#realizing how stuck in visuals i am by seeing that i mainly get into visual media just for character design most of the time

[silusvesuius]

I like using arttrades as shortcuts to success (dj Khaled ‘suffering from success’ insertion) but atp of my art crusade it turns into something i wanna do indefinitely but also not because it makes me feel like i dont wanna draw anything else which isn’t true but creates a sturdy wall between me and my own idea-filled creatively conundrumed brain. When the year started one of my written down goals was ‘get into Payday’ and i want to find a way to make goku my best friend also

[ihrtsevyn]

- NISHIMURA RIKI DATING IDOL!READER

GENRE fluff, headcanons, idol au, slightly suggestive.

SYNOPSIS what your idol life would be like dating ni-ki :)

WARNINGS slightly suggestive but nothing sexual considering he's still a minor as am i, a bit of angst, talks of insecurities, mainly fluff :)

PAIRING nishimura riki x gender neutral!reader

REQUESTED nope

WC 3.3k

`⌁ ◜ FIRST MEETING ◞

You first met at GDA (Golden Disc Awards). Your group was on a constant uprise since the moment you debuted. Everyone in the KPOP industry knew your group, it'd be impossible not to after being featured on the cover of multiple magazines, constantly being front row at fashion shows, as well as being the face of countless brands.

Niki knew of your group but never really had the time or interest to look more into it until your performance.

He was truly mesmerized by you when you popped on the big screen for your mini solo. Your visual, and your voice, enchanted him like no other. His lips would slightly part while his unwavering gaze softened whenever you appeared even if it was for just a split second.

And once the dance break started an unknowing smile would appear on his face. although barely noticeable, it still surprised his members as they're so used to him remaining stoic throughout performances.

Your performance ended much quicker than he'd like, he felt as if he was stuck in this euphoric like state watching you move and having it end so abruptly covered him in unmistakable dread. Still he didn't hesitate to stand up from his seat and give applause with everyone else once the lights dimmed.

Once everyone cleared the stage and the announcers were back to keep the crowd entertained, niki's eyes darted amongst the rows of seats where other idols resided, patiently waiting to see you again.

Niki watched as your group got closer, bowing to your higher-ups and smiling while waving to your close friends. He along with his members stood up to reciprocate your bows. Niki's eyes laser-focused on yours hoping you'd make eye-contact with him, which you did.

It was only for a split second but in that moment he felt his heart skip a beat, your warm smile along with your shimmering eyes made him feel like he was walking on air. He could feel the breath leave his lungs as you passed by him, it's as if your gaze casted a spell on him making his legs stiff and feet glued to the ground.

He didn't even realize that everyone around him sat back in their seats and had averted their attention back to the stage. Well, not until Jake pulled him down by his wrist.

"something catch your eye?" "or more so, someone?"

His members teasing him completely flew in one ear and out the other, he wanted to just drown out all of his surroundings and focus on you but he knew how certain fans could get and instead decided on training his eyes back to where they should be.

Throughout the evening his eyes would drift back to the back of your head, being ever so pleased when you'd slightly tilt your head enough so he could see your smile. It was obvious he had taken a liking to you, so with the help of his hyungs during the commercial break they pushed him over to your direction.

He smoothed out his blazer before standing up straighter and making his way towards you. One of your members noticed him coming before you did, nudging you discreetly before tilting their head in his direction with raised eyebrows.

You looked over to find him making his way over, his eyes pointed at you only, making you freeze momentarily before standing out of your seat.

"Hi."

"Hi."

`⌁ ◜ FRIENDS BUT CRUSHING ◞

— it's not obvious just in passing but to his members and yours it's extremely evident of his unrelenting crush on you.

— he's very attentive to you. if you're ever on a variety show together he'll do his best to keep a respectful distance but his attention will barely stray away from you.

— a small smile will creep up on his face as he watches you tell a funny story with such excitement. his eyes will follow you across the room as you hit one of the hosts across the head with one of those giant red hammers. and he'll cover his face with a shy grin when you're forced to do aegyo, laughing as he finds you so adorable while you're cringing at your own overbearing forced cuteness.

— he likes to do dance practices together. teaching you their new choreography step by step. laughing at your demise whenever you trip over your own feet or freeze in the middle of the choreo.

— he actually enjoys whenever you mess up, it gives him an excuse to get closer to you and 'fix' your mistakes.

— he'll come up behind you, towering over you as he moves your arms and hands along with his. he'll lean in, whispering in your ear with one of his arms around your waist.. "make sure to keep your core firm." while resting his hand over your abdomen.

— he'll suddenly detach himself with a teasing smirk, feeling accomplished at making you flustered. "alright, ready to redo it again?" he'll ask as if he didn't make the largest swarm of butterflies thrash around throughout your body.

— he'll follow close by you. he'll either hover over your shoulder to see what you're doing on your phone, or just linger by to be around you. but most of the time it's done unintentionally because of how naturally drawn to you he is.

— throws away inkigayo sandwiches. if he ever overhears an idol saying they're gonna give you one of those sandwiches, he's very quick to interfere. it's petty, yes and a bit toxic of him to block his peers from interacting with you but he just doesn't want to have to compete for your attention, especially if it's with another male.

— buys you small trinkets. he'll off-handedly give you a keychain with pochacco on it and say it reminded him of you. he's always quick to avert his gaze during these small moments, shoving his hands in his jacket pocket while anxiously waiting for your response.

— he'll always bite back a smile at your excited rambles as you talk about how you were "just thinking about sanrio" before attaching the keychain to your bookbag.

— anytime he sees you flaunting around his gifts in public or a new dispatch photo showing you wearing it he'll feel a sense of pride swell in his chest. he's even watched clips of your lives where you'll read out a question asking "where'd you get that cute bracelet?" watching with pure adoration as you fidget with the bracelet before one of your soft shy smiles appears on your face. "my friend gave it to me :)."

— practices your choreography. during late hours into the day after he's done all of the practice for his group's choreo, he'll stay back and practice yours.

— he'll deny any and all teasing if one of his members catches him humming your groups song, specifically your chorus while softly mimicking your movements during his regular day to day.

— he'll even surprise you during one of your bi-weekly dance practices together. getting flustered and hiding his face at your loud claps and boisterous cheers as he finishes off the dance perfectly.

— sends you tik toks. sometimes it's core videos of you and he'll attach a laughing emoji or a comment saying "ur so weird", other times it'll be a cute video of your assigned animal doing something goofy and he'll send it saying "you."

— there has been a handful of times where he'll randomly stumble across an edit of yours. he never scrolls pass them, always watching them in full and maybe even a few times again before silently saving them into a private folder on his tik tok saves, never to see the light of day or anyone else's eyes.

— truly doesn't realize how down bad he is until he's up at 2am, smiling with a toothy grin and lightly laughing at an edit of you to twice's 'look at me'. "so cute..." he'd murmur before scrolling up and quickly back down to watch the edit again and again and again...

— describes you as his ideal type. whenever asked about his ideal type or celebrity crush he'll always describe your physical features and characteristics and might even name a celebrity that has your type of likeness.

— a shy smile will be on his face while he avoids eye-contact with the interviewer, the only thing popping up in his head are fantasies of you. your hair, your eyes, your lips. all things niki's attracted to. while, most girls are excited to hear the list of attributes that they think align with their features, none of them will ever truly match up to you in his eyes.

— wants you to like him. if you describe your ideal type and it doesn't exactly align with who niki is, he'll get a bit sulky.

— he won't do much to change his appearance because he likes the way he looks, the most he'll do is add a bit more color into his wardrobe if that's something you're into. if you like a lot of jewelry, he'll add on a few more rings and bracelets. but other than that niki won't do much to change who he is, he'll just try to find a way to shift your romantic interest into more of who he is.

— if he sees you eyeing his necklaces or if you compliment his style in any way he'll genuinely be overjoyed. whatever jacket you liked on him, he'll start to wear it more. you liked his hair being part a certain way? he'll post a bed or mirror selca on weverse with his hair just to your liking. you liked his skull ring? you'll see it adorning his finger more often than any other piece of jewelry, it now being noticeable in nearly every photo he takes. if you weren't so oblivious you'd see him fishing for your attention more than anyone else and realize he likes you just as much as you like him.

— compliments that sound like scolding. the way he compliments you almost sounds like he's annoyed or angry with you.

— if you ever feel the slightest bit insecure of your appearance he's very quick to shut down any and all self-deprecating thoughts, and loudly. saying phrases like...

— "ya! what are you talking about? you'd pull it off so well."

— "shut up, you know you look good."

— is a relentless tease. he genuinely will never let up with his teasing but it's nearly unbearable when he's in the crushing stage. he'll laugh in your face and start mocking you if you stumble over your words, he'll find memes of you where you look unflattering and spam them to your inbox when he misses you but doesn't feel like saying it verbally. if you ever have a moment where you forget choreo on stage or your voice cracks he'll send the clip to you or mock you right in your face.

— if he ever feels like he might've gone too far with his taunts he'll dial it down a few notches and hold off on teasing you for a while.

— he likes seeing you annoyed at him because you always sport a cute pout on your face that makes his heart flutter. he never wants to push you pass your limits and have you actually become upset at his antics or distance yourself away from him.

— if anything he full on encourages you to tease him back. he believes you'll have a stronger bond with each other if you're comfortable enough to make certain jokes about each other together.

`⌁ ◜ CONFESSION ! ◞

— he's so nervous to ask you out. he really likes you, as a friend and as a romantic partner so he's extremely irritable throughout the entire process. he knows that this question could change your relationship for the better or for the worse and that just makes things so much more nerve-wracking.

— he planned on asking you out at one of your dance practices together. just you and him, no other choreographer, no other teammates to bug you both, just the two of you. alone. together.

— he's so much quieter throughout the practice, so you can tell he has something prodding at his mind. he's jumpier and has been repeatedly rubbing his palms on his sweatpants.

— after confronting him halfway through the practice niki will just blurt out his feelings for you in quick jumbled rambles. quietly asking after his tangent "will you- or do you maybe wanna go out with me?" all while fiddling with the long sleeves of his jacket.

— of course you said yes, which made him ecstatic. shy giggles and playful smiles were sent to each other throughout the rest of the practice before you finally decided to wrap up for the night.

— a small innocent hug to seal your departure away from each other made his heart nearly beat out of his chest and the butterflies in his stomach to reach down to his toes and to the base of his throat. he was barely successful at containing all of his excitement until he got back to the dorms.

— his hyungs already know what happened by the wide grin on his face and bounce in his step when he re-enters the dorm.

— niki had a date! and possibly a significant other :)

— it took quite some time for you to plan your date because of you misaligned schedules but after a few stressful days of running rampant and trying to figure out a proper time, the both of you decided on a nice movie night at his dorm.

— he's so displeased that he's unable to take you on a normal cute date because of dispatch and saesangs possibly ratting you guys out, but you're quick to reassure him and let him know you're happy to do anything with him, which relieves him quite a lot. ( he silently promises to you and himself that he'll take you on a real extravagant fancy date one day. )

`⌁ ◜ DATING STAGE ! ◞

— engenes have noticed an uptick in niki's mood. he seems happier, more playful, and more feral than he's usually been in recent activities.

— and it's all because of you!

— now that you're together, he can't go a day without speaking to you. on his breaks he'll spam your inbox non-stop until you reply. management had to confiscate your phone one time because it kept buzzing during an interview.

— his texts usually consisting of 'hey' 'imu' ' :D :D :D' '*photo attachment of two cats* us' 'tell ___ hyung/noona i said hi' 'i saw ur weverse post.' 'u look ugly today 😒' 'jk jk jk' 'pls don't kill me'

— bursts out laughing randomly. he does it a lot, especially on live and it's usually because he haphazardly remembered an inside joke between the two of you.

— secret touches. he loves to initiate small signs of affection in public. it gives him a bit of a thrill knowing there's so many cameras and people watching but none of them know what's happening between the two of you.

— he'll softly graze a hand on your back when moving past you on stage with other idols, winks at you when you make a split second of eye-contact, briefly caresses your hand with his when passing by each other backstage.

— he loves laughing at your flustered reaction after he does something bold. like when you were filming a tik tok together for your latest comeback.

— your group gathered together around the camera with enhypen on the other side, you and niki pushed to the far back.

— the whole time you couldn't focus on whatever your leader had been explaining enthusiastically to the camera because niki's hand that was resting on your lower-back had traveled down to your butt, ever so lightly patting it with a steady rhythm.

— you nearly forgot your lines when it became your turn to talk and had to focus on not stumbling over your lines. you could see the smirk on niki's face out of the corner of your eye but didn't say anything until the cameras were off and your managers were occupied.

— physical affection. if you're in his vicinity he needs to be touching you in some kind of way. he's not one to be physically affectionate in public or even around the members, but he'll still try to initiate some type of contact with you.

— in public spaces it'll be minuscule acts of affection, so small that no one would even blink an eye at you two. his knee barely leaning against yours as you sit next to each other, or his elbow just barely touching the skin of your arm when he stands next to you.

— when the two of you are around your members and no one else he's a bit more touchy. resting his head on top of yours, fiddling with your clothes, entangling his legs with yours when you're sat on the same couch, and maybe even a small kiss on the cheek if he's feeling bold enough.

— when the two of you are alone he can't keep his hands off of you. you two rarely ever get moments alone so when you do you make the most of it.

— he'll lay his entire body on top of you and stay there even if you plead with him to get off because you feel like you're being crushed. he'll just ignore your cries and nuzzle his head further into the crook of your neck. good luck trying to escape.

— is obsessed with the size difference between you two. loves to compare hand sizes, bending the tips of his fingers over the tops of yours. in dance practice he'll gaze at your smaller figure next to his in the big mirrors and just smile to himself.

— whenever you wear any article of clothing that is oversized it makes his heart melt, he'd much rather prefer you wear his clothing tho.

— he'll take off-guard pictures of you drowning in his clothes and just keep them for his eyes only. looking at the pics whenever he starts missing you.

— collects your photocards. he was hooked after being gifted a signed mini album from your leader where he just so happened to pull your photocard. he gave away all of the inclusions that didn't include you to his other members but kept whatever had your face on it.

— now the both of you exchange albums after every comeback and unbox them in-front of each other.

— truly getting excited when you pull each other's photocards and extremely sulky when you pull someone else's. ( i fully believe at some point he has snatched a sunoo photocard from your hands with his teeth. )

— self-care days. those rare days where you two cuddle up in matching pajamas in one or the other dorms with junk food surrounding you have created the best memories for the two of you.

— after long days constantly working with very limited bits of sleep, you two deserve to just spend time together, and the way you two do it is by doing nothing with each other.

— painting each other's nails, wearing face masks, gossiping together, and cuddling up together under a mountain of blankets while a random variety show plays in the background.

— those are the times where he's the most affectionate. nudging his nose against yours as a silent plead for a kiss, and once he does get what he wants he'll be reluctant to let go. always going back for more and lingering longer than the last.

— supportive. whenever your group wins an award he's one of the first people to stand up while clapping, biting back the cheesiest grin while he watches your eyes gloss up in shock.

— he likes to promote your groups music, if you ever come out with a solo he'll slyly mention it by posting a list of songs he's been listening to, yours standing proudly at the top of the list.

all in all he truly loves you, and can't wait for the day you two reveal your relationship to the public and he no longer has to hide his overbearing adoration for you. <3

a/n: i yapped a lot in this so i had to shorten it down lol sorry. HTGTG CHAPTER THREE (and possibly 4) WILL BE POSTED TMMRW <3 !!

[swarvey]

paper rings | harvey x f!reader

summary -> Harvey gets drunk with the boys; you have a realization. warnings -> none! wc -> 3818

a/n: calm before the storm <3

ch. 6 | ch. 7 | ch. 8

paper rings masterlist

chapter seven: i think he knows -> "it's like i'm seventeen, nobody understands."

“Done!” 

Triumphantly placing the last piece of the bundle in the box, you watched happily as a blue Junimo picked it up and took it away. As you continuously brought goods to the Community Center in hopes of restoring it — per Mayor Lewis’s request — you noticed this particular Junimo seemed to have taking a liking to you, as it kept following you to random places. Not only was it mainly the one who would take your completed bundles, but once in a while, it would show up at the farm or in the mines, usually looking at you with curious eyes before disappearing. You weren’t complaining, of course. It was harmlessly adorable, and after seeing it a couple of times, you fittingly named it Blueberry. It seemed as determined to bring the building back to its prime as you were.

You could hardly believe anyone in town would shop at the Joja Mart over Pierre’s. Sure, the guy could be a bit stuck-up, but at least his goods weren’t processed to hell like Joja’s. You shivered at the thought of working for the cursed company again, not comprehending how Sam and Shane could tolerate being in that place regularly. 

Well, Sam less so, as he always seemed to figure out how to entertain himself. It seemed like Shane just liked being in a place where no one would bother him, which made you all the more confused as to why he hung around Harvey and, of all people, Elliott, who seemed to be his polar opposite. 

You sighed contently as Blueberry wound around your feet once before walking away with the bundle, proudly looking at the two rooms you had completed so far. Although the effort was taking you a bit longer than you liked, seeing the rooms steadily come together was enough for you. You chose not to question how the Community Center was repairing itself, or where the Junimos came from — you’d learned long ago that many things in the Valley were unexplainable, and you were okay with that. 

You smiled as you waved goodbye to your little blue friend, swearing you saw it wave back.

I wonder what Harvey would think of this little guy.

-

“What in the everloving fuck am I looking at right now.”

For once, Harvey completely agreed with Shane’s words. Maybe it was the alcohol coursing through his bloodstream, but whatever Elliott was holding up on his phone screen was not making an ounce of sense to him.

“It’s a visualization of my novel!” the writer exclaimed, his usually precise tone slurred due to the three empty glasses in front of him. “I decided to expand my creative mind and turn to another output. This will allow me to make full use of my thought process.”

Shane snorted, grabbing the phone out of his hands and squinting at the poorly drawn stick figures. “Dude, I don’t know how to break it to you,” he started, laughter already bubbling in his voice, “but this looks like shit .”

Harvey shook his head and smiled as Shane cackled. Elliott snatched his phone back in retaliation, visibly offended. “It’s a rough draft, it’s not meant to look polished! You agree, don’t you, my good doctor?”

“. . . It kind of looks like shit,” he admitted, his rare use of profanity slipping off his tongue easily. Harvey took a long swig of his drink, avoiding Elliott’s utterly betrayed gaze.

Meanwhile, Shane continued to crack up, holding his stomach as he doubled over. “If this is the rough draft, the real thing might just pass off as a kindergartener’s drawing. Hey, why don’t I ask Jas to give you some tips? She’s not half bad, that kid.”

“I absolutely will not — actually,” Elliott paused, cutting off his own sentence, “that may not be a terrible idea. Then, I could obtain a glimpse of how she views my work, and incorporate it into the final product!”

As Shane groaned, tuning out the rest of the other man’s rambling, Harvey felt his phone buzz, looking down to see a text from you lighting up his screen.

Y/N : hey, you at the saloon?

In the midst of his drunken haze, he allowed a lovestruck smile to stretch his lips. He didn’t even notice Shane and Elliott momentarily pausing their bickering to glance at him, both of them raising their brows. 

Harvey : Am I that predictable?

Y/N : like clockwork. drunk off your ass yet?

Harvey : I never get drunk off my ass, Y/N.

Y/N : really? 

should i send the video?

Harvey : DO NOT!!

I asked you to delete it years ago. :(

Y/N : LOL you’re totally drunk

i’ll ask emily to take some funny photos

i’ve been meaning to update your contact pic anyway

Harvey : You are impossible.

Harvey felt like a teenager again, hiding his grin and tinted cheeks behind his hand. 

Harvey : Are you at home?

Y/N : yeah, i’m beat, probably gonna head to bed

still down for the festival on tuesday?

His posture straightened as he suddenly remembered the invitation he’d given you to the Stardew Valley Fair. After checking the date and seeing that it was Saturday, he realized he had less than a week to mentally prepare himself for the event. 

“Shit,” he swore quietly, once again not noticing the appalled look on Elliott’s face at his swear. Shane snickered, no doubt finding it amusing to see the doctor so intoxicated — it was largely his fault, after all, since he’d been determined to partake in as many rounds as humanely possible.

Harvey : Of course! Why don’t I meet you at the clinic?

I’ll have to close up in the morning, so you can come in and wait for me.

Y/N : wow, inviting me over to your clinic? 

does this mean i get a free check-up? 

A free . . . check-up?

Harvey could only imagine this was what short-circuiting felt like.

Apparently, alcohol caused his thoughts to run even more wild. Images of you propped up on his examination table and smiling at him innocently flashed through his mind, his fingers frozen and unable to type out a response.

“Talking to Y/N, I’m guessing?” Harvey quickly closed his phone at the sound of Gus’s voice, realizing Shane must have ordered yet another round of drinks for everyone. His friends looked away, though he could still make out their amused smirks. “How’s that goin’ for ya?”

Right. After his first dinner with you in town, Harvey had confessed to Gus the situation he was in, his head bowed in guilt as he lectured him about treating you properly. Despite his protectiveness over you, Gus was still supportive of his feelings, giving him as much advice as he could.

“It’s, uh, going well,” Harvey replied, thinking that was the best word to describe your relations with him as of late. “We’re just as close as we were before.”

The older man nodded, grabbing the empty glasses to stow them away. “Well, you better take care of her, son. It’s not every day people have a connection like the two of you do, and I’d hate to see either of ya get hurt.” With that, Gus worked his way over to the next table, leaving Harvey to sit with his words.

