#old piece. had to update it. will probably have to update again after the finale lmao

[amiracleilluminated]

How It Started / How It’s Going (updated)

[honnelander]

OK SO I HAVE THIS IDEA IN MY HEAD AND I HAVE TO TELL YOU, I can't stop laughing imagining that scenario xdxdxdxdxd

Well, then imagine go fish! Sanji takes (Y/N) to meet Zeff and Zeff being the good father he is, "accidentally" spoils the tea in front of everyone because he is so done with the drama around.  😂 😂 😂 😂

UMMM OK I LOVE THISSS!! this technically won't be go fish!Sanji BUT my interpretation of Sanji will pretty much always be like that.

here's Zeff "accidentally" spilling the beans about Sanji's affections for reader: (i can't believe this blew up to like 3k words rip)

masterlist

Zeff wasn't stupid.

He's been around the block a couple of times in his life and when Sanji's semi-regular letters to him had shifted from casual life updates and started to be more and more about details and little interactions he had with you, some girl Zeff had never met before, well, it was easy for the head chef to put two and two together: Sanji was in love.

And he was in love with you.

Now, while Sanji might not technically be his son by birthright, there was no way he didn't consider Sanji to be his own living and breathing kin, especially after everything they've been through together, 'pedigree' rules be damned.

Zeff truly loved that boy. Throughout their time together, he had raised Sanji from being a snotty-nosed brat into the respectable man that he was today and, in Zeff's mind, part of being a respectable man included knowing how to treat a woman properly.

Ever since he was a young boy, Zeff could see that Sanji took a special liking towards girls and then young women. The retired captain had lost count of the number of times he had to berate Sanji into getting back to work and to leave the wooing for after dinner service and his own personal time, but the scoldings never stuck. Sanji would always be Sanji, and that meant the lad had an endless wandering eye and a sharp silver tongue, no matter what.

To say that Zeff was sad to see Sanji go with Luffy that day was an understatement, he was devastated, but he knew, ever since he had held a knife to his throat during their first encounter, that Sanji was meant for bigger things. For things bigger than cooking up the same old dinner specials every night and breaking up drunk pirate fights on the regular. Sanji was bigger than the Baratie, so when Luffy had made his infamous offer to his pseudo-son, a part of Zeff was relieved because that meant that Sanji could finally start living the life he was always meant to live, and that was one of a pirate.

Zeff had also made peace with the very real fact that he might never see or hear from Sanji again. He (and Sanji) knew all too well how quickly something could go from bad to worse to life-threatening in an instant out on the open ocean, and if Luffy was truly determined to find the one piece and have Sanji join his crew, then Zeff knew that seeing him off that day was probably the last time he would ever see his son alive.

So, imagine his surprise when he received his first letter from him.

At first, he thought it was a joke, that one of the line cooks in the kitchen was pulling a cruel prank on him by writing him a fake letter in Sanji's unmistakable handwriting, but when he finally ripped open the envelope and found out that yes, Sanji did, in fact, write him a letter, well... it had actually brought a tear to his eye.

From that point forward, Zeff found himself eagerly awaiting Sanji's letters. He loved to hear all about the outlandish adventures that crew seemed to always find themselves in and it made Zeff nostalgic for his days at sea. There was never any return address, since the crew was constantly on the move, and Zeff expected as such, so he could never send a reply but that didn't mean he wasn't grateful for each and every letter he received.

Zeff should've realized that something was up though when Sanji had first mentioned you in one of his letters. Sanji's letters would come every couple of months and they, surprisingly, never mentioned any young lass or any other pretty girl he would meet during an island visit unless it was a woman they had ended up fighting.

So, when Sanji had first mentioned you to him, saying how you were the newest straw hat to join the crew, Zeff had thought it was just business as usual. However, what wasn't 'just business as usual' was when the rest of the letter had turned into a little biography about you; where you were from, how old you were, what your home life was like, that you had also agreed that 'oregano was for savages', etc., and the letter ended up being nearly ten pages long.

Then, after your 'introduction' in Sanji's letters to him, you were practically the subject of them all going forward, each one getting longer than the last. Gone were the letters detailing Sanji's adventures, and in came the letters describing the interactions you two had or what topics had come up in your conversations with each other.

At first, Zeff thought it was just another one of Sanji's infatuations (the boy was a huge flirt after all) but when more and more details were provided, and the letters started becoming longer, it was obvious to Zeff that Sanji was in love with you.

And why didn't Sanji just admit his feelings to you? He had no clue. Maybe it was partially his fault too, since Zeff never remembered having that 'what to do when you truly love a girl' talk with him, but he had hoped that Sanji would eventually be fed up with all the back and forth between the both of you and finally just confess already, but that declaration of "I confessed my love to her and she reciprocated" line never was brought up in any of the letters.

And Zeff was feeling himself go crazy the longer this went on. The 'drama' that was occurring between you both was driving him nuts and he vowed that if he ever saw Sanji and the rest of the straw hat crew at the Baratie again, that he would confess Sanji's feelings towards you for him. I mean... someone had to.

Then one day his lucky day came.

"Zeff!" a voice called out from the top of the stairs one afternoon before the day's first dinner service, a voice that Zeff thought he would never hear again. "There you are, you old shitbag!"

Immediately, Zeff stopped talking to the wait staff, turning his body to look up at where he heard the voice come from, his hands on his hips, and he couldn't believe what he was seeing: there was Sanji, a huge smile on his face, standing with practically the same crew that he had waved goodbye to nearly two years ago.

"Oi! Sanji!" Zeff yelled out, his own disbelieving smile lighting up his face. "I never thought I'd see your ugly mug around here again."

Sanji laughed at that as he quickly bounded down the stairs, enveloping him in a bear hug. "That makes two of us!" He pulled back, his blue eyes lighting up in pure happiness as he quickly took Zeff in, patting him on the shoulder as he said, "And look at you, you practically look exactly the same as the day I left you."

As Zeff took in Sanji's appearance, he realized that he couldn't say the same about him. Sanji looked older, not in a bad way, but in a more mature way. He looked like he was growing into the man that he was always meant to be.

And Zeff couldn't have been more proud.

"Well, I can't say the same about you little eggplant. You look like a seasoned pirate to me." Both of them dropped their arms off of each other and Zeff put his hands back on his hips. "You keepin' your feet dry?"

Sanji mirrored his pose, a small laugh escaping his lips as he looked down for a second. "Yeah," he said and looked back up at Zeff, a knowing glint in his blue eyes. "Yeah, I am."

Zeff knew right then that everything with his son was alright. "Good."

"Hey, uh, I wanted to introduce you to someone," Sanji started, looking slightly bashful as he looked back down at the floor and put his hands in his pockets. "She's the-"

"Girl from the letters?" Zeff said with a small knowing smile, finding it endearing how his normally smooth-talking son was suddenly acting about this girl. If he didn't know any better, Sanji looked nervous (and Zeff knew he was).

At his words, Sanji's gaze immediately snapped up to meet Zeff's, his eyes becoming slightly wider, a hint of panic within them, as he quickly looked back towards the rest of his crew that had just started to make their way down the stairs and towards them.

"The newest member of our crew," Sanji emphasized loudly, letting out a fake laugh as he looked back at Zeff pointedly.

"Right," Zeff relented with a small disbelieving laugh of his own. "'Newest crewmember'. Got it."

And when Zeff turned his attention towards the straw hats, he immediately knew it was you before you even introduced yourself. Sure, you were the only new face in the small group of familiar faces, but he had to give credit to Sanji, he had definitely captured your looks and essence in his letters.

Zeff's smile widened. You were cute. From just by looking at you, he could tell you were a sweet and kind soul, it was no wonder Sanji loved you. You definitely looked like the type of person who would do all those things that Sanji had spoken about in his letters and he immediately approved of you. If Sanji had stood there and introduced you as his wife instead of 'his newest crewmember', he wouldn't have had any objections to that at all.

"Zeff, this is y/n," Sanji started, gesturing a hand out to you, Zeff noticing the way his son's eyes softened just by looking at you. "And, uh, you already know everyone else."

Zeff looked away from Sanji and down at you, seeing that you already had your hand out to shake his, a nervous smile plastered on your face.

He liked you.

"It's a pleasure to finally meet you, Zeff, sir," you said, shaking his hand. "I've heard so much about you."

Now, even though Sanji had corrected him before about you, it didn't mean Zeff wasn't going to say anything.

"Aw, come on now, the pleasure is all mine little lass," Zeff replied, shaking your smaller hand with his bigger one. "It's nice to finally meet the girl that Sanji raves on about all the time."

From his peripheral, he could see Sanji stiffen.

Your eyes widened, your hand going limp in his as you asked, "Raves on about? Who, me? T-to you?"

Zeff's smile only grew wider and more cheeky. "Oh yeah, all the time," he said casually, as you both dropped hands. He placed his hands on his hips again and nodded towards his son. "You should see just how much of his letters are about you. It's like I get a damn novel every other month about your relationship," he joked.

"Zeff-" Sanji started but Zeff wasn't done.

He was on a roll and nothing was going to stop him. The more he spoke, however, the redder your face became.

"Oh yeah," the head chef continued, "from as much as Sanji talks about the two of you, I thought you two were in a relationship and said 'I love you' to each other already."

After he said that, the room got quiet. You stood there, completely frozen with wide eyes and a flushed face, like a deer in headlights, while Sanji stood as still as a statue. The rest of the straw hats stood quietly behind you three with varying looks of shock and awe on their faces at the display before them.

"Sanji," Luffy said, breaking the awkward silence first. "You love y/n?"

"Luffy!" Nami hissed.

"I knew it!" Usopp loudly and proudly declared, pointing a finger to the sky as he turned and laughed at the rest of the crew. "See, the great captain Usopp always knows the sparks of true love whenever he sees it," he said, hooking his thumbs at the top of his overalls with a grin.

Zoro snorted and rolled his eyes. "Yeah, right. You wouldn't know what true love looked like even if it smacked you in the face."

"Says the guy who doesn't have a girlfriend," Usopp smugly retorted with a laugh.

Before Zoro could say anything back, Zeff spoke up. "Hey, straw hats," he called, grabbing their attention. "Why don't you lot come into the kitchen and sit at the chef's table? I'll have Patty and the rest of 'em cook you a couple of steaks however you want, on the house. I'll even throw in a couple of beers too."

"I'm in," Zoro said without missing a beat as he started making his way towards the kitchen, not needing to be asked twice.

"Ooo, free beers? Show captain Usopp the way, please," Usopp said, following Zoro through the kitchen doors.

At the mention of meat, Luffy immediately perked up and forgot about the situation before him. "Steaks? Would it be possible to have more than one?"

"Sure," Zeff agreed easily and nodded towards the kitchen. "Eat too many though and I'll have you back on dish duty again to pay your bill."

"Deal," Luffy quickly agreed and followed after his first mate and sharpshooter.

With a shared look, Nami and Zeff started making their way towards the kitchen together, both ignoring you and Sanji.

"How do you like your steak cooked Nami?" Zeff asked conversationally before disappearing behind the kitchen's double doors.

"Medium rare, actually," Nami replied and slipped in after him, leaving you and Sanji all alone in the dining room.

It was quiet for a solid minute, neither one of you moving or making a sound.

"So," you started, clearing your throat and looking over at Sanji. "You, uh... told Zeff about me?"

But Sanji couldn't look at you. In fact, he was looking at everywhere but you. His cheeks were flushed pink and the tips of his ears were red. He looked down at the ground with his hands on his hips.

"Yeah," he said, forcing out a slight laugh that sounded more painful than anything. "I, uh, told him a bit about you. Could you tell?" he asked, a hint of painful and playful sarcasm in his tone.

You couldn't help but laugh at his attempt at a joke. You could feel your heart start to race as you slowly took a couple of steps closer to him. "Yeah, I could tell," you replied playfully. "You really love me, Sanji?" you asked him softly after a beat.

Turning his head to the side, you could see a blush crawl up his neck. It was so cute, you don't think you've ever seen Sanji be this flustered or embarrassed before. "Uh, well," he stammered, "I-I didn't want you to find out like this. I had a plan and everything. But Zeff and his big mouth had to ruin-"

"Sanji," you said simply, cutting him off. "Look at me."

Before obeying your command, Sanji took a deep breath, like he was bracing himself for the inevitable letdown and rejection he was used to receiving from women throughout his life.

When he looked down at you and met your stare, his eyes were filled with apprehension. "Yes?"

You wanted to do nothing in that moment but quelch his fears. "Oh, just come here," you said.

In one swift motion, you grabbed him by his tie and pulled him down into a kiss, capturing his lips with your own. You felt him stiffen in surprise, but once it hit him that you were, indeed, kissing him, he immediately relaxed and put his hands on either side of your face, his fingers entangling themselves into your hair, deepening the kiss. You wrapped your arms around his neck, your mouth moving in sync as you felt butterflies erupt in your stomach.

Was this real life?

After a moment, you pulled apart, panting slightly for air. You both looked at each other, faces flushed, neither one of you expecting to share your first kiss in the middle of the empty Baratie dining room.

"I love you too."

The smile that broke out across Sanji's face was brighter than the sun. But before he could say anything, you both could hear Usopp yelling from inside the kitchen.

"Guys! They kissed! See, I told you they would!" He declared loudly before turning away from the small circular window. "Zoro and Nami, you each owe twenty berry! Come on, pay up!" he laughed like a high roller that just won big, making his way back into the kitchen.

At the sound of loud protesting and groaning coming from the kitchen, you giggled, hiding your face in his chest from embarrassment.

"Oh god," you groaned.

"Aw come now, no need to be embarrassed, Madam," Sanji teased. "If they're placing bets on us, might as well give them a show to bet on, yeah?"

When you peeked up at him, you could see a mischievous glint in his eye as he scanned over your pretty face and back down to your lips before looking back into your eyes. His look made your heart skip a beat.

