#so I’m hesitant about posting too much horror-related content

[cuttlefishink]

Day 19 of Inktober: “dead pixel” | 📦 Anya from Mouthwashing 🩸

“…In the back of my mind, it’s always there…”

CW: Blood below the cut

I’ve been thinking about this game nonstop for the past couple of days. Be wary of the content warnings for the game if you choose to check it out, but I do recommend it if you’re in a good place to do so 🖤

[thisissirius]

so apparently my brain needed to write this before it could write anything else. it’s not the kind of fic i want to attach to a prompt so i’m posting it as is. 

some things to note; this is extremely personal to my situation right now. i write to deal with my feelings and that’s what this is. i’m okay, i promise. or at least i’m getting close to okay. but i’m working on it! 

i will not be offended if you don’t want to read :)

it’s an open ending because i don’t know the ending to my own story but in my head, he beats it <3

(i researched this because obvs i am female and eddie is not)

be my help eddie/buck, cancer

“I think you might have an infection.” Buck’s nose wrinkles as he frowns and Eddie traces the lines of it. He doesn’t want to look at the wound, at what it represents. Buck’s fingers are light as he puts on the new bandage. “Though the inflammation is here,” he continues, thumb grazing the skin around Eddie’s nipple. “It feels warm. Does it hurt?”

Eddie shakes his head. “Not really. There’s been blood a couple of times but I assumed it was from the wound.”

With another nod, Buck finishes dressing the wound. There’s a tightness to his mouth that spells a research binge—and possibly a call to the doctor—but Eddie’s content to let him handle it. “All done.”

“Thanks,” Eddie says, curling his fingers around Buck’s wrist. He runs a thumb over Buck’s pulse point. “For everything.”

Buck’s cheeks tinge pink, but he looks pleased. “You’re welcome. Come on, Chris’ll be home soon and there’s still dinner to do.”

Eddie can’t forget about the inflammation; 

Buck’s frown gets progressively more pronounced with every passing day, and Eddie’s starting to feel it. His skin is warm, there’s been spotty blood on his shirts, and it looks puffy and inflamed. It’s not until Eddie takes off his shirt one night to get ready for bed and sees just how swollen it is, that he ends up calling for Buck. 

It’s been a few days since Buck’s stayed over; he’s taking extra shifts because Eddie’s struggling with finances—and if Eddie thinks about that too much, he’ll feel sick with guilt—and he looks tired when he stands in the doorway. When his eyes rise to Eddie’s nipple, his face shifts into shock and a touch of horror. “Fuck.”

“It’s only been like this yesterday and today,” Eddie says, because he doesn’t want Buck to think he missed it. “I don’t think it’s an infection.”

Buck hums and steps forward. “It could be,” but he doesn’t sound certain. “We should take you to the emergency room.”

Eddie doesn’t really want to. “Buck—”

“Eddie,” Buck says. There’s something in his voice, his face, that makes Eddie take notice. “Trust me, I think we need to get a doctor’s opinion.”

“Chris,” Eddie says, searching for something to keep them here, safe in his home. 

Buck doesn’t look happy when he says, “We’ll take him with us.” Eddie opens his mouth to answer, to say something else, but he stops short at the tremble in Buck’s tone. “Please, Eddie. I think this is something we need to get checked out.”

Eddie sits. And sits. And sits.

Chris is asleep on Buck’s lap. He’s tucked under Buck’s chin, breath even, and Eddie can’t help but rest a hand on his leg. Buck’s talking in a low voice, information Eddie’s not really taking in, but it’s soothing. The emergency room is always horrible, no less when it’s personal instead of work related, and he leans more heavily into Buck. 

“Alright?” Buck asks, trailing off. “I’m sure it won’t be much longer.”

Three has given way to five, and Eddie’s got no doubt they’ll still be sitting here at seven in the morning. He’s glad neither of them are working, but Buck’s gotta be dead tired. “You should go home.”

Buck’s eyebrows shoot into his hairline and Eddie only realises what that implies when the words are out. “Eddie—”

“No,” Eddie says, shaking his head. “I meant you don’t have to be here, now, when you could be sleeping.”

Expression softening, Buck’s lips quirk into a tired smile. “I wouldn’t be able to settle. I’d be worried about you.”

Eddie’s chest goes tight with emotion and he smiles back. Something feels different between them since the shooting, but he can’t pinpoint what it is. Maybe it’s the loss of Ana from his life; Eddie knows Buck wasn’t happy for whatever reason. Breaking up with her had been easy after that because Buck’s happiness means everything. 

“Edmundo Diaz?”

“Come on,” Buck says gently, readjusting Chris, who makes a soft noise. “Let’s get you checked out.”

“Breast cancer,” Eddie repeats. “I thought—”

Silence. 

“I thought it was women,” he admits. “I didn’t think it could happen to men.”

To me is what he means. 

Buck’s hand is the only thing tethering him to the moment, fingers tight in Eddie’s. He looks calm, calmer than Eddie thinks he should. “What stage?”

Eddie swallows. “You knew?”

“Suspected,” Buck says, looking guilty. Eddie squeezes his hand. He’s not really sure what his emotions are doing, but he needs to make sure Buck’s okay. One of them needs to be. “I went online and I know I shouldn’t look,” he says, more to the doctor than to Eddie, “but it seemed too far from the wound to be related.”

“Perhaps not unrelated,” the doctor says. His voice is calm, almost soothing, and Eddie hates it, though he can’t pinpoint why. Maybe he’s trying not to wake Chris, but Eddie suspects it’s more that he doesn’t want to spook Eddie. Fuck. “It’s true that we don’t always know what causes cancer—”

“I don’t care,” Eddie says. His voice sounds far away. “Can it—like Buck said, what stage?”

The doctor looks at him and is silent for long enough that Eddie can feel whatever stability he’s got left spiralling away. “If it is cancer, which we’re not completely sure of, it will be stage three or four; advanced because of the symptoms, but still treatable.”

Eddie drops Buck’s hand to press the palms of his hands to his eyes. There’s a burn in his eyes, something heavy settling in his stomach. He can hear Buck talking, feel the hand on the back of his neck, but it’s almost as if he’s not in the room. “I want to go home.”

“I know,” Buck says softly, stroking a hand down Eddie’s back. To the doctor he says, “thanks. You’ll let us know about the appointments?”

The moments slip away from him; he doesn’t remember leaving the office, or getting into the car. Doesn’t know how he and Chris both end up strapped in and moving; he can feel the gear shifts, the radio playing softly. Chris is snorting in the back seat, and Buck’s breathing seems oddly loud in the truck; maybe it’s Eddie—he doesn’t feel as if he’s there. 

“What am I gonna do,” he says, breathless. 

Buck reaches over, hand on Eddie’s thigh. “You can fight this.”

Eddie’s eyes burn again and he turns away, glances in the rearview mirror. “What am I supposed to tell Chris?”

A pause. Buck’s fingers squeeze. “We’ll figure it out together, okay?”

“Buck,” Eddie says, and even to his own voice he sounds wrecked. “I can’t—”

Buck pulls over, shifts into park and leans over, hand to Eddie’s face. “Listen to me,” he says, foreheads touching. Eddie closes his eyes and hangs on. “I’ll be here every second, okay? I promise, Eddie, whatever happens, we’ll get through it.”

