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tigerkirby215 · 4 years ago

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5e Samira, the Desert Rose build (League of Legends)

(Artwork by Jessica 'OwleyCat' Oyhenart. Made for Riot Games.)

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Still fucking hate this champ but her theme still slaps.

The eternal joke of me putting off making a build for Samira is finally over, though ironically enough my distain for this champ has only grown overtime. Jesus fucking Christ Rito can you nerf this champ’s goddamn damage? Like nerfing her lifesteal is nice and all but it doesn’t mean shit when my dumbfuck teammates picked 4 assassins into her and I’m the only one who can CC her as a Lulu.

Ah well: Samira still definitely fills a fantasy everyone wants, being a badass with sword and gun styling on the competition. Devil May Cry? Yeah I suppose Samira would be pretty good in a campaign against Fiends.

GOALS

You want style? You've found her - Smile, Sweet, Sister, Sadistic; we’ll need to Surprise the Service with Style to Spare. Sssssssssssssssssamira.

Eyes up! - We’ll need to be everywhere at once, dashing and dancing around the battlefield so no one can lock us down.

Showtime! - When push comes to shove it’s time to speeeeeeeeeen~

RACE

Samira is human no matter what the meta might dictate, and for once in my life I actually want something particular from Variant Human. But firstly: you can increase two Ability Scores of your choice by 1: increase both Dexterity and Wisdom for sharp sight and sharper shots. You also get a skill of your choice and a language of your pleasing. For your skill take Slight of Hand for flips and other gun tricks, and for your language Infernal will be good for your Inferno Trigger.

Again: we came to Variant Human land for a Feat because two guns are better than one. The Crossbow Expert Feat will give you a variety of benefits: no need to reload (or at least the ability to ignore the Loading property), no disadvantage in melee range... But most importantly if you fire a Hand Crossbow (which will be working as our handgun in this build) you can fire it again as a Bonus Action! "Well! Look at you."

ABILITY SCORES

15; DEXTERITY - Dexterity is tied to both shooting and backflips.

14; CHARISMA - Who needs a military license when you’ve got style?

13; WISDOM - Wisdom measures how in-tune you are with the world around you, and you need heightened senses not to die doing stupid shit.

12; CONSTITUTION - Most of Samira’s sustain comes from Lifesteal but we won’t really be able to get lifesteal, so just focus on not dying really.

10; STRENGTH - It takes a lot of upper body strength to do the stuff that Samira does but Riot isn’t about to make another Illaoi.

8; INTELLIGENCE - Your primary goal is to do things as recklessly and dangerously as possible... “for the Vine” as the kids say. Vine shut down ages ago!

BACKGROUND

Samira is a mercenary. I wonder if there’s a background for that... hey look at that Mercenary Veteran in the Sword Coast Adventurer’s Guide! You get proficiency in Athletics and Persuasion as well as Ground Vehicles and a gaming set of your choice. But of course the main benefit of being a mercenary is the Mercenary Life. You can easily identify other mercenaries and know bits and pieces of their lives. You can also easily find work by hanging around taverns and such until Captain Indari passes on some info to you.

(Artwork made for Riot Games)

THE BUILD

LEVEL 1 - ROGUE 1

Starting off as a Rogue because I like skill proficiencies! Skills like Acrobatics, Perception, Insight, and Performance; you were a street performer once! You also get Expertise in two of those skills: Acrobatics and Athletics are necessary to be everywhere at once.

You can chat in Noxian military code thanks to Thieves’ Cant, but c’mon that’s not what we’re here for. We’re here for Sneak Attack! If an enemy is distracted or you have advantage you can stick a d6 where the sun don’t shine!

LEVEL 2 - ROGUE 2

Second level Rogues get Cunning Action, letting them Dash, Disengage, or Hide as a Bonus Action. Dance around the battlefield like an Olympic gymnast... does Runeterra have the Olympics?

LEVEL 3 - ROGUE 3

Third level Rogues get to choose their Roguish Archetype: to be the queen of style and also make people think you’re from Bilgewater (yeah I get it; it’s because of the eyepatch) look no further than the Swashbuckler subclass. Swashbucklers get two abilities at level 1 but honestly it’s more like three abilities: Rakish Audacity will let you add your Charisma modifier to initiative rolls so you can get into fights fast, and will also let you Sneak Attack anyone who’s beside you. I’d consider it less like you sneak attacking them and more like you slashing them with your sword. Oh and speaking of Sneak Attack? That increases to 2d6 now.

Speaking of sword slashing: Fancy Footwork is the mobile feat! Well, it makes it so that after you try to make a melee attack against an enemy you can move away without provoking opportunity attacks. It’s a little weird to run around with a sword in one hand and a gun in the other but you can easily slash at someone before backflipping away and running off to shoot them next turn!

(Artwork by @Aruneeko on Twitter)

LEVEL 4 - BARD 1

You didn’t think we’d be settling for just one class, did you? It’s time to go Bard; the masters of style! Bards get another skill proficiency at level 1 because why not be good at everything? Grab Medicine proficiency because it’s good to know how to bandage yourself up when living a dangerous lifestyle. “On my worst behavior." You also get a musical instrument and you know that I’ll always opt for good ol’ Noxian War Drums.

Bards get Bardic Inspiration, letting them show off their awesomeness so that awesomeness radiates onto their allies to give them a d6 to attack rolls, ability checks, and saving throws. You’ve got a number of these equal to your Charisma modifier, and regain them at the end of a Long Rest. For now, at least.

And of course while you may be all guns your style makes it look like Spellcasting... because it is. Bards get 2 cantrips and 4 spells at level 1:

CANTRIPS

Prestidigitation will let you put all the visual flair you could want on your moves, and more!

If you wanna walk the walk you’ve gotta talk the talk, and Vicious Mockery will let you talk smack so hard they can’t hit back! "Keep the change; you're gonna need it."

SPELLS

Magic is usually dangerous, and danger is usually fun! Take Detect Magic to see where that danger may be!

If you need some space in a pinch Thunderwave will give yourself some peel.

Steel yourself to do something crazy with Heroism, which will also give you a bit of a shield to do so!

You are still technically working for Noxus so it would be good to Identify anything important... or valuable... For safe keeping of course!

LEVEL 5 - BARD 2

Second level Bards truly are good at everything thanks to Jack of All Trades, letting you add half your proficiency bonus to any skill you don’t have proficiency in. You probably noticed that we already have proficiency in a silly amount of skills but I’m not going to say no to MORE!

After dangerous stunts it’s good to cool off with a Song of Rest, letting you help your crew with a d6 of healing during short rests to bandage up those wounds.

And of course: more spells! Faerie Fire will let you light ‘em up to get advantage, which will make it easier to sneak attack!

LEVEL 6 - BARD 3

Third level Bards get Expertise in two more skills: Perception will help you spot danger and Medicine will help you after dealing with danger.

But of course what we’re mainly here for is your Bardic College and in order to be too cool for school go for the College of Swords. You get some Bonus Proficiencies that don’t really matter but what does matter is you can use your sword to cast spells instead of a drum! Additionally you get a choice of Fighting Style and Dueling will make your sword swings do more damage if you swing it with one hand. I guess it’s worth mentioning that while a rapier would do the most damage a scimitar is the only finesse weapon that does slashing? (Excluding whips.)

But the main feature we’re here for is Blade Flourish which despite the name does also work with your hand crossbows. When you attack your movement speed increases by 10 feet as you charge up that Daredevil Impulse. If you hit with your shot however you can make a Blade Flourish (which again works with your hand crossbows?) of your choice from the following list:

Defensive Flourish does extra damage and also increases your AC as you dodge incoming projectiles.

Slashing Flourish will let you cleave with your sword (and just your sword because it only works on nearby enemies.)

Mobile Flourish will let you chase after a fleeing foe... after pushing them. But after shoving them into danger you can use your reaction to dive right in!

You can only use one Blade Flourish per turn which will matter later. As for what will matter now? Second level spells! Enhance Ability will help you give 110%!

LEVEL 7 - BARD 4

Heeey it’s about time we got an Ability Score Improvement! Our Dexterity has been lacking and you need that to fire straight!

Word of advice: if you know you aren’t going to level 20 feel free to get 4 levels in Rogue for the sake of the ASI.

You also get another spell, and another cantrip! For your cantrip Message is always good for keeping in team chat. For leveled spells Warding Wind does let you deflect nearby projectiles so...

LEVEL 8 - BARD 5

5th level Bards get Font of Inspiration so their Bardic Inspiration die come back on a Short Rest, which is good because said Bardic Inspiration die also increases to a d8! Oh and when I say “Bardic Inspiration” I actually mean your Blade Flourish die. "If you can't keep up don't step up. I don't have time for fools."

And now third level spells are up on the table, but they all suck so take Mirror Image from the second level instead, which was added to the Bard spell list thanks to Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything!

(Artwork by GaMu-ChAn on DeviantArt)

LEVEL 9 - RANGER 1

Three way multiclass? Don’t mind if I do! You get an extra skill proficiency by multiclassing into Ranger, because why not. Take Survival because you’re clearly damn good at it since you’re still alive.

Rangers get Deft Explorer at level 1 because Natural Explorer sucks and Tasha’s made Ranger a good class! Canny lets you learn two languages (honestly just pick your poison) and get Expertise in another skill, because lord knows we don’t have enough of those. I know we just got Survival proficiency, but it’s good to be good at not dying! (As well as finding food.)

You also get Favored Foe at first level, because Favored Enemy smells. If you shoot someone you can legally-not-Hunter’s Mark them so they take a d4 of extra damage once per turn when you shoot them. You concentrate on it like a spell and it works a lot like the Hunter’s Mark spell but you have a limited number of uses equal to your proficiency bonus, instead of using your spell slots.

LEVEL 10 - RANGER 2

Heeey more Fighting Styles! You already improved your sword swings so take Archery for +2 to ranged attack rolls to ensure that you hit your shots.

Rangers also get Spellcasting, only this spellcasting works with your Wisdom instead of your Charisma! You learn two spells from the Ranger list: Jump will let you do some hardcore parkour because the Ranger spell list sucks and I’ve got nothing else to give you, and Cure Wounds will allow Samira to have some healing... as a treat.

LEVEL 11 - RANGER 3

Third level Rangers can choose their archetype and Hunters are masters at taking down their foes. You can choose a way to take down your Hunter’s Prey. Colossus Slayer is a fairly simple affair: if you shoot (or stab) someone who’s already hurt they take an extra d8 of damage. Though you can only apply that extra d8 once per turn.

You also learn another spell: Longstrider will help you move thanks to that Daredevil Impulse. 10 feet may not seem like much but remember that you get an extra 10 feet thanks to Blade Flourish and can dash to turn 50 feet into 100 feet of movement!

Oh and I also completely forgot about Primal Awareness, which replaces Primeval Awareness. You can Speak with Animals once per day! Maybe not in character, but it helps if you have a Yuumi!

LEVEL 12 - RANGER 4

4th level Rangers get an Ability Score Improvement: time to finally cap that Dexterity score for the most precise shots and deadly cuts possible!

(Artwork by Jennifer Wuestling. Made for Riot Games.)

LEVEL 13 - RANGER 5

Total level 13 isn’t too late to get an Extra Attack, right? Well you can shoot twice now and mix some more Flair into your combos.

You can also learn second level spells now like Aid (ty Tasha’s) to let that adrenaline kick in so you feel no pain. Primal Awareness also gives you Beast Sense for a bit of covert Psy Ops.

LEVEL 14 - RANGER 6

6th level Rangers get Roving from Deft Explorer for 5 extra feet of movement along with a climbing speed and a swimming speed! Reminder that in combination with both Longstrider and Blade Flourish that increases to a whopping 55 movement speed, which means that you can Dash as a Bonus Action to move 110 feet in a turn! "Danger runs from me." Your Favored Foe mark also increases to a d6 of damage.

LEVEL 15 - RANGER 7

7th level Hunters learn some Defensive Tactics: while perhaps not the most useful since you have Heroism and all you’ve certainly got a Steel Will, giving you advantage against being frightened. “Death isn't the scariest thing; it's a mother's rage."

You can also learn another spell: Lesser Restoration can be helpful in a pinch if someone’s trying to slow you down. Or at least if they’re trying to blind, deafen, poison, or paralyze you.

LEVEL 16 - RANGER 8

8th level of Ranger means another Ability Score Improvement: Charisma means higher initiative rolls as well as more Blade Flourishes. Simply put Wisdom can’t beat style!

Oh yeah and you also get Land’s Stride to move through non-magical difficult terrain and plants without slowing down, and for advantage against magic plants. I legit forgot this was even a thing before seeing it on the character sheet.

(Artwork by dominaART on DeviantArt)

LEVEL 17 - RANGER 9

9th level Rangers get 3rd level spells like Conjure Barrage for some bullet rain; "My kind of rain!" Basically you shoot a bunch of bullets in a big cone, because Rangers get this instead of Fireball. Honestly something like Elemental Weapon (ty Tasha’s) would probably be better but we’re still sticking to flavor.

Oh and you can Speak with Plants thanks to Primal Awareness? Honestly these extra spells don’t fit at all but Primeval Awareness sucks. I’m literally adding these extra spells to the build last second.

LEVEL 18 - RANGER 10

10th level Rangers get Tireless from Deft Explorer. As an action, you can give yourself a Shieldbow shield for 1d8 + your Wisdom modifier in Temporary Hitpoints. You can do this a number of times equal to your proficiency bonus, and regain all expended uses when you finish a long rest. Additionally: whenever you finish a short rest, your exhaustion level is decreased by 1. Because danger doesn’t wait!

You also get Nature’s Veil because even if Vanish fits Samira better it still freaking sucks. Basically you can play around with Duskblade to turn invisible as a Bonus Action until the end of your next turn. You can use this feature a number of times equal to your proficiency bonus, and you regain all expended uses when you finish a long rest.

LEVEL 19 - RANGER 11

11th level Hunters can finally spin around and hit everyone around them. Whirlwind Attack will let you make a melee attack against any enemy within 5 feet of you (with a separate attack roll for each target.) This is best used when surrounded (obviously) because unlike Samira’s ultimate in League it doesn’t do much extra damage, and you’re better off just stabbing them twice if you want DPS in a 1v1.

You also get your final spell known: take Wind Wall because you have an AoE Wind Wall and I thought it would be funny to steal directly from mister 0/10 powerspike himself. But really get whatever spell you think will be useful.

LEVEL 20 - RANGER 12

Full disclosure: feel free to go for 4 levels in Rogue if you know you aren’t going to hit level 20. I only went for Ranger level 12 because the hit die is bigger.

One last ability score improvement to top the build off: Charisma is still used for a lot of abilities, so increase that because who needs common sense when you’ve got blade flourishes!

FINAL BUILD

PROS

Came all this way to die? - You have many a way to bump up the damage. With 2d6 on a sneak attack, an extra d6 from Favored Foe, a d8 from Blade Flourishes, and a d8 from Colossus Slayer that means that on average you can do about 20 extra damage every turn. That’s definitely nothing to sneeze at!

Finally some action! - Have you ever had +12 to initiative? Would you like to? You are incredibly mobile for a girl who didn’t bring Flash (IE Misty Step) with tons of ways to increase your movement speed and the ability to Dash every turn as a Bonus Action.

This took years of practice... for everyone else - It was not my intention but wow you’re quite the little skill monkey. Two expertise skills from Rogue, another 2 from Bard, and one more from Deft Explorer. Not to mention Jack of All Trades in what few skills you aren’t proficient in to make sure you can do just about anything.

CONS

Oh... I really gotta check these more often - Your spellcasting really isn’t fantastic. We invested almost everything into Charisma but we have very few Bard spells. While I did my best to avoid Ranger spells that forced saving throws there are still some that suffer due to your relatively low Wisdom score... Oh yeah you also have 6th level spell slots but your known spells don’t go past level 3. At least that means you can buff the party with Aid!

I feel most alive when I'm walking the line - As great as your skill checks are your saving throws are quite lacking. Your Dexterity is nice but that’s about it; all your other saves range from average (+5) to bad (+0) Notably your Constitution saves are a mere +1, which means you won’t keep concentration up for long if you play recklessly.

Well-behaved women don't make it - There are a lot of features I took more for flavor then actual utility. For a start Hunter is a rather meh multiclass. This might be one of the times “just play a Fighter with a bow” applies as a subclass like Battlemaster would’ve likely been a better choice, and honestly going down full Swords Bard would’ve given you far more utility overall. There were benefits from Ranger levels but they were lost in the multiclassing MADness.

But you prove that modern-day killers really must hate fun; more often people can’t get style rockin' knives and guns. You don’t need no fancy magic or divine ascension to be a badass: gun ‘em down and cut through whatever remains to show that S stands for Samira and Samira alone... As long as she isn’t permabanned.

(Artwork by @Yangyexin on Twitter)

#dnd #dnd build #dnd guide #DnD 5e #League of Legends #League of Legends Samira #Samira LoL #dnd rogue #dnd bard #dnd ranger #Devil May Cry #S #fuck this shitty champ #Rito plz remove her #holy shit #now she's ruining my TfT too

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cherryberrynice · 4 years ago

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Happy birthday! Dean + Benny, with the prompt "skinnydipping."

This got a little long, ooops!

They ice the shtriga without much problem, but Dean hunches up on himself uncomfortably when they get back to the motel. Making up nothing excuses to hang back at Baby with Benny and run through an unnecessary postmortem of the fight, staring at their motel room with curled shoulders.

“Too hot to sleep in that room tonight,” Benny says, “unless they fixed the AC while we were gone, which seems unlikely. What with the town handyman being dust now and everything.” It’s a weak excuse - yeah, the air is humid and hot and still, little like they’ve somehow found themselves inside of Oklahoma’s lungs as the state holds its breath - but they live in Louisiana and they’ve slept in worse.

Still, Dean unwinds a little at the offer, nods. “Yeah,” he says. “Yeah, okay,” leaning into Benny’s hand on his lower back in a way that tells Benny Dean’s going to offer up the story at some point, but not now.

They drive with the radio on lower and the windows down, air cooled somewhat by speed, talking about this and that without intent, and when they’ve lost the glow of the nowhere town in the rearview mirror, Dean’s hands unclench on the steering wheel and he starts to tap his fingers along with the music.

“Hey,” Dean says, suddenly. “Do you mind?” He waves his hand a little.

Benny has no idea what he’s talking about, but he shrugs his assent. Because really, there isn’t much he minds, and not much Dean asks for, really.

Dean pulls the car onto a side road.

“Huh,” Benny says, when he recognizes a boulder as their headlights sweep over it, and realizes they’re on a side road, heading towards the little lake one of the locals had mentioned as a great swim spot.

Dean pulls the car to a stop on the packed dirt lot, and the air coming in through the open windows is again a humid weight. Carries with it the tick of the cooling engine and the peaceful murmur of waves.

“Yeah?” Dean asks. Gestures toward the lake in the sudden dark as the headlights cut out. It’s a bright night - full moon, not quite enough to cast shadows, but more than enough to see by. Benny watches Dean’s pupils expand in the low light.

Benny grins. “I ever turn down the water?” he asks. Follows Dean out of the car and around to the trunk. Watched as Dean digs in the trunk for a blanket. Takes one out and examines it critically, shakes his head at the red blotches turned black in the moonlight that make Benny’s nostrils flare, just a little. Dean digs around for a bag and shoves it in there and ties it off, feels around in the trunk for another blank. Benny nods the okay at him for this one, and Dean tucks it under his arm.

“You have a suit in here somewhere that I don’t know about?” Benny asks, following him onto the sand, where he shakes the blanket out. It’s an oppressively hot evening.

“Nope,” Dean says, and, “They don’t call it skinnydipping for nothing,” like that makes a lick of sense, wobbling on the sand as he tries to balance on one foot and unlace a boot.

“Because it’s mostly done by skinny little slips of nothing in high school?” Benny asks, but the words are teasing, and he steps in to give Dean something solid to lean against while he undoes his laces.

“Hardy-har-har,” Dean says, slipping his boot off. “Like either of us ever fit that description.” He wiggles his butt against Benny in demonstration as he drops his boot to the sand.

The moon is full, bright enough to tamp down the stars, only a few scattered wisps of clouds reflecting moonlight. Bright enough for Dean to be able to see relatively clearly, for Benny to be able to see the fine bones of Dean’s ankle as he peels off his sock and places it in his boot, before bringing his foot down to dig his toes into the sand. “Got me there,” Benny says, and gives Dean’s ass a font pat as he works his other boot off.

Dean starts shedding clothes as soon as he has both feet in the sand, and it somehow never fails to surprise Benny just how many layers Dean is always wearing. Watching him strip always gives Benny a warm glow, and not just because of the obvious. Benny knows about armour, about protective layers, about the comfort of knowing you can survive for a while with whatever you have on you. He feels his face go soft as Dean’s plaid, his henley, his undershirt, his belt, his pants, thump softly to the blanket in the sand. Grins in a sharper way as Dean’s underwear joins them.

