#she just eyeballs everything and it somehow works out

[fruixtii]

why does my mom never follow the recipe 😭

[featherandferns]

Halloween and horror movies were nothing new, but JJ seemed bored by the concept... (MDNI)

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Outside on the porch sits Kiara's butchered children. At least, that's how she saw them. Her pumpkin babies that she'd planted and watered and kissed and nourished and grown from the ground up sat picked, gutted and carved. Inside were two tealights, creating an eerie glow through their hollow eyes. Yours was classic: two triangles above a brimming, fanged grin. JJ's? Your boyfriend had decided to create an homage to the stoner community: a joint sat between a doped smile, with half-set eyes somehow perfectly capturing that absent, blissed-out stare. Age appropriate? Absolutely not. But not a lot of children would come trick-or-treating out this way. With that in mind, yourself and the rest of the Pogues had opted for a movie night.

Nothing with the Pogues was ever simple. Sarah wanted to watch Beetlejuice but Cleo was adamant about a modern day horror. Pope swore against jump scares because it was cheap thrills and the science of a good psychological thriller is just too much of a mindbender to pass up on, right? Well, Kiara said that she thought psychological thrillers were trivial and dragged on. John B? He didn't want anything paranormal. That limited things quite a lot. What did you all agree on? The most harmless Halloween flick of all time: Hocus Pocus.

You're cuddled against your boyfriend on the farthest end of the old couch. A scratchy tweed blanket sits across both of your laps. Beneath it, JJ's hand rests comfortably on your thigh. In his other hand he hoards the bowl of Halloween candy. The lot of you were working your way through the gummy worms and chocolate eyeballs. Lights down, volume up, curtains closed: it was the picture of cosy, fall fun.

"This movie blows," JJ mumbles into your ear.

You roll your eyes and whisper back with a smile, "It's a classic."

"C.H.U.D. is way scarier."

"This isn't meant to be scary."

"But it's a Halloween movie. Isn't that the whole gimmick?"

"It's meant to be enchanting."

"La-de-da."

"Shush!" Kiara hisses from her spot on the floor. Her head turns so fast it reminds you of the exorcist, and that just makes you want to watch that movie again. Sighing, you sink against the warmth of your boyfriend. You had to agree: this was a lot better of a movie when you were a kid.

It's as if he can hear your boredom calling out to him. The moment Kie's attention is back on the crackly television screen, JJ's hand starts to shift. It's innocent at first, no different to the usual way he absentmindedly caresses at your skin. The first time his finger slips against your inner thigh, you think it's an accident. But then it's again, and it teases at the hem of your pyjama shorts, and you shoot him a look. The smirk on his face and the glint in your eyes tell you everything you need to know.

You lean up and hope it looks casual to your friends as you whisper into his ear, "we're literally watching a children's movie about witches with our friends right now. You cannot be horny."

"I'm bored," comes his excuse. "'Sides, they're all watching the movie. They're not even gonna notice."

You pull back to let your eyes flit across your friends. Pope and Cleo are in an armchair that you had thrifted, cuddled up, with Cleo half-asleep against his chest. Pope's eyes are so focused on the movie that you wonder if he's analysing each frame. John B lounges on the spot on the sofa near JJ, though there's a safe little gap between the two. He seems pretty hooked on the movie too. Kie and Sarah are on the floor sharing a bowl of popcorn.

JJ's hand continues to massage your thigh. His finger is ghostly in its teasing against your thigh, the touch just enough to wake up every neuron and every cell, but not enough to please them.

Your silent mark of consent to your ADHD ridden boyfriend is the slight opening of your legs, giving his hand more space to explore. You can see his grin in your peripheral. Talk about obvious.

But it becomes increasingly harder to care about the others in the room when JJ rubs your clit through your panties. Sighing slowly, relieved, your head leans against JJ's warm chest. It shakes with silent laughter and you debate cussing him out in front of everyone. The circles he draws are methodological; he knew your body like he'd read the handbook. Every touch and every kiss had reason and rhyme, and it had been months since JJ had struggled to flip on every switch that had your body singing.

Your cunt clenches around nothing as he picks up the pace and pressure. As the sounds of the movie fade away, you become keenly aware of your unsteady rise and fall of breath. The cool metal of his rings somehow bleeds through the thin veil of fabric as he fingers press against your slit. Teeth sinking into your lower lip, you fight away the moans and sighs of pleasure. The hot, damp feel of JJ's breath against your ear is cruel.

"So fuckin' dirty. Letting me feel you up right next to our friends, huh?"

You shoot him a glare but you know it falls flat when you're literally biting back the moans he's reasonable for. The weight of your look weakens as you chase your climax. So close, so close, so close...You rock forward gently when you come, before sinking back on your boyfriend. He eases up slowly, reeling it in. JJ plants kisses against your neck and behind your ear.

The moment your mind returns to your body, you're keenly aware of what just happened. You scan the other people in the room in mild panic to check nobody is shooting you disgusted daggers. But, no, everyone is still watching the three witches fly around on their mops and brooms and vacuum cleaners.

JJ's eyes find yours and you try your best to look unimpressed, but it's hard when your pussy is still convulsing. His voice is hushed and low when he teases with a grin:

"Guess you're not the virgin who lit the candle, huh?"

[icarusredwings]

Meanwhile, In the poolverse:

Piotr's Wade: Has anyone figured out a plan for me to see my mistress for longer than 3 minutes yet? Im so desperate im about to fuck a skeleton.

Nathans' wade: Okay so heres what were going to do, Okay, were going to go through time and steal the stones before he can-What the fuck are you doing?

Clint's wade: *subconsciously signing most of the cinversation* Oh sorry its a habit. But wouldn't that involve stealing from Loki?

The wade that has tried to get with Mobius and now is ashes with eyeballs: That's not gonna work... trust me..

Theresa's wade: Why does it even matter? She probably thinks were ugly anyway, I mean honestly why even bother?

*Both Tony's wades are fist fighting because both of them disagreed with each others plans*

Matt's wade: *trying to guide Bobbys wade, whos confusedly just glad to be incuded but has no clue how he got here* Come over here before I have to deck some motherfuckers. WATCH WHERE YOURE GOING!

Vanessa's and Val's wade: *Having a deep conversation about pegging in the middle of everything*

Harley's wade: Oohh!!! Lets smash him with a big hammer!!

O'hara's wade: You guys we cant just smash him with a big hammer, and even if we did somehow get the time stone from Loki, Its already a canon event.

Peter's wade: But guys, Peter says killing is wro-

All of them in union: WE FUCKING KNOW

Moonnight's wade: I think its ironic that both me and my 3 other boyfriends both are practically a god of death's muse... does anyone else think about that? No? Just me? Okay....

Shikla's wade: I think about it. I think about it a lot..... I miss my wife tails.

Tony's wade: I CAN'T BELIEVE THAT FUCKER MADE US IMMORTAL SO NOW I CAN'T KILL YOU

Other tony's wade: Kill me? HA! You can't even touch me!! You're too slow, old man.

Logan's Wade with his fat little dog and boyfriend on the couch: Babe can you turn up the channel? The voices are planning to try to kill Thanos again.

Logan: Tryna get revenge on him for forbading you from ever actually dying?

Wade: yyyuuppp........been there done that..

Logan: What?

Wade: Oh- Nothing..

[skyloftian-nutcase]

Okay, I'm way late on the prompt thing, but if you happen to still take them - or as something to hold onto for later - I'd love to see a little snippet from the ill-fated cruise ship HC Legend worked on!

Hadn’t there… been a storm? What…?

Link squinted against the bright sunlight, feeling sore and overheated, strangely stationary but still somehow dizzy. He heard seagulls, and—

Seagulls??

Groaning, Link opened his eyes, the sun seeming to shine directly into his eyeballs. What had happened??

“Link? Oh, you’re finally awake!”

He knew that voice. “Marin?”

The familiar face appeared in his vision next, red hair nearly radiant in the sunlight. She looked haggard, clothes a little torn, face flushed, hair a mess. “Oh, Link, I’m so glad you’re okay!”

“We’re on a beach,” Link slurred, completely disoriented. “Did we…? Weren’t we in a storm?”

“We were,” Marin answered, shadows covering her face all of a sudden. “We were.”

The heaviness of her tone made him nervous. Sitting up, Link looked around, seeing several life rafts strewn along the beach, alongside a handful of other people in various states of disarray. He felt the bottom drop out of his stomach.

They were… they were stranded, weren’t they?

“The ship…?” He looked at her, asking for confirmation.

She shook her head. “It’s gone.”

He already knew, really. He could put the pieces together. But hearing her say it made him feel his entire world flip. What were they supposed to do? Who had survived? How had he even gotten here, anyway? He just remembered the storm.

“I’m glad you’re okay,” Marin repeated. “When you got thrown I was so worried.”

When he got thrown? He remembered huddling in the medical bay with Marin; they’d both known it was too dangerous to be anywhere on the deck, exposed to the weather. He must have hit something.

“How did I get here, though?” He asked.

“Well, you were awake for a bit, just kind of groggy,” Marin explained. “The captain said the ship was sinking, we all got on life rafts, but the storm flipped some and… we managed to make it here with the rest.”

“And the other medical crew?”

“They’re… they’re gone, Link. They’re all gone.”

Gone?? How could they--he knew those people, had worked with them, they were--

Link grimaced as he moved his arm, staring at a large gash slicing along it. Marin helpfully grabbed a first aid kit, noting, “This is all we have left for medical supplies. This and one other, that is. But… it isn’t much.”

It… he… they…

This was insane. This couldn't be happening.

Shaking his head, Link tried to orient himself to the situation, slowly straightening his posture as he reached shakily for the first aid kit. “How many others are injured?”

“A few,” Marin answered, hastily adding, “I’m okay, though, don’t worry.”

Link looked her over. She was certainly run down, but he didn’t see any immediate signs of injury. Based on her story, they… hadn’t been thrown around too much, right?

Right?

But how had he gotten this wound, then?

Shaking his head, Link tried to focus. “Can you help me triage the others?”

Marin nodded, determined, reaching to help him stand. Link refused to let everything sink in all at once.

They had work to do.

[icamefromadream]

Character Quirks

Note: Idk when I wrote this but a lot of them suck.

╭┈��•◦❥•◦ Grabs onto things when slightly scared. Such as someone else's arm or just the wall or their shirt.

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Itches nose when lying

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Bites the sides of their nails when their nervous

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Massages their wrists when they get over-excited.

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Scrunched their nose when something smells or if it itches.

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Looks left/right when they try to remember something.

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Picks at their lip skin

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Does a handstand to remember stuff

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ reads out loud (force of habit)

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Extremely paranoid, stares off into the dark. Usually gets snapped back when someone touches them

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Kicks feet like child when nervous

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Gets excited when given ketchup packets

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Likes to have their feet cold when sleeping

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Flowers usually get tangled with them when they wake up (this is if the characters powers are nature stuff. Could work with other elements too such as sand, water, fire etc.)

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Falls asleep in random places, all snuggled up. (usually applies to characters with trauma, mainly because they're to scared to sleep at night)

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Clicks tongue a lot. (habit ig)

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Sends those emoji things usually formed of symbols in every text message. :>> :DD ;^; etc.

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Reaches out for phone at any minor inconvenience.

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Purses lips together when focused -looks unfocused but is focused

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Sits on chair at very weird and 'creative' positions when trying to focus

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ plays music when annoyed -sings when they think their alone

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Always looks at someone else when in disbelief.

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Looks at 'invisible camera' whenever surprised/scared/disbelif/haply/confused/etc. (like in thr office)

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Bling watches Lego ninjago(why did I choose this show?) when sad (or any other show ment for kids)

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Makes direct eye contact when speaking (sign of repect. Can be related to trauma somehow?)

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Looks anywhere BUT at a person's eyes. Stares usually at someone's eyebrows or forehead.

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Always buys new waterbottles but never drinks water.

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Eyes shake when scared -Scratches their neck whenever mad [at themselves]

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ fiddles with otherpwrsons hands when nervous (usually a partner)

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Loves painting. Can't paint. Rage quits. Ruins painting. Comes back. Paints about their rage. Gets bored. Leaves. Comes back to paint. Repeat.

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Writes about every detail of their day in journal (usually comes down to trauma, when characters get hypnotized or forced to forget.) -Hums. Whenever.

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ raises eyebrow when slightly irrated or annoyed.

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ soft spot for animals (and people who re.inds them of animals...leading to partner) -draws people as animals.

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Likes to get new hobbies all the time.

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Sets timer for everything that they do.

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ says happy birthday when giving someone something.

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Says "That was inconvenient...". at any minor inconvenience. (u could say something else.)

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ says "eating medicine" instead of taking medicines

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ mixes up drinking and eating.

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ "What are they gonna do, kill me?" ╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Refers to things as people. "Oh no, she broke" or "Can you feed him water?"(Talking to plants.)

╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Draws eyeballs on trh side of paper

[onlyrains]

hey there, i'd like to request a writing for yasushi if you don't mind. prompt can be up to you (surprise me!) thank you 🙌

a/n: i'm back with a request from a loooong time ago😫 i'm sorry for being inactive these past few months. life was harsh and now i'm trying to reorganized everything. thank you for requesting and i hope you like it!🩵

[9:16am]

—t/w: harsh words

smells of roses, blinding lights, and an odd repeating sound were things that came to your senses once you tried to crack open your eyes. it was heavy and hurts, but you gave all your strength to blink and think as you conclude that it wasn't your room.

clack.

someone entered your room and walked straight to the window on your right to close curtain so the lights would be more bearable for you.

