#perhaps for being in my 30s I now look back to shit I wrote about older people's relationships while I was in my early 20s and just EW | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

eleganzadellarosa · 1 year

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BOUNCE BACK

pairing: dominic fike x oc

genre: fluff, angst

word count: 2.2K

AN: I wrote this on a whim for my best friend a few months ago to kick start my want to write. Dom is her bae fr so I obviously had to include him lol. Enjoy and thanks for reading <3

The beach was practically empty, a person scattered about here and there but nothing compared to how packed it usually is. That’s all thanks to how late it was becoming, the setting sun being a telltale sign. You didn’t mind the scarcity though, you wanted to be alone with your thoughts. Maybe the beach wasn’t the best or secluded place to be but you needed some fresh air and wanted to be somewhere where you normally felt happy. The sloshing sound of the waves temporarily took your mind off of today’s earlier events.

You found texts in your boyfriend of 5 years’ phone talking to some girl who carried no importance to you which was a good thing in its own way. The texts ranged from normal conversation to “I can’t wait to be inside you tonight”. You’d been together since the start of high school and you truly believed the relationship would last a lifetime. The feelings were apparently not mutual and after scrolling through the thousands of texts, this charade had been going on for years now. The girl in question was his ex who he dated right before getting with you and their relationship was comparable to a light switch, very off and on. Coming to the realization that he used you as a way to get his mind off of her until they were ready to kiss and makeup.

Nothing could have prepared you for today, but you were never one to turn down your gut feelings and they were right 99% of the time. You felt so stupid for trusting him and loving him the way you did but you constantly reminded yourself that none of this way your fault. The orange hue of the setting sun beamed on you, warming your skin and making the tears on your cheeks glisten. You were a mess. This was the third or fourth time you’ve cried within the past hour and your body seemed to have no intentions of stopping anytime soon. When you felt the vibration from the phone in your hand, you so badly wanted to chuck it into the water without checking it first, hoping the waves would take care of the rest.

Wiping your tears on the back of your hands, your sobbing finally came to a halt and you prayed for a bigger gap in between your next crying session. You lean back on your hands and scrunch the sand under your palms, closing your eyes to soak up the sun before it fully set within the next 30 minutes. The water seemed to move rapidly as the waves began to reach the shore and splash against your toes more frequently.

“Hey um, you might want to move a little farther back, the water is getting kinda high.” An extra shadow cast next to you along with the unfamiliar voice that came from behind you. Unfortunately for you, your puffy face and red eyes showed signs that you had been crying your heart out for the past hour no matter how many times your hands tried to rid your face of the evidence. Perhaps you had been staring at the sun for too long but it took a few seconds for your eyes to adjust and focus on the person now standing beside you.

“I- oh shit sorry, are you okay?” the handsome man asks, crouching down to be at eye level. Speaking of eyes, anyone with a pair could tell that this man was absolutely gorgeous. He had the perfect “boy next door” look to him. The look that made you want to be around him all the time, the look that would have every girl in school chasing after him but not because he was a fuckboy.

Everything about him was downright perfect, well at least to your standards. His hair, his face, his body, literally everything and thinking back to the two seconds you heard him speak, that was perfect too. Maybe all the crying made you let your guard down, but his presence felt so welcoming and you fought the weird urge to go up and hug him. You didn’t realize you hadn’t answered his question until he speaks again. “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to but I’d prefer if you did, maybe I can make you feel better.” He then sits down next to you and rests his arms on his knees, which created a space for his head to lay as he looked at you. “Umm…earlier today I found out my boyfriend of 5 years has been cheating on me with his ex. I don’t know if I can even call him my boyfriend because apparently I was just a rebound whenever he needed it and I never caught on.” The end of your sentence gets slightly caught in your throat and you can feel your eyes burning, forcing tears to swell yet again.

“Man…I’m so sorry, that’s so fucked up. Would you feel better if you talked about it? I have time on my hands so I really don’t mind. Shit, you could tell me over and over if that would help.” It wouldn’t hurt to rant right now and him being one of the finest people you’ve ever met was just an added bonus.

The conversations quickly turned from your dumbass ex to getting to know each other. Everything seemed to flow naturally with him, he was such a joy to talk to and you wanted nothing more than for this night to never end. Sadly the sun had already set and it was quite dark out, the moon being the only source of light for you both. The two of you sat in silence for a while longer before you finally decided to check your phone. 9:15 it read. The singular notification being from “person who shall not be named” and you could only imagine what it said, but you wouldn't bother checking now, not if you wanted your mood to be soiled. He was the last thing on your mind and with the way this new guy had two hours feeling like 30 minutes, it was more than you could ask for.

“Oh my gosh, I’m so sorry I kept you here for this long. Thank you for listening to me though, I really needed it, I feel so much better.” He smiled when you finished speaking and shook his head as if to say “don’t worry about it”. “You know, if you’re comfortable with it, I can give you my number and you can text me whenever you need someone to listen. I know the feeling, so I really don’t mind and you’re a really great person to talk to”. Just hearing the offer makes your heart beat with excitement. Smiling maybe a little too hard, you hand him your phone so he can save himself as a contact.

“Wait, I never asked you your name. Dang, I’m sorry I was so focused on myself…” thinking about the selfish act had you almost in tears for the umpteenth time tonight until he rubs a comforting hand over your arm. “You really don’t have to worry about that love, I was here to listen. My name is Dominic but really just call me Dom.” The nickname gave you butterflies, more than his existence already did, if that was even possible. Whenever he smiled your eyes landed on the apple tattoo under his right eye. The longer you looked at him, the more things you noticed but nothing came across as a turn off. He stands up after handing back your phone and dusts the sand off his shorts. He reaches out for you to grab his hand to stand from where you sat.

“And who do I have the pleasure of speaking with?” Once standing, you mimicked his action of dusting off the sand from your clothing before you answer. “Jenna but really just call me Jenna”. Your response made him chuckle since you copied exactly what he had said to you moments earlier. You notice he still hadn’t let go of your hand and when you look up from where they intertwine, he speaks before you can. “Well Ms. Jenna, allow me to escort you back to your vehicle”. The night was ending all too quickly and your heart already aches with longing. “I kinda don’t wanna go back home yet Mr. Dom.” A small smirk paints his face, so small that you would have missed it if you didn’t look at him in time. “Um well, you can come chill with me if you want. I don’t really have anything to do at my house, but I do have food.” “Food is just fine and I don’t care if you don’t have anything to do, chilling is more than enough. Thank you for the invite.”

More hours are spent with you two learning more about one another and eating whatever random food or snacks he had in his house. You decided after chatting for a while that his laugh was in the top 10 things you liked most about him, it sounded so cheerful and he looked so cute whenever he did it. This was the most fun you’ve had in a long time, even more than you can ever recall having with your ex. “Hey do you want to hear something?” He says almost popping up from his seat on the couch. “What do you mean?” You ask clearly confused by his question. “I uh…like making music and I have something I’ve been working on. Do you wanna hear it?” You can tell he gets a bit shy with the way his ears turn a light shade of pink and he scratches the back of his head. Gosh could this man be anymore interesting? He lead you to a room near the back of his house and the door opened to a large space filled with instruments of all kinds. It looked like every studio you’ve seen in movies or TV.

“You can sit wherever you’d like, lemme just grab my guitar”. You find a place on the small couch nestled in the corner, sitting sideways to get a better look at what he was doing. He sits across from you on the couch holding the large brown guitar. He suddenly looked so serious, the guitar pick loosely hanging from between his lips, brows furrowing as he makes sure the guitar is tuned perfectly. Such a simple action, but you couldn't help but notice how handsome he looked while doing it. “This song is called 3 nights, lemme know what you think okay?” His voice mixed with the melody of the song possessed your body, making it move along to the beat. By the time he finished, the lyrics to the chorus were already stuck in your head on loop.

“No freaking way, that was amazing! You have to let other people hear this!” Your comment made him smile from ear to ear and a blush accented his cheeks. “Yeah? It’s still just a rough draft, but if you like it that much then I’m doing something right.” He sets his guitar down next to the couch and leans his head back against the arm. "You know, this is the first time in a long time where I didn't feel like I needed to smoke to get me through the day and I really appreciate that." He lifts his head and finds you staring at him with a sympathetic look on your face. "Obviously I wouldn't since we just met, but I didn't know you felt that way sometimes. I'm glad I could help you as much as you helped me today." He fully sits up on the couch and leaned over to you, his lips lightly brushing your forehead. The action made your body stiffen and he pulled away when he felt it. "Shit..sorry, I just felt like doing that. Sorry, I know that was so weird." You reached over to cup his cheek in your left hand and moved over to kiss him on the soft skin.

"It wasn't weird and I've been wanting to hug you all day. I could really use one of those right now." He wasted no time in pulling you into a tight but gentle hug and tears began to fall from your eyes. He lightly caresses your back and shushes you, trying to bring you some sort of ease to your pained heart. He plants another soft kiss on your forehead and you look up at him through teary eyes. "If I asked to stay longer, would you let me?" "Hell yeah, I'd let you stay the night if you were okay with that. You can sleep in my room and I can sleep on the couch in the living room." You nod your head and he rubs his thumb on your shoulder.

The night was over but the feeling of sadness never came to you as you expected. In contrast to yesterday, this day would start off a lot better and thankfully you had someone around that actually had the ability to take your mind off everything. Little did you know, this would count as the day you met the person who would later become someone you weren't ashamed to call your boyfriend.

#dominic fike #one shot #elliot euphoria #dominic fike x reader

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citrus-moonlight · 20 days

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Salvation is a Deep Dark Well

Chapter 3: Now When I Look In Your Eyes

[ Masterlist - Part Two ] -> [ Masterlist - Part One ]

Fandom: MCU - Age of Ultron, Black Panther Pairing: Ulysses Klaue x F!Reader Word count: 9.4K Chapters: 3/6 Rating: Explicit

Summary: You manage to distract yourself for long enough to make through the rest of the day, but when Klaue finally returns to you he still makes you wait, surprising you with something unexpected before finally making good on his promise.

Warnings: Explicit!, Mild Age Difference, Reader is Late 30s, Use of Pet Names, Teasing, Smut, Dirty Talk, Reference to Masturbation (F), Mild Size Kink, Soft Dom, Nipple Play, Oral Sex (F!Receiving), Begging, Overstimulation, Multiple Orgasms (F), PIV Sex, Cock Riding, Cream Pie, Praise Kink, Needy Dom, Very Brief Fingering, Cum Eating, Porn With Plot, Reader is In It Now Kids, More Accidental Feelings Oh No

Author's Note: Hello, friends, and welcome back! When I tell you I'm very glad I split up this chapter - this was essentially supposed to be a chapter "prologue" of maybe 2k, and then, well, *gestures broadly*. Klaue wants what he wants, what can I say. 😏

The next chapter is going to be an undertaking (gala!), and I can't really give a timeline at this point, but it's at least outlined and in the meantime you can read their little holiday interlude (which I accidentally wrote first, lol) and it'll now be in order! ☺️

As always, thank you for reading and for sticking with me, I hope you enjoy this next chapter! 💕

✨ Read on AO3 ✨

Chapter title is from "Come Alive" by Cannons

Now that you're by my side I get this feeling, get this feeling Like I'm hypnotized Now when I see your eyes I get this feeling, get this feeling I just come alive And I've been dreaming of you Do you dream of me too?

Through every ounce of will you can summon you somehow manage to last.

After stopping by your room to quickly wash and change, you realize once you get back to the industrial sector that there’s not enough of your shift left to justify starting on any new projects, so instead you occupy yourself with busy work - finally putting away your station that was left in disarray after the tense altercation earlier, and getting rid of everyone’s scrap that's been piling up in the workspace.

Then you trudge through a layer of fresh snow to finally finish the inventory that you’d attempted to start two days ago before everything had gone to shit.

Even as you try to focus on the tedium of the various tasks you inevitably find yourself turning over Klaue’s request - his command - in your mind.

Honestly, you probably wouldn’t have done more than think about it, having really just been wanting to tease him (which you’re starting to enjoy doing, perhaps a little too much), but on top of the natural frustration from being interrupted, then being told that you couldn’t?

He'd managed to find a way to drive you mad even when he was nowhere near you.

Waves of heat roll through you as you make entries in the log, and every time you move you’re growing increasingly aware of the slick sensation between your thighs, a reminder that you’re already making a mess of your fresh panties.

And, so? What do you want?

Besides whatever he’ll give you.

Besides everything.

A thick index finger slowly sinking into you, dragging and curling while his thumb rubs your throbbing clit until you’re shaking.

Another tick on your paperwork and you circle the total a little more aggressively than necessary, leaving a little tear in the paper, ink marking the page beneath.

Locking up the first cage you move on to the next, feeling as though plumes of steam should be visibly rolling off of you, and eyeing a snowdrift you wonder if it would draw too much attention if you just lay down on it face first. It seems like the only thing that might actually cool you off right now as the overlap of memory and anticipation has an aching heat wrapping around your hips and flowing outward from deep in your belly.

His thigh pressed against your sex, but now you're bare for him, the hair on his leg dark with your arousal as strong muscles flex beneath you, and this time you rut against him for as long as you want.

And he's the first man who's made it feel like it’s alright for you to want. Unafraid of your desire Klaue instead seeks it out, coaxing you to surrender to it, pushing you to admit that it’s yours until you can't help but take and then, oh, the satisfied darkness in his eyes when you do.

As you continue to work you wonder if maybe he’s feeling the same way you are right now. Does it make him hard to think about you while he deals with his men and speaks to important figures? Is he shifting and adjusting himself at the thought of how needy you must be but forced to deny yourself?

Or is he calm, knowing that even now there’s a way that every thought is tethered to him, not thousands of miles away but right here in the same building, waiting.

The idea of him being distracted pleases you, but certainly does nothing to help the throb in your core. You think about how easy it would have been to find a release when you’d stopped by your room, and now you're growing so distracted that you’re tempted to go back or to slip away into a washroom. It would be quick with how worked up you are and then maybe you’d be able to actually concentrate.

After all, how would he know if you did?

And yet a part of you knows that it wouldn’t be satisfying, not really. That same part that connects to the tugging desire to be good, that wants him to be pleased that you’ve obeyed.

So you shake your head and fall back on a trick you use to help curb your emotions when you’ve had to deal with shitty people throughout your career, starting to rhyme off words in your head - glow, tomorrow, elbow, tempo, Orinoco Flow. Gradually your mind begins to calm a bit, and after several slow breaths the ache ebbs enough that you’re able to focus back on the tanks and the clipboard in your hand.

Once you settle into a rhythm you manage to finish the inventory pretty quickly, even if can’t completely stop your mind from spinning a little, and as you lock everything up and head back to drop off the paperwork with Tom, you finally have to admit to yourself that you knew what your answer was going to be as soon as Klaue told you to decide.

Several hours later the sun has fully set when you open your door to the welcome sight of Klaue standing in the hallway.

You want to reach out for him, to grab his shirt and pull him to you, but for now you simply watch as he walks in and slowly shuts the door behind him and turns to face you.

“Did you have enough water?”

You can’t help but huff a laugh that the first thing out of his mouth is to make sure you’d listened to what he’d said, even though he must be more than aware that all you want is for him to throw you onto the bed.

“I’ve been drinking.” You assure him, though you can’t help rolling your eyes a little.

His gaze narrows, not questioning but still eyeing the half-empty bottle on your nightstand.

“And you’re feeling alright?”

“I’m feeling like I might lose my mind if you don’t touch me soon,” you all but scoff.

“You know what I mean, darling,” he warns, sharp eyes flicking down to your lips.

For the love of god, please just kiss me.

“Still good, Ulysses, I swear. And I promise I’ll let you know if I’m not.” you reply, sweetly frustrated, but you can’t help but smile at his concern.

He seems placated, but still doesn’t approach you.

“And did you work past your shift?”

You swear to god one more question and you’re just going to throw yourself at him, though this one still gives you pause.

It had been your instinct to, you can’t deny it, tempted to find more to occupy yourself so that you wouldn’t be quite so trapped with your thoughts. But you’d resisted, and once you passed off the paperwork there was no real reason to stick around.

“No. I didn’t.”

You feel a little silly at the giddiness that follows your truthful reply and the pleased grin that twitches at the corner of his mouth.

“And you waited.”

These words are lower and there is no question in them.

You’re certain that he already knows the answer, that he could tell as soon as he’d walked in the door. You’ve been antsy, unable to stop shifting on your feet, your restless hands unconsciously picking up your scarf from the table by the door and twisting the short fringe into tiny spikes during this exchange.

“I did.”

Slowly he steps toward you, plucking the scarf from your fingers and dropping it back on the table.

“I’m glad to hear it.” His voice drops, your breath hitching in anticipation when a hand lifts to finally reach for you.

But then he pauses, fingertips a hairsbreadth from your skin. Seeming to consider something he pulls back again and you have to bite back the frustrated noise that wants to escape your throat.

“Come with me,” Klaue moves away from you, nodding toward the door.

“I’d very much like to, thanks,” you think, the tingle of the near contact leaving your nerves buzzing, but while you're nearing your wit’s end you can’t help but be curious about what he’s thinking.

Steeling yourself with a deep breath you nod wordlessly, but as you walk over to grab your key card from the bedside table you make a quick decision. Following the temptation of a thought that you’d been considering earlier you slide open the drawer to find something hidden within, quickly pocketing it along with the key and your phone.

Before you’ve gone very far, though, Klaue directs you to the canteen. You can’t say that this is what you were expecting but you wait quietly, curiosity knitting your brows as he starts to work one of the machines, hot water pouring over a black tea bag as he adds a packet of honey to the dark, steaming liquid. But then instead of drinking it himself he hands it to you.

“I know you didn’t drink enough water,” he chides.

Your mouth drops open though no words come out.

You want to laugh, acutely aware that you both know the reason for the tea. Eyes wide, you glance around and even though you know that anyone who might be watching will continue on oblivious, when your eyes meet his heat flares between your thighs as you recall the tears that stained your cheeks while you gratefully licked his mess from your lips.

“Thank you.” Your heart races as you bite back a smile and finally wrap your fingers around the proffered drink, and then with a darkening look you feel a hand on the small of your back, swiftly guiding you on your way.

You really had felt fine but as you sip the hot liquid you have to admit that it feels nice as the honey soothes your throat, a frown and another swallow of your tea unable to tamp down the flutter in your chest that seems to match the sweetness on your tongue.

When you reach a familiar juncture you wonder if he wants to finish things where they’d started, but then you make a different turn and then another, leading you away from his office until eventually he stops in front of a door that appears to be down its own hallway.

The cup freezes on its path to your lips when you notice the key card in his hand and the realization suddenly hits you: These are Klaue’s quarters.

Oh shit.

It hadn’t even occurred to you as a possibility tonight. Not that you hadn’t thought about it - in fact you’d thought about it more than a few times - but you still feel like a deer caught in the headlights as the lock beeps and clicks open.

Your heart pounds as you follow him inside where you’re greeted by an insistent pinging coming from a workstation in the corner, and with an impatient sound Klaue walks to the desk with a scaled down version of what you’d seen in his office.

“Hm, I need to check on this. I’ll just be a minute.”

You barely hear him. He could have very well told you that an Asgardian ambassador and the Queen of England were waiting for a video call with him and you’re not sure that you would have reacted.

As you wait for him you force the analytical side of your brain to kick in and try to observe some of the details, noting that his room is almost identical to your own quarters, just bigger: An open layout, a closet in the same spot, but with something that could actually be considered a proper window.

The main difference is the additional space akin to an office with the desk and electronics connected to several monitors, which doesn’t really surprise you: Klaue doesn’t strike you as the type to ever really stop working - at least not for very long.

Aside from the cool light emanating from the corner where he’s sitting the room is dim and unexpectedly warm, and as you look around your eyes inexorably stray to the bed (his bed), partially made, the covers and sheets a stoney grey and roughly pulled up to where crooked pillows sit against the headboard and-

Jesus, you need to sit down.

Unfortunately the only place to sit right now would be the bed, which just makes you need to sit down even more, and-.

Oh god.

Squeezing your eyes shut you take several slow inhales in an attempt to get your pounding heart under control.

“So..”

You nearly jump at the sound of his voice, and when your eyes fly back open you see that he’s finished, the monitors now sitting dark behind him.

“Have you decided, darling?” Klaue’s words are deceptively casual, belying the heat in his eyes.

He’s back now, focused entirely on you again, chin propped against his knuckles as his hungry gaze slides over your body, and you can’t help how your own eyes immediately stray to his spread thighs and the prominent ridge between them that’s growing evident even in the low light.

“I have.” You manage to keep your voice soft, but you can’t hide the tremble in your reply.

Pushing himself up out of the chair Klaue slowly saunters over to where you still haven't moved, stopping when he's close enough that you can feel the heat of his body, invisible tendrils of need reaching out for him, desperate to close the gap.

“And?” The word is low and breathless and sets your nerves alight.

Finding it difficult to meet his eyes your teeth catch your lower lip, a shy flush working its way through your body even as your desire flares hot again.

“Well, it wasn’t easy.” You glance at him through your lashes. “I had a lot of time to think. And there are so many ways that you make me feel good.”

As you speak he finally reaches out to you, fingers grasping the hem of your shirt and tugging it up until you lift your arms to allow him to pull it over your head.

“Go on.” Klaue prompts, leaving you to swallow a moan when he suddenly drops to his knees.

Looking up at you expectantly his hands slide up the backs of your thighs, briefly cupping and squeezing the curve of your ass before moving to your waist to seek the bare skin there.

“Well, I was thinking about…letting you watch me.”

Fingertips still in their ghosting path just above your waistband.

“I thought about letting you watch how I use my fingers to make myself come when I’m alone here. Alone and wishing you could hear me every time I moan your name.”

You can see that his breathing is going rough at your words, and licking your lips you continue.

“Or maybe…using this.” Slipping your fingers into the pocket in the side of your leggings, you pull out what you’d tucked next to your phone earlier, shining silver and not much bigger than a tube of lipstick.

Brief confusion followed by a sharp look of understanding flashes across Klaue's face as he realizes what you’re holding.

“A vibrator?” His voice is intrigued, a brow arching as he takes the small device from you and turns it over in his fingers, perhaps imagining you using it, writhing in pleasure yet unsatisfied because it’s not him.

But at the same time you can tell he wasn’t expecting this, his expression coloured perhaps with a shade of disappointment. And that shouldn’t make you feel as good as it does.

He looks like he’s going to say something but holds it back, he’d laid out the parameters, after all. He’d told you that you had to decide how you were going to come, but he didn’t actually say that it had to be him.

“I thought about you watching me with this against my clit, until you decide I’ve had enough. Until I beg you to let me stop.”

You can see his mind working though he’s uncharacteristically quiet, the fingers of his free hand digging into your hip so hard it’s beginning to ache.

“But…then I changed my mind.”

“Yeah?” Klaue’s voice is strained as he seems to go still as stone, hardly seeming to breathe now, waiting for you to continue.

“I want your mouth, Ulysses.”

A look of pained relief glints across his eyes before hardening back into a vehement blue, and without waiting for you to say anything else he roughly tugs at the waistband of your leggings, peeling them halfway down your thighs, and then with a groaned sigh his lips are suddenly pressed against your clothed mound.

“I was hoping you’d say that.”

Klaue’s breath is warm through the fabric of your panties, his tone indicating that it may have been less hope and more desperation.

“Tell me why.” His command is the rumble of a distant storm that sends a shudder through your body.

“Because…I couldn’t stop thinking - I can never stop thinking about it, Ulysses, oh-”

You gasp when his tongue is suddenly on you, pressing to easily part your cleft before sliding down to taste the damp spot where your arousal has soaked through the fabric.

“Is that all?” He asks with an infuriatingly coy smile, waiting for you to continue.

“I need your mouth between my legs, I need you to taste what you do to me, what just the thought of you does to me, oh my god-”

He rolls his tongue against your clit, the slick friction quickly growing rougher and more demanding.

“And because…because I can feel that you want it too, and that makes me feel really fucking good.”

Arching against his mouth your words trail off to a moan, but just as pleasure begins to swirl hot and insistent Klaue pulls away, his fingers tugging your panties down as well, and your hands brace on his shoulders as he helps you out of everything.

