#one of them is starting to rot and its awful

[xxwish-bonexx]

Having teeth is such bullshit. You have bones in your mouth (that arent actually bones) that require constant maintenance. Brush everyday. Floss even though you dONT WANT TO. And if you do a terrible job at taking care of them, then they start to get these bastard holes that HATE YOU! Also you have teeth that you have to get pulled out or else they'll hate you to

[florencemtrash]

He Feels Safe With You — Azriel x Reader

Summary: Azriel's sleeping habits begin to worry you, but after a conversation with Cassian, you realize you've misinterpreted the entire situation.

Warnings: Major fluff. Like tooth-rotting sweetness. Sleepy Az.

Author's note: I should be sleeping because I have work tomorrow but instead I've chosen to write this oneshot and I have no regrets.

It was starting to become a problem now. 

You cocked your head to the side, cradling a cup of tea in your hands and watching Azriel as he continued to sleep soundly in your bed. You had the windows cracked open and the early Autumn breeze swirled indoors with the scent of lavender, bergamot, and the strawberry jam you’d slathered over your toast. You checked the time once again on the glossy marble clock face. The arrow-shaped hour hand clicked ever closer to 11am, the minute hand close to overtaking its competitor. 

10:55am and Azriel was still asleep. 

The sheets clustered loose and low around his waist, mimicking the curling of his shadows up and down the ridges of his spine and across the delicate membrane of his wings. His wings hung loose and relaxed, stretching off the edges of your bed and caressing the floor with a lover’s touch. You blushed at the sight. When you and Azriel had first started courting each other three years ago, you’d thought through the mechanics of housing an Illyrian warrior in your bed — should you buy a new bed frame and mattress? Did you even have space for it in your apartment? The answer had been no to both, and yet Azriel loved when your daytime activities ended here instead of at the townhouse. If he cared about having to walk sideways to avoid the bookshelves in the halls or having to crouch to avoid the overhang above the staircase, he didn’t mention it. 

Three hours ago you’d woken up beneath the gentle weight of his wings, untangled yourself from Azriel’s greedy limbs, and crept down the stairs to your kitchen, bleary eyed but well rested. But that was three hours ago! Since then you’d brushed your teeth, washed your face, and eaten breakfast, and still the Shadowsinger hadn’t stirred. You were beginning to question whether he truly was the Spymaster of the Night Court as you sat in your velvet chair and admired your lover. You traced all the subtle movements of his body as he muddled through dreams you could only wonder at — the creasing of his brow, the slack line of his lips as he breathed, the twitching of his fingertips as he reached for some phantom object. 

The clock struck eleven and you sighed, gathering your plates but leaving Azriel’s pile of toast, butter, and honey alone. You also left the teapot and its mismatched cup, blowing magic over its lid in a silent command to keep its contents hot until Azriel awoke. 

“I’ll be down in the shop,” you whispered to his shadows, trusting that they would relay the message when their master finally decided to grace the daytime with his presence. 

One by one, shadows slipped off Azriel’s skin, curling around your ankles and wrists in a silent plea to stay. You shook them off like one might a needy child, promising you’d only be two floors down. 

The artists’ corner in Velaris was an eclectic array of compact townhouses, each outwardly dressed in their unique, dazzling finery. Your townhouse was squished between a painting studio and a luthier’s. The painting studio’s owner seemed intent on changing the color of the wooden sidings every other day and the drawings scribbled over the windows every other week. Today it was periwinkle blue to match the hydrangeas overflowing from the window boxes. 

You nodded in approval as you flipped the apothecary sign over from “Much apologies, please try another time” to “You’ve caught us! We’re open!” The blue would match your tulip yellow sidings and the clean white accents of the luthier’s. Last week it had been red and that had looked gods-awful. 

You busied yourself in the shop, crushing up lavender and herbs and boiling mugwort in fire-stained glassware in between flurries of customers until the medicinal stench in the air grew thick and strong. You were used to it by now. It smelled clean. Like home. 

You were finishing tying up a bundle of teabags when Cassian came in carrying a sturdy wooden box under one arm like it weighed five pounds instead of fifty. You snapped out the wrinkles of a cloth bag, dropping the teabags and five vials of sleep serum for the nightingale-winged nymph in front of you. 

“Four feathers and three strands of hair, as we bargained for,” you said, sliding the bag across the counter. 

The nymph nodded in approval, extending out a wing and shoving her fingers into the pillowy softness. She tested for loose feathers ready to pull.

“You’re a godsend, Y/n, has anyone ever told you that?” She pulled out three feathers, closed her wing, and started testing the feathers on the other side. “Finnigan’s was asking me for ten. Ten! Can you believe that? If I hadn’t found you in time I’d have been reduced to a plucked chicken.” She was much less precious about her mousey brown hair and yanked out three strands at random. “Oops, you get an extra strand today,” she sang, dropping the feathers and hair into the jars you held out. 

“Well it’s a good thing you found me then, Moricka.” 

“Honestly! I understand he’s got a large studio space he’s renting in the thick of the Palace, and even I will admit the ambiance is rather professional—” 

Cassian raised his brow, a smirk tugging at the corners of his scarred lips as he continued to stand motionless in the doorway. It was true your space was more… homey than Finnigan’s, but your expertise shined in intimate spaces. You liked the control and the familiarity that came from running a smaller business and you wouldn’t give it up for the world. 

“But I do think the success is getting to his head. You both studied under Lady Madja so I don’t see why—” 

You nodded absentmindedly. It was always like this with Moricka. The songbird in her made it difficult for her to stop talking, but at least her voice was pleasant. 

She threw her hands up in the air before finally catching wind of another presence in the room. Cassian waved at her with a wink and an orange blush creeped onto her full cheeks. He tended to have that effect on fae with his towering size and the wild beauty of his chiseled jaw and smattering of scars over his cheeks and brow. 

“Oh… oh dear, I didn’t realize you had another customer. Oh my goodness I’ve been talking your ear off all this time and you’ve been too kind to say anything. You’re a godsend, Y/n. A godsend! I don’t know what I would do without you, although I should really be letting you go now.” She grabbed her things and sidestepped the range of Cassian’s wings, trying and failing now to gawk. “I’ll see you soon enough again I’m sure.” 

“I’ll be here.” You sighed in relief when the doorbell rang behind her petite frame, the inoffensive smile you offered all your customers sliding off your face like oil on water. Cassian chuckled, dropping the box onto the countertop with a dull thud. 

“Long day?” 

You pulled out a stepstool and began rummaging around through the box, pulling out jars of squid ink, bark trimmings, buttons, and one particularly nasty jar containing a large eye suspended in yellow goo. “It’s not even three.” 

“Did I stutter?”

You tapped the glass and the eye swiveled around to look at you, pupil enlarging and constricting with a stutter. “Yes, yes very good,” you muttered your praise and Cassian fought hard not to shiver. He had a stomach for a great many things, but some of the specimens you handled tested his resilience.

“Thank you for bringing all of this. You’ve saved me a great deal of trouble.” 

“Perhaps you could do the same for me and tell me where my brother is? I’ve been looking for him all day.” Cassian leaned forward on the counter, a mischievous glint in his eye. “Are you holding him hostage, Y/n? Are you using your feminine powers to bring the poor male to his knees? I must admit, I didn’t imagine you as the kind capable of kidnapping. Or shadow-napping, shall we say?”

You rolled your eyes. “I’m hardly holding him hostage.” You gestured down the hallway past the bookshelves and the cases of empty glassware where the light from the staircase glowed like an iron eye. “He’s upstairs sleeping.” 

Cassian furrowed his brows, stepping around and past you. He kept his wings tucked closer to his shoulder blades, careful not to upset the cramped organization you maintained in your shop. 

He smirked. “Still? Are you sure you didn't work your feminine powers last night?” 

You glanced out the store window. A few fae lingered outside the coffee shop across the street clutching takeaway boxes against their chest as they chatted and sipped their drinks. The street was otherwise empty. For now, you wouldn’t have to deal with any customers. 

You looked back at Cassian. “I actually wanted to ask you about that.”

His brows furrowed. “About feminine powers?” He'd meant that as a joke.

“Gods, Cassian let that go.” You wrung your hands. “I wanted to ask if Azriel was alright? Has he seemed… normal to you?”

“I don’t know, has he?” Cassian lowered his voice, sinking into one of the stools by the clear glass medicine cabinet. “From what I can tell he seems well. Happy.” 

Although happy was an understatement. Ever since you’d stumbled into their lives with Madja’s accolades and your wry humor, Azriel had been a goner. You’d pulled emotions from him as deftly as a spinster with a pile of wool, reduced him to a reverential, lovesick mess, and imbued his existence with a color not even Feyre could mix up. Which made it all the more confusing why you looked so nervous.

“You’ve seen more of him than I have, Y/n.” Cassian said. He braced his elbows against his knees, turning serious. The faint bags under his hazel eyes hinted at sleepless nights spent fussing over Neera. It was their fault really, any daughter of Nesta and Cassian was destined to be restless and particular.

“He just… he’s been sleeping more. Falling into bed early, but waking up late. Sometimes we’ll be reading together or just existing side by side and when I turn to face him, he’s dead asleep on the couch.” 

Cassian’s lips twitched, slowly stretching into a smile. You plucked a hemp bag off one of the wall shelves at random, tossing its contents into a mortar and beginning to grind just so you could have something to do with your hands. 

“At first I brushed it off, but it’s gotten to a point where I’ll be talking to him — mindless things, but regardless — and I’ll catch him dozing off. He’s always very apologetic after but I…” The mortar and pestle clattered to a stop. “I worry that he’s growing bored of me. Or that he’s sick in a way I can’t help.” 

“Y/n.” There was a smile in Cassian’s voice, and indeed when you looked at him, his teeth were glistening in the soft afternoon haze. His eyes shined knowingly, as if the answer were obvious.

You paused. “Yes?”

“He feels safe with you.” 

You blinked once. Twice. 

“Pardon?” 

Cassian tipped back in his seat, knocking his head against the cabinet with a rattle of jars and glass as he laughed. “He’s sleeping so much because he feels safe with you. It’s probably why he prefers to spend time here instead of at the townhouse and why he’s still dead asleep while we’re sitting here gossiping about him. Three years ago you couldn’t even whisper his name in a crowded room without him appearing from the shadows as if summoned.” 

You felt heat rise in your cheeks. “Oh... I see.” 

Cassian was grinning. “Y/n, I promise you he’s not bored of you. Azriel sleeping is a good thing. The gods know he could use more rest. I think he might be the worst of us when it comes to taking care of ourselves.” 

Something about Cassian’s words had a crack splintering in your chest. You knew about his past. You knew of the horrors burned into the ruined skin of his hands and the weight his duties deposited on his shoulders.

And here you’d been worried over him sleeping past noon. 

Shadows slipped down the stairs, pooling around your feet in a neat circle and kissing the exposed skin of your ankles. Azriel followed closely behind, still wearing his rumpled hair and pants and a shirt he’d hastily shoved his neck and arms into. He hadn’t even buttoned up the slits below his wings, opting to let the fabric swing free and loose and expose flashes of skin as he walked. 

He jutted his chin out in acknowledgement of Cassian and then folded himself over your back, wrapping his arms tightly around your waist and dropping his face into the crook of your neck where he breathed in the scent of lemon and lavender and medicine. 

“You weren’t there when I woke up,” he said, frowning. There was a slur to his words.

“It’s past three, brother.” 

Azriel snapped his head up in surprise, squinting at the window and the afternoon sunlight streaking in. The pale cobblestones shone like they’d been drenched in honey. 

“What?” 

Cassian rolled his eyes, patting Azriel’s back fondly and mussing up your hair before walking towards the door. He flipped the sign from “You’ve caught us! We’re open!” to “Much apologies, please try another time.” 

“Goodnight, you two!" He called from over his back. "Remember we’re meeting at Rhys’s for dinner tonight.” He turned, bracing his arms against the top of the doorway and leaning forward like he meant to share a secret. “8pm sharp. Don’t be too late or we’ll get the wrong idea about what you two are up to.” He winked, then whistled down the street, letting the door close on its own behind him. 

Azriel sighed, going back to nuzzling his face in your neck. He peppered the sensitive skin there with kisses. 

“Will you be coming back upstairs then?” He murmured hopefully. "Now that you're finished with work?"

You bit your lip and decided rather quickly that the world would not end because you closed a few hours early. 