"exc-"

"AAAAAH-" the man blurted out.

you really wanted to react the same but you felt something strangling your neck so only your eyeballs could follow his movements.

"you're sober!" he exclaimed excitedly.

"yeah, i think i am…?"

"wait, i'll call the doctor.” then he ran.

couple minutes later you found yourself being checked by several nurses and a doctor. they said you were okay and your condition was already stable—much better than before—which made you more confused.

“what happened to me?” you asked. a little hesitant at first but you couldn't fight the curiosity within you. he turned to make sure the doctor was gone and closed the door.

“you don't remember anything?”

“i remembered i was on my way home…” you stopped and so were your memory.

“you were hit by a car…”

“huh?” you almost turned your head to him but the throbbing neck muscle held you back.

he looked down before continuing. “my friend was testing his new car with me. we thought it was safer at midnight, we were wrong, we know that. he didn't see you crossing the road and … you know what happened next.”

you tried to proceed his words in your head but nothing came to your conclusion. it felt like your brain was stop working.

“w-when was it?” you asked startling.

“two days ago.”

“oh…”

“he tried to meet your family but it looks like you live alone…”

you weren't say a thing. nor did a thing. you were just staring blankly.

“but don't worry he will be responsible for all your care in this hospital.” yasushi added.

“where is he?”

“who?”

“your friend, who hit me.”

he sighed. “at work. he worked all day to pay your treatment and i'll be here all day to help you with anything you want.” a small reassuring smile painted on his lips.

you wanted to let your wrath out. to shout on his face. to pull his dry, damaged, neglected hair. to poke his doe eyes that constantly looking down. to punch his pursed lips. you really wanted to.

but you couldn't—physically and mentally.

thinking that they were responsible enough to paid the hospital costs and even take care of you 24/7 with that guilty expression, somehow melted your heart. moreover, you could finally rest from everything just as you wanted to without resigning from your work. you hadn't had a free day in two months and couldn't even take a furlough. so as silly as it sounds, this wasn't too bad for your sanity.

“he would come after work but it could be very late.”

“what's his name?”

“kiyoshi.”

“and you?”

“yasushi.”

you nodded. “how about you? didn’t you should be at work too?”

“we are actually students,” your eyes almost leave its place. “you know oya kou?” oh, the world must be joking with me.

“yeah, i know.” you can tell from his looks, honestly. but his demeanor didn't match it up at all so the thought wasn't even cross your head. of course you knew how brutal the student there. but was it because of his guilt? because of his—

“YASUSHI, IS SHE STILL UNCONSCIOUS?” you heard a slammed door with a loud voice entering your room. oh, maybe these are the real ones.

“shut the fuck up!” yasushi groaned. oh, there he is.

your three new visitors came up to you with a wonder look.

“hello?” you voiced.

“AHHH! she's alive!” the loudest one exclaimed.

“of course, you idiot!”

“don't be so loud, jamuo.” tsukasa added.

“are you … okay?” fujio asked, still with his curious look.

“no.” you replied quickly.

“of course.”

“i'm sorry, they are my friend. this is fujio, jamuo, and tsukasa.”

you nodded. “from oya kou too?”

“so you already know.” tsukasa interrupted made you tried to turn your head to see him.

yasushi quickly held your head still. “d-don't move your head too fast.” you knew your forehead was full of bandage but you could still feel his thumb brushing your temple a bit. why is this making it less hurting?

“okay.” you said quietly.

“…”

“i'm sorry this is happen to you.” tsukasa interrupting again but this time was very necessary—as he noticed yasushi's sudden tension.

your eyes now met tsukasa's.

“yasushi and kiyoshi are our friend, and here, fujio, is the student leader of oya kou. so we're here to make sure you're okay too and apologize properly.” the four of them started to stand together and then bowed to you for a few seconds. you just stared as much as you wanted to reciprocate.

“it's okay.” you said then they back to stood again.

jamuo sighed. “anyway, what a unique way to meet your crush, yasushi. finally, after a year of waiting.” he held his laugh.

yasushi turned with a unreadable expression. that was his last straw.

“GET THE FUCK OUTTA HERE YOU PIECE OF SHIT.”

and again. you just blinked and watched as much as you wanted to react to the announcement.

[rosainta]

Team Fortress 2: 12 Flash Fiction Excerpts

('ms pauling' by makani on DeviantArt: https://www.deviantart.com/makani/art/ms-pauling-208768568)

(Author's Notes (A/N) at the end. For now, enjoy these slices of TF2 writing cake, baked with the batter of my mind!) * * *

1 "The Runner's a Fool."

[Written 10-3-2024]

Scout’s heart was bursting as he ran through the underbrush.

He didn’t look back; he couldn’t. Not after what he saw. If he had known sooner, he might not have spent so much energy trying to woo her...

Maybe he wouldn’t have made such a fool of himself.

2 "Player of The Heart."

[Written 10-3-2024]

“Fine, one more time”, he grumbled.

Pauling gleamed as she turned to the tape player. Changing the song to something more romantic, she hummed along and placed herself into his arms. They began to sway with the music.

Sniper felt his heart racing, but his thoughts raced quicker.

He wondered: would the one he really loved be into this too?

3 "Long Overdue."

[Written 10-3-2024]

Spy knew what he had to do.

He sat down next to the crying boy, gently putting a hand on his back. “Screw off!” the younger yelled, pushing him away.

Seeing him like this broke him; it did every time. But he took a deep breath and said what he should have all those years ago:

“I am sorry, Scout.”

4 "What Happens if You Feed the Machine? (Or In This Case, Water It?)"

[Written 10-3-2024]

“Yer no fun, lad!”

“Come on now, you know how I’ve been goin’ dry...”

“What’s one bottle a’ scrumpy goin’ to do to you?”

“Well, let’s see here. How many eyeballs o’ yours do my teleporters teleport per use?”

“Er, one.”

“Well, expect that to be one less the next time ‘round, pardner.”

He chuckled, and in an instant, he gulped it all down.

5 "Soldier's Solace."

[Written 11-3-2024]

Soldier stared at the grand moon from the roof of the base.

After the day’s fighting and bread teleporting, the other mercenaries were off to bed. But Soldier remained, smiling contentedly from under his helmet without another care in the world.

Somehow, he knew that right then and for as long as he dreamed, everything would be alright.

6 "Буквы говорят о любви."

[Written 12-3-2024]

If Heavy learned one thing in all his years of studying Russian literature, it was that writing wasn’t something you did; it was something you became.

So, picking up the ink pen, he let his hand go and embodied with all he had what meant most to him.

“It is time I tell you, Doktor.”

7 "Like The Warmth of a Fireplace."

[Written 13-3-2024]

Pyro looked at Engineer as a child does a Mall Santa, clapping. “Huddah, huddah!”

“Okay, one more, just for you.”

The technician took a deep breath and began to strum on the old guitar, his low voice singing a song of pink skies. Pyro swayed to the beat in bliss.

And, with every hum, the two grew closer.

8 "A Smile Means A Million Words, That Is Until You Speak."

[Written 14-3-2024]

Scout liked sketching.

While words weren’t his forte, art allowed him to express what he felt but could never say. He licked his lips, furrowed his eyebrows, and furiously scratched at the page with a pencil. Every detail, every form-- they had to be perfect.

When he was done, he proudly smiled at his creation.

And it smiled back.

BONUS!

As he admired his creation, he didn’t notice Sniper approaching him.

“And just what are you scribblin' off today, mate?”

Scout snapped around, flustered. He wasn't expecting company, and especially not from him.

“A-ah, hey, Snipes!", he blurted out. "It's nothing, really. Just another drawing of Spy screwin’ those... stupid French bread swords, whatever ya' call 'em.”

As he stammered an excuse, his face slowly turning red, he didn’t realize that his creation's rough, sketched face-- a picture of the marksman himself!-- was peaking through the corner of the sketchbook in the crook of his arm. Sniper paused for a moment as he stared at the work in awe, its own happily gazing back at him. Then, snapping out of his trance, he wordlessly turned back to smile at the younger man.

“You’ve got some talent, kid," he said, softly. "Please, don’t waste it.”

Then, quick as he came, he ambled away.

Scout was left standing, bewildered, and admittedly a bit confused, and he slowly turned back to look back at his drawing.

He traced the rough face of the man, looking wistfully with a tinge of giddiness in his eyes.

“If only you knew...", he whispered to himself without thinking. "Maybe then I could draw you like one of my French girls.”

Then, upon realizing the stupidity of his own remark (and of its disgusting, Spy-related... Frenchness), he immediately gagged.

“Ew, crap, no!”

Somewhere in the distance, Spy instinctively rolled his eyes.

9 "I Feel Olive!"

[Written 15-3-2024]

Medic pinched his nose, a low groan rumbling from him.

"What is wrong, Doktor? You seem stressed", Heavy asked, concernedly lifting his nose from his book.

Medic turned to him, tired eyes smiling weakly. "Ah, it iz nothing. Just... ze dull, useless legal documents. You know, as per usual."

"Well, if it makes Medic feel any better, Heavy ran out of olive for sandvich, so eating it was practically useless! I could not even digest it without big frown", he said, frowning in turn.

He grumbled, continuing, "What Heavy means to say is... you are not alone in your troubles."

Medic paused for a bit, before laughing and grinning back at the giant. He was grateful for this goofy big old man.

"Oh, you alvays know what to say, Heavy. Come on, let us escape this prison of an office and find you that olive. I am getting quite hungry and ze papers can wait, after all!"

10 "Off-Target."

[Written 29-3-2024]

Scout's mind just. couldn't. think.

His head was jumbled, a puzzle with the pieces too lost in the messy maze of his brain ever to solve. He wished he could crack open his skull like he did the BLUs on the field; maybe that would knock some sense into him.

He really needed to focus. Sniper always did.

So, why couldn't he?

11 "Our Paths Shall Cross Again."

[Written 4-4-2024]

It pained him to see her like this.

So, for the first time in his life, he put his pride aside and took one last glance at the sleeping lady before leaving the room.

Scout wished he could stay all night and marvel at her familiar, sheer beauty, even as she slept so frail. But he knew what she needed most was not him, but help.

Who knew what she went through those 2 years?

He resigned himself to the couch, closing his eyes. His affections for Miss Pauling would have to wait, as they always did, but he was fine with that.

She was safe, and that’s what mattered most to him.

12 "Guess Who's Up For Surgery?"

[Written 6-4-2024]

Medic was practically laughing with joy! Or, in his peculiar case, cackling maniacally.

Ah, it was of no matter— the doctor was filled to the brim with inspiration! So many projects to start and bodies to stitch; oh, what a wonderful feeling!

Heavy smiled as he watched the doctor go about his merry way.

Sure, when he was in this mood, that likely meant imminent danger for all those around him (they’d be his newest experiment, no doubt), but seeing him happy always made Heavy’s heart feel a little lighter.

So, as the doctor bounced up to him with his newest rambling, he didn’t protest!

* * *

Author's Notes: Over the past weeks, I've been working on being more spontaneous in my writing—no planning, just writing with the flow! And what better way to do that than to write flash fiction about my favourite fandom? (Plus, I have been practically absent here (post-wise) for, what, months? So why not use this as an excuse to share them with you? Ehehe... Okay, let's forget I said anything; moving on!) Flash fiction, with its creative liberties and curt nature, is an excellent medium (not forgetting to mention the fact it's a disgracefully UNDERRATED form of media!) that inspires me to write because it sort of... brutally invalidates any excuse of author's block I have... since it is literally spilling the words from your conscience into text WITHOUT the worry of length (ah! My greatest enemies...). Plus, it is... sort of, maybe, kinda addicting because it's just so freakishly simple, and the more you do it, the more productive you'll be and feel! Isn't that wonderful? (It could even be a drug! Er, well, a good one... wait, is there even a thing as a good drug? Ah- nevermind.) Anyway, if you're struggling with author's block, I'd heavily recommend trying it. Of course, it may not work for everyone (and I am not here to legally endorse this like a paid sponsor!) but it's still worth a shot if you haven't yet already. And hey, if it doesn't, you can feel free to blame me for the waste of time! Don't worry, I won't mind. Before we go on, I have to take this moment now to thank the one sweet old woman (whom I've unfortunately forgotten the name of) who first taught me about it a few years back during a summer writing course. She taught me much about what I know and love today, so I owe this and much of my writing happiness and technique to her! Thank you, lady. May you continue to write on!! Anyhow, to give you more context, these are all excerpts taken from a private account (but not a secret one! It's out there... somewhere...) of mine, edited for quality purposes and also because a few of the original excerpts bugged me due to their... well, innate cringiness. Hopefully, there's less of it now, but I wouldn't count on my eradicating it as it seems that cringe is just a part of my habitual writing style (I am sorry to disappoint, unnamed woman from the course... I have failed you). I hope that at least is is bearable enough for you to read. However, if not, I offer you my greatest condolences. If you'd like some bleach for your eyes, I have that too. You can also tell by the number of Speeding Bullet and Red Oktoberfest excerpts that I was... in quite the shipping mood for some of them. So, if that doesn't bug you, feel free to indulge yourselves in these characters as I obsessively have over the course of writing these!! It would be my pleasure to offer that liberty to you (and perhaps, shamelessly to myself as well, ahaha..), so please, go ahead. Anyway, that's all of the random blurbs I have to ramble on about today. Thank you for reading- or skimming, at the very least- and please have a marvellous day, pally~!

