#she grew on me the more i thought about her

[kamaluhkhan]

WE DESERVE A SOFT EPILOGUE, MY LOVE.

pairing: vi x firelight!reader word count: 2k summary: after years of thinking her dead, ekko brings vi to the firelight base. you don't really know how to react when the girl you grew up loving is now a woman you know nothing about and still, somehow, feel everything for. warnings: arcane level angst + lesbian yearning. reader is referred to with she/her pronouns. reader has tattoos and a star-shaped birthmark behind her ear (y'all know vi loves a nickname and i thought 'stargirl' was v cute so i had to make it work). fic gets slightly suggestive at the end ;) author's note: happy act iii release day!!! i wrote this instead of working on my thesis oops. in my defense, vi has sparked something in me that i simply cannot ignore. i'm also working on a werewolf! pitfighter!vi x vampire slayer!reader fic (set in the same universe, just with a slight twist) sooo that might be done before part 2 of this fic (which is where the smut happens hehe). anyways, thank you for reading!

inspired by that quote: "i think we deserve a soft epilogue, my love. we are good people and we've suffered enough" by nikka ursula

even after all these years, vi is still the first one to notice you. 

her eyes widen as she hesitates to pull away from ekko, but you clear your throat to catch both of their attentions.

“i thought we were gonna question her together.”

ekko wipes a stray tear from his cheek and stands up a little straighter. 

“you were taking too long,” he shrugs. “don’t worry — she’s clean.”

you trust ekko’s judgement, but you still can’t reckon with the fact that vi is alive. you’d splashed cold water on your face just before to make sure you weren’t dreaming. 

“i don’t know.” you walk closer until you’re standing arms length from vi. “the vi i knew wouldn’t be caught dead with a topsider, let alone an enforcer.” 

you examine her carefully, and you imagine she’s doing the same to you. vi looks more grown up — stronger and sharper. you’d spent so much time in limbo, not knowing if she were alive or dead. you aren’t sure how to react when the girl you grew up loving is now a woman you know nothing about and still, somehow, feel everything for. 

“i guess the shoddy undercut is a pretty clear give away,” you deadpan.

vi quirks an eyebrow at you. “shoddy, huh? you know, your tattoos look like they were drawn by blindfolded children.”

she smiles, all bright and toothy. the scar on her upper lip stretches, achingly familiar, and you decide there’s nothing you want to do more than to bring her into your arms, to bring her closer, so you do. 

her hair tickles your cheek as you whisper:

“i did those tattoos myself.”

vi chuckles, and you feel it vibrate across her body to yours.

“i know. they’re beautiful.” her index finger traces the star-shaped birthmark behind your ear; you shiver. “i was just messing with you, stargirl.”

vi was the only one who ever called you that, said you made her life brighter or some other sweet nothing that would effortlessly fall from her mouth.

gods, she was the first one who even noticed that birthmark on your skin. 

“i was messing with you, too. the hair — you look hot.”

you feel her heart beating faster against your chest as she smiles into your shoulder.

she’s here.

she’s not some ghost from your past.

she’s really here. 

you’re so overwhelmed by how solid she is against you that you start to pull away, but vi catches your hand before you can fully untangle yourself from her. 

“that’s all i get?” she wonders, licking her lips.

you’re tempted, very tempted, to give her more. maybe you would have, until ekko clears his throat behind you.

“should i….give y’all a moment?” ekko asks. “i’ll go get the piltie.”

you then remember who vi came here with; she might not be working for silco, but you stand by your suspicions at her bringing a topsider to the lanes. 

you slip your hand from hers. you roll your shoulders back as if that would really shake away the hold she’s always had on you.

time has passed. things have changed. neither of you are kids anymore, and you don't have the luxury of indulging in a frivolous crush.

“it's fine, e. let’s show them around.”

“still a night owl, i see.”

vi finds you perched on one of the trees highest branches, surrounded by firelights as you sketch something. you close your sketchbook instantly and place it on the other side of you when vi sits down.

“thought you’d be in bed with that enforcer of yours.” 

“her name’s caitlyn.”

“caitlyn,” you scoff, shaking your head. 

the bitterness you try to hide is all too transparent to vi, who has to bite back a laugh at your pettiness. 

“you say her name like you’re gonna hex her. never pegged you as a jealous ex.”

“technically, we never broke up,” you point out. 

a firelight lands on your hand, and you let it crawl up the lines etched on your skin. 

“if that’s the case, i owe you an apology for cheating on you when i was in prison.”

you frown, but say nothing, your eyes following that same firelight as it illuminates your tattoos. 

“don’t worry, i’m kidding!” vi pauses. “mostly.”

the firelight flies away, and you huff out an annoyed breath. 

“whatever. i don’t care who you’ve fucked, or who you’re fucking. and, you don’t owe me anything. it’s not like we’re anything to each other, anymore.”

vi sucks in a sharp breath — she wouldn’t have expected such harsh words from you.

“is that why you can’t even look at me?” she finally asks.

you’d been strictly business since you first reunited hours ago. you expertly distanced yourself from vi all throughout the tour of the firelights’ base, and throughout dinner, too. 

where’s the girl she’d spend hours goofing around with, who always had a witty response to her sarcastic remarks, who smiled at her in such a way that made her chest glow? where’s the girl who brightened vi’s life when it seemed like the darkness would never leave?

“i don’t know,” you admit. “part of me still can’t believe you’re alive. i know that i should be happy that you are, but i keep thinking about everything i could have done to protect you, and powder —”

“hey. it’s my job to worry about everyone, remember?”

“you weren’t here.”

“i am now.”

she gently moves your chin so that you face her, so that you can see that she’s not going anywhere, at least for tonight. 

which is probably more time than either of you thought you’d ever have together again.

vi notices how your eyes flick down to her lips and back up, and she feels something spark in her chest. but then, you shake your head as though trying to wake up from a dream and turn away once more. 

“that enforcer of yours —”

“she’s not my —”

“whoever she is, she talked about how we all need to heal. i just keep thinking about what you’ve been through, what we’ve all been through…. how it never really stops. healing would be nice, but it’s hard when you have to keep fighting every day. you remember what ekko said, about why we chose this place?” 

of course, she remembers. 

“that if even a seed can survive down here, maybe we could, too.”

 “we. who’s ‘we,’ vi?” you laugh, but there’s no joy behind it. “we’ve gotten used to surviving without each other. maybe it was meant to be that way.”

“that’s not fair.” 

“a lot of things aren’t fair.” you gesture around at the base. “this — this community — took blood, sweat, and tears to build and i just know how easy it would be for someone to destroy it all. which is why we fight, obviously, to protect all this and each other, but i’m scared that we can only do so for so long before we burn out.”

you press your knees to your chest and curl into yourself. vi notices then — the slump of your shoulders, the shadows beneath your eyes, and just how deeply exhausted you must feel, down to your bones. 

you let out a shuddery breath. “is it even all worth it?”

vi swallows the tears building in her throat. you had always been the hopeful one, and it makes vi’s chest ache to think about what you must have endured to lose the brightness that had been woven into your being. 

that's part of what got her through these past few years, and there's no way she's going to let it fade.

“i....i think so,” vi starts, trying to find it within her to be inspirational. “maybe it'll make a difference in the long run, even if we don’t see that now. maybe someone, someday in the future, will be able to not just survive, but live in a better world.”

you raise an eyebrow at her, and vi swears there's a slight smile on your face.

"what?" she asks, her cheeks heating up.

"i'm just...surprised. how is it possible that prison made you less cynical?”

there's a glimmer to your eyes that wasn't there before, something playful, and vi decides to lean into it.

"oh, it wasn't prison," vi says, nudging her shoulder against hers. "see, i ran into this pretty girl from my past and she's this totally badass freedom fighter now, so i think there's some hope in the world."

you snort. "good to know you're still an unbearable flirt."

"i thought you loved that about me."

you laugh, a sparkling sound that vi wishes she could carry with her wherever she goes. it’s contagious, too, and vi finds herself giggling along with you. when it dies down, you rest your head on her shoulder, something you did even back when you were only friends.

“i missed you,” she admits. 

“yeah?” your voice is softer than a whisper. 

you lift your head and vi cradles your face in her hands.

vi nods. “so fucking much, and i want to prove it. if you’ll let me. please.”

“vi,” you exhale. she’s so close now that she can feel you breathing against her lips. “i can’t. you’re with that enforcer.”

“we’re not together,” vi assures, bumping her nose against yours. 

she leans in ever so closely to kiss you, but you move away. 

“you’re still with her, though, and you’re leaving in the morning,” you continue. “things are already so….complicated. i just don’t think we should start something we won’t be able to finish.”

with nothing more to say, you gather your sketchbook and pencils. vi’s sure that you’re not going to bed, just off to nestle into another hiding spot for the night, away from her.

maybe you’re still putting up a cold front, protecting yourself because that’s how you've been surviving in this world where the risk of losing everything lingers, and only gets heavier as you grow older.

but, gods, vi really has missed you, the you she remembers so vividly, the you that shone through just moments ago. she knows that glowing heart of yours is hardened by layers of ice, and she’s determined to make them all melt away.

so, vi gets up, heart beating in her throat, and calls after you:

“haven’t we already?” 

you stop in your tracks. you slowly turn around to back at her.

a moment passes, maybe more. the two of you suspended in time. your eyes are telling her a million different things – you’re confused, you’re scared, you’re tempted, you’re tired – and all vi can do is unsuccessfully blink back more tears because it’s true, how your story together never got the happy ending you deserved. 

“please, y/n. if this is our second chance, even just for a night —”

she’s cut off by you crashing your lips against hers.

the two of you were young, really, just girls when you first kissed. it was awkward and messy and though it ignited something in the pit of vi’s stomach, it was nothing compared to this.

she lets you guide her as you please, lets you press your warm body against hers against the trunk of the tree. she lets your lips mold into hers until her lungs are burning. 

your chest is heaving as you pull away slightly; vi bites back a whine, feeling empty. but air isn’t what she needs, she’s sure of it. what she really needs is more of you.

you study her like a work of art, like you're committing her to memory in case she slips away. your thumb wipes away a fallen tear, across the tattoo on her cheek. 

fuck, no one's held vi this tenderly since, well, you.

“you’re so beautiful.”

vi blushes, becoming increasingly flustered. she'd wanted to make this about you, take care of you in all the ways she'd imagined, but the way you're looking at her, touching her....she's not a religious person, but vi thinks she might have stumbled into her own, personal heaven, with you having some divine hold on her, soft and bright and passionate.

you're kissing down her neck, nipping at her collarbone when you repeat: "you're so fucking beautiful."

“yeah, i know. they should build statues of me,” she breathes, closing her eyes and trying to keep upright on weak knees. she squeezes your hips in an attempt to keep herself steady.

you’re the only person vi can recall calling her beautiful. 

sexy? oh, yeah. charming? definitely. hot? often. 

no one else calls her beautiful, though, let alone makes her feel like it the way you do.

“bad at flirting and full of yourself," you tease. "some things really don't change."

by now your lips are travelling lower, and vi doesn't want to miss a second watching you have your way with her. when her eyes flutter open, vi gets a glimpse of something over your shoulder.

“hm, i guess drawings are a good place to start.” 

she gestures with her chin, which she instantly regrets as you pull away to follow her gaze, eyes landing on the sketches of her from your fallen sketchbook.

“you weren’t supposed to see those,” you groan. "they're personal...."

it's cute, how flustered you get after making vi all hot and bothered.

vi smirks. "personal, huh? had some fun picturing me when i was gone? missed me so much you had to draw me back to life?"

"well, no - wait, yes, obviously, i missed you, but --"

vi cuts you off with a searing kiss.

she tugs on one of your belt loops to bring you closer to her. vi presses her thigh between your legs, relishing in how your mouth opens in a perfect gasp. vi takes the opportunity to bite your bottom lip and you whimper.

“don't be embarrassed, baby," vi mumbles against your mouth, thumb rubbing soothing circles into your hips. "you know i missed you, too. 'cept i'm not talented like you, so my creative imagination had to carry me through some long nights."

“is that so….” your hand slips underneath her tank top, and you manage to pull a groan from vi by scratching your nails against her stomach. “maybe you can clue me in to what, exactly, you’ve imagined.”

vi grins triumphantly. she places a kiss on your birthmark before whispering in your ear:

“sure thing, stargirl.”

[vampiresbloodx]

Arcane imagine.

arcane characters react to you confessing your feelings to them.

characters included: Mel medarda, Caitlyn, vi, jinx, sevika

warnings: mutual pinning, yearning, fluff, slight angst, happy ending, implied smut, flirting, kissing, yeah .

Mel medarda;

You've been crushing on Mel for the longest time, you don't even know when it started, as you two have known each other for a while now, you both were kinda friends, you were never really sure, but you always felt so close to her

She had felt the same, she liked sticking by your side, hearing about your day, your projects, what you are thinking, anything, she loved listening to you talk

It was the one thing that made her day better, and seeing your face of course

It happened so suddenly, these feelings you'd never expect just came to you, Mel was just there, and you fell in love

Not that anyone could blame you, really, she's a goddess

you always wondered why on earth she'd spend time with you, someone so beautiful, so perfect, that you can't help but always admire, no matter the time and place

When you're anxious, you think of Mel, she makes everything better

When you're alone, you think of Mel

When you're with mel, you think of her

When you spot a pretty flower, you think of Mel

One time, you unintentionally picked a couple of flowers, making them look all pretty as you practically skipped your way to where Mel would be. But she wasn't alone, jayce was there, another boy she was working with

You thought they looked close, and you started to back away from them, your heart sinking, you felt your throat get tight, god, you felt so stupid, of course she would like a man like jayce, why would she ever like you? You were always just going to be her friend

Later that same day, it had turned to night, you spent the rest of the day in bed, ignoring everything and everyone, you were hurt, confused, annoyed with yourself

You just wanted it all to go away

When you heard a knock at your door, and your eyes widened, you looked up, you were about to tell them to go away, whoever it was, that's when you heard a familiar voice

"hey, it's me."

It was Mel's.

You wanted so badly to ignore her, for her to just walk away, but you knew she wasn't going to do that, you closed your eyes and signed, eventually getting up as you walked towards the door and opened it for her

"what do you want? I'm trying to sleep..." You said, hating how you sounded speaking to her. You watched the way Mel frowned, how she looked so worried, her hand reached out and you flinched, she didn't show how much that saddend her.

"you didn't join me for dinner, I was worried. I had came to check on you, oh! I should tell you on what Jayce and I have been up to so far-"

You shook your head, turning away as your back faced her, "I don't wanna hear about him."

That was all Mel needed to hear.

She smiled, stepping closer to you as she wrapped her arms around you, pulling you in, you tried to protect but nothing came out and she wasn't letting you go anyways

There was no point

"tell me what's wrong, I know what you're like when you try and push others away, don't do that to me, please" she murmured, her voice soft and calming in your ears as you stared at the ground

you felt your eyes water

"I like you, Mel" you sniffled, you were ready for her to leave, for your friendship to be over. "I've always liked you Mel, more than how friends should like one another, I just I was so scared. But then I saw you with Jayce, and I got jealous, I grew distant, because I couldn't face you, I couldn't look at you in the eyes the same, knowing that he can be better for you than I could ever be."

For a moment, you didn't hear anything, you still heard her breathing from behind you as your heart thumped loudly in your chest.

