.

The meeting went well, actually. With a lively atmosphere, the Dorm Leaders were able to have some productive conversations. Yuu was especially happy to be included in future events run by the Dorms. There were a few interruptions, though.

Of course, it was pure coincidence that the Great Seven were also having a get together. But the oddest thing was that THEY WERE AT THE TABLE NEXT TO THEM??? If that isn't planned idk what is. Yuu introduced the gang to one another.

Riddle is all red in the face, probably very embarrassed to meet the Queen of Hearts. He certainly didn't expect to meet her in person! Though she's pretty impressed by him. He knows all 810 rules by heart. What a good Dorm Leader, remembering all the ruels and making sure the rest remember them!

Leona and Scar didn't talk to each other at first, but when the topic of siblings came around, YOU BET THAT THEY WERE TALKING SHIT. Honestly the funniest thing for them to realize this and begin gossiping about the dumbest things people have done in front of them. It's very sweet to watch them vent out their frustrations to each other.

Ursula talking with Azul and giving him tips on how to blackmail convice people to sign his contracts. Maybe even answer his questions about herself or giving him ideas for his business. A magic item made by the Sea Witch herself? For a price, of course~

Honestly, I can only see Jafar tolerate Kalim at best. He sees Kalim as a foolish kid. Though maybe Jafar slightly warms up to him??? Yuu is probably the one to mediate between the two, honestly.

VIL AND QUEEN GOSSIPING ABOUT BEAUTY TIPS. VIL WOULD TOTALLY TELL HER ABOUT MODERN BEAUTY TIPS. They would be the mean girls of the group tbh. I think Queen would also give tips on being a better leader, because despite her vanity, she was probably a good ruler if the kingdom didn't go to hell in the movie.

Idia would 100% be dying inside at Hades' extrovertness. Hades would be very excited to learn more about his dorm honestly. (Wait no Hades would joke about them being related, and Idia would sink into his seat further). The conversation was awkward until Hades asked about the video game Idia brought. Idia would not SHUT UP ABOUT IT-

Malleus and Maleficent would have a lovely chat over teas and biscuts that they ordered. Maleficent would 100% give Malleus any and all advice she had gained over the years. (Maybe advise Malleus to snag Yuu before anyone else got them). They would totally have conversations about the use of gargoyles and how spot a wild one.

It's getting late at night, and the meeting was over, but Yuu convinced everyone to stay. The show began, and it was one of the best Yuu's seen in awhile (to be fair, most of the shows were sabotaged by Pete, which they helped stop).

The night ended with a bang, and all the Dorm Leaders agreed to hold another meeting at the House of Mouse some time in the future.

[raya-04]

Upon A Star | PJM ☆ 1

Story Summary: Nineteen-year-old Y/n debuts as an idol under Hybe Entertainment, only to find her almost-boyfriend, BTS’s Park Jimin, is under the same company. Their painful “breakup” two years ago, driven by misunderstandings and trainee pressures, left unresolved feelings. As Y/n navigates her new life in the spotlight, she frequently encounters Jimin during rehearsals and events, sparking media speculation and fan rumors. Forced to confront their past, they struggle to remain professional while deciding whether to rekindle their romance or move on, all amidst the demands of their careers.

Pairing: jiminxreader

Genres: series, fluff, angst, smut, idol au

Word count: 5.6k

A/N: Hi! This is the first chapter in this series. I apologize for making it short, but next chapter will be much longer. I’ve worked really hard on this and hope you enjoy.

Y/n

This is the moment I’ve been dreaming of. My heart pounds in my chest, threatening to break free from my ribcage. Behind me, the rest of the group waits, just as nervous as I am. I reach back and grab a member’s hand. It’s trembling, her fingertips icy against mine. I give her hand a reassuring squeeze, even though my own fear threatens to take over.

Screams erupt all around us, nearly drowning out the ticking of the metronome in our earpieces. Suddenly, a deep voice cuts through the chaos. “G6ix, up next. Five minutes till showtime.” The metronome resumes, a relentless reminder that this is real. My breathing falters, shaky and uneven. I drop my head, close my eyes, and inhale deeply. This is happening—ready or not.

The six members behind me are quietly mustering their courage. I turn to them, forcing a confident smile. “We’re going to be great,” I say, my voice steady despite the storm raging inside me. They relax slightly, their faces softening. But truthfully, I’m just as terrified as they are.

“Five… four… three… two… one…” The voice in our earpieces counts down, and we rush to the side of the stage. “Go!”

My members jog past me onto the stage, waving to the audience with practiced confidence. The screams are deafening, vibrating in my chest. I follow closely behind the member in front of me, my mind racing with every step. Don’t mess this up. Don’t ruin everything we’ve worked for.

The crowd settles, and the opening notes of our song begin. I exhale, letting muscle memory take over. The stage trembles beneath us as we give everything we have, every movement sharp and precise. The lights blind me, but the energy of the audience keeps me grounded. They’re all here for us. I can’t believe it.

Jimin

Today has been exhausting. I had planned to spend the last few hours of free time doing absolutely nothing, but Jungkook had other ideas. He’s on his way over with food, insisting that I eat with him. To pass the time, I scroll aimlessly on TikTok. My ‘For You’ page isn’t showing my usual content—no dance challenges or comedy skits. Instead, it’s a random mix of topics: a movie sequel releasing next summer, product reviews, and a new girl group that just debuted.

One video catches my attention: a clip of the group’s debut performance. I tap on it. They’re good but clearly nervous. The camera zooms in on each member’s face, and I almost scroll away until I see her. I blink, my heart skipping a beat. Rewinding the video, I pause on her face. Lee Y/n. She’s right there on my screen.

I unpause, keeping my eyes locked on her the entire time. Toward the end, the camera focuses on her singing the outro. Her voice is amazing, so much stronger than it was two years ago. She sings the final words, turning toward the camera with a smile before joining her group. I watch the video two more times, then shut off my phone, embarrassed. I’m supposed to be sleeping right now, not getting caught up in the past. My stomach churns as her face lingers in my mind.

A knock at the door pulls me back to reality. Jungkook walks in, carrying bags of food and setting them on the coffee table before I can move. “I brought plenty,” he announces. We sit down to eat, cracking jokes and laughing. I try to focus on the moment, but thoughts of her won’t go away.

“Hey, Kook,” I ask, rolling a spoon between my fingers. “Did you see the group that debuted under Hybe?”

He nods, wiping his mouth. “Yeah, they’re really good. I’ve seen some of the members around before.”

“Which ones?”

Jungkook raises an eyebrow. “Why do you want to know?”

“It’s not like that. I’m just curious,” I reply, shoving a spoonful of rice into my mouth.

“Mm.” He picks up his phone, scrolling to a TikTok. “Li Niki, Song Haein, and Lee Y/n,” he says, pointing them out.

“What are they like?”

He pauses, thinking. “Y/n was nice. Well, they were all nice, but she stood out. Probably because she was the prettiest.” He grins.

“Did she know who you were?”

Jungkook shakes his head. “When she was a trainee, they took her phone. Said they wanted her to focus entirely on debuting.”

“I wish they’d done that for us,” I joke.

He nods. “Would’ve been helpful.”

Hours later, we’re still laughing and talking. I get up to throw away the snack wrappers, yawning. “I’m heading home,” Jungkook says, grabbing his stuff.

“See you later,” I reply, waving him off before finishing up. After taking out the trash, I finally crawl into bed. My eyes close, but my mind won’t stop replaying the day. Lee Y/n’s face appears, and I groan, opening my eyes. She really debuted under Hybe.

Grabbing my phone, I download G6ix’s album. It’s not weird to listen to their music, right?

My alarm blares, jolting me awake. I groggily pat around until my fingers slap the edge of my phone, dragging it closer. With a heavy sigh, I press the cancel button and sit up. Waking up early has never been my favorite thing. After a quick shower and brushing my teeth, I shuffle my playlist and let the music fill the room as I get ready.

