#same with digital textbooks for school

[uchispeach]

Killer

Dark! Bully! Rafe Cameron x Fem! Reader

Warnings: NON CON, SMUT, rough sex, manhandling & degradation, choking, breeding kink, bullying, violent & abusive behavior, Mean! Rafe, Bully! Rafe…

A/N: Sorry for disappearing, I’ve just had a shit ton of family problems. I hope I can update a bit faster from now on! ALSO lmk if you want this to become a series! 💕

A laugh, dripping with mockery, echoed through the vast room, sparking a ripple of chuckles and whispered insults from the nearby group of boys.

Rafe Cameron’s body stretched lazily in the chair, making it seem almost comically small under his heavy frame. Even with his limbs sprawled out in complete relaxation, the outline of his hard muscles pressed against his shirt, as if daring to break free at any moment. You couldn't deny he looked attractive, exuding an undeniable magnetism in that confident, almost predatory pose, his new buzz cut only amplifying the arrogance that oozed from him. But that ugly, smug smirk? It made your bones ache and your throat dry up in ways you couldn’t explain.

His eyes, the color of storm clouds, lingered on yours with a deliberate intensity, delighting in your discomfort, relishing in every flinch and subtle shift of your gaze. You turned away, hoping your disinterest would bore him eventually, but you knew it wouldn’t.

No matter how hard you focused on the lecture, his presence was like an intrusive, constant drill on your brain—his burning gaze a distraction that gnawed at your senses. How naive had you been to think he'd ever leave you alone? Every time you raised your hand in class, you could count on him to whisper some stupid joke under his breath. How foolish had you been to think he would ever stop tormenting you? This sick dynamic between you two had been a game since childhood, and if anything, he seemed to thrive on it.

His once-small fingers had grown long and strong -now covered in silver rings. Those same digits that used to tangle on your hair and pull from it until your scalp burned in pain. His legs were now far longer, but they had always been longer than yours, outpacing you as they chased you through the school halls in all infant and adolescent years, always with the aim of making you stumble and fall to your knees. But his mouth had never changed. It had only sharpened, evolving into something far more dangerous.

You’d convinced yourself you were above all of it. Charleston had felt like a fresh start, and you’d thought the Pogue curse might finally be something you could outrun. But when Rafe Cameron showed up once more, everything you’d built: your confidence, your peace of mind—began to crumble, piece by piece, until there was nothing left but the raw, unresolved tension between you.

You were studying to be a teacher, the first in your family to receive a scholarship that promised a brighter future. Your days were filled with lesson plans, textbooks, and the weight of academic expectation. Every second of your time was accounted for as you worked tirelessly to carve out a new path for yourself, one that didn't involve being brought back to the past or the memories of him. You didn’t have time for distractions, certainly not for him. But here he was, always lurking just at the edges of your life, a dark cloud you couldn’t escape.

Rafe was studying for an MBA, the complete opposite of you, and yet fate had forced you into a shared class. You would’ve done anything to avoid him, but trapped in between those fours walls, mere meters away from him - it just seemed impossible.

And there he was, at your left, staring with a look of sick pleasure every time he found you trying to focus. His presence was suffocating, like the air itself became dense with his attention. His words, the snide remarks whispered under his breath, were like a weight on your chest, making every breath harder to take.

He harassed you constantly in that class—every. single. time. Without fail. No matter how much you tried to bury yourself in your notes, no matter how hard you tried to ignore his mocking chuckles, his eyes always found you, always zeroed in on your every move. He’d challenge you with pointless questions, make stupid comments about your work, his voice dripping with condescension. But it didn’t stop there. His reach extended beyond the classroom, following you into the hallways, his tall frame casting a shadow that would make your stomach turn. He would appear out of nowhere, as though drawn to you by some sick fixation, and make his presence known with a smirk or a taunt, forcing you to look up from your books, to meet those stormy eyes full of wickedness.

He would ‘accidentally’ bump into you, making your school supplies fall over. He licked his lower lip when you bent over to pick the mess up. His front would get dangerously close to your back in any queue, sometimes getting bold enough to grind slightly against you. He would move you around like a rag doll, always putting his huge palm on your ass to push you to the side. Still, there was nothing as uncomfortable as having his dirty eyes scanning you from head to toe at any given time - he licked his lower lip in amusement, making your cheeks grow hotter.

You’d always hoped, prayed, that once the class ended, he’d disappear—vanish into his own world and leave you to yours. But you were wrong. Every time the teacher dismissed you, and you gathered your things to leave, he’d be right there, waiting. It was like clockwork. His long, strong fingers would slide into the pockets of navy trousers, the scent of his manly cologne wafting over you in an intoxicating way. His gaze would follow you as you tried to make a clumsy exit, his footsteps closing the distance between you with every passing second. You hated that you could never outrun him. Hated how he always found a way to corner you.

And just as you thought you might make it out of the door, safe, free—he’d appear at the threshold, standing in your way with that damn smirk of his, a look that seemed to promise nothing but trouble.

“Leaving so soon?” His voice would slither through the air like poison.

Your heart would pound in your chest, but you’d force your eyes to look anywhere but at him, hoping and praying, that maybe, just maybe, today would be the day he’d leave you alone. But you knew better. You always knew better.

And now, you could feel it again; the familiar pressure of his presence, creeping closer, dark and inevitable.

“What’s that I’ve heard?” He scratched his head while pressing his brows together, pretending to be deep in thought. “…Oh, right” Now, enlightened; he stepped forward. Your almost wobbly legs did their best on distancing themselves -though, they weren’t allowed much movement after hitting a desk.

The back of your knees stung against the protruding piece of wood. “You tryna leave…study abroad, right?” Your eyes peeled in horror, and you hid in yourself as much as you could when his tall frame overpowered yours. “No, no. Look me right in the eye.” He clicked his tongue in disapproval. Without any hesitation, his cold rings found their place under your chin, burying in your skin when lifting up your face. “How-how do you know?” Your stuttering made him smile -predatory grin adorning his harsh features. “Everyone thinks you’re smart…” The pain on your neck amplified at the uncomfortable position.

“…But I think you’re just a dumb bitch.” He spat at you. Tone as rough as the domineering grip on your jaw. “…Bragging left and right - you really thought I wouldn’t find out?” He shook you with erratic movement. The pain you felt under his digits distracted you from a perverted knee slowly opening its way between your legs.

His unruly eyes took a break from tormenting yours as he admired your skirt’s fabric draping over your thighs. The blond snob flashed you his hungry canines while biting into his lower lip.

The horror only amplified when a sharp thrust attacked your clothed sex. His impatient knee continued to roughly rub against the cotton underwear, cruelty reflected on the fast pace. “Ha. Would you look at that? The dirty slut is getting wet!” You whined in disgust when Rafe pressed harder on the soaked circle.

The scarce dignity you thought you held was harshly stripped from you. On his arms you were nothing but a squeaky toy he got to bite and squeeze whenever he desired, and little by little you felt victim to a raw resignation.

The next thing you sensed was his palm abandoning your neck and moving onto your meaty thighs. He gave the flesh a squeeze, followed by a lusty groan leaving his pinkish lips.

Your mind tried to wander away, but the situation was just too much; too much stimulation everywhere, too much heat coming from his larger body, too much degradation directed your way in mean words and touches, too much torturous pressure applied to your virgin cunt and too much pawing at your unexplored parts.

The next thing your brain registered was a rip. The sound of something being torn apart, and if you didn’t see the light fabric pooling around your feet, you could’ve almost swear it was the noise your spirit made when breaking in half. “And I was thinking about making it nice for you…fucking you on a bed of roses or some corny shit.” He talked with nothing but mockery, while leaning onto your chest. “But I guess you prefer it when I treat you like a cheap whore.” The Cameron boy finished it off with a chuckle, his muscles flexing hard under the rumbling laugh.

You wanted to contradict him, defend your honor and pull him off of you, but all protests got stuck in your throat when he took you by it and slammed your upper body against the desk. The rigid wood wasn’t welcoming. Your head spinned uncontrollably at the beast-like hit.

The lack of oxygen didn’t stop you from hearing him unbuckling his pants. Panic grew louder as you heard his clothes falling to the Classroom’s floor. Worries clouded you in a tumultuous storm, and you did your best to cover yourself up when the only layer covering your vulnerable hole was pushed to the side. “Open your fucking legs or I’ll break your useless skull!” He demanded in a crazied tone, ripping your limbs apart and throwing them over his shoulders.

“Please, don’t.” Your eyelids squeezed together, shielding your irises from looking at the violating scene. “That’s right, beg me” Warm breath imposed itself above your slit, followed by a warmer liquid dripping down your folds. “Gotta make it wetter…I don’t want you breaking at the first use.” Even though your sight was all black, you could imagine his satisfied grin decorating that diabolically handsome face.

You tried pulling away when a foreign limb rubbed against your sex, desperate to be let in. “Rafe, no-” You were cut short by your own screams, eyes peeled open at the feeling of his cock entering all at once.

“Fuck! Tight ass pussy.” He sounded in heaven, palms manhandling your knees to your chest while pounding ruthlessly into you.

The rest of your body went numb, being rocked up and down at the bestiality of the boy’s attack. His groans and moans overpowered your miserable sobs. Your withering form contrasted his blessed expressions, pure passion exuding from his now sweaty body.

“Your whorish cunt is squeezing the shit out of me…she doesn’t want me to leave!” He continued to talk while creating some deeply loud wet noises.

Your neck and waist’s skin burned under his cutting rings and the unsolicited friction of his grip that kept you still. Your ears got lost at the multiple pet names he called you, as well as the dirty sentences of encouragement he occasionally threw your way.

After almost an hour of feeling him impale you on his dick, you grew tired of screaming and crying, now reduced to quiet whimpers and even quieter pleas. “Stop-” He did the opposite to that, toned pelvis slapping hard against you as his tip bruised your cervix in persistent thrusts.

The cries that left your esophagus were now primal and raw, long nails holding onto his huge back. “That’s right, cry for me. You fucking deserve it!” That only made the tears fall faster down your cheeks, reaching your mouth on a salty taste.

And when his movements finally went sloppy and his member felt softer, your suffering only sharpened. “Tell me you love me” He barked at your face, drops of unintentional spit hitting your distressed face.

You thought you heard wrong, that between his chocking, and suffocating weight your brain had imagined the unimaginable. “Tell me you love me!” His features tensed, making a vein pop on his front.

Was Rafe Cameron asking for words of affirmation from you? Was the same guy who just butchered your purity asking you for your heart? Or was it just another inhumane prank? Another limit of yours he wanted to cross?

Clearly you took to much time thinking and not acting because the next thing you felt was the blond burying impossibly deeper into your core and making you know a new level of uncomfortability. “Tell me you fucking love or I’ll come inside you.” The light on the room was vast, you were sure of it. Such an elite university could only have the best illumination for its elitist students; still, his burly body completely covered yours.

His sharp jaw and eyes were enhanced by the darkness found in his stare. “I-” He trembled lightly in excitement at your shaky voice. “I love you.” You finally decreed, unknowingly sealing your fate.

His smile was like nothing you saw before, too devilish and twisted you actually doubted smiling was ever a nice gesture. And when you felt a dense liquid flooding your womb in overwhelming warmth, you swore you could see the devil in his eyes.

.

.

.

[notjustjavierpena]

Applied Physics pt. ii

Main Masterpost | Support a disabled creator

A/N: Long awaited… Hope you enjoy :)

Summary: Days later, you’re back but this time in Dr. Richards’ office with your assignment. It’s time to set up some ground rules.

Pairing: Reed Richards x f!reader/you (no y/n)

Tags: College student/teacher relationship, female masturbation, description of bruising,  dom/sub dynamics and arrangements, rewards and punishments, Reed has powers, clit stim, fingering, edging, 60s views, praise kink, dirty talking, orgasm denial, orgasm control, humiliation, multiple limbs, aftercare, stern Reed giving homework 🥵

Word count: 8.8k

Link to this work on AO3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/62948440/chapters/164546746

Applied Physics pt. ii

That Wednesday, you barely make it in through the front door to the shared housing before you excuse yourself to your housemates who look bewildered at the clear signs that you have been rushing home. 

“Hi! Goodbye! Lots of reading!” You grin with rapid breathing from practically running through the city. You stumble up the stairs to the second floor with your bag knocking into your hip as you bounce up the steps, cruelly reminding you of Reed’s work that is splayed all over your backside. You pass the bathroom, the three more rooms, and finally reach your destination. 

Your head is swimming with unreleased pressure between your thighs as you lock the door to your room, fingers shaking when you turn the key and the lock clicks. You almost frantically sling your school bag onto the floor by the door, wincing when your skirt tightens as the bag pulls on it. The textbook you have cried into earlier peeks out as the bag falls open when it hits the floor. 

Your shirt comes off first and then your skirt too until you stand in only your underwear with the blinds rolled down. You had planned to get straight to business and use the first of the three orgasms you have been allowed - after all, there’s no use in pretending you will get any studying done tonight - but to get to your bed, you must pass by the full body mirror. 

It is the color that catches your eye at first, a reddish-purple, deeper in some areas, taking up a large part of your behind. On your sore right cheek is an almost cartoonish mark of Reed’s hand, outlined enough for you to be able to count his fingers and you shiver at the sheer size of his palm. It isn’t that you haven’t noticed how big it is before, like when he has held a piece of chalk in his hand or corrected things on paper with a pen, but you have never been this close to the fantasy of feeling those thick digits inside of you coming true. 

With a clench of your cunt at the fantasy hitting you once more, you gush slightly and the wetness between your thighs becomes even greater along with the ache for release. It doesn’t help that you trail your fingertips over the sensitive skin and that you gasp at the pain that instantly comes at even the lightest of touches. It makes you wonder how Reed’s rougher and larger hands had made it hurt less. 

You twist your body slightly in the mirror to gain a better view of your bruising, and the thought hits you that Reed Richards, the sharpest mind in the world, has done this to mark you as his own. It is going to take at least a few good weeks before everything has healed and that is two weeks where you cannot give yourself to someone else. 

You hold in a pathetic whimper and exhale silently through your nose instead, your shameful horniness for someone you shouldn’t want passing the mark where it has become unbearable. You face your reflection again, trying to picture him standing behind you in the mirror with a knowing smile. 

Slowly, you reach up to smooth a hand - in your head, his hand - over your neck until you elicit a sigh. Then you let the same hand slide down the curve of your waist, keeping eye contact with yourself the whole time. Your fingertips dance over your bare skin, leaving goosebumps in their wake until they stop right above the waistband of your panties. Without thinking too much about it, you dip the hand into your underwear. 

Your cunt is soaked for him. You barely need to gather any slick to smear over your hard clit because you’re already so worked up from Reed’s attention today, and the thoughts they have left you with, that you’re damp and ready to imagine him getting you off. You bite your lip to keep quiet, rubbing your clit in taut circles and staring at the way your hand moves underneath the fabric of your panties. You touch yourself with little to no build-up because you need it now, and fuck, it feels so good that you can’t stand on your legs.

You sink to the floor, sitting with your back against the bed, and try to mask the hiss of pain from resting on the bruises with a cough due to the paper-thin walls. You want to cry out as the pain mixes with the pleasure you are giving yourself but you will yourself to stay near-silent. 

In your head, he is the one touching you. You may be home but your mind is still in the lecture hall, bent over Reed Richards’ desk who has his pupils blown wide by desire and his cock buried in you to the hilt this time. The mental image makes your cunt squeeze around nothing, and you spread your legs a little to chase your first high. You get so close so pathetically quickly. 

And you come so hard a moment later, fingertips moving erratically in your underwear and with a hand around your breast, squeezing harshly to match Reed’s roughness. It is so intense that you can’t stop the moan that rips from your throat, hoping you can brush it off later by saying you stubbed your toe. The way your cunt pulses and spasms with ecstasy seems never-ending, leaving you a twitching mess on the floor as you double over, hips thrusting and your trembling touch continuing throughout the whole thing. 

And it is still not enough. 

You lay your head back on the bed until you can stare up at the ceiling, panting in the aftermath. However, you are so wired that your pulse doesn’t stop racing in your chest. Apparently, there’s no relief from the spell he has you under.

You turn onto your hands and knees to crawl onto your bed, dragging your sensitive body up from the floor with a soft whine. On your unmade bed, you lay down on your back and close your eyes to try and let sleep overtake you. Yet what shouldn’t happen happens almost automatically; your hand slipping down into your, by-now, ruined underwear once more. You cannot stop the painful thought that you only have two more to go. 

—

It feels like weeks have passed instead of days when Monday finally comes around. You’d only lasted the night, had touched your swollen, needy clit to orgasm three times before midnight even if your body begged for more. Then you had used the whole weekend to throw yourself into working on your missing assignment as a way to steer clear of the burning desire he’d left behind in you.

The finished paper is in fact your best work yet, your need for distraction making you highly productive. It is meticulously researched - even if it was hard to stay disciplined while sitting with the textbook in your lap - and perfectly executed, every word carefully chosen, written in your neatest handwriting, the ink dried and pages stapled together, not a single smudge to be found. He will read it and you will be on his mind. 

You walk down the corridors of the main building with determination and in a look very different from the one that you had worn on the fate-changing Wednesday last week. The restrictive pencil skirt has been replaced by a checkered miniskirt, deliberately flirty and resembling something Twiggy would wear, the pleated fabric swishing loosely - as commanded by him - around your thighs. The cardigan is now a crisp white turtleneck that makes your neck appear longer, hopefully intriguing him to get to it now as it is hidden from view. 

If Reed knew your wardrobe as well as he does the mechanics of the universe, he’d know that it is you who is approaching his office because of the way your boots click on the marble flooring. The sound follows you as you pass other students, making a few of your male classmates turn their heads and successfully masking the nervous flutter that is taking up your whole body. 

To deal with your racing heartbeat as you approach the correct door, you busy yourself by adjusting your bag onto the front of your hip. You take out your paper as a way of beating him to asking for it, clutching it close to your chest with both hands. 

Reed Richards’ office is on the first floor of Columbia University. He has one of the largest ones on campus with the head of faculty being the only exception. The door is ajar to signal the beginning of office hours. With a steadying breath, you gently push it open with your shoulder before closing it behind you with the heel of your boot. 

You’ve been here before but as you enter his office, the things that are the same look brand new. The office sports the same wooden panels along the walls, the same orange upholstered chairs, the same bookshelves that carry binders with hurriedly scribbled labels on them and thick textbooks filled with theories you barely understand yet. They shouldn’t feel different, but they do, a symptom of how you have changed.

If you think about it, it makes sense to meet now; the rhythm of campus life is still slow so early in the morning with little to no one walking through the halls. Many professors do office hours now, so no one will think twice about you being here and everyone else is already busy talking about upcoming coursework projects in quiet, tired voices while getting coffee.

As you approach the desk, you notice that the window is open. Dr. Richards has decided to enjoy fresh air and natural light from the green areas just outside his window, and with how heightened your senses are in his presence, you can hear the faint rustling of the trees and a few distant murmurs. 

Reed sits in his chair behind the desk, its sleek design matching the ones on the opposite side of the table but with a higher back that radiates authority. His expression is unreadable, his fountain pen moving confidently even as he scrawls a hurried note across another student’s paper, but there’s something knowing in the way his posture shifts just a little the second you step into his office. He knows it is you.

He finally looks up and you can feel your heartbeat everywhere, his gaze spreading fire across your skin like his hand had last week. It feels like he is all-knowing, like he already knows how many times you came this weekend and the exact way you whined when you had to stop at three. 

“You have something for me,” he notes, his gaze dropping only briefly to the paper in your hands.

“Yes,” you step forward to stand with the edge of his desk just an inch from grazing your thighs. You hold out your work for him but he doesn’t take it immediately, deliberately toying with you. 

“Is it your best work yet, like I asked?” He questions with a small smile, smug as ever but hiding it well. 

“Yes, sir, of course,” you reply without hesitation in case he’ll reject the whole thing. It feels like something he would do. 

“Place it on my desk,” he orders neutrally and sets the other essay aside without knocking the papers into his ashtray. 

It feels shameful to do it when you have been offering it to him, the papers hanging in the air awkwardly. Your face is warm as you turn the pages in your hand so they are the right way to him, and then you place them neatly in the center of the desk. 

You swallow as you feel the wood underneath your fingers, a completely different material to the one he was sitting by last week. It makes you wonder how different it would feel to be bent over this table instead. 

He picks it up and flips through the pages for a moment, back and forth and with an occasional hum that you cannot decipher. You almost expect him to have immediate feedback from how easy it looks to him. Suddenly, unprovoked and without looking up, he talks again, “And you’ve been a good girl?”

Your stomach flips. Yes, and it has been torture, “Yes, sir.”

“All three?” His eyes scan the text in front of him. It could be all for show but knowing his reputation, and from what you have seen during his lectures, his mind is effortlessly multitasking. 

You forget how to breathe for just a second too long and he looks up at you with a raised brow. You quickly nod, head swimming with the heat pooling in your belly.

“And no more?” He interrogates, painfully in control of the room. 

You shake your head, “No more.”

“Attagirl,” the praise falls from his mouth so effortlessly that your inability to show restraint and stand still is embarrassing. He swivels his chair so it is slightly angled away from the table, “Come here.”

The command makes you shiver, your body remembering just as well as your head what happened the last time he said those words. Though this time, they’ve got a different ring to them; they are still an order but there’s a softness to them, like telling a nervous animal there’s nothing to be scared of. At least, you hope there’s nothing. 