“There’s very little in this world I want more, darling. I love feeling how wet you get when you’re desperate for my tongue."

As you watch his fingers moving it occurs to you that he often seems intent on being the one to undress you, calloused palms running over the skin he's revealed, that's his to reveal, eyes dark and riven with need as though seeing you for the first time.

Once you’re stripped down to only your bra he pauses, hands fitting around your waist, forehead resting against your hip. Warm breath washes over your skin and although he’s so, so close to where you’re aching for his touch you find yourself pausing with him, your mind growing quiet.

It’s a different kind of quiet from the way he so deftly empties your head with his fingers or his cock, every thought supplanted by pleasure. There’s still a trembling anticipation that can't be ignored, electricity buzzing steadily through the air between you, but for a moment you both surrender to the calm, hovering in that space between heartbeats.

Your hands explore the backs of his, playing over his rings, over the leather cuff on his wrist, and when they trail over his forearms you can feel the faintest tremble in his muscles as he holds you against him.

Your fingers find a salt and pepper curl and brush it away from his face, needing to see him, the breath nearly knocked from your lungs when his shining blue gaze finds yours. He almost looks surprised, perhaps unused to your tenderness, but after a breath the crease between his brows softens as he leans into your touch.

It’s not long, though, before the air begins to crackle again and with his eyes still on yours he shifts, slowly dragging the tip of his nose along your cleft with a deep inhale and a sigh, and just that warmth against your sensitive flesh has you whimpering, the calm quickly ebbing away as your aching need swiftly flows back in.

Your hips flex forward to seek more and your breath catches in anticipation of his tongue, but instead he pulls away, and before you have a chance to protest he's standing again, reaching quickly to unclasp your bra, sensing a crack in his composure in the brief fumble of his fingers as they work the metal loops.

Now standing naked in his room Klaue moves in close enough that as you breathe the peaks of your nipples brush against his still clothed chest, and when he leans in you instinctively tilt your head.

“Tell me again.” Lips ghosting across the skin beneath your ear sends fresh heat to your core.

“I need your mouth, need you to make me come on your tongue.” You pause before adding. “As many times as you want. Please.”

“That's right, you will.” Klaue replies, his voice low and tight with need. “Now, on the bed, darling.”

Without hesitation you quickly make your way over to sit on the bed, the scent of him swirling around you as you adjust the pillows and settle back, and when you glance back up you're greeted by the intoxicating vision of Klaue standing at the foot of the bed, fingers frozen on the bottom button of his now open shirt.

“I can’t tell you how many times I’ve thought about you here in my bed.” He says with a rough sigh, fingers freeing the last button as his gaze slides up your legs and over the soft swell of your breasts.

“Can’t be more than the number of times I’ve thought about being here.” You admit in turn, a smirk beginning but quickly falling as you watch him peel off his shirt, muscles flexing beneath the ink that paints his chest and shoulders.

“I have to say, it seems I was right, Mot.”

“About what?” You frown.

“About how lovely you’d look, right there.”

Caught off guard by the sweetness in his words a reply falters on your lips, and you squeeze your thighs together as though it might help you to hide from the way he makes you feel. But of course he notices.

“Would you spread your legs for me, please?”

Biting your lip you meet his eyes and begin to slowly straighten your legs, sliding them down towards the foot of the bed before letting your knees fall open. At first it’s just enough to give him a teasing peek but the heat of his gaze has you helpless to keep yourself from him.

Spreading your legs wider you pull your knees back and open, and when the cool air hits you exposed skin you’re immediately aware of just how wet you are, and not just your sex - you can feel the insides of your thighs have become damp with your arousal as well and judging by the look on his face he can see it.

Slowly you shift down a bit more, giving a little upward rock of your hips for his benefit as you tuck one hand up behind your head, letting the other rest across your hip, attempting to look much calmer than you feel.

Following to where you’ve made a lovely display for him on his bed he removes the last of his layers, freeing the deliciously thick curve of his cock to hang heavy and twitching between his thighs, and standing above you he tilts his head appraisingly. A flush of heat crawls through every inch of your body as he takes a moment to drink in the sight of you, then slowly sits down on the edge of the bed..

Reaching out a hand he lets his fingertips alight on your knee before dragging them up over the skin of your inner thigh, his eyes staying fixed along the path they take, watching intently as your muscles flex and quiver beneath his touch.

“Not my fingers, then? You’re sure?” Klaue teases, smirking when your hips cant up against the air. With significant effort you manage to drag your thoughts away from how good it feels, how easy it would be to let him relieve the ache in your core.

“YesI’msure,” you blurt in a rush, quickly reaching down to stop his hand where it hovers inches from your sex.

“Both hands.” He says quietly, eyes flicking above your head in explanation. “And keep them there. Understood?”

“Yes. I understand, Ulysses.” You nod, the vice of your fingers slowly releasing him.

Once you’ve tucked your hands up and between the two pillows you’re resting against, he seems satisfied and moves the rest of the way onto the bed, positioning his body over yours.

He’s warm and heavy and you can feel the grin when his lips find the hollow of your throat, your hips beginning to roll slowly beneath him, acutely aware of his hard cock nudging against the inside of your thigh.

“I’ve thought about you here like this for so long.” Klaue murmurs, his tongue tasting your skin, trailing slow kisses up one side of your neck and then down the other, making his way down your chest before pausing at your breasts.

Then you think you hear something else, something quieter, whispered against your heartbeat.

“Want to keep you here.”

But you're distracted by his mouth again before you can really register the words, overwhelmed by how you’re already trembling and clenching just from the drag of his lips across your inflamed skin, and maybe you imagined it anyway.

When his tongue flicks over your nipple none of your thoughts don’t stand a chance, a moan immediately sliding from deep in your chest. He spends just enough time on each to leave them peaked and aching, but when he starts to move further down you stop him.

“No, wait! More please, please..”

You look down at him, breathless and imploring, arching your chest up to encourage him, sighing with relief when his tongue returns to swirl over the pebbled flesh, and soon you’re moaning again as he alternates from one to the other, kissing and sucking until you’re writhing beneath the solid weight of him.

Just when you think you can’t take any more he holds a nipple between his lips, just the very tip of his tongue flicking quickly until an ache starts to build deep in your belly, everything growing hot and tight and then suddenly your back is arching hard as you let out a broken cry, and while his tongue continues to work a hand cups your other breast, his thumb circling there in a matching rhythm as your cunt clenches around nothing.

It doesn’t have the same peaking intensity but it still feels like you're coming, like if he keeps doing this you just might, and only when he pulls away does the desperate tension finally release from your muscles with a gasp.

“Another night I’m going to find out how many times I can make you do that.” He looks up at you, his expression more than a little smug. “But right now I think it’s time I made good on my promise, don’t you?”

You’re unable to respond with more than a nod, still panting and shuddering as he resumes his path downward. Your skin shines in the low light as his lips and tongue lave along your stomach and over your hips, and as he finally reaches the juncture of your thighs Klaue adjusts himself, setting there so that he’s lying with his erection pressed firmly into the mattress.

He pauses then, using his thumbs to gently spread you open for him, his mouth hovering just over your aching sex to let you feel his breath before you feel his touch.

“God, you are soaked for me, aren’t you?”

Before you can form any kind of reply he presses his lips against you, kissing just above your swollen bud, teasingly close to where you need him so badly that all you can do is whine for it.

“What was that, my darling?” He prompts you, gently taunting.

“I need your mouth on my pussy, please I needohhgod-”

He cuts you off with a flick of his tongue, then another, at first grazing you gently but then unable to resist he licks a hungry stripe through your folds, and the sudden slick warmth combined with the vibration of his moan through your cunt has you greedily rolling your hips.

Watching him as his tongue continues to move between your legs you can sense the tension in his shoulders gradually softening, that tension he holds as part of his natural state, ever curled and ready to react drains away as he gives in to your honeyed musk, his arms sliding around your thighs to hold you snug against his mouth.

You want to reach down, to run your hands over his neck and shoulders and through his curls, but you resist, gripping the pillow tighter in an effort to keep them where they are, not daring to take the chance that he might stop.

But then he does pull off of you suddenly, silently looking up at you with heavy lidded eyes.

“What- what’s wrong?” You pant, confused and trying not to be concerned.

“You’re not a dream, are you?” Klaue murmurs, resting his cheek against the inside of your thigh, plush beneath the scratch of his beard. He watches you for a long moment as though he were a parched man in the desert afraid that you were a mirage, and if he’s not careful he might lose sight of you.

“I don’t think so?” Relief floods you and you laugh softly.

“No. You taste too good to be a dream.”

Seeming reassured his mouth is on you again, lips soft and warm as they slowly, slowly close around your clit, and the gentle suction he adds now has your breath stuttering in your chest.

Your body begins to tremble, and seeming to anticipate it his arms tighten around your thighs just as you buck, keeping you in place as everything grows achingly bright and you arch against his mouth until you’re crying out, the pillowcase twisting in your fists as his hum of approval around your clit finally sends your orgasm surging through you hard and swift, pent up hours of thwarted desire finally finding its release.

And even when the pulsing waves begin to soften, he has no intention of stopping.

At times it feels like he’s trying to tease you apart at the seams, at others it seems to want to devour you all at once, and while Klaue has never been shy about exploring you he seems to relish taking his time tonight, soaking in your heat, teasing and licking every inch of you to find new patterns that make you sigh and roll your hips.

Your desperate pleas grow less and less articulate as his fingers dig into the flesh of your hips so that he can grind your cunt against his tongue, and as overwhelming as it is you find yourself sinking into it. Letting the only thing you need be his mouth against the soft place between your legs you eventually lose track of how much time passes, simply focusing on the susurrus of heat and pleasure that flows out from your center as the sheets below you become soaked with your release.

Eventually when you start to whine and try to pull away Klaue sees fit to give you respite, suckling instead at the sensitive flesh of your inner thigh until bruises begin to bloom there, and as his lips drag slowly across your skin you take the chance to watch him, your eyes catching the movement of his hips, his perfect ass flexing as he slowly ruts against the bed.

He must be achingly hard now, and you find yourself breathless at the thought of the stain he’s leaving on the sheets beneath him. Fresh heat spreads through your core as you imagine how his cock is twitching and leaking for you, and it’s not long before he notices your needy movements starting to seek him out again, eliciting a whimper when he presses a soft kiss against your clit.

This time, though, he waits, letting his mouth simply rest gently against you, warm and soft and shockingly patient, until just as he senses you starting to fully relax he suddenly sucks your clit between his lips and you’re gasping at the heated pressure around your bundle of nerves, his fluttering tongue unrelenting until you’re his name is the only sound your mouth can form.

Even now, sweaty and blissfully exhausted as he chases the last twitches of pleasure from your sex, you’re surprised that you can still feel the heady swirl of need humming through your tender flesh. And yet, although you have no real desire to pull away, and even though he told you that he was going to decide when you were finished, the thought still tugs from the back of your mind that he’s given you enough.

“You don't...don’t have to keep going.” You manage to stammer between panted breaths.

Pulling his mouth off of you Klaue looks up, his beard and full lips glistening with your juices.

“If you think I wouldn't spend the entire night with my mouth against you warm, sweet cunt." He punctuates this with a firm lick that has a moan lilting in your throat. "Then I'm afraid I'm going to have to work a little harder to turn off that mind of yours."

It's tempting, god it's so tempting to let him continue. You can feel yourself growing dangerously addicted to his unabashed hunger between your legs, yet you can’t deny that there’s a growing need for something else.

Because he hasn’t even put his fingers inside of you, only his tongue occasionally dipping down to tease at your entrance, and you’re fucking aching for more, imagining the arch and flex of his back as he fucks into you instead of wasting it on the mattress.

So you tilt your hips up to give him a more open view of where you’re dripping for him, a soft whine in your throat.

“What's the matter, darling? Tell me.”

“You said- you said if I was good…”

“Yes?” His eyes are fixed on yours as he mouths at the sensitive crease where your thigh meets your hip.

“You said I could come on your cock. And I waited. Like you said.”

“Yes, you did.” He pauses, considering. “But you were a tease, too, weren’t you? Pretending you wanted your little toy.”

Shit. Of course he’d figured you out. Your mind spins quickly, trying to figure out a way to keep what you’d been hoping for from slipping away.

“But I wasn’t lying, I did think about that.”

“Oh, I’m sure you did. But it was never going to be what you asked for, was it?”

You suck at your lower lip to keep from pouting and you have to swallow the lump forming in your throat.

What the hell has this man done to you? You’d lost count of how many times he’d made you come already and yet you’re on the verge of tears at the thought of not getting to fuck him tonight. But you hardly get to see him, after all. It’s not fair.

“No,” you finally admit meekly. “Ohh ‘m sorry.”

You whimper when the tip of a thick finger begins circling your entrance, but as soon as you tilt your hips to try to encourage him deeper he pulls his hand back.

“No, please, I need you.”

“Would you like to be a little more specific for me?” Klaue asks, watching your face intently as his finger slowly returns, and you know he can feel the flutter of your muscles as he dips teasingly into you.

“I need you inside me.” Saying it out loud sets an invisible spark alight, pushing out thoughts of anything else as your words continue to tumble out in a rush.

“God, do you have any idea how perfect your cock is? How wet I get when I think about you stretching me open? And I think about it it every fucking day. I need you to fuck me, Ulysses, need you to fill me with your cock and your cum, please I need you so fucking bad, I need you, I-”

The last words are cut off when your voice hitches, fighting to hold back the tears that prick hot at the corners of your eyes.

Desperate with need you’re only dimly aware that he’s moving, shifting himself to the head of the bed so that his back is against the pillows and then he’s tugging you up, causing you to let out a startled “Oh!” as your hands quickly move to catch yourself on his chest, quickly reminded of how strong he is as powerful arms lift you until you’re straddling his lap.

The thick length of him is hot and achingly hard, and he sucks a breath through his teeth when he slides through your folds, parting your cleft until the head, flushed and drooling, bumps against your swollen clit.

“Since you asked so nicely.” Klaue hums with a satisfied grin.

You’re nearly giddy with relief as you feel another upward flex of his hips, a heated slide of skin against slippery skin, and then you press your mouth against his, moaning when you taste yourself on his lips. He responds quickly, his tongue delving into your mouth, your kiss deep and full of desire as the rock of both of your hips grows more insistent.

Bracing more firmly on your knees you lift up, allowing him to slide further down until your kiss is broken by a moan when his cock catches at your entrance, your muscles already trying to clench around him.

Impatient now you reach a hand down between your legs to grip him, gasping at how hot he is beneath your fingers. He gives you a stuttered groan when you drag the mixture of his precum and your arousal along his length before shifting to line him up with your opening, and then finally you drop your hips firmly down.

Your head tips back with a sigh as you revel in the delicious ache of his girth slowly nudging into you, his mouth immediately moving to nip at the column of your neck, whispering praises against your skin.

“Needed my cock, hmm?” Klaue's voice pitches low. “That's good. I want there to be nothing else you can think about. Don't want you satisfied unless you're full of me.”

You feel a fresh surge of arousal at his words, your slick already dripping down his cock as you rock down harder, desperate to fit him inside of you.

“Yes, fuck, you feel so good. You're the only one who's ever made me want to beg, Ulysses.”

His eyes darken at your admission, groaning as your walls clench around him.

“I'm a lucky man, then, because you're so beautiful when you beg, klein Mot.”

Bliss continues to spool out through your body, and you’ve been so distracted by the sweet relief that you’re just realizing that he isn’t moving, that there’s a tension in his thighs and in the muscles of his jaw as he fights to keep himself still, focused only on watching you split yourself open on him.

Keeping your pace slow you allow yourself to luxuriate in every sensation, in the ridges of his cock as he slides deeper into you, the heat of broad hands roaming over you skin, dimpling the flesh of your thighs and then sliding to grip your ass, spreading you obscenely as you work yourself further down his length.

You’ve never been able to watch him like this and you’re nearly delirious from the sight, from the way he reacts to every flutter of your pussy around him, his arms flexing as his grip on you tightens in an effort to hold himself back. As you continue to ride him your own hands can’t help sliding greedily over the firm muscles of his shoulders, over the hair that covers his chest and belly and then down to where, although he’s softening with age, you’re still you’re keenly aware of the strength that resides beneath your fingers.

But as good as this feels there’s a frustration building, because although it’s gotten easier to take him he’s still so much, and you’re struggling to take him as deep as you want.

And judging by the look in his eyes, he can sense it.

“More,” you plead, the movement of your hips growing more insistent.

“What's the matter?” He asks with a wolfish glint of gold. “You said you needed my cock, darling. So take it.”

His bitten words are harsh, lightning crackling behind his teeth.

A surge of adrenaline courses through your veins as your hands slide around to grip the back of his neck in search of more purchase, fingernails digging crescents into his skin as you rock down harder. You can feel a low growl that you slowly realize is coming from your own chest as you desperately work to take all of him, and determined now you don't stop until your hips are snug against his, every inch of you finally stretched and spread open on his cock.

Breathing through the ache of it you take a moment to savour the prize of him fully buried in you, moaning when you give a firm roll of your hips and feel the slick friction of coarse hair at the base of him pressing and dragging against your folds, your eyes slipping closed with a blissful smile.

“Look at you.” Klaue rumbles, his fingers reaching to brush sweat-damp strands of hair away from your face. “That's my good girl.”

Tugged back by his words your eyes flutter open again as you rise up and slowly drop back down, your breathing mirroring one another as you find a rhythm. When you begin to add a rolling motion in time with each downward plunge you’re gratified when his mouth drops open, head tilting back to knock against the headboard with a groaned curse, though he still watches you through dark lashes, taking in the pleased curve of your lips and the bounce of your tits as your movements start to grow rougher.

Because you’re not sure if it's the angle from being on top and him sitting up like this but every slide of his cock into is you drawing an intoxicating flush of pleasure, tension swiftly coiling deep in your belly and licking a path up your spine as your breath comes in shorter and shorter gasps, and already being so overstimulated you’re unprepared for how quickly you can feel your climax approaching.

“Fuck, that’s it.” His voice is rough with hard fought restraint. “Use my cock like the needy little thing you are.”

Sweat beads on your skin, threads of pleasure stringing tight as the first inevitable surge begins to build, but then your thighs flex and your back arches and with the change in angle and the way your muscles are starting to tighten around him he’s suddenly slipping from where he’d been perfectly rooted deep inside you and you can feel the heated pleasure pulling away.

You were so close that you can’t get out anything more than a mixture of frustrated pleas, but then his voice cuts through the haze, dark and driving straight to your core.

“No.” Klaue growls. “Stay down.”

Gripping your hips tight he finally takes control, a hoarse cry ripped from your throat as he roughly forces his cock back into your clenching cunt, and startled by the sound that escapes you bite your lip hard, trying to hold it back.

“None of that,” he grits. “You're going to let me hear you, yeah? Because those lovely noises you make, they’re mine. The way my name sounds when you come, that's for me.”

Both of his arms encircle your waist and then you’re surrounded by him, by his grip, his voice, his musk, all of it demanding your pleasure, and your mouth drops open as you succumb to his command with a ragged moan.

Your thighs are burning now as you ride him, but with the edges of your climax gathering again you wouldn’t stop even if you could, and this time when your muscles tense and you buck suddenly against his grip he’s ready, powerful arms holding you in place.

You cling to his shoulders, desperate to hold on to something as you feel yourself tipping, the nearly unbearable friction against your clit drawing everything to a bright point, a silvery haze creeping in at the edges of your vision as you hover over the line between blissful agony and release.

“Going to come so hard for me, aren’t you?” His rasping words are more a plea than a question, rough from the rhythm of your hips as you grind helplessly against him. “So fucking beautiful.”

Finally you gasp a lungful of air as though hitting a shock of cold water and then the breath is forced from your lungs by a sob, tears you hadn't realized were pooling in your eyes spilling over as your orgasm crashes through you, his name falling in a tattered cry from your lips.

Your inhibitions are completely lost as you fuck yourself on his cock, chasing wave after wave of pleasure that rolls through your body and you can feel the rush of your release slicking the skin between you as you fall utterly apart, the heat of it only just starting to ebb when his gruff words bring you back to him, cutting through the din of ecstasy.

“Fuck, Mot don't stop. Need to come in your pussy, I'm-” Klaue stammers, his voice cracking with need.

“Ohh please,” you can only moan through hitched sobs.

Not able to thrust into you the way he normally wants he instead grips you tight, bracing his heels against the mattress and rutting his hips up as best he can while roughly grinding you down, his eyes squeezing shut as he focuses on keeping himself buried as deep inside of you as he can.

“Look at me,” you plead, your voice thick with tears and want.

Klaue’s eyes snap to yours, bright with the flame of a sapphire sacrament and after a few more broken thrusts he jerks beneath you, the muscles of his thighs flexing against the insides of yours, his bruising grip holding you down until relief floods his features and you feel the first hard throb of his cock, your name a honeyed plea on his lips as he comes deep inside you.

The tension in your body has finally begun to soften and as you regain some control you force yourself to hold as still as you can, wanting to feel everything, to feel every pulse as he spills himself inside you, soaking in the delicious sound of every grunted sigh as the thick warmth of his cum fills you.

He continues to twitch and throb inside you as you both catch your breath, large hands beginning to soothe over your back and sides and then back down to your hips, a satisfied hum rolling through his chest as his touch follows the lazy cant of your hips.

Sweat damp skin slides against skin and your moan matches his when he grips your ass and rocks you slowly up and then back down on his still stiff length, and though he hisses at the overstimulation he does it again, and then again, until wet sounds are filling the room as you writhe languidly against each other, the sticky slick of both of your leaking out from where you’re deliciously swollen and sore.

“God, the only thing better than the sweet taste of you, darling, is how pretty your pussy sounds when you’re full of my cum.”

“Jesus, Ulysses.” Your reply is half moan, half delirious laughter. “You’re going to kill me, I swear.”

He sucks a breath at the flex of your muscles around him when you laugh, though he still looks rather pleased with himself.

“Just returning the favour,” Klaue teases, though there's a sweet edge to his smug grin.

Giving him a watery smile you tuck your head down to rest your damp cheek against the slope of his shoulder, and when you start to work your hands between his back and the pillow he adjusts so that you can slide them around his broad waist.

Gradually you both grow still, the only movement for several moments is the rise and fall of your chests as you quietly rest against one another, the claw on the cord around his neck pressing into you to leave a mirrored indentation in your skin.

Slowly you nuzzle your cheek along the scruff of his beard, seeking every bit of contact he'll give you, relaxing further when the weight of his arms settles around your waist, and as you sit wrapped in each other you allow for the thought that maybe he's just as reluctant as you to untwine just yet.

And that maybe you did hear him say it earlier.

“Want to keep you here.”

Still, you don't want to overthink what he meant, so for now you let yourself simply enjoy this, here, tracing the salt of inked skin along his neck with your lips, though perhaps still hoping that, for tonight at least, he’ll want to keep you a little longer.

When you do eventually separate you're both still content not to get up right away, bodies relaxed and half pressed against one another, a hand splayed across a waist, hip and thigh meeting.

You're not sure when he does get up but as you drift in and out of sleep you hear Klaue in the shower, although you have no interest in moving yourself, not caring about the mess between your thighs enough to do anything about it just yet. You might even admit that you're rather enjoying it.

Eventually he returns to where you lie in a half-twilight, your eyes blinking open when the mattress dips beneath his weight.

“You don't have to leave, darling, but I do need to go,” he says. “I won't be able to come back tonight, but you’re welcome to stay as long as you'd like.”

Pushing yourself up you begin to protest but his mouth quickly finds yours, silencing you with a swipe of his tongue. The kiss is firm and slow, a hand moving to cup your jaw, working with his lips to guide you back down to the pillow.

“It's really no problem to go back,” you start when he releases you, “I can-”

He kisses you again deeper this time, a little more demanding, coaxing your mouth open as his tongue slides against yours until you’re wondering what your reason was for arguing at all, and when he releases you this time you can only look up at him with a glassy-eyed smile.

“Rest.” He murmurs, a thumb drifting across your cheek as you nod.

Before he stands to go, though, he draws your attention to something in his hand that glints in the low light.

“I'll be keeping this here, by the way.”

Your mouth forms a silent “o” as you watch him tuck your vibrator into the drawer of his night table and slide it shut.