~ Rosain Quivan

[thebluestbluewords]

is the worldbuilding in the room with us now?

"My sister is trying to court the little Tremaine." Freddie grumbles,rolling her eyes. And also her other eyes. All of the googly eyes she's got glued to her purse, and the embroidered ones on her coat all roll in sync with each other. The overall effect is very Isle chic. It's almost comforting. 

"If it helps at all, they're being very cute about it," Evie says, carefully maintaining her tone of absolute innocence. She certainly hasn't been encouraging Dizzy's advances, no siree. Freddie doesn't need to know about the cobweb coat that's hanging above Dizzy's table in the workshop right now. Evie's only been helping a little bit with the bedazzling. "I think they're sweet together." 

Freddie's eyes narrow. "Enabler." 

"Me? Fred, come on." 

Freddie swats at the hand that Evie's laid innocently on her chest. "You're enabling them somehow, I know it. Don't put on that act with me."

Evie swallows back her giggle. "No act, I just think they're sweet. They cuddle sometimes." 

Freddie growls, a low rumbling that picks up in her throat and reverberates through Evie's bones. "I'll kill her." 

"Which one?" Evie offers sweetly. "Because if you're looking to defend Celia's virtue, I think you're a little too late. That ship sailed while they were still living under the same roof." 

"You let them--" 

"I did. We were doing it at their age. We're fine." 

"I wouldn't call us--" Freddie sweeps both hands out in a broad gesture that somehow ecompasses both girls, her blinking eyeball purse, and Evie's glistening white kitchen as a whole. "Fine. I mean, look at this shit.  You have fake fruit on your counter." 

Evie snatches the glossed banana out of her friend's un-tender grip. "I have preserved fruit on my counter, actually. And it's there for a reason. Don't break it." 

Freddie relinquishes the banana, but leans back so she can cross her arms in an appropriately disapproving manner. "Why would I break you banana, princess?" 

"Lots of reasons. Maybe you have a grudge against bananas in general. Maybe you hate mine specifically. Maybe you've got a secret anti-fruit vendetta that you're acting upon one poor, unfortunate fruity soul at a time. Maybe," Evie leans in so they're nearly nose to nose. "You just want something from me, and abusing my fruit is the fastest way to get it." 

Freddie scoffs. 

"Hardly. What I want is to know why the hell you keep preserved fruit on your counter when any kid could come along and break a tooth on it." 

"It's a science experiment." 

Freddie's eyebrows crawl up her face. "Explain."

"Gladly. Everything arrives on the Isle already rotten, right?" 

"Right. Like us." 

Evie can be generous. She ignores this breach of manners, and forges ahead undaunted. "So, we deserve better than that. If we fix what arrives on the Isle, it goes a long way towards keeping things inhabitable, or at least bearable for the kids who are still stuck there while Ben works on the legal grounds to get them out safely.  I started a few experiments in food preservation, oh, maybe a few months ago?" 

"So this banana--" 

"Is four months old. Yes." 

Freddie lowers herself to go eye-to-eye with the preserved fruit bowl. "But it's solid." 

"Yes." 

"So if I peel this open..." 

Ah. No. 

"I didn't say that I've mastered the experiments yet," Evie says, sliding the bowl backwards before Freddie can try anything stupid. "I've succeeded in preserving some fruits, but the tradeoff is that they're currently fully preserved." 

"So?" 

"Inedible." Evie explains. "We preserved them too well. They'll just pass through your body fully undigested." 

"Gross." 

"You don't know gross until you're looking at a stool sample full of undigested orange chunks." Evie says grimly. "We almost called in Fairy Godmother for a case of magical poisoning before we realized that it wasn't organ tissue sloughing off on the way out." 

[trippygalaxy]

Ooooo??? I saw your post!! Sir Raven x oc??? 👀

Care to share maybe? 🥺👉👈

GASP! YES!!!

(picrews, not mine)

THIS IS VAL, or well, her full name is Valentina!

Shes a human witch, less booky/studies and more herbs/gut feeling- this doesnt mean she doesnt study or read, but she was more taught like how a grandma would teach their granddaughters to cook! Eyeballing it and somehow it just works! So she reads when she wants to learn new or different things about spells, or when shes learning about mythical/magic beings!

ANYWAYS

She and Sir Raven met when Raven first came to Holodrum. It was a more of a customer/seller relationship at first as the knight would come to Val when in need of potions, knowledge or help with things in more arcane nature. But after Veran (villain of the ooa game) took over Nayru (oracle of ages) and started to influence the Queen, she and Sir Raven began to hide people away in a hidden village to keep them safe from the Queen's growing tyrannical like ruling, which inturn caused them to start bonding more! Sadly, Raven often left the village to go back to the Queen as he was still her Knight, and a highly regarded one, to keep up appearences and to figure out what was happening to the ruler. Raven did not want to leave the village people by themselves, fearful of what would happen to them if the Queen's guards found them, but Val made a promise to the knight that she would look after them, doing everything in her power to keep them safe. She also shyly promised to greet the man everytime he returned to the village.

When Link comes around, Val very much acts like a mother figure to him, taking care of him and giving him protection charms and potions.

She and Sir Raven have a very...slow burn esk relationship! Both very focused on doing their respective jobs that its hard to grow anything, especially when you're worried about the other person dying. It consists of small acts between them, nights shared on patrols, reassuring words shared while bandaging the other up and other things!

Theres more to her, shes a big worrier and has this need to be perfect for the village, feeling like she cant be good enough for the people like Sir Raven is, and more! But didnt wanna dump it all on ya incase you got bored half way through!

[my-meadowlark]

Fic: Thermodynamics [Barbie/Gloria]

Title: Thermodynamics Fandom: Barbie (2023) Characters/Pairing: Barbie/Gloria Rating: T Word Count: 9,043 Summary:

Barbie has some serious trouble grasping the finer points of weather and humidity, which leads to her very first encounter with human illness. Gloria takes care of her, and some very confusing feelings accidentally come to the surface. Written for prompt #3 "Sickfic" of @tropetember

AO3 LINK

Water is extremely complicated.

Barbie honestly doesn't think humans realize just how complicated it truly is. And she's not even just talking about its fluidity and how infuriatingly hard it can be to contain it once it's decided to go everywhere at once (she's working on her accuracy when eyeballing the volume of liquid she can pour into a glass). Oh, no. That's, like, beginner level water-handling. It's the way water affects... everything else that keeps tripping her up.

Sometimes there'll be a day when the heat is so oppressive Barbie feels like she's trying to breathe with plastic lungs. And Gloria will nod sagely and simply say "it's the humidity" right before suggesting she take a quick cool shower like that won't just add even more humidity to the mix. But it works, somehow, until it doesn't because she's out of the shower and her damp hair has gone from keeping her scalp cool to weighing her entire body down until she feels absolutely, indescribably gross.

"Yeah. It's the humidity," Sasha will say when Barbie mentions how she can't even tell where the dampness from the shower ends and her own sweat begins and are they sure she's not melting? It's the humidity but if you add more humidity by hanging a wet towel in front of the fan it helps. Yeah. Okay.

Eventually, by the end of her first Summer in the Real World, Barbie thinks she has somewhat grasped the basics of water when it comes to temperature. Water can cool you down if you drink it or pour it over yourself or blow air through it (the bowl of ice trick Sasha saw on TikTok worked even better than the wet towel one). But it will warm you up if it's naturally in the air (humidity is her least favorite word).

She can work with that.

"If you go out later you may want to wear a jacket," Gloria says over breakfast one late October morning, "it's a bit nippy outside."

Barbie likes the sound of that. Nippy. It sounds fun. Playful, even. She's nowhere near bored of the Real World yet, but she'll admit some things have become so routine by now she barely even notices them anymore, and that makes her a little sad. She misses the feeling of absolutely every experience being brand new and exciting. So, nippy weather, huh? Sounds like a good time to her!

As it turns out, she enjoys nippy. The cooler air feels so different on her skin. She gets goosebumps like when she takes too long drying off after a shower, but they're not exactly the same kind. She doesn't notice when she breathes anymore because she's been doing it for several months now, but she does notice when she breathes in the colder air. She feels it going all the way into her lungs. Through her trachea and into her bronchi and bronchioles and filling up her alveoli like tiny little balloons.

She loves Sasha's Bio textbook.

So, when a couple months later, she hears the words 'cold snap' while watching the weather report, Barbie is nothing short of delighted. Nippy was fun, so she's sure a snap can only be even better, right? A snap. Fun!

"Do you think we'll get any snow?" Sasha circles the coffee table for the third time, open backpack in her hand, like she's expecting whatever she can't find to magically appear if she looks at the exact same spot the correct number of times. "Like, not downtown obviously, but nearby? Hey Barbie, where'd you put my Chem book?"

"Oh, I left it on your desk. Thanks for letting me borrow it! I loved reading the little intro about water's specific heat capacity but I need way more information than that so I think I'll go to the library later." She feels like she's found the path to understanding water and its weird behaviors, and she can't wait to pay a visit to her favorite librarian. Sasha insists she should just Wikipedia stuff, but Barbie likes the face-to-face interaction and the fun of going from book to book like she's on a scavenger hunt.

"Okay, Nerd Barbie."

"Tone," Gloria warns, one finger pointing in Sasha's general direction in a slight sweeping motion that means she's not really in any trouble at all. You can tell a lot from the exact way Gloria points a finger at you, especially when you pay as much attention as Barbie does.

"Sorry," Sasha lies (Barbie can tell when that happens, too), already on her way to her bedroom, "but you gotta admit it is kinda nerdy."

Gloria chooses to ignore that particular comment and focus on the earlier part of the conversation instead. "I don't know about snow. Maybe. We got some nearby last year."

Barbie's been in the Real World for long enough to know even the things they do have back home, like snow, are completely different here. Because they're real. "Gloria? What does snow feel like?"

"It's like—" Gloria stops pouring coffee into her thermos to think for a moment. She can answer easy questions while doing other stuff, Barbie's found, but when it's a hard one, or when she really cares about giving a thoughtful answer, she has to fully focus on her thoughts. Watching it happen makes a very particular warmth start somewhere in the vicinity of where Barbie's heart is and then spread out towards her lungs and down to her lower abdomen where it pools like... like something both warm and fizzy, somehow. Like warm soda pop, but not nearly as disgusting as that sounds. She hasn't found an explanation to that particular phenomenon in any of the human biology books she's read so far.

"It's like a snow cone, but like, without the syrup obviously." Sasha's voice travels through the open door of her bedroom and snaps Barbie back to reality, pulling her focus away from the mysterious Gloria-related effervescence in her belly. "And it's cold. And wet. It doesn't look like it should get your clothes wet, but it totally does."

See? Water. Doing unexpected things once again, even in solid form.

"I'd love to see it. Do you think it'll happen soon?"

"Maybe, yeah! You heard the weather guy." Gloria grabs Barbie's house keys instead of her own car keys, like she does nearly every morning. And like nearly every morning, Barbie notices before Gloria does and picks up the forgotten car keys, jiggling them to bring Gloria's attention to her mistake. "Shoot, thank you, Barbie. Sasha! We're gonna be late!"

"And, you know," Gloria continues, her voice down to a conversational tone once again, "even if it doesn't snow right here, we can plan a weekend getaway some time. Do some sledding, maybe skiing or even snowb—"

"I vote Switzerland," Sasha interrupts, walking past her mother towards the front door, "for the chocolate. And the cheese. Wait, do you have a passport? Can you even get a passport?"

"Right," Gloria says, "let's aim for Big Bear Lake or even Tahoe this year. I don't think we're at the international travel level just yet."

Gloria winks at Barbie like she's in on some kind of joke. Like they've just told someone Barbie's spent most of her life in Australia and that's why she's not fully confident with American money yet, and it's funny because they both know that's not the reason but it's a completely harmless fib. Barbie has no idea why Gloria is winking right now (international travel does sound complicated, and Sasha brought up a valid point about passports, whatever those are) but she smiles anyway, the kind of smile that's so wide she can feel it on her cheeks and in the crinkle of her eyes. She may not know exactly what the joke is, but whatever it is is between her and Gloria, and that's good enough for her.

"See you at lunch time?" Gloria is already halfway through the front door when she asks, like Barbie hasn't had lunch with her every single day since she arrived in the Real World. She even has a favorite taco truck that stops near the Mattel headquarters every other day.

So Barbie just lets her smile answer for her.

Later, Barbie finds out the cold snap is not fun. At all. As it turns out, there is a drastic difference between nippy and cold (Sasha's insistence that it doesn't even get really cold in LA does not help Barbie feel any better about it), and Barbie is firmly against cold as a weather concept, thank you very much.

It's interesting at first. It's like nippy, but more. Sharper against her skin and in her lungs and on the tip of her nose. But soon enough it becomes uncomfortable. Just like the heat in the Summer, it seems to permeate her clothes and then her skin and all its layers until she feels like it's inside her and there's no getting rid of it. Gloria recommends a warm shower, which helps just like the cool ones in the Summer did. Barbie figures she can let her damp hair do what it did back then and become warmer with time, but Gloria already has the blow dryer in her hand when she steps out of the bathroom, and Barbie is more than happy to let her play with her hair for as long as Gloria wants.