“You gonna join me?” Dean asks, grinning back over his shoulder, and there’s only the slightest undercurrent of wobble to his grin.

“Course I am, cheri,” Benny says, already pulling his coat from his shoulders, working at his cuffs.

Neither of them really got a proper high school experience, Benny because 19th century, and Dean because - well.

Dean <i>hoots</i> a little, goes dashing down the sand and into the lake, only swears a little bit when he crashes into the water, so Benny assumes it’s reasonably warm. He takes his time undressing, watching the way Dean quickly stops pretending he’s not a kid at heart, slashing and laughing and yelling at Benny to get his ass in there. Benny takes a second to shakes out their clothes and make sure they’re in the middle of the blanket because he knows Dean’ll complain the rest of the night about sand in places and he wants to make sure it’s mostly just grousing.

“Get your ass in here!” Dean hollers. He’s skulling, half floating on his back, looking back at Benny on the sand. “Water’s fine!”

Benny shakes his head and laughs, goes flying down down the sand in the humid night air. Water closes around his ankles, his calves, the backs of his knees, before he gathers himself up and hurls himself into the deeper water, arms wide, coming down as big as possible to make a splash that swamps Dean and sends them both underwater.

Dean comes up, sputtering and indignant, and throws himself at Benny. They wrestle, splashing, and Benny lets himself play at being human, being human strong, until they tire. Dean pushes up to float on his back. Benny twines their fingers together and kicks up to join him, and they float there on their backs in the lake in the warm night air, cool fingers of water licking up over bare skin, staring up at the moon and at the stars, and they breathe.

#supernatural #look #for AGES i have wanted to put some skinnydipping in wayfinding/luminism #thank you for the excuse to write this #deanbenny #Dean x Benny #benny lafitte #Dean/Benny #my fic #my fanworks #asks

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decadentdefendorhologram · 4 years ago

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Omnisphere 2 Steam Folder Not Writable

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WINDOWS - MOVING THE STEAM DIRECTORY AFTER INSTALLATION. Drag or copy the STEAM folder from your installation drive (C: Program Files Spectrasonics) to the hard drive location of your choice. This can be another drive partition, a secondary internal drive or an external hard drive such as a Firewire or USB2 hard drive, etc. You need to make a shortcut from the 'STEAM' folder on your external hard drive and then put that newly created shortcut folder inside the 'Spectrasonics' folder on the C: drive following that path. To make hidden folders viewable, open a window. Voice changer skype mac. Now go to 'Tools' and 'Folder Options.' I had this problem for Downloading updates, try going to which ever folder it says is not writable and check the properties. Make sure the folder says that it isn't read only, if it is change it. It fixed my problem hopefully will help you too. To 'Show Hidden Files' go to Start Menu/Control Options/Folder Options//View tab. Select the 'Show Hidden Files and Folders' option and hit 'Apply' Storing sound files on a secondary drive. If you are wanting to store your Omnisphere audio files on a second hard drive, you can put the Spectrasonics/STEAM folder onto your second drive. Steam is an alias file that calls the steam folder that is in your external drive. In my case this alias was corrupted, so I went to my external drive where the large Omnisphere library is saved and created a new alias of the steam folder and replaced the corrupted one for it, and all set.

And which are said to be static in nature so can't be changed. https://heritageyellow850.weebly.com/blog/psp-mac-address-changer-v2-download. Win7 MAC Address Changer enables users to change the MAC (Media Access Control) Address which are used to identify hardware devices such as Network Cards, modems, etc.

Omnisphere 2 Steam Folder Not Writable

Getting Started with Omnisphere 2. Omnisphere 2 is a virtual instrument that is used for both studio and live performance applications. After it is registered and installed, you can either launch the desktop app or load it as a virtual instrument track inside your DAW. All of the functions work the same as a plug-in and in standalone mode.

Omnisphere, Keyscape, and Trilian need to be in the same STEAM folder. If you have already installed one of these instruments, be sure to install to the same location. Unless you would prefer the library be installed on an external drive, we recommend installing the library in the default location by just clicking next.

Omnisphere 2 Steam Folder Not Writable

Nov 27, 2014 · Trilian and Omnisphere have been authorized on the new SSD, but neither can find the necessary STEAM folder which is in place and working just fine on my older HD and with DP 8.01. Its location is on a 3rd internal drive that I've named 'VIs and Plug-ins' Jul 14, 2017 · This is the folder we’ll want to move to our new drive. Note, you can get to the Library folder by clicking on the Go menu while holding the “Option” key. Also, do not move the entire Steam folder–just move the SteamApps folder. Here you see the Steam folder we’re talking about.

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under-the-blue-sun · 4 years ago

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come through (‘cause I just want to be with you) - chapter two

story summary: Dan is half-angel half-demon whose parents sent him to earth to try and live a normal life when he turned 18. In doing this, he lost any power he had, if proven he could live among them normally. The only rule? He couldn’t fall in love with a mortal. Fast forward 5 years later, just before his 23rd birthday, when things go downhill once he meets a barista in a coffee shop who he befriends and falls for.

story word count: 2759

rating: teen & up audiences

warnings: profanity

song of the chapter: black sun - death cab for cutie

note: i know this is late but in my defense i'm gay and i can't count. i hope you enjoy this chapter!! also on another note isn’t the new tumblr font just terrible

link to ao3 | link to first chapter on tumblr

Chapter Two: how could something so fair (be so cruel)

Beep. Beep. Beep.

Dan groaned, slamming the button on his alarm to stop the blaring noise. His bleary eyes squinted at the clock.

“11. That’s okay,” he muttered, hiding under his blankets to stop the persistent pain in his stomach, as if his body was reminding him he should be somewhere.

He suddenly rose from the covers.

“10. Lecture. Fuck.”

He leapt up, clearing his blurry thoughts from his mind, and ran to the bathroom, shoving a bottle of Listerine down his throat. Choking with disgust, he grabbed the first clothes on the floor to throw on, and sprinted out the door, black Muse tote bag stumbling out of his careless hands. Barely catching his breath, he staggered into the lecture room one hour and forty-five minutes late, seemingly unnoticed. He slipped into the back seat, laying out his notebook, pencil case and laptop.

“Rough morning, huh?” Chris whispered.

“It was actually a very good morning, until I woke up and realised I was one hour late for the lecture,” Dan whispered back.

Chris sniggered. “I’ll bet.”

Chris was one of the very few humans who Dan could talk to without seeming like a fool, mostly because Chris was very rather odd himself. Most people in his philosophy class were aesthetic, intelligent and very pretentious, but Chris made sure he was never two of those things at once. He was the person who introduced him to most of the human things he likes now, and has unknowingly helped Dan slip into human society very well.

Dan glanced at Chris’ notes. “Anything important?”

“It’s a philosophy class. Nothing is important, Dan,” Chris said. “I’ll give you the notes after, asshole.”

“Rude. Exam’s on Monday, right?” Dan said.

“Yeah, and the hand-in essay’s due before 12pm Wednesday.”

Dan sighed. “Well, fuck. I better listen.”

Chris wriggled closer to Dan, assuming his tea-spilling posture. “Have you-”

“Shut up!” Dan hissed.

Chris rolled his eyes, slouching back into the chair, and resumed his note-taking for the last fifteen minutes of class before they were dismissed.

“Oh, hurry up. I have something to show you,” Chris said.

“I haven’t had my morning coffee yet, please cut me some slack.” Dan yawned, slowly placing his items in his tote bag.

“That’s what I was going to show you,” Chris replied. “Hurry up!”

Dan finally finished putting his stationery away, and shoved his pencil in his pocket approximately five minutes later, after around one hundred carefully-crafted insults from Chris. “I’m done, what do you want to show me?”

“I have found the best coffee shop in the entirety of London,” Chris announced, heading out of the lecture room. Dan raised his eyebrows.

“I highly doubt that,” Dan said.

“Okay, maybe it’s not the best. But the baristas?” Chris blew a kiss into the air.

Dan shook his head, disappointed. “Chris, what did I say about objectifying people?”

“Please, come. It’s called ‘Never Gonna Give Brew Up’,” Chris said, looking at Dan expectantly. Dan stared back, expressionless.

“You know, like Never Gonna Give You Up?” Chris hinted.

“Yes, I understand the joke. You keep sending me links to the music video.”

Chris laughed. “Wait, you actually click on them?”

Dan scoffed. “Of course not. I memorized the several URLs you’ve sent so I recognise it straight away. I also tend to distrust every link you send.”

“As you should. Anyway, I am begging you to come. There’s one especially cute boy who I know works today, and I also know he’s very single. His name is Jack, and he is absolutely adorable.”

Dan continued walking, making no response.

“Dan. You’re single, sad, very gay and very lonely. Just ask him out, go on a date, see how it is,” Chris begged.

Dan snorted. “Like your love life is perfect.”

“Hey, I may not have a long-term partner, but at least I’m going on dates and meeting up with people. In all the four years I’ve known you, I’ve never seen you go on a single date unprompted.”

Dan shrugged. “Haven’t found the right guy.”

“Come on. Just come to the coffee shop, at least,” Chris pleaded.

“Fine,” Dan said, deciding to humour Chris. “I’ll meet the barista.”

---

Jack the barista was, in fact, very hot, just like Chris stated. They were definitely not the first people to notice that. There was a whole clump of people in the cafe hovering around him, eager for him to give them a chance, or a glance. It was ridiculous.

“This is ridiculous,” Dan muttered, turning to leave. “I’m going to get out of here.”

Chris grabbed his arm. “I’m not letting you leave, Howell.”

Dan groaned as Chris pushed him back in the line and started ordering the food.

“I didn’t come here to ogle at the resident hoe,” Dan whispered violently in his ear. “I am leaving.”

“What did you just call me?”

Dan froze, and looked to the unfamiliar voice that came from in front of him.

“Resident hoe. Don’t take it personally. I’m sure you’re a lovely person, I’m just lashing out and name-calling because my friend here is trying to set me up with you. I apologise.”

Jack smirked in amusement. “At least let the resident hoe get you some coffee. You look like you haven’t slept in years.”

“Probably because I haven’t,” Dan admitted. “And not in a sexy way.”

Jack snorted, and handed Dan a drink. “I think this coffee has the most caffeine which you can possibly stuff in a drink.”

“Sorry for calling you the resident hoe,” Dan said, turning to go.

“Well, if you want to make a full apology, I’ll be here tonight as well,” Jack said. “Opening hours till midnight.”

Dan grinned. “I’ll think about it.”

---

“I cannot believe you won him over by calling him a resident hoe,” Chris said, as they were leaving the cafe.

“What were you picturing?” Dan asked, taking a sip of his coffee.

Chris shrugged. “I don’t know. Not that. But hey, it worked! And you have another chance to actually talk to him tonight. You are going back there tonight, right?”

Dan clicked his tongue. “I’m thinking about it.”

“You better go,” Chris warned. “He literally invited you back to the cafe. You’re not gonna get that chance again.”

Dan glanced at his watch. “Well, I have approximately twelve whole hours to think about whether I should go back to the cafe to call Jack names, so that’s plenty of time to think. That’s philosophy, right? Thinking about stuff.”

Chris sighed. “Yeah. You should probably head to the library to revise right now.”

---

Dan looked up helplessly at his blank word document. He had been in the library for three whole hours, yet he had written absolutely nothing. He stared at the blinding white of his screen, mind completely empty. Frankly, he was incredibly amazed at his brain for managing to not have a single thought yet also have too many thoughts. Slowly and helplessly, he began to type random things that came to his brain.

Are immortal people allowed to fall in love with human beings?

Dan paused, then pressed the enter button.

No.

why?

because theyll probably find out?? that you’re a demon angel fuckin thing whatever also theyll die before u and thats like sad idk yeah

Dan sighed. A+ essay right there.

The thing is, he kind of really wanted to go on that date with Jack. He seemed like a nice guy. It would be kind of fun. Besides, it would really shut Chris up and he wouldn’t pester him for a few months.

It wasn’t like he was going to marry Jack, after all. Like, he was pretty much the resident hoe.

Dan sighed deeply.

But if an immortal person went to a cafe with the possibility of going out with someone who was not going to be a potential future partner, would that be wrong?

After a long pause, Dan began to type again.

No.

And with that, he gave up on his essay, packed up his bags and left the library.

---

Surprisingly, Never Gonna Give Brew Up was still open, and very brightly lit. Dan didn’t really know why he was surprised. He was told that it closed at midnight, after all. But still, he didn’t normally associate open cafes with dark evenings. He swung the door open and stepped inside with a wide grin.

“Hey J-” Dan paused. “You’re not Jack.”

The barista at the counter looked up from his screen with a smirk. “Astute observation.”

Dan stepped carefully in the cafe, closing the door behind him to make sure it didn’t slam. The barista was watching him carefully, smirk still planted on his irritatingly handsome face. Dan was seriously beginning to think the only qualification for applying to this cafe was to be good-looking.

“Well. This is awkward,” Dan said.

The barista shrugged. “For you, maybe. For me, this is rather entertaining. Tell me, what service were you wanting from Jack? I’m guessing it’s not coffee.”

Dan snorted. “Well, it’s a long story.”

“Is it?” the barista said, raising an eyebrow.

Dan thought over it. “Not really. I called him the resident hoe and I came here to apologise slash ask him out. That’s pretty much it.”

“I’m sorry for cockblocking you. I’ll give you free coffee to make up for it,” the barista offered.

“Thanks, I could use that actually. I have an exam I haven’t studied for and a hand-in essay I haven’t begun coming up in the next few days, so I’m guessing I’m not going to be getting a lot of sleep for a while.” Dan said.

“You already look like you haven’t gotten a lot of sleep in a while,” the barista pointed out.

Dan chuckled joylessly. “Thanks, everyone says that to me when I meet them.”

“I mean, I also haven’t been getting a lot of sleep. And no offense to your Jack, but it’s kind of because of him.”

“Oh yeah? Give me the tea,” Dan said. Then he frowned. “Or the coffee. I don’t know whether you do make tea here.”

“I’ll give you the tea and the coffee,” the barista joked, grabbing a cup to start making Dan’s drink. “It’s not really that interesting tea, though. I just have to keep on doing Jack’s shifts because he always says he’s busy last minute. He’s such an asshole. Probably did you a favour with the cockblock, mate.”

“Damn. Thanks for that, I guess,” Dan said, and the barista laughed, giving Dan an odd warm fuzzy feeling inside. Before he could fully process what that was, the barista handed him the drink.

“Here,” he said, and Dan took a sip, pleasantly surprised.

“I have to say, this is a lot better than the one Jack gave me,” Dan commented.

“Of course it is. Jack’s shit at making coffee,” the barista said.

Dan laughed. “Yeah, it was kind of nasty.”

“You should probably get to that essay soon, though,” the barista said, and Dan suddenly realised he may have overstayed his welcome. He cleared his throat.

“Yeah, probably should. Thanks for the free coffee,” Dan said.

The barista smiled. “Yeah, it was no problem.”

“I didn’t catch your name, by the way.”

“Phil. And you are?”

“Dan.”

“Dan,” Phil said, like he was trying the name out for the first time. “Nice to meet you, Dan.”

“Nice to meet you too, Phil,” Dan said, and left happier than he’d felt in weeks.

#dan howell #daniel howell #danisnotonfire #amazingphil #phil lester #philip lester #chris kendall #crabstickz #fics #fanfiction #fanfics #phanfics #phanfiction #demon-angel au #fluff #angst #slow burn #forbidden love #emilee.writings.exe

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renaer-is-allegedly-hot · 4 years ago

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session 13

wow i’m really out of it tonight lmao uh some highlights bc these r rlly atrocious:

adam shit himself and vomited over the dwarf in our basement

fought some ppl n killed; gotta hide six bodies

pregame !

Jacob n dom r talking abt other dnd campaigns

Jacob rigged explosives somewhere

They need souls to open coffins or smth

I REALIZED MY MIC IS MUTED SO THEY CAN’T HEAR ME SING THE GOLDEN GIRLS THEME SONG THE WAY MATTHEW GRAY GUBLER DOES HAHAHAHHAHA

Thank you for being a friend

Bum bum bum bum

Travel round the world and back again

If the truth be told you’re a friend and a confidant

Etc

Jacob explaining his eye scratch

I’m just sitting here singing the golden girls theme song

Tunnel vision in smash

I’m just renegading while they talk smash

Jacob wants to home alone our house the next night we have

Immovable rod is abt 3ft long

Last time on dnd asyna heard a window break

Roll initiative

Aerana and theo roll 22

Asyna rolls 21

Adam 13

Cel 6

Asyna was waking everyone up

Halfling size ballista ? In our turret ? Maybe

Ooh trebuchet is an interesting sans font

Aerana is going first

Double dash downstairs

You hear stuff on the first floor making noise; you and theo get to the second floor about to go downstairs

Theo in master bedroom double dashes towards where I am

Asyna

In watchtower, asyna's gonna try and do stuff from above ? Maybe .

Proposes turning into a hummingbird

Spike growth ? Grows spikes

Also creates rough terrain

In front of the door

Oop they're speaking goblin

Goblins

2d4 damage for each 5 ft they move

Some of them were able to get inside the house but still slowed down

Adam

Will cast cantrip

Thaumaturgy to boom voice 3x louder than normal "WHO DARES ENTER MY HOUSE PLEASE LEAVE WITHIN THE NEXT TEN SECONDS AND YOU WILL BE SPARED ,,, PLEASE"

Intimidation check

Lmao a 7

Entire house booms; everyone heard it but like effect?

Adam sleeps naked

Cel

Right in front of door to hall on second floor

Aerana

2 squares away from action at back of house

Theo

Also goes for pantry, same place generally as aerana

Asyna

Starts downstairs

Gonna turn into ape and try and make way down side of building as ape

Down p much by next turn

Goblins

Apparently being eaten up by spikes

Should I make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich I'm kinda craving

O shoot I gotta run soon for medicine

Adam

Dashing

This is just slow running in a dream

Cel

Base of stairs ?

Also heading towards pantry

Aerana

Bust in

Momentarily frozen

To the right next to basement hatch r two hulking figures covered in thick dark fur; kinda pointy ears, look kind of like goblins and v tall like easily 7ft

Big mauls

Bugbears

Can I fight?

23 to hit, 7 damage to closest one

The goblins trying to move the thing but not working well

Theo

I'M GONNA RUN TO GRAB MY MEDS

Slashes at the one aerana didn't hit lmao I rlly just did that I'm breathing

15 barely misses

Goblin blocks lillian's strike

Asyna

Srsly should I make a sandwich

On first floor outside

Bro my headache went to the other side of my head wtf

Gonna go through a window

Follows them in and attacks a bunch of them

Bro I kinda rlly want a sandwich

17 and 18 to hit, 6 and 4 damage ?? 10 damage ?? 10 damage for both ??

KILLS BOTH OF THEM N I C E

Bashes their heads together

I'm making a sandwich

"it's a very forceful kiss"

Third one readies self

Lashes out at asyna, misses

Goblins

R also gonna try and attack aerana and theo

12 damage to theo

I'm eating my sandwich

One of the middle ones is gonna go for asyna, hits, 5 damage

That was a good sandwich might get another one

Adam

Bro I kinda want another sandwich

Gets downstairs w max speed and peeks in, sees aerana and theo and two dead guys by window and two more living fighting an ape

Looks at theo

Bro again I kinda want another sandwich

Makes the one that hit theo make a wisdom saving throw

Did not make it, hideous laughter

Mans can't stop laughing, has to make wisdom saving throw each turn ig

Adam has to tell a joke

Comes down and looks at bugbear, locks eyes

Our party walks into a bar . But most of us walk under it

What

Is this a short joke ?

I don't get it yikes

Panicked dom laughing

Tells us to not hit the guy laughing; save him for last

Bonus action uses cutting words on the one aerana is fighting; "fuck you"

Cel

I still kinda want another sandwich

To clarify my sandwich was like half

I think yesterday or smth I like hit my foot lol and I did the thing where I compose myself rlly quickly to ignore the pain and up my pain tolerance and it left a mark but like it literally doesn't hurt so not saying I'm upping my pain tolerance but one day if I ever got like idk shot or smth I'm not gonna have a reaction

Cel hits the one that's doing better w a spell and then does shortbow 25 to hit, 12 damage

"how do you want to do this?"

