#she has a dark brown with red undertones from where they dyed over the red dye from s2

[yackers]

you guys are crazy!!!!

[ayzrules-art]

a lil intro for moon-and-seraph's words into potions event this march! definitely check it out if you can; they've put so much work into making such a cute, motivating challenge for us!

WILT AND BLOOM .

GENRE・Fantasy (specifically, second world urban fantasy) WARNINGS・Body horror and plant-related body horror, mild gore, physical/emotional abuse, implied/fade-to-black sexual abuse, violence, torture, nonconsensual experimentation, abductions/kidnapping.

SUMMARY・Sworn to serve the Blooming Court and its fickle blossom-queen, Alejandro has resigned himself to an eternity ensnared in the treachery of fae lords and their patronage contracts—binding agreements drawn in blood, and in the flowers that sprout from his bones each spring. But everything changes when he rescues a girl cursed to die as a star.

First, Alejandro must accept the help of a traitor. Then, the manhunt to bring in a heart-eating Oathbreaker wreaks havoc on the centennial Ascendancy, uprooting all his attempts to save Genevieve. To make matters worse, the embers of an ancient war are flaring back to life: the Blooming Queen and her Withering half-sister have been battling for centuries, the magic of the land sickens with the pollutants of the modern age, and investigating the curse reveals a deadly truth that leads to more questions than answers.

As Genevieve grows weaker, it all comes down to Alejandro to put an end to a battle between the forces of life and death and wilt and bloom—a battle that may just be the end of the world as he knows it.

[aesthetics + court info under the cut]

COLOR PALETTE .

The Blooming Queen’s hair as it is when the story starts: a rotting, brown-sweetened gold, like a bruised persimmon, pale orange undertones mottled with the hues of overripe peach flesh.

All the reds of an autumn forest, but especially the deep, bloody reds that certain trees produce—crimson with a cool tinge to it, a violet-indigo like shadows blooming at twilight.

The dry, wilted brown of fallen leaves; the papery chestnut of dying grass; the goldenrod that adorns fields in sways and swirls until first frost.

Dusk-light that pours like honey, a sighed warmth that pools into all the places where you have gone hollow.

The depthless dark of the Withering Queen’s eyes, like earth black with everything once-bloomed and dying; the burnished gleam of the wilt-prince’s eyes, dark like his mother’s until the light hits right. Then, they’re veined in the softness of mercy.

The orange ember-brilliance of Tselvya’s flames, of Genevieve’s hair, of chrysanthemums and marigolds throwing flamboyant blooms into the slow subside of midsummer sunshine.

THE BLOOMING COURT .

Butterflies and moths and beetles have domain over this land, where the flowers are bright and the berries overripe, sweet and heady and repugnant. The Blooming Queen dotes upon them, and they grow larger than they have any right to be.

The fae sworn to the blossom-queen adorn themselves in red, red jewels and red flowers and red life, carnage bloodied down the tips of sharp teeth and talon-pointed nails. They pluck the eyeballs out of freshly slaughtered game and feast on fruit bruised to the point of bursting, and all the flowers they touch bloom big and bright and radiant, incandescent—almost frighteningly alive.

Death will always be much too slow to come, here where life rots to the very core.

THE WITHERING THRONE .

The wilt-queen rules from a throne of bones and moonflowers, and her flesh is so brittle that she appears to be no more than a dead body propped up in a borrowed imitation of life. A single touch of her finger leaves spiderwebs of pale mold behind, dozens of white moths fluttering about her shoulders and settling atop the crown of fresh roses adorning her hair. As the moon rises and falls and rises again, the moths drop all around her, and the roses lose their bright sweetness, rotting into a slow, violet-brown mass, until the Withering Queen is draped in nothing but corpses.

The wilt-queen offers her white-clad followers all manner of delicacies over the course of their midnight banquets, and she eagerly partakes in the festivities herself, her dainty corpse-mouth red with the hearts of small, dead creatures. She caresses bony fingers—spindly like the stems of wilted flowers—down the edges of dewy blossoms and trapped prey animals before she drains all the life out of them, her face going from dead-eyed translucence to pink and flushed in the space between one exhale and the next. 

Birds and insects and rodents die at the hands of the Withering Throne, laid to rest in the soil, and the Withering Queen feasts. She feasts.

[subbykboys]

the bad boy’s secret | chanyeol

↳ pairing : badboy!chanyeol x reader

Genre ➞ bad boy AU, fwb AU, college AU, smut

Warnings ➞ sub!chanyeol, dom!reader, bondage, oral (m. & f. receiving), edging, unprotected sex, riding, mild dirty talk, mild degrading, creampie, face riding, cum eating [ sorry not sorry ], reader is in denial , overuse of the word please

Word Count ➞ 8.2k

chanyeol is a bad boy with a nasty reputation. he’s sexy, mysterious, and entirely untouchable. well... to most people, that is. to you, on the other hand-- he’s something else entirely.

posted ; 6.04.20

there was an angry chill in the air. it bit at your face and hands as you strode to the campus lot where your car was parked. all around you, brightly colored leaves fell to the earth as strong gusts of wind broke them free of the branches they so weakly clung to. they blanketed the ground in shades of vibrant reds, tempting oranges, and dull, blotchy browns. 

it was actually really beautiful. you'd always been a fan of the cool undertones of fall. especially the reds. ugh, red was such a gorgeous color. practically everything you owned was red, or some varying shade of it. it was just so sexy and dangerous and— 

"(y/n)!" you were snapped from your inner thoughts by a barking voice. 

quickly, you averted your eyes from the ground and onto the face of the girl walking beside you. her name is Mina, you're pretty sure. you grimaced at her irritated expression, realizing you must have zoned out again. getting lost in your thoughts at inappropriate times was a pretty frequent occurrence for you. 

"huh?" 

she scoffed in disbelief, eyes narrowing, "where's your head at? i've been talking for a solid five minutes and i'm pretty sure you stopped listening six minutes ago."

you chuckled, scratching the back of your neck as an apologetic smile touched your lips, "sorry. i was just thinking about the leaves." 

"you're so weird." 

you didn't know why she felt comfortable saying that to you. you weren't even friends. at least, not by your standards. maybe acquaintances. maybe. 

and that was only because you happened to have the same afternoon photography class and just so happened to sit next to each other. you supposed in her pea sized brain that was enough to qualify for a friendship. but you had standards. and she was god damn rude. 

regardless, you didn't have the energy or patience to start any sort of altercation. so you shrug, head bobbing lazily in agreement. 

"i know."

that seemed to satisfy her as any remaining glimmer of annoyance was swept off her features with one last eye roll and replaced by a light grin, "whatever. hey, there's this party at my boyfriend's frat house tonight and you should totally come." 

"no thanks." was your swift, concise rejection. but of course, that was not enough to satisfy her. 

"what? why not?" her tone demanded an explanation that you really didn't feel like giving. 

sighing heavily, you kicked a pebble across the sidewalks. "parties aren't my thing." 

that was maybe half the truth. you actually did like parties. just not frat boy parties. they were like beacons for girls with low self esteem and insecure rich boys with superiority complexes. they were loud as fuck and made your head ache. not to mention they reeked. apparently, a lot of guys didn't learn in high school how to put on deodorant. your preference stood with more low key parties, with a more controlled number of attendees and some chill drinking. maybe getting a little baked if you were in that vibe. 

"you can be such a buzzkill," she groaned loudly, head rolling back as she stomped her foot childishly. you resisted the urge to roll your eyes. 

"i know." 

"do you ever just let yourself have a good time? like ever? we're in the prime of our lives for god’s sake!" and there she goes again with the 'prime of our lives' bullshit. please. maybe this was the best life would ever be for her, but you had other plans. 

"i have to finish an essay for my business class." no you didn't. 

"but it's friday! you have all weekend to finish it!" why was she trying to argue with you? you'd already said no, so why was she still trying to convince you. spoiler, you weren't about to change your mind anytime soon. 

"i prefer not to put work off until the very last minute." also a lie. 

"(y/n)," she whined, "come on, i personally think it would be pretty healthy for you not to spend another friday night pent up in that little apartment of yours—" 

all at once she was cut off by the distinct roaring of an engine. both your gazes shifted towards the road ahead of you, watching as a flashy red motorcycle came tearing down the street. an excited gasp exploded from your–barely–acquaintance's mouth while a low groan escaped yours. 

fantastic. just what you needed. your daily dose of—

"Yeolie!"

you winced as she squealed his name, waving energetically. you silent prayed he'd just keep going. but of course, he didn't. his bike came to a gradual halt in front of the sidewalk you stood on. it purred as he planted his feet securely on the cement. 

now this next part you could almost see happening in slow motion. 

he reached up with his leather glove clad hands, pulling off his sleek black helmet to reveal a pair of thick, pink lips, a sharp, defined nose, charcoal black eyes, and a head of silver locks. you could practically feel Mina swooning as he swung his head to the side, effectively flipping his hair like some kind of wannabe fetus Justin Bieber. it took less than a moment for those dark eyes to fall on the pair of you, and a slow smirk to crawl across his face. 

Mina immediately rushed up to him (all too energetically for someone who already has a boyfriend, mind you), squeaking out sweet greetings as her touchy hands found purchase on the sleeve of his leather jacket. 

what was up with him and the leather anyway? it was only on shockingly rare occasions that you witnessed him donning something other than his signature black leather outfit, decorated with silver zippers and complimented by a thick chain around his neck and a single silver earring. how much cheesier could he get? 

you'd think after high school, people would be over the whole 'bad boys are so hot' thing. 

apparently not. 

because at your uni, Park Chanyeol was hot shit. every girl and every guy wanted to get their hands on him in one way or another. he was dangerous, sexy, mysterious, hard to get. he rode a blood red motorcycle and smoked blunts behind the main building for god's sake. 

he was the definition of a cliche. but it seemed you were the only person that could see through his whole charade. 

"(y/n), don't be rude! come say hi to Yeolie!" Mina suddenly whipped around, waving you over. 

this bitch— 

the corner of your lip twitched in a subtle sneer, but, ever the pacifist, you obliged, slowly moving to stand at her side. his irritating smirk widened upon your approach, tongue swinging over the corner of his lip as his eyes dropped to do a brief once over. 

"Chanyeol," you grunted with a less than enthusiastic tone. 

"(y/n)," was his swift reply, voice as deep and smooth as ever, "wonderful seeing you again. you look as happy-go-lucky as ever." 

the sarcasm was palpable. 

"yeah well, it seems i just can't contain myself with you around," you bit back with just as much satire, lips curling dryly. 

"i'm flattered," he all but cooed, head tilting downward as his teeth latched onto his bottom lip. 

he stared boldly into your eyes, and you stared right back with just as much fire. 

"um... do you guys, like... know each other?" 

"no."

"yes."

you both responded simultaneously.

confusion plastered itself across her face, eyes jumping back and forth from your face to his. a taunting smile tugged at the corners of his lips, "we actually went to the same high school, isn't that right, (y/n)?" 

you huffed in annoyance, shoulders slumping, "yeah. we did." 

"and you never told me this because…?" 

because you weren't close in the least and you hadn't even told her when your birthday was let alone about your high school life. 

"didn't seem like important information." 

she gaped at you in disbelief, "anything regarding my Yeolie is important information!" 

was she trying to stroke his already colossal ego? if his head got any bigger, it might just explode.

Chanyeol’s grin broadened at her statement, and you silently groaned, knowing exactly what was coming before he even opened his mouth, "yeah, (y/n). anything regarding me is important information. so why didn't you tell her? trying to keep me all for yourself? how greedy of you." 

"please." you scoffed.

Mina glared at you sharply before plastering an innocent smile across her face and twirling a strand of her platinum blonde dyed hair. "ignore her, Yeolie. i was actually wondering if i'd be seeing you at Jake's party tonight?" 

"wasn't planning on it," he admitted, and Mina pouted, lips puckering, over dramatically whining in protest. suddenly, his eyes shifted to you, that stupid smirk touching his features,  "but maybe if a certain buzzkill was attending... i'd be more tempted to make an appearance." 

buzzkill? oh, you. 

"i'm not—"

"of course (y/n)'s coming! wouldn't be a party without her!" Mina rushed to cut you off, throwing an arm over your shoulder and yanking you into her side with a grip tight enough to bruise. you looked at her like she was crazy, brows furrowed, eyes wide, lip raised in a disgusted sneer. but her hold was enough to squeeze the air out of your lungs and steal away your ability to refute. 

Chanyeol’s brows jumped in surprise, an amused grin spreading across his face, "really?"

"wait, no—"

"yes! i was surprised when she agreed, too! but guess she's finally breaking out of her shell!" you were going to kick her ass if she kept cutting you off. 

"well isn't that great to hear." there was a mischievous flicker in his dark eyes, a look you knew all too well. 

"so... you'll come?" she asked hopefully.

"sure." you were annoyed at how easily he agreed. he was still smirking smugly as he began pulling his helmet back down over his head. shooting you a wink and a two fingered wave, he spoke again, "see ya tonight." 

with that final word, he was speeding off down the road, tires kicking up dust and pebbles as they spun. 

as soon as Mina's grip loosened from around you, you were ten feet away, swiftly walking in the direction of your car. "(y/n)! wait!" she cried out, running after you in her five inch heels. you didn't slow down in the least. 

"i'm not going, Mina," you said sternly, not even bothering to look back at her. 

"b–but i told Chanyeol��" 

"no." 

"please?"

"not. happening." 

⋄⋆⋄

you ended up going. 

not because you wanted to, of course. but because Mina decided it was necessary to show up at your apartment and quite literally drag you out. she was surprisingly strong for such a small person, and fiercely persistent. she'd even gone the extra mile of forcefully applying makeup to your eyelids and lips. that's not to say you didn't put up one hell of a fight. but conflict was never your strong suite, and you eventually ended up going pliant under her ministrations. 

unsurprisingly, it was just as you expected it to be. loud. stinky. and filled to the brim with horny bastards looking for a quick fuck. you'd been there for all of ten minutes and you'd already gotten your ass grabbed six times. slimy assholes think it's acceptable to touch someone without permission. all the more reason you didn't want to stick around for long. 

not to mention, Mina had ditched you the minute you walked in the door to suck faces with her fuckboy boyfriend. since then you'd been gravitating from room to room, searching for the best place to sit without being squished by a horny couple practically dry humping against you. 

luckily, you found your solace upstairs in an empty bedroom. the music was muffled the moment you shut the door, the stuffy air that smelled of sweat and marijuana also clearing out. finally, you could breathe. 

you spotted a candle and lighter on the bedside table, and quickly moved to light it. the dull, soothing glow that filled the room, splashing light across the walls made the headache that had begun to swell at your temples ease up. exhaling softly, you fell back onto the neatly made bed, body relaxing into the soft duvet. 

but of course, your moment of tranquility was short lasting. 

because before you could so much as shut your eyes, the door was opening, and a painfully familiar voice was purring, "there you are~ i've been looking all over for you, (y/n), you sly girl." 

"fucking hell," you growled under your breath, propping yourself up on your elbows to face him properly, "what do you want, Chanyeol?" 

he gently nudged the door shut behind him, before walking over to where you lay. "isn't it obvious?" he murmured, leaning forward to press his hands against the mattress on either side of your ankles. 

"spell it out for me." 

he chuckled softly, knees meeting the bedding as he began to crawl upwards, until his face was hovering over yours. even you couldn't deny how beautiful he looked up close, with those big, dark eyes, boyishly grinning lips, smooth, tan skin... 

"i," he began, nose nudging against your cheek, "want," his lips feathered over yours, "you." 

a dark chuckle rolled off your tongue as you met his hooded, lustful gaze. "you we're so greedy last time... and still... you couldn't get enough," you replied smoothly, voice deepening as your desire for him grew. 

"what can i say? i'm insatiable." 

you scoffed, the corners of your lips curling as you lifted your head slightly, leaving only the tiniest of spaces between your mouth, "i don't think you deserve it." your whisper caressed his lips all too temptingly. A chill rolled down his spine, eyes fluttering as he felt himself falter briefly. 

"maybe i don't... but i can earn it..." 

now that caught your interest. 

a smirk touched your features, "and how might you do that?" 

he bit his lip, trying his best to subdue a grin, "by doing whatever you ask of me." 

"you willing to take that risk? after that little stunt earlier? i might just decide not to go easy on you." your voice was taunting, but the challenge and threat were very real. 

"i can handle anything you give me." 

you raised a brow, amused by his naive confidence. then, in the blink of an eye, you had him underneath you, pinning his wrists to the mattress above his head. the action had been so sudden that he could only gasp in shock when his back collided with the bed. you stared down at him with dark eyes, the tip of your tongue sliding over the corner of your mouth. 

"you sure about that, big boy?" 

he inhaled deeply when your head lowered to the curve of his throat, lips just barely grazing over that sensitive spot. "most definitely." he let out breathlessly, eyes fluttering as he tilted his chin back, offering himself to you. something dark alighted in your eyes, a sinister gleam in your smirk as thoughts of how you could absolutely ruin him flooded your mind. 

"you're going to regret saying that." 

you didn’t offer him the opportunity to respond before your lips crashed down on his. he let out a muffled sound of surprise at the sudden action, but quickly relaxed beneath you, returning the kiss eagerly. 

see? you much preferred Chanyeol when he wasn’t running that big mouth of his. he was always so much more fun when he was choking on desperate moans and trembling uncontrollably under your touch. 

truth about the infamous Park Chanyeol? he was a bitch. 

in fact... he was your bitch. 

it started back in high school. when you were the chill girl who wasn't too well known by anyone outside of your friend group, and when he was the untouchable bad boy that everyone drooled over. 

to keep it to the point, you'd both attended a mutual friend's party your senior year, got wasted, and hooked up. 

but, it wasn't what you'd expected it to be. no, because you'd expect Chanyeol to be the kind of guy to pin a girl (or guy) down and dominate the fuck out of them. but the moment your voice took on an authoritative pitch, he was putty in your hands, whining and moaning and begging... it stirred something to life inside of you that you had no idea was there. 

and it was good. really good. so good, in fact, he came running back to you within the next week practically begging for more. and shit, you gave it to him. he was one of the first guys you'd dominated like that. it was empowering, controlling a guy as big as Chanyeol was. it was an addictive sensation. 

but you'd made it very clear from the beginning that it was going to be nothing more than sex. it wasn't romantic, you weren't friends, and you had no intention of getting to know him on a deeper level than his body. though, he seemed suspiciously intent on worming his way into your life one way or another. the boy was relentless. luckily, you were equally as stubborn. a match made in hell, aren’t you? what a spectacle. 

you drew away from the kiss at the feeling of his tongue prodding at your lips, a low whine following soon after. you scoffed softly at the sight of his pouting face, “so needy.” 

“you can only blame yourself.” he shot back easily, eyes already hooded and darkened with lust. excitement glimmered within them as you reached down between your bodies, fingers slowly undoing his belt. 

“is that right?” you murmured, not breaking eye contact for a single moment, a lazy smirk resting on your face. he swallowed, trembling pupils jumping noncommittally from your intense stare down to where you were making easy work of his belt buckle. 

“i— yes.” you don’t think he knew what he was saying yes to, his mind already becoming a muddled mess from the promise of what the night had in store for the two of you. his rationality had a nasty habit of hopping out the window whenever you got him in this position. 

“what are you hoping happens tonight, Chanyeol?” you asked softly, slowly pulling his belt from the first loop of his jeans. 

he swallowed thickly, head beginning to swing back and forth is slow swoops. “i– i don’t—” his voice broke off with a strangled whine as you allowed your fingertips to caress ever so gently over the ever growing tent in his pants. 

you raised a brow into a questioning arch, stifling a smirk of amusement at his already flustered state. “it’s a simple question.” 

his cheeks pinkened. “i just… want you.” it almost came out more as a question than a statement, words shy and hesitant. 

“want me to what?” you pressed. 

“to… to kiss me.” his gaze fell onto your lips, his own parting. 

“kiss you?” you repeated, tone on the verge of taunting. “asking for a lot there, aren’t you, sweetheart?” 

you were teasing him, but he didn’t seem to mind, blinking slowly as he dragged his tongue over the pink swell of his thick lower lip. “want you to touch me…” his voice lowered an octave, deep, lustful eyes looking up at you intensely. 

“where?” 

“everywhere.” he replied without missing a beat. “anywhere. just— just want your hands. or your mouth. i’ll take anything that you give me… but you already know that.” 

you really loved the sound of his voice when he got like this. it was softer than cotton and smoother than silk, rumbling so deep in his chest that you could almost mistake it for purring. it spilled off his lips like the thickest, sweetest honey, so lush and lovely, dripping with shameless desire. something about it was so soothing. and the sounds he made were even better, his guttural groans and melodic moans were nothing short of symphonies. and you were the conductor. 

chuckling, you smirked down at him. “you’re right. i do already know that.” he gasped as you suddenly yanked his belt completely free. “now be a good little bitch and grab onto the headboard.” 

he eagerly complied, capturing his lip between his teeth as he watched you bind his wrists above his head. his eyes slowly dragged over your face, drifting over the length of your neck, following the smooths swells of your chest beneath your black tank top. a low groan slid from his lips as you pressed your hips forward slightly, just barely grinding against his growing erection. his eyes snapped up at the sound of your soft laughter. 

