#or sexualizing them cause what the fuck that's wrong and gross PLS stay away from me if you do this

[benjineedssleep]

i know literally none of you are here for my bandom/music brainrot however i've been thinking about this (not controversial, very silly) for eons and i need to get it out of my brain

the clique is a funny thing man. and i mean that both endearingly and like conceptually when it comes to how the fandom interacts with their musicians and music/media. rpf is like,,, not seriously genuinely a thing the way it is in other bandoms. it almost always boils down to "holy shit they're best friends" and "literally why are you doing that gay shit in public" LMFAO

even posts that explicitly state the drawings of tyler and josh are platonic still tag it joshler. kinda reminds me of peterick when it comes to fob. like,,, most people do not romantically ship those guys (which is great and amazing let's not ship real people okay ty :3) but will still tag it peterick!!! and then there's killjoys whose ship tags need to be blocked unless you want to see real life men being drawn fucking. that is wild and insane behavior...

anyways the reason i really brought this up (i got sidetracked oops) is because clikkies have characters to ship. the pilots have lore and separate lore characters that despite being played by tyler and josh are not tyler and josh. it's very much akin to mcyt lore where you put 'c!' before the content creator's name to indicate the character they played except the pilots' lore characters have actual names.

so like from the outside (teehee) it looks like most of us are rpf shipping but really we're pointing and laughing at whatever homoerotic bullshit torchbearer and clancy have going on HAHA--

[cardshcrp]

-slowly slides in, pushes u a $20- 5 times kissed pls and thank

FIVE TIMES KISSED.

@jeangreyed // JEAN GREY // always selectively accepting !

                                                                                                               i.

      Jean Grey is an enigma. She’s the ideal woman, for most - beauty, kindness, power, all wrapped up in a gorgeous bundle and topped so pretty with bright red hair she might as well be a blessing. Or that’s what people think, anyway. Remy understands why they do. 

Funny enough, all the perfection doesn’t do it for him, though his judgment is probably skewed because his heart’s already hung up to dry for two pretty girls as it is and he really isn’t looking for more pain. 

It doesn’t stop the fact that she’s objectively attractive, of course, or a colleague that might be something close to a friend. There’s still a fifty-fifty chance his eyes drift to her when she enters the room and that he flashes her a smile; it isn’t hurt any by the fact her hair is one of the brightest things he can see, his color-muddied eyes so drawn to things as fiery as they are.

Gambit likes Jean Grey fine, but he isn’t in love with her, isn’t caught up by her. He doesn’t plan to be. Doesn’t want to be.

So it’d figure that the one woman out of his league he actually didn’t pursue would be the one to start shadowing him. His life has always been a divine comedy, and it’s an obvious twist. He’s a clever boy. He should’ve known.

It’s not immediate, of course. She’s got plenty of suitors, on and off, the ones that speak up and the ones that don’t and linger waiting. He’s busy chasing Rogue and dreams he’s tried to put away and hasn’t quite managed to, an odd little tug-of-war in his heart over an unused house in the Garden District that’s just waiting for him to usher in a belated blushing bride.

It takes fucking years, and death, and Death, and being left for dead. It takes Remy’s heart drying up so bad he thinks it’s never going to feel okay again, and him finally leaning into it, accepting the fact that he just isn’t cut out to be loved, or that maybe it’s how he loves that fucks things up. 

But for all that, he hasn’t forgotten how the game is played, the way meaningless flirting feels and the way heavy looks push down until pulses quicken. He hasn’t forgotten how it feels to watch from across a room and pray that they notice and that they don’t, all at once.

He can’t forget heartache when it’s all he can taste, forget-me-nots and the tang of rot.

He tracks her down as a friend when she disappears, stays with her because he knows what it’s like to be alone, for once a thief with no ulterior motive. He cooks for her, trades stupid little chores, lives like the world isn’t falling down around their ears just for a while. He’s good at playing house for someone who’s never done it before. Remy figures it’s kind of healing for both of them, being normal.

He’s good at pretending he doesn’t notice when her eyes start linger at the curve of his mouth after a few months, or the flashes of longing pressing into his empathy just for half a second. He’s good at it for a while, but it’s hard not to love back when someone wants to offer you their heart even if they’re hiding it, and he’s a starving thing at the end of it.