"Sounds like a plan to me," you answered with a small laugh before you pulled him back down to kiss him all over again.

taglist: @smolracoon25 @shadydeanmuffin @cherrypie5 @sauceonmyshorts @hhighkey @gimmebackmyskeeball @he4vens-ang3l @selcouthaesthetics @chexmixtrys @princettecharlie @amitydoodlez @abracarabbit @the-maladaptive-daydreamers @mischiefmanaged71 @asianfrustration13 @shuujin @nimtano @your-platonic-gay-lover @lovelymrvl @browneyedhufflepuff @stevenknightmarc @deserticwren

[cringefail-clown]

I'm so fucking invested in your turnabout au I'm going to explode please just like ramble if you up to it

hoo boy lets do it

so atm my favourite part of the au to think about is post scratch bro and his relationship with hal, post scratch roxy and what dave would think about him. like for example i don't think he'd be this big superstar like post scratch dave was in canon, his work against the condence would be much more subtle. i imagine him working much more closely with roxy and grandpa jake - its not clear in canon how much dave, rose and jade collaborated together, they for sure were in contact, but its honestly up to interpretation. those three in the au would probably work very closely together, maybe roxy and dirk could help jake with building up skaianet - dirk as an engineer and rox as a programmer. they'd also have their own gigs on the side, roxy would sure as hell hijack crocercorp with malware every chance she got, and dirk would have some obscure websites that'd spread propaganda against condence under the veil of weird puppet stuff and insane chatbots. he'd probably write some kind of this universes detective pony parody book and get it published and it'd become one of the most recognisable pieces of literature documenting the takeover of the troll empire and the rebellion against it

(some quick designs of hal and bro i pulled outta my ass)

honestly he'd probably become some sort of vigilante batman-esque figure in this universe?? he'd show up unexpected, blow some crockercorp warehouses and disappear into the night. and after hal joins him when he builds him a body the media would paint them as some sort of twin antiheroes lmfao

oh man and hal. it'd go simialrly as it was in canon, dirk would fuck around and copy his brain at a young age and they'd HATE each other at first. like dirk would feel responsible for creating hal, and hal would resent the shit outta him - like how dare he be the one who gets to keep the body and hal must be stuck in a pair of glasses, trapped with no means of escaping? but they'd start working together when they find out about dave and the future to ensure their lil bro has the best chances of survival, and in time they'd bond over it and their shared work against condy. they'd come up with a plan so that hal goes into sleep mode until the arrival of the meteor (bc no way in hell dirk would make hal go through hundreds of years of lonely existance, watching as humanity slowly ceases to exist and unable to do anything about it, he'd go nuts).

and the day finally comes when dirk would have to go face the batterwitch so he'd put hal in the apartment and they would tell each other one last goodbye and dirk would put hal in the sleep mode. and hal would wake up like only seconds passed, not years upon years, only the vast ocean streching as far as his eyes could see behind the dirty, dusty windows, and he'd know his one brother is long dead, gone while facing the enemy he was destined to lose against but had to do it anyway, and the other one moments from crashing into the waters below on a meteor sent by some insane video game that creates new universes. he'd sit there for a while, reality slowly sinking in, and he'd probably desperatly wish like he hasn't in years, to be human again and to mourn his losses the human way, because as advanced as his robotic body was he haven't thought about updating it with some goddamn tearducks.

on a lighter note, imagine dirk crunching numbers for three days straight to figure out how much food he'd have to stock in the apartment to make sure dave doesn't grow up malnourished, desperately googling "how much calories does an *insert age* year old need". he'd be banned from every supermarket in at least two states. he would walk into the store and employees would start weeping at the sight of him. i think about it a lot

[covetyou]

jester little bit more

ao3 ⋆ main masterlist ⋆ series masterlist

pairing: Dieter Bravo x fat contortionist f!reader rating: Explicit (18+ only!) warnings: clowns, vaginal fisting, protected PIV, inappropriate use of grease paint, drug reference, slightly subby Dieter, the hand tattoo, reader is referred to as Sparkles and has a briefly mentioned latex allergy. word count: 4.4k summary: Dieter drives you to distraction all day, so you go to give him what for, only to get more than you bargained for in return.

A/N: A gift to my beloved @sp00kymulderr - a simple mention of it a month ago (to the day!) is quite literally all it took to convince me to write a clown fist-it-fic, you are my muse, my inspiration. happy holidays bb

not clowny in an intentionally scary/horror way, but if you really hate clowns probably do not read. this is a different reader, same clown!Dieter to send in the clown.

follow @covetedfics and turn notifications on for updates on future work

ooh ahh, jester little bit, ooh ahh jester little bit more...

You notice it through your whole act - the burning hot stare of Bravo the Clown as you twist and turn your body into shapes for the awed masses. You never felt more beautiful, more alive, than when you were contorting yourself like this, soft rolls bunching at your sides, rippling fabric and making your sequinned costumes glitter under bright lights with each undulation.

It's when you see him start to adjust his red clown pants that you have to calm yourself, stop yourself from unrolling from your position, stomping over to him, knocking that stupid wig off his head and slamming him into the ground. You don't want to kick up a fuss, not in front of a crowd, and you just know the bastard would like it anyway. He usually did.

Closing your eyes and taking a deep breath, you move through the motions of your set. Contorting this way and that, bending a leg here, twisting there, until you're taking a bow and hurrying backstage to give that fucking clown a piece of your mind.

But Bravo the Clown is nowhere to be found.

Probably in that filthy fucking trailer of his already. He never did like sticking around for the finale, always taking off his own performances, sometimes forgetting he even had two and leaving straight after the first was finished. So, you wait it out, standing with your arms crossed, ignoring anyone's attempts to communicate with you. By now they know the score - once Bravo the Clown had pissed you off, there was only one thing that would solve it.

You rush through the final bows of the night, plastering a sickly sweet smile onto your face before all but running back to the dressing room. No one bothers you, letting you tug off your costume in peace, the tight lycra slinking from your body and landing in a heap on the floor. Throwing on your shorts and a sweater, you stomp from the tent - your make up can wait, you're going to go talk to that asshole before he gets too high to function.

Approaching his worn trailer, you slam the flat of your palm against the old door. "Bravo! Hey! Asshole! Open up." The light is on and you can hear movement but you slam again anyway, imagining his face right beneath your palm as you smack it against the door.

The door wiggles, bowing a little where it gets caught on the latch, before flying open to reveal Bravo the Clown, who almost comes flying with it.

"What do you want, Sparkles," he grumbles from around an unlit joint. You snatch it from his mouth just as he's about to light it, and watch was he feebly reaches for it with a pathetic grabby hands and a scowl on his face.

"Who the fuck do you think you are, Bravo?" you say, pointing your finger into his chest, pushing him back into his trailer and following him in. "Do you know how distracting it is, you practically getting yourself off in public like that? I'd be just as much to blame as you if you were caught, and you are not ruining this for me."

You slam the joint down onto his vanity, the discarded grease paints rattling with the force of it.

He looks so sad and pathetic like this, though maybe it's his choice in make up. He usually opted for a classic, simple clown face, but lately he'd been mixing it up. Today he has sad eyebrows drawn above his own, making him look more like a sad puppy than a man.

"You took the outfit off," he mumbles, huffing out a sigh of disappointment.

"Yes, Bravo, I took my work outfit off, now that I have finished working. You can take yours off too y'know, you don't have to live in this shit." You gesture to his obscene get up, the red pants still strapped up and his striped shirt still buttoned to the top, collar securely in place. The only thing he was missing was his wig, which was thrown onto its shelf with the others.

He smirks at you, a ridiculous gesture beneath all the make up, and starts to unbutton his shirt.

"That is not what I meant, and you know it."

"Whaddaya mean?" he says, rubbing his hands down the front of his shirt to get to the last button.

You roll your eyes at him. You weren't in the mood for this, you tell yourself. Not for him, not for any of it. "Quit clowning around, Bravo. Just tell me you won't do it again. I can't risk this job."

"No can do, Sparkles. Y'know, your ass looks huge when you bend backward like that. Can't help what you do to me." He's adjusting his pants again, just as he was back in the big top, only this time you can see the tent in them easily through the thin fabric.

"You can help it, and you will help it," you say in a low tone, walking toward him to jab your finger into his chest once again. "Or so help me, I'll have your ass kicked out of here."

"Hey," he says raising his hands in surrender. "Can't help that I know what you look like all bent up like that under that tight costume. Bet the crowd would like it just as much as I would if you didn't wear it at all."

And there it was. You fuck a clown one time - okay fine two times...three times, it was only three times - and now he won't let you live it down, constantly chasing you whenever he couldn't get his dick wet by other means.

"I know you like to pretend you don't want a piece of Bravo the Clown, Sparkles, but we both know that ain't true. Who came to who first? I know I wasn't the one desperate to get my pussy pounded. And last time? You were wet before you even got here, you were practically humping my leg before I even got anything off you. Even now, don't think I don't know how this is going to end. You're not mad that I find you sexy, baby, you're mad that I turned you on in the middle of your set."

You're going to actually fucking kill him. It doesn't matter that he was right, it was the principle. You snarl at him, ready to snap, when he's pointing between the two of you, a question on his face.

"Are we gonna hate fuck?"

"You are unbelievable."

He's pulling his shirt off and sliding his suspenders over his shoulders already. With his discarded shirt, he swipes the sad expression from his face, exposing his golden skin. He definitely knows where this is going. "You didn't say no."

"We're not fucking, Bravo," you say, crossing your arms. If this is how he wanted to play it, you were going to play right back. "You owe me. Big time."

His eyes light up, this could be the best day ever for him for all you know. "Oh, hell yeah I do. I've been bad, let me make it up to you. Please?" He's on his knees hands clasped together, pleading, before he even finishes.

You roll your eyes at him again, biting the inside of your cheek. He knew you liked him pathetic, but this was new entirely, and you couldn't hide how much you were enjoying it, even if you were still angry. You nod down at him, giving him silent consent to do what you suspect he's been waiting to do all day.

Bravo the Clown, never one to disappoint a captive audience, dives right in. Head first. Straight for your crotch. He pulls your shorts to the side, exposing your pussy to him and starts licking at you with abandon, digging his tongue as far between your legs as he can, eager to taste you. You have to hold on to his hair, still sweaty from his wig, to stop yourself from falling over.

It had been a long time, you consider. At least a few weeks. It was the least you could do, and he did owe you. And if you ended up having sex, what did it matter, it would be because it was what you wanted and he owed you.

You spread your legs wider, and Bravo moans into your cunt, nodding along as you hear him mumble thank you straight into your pussy. That does something to you then, and you throw your head back with a moan of your own just as he sticks a finger straight into your slick hole.

Your legs can barely take it, already strained and exhausted from your set, and now desperately trying to hold yourself up as a clown eats you out on his knees. He sense it, sees how your legs start to quiver before you're even close, and within seconds he's pulling you to the messy floor of his trailer. He pushes you down onto your back, and you let your body go limp as he dives back into your pussy mouth first, tasting every inch of you. It's sweaty business, being a circus performer, but Bravo the Clown didn't seem to mind. Quite the contrary, he seemed to love it, the hotter and stickier you were the better.

Pent up aggression had already seemed to do half the job for him it seemed, and when he curls another finger into your core you're shaking again for a wholly different reason.

"Fuck, so close. Keep going."

Between your legs, Bravo the Clown groans loudly. The sound is muffled, but that doesn't stop it from rumbling straight through you as his tongue swipes rapidly over your swollen clit. You grab his hair, your belly bunching and curling on one side as you reach for him. His hair is a mess, and your fingers tugging at the strands do nothing to help, but seeing him such a mess, framed between the thickness of your thighs makes you tug his face into you harder, bucking into his face as you go.

His free hand comes up to hold you, tattoo'd forearm pinning you down whilst his fingers grip your belly, creating soft little divots in your flesh with the pressure. You grab his wrist, fisting a fluffy robe discard on the floor in your other hand, anything to anchor you down as you get closer and closer to release.

It's the third finger that does it, slipping into you so easily where he'd worked you open with two, dragging his fingers from side to side to pull your walls apart, pushing down when inside you to make you feel fuller than you were. You're coming with your head thrown back and eyes squeezed tight, fingers clawing at his hair as his tongue continues its dance over your throbbing clit. Your hips go from chasing his mouth, pushing into his tongue, to desperately trying to be free from the overstimulation.

When he pulls back, his whole face is wet - forehead with a sheen of sweat from his efforts, and his lower face glistening with saliva and the wetness of your own cunt. The remnants of white paint caught in the creases around his nose are gone, likely smeared into your own skin and the matching halo of white around his face is further smudged into his hairline, looking like a mad professor streaked with gray where you'd dragged your fingers through his hair.

If you weren't still so annoyed with him you'd be licking it all off, tasting yourself mixed with the sweat on his face, paint be damned.

"Fuck, you look so good when you come, Sparkles."

He looks drunk, or high, or a combination of the two. You laugh at how ridiculous it is. A clown drunk off your pussy, fingers still slowly working away inside of you, your flimsy shorts still yanked to the side.

"Consider yourself lucky, Bravo," is all you say as you let your body flop back onto his floor. He shuffles forward a second later. Probably adjusting his dick for the millionth time tonight, you think.

When you finally open your eyes again, he's sat on his ass, his fingers inside you feeling more like a massage than anything else. You could, should, tell him to stop, but you're too boneless and relaxed to care. He catches you looking, and not a moment later a sly smile is pulling at his cheeks.

"You're so bendy," he says, wiggling his fingers in you. "And stretchy," he splays his three fingers wide.

"Bet you're stretchy everywhere," he says, waggling his eyebrows - his actual eyebrows visible for once now that he's swiped off all the paint.

"Bravo," you say as a warning. You knew what he was getting at. You'd made the mistake of making that little confession whilst high with him one night. It intrigued you, sure, and you'd be lying if you said you hadn't tried to fit your own hand in yourself just to see, of course. But you couldn't quite reach, the angle wasn't quite right, and as flexible as you were, more than four fingers by your own hand seemed too awkward to fit. When he offered you a hand that night, you'd both descended into giggles and you thought it was all forgotten. Well, obviously not.

"Please," he begs, eyes softening behind the dregs of his eye make up - blue and smudged and looking more like icy bruises than make up now. You doubt your own looked much better, your eyes already feeling gritty from screwing them closed whilst covered in glitter.

"I owe you, remember?"

"...Fine."

It's with a triumphant look that he pulls his fingers from you, dragging your shorts down your legs and leaving a wet trail of your juices in his wake. He throws them into the pile on his bench, no doubt you'll have fun looking for those later, and he bends down to kiss the swell of your lower belly, thanking you in the process, before sitting back on his haunches.

You think you're wet enough, relaxed enough, his hand already coated with your slick, to take him. Bravo the Clown thinks differently, and reaches over to his vanity for the first grease paint he can get his hands on.