Takes an arrow right through his brainstem and the arrowhead goes out his mouth

Aerana

Wasted insightful fighting, didn't hit

Scream of frustration that I missed

Theo

Takes bow and tries to hit, 13 misses

Asyna

Do I rlly still want another sandwich

Hits on one roll, 7 damage

Guy is barely alive

Goblins

One that tries to attack aerana misses, guy on ground is now up, guy attacking asyna hits, 11 damage

Adam

Cutting words on guy that just got up "oh you're finally awake"

"ever heard of the one where the guy got back up"

Goblin rolls nat20

Cel

22 to hit, 9 damage

Stabs him, hurts

Aerana

"next time remember it"

If an ally is within 5 ft of you you get sneak attack

If u have advantage

Don't need advantage if another enemy of the target is within 5 ft of it

Start over

When rogues have advantage, get to add sneak attack

Can add sneak attack when u don't have advantage if

One of allies is within 5 ft of you

And if u don't have disadvantage

Theo

Gonna try for the bow again

Going for the one asyna's fighting

8 damage

Guy is on last legs

Asyna

Kills

Fun fact apes have been known to rip off the faces of their enemies

Rips face off then gently puts him down

Still two goblins left

Goblins

Try and run

Attacks of opportunity from celandine, theo and aerana

Nat20 from cel

Theo and aerana miss

I've missed like every hit what is this

14 damage from cel

They're still able to get away

Asyna makes attack of opportunity

I still kinda want another saaaandwich

Neither hit

Adam

33 across board for both for sleep; both fall over and hit ground, asleep

Adam goes outside and looks if anyone is watching outside their window

Looks like one of our neighbors is at their window out of the apothecary

Uses infernal legacy to cast darkness, blocking their darkvision

Puts it between fallah's house and bodies

Then drag the bodies

Adam is kinda sweaty n exerted

Aerana is watching ot, asyna takes one body cel adam and theo take the other

Theo is rolling damage

Cel binds their feet first and adam prepares sleep

Theo rolls 13 damage and one dies, other 15 and also dies

Why is my eye glitching lmao

Maybe I still want a sandwich

What time do I need to be up tomorrow wait

Idk lmao

We've brought our bodies in, the night is ours

It's 10ish at night

Adam's gonna sleep in jeans

Adam was not naked in combat ?

Or maybe he was

Adam doesn't wear pajamas so he had pants

Sleeping downstairs shifts for the night

Adam takes first shift

Adam is sweating a lot, feeling a little odd; feels super weak and cold and feels a little sick like he might throw up

Constitution saving throw

"can I feel this coming and give myself bardic inspiration?"

"uh . Sure"

"hold it in hold it in hold it in"

Check to see if he can make it to the bathroom

"boi that's just nasty" adam wakes up someone ? Adam

Adam wakes theo up

"you must be real glad I'm wearing pants right now"

Rolls nat1

Adam vomits onto theo ? Vomits into theo's cloak

Adam becomes violently ill

The key eventually comes out the butt

A 4

Able to makes way down hatch towards bucket by ot

Vomits on ot

"ot is, like, weeping"

Adam is weakened

So adam shit and hurled

Adam stomps it down the drain ?

Next morning

Adam comes down with the key

Adam's exhaustion is cured after long rest

We're not talking to adam today

Adam sets key on table "did you wash that first" theo / adam slowly takes key back

Adam casts sleep on ot to kind of relieve him

Cel goes to jones, one of the goblins informs cel that jones is out ,,, just out

Cel can't find jones

Home alone-ing the house now ?

Aerana

House was in state of disrepair before

Spike spell tore up front of house, lots of windows knocked out from fireball explosion and were damaged during fight

Bad to a little bit worse

Theo 20 for investigation

Random ropes and bricks, nails, wooden planks

Intelligence check w advantage

19, sets up a few different traps; two swinging brick traps when a door is opened + simple nails stuck into plank so would hurt if someone stepped on it

Asyna 9 for investigation

Cel sees jones putting a bunch of keys into the lock

Jones can't find the key to open his door

Jones is maybe gonna get some stooges to remove the bodies

10 dragons

Henrietta is gonna dump em

Astigmatism lmao

Back at the manor

Adam is done cleaning

Ot asked if he could be set free, adam says "this is my fault, I got it buddy"

Adam is going to the apothecary down the street

Walks up to counter, fallah is there

"heyo what's poppin fallah"

Takes out potion of necrotic resistance

Adam says he bought it at sea ward, roll for deception; 12

Why am I sO LETHARGIC ALL THE TIME !!!

Offers adam 50 gold

Pushes for 60, 10 for persuasion check

Just takes it for 50

Fallah gives medicine, smells like oregano

Adam goes in for a hug, hesitates then retracts

Goes to bardic school to talk to master

Yava is there

12 insight check

Yava is usually v composed but today

Yava is an elf so is like bruh wdym u trust me after knowing me for like a month

Asks abt house security

Adam just straight up tells her he's in trouble w the xanathar guild and is asking for glyph of warning spells ?

Persuasion check, gives self bardic inspiration

11, yava agrees to help

She's willing to do it for free

Can cover 8 entrances to the house

"I'd b willing to do this but adam u must b more careful"

Adam tells her he's dealing w a large sum of money - half a million dragons

There was half a million dragons embezzled ?

Yava thought it was just a rumor

Adam is idiot

Adam asks yava if she wants in

Idiot

#i talk a lot about sandwiches in this one #sn #13

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wadey-wilson · 6 years ago

Photo

9k FOLLOWERS CELEBRATION: GIF TUTORIAL by winston-wilson

In this tutorial, I’ll try to show you the basics of making a gif. Of course, there are many ways for this joyful and absolutely not stressful part-time hobby slash addiction, but this is how I’ve been doing it for a couple of months now, and it’s worked out pretty well so far. I’ve learned a couple of tricks, created my own shortcuts, and at this point it’s just something that comes naturally.

I use Photoshop CS5 Portable (you can get it here)

for taking caps, I’m using KMPLayer (get the 4.2.2.22 verison, the .23 one is screwed up - you can get it here)

please, like / reblog if you find this useful

feel free to hit me up with any questions.

1. Don’t beat your laptop with a baseball bat. Yet. Use your chair.

1.1. Videos/clips/movies.

I explained that part in this tutorial. What I want to add is that if you want the highest quality of a trailer, get QuickTime, wait a day or two after it comes out, and get the trailer here.

Find a trailer you’re interested in, play it, choose the highest quality option, press ctrl+shift+i, and you’ll get this:

Click anywhere on that html codes and press ctrl+f. This will show up:

Put that brandy away. Search for ‘source’, find this:

Clink on the blue link using the right-click of your mouse, choose open in new tab, and a download window should show up.

Save the video where you want to.

You can use videos from YT or movies you have on your computer or get those movies. Those movies also should be in the best quality possible. I suggest the ones with quality of 1080p and bit rate at least 6 Mb/s for best gifs.

In this tutorial I’ll be using the trailer of Spider-Man: Far From Home. Because all my movies are on another disk and I, uh...

2. KMPlayer + taking caps.

Before you open a video and take caps, I suggest you create a folder that’s easy to find and use on your desktop. I have one called ‘CAPS’.

- Open your video in KMPlayer. Pause it because this version of KMPlayer stinks and you have to pause the clip in order to start taking caps. So pause it and press ctrl+g. When the caps window shows up, set it to those (red) options and choose your folder (yellow) where your caps will be stored. You have to choose that one thing every time you open that window. [Sorry for the language, but it doesn’t matter. Just choose them settings.)

- Play the video & make sure your caps window is somewhere on the side like this:

Find the part that you want to gif. You can pause before it, press start on the caps window and then play the video or just start taking caps while the video is playing. I’ll do it using the first way.

pause:

click ‘start’ on the caps:

and then play the video until I get the caps I want and click stop on the caps window first, the video second.

Close that thing if you have what you want.

- Open your CAPS folder.

Get rid off the caps you don’t need. They’re trash and should be treated as such.

If you’re giffing more than one scene, you can sort them caps to folders. I have 10 folders named from 1 to 10 where I sort mine. And because for now I’m making just one, I’ll move those caps to folder ‘1′ on my desktop.

Time to make a gif. You good out there? If the answer is no, take Vicodin. No worries, when you’re done learning the basics, you’ll make gifs with Britney Spears playing in the background. Now shhh, focus.

3. Photoshop, aka that scary part.

- When you install it, you’ll get a folder, and in that folder there’s the app.

- Open that thing (and maybe copy on your desktop).

What you need is the layers window, the actions window, the adjustments window, the characters window, the animation window, the paragraph window, the history window... It... It sounds horrifying, I know, but cool your pits. It’s just this:

If you’re not laughing, take another Vicodin. Use this if those windows aren’t on display automatically:

And sort them. Now, I use my own keyboard shortcut for gifs. I suggest you do the same. Trust me, you don’t want to do this:

every time you make a gif. As you can see, I use alt+ctrl+p. You can set your shortcuts using the ‘Edit’ window at the bottom of which you’ll find the ‘Keyboard Shortcuts’ thingy. Then it’s a bit of digging but it all makes sense, ok? Ok. Yeah, no, it’s a lot of digging but I believe in you.

So you load them files, and this shows up:

so choose your folder where your caps are, and click OK. Ta-dah:

- This is the ‘make gif’ part. Click this:

so you can get this

at the bottom. I have this whole process made into an action, and if you want it in an action too, at this point you should click this:

and choose ‘New Action’. Name it. Click record.

and now 1)

2) take Tylenol

2.1.)

(you should be here now:)

7) (right-click mouse)

8) stop the action recording here:

And this is how you should be looking right now:

Oops, not this. This:

Fine? Fine. Go smoke a cigarette.

You back? K.

- Dimensions. Very important. Like, 10/10 important. Don’t cross the 3Mb size.

Fitting into the tungler dimensions means your gifs will be posted in the highest quality. This is a visual of those dimensions (depending on how many gifs per row):

If you don’t do that, your gifs will look like blurred filmography of Zack Snyder’s.

I’m gonna make a 253px gif so it won’t stretch in that post. Gifs over I think 268px stretch on normal posts as in posts and look ugly.

So that brings us to the next steps.

- Cutting, resizing. Easy. Don’t panic.

choose that tool:

set your... this:

(make sure it’s ‘cm’, otherwise you’re screwed) and crop, baby, crop. I suggest the biggest area you can, of course without the black parts.

Also, depending on gifs, the dimensions can be different. For my 540px gifs I use 5x2 or 2x1 or 16x9. For my 268px gifs I use 11x7, 11x8, 5x3, 1x1. For the 177/8/7px ones, I usually use 3x5 or something. Just make it look nice. Not too thin, not too high.

Ok, so I’m cropping.

And now resizing. Crtl+alt+i.

Make sure this thingy looks like that:

My width will be 253px, you make it 268, alright? Or something. Just don’t cross 540px. And put that beer away.

So I have this now:

Doesn’t look appealing, huh? Yeah.

Also click ctrl+’-’/’+’ to zoom in/out the gif.

- Sharpening.

Some people use actions, some do their own thing, I use an action. I’m lazy. And I don’t look forward to just... You know. Clicking a lot. So I use this action. Download it, make sure you like or rb that post, and upload the action using this:

Find your action. Load. Choose it, click play.

So this is how the gif looks without:

and with the sharpening:

Magic, I know. Okay, you can have that beer. Or no, don’t mix alcohol with pills.

- Coloring.

This is the fun part. That’s where vodka comes in. The part with 390248 times you get frustrated and your laptop is in danger because it can never know when it will join the doves behind your window in a short fly. Anyhoo.

Start from brightness. This is one little trick I learned. You can use these options:

I start off with doing something else. I choose the first option, aka Brightness/Contrast, and when it appears on my layers window, I choose the ‘screen’ option.

So I’ve gone from this

to this

It’s clean. It’s cute. Brightens the whole gif.

Of course, you can do it traditionally and/or adjust the opacity of that ‘screen’ layer. I think I’m gonna brighten it just a tiny bit more and add some contrast.

Now cooolors. I’ll make a standard gif, nothing crazy. You can go crazy if you want to, just don’t make someone’s skin orange. It just... doesn’t look good, kay?

Kay.

Those are my options:

And this is the result:

Save your gif using this (once again you can see my shortcut)

and your settings should look like this:

Click save, name the gif, save it wherever you want. And it’s done.

As a bonus we’ll go through...

4. Text on gif.

I use Arial Rounded MT Bold. You can use Calibri, it’s the one I used to use.

Choose this:

Click on the gif. Write your text. It looks like crap.

No worries. Choose the text (ctrl+a). Choose your character window. And manipulate until you get the result you’re happy with. Change the size of the font, the distance between letters and paragraphs (and choose the paragraph window to make the text centered).

My options:

and result:

Doesn’t look nice, we want it nice and clean and all that jazz. So. Back to the layers window. Choose that text layer and find this button

and choose drop shadow. When a window pops up, choose those settings (those are the ones I use:)

Then go to Stroke on your left and set it like this:

And click ok, and that’s the result:

Tips:

- create shortcuts. saves time, - make gif actions. saves time, - make sure you use the tumblr dimensions, - don’t do orange faces, ok? - when setting the text on your gif, you can do this little trick so it’s in the center:

x if my gif is 253x wide, the center is in 126,5, I make it 126px.

(make sure to write that ‘px’). click twice on your text layer, and this is the middle of that layer:

while moving that layer you should be able to see that tiny square and it’s the center of your text. Set it on the guide and you’re done. It’s centered.

- use these

to cut your gif. - play with the opacity and layer settings. for example, if you use color selection or saturation, you can set the layer’s option to ‘color’ and have it 70% opacity. - you can save the text layer only and reuse it by using ctrl+shit+s and saving it as psd

and then just open it again anytime with ctrl+o and duplicate it to the gif. - have fun with it. don’t throw your laptop out of your balcony, they’re expensive.

If you have any questions or want me to make a different tutorial on coloring or something, don’t be scared, I don’t bite (for real, I have braces, biting hurts).

I hope I helped and making gifs doesn’t look like magic to you anymore.

#completeresources #fyeahps #userlance #userjessie #biafrnc #userariella #photoshop help #ps help #making gifs #gif tutorial

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spiderlassie · 5 years ago

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Alright, dt fandom, in light of recent events, I’m gonna let y’all in on a secret: how to blacklist blogs so they don’t appear on your dash ever. For this trick, you will need to install the New X-Kit extension, which I will not teach here because you can just google (or better yet, use Ecosia and plant a few trees) it and the install walks you through it. If you’ve installed it correctly, you’ll see this at the top of your dash:

[ID: an image of a blue bar with white symbols resembling a house, a compass, an envelope, a smiley face, a lightning bolt, a logo, and a person. The logo has a poorly-drawn red arrow pointing at it. End ID]

(Sorry about the arrows, drew ‘em with the trackpad on my laptop)

Click on that symbols, then go to the tab labeled “get extensions” at the bottom and scroll down until you see the extension labelled “blacklist”

[ID: A white user interface with several different boxes is shown. There is a re arrow labelled one pointing at a tab at the bottom called get extensions, and a red arrow labelled two pointing at a box with an extension called blacklist on it. The blacklist extension is grayed out here because it has already been installed on this computer. End ID]

Once you’ve installed that, reload the page to make sure it sets and reopen X-Kit. Scroll down on the sidebar until you find the new “blacklist” tab (for me it’s near the bottom) and click on it.

[ID: A white userface with several tabs in a sidebar. There is a red arrow pointing at a tab labelled blacklist. End ID]

Scroll down until you see a box labelled “Check author blog title and usernames for blacklisted words.” Make sure this is checked.

[ID: A white user interface with several options. An option labelled check author blog titles and usernames for blacklisted words has a blue check mark on its left side and a red arrow pointing at it on its right. End ID]

Once you have that checked off, scroll all the way down to the bottom of the options list and click “add new” under “blacklisted words”

[ID: A white user interface with the label blacklisted words in all caps. There is a red circle around the option to add new. End ID]

Once you’ve clicked on that, just add the username like you would any other word and click “add”.

[ID: a prompt screen with a blue border at the top. The words add word to blacklist slash whitelist is at the top in large bold black font, with enter the word you want to add in bold but smaller font below it. Under that in regular typeface is the phrase your words can not contain commas or backslashes. Below that is a box with the phrase insert username here all as one word in it, with a red arrow labelled one pointing at it from the left. An option at the bottom to add word is in a grey box and has a red arrow labelled two pointing at it. End ID]

And there you go! That is how to blacklist a user from appearing on your dash. Please be advised that this advice is for desktop site users, but the tumblr app does have a blacklist built in, though I don’t know how well it works with usernames. Still, now you can blog without seeing posts from people you don’t like, so let’s all agree to utilize this trick and not tear each other apart over ultimately inconsequential things!

(Also if anyone wants to give me tips on how to better do image descriptions, it’d be much appreciated!)

#ducktales #long post #let's all take a deep breath now and remember it's not the end of the world if someone ships something we don't and vice versa #it's not that deep ya'll #again my apologies to sam and frank that they got dragged into this mess

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kaioken16 · 5 years ago

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Tales of Skaia (Preview)

This is a preview chapter for an upcoming story, I'm working on. A fantasy based AU heavily inspired by the story elements of the Seven Deadly Sins, and Fairy Tail.

For example, Dave and Karkat being actual knights, using magic, going on adventures, missions etc.

The extract below features the morning training routine between my OC (Zack) and Karkat. I'm going to full the story soon, but I would appreciate some feedback on the chapter, constructive criticism is always welcome on how I can improve, I'll posting in other sites too to get feedback from other people, and at the end of the month, I'll be posting the first official chapter, and I'll be commissioning some art to go along with this story.

I've also attached a Google Doc link in the traditional HS text font and colors for Zack and Karkat's lines if you'd like to read that.

Word count: 2401 Rating: Mature (mild violence, fantasy, blood.) Characters: Karkat Vantas, OC, Dave Strider (Mentioned briefly)

Karkat was sprawled over his bed, his blanket partially covering him. Snoring loudly, a trail of drool running from his mouth onto his pillow. The shutter was closed keeping out any annoying sunlight that would’ve disturbed his sleep, but of course, there would be other things that could wake him up… In the distance, the sound of footsteps approaching his room. A gentle knock against his door, which made him move around slightly. Then slowly his door opened, a creaking noise from the wood moving.

Standing in the doorway was Zack, fully dressed in his armor, minus his helmet, the sound of his metal clinking with each movement as he approached Karkat. It was a little funny to see how the troll slept, but of course, they were on a deadline. The older knight then brought his fingers to his mouth without warning a loud high pitch whistling filled the room. “AHHH!” Karkat jumped out of his sleep, then screaming at the sight of Zack, falling out of the bed. Like a frightened animal, he was looking around before he remembered where he was. “WHAT THE FUCK?!” He shouted looking at Zack, seething with his usual rage, jumping back up to his feet. “WHY? YOU COULDN’T FUCKING WAKE ME UP NORMALLY?!” Karkat roared out while Zack just grinned. “Come on, get dressed. It’s a new day and we’ve got training to do.” Zack said not even answering Karkat’s question which further vexed him. “What’s the time right now?” Karkat asked, rubbing his eyes as he looked around, as Zack went over to the shutters, opening them to let the sunlight in. “Just after a little sunrise.” He spoke in his usual upbeat manner, hearing how early it was just made Karkat groan out in annoyance. “Now, nothing too strenuous. Just a little hike through the forest, some swordplay, some magic training, and a cold waterfall shower.” He smiled, Karkat, however, glared at him in silent rage. “Sounds delightful. I can’t WAIT.” Karkat sharply said, bearing his teeth. As frustrating as this was, this is what he asked for after all.