“my eyes are up here, sweetheart.” you hummed, pulling his belt taught before looping it around one of the vertical wooden bars. 

“and beautiful eyes they are.” he grinned up at you in that boyishly charming way, shooting you a playful wink. you scoffed, hands drifting down to rest on his firm chest before one raised to grip his jaw, tilting his head upward. lowering your own head, you allowed your lips to caress teasingly over his. 

“maybe i should gag you, too. keep that pretty mouth in check,” you mused, dragging your thumb slowly over his full lips, “but unfortunately i think i enjoy the sound of your voice almost as much as you do. especially when you're moaning my name. god it’s so hot.” 

you almost growled as he took your finger into his mouth, moaning softly around it. you swooped down, swiftly replacing your finger with your lips. the kiss was deep, rough, and hungry. distracted by your weaponized tongue, he didn’t process that you were unbuttoning his jeans until they were being pushed down his thighs and your hand was gripping his arousal through his thin black boxers. 

“fuck, (y/n),” he groaned deeply into your mouth, arms gently tugging against their restraints. you dragged your lips away from his, face lowering so that you could suck your mark onto the expanse of his neck. he sighed blissfully, hot breath rushing over your ear as he subtly rolled his hips, body temperature rising steadily. you bit down on his collarbone, hands pushing up under his shirt to feel at his toned, well built torso. he was so hard, muscles rigid and protruding, so warm to the touch. 

it was rather amazing. a guy as big as Chanyeol, as strong and as confident, could easily get the upper hand over you if he wanted. he could flip you over and pin you down without so much as breaking a sweat. but he didn’t. he let you pin him down, tie him up, dominate him, mind and body. he allowed himself to submit to you, to be taken by you: slowly, quickly, roughly, gently, he didn’t care, but dammit he enjoyed every second of it. and if that didn’t give you a rush of power, then you don’t know what could. 

goosebumps rose across his honeyed skin as you pushed his shirt up to fully expose his tight body to your ravenous eyes, a chill rolling down his spine when you lowered your mouth to latch onto the smooth swell of his pectoral. he moaned quietly, back arching as you peppered kisses down his abdomen, slowly shifting lower, lower, lower… until your face was level with his bulge. 

a sound of excitement flooded past his lips, his breathing becoming rapid and deep. “really?” he asked hopefully, voice breathless and light. a slow smirk crawled across your lips and you chuckled at the way he jolted with a moan when you pressed a slow kiss to his clothed arousal. 

“really.” you hummed in confirmation. “you said you wanted my mouth, didn’t you?” 

he frantically bobbed his head. “yes. yes, god yes. please.” you almost laughed at his shameless display of desperation. he let out a deep, strained groan as you flicked your tongue over his clothed erection, head falling back. 

“ah ah, eyes on me, baby.” you scolded mildly, squeezing his thighs in warning. he lifted his head without argument, face flushed and glistening with faint perspiration, lip caught in a tight grip between his teeth, brows furrowed. 

from your viewpoint, he looked rather beautiful: arms bound above his head, exposed chest rising and falling dramatically with each deep breath, messy silver hair falling flawlessly over his hooded, lustful eyes. 

and he in turn was also quite taken by how perfect you looked between his legs: smirking lips hovering right over where he needed them most, dark, penetrating gaze making his body tremble with an unspoken need. 

your fingers slipped under the elastic of his boxers, slowly easing them down his thighs until his length sprang free. “there he is,” you murmured, tongue dragging over your lower lip as you admired him, long and thick and swollen, precum spilling over his hot, red tip. he shuddered in delight as you traced your finger over a vein. 

“(y/n)…” his usually deep voice was pleading and airy, hands curling into tight fists above his head, “please.” 

you smiled up at him innocently before delivering a teasing kitten lick to his sensitive tip. he whined softly, hips twitching as his need for you increased tenfold. 

a slightly more sadistic side of you rather enjoyed watching him squirm. perhaps it was that hidden part of you that wanted nothing more than to tease him into oblivion with insubstantial caresses and borderline torturous kisses until he was writhing helplessly and there were tears spilling from those beautiful big brown eyes. 

however, a larger part of you craved the sight of his stunning, fucked out expression. the one where his face glistened with sweat, thick pink lips swollen and red from being ruthlessly and relentlessly attacked by those pearly whites, puppy dog eyes hooded and fluttering, fighting to remain open against his mind's desire to just melt completely into the pleasure coursing like hot lava through his veins. that was the face you wanted to see more than anything. 

a broken moan flooded from his gaping mouth as you fastened your lips around his tip, the taste of his salty precum immediately lathering your tongue. he trembled as you hummed lightly around him, mouth silently forming the words ‘oh god’ as the vibrations sent sparks of pleasure shooting through his body like static shock. 

“feels good, (y/n),” he whined weakly, stomach tensing, “feels so good.” 

your response was to thrust your head down and as much of him into your mouth as possible. he cried out, hips snapping up at the feeling of your gentle sucking. you were quick to pin them back down, a warning glare darkening your gaze. 

“‘m sorry—,” he slurred, panting heavily, “i’m sorry.” he was quick to submit, fighting against the painfully strong urge to fuck himself up into your warm mouth and forcing his quivering body to go pliant beneath your ministrations. satisfied for the time being, you dragged your tongue from his base to his weeping head, tracing slow, taunting circles over his most sensitive place. 

a broken moan was all he could manage as his cock twitched tellingly, precum spilling down his throbbing length. you fixed your lips back around his tip, sucking gently. his thighs trembled at the sensation it sent shooting through his veins, a breathless ‘oh’ pulsing from his pink-bitten lips. 

“(y/n)— (y/n), if you keep doing that—” the warning was clear, but you wanted to see just how close you could bring him to his release before stealing it away last second. it was always fun to watch how hard he came down from his high when he was denied of it. it was delicious, the way he gasped and trembled, shuddering hips desperately seeking out more frictions, but never receiving it. he was so cute when he got like that. 

“you gonna come, baby?” you cooed, replacing your mouth with your hand and shifting upwards so that you could look directly into his eyes. you wanted to be able to see the look in his pretty brown eyes when you stole away his release. he whimpered, head bobbing rapidly as he caught his lower lip between his teeth. 

“please.” 

you only offered a low, contemplative hum before a wicked smirk struck your features. “not yet.” 

a sob broke from his lips as you drew away from his throbbing dick, his high stolen only moments before it could come crashing down over him. his hips bucked, desperately seeking the friction you so cruelly denied him of, but finding nothing but empty air in place of your warm touch. his muscles trembled, broken pleas spilling from his quivering lips. 

“(y-y/n), no— please,” he gasped out, arms tugging against the sturdy binds, fingers aching to touch you, grab onto you, hold you. 

you hushed him with sweet words, pressing a soothing kiss to the cut of his jaw, hands massaging the bulk of his muscular thighs and holding still his stuttering hips. 

“fuck– i hate it when you do that.” he cursed weakly, glassy eyes peering up into yours. 

“no you don’t.” you chuckled softly, brushing his damp bangs out of his face in an unexpectedly tender gesture. 

“you’re right, i don’t.” he relented easily, the corners of his lips curling subtly. 

a sudden silence fell over you, and it took you a moment to realize that he was looking at you with those eyes— the ones you knew all too well. the ones you’d told him plenty of times to drop. because those weren’t the kind of eyes you were supposed to look at a fuck buddy with. those weren’t the kind of eyes that just anybody could be on the receiving end of, most definitely not you. 

“don’t look at me like that.” you warned, hardening your expression. 

“i can’t help it.” he breathed. you felt your stomach twist. damnit. 

“then close ‘em, Park. before I decide to blindfold you, too.” 

it seemed your threat wasn’t very well received, as the smile adorning his features only expanded, the corners of his eyes crinkling endearingly. 

“that doesn’t sound too bad.” 

a dry laugh burst from your lips. “god, you’re so fucking submissive. how has nobody else untangled your little ruse, hm? acting all big and tough on the outside when all you really want is to be tied up and fucked like a horny little bitch. am i really the only one that’s got you figured out?” you hummed thoughtfully, tracing your fingers down his throat and caressing his collarbone. 

“you’re the only one, (y/n).” 

for some reason… you had a strange feeling that that sentence held more meaning than you were willing to decipher.  

“you tell all your little side fucks that?” you taunted, disguising the slight tremor in your chest with a dangerous smirk. 

he shook his head, gaze not wavering for a moment. “there’s no one else. only you.” 

fuck. you needed him to stop talking. so, you did the one thing that always did the trick: shoving your fingers down his throat. he let out a muffled sound of surprise at the unexpected intrusion, a sound that easily melted into a low moan, his tongue immediately getting to work lapping at your digits. 

“you talk too much.” you murmured, taking him off guard and eliciting a low groan from the back of his throat as you ground yourself down on his naked length. “you came to get fucked, didn’t you, sweetheart?” 

he eagerly nodded his head, hips nudging up excitedly against your own. 

“thought so.” you chuckled. 

through wide, glassy eyes, Chanyeol watched you push yourself upright, straddling his thighs. just as he was about to ask what you were doing, you grabbed the hem of your tank top and peeled it off over your head, discarding it onto the floor, your pants fast to follow. 

“fuck. you’re so beautiful.” he groaned deeply, ravenous gaze raking over your nearly naked form. you smirked at him cockily. 

“i know.” 

a surprised laugh erupted from his lips at your blunt reply, eyes glinting with something akin to admiration. “as you should.” 

smiling to yourself, you swiftly climbed back on top of him, not wasting any time before grabbing hold of his throbbing dick. he let out a breath of appreciation at the contact, biting at the inside of his cheek. every muscle in his body tightened as you teasingly traced his tip over your clothed heat, his precum slickening the thin fabric. 

“are you wet?” he asked weakly, voice so airy and strained that you almost missed it. 

grinning devilishly, you toyed with the elastic. “do you wanna find out?” 

“yes,” he all but hissed out, muscular arms straining against their secure restraints, “fuck— yes, please.” 

“mmm, you sound so hot when you're desperate to get fucked.” you groaned softly, nudging your underwear to the side in order to slip his head through your hot arousal. he shuddered at the sensation, his pupils blown wide with lust as he watched you tease not only him but yourself as well with fleeting caresses of his needy length against your burning core. 

“(y/n).” his deep voice had become little more than a breathless whimper singed with molten desire. you felt your pulse jump at the very sound of it, your own want for him swelling with every passing second. 

Chanyeol let out a broken gasp as you sunk down on him, cursing weakly as you took him in inch by inch. a low hum vibrated on your lips at the blissful stretch, hot tendrils of pleasure igniting throughout your body. 

“sometimes i forget just how good you feel inside of me.” you breathed out heavily, peering down at his already fucked out expression with a coy smirk. 

“i could never forget.” he moaned, roughly biting his lower lip. a slow, deep grind of your hips had his head of unruly silver locks tossed back into the plush pillows, an unsteady groan of your name filling the hot, heavy air surrounding you. 

“fuck, go faster.” 

he realized his mistake only when your fingers were pressing into the length of his throat, all motion ceased. “is that how you ask for things?” you asked, voice dangerously calm. 

he was quick to shake his head, eager to right his wrong. “please. please go faster.” 

“that’s better.” 

a rough sob is pulled from his flushed throat (which you’re almost certain will be raw tomorrow morning) as you fuck yourself down onto him. the pace was fast, hungry, rough. his back bowing off the mattress, hips pulsing upward, desperate to meet each thrust half way. 

“(y/n),” you almost moaned at the sight of his body rolling beneath yours, muscles flexed and trembling, toned arms straining against the tight hold of his belt, the leather biting pretty red marks into his wrists, “i wanna touch you— please let me touch you. let me feel you, baby. you know i can make you feel good.”

his begging caused a playful grin to draw itself across your face. “should i?” you murmured thoughtfully, rolling your hips in slow, controlled circles. a low, throaty moan vibrated in your chest as he thrust himself up inside of you, just barely brushing over that perfect little spot. 

“i can be so good for you. please… let me be good for you, (y/n).” 

“well when you say it like that…” you sighed, feeling any remaining resolve come crumbling down. 

excitement ignited in his dark eyes, and he watched with bated breath as you reached up, getting to work on freeing him from the binds. 

the very moment the belt fell slack, releasing his hands, they were on your skin, eager and impatient, tugging you down into a heated kiss. it was messy and rough, all biting teeth and lashing tongues. not that you minded much, it was always fun reminding him who was in charge, one way or another. 

his wandering hands eagerly explored the expanse of your body, squeezing, pressing, pulling. and you let him have his fun, let him push the limits, testing your boundaries with every curious prod and trembling caress. 

it was only when you felt his fingers pressing into the swells of your ass and begin guiding your movements that you drew the line. it took all of a few seconds for you to have his wrists pinned down on either side of his head. 

you pulled away from his lips was a disappointed sigh, tongue clicking. “still no restraint, i see? i’m disappointed. i thought you said you’d be good for me, yeolie? was that good?” he all but whimpered, his head, too muddled from pleasure to form coherent words, shaking remorsefully. “no… that was very bad. bad boy, yeolie.” 

his dick throbbed so hard inside of you that you could’ve sworn he’d almost just come. 

a scoff of both amazement and disbelief escaped your lips. “you like being called a bad boy?” 

how ironic. 

color flushed into his cheeks, embarrassment shining in his big, glassy eyes that were now refusing to meet your gaze. 

“look at me.” 

he gasped as you purposely clenched around him, thrusting your hips back until he was balls deep, successfully forcing his attention onto your face. you grabbed his chin securely between your thumb and forefinger, and lowered your head to the point where your lips were just barely brushing over his. his pupils were blown and trembling as they met yours. 

“you wanna be my bad boy, baby?” 

his jaw fell open, a thunderous moan breaking from his chest. 

“yes.” 

“say it.” you all but growled, tone leaving no room for argument. 

at this point, he was too lost in his own desire to feel any real shame. 

“i wanna be your bad boy.” 

a triumphant smirk curled onto your face, and you rewarded him with a gentle kiss to his quivering lips. “you gonna come for me, bad boy?” he was already bobbing his head frantically before you’d even fully gotten the question out. you chuckled sadistically at his unabashed desperation. “should i let you?” 

“(y/n), please— i don’t think i can— fuck.” he panted out, voice shuddering and breaking as you fucked yourself down on him at just the right pace to keep him teetering dangerously on the edge without completely throwing him over. you bit your lip, pleasure exploding like firecrackers in your veins as he thrusted into you. fuck, if he didn’t stop hitting that spot… 

his hands curled into tight fists where they were pinned to the mattress, dull nails biting smooth crescents into his palm. noticing this, you took it upon yourself to weave your fingers through his, holding his hands in an unexpectedly tender display. only because you didn’t want him to accidentally hurt himself… that was all. 

but, perhaps it was a mistake. 

because that look returned to his eyes with vengeance, his features melting into bursting admiration and unspoken emotion. this time, you ignored it, too gone in your own pleasure to spare it a second thought. that’s what you convinced yourself of, anyways. 

he was pulsing intensely against your slick walls, twitching cock threatening to erupt at any given second. you could tell he was fighting to hold himself back, the veins in his throat growing prominent from the strenuous effort. it was admirable in a way, how desperately he wanted to please you, even if it meant denying himself of the greatest pleasure of all. you’d encountered very few men with that kind of will power. so you couldn’t help but to respect it when you saw it in Chanyeol. 

“you look like you’re about to explode.” you taunted breathlessly, lips pulled into a lust hazed smirk. “it’d be cruel of me to tell you to hold it, wouldn’t it?” 

he whimpered helplessly, obviously not sure which answer would satisfy you and which would coax you into further torturing his already wrecked body. 

you offered a rasping chuckled. “you’re lucky that i’m feeling rather generous today.” 

something between a sob and a moan are thrown past his lips as you slam yourself down on him, purposefully squeezing your walls around him. he cries out your name desperately, imploringly. you know he can’t hold back anymore, no matter how hard he tries. his body was going to come whether he liked it or not. you felt in the way he throbbed and twitched inside of you, heard it in the way he groaned and sighed, saw it in the way his eyes rolled, body shuddering uncontrollably. 

“come.” 

and he fucking did. 

his body stalled, back arching off the bad, hips sputtering up in sharp, quick thrusts, the sound of skin on skin contact resonating through the room. you cooed, relishing in the way he quivered and keener beneath you, mouth gaping silently for a few moments before growling moans finally broke through, rumbling so deep in his chest you could have easily mistaken it for thunder. 

you let him fill you up, painting your walls with his release, knowing damn well your intentions once he was finished. 

“that’s it, baby…” you cooed, releasing one of his clenched fists to caress his feverish face, tracing the lower line of his plump lip, swollen and red from his relentless biting. 

“oh! look at that. you made a mess, sweetheart.” you purred, smirking wickedly as you watched his arousal drip out of you and onto his now half hard cock. he moaned at the sight, cursing under his breath. “I think it’s only right if you clean it up.” 

his eyes snapped up to meet yours, excitement immediately burning with his hazy, blown pupils. that was your boy… always eager to clean up after himself. especially if it meant he could put his tongue and lips to proper use. 

“fuck. ride my face. wanna taste you. wanna make you come.” he groaned breathlessly, freed hands reaching down to grip at your thighs, tugging at them impatiently. 

you chuckled at how eager he was, happily obliging. you climbed up, repositioning yourself to hover over his flushed face, caging his head between your thighs. his fingers pressed into your hips, pulling you down and into reach of his greedy tongue. you couldn’t help the sigh that slid from your lips at the first contact, eyes fluttering at the feeling of his tongue dragging hungrily through your come soaked folds. 

“that’s right. eat your come, baby. lick it up.” you breathed out heavily, fingers weaving through his damp silver locks. 

he moaned against you, the vibrations sending chills rolling down your spine. it was like white hot electricity in your veins when he rolled his flattened tongue cover your clit, a sharp moan erupting from your throat. 

“fuck, just like that. right there.” you panted, hips grinding down against his skilled tongue. “you’re so fucking good with your mouth, yeol.” his determination spiked at the praise, lips encircling your clit and sucking purposefully. 

pure euphoria rushed through your veins, head falling back as your grip on his hair tightened. his rapacious hands danced across your body, fingers pressing hotly into your skin, obviously not having learned his lesson the first time around. though, you weren’t too keen on correcting him. especially not with the fire his touch was igniting across your body. 

your hips stuttered as his tongue pressed inside of you, lapping at you hungrily. “tastes… so good…” he groaned brokenly against your arousal, hooded eyes devouring the sight of you falling apart above him. 

if there was one thing Park Chanyeol loved– it was being the cause of your pleasure. 

snagging your lip roughly between your teeth, you meet his searing gaze, your walls clenching around his invading tongue at the almost unbearable intensity of it. 

“you like it?” you moaned, feeling yourself begin to climb your way towards release. he nuzzled against you, nose pressing against your clit as his tongue teased your entrance. 

god… if you didn’t know any better you’d say he was trying to suffocate himself. knowing Chanyeol, he’d probably consider it the perfect way to go. perhaps you would have laughed at the thought had it not been for the molten pleasure numbing your mind and senses.

“i’m gonna come.” 

at your breathless declaration, Chanyeol is quickly replacing his tongue with two of his fingers, fucking them up into you steadily while his mouth gets to work on your clit. it feels so good… you’re numb to pretty much everything else but the feeling of him, the sight of him. 

and you find it’s just that that finally sends you tumbling over that ledge: the sight of those beautiful brown eyes, dark and eager, burning with unspoken emotion, pooling with crimson seduction. he’s breathtaking. 

you shift off of his face carefully, a hazy, satisfied smirk settling across your face. 

“what a filthy boy.” you purr softly, more so to yourself than him, delighting in the sight of his face, glistening from a mixture of both his and your own release. his lips curl upwards at the corners, sinful tongue peeking out to drag over them and savor the lingering taste of you, a low hum of appreciation rumbling deep in his chest.  

his hands don’t leave your hips as you carefully lift yourself off of him, offering some much needed support for your still shaky legs. you flop down on the mattress beside him with a soft ‘oof’ and shut your eyes, taking a moment to catch your breath and gather your scattered wits. a few moments of silence pass, before your brow twitched in irritation. 