You led him up the stairs, past the kitchen and living room on the second floor, and then up to the third floor — your bedroom. The window was still open, the hustle and bustle of the city and the smell of coffee from across the street wafting in. Steam no longer poured from the lip of the teapot, so you knew Azriel had had something to drink, and where you’d left toast on his plate this morning lay only crumbs. 

Azriel dropped to his knees, untying your laces and helping you out of your boots. Then he straightened and tugged at the belt loops of your trousers, silently asking for permission before unbuttoning them and sliding them off your legs. Your shirt, then his shirt, and then his trousers joined the pile of crumpled clothing on the floor.

He gently pushed you back onto the bed, falling face first after you with a sigh. This was his favorite position to sleep in — you comfortable on your back and him laying with his hips slotted in between your legs and his head resting over your heart. 

You sank your fingers into his velvety, black hair. His hums of satisfaction flowed through your body, lighting every nerve with a comforting buzz. 

“Azriel?” You asked him, before sleep could finally claim him once more. 

“Hmmm?” 

“Do you feel safe with me?” 

He pressed his face further into the soft flesh of your chest, bringing his arms up and around your waist before allowing his wings to do the same. The thin membranes glowed red as hot coals, blocking out the most offensive rays of light from outside. 

“When I am with you, I forget that I was ever that boy whose hands got burned. When I am with you, the hundreds of years I spent feeling alone and worthless in this world melt away into nothing. When I am with you — when I am in this place that smells and feels so strongly of you — I can imagine a future that is good and pure and perfect.” He sighed deeply, seemingly ignorant to the pounding of your heart and the waves of feeling flooding your system. “So yes, my love — my Y/n — I do feel safe with you.”

“I feel safe with you too,” you murmured. “I love you, Azriel.” 

You kissed the crown of his head, earning one last smile and a slurred, “I love you, Y/n,” before his jaw went slack and the room went silent save for the mixing of your breaths and the stirring of shadows.

[l0vergirls]

just a little something that's been on my mind for a while now, like it's actually rotting my brain.

cw: stalking, a bit nsfw near the end, just general yandere stuff, not proof-read!!!!! so sorry if its a bit messy !!!!

★ (romantic) yandere!batfam x reader

imagine being the shared darling of the batfam.

it only takes one of them for the rest to fall in love with you, too.

let's say you meet tim during one of the days he actually decides to go to class, and he's thanking the heavens he did.

slowly, he starts to integrate himself into your daily life, and into your friend group. they all love him, of course. who wouldn't love the kind, funny, and handsome tim drake?

during all of this, he'd already told his brothers about you, and because they can't hide anything from bruce, he finds out about you too. unsurprisingly, they come to appreciate you as much as tim has.

and suddenly, you get a particularly handsome new neighbour in the apartment across from you (which you didn't know was even up for rent) and somehow always seems to be in the middle of stripping when you're home. almost as if he can feel your eyes on him. of course, you make sure not to get caught, and avert your eyes as soon as the cloth leaves his waist.

later, you find out his name is jason, and make a good friend out of him. he smokes on his balcony, while you drink coffee on yours.

barely a week after that, you get a new regular at the café you work at. his name's dick grayson. he says it's probably best for you to yell out his last name for his orders too. he's a detective, which explains the late nights he comes into the café. he's always got a stupidly handsome smile on his face, which only adds onto his neverending charm.

and during the occasion that you're walking home alone, you always seem to run into one of the many vigilantes that guard gotham.

you meet both batman and robin during one of your walks home. you're not scared of them, as most people are; you're merely fascinated at the tall figure that towers over you, and his more colourful counterpart that is also taller than you. robin seems to be just a couple years younger than you. and batman... you can't seem to get a read on the man.

you greet them both as calmly as you can, a small smile on your lips. you get nods of acknowledgment from both of them, which you suppose is the most you're getting.

batman doesn't seem to like that you're walking alone, so he sends robin to walk you home. you don't understand why, and you tell them you've walked this route many times already, that they probably have worse things to take care of.

he tells you that you can never be too sure in gotham. with the way he says it, in that gravelly tone, you can't find yourself to disagree.

on your walk, now with robin's company, you feel safer. you also find out this robin is a man of few words, very unlike the last few robins yet much like batman.

the next night, you run into red robin, who has an air of familiarity around him. he's real friendly— in fact, it's almost like talking to a friend. you think you've seen his smile before.

the night after that, you meet nightwing in all of his spandex-clad glory. he's charming, almost flirty.

and for a week, you don't bump into any of the vigilantes, but you do feel watched. you should be frightened, by all means, but you have a feeling deep in your stomach that tells you they won't hurt you. whoever they are.

you see red hood after that week. he's the more intimidating one of the bunch, you reckon. you've nothing to be scared of, knowing he (along with all the others) only goes after the real awful people. you're not guilty of anything, as far as you know.

his voice is almost robotic, as if being run through a voice changer. it doesn't do much to help his image, though you suppose that's the point. he asks what a little thing like you is doing walking around these parts. you say you're just heading home, like all the times you've met one of them.

he lets you on his motorcycle. if you were paying enough attention, maybe you would've felt his heart beating a mile a minute.

your days go on like this for a while. class, work, walk home with one of gotham's protectors. rinse and repeat.

unbeknownst to you, cameras have been planted all around your apartment. in many angles of your bedroom too, save for your bathroom. they've decided to give you privacy in there. no matter how much dick begged.

though they do have clips saved of you walking around in just a towel, or your underwear. god knows what they're doing with those.

but truly, can you blame them? you've invaded the deepest crevices of their minds, your smell lingering on their noses, and the shape of your lips following them in their dreams.

oh, they can vividly see— almost feel your lips on theirs, and they wonder what you look like when your face is scrunched up from pleasure, as their fingers enter you.

but they'll have to wait a little longer. and they'll be damned if they lose you, when you're playing right into their hands.

this got so long !!!! i had to let this all out somewhere <//3 definitely gonna add more but i needed to cut it off at this 😭😭😭😭

[envy-of-the-apple]

ive been really obsessed with your gojo/geto naga oneshots and asks lately it feels like literal brain rot at this point its so good. ive reread it 6 times lol

i was wondering though, what would Geto do if Gojo was just a little bit too heavy handed with you? to the point of a sprained or broken arm or leg. Would he get mad at Gojo or just mad in general that reader was hurt? Also how would they act in response to the injured reader who can't do basic tasks themselves, I personally think they would enjoy the fact she relied on them even more to even move now.

Reminder requests are still closed!!!! I just love this idea so so much holdon lemme-

Part one Part three

(Yandere, dark, implied forced relationships, noncon touching, biting, language barriers, drugging(?))

Top of the Food Chain pt2

Dark!Naga!SatoSugu x reader

Two days later, Satoru still wasn't allowed inside the cave.

You can hear him, hissing and clicking, right outside, hovering just behind the invisible line Suguru refused to let him pass. If you weren't already in so much pain, you would have found pity on the poor thing. He wasn't allowed in his own home, even though the incident wasn't entirely his fault.

Technically, Satoru saved you. It was yet again another escape attempt. Something you'd been doing a lot these days once you've figured out these beings' intentions with you. You'd gotten past the rock quarry this time, a new record. Your plan was filled with holes: there was no way to truly escape the island. You had no boat, no way to call for help. Still, you ran, forgetting that there were more dangerous things on this island other than two territorial serpent men.

It was a monster. There was no other way to describe it. Big, ugly, shiny spikes and sharp teeth, eyes dripping with bloodlust. You would have been eaten, killed, maimed, if Satoru hadn't caught up with you in time.

The only collateral was the loss of nearby plant life and your broken wrist.

That had been Satoru's fault. He'd pulled at you too hard at the hand. The remnants of adrenaline from the fight, his anger, anger made him too rough on your fragile body. He froze at the wet snap, and then you started screaming. That was how Suguru had found you. Despite how much Satoru clicked and hummed and tittered, from his mate's look, you doubted it helped his case.

Another lonely coo made you wince. Suguru only huffed, wrapping you tighter in his coils. They were already warm from your body heat. The numerous animal pelts helped your comfort too.

"Make him stop," you beg, "he's been going on for hours."

At that, Suguru lifts his head from the base of your neck. He tilts his head as he surveys you, and you can't help but think how awful you must look. Sickly-looking from the pain, clammy skin. He can't do much about your appearance, but the least he could do was shut Satoru up.

"What want?" Suguru asks, "water?"

At that, he picks up a sack filled with sea-smelling water. You wrinkle your nose, turning away, cocooning yourself within his coils. With the increased pain, your appetite has decreased, as well as your thirst. The stress of being trapped like this along with your broken wrist was starting to take its toll on your body.

Suguru makes a sound of disapproval, shuffling around behind you. You know he's still mad about the escape attempt, but he's concerned enough for your well-being to put his anger to the side for now. He'd helped wrap your wrist, using something stretchy and soft.

You raise your wrist up, inspecting the thin material wrapped around your wrist. You're not sure what it is, it's too silky to resemble cotton. It must be from the foliage around the island. Yet, another strange thing you'd never find the answer to.

There's another rumble coming from the Naga's chest. He wraps a hand around your chin, bringing your face closer. In his other, he holds the dripping sack.

"Suguru," it's too soft to be anything more than a whine, "it hurts too much to take anything right now. Stop."

"Hurt?" he asks.

To that, you gesture to your broken wrist. It may not have been broken, you were no doctor, so you couldn't say for certain. But considering you'd been in the same amount of pain for two days, it really didn't matter to you.

A click, before he's tossing a glare at the entrance of the cave. He'd already given Satoru a beating right before coming to coddle you. Despite being bigger than his mate, Satoru is docile enough to take them. Suguru had been acting more aggressive lately. You had a feeling it was your fault.

He'd been inspecting your wrist every so often, but you see a different look within his brown eyes now as he takes your injured hand. He carefully turns your palm over, pressing slightly into your wrist. When you yelp, he retracts.

"Hurt." Suguru confirms. You can only nod.

"Hurt. No drink? No eat?" You don't like the way he's talking. As if he's putting a puzzle piece together. Coming to a solution you won't like.

When you go to pull away, his grip only tightens.

"No hurt," he says it like a promise, as though you're a toddler and he's coaxing you into drinking a sour-tasting medicine. His lips part, revealing the fangs you've often seen him use on meat, on Satoru.

Never did you think he'd ever use them on you.

"Suguru," you're pleading, trying to move away when he bends down, his hair brushing your sweaty forehead. You can feel his breath on your neck.

"No hurt," he repeats, and then he bites down.

He lied, of course, he did. His teeth puncture your skin, tearing through like paper. You think you screamed, or maybe it was more akin to a pitiful whimper. In the background, you can hear someone hiss, Satoru maybe?

For a second, you feel everything, the pain, the puncture wound, Suguru lightly licking your neck.

And then, you feel weightless.

It's hard to describe, but your brain feels like it's turned to mush. Your body feels like you're on a soft cloud, just there, floating. In the back of your mind, you remember how dazed Satoru would get whenever Suguru bit him. At the time, you just thought he was lovestruck.

When Suguru pulls away, he's smiling. A trail of blood, your blood goes down his lip. You can barely keep your eyes on him, close to falling asleep.

"No hurt," he says. When he leans down to kiss you, you accept without a single fuss.

You don't remember much after that, but you remember accepting whatever Suguru put in your mouth. The panic in your body was non-existent as he held the water-sack above your lips, watching as your throat bobbed. You think he kissed you a few more times, but you're not too sure. You were a lot more averse to kissing before. It'd make sense he'd take advantage of it.

When you wake up again, you're in between two bodies. The pain in your wrist is still there, but not as horrible as before. You're still groggy, mind fuzzy. Whatever Suguru had given you was still in effect.

Satoru is the first to notice you're awake. Suguru and him must have made up during the time you were unconscious. He props himself up, peering down at you. With how dim the cave is, you can barely make out his features. He looks just as guilty as he had two days ago.

"Sorry," he mutters, "is sorry."

If you weren't still high, you might have laughed. When you continue to stare, he takes it in stride, leaning forward to kiss your cheek, then your lips. You wince in distaste, leaning back.

"Stop," you say but don't fight when he licks at your jaw. You can barely move your fingers.

Panic is still far away, a distant call than anything alarming. It should worry you, but you still can't feel anything.

Suguru is at your back. You can hear his scales move across the cavern floor. He gives a hum, content as he curls himself around you. He doesn't seem to mind Satoru's touches. Your theory that they must have made up is unfortunately starting to strengthen.

You could barely manage Suguru's coddlings. You don't think you'll survive Satoru's.

"Sorry," he mouths into your neck. You can feel the grip on your waist starting to tighten. He stops, rising up to stare at you.