Karkat Vantas. A young warrior-in-training from the troll clan. He left his home in order to become a knight and to seek out adventure, and become a stronger warrior. He had joined a rag-tag group of knights, but he was still a rookie compared to them. A desire to get stronger, he was sent to train with Zack Daemon, His superior within the group and now his new teacher. For the next month or so, the pair would be training in isolation away from their comrades until Karkat was at a higher level with his combat and his magic. He especially wanted to get stronger so he could knock Strider off his feet. A little later Karkat was dressed in his training gear, a small bag with a few supplies. Throwing it over his shoulder, this was the small cabin that he and Zack were staying for the duration of his training, it was located at the base of the mountains, surrounded by forest going on for miles. Many beasts, dangerous wildlife, and treacherous terrain made it the perfect place to train. Today marked 4 days since they had been here. Of course, it took some time for Karkat to adjust, he still was. He no longer had any of the comforts that made his life easy. But Zack was fair too. He didn’t overwork Karkat, he wasn’t cruel, he was firm but kind. “Alright, we’re all set. Let’s go.” Zack said, opening the front door and stepping outside, taking a deep breath and sighing, that fresh forest air always smelled good. Karkat just mumbled something under his breath, following after Zack, shutting the door behind him. Karkat yawned out, while Zack just grinned at him, running on the spot before taking off into the woods. Karkat shook his head to the sides, before running after Zack. It was an upward slope to their destination, and it was gonna be a thirty-minute hike, and then another thirty minutes back down. Karkat was trailing behind Zack, the other was wearing heavier gear and yet he always managed to stay ahead of him. Halfway up the path, Karkat was starting to get breathless, he was mentally telling himself to ignore it and keep going. Finally, they reached their destination. A large clearing, with a small waterfall pouring into the lake. At the center, there was no grass, just the soil. Karkat was at last able to crash on the ground, catching his breath. He threw the bag off his back, Zack did the same, performing some stretching poses. Karkat got back to his feet and mimicked Zack’s actions. “Okay, we’ll start with combat first. Then some magic practice. After that, we’ll head back for breakfast.” Zack smiling softly. “You ready?” Asking the troll, who nodded getting back to his feet. Karkat raised his hands up, making fists and making a stance. Zack smirking got into an identical stance. Karkat suddenly rushed towards the human, swinging his fists with Zack blocking or countering his blows. Karkat gritting his teeth, tried to punch Zack in the face, the other evading him, Zack then grabbing Karkat’s arm, holding it tight as he threw him over his shoulder, making Karkat hit the ground hard. Immediately becoming more frustrated, Karkat attempted to kick the other, but Zack caught his leg. Now holding onto two of his limbs, Zack threw him across the clearing, he watched the troll roll across the grass. Karkat managed to stagger back to his feet. Bearing his teeth towards the smirking Zack, clenching his fist anger, hitting the ground. The troll’s eyes suddenly flickered a bright red. The same color of aura manifested in his palms, and in a flash of light in his hands were now a pair of sickle blades. Zack raised one of his eyebrows, an impressed look on his face. Karkat charged at the other, dragging one of his sickles across the ground. Zack then held his arm up in a defensive manner, a yellow aura gathering around his wrist, with Karkat closing in. “Too slow!” Karkat yelled slashing upwards at Zack, at that moment the light-gathering around Zack formed a circular shield that blocked Karkat’s attack. “Predictable.” Zack simply said in a taunting manner which made the other growl and snarl at him. “You could’ve struck from behind or the sides and you might’ve hit me.” He lectured Karkat and began striking at Zack’s shield with both sickles. “Thanks for the tip!” Karkat spoke in a sarcastic manner. Zack sighing quietly as a light materialized in his free hand, shaping into a blade, a long rapier appeared in his grip.

Using his shield, he knocked Karkat back a few feet, then with a forward advance his blade slashed against Karkat’s cheek. He hissed at the small cut, blood running down the side of his face. Zack wastes no time unleashing a barrage of strikes, with Karkat countering with his sickles. Sparks flying each time their metals clashed. Karkat was on the defense, he was gonna wait for the opening to strike. But that was easier said than done. The other was able to make several cuts all over the troll, which only further infuriated Karkat. Roaring with rage, that same glow filled his eyes, bringing his sickles together. In a bright red and black flash, his twin sickles became a long scythe, the handle was black with red glowing marks pulsating. Zack’s expression changed to a more serious one, all of a sudden, he made his sword and shield vanish in a flash. The knight then moved with blinding speed, closing the distance between him and Karkat. Before the troll could even strike, Zack grabbed a hold of the scythe, holding the blade against Karkat’s throat. “Stop. You’re not ready to use this weapon form…” Zack’s voice was stern, his eyes glaring into Karkat’s. Gritting his teeth, sweat running down his forehead. He kept the cold metallic of his own blade on his neck. “O-Okay… Fine. Take it easy will ya…” Karkat raised his hands up in surrender. Zack stared at him for a moment. Sighing again, he squeezed the handle of Karkat’s scythe until it shattered into a light, fading away. “You already know how much magic power it takes to wield your second form. You haven’t mastered it, and it drains you completely of energy.” Zack lectured the other, gently knocking his forehead. “Yeah, yeah. I know until I can control it, the second form: scythe is off-limits.” Karkat had heard this all before, and of course, he knew he couldn’t use his second weapon configuration until he wasn’t physically and magically stronger to handle its power. “However, being able to transform it and maintain its form. You’re improving.” Zack wore a small smile, messing up Karkat’s hair. This made the other push Zack’s hand away.

“Improving is all good, but I need to get stronger so I can use the second form for more than just a few minutes.” Karkat examined his palm with his eyes, a serious look in his eyes. Slowly he tightened it into a fist. “More time is required. The more battle experience you have, the better chance you have of getting stronger.” Placing his hand on Karkat’s shoulder, smiling. Zack reassured the other that improvement would lead to the desired results. “Being patient is important too.” That is something Zack would always say to Karkat, being patience and progressing at a normal pace. “I have faith in you, and your skills.” He added. “Alright, let’s continue.” Zack took a few steps back from the other, raising his arms. “Hand-to-Hand combat for now.” “Okay. But you take the first move.” Karkat returned to his fighting stance, his eyes narrowing, he had to watch Zack’s movements carefully. Studied his fighting styles, anticipate his next move. These of course were all things the seasoned knight had taught him. Smirking slightly for just a moment, Zack rushed towards Karkat, and like the pair resumed. The troll was taking a defensive stance still time, either barely dodging Zack’s hits or simply blocking them. It was a minor bonus that trolls had thicker skin than humans. However that didn’t mean he could let Zack hit him, his punches would still hurt. He really was so strong, just like the others from their group. Countering one of Zack's blows, Karkat retaliated, he attempted an uppercut which missed, but he was able to deliver a swift kick to Zack’s side, knocking off balance. Rushing in close to strike at the other’s face, Zack held his arms up in cross position to block the punch. Taking Karkat’s blow, he stumbled back a bit. Karkat was coming close again, but this time Zack reached out grabbing the troll by the collar of his clothing, throwing his head back before slamming hard against Karkat’s forehead. “FUCK! Grrr!” Karkat held his face in pain, his head throbbing. Seizing his moment, Zack tackled Karkat to the ground. Gritting his teeth, his expression was back to his usual angry glare. Staring up at Zack’s smug expression.

Zack chuckled, he had the other successfully pinned, the added weight from his armour made it difficult for Karkat to move. He then held Karkat’s face tightly, pushing to side with Karkat snarling at Zack. His eyes twitching, as the other just smiled at him, but that grin was soon replaced by an expression of pain. Karkat used his instinct and sunk his sharp teeth deep into Zack’s hand that was holding his cheek. Zack immediately let go, holding his hand in pain. This gave Karkat the opening to push Zack off him. Zack just let out a bunch of incoherent noises of pain, his right hand now a large bite mark, and it was bleeding. It was dirty. But it worked. Karkat was now wearing a smug look of his own, spitting out some of Zack’s blood. Shaking his hand, throbbing from the pain. Zack tightened his bloody hand into a fist, he rushed at the Karkat who braced himself for Zack’s attack. However, he used his bloody hand, and swiped over Karkat’s eyes, wiping his crimson stain across Karkat’s face. Shutting his eyes, which allowed Zack to grab Karkat’s arm, throwing him over his shoulder and slamming him hard into the ground! “HEY! That was a dirty trick!” Karkat grunted, gritting his teeth. Rubbing off the blood away from his eyes. With Zack still holding his other arm. “Just following your example.” Zack said, keeping Karkat pinned for only a moment before letting go of him. Once the troll’s vision finally returned he was met by the sight of Zack holding his hand out for him. “Let’s take a breather, that’s it for the combat training…” Zack smiling at the other, Karkat huffed before taking Zack’s hand as he was helped back up to his feet. “You’re learning, changing up your techniques and styles. Not being restricted to just one.” Zack was impressed with Karkat switching up fighting styles. “Using any trick to your advantage…” He examined the bite mark on his hand, as he went over to their bags and grabbed a cloth and wrapped it around his hand over the bite wound.

Zack was genuinely impressed with how Karkat was progressing with him. His opinion of the troll and his attitude had changed since their first meeting. He was debating whether to take Karkat in as a student and train with him, but he had grown to like the other and was accustomed to the troll’s company, despite his flippant nature. His missions often had him alone, though this was by Zack’s choice. But working with a partner, and a team proves to be useful in more than one way. “Alright then. Let’s continue with Magic practice now.” Zack raising his arm up, a sphere of light appearing in his hand.

In another realm, another time, a world beyond belief, in the era of fairy tale. A time with knights, mages, mythical beasts, and adventure. In this era the human and non-human races were not divided, coexisting together, this land was full of magic. This supernatural force was intertwined with the very earth. This is a tale of a brave group of warriors who serve the realm as protectors, each with their own desires and goals. These are the tales of Skaia.

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chemicalmagecraft · 5 years ago

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The Gamer Hero, Deku Chapter 19

"So the cavalry battle's about to start," Mic-sensei said, "and I've just gotta say..." I strapped myself into the harness Hatsume had thoughtfully made for me so that I wouldn't fall while I was Meditating, because I really needed to use Meditation for my crazy plan to work. "IS THAT ONE OF THE ROBOTS FROM EARLIER!?" The two-pointer that I'd stowed in my inventory during the obstacle race. I was sitting on the center of the robot's torso, which thankfully acted a bit like a platform, Uraraka and Hatsume were by the front of the robot, with Hatsume arm-deep in the robot's guts still. Our final teammate, Tokoyami, was by the back of the robot due to its size. While I was the only one with a harness, my teammates had bits of scrap metal that Uraraka had magnetized that let them stick to the robot but still allowed them to move if they needed to.

"Too loud, Mic," Aizawa complained. "And yes, that is one of the robots from earlier. The problem child argued that if his teammate, Hatsume, modified and hacked the robot, then it would be her creation and therefore, as she is a support student, her team would be allowed to use it." He sighed. "And apparently the principal specifically wrote into the rules that hacking the robots is okay, so it's not even technically a loophole. When I asked Nedzu about it, he just maniacally laughed."

"To be honest I probably should've seen that coming."

"Probably. And by the way, the cavalry battle begins in about one minute, so get ready."

I took a deep breath and focused on my mana. A ball of faintly glowing light blue mana appeared on my chest, and three tendrils of mana extended from it. The tendrils touched my teammates on the chest, forming balls of mana on their chests like mine. Bestow, a spell I thought of that allowed me to share my mana with others, though there was a bit of mana lost. "So interesting!" Hatsume shouted as she poked the ball of mana on her chest, her eyes glowing. She was actually pretty good with magic, judging from how quickly she'd picked up Eye For Magic.

Tokoyami put a hand up to his mana ball. "I feel power flowing through me," he muttered.

I nodded. "Just remember that even with Meditation, I have a limited amount of mana. And there's three of you, which means that my mana will be split between you. We should be fine if only one person does something big at a time, so coordinate your spells."

"On three!" Midnight shouted.

"And finally snap me out of it if we need something big and I'll use Limit Break," I said quickly, then activated Mana Dome and Meditation.

"Begin!" Midnight shouted.

I couldn't really see much of what was happening at first because of how I was meditating and in the center of the robot. However, after a few moments, it seemed like Bestow started to synergize with Open Mind and possibly even Meditate, Tactician, and the party we'd made, because I was able to see through my teammate's eyes. I mostly focused on Uraraka because Tokoyami was watching the rear and Hatsume was piloting the robot. I kept a bit of an 'eye' on Hatsume, though, because I hoped to absorb some of her mechanical expertise. Uraraka saw that a lot of the teams made a beeline straight for us. One of the teams used some sort of ground-softening Quirk. "I'm gonna lower gravity!" Uraraka shouted. "Hit the jets, Hatsume!" I felt a sudden drain on my mana coming from Uraraka. A pink glow spread from her body, engulfing the entire robot. Hatsume activated the robot's jets, and despite its weight it flew. Tokoyami deflected a few shots that came after us with Dark Shadow.

When we touched down, the robot sank a bit. Hatsume looked down at the legs and saw some mud, using Eye For Magic. "Someone's attacking my new baby with water magic!" she shouted.

Uraraka looked around and saw Tsu and someone from gen ed that I didn't know very well riding on Shoji's back. "Tsu-chan!" she shouted.

Tsu spat out a glob of water, which shaped itself like a buzzsaw. "Ochako-chan, I'm sorry to do this, but-"

"Well I'm not at all!" Hatsume shouted, then laid her hands on the robot. She stared at her hands with Eye For Magic as she poured mana into the robot. She, and therefore I, could see how the mana interacted with the technology. I heard a text box open as I learned the skill from her. Blue lines spread across the robot, and Hatsume's vision changed to the robot's camera. She shot a net at Tsu's team, entangling them, and made the robot carefully step out of the mud.

"DEKU! YOUR FUCKING ROBOT WON'T SAVE YOU NOW!" All three of my teammates turned in unison to see Kacchan's team. Kacchan jumped off of Kirishima, his front horse, and started flying at us with Fire Dash. Tokoyami had Dark Shadow curl around me protectively.

"He's going after my baby!" Hatsume screeched.

"I've got this!" Uraraka shouted. She slapped her hands on the robot, blue sparks springing into existence and traveling over to the leg Kacchan was aiming for. When Kacchan tried to explode the leg, it just... compressed a bit before springing back with a wave of energy. Kacchan was knocked back, but another one of his horses, Sero, grabbed him with his tape. "Get us out of here, Hatsume!"

"What did you do to my baby?" Hatsume demanded as the robot ran.

"I temporarily messed with the strength and stuff of the armor using particle magic. I can do that to my skin, too. It feels really weird." If I wasn't drawing in the energy of the world or however Meditation worked I'd have asked how that worked. It sounded interesting.

A few teams moved to intercept us. "I'll be taking your headband, Midoriya," Todoroki said. "Kaminari!" His teammates were Yaoyorozu and Kaminari in the back, on roller skates that I assumed Yaoyorozu made, and Iida in the front.

Yaoyorozu made a sheet and a grounding rod while Kaminari started to build up lightning. "I believe my power will be the most useful in this situation," Tokoyami said. "My comrades, please allow me to complete access Midoriya's font of power." Tokoyami drained my MP even faster than Meditation could bring it back. In return, a shroud of near-total darkness engulfed the world. "Primordial Void!" he intoned. Through Hatsume's enhanced eyes, I could just barely see Corvo and Dark Shadow emerge, though Dark Shadow was so big that it dwarfed our robot. I remembered what he said, about how Dark Shadow got stronger but harder to control the darker it was. "Now, my minions of shadow, let us have a true revelry in the dark." Dark Shadow rushed forward, with Corvo riding him and seemingly controlling him, or at least directing him.

Kaminari shot most of his lightning at Dark Shadow, or at least I think that's what happened in the gloom. It wasn't very effective with such poor light, and it seemed that the dark magic was dampening the lightning itself somehow. Dark Shadow raged, knocking back all of the teams. The drain on my MP abated, and the black shroud started to fade away. "Run, Hatsume!" Tokoyami shouted. "Away from Todoroki's team!"

"I can see!" she shouted as the robot started running away. Tokoyami saw Todoroki freeze out the other teams in the confusion and then Iida shouting something. Todoroki made a ramp of ice and Iida shot off faster than I'd ever seen him run before. Tokoyami made to intercept with Dark Shadow, but Todoroki's team sped up even more as the ice at the tip of the ramp exploded, and then Kaminari shot a bolt of lightning at Dark Shadow that stunned it. Yaoyorozu shot a miniature cannon past Tokoyami. I opened my eyes just in time to get hit in the back of my head with the cannonball that shattered my Mana Dome. It didn't hurt, but it was really jarring! Because I'd flinched from the hit, I wasn't able to react in time to stop Todoroki from snatching my headband. Their team landed on a platform of ice, then slid down the slide that Todoroki turned it into.

I took stock. The two skills that I'd learned, Sight Sharing and Technomancy, wouldn't be very useful. However, we already had everything we needed to get that headband back.

"Ditch the robot and go after them, guys!" I shouted. Luckily, Todoroki didn't think to melt the slide. Actually, I couldn't remember him ever using his fire in battle. That probably wasn't a good sign... My teammates jumped into the formation that we'd discussed on the slide, and I used Sonic Embodiment to take my place as the rider. Tokoyami used Dark Shadow to push us down and I used Speed Up on my teammates. Now that I wasn't using Meditate, which didn't let me use Observe while I was using it, Tactician told me that Iida's engines were stalled by whatever special move he'd used. "That move wiped out Iida's Quirk for the rest of the game, so we have a chance! Get me close!"

Uraraka lowered our gravity, letting us run faster. I noticed that the robot was tailing behind us, but I didn't give it much thought. We got within range, and Todoroki's eyes widened as his left arm caught fire, a knee-jerk reaction. I slashed my arm at him with wind mana, blowing his defenses away, then used a light amount of One For All to grab the golden headband. They'd flipped the headbands around and mixed up their order to try and trick us, but with Observe and Tactician that meant nothing to me. "We're flying away!" I shouted, activating the jetpack I hadn't had to use yet in the cavalry battle. Uraraka used a mixture of her Quirk and gravity magic to lift us out of there. Apparently the reason why she got such bad nausea when she used her Quirk on herself was because she was resistant to it, but she didn't have as much of a problem with gravity magic.

"DEKU!" Kacchan screamed at me, flying toward us. It looked like he was back to attacking us...

"Uraraka! My baby!" Hatsume shouted. Uraraka got what she meant immediately and pointed at the two-pointer, which jumped and started using its jets. Uraraka pulled on Bestow again, causing the robot to glow pink and start flying. It intercepted Kacchan, but it looked like Uraraka did the strengthening spell again. This time, though, well...whatever the spell did, it didn't completely solve the problem of Newton's third law of motion. The robot absorbed all of the force, yes, but when it rebounded the force... It was weightless. "MY BABY!" Hatsume shrieked as the robot was repulsed away from Kacchan. I didn't want a giant robot, even a giant robot with the weight of a beach ball, crashing into the stands or even worse the stalls outside, so I grabbed it with Mana Rope and braced myself on an air platform. I swung the robot down to try to take some of the motion off.

"Get on the robot!" I shouted after getting the robot to only be slowly falling. We landed on it and I started meditating again to help with keeping us lightly falling.

"And Team Midoriya are back just in time for the end of the cavalry battle!" Mic-sensei shouted when we touched down. "The game was totally crazy, but now it's OOOOVEEEER!"

"In first place, we have Team Midoriya, clearly," Aizawa-sensei said. "Second place is Team Todoroki, third is Bakugou, and fourth is... it looks like Team Shinsou snatched a few last-minute points. Impressive."

"We'l be taking a lunch break, but we'll move on to the final games after the break, folks! Stay tuned!"

I dropped off of the robot, not waiting for Hatsume to lower it. "Are you okay, Midoriya?" Yaoyorozu asked me, rubbing her elbow.

"O-oh, I'm fine," I reassured her. "I can fall from higher than that without any problem."

"No, I mean from when I shot you. That looked like it hurt..."

I shook my head. "No, no, it was more surprising than anything! My Mana Dome probably took most of the hit, and my Quirk is really overpowered. I think I wouldn't be too hurt if All Might were to punch me in the face."

She nodded. "That's impressive. I still apologize, though. I was aiming to just pop your barrier, but we were going very fast, so..."

"It's fine!"

xoxoxo

After we left to get lunch, Todoroki stopped me and rather forcefully asked to meet me alone. I saw no reason not to, so I followed him to an abandoned hallway. "What did you need me for?" I asked. "Did you get hurt in the caval-"

"I was overwhelmed." He glared at me. "Your power. I only saw it once, but it reminded me of All Might."

"I'm pretty sure All Might doesn't use wind magic. He just punches the air hard enough that it looks like he does."

"I don't mean your magic. You did... something that wasn't magic."

"How did you know?"

"I can sense magic. And that sudden movement you did, it was more like All Might's Quirk than magic."

I blinked. "I'm sorry, did you just say you can sense magic?"

"And considering how All Might seems to be supporting you, I have to ask one thing." I gulped. I didn't know what he was going to say, but he was getting pretty close to the truth... "Are you All Might's secret love child or something?"

I spluttered. "Wow, I wish I was All Might's secret love child! All I know about my dad is that he had some kind of firebreathing Quirk and curly white hair. And that he owes us a lot in child support."

"Regardless, you clearly have some kind of connection to All Might. Just know that I must beat you. You see, my father is an ambitious man. He wanted to be the number one hero, and wasn't even satisfied with second place." His voice became ice cold. "And so he made me to carry out his ambitions."

"What do you mean, 'made you?'" His Quirk involved two separate powers, even stated in Observe to be two Quirks in one body. It reminded me of that Nomu thing...

"Are you aware of Quirk marriages?" Oh. In hindsight that was the more likely conclusion. Probably worse, though. He snarled. "My father used his influence to put pressure on my mother's family, forcing an arranged marriage. It took the bastard four tries, but he finally made me, his masterpiece, and trained me relentlessly. My mother hated my left side. I don't blame her. It's his." I'm not a psychologist or a Quirk counselor... yet... but that seriously did not sound like a good sign, psychologically speaking. "I remember one time, she was talking to someone on the phone, about my left half." Seriously, I could tell Tokoyami was joking whenever he called his power a curse, but it seemed that Todoroki genuinely felt that the entire left half of his body and the power it gave him was some sort of... well, curse. "She saw me, and threw boiling hot water at me face, as you can see. As you've probably noticed by now, my left side is heat-resistant, but not fireproof."