The outfit my stylist chose isn’t something I’d usually wear, but I put it on anyway. As I tug a sweater over my head, I freeze. A familiar voice plays through the speaker—G6ix’s song. Quickly, I pull the sweater the rest of the way down and grab my phone, staring at the album artwork. A black background with a pink star in the center. The members are dressed in blue jeans and white shirts, standing together in a simple but striking formation. My heart tugs at the sight. Shaking it off, I pause the music, power down my phone, and tuck it into my pocket. I lace my boots, double-check my bag, and head out the door.

The streets are alive with the morning rush. Crisp air nips at my ears as the wind cuts through, but I make it to the Hybe building quickly. The moment I step inside, I’m greeted by the familiar chaos of a photo shoot: lights being adjusted, backdrops set in place, and people rushing with purpose. I nod and smile at a few idols before heading to the dressing room to check in with the stylist.

An assistant walks in and hands me the day’s schedule with a polite smile. As I scan the details, a voice from across the room stops me in my tracks. Y/n. She’s talking to the makeup artist, completely unaware of my presence—until our eyes meet.

For a moment, time seems to stand still. Shock flickers between us before we both recover. I nod and offer a small smile, trying to keep my expression neutral. She mirrors it, but there’s an unspoken tension in the air, the weight of past memories pressing down. Neither of us expected this. I quietly excuse myself, needing space to clear my head.

While helping set up the equipment, I can’t stop stealing glances at her. Memories bubble up, but I shove them aside. Focus. I catch her watching me once, just for a moment, before she turns back to what she’s doing. Is she thinking about the past too?

The shoot moves along smoothly, but the silence between us makes it hard to concentrate. My hands slip as I adjust the backdrop, pinching my fingers painfully. “Damn it,” I mutter, shaking my hand to ease the sting. I hear a soft giggle and glance up to see Y/n quickly covering her mouth, trying to stifle her laughter. The sound is light, familiar, and briefly disarms me.

When we finally wrap up, relief floods me. I pack up quickly, eager to leave and let the day settle. Before I head out, I glance at Y/n one last time. She’s busy with the makeup artist again, her expression unreadable. I turn away and walk out, the weight of unspoken words trailing behind me.

Y/N

The studio feels like home by now—the familiar smell of makeup, the hum of lighting equipment, and the quiet buzz of staff moving with purpose. Today’s solo shoot is a big one, my first since debuting. My stylist adjusts the strap of my dress as the photographer fine-tunes the angles of the spotlight. I take a steadying breath, trying to ignore the knots in my stomach.

“You’ve got this, Y/N,” the stylist says with an encouraging smile.

I nod, trying to believe her. The click of the camera begins, and I shift into the first pose. Confidence starts to settle in as I fall into a rhythm, my movements becoming fluid and natural. The photographer offers occasional feedback, praising my expressions and angles. For a brief moment, I forget about everything outside this room.

But then the door creaks open.

The faint sound of music from the dance studio across the hall seeps in, the familiar bassline tugging at a memory. I glance toward the door, my heart skipping a beat when I see him—Park Jimin. He’s wearing a loose black hoodie and sweatpants, his face slightly flushed, probably from practice. His hair sticks to his forehead, damp with sweat. He pauses when our eyes meet, his expression unreadable.

The seconds stretch unbearably. I quickly look away, turning back to the camera, but my focus is shattered. My body stiffens as the photographer calls for another pose, but the fluidity I’d found earlier is gone.

“Take five,” the photographer sighs, sensing my sudden shift.

I step away from the set, needing air, but my path to the hallway feels like a trap. Jimin’s still there, leaning casually against the wall, his gaze heavy as he watches me approach. There’s no escaping it now.

“Y/N,” he says, his voice quiet but firm.

“Jimin,” I reply, trying to sound indifferent.

“You look… busy,” he says, glancing at the setup behind me.

“And you look like you’ve been working hard,” I say, motioning toward his sweat-soaked clothes. My attempt at casualness comes out colder than I intend.

His lips twitch into a faint smile, but it doesn’t reach his eyes. “It’s good to see you’re doing well,” he says after a beat of silence.

I swallow hard, the words sticking in my throat. “You too,” I manage.

The silence between us feels heavier than the noise of the studio. The air is thick with unspoken words, memories threatening to resurface. I start to walk past him, my heart pounding so loudly I’m sure he can hear it.

But then his voice stops me.

“Good luck with the shoot,” he says, his tone dismissive.

I nod, unable to muster anything more, and walk away. But even as I return to the set, his presence lingers, his voice echoing in my mind. For the rest of the shoot, I can’t shake the feelings I felt when he walked in.

The dorm is quiet now, except for the faint sounds of laughter coming from the living room. The rest of the group is in high spirits, chatting and teasing each other. Their voices drift through the walls, but here I am, lying in bed, alone with my thoughts. The bed is soft, the covers warm, and yet it feels like nothing is quite right. I turn over, burying my face in the pillow, trying to block out everything around me.

Today was… strange. Seeing Jimin again felt like a blur, a mixture of nostalgia and confusion. At first, when our eyes met across the studio, I couldn’t help but freeze. The shock was instant, but not in the way I expected. It wasn’t anger or hurt that flooded me, but a strange sense of déjà vu. The same feeling I had when I left—like I was making a choice, but unsure of where that choice would take me.

I roll over, staring at the ceiling. His face had been so familiar, almost too much. His eyes, the eyes that used to be my safe place, were still so full of that quiet warmth. Yet, there was a distance, a wall between us now, something unspoken.

Why now? Why is the universe bringing him back into my orbit, just when I thought I was moving on, when I thought I had finally gotten my footing in this new life? It’s not like I’m pining for him. I’m not sitting here regretting everything that happened. But it’s like a door was left open, and I don’t know if I should walk through it or close it once and for all.

The laughter in the other room rises and falls, but it doesn’t reach me the way it usually does. Normally, I would join them, joke around, laugh along. But tonight, I just can’t. The silence here feels safer.

I close my eyes, replaying the brief interaction from earlier. It was a simple exchange, very superficial. He asked how I was, and I said I was doing well. And then, as I walked away, he wished me good luck. That was it. It wasn’t some grand moment of reunion. But something in the way he said those words, something in the way his eyes lingered on me for just a second too long—it made me feel like there was more I should’ve said. But there was no room for it. Not now.

I run a hand through my hair, exhaling slowly. I don’t need to re-open that wound. I don’t need to re-enter that chapter of my life. But why does it feel like the universe is pushing me in his direction? Every time I think I’ve closed the door, something reminds me of everything I left behind. Is it a sign? A test? Or am I just overthinking?

Sighing, I sit up in bed and pull my knees to my chest. I stare at the soft light of the lamp on the nightstand, the warm glow offering some comfort.

Maybe I’m not supposed to have the answers right now. Maybe I’m not supposed to know what today meant. Life isn’t always clear-cut, and people aren’t as simple as we’d like them to be. And so much has changed in these past two years.

But still, a part of me wonders if the universe is testing me. Whether it’s trying to tell me something, or if it’s just showing me that some connections, no matter how far apart we grow, never truly disappear.

I lay back down, my head sinking into the pillow once more. The laughter in the living room continues, a little louder now, and I can almost feel their warmth through the walls. The familiar sound is a reminder that, no matter what, I have my group. I have this new chapter, and it’s mine to write.

But for tonight, I’ll let myself wonder. Why now? And why him?

The morning light peeks through the curtains, casting a soft glow across the room. I wake up slowly, the remnants of a restless sleep still hanging over me. It’s not like I didn’t sleep well—just that my thoughts kept drifting to things I didn’t want to think about. I stretch, rubbing my eyes as I sit up and take in the quiet of the dorm. The sound of distant chatter and clattering from the kitchen below tells me the other members are already up.

After a quick shower, I change into comfortable practice clothes—just a hoodie and leggings—and grab my bag. I can’t help but notice the slight flutter of nerves in my stomach. Today feels different, though I can’t put my finger on why. Maybe it’s just another day of practice, just another day to get better, but there’s an underlying tension that keeps me on edge.

I make my way to the kitchen, where a couple of members are finishing breakfast. The morning bustle is comforting in its routine, but it doesn’t do much to ease the unsettled feeling in my stomach. I sit down with a cup of coffee, and we talk about our plans for the day, the usual mix of excitement and exhaustion. But that feeling never quite disappears.