“I forgot about that.” You whisper with a bashful smile.

“So did I,” he admits, his fingers tugging down the sheet that's covering you to reveal your naked form. “And when I did remember, I wasn't really in the mood to share.”

His hand coaxes a knee open, his jaw clenching when he catches the mess still shining between your legs.

“But you might not be so lucky in the future.”

There's a glint of a warning when his eyes return to yours, but before you can say anything you’re gasping when he suddenly slides two fingers into you, thrusting deep before pulling back out and you moan when, instead of offering them to you, he takes them into his own mouth, a satisfied hum rumbling through his chest at the taste of you mixed with him.

You’re still staring at him half stunned when he stands back up, licking his lips as his eyes sweep appraisingly over your body, as though he's trying to commit the image of you like this to memory.

“And you say I'm a tease. Do you have to go??” You try not to sound too needy, though you're pretty sure the way your hips are shifting again gives you away.

“I'm afraid I do, darling. Believe me, if I didn't...” He gives a rough sigh, frustration plain on his face. “But I'm here for two more days, and I will be taking advantage of them.”

“I certainly hope so,” you reply, a lazy smile curving your lips.

He gives you one last look as he closes behind him, and almost immediately you can feel sleep starting to steal over you again. You don't plan on staying very long, though, and as you turn over and tug the sheet back up you tell yourself you’re just going to close your eyes for a few more minutes, however it's several hours later when you open them again and realize that it’s now late (or early, rather).

Once you manage to orient yourself in the unfamiliar space you have to laugh, entirely unsurprised at this point that you’d passed out almost immediately.

After showering you actually don't rush to leave, but strange as it is to be here without him you find yourself unable to resist the chance to observe his room a little more closely.

While this obviously isn't a permanent space it still has details of him scattered around; you'd noted a razor and shaving bar next to the sink, one of his khaki shirts hanging on a hook in the bathroom.

You take a peek at a shelf by the door, full of books that for the most part you don't recognize or aren't in English, but you do spot Mary Shelley's “Frankenstein”, a small wood carved stingray next to it.

Hanging on the wall beside the shelf there's a framed photo of the ocean that looks like it was taken by a 35mm camera. Is it from somewhere he's been? Did he take it himself?

Sitting back down on the bed you intend to check your messages but your mind still wanders. You wonder if he does have somewhere that’s…maybe not home, but a place where pieces of him might be a little more embedded, that looks and smells familiar when he returns from time away. Somewhere that he rests.

You know it's time to head back to your room so you can get ready for the morning shift but you’re hesitant to get up just yet. Glancing at the bed and the mussed sheets, your hand slides over the pillow he'd been leaning against, acutely aware of the scent of him surrounding you, and without really thinking you lean down and press your nose into the creased fabric.

Immediately you're overwhelmed by the heady scent of him that infiltrates your senses: His musk beneath the soap, sweat and a faint trace of oil, all tied up with the still present scent of your mixed arousal, and it's only when you take a shuddering breath that you realize you’d been holding back a sob.

Sitting back up your hand quickly flies to your mouth, breath caught in your chest as you blink away the tears.

Shit.

The intensity of it honestly doesn't surprise you anymore, Klaue makes you feel - seems to revel in making you feel - more than you ever thought you could, teasing away the layers, revealing pieces of you that you didn’t even realize had been hidden.

“I don’t know what this is.”

“And I don’t know if I can tell you.”

None of this feels any clearer now yet there's a certainty settling in your chest, and it feels like that part of you that's been unsteady since you’d met Klaue in Utrecht is finally starting to right itself. And at the same time, maybe for the first time, you feel something unlocking in you, opening to the possibility of perhaps letting someone else help you find your balance.

So although you have no idea where this path leads, you're starting to accept that you aren't going to be able to stop until you find out.

AN: Once again, thank you so much for reading! 🥰 As I said this next chapter is going to be a beast (already trying to talk myself out of splitting it up again if it comes to that, lol), but I'm looking forward to continuing to exploring things between these two idiots, and I hope you'll come along for the ride!

#salvation is a deep dark well #bringin' home the rain part two #ulysses klaue #ulysses klaue x f reader #ulysses klaue x reader #ulysses klaue x you #ulysses klaue smut #reader insert #x reader #mcu fanfiction

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genericpuff · 1 year

Text

Mystery solved.

Okay. Okay I gotta figure out where to begin with this- breathes

A fellow ULO community member was going through old S1 panels and pointing out typos that we had all somehow missed (LO typos have a tendency to sneak by like that) and one thing they pointed out that I had never noticed was this one panel from Episode 102:

Particularly pointing out how the font overlays Hades' fingers which is just hilarious. That was where it was supposed to end.

But have you ever actually read the letter?

Because I did. And it took me on a ride I wasn't expecting to go on at 2:30 in the morning.

This shot of the letter is from the second instance it appears, when Hades scratches out part of it and writes, "I love the way you treat me, and I want to feel that way all the time."

But the first time this letter appears, when he's actively writing it, it's delivered to us through narration, in Episode 47. I actually love this episode, it does a great job at visual storytelling without overuse of active dialogue, and the content of the letter itself shows a great amount of self-awareness from Hades in the moment, even though the dark implications of what he's feeling is falling on his own deaf ears and the scene itself is quickly dashed by the obligatory quip-for-comedy-so-people-don't-get-too-sad of Hades' dismissing his therapist's advice, with the irony of him not realizing his own issues as he's writing this letter mere hours before overstepping his boundaries and having a guy whacked for taking photos of the Goddess of Spring.

But there was one line in particular that's always stood out to me.

The line "it ends up hurting you" felt random and out-of-context. In the beginning on my first read through back in early-mid 2019, I thought maybe it was just being poetic and I "didn't get it", until I became a critic of the series and had a reality check and realized it was likely just a typo, perhaps it was meant to be "It would end up hurting you" or something of that nature.

But it was looking at that panel of the letter and actually reading the text that was there that I realized - the line feels random and out-of-context, because it is random and out-of-context.

Look back at the letter. Paragraph eight. Rachel didn't write the full line despite it being necessary to the line 'it ends up hurting you'.

The full excerpt reads:

"I WISH I COULD EMPTY A DRAWER IN MY DRESSER FOR YOU, OR BUY YOU A TOOTHBRUSH TO KEEP IN MY BATHROOM. THE TRUTH IS, EVERY TIME WE HAVE SOMETHING TO DO WITH EACH OTHER... IT ENDS UP HURTING YOU."

I can't believe it's not just a typo. I can't believe it took me this long to find this. I don't know how this got missed by Rachel, I'm assuming she wrote the letter out first and then copy and pasted the words into a larger font size which she placed throughout the episode, but how could that one part have been missed when the line "it ends up hurting you" is a dependent clause that can't stand on its own without the line that precedes it?

At the very least, I do finally feel like I've found closure over this one scene, now that I know the full context to the line. And I wouldn't have found it if it weren't for people joking about the letter panel being drawn like shit.

But it's definitely discouraging because it begs the question, what else is being haphazardly left out of the dialogue? What other clunky sentences with next to no context or build-up or reasoning could be better if they were actually finished or if Rachel and her team had spent the extra time to double check the script and ensure that no sentence is being left half-finished?

The irony in this scene as well is that Hades acknowledges he's too old for Persephone, he acknowledges that they aren't good for each other and that he'll only wind up hurting her, he acknowledges that he barely knows her and he shouldn't call what he feels for her 'love', but infatuation, a very accurate and self-aware statement that I feel like the current Hades lacks. It makes it feel all the more distressing when the letter makes a return in Episode 102, and he makes one simple change:

As impactful as this statement was back in the day, looking back, knowing fully well how far his character has now fallen, this now feels less like a triumphant statement accepting his feelings and more like one of giving in to his selfish desires. This is even more accentuated by the use of the red ink, which splatters across the page alongside messy handwriting, contrary to the meticulous typewriting above.

He's pushing off his baggage as a mere bridge to cross later.

He's making hopeful assumptions about her feelings and putting her on a pedestal without communicating his actual baggage outside of his own head and with her directly. In fact, he doesn't get around to talking about this baggage until she's in a position to depend on him in Season 2.

He's fantasizing about their future with next to no foundation yet, and while he's recognizing that she might not be happy with him in the long term, he still tosses all those legitimate concerns aside to "I love the way she treats me", as if all that matters is what she can do for him - and what he can and can't do for her isn't important until it will inevitably rear its ugly head after she's already become his.

This is the turning point where Hades has become the villain. Where he's shifted from being the responsible adult and leader to an obsessive fanatic whose only goal is to have Persephone. To the point that, despite him saying in the letter that it would be best to limit his presence around her-

-seems to be upset over the notion of doing that exact thing as soon as she's the one to suggest it. Acting as if he's being rejected when he was the one to originally conceive the idea to limit their presence around one another for her own good.

Hades being a responsible King and adult went out the window years ago and I feel like this was the moment where it happened, and that red pen was the gavel. Apparently all it took was her admitting she has a crush on him - undoubtedly as shallow as his crush on her, based solely on infatuation but not written on paper as Hades' confession was - for him to toss aside all that work to unpack his feelings and all that responsibility he was willing to take. Never mind the fact that her feelings could undoubtedly use unpacking of their own. Never mind the fact that her liking him back still doesn't change the reality of their situation - that they're fundamentally different people, from different worlds, with vastly different experiences and outlooks and values and goals, living in massively different life stages. Try as it might to be presented as romantic, that "opposites attract", it's more appropriately and commonly known as being incompatible.

If this were any other story, this would be a precautionary tale in so many ways, made especially significant for an audience that's largely coming of age and experiencing feelings of infatuation and attraction for the first time.

But this isn't that story. It's Lore Olympus.

Hades is, through and through, the villain of this story, no matter what the narrative tries to convince us of otherwise. I stood by that statement before and I stand by it even more so now. Unfortunately we're now at the point where Persephone herself has become a villain, corrupt by the same system she used to criticize.

And just like the letter and all its raw text admitting to Hades' faults and baggage and showing he's willing to take accountability, so too does the narrative itself slyly tell the ugly truth in between its lines: that love is not enough, that love is not the same as obsession, that power can corrupt even the purest of hearts - that love is enough, that you should pursue the one you desire until they're yours and only yours, that you should climb higher towards those in power above you until you have that same power in your hands.

Because you love the way it makes you feel and you want to feel that way all the time.

#oops this wasn't supposed to be this deep #it was literally just me wanting to point out a missing sentence in a panel from years ago #this is what happens when i eat too much LO food for thought at 3 AM #lore olympus critical #lo critical #antiloreolympus #anti lore olympus #next thing you know i'm drawing parallels between the narrative and hades' own delusions

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pippinoftheshire · 9 months

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AO3 Wrapped [Writers Edition]

(Found this on Tumblr somewhere obscure so...)

How many words have you written this year?

How many works did you publish this year?

What work are you most proud of (regardless of kudos/hits)?

What work of yours has the most hits?

What work of yours got more feedback than you expected?

Favorite title you used

If you use song lyrics, which artist’s songs did you pull from the most?

Pairing you wrote the most for this year?

Favorite pairing you wrote for this year?

What work was the quickest to write?

What work took you the longest to write?

How many WIP’s do you have in your docs for next year?

What’s your longest work of the year?

What’s your shortest work of the year?

What WIP are you taking into next year with you?

What’s your most common “Additional Tags” tag?

Your Favorite character to write this year?

The character that gave you the most trouble writing this year?

What’s one pairing you want to explore next year?

Which work of yours have you reread the most?

How many kudos in total did you get this year?

Which work has the most comments?

Did you do any collaborative works this year?

Did you write any gifts this year?

Did you receive any gifts this year?

What’s your most common category?

What do you listen to while writing?

Favorite work you wrote this year?

Favorite line/passage you wrote this year?

Biggest surprise while writing this year

------------------------------------

I Don't know why I decided to torture myself by doing this but here we go:

1. 150,849

2. 52

3. And They Call It Salvation (TMFU/Unfinished)

4. House Telcontar (LoTR)

5. Oh… either my series The Fallout (Mission: Impossible), which was more of a self-indulgent thing tbh; or my long running Witcher fic, On the Streets Of Novigrad.

6. And Our Love Shall Be Like The Stars (TMFU)

7. The only times I have uses song lyrics (This being twice, and only for Good Omens fics) were The Velvet Underground and Lauren Aquilina.

8. Napoleon Solo/Illya Kuryakin (Sometimes Gaby joins this tag). Second place goes to Ethan Hunt/August Walker. By ONE FIC!

9. Crowley/Aziraphale (Good Omens)

10. Scales and Secrets (TMFU) I think it took me two hours.

11. The Finer Act of Kindness (The Witcher.) Though there are a few others who come a close second…

12. about six or seven 😊

13. On The Streets of Novigrad (Witcher) By a long shot.

14. If I Could Turn Back The Time (TMFU). At 588 words.

15. And They Call It Salvation (TMFU), Narnin O in Duath O Ernil (Middle-Earth) and On The Streets Of Novigrad (Witcher)

16. Napoleon Solo is a Little Shit. (Thank you, Writing GOD!!!)

17. Oh darn… tough one… Either Crowley or Illya/Napoleon…

18. Bruce Wayne. By far.

19. I’d like to do more Aziraphale/Crowley next year, but also to try and get back into Sherlock/John.

20. Eughhhh that’s an embarrassing question! …It would be, I Can’t Not Love You (TMFU)

21. 1,530

22. On The Streets of Novigrad (Witcher)

23. No, sadly 😊 But it’s on the Bucket List hehe

24. I did indeed! 4 of them!

25. No. Unless Kudos and Lovely comments count- I got plenty of those <3

26. Like Fandom? I’m confused. If it’s fandom then it’s Man From UNCLE 2015…

27. Dear lord- I have far too many playlists on Spotify- tailor made for almost every fic… So uh… Music?

28. At the moment it’s either We All Have Our Shadows (BvS), or Scales and Secrets (TMFU)

29. Blarghhhh why are these questions so HARD???

llya does too, but he is far from willing to offer that up. Now, in the stillness, Illya takes his first uninterrupted look at the man he has been looming over. The dark curls mattered with sweat and blood… eyes the color of a summer sky… O’ bozhe but Illya misses the sky… the way it would unspool in an endless ribbon over the city. In his memory, the buildings are untarnished, the clouds drifting on a slight breeze as a little boy runs amongst the leaves in a park, blond hair shining in the sunlight. Nothing has hurt him yet. Perhaps nothing ever will… if Illya does not blink.

30. Probably just how kind everyone is. The fandoms I belong to- especially The Man From UNCLE one- are just such wonderful people <3

#ao3 wrapped #fic writing #fanfiction #why did i do this?????#lol

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coochiequeens · 3 years

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Saturday, June 26 saw the third London Trans Pride march for ‘BIPOC trans people, trans women, trans sex workers and trans kids’ (sorry transmen, they forgot you again!), and here’s some of the #bekind signage from it.

There is speculation on social media that these calls for murder were made by 51-year-old Sarah Jane Baker, as someone who looks like Baker is holding one of the signs, they’re in Baker’s style and they even use Baker’s slogans.

Baker, who wants to become Britain’s first transgender MP, was once jailed for armed robbery, and kidnapping and torturing a family member. While in jail, he tried to murder a fellow prisoner and began identifying as a woman. He ended up serving 30 years until his recent release.

Baker has since written a book which is essentially a guide for gaining privileges as a man in jail, by saying you’re a woman.

As with Aimee Challenor and Morgan Page, Baker is no outlier. Here he is with Monroe Bergdorf.

Also: Baker was an actual speaker at the march, giving an inspiring message to young women that even if they lose the ability to orgasm by taking testosterone, it doesn’t matter because “you spend hours on foreplay and that shit is good too”. Nice piece of advice there from a middle-aged ex-convict to young women.

As Rachel Rooney put it on Twitter: “I've been going to Pride on & off since the mid 80's & I don't recall any of the top speakers there having a history of kidnap, torture & attempted murder… Maybe I just didn't look hard enough.”

You might be asking yourself: if a person has a history of extreme violence, and he’s possibly issuing death threats against a woman amid calls for criminal activity, is that not a police matter? Why haven’t they intervened? Is it because they’re too busy arresting women for posting pictures of Suffragette ribbons?

Perhaps the answer can be found in this video by a Metropolitan Police officer at London Trans Pride who made a statement to attendees saying: "If you need anything, give us a call on 101 or 999", which the Met LGBT+ Network thought was an appropriate message to publish.

On the same day, at Paris Pride, men who identify as women physically attacked lesbians because they were defending their sex-based rights.

And in Spain, Feminist @LauraStrego was violently attacked by a trans activist while participating in a peaceful demonstration on women's rights.

So confident are these violent misogynistic men about their sacred status, one even went on Spanish television with a T-shirt saying ‘KILL THE TERF’.

This brings us back to where we began, with JK Rowling, who you may remember wrote the following words in her moving essay, which is so dangerous that trans rights activists spent a lot of man-hours telling people not to read it.

“We’re living through the most misogynistic period I’ve experienced. Back in the 80s, I imagined that my future daughters, should I have any, would have it far better than I ever did, but between the backlash against feminism and a porn-saturated online culture, I believe things have got significantly worse for girls. Never have I seen women denigrated and dehumanised to the extent they are now. From the leader of the free world’s long history of sexual assault accusations and his proud boast of ‘grabbing them by the pussy’, to the incel (‘involuntarily celibate’) movement that rages against women who won’t give them sex, to the trans activists who declare that TERFs need punching and re-educating, men across the political spectrum seem to agree: women are asking for trouble. Everywhere, women are being told to shut up and sit down, or else.”

#UK #Graham Linehan #I stand with JK Rowling #Sarah Jane Baker is a man #Sarah Jane Baker is committed violent crime #Monroe Bergdorf #Pride speakers with a criminal history #Spanish feminist attacked at Pride #Laura Strego

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canmom · 2 years

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Animation Night 103: Toshiki Hirano

Hi friends! It’s a Thursday, and I hope you know what that means by now~

Next week: the two year anniversary of Animation Night! I’m aiming to get a commenting system up on my blog by then and do some of the cleanup tasks for the Animation Night archive.

Now, you like Animation Night and want it (and various other creative projects) to continue, please forgive me for humbly passing around the Patreon hat. The next week or two I’m going to be working on illustrating, and then releasing, a certain RPG setting with all sorts of things I like such as jelly alchemists, weird gender shit, and early-modern body horror, and I’ll be keeping you posted on there.

Anyway, on to this week’s event: lesbian apocalyptic sci-fi mecha OVAs from the 1980s.

Tonight on Animation Night, I have two of the earliest ‘big’ OVAs, back from when the new format was still an open question, which both became cult classics: Megazone 23 and Fight! Iczer One. And this writeup, I’m indebted to Youtube user MercuryFalcon, who put together a 30-minute video about Iczer-1’s production, and even more so the blog aaltomies, who wrote this impressively detailed retrospective.

We’ll begin with the erotic manga magazine Lemon People, which I believe I first talked about back on Animation Night 69 (now in its proper place in the Animation Night archive!), and the mangaka Rei Aran (阿乱霊). Despite the long shadow that Lemon People’s work cast over the evolution of anime and manga styles, and Aran being active at their strongest period, Aran remains barely known outside of his work on Iczer One. Aaltomies writes that Aran was prone to overworking, and as a consequence, most of his works - including Fight! Iczer-1 and Galaxy Police Patrizer-3 (the latter running from 1983 to 1993).

You can see some of Aran’s work at the link above. He was a self-taught artist, working his way up through dōjin groups before submitting work to Lemon People at the suggestion of his friend Hariken Ryu. but here’s a cover he drew for the issue of Lemon People in which Iczer 1 debuted:

The jump to OVA came via Hariken Ryu’s college friend, Toshihiro Hirano (who’d later change his first name to Toshiki), who in 1982 had been working on Macross (Animation Night 64). Having yakked sufficent de culture, Ryu, Hirano and many Macross animators announced in ‘83 they would adapt Ryu’s 1982 manga Gekisatsu Uchuken (Space Punch) for TV, but it fell through. Meeting Aran, Hirano instead started talking about adapting Iczer, perhaps as one of these new-fangled OVAs...

The OVA format was still very new in 1985, and even in the bubble economy (c.f. Animation Night 34). The ball was supposed to start rolling Mamoru Oshii’s Dallos (1983), but when it flopped, the idea was postponed and Hirano went to work on other projects like Megazone 23 (1985). Planned as a 12-episode TV anime, funding was pulled and Megazone came out instead as an OVA, where in contrast to Dallos, it proved wildly successful. Suddenly adapting Iczer was back on the table for AIC, who gave Hirano the choice of what to adapt; he chose Iczer, and the first episode released that very same year.

Hirano is one of the major sources of the look of 80s anime, and yet he was slow to come around to the medium. (Drawing now on another retrospective on him here). Born in the 50s, Hirano was initially dismissive of anime, seeing it as inferior to his beloved manga; he changed his mind after seeing Toei’s The Little Prince and the Eight-Headed Dragon (わんぱく王子の大蛇退治, Wanpaku Ōji no Orochi Taiji, 1963), which was I suppose you could say his sakuga awakening, but his biggest passion was tokusatsu, particularly Tōhō’s kaiju movies and TV series like Ultra Q and Ultraman. His interests drifted to Western movies, but he was pulled back in high school by the 70s era of tokusatsu (notably the original Kamen Rider) and early robot anime such as Mazinger Z.

This waxing and waning interest continued as he went to Tokyo Designer Gakuin College, falling in with a group of future mangaka including Hariken Ryu who shared his love for robots and toku. Still, it wasn’t as if he then ran straight for anime; he took a part-time job at Toei at university, drawing inbetweens for none other than Yoshinori Kanada (see Animation Night 62); he only gradually came around to working full-time at Toei.

As such, he is an artist whose passions are very straightforward: he wants to make stuff with the same feeling as tokusatsu; he likes drawing robots, superheroes, monsters and women he finds beautiful. He got his start at Toei only to find to his immense disappointment that he’d instead be working on a 200-episode historical series Ikiyu-san about a young Buddhist monk, which ran from ‘75 to ‘82. He absolutely hated the ~8 months he worked on this series, only finding relief drawing robots for Televi-kun magazine. Eventually he escaped to draw nigen [2nd key animation, aka tiedowns] of cars for a racing show Arrow Emblem: Hawk of the Grand Prix (1977) directed by Rintaro, which proved much more to his taste. This led him directly to work on Captain Harlock, drawing nigen for two episodes, particularly proud of his illustrations of the women antagonists in each. (Not sure if the following is one of Hirano’s...)

Next came inbetween checking on Farewell to Space Battleship Yamato (1978) - it’s notable that here Toei were already outsourcing douga (cleanup and inbetweens) to South Korea, and Hirano’s job here was to fix those drawings or even fully redraw scenes that weren’t up to standard. This is where we can join (drink) Matteo Watzky’s account of the period here, as Hirano finally left Toei to found studio Beebow with Tomonori Kogawa, working as a subcontractor mainly for Sunrise, particularly on Space Runaway Ideon (see: Animation Night 88). There, we started to see some real breakthroughs in drawing characters with solid 3D form; Watzky points to this cut from the Ideon followup film Be Invoked.

Following this, Hirano launched another new studio, called Io, and it’s here his work on Macross takes place. Hirano was very frustrated with the corners the anime had to cut, but here he started rising to prominence for his animation of Linn Minmay, off the back of which he became one of the animation directors for the Macross film Do You Remember Love (Animation Night 64), made an episode director debut in the foundational ero-anime series Cream Lemon (Animation Night 69). DYRL was followed for the Macross team by Megazone 23, pitched as a sci-fi series Omega City 23 that ended up awkwardly compressed into an OVA film after a troubled production, yet this all found unexpected success on the sheer strength of the animation and style - much of that being Hirano’s character designs. (Notably, this film also featured the key animation work of Hideaki Anno.) Which brings us back up to Iczer One...