Remy respects her too much to push for something she doesn’t want to embrace, so he does nothing. It’s the hardest thing he’s ever done, but he does it anyway, mostly.

And sure, maybe he really shouldn’t, but if he slips a chocolate candy into her jacket pocket when she isn’t watching with exchange me for a better kiss scrawled inside the wrapping, he can pass it off for playing if he absolutely needs to.

Turns out he doesn’t, though, ’cause she drops the wrapper in his lap three days later before settling herself right on top.

                                                                                                              ii.

      They aren’t very public about it. Maybe that’s surprising; Remy doesn’t really want to waste the brainpower on figuring out if that contradicts their respective public images, because frankly, everything about them side by side contradicts their public images anyway, so fuck it. 

The more observant ones notice, of course, when they come back. The fact that they come back together isn’t in itself that unusual - Remy had said he would find her. He was good at tracking. He delivered, even if it took longer than they might have expected.

Logan knows, right off, Remy’s sure of that. He can act as much as he likes, but nothing is going to cover up the way their scents layer atop one another, and despite common misconceptions he isn’t really fond of bathing in cologne, so he’d accepted in advance that Logan would be onto them. He’s also the type not to ask questions or try to pass judgment, so it works out.

Rogue is more of a problem, and more of a giveaway for everyone else, because Remy flirted with her out of sheer familiarity and in the name of friendly banter before. Now, he doesn’t at all - inside jokes, teasing, time together, sure. But there isn’t any of the ever-pervasive sexual tension lingering between them, and none of his quips are double entendres, because he’s not about to lead her on. She isn’t exactly mad about it, more puzzled, but it’s the lack of push and pull between them that tips some of the others off. 

Logan knows, then Rogue. Kitty figures it out quick after she sees Rogue glare at Jean a little, ’cause even if she’s forfeited the rights to Remy’s heart old habits die hard. Once Kitty knows, Piotr knows, and once Piotr knows so does Kurt, and Kurt accidentally lets slip to Jubes, and once Jubilee knows everyone knows; it’s just a damn chain reaction, all within two months. 

Remy doesn’t mind, exactly, and Jean doesn’t too much either. It had been inevitable. 

The bad part is how many people tell her not to waste her time with him.

She doesn’t tell him that, of course she doesn’t, but he knows. And it hurts because it’s the truth. She’s Jean fucking Grey and she deserves to have a paragon of virtue that doesn’t keep his head shut up, but there they are, and it hurts like hell that he’s actually a kind of happy for once and it’s to her detriment. 

But every time he pulls away even a little, she pulls him back. She gets it, of course she does, because even if she doesn’t entirely know his mind she knows human cause and effect better than anybody else. 

She takes him on walks by the lake, moves a few of his scant personal belongings into her room (which results in such a scolding, because Remy, don’t tell me this is the real Mona Lisa - ). She perches on the kitchen counter and volunteers for taste tests like it’s any kind of ordeal at all when he’s the one cooking. 

On an overcast Saturday in mid-March, she wraps gentle fingers around his fragile wrists and pulls him down into a kiss right in the front of the very full dining hall. It works; she makes her point, crystal clear. There’s no doubt about the rumors then.

Later Remy finds out she’d also stuck her middle finger up at the whole hall, students and instructors and all, behind his back. He has to smother a smile when he does, because well, they hadn’t been wrong after all. He was a terrible influence.

                                                                                                             iii.

     It’s not easy to get inside Remy’s head. It’s one of the things that infuriates people most; hard to read, hard to understand. He puts up a good front, and he keeps his head locked up tight, shielded by the nature of his powers, shields of energy in crackling flux that even the esteemed Professor can’t touch for long.

It’s not easy, but it’s not impossible, either. The Shadow King has done it. Xavier has managed. The Phoenix cracks him open and scoops him out raw. 

He is so used to being impenetrable to all but the worst that he has forgotten that when he does put the massive effort in to let someone peek, even a little, it leaves the door open. He’d let Betsy and Jean in, this time, for the sake of teamwork, because that’s always worked out for him so well.

He’s paying for that mistake right now.