Blue, almost glowing.

"But no more leave."

You're coherent enough to piece together what he means. You can't escape Satoru. You can't escape Suguru. You can't leave this island. Running away is useless.

The nagas understood it. It's time you did too.

"Yes," you finally say, "no more leave."

[jam3sacaster]

“You just don’t see it, do you?”

(Rivals) Rupert Campbell-Black x Reader

Suggestion by a sweet anon 🫶🏽 / You are convinced you are utterly unlovable. Rupert, however, is convinced otherwise ..

18+ FANFIC / A lil soft one for you guys to break up the brain rot I’m inflicting upon our fandom 😅 Reader character aged 21.

Growing up, there were many ways you envisaged your 21st birthday playing out. Copious mounds of presents among constantly refilled glasses of ridiculously expensive champagne. One of the ways you didn’t imagine your 21st, however, was sitting on your living room sofa, sobbing silently. Not a single living soul in Rutshire had been to visit you. The only friend you’d made in this wretched village, Caitlin O’Hara was still holed up at her boarding school, but had sent you the most charming birthday card she could muster— fangirling over Rupert Campbell-Black, as usual. Talk of the devil, the aforementioned man that you had spent many a night with in recent weeks hadn’t even bothered to send so much as a card. Some birthday, you think to yourself.

What is wrong with me, you ask yourself. You’re young, you’re beautiful, you have a sparkling personality. Yet the man frequenting your bed so often couldn’t even grace you with a brief appearance on such a significant birthday? Hoisting yourself from the sofa to let your charming your charming mongrel, Bertha, outside, you hear a soft, rapping knock at the door. Huffing, you shuffle to the front door and open it just a slither. “Hello?” You ask, before clocking Rupert stood, puffing a cigarette whilst grinning widely, arms clutching large, intricately wrapped gift. “Oh, it’s you.” You roll your eyes, feeling them sting with salted tears. “You could sound more overjoyed.” He huffed jokingly, and pushed his way inside.

“I’m not in the mood tonight, Rupert. I’ve had the most awful day.” You groan, following the overly enthusiastic man into your living room. You throw yourself onto the sofa and curl your legs into yourself, watching him as he stands in the centre of your sheepskin rugs, muddied boots leaving the most unforgiving stain. He outstretches the present into your eyeline again, and shoots you that intoxicating grin. “Happy birthday, angel!”

“What is it?” You ask. Unsurprisingly, you’re not in the mood for his foolishness. “Open it and see.” He rolls his eyes. “As I said, Rupert, I have been on my own all day so I find it wildly inappropriate that you arrive nearing on,” you stop to check your watch, “10pm with a gift.”

“Good things seldom come to those who wait.” He replies, grinning. This wasn’t about you— he was wholly referring to the gift you would undoubtedly give him later. Suppressing your 12th huff of this conversation, you snatch the present from his grip and unwrap it. Between the gold-lined wrapping paper sat a red, leather box. Inside the box sat the most beautiful, delicate necklace. Silver links — each one adorned in the most intricate diamond. A thing of pure royalty. “For me?” You ask, gently pulling the jewellery from its carefully engraved indent in the box. Without responding, Rupert pulled you up and grabbed a handful of your hair, tossing it over your shoulder to tie the necklace to your body. His gentle touch sent shivers down your spine. After a few minutes of him grunting at the perplexing intricacy of the links, he spun you round to admire the eye-watering expensive gift he had bought you. “A special birthday gift for a special lady.” He remarked, taking a seat on the sofa and waiting for you to follow.

As you sat down, the sincerity of his gesture and the absolute misery of your day just got to you. Starting as quiet sniffles at first but working it’s way to inconsolable sobs, you absolutely broke down, prompting a rather shocked look from Rupert. “Hey, angel. What’s wrong?” He asked, wrapping a muscular arm around your shoulder and pulling you tight to his chest. “I just wanted to feel special, but all today has done is remind me of how brutally and honestly alone I am. I wake up every day to nobody but Bertha, and I fall asleep the same way. I look in the mirror everyday and my reflection gets more and more alien. I’m starting to have the utterly terrible feeling that I’m going to be this way forever,” you breathe deeply through your tears before continuing, “I am going to be alone forever. Unlovable and alone.” Rupert could only exhale— astonished at your heartfelt confession.

However, there was a touch of something deeper than astonishment in his sigh. “You just don’t see it, do you?” He shook his head as he spoke. You looked up at him now, eyes glassy and mottled cheeks stained with tears. “What?” You prompt.

“I have been to five different jewellers today. Granted, I should’ve come earlier but I travelled two hours outside of Rutshire, to a diamond specialist, to find your necklace. Have you read the note?” He sighed once more, motioning towards the jewellery box. You lifted the box open, and brought the small carded note to your eyeline. It read:

‘To my darling angel on your birthday, I hope you have the most special day, and I hope this gift makes you see yourself in the astonishingly beautiful way that I see you. With love - R’

Wiping away a falling tear, you sniffle. You felt incredibly guilty for being so coarse with him, but his heartfelt gift had warmed your heart — only very slightly. Rupert brushed his palm gently across your cheek, prompting you to maintain the most devilishly intimate eye contact.

“You don’t seem to understand angel, you absolutely terrify me. I am so wildly in love with you that I am afraid of my own reflection.. I look at myself and I only see a man that loves you. Ever since I met you, I have been restricted to being a man that loves you. It terrifies me, yes, but I couldn’t wish to be anything else.”

‘Doubt thou the stars are fire, doubt that the sun doth move. Doubt truth to be a liar, but never doubt I love.’ - Shakespeare

[tojisun]

like everything with john, it ends with a quiet admission.

"i'm tired."

the words fall from your lips like needles dragging along the curvature of your throat. they puncture, aching with their vengeance, until they slip into the open space, never to be taken back. never to be unsaid.

you do not look at him when you say this, incapable of facing your limits. your shortcomings.

you are a fraud dressed in fluffed up costumes, preaching about true love and never-ending devotion but look where you are right now—straining behind the stained walls of this relationship, splintering at the fleeting weight of his affections.

and you thought it was poetic how flowers could grow in between cracked asphalt.

the reality of the situation is like this—john loves you.

but it's not enough to silence the doubts and the jealousy, because you are jealous. you're not a jealous person, god knows many tried you, but this thing with john—this relationship that ever so fluctuates—it is troubling. insufficient, truly.

your friends told you to be better; that people who are jealous are just insecure about their relationship and yes, you are. that is the crux of it; that is what drags the voices from the pits of your stomachs to spit to each other’s face, spewing with vitriol because john has made you this beastly being, always pawing for his attention, always begging for the scraps.

he's left you rotten and all hollowed-out.

an empty opera house.

“is it because o’mary?” he asks, quick to find the rot in your core only to prod at it. gawk at it. to marvel at its festering like he had not been the cause of such unravelling.

is it because of mary he asked like you had not spent sleepless nights crying to him, telling him that you do not feel good when it was just the two of them. that you do not want whatever it is they have—hell, his friends had called her his work wife; crooning to each other like you were just a pinned butterfly stuck behind glass, watching as they coloured the details of john’s life beyond your grasp. of his love outside of your arms.

is it because of mary he asked like he hadn’t just told you of mary’s love for him, the confession she’d whispered as he held her in his arms after she had lost her pet to an illness. like he didn’t tell you, in awed whispers, how mary told him that he was the best thing that ever happened to her; the loveliest thing in her life like john was hers to begin with. like john wasn’t wearing a gold band on his ring—the promise he’s made in that courthouse, when the two of you were still too young and obsessively in love.

is it because of mary he asked like he hadn’t just told you, in angered puffs, that he couldn’t have rejected her then. she was in pain, he’d said. i couldn’t do that to her, he’d added like it was mary whom he married. like it was mary who he needed to protect and reassure and cherish.

so yes, it is because of her. but also, it is because you are tired.

tired of asking for his love. for his devotion. for him to choose you, come what may.

“just,” you begin, too weak for anything more. “sign the papers, please john.”

even when you are leaving him, you are still unable to stop yourself from pleading to him for his kindness. for his grace.

he stares at you, pinched lips and flared nose, and you stare back because this man—this john that stands before you—this isn’t the man you’ve loved. not the one who loved you back.

your john wouldn’t have hurt you this way; he would have listened to your whispered confessions, see the ache in your admission, and move himself away from mary because why did it matter if she had loved him? your john wouldn’t have cared for her affections; your john would have only cared for your own.

your john wouldn’t have—

your john wouldn’t. and now he is gone.

so you walk away from… this man amidst the suffocating silence, feeling nothing wash over you.

they said divorce feels like liberation; that it feels like the start of something kinder and better and brighter. but this just feels like a bruise on your tender skin—something blooming, pain so muted that it hurts only when you poke it.

and like how you were with all your previous bruises, you cannot stop poking at this one too.

[satorusugurugurl]

okay so 1st of all i love your posts

can you do nanami with a breeding kink plsss

ty <3333

First off thank you so so much!!

And secondly heck yes!! 😏

More Than Words

Summary: Your husband, Nanami Kento decides he’s ready to take your marriage to the next level.

Pairing: Nanami Kento x FAB!Reader

Warnings: Teeth rotting fluff! Super romantic, language, dirty talk, breeding kink, mentions of pregnancy, unprotected sex

Word Count: 2,704

A/N: This, this did things to me. But I liked it 🥵

Nanami watched you closely from the kitchen. You sat outside on the porch, sipping tea as you scrolled through your phone. The two of you made it a point to spend the evenings outside, enjoying the setting sun and breathing fresh air. He had just been outside with you but excused himself to try and settle his nerves.

He would ask you tonight if you were ready to start trying for a baby.

The thought of having a child hadn’t crossed his mind in your two years of marriage until last weekend. You two had gone to dinner with one of your coworkers, who had just been blessed with a baby boy. You were practically glowing as you held the little boy in your arms. The way you spoke softly, gently rocking them while humming? It was a side of you Nanami had never seen before.

The raw awe and amazement etched on your face was a look he desperately needed to see again. To see you staring at the child you both made would be a sight that would forever linger in his daydreams until he made sure it came true. To step in that direction, he needed to bring it up with you.

You weren’t on birth control. Every single form you tried since you were seventeen made you sick. From the pills to the shots, you considered trying the IUD, but you chicken out at the last second. The entirety of your sexual relationship with Nanami had always been with the use of condoms. So, if you agreed with him, that would mean you’d be doing it raw for the first time in either of your lives.

So he was nervous beyond all words, from wanting to bring a child into the world to experiencing having sex at its rawest form. Thoughts swarmed his mind in a slurry. There was a lot for both of you to consider. Both of you. Nanami couldn’t move forward without talking to you.

With a deep exhale, Nanami headed back outside, shutting the door behind him. “Sorry about that.” He whispered as he sat next to you on the outdoor couch.

“Mmm,” you immediately snuggled next to him, “I was about to call for a search party.” You teased, putting your phone away. “Are you feeling okay?”

“Mhmm,” You could easily see through that heavily played hum. Something was on his mind.

“Nanami Kento, I hate to break it to you, but I know you better than you know yourself. You have something on your mind.” Tilting your head up, you watched the tips of his ears flush before spreading down the nape of his neck. “So, you might as well talk to me.” You paused, “You know, seeing that I’m your wife.” You wiggled your left hand in front of his face—your wedding ring sparkling in the pastel colors of the setting sun.

“My wife.”

Your breath hitched as Nanami’s larger hand wrapped around your smaller one. Bringing your ring to his lips, pressing a kiss against it. His eyes were shut; he looked handsome, pondering whatever clouded his mind. Feeling your gaze on him, Nanami slowly opened his eyes, looking down at you.

“But you’re so much more than just my wife Y/N.” His fingers trailed slowly over your palm, tracing the lines over your skin. “You’re my best friend, partner, the love of my life.” Nanami brought your palm to his mouth, retracing the path of his fingers with his lips. “You’re my purpose, my reason to keep going.”

“Kento.” You whispered in awe as he turned the both of you so you were facing each other head-on.

“My soul.” He placed both hands on yours. “My strength.” You shuddered as his heated palm moved up your arms, trailing them slowly towards your shoulders. “My everything.” You moaned as his hands that so lovingly traced over your arms gently cupped your face. “But I hate to admit that I want more.”

His thumbs lovingly caressed your cheeks, bringing you flush against his chest. “More?” You followed his lead, running your hands slowly down his pecs and over his ab’s, heading towards his crotch. “How much more?” The groan that left his lips was deep and full of unfiltered need.