“stop staring before i smack you.” even with your eyes closed, you can feel the heat of his gaze on the side of your face. 

he chuckled unabashedly, not all too torn up about being caught. “sorry. i can’t help myself,” he paused, “you’re just so beautiful like this.” 

sighing, you roll your head to the side, eyes fluttering open to meet his. “what’d i say about calling me beautiful?”  

he pouts, looking like a scolded puppy. “not to say it after sex.” 

“that’s right.”

“but it’s the truth!” 

“Chanyeol.” you groan, throwing an arm over your face. 

he huffs in annoyance rolling onto his side and propping his head up on his palm. “what’s so wrong with me saying that you're beautiful?” 

“you know exactly what’s wrong with it.” you grumble, shooting him a pointed glare, one he is quick to return. rolling your eyes, you turn away from him. “i’m too fucked out to try and argue with you right now so can you just drop it?”  

one of his arms snakes over your waist, and you inhaled sharply in surprise as he tugged you into his chest. 

“Chanyeol—”

he was quick to disregard your warning tone, nuzzling his face into your neck. “i like to cuddle.” 

“you know—” you began, scowling as he cut you off a second time. 

“i know what we agreed to but come on… a few minutes won’t kill you.” he grumbled, low voice raspy with exhaustion. 

the slight tightening of his hold around you told you that he had no intention of letting go any time soon. your features twisted into a scowl, eyes staring blankly up at the ceiling. 

but your resolve to remain unphased wavered. 

because, for a moment, you let yourself feel the warmth of his body against yours, allowing yourself to melt into it. it was a strange sensation, the comfort it brought you… the security. perhaps it was the aftermath of your orgasm. or maybe the exhaustion from a stressful week. or maybe something else entirely… regardless, you found yourself relaxing into him, into his hold, into his warmth. it wasn’t something you could really control. and even if you could, you weren’t sure if you would do anything different. 

minutes passed. maybe two. maybe five. maybe twenty. you weren’t really sure. you could hear the muffled music still pumping through the speakers somewhere downstairs. dull footsteps and low voices passing outside the door every now and again. the soft glow from the still candle flickered soothingly over the pale walls. 

a strange sense of calm had settled over you at some point. you weren’t sure quite when. all you knew was that if you listened hard enough, you could almost hear the steady beating of Chanyeol’s heart. his breathing had become slow and heavy, warming the side of your face with every exhale. 

“are you…” you swallowed, throat unexpectedly dry, “are you asleep?” 

you were met with silence. 

sucking your lips into your mouth, you slowly turned your head. your heart faltered in your chest. “geez.” you muttered softly, a faint smile touching your lips. 

he was knocked out cold, cheek smooshed up against the pillow, lips parted and puckered out, hair cast across the white pillowcase, a few locks stuck on his eyelashes. you lifted your hand carefully, gently brushing the silver strands out of his face. your fingers lingered on his skin, caressing ever so lightly over his cheek and jaw. 

“beautiful.” 

it took you a moment to realize that that word had just come from your lips. you jerked away like you’d been stung, eyes wide, and heart suddenly racing. 

shit. 

you were so fucked.

[misteria247]

Forgotten

Chapter Five

If looks could kill then Casey had a sneaking suspicion that he'd be dead where he currently sat. The vigilante suppressed a shiver as he felt the dark blue eyed gaze bore into him like an ant under a magnifying glass. Sitting across from him tied up by zip ties was the once believed dead Leonardo Hamato, the turtle glaring at him. From the moment him and April had brought him back to her apartment and he'd woken up, Leo had been glaring nonstop at the man. His gaze held nothing but distrust as he kept his gaze on Casey at all times. It was unnerving to have someone who was a friend look at him like that, to have him look at him like he was an enemy. Casey couldn't help but flick his eyes towards Leo, only to regret it instantly. Leo's stare held no friendly affection, no recognition, only barely concealed anger.

Casey had only seen this look a few times before. It was a look of someone who wouldn't hesitate to try and possibly hurt him if given half the chance to. It was a look that was often times directed at Leonardo's enemies, the look of a furious warrior who would show no mercy. Casey swallowed hard trying not to lose his cool. It made his stomach sink at seeing this nasty look being directed at him. Leo the kind and wise eldest son of his best friend was looking at him like he was a threat and it made him feel ill especially when he recalled what April had told him earlier in the van.

'Casey when he attacked me it.....it was like he didn't know who I was.....almost like he....he doesn't remember who we are....'

The man bit the inside of his cheek and clenched his fists in frustration. Now he understood what she'd been talking about. Casey had to bite back a frustrated groan as the gravity of the situation hit him. If Leo didn't know who they were then it'd make things difficult, especially if he didn't know who his family was.

'Oh god if that's the case.....Raph and the others are going to be crushed.'

Casey thought somewhat bitterly. After finally finding their friend they'd still in a way possibly lost him. The vigilante was taken out of his thoughts by April's shout.

"Wait Master Splinter I need to tell you-"

April stopped mid sentence before letting out a loud noise. Casey gave Leo a look over to make sure he wouldn't move from his position, which was met with an even nastier stare from said turtle before he made his way towards the kitchen where April was. Poking his head through the doorway he took in the roughed up look of April who was clutching her phone staring at it in a conflicted way.

"Ape....?"

Casey called out to her making her look up at him.

"I told him. He was.....shaken to put it bluntly. But I wasn't able to tell him about the uh....situation. Master Splinter hung up on me saying that he'd be here soon."

April mumbled running a hand through her hair. Casey bit back a swear realizing just how bad this was. With Leo being all murderous distrustful ninja mode, the meeting with his father and brothers could end very, very badly.

"What are we gonna do red?"

Casey asked keeping his voice low as to not get their guest even more riled up. April gave a small look, eyes conflicted before she answered him.

"We'll just....have to hope for the best and hope that things don't go straight to hell."

She responded her eyes flickering towards the living room where Leo was held in custody. She could barely make out the turtle from where she was sitting but she could see enough to notice that he was as strung up as a rubber band just waiting to snap at the tiniest amount of pressure.

'Please don't let this end badly.....'

~~~~~

'Leonardo's alive.'

The sentence rang through his head like a record, refusing to stop. Splinter stared at the phone that he'd just hung up, gripping his counter to keep himself from falling over from the shock and various other emotions that slammed into him. His son....was alive. After four years of grief and suffering Splinter was given a miracle. The old rat couldn't stop the sudden tears of joy from spilling over and he let out a choked sob. Leonardo was alive, his son was okay. Another choked noise came from him as he tried to get himself under control. It was surreal for him.

"Master Splinter....?"

A voice spoke up from the entryway of the kitchen. Splinter jumped at the voice being caught off guard for the first time in a long time. Turning towards the doorway his dark eyes met the twin hues of baby blue that belonged to his youngest son, Michelangelo. The turtle stiffened his eyes widened in concern as he saw the tears that stained his father's face.

"Dad-! What's wrong?"

Mikey said panicking as he made his way to him quickly looking the old rat over for any possible injuries. Splinter couldn't help but smile a watery smile at his son's concern and placed a hand on his cheek.

"I am okay my son. In fact I'm better than okay. I have been told the most wonderful news my son."

Splinter said in a somewhat choked tone. Mikey's eyes filled with confusion and he tilted his head a bit like a puppy.

"News? What kind of news Master Splinter?"

The turtle teen asked curious and somewhat cautious. The old master felt his heart twist at the cautious undertone in his child's voice. There was once a time when Mikey would only have curiousity in his voice, but when the tragedy happened his son had become more cautious with receiving news.

'Hopefully it'll be better once we bring him back home.'

Splinter thought warily before smiling at him.

"Go get your brothers and met me in the living room. This is something that they need to know as well."

Splinter answered vaguely, not wanting to say anything till all of his family was in the same room. Mikey gave him a small concerned look before nodding silently and going to do what his father had told him. Splinter watched his son leave the kitchen, letting out a sigh as he mentally prepared himself for the conversation that was to come. Leaving the kitchen as well he made his way towards the living room to wait for his family to be gathered.

~~~~~

Mikey woke up his brothers, his nerves on edge as he led them to the living room trying to ignore their questioning gazes. The youngest son had no idea what was going on but he couldn't help but feel uneasy. Something was going to change, big time. Something that would shake his family up all over again.

'I can't do this again. I can't do another strike.'

His heart cried out. While his father had said it was good news it still didn't help him feel at ease. He always felt like that these days, ever since the death of his older brother.

'Leo.....'

Mikey swallowed the sudden lump in his throat as he thought of Leo. Never in any circumstances did he dare to imagine not having any of his brothers in his life. They were his family, his role models and his protectors. Mikey loved his older brothers more than anything in this world and when he'd lost Leo it was as if someone had come and cut his heart out of his chest. It still haunted him even after four years.

Raphael coming home bloody and bruised.

The two broken swords that were lain in front of Master Splinter's feet.

The broken sobs that his older brother let loose and the sentence that ruined everything.

'He's gone....The Shredder he.....he killed him.....'

At that moment his worst fears had come to life in the most horrifying way possible. He could still hear the broken wails of Donnie, could still see the absolute devastation on his father's face as he broke, could still feel the sudden agonizing pain that overwhelmed him as he joined Donnie's sobbing. Mikey shook his head not wanting to burst into tears again over the memories that would forever haunt him. He needed to keep it together, especially for his family. He needed to be strong like Leo had been before he was cruelly ripped away from them. The turtle took a shaky breath, and nearly jumped when he felt a hand on his shell.

"You okay Mikey?"

Donnie asked softly, his reddish brown eyes knowing. The teen swallowed the sob that wanted to come out and gave Donnie a small smile.

"I'm good Donnie. Just wondering what the news is about."

Mikey answered, earning a huff like noise from Raph.

"Maybe that bastard finally got what was coming to him."

Raphael growled lowly making Michelangelo and Donatello look at him, their own expressions mirroring his. The two knew exactly what their older brother was referring to.

The Shredder.

"If that's it I'd throw a celebration party."

Mikey said simply though the barely concealed anger was heard in his voice. Donnie nodded stiffly, his mouth formed into a tight grimace. The three brothers all felt the ungodly hatred for their worst enemy, as soon as he had taken Leo away from them the trio had let their anger fester somewhat, especially Raph who was dying to get a crack at The Shredder.

"I'll help you decorate."

Raph said with a somewhat smirk. Donnie huffed slightly in somewhat exasperation while Mikey shot him a somewhat smile.

"Awesome dude."

He said. The trio found themselves in the living room shortly after, the sight of their master standing in front of the couch and recliner greeting them. The ninja master gestured towards the seats and the boys quickly sat down before waiting for their father to speak.

"I received a call tonight from April."

Splinter said eyes gazing at them. The brothers stiffened slightly surprised. Splinter continued.

"She has found something. Something important to us. She and Casey found him. They found Leonardo. He's alive my sons."

Splinter said simply, his tone soft. The room fell into a stunned silence, three pairs of eyes burning into their master with disbelief. It didn't last long however when Raph broke it, his voice booming somewhat.

"Leo....! He's alive?!? Then where the hell has he been????"

Raphael shouted his green eyes wide and filled to the brim with conflicting emotions. Donatello sat back in his seat, his eyes wide and frozen in shock as he tried to process this. Michelangelo on the other hand felt his eyes sting as he was overcome with emotion. Splinter gave Raph a small unreadable look.

"I do not know where he has been Raphael. I am hoping that he will explain to us when we go to see him."

Splinter answered soothing Raph's anger for the time being.

"We're....we're gonna go see him? Right now....?"

Mikey asked his voice thick and small. Splinter gave the youngest a smile his eyes alight with warmth.

"Yes we are my son."

He said softly. That was all that was needed before the three boys were out of their seats and going to grab their things.

"I've got to go get my medical kit, Leo's probably got some injuries knowing him."

Donatello rambled under his breath already rushing towards his lab to grab his things. Raphael and Michelangelo were also going towards their own destinations.

"When I see him I'm gonna sock him so hard, that absolute bastard-"

Raphael growled though it was clear to see that he was beaming with unbridled joy as he went to go get the shell raiser warmed up.

"I'm gonna have to make him his favorite dish as a welcome home surprise when we get him home!"

Michelangelo chirped sounding much like he used to be. Splinter smiled warmly as he watched his sons do their thing, feeling his chest well up with hope and happiness.