Then she forced you to turn around and look into her eyes as her hand grabbed your chin, "you mean more to me than anyone could ever be, Why would you think such things?, you're more than my friend, you're my love, my laughter, my everything, this is all I ever wanted to hear from you" Mel said, she smiled so brightly, she looked gorgeous, you wanted to kiss her

You caressed her cheek with her hand, "can... Can I?" You were hesitant to ask, she chuckled, crashing her lips against yours, you melted into the kiss, wanting to stay here forever and ever, she tasted like strawberries and honey, you never wanted to get rid of that taste

Caitlyn;

Caitlyn knew there was something off about you the moment you stopped talking to her as much like you usually would

She found it strange, so unlike you, she looked forward to seeing you whenever she could and hear your voice

But as of lately, she's been alone and missing a certain someone, you

She's been talking to Jayce and wondering what to do and how she can help you if there is anything going on, she'd want to help, she was your friend, your best friend even

So it hurt her when you suddenly stopped hanging out with her

She couldn't stop thinking about you, if she had done anything to cause this, she was freaking herself out

She had even gone to Viktor and ask for his advice, he was sort of helpful, but it wasn't like he was cupid and had the best advice for crushing on your friend

Caitlyn missed you, a lot

She went to your place to find you, surprisingly, you weren't there, she looked at the library, she didn't see you, eventually, she did find you, sitting outside by a tree, you looked so pretty, she couldn't help but admire, she ran up to you, excited, she needed to be around you again

"Cait?..." You said, looking surprised, she wasn't sure why you would be, she didn't say anything and just hugged you tightly

You hugged her back

"where have you been? I've been looking everywhere for you, you had me worried" Caitlyn's words came out rushed, you smiled at her.

"can you sit with me?" You asked.

She happily did.

"what's going on? Did something happen?-"

"Cait, let me speak."

You had cut her off before she could even finish asking more, she immediately shut up, she knew you needed to take your time to gather your words, she wanted to touch you again, but she restrained herself

"there's been a lot on my mind, that's why I haven't seen you, but I need to tell you something" you said, she can see the way you were fidgeting with your fingers, a thing you do when you're nervous, then you just randomly stood up, pacing back and forth.

"whatever you have to tell me won't be that bad-" Caitlyn tried to reassure, still you didn't listen

"I like you" you shouted at her, she blinked.

"you what?" She muttered, still processing your words

"I know this was a bad idea to tell you how I really felt, but I had to, I couldn't not tell you, I really fucking like you, Caitlyn" you said, it almost looked like you were on the verge of tears

Caitlyn stood up, you stared up at her expecting the worst, but then she cupped your face and kissed you

That alone told you enough of what she really meant, as you kissed her back, smiling

Vi;

You have always liked Vi for as long as you've known her, that wasn't anything new, anyone who's ever met you knows about your crush on her, except for one person, Vi

She's always claimed not to be an oblivious person, but people who know her also know that's obvious to see from a mile away

Vi has always been a good friend to you, more than anyone has ever been

Ekko, one of your other friends, has been telling you to confess your crush to Vi for years, yeah, it's not something that's new, you two have known each other for ages, Ekko has been through it all witnessing it, and he just wants you to tell her already

"Ekko, I don't know. I don't wanna ruin what I have with her" you muttered, the two of you were hanging out one night, catching up over snacks and games, you hear him chuckle

"you won't, trust me. I wouldn't be telling you to do this if I wasn't sure."

He was right about that. You've always trusted Ekko no matter what it is, he's always had a good heart

and almost most of the time he was always right

Just maybe things will go okay, if you told Vi how you really feel, she won't stop being your friend, but the fact that everyone else can see your crush on her except for her you just weren't sure

Even when you think you know her, you still can't wrap your head around her

You had planned to tell her this Friday night, where you know she'd always meet at your hangout spot, you wanted to make it look pretty, make it feel special, also it was an excuse to distract yourself from what tonight was actually for

Ekko had helped picked out the music, Vi has always liked metal and punk rock, you were sure in another lifetime she would be in a band

you had gotten the snacks, her favorites and yours, including the drinks and the gift you wanted to give her, you've set up a blanket and pillows down for you both

Your heart felt like it was beating so hard it could rip out of your chest any minute

You checked the time and your eyes widened, she was going to be here any second, fuck

You tried to stop pacing around, before you knew it she had arrived right on time, she greeted you with a smile and immediately hugged you, your cheeks warmed as you hugged her back, god you missed her so much

"what's the special occasion?" She asks with a raised eyebrow, biting her cherry as she laid down onto the blankets. "Everything looks so nice, and you got me my favorites? You spoil me."

You smiled, sitting down with her as you contemplated even telling her how you really felt, with how pretty she looks right now, you so badly wanted to kiss her

"I may have something" you said, finally able to get your words together. "Actually yes, I need to tell you something, vi" you hated how you were stuttering, you bit down on your bottom lip as you avoided her gaze.

"what's up, angel?" She said with a grin, she's always called you that, it's been her personal nickname made for you, it's always made you flustered

"Vi, I like... " You paused, trying to actually look into her eyes without looking away, "I like you."

Vi smiled, she looked like she didn't get it at first

"I like you to, angel" she chuckled.

You shake your head.

"no, vi, I actually like like you, I wanna be your girlfriend."

God you couldn't believe you actually told her

you waited for her to reject you, to just stand up and leave, but she didn't do any of that, instead Vi pulled you in closer, pressing her lips to yours as she kissed you hard, you gasped into her mouth, processing whats happening, that she's kissing you, her lips feel so soft against your own, your hand reached up to cup her face

She pulled away, letting you two have a moment to catch your breath as you felt ecstatic, "vi..."

"I've always liked you too, I'm glad you told me. I was actually planning on telling you myself, I didn't know when but you bet me to it, I'm glad you did, because this was the best, it was perfect."

You smiled, leaning in as your nose brushed against hers, she grabbed you by the shirt, making you fall into her as the night was not over just yet

Jinx;

Jinx had always been by your side for as long as you've known her, you have always been by hers, and she's always been by yours, that's just how you two were, when you met, it was an instant click, it was rare for jinx to experience that, so she kept you by for as long as she can

She loves everything about you, your entire personality, how no matter what you always make her day better, you were different, you meant a lot to her

She meant a lot to you as well

More than she'd ever know

Despite all that was happening, what you two have been through, you have always defended her, even when you didn't have to

She appreciates that, even if she doesn't tell you herself

It's like you somehow knew

She needed you, when Vi left, she needed you the most

You were one of the very few that stuck around, and you weren't going anywhere anytime soon

Jinx notices something was up when you weren't showing up to her place like you'd usually be, you were always around, as of late, she didn't see much of you

She wondered why

Did she do something wrong? Are you finally realizing you're better off without her?

No, she couldn't think like that

She was able to easily find you again, you were standing by yourself on an edge, she was concerned, extremely worried, she was so happy to see you again, but she knew she shouldn't rush you

"hey" you said, she didn't even say anything yet you knew she was here

"hi" she smiled, "what are you doing out here? It's cold" she starts to take off her jacket, she always gave you something to wear even if you don't need it right then

You let her put it on

You've always looked so pretty in her clothes

"you know, you'd be a good model, definitely have the body for it" she chuckles with a grin, unable to keep her eyes off you. She saw the way you looked down, how you smiled, she felt proud of that, a little bit cocky too. "You okay? You wanna tell me what's up? You've been avoiding me. You know how I am when people try to ignore me" she couldn't help but pout.

You turn to face her, finally looking at her, she smiles at the sight of you. "I know, I'm sorry about that, a lot has been on my mind. Jinx, there's something I have to tell you, I can't hide it anymore."

She frowned, unsure of what you meant, were you planning on leaving her? Moving away forever? Was she not going to be able to see you ever again? So many thoughts clouded her

But what you told her was nothing she was expecting

"I like you, Jinx, for so long, I've liked you, and no, not in the platonic way, yes, that too, I mean you've meant something more to me for a long time" you said, staring into her gaze as her mouth hangs open, you what?

She rushes to you, wrapping her arms around you tightly as she feels like she could almost cry, good tears this time, her heart was beating so fast she laughed loudly

"why didn't you tell me sooner?" She grinned, cupping your face with both of her hands like you were her entire world, you are, you've always been. "I've liked you since forever, idiot, jeez, finally one of us came clean about it. I was gonna make a dramatic reveal to you but this was so you. I like it. I really like you too. A lot. Please be mine."

And you happily did, you kissed her, that night was the best night of your lives.

Sevika;

Sevika wasn't an easy woman to read, some people have found it hard to even get under her skin, find out what makes her tick, what makes her squirm, loose balance

But you'd be a fool to test her

Then again, you were always known to be a foolish one

When people see you two together, they can't see it, you were brighter, much bubbly, always smiling then there was Sevika, scary, intimating, will kill you with one look

You two were total opposites, no one could understand how you worked so well together

But you just made it work

You were the book smart to Sevika's street smart, which is why silco partnered you with his most trusted a lot, she couldn't exactly argue with it at first, she still did, complaining about having to babysit you, despite the fact that she wasn't that much older than you anyways

Okay, maybe by a few years older, but you didn't need a god damn babysitter

She knew how to piss you off, and you knew how to annoy her as well

It went back and forth, at first, you two fought a lot,there were a lot of misunderstandings, people were even nervous to get in between you both, you two were just so loud about everything that only silco can shut you both up

Eventually, after a while, a long while, things started to settle, and Sevika understood why silco picked you

She knew he wouldn't pick any random person, he had his reasons

Then something weird started to happen, she grew more protective over you, sure, she knew she was already protective of those she cared most, but you, she wasn't sure about, it just happened all of a sudden, if anyone was bothering you, hell, if anyone tried to hurt you, hell would be unleashed

Jinx would always mock her of how much she protects you and will do anything for you, Sevika tries to fight it, her stubbornness winning, but as soon as she sees you, her walls are being cut down, forced to let you see her, as she watches you from afar, admiring your work and talents, how much dedication and time you put into things, she's actually impressed by you

The first time she ever complimented you had you feeling all giddy for weeks, months even, you wanted nothing more than to be praised by her again

Jinx was over it

How much you talked about her, how pretty she is, she'd literally gagged at how love sick you were about her, she was so tempted to shove you both in a closet to hurry the hell up and get it over with

But she knew sevika would kill her

Then again, she's reached a point where she couldn't care less

When Jinx was able to get you two alone together to finally actually talk things out, she did, she was gonna make it work, even if she had to be dramatic and pull a little strings

She would live with the fact that Sevika was gonna be pissed at her for a long time, possibly forever if this goes terribly wrong, but she doubts it would

It was a late Saturday night, everyone was still awake and hanging around, Sevika was sitting at the bar, right where Jinx told her where to meet, Jinx watched as you finally showed up, looking all nice as she grinned, walking away from it, letting it all play out

"Sevika?" You muttered, confused to see her there

But fuck did she look good

She frowned at the sight of you, about to say something, but her words fell flat at what you were wearing, you looked beautiful

Like really fucking gorgeous

"you look... Nice."

Your cheeks warmed at that, hearing her compliment you as you looked away from her gaze that was too intense for you

"yeah, I was told you'd be here... Jinx told me you wanted to speak to me about something important."

Then it clicked to her.

"fuckin' jinx" she groaned, shoving her glass away. "She set us up."

"what?" You said, dumbfounded, going to sit next to her.

There was a pause, you stared in the distance, distracted, she stared at you more, admiring your features, how pretty you looked in that dress

She's never seen you wear something so formal

It suited you

She bit down on her bottom lip, all of a sudden feeling nervous to speak

"how do you feel about us?" You asked, still not looking at her, she frowned

"us?" She repeated.

You nodded, turning your head to look at her in the eyes

"yeah, me and you. We're a good team, you make a good partner" you say. She felt her heart skip a beat, what the fuck was happening? Why were you being so nice to her?

"what is it" she muttered, "just tell me what you want."

"huh?" You looked confused.

"fuckin' hell" she groaned, running a hand through her hair. "Tell me."

"I like you" you spat out before you could even think.

She raised an eyebrow at you.

"say that again?."

"sevika" you sighed, she liked the way her name sounded coming from your lips, she wanted to hear it again. "This is already awkward as fuck, I like you, okay, fuck, I never hated you, well, maybe at some point I disliked you, at the start, but even then, you're a goddess, fucking look at you, your stunning, anyone would fall for that."

That took her off guard, definitely not what she was expecting

"if you want to cuss me out and stop being partners I'll accept I-"

She shut you up with her lips, pressing herself into you as you almost fell off your stool. She grabbed onto you as you held on tight, kissing her hard, as you moaned into her mouth.

After a while, she didn't want to stop kissing you, neither did you want to stop, you both broke away breathless, pressing your foreheads against each others

"come to mine?" She says with a smile

It's not often you see Sevika smile

"lead the way."

[moosesarecute]

Song of the Wind part 2

Part 1

Masterlist

“What do you mean you met your mate?”

Azriel almost flinched at his brother’s loud voice.

“When? How? Where?” Cassian continued just as loud. “And why haven’t you told me before?”

Azriel really appreciated his brother’s excitement, but he was simply too loud for him.

“Calm down Cassian,” Rhys luckily felt similarly. “But we would like to know, if you’d like to tell us.”

Azriel was super excited that he met his mate, but he’s quite worried he scared you away.

It had been two months since the attack on Adriata, which meant that you had been on his mind for every calm moment the past two months.

But he had to control himself and stay away so that you would be safe in the war. But now that the war was over, he found it harder and harder to stay away.

“I flew her to the palace during the attack on Adriata,” Az explained.

Cassian gaped at him.

“Two months?! You have known for two months and you didn’t tell me?”

This time, both Azriel and Rhysand flinched at Cassian’s yelling. Azriel just nodded at him.

“Have you any contact with her?” Rhys asked him.

Azriel shook his head this time and let out a sigh. How he would have loved to have contact with you. To see you and your adorable face again.

“We’ll have to change that then.”

“I thought I would let her come to me. I fear I scared her away,” Azriel explained.

“I’m sure you didn’t,” Cassian reassured him.

“We can send a letter to Tarquin or Varian and ask if they knows her. What’s her name?”

“Y/N,” Azriel said and he couldn’t hold back the big smile that grew on his face. Saying your name aloud was so amazing. He felt such a comforting feeling spreading through his body.

A laugh from Rhys pulled him from his thoughts. Cassian punched him in his arm.

“You were even worse when you first told us about Feyre,” he said.

“Okay okay, but I’ll send them a letter today,” Rhys said.

Azriel felt extremely excited at the thought of seeing you again.

Every time Azriel saw Rhys he wanted to ask him if his letter had been answered. However, he also tried to act stoic and neutral, so he never actually did ask him.

Then, a week after the letter was send, they had gotten an answer.

Azriel was at family dinner with his entire family when Rhys walked in with a letter in his hand.

Azriel felt his heartbeat rising, but he decided to stay calm until Rhys had given him the letter.

“Azriel, I have a letter for yo-,” Rhys stopped speaking as Azriel’s shadows ripped the letter out of his hand and dumped the letter in Azriel’s lap.

Azriel felt slightly embarrassed by his feelings, and as Cassian and Rhysand started laughing, he only felt worse.

“What’s going on?” Mor asked and Feyre looked just as confused.

Azriel felt surprised as he realized Feyre didn’t know. When he decided to tell Rhys about his mate, he sort of assumed that would be telling Feyre too.

Cass and Rhys looked at him with hopeful eyes. They wanted him to tell them, but it was his choice.

He looked once more over at Mor and Feyre.

“I found my mate,” he said and continued speaking even though both the females let out surprised gasps. “She’s from Summer, so we sent Tarquin and Varian letters to ask if they know her.”