“I don’t just want you to be my best friend, partner, or wife, Y/N.” His lips were centimeters from yours. Your breath mingled with his as you breathed slowly in the last fragments of sunlight. “I want you to be the mother of my children.”

Kento saw the way your eyes lit up. A glimmering sparkle in Y/E/C irises. Just like you knew him, Kento knew you better than yourself. The way you melted against him, drawing yourself as close as you could on the small loveseat, there wasn’t a doubt in his mind.

The irrational fears and hesitation vanished as you whimpered. “I want that so bad, Ken; I want to be the moth—“ your husband silenced you with a searing kiss.

You followed his lead, kissing him as his gentle touch turned into something more needy, more primal. There was a desire he’d never felt before boiling deep within his chest. Kento needed you, needed to be buried inside of you, filling you with his cum, ensuring that you would be, without a doubt, pregnant with his child.

He was going to breed you.

Pulling away, you gasped for air, a string of saliva connected between your lips. Nanami’s chest rose and fell with each strangled breath as he so desperately tried to refrain from destroying you. Seeing the conflicted expression on his face, you decided to help. What kind of wife would you be if you didn’t? Dropping to your knees, you slowly pulled the waistband of his lounge pants down.

“Y/N love, what are you doing?”

“Shh~” you glanced at him, “you need to relax. Let me help clear your mind.”

Your delicate fingers traced the v-line of his crotch up and down. His hips jerked up, cock throbbing within his boxers. His brown eyes followed your hands, watching you tug his boxers down. His already hard, throbbing cock smacked against his stomach with a smack, his pre-cum smearing over his toned skin. The sight of his thick length had your mouth watering. Wrapping your hand around the base, you slowly stroked up and down, smearing his pre-cum over his entire length.

“Fuucck,” Nanami’s voice was almost inaudible as he groaned. Hearing him curse like that’s had your cunt throbbing, your slick coating your panties. “Fuck Y/N, that’s feels so fucking good.”

“Oh, my darling husband,” He peered down at you through half-lidded eyes, “you haven’t felt anything yet.” You took him in your mouth, and the salty yet sweet taste of him hit your tastebuds, making you whine around him. You bobbed your head up and down slowly, coating the throbbing tip with your saliva before you moved further down his shaft, gagging as his cock hit the back of your throat.

You slowly lifted your head back up when his hand wrapped into your hair. You shut your eyes, bracing yourself for him to slam your back down around his throbbing length. Much to your surprise, he did the complete opposite. Yanking your hair, he practically had to pry you off of him, his chest heaving as he forced you to look into his eyes.

“Did you not understand what I said earlier?” He stood, releasing his grip on your hair.

“I did; you want to make babies with me.”

“Mhmm,” he hummed, taking your hand in his helping you to your feet. “And how do you suppose I do that if I cum down your throat.” Nanami didn’t even allow you to consider an answer. “Looks like I need to give you a thorough demonstration of how it works.”

“Oh my god!” You laughed as Kento lifted you, carrying you inside towards your bedroom. “I guess a demonstration would be beneficial in this case.” You breathed out breathlessly as he tossed you onto the bed. “Just so you know, I might need several demonstrations.”

“I agree; the more demonstrations, the better.” Your husband grabbed the hem of your shirt, tugging it up and over your head before tossing it to the floor. “To start, we need to remove these pesky clothes.”

You tried to keep a serious face as you followed his lead. Shirts, pants, and underwear piled on the floor around your bed. Only once the two of you were bare, Kento situated between your thighs as you wrapped your legs around his hips. The giggling and joking around subsided into a comfortable silence. While the room was thick with tension, it didn’t change the fact that both of you were ready for this. To experience making love without a pesky condom.

“Y/N.” Nanami drew your attention to his face as he spoke. “I love you.” His fingers rubbed small lazy circles over your clit. The sensation had you bucking against his hand, eager for more than the gentle caressing he was giving you.

“I-fuck feels good. I love you too, Kento.”

His fingers began moving faster, the circles tighter as his eyes trailed over your body. He was taking a mental picture of you in this moment, imagining how you’d look several months down the road. Breast and belly swollen with the child he put inside of you. You’d be even more gorgeous than you already were, which seemed utterly unfathomable to him. The images of you, pregnant with your child, God, it was more pornographic than any movie or book he’s seen. A lot of it had to be because of you. Nanami was so fucked up over the thought of breeding you.

“Ke-Kento, I-I’m gonna cum!” Your whimpers and whines brought him back to the moment. “Stop. I wanna cum with you inside of me.”

He leaned down, kissing you softly, his hand slowing down. You lazily kissed him back before gasping as you felt his leaking tip rub up and down your slit. Without the condom, you could feel just how hot and hard he was. Kento’s arms were caging around your head. His wide eyes mirrored what you imagined you looked like. The feeling of your bare wet pussy felt-ten times better than he imagined. And he wasn’t even inside you yet.

“You’re so wet,” his eyes fluttered shut, “you felt good every time I slid into you before, but this, god, this is going to be a whole new experience.”

“Y-Yeah feels good, though.”

“Very good.”

Nanami continued gritting his teeth as he slowly slid into you. Your silky wet, warm walls hugged his cock in a way he could never experience with condoms before. The raw feeling had him clenching his fists into the covers, furrowing his brows together as he desperately tried not to cum inside of you like a virgin. He needed to focus on something other than your pussy, so he focused his attention on your face.

Which was a major mistake on his part.

Cheeks flushed; your mouth was frozen in an ‘O’ shape. And fuck, the whimpers and way your chest heaved it made his knees weak. “S-So hot, oh my god Kento your cock is so hot and velvety.” His eyes were as wide as saucers as you slowly began rocking against him, trying to get his thick, cock deeper inside of you. “Please don’t stop, fuck me, please fuck me. Need to feel you, I need more.” Between your cunt squeezing him and the needy tone of your voice, Nanami lost all self control.

His hips slammed against your, causing a scream to escape you as your arched your back off the bed. As soon as he was buried deep inside your wet pussy, he was pulling out before slamming back inside your tight spongy walls. You were hit with a sudden wave or revelation as to why people hated wearing condoms. They prevent you from feeling the velvety smooth pull of your husband cock as he slammed into you over and over again. You could feel his cock throbbing, leaking inside of you, God it felt so good to be fucking you raw like this.

“Fuck your pussy is perfect, so fucking wet, so tight just for me.” His lips pressed against your, his thrusts finding the perfect rhythm as you cried into his mouth.

“Yes Ken, yes, fuck me, fuck me!”

“I’m going to fuck you so hard you’ll get pregnant off the first try.” He chuckled his hands groping your breasts, kneading them. Nanami whined, picturing them swollen with milk. “Even if that happens, I’m just going to keep fucking you full of me cum, just to be safe. God fuck Y/N!” His shameless words had you drowning in pleasure as you twitched around his perfect cock. “Ah~ fuck I felt you twitch. You like knowing that your husband is going to stop at nothing, until your breed?”

“Oh, oh fuck, yes, I want it, I want it!”

“Such a sweet girl, you want it?” He groaned in your ear, feeling you clamp down harder around him as his thrusts losing his rhythm. “Tell me you want me to breed you. Tell me you want me to be the first and only man to fill your tight cunt with cum.”

“Kento~ nngh, yes, breed me, make me yours in every way you can! Cum inside me, please, please!” Your begging, the moans, only had him whining and growling louder, fucking into you like he never had before. So rough, so passionately, it was perfect. All through subsided as you cried out Nanami had angled his hips to brush against your g-spot before pressing directly into your cervix. “Holy fuck yes, fill me up Ken!”

More dirty words and curses spilled from your tongue as you felt yourself approaching your orgasm. The tightening coil in your lower abdomen, had your withering under your husband. Your squirming had Nanami fucking harder into you, His mouth on yours as he made love to you like the world was going to end. In his horny brain it might just happen if he didn’t fuck his cum into you soon.

“That’s it, good girl, good fucking girl~ take it, fucking take all of it.” His thrusts were jerky, his balls tightening as your dug your heels into his ass, successfully pulling his deeper inside of you. “Ah fuck! You’re such a good girl, so eager to be the future mother of my children.” All you were capable of doing was nodding as you cried out around him with each deep thrust. “Fuck, get pregnant Y/N, cum on my cock, and milk me for all that I’m worth.”

“K-Kento! Ken!”

“That’s it, love~ fuckin’ cum, cum all over me, good girl.”

“Nnngh!!” A scream ripped through your throat as Kento sped up, his thumb rubbing your clit as you came, extending your orgasm.

Your cum coated his cock, the warm slickness and you throbbing walls urged him to do exactly what he had been promising to do. “Get pregnant, take it, take all my cum. I’m cumming, oh my god I’m cumm-“ Kento cut himself off by slamming his lips against your, his tongue slid into your mouth as he moaned. His cock spurted and spurted, filling you full of his cum the sensation was strange, warm, and new.

But it felt so fucking good.

Pulling away from you, Kento gasped for air as he reached up gentle caressing your face as you both tried to catch your breath. Once Nanami managed to swallow down enough air to slow his heart rate, he beamed down at you. “Y/N I love you.” He didn’t say anything else, because his loving touch, and the gentle kisses he peppered over your face spoke volumes.

Those strong loving arms held you close, pulling you onto your sides. His cock keeping your bodies connected as he spooned you. Your husband loved you more than words could describe. The mere gentleness of this moment, had you praying that if you were to get pregnant, this was the moment it happened.

[yandere-daydreams]

Title: Scorched Earth.

A Grab Bag For A Very Lovely Anonymous Commissioner.

Pairing: Yandere!Warrior x Reader.

Word Count: 1.3k.

TW: Unhealthy Relationships, Mentions of War/Death, Unbalanced Power Dynamics, and Kidnapping.

You saw the torchlight hours before he reached your cottage.

Bright and brilliant, a red stain ebbing through the trees and bleeding into the dark sky. The forest was dense, the canopy stifling, yet somehow, the light he and his soldiers carried was awful enough to pierce through it all, to burn away every behind them and fill the open air with thick, choking smoke. You could’ve tried to flee, it wasn’t as if you couldn’t guess what was coming for you, but you didn’t keep a horse, and you knew better than to stave off the inevitable. He’d catch you, no matter how far you ran, no matter how many times you refused him. He’d promised as much, the first time he declared that you’d be his.

Rather than escape, you stayed where you were, perched on the rotting wooden steps leading up to your door and watching the oncoming flare. His scouts, dressed in black and prone to circling your meager home like vultures, reached you before he did, then sergeants, piling in by the dozen, well-armed and jeering and carrying his insignia with a sort of heady arrogance. Finally, he emerged from the growth, surrounded by his lieutenants and mounted on a sleek, grey steed larger than any you’d ever seen before. He was a far cry from how you’d seen him last – his bandages gone, his pitch-black hair grown down to his shoulders, the rags you’d been able to lend him traded out for shining armor clean enough to catch the torchlight and glow scarlet. A great-sword sat at his hip, two more curved blades crossed over his back, but you couldn’t seem to find much joy in his fortune. Not when you’d soon be counted among one of his many, many precious things.

As he dismounted, the movements practiced to the point of thoughtlessness, you rose to meet him, hyper-aware that this would likely be the last time you’d be able to stand on equal ground. “Wren.”

It wasn’t his name. You’d misheard him, the first time you asked; made what you could out of the slurred syllables he’d been able to spit out and never found the time to look back. Even when he started to recover, when he was able to hold onto consciousness for longer than a minute at a time and more than just your clumsy stitching held the jagged cut stretching from his shoulder to his hip shut, he always failed to correct you. His real name – Wyvern, given to him as an unknown orphan after he slayed his namesake and delivered its head to a king who’d let him massacre armies and rampage through the countryside as he pleased – was something you had to learn the day he left, the day he told you who he was and why you’d found him bleeding out in a stream all those months ago. He’d asked you to come with him, back to the castle, and through tears, you’d told him that you wouldn’t have helped him if you’d known you were saving the life of a murderer. He’d tried to kiss you, and you slapped him and told him to get out of your cottage.

It wasn’t his name, but he smiled like it was, taking a step toward you. His soldiers started to close in, but he held up a hand, keeping them at bay. “Beloved.” It was a familiar petname. It used to make you blush, stammer, want to make flower crowns and kick your feet and learn to play some ridiculous stringed instrument. Now, it just made your stomach turn, your vision dim at the edges with rage. “I’m sorry I took so long to return to you. I had to gather a few friends – thought you should meet the future guests of our wedding.”