'Soon he'll be home. Just wait a little longer my son.'

~~~~~

He had no idea how long he'd been sitting there, tied up and being watched constantly by the two humans who had captured him. All he knew was that his wrists and head hurt and that he was scared and angry. He was angry at his thoughtless decision when he'd jumped them from the trees to protect his semi permanent home, he was angry that his mission to be undiscovered had backfired so horribly, he was angry that he was in this mess because of those strangers in his old home that forced him to run. But the thing that made him the angriest was the woman who made him hesitant for that split second. The way she had looked at him, like she couldn't believe what she was seeing, like she felt scared and betrayed by him. It had messed with him badly, making him pause for that precious moment. Not to mention the name that she had called him, the name that had been haunting him since that night when his world went to hell.

Leo.

She'd called him Leo.

The same name that those people who raided his old home had been searching for. It confused him and put him on edge, that he was being mistaken for this Leo person. He had no name, he was just a turtle who lived in the forest before he was forced to flee. He could hear the two humans whispering in the one room voices soft and frantic.

"So how are we gonna explain this April? Master Splinter and the guys are gonna be here soon and he's still looking at us like he wants to gut us!"

The masculine voice, Casey whispered harshly making him narrow his eyes even more in that direction. This human was really pushing his luck with him, after hitting him with that baseball bat and then tying him up like a pig to the slaughter.

"I don't know Casey, I'm hoping that maybe if he sees them....."

The feminine voice, April trailed off quietly.

"That it might jog something?"

Casey finished for her.

"Yeah."

April said softly. He bit back the urge to sigh as he leaned his head on the couch, trying to figure a way out of his predicament. He needed to get out of his bounds so he could escape. He didn't know what these humans wanted nor who this Master Splinter was but he wasn't going to stick around to find out.

'I've gotta get out of here, fast.'

He hissed as he struggled somewhat. He wished he still had his knife but that Casey guy took it from him. The turtle teen continued to struggle with the zip ties, becoming a bit more panicked when they wouldn't budge. He was going to be sold or killed or experimented on at this rate. He hissed as he felt the plastic cut into his wrists and he couldn't help but curse.

'This is it, I'm going to die aren't I?'

The thought made his stomach sink in horror as he realized that he couldn't get out. He felt the fear build up inside him as he tried not to hyperventilate. He should have stayed in his shack, he should have stayed in his forest. Coming to the city had been a terrible mistake and now he was paying the price for it. He was so lost in his turmoil he didn't realize that the front door had opened up and a voice rough and accented filled the air.

"Where is he??"

The voice nearly barked making him flinch in slight panic.

"Nice to see you too Raph. We'll show you in a moment but me and April gotta tell you something-"

Casey's voice answered the one before another voice called out, this one childish and desperate.

"Where's Leo??? You said he'd be here???? Why hasn't he come to greet us???"

The voice questioned before the sound of footsteps could be heard storming into the apartment.

"Mikey wait-!!"

April's voice called out somewhat rushed as the footsteps drew closer to the living room followed by several others. He stiffened, desperately wanting to disappear. He was going to die and there was nothing he could do about it. The turtle teen bit his lip hard the taste of copper filling his mouth as he braced himself for the inevitable humans. Instead what he got left him winded. The footsteps stopped in the doorway of the living room before a small gasp was heard. He looked up at the noise and felt the breath leave his lungs. Standing by the doorway was another turtle.

Just like him.

The turtle was frozen in the doorway, his baby blue eyes wide and stunned. Unshed tears were gathered in the corners of them and he wore a bright orange cloth around his eyes. Light green skin covered in freckles and twin weapons hung from his hips.

'Nunchucks.'

His brain supplied making him pause for a moment before the turtle in front of him was joined by others. His dark blue eyes went wide as two other turtles and a giant rat filled the room, their stares the same as the orange turtle. April and Casey were the last ones to join them. He sat there unable to process everything.

There was more of him.

He wasn't the only one.

"L-Leo....?"

He was snapped out of his thoughts by the orange turtle, who looked at him with a somewhat confused and broken look. A sudden swear made him snap his head away from him towards the other turtle.

"What the shell happened to him?!? Casey did you do this to him???"

The accented voice came out of the other turtle. This one was dark green in his skin, and had bright green eyes filled with confusion and anger. A red cloth was around his eyes and he too had weapons on his hips.

'Sais.'

His brain again supplied for him.

"Oh God Leo....! He's bleeding what the hell happened?!?"

The last turtle finally spoke up, his voice smooth yet high strung with barely concealed horror and anger. The last turtle had light green skin and was somewhat taller than the other two. He had reddish brown eyes and a purple cloth that surrounded them. His weapon however was on his back.

'Bo Staff.'

He felt himself getting annoyed with his brain supplying him with this knowledge that he didn't know before another voice this one soft and soothing spoke out.

"My son....what happened to you, who did this to you?"

He looked to the last figure in the room. The rat was older than the turtles and wore a dark colored rob and held a staff in his hand that he somewhat leaned on. His fur was a mixture of browns, whites and blacks and his eyes, a dark brown were looking at him with such a tender look that it made him flinch. The orange turtle moved towards him, a hand reaching out for him somewhat hesitantly.

"Bro.....?"

He asked softly his voice wavering as he went to touch him. The captive turtle looked at the group of unfamiliar faces, his eyes that were once full of panic narrowing into a threatening look when he noticed the orange one trying to touch him. A sudden silence filled the room as the air grew thick with sudden tension.

"I don't know who this Leo is but if you touch me so help me I will end you."

He spat out coldly, his eyes hard and indifferent. The orange turtle flinched harshly like he'd just been slapped. The other two turtles and the old rat froze, their expressions stunned for a moment. He continued to glare in a nasty manner refusing to show how afraid he truly was. April bit her lip and Casey swore. The swear caught the red turtle's attention, the once stunned expression turning into barely contained anger.

"You'd better start explaining Jones."

He snarled his green hues poisonous. Casey looked at the faces that were now staring at him and April before letting out a small exhausted sigh.

"Ya may want to sit down for this one Raph, cause it's a long story."

*Well then things took a rather upsetting turn didn't they? (I'm so sorry Mikey I didn't mean to hurt you baby boy-). Anyways we've finally gotten the fam reunited but it's unfortunately far from the happy reunion they were picturing sgdgdhfh. And our poor boy Leo is lowkey freaking out. Now for this story I want to make clear that it's not really set in a main universe. It's basically a little bit of all the Tmnt franchises I've seen. So while the boys have their 2012 versions looks they also have some of their other versions personalities like from 2003 to 1990 to 2018. Ya get the point, it's basically freeform and up to the reader to decide which one they wanna go with. I'm sorry I wasn't go at explaining that in the last chapter it was late when I'd posted it and I was tired lol. Anyways if any y'all read this I hope you enjoyed it!!!*

[apprentice-liuyin]

Liuyin Mei

“Uneasy are souls that awaken in smoke”

General information

Known as

Sima Liuyin: Birth name

Leonie Mei: Alias

Occupation

Shop Keeper

Magician

Spirit medium

Medical apprentice

Favorites

Favorite meal: Lamb skewers

Favorite drink: Chrysanthemum tea

Favorite flower: Tea rose

Personality traits

Birthday: January 23rd

Age: 26

Zodiac sign: Aquarius

MBTI: ISFJ-T

Pronouns: They/them only

Main(s): Asra (primarily), occasionally Julian as well

Patron Arcana: Death, Page of Pentacles

Relatives

Note that their family back in Langya would still utilize the traditional naming format of <surname, given name>, unless they have specific titles.

Liya Zheng: Paternal aunt, their father’s elder sister who left Langya and settled in Vesuvia. Liuyin inherited her magic shop.

Lieutenant Zheng: Father, subordinate to General Sima. A harsh and temperamental man, from whom Liuyin became estranged.

Sima Yu: Mother, daughter of General Sima. A healer and free spirit who became fettered by the expectations of family.

Sima Xiaoping: Younger brother, five years Liuyin’s junior, born when Liuyin was still living with their grandparents.

Sima Qianren: Younger brother, eight years Liuyin’s junior, born when Liuyin was still living with their grandparents.

General Sima: Maternal grandfather and patriarch of the Sima family.

Madam Sima: Maternal grandmother, wife to General Sima, owned a teashop in her youth.

Zheng Xuan: Paternal grandfather and guardian, a countryside farmer with an affinity for magic, though no abilities of his own.

Sarnai: Paternal grandmother and guardian, wife of Zheng Xuan, a Kokhuri-descended magician who was Liuyin’s first teacher.v

Physical description

Gender: Nonbinary

Height: 5′6′’

Eye color: Plum-purple

Hair color: Black-brown with orange and red undertones

Appearance

Liuyin is a youth with a compact frame, plum-colored eyes, a long and pointed nose, and dark hair that shines copper in sunlight. Their bearing is collected and serene, with a slight smile to their lips. Their customary outfit consists of an inner blouse that resembles an ao, or Chinese upright-collared blouse popularized in the Ming Dynasty that was usually worn outside the tucking of a skirt, as well as an outer cross-collared robe, and any other clothing they may wear would come in shades of blue, grey, and white. They often wear clothing with butterfly motifs on it, as a silver butterfly was their familiar before their death. Their hair is usually left half-up in buns decorated with butterfly pins, and half-down, with sideswept bangs and locks of hair looped over their ears before being pulled back into a bun.

Personality

Liuyin is a person who is serene and demure on their exterior, almost to the point of seeming withdrawn, aloof, or distant from others. However, they bear a naturally warm aura, with a high-spirited but practical-minded personality with a quick wit, being able to banter easily. They have a sincere and well-meaning heart, as well as loyalty to those they care for, to the point they may act recklessly, going against their usual analytical approaches wherein they slice every action down to its bits and pieces, to save those they love. Thus, they rarely get angry unless someone they love is at risk. They hate boredom and insincerity.

History

Family background

Liuyin Sima was a member of the House of Sima, a noble clan of the nation of Langya, a kingdom to the south of Vesuvia which was located east of the Shining Steppe and west of the Strait of Seals.

Their grandfather was General Sima, a powerful military official overseeing the command of the cavalry of the nation, as well as the current patriarch of the House of Sima.

Their mother was the daughter of General Sima and his wife, and an adept healer.

Their father was a lieutenant under General Sima who was arranged by Madam Sima to marry the general’s daughter.

Childhood

They were pretty unplanned as far as children goes-- their mother had to put their studies to become a healer on hold to carry Liuyin to term, and once they were born, they were sent to live in the countryside with Liuyin’s paternal grandparents, since there’s really no place for a baby either in the barracks or in a healer’s academy.

Their paternal grandmother, Sarnai, when she was young, was a Kokhuri shaman and magician, before marrying her husband and settling down as a farmer in the countryside. Liuyin had gained some degree of healing magic ability from their mother, and Sarnai helped hone Liuyin’s paternal magical capabilities, in communicating the restless dead as well as creating an entrance and space within the spiritual plane akin to magicians’ gates and Asra’s oasis, respectively.

Adolescence

When Liuyin was ten years old, they moved back to the General’s manor to live with their father and mother, and their two younger brothers, one of whom was already 5, and one who was 2 at the time. Due to the strict disciplinarian method of parenting their parents and maternal grandparents enforced, Liuyin, who was raised in a more casual and relaxed environments found themselves miserable and often butted heads with their parents, which was then duly punished.

They, at this point, practically lived only for summer visits to their grandparents, where their magical growth increased by leaps and bounds. When they were 16, their father forbade them from seeing their grandparents, and Liuyin had run away from home in retaliation, first stopping by their grandparents’ house, who then sent them on their way to Vesuvia, where their father’s elder sister, Liya, had opened a magic shop.

Arriving in Vesuvia

Liuyin arrived in Vesuvia on the eve of the Masquerade, where they were received by their aunt. They found Asra reading fortunes behind the shop, and they befriended him under the pseudonym of Leonie Mei-- over the course of the next half year or so, Liya had taught Liuyin all she knew about magic, after which Liya had received an offer of professorship at a prestigious academy in Zadith, leaving the shop to be tended to by Liuyin and Asra.

The Red Plague

By the time the Red Plague struck, Liuyin had shed the name of Leonie Mei and went by Liuyin Mei instead, eschewing their family name completely. When the plague broke, Liuyin and Asra had argued over whether to leave the city or stay and help-- Liuyin stayed, Asra left. Liuyin initially tried to ease the pain of the deceased’s families through her divination abilities, trying to allow the spirits to move on.

Somewhere along the line, realized that wasn’t enough and apprenticed themselves to Julian as a medic. It was there in the palace, researching for a cure, that Liuyin succumbed to the disease, dying alone, and being sent to the Lazaret, where they were eventually cremated.

The Masquerade

Broken by their death, Asra resolved to resurrect them. Meanwhile, Count Lucio, failing rapidly from their battle with the Red Plague, hosted a feast on the night of the masquerade designed to gift him a new body, a ritual that Asra sabotaged, stealing the body to resurrect Liuyin. And the rest, from that point, is history...

Powers

Smoke divination: Liuyin has the ability to use a special blend of incense smoke to induce within themselves a hallucination or dreamscape, in which they would be presented with a series of seemingly-disjointed visions, from which they had to determine a storyline or solution to their question. They can also inhale this in the presence of a corpse or scene of crime, and it would show them things that, if interpreted correctly, would show them the cause of death or how a crime was committed. They can also contact more recently-deceased spirits when inhaling this smoke, and thus can use this in a manner similar to an exorcism, laying a spirit to rest.

Potion making: Liuyin is talented at potion-making as well as cooking, as well as a hobby in

Personal gate: Liuyin’s gate to the Arcana realm, taught to them by their grandmother. Later, with Asra’s help, they rediscover and unlock their gate.

Trivia

Liuyin’s inspiration draws from both Chinese folklore as well as popular culture.

Liuyin’s initial inspiration was from Lan Caihe, a nonbinary Taoist immortal said to be patron to florists and gardeners. They traveled the kingdoms wearing a single shoe and ragged blue robes, singing improvised songs about the impermanence of youth.

Other inspirations for Liuyin come from Mei Changsu, Guo Deyou, Kuang Lu, Xiaolongnu, and Lan Wangji

Their name, Liuyin, means “shadow of the willow”. Their birth surname, Sima, means “master of the horse”, and their given surname, Mei, means “plum”.

Their favorite season is winter

Their voice is mid-tone, and a bit husky.

They speak three languages-- the common tongue of Vesuvia, the common tongue of Langya, and the common tongue of the Steppes.

Template credit: apprentice-liuyin

[until-we-fall-in-love]

Into the Hush: Chapter One

Into the Hush Masterlist

Pairings: Bucky Barnes/Reader, Wanda Maximoff/Reader undertones

Summary: It's only ever been you and the rugged wilderness; both unkempt and undomesticated. Until it isn't anymore.

(1870s Cowboy AU. A/B/O AU. Gothic/horror.)

Warnings: Violence, gore, dark themes, A/B/O dynamics, smut in later chapters.

If you are under 18, you should not be reading this!

A/N: howdy ya’ll lol don’t know how i came up with this one but it’s an A/B/O cowboy historical gothic au. it’s gonna get dark! also gonna be a real nasty slow burn lmaooo so mind the warnings, if you don’t do well with gore or violence, perhaps this isn’t the fic for you. also if you don’t like the Alpha/Beta/Omega dynamics, this isn’t for you, either, though i will be taking some liberties with this and trying to give my own take on it because there are aspects of it that i don’t like lol. im not quite sure how long this series will be, but i have plans for it. that being said, saddle up pardner lol and pls let me know what you thought of this first chapter!!!!

---

 Wyoming, 1872

The early morning air is crisp with new spring, cold and a little damp, dew glistening on the grass and glinting gold in the morning sun. Your breath still comes out in soft puffs that curl into the air as you step out onto your creaking, front porch. It overlooks the barren dirt road that leads up to your humble and charming farmhouse; weathered by time and storm and pleasantly cluttered with life and home at every turn. Off to the left is the freshly tilled ground that has been planted in; herbs and fruits and vegetables that will take over in the warm summer months. Trees have shaken the snow from them and have turned green and budding and new again. 

You wrap your shawl tighter around your shoulders, trying to gather more warmth from the worn cream, crochet wrap. You know once the sun rises higher into the afternoon, you’ll grow too warm for it, but now it’s needed. The wind curls around you, rustles your hair, lifts your skirts. It carries the promise of warmth, the reminder of winter. 

All is peaceful in the morning, before the day has broken over the hills. All that sings is the birds, lovely and bright and flitting from tree to tree. 

You lift your skirts, head over to the back porch, which wraps the entire way along your house. In the back is the barn, the pasture for the animals to graze when it’s warm. The creek towards the back, bubbling softly over the stones, crystal clear and cool. It’s perfect on a summer afternoon, but now would be too cold for you.

And you begin your day, head over to the shed where you ready the feed for the chickens, grab a basket for eggs. You enter the coop, greet the clucking hens with a coo, spreading food for them which they hurry to eagerly. As they eat, you gently reach for warm eggs in their nest, gather it into your basket and rush on to your other chores. 

Milk the cows, get them fresh water, fresh hay and in the afternoon, you’ll let them out in the pasture to warm in the sun. 

A few of them are round with calves, ready to give birth any day now. 

You tend to the single horse, only one now after your father’s male passed away last spring. The one left is yours; a dappled, brown mare you’ve affectionately called Clover. 

You’ll take her to town later, to sell extra eggs and milk, all the goods you can in exchange for bread or spices or money for the tax collector. By the time you’re finished with your chores, which is taking longer and longer as the farm extends and your father grows older and older, it’s around noon, the sun beginning to warm into pleasant rays of topaz and canary. 

Your father sits on the porch, in his old rocking chair, smoking a pipe. His knee has been bad since this past fall, has a harder and harder time helping you. Not that you mind; this farm has practically become yours, but he hates leaving you to it all alone. 

He’s been dying to set you up with an Alpha, find a good man to marry and help you with the farm. But none of the men from town pique your interest, few good Alphas in the small town of Longbrook, Wyoming. The train, not far from town, brings newcomers once and awhile, but it’s mostly quiet, tucked away in a valley, a river snaking its way through and out into the plains of wildflowers and fields. 

You know Longbrook’s secrets, the quiet, beautiful places that you run to when you have the time. Spend your evenings lazing in columbine and aster flowers, beneath old, crooked trees near quiet, turquoise lakes. Or on a bluff, looking high above the world, cool wind in your face and the fluttering of birds nearer to you than planted on the grounds below. 

You know where not to stray to, when the wilderness grows too rough and dangerous. Unrestrained in both it’s beauty and viciousness. 

So independent that you can’t quite imagine your life beside another, especially not beside an Alpha, with their combative, controlling natures. You can’t imagine a husband that wouldn’t mind you taking off, disappearing into the wilderness and returning when you fancy; like some feral cat, your father always remarks gruffly. 

He isn’t a fan of your disappearing acts, either. Alpha that he is, he’s kept careful and close watch on you since you discovered you were Omega, as irritating as it is. Controlling, but only because he means well. You manage to sate him by coming home before nightfall, when dusk is lavender and rose and the moon is only beginning to take the sun’s place. Besides, there’s not much he can do with his bad knee, can’t keep you cooped up the way he used to. 

Ever since your mother had passed, you had to step up around the farm, grow up a little too quick. Responsible and resourceful, you work hard for you and your father. But your father has grown rather overprotective, wary with the Alphas he let come around; well respected in the town, no one has dared disobey him. A few had tried; Brock Rumlow, the tax collector, was the most notable of them. Pushy and irksome, he’d tried to convince you to disobey, sway you to sneak out with him or let him come by but you always turned your nose up at him.

You have no interest in someone so aggressive, so controlling.

You aren’t one to roll over or lower your eyes submissively; many Omegas aren’t, in your opinion, but it’s expected. There’s no time for that, though, not for you. No use or desire for it. You have a farm to take care of, to keep running smoothly. You have a life to live, adventures to have, open sky to chase. 

And there’s  certainly nothing and no one that’s going to stop you. 

“Be careful goin’ into town,” Your father speaks up finally, smoke curling from his lips, voice rough and fogged, “Heard there was a few newcomers.” 

Your father is always wary of newcomers, prefers to assess them himself, rather than hear from others. 

“Yes, pa.” You respond, not particularly interested in them, nor sticking around for one of your father’s infamous lectures. You hurry on, grabbing all that you need, loading up Clover for the journey. You saddle her up, throw yourself over her with practiced ease, hitching your skirts up slightly and out of the way. 

“Be home by nightfall!” Your father hollers after you, but you’re already easing Clover onto the dirt path. 

“Of course!” You call back, just as you urge her into a faster pace, your voice carries on the wind, distant and as light as the new blossoms. 

You push her into a gallop; not because there’s a rush, but because it’s fun. Because the wind is in your hair and the sun is warm on your shoulders and Clover thunders across the ground, kicking up dirt and making a mess. 

You let a grin hitch onto the corner of your lips, lean forward, ease into the speed. The town is only a twenty minute ride, fifteen if you pushed, but you want to enjoy the ride. The landscape blurs past you in shades of olive and juniper, butter cream, robin’s egg blue. The pop of lily white, a sudden burst of dainty pink or blushing red. But it’s just you and the trees and the pounding of your heart along the beat of hooves against the solid ground. 

Free and open and bursting, you race away from home eagerly and into the wilderness.

You end up slowing Clover halfway through your journey, appreciating the spring air, new and linen clean, shadowed patterns falling over you beneath the trees. The wind tickles your cheeks, the distant sound of the river can be heard when you listen carefully, a soft rush of water. It’s soothing, like the creek by your house, the sloshing lake you visit often. You let it carry you into town, peaceful, lazily letting Clover step onto more worn dirt roads. 