The fatalistic part of Eddie thinks it can’t be that easy but the rest of him wants to lean on Buck, to take the comfort he’s offering. “If it’s cancer—”

“Then you’ll look over treatment, figure out what you want, and we’ll tackle it like we do everything else.” Buck’s thumb runs over Eddie’s cheek. “I’ve got your back, Eddie.”

Eddie lets out a shaky breath, leans into Buck. He can still hear Chris in the back seat. He knows there’s so much left unknown, but he’s got Buck, right here, and together they’ll protect Chris. He knows even if he does—if they can’t—if anything happens, Buck’s got Chris. 

“Stop it,” Buck says, running his thumbs under Eddie’s eyes. He’s wiping away tears and Eddie blinks, surprised; he’s not sure when they started. “You can fight this.”

“Okay,” Eddie whispers, because he desperately wants to believe he can. His mouth forms the words before his brain can catch up and stop them, “I’m scared.”

Something in Buck’s expression breaks, but he presses forward, touching their foreheads together. “I know, Eds. It’s okay to be, but I promise, no matter what, I’m gonna be here.”

Eddie swallows around the lump in his throat, leans into Buck’s touch on his cheek, the fingers curling around the back of his neck. “Promise?”

“Yeah,” Buck says without hesitation, his voice low and husky. “I promise.”

Kissing the corner of Buck’s mouth is easy. Turning his face into Buck’s neck is even easier. Listening to the thump of Buck’s heartbeat, the words of comfort and promise Buck whispers in his ear makes even the darkest thoughts in his head quieten down. 

“I’ve got you,” Buck promises. 

“I know,” Eddie says, and he means it.

[itsthemoofacewriting]

Take them, they’re yours

For Ray, the person who is very quickly becoming my partner in crime for all things SaNami related. We did a trade; I wrote this for them, and in return she drew this masterpiece from a scene in ‘amongst the trees’.

I also have to thank them their endless patience as I wrote this and teased them as the word count steadily went up and up. I’m so sorry this took so long.

Let’s play a game (points for those that thought of Saw), there’s a line in here that inspired my very rude SaNami piece I posted recently, can you find the line?

So, it’s been shown time and time again that Sanji has good kenbunshoku haki but not the full extent of it, so please excuse some of the artistic liberties I took.

Summary: If it was between his hands or Nami, it would be Nami, every time, without question. Every. Damn. Time. Rating: T

You can also find this on AO3 and FFN.  

Enjoy!

It’d all gone so wrong so quickly.

“There he is! Vinsmoke!”

Instantly Sanji felt his mood flip like a switch, from content to enraged at the use of that name.

It’d been a wonderful day. Nami had agreed to come shopping with him and Chopper. Although he had a feeling Chopper had something to do with that more than him, but that was fine- he’d soak up any attention she gave him. They’d been shopping to do all the chores, such as food shopping and medical supplies, as well as some personal shopping for her. When they’d dropped everything back at the ship, Sanji had taken the bold step to suggest extending their trip out and invited them both to a café and, much to his relief, Nami had accepted.

But all of that came crashing to a halt as one man turned into two and then three, more and more men appearing from behind trees and shrubbery, creating a circle around them.

His eyes zeroed in on the guns some of them were equipped with.

“What the hell did you call me, shithead?” His voice threatening and all attention turned to him as he took a small step forward in front of Nami, Chopper the other side of her doing the same.

As he looked over the large group, he wondered how long they’d been following them and how they’d managed to go undetected.

It was their first day here and Luffy hadn’t even made a ruckus yet, so it was strange how they knew where they were but as he eyed his surroundings, from the large group to their location it started to make sense.

There was only three of them, him, Nami and Chopper, in a tight secluded spot, far away from their ship or the rest of the crew.

This wasn’t by chance.

This was planned.

It was an ambush.

And Sanji had let it happen. Something that could’ve been prevented, quite easily, if he’d been paying attention to his surroundings, instead of the gorgeous woman behind him.  

His question was ignored as, what he presumed was the leader, took a step forward and called out, “Take him alive, we can get more money for him that way.”

They weren’t marines or CP9, they didn’t care if he was dead or alive. It looked like they bounty hunters and he knew what they were thinking; he was a prince; he came from wealth and power. Something these people would be able to attain through him.

But they clearly didn’t know anything. Didn’t know that his family would happily see him die before handing over money or technology for his life and it was why he hated that poster so much. There were assumptions that came with his birthname and no matter how notorious he became in his own right he’d never be able to escape them.

“Take the woman too,” one of them added.

And that very title had dragged Nami into his mess.

Again.

“Chopper, take Nami back to the ship.” He wasn’t sure if Chopper was depressed at being overlooked, he was too busy staring the leader down.

“I’m not going anywhere. I’m not leaving you,” Nami said firmly, tone suggesting there was no room for discussion.

He wondered if she was thinking about Capone’s back on Zou. She hadn’t wanted to leave him then either, but she hadn’t had a choice back then. Now she had a choice, and from her rigid posture and frown, it was clear she wouldn’t be moving. The irony was that they only needed Brook and it’d be a reunion.

“Call the others, we found them!”

At least they weren’t being taken lightly, but that still wasn’t good. It was hard to believe there were even more of them considering the size of the group already.

“Chopper, go to the ship, get whoever’s on board.” The words felt bitter coming from his mouth, but it was no secret they were vastly outnumbered and if they managed to get their grubby hands on Nami, he’d have no choice but to surrender instantly.

Chopper looked like he wanted to argue, stand his ground just like Nami had, but he must’ve done the math; knew they’d come out of this better if there were more of them.

“I’ll be back!” He called, changing into his walking point and sprung between the men with ease, dodging their attempts to stop him.

They didn’t follow after him though, so at least that was one less person to worry about.

“Nami-san, do you have your climatact?” They were back-to-back now, and he chanced a glance over his shoulder to look at her, she looked fierce and determined.

“Of course.” Her hand disappeared down the front of her dress and he quickly averted his gaze because he really didn’t need that sort of distraction right now. He had to be on his game, because as much as he trusted Nami’s strength, he was still responsible for her.

A tension settled over the tiny clearing with both parties hesitant to make the first move, sizing up the other with a critical gaze. It finally shattered when a branch in the woods snapped, and it had the effect of a gunshot through the quiet clearing.

They’d been outnumbered plenty of times before, so they sprung into action just like they had in the past.

A glance over at Nami as he spun to kick someone in the face, and she was more than holding her own. It was a hard trying not to become distracted by her as they fought. She moved with such grace, body in total coordination whilst she twirled the baton between her hands, timing meticulous as the climatact extended and retracted to do the most damage.

But ultimately that was the issue.

Whilst they may have done this in the past, they did it under very different circumstances. They weren’t contained in such a tight space, with only the two of them and the opposition desperate to get one of them to the floor as they were now.

They could only keep them at bay, push them away before someone else was on them trying to pin them down.

There was too many of them to be able to fully take them down without the risk of being overwhelmed.

A quick scan told him they needed to do crowd control and do it now. He couldn’t take off into the air like he normally would, it’d leave Nami on the ground by herself and a flurry of kicks would be reckless in a tight space. If he hit her, even by accident, he’d never be able to forgive himself.