So what’s it about? We’ll start with Iczer One. Let’s put it this way: in 1983, throwing around the word Cthulhu wasn’t nearly so stale as it is today. It’s packed full of indulgent ideas and things that someone like Hirano would like: women, robots, body horror... and he made it even more so, making it much more lesbian centric. As not just the director but also the character designer

The story begins with a catgirl called Iczer-One - this is a catgirl of the classical anime big hair mode - who wishes to fight aliens called the Cthulhu (no relation, I think) who are attempting to take over the Earth by implanting mind control parasites. When Iczer foils this plan, they escalate to full-on military invasion. To fight back, Iczer needs a suitable ‘synchronisation partner’ to pilot her mecha... which she finds in a Japanese schoolgirl called Nagisa. The battle against the aliens rapidly escalates, destroying much of the planet that Iczer wished to defend.

And Megazone 23? It’s set in a far-future city deep in space, locked in a war with a rival megazone. The government of the eponymous Megazone 23 launch a plan to hack the city’s governing AI, EVE, and force it to participate in the war. In the midst of this is Shōgo Yahagi, who gets pulled into a complicated intrigue which reveals that, surprisingly enough, the government is full of lies and his world is some kind of simulation. The first two parts of the OVA series, released in 1985 and 86, tell the story of what happens to Shōgo, while the third, released in 1989 under the direction of Ichiro Itano (yep! the missile circus guy!), takes place after a centuries long time skip during which time Shōgo has undergone a serious heel turn. whoops, I got this mixed up: Itano directed the second episode in 86, and actually that’s a really interesting story in its own right which I’ll address in a followup post!

The animation is absolutely spectacular: you can totally see that this is the same team that made Macross DYRL, and it’s full of the ideas of the Kanada school taken to an absurd level of polish - like just look at this background animation, how??

I will admit, these are absolutely on the more indulgent end of OVAs and probably not going to offer deep meditations on the human condition, but they’re also a fantastic window into a period when the craft of animation was going through some seriously rapid development. It really is hard to overstate the difference in animation of 1980 and 1983: the drawings are more convincingly physical, rich in detail, move better; effects animation has completely transformed; the complex camerawork of people like Itano has come in. Nothing would be the same after.

Hirano would go on to make many more OVAs and films, both as a director and key animator which I may well address in the future; he would later fall in with the realists and work on Roujin Z and Akira, and work on Itano’s gory 90s OVAs like Battle Royal High School. And although his 80s designs sensibility went out of fashion, he is still very active in the anime industry today, most recently directing a Netflix-backed adaptation of the Grappler Baki martial arts manga just last year! Which is wild, because he is almost 70 years old at this point.

So if that all sounds fun, please join me at 7pm UK time at our usual place, twitch.tv/canmom! In the meantime, I will hopefully soon be live with some drawing of my own.

#animation night #anime #ovas #iczer one

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gillianthecat · 2 years

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The Devil Judge: Episode 7

I just finished The Devil Judge and something about this show compelled me to take copious notes - it had emotional intensity and layers of mystery. These are long and rambling, so they're likely not of interest to anyone else, but since I spent all that time writing it I decided, why not post it. Perhaps someone will find it interesting.

Below are my moment-to-moment reactions, predictions and analysis as I watched episode 7.

eps 1&2 ep3 ep4 ep5 ep6 ep7 ep8 ep9 ep10 ep11 ep12 ep13 ep14 ep15 ep16

I wrote about my initial impressions, up to episode 5, here and here.

This is cleaned up only slightly. I followed the spelling given in the Viki subtitles. I mostly don't explain what I'm reacting to, so this will probably only make sense if you've seen the episode recently. Occasionally I give timestamps.

I'm worried all the plots and counterplots won't make sense. But they usually don't; it's just about the vibes. Which would be fine, but it would be really exciting if they day.

Getting more focus on the tv/public image mob rule stuff, and I'm starting to think the show is not going to have much meaningful or interesting to say on the topic. I think because the public is portrayed as a single entity, credulous and easily swayed, so they're just a pawn in the political game. And there isn't much to say about pawns. At first I was hopeful because of the aesthetics of the show, but it turns out the focus is on the powerful.

So if public attention and/or opinion is useful in anyone's plots we'll see it, but otherwise it will be ignored. Or if they want it for its vibe and aesthetic.

Is Judge Oh really this naïve? She seems to be a stand-in for the public. so yes she's going to be shown as naïve, to voice what the person-on-the-street might be thinking. Which is too bad because I thought she was going to be interesting with her poor rural background, her ambition, and her interest in playing the media game. But I suspect any cohesiveness as a character she might have will get drowned if the story needs a mouthpiece for public opinion. Hopefully I'm wrong. She will still be ambitious etc, but only when it's convenient for the story.

Of course Judge Kang would hire someone he thought he could manipulate easily.

And now she's maybe being insightful again?

She's also sometimes expressing the extreme distillation of G's thoughts of feeling.

Judge Oh and her upside down reflection in the glass table as she's thinking about how to political intrigue.

(7:30) JSA's glass walled stone and metal house. Very empty and full of reflections.

This skincare routine looks like product placement but I don't think it is. JSA just never drops her mask, even alone. Has she forgotten she had any other self? Does she not trust that she's ever alone? When your whole house is windows...

(8:20) And it turns out she wasn't alone. Does Jae Hui live with her? I'm curious about their relationship.

JSA backstory implications? Real emotions?

What is honest and what is performance here, and who is she performing for?

Interesting. This is the first time we've seen her with no sexuality in her performance of self. She performing big sister instead.

She was 12 when she started at the Kangs'

Oh, and she's switched back to her seductive persona, perhaps?. She's dropped whatever honesty was involved, and I'm pretty sure there was some honesty there. But this is another kind of honest, maybe even more so, she's telling them her core belief and I think she really wants to help them. She's big sister again

Does she not think any of the adults here are important enough to harm her? Or is she caught up in identifying with the girls so she doesn't really notice them?

Is that what she did to chairmen Seo?

That heartbreaking question at 16:45.

Did JSA kill her mother at 12? Oh shit. Well she killed now.

(18:00) Elijah. Thank you for asking the question for me.

Immediately following the orphanage we get E and Y's argument about guardianship.

Oh my god this whole scene was amazing.

(25:46) An all out media war was instigated. Prez evoking xenophobia. Paying for tips?

I love these rows of journalists on their laptops at student desks. Echos of JSA's speech?

Wife thinks he went too far.

(28 ish) How the 5 gained power. And their eventual plot to build a concentration camp?!

Y was playing the politics game with G. Y thinks risk is fun. but G is too earnest and brought in the domestic. have you thought about Elijah? their real selves in the judges’ chambers

Episode 7, 30 minutes in and G has joined Y in his plotting for the first time!

Fuck he's sexy

That was the plot? Fake like he received an envelope from them? Ok, he Sets them all against each other. They're not that bright, but that's ok it would needlessly complicate the plot if they were.

Y loves the risk. Adrenaline junkie. He's so happy now, he's playing games against his enemies and winning and he comes home to his crush working alongside him on his lifelong project. (I'm sure he will crash soon, but his life is great now!)

Presidential basement.

Journey to the prison:

G has been repressing his desire for revenge.

I would have taken a different message from that than Kang is trying to give.

Is this the moment of corruption? Here in the prison yard?

I feel like we're finally seeing Seon Ah’s true face as she murders Seo. Anger and grief

White was a bold choice for a murder. Contrasting Y in his all black.

Huh, this ‘coronation’ framed like a Christian wedding

eps 1&2 ep3 ep4 ep5 ep6 ep7 ep8 ep9 ep10 ep11 ep12 ep13 ep14 ep15 ep16

#the devil judge episode 7 #kind of like liveblogging #the devil judge reaction #the devil judge #the devil judge spoilers #reaction by gillianthecat

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sineala · 3 years

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Captain America: The Great Gold Steal

I wrote this up last week because I did not have access to my usual comics files but I figured I could review something that was just a book. So here is a review of the 1968 Captain America novel Captain America: The Great Gold Steal by Ted White, with an introduction by Stan Lee. I really liked it, actually! It was surprisingly good!

This novel features: Cover art of Captain America holding his shield in one hand and a very large gun in the other! A scene where the villains dramatically unmask Captain America and have absolutely no idea who he is! Captain America being extremely, extremely depressed about being in the future! Captain America dropping acid!

(I'm not kidding about the last part. In this novel there is a lot of LSD use. By Captain America. Talk about something the Comics Code wouldn't ever let you put in a comic book. Thank you, 1968.)

Faithful readers may remember that some time ago I posted reviews of Marvel prose novels from the 1970s. There was a line of prose novels featuring everyone's favorite Marvel superheroes, published by Pocket Books in the late 70s; I have reviews of the Iron Man, Captain America, and Avengers entries in the series; I liked the Iron Man one best, and I also have a Doctor Strange one I have not yet read. They're all short and action-packed paperback reads, of varying quality; the only one by anyone you might have heard of is the Avengers one, which was written by David Michelinie, who was actually writing the Avengers run at the time. That one was, um. An experience.

(Yes, it's "prose novel" because otherwise the assumption is "graphic novel.")

Marvel still publishes prose novels now, of course, also of varying quality; some are new plots and some are straight-up novelizations of comics arcs, which I guess is useful if you want to, say, read Civil War and not look at pictures at the same time. I also have a bunch of those that I could probably review if anyone wants. But, anyway, I personally am particularly intrigued by the older Marvel prose novels, both because the stories are all original and not retellings, and also because I often prefer the characterization found in older comics. And the older prose novels of course use the then-current characterization. So reading a Marvel prose novel from 1979 is like getting to read a brand-new comic from 1979, and that's a whole lot of fun for a nerd like me. Also do you know what's not subject to the Comics Code? Prose novels. So things can happen in these that definitely could not happen in comics of the same era.

This brings me to my current prose novel, which is something else entirely. I mean, okay, not really, it's still a Marvel prose novel. But it's not part of the same line. It's actually a lot older.

Bantam Books actually published Marvel prose novels in the late 60s. Yep, a full decade earlier. They published exactly two, so I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that they were probably not bestsellers. The first one, which I do not own and now sort of want to track down, was an Avengers novel in 1967, The Avengers Battle the Earth-Wrecker. And then in 1968 they published the novel I am currently holding in my hands, Captain America: The Great Gold Steal by Ted White.

(I am still not sure why no one involved in titling this book thought of the word "theft.")

Judging by the back copy, it appears to be about Captain America foiling the villains' dastardly plan to steal gold from the Federal Reserve. Oh boy. Fun.

So this book is from 1968. The modern Marvel universe had kicked off just a few short years ago! Captain America was just getting his own solo book after the end of Tales of Suspense! And here's a novel about him, back when certain elements of his characterization were perhaps a little more flexible than they are today, by which I mean that the cover art -- which the internet informs me was painted by Mitchell Hooks -- is a striking full-body portrait of Captain America, head held high, shield in one hand... and a very large gun in the other. Hell, yeah. Not gonna see that in today's Cap comics, are you? It's amazing and I love it.

(Okay, you might see that in Ults. I'm pretty sure I have seen that in Ults, actually. But this is still cool.)

So the cover art is a definite plus, and apparently it's one of the few reasons anyone has ever heard of this novel. The other reason -- and the reason this is more expensive than the later novels, I assume -- is that Stan Lee's name is slapped on the cover, because he wrote an introduction. (I think I paid about $30 for this. The others were definitely under $20.)

All right. Here we go.

The first page is actually a brief summary of Steve's origin story, but not a version I was familiar with. Steve was born July 9, 1917 (yes, I was surprised too), was orphaned at a young age, and was a student at Columbia University (!) before Rebirth, which in this version is a gradual process that is also extremely body-horror. Steel tubing was inserted into the marrows of his bones. He was fed "high-protein compounds." Then they gave him a chemical that "gave him complete control over every nerve, muscle, and cell in his now-magnificent body." Sweet. Where can I get some of that?

The blurb also confirms his control over his own metabolism as well as his healing factor ("wounds would heal in half the normal time"), which is nice, because sometimes I wonder if canon even remembers the healing factor.

(I don't know why Marvel has this kink for filling people's bones with metal, though. It's not actually empty in there, guys! You need your bone marrow! How else do you want people to make new blood cells?)

The book is dedicated to "Jack Kirby and Stan Lee, without whom there would be no Captain America." Hey, Marvel, Joe Simon would like a word with you. I'm just saying.

The Stan Lee introduction is three paragraphs written in Stan Lee's, um, inimitable, distinctive and extremely florid narrative style -- if you've read any of his work, you know what I mean -- and making the point that Captain America is incredible and you will like him. If you are just discovering him for the first time, you will definitely like him. Okay. Thanks. I guess.

Oddly, the writing style here is substantially different than any of the other Marvel prose novels I've read; it doesn't immediately front-load you with exposition and a cast of colorful superheroes. It opens with a sort of James Bond spy-novel feel, running through a series of unnamed villains and bystanders, and a man who wants nothing more than to talk to Captain America but is killed before he can. Steve comes in halfway through the chapter, and he seems to be written for a reader who doesn't necessarily know who he is, and he isn't introduced as Captain America with his shield flying ahead of him to smite evildoers, or anything like that. He's just a tall, handsome blond guy who is reading a bunch of novels and is unsatisfied by all of them because all he can think of is the past. It's definitely an attitude I would expect from Steve in this era -- he is very much a Man Out Of Time here -- but it's also not how I expected the book to introduce him. You wouldn't even know he was Captain America by the end of the opening chapter, which then ends with a digression about the history of NYC subway tunnels. It's like it wants to appeal to someone who has watched a bunch of Man from UNCLE and just wants to read a cool thriller. Which is not at all what I was expecting.

By the beginning of the second chapter, of course, we discover that Steve is Captain America, as he changes into his uniform. The narration refers to him as Rogers when it's in his POV, if anyone is curious. He apparently keeps the cowl off in the mansion, because the cowl annoys him.

It was not so much that he needed to conceal his identity these days, because for all intents and purposes he had no other identity. Steve Rogers was officially dead, and had been for almost twenty years. Captain America *was* his identity. It was only when he donned the tight-fitting blue uniform with its shield chest-emblem, the red snug-fitting leather boots, and the heavy, yet pressure-sensitive red-leather gauntlets, that he began to feel real -- a complete human being.

Steve? Buddy, are you okay there? You're really not okay, are you, huh?

You see what I mean? They're really hitting the early-canon angst. Hard.

(Also it sounds like his uniform is a few sizes too small.)

We then get an expanded version of the backstory from the beginning excerpt. In this version of canon, Steve actually has an older brother, Alan, who is handsome and athletic and basically amazing, and when they are orphaned they are raised by their aunt and uncle. Steve gets TB twice as a kid, nearly dies from it, and when the stock market crashes, ends up separated from his brother and in an orphanage after his uncle loses everything.

(Honestly if I were writing this book, his brother would be the secret villain. Chekhov's Gun!)

Steve has glasses, gets bullied, is a nerd and an honor student, and studies law at Columbia because he wants to help stop fraudulent business practices and also fight organized crime. Legally, I mean. In a manner relating to law. I guess he's sort of like Daredevil. The lawyer part of Daredevil.

And then he joins Rebirth, and this is the part where I had to put the book down for several minutes, because Erskine's secret chemical, the key to making super-soldiers... is LSD.

Oh my God. You should see my face right now. My expression is, I am sure, indescribable. I'm trying not to wake the dog up laughing.

I just. Holy shit. This book is from 1968 in a way I definitely was not expecting. What the fuck, Marvel?

This project was headed by the brilliant biochemist, Dr. Erskine. His work with the endocrine system, and chemical body control, was well beyond that of his contemporaries. Only he, of all his colleagues, had fathomed the secrets of the Swiss Dr. Hoffman's 1938 discovery -- the mind-controlling LSD-25.

Let's just pause here for a few minutes and contemplate this.

I will point out that Albert Hofmann (yes, the book spelled his name wrong) didn't actually discover that LSD was a hallucinogen until 1943 when he accidentally tried it, but I am positive that 1968 here was a time when Some People were convinced LSD was a wonder drug. I'm still laughing. As far as I can tell, legal manufacturing of it stopped in 1965 so I am pretty sure that the author did not just decide to name a drug that had an ostensible legal therapeutic use, because it wouldn't have still had one by '68.

Anyway, in this version of events, Rebirth is a month-long process that involves a lot of vitamins, physical conditioning and training, and, yes, putting metal in his bones like he's the next Wolverine. They're filling his bones with stainless steel rods to make him stronger. That doesn't seem like a great idea to me, but I am also not sure about dropping acid to gain superpowers. Clearly I am not a genius scientist. Also Erskine knows what DNA is, apparently, because he's just that great. Anyway. Other than the metal, those all seem like relatively normal interventions. So far.

Now Steve has become fairly big and strong (and I guess he still has metal in his bones? this concerns me!) but they need to make him superhuman, so, yes, really, it's time to drop acid. Several pages of this book are devoted to describing Steve's acid trip. His acid trip is amazing and he discovers that he has conscious control of his entire body down to the cellular level. He can control the adrenaline in his bloodstream! He can tighten his muscle fibers! And when he's done tripping he still remembers how to do this, if not exactly on a conscious level, but he can still access the abilities. And that is how you make a super-soldier. It's LSD. Remember, kids, drugs are awesome! Do drugs!

Let's maybe take a few more minutes to think about this.

I just. I have no words. How did anyone at Marvel agree to print this?

I think for the most part superhero origin stories tend not to involve real drugs because people are generally aware that drugs they've heard of won't make you into a superhero. I guess this is what it looks like when you invoke the names of real drugs. They probably wanted something that sounded more realistic but somehow I don't think this was the best way to go. (Radiation, of course, will definitely make you into a superhero but I feel like most people have accepted that as one of the conventions of the genre.)

Anyway, after that Erskine gets killed by Nazis, of course, and Steve goes to war, and for some reason this book contains footnotes by Stan Lee himself listing the comics you can read all of this in. Just like the actual comics do!

We are introduced to Bucky, who for some reason is also from the LES in this version, although not anyone Steve knew before the war, and there is of course a description of Bucky's tragic death and Steve's subsequent icing.

They are really, really stressing the Man Out Of Time thing here:

No other man could have survived so fantastic a voyage through time. And no other man could feel so displaced by time.

He was a man twenty years in his own future. By rights, he should be nearly fifty years old -- nearly twice the age of his fellow Avengers. Yet his mind and his body were not yet thirty.

When the Avengers had brought him back to New York with them and insisted that, as an honored hero of the past, he join them, he felt a sort of melancholy homesickness for his own time and world.

We then get a few paragraphs with the usual being sad that he let Bucky down and got him killed, and also that he misses his family, and that Steve Rogers doesn't exist anymore, and that nobody is alive who remembers him, and that war is hell.

Hey, Steve, maybe the drugs you should do are antidepressants. Just a thought.

Also, this book is 118 pages and we're not out of the origin story flashback until page 34. I think there are some pacing issues here.

Actually, I lied, the flashback keeps going, but now we're up to the Avengers finding him, and I have to say that the list of things Steve finds strange about the future is kind of charming when the future is 1968. Men have long hair! Women have shorter skirts! Everyone is kind of blasé about rocket launches because there have been so many space missions now. (Oh, come on, you haven't even landed on the moon yet, 1968! You're not that blasé.) Color TV! And, excitingly, LPs! You can now listen to 36 minutes of consecutive music. (I actually don't know what previous standard he's describing that is a ten-inch record that holds six minutes a side because I don't think 45s are that big. Yeah, no, I just checked and 45s are seven inches in diameter. Hmm. Oh, never mind. He means 78 rpm, doesn't he? In my defense, the record player my family had when I was a kid didn't play those.)

The description of Steve coming into New York for the first time is definitely written by someone who knows New York, which is fun. There is generally a lot of local flavor to the setting of this book. That’s one of the best parts.

There is a brief summary of Steve's feelings about all the Avengers -- he is most impressed by Thor, which, I mean, fair, he's an actual god -- and Hank telling him all about how he can live in Tony's mansion. With Jarvis. Who Hank says is actually from Flatbush. Apparently Steve spent a lot of time at the NYPL branch at 5th and 42nd trying to catch up on history. And then of course the Avengers ditched him and gave him the Kooky Quartet, and for some reason they're not here right now either so it's just Steve being sad and alone and dealing with this mysterious dead guy. I think probably the book is also done explaining fiat currency now. This is definitely the weirdest Marvel novel I've read.

Anyway, we have now returned to what is ostensibly the actual plot. Steve shows up at the New York Federal Reserve Bank (I guess the theft is happening here and not, like, at Fort Knox) with the gold bullion that the dead guy from the beginning of the book had on him -- I think I got distracted by the LSD bit and forgot to mention that part, but the dead guy was carrying some US government gold -- because the actual plot is that villains are trying to tunnel into the bank vault and steal gold. Steve discovers this after he gets the bank manager to give him a tour. The bank manager tries to refuse, citing security concerns -- Captain America could be anyone under that mask, after all! Steve just smiles and says, "If I removed my mask, would you have any better idea of who I am?" and I guess that's a flawless argument because he gets his tour.

(I'm sorry, all I can think of is that one gif from the JLA cartoon where Lex Luthor bodyswaps with the Flash, announces that now that he's in the Flash's body he's going to discover the Flash's secret identity, then pulls off his own mask, stares at himself in the mirror, and says, "I have no idea who this is.")

Given that the theme of Steve's interior life in this novel is "Steve Rogers died twenty years ago" it seems even more sad that Steve is just walking around basically saying, yeah, well, I'm nobody. And apparently that is being reaffirmed for him by the narrative.

So Steve goes down the tunnels, takes out some of the bad guys, and gets himself knocked out and buried in a collapsing tunnel. Don't worry, he's gonna be fine.

A lot of this book, by the way, is from the POV of random people, like this bank guard who went with Steve into the tunnels:

He had wondered, briefly, if a man like Captain America ever knew the pinch of too many bills, had ever felt desperate over the arrival of yet another mouth to feed. But, of course, Captain America had no family, and would hardly concern himself with such matters. It didn't occur to Thompson to wonder if this in itself might not be something for which to pity Captain America.

Rude. I mean, come on, do we really need random characters telling us Steve is a sad sack whom nobody loves? Steve's already got that covered! (Also, how does this guy know Captain America has no family?)

Anyway, thanks to the power of LSD, Steve is going into a trance, amping up his metabolism (he loses "several pounds" in a few minutes), and making himself super-strong so he can dig himself out. Hooray. This is definitely how human bodies work. Also LSD. This is definitely how LSD works. Yes.

Steve then finds out that a couple of the guards who were with him in the tunnels died down there and he goes home and eats dinner while stewing in miserable guilt because he was responsible for their deaths. He's really not okay. I'm not sure the book actually understands how not okay they have made him. Then someone from SHIELD is on the phone for him and he is briefly cheered up by the thought that it might be Sharon although I think we should also note that the narrative makes it clear that at this point in canon Steve still doesn't know her name. Remember when that was a thing?

Alas, it is not Sharon; it's just a random SHIELD agent who happens to have information about the plot and asks to meet. Then, as Steve leaves to go to the meeting, we get two pages of exhaustive description about the mansion layout and how it's built relative to the surrounding buildings. It feels like this book was written by a frustrated city planner. But anyway, the meeting is a setup and the villains capture Steve.

They knock Steve out, drug him, take him to their hideout, and tie him to a chair. Except, once again thanks to the power of LSD, the tranquilizer they're using wears off way sooner than they expected and so Steve feigns unconsciousness and listens to them discuss their evil plans.

And then the villains unmask him and I swear it's exactly like that JLA gif:

Rogers heard footsteps scuffing across a thick carpet, and then Sparrow's voice again, almost directly over him. His ears still buzzed, but he fought to catch the elusive familiarity of the man's tone. He wished he dared open his eyes.

"This is a moment which I, personally, have long awaited," Sparrow said, his voice rising in triumph. "*The unmasking of Captain America!*"

Then, his nails scraping along Rogers' face, Sparrow dug his fingers under his cowl, and ripped it back. Rogers felt air strike his exposed cheeks and forehead. Then fingers clutched his blond hair and pulled his head back. "Behold!" Sparrow said.

Raven was first to speak. "Well, I dunno about you, Sparrow, but it rings no bells with me. I never seen him before."

Starling agreed. "His face means nothing to me."

"He could be anybody," said Robin. "What good does this do?"

Sparrow let Rogers' head fall back to his chest, and his voice when he spoke was defeated. "I don't know. Nothing, I guess. I always wondered. I felt, if these guys -- these costumed heroes -- wore masks, it must mean something."