“Are you ready for practice today?” one of the members asks as she slides a bowl of cereal in front of me.

“Yeah, I think so,” I say, though my voice betrays my nerves. I’m trying not to focus on whatever this is building inside me, trying to push it aside and focus on what’s in front of me.

The walk to the practice room is uneventful, the cool morning air doing little to calm the nerves gnawing at me. As we enter the studio, the familiar hum of the place sets a sense of rhythm, and I breathe easier for a moment. But as I start to stretch, my phone buzzes in my pocket. A quick glance tells me it’s a message from our manager.

“Meeting in 30 minutes. Big news. Be ready.”

My stomach flips. A meeting? My mind instantly racing. But it’s not long before that gut feeling shifts. Something feels different about today. My thoughts circle back to Jimin, though I try to push them down. I can’t get worried now.

The buzzer rings, and we’re all called into the meeting room. We gather around, exchanging curious glances, none of us sure of what to expect. Our manager walks in, his face a mixture of excitement and serious business. He wastes no time.

“Okay, everyone, listen up,” he begins. “I’ve got some big news. You’re all going to be part of a major game show event in two months. It’s a live show, meant to promote G6ix. You’ll be meeting idols from a variety of different groups, competing in challenges, and introducing yourselves to an even bigger audience.”

The room goes silent as we process the news. A game show. Live. There’s a certain weight to the announcement, and I can feel the excitement building, even as my own thoughts begin to spiral. I force myself to focus on what he’s saying.

“You’ll be paired with idols from the biggest groups—BTS, G-idle, Seventeen, Stray Kids, Ateez, Twice, Itzy, and more,” he continues, his words almost blending together in the buzzing air of the room. I can hear the shock and excitement in the members’ voices as they start talking over each other, reacting to the names, the possibilities.

My heart races. BTS. Jimin. I can’t stop my thoughts from rushing back to him. The idea of being on live TV, in front of thousands, maybe millions, with him standing there… it’s overwhelming. What if I freeze up? What if I forget what to do?

I blink a few times, trying to keep myself grounded, but it’s not helping. My mind is reeling. I can’t even imagine what it would be like standing in front of all these idols—people who were once just names to me, faces on a screen, and now they’ll be real. They’ll be right there, with us, competing alongside us.

“Are you okay?” A member asks, snapping me out of my thoughts. I look over at her, offering a weak smile.

“Yeah, just… processing,” I reply, but the truth is, I’m not sure I’m okay at all. How am I supposed to act around them? Around him?

I feel my heart flutter again, but this time, it’s not just excitement. It’s also fear and uncertainty. What if I make a fool of myself in front of all of them? In front of Jimin?

The manager continues talking, explaining the details of the game show, but I find it hard to focus. All I can think about is the idea of being on camera, surrounded by idols who are far more experienced in the spotlight than I am. And then there’s Jimin, always lurking in the back of my mind.

What if I freeze up when I see him? What if I get nervous and say something stupid, or worse, embarrass myself?

I push the thoughts aside, trying to breathe through it. I don’t have time to worry about things I can’t control. I need to focus on the present, on the group, on the opportunity we’ve been given.

“Alright,” the manager concludes, “It’s going to be intense, but this is a huge chance for G6ix to shine. So get ready. Practice hard, and when it’s time, give it everything you’ve got.”

The room is buzzing again as everyone talks excitedly. I force myself to smile, but the knot in my stomach is only growing tighter. I have to find a way to stay calm. I have to keep my composure.

Jimin

The practice room is unusually quiet, the only sounds coming from the faint hum of the speakers and the occasional shuffle of shoes against the hardwood floor. It’s rare for the seven of us to get a moment of peace, but we’d earned it after the morning’s grueling choreography session. I sit against the mirror, a towel draped over my shoulders, catching my breath while the others are sprawled across the room in various states of exhaustion.

My mind drifts as I sip on my water bottle, letting the stillness calm the racing thoughts in my head. It’s been a packed schedule lately, with no real time to think about anything else. But even so, Y/N keeps slipping into my thoughts. Ever since I saw her again at the studio, it’s been impossible to push her from my mind.

“BTS, meeting in ten,” a staff member announces, sticking her head into the room.

Namjoon sits up immediately, always the responsible leader. “Let’s go.”

I groan softly but pull myself to my feet, tossing the towel onto my bag. Meetings usually mean schedules, and schedules mean more packed days. But we’ve done this for two years now; it’s nothing new.

The seven of us file into the conference room, where our manager is already waiting, his clipboard in hand and a laptop open in front of him. He looks excited, which instantly puts me on edge. Excited managers mean surprises, and surprises rarely mean more rest.

“Good timing,” he says, gesturing for us to sit. “This is big news, so I need your full attention.”

We settle into our seats, exchanging curious glances. The air feels charged, like something important is coming.

“You’ve been invited to participate in a live game show,” he begins, his voice carrying that edge of authority that always demands focus. “It’s designed to promote newer groups while featuring established idols as mentors and competitors. You’ll be working with G6ix and several other rookie groups.”

The room buzzes instantly as the other members react.

“A game show? Sounds fun,” Taehyung says, his voice laced with curiosity.

“Who else is participating?” Jungkook asks, leaning forward, already intrigued.

Our manager scrolls through his notes. “Alongside G6ix, there’ll be groups like G-Idle, Seventeen, Stray Kids, Ateez, Twice, Itzy, and more. It’s going to be a star-studded event, so the pressure will be high.”

The buzz in the room grows louder as everyone reacts, excitement mixing with anticipation. But for me, the words hit differently. G6ix. Y/N.

I feel my stomach drop, my pulse quickening. A live game show, with her there. It’s not just the pressure of being on live TV—it’s the thought of being in her presence again, in front of an audience, with cameras capturing every second of it.

“You’ll be participating in games, challenges, and group interactions,” the manager continues, oblivious to my internal spiral. “It’s a fantastic opportunity to connect with other idols and engage with fans in a more casual setting. Think of it as a mix of promotion and fun.”

Namjoon nods thoughtfully. “It’s a good chance for exposure,” he agrees.

But I barely hear him. My thoughts are racing, images of Y/N flashing through my mind. How am I supposed to act around her? What if I can’t control my reactions? What if the cameras catch something—anything—that I don’t want the world to see?

“Jimin?”

I snap back to reality, realizing everyone is looking at me. “Huh?”

“You alright?” Yoongi asks, raising an eyebrow.

I nod quickly, forcing a smile. “Yeah, just thinking about what kind of games we’ll have to play.”

“Don’t worry,” Jungkook says, smirking. “You’re good at games. Just don’t let your competitive streak scare the rookies.”

The others laugh, and I join in, though it feels hollow. My mind is too preoccupied to fully engage. I keep thinking about what it’ll be like to stand across from her, to see her in that setting. I’ve seen Y/N on stage, I’ve seen her growth as a performer, but being this close again—especially with the world watching—it feels like too much.

The meeting wraps up with our manager handing out schedules and notes about the show. As we leave the room, the others are still talking about the event, speculating on what games we’ll play and which groups they’re excited to meet. I trail behind, lost in my thoughts.

Once we’re back in the practice room, I sit on the floor and lean against the mirror, staring blankly at my water bottle.

“Live TV,” I mutter under my breath. “With her.”

I can’t decide what’s worse: the idea of facing her again or the fact that part of me is looking forward to it.

Y/N

Three weeks. It’s been three weeks since the news of the game show was dropped on us, and ever since, I’ve been running into Jimin more than I ever expected. It’s like the universe is intentionally testing me. The Hybe building is huge, with countless studios, offices, and hallways, yet somehow, our paths keep crossing.

The first time was in the cafeteria. He was grabbing a water bottle, and I was in line for coffee. Our eyes met for a brief, awkward moment before we both looked away, pretending it hadn’t happened. The next time, it was in a hallway between practice rooms. He was heading out as I was coming in, and all I could manage was a tight-lipped nod before brushing past him.