“He’s right,” Shane said, pushing over another glass to him. “You two are somethin’ else for sure. Kinda makes me sick.”

“I would expect nothing less,” Elliott countered. Upon seeing half his new drink was already gone, Harvey questioned how his speech was still comprehensible. “As I have been insisting since our dear Harvey first brought up the farmer, these two are a clear example of fate .”

“Oh, enough with that bullshit. Fate this, fate that — if fate’s real, why can’t it get me a new fuckin’ job, huh? That place makes me feel like I’m losing whatever brain cells I have left.”

Buzz!

“What does she want, anyway?” Shane asked, attempting to read Harvey’s screen. He quickly picked up his phone, looking away sheepishly as he hid your conversation. His friend huffed an unamused laugh, shrugging. “This is some damn middle school shit,” he grumbled, and Elliott laughed into his glass as he sipped his drink.

Y/N : relax harvs, i can practically see you having a heart attack through the screen

it was a joke btw, i’ll make sure to properly pay and schedule an appointment whenever i need one :salute:

Great. Now you thought he was being stingy. 

Harvey : Sorry, I got distracted. You know you can come in whenever you’d like.

Y/N : i know, thanks dr. harvey 

anyways, have fun, i’m off to bed

goodnight!

Harvey : Goodnight, Y/N.

When Harvey awoke the next morning, blinking past the dull ache in his head, he saw an unread text from you sent an hour before. His eyes widened as he opened it, realizing Emily must have listened to your request and snuck a picture of him when he wasn’t paying attention.

Of course, she had caught him while he was texting you, his face and ears burning red and his hidden smile completely up for show in the photo. He groaned in embarrassment, certain you would notice his expression and question him for it.

Instead, your text focused on a completely different aspect of the image.

Y/N : what the hell are those two idiots doing??

Confused, Harvey looked back at the picture and zoomed in, stifling a laugh at the sight of his two friends in the middle of a heated argument. Shane’s lips were pulled back in an aggressive snark while Elliott raised his phone to his face, his eyes lit with an honest passion.

Harvey : Lovers’ quarrel. Happens every day.

-

Memories hit you like a truck as you and your horse slowly headed towards town. You could practically smell the buttered popcorn and hear the ringing sound of festival games already filling the air. The Stardew Valley festival used to be the perfect way to end your summers as a kid, especially when your grandfather would tag along with you. He would always take your hand and smile at you warmly, sometimes even giving you a pouch of coins to spend on your own. You smiled to yourself at the thought. Although he wasn’t walking beside you anymore, you swore you could still feel his familiar energy around you.

Or maybe Emily’s starting to get to me. 

Either way, your excitement only grew at the sight of the booths and games coming together, making sure to stop by your stand and drop off the goods you brought to show off. You were sure each of the items was of top quality and glanced at the other displays to see your competition, though you already knew who you had to beat. You glared at Pierre’s abundant stand, scoffing as you made your way toward Harvey’s clinic. Surely, you would win against the overconfident store owner — you were growing your own crops, after all. 

You poked your head into the clinic, eyes brightening at the sight of your childhood friend. Harvey, too consumed in tidying up, didn’t notice you right away, continuing to rearrange some items in the cabinet and humming to himself. You were suddenly reminded of the image Emily sent you the night before, recalling how, for a split second, you’d thought Harvey looked a bit cute with his flushed cheeks and ears. He’d always gotten a bit pink when he drank, but something about that particular angle of him caught your eye. Maybe it was the fact that he was looking at his phone, no doubt in the middle of texting you? Or maybe it was the dumb smile on his face?

Not that you would ever mention any of that, though. Why would you? They were simply quick thoughts you were having, nothing more.

No, you opted to instead highlight the incredibly stupid looks on his friends’ faces, laughing when he called them lovers. Although you didn’t nearly talk to the other two men as much as he did, you could tell they were all good friends. You were glad Harvey had a circle of support around him — knowing him, he constantly had something to stress over, and you knew you couldn’t always be there for him.

You walked up behind Harvey, giving him an exasperated look when he still didn’t turn around. Half-smiling, you extended your hands toward him, slowly inching closer before poking his sides.

“ Boo! ”

“ Huh —?”

Harvey jumped as he yelped in surprise, dropping several rolls of bandages onto the floor. He bent forward and rested his hands on his knees to catch his breath, all while you died of laughter beside him.

“You know I scare easily!” he complained, standing straight to adjust his glasses. 

“Of course I know,” you replied, wiping a fake tear off your cheek. “That’s why I did it.”

“You will never stop tormenting me, will you?”

“Nope. Not ‘til I drop dead.”

“Great,” he deadpanned, shaking his head. “Were you able to finish all your farmwork this morning?”

You nodded, lips still stretched into a lingering smile. “Pet bowls filled, animals fed, and crops watered — all done.” You glanced around the room, noticing he was alone. “Where’s Maru?”

That’s an innocent question, right? Of course it was. She worked under him, after all, it only made sense to ask why she wasn’t there to help. One thought led to another in your head, and suddenly, you were thinking about the Flower Dance; about how pink Maru’s face had been while talking to Harvey; about the soft shyness covering his face, an expression you didn’t know how to read and would bet your farmland it was because he reserved it for her and her only—

“Oh, I told her to sleep in,” he replied easily, putting the bandages in their proper place. “There wasn’t much to do, so I figured I would just get it out of the way.”

Of course. Of course, he told her to sleep in, because Harvey was and always would be thoughtful, more than you’d ever understand.

“Not much to do, huh?” you repeated, and he nodded.

Without warning, you grabbed Harvey’s arm and began to drag him out of the clinic, ignoring his protests about his unfinished work. 

“You can finish when you get back, Harvey, the clinic isn’t going anywhere,” you said, anticipation filling you as Lewis had just finished looking at all the displays. “Mayor Lewis, hey!” You waved him down, and he greeted both of you with a big smile.

“It’s good to see you two.” He sighed, a wistful look taking over him. “I can’t believe how much you’ve grown up. Ah, before I forget,” he started, reaching into his pocket. “Y/N, congratulations! You won first place with a rating of a hundred.” You whooped, nearly knocking Harvey over with your excitement as you happily accepted the small bag Lewis gave you. “Here, your prize is a thousand star tokens — use them wisely!”

“A thousand? ” Harvey questioned, peering into the bag. “We used to spend the entire day getting this many tokens.”

“And now, we have a head start,” you said, an old sense of competitiveness creeping its way back into your senses. “Let’s go win some prizes!”

As the plaza began to fill with more and more people, you and Harvey fell back onto your old rhythm — while you took care of all the games requiring strength and technique, he took care of the trickier, mind-twisting ones. Your jaw remained dropped as he stared at the wheel for the seventh time in a row, a finger touching his lips as he thought.

“Green,” Harvey said, to which the man running the game scowled. 

“You sure, bud? You seem awful confident, but your luck might just run out,” he reasoned, though you could tell he was trying to trick him.

Harvey narrowed his eyes. “I’m sure.” 

You laughed giddily as the two of you walked away from the wheel with a heavy sack of tokens, Harvey flaunting a proud look on his face.

“I still don’t get it — how do you do that?” you asked, in awe at his winning streak that had remained unbroken since you first played with him. “You make us tons more compared to that slingshot game!”

He shrugged, putting his hands in his coat pockets. “I mean, after stopping by every year, I started to recognize the pattern. I suppose it’s more statistics, since there’s a much higher chance that—”

“Look who it is!” 

You felt a light punch land on your shoulder as Alex and Haley approached you, watching amusedly as Haley scolded him for hitting you.

“Geez, it wasn’t even that hard,” he mumbled, but lightened up at the sight of your pouch. “You guys won those already?”

“Honestly, it was mostly Harvey,” you admitted, nudging his arm. “Ever since we were kids, he’s always been scarily good at that wheel game. What were you saying, Harvs? Something about statistics, or something?”

No response. 

You looked at him, noticing he was suddenly spacing out and staring at the space in between the two in front of you.

“Harvey? You okay?”

“What?” he questioned, blinking. “Yes, uh, it’s just some simple math, that’s all. Nothing much to it.”

Haley huffed. “Well, can you teach this guy how to do it? ‘Cause whenever I play with him, we never seem to win anything.” Alex opened his mouth to respond, but she paid no mind, opting to walk toward the game Leah was playing instead.

“Wait up!” Just as he was about to turn, Alex looked back at you, grinning. “I’ll see you around, Y/N! Hey, if I have any leftover tokens, I’ll get you something from the prize booth, okay?”

“Deal!” 

After he ran to catch up with the blonde, you turned back to Harvey, cocking your head at the serious look that had hooded over his eyes.

“Um, you sure you’re okay?” you asked, but before you could question him further, he took your arm and led you to the prize booth, gently taking the tokens from your hand. You had never seen him look so determined before, as if he was trying to prove something.

“Here you go, ma’am,” he said, sliding them over to the lady behind the counter. “I believe this should be enough for one of everything you have.”

“One of—? Harvey, what are you doing?!”

That’s how the two of you ended up leaving the Stardew Valley Festival early, Harvey helping you carry home the copious amount of prizes you received.

“You’re sure you don’t want any of this? Come on, Harvs, you practically won all of this yourself,” you said, opening the door to your house. 

Harvey shook his head, smiling as he placed everything in a neat pile at the foot of your bed. You had never seen so many stuffed animals in your life.

“Please, I have no space for any of this in my apartment, anyway.” He looked fondly at the matching bear they’d given the two of you — although yours was obviously more worn down, the design on the new one was the exact same as its counterpart.

You shook your head, pressing the bear back into his arms. “I’ve already got mine, this one can be yours. I can’t have two of the same thing.” You definitely could. Part of you just liked the idea of matching with him.

“If you insist.” He smiled at the stuffed animal in his arms, though it quickly wiped from his face as he turned to leave. “Is that . . .?” You followed his gaze, stomach dropping at what had caught his eye.

He was staring directly at the bouquet you’d hung by your bedside the first morning you had moved in.

Fuck, fuck. He can’t know, I had no idea what those stupid flowers meant back then! You wanted to punch your past self in the jaw for her stupidity. After the Spring season had past, you’d learned the true meaning behind the bouquets Pierre sold, cursing him for not telling you back then. There was no way Harvey could know you bought it with him in mind, not when neither of you saw each other in that way.

Not when he had Maru in mind, supposedly the girl he felt he was constantly gravitating towards.

“Oh, that?” you laughed awkwardly, a cold sweat brewing on your neck. “I bought it for myself!”

He blinked, and for a second, you thought you saw relief flash in his eyes. “Ah, for . . . yourself?”

“Hey, don’t judge,” you responded, crossing your arms. “I just thought they looked nice, so I decided to dry the whole thing to make it last. That’s all.”

“But you do know what a bouquet symbolizes, correct?”

“I do, in fact, know what they mean, Dr. Judgey,” you shot back, feigning offense. “What happened to being a supportive friend?”

“Alright, enough with the dramatism,” he laughed lightly, adjusting his hold on the bear. “I had fun today, Y/N. Um . . . thank you, for spending time with me.”

The tension left your shoulders as you smiled at him. “It’s the least I can do, especially after you got me all this stuff.” You held the door open for him as he left. “Same time next year?” you asked playfully. He managed to salute in agreement with one of his hands, peeking around the stuffed animal’s body to make sure he wasn’t running into anything. 

You spent the rest of the night staring at the flowers on the wall, wondering why your heart clenched whenever you thought back to Harvey seeing them. There was no way he could figure it out, right? As smart as he was, you highly doubted he would think the bouquet was meant for him. You used to visibly gag in front of him whenever people mentioned the idea of you dating him.

So, why were you now having the same reaction at the thought of him dating someone else?

You groaned in frustration into your pillow, lifting your head to look at the pestering flowers once more. You knew it wasn’t fair — it wasn’t fair you were just starting to like him when you’d quite literally had years to do so, and it especially wasn’t fair that he was, in fact, in love with someone else. You couldn’t blame him, though, of course you couldn’t. Maru was smart, pretty, and kind; she lined up with Harvey perfectly.

And yet, there was a part of you screaming there was no one more fitting for him than you. It didn’t matter, though. None of your thoughts mattered if Harvey didn’t see you in that light, if all he saw when he looked at you was his childhood friend who he was able to reconnect with.

You closed your eyes.

It never hurt to pretend, though.

[lunatenais]

I’m realizing as I’m writing I don’t know my own interests! Wahoo! Anyway I’ve had such a wonderful 2 years in TOA, and I’m so excited to be here for many more years to come!!

Tagging: You. [grabs you]

Name: Eleven/Emil

Pronouns: He/they

Birthday (no year): June 19th

Where are you from? What is your time zone? AST :) I’m in Atlantic Canada

Roleplay experience: I think it’s been like 10-11 years? My first RP was for like Sonic OCs but I mainly did DR OC :]

---

Got any pets? Yes! I have a cat named Jerrie! I also live with 3 cats who belong to my roommate.

Favorite time of year: Autumn

Some interests and things you like: Flowers/gardening, magical girls, classic literature, pink things tm, stuffed animals, idols

Some fun facts & trivia about you: I have no idea

What non-Fire Emblem games do you play? Dangan Ronpa, Granblue Fantasy, Love Live, Ensemble Stars, Genshin Impact, League of Legends, been on a visual novel kick recently also EDIT I FORGOT PERSONA AND HARVEST MOON

Favorite Pokemon type & Pokemon: Fairy type & my fav pokemon is Lilligant!

---

How did you get into Fire Emblem? I bought Awakening because a friend of mine (N) liked it so much, and then I didn’t play it for almost a whole year after that! But I decided to try it out while I was on a road trip and quickly became obsessed.

What Fire Emblem games have you played? (In order): Awakening, Sacred Stones, Fates, like 1/4th of Gaiden, SoV, Three Houses, Genealogy, like half of Shadow Dragon, Binding Blaze, Blazing Blade.

First Fire Emblem game: Awakening!

Favorite Fire Emblem game: Sacred Stones :)

Any Fire Emblem crushes? a Frederick, Niles, Leon, Seth, Linhardt, Henry, Ced, Donnel, Duessel, JOSHUA

If you’ve played the following games, who was your first S support? - Awakening: Frederick, Fates: Niles, Three Houses: Linhardt, Engage: ?

Favorite Fire Emblem class: Mage :)

If you were a Fire Emblem character, what would be your class? Probably Cleric or Pegasus Knight

If you were a Three Houses character, what would be your affiliation? Golden Deer

If you were an Engage character, which Emblem would you Engage with? EIRIKAAAA

---

How did you find TOA? My good pal N was talking about it and I was interested in it! I often follow him to different rp groups like a dog.

Current TOA muses: Eirika, Lugh and (hopefully soon) Tharja!

Who was your first TOA muse? If you don’t have them anymore, could you see yourself picking them up again? Knoll! I have highly entertained the thought of bringing him back, though I worry about the interest in him a lot!

Have you had any other TOA muses? a Knoll, Julia, Patty, Olwen, Peri, Ingrid, Nanna, Lute, Leon, Hisame, Florina, Panette (am I forgetting someone??)

Do you think you have a type of character you gravitate towards? I love thieves, though it doesn’t show from my list since Patty stuck around so long— I also love quieter, mysterious characters a lot or characters with some sort of image issue tm especially in the vein of growing up too soon

What do you believe you enjoy writing the most? I love anything I can put some fucking angst on happy characters going through something tm is my fav ever.

Favorite TOA-related memory: Uh yeah that bitch explodes

Got any delusions that didn’t see the light of day in TOA that you’d like to share? Nótt, Clarine, Ced, Tethys, Virion, Nina, Seadall, Marni, Maribelle

[shiningstarr15]

‼️warning: the post I’m about to make has heavy topics pertaining to mental illness and disability. Please view at your own discretion‼️

I want to come on here to talk about something that I don’t feel gets talked about enough. And that is mainly thanks to social media that has advocated to the understanding of mental illness and disability to the point that it is immensely glorified. And while I would rather choose the lesser of the two evils than deal with the ableism and discrimination, I think it needs to be addressed on why glorifying it is also very problematic.

As you know by now, I am on the autism spectrum, and with this came a slew of other mental health conditions that I have suffered from for a long time such as anxiety and depression. One thing I would never want to do is beg for pity. I am still a functioning human being and do not wish to be treated as a charity case. However, I think it is important to showcase the darker side of being diagnosed with such a condition as Autism.

What you see, you may see awkward social interaction, you may see unusual movements of my arms and legs and even my whole body(stimming), you may see high emotional sensitivity, you may see aversion to loud sounds, and so forth. And these are things that, in of itself, are not inherently bad. Yes I am prone to accidental inappropriate social interaction, but there is ways of accommodating and advocating for it while still holding me accountable. Gentle approaches and positive reinforcement go such a long way. And the more people learn and accept that, the better quality of life you make for me and my community.

What you don’t see, is the struggles that come with it.

Being autistic comes with many many processing issues. Auditory, sensory, information, visual, cognitive, etc. And like the disorder itself, they all live on a spectrum and affect us all differently. One of these things that we struggle with due to this processing issue, and the one we usually get the most abuse from, is personal hygiene.

I took a shower tonight, which is something I struggle with due to the task of having to wash myself, having sensory issues such as too strong of smelling soap and the water temperature not being right, but also the transition from being wet to cold is something I hate. I hate drying myself and the water from my hair dripping down my back. I don’t like water on my face. The entire thing is an absolute hellscape.

But it needs to be done, so I got in. And I noticed that my hair felt heavier than usual. After shampoo and conditioner, I ran my fingers through my insanely thick and long locks. And.. it got stuck.

With conditioner, it was stuck.

That is how bad the tangles were. As a result of having not brushed it for weeks. Yes, weeks.

Over the course of the shower, I pulled out probably a dozen knots, all around this size..

I’m tender headed, brushing my hair hurts my neck and my arms. So I wear hats to cover it, it also helps as an impromptu noise buffer so it’s a win win in the moment. However, it just adds on to the ever growing tangles and become more and more prominent until I actually do something about it.

This is something in it of itself, I’ve grown used to.

But as I ran through the tangles, yanking out knot after knot, the hair piled in the drain.

When I looked down and saw the result, I couldn’t believe how much hair was caught in the absolute rats nest that had accumulated for weeks.

And I cried.

I still have plentiful hair, but I didn’t want to lose that much. I hadn’t even realized it had gotten so bad. As I got out I immediately noticed the lightness on my head and panicked, thinking I may have a bald spot (I don’t) bc so much was gone now..

I may be used to it, but I hate it still. Every time. But it happens over and over again, bc I hate brushing my hair.

This.. this is the true dark reality of living with Autism.

I love my hair, and me not liking to brush it does not mean I don’t care. It is a physically daunting task, it fucking HURTS, and it sucks bc I KNOW it’s not supposed to!

Everyday I wake up, the lights are too bright and I can hear every sound like a siren. It takes excess energy just to get out of bed, even more to change clothes, and if I am lucky, even more to brush my hair. I have 30 min to decide before I get to work what my support needs are today bc they change DAILY. Some days I have enormous amounts of anxiety, some days I have sensory overstimulation, some days I feel literally touch starved, some days I can’t find the right words to say, or barely want to say anything. I have to figure out what I need, what will get me through the day, what will allow me to survive. And even now, I am struggling to find my place in the workforce due to the lack of resources and currently on the verge of autistic burnout that I’m desperately trying to avoid.

Every time I brush my hair, there are knots. And when I brush my teeth, there is blood in the sink.

This is my reality.

I am imploring you to PLEASE consider these things when you say things about how hating autism is “internalized ableism” or glorify it to the point that it becomes a trend that everyone wants to have bc it’s “cool.” I do NOT like being autistic. It has caused me immense heartache, trauma, struggle, and being in constant survival mode. It FUCKING SUCKS.

I have accepted that I am autistic. But I do not enjoy it. It is still, in its own right, a DISABILITY. It is not something to be glorified and praised. It is not something that is “trendy” and something you WANT to have.

Wanting answers is one thing, I understand that. That’s how I got my diagnosis. But I am begging and pleading, DO NOT ASK FOR IT. If you have it, learn to accept what is and learn what you need to do in order to live your best quality of life. It is not something to be taken as a joke, it is not a “gift” and it is not a trend.

It is a disability. It is a disorder. A brain disorder. A processing disorder. And it fucking sucks.

[hqsenvs3000w24]

A learner today, teacher tomorrow

"…we cannot forget that people are with us mainly seeking enjoyment, not instruction." - Tilden (1967).

This is a quote from on textbook (page 44) that really stuck out to me. Really, in actuality, this quote is seemingly quite simple, but I saw a deeper meaning in the words, one that I connected instantly with my co-op placement up North.

I have had the great honor of being (what I call) a baby nature interpreter at a rather young age. When I worked up at SOES, I had the opportunity to learn from the specialists there who each had a deep connection to the outdoor world and dedicated their lives to helping teach the next generation about it. Most of my time spent interning there was just absorbing knowledge, and as I got more comfortable, the opportunity to teach some lessons myself. Imagine it like being a classroom teacher, but the classroom is in the middle of the forest and the kids are really excited because instead of teaching them math you're teaching them how to build a shelter. It was one of the best experiences of my life getting to share my love of nature with those kids.

But it wasn't always easy, and the quote I mentioned earlier really comes into play, especially when working with children. As much as we were teaching them about the natural world and the connections we can make with the land, so much of it was just allowing them to explore on their own. By the end of my four month term, I understood why the lessons we taught tended to be so short or why on a hike we would sometimes stop for longer than we should have. It was because the specialists up there knew that these kids needed to enjoy their time up there, even if it meant skipping a lesson we had planned, or rearranging the schedule.