"Yeah, I may not have a fire Quirk, but I still have some weak fire resistance from my dad. Speaking of which, I suddenly feel very grateful my jackass firebreather dad was an absent jackass firebreather father."

"I envy you for your absent parent."

"You know, if you want I could try to heal that scar? It's obviously tied to some serious trauma, and I figure not seeing it in the mirror would ease some of the pain?"

He shook his head. "No. My purpose was to tell you this: I plan to deny my father the satisfaction of using his fire. I'll defeat you without ever using my left side again, this I can promise you." He started to walk off, leaving me in thought.

I Flash Stepped behind him a moment later and put my hand on his right shoulder. "You do realize I'm going to have to report this, right?"

His head whipped back. "What?"

"One of the stipulations of Shuzenji-sensei's training program. If I find evidence of any of my classmates being abused, I'm to report it to her or another teacher, with or without their permission. Even if I wasn't, though, I wouldn't just take that and say nothing. What kind of hero would I be if I learned my classmate was being abused and didn't say anything?"

"I appreciate the offer, but Endeavor's influence is too much. He always boasts how, if we did do anything, he'd have his people on it." He shuddered. "And then he'd punish us."

"Have you ever actually done anything?" I asked.

"I just said-"

"You said what he told you," I corrected. "A few years before Endeavor's debut, there was, obviously, another hero in the number two spot. Undertow. He had a flashy, powerful water Quirk that let him shoot water from any part of his body, and lots of it. To be honest, it'd be pretty funny how similar he was to Endeavor if it didn't extend to the point of abusing his daughter in the form of 'training.' Apparently, he even married a telekinetic so he could get a child with hydrokinesis, much like with your situation."

"What happened?"

"It took a while, but Undertow's sister reported him. She'd known for a while, but he'd threatened to... do something to his daughter if she did." I wiped a giant tear from my eye and sniffed. "It wasn't publicized much, because people were afraid that a pro of that ranking turning out to have done something like that could've triggered massive unrest, but Undertow was arrested and some of his charges were released, enough that nobody would question the arrest. He's still behind bars today." I smiled. "And at the same time I'm sure All Might would be willing to help you if he heard what happened, and I doubt that the influence of the number two hero outstrips that of the symbol of peace."

Todoroki nodded. "I'll take your word for it. Though, how do you know about Undertow if, as you said, the whole story was suppressed?"

"My grandmother told me about it." I used some magic on my tear ducts, causing a massive amount of water to pour from them. Then I wiped off my face and shirt because I didn't put any pressure into it, making the water dribble all over me. "She didn't want me to repeat her mistake."

Todoroki blinked. "Wait, so are you saying-"

"Undertow is my great uncle, yes. We don't talk about him much, though, because of the whole, ah..."

"I see. You have my condolences. If I may ask, would it be possible for you to get me in contact with Undertow's daughter?"

I rubbed the back of my head. "Ah... that won't be possible, unfortunately. For one, she kind of hated my grandmother? Okay, not exactly hate per se but, well... Grandma didn't blame her, what with how she didn't say anything about the abuse for a while. And I think Undertow made it worse somehow..."

"When was the last time I talked to my siblings..." Todoroki muttered.

"Yeah, child abuse is pretty awful," I said. "Anyway, I think she reached out to my mom a few times, but... well... Then she died..."

"I'm sorry for your loss."

I shrugged. "I didn't even know her. Well, I didn't know her personally. I knew a lot about her. She was actually a pro hero."

"Was that... how she..?"

I gave him a small nod. "The hero duo Water Hose. A husband-and-wife pair. About two years ago, they sacrificed themselves to take out a dangerous villain with a powerful enhancement Quirk. But enough about my messed up family. I won't force you to go to Shuzenji-sensei now, but when the sports festival is over we are talking to him, even if I have to drag you there myself."

He grunted. "Fine. If it will really destroy my father, then I'll happily talk to Shuzenji-sensei."

"That's probably not quite the healthiest thing to say, but it's better than not telling anyone about the abuse, so I'll let it slide," I muttered. Todoroki shrugged and started to walk off. This time I let him.

xoxoxo

A/N: Okay, so originally Undertow wasn't going to be related to Deku, but then I remembered that I said that his grandmother had a water Quirk and decided that he'd probably have reason to know about this guy if grandmother dearest told him about her evil twin. I mean, hero-nerd Izuku would probably know about the guy even without being related to him, but there's the reason for him to know the censored bits.

#fanfiction #bnha fanfiction #bnha #The Gamer Hero Deku #Gamer Hero Deku #GHD CH19

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welcometothepenumbra · 6 years ago

Text

SECOND CITADEL – THE MOONLIT HERMIT (PART TWO)

SOUND: RAIN. TRAIN ARRIVES, CREAKS TO A STOP. DOOR CLANKS OPEN.

CONDUCTOR: Ah, good evening, Traveler. And welcome… to The Penumbra.

SOUND: DOOR CLANKS SHUT.

Take your seat, please, take your seat.

MUSIC: STARTS.

The junction lies ahead, so if you’ll allow me just a moment.

SOUND: TRAIN WHISTLE.

We are now passing through the Swamp of Titan’s Blooms.

SOUND: TRAIN MOVING.

Our next stop?

SOUND: TRAIN BRAKES.

The Moonlit Hermit.

SOUND: DOOR CLANKS OPEN, RAIN.

ALL SOUNDS: FADE OUT.

***

SOUND: RECORDER TRACK CHANGE. SWAMP AMBIANCE.

RILLA: (WHISPERING) It’s nearby. I’m not sure it even knows where I am, but I heard—

SOUND: SAWING.

It’s up there.

(PANTING)

SOUND: RUNNING FOOTSTEPS. CREAKING WOOD, CRASH.

Too close. Gotta throw it off track, gotta—

(GRUNTS)

SOUND: SWISH, THUD. THUMPS DEPARTING.

MUSIC: STARTS.

(PANTING) Okay. Better get started. Not much time left.

(CLEARS THROAT) Research log. Final entry.

My name is Amaryllis of Exile, and that thing you just heard slashing and stomping around… I made it with the monster’s tools, and it’s going to kill me.

I can’t stop it. Neither the magician-lord of this swamp nor his living castle could even put a dent in it, and now… it’s just out here, raising hell and… that’s just what I made by accident. I don’t even want to imagine—

Please. Warn the Citadel. Please. And maybe this story will give them something to go off of.

After the night I tried to escape from Lord Arum’s Keep, the night I made that thing, Arum and I had a conversation which I did not record. All you need to know about it was that he wasn’t happy, and neither was I – but even then, for all his threats, he didn’t hurt me. He just took the Moonlit Hermit with him, told the Keep to grow me a proper room to sleep in, and left. So I didn’t get any more answers until the lizard showed his face the next morning, and we came to… an agreement.

SOUND: MUSIC CUTS OUT, RECORDER TRACK CHANGES. KNOCKING.

ARUM: (THROUGH THE DOOR) Amaryllis.

Amaryllis!

RILLA: You grew this room. Don’t see why you need permission to enter it.

ARUM: (THROUGH THE DOOR) I… don’t need your permission, of course. It’s my Keep. And it’s because of your whining that I— (SIGHS) I’ll come speak with you another time, then. Enjoy your rest, tktktktktktktktk.

SOUND: RUSTLING.

RILLA: No, come on. Wait.

SOUND: DOOR CREAKS OPEN. JUNGLE AMBIANCE.

Sorry. I… might not have slept. At all.

ARUM: You should be sorry. I didn’t sleep either.

And. Well. I suppose I also… apologize.

That… thing.

RILLA: What thing?

ARUM: Your… recording device. It’s on.

RILLA: It is, yeah.

ARUM: I thought I told you to—

RILLA: Yeah, well, I’m not just going to roll over and do everything you say, okay? I want the recorder, and if you want to talk to me, it stays on. You don’t get to care why.

ARUM: …Alright.

So. Did you think at all about my offer?

RILLA: I did.

ARUM: And?

RILLA: I don’t know yet. It isn’t a very good one right now.

ARUM: Then come up with one you prefer. I’m too tired and in too much of a hurry to haggle. Go on.

RILLA: I’m going to want some things in return.

ARUM: Beyond my tutelage? I’m offering you the impossible mysteries of the universe, you—

RILLA: Okay, all this stuff about you teaching me, me working for you? That’s exactly why we couldn’t have this conversation yesterday—

ARUM: Oh, spare me—

RILLA: If you want my help fixing your Keep, I’m not going to be your assistant.

ARUM: Well, I certainly won’t be yours!

RILLA: I never asked for that. We’re going to work together. Share methods together, theorize together, experiment together. But I’m done working for you.

And any questions I have… you have to answer them all. I can’t help you if you don’t let me do my job.

ARUM: That is… logical.

Agreed. With one restriction. There are certain lines of questioning that I cannot, under any circumstances, answer.

RILLA: But—

ARUM: The work I do, and the beings I do it for, are dangerous. Giving up information they’ve protected would ensure my Keep’s death, and I cannot endanger my Keep. That you must understand.

RILLA: …Alright.

ARUM: Well, then. Shall we—

RILLA: One last thing.

ARUM: My, this deal just gets fairer by the second, doesn’t it?

RILLA: If I cure your Keep, you have to let me go home. Seriously this time.

ARUM: I’ve already told you, I can’t—

RILLA: Well, you’re gonna have to, Arum. You’re bargaining with me, and you’re not getting any sleep, and for all the times you’ve threatened to kill me, that’s never really been an option for you. And all that means: you’re desperate. You need me. And that means: I get to name my price.

Well? I want some kind of guarantee—

ARUM: (GROWLS) Keep!

KEEP: (SINGING)

ARUM: For the remainder of her stay within these walls, you are to listen to any requests the human Amaryllis makes. Is that understood?

KEEP: (AFFIRMATIVE SINGING)

RILLA: How am I supposed to know that worked?

ARUM: You’re the researcher. Test it, tktktktktktktktk.

RILLA: Uhhh… okay?

(CLEARS THROAT) Keep! I want to see the way back home! …Uhh, please!

KEEP: (SINGING)

SOUND: STRETCHING, CREAKING.

RILLA: Saints, is that…?

DOOR CREAKS OPEN. SWAMP AMBIANCE.

ARUM: A portal to the swamp’s edge. Now you understand how we came here this quickly. Satisfied?

RILLA: But… could it make a portal to—

ARUM: Only the Swamp of Titan’s Blooms, Amaryllis. (SNORTS) Humans… you show them the impossible and within seconds they already want more.

RILLA: No, it’s just… that’s a lot of power to give me, Arum.

ARUM: (GROWLS) Close the portal, Keep. And put this room away; we won’t be needing it any longer.

KEEP: (SINGING)

SOUND: DOOR CREAKS SHUT. JUNGLE AMBIANCE.

ARUM: When I first told you my Keep was the font from which every Titan’s Bloom springs, I was not telling the full scope of the truth. It is true that all the flowers here are born from the Keep; but so is all life in this swamp. The Keep had a hand in creating every living thing here, and it is the source that keeps them living. If it dies—

RILLA: Then everything in the Swamp of Titan’s Blooms dies, too.

ARUM: Precisely. I cannot expect you to understand the bond I share with such a creature; the depth of emotion and devotion I feel for that which gave me life, and that which it is my birth-duty to protect—

RILLA: So it’s your mom.

ARUM: No it is not! Our– our relationship is far more complicated than that! The Keep has but one familiar at a time, a symbiotic soldier who both harnesses its infinite power and lives only to protect—

RILLA: Right, right, but besides that, it’s basically just your mom. Gave you life, sings you lullabies, gets a lot of attitude. Mom stuff.

ARUM: It is not.

KEEP: (SINGING)

ARUM: You stay out of this, tktktktktktktktk!

RILLA: (LAUGHS)

ARUM: There! Your deal is accepted. You have your answers, you have your freedom, you have my pride. It is ample pay. Now earn it. What do we do?

RILLA: (LAUGHING) Okay, okay, okay.

So. If we’re going to do this right, we’re going to need to perform an exam. Where did the petrification start?

ARUM: How should I know? It’s a massive tower. By the time I noticed it—

RILLA: Then where did you first notice it?

ARUM: In my workshop. When I’m not babysitting troublesome primates that is usually where I am.

RILLA: Then that’s where we go. Keep, could you show me the way to the workshop, please?

KEEP: (AFFIRMATIVE SINGING)

SOUND: DOOR CREAKS OPEN.

RILLA: I think I could get used to this.

ARUM: Ugh.

SOUND: RECORDER TRACK CHANGES.

RILLA (NARRATOR): Arum’s workshop was the first room in the Keep I’d seen with a window… and Saints. Who knew a swamp could look like that? Flowers as wide as temples. Life of every color. Frogs that spread wine-colored splotches everywhere they touched, herons robed in golden moss, fish that bowed before the swaying trees and then flew, flew, up to the branches to roost. It was so, so…

It was the first time I felt that feeling Damien talks about. When he thinks he sees Saint Damien in the reflection on the water. Hears him in the sound of the rain. Which is impossible, of course, but…

For now, I’ll just say more evidence is needed. So… get on that, I guess.

SOUND: RECORDER TRACK CHANGES.

RILLA: Why are you standing by the door? Come on. A look won’t kill you.

ARUM: It won’t kill me, no. I’m waiting for the clouds to pass; to find a safe spot for this.

SOUND: CHIMES JINGLING.

RILLA: The Moonlit Hermit?

ARUM: Its cage was demolished. And I don’t just leave my most powerful tool lying around.

There. This spot should be safe… and dark.

RILLA: So… that part of the story’s really true, too? This flower that’s powerful enough to bring things to life… just dies in the sunlight?

ARUM: I do wish you’d stop saying that. The Hermit itself doesn’t do anything. It just wants.

(SIGHS) The Hermit lacks almost every basic structure flora require to survive.

MUSIC: STARTS.

So it only lives for one reason: because it wants to, so badly, that physical laws must suspend in its presence. Its will to live is so strong that it lives on that alone.

RILLA: So your theory is that, its will is so strong, it’s contagious, too?

ARUM: Indeed. It speaks to the small amount of life present in every object, whether inanimate, deceased, or… currently alive. Like the abdomen of a Macrachnid, tired of being a thoughtless slave to the head.

RILLA: Yeah, okay, I get it, thanks.

ARUM: Sunlight is the only thing the Hermit wants more than life. So if it gets it… it becomes distracted.

RILLA: And it forgets to live?

ARUM: I wouldn’t put it so crudely. Really it…

Yes, it forgets to live. It finds something that matters more to it. Are you happy, tktktktktktktktk?

MUSIC: ENDS.

RILLA: Huh.

ARUM: That face. What does that face mean?

RILLA: It means I’m thinking.

ARUM: You admit that my methods are superior.

RILLA: Not really. Honestly, you don’t seem to know what you’re talking about.

ARUM: What?!

RILLA: But plenty of scientific breakthroughs have started with fairy tales, so I am interested. Show me what you were working on when you first saw the petrification happen.

SOUND: RECORDER TRACK CHANGES.

RILLA (NARRATOR): We passed experiment after experiment, and I couldn’t see any use for any of them. In one cage of nettles sat a rodent that belched periodically, inflated until punctured by a thorn, then deflated and started over again. In another stood a small creature with many faces, busily whispering insults to itself. In a third grew a flower that changed its color every time I blinked, its roots twined around a scrap of silk.

SOUND: RECORDER TRACK CHANGES.

ARUM: Prototypes, mostly. I keep intending to get rid of them, but disposal is such a lengthy process.

RILLA: Couldn’t you just… let them go?

ARUM: Let them go. (BIG LAUGH) Nearly half of my work is ensuring these creations don’t get free, Amaryllis. New species can be fatal to an ecosystem – as you saw with these.

SOUND: JAR OPENS. INSECT BUZZING, HEARTBEAT.

RILLA: The grubs… from beneath the Numbcap! Saints… there are so many of them!

ARUM: Yes. It took many weeks of tireless testing to get through all of these. And in the end not a single one did as I needed.

SOUND: JAR SHUTS.

RILLA: Hey, I was looking—

ARUM: And now you aren’t.

I still don’t know how they got out and I can’t risk another breach.

RILLA: But… what are they for?

ARUM: A contract. Other monsters hired me to make… something. They are one failed attempt.

RILLA: But what—?

ARUM: I warned you when we began this that there would be some questions I could not answer. This is one of them.

RILLA: Arum!

ARUM: I can only assure you, that after their escape, the Keep and I spent many sleepless nights studying them, and studying them, and I do not think they could be the cause of the Keep’s illness.

Here. You may look into their case, if you wish. It’s Vanishwood – just pass your hand over the side. I’ll gather supplies that may prove useful, tktktktktktktktk.

SOUND: SLITHERING.

RILLA: Research log, entry four-three-zero-one. Observing what appears to be a colony of those grubs I found beneath the Numbcap… Lord Arum’s creations. Interesting. My original sample didn’t exhibit any unusual behavior, but, when you put them in a group they cluster and move as one unit. I think I see something behind them, but they keep getting in the way. Come on, come on!

Uch, seriously? No matter where I look, they—

…keep moving in my way. They cluster where I look before I look there… like they know where that’s going to be.

Agh, I can just catch glimpses of what they’re blocking. It looks like… a rolled-up cloth of some kind? A scarf?

ARUM: Have you found anything interesting?

RILLA: (GASPS) Don’t sneak up on me like that.

ARUM: I will not alter my walking just because you have primitive ears, Amaryllis. Are you satisfied?

RILLA: Nope, but it sounds like I just have to get used to that. (SIGHS) Whatever tools you used to make these grubs… can you bring them back to the greenhouse with us? I want to run some checks on them.

ARUM: Keep. Bring the tools Amaryllis has requested to the greenhouse – and open the way for us, as well.

KEEP: (TIRED SINGING)

SOUND: STRETCHING, CREAKING.

(SINGING)

SOUND: METAL CLATTERING.

ARUM: Be careful! Those tools took months to grow, you oaf!

RILLA: Arum… the door! It’s—

ARUM: Petrifying. (HISSES)

SOUND: CRACKING, CRUMBLING.

(STRAINING) Open this door! I told you to open… it!

SOUND: CLANK.

Yah!

RILLA: Arum!

ARUM: It’s alright. I’m alright.

No thanks to my Keep!

KEEP: (TIRED, SAD SINGING)

RILLA: Arum… it’s sick.

ARUM: Oh, is it sick? Is it tired? Because I’m certainly tired, too, but I’m at least holding up my end of the bargain, aren’t I? We’re supposed to protect each other, you ungrateful plant! Are you even trying?!

RILLA: Arum… come on. Of course it’s trying. It’s just—

ARUM: It’s fought off illness before! And curses, and sieges, and…! If it wanted to live, it would. It’s chosen to give up!

Haven’t you? Haven’t you!

KEEP: (TIRED, SAD SINGING)

RILLA: Stop. I know you’re upset, but this isn’t helping. If the problem was just that the Keep didn’t want to get better… it would already be dead. When people really give up… it’s over pretty quickly.

ARUM: Then the only thing those people are missing is… the will to live.

Get out of my way.

SOUND: SLITHERING.

RILLA: What? Where are you going?

ARUM: Your compulsion to gather facts and put them all in a row might be effective for your simple concerns, but when you grapple with a near-infinite being you must employ near-infinite power.

RILLA: What are you doing with the Hermit?

ARUM: What do you think? Move.

SOUND: SLITHERING.

RILLA: Arum, we don’t know what that’s going to do. At this stage, we have to be careful!

ARUM: We should never have gotten to this stage in the first place. I’m getting us out of it.

SOUND: BOTTLE UNCORKS. LIQUID POURING. CHIMES JINGLING.

There, little Hermit… teach this Keep the value of a life, that it may fight this stone away, tktktktktktktktk.

SOUND: TWO DROPLETS.

KEEP: (CURIOUS SINGING)

ARUM: There. You see, Amaryllis, how the color returns to this stone?

RILLA: I do.

KEEP: (STRAINED WORKING SONG)

SOUND: STRETCHING, CREAKING.

ARUM: The doors. This is the effort I’ve been looking for. Learn from the Moonlit Hermit, my Keep. With enough will, enough desire, even death itself holds no power—

KEEP: (HIGH, PAINED NOTE)

SOUND: POP.

ARUM: (HISSES)

RILLA: Whoa!

SOUND: CRACKING, CRUMBLING.

ARUM: Push it back, Keep! Try, tktktktktktktktk!

KEEP: (EXHAUSTED SINGING)

ARUM: No excuses!

Try it again.

SOUND: CHIMES JINGLING.

RILLA: Uh-uh! No way! Gimme that!