Every encounter feels the same—awkward glances, stiff words, and an invisible wall between us that neither of us seems willing to break. My group members have noticed, of course. They’re observant, especially Haein.

“Hey, Y/N.” Haein’s voice pulls me out of my thoughts one night as we sit in the dorm’s cozy living room. The others are scattered around, some watching a drama, others scrolling on their phones. “Can we talk? Privately?”

My stomach twists. “Sure,” I say, following her into the shared bedroom we both sleep in.

She closes the door behind us and leans against it, her arms crossed. “So… what’s up with you and Jimin?”

My heart skips a beat. “What do you mean?” I ask, feigning ignorance.

Haein raises an eyebrow, her expression skeptical. “Don’t play dumb. Every time you see him, you get weird. And don’t think I haven’t noticed the way he looks at you, too. There’s history there.”

I sigh, sinking onto the edge of my bed. “It’s complicated,” I admit.

Haein sits beside me, her voice softening. “Then uncomplicate it. What happened?”

I hesitate, staring at my hands. Part of me wants to keep it all bottled up, but the other part—the part that’s been carrying this weight alone for too long—wants to let it out.

“We dated… kind of,” I finally say, my voice barely above a whisper.

Haein’s eyes widen. “You… and Jimin?”

I nod, my throat tightening. “It was years ago, before I became a trainee. We met through mutual friends. It was perfect—he was kind, supportive, and everything I could’ve asked for. But then… things got complicated.”

She doesn’t interrupt, just waits patiently for me to continue.

Flashback

The night was cold, and the city lights blurred in the rain as I sat across from Jimin in the small café where we always met. The warmth of the space did nothing to ease the ice in my chest. I had rehearsed this conversation a hundred times, but now that he was sitting there—his soft eyes filled with exhaustion but still looking at me with so much love and adoration—my resolve felt like it was crumbling.

“Y/N, what’s wrong?” His voice was gentle, but there was an edge of worry. He could always read me too well.

I gripped the warm mug of tea in my hands, staring at it as though it held the answers I didn’t know how to say. “I… I think we need to talk,” I said, my voice barely above a whisper.

Jimin stiffened, his fingers tightening around his cup. “That doesn’t sound good,” he said, his tone cautious.

“It’s not,” I admitted, finally forcing myself to look up at him. His hair was slightly damp from the rain, his hoodie slightly too big on him. He looked so vulnerable, so real, and it only made the ache in my chest worse.

“Are you… leaving me?” he asked, his voice cracking slightly.

I felt the first tear slip down my cheek. “Jimin, you’re about to debut. Your entire life is about to change. You’re busier than ever, and I don’t want to be one more thing pulling at you. You deserve to focus on your dream.”

“No,” he said firmly, shaking his head. “Y/N, no. Please don’t do this.”

“It’s for the best,” I insisted, though my voice wavered.

“For the best? For who? Because it’s not for me,” he said, his tone rising with desperation. “Y/N, I know I’ve been busy. I know I haven’t been around as much as I should, but I love you. I love you, and I’m trying.”

His words felt like a punch to my chest. I swallowed hard, trying to keep my composure. “I know you’re trying, Jimin. But I feel like… like I’m becoming a distraction. You’re exhausted all the time. You barely have a moment to breathe.”

“You’re not a distraction,” he said, his voice breaking. “You’re the only thing that keeps me sane, Y/N. When I’m tired, when I feel like I can’t do it anymore, I think about you. Please, don’t take that away from me.”

Tears streamed down his face, and seeing him like that—so vulnerable, so raw—was almost too much to bear. My own tears blurred my vision as I reached across the table, taking his hand in mine.

“I don’t want to hurt you,” I whispered. “But I feel like I’m already hurting you by staying.”

“You’re not,” he insisted, his grip on my hand tightening. “We can figure this out. Please, Y/N. Don’t do this.”

I bit my lip, trying to hold back a sob. “Jimin, you deserve someone who can live with you having to divide your attention between your career and your relationship. I don’t think I can be that person.”

“You’re all I want,” he said, his voice trembling. “Don’t leave me. Please.”

My heart shattered into pieces as I watched him cry, his shoulders shaking as he clung to my hand like it was the only thing keeping him afloat. I wanted so badly to take it all back, to tell him I’d stay, but I knew deep down that I was making the best decision for him. His dream was bigger than the both of us, and I couldn’t compete with it anymore.

“I’m so sorry,” I whispered, my voice cracking under the weight of my own heartbreak. “I love you, Jimin. But I have to go.”

His hand slipped from mine as he leaned back, tears streaming down his face. “Why are you doing this to me?” he asked, his voice breaking.

I couldn’t answer him. All I could do was stand, grabbing my bag and walking away before I lost the strength to leave. As I stepped out into the rain, my sobs finally broke free, my chest heaving with pain.

It felt like I had left a part of myself in that café, and no matter how far I walked, I couldn’t escape the feeling of emptiness that followed me.

Present

I blink, the memory fading as Haein’s voice pulls me back to the present.

“Wow,” she says softly. “That’s… a lot.”

“It was the hardest decision I’ve ever made,” I admit, my voice trembling. “I cried for weeks afterward. And even now, seeing him again, it’s like ripping open an old wound.”

Haein places a comforting hand on my shoulder. “Do you still have feelings for him?”

I shake my head quickly. “No, it’s not that. It’s just… seeing him reminds me of everything I made him give up. And I don’t know how to act around him. He feels like a stranger, but also… someone I used to know better than anyone.”

She squeezes my shoulder gently. “Maybe this game show is the universe’s way of giving you closure. Or maybe it’s a second chance. Either way, you’re going to have to face it.”

I nod, though my chest feels heavy. As Haein leaves the room, I lie back on my bed, staring at the ceiling. The laughter of my members echoes faintly from the living room, a stark contrast to the turmoil in my heart.

Three weeks ago, I thought I’d moved on. But now, I’m not so sure.

[invaderhogtwopointohno]

What Extraordinary Beings We Are

Summary: Qimir is the hottest pop star on the planet right now with a new album, awards and a movie, he is enjoying himself until he suddenly gets attacked outside of a club. His manager, Mae, arranges for her sister to become his protective agent until they can get more permanent security but there is something about Osha that just has him in awe. Based on a Tumblr prompt by @flythesail

Find on Ao3.

Chapter One

The stadium was packed full of screaming fans, mostly girls and women in anticipation of the concert. The roadies and techs running back and forth to get everything going, the massive screen on the backdrop showing an image of a countdown to the concert’s beginning. The band was sitting in their positions, listening to the stage manager in their ear pieces. The backup dancers were jumping up and down and stretching, ready to go out.

The only one missing was the star himself.

Mae knocked on the door.

“Qimir, hurry your ass up,” she said, looking at her phone. Mae Anaseya had been Qimir’s manager for the last three years and she had been the only one to stay by his side that long because she didn’t put up with any of his bullshit- of which he had plenty. She looked at the time. They were minutes away from starting, opening the door before he could answer her properly.

She walked in to find him sitting in front of his vanity, looking at his phone and generally ignoring the woman who was working on his hair.

“Come on, you need to get out there,” she said and he looked up from his phone.

“Mae,” he said in mild annoyance, the woman putting his microphone around his head and taping it into place. “I thought we said we weren’t going to come into rooms without knocking first.”

“I did. You are going to be late, let’s go,” she said, shooing the woman away as she dragged Qimir from his perch and shame walked him down the hallway. The roar of the crowd filled the stadium and shook the walls. They were like wild animals out there.

“Where are we going next?” he asked, looking at his phone, scrolling through Instagram to see if any of the BTS guys had hit him up.

“Jacksonville, and you need to actually remember this time. Saying thank you to Boston when you were in New York did not go over well,” she said, shoving him along the path to the stage. He didn’t pay her to be nice, that was for sure.

“Thanks for the tip,” he muttered and fixed his black jacket.

“The movie is wrapping post production so you’ll be going on a press tour starting in two months, you have six more stops on this tour and you are done until Feburary next year,” she said, looking at her phone. She had been hired because she had been the only one who had gotten him where he needed to go and doing what he needed to do without much of a fight. Everyone was always letting Qimir do whatever he wanted, as long as he gave them a wink and a smile, but Mae was immune to his stupid charm and instead focused on their working relationship- she was his annoying sister who kept him on the straight and narrow.