After working with students in a natural environment I realized a had a strong passion for helping educate kids on the topic of nature. This led to a second placement for me working with students at a nature photography camp. I thoroughly enjoyed my time working as a nature interpreter in these two roles, and would love to have a future role in a similar position. Taking the quiz regarding how I learn was very insightful as I am a mainly visual and audio learner. I am a person who likes to see either instructions or visual depictions of information and benefit from having someone describe it as well. However, I understand that a lot of students are kinesthetic learners or a mixture of all things and I try my hardest to teach information in a way everyone will understand. When I was younger I always had a hard time understanding instructions if they were only given verbally, and I greatly benefited from visual aids or seeing someone else do it. I know it can be hard for everyone to understand but it is very important to ensure for me as an interpreter to try my hardest to teach/transfer information in a way that most if not all of the group walk away with some new piece of information.

In the future, I would love to work in an outdoor education school environment to help educate the future generation about the importance of the natural world, and bridge the connection to nature in their daily lives. I would love to live in northern Ontario and share my knowledge and enthusiasm with today's youth.

All for now :)

[powered-by-paranoia]

one more time | Rex

pairing: captain Rex x admiral!reader

summary: you give Rex a wrist-chrono. in reaction, although he seems fine at first, he now constantly avoids you. this somehow leads to the two of you kissing. find out how!

word count: 6241

warnings: none

a/n: I’ve been sitting on this story since December (you can see I had two special occasion attempts to post it), but here it is. finally. again, I tried to keep it gender-neutral, but let me know if I slipped up. Winter Fete is supposed to be something Christmassy or whatever, and Affection Day is... me being shit at coming up with holiday names.

this is kind of a series now I guess, but each fic can be read as a standalone fic (there’s also our fallen heroes and jaig eyes, if you’re thirsty for more. but there’s no smut. not yet. not yet.)

"He had the awkward tenderness of someone who has never been loved and is forced to improvise."

Isabel Allende

An icy shiver ran up your spine as you glanced out the viewport. You were sitting in your office aboard your ship, having just turned around to take your mind off your responsibilities for a few minutes and sip your caf in peace. But the image — that of the lush planet you were stationed above — triggered a flashback you had been trying to fend off these past days. Only it wasn’t a visual flashback, you realized. It was a sentiment that you remembered vividly from when you were a child and your parents had gifted you a trip to Coruscant for Winter Fete.

You remembered the excitement of seeing your home planet from outer space. Your first ever interstellar trip — and to Coruscant, of all places. The festivities, the Winter Fete spirit, they were perhaps still present on Coruscant and on your home planet, but not there. Not in the coolness of space and the warship you commanded. Not among the lifeless bodies you had to wander through only a few days earlier — the bodies recovered from the battle. The bodies someone would have to deliver to worried families.

That cheerfulness now only lived in your memory. You could hardly remember the last Winter Fete you had spent with your family. Or any such holiday, for that matter. But what was easy to recall was the warm feeling you experienced every time you gifted things. The search for the perfect match, the smile on people’s faces as they realize you know them better than they expected. It had always brought you joy to make presents.

But this chain of thoughts now brought back another memory, albeit an awkward one that you wouldn’t admit was slightly painful as well. A recent one. At the start of this campaign, you had gifted Rex a military-style, top-of-the-line wrist chrono, which he had been reluctant to accept at first. After a few jokes on how this could be considered a military offense, and quite some heavy amount of polite convincing, he had eventually taken it and you had even noticed him wearing it later. It warmed your heart. And for a short period of time, you had gotten the chance to relish in the sensation once again. But only for a short period of time.

Because half a day later he had started to avoid you like you’d just been exposed to the Brainworm Rot.

It wasn’t as obvious at first — turning corners the moment you sighted him, pretending to look the other way when you passed by — but soon you just had to admit it to yourself when you spotted him turning one-eighty degrees only to disappear when he must have realized he was walking towards you.

You stared at the darkness of space, lost in thought and bordering on the line of anxiety. There were no answers coming from the darkness, only questions. Had he found out you had re-gifted it? Your mother had originally bought it for you as a Winter Fete present, but you liked your older one better and considered motivation before a battle was a decent enough excuse to offer a present to your favorite Captain. He surely couldn’t blame you for it though, could he? You barely had time to finish your cups of caf most days; how could you possibly find the time to go gift-shopping?

Then again, perhaps he concluded by himself that the gesture was offensive. But back when you gave it to him, he hadn’t seemed the least upset about it. He had even smiled and blushed a little. And if someone had the guts to call you out on your bantha-shit, it was Rex. It was one of the things you valued most about your friendship. You always talked freely, and he would never beat around the bush or keep his opinions for himself, even if they went against yours. Besides that, he always delivered contradictions in such a polite manner that you recognized he had your best interest at heart.

Your thoughts spiraled, and you bore a heavy heart with guilt for putting him in such a delicate position. You had to apologize. But in order to do that, you needed to find him and… not let him escape this time. 

***

On their way to the mess hall, Rex had been called out at least three times by Fives and Echo for constantly scanning his surroundings. He had brushed it off by telling them he was preoccupied looking for General Skywalker in case he passed by, so they could have a talk about some mission he wouldn’t elaborate on. 

Fives decided to push on and jokingly asked, “You mean the mission in which you got that chrono?”

“I’ve been meaning to ask, Captain. That’s quite a fancy one. I didn’t know you had your eye on the latest tech,” Echo chimed in before he could react. 

Rex was now even tenser than before, but he played stupid. “Latest tech? This?” He brought it to his face to pretend to examine it better. “I had no idea.”

“So where did you get it from?” Fives insisted.

Million excuses ran through his mind, and he pretended to study the chrono for a few seconds more to get his thoughts in order. But he settled on the lamest one. “One of the locals gave it to me before the battle. As thanks for showing up, I suppose. I couldn’t really understand the language.”

“Just in time for Affection Day,” Echo teased, and it appeared as if he was twisting the knife. As if he knew.

The idea that you had offered him a gift had been enough to make Rex’s knees weak that day. But after you had left, and he could freely relish in the feeling, a troubling notion had snuck into his mind. He had nothing to give you back. And worse, after realizing that it had been an Affection Day gift, he had done some research to find out what the holiday really meant. That way, he found out it was similar to the Winter Fete season, but mainly practiced between lovers, sometimes really close friends — people exchanged gifts.

Exchanged.

At first, he had thought he would be able to come up with something. At least something symbolic. But he ended up dismissing every idea that popped up, only to end up now, in the last few days before returning to Coruscant, with nothing. He wouldn’t have let that affect him as much if it didn’t draw other, more depressing conclusions he didn’t want to think of at that moment.

Shortly after the three of them found a place to sit and eat in the mess hall, he inwardly cursed.

“I was planning to show you the new weapon upgrades we’re getting, boys. But I forgot my datapad in the room,” he muttered. “I’ll go get it. Hold on.”

***

Rex wouldn’t have the time to register what was happening. As the lights turned on in the barrack, the door shut behind him and there you were — standing next to his bed with his datapad in hand. He looked around. But you were alone. 

“I suppose this is what you’re looking for, hm?” you asked, handing him the datapad. He stared at it as if not fully believing it was his. “I shouldn’t be here. I’m sorry. I only want to talk.”

You did nothing to hide hurt in your voice. He took the datapad from your hand and placed it on the side table next to his bunk bed. “You can tell me anything,” he tried to say in a comforting voice, but the guilt slit through.

“Well, to be fair, I am here to listen. I want you to do the talking.”

He paused, but you had the feeling he knew exactly why you were there, and he was trying to waste time. “What about?”

“You’ve been avoiding me. Tell me it’s not just my imagination.”

He feigned confusion. “It is. I guess… we’ve both been quite busy, haven’t we?”

“Captain.” You held your gaze, although he looked away for a second. “You know you can speak freely with me. It’s about the gift, isn’t it? I’m sorry if it offended you or made you uncomfortable, I was only—”

“You didn’t,” he interrupted you, eager to deny it. You could see on his face that he had lowered his defenses. But he wouldn’t crack just yet.

“Then what is it about?”

He shrugged. “I told you. We’ve just been off-sync, I suppose.”

“Yesterday you started walking in the opposite direction as soon as you noticed me.”

“I’d forgotten something in the briefing room. I don’t even recall seeing you yesterday.”

“Like you forgot your datapad in one of the training rooms? You’re distracted. What’s it about then, if it’s not about the gift?”

“I appreciated your gift, Admiral. It’s just that…” he trailed off, but you decided to give him time to find his words. You’d sit there in awkward silence for an entire hour if you had to. “I have nothing to give back.”

You frowned and tilted your head. “Give back? What for?”

Rex brought his hands together, struggling to make the words leave his mouth. “For… Affection Day. Isn’t that the custom? Exchanging gifts?”

You froze, your mouth hanging as you rewinded the past couple of dates. You hadn’t thought of that holiday since you were in middle school and forced to exchange gifts with a random classmate. The timing of your gift had been so poor — no wonder he was avoiding you all through the ship. You panicked. 

“What day?” you said, your voice in a higher pitch than usual, then laughed nervously. “I gave it to you as a simple gift from one friend to another. I didn’t take you for someone to care when such a holiday was around.”

He shrugged. “Someone mentioned it a few days before, and I suppose it stuck with me. Still, you made time to get me a gift, while I can’t even think of something you could possibly want of what I can offer.”

You knew exactly what it was, but you also knew better than to throw it in the conversation like that. Instead, you threw in a little sincerity. “I re-gifted it.” His head perked up. “My mother gave it to me a few months ago during Winter Fete. I liked my old one better. I thought you would enjoy this one.”

“I did— I am! But…”

You went on, seeing he didn’t look so relaxed or even convinced, “I did not give it to you expecting something in return, or because of some special occasion. It was just a sympathetic gesture I thought I might as well do for a friend. I’m sorry for the confusion — I shouldn’t have put you into this situation.”

“You don’t have to apologize, Admiral,” he said, but his voice sounded a little more formal than before. As if he had switched back to his default military tone. “It’s my fault. I shouldn’t have handled it this way.”

“I’ll accept your apology if you accept mine,” you teased. 

He smiled. 

 ***

One day after the gift fiasco, you finally reached Coruscant, and it had been the last time you had seen each other. You both had a week of leave to look forward to, but as you bid your farewells prior to landing, neither mentioned it.

Your last day on Coruscant found you cooking yourself dinner. All alone — you watched as the water for the pasta started boiling and tried to remember the last time you had a home-cooked meal. You smiled to yourself as you poured too much pasta into the pot. You could never get it right. 

It was a pity you had no one to share it with. Your mind automatically drifted to Rex, as you knew he was probably out with his brothers at 79’s. It was their custom to spend as much time there as possible whenever they were allowed free time. But your smile faltered as you realized — of course they spent their time there. Where else? 

***

Back at 79’s, Rex was wondering whether Fives had always been this annoying, or if it was just a result of drinking too much. Didn’t he use to enjoy spending time with them, there? Why was he suddenly the subject of so many mean comments about ruining the mood for everyone? Why couldn’t he just get up from the barstool and have a good time? It was their last evening on Coruscant, and Force knew when they would return. If they would return.

Instead of talking, joking around, or dancing, Rex barely even sipped his drink. He stirred the liquid inside its glass — a half-empty glass of Corellian whiskey. 

“Alright Rex, there’s obviously something on your mind,” Fives interrupted his momentum of self-pity for the fifth time that evening. Rex didn’t even bother to roll his eyes or deny it at this point. Echo took a seat next to him on the other side, while Kix stood right behind him, encircling him. The only way he could escape them was by jumping over the bar. It didn’t seem like such a bad idea.

“You’ve barely even touched your drink,” Echo chimed in.

Kix reached further, drawing a conclusion. “Which means it’s not something depressing since you would drown yourself in alcohol, but it’s not something exciting either because… you’d celebrate. You’re not angry either, because you wouldn’t have come with us here if you were. You’re confused.”

Rex grunted. “Actually, I might start leaning towards angry soon enough.”

“Come on,” Fives said. “You either join the party or spill it out. And we’ll be able to tell if you’re faking it.”

Kix attempted a less aggressive approach. “We’re all brothers, Rex. We can tell each other anything. Good or bad, we’ll always have your back.”

 Rex looked between all three of them, and then at his drink. He downed it before they could say anything more and then sighed loudly. They were right. There was no point in hiding it. Though it was a stupid thing to stress on, perhaps they’d be able to provide a fresh perspective.

“Remember that chrono? The one I told you the locals of that planet gifted me?”

 They nodded in unison.

“Well, it wasn’t a gift from the locals. It was from…” he trailed off. Your name got caught in his throat. He felt as if he was about to expose you for acting inappropriately. 

“The Admiral!” Fives exclaimed, punching the bar top. “I knew it!”

Rex shushed him, while Echo rolled his eyes.

“So why are you so stressed about it? I’d be honoured!” he continued, now in a lower voice.

“I… I thought it was an Affection Day gift. She made it clear it wasn’t. To cite, she said it ‘was just a sympathetic gesture for a friend’. And that she hadn’t even realized the date matched.”

Fives’ face contorted into a grimace which only served to embarrass him further. “Ouch. Well, at least you made a friend.”

Rex shot him a glare, to which Fives responded by suddenly becoming fascinated with his glass.

“I mean, he’s right. In a way,” Echo said. “But I reckon it’s too much of a coincidence.”

“What is?” Rex asked.

Echo cleared his throat. “The date. I personally don’t believe the Admiral wasn’t aware of the date. And knowing that, why not choose another day for gifting it to avoid confusion? I guess it was on purpose, but since — you know — court-martials exist, the only solution was to brush it off as a friendly gesture.”

Rex wasn’t buying any of it; he had seen the surprise on your face when he had mentioned the date. Kix and Fives, however, were suddenly very intrigued by it.

“He’s right,” Fives said. “I mean, I’ve never seen a higher-up’s face light up that much when talking to some subordinate. Unless they’re delivering some fantastic news,” he added. Rex couldn’t believe they had all simply jumped to that conclusion in such a hurry.

“It’s called being nice. And very… expressive,” he said, dismissing the notion. “I think.”

“Well,” Kix concluded, after exchanging a malicious glance with Fives and Echo. “There’s only one way to find out, right?”

***

You flinched when you first heard the notification that someone was at your door. Not that you were particularly flimsy about visitors, but you were about to sit down and enjoy your own pasta by yourself, and it was rather late. It could mean there was an emergency. You were used to people announcing their visits.

So you brushed off your clothes and rushed to the door, only stopping once in front of the mirror for less than two seconds to make sure your hair looked decent and that you didn’t have any food on your face.

When the door slid to the side, you gaped at what you instantly recognized as Rex’s back. He was already turning to leave, but he heard the door and turned to face you. Flustered, he offered you a weak smile. 

You frowned, tilted your head a little and asked, “Did something happen?”

You could see the vigor leaving his body for a second, but he then proceeded to shake his head. “No, Admiral. Not really. I just…”

Eyebrows raised, you wordlessly prompted him to go on. He shook his head again, this time with more vivaciousness.

“Nevermind. I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have disturbed you at this hour. I don’t know why I got the idea that—”

“Would you like to have dinner with me?” you blurted out, interrupting him. His features relaxed, but yours tensed up. What were you thinking? He was obviously there because something had happened that he believed you should know about. Perhaps he had heard unpleasant rumours at 79’s.

He hesitated, but you couldn’t even process an excuse to take back your words or undo the awkwardness. But then, he straightened himself and finally answered, “I’d be honored. Do you have any place in mind?”

You smiled faintly. “I meant here, now. I made some pasta.”

***

Rex blinked a few times, dumbfounded by the invitation. It had taken his brothers nearly one hour of convincing to get him to visit you. And he had given in — even with nothing to bring you but his words. Words that he had lost the moment he rung your doorbell, which was the reason he had swiftly decided it was time to leave before you opened the door.

Now, he stood there in full armour, while you were without your uniform — dressed instead in a long, dark, silk robe to contrast with his white duraplast, your hair a wild mess compared to when you were on duty, and your face all natural. And in his eyes, you had never looked more beautiful. Or terrifying.

And you had just invited him in for some homemade pasta. 

***

Once inside, you had insisted on him taking off his armour, and he had happily obliged. You figured he would not be comfortable around you in just his blacks, so you offered him a pair of pants he could change in to be more at ease. He walked in while you were arranging the table for two (which hadn’t even been arranged for one — you had been planning to eat while indulging in some holodrama on the sofa). 

You moved slowly, but your heart rate could have betrayed you at any moment. Even though he stood still by the doorway, you knew he was looking at you. You felt his eyes follow your movements, yet you were aware that he was most likely just waiting for you to invite him to take a seat. However, you couldn’t focus on anything else but making sure everything was perfect. That you grabbed everything with precision and just the right amount of force. You didn’t want to look clumsy. 

Why did you care so much how you looked setting the damn table?

Eventually, you took a step back from the table and gestured towards a seat. 

“Are you sure I can’t help with something first?” he asked. 

You smiled. “You’re my guest. Make yourself comfortable.”

He hesitatingly drew a chair and sat down, and as you turned around to get the food, you felt his eyes on you again. You feared you would suddenly need a crash course on how to walk. Before sitting down to eat, you pulled out the finest red wine you could find in your cabinet and poured two glasses of it. 

The awkwardness lingered on through the first couple of bites. While part of you felt sad that this must have been the first time someone invited him in for a home-cooked meal, there was also nervousness in the air. It was the first time — so it had to be perfect. You had to make it memorable. And you hadn’t exactly prepared the food with guests in mind.

“If you’d like more salt or anything…” you began, gesturing with your fork towards his plate. 

He looked up at you, wide-eyed, and then returned to reality. “Oh, no. It’s fine. It’s delicious, actually,” he added the last part as an after-thought, glancing away from you and back into his plate. You realised then that the silence wasn’t caused by him feeling any certain way. He was just too distracted enjoying the food.

You took another bite and decided to pull the band-aid. “So why did you come all this way?” You noticed him pause for a moment. “What was it that you wanted to tell me?”

He took a bite to avoid answering too early. He then took his sweet time chewing it. “It was stupid. I wanted to clarify something, but it was already clearing up as I got here. I had some drinks at 79’s and…”

“And…?”

“What you said about the gift. I kept turning it over in my head.”

Your appetite faltered — not that it managed to grow too much since he had gotten there. Not for the food, at least. But you raised your eyebrows and tilted your head. “What about it?”

“About it being a nice gesture… from a friend to another friend.”

“Well, I assumed it would be a nice gesture,” you explained, playing stupid and purposefully ignoring the last part.

He sighed. “It was, that’s not what I wanted to clarify. It’s…”

You watched him draw in a deep breath, and you realized he wouldn’t continue the explanation. Your shoulders dropping, you let go of the fork and placed both your elbows on the table. “It’s about us being friends. I know.”

Another long moment of silence, where your eyes only met for a split second before you looked away. 

“I know it’s not professional. I know I shouldn’t be giving you gifts or inviting you into my apartment to have dinner. If you feel uncomfortable, you can tell me. And I will stop. No hard feelings.”

Lies. You’d omitted that you didn’t really care what you should or should not be doing when it came to him.

“I’m not. In fact, I feel the most comfortable when I am around you, Admiral.”

“Then I see no way our friendship could conflict with our duties. Do you?”

You’d expected a solid ‘no’, or at least a vigorous shake of his head. Instead, he hesitated. Your eyebrows twitched.

“It does, in a way,” he half-heartedly admitted. You weren’t sure you liked where this was going. But he must have noticed your body tensing up, as he quickly added, “Although not in what I would consider a bad way.”

“How so, then?”

“Some days, when I read news of the war on other fronts, the first thing on my mind isn’t ‘How would I have handled this?’, or ‘What can I learn from this?’. The first thing on my mind is you, and how I can’t wait to discuss it with you.” He’d glance around as he spoke, switching from looking at you, to his plate of food, sometimes at yours or at the decor in your kitchen. “There are moments when I am in the middle of the firing zone, and I have to make the decision on whether I should ask for air support. And I find myself secretly wishing you are the one commanding those ships that drop into the atmosphere. Because it means I get to thank you later.”

Your grip tightened around the glass of wine as you brought it to your face and pressed your cheek against it. It was a useless attempt to keep you from blushing, but the coldness grounded you.

“I understand,” you muttered after a few moments of silence. He looked up at you, but you had to avoid it. “When I come up with strategies, I never consider them any good until I pass them through you. I always pay extra attention to what the 501st is up to in briefings. Kriff, my mother got me a chrono and all I could think of was how I was going to gift it to you instead.”

Had you accidentally slipped truth serum into the pasta? What was happening?

You both chuckled nervously at your last confession. 

“I have never had the opportunity to call someone a close friend,” you continued, trying to figure out ways to drive the awkwardness away from the conversation. “But I suppose this is what it feels like. I’d rather know I have a friend in you than to be permanently struggling to come up with ways to win the war by myself.”

“Of course you have a friend in me. You will always have.”

While he delivered the line with a smile on his face that you mirrored, a wave of sadness engulfed you. You continued eating, stopping now and then to either comment on rumours and news from the battlefield or on how coincidental it was that both of you had only one day of leave left. Knowing that, you felt as if the Galaxy was prodding you to do something about the craving of your heart, but your mind was quick to quiet that plan. He would have said it by now, wouldn’t he? You had given him all the signs — told him how your thoughts always seemed to lead to him. He would have done something about it, had he thought the same of you.