On the second day of the cold snap, the weather guy informs there's a low-pressure system bringing in higher humidity, and Barbie breathes a sigh of relief. Humidity makes things hotter. It makes you sweat. If heat plus humidity equals being slowly cooked in your own juices, then cold plus humidity should equal something between pleasant and slightly nippy, right?

See, she's been reading about thermodynamics. It's all about equilibrium, as it turns out.

So you can imagine her surprise (and, frankly, outrage) when she goes out in a light cardigan and finds herself standing in what can only be described as an outdoors fridge. Ridiculous. It's ridiculous and wrong and downright unfair, because the air is cold and the humidity is in there and she's been reading those books that say the heat will go from the hotter substance into the cooler one until they reach thermodynamic equilibrium so why is the moisture not heating up the cold air? Why is the air somehow even colder than yesterday?

Barbie feels her eyes sting with tears and she's not sure if they're from the sheer frustration of feeling like the laws of Physics keep tricking her, or from the cold air hitting her eyeballs. She figures it's a combination of both of those things.

All she wants is to go back into the warmth of their home, but it feels like letting the humidity win, somehow. Like going back inside is admitting defeat. And Barbara Millicent Handler may be many things (she's still figuring out which things she is, as a matter of fact) but she's absolutely not the kind of woman who gets defeated by moisture, of all things.

No way.

So, frown in place and arms tightly wrapped around herself and her puny cardigan, she marches towards the library determined to figure out this humidity nonsense before lunchtime. It can't be this hard. Everyone else seems to get it. There has to be something she's missing.

Her favorite librarian is helpful as always, even offering Barbie a cup of hot cocoa from the coffee machine when she notices the way her teeth chatter as she asks for another book on thermodynamics.

"Is there anything in particular you want to research?" She asks, and is kind enough not to mention the way Barbie's eyes water all over again when her nearly numb fingers wrap around the warm paper cup. "We may have better luck finding exactly what you're looking for if we narrow the field a bit more."

Fifteen minutes later, Barbie's sitting at her usual table with a book about weather that has her feeling so giddy she's no longer thinking about the cold. Well, she's thinking about cold as a concept. Just not about how cold she was just a moment ago. Sasha can insist all she wants: there's no way her beloved Wikipedia would've provided not only the perfect book, but also the perfect hot beverage.

Once she's finished her cocoa, Barbie opens the book and immediately realizes she's found a whole area of knowledge she didn't even know existed. Weather seems simple enough on the surface, but the more she reads, the more she realizes just how much there is to learn about it. By page four she's feeling so full of excitement about all the things she's about to discover that she actually giggles out loud. By page ten, she's wondering why the weather segment is always so short when there's so much to talk about.

"Barbara?" The librarian's soft voice pulls Barbie's attention from a two-page illustrated guide to cloud shapes. She's got to tell Gloria about lenticular clouds. "I hate to interrupt your reading, but you always leave at eleven, so—"

"Oh?" Eleven. Gloria. Lunch. "Oh! Thank you so much, Evelyn."

She rushes out of the library with the reassurance that Evelyn will make sure nobody checks out the book before tomorrow and makes it to the bus stop with six minutes to spare (running helps with the cold, she finds) according to the clock on her phone. And she has only been waiting for a minute when she feels a drop of water on the very cold tip of her nose.

"Oh, no."

It doesn't rain often in Los Angeles, but she's already experienced a couple of rainy days and she can recognize the first sign. Rain is a lot like crying, in that you get one drop first and then a whole bunch of them with no warning at all.

By the time the bus stops in front of her, she feels like she's spent the last five minutes taking a cold shower with her clothes on.

The bus ride to the Mattel headquarters is not very long, but when she gets off at her stop Barbie feels like even her bones are soaked through. Her clothes stick to her skin, cold and heavy and wet, and (thermodynamic equilibrium!) seem to be sapping every last kilojoule of body heat out of her. She feels like there isn't an amount of hot cocoa in the world that could possibly warm her back up.

"Barbie! Oh, honey, didn't you bring— I should've told you to grab an umbrella. Why aren't you wearing your coat?" Gloria is waiting at the bus stop like always, dry under her umbrella and toasty warm inside her fleece-lined rain coat. "Why aren't you wearing your boots!?" Gloria looks at Barbie's soaked tennis shoes like the sight of wet feet is something out of her wildest nightmares.

"I just—" Barbie feels her chin tremble. It's half shivers and half wanting to cry from just how uncomfortable she feels standing in the cold (at least Gloria's pulled her under her umbrella so she's not getting rained on anymore) in soaking wet clothes. And shoes. And socks. "I just thought—" Barbie shakes her head just as the first tear falls, "I just don't get humidity, okay!?"

"Humidit—?" Gloria shakes her head slightly, like she's decided halfway through her question that she's not actually going to focus on that right now. "Oh, look at you," Gloria's fingers feel soft and warm against her skin when she gently brushes strands of wet blond hair away from her forehead, "why didn't you go back inside when you saw it was raining?"

Barbie shrugs and sniffles slightly. Sometimes being a real person is a bit much for her. There are too many things to feel all at once. And she was already close to the point of being overwhelmed by all the terrible feelings from before — cold and uncomfortable and wet and sad and confused and frustrated — but now there are all these new things added to the mix, and she doesn't even have a name for most of them. The feeling of being very close to someone under an umbrella while it rains. Is there a name for that feeling? The feeling when someone's voice is so soothing it feels like you're being wrapped up in the softest blanket in the world. The feeling when being near someone makes all the bad feelings fade into the background until they barely register anymore.

The feeling of someone catching one of your tears with the pad of her thumb and then pressing her warm palm against your cheek. Is there a name for that? Because it spreads from the point of contact between Gloria's hand and her face, filling her up with whatever the feeling is called until there's simply no room for cold anymore and all she can feel is that.

"I didn't want to miss lunch," she finally says, leaning into Gloria's touch and adding another feeling to the mix when Gloria smiles.

And for a handful of heartbeats they just stand there, Gloria's hand on her cheek, thumb brushing softly against her skin, like they're both a bit too busy feeling to do anything else.

"Let's get you home," Gloria finally says. She moves her hand away from Barbie's cheek and holds the umbrella in her direction. "Here, hold this for me for a second." And when Barbie does, Gloria quickly unbuttons her raincoat and slides it off to wrap it around Barbie's shoulders instead. "Better?"

Barbie nods. The fleece lining is warm from being wrapped around Gloria and it smells faintly of her perfume, and "home" is the closest she can get to finding a name for the feeling in her chest.

"Come on," Gloria lets Barbie hold the umbrella and loops one arm through Barbie's so they can walk close together towards the car, "I don't want you to get sick."

—-

Gloria practically shoves her into the hot shower the second they walk through the door. And if her brain felt even just a bit less foggy, Barbie would've had a thought or two about one kind of water being the cure for another kind of water, but she can't focus on that right now. She's never felt worse in all her months as a human woman. She's cold even if her skin gets warmed up by the hot water. She keeps shivering but she can feel herself sweat. She keeps sneezing, and every sneeze makes her head hurt.

"This is the worst day ever." Barbie pouts, sitting on the couch with a flannel blanket wrapped tightly around her body. The words scratch against her throat as they come out in the most annoying way.

"I know," Gloria says, tone sympathetic from the kitchen area, "I'm sorry, honey."

They've been home for a few hours now — Gloria decided Barbie's first brush with sickness was more important than the rest of her work day, and Mattel agreed — and Barbie keeps feeling steadily worse with every passing minute. At first she was just cold and wet. Now she feels like she's been run over by a cold, wet truck.

"Here," Gloria hands her a bowl of hot chicken soup and sits next to her, "it'll make you feel better. I promise."

It doesn't work right away, but it's delicious and it soothes her throat as it goes down so Barbie can't complain at all.

"How are your feet?" Gloria slips one hand under the blanket to feel around for one of Barbie's feet, both of them safely wrapped in the warmest, fluffiest socks she's ever worn. Barbie doesn't think she's ever seen Gloria look as horrified as she did when she saw Barbie's drenched socks before.

"Warm," Barbie offers, even if she's sure Gloria can tell when she lightly squeezes one of them.

"Good. That's good." Gloria lets go of her foot and fixes the blanket, tightly tucking it under Barbie's legs. "That's good," she repeats, softer this time, like she's talking to herself. She doesn't speak again until Barbie's left the nearly empty bowl on the coffee table.

"I'm sorry you're not feeling well." In her time in the Real World, Barbie's learned people often say things like 'I'm sorry' without really meaning them. Just because it's polite. But she can tell Gloria means it in the most literal, true sense of the words. She can see the sorrow in dark brown eyes, in the worry lines on her face, in the way she moves around Barbie, like she used to be made of the most delicate porcelain instead of plastic. "I wish I had a magic cure."

Barbie can tell she means that, too.

What Barbie can't do is understand why the thought of Gloria snapping her fingers and making it all go back to normal doesn't sound nearly as appealing as it probably should. She wouldn't miss the shivers or the sneezing, but she thinks she'd miss the way Gloria's stayed close all afternoon, making sure she's okay.

"You should go to bed. Chicken soup and rest is the best remedy for the sniffles."

Barbie nods. She's not exactly tired, but she doesn't feel like being awake either. Being sick, unsurprisingly, is no fun at all.

"Shouldn't Sasha be home already?" Barbie stands up from the couch, bringing the blanket along like a long, fluffy dress. "It's Wednesday so she doesn't have practice."

Gloria smiles the specific smile she reserves for moments when Barbie remembers details about her or Sasha. She's noticed.

"She's staying over at Mei's to finish a project. She asked for permission in the car this morning." Gloria watches Barbie take the first few steps away from the couch like she's not sure she'll manage without falling over, and breathes a sigh that sounds a lot like relief when Barbie manages to stay upright. "I'm here if you need me, okay?"

Barbie smiles, because she already knows.

—-

"Hey." Gloria's voice is barely above a whisper. Barbie's bedroom is dark except for the warm light sneaking in from the hallway through the halfway open door. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to wake you."

Barbie has never had as much trouble figuring out whether she's awake or still fast asleep as she does right now, with Gloria sitting on the edge of her bed and tucking Barbie's hair behind her ear.

"How are you feeling?"

Barbie wants to answer. She wants to say she's not sure, because she isn't even sure this is really real or just a warm, hazy dream. But Gloria's fingertips brush against Barbie's warm skin as she moves her hand from Barbie's ear to her temple, and then Gloria's slightly cooler palm presses against Barbie's forehead, and all she can do is breathe.

"Oh, that's too warm." Gloria sighs, and Barbie feels the soft whoosh of the air leaving Gloria's lungs and hitting her skin as Gloria leans in to press her lips against her forehead.

It's not a kiss. It's just a press. The softest ghost of a touch. And Barbie realizes in that very moment that she's forgotten how to breathe, but her heart seems to have decided to beat twice as fast to make up for it so she figures she'll be fine.

Gloria remains so close when she pulls away that Barbie can't really tell if she's hearing her or just feeling the words against her skin when she speaks again. "Family trick. You can tell if there's a fever easier with your lips than with your hand."

Barbie nods, maybe a little dumbly. She's never had a fever, but she knows the concept of it. And she definitely feels like her body temperature is much higher than just a few seconds ago.

"Can you sit up?" Gloria turns towards the side table while Barbie rearranges herself against the headboard. The light from the hallway is enough for Barbie to make out a water bottle and a glass, and she watches with fascination as Gloria carefully pours some water and then shakes a little packet of something and adds its contents to the glass. "Here. Take this. If the fever hasn't budged by tomorrow we'll call the doctor, okay?"

Barbie nods again. She's never tried drinking water in bed — that seems, frankly, like the sort of advanced fluid dynamics she should not be trusted with just yet — but Gloria seems very sure of this whole process and Barbie doesn't think she can speak right now, let alone argue with Gloria's instructions.

As it turns out, she shouldn't have worried at all. Because Gloria's hands don't leave hers when she hands Barbie the glass. One warm hand remains covering Barbie's, steadying her fingers around the cool glass, and the other rests gently on the back of her head. It feels like a reminder that Gloria will catch her if she falls.

"I'm not gonna lie to you, it doesn't taste good at all, but I don't think this is the time to learn how to swallow pills," Gloria says, and Barbie looks into the glass even if she can't really see what the liquid looks like with such little light. She can hear it fizzling, louder and faster than any soda she's tried so far (and she's tried a few). It smells oddly... synthetic. Like it doesn't belong in the Real World. "It'll make you feel better. I promise."

It tastes even worse than she imagined. It tastes like nothing she's ever tasted in her short human life. It tastes like something not meant to go inside or even near a human body at all. It tastes so bad she lets out a horrified gasp at the end because she's honestly a bit surprised the awful taste didn't kill her.

"That was—" Barbie struggles to form the words around the lingering taste coating her tongue.

"I know." There's the slightest bit of amusement in Gloria's voice, even if she still mostly sounds concerned. "I know, honey, I'm sorry. Here, have some water. Wash off the taste."