Qimir was ushered onto the stage and in front of thousands of screaming fans, Mae standing off to the side, looking at her phone. She returned to the green room, answering calls and e-mails as the concert went on for three hours and finally he came back, sweaty, laughing and looking like he had been having fun. He showered quickly in his dressing room and they were on their way out to greet fans out front.

“We’re heading back to the hotel, your fans have twenty minutes,” Mae said, the stadium security escorting them through the hallways, leading towards the front of the stadium where fans were spilling out of the building, waiting to get a glimpse of him.

Qimir pushed his black hair back, thinking about the evening’s performance when just as they were going through the doors, a shot rang out and everyone screamed, fans running in different directions, everyone dropping down and the stadium security grabbed him, taking him back inside.

He didn’t know what was going on when there were more shots and he was forced into a side hallway and into an elevator.

“What’s going on?!” he asked, looking at Mae, who had also been grabbed.

“I don’t know!”

The security team took him down to the basement and shoved him into a car before he had the chance to ask what was happening and they were off.

“What is going on? What happened?” Qimir demanded of the driver. They made it back to the hotel and heard the news that someone had been shot outside of his concert. A fan had tried to bring a gun into the building but she had been stopped by security and the cops had talked to her. It was a legal handgun that she owned and she had been told to leave, apparently she came back after the concert and had starting shooting in Qimir’s direction when she had seen him coming out for fan photos. She was shot and in critical condition in downtown.

“Well, this isn’t good,” Mae said, looking around the hotel room. The crew and roadies had been escorted back to their hotels by stadium security, but already everyone was on edge because of the incident. Qimir had been popular but since his album release a few weeks earlier and being nominated for Artist of the Year, he had moved to a super high status in the entertainment world. That kind of attention came with all kinds of threats. They had never had serious security before and this was making her nervous.

“We are going to have to get you personal security.”

“Personal security? Mae, there’s no need for all of that,” he said, looking skeptical and she shook her head.

“With everything going on I think we need to be more careful. With the movie coming out, the concerts and the public events, you are extremely exposed, you need someone to watch out for you.”

“Yeah, but I don’t want someone who is going to stand out, that’s boring. Can you get someone who does like undercover work? Like a cool spy?” he whined and she rolled her eyes. This guy was so annoying. She looked at her phone and saw that her sister had finally texted her back.

Are you okay? I heard about what happened. Call me!

“Hold that thought,” she said, stepping into the hallway and calling her sister. “Hey, Osha, I am okay, I promise.”

“Mae! What on earth happened?”

“Well-”

She explained the situation and then finally made her request, “Hey, do you think that Sol would let you come help us out for a bit?”

“You want me to come be security for your client?”

“Qimir is not going to let some guy in a suit and sunglasses protect him, I need someone who can handle all of his annoying,” she explained, thinking of the many times he had gotten into trouble with the paparazzi in the past by making a scene. “We need your help, Osha.”

The Republic Knights were a very effective personal security team that had been formed many years earlier by Osha and Mae’s mentor, Sol. When Mae and Osha were younger, they had been enrolled in self-defense classes by their mother, and Sol had taught them how to take care of themselves. He had moved into private security after several years with the FBI and had offered Osha a job when she was in college. She had been working with him ever since.

Private security was never really Osha’s original interest, but she did get to travel a lot, help protect people and enjoy the added benefit of getting to go to some really nice places. The hotel in downtown where Mae was staying was far more luxurious than Osha was used to.

She had been working personal security for a trading group that had ships going in and out of Africa for the last several months when she got the call about Mae and went to Sol to ask for the security evaluation. Mae was insistent that the Republic Knights be the ones that provide the security service because she could trust Sol. He had a small but dedicated team that had not lost a client the entire time he had been in business.

Sol had insisted that he take the meeting in person, bringing Osha, Jecki and Yord with him to assess the threat level.

“This is a nice place,” Osha muttered to herself as they looked around the hotel lobby, waiting for Mae to come to them. The place was high dollar and they had never worked for someone at this level before.

“Not very secure,” Yord muttered and Jecki looked at him.

“It’s a hotel, idiot, not a Marine Barracks, they’re hiring us to secure it,” she said, rolling her eyes. The two had been working with Sol for about a year now and they were constantly getting on each other nerves.

“Enough, all of you, we have to look professional,” he said, fixing his suit jacket.

“What’s so special about this guy anyway?” Jecki asked, looking at Osha.

“My sister is his manager, he is mainly a singer, but he’s been doing TV shows and movies, he has a new movie coming out and the threats have been getting worse and worse. He is a big deal, I guess,” Osha said, though she had never met him before. Qimir was the thorn in her sister’s side, she was always complaining about what a pain in her ass he was, but she had liked the job and they had a good working relationship.

Mae appeared at the elevators and thanked them for coming, shaking Sol’s hand and they went up to the penthouse to meet Qimir.

“Qimir was discovered by a modeling agency about five years ago, he started singing too and that’s when his career took off with his first album, The Stranger. Since then he has been super popular. We’ve been on tour for the last two months. We wrapped his movie a month ago and it’s in post production so soon we will be doing a press tour. After what happened, I realized that we need to come up with a better security set up because we’ve been relying mostly on security at the venues and the movie lots.”

“We are more than happy to oblige, but this is a big ask, Mae, we have never taken on such a big client before.”

“That’s why I thought of you, with such a small operation, you would be more dedicated to his security than a bigger name. Besides, he’s an annoying pain in the ass and handling him is going to take a full team.”

“What about your security?” Osha asked, looking at her sister. She had been there when the woman had shot into the crowd.

“If you keep me from getting hurt too, that’s a bonus,” she said, as they reached the floor where the room was. They entered the massive penthouse to find that it was only decorated in the finest. Qimir was a major client. The most security that they had done the past few months had been escorting and trade route protection, not a single client that came with a big name. But Sol was excited for the new challenge and the higher rate of pay for his employees.

And he trusted Mae, she had been a good kid since he’d known her and Osha. They had been a little at odds because Osha had decided to keep her training under Sol going when Mae moved on to other things, but this was a chance for them to all work together.

“Qimir! Get out here, the security team is here,” Mae said, leaving them standing in the sitting area to hunt him down.

Yord took in the room, searching for all exits and being mindful of the massive windows that looked out on the city. Jecki helped herself to a spot next to Sol on the couch and Osha looked at the large painting of a lion on the wall.

“This is ridiculous, I don’t want some random people hanging around me like this,” Qimir whined as he followed Mae out of the bedroom, looking at the pair on the couch. “This is bullshit, I don’t need some suits hanging around telling me what to do.”

Mae looked at him, shaking her head.

“Qimir, I trust Sol, we’ve known each other for years, he will make sure that you are safe and that’s all that matters to me. I can’t lose my meal ticket now,” she said and he rolled his eyes, looking over and spotting Osha standing next to the massive painting and he stopped, taking her in.

She was wearing a black suit and white button up shirt and stiffened at his sudden attention. He looked her up and down and turned to face her.

“Hello,” he said, smiling at her and she looked at Mae.

“H-Hi…” she replied and walked right up to her, looking her over.

“Hi,” he said again in a much lower voice and got extremely close to her. She stiffened, looking up at him.

“Qimir, this is Sol, he’s the one who you’re meeting with today,” Mae said, looking annoyed and Sol stood up. “This is my sister, Osha, I’ve told you about her before.”

“I remember…” he said, not taking his eyes off of Osha as he completely ignored everyone else in the room. “How are you doing today?”

“F-Fine,” she said, looking at him, confused. What was his deal? She was used to being generally ignored and pushed aside. Sol was a great mentor, but he always maintained professional distance with her. Yord was the king of following the rules so he was no fun and Jecki was great, but she was not great at getting close with people, making Osha tend to stand off on her own. Her profession also made her more of a wallflower than a conversationalist.