There was no thought process as he flipped into a handstand, moving away from Nami, and spinning on his hands. He ignored the grit and sharp pieces from the floor digging into his hands and instead focused on the people before him. They’d be up after a while, the move not doing enough damage to keep them down, but it’d be enough to buy him and Nami time and stop them being swamped.

Ultimately, his only goal was keeping her safe and their grubby hands off of her.

And it seemed her goal was similar to his. He knew it wasn’t for the same reason as his, but it made him feel warm at least that she cared for him that much.

With their similar goals, they were doing well at containment, even as Sanji moved slightly further away hoping to do a bit more damage without the risk of hitting her.

But all of that came abruptly crashing down.

In the heat of battle, his haki was better, he could sense the people around him and just about anticipate their moves, which was handy, and it guided him on where he needed to be. Right now though, it was heavily focused on Nami so he could get a feel for how she was doing without having to take his eyes off his opponents. She was focused and slightly anxious, but that was to be expected and he couldn’t sense any panic, so he trusted she was alright.

However, the feeling that came next had ice settling over his heart. Someone close reeked of ill intentions, repugnant thoughts almost brimming over, and that was saying something considering the group were all bounty hunters. But this was different from the rest of them, this individual was backhanded, immoral, a mixture of utter glee and vile motive.

It was that combination he didn’t like.

For the first time since developing his haki, he could make out a shadowy outline and it was over as quickly as it came on but there was no forgetting it, it was like he’d had a front row seat to a horror show. It’d been a shadow of a woman being shot from behind, her figure falling in slow motion to a heaped pile on the floor.

Despite it just being a shadow, there was no mistaking it, the woman from his vision was Nami. He’d know her presence anywhere.

It made him feel sick, but he didn’t linger on the image, instead he sent a forceful kick to the man in front of him and did a U-turn, charging towards her before he could think about what he was doing.

The voice in the back of his mind was chanting that he would be too late, be too slow and would be picking her body up from the floor before he could do anything. The people around him were forgotten in his single-minded devotion to get to her, shoving them out the way as he pushed any doubt out of his mind.

By hook or by crook, he would get there in time.

It wasn’t the heroic, princely move that he wanted or ever envisioned doing, but desperate times called for desperate measures as he hurled himself at her, outstretched arms curling around her and knocking her off her feet. The distinct sound of a gun firing went off as they started to fall to the floor, but it was okay, because he’d made it in time.

He spun them just in time that he ended up taking the brunt and they skidded on the ground, Nami clutched to him. His arm hurt and his back burned, his jacket no doubt shredded but the woman scrambling to get off of him was all worth it.

She was out of his arms and at his side, looking down at him with a frown. “Sanji, what are you- are you bleeding?!”

Her frown was gone, in place panic and when he looked down, he was greeted with a bloody arm. It twinged when he moved it but from what he could see, it was a graze.

It at least explained why his arm hurt.

Luckily the chaos bought them some time as the bounty hunters argued amongst themselves about the use of the gun that almost damaged their pay-check.

Just a shame it wasn’t all of them that were distracted.

He pushed up on that arm, ignoring the pain that flared from the wound in distress, and kicked one of the men that got too close to Nami. He shucked off his ruined jacket and threw it at another group starting to get too close and it gave him and Nami the time to get back on their feet.

But it wasn’t working like it was before, no matter how much they both pushed back, it felt like all of a sudden, the tables had turned. Where they’d been holding them back before they were now overwhelmed, barely keeping up with the punches. The distance they’d been able to establish was gone as the men crowded in and it was relentless.

He was being reckless, he knew he was, as he threw himself around with very little regard for himself, but he’d be damned if what he saw came to life. He didn’t care what happened to himself and at the end of the day, what was a scratch or bruised rib if it meant a healthy Nami.

His recklessness soon cost him when he fell to the floor a second time, but not of his own free will this time. Someone had taken him by surprise with the end of their gun and as his brain rattled, he knew that hit held the intention of trying to knock him out.

His head throbbed at him, almost begging him to stay down, but if he went down, it would only be Nami left, and he couldn’t leave her. With that thought in mind, he swept out his leg, knocking the other man to the floor before he could get in a hit that actually did finish him. He fought through the way his vision blurred and how the world wouldn’t stop moving as he stood to his feet.

“Sanji-kun! Are you okay?” She grunted; voice strained as she pushed someone back with her climatact and swung it around to hit someone else, unable to spare a moment to really look at him.

Nami was doing the best she could to cover him whilst he recovered but the group were getting frustrated by him and Nami’s resilience, it was clear as day in the way their moves were turning desperate and more vicious by the second. The earlier words of taking him alive seemed to be slipping from their minds, which worried him because so far, their gun use has been severely limited but if that changed…

“As long as you are, I am,” he replied, getting to his feet and at this point it was pure adrenaline keeping him up.

“Then think about what you’re doing!” She barked, smacking someone around the head.

From there on, the fighting had shifted. It’d turned into a free for all and Sanji silently willed Chopper to reappear because he was aware of the ticking clock working against them now. If the rest of the bounty hunters group showed up, they’d be done for.  

Now, Sanji knew the score amongst the seas, he knew pirates, marines, bounty hunters had no honour, it wasn’t something to be expected from others, regardless how he felt about it.

But when he caught a flash of silver glinting at him from the corner of his eye, he felt his blood heat. If he thought he was angry before this, it was nothing compared to the man raising his knife on an unsuspecting Nami and he was flipping onto his hands to get in between them.

It was his sloppiness that put himself in this position. A position where he hadn’t been quick enough to position himself and in a last-ditch attempt, he found himself catching the man’s arms before he could bring the knife down on Nami’s back.

For the first time since Enies Lobby, he’d been forced to fight with his hands.

He’d dealt with enough squirming ingredients in his lifetime to have a firm grip, but the last thing he’d expected was for the man’s arms to slip straight through his hands like butter, along with the knife.

He hissed and recoiled in pain as he felt it slowly slice through the skin, his hand throbbing at him. It felt like it’d happened in slow motion, and he didn’t need to look down to know it was bleeding- he could feel it.

He hadn’t for one second expected a devil fruit and that was on him.

The man smirked nastily, proud of getting the better of him and what he wouldn’t do to plant his foot in the man’s face, but Nami’s voice behind interrupted, “Sanji, duck.”

He did so without hesitation, dropping to the ground and watched as Nami’s climatact stabbed the man in the face before twirling it between her hands to knock down anyone close enough.

He felt proud watching the damage she did until she turned her gaze on him and that vanished because of the look on her face. For the first time, he couldn’t read it. She looked pale and for a split second he was worried she was hurt until he watched her eyes flick from his face to focus on his hands.

He’d only caught a quick look at his hands but that was bad enough.

He flipped onto his hands, burying his bloodied palm into the dirt, to kick the man trying to sneak up behind Nami. If he thought his arm hurt, it was nothing compared to the heat flaring angrily from his palm. Grit burying itself in all the cuts on his palms, large or small, but he ignored that in favour of flipping and throwing himself back into the fray.

He couldn’t let up for even a second.