***

Rex wasn’t sure he could hold the food down for much longer. It wasn’t anything physical — and the taste had been exceptional — but he felt as though there was an ever-growing hole in his stomach that threatened to kick everything else out.

What was he doing? He had come all this way, encouraged by his brothers, to let you know how he felt about you. It was the right thing to do. From there, you would have the power to decide whether you should never speak again, or…

Or what?

What options did he really have, but sit awake at night and think of all the what-ifs? You were an Admiral in the Republic’s Navy, and he was a clone commander. Bred for war. Not for figurative earthquakes in his stomach.

Then you’d said it again, that wretched word. Friend. Close friend — the culmination of what was possible and realistic between the two of you. It was, at its core, bittersweet. He was honoured you considered him a close friend, but ashamed that he wanted more. He was sitting in your home, eating your food, drinking your wine, and he still wasn’t satisfied.

***

It wasn’t hard to revert to a normal dinner conversation after clarifying the matter, but a remnant of doubt still nagged you. Whether he felt the same, Rex didn’t show it. 

As you both finished your food, the uncomfortable atmosphere of having left things unsaid grew exponentially. He still had some wine left in his glass, yet you hadn’t touched yours, besides a courteous sip. You didn’t trust yourself that much. Even sober, you could barely hold your feelings in.

The time to clean up the table eventually came, and he had insisted that he could at least bring his own plate to the sink. You let him, but instructed him to leave the glass on the countertop next to it.

Instead of pouring the untouched wine into the sink, you stopped behind him and downed it. He said nothing about it, but looked at you curiously.

“I never said it back,” you commented while placing your empty glass of wine next to his, avoiding his gaze. The gesture brought the two of you even closer. 

“Said what back?”

“You told me I would always have a friend in you. I never said you would, too.” You looked up at him and met his confused grimace with a dead-serious gaze. “You have more than a friend in me.”

His grimace faltered, and his gaze matched yours. You’d said it, and this was it. The decision was his. You had both experienced enough awkward moments, one more could hardly make a difference.

But there was nothing awkward about it anymore. Your gaze moved between his lips and his eyes. His did the same. Instead of constantly replaying everything you had ever said to him, your mind was now completely blank, but at peace. You were living every second of that moment. Every heartbeat, every inhale, and every exhale. All you could see was him — his beautiful eyes and his lips that he parted.

You didn’t notice him raising his hand, but you felt it on the back of your neck. His thumb brushed against your ear, but then he broke eye contact for a couple of moments to arrange a strand of hair behind it. You released the breath you hadn’t even realized you had been holding in, and he met your eyes again.

He smiled down at you — sadly, in a way, but in his eyes a glint of hope that you were too familiar with. “Then you can have anything you want in me.”

You brought both your hands to his face, tracing your thumbs along his chin. You kept going until your hands were close to the back of his head, and you pulled him in. He closed his eyes, but you felt his grip on you become weaker. You both had the same voices in your heads, trying to convince you that your actions were wrong. But you wouldn’t let those voices win him over. Your own, you could handle. You had ignored them for so long; they had no effect on you.

As your lips crashed against his, you closed your eyes in reaction to the shivers running down your spine. He hummed softly, and something inside you went wild at the sound. You dug your nails into the back of his head and parted your lips to deepen the kiss.

First, you tasted the wine that lingered on his lips. And then, as he gave in and crashed against your lips, you tasted him. His passion, his fervor, and all the words he had wished to tell you until that moment. All the missed opportunities and all the doubts that now held no meaning anymore. No unspoken words or repressed cravings could bring you down from the high you were experiencing as he let go of his hesitation and leaned into you.

His grip on you grew tighter and his humming against your lips more frequent. You were finally his, fully his, body and soul alike.

When he pulled away, he did so as slowly as possible, as if afraid he would wake up from a dream. You kept your eyes closed until you felt him press his forehead against yours. 

Your hands that had, until that point, caressed his skin with desperation — proof of your own patience having been torn to shreds — fell limply at your sides. He ran his fingers through your hair, and you watched him revel in the moment.

Finally, he opened his eyes and whatever glimpse of sadness in them was gone. But in a split second, you could tell there was something on his mind.

“Before you tell me we shouldn’t be doing this,” you breathed, “let’s just do it one more time.”

He didn’t reply, but he moved his hand from the back of your neck to your front, running his thumb across your collarbone, and then back up to cup your cheek.

You had to stand on your toes to reach him and kiss him again. You felt electrified once again, but it lasted for a shorter while this time — he wasn’t reacting to it. Pulling away, you opened your eyes to see him staring down at you. There was a war raging inside him. But you weren’t so sure of your actions anymore, either. You didn’t want your selfishness to break him. It took every ounce of self-control left in you not to beg him to ignore all rules for one night. Your night.

He cupped your other cheek with his free hand and brought your face closer to his. 

“One more time,” he repeated, his voice somehow hoarse and soft at the same time. His lips caught yours in a hard kiss. Not as gentle and timid as he had been until then — he had won the battle against those voices. Your hands reached for the seams of his shirt and just as you slipped your fingers underneath them, before you could register what his skin felt like, an alarm pulled you out of it.

Both physically and mentally.

You retracted your hands, and he took a step back, breaking the kiss. You could hear your heart starting to crack.

The alarm was coming from the living room, where he had left his change of clothes. And his comlink.

He looked between you and the direction where it was coming from, as if waiting for your approval to leave. The corner of your mouth twitched into a smile and you gestured with your head in the direction of the living room. As he took the call, you picked a spot on the floor to stare at blankly. You couldn’t hear what he was saying, but you figured out easily what it was about.

A few moments and he appeared at the threshold, fully clad in his armor, his helmet under his arm and a conflicted expression on his face.  

“The 501st is being dispatched to Ryloth for an emergency rescue mission,” he explained, and you struggled to offer him a comforting smile. His voice wasn’t soft anymore. It was the tone of a clone commander speaking to his superior.

You made your way towards him and reached out to arrange the collar of his blacks. He had readied himself in such a hurry he hadn’t noticed it getting awkwardly stuck beneath his armor-plate. “Make sure you get some rest on the way there.”

Once you fixed him, you looked up and had to swallow your frustration. He was just as saddened by it as you were, judging by the look on his face. “I’m sorry,” he mumbled, but you shook your head.

“You’ll be if you don’t come back in one piece. So make sure you’re well-rested,” you said, ignoring the voice in your head that was raging at whoever needed saving. You started dragging yourself towards the front door of your apartment to walk him out, and he followed.

“I don’t know when I’ll come back. I don’t know when we’re going to see each other again.”

Before pressing the button to open the door, you turned around and pursed your lips. “I understand. But it seems we have kept bumping into each other during this entire war. Perhaps it will stay that way. Perhaps this is where we are meant to be,” you said. “Two entities crossing each other’s paths until it becomes one.”

Your words seemed to bring some comfort to him, at least enough to get him to move again. But before he exited, just as he had walked by you, he stopped once again to look at you, in case it was the last chance he would get. You did the same.

“One more time,” you muttered as you took a wide step towards him. He extended his free arm to wrap it around your waist while yours curled around his neck. And your lips met once again, with the same passion they had the first time.

You didn’t want him to go. You didn’t want it to end. You wanted him to hold you for one minute longer, and then have that minute bleed into an hour, a night, a lifetime. But you had both agreed on it, less than an hour earlier. It wouldn’t affect your duties. Although it already did.

You both ended the kiss with a smile on your faces. He would find his way back to you. This couldn’t be the end of it. 

That night, you found the spare clothes you had given him neatly arranged on the sofa. You finished the bottle of wine by yourself and fell asleep dressed in his scent. You would go back to your ship the next day — hoping, as always, that your next campaign would somehow involve the 501st. But knowing now that he shared the same hope as you.

[lovelivingmydreams]

A might have been

Because I needed my @kingcreativityau fix and my brain does not shut up.

So… What if King didn’t split before Instinct formed? Does that lead to a happily ever after for all?

Instinct opened his eyes. He had eyes now. And there were many eyes staring back at him.

There was only one pair that mattered right now though.

“K-king?” he asked, not quite clear on how he knew it. He just did.

The familiar eyes lit up and the figure they belonged to, warm and bright and… good, turned to a cool presence and shook it.

“He recognizes me!!!” he exclaimed. It was loud but familiar, so instinct was able to ignore the initial urge to jump back at the sound. King turned back to him while he blinked away the last bits of disorientation and confusion. Trying to identify more things. King was moving from one foot to the other excitedly, but biting his lip and clenching his fists to give him the time. It made him smile. He was right. King was his friend.

There were two other sides flanking King, and one standing a bit farther to the back.

“Yes, yes…” the cool side grumbled as he straightened himself out before directing his curious bespectacled gaze to Instinct. “It is rather fascinating. Never before has a side shown any indication of retaining any kind of memory of before his manifestation.”

Instinct took note of the tone of voice and found a name to go with it. “Logic?” he asked. This surprised the side. “I… Yes…” he confirmed.

“Oooooh! Me next!!!” the shortest side giggled.

Instinct frowned, it wasn’t as clear in his mind as the other two, but a title eventually came, much to his relief. He didn’t want to disappoint anyone.

“Morality?”

The excited squeal told him he was right.

“Perhaps he simply knows more because he formed later in Thomas’ life,” Logic suggested.

“Come now Logic. Why is it so hard to believe that he learned all about us through king?” Morality objected.

Instinct felt very lost right now. Why were they talking about him like that? Could they still not see him?

He thought he manifested right. He wasn’t as tall as most of the others but he was here right? Was he not finished? Maybe he was just a shadow and a voice? Not good enough to be considered one of them yet…

“Don’t mind  them. They still have to get used to you being here. Wanna go play in the imagination with me? I have so much to show you!” King gushed reaching out a hand, but waiting for Instinct to take it. The newly formed side lifted a trembling hand and reached out. Once the appendage came into view Instinct felt a little bit more encouraged, he was visible it seemed and then his fingers touched the offered palm.

And just like that instinct relaxed completely. He was here after all.

The two other sides paused their conversation and Morality looked like he felt very bad, even Logic seemed too embarrassed to meet anyone’s gaze. “Oh I am so sorry instinct! We didn’t mean to ignore you. It’s all just so exciting, we tend to get carried away,” the short, bespectacled side assured him.

“Indeed. My apologies as well. I should have realized that you are now here and more than capable of understanding and answering any questions we may have.”

“After I show him around!” King stated firmly, but then he seemed to catch himself and looked back down at Instinct a little sheepish. “Unless you want to stay here for a bit first?”

Instinct thought about that. He didn’t feel like being around a lot of people right now.

And getting to know the mindscape a bit more sounded like a good idea.

“I’ll come with you,” he stated before turning to Logic and Morality. “We’ll talk later okay?”

The two sides nodded and waved them off, the other side who hadn’t talked to him yet -was that Deceit?- was walking away. Instinct didn’t have time to ask. King pulled him along, pointing things out and telling him all about them, often getting of track until Instinct pointed at something specific and asked about it.

Instinct soon settled into the mindscape.

He kept a close eye on Thomas and ensured they didn’t get in danger, or got anyone mad at them. He was very careful about upsetting the others as well. That didn’t mean he never messed up.

“I’m sorry Morality! Please, don’t cry…” he whispered soothingly as he hugged the slightly smaller boy.

“Instinct what is going on?” Logic asked as he and King appeared in the common space.

“There was a scary shadow and… I thought…I didn’t mean to upset Morality I promise!” Instinct pleaded. He directed his eyes mainly at King.

He was keeping Thomas up with his worries. Meaning he was keeping him from dreaming. King was going to be mad, he just knew it.

“You feared there was an intruder and you went to Morality for comfort yes?” Logic deduced.

Instinct nodded, wringing at the corners of the hooded blanket King gave him when it became clear that soft textures and hiding away his face made Instinct feel more comfortable at times.

“Oh, Instinct. Why didn’t you come to me? You know I’ll gladly get rid of any creeps that lurk in the night?” King wondered.

“I… Yes, but you were hard at work making a dream for Thomas and…”

“Then why not come to me? I could have explained any shadows or sounds like usual…”

Instinct knew all that. He didn’t know why he’d gone to Morality. He knew that wouldn’t end well. It never did. But…

“I already bothered you enough today and…” And now he’d bothered them even more. Instinct tried not to be in the way too much. But everything made him wonder.

How did they know the bike would keep steady? Why was Shea crying? Would the teacher be mad if they asked that question? How could they make Mom smile?

“King will you take care of Instinct? I’ll talk to Morality,” Logic suggested.

King nodded and put a gentle hand on Instinct’s back to lead him away.

“Sorry,” the youngest side muttered one last time.

“It’s no problem Instinct. What did you say to send Morality in such a state though?” King wondered.

“I… I told him about the shadow and I tried to do what Logic does. I tried to ‘reason’ and say that if it was something bad, mom and dad would protect us. But… But then I got afraid something would happen to them and… Morality didn’t like that,” he muttered. Why did he have to bring up those scary things all the time?

“Well… You are right. Something could always happen,” King nodded slowly.

Instinct cringed at the thought. “But… Dad is very brave. I don’t think there is any challenge he couldn’t overcome,” the creative side assured him.

“Really?” Instinct asked hopefully.

“Really. And mother is very smart, I’m sure she can outwit any bad guy.”

King was so certain of it that Instinct couldn’t doubt him.

“Thank you King. I’m sorry I kept Thomas up,” he muttered.

“No worries. Let’s go to the dream room, I’m sure now that you and Morality are calming down, Thomas will be needing a marvelous adventure soon.”

Instincts eyes widened. “You still want me there? What if I mess up again?”

“You won’t. At most you’ll come up with exciting challenges for us to overcome. Logic did say that dreams can help us overcome the worries of the day right? So you have to be there!”

Instinct chuckled as King pulled him to the dream room.

Logic did manage to calm down Morality, who ensured Instinct that he wasn’t mad with him in any way. But they all agreed that it was better that Instinct relied on the two older looking sides when he needed reassurance for the time being. Morality was very comforting and understanding, but he could easily be swept up by his own emotions. Logic predicted that as they got older, this would change.

So instinct stuck to asking Logic his questions. Though he often had to turn to King anyway if he needed to truly be reassured. Logic had a way of… Stating the odds. And while knowing that the chance of getting struck by lightning was really small was enough reassurance for most. In Instinct’s mind any chance was too risky sometimes.

King however could coax him from under his cover and let them all enjoy the way the light danced across the sky as he told silly stories about the thunder.

And as Instinct, and therefore Thomas, started to rely on creativity to soothe his fears some of King’s old power returned.

“So you see, you are actually the bravest of us all! A real royal knight!” King exclaimed with a flourish of his hand. Before Instinct could argue, his soft sweater and hooded blanket changed into a knight costume, baring King’s sigil.

Instincts eyes widened in awe and King was speechless.

“Ah, king I wished to discuss… What is going on?” Logic wondered as he found Instinct staring down at himself and King looking at his hands stunned.

“My powers are back…” he muttered.

“I am sorry. What?” Logic asked confused.

“Not as they were… but…” Then King grabbed Instincts hands and started dancing around with him. “My powers! Oh Instinct! Such joyous day!”

Morality was happy about this development as well. Logic however was slightly concerned. With the strange outbursts King kept having… Was it safe for him to have that power again?

He’d thought Instinct was only helping keep King in check.

He’d noticed a significant increase in Thomas’ ability to concentrate, since Instinct often pleaded with King not to distract Thomas. Fearing sever punishment should they get bad grades. Logic had to admit he didn’t put as much effort in rationalizing those worries as he did others. It was selfish, he knew, but he could finally work in peace.

On occasion King even helped visualize the material in ways that made it easier for Thomas to understand and remember.

In retrospect this might have been a long time coming. Thomas was using his creativity in more daily tasks again, even if it was in more practical ways. To deal with his studies, to deal with his emotions… King might no longer be able to convince Thomas that reality was something different than what it was. But he had once more gained the ability to change the mindscape, change them, to some extent. Which wasn’t too terrible, King seemed to have learned to take others into consideration when making decisions… But those outbursts.

King’s first order of business turned out to be to give Instinct a way to deal with his worries on his own. “It’ll be good for you to conquer Thomas’ fears on your own! Just visualize, and then turn them into something harmless.”

It’d taken a while for Instinct to manage to turn the shadows he could only yell threats at until they dissolved into bunnies, puppies and kittens. But he managed.

Now if King and Logic were busy and couldn’t help him out he could just catch whatever it was and that made him feel in control.

One afternoon, King was helping Thomas with a drawing and Logan was preparing for a math problem after, when Instinct found himself struggling with a rather large ‘stress bunny’ as they’d dubbed them.

“Oh, no you don’t! I won’t let you hurt Thomas!” Instinct insisted as he chased the creature. Determined to succeed, even though it whispered doubts and worries into his ears that made part of him want to run up to king and beg him not to show anyone the drawing.

“If they hate it, it’ll hurt him!” the whisper insisted.

But instinct was focused on catching the bunny. King wouldn’t show anyone anything if he wasn’t completely satisfied. Besides he often asked their opinion on it before showing it off anyway. If it was really a problem, Instinct could handle that later. After he took down this damn Bunny.

“Need a hand?” a smooth, pleasant voice wondered. Instinct froze along with the bunny.

Once he realized that the bunny was distracted, the young side jumped on the bunny grinning in triumph as it dissolved. He had confronted the thoughts and showed them who was boss!

Now, who had helped distract them?

Instinct looked up and took the side in. He looked like a preteen. Older than him and Morality, but younger than King. Maybe more Logic’s age?

Not that that meant anything. If they looked their age, Instinct should still be a baby.

Or they’d all be around six years old like Thomas.

Anyway. Instinct knew who this was, the same way he’d known everyone else. He smiled brightly and waved in greeting. “Hi Deceit. Finally decided to meet me?” he wondered.

Why, he didn’t know but this was the first time he’d seen him up close since he formed. He could sometimes see him hanging at the edge of his peripheral. Sometimes human sometimes as a snake. But never anywhere near any of them.

“Maybe,” Deceit muttered, looking around tensely.

Instinct got up and reached out a hand in greeting. “I’m instinct. I keep Thomas safe,” he greeted.

Deceit hesitated, looking from the hand to his face and back. Slowly he reached out…

“Instinct!” The side in question jumped at his name being called. He looked around and there was king. Oh! Wait until he heard about this!

“King! You should have seen it! It was a stress bunny half my size and it was so fast! But then Deceit distracted it and I got it! I wasn’t even a little afraid!” he exclaimed proudly.

“That’s… Great Instinct. Why don’t you go tell the others. I want you all to check over the drawing Thomas made before we give it to Mother.”

Instinct nodded and waved goodbye to Deceit who waved back. “Until next time, Instinct.”

Once Instinct was out of earshot King turned to Deceit with a glare.

“Forgotten to tell your pet to stay away from the big bad snake did you?” Deceit taunted bitterly.

“Instinct is my friend!” King bellowed. “And you will never speak to him again if you know what’s good for you!” his eyes flared red with his passion.

“Why haven’t you told him to stay away?” Deceit wondered, pretending like the whole conversation didn’t both hurt and terrify him.

“Telling him about you means telling him about Logic. And he needs the nerd to calm down on occasion. If he can’t rely on him… Besides, the nerd has actually tried to be decent. And he never pretended to be my friend.” That got Deceit’s attention.

“I was… I am… Why can’t you see that that day wasn’t about us!?” Deceit pleaded, façade dropping.

“There is no us… Maybe there never was.”

Deceit latched onto the hurt in King’s voice. Twisted as it may be. The fact that it hurt King too meant that it had meant something. Which also made this new normal hurt so much more.

“So what? You’ve replaced me so I can rot away on the sidelines all by myself?” he bit.

“Don’t you dare compare yourself to Instinct. He actually has an opinion. He is shy about sharing it sometimes, but he will tell me when he has doubts about my ideas. Which is what it means to be a true friend! They tell you when you are getting in over your head and stop you from doing something that makes everyone turn against you!”

Deceit staggered back with the force of the outburst.

“This is the last time I’ll let you get away with this. I see you anywhere near him again…”

King’s eyes flashed green and he didn’t finish his threat. He just squeezed his eyes shut and stalked away.

They all knew there were still things they needed to learn about Instinct. And that Instinct would most likely grow into other things over time. Knowing that something was coming sooner or later didn’t mean they were prepared for it though.

“I don’t think they are really friends with Christian,” Instinct muttered.

A group of older kids had approached Thomas as he was playing in the front yard. They said they were friends with his older brother and asked him to go get their ball for them a few houses over.

“Even if they’re not… We should help them though right?” Morality suggested.

“But won’t the old man get mad that we trespassed?” he tried again.

“The plan they proposed is very thoroughly planned out.” If Logic was on board, usually that would calm Instinct down but… This still didn’t feel right.

“But we’ll need their help to get back over the gate. What if they run off?” he insisted.

“That would be dishonorable and cowardly! If they dare, we’ll make our way back over the gate ourselves and get reinforcements!” King declared.

Instinct looked around frantically. No. This was wrong. All wrong he couldn’t let this happen.

“No!” He yelled so loud and forceful that it bypassed all of them and came out of Thomas’ mouth just as commanding. Surprising the boys and alerting mother.

“Thomas? What’s going on?” Mother’s voice called out in alarm.

“Run!” one of the boys shouted and they all fled the scene while Thomas burst into tears.

Instinct was still reeling from his own outburst and looking around at the others, worried he’d overstepped.