"Don't you -"

But he's already doing it, smearing a thin layer of white paint over the broadest part of his hand, almost covering the small tattoo by his thumb in the process.

" - dare." You sigh and he simply shrugs as if to say what before plunging two fingers back into your slick pussy, curling them up into you and dragging along your walls, making you fall back with a moan yet again. This fucking clown.

A third finger slips inside you, quickly followed by a fourth, and you're sitting up on your elbows on the floor of his trailer, watching him as he's singularly focused on your hole stretching to accommodate his digits. The triangular tattoo on his wrist may as well be a neon open for business sign with how it's directing his, and your, eyes straight to his fingers being slowly engulfed by your pussy.

A quick look up at you and a small nod of your head is all he needs to push forward, applying pressure to his hand and slipping it further and further inside of you.

You gasp when you stretch over his knuckles, your brows knitting together. Even with your legs spread wide, there's a small burn, a stretch, as he pushes into you. But then he sinks in past the hard ridges of his knuckles and his hand gives a little more, leaving you feeling impossibly full. You made a living off of stretching and twisting your body into seemingly impossible positions. There wasn't a stretch you hadn't felt, but this was something new - the ache of a stretch you'd never felt before.

"Amazing," he mumbles, fucking his fingers into you past the knuckle then back out again. They start to slip in with ease after a few moments, and you reach down between your legs to feel him as he pushes in.

"More," you moan, knowing only half of his hand is in you. If he hadn't smeared grease over his hand to lube himself up, you'd still be able to see that tiny tattoo. You wanted it inside you.

A slow push of his hand again and his whole fist is breaching you. He submerges his hand into your heat, the slick pooling at your entrance from your earlier release and the grease on his hand making his hand suddenly slip all the way inside of your pussy. If you felt full before it was nothing compared to this.

You whimper, watching him watch you as you take his fist.

"Oh fuck."

You're going to come again already. You know there's no stopping it. Especially not when he brings his other hand up to hold you still, swiping his rough thumb back and forth over your clit as he twists his fist from side to side, getting a feel of you from the inside out. You grab at his wrist, holding it steady and rock your hips, shallowly fucking yourself on his fist.

You feel the first spasm without warning, clamping around his hand so hard you'd expel him from your body if you weren't holding him so tightly in place. Your whole body quivers, quakes, shaking like some haunted hand puppet controlled by Bravo's fist.

Seeing stars, or maybe it's the glitter caught in your eyes, you fall back as you shake, the pulsing between your thighs unrelenting as you feel yourself gush and soak his hand. Your moans and twitches die down, and your death grip on his wrist finally releases.

Now that he's free, Bravo the Clown takes this as a cue to start up again, pulling his hand out of you in one continuous movement.

"Oh - nnhg."

Your back arches off the trailer floor at the slow drag of his fist, and caves back in when he pushes back in. You let yourself curl back up to watch again, too curious by how his fist looks moving inside you to fully give in to the fullness overwhelming your body.

Punching in and out, the rim of your swollen pussy stretches across his fist, and you watch, mesmerized and crying out, as the paint smeared on his hand fades and the tattoo usually hidden by his gloves comes back into view, only to make a disappearing and reappearing act inside of you. Before now you'd licked every single one of his tattoos, and now more than ever you wanted to do it again.

"Oh, god yeah."

"That good?" he finally asks, his voice thick and heavy. Looking up at you for only a second before being drawn back to your cunt with wide eyes.

"Your body is amazing," he says enthusiastically, as if you're the first person to ever be fisted, and he dives back in again to lick around your spread pussy, sucking your clit into his mouth with a wet slurp.

"Dee!" You squeal, falling back with a thud. You want to watch, you really do, but you just can't. Not when it feels like this.

"So now you know my name," he mumbles from around your clit, trying to suck it back into his mouth a second later. Your pussy is squelching, wet and dripping all over his hand, down his wrist, onto the floor of his trailer and whatever unfortunate item of clothing it is you're laying on. It's going to be soaked and you don't care. All you care about in the moment is his fist, still moving, fucking you so full and leaving you so empty, and the flick of his tongue over your clit.

"Gonna come, gonna come, Dieter, - oh, g- fuck."

He moans, nodding into your clit, shoving his fist straight into you and rocking it back and forth inside of you, leaving you full as he flicks your clit to orgasm.

You clamp down on him, pussy tightening around his entire fist as you come, spasms shooting through your pussy until you're a writhing twitching mess, begging him to stop the movement of his tongue. He does, but can't resist kissing your clit one last time, tongue peeking out to swipe across it, grumbling laugh leaving his chest when your entire body twitches at the act before collapsing into a heap.

He's breathing as heavy as you are when you look up at him a second later.

"Please can I stick it in? Please?" his eyes do that infuriating puppy thing again. You look down at him, still panting as his fist rocks in you slowly.

"Fine," you whine, the only reluctance in your voice from him having to remove his hand to get his cock in you. "But you know the rules."

"Yeah, yeah, wrap it up," he mumbles, pulling his hand from you with an ease you would've been embarrassed by if he hadn't got you so worked up and if the subsequent orgasms hadn't turned you into a liquid human being. He reaches over with the same slick coated hand to grab at a tin under his trailer bench. Opening it, it looks to be his weed stash, or what's left of it, but he knocks aside some loose rolling papers to pull out a gold packet.

"Latex free, baby," he says, shaking the packet between two fingers. It was sweet, really, that he remembered your allergy.

Dieter is pushing his pants down his thighs a second later, pulling his cock free from their polyester prison. You almost ask if he needs a hand, if he's hard enough, but a quick glance and you know. His pants have a wet stain on the front of them, precum leaking from the tip of his cock whilst he fisted you. From the looks - length rock hard, tip swollen and angry, slit still dripping for you - he's painfully engorged, desperate to relieve the ache in his cock with your warm, wet, pussy.

Tearing the wrapper with his teeth, he rolls the condom down his cock. As much as he owed you for distracting you all evening, you couldn't deny there was something about this man when he was a desperate, needy mess for you. It was your body that did this to him - the soft rolls of your belly as you contorted yourself, the swell of your ass as you bent backward, the broadness in your hips, the strength in your arms.

He fists his cock, and you watch him nearly lose it there and then. Biting back a laugh, you reach out, pulling him over you until he's slotted between your legs. Any other day and you'd be trying something more adventurous than missionary with him, but right now you didn't trust your limbs to keep you up, or Dieter to last more than a few seconds.

He lines up with your slick hole, and pushes in with a shaky breath, stilling once he's seated inside you. You think for a second that he might be asleep, but then his hips start slowly moving.

"Why d'you always feel so good?" he asks, face close to yours you can see the paint caught in his wrinkles more easily now.

"Magic pussy."

He laughs, raspy and scratchy in your ear, tucking his face into your neck. "Sparkles and her magic pussy. That's a TV special I'd like to see. Could probably pull a rabbit out of- oof."

You hit him, and it only makes his hips pump faster, snapping his mouth shut to concentrate.

The sound of the wet slap of his skin against yours fills the trailer, his balls squelching against your dripping cunt with each thrust. He's moaning and grunting in your ear, whispering about how good you feel, how great you looked, about that fucking bodysuit and how much he loves how wide your legs can stretch. At that, you wrap them around him, pulling him in tight to you, forcing his thrusts deeper. For as much as he pissed you off, you still trusted him, had an affection for him you would never admit to, neither publicly or to yourself.

"Uh - oh, fuck, Sparkles. Lemme. Please let me..."

Feeling between your bodies, he tries to touch your clit again. You knock away his hand, threatening to ruin his orgasm if he so much as tries to touch you one more time. He whimpers in your ear, settling his hand on your breast instead, squeezing and relaxing his grip as a distraction from his own orgasm tingling through his bones. You know what a threat could do to him and from the feel of him alone you know he's holding back more than ever. If his balls were any tighter and his cock were any harder you'd think he'd burst.

So, you do something you said you would never do for any man, and you beg, just a little bit, whispering softly and sweetly into his ear as his cock fucks you full.

"Come, Dieter. Come in me. Please."

And he does, groaning deep and low, deafening you in one ear with it as he empties his balls into the condom inside of you. You grip him hard, hugging him tight to you as he shakes on top of you.

He looks totally fucked out and ridiculous when you next look to the side and see him, face smooshed into the plush robe you'd been laying on. One of your own eyelashes is stuck to his cheek, along with a streak of glitter. You can't even imagine the state of your own face, but he doesn't seem to mind it when he finally peels open his eyes.

"You wanna get food and smoke pot?"

The man was a joke. Infuriating. A total and utter clown in every sense of the word.

But you always knew what you were getting with Bravo the Clown. It's what drew you to him, it's what made you trust him. Everything he did was written as plain as day on his face, or tumbling from his mouth in a stream of consciousness. Most of all, it was nice to be soft and pliable, as much as you were strong, with someone who wouldn't use it as a weapon against you.

And you would never say a single word of it to his face, opting instead to suck a hickey into his shoulder, tasting the sweat from his skin as you draw a bruise to the surface.

"Fine, but you're buying. You still owe me."

soz to my tag list for this: @jupiter-soups @wannab-urs @bean-is-reading @not-a-unique-snowflake-blog @youandmeand5bucks-blog @bbyanarchist @vickywallace @kamcrazy123 @valkyreally @ashhlsstuff @a-literal-goblin @ariundercovers @iluvurfather @stevie75 @toxicanonymity @thesevi0lentdelights

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Safe With A Ghost

+18 Readers Only

Chapter 2 : All Those Who Suffer

Summary : After making a narrow escape, you find yourself wounded and alone...will you survive? Will Simon/Ghost ever hear about you if you die ? For now...all you have is will power and hope.

What to Expect: Self Stitching, Blood, Killing, Gore, Cursing, Pet-Name, military stuff (I'm not a pro so sorry for my inaccuracies), medical issues, tension, shouting, rage, crying, emotions,mentions of nausea etc.

Pet name: Pigeon

Word Count: 4.6K

════ ⋆Safe With A Ghost MasterList⋆ ════

═════════ ⋆Chapter 3⋆ ═════════

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Ghost got off the heli, that picked him up at the airport in Manchester...he barely slept a wink. When the heli, landed he immediately grabbed his duffle bag getting off the helicopter. Stepping off grudgingly, he felt the vibration in his pocket ignoring the sound of Soap calling for him in the distance.

He smiled under his mask feeling already better despite the dread of going to work in a minute. Seeing he's already got a message from you. He figured by now, you've headed to work, as you're holding your cup of coffee for you long night shift ahead. Even though to his constant detest for such a drink, you simply however thrived on it over a well made cup of tea. He'll never understand your American taste palette but luckily he loved you enough to "allow" (yes he is allowing because if you were a recruit he would've thrown out the coffee maker long ago) it. Yet seeing your message brought him back to the present as he replied back.

You: Miss you already... :(

Ghost: I miss you too pigeon, you at work ?

You: Image Sent

Looking at the picture, it made his heart beat, it was a picture of you smiling, your genuine smile. You were in your lab coat, your hair in your normal high ponytail, and red nurse shirt. You were of course to no surprise, holding your favorite mug of coffee, yet he tried to ignore that detail. He saved the picture onto his phone setting it for your contact number. Whenever he got a new picture of you, he'd update the contact photo so he could see the last picture of you. It was almost like a habit, one he was sure you knew. And you seem to indulge him in. Sadly, he knew he had a job to do and sent you one quick text.

Ghost: Gorgeous. I'll be back before you know it pigeon.

You: Counting on it. Be safe, I love you !

Ghost: Love you too.

With that he made his way to his quarters, to put away his stuff, and put on his gear. His old familiar bunker was the same as the last time he left it. He tossed down his duffle bag behind the foot of his cot, and went to his small locker where he kept his stuff. Pulling out his vest, glasses, balaclava with the skull stitched onto it, gloves, and other weaponry equipment. It was a process to put everything on, and holster all his weapons. Checking his pistol, rifle, grenades, smoke bombs, etc. He always had a mental checklist on making sure he was all prepared. Getting his comms on and ear piece in as he was beginning to adjust to the weight of the vest. Stepping out of his bunker, Simon, was gone, now it was Ghost.

You looked at your final text from Simon, heart lurching, as you kept reading the same text over and over and over again.

Ghost: Gorgeous. I'll be back before you know it pigeon.

How such simple words made you linger over them, analyzing it, dissecting it, interpretating. Your overthinking brain trying to make a whole scenario of the message, wondering what he was doing at the time he texted you, was he really missing you ? Does he really think you're gorgeous ? So many questions racing through your head, you had to shake your head abruptly to regroup yourself and tell yourself Stop overthinking it...he loves you... he'll be back for you....he thinks your beautiful...don't let your mind fiddle his words. You were in the bathroom after feeling nauseous, you figured it probably was the meals you both had over the course of Simon's return home, he did have a sweet tooth and you both were eating a lot of bake goods. After taking a minute to regain your composure you made you way to the front desk asking the nurse for a new chart to examine your next patient. The nurse Carina, seemed to tell you were feeling off as she was a close co worker friend, looked up from her computer screen with a concerned looked "You okay y/n, you've looked like youre about to hurl down this aisle ?" You laugh softly as she was holding your next patients chart as you reached for it "I'm fine Carina, just my boyfriend was on a bake good spree and I'm feeling the effects" Carina eyed you head to toe as you watched her slowly give off a mischievous grin "Oh ? You and your boyfriend huh ? Maybe your pregnant" You were already glancing down at the chart when she had said that as you look up abruptly blushing "I'm a doctor, I'd think I'd know when I'm pregnant, besides I'm on the pill" you wave you hand dismissively making your way to your patients waiting room "Next case here I come..." you shout over your shoulder heading to the elevator "Don't be spreading false rumors !" Carina cursed under her breath as she huffed "Still think you should take a test !" Rolling your eyes getting into the elevator you began looking over at this patients chart you when the elevator door dinged, you started to make your way to their waiting room considering every detail they've given to the nurses. You found it weird the chart mention this man having a cold, this was annoying to you, wasting your time over a mere cold, when anyone could just nurse themselves back to health at home. But it was your job, nonetheless, to treat people. When you opened the door, there stood a big man, you would've thought it was Simon but didn't give off the same aura. His was more prominent like he almost want to be noticed. He had tattoos all around his neck, he reeked of alcohol and smoke (judging from your sense of smell which you never realized how strong it was, definitely smelled of weed, but you weren't going to comment on that). His eyes were black and hollow as you took note that he wasn't sitting in the chair, no he was standing arms crossed like he's been expecting you. Weird...he doesn't look sick..."So....Mr-" Before you could even finish saying his last name, you felt an arm slip around you and cover your mouth, you felt something press into your lower back, it was cold, you realized it was a gun. You eyes wanted to sob, your mind racing, you was staring at the large figure as the man behind you spoke "Move. Scream. Or try to run, I'll put a bullet through you...you hear ?" Judging by his voice he almost had an accent.... it was gruff in a way, no charismatic, just blunt "Nod your head for me velikolepnyy (gorgeous) if you understand?" Mustering the courage you slowly nodded you head. "See ? Wasn't so bad. Now you're going to walk out this hospital calmly. We're just gonna get a...what you Brits say ? Cuppa tea ?" He Snickers near your ear, it was horrifying to hear. "aye, but you aren't British are ya malen'kiy (little one) " All you could do was look at the man in front of you, now that you're studying him, he was dressed in a sweater (even though it wasnt that cold out for a jacket), thick pants with lots of pockets, his bald head and bodyguard like face. He definitely gives off, mafia vibes, someone who'd snap you like a toothpick if he needed to.