Although he didn’t want to entertain the thought, he was tired, and he wasn’t sure how much longer he was going to last. Everything was working against him, his head still throbbed, his arm and hands both competing for which would burn stronger, and he couldn’t remember how it happened, but his ribs had begun to protest.

But he wouldn’t give until Nami was safe, that was why he wouldn’t entertain any thoughts of stopping. He couldn’t and wouldn’t until he could ensure her safety and that’s what kept him going.  

It could have been a minute or an hour but the distant sound of ‘oni giri’ had relief flooding through him, for once happy to hear Marimo’s voice and his body gave up, right then and there. He slumped to the floor against his will; he was tired, his head was killing him, and his hands burned. From the cut to the dirt in the cut and everything in-between that’d made itself at home in the skin of his palms.

“Sanji-kun!” Nami’s distressed voice called out to him.

The last thing he saw was the stunning, unharmed, face of Nami, crouched over him, calling his name.

That was a good way to go down, in his opinion.

“Sanji!”

.

.

.

His head throbbed as he came to, and he groaned when he touched his forehead. Everything hurt. His head, hand, and arm. His hands. He tried to sit up, but his ribs protested, and he mentally added his body to the list.

An ambush. Just him and Nami. Someone trying to shoot her.

It all came flooding back and headache be damned, he opened his eyes to scan his surroundings. He instantly recognised Chopper’s medical room, so he could relax a bit but then his eyes caught the flash of orange beside him.

Nami.

She was facing away from him but from what he could glean she looked okay, and he breathed a sigh of relief.

The movement caught her attention and she turned to face him. She still looked fine, but he had to ask, “Are you hurt?”

“You’re seriously asking me that right now?” Her voice filled with disbelief.

He didn’t respond, continuing to stare up at her, waiting for her answer.

She shook her head. “I’m fine. How are you feeling?”

“As long as you’re fine, then I’m fine,” he parroted his earlier words, and it was true. The ache in his head worth it all to see her well. She didn’t look like she believed him and snorted, turning back around to grab more things.

As happy as he was that she was there, he’d been expecting Chopper flitting around him instead. “Where’s Chopper?”

“He’s dealing with the other idiots,” she said, sitting on the chair next to the bed.

“Chopper checked you over before going. You’ve got a minor concussion, we haven’t scrambled your brain yet.” Her lips curved up and she added, “Well, no more than normal.”

“Being around you scrambles my brain.”

“Which is normal,” she teased, grinning at him.

He laughed lightly but his ribs still protested angrily. He didn’t manage to smother the grimace in time and the smile slipped off her face as she turned to the side, gathering the supplies she’d need.

“We can deal with that later,” he said frowning, slowly sitting up and building momentum to get off the bed. “They put themselves out, the least I can do is make sure they’re fed.”

“You’re not leaving this bed!” Nami snapped, hand on his shoulder pushing him down.

He’d wanted to hear that from her mouth for as long as he’d known her, and he’d store that sentence away for later, but it was hard to be happy about it when her words were paired with the firm set of her mouth and furrowed eyebrows.

She was upset.

He’d upset her.

He laid back without any further resistance and the stiffness from her shoulders relaxed. He didn’t say anything else as she sat down on the chair next to the bed, her hands reaching for his.

“I haven’t seen you spin on your hands in ages,” Nami said, her thumb brushing over the pulse at his wrist to avoid any of the small injuries to his hand. “I can see why now.”

There were two bowels on the bed, and it wasn’t rocket science to realise what they were for. One was filled with water and the other empty bar a pair of tweezers.

She moved one of the bowels closer to them and cupped his hands. “Deep breath,” she told him and then dunked his hands into the bowel filled with water.

It stung, the water working its way into all of the cuts, but he didn’t complain. He wouldn’t, because she was safe, and this was the most she’d ever touched him, and it was so gentle. She held his hands in the water a second longer before lifting them out and onto a towel.

The, now murky, water filled bowel was moved onto the bedside table and the other bowel moved closer. She picked up the pair of tweezers with one hand and cupped one of his hands with the other. Her touch was delicate, and his hand went limp under her touch, letting her move it into the position she wanted.

With his palm facing the ceiling, she worked on getting all the various pieces lodged into his skin out. She was clinical in her movements, methodical as she moved over the skin, but she was gentle about it. She tried her best to do so without having to dig, but some of it was unavoidable.

For all her professionalism, once she’d pried a piece out the thumb from her free hand would rub a little circle into the side of his hand. He wasn’t sure if she was soothing herself or him, but it made him smile and goosebumps erupted over his arms.

With Nami focused on his hands, he had the luxury of looking over her face. Her face the picture of concentration, from the pinched lips to her furrowed eyebrows. Beneath the focus, she looked tired, but there wasn’t a single scratch on her face, and he was proud of that. Come tomorrow, she’d be back to her smiling self.

She moved onto the second hand, placing the first down onto the towel, and although she’d been doing it a while now, she was still just as doting and attentive to the other hand.

Brown eyes met his, finally acknowledging his staring and her hands stilled their work. “What?”

“My own personal nurse,” he joked, hoping to make her smile.

“Don’t imagine me as a nurse! We don’t need to add blood loss to the list of problems!” She scolded, lips pulling slightly at his antics but not what he’d been aiming for as they lapsed back into silence, and she continued with his other hand.

He hadn’t let himself look down at his hands before now, mainly because he didn’t need the distraction at the time but because it wouldn’t really make a difference how they looked. They looked like they’d been through the ringer though. Far worse than when he’d first learned to cook, where his fingers had been constantly burned or cuts had littered his fingers and palms from inexperience. Stains of dirt still remained in patches where it had resisted the first wash, and it clung to all the little openings from where anything sharp had been buried. All those openings were angry and red, some bleeding a little from where they’d been pulled about to get the bits of debris out.

Then there was the large cut spanning his left palm.

If the small cuts were angry, then that was furious, from the raw skin to the dried blood on his skin that would need a few more persuasive washes before coming out clean. It was long and deep, but he didn’t dare flex his hand to see just how deep it went into his palm. Thankfully it’d stopped bleeding but, in its place, it oozed instead.

That wouldn’t heal quickly.

But as he looked at his hands, he didn’t feel any strong emotion. He felt neutral. He wasn’t happy of course, but there wasn’t an ounce of regret. He’d do it again a million times over just to see Nami unharmed.

And he realised right then, if it was between his hands or Nami, it would be her every time. No questions asked, no hesitation.

It felt like it should be a huge earth-shattering moment, where the axis suddenly shifted, and all the pieces aligned into a moment of pure epiphany, because he’d said all his life how important and sacred his hands were. Yet it felt very matter of fact, like it just made sense and had never been any different. Sanji supposed, it never had been any different. Not for a long time at least.

“Look at your hands,” Nami mourned, face drawn and thumb focusing on cautiously tracing alongside the wound.

She’d said it so quietly he wondered if it was meant to be said to herself only. She was beautiful no matter what, but he hated that look on her face and he hated that he was the cause of it.

His uncut hand lightly gripped her hand. “I’d do it again.” He would, in a heartbeat. His gut flaring the exact same way it had just this morning.

“Don’t.” She looked at him sharply. “I don’t want you to.”

He knew what she wanted him to say, what she expected him to say because she’d known him for so long. But on this occasion-

“No.”