"Captain America was missing for twenty years," Starling said. "That could mean the first one died, and this one took his place. He looks awfully young."

"Perhaps. It doesn't really matter. Let's get going."

(Yes, the villains all have bird-themed codenames. I have no idea why.)

This scene just makes my day. I love dramatic unmaskings. I bet they'd have been a lot happier unmasking Iron Man.

The villains then leave Steve and go to a power plant, where we switch POVs to one of the plant employees and get two entirely unnecessary paragraphs about his racist and anti-Semitic thoughts about his coworkers before the villains murder him. Great. Thanks.

Anyway, the villains cause a blackout, while meanwhile they've left Steve alone with the girl villain, and Steve is busy trying to persuade her that crime doesn't pay. He's moved from the "do you know what they'll do to you in prison?" theme onto "how exactly are you going to spend a billion dollars in gold bullion when it's illegal for civilians to possess? who are you going to do business with?" and then points out that gold is heavy and hard to transport, which is when she gets out a a knife.

The bad guys are off to steal the gold, and Steve has now successfully turned the girl they left him with, because she frees him. Of course, the first thing he does is put the cowl back on.

"Why do you wear that?" she asked.

"The mask?" He smiled. "It gives people something external to concentrate upon."

"But..."

"Without it, I'm just another ordinary-looking man. With it, I become a symbol. For some people it creates awe; for others, fear. Look at me. I'm different now, aren't I? With the mask on."

"Yes," she nodded. "You look -- bigger, somehow. Stronger. Fierce, implacable. You look a little scary."

"Exactly. You no longer see me as a person, but as a thing -- an Avenger. It can be a potent psychological weapon."

"They were so disappointed, when they took your mask off. As though underneath they'd find a famous person."

"Maybe that goes on TV -- handsome playboys, and all that. But I've been anonymous all my life. Even my real name would be meaningless to you, to them. No, the mask is part of the uniform, a psychological device. That's the whole story.

Now: let's get out of here. You have a good deal more to tell me yet, and we can't waste more time."

Bwahaha. In a few years, Steve's going to be pretty surprised about who superheroes are, I think.

STEVE, now: Superheroes definitely aren't secretly handsome playboys! That would be silly! STEVE, after Molecule Man: fuck fuck fuck FUCK FUCK I'm such an idiot

I'm definitely looking forward to that.

Also, not that the issue of Steve's psyche actually recurs after this, but he's once again having the narrative vindicate his belief that Steve Rogers is dead and whoever he is under the cowl doesn't matter. Steve, I don't think this is very healthy.

Steve then tracks down the villains stealing the gold, has some geopolitical thoughts about where the gold could be going (he thinks either South Africa or Russia for the best laundering potential) and then hides himself in the villains' trunk while they drive to Staten Island, which is where they're taking the gold out of the country from.

During the final confrontation, Steve finally gets to see the villains, and he discovers that the one in charge is in fact the director of the Federal Reserve Bank who Steve met at the beginning of this book. Gasp. But that's not all! He's also... the Red Skull!

Honestly, I was kind of surprised; I didn't think this was the kind of book where we'd get any known comic villains, but I guess it's always gotta be the Red Skull. I think he's the only one of Steve's big villains who likes to disguise himself; Zemo has obvious disguise issues and I imagine it's also hard to cover up Zola's Teletubby-esque television body.

Steve shoots one of the villains, because I guess that's what he does in this era of canon.

So the plot wraps up in, like, two pages, because for some reason all these early Marvel novels wrap up very fast. Red Skull, of course, attempts to escape and then disappears and his body is never found. The end.

Well.

That was definitely a book. That I read. Believe it or not, I actually think it was the best of these early Marvel prose novels that I've read so far, even if it was also the absolute weirdest; I thought the thriller-style plot was entertaining, I liked Steve and his Extremely Sad characterization, I obviously enjoy all the identity themes, I liked how very detailed the New York setting was, and I do like how they tried to treat it all seriously. I mean, sure, this did lead to LSD in the super-soldier serum in presumably the name of realism, but I felt like the book was trying to present superheroes in a way that didn't feel silly and also didn't really take for granted that the reader would automatically accept superheroes.

It felt like a book that was written hoping that people who weren't superhero fans would read it, if that makes any sense. And I thought that was interesting, because most modern superhero work that I can think of assumes they've got complete audience buy-in and everyone is willing to suspend their disbelief and we all know the genre conventions and are expecting people running around in brightly-colored spandex. Whereas this is more like a James Bond novel if for some reason James Bond were called upon to defend his decision to wear brightly-colored spandex instead of bespoke suits. But I assume no one read it, because Bantam never published a Marvel book after this one.

If you can actually find a copy of this one for a price you're willing to pay. I recommend it. It was delightful and way more solid than I thought it was going to be.

Also, come on, you know you want to read about Captain America's acid trip.

#posts i actually wrote

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mypoisonedvine · 4 years

Text

Satisfied | Andy Barber x reader (chapter 3)

(chapter 1) (chapter 2)

series summary: you’re the only lawyer in Boston who can get under Andy Barber’s skin, but you didn’t realise that he was trying to get under your clothes. as is the nature of law, it’s only a matter of time before the truth is discovered.

word count: 4.3k

warnings: smut, rough sex, safewording, oral (f receiving), angst, non-linear storytelling/flashbacks

a/n: I wrote this series originally with my friend joyce, and after she deactivated some of the chapters were lost. this series is long-since completed, but I’m reposting now so people can still read!

You stretched a little, eyes still closed to protect them from the blinding sunlight peeking in. Daylight had crept up on you, and it came quickly. You were sure that you had only fallen asleep a mere few minutes before you woke; muscles sore from overexertion. Letting out a groan, you shifted your body once again trying to get comfortable.

Andy really did a number on your body and you needed a deep stretch to try and regain some control over your aching muscles. You turned and looked at him. Andy was peaceful. His brows were relaxed and his mouth was slightly agape. You hadn’t realized just how badly you missed seeing him like that. So much so that you caught yourself just in time. Your hand had almost reached his cheek before pulling back.

“Stop moving,” Andy mumbled from beside you. When you did not quit the shuffling, he groaned and wrapped his arms around your body, trapping you beneath his weight.

It caused you to hesitate and freeze for a second. His body heat radiated onto your naked body. His skin against yours. Memories of the night before flooded your mind and it’s then that you realized that the feeling of his body was ingrained in your existence.

“Andy…” you whispered but he ignored you, snuggling back into the sheets instead. It felt almost domestic. And wrong. It felt really wrong. Maybe it was the fact that it reminded you of being young, and in love, again.

In love with Andy.

---

“We should do this again sometime,” Andy beamed as you got up off the bed and pulled your t-shirt back over your head from where it had been tossed onto the floor. Ah yes, the telltale smile of a man who just got laid.

“Andy, I probably should’ve been more clear,” you admitted. “I’m not looking for a relationship. I’m too busy, and I’ve always felt that single women are taken more seriously in law school.”

You expected him to question it, but he nodded. “Yeah, that is probably true. Fucked up, but true.”

He hopped up and followed you before you could walk to the bathroom, turning you around with a hand on your shoulder. “Does that mean that we can’t do this again?”

“Oh, we’re definitely going to do it again,” you grinned, biting your bottom lip. “Just, not as boyfriend and girlfriend.”

He seemed happy enough with that answer, if not ecstatic.

“But for now, I need to study, so get out of my room,” you chuckled, watching him redress with a satisfied smirk on your face.

---

Another party, another stupid performative social event, another red plastic cup with god knows what in it that you have no intention of actually drinking. Or at least you had no intention when you walked in.

Andy was better at this. People actually cheered when he came into the room— but admittedly he was also holding booze so, they might have been cheering for that. But they were still happy to see him, and who wouldn’t be? You were too, but you tried to hide it. The company line was still that you two didn’t care much for each other, and it was… somewhat true, he still got on your nerves, but you undeniably had a soft spot for him. Perhaps literally.

You decided you could pull him aside for a chat once, that wouldn’t be too suspicious. But it couldn’t be right as he walked in, so you were basically just counting the minutes in your head until you could talk to him. But then you were just trying to not get caught looking at him every 30 seconds. How was he so… attractive? Not just hot, but magnetic. Guys jumped over to laugh with him. Girls hung off his arm while he told hilarious stories. And here you were, across the room staring because you didn’t want to be a part of his harem.

Speaking of harem, he seemed to have a new fan tonight, and she was hanging onto his every word. You’d seen her around before— Jessie something, most likely short for Jessica but at the moment you decided it was short for Jezebel. She was cute. Gorgeous, actually. One of those girls who looked like she just got up in the morning and brushed her hair and was already model-perfect. You tried not to hate that about her, you tried not to hate her because she was just a beautiful girl talking with this amazing, charismatic guy and you had no reason to be mad at her because she was just— oh my fucking god did she just grab his bicep??? SKANK!

You left the party quickly after that, deciding you didn’t like the person you were becoming. One of the many, many reasons you’d sworn not to get involved with guys in law school was because you knew how women could get defensive and territorial over men, and you were never going to prioritize getting dick over being a good feminist. How had you already fallen so far?

You were grateful for the half-empty bottle of Fireball in your cupboard. It was to be your companion to drown out the sorrows. You hoped that it would be enough to make you forget what you saw. Especially the fact that Jezebel and Andy would have made a good couple. They looked good together. Not right. But good nonetheless.

---

“...the defendant clearly has the mental capacity for there to be mens rea. He should be prosecuted and I don’t understand how I am the only person that thinks so,” Andy tugged at his hair in frustration as you walked beside each other down the hall. “I think it’s ridiculous that--”

“Are you fucking that Jessie chick?” you suddenly interjected, trying (and failing) to curb the anger bubbling in your stomach. Andy’s eyebrows shot up and you felt a sense of dissatisfaction at the response. He proceeded to drag you into an empty classroom.

“You have no right to be jealous,” he reminded you firmly. “We’re not dating.”

“I know, I know. Who said that I’m jealous?” you frowned, but your voice was a lot higher than usual, “but that doesn’t mean I’m down to catch whatever cooties you get from her.”

“You think I’m gonna sleep with her?” he asked incredulously.

“Uh, yeah,” you retorted with a heavy layer of patriotism, “and everyone else thinks so, too.”

He reached out and cupped your face, tilting it up to make sure you were looking at him. “Just because we’re not together… doesn’t mean I want anybody else.” He looked so sincere and sounded so soft that it took you aback. You had never expected Andy to say that. Ever.

“I… what?”

“Baby,” he sighed, and your heart tensed a little, “you’re the reason I’m not your boyfriend. I don’t want to date anybody else, I don’t want to be with anybody else… you’re it. Just you.”

“Oh,” you nodded with wide eyes.

“Are you… seeing other people? Not that you can’t, I just… I didn’t think you were.”

“No, no,” you dismissed, “I only… no.”

“Then let’s make it official. You have no reason to be jealous. Be my girlfriend.”

“But I—”

“We don’t have to tell people,” he quickly backpedaled. “I know you don’t want to be seen as half of a couple, or an extension of me or something. But I wanna be able to call you my girlfriend. Even if I can’t actually tell anybody about it.”

You looked at him, making sure he wasn’t joking or messing around before slowly nodding. His face lit up, “but we have to keep it on the down-low,” you reminded him quickly, to which he nodded.

“That we do. Verity would advocate for our expulsion if she knew.” Your eyes went wide with fear. Andy was right. It had the potential to completely decimate your career.

“Andy, we can’t tell anyone about this,” you whispered sharply, “especially now that we’re on a case together.”

“Calm down, baby,” he soothed. It was the first time he called you that since you became secretly-official and it sounded different now, somehow; it made your stomach flutter a little. “Trust me, I know, and it will be fine. Verity won’t find out.”

“Okay,” you nodded, believing him, “however, you really shouldn’t be calling Dr. Verity Woods, J.D. Esq. by her first name alone.”

“You don’t need to use her full name and title,” Andy laughs, “she said it’s fine to call her by her first name. You were there.”

“That I was. But it doesn’t feel right, especially since she’s leading the case.”

Andy shook his head and smiled. You really were something else but he needed it. He needed you. Even all of the crazy and particular aspects of your personality. “Speaking of her, I need to go to her office in—” Andy looked at his watch— “shit, 10 minutes.”

“Well, go, run,” you gestured at the door and Andy bolted out, not even having the time to peck your lips. You waited a few moments before leaving the room, not wanting to attract any attention.

---

“Hey, cupcake,” he cooed and then kissed your ear. Without having to look at him, you knew that he had a smug grin on his face and enjoyed the teasing.

“You eat one cupcake one time and suddenly it becomes your whole identity,” you groaned with a roll of your eyes. Andy’s body pressed up against yours and you tried to push him off but the warmth of his body was far too comforting.

“But you looked so cute when you got frosting on your nose,” he recalled.

“Go away,” you giggled and squealed as Andy tickled you, “s-stop it.”

“Come on, cupcake, you can do better than that,” Andy continued to tickle you until you fell on the floor in a giggling heap, “all you have to do is let me call you cupcake.”

“Andy—” you squealed. “Barber, you better stop this right now!” Your stomach hurt from the laughter as his fingers dug into your waist making you scream.

“Come on, cupcake.”

“N-no!”

“Since that’s the case, I’ll just keep doing what I’m doing.”

“Fine! Fine,” you relented, “you win.”

---

You looked around the sterile reception as you took a seat on the plush sofa and looked out of the window. The California sun shone into the room illuminating everything in its path. You weren’t running away, you told yourself repeatedly. Maybe you would believe it at some point. It was simply that you needed a change of scenery.

One thing that you were sure of was that you were more than qualified for the job. And that should be enough. But it came at a cost. Your personal life. It had always been on the back-burner for you but you had to accept you had chosen the lonely path.

Nobody had ever told you just how much you, as a woman, had to sacrifice to be successful. And so you learnt the hard way. Your friends told you that you had made your bed so you had to lie in it. They were not wrong but they did nothing to ease the vacancy in your heart.

Flicking through one of the magazines on the table, you let it distract you from the ticking clock. It seemed that you were the only person that was there for the job which should have eased your nerves. But you haven’t always been the first choice.

---

“Am I remembering correctly that you were valedictorian of your class?” the man across from you had your resume in front of him and was still unable to get it right. Maybe the job was not right for you. But it was a better offer than still being in Boston.

“Salutatorian,” you corrected coldly, gaze piercing. You tapped your nails on the table as the interviewer tried to regain his posture.

“Oh, well,” he shrugged, “that’s still pretty good.”

Pretty good. You didn’t believe in stuff like that. There was greatness, and nothing else. “Well, that’s the past,” you quickly shut off the conversation about your greatest failure and threw the man a tight-lipped smile.

“So,” he cleared his throat, “what makes you think that you will be suitable for the role?”

The fear left your system. You were sure of yourself. You were more than qualified.

---

“Time to get up for breakfast,” Andy roused you from your sleep. You had no idea when you went back to sleep but it was your turn to groan. “Don’t make me wake you up; you won’t like that.”

“I’m tired. Leave me alone, Barber,” too tired and sore to really care about eating or the punishment. That being said, you were a little hungry after missing dinner.

“I know you’re sore so don’t make me wake you up,” he warned but you still refused to pay him any mind. That was your mistake as Andy ripped the covers from your body; exposing it to the chilly morning air.

“What are you doing?”

Andy didn’t respond. Instead, his face went to your core. “Fuck, you’re so pretty,” he cooed, “I think it’s time for you to wake up.” He licked a stripe across your sex and watched it glimmer in the light. Fisting the blankets beneath you, your back arched involuntarily.

You let out a breathy moan when he parted your folds to allow his tongue better access to your dripping cunt. He licked and explored your body like it was the first time he was given the privilege.

“Taste so good,” his voice reverberated through your body sensing little shocks of pleasure through you. Andy suckled on your clit making you cry out. His beard scratched the soft skin of your inner thigh and your sensitive folds. The contrast of his soft, wet tongue and his rough beard made your eyes roll back.

“Andy,” you mewled, “please.”

“What do you want?” Andy taunted you. Your body kept moving; your hands tugging at the sheets. You needed him to do more. He was teasing you. “Words, my little fuckdoll.”

You were unable to form any coherent sentences when Andy had such control over your body. He inserted one finger into your aching core, massaging your walls. “You have to use your words or I’ll stop now seeing as you’re awake.”

“No,” you rushed out. “P-please let me come.” You had no dignity left but you were too far gone to care. You needed Andy’s mouth and fingers too badly.

“Well,” Andy clicked his tongue as his lips curled into a smile, “since you asked so nicely...”

---

Unable to find your clothes fast enough, you found a discarded Harvard sweatshirt of his and slipped it on, smiling to yourself at the bagginess. Looking down at the left sleeve, you realized that it was the same one you wore when you were dating. It made you feel a little nostalgic. The sweatshirt was practically yours.

You emerged from the bedroom to find him in the kitchen with an apron on-- why the fuck did he own an apron?-- and messing around at the stove. He must have heard you enter because he turned to you with a smile.

“Huevos rancheros!” he announced with a smile, lifting the pan for you to see.

You looked to him, and the pan of eggs, and around his stylish condo worthy of an ADA’s inflated salary, and shivered with the overwhelming sense of ‘wrong’. That was even in spite of your rumbling stomach. “Andy, stop, this is all too much. Too domestic,” you whispered, unable to look at Andy when you said it.

“Don’t say that. Don’t say things like that,” Andy pleaded, “I just want to see you.”

“What do you mean?”

“Exactly what I said. I want to see you.”

“You’ve seen me before.”

“But I can’t remember the last time that I saw the real you,” Andy’s words made your stomach turn. “I don’t know the last time I saw the you that I fell in love with all those years ago.”

“She doesn’t exist anymore, Andy,” you whispered, “you need to let her go. God knows I did.”

“No, she’s not. I don’t believe that,” he argued; heart breaking by the second, “she’s still there, I’m certain of that. You wouldn’t end up here so often if she doesn’t exist. And you wouldn’t be so upset about not being valedictorian.”

“We shouldn’t keep doing this, Andy,” you decided with a sigh as you found your purse and attempted to gather your things. Where the fuck were your clothes again?

“No. You don’t get to say that,” he raised his voice, shedding his apron as he left the kitchen, “you can’t just waltz back into my life and keep... taking. It’s not fair.”

“Taking? I’m not taking anything, you’re throwing yourself on me! I don’t know what you want from me, Andy,” you sighed, placing your purse on the sofa.

“The same thing that I’ve always wanted.”

“Maybe it’s not what I want,” you lied through your teeth. “Have you ever thought about that?”

“Then why do you keep coming back?” Andy’s voice cracked. You knew that you were hurting him. And yourself. But there was no other way.

“Because I love being humiliated, and you are the most embarrassing thing I could possibly be involved with. Because you already know all my fucked up kinky shit and I’d rather keep the number of people who know that down to a minimum. Because when I walk home after seeing you I feel fucking sick to my stomach and filthy and stupid and I like it. Because I love the way that fucking you makes me hate myself.”

“I’m used to you lying to me, but I think now’s a good time for you to stop lying to yourself,” he shouted, the vein in his neck appearing. You were shocked to realize that you had actually hurt him. Badly. “Actually, it’s more than overdue. You’ve been doing it for what? Ten years?”

“Why can’t you just admit to yourself that you want this?” He pointed at the house, and then himself. “That you want me.” His voice was so strained that you felt a little guilty.

“I don’t want you.”

“That’s not the impression I got last night. Or this morning. You were just begging for me.”

Something about arguing with him was so erotic. Was that a strange thing to think? It certainly made court a lot more interesting. And now you found your gaze trailing greedily over his body and as it met his eyes once more, you saw that he knew what you wanted. That you were falling back into this cycle again.

“If you want me to want you again,” you hissed, “you’re gonna have to make me beg, aren’t you?”

He slammed into you, tossing you down onto the sofa as he slid his own sweatshirt up your body, latching his lips onto your nipple which was embarrassingly already hard.

“You say it like I’ve not been making you beg since you were twenty-two,” he growled, teeth grazing your sensitive skin.

“I can’t seem to remember that.”

“Well I guess it’s time for me to remind you, then,” he swiped a finger across your (already wet) folds and looked at his slick-coated fingers with pride. He had always loved the way you glistened on his skin.

He pushed your back down until you arched it for him. “Get that ass up, baby.” You moaned when he slapped your ass quickly, tugging on your hair to arch your back even further. “Want me to put this cock in you?”

“Please,” you whimpered.

“You can do better than that,” he tutted disappointedly.

You stopped yourself from responding because you knew you would say more than you should. He leaned down and pressed his lips right against your ear.

“We both know it, just say it,” he encouraged in a low voice.

“Fuck you,” you hissed. He slipped his hand around your neck and tightened until your face tingled from the loss of blood.

“Don’t say anything until you’re ready to be honest,” he instructed, finally slipping his cock into you— and even though you couldn’t breathe or moan or speak, you managed to react plenty strongly to the feeling anyways. You were outrageously sore from a long night of fucking and the pain burned just the right way.

He began to move his hips, each time, the base of his cock would brush against your overstimulated clit. Each thrust hitting that one place that made your body quiver. But then it got a bit too much. The stretch and burn of his cock and the hand around your throat.

“Objection!” you yelped your safeword, and instantly he stilled, slipping his arms around you and holding you close. Tears started to pour against your will. “I’m sorry,” you whimpered. “I can’t believe that after all this time you still remembered…”

“Never apologize,” he hushed, kissing your shoulder. “I went too hard on you. And I could never forget a safeword like that,” he laughed softly.

“No, no, I just… I got a little overwhelmed. It’s not your fault.”

“Do you want a glass of water?” he asked lightly. “I’ll help you get dressed…”

“No, stay,” you requested.

“Okay,” he nodded, a little surprised. “Tell me how to help you.”

“Just hold me,” you shivered, “like you used to. Back when you liked me.”

He chuckled. “I like you. Even now; I always have… especially when you didn’t think that I did.”

“We’ll see if you say that in court tomorrow.”

“Almost certainly will not,” he admitted, eliciting a small smile from you.

He pulled you down to lay on his chest as he relaxed into the sofa. His fingers delicately ran along your skin, leaving goosebumps in their wake, and you let your breathing steady back to normal as your eyes fell shut.

You looked up at him after a while and appreciated the peaceful look on his face. It wasn’t something you saw on him often, since you were always pissing him off. Maybe that was why you liked getting on his nerves so much; because when you saw him like this, happy, you remembered feelings you wanted to forget. But there was also a part of you that just wanted him to feel something about you when he saw you. The opposite of love is not hate but indifference… and even if you didn’t want him to love you, and knew that he could never love you again, you couldn’t live with indifference.

You sat up and he looked at you but you said nothing, just leaning down and kissing him again. He kissed you back, slipping his hand around the back of your neck to hold you close. His breathing against your face began to speed up a bit as you straddled him with your legs, rubbing your hips along his again.

“You’re sure you’re okay?” he asked softly as you reached down to guide his cock into you one more time. You closed your eyes briefly.

“I’m sure that I’m not okay,” you responded as you moved your hips down and felt him slip inside you, “but I need you right now.”

He nodded and you sat up to plunge yourself down onto his cock, moaning as his length reached deeper into you than normal from this angle. His hands gripped your hips tightly, not out of any sense of dominance but simply his reaction to the feeling of you as you began to ride him. You were slow at first, balancing yourself on his chest, but it wasn’t too long until you were bouncing with abandon, moaning his name over and over while he watched you closely.

Your hand fell to his chest and you felt his heartbeat, strong and steady. You wished you could be so strong as that. You wished you could be so stable.

He sat up suddenly, looking at you with a hint of concern. He must have seen the fear on your face. He pulled you closer and you still, instead letting him grind deeper into you as he held your face in his hands.

“So beautiful,” he whispered reverently, kissing your collarbone lightly.

“Andy…” you sighed, another tear falling but for an entirely different reason.

“So perfect,” he continued, kisses trailing to your neck. He wrapped you in his arms and you both moved together in a way that didn’t feel like what you were used to at all. Your orgasm came and went with only a stuttered gasp but he felt it and praised you all along the way, made some promises he couldn’t keep, said some things you elected to ignore.