You walk around the table to stand in front of him, heat thrumming through you with every heartbeat. He sits further back into the chair and spreads his thighs, acting so much calmer and more collected than you. You hesitate for only a second before you step closer until you have his knees on either side, relieved to not be scolded for it. 

“Turn around,” he says instead of praising your work over the weekend. 

You swallow thickly but do as you are told, hoping that you are hiding the panic on your face somewhat successfully. 

Reed’s hand starts tugging at the hem of your skirt, neatly pulling it up until your underwear is exposed. His hand settles on your hip to keep it from falling down again and then his other hand slips into the back of your underwear. He feels the pain he’d left behind last week, tracing over the remainder of a minor bruise and then the large one that you still wince at when sitting down. 

“Still tender? Sore?” He asks and you notice his breath is slightly ragged. He likes this. 

“Yes,” you answer. 

“Good. Very good,” the hand in your panties draws back. He gently smooths it over the worst of the bruises and then delivers a soft smack to it that makes you gasp audibly, “And you are wearing what I told you.”

He caresses your backside on top of your skirt when it tumbles down into place, his fingers absentmindedly moving between the pleats in the fabric, “I assume that means you’re eager to continue your lessons.”

“Y-yes, sir,” you try to recover from the tiny blow to your bottom, “Very eager.”

“Suppose I should reward you for following instructions then,” he muses. His hand snakes between your thighs until his fingers rest against your clit. He finds that your underwear is damp underneath his touch, and the discovery makes him exhale sharply through his nose, “Already?”

“Mhm, since I stepped foot on campus,” you bite your lip and push back against his hand, seeking more after five days of abstinence but it draws away, leaving you aching and him with a shine on his fingertips.

"You’re still impatient. Your generation lacks discipline, always just wants more," he tuts softly, disapprovingly, while you make a noise of frustration. You’re just about to beg when he interrupts you as if he has read your mind, “Saying please won’t get you anywhere.”

You swallow down the word and stand up a little straighter. At one point, the idea that you might be in over your head flashes in your mind but then he speaks softly behind you. 

“Come back to me, angel,” he says and you melt at the way the pet name rolls off his tongue. You pivot back to face him, at this point even affected by the way your thighs rub together as you move. 

He has leaned even further back into his chair and is currently rolling up his sleeve to his elbow. The shine of your slick on his fingers is gone but in your inexperience with this level of depravity, you can’t imagine how he has sucked his fingers clean while your back was turned. 

“I think we should start by laying down some ground rules,” he informs you when moving to roll up the other sleeve. He looks up at you when he has secured it above his elbow, “But before we begin, tell me, how many men have you been with, if any?”

Something about the invasive question makes your stomach do a somersault. You know he is asking for a number but your instincts tell you that there’s more to it than that. He is gathering data, putting you under scrutiny, and cataloging each detail in his meticulous mind so as to figure out how exactly to handle you. The number itself, yet also the way it falls from your lips, will determine something you aren’t sure you really understand or even know what is but you have never felt so eager to please, to get it right. 

What should your answer be? If you say none, you’re a lying prude. If you say too high a number, you’re reckless, careless, and suddenly uninteresting. Your mind races with a million thoughts per second. 

The correct and simple answer is three, maybe two and a half if you don’t really count the embarrassment that was your first time.

“Three,” you eventually say and hope it sounds somewhat confident. You’re thankful for the way your turtleneck hides your throbbing pulse, sure that he would be able to see it underneath your skin if it was exposed.

“Three,” he repeats, taking in the fact for a moment and making you think that he is satisfied. He taps the armrest of his chair, studying you like an equation he has already solved and you think that’s the end of it.

But then, “And were they any good?”

Your mouth goes dry and it feels uncomfortable to swallow around the lump in your throat. Were they? Your immediate thought is to say yes. 

You’ve done things that felt nice, sure. You’ve ultimately had sex that wasn’t a disaster but it was fine - after all, this is the sixties and times are changing, history reshaping the ideas of what a woman should or shouldn’t do - but looking into Reed’s eyes there’s something that tells you that whatever you think you know is good sex, he is about to completely turn upside down. 

Still, if you say no to his question, he might need you to elaborate on what they did wrong and then you’ll have to admit that you simply do not know, so instead, you smile a little and say, “They were fine. One of them was pretty good.”

The response elicits the first genuine surprise from him. He raises both eyebrows instead of one this time, and you regret your words because he looks curious to know more. 

“And what did this one boy do?” He scoffs as if humored by your reply. You hadn’t realized that he’d question you about what they did right too and your gut tells you that you are walking right into a trap.

You have no interest in talking about previous affairs, so Reed can analyze them under his microscope. You just want to fall to your knees and beg him to smother you with his attention. 

“He was confident and good-looking, sweet, not selfish and quick at all,” you say and try to look as if thinking back at him fondly in an attempt to make your answer appear safe. Unknowingly though, you are making a fool of yourself when your words reflect your inexperience, ”I felt really good when I was with him, like he was enjoying me and not… just getting to the finish line.”

After a beat of silence, he pulls the rug from underneath your feet. 

“Did he make you come?” The question slices right through you like he knows there’s only one possible answer. The intent behind the question stares you in the face and taunts you for thinking that a sweet, patient boy in bed is the best sex you will ever have. 

“No, but—“ you start to protest. 

“You think taking his time is what makes a man good in bed?” He continues his dissecting of you. 

“No, but he was nice,” you continue your protest, but when you want to say more, you find yourself opening your mouth with nothing coming out. 

“You’re too smart to settle for ‘nice,’ angel,” he smiles a little too devilishly, his gaze burning as he looks at you like he has figured you out. The worst part is that he probably has, “That’s not what you want.”

“What do I want then?” You swallow around nothing. It sounds like a challenge but it is tinged with something else; the realization of one thing only. None of the three men you have had inside of you have ever made you feel the way Reed Richards does by just looking at you.

He beckons you closer. You place your hands on the armrests of his chair, leaning down over him until your faces are mere inches apart. Out of the corner of your eye, you see his arm stretching out to lock the door to his office. The act doesn’t make your heart stutter like it did the first time. 

“Young people think they want fast and easy,” he talks quietly and still, his voice is so loud in your head, never has sounded more in charge despite the calm of it, “But I am here to tell you that I won’t be indulging you in this tedious narrative after you have been throwing yourself at me for months. You may categorize those months as torture but you have never been on the very edge of desperation and gotten told no. I will teach you how good it feels to be patient and earn what is given. That’s what you want.”

Your stomach flips but you refrain from asking when you can start. His eyes bore into yours until your skin prickles. You can barely stand on your legs, shaking like a leaf as you feel his breath on your face. A whimper escapes you. God, you want him. Slowly. Intimately. In every way that he thinks best.  

“Shh,” he coos, “First, there has to be rules.”

“Please,” you don’t know what you’re begging for - after all, you’ve never considered your experience lacking until now - but you don’t dare lean into a kiss. 

He ignores your near-sob completely, “First of all, I don’t want to see you nodding your pretty head as a reply to instructions. Use your words.”

Stupidly, you nod your head in your eagerness and he raises a brow. If he’s affected by the way your body trembles before him, he doesn’t show it. 

“Your words, angel,” he repeats calmly. 

“Yes, sir,” you answer quickly. 

“That’s it. Nicely done,” he praises to cause a thrill to run up your spine, “Second of all, you don’t touch me without permission.”

Thank God that your instincts told you not to take a chance and kiss him. He must have noticed the way you had wanted to, and you hope it’ll reward you later on. You nod. Stupidly. Again. 

“Words.”

“Sorry.”

“We’ll work on that,” he smiles softly and reaches up to run his knuckles over your burning cheek, overbearing and sweet, “Thirdly, I won’t have you pouting when you don’t get what you want. If I tell you no, you accept it.”

“Of course, sir,” you say, not forgetting, to show him that you can be a good student, hoping that he won’t send you out the door without an earned reward. 

“And lastly,” he starts but trails off, ghosting his fingertips down your shoulder and arm, leaving goosebumps underneath your blouse, until he can grab your hip. He pulls a little to signal for you to move, silently commanding you to turn around in your spot, so he can drag the zipper on your skirt down. The garment slips down your hips and pools around your feet on the ground. You step out of it without being told. He hums in approval and drags you to sit in his lap, “Lastly, you don’t come unless I say so.”

You gasp but not at the unfairness of his final rule even if your mind tells you to argue. 

Something else has caught your attention. 

So far Reed has been controlled, methodical, and in charge, might have been able to hide the arousal from his expression but as you sit on his thighs, the hardness of his cock is unmistakable and pressing into your still-sore backside. Left speechless, you say nothing for a moment, focused on the fact that his body wants you and contemplating, if only briefly, to grind down on his cock and hear him moan. You conclude that you do not dare.

“Your pleasure belongs to me now. Do you understand?” His hands come around your waist to rest in your lap, inching inwards to the insides of your thighs. The move pulls you from your thoughts of disobedience and temptation.

“Yes,” you blurt out when you don’t know how many seconds have passed. Your heart pounds in anticipation, dizzying you to the point where you need to relax against his broad chest and wait for him to have mercy on you. You swear that you can feel his heartbeat against your spine but you are so scatterbrained that it might be your own, so deeply in his grasp that you can’t tell where you end and he begins.

Once again, he hums in approval because you are learning to follow orders. He slowly spreads your thighs apart and guides them to hook over the armrests of his office chair, “You did well this weekend.”

“Thank you,” you say with your eyes fixed on his strong hands as they move on you and position you exactly how he wants. Your whole body trembles as his fingers tap your skin in deliberation of what to do with you. 

“You deserve a reward for showing me you’ve got discipline even without me present,” he states matter-of-factly. His breath tickles in your ear, his voice smooth and steady unlike yours. 

“Y-yes.”

“One orgasm.”

You swallow thickly, your cunt pulsing at the unfairness of it. You were definitely hoping for more than that after a mere three in the last five days. Your body is killing you with how turned on you are, burning with need and waiting desperately for him to chuckle and say it was a joke, that he’ll give you as many as you can take.

“And you won’t beg,” he adds instead and has you whining feebly, “If you even think about begging, you’ll tell me. Out loud.”

The humiliation is making your stomach do a million somersaults and shutting down your brain until only the fire of your loins remains. You manage to stutter out another simple yes. 

“If I hear even a tiny, little please slip from your mouth,” he starts, his index finger finding the front of your underwear, smoothing over the fabric before hooking into it, “You’ll wait another week.”

Your breath catches in your throat. A week. Time makes no sense anymore. Just days ago, you would never have thought that a man could be so cruel in the name of pleasure and days ago, you would never have imagined that you’d ache for that cruelty.

But you do and when he pulls your panties to the side, you watch with relief and clench around nothing, painfully in need of him, “I’ll be good for you, sir.”

“I suspect so,” he answers with a mix of a scoff and a chuckle that rumbles in his chest, “You know what happens if not.”

His fingers find your clit then and you respond by tensing up for a second, shocked to be so fully touched by him already, before letting out a soft moan. A memory of previous men fumbling with their hands underneath your skirt flashes in your mind, because it is like Reed Richards was put on this Earth just to make you feel good. 

Your eyes flutter closed in relief, “Ah.”

The pads of his fingers brush over the sensitive nub in slow, featherlight strokes until the first spark of pleasure makes you shiver. He moves them in circles, taking his time without uttering a single word because, you realize, he is studying you. He is treating you like an experiment, testing out his theories on how to pleasure you and deciding exactly how to touch you after categorizing your responses. 

When your moans become more frequent, he hums to himself and doesn’t change his method. He breathes a little harder behind you, his neglected cock twitching underneath you, but he doesn’t do anything rash or desperate. He doesn’t react. Doesn’t groan, doesn’t tense, doesn’t adjust his hips. He is showing you how to be the prime example of restraint, discipline, patience.

He works you all the way up to the brink of heaven, your cries that continuously climb in pitch telling on you so he can still the movement of his hand before removing it altogether from your cunt. You shake your head at the loss, brows furrowed and trying to lift your hips towards his hovering palm, your heartbeat throbbing painfully right behind your clit. 

“Sit still,” he orders immediately and uses the hand to force your hips down. He isn’t going to let you chase it. He’s going to make you take exactly what he gives you and nothing more.

“Sorry,” you whine, the plea for more right on the tip of your tongue. You swallow it down quickly, the muscles of your calves twitching, “I— I thought about begging.”

“Shh… Of course, you did,” he replies almost too sweetly and cups your whole mound to steady you when you sob, “And you told me like a good girl. So well behaved.”

The colorful interior of his office makes you dizzy at this point, causing you to keep your eyes shut as you breathe heavily through your mouth. You want him to touch you again, move those skilled fingers over the sensitive parts of your body, still aching from being pulled back from the edge, until you fall apart. 

However, while the clock ticks on the wall, nothing happens. You’ll swear to this day that you can hear the cogs turn inside of Reed’s brain, listening closely to when your breathing has settled down enough for him to add to his ministrations. 

You let your head bump against his shoulder, trying not to come off as impatient and tortured as you actually are but every fiber in your body is screaming for relief. 

It’s pathetic. 

You know this, and while you won’t say it out loud, you slowly come to terms with the fact that maybe your professor is right. You need to learn how to wait for things if this is how you act after being denied just once, gripped by the spirit of a feral animal, a wild youngster.

His hand smooths over your mound, back and forth in a slow motion that doesn’t really make any difference because of how light it is. He doesn’t rush, just speaks lowly in your ear, “You’re doing really well.”

You tremble at the praise, tightening your legs around the armrests of his chair. His fingers slide back to your swollen clit but his free hand joins the other. Your thighs twitch in nervous anticipation, hoping that he will use his unoccupied fingers to stretch your cunt open. However, something else entirely happens and it causes a tiny gasp to slip from your mouth. 

At first, it feels strange and your instincts tell you to stop him, to bat his hand away at once, but another part of you convinces you to trust him fully. His fingertips spread you open to a shameful degree and then they trace upwards, moving higher. It hits you; he is pulling something back, you realize, exposing something that you have never thought to touch before. Your heart stutters and the air in the room shifts because your body reacts as if it already knows what will happen. 

A calm chuckle rumbles in his chest against your back. He is amused at your confusion and nervous fidgeting, choosing to distract you with the sound of his voice, “Do you know what I’m doing?”

You shake your head before catching yourself in it. You quickly let out a breathless moan when the breeze from outside hits the much more intimate area that he has brought out in the open, “No, sir.”

Your thighs instinctively try to snap shut as soon as he thumbs at your very exposed clit, circling the finger around the very tip of it but you can’t seem to figure out how to unhook your legs from the chair, the connection to all logic severed. His gentle touch creates white, hot, searing pleasure. 

“You’ve never touched yourself like this before,” he notes but there’s something about his tone. He isn’t mocking your inexperience, no, instead he is teaching you. He sits up a little to nose along the shell of your ear, continuing his torture between your legs, “The most sensitive part of you is right here, but most women have never really touched it. The hood protects the sensitivity, but being so direct in stimulus can be—“

“It’s—“ you try to say something to tell him how you feel, to sound clever but all you can do is swallow down big gulps of air. 

“Too much?” Reed finishes your sentence but you shake your head quickly when he starts to ease off again. 

“No!” You protest a little too loudly and he tuts disapprovingly, giving you a few seconds to calm down again, but ultimately only causes you to try lifting your hips towards his controlled hand. You clench around nothing, screwing your eyes shut, “No. It’s good. Please don't stop, sir, I’d like more.”

“Asking. Not pleading. What a good girl I have on my hands,” he muses and you can hear the smile on his face, pride swelling in your chest. He teases your clit again and time is lost on you, whines becoming higher while you fight the urge to beg for your release. 

It’s hard but you quickly discover that your vision being gone due to your eyes staying closed distracts you from begging because it comes with the price of losing awareness of his next move. Without sight, there’s only touch. You are lost to only the sensation of the way his fingers stroke through your soaked folds, over your twitching clit until you whine again, and how he smooths a hand over your thigh, one over your stomach too. How he is doing this is beyond you because you swear that he is everywhere.

Suddenly, confusion starts to tease in the back of your mind and shortly after, it momentarily cuts through the haze of ecstasy. You brush it off with a giggle that transitions into another soft gasp. 

“Feels like you have more than two hands on me,” you huff a laugh, saying it through a moan too, like it is the most ridiculous thing in the world. 

“Do I?” He chuckles softly in your ear but for the first time, it is tinged with something darker. He is amused. 

His words don’t register at first. Not fully at least, not until you start counting his limbs in your head and they don’t add up. However, you have to stop because two thick fingers push into you and curl just right. Your eyes snap open as it dawns on you. 

Three arms. 

You were already aware of Reed’s abilities that make him Mister Fantastic - the stretching limbs and the almost absentminded use of them during lectures - but this is not something that he displays at random. It should be unsettling to see, should feel outrageous and even bordering on horrifying but as you watch the third limb that has unfurled touch you so skillfully, your cunt betrays all of that by forcing one thought only: This is a daring thing to experience because Reed Richards is actively ruining others for you, touching you in a manner that no other man could ever offer. Your cunt clenches around the fingers inside of you at the thought.

“I… I didn’t know you could do that,” you manage to say through a hitched breath. 

“Does it scare you?” He asks with a voice that has dropped an octave from how worked up he is.

“N-no. It feels so fucking good,” you whimper with a shuddering breath, too caught up in everything happening to your body at once that you are without care for the swear. His fingers are so deep inside of you, his fingers circle your still-exposed clit.

“Good. Let’s see how long you can handle my touch like this,” he answers, his labored breath hot against the nape of your neck. 

You don’t know how long he toys with you like this, dragging his thumb over the sensitive nub in agonizingly slow motions and fucking you open on his fingers. You thought only you would know where that sensitive spot inside you was, that it was something you had for yourself behind locked doors, but right now, it feels like it belongs to him. All three hands on you, working in unison, have you dancing on the brink fast, choking on air until— 

Reed stops altogether, the immediate halt of his touch making you feel like you have been thrown into an ice bath. Your vision is blurred, your breathing is ragged, and your whole body is trembling in his arms. Just a few more seconds of his touch and you would have experienced ecstasy like never before, you’re sure of it.

“I can’t stop thinking about coming. I’m thinking— I want to beg for it, sir,” you bravely confess. Please. You almost say it at the end of your sentence but catch it just in time. It takes every ounce of power within you to not let the word slip out.

“You can have it,” he whispers behind you, almost affectionately, bordering on paternal, and you want to sob in relief. He presses an open-mouthed kiss to your skin right above the turtleneck, “I’m not going to stop this time, and then you’re gonna come for me, angel.”

The pleasure mounts again when he continues where he left off but this time, the air of control to his touch that has kept you on the edge is gone. He wasn’t lying; he is giving you this. You think about those words again, hearing them as if they are a broken record in your mind. You’re gonna come for me, angel. It isn’t a maybe, isn’t a suggestion either. It is pure fact. An order.

“Are you ready?” He asks. 

You nod frantically, “Y-yes!”

Reed senses the way your body is winding even tighter. His cock twitches beneath you, probably aching by now but he still isn’t in this position for himself. He throbs against your sore backside, “Be a good girl and let go for me, angel. Thaaat’s it.”

When you finally come, you can’t even scream at first, totally seized up for a second before your legs start to shake violently. After a moment, noise finally leaves you and it is a handful of wrecked, gasping sobs. You feel like this is the devastating possession that Sunday church has taught you about, a thing that will ruin a person. 

Sure, you have felt so good in bed with a pillow between your thighs that you have let noises slip from your mouth by accident, small whines and whimpers that no one really heard or found necessary to comment on, but this.

This has you losing control of any restraint that you have previously been capable of, your nerves being licked by fire as you can do very little else but just take it. 

“I know, sweet angel. You are so good for me,” he soothes you as he deliberately presses the pads of his fingers against your g-spot, holding them there as you pulse around the digits, “You earned every bit. Take it.”

You’re about to say something back during the most intense moment but then you hear it. There are footsteps outside, a shadow passing by the window, and voices in close proximity. You panic, practically gurgling in your state by now because someone could hear, someone could see the way your pussy drools in his lap, hear you crying like a tortured animal. It would devastate you, would ruin his—

A quick fourth hand stretches out and suddenly, the latch on the window clicks shut and the blinds are effortlessly pulled down. His fingertips still sit against the perfect spot inside of your cunt but the hand that closed the window moves, determinedly like a snake closing in on prey, to clamp down over your mouth, shushing you because you’re apparently still loud enough to hear outside the room.

You writhe as he continues guiding you through the last few seconds of the best orgasm you have ever had and then through the beautiful aftershocks that you can feel in the very tips of your fingers and toes. 

When it is all over, your entire body, boneless and spent, slumps against him. Your turtleneck feels like a prison more than a garment, sticking uncomfortably to your body from how sweaty you are. Your heart is steadily finding a slower rhythm, no longer beating in your ears but leaving you slightly chilly and tired. 

Your breath is damp and warm against Reed’s palm. He still has it firmly clamped down over your mouth but only holds it there until you have gone quiet again. When he removes it, simultaneously retracting his extra limbs and leaving your cunt empty, you heave for the breaths you have been deprived of. It is suddenly nice to not be touched there anymore.

“You’re okay. Breathe. Deep through the nose and out your mouth,” he gently guides you until your gasping slowly turns into regular breaths and any impending anxiety vanishes. He hums in approval, “Better?”

“Mhm, yes,” you answer dazedly, “Thank you.”

“Good job,” he praises and helps you unhook your legs from the armrests. The tip of his nose presses into the sensitive spot behind your ear, his lips pressing an occasional kiss to your skin there, “I need you to stay still for a minute.”