He’d never refused her before in all the time of knowing her. He’d always catered to her whims or discussed anything they’d disagreed on, coming to a mutual agreement before moving on. He’d never refused her so outright, so firmly and he would not budge on it. He refused to.

But as adamant as he felt about it, she looked just as equally defiant based on the tight expression she was giving him.

“Look at your hands,” she said sternly and held his hands up as if he’d see them clearer that way, “These are your dreams, your life, your everything. Don’t expect me to sit here and agree as you recklessly throw it away.”

Although he wasn’t shocked about his new revelation regarding his hands, it was still a revelation all the same and he found himself disagreeing with what she’d said. She was worth it all, it wasn’t reckless when it concerned her.

The next thought was at the tip of his tongue, threatening to bubble over past his lips but he hesitated. He knew what he was about to say would spook her, make her skittish and knew that his feelings for her weren’t returned- and that was okay, he just wanted to be around her, in whatever way he could.

Ultimately, he threw caution to the wind because when did he ever not give his all to everything he did?

“A life without you in it isn’t worth living.” And he meant it, with every fibre of his being. It’d be hollow without her smile, her laugh, her everything, brightening up his day. His dream of all blue was grey without the smart, caring and sassy navigator at his side, regardless of whether she returned his feelings.

“You’re being dramatic.” She didn’t sound sure; she didn’t look sure. He’d surprised her, he realised after a second, with such a sweeping statement. And it was warring with her anger over his refusal just seconds before.

“I’m not,” he said firmly, trying to get the message across.

“Don’t pretend you wouldn’t do it for anyone else in this crew.” She was deflecting.

She had him there though. The same gut instinct flared up. “You’re right.”

But the feeling was different. They were his family; he’d do anything for them but her. Her. Nami. The sun rose and set with her. She was the first thing he thought about and the last at the end of the day. Her happiness was his happiness.

“But it’s different with you,” he continued, adamant.  

This was the last thing he’d expected when he’d woken up and perhaps now wasn’t the best time to be doing this. He still had a concussion, and they were currently mid disagreement (he wouldn’t call it an argument) but he didn’t want the moment to pass. He didn’t want to try again later, to try and regain the moment they were currently in.

“Don’t change the subject.” She wouldn’t make eye contact, but she was still holding his hands.

“I’m not, it’s all relevant,” he insisted, and it was. He needed her to see that. This wasn’t something he just did on a whim.

It was silent as they stared each other down, willing the other to give. Well, Nami was actually glaring at him, which he could understand but he wasn’t giving in on this. He just couldn’t, it went against everything he felt so strongly about, but it still made his stomach twist uncomfortably.

The door to the med bay creaked open, breaking the stalemate as Chopper poked his head through. He hesitated at the door when he picked up on the odd tension. Sanji was just about to ask for ten more minutes because they were nowhere near done but Nami stood, his hands falling from her grasp onto the bed.

“Nami-san,” Sanji called after her, a battered hand feebly stretched out.

“He’s all yours,” she said to Chopper as she passed him.

She didn’t look back as she left, the door closing behind her.

.

.

.

Nami wasn’t speaking to him.

She was also actively avoiding him since the med bay and that had been yesterday. He wasn’t sure if it was because of their disagreement (not argument) or because in a roundabout way he’d confessed and made her uncomfortable.

He may regret the timing of the confession, no matter how right it had felt, but he didn’t regret their disagreement, not then and not now, even as Nami quickly left the kitchen without looking at him.

It stung a bit though.

Her reaction confused him though, he was expected to be yelled at or hit instead of silence, but he’d give her the space she clearly wanted for the rest of the day and then smooth it over tomorrow. Who knows, maybe he’d get that reaction tomorrow. He just hated the tension between them and the confused looks he kept receiving from the rest of the crew.

For now, he was looking down at a bowel of hot water and a pile of dishes that needed washing up. Chopper hadn’t mentioned about getting his stiches wet, but he figured he could always get the dressing covering his stiches wrapped again afterwards. Someone else in the crew would do the dishes, he knew that, but they’d already bailed him out once and the stiches would be in for at least a week, he should be able to do this himself. Dinner hadn’t been too bad, the hand with stitches twinged slightly and his arm where a bullet had skimmed had protested when he lifted it above his head, but he was no whiner.

So he cracked on, picking up the first plate and sponge to wash it with.

“Put down the plate,” a steely voice said from behind him.

Nami stood in the doorway, a vision of loveliness as she glowered at him with her hands on her hips.

She strode in, pushing the door closed behind her. “I saw everyone come out of the kitchen and I knew what you were doing, you big idiot.”

She snatched the towel of his shoulder and threw it onto the counter next to them when she reached him, eyes fiery and although he was taller than her, he’d never felt smaller in front of her.

Shit, he wasn’t ready for this, he thought as his palms started to sweat. Sure, he’d planned on talking to her tomorrow, but that was tomorrow, he would have had time to think it through before then.  

“Did you mean it?” She asked, her tone neutral now and that only made him feel more on edge, that any wrong answer would have him toppling off the deep end.  

He didn’t know what part of their conversation yesterday she was referring to, but there was no part he’d take back, even if it did make her angrier.

“Every word,” he said with surety, jaw set and staring into her eyes, trying to match his words so she understood.

She sighed deeply and he was bracing himself because that couldn’t be good.  

“I’m still upset about this.” Her fingers tentatively grazed his bandaged hand and if they didn’t break plates as quickly as he knew they did, he would have dropped it then and there just to take her hand.

Instead, he put the plate down on the side, resting the sponge on top and he was going to gather her in his arms to hug her because he hated that he’d upset her, but she took his hands, stopping him in his tracks.

It was quiet as she looked down at his hands, palms facing upward so his cuts and bandage was on full display. It was a much better sight than yesterday; the rawness had faded, and the gruesome display of his wound hidden behind white cloth.

He was jarred from his observations when she let go of one of his hands and instead used it to trace along the bandage, fingers light as it travelled along his hand, retracing the length of the cut and although it may be hidden by a bandage, it might as well have not been by how accurately her fingers moved along it.  

“I’m angry that you’d throw this all away,” she said lightly, voice even and it didn’t match her words. Her fingers stopped their journey to cup his hand as if to make her point and he didn’t need her to explain what she meant.

He didn’t want to argue but the way he felt still hadn’t changed. “Nami-”

“I’m not finished talking!” She snapped and his mouth shut without another word.

“I’m angry that you don’t trust me.”

Oh God, no. That was never what this was about, and he hadn’t even contemplated how she might think that. He didn’t care whether she was done talking or not, he was ready to shut that down but then her next words stole the breath from his lungs.

“But mostly, I’m angry that after all this time you don’t value yourself. Everything we’ve been through, and you still throw yourself in as if it means nothing.” Her eyes seared into his and like a coward he turned to the floor, unable to bear the brunt of that look.

His previous life might be well behind him now, but he couldn’t just switch off all the things that’d been said to him in his youth. It made it hard to believe that someone could care about him, care about his life to that extent. But it wasn’t an excuse; he knew that, and he knew the people on this ship felt very differently about him but that didn’t stop the thoughts in his head sometimes.