“Qimir,” Mae snapped, grabbing him by the collar and pulling him towards the couch, forcing him to sit down. She shook her head, looking at Osha. “Sorry about him.”

Osha recovered quickly, but Qimir had yet to take his eyes off of her.

“I understand you were hesitant about having a security team around,” Sol said, trying to gain control of the meeting, “And I understand that you want to go about your life normally but-”

“No, it’s fine- I want Osha to take care of me,” Qimir said, finally taking his eyes off of Osha and looking at Sol.

“Excuse me?” Sol asked, surprised.

“Sure- yeah, if she is the one who is my escort, I am more than satisfied,” he said, smiling at her. “Mae trusts you, so I trust you, and I want Osha.”

“Uh- I don’t think-” Osha tried to interject, but Sol reached out a hand to Qimir.

“We are happy to do business with you!” he said a little too hastily. A client like this with this kind of money was going to get them more team members. Sol looked at Osha, smiling at her in reassurance.

Qimir looked at Osha, sitting back on his couch and she felt like this was a big mistake.

______

@flythesail bruh you did this to me, now I can't be stopped

[void-ink-studios]

Traitorous Cockroach

I wrote that idea I had about Orbo!

It was fun, writing from a bastard's perspective. Orbo is simply the worst, unapologetically so. He's a narcissist, and I will not say sorry for writing him as such.

So enjoy Scarab putting him in his place!

Word Count: 4,100

When Orbo got to roll back out into the light for the first time in... what, 5,000 years, he thought he'd finally be allowed a bit of peace.

He thought he'd have his rad office back, he could find someone to get rid of this fucking snake, and he could spend the rest of eternity not thinking of two certain gods ever again.

He gave the Organizer nothing more than what was strictly necessary in terms of a farewell. He listened to the Judge prattle on about how they hoped Orbo had seen the error of his ways or whatever.

It was all worth it for when he'd get his office back.

Until the Organizer handed a piece of paper with a new room assignment.

"Demoted?!"

The Organizer gave no verbal reaction to the Star Core's indignation.

"Hold on, wait, I served my time! I want my office back!"

"Did you expect to be granted your old position back after what you were in trouble for in the first place? Do I need to go over everything you were found guilty of again? What were you honestly expecting?"

Orbo sputtered for a second, feeling himself shrink a moment at her harsh tone.

"Orbo, you stand before the Judge to answer for several egregious violations of Judgement Hall conduct and ethics. Organizer, please read the charges."

Orbo couldn't believe this was happening. Just a few days ago, he was about to get his buddy the Wishmaster back from whatever spell that bug put on him and now... Now he was standing in the Judgement Hall like some kind of criminal?!

"Yes, Judge. Orbo, you stand accused of abuse of Judgement Hall resources, repeated instances of abuse of power over subordinates, failure to respond to reported threats in a timely or appropriate manner, and inappropriate enactment of punishment outside of your authority and jurisdiction."

"Orbo, how do you explain these charges?"

"I... They're not true! None of that is true!"

"Is it, or is it not true you sent a High Auditor on missions meant to be handled by Interns and Low Auditors? These include cases of misattribution of Judgement Hall supplies and misuse of Judgement Hall time."

"W-Well, yes, I sent Scarab on those missions. But he was out of important missions to do!"

"The appropriate course of action would be to let Scarab rest if that were the case. Sending him out on such missions is a waste of his time, your time, the Judgement Hall's time, and is taking learning opportunities from new recruits, which has lead to an overall decrease in productivity in the lower branches of Auditors. Organizer, is this assessment accurate?"

"Yes Judge."

"That is one charge you have lied about. Do you wish to revise your previous statements? If you revise right now, I will not add perjury onto your charge list. Otherwise, we can continue down the list, and I will add a new charge of perjury for every single instance we find. So I will ask again. Orbo, how do you explain these charges?"

Orbo swallowed at the memory of his... interesting trial. He shook his head, looking back up to the Organizer, who seemed to be preoccupied reading something on the desk.

"But-"

"Not to mention your... substandard performance in the Archives. No, I can't grant you your previous position at this time. Perhaps if you show improvement, we can revisit this. But for now, you are being reassigned."

He couldn't believe this.

He was a god. He was older than most of the starry-eyed dolts in the pantheon, he had earned his position!

"Let's see... Hmm, no, you've been out of practice far too long to be an Auditor again... Let's see here... Ah, here's a place for you."

She handed him a piece of paper.

"...Compiler? As in... as in the guys who sort through those endless stacks of paperwork looking for discrepancies?" She couldn't be serious. She couldn't really be diminishing him to... to a paper pusher!

"Yes, a Compiler. You'd have no subordinates to terrorize, and it's one of the only jobs in my jurisdiction that you can't fail at badly enough to cause a crisis."

"But... But that's... That's almost the bottom of the barrel! I have Seniority over everyone in that office!"

"Yes, I'm sure they'll be impressed that such an old guard is joining them. If you don't like it, you can always continue where you left off in the Archives."

The door to the side of her slid open, the dusty smelling ozone seeping into the room.

"N-No! No, that won't be necessary, mate. Compiler it is then..."

She hummed, gesturing for the paper to be returned. Orbo silently obeyed, wincing as she brought the stamp down, and handed it back to him.

"Glad we have reached an agreement. Now then, you're to report to your new office immediately. You're dismissed."

Orbo's eyes widened as the door to her office opened.

"W-Wait!"

The Orgranizer shifted a few tired eyes at him.

"Is something the matter?"

He squirmed a little under her gaze, but took a deep breath.

"Could you do... something about this?"

He gestured to the snake currently sinking its teeth deep into the side of his head. He was thankful he had no blood to spill.

"I'm sorry but curses and the breaking of them are not part of my jurisdiction. You either need to resolve it with the one who cursed you, or take it through the official channels and file a request for the Judge."

"The Judge?!" The snake snarled, biting a bit harder, making him wince. "The Judge has a waiting list lightyears long!"

"Well then. Better file one as soon as your first break starts. You might want to get going."

And so, Orbo did.

He languished in the Compiler's office. It was as dreadfully boring as he imagined. Paperwork stacks a mile tall, replaced with a new one just as he nearly finished.

He wondered if his punishment ever actually ended.

And don't get him started on his... coworkers. Nothing special, most of them not even truly immortal. Many of them were just long-lived species on the intergalactic stage. Most of them didn't even have magic, not even innately. And none of them had a remotely interesting thought to share.

Several tried to chat, but none were even remotely cool enough to dignify with a response. Eventually, they got the hint and stopped trying.

One of them even had the audacity to try and pet the snake latched onto him. Called it cute.

Until one of them, finally, said something worth his attention.

"Guys! Guys you'll never guess what just happened!"

Orbo rolled his eyes as he continued working through his newest stack. The one currently disrupting the quiet was an odd little thing, an octopus looking creature, piloting some kind of robotic skeleton.

"What happened this time, did you finally catch your lunch thief?"

Nope, because that would be Orbo.

"No, that's still a bust. No, I saw Scarab! He was here, and he even said hi to me!"

Now they had his attention. He turned to look more at the excited alien. Wait... excited? About Scarab?

"No way! And you didn't tell us the Star Auditor was here? Glorm, I will tie your tentacles in a knot, I swear to Glob-"

"I didn't know! I literally just got back from delivering something to one of the managers, and he was just... There! Just leaving the Organizer's office!"

"And you're sure he said hi to you?"

"Yes! He asked where I was coming from and said to keep up the good work!"

No, this couldn't be right. This was the same Scarab, yes? The traitorous little cockroach, there was no way he was being spoken of with... awe, right? He must be mishearing the emotions in their voice.

"Sorry you had to experience that, mate" he decided to butt in.

The office went weirdly quiet. They were looking at him now, but with dumb confusion.

"Sorry? Why are you sorry?"

"If this is the same Scarab I remember, I can't imagine seeing him being pleasant. Not a cool bone in his body." Orbo shivered just thinking about it.

"Wait... You knew Scarab from back in the day? Back when he was the God Auditor?"

"Knew him? I was his boss."

"Is it true? Is it true that he was hand-picked by the Boss for defeating a Comic threat as a mortal?"