Remy whirls around - another way out, he needs to minimize the damage he can be used for against the others - the hole in the side of the jet is big enough to jump through, so he does, coat catching at jagged metal edges for barely a second before he’s gone, twisting like a rag doll through the air with the lingering panicked shouts falling away behind him. The pressure in his head builds, screaming, until it feels like it’s about to burst - 

He pulls himself out of freefall, flings his arms out to the side to slow his fall just a little. It ain’t much. It doesn’t have to be.

Two thousand seven hundred meters up, clocking in at eighty-one kilograms, he figures on the fly he’s got about twenty-three, twenty-four seconds before he’s out for good. It’s hard to check his math with a wrestling match in his head, but that’s alright. He’s not going to need that long.

Seventeen seconds left.

In the back of his head, the voice builds, demanding he do something, save himself, and he can’t help but grin even though it feels like his face is peeling apart because even once they’re in, they have to fight - and he doesn’t make it easy. There’s a split-second struggle, and the intruder realizes that yes, Gambit is that much of a suicidal moron - 

He hands the tele control of his body, plummeting towards being an extra-gross smear on the pavement, and takes the opening to crack open his mind and scream, tossing it out as best he can. It’s clumsy, unrefined, weak underneath the crushing pressure of his piggybacker, but he knows at least one person will hear him. Jean is always listening for him.

H E A D S   U P !

The voice twists, working its will into his body, coaxing him to give in. Surrender is easy. Surrender is bliss. Surrender is ecstasy. The pain squeezes his brain until it feels like gray matter is dripping out of his ears. The acrid iron taste of blood fills his mouth.

Give in. It’ll feel so good if you do.

But he’s not the surrendering type, never has been. He’s a pissed-off piece of pure dynamite. And psychic links are two-way. 

I can save you.

Six seconds left.

Red eyes spark to life, and he reaches around with fingers to his temple, bang!, shoves a goddamn payload of hyperactive energy through his own skull. His bones and brain are built for it. The tele’s aren’t, and he can feel their eyes widen and the link snap as their brain gets fucking pulped. Maybe they’ll recover, maybe they won’t, but he’ll worry about that later if he’s around to.

He’s still falling, terminal velocity now, dropping at a hundred twenty-five miles an hour to splatdown and he really hopes he hasn’t miscalculated this one, ’cause the ground is coming up real fast, about as quick as his heartbeat.

Four seconds left.

His body jerks, not slammed upwards so much as pulled, dragged around like he’s a damn kitten being hauled by the nape of his neck except it’s his whole body and eh, it’s a stupid comparison but the more important thing is that he isn’t about to die. 

Jean is so nice about it, in fact, that he finds himself being deposited bridal-style in her arms, which he’s sure is to really emphasize how much of a mess he currently is in comparison to her. Bright green eyes drift down to meet far darker ones, half-worried; the nudge of m’fine he pushes at her is enough to have full lips turning upwards just a bit.

“Cuttin’ it a little close there, Jeannie,” he wheezes, so out of breath he can’t even pretend to be slick this time, and she rolls her eyes so damn expressively he can’t help but cough some more as he cackles, her voice measured and full of I’m-so-done-with-you in response. “Maybe I’d have an easier time helping people that don’t decide to jump out of planes without parachutes.”

He’s about to argue that it’s not his fault that he’s been shoehorned into another dumbass spandex nightmare, and that if he had it his way he’d have his breastplate and included chute, but instead the faint burgeoning banter is cut off rather abruptly when she actually dips him back and kisses him full on the mouth, shutting him up in the most time-tested, scientifically-proven effective way available.

“Oh,” he breathes, and if he’s grinning like a jackass she probably knew it was coming anyway. “You really have been spendin’ way too much time around me, Jean Grey.”

                                                                                                             iv.

      It doesn’t take him that long to figure out she’s still got some Phoenix in her.He’s a fool for Lady Luck and nobody else; he sees when she pulls away, looks at him with guilt and fear. Concern for him. It’s an interesting change, one that’s oddly unwelcome in the context it comes in. 

He can take care of himself, but he can’t say that to her without making it worse, so he doesn’t.