There was cheer from his soldiers, a flash of a grin from Wren. You stiffened, squaring your shoulders, but he remained unaffected, his expression only softening as you forced yourself to respond. “I meant what I said. I could never love a man with blood on his hands.”

If he heard you over the milling of his soldiers, the crackling of his torches and the distant sounds of the forest’s nightlife, he clearly wasn’t listening. Rather he closed the remaining space between you and him and took you in his arms. Your feet were off the ground in a moment, your chest against his chest in another, being spun idly as he let out a throaty laugh. “God,” he sighed, when he finally came to a stop. The sharp corners of his plated armor dug into your skin at odd angles, and his hold on your waist was tight enough to bruise. You’d had to ask him to be gentle before, to mind his inhuman strength when he touched you, but it was a lesson he just couldn’t seem to take to heart. “I missed the sound of your voice. I’ll have to take you with me on my next campaign - I don’t know if I could stand to leave you at court for all that time.”

“Put me down,” you hissed, hitting his shoulders with as much force as you could manage. He abided you, but didn’t let go of you – just moving his hold from your hips to your hands, taking them in his own before you had time to pull away.

“I couldn’t. I absolutely couldn’t. Most of the knights are absolute bastards, and you’re too sweet – they’d try to take you for themselves in a heartbeat. No, I can’t let you out of my sight for a moment, can I?” He paused, his face lighting up with apparent zeal. “You’ll adore the castle. I’ve already secured a cottage on the edge of the grounds, and you’ll have full reign of the gardens. We won’t have to—”

“Stop.” You attempted to wrench yourself out of his vice-grip, and when that failed, let out a ragged groan, tears already forming in the corners of your eyes. “I’m not going anywhere with you.”

“That’s not true.” His smile didn’t so much as waver. “You saved my life. You told me that you loved me, and I love you, too. How would either of us ever be happy if we were seperated?”

Something deep in your chest ached. It was impossible to look at him and not picture the countless mornings you’d woken up by his side, the countless days you’d passed teaching him how fish and tend to a garden, the countless nights you’d spent bundled beside a fire sharing stories with a man you thought you’d loved. It was impossible not to think about what he’d done and wish you’d driven that knife into his stomach yourself.

“I can’t love someone like you,” you said, finally, because you couldn’t bear to say anything else. “And I’m not leaving my home.”

At that, you could’ve sworn you saw something register in his dark eyes. He was quiet, his enthusiasm fading, and for a second, you thought he might’ve understood. For a second, you thought he might call away his soldiers, get back on his horse, and leave you to your quiet suffering.

Then, he leaned forward, his lips coming to rest against the top of your head. “Beloved,” his voice was low, stifled your skin. “You don’t have a home. Not without me.”

Abruptly, he pulled away from you, raising a hand and looking toward his soldiers. While you were left in the dark, they knew their signal, surging forward in a chaotic wave of yelling and footsteps. You pressed your form against Wren’s side, clenching your eyes shut and bracing yourself, but there was only a burst of heat, a sudden visible even through your eyelids. Another kiss, this one pressed into your cheek and chased with a soft chuckle.

When you could bring yourself to look, you found not a volley of arrows or a hundred swords all pointed at your neck, but your cottage engulfed in flame, shining golden in the oppressive night. Your shoulders fell, your mouth opening, but you failed to make a sound. Wren wasn’t as stunned, grinning as he pulled you close and pressed his lips into yours, the kiss delicate and tortuous all at once.

“Don’t worry,” he muttered as he pulled away, his tone so soft and so gentle, you could almost tell ignore the blood-soaked cruelty lingering just underneath it.

“The only home you need is with me.”

[gumbootillustrations]

divine warriors loredump!

so yeah, the divine warriors! admittedly, i'm fascinated by them - i rlly rlly wish that we'd gotten to see more of them + their powers/domains/abilities in mcd, especially considering that they're a driving force behind the plot. so, i've gone ahead and done some redesigns for the sigils (above) and expanded on the domains and abilities of the divine warriors within the context of ashes, ashes.

more under the cut!

irene retains her matron title. for her domains, i rlly wanted to lean into her being a deity of life and family; as such, her official domains are  life, light, healing, childbirth and parenthood, fertility, marriage, tradition, beauty, and romantic/familial/platonic love. menphia also has domains over aspects of love (namely over sexual/carnal/manic love), but i wanted them to sort of have an aphrodite ourania (irene) and aphrodite pandemos (menphia) sort of vibe. in terms of the abilites that her relic gives its wielders, its a lot of what's seen in canon mcd: lots of healing and light abilities, but also some dimensional manipulation and time manipulation stuff thrown in there for the shits and giggles.

for shad, i rlly wanted to play into him being both a mirror and a foil for irene. where irene creates, he destroys; where irene brings life, he brings death. his official domains are that of death, darkness, chaos, the afterlife, change, rot and decay, the Nether, bloodshed, and madness. although he's also a war deity like menphia (and, to an extent, esmund and xavier), he's mostly associated with the worst bits of battle - the blood, the rot, the awful awful deaths, that sort of thing. his relic grants its wielders a lot of destruction-associated powers like disintegration and rot/plague/death stuff, but also some shadow and blood manipulation as well.

like a lot of other folks, i felt like enki was the best fit for a knowledge deity. he looks after scholars, librarians, witches, and inventors; officially, his domains are those of knowledge, air, magick, prophecy, the weather, winter, reason, and lightning. from here, you'll start to see pretty much all the warriors having some sort of like. elemental association? is the best way i can put it. i've sort of based it off of the minor arcana of the tarot; the suit of swords, which is associated with air, is the suit of knowledge and the mental realm, which i thought was fitting for enki. enki is also one of the four seasonal divine warriors (the others being esmund, menphia, and kul'zak); he gets winter, mostly because of his centre of worship being in gal'ruk. wielders of his relic get air and weather manipulation powers, as well as powers related to memory and access to witchcraft (if they aren't witches already). they also gain clairvoyance.

esmund! again with the tarot symbolism; esmund is associated with the element of earth and the physical world, hence the mountain in his sigil. his domains are those of protection, earth, wealth, autumn, boundaries, earthquakes, guardhood, and the harvest. the domain over the harvest might seem a little left field but it makes sense i promise! i sort of saw esmund's association with the harvest not only being because of him being an earth deity, but also because i feel like being able to provide is a form of protection, and given the setting of mcd, i feel like being able to provide a good harvest is a part of that. this is also why he is associated with autumn. regarding the abilities that his relic provides, there's a lot of earth manipulation and barrier/force field creation stuff in there; his relic wielders are also freakishly stronger and more durable than those who wield other relics, sort of playing into esmund himself being a tank.

i changed menphia's title to 'the conqueror' because i thought it'd be a bit more fitting for her, especially considering how i'm working tu'la in ashes, ashes (more on that later). i also changed her colour scheme to more of a blue/copper theme despite her being a fire goddess - i thought it was neat, considering that blue flames are those that burn the hottest. her domains are those of warfare (the glorious bits), fire, soldiers, political power, summer, passion and courage, festivals and celebrations, and sexual/carnal/manic love. i'm still not suuuper sure on the abilities that her relic gives its wielders, but there's definitely some pyrokinesis and emotion/heat manipulation, along with some combat-specific foresight in there. i'm open to suggestions!

nothing much really changes regarding kul'zak. he's a nature deity and watches over journeymen and particularly sailors, given that he's a water/ocean deity; he's often worshipped by pirates. officially, his domains are travellers, water, animals, the wilderness, the cardinal directions and navigation, hunting, and spring. i really wanted to lean into him being a man of the wilderness and not really having a home in urban environments. as such, his relic grants its wielders a lot of wilderness-based abilities, like shapeshifting, water and plant manipulation, and camouflage, with a bit of teleportation in there for all your wandering needs.

xavier is probably the divine warrior that i've changed the most. first off, he becomes a divine warrior in ashes, ashes where he isn't in canon mcd. i also really wanted to lean into him being the founder of the jury of nine, hence his title - the justiciar. he's associated with the domains of guardhood (along with esmund), loyalty, metal and metalworkers, justice, balance and order, peace, brotherhood, devotion, and artisans. where esmund looks after the more physical side of being a guard (being your lord's shield and spear, aka the protection side of things), xavier looks after the more emotional side of being a guard - the devotion to your lord and the comradery that you share with your fellows. his relic's abilities capitalise on that, with its wielders being able to both amplify and nullify the magick of the people they're fighting alongside/against. there's also a bit of metal manipulation and a lot of supportive magick in there too.

and, as a fun little tidbit - a lineup of the divine warriors! (the layout is inspired by @star-boi0720 - the way you lay out your drawings like this is mint as 🤩)

i'm still not suuuper happy w kul'zak or irene's designs but i'll get there in the end i guess :)

[dimonds456]

Billford and Abuse: An Analysis

Honestly, as someone who ships both Billford and Fiddauthor, the thing I like about the toxic yaoi ship is the fact that it IS toxic. Like, the jokes are great, but its depiction of abuse is so, like... genuine. Without getting personal, I've been in a really fucking bad toxic (platonic) relationship before, and Billford deadass helped me come to terms with it.

Cuz here's the thing: most fictional abusive relationships just start with the abuse itself. It shows the victim and the perpetrator at the height (or almost at the height) of the abuse, and we see as either one of them is destroyed by it or the victim becomes free. But Billford actually shows the WHOLE timeline.

Something that bothers me about a lot of fictional abuse reps is the fact that you cannot sympathize with the victim aside from "aw that's horrible :(". Cuz it just starts AT the abuse. We don't see how they got there or what's causing the victim to stay. We just know they need to escape.

But with Billford, we see EVERYTHING. How it started out as something Ford genuinely loved, seeing Bill as a friend and someone he could trust, how it made him feel better because he was actually making progress on his research and he wasn't lonely anymore.

To Ford during those early days, Bill was the highlight of his time in Gravity Falls. We can follow his train of thought exactly to where he let Bill possess him with basically no strings attached (pun intended).

That's what makes it all the more devastating. Bill isolated Ford from everyone. He sabotaged his friendship with Fiddleford by planting that seed of doubt in the engineer and pulling Ford further and further into his plans. Then the thing with the portal happened and Ford had NOWHERE to go. Plus, Bill kept trying to get Ford to stop thinking about Stan, to move on and let him rot. So he kept planting seeds of doubt in his own brother as well, causing Ford to further and further slip away.

Then Ford confronts Bill. And the monster is unleashed.

Once Bill realizes he's lost control of Ford's devotion and the illusion has shattered, Bill just LEANS into it. In order to take control back, he started tormenting Ford and just being horrible to him, to try and make him fall in line. Love and fear ARE right next to each other in the brain, after all. And there's NOTHING Ford can do but just fall further and further into paranoia.

Bill demonstrates many real-world abusive/manipulative tactics on Ford, the big one being isolation, since that allows the rest of the everything to even happen, but the way he turns Ford against LITERALLY EVERYONE using paranoia is really true to real life.

Now obviously your toxic boyfriend cannot possess random strangers irl. But you know what he CAN do? Start spreading rumors behind your back. Stalk you. Harass you. Make you feel unsafe everywhere except home (which isn't safe either, but it's better than the outside world). He can spend your money or break your things. Slash your tires. In Ford's case, LITERALLY abusing his body. There's the sticky notes, the threats, the roof incident, all of it just piling one atop the other.

I cannot imagine how fucking terrified Ford must have been to finally send that postcard to Stanley. He was at a point where he assumed Stan would hate him, or at the very least wouldn't respond so why even bother, and he'd just gotten the "steal your eyes" threat. He was out of options, and was absolutely sure he was putting Stan in danger by getting him involved (another irl abuse thing that happens).

He was scared to reach out for help because 1) he didn't want others getting hurt (like Fidds had), 2) he was ashamed he'd let this happen, and 3) he, on some level, felt like he deserved this.

Justified? To a paranoid, scared, abused, irrational brain: Absolutely. In reality? Never. But HE'D built that portal. HE'D allowed Bill to possess his body basically freely. HE'D basically helped start the apocalypse. And that shame would have lead to SO much self-hatred and despair.

His reaching out to Stan was his last resort, his only way out. THAT'S what intrigues me about the ship so much.