Another reason came to mind, but it made his chest constrict painfully, like he couldn’t breathe, and he always desperately tried not to think about it for too long for that very reason. It was the death of his mother. It hurt, it ached, and it haunted him in the quiet moments when it was just him and his memories. How he’d been helpless, unable to do anything as he lost her, and he wouldn’t see it happen again. Didn’t want to see it happen again, not if he could help it. The thought of losing someone precious whilst he lived on would be unbearable to live through again.

Both tied so deeply into one another, he wasn’t sure he’d ever be able to pry them apart and let them go.  

She gripped his hand, trying to get his attention from his thoughts and staring match with the floor but the best he could do was look at their joined hands.

“I don’t want to lose you,” she said it softly, but it was so loud in the quiet kitchen.

“And I don’t want to lose you,” he said earnestly, his free hand coming to rest on top of hers, to feel the warmth on her skin because his chest tightened at the thought of her not being around.

She considered him for a second and he wondered if this was the start of another disagreement before she delivered, “The way you feel about me getting hurt, why do you think it’s any different when it’s you?”

The way he felt about her…

Oh.

And just like that, the tables had turned. He looked at her face, scanning, searching for the answer to a question he hadn’t yet verbalised whereas she wouldn’t look at him, resolutely looking down at their joined hands.

Her bashfulness gave him the courage to ask.

“You mean…?”

He was met with silence but that didn’t dishearten him, his heart felt as if it was going to burst through his chest at any moment, as hope foolishly blossomed in his lungs because surely, she didn’t feel the exact same way as he did. Surely not. Not for him.

“You’re an idiot,” she said, frowning and his heart sunk.

“But I’m the idiot that wants you.”

He’d imagined this moment so many times, played this over and over in his daydreams but it didn’t hold a candle to the actual moment. He was speechless and his heart was doing summersaults from the roll coaster ride it had been on in the last minute. He still wondered if he was asleep, if he would wake up any second to the cruel reality it was in his imagination again.

“I expected more enthusiasm,” Nami said dryly, smirking and she was back to looking him in the eye.

“I just…” ‘didn’t expect it. Ever.’ Is what he wanted to say but she had, and he didn’t want to tar the moment with his insecurities. Although someone would need to pinch him later.

“I know you’re not going to give on your recklessness, it’s partially why I was so angry, but just so you know Black Leg Sanji this is a two-way street-” she leaned in, eyes alight with confidence- “and I’ll be fighting just as hard for you.

She wouldn’t need to, he’d make sure he was more than enough for the both of them, but her words made him smile, made him feel delirious and the nasty thoughts at the back of his mind were quiet for once.

But there was something he had to clear up first.

“Nami-san, I’ve never thought you were weak. Never thought you weren’t capable. You’ve proven time and time again you can protect yourself, but if I can prevent you getting hurt, I’m going to.”

She breathed heavily through her nose but smiled softly. “All I ask, is that you at least consider your hands when doing stupid things.”

“I’ll do my best.”

She laughed, short and sharp. “That’s the most I’m going to get from you, so stop messing around and kiss me already.”

He gaped at her like a fool, he’d expected so much more than this, more arguing, more talking, more back and forth. That internal dialogue came to a screeching halt when Nami, bored of his staring, grabbed the lapels of his jacket and brought him into a searing kiss.

Fireworks, sirens, alarms were all going off in his head as he scrambled to catch up, but she was persistent, lips coaxing and hands tightening on the lapels, urging him along. All of those noises faded away into bliss when he reciprocated in kind, seizing the moment he’d waited so long for.

For the first time since it’d been wrapped on his hand, he cursed the bandage that was denying him feeling the soft skin of her arm. That was pushed to the back of his mind when she pulled on his jacket, pressing them closer together and his hands moved to her back to diminish any space left between them. At least his fingers could enjoy the delicate skin of her back exposed from the halter top she wore.

They pulled apart, breathing heavily and he was trying his best to take in her face.

“What a poorly timed confession,” she teased, lips brushing against his as she spoke.

“I know.” He cringed, she deserved so much more than this.

“I expect you to make it up to me.” Her lips curved upward.

“For as long as you’ll let me.”

Her eyes crinkled and the teasing expression was gone, replaced with softness. “Good answer.”

The next kiss was slow, and he was ready for it this time as he put his all into it. Lips caressing, heads tilting to find the right angle and they soon found their rhythm. Daringly he brushed his tongue along the seam of her lips and their tongues brushed when she parted her lips. As much as he liked their first kiss, the second was his favourite as he got to take his time as he tasted her and listened to the little breathy noises she made.

He looked forward to having more favourites with her.

“Seeing as I can’t get my stitches wet, maybe you’ll help me in the shower,” he muttered when they pulled apart briefly.

She leaned up on her toes and he had expected her to kiss him again, she was so close he could almost taste her on his lips when she whispered, “Ask Zoro to wash your back.”

That threw cold water on the mood and the image that popped into his head was enough to make a nasty shiver slither down his spine. “That’s not funny, Nami-san.”

Nami laughed, eyes crinkling and face lighting up at the displeased look on his face and as horrified as he was with her suggestion, it was the look on her face he adored seeing.

“I’m sure something can be arranged,” she said once her giggling had resided.

He leaned down to kiss her again, but she took a step away, swiftly dodging arms that tried to drag her back in. When he went to follow her, his world went black as she threw the tea towel on his head.

“Come on, I’ll wash, you dry.”

Yeah, he regretted nothing. He’d do it a hundred times over again now and in the future, just so he could have this with her.

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

Listen, I just love the way Sanji feels about Nami, and I channelled all of that into this. He adores her, she’s the one for him, he’s her number one cheerleader. I HAVE SO MANY FEELS.

I have a head canon that Sanji stopped doing those kicking handstands because he’d get scratches and splinters in his hands afterwards and that defeated the purpose of fighting with his legs (even if I think they do look super cool!). I’m sure the manga will prove me wrong, but I can’t recall him doing it since pre time skip.

Just in case you didn’t read my other (filth) fic, Ray started a SaNami discord group, it’s a chill place to chat and share your love for this pairing. If you’d like to join, message me on here or Twitter and I’ll send you the link (Please make sure I can message you back!). Feel free to join, the more the merrier!

As always, please excuse any errors.

Thank you to Ray for this lovely trade and to everyone for reading.  

[baoshan-sanren]

Chapter 34

of the wwx emperor au I’m thinking of calling -- you know what? I suck at titles. let’s just accept the fact that I’ll slap something vaguely poetic on this thing when it’s finished, and that it will probably have no relation to the actual fic

Prologue | Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5 | Chapter 6 | Chapter 7 | Chapter 8 Part 1 | Chapter 8 Part 2 | Chapter 9 | Chapter 10 | Chapter 11 | Chapter 12 | Chapter 13 | Chapter 14 | Chapter 15 Part 1 | Chapter 15 Part 2 | Chapter 16 | Chapter 17 | Chapter 18 | Chapter 19 | Chapter 20 | Chapter 21 | Chapter 22 Part 1 | Chapter 22 Part 2 | Chapter 23 | Chapter 24 | Chapter 25 | Chapter 26 | Chapter 27 | Chapter 28 | Chapter 29 | Chapter 30 | Chapter 31 | Chapter 32 | Chapter 33

About half-way to the Imperial guest chambers, it occurs to Wei Ying that he cannot simply knock on Lan Zhan’s door past midnight. 