ARUM: Amaryllis… this was effective. It fixed things, for a moment.

RILLA: Do you think your Keep could take another shock like that? Do you? Because your workshop is starting to look like a quarry.

ARUM: That is just how magic operates. When you reach for the cosmos, there are no guarantees. What didn’t work then may work now. We will not know unless we try.

RILLA: So magic is inconsistent.

ARUM: Exactly.

RILLA: And so: useless. Huh. That’s good to know.

ARUM: What?

RILLA: You can reach for the cosmos, Arum, and that’s great. But sometimes you just want what’s right in front of you. That’s when you gather evidence.

ARUM: Hah!

RILLA: The reason we want results to be consistent is because some things are too valuable to risk on a maybe. Like your Keep, for example. So: we have to figure out the problem, and in order to that, we need data. Do you have a microscope?

ARUM: A what?

RILLA: It lets you see things that are really, really small. If I could get a closer look at the Keep’s cell structure, I might be able to—

ARUM: Why should you care what things so small look like? Perhaps they don’t want to be seen.

RILLA: (SIGHS) I need to take a sample, at least. Do you have a chisel, or something? I want to see if there’s any living tissue underneath this stone.

ARUM: (GRUMBLES)

SOUND: SCRAPING.

Here. The Keep dropped it, so let’s hope it isn’t broken, tktktktktktktktk.

RILLA: It’s a pick, Arum, I don’t think dropping… whatever.

SOUND: SHOVELING DIRT.

This spot should do.

SOUND: SHARP TAPS.

ARUM: What are you even hoping to find?

RILLA: Well, I hope I find the cause of the Keep’s illness, but I don’t expect—

ARUM: Hah! Typical human overconfidence. Be careful of what you unearth with that blade, little Amaryllis – for your own sake. The secrets this Keep holds tie into the very fabric of the universe. To think you will be able to contain them within your small human mind is pride itself—

RILLA: Found it.

ARUM: What.

RILLA: Yeah, look at this.

SOUND: SLITHERING.

See that white fuzz on the greenery packed in there? Mildew. Pretty common plant infection.

ARUM: And it typically causes flora to turn into stone?

RILLA: Just eats them, usually. But, if their host has this much magic rolling around inside it… I, I don’t know. If I had my lab I could do some tests on it, but…

ARUM: But?

RILLA: Your tools are very, very, very, very bad.

ARUM: Ungrateful—!

RILLA: But hey, the study of medicine’s way older than proper measurements. It was less accurate then, but still followed the same rules: test, take notes, test some more, and once you’ve found a pattern, use it. So get some paper ready, Arum: I’m sending you and the Keep out shopping.

SOUND: RECORDER TRACK CHANGES.

RILLA (NARRATOR): I had a plan in mind, but it was going to require a lot of supplies. I gave Arum my list, and he translated it into terms the Keep could understand.

SOUND: RECORDER TRACK CHANGES.

RILLA: I need a ruler – something that will help me measure length.

ARUM: Keep, a stick with notches at regular intervals.

RILLA: And some pure water with a few drops of oil. A few gallons of that would be great.

ARUM: That’s two gourds of Spring-Dew with Bloatnut runoff, Keep.

RILLA: Some kind of device for spraying… and for holding it all together.

ARUM: A Spitting Lily and a ball of Macrachnid web.

RILLA: And some baking soda. That’s the white powder stuff you find under—

ARUM: And some baking soda.

Don’t make that face. Monsters have made this land’s finest cakes for thousands of years, tktktktk—

SOUND: RECORDER TRACK CHANGES.

RILLA (NARRATOR): And then, we put it all together: a solution comprised of the water, oil, and baking soda, poured into bags tied and fastened to the Spitting Lillies. An antifungal spray not unlike the kind I used at home.

The first tests were promising.

SOUND: RECORDER TRACK CHANGES.

RILLA: Here we go…

SOUND: SPRAY. SIZZLE.

Alright. I think we’re onto something.

ARUM: So… that’s it, then?

Then why is there still stone everywhere, tktktktktktktktk?

RILLA: Because that was just the first test. Help me make another bottle for you. We have a lot of stone to cover.

SOUND: RECORDER TRACK CHANGES.

RILLA (NARRATOR): It took most of the day to finish that room. And in that time Arum and I didn’t have much to do, besides talk.

Getting to know him reminded me of meeting Damien, in some ways. He was still a knight-in-training back then, a hypochondriac who’d made himself a thorn in the heel of every doctor he went to… and when he took a blow from his first real monster, nobody in the Citadel would treat him. So, he had to come to me. (CHUCKLES) Scorpion Queen venom, I remember. He was such an awful patient. Always trying to make grand gestures of strength or heroism, always making himself sicker.

But, in his quiet moments, when he’d tell me his stories, we’d get lost in them. They were beautiful, and so funny. And we could talk for hours, he was so curious about my work, and—

SOUND: RECORDER TRACK CHANGES.

DAMIEN: And so the great doctor took the warrior’s mighty belt and ventured on into the plague-stricken night. Oh, Rilla, it was a bright twilight then, the sky shimmering as black silk before a raging flame, and—

Wha– what is that?

RILLA: Don’t stop.

DAMIEN: Is that– that’s your recording device, isn’t it?

RILLA: Yes, and? I just wanted to have this story for later, too.

DAMIEN: (COUGHS) Yes, but, well– I wasn’t– p-perhaps it wasn’t meant for any time but this, a-as only, i-i-if I knew it would be recorded I would have, perhaps, written it down, revised it, or— (COUGHING)

RILLA: Stop, stop, stop. If you don’t calm down that venom’s never going to get out of your system.

DAMIEN: (PANTING) Y-yes… doctor…

RILLA: (GIGGLES)

DAMIEN: What? What is it? My face, i-it’s gone a color, hasn’t it? Rose Fever! Oh, Saint Damien, I knew I would die this way, pink-cheeked and babbling—

RILLA: No, no, you’re fine. You’re just…

It’s cute, when you get all riled up. When you call me doctor. Annoying, but… cute.

DAMIEN: Annoyed? Oh, Saints, I’ve annoyed you! A thousand lashes on my person, a thousand thousand—

RILLA: (LAUGHS)

DAMIEN: What? What did I…?

(CHUCKLES) Oh. Well… that is rather funny. (LAUGH-COUGHING)

RILLA: Now, go on. Tell me more about this doctor. How beautiful was she?

DAMIEN: Beautiful, of course, beautiful. But her beauty was nothing compared to her mind, sharp as the blade and patient as its whetstone. Why, it’s said she once outwitted a tower full of Sphinxes, an Academy, no less—

SOUND: RECORDER TRACK CHANGES.

RILLA (NARRATOR): And… those stories… that time with him? That was worth the world. Worth every late night panic. Worth everything.

Arum doesn’t tell stories. Or ask questions, really. But… he does have his moments.

SOUND: RECORDER TRACK CHANGES.

ARUM: My, this is an interesting patch… I’ll have to keep you for further study, tktktktktktk—

SOUND: SPRAY.

(HISSES) My cape! You’ve gotten serum all over my cape!

RILLA: Had to get your attention somehow. Now get down here and—

SOUND: SPRAY.

(YELPS) My hair!

ARUM: There. Now we’re even—

SOUND: SPRAY.

(HISSES)

RILLA: You can take your cloak off! I can’t take off my hair!

ARUM: You… can’t?

SOUND: SPRAY.

Agh, stop that, tktktktktktktktk!

SOUND: SPRAY.

RILLA: (GIGGLING) Missed me!

ARUM: Stand… still…

SOUND: SPRAY.

(HISSES)

SOUND: RECORDER TRACK CHANGES.

RILLA (NARRATOR): I don’t know why I’m saying this. I know that the Citadel has to protect itself from monsterkind. But…

I’ve seen so many knights kill so many monsters, like I killed Arum’s weeds, without a second thought. And even if Arum is a threat, and even if he does have to be dealt with…

He isn’t all bad. I guess that’s all I’m really saying. He’s—

SOUND: THUMP.

(GASPS)

The antifungal spray we made got rid of the mildew… but, it didn’t cure the Keep.

SOUND: RECORDER TRACK CHANGES.

ARUM: A bit of green’s returned to this stone… and if I’m not mistaken it’s grown a bit softer.

So we’re really to take it that all this trouble was caused by some common fungus?

RILLA: Not necessarily all. It could have caused a strange immune response in the Keep – the stone as a way to protect itself. Or, this one infection could have weakened the Keep and made way for another, or—

ARUM: Then which one is it?

RILLA: It could take years to figure all that out, Arum. I said science was consistent. I never said it was fast.

ARUM: But in the meantime, my Keep is saved. (CHUCKLES) We’ve done it.

RILLA: We did.

ARUM: Tell me, Amaryllis: did you ever fear we might not get out of here alive?

RILLA: Only for the first eleven hours.

ARUM: But we’ve only been in here for elev—

Oh. (CHUCKLES) Oh, that’s quite good, isn’t it? (LAUGHS)

RILLA: (LAUGHS)

And Keep, how do you feel?

KEEP: (TIRED HAPPY SINGING)

ARUM: (LAUGHS) It’s saved! My Keep is saved! We’ve done it, tktktktktktktktk!

RILLA: Oh! Uh… haha… ah, uh, Arum?

ARUM: Yes, Amaryllis?

RILLA: Maybe you should… put me down, now.

ARUM: …Oh. Yes, yes, that seems… right.

RILLA: …Thanks.

ARUM: (CLEARS THROAT) That’s… hm… sleep exhaustion. Natural biological response. I blame you entirely.

RILLA: It’s really okay, Arum – but, maybe we should just, uh—

ARUM: Go. Yes, agreed.

SOUND: SLITHERING. CREAK.

(GRUNTS)

Hm. But the door, it seems, is still… (GRUNTS)

SOUND: CREAK.

Petrified.

RILLA: Right, no, that makes sense. We only got this room. You’ll have to do this for the whole Keep if you want to really drive the illness back.

ARUM: And if we’re sealed in here… you plan to have the Keep apply its own cure. Interesting.

RILLA: Exactly. Keep!

KEEP: (TIRED SINGING)

RILLA: That process we just did? I want you to use your vines to do that everywhere you can. Think you’ve got it?

Uh… Keep?

KEEP: (TIRED WORKING SONG)

SOUND: STRETCHING, CREAKING.

KEEP: (SINGING FADES OUT)

RILLA: That… doesn’t sound good.

ARUM: It certainly does not.

Keep. You will do as Amaryllis says. Apply the medicine. Now.

SOUND: STRETCHING, CREAKING.

KEEP: (SAD, TIRED SINGING)

SOUND: CRACKING, CRUMBLING.

RILLA: The petrification is spreading again!

ARUM: Keep! Stop that this instant! Your lord and creation commands you!

KEEP: (HIGH PAINED NOTE)

ARUM: Keep! You will open this door!

SOUND: POUNDING ON DOOR.

Open it at once! Keep!

RILLA: (AFTER A PAUSE) Arum… I’m sorry.

ARUM: (PANTING) I hope you’re happy with yourself.

RILLA: Me? You think this is my fault?

ARUM: Of course it is. You gave it the command that turned it to stone, tktktktktktktktk!

RILLA: The Hermit hurt it much worse than that! And whatever was causing this started before I got here! You know that!

ARUM: (GROWLS) We lived perfectly well on our own.

RILLA: Yeah, until you kidnapped me.

ARUM: Oh, this again.

RILLA: Yeah, this again! This forever, actually!

ARUM: Then I suppose you’ve had your revenge, haven’t you? Congratulations.

RILLA: I didn’t do this. This wasn’t revenge.

ARUM: Call it whatever you like, it’s a purely human concept. Revenge, fairness, this sense that everything must balance out. It’s the ugliest part of thinking everything should make sense. Because when you believe the scales should be even and someone adds a slight to your side, you add a slight to theirs, and all you’ve done is created a crueler world than you started with.

RILLA: You don’t get off that easily. I had a family. Friends. You shouldn’t have kidnapped me.

ARUM: Oh, should. It’s always should, isn’t it? Should I have kidnapped you? No. But I’ve also never asked you for forgiveness, have I? Well, have I? (SNORTS) You humans. You get so caught up in what should be true that you never think about what is. Everything in its little box, hmm? I should not have done what I did, so do whatever you like to me. Never mind the fact that I should never have met you, should never have had to step into that cesspit Citadel in the first place!

It’s evil, this need to categorize, to call things good and bad. Justification for crushing those who have already been crushed. Evil.

RILLA: Yeah, okay, so, you’re really not in a good place to talk right now.

ARUM: Oh, yes! Casting judgment is so easy, isn’t it?

Where are you going? We’re trapped in here!

RILLA: Commanding the Keep isn’t working right now, and you’re in a mood, so I’m just killing time until one of those things changes. Could you hand me that Macrachnid silk?

ARUM: (GRUNTS) I don’t see how that helps.

RILLA: Maybe it doesn’t.

ARUM: What happened to your reproducible results? Your “it has to work every time”?

RILLA: It’s been a big day. Maybe I learned something.

SOUND: GUITAR NOTE.

This’ll work.

ARUM: …What are you doing?

SOUND: STRETCHING.

RILLA: Measuring the silk. Cut here, please.

ARUM: Ridiculous.

SOUND: SNIP.

RILLA: And here…

SOUND: SNIP.

and here…

SOUND: SNIP.

and here.

ARUM: (GROWLS)

SOUND: TAPPING. STRETCHING.

RILLA: Mmm, now, I’ll just fasten these to half of one of the gourds, and… aha!

SOUND: GUITAR STRUM.

ARUM: What’s that grinning? What are you doing?

RILLA: Proving a point.

SOUND: GUITAR NOTES.

ARUM: Of course. It’s always an argument with you, isn’t it?

Don’t look so smug, tktktktktktktktk! I’ll show you.

SOUND: SAWING, HAMMERING, STRETCHING.

There. See? No measurements required.

RILLA: Alright. Play it.

ARUM: Gladly.

SOUND: DISCORDANT-BAD CHORD.

What? I must be holding it wrong.

SOUND: DISCORDANT NOTES.

(HISSES)

SOUND: MORE DISCORDANT NOTES. GRUNT, ONE LAST DISCORDANT NOTE.

A waste of time, tktktktktktktktk.

RILLA: Huh. So, do you want to know why yours didn’t work?

SOUND: GUITAR NOTES.

ARUM: Because sometimes magic just doesn’t, as our current situation demonstrates. And music, obviously, is a form of magic.

RILLA: (LAUGHS)

ARUM: What? What’s so funny?

RILLA: Music’s not magic, Arum. Come on – music is math.

ARUM: We invented mathematics before you. But we moved on to something better.

RILLA: You found something bigger, maybe. But there’s something beautiful about things that work every time, isn’t there? Something comfortable. The same notes always make a chord; it’s all about counting the same chunks of time. It can even have psychological effects, slowing heart rate, and preventing rushing thoughts and—

ARUM: You said can. Not must. So much for reliable, hm?

RILLA: I guess that’s a fair point.

MUSIC: STARTS.

Meet me by the river / Where the elderberries—

ARUM: What?

MUSIC: STOPS.

What– what are you doing?

RILLA: Uh… singing?

ARUM: Why!

RILLA: I thought it might be fun? And, like… what else are we going to do?

ARUM: (GROWLS) …You may continue.

RILLA: Oooookay.

MUSIC: STARTS.

Meet me by the river / Where the elderberries grow / When stars are silver / No one has to know…

MUSIC: ENDS.

KEEP: No one has to know…

RILLA: Saints above, what the—

ARUM: Shhhh! Keep going!

MUSIC: STARTS.

RILLA: Meet me by the river / By driftwood and stone / I’ll float down with her / No one has to know…

KEEP: (HARMONIZING)

RILLA: And if the old man caught me stealin’ / Wouldn’t bother to lie / Momma let her baby grow through the ceiling / But do we wonder why? / She seems so bitter / Bitten by the cold / I’ll watch her shiver / And leave her alone…

MUSIC: ENDS.

KEEP: Meet me by the river / Where the elderberries grow / When stars are silver / No one has to know…

(SNORING)

RILLA: More… petrification?

ARUM: No. It’s… asleep.

I don’t think I’ve ever heard the Keep sleep before.

RILLA: Must be tired.

ARUM: That’s ridicu—

That’s…

RILLA & ARUM: (IN UNISON) That’s it.

RILLA: Sleep deprivation causes a weakened immune system…

ARUM: And its mood has been poor…

RILLA: Depression, skin problems, poor self-care…

ARUM: All that work I made it do… all those sleepless nights.

RILLA: Why don’t… we try the door?

ARUM: That sounds… like an excellent idea, Amaryllis.

SOUND: SLITHERING. GRUNTS, DOOR CREAKS OPEN.

RILLA: So I guess we’re free.

ARUM: We are. And now I owe you your payment.

(CLEARS THROAT) Follow me. I will show you your way out, now.

RILLA: But… don’t you want to make sure—

ARUM: No, no, I think it should be now. And bring the Hermit, would you? After the trouble it’s caused, I… don’t know what I am going to do with it, but I’d rather it not stay here.

SOUND: SLITHERING. GRASS RUSTLING, CHIMES JINGLING. RECORDER TRACK CHANGES.

RILLA (NARRATOR): Because the Keep was asleep, it wouldn’t respond to our commands, so instead of Arum’s magic door we had to use the real front door, far, far below us. Carrying the Moonlit Hermit all that way was… like a dream. I could feel that glow within it, and I could feel my old hopes stirring again, and I could feel my fear, too – of the things it had made. Of what it had made the Keep do to itself. I didn’t know what we were going to do with it. None of the options made me feel any better.

SOUND: RECORDER TRACK CHANGES. CHIMES JINGLING GENTLY.

ARUM: This must be strange to you. A patient who would get better if it rested, but who insists on writhing.

RILLA: That’s pretty typical, actually.

So… how do you think the Keep learned that song? It’s an old folk tune, way back from the First Citadel, I think. How’s a monster plant learn that?

ARUM: I don’t know. A traveling human, maybe. Or perhaps a traveling human learned the song from it. I’m not sure how we’d ever learn the difference.

RILLA: You sang it beautifully.

ARUM: O– oh. Thank you.

(CLEARS THROAT) But, you see, this proves my point exactly.

RILLA: What point?

ARUM: Music. It’s magical in nature.

RILLA: Oh, come on, really—

ARUM: I’ve never lost in debate before and I won’t lose now. It’s magical. The lullaby that the Keep sung me as a whelp – it didn’t work every time, did it? Unpredictable. You can do everything right and it doesn’t always have the desired effect. Sleep, or the aesthetic beauty of the notes, or what-have-you.

RILLA: Huh. Yeah, I guess you’re right.

ARUM: And besides, according to the great sorcerer and former Keep-Lord Purple-Plumed Vaxellius, music is firmly– what was that?

RILLA: Kind of right, anyway. I mean… why can’t it be both?

ARUM: Nonsense.

RILLA: No, I mean… maybe, that’s what makes music special. It uses these predictable scales and measures, and combines them with some unpredictable something—

ARUM: Magic. And what comes out isn’t really either. It’s… more.

SOUND: RECORDER TRACK CHANGES.

RILLA (NARRATOR): I looked at him, and… his eyes. His violet eyes.

Subject: Amaryllis of Exile. Input: interaction with the monster Arum, Lord of the Swamp. Observations: Accelerated heart rate. Sweating palms. A rushing feeling, like… riding a horse, like falling, like… reaching the top of a mountain and seeing just how small you really are. Racing thoughts. A tingling in the lips.

I looked at him, and I felt… what I guess, is a kind of magic.

And I think he did, too.

SOUND: RECORDER TRACK CHANGES.

ARUM: (CLEARS THROAT) Nonsense, of course. But… a nice theory, anyway.

RILLA: Right. Nonsense. Right.

ARUM: And… how did you know the singing would work? You finished your instrument with such purpose.

RILLA: Right, right. The singing.

Uh, honestly? It wasn’t for the Keep to start. It was for… you?

Because you sounded worried, I mean. Anxious.

ARUM: Doctor, scientist, musician… how many hats do you wear, Amaryllis?

RILLA: Whichever one I think is interesting today. There are just so many things to know about, you know? And so many interesting people who know all about them. Doctors and scientists and poets and…

ARUM: Knights.

RILLA: And knights.

ARUM: I imagine you must be excited to rejoin them, then.

RILLA: I am. I miss them.

ARUM: Well.

SOUND: SLITHERING.

You to your home. And me to mine.

RILLA: Yeah.

Um… Arum?

ARUM: Yes, Amaryllis?

RILLA: You said… that those grubs… they’re for a contract with some other monsters. Right?

ARUM: (SNORTS)

RILLA: Arum… what are you making for them?

ARUM: I cannot tell you that.

RILLA: If you’re making weapons for the monsters to use against the Citadel… Arum, that’s my home.