The man spoke to the other man "Poshli, yesli kto meshayet, ustranim." (Let's go, if anyone interferes, eliminate.) The big man in front of you reached into his sweater which you could only presume he had a gun as well...How the hell, they get through security?! He spoke "My ne khotim ustraivat' stsenu, budet besporyadok" (We don't want to make a scene, it will be a mess.) Feeling the gun press harder into your back you wince "bylo by veseleye, chem snova, ya uverena, chto s etoy kukloy... my obyazatel'no vyzovem prizraka"(it would be more fun than again, I'm sure that with this doll... we will definitely summon a ghost) whatever was said they both gave a deep chuckle, you presumed the worse meaning they had horrible intentions for you. Pulling you from your thoughts he took his hand away from your mouth as you stayed silent as he roughly grabbed your arm forcing you to walk at his side. You had to walk at their brisk pace, it was hard not to scream for help, but the cold gun into your back was enough to stay silent. You just prayed you found an opening to find an escape from them. They quickly made their way to the emergency exit, one only medical staff have access to, one no one knew unless you studied the hospital floor plan, which obviously gave her a hint, these people, planned this out...they knew the layout, how to avoid cameras, the hospital weak points. As you made your way down the staircases they were talking to one another to whole descent, you however were zoned out, thinking about Simon...what would he think when he returns...a cool blast of air snapped you out of your daze. You were outside. The men now picking up their pace as you were forced to jog now, it was then the man holding a gun at your back was being neglectful. He and the man both holstered their guns, as you kept walking, you eyed at your feet and scanned around you. Plenty of covering, and building, you were surrounded by shops, businesses, etc. Out in public. It was perfect. You then took the chance, you made a fake trip, causing the man to stumble in his stride as you were able to loosen his grasp, taking the advantage, hitting him in the groin. He hit the ground hard, you made a dash to the road not caring. Behind you can hear him painfully yell "Pristreli yeye! Ne day yey uyti!" (Shoot her! Don't let her get away!)

Just when your foot hit the road you knew it was good timing because you could see a zip line of cars coming. You just kept running even after hearing a loud pop, you felt your body shot up with fear,coldness,and nausea, but you kept going. Running on pure adrenaline, weaving through people. As you make it around a corner seeing a hotel dashing inside. In that moment, you were safe...for now...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Pulling up about 90 klicks they got out of the humvee. Price gripped the edge of his vest to speak "Alright, Alpha Team will consist of Ghost and Soap, you two will handle the ones at entry, Bravo Team will be Gaz and I, we'll cover you and handle the ones on rooftop. Infiltrate, collect data, then pull out. Laswell's on channel 2 keep it on everything will go through HQ, any leads is what we're after, otherwise if anything arises we verify with Laswell, Is that clear ?" Everyone nodded their heads. As Price grabbed his rifle "Alright...let's see what's in store for us."

Soap and Ghost kept low, making their way into position, they both laid low to examine the warehouse, Ghost was looking through his scope on his rifle while Soap was using some binoculars, they were observing the place and how many were keeping watch. The comms rang out as it was Price "Ghost, Soap ? You in positions ?" Ghost reached for the button to respond "Affirmative, eyes on building." Looking through his scope briefly, Laswell than responded from HQ "This is Watcher, to Alpha Team 01 and 02, you're clear to eliminate any targets in your way" Both Ghost and Soap responded through their comms "Rog". Ghost held up his rifle close to his chest, as he made hand gestures for Soap to follow, making their way down to the building, staying in the blind so they wouldn't be spotted. They had their night visors down, as they got closer, they both pulled out their knives, then began eliminating the 3 guards at entry. Was quick and efficient. Causing no noise as they used hand to hand weapons. Ghost slitted two the mens throats with ease, while soap had to wrestle the 3rd to the ground before stabbing. Was barely putting up a fight. Ghost didn't like that it wasn't a challenge, but they continued on. Soap spoke "I'll take point LT" Ghost grunted in approval as he hit the comms "Soap and I entering, heading upstairs." Letting go of the button,hearing a response from Price "Rog, Gaz and I won't have visual, you're on your own in there". Soap led as they did encounter some men who fired at them, however they made quick work of them firing back. As they walked over the fallen bodies, Ghost looked down at their bodies seeing that they had an insignia, he bent down to inspect as Soap stood watch. It was Russian. He cursed getting in touch "This is Alpha Team 01, Ghost to , Watcher, Copy, we got Russians in here, I repeat, we have Russians" the static came through as it was Laswell coming through "Copy Alpha Team 01. Eliminate all targets. Get the data and rendezvous back to base." Ghost comms back before standing up holding rifle "Copy that" looking at Soap who seemed ready as ever. "Right LT, let's get this done"

Without any hesitation, both Ghost and Soap made their way up to the top floor, eliminating the last bunch of men who were in a room where obviously the planning happened. There was a bunch of maps littered everywhere pinpointing particular spots, one he recognized but didn't put much thoughts, looking over documents they had, until Soap shouted "LT, you need to look at this !" Ghost head snapped to where Soap was, making his way over, when his heart dropped at the sight. Soap was holding a picture, of none other than....you. Ghost mind began to race What the fuck they'd want with y/n ?! How the hell did Russians know about you ?! Slowly it began to make sense...the pinpoint on the map looked familiar because it was where YOU worked. The picture was of you walking into the hospital. He couldn't fathom when these photos were took but all he knew was you're in danger. Soap interrupted his anger rampage in his head "Why they have pics of a lass ? Who is she ? Maybe their next target ? Perhaps she has something they want ?...Ghost ?" Soap sees Ghost turn on his heel storming out of the building as Soap held the picture of you. Soap rushed behind to catch up with Ghost as he spoke into the comms letting Price and Gaz know they had a hit and coming out. Ghost just kept walking though, Price and Gaz making their way to meet "What'd you boys find ?" But Ghost didn't pay them any mind marching back to where they left the humvee. Price looked at Soap quizzedly "What's going on Sergeant?" Soap gave a shrug "I don't know either sir, but the minute he saw this..." Hands Price the picture of you. Price frowned watching Ghost not waiting up for them. Grumbling to himself as he lets out a heavy puff from his cigar "Fuck.."

Hopping into the humvee, Ghost barely waited for everyone to pile in, already hitting the pedal before Gaz and Soap could get comfortable. Price scolding for almost losing his cigar "The hell Ghost ! What's going on ?! You better cool it Lieutenant or I'll take the wheel. " Ghost grip tightened on the wheel "Sir, she...the photos..." He processed his next words not letting them hear how shaken up he was "I know her." The captain raised his brows not wanting to pry as he could already tell from Ghost's behavior this wasn't an ordinary friend...it was someone much deeper "I see...than what ties does she have to a warehouse in Iran with Russians ?" Ghost side-eyed his Captain when Price noticed he let out a puff of smoke " Obviously it's an enemy of yours. If they know her...there's a good chance they know where you live and all of us." Gaz and Soap glanced at each other hearing this as Gaz spoke "So likely we have a rat amongst us?", Soap interjecting "If it's someone the LT knows then obviously they have deep access to shit only a handful would know." Soap rubbed his mohawk"Shit, we in quite the shit hole too, who the fuck would betray us !" This made them all sit silently tension lingering on each other's words. Price spoke up again. "From here on out. We don't rely on anyone. Even Laswell. I don't believe she'd do something like this...but that doesn't mean someone in proximity is. We'll stay off the radar. We'll go to Manchester find this girl. And figure out from there any leads to who and why we've be compromised. I'll get a hold of Nik." Gaz and Soap agreed but Ghost was silent. He was too busy worrying. Hoping nothing horrible has happened to you already. He's barely been gone a day and already you're being targeted. When I find out who fuckin took pics of her...if anyone laid a fuckin hand on you... I'll make them SUFFER dearly.

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You were exhausted, now that the adrenaline was settling...you body was now feeling the side effects of after your narrow escape. Deciding to take a room for a couple weeks, you didn't want to risk trying to go home only for them to stalk you. You sat up on the bed of your hotel room wincing in pain, when you were running for you life, they were able to shoot you. Luckily you could tell the bullet wasn't embedded too deep, was more superficial. You could extract it on your own. You sat up groggily, having used the hotels towels and robe string to tie around you bleeding shot thigh. You never realized how much adrenaline made you almost immune to the pain, and now you're wishing it was still pumping because the pain was unbearable. This sucked...you couldn't go to your hospital too afraid they'd expect you to go there to treat your wound and leaving the hotel was not optional, least there was food. Seeing the phone at the bedside, you made an attempt to call Simon's number multiple times. Your hand was covered in blood from putting pressure on your wound as it dialed. "C'mon Simon....pick up..." Tears began to fall down your cheek as you shaked leaving another voicemail "S-Simon....I-I need you...." You began to sob into the phone "I'm scared..." It the beeped as you were shaking holding the phone tearing dropping on to the keypad. Trying to compose yourself. Deep breaths...I'm sure Simon would be here if he could...right ? You were too tired to deal with your wound but you had to suck it up and do it. Limping, standing you grabbed the pen, using the cord from the tv, a fork and knife (from food you asked to be delivered to your room and some wipes that went with it ,you began to do your own bullet removal. Luckily you've had experience but with not the correct tools it made it very challenging. You put a hand towel into your mouth to prevent yourself from screaming. You used the tv cord to wrap above the bullet wound to stop the blow flow a bit, tightening is hard as possible, as you began to cut around the bullet wound with the knife. Eventually using your hands and fork you worked into your thigh to pull it out...it was painful, you had to keep running your voice through your head as you whimpered and screamed with your gag in mouth trying to pull it out. Once you finally did, you had to force some of the curtains string using the tiny threading (your mother used to sew so you knew how to collect string from materials) you began to use the strings you had to stitch your thigh. When finished you used some cut up bed sheets to wrap around your thighs to hold the bleeding. It wasn't the best, but it would work for now. Feeling hazy, you laid back down onto the bed tears welling up as you began to fall asleep from exhaustion..."S-Simon." Was the last words you mumbled as you hoped you'd wake up and it was just a nightmare...or never at all.

Thanks to Price, he made some calls as they found someone near Manchester who could locate her quickly. They were at best 5 hours out from where you worked, Nik had picked them up flying as quick as possible. It was unnerving. He hated feeling restless not knowing where you are, if you were safe. His gut was already feeling sick to the pit of his stomach as he dreaded what may have happened to you. Especially how defenseless you'd be. He was clinching his rifle so tight he didn't even realize as Price sat next to him smoking his cigar as he tilts his brimmed cup hat back "So." He lets out a small air of smoke speaking softly as he holds the cigar in hand "Who is she really Simon ?" Hearing his name Ghost snapped his head at Price, eyes narrowing, his eyes were sunken and almost seemed furious mixed with anxious. Ghost grumbled "Don't be spatting out my name..." Price glanced at him still waiting for an answer, which Ghost relented setting down his rifle to his side, "Her name is y/n, she's my....." His features twisted as he had no problem with having you as a girlfriend but saying it to his Captain and everyone else...made him feel almost shy. "significant other..." As he gets those words out tentatively. Price was shocked....hearing Simon had a girlfriend all this time and he never knew, Little sucker didn't think he had it in em. "Seems she's quite the deal to make you lose it..." Simon flinched at this, aware of his behavior so far as Price puffed out another smoke "We'll get her back Simon." Ghost looked at him as Price gave him a nod, Ghost hoped...no knew he'd get you back. He just hoped not too late. As his mind wondered apparently Price had a phone that was a backup when they had to go incognito, it was from someone in Manchester he knew. He answered "This is Price, give me something good Rococo" Ghost frowned at the name. He never heard of it, but he just hoped the person got Intel about you. He didn't dare look in Price's direction just listening to him respond with "Mhm" "Right" "Shit" (hearing that made Ghost more anxious) settling his nerves when Price thanked the man and hung up. Taking a breath through his nose he spoke up "Alright...so, apparently the Russians did make an attempt to kidnap her..." Before he could finish Ghost shot up standing, eyes wild ready to pounce as Gaz and Soap watched uncomfortably as the Captain shouted, gripping Ghost's shoulder to settle him down, "Let me Finish Simon ! Sit !" The captain regained his composure as Ghost relented to sitting back down, going back to grip his rifle ever so tight, the rifle looked like it was bent. "She got away from them. Was caught on some security cameras near the hospital. However, she looked.....wounded. Right now, she's at a hotel. The Russians are snooping around, they're probably hoping she'll come out. As of now, she is still alive." Relief, anger, anxiety, fear, all emotions began to overwhelm him with the thought of you. He didn't know which to feel at the moment until Price interjected another thing "Also, Rococo found the room she's in, he's got access to the cameras down her hall so he'll be watching, and...he knows her room number. " In this moment, Ghost just blinked as Price offered him the incognito phone, Ghost just staring at it, he was scared you won't answer. Price could tell his reluctance as he spoke with authority"Call her Simon" Ghost took the phone obeying an order since that's something he's ever known, but he was truly scared to not hear your voice or worst if the kidnappers succeeded again and they pick up the phone. Swallowing it all. He dialed the number given from Rococo. Hearing the beep from the machine until....