You fell asleep together and stayed that way well into the afternoon, not having gotten the most effective night’s sleep beforehand. When you woke up to golden light on your face and a snoring Andy Barber, you gave him a quick, tight hug before you got up, finally recovered your clothes, and grabbed the handle of his door. Something stopped you, though you couldn’t be sure what, and you looked back to watch him on the couch again. You found yourself setting your purse down and undressing again, trading the wrinkled suit for that stupid Harvard hoodie, and slipping back under his arm on the couch. You weren’t very tired anymore so you watched him sleep for a bit, running your fingers through his hair and scratching his scalp. You remembered him liking that before, you hoped he hadn’t changed his mind. It was a familiar feeling, safe feeling, one that you hadn’t felt in so long. You couldn’t think about what would happen tomorrow, what had happened yesterday. You just let yourself swim in the comfort of him for a little while longer.

(next chapter)

#andy barber x reader #andy barber smut

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chai-tealattae · 4 years

Text

Pen Pals

soul mate /ˈsōl ˌmāt/

noun; a person ideally suited to another as a close friend or romantic partner.

✒️ Pairing: Taehyung x reader

✒️ Genre: Fluff

✒️ Word Count: 2.4k

✒️ Warnings: Swearing

A/N: This is my first fic pls be nice AKSDK

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

You tossed and turned in bed, unable to sleep. Tomorrow was your 21st birthday, the day your soulmate connection would be revealed to you. You’d heard stories from your parents, family friends, and even some of your friends that were a year or two older than you about the different connections. What if you got one that would make it damn near impossible to find them? What if your soulmate was older than you, and already knew, but gave up since you were too young? You sighed and laid flat on your back, staring at the ceiling, giving up on your futile attempts at a decent night's sleep, your mind hot with the different scenarios baking within it.

The next morning, you groaned and begrudgingly swung your legs over the side of your bed, stretching as you opened the curtains, the mid morning sunlight flooding into your room. You cringed slightly at the brightness, your eyes struggling to adjust. Yawning as you walked into your kitchen, deciding on a bowl of cereal for breakfast. Scrolling through your phone as you ate, you smiled as you read the birthday wishes from your friends and family. After replying to as many as you felt like doing, you opened Twitter to see what fresh hell awaited you on your timeline. Surprisingly there wasn't really anything bad being mercilessly tweeted about.

The one thing that caught your eye was the lovely photo on your screen, tweeted a couple hours ago, staring back at you. It was embarrassing how infatuated you were with a certain man by the name of Kim Taehyung. He was the perfect man, in all honesty, by your standards at least. He was devilishly handsome yet charmingly adorable from the tip of his nose down to his toes, the smallest details all adding to the things that caused him to worm his way into your heart.

You smiled as you saved the picture to your camera roll before setting your phone down on the table. Your smile quickly turned into a surprised squeak as you felt an oddly ticklish sensation on your wrist, and you stared down at it in shock. Appearing on your skin before your eyes was writing, but it wasn't just any writing. It was a greeting.

“Hello?”

This must be it, your soulmate bond. You didn’t know anyone personally with this particular bond, but you’d read about it through your countless nights of curiosity and excitement driven research.

You nearly tripped on your own feet as you scrambled to find some kind of writing utensil, eager to respond to the stranger. Not just a stranger. Your soulmate. You felt your heart rate quicken just at that thought. You found a pen on your counter, quickly scribbling a response below their message.

“Hello!” You wrote back. Not 30 seconds later, you felt the tickling sensation again, impatiently tapping your pen on the counter as you awaited their response.

“It’s you! You’re finally getting my notes!” You smiled to yourself, your late night suspicion confirming itself. They were definitely older than you, but hopefully not by much. You’d hate if you left your soulmate waiting for too long for you.

“How long have you been trying?” You wrote, a little smaller this time near the ditch of your elbow, so you wouldn’t take up too much valuable space on your skin. You bit your lip as you felt your skin tingle again, hoping it wasn’t too bad-

“Four years” Four years. Four whole years they’d been writing on themselves with no response. You sighed, feeling awful. Well, at least you knew how old they were. Twenty-five, twenty-six tops, if their birthday was coming up sometime soon.

“I'm sorry you waited so long… today is my 21st birthday” you wrote back, twisting your arm at a slightly awkward angle as you did this. You smiled softly, growing familiar with, and anticipating the feeling as they wrote.

“Happy birthday :)” Was written there. You smiled and wrote your thanks, not really sure how to proceed with finding them. You’d read that there were specific guidelines when it came to the different connections, things you weren’t able to do, since that would make finding your soulmate too easy. Things like their exact location, names, things of that nature. The catch is, you were able to reveal that when you were in the same vicinity. As if trying to find them wouldn’t be hard enough.

Over the next month or so, you’d learned that your soulmate was a man that was born in South Korea (you didn’t know how you’d ever be able to swing a trip there, or vice versa). You learned that he enjoyed drawing, painting, photography, singing and dancing. He was fun to talk to (at least until there wasn't any more space on either of your bodies for more ink). He had a pretty time consuming career from what he told you, but he still liked to draw you pictures to wake up to, or write you little good morning messages. You found yourself becoming incredibly fond of him, even without ever seeing his face.

One day, you found yourself staring at your laptop and phone screens, focusing excruciatingly hard on trying to score tickets to see BTS in your city. After nearly missing the opportunity, and a decent amount of money you’d surely have to pull quite a bit of overtime to make up for, you scored a decent seat for their show in a couple months. Eager to share the news with someone, you wrote on your arm.

“I just got tickets to see BTS!!” You wrote with a shaky hand, your already poor penmanship suffering even more. This would be your first time seeing them, seeing the man you’d had your eyes on for so long.

~~~~~

Taehyung smiled when he felt you were writing or perhaps drawing something for him. He loved reading your short messages about your day, getting to know you. Over the past months he was growing more and more impatient, half tempted to fly to the States and wing it. His heart nearly thudded out of his chest when he read what you wrote.

“I just got tickets to see BTS!!”

Holy shit. This was good. This was great, actually. Now he knew you were a fan. Jimin looked over when he saw the stupid grin plastered on his bandmate’s face.

“What is it, Taehyung-ah?” He asked. Taehyung didn’t answer verbally, just angled his arm so Jimin could see what you wrote. He broke into his own smile. “Oh this is good! Maybe you're closer to meeting her than you thought.” He said, patting the younger man’s back. Taehyung smiled with a nod, you being the only thing occupying his mind at the moment.

~~~~~

It was the day of your concert and you could barely contain your excitement. You barely slept the night before, knowing you would be exhausted, but couldn't find it in yourself to care all too much. You’d been waiting for what seemed like forever for this day, and weren't going to let anything, not even your lack of sleep, ruin it for you.

The day seemed to drag even longer than usual, before you figured it was a good time to start getting ready. You got dressed in an outfit that you purchased specifically for this event, a more affordable version of the Dior outfits Rap Line sported during their performances of Tear, and you put on your TaTa headband as the final touch. You know, so everyone knew specifically who you were there for. You looked at yourself in the mirror one last time, smiling and letting out an excited squeak as you grabbed everything you would need, before you made your way to the venue.

The venue was absolutely packed. There was no way you’d be able to even get any merch without missing half the concert standing in that line. You sighed quietly to yourself and went to your seat, busying yourself with syncing your lightstick so it would light up with everyone else's. You looked around from your seat, in awe about how many people were here. Crazy how many people could fit into one space.

While you waited for the concert to start, you decided to write him a message about how excited you were, and that you would keep him updated throughout the show. You decided to draw a small heart on your hand, in the space between your pointer finger and thumb, just because. You smiled when you saw his words appear on your arm.

“Have fun <3”

Oh, you would. You would have the time of your life. Little did you know, in more ways than one.

~~~~

Taehyung knew you had to be here somewhere. You just had to be. He ran a hand through his perfectly groomed hair, effectively rendering his stylist’s hard work useless. He couldn’t help it. Not when he knew his soulmate was in this building. His mind started to race. What if you didn’t want to be with him? What if you liked one of the other members better than him? What if you couldn’t deal with his lifestyle? He was pacing now, and everyone but him seemed to notice.

“Taehyung-ah, relax. I’m sure everything will work out fine.” Namjoon smiled reassuringly. Taehyung nodded and let out a breath, sitting down. They were called to start getting into position, and Taehyung knew he had to do it, now or he wouldn’t have time, and you would slip through his fingers. He pulled out his pen, writing one word on his forearm in larger than usual letters. He put his pen in his pocket, heading to where his microphone and earpieces were waiting for him, hoping you would see his message.

~~~~~

When the concert started, you could barely focus on anything else other than the men on stage in front of you. You felt the familiar tickle on your arm that your soulmate had written you, though you ignored it for the time being. You couldn’t keep your eyes off of Taehyung, witnessing his incredible stage presence and the massive amount of fan service he was giving was mesmerising, to say the least.

When time for the intermission came around, and the VCRs played on the big screens, you took a moment to see what your soulmate wrote to you. You gasped when you saw the big, capital letters spread along the length of your forearm.

“TAEHYUNG”

There was no way. Absolutely no fucking way. Kim Taehyung was not your soulmate. You had to have been some sort of saint in your previous life to deserve such treatment from the universe. You stared at your arm for a few more seconds in complete disbelief, before taking your pen out of your pocket, writing your name under his on your arm. A minute later, you felt him writing, and you anxiously chewed at your lip as you awaited his response.

“Where are you?”

You hurriedly scribbled your section and seat number, your brain barely able to process what was happening.

Within 5 minutes, there was a man approaching you, asking you to confirm your name. When you did, he told you to come with him, you did without asking any questions. The man led you backstage, and you looked around, frantically trying to find the familiar face in the crowd of stage hands.

When your eyes finally met his, you felt like you couldn’t breathe. Was it anxiety? Excitement? A spicy mixture of both? You couldn’t really tell, but there were some things you needed to see. His long legs effortlessly closed the distance between you, until you were standing toe to toe. You looked up at him and he looked down at you, neither of you truly believing you were here at this moment. You studied his face for a moment, then without a word, you took his hands, inspecting them. There it was. You brought your hand up and compared, the tiny heart you drew on your hand matching the one on his. He rolled up his sleeves, revealing the messages you’d written to each other throughout the day.

“Y/N…” He said quietly, only loud enough that you could hear. “I finally found you. You’re even more beautiful than I imagined.”

“I can’t believe it’s you.” You said as you looked up at him, tears beginning to form in the corners of your eyes. He smiled and brought his hand to gently cup your cheek, his thumb lightly brushing against your cheekbone.

“Are you disappointed?” He asked with a chuckle, his tone teasing. You shook your head, letting out a quiet laugh.

“Not even a little bit.” You reassured him, smiling softly. He gave you a toothy grin before leaning down and closing the small space between you, and you couldn’t help but melt when his lips finally met yours. The kiss was soft and careful, as if he was testing the waters. When you pushed slightly against his lips, he deepened the kiss just a little more.

He was the first to pull away, seemingly remembering his surroundings, and you caught the faintest tint of pink creep onto his face. It was almost time for him to go back on stage, and he rested his forehead against yours for a moment, his eyes locked with yours as he intertwined your fingers with his.

“Wait for me? I plan to talk to you for hours, now that I can finally hear your voice.” He said, and you nodded without hesitation. He smiled widely before pressing a kiss to your forehead, jogging off to wherever it was he was needed. You sat on the couch that was there for the members beside the stage, running a hand through your hair. Never in your wildest dreams did you think something like this could happen. Not to you, at least. You felt him writing again, and this time, you paid full attention to the words appearing along your arm.

“I love you.”

Your heart skipped a beat as you read those 3 words, pulling out your pen and writing your response.

“I love you too.” You wrote, carefully, easily readable. Never had you meant something more in your life. You couldn’t wait for him to come back to you, for him to execute his plan. After what felt like a very long time, you couldn’t wait to finally begin your life with the man you happily called your soulmate.

#taehyung x reader #taehyung fluff #taehyung x you #taehyung #Kim taehyung #taehyung fanfic #taehyung fanfiction #bts fic #BTS v #bts #bts fanfic #taehyung fic #kth oneshot #kth #soulmate!au #soulmate!taehyung #taehyung au #bts au

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arhvste · 4 years

Text

❝atsumu, kuroo, tsukishima and bokuto playing acnh ❞

miya atsumu

→ first he called the game dumb but he eventually gave in because everyone and their aunts were playing it and he didn’t wanna be left out

→ mf tries so hard for raymond at first

→ he insists it’s just because he can sell him for a lot

→ he really just wants raymond because he lowkey reminds him of osamu

→ anyways this fool doesn’t get raymond but ya know who he does get?

→ pedro

→ atsumu was ✨disgusted✨

→ “a clown?! a fukn clown?! yer jokin me!”

→ “aw don’t cry he fits in so well on your island 😹”

→ “sHUT YER TRAP 😠😠😠”

→ he hated pedro at first and for what?

→ eventually he starts vibing with him though

→ he decides that perhaps... pedro isn’t a bad guy after all

→ so atsumu develops a soft spot for him and begins to favour him over the rest of his mediocre villagers whose names he can’t be bothered to remember

→ ya know whose name he can remeber though?

→ BELLA 😡😠😡😠😡😡😠

→ the name that sparks rage in him

→ atsumu hits his villagers with his net shouting “nice cut g!” as a joke

→ with bella he’s not joking 😐

→ he hits her repeatedly and grins maliciously when she gets angry eventually

→ LOVES shoving her into pitfalls for absolutely no reason

→ cusses her out under his breath

→ writes hate mail to her only to get fustrated when she sends a nice reply about the flowers she saw the other day that reminded her of him

→ honestly bella girl it ain’t worth it, pack your bags and get outta there sis 😔

→ he wants her to get tf off his island because he doesn’t like her but he also kinda wants her to stay because he loves annoying her and making her angry

→ literally goes out of his way to buy the ugliest clothes for her to wear

→ he also has all his villagers address him as “big dick man”

→ pedro is special though 😳

→ pedro is the chosen one who gets to call him “tsumu”

→ JUST PEDRO 😤😾😡

→ literally thinks it’s the funniest thing when his villagers say “hey big dick man! the weather sure is great today isn’t it!”

→ you can hear his cackling from down the hall

→ thinks it’s the peak of comedy

→ oh and you’re not allowed to visit his island on a saturday

→ saturdays are “for the boys”

→ and by that he means he’s just going to buy a ton of matching clothes for him and pedro and talk to him all day until he eventually annoys pedro by accident to which he genuinely gets upset about

→ he doesn’t really bother with the fishing tourneys or bug offs

→ does catch a few though just to make sure he beats bella earns nook miles

→ pretty average island, not too much effort put into it yet

→ atsumu prefers channeling his energy and game time into bullying bella interacting with his villagers

kuroo tetsurō

→ bangs. it. tf. out.

→ literally acts like he doesn’t care about the game but has 395+ hours game time

→ uses the excuse it’s to play with kenma but kuroo actually got into it before kenma had the chance to look at it properly

→ fishing tourney KING

→ has multiple gold trophy’s and built a whole extension just to show them off

→ also treats all his villagers equally

→ he was a bit picky and only wanted cats and dogs on his island though

→ if you’re anything but a cat or a dog, i’m sorry but kuroo will timeskip you tf off of his island

→ has a soft spot for lucky but doesn’t admit it

→ he likes to come across as a “fair dictator of the island”

→ just admit luckys your fav and go oh my god

→ his house is really nice too

→ pretty much paid off all his debt and is financially responsible 😼

→ he will send you money over a few times a week because he claims he’s a good boyfie virtually and realistically

→ LOVES opening the letters from ‘mom’

→ it’s a small detail in the game but it brings kuroo comfort when he opens the letters and sometimes receives gifts from his virtual ‘mom’ 🥺

→ keeps all the letters from her because that’s what he would do if his real mom ever wrote to him

→ he’s a shameless timeskipper

→ “tetsu?? where tf did you get all this the games only been out a week??”

→ “👁👁 idk what you’re talking about baby”

→ the thing that annoys him the most are the fossils

→ HATES the stupid little marks in the ground that appear every day

→ also HATES talking to blathers

→ “spit it out already! i have places to be and villagers to see!”

→ completely ignores blathers’ real name and refers to him as ‘bokuto’

→ because he’s an owl duh

→ and bokuto also talks a lot

→ you thought it was a cute friendship thing at first but took it back when you heard him muttering under his breath

→ “oh my god just analyse the fossils already you himbo bird!”

→ “did you just call blathers a himbo? 😳”

→ “...no? 😳👀”

→ all in all, kuroo’s pretty good at the game

→ you like visiting his island because he has a ton of extra stuff he just gives you

→ “i never want to hear you call me a bad boyfriend again 😐”

→ “okay fine...but oNLY if you give me an ironwood dresser 😏”

tsukishima kei

→ another one who bangs it out

→ doesn’t really care when you point it out though

→ “you’re just jealous your islands a dumping ground compared to mine 🥱”

→ “k-kei 😔”

→ also sprints near where you’re fishing to scare the fish off and be spiteful 💀

→ little shit KNOWS you only need oranges to complete all the fruits on your island

→ he also knows you’re out of nook miles tickets

→ “aw that’s a shame, maybe if you were a bit better at the game you’d find them quicker but good luck! 😀”

→ oranges are his native fruit 😐😑😐

→ eventually he gives you them because you’re relentless and his patience runs thin after a while

→ good at the bug offs

→ pretty good at scorpion/tarantula hunting too

→ convinced spike is in love with him after the amount of scorpions and tarantulas he’s donated to him

→ his fossil exhibition in the museum is completed already

→ when blathers tells him the facts about the dinosaurs he just rolls his eyes

→ “i knew that already you stupid bird 🙄”

→ why’s everyone bullying blathers damn 😿

→ now, he likes henry

→ one of the few villagers he doesn’t bully

→ tsukki doesnt particularly care for majority of his villagers

→ henry has a special place in his heart though

→ maybe it’s because henry isn’t overly perky or he isn’t rude like the cranky villagers which tsukishima doesn’t like

→ henry is just??? so??? nice????

→ he can’t hate him

→ all his villagers have catchphrases that are dumb af

→ tsukki thought he was being clever when he made them but he just looks mean when other people talk to his villagers

→ “good morning i am useless! i love your outfit!”

→ henry gets to call him tsukki though

→ only because he figured out that henry reminds him of yamaguchi

→ that’s the only reason henry’s the exception to his bullying

→ i feel like tsukki has a pretty nice house too

→ he makes a lot of bells from selling scorpions and tarantulas and spare fossils he’s dug up

→ doesn’t really care about the size but has very detailed rooms

→ like all the furniture in his rooms follow a scheme

→ mf never opens his mailbox

→ doesn’t care for what the other “peasants have to say for themselves”

→ terraforming isn’t really his thing tbh

→ doesn’t like how slow the process and be and kinda likes the natural flat land

→ he likes laying down paths though

→ cusses villagers out when they get in the way though

→ full on shoves them and will keep shoving them until they get annoyed just because they’ve annoyed him

→ tsukki doesnt put as much time into the game as kuroo but his island is still pretty good and aesthetically pleasing

→ he just won’t help you make yours look like that 💀

bokuto koutarō

→ weeds. everywhere.

→ get so confused when he’s told he has to pick them all

→ “really? why can’t i just let them grow though i kinda like them 🤩”

→ mf ✨struggles✨ at the first stages

→ “y/n, you know i love you, please give me 30 iron nuggets 🥺💖💞💗”

→ ofc you give them to him because you’re well ahead in the game and don’t need them as much as he does

→ praises you like royalty but then he’s back to begging for materials from you 💀

→ doesn’t pay his debts

→ you’re gonna have to help him out here

→ doesn’t like the idea of having to constantly pay them off

→ like?? he doesn’t want a bigger house so why is this damn raccoon always bothering him to upgrade like leave him and his 2 room house alone 😠

→ has a the same camp bed and lamp from when he first moved out the tent 💀

→ insists he doesn’t need another one because the furniture all functions the same

→ he has a point tbf but his house just isn’t aesthetically pleasing

→ he also hoards stuff

→ common butterfly? yeah bokuto has 37 sitting in his storage

→ doesn’t like letting the bugs go because he “caught them fair and square”

→ you show him how to pay his debts back and then he dedicates a whole room to his stupid bugs 💀

→ loves blathers and celeste just because they’re owls

→ doesn’t care about what they’re wittering on about he loves interacting with them just because they’re the only owls in the game 😐

→ his favourite villager is kid cat

→ literally follows him around and sprints circles around him

→ l o v e s the chaos outside the town hall

→ 2 of his villagers are singing, 3 are running around and 1 is just watching like 🧍🏻‍♀️

→ HYPES his singing villagers tf up

→ “yeah get it bianca! turn it up!!! 🥳🥳”

→ has to match his villagers clothes at least once a week

→ also makes them all refer to him as “the best ace”

→ it boosts his ego a little more each time they say it

→ bokuto actually got raymond out of luck but had no idea who tf he was and just how popular he was

→ lets that mf go without advertising that raymond’s in boxes

→ atsumu screeches when he finds this out eventually

→ bokuto doesn’t care what his villagers look like everyone’s welcome

→ bella should move to bokuto’s island and move from atsumu’s because bokuto will accept her with open arms rather than a net to the head everytime he sees her 😿

→ ALWAYS remembers birthdays for his villagers

→ and always shows up to their birthday parties insisting he’s the life of the party and they’d be bored without him 😹

→ which is true to a certain degree cause the party only really starts when the player arrives

→ bokuto is actually okay at terraforming

→ quickly changes his mind after an hour of building and digging and restarts it all over again

→ he can make his island look pretty good

→ theres just weeds and buried fossils everywhere though 👁👁

→ also forgets his turnips go bad

→ literally the least financially responsible out of them all

→ it’s okay though because you help him and he eventually gets the hang of it

general taglist → @atsumuwoah @bloody-bella @bbymilkbread @miracleboy420 @doggonudez @atsunakaashi @peteunderoos @saturnfarie @toffees-main @zumisace @boosyboo9206 @totorosleaff @27kei

please send an ask to be added / removed from my taglist

ALL CONTENT BELONGS TO @KUROOSKULT ON TUMBLR 2020 PLEASE DO NOT REPOST, CHANGE OR PLAGIARISE

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talkfantasytome · 3 years

Text

Going to delete ask posts that directly linked other people's posts, based on this feedback and suggestion (which I thoroughly appreciate!), as I'm not trying to point fingers at anyone or directly tell a specific person they're wrong. I'll repost the general content, with a summary of what was asked, starting with this post.

Anon Ask: Some people are saying that SJM has confirmed Vassien by saying that she'd like to do retellings of firebird legends, swan lake, and Vasilisa the Beautiful, using some shots of her comments. What are your thoughts on this? And the time on facebook that Sarah said E\ain and Lucien have a lot of "tension, growth, and healing to be found (together)".

The most important thing to consider here is timeline. Both of the twitter shown were made in April of 2015. The first one is, honestly, fairly irrelevant. First of all, she's just saying fairy tales she might like to retell. And, for the record, she has also said she'd like to do a retelling of The Little Mermaid, yet often people disregard that as an argument for Gwynriel. So, either her comments on what she'd like to do a retelling of matter, or they don't.

And, if they're saying that those comments are foreshadowing a Vassa + Lucien book, then clearly The Little Mermaid comments are foreshadowing a Gwynriel book. And then...where's E\ain's?

E\ain is getting a book, so which fairy tale gets the short straw?

Or, maybe, the story won't be exactly like the fairy tale.

I do think that both of those comments are important, but Sarah said she wants to do a retelling.

That could literally mean anything. All that tells us is that she will take themes and ideas from the story. I'm not saying Vassa won't be important in a later book, but Sarah can retell the story any way. She could have Vassa betray E\ain, get Koschei to transfer the curse over to the middle Archeron, and now E\ain is the swan on the lake (cause, come on, E\ain's def. a bit swan-like), and Lucien has to rescue her. Or, maybe Jurian is the one that rescues Vassa while Lucien and E\ain deal with Koschei?

There are so many options in a retelling that to say SJM telling us she wants to do a retelling of these stories is a clear sign that Vassa + Lucien are endgame is, honestly, not a very critical analysis.

I'm going to address this tweet next:

This twitter exchange happed April 30, 2015. ACOMAF was published in May of 2016. This post can not be used as foreshadowing of Vassa + Lucien, because it happened before we found out E\ain and Lucien are mates. That "at some point further down the road" literally means "any time after book 1".