If was a little bit of silence before Mor spoke.

“What are you waiting for? Open the letter then!”

Az let out a small smile and was about to pick up the letter when his shadows did it before him and ripped up the letter.

They pushed the letter into his face and he took the letter before he waved the shadows away from it face.

Hello, Azriel.

I’m happy to hear you’ve survived the war.

It’s nice to hear that you’re looking for me. I have to admit, I’ve been hoping to hear from the ever since we met.

I’m relieved to know that the mating bond have snapped for you to. And I have to say that I have been thinking about you, a lot.

My mother and brother wishes to meet you. I’m afraid that they’re quite conservative when it comes to dating and that they expect propper courting after Summer-standards.

I hope that you’ll come to dinner next Friday.

Sincerely,

Y/N

Azriel felt his throat dry up at your words. He also felt his heart go crazy, felt himself fall in love with your handwriting and the need to hold his shadows close so that they wouldn’t show all his emotions by going crazy swirling through the entire room.

“What did he say?” Cassian asked.

“It was from Y/N. I’m invited to dinner with her family next Friday,” he rasped. His throat was too dry to speak normally. “She also wrote that her family is quite conservative and that they expect a proper courting after Summer Court standards.”

“First of all, you’ll need a chaperone,” Varian explained. “Someone who’ll bring out your best qualities and make sure to keep a civil and respectful atmosphere.”

Civil and respectful atmosphere? Not Cassian then, not that he could have gone either way, being banned form Summer.

He couldn’t bring Mor, that was just wrong. Bringing Rhys or Amren felt to intimidating.

“Feyre?” he asked and Varian agreed.

“You’ll need to bring flowers to her mother and call her mother and brother madam and sir. You shouldn’t be in alone in the same room as her and you have too be extremely polite. Ask if you can help with anything and compliment the food.”

Azriel nodded and tried to remember every detail Varian gave him.

“And I would recommend not wearing anything black.”

“You look great, Az,” Feyre tried to comfort him.

He stood in the entrance of the River House and tried to find a way he felt comfortable in his Summer clothes.

He wore a cream colored linen shirt and blue linen pants. The lightness of his clothes made him uncomfortable, but he wanted to impress you.

Feyre wore a summer dress. She looked relaxed and happy. Azriel wished he could take some of her calmness.

“Ready to go?” She asked.

Azriel nodded, even though he felt more nervous than he had ever before.

He picked up the flowers for your mother and went over to Feyre. She winnowed them to your home. You had explained the way in your letters.

It was a small house with a big blooming garden. It was also in a very different neighborhood than where he had found yon during the attack on Adriata.

“Hallo,” a deep voice sounded from the front door of the house. Your brother, Azriel realized. “Welcome to our home.”

“Thank you for the invitation,” Feyre replied with a bright smile.

“I’m Mateo, Y/N’s brother,” he said. “Come in, please.”

Azriel let Feyre walk in before him. Both as a sign that he respected her, but also because he was freaking terrified and needed her to go first.

They walked inside and removed their shoes. Mateo showed the way to the dining room. That’s when he first saw you.

Last time he had seen you, your face and body was covered with fear. This time, he only saw beauty.

You glowed in a pretty light blue dress and your hair had different kinds of flowers in it. He felt his knees weaken a little and he ended up hiding his shadows completely to keep them from covering you.

You stood a few steps behind your mother. Both of you were smiling brightly.

“Good afternoon,” your mother said. “We’ve been looking forwards to your visit.”

“Thank you so much for inviting us,” Feyre said and moved slightly to the side so that Azriel could move towards you and your mother.

“We’re very grateful for your invitation, madam,” Azriel said. He got surprised by the shakiness in his voice. He tried to shake away his stress and gave your mother the flowers.

“Thank you very much, Azriel,” your mother spoke and Azriel felt so relieved.

Your mother then moved slightly to the side so that you stood right before him.

He had to hold back the urge to hug you. To feel your body against his once more.

You made a small curtesy and Azriel responded with a small bow, just as Varian had learned him.

As you stood up, he lifted his hand and you put your own upon his. He felt the warmth of your hand and he struggled to think about anything that wasn’t you and your hand.

His eyes met yours and he felt himself get lost. They looked so peaceful and bright.

Suddenly, you moved your gaze from him towards the table and then back.

Azriel’s eyes widened a little, before he sprung into action. He couldn’t fail this quickly.

He led you towards the dining table and only let go of your hand when he pulled out a chair for you to sit in. You sat down and he helped you push the chair closer to the table.

He checked the point of his mental checklist and tried to remember what he was supposed to do next. But then he smelled you.

Your scent filled his entire nose and mind. He closed his mouth that he didn’t realize was open, to prevent it from drooling. He felt his wings almost slump to the ground at the comfort he felt from your scent.

Feyre made a small sound behind him and pulled him back from his daydreaming.

Your mother! He was supposed to help your mother to the table.

He straightened his back and tightened his wings, before he made his way towards your mother.

She gave him a little smile, her eyes almost looked full of pity.

Azriel had failed, hadn’t he?

Azriel seated your mother as Mateo helped Feyre. Then, Azriel and Mateo sat down last.

The food was already at the table and Mateo and your mother filled their plates first, before Azriel and Feyre got food and lastly you. It was some sort of special tradition.

“So Azriel, what do you do?” Mateo asked you.

Azriel, who had just taken a mouthful of food, hurried to swallow before he answered. He felt his tongue and throat burn from the heat of the food.

“I’m the spymaster of the Night Court,” Azriel explained.

“That doesn’t sound safe. Are you gone often?”

“I have periods where I’m gone a lot,” he answered. His voice faltered more and more. He really wanted to impress you, even though he was sure your mother already disapproved. He picked up his cup, hoping water would help him sound less stressed.

“Will you leave less when you become a father?” Was Mateo’s next question.

Azriel chocked on his water.

“Mateo!” You exclaimed. Your eyes were wide.

Azriel drew a nervous breath.

“I would definitely give a lot of the work I do now to my spies, but I’m afraid I would still need to leave a little for the more important missions.”

Mateo nodded, he seemed almost happy with his answer.

“Would you live here or in the Night Court?”

Azriel had luckily prepared to answer that question.

“I would prepare to stay in Velaris with my family, but I would be open to live here as well.”

“Y/N?” He asked next.

“I wouldn’t mind living in the Night Court,” you said and Azriel felt himself smile. He had imagined the two of you in Velaris so many times. He loved to think it would happen eventually.

Mateo continued the questioning throughout the dinner. Some questions for him and some for Feyre.

“Thank you for a delicious meal,” Azriel said as he thought all of you had finished eating.

That’s when he saw your mother still held her fork in her hand.

He felt the need to slump his shoulders in disappointment, but he kept them up. He felt like he had failed everything this evening. He forgot to help your mother to the table, he choked and answered poorly to your brother’s questions, he didn’t call your brother sir even once and he spoke before everyone was done eating.

His heart was beating so loudly in his chest as he bowed goodbye to you. A small voice inside his head told him to look closely at you. To look at your adorable cheeks, your bright eyes and your soft hair. Because, he wasn’t sure your mother and brother would ever let him as you again.

He kissed your mother’s hand and gave your brother a solid handshake as a goodbye.

Feyre led the way out of the house and Azriel felt himself breathing calmer in the summer air.

They stepped into the small garden and were making their way out of your home, when a voice stopped them.

“Wait!”

Azriel has never turned around faster than when he heard your voice. He, the spymaster of the Night Court, almost lost his balance from the spin.

You stopped right in front of him.

“You did really well. They’re really happy,” you said to him.

He was sure he gaped at you. How could he have done a good job when he failed so much?

“Thank you,” he said back, even though he didn’t believe you.

You then shifted your gaze and looked at Feyre. Azriel turned his head and watched as Feyre turned around.

He looked back at you and then you stood up at your toes and kissed his left cheek.

The small action made him lose all control. Suddenly his shadows got loose from his no longer strong grip and they started playing with your hair and stroking your cheeks. It was like they were kissing your cheek as well.

You laughed a little.

“I’ll se you soon, Azriel,” you said and walked back inside.

Azriel had to pull his shadows to the opposite direction to prevent them from following you

“I never knew you could be that flustered,” Feyre said.

“Shut up,” he muttered back through his giant smile.

Dividers by @cafekitsune

[nadvs]

　　　⊹　❀　︵　∘　 destined ⟢

pairing singledad! zach maclaren x nanny! female reader

summary after you find out you’re pregnant, you tell zach and prepare to share the news together.

this is a continuation blurb of this two-shot! requested by anon.

You impatiently check the time on your phone again. It’s been fourteen minutes since you sat down in the private room at the doctor’s office.

Your eyes travel over the lockscreen photo from your wedding half a year ago. In the captured moment, Zach is holding Ella. Her left arm is around her father’s shoulders and her right is around yours.

Her poofy dress is sparkling under the warm banquet hall lights, her smile just as big as yours and Zach’s.

You’d done a lot of happy crying that day, but a moment after the photo was taken, you’d never had tears of joy quite like this.

Ella had run off after the shutter of the photographer’s camera and Zach pulled you in by the waist, his lips soft against your cheek, murmuring just loud enough to be heard over the music and people dancing around you, “You know what she asked me this morning?”

“What?”

“Since I get to call you my wife, if she can call you her mommy.”

You nuzzled into the crook of his neck, tearing up as he held you tighter. She had just turned seven years old and still didn’t talk about her biological mother all that much. She also hadn’t called you anything other than your name.

Zach had told you he’d be comfortable with it if Ella grew to want to call you her mom. You’d told him you’d be, too, but that you hoped she didn’t think you were ever trying to replace anyone.

“Really?” you said, your hand over your heart. “What’d you say?”

“I said she can,” he replied. You pulled back to meet his eyes, beaming up at him, almost in disbelief that three years ago, you’d knocked on his door for the first time. You could have never known the turn your life would take.

“You love her like she’s yours,” he said, his eyes glossy, “and she loves you the same way. I’m so happy she has you.”

You squeezed his hand. He’d already reassured you many times that you weren’t taking the place of Ella’s mother or being a substitution for what she lost. Instead, you’re an addition to their lives.

“I can’t believe how lucky I am,” he said. The tears he was trying to hold back fell from his eyes and he chuckled defeatedly. “Who’s cried more today, do you think?”

“I’d say it’s even,” you said with a laugh.

The door opening pulls you out of the memory. You meet the doctor’s eyes, your heart thrumming.

You and Zach had been trying for a baby for four months now. You didn’t even have to ask Ella what she thought about gaining a sibling. She’d been asking for one for a long time now.

After a string of failed attempts, you prefer not to tell Zach every time you take a test. You can see the disappointment in his eyes, no matter how hard he tries to hide it behind a gentle, “The baby just wants to make us wait.”

A couple of nights ago, when the home test you secretly took showed two lines, you booked a blood test to be sure. The doctor starts her sentence with Congratulations and you exhale a shaky breath of relief.

────୨ৎ────

Later that day, you’re folding laundry in the living room while Ella’s at school. Zach gets home from an early practice and beams when he sees you, dropping his bag on the floor.

“Hi, baby,” he says. “How are you?”

“Good. How was training?”

“I’m getting old,” he chuckles, stretching his arms over his head. You laugh.

Zach had already decided that after eight years, this is his last season professionally playing. He was offered a position on the coaching team after he told his managers he’d be resigning. He’s ready to slow down, to work a job that doesn’t have such a high risk of injury, to have more time for his family.

He sits next to you, takes the t-shirt out of your hands, folds it and then puts it on the stack on the table so that you’re free to hug him. You giggle as he leans forward and pushes you back against the couch. He’s hovering over you, his cheek pressed on yours as he hugs you, smelling like his body wash.

Zach lives for these simple moments. Getting home to you, holding you, grounding himself and reminding himself that this is what life is about.

“Hey, how’s your day look six Mondays from now?” you ask.

“That’s specific,” he laughs. “I’ll have to check. Why?”

“I’d prefer it if you came to the ultrasound with me.”

He pulls back, searching your face in awe.

“What?” he whispers. “Are you… What?”

“I am,” you laugh, tears building in your eyes, stroking his soft hair.

“When did you…?”

“This morning,” you say. “I didn’t want to tell you in case it came back negative.”

“I’m…” Zach doesn’t have words. He leans forward, gently pressing his lips against yours, shuffling quickly so he doesn’t put any weight on you.

“It’s okay,” you laugh. “You won’t break us.”

“Us,” he repeats happily, his voice cracking. He looks down at your stomach, gently putting his hand on you. “It’s okay that you made us wait,” he whispers to the baby. “I already know you were worth it. Are you being gentle with your mom?”

He looks up at you, a flash of concern washing over his awestruck face.

“I’m a little more tired than usual,” you say. “But nothing crazy yet.”

“I can’t believe it,” Zach sighs. He sniffles, his heart racing with happiness as his eyes fill with tears. “I can’t believe it.”

“I know,” you breathe. “Me, neither. We can give her the book soon.”

Zach smiles. He’d bought a children’s book a few months back about becoming a big sister for when it was time to tell Ella a baby was on the way.

Having known you for nearly four years now, he was already well aware of how pure your heart is. But the fact that your first thought is to tell Ella is yet another reminder of how you’ve always seen yourself as not only sharing your life with him, but with her, too.

“Gonna be hard not to do it right away,” he says.

“Do you have any idea how hard these last three hours have been?” you laugh. “I couldn’t wait to tell you. But we’ll share the news with her after the first trimester. To be safe.”

“Of course,” he agrees, cupping your face and pulling you in for another tender kiss.

────୨ৎ────

By the three month mark, your appetite has grown and fatigue has hit you hard. When the day comes to tell Ella, you’re bursting with excitement to tell her the news.

After dinner, you sit on the couch, already used to Zach quietly telling you to sit down and not do any housework.

Ella’s doing homework at the coffee table as you help. You gaze at her as she concentrates on her writing and remember the four-year-old she was when you first walked into this house.

She’s nearly eight now and still has so many of the qualities you’d first noticed about her. She’s energetic and loves conversation and never hesitates to show affection.

Zach comes in from cleaning up after dinner and raises his eyebrows at you, discreetly holding the book. You nod to confirm you’re ready, nervous.

He sits next to you, taking one last moment to look at you and at his daughter, accepting that this is the last moment the three of you will have like this. His family is growing now, and it feels like his heart is, too.

“Is it two R’s? Or one?” Ella mumbles, the pencil in her hand. She looks up when you don’t answer, too busy trying not to cry as you watch her. “Are you okay, mommy?”

“Yeah,” you say. “I’m okay. Can you sit with us for a moment?”

Ella nods, running towards you. Zach stops her in his arms before she lands too close to you. You laugh, having already told him privately that she’s never rough enough to hurt the baby, but he can’t be too careful.

“I have a book for you,” Zach says, kissing Ella on the temple as she sits between you. “Can you tell me what you think?”

He hands her the purple hardcover.

“What’s it called?” you ask.

“Big Sisters Are The Best,” she reads. She curiously opens the page, gazing over the illustrations of a little girl with a baby.

“Thank you,” she says politely. “I’ll tell my friend Kaley about this book. Maybe she can borrow it. She’s a big sister.”

You chuckle, meeting Zach’s eyes. He rubs Ella’s back and tells her, “You’re going to be a big sister, too, honey.”

Ella’s gaze darts up to him, then to you, then back again.

“Really?” she says. Zach’s face brightens with endearment, eyes growing shiny with tears.