I do not want them to make up and get back together. They're horrible for each other. But I do enjoy exploring the dynamic of it, fully seeing the cycle and how it happens, and seeing a whole new side to Ford that we only caught a glimpse of in the show and Journal 3. Plus Bill but his side is more comedic and sad to me I do not take him seriously FSDGHJ

The jokes are great and I love it here, but if I ever write a fic or draw art for these two it's going to be toxic as hell man. And not in the fun way fgsjd

[sunder-soul]

✦𝖒𝖊 𝖆𝖓𝖉 𝖙𝖍𝖊 𝖉𝖊𝖛𝖎𝖑✦

[read 𝖜𝖍𝖎𝖙𝖊 𝖉𝖔𝖛𝖊 here]

Chapter one: The lesser of the two evils Wordcount: 600 Header credit

“Someone’s making Horcruxes.”

If you’re being honest with yourself, whatever mental barrier that lies between the daily mess of to-do lists, deadlines, and humdrum Department bullshit holding back thinking about him, it’s a thin one. Gauzey, permeable, you’ll find him seeping into your mind when you’re staring off into the corner with at a half-finished report, bleeding in when you’re alone and waiting for the elevator, always with a sick sense of self-betrayal and something that stings an awful lot like shame–if you’re being honest with yourself.

A Friday evening at 4:56pm. That’s when McCollin decides to drop this news on you. It’s raining outside, a thick, thorough rain that falls restlessly over the dark city, framed by the single window in your office behind you. Both the lamp on your desk and the city below glow yellow-orange, the only lights left at this time of night so late into winter. That first promotion had come with bumping enough floors that people comment on the view whenever they step into the room, but more often than not they’re politely neglecting to comment on the fact that it’s Muggle London–not Wizarding–that you’re looking out over. It’s no secret that the Ministry maps out its favourites with the floorplan. The press on Riddle dropped off years ago and ever since, so subtle at first that you could write it off, that relentless, incremental push out of the limelight has been growing ever stronger. The job gets more menial, the promotions stop paying well, and slowly but surely new favourites sweep onto stage.

Here, tonight is where you're startled by the sudden sound of your door opening without a knock, and before you can even make some comment to McCollin he’s said the one thing that tears aside any aspersions that maybe one day you’ll be free of what happened.

“Someone’s making Horcruxes,” says McCollin.

You already know what’s coming next, you can feel it sinking fast into your stomach like you’ve stepped out into the dark, yellow-stained night.

“We’re gonna need his help,” McCollin says, and he says it with an apology already saturating every word, he says them heavily like he’s struggling to keep his head up to look you in the eye.

You stare at him, and the rain swells suddenly louder. You put down your quill and watch a bead of ink well at the nib.

The gravity of it is starting to weigh on you, too. They wouldn’t even be considering if it wasn’t already bad, if whatever they’ve been doing is far from working. They’d have to be desperate, very desperate, and you’re wondering what could make them consider their last possible option, Plan Z, what could be so monstrously bad that hauling Tom Riddle out of Azkaban to grill him about Horcruxes is the lesser of the two evils.

You’re thinking about his ring. You’re thinking about his last request. You’re thinking about dark eyes in a dark cell somewhere beneath the ocean and you’re wondering what he’ll be when they drag him out of there–half soulless? Half insane? How long has he been down there, rotting in the darkness, deep in the roots of Azkaban? How many times have you wondered that since you last saw him?

Your fingers are shaking.

“They want you there,” says McCollin, needlessly.

You already knew it. And god, god, here comes that sick shame and that self-betrayal, because somewhere beneath the dread­–if you’re being honest with yourself–you know that some part of you can’t fucking wait.

[ranticore]

so ive been meaning to explain more about ironwall than the lil hints u get from that one story i posted a while back but essentially it's a city that grew out of the necessity of making a place for people with monstrous or non-standard anatomy. it grew from a few alehouses with double-high doors into an industrial city in the 1700s, one which remained largely independent of the nation around it by virtue of being essentially "worthless" to the kingdom. it was ruled by a self-appointed Protector who was supposedly chosen by council vote at regular intervals but we'll get into that

So due to being the only place with accessible infrastructure for centaurs (of all animal types), it became a major population centre and, of course, with no alternatives and a rapidly depleting countryside due to population growth and farmers/peasants being unable to support themselves on their land anymore, Ironwall became something of a prison, too. Where else could anyone go? Ironwall in the 1800s was known to be a deeply corrupt cesspit built on the exploitation of citizens who had nowhere else to go. The council did not allow non-landowners to vote in elections resulting in a ruling class of landlords only voting in their own interests and a strongly stratified society. All because the majority-human settlements elsewhere were not obligated to build suitable housing or accommodations, and some would actively work to avoid such accommodations, like entire streets of houses where access is by steep flights of stairs, or houses on stilts in smaller villages etc. They had heard stories of how awful it was to live in Ironwall and wanted none of it in their backyard thank you very much.

The structure of Ironwall in the early 20th century took the form of a huge wheel-shaped city with accessory satellite towns at each spoke. Centaurs being able to comfortably travel long distances, they kind of invented the commuter town before anyone else out of necessity, as there was a well-developed housing crisis within the city with citizens crushed between sky high rents and few if any places to live. It took until the 70s before motor vehicles were legalised and they were not popular, mainly used by the wealthy who could afford to modify them.

The culture of Ironwall was extremely conservative for most of its existence due to the religious leanings of its founders and landlord class, with strict modesty laws for all centaurs (specifically banning the display of the juncture between human torso and animal body) and a "hard work shapes character" attitude.

When the steel industry finally collapsed, the centre of Ironwall saw an exodus of businesses and people until suddenly, low-quality housing was readily available and super cheap - and the regular humans began to move in. This was matched by similar economic pressures elsewhere, and the different populations finally starting to truly mix; factory workers from Ironwall had gone anywhere that was still hiring and centaur accommodation was being built outside Ironwall and its satellite towns by unscrupulous business owners seizing upon this new supply of cheap labour.

With Ironwall's historic heart starting to rot, there was a big push towards making the city welcoming to tourists and rehabilitating its shabby image. This was largely successful and the first wave of poor human arrivals was quickly drowned out by a second wave of gentrifiers. The historical city centre was preserved as high rise apartments (inhospitable to centaurs) went up around the outskirts, and many of the people whose families had lived in Ironwall for generations, who'd stuck around through the recession, found themselves in the tourism industry, in a very different place than the one they'd grown up in.

And that's why ironwall au Pascal was a taxi driver miserably trying to go viral on the internet in the hopes he'd finally be able to quit ferrying tourists around his ancestral home

[weirdly-specific-but-ok]

read more of the good omens book. i am in love with crowley. go away.

I'M DONE WITH THE SECTION WEDNESDAY AND GOD DEAR GOD AND SATAN AND EVERYONE IN BETWEEN I AM SO FUCKING IN LOVE WITH CROWLEY IT HURTS.

This is exactly why I was petrified of the bloody book. It's going to make the brainrot irredeemably deep. Entire bodyrot, in fact. Even Tommy (yes I named my haematoma Tommy, and he's trans, so he's a he/himatoma) will succumb to the rot.

THE LINE: "RIGHT," MUMBLED CROWLEY, SUDDENLY FEELING VERY ALONE. IT IS MY ROMAN EMPIRE. IT HURTS ME EVERY DAY SINCE I FIRST READ IT, WHICH WAS WHEN I GOT THE BOOK LIKE A MONTH AGO. I OPENED IT AT A RANDOM SECTION AND READ THAT AND PROMPTLY SHUT THE BOOK AND PROCEEDED TO CRY. THAT WAS THE MOMENT I BEGAN TO FEAR THE BOOK.

Aziraphale, you silly, silly, adorable little prissy motherfucker. What a bastard.

Sister Mary Loquacious making up her mind to have an orgasm gives a whole new subtext to my thirst for her during the rewatch of episode one.

RIGHT MUMBLED CROWLEY SUDDENLY FEELING VERY ALONE.

OW.

DOG IS THE BEST THE CUTEST EVER. EVEN WHEN HE WAS BIG AND HELLHOUNDY. HIS CONFUSION AT TURNING SMALL BUT THEN IT BEING OVERRIDDEN BY HIS LOVE FOR ADAM. IT JUST. AWWWWW.

Anathema carries a foot-long bread knife with her. Queen shit.

THE FACT THAT THEY GOT SHOT BY PAINTBALLS AND IMMEDIATELY CROWLEY THINKS HE'S DEAD AND STARTS WORRYING ABOUT PAPERWORK. ALL THAT CLUES HIM IN IS THAT THE BLOOD IS YELLOW. AND THEN HE TASTES IT TO CHECK IF IT'S PAINT WTF CROWLEY.

Warlock's birthday party omg. Aziraphale looking at Crowley desperately for help and Crowley pointedly refusing to meet his gaze because he's cringing from second-hand embarrassment and staring out of the window. I read that bit when I got out of the X-ray for Tommy and it made me smile on a very shit day.

Right mumbled Crowley suddenly feeling very alone.

Okay but ngl Crowley was entirely right? He turned the paintball guns to real guns, but the humans continued to shoot each other even after they realised the switch. Not his fault.

Oh Lord, heal this bike. So it was from the book, too.

Aziraphale being like let's get the fuck outta here before the police come coz I'll morally have to assist them with enquiries is so babygirl of him for real. You little bastard, you.

"A CAR BELONGING TO TWO CONSENTING REPAIRMEN" ah yes "THOSE TWO GAY RANDOS IN THE BENTLEY ARE DEFINITELY HAVING SEX"

I love Aziraphale. Crowley makes a man faint from fear and Aziraphale isn't all that pissed because he's salty about the man ruining his expensive shirt. Oh, Aziraphale.

So attracted to War in an awful way. It makes so much sense how attractive in an awful way she is.

Pouring one out for Mr and Mrs Threlfall of 9, The Elms, Paignton.

"Right," mumbled Crowley, suddenly feeling very alone.

Slightly desperate italics is a phrase I didn't know I needed in my life but during my inevitable next war with fucking typefaces, I will definitely use. Fuck I had design work to do for my mum. AH WELL, CROWLEY, CROWLEY, CROWLEY.

In response to watch out for that pedestrian, Crowley says It's on the street, it knows the risks it's taking! Crowley supports it/its pronouns, pass it on.

Where do you live my dear? Aziraphale oozed. OOZED. OMG.

RIGHT, CROWLEY MUMBLED, SUDDENLY FEELING VERY ALONE.

Everyday, my-homoerotic-tension-and-love-hate-relationship-with-my-copy-of-this-book's a-getting stronger... WHY MUST THAT LINE HURT ME SO MUCH.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

The enshittification of garage-door openers reveals a vast and deadly rot

I'll be at the Studio City branch of the LA Public Library on Monday, November 13 at 1830hPT to launch my new novel, The Lost Cause. There'll be a reading, a talk, a surprise guest (!!) and a signing, with books on sale. Tell your friends! Come on down!

How could this happen? Owners of Chamberlain MyQ automatic garage door openers just woke up to discover that the company had confiscated valuable features overnight, and that there was nothing they could do about it.

Oh, we know what happened, technically speaking. Chamberlain shut off the API for its garage-door openers, which breaks their integration with home automation systems like Home Assistant. The company even announced that it was doing this, calling the integration an "unauthorized usage" of its products, though the "unauthorized" parties in this case are the people who own Chamberlain products:

https://chamberlaingroup.com/press/a-message-about-our-decision-to-prevent-unauthorized-usage-of-myq

We even know why Chamberlain did this. As Ars Technica's Ron Amadeo points out, shutting off the API is a way for Chamberlain to force its customers to use its ad-beshitted, worst-of-breed app, so that it can make a few pennies by nonconsensually monetizing its customers' eyeballs:

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/11/chamberlain-blocks-smart-garage-door-opener-from-working-with-smart-homes/

But how did this happen? How did a giant company like Chamberlain come to this enshittening juncture, in which it felt empowered to sabotage the products it had already sold to its customers? How can this be legal? How can it be good for business? How can the people who made this decision even look themselves in the mirror?

To answer these questions, we must first consider the forces that discipline companies, acting against the impulse to enshittify their products and services. There are four constraints on corporate conduct:

I. Competition. The fear of losing your business to a rival can stay even the most sociopathic corporate executive's hand.

II. Regulation. The fear of being fined, criminally sanctioned, or banned from doing business can check the greediest of leaders.

III. Capability. Corporate executives can dream up all kinds of awful ways to shift value from your side of the ledger to their own, but they can only do the things that are technically feasible.

IV. Self-help. The possibility of customers modifying, reconfiguring or altering their products to restore lost functionality or neutralize antifeatures carries an implied threat to vendors. If a printer company's anti-generic-ink measures drives a customer to jailbreak their printers, the original manufacturer's connection to that customer is permanently severed, as the customer creates a durable digital connection to a rival.