Water only really helps a little bit. The aftertaste remains, gross and bitter and metallic— no. Not metallic. Plasticky. She wonders if her face will ever go back to normal again or it will simply remain in a slight grimace forever.

Barbie rests against her pillow once again with a sigh. She's oddly tired but in a nebulous sort of way, not in the same way she's tired after a long day or after a trip to the mall with Sasha.

"I hate being sick," she says, bottom lip jutting out in a slight pout. She hates that it makes everything she's slowly gotten used to about being human feel just off enough to keep her constantly uncomfortable. She hates that her thoughts feel fuzzy (not in a good way) and slow. She hates everything about it.

"That's a very human emotion, if it helps you feel better at all."

Barbie's never been to the desert. She doesn't know what a glass of water may feel like under those circumstances. But she thinks it must feel similar to hearing Gloria's soft voice right now. Like the one thing that feels good when everything else sucks.

"You help me feel better."

It's not the first time she's said something similar to Gloria. Barbie appreciates everything Gloria's done for her since coming to live in the Real World, and she makes sure to be very vocal with that appreciation. But it feels a little different when she says it right now. Like there's something extra weighing down the words.

"Yeah?" Gloria smiles, Barbie thinks, but there's not enough light to be sure. She thinks she hears it in her voice anyway.

Barbie nods and reaches for Gloria's hand. It's warm against her own even if it felt cool against her forehead before, and Barbie briefly wonders whether Gloria's lips would feel different against her hand, too. What they'd feel against her—

"That's good," Gloria says, soft and quiet like a secret, fingers squeezing Barbie's, "I want you to feel good."

And it feels like there's a weight to Gloria's words, too. It feels like the air around them is thick with things they both mean but neither say. And then Gloria leans in and Barbie thinks maybe she's going to check her temperature with her lips again, or maybe she's going to do something else entirely, and maybe Barbie's human body picks up on things her brain can't quite grasp just yet because she feels herself... react. Her skin tingles and her stomach flip-flops and her lips part because her breaths are just a little bit shallower and her heart beats just a little bit faster and she's fairly sure her entire nervous system has been rerouted to her hand and her fingers as they slot in the spaces between Gloria's and whatever Gloria is going to do Barbie just knows she wants it to happen, and then—

Nothing.

Nothing happens.

Gloria sits up straight once again and Barbie can tell what she feels is loss even if she still doesn't know what was going to happen.

"You should go back to sleep," Gloria says, a little breathless, fingers still tangled with Barbie's, "get some rest."

But Gloria doesn't stand up or let go of Barbie's hand, and honestly the thought of that happening — the thought of Gloria leaving her right now — makes something twist uncomfortably in Barbie's chest, so she decides to say something before Gloria can change her mind.

"Can you stay with me?"

Gloria doesn't answer right away. Her thumb rubs gently against Barbie's knuckles, and the air fills up with unsaid things once again, only this time it's uncomfortable and a little oppressive. It reminds Barbie of the humidity on hot summer days.

"I don't—"

"You don't have to." Barbie quickly clarifies, because something about this situation has clearly made Gloria uncomfortable, and that's the last thing Barbie wants. "Of course you don't have to, I'm sorry." But when she lets go and pulls her hand away, Gloria's hand chases it and holds it once again.

"It's not— that."

Is this conversation particularly cryptic and heavy on subtext, or is it normal and Barbie's cold-impaired brain is just a bit too slow to follow it like it normally would?

"I want to stay with you. I just wonder—" Barbie hears a sigh, and it's not an exasperated one or a tired one or even a sad one. It's a different kind of sigh. Barbie doesn't think she's ever heard Gloria let out that kind of sigh before. "Because you don't have all the context for this stuff, right?"

Barbie feels herself nod even if she honestly, truly has no idea what Gloria is even referring to. Maybe that's the lack of context she means.

"So I'm not sure if we're looking at things the same way or if you even— if you know what's happening sometimes. You know?"

Barbie is nearly sure this has something to do with before. With the moment Gloria leaned in and something almost happened but didn't.

"The last thing I want to do is hurt you. And if I cross a line and then you didn't want to or— God, or you didn't even know there was a line, I just—" Gloria shakes her head and squeezes Barbie's fingers for just a second, and Barbie still doesn't know exactly what they're talking about but she knows she wants Gloria to not be upset.

"I trust you."

Barbie's words are soft and quiet but there's nothing unsure or tentative about them and she thinks maybe that's why Gloria seems to snap out of her previous thoughts as quickly as she does.

"What? What do you—?"

"I trust you," she says again, "so I'm not worried."

It's not that simple, she knows. She knows almost nothing in the Real World is ever simple or easy, and especially not things involving feelings and worries and potential hurt. But she thinks maybe knowing Barbie feels like she's in excellent hands, like she has nothing to worry about as long as Gloria is with her, will help. Maybe it can be enough for now.

And it looks like it may be, for a while. Gloria doesn't speak for a few moments, and the silence that settles around them is comfortable and light to the point where Barbie feels herself relax into the pillows as her body grows heavier with sleep. She's tired but she's not as achy anymore, and the room is mostly dark and her hand is warm and safe in Gloria's. It would be so easy to just fall asleep.

"I just—" Gloria's voice is softer than before. So soft, actually, that Barbie doesn't feel like she's expected to make an effort to stay awake. "I don't want to ruin things. I don't want this to change."

Barbie isn't sure Gloria is actually talking to her. She sounds a bit like she's talking to herself, like when she's going through the shopping list in her head to make sure it's all in there before she leaves the house. But Barbie feels like maybe this is a rare moment where she knows something Gloria doesn't. Or, more accurately, she knows something Gloria knows, but isn't thinking about right now.

"But that's life," Barbie says, and even she can tell her words sound a bit muffled by sleep, "it's all change."

Her eyelids are so heavy. The room is mostly dark anyway, so she can't see Gloria but she hears a huff of something that sounds almost like laughter, but not quite.

"You were right, you know," Gloria whispers, like it's a secret, "it is terrifying."

It could be the disgusting powder in the water from before muddling her thoughts. It could be the fever, or the cold, or really just being so close to asleep that her brain isn't working right. But Barbie feels like it's been years and decades and centuries since she was sitting on that patch of plastic grass, fighting against the notion of change and imperfection and the unknown.

She was right, like Gloria says, in some ways. The cold is awful. She could do without humidity as a concept. Being sick? She would not recommend it. Pockets weren't really a thing in Barbieland but they're a basic necessity in the Real World and there seems to be a global plot to not put any in clothes marketed towards women. And you do not want to know what happens to milk when you forget it on the counter overnight in the Summer.

But now she knows what it feels like to drink a glass of water when you wake up parched in the middle of the night. She knows what it feels like to bite into a blueberry muffin and get that perfect spot of soft, warm, blueberry-infused cake. She knows the feeling of freshly washed sheets against her skin after a long day. She knows the smell of Gloria's hair when it's late at night and they stay up too late watching old films Barbie's never even heard of but Gloria insists they are a 'must watch' but then she falls asleep halfway through and Barbie pays more attention to the weight of Gloria's head on her shoulder than whatever cinematic masterpiece is playing in front of her.

"Yeah," she finally agrees, because she'd be lying if she said she's not scared at all about all the bad feelings she's sure she'll inevitably discover in her years as a human woman, "but it's worth it."

She thinks she sees Gloria nod right before she finally gives in and closes her eyes. A little later, she thinks she feels Gloria's lips against her temple once again, but she's nearly sure it was the start of a dream.

—-

Barbie's cold lasts less than twenty-four hours.

She's fine the next morning. A little groggy from sleeping twelve hours straight, but all her body parts feel fine and free from aches, there isn't a shiver in sight, and if Gloria hadn't made her promise she'd stay in the house just to make sure she's fully recovered, she would have happily taken the bus and joined her for lunch.

It's one of the most boring days she remembers, but she's fine.

She's fine the day after that, too, when she returns to the library and to her Weather Encyclopedia. She's fine when the cold snap officially ends and the weather goes back to a very boring yet pleasant "mild". She's fine! She's fine.

It's just—

Sometimes she thinks about those few hours between getting home soaking wet and miserable after her mishap in the rain and feeling (or imagining?) Gloria's lips against her temple. And the memories are just hazy enough that she wouldn't be able to say what exactly she and Gloria said, or what she did beyond sleeping and drinking the most vile — yet effective — medicine in the world, but the feelings.

The feelings are so clear in her mind she feels like her brain is taunting her by interrupting her normal thoughts with flashes of Gloria's hand around hers and Gloria's lips against her skin and a moment when Gloria leaned in and then nothing happened. And that moment haunts her in a way that has her unable to fully focus on things like dew point and wet bulb temperature and tsunamis. Her brain keeps circling back to it over and over and over again and she keeps hearing Gloria's words — words about missing context and lines that may or may not exist — and it's driving her a little insane.

She could ask Evelyn, of course. The librarian is so smart, Barbie's sure she could explain or at least point her in the direction of the right book to research it, but it feels... it feels...

It feels hers. Theirs, maybe. Hers and Gloria's. It feels like something she doesn't want to share with anyone else. And a few times she considers asking Gloria herself. Asking her for context or an explanation or even just asking her if she's aware that something almost happened, too. But it's scary in a way she can't exactly pinpoint, and though so far all the risks she's taken since this whole humanity adventure started have worked out for her, there's something about this particular one that gives her pause.

So she doesn't ask. And she's fine. Kind of. Mostly.

Until she suddenly has an epiphany. She's watching daytime television, which may not be the pinnacle of cinematic arts but has its charm. Soap operas feel like crash courses in human emotions, and Barbie likes to indulge from time to time. And she's doing just that when she witnesses a scene that makes her understand why light bulbs are used as metaphors for having ideas. Because she sees a very beautiful woman about to die in a hospital bed, and she sees the Ken-like man standing by her with tastefully glistening eyes, and she sees him confess his secret love for her. And it all makes sense.

This isn't her first 'deathbed confessions' scene, but she hadn't made the connection until now: people say things when other people are dying. Things they may not say when nobody is about to die. And it doesn't even have to be something as drastic as dying, actually. When she was sick, Gloria talked about lines and context, about changes and being terrified. Barbie didn't have to ask, Gloria just talked about them on her own.

Clearly, the way to get the answers she desperately needs is to recreate the exact situation once again. It's a foolproof plan.

So she... lies.

Okay, calling it a lie may be a bit of an exaggeration. It's playing pretend. A fib, at most. It's nothing, in the grand scheme of things. She feels suitably guilty, if that helps her case at all. And when she calls Gloria to tell her she won't be joining her for lunch because she has a bit of a cold, she makes sure Gloria understands it's nothing serious and she doesn't need to take the afternoon off.

She thinks that's just about as ethically sound as she can make this whole plan.

"Hey," Gloria says when she walks into Barbie's room, quiet and soft like last time, "how are you feeling?"

And then Gloria does it again. She presses her palm against Barbie's forehead, and Barbie's eyes flutter closed because when you don't actually have a cold everything feels a little crisper and sharper than when you do.

"I don't think you have a fever. You don't feel too warm."

Barbie's not proud of herself for what she does next. She just wants to make that clear. She's not proud at all but she does it anyway because there are some weaknesses that come with being a human, and this is clearly hers.

"Are you sure?" Did she just infuse her voice with just a hint of a pained tone? Perhaps.

"Well, I don't know," Gloria concedes, and then she leans in and presses her lips against Barbie's forehead and her hair smells like her conditioner but not exactly like it does when it's in the bottle (Barbie's smelled it). It's an entirely different, unique smell that's a mixture of conditioner and Gloria filling Barbie's lungs, and she decides a fib can be worth it sometimes.

"No fever." Barbie can hear the smile in Gloria's voice. "Looks like you're already on the mend. I'll make you some soup for dinner and you'll be just fine in the morning."

And Gloria is already turning to walk out of the room, clearly relieved and happy to see Barbie's sickness was nothing serious. And it's not that Barbie wants her to worry. She doesn't. Not at all. She just feels like she's missing her chance to finally know the answers to all the questions in her head.

"Wait! Wait, I—" She what? She's not going to fake a serious illness, that would be just plain mean. But she needs Gloria to stay. "I think you need to double check."

Barbie sees the second Gloria figures it out, because her entire stance changes. She flicks the light on and looks at Barbie with a slightly raised eyebrow that reminds her of the look she gives Sasha when she says there is no homework on a Friday afternoon.

"Are you faking a cold?"

Barbie feels her blood immediately rush to her cheeks. They feel so warm she's sure Gloria would believe she has a fever if she checked right now. And she's bracing herself for a lecture like the ones Sasha gets when she's far from honest about her school obligations, but Gloria sighs and comes closer instead.

"Why are you faking a cold?" Gloria sits on the edge of the bed, close to Barbie, both hands resting on her lap.

Barbie shrugs. This is a new feeling, actually. She doesn't think she's ever felt it, but it's one of those she's heard about enough to be able to name it. She thinks it's shame. It makes her eyes prickle with tears that fall as soon as she blinks twice.

"Hey. Honey, I'm not mad. Please don't—" Gloria brushes tears away with her thumbs and Barbie doesn't know what she's feeling anymore. Shame and something else, something warm, something big. Shame and too many things at the same time. "What is it?"