Town people shout to you in greeting, wave as you pass by; you’re a familiar face to them. You give them smiles, holler back to some as you make your way to the grocers to sell your eggs and milk. You swing down from Clover, hopping easily onto your feet. 

You end up walking out of the grocer’s with some extra money and a few cans of preserved vegetables and fruits. You buy some bread at the bakery, a pastry to split with Wanda, who you’re hoping can join you for the afternoon. 

You catch sight of her outside the dress shop, peering at the finely made clothes through the window. She wears her own dress of dove grey, similar in fashion to yours rather than the ones she gazes at; your dresses are looser, easier to move and work and play in, aprons tied around your waists instead of the ruffles and frill of the dresses in the window. Her long curls cascade over her shoulders, near copper under the afternoon sun.

You call to her, watch as her features light up upon seeing you, before she picks her skirts up and bounds over to you. Her scent hits you; sweetly Omega, soft clary sage, warm rose, and damp patchouli. Mysterious and floral, she’s always been a little offbeat with her wide, wondering eyes that linger in darkness. 

Some of the elders call her a witch, little demon child, with her Eastern European ties and mischievous curl of her lips. But to you she is only Wanda, your dearest. 

Her fingers, nimble and quick, find yours, lock and lace together. “Hello, darling.” She says, pressing her lips to your cheek in greeting, her voice melodic and smooth; velvet dark and sweet twilight. 

You let your cheek brush hers, lean into the touch eagerly, soft, rosy and warm skin against yours. “Hello, Wanda.” 

She pulls back with a flutter of her lashes, wide eyes finding yours. There’s a familiar glimmer in them, which makes your heart leap amorously, excited and playful. “Are we going to sneak off to the meadow today, still?” She asks, dropping her voice to a hush and stepping nearer. Your hands tighten over hers as you draw closer, duck your head so you catch another breeze of her scent in her hair, the nape of her neck.

“Yes,” You reply, an eager smile pulling at your lips, “I bought us a pastry to split and a book to read.” 

“Then what are we waiting for?” She nearly purrs, bouncing lightly on her toes in excitement. You’re about to pull her along, drag her towards Clover when someone clears their throat behind you.

You both turn, fingers still interwoven, pressed to one another’s sides. Her warmth is welcome and comforting, especially as you both find Rumlow gazing back at the pair of you with depthless, cold eyes. His face, so marred and twisted, gleams pink and shiny with scarred and new skin under the afternoon light. The rays of white gold sunlight do nothing to lighten his features, nor the darkness of his gaze.

It pierces deep into you, as if he wants to pry and prod and pick you cleanly apart. It’s the gaze of a conqueror, you think, the gaze of someone who wants something that can never be theirs. It’s a disturbing hunger, the kind that sends a deep chill down your spine. 

Wanda squeezes your hand in comfort. So attuned to you, she perhaps can tell by body language or the dip in your scent that you’re frightened in some way, that Rumlow has caused you distress and he has yet to even open his jagged, scarred mouth. 

“Lovely afternoon for you ladies.” He says very coldly, as if he is not in fact concerned with the weather nor you both.

“Yes, it is.” Wanda replies for you, a dark, protective little gleam in her eyes. You can smell the shift of scent with her light aggression, the flare of sage that burns and tickles your nose. It sharpens and spices, makes you blink with it. 

“You’re both looking mighty fine, rich with spring. Omegas always were sweetest in spring. Isn’t that right?” He muses and it chills you to the bone, makes you press closer to Wanda’s side, as if you could fold into the safety of her body. 

There is old folklore; spring being associated with Omegas. It’s all about fertility and the new life that blossoms in spring, old wives’ tales of Omegas getting their strongest heats in the spring after long, dormant winters. Perhaps there is some truth to it, biologically, because winter can get so harsh and so sparse with food if one isn’t careful. Bearing children in winter would never be easy, but it’s something you don’t wish to linger on, particularly not with the way Rumlow is eyeing you.

Like ripening fruit to be picked. A flower blooming, awaiting the moment to pluck it from the earth.

Wanda grows uncomfortable now, too, you can feel it in the bunching of her slim shoulders. But she steps in front of you purposefully, a show of challenge to Rumlow, one of protection for you. 

“Isn’t that right, ladies?” Rumlow urges, taking a step forward and Wanda sharply takes a step back, forcing you back as well. You cling to the back of her skirts with tense, seeking fingers. 

“I sure hope you’re not botherin’ these girls.” Another voice speaks up, authoritative and strong and sure. The kind of voice that gives commands, ones you think many eagerly would follow. Not unkind, but unwavering. When you both turn to the source, it’s a blond man, broad shouldered and wide and tall. He’s dressed simply, the top few buttons of his shirt popped open to reveal a muscled chest. Pretty, light blue eyes. He has an honest face, a strong jaw, trustworthy and noble. 

His scent is distinctly Alpha, strong and commanding; cedar wood and leather. The soft notes of something gentler like cotton and the way your linen smells on a summer day fluttering in the breeze to be dry. It’s soothing, a deep comfort compared to the off-beat, metal tang and sour blood smell of Rumlow’s scent. 

Which, has become bitter and salty with his anger and aggression for this newcomer.  

“I wasn’t bothering them. Was I bothering you Omegas?” He asks sharply, prickling with agitation and it makes you grip Wanda’s skirts a little tighter. “And who are you, anyways?” He then almost growls, “Newcomer isn’t gonna tell me what to do.” 

You can tell Rumlow’s itching to pick a fight by the tightening of his shoulders and baring of his teeth. The air becomes charged with scent, territorial and angry and pungent. Wanda’s is still spiced and agitated, too, with the threat of Rumlow. Your own is dipped into distress, irritation, and the newcomer’s becomes stronger, cedar wood sharp. Rooted in place, he cocks his head slightly, challenging. 

“Why don’t you move along.” The newcomer says, and he’s not asking, he’s telling. It’s bold of him, with the way Rumlow’s face; twisted and angry, settles on him. No one challenges Rumlow in this town. He holds too much power, is too strong; both physically and socially. Even protected by the law by being a tax collector for Alexander Pierce. 

Another man steps up behind the blond, eyeing Rumlow with particularly cold and dark eyes; midnight blue, the evening sky bleary with stars, depthless and all consuming. His hair is longer, brushing the tops of his shoulders, half pulled back from his strong face--

When your eyes settle upon his features for the first time, it feels as if you’ve been struck; a blow of lightning, the sudden shock of cold water, the gasp you take when you resurface. It’s damning, you think, as if you’ve seen him in your dreams or in hazy, unknown past lives. As if you’ve known him your whole life, somehow, as if you recognize him now and wonder how you ever could’ve forgotten him.

He looks like the tragic heroes you read about; the ones that rise only to fall, crumble down after being so noble and wide-eyed. He is breathtaking and standing tall and strong against Rumlow’s piercing gaze. There’s a warning in his eyes, a half-dare, begging Rumlow to try something and see what happens now. Where the blond is golden-hearted and bright-eyed, he seems darker, more eclipsed. 

And surprisingly, it works, Rumlow eyes the pair of them, weighs his options, and then promptly steps down. He mutters something about leaving, about how this isn’t the end. But you can’t help the quirk of a smile, the hint of cruel amusement you get from watching him ease away. Slink off back into the hustle of town.

Wanda smiles wider than you, sharper, a little more mischievous, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen Rumlow cower like that.” She says and turns towards the newcomers with a radiance that is hard to match. 

And the blond smiles, easy and gentle, “Glad we could help.” And then with deep courtesy, “Steve Rogers, by the way.” 

“Wanda Maximoff.” She pulls you back up to her side once more, offers your name to them, too.

Steve claps the other man on the shoulder, an ease is shared between them that is not unsimilar to you and Wanda. Steve adds, “James Buchanan. But we just call him Bucky.”

And Bucky nods, his eyes finally sliding over to you; his scent hits you at nearly the same time. Offbeat and pine, the sharp, cold smell of metal. There’s evergreen and winter, maybe the soft spice of juniper, the low cut of musk. It makes your eyes flutter, makes your head go soft and bleary with it. 

“Pleasure to meet you both.” Wanda says and her voice refocuses you, her fingers skimming yours to ground you. You flit your eyes away, but can feel Bucky’s suddenly sink over you the way the red sun will drop below the hills. 

You become keenly aware of your bare neck, hair pulled from your face and shoulders to reveal it to him. The cut of your dress suddenly seems both revealing and not revealing enough. Like it could constrict you, or maybe you’re showing too much skin.  

“What brings you here?” You ask, perhaps a little cooly, eyes seeking out the horizon rather than them. Anything but him. 

“Passing through. Looking for work for a few weeks.” Steve answers politely and his eyes glitter like the creek in the high summer. He’s pretty, you think, long lashes framing those eyes. 

“Oh!” Wanda exclaims and she loops her arm through yours solidly, her body warm and soft beside you, “You’re in luck! She needs help running her farm!” 

You almost choke. Throw Wanda a glare but she only meets you with that impish, precious smile you can’t stay mad at for very long. 

“I don’t--” You try to protest. 

“She does!” Wanda interjects, “Her father injured his knee awhile ago, been looking for someone to help out.” 

“Well, if that’s the case, then perhaps Buck and I will have to stop by.” Steve says easily, a half amused grin tugging at his lips as he gazes between you and Wanda. Almost as if he’s endeared by your antics. You bristle. 

“My father doesn’t take to newcomers very well.” You warn, as if that’ll scare these two Alphas away so easily after their little stunt with Rumlow. You worry that few things will scare these two off. 

Regardless you don’t need them on your farm, don’t need them trying to help or care for you or order you around. It’s always been you, and no one will change that. You’re not about to let them treat you like some soft, little creature who should be inside baking them pies and fetching them water. 

But you can feel Bucky’s eyes on your face still, as if he’s trying to burrow in there, make a home upon which he gazes. 

You grow even tenser, teeth grinding. No home to find inside you; just the unruliness of nature, the ever-changing seasons, or unforgivable storms. The river that churns too fast, dives between the mountains and the forests, the sly, sharp-toothed fox. 

You turn your nose up, “Besides,” You say, insolent and dry, “I don’t really need any help.” 

“‘Course.” Steve agrees and you aren’t sure if it’s to placate you or if he’s genuine, “But if you’re looking for an extra pair of hands to order around, we’re your guys.”

“I’ll keep it in mind.” You say, though decidedly won’t. 

Daring yourself, you finally force your eyes to Bucky once more. His face is stern and closed off, reserved. He hasn’t spoken once, and stupidly, horribly, you long to hear his voice. You wonder what it sounds like, if it’s rough or smooth or everything at once. Does he speak loudly or softly? Will you have to lean in to hear him or will you step back at the crack of it? 

And yet, he hasn’t needed it once yet. His presence, formidable and strong and raw, is enough.

You blink, look away just as he glances back at you. This strange game of cat and mouse with eyes is making your fingers twitch and tighten in your skirts. 

“We should be off,” You tell Wanda, wishing to flee, to feel the wind on your face and Wanda’s body beside yours and the afternoon sun bursting on your skin. 

Steve wishes the pair of you well, gentlemanly and sweet. Tips his hat with a boyish sort of grin that perhaps would leave other’s swooning. 

And Bucky, gruffly, and with a sort of gentleness you aren’t expecting to find, says to you, “It was nice meeting you both.” 

Something warm settles into your chest, sliding down like molasses, dripping into your stomach and core, spreading throughout you like it owns you; settles deep into you like it won’t leave, real deep into the marrow of your bones. And you inhale, breathe as if this is your first real breath in the whole of your life.

You find yourself replying, almost as softly, “It was nice to meet you, too.” 

His lips twitch upwards in the barest hint of a smile, as if it’s the first time he’s smiled in a long, long time and he needs you to show him how again.

So you do, you give him your own smile that isn’t much bigger, but it’s much easier and sweet as honey, clever as a fox. Almost like you want him to chase you, follow that curve of your lips. 

Wanda giggles, before pulling you away and back towards Clover to begin your adventure for the day, but you think you can feel the dark of his eyes on the back of your neck still, the line of your shoulders. It lingers, until you ride off into the heather hills with her and disappear on the gauzy horizon. 

---

Wanda and you roll in the wild grass on the sloping hills. Laughing and chasing and playing like you’re girls again, half-savage and free and untempered. You tumble and shriek and hitch up your skirts, loosen your dresses and unbutton collars. The sun is a gold glow, warming the earth and your skin, shimmering dreamlike on the new green buds, the wheat yellow of the tall grass. You tip your face up to the sky eagerly, just as you let yourself flop back into the field, back hitting the ground that catches your fall, cradles you. Clouds pass overhead in cotton shapes, free and darling, and you’re still breathing a little hard from romping around with Wanda, feeling your heartbeat inside the cage of your chest. You feel flushed with life; ferocious and curious and excited. 

Wanda drops down by your feet, before slowly, languidly crawling atop you. She straddles your waist, her skirts spilling out over the two of you. You sit up on your elbows, jostle and try to dislodge her a little with another round with warm laughter, but she holds fast, nails digging into your shoulders. 

“I saw the way you were looking at Bucky.” She says and there’s too much mischief in her eyes, a clever glint that the sun turns amber and honey hazel. 

You roll your eyes at her, but even the mention of his name on her lips makes something inside of you stir. But you indulge her, leveling her with an unamused gaze, “And how was that, Wanda?” 

She leans over you, her fiery hair brushing your cheek, your shoulders. She fits herself closer, twines her arms around you all close and snug. 

 “Like you wanted to bare your throat to him right then and there.” She teases playfully, voice dipping into a warm, rumbling purr. Her nose drops, nuzzles lightly at the sensitive scent gland at your neck. It makes you squirm, your fingers tightening in the skirts of her dress. 

You allow her so close, allow lips and teeth and nose into the dips of your body because she’s so familiar to you. A piece of your heart is firmly in her small, warm hands. It blurs the thin, unsteady line between you two, though. Scenting at the neck is usually romantic in some way; often times sexual. Comforting, when it needs to be, but you’ve laid so many times with Wanda, gotten so close and tangled together that you often find your nose at her throat, the nape of her neck, tucking your face into the crooks of her body and she to you. You know her like a lover, you think, sink into her body beneath the sun and the moon and the open skies that spread out before you both. As if the whole world opens for you two. 

“Your scent got sweeter; milky lavender and dark jasmine.” Her lashes tickle your collar bones, her mouth warm and open against the skin there. It makes you flush deeply, sink into the earth beneath you, “Want him to bite you?” She jibes, flashes pearly teeth, her canine gleaming in that white sun. 

“Wanda!” You yelp, shoving at her and she throws her head back and laughs, “No!” And you begin to wrestle with her once more, pushing her off and sending you both tumbling down another hill. You shriek and peel with laughter, pulling and grabbing at each other until you roll apart.

She gets on her hands and knees, feigns a growl from an Alpha in her throat, the kind that rumbles out from deep within them, but the sound is a little muted, and too light in her mouth. She suddenly pounces for you again, playful and light, sending you belly up and onto your back, though. “You want him to tackle you like this,” She torments, grabbing at your wrists as you try and squirm and fight with her. 

With a grunt and all your strength, you roll her right onto her back now, hook your legs over her hips like she did. 

“You want to simper and cry under him,” She says and this time her voice gets soft and breathy and pouty and she is good at that. Her back arches beneath you and you push at her more, tighten your hands around her wrists, shove them down to the ground, feel her heaving chest and trace the curve of her smiling lips and rose touched cheeks with eager eyes. 

“I don’t!” You laugh, playfully bare your teeth at her and try and growl back the way she had. It’s better than hers, a little more bite to it, but it’s still too light and soft. She laughs with you at your attempt now, laughs and growls and yells with you until you’re both breathless because there is nothing and no one around to hear you but each other.

You howl and chase and fall into each other with giggles and wildflowers in your hair, get lost in her and the way the sun begins to fall from the sky and cast everything in a rosewood haze, slow and burning and beautiful. 

She lays her cheek on your back when you ride Clover back to her home, and she kisses you goodnight, lips at the corner of yours. Promises to see you tomorrow. 

And then you ride home, race fast and hard before the sun is swallowed by the moon, before the stars blink into existence and your father scolds you to all hell and back. 

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

Home seems eerie with the darkness that creeps around its edges, night drawing out all the creeks and aches and splinters in the old house. All the memories pushed towards the back of your mind rush forward like skittering spiders. The last sliver of light sits on the horizon, fighting, railing against that inky sky as you get home. 

And when you rush through the front door, shouting, “Pa, I’m home before the sun’s set!” You aren’t expecting to nearly run right into the broad chest of Steve Rogers.

You blink hard and he steadies you with a hushed, “Easy,” And his big hands on your shoulders. 

You look up at him in disbelief, brows furrowing, quickly lurching away from him, only to realize Bucky stands to his right. 

“What--” You start to snap, and this time your teeth are baring with aggression and irritation, gone is the lightness and playfulness you had with Wanda. Your eyes flash with the last cut of light that slashes through the old windows of your house. 

“There’s my feral cat of a daughter, fellas.” Your father says and your head whirls to him. 

He begins to introduce the three of you again, but you cut him off, “I met ‘em today, Pa.” 

“Oh, good.” He says dryly, unappreciative of your tone. You force back a wince, know you’ll get scolded for that one. “They’ll be helping you out on the farm for a few weeks.” 

You whip back to face Steve and Bucky, narrow your eyes at them, “Thought I told you both I don’t need any help?” You snap, unruly, wildflowers still caught in your hair that now slips free of what it’d been pulled back in earlier. You’re sure you look half-wild. 

Steve holds up his hands as if he means no harm, palms up to you and you see they’re rough and calloused and scarred. Used, working hands. Hands that have seen a lot. You glance at Bucky, notice that one of his hands is gloved, the other free. You try not to stare, flit your eyes back to Steve.

“In our defense, we didn’t know this was your farm. We were sent this way after inquiring in town for work.” Steve says calmly, and then puts his hand over his heart, “Honest.” 

You scoff lightly, turn back to your father, “I don’t need them, Pa.”

“No,” He agrees and pride swells in you, a small bubble of it for a heartbeat, “But they’d be a great help to you.” 

There’s no amount of arguing or protesting that’s gonna change your father’s mind once it’s been set. He seems settled on this, content and confident. You try not to pout, try not to stamp your feet or snap or glare them right out of your house. 

Final discussions are had; pay and what times they’ll arrive and leave. Your father, thankfully, warns them to listen to you, and if he finds differently, they’ll be kicked to the dirt as quickly as they’d gotten the job.

And then he warns them, quite frankly, to mind themselves around you and you can feel your cheeks deepen into crimson. Bucky and Steve dip their heads, though, say obedient and firm, yes sir’s, as if they expected it. 

Your father finishes with, “Alright, then. You two start tomorrow.” And then he looks to you, “Walk them out, will you?” 

You huff, but do so, walk them to the porch where the crickets and frogs have begun to chirp and croak and sing. The night crawls onward, the wind rattles this old house. A chill overcomes you, a little shudder. You think you can hear the far-off sound of baying coyotes, erie and high pitched in their frenzied yelping. 

“Suppose I’ll see you both bright and early in the morning, then.” You say, crossing your arms over your chest. 

“Suppose so.” Steve says, lowers his eyes a little, “I did mean it, we didn’t know this was your farm.” 

You eye him, “Nothin’ I can do about it now, is there?” You counter, unwilling to give an inch, no matter how sweetly he looks at you with those darling, blue eyes. You’re sure that boyish charm works everywhere else, but you refuse to let it here.

He has the good sense to dip his head submissively, nodding slightly, “We’ll get out of your hair for the night then, let you rest. Goodnight, ma’am.” He says respectfully, before easing down off the old wood that protests beneath his heavy steps. 

And for a heartbeat, it is only you and Bucky and the rattling tree branches and the croaking night. A moment frozen, as if you’d captured it in a bottle like a letter that you’ll throw into the sea. Just this sliver of time that makes the whole world stand still, as if it’s been waiting or fearing for your coming together. 

You have nothing to say, but he inclines his head, holds your eyes like he’s holding the world in his arms, and murmurs all low and rumbling, “Goodnight, miss.” 

Then turns his back on you, and hustles over to Steve, to their tethered horses. 

And this time it’s you that watches him, eyes glued to his muscled back, the nape of his neck, as he eventually is swarmed by the darkened, reaching horizon.

---

You fall into bed, feeling strange and wary, a little weary, perhaps a little hopeful, too. For what, you don’t know. You can feel the wind changing, coming with new spring. But there’s something else, something heavier; the pressure is building, as if there’s a storm brewing. The kind of spring storm that bring destruction and clamor and the kind of rain that threatens to sweep you away in their flood and ferocity. 

Your bed creeks, the shadows are tall and reaching in your room. The moon spills in, but instead of painting you with wonder or lovely, pearl light, it only makes the shadows that much darker. The night brings the cold, makes you pull tight and inwards. You curl up beneath your quilt, try and ward off all that presses in. 

Eventually, you sleep. 

And you dream. 

You dream in visions of phantom grey and oil slick black, syrupy red, and flesh pink. You step lightly in a graveyard, the earth freshly turned and dark. Stones jut out from the ground like jagged, crooked teeth. It swallows you whole. The fog is thick and evasive, surrounding you and gathering around you, a train to your skirts that murmur and brush against stones and dirt and the hollowed out ground. 

A grave with your father’s name grows from the earth, forces you to stop, stutter backwards. Your teeth begin chattering, the clanking of bone against bone. You can feel the whispers of wind, something so near. Your heart plummets as you read his name, as you see his grave, which you now see is besides your mother’s. 

The ground trembles. 

Their graves crack, splinter like a dropped glass, bursting outwards in a wave of skittering, flaming stone. 