You nod, feeling cherished even if your limbs feel like they belong to someone else. For the first time since you stepped into his office, your body relaxes completely against him. Reed lets you. 

Reed huffs a laugh, “Your words, angel.”

“Yes, sir, I’m sorry. My head’s… it’s fuzzy,” your first real sentence reveals that you are slightly hoarse, matching very well how clouded your mind is. You barely even register that his hands are already moving, basking in the warmth of his body as your own slowly comes back to you.

“That’s alright for now,” he reassures and pulls your panties back into place. You only just manage to think that you could stay here forever, curled up in his lap or even just on the couch along the wall, but then, “Let’s get you on your feet.”

“What?” You aren’t sure you have heard him right. Even so, and with your shoulders tensing at the thought of using your trembling legs, you start getting on your feet. 

“You heard me,” he states as if it is fact. He is right, of course. He steadies you briefly by holding your waist when your legs wobble. 

You remove yourself from his lap, hearing the softest of hisses escape his mouth and feeling the soreness in your thighs setting in immediately to join your bruised backside. You have to grab the edge of his desk to keep yourself upright but even if you want to sink to the floor right there, the infatuated part of you makes you turn around to face him. 

Briefly, you glance down with your lip between your teeth. He is still tenting in his slacks and you recall a time when your ex told you how cruel it was to leave a guy hanging. You move for his belt buckle before you think better of it, having little to no brain power left in you to recall that he specifically forbade you from touching him without permission. 

He catches your wrist just in time, tightening his grip when you try to twist your hand free of it, “That’s none of your concern. I know your body better than you do right now and you need no more right now. Stop being greedy. You’re going to crash again in a few hours. When you do, I want you to rest.”

Your breath hitches at the accusation, the veiled concern for your well-being lost on you. Your brows furrow in confusion because clearly, this is you offering something in return, “I’m not being greedy. I got to— You didn’t… That’s not fair.”

“You really think this is your brain telling you about fairness? This is greed. Impatience. You just came, angel. You should be floating, blissed out, grateful. Instead, you’re already reaching for more. I don’t like that.”

You don’t reply. Men don’t usually have this kind of self-control, you think to yourself as your gaze flickers to the way his cock strains against the front of his trousers. You ache to prove yourself worthy of his time.

"You think this is about me?” He continues and reaches for your discarded skirt on the floor with ease, “I don’t take what I want when I want it. That’s your problem, angel. Not mine."

But it is about him. You can feel it, read it between the lines. He likes the power, the control, the fact that you’re completely at his mercy and willing to submit even when he isn’t there. 

You like it too. You even like the shame of being reprimanded by him, like the burn of embarrassment in your cheeks. It seems that sweet, little, dutiful you love to get into trouble. 

He stands from his seat, towering over you, and doesn’t even show how affected he is from being hard, a large wet stain on his thigh, right next to his thick cock, from where you have been sitting. He doesn’t even need to tell you what to do. You already know, stepping into the skirt to which he nods.

“Don’t think offering your mouth or hands to me makes us even. That’s not how this works,” he goes on when you still haven’t dared utter a word. He slides the skirt back up over your hips, his hands grabbing the hem and adjusting it into place so the zipper is on the right side. He follows it up by brushing out the creases and fixing the pleats like it is a task of utmost importance. 

“Sorry,” you murmur. 

“You’re still learning,” he simply states after letting the apology sit between you for a moment, holding onto your hips. His thumbs press in where your hip bones are, “But you should go home and revise your new rules until we meet next Monday or you will be.”

Then he steps back, leaving only the scent of ink and paper and his aftershave. His self-control is maddening compared to yours which is still in its early stages, and it makes you seem even less composed than you actually are. 

You watch him sit down again, opening a drawer at the very bottom of his desk to reveal a stack of crispy white shirts with new slacks at the very bottom too. He takes out both. You wonder if he sometimes sleeps here. 

There’s tension in the air. You have the urge to turn and leave because of how charged the room feels but you know better than to do it before you have been excused, wouldn’t even do it if he had just held regular office hours with you. You wait. 

He looks at you after making room for his new change of clothes on the desk, contemplating for what is probably only seconds but feels longer.

“What I did to you today is called edging,” he says, watching your face to make sure that you’re taking it in, “It’s when you bring someone to the brink of orgasm and then stop. Over and over again.”

“Yes,” you nod, “I have heard of it.”

It is the truth but the way he says it is so far from the context you know it from. He uses the words of a scientist, uses it as a term, whereas you have only heard it in drunk conversations with other girls who giggle loudly and have never experienced what you just have. 

“Good,” he says but it isn’t meant as praise, “Then you know it is not done to delay gratification but to teach you that good things come to those who wait. When I say there’s no coming without my permission, I don’t just mean within these walls. I mean at all times, even at home in bed with your hands under the covers.”

“This means,” Reed starts rolling down his sleeves again, but he doesn’t button them. You wonder if he’ll change his clothes in front of you, “That you need to give up the idea that pleasure is something you can just take whenever you want just because I can’t see it. Trust me. I always know.”

You gulp. You know what is coming and he can’t be serious. 

“Therefore, I am giving you homework,” he continues, “You are not to come this week but you will edge yourself at least twenty minutes a day.”

“I—“ your pulse picks up. 

“I don’t care how busy you are. Find the time,” he interrupts you and holds up his hand to make you stop talking, “I want to know what you think about when you touch yourself. What part of me you imagine. What part of you aches most after. What words you’re thinking when you stop. If you cross the line, you’ll write down the time, date, and place. I want to know how long it took and how it felt. Bring the notes to me next Monday. Neatly written. Stapled. As always.”

Your mouth opens slightly, not to protest his wishes, but because your mind is already scrambling to understand how you’re going to survive till Monday morning.

“We’re done for today. You’re excused,” he finally says and reaches for your paper, flipping to the first page, already critiquing it. You wonder if he’ll think of you beyond it, have you on his mind while grading the next paper in his pile or while talking to another student. You will think about his hands, the way they felt between your thighs. If he’ll wash them right away or touch himself with your dried-up come on them.

“Monday,” he reminds you just as you reach for the doorknob. You want to say that you don’t need reminding of the day because you’re already counting the hours. 

“Yes, sir,” you answer obediently instead. You push the handle down but he interrupts you just as you start to swing the door open. It stays closed.

“Oh, before I forget,” he stops you. You turn your head slightly to glance at him over your shoulder. He is leaning comfortably back in his chair, your paper still in hand.

He smiles, looking over the page, “Wear a skirt again.”

Outside in the corridor, the bustling noise of students turning up for classes greets you harshly, shattering the intimate bubble you’ve just been in. You smooth down your skirt nervously, subtly shifting on sore legs and feeling the ghost of his touch on your aching body. Suddenly, your classmates' chatter feels unbearably loud, their laughter grating, their very presence uncomfortable. 

You feel alienated from them suddenly because Reed Richards has changed you, and none of them know it.

.

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[ninguitar]

LOWKEY.　　◦　 prev.　next.

eight. gacha ahh music

❛ in which a concert you were tantalized by your friends into attending led to a one-night hook-up with band member, yu "karina" jimin, who was coincidentally a classmate, too. though incredulous and foolish, in karina's eyes, you were way too good to have you slipping through her fingers, but even so, she couldn't just act on it, leaving the two of you in an awkward predicament, keeping the feelings amidst lowkey. ❜

as you dismiss from your last period class, a grunt escaping your breath—finally, you thought, you felt as though the class was an entire bore. swinging your backpack over your shoulder, you leave the classroom, only for a girl to exclaim "boo!" popping up behind you. fuck, you felt your soul leave your body.

turning around, you face yu jimin, warmth spreading to your cheeks, as a sigh drifts from your lips, "christ, jimin!" you exhale, your hands firm against karina's chest to keep a distance between the two of you.

a wide, teasing smile tugs the corners of her lips, the girl's eyes creasing into small crescent moons, making you relent and huff. the korean girl was the textbook definition of whipped, as she giggles, "how was school?" sauntering through the hallways with you, she takes the books in your hands from you, carrying them herself.

you shrug, "boring—just like any other school day." heat curls on your cheeks at karina's gentle gesture of carrying your books herself, as you ease your weight against her. strolling through the hallways, you occasionally make small-talk with some students—mainly about student governmental affairs.

"real popular, aren't you?" she prods at your cheeks, poking them slightly. once you guys exited the school building, karina meekly shoves your extra books into her backpack. her hand remains slack at the small of your back, tenderly rubbing circles on it.

you softly hum, following the korean girl to wherever you guys were going. with your eyebrows furrowed and knitted, you ask, "where are we even going, rina!" you exclaim, eliciting a laugh from the musician. unconsciously, your hand interlocks with karina's, barely noticing it yourself.

"you'll see," the korean girl drawls on, her gaze flickering to your guys' hands before hastily returning to the streets. following karina, the girl eventually comes to a stop, a dark building flashing with the word, "arcade," coming into light.

the two of you eagerly enter the arcade, childish, animated smiles painting both your guys' faces. heading over to a machine, you immediately purchase a card with points to play games with, beaming a smile at the korean girl, which only makes her chuckle, her cheeks flushed.

before you could react, karina plops a headband onto the top of your head, sliding a matching one onto hers, as well. your gaze softens, "just know i'm really competitive, 'rina." with a small, portable digital camera in your hand, you begin to film, panning in on karina's face.

leaning against one of the claw machines, karina chuckles, "if i get you that, you owe me a favor, yeah?" to which, you nod, nudging her shoulder playfully. excitement washes over her face, as she starts the game, deftly checking the other sides of the machine to find the perfect spot.

pushing the button, the claw falls down onto one of the stuffed animals, making your breath hitch in anticipation. jimin's lips quirk up into a shit-eating grin, as she raises her hands up in enthusiasm, watching the stuffed animal fall into the slot.

"i told you i'd get it!" she exclaims, oozing with elation, as she grabs the stuffed animal, plopping it into your arms. the korean girl wraps her arm around your shoulders, gravitating towards you.

"okay—fine, fine, you were right, 'rina," you relent, huffing, as you can feel karina's hand drawing patterns on your back. heat subtly spreads to your cheeks, the same goofy smile lingering on the korean girl's face now on yours.

leading you to a skeeball machine, jimin wraps her arms around your waist gently, her head resting on your shoulder, "y'know how to play?" she whispers against your ear, as she takes the camera from your hands.

you protest meekly before shrugging and leaning further against the inclined lane, a ball in your dominant hand. her free hand curls around your dominant hand's wrist, using the game as an excuse to just hold your hand. karina pushes your arm upwards, helping you roll the ball to the highest amount of points.

"look, you're a natural!" the korean girl's face lit up, as she hovers over you, letting you roll the ball up yourself. watching you with heart eyes, she practically acts as your very own personal cheerleader—the korean girl whispering praise every few seconds.

as evening rolls in, the two of you find solace by the shore, one side of the earbuds in your ear, and the other in hers. the moon casts light onto the midnight hued water, the waves gently crashing. the world seems almost as though it was painted in strokes of a dark blue, the lake silver.

"y'know i'm posting this right?" you chuckle, leaning against the korean girl, as your head rests on her shoulder, watching ferries transcend through the shore.

jimin nods her head, "it'll be good promotion for our next song," she whispers, her hands interlocking with yours. turning to face each other, you two fixate on one-another's lips. reluctantly, you guys lean into one-another, desperately kissing each other in hungry, searing kisses.

her hand tenderly cups your chin, pulling away for a second, before capturing your lips once again. karina murmurs incoherent whispers against your lips, too immersed in kissing you to even realize they were incoherent.

"i'm like, way past my curfew," you giggle against her lips, your breath fanning over them, and before she could pull away and meekly apologize, you kiss her once again.

taglist. ୨ৎ @yeetaberry127 @yoontoonwhs @1luvkarina @sed7ction @stareaa

@cceanvvaves @ariiiiii8iiiii @nwjnsloona @yjiminswallet @nasyu-kookies

@saysirhc @secretcessy @sixflame438 @chaefims @saranglasses

@vrtualstar @awhrin @andaengjinlvr ( send an ask, or dm if you want to be tagged !! )

[redisthenewblue]

TINKER-Twisted Wonderland x Tinkerbell!Yuu/Fem!Reader Part 6

Part 5

⋆.ೃ࿔*:･“Whoa, I didn’t realize you had that in you…” The delinquent looked down, clearly embarrassed, while [Name] shot them an angry glare.

“Listen, I’m gonna let you slide this time, but that’s only because I don’t want my pasta getting cold,” the delinquent said as they backed away, trying to save face.

“Pffft! I knew you were all talk! You better hope I never see you again!” Grim chuckled as he watched the boys scurry off.

“Well, I guess this is my life now,” Yuuken groaned, rubbing his face in frustration.

“Can we just grab some lunch already? I missed breakfast and I’m about to pass out here,” Ace whined.

Deuce let out a sigh, “I can’t believe this. Textbook bullies at a school that’s supposed to be known for training top-notch mages…”

“Oh, come on! Get over it already. It’s time to eat like there’s no tomorrow! This omelet is as fluffy as a cloud and bursting with cheese!” Grim said, obnoxiously chewing and smacking his food. “So, I checked out your guys’ dorm, but what’s the deal with the others?”

“Are you familiar with the statues of the Great Seven? Night Raven College has a dorm themed after each of them,” an orange-haired upperclassman chimed in, addressing the lowerclassmen.

“Bwah! You’re that guy from this morning!” Ace exclaimed, his face painted with shock.

“You totally tricked us into painting those silly roses!” Grim pointed an accusatory finger at Cater.

Cater grimaced, glancing at [Name] as he tried to defend himself. “Tricked? That’s such a harsh word. Do you think I wanted to spend MY morning painting roses? It’s dorm policy! I was just following orders.”

“And grinning like a maniac the whole time,” Deuce added, backing up Grim.

“Now, now, Deucey. Outside of the dorm, I don’t care what rules you follow. Here, I’m just your friendly mentor!” Cater waved off the first year’s comment.

“Please, do NOT call me Deucey,” Deuce replied, shaking his head in disapproval.

“Ah ha ha! That’s just how Cater shows he cares,” a mysterious voice chimed in, causing [Name] to look up from her meal.

Ace narrowed his eyes at the newcomer, “And who are you?”

“Right, I should introduce myself. I’m Trey. Trey Clover. I’m a junior at Heartslabyul, just like Cater here. And you must be Yuuken and [Name], the new prefects from that, uh, rustic dorm. I heard all about what went down from Cater. Thanks for having our boys' backs yesterday.”

“The dorm is a work in progress, Trey,” [Name] corrected him.

“I don’t remember inviting you to sit with us…” Ace shot him an unimpressed glare.

“Hey now, we’re all from the same dorm, right? Let’s try to get along. Here, give me your digits,” Trey said cheerfully.

“I don’t have a smartphone,” Yuuken replied, looking disgruntled.

“For real? I’ve read about people like you, but I never thought I’d meet one in real life! I know a place that sells the latest models for cheap. How about you, [Name], and I go on a phone-shopping date?” Trey suggested with a grin.

“Wait, what...?!”

“Whoa, okay. Coming on a bit strong there,” Grim said, looking a bit taken aback.

“What’s up with you guys? You all look so tense! Chill out, baby! Relax! I bet you’re the type who’s super awkward in real life but can text like a pro, huh? Just give me your info already!” Cater pressed on.

“Cater,” Trey interjected, “You’re freaking out the freshmen. Maybe tone it down a bit?”

Cater chuckled, “Ha! Sorry! I can get a little carried away sometimes. So, what were we talking about... Ah yes, the dorms! What a blast it is to mentor new students! Go ahead, A-M-A.”

“Before we dive into the other dorms, I’d love to know more about ours. Like, what’s with all this ‘Queen of Hearts rule number whatever’ nonsense?” Ace leaned in, eager for answers from the upperclassman.

“You know about the legendary Queen of Hearts, right? She had to rule over a kingdom of oddballs, and she did it by enforcing order and making strict rules,” Cater explained.

“Our dorm, Heartslabyul, is a tribute to her. By tradition, we wear armbands in the red and black of the Queen's dress and live by the rules she set,” he added.

“Pfft. Can you make this any more boring?” Grim rolled his eyes, clearly uninterested in the topic.

“Now, how strictly we follow those rules really depends on the current housewarden. Past wardens have been a lot more flexible,” Cater continued.

“But Riddle? He doesn’t play around. You could say we’re honoring that tradition to the fullest extent,” Trey chimed in, trying to put a positive spin on the strict rules.

“Ugh. Just my luck…” Ace sank deeper into his cafeteria seat.

“So what are the other dorms like, then?” Grim asked, trying to steer the conversation back.

Trey opened his mouth to explain each dorm one by one. “As Cater mentioned, the dorms here are themed after the Great Seven. We have Heartslabyul, modeled after the Queen of Hearts’ strictness. To summarize the rest, we’ve got... Savanaclaw, inspired by the relentless spirit of the King of Beasts. Octavinelle, reflecting the benevolent heart of the Sea Witch. Scarabia, representing the thoughtful nature of the Sorcerer of the Sands. Pomefiore, showcasing the tenacity of the Fairest Queen. Ignihyde, based on the diligence of the king of the underworld. And finally... Diasomnia, which embodies the noble spirit of the Thorn Fairy.”

“That’s a lot to take in,” Yuuken said, clearly overwhelmed.

“All those names are way too long! How are we supposed to remember them?” Grim crossed his arms, frustrated.

“Any good magician would take the time to learn them,” [Name] chimed in, poking Grim’s forehead with her index finger.

“Ah ha ha! Well, you get the idea. Whether you like it or not, you’ll learn them soon enough,” Cater laughed.

“At orientation, the Dark Mirror chooses a dorm for you based on your essence. Each dorm ends up with its own distinct... flavor, let’s call it,” Trey explained.

“That’s so true. I totally see it,” Cater nodded in agreement with Trey’s quirky metaphor.

“‘Flavor,’ huh...?” Deuce sweat dropped at the unusual choice of words.

“For example, check out that guy.” 

Turning around, [Name] whistled at the sight of him, only to get elbowed in the side by Yuuken.

“Muscly dog man, sure, why not?” Yuuken blinked at the tall beast man.

“That rough-and-tumble vibe he’s giving off screams Savanaclaw,” Trey noted.

“No doubt. That dorm is packed with tough guys who are all about working out and fighting. How should I describe the vibe...? Macho dudes? Gruff big brothers? Something like that. The black and gold armband is another giveaway,” he elaborated.

“Huh. Okay, what about that guy with the grey and purple cord wrapped around his arm?” the cat asked.

“He’s definitely from Octavinelle. And the student sitting at the table in front of him has a red and gold armband—Scarabia colors,” Trey continued.

“Those dorms are for the brainiacs. They’re always neck-and-neck in academic rankings. Ah, but the current housewarden of Scarabia doesn’t seem to be the brightest bulb…” 

“And here goes Cater again, rambling off on a tangent,” Ace said, rolling his eyes.

“Ha. You catch on quick. Let’s get back on track. You see that flashy one with the purple and red armband? Those are Pomefiore colors,” Trey pointed out.

“Whoa! The girl with the potion books, I really like her!” Grim exclaimed, staring at the boy with light purple hair and striking blue eyes.

“I don’t think—”

“What’s she doing in a boys’ school?!” Deuce asked, confusion written all over his face.

“That’s not—”

Ace almost facepalmed at his dormmate's cluelessness. “You two are such dummies. There aren’t any girls officially enrolled here, except for [Name].”

“WHAAAT?!” Deuce and Grim shouted in unison.

“Speaking of girls, there’s a portrait in the west hall of a real beauty. Her name’s Rosaria. If you want to meet her, I can introduce you. Maybe we could set something up?” Cater suggested, a hopeful look in his eyes. Everyone sat in stunned silence, processing his words.

“A painting? No thanks! I don’t care how cute she is if she’s two-dimensional!” Ace shook his head vigorously.

“Come on, who cares how many dimensions she has! Anyway, they take vanity super seriously at Pomefiore. It’s basically a dorm full of models. Their housewarden has 5 million followers on Magicam,” Cater said with admiration.

“Hey now, they’re not just pretty faces. The students at Pomefiore are top-notch when it comes to potions and casting curses,” Trey added.

“Eh heh. True that. Next up, we have Ignihyde... Their armbands are blue and black, but I don’t see any around here. They tend to be a bit antisocial. Even I don’t have any friends from that dorm. They’re kind of the complete opposite of us sunny, fun-loving Heartslabyuls,” Cater sighed.

“So they’re gloomy and miserable?” Grim asked.

“Hey, no need to put it that way! They just have a reputation for being quiet and serious, that’s all. That dorm tends to attract magical-energy engineers and students who are good with tech.”

Good with tech and engineering? Hey… why wasn’t [Name] chosen for that dorm? What was the mirror trying to say?

“And that just leaves... Diahonyalara, right?” Deuce stumbled over the name.

“You were close, but you hit a guardrail there. It’s ‘Diasomnia,’” Ace teased.

“I know that! I just misspoke, okay?” Deuce shot back, his irritation flaring up again.

“Diasomnia House is, hmm...” Cater scanned the cafeteria, “Ah, look over there. Those guys in the special seating area. You can tell by their neon green and black armbands. They’re basically campus celebrities. The vibe they give off makes it super hard for regular folks like us to approach them. And their housewarden? That’s a whole different level of intimidating.”

“There’s a little kid in that group!” Ace exclaimed, his jaw dropping.

Trey shook his head, “Ah, we do have some child prodigies here. But that guy over there is no kid. He’s a junior like us. Name’s—”

Suddenly, the same familiar fae they were just talking about appeared right in front of them, “Lilia. Lilia Vanrouge.”