Orbo scoffed. "He got lucky. Wouldn't have been able to without that crystal he swiped from the Judgement Hall. Look, just take my word for it, you don't wanna be on his radar. Best to avoid him in my opinion."

With that, he turned back to his desk, satisfied.

"...Where have you been for the past, I don't know, eons?"

And he stopped again.

"Excuse me?"

"I mean... Scarab's awesome! He saved his home world, like, single handedly! As a mortal!"

"Like I said, he got lucky." How did these knuckleheads not get it yet?

"He was the most effective Auditor of all time! He's the Organizer's go-to!"

"Her personal enforcer if I remember correctly!"

"Wait, what?" When did that happen?

"He's captured almost every cosmic criminal sitting in the Neo Citadel!"

"He's an inspiration! He was mortal, and he managed to do all that! Gives me hope maybe I could do something amazing like that."

"Yeah, maybe when you finally remember which stamp goes on which form, we'll talk."

They all laughed with each other like they'd said something actually witty but... Orbo was just... stumped. How is Scarab this... well liked? What happened in the time he was gone? He thought he had everyone being on the same page as him.

There was nothing admirable about a cockroach.

Looks like this place really has gone mad.

He shoved it out of his mind for now, more focused on trying to get his office back than worry about what that skittering little creature was up to.

Until he heard about it again.

"I think Scarab's going to be hosting a seminar soon, right? Yeah, for the new Interns. Maybe they'd let some of us hang out in the back?"

And again.

"You hear Scarab took down the Star Leech? Can't imagine what that battle must've looked like. Wonder what he'll go after next."

And again.

"I saw Scarab out by the gardens a bit ago. I wanted to talk to him, but I think he was meditating or something. Looked peaceful, I might try it."

Okay, what was happening?

Back when he was in charge, Orbo practically had to pull teeth to get Scarab in the Judgement Hall. Now it seemed he was here every other minute. And people didn't seem to have a problem with it. How? How did no one see the issue here?

Something was off. Something had changed. But what?

A particularly hard bite to his back prompted a potential answer.

Prismo.

Prismo had to have done something, there's no other reason Scarab had such free reign.

He was still baffled by the Wishmaster's behavior. How could someone so... so cool fall for such a repulsive little worm? He acted like... like he loved him or something.

He gagged at the thought.

Prismo had to be swaying the pantheon, that was the only explanation.

If Orbo had known that the mercy he granted the bug would blow up this badly, he'd have just chucked him in the furnace and been done with it.

Why hadn't he? He'd finally gotten what he wanted for eons, and he just... Why did Prismo stick out for him? It still made no sense.

At first, he'd been amused. Sure, let the Wishmaster "mentor" Scarab for a bit. Prismo had an annoying habit of trying to see the best in everyone. But, spend a long enough time with Scarab, and that'd be his last ally gone. He waited for the day he got contacted by Prismo telling him he changed his mind, he wanted this gross bug out of the Time Room, and Orbo would be the hero.

Except... the call never came.

A day past.

Then a week.

Then a few months.

Nothing.

A part of Orbo worried Scarab might've finally killed the Wishmaster, but that would've been instant news. No, Prismo was probably okay...

Maybe he was just too nice a guy to say anything? Afterall, he knew first hand how awful Scarab was to deal with at the best of times, much less when stuck with the one entity he hates the most.

He really should apologize to Prismo for that one.

And yet, when he showed up, Prismo didn't take the out! Despite him witnessing Scarab's creepy behavior, he was on the ceiling for Glob's sake, but Prismo seemed none to care! He got angry at him! Him! Scarab must've been saying something. Something to turn their beloved Wishmaster against them.

How else would you explain that terrifying shadow he turned into?

Orbo was getting tired of hearing about Scarab. He even saw him, once, out in the hall. Didn't even acknowledge him.

How dare he.

"GUYS!"

His manager (ugh) barged into the office, clearly excited about something. Everyone jumped as he banged the door open, a piece of paper clutched in his hand.

"What what what?"

"Guess who just got invited to a party at the Time Cube?!"

"No way!"

"What?! Jealous!"

"Aw man, lucky!"

Orbo sat there. Baffled. Prismo's hosting... parties again? And he wasn't invited???

Wait, since when was Prismo's parties invitation based?

"I know, right? I guess I really made an impression on Scarab! He got me invited! I can't believe I get to party with both Wishmasters! Somebody pinch me! I'll put in a good word for you guys, maybe I can get Scarab to come in one day!"

Wait wait wait wait wait.

"Did you just say... BOTH Wishmasters? I thought Prismo was the only one?"

Now they looked at him like he has three heads.

"Wow, you really missed a lot, Orbo. Yeah, Scarab's a Wishmaster, part of the time. After a string of big cases, the Boss gives him some time to be Wishmaster alongside Prismo. Sounds like a lot of work to me, but it seems to work for the both of them."

"Oh, it works alright. They get to smooch all they want."

"Carsinda! We don't gossip like that!"

"Since when? You know it's true, it's not gossip if everybody knows."

Okay, now Orbo's brain was broken.

Prismo and Scarab? Together?

The thought of anyone wanting Scarab like that... to say it made him retch was an understatement.

And here he thought Prismo had decent taste.

Although, from what he's heard about a connection he had to some... mortal, maybe that was an overestimation.

This entire place has gone mad, that's the only explanation. Things have fallen apart without him. People have forgotten exactly what Scarab is. What he always will be.

A dirty little traitorous cockroach.

And dirty little cockroaches don't get to win. They don't get to hang out in the most powerful spot in the multiverse, in the good graces of the most powerful gods in the pantheon. Not when awesome, true gods like him is left to languish in a meaningless office job!

No, they belong in the dirt. Preferably under a boot.

Hmm...

Maybe it was time to pay his old pals a visit. Just to clear the air.

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

It wasn't hard, slipping away from the office. And getting to the Time Room from the Judgement Hall was simple enough.

But... woah. Seems the Time Room's... changed a bit.

He lingered in the doorway, just taking it in, swallowing down winces and yelps from his "buddy's" little interruptions.

There were plants everywhere. Vines, ferns, flowers, even a willow tree. How they were there, he had no idea. He thoughts things couldn't really... live? Not in the Time Room at least. And yet, it looked like a terrarium in here, with strange glowing flowers to boot.

Crystals wrapped in gold filigree cast a soft light, contrasting against the strange clouds swirling at the ceiling. Throw rugs covered a large chunk of the floor, a desk against a wall, and many shelves climbing up and down the previously featureless surfaces of the Time Room. The only wall spared of strange shelves and photos was the TV Wall it would seem.

Well, at least the hot tub was still there, sitting underneath the previously mentioned willow tree. Something familiar.

An elaborate nest of pillows and blankets nearly covered up and comfortable looking seating area, so all encompassing it took up a huge corner of the room.

And it was there that he saw... them.

Prismo, holding Scarab against his chest, sitting on the couch.

Orbo had to blink a few times to process what he was seeing.

Prismo. Was off the wall. He looked strange, not just because he wasn't just a shadow anymore. His legs looked different, he appeared to be made out of gas, he had stars orbiting him, it all looked... wrong. That wasn't his Prismo.

Scarab looked pretty much as hideous as he remembered. There wasn't even the decency to wear his mask. Just his horrid face, out for all to see.

The cockroach seemed to be asleep, thankfully, tucked in close to Prismo's side as the Wishmaster browsed the TV Wall. Scarab made those odd chittering noises as he slept, mandibles twitching ever so slightly. Prismo seemed to have taken to idly petting Scarab's head. It was... sugary sweet.

Wait a second... Were those....?

Yep. Antenna. Ghostly blue antenna, but antenna none the less. Prismo curled his finger around one and dragged up, earning himself a content sigh from the bug in his arms.

How in Glob's name did he get his antenna back? He made sure they were gone, he watched them get cut from his scalp, he tossed them into the incinerator himself!

Wait, if his antenna were back did that mean...? No... No, he couldn't have those back...

The longer he stared, the more confused he became. What had happened to this pantheon?