“S-s-spider!” Morality whimpered. Instinct looked around in a panic. Spider? Where? The others were scared of spiders. He had to get rid of them if there… Then he saw the arachnid legs in his peripheral. He felt them. He was the spider.

Only now did he notice his senses had sharpened. He could feel so much. He could even feel the other’s breathing.

And they were all frightened. Of him.

He shot off. Running as fast as he could. And with four extra legs he was very fast.

He went farther away from the central consciousness than he ever had in his life.

He collapsed under a gorgeous willow at the edge of the mindscape.

He only registered the willow because he couldn’t not see. He saw and heard and felt… It was almost overwhelming.

He also saw the snake curled up in the tree, but he didn’t care. He collapsed and curled up on himself nestling against the trunk, hidden by the leaves. He sat there shaking. For a second, a minute, a year…

He was so full of doubt and self-loathing. Time was irrelevant.

“Will you at least be quiet? Some sides like to wallow in peace.” The snake, Deceit, hissed.

“S-sorry,” Instinct whispered, trying not to upset the snake even more.

“Oh, my. That’s quite the transformation. A complete 180 from cute ten year old wouldn’t you think?” Instinct looked up. Deceit was curled up in a hole in the tree above his head and looking down on him.

Instinct shivered. “I didn’t… Mean to... I just… Thomas was… Something bad was going to happen and I just had to. Do something.”

“Is he still in danger?” the snake wondered as he made his way down the trunk and righted himself in front of Instinct.

“Well…” Instinct thought about it. Mom was with Thomas. Everything would be okay now.

“No…” he admitted.

“Then why not drop the scary act? We both know you aren’t that tough. Or maybe the cute kid is the act. I don’t know. What do you think?”

“I don’t want anyone to be scared of me. I never did!” Instinct insisted. He wanted everyone to be safe. That was all.

“So, what is this then? Didn’t they listen to sweet little instinct, so you had to be a big bad spider to protect Thomas?” It wasn’t accusatory. And… Maybe a little right.

“I didn’t do it on purpose,” Instinct repeated.

“I believe you. You wouldn’t be able to lie to me anyway,” Deceit assured him.

“I… Thanks.” Somehow, someone believing him, helped. And just like that he felt himself going back to normal. And then Deceit was in front of him in his human form.

“Good job,” he praised gently.

“Why don’t the others ever talk to you? You seem nice,” Instinct frowned. He didn’t know how he got so bold, but the question had been plaguing his mind since day one.

“I’m Deceit. I can’t be trusted… They probably have a point not wanting to be friends with me. Not unless they need something.”

Instinct thought about that. “Well…” he sat up straighter.

“Maybe I can talk to them? If they don’t kick me out for earlier that is.”

Deceit gave Instinct a sad smile. “That’s nice, but I’d rather you didn’t. You are alright Instinct. I should be going…”

“Instinct?! Instinct where are you?”

Instinct almost called King over, but then saw Deceit stiffen.

“Hide,” he mouthed instead as he walked out from between the tree branches.

“I’m here,” he announced softly.

King let out a sigh of relieve, hurried over and knelt down to talk more on Instinct’s height.

“I’m so glad you are safe,” he told him. “King! Oh goodness! You found him!”

Morality exclaimed as he and Logic joined them.

“I told you this would be where he’d go,” King pointed out slightly smugly.

“Yes, you did,” Logic nodded as he turned to Instinct.

“Instinct. We wanted you to know that Mom is not upset with Thomas.”

“She said it was brave to say ‘no’!” King exclaimed in excitement.

“I’m so sorry I got scared!” Morality rushed worriedly.

“I think that was the point actually,” Logic suggested.

“I didn’t want to scare you!” Instinct exclaimed, horrified that Logic would suggest that.

“I am sure that was not your conscious intension. But I meant… It has been clear for some time that you are more than just a base instinct. You are fear. In general.”

Fear… That, did sound better.

“Yeah…” He looked at king. “Would it be okay? If I am Fear? Are we still friends?” he asked timidly. He had been rather forceful. Maybe King didn’t like Fear as much as he did instinct.

“I promise I won’t do… I won’t abuse that thing I did back there. I don’t even know how I did it…”

King pulled Fear in for a hug. “Of course we are still friends. No matter how often your name changes, that won’t.”

Fear relaxed at that.

Morality squealed at the sweet display.

“This calls for cookies! Maybe even double servings!” he gushed as he led the way back to the central consciousness. King let go of Fear, who darted out to the front to talk with Logic about what he thought his role was exactly. Of course he wanted to understand as much as possible right away.

King held back a little. His eyes flashing red.

“I know you’re back there,” he growled.

“I didn’t do anything. I was here when he came storming in…” Deceit pleaded.

“You expect me to believe you stayed hidden? That you didn’t say a word?” King growled, not looking back.

“I… I just helped him calm down enough to put his spider form away. Nothing else!” Deceit swore.

“Stay away from him you slimy two faced snake!” King looked back and Deceit could see one eye, looking down at him with pure hatred. Glowing red and then green as a wicked grin split across his face.

“Now that would be funny,” he chuckled cruelly to himself, before he turned fully, eyes wide in horror. Deceit doubled over as he felt his left side burning and itching… What was happening?

King righted himself. “I warned you… You did this to yourself.”

Lie, it was a lie. King tried to act like this was intended, but even as Deceit’s vision twisted and he saw the scales appear on his left hand, he could tell that King was just as shocked as he was. “Please!” he begged, but king turned and started walking away.

“I’ll take it back when you’ve learned your place!” he barked before leaving him behind.

King didn’t tell the others about what happened. Not even Fear. Even if part of him wanted to talk about it. He didn’t have to worry anyone. He just had to get control over these… Thoughts, ideas. What if he’d done that to someone important? To a dream? To Fear?

No he wouldn’t. Fear was his friend. He wouldn’t hurt his friend.

Or so he thought.

There had been slip ups of course. Saying a weird thing, or a suggestion that was dangerous or ‘bad’.

In the moment they seemed brilliant but one look at the incredulous faces of the others made him realize just what he suggested and hurriedly corrected himself.

“I’m kidding! Of course we can’t do that!” he’d laugh.

He was pretty sure Logic didn’t buy his excuses.

He could handle Logic’s suspicions, his attempts at getting King to talk about it and the way he and Morality would look at him like he’d gone insane. But Fear, he looked terrified by those suggestions. He hated that he did that. He was supposed to make things easier on him. Not worse.

And of course, Fear was around when he made a real big mistake.

As good as the young worrier had gotten at conquering fears, he still preferred to find comfort with his friends. Today he was worried about going on their first big bicycling trip with the family.

“We aren’t ready! What if we can’t keep up? What if we fall and cut open our knee?” he fretted. King had thought that this was a case were Logic would be better suited, but he wanted to at least try to comfort his friend. He would come to regret that decision.

The image of bleeding knees stuck with him. Exposed bone, infections…

All kinds of horrid, disgusting thoughts sprung from that and he didn’t realize he was saying them out loud until Fear used his spider voice.

“Stop!” King wasn’t forced to be quiet this time. Fear was holding back his influence it seemed. But the raw emotion was just as effective.

“I don’t like this game King! Please stop!” he cried shakily.

King immediately fell to his knees to comfort his friend. “I am so sorry Fear. I was thinking out loud. I didn’t even realize. I never… I’m sorry,” he chocked. He had upset him. He’d upset Fear. He didn’t have it under control. He needed help.

King looked up. And the last thing he saw was Fear’s pleading eyes overflowing with tears.

“Oh…” Fear breathed as he whipped away the tears and calmed down, relieved his friend was back to himself.

“I get that. My thoughts do that too. It’s okay. Logic has been teaching me to manage it.”

King nodded. Yes. Logic would know what to do. Maybe they could handle these thoughts like Fear’s worries. Push them out and take them down. Just more permanently.

“Good idea, I’ll go talk to him right away.”

“I can help too!” Fear insisted. “I can teach you what I’ve learned.” The younger side was eager to help his friend for once instead of the other way around.

He was brushed aside though, assured that it wouldn’t be long.

Fear didn’t manage to stay away though. A feeling of dread filling his stomach. King wouldn’t do something stupid would he?

Ice filled Fear’s veins. King would absolutely do something stupid.

Fear kept him from jumping from too high. Fear kept him from looking in dark alleys.

Fear started running. He had to stop him. Whatever he was doing, it wasn’t going to be good. “King!” He called out. He was caught by Morality in a normally soothing embrace. But now it was only a restraint. “It’s okay kiddo. We all agree this is best for Thomas,” he heard muttered in his ear. Fear shook his head.

“I didn’t agree! I disagree! Please! Please King don’t!” he begged. But he could see that it was too late. King was buckled over with whatever he was doing to himself, Logic only two steps away trying to talk creativity trough whatever crazy plan they’d come up with.

Time passed and due to a joint effort of the twins Fear forgave himself for losing King, coming out of a self-imposed isolation after a few months. He also forgave the others. Knowing that they truly only wanted to do what King asked. And if the twins weren’t angry with them, he had really no place.

He and the boys got along even when the twins were fighting.

Said fights were often put to an end by him putting his foot down and getting them to talk things out. They were brothers after all. No one understood what it was like to be them like them.

King sort of kept his promise. It didn’t matter that King was now Roman and Remus or that Instinct was Fear, Anxiety or Virgil. The three of them stayed friends.

Bad horror movies with Remus, Disney marathons with Roman… Virgil would always miss his first friend, but he wouldn’t trade the twins for anything.

Thomas still struggled a little with his social anxiety at times, but he had a good relationship with Virgil on the whole. While Virgil told the others his name right away, it took him a while to tell Thomas. Mostly because he just… Well he was nervous. None of the others divulged this information for him, respecting that he had his reasons to wait.

Things got bad though. He ducked out. After months of dealing with Thomas’ issues as a group Virgil came to the conclusion that he was the problem, despite his best efforts.

  Virgil opened his eyes. Something had knocked him back pretty hard. Had he been knocked unconscious? For how long?

That train of thought was put aside by the group immediately collectively breaking down his door and almost begging him to never leave again.

When Janus showed up for the first time there was some tension between him and Roman. Things were always tenser between him and the good creativity than the bad.

And after two rounds of manipulating Roman for his own agenda Virgil is not a fan of him either. Impersonating Patton and Logan was one thing, but upsetting Princey?

Until that moment they’d been friends, even if Virgil spoke out against him a lot on a professional level, they got along great. He even suggested trying to talk to the twins about reversing king’s accidental curse, though Janus had declined.

Now however Virgil felt like he was forced to choose. And he resolutely chose for Roman.

Roman and Remus both at one point swore to Virgil to never leave him after he had a nightmare.

The last thing the twins see is Virgil looking on in horror and betrayal.

He looked up and found two figures in front of him… Patton? Why was he sitting like that? Was he hurt? Who would…?

Virgil looked up and gasped, drawing the attention of the imposing figure that was towering over Patton’s shaking form. No… No… This couldn’t be happening. He’d mourned and put all that behind him! And this… This was a mockery of everything any previous creativity stood for. This had to be a sick nightmare.

“Ah, Fear. How are you doing my old friend?”

[quijotine]

come get ya miraculous juice

If your thirst for lukanette and slow burn adrinette cannot possibly wait for season 4, Chapter 10 of The Wall Between Us is up on AO3! 

Or read in Tumblr below the cut

Chapter 10

“Aw, come on Luka, don’t be like this,” Albin said, swinging an arm around his neck.

“I’m not being like anything,” Luka protested as he and his group of friends made their way out of the metro station and towards Place de la Concorde. “I’m just saying I don’t feel like coming to a demonstration.”

“So, what would you rather be doing today instead, hm? Stay locked up in your room like an emo kid? Besides, the weather is great today and you know Margot will hang us by our heads if we don’t show up.”

Luka sighed and remitted to walk along, which pleased Albin.

Luka’s friends had been very adamant on helping him out of the house as often as possible since his breakup with Marinette. They knew that, left to his own devices, Luka would close up and keep to himself. He wasn’t the kind of guy that readily shared when something bothered him, he was more the type that had to be squeezed like an orange for him to share his mind when he was feeling low. However, this was not the reason why Luka had put up more of a fight than it was usually his style. It had been almost a week since the breakup and he had managed to keep out of trouble with Hawkmoth, but he attributed his success to a lot of calm evenings and just processing everything his own way.

As much as he supported the cause and his friend Margot, he could see how participating in a demonstration could get him riled up, especially if some asshole showed up. And he’d attended enough demonstrations during his lifetime to know that there was always some asshole showing up.

The trio of boys made their way to the organizers’ tent, where Margo kept busy readying cardboard signs. Without as much as a quick glance upwards and a smile, she said, “Oh good, you’re here. Help me with these, please. Paint is on the table over there.” She handed a couple of cardboard pieces to each of the boys and left them to their own devices.

Luka wasn’t sure what he was supposed to do with these. His creativity didn’t exactly lie in the visual department. That was always more a thing for...

He shook his head and proceeded to grab some random paint and brushes for Albin, Noe, and himself. As he turned around, he accidentally knocked a container of black paint on the person behind him waiting their turn.

“What the heck! Watch it!” the girl exclaimed.

“Shit,” he hissed. “Oh my god, I'm so sorry! Let me help you clean-- Kagami?”

It took him a couple seconds to recognize who she was. It had been almost a year since he had last seen her. There was an air to her that made it evident she had changed a lot during that time, but it was also obvious in her appearance. She had cut her hair shorter than before and she had now several piercings on her ears. She seemed to have also shed her preppy outfits in favor of high-waisted mom jeans and a black crop top. Besides her appearance, Luka could  just tell this was the type of girl who wouldn’t take crap from anyone, even more than before. It was a bit… daunting. He did always wonder how someone as intimidatingly sure of herself ended up with someone like Adrien.

“Luka,” she said deadpan.

“You... look very different.”

She gave him a dirty look. “Really? You come to a feminist demonstration and the first thing you do is comment on my appearance?”

Luka blushed with embarrassment. “No, no, no! Sorry! I didn’t mean it like that! You just-- in general. You look different in general.”

She sighed and rolled her eyes. “Whatever. Thanks for ruining my pants, by the way. They weren't my favorite or anything,” she said sarcastically, then stopped, looked around the room and asked, “Where’s Marinette, anyway? Maybe she knows some way to take the stain off.”

Luka clutched his painting utensils and gulped. He had tried to steer away from the subject as much as possible to reduce his risk of getting akumatized, but he supposed there wasn’t much of a way to evade it right now.

“We, uh... we broke up a few days ago.”

“Oh.” Kagami perked up, suddenly aware how her question might have been a little insensitive. “Sorry to hear that.”

“Yeah.”

“Not that it’s my business, but how are you doing? After your akumatization and so on?”

“I didn’t get akumatized,” he said, suddenly defensive, as an urge to get back to his friends built up.

“Really?” Kagami said, a bit surprised.

“Yes, really.”

“I always had the impression you were super into her,” she commented, but mostly to herself.

“I am--I was,” he said, getting angry.

“I got akumatized into this nightmarish monster when Adrien and I broke up and it turned out it didn’t take me so much to get over him.”

“That has absolutely nothing to do with it,” he retorted, evidently irked.

“No, no. Of course not,” she hurried to say, realizing she had unintentionally pushed his buttons. “I just meant to say props to you. Lesser people get akumatized for the weather or something like that. Sorry for the stupid comparison.

“Sure. Whatever…”

“... Anyway,” Kagami said, sighing. “I guess we’ve made this sufficiently awkward, right? So, I’ll get going.”

Luka marched back to his friends and unceremoniously dumped the materials at the center of their little circle as tried to calm himself down.

He tried to focus on getting something into his sign but the fact he was stuck doing something Marinette usually loved to do was not helping in the slightest.

He breathed heavily, his eyes prickling him as hot, angry tears pooled and then fell onto the cardboard.

“I need some fresh air,” he announced to his friends, who had noticed his mood but had not said anything yet and watched as he stormed outside.

He paced around, taking deep breaths. The anxiety of not being able to calm down mixed with the fear of getting akumatized, was like kindling soaked in gasoline being thrown into a starting fire. And, as wildfires do, it burst out of control.

Luka gasped for air and then, with horror saw as the black butterfly approached him. He sprinted back to the tent where his friends were but by the time he got there, the butterfly had already lodged in the paintbrush he was holding.

The voice of his friends urging him not to give into the spell was faint and distant in his ears, but enough to keep him steady.

The first thing he noticed is that this akumatization felt different. He's was still aware of everything. He hadn’t been completely akumatized yet. Hawkmoth held him in his petrifying grasp but stalled, as if deciding what to turn him into.

Suddenly, his grave voice echoed inside his head.

“What is it that you want, Luka Couffaine?”

“Get out of my head,” Luka hissed, focusing as hard as he could on not thinking of anything that would reveal the secrets he knew.

Hawkmoth laughed. “But you called me here. Your emotions... I can tell you’re a soul in pain. You lost something. I can relate to that pain.” Luka felt how Hawkmoth snaked through his thoughts, looking for something to convince him. A flash of a thought, and Hawkmoth knew he was hiding something.

“GET OUT!” he screamed in his head.

He laughed again. “Oh? And what secrets might you be keeping? Hm?”

Luka winced, straining to keep thinking of random things: music, the weather, that weird bench at school that wobbles when he sits and how he hates it. Anything.

“I can help you recover what you lost...” he whispered softly. “Your girlfriend… Don’t you want her back? What is her name? I can help you. I promise I won’t hurt her.”

He felt himself slipping, turning.

“No!” he said, reverting back into his human form. “Let me go!”

“Maybe what you want is revenge on him? The reason she abandoned you? You’re not worthy like him, are you? That’s why she left you… But I can make you worthy… Wouldn't you want to be in his place, hm? Wouldn’t everything be better with that pesky boy of the way?”

Again, Luka felt himself morph and forced himself to think of other things. He tried reciting stupid facts he knew about ship maintenance.

“Get out of my head!” he exclaimed, sounding much weaker.

“Your power of will is very commendable,” Hawkmoth said. “But if I’m overstaying my welcome all you need to do is tell me what you want.”

“N-no!” Luka said, straining and screaming. “GET OUT!”

“If you--”

Suddenly the contact broke, and he collapsed onto the ground. The world went dark.

When Luka regained consciousness, he did so with a jolt. He was surrounded by his friends, Ladybug and Chat Noir, and surprisingly enough, Kagami.

He had an ungodly headache and realized blood had dried on his upper lip. His nose must have bled.

“Give him some space,” Ladybug ordered the crowd, seeing as Luka was struggling to gather his bearings. He didn’t know what particular panic to tackle first.

“What happened?” he asked, noticing they were not under the tent anymore and the gathering crowd that was preparing for the demonstration had dissipated.

“You got akumatized,” Ladybug explained, a bit surprised she had to fill him in on that particular point.

“Or rather, were about to akumatized,” Chat Noir said, trying to help his confused expression.

“You kept changing into different things. Like, you were getting akumatized on and off again,” Albin explained. “It was pretty scary.”

He turned to Ladybug with horror realizing what that meant. “You need to take me out of here,” he urged.

“Please!”

“Just take it easy for a second, okay?” Ladybug said, trying her best not to share Luka’s worry. “We’ll take you home in a minute.”

Ladybug and Chat Noir had not been present for most of the incident, so they stayed to talk to the people that had seen the attack, mainly Luka’s friends and Kagami.

Chat Noir was the one to interview them while Ladybug found some water for Luka to drink. Once everyone had calmed down and gave Chat Noir their testimony, they took Luka away to a secluded place to talk. It was the abandoned industrial section where Chat usually led Akumas.

“He knows,” he said, with absolute terror in his voice, Luka said pacing around, trying his best to contain his tears. “He knows that I know something! He saw that I was hiding something. I’m so sorry, Ladybug. I tried but he--he was in my mind and saw--.” His voice broke down.

For a reason unknown to Chat, Ladybug suddenly assumed the same urgency as Luka.

“Did he see?” she asked as Luka cried. “Luka, did he see?”

“See what?” Chat Noir asked, with escalating worry. “What is going on?”

“He didn’t. That’s why I kept changing, he tried to convince me several times,” said Luka. “But he knows that I’m keeping a secret.”

Ladybug covered her mouth with her hands.

“Would somebody please just care to explain what is going on?” Chat demanded.

“You didn’t tell him?” Luka said with disbelief.

“Luka, I need you to tell me exactly everything you remember. What happened?” Ladybug said, ignoring the question.

“Nothing. He just… he figured that I… lost someone. And he was trying to get me to tell him who it was, and to convince me to try to get them back, or to get revenge. I managed to focus my thoughts, but what if he tries again,” Luka said fearfully. “You were right,” he sobbed. “I shouldn’t have—I should’ve just looked away that day! I wish I never knew about this.”

Despite Chat’s presence, Ladybug could only comfort Luka with a hug, not knowing what else to do. Chat, on the other hand, seemed to have put two and two together. Luka knew Marinette’s identity.

“Oh my god…” Chat muttered with disbelief as he leaned against the metal sliding door of one of the warehouse buildings and fell to the floor. He grabbed chunks of his hair just to process what all of this meant, what to feel first. His father was only an akumatization away from figuring out Marinette.

“Luka, I promise you I won’t let anything happen to you, okay? We will come up with a plan, Chat Noir and me. But for now, I need to you to lay as low as possible. We cannot be seen together anymore. At all. If Hawkmoth is the person Chat and I suspect he is, he could be very close to finding out who I am if he makes the connection that we were together. Erase everything. Everything we ever posted on our social media, messages, calls, anything that might be public evidence. Try to have Juleka do the same.”