Frantically, you drop to your knees, try to put them all back together, as if that will somehow help. As if that will fix anything. You curse and cry and there are tears-- there are tears that drop onto burning stone. It sizzles and smokes but you can’t put them back together. You are alone, and you can’t. 

Your hands begin to burn, flesh pink and blister white. Mud sucks at your legs and your knees and then you are sinking, sinking, sinking--

Oil drowns you, forces its way down your mouth and your throat and clogs your lungs. Seeps into every part of you. It’s invasive, forceful in it’s push and pull of you, it sucks at you and you are forced downward, kicking and screaming. Forced to swallow and take and be filled.

You twist, frantic. Try to fight back, but you are caught in the thick of it. It devours your screams and cries and pain.

And from above, there is a cut of silver, a star in the inky sky. A hand; metal and unnatural plunges in for you. And he pulls you clear out of the muck, the earth’s blood and into his arms.

When you emerge, it is as if you’re cleansed by the light. Gone is the slick oil, gone is the choking and drowning and thrashing. Bucky holds you to him now, crushes you to his chest where you can hear the live, thundering beat of his heart. 

“I’ve got you,” He murmurs, cradling your skull as if it’s precious, something to be protected. Your nose is pushed to his neck and you--

You cling to him, swallow down clean gulps of spring air and the juniper bright and metal sharp smell of him. Pine, there is pine and evergreen, too. Clean and fresh and dipping into musk. Your heart slows, lulls, with his voice in your ear; that voice you’d so desperately wanted to hear.

You feel as if you’ve heard it your whole life now, as if you can’t imagine going another day without hearing it. And he says your name, not Omega, just your name. And he breathes and is warm and alive beneath you. 

When you look around now, the earth is fertile and bright and warm. Spring damp roses and sweet, honeycomb sunshine. The fauna is in full bloom, an overabundance of life that leaves you inhaling the fragrant air. It’s so thick, almost cloying. 

And there is no breeze, you think. 

And Bucky’s lips are at your neck. 

And there is a stirring in your stomach but its--

It’s all wrong. 

He tries to lay you down. And you don’t protest because there’s something so tempting about it all, so safe, or so instinctual. There’s an ache and a burn and you want to shed your skin, you want to let him in and never let him out, bury his body in the ground with you. Become the earth and fertilize the flowers and feed the foxes you love so much. You wanna lie with him until the crow calls, until you’re nothing but him and you and the gem stones deep in the ground. 

But when his face lifts from your vulnerable neck, it is not him. 

Rumlow stares down at you, his scarred face so close and imploring. He croons Omega and you shriek, you try to get away, but it’s like the oil all over again; you trapped and thrashing and stuck. Rabbit in a snare. Fox in a trap. You scream, scream for Bucky or Wanda or even Steve or your father. You scream until it tapers off and burns into something ragged, shredding your voice. 

He is just heavy atop you, and his face is morphing and shifting, like he’s a new creature altogether. Blackened eyes that are too wide, too large and there is a gaping whole where his mouth should be--

You claw at him, scratch with nails, pull at pink flesh and cartilage and bone until he starts dripping blood and saliva, growling like a rabid dog. You twist his face away so sharply, so horribly, that there is a sickening crack and then the full of him collapses atop you.

You squirm and you are crying, choked sobs because it feels like you are burning, or aching. Lonesome and longing or horrified and fearful of everyone. You want to be held in equal measures that you want to run away and never see another face again. You are torn, split in two and unraveling. 

When you scramble away, deeper into the fragrant wild grass. You realize there is wetness, slick and warm and--

There is blood. So much blood coating your legs and it seeps through your skirts, stemming from between your legs. It pools beneath you, waters the flowers and seeps into the earth as if it belongs there. 

You howl like an animal, fingers squabbling in the dirt and the blood and your body as if you can put yourself back together again--  

You wake with a hard, sucking gasp. Blinking hard in the darkness. Your hands pull at your nightgown, shift to feel your skin, still warm and dry and clean beneath your heavy quilt. Reassuring, gulping breaths bring back cool air into your lungs. I’m safe, you tell yourself, it was just a dream. 

But the night is still dark and the bed still creaks and the wind still howls, almost the way you had when you’d found all that blood-- No. 

But now you’re just awake, in a lonely room. And there is no comfort, no warmth or forgiveness in the hollowness of it all. 

You rise in the morning, heavy bags beneath your eyes, and begin your day in hopes of a better one.

[ffamranxii]

I draw a manga/write a light novel series based on that manga, which is essentially an amalgamation of my favorite series and giving some of my favorite characters, who I feel were shafted in their source material, a better ending. That series is called C’est la Vie 5, because it originally featured five fandoms that I LOVED enough to have created an original character for.

Now, like many people, I’ve created a fuckton of OCs for a fuckton of series. However, unlike, say, Dragonball Z and Pokemon (RIP to Son Mei and Cissy the Eevee breeder), I still use these characters. I am still active in these fandoms. Some of these characters are nearly as old as I am. Some have gone through so many iterations that they’re nearly unrecognizable from their original forms (looking at you, Haruhi, Suzuka, and Kinoko). But they have ALWAYS been there.

C5 the way it is now started as a fun little project in college to help me memorize my Japanese vocabularly. It was a series of one shot or 4koma doodles in the margins of my notebooks, featuring PGSM+Hina. Then the doodles got mutated. I replaced Makoto with an original character named Sun Hwa, who then was replaced with Ayumi Yamada from Honey and Clover. I added in Hagumi Hanamoto from H&C too. Ami was renamed Moeco, and her appearance changed. I ended up splitting Ami in two, because I loved her Dark Mercury arc so much, and ended up with Moeco and Akumi. I added Mio Kuroki but called her Arisa Kuroki, because my Usagi at the time was called Mio. I added Mikasa from Attack on Titan. Misa Amane (named Erika after her actress in the live action). And it spiraled from there. C5 went through a TON of iterations as well over the past ten years. There was a character called Haruhi, but she was from the Haruhi Suzumiya series.

Now it’s pretty ironed out. The cast is so big I’ve split the series into a set of volumes into one big volume, so it doesn’t become Naruto. Each volume has a set of plots, two of which are contained within that volume. It’s pretty easy and I like it.

HINA is a mishmash of three fandoms (two if you count PGSM and Sailor Moon as one fandom). I fell in love with Boys Over Flowers (the Korean version) after discovering the live action Sailor Moon, and had a complete fit the entire time that Jandi chose Junpyo. (WHY, Jandi. WHY. Jihoo was BETTER for you. BETTER!) I had a Korean friend in my Japanese class, and it was at this period that my Makoto doodle was replaced with Sun Hwa (another Korean) and that Hina Kusaka (who is exclusive to PGSM, and whose name I stole for my OC) became Hina Ku (after the actress who played Jandi, not Goo Junpyo). Hina and Sun Hwa had small side conversations in Korean that my friend taught me, while the group as a whole reinforced my Japanese lessons. C5 has plenty of Boys Over Flowers characters (a mix of the Korean, 2019 Chinese, and Japanese versions), but I never made an OC for the series. Hina filled both roles. In PGSM and Sailor Moon I kept her name as Kusaka, but in C5 it’s Ku, and she is a zainichi - Korean-descended. Hina also plays a different role depending on which series I’m using her in. In PGSM, I used her as Sailor Sun. Sailor Sun has been a character I’ve had since I was five years old. She’s changed style and looks considerably over the years, but she’s always been there. In every other iteration of Sailor Moon, I prefer the theory that Naru and Unazuki are Sailors Earth and Sun, and Hina is one of Usagi’s many friends. In the pre-C5 era, she, Usagi, and Erika were part of the 3 Bakas, for their bad grades. 

AKIHO is my newest OC and holy shiiiiit I have cleaved to the Persona series hardcore. Rather than create a new OC for each entry in the series (though I may change my mind when Person 6 comes out), Akiho’s look, style, and role in the story changes (I reconcile this to be something akin to Clara Oswald in Doctor Who). In P5, which she was created for, she’s a Phantom Thief. The idea came to me when I learned there has never been a playable character of the Temperance arcana, Hifumi was supposed to be a PT, and the general consensus that Mishima and Shiho should have been PTs. Akiho has been through several iterations herself but her general look is based on Tae Takemi from @scruffyturtles ‘s Adult Confidant AU. Her personality seems very calm and serene, but she is a secret metal head and a huge fan of Eikichi Mishina’s band Gas Chamber. Her PT mask is based off a butterfly. Her role in C5 is a shrine maiden, where she gets along with Rei (Sailor Moon), is the sister of Akira Kurusu (who is a separate person from Ren Amamiya), and the daughter of a pair of mobsters.

KINOKO is my second oldest OC, having been around since I was twelve. Her original name was Cherry (like every other Tokyo Mew Mew OC) and her original animal is lost to the sands of time. Luckily, my favorite animal is a red data animal, so she can be fused with that now! Kinoko has been through so many iterations it isn’t funny. In the TMM world, her hair is an auburn, a dark brown with red undertones, mimicking how some mushrooms (where her name comes from) appear. (It’s a callback to her original name). Her Mew outfit has also changed considerably and I still haven’t settled on it completely. The Mew Mews are not a unit in C5. Zakuro is a model with Ann and dating Minto, Ringo (LOVE Ringo) is a middle schooler who hangs out at an arcade and is best friends with Bu-Ling, Ichigo is a waitress with Berii, Retasu works with Ryou. And Kinoko works at a karaoke bar, chasing troublemakers like Bu-Ling out. She also interacts with the new Au Lait boys.

SUZUKA is also an old OC, her name having originally been Meiling. She’s from Fushigi Yuugi, which I was obsessed with as a child. She’s nearly as old as Kinoko - I was introduced to the series at around the same time. Suzuka’s original role as Meiling was Miaka’s attendant and general Mary Sue, and she was one of my first attempts at exploring fanfiction (along with Kagami the cat demon and Teiten the Thunder Sister from Inuyashs, RIP), because I couldn’t decide which of the original Suzaku warriors I loved most. Everyone had such a wonderfully tragic, lovely backstory, and I needed to give them all blankets and hugs, and Miaka was just a dumbass, okay? (I think I settled on Tasuki. Love me some Tasuki.) Anyway. Suzuka eventually morphed into the Priestess of Kouryuu once I learned that Fushigi Yuugi was based on real Chinese legends, and one legend sometimes included Koryuu, the Yellow Dragon of the Center. (Fun fact: There’s a video game that explores this option, but in it, Kouryuu, is treated as a false god.) In my OC world, Kouryuu is the Great Unifier, only able to be summoned once the first four priestesses have summoned Suzaku, Seiryuu, Byakko, and Genbu, and it is he that will stop the war that threatens the four countries of the Book of the Universe of the Four Gods. In C5, Suzuka works at a bookstore owned by Hifumi Togo that specializes in rare books.

HARUHI is the last old OC, but she’s also new? Haruhi was, for the longest time, existant in a stage of limbo. Fruits Basket was introduced to me as a teenager, when I was about thirteen or fourteen, and I didn’t quiiiite embrace the message, behind it. I couldn’t get past the art style (I was very picky about what I visually consumed back then), I couldn’t get into the anime for the same reason, and I couldn’t quite get past the whole “it’s called Fruits Basket wtf and also they turn into animals? And it’s not a magical girl anime? What in the actual fuck?” But like many things I of course loved the characters, I adored my baby Kyo, and I of course made an OC specifically for him, because I back then did not ship Kyoru (sacriligious, I know). I don’t even remember what Haruhi’s original name was. I just decided that she was a Sohma and the rooster, because the curse of the original rooster was broken, and broke a long time ago, so it was entirely possible for Kyo to have a love interest who was a Sohma and the rooster who was around his age (in my teenage mind). That old Sohma OC, is of course, RIP. I can’t even. And recently, I discovered Fruits Basket Another, and I somewhat resurrected that OC in the form of Haruhi, but as the child of the OG cast. Sawa needs more friends, more protectors, and there’s no tsundere besides Hajime. It always bothered me that Kagura never got any canon love interest or story wrap up after she let go of Kyo, and then in Another she doesn’t have children. :( I love Kagura, so Haruhi is hers! I’m also sad that no one in Another dresses in kimonos when so many in Furuba did (Ritsu, Akito, Shigure, Kazuma, Kunimitsu), so Haruhi dresses in them when she isn’t in school. 

KEIKO is special. Not only is she the newest, but she is also the only character exclusive to C5. While the other characters in C5 are based on characters from other fandoms and have their personalities and such shaped by the new series, Keiko is entirely unique. Her name is a combination of the two things that birthed the series: Sailor Moon and Persona 5. Keiko is for Keiko Kitagawa, the actress who played Sailor Mars in PGSM; and Makigami is for Kazuya Makigami, a major character in Persona 5 the Daybreakers. Kazuya is also Keiko’s brother in C5 and he is... not a great person lol. Neither is Keiko. Her appearance is based on how I wear my hair irl and the clothing of Jim Hawking from Outlaw Star, my favorite anime of all time. (I sadly never made an OC for that series. I tried but I am not good at space opera.)

None of the OCs ever cross paths in C5. It would create a temporal paradox and probably result in one of them fainting or dying lol. Since they’re all essentially the same person. Fun fact: I, Ffamran (known in-universe as Bideru the author) also occasionally make cameos, and I also cannot cross paths with the OCs. Luckily Tokyo, where C5 is set, is a very big place. 

If you stuck with me through this very long post about OCs, thank you! I just really wanted to go off about them since I’ve been in a writing mood and I’m on volume 2 of C’est la Vie 5 now. 

[tatticstudio55]

A dragon alone in the world is a terrible thing

I thought it would be interesting to write about the dragons who fought and/or died and/or were featured in the Dance of Dragons. Covering them all would take forever, so I’ll go with the main (“main” in my opinion, that is), those who fought the most “peculiar” battles and those with the strongest symbolism attached to it: Vhagar, Sunfyre, Caraxes; Dragonstone’s three wild dragons, Sheepstealer, Grey Ghost and the Cannibal; and the dragons from the battle at Tumbleton, the “Blue Queen” Tessarion, Seasmoke, Vermithor and Silverwing.

 VHAGAR

During the Dance, Vhagar became the closest thing to what I’d call an all out “monster”, shredding havoc indiscriminately all across the riverlands. Fire and Blood doesn’t usually present dragons as a constant source of terror for lords and peasants alike, or, you know, the Smaug kind who’d gorge on maidens at the full moon, but Vhagar made the exception.

When her corpse was dragged from the water years after her final battle with Caraxes, Aemond’s “armored bones” were “still chained to the saddle” and Visenya’s sword, Dark Sister, still “thrust hilt-deep through his [blind] eye socket” (F&B, 502). Prince, sword and dragon all re emerged in a tightly bound, single package. We know that dragons bond with their riders, but what about swords? Wasn’t Visenya Vhagar’s first rider? How curious is it that Dark Sister remained with Vhagar’s bones at the bottom of the lake – even after having “fought” against her?

Speaking of curiosities, Aemond’s demise atop Vhagar is reminiscent of “one of the more curious incidents of the Dance of the Dragons”:

Legend has it that during the Age of Heroes, Serwyn of the Mirror Shield slew the dragon Urrax by crouching behind a shield so polished that the beast saw only his own reflection. By this ruse, the hero crept close enough to drive a spear through the dragon’s eye, earning the name by which we know him still. (F&B, 476)

Compare this with the onslaught of Caraxes and Daemon on Vhagar and Aemond:

The hour was late, the sun was close to setting, and the lake was calm, its surface glimmering like a sheet of beaten copper. Up and up she soared, searching for Caraxes as Alys Rivers watched from atop Kingspyre Tower in Harrenhal below.

The attack came sudden as a thunderbolt. Caraxes dove down upon Vhagar with a piercing shriek that was heard a dozen miles away, cloaked by the glare of the setting sun on Prince Aemond’s blind side. (F&B, 500)

Here as callback to the mirror shield, we have the “sheet of beaten copper” and the sun shielding Daemon from Aemond’s sight. The lake is the mirror, the sun the shield, and Vhagar is faced with her own deadly “reflection” Dark Sister.  When they all crash in the lake, Vhagar sink to the bottom of the metaphorical “mirror” and reunite with her reflection at last.

 SUNFYRE

As far as I recall, Sunfyre fought three dragons during the dance: Meleys, Grey Ghost and Moondancer. All three died, but each battle left Sunfyre with severe injuries he’d never recover from. Sunfyre was described as the most beautiful dragon the seven kingdoms had ever seen, a bright gold color with pale pink wings. That changed after the battle with Meleys, where he “had one wing half-torn from his body” (F&B, 435). His third and last fight left him so battered, broken and bloodied that queen Rhaenyra, when she saw him, supposedly said “Whose work is this? We must thank him” (F&B, 545). He was mounted by Aegon II Targaryen.

Sunfyre is often given “solar” attributes. His flames were so bright that they blinded Moondancer; “a blast of golden flames so bright it lit the yard below like a second sun” (F&B, 544). The fight against Baela and Moondancer broke Aegon’s legs and Sunfyre’s wings for good, for he was never able to fly after that (strong association with Icarus here). Sunfyre’s early splendor represent what’s ultimately the uselessness of a beautiful outer shell. The fact that Aegon was separated from him during most of the Dance (severely burned after the battle at Rook’s Rest, Aegon would remain at King’s Landing, drugged on milk of the poppy, until Rhaenyra took the city, while Sunfyre remained at Rook’s Rest to recover) pinpoint as well the idea of an “empty dragon”.

His fight with Meleys, just like Vhagar’s fight against Caraxes, is a fight against blood: Meleys was a bright scarlet dragon and Caraxes was nicknamed the “blood wyrm”. Both fights were drowned in the sun. At Rook’s Rest, the armor of Rhaenys Targaryen (Meleys’s rider) “flashed in the sun” (F&B, 434) and “the dragons met violently a thousand feet above the field of battle, as balls of fire burst and blossomed, so bright that men swore later that the sky was full of suns” (F&B, 434). Compare this to Sunfyre’s fight against Grey Ghost, which was spotted by sailors at sunset and described as “grey and gold they was, flashing in the sun” (F&B, 489), and the following fight against Moondancer, which happened at night. Both had “moon vs sun” undertones, and all three battles happened on a very specific sky background:

Rook’s Rest happened in the daylight, sun against sun.

The battle above the Dragonmont happened at sunset, the setting sun against the rising moon.

The battle above Dragonstone happened “amidst the darkness that comes before the dawn” (F&B, 544), the rising sun against the setting moon.

(By that logic, the one battle Sunfyre shouldn’t have won was the one at sunset, against Grey Ghost. Thus, it might explain why the two Toms randomly decided to go on a hunt for Grey Ghost’s killer (F&B, p. 489), symbolically, at least… for the “sun” would’ve transgressed a fundamental law by killing the “moon” at sunset.)

 CARAXES

Of all the dragons of the Dance, Caraxes is the one with the strongest association to blood. He’s called the “Blood Wyrm” for his bloodish colors, partakes in many battles on the Stepstones even before the beginning of the Dance, fights against Vhagar beneath a “blood-red sky” (F&B, 502) and, before dying, crawls out of an – almost literal – lake of blood:

Caraxes lived long enough to crawl back onto the land. Gutted, with one wing torn from his body and the waters of the lake smoking about him, the Blood Wyrm found the strength to drag himself onto the lakeshore, expiring beneath the walls of Harrenhal. Vhagar’s carcass plunged to the lake floor, the hot blood from the gaping wound in her neck bringing the water to a boil over her last resting place. – F&B, 502.

It might also be noted that upon her parting with Caraxes’ rider Daemon Targaryen, Nettles’ clothes are “stained with blood” (F&B, 499). Thereafter, Daemon rides to Harrenhal and there waits, alone with Caraxes, for his nephew Aemond, marking each passing day with a slash on the heart tree in Harrenhal’s godswood.

Thirteen marks can be seen upon that weirwood still; old wounds, deep and dark, yet the lords who have ruled Harrenhal since Daemon’s day say they bleed afresh every spring. – F&B, 499

Which is very Robinson Crusoe, btw, a tale about a man slowly loosing touch with his humanity. Robinson marks the trees to keep count of the passing of time and anchor himself to the last bits of his human self – the self that’s self-aware and time-aware. The weirwood’s wounds “bleeding afresh every spring”, might not be as negative as it seems, then, for it’s a reminder of enduring humanity, even in a place as cursed as Harrenhal. The man vs beast conflict is furthermore underlined by the duality between the Blood Wyrm (the “beast”) and the “blood tree” (the “man”), with Daemon Targaryen in the middle. Sure enough, Caraxes’ characterization paints him as very beasty: “Blood Wyrm” essentially refers to “bloodworm”, if you ask me, something that crawls and suck blood. But then… one of Daemon’s mistress was nicknamed the “White Worm” (Lady Misery), which creates an interesting paradox, for a bloodworm is still a symbol of life when compared to a bloodless worm. And, here and there, Caraxes has his ambiguous moments: he “gave a scream that shattered every window in Jonquil’ Tower” (F&B, 499) when Nettles and Sheepstealer fled from Maidenpool. Even his crawling from a pool of blood in the end had the undertones of a newborn crawling out of the womb. Caraxes was a beast, that is certain, but also, in an odd way, a symbol of life.

 The wild dragons: Sheepstealer, Grey Ghost, the Cannibal

Sheepstealer won the Dance of Dragons. Fight me.

Thematically, he’s Sunfyre’s complete opposite. The later was dubbed the most beautiful dragon who ever existed. Sheepstealer was probably the ugliest. Sunfyre also had the worst ending possible for a dragon, if you ask me. No dying in battle for him, no sir. He spent the last months of his life unable to fly, surely unable to even fend for himself, and dying in the stink of infected wounds. Completely undignified for a dragon. Sheepstealer? He returned to the wild with its wild rider Nettles, uninjured and as sane as a dragon can be. For all we know, he might even still be alive in asoiaf, hiding in the mountains around the Vale. Wouldn’t that be cool? The last scene with Nettles and Sheepstealer actually reminded me a bit of Dany and Drogon in the Great Grass Sea (and we know Sheepstealer wasn’t the only one who was fond of sheep…), with both women in rags and clinging to their dragons’ necks. No whips: dragons fare best when left wilds. Sheepstealer’s brown scales marks him as a creature of mud, earth and mountain, rather than one of air, sun or moon. On that he’s similar to Grey Ghost, another wild dragon who mingled with smoother elements such as fog, water, mist, smoke and dusk:

Grey Ghost dwelt in a smoking vent high on the eastern side of the Dragonmont, preferred fish, and was most oft glimpsed flying low over the narrow sea, snatching prey from the waters. A pale grey-white beast, the color of morning mist, he was a notably shy dragon who avoided men and their works for years at a time. – F&B, 443.

I like this. It’s poetic. It’s elusive like magic itself. Strangely, Sunfyre, an injured dragon, manages the unprecedented by catching and killing him, whereas this had proved impossible for men and the Cannibal. You could probably write a very long meta on all the possible significations behind Grey Ghost’s death. I know I already proposed one in a previous post, and now I’m about to propose another: Grey Ghost is a (symbolic) dragon “soul”. Sunfyre, on the other hand, is an empty dragon “shell”. He hunts and eats Grey Ghost because… a shell wants to fill itself of a soul? Among other interpretations?