“Really?” she repeats, looking at you.

“Really,” you say, putting a hand over your stomach. “That’s why I keep going back for seconds at dinner lately. There’s a baby in here making me extra hungry.”

Ella stands up, unable to contain her happiness, jumping up and down in her spot a few times before wrapping you into a hug. You laugh as she wiggles in your arms.

Zach wipes his eyes, still unsure of what he did to deserve this sort of happiness. It’s like he’s in another world, experiencing a type of joy reserved specifically for him.

“This is the best day ever,” she says. “And you’re the best mommy ever and daddy’s the best daddy ever.”

“He is,” you agree, looking at him with pure love.

────୨ৎ────

“You’re such a girl dad,” you say amusedly when you go into Ella’s bedroom.

Zach’s sitting on the floor as Ella adds what looks like the twentieth clip in his hair, while he holds Olivia, who’s happily ripping up a piece of paper.

He smiles at you gratefully. Your one-year-old is exactly how Ella was at that age. Curious, smiley, and eager to make messes wherever she can. He knows you’re technically a blended family, but it has never felt like that.

“Ella, can you do mine next?” you ask.

“After Olivia,” she says happily. “I told her she’s next and I have to keep my promise.”

“Of course,” you say. “She’s lucky to have such a nice big sister.”

“Ebba,” Olivia babbles.

“Ella,” Ella corrects. You laugh. It feels like yesterday, you’d just met her and Zach, and he was correcting her on how she’d called him the bestest. Now, she’s growing before your eyes, already so mature and well-mannered.

“But Ebba’s okay,” Ella says with a smile. She leans to give her little sister a kiss on the forehead, earning a giggle from her, clapping for more.

You sit on the floor next to Zach, squeezing his knee lovingly as your daughters laugh together. He takes your hand and brings it up to kiss the back of it.

“And to think,” you joke, “we wouldn’t be here if I bombed my interview.”

Zach laughs, shaking his head as he kisses your hand again.

“No,” he says. “This is how life was meant to be. You would have found us, no matter what. I know it.”

You grin at him, nodding in agreement.

Sitting here with his wife and daughters is the definition of destiny. Zach knows deep in his soul that he was always fated to be right here, with his heart split between three beautiful girls.

(the end)

if you enjoy a fic, reblogging is the best way to thank and support the writer!

[darnell-la]

Love your work! it’s so good, i was wondering if i could request another darkpervy!Logan and reader, She’s sleeping and he sneaks into her room and does whatever, you can decide if she wakes up or not and what they do, thank you!

note: we’ve been gone for a little, but we could never not come back with a dirty, dark, and pervy Logan Howlett post.

———

Logan wasn’t the type to think about secrets the group exposes on themselves on their drunk Friday nights, but what y/n had said earlier had been in his head for the last hour.

“Is it normal to, like, pass out after you finish? I’m not joking- Shop laughing!”

Everyone took what she said as a normal dirty secret, but Logan? God, he got hard within seconds of hearing her secret.

Now the man is outside of her room, listing through the thick door for her moans. He could tell she was close.

“F-Fuck,” y/n whined as her legs began to shake. Logan did his best to keep himself back from cumming right then. Her voice was enough to make a mess in his pants.

After Logan heard a few whines that sounded low and dead, he knocked on her door. He prayed she wouldn’t answer, and thank god she didn’t.

Logan quickly entered her room, closing and locking the door before anyone saw him in the hallway.

The man slowly turned around and met y/n’s sleeping body. She really wasn’t lying.

Logan was excited, heart pounding as his cock twitched. He knew tonight would be the best night he’s ever had.

“Can smell that pussy from over here…” Logan spoke low as he came up to her bed. He thought about taking his time, maybe eating her out or jerking off over her face, but he decided he needed to be in her.

Logan quickly undressed himself before hovering over her, getting in between her loose legs to spread them apart. “So perfect,” was all he could say.

Y/n isn’t too much of a heavy sleeper after she goes out after an orgasm, but for some reason, she hasn’t woken up yet. That orgasm had been one of the top bests.

“Gonna get this done quick and easy, okay, princes?” Logan spoke as he began pushing at her entrance, instantly feeling her tighten around his shaft. Logan groaned loudly as y/n whined, slowly waking up.

Y/n spoke, but Logan couldn’t understand her. She hadn’t even known what she said. She was out of it, and that only made her look better to the man.

“Keep it down, baby,” Logan said as y/n’s head slowly began to move, but she wasn’t fully awakened. She knew something was going on, but she felt pressure in her lower stomach and head. She felt a good kind of dizzy.

“So fuckin’ wet, Bub. You weren’t gonna tell me this? I thought we were close friends?” Logan said as his hands grabbed her lower body, pulling her into his now hard and deep thrust.

Y/n’s eyes squeezed before she tried opening them. She had failed a few times until they finally opened. That meant nothing though, as they were rolling to the back of her head from the sudden pleasure.

“Feels good, sweetheart? Tell me. Tell me you feel good, y/n”, Logan growled as he looked down at her smaller girl, watching her struggle to stay awake and take him.

“Lo?” Y/n asked, which came out as a whine. “Ah huh, I’m right here, baby. It’s me,” the man assured as her hands touched anywhere to grasp what was happening to her.

“L-Lo,” y/n whined, feeling his cock slip into her with ease as she grew more wet. Now she knew she was being fucked, but her brain still couldn’t comprehend the situation.

“Don’t worry — I’m close,” Logan spoke, confusing y/n as she slowly lifted her head. The young lady focused on what was thrust in and out of her cunt, and when she realized it, she couldn’t help but moan.

“Logan,” y/n whined, eyes still on the way his cock pushed into her. “You like it?” Logan asked again as one hand rested on the back of her head, keeping her up to see the view as the other strongly gripped her waist.

“I-I don’t know,” y/n said, but lord knew she loved this. “C’mon, Bub — Tell me you like it. You take me too good not to like it,” Logan said, feeling himself near. “I-I like it,” Y/n’s low voice echoed through his brain.

“Fuck yeah — You fuckin’ like it, baby? Like me having my way with your half-unconscious body?” Logan couldn’t stop thinking about how much he loved her being this way. He never knew this was a kink until earlier today.

“I-I do,” y/n replied right before a pool of cum gushed out of her. “Oh yeah, baby — That’s what I like to see,” Logan picked his pace up, feeling his cock goat h uncontrollably.

“Once I fill you up, I won’t be able to stop,”

[jamiepaige]

Constant Companions Closeup #11: MACHINE LOVE

(also on bandcamp and spotify!)

Welcome back to the Constant Companions Closeups - a series of in-depth dives into the songs off of my latest album, Constant Companions! Yesterday was the title track, My Darling, My Companion, which means today is the final track on the album - a song about the truths that lay in hiding within artifice, and a computer falling in love - Machine Love!

Before we get started on this particularly long closeup - I'll be doing a follow-up post after this one, answering various miscellaneous questions I've gotten over the course of writing these! If you've got anything you wanna hear more from me about, album-related or otherwise, feel free to reply to this post or send me an ask! It may very well end up part of the bonus closeup :~)

---

Let's circle back to the very first track, Dyad.

In that track's closeup, I mentioned the main sonic touchstones of this release relative to my previous ones being guitars and vocal synths. The whole guitar rock thing I think I've gone into detail enough about, what with all the inspirations I've rattled off in other posts, but there likely is still a burning question for some long-time listeners.

Why vocal synths? Why am I not singing on like half of this album? I thought you were a singer, Jamie Paige, so what is this Hatsune Miku robot Vocaloid crap?

Truth be told, the Vocaloid scene and community has always been a massive source of inspiration for me. So much of my favorite music ever, music that inspires me or touches my heart or makes me go apeshit, has been sung by synthesized vocalists in a language I don't even speak. I grew up with it, and it's grown up with me - music just as intricate, mind-boggling, twisted, fun, and ridiculously creative is being put out every single day by vocal synth producers, and nowadays it's coming from English speaking musicians in droves!

Before this year began, I'd made at least one major contribution to the culture, but in spite of my genuine adoration of everything vocal synth related, I felt like I was just looking in from the other side. Caught between worlds, existing outside of any communities, simply gesturing vaguely towards what I wanted to do.

But I wanted more! I wanted to make the same kinds of things that stirred my heart and made me want to write! I wanted to sing with those same voices! I wanted it to be true - to be like you!

---

I won't lie to you and tell you Kasane Teto has always been my favorite vocal synth. That title used to go to GUMI, and in general, I wasn't particularly attached to any UTAU voicebanks as a younger vocal synth fan. (Nowadays, I genuinely open up OpenUTAU just as much as SynthV because I've fallen deeply in love with Adachi Rei, but that's a story for my next album.) Obviously, I knew of Teto, and found her presence in things like Triple Baka delightful, but for the most part, she was mostly something of an oddity, a wayward piece of vocal synth history that had her Fans like any other.

However, there was one Teto song I've been inexplicably attached to since the moment I first heard it - Song of the Eared Robot, by nwp8861. I was introduced via this particular cover, which I love, but I quickly gravitated to the original. Something about the warbly, childish nature of her very first voicebank, the ambitiously orchestrated and unabashedly digital instrumental, the lyrics referencing fundamental frequencies and Markov chains and compiling code all just spoke to me!

That song stuck with me, laying in a part of my heart that had been collecting dust, all the way to April of 2023.

Now, yes, Teto wasn't always my favorite, and I had other vocal synths I was attached to, but I don't live under a rock, and I still understood how monumental the announcement of Kasane Teto's Synth V voicebank was - to the point that I interrupted a call full of FFXIV-playing friends who knew barely anything about vocal synths and gave them an impromptu TED talk because I was so excited.

(An excerpt of a summary of that night's events, written the morning after. i was up my own ass a little bit but in my defense Kasane Teto had just been announced for Synthesizer V)

I was watching, in real time, a dream made manifest. It's literally one of the Bits with Teto! That she'd be a Vocaloid one day too! And here she was, on the fan favorite engine, sounding genuinely fucking incredible. Especially in hindsight, it's such a beautiful and perfect twist of fate for her.

I saw myself in her. A weird little outcast, explosively reborn and thrust straight into a community's open arms with love. I wanted it to be true - To be like that, too.

It didn't fully hit until later, hearing another cover of a song I'd almost forgotten.

Machine Love, my love letter to the entire world of unbridled creativity and artistry surrounding vocal synths filtered through one sentimental little song, was fully written by the start of May, maybe 4 days after I had gotten my hands on Teto SV and long before a certain compilation album was even a glint in my eye.

If you haven't heard DAEMON/DOLL yet, you really, really, really should go listen to it - yes, I mastered this album, many of my friends and collaborators are featured, and I have two entire songs on it, but I genuinely mean it when I say I believe it's some of the best fucking music that's come out this year in general. In many respects, it also feels like a companion (hah) to Constant Companions.

I had finished writing Machine Love by this point, but it was working on this album in its entirety - discovering artists like Anh Duy, Eggtan, and beat_shobon through it, and hearing everyone in top form making this twin-drilled chimera fucker sing her heart out - that not only made me confident in my decision to go down this artistic path, but that made me fall completely in love with Kasane Teto. And honestly, how could I not? She feels like a microcosm of everything that makes vocal synths so special, this community of creatives all leaving their marks and touchstones along the trail of a great big shared folk mythos. Yeah, maybe the folk hero we're all collectively mythologizing is an anime girl, but yknow maybe Odysseus could take some branding cues from hatsune miku idfk

Basically, even if he says he wants to kill me, I owe fucking everything to rice for inviting me to work on DAEMON/DOLL.

---

On that note, my vision for Machine Love's MV was pretty clear from the beginning.

the actual factual setup for the above shot, which was done entirely in-camera with my laptop, a tv, and two video files manually synced using VLC

The fundamental idea was always there - live-action shots of animation playing back on various screens, edited together to feel somewhat seamless. However, I really struggled with what exactly was going to be on said screens for a while; Big commissions were very far out of my budget, but I knew this song needed something grandiose.

Ultimately, what I arrived at was exactly the kind of scrappy, DIY bullshit it was always meant to be.

I asked my Twitter mutuals for help. And spent a couple months in Final Cut Pro and Apple Motion hell turning all the Teto art I got into a bunch of tiny little mini MVs, some of them parodying real vocal synth MVs, some of simply just evocative of vocal synth MVs, all of them painstakingly edited by yours truly and filmed with the help of some friends over the next couple months across two states and many more cities just to be painstakingly edited and synced up again by yours truly.

THE NEXT MV I DO WILL BE SMALLER IN SCOPE

---

And with that, I believe that's the album!

There's a reason it ends with Machine Love, and not with the title track. I do think that in some respects My Darling, My Companion would have made a better closer, but that song only really resolves one of the thematic strands running through the album.

There isn't really a definitive answer to the specific question "Baby, do you know what you wanna hear?", but it evokes a theme running through the entire album - wanting something, knowing that you want something, and simply needing to find the courage to do it or say it or be it. My Darling, My Companion is in many ways a declaration of intent, an acceptance of what needs to happen, but Machine Love, to me, is that action being done. The words being said!

And now, if I may give this a somewhat selfish tint - with the explosive response my works from this album have gotten, my contributions to things like DAEMON/DOLL and Flavor Foley, the collaborations I've done and that I still have in the pipeline, the friends I've made and the community I've found a spot for myself in, and the newfound voices that I can lay my heart bare with -

Well, shit, I know what I wanna hear, and I've gotten to hear it. I'm a vocaloP. It's real!

Thank you all so goddamn much for reading and listening. I'll see you back here either tomorrow or Monday for the bonus AMA post thing!! Make art and be gay, motherfuckers.

❤️💚

[endereies]

BREAK UP DRUG - MS - PART 2

No Nut November - Day 23

NNN Masterlist...

-➤ When you stay over at the triplet's house, you confront Matt

Part 1

“He what.” You were sat down in between Nick and Chris, tears forming in your eyes anytime you uttered his name.

“He didn’t even say why! Just that he couldn’t tell me. Did I do something?” Solemn gasps pass your lips as you begin to sob once more. It didn’t stop. I couldn’t stop. Skin had been scratched on your wrists, a sign of the failed grasp you had on him. It was just too much now.

The brothers gave a knowing glance to each other while you sniffled into your jumper. For the first time in months, it wasn’t Matt’s.

“D-do either of you know why…?” The look on your face shattered them, of course they knew why, but like Matt, they couldn’t tell you. “I’m sorry, we have no idea, we can try and talk with him?”

Nick’s voice was promising, a chance to get an explanation, anything. That was enough for now. Chris quickly got up to grab some tissues and chocolate he had stored in the fridge and handed it to you. With gratitude, you smiled up at him. Your voice couldn’t be trusted to be coherent.

Eventually, you fell silent, laying against the cushions of the couch. Sniffles grew quiet and you just stared at nothing. Chris and Nick were alongside you the entire time but they knew you needed space.

“Hey…kid? Do you want to sleep in my room tonight?” Soft eyes looked up to Nick as he offered you a safe space. “Shouldn’t I get home, what about Matt?”

“He said he was busy tonight, but it is up to you.”

The nails of your fingers protruded the underneath of others as you came to a decision. It was like part of you wanted to leave this place and never come back, but it was all you knew. Your home felt a little too empty, too quiet. “Yes please…”

“Alright, you know where everything is, I’ll see you in the morning.” The triplet just looked at you pitifully, not envying you situations.

Hours flew by and by surprise, you fell asleep. The comfort in familiarity brought you to ease. Until voices woke you up.