When companies act in obnoxious, dishonest, shitty ways, they aren't merely yielding to temptation – they are evading these disciplining forces. Thus, the Great Enshittening we are living through doesn't reflect an increase in the wickedness of corporate leadership. Rather, it represents a moment in which each of these disciplining factors have been gutted by specific policies.

This is good news, actually. We used to put down rat poison and we didn't have a rat problem. Then we stopped putting down rat poison and rats are eating us alive. That's not a nice feeling, but at least we know at least one way of addressing it – we can start putting down poison again. That is, we can start enforcing the rules that we stopped enforcing, in living memory. Having a terrible problem is no fun, but the best kind of terrible problem to have is one that you know a solution to.

As it happens, Chamberlain is a neat microcosm for all the bad policy choices that created the Era of Enshittification. Let's go through them:

Competition: Chamberlain doesn't have to worry about competition, because it is owned by a private equity fund that "rolled up" all of Chamberlain's major competitors into a single, giant firm. Most garage-door opener brands are actually Chamberlain, including "LiftMaster, Chamberlain, Merlin, and Grifco":

https://www.lakewoodgaragedoor.biz/blog/the-history-of-garage-door-openers

This is a pretty typical PE rollup, and it exploits a bug in US competition law called "Antitrust's Twilight Zone":

https://pluralistic.net/2022/12/16/schumpeterian-terrorism/#deliberately-broken

When companies buy each other, they are subject to "merger scrutiny," a set of guidelines that the FTC and DoJ Antitrust Division use to determine whether the outcome is likely to be bad for competition. These rules have been pretty lax since the Reagan administration, but they've currently being revised to make them substantially more strict:

https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-and-ftc-seek-comment-draft-merger-guidelines

One of the blind spots in these merger guidelines is an exemption for mergers valued at less than $101m. Under the Hart-Scott-Rodino Act, these fly under the radar, evading merger scrutiny. That means that canny PE companies can roll up dozens and dozens of standalone businesses, like funeral homes, hospital beds, magic mushrooms, youth addiction treatment centers, mobile home parks, nursing homes, physicians’ practices, local newspapers, or e-commerce sellers:

http://www.economicliberties.us/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/Serial-Acquisitions-Working-Paper-R4-2.pdf

By titrating the purchase prices, PE companies – like Blackstone, owners of Chamberlain and all the other garage-door makers – can acquire a monopoly without ever raising a regulatory red flag.

But antitrust enforcers aren't helpless. Under (the long dormant) Section 7 of the Clayton Act, competition regulators can block mergers that lead to "incipient monopolization." The incipiency standard prevented monopolies from forming from 1914, when the Clayton Act passed, until the Reagan administration. We used to put down rat poison, and we didn't have rats. We stopped, and rats are gnawing our faces off. We still know where the rat poison is – maybe we should start putting it down again.

On to regulation. How is it possible for Chamberlain to sell you a garage-door opener that has an API and works with your chosen home automation system, and then unilaterally confiscate that valuable feature? Shouldn't regulation protect you from this kind of ripoff?

It should, but it doesn't. Instead, we have a bunch of regulations that protect Chamberlain from you. Think of binding arbitration, which allows Chamberlain to force you to click through an "agreement" that takes away your right to sue them or join a class-action suit:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/10/20/benevolent-dictators/#felony-contempt-of-business-model

But regulation could protect you from Chamberlain. Section 5 of the Federal Trade Commission Act allows the FTC to ban any "unfair and deceptive" conduct. This law has been on the books since 1914, but Section 5 has been dormant, forgotten and unused, for decades. The FTC's new dynamo chair, Lina Khan, has revived it, and is use it like a can-opener to free Americans who've been trapped by abusive conduct:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/01/10/the-courage-to-govern/#whos-in-charge

Khan's used Section 5 powers to challenge privacy invasions, noncompete clauses, and other corporate abuses – the bait-and-switch tactics of Chamberlain are ripe for a Section 5 case. If you buy a gadget because it has five features and then the vendor takes two of them away, they are clearly engaged in "unfair and deceptive" conduct.

On to capability. Since time immemorial, corporate leaders have fetishized "flexibility" in their business arrangements – like the ability to do "dynamic pricing" that changes how much you pay for something based on their guess about how much you are willing to pay. But this impulse to play shell games runs up against the hard limits of physical reality: grocers just can't send an army of rollerskated teenagers around the store to reprice everything as soon as a wealthy or desperate-looking customer comes through the door. They're stuck with crude tactics like doubling the price of a flight that doesn't include a Saturday stay as a way of gouging business travelers on an expense account.

With any shell-game, the quickness of the hand deceives the eye. Corporate crooks armed with computers aren't smarter or more wicked than their analog forebears, but they are faster. Digital tools allow companies to alter the "business logic" of their services from instant to instant, in highly automated ways:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/19/twiddler/

The monopoly coalition has successfully argued that this endless "twiddling" should not be constrained by privacy, labor or consumer protection law. Without these constraints, corporate twiddlers can engage in all kinds of ripoffs, like wage theft and algorithmic wage discrimination:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/12/algorithmic-wage-discrimination/#fishers-of-men

Twiddling is key to the Darth Vader MBA ("I am altering the deal. Pray I don't alter it further"), in which features are confiscated from moment to moment, without warning or recourse:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/26/hit-with-a-brick/#graceful-failure

There's no reason to accept the premise that violating your privacy, labor rights or consumer rights with a computer is so different from analog ripoffs that existing laws don't apply. The unconstrained twiddling of digital ripoff artists is a plague on billions of peoples' lives, and any enforcer who sticks up for our rights will have an army of supporters behind them.

Finally, there's the fear of self-help measures. All the digital flexibility that tech companies use to take value away can be used to take it back, too. The whole modern history of digital computers is the history of "adversarial interoperability," in which the sleazy antifeatures of established companies are banished through reverse-engineering, scraping, bots and other forms of technological guerrilla warfare:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/10/adversarial-interoperability

Adversarial interoperability represents a serious threat to established business. If you're a printer company gouging on toner, your customers might defect to a rival that jailbreaks your security measures. That's what happened to Lexmark, who lost a case against the toner-refilling company Static Controls, which went on to buy Lexmark:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/06/felony-contempt-business-model-lexmarks-anti-competitive-legacy

Sure, your customers are busy and inattentive and you can degrade the quality of your product a lot before they start looking for ways out. But once they cross that threshold, you can lose them forever. That's what happened to Microsoft: the company made the tactical decision to produce a substandard version of Office for the Mac in a drive to get Mac users to switch to Windows. Instead, Apple made Iwork (Pages, Numbers and Keynote), which could read and write every Office file, and Mac users threw away Office, the only Microsoft product they owned, permanently severing their relationship to the company:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/06/adversarial-interoperability-reviving-elegant-weapon-more-civilized-age-slay

Today, companies can operate without worrying about this kind of self-help measure. There' a whole slew of IP rights that Chamberlain can enforce against you if you try to fix your garage-door opener yourself, or look to a competitor to sell you a product that restores the feature they took away:

https://locusmag.com/2020/09/cory-doctorow-ip/

Jailbreaking your Chamberlain gadget in order to make it answer to a rival's app involves bypassing a digital lock. Trafficking in a tool to break a digital lock is a felony under Section 1201 of the Digital Millennium Copyright, carrying a five-year prison sentence and a $500,000 fine.

In other words, it's not just that tech isn't regulated, allowing for endless twiddling against your privacy, consumer rights and labor rights. It's that tech is badly regulated, to permit unlimited twiddling by tech companies to take away your rightsand to prohibit any twiddling by you to take them back. The US government thumbs the scales against you, creating a regime that Jay Freeman aptly dubbed "felony contempt of business model":

https://pluralistic.net/2022/10/23/how-to-fix-cars-by-breaking-felony-contempt-of-business-model/

All kinds of companies have availed themselves of this government-backed superpower. There's DRM – digital locks, covered by DMCA 1201 – in powered wheelchairs:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2022/06/when-drm-comes-your-wheelchair

In dishwashers:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/05/03/cassette-rewinder/#disher-bob

In treadmills:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/06/22/vapescreen/#jane-get-me-off-this-crazy-thing

In tractors:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/05/08/about-those-kill-switched-ukrainian-tractors/

It should come as no surprise to learn that Chamberlain has used DMCA 1201 to block interoperable garage door opener components:

https://scholarship.law.marquette.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1233&context=iplr

That's how we arrived at this juncture, where a company like Chamberlain can break functionality its customers value highly, solely to eke out a minuscule new line of revenue by selling ads on their own app.

Chamberlain bought all its competitors.

Chamberlain operates in a regulatory environment that is extremely tolerant of unfair and deceptive practices. Worse: they can unilaterally take away your right to sue them, which means that if regulators don't bestir themselves to police Chamberlain, you are shit out of luck.

Chamberlain has endless flexibility to unilaterally alter its products' functionality, in fine-grained ways, even after you've purchased them.

Chamberlain can sue you if you try to exercise some of that same flexibility to protect yourself from their bad practices.

Combine all four of those factors, and of course Chamberlain is going to enshittify its products. Every company has had that one weaselly asshole at the product-planning table who suggests a petty grift like breaking every one of the company's customers' property to sell a few ads. But historically, the weasel lost the argument to others, who argued that making every existing customer furious would affect the company's bottom line, costing it sales and/or fines, and prompting customers to permanently sever their relationship with the company by seeking out and installing alternative software. Take away all the constraints on a corporation's worst impulses, and this kind of conduct is inevitable:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/28/microincentives-and-enshittification/

This isn't limited to Chamberlain. Without the discipline of competition, regulation, self-help measures or technological limitations, every industry in undergoing wholesale enshittification. It's not a coincidence that Chamberlain's grift involves a push to move users into its app. Because apps can't be reverse-engineered and modified without risking DMCA 1201 prosecution, forcing a user into an app is a tidy and reliable way to take away that user's rights.

Think about ad-blocking. One in four web users has installed an ad-blockers ("the biggest boycott in world history" -Doc Searls). Zero app users have installed app-blockers, because they don't exist, because making one is a felony. An app is just a web-page wrapped in enough IP to make it a crime to defend yourself against corporate predation:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/08/27/an-audacious-plan-to-halt-the-internets-enshittification-and-throw-it-into-reverse/

The temptation to enshitiffy isn't new, but the ability to do so without consequence is a modern phenomenon, the intersection of weak policy enforcement and powerful technology. Your car is autoenshittified, a rolling rent-seeking platform that spies on you and price-gouges you:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/24/rent-to-pwn/#kitt-is-a-demon

Cars are in an uncontrolled skid over Enshittification Cliff. Honda, Toyota, VW and GM all sell cars with infotainment systems that harvest your connected phone's text-messages and send them to the corporation for data-mining. What's more, a judge in Washington state just ruled that this is legal:

https://therecord.media/class-action-lawsuit-cars-text-messages-privacy

While there's no excuse for this kind of sleazy conduct, we can reasonably anticipate that if our courts would punish companies for engaging in it, they might be able to resist the temptation. No wonder Mozilla's latest Privacy Not Included research report called cars "the worst product category we have ever reviewed":

https://foundation.mozilla.org/en/privacynotincluded/articles/its-official-cars-are-the-worst-product-category-we-have-ever-reviewed-for-privacy/

I mean, Nissan tries to infer facts about your sex life and sells those inferences to marketing companies:

https://foundation.mozilla.org/en/privacynotincluded/nissan/

But the OG digital companies are the masters of enshittification. Microsoft has been at this game for longer than anyone, and every day brings a fresh way that Microsoft has worsened its products without fear of consequence. The latest? You can't delete your OneDrive account until you provide an acceptable explanation for your disloyalty:

https://www.theverge.com/2023/11/8/23952878/microsoft-onedrive-windows-close-app-notification

It's tempting to think that the cruelty is the point, but it isn't. It's almost never the point. The point is power and money. Unscrupulous businesses have found ways to make money by making their products worse since the industrial revolution. Here's Jules Dupuis, writing about 19th century French railroads:

It is not because of the few thousand francs which would have to be spent to put a roof over the third-class carriages or to upholster the third-class seats that some company or other has open carriages with wooden benches. What the company is trying to do is to prevent the passengers who can pay the second class fare from traveling third class; it hits the poor, not because it wants to hurt them, but to frighten the rich. And it is again for the same reason that the companies, having proved almost cruel to the third-class passengers and mean to the second-class ones, become lavish in dealing with first-class passengers. Having refused the poor what is necessary, they give the rich what is superfluous.

https://www.tumblr.com/mostlysignssomeportents/731357317521719296/having-refused-the-poor-what-is-necessary-they

But as bad as all this is, let me remind you about the good part: we know how to stop companies from enshittifying their products. We know what disciplines their conduct: competition, regulation, capability and self-help measures. Yes, rats are gnawing our eyeballs, but we know which rat-poison to use, and where to put it to control those rats.