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The sound of the hotel phone ringing made you open your eyes slowly, as you were gazing up at an unfamiliar ceiling. You frowned for a moment taking in your surroundings realizing it wasn't a nightmare...you're still living it. You sit up, gasping out in pain, noticing your leg was still bleeding. The reminder that the phone was ringing made you reach for it answering it groggily "H-Hello ?" .....Is this a scam call or something ? Bunch of teens maybe making prank calls ? Or the office or kitchen calling ? Before you were going to hang up..you heard a familiar deep British voice, "It's me, Pigeon.... it's Simon" you froze....your eyes welling up full of tears as you were now shaking "S-Si ?" He lets out a soft huff mixed with a laugh "Yea, Pigeon it's me...." Your mind was reeling with relief hearing his voice, his deep gruff voice made you feel all warm inside "How'd you...When....This....I-" you mind was spiraling you didn't know what to feel "Deep breaths for me pigeon...I know it's a lot right now. I'm on my way." Hearing him say that, your tears began to fall "R-Really?" You could already imagine him smiling at you when he responds "Really. I know you went through a lot. I promise nothing will happen to you." This is what caught your attention as you furrow your brows "Wait...how'd you know I was here ?" You could only hear your heart beating hard scared of the answer " I can't tell you that over the phone lovie, it's a lot to take in. But I promise, when I get there. I'll tell you everything. This is my fault you're in this mess" you smiled softly wiping your tears sniffing "Yeah well, I knew from the day we met you were trouble Simon..." you let out a soft laugh for the first time in a while since this ordeal. Ghost hearing it made his heart throb, he missed your voice. "Hang tight, what room you in ?" You glance around to find a way to see what number room your in "Room, E 17" he frowned a bit " Not near the exit or elevator right ?" you laugh, now understanding his reasons for being paranoid "No, I'm away from any escape window, stairs and elevator....and Simon ?"

He lets out a shakey sigh scared if he hangs up it'd be your last time "Mmm?" You take a deep breath eyes welling up again Stupid hormones "I love you..." Waiting for what seemed like an eternity Ghost smiled under his balaclava "Yeah....I love you too Pigeon. Be there soon." That's all you needed to hear....your Simon was coming to save you. Everything will be fine now. After a few minutes of silence taking in each other's words, you hung up on him reluctantly, wishing you could stay on the phone with him forever but knew, it'd be more worth him focusing to get here. You smiled, your genuine smile. Simon, your love, was going to save you from this nightmare. Now you just have to wait for him to get here.

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Thanks for Reading !

ꨄ︎ I know this chapter was much shorter and felt rushed than my first, but that's cause I wanted to leave at a good cliffhanger for the next chapter.

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ꨄ︎Taglist:@marshallowy @babygirl-panda19 @crazy-phan-girl13

[sunnebeam]

twin flame bruise. (02)

PART 2.

pairing: jeon jeongguk x reader, jeon jungkook x reader (yes they're different people)

plot: the jeon twins have become nothing more than two strikingly similar looking guys who share a mere home address and a last name. but in their senior year of college, the estranged twins may have found one more thing they share in common – you.

warnings: jeon twins au, possible headache bc the use of Jeongguk (nicknamed Guk) and Jung Kook (nicknamed JK) is v confusing, mentions of money laundering, strained family relationships

series index. | masterlist + disclaimers.

note: part 2 is here!!! this will have 8 parts + an epilogue btw! each part will more or less have the same word count as this one (since i still struggle writing long pieces),,, no update schedule, we just chillin' here and writing things when we have the time and energy <3 as always, feedback is highly appreciated!

It’s been a month and a half since Jung Kook last had a good night’s sleep.

But he supposes it could be worse. After all, the bed he’s laying on is decently soft, the pillows are freshly fluffed, and the bedroom he’s occupying doesn’t have that dusty-old-room smell. Yoongi really outdid himself with this one.

“Hey, kid.”

Speak of the devil.

JK turns on his side, his back facing the opened door and the person entering it. He hears another set of footsteps that tells him Namjoon just entered, too. Still, he doesn’t budge.

He knows his being a bit too hard on his two companions, but JK can’t help it.

“I know you’re mad at us…”

He’s not, actually. He’s mad at the situation.

“...and I know you hate this place…”

Not exactly. It’s a decent house. He just prefers his own.

“...but it’s still too dangerous right now. Please understand, kid, we need to hide away for a while. Make things die down a bit before going home.”

Home. He wants to go home. To his apartment. To his bed. To you.

JK sighs. He already had this particular talk with both Yoongi and Namjoon a hundred times already in the past month alone. He doesn’t mean to be so difficult but the situation just frustrates him to no end.

But then again, this is his own fault.

Entering the underground world of money laundering – even as an errand boy at the bottom of the food chain – wasn’t the greatest idea for a side job. But when you’re an impressionable college student mixing in with the wrong crowds, you don’t exactly make the best choices.

What started as a small, risky gig to earn some extra cash turned into an endless cycle of running his clients’ dirty money around different places and concealing them in clean, legal transactions.

He tried hiding his little errands from you but you were too observant for your own good. Though you don’t exactly know what he’s gotten himself into, you do know it’s dangerous. In fact, you told him time and again to get out and get his shit together. But by the time JK finally got his head out of the gutter and tried to leave, he couldn’t.

Because you needed money.

Money has always been a sore spot for you, having struggled financially for as long as you could remember. And yet, not once have you asked for his help nor forced him to put himself in risky situations just to help you out. Unfortunately for you, JK is nothing if not stubborn, and if there’s a way he could help you, he’ll do it.

But this time, though, he fucked up.

“You didn’t fuck up,” Namjoon interrupts his self-deprecating thoughts. “It’s not your fault, JK. Don’t beat yourself up over it.”

But it is his fault. After all, their latest client was dangerous, influential, powerful. This client was not to be messed with, not to be stood up, not to be denied…

…and yet JK backed out of the deal at the last minute.

“You were right to back out,” Yoongi reassures him. “I wasn’t sure about that client, either.”

“You’re just saying that,” JK says.

“I’m not. If you hadn’t called to back out, I probably would’ve. Either way, the man's pissed off so we need to lie low for a bit, yeah? Don’t brood too much."

Yoongi turns and heads out the door, motioning for Namjoon to follow him out, but not before calling out to their younger companion for one last thing.

“You got a good heart, kid. Don’t worry, you’ll get home soon.”

And he will. He just has to hold out a bit more.

He can’t. He can’t hold out any more.

Jeongguk looks at the caller ID with panicked eyes, the incessant ringing of his phone echoing in his ears, and he realizes he can’t put off answering any longer.

Swiping the green button, he holds his phone to his ear and internally hypes himself up, before finally talking to his parents.

“Eomma.”

“Well, hello to you, too,” his mother responds sarcastically. “I was beginning to think we didn’t have a son anymore, with you not answering our calls and your brother giving us the silent treatment.”

His brother.

Guk pinches the bridge of his nose, wondering how he can keep feeding his mother the lie that his twin brother was just in one of his so-called moods and took an impromptu vacation somewhere.

He feels horrible for lying but he also doesn’t want to unnecessarily worry his parents on the fifty-fifty chance that his younger twin really did just take some time to himself without telling anybody. And maybe it makes Guk a terrible brother but he really thinks JK is capable of such a thing – of just going off the grid and not warning anyone.

But that’s the best case scenario.

As for the worst case scenario, the two of you already went to the police station to report his twin as missing. But since the last text he sent was telling you he was going somewhere and explicitly telling you not to follow him, the police couldn’t do much.

Still, Guk is nothing if not thorough, so he takes it upon himself to call in some favors and hire a private investigator. As of now, he’s still waiting for some updates.

“Sorry, Eomma, I’m a bit busy with homework,” Guk tries to placate his mother through the phone but at the mention of the last word, he’s reminded that he actually has company in his apartment right now when Taehyung and Jimin snort at his lame excuse.

“Homework?” his mother repeats. “You work too hard, Gukie,” she sighs. “If only your brother was more like you…”

Again with the comparisons.

“Nah, he’s alright, Eomma,” he defends. “Y’know, he’s not failing his classes, right?”

“Yeah, well, he’s not excelling in his classes, either.”

“He doesn’t have to. Cut him some slack.” At this point, he’s getting tired of the nagging, even though it’s not directed at him. This kind of nagging is the exact reason his parents’ relationship with his younger twin is so strained in the first place. “Anyways, tell Appa I said hi, will you? I gotta go. Bye. Love you.”

He hangs up.

“Damn, Guk,” Jimin sighs. “Still haven’t told your parents?”

“I’ll tell them at some point, okay? I just need to make sure that JK didn’t leave on his own on a whim.”

“You still think that?” Taehyung asks incredulously. “I highly doubt he went missing on his own. Hell, even Y/N doubts that.”

At the mention of your name, Guk can’t help the slight reddening of his cheeks, something his friends immediately notice.

Taehyung smirks. “Looks like someone’s got a crush.”

He doesn’t even bother responding because how could he not have a crush? His growing, albeit awkward, relationship with you is plaguing his thoughts every minute since he met you. In between discussions about his twin’s possible whereabouts, your other conversations allow him to learn more about you, and what he learns is that you’re passionate, driven, diligent – all the good things.

And of course, to top all that off, you’re fucking beautiful, too. It’s no wonder that, despite the unlabeled situationship, his brother fell for you.

Guk just hopes, when all this is over, you’ll give him a chance.

Nope, you won’t give him a chance.

You stare at the customer who has the audacity to only order side dishes and nothing else again. He usually gets away with his request when your boss, Seojoon, is manning the counter. But with you? Nope, you’re not giving him another chance.

"You need to buy more than just pickled radish before I let you eat in this pub," you tell him, arms crossed. Your manager, Yiseo, is at your side, tapping her foot expectantly, her eyebrows raised.

He scoffs.

"Rude," he grumbles. "What if people find out you're turning away customers?"

"You can't be a customer if you only order the free side dishes," Yiseo retorts.

"At least I pay for the rice," he grumbles when a hand lands on his shoulder.

"That you do, Jin," your boss says, inserting himself into the conversation. He then tells Yiseo to cater to another customer who wants more drinks, before turning to you. "Y/N, why don't you prepare Seokjin's food while I show him to his table?"

You sigh, complying with the request and ignoring Jin's annoying smirk directed your way. Well, if Seojoon wants his business to be at a deficit, it's all on him.

Besides, you suppose you owe Jin now since Guk hired him, and being hired to investigate a missing person's whereabouts definitely isn't a walk in the park.

And speaking of Guk…

"Hey, Y/N."

Ah. Right on time.

"Hey, Guk," you greet him, waving your hand stiffly and awkwardly. Yiseo sees your shaky wave from across the pub and teasingly wiggles her eyebrows, but you silently plead with her to not make a comment.

After all, this has already become an everyday occurrence.

Everyday, a few hours before your shift ends, Guk visits the pub and eats with Jin, ordering a generous amount of actual food to compensate for the latter's small meal. Then, later at night after you close up, he walks you home – sometimes updating you on Jin's progress with the case, sometimes just talking to you about anything under the moon.

You've grown closer with him, without a doubt, but you can't deny that you're in an awkward situation – what, with your history involving his twin and all. You cringe internally when you remember the time Seojoon mistook him for JK, much to your embarrassment.

"Seokjin's over there." You point him to the table where the man is eating.

Guk looks at the direction you're pointing to before turning back to you with his eyebrows scrunched. You're about to ask him what's wrong when you see his hand reach towards your face, more specifically, your cheek.

"Eyelash," he says as an explanation, pulling the offending object from your cheek, completely oblivious to how you freeze up at his touch and proximity.

When he finally mumbles a low, "see you later," and heads to Jin's table, Yiseo rushes over to you and gives you a pointed look.

"I see you have a type."

"Please," you whine. "Don't."

She laughs at your expense, patting your shoulder and bumping her hips against yours playfully.

"Y'know," she starts, "you should consider giving him a chance."

"Unnie!"

"What?"

It's your turn to give her a pointed look. "Did you forget he's JK's brother? His twin brother?"

"Yeah, well, your fuckbuddy isn't here, so…" She shrugs. “I don’t see why you can’t ask him on a date.”

You sigh, wrapping your arms around yourself, your eyes downcast. "I can't even afford to go on dates, let alone have time for it."

It's the truth. Dates entail time and money – things you don't have. And it's not like you have any family to help you out, having been orphaned at a young age. You’ve only ever had yourself to rely on. That’s how it’s always been.

"Y/N."

You're pulled out from your thoughts when you see Guk approach you with wide eyes.

"Hey, Guk. Did you want more rice?"

"No. I, uh—" He looks from you to Seokjin who's frantically typing away on his phone back at their table. "Jin and I were just…"

He trails off. You stare at him, waiting.

After what feels like a hundred years, he finally gathers the resolve to tell you the three words you've been wanting to hear.

"We found him."

COPYRIGHT 2023. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

[allbridgesburn]

Hello everyone! Some updates, because I know I've been an awful blogger these past few weeks (again, i'm more active on twitter, i recc looking for signs of life over there).

AO3 user GoldenKanekalon wrote a wasteland fic!!!! (i am still not over it, i may continue fangirling over this fact until I'm old and gray). It's a Mallory POV after chapter 8, with a delicious gothic vibe and a messy girl-dad Coriolanus Snow that had me shedding some tears. Please check it out and leave a kind word, because it's truly a GREAT PIECE: Paint the Roses Red by GoldenKanekalon💙 🥹

I've finally started writing chapter 9 (yes, it does seem like my main incentive for writing is audience interaction. who would have THOUGHT). I've had a terrible case of writer's block these past few weeks ngl, but I think I've managed to conquer it for now. It sure feels good to be finally moving forward with the fic!

I'm also almost finished with a oneshot of a Coryo POV of one of the scenes from ch8 (i thought picking through his psychotic brain would help me finally pick up the pen--uh, keyboard, again, and it worked! thank you LOSER!). I might post it this week - probably as a 'sequel' work connected with the main story, as I have some other wasteland related oneshots / codas I'd like to tackle in the future, so it may be a good idea to just keep them all in one place.

To answer the messages I got about abandoning wasteland - I assure you, again, I /am/ going to finish this story. I know it's been a long time. I hate it too. But we will get there, I promise!