People keep using this tweet and presenting it as if Sarah's response came recently. They're spreading misinformation - it may not be purposeful, they may not have seen or noticed the date, but this twitter exchange can't be used as proof that Lucien's person has to be someone other than E\ain, because when it was made we did not know about the Lucien and E\ain possibility.

That doesn't mean it definitely is talking about E\ain, but my point is that this is not proof of Vassa + Lucien, of someone else + Lucien, because of when it was posted.

As for other comments on retellings Sarah would like to do - it's the same argument as the first one. Sarah said she wants to do a retelling of the firebird and swan like. We all know this. It's not new information. People who are saying Vassa + Lucien won't happen aren't ignorant of this fact. We're well aware, and we're also well aware of every other thing Sarah has said, mentioned, foreshadowed, and we're tying it all together. Focusing solely on stories Sarah has mentioned she'd like to retell - not confirmed she will retell - and ignoring everything else doesn't provide a solid analysis. You have to weave how those stories would fit into the grander scheme, and look at the other surrounding factors as well.

And, again, we need to remember that Sarah can do whatever the hell she wants in terms of the story and how she chooses to retell a fairy tale. I mean, how often is Little Red Riding Hood turned into a werewolf story? And sometimes even Red is the wolf?

Writers use fairy tales as a base, a foundation, but then they make it their own. No writer is going to tell the fairy tale exactly how it first was. They're going to adjust it...a lot...to make it their own story.

I'd also like to point out that both times she mentions Vasilisa, she says "Vasilisa the Beautiful". The first time she also said 'the Brave', but the second, solely 'Beautiful'. Vassa is beautiful, of course, but one of E\ain's defining characteristics is her beauty. Even in ACOSF it was again mentioned, discussed, about how her beauty made others hate her.

Could Vassa be Vasilisa...of course. However, I think people are a bit blinded by the similarities in names. Remember, Vasilisa the Beautiful wasn't the firebird - those are different stories. And, honestly, after doing a bit of research into the tale, I'm starting to get more and more sure of the thought that the character who would portray Vasilisa is E\ain.

I think I'm going to do a post on it...

In the later comment on retellings she'd like to do - which we know came after the first as the first came out in August 2015 and that story she's telling was given after the second set of books was confirmed - I also find it interesting that she said Vasilisa the Beautiful (specifically) and Swan Lake, subbing out the firebird.

Why would she do that? Perhaps because she's already brought in the firebird pieces she planned to bring in. We already know that retelling, and how it's come to play. Vassa is a firebird by the curse.

I'm not saying it couldn't end in a Swan Lake thing, as that is what the curse reminds me of. But, personally, I think the fact that she's saying Swan Lake now is also symbolic of something more, possibly another character getting trapped by Koschei.

As for the other piece you asked about, I don't have much to say about it, because it feels like the closest we'll come to an elucien confirmation.

That was also posted a while ago, back when ACOMAF came out. So, it's not like this is recent information Sarah is providing us. However, we know that Sarah can sometimes end up choosing endgame based on gut and things that just hit her. Cassian and Nesta - literally didn't know about them until she wrote them on the same page and was like "oh shit". So Sarah saying that she and Lucien didn't see E\ain coming...I'm sorry, but that feels almost more telling than even the next part of the sentence - where she says they have growing and healing to do together.

That's so huge. And we haven't seen that yet. We've only really seen the tension.

Sarah said this back when ACOMAF came out. And it was around writing or publishing ACOWAR that she got the okay for the second set of books (I think?). Which means she was likely thinking about the longer-term stories before that. Which would explain why we didn't get that growth and healing in ACOWAR.

Instead, she left them in a spot where it seemed like a possibility, and then for the later books has just added more tension. But that journey is still there. She's had it planned for so long. And yes, maybe she could change her mind, but we only know of two cases where she did just that:

Az and Mor

Nesta and Lucien

For Az and Mor it was because she decided to make Mor bisexual and unable to be in an emotional relationship with a male. This was due to complaints over diversity. It's the closest Sarah's probably come to 'fanservice' - except, admittedly, this is so not fanservice. Fanservice is doing something like, say, having Voldemort and Bellatrix have a secret love child despite the fact that Voldy never once came off as having any form of romantic or sexual feelings for her or anyone, ever. (Seriously, that guy was asexual and that is a hill I'll die on.)

Adjusting a character due to legitimate complaints and concerns on diversity, not just fanservice. It's more a full on social service, really, to try and provide that representation better. Yes, it wasn't done in the best way, but she did make an attempt.

The second one - Nesta and Lucien. That was her general plan, until she put Nesta and Cassian on page together. Then it all went out the window. Just like all of Nesta's thoughts when she saw Cassian. Just like Cassian's entire brain when he saw Nesta. 👀

And we get it, because we see it too.

So, while Sarah could have changed her mind about E\ain and Lucien, the only reasons she'd do that don't yet apply. She's already made a change for the diversity complaints, and I don't see her doing that with these two. As for finding out they actually belong with someone else when she sees them on page - well, that hasn't happened yet. She made the E\ain + Lucien decision after we see E\ain and Azriel interact, so clearly Az is not that for E\ain. And we've seen Lucien and Vassa on page together. There's nothing there except Lucien being pained about her curse - which, yeah, she's his friend. How often is one IC member described as looking pained for another? Or thinks about how much it hurt them to see their friend hurt?

But we know what it looks like when the chemistry is so undeniable it will adjust Sarah's plans. And if you're not sure - go back and read all the Nessian scenes in ACOMAF. And then see the one scene where Lucien and Vassa are on page together - I think you'll find there's another male there that, with Vassa, rings closer to the Nessian home.

There was no on page chemistry between Vassa and Lucien, and certainly not enough to change Sarah's mind. Which would also mean E\ain already wasn't meant for Az, which is likely why no one arguing for Vassa + Lucien seems to care as much about that, because most people who ship them are already dead set on E\ain + Azriel.

So, there you have it, my point of view/rant on those two pieces. But it's always important to look at the context of a post, and especially the "source material" people use to provide proof. It's why I tend to stick to the text where I can, and only use SJM statements that don't have an expiration date to their importance. SJM saying something about how she loves happily ever afters, for example, no expiration date. SJM telling us in 2015 that there is someone special for Lucien down the road - an expiration date after the first sign of a possible love interest for Lucien. Once E\ain was declared to be his mate, that statement became irrelevant, because regardless of whether it will be E\ain or not, you can no longer state that it's clearly hinting at someone else, since E\ain is a love interest for Lucien.

#ask box #acotar #acotar thoughts #acotar theory #elucien #antielriel #anti elriel #anti vassien #elain archeron #elain and lucien #elain x lucien #lucien vanserra #gwynriel

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lady-divine-writes · 3 years

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Good Omens - “At Midnight” (Rated G)

Summary:

Crowley is devastated by how smoothly the world continues on after he loses Aziraphale to the bookshop fire. Adam stops the war between Heaven and Hell, and things go back to normal for everyone... except him. Crowley goes from demon to ghoul, haunting St. James's Park every night, caught up in his memories of his angel. Until one night, he comes across something unexpected that makes things a little better... (2416 words) ... and a whole lot worse.

Read on AO3.

The hands on Aziraphale's grandfather clock have crept dangerously close to eleven by the time Crowley steps out the door of the bookshop and into the night. He's not closing up. The shop was never open.

Not for anyone but him.

He’d spent the day lurking in the shifting shadows, coiled around the leg of angel's favorite chair, keeping guard.

Watching for movement.

Praying for change.

For resolution.

He marked time by the tolling of Aziraphale's clock, the ebb and flow of the commuters outside, and a single ray of sunlight carving its path across the floor, disappearing out the window at the stroke of seven. That’s when he came out of hiding, became his demon self once again.

Crowley pops his collar against the wind and locks the door behind him. He takes one last look at the pane beneath his fingertips, running them lightly over a ridiculous note affixed to the glass. It’s a note he wrote on Aziraphale's behest, proclaiming when customers can expect the shop to open.

The long and short of it being - don't.

I open the shop on most weekdays about 9:30 or perhaps 10 a.m. While occasionally I open the shop as early as 8, I have been known not to open until 1, except on Tuesday...

Crowley had written it to irritate his angel - a demonic dig, as it were. But after reading it, Aziraphale couldn't have been more delighted.

"Brilliant!" he'd said. "Masterfully convoluted! Now I can finally relax and finish my crossword puzzle in peace! Thank you, my dear."

Crowley had gone warm at Aziraphale's words. He had never felt so overwhelmed by praise.

But now, the sign makes him bitter.

It should have long been replaced with one that reads on holiday, circling the globe, or living the happily ever after life in Mayfair with my husband.

But that wasn't in the cards for Crowley and Aziraphale.

Crowley snaps his fingers to lower the blinds and snuff the lights, and takes off at a brisk clip to the park.

Alone.

He does this every night - haunts St. James's Park close to midnight when he'd rather be at home asleep. Crowley had planned to sleep the next seven millennia away, wait until the world started over again before he showed his face to the sun, but infuriatingly, he couldn't. It's impossible for him to get comfortable in his bed when there should be someone else beside him, sitting up and reading by his damned holy light.

Crowley never thought he'd miss that stupid light piercing his eyelids and interrupting his slumber, but he misses it more than anything.

There was nothing left for Crowley after he lost Aziraphale in the bookshop fire.

He'd always felt that if they went their separate ways, it would sever his heart, but nothing more. He'd go on. But the assumption had been that Aziraphale would still be - exist, just not in Crowley's life.

When Aziraphale went, everything good went with him - love, hope, color, and taste all vacated Crowley's world. But Crowley was too much of a coward to call it quits and join him in oblivion, since, as far as Crowley was concerned, that was where immortal beings ended up if they were eliminated from Earth. Heaven and Hell only existed for humans. Aziraphale and Crowley were created for this world.

For them, this was it.

He thought he would get into his car and drive, but he couldn't make himself leave. He would get as far as Kent or Surrey, then his Bentley would stop.

Whether he was the one pressing the brake or his car - it varied.

Either way, he'd take a deep breath, toss off his glasses, rub the blur from his watery eyes, and the next thing he knew, he was home.

Couldn't sleep.

Couldn't leave.

Couldn't escape.

Yup. This was Hell. Undoubtedly.

Since he couldn't stay put and he couldn't run away, he spent night after night roaming the park - a ghoul shrouded in shadows of the past. Selfishly, he did everything he could to make the park inhospitable after dark, the same way Aziraphale did for his bookshop to deter customers. He made the place dreary, filled it with suspicious shadows, cold spots, and feelings of dread. In his attempt to get rid of anyone who might bother him, he unwittingly thwarted a few mugging attempts and a handful of assaults, which eliminated crime in St. James's Park for the most part.

Otherwise, he kept to himself.

It didn't matter to Crowley one bit that Adam had saved the planet from Heaven and Hell's blasted war. Or that, in doing so, neither side seemed interested in Crowley anymore.

Without Aziraphale by his side, Crowley wanted none of it.

These nightly walks, re-visiting the spots where they'd met up through time, didn't help. His memories of Aziraphale had begun to erode what was left of his soul.

His regret over the one thing he had left unsaid.

But there was a handshake exchange afoot.

His late-night trips to the park were how he noticed the light, blooming, growing on the bench smack dab in front of the duck pond.

Their bench.

A thread of silver light that lasted one solid minute from beginning to end.

It was spectacular. Unbelievable in its brilliance. Of the few souls who braved Crowley's shield of demonic influence, only Crowley seemed to notice it. And he couldn't avoid it.

It called to him.

Crowley stalked the light for over a week, never getting too close. It seemed like the kind of thing Gabriel might conjure up to trap him. Heaven may not give two shits about him, but archangels have been known to hold serious grudges.

He resisted its pull, but Crowley is a curious demon, and curiosity got the better of him. Besides, what did he care if Gabriel got the drop on him? Crowley was up for a fight, even one he might lose.

He had nothing better to do.

Crowley walked straight to the bench and sat down the moment the light appeared. He stared at it, into it, trying to sniff out its origins, what it was doing there. Being this close to it, he realized he was wrong. It didn't appear out of thin air. It was a consequence - evidence of a seam ripping in the universe, and on the other side...

Crowley only saw him for a second, but that was all he needed.

Aziraphale.

They locked eyes. Aziraphale's face lit up as if he were seeing the stars for the first time.

Stars Crowley created.

He was quite a distance from the tear. Like Crowley, he avoided it as much as possible. But seeing Crowley on the other side, he ran toward it, calling out a single word. It was all he had time for before the rend closed, and he was gone again.

The word he managed was Crowley.

Every night after, Crowley would arrive at the bench with plenty of time for the two of them to speak. As best as they could deduce, something bizarre happened during that fire in Aziraphale's bookshop. Unprecedented. Crowley assumed, at first, that the flames that devoured his angel's pride and joy had come from Hellfire. But they didn't. And Aziraphale, standing in the center of the transportation portal in his corporeal form, never made it to Heaven. He got caught in between.

Purgatory.

A place that many supernatural beings consider scarier than Hell.

A railway station with a way in but no way out. For immortals, that is. Mortal souls can earn a place upstairs depending on how they behave in this celestial waiting room. But as humans and demons don't concern themselves much with Purgatory lore, there is no book in Hell or on Earth that can help. Crowley has tried finding one - traveled to libraries and broken into collections he would do only on Aziraphale's behalf. But for all of his lofty capers, he found nothing. There might be a book in Heaven, but Crowley has no way to access it.

And Aziraphale is trapped.

Wouldn't Crowley know it, but even under these circumstances, Aziraphale found ways to continue his insufferable good deeds, helping mortal souls trapped with him to move along. Though Crowley believes Aziraphale has an ulterior motive.

Peace and quiet.

Aziraphale has one of those faces that attracts people to him, people who long to share their woeful life stories. So he listens, and then he counsels. When that soul moves on, he earns the most sought-after prize of all - an additional measure of silence.

Crowley and Aziraphale thought Heaven would notice his absence by now. Gabriel’s memos were piling up on Aziraphale's desk, untouched. Or by the massive influx of souls arriving at the pearly gates.

But no luck.

The angels in charge of the prisoners in the bottomless pits of Hell are more on the ball than the ones who keep an eye on the poor souls stuck in between.

This boundary between Earth and Purgatory dissolves at the stroke of midnight but zips up as soon as the clock strikes 12:01. Then Aziraphale disappears, not returning again till the following day. They are permitted one minute to tell each other everything, and they do their best to get it all out.

There's one thing Crowley hasn't gotten to yet. Hasn’t for 6000 years.

His one regret.

He plans on telling Aziraphale tonight on the off chance they can't come up with a solution to this.

Crowley feels the light before it appears. It tugs at something deep inside, ushers him to his seat on the bench. It arrives with a clap like thunder, so loud he’s surprised when it doesn’t shatter windows and crack foundations. Air whooshes by him at hurricane speeds, sucked into the impending rend.

A second later, Aziraphale appears beside him.

In a different dimension but beside him, framed by the light as if he's a reflection in a mirror.

Crowley inches his hand close, knowing without seeing that Aziraphale’s hand rests similarly on the opposite side. They cannot touch. They’ve tried.

Neither can cross the barrier.

“So, my dear,” Aziraphale starts, looking through the shimmer at Crowley, “how’s the bookshop?”

“Right as rain as always,” Crowley replies. He used to mutter, “Hello, Crowley. How are you? You’re looking well this fine evening,” but realized how immature and hurtful that was when Aziraphale heard him, and his face fell. Aziraphale wasn’t disregarding Crowley by not asking after him first. It was too painful for Aziraphale to acknowledge how far apart they were from one another. “How have you been, angel?”

“Can’t complain. Although I could really go for a plate of crepes. Or perhaps a nice, hearty gazpacho.”

“Don’t you worry. The moment I have you free of there, I’ll take you to dinner. Anywhere you want to go.”

“I’m holding you to that,” Aziraphale says, the longing in his eyes heartbreaking. “It wouldn’t be so bad over here if I had a book or two.”

“I did try passing you one over, but… “

“Yes, yes, I recall.” Aziraphale sighs at the memory of a favorite Wilde hardcover disintegrating into thin air. Luckily, that didn’t happen to either of them when they attempted to cross. “Valiant effort. Disastrous outcome.”

“Meddled in anyone's affairs today, have you?”

“As a matter of fact… ” Aziraphale smiles brightly. “A charming lady named Agatha. Lived a good long life. Died at the age of 93, I believe she said.”

“Wot in the world did she do to make it into Purgatory?”

“The usual. Attachment to sin.”

Crowley nods, lips twisting with a knowing grin. “Let me guess… the premarital variety?”

“That’s the one. She also poisoned an abusive stepfather, not her own, broke into a research facility to rescue rabbits, and stole a petty neighbor’s tomatoes on the daily until the day she died.”

Crowley chuckles. “Ah, yes. You’ve got to love old ladies.”

“Indeed.”

“Wot did you do?”

“Same as always. I had her give a proper confession. I forgave her for the poisoning, of course… “

“Of course.”

“... and the rabbit liberation. But we talked through the issue with the tomatoes. I explained that trespassing on her neighbor’s property is wrong even if the woman did dye all her delicates on her drying line puce.”

Crowley makes a face. He has no idea what puce is, but it sounds vile. “Probably justified there.”

“But that wasn’t the crux of her dilemma.”

“Wot was?”

Aziraphale turns, eyes wandering in the direction of the pond even though he can’t see it. “She misses the love of her life.”

Crowley's eyes widen. “Oh.”

“I assured her that her lover would be with her soon. After that, she was fine moving on.”

“Is that the truth?”

“Yes,” Aziraphale says wistfully. “He beloved misses her very much. They make a lovely couple.”

“That’ll be nice. The two of them reuniting.”

“Yes. It will be… for them.”

Silence falls between them. They steer clear of silence when they can, seeing how short their time is together, but it can't be helped. Aziraphale could work from here till eternity joining lost souls, but he can't help himself do the same.

The weight of that overwhelms them.

Crowley's phone vibrates in his pocket, signaling their minute together coming to an end. The silver frame phases, its light dimming, sputtering like a candle about to go out. As with every time before, Crowley tries to stop it, tries to stop time to keep Aziraphale with him longer. But it doesn’t work. Either this rend works outside of the laws of time, or time has had it with Crowley’s antics, but this can’t be stopped.

Crowley’s imagination isn’t strong enough.

“We only have a little time left,” Aziraphale says, “and we’re no closer to solving this puzzle!”

“I know,” Crowley replies. “I'll keep working on it. I promise. But before you go, I just wanted to tell you… ”

The air crackles as the rip begins to mend, the noise drowning them out.

"Yes, my dear?"

"I need to tell you... "

“Oh, Crowley!” Aziraphale starts to fade as the gap sutures shut. “I’m so sorry… "

The tear closes, his angel gone, and in the ensuing silence, Crowley’s last words hang in the air, having escaped his lips a second too late for their recipient to hear.

“… I love you.”

#good omens #good omens fanfiction #ineffable husbands #crowley x aziraphale #aziraphale x crowley #aziraphale #Crowley

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official-weasley · 3 years

Text

Meant to Be (Charlie Weasley x OC)

What happens when Bill brings home a girl and Charlie is completely awestruck by her?

WARNINGS: Mentions of sex and alcohol.

CHAPTER 2

Charlie

“How come you are always the last one to leave?” I chuckled at Peter’s remark.

“I’m in no hurry, I still have to feed the Chinese Fireball and you know she’s stubborn.” I turned to him, brushing the hair off my face.

“I can do it, you know I’m staying here for the holidays and you’re…” He stepped closer and snatched the bag with food in front of me. “…going to miss your portkey.”

“Are you sure?” I narrowed my eyes at him, taking off my gloves.

“Charlie, when was the last time you saw your family?” He sighed.

“About six months ago.” I actually had to think about it.

“See!” He stretched out his hand, making me give my gloves to him. “The dragons will survive without you for a few days.” He winked at me.

Perhaps he was right. I don’t know how to take a day off. If it wasn’t for Peter and my team, I would be working all the time. They are the ones who stop me here and there and get me drunk.

“I still have to pack!” I remembered.

I woke up at 5 this morning and went to feed the dragons straight away, completely forgetting I am leaving for the Burrow afterward.

“Damn it, Charlie! You always do this to me.” Peter shook his head. “I’ll fire you.”

“What for?” I chortled. “For working too hard?”

“Yes!” He laughed. “You have 30 minutes before the portkey closes. You better go now!”

“Alright, alright. I’m going.” I rolled my eyes.

“Don’t you miss your family?” He asked, concern on his face.

“Of course, I do!” I really did but I am not going to tell my boss how much. “Don’t you miss yours?”

“I do but I see them once per month, sometimes even twice. You don’t know how to take that much time off, remember?” He smirked at me.

“That’s right, keep rubbing it in my face.” I bumped his shoulder with my fist and waved at him, starting down the path towards my hut.

Did he say 30 minutes to pack and catch the portkey? He’s mental, that’s not enough time! I picked up the pace, my keys ready. I ran straight to my dresser when I entered my home and started throwing clothes on my bed.

A pair of jeans, a hat, scarf, two t-shirts. I think that’s enough for a 4-day stay! Oh, shit! I can’t go without one of mum’s jumpers. I stuck my head back in the dresser, my eyes tracking the burgundy jumper with a green dragon in it.

Where are you?

I would say that I have to reorganize my closet but I know I would never end up doing it anyway. I wear mostly the same clothes to work every day and the only time I try a bit harder to look presentable is when I go home. It’s a waste of time otherwise. Why spend the time picking an outfit when you can spend it with dragons?

There it is!

I knew I was probably going to get a new one as a Christmas present but I loved this one the most. Mum’s jumpers were the only thing I didn’t like about my job. I couldn’t wear them without completely ruining them, I loved them too much to do that so they were being untouched in my closet.

Now to get my toothbrush and that should be all. How much time I have left until my portkey closes and Peter kills me?

I leaned my head to check the clock on the kitchen wall. 10 minutes. I can make that if I run!

I was walking towards the front gate, still zipping my bag.

“Going home for the holidays, Charlie?”

Oh, no. Not now!

“Yes.” I turned around and forced a smile. “How about you, April?”

“Oh, I’m staying. Don’t really have anywhere to be.” If she is indicating that I should take her with me, she has got to be joking.

John was right, should’ve never slept with her.

“Well, a lot of our mates are staying, I’m sure you’ll be fine.” I didn’t want to be rude, but I am not bringing her home.

My mum would faint, me having a girlfriend after all these years and she really wasn’t a girl I imagined myself in a relationship with. She was too needy and wanted to be with me all the time.

First of all, I don’t have time for that and second of all, sex wasn’t that great either and we have nothing in common and…

“I just wanted to say goodbye.” She took a step toward me and I took one backward.

Please, don’t hug me!

“Bye!” I waved my hand, turned around, and ran for it.

The second I touch the portkey, I’m free!

I have to start being better at picking women. This one stalks my every move, the one before that still sends me letters and my friends are doing nothing but laughing in my face for it. Perhaps I should get better at picking friends too!

I finally reached the portkey and without turning around to see if April followed me, I touched the bottle and landed flat on my face in the forest near my family home. I dusted myself off and started towards the house.

I stopped walking about 20 meters from it. I just had to take it all in. I missed it. I missed my home, my parents, and all my siblings. I really hope Bill will be able to get time off and come too, I miss him the most even though I saw him 2 months ago when he came to visit me.

I knocked on the door and slowly opened it.

“Charlie!” Before I could put my bag down, Ginny’s hands were already around my waist. I hugged her back.

She grew so much and got stronger too.

“I missed you too, Gin.” I chuckled.

“You’re going to help me later.” She grinned and ran away before I could ask her what she needs help with.

“Charlie, dear. Welcome home!” My mum crushed me with her hug but I didn’t mind.

I might be 21 but I still loved to hug my mum as I did when I was a kid. Mum pulled away and started looking around behind me.

“I didn’t bring anyone with me, mum.” I rolled my eyes.

“Oh, Charles. Don’t tell me there aren’t any pretty girls in that Sanctuary of yours.” She scolded me.

“Mum, beauty isn’t everything. I want someone I can connect with.” She was the only one who got me to admit things like this out loud.