“BWAH?!”

A bright grin broke across [Name]’s face, “Lilia!”

Lilia smiled playfully, matching the energy of the girl, "Fufufu, look who’s finally here, [Name]. So, my youthful appearance has caught your attention, huh? As our insightful friend here pointed out... Even though I’ve got that fresh-faced, boyish charm, calling me a 'child' would be a bit off the mark."

"‘Fresh-faced,’ huh?” The green-haired guy let out a nervous sweat at the older fae’s words.

"Hey, no need to stare at us from a distance! Feel free to come chat with us. We’re all schoolmates here, right? Everyone in Diasomnia House welcomes you with open arms." Lilia extended a warm invitation, but as their gazes drifted back to Diasomnia's table, a chill ran down their spines. There sat two guys, both muscular and a bit intimidating. One had silky silver hair, while the other sported a pale green that was just a shade darker than [Name]’s wings.

“Wait a minute,” the girl's eyes narrowed, “isn’t that the rude jerk who told me to move at the Diasomnia entrance ceremony?” All of [Name]’s fear seemed to evaporate, replaced by annoyance. Seriously, could she fit any more emotions into that little body of hers?

"And those guys over there? Not exactly the friendliest vibe, huh?" Deuce stammered, clearly uneasy.

The male fae chuckled softly, “Sorry if I seemed a bit above you during your meal. I really hope we can chat again soon.”

“Their table is, like, twenty yards away! And they heard our convo? That’s so creepy!” Ace shivered at the thought.

In response, [Name] pointed to her pointed ears. “Fae have incredible hearing, and honestly, their senses are just off the charts.”

“Yeah, Diasomnia House definitely has a reputation for housing some seriously talented students. A lot of them are magic prodigies. And their housewarden, Malleus Draconia? He’s one of the top five mages in the whole world,” Trey explained, sounding a bit in awe.

“Malleus is definitely not someone to mess with. But hey, you could say the same about our own beloved housewarden,” Cater added casually.

“No kidding! He freaked out on me for snagging just one slice of tart! His obsession with rules is totally over the top!” Ace complained, completely ignoring the stares of everyone around.

“My 'rule obsession' is 'over the top,' is it?” 

[Name] couldn’t help but stifle a laugh at the ridiculousness of it all.

“Absolutely! Riddle’s just a little tyrant who uses the whole 'rules' thing as an excuse to keep everyone under his thumb!” Ace continued, oblivious to the grimaces on everyone’s faces. Finally, someone decided to save Ace from his blundering.

“Ace! Behind you!” Deuce warned his dorm mate.

“Wha—?! Housewarden!” Ace froze under the piercing gaze of the strict housewarden of Heartslabyul.

“Hey, Riddle! What’s up, buddy? You’re looking adorable, as always!”

“Hmph. Cater, keep talking like that and you might just lose your head along with that mouth of yours.” Riddle dismissed the compliment with a glare.

“Sorry, sorry! My bad!”

There it was again. [Name] quickly lost interest in the conversation, her gaze wandering around the cafeteria. This place never ceased to amaze her. The Merfolk, the beastmen, and all the different fae were completely new to her. I guess being sheltered as a kid does that to you. Then she started to wonder what would’ve happened if she hadn’t acted out all those years ago. Maybe she’d still be close with Peter and the Lost Boys. Then her mind spiraled even further—what if she could invent a time machine to erase every single mistake she’d ever made and create the perfect future? What if—

“You want me to pay you to make it?! What kind of scam is this?!”

“Nah, I wouldn’t take money from a freshman! But Riddle wants a chestnut tart next, so I’ll need you to gather a whole bunch of chestnuts,” Trey reassured him.

“Like that’s any less of a hassle. But... fine. How many do you need?” Ace replied, acting like he wasn’t the one who got himself into this mess in the first place.

“Well, it’s for the unbirthday party, so... probably two or three hundred?” Trey estimated.

“Did you say HUNDRED?!” [Name] exclaimed, staring wide-eyed at the baker.

“And they all need to be boiled, shelled, and pureed,” Trey added, completely serious.

“Alright, I’m outta here.” Grim finished his food in one last bite before sliding off.

“I’m leaving too.” Deuce followed suit.

“See ya,” [Name] said as she dumped her plate, getting ready to leave.

“You heartless cowards!”

“Wait up!” Cater called out to the first-years walking away, “Haven’t you heard that food tastes better when you make it with friends? This could be a memory to cherish! Plus, it could be your big break as a cooking blogger!”

Trey chimed in, “Don’t tell Riddle, but chestnut tarts are best when eaten fresh out of the oven. Only the ones who make them get to enjoy that luxury.”

“Well, when you put it like that... Alright, humans, let’s do this!”

[Name] shook her head. Seriously, how was Grim so easily swayed?

“Where can we find chestnuts, anyway?” Yuuken asked, cutting right to the chase.

“I heard there are tons of chestnut trees in the woods behind the campus botanical garden,” Trey suggested.

“Sweet. Plan in motion. Let’s meet at the botanical garden after our last period,” Ace declared.

“We’re gonna be swimming in chestnuts!” 

“I can’t believe I’m actually helping with this,” [Name] sighed, pushing some loose hair behind her ear.

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“Whoa! Check it out, there are so many chestnuts just chillin' here! I’m about to feast on some delicious chestnut tarts! Mmm! Let’s start grabbing—YOWCH!” Grim yelped, “Myah! These chestnut spines just pricked my paws!”

[Name] couldn’t help but stifle a giggle at Grim’s little mishap, “I could’ve warned you about that,” 

“And you didn’t say anything?!” The cat was frantically trying to get a spine out of his paw.

“Nope! You gotta learn the hard way sometimes!”

“I don’t think we can do this with just our bare hands. Plus, we need something to put them in,” Deuce chimed in.

“Maybe we can find some supplies over in the botanical garden,” Ace suggested.

“Let’s check it out,” Deuce said, leading the way into the garden.

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“Whoa, I had no idea this place was so massive.” Ace spun around, soaking in the sights of the garden.

“If it’s this big, there’s gotta be a groundskeeper somewhere. Let’s split up and search.”

“Sure thing. I call dibs on the right side.” The orange-haired guy started heading toward that direction.

“Then I’ll take the left, and Grim, you and [Name] can go straight ahead?” Deuce suggested as he headed left, leaving Grim, [Name], and Yuuken to go straight.

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“Hey, come check this out! There’s a ton of fruit growing here! And it smells ripe too!” The cat tried to grab some berries from the bush but was yanked back by [Name].

“Hey! You can’t just step on my tail and walk away like that!”

[Name] glanced around, her eyes landing on a figure lying on the cement floor. 

“Are you the groundskeeper? Not sure you should be talking to students like that, buddy.” Grim shot at the beast man.

“Ain’t nothing worse than trying to catch some Z's and having some jerk step on your tail,” the guy replied, sitting up to meet the freshmen’s gaze.

“Here’s a thought: don’t sleep on the ground in a public space,” the fairy snapped back at the lion.

The guy chuckled, leaning in closer, “You... I know you. You’re that girl from orientation.” Then, shockingly, he started SNIFFING HER?! A yelp escaped from [Name] as she stumbled back, her wings flapping wildly to stay upright.

“Well, it’s true. You’re definitely one of a kind.” The beastman commented, “You’re taller than most fairies around here. What kind are you?”

[Name] and Yuuken stood there, completely shocked and speechless at his boldness. Thankfully, Grim broke the silence.

“I don’t know what’s up with this guy, but he’s giving me serious creeps...”

“No one gets to step on my tail and just stroll away without facing consequences. I’m in a bad mood because of this nap interruption, so you’re gonna owe me a tooth.”

“Sevens, WHY DOES EVERYONE AT THIS SCHOOL WANT TO FIGHT?!” The fairy threw her arms up in exasperation.

“Please! I don’t have dental insurance!” Yuuken cried out, earning some puzzled looks from [Name] and Grim.

“Yuu! Chill out!” Grim yelled at him.

“Leona! There you are!” A voice called out.

In walked another beast man, “I knew I’d find you here! We’ve got after-school classes today, remember?”

“Ugh... And now I’ve got this guy bugging me...” Leona ran a hand down his face in frustration.

“Leona, you’ve already had to repeat a year. If you get held back again, we’ll be in the same grade!” The beastman scolded.

[Name] nudged Yuuken, “He’s like a hobo.”

“Oh, just zip it already. I’m tired of your chatter, Ruggie,” Leona waved off the hyena beast man.

“Look,” Ruggie said, exhaustion evident in his tone, “you think I enjoy always being on your case? C’mon, man. You could coast through life if you just put in a little effort. Let’s get moving!”

“Hrmph... Next time you mess with my turf, there’s gonna be a price to pay, herbivores!” Leona finally relented, giving in to Ruggie’s insistence.

“Myah! I don’t like the sound of that! What is up with this weirdo?” Grim shuddered.

“Yeah, I don’t think he’s the groundskeeper...” Yuuken concluded.

“Seriously? You’re just figuring that out now?!” [Name] mentally facepalmed.

“Yo, guys, we found baskets and tongs!” Ace called out to the group.

“What on earth happened to you three?” Deuce asked, noticing their frazzled expressions.

“Oh right, the chestnuts! We gotta gather those so I can whip up my tart! We’ll fill you in on the crazy groundskeeper while we gather,” Grim said, excitedly.

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“…and then he just dipped out!” 

“Right? No way that dude was the groundskeeper,” Ace chimed in, nodding his head.

“Wait a second, now that I think about it, he was rocking that golden vest from the Pajama-clog dorm,” Grim said, tapping his chin like he was deep in thought.

“Pajama... clog? You mean Savanaclaw? Man, I’m starting to think there are way too many troublemakers hanging around Night Raven…” Deuce looked like he was really getting lost in his thoughts.

“Okay, that’s enough chit-chat. Let’s hustle these baskets over to Trey!” Ace said, striding ahead, clearly eager to wrap things up.

“Myahaha! Now that we’re all pumped up, it’s time to hit Flavortown, baby!” Grim clapped his hands together, clearly ready for action.

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“Welcome back, folks! Looks like you scored big!” Trey waved them in, looking pleased.

“Now you can whip us up some gigantic tarts!” Ace plopped the bag of chestnuts down on the counter with a thud.

“Well, the bigger the tarts, the tougher it’ll be to peel all these nuts, so... good luck with that!” 

[Name] just stood there, jaw dropped at what Trey said. 

“We have to peel all of these...? Suddenly, I feel like the room is spinning...” Deuce closed his eyes, bracing himself for the task ahead.

“Preparation is key to good baking,” Trey noted, like a wise sage.

“Yeah, yeah, I know. We’ve come this far. No way we’re giving up now!” 

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“There! Finally got all these pureed!” Ace shook his hands, trying to shake off the ache.

“My arm is killing me...” Deuce stretched out with a big yawn.

“I’m gonna throw up,” [Name] pinched the bridge of her nose, clearly overwhelmed.

“You didn’t even use your hands; you used your fairy dust!” Ace shot back.

“Okay, but who am I really helping here?!” The fairy flicked some dust into Ace’s mouth before he could respond.

“Nice work! It'll taste even sweeter because of your struggle!” The green-haired boy applauded his underclassmen.

“The smell alone is making me drool...” Grim reached for the paste, only to have Yuuken swat his hand away.

“I just need to mix in some butter and sugar with the chestnut paste, plus a splash of oyster sauce—that’s my secret ingredient!”

“Oyster sauce?!” [Name], Ace, and Deuce all looked at Trey with disgust plastered on their faces.

“Yep! The umami from the oysters gives the cream this rich, savory flavor. I use the Walrus-brand Young Oyster Sauce. All the top bakers swear by it in their tarts,” Trey pointed at the label like it was gold.

“Really? But isn’t oyster sauce, like, super salty?” 

“Some people throw chocolate into their curry, right? Maybe it’s the same vibe,” Ace suggested.

“Pfft... Ah ha ha ha! I’m totally messing with you! No one in their right mind would put oyster sauce in a pastry!” Trey burst into laughter.

“What?! So you were just pulling our leg?” Ace shot a look at the upperclassman.

“Ah ha ha! I mean, if you’d thought about it for a second, you’d have realized how ridiculous it sounded! Let this be a lesson: don’t believe everything you hear,” Trey laughed at the clueless freshmen, clearly enjoying his little prank.

“Touché,” [Name] replied, giving him a blank stare. Jokes aren’t so funny when you’re on the receiving end, huh?

“Feh. And here I thought that guy was actually kinda decent,” Grim grumbled at Trey.

“Next up, I’ll add in the cream… Oh!” Trey suddenly looked shocked. What now?

“What’s wrong?” [Name] asked, concern creeping into her voice.

“You guys gathered so many chestnuts that we might’ve overdone it with the chestnut paste. I don’t think we have enough cream to mix in.”

“Then I’ll go buy some. Do they sell it at the school store?” Deuce offered, sounding like a scholar.

“They pretty much sell everything, so... probably. Could you grab me a few other things while you’re at it? I need two cartons of milk, two packs of eggs, some muffin cups, five cans of fruit…” Trey scribbled down the list, making it impossible to forget.

“I don’t think I can carry all that back. Yuuken, you wanna come with me?” Deuce said flatly, eyeing the black-haired boy who was lounging in a chair.

[Name] sighed, glancing at the sleeping figure, “I’ll help. I could use some fresh air anyway.”

“I’m coming too! I’m getting dizzy from all this stirring. I need a break!”

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The bell chimed as they opened the door and stepped into the shop.

“Hello, can I get some he-” Deuce froze, taking in the sights. “Whoa. This shop is wild! They have crystal skulls, grimoires, and... uh, I don’t even know what animal that is!”

“You think they actually sell cream here?”

“Maybe it’s in a different section?” [Name] suggested, pondering the possibilities.

“Greetings, my wandering imps! How do you fare today? Welcome to Mr. Sam's Mystery Shop. What among my humble selection interests you? A charm from a hidden land? The mummified remains of an ancient king? A cursed tarot card?” Sam pulled out each item with flair, presenting it to the students.

“Myah! I wasn’t expecting this kind of selection,” Grim said, scratching his head in disbelief.

“Um, we wanted to buy everything on this list...” Deuce handed over the paper like a true customer.

“Throw in two cans of tuna while you’re at it!” Grim called out as Sam headed to the back.

“Are you going to pay for that, Grim?” [Name] shot him a glare, “I’m pretty sure we’ve talked about this before…”

At her words and glare, Grim sulked like a toddler denied a toy.

Before long, Sam returned with two grocery bags in hand.

“Whoa... He really does have all this stuff, huh?” Deuce muttered to himself.

“Here you go. It’s pretty heavy… Are you sure you can handle this? Luckily for you, our 1/100th size flying saucers are 30% off today. Perfect for carrying groceries!” Sam offered the discount with a grin.

[Name] perked up at the idea. She’d never seen a flying saucer in real life before. “Ooh, let me see! That sounds awesome!”

“We’re good, thanks. Let’s go,” Deuce said, taking the bags from Sam.

“Myah! I didn’t realize today was National No Fun Allowed Day!” Grim pouted, getting dragged out by the back of his neck.

“Very well. Until next time, my little imps. Do come again! Ciao!” Sam called out as they stepped onto the warm patio.

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“That store was amazing,” Deuce said, clearly impressed.

“Yeah, and you’re impressively cheap,” Grim quipped, eyeing the awestruck Deuce.

A disgruntled cry came from the side. There was [Name], hunched over, desperately clutching a heavy bag filled with cans, trying to hold onto her dignity at the same time.

“Need a hand there?” Grim chuckled at her struggle. “Don’t get squashed now!”

“Shut up,” she hissed through clenched teeth.

“Here, let me take that,” Deuce offered, grabbing the bag and tossing it over his shoulder. “I’ve got a trick for this,” he handed [Name] the eggs, which she clutched tightly.

“A trick?” The fairy raised an eyebrow, intrigued.

“Yeah. My mom always stocked up when things were on sale, and the bags would get ridiculously heavy. Being the only guy in the house, I had to do all the heavy lifting, and—oh, sorry. Didn’t mean to hog the conversation,” Deuce explained.

“Sounds like you took great care of your mom,” [Name] complimented.

“No, it wasn’t like that at all. The truth is, I— Owww!” Deuce winced, feeling a sharp sting on his arm.

“Myah! The eggs!” Grim exclaimed, eyes darting to [Name], who had fallen to the ground, eggs smashed in her arms and splattered on the pavement. A groan escaped [Name] as the sticky mess settled in.

“[Name]?! The carton of eggs is totally wrecked! And now the bag’s leaking egg goo everywhere!” Deuce rushed over to help her up.

“Ouch! Why don’t you watch where you’re— Hey! You’re the jerks who broke the egg yolk on my carbonara!”

“I’ve had it with you punks. You need to learn your place!” The magenta-haired student stepped forward, getting all up in Deuce’s face.

Deuce took a step back, disbelief written all over him. “......You’re the ones who jumped out at us from around a corner! And you picked a fight with us at lunch over an egg that you could’ve still eaten! And now you’ve wrecked six of OUR eggs and knocked over [Name]!”

The white-haired one piped up again, “So what? You saying that was our fault?”

“I am. Please reimburse us for the eggs. And then apologize to the chickens and [Name],” the dark blue-haired boy tried to sound as polite as possible, but his words came off more like a warning.

The delinquents just laughed, clearly not taking Deuce seriously. “Ooh, look who’s got his big boy pants on. You’re making a huge deal over some stupid eggs.”

“What?” Anger bubbled up in Deuce’s voice, his blood starting to boil. The delinquents were still finding amusement in the situation, but for Deuce, this was crossing a line.

“They haven’t even hit the ground, so they’re still good. Quit whining. Plus, the girl could always just take a shower.”

“You should thank us for saving you the trouble of cracking ‘em and cooking them for you!”

Deuce stood there, watching as those punks laughed at the girl who was just sitting there, all sad and covered in egg while baking under the hot sun. 

“Seriously, that’s not cool,” he said, feeling a surge of anger. 

The delinquents looked at each other, clearly confused by his outburst.

“I mean it! I said, THAT'S NOT COOL! You think it’s okay to call my eggs stupid? No way! Those eggs might not have turned into chicks, but they were destined to make some delicious tarts! And instead of saying sorry, you just trash [Name]’s uniform and throw insults? Do you even get it? DO YOU?!” Deuce’s stare was intense, piercing right through them and making them rethink their choices. 

“What’s up with this guy all of a sudden?!” The confusion was clear on the face of the delinquent, totally thrown off by Deuce’s fiery attitude shift. 

“You owe me six eggs and [Name] a heartfelt apology. If you’re not down to do that, then you’re in for a world of hurt!” Deuce's fist was clenching tight, ready for whatever came next. 

“Are you for real?!” The magenta-haired delinquent stepped back, utterly shocked. 

“Buckle up,jerks!” Deuce shot them a fierce glare, standing his ground.

I made a bonus chapter for Valentine’s Day but I don’t know if I should post it😭😭 it’s like 3 days past Valentines Day💀 But thank you for reading!!🤍

Taglist : @itwaszzmoon @brights-place @capcryooo @strayharmony943 @chaoticotaku @animegirl-12s-world

[nakylvr]

1:43 a.m.

kim yooyeon (triples) x gn!reader

summary: studying for finals was good considering your girlfriend helped you study, only thing is that it ends in the latest hours imaginable in the night

warnings/tags: established relationship, non-idol!yooyeon, fluff fluff fluff! i don't ever write it but here 🤲

triples masterlist | main masterlist

studying for finals was possibly the worst and best times of your life in college. worst because well, you're studying for finals. best because you're studying for finals with your brilliantly smart girlfriend who knows everything and you know near nothing. it was a normal routine for the two of you to study for exams and finals together. most of the time it was nice because you were able to spend time with your girlfriend and study at the same time. except for times like this when she's determined to finish a subject and it's nearing two in the morning.

you tried listening as you rested your head on the palm of your hand, looking at yooyeon and nodding your head occasionally to show you were somewhat listening when she stopped and looked at you.

"you're not listening, are you?" she questioned.

knowing you were caught not listening, you didn't try hard and lie about it. "sorry, you're just so pretty when you explain things," you answer, smiling at her.

she rolls her eyes at your words, but a small smile makes its way onto her face as she sets down the pen in her hand. "i just want to make sure you don't fail this," she says.

"have i ever failed an exam you helped me study for?" you reply, the cheesy smile still on your face. "face it babe, you're literally a genius."

yooyeon rolled her eyes again at you, but closed the textbook and spun around in her chair to face you. "i'm not a genius. and you're lucky i help you and you only. majority of the students here try to bribe me to do their work and i don't."

you gasp dramatically, holding your hand to your chest. "only me? i must be special then to be taught words of wisdom from the best in the school," you said with a grin.

"shut up," she replied, gently shoving you away from her, the smile on her face growing.

"what? you know you love me," you tease, pushing your chair closer towards her and wrapping your arms around her, leaning your head on her shoulder. "trust me, i promise i won't fail this one. but can we please go to sleep now? i'm going to pass out asleep if i have to study for another minute." you pout.

yooyeon sighs, looking at the papers and textbooks before seeing the time and mentally cursing herself for making you stay up this long. "yeah, we can go to sleep now. i didn't realize the time. i'm sorry, i didn't mean to make you stay up this late," she replies, one of her hands running through your hair and playing with it.

"it's okay," you mumble. "i know you just want me to not do bad, i appreciate it."