Lan Zhan had asked him to use the door, and Wei Ying wants to use the door, but he cannot. It takes a few moments for his pleasantly drunk mind to reconcile itself with the whole not using the door thing. But he still wants to see Lan Zhan. He wants to see Lan Zhan pretty badly. He wants to apologize for being stupid, although, at this very moment, he is not exactly sure what he had been stupid about. Probably a lot of things.

He sighs.

He also needs to apologize for failing to protect Lan QiRen. Lan Zhan had clearly told him that he does not want his brother or his uncle being hurt. Wei Ying had sworn to protect them both to the best of his ability. It does not matter that Nie HuaiSang had made the decision to decrease Lan QiRen’s guard. Wei Ying had promised. Protecting Lan Qiren had been his responsibility.

The horror he had felt, when he saw the Peach Blossom Pavilion on fire, cannot be described. If Lan QiRen had been killed, after Wei Ying had sworn to protect him-- he does not think that Lan Zhan would have ever forgiven him.

Still standing, stupidly, in the middle of the hall leading to the Imperial guest chambers, Wei Ying thinks perhaps his mind is not in the best place at the moment. He should wait and speak to Lan Zhan in the morning. He should not be stumbling drunk around the Iron Palm Palace, as if looking for Madam Yu to corner him.

But he wants to see Lan Zhan.

He remembers the absolute fury with which Lan Zhan had turned on A-Sang, the wild look in his eyes, the white robes flaring in an arc, blade flashing. Against the backdrop of the fire, he had looked coldly savage; an ancient immortal, an avenging deity too terrible to be gazed upon by ordinary humans.  

In that moment, Wei Ying had been certain that Lan Zhan would not hesitate; that he would not let himself be restrained with such a simple gesture as his brother’s hand on his wrist. A-Sang would meet his end in that courtyard, and Lan Zhan would not stop there, but go on to carve a bloody path through every person in his sight, Wei Ying included.

The Peach Blossom Pavilion, its fragile old wood and intricately carved posts, dusty and forgotten, had stood for over a century, the Immortal Mountain City growing and spreading around its delicate shell. A legacy, left behind by the Immortal Empress, an arrogant girl who had thought herself so powerful that she had tried to rule over the cycle of life and death, nearly extinguishing the flame needed to form the Empire.

Her peach trees cannot be moved, altered, or destroyed. They are a lesson Wei Ying had been taught long before he understood what it meant.

But there is a much more subtle lesson in the Pavilion itself, a building even YanLing DaoRen could not bring himself to touch; the brittleness of family, home, comfort. How even the meanest creature will take time to burrow a hole in the dirt, then protect it with its last breath. The Immortal Empress had burrowed a hole next to her peach tree, then nearly given up her life to keep it intact.

Watching the Peach Blossom Pavilion be consumed by flames, used as a death trap for an honorable, righteous man, Wei Ying could not help but think that, if Lan Zhan had truly decided to kill them all, he would have been hard pressed to explain why they did not deserved it.

He leans against the hall arch, the stone cool and soothing against his skin. His mind is definitely not in the best place. But he still wants to see Lan Zhan.

Instead of heading towards the Imperial guest chambers, he turns to the door leading into his public study, a room he actively tries to avoid unless pressing business requires his presence. It is a bleak, cavernous space, where guilty men, often three times his age, would kneel on the marble floors, begging for their lives. He had not executed men often, even when they were indisputably guilty, but the few times he had were enough to make the space unbearable forever after.

There is one aspect of the study that Wei Ying does not hate, however, and it is the window hole leading out to the lower rooftop of the receiving hall. In the daylight, this particular portion of the roof is clearly visible from the entirety of the Iron Palm Palace courtyard. But during the night, it is a perfect starting point, no matter which part of the City he means to access. Some day, someone will realize that Wei Ying uses the tops of the courtyard walls as bridges to all of the surrounding palaces. The wall tops will be deemed a security breach, one that uncle Jiang will remedy without asking for his opinion, or his permission. But that day is not today, and Wei Ying has no intention of using the walls anyway.

The receiving hall roof curves to the east and west, winding around the palace, and Wei Ying counts window holes carefully, never having accessed the Imperial guest chambers in this manner before. It would just be his luck to drop into Lan XiChen’s chambers in error, or even worse, Lan QiRen’s.

He should not have worried. Long before he can be certain that he has counted correctly, he sees the flash of the white robes.

Lan Zhan had crawled out his window as well, and is sitting on the cold rooftop tile, the snow-white sleep robe pooling around him.

His hair is loose, a dark cape laid over the bright robe, and Wei Ying thinks he looks ethereal still, beautiful and aloof, not meant to be observed by lowly human beings.

Preoccupied by Lan Zhan, Wei Ying forgets that he is, in fact, more than a little drunk, and that he had forgotten to take his shoes off. The soles, not meant to grip the slick tiles, slide without a warning. He flails, nearly loosing his footing altogether.

By the time he has regained his balance, an act that was probably ridiculous to watch, Lan Zhan has noticed him and gotten to his feet. Wei Ying feels stupid, however, this has never stopped him before, so he crosses the last stretch of the roof anyway, but carefully now, minding his footing.

“Lan Zhan,” he says softly.

Lan Zhan studies him for a few moments, then lowers himself back down. Wei Ying takes this as a permission, and ungracefully sits next to him.

Something about the coolness of the night seems to magnify the scent of the sandalwood; it wraps around Wei Ying, smooth and warm, cutting through the chill of the north-western winds. He had come to apologize, but the right words seem to have abandoned him for the moment. Lan Zhan is perfectly still, a cold statue glowing brightly in the darkness. Wei Ying’s drunk tongue, unable to to properly ask for forgiveness, has nonetheless found a thousand poems at its disposal, each one attempting to give justice to Lan Zhan’s beauty, and each one falling short of the mark.

He does not regret coming to find Lan Zhan, but he does regret doing so with his mind less than perfectly clear.

Perhaps some other youth on some other rooftop can speak of marriage lightly, carelessly drunk on wine and beauty of the person beside them, knowing that the life they promise to share will be the one of comfort and safety. But the last few hours have made some truths starkly clear; Wei Ying has nothing to offer that does not come with its share of danger and grief. And Lan Zhan is no Nie HuaiSang, to find pleasure in the vicious court games, to smile politely while cutting with his words, to accept gifts with one hand while hiding a knife in the sleeve of the other.  

He remembers Lan QiRen’s admonishment clearly, and wonders, for the first time, if Lan Zhan could ever be happy, married to Wei Ying.

The silence has now stretched so long, that anything said out loud may carry more than one meaning. Lan Zhan does not look as if he intends to speak at all. Coldly beautiful he may be, but at this moment he is also oddly peaceful, his breaths deep and even, his eyes half-lidded, studying some mystical point in the distance that Wei Ying cannot see.

Silence has always been Wei Ying’s enemy.

It is Jiang Cheng’s anger, grown too vast for words. It is Nie HuaiSang’s hurt, caused by his carelessness. It is uncle Jiang’s disappointment, shijie’s grief, Wen Qing’s disapproval. Things unspoken have always wounded Wei Ying in a way that no spoken word ever has.