Luka contemplated the prospect for a moment. Ladybug knew she was thinking exactly the same thing as him: how devastating it will be to have to pretend that nothing ever happened. To actively destroy their memories together.

“Okay,” he said after a while. “And what if I get akumatized again? I don’t think I’ll be able to hold him off for any longer than I did today.”

“Don’t worry about that,” Ladybug said. “That’s for us to figure out. Your only task is to pretend like you don’t know us, for your own sake.”

They sent Luka back home on a cab that Marinette called through her burner phone, leaving a heavy sense of danger looming between Chat and Ladybug. He was still on his spot on the ground, with his head on his hands as he supported his arms on his knees.

Ladybug sighed and slid down to sit next to him.

“You told him?”

“I’ve only ever told Alya. He found out by accident,” she said, already defensive and prepared for the argument that was bubbling up between them. “He also knows who you are.”

Chat’s stomach dropped. “Come again?”

“He was hiding in the same alley you transformed in one day.”

Chat let out a heavy sigh and swore loudly.

“You knew about this and you didn’t think to tell me?” he asked Ladybug.

Ladybug was in complete silence. She didn’t know what to say. “I—“

“You what?” Chat demanded.

“I— I meant to tell you next time we met,” she said. “I didn’t think—“

“You didn’t think to tell me that the boyfriend you just broke up with and was very much at risk of being akumatized knows who we are?” he exclaimed with frustration.

“I just—“ Ladybug tried to come up with an explanation, but the words kept getting stuck on her throat. Chat was right to be mad. She should have told him as soon as she found out. But everything had been so much, with him disappearing and Luka suddenly breaking up with her that, in a moment of weakness, him knowing her identity had been the least of her worries.

“What were you thinking?” Chat demanded. “Ladybug, I told you I’m close to the Agreste family!”

“I’m sorry!” she yelled. “I’m sorry, okay? I didn’t think—I was… I was so distracted by everything going on that I never thought… I meant to tell you! But then all this stupid teenage drama got in the way! He broke up with me literally the day after you and I talked. That’s when he told me. I meant to tell you Chat Noir, I swear. I just...” she sighed. “I’m so stupid!”

She knocked the back of her head on the metal wall that they were leaning against. “This was the kind of mistake I wanted to evade by telling someone! And it still happened… No matter what I do, nothing ever seems to be enough.”

She was angry at herself, at the situation, at the fact that no matter how hard she tried, she was still not a good enough Guardian.

“We still have time to fix this,” he said, a lot calmer and even with hints of reassurance in his voice. “We need to use our upper hand before Hawkmoth gets a chance to get his,” said Chat. “I can get a hold of his personal calendar. We can attack when he least expects it.”

“How are you going to do that, Chat? Let me go with you,” Ladybug said, worried.

Chat shook his head. “I’ll do it as a civilian.”

“The more reason!”

“No, Ladybug. If anything goes wrong and he sees you there, he’ll be able to figure everything out. Trust me. I promise I will be careful.”

“But--”

“Marinette, I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if anything happened to you,” Chat Noir said, his voice cracking and evidencing the whirlwind of emotions he had been trying to hide from her. “Please, just let me do this. Please, my lady.”

“Okay,” she said quietly. “But promise me you’ll be careful. And you’ll tell me when you do it. Please, promise me you’ll tell me.”

“I will.”

The clicking of Natalie’s heels as she entered the office disturbed the soft classical music playing in the background.

“Here’s the schedule for tomorrow, sir,” she said, placing a thin stack of papers on Gabriel’s desk. “Your flight to Helsinki is expected to arrive at nine a.m. and your first meeting is at ten, as you requested.”

“Excellent. Thank you, Natalie,” Gabriel said, without taking his sight off his screen.

Natalie nodded, heading to her desk.

“One more thing while I am absent, Natalie.”

“Yes, sir?”

Gabriel zoomed into the picture of the article he had been reading. The photographer had managed to capture the teenager he had akumatized looking urgently at Ladybug, who seemed to reciprocate his concern.

“Make sure to find out everything you can about this... Luka Couffaine.”

[sometimesrosy]

How helpful is pinterest when writing? I’ve been working in a sci-fi story which I actually haven’t written on for some months now. I want to go back to it, but I can’t seem to find it in me. I have trouble describing cities and buildings, so maybe it’ll be helpful there too. Seeing other images can also give me inspiration for a myriad of things. I’ve realized I want to make it sci-fi with fantasy elements, so it’ll probably help me there too, I’d assume!

I find pinterest SO helpful. But then I’m a very visual person and a pinterest addict. So like, the platform just works for me. I can understand why it wouldn’t work for other people. So let me tell you how I use it.

I have a BILLION boards for writing and they are all titled “to write...” something. Whatever I’m talking about. Sometimes they’re about craft. Like to write stories, or to write villains. I’ve got one for nanowrimo and for poetry too.

I have pinterest board for the genres that I write. Right now that’s really romance and sci fi. I also write fantasy, but haven’t much lately, although I do have an urban fantasy that I should be querying but I’m kind of ignoring.

My first sci fi board , where I have folders for sub genres, filled up (I try to archive them when they hit 1k pins but i don’t want to archive this one because it’s a resource.)  So I started a second which I haven’t done folders for yet. This is where I put cool ideas that I might use later, that might get story ideas started. Then I have a sff characters board and that includes costumes as well as fancasting or faceclaims or names. This is so when I’m writing, I don’t have to search for characters, I’ve got my own pinboard. Also, other people are free to use them for inspiration. 

My romance board is sort of like the sff board, but for romance, except I put my personal romance projects there, and that mainly is the fanfiction that I’d like to turn into original fiction, but all those projects are on hold.

Otherwise I create boards for each project that I have. That means I have them for novels I’ve finished, novels I’ve abandoned, novels that I’m in the middle of, novels that I’m planning. I have a LOT of project boards, but that doesn’t mean they’re all active projects. At least two of them are things I’d like to write but don’t have time for, and I don’t want to forget. Right now, I have two WIPS but I’m doing to write spacewitch, while to write sleepers is on hold because I can only finish one at a time, and i’m also trying to work on to write sound of silence which is a NON fiction project on writing process. The novels can now have folders for characters or settings or whatever. That’s nice, because you can get appearance and costumes and hobbies or whatever straight.

So here’s the thing. While you’re planning or researching or even just getting into the groove, you can search for new things for your project board, but ALSO, when you’re stuck or before you start writing every day, you can go over that board to get back into the mindset. Relationships, attitude, events, history, goals, personality, setting... it can all be in your pinboard.

And while I’m writing the story, I often will need to look up new things as they happen in the story. So maybe spaceships or explosions or rebellion or a new character. Those go into the board. That means that if you start at the bottom of the board, you can actually watch the plot progress. And viewing it can remind you of the entire book you’re writing. 

I also have boards for my ghostwriting projects. I keep them on private, but I use them constantly. When I am researching, say types of ultralight aircraft, or menus for a Moroccan restaurant, I pin those websites to my board so I don’t lose my info. I pin pictures for mood. Examples of evening gowns or diamond rings. Remember I write contemporary romances, and they’re all billionaires. So I need billionaire details. Hello google. Hello pinterest. It also helps when I’m doing series, because I can use the same info for multiple books.

I use pinterest when I’m writing fast romances, or when I’m working on books that take years. It especially helps the long term books because it’s so easy to forget things and lose your mood. I was just looking at sleepers and I started to get excited for that book again, even though I don’t have time to write it right now. So I can just hold that excitement off and keep it in the pinboard and when I’m ready to finish that story I can do so. It’s a load off of my mind. And it helps the ghostwriting because I don’t need to hold all those details in my head. 

If you look at my pinterest board, don’t get overwhelmed. I have a LOT of boards, but I separate them with the titles. Art all starts with “Art and...” Fashion all starts with “Style...” Cooking all starts with “Food...” and Writing all starts with “To Write...” Although I have boards called “The Writing Life,” (1 and 2) which is just like... mood. What it’s like to be a writer and artist. Because we have to live, not just write, right?

[buckysbitch107]

Blobs and Shadows | Steve Rogers x Blind!Reader

Summary: It originally started out as just some fuzzy spots in your line of vision, but by the time you were 10, both of your retinas had completely detached. After multiple surgeries and piles of medical bills all before your 13th birthday, you stopped trying to fix it. You never had a friend who stuck with you the whole way, that is, until you met your best friend Clint. You were friends until he ran away to join the circus, but eventually reconnected at S.H.I.E.L.D. While Clint got married and settled his family down while also juggling this job, you simply stayed single. The fact that Steve hadn’t noticed your obvious infatuation with him, or your visual impairment, confused you. But when Bucky tries to set you two up, Steve voices his concerns, not noticing you standing right behind him.

Requested by: Anonymous (I lost the original request, so this is the best I could do!)

Warnings: Swearing, Sarcasm, Angst I Guess?

Word Count: 2.3K

A/N: Sorry this took so long! I wanted to do extra research so I didn’t get anything wrong, and this was also just a challenging request in general. I focused on retinal detachment, specifically my cousin’s experiences (I’m aware every blind person is different, that’s why I simply focused on him.) I also did change Clint’s storyline a little bit, mainly saying that he was orphaned at the end of high school instead of earlier, and I did write Comic Clint. I made him younger to fit the storyline, and I based his hearing loss on one of my good friends, so not everything will be like the comics. I really hope you enjoy this one, and another one should be out soon. Just a reminder that I will be starting school again on August 18th, so the time it takes to write a fic will extend a little more. Also sorry for the song I use in this fic, I watched Rio last night and it’s stuck in my head.

You sit quietly in your fourth period English class, waiting for the teacher to introduce herself as they all did on the first day of school. A book sits open in front of you, your fingers running over the raised dots as you wait for the teacher to start, well, teaching. You hear other students file in, and soon enough, the teacher clears her throat and begins introducing herself.

“Hello, class! My name is Mrs. Luken, and welcome to 8th grade English. Now, my number one policy is that at all times, I need watching eyes and listening ears!” A look of confusion crosses your face, and you slowly raise your hand, not realizing you’re the only one doing so.

“Yes, Clint?” She asks, pointing to the other person in the room with their hand up. He lets out a loud sigh before responding, his speech slightly slurred.

“I’m deaf.” Mrs. Luken lets out a small “oh” as she tries to think of a response.

“Are there any accommodations you would like me to make?”

“Just annunciate and write things down and I should be good.”

“Got it! And yes, (Y/N)?”

“I’m blind.”

“Oh, dear.”

~~~

“May I sit here?” A voice asks, one you immediately recognize from fourth and fifth period. You nod and feel the table shift as someone sits down, the sound of a lunch tray clattering against the table ringing out amongst the chaos that is 6th-period lunch. 

“How could you understand the teacher?” You ask, honestly curious about the exchange that happened earlier in the classroom.

“I can lip read pretty well, it’s also how I can understand you.”

“Huh. I’m (Y/N).”

“Clint.”

~~~

“Tony, what is this?” You question, rolling the unusual object around in your hand.

“(Y/N), meet Athena. Couldn’t come up with an acronym, so I just settled on a catchy name.” A small string of silence rings between the two of you as you continue feeling the object, now slightly recognizing it.

“Is this an upgraded guide? Does it still have F.R.I.D.A.Y in here? I like her.”

“Upgraded? Oh honey please, that doesn’t even begin to describe it! And yes, F.R.I.D.A.Y is still your guide. Go ahead, put it on!” You sigh before eventually complying, placing the small little earpiece in it’s designated place. A small beep signals that it’s on and something immediately seems different.

“What the? Why are the blobs clearer?” Tony lets out a short laugh as you still stand there in confusion, wondering how in the hell your “vision” cleared up a bit and you can see the tiniest fragment of anything other than shades of gray.

“Athena is emitting a high-tech neuro frequency towards your retinas. It can’t repair them yet, but it provides a little bit of aid.”

“Is this what Instagram filters look like?”

~~~

“Athena, help me out here. I need to get to the kitchen.” You whisper, stepping out of your room, completely alone with her for the first time.

“Of course!” She replies, pausing for a second before continuing. “Go ahead and take about 10 steps to your right. You’ll feel the floor tiles shift from carpet to a smoother texture. Once you do, take another right and you’ll be standing in front of the elevator.” You nod to no one but yourself and follow her instructions, walking confidently to be in front of the elevator. You hear the doors slide open and you step in, the doors closing behind you before the lift begins to move on its own. “ Don’t worry.” Athena reassures, most likely feeling your heart rate shift. “I communicate with the building’s mainframe to make mobility and everyday life easier for you.” 

“Got it.” The elevator stops and you step out, the light from the windows brightening up your vision. Athena guides you to the counter, allowing you to grab an apple and a knife before you begin to carefully cut it. The familiar beep rings in your ear, and you listen for whatever Athena has to say.

“James Barnes is entering the kitchen and dining area from the main elevator.”

“Okay thank you.” You whisper to her, receiving a small beep in response before you lift your head and turn it so you’re not shouting into a cabinet. “Hey Buck! Want an apple?”

“Um sure? I didn’t know you heard me come in.”

“Tony gave me a new guide. Name’s Athena.”

“Oh cool. Also, I’m gonna have to cancel our sparring session today. Sam’s taking me and Steve to the new sushi place downtown.” Your cheeks immediately flare up at the mention of America’s Golden Boy, also the man you’ve had an infatuation with since you got here. Bucky notices and laughs, quickly shutting up as you hit him on the arm before retorting an answer.

“Are you sure about that? Or do you just not want to get your ass kicked by a blind girl?”

“A little bit of both.” He admits, taking a slice of apple off the cutting board. You turn your head to glare at him, his body creating a large shadow in your viewpoint.

“Thought you didn’t want an apple.”

“I didn’t. I just wanted one piece.” You roll your eyes as you finish cutting your snack, taking a bite out of the delicious fruit after setting the knife down. “Also when are you going to tell him?” You nearly choke on your bite, calmly swallowing before turning your head to face the man, or at least you think (You really couldn’t tell if you tried).

“Tell who what?”

“We’re not dumb, (Y/N). Well, I’m not. I honestly don’t know about Steve ‘cause he hasn’t noticed your obsess-”

“It’s not really a-”

“It’s an obsession (Y/N). Don’t even try to deny it.” You huff out a sigh before Bucky lets out a short gasp, immediately drawing your attention.

“What?” You can’t see him, but you can practically sense the grin on his face.

“I have an idea.”

“I’m scared.”

“You have reason to be,” Athena comments, making you giggle to yourself. Bucky somehow hears it, as he lets out a loud sigh before explaining his plan.

“Just wear something nice, okay. And meet me in the living room at-” He pauses, thinking of an appropriate time. “7 pm, got it?”

“Sure, and what’s your definition of nice?”

“Not a ballgown, but good enough for a date.”

“Bucky no, you are not-”

“Yes I am, now go get ready.”

~~~

“Athena, who’s in the living room?” You ask, rubbing your sweaty palms on the edge of your skirt as you walk down the hallway, your feet making a small pitter-patter noise on the tile.

“James Barnes and Steven Rogers.” You let out a small sigh before walking further down the hall, just barely entering the room when you hear the two men arguing, causing you to take a step back into the shadows. 

“Where are they?” You whisper, holding your arms to your body and trying to make yourself as small possible.

“Standing in the middle of the room. Mr. Barnes is facing you, and Mr. Rogers is facing away from you.” You nod and peek out from behind the wall, Athena alerting you that Bucky had noticed you, but Steve hadn’t.

“I don’t get why you’re getting upset Steve! You like (Y/N), don’t you?!” Bucky yells, trying not to keep his eyes on you for too long as to not alert Steve of your presence.

“I do, but you know that I don’t date anyone!”

“You told me she was different!”

“She is! And I don’t know if it’s in a good way. She seems to kind of, I don’t know, look past me? And she does these little things that I don’t know if it was how she was raised or something, like stopping before entering a room, or staring in the completely wrong direction. I don’t get it, Buck! I don’t! And even if she is different, I still don’t date! She’ll be like the rest. She’ll see me like this famous piece of muscle, not the small guy from Brooklyn. Thanks for the offer, but I’m declining. Tell (Y/N) I said sorry.” Steve rants, walking out the other entrance to the living room as you start to step forward.

“(Y/N), I-”

“This is why I didn’t tell him.” You whisper, stopping in front of him when Athena tells you to. Bucky tries to speak again, possibly apologize, but you’ve already turned around and started heading out of the room. Athena leads you to your favorite spot in the building, the balcony facing the river. You carefully climb on the railing and sit, balancing yourself as not to fall, but still feeling nearly weightless in the evening breeze.

“James Barnes is walking onto the balcony.” You sigh before turning your head, hearing the other man gulp before eventually walking closer.

“I’m sorry you had to hear all that.” He whispers, receiving a short grunt from you. Bucky places something on the railing, the sound of crinkling paper piquing your interest. “I brought you some bread, its fresh from the oven. I know that carbs comfort you so…”

“Thanks Buck.” You sigh, taking a piece of bread from his hands and holding it in your own. He steps a little closer, resting his arms against the metal railing, standing next to you as the light slowly fades from the sky. 

“I’m gonna go, I know you like being alone so-”

“Thank you.” You whisper, turning your head towards the last place you heard his voice. He leaves the bread with you before heading back inside. You listen to the crickets starting to chirp, but also the sound of New York City starting to come alive.“Hey Athena?”

“Yes (Y/N)?”

“What was that song I was singing yesterday? The very offkey one?”

“You’ll have to be more specific.” You mutter a short “ouch” before racking your brain again, trying to specify what you wanted.

“From that movie. Rio, I think.”

“I believe the one you are looking for is ‘Fly Love’ by Jamie Foxx.”

“Yes, can you play it on the speakers out here?”

“Of course. Anything else?”

“You can turn off for a bit, I just want to listen to music and eat the delicious demons they call carbs.”

“Understood.” A small beep signals the AI turning off, leaving you to the sounds of the city before the music softly turns on. You start humming along to the melody, your feet swaying along. You begin to sing along, not noticing the sliding glass door opening quietly behind you. Since you told Athena she could turn off, you’re not aware of the blonde supersoldier stepping onto the balcony.

“Um, (Y/N)?” You screech in surprise, your hands grabbing onto the railing. Your body slightly tilts forward, causing your bread to tumble off your lap and down onto the ground below.

“My bread.” You whine, staring at the direction you think it went. You feel Steve move up to stand beside you and you turn your head towards where you feel his presence.

“Sorry about that. Listen-”

“Look at my eyes.”

“What?”

“Look at my eyes and tell me what you see.” You explain, turning your head fully towards him so he could see your face. He stays quiet for a few seconds before responding.

“Your eyes are glazed over?”

“And what does that mean?” He stays silent before gasping, realization hitting his brain like a bullet.

“You’re blind?!” He exclaims, making you roll your eyes.

“Wow! Sherlock finally solved the fucking mystery!” You speak, a horrible British accent coming out alongside the words. 

“Wait so-”

“So I can’t see the ‘famous piece of muscle’. All I see is a blob. A very handsome blob, I’ll give you that, but still a blob. I fell in love with you for your personality. I fell in love with that little guy from Brooklyn. And the reason I seem to look past you or stare in the wrong direction, is because I rely on hearing, dumbass.”

“You heard all that?”

“Mhm.”

“Oh.” He pauses. You can practically hear the gears turning in his head. “Wait, you love me?”

“What?”

“You said you fell in love with me for my personality.”

“I didn’t say-”

“Yes you did! You love me!”

“Not anymore I don’t.” He fakes a hurt gasp and you laugh, flipping your legs over to rest on the balcony side of the railing.

“What if I said your love is requited?”

“Then I’d be so overjoyed I’d faint.”

“Okay, so I’m not telling you that.” You laugh again, Steve joining you this time. “Dance with me.”

“What?”

“You were listening to music. Dance with me.”

“I don’t know how to dance. The last time I could see while dancing was square-dancing in fifth grade.” Steve lets out a short laugh at that, before carefully grabbing your hands, placing one on his shoulder, and holding the other in his.

“I’ll guide you.” So the two of you sway to the music, Steve having the speaker play the song over.  You rest your head on his shoulder, the whole situation quite calming. As the song ends, Steve places one of his hands on your cheek, the other going to sit behind your neck. “Is this okay with you?” He whispers, his voice severely closer than it was last time he spoke.

“Yeah.” You reply, nearly feeling lightheaded from imagining what’s to happen next. Steve presses his lips to yours, and you nearly faint right there. He smiles into the kiss, pulling away to rest his forehead against yours. 

“I love you. A lot.” He whispers, a short chuckle following his sentence.

“I love you too, even if you are just an attractive blob.”

Permanent Tags: @wintersoldierslut​ @breakmy-bedbarnes@stuckys-hot-dogs​ @andreasworlsboring101@yaxamarvel @donutloverxo​

Just a reminder that all requests are open! My masterlist is in my bio, so you guys know who I specialize in, but really I do anyone y’all request. As I’ve mentioned, nothing is too fluffy, angsty, smutty, or gorey for me. I mainly write Marvel and its characters/actors. I can also write some characters from other things, you just have to ask! Also please let me know if you want to be a part of the Permanent Tags! But please, for now,

Call me Emily

[spiritus-sonne]

Being Blutpir

It occurred to me after reading parts from my past vampirekin and monstrosity writings that I have never written a more straight-forward piece about what it is like for me to be vampirekin and that’s something I want to do (so thus this writing). Specifically, I refer to my vampire ‘type as a “blutpir” since that’s the ‘species’ name I’ve chosen for it and my original concept of fictional vampires that it aligns with. They are, in essence, fictional humanoid vampires that have a notable amount of ‘animality’ to them mentally and behaviorally. There are various renditions of vampires that I connect to in some sense but none I’ve yet come across align as well as my concept of blutpirs that I had been slowly developing starting about a decade prior to consciously realizing I am vampirekin. Blutpirs are kind of cat-like, mildly shapeshifting humanoids, so it took me awhile longer to figure out my vampire ‘type from the time I came across therianthropy and otherkin as I knew very early on at that time that I have a cat theriotype. My cat ‘type kind of overlaps and blends with blutpir, so it’s not like I can always draw a distinct line and say more definitively “that is just a cat experience” and “that is just a blutpir/vampire” experience.