"mhm," she hums, closing the other textbook and turning off the desk light with her unoccupied hand, the room going dark after she did so. "c'mon," she says, standing up out of her chair and pulling you up with her.

yooyeon, barely being able to see in the dark, manages to drag you with her to her bed and lay down on it, seeing the time glow on her digital clock with a green 2:27 lit up. she looked over at you as you laid down next to her, your arms not moving from around her as you put your face in the crook of her neck, smiling to herself as her hand played with your hair again. "i'm sorry again for making you stay up like this," she whispered quietly.

"it's okay," you murmured tiredly into her neck. "as long as i'm with you, it's alright."

"i love you," she says, pressing a soft kiss against your head.

"i love you too. thank you for helping me study," you respond, your words slowing as you tried not to fall asleep.

"you don't need to thank me, i'd do anything to help you," she replied. "now go to sleep, it's late."

"mm," you hum, finally closing your eyes.

within five minutes you were dead asleep as yooyeon silently looked down at you, her hand not moving from your hair as she ran through it. once she was sure you were completely asleep, she gently kissed your head before laying her head on the pillow and closing her eyes.

thankfully, you passed the final the next morning despite getting four hours of sleep total. yooyeon got you coffee and breakfast before you took the exam as an apology for you getting such little sleep even though you kept insisting she didn't need to. but, you definitely remember to remind her of the time so it doesn't happen again, you felt and looked like a literal zombie the next morning.

[winonaparadise]

short story 💯

wrote a very quick story about a class i took in college. if you like my writing in my videos you may like this

Five years ago today I was clawing through state university. I had switched majors in an effort to come away with something more material from my college experience – but I was also trying to earn as many credits with as few courses to keep my schooling short and cheap.

I took a heavy weighted class in “media law.” A subject notoriously as intricate as it is absolutely fucking stupid. Anything you could learn, Disney will change tommorrow. The professor was an adjunct, splitting his time between the humble basement where boys with Pulp Fiction posters in their dorms fiddled with cameras and the actual law school where he was employed some miles down the road. I have never seen Pulp Fiction, but I’ve fiddled with enough cameras and enough of the boys who own them to have reviewed it twice. This is not a problem to me now.

Then I was stupid. Twenty. And basically friendless. I spent all my time trying to make something the same way the universe spent billions of years pouring hot soup into holes and hoping life would bubble out. I studied Japanese during quiet matches of PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds. I never got a win, and I never got an “A” in Japanese.

Weeks of school went by as I skimmed textbooks, got high, and thought about talking to literally anyone. Academic words danced around the edges of my brain like sand. I wrote essays on the same autopilot I write today. Feverish. Flowing. Fantasizing about what it would be like to go out with someone instead of texting a girl who now lived in Japan and making ramen noodles while listening for footsteps in a digital warzone.

I did all my work. I submitted it on something called “canvas” that the muscle memory in my fingers still types in search bars to this day. I never checked my grades. I knew they were bad.

Classes dragged me through the week on a bungee cord. I lived a block away from the bulk of them and found myself drifting in halls of buildings I’d never attended just to keep myself from meandering back home to draw a bad comic about a girl who lived in hell. 

I knew nobody. I went nowhere. I struggled to do classwork alone on outdoor benches dreaming of someone speaking to me. I needed to live in hell instead.

My media law professor was late the weekend after our first term essays were due. I don’t know what mode of transportation he took to get from one school to the other but today the Carolina sun had drenched him sweaty. We were chilly waiting for him to begin.

“Just about every single one of you failed.” He spat and chugged coffee through the entire period. “While I first was grading I thought I was the one who failed.”

He didn’t let the moment of respite last. “But I also did something I’ve never done before.” He paced like my father did when a restaurant was closed early. “I gave out my first perfect score. Which prevents me from grading on a curve.”

He huffed, he assigned a new reading, and he rushed out like he had lit dynamite. “Do better!” “What an asshole.” The girl who sat next to me in every class spoke as if she had been holding her breath. “Fuck him and fuck whoever got that hundred.”

“I know right!” I launched in on her anger, feeling it too. Back and forth we complained. We walked off campus together. She had long blonde hair and towered over me. I had felt ugly and mousey next to her, but today I felt like her equal. It felt good to bitch.

“I got a fucking 50. What about you?”

“It wasn’t pretty.” I recalled how I stayed up the night before the assignment was due. I milked bullshit into a puree. I got a rush of adrenaline from killing someone with a shotgun through a door in an abandoned house on the outskirts of Pochinki. I was probably close to being expelled. “This class is too fucking hard,” she smoked and shook her head by a bus stop on Tate Street. “I’m not about to lose my freetime over it.”

“Right.” I imagined her at parties. Black silhouettes against colored lights and deafening music. Like The Social Network. “We should be partners for the next assignment,” she got out her phone and passed it to me for my number. I typed it in. I waved her off on the bus. We did the assignment together. We texted each other about our studies. We joked about finding the guy who got the perfect score and beating him senseless. I thought about talking to her about my art or what we were making in other classes, but never did.

Towards the end of the semester I had to plan the next. A whirlpool churned in my stomach as I clicked on “grades” on my campus’ online portal. I had an A+ in a single course. 

Media Law.

My friend from class texted me that she was dreading the final. I texted her that if we failed I would kill Mr. Perfect Score. She texted “lol.”

She passed the course. I got my degree so I assume I did too. We stopped texting.

That professor emailed me asking me to take a course at the law school down the road. He said he would let me sit in and see if I wanted to change majors a third time. I never replied.

A law degree would just make Mr. Perfect Score a hundred times more punchable.

[scarletsaphire]

For his entire nine years of life, Danny has had incredible dreams. Featured in every one is a patch of stars, staying just in the corner of his vision, just out of reach. It is only after his first nightmare that the stars appear as what they truly are; a ghost, here to make a deal.

--

This is my Big Boy fic I've been planning for over a year. I hope you guys enjoy.

Danny had always dreamed of stars. It wasn't necessarily that he always dreamed of the stars, but they were always there. Sometimes he'd dream that he was a pirate, fighting glowing green sea creatures that came up from the bottom of the ocean, tentacles grappling on the sides of his pirate ship. Sometimes he would dream of a world made entirely of smudges of color, and he had to save it from the evil people who wanted to erase it all. Sometimes he would dream of exploring other planets, of the taste of space dust on his tongue and a ground that made him bounce like a trampoline. Danny dreamed a lot of things, but no matter what he dreamed about, the stars were always there, just out of reach. They were different then the ones that appeared in the sky; they seemed to flow and ripple like water, and they always seemed to move to the corner of his vision no matter how hard he tried to see them.

For a while, Danny tried to catch the stars. Every time he got close, he'd wake up. But his parents had taught him that Fentons don't give up, and Danny wouldn't be the one to break that streak. So he swore to himself, after what felt like the millionth time waking up in the dead of night, that he'd get to hold those stars someday, even if he needed to go to space to get them. He spent every night that summer trying to catch them, every night waking up disappointed and going through the next day so tired his mom brought him to the doctor's for a check up.

Danny didn't try and catch the stars the night before third grade. In between teaching Danny the correct way to weld, his dad had talked all about how he'd need all his energy to learn the new things that tomorrow would bring. His mom had stolen Danny away to show him the new and improved Fenton Folders she'd finished for him, designed to be able to hold not only the papers for his class, but any textbooks or other supplies he might need as well. They were bulky, and the combination of metal and mesh wasn't the prettiest, but Danny loved them; he'd helped her make them, after all. Jazz had told him while helping him pack that he needed to prepare himself. 

"Third grade is where the real school starts," she said while trying to fit his pack of #2 pencils in the backpack without disrupting the spots she'd already put his other supplies. "I can help you prepare physically, because I'm the best big sister ever, but you've gotta make sure you're prepared mentally. It's a lot of responsibility."

"I don't know what that means," Danny admitted.

Jazz grinned at him, showing off the gap in her teeth. "Yeah, well you're gonna. That's something third grade will teach you."

Danny did not pout. He was nine now, which was basically double digits. He was above pouting. "Why don't you just tell me now?"

Jazz zipped up the backpack and left it on the hook next to the front door. "I can't do that, it's against the laws of third grade. Everyone has to go through a ritual at the start, to make sure they're fit to be a third grader."

Danny narrowed his eyes. "You're lying."

"Would I ever lie to you?"

"Yes."

Jazz stuck her tongue out at him, and Danny did it right back. "I'm surprised Mom and Dad didn't tell you about the third grade ritual. What else do you think they've been having us do those martial arts classes for?"

"Ghost fighting?" Danny said slowly.

"And who says the challenge isn't a ghost?" Jazz was smiling at him in the same way she had when she said she didn't hide his cookies on the top shelf.

"You're definitely lying."

Jazz shrugged and turned around towards the stairs. "Believe what you want. I just know that if I was you, I would listen to your big sister who’s already beaten the ghosts. You don't want to fight them by yourself, do you?" With that she went upstairs, leaving Danny by himself. Jazz was lying to him. She had to be. But...

Danny grabbed one of the half finished inventions laying on the end table in the living room and slipped it into the side pocket of his backpack. It was better safe than sorry.

That morning Danny woke well-rested, having slept better than he had all summer. He’d had a dream about constructing fish bowls out of clouds, wringing the water from them like you would a towel. It had been a good dream, even if the stars still hung in the corner of his vision, taunting him. It would have been a pleasant way to wake up, if the first thing he was aware of wasn't the bellowing of his name from the doorway.

"Danno!" Jack repeated at a volume that only made his ears ring a little bit. "Hurry up kiddo, you're gonna be late!"

Danny blinked the sleep out of his eyes as he tried to interpret the numbers on his clock. 7:10. "Dad, you were supposed to wake me up at 6:20!" Danny yelled, jumping out of his bed, blankets falling in a twisted knot to the floor. "The bus is going to be here in 10 minutes!"

"Sorry, son," Jack said. "You don't have to worry about the bus, your old man can drive you."

"No, I'm sure I can catch the bus."

---

Danny walked out of the GAV at precisely 7:24, with only his nine years of experience keeping him from vomiting. He'd missed the bus by thirty seconds at most. 

"You've got this, kiddo! Face those challenges head on!" Jack called from the open window. "Love you, good luck!"

Danny waved back, and Jack drove away. His mention of challenges reminded him of Jazz's words yesterday. Unfortunately, he hadn’t been able to take the unfinished device with him to school; his mom had ended up grabbing it to work on, and with how late he'd woken up, he didn't have a chance to grab a new one. That was okay. Jazz was just kidding. Probably. He tightened his grip on his backpack straps and made his way into the school yard.

Danny's plan was to find Tucker. His parents hadn't let him hang out the past week. They'd said something about summer reading stuff that Tucker still hadn't done, and that he was grounded until he got it finished or school started back up. It was completely unfair, and it meant that the couple minutes before they had to go inside were crucial for catching up about all the exciting things that they had done since the last time they'd hung out. Unfortunately, the first person Danny found was not Tucker. It was Dash.

"Are your parents still adding weapons to that hunk of junk you call a car?" he called out from his spot on the stairs. Dash was mean and a bully, and he had been since kindergarten, but he wasn't persistent. Danny had learned early on that the best thing to do was ignore him and walk away, ideally into the sight of a teacher. Danny tried to do this now, but Dash got up and started to follow him. "What are you running away from? Gonna go hunt down some ghosts to talk to? It’s not like any of us want to."

Danny's grip tightened around the straps of his backpack. "Leave me alone Dash."

"What are you gonna do if I don't?" Dash spat. Danny's next step was halted by Dash's grip on his backpack, forcing him to stumble backwards to keep from falling. "Are you gonna tell your weirdo parents? You'd probably have to lie to get them to care." 

Danny spun to face Dash, the force of his twist breaking the taller boy’s grasp. Despite their height difference, Danny didn't back down.

"Stop it," he spat.

Dash sneered. "Oh, I'm so scared." He leaned down until Danny could smell his breath, warm and gross on his face. "Your whole family is a joke, and everyone knows it. You're no different."

There were a number of things that happened in those few seconds. The first was that Danny realized that, whether intentional or not, Jazz had been right about needing to fight a monster. He wouldn't tell her that, of course. She was already insufferable. 

The second was that Danny's hand had let go of his backpack, clenched into a fist, and flew at Dash's jaw with all the speed and might Danny's nine year old body could muster. 

The third thing, which was by far the worst, was the door to the school yard flying open only a few feet from where Dash and Danny stood. This meant that the teacher got front row seats to Dash's tooth flying out of his mouth.

"Daniel James Fenton!" she called, but her voice sounded distant under the rush of Danny's blood in his ears and Dash's blubbering. He only fully processed that his name had been said when he felt her grab his arm. "Just what do you think you are doing?"

Danny flushed red from embarrassment as he realized that the teacher's yelling had attracted the attention of the whole school yard. "He started it," he mumbled under his breath.

"I don't care who started it, young man, that's no excuse for violence!" she snapped. "I'm going to need to call your parents, do you understand that? In all my years of teaching, I've never had to call anyone about something like this so early in the school year." She moved towards the building, Danny dragging along behind her. 

She stopped briefly near the door to point at a student Danny didn't recognize; a 5th grader, by the looks of it. "Would you be a dear and escort Dash to the nurse’s office?" The student nodded.

The teacher led Danny through the halls of the school to the main office. "You are going to sit right here," she said to Danny, leading him to one of the waiting chairs, "-and you aren't going to move a single muscle, do you understand? I'm going to talk to the principal, and then she is going to talk to you." Danny nodded, and the woman disappeared behind the adjacent door.

Danny would not cry. He wanted to, and his eyes burnt with hot, angry tears, but he did not cry. He was nine. That was almost double digits, and someone who is double digits doesn't cry. Danny focused on one spot on the worn, dirty, carpeted floors, trying to get the heat of his anger to burn a hole through it.

It didn't work. Danny cried quietly.

When the teacher walked back into the room, he wiped away his tears as quickly and discreetly as he could before getting out of his chair and following her into the principal's office. Danny had seen Principal Caulfield a couple of times before; she would give announcements in the cafeteria sometimes, and would lead fire drills. He'd never been called to her office before. He'd never wanted to.

She smiled at him warmly, a stark contrast to the teacher's steely gaze he could still feel burrowing into the back of his head like knives. "Hello, Daniel. I assume Mrs. Robertson explained why you're here." Danny nodded. "Mrs. Robertson explained what happened to me, but I want to hear it from your perspective. Can you do that for me?" 

Danny shifted from foot to foot, not meeting Principal Caulfield's eyes. "She can leave, if that would make you more comfortable." Principal Caulfield nodded to her, and Mrs. Robertson took her leave.

"Dash was making fun of my family," Danny mumbled. "I tried to walk away, but he grabbed me and wouldn't let me go."

Principal Caulfield nodded. "So you decided to hit him?" 

Danny nodded. 

"Why don't you take a seat?" Slowly, Danny sat down in the chair opposite of hers. "We try very hard to teach our students that violence isn't the answer here, and it never is. You should've called for a teacher, or tried to settle the issue with words. Do you understand that?" 

Danny nodded again. 

"Now, I'm going to call your parents. I'm going to have a long discussion with, and you will be sent home early. I know that the first day of school has a lot of fun activities, and with your behavior today, I think a fair punishment is missing out on them. If this happens again, however, you will be in far more trouble. Do I make myself clear?"

"Yes ma'am," Danny said. He focused on keeping his voice from wobbling.

"Good. Now, let me see here..." Principal Caulfield stood up and made her way over to her filing cabinet, rifling through one of the drawers and pulling out a folder with a label that read "D. J. Fenton." She flipped through it, traced her finger down one of the pages, and started dialing a number on the phone. Just as Danny had expected, it went to voicemail. A voicemail that was completely full.

Principal Caulfield frowned down at the phone. She looked through the file again, before looking up at Danny. "Are your parents busy right now?"

"My mom's down in the lab," he said. "If Dad's home by now, he's down there with her. If not, he's in the car."

Her face twisted in confusion, probably trying to figure out what Danny meant by lab, before it settled on an expression Danny had become very familiar with over the years. It was the mixed horror and understanding that most adults got when they realized that those two jumpsuit-wearing ghost hunting weirdos did in fact have children, and one of them was standing in front of them. Danny braced himself for the conversation that almost always followed, even as Principal Caulfield's expression faded into a professional veneer of kindness.

"I didn't realize that your parents had a laboratory in your house," she said. "What type of things do they do in the lab?"

"They build things, mostly," Danny said. That was a major simplification; even though Danny wasn't allowed to help with a lot of the things they did, he helped with enough to know a lot more than that they just 'built things.' More importantly, he knew that Principal Caulfield wasn't actually interested in hearing about his parents’ work, no matter how interesting it truly was. She was poking and prodding around the house to make sure Danny and Jazz were safe. He'd gone through it many times. It was never a pleasant conversation but it didn't normally bother Danny. "They don't let me or my sister into the lab unsupervised, they have all the proper PPE for both themselves and us, and anything they think will hurt us, or that they don't know whether it will or not is locked away where we can't get it," Danny recited.

Slowly, Principal Caulfield nodded. "It sounds like that's something you've practiced."

Danny shrugged. "I just get asked things like that a lot."

"Daniel." Her voice was hard. She cleared her throat and tried again. "Danny," she said, and her voice softer this time. She reached her hands out on her desk and folded them over each other. "You understand that that's not normal right? That you shouldn’t be in a house where your safety is questioned by everyone?"

That was also something he heard a lot. It wasn't like any of them were wrong. His parents weren't normal, and he knew that; what did it matter that everyone else knew that too? But Dash's words from before whirled in his head, mixing with Principal Caulfield's concern and the remaining whispers of the dozens of other people who'd said it. Danny bit his tongue to keep from either crying or shouting. He wasn't sure which was more likely. 

It took a few seconds before he managed to get out the response he wanted. "I am safe."

Principal Caulfield sighed. "Do you have any other way to get in contact with your parents?" Danny shook his head, and she pursed her lips. "Ok. Do they let you walk home alone?" Danny nodded. "Since I'm not going to be able to get in contact with them, what we're going to do instead is you're going to walk home. Straight home, no detours. You’re going to give them a letter explaining the whole situation, and then they are going to call me back. If I don't get a call back from them by -" she glanced at the clock on the wall next to her "- by nine o'clock, you are going to be in a lot more trouble. Do you understand?" Danny nodded again.

The next few minutes passed in tense silence as Principal Caulfield wrote out the note for Danny's parents. Finally, she handed the paper over to Danny. "You're free to leave." Danny shoved the note into his backpack and stood up. 

Just as he was about to walk out of the room, she spoke again. "Daniel?" He turned back to look at her. "Let's make sure this doesn't happen again, ok?" 

All he could do was nod.

---

It was almost 8:30 by the time he walked through the front door, his face red and puffy from anger, tears, and the rising August heat. As he had guessed, the sounds of clinking metal echoed up from the lab. He threw his backpack on the couch, and crouched to untie his shoes. He needed to gather his bravery to face his parents. He'd gotten in trouble in school before; even Jazz had gotten in trouble a couple of times, and she was as goody two shoes as they got. It was just that most of the time when he got in trouble, it was for something that his parents were more lenient about; they didn't care about him missing homework assignments when he had spent most of the time with them in the lab. They didn't care about him not paying attention in class because neither of them could pay attention to much of anything not related to ghosts or science; they claimed it was a Fenton Family trait. 

Danny knew that they would care about this.

He took a deep breath and started down the basement stairs. "Mom? Dad?" he called out as soon as he reached the bottom, peeking his head around the corner.

"Danny? Is it three o'clock already?" Maddie said, glancing over at him in confusion.

"I could've sworn that I only just got started!" Jack said, sitting upright from where he was hunched over his workbench. 

"Time sure flies when we're working," Maddie replied with a laugh.

"Um..." Danny shuffled from one foot to the other. "It's not."

"What was that sweetie?" Maddie asked. 

"It's not three yet. I got sent home from school early," Danny said. He started to explain everything, the words falling out of his mouth as he talked. When he finished explaining what Principal Caulfield had said to him, he pulled out the note and held it out to his parents. They'd both moved to stand next to Danny while he was talking. 

Maddie took the paper and opened it to begin reading, while Jack lowered himself to one knee to get on Danny's level. "I'm disappointed in you, son. I thought we had raised you to know better than resorting to violence."

"Unless it’s against a ghost," Maddie added quietly as she continued to read.

"Unless it’s a ghost," Jack amended. "Then your old man can show you how to shoot the sorry spook right between the eyes!" Jack bounced to his feet, pointing his hands into finger guns, and imitating the sounds of shooting and explosions. That went on until Maddie finished reading the note.

"Jack dear, you've gotten distracted again," she said, folding the note back up and slipping it into her jumpsuit pocket before turning to Danny. "What your father is trying to say is that we're proud of you for trying to stick up for us, but you should know better than to start fights."

"I'm sorry…" 

"You don't have to apologize to us," Maddie said. "You need to apologize to Dash. And that's what you're going to do, right now. You're going to go up to your room and write an apology note to him, and then you are going to go right to bed. No games, no TV, no books, no toys. I think that's a fair punishment, don't you honey?"

"Sounds right to me."

"But he started it!" Danny protested. 

"I don't want to hear it, young man," Maddie chided. "We can be a lot meaner about this if you make us."

Danny bit his lip. "Fine."

"Good. Now, you go upstairs, and I'll give your principal a call."

Danny and Maddie made their way out of the basement together. She stopped at the phone to wave Danny along. "And I'll be coming up to check on you soon, so don't think you can sneak out of the punishment." Danny gave a curt nod in response, not stopping his trek upstairs. 