“Are you fucking serious, Matt! You love that girl. You didn’t think to talk to either of us about it?” It was Chris, angry. Matt’s name sobered your thoughts, and you sat up quickly. Surely you were still dreaming…

Nick lied peacefully beside you, his glasses shining against the hallway light. It fell silent until Matt spoke up.

“Of course I love her, do you think I fucking stopped? I was prepared to do anything for her, so I did.” He didn’t sound like himself, it was sharper.

“So, you thought that shoving her away and into the dark was the best choice?”

“It was either that or Arlo would do some shit, he knows about her Chris. I let the relationship get into my head and I’ve jeopardised her safety.” It was obvious it was about you, one thing that Matt wasn’t was disloyal.

“You chose your little drug group over her; do you know how pathetic that is.”

That made your chest ache. Drugs? He was always clean; he never gave you a reason to think otherwise. Matt was always so adamant about not letting you near them. Maybe it was because he knew what it did to people first hand.

“That is one of our only incomes, but that’s not the point.” The voices grew louder as you grew closer.

“Then what is! Tell me Matt, because I have spent the past three hours consoling her because of you.” Matt stammered before responding.

“She is! Y/n is the point, if she was kept near me, she’d become a target, you know what they are like. If they find out that she is the reason why I’ve fucked up so many times… I don’t want her hurt.”

You now stood at the entrance of the kitchen, staring at the two brothers. Chris was pissed, and disappointed. Although that was easy to tell by their voices. Matt had a stray tear fall down his cheek. You never saw him sad, not around you at least. Was there a reason?

“Matt?”

Both the boys perked up at your voice. Chris was more stunned than Matt was, he smiled at you before walking out the room, grabbing a stray can of Pepsi as he left. Matt just looked at you, so gently. Why did he have to look at you like that?

“Drugs? What is going on, am I finally going to get any information from you.” You didn’t want to cry, but his own tears made your body choke up.

“Baby… I-“ The nickname didn’t even shock you; you were too attached to throw that away.

“I don’t want lies, Matt”

“I ended things…to keep you safe, protected.” He watched your eyes, how they were expectant for more before he gave in and spoke again. “Yes, drugs. It’s so stupid, I know. But it’s income. I swear on my life I’ve never touched them, I don’t use, baby.” His voice quivered and it broke you, the tears visible on your faces from the light above.

“Protect me? Matt, you hurt me.”

“Y/n, let me explain. I sell drugs, with a few other people. I hadn’t meant to but my had revolved so much around you that I started fucking up my job. It was my last chance to pick between you or my work. I chose my work to keep you safe. They know all about you, they can hurt you, you don’t understand.” He rambled continuously, spewing words at me. Both his hands talked with him, and it was almost hard to keep up.

“You didn’t mean to revolve around me? What am I, some sort of side piece to you?” He hadn’t meant it that way, you both knew it but it was just so hard to understand each other.

“No wait- I didn’t mean it like tha-“

“Don’t Matt. I- I’m not in the mood.” Walking away felt the same as before, as cold at least. You left him again in the dark, alone.

Just as last time.

@melliflws @yuhayeee @st7rnioioss @sturn-bugz @bueckerrss @worldlxvlys @raysmayhem-72 @patscorner @y0urm4m @bernardsbendystraws @junnniiieee07 @luverboychris @jnkvivi @rac00ns-are-c00l4 @shorthairchris @colorthecosmos444 @anabethinking @zay-sturns @anyaa2s @emilyfaith2003 @jassturn @imjusthereforthesturniolosmut @sturniolosiphone @ribread03 @slutf4rmatt @spaghetti835928383 @flouvela

© ENDEREIES 2024

[hayateart]

'Labyrinth' inspired Moshang&Bingqiu AU idea

So, while driving home from work I had this thought that SY would absolutely swore off Airplane to the Goblin King and then regret it immediately. And here we are.

In this AU Airplane is a fairly successful author of multiple most clichéd online novels you can imagine. Since they are fairly well written and full of fan service, he managed to secure a faithful audience. He's not especially famous but he earns enough to pay the bills.

Shen Yuan again is one of his readers. He finds the characters very compelling and though he hates the clichés, he can admit Airplane has a talent to combine them in an interesring, even if predictable, way. He will never admit to liking the fanservice and copious papapa under the threat of torture.

In this AU they know each other irl. SY still pays to read Airplane's novels because 'they are not friends and he will not accept them for free'. Airplane is happy with that because SY should 'obviously pay for his hard work, it is a sign of appreciation.' They both know that if SY only asked, Airplane would let him read everything, even the drafts for free.

The newest novel that Airplane writes is the Labyrinth rip off with the demon Ice King, Mobei Jun, who kidnaps a princess after she is rejected by her own father. MBJ imprisons her in his castle in the middle the labyrinth full of monsters, and traps, and riddles. A valiant, dashing hero sets to her rescue. On his way he is joined by a young fellow with a heart of gold. They soon become blood brothers, and while the novel is not yet finished it is clear they will rescue the princess.

'And let me guess,' Shen Yuan says, 'the young fellow turns out to be the real heir to the throne in the Labyrinth castle.' He keans it as a joke. Airplane's face clearly says it is exactly so.

Which prompts SY to reject Airplane and angrily disown him the same way the princess' father did in the story. Cue MBJ stepping through a portal and tossing Airplane back to his castle.

SY:

Of course, he needs to go and rescue his stupid not-friend. The police will never believe him he did not kill the idiot out of frustration!

Fortunately, the portal that leads to the Labyrinth in Airplane's novel was inspired by two twisted trees that grew with joined branches in the park they both like to visit. SY recites the incantation and the portal impossibly works! He is in the Labyrinth!

SY meets Luo Binghe, the young fellow/true heir to the throne and hopes he will help him save Airplane.

Here's the catch. The world was created from Airplane's story and follows the rules the story does. And that means both Airplane and SY must follow them as well if they want the story to progress and save the princess. As hopefully informed by their new systems.

SY needs to play the part of the hero. He is cool, collected and should not be gushing over interesting monsters and intricate riddles.

Airplane is the princess, damsel in distress. And he is distressed, alright! He has been kidnapped, hit and locked in an inescapable labyrinth. He cries a lot and is scared shitless. But also pretty horny cuz, you know, MBJ. That man is walking perfection.

Airplane can't help it. He is also pretty annoyed because while all his ideas about the castle and the labyrinth sounded good on paper in practice they simply... aren't? S0 he makes adjustments. In real time, without realising it he orders both the staff and MBJ around to make everything better.

Back to the systems - there is no punishment if our boys don't comply and play their roles, but the 'plot' systems require simply does not progress. What does change is the environment and the characters they interact with - especially MBJ and LBH. They are developing more and more, the more time they spend with their humans. Instead of being cookie cut villain and hero, they become complex, emotional, unpredictable, and by the time SY finally reaches the castle, undeniably real people.

Both Airplane and SY know that the moment SY 'rescues' the princess and LBH takes over the throne, the story will end. That's what the sytem says. And when the story ends, characters and their entire world will have no reason to exist any more. They can't allow this to happen to people they grew to care for and even love!

So, there is no rescuing, they decide. Whatever created this world clearly likes Airplane's story telling enough to have them to role play it. They can make new plays if it means they can stay with their partners. And so, Airplane marries MBJ and they both rule the Labyrinth together while SY and LBH play the role of heroes and try to stop them. Sometimes they lose. Sometimes they win but get overthrown again. Sometimes, they win and become the villains themselves, and ot is MBJ, and his husband that need to defeat the evil. Sometimes they have a beach episode.

The possibilities are endless and Airplane has planty of stories to tell. Maybe not all clichés are bad after all.

[starrysnowdrop]

So I’ll go through all three of my ships briefly, starting with Hali, then Yume, and then Sohna!

Hali x Aymeric

For me, I’ve loved Aymeric ever since his first appearance in 2.4 with his meeting with Alphinaud, and Hali has been smitten with him since she first saw him as well, at the same time, but my reasons and Hali’s reasons are very different.

At first, I thought Aymeric had major hidden antagonist vibes, like he was going to betray us and he was going to be the big bad of HW, but instead I was completely wrong, and he ended up being the exact opposite of what I had expected, and I ended up loving him even more for it.

Hali always thought the best of Aymeric, and she wanted to climb him like a tree ever since she first saw him, but the “Oh” moment for her was not until the assassination attempt on Aymeric’s life in 3.1 that Hali realized that her feelings were way deeper than just friendship. A love confession wouldn’t come until 6.0 though! 🤦‍♀️

Yume x Zenos

((Yume’s side blog: @firelightmuse))

Both Yume’s and my feelings for Zenos have been, well, complicated to say the least. I’ve always thought he was hot as hell, and next to Aymeric, he’s definitely the hottest man in game for me. But I wouldn’t even think of shipping him with Yume until this year, thanks in part to a dream I had, and also a HUGE boost from @meepsthemiqo (TYSM my friend!!).

For Yume, she became obsessed with him after he had defeated her in battle twice, and spared her life twice, which drew her to Zenos, as she had never been defeated before in a one on one battle. Even though she knew he was her enemy, her feelings for him only grew over the years, and her “Oh” moment comes after their battle in Ultima Thule, in which she realized that she couldn’t let him die, and she saved his life instead.

Sohna x Alphinaud

((I don’t have any banners made for Sohna or for the ship banner yet, so have an Alphi gif instead!))

So, this is my newest ship, and many of you probably never knew this, but Alphinaud has always been my favorite Scion, and he’s overall one of my favorite FFXIV characters period. Talk about that character growth! He’s such a great character, and I even thought of shipping Yume with Alphi a LONG time ago, but I aged Yume up to 24 at the beginning of ARR, and they had a good friendship instead. I have never tried to write a ship with Alphi until now, but I have been fond of him since his character growth in HW.

For Sohna, she’s smitten from the beginning, but she has her “Oh” moment and falls for Alphi hard when he saves her life in the first attack on Tuliyollal. That’s all that I have for them for now, but I’ll be working on Sohna’s development in the meantime.

((Thank you for sending this to me @mimble-sparklepudding!!))

fellow wol x npc shippers- If applicable, what was the "oh" moment for you and your oc falling for their love interest? Was yours seperate from your WoL's?

[mercy-misrule]

mouthwashing spoilers, mentions of fictional sexual assault, discussion of fictional neglect and abuse of a disabled person, the many nuances of the patriarchy and capitalism

Let's have a chat about how Swansea and Daisuke failed Anya as crewmates!

Thank you everyone for your very lovely and thoughtful responses to my previous Mouthwashing meta pieces, here and here.

Let's have some more thoughts! Again, I'm examining the text from the perspective of a sexual assault survivor, a survivor of a life threatening accident, a domestic violence survivor and a person who grew up in poverty.

I love this game for giving me enough meat to sink my teeth into, for fodder for thought.

I've written about how supremely vulnerable Curly is, post-crash, the real true horror of being reliant for every aspect of your survival on an abusive person.

I'd like to look at another aspect now, the fatigue and isolation of the carer under a profit driven patriarchy!

Being a carer for someone who is entirely reliant on you is tough, is stressful and supremely isolating. The best and most dedicated carers in the world get burnt out, and not because they are bad people who don't truly want the best for the person in their charge.

You see it happen. Their friends and family disengage with them, not wanting to be asked to help, not wanting to confront the difficulty and reality of disability. They'll start to ask why the carer doesn't give their charge up into permanent care, they'll make snide comments about how much easier it would be if they weren't a carer....and if a carer cannot provide for their charge, and does get professional support or their person does go into care, they get met with judgement for 'not trying hard enough' or bewilderment that they might be upset.

The disabled are seen as a burden, and when anyone tries to challenge that, the system is set up both at a macro and micro level to fundamentally quash that challenge.

And at home carers? Over proportionally, they are women.

So look at what happens to Anya. Anya is a medical professional, yes. But there are many tasks that could be done in Curly's care that don't require specialised skills. Swansea or Daisuke could have stepped in at any minute and offered her help.

Instead, she asks Jimmy, the man who abused her, who is abusing Curly to help, because as awful as it is, he's literally the only other person interacting with Curly.

He's the only person who talks to Curly post crash. Anya doesn't say a word to him, only talks about him.

Anya is not a cruel person. She's not revenge driven or malicious. She actively does not want to hurt Curly, his pain is extremely distressing to her, and she is put in the position where she has to cause it, either by her own hands or Jimmy's by proxy, because she has no other help.

Swansea is very dismissive of Anya. He refers to her as our so-called nurse, that woman, and that rickety elbow of a woman. Swansea also shit talks Daisuke, and we know he has affection for Daisuke, but actions, or inaction speak louder than words.

This is a game where taking responsibility is a core theme, and Anya is forced to take sole responsibility, where she could have been supported and helped, if Swansea or Daisuke could have stepped up as her crewmates.

Daisuke is a grown ass man. Is he a young man? Yes. Is he a full grown adult capable of making his own decisions and responsible for his own actions? Yes.

So his choice, to actively ignore Curly and Anya, is just another decision.

The way this mirrors the way society isolates carers is such a good piece of storytelling to me. The way it causes Anya so much stress, the way it causes the quality of care she provides to Curly to degrade because she is the only person helping...it's a mirror of real life.

Is it because Anya is the nurse? Sure. Is it because she's the only woman? Maybe. Is it because both Daisuke and Swansea are mired in different versions of toxic masculinity? Absolutely.

Daisuke's indifference and pleasant disengagement, while being tolerated by everyone, handwaving away criticism is the prerogative of a rich young person, especially a rich young man. It'll all be alright! and no one expects anything of him. It's not the same thing, but there's that tinge of learned helplessness in there.

Swansea's unpleasant, grinding negativity, his self focus, the way everything is a burden to him...if you haven't had to work with a man like this, you're doing well in life. You never ever want to ask them anything because it's like being rubbed by angry sandpaper.

If i seem like I'm being very harsh against Daisuke and Swansea, I am. I am purposefully pointing out their worse qualities, not just as people but as crew.

There is no unity within the crew, and the company prefers it that way. No one unionises after all, if they can't stand or trust one another. They force Curly, a chronic people pleaser to hold himself above them, which spirals his anxiety, which leads into him failing as a captain in a myriad of ways.

Daisuke is introduced too late and underprepared. The crew is automatically going to be against him, frustrated with him, and he has no incentive to work against that, apart from his own easy going nature.

Anya is under immense self pressure. She's failed to get into medical school 8 times. She's got no savings. And then she is in close quarters with her abuser, and the only person she tells about it believes her AND THEN does nothing, and seemingly then crashes the ship.

Swansea has that inbuilt, boiling pressure of a life lived like he feels he's supposed to. But he's supremely unhappy, lashes out at everyone. And not in the way that Jimmy does, but in this unpleasant background radiation way, where everyone is already under so much stress.

Jimmy was barely keeping himself together under Curly's command. Without it, he's a whirlwind of aggression, negativity, threats and delivered acts of violence. There was no unity with him, previously, and there certainly isn't any now.

Everyone is responsible for their own actions, and inaction. But the company set them up to fail before they set off, and then the social desertion of Anya dooms the crew.

Anya doesn't need to be rescued, no one needs to get revenge for her. What Anya needs is support, in the actual physical sense.

Swansea could talk to Curly, to distract him. Daisuke could be there to talk her through giving Curly his meds, keeping her panic at bay.

Literally the least they could do, it could have changed everything. If Jimmy was denied access to Curly, if there was a sense of solidarity between the crew, something, anything. If there was any trust at all.