"I just—" Barbie's chin trembles, and she's trying not to let this turn into actual crying because she's really not very good at sobbing and talking at the same time, but she's a bit overwhelmed by it all. By her feelings and the things she doesn't know and doesn't even know how to ask about. "I just wanted you to talk to me again."

"But we talk all the time," Gloria says, brows furrowed even if her voice remains gentle, "like, literally all the time I'm not at work."

Barbie shakes her head. "Not like that. Not like— like the other night. When I had the cold."

"I don't know—"

"When you said I didn't have the context." Barbie watches as realization washes over Gloria. As brown eyes round and cheeks darken and she stands a little straighter. "When you said there were lines. That you might cross."

Gloria nods, slowly. Barbie lets the silence settle between them for a few moments, because she figures maybe Gloria needs some time to figure out what to say. But she doesn't. And Barbie's not about to let this conversation end here so she can go back to thinking about it constantly for another week, so she decides to press on herself.

"You leaned in, and then nothing happened." The moment is so vivid in her mind she doesn't feel the need to clarify further. Surely Gloria knows exactly what she's talking about. "Was that a line you didn't cross?"

"Yeah, I—" Gloria looks down at her hands, and then at the coffee table, and Barbie wonders if she's just doing whatever she can to avoid looking at her, "I'd say that's right."

Barbie sighs, relieved to finally have at least one answer. That moment did happen, and it was significant, and it wasn't just her own inexperienced human brain making it bigger than it actually was.

"What was the context?"

"What?"

"The context," Barbie folds her legs under the covers and wraps her arms around her knees, settling in for what she hopes will be an enlightening lesson, "you said I don't have all the context, so I want to know what it is. What the line was and why you didn't cross it. You know. Context."

"Well, I just—" Gloria looks at one of the flowers on Barbie's bedding, and then at her left foot, and at one of the pictures on Barbie's wall, and the more she looks away the more flushed her cheeks look. "There was— I mean I—" Eventually after a few more failed attempts to get out a full sentence, Gloria shakes her head and looks at Barbie once again. "You can't just ask that. I can't just answer that. That's not—"

"See? That's why I had to fake a cold!" Barbie just cannot believe Gloria would simply refuse to answer a question. She doesn't think that's ever happened before. And it really only serves to fuel her belief that whatever it was had a lot to do with her being sick and a milder version of deathbed confessions. "You talked about it then, kind of, so why won't you just tell me now?"

"Because!"

"That's not a real answer!"

"Well, it's the only answer I have!"

Barbie could just cry again from the sheer frustration of knowing there's this apparently essential bit of knowledge she doesn't have and is also not allowed to learn. It's like the freaking humidity all over again. Obvious for everyone except for her. Because she doesn't have the context. And for the first time since she met her, Gloria is not willing to help.

She's watched enough movies (and soap opera episodes) by now to know she probably should say something right now. It's an emotionally charged moment. An argument. She's angry at Gloria for the first time in her life. But she can't come up with anything to say, so instead Barbie shifts under the covers and slips out of her bed. Gloria can stay seated on it for as long as she wants. She just needs to not be with her right now.

But when she's walking around the bed to leave the room, she feels Gloria's fingers wrapping around her wrist. Lightly. Light enough that Barbie could easily keep walking and they would do nothing to stop her. The touch feels like being asked to stay.

"Wait," Gloria finally says when Barbie stops walking, and her voice sounds quiet and almost small and Barbie feels the anger melting away, "I'm sorry."

Barbie has already forgiven Gloria by the time she looks at her. Because she knows she really is sorry, and she knows she never wants to hurt her. Because Gloria's fingers are so soft and warm around her wrist, and there's something in Gloria's eyes that feels nearly as big as the feeling that lodges itself between her ribcage and her heart when she thinks about whatever almost happened when Gloria leaned in.

"I'll tell you. I just need to—" Gloria stands up without letting go of Barbie's wrist, and she reaches for the light switch to make the room mostly dark once again. "It's easier like this."

Barbie nods. Maybe it wasn't her illness making Gloria want to open up. Maybe it was just the lack of light.

"There was a line." Gloria's thumb presses against Barbie's pulse and Barbie doesn't tell her she's read you're not supposed to take someone's pulse with your thumb because you'll feel your own pulse instead. She just stays quiet and imagines the sound of both of their heartbeats at the same time. "When I leaned in." Gloria moves her hand, thumb sliding from Barbie's wrist to her palm, and Barbie's fingers wrap around Gloria's almost on instinct. "And what I nearly did— what I wanted to do," Gloria swallows and squeezes Barbie's fingers like she's keeping herself from running away, "was kiss you."

"Oh."

Barbie knows what a kiss is. She's never experienced a kiss — not a real kiss — but she knows what they are. And she wants one. It surprises even herself because if she's perfectly honest she doesn't know exactly what a kiss entails beyond lips touching lips (which really doesn't sound appealing at all out of context) but right now she wants Gloria to kiss her more than she's ever wanted anything in her life. It's a want that comes from somewhere she doesn't control, somewhere that's definitely not her brain because there's nothing rational about what she's feeling right now. All she knows is she wants the kiss that nearly happened that other night.

"I'm sorry if you—"

"Kiss me now."

"What?"

Barbie takes one step forward, closer to Gloria, and she feels like maybe she's stepped over one of those invisible lines herself. Because they've been physically close a million times before. They've hugged and held hands and fell asleep on each other's shoulders while watching movies. But this feels different. This jump-starts something, makes her feel like one of those magic balls that make your hair stand up when you touch them, gives name to a bunch of different feelings she hadn't been able to categorize before.

"Please," Barbie says, and she's so close now she can feel Gloria's breath against her lips, "kiss me now."

Gloria's lips feel soft and gentle and real. Barbie doesn't think she's ever felt anything as real as a kiss. It's short but it lingers, and when Barbie thinks it's over Gloria presses another, quicker, softer kiss to her lips that makes Barbie smile around a sigh.

"Good?" Gloria asks, still so close and so warm and making Barbie feel all kinds of things she now thinks are different flavors of want.

"Mhmm," Barbie manages, licking her lips and feeling a sudden urge to do the same to Gloria's, "again?"

She feels Gloria's silent chuckle against her skin just before she feels Gloria's lips again. And this time it lasts longer. Barbie's free hand moves to rest on Gloria's waist, to keep her close, and Gloria's lips part to suck on her bottom lip as Gloria's fingers slide into Barbie's hair, and Barbie feels like her world has changed completely once again and there's no going back from this.

She doesn't ever want to go back from this.

"Still good?" Gloria's whispered words come out muffled against Barbie's lips, and all Barbie can manage is an affirmative (she hopes) sound as she chases Gloria's mouth to kiss her once again, bolder this time, tongue nudging Gloria's lips apart and then sliding inside her mouth and feeling a new wave of want build up low in her belly at the sound of Gloria's moan.

They kiss for a long time. Barbie doesn't know how much time passes. She knows they go back to the bed eventually, sitting first and then Gloria is on her back and Barbie is on top of her and their bodies are pressed together, legs tangled and hands exploring warm skin under a work blouse and a sleep shirt and Barbie can't remember ever pondering the actual meaning of life, but she's pretty sure this is it.

Hours or days or weeks (under an hour, realistically) later, their kisses become less hurried. Less hungry. There's less urgency and more warmth, and they're back to just soft lips meeting soft lips until they're both smiling a bit too much to go on.

"Are you okay?" Gloria reaches up and tucks a wisp of blond hair behind Barbie's ear, her other hand still busy under Barbie's night shirt as her fingertips slowly trace the line of Barbie's spine.

"Yeah," Barbie's voice comes out low and breaks halfway through the word, and it makes her smile even more. "I'm very okay."

"We'll have to talk about all this," Gloria says, thumb brushing against Barbie's tingling bottom lip, "about—"

"The context?" Barbie offers right before she presses a kiss to the pad of Gloria's thumb. She's not sure whether Gloria laughs at the kiss or at Barbie's suggestion, and she's not sure she cares.

"Yeah. The context. We'll have to talk about that."

Barbie nods. She has a feeling kisses are like water, in that they're seemingly straightforward but there's a lot going on under the surface. She wonders, briefly, if there's an encyclopedia of kisses at the library, but then decides she'd rather learn from Gloria than read about it anyway.

"Will I have to fake a cold again so you'll talk to me about it?" She teases, and she feels Gloria's laughter under the hand she has pressed against Gloria's ribcage.

"No more faking, please."

Barbie nods and kisses her again. Just because there's nothing less fake than that.

[misty-zzz]

Chapter 9

Finally writing block had let me go, off to its next victim 🤷

It’s a tad bit of a shorter chapter, but I think it’s a nice one :)

The Wubbox offered its gifts. Shiney clear stones, filled with potential. Dragong steals them right as he lays eyes on the valuables. He shut his eyes, but his concentration was halted by Auglur. They motioned some towards Dragong, he immediately remembers what he’s supposed to do. Not for the gems. He places the three gems on the goopy ground, and clears his throat.

“Thank you… for these supplies…” his eyes scatter around, avoiding any sort of eye contact. Auglur pushes him foward. “And, uhm- these will be a great help for me, and… I am appreciative of it.” He smiles quite awkwardly. Auglur eyes hint in a faint smile. Can’t tell too much of emotion in a floating eyeball flower. Tootoo smiles back, “It’s our pleasure!” She says.

“Anyways, back to this, I’ve finally remembered what I had to do.” Dragong crushes the crystals under his weight. He continued until it was fine dust — but it was just what he needed. He gathers the pile of dust up, and spits right into his palm. This is what magic is like for the monsters. A tad bit strange, but what’s needed.

Fiddlement seemed a tad bit disgusting by the now ball of spit and fine dust. Dragong carefully shapes the mixture into a round fire emblem, somehow able to with his cymbal hands. “Magic for us is weird. I’m not sure how our ancestors found out about this.” Dragong finished the reshaping of the mixture. So he does as he remembers, and places it on top of his forehead.

The orange sludge seeps into his skin and scales, his eyes are shut, and there was a faint glow of red radiating from him. His eyes peel back open. His magic was back, at least for fire balls.

“Did it work?! Fiddlement eagerly tilted forward. Dragong moves over to an area with no one. He draws out the same symbol mid air.

The symbol makes a light carve in the air, quickly becoming a cloud of fire. It shoots out, blasting the wall of the workshop. Gunks of the wall goop fly in every direction. “I did it!” Dragong’s wings burst up. “Oh how I missed magic!” He grins with his sharp teeth.

There were a couple of more explosions from Dragong. Eventually they decided the time had to come. Dragong was going to leave the hole. He’ll miss the triple element ethereals, sadly they aren’t able to join along.

“Don’t tell them about us.” Auglur plead the four. “I don’t want us to be found out by the mythicals. Especially after all I’ve heard from Dragong.” She sighs. “I promise, only we will know.” Tootoo assured her.

“Maybe I’ll come back here every once in a while.” Dragong thought out loud.

They headed off to the outside. Finally Dragong will smell some fresh air. For someone who had been trapped in a cave for so long, he really was a bundle of energy. He bounces on the walls, exploding everything in his path. The only area Wubbox forced Dragong to stop was the areas with the cave paintings.

Along this area, Dragong had a moment to slow down. “Sorry about that, way earlier.” He starts apologizing for seemingly nothing. “For what?” Fiddlement questioned. “That thing with auglur, how she made me say thank you and that stuff.” Dragong grumbled. “We’ve been working on our manners, I guess.” He went on “We knew that eventually we would have to see other monsters eventually. And we didn’t want them to see us as rude or anything.”

“I don’t see anything wrong with that!” Tootoo exclaimed. “I’d rather have someone be kind than to be mean when I first meet them!”

“I guess I just kinda saw it as awkward.” Dragong drags along the dirt path.

With a few back rides on Dragong, and a whole lot of walking. They had done it. Now Dragong will reintroduce himself. A new era for him!

He takes his last breath of cave air, and his first in a while of ethereal air. But everything besides the air was ethereal. A group of monsters stood a couple of feet away.

“A little tweedle told me that someone was going inside that cave.” Laughed the small, stout, orange monster. “Is that-”

“The mythicals!” Dragong cuts off Tootoo. “Why in the name of galvana are you here?” Dragong snapped. He hated that Buzzinga. “For you, of course. Eventually you would wake up, we knew it wasn’t permanent.” The edges of his mouth curl. Something bad was about to happen.

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

Some silly notes::::

GUYSSSSS AAAAAHHAHAHAH

I’m SO excited to write the next chapter, FIGHTING AND ARGUING, LETSSS GOOOO!!!!