Danny sat down at his desk in his bedroom, grabbing one of his new school notebooks. He and Jazz had talked their parents into buying a bunch of stickers, and the two of them had spent an entire afternoon customizing their new school notebooks. Danny had, of course, covered his in stars, rocket ships, planets, and astronauts. 

Danny’s lungs and eyes burned with anger as he realized that the very first thing he was going to have to put in his new notebooks was an apology letter to Dash, of all people. But he didn't have any of his notebooks from last year, so he didn't have much of a choice.

He flipped to the first page and lifted his pencil to start writing. The first couple of words were dark and shaky. The pencil tip snapped from the force he used. Danny let his head fall to the desk, and groaned into his arms. "Why do I have to apologize?" he complained to himself, not lifting his head from the desk. "He doesn't deserve it. He's been nothing but mean for years." 

The burning feeling in his throat got more intense. Hot tears ran down his eyes onto the notebook, smearing the few words he’d managed to write.

Danny turned over and glared at the door. His mom had said that she'd come and check on him, but he had grown up with her. There was the chance that she'd make good on her word, sure, but it was far more likely that something would call her back to the lab and she'd forget all about Danny, at least until Jazz got home. 

Danny didn't want to risk the offhand chance of her coming up and catching him doing something she said not to, but that didn't mean he had to write the letter. Not yet, anyway. Danny pushed his chair back from the desk with a squeak, and made his way over to his bed, flopping onto the mattress. With his pillow muffling him, Danny let the tears flow freely.

---

Danny sat in class, the teacher at the front of the room droning on about something. He wasn't paying attention. How could he, when he could feel the weight of his classmates’ stares on his shoulders? Their whispers joined together in a cacophony of noise, getting louder and louder with every passing moment until Danny couldn't even hear himself think. The sound persisted even when he covered his ears with his hands, pushing against his head until it hurt. "Please, stop," he begged. Like a switch, everyone stopped whispering. Danny opened his eyes to see the teacher from the playground standing above his desk. 

"What was that, Fenton?" she said, her voice dripping with venom. 

"I just..." Danny looked around at his classmates, but he couldn't focus on any of them, not under the heat of the teacher's gaze. "I wanted them to stop talking."

"How dare you interrupt their conversation!" Spittle flew from her mouth, bright green, and splattered against Danny's desk where it sizzled, chewing through the wood. He flinched back. "Apologize. To all of them. And then it's straight to the principal with you!" 

"But I didn't do anything!" Danny protested. 

"And you're talking back? If you're ever allowed back in this school again, you can apologize then. But I think the principal might put a stop to that."

Danny tried to stand up, but his legs were glued to the chair. He strained against the force holding him down until his muscles burned, but no matter what he did, he couldn't move. 

"What do you think you're doing, young man?" The teacher said, and she bared her glistening fangs at him. "You are about to be in a world of trouble!"

"What, are you too weak to get out of your chair, Fenturd?" Dash's voice overlapped the teacher’s. "Or is a ghost holding you down? We gonna have to call your crazy parents?"

They didn’t stop talking even as the rest of the class started again, an echoing cacophony of every horrible thing Danny had ever heard about him and his parents and his sister and his house and everything. All he could do was struggle against the chair even as his legs burned from the effort and his head pounded and his eyes leaked hot tears and- 

Danny sat upright in his bed, gasping for air. His school clothes, which he had fallen asleep in, stuck to the skin, and the blanket he'd been sleeping on top of was soaked with cold sweat. He grabbed at his chest, trying to slow down the frantic beating of his heart. 

"It was just a dream," he said to himself, still breathless. "It wasn't real."

Danny'd had nightmares before, but they'd always been full of fantastical beasts and monsters and ghosts. He’d never felt trapped; any time that he'd get too scared, he'd reach to the stars. Their ever-present shimmering would block out whatever terrors plagued his mind, and he'd wake up calm.

The stars weren’t there to save him this time, and that was almost scarier than the nightmare had been.

---

"Did you get the note finished like I asked?" Maddie asked over their Chinese takeout. (Surprisingly, Jack had tried to cook dinner. Emphasis on the tried. He claimed that the hot dogs started the fire in the kitchen, but they had been peaceful since the Great Toaster War, so Danny was pretty sure that Jack just burned the water he'd been boiling. And the stove he'd been boiling it on.)

"Mhm," Danny answered around his mouthful of pork fried rice. He hadn't even started the letter. Every time he did, the cutting words of his dream flooded his mind. It wasn't like she'd check it anyway.

"Good. Make sure to give it to him tomorrow when you go back to school," she said. 

"I still can't believe you got into a fight!" Jazz said. "I didn't get into any fights when I was your age."

"You're only two years older than me," Danny grumbled, shoveling another bite into his mouth.

"And those two years make quite the difference, obviously," she replied. She twirled the noodle around her fork. "I wonder if it has anything to do with the fact that-"

Danny cut her off before she could get started. "Can I be excused?"

Maddie and Jack shared a look before Maddie nodded. "Don’t forget you’re still grounded, mister!" Jack called out after him as Danny shoveled one last spoonful into his mouth and retreated to his room. 

The day had passed slowly and painfully, with Danny spending a lot of time staring at his wall. He'd tried going down to the lab to help his parents, but they had made him go back upstairs to his room. It had taken an hour for them to remember to do so, in which they had told him all about the newest ecto-filtration system they were working on developing, but that hour hadn't done much to help with the other ten hours of extreme boredom. That, and the skin crawling grossness from the dream had yet to leave him.

Despite the fact that Danny had done less than nothing today, he was tired. He may have left the dinner table to avoid Jazz's rambling, but he probably would've done that anyway. In spite of the sun still streaming through the window, he made his way through his bedtime routine, before laying down in his bed, this time in his comfortable pajamas.

Apparently, it didn't matter that Danny's exhaustion seemed to run bone deep; no matter how he twisted and turned, he couldn't get comfortable. Every time he thought he'd found a nice position, his hand, head, or legs would throb. Every time he closed his eyes, he saw the teacher from his nightmare with the venom filled fangs, or the disappointed faces of his parents and Principal Caulfield. 

Something told him that if he fell asleep, he would be met by similar dreams. No matter how tired he was, he didn't want to go through that again. He tried to keep his hands busy, and when he was too tired to move them with any more grace then a baby, he moved to keeping his mind occupied.

Despite how much he fought it, the soft ticking sound of his clock lulled him into an uneasy sleep.

—

Danny knew that he was dreaming because of the stars. The stars that had hovered at the edges of his vision in every dream but the last now covered everything, as if they were making up for lost time.

"Woah..." he whispered. He'd dreamed of standing in a field of stars before, but this felt...different. Before, there’d always been that one patch that stood out from the rest, his constant companion, a spot inconsistent with the rest of them. It had always felt more real, more physical, then the rest of them. This time, that patch made up everything around him. 

He dropped to his knees to touch one, an exceptionally bright star that pulsed with the beating of his heart. He cupped it in his hands, pulling it out from the inky blackness that surrounded it. It stayed where he held it, with most of the darkness dripping off like water, only a thin strand keeping it connected to the rest of the starscape. It wasn't warm like he'd expected; in fact, it was cold. So cold that it almost hurt to hold it, but he didn't put it down. He'd been dreaming of this moment, literally, for his entire life.

He stared down at the glowing ball, enraptured by its flickering lights, before he realized that it was… wrong. He knew stars; he had begged his parents to bring him to the space museum so often over the summer the people working there knew him by name. Stars were not just balls of light, they were balls of fire that moved and changed. Whatever he held in his hand was nothing but pure light, perfectly frozen, completely unchanging. 

He let the not-star fall from his hands, slipping back into its place in the inky void.

"Is it not living up to your expectations, little dreamer?" Danny whirled around to try and find the voice, but it seemed to come from everywhere, echoing endlessly. The sound traveled in ripples across the not-quite liquid floor, and the echoes only started to fade when the ripples did.

"Who are you?" Danny asked, continuing to scan his surroundings unsuccessfully. "Where are you?"

"You may call me Nocturne," the voice said. "And you already know the answer to the last question."

"I do?" Danny asked, confused. He spun around in a circle slowly. 

"You do. We're in a dream."

"This doesn't feel like my dreams..." Danny said. 

"That's because it isn't one of your dreams," Nocturne said. The surrounding darkness coalesced into one being, the starry cloak extending endlessly into the rest of the surroundings. One cluster of stars became a horned mask, with sunken eyes that seemed to be staring straight through Danny. "It's one of mine. I've brought you here to make a deal."

Nearly every alarm bell Danny had started ringing at once. Despite this, he did not feel scared, just wrong. Something was wrong. He tried to figure out what, but failed. Nocturne was still staring at him expectantly. He had to answer, even if he couldn’t figure it out. “My parents say I’m not supposed to talk to strangers.”

Nocturne's laughter rang out through the dream, even though his mask remained perfectly stationary, his eyes never leaving Danny. "Dearest Daniel, I am many things, but I am no stranger." He moved closer to Danny. Or, Danny moved closer to him, the ground beneath his feet folding over itself as if the world was being moved around him.. "You've known me for many, many years now."

"I don't..." Danny started to say, but he cut himself off with a hard swallow. He did know Nocturne, even if he didn't understand how. "What are you?" Danny asked instead.

"I am a ghost," Nocturne said, and Danny’s alarm bells worsened as a cold dread settled on his shoulders. Maybe he was in danger. "You don't need to be afraid, little dreamer. If I wanted to hurt you, I would have done it a very long time ago." 

For some reason, that didn't make Danny any less afraid.

He tried to stumble backwards, only to find that the cold liquid of the pool had hardened around his ankles, locking him in place. "What do you want with me?" Danny said, and his voice was barely over a whisper.

Nocturne tilted his head to the side. "I think a better question is how can we help each other? As I said before, I am offering you a deal. All I want from you for now is to listen." Nocturne laughed again. "I suppose in this case your question ended up just as good as any other." He held his hand out to Danny. "Now, shall we?"

Danny struggled to tear his gaze away from Nocturne's piercing eyes, but he managed to. The ghost's hands were barely visible, blending in almost perfectly to the inky blackness surrounding them, but Danny could still make out the vague outline of claws connected to a hand nearly the size of his face. He knew he should say no; he'd spent his whole life listening to his parents talk about ghosts. They were heartless creatures, a sad mixture of energy and ectoplasm and nothing more. They were more dangerous than anything Danny could ever dream up, had the ability to kill him with nothing more than a thought, and may do something even worse with only a little bit more. He should not take Nocturne's hand.

He tried to move again, but his foot was still stuck in the pool, the cold liquid clinging to him like tar. It didn't look like Danny had much of a choice. Hesitantly, Danny reached out and took hold of one of Nocturne's claws, touching as little of him as he could. Nocturne's expression did not change, but Danny could still feel the satisfaction rolling off of him in waves.

Danny could not remember blinking, but he must have, because one second they were in the star-studded abyss, and the next they were standing at the rear end of Danny's classroom. Danny looked around, confused, and his confusion only grew when he saw himself sitting in the middle seat. His doppelganger was hunched in on himself, visibly uncomfortable.

"You recognize this scene, do you not?" Nocturne asked.

Slowly, Danny nodded. "My nightmare. From earlier today."

"Very good. Tell me, what do you think of it?"

"Um, I don't like it?" Danny answered.

"And why is that?"

Danny shrugged. "I mean, no one likes nightmares."

"Yes, but you've had plenty of nightmares before. Why was this one different?"

Danny bit his lip and took a shot in the dark. "It reminded me of my bad day?"

"Excellent, little dreamer," Nocturne said, his voice laced with pride. "The bad things that have happened, or the bad things that might. Everyone gets them, at some point or another. And yet, for a very long time, yours were special. You were never truly afraid of the things that might happen, but created new things to be afraid of. Isn't that right?"

Danny gave a small nod. It felt like the answer Nocturne was looking for.

"Tell me," Nocturne continued. "Do you want to have more dreams like this one? Do you want for them to be built on the ugly truth of your reality?"

This time, Danny shook his head.

"I didn't think you would," Nocturne said. "Which is why I am offering you an escape from it. I can make it so that you never have these dreams, or any like it, ever again. All you need to do is help me in turn."

Danny narrowed his eyes. He may not have been the smartest Fenton, but he wasn't an idiot. And he had grown up with an older sister. "How would I be helping you?" he asked. "Cause my parents have talked a lot about fairy stories, and they say it’s really bad to make a deal with a fairy, and that fairies are just ghosts that have been mislabeled."

"The details are somewhat complex."

Danny crossed his arms. "Well, I'm not making any deal unless I know what it’s about."

The stars in Nocturne's cloak twinkled brighter. "There is an issue within my home, the Infinite Realms, that requires someone special like you to fix. It is, of course, more complicated than that, but that is the important part."

"And what would I need to do to fix it?" Danny asked.

"It is my understanding that you would simply need to be present," Nocturne replied. "As for the how, that comes back to your side of the offer. Instead of having dreams like this," Nocturne swept his hand across the room. "...you would instead spend your dreaming nights in the Realms. In the morning, you would wake up in your bed as if nothing had happened."

"It won't be any kind of sleeping forever thing, right?" Danny asked.

"It could be if you would like," Nocturne said. "Unless you request it, however, no. It would last just as long as any of your other dreams."

"So you want me to agree to let you take me into the world of ghosts, every night, instead of having the occasional bad dream?" Danny asked slowly. "That doesn't seem very fair to me."

"It would not be the occasional bad dream," Nocturne said. "Dreams are my realm. I know them very, very well. And your dreams have been... tainted. It does not matter whether you take this deal or not, you will never return to the dreams you had for so long. I am simply offering you an alternative to this mundanity."

"Why should I trust you?" Danny asked.

"You shouldn't," Nocturne answered easily. "But you don't need to trust me to agree to the deal."

"And if I don't agree to it?"

"Then you will wake up with no memory of ever seeing me, and go back to a life where you can't escape the horrors of the real world even in the comfort of sleep."

Danny took a deep breath through his nose, and looked around the room. He couldn't hear anything that was happening, but his memory worked to fill in the gaps. The teacher was nearly frothing at the mouth with her green, acidic spit, the other kids in the class were either whispering or laughing at him, and the dream Danny was sitting at his desk. His face was a patchy red, tears streaming down his face. He remembered how helpless he had felt sitting there, and he couldn't imagine feeling like that for who knows how long.

Danny turned back to Nocturne, whose gaze had never once strayed from him. "Okay." His voice didn't shake, despite how nervous he felt. "I agree."

"Wonderful." Nocturne reached his hand out to Danny. This time Danny didn't hesitate to take it, and then the world shifted around him.

[elizaditton]

Too Small To Be Afraid (Chapter 12)

Links:

Cover / Master Post / Previous Chapter / Next Chapter

- - - - - - - - - -

The past few days at Pacific Deskmate High School have been more or less an improvement over the first two. But despite somehow becoming friends with a perthean, I've been struggling more than ever to hide my fear.

On Secandday, Derrick dropped his Biology textbook right beside me on his desk! All I could do was stand there, adrenaline flooding through my system as I ruminated on how easily I could have been crushed. Would he have even noticed if the book landed right on top of me? Was he trying to kill me? Honestly, it wouldn't be hard at all for him to drop a book like that on me and make my death look like an accident...

On Sirdday, he poked me in the middle of Algebra to ask if I had written down a certain formula before the teacher cleared the whiteboard. I'm not sure whether or not he was trying to be gentle, but the force of that unexpected poke was enough to send me into a spiral about how he could easily pin me down with nothing more than a single finger if he wanted to.

And on Forsday, after our English lesson on Greek and Latin root words, I was glad to watch him happily ramble away on the subject. It was only when he lifted me up off the desk that I guess he somehow managed to forget he was dealing with a human! He snatched me up so fast, so effortlessly, as if I didn't even weigh a thing! I thought for sure I would be flung across the room! He apologized, so I know he could tell I was scared, and that's not good.

If I were to slip up and reveal to Derrick that I have a fear, it'd ruin our friendship for sure! We'd be worse off than we were at square one! I need to make sure I'm doing whatever it takes to keep this fear hidden from him. I've never let a perthean find out about my fear before, and I don't plan on letting one find out now! Who knows how Derrick would react after finding out about my fear?

Ever since Derrick and I became friends, I've felt guilty for having this fear. I don't want him to think I see him as some kind of monster! But standing here on the balcony, watching him approach me, all I can think about is how much I want to get out of here before it's too late!

I tighten my grip on the balcony railing until my knuckles turn white to keep myself from running away, but that doesn't stop my legs from restlessly fidgeting beneath me. My heart pulsates as I'm covered by Derrick's shadow, and my lungs gasp for more air than I can take in with each shallow, shuddering breath. I need to get away from him!

"Hey, Kaylin!" Derrick says, smiling down at me.

My heart skips a beat as I stare into his big blue eyes, nothing short of terrified at the sight of my perthean friend. I try in vain to back up, my grip on the railing stopping me. I know I can't just run away— that would reveal that I'm afraid. As slowly and as steadily as I can, I take a deep breath and hold the cold surface air in for a moment before setting it free.

"Hi, D-Derrick!" I say, kicking myself for stuttering.

"How are you this morning?" Derrick asks, holding out his index finger for me.

I know I can do this, I've done it before. I release my hands from the balcony railing and carefully wrap my arms around Derrick's finger. It twitches in response to my touch, catching me by surprise. It still blows my mind how something as minute as a twitch to a perthean can translate into a harsh jolt for a human like me!

"I'm good!" I manage to squeak as Derrick lifts me from the balcony. "And you?"

"I'm doing well," he responds with a slight chuckle that I'm almost certain I can feel through his hand as he sets me down in his palm.

Once I'm settled in his hand, Derrick turns and starts heading to our first class. As we're moving along, I find myself staring at the fingers that surround me. They're a bit... close. Too close. Each long, curled digit is about the same length as I am, and about as wide as a tree trunk. A trunk of a human-scaled tree, that is— like we have in the undercity. I don't even want to consider the thought of a being with fingers that would match the width of a perthean-scaled tree! Such a being could easily hold a perthean in their hand the way my deskmate is holding me now...

I watch Derrick's fingers as they curl inward, every second inching closer and closer to where I sit in the center of his palm. My core tightens and my racing heart sinks in my chest. Does he realize what he's doing?

Without warning, each massive extremity begins to slowly wrap around me. I let out a gasp. What's he doing?! I look up at Derrick as his grip on me tightens. He's... smiling?!

My insides churn upon seeing a twisted smile plastered across my deskmate's face, and narrowed brown eyes that show no signs of mercy. My heartbeat rings in my ears as I squirm between the fingers fastened around me in a pathetic attempt to escape from Derrick's unyielding grip on me.

"W-what are you doing?!" I stammer, trembling in my deskmate's clutches.

"What I should have done the moment I first laid eyes on you," he says, letting out a loud, deranged cackle as he tightens his grip on my figure.

As I'm gasping, fighting for air, a sob rises in my throat.

"I-I thought we were friends!" I cry.

My deskmate lifts me close to his eyes. Those narrowed brown eyes... there's something off about them.

"No real perthean would be caught dead befriending a pathetic little weakling like you!"

"P-please!" I beg, tears streaming down my face as I struggle with all my might to escape this perthean's grasp. "D-Don't hurt me!"

"Huh?"

I open my eyes and look up at my deskmate. He's stopped in his tracks, raising an eyebrow at me. His big, blue eyes look to be searching mine for some kind of explanation to what must have sounded like quite a perplexing remark.

Blue...! I knew his eyes were blue!

I look at my surroundings. I'm in Derrick's open palm, and his fingers are only bended toward me slightly. I look at myself. One of my legs is curled inward, and the other is stretched out as if I tried to scoot backwards. Oh no. What happened here?

"Kaylin?" Derrick says as he lifts me closer to his face, his eyes filled with concern. "Don't what?"

"I-I—" I stutter.

I stare into Derrick's eyes, my heart sinking further in my chest with each rapid beat. I can't think of anything to say! He's bound to realize I have a fear now!

"Don't... don't forget there's an English quiz today!" I blurt out.

Really?! That's all I could think to say?!

"Oh, is that all?" Derrick says with a chuckle. "I could have sworn..."

I resist the urge to curl up into a ball with all my might as I quake in my deskmate's hand. Is he about to call me out?

"Nah, it's nothing. Nevermind," he says, continuing the walk to our first class.

That was close. Too close.

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

Brittney huffs and puffs down the hall with the neon pink and orange lunchbox she retrieved from her locker after gym. Even after cool-down, showering, and changing back into our regular uniforms, I'm surprised to see her still struggling to catch her breath.

"Hey," I say, coming alongside her after we reach the cafeteria. "Good running today."

"Thanks!" She laughs. "Running always takes it out of me, but knowing lunch was coming was enough to keep me going!"

We sit down together at an empty table and take out our lunch. I unwrap what I'm decently sure is a turkey and swiss sandwich and take a bite. Brittney takes out a thermos and a grilled cheese.

"Grilled cheese again?" I ask.

"I guess so. What's the note of the day?" Brittney asks.

I'd completely forgotten to check for a note from Dad. I rummage around the brown paper bag in front of me and pull out a note. This one says:

What is a geode without its crystals, an oyster without its pearl?

So it is with a person's heart.

- Zenara

"Wow," Brittney says. "I didn't think your Dad was one to quote Zenara."

"He found one of my mom's old poetry books when we were moving and has been flipping through it over the past few days," I say, setting the scrap of paper down on the table. "I'll probably be getting more notes like this."

"So..." Brittney says, folding her hands together and propping her chin on top of them. "Speaking of looking into people's hearts, how are things going with Derrick?"

"What's that supposed to mean?" I ask, befuddled.