Competition, regulation, constraint and self-help measures all backstop one another, and while one or a few can make a difference, they are most powerful when they're all mobilized in concert. Think of the failure of the EU's landmark privacy law, the GDPR. While the GDPR proved very effective against bottom-feeding smaller ad-tech companies, the worse offenders, Meta and Google, have thumbed their noses at it.

This was enabled in part by the companies' flying an Irish flag of convenience, maintaining the pretense that they have to be regulated in a notorious corporate crime-haven:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/05/15/finnegans-snooze/#dirty-old-town

That let them get away with all kinds of shenanigans, like ignoring the GDPR's requirement that you should be able to easily opt out of data-collection without having to go through cumbersome "cookie consent" dialogs or losing access to the service as punishment for declining to be tracked.

As the noose has tightened around these surveillance giants, they're continuing to play games. Meta now says that the only way to opt out of data-collection in the EU is to pay for the service:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/30/markets-remaining-irrational/#steins-law

This is facially illegal under the GDPR. Not only are they prohibited from punishing you for opting out of collection, but the whole scheme ignores the nature of private data collection. If Facebook collects the fact that you and I are friends, but I never opted into data-collection, they have violated the GDPR, even if you were coerced into granting consent:

https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2023/11/the-pay-or-consent-challenge-for-platform-regulators.html

The GDPR has been around since 2016 and Google and Meta are still invading 500 million Europeans' privacy. This latest delaying tactic could add years to their crime-spree before they are brought to justice.

But most of this surveillance is only possible because so much of how you interact with Google and Meta is via an app, and an app is just a web-page that's a felony to make an ad-blocker for. If the EU were to legalize breaking DRM – repealing Article 6 of the 2001 Copyright Directive – then we wouldn't have to wait for the European Commission to finally wrestle these two giant companies to the ground. Instead, EU companies could make alternative clients for all of Google and Meta's services that don't spy on you, without suffering the fate of OG App, which tried this last winter and was shut down by "felony contempt of business model":

https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/05/battery-vampire/#drained

Enshittification is demoralizing. To quote @wilwheaton, every update to the services we use inspires "dread of 'How will this complicate things as I try to maintain privacy and sanity in a world that demands I have this thing to operate?'"

https://wilwheaton.tumblr.com/post/698603648058556416/cory-doctorow-if-you-see-this-and-have-thoughts

But there are huge natural constituencies for the four disciplining forces that keep enshittification at bay.

Remember, Antitrust's Twilight Zone doesn't just allow rollups of garage-door opener companies – it's also poison for funeral homes, hospital beds, magic mushrooms, youth addiction treatment centers, mobile home parks, nursing homes, physicians’ practices, local newspapers, or e-commerce sellers.

The Binding Arbitration scam that stops Chamberlain customers from suing the company also stops Uber drivers from suing over stolen wages, Turbotax customers from suing over fraud, and many other victims of corporate crime from getting a day in court.

The failure to constrain twiddling to protect privacy, labor rights and consumer rights enables a host of abuses, from stalking, doxing and SWATting to wage theft and price gouging:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/11/06/attention-rents/#consumer-welfare-queens

And Felony Contempt of Business Model is used to screw you over every time you refill your printer, run your dishwasher, or get your Iphone's screen replaced.

The actions needed to halt and reverse this enshittification are well understood, and the partisans for taking those actions are too numerous to count. It's taken a long time for all those individuals suffering under corporate abuses to crystallize into a movement, but at long last, it's happening.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/11/09/lead-me-not-into-temptation/#chamberlain

Image: Cryteria (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HAL9000.svg

CC BY 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en

[wrightingdungeon]

Cheese, Spice, and Everything Nice

Had this brain rot in my head... Its leading to more brain rot... and a new ship...

Listening to the dull buzzing of the microwave, Shane sighed to himself, his eyes closed as he tried to relax for just a moment. He was on his legally required lunch break, the one thing keeping Joja Co. from working him until his back actually broke.

The smell of pepper poppers filled the small break room, the aroma strong and savory as they started to pop and sputter in the microwave. Shane couldn't help but feel his stomach growl in anticipation.

The microwave beeped, alerting him that the spicy goods were finished being nuked. Opening his eyes, he allowed himself a rare smile as he pulled out his food. He couldn’t help but remember the day the Farmer had first handed him a plate stacked high with these pepper poppers.

"You said you were bored of the frozen kind, so I made fresh ones!" they had exclaimed, eyes wide with excitement, bouncing eagerly on the balls of their feet as they waited for him to try one. They were the best Shane had ever tasted—spicy, cheesy, and full of flavor. It made him feel like someone had genuinely listened to him, cared about what he wanted.

The leftovers, in his opinion, were even better, with the flavors blending together over time. It wasn’t often someone besides Marnie cooked for him, just because he'd mentioned he wanted to try something new. It made him feel… special.

“Dude, that smells so good,” a voice suddenly broke through Shane's thoughts. His face fell flat as he turned to see Sam standing in the doorway, already leaning in as if drawn by the scent. The younger man’s eyes were practically glued to Shane's plate.

“Lemme snag one?” Sam asked, not even waiting for an answer as he leaned over Shane's shoulder, fingers wiggling in anticipation like a child reaching for candy.

“Nah,” Shane replied without missing a beat, pulling his plate closer to himself, body-blocking Sam. “This is the last of what Farmer gave me.” He took his seat at the wobbly, outdated table, ready to savor every bite.

Sam’s shoulders slumped in disappointment. “Aw, come on, man! Just one, they smell so good!”

"They are," Shane muttered, taking his first bite with exaggerated satisfaction, making sure Sam saw how good it was.

Sam sighed dramatically, tearing open the package of his frozen mac and cheese. “You know, it’s kinda funny,” he said, tossing his meal into the microwave. “Farmer doesn’t even like spicy food.”

Shane paused mid-bite, blinking in surprise. "What? They don’t?"

"Nope," Sam said, smirking. "Tried to give 'em some hot chips once. They wouldn’t touch them. Said something about not wanting their mouth to burn."

Shane sat there, chewing slowly as he processed this revelation. He looked down at the pepper poppers, the warmth of them still radiating through the plate. “You’re serious?” he asked, disbelief clear in his tone.

“Dead serious,” Sam replied, punching the microwave buttons to start cooking his meal. “Kinda funny, huh? Making pepper poppers when they won’t even eat a single hot chip.”

Shane’s mind drifted back to the excitement in Farmer's eyes, the way they’d watched him take that first bite, practically holding their breath. He had assumed it was just because they were proud of their cooking. But now…

Shane felt a strange tightness in his chest, a warmth that had nothing to do with the spicy peppers. He thought about all the times the Farmer had shown up with little gifts, the way they always seemed to be there when he needed a bit of kindness. It was hard to wrap his head around it. “That’s… kind of ridiculous,” Shane mumbled, a small frown forming on his lips.

“Why would they do that?” Shane muttered, mostly to himself.

Sam shrugged, tapping a beat with his fingers idly on the countertop as he waited for his food to heat up. “Maybe they just wanted to see you smile.”

Shane snorted, though the hint of a smile tugged at his lips. “Yeah, right. You think anyone actually cares that much?”

“Why not?” Sam countered, leaning back against the counter with his arms crossed. “Farmer’s always doing stuff like that for people. They’re just… nice.”

“Nice,” Shane repeated, tasting the word as if it were something foreign. He stared at the pepper poppers, the golden crust glistening from the melted cheese. He bit his lip, his heart giving a faint thud in his chest. “Yeah,” he murmured, “I guess they are…”

Sam watched him for a moment, his expression softening. “You know, Shane,” he said, his voice more serious than usual, “sometimes, it’s okay to let people care about you.”

Shane stiffened, the words striking deeper than he’d like to admit. “I’m not looking for a therapy session kid,” he grumbled, turning his attention back to his plate, though the warmth spreading through his chest was hard to ignore.

“Yeah, yeah, Mr. Tough Guy.” Sam rolled his eyes, a knowing smile playing on his lips. “Just saying.”

Shane didn’t respond, but as he took another bite, savoring the blend of spicy heat and cheesy goodness, he couldn’t help but think that maybe—just maybe—Sam was onto something.

A comfortable silence settled between them, interrupted only by the hum of the microwave and the faint tick of the clock on the wall. Shane could feel Sam’s gaze lingering, but for once, he didn’t mind it.

“Hey,” Sam said suddenly, breaking the silence. “If you ever feel like sharing those pepper poppers… y’know, I’m always around.”

Shane huffed a laugh, shaking his head. “Don’t push your luck, Samson.”

“Damn, worth a shot,” Sam grinned. "…But seriously," he added with a casual shrug, "it's nice seeing you like this. You’re, I dunno, more cool when you're not glaring at everyone."

"Is that supposed to be a compliment?" Shane asked, quirking an eyebrow.

"Take it however you want," Sam replied with a chuckle. "I mean, you're still grumpy, but you’re not as… I dunno, angry all the time."

Shane’s expression softened, though he kept his eyes on his plate. “Maybe I’ve just had a good reason,” he muttered, more to himself than to Sam.

Sam's grin widened, but he didn’t press any further. “Keep it up then. It’s a good look on you.”

"Don't make it weird," Shane muttered, but there was no real bite in his tone.

Sam simply snickered, pushing himself off the counter. “Alright, alright. I’ll leave you to your precious pepper poppers.” He gave Shane a lazy salute and started heading toward the door, playfully pretending to snatch a pepper popper on his way out.

“Touch my plate, and you’ll lose a fucking finger,” Shane shot back, but this time, there was a genuine smile on his face.

[bogleech]

i keep wanting to draw anthro maggots but they end up looking like beetle larvae instead- any ideas on how one might stylize a maggot person to make it a little more distinctly A Maggot? it's especially hard to me bc maggots are like THE MOST featureless insect larvae.... which i suppose counts as a defining feature in and of itself- but i dunno. im mostly just curious to hear your approach!!!

Yeah beetle grubs, caterpillars and a lot of other insect larvae have armored heads with complete jaws structures as well as six little legs, plus they often have a defined looking "top" and "bottom" with ridged and wrinkles almost like they got soft armored down their back

But maggots are weird! They streamlined EVERYTHING down to where they have no legs at all, not even vestigial ones, and their body segments almost evolved towards something like radial symmetry by being the same all the way around!

Then there's the fact that they sort of lost most of a "head." Not only is there no exoskeletal cranial case (bug skull) to protect it but there are no jaws and never any eyes; there's just a little hole for drinking liquefied food, a pair of tusk-like hooks for gripping surfaces, and a pair of eye-like knobs that are actually chemosensory (noses)

The weird, tiny walrus-face is totally unique! They don't have any chewing mouthparts because they only need to "drink" the particles of rotting matter they live on, and like adult flies, they help this along by secreting digestive enzymes!

Maggots also have these very distinct, furry looking bands at every segment, which help them grip surfaces like a tire tread or the sole of a shoe. If you compare this photo with the one above you'll also notice how the segments can retract in and out like a telescope!

The last special thing about common maggot anatomy is that they are technically semi-aquatic animals, because maggots evolved to be buried head-first completely in their own food as much as possible and rotten corpses are WET. In order to breathe, maggots have a pair of breathing spiracles on their rear ends, which they try to keep exposed to the air!

There are exceptions to all of this, though; there are species that can be fully aquatic, fully terrestrial, herbivorous, parasitic or predatory, and some ancient fly groups (including mosquitoes!) whose larvae still have fully armored heads and even eyes. Everything above is universal to the maggots you find in rotten stuff though, so what most people think of when they hear the term :) When I designed a hybrid human and blowfly maggot for the Mortasheen setting I deliberately made it look like a doofy cartoon Walrus, and I gave its segments large spines that can be seen in some parasitic maggots, including botflies:

And when I made a maggot character for my webcomic Awful Hospital I designed her like a little spacesuit or a parka (the resemblance to Kenny was an accident)

Actually I don't think I ever shared this most recent "main artwork" of Maggie. I don't know what idea inspiration any of this might provide but basically a maggot is a prickly living sock with fangs. Or I guess from a design and engineering perspective, a maggot is a biological drill. The tiny end starts a hole, the rest of the body is just a flaring cone perfectly equipped to keep making the hole deeper.