Also I kinda want to write a part 2 to fate of the stars, but then there’s another one shot in my mind too. Augahagah. I think I’ll write part 2 when all the adult celestials are released. Okay I think I’m going to go insane. 💃🏼🕺🏼🕺🏼💃🏼🕺🏼🕺🏼🕺🏼💃🏼💃🏼💃🏼💃🏼

[boltwrites]

I am a slut for pumpkin pie ofc I want the recipe…

In other news, I ate up that whole fic. I’ve missed you so bad bolts :,]

aw, thank you! and yeah, my life has been crazy in the worst of bad ways but i don't want to trigger the people with that discussion lmao. i'm just glad to be back. anyway recipe and story about recipe under the cut lmao

fun facts about this pumpkin pie recipe: my mom and i found it while cleaning up my grandma's recipe card stack. now, my grandma was a true 1950s housewife, which meant she had a lot of written down recipes that made it look like she cooked, but really she worked a full time job and didn't have time for that shit. so this was my great-grandma's recipe that my mom couldn't remember much about other than that it was good and also a family recipe, so obviously we had to make it because uh. *vin diesel voice* family.

anyway. that first thanksgiving we start to make it. i'm like wow. huh. that seems like a lot of filling. whatever. maybe it makes two pies. i can handle that. and then - somehow i filled two crusts and there was still more. this BITCH'S recipe made THREE PIES. there are THREE PEOPLE in my family. we had pie out our ears, man. anyway:

this recipe is for ONE GODDAMN PIE which is why some of the measurements are FUCKING GODAWFUL. just try your best.

ingredience

1 2/3 cup pumpkin puree

1 cup sugar

2 eggs (one large and one small, or whatever who cares)

1/3 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon allspice

1/3 teaspoon cinnamon

1/3 teaspoon nutmeg

1/3 teaspoon cloves

1/4 cup milk

2/3 tablespoon flour

3 tablespoons whiskey or bourbon (it does NOT have to be the good stuff. also imagine how much i had to pour in to make THREE PIES)

2/3 tablespoon vanilla

for crust: use your favorite plain flour pie crust recipe, but sub about 1/3 of the water content for vodka. or buy that shit at the store.

instructions

beat eggs well, then add sugar and spices. mix until very smooth. blend flour and milk, then add to the sugar and spice and everything nice. add "flavoring" (liquor) (and vanilla i fucking guess), mix. lastly add pumpkin and mix. pour into unbaked pie crust. bake 15 minutes at 450, then 35 minutes at 300. pie.

additional fun facts:

"but bolt!" you cry "i don't have a 1/3 teaspoon or tablespoon!" "NO ONE DOES" I shout back, shaking you by the shoulders "I'M WORKING WITH A RECIPE FOR THREE PIES HERE, PEOPLE! EYEBALL IT!"

also. the original recipe had absolutely no fucking baking instructions. no time. no temperature. that was fun!

"why add the vodka to the crust?" you ask. well, i answer, vodka doesn't freeze like water does, so when you put your crust in the fridge to chill, it'll get cold, but it won't be quite so hard to work with. i've found that the vodka makes it easier to roll out. but it also gets warmer quicker, so you gotta fucking MOVE IT when you make that crust. also no the recipe didn't come with how to make a crust. git gud.

"will this pie actually make hugh jackman and/or logan howlett fall in love with me?" you might also ask. and to that i reply FUCK no. it's just a normal pumpkin pie except THIS ONE has a funny backstory. both to me, who had to deal with THREE PIES, and also to you, who can make this for thanksgiving and when your aunt you see maybe two times a year asks you where you found it you can say "oh, a wolverine x reader fic on tumblr dot com." and she will never ask you anything ever again.

[sanversandfriends]

This writer needs no introduction. She's been keeping eyeballs glued to AO3 since the Halcyon days when the show was still good and Alex was still Alex. Behold the origin story of the Sanvers fandom's very own @performativezippers!

Tell us a little about yourself. How did you get started writing fic? Have you written for other fandoms? What are your favorite tropes?   I've talked about this before, but I found fic because of research I was doing in grad school. I was studying a fan advocacy group about queer representation on Glee (bleak times!) but the group folded before I had everything I needed. I had to produce a publishable paper by the end of the semester, and fanfic was the closest pivot I could make to use the research I'd already done. So I started studying Glee fanfic, and went down a rabbit hole of canon vs noncanon representation in fanfic and what that means for queer imaginations, basically (one of my papers was called "Faberry is Love, Pass it On," and another was "Write Your Own God Damned Stories," good fucking times). And then later I was like...you know what, there's a formula to successful fanfics, and now that I know it, could I do it? What if I wrote something as a test? And oops that was in like 2013! 

I originally wrote for Rizzoli and Isles, then for Sanvers, now also for Kacy (ncis hawaii).

In terms of tropes, I'm a sucker for a good friends-to-lovers slow burn arc. That's *chef's kiss* when it's done just right. What were your inspirations for this particular story? What was it about this/these ships that grabbed you?

Not to remind people of The Wars, but if you don't mind remembering, back when Sanvers was broken up (I'M SORRY), they said it was because Alex wanted a kid. Now, I thought that was stupid, because lord knows I fucking love Alexandra Danvers with all my heart but she was definitely not a parent of the year candidate in any way. I don't remember how it happened, but to get through our pain, some of us were joking about like, "just give her a dog and dress it up like a baby" and then I was thinking, "hmm, Alex would probably want like, a big ass predator for a child" and then somehow, probably in a fever dream, it became Make Alex's Child a Velociraptor. So it's actually a direct response to canon, which is weird because it's about a dinosaur and also Kara isn't in it, but there you have it.

This ship (Sanvers) grabbed me in a chokehold from day one. I had started watching Supergirl in season one because I like superhero stuff and I like ladies, and I crushed on Alex hard from the beginning. And then Maggie showed up for season two, and it was...fucking magic. I didn't know what was going to happen, I wasn't on the spoiler internet yet, so I watched it with baited breath. So often when you see two women characters with that kind of chemistry, you're screaming at the TV "YOU GUYS, THAT'S GAY" but it never happens. And this time it did. I yelled, "Alex, that's gay," and Maggie said, "Damn Alex, that's pretty gay," and then Alex said, "Fuck, you guys, I'm gay" and then THEY KISSED. I couldn't believe it.

And Alex's coming out speech was the most me-like thing I had ever seen on television, hands down. Has the time spent away from your story changed your outlook or approach to any of the storylines or themes? Have you had any new inspirations or breakthroughs/revelations in the meantime?

I'm a much better writer than I was when I started this fic. I've learned so much, from line-level work to how to write a plot and everything between. I still really love the worldbuilding I did originally, and the character of Gertrude the Dinosaur, and most of the large-scale choices I made for the ship and the tension. What's interesting about this fic is that it's the only thing I ever outlined, and it's the only thing I never finished. Not a coincidence! If I know what's happening, I get both bored and confined, and it doesn't work for me. The trick was to wait so long that I straight up forgot what was in the outline. I literally haven't reopened that word document, and I won't until my draft is finished. Maybe I'll find some gems in there that I want to work in, but I learned my lesson! No outlines! No thinking too far ahead!! That way lies madness (and unfinished fics). Any advice for new or aspiring fic writers?

Write what you want to read. Honestly, that's it. When I'm sad, I read my own stuff. When I want to be delighted, I read my own stuff. It's really easy to get hung up on what other people say or want to see, how many comments or kudos you get (I'm very guilty of this!) but ultimately, write something that, when you want comfort, you can read and go, "oh yeah, that's the good shit right there." Maybe that's fluff, maybe smut, maybe 100k of bloody torture--doesn't matter. Write what you want to read.

(But please, for the love of lesbian jesus, my actual advice is to put the dialogue tag on the same line as the dialogue. Please!) If you were going to promote this fic with a single line, what would it be?

Alex's child doesn't like Maggie, which is difficult because Alex is in love with Maggie and also the child is a velociraptor.  If you’ve already posted some of your work, please provide a link.

You can find the fic here, but I haven't posted the edited versions of the existing chapters yet, so I honestly recommend not diving in until I've posted the first of the new chapters (chapter 10): https://archiveofourown.org/works/13799136/chapters/31724760 

"Thanks, Zipps!"

she said.

[sparkplug02]

Good Omens Theory that I will work into a fanfic one day (S2 Spoilers)

Disclaimer: I just binge-watched the show, and only once, and I have not read the book yet. It's on hold at the library, I promise. I have been in the fandom officially for all of about a week now.

Angel!Crowley (the most popular theory I've heard is that he used to be Raphael) did in fact march up to God and 1) create a suggestion box and 2) immediately fill it with questions. I think this is before Satan/Lucifer fell with the other demons, and God did, in fact, answer Angel!Crowley's questions. All except for one, which was "what's the plan?" God didn't need a plan yet because Lucifer hadn't fallen yet. She was just going off of vibes at that point, and the vibes were, for the time being, good.

Angel!Crowley has lots of questions about the humans, one of my favorites being "are the humans ever going to appreciate my nebulas or are they not going to be smart enough to figure out how to see them with their tiny eyeballs that only see in the visible spectrum?" She assured him that they will, eventually, appreciate his nebulas. Not really the important part. The important part is human nature, because angels already know what is good and right, but how will the humans know? God explains that She and all the angels will teach the humans and they will learn. Smart little things, they will be, She tells him, and we will teach them everything in the Garden of Eden.

Except Lucifer falls. Lucifer wants to corrupt the humans and a lot of the demons get on board with him. Angel!Crowley does not, but he is the one to raise the question (unsurprising at this point) "What's going to happen to the humans?" He's becoming fond of them, after all, and he was going to teach them about the stars. "What if the Lucifer and the demons get to him first? Won't they teach the humans to be evil, not good like we will?"

This is true. Angel!Crowley is exactly right, and it's at this point that God realizes She needs a plan. An Ineffable Plan, to be precise. Angels and demons are going to crowd the Garden of Eden, trying to vie for the attention of the humans to teach them either good or evil. This is not only a problem but a headache. If She doesn't come up with something, the humans will follow the teachings of whoever they hear first, or whoever they have heard most recently. Not good.

"Well, if we're teaching them what is right, won't they know?" Angel!Crowley asks. "Can't they just choose to follow the angels instead of the demons?"

"No," God says, "because they do not know the difference between good and evil. They do not have that knowledge. We were supposed to teach them."

"What if they did?" Angel!Crowley asks. "What if they could choose for themselves?"

That was the most important question Angel!Crowley ever asked God.

"I cannot give them knowledge of evil," She says, trying to think. There must be a way to make this work. "Only Lucifer or a fallen angel could do that. I cannot put that burden upon any angel, and whoever gives them the knowledge of good must also give them the knowledge of evil if they are to be able to choose. They must have free will."

She thinks. There must be a solution. There must be a way to enable Her beloved humans somehow.

"What if I do it?"

"Angel, I told you. Only a demon could-"

"What if I Fall on purpose?"

That question very nearly broke Her heart on the spot. Angel!Crowley usually sounded so confident, so curious, so excited about his questions, but not this one. This question was timid, even a little scared, but oh so brave. "What if I Fall and become a demon and give the humans the knowledge of good and evil? What if I give them free will?"

It would work, She realizes. That is perhaps the worst part. It is the only thing that might work. The first part of the Ineffable Plan is in place.

Angel!Crowley writes his last question on a piece of paper along with his angel name: "What if I Fall on purpose? -Angel!Crowley." For his sake, God takes Angel!Crowley's memory as he Falls, and when he lands in Hell, he only knows two things: that he Fell for asking questions, and that he must tempt the humans into eating from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.

He succeeds. In those days, many angels and demons were preparing to teach and tempt Adam and Eve, but Crawley beats them all to it. Upon his successful temptation, God demands that all angels and demons leave the Garden of Eden, and Adam and Eve are cast out. The angels are corralled into Heaven, and the demons sink back into Hell, unable to match the achievement of Crawley the Snake. The humans have free will.

This raises another problem. Now, angels and demons realize that humans can judge for themselves what they want. Now each side wants to be better. Metatron, in particular, is determined to win another Great War, and he immediately begins writing his plans. God ignores him. This isn't about winning, but about the humans. Angel!Crowley understood that better than Metatron ever will.

Still, She worries. If such a war were to ever happen, surely humans will perish in its wake. The first war was terrible and shook the universe. Humans are fragile, breakable creatures. Even with their knowledge, they are much weaker than angels or demons.

God never speaks to Crawley again (or Crowley, as he would later call himself), but She listens. She always listens to his questions, even missing them as the centuries go by. One of the first ones he asks, just after his temptation when he leaves the Garden of Eden, is none other than, "So what's the deal with the angel? The one who gave away the sword?"

She hadn't heard about this yet. Sure enough, when she looks at the Principality she assigned to the Eastern Gate, he is patching up the entrance but doesn't have the flaming sword he was holding mere minutes ago.

"Aziraphale, Angel of the Eastern Gate," She says, shining down upon her angel.

"Yes, Lord?"

"Where is the flaming sword I gave you, Aziraphale, to guard the Gate of Eden?"

"Sword? Right. Um... uh..."

An amused smile tugs at the corner of Her mouth.

"Big, sharp, cutty thing. Yes. Uh... Oh, must have, uh-- must have put it down here somewhere. Um..."

God has heard enough, and she is laughing as she hears Aziraphale remarking something about forgetting his own head. This angel has lied to Her, to the Almighty, about giving his sword to humans. Aziraphale, too, understands the purpose of the angels better than the Metatron. How remarkable!

It suddenly dawns on Her that this is the piece she was missing. With the flaming sword, the humans will have power to protect themselves, to resist their own destruction. They will be able to fight war, pestilence, pollution (though hopefully not for a long time), famine, and even death.

Without realizing it, God had found the second piece of the Ineffable Plan.

She keeps the slip of paper, the one with Crowley's most important question on it, though he does not know it, in her pocket. It holds his memory, and She protects it. For over six-thousand years, somehow, a certain sword is never destroyed, never rusts, and has a tendency to suddenly catch fire. It never strays far from London. Metatron has long since stopped listening to Her. The Antichrist is born in Tadfield.