Brittney rolls her eyes. "You know, seeing him for how he is on the inside in spite of how he appears on the outside! Like the quote?"

"So that's what that means?" I say, looking back to the note. I've never really been one for poetry— it usually goes right over my head. I figured it was the same with Dad, and especially Brittney.

"Anyway, spill it! How are you two getting along?" Brittney asks, eyes wide with anticipation.

"You say that like we're dating or something!"

"You know what I mean, girl, now spill!"

"Well," I sigh, "things are going... well, they're going."

Brittney pouts. "Come on, you know I want more than that!"

"Okay, fine, fine!" I say, waving my hands. I stare at my sandwich in contemplation. "Ever since we became friends... I've felt guilty for having a fear. And not only that, it's been getting harder to hide it!"

"Go on," Brittney says, her brows turning upward.

"I guess it's only a matter of time before Derrick finds out about my fear. And after that, I'm not so sure he'll want to stay friends with me."

"Why not?" Brittney asks.

"I mean— who would want to be friends with someone who only thinks of them as some kind of monster that's out to get them?" I rest my cheek on my hand in defeat. "Maybe I should just tell him I have a fear and get it over with. That way, at least I'll know how he feels, and if he doesn't want to be friends anymore then it'll hurt less now than it would if he found out later on."

"I-I wouldn't do that!" Brittney blurts out.

"What?"

"I-I mean, normally I'd tell you to be honest, but Derrick..." Brittney trails off, looking down into her soup.

What's she going on about?

"Brittney, what about Derrick?" I ask.

Brittney shakes her head. "Nothing. It's nothing. What I mean to say is... I don't think telling him outright that you have a fear would be the best idea."

"Why not?"

"Well, some pertheans don't really know how to act around humans who are afraid of them. For some, it might get to them."

My insides twist. "Are you saying Derrick is like that? Would he really be hurt to find out about my fear?"

"Well..." Brittney says, averting her gaze. "All I'm saying is I wouldn't tell him if I were you. Derrick is... sensitive."

I know Brittney's known Derrick much longer than I have. If she says I shouldn't tell him about my fear, I'm inclined to trust her judgment. I just can't help but wonder... what isn't she saying?

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

"So, what are you up to this weekend?" Brittney asks as we approach the spot on the balcony where we've been meeting up with the boys.

"I don't know, I might try my hand at gardening. We found one of those indoor planters when we were going through our stuff before the move."

"Ooh!" Brittney says, clapping. "Gardening! I've always wanted to try! Especially since the undercity is so void of greenery compared to above ground."

"After that, Dad and I will probably watch Stranded together," I say, wondering how much we need to catch up on before Restday night's new episode.

Brittney's eyes get wide and she grabs onto both of my arms. "Did you say... did you say Stranded?!"

"Um... yeah?" I say as I look down at the hands gripping my arms, her grip a bit too tight for my liking.

"I. Love. Stranded. It's like, my favorite show ever!" She gasps. "Do you read fanfiction?! I'm working on this one story about Jack and Merlot— I should totally send it over to you!"

"Hey guys!" my deskmate says.

Dread fills the air, and a burning anxiety creeps up my spine. My legs quake, and I nearly trip over them as I leap behind Brittney to shield myself from this perthean boy. This perthean boy... who's supposed to be my friend. I realize I shouldn't be hiding from Derrick, especially since I don't want him to find out about my fear— but no matter what I do, I can't seem to stop myself from shaking uncontrollably like a cold, wet puppy!

"Kaylin? Are you—" Derrick starts.

Brittney laughs. "If you think this is bad, you should have seen her this morning when I snuck up on her with a hug!"

What? Brittney didn't do that! I didn't even see her today until it was time for gym! I look at Brittney, and she looks back at me. She winks.

"Ha, ha... yeah," I say, slowly coming out from behind my friend. I fold my hands together in front of me, all the while trying my hardest to suppress my unrelenting trembling.

I look up at Derrick, who stares right back at me with a blank expression. He hums flatly. Does he buy it?

"Well, I'm not sure where Kevin went, but Kaylin and I should probably be getting to Biology," Derrick says. "Are you okay waiting by yourself?"

"Yeah," Brittney says. "Kevin's a slacker. I'm used to it by now. You guys go on ahead!"

A knot forms in my throat as Derrick lifts his index finger and places it in front of me. With how many times we've had to do this so far, even today alone, shouldn't I be used to this by now? I try to be discreet about wiping my sweaty hands on my skirt, and then manage to wrap my arms around Derrick's finger in spite of the sinking, spiraling feeling in my gut.

"Have fun, you two!" Brittney calls out as Derrick lifts me from the balcony.

I expect Derrick to say something in turn, but he remains silent. He places me in his palm and turns to head to our Biology class. He remains silent the whole trip there.

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

Our Koronian class has nearly passed us by, and Derrick has barely spoken a word to me since the incident at the balcony before Biology. I try to focus on the lesson being taught, but the history of adjectives in the Koronian language fails to occupy my brain as much as my anxiety does.

Does he know I have a fear? Is he mad at me? Does he think I see him as a monster? Does he still want to be friends with me, or is he thinking about some way to go about telling me how inconsiderate it is to have a fear of pertheans? What if he hates me? What if we end up being stuck in an even more awkward relationship than what we had when we first met? What if he doesn't want to be deskmates anymore?

My thoughts are interrupted by the sound of Derrick's notetaking. I know he loves languages, so I was sure he'd be taking as many notes about Koronian as possible during class. What I find odd, though, is that I haven't heard him write anything down until now. After a few seconds of pencil scratching, he goes silent again.

I try to take my focus off of Derrick and keep it on the teacher, but just as I tune back into the lesson, his notebook slides into my peripheral vision. Do I dare look? I pretend I don't see the notebook and shift my focus away from Derrick. After a moment, he slides the notebook closer to me. As worried as I am, I can't help but wonder what he wants to tell me. I hesitate, but take the bait and read the note presented to me.

Are you afraid of me?

Hot blood rushes to my cheeks, and my heart pounds against my ribcage. My whole frame trembles as I turn my head to the shaking hands in my lap. He knows.

I try to steady my quivering breaths. I can't let myself panic. Not now. Not in the middle of this class, not in front of all these pertheans... not in front of Derrick. We're so close to the end of the schoolday. All I have to do is sit through the rest of Koronian, get to the balcony, and go home! He'll forget all about this tomorrow, and I'll have a better chance to hide my fear then.

Derrick taps his notebook, drawing my attention back to it. Why is he so insistent? He underlines the question he wrote with his pencil. He's not going to be satisfied without an answer, is he?

I stare down at my own notebook laying atop my desk. What should I do? Should I answer? Should I try to continue ignoring him? How long can I keep this up?

As I'm lost in contemplation again, a large, warm surface presses against my back, poking me. That's it. I scrawl down a response in my notebook.

Why are you so insistent on me answering this question?

I can't keep from trembling as I push my notebook to the side of my desk. Derrick leans over in his seat. He's so close! I try to take deep breaths in and out, but my constant shuddering makes my breathing anything but smooth.

Derrick sits back in his seat. Silence. Maybe he'll finally leave me alone. Just as I begin to let my shoulders droop and my muscles relax, I hear it again: the scratching of Derrick's pencil against paper. A few seconds later, he pushes his notebook back into my view.

Why are you so insistent on not answering this question?

He just won't let it go! What should I say?! What should I do?!

Brittney said I shouldn't tell Derrick about my fear because he's 'sensitive.' But what was it she didn't tell me? What's going to happen if I'm honest with Derrick? Should I lie?

Derrick underlines the question again.

Are you afraid of me?

My heart sinks, weighing me down, and there's an aching unease deep in my inner core. Do I tell him? Can I tell him? I stare at my notebook as anxiety creeps up my back and threatens to choke me. Hands trembling and barely able to grip my pencil, I write my response and slide my notebook back into Derrick's view.

I'm sorry.

He's quick to scribble down a response.

You're sorry?

I don't think and simply let my pencil glide along my paper. I slide over my answer:

I'm sorry that I'm afraid of you.

I sit in my anxiety, nervously awaiting Derrick's inevitable reply. What will he say now? Will he call me a coward? A bigot? Would he call me... a tiny?

Silence. He must be satisfied with my answer. I just hope things aren't awkward for us after class. I rub my legs to keep them from jumping up and down under my desk, and return my focus to the teacher.

Scribbling. It's quiet at first, then harsh. There's the sound of an eraser rubbing the paper, followed by more harsh scribbling. I clench my fists as tears prick the edges of my eyes. He's really going to let me have it, isn't he? My heartbeat, oddly enough, slows down as I think through what must be in store for me. Deep down, he's no different than that man, is he? Merciless. Unforgiving. Cruel. No perthean could ever be understanding when someone thinks of them as a monster, could they?

Derrick slides his notebook back over. Blinking back tears, I brace for impact, breathing in and out, and turn to see what it is he's penned.

Let me help you.

What? What's he talking about? He's not going to let me have it? I hesitate before looking back at Derrick as apprehensively as ever. He's... smiling.

"What?" I whisper.

He points to what he wrote on the page, and looks back at me. I spin back around in my seat, my mind buzzing with questions. What does he mean? Is that even possible? Is he joking? I pull my notebook back towards myself and start writing. Once I'm finished writing, I push my notebook back into Derrick's view.

What are you talking about?

Again, he doesn't hesitate, but writes his response swiftly.

Are you free to meet behind the school after class?

An uneasiness creeps up from my gut and into my throat. I gulp. He wants to meet after school? What does this mean? Is he serious, or does he have something more sinister in mind? I stare at my hands in my lap. What should I do?

I turn around and look Derrick in the eyes. As he smiles at me, his wide blue eyes seem to smile, too. I have no idea what to say, and I can barely breathe! He looks at me with anticipation. Almost as if to ask, 'Well? What do you say?'

I nod. I have no idea what I'm supposed to expect, but at this point, what do I have left to lose? Derrick laughs softly as he continues smiling at me.

"Mr. Drake and Miss Finch!" the teacher says, raising her voice and catching Derrick and I by surprise. "Is there something the two of you would like to share with the rest of the class?"

I turn back around in my seat, my heart fluttering and my cheeks as hot as ever.

"No, m'am!" Derrick and I both exclaim.

I try to focus on the lesson again, but all that comes to mind is my deskmate. Really, what could he possibly mean by helping me? And what did I just sign up for?

[thenixkat]

Mundane AU!Laios thoughts

Note:

Probably contains spoilers

Mundane au= no magic and no fantasy 'races' (like... little people are a thing, they exist in reality, some people just have dwarfism. The elves are just skinny racist and xenophobic Europeans like? And there's already parralells made with the demi humans so if I do anything the orcs are Afro Native and Kobolds are somewhere African or Arab. And for the ogres... gigantism is a thing that exists in real like and totally a teen girl would just wear some horns.)

Thoughts:

The Toudens are European-born. From somewhere cold as hell, really isolated and conservative, that's close to some mountains, that's racist towards the local indigenous people.

(The sibs, but especially Laios got chewed out about some shit and has been trying to be better, slips up every now and then but takes criticism well so long as folks tell him what he did/said wrong).

Local weird kids put off vibes that the rest of the village didn't like, Laios and Falin grew up bullied and ostracized. Falin got sent off to schooling in the big city and later to a university in Italy where she met Marcille.

Laios dropped out of high school and joined the military as soon as he was able to b/c he wanted to get the hell out of dodge. Served for a few shitty years b4 just... deserting and backpacking across Europe just straight up homeless and working whatever odd jobs he could find. Man was going through it. Wound up in the same city where Falin was studying at a university in and decided to visit her. She took one look at him and refused to let him just go back to what he was doing, so Laios started couch surfing with her (very much against dorm rules but he looked terrible and Falin wasn't about to let anyone stop her from making sure her brother has a roof over his head and food).

Eventually, she takes him with her when she does a work-study in the USA for her ecology degree and they ended up staying/Falin kinda maybe sorta dropped out and got a job with a vet near where she was doing her work-study.

Laios and Falin are technically illegal immigrants but they're white so no one really questions their citizenship (their working on getting citizenship/papers)

Laios gets a GED. Does some self-study from Falin's textbooks and online stuff but that's about it for his schooling.

Laios definitely, like, lives in Falin's basement. Falin is the primary breadwinner in this household, Laios is aware of this and has learned to accept it even tho he would like to take care of his baby sister and sometimes feels bad about not being able to. They used to share a room in a cheap apartment but after building up enough savings they managed to buy a suspiciously cheap house in a rural town bordering a reservation and not far from a national park.

Laios still works odd jobs, mostly physical labor and stuff where they won't ask for a degree. Has worked retail, where his customer service was trash but he's darn good at just stocking and shelving shit.

Met Chilchuck while working retail, Chilchuck introduced him to the concept of a union which Laios thinks is really neat.

The town where the Touden's moved has a sizable population of people with dwarfism, Chilchuck is a notable member of the little person community in the area. The Touden's go to Chilchuck for help with paperwork (they pay him a small fee) and he doesn't ask too many questions about why they don't have this or that piece of documentation.

Laios enjoys doing citizen science and bird watching. During the tourist season, he runs a small wilderness guide giving campers and hikers tours in the local national park.

There's a hermit that lives in the national park illegally (Senshi) that Laios and Falin made friends with. They love his cooking.

Laios is active in the online furry community. He does commissions, mostly of digital and physical art or people's fursonas and vore stuff. He does great ferals, and decent anthros, but his human art is not good (he's working on it).

Laios is decidedly chubby in this, his weight goes up and down depending on the season and how much physical activity he's doing. But ever since he reunited with Falin, she's been making sure he doesn't skip meals if they can afford to eat. And ever since he met Senshi he's gotten heftier since he loves that man's cooking.

[rigelmejo]

So I like to find older language learning textbooks, or just specific ones. I could make some posts on them if anyone would be interested. I have some weird ones, and then some genuinely useful ones, and rather old ones which are a mix.

Some of my favorites:

German Through Pictures: learn like a child, or like me and my friend in high school translated to each other (with pictures!) when we didn't speak the same language. It is a simple book, but very easy and you WILL learn some basics. Its simple, its a nice idea.

This book is very cheap used, I found it at a library book store sale for 4 dollars.

Read Japanese Kanji Today: there's an older version of this book, equally good. This book is free in a lot of digital libraries (a lot of college libraries have it in ebook form, if you are on an app like Libby or Hoopla it's worth searching). A kanji mnemonic stories book that is not dauntingly huge. Good for beginners to wrap their heads around how to start studying Kanji. Be aware, it doesn't cover much, so don't spend too much time studying it if you're trying to make progress (not like perfectionist me in college who... was too obsessed with memorizing and so I never finished reading this).

https://archive.org/details/jensen-arthur-le-francais-par-la-methode-nature

Le Francais Par Le Methode Nature: I have this book to thank for getting comfortable learning French in French, for getting comfortable reading more, and I love the teaching style. I love textbooks written in The Nature Method, where they teach entirely in the language. The Arthur Jensen books in particular (and a few others of this time period) have 3000+ common words and a good overview of grammar taught, setting you up to transition to regular daily conversations and novel/news reading after The Nature Method textbook. My ideal. I wish desperately for a book like this in chinese or japanese. I've thought for hours about how to add pinyin for hanzi, romaji and hiragana below kanji for japanese, in order to make it still equally comprehensible to start seeing regular chinese and japanese text immediately. Chinese or Japanese would need more pictures for explanation, since there's less cognates. But i really think a similarly designed textbook would be very achievable. But I do not confidently know chinese or japanese grammar enough to try to translate English by The Nature Method into Chinese or Japanese. If someone does, I'd love to talk cost for that kind of translation job. I'd need that base text translation, then I could draw pictures and add pinyin and romaji/hiragana myself... (or also do what one great person did when he wrote a tiny Comprehensible Input japanese site - use emojis).

Anyway. I love these type of books. I wish more existed desperately. There's a French, English, and Italian one. There's also textbooks written with the same "all taught IN the target language" approach - a Greek one called Athenaze, and a Latin one called Lingua Latina.

Be aware because of the age of some of these, some language info is outdated. But for me the sheer VOLUME of nonstop practice reading the language makes up for a few issues of age.

French for Beginners by Charles Duff: I love the way Duff teaches, lots of practice reading immediately. He has a Beginner Spanish textbook I also got, and also love.

Chinese Grammar Self Taught by John Darroch: this book is NOT actually the nature method. I got a hard copy that's really old. Its lovely and has gold lettering on the cover. The book uses an old pronunciation system so its easier to go into this book if you already know how hanzi are pronounced or have an alternative source for that. If you're a nerd like me who Likes seeing the old pronunciation system, the older language features (like le being liao more, like the use of nin instead of ni more often), the print hanzi back then? Its really cool. The grammar lessons are also very easy to read - probably my favorite grammar explanations I've read. The section in the beginning explaining hanzi radicals and the types of hanzi, the sound+meaning type and symbolic type, on its own makes the book worth it. After reading that section, hanzi made so much more sense to me, got easier to remember and learn. I just think its a really neat book. It also has a dictionary of about 2000 hanzi in the back. Which serves as both a good vocabulary list and practice going through a/stroke order dictionary. The grammar book also teaches a decent number of words. A very useful little book.

Its the polar opposite of a chinese textbook I once had that only taught 200 words and made me so mad i donated it and forgot the name of it.

Japanese in Thirty Hours: this book is free on some univerity sites, if you search google itself or another web search. I bought a physical copy for 9 dollars. Its my favorite beginner grammar book for japanese - in particular, because it describes a few grammar points in a way that I found helpful. Also, like the chinese book above, this book pulls its weight! A lot of information in a small book. It has over 1000 words in the back vocabulary section you can study, a TON of grammar explanations and sentence drills to practice, easy to read, and the book's goal is to get you speaking (with the use of a dictionary/looking up key words you need to say) ASAP. It does it's job. The sentences are a bit unnatural, but so is Genki's sentences (like saying watashi wa so much even though in Japanese it wouldn't be explicitly stated so much).

Reading Japanese by Hamoko Ito Jordan, Eleanor Harz, Chaplin: I love learning a language by DOING. So I love this book. It's a bit slow paced for me (but only since I'm not an absolute beginner). It's a great, dense book of 624 pages. You practice reading all hiragana, katakana, 425 kanji, and a ton of example words and kanji. Even though I can read somewhat, the katana section of this book is intense even for me in that it makes me practice reading a TON of katakana words and situations in order to get the learner truly comfortable with encountering the writing system and reading it. There's also a companion grammar book by them, Beginning Japanese. Due to the very general title you'l need to search author names to find these books.

Weird bits: unique romaji system. I was fine with it, since I already knew the pronunciations of everything I saw in this book, from prior study. If you're an absolute beginner though, it would be worth it to learn the regular romaji system and hiragana/katakana romaji sound representations in it before starting this book.

Beginning Chinese Reader by John DeFrancis: note that you can find this cheap used sometimes, and very expensive other times. My copies were around 60 dollars a piece because the books were out of print and rare at the time. There's several books in the series: Beginning Chinese Reader 1 and 2, Intermediate Chinese Reader 1 and 2, and Advanced Chinese Reader. (Pdfs can be found online if you go searching).

The positive: 1200 hanzi are taught, and thousands more words (tons of combininations of the hanzi into many words). The main plus of these books is sheer volume of reading practice. Its TONS of reading practice, thousands of pages.

There's graded readers nowadays which are more entertaining with funner stories, but they are short. My mandarin companion stories were very short, my Sinolingua Books were quite thin, and most of my "beginner" reading in chinese ended up being easier novels in chinese (like tu tu da wang, xiao wang zi, sa ye and simpler written B)) because I just could not find thousands of pages of gradually increasing difficulty graded readers (although Pleco does offer a decent amount of some condensed versions of stories like Legend of the Monkey King, etc).

So yeah, the plus: huge amount of reading material to internalize hanzi and new words, and get really comfortable reading.

The negatives: its old. Old cultural details, old language things that don't all apply anymore, the technology words we have now didnt exist when it was written. And its written so dry and boring, unfortunately. For me, the elements that age it help me get interested in catching those, enough so that i can get myself to read it. But the material itself? Boring (at least in the beginning).

Regardless, I find the concept of these textbooks to be wonderful. I would love to find some modern chinese textbook series that provides over 1000 pages of graded reading, with words repeated at intervals to reinforce memory of them. If you know of any (even with just 400 pages practice reading that gradually teaches more words) please let me know.

Madrigals Magic Key to Spanish: I love this book. I have Madrigal's books for Spanish, French, and German. I read this spanish one over the course of a summer once, it probably helped me get better at reading Spanish. It works excellently in combination with Language Transfer Spanish podcast, and if you like learning materials that teach based on similarities to what you might already know in your native language (grammar similarities, cognates) and clear explanations of language patterns (showing how adjective word endings are sometimes X like -ent in english or french "intelligent") then this book's teaching style will work well for you. And, like many of my favorite books, it teaches a LOT of words.

So! That is a snippet of some of the language books I have. I've got a lot more... I love checking out textbook methods and the variety so I tend to look for them whenever I see used books.

[drelldreams]

Mass Effect Lore: Common technologies in the 2180‘s (Part 2)

This post is both a collection of canon technologies in the Mass Effect universe, and personal headcanon which may be borrowing common concepts from sci fi.

Infrastructure:

Autonomous public transportation vessels of all sorts. As seen with the tram on Noveria. Trains, buses and cabs are also autonomous. Rude bus drivers, trains and buses being cancelled or too late are problems of the past.

Some of those buses and cabs drive on land; others are flying vessels that travel through the sky.