I think part of my eventual realization to blutpir is that there were seemingly cat-like experiences and aspects to me that didn’t fit my cat theriotype, or my other three theriotypes, and upon further investigation, I couldn’t manage to attribute just to my monster-heartedness. Now, I will say, my monster-heartedness does kind of sing through my vampire ‘type, especially since the monsters I connect to the most are animalistic humanoids, including some kinds of vampires. Honestly, when I get down to it, though, I think my main self-concept is actually that of a blutpir--it is how I see my human(oid) self in my mind’s eye. Plus it was actually a very rough concept of an original (blutpir) vampire called Sonne from where I came to eventually take on the name for myself and it’s stuck to the point of being about as close to a “true” name for me that I’ve ever had (the “Spiritwind” part always feels more like a last name, an extra specifier to better designate that is is me online). Sonne was a vampire character that I really looked up to in some sense for her power, charisma, and confidence, and for her being a blutpir. I never really fleshed out the character much, though I did early on write a poem about/inspired by her. The vampire connection, plus the connection to the sun (as sonne is the German word for sun), which is a strong point of my spirituality and theism, really allowed the name to become a seemingly permanent self-identifier for me.

I have a certain visual self-concept in my mind of what I look like: black hair (my real hair is dark brown), amber (sometimes greenish) colored eyes, a little darker skinned, and a thinner build than I actually have. Along with this is mild shapeshifting abilities like shifting claws or claw-like nails, shifting eye color (to an inhuman one, either glowy amber or all black, including the sclera (white) part), and shifting or retractable fangs on the top of my mouth. Those aspects have been rather constant for a long time in how I internally view myself, even though it’s really taken me until now to realize I’ve probably been seeing myself as a blutpir for all that time. This also doesn’t mean that I was wrong about my cat ‘type because I still experience aspects of it that I find to be or resonate with specifically a cat rather than a blutpir (including phantom parts, like my pivotal cat ears, fur, feline feet/legs, and having body-oriented thought of my feline body doing things, such as curling up to sleep). Yet perhaps, I will admit, maybe I developed over time a vampire ‘kintype and blutpir-specific self-concept in part from aspects of my cat therianthropy mixing with my humanness and my monster-heartedness until eventually I ended up with a blutpir ‘kintype and self-concept.

It’s unfortunately been years since I’ve felt more strongly like blutpir and I miss it. Don’t get me wrong, it’s still there, still present within me and I do still experience aspects of it actively, but because of depression, it’s not like I used to (yet I hope that will change over time now that I’m on medications that seem to be significantly helping me emotionally and psychologically). One of the ways in which I used to strongly experience blutpir was during sex (whatever kind of specific sexual activity). It got me feeling rather vampirically shifty, which I won’t get into details but it involved a more vampiric mindset, phantom claws and fangs, and a desire to bite and tear my partner (though I never did it beyond what my partner was okay with). Over time I lost that shiftiness and anhedonia took hold during sexual activity. I used to feel so free and euphoric during sex, not so much from the sex itself but instead from the vampire and cat shifts I had during it, which after I lost the shifting, I also lost the ability to much at all enjoy sex. I want to have that back, in part for my own sake and also because I think it would be healthier socially with my partner for me to enjoy having sex again, to actually be able to feel euphoric during it.

Certain movies and TV shows will get me feeling vampire shifty, mainly if there is a vampire or other animalistic humanoid in it. I’m kind of particular about it though--most vampire media just doesn’t do it for me and often times they are depicted as too human or not humanoid enough, the former often being vampires that seem like mentally and behaviorally just humans that happen to drink blood. Fangs on vampires is a much preferred thing for me to see and I get disappointed when I see fictional vampires without fangs. I also prefer to see them with claws or claw-like nails and extra points if they have (shifting) inhuman eye color. These three physical traits are the physical aspects of vampires I keep coming back to; being so drawn to and resonating with them, time and time again. They are consistent with that self-concept I have that I mentioned in this earlier. And when I do watch something that gets me feeling vampire shifty, I sometimes will get a pleasurable but strange rolling, contracting feeling in my abdomen that I only experience when reading or watching certain fictional humanoid creatures, particularly when they are shifting. I’ve wondered if it’s the same as the “butterflies in your stomach” response, but I’ve felt that during anxious times and know it doesn’t feel the same way.

One of my favorite depictions of a vampire in media is Colin Farrell as Jerry Dandrige in the “Fright Night” reboot in 2011. I don’t really connect to some of the more stereotypical aspects of the vampire like his weaknesses, but what I do strongly connect with are his animalistic behaviors along with his appearance with fangs, claws, and black eyes. One scene in particular I love is when he can’t get into a house to attack someone because he has to be invited in, and he acts cattish at the door, like an anxious caged cat pacing as it can’t get to the food/prey it wants. He manages to display some (of course not remotely all) of the behaviors and physical embodiments that I resonate with as a vampire, so I love being able to see that. I also rather like Henry from the TV show “Blood Ties”, mainly when he’s shifted because of how I connect with him in that state. In contrast, I’ve seen media that shows a character that looks like a bipedal, anthropomorphized creature/monster, even in a horror sense, or any range of looking like an animalistic humanoid and connect very little if at all with them because *behaviorally* and/or mentally they aren’t animalistic enough--they’re just a human mind in a nonhuman body, which kind of bores me, to be honest.

The list of typically vampire-associated things I don’t relate to is probably long, but I’ll mention some of it. Foremost is that blutpirs aren’t harmed by sunlight anymore than most humans are--that’s always been kind of an annoyance to me in vampire media, and it’s unfortunately a very common trope. Secondly, they aren’t undead at all, they are living beings, albeit with some supernatural aspects including longer-lived, reduced signs of aging, mild shapeshifting abilities, and ability to ‘breed’ via supernatural means rather than sexual (essentially blood transfer in a more typical vampire trope kind of way). They also aren’t adverse to religious symbols nor need to be stabbed through the heart with a wooden stake in order to kill them (or poof into ash when killed). There are others I can’t think of right now, but that covers at least some of them.

Sometimes I get phantom shifty with claws and/or fangs and I am fond of the feeling. I can at times feel my fangs gently pressing up against the inside of my lips, which leaves me pursing my lips just a little bit in response to them. I get, more uncommonly, a strange phantom feeling in my eyes that I’ve come to associate with maybe a shifting feeling to them, like they are (phantomly) turning to an inhuman state. These phantom parts can combine with other phantom parts of whichever of my theriotypes, usually cat (especially since I have constant phantom cat ears). I may feel defensive with eyes wide and flared, claws ready, and fangs bared (with me tending to feel only top fangs as a vampire, I think, and more pointed teeth on top and bottom as cat, but again, cat and blutpir are kind of blurred at times). At those times I will also want to hiss and growl and have ears back and hackles/fur on neck and back bristled. There’s also a certain ‘cattish’ grin or smirk I have sometimes when feeling vampirey, which I doubt looks nearly on my physical body like how I see it in my mind; and it’s something that the Jerry Dandrige character I mentioned does oh so well. When I’m feeling myself doing a ‘vampiric grin’ (whether internally or externally), I also mentally feel more confident, charismatic, and predatory, so it’s a mental shift and not just a phantom sensation or body-oriented thought. Comparatively, I’m usually docile, meek, submissive, and passive, so it honestly feels different but enjoyable to have that kind of shift in mindset (no matter how fleeting it may be, which it always is). I still feel like myself, to clarify, just a different sort of version of who I really am. It really captures what I felt Sonne-the-character was like.

I will say that I do have a distaste for the fact that the term “vampirekin” has seemingly become (at least on Tumblr) synonymous with vampirecore, I assume from the ‘kinning-for-fun’ people. It just reminds me of years ago when the Tumblr vampirekin tag was hardly even used, though even then what bit it was used was mainly not by people identifying as vampires in an otherkin-sense, but I like the *concept* of the tag potentially being used to help vampirekin find other vampirekin. Honestly, I’ve only come across a few or so people who actually identify as serious vampirekin, though I haven’t talked much with any of them about either of us being such, unfortunately (I guess, really, I’m just more apt to talk about this stuff in my longer writings and sometimes on forum posts for some of the shorter stuff). I’m thankful for those who have actually made it a point to denote vampirekin as not being the same as ‘energy vampires’ (or whichever term to call them, since there are a few; I mean the psi/sang vampires). Recently I came across a Discord server which does make that distinction and welcomes a wide variety of people in connection with vampirism of some sort. However, the description of the group noted that vampirism is about the practice of leeching another being’s life force or vital energy which I feel I can’t relate to in the way I experience my vampire otherkinity, but I do see that it would ultimately fit with my vampire ‘kintype itself with it being, of course, a blood-drinking vampire.

This is something that’s interesting to me in how I experience this otherkinity: my lack of a desire, let alone a strong, nagging urge, to drink blood. I figure it’s for the same reasons that I don’t experience the desire to eat grass (for horse), or arthropods (for mongoose and erdenvogel), or raw meat (for cat). Those urges for consuming foods of my ‘type-specific diets just have never been part of me and my experiences, for whatever reason. So why would it be present in my vampirism when it isn’t present for my four theriotypes? That makes sense to me, but whomever else may not understand it since I experience *being* (non-physically) a vampire in this life without the cravings for blood (or other life-force substance, yet my vampire ‘type is specifically a blood-drinking one). In the lore that aligns with my vampire ‘type, it doesn’t survive solely on blood--it eats like any other human--just needs to consume blood periodically to stay healthy and functional and may die without it.

They, from what I’ve come up with in my personal lore of blutpirs, don’t tend to go into (let alone on a frequent basis) strong, deep cravings for it, but that those urges can at times come up if they are starting to basically ‘wither away’ in health and such from going too long without blood, or if they’ve lost a lot of blood and haven’t had it replenished via transfusion yet. Those scenarios haven’t been applicable to me, especially since I’m living life in a human body that doesn’t need to drink blood to be healthy, functional, or to survive in general. It’s not that I’m mentally adverse to drinking blood, it’s just that I literally never have a craving for it and see no point in me trying to find a way to get a hold of either another person’s blood (safe donor) or another animal’s blood (like pig’s blood). Although it’s kind of funny to me that I have always preferred well-done meat and generally dislike the taste of meat that’s any below well done or sometimes below medium doneness (like roast beef for the medium level; steak and ground beef I dislike pink at all). Most people I know prefer their steaks rare to medium-rare, so I’m the ironically odd one out in that.

So yeah, being a blood-drinking vampire-identified person who doesn’t crave blood at least *sometimes* makes it more difficult for me to relate to other vampirekin along with most other people who have a connection with vampires, are energy vampires, or vampire lifestylists since so much of these vampire things tends to focus on the *need* and *cravings* for blood or life-force that defines vampires. Though when I really stop to think about it, despite that being definitive of describing or categorizing vampires, maybe even a fictional vampire species doesn’t *have* to be so much about that. It’s like thinking that a theriotype of a certain animal is heavily defined in being that kind based largely on what that animal’s diet is and that they would be odd if they didn’t, during this current human-body life, experience strong cravings for the theriotype’s food. Now granted, yes, most animals are not defined by their diets in our vocabulary: we don’t define a horse as a horse because it eats grass/vegetation, for example, but my point is that I don’t experience being a vampire as “a being that feasts on blood to survive”. I experience vampire as an animalistic humanoid that has various physical aspects and adaptations that came about over time, in part for predatory reasons to gain the sustenance (blood, especially from humans) that it needs from time to time to function and survive. Being vampire for me is much more about being a nonhuman, animalistic humanoid than it is about “I *must* drink blood”; it’s a much more diverse experience that I shouldn’t think has to boil down to such an oversimplistic concept of what a vampire is or should be.

For comparison purposes, it’s kind of like my domestic cat theriotype and how it is similar to actual domestic cats. Now, of course, I can’t know what actually goes on in the brains of cats, but things can be inferred from their behaviour. Domestic cats, like other felines, are evolutionarily built to *kill*, to be predators, mostly ambush predators. However, when we keep them inside and well fed, they are allowed to experience a life that isn’t mostly about “when will my next meal be” or “I need to hunt now” in order to survive. Instead, although they are still very food motivated and frequently are preoccupied with getting or wanting to get food (if they aren’t totally free-fed with a constant supply of food available all the time), they express a variety of other behaviors that include other aspects of their lives and selves (like social aspects, grooming, play, etc.). My experience in being vampire is kind of like that--although I do think often about wanting food, I’m fortunate and thankful to be able to be well-fed and not have to worry about obtaining my next meal for the most part. My behaviors and my mindset don’t end up involving me needing or feeling I need to obtain blood, especially since I don’t possess the physiology for that need to be present. Yet I do experience desires for attacking or biting as a vampire, even though those have been reduced for the past few years due to my depression (which I cover in a different writing).

It is thus not a sense of a need for blood that could connect me to other vampirekin and other vampirism-related people, as it is instead a sense of humanoid animality (albeit a very particular kind) that connects me to some concepts of vampires. And so even as a fictional humanoid vampire I still find more sense of similarity among therians than I do for most people who use the term “vampire” for themselves. I would like to find more animalistic vampirekin to share thoughts or writings with; to read of their similar and contrasting experiences in being a vampire. I want to read more thoughts about their vampirism “beyond the blood need” and into the diversity of other experiences they have related to being vampire. So here I am, trying to share my own pieces of vampirism for others to see and maybe relate to.

[polandspringz]

Sorry to bother you but, are you still working on your obey me shall we date series Siberia? You haven’t updated it in a while.

Sorry again cams have a good day/night!

I'm super sorry for the delay! I promise I intend to finish the story, it's just been difficult for me to sit down and focus on writing recently, because I have trouble prioritizing my tasks, mainly what fic to work on first. After publishing a lot of one-shots in the last long gap between updates on Siberia & YDRWS, I swore to focus only on updating both these fics, but because they both have very long chapter lengths they take a long time to write, not including time it takes rereading the previous chapters to make sure I do not mix up details, which is important in a mystery like Siberia.

Also, because I wanted to focus on updating Siberia AND YDRWS, because when summer hit I had not updated both of them since around February, I've been focusing more on updating YDRWS, since Siberia got two updates and YDRWS only got one. I had actually written the full chapters of 3 & 4 for YDRWS but realized that a lot of things sounded really contrived and I wasn't happy with chapter 4 at all so I've been struggling to fix chapter 3 so I can rewrite chapter 4. It's a lot of piecing together elements and scenes from the original version I like and then working them into the new flow of the story.

The only other things that I can say for the delay is that, well it's summer and this is the only time I get to really hang out with my friends. One of them goes out of state for school the rest of the year and rarely comes back on breaks due to work, and because of lockdown I did not get to hang out with any of my friends still living in state until now. Also, when I hit writers' block on my fanfiction stories, it happens a lot because I feel like I should be prioritizing my original works instead, so I've been revisiting some personal stories. I am not just a writer, but create art and sew, and that plays into my struggle of prioritizing, so when my laptop broke in late June/early July I ended up working on art which took me out of my writing zone. Also (I hate saying "also" so much but oh well), a big thing that has affected my ability to work on stories I started last year is that I'm just in a different state of mind. A lot of my series from 2020 had strong focuses on touch & being starved of it, loneliness, and isolation, all brought about due to my mental health during the start of lockdown. While things have not changed much, being able to see people again has made it harder for me to dive back into those themes as strongly as I did before.

I promise that not a day goes by where I don't think "Oh god I need to work on Siberia (and other fics)" because I genuinely don't want to leave these works unfinished. My whole reason for starting Siberia was because I visualized a scene that can only happen near the end of the story, and that's what has been keeping me going. As I always stress, the entire story has been mapped out since the beginning, but I want to ensure I deliver the best possible chapter I can with each update and don't leave anything out. I'll confess that I haven't played OM in a few months and have been stuck at Lesson 22, and usually when I hit a roadblock it would be because I lost sight of the characters and would go back and play a bit to get me back in the zone, but I just haven't had the focus for that recently. Again, I'm super super sorry for the delay! I've been holding off on writing other long length stories because I know I need to put all my energy into working on the ones I started already. But, as it stands I probably will still only be able to deliver one update a month if I get back on my normal schedule of writing. I originally estimated the story to take around fifteen chapters, and we are approaching the one year anniversary of it's start. Siberia was honestly my first long-term story idea I've ever done, at least for fanfiction and published in a public space, so I do not know if it will be fifteen or maybe closer to twenty chapters to finish, but I estimate it will take us into next year at the very least.

I'm sincerely sorry, and I hope you understand! And please don't feel bad about sending me this ask! Getting messages like this actually helps motivate me to work on my stories, because Siberia has actually felt like one of my OM stories that I got the least response on (I mean, compared to how I still get comments about CYDRWG), and it's nice to see I have a few dedicated readers each time a chapter goes up.

I don't have much to show for work on chapter 9 yet, and don't want to show the outline obviously for spoilers, but if people were interested I've been thinking about showing some of my notes/my process in my notebook for crafting stories like this? At least for the earlier chapters (just so you can see how I attack each chapter)

[nad-zeta]

Match up ~(˘▾˘~)

Hi I’d like an Ikevamp matchup! (This is my first time doing this but oof) i’m a shy(at first) brown(Filipino to be exact) girl that’s a lil on the chubby side, Virgo, messy short hair, 149 cm(short-), and an INFJ T and a Ravenclaw. I’ve also got really fat legs and as much as i like them some dont :”) i like to read books than listen to people read them aloud cuz I’m a visual learner. I like writing bc it helps me get all these ideas out of my head. But i’m really unorganized so i never really finished anything other than a few poems and one horror short story. I enjoy cracking a good joke for anyone to laugh at and am really affectionate with my loved ones. I draw sometimes too but they’re not that good :> so my hobbies are:writing(mainly), drawing. I love learning about new stuff that’s not really included in school bc it’s not one of my biggest priorities to me lmao. I also really like studying whilst listening to music. But unto my dislikes, i really dont like injustice for other people and have this belief in me(i belive everyone is equal). I hate loud noises (eg. rain, or a truck) it messes with me more than my hair lol. I don’t like people insulting me in a more meaningful sense, meaning im not hurt if anyone curses at me but if it’s a little more meaningful then that hits me hard. Most people think im insensitive but i get hurt too ya know. But i always welcome critique even if it doesnt seem so. I flirt sometimes with my friends cuz thats how much i love them ig. I can play the ukulele but im not too fond on playing instruments so i ight sing instead of both. Anyway, i hope that’s enough. Message me if it wasn’t and i’ll add more! Thanks!

 Hi hi, love! ❤🥰Thank you so much for the request! Ooooh your first match-up, how exciting! I hope I can live up to your expectations. 🦋🥰☀️Anyways sorry for the long wait and I truly hope you enjoy. Hope you have a super good day!❤🥰  @la-liar​

So I match you with…………… Mozart

So the first time the two of you interact, it was basically silence. Both of you cuties were too shy and reserved to speak to each other. That is basically how it was for the first few weeks of your stay at the mansion. 

You were rather shy, so you kept mostly to yourself spending all your time in the library, reading and writing. But that all changed one day when you discovered the music room. 

You had decided on a whim to explore the mansion a bit and stumbled upon a pristine music room. You made your way inside and smiled as you spotted a ukulele in the corner of the room. You simply couldn’t help yourself, as you picked up the instrument and started to play. Closing your eyes as you played, you started to sing along to the familiar tune.

At that moment, Mozart had walked past his beloved music room. He had stepped out for a moment, only to get himself a freshly brewed cup of hot chocolate before continuing to compose his newest piece. The second he heard the sound of an instrument coming from his beloved music room he sighed internally. He slammed open the door and froze in his tracts when he spotted you sitting on the floor in the corner of the room absorbed by the music you were producing. He had every intention of scolding you, but all that dissipated as the soft, soothing tones of your voice wash over him like a gentle ocean wave. He found himself calm and at peace for once in his life. 

Inspired by the tune you were singing, he sat down at the grand piano and started playing along. The second the first note of the piano echoed off the walls of the room you opened your eyes in shock, not realizing someone had come in midway through your song. You profusely apologized to the man and left before he could say anything.

For the rest of the day Mozart was stuck, he couldn’t get that song you were singing out of his head. He was starting to get frustrated as thoughts of you were plaguing his mind. That night he stormed up to your room, took you by the hand and guided you back to the music room where he handed you the ukulele, “Play.” His words were blunt and his violet eyes were sharp and determined. You stared up at the man in confusion as he sat down at the grand piano, waiting for you to start the song. You sighed sitting down next to him on the bench and softly started strumming the strings. Mozart couldn’t keep the faint smile from forming on his face at the sound of the perfect harmony and melody the two of you produced together. Since that night you were the only other person, other than Sebastian permitted to enter into the music room whenever you wanted.