Three children pick up Aziraphale's sword and face down three of the Horsemen of the Apocalypse. The Antichrist, Adam, in all his humanness, stares down Death. Death leaves. When Lucifer's rage escapes Hell and invades Earth, Aziraphale and Crowley are standing at Adam's side to help him and give him strength. Aziraphale holds his sword again and remains steadfast as Adam rebukes his Father-Who-Is-No-Longer-In-Heaven. Crowley stops time just to tell Adam that he has a choice, that reality will listen to his choice.

The Supreme Archangel that replaced Lucifer, Gabriel, has run off with Beelzebub, Duke of Hell. Aziraphale very nearly starts a war by using his halo to protect a pair of lovely lesbians, and Crowley makes up a law the other demons are too stupid to check. In six-thousand years, they have become so human that they love each other, but Metatron is still insistent upon his Great War. He tears Crowley and Aziraphale apart. First, he threatens to write any angel found helping Gabriel out of the Book of Life, and Crowley fears he will lose his angel. Then he implies that Heaven is talking about blaming the rogue demon for Gabriel and writing him out of the Book of Life, and Aziraphale fears he will lose his demon. Crowley tries desperately to get Aziraphale to run from Heaven, and Aziraphale tries desperately to bring Crowley back. Neither of them succeed. Metatron is determined to bring about the Second Coming.

She keeps Crowley's question in her pocket. She makes sure Aziraphale's sword is still safe, out of the hands of angels and demons and instead in the hands of humans. Not yet, She knows. One day, She will return Crowley's memory. One day, she will explain why She did not get angry at Aziraphale for giving away his sword.

One day, She will explain her Ineffable Plan to the angel and the demon. One day, God will tell Crowley and Aziraphale that they ARE her Ineffable Plan.

But not before they redo that kiss properly. She has been watching them for six-thousand years, and by Herself, they WILL eventually figure it out.

Bonus:

Crowley: *replaces Job's old children with his old children three new children*

Gabriel: Aziraphale, are these new children?

Aziraphale: Yep! Totally! For sure, new children.

God: Good to know nothing has changed. Carry on

[late-to-the-magnus-archives]

A Secret Friend - a Malevolent Fanfic

Faroe knows they're fighting again. It's upsetting.

Sounds like the perfect time for her new secret friend to make himself known.

(Takes place in the Surrogate universe, after Once Upon a Dream.)

AO3

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

Kayne is only a little bored. It’s not dangerous yet.

Not really.

The metaphysical equivalent of floating around the party room, providing hors d'oeuvres to beings his level and somewhat greater, is entertaining enough—handing over tiny planets he's corrupted, or entire species he’s driven insane. Occasionally producing weird treasure thought up by some mortal and stolen.

But really, all of that is the prelude.

He’s got them all watching his favorite show now, which is deeply gratifying. The only challenge is keeping them watching and not interfering.

All I’m saying, spurts Abhoth, spraying ankle-height abominations with every syllable, is she might be more interesting with some cancerous growths.

“No,” Kayne says, far more patiently than he feels. “That would just ratchet everything up the wrong way, and it would make Arthur, John, and Hastur work together. See? We don’t want that. That’s dull.”

Oh, says Abhoth, who wouldn’t have thought of that.

“Subtlety of a mack truck!” Kayne chirps and moves on.

Ghroth is no fucking better. Imagine the carnage if I caused the Dreamlands to erupt.

“To erupt into what, oh Maker of the Doom of Worlds?” says Kayne, who does know how to play the game.

Ghroth considers. It takes him a while. Volcanoes, he suggests.

“Naw.” Kayne pats Ghroth's enormous eyeball self and moves on.

Down below, John and Hastur have gotten into a screaming fight while Arthur rocks, holding his head in his hands; which is dull, until Hastur’s internal alarms go off and they know Faroe is on her way in with a basket of flowers and her horrible goat-god in tow.

And it is amusing to watch them all scramble, to do the equivalent of smoothing hair back and straightening ties, and when Faroe is older, she’ll know immediately that things were hardly as peaceful as projected.

She’s not quite there yet, so she smiles, tells them a nonsense-story she made up as she hands out flowers, and skips to her room.

Everyone is sullen in her wake.

Curious, says the Nameless Mist, one of Kayne’s siblings and one of the only beings he bothers actually respecting. What do you intend to do?

“Beyond ensuring these chuckle-nuts don’t get involved? Well. I have a twist for the evening,” says Kayne, for once not sarcastic. “Call it a mid-season surprise. A guest star.”

Oh? says the Magnum Innominandum. Who would that be?

“You’re about to find out,” says Kayne. “After the ad-break.”

#

Faroe likes shallow baths.

She does not like deep ones. She learned to swim under grave duress at her daddy's insistence (one of the few times her tears and wails did not move him). She’s a very strong swimmer, thanks to him, but it scares her badly. She doesn’t understand why.

Shallow baths are fine. She can wash, and use her cloth, and get her hair clean under running water (but never putting her face under), and she can clean Nibbles, and focusing on her friends’ weird hooves always helps. Not that Nibbles ever seems to need a bath, but that's not the point. Bath before bed. That is the rule.

Faroe thinks water is alive. It feels bad to her.

She tried to explain that to daddy, but he couldn’t quite get what she was saying. Water is not alive, he said, trying to explain chemicoles to her, and how it wasn’t living and so could not be bad.

But it was bad. She knew it was bad.

Uncle Arthur understood, though. Somehow, he did—and like he did with everything that scared her, he turned to music for a solution.

One night, after she sniffled because she’d had to have a real bath (she’d fallen into some mud and it had gotten under her nails and in her hair and it wasn’t her fault), he played something beautiful, and it… helped.

He said it was called Claire de Lune, and was about moonlight, but he always felt it was more like moonlight on water.

He played, and he told her to think about moonlight dancing on black waves, and how it could be beautiful, and how she didn’t have to go into it, but that it wasn’t always bad.

Something happened whenever Uncle Arthur played the piano.

Passing deities stilled. Monsters calmed in the walls. Sentient plants peeked over the balconies to listen.

Even the shriek-birds (which she did not like) went quiet.

And this piece… this moon piece… she liked it very much. Even if it was one of the ones that made him cry.

He cried a lot.

She hadn’t noticed it when she was little. She does now. She’s not sure what it means; he seems to just… do it all the time.

It feels bad. She doesn’t know why.

“This is concerning,” she says, because that’s how daddy talks about his people when things aren’t right. “I don’t think he should cry so much, do you?”

Nibbles bleats.

“Yeah,” she says, deciding the goat means ‘of course, you are correct,’ and gets out of her very shallow bath.

She’s big now, and can get into bed on her own.

She settles in under her sparkling white canopy, looks out her window at the velvet-blue sky and enormous moon, and sighs.

She’s in bed, She’s being good. But she’s not sleepy.

She can hear them yelling out there.

Faroe is young, but not stupid. She knows they think she doesn’t know they always argue.

“I don’t like it when they fight,” she tells Nibbles, sniffling a little.

Nibbles bleats.

I agree, Faruffin. It’s downright rude, isn’t it?

“Hello?” Faroe says, sitting up. “Mister?”

Nibbles makes a questioning sound.

Shh. She can’t hear me, little princess. Only you can. I’m your secretest friend.

“Secretest?”

Nibbles bleats again, slightly more concerned.

You can just think, sweetheart. I'll hear you.

Oh, she thinks, and lies back down.

I’m your secret friend! Everybody gets one when they’re almost four years old.

Oh! Well, that makes sense. Oh, okay. Hi, secret friend.

Hi, Faruffin!

The name triggers a memory, though she can’t quite place it. A weird day, she remembers that—but the nickname only brings good feelings. Safe feelings. Funny ones, amusing. Did we meet before?

We sure did! We made friends before, on the day you met Uncle Arthur. Remember what a mess he was? Oooh! Poor guy. He just can’t stop crying, can he? Pretty sad, if you ask me.

She ponders this.

She has no idea what to do with this information. But you’re not secret. Everybody saw you.

Oh, no, sweet thing, they didn’t. They were talking to each other.

Her brow knits. That’s not… quite what she remembers, but then, it is fairly vague. It was a weird day, tiring, and she isn’t quite sure.

Besides, it’s a grown-up voice. She remembers he was nice. Okay.

You can call me Brother Kayne, okay? But here’s the thing—you have to keep me a secret. Every time you tell someone about me, I get pushed further away! Eventually? I could shout at the top of my lungs, and you wouldn’t hear me ever again.

Well, that sounds terrible. Faroe wipes at her eyes. There is some reason that… someone going away forever is bad.

She can’t really put it together. Okay.

Our secret?

Our secret, Brother Kayne.

The voice laughs. No, that’s… yeah, I can’t do that. Just Kayne, okay?

Okay. Grownups are strange.

Wanna learn a trick?

Yes!

And Kayne teaches her a simple incantation.

She speaks it aloud—opening herself to magic the way her daddy’s been teaching her—and magic immediately happens.

The canopy overhead fills with stars.

She gasps.

The canopy is white, diaphanous, lovely; it shifts in the breeze from her window, and now, stars float through it, a lazy and lovely rotation, and she made it happen all by herself.

Nibbles bleats, then calms down. Maybe she likes stars, too.

Wow!

What do we say, Faruffin?

She remembers that name, now. It’s a good name, a silly one. She liked him when they met. Thank you!

Good girl. Now, go to sleep—you have a lot of growing to do.

Faroe watches the stars, tracing them, counting, until she finally falls asleep.

#

Kayne bows to his audience. “Will this come up again? Will it matter? Am I a Chekhov’s gun? Stay tuned!”

I don’t get get it, Ghroth says.

“Philistine,” Kayne says almost fondly, and pats the enormous world-ending eyeball. “Go on, now. Off you go!”

Would Faroe keep the secret? He didn’t know. If she didn’t, he’d disappear. If she did… well.

There were a lot of things he could teach a boring little girl on her way to becoming interesting—things that could actually make her worth a spin-off, once this all went to hell.

“It’s all about planting seeds,” he says.

Hypnos twitches, and might or might not have comprehended what Kayne said. But probably not.

“A smart little Sheila told me that some plants need to be babied. Have to say, I agree.”

Hypnos looks blank.

Kayne sighs. “Always boring when they’re broken.” And he wanders away. There are plants to tend, after all, and victims to visit.

And safe in Hastur’s castle, Faroe sleeps through further shouts about marks and ceremonies and owning, and dreams about singing stars.

----

NOTES:

That note about plants being babied will come up again, we promise. Muahaha.

[winns-stuff]

See I normally like the "a-hole with a heart of gold" trope because usually when done well it shows layers to the character, like why they act the way they do and it also shows them growing out of being an a-hole or has them change for the better. For the most obvious ex ever that people harp about (but for good reason actually I promise) - Zuko from avatar the last airbender and Darcy from Pride and Prejudice.

Hades we get to sort of see why hes a closed off jerk (he has some trauma regarding his parents and relationships) but the difference is, it seems like this is used to excuse his actions and even justifies them. Like instead of showing hey hades might seem like a cold hearted jerk to his citizens hes actually fair and decent all we get is... Hades doing the exact thing that people accuse him off / 'misunderstand' about him.

The citizens don't seem to recognize him because hes always cooped up in a building but we never actually see hades do any work. The citizens see him as mean and uncaring and instead of contradicting this he... Pulls out a college students eyeball and breaks his bones over a photograph. There's one day a year or something that citizens actually get to use to complain / offer suggestions to Hades for the underworld and Persephone skips the entire line and uses the day to have lunch with him and also to have him fix her problems (that he created).

We see the underworld itself getting fixed but what about the citizens? Nothing about the time change or sleep curse affecting them?

Persephone mentions hades and his brothers are known for their sordid affairs and instead of him being loyal to Minthe he... Kinda cheats on her with Hera and does cheat on her (emotionally at least) with Persephone herself, who says she doesn't like Minthe but she doesn't deserve to be cheated on... Then they don't really set up boundaries or stop trying to see each other they just agree to "slow their relationship down".

So I don't think Hades deserves to quantify as a-hole with a heart of gold if the only things we see from him is him being nice to one person (his love interest whos interactions are a bit weird anyway... With Persephone often having to console hades over both his own trauma and hers, him love bombing her etc.) And him... Liking dogs I guess?

Like even in comparisons where its trying to say Hades is somehow the better man compared to the rest of the cast, even Zeus ... Fails. Hades shouts at Zeus for trying to basically sell him Leuce and at Zeus for being a cheater and not knowing what loyalty is... When again, hes cheated on Minthe before with Zeus' own wife, his sister in law, Hera.

We don't see Hades contradicting really anything people "misunderstand" about him. All we see is confirmation of it.

I agree! I enjoy the trope as well when it’s done right but when it’s so one sided that it feels like they’re just an asshole and nothing else it gets boring. Especially when they have no actual acknowledgement of their behavior, like Zuko realized he was wrong and he decided to help the Avatar just to right his mistake. Hades never rights his wrongs because no matter what he does both himself, the people around him, and the story justifies everything and it feels like he’s never wrong. There’s always an excuse yet never any accountability and that’s what makes it breaks the whole “asshole but has a heart of gold trope”, you can’t just make an unlikeable and terrible character and instead of actually developing him you try to label him a good guy without ever doing any good guy things. It’s pointless and defeats the trope as a whole.