I know she only wants me to be happy but I’m still too young to think about settling down.

“What about that April girl. I was really hoping to meet her.” She sighed.

April? How did she know about April?

“How do you know about her?” I asked rather frightened.

I was afraid of her answer.

“She wrote to me a few months ago, telling me what a wonderful son I’ve raised. She seemed nice, did you break up with her already?” She narrowed her eyes, her hands on her hips.

She wrote to my mum?! She’s mental!

“We were never together we only slep…” I bit my tongue. My mum really didn’t have to know about my sex life. “You know what, it’s complicated.” I raised my hands in defeat.

That’s the sentence that usually keeps people from asking further questions, right?

Mum didn’t get a chance to say anything else as Fred and George came down the stairs.

“Hi, Charlie!” Fred said and ran past me and straight through the front door.

“Might want to duck!” George stopped next to me for a second before following his twin.

I quickly turned my head towards the stairs where a whistling sound was coming from. I ducked as fireworks started to go off all around the living room, kitchen, and hallway. If mum wasn’t shouting, storming past me to find the twins, I would be laughing right now.

“I see they still haven’t changed.” I said and sat next to Ron on the sofa.

“You’re lucky you were at Hogwarts with them in their early years.” Ron rolled his eyes. “They are driving mum mad. She sends them a Howler per week if not more.”

“Should I talk to them?” I chuckled.

I know I shouldn’t find this amusing but I couldn’t help it. They were the only ones of us kids that didn’t fear mum and I know a Howler is not going to stop them from wreaking havoc.

“I don’t think it’s going to help, mate. Nothing can help those two.” Ron gulped. “Nice to have you home, though.” He patted my shoulder.

Ron was always a bit awkward when it came to social interactions.

“How is school? You doing good?” I cleared my voice, pretending to be strict.

I never gave hard time to my younger siblings. It was always Bill’s job and I just helped the house from setting on fire. He was the one who kept track of the homework and even did some homeschooling when mum was too busy. I was the one who chased them around and made sure they didn’t hurt themselves.

“School’s fine, I guess.” Ron shrugged. “How’s Norbert?” He swallowed hard.

I know he thinks he can’t ask about the dragon we helped rescue in his first year. I miss Hagrid, I really do.

“Fine. Healthy and big.” I laughed. I rolled up the sleeve of my right arm and showed him a deep scar all across my forearm. “He did this.”

“Charles Weasley, what is that!” Mum seeing a new scar while being mad at the twins was a bad combination.

“Mum, it’s already healed. Don’t make a big deal out of it!” I quickly rolled my sleeve back down.

“You better tell me that this is the only new one you have!” She barked at me.

Where were Fred and George now so she could shout at them?

“Yes.” I lied.

Thank Merlin I don’t have to take off my shirt because I have a much bigger scar stretching all across my back and I know she would lose her head if she saw that one.

She eyed me suspiciously, not really believing my lie but she knew she wouldn’t be able to do anything about it. The second I got the job in the Sanctuary she flipped out. She was hoping until the last minute that I would somehow change my mind even though all I could talk about were dragons since I can remember.

I’m pretty sure dragon was the first word that came out of my mouth. At first, I cared that she was so against it but after a while I let it go. I knew she would never understand.

Nobody ever did. Not even Bill and he is my best friend. He loves his job but he wasn’t obsessing over Curse Breaking until his fourth year at Hogwarts and even then he wasn’t so into it as I was about becoming a Dragonologist.

“So Charlie are you going to help me?” Ginny squeezed between me and Ron, making him almost fall off the sofa.

“What do you need help with, Gin?” I smiled at her.

I forgot how my siblings always occupied me. I am not going to deny it, it felt great.

“I need you to help me with my Transfiguration essay.” She said, staring at the notes in her hands.

“Transfiguration?” I blinked at her. “How am I supposed to help you with that?”

I sucked at Transfiguration. Charms, okay. Astronomy, maybe. Even Defence Against the Dark Arts. But Care of Magical Creatures was the only subject I was confident I could help with.

“Have you forgotten what I do for a living?” I poked her shoulder.

“I’m joking!” She laughed. She loved messing with me. “I need to write an essay about newly hatched dragons for Care of Magical Creatures and who better to ask.” She scrambled her notes across the coffee table and gave one of the papers to me.

“What do they eat, how they behave, when can they leave their mother, how dangerous they are and how to defend yourself if you encounter one.” I read out loud.

“Easy!” I exclaimed. “Do you have your quill and paper ready?”

I clapped my hands and she stood up, grinning. She came back only seconds later with her writing equipment and sat back down.

If Peter ever fires me for working too hard perhaps I can help Hagrid with Care of Magical Creatures.

I couldn’t believe how much fun I was having helping Ginny with her essay. Answering all those questions was a piece of cake for me and I could tell that Ginny was enjoying my company.

“Mum, need any help in the kitchen?” I asked when something started to smell good.

I missed her cooking. We had good food in the Sanctuary but nothing compares to home cooking.

“Don’t you worry about it, Charlie. You help Ginny with her homework, I will ask Ron and Percy to help.” She grinned at me, thankful for the offer.

I turned back to Ginny as she was just finishing the answer to the second question when I heard a pop outside. I looked at the family clock and watched the hand with Bill’s name move to Home. Before either Ginny or I could announce it to mum, the door opened and Bill stepped inside.

“Hi, everyone. I’m home!” He sang. He wasn’t alone though. I heard someone chuckling behind him. “I brought a guest, I hope that’s alright.” He said, turned more to mum than to us.

I could see he was nervous and a second later, I found out why.

He brought home a girl. Damn, she was beautiful. Perhaps I should reconsider my career choice. None of the girls in the Sanctuary looked like that. No offense to them.

I blinked twice to be sure I wasn’t overreacting. I have never seen someone as lovely as she was. She wasn’t the most beautiful girl in the world but there was something about her, something shining through that made her absolutely stunning.

I shook my head, what was I doing! She’s Bill’s girlfriend.

“Oh, my.” Mum whispered into her hand.

I could see her eyes sparkle as she slowly made her way towards Bill and his guest.

“Everybody this is Rhylee. Rhylee, this is my mum, my brother Charlie and my sister Ginny.” Bill pointed his finger at us on the sofa. “And that’s Ron and Percy.” He pointed at them at the kitchen table and they both waved with a knife, as they were cutting vegetables. “And I guess you’ll meet the twins later.” Bill’s eyes were searching for them.

“Where’s dad?” Bill asked, taking off his coat.

“He’s stuck at work but will be joining us soon.” Mum beamed, her eyes still on Rhylee.

She grabbed her hand and practically dragged her into the kitchen. Bill rolled his eyes and quickly followed them. I think he was afraid mum would bombard Rhylee with questions.

“She’s really pretty.” Ginny said, her eyes on Bill’s girlfriend. I couldn’t take my eyes off her either.

“Yeah.” I blurted out. I shook my head. “Ginny, come on. Focus on your homework.” I tapped my finger on Ginny’s parchment.

She snapped back and took her quill out of the ink bottle.

“On it.” She started scribbling again.

“The sooner you finish, the sooner we can play Quidditch.” I whispered to her.

She started writing faster and I giggled. That always got her. If you could bribe my sister with anything it was Quidditch.

My eyes quickly wandered back to the kitchen. To Rhylee. She was so interesting and I have never wanted to know more about anyone as I did about her right now. She seemed mysterious as if you would need a lot of time to figure her out.

“What was the spell again, Charlie?” Ginny’s voice made me look away for the third time.

I really need to stop staring at her or she will think Bill’s brother is a creep.

“Immobulus, Ginny.” I said, my voice distant. I was not having as much fun helping her anymore. I was more interested in Bill’s girl.

“What are you two up to?” Bill sat next to me on the sofa and peeked at what Ginny was writing. “Homework! Merlin, I’m glad I’m late.” He laughed and tapped my back.

“Congratulations, Bill.” I winked at him. “Mum seems to like her.” I nodded to the kitchen where Rhylee was talking to our mum.

She didn’t look uncomfortable at all even though I knew mum was asking her all sorts of questions that violated personal space.

“We’re not together.” Bill said quietly.

They’re not? What was he waiting for!

“And that’s my cue to leave.” Ginny closed her ink bottle.

Bill and I laughed.

Every time we talked about girls, Ginny got up and left. I know she was too young for these things and she was always uncomfortable talking about it even though Ron told me once in a letter that he finds it annoying how obsessed she is with Harry Potter.

“What about your essay?” I mocked her.

“I remember what you told me and I can finish it later.” She stuck her tongue at me. “Besides, mum needs me in the kitchen.”

That was a bold lie Ginerva and you know it!

She just wanted to properly meet Rhylee and ask her questions as mum did.

“What are you waiting for, Bill?” I turned to my brother now.

I couldn’t believe the girl he brought home wasn’t his girlfriend. What was he thinking?

“I don’t know, Charlie!” He sighed and melted into the sofa. “I feel so intimidated by her and we have been friends for 3 years and…”

“How many more excuses are you going to give me?” I raised my eyebrows at him.

He never had problems asking a girl out before. He wasn’t as big on one-night stands as I was but he wasn’t awkward with girls either. But even I have to admit that Rhylee did look a bit intimidating. However, I know that wouldn’t stop me. She was a mystery box waiting to be opened and I knew that if it was me I wouldn’t waste a minute.

“I know. I suck.” Bill pursed his lips and looked towards Rhylee. “I promise I’ll do it once we get back. No more excuses.”

“You swear?” I mocked him.

“Yes!” Bill rolled his eyes.

“What’s that thing Ginny does?” I scratched my head. “Something with fingers?”

“Pinky promise?” Bill laughed.

“Yes! Let’s do that!” I smirked.

“No way. I am not making a pinky promise with you!” Bill wanted to get up but I grabbed his hand and pushed him back down.

“Oh, yes you are!” I was having too much fun messing with him.

He might be two years older than me and might have a fang for an earring and might be dressed in leather and look all cool but I knew he was still a big loving teddy bear he has been before he decided to put dragonhide boots on his feet. I brought my pinky closer to his face and just as we were about to finalize the deal, Rhylee disturbed us.

“I think we haven’t been properly introduced yet.” She said, looking at me.

“Yeah, I guess so.” I cleared my throat and lowered my hand. I shook hers and Bill offered her to sit down next to him.

“You know, you two have a lot in common.” Bill said after a few seconds of awkward silence.

“How come?” I finally tore my eyes off hers and looked at my brother.

“Rhylee here is a Dragonologist like you.” He grinned.

I think my heart just skipped a beat. This was not happening. She wasn’t. She couldn’t be. This was so unfair! Bill gets this amazing girl and doesn’t even ask her out and I’m stuck with April who sends my mum letters without me knowing about it.

“I work at Gringotts.” She explained.

I gasped. Finally, someone who can tell me about the dragons that are guarding the vaults in the Bank!

“What breeds do you have down there?” I bit my tongue.

I suddenly remembered that I was not supposed to know that Gringotts had dragons.

It’s supposed to be a secret and Bill could lose his job by telling me that. Ministry wasn’t big on dragons and goblins would never admit that they have one of the most dangerous creatures so close to where people go. Bill let it slip one time I visited him in Egypt. He thought I would find it interesting, being obsessed with dragons and all.

“Oh, Charlie.” Bill laughed and Rhylee followed his lead.

If somebody asked me right now if she fancied my brother I don’t think I would be able to answer them.

“It’s okay. I won’t tell anyone that you know.” She turned to me with the biggest grin on her face.

Was she excited to talk about dragons?

“How many dragons do you keep down there?” I tried to sound as casual as possible even though I wanted to burst from excitement.

“Two and we are getting a third one after the holidays. We have an Ukranian Ironbelly and an albino Swedish Short-Snout and we’re getting…”

“You have an albino dragon down there?!” My voice was a tad too loud.

I had to sit up straight to steady my breathing. I have never seen one and thought they were a myth. I only read about them and made it my life’s goal to see it one day and here she was, saying they have an albino Swedish Short-Snout as if she was talking about rabbits.

“Yeah.” Rhylee chuckled. “You should see him. He’s so beautiful. He was already grown up when I got the job but one of my co-workers has worked with him since he was 6 months old and I’m still jealous of that. Imagine a small albino Snouty!” Her voice got just as high as mine was before.

This was unreal. I couldn’t believe she loved dragons so much. I work with more than 20 Dragonologists but I always felt like I am more obsessed with the creatures than anyone else and here she was. She looked about my age so she couldn’t attend Hogwarts otherwise I would remember her. Heck, I would probably want to be her best friend!

“I wish! You have to smuggle me in one day. I would love to see him!” I leaned on my arms.

“Perhaps that can be arranged.” She laughed.

“What do his scales look like? Are his eyes red, because I read once that it’s a fifty-fifty chance that they have normal eyes and…” I looked at Bill, sitting between us.

I sat back up straight and cleared my throat. This wasn’t right.

I know the expression on Bill’s face and I don’t like it. Out of all my siblings, I was always closest to Bill. We were the first to go to school and he always looked after me there. He was my big brother and I owed so much to him.

He was my best friend and he knows everything about me. He was there for me when I broke up with my girlfriend the Summer after I graduated from Hogwarts and we stuck together when mum was going on and on what dangerous career paths we both chose.

I knew him better than anyone and the look on his face was saying that he felt left out and I couldn’t blame him. It was enough that he had to listen to me talk about dragons non-stop until he became a Curse Breaker and moved to Egypt and even after that I didn’t stop with my obsession. And now he was sitting between me and the girl he really liked and he had nothing to add to the conversation.

It was wrong and it wasn’t fair to him. He brought this girl here to introduce her to his family and then ask her out and I was ruining it for him. It didn’t matter that I was completely awestruck by her or that she was beautiful or that I would love to get to know her better.

Nobody was worth losing my brother over. I never want to see that expression on his face again. He shouldn’t feel like this. He already stalled asking this girl out and I wasn’t helping.

“You know what…” I sucked in a breath. “Doesn’t matter. Let’s talk about something else.” I forced a smile.

As much as I would love to talk about dragons with Rhylee, Bill was more important to me even though I could see she felt the same and was loving all the questions I was asking her.

“How did you two meet?” I turned to Bill.

I wanted nothing more than for him to start speaking, to feel included.

“We can talk about that later.” Bill smiled. I know he appreciated that I tried changing the topic. “You two clearly have a lot of questions for each other and I haven’t seen the twins yet so I will go upstairs and see what they are up to and you two talk.” He stood up.

“You sure?” I tried stopping him.

I know he wasn’t okay with this and neither was I.

“Pinky promise.” He laughed and walked away.

“Pinky promise? Really?” I turned to Rhylee, her eyebrows raised.

“Long story.” I shook my head and chuckled.

“So…” She pressed her lips together and poked my knee. She was so playful. “Do you want to know more about the dragons I work with or do you want to know how Bill and I met?”

“What do you think?” I smirked at her and made her laugh.

This was not good. I was completely mesmerized by her.

“To answer your previous two questions…” She sat closer to me. “His scales are completely white except the ones on his tail. Those are washed-up red. It’s really interesting and I tried searching for the reason behind the reddish color in several books but I couldn’t find anything.” She sighed.

“And about your questions about the eyes. I asked Simon, the one I said before that worked with the albino before I got there, he said that his eyes changed when he was about 1 year old. They are black now but apparently, they were red before and I so wish I could see that. He had to look even more beautiful!” She squeaked.

“So according to him, that would mean that they do have red eyes but lose the color with age?” I thought out loud.

“Seems like it. He’s the only albino I encountered. I’m sorry I can’t tell you more about it.” She sighed.

“Anyways, as I said before. We have the two and we’re getting a Norwegian Ridgeback after the holidays. I can’t even begin to explain to you how excited I am for that!” She clapped her hands together.

She was basically me in a female form.

“Do you name them? We do in the Sanctuary. One of my co-workers has a 5-year-old daughter and a few months ago our rescue team brought a new Common Welsh Green and we let her name him and she called him Bunny.” I laughed.

“Oh, that is so sweet!” Rhylee laughed too. “The albino is Dash and our Ukrainian Ironbelly is Kyan. They were named before I got there so I didn’t have a chance to pick.” She said sadly. “But my team did say that I can name the one we’re getting now.” Her face brightened up immediately.

She has her own team? I had so many questions for her that I would need to prolong my stay to get the answers to all of them.

“Did you pick out the name yet?” I asked.

Even though I wanted to know more about her team and how is she handling being in charge. I was recently appointed to lead a team and I wasn’t good at bossing people around. One question at the time, Charlie.

“I was thinking of Nyx. It’s similar to Nox since the dragon is black. I don’t know yet.” She shrugged her shoulders, but I knew she had it all figured out.

She reminded me of myself when I had more to say but stopped because I thought the other party wouldn’t be interested in what I have to say.

“I like it.” I encouraged her. “We have a Norwegian Ridgeback. His name is Norbert.”

“Oh, that’s cute.” She cupped her face. I could see she was debating whether she picked the right name or not. “Maybe you can help me pick a name.” She bumped into my shoulder. “You know, in case I change my mind.”

“Sure.” I replied and sat a bit away from her. I don’t want her to be too friendly with me. I was already having too much fun with her.

“I’m sorry. Am I talking too much about dragons?” She sighed.

She must’ve noticed me moving away.

“Oh, no. Not at all!” I reassured her.

“It’s just…” She sucked in a breath. I knew she wasn’t sure if she should say what she’s about to say and at this point, neither was I. “Nobody ever shows such enthusiasm about dragons as you just did. All those questions you asked me. It’s nice to talk to someone who shares your passion.” She explained.

“Tell me about it.” I took a deep breath.

We should not talk about how much we are enjoying this or how much fun we are having. Just talking to her felt like I was doing something illegal. She came here with Bill, remember?

“I have a team of six including me and it’s hard to see that it’s just a job to most of them, you know. They don’t care as much as I do. If it was on me, I would be there all the time and I would do so much more for them but they always laugh at me and tell me I’m too obsessed or that I’m a workaholic. They do what they need to do and then go home and it’s hard working with people like that. It’s hard to trust them. There is this girl,” she licked her lips, “Lizzie, she’s the only one I can trust. She cares about the dragons. The rest of them, I don’t know. Perhaps I’m overreacting.” Her eyes moved from the coffee table to mine.

They were so full of emotion, so full of passion for her job.

Why did Bill bring her here!

“You’re not.” I placed my hand on her shoulder but quickly pulled away.

What was I doing?

“I’m the same. There are more than 20 people in the Sanctuary and I can’t relate to any of them.” I frowned. “They love dragons and they do care about them but after a long working day, they don’t want to talk about work which is understandable but it can get quite lonely when I want to discuss several occurrences that happened during the day and they all tell me that I should shut up and drink my beer and that we can talk about it in the morning. They just don’t understand that there is so much more to the creatures than just breathing fire and feeding them.” I couldn’t believe I was telling her this.

I never talked about this to anyone. I loved my job and I loved Romania and I love all the friends I’ve made there but nobody understood me as Rhylee did and I met her an hour ago. It was crazy.

This was crazy! I can’t believe I was talking to this incredible girl that was as obsessed with dragons as I was and wanted to talk about nothing else and I had to hold myself back because I felt guilty because of Bill.

“I can’t believe someone actually understands me.” She said more to herself than to me.

I looked at her and we stared at each other for solid five seconds before she looked away, clearing her throat.

“So…” She swallowed. “Your mates tell you to shut up and drink your beer?” She chuckled.

“Yeah.” I joined her. “We usually grab a beer or two on Fridays or during the weekend. There isn’t much to do for fun so we get drunk.” I said, a little embarrassed.

I didn’t know her well enough to know if she was okay with that. Not that it matters what her opinion of me is. Soon, I’ll be her brother-in-law.

“At least you can get drunk.” She laughed. “I have nobody to do that with. All my co-workers are so serious and go straight home after work so the only one I can really talk or have any fun with is my roommate Lyla.”

“That’s just sad.” I teased her.

“Tell me about it.” She guffawed. “Why don’t you tell me about one of your adventures, mister I-have-friends-who-want-to-drink-with-me.” She winked at me.

I know it was harmless and I was reading too much into this but it only made me feel worse.

I didn’t know how she was around Bill but she was great with me. I felt so relaxed around her and felt as if I could tell her anything and she wouldn’t judge. She emitted this calming energy that was just pulling me toward her and I was losing it.

“Well, this one time me and my two co-workers Andrew and Theo got drunk. We were walking to our huts when Theo got an idea that we should fly on a dragon.” Rhylee put her hand on her lips, trying hard not to laugh. “We didn’t go to the ones that are still young and therefore less dangerous, we went to the most vicious one we have in the reserve!” I exclaimed. “The Chinese Fireball that was also guarding her newly hatched babies.”

“You’re insane!” Rhylee gasped, her eyes widened.

“We were giggling like a bunch of schoolgirls, Andrew still with a beer bottle in his hand. We thought we were being quiet.” I continued.

“And you were not.” Rhylee chuckled.

“Of course, not! We were probably louder than her roar.” I laughed. “We were walking towards her and laughing so much that we didn’t notice she woke up. She stood up and when Theo saw it instead of running he started laughing his arse off! The Fireball roared her lungs out and woke up the entire village, while we ran back to the huts and tried to hide the fact that it was us.”

“Did you get away with it?” Rhylee was completely invested in the story.

“Nah! Almost got fired. If Peter wasn’t such an understanding boss we would probably all be out of jobs right now.” I finished my story.

Rhylee couldn’t stop laughing. She had one of those rare laughs. You could tell she only laughs when something is really funny and would never fake it just for the sake of it.

I really didn’t like how much she was starting to grow on me. Thank Merlin I was rarely home and was in Romania almost the whole year-round. I will have to find a way to avoid her when she comes to visit with Bill for the holidays.

Rhylee bit her lip after she stopped laughing and we stared at each other again. Why was she doing this to me! It looked as if she was reading my expression. Trying to figure out what I was thinking. I hope she wasn’t a Legimens, that would be really bad for me and for Bill. As long as I keep it inside my head I am not doing anyone any harm.

“Can you tell me where the bathroom is?” She said after the awkward silence.

“Upstairs, first door to the right.” I was glad she was going away.

Not that I wanted her to leave. I could see why Bill liked her so much. I am completely screwed. I have never felt such a connection to any girl before. Not even with the girl I had the only serious relationship with. This is not how I imagined my holidays to go.

I wanted to spend some quality time with my siblings and my parents and then bury myself in my work again. I did not plan to hate myself for feeling what I feel.

Which, by the way, I have no idea what it is. I have never felt something like this before. It wasn’t butterflies. No, it was stronger than that. She filled my chest with excitement and my head with questions and not just about dragons.

I wanted to get to know her better. I wanted to talk to her about her life and what she likes and about her family. I wanted to take her out on a date and I haven’t felt that way with anyone since I left Hogwarts.

I don’t have time for a relationship. Perhaps that’s an excuse because I didn’t find the right person yet. I am pretty good at reading people and if I see that it wouldn’t lead to anything or would fall apart sooner or later I just leave.

Or take them to bed.

I know it’s not exactly nice if the other party expects more but a meaningless fling or a one-night stand here and there is what I have been about for 3 years now. Well, to be honest, the last one was with April, 7 months ago, and staring at my older brother’s future girlfriend’s ass while she goes to the bathroom really wasn’t helping.

“Did you scare her away already?” Bill’s voice snapped me out of my thoughts. I have to stop doing this. I have to stop thinking about her, staring at her and I definitely have to stop talking to her.

I don’t know how I will be able to do it for the next 4 days but I have to try. I love Bill. He’s my brother. I have to put myself aside and I have to think about him. I would never do anything to hurt him and the thoughts I was having would do just that if he knew about them.

I asked her about dragons, she asked me the same. We had a few laughs and now she should spend the rest of the holidays with Bill. I have 5 other siblings, somebody ought to keep me occupied and then hopefully I won’t have to see her until their wedding and to be honest I could probably avoid her there too.

It doesn’t matter how she made me feel. It doesn’t matter that I felt understood and that we have so much in common. It doesn’t matter that she laughed at my dumb story or that she made me feel as if I could tell her anything in this world.

It doesn’t matter that I find her beyond beautiful and charming and it definitely doesn’t matter that I felt something between us that I have never felt before in my entire life.

Bill.

Bill is what matters.

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