But instead Daisuke gives into apathy, Swansea into secrecy, Anya into despair and Jimmy into a frothing frenzied need for control.

There is no win solution for the Tulpar crew. This is a hopeless crisis.

But if there had been a sense of community, of reciprocity, they'd have options. But it becomes the loudest voice in the room, Jimmy's voice, and just like that, the options disappear.

Being a carer takes community support. It's how carers are kept accountable too, because a disabled person who needs that level of care exists at the whim of the carer. A carer has to be supported to be supportive. Anya receives nothing.

[elspethdekarios]

Atonement

Hello fellow Solavellan sufferers!!! I've written a little fic about what I imagine goes down between Solas and Lavellan once the game is over. I'll have you know I listened to the Lost Elf Theme on repeat while writing it, if that tells you anything. Anyway, read below the cut or on AO3 here!

SFW, Angst, Hurt/Comfort

Words: 2,821

! HUGE VEILGUARD SPOILERS !

When she stepped into the Fade, hand in hand with her love, Sulah had no preconceived notion of what to expect on the other side, nor did she spend a moment speculating about what it could possibly be. She was with Solas, after all, and there was no use in trying to predict his actions. It was funny, really—how she found him predictable and surprising all in the same. No, there was little use trying to guess where in the Fade he would lead them. Nonetheless, she wasn't sure she would have ever expected this.

The pocket of the Fade they walked into was dull and gray as stone. In fact, most of it was stone. Fragments of buildings and debris floated slowly through the foggy sky above. Tendrils of winding roots grew up through cracks in the stone. There were staircases that seemed to lead to nowhere, and twisted, barren trees clinging to broken columns and walls. The air was so still it felt stifling in Sulah’s lungs. And Solas, downtrodden and bruised, looked like he belonged there. Like he was part of the backdrop. As if he could hear her thoughts, he spoke.

“It is a reflection of what I am. What I don't want to be.” He paused, dropping his head. “What I don't want to face.”

“This is how you atone?”

“I told you it would be terrible.”

“And I told you forever.” Sulah turned to him, heart aching for the bloodied mess of his face. “I meant it.”

Solas lifted his head enough to look at her through glassy, violet eyes. “I don’t deserve you, vhenan.”

“I think that’s up to me,” she said, wiping away a stray tear on his cheek. “Let’s talk, my love. Before you start making your amends.”

They sat with their backs against a nearby stone wall. Solas’s eyes alternated between being heavy with sleep and haunting despair. He looked so much older than she remembered him—not physically, really, but in the way he seemed to be held down with millennia of burden. On the other hand, he had the heartbreaking demeanor of a child unable to emotionally grasp the multitude of his feelings.

“I don’t know… where to start,” he breathed. With one look at her, a hint of hope glimmered amongst the sadness in his eyes. “I have missed you. Desperately so.”

“I’ve missed you, too.” Sulah’s voice cracked as she spoke, a stream of tears steadily falling down her cheeks. She brushed them away and smiled sadly. “So let’s start there, shall we?”

His kiss tasted of salt and metal. She didn’t care about the wounds on his face or the small gash on his lip still swelling with blood. It had been a decade since she tasted him, touched him, spoke to him. Even though she knew he visited in her dreams, he never made contact—only watched, a dark figure in the distance. How she longed to reach out for him every time, to pull him close and find solace in his arms like she used to. Sulah crawled in front of him, her knees aching as they pressed into the cold stone, and wrapped her arms around his neck. After a brief hesitation, Solas rested his hands on her waist, his touch timid at first, like he was afraid of doing something wrong. But his touch grew more confident by the second, and soon his arms were wrapped around her so tight she could barely breathe. It felt as if a missing piece of her heart had been restored, held in place by molten gold.

“I don’t know that I can possibly tell you all of it. Perhaps I could… show you, instead.” With a single thought, Solas willed into the Fade a blue crystal statuette of a wolf, not unlike the one Sulah found when his ritual failed. He held it, concentrated on it, and its core radiated bright blue magic. He held the figure out to her. As Sulah took it from him, their destitute surroundings swirled and dissolved, leaving her in front of a young Solas. His face was not quite so worn with pain and exhaustion like the one she knew. Long, auburn hair cascaded down the center of his head, falling over his shoulder as he turned to face the other elf in front of him.

“Solas, how could you?” the other elf asked. His skin was tan, his hair was dark, and his face was marked with Mythal’s branching vallaslin. The same branches that Sulah had tattooed underneath her eyes.

“I do not expect you to understand, Felassan,” Solas said, standing tall and proud as ever. “It was necessary for the enemy to believe we were committed. A heavy sacrifice, but one that gave us a real chance to end the war.”

“You knowingly sent those spirits to their deaths!” Felassan shouted. “We’re supposed to be better than this.”

Felassan spoke to Solas with the intimacy and confidence of a close friend, unafraid to confront his wrongdoings. Sulah could make out a hint of remorse in Solas’s eyes before his face hardened into a scowl.

“I did what had to be done.”

The scene dissipated. Ruins were replaced with the glorious landscape of ancient Arlathan, sprawling greenery among grand, floating palaces. Solas argued with an elven woman who Sulah now recognized as Mythal. She was identical to the spirit fragment she had seen before stepping into the Fade with Solas, only solid and real. The words they spoke were jumbled, as if Solas couldn’t remember the exact things said when he transferred the memory to the statue, but Sulah knew what they were discussing all the same: the Blight. Solas protested, pleaded with Mythal, before finally giving in to her demands.

“I will follow you always,” he said. Sulah had never heard him sound so defeated. A distinct and overwhelming sense of shame settled over her as the scene faded.

The memories continued like this, one after the other, each one brief but enough to show her the actions that haunted him. And enough to leave her with thousands of questions. She saw his regrets from centuries ago—memories of Mythal, Elgern’an, Ghilan’nain, the other Evanuris. She saw him destroy the legacy of the titans, and the corruption that introduced the Blight to the world. She saw his sorrow at the creation of the Veil, the loss of the world he knew, the unbreakable tether he had to Mythal, similar to a commandeering mother and a child eager to please her, desperate for her approval. She saw his plans to give Corypheus the orb go awry, the conflict raging inside of him as he fell in love with Sulah, the way he almost told her the truth that night in Crestwood. She felt the guilt he carried afterwards—that he still carried. She saw him devise his devious plan to mold Rook into someone the prison would take in his place. His betrayal and desperation.

She saw the despair in his eyes when he killed Varric.

Sulah stood on the raised platform where Solas orchestrated his ritual, watching as Varric climbed the stairs in an attempt to stop his friend. Even in a memory, the air was charged with powerful magic, culminating in a swirling wind that blew her hair into her face, obscuring her view. She could only make out fragments of the argument.

“You need to listen—”

“You have come a long way and made a valiant effort, Varric—”

“—able to give me a straight answer—”

“—rather than admit this is mine to solve—”

“—who are you trying to convince here? Me or yourself?”

Varric’s last statement stung like a knife. His words echoed as time slowed. Sulah felt the heavy burden of self doubt imbued in Solas’s memory as the two men locked eyes, their argument hanging in the air between them. In a chaotic flash, several things happened: Solas turned to continue the ritual, Varric attempted to pry the lyrium dagger from Solas’s hands, and the monuments of the Evanuris surrounding the ritual site began to fall. Somewhere in the chaos, while wrenching the dagger back from Varric’s grasp, the blade pierced through his chest. The sound of ripping flesh. The gasp from Varric’s mouth.

“NO!” Sulah shouted. Time had slowed, and she rushed to catch him as he stumbled, forgetting that it was no use. Her arms moved through him like a ghost.

Solas watched his friend fall to the bottom of the stairs, regret bubbling up inside of him at what he’d done. And still, the sense of doubt from Varric’s words lingered, sullying Solas’s certainty as innocent blood seeped through the fabric of his gloves.

He steeled himself with cold resolve and turned away.

The gray of the Fade prison came back into view. Sulah felt like she had been in Solas’s memories for hours, but neither her body nor his had moved from the ground against the wall. He watched her with bated breath, his jaw clenched, eyes glossy with fresh tears. Moments ago, she watched him command a rebellion, steadfast and resolute and proud. A powerful god among mortals. But the Solas in front of her now held little of the immense ancient spirit she’d seen. He was only a man, broken from the weight of his regrets.

“I cannot ask for your forgiveness, vhenan. Not even your understanding.” His voice broke, his next words spoken through a sob. “I am so sorry that I let you fall in love with a monster.”

Solas hugged his knees to his chest. His hands shook and his body trembled as he cried. It was pure, raw, searing emotion—and it was the first time she had ever seen him lose control of himself. Sulah had been lonely for years, yearning for the man who felt like home while sleeping cold in an empty bed, but she’d never felt as alone as she felt now, sitting in the vast emptiness of the Fade with a god shedding centuries’ worth of repressed agony that she could never possibly comprehend. He was the one who always seemed to know what to do, who had a plan for everything. He was the one more familiar with the Fade than the waking world. But he was also the one who had to face his regrets. His pain. And he had already proven that he couldn’t do that on his own.

“Solas,” she said, quiet and sad. “You killed Varric.”

“I’m sorry,” he choked through tears.

“I… I knew he was gone, but no one…” she trailed off, thinking back to the letter she received from Morrigan shortly after she met Rook and the others. Varric was gravely injured in an altercation. He did not make it. I am sorry you have to find out this way. “No one told me it was by your hand.”

“They were protecting you,” he said. “From the truth of what I am. Perhaps they shouldn’t have done so.”

Sulah sat in silence, trying to piece it all together in her mind.

“I never meant to hurt Varric,” Solas whispered. “I have harmed so many people, innocent people, and Varric… Varric….”

He stopped speaking and rested his forehead on his knees, letting the tears fall on his armor.

“My love—”

“How can you possibly still love me, Sulah?” he snapped, a wolf showing his fangs. “I deserve whatever cruel fate awaits me here. You do not.”

“Solas—”

“Would you truly—”

“Let me speak,” she said, stern and commanding. Her Inquisitor voice, the other members liked to call it. It worked. Solas nodded for her to continue. “To heal from your past, you have to confront it. It will be painful, but you must. Tell me about Varric.”

Solas sighed and let his head fall back to the wall, the apex of his throat bobbing as he swallowed.

“Varric was a good man. He was my friend.” He closed his eyes and Sulah watched as a single tear ran down his bloodied face. She tried to hold back her own tears, but they streamed warm down her cheeks nonetheless.

“What would you say to him if he were here?”

“That it is one of my greatest regrets, one that I desperately wish I could take back. That I enjoyed his company on our journey years ago, and that I have missed him in the years since. And that I am terribly, terribly sorry.”

Like a prayer, the final words escaped Solas’s mouth in a despondent whisper. In the distance, a structure resembling the skyline of Kirkwall crumbled. Sulah recognized it from her visit several years ago. She had only made it to Kirkwall once in the time that Varric was viscount, a position he reluctantly accepted, but one that she always suspected he secretly enjoyed. He took her to the cliffs of Sundermount, where Dalish sometimes set up camp. It looked remarkably like the area of the Free Marches her clan frequented before she left.

“I thought it might remind you of home”, he had said.

“I came here to see* your *home, Varric.”

“We’re doing that too.” he pointed across the water to the silhouetted, square buildings.

She smiled at the memory and let herself cry as the Kirkwall replica became an avalanche of stone plummeting into the abyss. When its final, broken pieces fell, Solas turned back to her and took a long breath. She looked at him, attempting to reconcile the Solas she knew and loved, the Solas in front of her now, with the Solas she saw in his memories. There was a cruel pride deep inside of him, one he tried to keep from her for so long. She could see it now, and it was fractured.

How could she possibly come to terms with all he had done? He had taken Varric away from this world, a man who, despite his faults, brought hope and friendship and humor into the world around him. She could feel the empty, aching shells of all the hearts who missed him—including her own. There were more adventures to be had, more books to be written, and Solas took it away. Away from Varric, away from the world. Sulah couldn’t bring herself to consider the even larger things he had done. The man she loved was responsible for the Blight. He tranquilized the Titans. He murdered his friends—sometimes on accident, sometimes for what he considered betrayal.

Sulah steadied her breathing and closed her eyes, focusing on the rhythm of the air flowing in and out of her lungs. She let the world fall away until she could feel nothing but the essence of her soul spreading into her limbs, making her weightless. If Solas was a spirit of wisdom, what was she, deep down? A word stirred somewhere in the depths of her heart: patience.

“This is going to take a long time, vhenan.” Solas’s words roused her from contemplation.

“Yes,” she said. “For both of us, I think.”

For the first time since reuniting, he touched her of his own accord, studying her prosthetic arm with gentle fingers before resting his hand on her thigh beside it.

“It’s a good thing time doesn’t exist in the Fade, then.” Sulah placed her remaining hand on top of his. “To answer your earlier question, I choose to still love you despite your mistakes, Solas. I love you because I tried to move on, to meet other people, but none of them could touch whatever piece of my soul that you do. Every person I tried to give my heart to was a flimsy bandage over a gaping wound. And I had to reconcile with myself that I love someone who would tear the world apart for his own stubborn pride. I know your heart, Solas. You are more than your mistakes.”

Sulah felt as if a small part of the rift between them had stitched itself back together; a fragile scar translucent and deep, but healing nonetheless. For a moment, the insurmountable hurdles she would have to help him overcome fell away. It was just the two of them, together in the Fade like all those years ago. She knew how the world would see them: the lovestruck Inquisitor and the Dread Wolf. The cautionary tale of a Dalish girl who fell right into the jaws of Fen’Harel himself.

“Sulah,” Solas reached for her face with both hands, holding her like he had to be sure she wasn’t a mere reflection of his desire. “As long as you will have me, I swear to you: I will never abandon you again. You will have me, always.”

His kiss was soft, but charged with intention. Devotion. As they broke apart, he pulled Sulah into his arms, resting his cheek on the top of her head.

“Ar lath ma vhenan. Bellanaris.”