And to everyone who's been supportive of this project and who's been listening to me moan about it on twitter and patting my back - thank you! You are the gems that make me want to keep writing 💙

[asimplearchivist]

𝓢𝓱𝓲𝓷𝓲𝓷𝓰 𝓢𝓹𝓲𝓻𝓲𝓽

𝐏𝐚𝐫𝐭 𝐈𝐕 𝐨𝐟 𝐈𝐍 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐌𝐎𝐑𝐍𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐋𝐈𝐆𝐇𝐓.

[𝓪𝓼𝓲𝓶𝓹𝓵𝓮𝓪𝓻𝓬𝓱𝓲𝓿𝓲𝓼𝓽'𝓼 𝓶𝓪𝓼𝓽𝓮𝓻𝓵𝓲𝓼𝓽] [ 𝐏𝐎𝐊𝐄𝐌𝐎𝐍 𝐌𝐘𝐒𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐘 𝐃𝐔𝐍𝐆𝐄𝐎𝐍 𝐌𝐀𝐒𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐋𝐈𝐒𝐓 ] [ AO3 | SPOTIFY | PINTEREST ] summary ✨ ⤏ After the events that took place on Vast Ice Mountain, Dialga has released Dusknoir of his duties as his henchman. Dusknoir, in the midst of a self-crisis, is taken under wing by Celebi and Grovyle. Dusknoir finally breaks, and Grovyle reassures him. Dusknoir finds out a couple things about himself that he didn't know before. ⤏ Alternative summary: my take on what happened directly after the fifth special episode, mostly influenced by my own pent up Dusknoir feels! :D Yay for angst! (Also, please guys, don't hate Dusknoir, he doesn't deserve it. He's a tender marshmallow.) pairing(s) ✨ (mentions of) hero & grovyle [nostalgiashipping] word count ✨ 2.5k a/n ✨ [header credit] [divider credit] ⤏ This is an old piece from 2016, when I last replayed Explorers, so with my recent resurgence I figured I might post it here for my new PMD moots. Considering this is six years old, please forgive my older, less polished writing; but I'm still fairly pleased with it. :) (That's also why it's not getting a dedicated Sunday post, but since it's Christmas I thought I might share something that most of my followers here probably haven't seen before.) ⤏ My hero's old name was Celina, so I changed it to the newly updated Eliana instead. Other than that, it's pretty much a time capsule haha.

This new, brighter future was, in all honesty, taking quite a lot more to get used to than Dusknoir had anticipated previously.

It had been a mighty triumph, incapacitating Primal Dialga to prevent him from tampering with the Passage of Time, the possibility of him ruining time just before it managed to begin to function again diminished to none when his massive legs had buckled beneath him after Grovyle had dealt the final blow. That triumph had been short lived, however - it hadn't been but a few moments before they all had turned to light and had disappeared; but, upon their almost immediate return, the immense relief of being able to breathe in the newly shifting air, to see the sunrise glowing in more colors than Dusknoir had ever seen in his life - it had robbed him of breath and had humbled him in such a way he doubted he would ever look at the sky the same way again. Whomever it may have been to preserve his and the rest of the future Pokémon’s lives, they would have his immense gratitude for the rest of his days.

Everything in that moment had been exhilarating - he had felt the wind, cold and biting, race past him, the sun shining in his eye so brightly that he quickly learned that he mustn't look at it directly, lest he be temporarily blinded - but then, after Dialga had been generous enough to provide them with a portal to return to the Hidden Land (now in the budding stages of returning to its past lushness and fertility), he had found himself in an unexpected state of absolute dumbfound ever since.

Given that Dialga was no longer under the influences of darkness and had no reason to bind them to his will, he had released Dusknoir and the Sableye of their past duties, and thus had turned Dusknoir away from the one thing that he had ever truly known - servitude. He had always served for someone else, and he had always had a strong sense of loyalty to those he did. But for lack of better terms, Dusknoir was now out of his realm of confidence, and honestly had no idea of how to go about his life from here forth.

Celebi and Grovyle had been surprisingly kind and generous to him thus far - while Celebi had offered to house Grovyle in one of her many homes, she had also extended it to him as well. It was a shallow cave, high up on a cliff face where no one would usually be able to spot it. Both Grass types fit easily enough inside - but if Dusknoir were to be completely honest with himself...he was not a very small Pokémon. At all. At least, compared to the other two.

Luckily, he was not quite corporeal at times, so he managed to squeeze inside and settle on the cave floor - hunched over, but he had something over his head, at least.

Grovyle set to work at pulling a few things from his worn Treasure Bag, a couple of differently textured rocks and a bit of dried leaves and tiny sticks, before he struck one rock upon the other. A few sparks flared from it and onto the small collection of dead vegetation, but it took a couple of tries to actually get it to start smoldering. Thin wisps of smoke danced up from it and Grovyle set to work at blowing on it gently, coaxing it into a small, dancing flame that cast a warm orange glow across the cold cave floor.

He glanced up at Celebi and murmured that she go gather a few smaller sticks to help build up the flames. She bobbed her head and soared out of the cave, her little wings flapping with determination.

Grovyle sat back on his haunches and released a long sigh, scrubbing at his face with his clawed paws. Dusknoir tried not to shift around uncomfortably, afraid his antenna would scrape against the ceiling.

"I thought Grass types were supposed to be wary of fire," Dusknoir, for lack of other words, tried to prompt.

Grovyle glanced up at him, his bright yellow eyes seeming to gleam in the fading sunlight. The smaller Pokémon’s strong reserve was back, the emotion he'd shown in the past day probably having drawn too much from him to offer much more.

It had been quite an exhausting day, even for Dusknoir himself. He understood that Grovyle was most likely exponentially wearier than he, especially considering the energy the ice pillars had drained from the Grass type. Dusknoir was amazed that Grovyle was even still conscious. (He had been lucky to have knocked him from the energy beams’ grip in time.)

“I learned many things when I met Eliana,” Grovyle told him, settling against the stone wall and folding his arms over his thin chest. His eyes shifted to gaze out of the cave mouth, the circles beneath darkening with shadows that the meager flames were pushing away. “Choosing to qualm simple fears was one of the first.”

Dusknoir hummed for lack of a response, following the Grass type’s gaze.

The sun was setting. A grandiose amalgamation of color painted the sky, oranges and pinks and lilacs mingling in a joyful reunion as the great burning ball of gold retreated beneath the distant horizon. Stars were beginning to appear, tentatively sparkling against the darker parts of the great canvas stretched out before them.

Dusknoir found that he was holding his breath.

“Beautiful, isn’t it?” Grovyle mused absently.

The Ghost type hummed once more in agreement, trying to take in as much of the view as possible.

“I…haven’t seen so many colors in my life,” he admitted softly. He felt Grovyle’s eyes rest upon him.

“You were in the past before,” Grovyle reminded him, his voice somewhat dubious. “Didn’t you ever stop long enough to look around you?”

Dusknoir fell silent, shifting uncomfortably and flinching a bit when his antenna brushed the stone above him. Grovyle huffed quietly, shuffling around in his Treasure Bag before holding out something in his paw. The Ghost type stared in puzzlement at the two Purple Gummis before looking back up to the Wood Gecko Pokémon.

“I picked these up before we went to Temporal Tower,” Grovyle explained, eyes still searching the growing darkness outside. “I didn’t want to let them go to waste, and I figured you were hungry after the day we’ve had.”

Dusknoir hesitantly took the small food items, eyeing them a bit before looking up at the smaller Pokémon. Honestly, how had this Pokémon’s attitude towards him changed so drastically? And why? What had Dusknoir ever done to deserve any sort of good will - and from Grovyle, who had been his target for months and who he had attempted to murder multiple times, no less? Why did he deserve any mercy? Why had he come back after disappearing? What good had he ever done, truly, to deserve to even be breathing? He’d been a twisted soul for most of his life, doing nothing but the morally bleak bidding for any master that offered him power…

…Had he really redeemed himself, in helping Grovyle and Celebi save the future? Or had he merely been a side note?

“…Dusknoir?”

The Ghost type startled back into reality, confusedly taking in Grovyle’s troubled expression. “Pardon me, I was…thinking.”

“Dusknoir…you…you’re crying.”

Dusknoir blinked, gingerly running a fingertip beneath his eye and drawing it away. When had his vision gotten so blurry?

Grovyle straightened, creases forming between his eyes in what Dusknoir vaguely recognized as his concern. “Dusknoir, what’s wrong?”

The Ghost type flushed in shame, attempting to swipe away the outward evidence of his inner conflict. “Nothing, nothing. I believe I may have gotten dirt in my eye.”

The Grass type was silent for a long moment, so long of a moment that Dusknoir glanced up to make sure that he was even still there. There was an odd expression on the smaller Pokémon’s face, one that looked to be a conglomeration of several at once.

“You’re beginning to doubt yourself,” Grovyle observed gently.

Dusknoir wondered when he had become so transparent. Metaphorically. He was a Ghost type. Conditional transparency came with existing.

“I’m not aware of what you’re implicating,” he rebutted dismissively, looking towards the end of the cave. It was much darker than before. Did the sun always set so quickly?

“You can stop lying, you know. I’m not going to judge you for whatever you’re feeling.” Grovyle’s voice had taken on a foreign gentleness, one that Dusknoir had only ever heard once before. It had been at the temple in the Hidden Land of the past, when the Grass type had retold Eliana of their doomed fate to disappear upon rescuing Temporal Tower. He’d gazed upon the human-turned-Eevee with such a tenderness that Dusknoir had, at the time, found it to be a sign of extreme weakness and idiocy. But, seeing how Grovyle had spoken of her throughout their adventure the past day, Dusknoir had clearly seen the true strength of their relationship shining through his words. They were extremely close, there was no denying that. They had endured much together, and it showed. Dusknoir just wondered how much it had hurt him to discover that she had lost all her memories of him.

“It is nothing that concerns you,” Dusknoir persisted, trying to ignore how his voice shook, quite involuntarily.

“Something is telling me otherwise.” Grovyle leaned towards him, scrutinizing him carefully. “You’re feeling something, that’s for sure. Feeling something is better than feeling nothing at all.”

Dusknoir growled beneath his breath, but it was weak. “You certainly are persistent.”

Grovyle chuckled lightly. “How do you think I’ve managed to live this long?”

The Ghost type stared at him, clenching his fist around the Gummis and heaving a shaky sigh. “I am…confounded.”

The Wood Gecko Pokémon raised a brow.

Dusknoir looked back towards the mouth of the cave. The sun was completely concealed by the distant horizon, and the colors were beginning to drain into a deep indigo. “As you are well aware, I…have not had many good accomplishments in my life. I sought nothing but power, strove to gain it by any means, and…I have done nothing but serve for the betterment of darkness. I did hunt you and Eliana down, I attempted to attack you, then I pursued you into the past…” Dusknoir drew his shoulders in, folding his arms tightly over his chest and shrinking into himself. “I very nearly killed you multiple times, with clear malice exhibited constantly, but you still found it in yourself to grant me pity. Why?”

Grovyle fell silent for a very long moment.

“Dusknoir,” he began slowly, “have you ever felt true hate for someone, ever, in your life?”

The Ghost type was taken aback. “Pardon?”

The smaller Grass type raised a brow and Dusknoir averted his eye.

“No,” he said hesitantly, “I don’t believe I have.”

“Have you ever strongly disliked someone?”

“A few. Where are you going with this?”

“Do you dislike them because you think they wronged you?”

“I do, but I don’t know what you’re-”

“How difficult would it be to forgive them?”

Dusknoir squinted at him. “Excuse me?”

“How difficult would it be for you to forgive them?” Grovyle repeated.

Dusknoir studied him, recollecting his past resentments and grudges. It would, admittedly, be very difficult to forgive some of the things that other Pokémon had done to him before. He sighed deeply. “Very.”

“But could you find it in yourself to forgive them?” he asked.

Dusknoir thought a moment. “I…suppose so. Why are you asking me this?”

“Eliana once told me,” Grovyle said, “that part of the reason so many Pokémon have become twisted as they are is because they were cold-hearted to begin with. Refusing to forgive others can result in constructing a wall of bitterness that will block you off from anything good, and hatred can make that wall much harder to tear down. But if you’re willing to forgive, and to keep bitterness from building up, then you can in turn better yourself.” The Wood Gecko Pokémon eyed him neutrally. “Dusknoir, despite what you said during our journey about despising me, I didn’t believe you. You couldn’t truly hate anyone - it’s not in your nature, and I sensed that. The only reason you ever felt any kind of malice to begin with was due to where your loyalties lay, but when you began to realize that there was truly no reason to possess such mal intent…”

He smiled softly, glancing out towards the quiet dusk outside. “That’s when you began to question what you’d known. That’s when you began to feel guilt. But that’s also what’s proving to me that you are a good Pokémon, Dusknoir.” Grovyle continued, leaning forward, “The fact that you are feeling guilt and that you are questioning yourself tells me that you aren’t twisted, you aren’t a bad Pokémon - you were just a little misguided. You are a good Pokémon at heart, and I want you to realize it.”

Dusknoir looked away, pulling his shoulders inward and trying to fight the hot sting beginning to blur his vision.

“Your shining spirit,” Grovyle said softly. “It’s always been there. It was just hidden for a long time.”

“Grovyle…” Dusknoir swallowed thickly, folding his arms tightly over his chest. His dignity was in shambles, but picking up the pieces didn’t seem as mortifying as he might’ve thought. “…you’re deluding yourself.”

The Grass type chuckled. “Don’t worry. I won’t tell Celebi about this.”

The Gripper Pokémon grunted, swiping at his eye just as the beat of tiny wings made itself faintly known. He could hear Celebi’s grunts of effort, and Grovyle shifted to his feet, moving towards the cave mouth.

“Dusknoir…”

The Ghost type looked towards him, taken aback by the almost amused smile plastered across the Grass type’s face.

Grovyle tilted his head towards the outside world. The sun had completely receded below the horizon, the sky a deep navy, and stars were twinkling brightly against the dark expanse. “Welcome to the future.”

Dusknoir watched him exit the cave and disappear around the mouth’s edge, and after a moment he heard his and Celebi’s voices mingling, her tone obviously grateful as Grovyle must’ve been taking a part of her burden.

This new, brighter future would take a lot more to get used to than Dusknoir had anticipated previously, but he felt that maybe it wouldn’t be so bad. If this, finding himself, was just the beginning, then he looked forward to everything else that awaited him. There were many things that would need to be done as time transitioned into functioning properly again, many responsibilities to take up, but Dusknoir was ready for the challenge. He was much stronger than before. He was sure of that.