Trains travel at immense speed, with most trains being able to travel at least 1000km/h. Low pressure tunnels allow for this level of speed.

Suspension railways are a common means of public transportation and are widely featured all across the galaxy on various space station, colonies and in most Earth countries. This also includes maglevs (magnetic levitation trains).

Cities commonly not only feature terminals providing rentable e-bikes, e-scooters or even e-rollerblade, but also rent flying hoverboards.

Medicine & Health:

Needles have become obsolete. Technologies akin to Star Trek's hypospray have replaced them. (This contradicts with Mordin's line in ME3: „Fear of needles. Common phobia." I know.)

Genetic therapy has advanced so far as to being able to cure almost any genetic disease. (Book canon).

Cybernetics can fix deafness and blindness.
(Canon implied, I believe?)

Advancement in technology and medicine have slowed down human aging significantly. Women can have healthy children in their sixties. (Book canon). Anti aging therapies and cybernetics can allow humans to reach ages of up to 250 years.

Education:

Paper and pens being used in schools is a thing of the past. Students use tablets (which are made of ultra-light also foldable) with either keyboards or tablet pens for handwritten notes.
(Book canon implied - Gillian uses a computer to work on her assignments in Mass Effect:
Ascension).

Some teachers and students would prefer to have their textbooks in form of super light datapads (like e books) rather than have them all digitally stored on their computer.

Learning programs are highly advanced and VI‘s provide students with custom tailored, individualized exercises and study plans and games.

Food:

Liquid food drinks, nutrient pastes and bars that replace entire meals are available just about everywhere. With biotics burning huge amount of calories, the asari have perfected such products. Being cheaper than freshly cooked take out meals and coming in all sorts of flavors and textures, such nutrient pastes proved to be a saving grace for poorer individuals. Some poor people nearly only eat 3D printed nutrient paste, which does not have the same feeling as eating real meals, but nutrient paste in Mass Effect is of such high quality that it provides the body with all nutrients it needs while being free of unhealthy ingredients.

People-prepared foods (by humans/aliens) are still appreciated, but many foods available in grocery stores are 3D printed. Cafés tend to feature feature people-prepared foods. A café selling 3D printed cakes for instance would be looked down upon.

Synthetic flavors have been perfected. While technology has been advanced to the point where you could grow strawberries on Omega without issues (using environmental control systems in a hydroponic bay), the ultimate cheapest way to replicate the flavor is using synthetic ingredients. This way, you can find foods of any flavor, no matter what exotic fruit from Palaven or Khar'Shan it might be, anywhere.

Sugar free snacks and candy are as common as the sugar variants. Ice cream cates feature sugar free ice cream options. Sugar free chocolate or cookies are available at any grocery store.
Various synthetic ingredients are used to replace sugar.

Lab grown meat is incredibly common (canon) and meat from Earth animals found on space stations is grown from animal stem cells.

Home:

Significantly less time is spent on chores due to robots doing most of the work. With floor wiping and vacuum robots being affordable for middle class people in the 21st century, in the 22nd, the majority of cleaning is done by robots in a middle class household. Advanced kitchen aid machines are found in most households and make cooking less time consuming and complicated for most people.

Blinds, curtains, light, air filtration systems, thermal regulation systems (air conditioning or heating systems) and television are typically navigated via a voice command (for example, „Light on“ or „Television off).

Holographic home ambiences like in Cyberpunk 2077 are common. Windows can be made to look like they‘re displaying a galaxy full of stars via holographic projections. Some people use those home ambience holographs to create the appearance of a luxurious club lounge, or to project beautiful landscapes into a corner of their room.

Personal Care:

Like in Star Trek, sonic showers can be used to clean the body effectively. Ultrasonic vibrations remove dirt, bacteria, excess oil and dead skin cells without requiring soap or water. While more expensive than typical showers, the use of sonic showers saves water. This sort of technology is found within quarian environmental suits. Drell with Kepral's Syndrome generally use sonic showers rather than water showers.

In addition to having an inbuild shower function, quarian environmental suits are equipped with a dental hygiene program that cleans the teeth and mouth of the wearer effectively using ultrasonic vibrations.

Certain suit upgrades can even use nanobots to moisturize the body.

Toothbrushes are also generally sonic toothbrushes that use the same technology as showers do; ultrasonic vibrations.

Clothes are typically self-cleaning with nanoparticles that kill bacteria and prevent the build up of odor.

[n2qfd]

9265 kHz @2330z G106 radio G5RV antenna Southern Tier NY

Rough reception tonight.

MFSK-32 0-5 db

MFSK-64 -6-0 db

Repeat of 1st story from last week but 2nd story new and new pics.

Welcome to program 399 of Shortwave Radiogram.

@swradiogram

I'm Kim Andrew Elliott in Arlington, Virginia USA.

Here is the lineup for today's program, in MFSK modes as noted:

1:46 MFSK32: Program preview (now) 3:06 MFSK32: Digital Radio Mondiale shortwave learning event* 10:12 MFSK64: Judge halts Trump's shutdown of Voice of America 12:46 MFSK64: This week's images 27:42 MFSK32: Closing announcements

Same as last week's DRM story, including the triangle image, but this time in MFSK32

Please send reception reports to radiogram@verizon.net

And visit http://swradiogram.net

We're on Bluesky now: SWRadiogram.bsky.social

And X/Twitter: @SWRadiogram



Digital Radio Mondiale press release:

Digital Radio Mondiale DRM Delivers Distance Education – An Excellent First for Africa and the World

April 10, 2025

The DRM Consortium, in cooperation with St Joseph's Senior Secondary School in the Gambian capital, Banjul, has conducted its first public demonstration of an innovative project to deliver education at a distance via radio on April 8th.

In a Gambian, African and world first for digital radio, a maths lesson from the Encompass Media Services Woofferton transmitting station in the UK was broadcast (on 15390 kHz and 21740 kHz), over 4,000 kilometers to The Gambia. A group of 15-year-old students received audio and text lessons transmitted via DRM shortwave. The content was made available to their tablets, mobiles through a local Wi-Fi connection to the radio.

The demonstration showcased the ability of DRM digital radio to deliver lessons in multiple languages as the key audio lessons were in English followed by two AI-generated versions in French and German.

A central component of the broadcast, alongside the audio, was a digital textbook (Journaline), showcasing how the lesson content — including graphics — can be made available in several languages, both as a live accompaniment and for on-demand access.

The on-demand use for the distance transmitted lessons (the cached lessons) was shown at the public event held at the St Joseph's Senior Secondary School in the presence of other students, teachers, VIPs and the press.

As the technology only requires a single transmitter thousands of miles or kilometres away, the lessons can be delivered entirely remotely or supported by teachers locally; this proved that educational content can be delivered, without the need of IP or internet.

The revolutionary new application of Digital Radio Mondiale (DRM) technology is designed to remove barriers to education for populations most in need worldwide. The technology also has applications in areas such as medicine and religious education.

The tablets used for this e-learning demonstration were donated to the school in Banjul as part of the commitment to supporting continued learning and access to technology by the DRM Consortium and the key members which supported this ground-breaking demonstration.

Full text: https://www.drm.org/digital-radio-mondiale-drm-delivers-distance-education-an-excellent-first- for-africa-and-the-world/

On Shortwave Radiogram, we can also transmit lessons for schools outside the reach of the internet. We can't transmit voice like DRM does, but we can transmit text, and we can transmit the image of a triangle. And all of this can be received in reception conditions in which the DRM signal may drop out.

The subject of the DRM transmission was triangles. Here is our lesson on triangles …

. . .

If we, in the following triangle, draw the altitude from the vertex of the right angle, then the two triangles that are formed are similar to the triangle we had from the beginning. The two triangles formed are also similar to each other.



△ABC ∼ △BCD ∼ △ABD

The measure of the altitude drawn from the vertex of the right angle to the hypotenuse is the geometric mean between the measures of the two segments of the hypotenuse. Hence BD is the geometric mean of AD and DC.

Shortwave Radiogram now changes to MFSK64 …

 Kayla Epstein April 22, 2025

A federal judge has ordered the Trump administration to restore all jobs and funding for the Voice of America and other US-backed news outlets, ruling that efforts to dismantle it violated the law and Constitution.

Over 1,300 VOA employees, includingKrout 1,000 journalists, were placed on leave following President Donald Trump's order. The White House has accused the broadcaster of being "anti-Trump" and "radical".

VOA, still primarily a radio service, was set up during World War II to counter Nazi propaganda, and has become a major global media broadcaster.

The ruling noted that b}oÜ 3o=MOA0t»tght!hnews for the first time in its 80-year existence ".

Judge Royce Lamberth said the administration acted "without regard to the harm inflicted on employees, contractors, journalists, and media consumers around the world".

He ordered the administration to take steps to restore employees and contractors to the jobs they had prior to the executive order, and to do the same for Radio Free Asia and the Middle East Broadcasting Networks.

The judge found the administration also likely violated the International Broadcasting Act and Congress' power to appropriate funding.

"My colleagues and I are grateful for this ruling. But we know that this is just a small step forward, as the government is likely to appeal," said Patsy Widakuswara, the VOA White House bureau chief and a lead plaintiff in the lawsuit.

"We are committed to continuing to fight against what we believe is the administration's unlawful silencing of VOA until we can return to our congressional mandate: to tell America's stories with factual, balanced, and comprehensive, reporting," she said.

Trump has long criticised VOA as part of his broader attacks against the media, frequently accusing mainstream outlets of bias.

After taking office in January, he appointed a political ally, Kari Lake, to run VOA. Lake has previously supported Trump's false claims that the 2020 election was stolen from him.

In March, Trump ordered the US Agency for Global Media (USAGM), which oversees VOA and funds outlets like Radio Free Europe and Radio Free Asia, to be "eliminated to the maximum extent consistent with applicable law".

A separate judge in New York temporarily blocked the executive order after journalists, advocacy groups and unions sued, arguing the move was unlawful.

Judge Lamberth, who is based in Washington, DC, ruled the Trump administration lacked the authority to shutter VOA, which is funded by Congress and has a legislative mandate to deliver credible news globally.

"It is hard to fathom a more straightforward display of arbitrary and capricious actions than the Defendants' actions here," he wrote.

USAGM and the White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.





This is Shortwave Radiogram in MFSK64

Please send your reception report to radiogram@verizon.net

This week's images …



A Least Grebe, usually not more that 25 cm long, at Três Picos State Park, Brazil. tinyurl.com/29rawczj …



A bicycle ready for a trail at Codorus State Park in Pennsylvania, not far from our WINB transmitter site. tinyurl.com/2cdcdjag …



A blue-and-white flycatcher in Japan. tinyurl.com/23st98zw …



Sunrise over Rock Creek Park in Washington DC, April 22. tinyurl.com/2yh8xzzy …

Oakland mariposa lily showing its geometry in Mount Tamalpais State Park, California. tinyurl.com/2bax2rwd …

 

A Betty Boop rose at the Los Angeles Arboretum. tinyurl.com/284wou7m …



This pottery tea set was on sale last weekend at the Los Angeles Arboretum. tinyurl.com/2bc6kc6s …



Our art of the week accompanied a New York Times essay about Votvot, an alternative RFE/RL service for Russian audiences. tinyurl.com/2cmsjxth …

Shortwave Radiogram returns to MFSK32 …



This is Shortwave Radiogram in MFSK32 …

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and

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I'm Kim Elliott. Please join us for the next Shortwave Radiogram.

[2jam4u]

hi milla! It’s so nice to see you around again, I’m so touched and happy for you that your life is so beautiful 🥹 you give me so much hope. I have the same dream of becoming a therapist, I’m autistic and have a GED because I had a horrific time in school in general as a kid. I’m 30 now and it intimidates me so much to go “back” to college (for the first time) not bc of my age but because it was so difficult the first time with undx autism amongst other things. I’m still undiagnosed officially today, and I always weigh whether or not I want go through with a dx, but my understanding is the only way I can get accommodations is with the official diagnosis. Do you have any words, thoughts, or advice for an autistic girlboy on a similar path to you? Thank you just for reading this I hope you have such a nice night 🫶

Honestly the 10+ years between my last attempt at post-secondary education were mostly me in a panic because I had my hs diploma and what felt like a brain that just didn't work with traditional education and a job market that demanded at minimum undergrad degrees for entry level jobs. It took a solid 10 years of my sister convincing me year after year for me to finally get on board and allow myself to try again. But yeah, I think a large part of why I'm able to be successful now is the knowledge I have of how my brain operates and my clinical diagnosis.

I think when it comes to accommodations at school or work, those are the only areas where the formal diagnosis has any worth. In pretty much any other area of life it's not necessary, but you do need to have formal diagnostic reports to give in for those accommodations. That being said the majority of my accommodations are for the adhd according to accessibility services at my school. I don't think they're very well versed in autism related accommodations but they know a lot about adhd so I have a recorder for class, access to digital copies of all my textbooks, a text-to-speech software for those digital texts and extra time in exams — all of those are specifically for adhd. So if you're auDHD i'd recommend getting an adhd assessment done because they're significantly cheaper and (I don't wanna say easier but) easier to get, people are more likely to believe you, more likely to take your self-reporting at face value, shorter assessment etc.

But like I said before, I think the accommodation is only half the reason I'm doing better, there's a ton of stuff I do for myself in the way of regulation, support for my "deficits", preparing myself for routines and possible changes, laying out my school info in a way that's most digestible for my brain bla bla bla. Those are things you don't need a diagnosis for but are work you can put in for yourself that can make a HUGE difference. I can talk more about that if you want but if you're not able to get a formal diagnosis please don't think that means school is ever off the table for you entirely.

Black and white tism thinking here but I tended to see school as an all or nothing situation. Either I was naturally great at it and had no problems, or I couldn't do it at all. So when I struggled I gave up quickly, but now I'm forcing myself to work through things and it turns out I don't have to be naturally gifted at something to still get really good results and good grades. And I think the same can be true for a lot of us, if we give ourselves the opportunity to make it happen.

[skwpr]

7 Terrible Study Habits To Quit Immediately

Not Making To-Do Lists

If you’re going into a study session without a plan or to-do list regarding what you’re going to study, you’re not properly maximizing your time. 

I usually start working on homework assignments as soon as school is over; but before I actually start, I review the day’s classes and make a list of the assignments I have to do.

It’s also helpful to prioritize so you can efficiently finish your homework. I usually do this on my laptop with digital sticky notes (like the image below), but you can also use a physical planner and to-do lists.

Making lists and setting goals doesn’t just apply to homework, though. Whenever you’re having a study session or attending a lecture, come prepared! Always preview the work beforehand and make a to-do list of important things you’ll learn or will go over.

Writing to-do lists will help you organize your tasks while studying, and is a great study habit to build to effectively tackle your busy study life. 

Not Prioritizing

Prioritizing comes hand in hand with making to-do lists, and it’s key to studying productively without feeling burnt out. 

Once you’ve got your to-do list written out, analyze each task and determined which are the most important and urgent. These could be based on a variety of factors, like:

Due date

Time it will take to complete

Percentage of your grade

Difficulty

Whether you’ll be collaborating with someone

Once you’ve ranked each task on your to-do list (don’t worry, it will become easier as you do this more often), you can get to work with a sense of purpose and structure.

Having structure has always been one of my top study habits and has helped me stay productive, and I hope you’ll try it as well!

Having Your Phone Near

Your phone is likely your biggest distraction while studying. It just holds so many interesting things, especially social media and entertainment. These will distract you and cause you to procrastinate or multitask while studying, both terrible study habits.

It’s not easy to break your phone addiction completely, but physically keeping your phone away can definitely help. When your phone is in another room, you won’t be exposed to constant notifications and will then stay focused and productive while studying.

However, if you find extreme difficulty in separating from your phone, you can begin by turning off social media notifications. Instagram, Snapchat, Twitter, etc. can be hard to quit once you open them, so avoid doing so in the first place by turning off notifications.

Looking & Not Seeing

I used to take notes by reading the textbook and copying down whatever I thought was important. I highlighted terms, underlined names, drew some pictures… but the entire time, I didn’t really understand what was going on.

Whenever you’re taking notes, annotating a document, reading an essay, or learning something new in general, actively see and understand, not just look and accept.

This means that you should think about what you’re learning, pose questions to yourself and/or the teacher, make connections with your previous knowledge, and overall put thought into what you’re learning.

Just looking and not seeing is a study habit you should quit immediately, as it is a complete waste of time and effort on your part. Only when you actively use your brain to understand and form connections will the information stick.

Studying In Bed

Your bed is where your body associates with rest and play, and your mind will not be focused enough for you to study productively and effectively. Therefore, what you should do is to study in a designated study space like your desk.

However, it’s important to note that you should only study at your desk as well, and not watch movies, go on your phone, etc. Only when you clearly separate spaces for work/rest will your body and mind make the same associations.

So get up and off your bed and move to a desk or table the next time you’re studying, then jump back when you want to rest; be sure to make this a habit!

Procrastinating

Procrastination is one of the most common bad study habits students have. When you get intimidated by your work or distracted by something fun, you often end up procrastinating for more than you intended.

But it’s not impossible to beat procrastination! One of the best tips I have is to plan ahead and break things down. Similar to making to-do lists, doing these 2 things will give you structure and actionable steps, which will make everything seem easier.

Relying On The Textbook

The last bad study habit that many students don’t realize is their complete dependence on the textbook. No textbook is perfectly exhaustive and comprehensible, so it’s important to utilize outside resources as well.

Though reading the textbook can be of great help, you sometimes need more information (or simply more opinions) to fully comprehend something. Therefore, a good habit to build would be to search around more.

Here are some resources you can use other than the textbook to learn about a certain topic:

Your teacher or classmates

Wikipedia (great for people and historical events)

Britannica (great for people, concepts/ideas, and events)

YouTube (best for math and science concepts)

Quora (best for abstract/opinion-based ideas)

Once you break these 7 bad study habits, you’ll be ready to become a better student and tackle your studies with no trouble.

[5ivebyfive]

I need some advisement. I have classes starting in a couple of weeks and one of my classes requires a book that’s $200 for the physical book, no rental option. Otherwise I can get the ebook cheaper, buuut I can’t really read textbooks well digitally. I need the actual paper in front of me. I don’t have a tablet and reading on my phone or laptop just doesn’t work for me.

I searched online and everywhere is about the same for the physical book. Does anyone know of options for students that can’t do digital books? Or does anyone have the book I need?

It’s called Exploring Mass Communications by Vincent F. Filak.

I haven’t been in school for a while so I don’t know what the cheats are for books. If anyone can give me ideas, I’d appreciate it.

Thank you!

[paintcloset]

Plus Plan 2, Electricity Doesn't Make Noise

I realized recently I actually enjoy learning new things. I like thinking and exploring concepts if they intrest me. And I like researching. I started realizing this when writing the assignment for theory about the post soviet influence of Kazakhstan's contemporary art, but due to the limited word count, I didn't have enough space to spread my theoretical writing wings.

On my first flight to make it back to Rotterdam, I started rewatching Evangelion, yes the anime, and remembered how much I like the mysticism of seemingly advanced technology. Same reason for why I liked Akira's aesthetic. When you don't know how a computer works, or in this case a futuristic mecha flesh robot, it may as well be magic. The lines blur when you don't know enough to understand.

Rewatching Evangelion reminded me of the playlist I made years ago, "Shinji's mental breakdown in the cockpit", which is mostly house/electronic music. Music which I associate with feverish tech, unstable electronics as well as with technological mysticism. Not knowing how it work but still going along with it. Very similar to the main character, Shinji, just going along with piloting the giant mecha robot because it's easier to along with what you're told to do. The anime also explores themes of human connection, how we yearn for it yet avoid it out of fear of pain, the hedgehog theory ect.

But where I'm going with this tangent, is that the digital music made me think of visuals that I associate with the sounds that I hear.

None of the following statements are backed up by science that I know of.

Most things make sound. Natural (vs Manmade) objects have sounds that they are predisposition to make certain noise this can be evaluated/ calculated with a visual analysis. Sound doesn't equal Visual, but when you see a piano, you associate it with the sound it makes. You can knock on a table and predict the sound it makes. Physical music can be quite intuitive to make and play and i think also listen to.

But what about digital sound? Digital instruments and digital songs? And how do these unnatural sounds become associated with certain visuals? I feel a certain level of uncertainty when staring into FL Studio, and this feeling has been following since I first got it when I was 13. What do all the commands mean and buttons do? There's no intuition that can help you in a lawless technological mind field.

So I decided for plus weeks I just want to continue researching, thinking, learning and writing about the connections between digital sounds, their associations with visuals. I'm starting from roughly learning about music theory. I played the piano for 7 years and never learned how to it works lol so that would be a nice gap in my knowledge to fill. I will be following the following course:

Understanding Basic Music Theory | Open Textbooks for Hong Kong

It also covers the physics aspects of why music musics which I'm also interested in, and I think it will help me know which aspects to further research to answer my questions. I like learning about physics, i just never had any good teachers to get me interested or teach me anything about it. Fuck you middle school and high school physics teachers!!!!!!!!!!! Maybe I would have been an astrophysicist if not for your dumb fucking asses that don't know how to teach!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I have a very deep and personal grudge towards physics teachers.

Oh yeah I'm also being motivated to do more music related things because I got my first guitar that mine and mine only!! And it's a silent guitar! Which is an electric guitar that you can still play without an amp or headphones and hear it very lightly

I don't know how electric guitars works but I wanna know more cus I love how they sound and I love my new guitar

I don't really know where all of this investigation will lead me but it's something that's grasping my attention and curiosity so I just want to roll with it and see where the research will take me !

physics