[bestworstcase]

So, it should be obvious to anyone paying attention or taking this seriously by now that Whiterose isn't happening. And I mean, they wouldn't really fit with what the show is going for anyways, with romantic relationships, no Ozlem fractals and all that. But it does stick out like a sore thumb, that within RWBY and JNPR they're the only pair of partners where it's not a thing. And I'm curious if you make anything of it, from an out-of-universe perspective, on why that's the case?

well for one thing, i think the conceptual basis for any ship being "well the other three major character academic pairs developed into romantic interests" is a de facto admission of non-canonicity in itself, and betrays a fundamental disinterest in character and narrative. this is perhaps not surprising, as i'm given to understand people have been shipping wr literally since the color trailers, which is to say that the core appeal has always been aesthetics.

full disclosure, my personal feeling is that wr is "man and woman breathed near each other one time!?" for sapphics. it's gay ruby/jaune. the ship isn't sunk, it's dry-docked.

in that sense, the out-of-universe perspective i have to offer is: the difference between ruby/weiss and arkos / renora / the bees is that the latter three were written with romantic intent from the start whereas ruby and weiss were not. i'll grant the possibility that the academic pairings were an inelegant plot device motivated by that romantic intention, but i don't in fact believe that is the case because the one/two/four motif is such a thematic workhorse for the contortions and distortions of ozpin's psyche; i think pairing the romantic partners was at most a secondary consideration. in any case, there is no rule dictating that every academic pair must eventually kiss. that's nonsense.

now. in the more specific sense of "why do these two characters in particular not go together" i think there are two reasons.

first, it's narratively important for ruby to be isolated. she's two years younger and left all her friends behind to enroll in beacon early and her big sister isn't and can't be her mom anymore and she gets paired up with an academic overachiever who initially treats her like an idiot baby who doesn't deserve the responsibility she's been given. ruby surmounts each of these challenges by remaking herself into their serious, competent, trustworthy leader and crucially this does not address, but in fact reinforces, her alienation from the rest of the team.

second, both ruby and weiss are profoundly sheltered and lonely girls raised in environments, denied close relationships with anyone but their elder sisters whom they both grew to idolize, and became, in contrasting but fundamentally similar ways, really good at performing the "right" behaviors—ruby adopting a happy, carefree mask, weiss becoming an overachieving perfectionist obsessed with her family's honor.

the point is, a) neither have ever had a real, emotionally close friendship before, and b) both have a deeply-ingrained tendency to Perform To Expectation. in this i think it is instructive to compare the conflict and resolution between weiss and ruby vs weiss and blake:

blake directly and overtly challenges weiss on her awful behavior until the brick wall of regurgitated bigotry breaks down and weiss starts to talk about the real emotional pain behind that wall, and blake reveals her own secret and then flees in distress, with the result that weiss has to face and think about the pain she's caused to someone she cares about and actually reflect on things blake said to her for a while. and then when they come face-to-face again weiss stops blake from anxiously trying to apologize / explain / appease her and says no, i thought about it, i trust you, you don't owe me any of that. she doesn't say the words "i'm sorry" but her actions demonstrate real understanding and empathy for blake.

meanwhile her conflict with ruby tears down ruby's self-confidence, ultimately leaving ruby receptive to ozpin's extremely destructive advice, and ends because port dresses weiss down and lays out for her in plain terms that her envy and resentment reflect poorly on her, whereafter weiss commits to becoming "the best teammate [ruby will] ever have."

spot the difference. the conflict between weiss and blake fosters a deeper, lasting emotional connection between them chiefly because they're fighting with each other—there's this back-and-forth, give-and-take that drives a resolution from within. weiss has to reflect on herself and decide that what she believed about faunuskind is wrong. and the. she has to decide for herself how to make it right. but that's not what happens in the conflict between weiss and ruby! weiss is just being a bully and gets told by a teacher she respects to knock it off!

and then little miss overachieving perfectionist pivots to "i will be the perfect teammate!" while the lesson ruby takes from this experience, courtesy of ozpin, is that she deserved to be treated that way because she didn't take her duties as the team leader seriously enough. she puts on a happy face and pretends nothing hurts because that's who ruby is, but the resolution here is very much just papering over the cracks.

not to say that ruby and weiss aren't truly friends and don't care deeply for each other, because they are and they do, but the foundation of this friendship is very brittle. on the surface, they appear as virtually the platonic ideal of what huntsman academy partners are meant to be—an unlikely pair who overcame enormous personal differences to become inseparable comrades-in-arms—but that is in large part because ruby's skill in masking problems harmonizes so well with weiss's drive to be the perfect huntsman academy partner.

but they're really not that close! it's a meme at this point for wr shippers to bemoan the dearth of "moments" between ruby and weiss, but that is by design. these are two girls who've never had a really close friendship before performing close friendship with each other almost flawlessly until the wheels very suddenly and violently fall off in v9, whereupon weiss—who is otherwise an empathetic and emotionally insightful person—realizes this hollowness and reflects on her treatment of ruby just as she did with blake back in v1. her perfect partnership has been an emotional burden to ruby this whole time, and she has to face that head-on before it can be fixed.

i think they're probably headed for a serious "we're combat partners who fight well together and get along, but are we actually friends?" kind of reckoning that will undoubtedly resolve in the direction of building real closeness, because maybe they're not as close as they believed but they want to have that kind of friendship.

which is like. you know. interesting. the core problem i have with wr fanon and the general insistence in that contingent of the fandom is that the apparent ideal-partnership is Real and trust me, they're totally in love, we're just meant to understand that they're having heart-to-heart conversations and emotionally vulnerable moments with each other off-screen all the time, the complete absence of this in the text is only because the narrative doesn't have the time—as if the narrative hasn't carved out time for arkos and renora and the bees and ruby/oscar, as if it wasn't a deliberate choice to contrast weiss getting scolded for bullying ruby against weiss empathizing and sharing childhood traumas and deep fears and cherished aspirations with blake and yang. like. come on.

the point is that things were "resolved" between ruby and weiss by external pressures that did not foster any real understanding between them, and then nothing ever changed. weiss' friendships with blake and yang pushed her to grow, to mature, but until v9 she and ruby were coasting on that "good leader/perfect teammate" dynamic, stagnant for ruby and a blindspot for weiss.

and this is the narrative reason why ruby and weiss had to be paired during the initiation. looking at it through the lens of "pairing the romantic partners (and the sore thumb of ruby and weiss)" misses the forest for the shipper goggles tree: the academic pairings are the inciting incident for each main character arc. for jaune, it's the first stroke of the ozlem fractal and the tragedy that motivates the rest of his story. for ren and nora, it's the safety of a comfort zone they'll eventually need to leave. for blake and yang, it's finding each other for the first time. for weiss, it's the mistake that will fester until it comes back to bite her to put all her growth in the interim to the test. for ruby, it's the painful experience that pushes her to take on self-sacrificial heroism as her duty.

it's just a device for establishing character pairs that will facilitate long-term development. that three of the four can be grouped together loosely as romantic arcs doesn't inherently mean anything for the one that isn't; to suggest otherwise is to collapse the differences between arkos / renora / the bees (and also ignore the goliath in the room of arkos not being endgame) and imagine a rule where there just isn't one.

for the sake of completeness i will add that coco/velvet is canon and the CFVY novels make a point of them not being academic partners.

[otomehonyaku]

DIABOLIK LOVERS More,Blood Stellaworth Complete Set Tokuten Short Stories ☽ Kanato ver.

Original title: DIABOLIK LOVERS MORE,BLOOD ステラワース全巻連動購入特典ショートストーリ English translation by @otomehonyaku Scans can be found here (courtesy of @karleksmumskladdkaka!)

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

SUMMARY | This short story provides a slice of Kanato's and Yui's daily life after the events of More,Blood. Kanato suffers from a bout of nausea, but Yui knows exactly how to make him feel better.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

Please do not reuse or repost my translations elsewhere or translate my work into other languages without my permission.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

A vampire feeling under the weather, just like a lowly human? I had never heard of such a thing, and yet here I was, laying in bed while waves of nausea rolled over me.

“Ugh… It hurts, Teddy… What on Earth is happening to me…?!” The low groans of pain that left my mouth sounded as if I were chanting curses.

A carefree voice suddenly carried through the air. “Kanato, are you okay?!”

“Does it… look like I’m okay?!” I yelled, agitated, but my throat soon started hurting and I nearly choked on my breath.

The girl anxiously rushed to my side and rubbed my back.

“Ugh… Where is… Where is Reiji…?!”

“About that… I think he’s gone to the castle…”

I clicked my tongue at her bewildered expression.

When it comes to vampires feeling under the weather, only a vampire could know how to make it better. Because vampire doctors do not exist, though, I had no choice but to rely on Reiji.

“Go… fetch Reiji already! If you don’t… you must do something about this immediately…!”

A defeated expression appeared on her face as she shrunk in on herself at the shrillness of my voice. I knew full well that it was no use asking such a thing of her, but I had never felt this unwell before. My irritation only grew.

“Ugh…” I buried my face in my pillow, trying desperately to fight off the nausea.

“U-um, Kanato…! You’re only making it worse by acting this way…” Even as restless as she seemed, she gently took out a plate from behind her back and held it out to me.

When I saw what was on the plate, I clicked my tongue again.

What on Earth was she even thinking, offering me pudding of all things in a situation like this?

“You’ve turned into a full-fledged idiot, haven’t you…?!”

“I… suppose so…? I’m sorry. Kanato, I know you love sweets, so I figured… maybe if you eat this…”

Though I appreciated that she had truly racked her brain for a solution, it would be better if she thought nothing at all if she came up with foolish ideas like this.

“I’m sorry—I’ll eat it myself, then.”

“What?!” I retorted, watching as she started to raise the pudding to her mouth. Before I realised it, I had jumped upright. “Hold on a second! Why would you eat it?!”

”Huh? B-but…”

“I never said I wouldn’t eat it,” I spat. Truthfully, while I was in no shape to be eating pudding, I could not restrain myself when someone was eating it right in front of me.

“Will you eat some, then?”

“I shall. Come… hurry up and feed it to me,” I grumbled.

In response, she timidly scooped up a spoonful of pudding and held it out to me. I decided to put up with it and opened my mouth. I had no idea if I was going to be able to keep it down, but I simply could not bear to watch her eat it, either.

Gingerly, I beckoned for her to put the spoon in my mouth. “Ugh…”

“T-this is not going to work, is it?” she said, fidgeting.

I ignored her and swallowed the pudding in my mouth in one big gulp.

“Mm.. it’s delicious…” It actually took me off-guard how smoothly the pudding went down. It was as though it instantly alleviated the nausea in doing so. I found myself thinking sweets might have been the cure to my condition all along…

“So it’s just like Reiji said…” she whispered.

“What?” I blurted out.

A look that screamed oops! passed over her features for a brief moment, but she swiftly regained her composure. “Well, Reiji said…”

“What? What about Reiji?” I thought she had said that Reiji was away earlier.

“Um… actually, Reiji told me that you would instantly feel better if I fed you something sweet…”

“What?!” I called out brazenly, unthinking. “I knew I’d be healed if I ate something sweet, but… what does feeding me have to do with that?!” Maybe Reiji had only pretended to leave the house. So be it, then, I thought as I got up and drew closer to her.

”Yeah, I suppose it might have nothing to do with it… If you understand, won’t you please eat this pudding? Keep your head up, alright?”

After I hurried to take the bite of pudding she held out to me, she offered me another spoonful.

“I understand… If that’s what you want me to do, then keep feeding me until there’s nothing left!” I finally declared.

[bexxa12]

STUDIO SECRETS|| JJ x Y/N

{Summary}

Jungkook, a musical prodigy whose voice captivates millions, finds himself drawn into a world beyond the spotlight. His path crosses with the enigmatic daughter of his esteemed producer, a woman whose secrets run as deep as the melodies he crafts.

Chapter 3

WC: 2,210

The door closed behind her, the sound echoing through the studio like a final note of a symphony. Jungkook couldn't shake the feeling that she had left an indelible mark on him, a spark of something he hadn't felt in a long time. 

Mr. Kim cleared his throat, the spell broken, and Jungkook turned back to the task at hand.

They worked into the night, the energy in the studio palpable. The walls seemed to hum with the power of their collective passion, the music growing more intense with each passing hour.

The scent of freshly brewed coffee lingered in the air, melding with the faint metallic tang of new technology and the nostalgic scent of worn-out vinyl records.

As Jungkook played, Mr. Kim's eyes never left the monitors, scrutinizing every note and beat with a meticulous precision that had made him a legend in the industry. 

His graying hair was swept back in a neat style that defied the chaos of the cables and instruments scattered around the room

Finally, the last note of Jungkook's song faded into the quiet embrace of the studio. Mr. Kim leaned back in his chair with a satisfied sigh, his eyes closing briefly as if to savor the sound that had just filled the space. He opened them and nodded, a rare smile tugging at the corners of his lips. 

"Good job, Jungkook," he said, his voice gruff but warm. 

"We're done for the day. That was the final take."

The song they'd been crafting together had finally come alive, a fusion of beats and melody that felt like a piece of his soul.

As Jungkook stepped out of the music booth, the cool air washed over him, a stark contrast to the warmth of the spotlights.

"It was nice to finally meet her." Jungkook said casually, as he approached Mr. Kim.

Mr. Kim's eyes lit up at the mention of his daughter, Y/N. He leaned back in his chair and folded his arms. 

"How did she seem?"

"Determined, like you," Jungkook observed, chuckling.

Mr. Kim's expression grew thoughtful. "She's got a good head on her shoulders, that one."

Jungkook nodded, picturing the young woman who had visited the studio earlier that day. 

She had the same sharp gaze and focused demeanor as her father, yet there was a warmth to her that was all her own.

"Yeah, she was pretty intense," Jungkook said, smiling. 

"But in a good way. She talked about her cases like they were the only things that mattered in the world."

Mr. Kim's eyes twinkled with pride. 

"That's her alright," he said. "Her passion for justice is unrivaled."

The conversation grew quiet as they both reflected on the day's achievements and the paths their lives had taken. Jungkook had always admired the producer's dedication to his work and family. 

The way he balanced the two, especially in the fast-paced world of music and entertainment, was inspiring.

Mr. Kim's phone buzzed on the desk, breaking the silence. He picked it up, squinting at the screen. 

"Looks like Y/N is stuck at the office again," he said with a sigh. "She's always working."

Jungkook leaned against the soundboard. "Is she okay with that?" Mr. Kim rubbed his temples. 

"It's tough, but she loves it. Says she's fighting the good fight. Sometimes, I wish she'd take a break though."

Jungkook nodded sympathetically. 

"You've taught her well," he said. "She's following her dreams."

Mr. Kim couldn't help but smile. 

"I just want her to be happy," he said. "And if that means fighting for justice, then so be it."

Jungkook nodded. 

"You know, I've never met anyone quite like her. Most people in my line of work are chasing fame or fortune, but she's out there making a difference."

Mr. Kim's expression grew contemplative. 

"Yeah, she's one of a kind," he said, a hint of wistfulness in his voice. 

"When she told me she wanted to be a lawyer, I was worried it'd consume her, but she's found a way to keep her passion from becoming a burden."

Jungkook nodded thoughtfully. 

"I can see it in her eyes," he said. "The same fire you have for music, she has for justice. It's pretty amazing."

Mr. Kim's gaze drifted to his phone's lockscreen. In the picture, his daughter, Y/N, was a young girl, her tiny hands clutching a makeshift microphone, mimicking her father's every move as he worked in the studio. 

He couldn't help but wonder if she had inherited his love for music, or if it was his passion for his work that had inspired her to pursue her own dreams with such fervor.

"Well," Jungkook said, breaking the silence, "we should start wrapping up. It's late." Mr. Kim nodded, his eyes lingering on the picture before he set the phone down. 

"You're right," he said, standing up and stretching. "Let's get you home. You've earned it."

Jungkook grabbed his bag and jacket from the chair, feeling a mix of excitement and exhaustion. As they walked out of the studio, the cool night air was a welcome change from the stale air-conditioning. 

The city outside was alive with the hum of traffic and distant laughter. 

"You know," Jungkook began, "I never thought I'd find a producer who understands me so well."

Mr. Kim chuckled, his eyes never leaving the descending numbers. "You've got a unique style, kid," he said. "It's been a hell of a ride working with you."

"Same to you," Jungkook said, his smile mirroring the producer's. "Couldn't have done it without you."

"Hold on a sec," he said, turning to Jungkook with a sudden seriousness. 

"You ever think about what comes next?"

Jungkook cocked his head, a bit confused by the shift in tone. 

"Next?" he echoed.

Mr. Kim nodded, his eyes searching Jungkook's. 

"Yeah. You're on top of the world right now, but there's more to life than just music, you know?"

Jungkook took a moment to digest the question, his thoughts drifting to the moment he'd shared with Y/N during her visit. 

"Sure," he said, his voice a little softer than before. "But music is what I know. It's who I am."

Mr. Kim clapped him on the back. 

"I know, I know," he said. "But don't let it consume you. There's more to life than what's in there," he said, gesturing to the studio.