Scarab's antenna twitched. They shivered, perking upright, making the cockroach rouse from his slumber. A nervous chitter fell from his mouth.

"Hmm? Something the matter, Lovebug?"

"...I know you're there" Scarab said, voice flat.

Well, now or never.

Orbo rolled on in, smiling.

"Ya got me. Guess who got out of prison!"

Scarab sat up, his eyes narrowed but expression blank. Prismo frowned.

"What are you doing here, Orbo?"

"What, I can't visit my favorite Wishmaster after 5,000 years? Like what you've done with the place."

Neither entity seemed impressed.

"Get to the point" Prismo growled.

Woah, tough crowd. He yelped a bit as the snake sunk its teeth into the top of his head. He missed Prismo's little smirk.

"Just wanted to confirm some... rumors I heard around the office. Scarab's Wishmaster now?"

"I am. Part time, at least."

"Hmm. So. You finally got all you wanted, Scrabs?"

"You don't have permission to call me that."

Orbo's head throbbed. This little...

"Oh you skittering little-"

The snake on his head seemed to get a bit bigger. A bit heavier, now biting over and over. Prismo had stood up at some point, leering angrily over Orbo.

"I thought I made it clear you aren't welcome in the Time Room, Orbo. I thought that maybe the Archive might've given you time to think or something. Maybe realize what a scum bag you were. But I guess not."

Scarab watched from the sidelines, an even expression on his horrid little face.

"Oh shove off you sham of a Wishmaster! You and I both know that he wouldn't have none of this if it weren't for you! He's a leech. And you're just letting him cling to your belly."

"That's it, get out-"

Prismo stopped as a hand tapped his shoulder. Scarab had stood up and walked to stand beside the Wishmaster.

"Lovebug?"

Scarab took a deep breath.

"Let me handle this, Prismo."

The dream's eyes widened, looking between Scarab and Orbo concerned.

"Are you sure...?"

"Completely. It's clear he has something to say to me. I say let him say his piece. And I'll say mine. And then I kick him out."

The two shared a look with each other, a silent conversation bouncing back and forth between them. Prismo nodded, taking a step back to observe.

Scarab turned back to Orbo.

"You've got something you want to say to me, Orbo? Now's the time. Go ahead. Nothing will leave this room. You've never held back before."

Orbo blinked. Scara had never looked this... calm before. He saw the traces of wish magic thrumming across his shell.

"You're nothing. You know that, right Scrabs? You're just a dirty little cockroach. This life ain't meant for the likes of you."

"Oh come now. Is that the best you've got?"

Rage boiled into Orbo's heart.

"You know what I said was right. This? All this? It's all Prismo. You'd be nothing without him. I'd have tossed you in the incinerator without a second thought if not for him. Just like I did with your antenna and your wings."

He saw Scarab stiffen a bit, but his expression remained unchanged. Prismo seemed to be boiling, but the cockroach seemed to be keeping him at bay.

"Yeah, there's that little mystery solved for you, mate. I tossed your antenna the second you left. I kept your wings in a drawer for a few centuries. Then I tossed those too. It's what creatures like you are meant for. You're an ugly little novelty. And if it wasn't for him trying to get some, you'd be nothing. You're built on nothing but luck and riding on someone else's coattails. You and I both know it.

"I'd do it all again. I'd just be better at training you to keep your mouth shut."

Scarab was still. Silent.

Yeah, that's right. You know I'm right, you cockroach.

"Are you done?"

Orbo's scowl deepened. He didn't step down, he never would to the likes of Scarab.

"Seems like it. You know... Everything you said probably would've... I'm not sure. Devastated me? If it were a few thousand years ago, I'd have believed everything you said. I still believe some of it. I truly believe you'd have done everything you did to me, again and again. Even after one million years in the Archive, you would still see me as nothing but a skittering little insect at your feet."

Scarab opened his elytra, letting his false wings carry him up into a relaxed hover, above Orbo.

"But... Well, we're not 5,000 years ago. I lived. I carried on. You languished. I know where you're stationed, Orbo. I know all you have is words. Empty words. You can't help but recall what happened all those eons ago, because you can't do anything except revel in the past."

Scarab took a moment to examine his talons before looking back down at the Star Core.

"I know what you are, Orbo."

He lowered himself, leaning his face in close.

"You're empty. You're sad and empty. There's just... nothing but hollow ego inside you."

Scarab raised himself back up, his expression almost softening.

"That's the difference between us, Orbo. You're nothing but ego, so what are you when you sit at the bottom of the hierarchy? I'm not interested in your politics. I'm not interested in your games. I know you only came here to play. But you're the only one at the table, Orbo. You're playing by yourself."

Scarab let himself drift into a relaxed position, even reaching down to pet the snake's head softly.

"I don't forgive you, for what you did to me. But I will thank you. Unfortunately, you have nothing else I want. Perhaps I'll forgive you, in a millennia or two. Honestly, I hope all the best for you. But... above all else..."

Scarab landed on the ground again, hands folded in front of him.

"Above all else, I pity you Orbo. I. Pity. You. Now then, this has been a good chat. Goodbye."

And with a snap, Orbo was gone. Dumped right back in the compiler's office. With nothing but a hollow anger and confusion.

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

Scarab released a shuddering breath. Prismo was by his side in an instant, cooing and kissing the side of his head and neck, nuzzling his cheek.

"You did so good, Lovebug... Glob, I'm so proud of you..."

Scarab nodded. His hands trembled, but he made sure to get a good hold of Prismo's. He turned his head to nuzzle back. He let the Wishmaster drag him back to the couch, wrapping around him in a loving embrace, murmuring sweet nothings.

Scarab thought hard about what just happened. What he said.

That was hard. That was terrifying. But...

He purred into Prismo's sweet touched. He looked all around their little paradise, their home. He was safe here. He was loved here.

Above all, he was free here.

[tabinavi]

Song Titles 12-15-24 I always looked at song titles weirdly. They stare back at me in contest, like when a word repeated too much sounds fake (I mean… titles are words). What are you supposed to be? I don't think people double-think about song titles, or even artists themselves, but to me, what makes you decide to name a song? Maybe naming a song is way to finally write off your piece as finished, but artists can come to a name for a song early, and even release/perform unfinished songs with a name. True Love Waits by Radiohead comes to mind when I think of this. A song that had been through many iterations for decades until it's studio release in 2016. I guess the 2001 live recording isn't "really" True Love Waits. Well, obviously it is, but we have the band's approved version now. And if something is remastered, is the "- Remastered" really a part of the name? Is it a different thing entirely? Well, it's not the same mastering, but still the same songs at its core. There are songs that are completely unpronounceable too. Yes DJ, turn up that IV VV IV VV VII! Oh yes, I love ʕ•̫͡•ʔzZZZ1. Are you crazy, man? Ask for some David Guetta like a normal person. (joking!!!!) Then I get to "Untitled" songs. A whole can of snakes there. What constitutes an untitled song? Is it an unfinished product? Is it a lack of creativity at the moment? An artistic choice? Who knows if Interpol's Turn On the Bright Lights opener was supposed to have another name. Can't go back now! Elliott Smith's Roman Candle is littered with "No Name" songs, but it was a released, official album. Jai Paul's bootleg'd tape of course had unnamed tracks when it was pirated, but when it came to the official release, they got new names, but it was the same songs back in 2013. Aphex Twin's SAWII had untitled songs, but fans have given them fan-names that became synonymous with the work. Do we still work with #19, or is "Stone in Focus" easier for us? Are some titles just a battle for us to figure out forever? I think of humans striving to label things how they see fit to comprehend things better. Things like culture, time periods, plants and animals, and the sorts. Music is no different. We have genres, record labels, and obviously song names. Someone can easily attribute "Espresso" to Sabrina Carpenter, but "Untitled"? Who are we talking here; The Cure, D'Angelo, some Snoop Dogg skits? The people can recognize songs better with "proper" titles, but we shouldn't be chained to names. Autechre and Aphex Twin have personality in their titles. "Song 2" is kind of a untitled track, but Blur decided on it, and it's uber-popular. There is still artistry to be found in unconventional names, and you too should think hard about them like me.