He and his shining spirit.

[threeletterslife]

Update

TL;DR: below the keep reading, vote on my update schedule

Hey everyone :) It's been a while—five months since I've last posted on this account and nearly a year since I've posted the 35th chapter of LOD

First and foremost, I want to apologize for being gone much longer than expected, and I will apologize again for being unable to offer more clarity about my absence, for now and in the future. Thank you to everyone who sent kind asks/messages checking up on me and to everyone who was invested enough in LOD to inquire about an update schedule. I felt a lot of guilt for not being active and for not delivering or meeting expectations, so just wanted to send out my sincerest apologies :')

I will attempt to answer the three most commonly asked questions I've gotten during my hiatus in this post:

Will you be continuing LOD?

Yes. As I've said time and time again, I will never abandon a story that I've invested so much of my time into. Call it sunk cost fallacy or delusion but I will finish LOD if it's the last thing I ever fucking do lol. Updates will be slow, however. But I promise you now that I will never actually leave. If I do suddenly disappear for years, that honestly means that I've died lol

When will you be posting a new chapter?

This depends on you guys. In all honesty, I have chapters 36 to 39 "ready" to publish. I am not in the position to write at this moment in time, so this would mean after I post chapter 39, there's no telling when the next update will be :( I have two options for you guys:

OPTION 1: I can post all of the chapters I have written in one go

Pro: You'll have access to all of the existing (and finished) LOD content, which is very well-deserved, so you can binge-read to your heart’s content

Con: You'll probably have to wait over half a year for chapters 40 and beyond

OPTION 2: I can post one chapter monthly/bi-monthly on a consistent schedule

Pro: I'll be able to buy some time (it'll take 4-7 months to post the remaining chapters) to write so that by the time I post chapter 39 (later this year or early next year), I'll most likely have chapters 40+ ready so you won't be as much in the dark about my future update schedule

Con: You'll only get one chapter every ~1.5 months. I also can't guarantee I'll have chapters 40 and beyond ready to go after I finally publish chapter 39 but I'd try my best

Are you alive? How are you doing? Are you okay?

I'm managing, though it's been a while since I've felt like I've been living. I've been in survival mode constantly for the past year, and it's quite draining. But the good news is that I'll be graduating next year with my degrees, so I expect I'll be freer then. I'm currently taking classes and working at my internship so I'm constantly inundated with projects and exams

I have been writing, though. That's one thing in my life that will never change. College has been hard on me, though it has also been such a privileged, fun, and rewarding experience. It helped me grow up or maybe even devolve in some ways. I've met some diabolical people around here, and have had not-so-great experiences that definitely forced me to become less trusting and stern. Sometimes I miss my old self, but I also know that I've grown into someone who can be more tolerant of the complete BS that is occasionally adulthood LMAO

Anyway, I'm extremely oversaturated with STEM everywhere I go, which given my majors, is a no-brainer. But I find great reprieve in art, especially art that I create to heal myself. So I've slowly come to realize that the content that I want to create—and the content that makes me happy to create—is not well-aligned with LOD. Over the past year, I've been working on small side projects, such as an original collection of short stories that I feel really at peace with. I've said it before and I'm saying it again, but LOD has always been my challenge piece. I don't dabble often in fantasy, and I wanted to give it a go; I'll finish what I've started. But I would also hate to reduce what LOD is to a simple word like "fantasy," though that was my excuse to avoid writing it for months. I actually think LOD's a lot more than that. In a way, it's a character study; it's not purely about the magic systems. In fact, I don't even think I put that much emphasis on the magic systems in the first place. It's more about the characters, and what the people have to go through during a war, which I've also realized becomes increasingly pertinent given the political climate right now

I'm getting into ramble-town territory, so I'll stop for now. I think with all that being said, I'm doing okay. I'm exhausted, but I'm also an incredibly privileged person, so I should be grateful for where I am in life right now and the people who have helped me rise to this level (you included!)

I'm excited to graduate, and I'm excited to write every single day once I start my full-time job. My life goal is to publish a book, though I don't think it'll be a novel—either a novella or a collection of short stories. Anyway, if you've come this far, I thank you from the bottom of my heart. I will forever be grateful for this platform that I have and also be incredibly honored that people read what I put out here. I'll begin posting as soon as the poll is completed

Thank you for being patient with me, and I hope you stay happy and healthy <3

[writerpyre]

Hello!!

It’s been a LONG time but if you’re inclined to read please have a bonus chapter to an older fic: first time in just over four years that I’ve posted anything for any fandom!

I found it in my files today and being as it’s been so long, I figured why the heck not, as I reckon it’s about time I came back with something. It’s not technically new writing, but I’m pretty gosh darn happy with myself either way. I’m finally at a place in my life where maybe things are going to be ok? I mean, I’m 31.

I’ll see what else the fates bring (my bestie is pretty unwell — not sure what’s with this people closest to me getting horribly sick thing), but I think I’m in a place where if I go back to using my writing to cope I’ll be fine. I can at least hope.

(For those who have by this point probably given up anticipating an update for Fulcrum (or anything related to it) never fear, for that one is next on my agenda! I’m ‘Bound’ and ‘Determined’ to get John through his decade-long predicament. Haha.)

Either way, have a chapter. :)

(For those who are unaware, Kent is my OC, Virgil’s identical twin who died of complications from a heart condition, three days after their birth. Technically part of my AIE “AU”, I originally wasn’t intending to ever post this part, as it’s a practice piece I used to look at who Kent Tracy may have been had he survived past infancy.)

Midnight

The soft sounds of Virgil’s snores rumble through the room from the top bunk, but Kent lays in the bottom bed, wide awake with his pen in one hand, the flashlight in another; scrawling furiously across the pages of his notebook.

It’s past eleven again, and the fourteen-year-old boy can’t sleep; the insomnia from sleeping all day has kicked in again, and all he can do is while away the hours until his father and older brothers roll out of bed. He doesn’t fear waking up his twin brother; Virgil doesn’t wake up unless someone holds the alarm clock right next to his ear; volume up on full, so it’s highly unlikely that he’s going to be disturbed from the light.

He doesn’t mind overly much though, these quiet hours before the dawn. Being one of six children often means that aside from the two hours of study that their father enforces every day, it’s very rare for any of the Tracy children to have any time to themselves without another sibling interrupting it somehow.

It’s nice to have this time to write, and consider and dream without his two youngest brothers asking ‘What are you doing, KT? Can I see? Lemme look!’ he finds it bliss to not have his father wanting him to help with chores or his grandmother wanting him to watch Alan while she takes Virgil and Gordon out, because their father is busy in the office again.

It’s peaceful, and as much as he likes a bit of chaos and excitement, Kent also likes to have some quiet now and again. He loves the way the moon streams through the curtains in the bedroom, how he can listen to Virgil dreaming and feel his brother’s happiness and quiet soul soar through their twin bond.

He feels the pressures of being the sickly child; the one who everyone has to be careful of and look out for too much, and for Kent, these moments when he doesn’t have them looking over him in concern and hovering when he’s ‘too pale’ or ‘overtired’, it just makes him feel more whole somehow. At fourteen, he just wants them to stop seeing him as the ill one and allow him to grow without them worrying that he’s going to overtax his weakened heart.

In these moments, he can remember his mother, and how like him; she was a writer, although with six children before she died, she never got to achieve her dream of getting a novel published. Sure, she wrote for the local newspaper, along with the kindergarten teaching and the music lessons she taught in order to help their father with the monthly bills, but it’s something that Kent knew she always wanted to do. Now she’s gone, he’s more determined than ever to achieve that dream, and make his mom as proud of him as she was as his other brothers.

That’s not to say that he didn’t think she was, but he just wants to do something that his three older brothers haven’t yet.

Kent loves his family, but he just wants to get out of this little box, pre-packaged, made just for him, the one that labels him as the sickly child, the one who is to be worried over and assisted.

It’s not that his father, Grandpa and Grandma don’t expect him to amount to anything, just that somehow, Kent has this invisible label on him that instantly informs people that he’s ill and that he is given just that little bit more leeway to get to places a little easier. There’s nothing more Kent hates more than to be told that he needs to take it easy, or that he can’t do something, just because he’s sick.

That’s why he uses this time, past the hour he should’ve been in dreamland to work harder on anything he ever has in his life, because he wants to make them proud, to break out of the accidental constraints that his condition has placed upon him. He’ll rise above and beyond those automatic assumptions, and prove to everyone that he can do just as much as his brothers. Even if it takes him a little bit longer, even if he has to work a little bit harder, he will achieve his goals.

As he packs up his book and caps the pen an hour later, still not sleepy but content that he’s worked with what he can for tonight, Kent is determined that he’s going to become a published author before he hits his eighteenth birthday, because he’s a Tracy, and for a Tracy, failure isn’t an option.

He’ll lie awake for the rest of the night, and yes, he’ll be completely exhausted and will spend the day in bed tomorrow, but he’ll keep with him through his grandmother’s fussing and John and Scott’s smothering, the peace and tranquillity that this time has given him.

He’s happy, and he knows that if his mother is watching, she’ll be proud.

[aotopmha]

The final bits of the lvl 88 MSQ I have thoughts on are the dungeon and the trial.

Ktisis Hyperboreia was a little less impactful for me compared to all of the other dungeons in Endwalker.

Zot had the really cool interior design and final boss, Babil had the really cool train set piece that lead into the tower and Anima, which narratively led perfectly into what came next, Vanaspati had the scale, tension and awesome monster designs.

Eventhough Ktisis gave you the chance to run a dungeon with the ancients and explore an ancient facility, only the final leg of the dungeon had a setting and a boss I found to be pretty cool: while the rest wasn't bad, it also wasn't as cool and interesting as some other encounters before it.

It was a cool idea that really deserved more interesting execution in my eyes.

So how does The Atiascope compare to them all?

Well, The Atiascope is equally a feast on the eyes as well as lore brain.

I think it is probably the best-looking dungeon of the game so far and I can't wait to see it with the graphical update.

We actually see what the Aetherial Sea approximately looks like, and the echoes of the souls of our friends accompany us on our way to Hydaelyn.

I think how souls work here also explains the apoearances of Haurchefant and Y'sayle when Estinien is freed from Niddhog's eyes. It's trace of their (memory) aether still not having moved on to the sea proper.

Sometimes the big lore dungeons can be less interesting mechanically than narratively (I love Amaurot, but feel like the cool monster designs deserved more interesting mechanics), but I think I enjoyed all of the bosses in the Atiascope because they gave new twists to old foes.

Livia, Rhitahtyn and Amon all had really neat twists to their fighting style and attacks.

I like the positioning with Livia.

I like opening up the safe spot for the walls Rhitahtyn creates. Shields as weapons is always such a neat concept to me.

And Shiva creating the ice block for Amon's attack is one of coolest story-gameplay integration moments in the game for me.

What a fantastic idea.

Between the bosses, the souls we see are:

- Papalymo, with Ilberd as a strong mob to take down.

- Haurchefant, who gives us a buff.

- Minfilia, who we see creating the way forward at some point.

- And of course, as mentioned Shiva/Y'sayle, who creates the ice block to protect you from Amon's attack.

The cutscene after the dungeon gives us closure on Amon, which I already went into in another post here, but it also gives closure on Asahi.

I love how the hatred between Asahi and Alphinaud is mutual.

"Likewise I hope we do not meet again."

In the cutscene before the trial, Hydaelyn sums up the character arcs and struggles everyone has gone through and also restates that she ultimately sundered reality for humanity to have a chance against Meteion, for which they need the ability to manipulate Dynamis.

And most crucially she restates that what she did caused much suffering; it was simply her solution to the problem of humanity's survival, not the morally optimal option out of any of the solutions the ancients could find. And I think that's my favourite part of her story.

She implemented the best solution she could think of that would preserve humanity's future, and it was still imperfect and caused much pain.

And then we get to the trial itself.

Which was a little bit of a let down in my eyes because Zodiark was so good.

It's, again, great on the lore level because we see all of these iconic elements associated with her character used in the fight.

We see her as an all-rounder fighter, then must defeat the crystals styled after the ones we initially get from her and finally, we see her create mini Floods of Light.

However, I don't find it particularly unique mechanically.

I still like it, I just don't find it mindblowing.

What I like about her farewell afterwards (this also applies to the cutscene before the fight), is that we get to address her as Venat because I think the real intention with her characterisation in Endwalker was to humanise her.

Not necessarily to make her good or bad morally, but to give her beliefs she acts upon with conviction.

I see the intention behind her character as that of an incredibly strong, but still imperfect woman put into a difficult situation, who fought for the future of humanity with all of her might.

And I think she deserves to be sent off as that "human" woman, not the "goddess" she became.

And finally, here is where I mention the details that the Labyrinthos/Atiascope section uses to bring the story full circle: the Dalamud shards, which were a symbol of the Seventh Umbral Calamity are now used to save humanity along with the Mothercrystal, which has been a stand-in/symbol for Hydaelyn for so long, is used as a fuel to travel to Meteion.

Once again, I think it's all just really well done.

And with the next quest I'm at being the first lvl 89 quest, I'm officially in the final stretch of 6.0.

I was planning to get to it today, but I think I also have other plans today and the next few days, so I'll see how it works out time-wise.

Aiming for it in the upcoming days/week for sure, though.

[moongothic]

Knowing how funky One Piece world can be, Crocodile could probably blame his sudden change in looks after HRT on him being a late bloomer (in case if anyone asked about it)

Yeah, and I have discussed that before, how like, it is still plausible Crocodile could be stealth trans

For one, Iva-chan's ability to change people's bio-sex isn't actually that widely known about, Bon-chan even talked about them like they were a myth amongst the queers. So even if there were big news about a Shichibukai suddenly transitioning in the news, the average person outside the Grand Line (where Devil Fruits are so rare they're considdered legends by some people) might not even considder it possible that someone could just suddenly change their bio-sex

Another thing is that we know Crocodile had one (1) bounty before he became a Warlord (he could've had one or two smaller ones before the final pre-Shichibukai bounty, but we can't know for sure until Oda spills the beans), but we've never actually seen his original bounty poster from 20+ years ago. And we know that sometimes bounty images aren't actually that accurate, they can be decades old (like Robin's which took like 20 years to get updated), they can even be shitty drawings (like Sanji's). So it's entirely plausible Crocodile could've had a really shitty bounty poster originally And last but not least, we don't even know how often Crocodile was in the news pre-his heroic era. Like we know he made a name for himself fast and became a Shichibukai quick, but even if the news did report on his crimes often, for all we know those could've been text only without any photos of him (or if there were photos, they could've been blurry as hell because of sand or whatever).