And speaking of dragons eating other dragons, there’s the last of the wilds, the Cannibal:

The largest and oldest of the wild dragons was the Cannibal, so named because he had been known to feed on the carcasses of dead dragons, and descend upon the hatcheries of Dragonstone to gorge himself on newborn hatchlings and eggs. Coal black, with baleful green eyes, the Cannibal had made his lair on Dragonstone even before the coming of the Targaryens, some smallfolk claimed. – F&B, 443-444

The Cannibal’s old age reflects the very primal nature of his behavior. If he was there before the Targaryens, what did he eat? Were there other dragons around? (Probably not. One dragon or two may slip under the radar but if they were more it would’ve been known.) I’ll speculate that the Cannibal’s diet was once in parts composed of his own eggs, drawing a callback to the myth of Kronos, the titan who ate his own children to prevent that they’d overthrow him one day. The myth of Kronos doesn’t apply only to the Cannibal, but to the bulk of subtext and symbolism behind the Dance of Dragons as well: both greens and blacks aimed for the sole supremacy over dragons, and both ended up killing them all in the process. The Cannibal himself is “coal black, with baleful green eyes”, both green and black, both dragon and dragon slayer. Moreover, he doesn’t really have a name. The book doesn’t say “Sheepstealer, Grey Ghost and Cannibal”, but “Sheepstealer, Grey Ghost and the Cannibal”, meaning, on a deeper level, that any dragon could become “the Cannibal”. (As Sunfyre did.)

 The dragons from the battle at Tumbleton: Tessarion, Seasmoke, Vermithor and Silverwing

History calls the struggle between King Aegon II and his half-sister Rhaenyra the Dance of the Dragons, but only at Tumbleton did the dragons ever truly dance. Tessarion and Seasmoke were young dragons, nimbler in the air than their older kin. Time and time again they rushed one another, only to have one or the other veer away at the last instant. Soaring like eagles, stooping like hawks, they circled, snapping and roaring, spitting fire, but never closing. Once, the Blue Queen vanished into a bank of cloud, only to reappear an instant later, diving on Seasmoke from behind to scorch his tail with a burst of cobalt flame. Meanwhile, Seasmoke rolled and banked and looped. One instant he would be below his foe, and suddenly he would twist in the sky and come around behind her. Higher and higher the two dragons flew, as hundreds watched from the roofs of Tumbleton. One such said afterward that the flight of Tessarion and Seasmoke seemed more mating dance than battle. Perhaps it was. (F&B, 532.)

I’m calling it right now. If ever there’s a “Dance of Dragons” between Jon Snow and Daenerys Targaryen, it will be a dance of this kind. No joke. Seasmoke fights on the Black side and Tessarion on the Green, but Tessarion is on Vermithor at once when the latter attack Seasmoke. She’s referred to as the “Blue Queen” (Daenerys’s eponymous color from season two till season four) and Seasmoke is mounted by Addam Velaryon, born Hull, who was “determined to prove that not all bastards need be turncloaks” (F&B, 529). Need I say more? And Vermithor and Silverwing… that was just plain heart wrenching:

Silverwing, Good Queen Alysanne’s mount in days of old, had taken to the sky as the carnage began, circling the battlefield for hours, soaring on the hot winds rising from the fires below. Only after dark did she descend, to land beside her slain cousins. Later, singers would tell of how she thrice lifted Vermithor’s wing with her nose, as if to make him fly again, but this is most like a fable. (F&B, 536)

I don’t think it was a fable. What can I say? I’m a romantic at heart. But we’ll finish this with a few words on Vermithor the “bronze fury” and Silverwing, the two most gendered dragons in my opinion. Bronze, I assume (though I’m not an expert on this), can be used to make armors. Silver is used in clothing and jewelry. Vermithor died in battle and Silverwing remained behind like a wailing widow. They came in a pair and always fought on the same side: when Hard Hugh Hammer (on Vermithor) turned his cloak and joined the Green side, his sidekick Ulf White (on Silverwing) did the same. After Vermithor’s death, Silverwing retreated “on a small, stony isle in the middle of Red Lake” (F&B, 557) and rejected every man who’d try to claim her. 

At Tumbleton, Seasmoke and Vermithor were the only ones to die directly in battle. Tessarion was put down mercifully a few hours later (Silverwing was the only one to survive at all):

Tessarion, the Blue Queen, lasted until sunset. Thrice she tried to regain the sky, and thrice failed. By late afternoon, she seemed to be in pain, so Lord Blackwood summoned his best archer, a longbowman known as Billy Burley, who took up a position a hundred yards away (beyond the range of the dying dragon’s fires) and sent three shafts into her eye as she lay helpless on the ground. – F&B, 534

@oadara I’m tagging you here because of the Tessarion/Daenerys parallels, and because you’re the expert when it comes to Daenerys and the number three.

The females lasted longer that their male (mate?) counterparts. Vermithor and Seasmoke were the main “aggressors” in the fight and it seemed like Tessarion intended to protect or help one of them out, presumably Seasmoke:

Vermithor’s size and weight were too much for Seasmoke to contend with, Lord Blackwood told Grand Maester Munkun many years later, and he would surely have torn the silver-grey dragon to pieces… if Tessarion had not fallen from the sky at that very moment to join the fight. – F&B, 533

As for Silverwing, she didn’t partake in the fight at all, so that’s a lot of gender-related tropes behaviours. Now, I don’t think it was Martin’s (or Archmaester Gyldayn) intent to turn Tumbleton into a dragon style Romeo and Juliet. Tumbleton was the last major battle of the Dance and I think he wanted to humanize the dragons, while also underlying the absurdity of the battle itself: Hard Hugh Hammer had already died when Vermithor was attacked with bolts and spears (which mean that he was attacked for nothing, being now riderless). If Vermithor hadn’t been attacked, he wouldn’t have turned on Seasmoke. Vermithor, Seasmoke and Tessarion might’ve survived the battle. And remember, the Blacks won that battle. They could’ve finished Tessarion anytime after (she really wasn’t in good shape). Instead, apparently, they left her alone as she was trying to fly again, and only killed her when she started showing signs of pain. 

I saw what you did there Martin.

[guardiankarenterrier]

from the ruins and from the ashes

(for Caffeine Challenge #27 hosted by @caffeinewitchcraft)

"I didn't do it to save your life," the girl sniffs, wrapping her arms around her knees and pointedly not looking at him, before jerking her chin in the direction of the last person in their makeshift foxhole. "I did it to save his."

Scott looks before he's thinking about it. Neither of the strangers look like much, but the girl at least has sturdy clothes; the man's clothes are bright, tattered things that don't belong in the Ruins. They're probably what attracted the monsters to them in the first place.

"Well," he says finally, because the girl's still scowling down at her knees and the man still hasn't said a word. "Thanks anyway. I don't- I don't think we'd have made it, if you hadn't done that." He pauses, then says, slowly, "What was that, anyway?"

"Healing." The man speaks up for the first time. His voice is much rougher and hoarser than Scott expected, even knowing how close they'd all been to death less than an hour gone. "Healing, but she did it.... wrong."

"Hey," she snaps, raising her head. "Your life was intentional, don't make me regret it."

His voice gentles. "I'm sorry, Ash. I never meant for you to follow me."

"Yeah, well." She sniffs again. "You shouldn't be out here without backup."

"Neither should you," he says wryly, before levering himself to his feet with a wince and offering his hand to Scott. "I'm Moth. This is my daughter, Ash. We scout the Ruins sometimes. You?"

Moth's voice goes noticeably flat and neutral on the last word, and Scott can't tell for certain whether that 'you' is meant as a 'why are you here,' or a 'who are you,' or even a 'what are you doing out here.' He opts to answer only what he feels he has to. "My name's Scott. Your daughter was kind enough to catch me up in that spell as well."

"Wasn't on purpose," Ash mutters, uncurling from her crouch to glare up at them both. "You're an idiot."

"Ash, you know it's me they came after," Moth says gently. "I should have asked someone to check my outfit first."

She tosses her head back and groans. "Yeah, you should have, but at least you have an excuse. He's not colourblind, he's just loud."

"Sorry," Scott says, because he actually is, this time. "I'm not from here. Where I'm from, the monsters mostly react to movement. Are you- it's colours and noise, here?"

"Well, bright colours and loud noise," Moth amends. "They won't react to us talking, but if we were to start shouting or I moved into view, they'd attack."

"So we're not safe here, is what you're telling me," Scott says slowly.

"Well we would be." Ash stands up, still scowling. "But you two both managed to be targets, and I'm out of energy. Unless one of you has a spare set of clothes and a full meal on you we're fucked."

"Ashley," Moth says. "Language."

"We're proper fucked," she tells him.

Scott looks around, trying to see a way out of their situation. He's still not entirely clear on what happened- one of the Ruins creatures had been chasing him, something he'd never seen before, something that had been horrifyingly capable of following him around blind corners and across moving water. The City Ruins he'd come from don't have creatures that intelligent, but apparently the Forest Ruins had thrown better predators.

He'd thought it was going to catch him, actually, right up until a painful blast of magic had slammed him off his feet.

(How did she weaponise healing? He's never heard of a human doing that).

Only the vines that provide handholds up one side of the hole they're hiding in prevent it from being a trap rather than a hiding place. Ash had clearly known the pit was here, and Scott's not so certain it hadn't started life as a trap.

Scott's also still trying to accept that his life's just been saved by a surly teenager. He's never thought of himself as a poor scout; it's a little humbling to realise that she's better.

"What if we swapped clothes?" he says, finally. "I think Moth and I are similar sizes. If we could split the coloured clothes between us, it might break up the brightness enough for us to make a run for it. If- making a run for it is something that works, here." It doesn't always back home; usually if you've reached the point of running you're already in deep trouble, because running means they've seen you.

"That might work," Ash admits, grudgingly, and then gets out of the way while Moth and Scott divvy up their clothes.

He can see how Moth made his mistake in the first place. Scott isn't colourblind, but one of his best friends is, and he knows how reds can look too much like browns and greens too much like greys. It's never been much of a problem for Jake, but then Scott supposes camouflage adaptations are more important in the forests than the cities, even now.

It doesn't take too long to work out who ends up with what. No amount of miracles is going to get Scott into Moth's pants, and vice versa, but they can switch shirts fine and although the dirt the vines are clinging to is dry and cracked Moth digs his hands in far enough to find damp soil and smears it over the brightest bits of fabric.

"You don't have to help us," he tells Scott, in a low undertone that probably doesn't carry over to Ash. "Why are you?"

"Practicality, mostly," Scott admits, twisting the rough shirt under his hands to make sure the bright hemline is hidden. "She did save me. Even if it seems like she might regret it, now."

Moth's voice gentles with pride as he says, "Ash doesn't need a reason to help people. She never has."

"We need to hurry, old man," Ash says from the other side of their hiding place. "It's almost dark." Her eyes flash in the low light as she looks at Scott and adds, with a strange dissonant tone to her voice, "They hunt better, in the dark."

"Ash," Moth says, but he sounds worried this time. "How much of your energy did you use?"

The girl shakes her head and the unsettling gleam fades back out of her eyes. "Enough."

"Ash," Moth says again.

Ash snarls, and Scott takes a startled step back.

"She's-" He swallows as Ash's head swings to face him. "You're a mutate."

"She's my daughter," Moth says, stepping between them.

Scott looks between them. Ash is several shades darker than Moth, but most families these days aren't determined by blood anyway. Scott hadn't thought anything of it. He hadn't noticed that her skin is the colour of tree bark, that her eyes are the same colour as cloud shadows on leaves or that her hair matches the surrounding dirt near perfectly; he hadn't looked that closely once Moth had claimed her as family. "She's a mutate. She's a- a creature, just like-"

Ash snarls at him again, stepping back into the shadows as she does. Her eyes spark again, green and darker green, leaves in shade. Whatever tenuous clawhold she'd had on humanity is clearly slipping away.

"She's my daughter," Moth repeats, firmly. "She and her brothers are family. Did you think they were all the same, out here?" His voice is changing, now, filling with scorn. "You're not from any of the wild ruins, are you? The cities are different. The cities were safe. Out here-" He swipes his hand out, gesturing beyond the pit. "Out here's different. It hit everyone."

"They're not human," Scott says- repeats, distantly. "You can't trust them."

"She saved your life," Moth says. "She didn't have to save your life, but she did.  And for what, I wonder? You lied. You don't actually care at all." He takes a step closer to Scott, unconcerned with the way Ash matches him, growling low from behind his back. "Why are you here?"

"They sent me here," Scott says, stiffly, his eyes fixed behind Moth on the real danger. "There's been reports."

"Of mutates," Moth says, voice low and certain. For a moment his eyes seem to flash too, and Scott jerks his gaze back to him, but it's only a reflection of the dying sun. Moth is human, as far as he can see.

Moth is human and Ash did something reckless to save both their lives.

Scott takes a step back of his own, raising his hands palm- up in front of himself. "They sent me. They don't expect me back."

Some of the aggression goes out of Moth's posture. Some of the unnatural light goes out of Ash's eyes.

It's the second one that decides him, because it means Ash is still listening.

"They don't want me," Scott says, voice pitched just as low as Moth's had been. He can't keep himself from flinching as he says it, but- Moth said Ash has brothers. If Moth is so accepting- then maybe Scott can finally stop running. "The cities weren't that safe."

His hands are still facing Moth and Ash. He twists them, lets them see his claws.

"Oh," Moth says, softly.

"Yeah. So." Scott lets his hands drop. Ash has stopped growling, now, tilting her head at him instead. "I won't be reporting back."

"Oh," Moth says again, stronger, and then lifts his head with a determined gleam in his eyes. "Well. Ash knows how to fight like that.  That's how we usually get out of these situations. Want to learn?"

For the first time in a long time, Scott lets his fangs show as he smiles. "I think I'd like that."

[discord-of-laughter]

The OC challenge! - Phase 1

The sideblog isn’t ready, I [melody-of-scream] am not ready and the challange isn’t finished, but I just can’t hold back any longer, so I’ll just start by posting phase 1 only until I got phase 2 finished. Which takes forever with that many OCs.

The wonderful @cantankerousintrovertedpumpkin 💋 made this challenge up and tagge me. And how could I have resisted! 💛

Phase 1 – Introduction

How many are there?

21 – 5 male & 16 female – that are currently in use or in any way still present in my mind and used in my thoughts. There are more… trust me… Some are kind of @steverogershield’s fault because she keeps encouraging me instead of stopping me… fine Jason and Lou are just two but that’s 9.5% that could have been avoided! Just kidding dude ~

What are their names? [+ in my case which fandom are they from]

Allete “Alouette” Toupine [Man from U.N.C.L.E.], Belial “Bel” [Lucifer], Cardia Rose [Disney Descendants], Johanna “Jo” Jayne aka “Counter” [X-Men], Damian ? [Marvel’s Defenders], Deicida [Young Justice], Gabriele Hoffmann aka “Blueprint” [X-Men], Guinevere aka “Jennifer Elisabeth Kross” [Kingsman], Ophelia [...] Shilazar aka “Gust” [DCEU/Legends of Tomorrow], Aquila Pace [The Librarians], Kayleigh Fortuna Porter aka “Lady Luck” [Dr. Strange], Loreley [American Gods], Lucius “Lou” Kadin Perez Bowman aka “Voiceover” [DCEU/Flash], Phionee Esteria Usmin [Guardians of the Galaxy], Rachel Woods aka “Roads” & Daniel Weston aka “Danton” [Supernatural], Skandra Thorn aka “Skadi” [Thor/Avengers], Mariana Josefa Moraes Cardoso aka “Somnia” [X-Men], Jason Tiberius Green [Suicide Squad], Vanessa Lind [Harry Potter] and last but not least Cain Goldfin [Shadowhunters].  

What’s one word you’d use to describe them?

Allete: determined

Bel: demonic

Cardia: burdened

Jo: restless

Damian: lying

Deicida: emotional

Gabriele: torn

Jennifer: loyal

Ophelia: fiercely

Aquila: sly

Kayleigh: cordial

Loreley: wary

Lou: controlled/sweet

Phionee: lost [formerly reasonable]

Rachel: unyielding

Daniel: bossy [formerly protective]

Skadi: sore/persistent

Mariana: disappointed

Jason: stubborn

Vanessa: kind

Cain: angry/proud

What do they look like?

Allete: A lot like Eva Green, light skin colour, dark hair, blue-green eyes, tall, slender, full lips, from France.

Bel: A lot like Mariette Valsan, middle dark brown/Indian skin tone, brown eyes, under the right circumstances insanely beautiful… but her appearance changes based on the attitude of people towards her or humanity in general, she’s missing the little finger of her left hand though. Originally from heaven, then hell.

Cardia: Pale, red and black dyed hair, very dark eyes, short, stocky, curvy (on her belly too!), small hands, scars on her arms. From the Isle of the Lost.

Jo: Slightly tanned, light brown eyes that seem to glow slightly, very long brown hair, small nose, chubby cheeks, short, with a bad posture, from the US.  

Damian: Slightly ashen skin tone with a hint of olive hidden beneath it and a hint of yellow over it since he smokes quite a bit, black, short hair, blue eyes, not exactly tall for a guy, rather thin due to a certain lack of physical activity, leads a pretty unhealthy lifestyle in general, dark rings under the eyes, thin lips… despite everything he’s still kind of attractive though, from the US of unknown heritage.

Deicida: Grey skin… like really silvery-grey skin, looking like metal, dark grey lips, white hair and golden eyes, much heavier than she looks. Middle tall for a teenage girl, slender… the back of her legs is pointed like a blade and as sharp – yes blade legs and grey skin, she is weapon forged by Hephaestus and given a soul and can turn back into her original sword from if needed. From… well Hephaestus’s forge.

Gabriele: A lot like Sonja Gerhard. Short, blond, slightly curly hair, grey-blue eyes, like a perfect little white skinned angel. From East Germany (DDR) when the country was still divided into DDR and BRD.

Jennifer: Naturally red, curly hair, deep green eyes, rather tall for a woman, comparably skinny, small chest, prominent cheekbones, slightly bigger nose, in her late forties, early fifties, still considerably pretty. Of Irish descent.

Ophelia: Dark, Arabic skin tone. Long dark brown hair, with three green dyed strands of hair, eyes so green they seemed to glow and strange green marks running down from the middle of her lower lid to half of her cheek. Naturally rather red lips, but even brighter lipstick, hourglass figure, slender fingers, unfortunately creepy laughter but sweet smile, freckles on her chest, 6’7, in her end twenties. Of Iranian descent.    

Aquila: Think of Kat Dennings dressed fancy. Brown wavy hair, blue eyes, large chest, 5’3… the whole package. Usually dressed unassuming but tidy. Wears glasses to read. From… that would be too much of a spoiler, so let’s say the UK. Also her names a made-up fake as well.

Kayleigh: Assumed the form of black girl, rather dark skin tone, attentive eyes so dark brown they appear black, long, really long bright orange hair – says it’s natural, no one believes her, sly smirk, surprisingly pinkish lips, not very tall with little curves but not petit. Looks nothing like either of her sisters. From a place that is too much of a spoiler.

Loreley: Like Diane Kruger, straight, thin light blond hair, light blue eyes, pale lips, would be considered petit if she wasn’t a bit too tall for it. So pale and thin it’s close to making people worry. Often either dark rings under her eyes or red, slightly swollen eyes. She has lost quite some of the beauty (and weight) songs sing about. From Germany but that was a long, long time ago.  

Lou: Very mixed heritage reflected in his skin colour – Latin-Arabic and a bit of white. Black hair but buzz cut, grey eyes, unassuming, sweetest and brightest, toothy smile and perfectly straight teeth, slightly crooked toes, moderate height and weight. Tries to stay fit… but music and Aunt Isabella’s food are not helping. Long, slender fingers. Born in the US.

Phionee: White skin, not like a human white skin tone but white-white. Humanoid Alien. Dark pink, sharp eyes, slightly pointy ears and a long, slender tail that ends in a sharp point [kind of similar to Nightcrawler’s], feet that are a bit more claw like, white, straight hair usually worn in a pinned updo. Eyebrows that give her a snarky expression, light pink lipstick and pink eyeshadow, very cold skin and since she’s from an ice planet it’s usually to warm everywhere for her, so she wears short shorts and cropped tank tops when others are about to freeze off some parts. Still manages to make a point by wearing Ravenger red. Thin but athletic build. From the Usmin planet Sikon.  

Rachel: A lot like Natalina Maggio. Caucasian but likely with a southern European heritage. Green eyes with golden speckles. Thin, straight, dark brown hair. Unassuming figure but well-trained and a bit muscular for a woman. Thin face, thin lips, piercing gaze. Always seems to show a slight frown. Huge ban tattoo on her left side since she was a baby. Not very tall. Often dark fingertips from old ink and such. Found on the doorstep of a hunter family – Westons – when she was still a baby.  

Daniel: Light skinned but with a bit of a tan, short, curly, brown hair. Light blue eyes. Full lips, stubbles all the time. Tall, obviously well-toned and thoroughly fit body but a bunch of scares hidden beneath his clothes. Always seems to have an amused expression and sparkling eyes. Rachel sometimes calls him “Disney Prince” because he’s the pretty of the two of them. Youthful looks even though he is in his late thirties. From an hunter family which has been doing their job in the US for generations.  

Skadi: A Jotun goddess and born frost giant. Very tall with a swirling intricate pattern on her skin. Pure white eyes and hair and whitish lips. Strong and sturdy but athletic build. Full lips… and with a human form magic and living among the gods of Asgard allowed her to take on. Still kind of tall, very pale with a bluish touch with slightly bluish lips, pale blue eyes and a lot of long, full-bodied, wavy hair that she dyes black to not stand out so much. There is something rough and wild about here that tends to draw people in and push them away at the same time. From Thrymheimr and/or Asgard.

Mariana: A lot like a slightly younger Morena Baccarin with half-short hair. Black hair, warm brown eyes, rather light skin tone but still noticeably a Latina. Thin lips, a bit bigger ears, 32 years old, with surprisingly long legs. Has a nice smile but a tendency to frown due to bad decision-making. From Brazil currently living in the US with a work visa.

Jason: Like Seth Green – just google him, like that. 5’3 short, green eyes, ginger hair and beard, mole under his left eye, the best and worst smirk, more buff than Seth Green though. Small/Short power package. From the US and of Scottish and Polish heritage.

Vanessa: Kind of shortish, with a pale skin with a golden undertone, slightly prominent nose and chin, small ears, bilious green eyes and ash brown hair. Kind eyes. Hints of being a bit stout but working against it constantly. Very small feet and rather small hands. An unsuitable mean smirk. Inside and outside of the school day she can usually been found barefooted. From Wales.  

Cain: Soft facial features – a bit of a baby face – broad nose, narrow eyes the lightest blue imaginable. Round face, slightly tanned skin, short dark hair, full lips. Well-built but not very tall… in the form he got from one half of his parents. The other one granted him golden and black scales and rough golden and black skin, gills on the side of his cheeks, the same broad nose and narrow eyes of the lightest blue imaginable, but his features seem less soft like this. Oh and of course a golden fish tail. Lavish and to show off, he’s considered too flashy to be pretty by his mother’s people where he grew up.    