Instead, he plays the part of pretty distraction well; he notches up every bit of overdone personality when they’re in public. Spoiled. Flashy. Smug. It didn’t matter much, because the truth of it was that he was capable and reliable, but being the class clown on missions kept the wan look from her face - even Jean Grey didn’t have time to worry about little things like shitty psychic firebirds when her boyfriend/lover/nuisance was causing trouble.

Ironically, he succeeds best when he isn’t actually trying to. 

Gambit is particularly well-suited to reconnaissance and infiltration, in settings of any quality; as infrequently as the X-Men’s work calls for those things in a more lavish circumstance, it does happen once in a while. He can’t remember the last time he’d dropped by a gala with bad intentions, at least on hero business, but he’s quite certain that whenever that last time was, he’d been with Rogue. And Rogue was not allowed to come with, because sometimes these jobs called for a little more than flirting, as nasty as that was - and Rogue had a temper about seeing these things, even if he’d gotten out of all circumstances so far without having to stoop so low. Just the flirting was bad enough. 

Jean was more mission-focused, or that was the thinking, and she was making the rounds as a waiter, checking for hidden exits on her trips to the kitchen. Doing a lovely job, too, he’s sure.

He, on the other hand, has to isolate and charm a particularly violently anti-mutant senator’s wife. It turns out it isn’t as difficult as he’d expected; she’s pretty, but not exquisite, and she’s clearly feeling more than a little sour towards her husband as he laughs with his colleagues. It’s also likely that one of said colleagues’ newest trophy wives standing five feet from her and glimmering all over in the most expensive latest fashions isn’t helping her self-esteem either.

Remy blowing the girl off with a smooth smile and excuse and sliding right on up to her side likely boosts her ego more than a bit - it isn’t hurt by the way he snags a fresh champagne flute for her off of a passing tray. 

“You’re not the dangerous kind of mutant, are you?” she asks, and the second her eyes lock onto his, he’s got her. The flare of irritation that rose up with her words is squashed quick enough, though he’s sure he’ll be stealing from wherever it is she lives next he’s in the area.

Remy shakes his head just quickly enough to be boyishly earnest about it, lets his cheeks dimple with a demure smile. “No, ma’am - don’t think I am.”

She flaunts. He flatters. She flutters. He flirts. The whole damn tricky jig of it takes so little time the ice in his drink hasn’t even begun to melt before she’s making a calculated departure towards the upstairs study.

He crosses over to Jean, who’s holding two full glasses of merlot for him with an impassive look on her face; draining the last of his whiskey, he swaps out. Head tipping back, she asks, “You got the information?”

“I’ve opened up avenues of communication,” he says, amiable as ever, and turns to go.

The muted twinge of jealousy that decidedly isn’t his hits him like a sack of bricks, and he spins on his heel, eyes wide in surprise, because, well, he just hadn’t expected Jean to care. 

Somehow, it’s nice that she does.

“Hey,” he murmurs, and stoops to press a kiss to her cheek, a quiet chuckle escaping him. “The flash drives are in a desk drawer.  I’m getting those, telling her to go start a shower and that I’ll catch up, and then locking her in. She’ll be embarrassed, not hurt, nothing else. I’ll be back in ten minutes. Promise.”

He’s back in six, with a sparkly paperweight to boot.

                                                                                                              v.

      The days are kind of a mess, but that’s okay. They slide by alright just the same, and they’re still sticking together fine, just fine. Some nights they don’t talk at all, just lie around in silence because it’s easier; some nights he disappears without a word because it’s how he is. She doesn’t ask him where he’s been, because she knows that if it mattered he’d say. She swipes his sweaters and feeds his cats until they’re extra-plump. They pretend that they’re normal like they’re ever going to get there.

“I’m not a good man,” he reminds her, smudges her nose with flour just enough that her eyes cross when she assesses the damage; she doesn’t say anything for a long moment, just confiscates the mixing bowl in his arms so that he can’t smudge her anymore.

When she smiles at him, it’s a little sad, but that’s alright. They’ve both been broken for a long time.

“You’re not as bad as you think you are,” she tells him, the same conversation as always, played out over and over again because some things can’t be fixed but that doesn’t mean they aren’t alright, alright. He doesn’t bother to fight it when her fingers trace over his cheek and she stands on tiptoe to slant warm lips over his.

“It doesn’t matter anyway,” she says, and her smile says she means it. “You’re mine.”