ARUM: Of course.

RILLA: There are people that I love there, Arum, just like you love this Keep. If there’s any way I can protect them—

ARUM: Foolish… should have known better.

RILLA: You aren’t listening to me.

ARUM: Oh, but I understand you, Amaryllis. I may have had a lapse in judgment, but I understood you perfectly well the moment we met. Whether you round up or down, you always need things to come out neatly – true or false, honesty or lies. Any creature that cannot tolerate the grayness in between cannot be trusted.

SOUND: DOOR OPENS.

So go. Leave.

RILLA: I’m just trying to protect my friends. My family!

ARUM: And I mine. We are at war.

SOUND: SWAMP AMBIANCE.

It was foolish of us to forget that. Even for a moment.

Farewell, Amaryllis. I am… glad to have met you. And so I hope the universe wills us peace such that we never see each other again.

RILLA: Arum—

ARUM: I said farewell!

RILLA: Ah!

SOUND: SPLASH, DOOR SLAMS SHUT. WET FOOTSTEPS.

You don’t just get to hide away! Your actions—

SOUND: POUNDING ON DOOR.

—have consequences, you… you coward! (PANTING)

SOUND: RECORDER TRACK CHANGES.

RILLA (NARRATOR): And now… here we are. Just me, and thatthing out there, and—

SOUND: CHIMES JINGLING.

…the Moonlit Hermit. I don’t know why I still have it. Before I broke my ankle, I kept meaning to throw it out, but… then I’d think about what I could make with it. What humanity could make with it. Because, if the monsters have been planning something, making weapons? Then we’re going to need all the help we can get. Right?

And so… in the name of survival, we take the weapon too terrible for a monster, and – what? Keep struggling for life like nothing else matters? Make abominations and trade away our souls just because we’re so afraid to die?

SOUND: GEARS SPINNING, RECORDER PLAYS.

ARUM (FROM RECORDER): Yes, it forgets to live. It finds something that matters more to it. Are you happy, tktktktk?

SOUND: RECORDER STOPS, QUIET. THEN THUMPS APPROACHING.

RILLA: That’s maybe… the most important question I’ve ever asked. And… I’m not going to live to see how it works out, am I?

And so… I guess I leave it to you, whoever you are. I can’t make you do anything, but… please. Just think. And do the right thing.

And tell Damien that I love him. Tell him that I lived for him like he lived for me. Please.

End of log.

SOUND: RECORDER TRACK CHANGES. LONG SILENCE. RECORDER TRACK CHANGES. THUMPS.

RILLA: (DEEP BREATH) Alright, Rilla… be brave, be brave…

SOUND: MACRACHNID CLICKS. SAWING.

If you’re going to do it, just do it!

SOUND: MACRACHNID SQUEAL. BLADE SLASH. GRUNT, WET STAB, CRUNCH, MACRACHNID PAINED SCREAM. GRUNTS, MACRACHNID SCREAM FADES OUT.

SIR CAROLINE: Hmph. I was told that the Swamp of Titan’s Blooms held the most terrible monsters of this region. How disappointing.

RILLA: (PANTING) You… you killed it. I thought it couldn’t… I thought it was…

CAROLINE: Invincible? (LAUGHS) Perhaps for a lesser warrior. One distracted by women or poetry.

RILLA: Poetry?

CAROLINE: You’re right. On second thought, the women are fine. Now, let’s get you up. (GRUNTS)

RILLA: (PAINED GASPS)

CAROLINE: There you are…

You. I recognize you. Why do I recognize you?

RILLA: You’re the lady knight. Sir… Caroline? Right?

CAROLINE: (SIGHS) And you’re the missing herbalist whose name I’ve blocked out completely.

RILLA: It’s Rilla.

CAROLINE: Don’t say it again. Your fiancé has been shouting at me for weeks.

RILLA: Damien? You’ve been with Damien? Where is he?

CAROLINE: On the other side of the lake, where he belongs.

You’re… certain you want to marry him? Really? I’m not even sure I want him alive, to be honest.

RILLA: Wait, wait, slow down. Are you all out here to save me?

CAROLINE: Ugh. No. I am the Queen’s Investigator-General. Saving little lost girls is well below my pay grade.

There have been monsters with powers of manipulation running rampant across these lands for months, now – and according to your Damien, one such monster had its claws upon you. A lizard of some sort, I’ve been told. Repeatedly. At high volumes.

RILLA: A… lizard?

CAROLINE: Indeed. …What’s happened to you, exactly? Injured during your escape, were you?

RILLA: It wasn’t an escape, really, i—

CAROLINE: You were captured. What else would it be?

RILLA: He… let me go.

CAROLINE: Oh, did he? Sent you on your way home with a packed lunch and a pat on the head, hmm?

RILLA: No, it wasn’t that, it was—

CAROLINE: Treason, then?

RILLA: Wh… what?

CAROLINE: Well, if you didn’t escape and he didn’t let you go, that’s the only conclusion left that I can think of. You came to an agreement with a monster. And that is, by definition, treason. And a Knight of the Crown may deliver punishment for treason wherever and whenever she pleases.

RILLA: That isn’t true. Damien says that a trial—

CAROLINE: That may not be true, but I see no one here to say otherwise.

RILLA: You’re a knight. Aren’t you supposed to help people?

CAROLINE: I am supposed to protect the Citadel at all costs, and that is precisely what I am doing.

RILLA: The Citadel… we have to go, now! The monsters, they’re planning an assault, and if we don’t get back and tell the Queen—

CAROLINE: Hm, it sounds like we’re running out of time, then.

RILLA: We are.

CAROLINE: A fact which concerns you greatly.

RILLA: It does!

CAROLINE: Then in that case I think you ought to get on with it and tell me: where is the lizard I must slay?

RILLA: Please, he’s—

CAROLINE: He’s what?

RILLA: He’s… that way.

CAROLINE: I thought you might come to reason.

SOUND: BLADE SHEATHING.

Well. Lead the way.

RILLA: My ankle’s twisted. Broken, probably. I need something to make a splint.

CAROLINE: Then find it. Quickly.

MUSIC: STARTS. RILLA: See those sticks over there? In that patch of sunlight? Bring me to them and I’ll make the splint myself.

CAROLINE: Hmph!

SOUND: GRUNTS, PANTING.

RILLA: Thank you.

SOUND: CHIMES JINGLING.

CAROLINE: What was that?

RILLA: What was what?

CAROLINE: You dropped something just now. I saw—

RILLA: Well, where is it, then?

CAROLINE: Very well.

You have two minutes to build your splint.

RILLA: I need at least fifteen—

CAROLINE: You have two. Minutes.

And then… we have a lizard to hunt.

ALL SOUNDS: FADE OUT.

***

SOUND: TRAIN MOVING, MUSIC.

CONDUCTOR: If you’ve enjoyed this tale, please consider donating to The Penumbra on Patreon. Our artists work tirelessly to bring you these stories, and if you have the means, we hope you will support our efforts. Every dollar helps. You can find that page at patreon.com/thepenumbrapodcast. If you support us on Patreon at the $10 level or higher, you’ll receive access to commentary tracks like this one, from co-creators Sophie Kaner and Kevin Vibert, and composer Ryan Vibert:

SOUND: TRAIN STOPS, DOOR SLIDES OPEN, RAIN.

RYAN: …person, both of them.

SOPHIE: Well, they have a lot in common. But, like, y’know, he kidnapped her.

KEVIN: Yeah and I think one of the, the things that made this so much harder, than the Damien and Arum relationship, is that, like, the Damien and Arum relationship goes a long way just based on wantin’ some smooches. It, like, that is—

SOPHIE: Smooches, yeah.

KEVIN: —smoo– yup.

SOPHIE: (GIGGLES)

KEVIN: Ah. This is a PG program, folks.

RYAN: Big– they’re big smooch, smooch fellas, yeah.

KEVIN: Big—!

SOPHIE: (LAUGHS)

KEVIN & SOPHIE: (IN UNISON) Smooch! Fellas!

SOUND: DOOR SLIDES SHUT.

CONDUCTOR: You can also support The Penumbra by liking us on Facebook, following us on Twitter @thepenumbrapod, following us on Tumblr @thepenumbrapodcast, telling your friends about us, telling your friends to tell their friends about us, and especially by rating and reviewing our podcast on iTunes. Every rating, comment, and kind word spreads our stories further and inspires us to keep creating more and better tales to come.

We would like to give special thanks to all who support us on Patreon, but especially to Camille Blanton, Cantaloupe, Fiona Parker, Ota Arcana, Juno Yanto, Regan, Ko, KC, Kim Zeugen, Atha Lang, Vron, Charlie Spiegel, Minchowski, and Jaimie Gunter for their incredibly generous contributions per episode. Thank you.

Did you know that The Penumbra has merchandise for sale? It’s true! The Penumbra has partnered with DFTBA to bring you the posters, shirts, and pins your heart desires. Just go to dftba.com and search for The Penumbra Podcast.

This tale, the Moonlit Hermit, was told by the following people: Melissa Ennulat as Rilla, Noah Simes as Lord Arum, Kate Jones and Kat Buckingham as the Keep, Matthew Zahnzinger as Sir Damien, and Leslie Drescher as Sir Caroline, with musical direction by Melissa Ennulat, and assistance by Kat Buckingham.

The Penumbra is created and produced by Sophie Kaner and Kevin Vibert. If you wish to know more about our ever-expanding, infinitely-creative team of artists, musicians, editors, designers, and managers, you can read about them in the show notes of this episode.

I’m afraid this is the end of the line for today, dear Traveler. We hope you will ride with The Penumbra again soon.

ALL SOUNDS: FADE OUT.

#second citadel

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a-splash-of-stucky · 7 years ago

Text

A Messed Up Place | Eight

Pairings: Bucky x Reader || Steve x Reader

Summary: The morning after one hell of a night.

Warnings: Look, I don’t know what warnings I need to put, okay?

Mentions of past sexual activities and dub-con/rape (nothing graphic or explicit, but if you’re squeamish, I would tread with caution). Sexual activity and sexual arousal discussed, but there’s no smut in this chapter. Put it this way: If this chapter were to get an AO3 rating, I’d give it an ‘M’.

Notes: Uhhhh…I swear on my life that reader is a nice person, y’all. She is, she really is. Just…nice people do questionable things, sometimes. Apologies for the typos.

Written for @hellomissmabel‘s birthday/follower celebration.

AMUP Masterlist

Time goes by so slowly for those who are waiting for something to happen.

In Bucky’s case, that ‘something’ is waiting for the ninth day of June, otherwise known as the day when you become Mrs Rogers and Bucky’s chance of finding a happily ever after with you well and truly evaporate into thin air.

There are exactly 34 days left before your wedding. Not that Bucky’s counting, or anything. He doesn’t have a countdown app on his phone — god that’s too obvious. He may or may not have a small desk calendar stashed in his bedside table, though. He may or may not be crossing off the days as they pass, the bright red x’s he slashes with pen acting like a foreboding symbol of his impending lifetime of misery.

There are exactly 34 days left before you walk down that flower-strewn aisle in your breathtakingly gorgeous white dress.

34 days left until Steve puts a ring on your fingers and calls you his until death do you part

34 days left before Bucky’s time runs out.

Bucky’s accepted the inevitability of that outcome. He reasons that the sooner he accepts it, the longer his mind and body can adjust to it and therefore, the happier he can pretend to be when your big day actually rolls around.

Today, as he seems to be doing with increasing frequency as of late, Bucky’s holed himself up in his room. At least this afternoon, he’s tried to do something vaguely useful with himself, by clearing out the crap that lives underneath his bed.

Seriously. The experience has been a wake-up call. He clearly needs to do this more often, or be a little less lazy about throwing stuff in the bin. God knows how long that apple has been living under there.

Just as he’s tying off the bin bag, a sharp rap sounds on the door.

“Come in!” he calls.

“Hey, Bucky!” you chirp, shouldering the door open just wide enough for you to pop your head around. “You mind if I ask you a question?”

“Sure, come in,” he says, straightening up as he shoves the bin bag into the corner of his room; he’ll deal with it later. Bucky notes that you’re holding a box between your hands. It’s a glossy black colour, slightly longer than your average shoe box ad slightly shallower than one too. The seal on the front has been broken and a hint of pink tissue paper is peeking through the gap. He wonders what you’ve got inside it.

You set the box down at the foot of his bed, then step back and rest your hands on your hips. Your head is tilted to the side and you’re gnawing on your bottom lip incessantly, your gaze blank as you stare at the floor. Bucky shoves his hands into the pockets of his sweats and clears his throat obnoxiously.

“So…what’s up?” he asks, “What can I do to help you?”

The sound of his voice snaps you out of your trance. You look up at Bucky through your lashes, sigh heavily, then shake your head, seemingly frustrated. “I—,” you start, before clamping your mouth shut and crossing your arms underneath your breasts. You gingerly perch on the edge of the bed, to the left of the black box. The fingers of your right hand curl over the lid, about to pull it open, but — just when Bucky thinks you’re about to reveal the contents of the box to him — you pull your hand away at the last minute, chuckling in a self-depreciative manner. You smile forlornly in Bucky’s direction.

“Okay,” you sigh, “I know this is…look, you can say no if you want to, alright?”

Bucky furrows his brows, perplexed. “Say no…to what?”

You barrel on, continuing to ramble as if Bucky had never even spoken. Your words come out in a torrent, rushed because of your nerves. “I wouldn’t be asking you if I didn’t have to, but Nat and Wanda are out and I really need to hide these before Steve gets back, and—,”

“Hide what? Y/N what the fuck is going on?” Bucky asks, anxiety levels progressively increasing the longer he listens to you.

“—because I really want this to be a surprise for him, but, like, I really, really understand if this is a little awkward for you. And if you’d rather not, just say and I’ll—,”

“Y/N!” Bucky snaps

Your jaw stops moving, your mouth snapping shut sharply.

“Breathe,” Bucky murmurs, voice low and soothing. You close your eyes and inhale deeply through your nose.

“Sorry, didn’t mean to shout,” he says apologetically, scrubbing his hand over his eyes. “Just wanted you to calm down. Start from the beginning, doll — what did you need my help with?”

You groan, throwing your hands up to cover your face.

“I bought some lingerie and I need you to help me decide which one I should wear,” you mumble, the words coming out slightly muffled because your face is hiding behind your fingers.

“Which one you should wear?” Bucky echoes, mystified. “Wear for what?”

You drop your hands to reveal your sheepish expression. “Um…for my wedding. Underneath my dress. For um…y’know,” you mutter, letting your voice trail off as you cross your chest in a defensive posture.

Bucky blinks owlishly. “You want me…to help you…decide what lingerie you should wear,” he repeats slowly, at the risk of sounding like a fool. He’s still confused as to why exactly you’re coming to him for advice, of all people.

“Well, it’s kinda for my wedding night too, ‘cause I wanted to surprise Steve,”.

Oh.

It’s not like Bucky’s under any illusions, or anything; he’s very much aware of the fact that you and Steve have a healthy and active sex life (he’s had the misfortune of hearing the two of you getting it on during more than one occasion), but this is…downright strange. Oh god, if he goes through with this, he’s going to know what you’ve got on underneath your dress—he’s…he’s not going to be able to take his mind off that fact for the entire day. Goodness, he’s going to know what Steve sees when he finally gets you out of that dress. Fuck. Bucky’ll not be able to focus on anything else for that entire evening, because he’ll be so caught up in his head. He’s not jealous, per se, but the reminder just…strikes a chord inside him. He feels a tad bit remorseful, if he’s honest.

“Doll, I hardly know anything about lingerie,” Bucky points out, taking his hands out of his pockets to gesture helplessly. “Don’t think I’m gonna be much help to you,”.

“I know,” you huff, “But you know what I look like undressed and you know what I look good in and bonus — you know Steve,”.

“Yeah, as a friend,” Bucky retorts, “Hardly know what he likes seeing his gal in, doll,”.

“Ugh, forget it,” you grumble, “This was stupid. I get it, if you don’t wanna help, that’s fine, I’ll just—,”

“No, no,” Bucky says hurriedly, crossing the distance to the bed in two large strides, “I’ll help, you’re just gonna owe me big time,”.

The corner of your lips twitch up into a weak smile. “I—look, I get that this is kinda shitty of me to do, and I wouldn’t involve you if I really didn’t have to…’cause I get that this is a lil’ weird because of the…history between us, but…uhh…yeah. A second opinion would really be useful,”. You pause, then hastily tack on, “But you can say no if you really would rather not do this, it’s cool,”.

Bucky sits down on the bed on the other side of the box, angling his body so that he’s facing you. “Let’s see what we’re working with, then,” he says, lips curling into a half-smirk. Bucky imagines it’s the kind of cock-sure smile his past self might have put on.

You smile tentatively at him before flipping open the lid of the box to reveal delicate scraps of lace surrounded by pink and white tissue paper. The inside of the box is a crisp white colour and there is a company name embossed in gold curlicue font on the inside of the lid. Bucky guesses that this must be some high-end stuff.

“So there’re basically three sets in here,” you explain, deftly picking out the pieces one by one and arranging them on the bed so that they’re laid out in a row. “I couldn’t decide which one I liked best, ‘cause they all have different vibes, y’know? Wasn’t sure what I was looking for,”. You finish laying out the lace piece of lingerie and move your hands away.

“So what d’you think?”

Bucky is stunned speechless.

All three sets are beautiful in their own right.

On the leftmost side is a pale pink bra and panty set. The cups are made of a translucent material, decorated with embroidered flowers and tiny rhinestones that sparkle prettily when they catch the light. The matching panties are equally translucent, complete with tiny satin bows on the hips. They’re cut quite low and, judging from their size, would expose about half your ass. It’s a set that treads the fine line between ‘good girl’ and ‘seductress’.

The set on the right is the complete opposite of innocence. With it’s fiery red colour, it is definitely the most attention-grabbing, eye-catching set out of the three. The bra itself, if he can call it that, seems to be composed more of cut-outs, rather than actual fabric. By his best visualisation, Bucky pictures the floral appliqué on the cups just barely covering your nipples. Your breasts would be mostly bare, framed by an intricate network of red straps. Bucky finds himself having to reign in his over-active imagination, for fear that lingering too long on the image of you in this set could cause unwanted bodily reactions in his nether regions. There is marginally more coverage when it comes when it comes to the bottom half of this set, although the accompanying sexy garter belt isn’t doing much to tame his growing arousal.

But really, it’s the set in the middle that holds Bucky’s attention for the longest. There’s nothing overtly remarkable about the set, really. It’s black and, unlike the other two sets, seems to be made of a shiny, satiny material. It’s understated, yet elegant. The edge of the cups are trimmed with delicate eyelash lace; the same lace seems to make up the back of the bra too. There’s a small black gem dangling between the cups. The panties have more coverage than either of the other two sets, but the sides are composed entirely of lace and, when worn, would undoubtedly give an alluring peek at the skin of your hips.

Bucky gulps nervously. The black set reminds him of a night that he would rather forget.

No, that’s a lie.

He wants to remember the good parts of that night — the soft feel of your skin against his, the warmth of your touch, the fiery passion with which you’d made love. Bucky just wishes that those memories were not tainted with the internal conflict and guilt currently weighing heavy on his soul.

“Fucking hell,” Bucky breathes, breaking an eternity of silence.

“So?” you prompt, looking at him expectantly.

“I just…wow,” he murmurs, casting his gaze over the lingerie one more time.

You chuckle. “D’you like them?”

Bucky pauses for maybe a millisecond too long before answering.

“Steve’s gonna love whichever one you choose,” he replies, wisely deciding to avoid that question in its entirety, stepping to the side and giving it a wide berth.

Because the thing is — he does like them, perhaps a little more than is strictly appropriate. Bucky’d like them a lot more if they were on you, but he’s not about to admit that to anyone anytime soon.

Even so, he can’t do anything to turn off the slideshow of images tormenting his mind; the pink lace framing your breasts, your nipples peeking through the see-through cups, that bold red number accentuating your skin tone beautifully, and the alluring way that black set would highlight your natural form. God, it’s making him salivate just thinking about it. Bucky’s cock is beginning to chub up in his sweats, its interest piqued by the impure thoughts and vivid — borderline pornographic — images racing through his head.

His mother’s probably turning over in his grace, at this point, disgruntled by Bucky’s lack of self control.

Forgive me, mother, for I have sinned, he thinks ruefully. A lot. Far more than you’d’ve liked me to.

What sucks most of all is that Bucky knows that he shouldn’t be thinking of you like that. Not now, not ever, and especially not after KL.

——————————

Bucky wakes up with a start, momentarily disoriented.

The room is dark, save for the weak tendrils of moonlight streaming in through the open curtains. He’s naked, with his arm wrapped protectively around your waist and his face pressed to the crook of your neck. With every inhale, he’s taking in a fresh whiff of your scent.