Jungkook nodded, understanding his mentor's concern. He knew all too well the pressures of the industry and the toll it could take on one's personal life. 

"I'll keep that in mind," he said, his voice earnest.

Jungkook couldn't shake the feeling of unease that had settled in his chest. Mr. Kim's words echoed in his mind, prompting him to consider the future beyond the glitz and glamour of the music world.

"You've got a big heart, Jungkook," Mr. Kim said, his voice gentle. 

"Don't let the industry change that."

Jungkook nodded, feeling the weight of Mr. Kim's words. He knew the path ahead was fraught with challenges, but he was determined to stay true to himself. 

"I won't," he promised, his voice firm.

Mr. Kim nodded back, his eyes reflecting a silent understanding. 

They walked towards Mr. Kim's car, the rhythm of their footsteps syncing with the distant sound of the city's heartbeat. Jungkook broke the silence once again, "You know, I haven't been home in a while," he said, his voice tinged with a hint of nostalgia.

"Yeah?" The producer's tone was curious. "I think it's time," Jungkook said, looking up at the neon lights of the city. "It's been too long since I saw my family." Mr. Kim's gaze followed Jungkook's, understanding the unspoken longing in his voice. "They'd love to see you, I'm sure," he said.

Jungkook nodded, a wistful smile playing on his lips. "Yeah," he said. "But it's more than that. I miss the simplicity of it all. The quiet mornings, the smell of mom's cooking."

Mr. Kim chuckled. "Sounds like you're due for a visit," he said, unlocking the car door. 

Jungkook slid into the passenger seat, his eyes lingering on the cityscape as the Mr. Kim started the engine. 

"I hope so," he said, his voice a mix of excitement and apprehension. "It's weird, you know? Being famous and all, but still feeling like the kid who used to run around the neighbourhood."

Mr. Kim nodded as he pulled into the flow of traffic. "You're still that kid, Jungkook," he said. "Don't let the lights and cameras fool you. They're just a part of the show."

Jungkook leaned his head against the cool window, watching the city lights blur into streaks as they drove through the night. His heart felt a tug of longing for the simple life he'd left behind.

The producer's words resonated deeply within him, reminding him of his roots and the importance of staying grounded.

As they pulled up to Jungkook's apartment complex, the stark contrast between the bustling streets and the quiet residential area was palpable. 

Mr. Kim put the car in park and turned to him, his expression a blend of pride and concern. "Take some time, Jungkook," he said, his voice carrying the weight of a man who had seen too much of the world. "Go home, recharge, and remember what's truly important."

Jungkook nodded, his eyes reflecting the neon glow of the city. "I will," he said, his voice filled with a newfound resolve.

Meanwhile, in the bustling law firm across town, Y/N was deep in thought, her eyes scanning through a mountain of case files that threatened to topple over at any moment. 

Her office was a beacon of order amidst the chaos of the open-plan workspace, her desk a bastion of neatness in a sea of clutter. 

Her concentration was shattered by the abrupt ring of the office phone. She picked it up, her heart racing from the sudden noise. 

"Yes?" she barked into the receiver, expecting yet another urgent demand from a colleague.

"Y/N, the senior partner wants to see you in the conference room," the voice on the other end said. "Now."

Her heart skipped a beat. This was unexpected. She'd been burning the midnight oil for weeks, but she hadn't anticipated a meeting at this hour. 

Y/N quickly gathered her thoughts and her files, straightening her blazer and taking a deep breath before heading down the hallway. The sound of her heels clicked against the marble floor, each step echoing through the late-night emptiness of the law firm. 

She could feel the weight of anticipation growing heavier with every stride.

The conference room was a stark contrast to her cluttered office. It was sleek and modern, with floor-to-ceiling windows that revealed the sprawling cityscape outside. 

The senior partner, a sharp-featured man with a reputation for his no-nonsense approach, sat at the head of the table, his expression inscrutable. Y/N took a seat opposite him, her palms damp with nerves.

"You've been working hard," he began, his voice cutting through the tension like a knife. "Very hard."Y/N nodded, her eyes never leaving his. 

"Thank you, sir," she said, her voice steady despite her racing thoughts.

The senior partner leaned forward, his gaze intense. "We've noticed your dedication, and we have a case that requires that level of commitment."

Y/N's eyes widened. This was the moment she'd been waiting for. A chance to prove herself, to show that she was more than just the daughter of a legendary music producer. 

"What is it?" she asked, her voice betraying the excitement she felt.

The senior partner slid a thick file across the gleaming mahogany table. "We're taking on a high-profile case," he said.

Y/N's heart raced as she reached for the file, her fingertips brushing against the cool metal of the folder. It was the kind of case that could make or break a career. 

The kind that had the potential to change lives. She felt the weight of it in her hands, the pages thick with legal jargon and the stories of those in need of her help.

The senior partner began to lay out the details, his voice measured and precise. 

"It's a murder trial," he said. "The defendant is a man named Lyle Castellanos. He's been in the system before, but this is his first degree charge. If we win, we could set a precedent."

Y/N's eyes scanned the file, her heart racing. A murder trial. This was bigger than she had ever imagined. The gravity of the situation settled heavily on her shoulders, but she felt a strange sense of excitement. This was it, her chance to make a real difference.

"You'll need to leave for Busan tomorrow," the senior partner said, his tone no longer one of praise but of urgency. "The case is complex, and we need you to be fully prepared."

Y/N's eyes snapped up from the file. 

"Busan?" she repeated, surprise colouring her voice. The city was a world away from the bustling streets of Seoul, where the law firm was situated.

The senior partner nodded, his expression unyielding. "The case is there," he said. "We've got witnesses to interview, evidence to review. It's a fresh start for you, Y/N. A chance to show us what you're made of."

Y/N took a deep breath, her heart hammering in her chest. 

"I won't disappoint you, sir," she said, her voice firm.

The senior partner's eyes narrowed. "I'm not looking for perfection, Y/N," he said. "I'm looking for someone who won't back down from a challenge."

Y/N met his gaze without flinching. "Then you've come to the right person," she said, her voice steady. 

"I'll take the case."

[wickedwitchofthegalaxy]

Last Hope

Pairing: AnakinXFem!Reader

Warnings~ NSFW, Dark Theme, Psychological manipulation, Power dynamics, BDSM themes, Angst, Canon divergence

Word count: 1.1K

Summary: Anakin Skywalker is running out of options. The Jedi Council has sent him to you. He doesn’t want your help, but you are the only one left who can keep him from falling too far. In a game of control and defiance, you’re his last hope.

Notes: Little somethin’ somethin’🤭 I’d like to write a whole BOOK about them but I’ll let y’all tell me if it’s worth it. As always, banner at the end by @cafekitsune !

~

Enjoy 🖤

~

The room was sterile. The Council sat in a circle in the center, their robes shifting like ghosts in a cavernous, cold room. The hum of the air seemed to steal all warmth, all life, from the space. Shadows clung to the corners like secrets, but their faces—detached, disassociated—were illuminated under harsh lighting. No one spoke at first, as if the weight of the decision had already crushed the life out of them. And it had.

"Anakin Skywalker," Master Windu began, his voice a low rasp, "has proven himself to be... unreliable."

A pause. The room tightened like a fist around the words.

"Unorthodox," Obi-Wan added, barely a whisper, but it carried the sting of a reprimand. "Dangerously so."

The soft buzz of the air returned, heavy with the lack of fear and disappointment.

"Slipping he is," Master Yoda's voice cracked through the silence, old as time, yet still absolute with the sting of truth. "Too close to the edge. The dark side... waits for him."

So this is why I’m here, you thought. You were part of the machinery, an unseen piece of the puzzle, but always necessary when the Jedi couldn’t keep their prodigal sons in line. The Council had her in their back pocket, only pulling her out when their precious Jedi grew too unruly.

"A test," Windu said. His eyes were sharp as they locked with yours. "The same as before. Anakin Skywalker will need... guidance. From you. Like you once did for Obi-Wan. It’s already been decided, there is nothing more to say at this point."

Your eyes flicked over the Council. All of them—distant, cold. One by one, their eyes turned away. The truth wasn’t theirs anymore.

"Then consider it done," you replied, your voice soft yet stark. "He’ll come. They always do. We both know what happens when a Jedi doesn't follow the rules."

The room fell silent again.

Your role was set. His punishment had been decided.

~~~~~~

Anakin wasn’t used to being told what to do, in battle or in life. And certainly not by someone like her.

Her eyes didn't twinkle with the promise of submission. No. They were cold, calculating, like an executioner who knew his work was necessary but hated it all the same. She stood there, calm as death itself, under the dim lights of her ‘sanctum’- as she called it.

He walked in without permission, not bothering to wait for an invitation. His boots hit the ground hard, the thud echoing in the room. "So," he sneered, crossing his arms. His presence seemed to fill the room, every crack and cranny filling with his superiority. "This is what the Council thinks will solve my problems? Not a Jedi. Not a Master. Just… you.” He spat the words out like it was bitter. Like it tasted wrong in his mouth.

You had seen men like him before—heroes in their own minds, lost causes in the making. It didn’t phase you anymore—not that it did much to begin with, but even less nowadays.

“You think too much of yourself,” you reply, voice flat. “You think too much in general, and that makes you, Skywalker, a problem.”

His nostrils flared, a fire sparking bright in his eyes. “I don’t need you to fix me. I don’t need fixing. You think you can control me?" he said, his voice low and challenging, as his shoulders tense.

You smiled, but it wasn’t kind and your gaze never wavered. You tilt your head, the faintest smile curling at the edges of your lips. "Control is an illusion," you say softly. "But understanding... that’s something else entirely. Tell me, Skywalker. How much are you willing to sacrifice to maintain your power?”

His lips parted, and for a second, you saw it—the anger, the desperation. And just underneath it, that flicker of fear he was too afraid to confront.

Got him.

“You’ll come to me willingly, in the end,” you say, voice a whisper of a promise. You stepped forward, slow and deliberately, meeting his broad stance. “Not for the Council, and not because you’re broken. But because you need someone who’s stronger than you. Someone who knows your limits better than you do.”

He laughed, that hollow, bitter sound, as he shifted his weight. “I’ve fought wars, faced enemies most would run from. I’ve been trained by the best. No one knows my limits better than I do.”

“No one,” she agreed, “is willing to push you the way I will. So… shall we begin?”

~~~~~~

The door to her ‘sanctum’ slid open with a whisper of metal, and Anakin stomped inside, his boots hitting the floor with deliberate thuds. The air was thick with tension, heavier now—like a storm that had been brewing. He was here again, whether he wanted to be or not.

This time, he came with a plan. He wouldn’t be anyone’s puppet. Not hers. Not the Council’s.

You stood in the middle of the room, your posture as poised and perfect as ever. Your sharp eyes locked on his the moment he entered. She’s wearing that outfit again, the same one as before, all black and smooth, some kind of material that water would just flow off. He thinks, before shaking his head to focus on the words he had practiced before coming in.

“I’m fine,” he establishes, his voice steady, but even to him, it sounded hollow. He stopped midway across the room, trying to stake his ground. "I don’t need you."

Your lips curved, just slightly, a smile full of disbelief. “Really?” Your voice laced with knowing, but your expression remaining calm. “Then tell me, Anakin, why does every fiber of your being scream for something more? Why do you feel so... unsettled?”

He clenched his fists, the muscles in his jaw tightening. He couldn’t look you in the eyes. Every time he tried to hold your eyes, his focus and his thoughts scattered, and he found himself lost in that damnable calm of yours.

“You’re losing yourself,” you continue, as if you had seen it all before. You stepped forward, closing the gap he had tried to place. “And that scares you. You’re losing the thing you thought you had a handle on, that piece of you that made everything make sense. But you can’t stop it. Am I getting warmer?”

The words hit him like a physical punch. His breath came faster, chest rising with every inhale as he crosses his arms over himself. You watch him closely, your gaze never leaving his face. There was no cruelty in your eyes, no mocking. Just an understanding so deep it unsettled him even more.

“Thought so,” You counter to his silence, your voice almost a whisper now, but it carried the weight of a ton. You stepped even closer to him, narrowing the space between you. Your presence is suffocating, even if you were inches smaller than him, and your closeness makes his chest tighten.

“Kneel, Skywalker.”

[teethmafia]

It sure takes effort to participate in the defense of a YouTuber who’s entire brand is fostering an echo chamber of ignorance about her very well documented history of harm, all while she scapegoats her gender and professed race to dismiss logical conversation about who she is and what she is actively continuing to do. I grew out of her content when I stopped indulging her thought terminating nonsense. My radicalizing moment was specifically hearing her lie about petty shit, that I heard her say, in her own videos, that I watched. That ounce of awareness and self respect lead me to pay proper attention to the very consistent history multiple people archived about her many transgressions. (Pun not intended but actually pretty good)

I totally don’t blame them for staying on anon to voice this kind of thought slop. I can see the sparks of critical thought at the beginning of this ask, but it really doubles down hard into just taking Lily at her word. This post probably won’t reach this asker, but I encourage them, and any other self-professed fan to pay some more critical attention to Lily. When it comes to Lorch, being an active audience member is a radicalizing force on its own. I think her model of audience control relies on fostering an audience that has already bought into the idea of her as an authority on everything she talks about, and that don’t want to be accused of being labeled a bigot by a trans woman in digital brown face.

Anybody who still watches her, and sees a new video of hers on a franchise you have little to no reference for yet, I encourage to do this reality test. Save her video for your watch later, and watch 2 or 3 videos on the franchise from a different essayist. Then come back and watch her video and how she talks about things. It’s a weird time.

Lily fan here. Ok, I agree that it's most likely that some of the accusations of her being profic are true. I mean, she doesn't even deny writing Stockholm anymore. However, I still don't see how that justifies your and other haters' attitudes towards Lily. She isn't allowed to go on with her life? Why should she be stained forever for things she did ten years ago? It isn't like she raped or sexually harassed any of you, she wrote and liked disgusting shit and that's it. And even implying that she actually still likes idk, shotacon/lolicon (based on the Alchorative esix account) isn't it better that she keeps it to herself instead of trying to justify it? Is not like she's some kind of threat to anyone for liking that shit, even though it's disgusting, and bad, it isn't the type of shit that gets you the kind of harassment she's getting. She clearly just wants to make content and be left alone, so why are you doing this, do you enjoy torturing a trans woman because she's loudmouthed and doesn't take anyone's shit?

Hi! Weird you’re here about Stockholm when my recent stuff is about Tara Callie and how we’ve proven she never went to jail and that Lily’s made multiple contradictory stories about her — leading more credence to the idea that Tara was never real and Lily just catfished multiple people and sexually harassed and manipulated them. 

But okay, let’s talk about Stockholm instead!

I don’t care that Lily wrote Stockholm. You’re right. It was a cringe fic she wrote years ago, she’s allowed to move on and change her opinion on it. 

That isn’t what happened though, is it? Lily lied about it. First she said she didn’t write it. Then she said people edited it to make it porn. Then she purposely wrote it that way to piss off bronies. Then people were getting it confused with her other fic Scars. Then people were editing her voice to forge a false confession.

She deliberately lied to her audience, misrepresented the facts, and painted her detractors as unhinged liars — all to keep from holding accountability long enough to say “yeah I regret writing that.” 

That’s not something a good person does, so yeah, I think my attitude is pretty much justified?

And again, clearly she never kept this shit to herself, because she literally catfished folks and engaged with them sexually (or attempted to) under false pretenses. Maybe when she owns up to that I’ll shut up. ✌️