The poing being that the average person might not have even known what Crocodile looked like pre-T. And so even if there were BIG HEADLINES and a massive scandal about Crocodile transing his gender... Like the average person who doesn't know about Emporio Ivankov could probably brush the news off as nonsense. And if there were no big headlines about it, Morgans just started reporting on Crocodile's heroics without really bringing up the transgenderism, again. Some people might be like "wait, I thought Crocodile was a chick", but if the masses don't know about Ivankov, a "you must be mistaken, clearly that's a guy" response and people moving on would make sense.

And yeah, the guy probably would've had to go MIA for a month or two for the pregnancy at the very least, for all we know Crocodile could've been lowkey MIA for a whole year (if not even longer! 'Cause we don't know what he was doing in his mid/late 20s). So if he suddenly came back with some extra scars and a giant hook, him saying he hit the gym after Whitebeard kicked his ass and/or claimed to be a late bloomer, for the average person that really could work as an excuse as to why he's changed so much physically since they last saw him (if they ever did).

The thing for me though is that it's just easier to imagine Crocodile being openly trans (and nobody gives a fuck because he transitioned like 17 years ago pre-TS), than jump through all these hoops to make stealth trans Crocodile happen.

[davekat-sucks]

Something fascinating I realized is that it has been almost 3 weeks since the last Beyond Canon update! If I can recall, the previous mini-update was on August 23rd, a Friday. From where I am tomorrow will be September 13th, 3 weeks!

So I now speculate this large gap of time (longer than the 2 week waiting period) may be for various reasons, and because I don’t follow James Roach on Twitter.

In my speculation, I will order my ideas from most likely to least likely, with the first reason being most probable, and the last reason being more a fanstasy than reality.

So Beyond Canon’s update has been delayed probably because:

1. James Roach had to attend to personal business with family or his individual life, which you should prioritize over a webcomic.

2. The last Vriska VN updates will come out in a bundle, and the planned release date is the 1 year anniversary of the comic’s return, 10/8/24

3. The team is taking a break from work stress and is using their vacation days to do fall stuff like pick apples from an orchard.

4. Members of James’s team have been moved to the Hiveswap development team by request from Whatpumpkin to the HICU and James is hiring new members for writing and art.

5. The comic is going on a long Hiatus again, similar to when the old Beyond Canon team packed up their stuff and had the comic in stasis for 2 years and 9 months. It’s likely no one would try to pick up the comic where it left off a second time, considering even the fandom’s favorite music producer and competent guy James Roach could run the comic for an even shorter period of time than the much less beloved and much more volatile old team. Thus, Homestuck: Beyond Canon would be soft cancelled.

Remembering how there was a job listing for Act 3 as well, I wouldn't be surprised that James Roach was involved with that process as well to recruit new team members. I can definitely see the last Vriska VN update be on the anniversary BC/HS2 started. There are only two sections left for Vriska redemption arc. If they aren't ending it off with some epic flash video, then that means the final update will fall on October 8th. The polls on Patreon show though they won't update the story that quickly after finishing Act 1, they will still make illustrations/art pieces for the Patreon supporters. So the Patreon won't exactly be closed by the time they take their break. There is also the fact that the Karkat plushie on Makeship, the official campaign will be released on September 16th. So if things Patreon funds can't help for Beyond Canon or Hiveswap Act 3, then this is the safety net to rely on.

[curiouscompanions]

Entry #5

It hurts. Mariella didn't blink yesterday. Is it possible to count every pixel creating the flawless gray of this fake sidewalk? Is it possible to cure corrupted files and rewrite their codes? Mariella didn't blink today. I want to do something for her so badly. But all I can do is observe her. Mariella is still standing there and I am still sitting here. We are so close, yet so far from each other. Multicolored spots are swirling everywhere, static electricity is jumping on the tips of my fingers. I'm sure Mariella feels my continuous gaze. I know that she knows that I know she feels it. And it hurts so much. Mariella doesn't blink. Why does it hurt so much? Mariella doesn't blink. Please, blink just once! Just once!

The blue screen burns my eyes the moment I try to take off these stupid damned glasses. Tears and blood stain my shirt’s sleeves. It hurts so much. I'm trying to reject this role, but it seems attached to me too tightly. It hurts too much. I am just an Observer.

No. No. NO.

I have to do this. For her, for my dear Mariella.

... 100% ...? What just happened? Did you really extract all available text files? Wait a second. Not extracted, but cured. That's exactly what I meant. Well, your antivirus did a truly remarkable job. You should let it update itself every time you turn on your computer. Well, dear Reader, I'll start from the beginning—

In reality, I find myself starting over and over again from the very end, and since there is no end and never will be, there is no beginning, at least not in my memories. Yes, once upon a time I was just one of the many people stuck within these plain beige walls, once upon a time I had a name, once upon a time I even had a life …probably. The Narrator keeps saying that he was "built" for this job, that he is just a machine, he continues to try to convince us, especially himself, and so far, he is surprisingly good at it. Indeed, if you repeat the same lie many times, sooner or later, it slowly begins to transform into truth. So, it's not surprising that I began to doubt the existence of my own elusive backstory. It's entirely possible that I, too, would have started denying my own humanity …except, fortunately or unfortunately, I noticed her. I found her, my dear Mariella. And when I saw her, oh yes, I could see echoes of those qualities in her, I saw my humanity within her eyes. Humanity had eluded me for all eternity and after seeing it in her, I could no longer look away and lie to myself.

Echoes of old pain make me flinch once again. How many times have I died like this, bleeding, stricken by conflicted algorithms, sparkling with electricity? It happened often, very often. It's okay, though, because I wasn't completely alone anymore. I found her, my dear Mariella. And she found my gaze.

Since that moment finally happened, all my thoughts were consumed by her, all I could observe now is that piece of the fake Street, the very place where she continues to stand completely still.

These damned glasses, when I finally manage to take them off, my mind is pierced by this disgusting torturous feeling as if I have torn a part of my own flesh. I scream, cough and choke, but still overcome yet another meaninglessly unreal death.

I am still here, in this small dark room on the top floor. I am still here.

Another eternity passes, or maybe just a few minutes. The pain only recedes when my hands grab the glasses and put them back on my nose. Darkness fades away, and I see her again, my Mariella. We are together again, so close and yet so far. But this time, I refuse to be just a mere Observer.

One awkward movement and all my papers fall onto the ground; another one, and I dive into the blue glow of my screens. And here I am, the Street greeting me in all its gray glory. Teleportation turns out to be much easier than analyzing components of this action in theory. All it takes is determination and some basic understanding of the space-time continuum.

"Please, blink just once," I say, as I am approaching her, slowly going forward step by step, to my dear Mariella.

"Mariella," I exhale her name, staring into her foggy eyes. My fingers entwine around her palm, gently scratching her cold skin.

Let me look at you.

I gaze at her. She looks back at me, but she doesn't react at all, she still doesn't blink at all. Her current state shatters my heavily beating heart. I can't let go of her hand, can't take my eyes off her.

Let me be with you.

Perhaps I just imagined it, but in her misty eyes, there was a fleeting sense of understanding? Whatever it was, it was enough for me to take her by the shoulders, pull her towards me and embrace her.

I love you.

End of Entry #5

[breadknight-likes-things]

Bread's Game Of The Year 2023, #5: Cyberpunk: Phantom Liberty

2023 is one of, if not the, strongest years ever for video games as a medium of entertainment. I am limiting myself to five entries for my longer form GOTY list, because describing all ten of what I consider to be the best games of this year and why they resonate with me would be a herculean task that frankly, I don't know I have the mental capacity for anymore. I can do five though, and coming in just under the wire, isn't quite a full game, but welcome to my first instance of bending the rules in this series of posts: Cyberpunk Phantom Liberty. I don't have to get into the saga of Cyberpunk, if you're reading an online blog about video games, you probably know the story of that games fall and subsequent anime based redemption arc. Phantom Liberty, though, feels like a clean break, from all of it. Phantom Liberty had it's fair share of hype, of course, but going into this expansion pack, at least to me, felt like a good, solid clean break from the expectations that had come before and wildly affected the reaction Cyberpunk had received, and not entirely undeservedly. Phantom Liberty feels like something new, even though it was built on the much publicized enhanced bones of something old. It's funny that I want to describe the story setup of Phantom Liberty as "Straightforward" in my head, because the plot is cranked up twelve on the insane-o meter from the instant you load the quest. Phantom Liberty is a story that lifts themes, events and ideas from influences as far reaching as Escape From New York, James Bond, to paranoid political thrillers featuring a new double cross every five minutes. Somehow, in the face of all that, it tells a story that I still think I could define as simple, human, and fascinating. Even in the face of Idris Elba doing a.....strange approximation of an American accent. That they even got Keanu Reeves back in the booth to record a sizable new amount of dialogue as the infamous piece of digital shit, Johnny Silverhand, is wild. Even more wild that his best performance in the entirety of his time as the character only comes if you follow one specific line of quests that many players could easily miss. As a game, Phantom Liberty also has the undeniable advantage of coming out after Cyberpunks much vaunted 2.0 update. An update that it wouldn't be an exaggeration to describe as "Transformative". Loose collections of systems were tightened into a cohesive whole, the general play experience was wildly overhauled. Playing Cyberpunk finally feels like it approaches the game it promised to be all those years ago. So having all of this fresh coat of paint be present for the launch of a new major piece of content, is undeniably important to the success of Phantom Liberty as a whole. The trappings are familiar, but given how much has changed and improved, if you sat someone down in front of the systems at their most nitty gritty and said "This is Cyberpunk 2", it would not be the least believable statement. CD Projekt Red is no stranger to making good expansion packs. Witcher 3, famously, has two of the best ever designed for any RPG, let alone in the modern era. So I think the quality of Phantom Liberty perhaps could have been more predictable that many of us felt. Still, in a year packed so full of great games, Phantom Liberty rose above some real heavy hitters and delivered one of my favorite experiences of 2023. I don't know that I'd ever want to spend any extended period of time in Dogtown, but after this, I sure wouldn't mind visiting again.

[dominic-sessa]

life update!!

i finally have some free time and havent properly posted something in so long so i thought id write up something!

first of all i want to say that ive successfully fixed my bingewatch problem in late january!! i hate to say it, but seeing how many movies i saw last year in my letterboxd wrapped really concerned me 🫤 i wanted to make an effort to make use of my time properly (after starting a new job and all) and i thought i wont let myself waste time bingeing horrible b-movies just so i can bump up the percent watched in someones filmography (its kinda tricky doing it so i made a resolution to only watch movies which interests me if i want to see more of someone)

with that said, i ended up not watching anything on weekdays and eventually think that staring at my phone for more than an hour wasnt my thing anymore (at least in the context of doing it EVERYDAY). so that may be one of the reasons why the turnaround for my hyperfixations got slower (which i think is good!).

ALSO, i do want to mention that because ive been watching less films recently i initially thought it would be great for my gif making hobby since i wont feel the pressure of wanting to gif so many movies at one sitting. i tried this in early feb and.. well... lets just say that it takes time for my very old laptop to make gifs (i had it since college during the pandemic so it was really used!). i only screen record scenes i want to gif because i hate having to wait to download AND even if i had hq clips it would take my laptop so long to render. so making something lq and having to wait 30mins just for a single gif wasnt doing it for me (bcs i said i wanted to make more use of my time).. so thats the reason why i havent posted anything lately (I REALLY REALLY wanted to make a gifset of josh whitehouse in valley girl but the quality just ended up stressing me 🫠)

and for my last update, as u can tell from my reblogs on queue, i just saw daisy jones and the six and LOVE josh whitehouse and he really got me playing the guitar again 😭😭 (i still think its a miracle!!!). ive been practicing some old pieces i used to perform when i was in high school during my 5-9's and i just had a bizzare idea of getting into the piano. i only ever played classical before, so i always had a problem doing improvs. i spent some time looking at videos on youtube and found out improvs on the piano were waay easier to play and understand, so im gonna buy a keyboard very very soon (which im so excited for)!!!! learning how to do jazz improvs on keys would probably be my new hobby and making gifs would probably be back until i get a new laptop (which at the moment is very low priority 🥲)

SO THERES THAT! Now heres an audit trail of my jan-feb hyperfixations!

still on a tom blyth high since late december 2023

dom sessa: after watching the holdovers (seriously this time)

sam claflin: i wanted to get out of the coriolanus blackhole so i ended up reading finnick odair fics 😭😭 i found out he was the lead in daisy jones and the six so i watched that! my hyperfixation didnt last tho!! i have love rosie on my watchlist but got side tracked bcs of... *drum roll*

JOSH WHITEHOUSE -i find it crazy how most of my hyperfixations are englishmen. but yes. my sweet pookie. i love him. i will try not to talk much bcs if i start i wont stop. but tldr i didnt binge his filmography so i was on his youtube channel for quite some time and spent 15mins a day there... thats maybe the reason i got into playing the guitar again? love his music videos AND love how he plays flamenco. i play classical on the guitar and am a tarrèga girl so i never bothered to learn flamenco (tarrèga hated it) . but knowing just that made me want to at least remember some pieces i used to play just so i can play again... THEN i found out he has a new movie coming up with...

malcolm mcrae: ngl his pretty face caught my eye (special shoutout to anya! literally the power couple)... my first thoughts were like 'ohh i wonder what his character is like in triton'. but then i found out hes in a band SO i was thinking ok hes in a movie w josh so theres probably gonna be something music in it. i then looked up his band and love their songs!! theyre only a duo which i think is p strong (u dont need that many ppl in a band rly!) and i watched some interviews they had too!

KANE RITCHOTTE: my babygirl. my darling. idk what to say abt him. his songs with malcolm are always so magical. ive been playing gods in the details on repeat since early feb. hes my favorite more* member. the literal musical god. im praying hell sing more songs. ALSO i was suprised he did a cameo in daisy jones and the six with malcolm (they were the one who taught some of them how to play their instruments!! i was in awe bcs malcolm was the literal billy dune. LIKE sam claflin really copied his playing style which is so neat!!)

thats all!! thanks so much if uve read up until this point ily and pls lmk what uve been up to as well 🫶

take care <3