Bucky hurriedly tugs his head away — more out of disgust with himself, as opposed to a reluctance to sleeping with you in his arms.

His neck cracks as he cranes it over your shoulder to check the alarm clock on the bedside table. Its bright red digital display tells him that it’s just after five in the morning. He’s been asleep for approximately two and a half hours, then.

The memories of what the two of you have just done come rushing back at full force, colliding with him in a tsunami-like wave of raw emotion. Bucky’s not sure exactly how he feels, let alone what he should be feeling, but what he does know is that he needs to clean this mess up before you wake up. If you happen to wake up and remember the events that transpired a couple of hours ago, then Bucky will meet that confrontation with his head held high and his shoulders squared.

On the chance that you don’t remember what happened, though…well, Bucky would like to try and keep things that way.

Bucky allows himself to press one last kiss to the back of your shoulder, memorising the softness of your skin against his lips. With a muted groan, Bucky rolls away, forcing himself to leave the warmth of the bed and the comfort of embracing you. He winces as the chill of the night pierces through his skin, the room suddenly feeling much colder without you pressed against his side.

He gets up and ducks into the ensuite, flicking on the light as he passes by the switch. Bucky grabs a washcloth from beside the sink, runs it underneath warm water, then wrings out the excess moisture. When he glances up, he catches his expression in the mirror and grimaces.

It is the face of a guilt-ridden sinner.

With a weary sigh, Bucky wipes himself down with the cloth, scrubbing away the dried residues of semen and bodily fluids. He rinses the cloth once more, pats himself dry with a fresh towel, then brings both out the the bedroom to clean you up. Bucky pads over to the bed and perches by your side, being careful to not jostle the bed too much, for fear of waking you. He works quickly and methodically, wiping down your back, thighs and pussy as thoroughly as he can without being too aggressive with his movements.

Once he’s done, he tosses the cloths into the bathroom, flicks off the bathroom lights, then strides over to his bag. Bucky pulls out a pair of sweats and slips them on, not bothering to put on underwear, before grabbing a clean pair of boxers and one of his t-shirts for you. Thankfully, you seem to be in a deep sleep, not stirring at all as Bucky slips you into his clothes. His heart wrenches momentarily at the sight of you in his things. Bucky pulls down the corner of the duvet, then carefully scoops you into his arms and moves you to the top of the bed. He tenses as you shift around and mumble sleepily but, to his relief, you don’t wake up. He sets you down, then pulls the blanket over you. For good measure, Bucky strips off the top sheet and stuffs it into the back of the closet, because it has a giant damp spot and smells vaguely of sex.

He flies around the room, picking up various items of discarded clothing. His shirt and pants get neatly folded and packed away into his duffel bad. The dress you were gets put on a hanger and hung up in the closet. Your lingerie — if those goddamn scraps of lace can even be called lingerie — he picks up and drops into the cloth laundry bag that you’ve been keeping by the bathroom door. He packs away his shoes but leaves your heels where they’ve fallen by the foot of the bed, thinking that they’re not doing much harm by being there.

Bucky stands by the door and does one last cursory sweep over the room, making sure that he hasn’t missed any detail that might seem overtly suspicious. Satisfied that he hasn’t, he takes one last look at your sleeping form (ignoring the small twinge in his heartstrings), smiles inwardly, then pulls the door shut.

As they say; when one door closes, another one opens, except the door the opens inside of him is less of a door and more akin to a gigantic floodgate. The emotions come crashing though his system in tumultuous waves and it’s Bucky can do to keep himself upright.

Bucky flops down onto the couch and twists onto his back, hands folded over his chest and eyes staring at the ceiling, unseeing.

He’s repulsed by himself. More so than he has ever been his entire life.

The early morning hour seems to be a good a time as any to contemplate his poor life decisions and that, it seems, is exactly what his brain chooses to do.

Back when all of this started, you and Bucky had sat down and laid out some ground rules with each other, because as everyone knows, establishing boundaries is a must. He runs through them like a checklist in his head.

Rule number one: no kissing each other on the lips. Yeah, he’s definitely broken that one — multiple times, at that. Without thinking, Bucky brings his hand up to his mouth, traces the swell of his lips with the tips of his fingers, trying to remember the precise way in which your mouth felt against his. Though he has no trouble memorising 16-digit passwords with only a sparing glance, Bucky finds that he’s having trouble recalling exactly how your his lips slotted together with yours, exactly how soft they were, exactly how delicious you’d tasted.

Maybe that’s for the best; the less he remembers, the less he’ll miss. There’s one thing he does knows for certain, though: he was dead on the inside, before his lips met yours.

Rule number two: no having sex whilst drunk or otherwise inebriated. Yep. No question as to whether or not that one’s been breached.

Bucky remembers letting out a surprised huffed when you’d suggested this rule, reminding you that due to his enhanced metabolism, getting drunk was not actually a possibility for him — this had happened at a time before he’d met Thor and been introduced to the wonders of Asgardian liquor. Your expression had turned solemn and you’d rested your hand on top of Bucky’s.

“I know you can’t get drunk, Buck, but I can,” you told him, “And I know you’d never take advantage of me like that, but it’s better to get things clear now, right?”

His face contorts into a scowl at the memory. Taking advantage of you in your drunken state is, sadly enough, the smallest of his worries — the fact that he’s betrayed your trust is the bigger issue, from his perspective. It’s a fact that feels as heavy as a boulder, where it’s weighing on his conscience. Guilt twists its serrated knife into his stomach, sending ripples of pseudo-pain through his system.

Rule number three: no spending the night together after sex. For all the times that you and Bucky have fucked around, you’ve never actually slept with each other, in the conventional sense of the word. Much like the rule about no kissing, the no-sleeping-together rules was established because cuddling up in each other’s arms having just had sex seemed a tad bit too intimate for either of you to handle. Your fuck dates were literally just that: a good, satisfying fuck, before the two of you went off on your separate ways. Tonight was the first night that Bucky has ever allowed himself to fall asleep beside you and, whilst you technically didn’t spend the entire night together, there was definitely some sleeping in each other’s arms involved. And, as much as Bucky enjoyed it, it’s just another layer of complexity to add to the ever-growing confusion in Bucky’s head.

Rule number four: no unprotected sex, for obvious reasons. At least this one he didn’t fuck up as bad as he could’ve. Bucky had had enough wits about himself to remember to pull out at the last second, and he’s ninety-nine percent sure that you’re on birth control anyway, but still. The risk is always there, isn’t it? As nice as it would’ve been — god he can only imagine how sinfully good it would’ve been — to allow himself to finish inside you, Bucky knows that he did the right thing. The pleasure would have been short-lived and his level of self-hatred would be an order of magnitude larger than what they currently are.

There is one more rule, however, never spoken aloud or explicitly addressed by either of you, but embedded in the very nature of Bucky’s relationship with you: no romantic feelings. The two of you were supposed to be friends with benefits, nothing more.

Look how royally well Bucky’s fucked that one up.

Conclusion? prompts the pessimistic voice in the back of his head.

“I’m a failure,” he breathes, talking to the empty room.

A failure. An abject failure. A disappointment in every sense of the word.

A disconcerting feeling of misery worms its way into his bones. You’ve fucked shit up before, Barnes, but never as bad as this, he scolds himself.

With a resigned groan, Bucky rolls onto his side, turning to face the back of the couch, pillowing his head on his flesh arm. Though he prays for sleep to take him back into its clutches, that doesn’t seem like something that’ll be happening anytime soon. His mind is exhausted, the thoughts he’s been having and the secrets he’s been keeping finally taking their toll on him mentally. But at the same time, he feels wide awake, a million and one things galloping through the space between his ears at a frantic pace.

As time drags on, thoughts of you eventually get replaced by thoughts of Steve. Specifically, thoughts of how Bucky has let down the one person he swore he would never fail.

Steve is…there’re no words adequate enough to describe how incredibly important Steve is to Bucky. Not just as a friend, not just as someone who helped him adjust to the wonders and perils of this strange new world, not just as a connection to the past but because he’s — Steve. Good old, dependable Steve, who has never failed to come through for Bucky when he needed him to.

Bucky swallows anxiously. He doesn’t know if he has the guts to tell Steve about this. He owes it to his best pal, he knows this is true, but…knowing things doesn’t inherently make you braver. And Bucky doesn’t have much bravery to begin with.

Bucky is paralysed by indecision. There are a thousand and one ways in which things could go when you finally wake up, but he’s not entirely sure which one of those ways is his best case scenario. From Bucky’s point of view, for him, there isn’t one. There is no version of reality in which Bucky emerges victorious. He’s going to come off worse in some way, whether or not you remember, whether or not he plucks up the courage to tell Steve. Never a winner, always a loser.

Never the hero, always the sinner.

So yes. It’s cowardly, of this he is fully aware, but he hopes to the dear Lord in heaven that you don’t remember a thing when you wake up in the morning.

But god, what if you do? he frets. What if you tell Steve? Or—worse, what if you don’t?

Can Bucky live with himself, knowing that he’s carrying around a secret as big as the fucking sun, a secret so immense it could demolish the very foundations upon which his sanity depends on? Equally, can he ever truly be himself without Steve?

Bucky feels that at this point, it’s no longer a question of head battling over heart. There are a multitude of voices creating a dissonant cacophony inside his head; they’re threatening to crack his skull open with the racket they’re creating. He feels like the universe is playing a twisted game of tug of war with his mind, threatening to split his identity in two — on the one hand, he knows he should ‘fess up and admit to his mistakes. On the other hand, he doesn’t want to lose the trust of the two people he loves most.

He doesn’t know what’s worse. You not remembering a thing, or you remembering something — maybe by putting the pieces of the puzzle together — and accusing Bucky of rape. He’s going to get hurt no matter the outcome. It’s just a matter of which kind of hurt is more tolerable.

Bucky sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose with his metal fingers. There’s a deafeningly loud din inside his brain right now, and the beginnings of a migraine are starting to throb in the back of his head. Though he’s too wired to sleep, he forces himself to focus on the steady rise and fall of his chest, slowly grounding himself which each breath he takes.

There’s not much he can do about anything at this point, he muses. Whatever happens, happens. Bucky comes to the conclusion that he will confront the truth if it comes to greet him. That is, if you ask him outright whether or not the two of you had sex, he’ll not deny the fact that you did. Whatever the end result of that admission may be, he’ll tell you the truth. But, if you don’t bring up the subject, Bucky’s not going to be the one to broach the topic.

When sleep finally overtakes him, it’s uneasy. Flickers of half-formed nightmares brush along the edges of his mind, enshrouding him in an oppressive, inescapable sense of terror. He can’t shake it off no matter how hard he tries. He sees your face, he sees Steve’s face, he hears snippets of half-formed conversations, but he can’t—

Bucky jolts awake.

He groans as he rolls onto his back, stretching his arms above his head to work out the kinks in his shoulders. The clock on the wall tells him that it’s a little after eight. He probably fell asleep at around six. With the level of fatigue his body’s feeling, it’s a wonder he’s functioning at all.

The door to the bedroom creaks open. Bucky stills.

You come shuffling out, swathed in a fluffy hotel bathrobe with a distinctly grumpy look on your face.

“Hey,” Bucky whispers, slowly pushing himself up into a sitting position. He scoots over to one end of the couch and folds his legs underneath him. You flop gracelessly onto the other end of the couch, turning your body so that you’re facing away from the windows and the sunlight they’re letting in. You grunt out a good morning in return.

“Not feeling so good?” Bucky asks. His heart is racing, hammering manically against his ribs. He hopes that it’s not loud enough for you to hear.

“Headache. Not so bad,” you mumble. You pull your face away from the couch cushions and look at him through narrowed eyes. “What happened?”

Bucky legitimately believes that his heart might just give out on him.

“How much—,” his voice comes out croaky, so he clears his throat and tries again. “How much d’you remember from last night?”

You grunt noncommittally. “Not a lot,” you reply, your voice throaty and a little hoarse. “One moment I was raving, the next moment I’m waking up in bed,”.

Bucky’s insides are doing sickening flips. Relief is spreading through his veins, dampened by a faint hint of misery. “Oh, um…you don’t remember how you got home? Or afterwards?” he asks tentatively. Sure, this line of enquiry has a high chance of raising your suspicions, but dammit, he needs to know how much you know.

You shake your head but stop abruptly, wincing at the jarring motion. “No. Don’t ‘member much,”.

Bucky breathes out an internal sigh of relief.

“Actually, I do remember—,”

His heart forgets how to beat.

“—vaguely us getting into a cab. And then I have a flash of you carrying me through the lobby,” you muse.

Bucky wills his overactive body to calm down. He licks his lips nervously. “That all? That’s the last memory you have?” he pushes.

“Mmm, I think so,”. A pause, then, “Why? What did I do?” you ask, narrowing your eyes in suspicion.

“Uh—,” Bucky flails, racking his mind for a realistic-sounding answer. “Nothin’, nothin’ happened, just tryna figure out how drunk you were,”.

“Haven’t gotten black-out drunk in a long time,” you mutter, scrubbing your hand over your face as you burrow further into the cushions, tugging the lapels of the bathrobe over your chest. “Tell me what I missed?”

Bucky swallows. His mind goes through one last-ditch battle between wrong and…questionably right, his indecisive conscience trying to decide whether or not he’s going to tell you what really went down last night.

“Um, we…left the club around one,” he says slowly, “I called a cab, brought you to the room, and that’s about it,”.

“How’d I get into your clothes?” you ask.

The hairs on the back of Bucky’s neck rise in response to the alarm bells blaring in his head. He chances a quick glance at you to read your expression; your eyes are closed and there’s nothing about your body language that indicates that you’re particularly suspicious. Bucky hopes that your question is just that: an innocent question.

“I, uh…I handed you some of my things and then you must have changed yourself,” he lies, “You left your dress on the floor so I hung it up,”.

“Mm, thanks,” you murmur.

“No trouble,”.

“Anything else?” you prompt.

Bucky hesitates, chewing on the inside of his lip as another flare of indecision spreads through the back of his mind. He could be brave, and tell you — in fact, he should be brave and tell you, he owes you his honesty, having done shit all with your trust — but he’s terrified of the consequences. Bucky thinks he can just about live with the knowledge that you have no recollection of what was undoubtedly one of the best nights of his life.

He doesn’t think he can live bearing the shame of your disapproval.

He hesitates for a few seconds too long.

“What?” you ask sharply, lifting your head to squint your eyes at him. “I did something stupid, didn’t I?”

Bucky curses himself mentally for his hesitation.

“Uh, no—you didn’t,” he says hastily.

You stretch out your leg and poke him in the thigh with your foot. “I so did, I can see it in your expression!” you protest, “C’mon, tell me,”.

Bucky hopes that you’re too off your game this morning to catch the way his skin has turned pale with worry. ‘Stupid’ is probably a euphemism for the shit that went down last night.

Of course he’s not going to admit that, though.

“You didn’t do anything!” he insists.

A hint of fear and nervousness flicker over your expression. “Seriously Barnes, how bad was it?” you ask, “What’d I do?”

You don’t seem to be inclined to drop the subject anytime soon, so Bucky roots around in the back of his head in search of a vaguely plausible story. “I ain’t gonna tell you,” Bucky sing-songs tauntingly, deciding to allow himself to be swept along with this lie. He’ll try and tease you for as long as possible, but himself as much time as he can to cook up something believable.

“Fuck you,” you growl halfheartedly, sitting up a little straighter as you shoot Bucky a murderous glare. “You’re gonna hold this over me forever, aren’t you?”

“Yup,” Bucky replies, popping the ‘p’ in a manner he knows will definitely irritate you. It’s so much easier like this, he thinks, teasing each other and pretending like everything’s okay. It’s not a long-term solution by any means, but pretending’s so much easier when the reality is that Bucky is just heartbeats away from an internal breakdown.

“Tell me!” you whine, “C’mon, Bucky, just fuckin’ tell me what I did,”.

“I’m not gonna—oof!”

Without warning, you leap across the couch — no small feat, given the hangover you must be sporting — and mercilessly attack Bucky’s ribs with your fingers. He lets out an undignified yelp, squirming to get away from you as you tickle his sides. Bucky dissolves into a fit of helpless giggles.

“Okay!” he concedes, half-shouting in his delirious state. “‘’kay, okay, stop it, Y/N!”.

Bucky places both his hands on your shoulders and pushes you back. You give him one sharp pinch on the stomach, before sitting back on your haunches.

“Ah—Jesus, cut your nails, woman,” Bucky grumbles, rubbing at the spot indignantly. You arch an eyebrow, waiting for an explanation. Bucky sighs, giving his full body into the action, exaggerating the rise and fall of his shoulders a little.

“You were telling me what you wanted to do to Steve on your wedding night,” Bucky says, “In full HD detail, I might add,”.

You groan, flopping against the back of the couch and throwing an arm over your eyes dramatically. “Really? I said that?”.

“Mmmhmm,” Bucky says, nodding his head sagely. “You were telling me about your plans to suck his soul out through his—,”

“Okay!” you interrupt, holding up a finger to silence him, “Don’t need to know what drunken me decided to come up with,”.

Bucky snorts. “Drunken you actually came up with some pretty good ideas,” he says solemnly.

You sigh heavily, lifting your arm up a little so that you can look at Bucky with one eye. “Let’s just agree to not tell Steve about last night, okay?”

Bucky’s heart shrivels up in his chest.

Shit. Steve.

The guilt comes back to hit him like an icy-cold slap to the face.

What hurts most is not the fact that he has to lie to you, or to Steve, although those two issues do contribute to the pain; it’s the fact that last night for you means something entirely different to what it means for Bucky. It’s the fact that you clearly have no memory whatsoever of last night’s passionate, heated tryst. It’s the fact that you clearly have no memory whatsoever of the one time Bucky gave himself to you completely. It’s the fact that you clearly have no memory whatsoever of the only time Bucky’s ever confessed his love for you aloud.

With luck on his side — though in fairness, with the way his life’s been going recently, that seems like a slim chance — you’ll remain in this state of oblivion.

But still. It hurts.

It’s better this way, he tells himself, nodding at you when you murmur something about going to have a shower as you get off the couch. It means that things are less messy between you and Bucky, between you and Steve — it’s the ultimate sacrifice, an act of pure utilitarianism. Giving up the happiness — and by extent, sanity — of one for the sake of many others. Sure, a secret that weighs about as much as a baby elephant is being added to the suffocating burden already on Bucky’s shoulders, but still. It’s worth it.

If it keeps you happy, if it keeps Steve happy, then it’s worth it.

——————————

“Bucky?” you murmur, reaching out to rest a hand delicately on his forearm. “Are you…what’s up?”

He gives you a tight smile, roughly shaking his head to clear the thoughts plaguing his mind, trying to centre himself back in the present. The three sets of lingerie are staring back at him, tauntingly inviting with their lace and embroidered details.

“Nothin’,” Bucky croaks out, taking a few steadying breaths through his nose.

“Bullshit, Barnes,” you scoff, pulling away and moving to pack the sets back into their box. “Look, sorry, let’s just—forget about it, I shouldn’t have—,”

“No, it’s okay,” Bucky says, his flesh hand darting out to catch your shoulder, “I just…that…triggered a memory that was…difficult,”. For once in his life, Bucky’s telling the truth.

“Oh Bucky,” you whisper, understanding flickering in your eyes. “Bucky, what you—no, that wasn’t your fault, okay? No matter what it is you did all those years…that wasn’t you, that was them,”.

What?

It takes his mind a second to catch up to what you’re implying. He tries not to let the sudden understanding show on his face. You think he’s talking about…a difficult memory from his time as the Soldier. Huh. He goes along with it, because at least this lie is easier to play along with than the truth.

“I…know,” he sighs, “I still did it though,”. His insides churn uneasily over the fact that he’s lying to you — again, for at least the billionth time this month.

You cluck sympathetically, resting your hand over his flesh one and giving it a reassuring squeeze. “Bucky—,”.

“Just…drop it, Y/N, okay?” Bucky says tiredly, his tone inviting no further conversation.

You purse your lips in disapproval, but nod in understanding, respecting Bucky’s request.

He reaches a hand out to finger the satiny-smooth cups of the black bra. “This one,” he murmurs, flicking his gaze up to catch your eyes. “This one’s the one. Steve’s gonna love you in it,”.

You beam at him gratefully, before surging forward, throwing your arms around his neck. Bucky’s caught off-guard, inhaling sharply at the sudden proximity of his body to yours. He doesn’t dare to hug you back, for fear that he might never be able to let you go.

“Thank you, Bucky,” you whisper, “I’m sorry for—yeah. But thank you,”.

“Thank me? For what?” Bucky asks, as you pull away. His brows knit together in confusion.

You smile, “For being you. You’re the greatest, Buck,”.

You wouldn’t think of me like that if you knew what I’ve done, he thinks darkly.

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