Every day since, you would wander into the room as Mozart would play the soothing melodies. You loved to study while listening to music. So every day you would bring your books to the music room as Mozart played and just sit and read or write, as Mozart’s symphonies would echo in the background. Although the white-haired man would never admit it, he very much enjoyed your company. Unlike the rest of the residents, you were quiet and soft-spoken, and you didn’t irritate him like the rest of his housemates. 

Often during the afternoons, when Mozart would take a break from playing, he would walk over the corner of the room that you would occupy and just stare down at you. He would usually in his classical tsundere roundabout way, ask you if you wanted to grab lunch with him. You honestly had to smile at his clumsily blunt tone and the dust of pink that would grace his features.

The two of you would sit under the shade of a tree and chat for hours and hours about the most random of topics. You had quickly come to realize that the brutal way in which Mozart spoke, was just a front to cover up his true feelings. Thus you never minded the meaningless insults that he would occasionally throw your way. Cause they were just that meaningless. If anything, the way he would say them with that slight smile dancing across his lips, they were probably meant as his own type of endearments towards you.

Both of you cuties often get so absorbed in your daydreams that during your lunchtime picnic, that you can be found just staring into space. Mozart’s mind would be occupied with the latest songs that he would like to compose, and your mind would be drifting off, thinking about the latest topic that you have learned about or read. Its actually pretty hilarious, especially when the two of you are at the dinner table and Arthur is chatting away to the two of you, while both of you would be off in dreamland. It’s only when Arthur waves a hand in front of your eyes that both of you come back to reality. During these times, you and Mozart usually lock eyes and laugh, as it had become a somewhat, inside joke between the two of you.

You often flirted with the man, especially after the two of you had started to become friends. You loved the way his cheeks would get dusted in a light pink shade matching his eyes perfectly. And you can’t help but laugh whenever he stutters a little insult in response. Although don’t get me wrong, he is the only person who can give you small insult endearments. Anyone else who dare utter one bad thing about you, will face Mozart’s scorn. 

Like one time the two of you went to the bookshop to browse together, when some dodge man came up to you and started telling you that a woman shouldn’t be in a book shop and that the book you were holding was too advanced for you. Cue Mozart practically tearing apart the man with his sharp gaze. Mozart’s voice boomed in the bookshop like a crack of a whip, and by the time he was done giving the man a verbal smackdown, the dodgy fellow couldn’t leave the shop quick enough. 

Just then violet eyes met your dark brown ones, as Mozart gave you the most tender look and asked in a soft tone if you were okay. He could see the sadness in your eyes, and he knew even though you put up a tough front, you were also rather sensitive deep down. He gave you a tight hug and kissed your forehead as he told you not to ponder on the man’s hurtful words. “Mein Liebe, don’t let that man’s mindless babble bother you.” He then took you by the hand and lead you to a coffee shop where he bought the two of you some hot chocolate. And the two of you spent the rest of the afternoon chatting away.

It wasn’t clear exactly when you and Mozart transitioned from friendship into a relationship, but regardless you were the only person privileged enough to see this man’s soft side. And boy oh boy was his smile enough to make your heart melt. Mozart is actually a massive softie under his harsh words, and loves to shower you in affection. He knows you hate loud noises, so he is always sure to, take you the town route with the least amount of people and noises. And you best be sure he will be by your side to soothe you in a split second during any type of thunderstorms

He never knew just how much you hated loud noises like thunderstorms until one night. It was the dead of night, and the sky was littered with dark stormy clouds and flashes of lightning. You woke up abruptly to the loud rumble of thunder that followed a flash of light. You let out a loud squeak as you pulled your blanket over your head, in an attempt to block out the noise. By the second flash and roars of thunder, you were on your feet making your way to Mozart’s room. 

You gently pushed open the door, when yet another loud crack of thunder and lightning could be heard shaking the mansion’s walls. Mozart had no time to react, as all he heard was the patter of your bare feet on the wooden floor, and then the weight of a warm body diving onto his bed. He cracked open an eye and was shocked to see the expression of dread on your tear-stained face. He wasted no time at all in pulling you beneath the covers into his warm embrace and he pressed your face to his warm chest. He gently traced soothing circles on your back, while he tenderly sang you a soft lullaby to coax you into sleep. The noise of thunder and lightning faded into the background, as you focus on the feeling of Mozart’s fingertips dancing across your skin and his soft, soothing voice. 

Since then, at any sign of a storm, Mozart would be sure to drop everything and seek you out. He would usually wrap the two of you in a fluffy blankie, and he just holds you tight in his arms. Sometimes he would play the piano to soothe your anxiety, while other times he will just sing to you.

Mozart absolutely loves your sense of humour, and his stony features will always crack with a slither of a smile whenever you make a joke. Bonus points if you actually get him to laugh. He will legit huff out in laughter, while shyly hiding his face in the crook of your neck as you continue to crack hilarious jokes. Anyone privileged enough to see this rare scene unfolds is very lucky indeed, as Mozart’s smile and laughter is like the sun coming out after a very long stormy week. It is bright and filled with warmth, and reserved for your eyes only.

Even though you have a tendency to never really finish writing, Mozart will insist you show him any of the pieces that you do manage to complete. He loves the way your words flow on paper, and it down right inspires him to write a few songs to accompany your stories. He also beams with pride whenever you draw him a cute little scene on his sheet music. He will be sure to keep that page with your doodle safe for all eternity, cause he just loves them so much. 

The two of you cuties are the most affectionate couple around, behind closed doors of course as Mozart might just die from embarrassment if the two of you engage in any sort of PDA. He loves it when you sit beside him and rest your head on his shoulder as he plays you the newest ballad of his love. You are the love of his life, and he will spend every day of his existence loving you. He loves to give you cute little Eskimo and butterfly kisses whenever the two of you meet in the hallway.

You best be sure this man will spend every free moment he can get hugging and cuddling you. Often the two of you cuties will simply be spending a quiet afternoon in the music room together, nestled in each others arms while drinking a warm cup of hot chocolate, listening to the pitter patter of the rain outside. 

Other potential matches……………. Dazai

I hope you enjoyed this dear and I hope you have the best day. 🦋☀️❤

[kenzie-ann27]

My Obnoxiously Long Analysis of Danny Torrance and Richie Tozier

I have thought about this particular analysis for a while, and this has been a really fun thing to write, but at the same time, I feel like I am missing a large part of the story because I am struggling to figure out why? I know these characters are connected in some way, that part is obvious, but I am unsure of the significance. Why are these two characters so similar yet so different? This isn’t a case of the Stephen King self-insert where every male lead is an author but grew up in a weird place and lost a family member that causes him great distress even in his adult life (looking at you, Bill Denbrough and Gordie LaChance). The case of these two characters is different, as their personalities and lives are so different as to not have them be carbon-copies of each other, but at the same time they share so many traits and they have this connection that is interesting to me (though not as interesting anymore, thank you so much, Mike Flanagan).

First, I will talk about the gifs, since I think that’s probably the best place to begin. That quote by Dick Hallorann is so, so interesting to me because it directly relates back to It. Towards the end of the book, Richie recalls a very distinct moment when Bill killed a mosquito that was on the back of Richie’s neck, and he talks a bit about it and how bugs were often drawn to them (though he uses pheromones as an example). Leeches are also mentioned quite descriptively in It as well, them being Patrick Hockstetter’s fear and what kills him in the book. The other gifs are mainly a visual comparison, as I think that the way those two moments were carried out was pretty interesting. I was going to make another visual comparison with the weird cloudy eye effect that both films utilize very well, but that part in It: Chapter Two with Richie does make me pretty uncomfortable. In both movies, essentially, characters’ eyes get clouded over when they get into someone else’s head: Danny Torrance does this to Rose the Hat, while It does it to Richie.

To start off, both Richie and Danny grew up as only children in a family where they had close relationships with their parents despite them having a hard time understanding their children. They both felt closer to their mothers, as their fathers were often busy with work; both Maggie and Wendy seemed to ensure that Richie and Danny grew up with strong moral values, and both of the children were affected greatly when their mothers died. As children, they are forced into an environment where they deal with a supernatural evil, though they are not in any real danger unlike other characters until the end of the story (when Jack chases Danny and when Richie and the other Losers fight It for the first time); all other times, they mainly see things that make them aware of the danger that is present. Notice that with Richie, unlike the other Losers, is not physically affected by It really at any point. This is very different from how It works with the others because that danger is still there even after the event has passed. The blood in Beverly’s bathroom is still there even after she leaves and goes back. But with Richie, in the park, he is able to make the danger go away, he puts those glasses back on and everything goes back to normal (the others physically run away from the danger, but Richie is psychologically running away from it by telling himself it isn’t real). Anyway, this event stays with them long after they’ve grown up and moved far away from the place where the trauma occurred: Richie moved from Maine to California (Chicago in the film) while Danny moved from Colorado to Florida (later to New Hampshire). They then, turn to drugs and/or alcohol, which is said in Doctor Sleep to sort of repress the ability to shine and keep those negative past memories at bay; Richie seems to lean more towards drugs than alcohol, and vice versa for Danny. When they are 40, they are drawn back to the place where they were mainly abused as children and are able to use their abilities to destroy the evil thing finally before returning back home to their pets and their co-workers that they have weirdly close relationships with and all is good. That's essentially their main stories, but I'm also going to talk about a few specific connections that I think are cool to see.

Both Danny and Richie use their hands as the main source of their shining abilities. This is not obvious with Richie in the movie, but it is for Danny with him and Tony. However! In the book, Richie's main goal in life as a child is to become- of all things- a ventriloquist. You know, a person that uses their hands a lot like how Danny does to make it look like Tony is more than just a voice. Speaking of voices, that's Richie's main thing. Who is to say all those voices aren't like Tony in that they're a personification of the shining? (more on this below) This is also a connection between the two because neither of them is particularly good at doing voices, they essentially still just sound like themselves; this doesn't mean that those voices don't represent other people, though, even if they do come out of Danny's and Richie's mouths. The whole hands thing also works for the other members of the Losers Club, with each of the Losers relying on their hands for their jobs, just like Danny, who, in Doctor Sleep, is mentioned as being a janitor before becoming an orderly at a hospice (I would classify him more as an unregistered nurse, as he does say he’s had medical training). Hands and arms in general play huge roles in these two stories, which I think sort of puts the nail in the coffin of this argument. As a child, Danny Torrance gets his arm broken by his father, which is the moment when he starts talking to his imaginary friend/personification of the shining, Tony. While nothing huge happens to Richie’s arms in the book or movie, I would go as far to say (I am aware this goes off-topic, but bear with me here) that in the hierarchy of who shines the brightest of the Losers, Eddie is up there since not only does he get his arm broken twice in the book, it’s also what causes him to die because he gets his good arm bitten off and he bleeds to death. Eddie in his final moments is so strange to me, and I think the reason why that is is that he physically cannot shine. His only arm left is broken. Of course, It would want to take that away from him because it’s aware that Eddie has the ability to kill it.

Both Danny and Richie rely on the guidance of an old (dead) friend to keep them on the correct path. For Danny, this is Dick Hallorann, as he appears in Doctor Sleep to guide Danny to return back to the hotel. For Richie, this is Stanley, as a memory of Stan keeps Richie from going back home.

Both Danny and Richie are able to form a connection with the dead/dying. For Richie, he's mostly connected to those who have already died, while Danny seems to help more with people who are dying. I mostly noticed this in It after realizing the voices of people (rather than original characters) Richie seems to do more often- Humphrey Bogart, James Dean, and Pancho Vanilla (based on Pancho Villa, the Mexican general)- are all people who have died before 1958. I like to imagine that this is just Richie flexing with his shining ability and him being able to form those connections with those people by taking their voices and making them his own. Notice that in the book, “voices” is usually capitalized, as if it represents something a lot more important than just a kid doing an impression.

Both Danny and Richie have confusing relationships with others, specifically their bosses. This is more a personal thing rather than a fact, but I have realized that these characters do have rather strange relationships with others. With Danny, he meets Billy after taking a bus to New Hampshire, and Billy gives him a job and a place to stay. They become fast friends, though I mainly attribute this to their shared ability to shine (yes, of course, I’m going to mention that Danny often sings along to YMCA while working). Danny eventually tells Billy about what’s going on with the missing kids, and Billy is just unusually calm with the situation and agrees to go with him to Idaho to find Bradley’s glove. With Richie, however, I would say the strange coworker comes in the form of Steve, who is his manager in both the book and the movie. Obviously, if you have never been to my blog before, I really like Steve. He’s a fun character to look at not only because of the way he interacts with Richie but because I am willing to bet that that’s who Richie ends up with (at least, in the movie, since that was the plan in the 2010 script). Like Danny with Billy, Richie wants to tell Steve about the crazy stuff that’s happening, if he remembered what happened at all. I know this isn’t really a good explanation for the comparison between Danny and Richie, but I feel like their relationships with Billy and Steve are just really interesting and something that stuck out to me in the books and the movies.

Of course, now, I feel like I need to justify all of this. I need to come up with some reason why these two characters are connected and why I felt the need to write all of this garbage. And for the longest time, I didn’t know why. I didn’t know why these two characters stick out so much in this universe.

And then I rewatched It: Chapter Two.

Richie sticks out the most in that movie because of the way he acts is so different from the others. He feels distant, almost. From the minute I see him on screen I am able to look at him and say “that’s Richie”, but at the same time he feels so different to me, as someone who has looked at this character for a long time to try and dissect him. In his opening scene, for one, unlike all of the others, Richie gets a moment on stage where he stares out blankly and he hears these voices, memories from his past (I don’t remember the exact things they said, but essentially they were the voices of himself, Stanley, Eddie, and Henry). That sticks out to me so much because he is the only character that that happens to, even after he drank a glass of bourbon like a minute beforehand (of course, this also can sort of be explained as the shining is dulled by alcohol, not always taken away completely). To be honest, all of the Losers tend to turn to alcohol when faced with stressful memories throughout the movie. But it wasn’t until later that I realized that Richie was seen differently by the Losers. In the Neibolt House, I feel like the Losers tend to somewhat overreact when it comes to Richie after being attacked by the spider-Stanley (like… when Eddie broke his arm, most of them were focused more on Pennywise rather than helping Eddie). And later after Eddie got stabbed, he looks to Richie as if Richie is going to help him.

This goes back to my hierarchy statement before, but essentially, what I’m getting at is that Richie shines the most. Like… Danny Torrance levels of shine. That’s why they are connected. It’s shown in Doctor Sleep that those who shine the most tend to connect to each other, so who’s to say that Danny didn’t know about Richie? In my hierarchy, by the way, I would say that the order of who shines the most would be: Richie, Stanley, Eddie, Beverly, Bill, Mike, and then Ben. Of course, this would bring up the issue of “if Richie shined the most, then why didn’t the Turtle talk to him instead of Bill?”, and that can just simply be put down to the fact that Bill is the leader. That came to be not because of his shining, but rather simply because of the way he looked; the other Losers (I believe it was either Eddie or Richie) mention that they look up to Bill, mainly because he is taller and stronger and more handsome. Why would the Turtle go to Richie for help with this when Richie has been running away from himself his whole life? Bill was the logical reason because he could lead them in a way that Richie never did.

Overall, I feel like both Richie and Danny have these super similar qualities that are hard to ignore. I love both of these characters, so writing this long piece of garbage was a lot of fun. It was also fun to rewatch these movies and see that there is just this big connection that is there for fans of the books, so I am dying to see where it goes. It feels like they are waiting for The Dark Tower to bring them together with the mentions of the Turtle and Ka and space and all of that, but I feel like a whole new story would be really interesting as well. Plus, you know, I am dying to see a teenaged Abra trying to explain to shining to Richie.

[destiny-smasher]

(Music by Samantha Pena, soudncloud user spena1989) Not gonna lie, I'm at a point with All Wounds where I'm like...oof, I wasn't able to envision everything I wanted to a few years back (by a long shot) but I'm kinda...wanting to be done with it. Even though I don't want to be done with it. 😅All Wounds was created from the get-go to be a visual novel - that's why the initial demo released so early into the project's life. My original intent was to go back and forth between fic and VN. But my original intent was also to end the story during the Portland road trip (Chapter 7). And while you could certainly make a case that the story is technically stronger up until that point, and becomes less potent and more dragged out for it's post-time-skip stuff, the latter stuff was also just...a lot more fun to write. And when I look back, if I had committed to the visual novel as intended, we'd not have gotten, like, ANY of that post-time-skip stuff, which includes Other Max being as fully fleshed out as she became. She'd have been stuck being a ghost in Max's head, pretty much. At this point, though, it's been so long, the fic I made INSTEAD of working on the visual novel is SO long, interest in the project peaked back while it was being written, working on this by myself is DAMN exhausting in terms of time spent, emotion and mentality drained, etc. Whenever I go back and listen to all of the amazing music made by people in the LiS it reinspires me to keep working on All Wounds but that's had diminishing returns as my life has changed drastically this past year. I love Max and Chloe. But, tbh, I just moved to a new country and got married, and I love my wife more than Max and Chloe? ^_^;; I’m not depressed and stuck in retail hell anymore, relying on staying up late working on a LiS fan project to channel that depression. I don't wanna completely shut the door on the visual novel and there's a chance I may still try to keep pushing to at least get to that road trip and maybe fudge it a bit. After all, a LOT of work has been done to the project that isn’t apparently or accessible in the public version; and I was able to add pretty well presented versions of Chapters 3 and 4 recently. So it’s entirely possible I could at least push it a little bit further if I end up inspired to do so. Either way, regardless, I still want to try some kind of epilogue, end-cap, etc, maybe even in VN form (Jenny and I had envisioned an epilogue where the characters play DnD). Max and Chloe mean the world to me, and exploring a version of events where both endings of the original game are expanded and tied together felt very cathartic. I'd rather that exist in SOME form (fic) than none at all; I think I'd still have done things this way a second time. But All Wounds inherently was a story about processing pain and grief and trauma and figuring out how to cope with it and heal and move on. And when I was at such low points, that made sense to write and steep myself in. But now? It just kinda doesn't. More than anything, though, is the fact that it's still a fan project - one that has had a lot of its interest evaporated for multiple reasons. The game’s ending is over four years old now; a prequel AND a sequel have both come out, further fragmenting the fandom; people have moved on. And it’s easy for outsiders to not realize how emotionally exhausting and sometimes painful All Wounds was, has been, and can still be for me to work on. Even things like pieces of music or art made by people who hurt me, who I hurt, that shit isn’t easy to work with. I could be spending all of this effort and energy on something less emotionally painful that isn't complete in ANY form AND is original. It feels bad to seriously consider dropping it when I'm sure there are still SOME people out there waiting for it, but I have other stories that I really need to work on. I can't keep myself locked in this cage forever when the work is such an unreasonable mountain to surpass. What I HAVE created is a fleshed out and substantial story and a chunk of it imagined in VN format which all kind of acts as a love letter to PriceField as well as an ultimately cathartic way to leave that original game to rest, I hope. Going forward I really think I'd like for Arcadian Rhythms to function as my one sole fanfic project I do inbetween original works, with one-shots or other bits (like the Butterfly Soup fic) just being other, far less intensive ways of working out those kinds of inspiration. It would probably do me better to also not talk about what I'm working on (aside from AR I suppose) in much depth or detail until I have something finished to really show for it. 😓 So if you want to see what I’ve been able to make of the visual novel so far, you can find that here.If you want to read the prose fic version of the story, which was finished quite some time ago (and which is where I want to update with an epilogue eventually), you can find that here. My newer fandom project, Arcadian Rhythms, which actually does feature Life is Strange characters, can be checked out here. You can follow our Patreon over here - we’ve been on hiatus as we deal with immigration but that should be all sorted soon. Regardless, any major updates to projects will be getting posted there once we’re back up and running. And you can follow me on Twitter over here; or just check back on my personal Tumblr here as I’m sure any meaningful thing I complete, fanfic or otherwise, will get posted here. So to clarify, current creative plans for the future on my own time: - original fiction projects (I’ve actually started work on an original VN for ex.) - Arcadian Rhythms for fun - some kind of epilogue for All Wounds - some kind of conclusion to Runners at the Corners (Butterfly Soup)

Interest in AW severely declined after the fic was done, no one else seems interested in working on it, either, it'd be SO MUCH work still. Sunken cost fallacy is a thing and tbh that’s part of why I even pushed myself to finish the update I did a few weeks ago. I am sorry to anyone who’s been waiting all this time for it - what I managed to produce is still a multi-hour visual novel, and I am still contemplating trying to at least get it to the end of the pre-time-skip. At the very least, there is still a complete story that can be read in fic form, the project just floated up and away from a reasonable grasp for one person, mainly because I just...wrote way more than I originally intended to. When I started work on this prokect, I also didn’t expect to fall in love, struggle to make ends meet, move across an ocean, and get married. And as important as All Wounds has been to me, I did at least finish telling the story I started, and the story it became, but I’ve learned all I can from it at this point and am so tired of trying to drag it out on my own. In the same way All Wounds sees Max and Chloe needing to accept their losses and let themselves move forward despite not everything going how they wanted, I guess I have to do the same with this project. Max and Chloe start a new future together, and it’s that time in my life where I probably should start doing the same. I need to start focusing on telling my own stories with my own characters more than I have been, as well as making more space for this new future with my new wife. And to All Wounds, the most difficult project I’ve worked on to date, as someone I once knew once sang, "I know, I know I made so many promises I know I left you such a mess; Gotta let go, gotta let go, and move on Been walking in a circle for too long"

And as another musician put it,

“Come and see the light of day out in the open It’s like I’m waking from a dream, oh Many days since I have seen the end unfolded Many times that I’ve looked back on all the times that we have had”