 Any illnesses/disorders/disabilities…?

Cain has BPD. Vanessa has a well-hidden but not specified anxiety disorder. Mariana is rather emotionally instable without an explanation so far… don’t know if that counts. Damian has a heart condition. Skadi is dyslexic but you can bet the goddess won’t tell anyone. Rachel has ADD and so has Lou. Bel is missing the little finger of her left hand. Cardia has gotten past self-harming tendencies and Mariana was thought to have narcolepsy for the longest time… until they found out it has to do with her mutation and an inability to control her power. And do Deicida’s blade legs count and the fact that human emotions confuse her? Not like on the autistic spectrum though just because she hasn’t had to do much with them before and is still learning.

 Who’s your favourite?

That’s not fair *whines*, they are all my kids!! Skadi and Ophelia are always high on the list but always rivalled by the OC or one of the OCs from the fandom I’m just in the most.

 Who is most like you?

??? There is a bit of me in every OC I make… but I try it to never be too much. However… Vanessa maybe? She’s probably the oldest of them and the most like I’m when it comes to looks. But personality vice… I’d like to think Jo maybe or Cardia.

 Do you ship any of the characters you’re talking about here?

Yes. Some but very few with canon characters mostly it’s just a thought though nothing I would insist or necessarily talk about. And I ship Rachel and Daniel with each other ~ it’s difficult though.  

[emily-echolls]

QUOTE

“The true opposite of depression isn’t gaiety or absence of pain, but vitality: the freedom to experience spontaneous feelings.” -Alice Miller

BASIC

NAME: Emilia Eleanore Echolls NICKNAMES: Emily, Em, Emmy AGE: 22 BIRTHDAY: November 21st, 1995 GENDER: Female PRONOUNS: She/Her

FAMILY

MOTHER: Evelyn Echolls (Maiden Name: Montgomery) FATHER: Edgar Echolls LEGAL GUARDIAN (?): N/A SIBLINGS: Elisha Macdonald, (Maiden Name: Echolls) Elizabeth Echolls PETS: Jett, a female black longhair cat IMPORTANT EXTENDED FAMILY MEMBERS: N/A

PHYSICAL ATTRIBUTES

FACE CLAIM: Kristen Stewart RACE/ETHNICITY:  English, Scottish, Irish… Your typical American mutt. NATIONALITY: American HEIGHT: 5′5” WEIGHT: 113 (Waaay too skinny) HAIR COLOR:  Naturally dirty blonde, dyed dark brown EYE COLOR: Light green SKIN COLOR: Pale DOMINANT HAND: Right ANOMALIES: To list Emily’s tattoos would take up too much space on this- there’s a post here for those interested, but suffice to say she’s seriously inked. Her ears are pierced three times on each ear, including two cartilage piercings on the left side. Her belly button and right nipple are pierced. (The latter done on a dare during her freshman year) She has a mess of raised self harm scars on both thighs, starting as high as her hips and going down halfway down her femurs, covering the front of them and going all the way over to the sides of her legs. Some of the scars are pale and faded out, but a good number of them are discolored and may never completely go away. One of her front teeth has a barely noticeable crack across the front of it where she into a fight during high school and someone hit her in the face with a textbook and broke it. SCENT: Eucalyptus and spearmint from her shampoo and conditioner, Kat Von D Saint perfume, a clean herbal smell from her lotion. An undertone of cigarette smoke or pot. ALLERGIES: Cherries and strawberries, acetaminophen FASHION: Emily puts just as much thought and care into her clothes as her sister, in her own way. Her clothes aren’t designer, but they are carefully purchased from alternative kinds of clothing brands like Banned Apparel, Killstar, and Aderlass, and kept as carefully as Emily keeps anything. Her fashion sense is tomboy meets former scene kid meets punk meets greaser meets tattoo model. It’s dually a look meant to draw stares and a costume for Emily to hide behind, though she wouldn’t admit to it. NERVOUS TICS: Running a hand through her hair, picking at her cuticles, pulling out her cigarette pack and hitting it against her palm, pulling out her zippo lighter and flicking it open and shut, biting her cheek.

LIFESTYLE

HOME ADDRESS: 9430 East Cove Lane #1F, Seacrest Cove, CA RESIDES: Seacrest Cove, CA BORN: Beverly Hills, California RAISED: Beverly Hills, California VEHICLE: A fully restored 1971 Buick Regal, black with dark red seats and a top rated stereo system PHONE: iPhone 7 with this phone case LAPTOP/COMPUTER: A cheaper alienware model HIGH SCHOOL EDUCATION: (A private high school in Beverly Hills- will update once I collab with Brand) COLLEGE EDUCATION: Seacrest Cove University MAJOR: Psychology / Social Work MINOR: N/A JOB: N/A POLITICAL AFFILIATION: Left leaning but she doesn’t really give a shit. RELIGION: Atheist BELIEFS: Karma MISDEMEANORS: A count of indecent exposure, an underage drinking charge, and a public intoxication charge- all of which were issued when she was seventeen and were sealed when she turned eighteen FELONIES: N/A TICKETS AND/OR VIOLATIONS: A handful of speeding tickets, a disturbing the peace charge. DRUGS: Weed, (regularly) cocaine, (a few times) xanax, (occasionally) ecstasy, (a few times) oxy, (was abusing to control pain before her last ER visit) acid, (a few times) SMOKES: Yes ALCOHOL: Yes. DIET: Whatever’s easy. Emily tends to dislike anything deep fried or overly processed. She has a love/hate relationship with frozen food. She likes fresh fruit but hasn’t ever been a huge vegetable person, and she tends to dislike red meats in most everything. SEXUAL ORIENTATION: Bisexual with a preference towards women. RELATIONSHIP STATUS: Single CHILDREN: N/A LOOKING FOR: Not looking for anything. At all. BEST FRIEND(S): Julian Lowell, Stella Belmonte LANGUAGES SPOKEN: English PHOBIAS: Lizards HOBBIES: Mobile games, skateboarding, going to concerts, sketching, TRAITS: Aggressive, bold, protective, depressed, sarcastic SOCIAL MEDIA: Twitter, Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram, Tumblr

FAVORITE

LOCATION: The beach at night, any old place. SPORTS TEAM: The only time Emily gives a shit about sports is during the Olympics, and even then only kind of. GAME: Alto’s Adventure, Blyss, Miracle Merchant, Plants Vs. Zombies, horror PC games MUSIC: The Runaways, Joan Jett and the Blackhearts, other pioneering girl rock bands, My Chemical Romance, Pop Evil, Nine Inch Nails, System of a Down, Slipknot, Iron Maiden. SHOWS: American Horror Story, Bob’s Burgers, Black Mirror, Rick and Morty, Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Luke Cage, Iron Fist, The Defenders, Lost Girl, Salem, Orange is the New Black, Sense 8 MOVIES: Horror movies, light hearted comedies, crime movies, the kind of mind fuck movies with twist endings that make you think, thrillers. RADIO STATION: N/A FOOD: Peaches and cream, baked salmon with wild rice, salt and vinegar chips,  pomegranates, peanut butter and honey sandwich, pickles, grilled chicken sandwich with ranch and tomato, blueberry muffins, mashed potatoes PROFESSOR: Emily feels like she’s honor bound to say Macdonald BEVERAGE: Sweet tea, sprite, vanilla coke with rum, orange juice, almond milk. COLOR: Ash gray and dark teal

CHARACTER

MORAL ALIGNMENT: Chaotic Good/True Neutral MBTI: ESFJ ENNEAGRAM: Type 5 - The Investigator TEMPERAMENT: Melancholic and Choleric WESTERN ZODIAC: Scorpio   CHINESE ZODIAC: Pig PRIMAL SIGN: Squid HOGWARTS HOUSE: Gryffindor SONG: Angel of Small Death and the Codeine Scene - Hozier IDEOLOGIES: That people are inherently selfish, and have to put effort into not being selfish pieces of shit, so when you find someone that’s a good person- they deserve twice your respect than they would otherwise.

[lapreshjewel]

Pretty Man

KIM SEOKJIN WILL BE THE MEANS OF MY DESTRUCTION. 

Warnings: Smut, Language

As the saying goes, “I didn't choose this life, this life chose me”. The same could be said for Kim Seokjin. His lifestyle wasn't something he necessarily chose for himself. It chose him. Literally. He was handpicked by her, the one he owed his gratitude for changing his life like she did. Was it a coincidence? Or was it the universe playing its cosmic hand in his fate? He could recall the day that they met as if it happened yesterday, rather than two whole years ago.

It was the last day of July, and probably the hottest day of the entire year. The air was thick with the promise the rainstorm soon to come. A soft breeze whirled around him, carrying all of the early morning scents of his neighborhood. The sweet, sugary smell of the bakery next door to his apartment building was the first to greet him as he made his way down to the bus stop at the end of his street. The birds were chirping, the sun shining behind the graying clouds in the sky, and the semi-cool morning winds whipped his hair into his eyes as he walked. The bus stop was directly next to the traffic light, which awarded Seokjin ample opportunities to people watch. His favorite kind of people to watch were couples. More specifically, couples that argued. They were always so animated in their heated discussions, hands moving angrily as they each tried to get their point across. It made watching them that much more entertaining. He liked getting to the bus stop early enough that he’d have plenty of time to scope out the morning traffic and be low key invasive on their privacy as he waited for his bus to carry him off to work.

This morning was the same as any morning. Seokjin sat and waited, giggling occasionally to himself at different things he'd seen as he scanned the street with his curious gaze. The only difference to this particular summer morning was the sleek, black sedan that pulled up beside him. Judging by the body frame of the car, he guessed it was one of the more expensive Mercedes models. The windows were tinted enough that he couldn't see inside the car. Furrowing his eyebrows in frustration, he moved his gaze away from the car and on to the intersection to watch the oncoming traffic. Cars where speeding by, most of which were probably going several miles above the speed limit, rushing off to work or wherever it was the drivers were in a hurry to get to. Seokjin shook his head in thought, people. Always rushing to somewhere.

The black car was still sitting idly beside him despite the fact that the light had turned green. There were no cars behind it, so he figured they were taking that time to reply to text messages or change the station on the radio. The back window rolled down, and a woman with dark, over sized sunglasses turned to him. Her deep red lips turned up into a seductive smile, baring her impossibly white teeth. For a moment, Seokjin was dazzled. He couldn't see her whole face due to the glasses, but he could tell she was beautiful, as if she were cut out of a high fashion magazine. Or maybe even sent straight to Earth from some heavenly realm where only the most beautiful creatures resided. 

She spoke to her driver, saying something that Seokjin couldn’t hear, and then he watched as she opened the door, and stepped out of the car, removing her sunglasses. Seokjin’s breath caught in his throat as he looked her over. She really was beautiful. Her skin was the color of mocha with subtle golden undertones. She was dressed simply, in all black. A black button down shirt, tucked into the waist of a black pencil skirt, and black stiletto pumps graced her feet. It was as if all the sounds of the world around him fell away, and all he could hear was the sound of her heels clacking against the concrete as she approached him. The steady rhythm of her footsteps were in-tune with the beating of his heart. She was getting closer, and he was starting to panic. What did she want? Why was she coming to him? His eyes darted around him, trying to find something, anything that could possibly be the reason for her walking towards him. When he came up empty, it was already too late. She was situating herself next to him, the split in her skirt exposing her toned brown legs as she crossed them at the knee, her stiletto-clad foot catching his attention. “Are you waiting for something?” She asked him without looking at him. Her voice was husky, smoky even, and thick. Something about it appealed to him, sliding over him like the softest of velvet.The car she’d stepped out of drove away, leaving just the two of them at the bus stop. “Bus.” He whispered, breath coming out in a rush. 

She hummed thoughtfully at this and after a moment, extended her hand to him. Her nails were as red as her lipstick. Red and shiny. “Sarabi.” He chewed on it for a while, Sarabi. It had a nice ring to it. “Seokjin.” He introduced himself, shaking her hand. Her gaze was piercing, making him feel like she was stripping him bare of any kind of facade he might have tried to put up. “Has anyone told you how beautiful you are, Seokjin?” Thrown, Seokjin shook his head. He had, though. He’d been spoken to countless times about his looks. But until now, it never seemed to resonate with him. She was gazing at him with such sincerity that he could only do one thing, believe her. Everything about this woman was dazzling, inviting. He didn’t want to let go of her hand, didn’t want to stop looking at her. She glanced away from him as her car pulled up beside them, standing and fixing her skirt. Turning, she held out her hand for him to take a second time, this time, an invitation rather than an introduction. “Ride with me.” 

That was two years ago. In two years, a lot can happen. You come into new knowledge, you mature as a person. Whether the changes are subtle or not so much so, the point is, you change. Sometimes for the better, sometimes for the worst. Seokjin liked to think he changed for the better. Becoming an amazing version of himself, and all thanks to her, Sarabi. She let him live his own life, but she also called on him often. And every time, he went running. Every time. They had a special bond. A bond that was unlike any he’d ever had. She’d told him once, that he was more special than the others. That he was the first one to make her feel something. At first, the others she referred to were unknown to him. He didn’t want to know either. He didn’t want to know how many had come before him, or what she meant by anything she said about them. That was, until the first time she fed on him. There was no words that could describe how he felt in the moments that she drank from him. He was afraid in the beginning. Afraid of what she was, afraid of what her existence meant for him, afraid of dying. But she was so gentle, so soothing, that he’d melted against her immediately, feeling the slight tug in his body as she sucked at his neck. She’d hold him tightly against her, lips on his skin, heat radiating from her in waves. And when she was finished, she’d slowly swipe her tongue against the tiny holes she’d made, sealing them. He’d shiver at the feeling, and she’d grin against him, climbing over him in a catlike fashion, speaking softly, seductively. Telling him that she loved him and that he was hers, and hers alone. He’d do anything for her, as she did for him. 

They were inseparable, and would be forever. That’s what she promised him. Forever. 

[to be continued]

One | Two 

[radiantseraphina]

Can we have a detailed appearance description for each of the main characters in Dreamland University? (To classify main, I'd say the 4 nerds, plus Nightmare, Dedede's Mom, and Princess Sectonia)(Also you don't have to do this, I just want to be able to know more about what they look like)

OMG. The Four Nerds. That’s now officially their group name. 

Are you kidding me? I will talk about my fanfiction to my dying breath.

Kirby: A bit pudgy, 5′3. Has short, fluffy naturally white-blond hair, dyed cotton candy pink because it’s Kirby’s favorite color, to his parents’ horror. Is pale with skin that bursts into flames under the threat of sunlight. Needs several coats to survive a beach outing. Has a soft, adorable face, the sort that reminds people of fairy princesses and kittens. You’d trust him to walk little old ladies across the street and think his pink hair was charming. Most likely to be mistaken for being a cute girl, which suits Kirby fine. 

Meta Knight: He says he’s 5′8. It’s really more like 5′6. Not nearly as beautiful as Kirby thinks he is, but still very attractive. His natural hair color is dirty-blond, prefers to keep his hair long and dyed either blue or purple–partly because his father would never let him. And because short hair makes him look too pretty, whereas he thinks long hair makes him look elegant. He’s half-Halcandran Hispanic. Soft-featured with grey eyes. Most likely to be dubbed pretty, much to his dismay; he’d rather be handsome and intimidating like his father. His face looks a lot like Kirby’s. 

King Dedede: Very heavy, very broad, and 6′3. He accentuates this by wearing layers and very heavy coats. He’s actually biracial, which I’ve alluded to but doesn’t get clarification until chapter ten, and has olive-toned skin with a bit of perpetual redness over his cheeks. He has dark blue eyes and a very square jaw. Natural brunette, likes to keep his hair short and gelled up. Looks like the sort of person who’d give a really good hug, and he does. Most likely to be picked for a commercial for Crest Whitestrips; his teeth are quite nice.

Bandanna Dee: Very devoted to trying to put on muscle tone and trying for a lithe appearance, and is the same height as Meta Knight. Out of the four, he’s the only one with naturally straight hair; both Meta Knight and Dedede straighten theirs. His hair is auburn and used to be very long, although after transitioning, he favored shorter styles. Has peachy undertones in his skin and lots of brownish-red freckles across his cheeks and nose and a very angular face, which makes him look very severe. He has lovely brown eyes. Most likely to be mistaken for a haughty nobleman.

Nightmare: Uncommonly thin, though it’s not readily apparent from the way he dresses. To Meta Knight’s dismay, Nightmare is 6′4″. He has grey eyes and blond hair, which he tends to dye black, and very sharp, distinct features. He’s also eerily pale with a sort of greyish tinge to his skin. When he was younger, he actually looked a lot like Meta Knight, although Nightmare has altered his appearance, trying for a more intimidating look. Hasn’t aged much, creating an uncanny appearance. He looks strangely young and appearance-wise, hasn’t changed much since Meta’s childhood. Most likely to scare small children, which suits him fine.

Princess Sectonia: Very curvaceous, conventionally attractive woman. She’s 5′8. She has long, naturally dark hair that curls easily and soaks up humidity like a sponge. Takes great pains to keep her skin the royally approved pale, which is made difficult by her love of the outdoors. Her eyes are violet, and her face is very modelesque with high cheekbones. People are frequently how stunned by how gorgeous she is; she looks, in person, like she’s been run through a few Photoshop tricks. Isn’t above using her magic to make her look more attractive. Most likely to receive criticism for being too vain and self-centered about her appearance.

Dedede’s Mom: Like her son, she’s very heavy and very tall; she’s 6′0″. She’s a natural brunette with very thick, curly hair. Her eyes are blue, although a lighter shade than Dedede’s. She has a very ruddy complexion and is not considered to be a very attractive woman, although this is primarily because of Dreamland’s very narrow standards of beauty and because of her egalitarian views and infertility (uh…spoiler. It’s part of the Kirby/Dedede bonding conversation in chapter ten). Wears lots of very dramatic eyeshadow. Most likely to be that person who you know you’ve seen somewhere but can’t quite remember where.

[technoparadigm-a]

[ Jack’s Firing Squad: Complete List, Details & Ranks: ]

+ You may send in asks pertaining to these muses.

+ You may ask for a starter/im me to plot with one of these muses.

I. Junko, the Leader: The worst of Jack’s Squad to be after you. She is merciless and cruel, and she does not take bargains for your life. She will not take pleas and is immune to sincerity. She has a protective vibe for Jack-- very protective but does not harbor any feelings for him.

Her joining Jack was the result of her being in the wrong place at the wrong time. He gave her a choice: join or die-- it was simple as that. Junko, before she joined was much more frail and valued her life. Being in Jack’s ranks for so long caused her frail demeanor to change.

Junko is 22; hair is a dark purple, reaching to her mid back, straightened. Wears all black and a black hospital mask on her face, hiding her nose and mouth. Jack nicknames her, “Kuchi-Kuchi” (from kuchisake-onna). Her code is “Kuchi,” because of this.

[ Junko’s Full About Page ]

II. Kasumi, Rank II: A logician. She takes the “less bloody” approach to a situation. Get it done and over with and call it a day. She will accept bargains, but ultimately, it is up to Jack. She deals with the killings that has to do with contracts and any other things related to contracts. Her code is “Kami.”

Looking for work because she desired to go to college, Kasumi joined Jack’s ranks. When she discovered the undertones of Jack’s business, she feared Jack would fire her and ended up joining his squad. Jack afterwards gave her the necessities she would need to study whatever she wanted.

She is 18, blond hair, curled, and short, barely reaching the neck. wears dark blue, and a specialized pair of blue gloves that do not leave any trace of fingerprints. She wears a special type of spy glasses with a blue tint. Jack sends any information that is needed to her through the glasses.

III. Shinobu, Rank III: Master Manipulator. If Jack can’t get a certain proposal by his own hands, he calls in Shinobu. When she is called in, there is no implication that she is working with Jack. She appears out of nowhere. She will get the proposal Jack needs in whatever way necessary. She is seductive, deadly and very manipulative. She will come off as sweet and innocent in a way that it isn’t obvious. Her code name is, “Mirage.”

Shinobu joined Jack’s ranks after having a one night stand with him. Jack was so incredibly attracted to her and he couldn’t help himself. At one point, Shinobu spied on one of his conversations and gathered her own intel on it-- and discovered the person Jack was talking to would betray him. She prevented this and Jack was deeply impressed, making her a part of the Squad.

She is 21, hair is cherry brown, reaching to her upper back, wavy. Wears white and a red brooch on the left side of her chest. It acts as a microphone. She records the terms and conditions as they’re being said, and Jack in return, is listening to the conversation.

IV. Sora (Rank Four, The Secretary; Queen Coup d’Grace [’blow of mercy’])

Sora is Jack’s acting secretary of Spicer-Saito tech as well as being on his team in secret. She does not take the bloody approach unless absolutely necessary, preferring to just paralyze/immobilize victims that just get in the way. Often she believes this is why she is rank four but Jack says otherwise.

She also has a desire for Jack, longing for him to give her the same lustful look he often gives Junko (and formerly once gave Shinobu). She is mildly jealous of Junko for this, but does not hate her for it and doesn’t let it get in the way of both her ethical and unethical work. Her code name is ‘Sky’ (which is what her name means).

Age: 23, hair is straight, going to her midback, and blond. She has blue eyes, and often wears the color red, as it is a color of passion, love, and sexual desire.

V. Takumi (Rank Five, The Elegant Assassin’s Dagger)

Takumi is a quiet, reserved man and also the only older man in Jack’s Squad. Takumi once worked for Pandabubba and narrowly avoided Jack’s wrath once he proved to Jack that he was competent unlike the other stupid goons of Pandabubba and also helped Jack pave the path into destroying Pandabubba and his worth.

Unbeknownst to Takumi, Jack keeps a watchful eye on him above the other members just in case’, however Takumi is grateful to Jack for sparing him and has already sworn his loyalty to him.

Takumi dresses elegantly, often like a butler at times, and does not curse, choosing a more refined way of speech.

Age: 25, hair is curled, going to his neck, and dyed purple (original hair color black). Brown eyes, and often wears the color gold.

VI. Raimondo Bonaccorso (Rank Five, Dark Cloud)

Raimondo sticks out for two things A) He is of Italian descent, unlike the other members who are Japanese and B) His name is very similar to a certain Dragon of the Wind we all know. He is also the youngest member, being 17 years of age.

He was forced into a life of crime by his own parents, who’s whereabouts are unknown. When Jack met him, he was in the middle of a heist. Oddly enough, Jack offered to help and also offered to give him a place to stay and his own bearings should he choose to join Jack. Of course Raimondo accepted and thus became where he is now.

He deals with the happenings money wise, performing heists and stealing information from the enemy, sometimes working with Kasumi if needed. He is very cautious but very skilled at what he does.

Age: 17, black hair reaching towards his shoulders, and wavy, covering his right eye. Eyes are green, and often wears the color green.