Because long before he had learned their silences, and all the ways in which they brought him pain, there had been the silence of the Six Fans Pavilion, never again graced with his father’s footsteps. The silence of his mother’s chambers, never again to echo her laughter.

Silence had always meant loss.

But now, sitting next to Lan Zhan, wrapped in hushed tranquility, he wonders if one person can change the nature of silence forever. If one person can have such power, to transform this thing he had always dreaded to something bearable and peaceful, something in which he may find contentment.

As if hearing his thoughts, Lan Zhan shifts, a smooth, soundless movement that brings him ever so slightly closer. In the next moment, Wei Ying feels a brush of cool skin against his hand. A finger hooks around his own, and this time, it does not tremble.

[absoluteindulgence]

Vacay Away

A/N: OKAY SO LET ME START BY SAYING, THIS FIC IS 2 1/2 MONTHS LATE. I originally wanted to post this for Black History Month. But I'm black all year so better late than never! Also, I apologize to all those waiting for me to upload, I've been consumed by Sims 4 and even made Mirio in-game lmao. If you have not finished MHA Season 4, there's a mild spoiler. Lastly, this is smut, so read at your own horniness risk.

Pairings: Mirio Togata X Black/POC!Reader

Warnings: Smut, Cursing

Word Count: 5.1K

As new graduates, the world was bright and shiny, like an apple ripe enough to bite. You decided after all the hell you and Mirio went through this year; it would be enough to graduate and offer Mirio a well-deserved rest. Too many nights went on with sweat induced nightmares with tears flooding from his despairing blue eyes; Reliving the horrors of fighting Chisaki, losing his quirk and his mentor who always showed him promise until his last breath.

Although you were at another agency during the ordeal, you always kept in contact with Tamaki and Nejire. At first, Tamaki didn't want to share any information, because he knew how it would tear you apart, but after he saw where your loyalty stood, he had to. You spent the rest of your days taking care of Mirio. By his side as soon as you knew his whereabouts. Staying in the hospital overnight, even going home to get a spare change of clothes, just to come back. You watched as he vented what it felt like for him. Not a single bone in your body blamed Eri; she was a child after all.

You still trained with him and even accompanied him on his internship. You knew he was capable of hand-to-hand, but what mattered was the villains with quirks that were life-threatening. Eventually, you laughed with each hospital visit and became well acquainted with the staff. After graduating with just above average grades, the two of you felt a sigh of relief: no more pity parties and sad looks. You two had to get away from it all.

And so, the voyage outside of Tokyo began. Originally you were going to celebrate by staying over at one another's home, but that wasn't fun enough for you; you wanted to feel free. Not just for yourself, for Mirio. He deserved to feel like himself even though he said he wouldn't cry over spilled milk anymore. You wanted to be by his side.

And so the bustle outside the city proved to be challenging. It took more buses than trains to leave. And even then had to take the abstract route to get outside of the town and into the country. Your breathing was more steady with the air being exceedingly more lucid, camping out to watch the stars shine, even being cheesy, mentioning the shapes found in the midnight sky. And the impromptu sexy times would be something you two take to your graves.

When you finally got close to the hot spring you were planning to surprise Mirio with, you admitted into the closest hotel. Luckily, the staff knew who you two were and gave you a week free, along with benefits like the perks of free food and massages. Unsure if that was related to filling a quota for the month or if they loved LeMillion as much as management said they did.

You two were starting to look like people who lived in the forest, eating off the land. So, of course, you were going to take advantage of the salon there as well. But you knew better than to go in expecting them to know what to do with your hair. You had your hair products tucked away neatly in your oversized backpack and had even taught Mirio how to handle your naps. He liked playing with your hair because he found it therapeutic and saw it as another way to bond with you.

Mirio's face of content made you beam with hope into his recovery. You were pushing yourself to get him out of his rut. You weren't sure if he knew how much you still worried about what happened. But you wanted to make up for the time that you weren't able to be by his side during the life-changing experience, apart from blaming yourself, because he told you what had been plaguing him.

As his partner, you did your best to assert the situation and go based on logic instead of emotion. But the look on his face, knowing that he let Eri out of his sight, spoke louder than any words. Having obtained Eri, and getting to spend time with her to build morale, was challenging at first as she was hesitant when looking at you. At first, she thought you were dirty due to Chisaki's influence.

After realizing that's just how your skin looks, she apologized profusely — not wanting to hurt your feelings and be accepted by you. You worked your way into taking care of her, although not great with kids. And since she was a particular but essential case, you wanted to make your imprint on her memory. She began to ask you questions about yourself and Mirio. At times asking the dreaded ones related to sex since she was around Deku and his friend Bakugou. You kept calm but wanted to dropkick the self-proclaimed hero with murder in his name. Aizawa made sure to scold him and tell him not to slip up on the foul language around Eri again.

As you entered your hotel room, you dropped off all the luggage you brought — yearning for the chance to feel warm running water. Mirio's breath lightly fanned over you as he rubbed your shoulders for you. He insisted on carrying your belongings before the trip, but you ran ahead of him with all your things. Even though your bags were more substantial than his one.

"See Sunshine; I told you to let me carry them. And now you're rolling your shoulders to relieve the tension." It was clear that he was smiling, with every grip on your muscles.

Your moans were soft, reassuring he hit your tense areas, "And yet I didn't complain at all like you thought I would."

"Because I was watching you." His light chuckles tickled the back of your neck, "And you're too stubborn sometimes."

You giggled under his touch, eyeing your heap of bags near the king-sized bed, slowly undressing. Slipping out of your boyfriend's gentle hold, you placed your dirty clothes in a laundry bag you brought. You needed to take a shower soon; you were getting antsy and anticipating fresh water from a showerhead instead of a stream. The life of hiking in the wild could only be so good for so long. Especially with your hair not getting enough moisture in the fresh air.

Fully nude, you turn to look at Mirio with a playful smile, "Oh, you think so?"

You were pulling your hair out of its messy afro bun while Mirio ogled your hair defying gravity as it did, it left a pleasant grin on his face. You gave him a quick peck on the lips before you searched through the bags. Looking for your tried-and-true skin and hair care products that were placed throughout your belongings. Speeding into the bathroom, you turned on the cold, metal dial to hot water. Awaiting the warm water, you tried your best to detangle your hair, barely succeeding.

Assuming the water warmed up enough, you step into the shower and let the water run through your hair and down your body. An exhale leaves your body as you peaceably scrub your skin of scum. You inhale the smell of your favorite soap, and your mind clears with a serene smile. After lathering and rinsing yourself off, you gently detangle your hair, working the shampoo through it.

The door to the ugly white bathroom swings open slowly, enters your buff boyfriend. Undressing to get in with you, he yawns as he wraps his arms around you. You hastily scoff and turn to him, his sleepy smile says it all. Mirio pulls you closer as he kisses your neck.

"You took too long to get out, Sunshine."

"Because I'm at war, right now."

"Is that right? Well, you could have asked for my help."

Mirio lightly patted your curly locks, patting them down and occasionally scratching your scalp. The feel of his fingertips was enough to make you doze and lose balance. Catching you with his free hand and pulling you closer to his defined chest. With a little giggle, you smile and gaze into his eyes, looking at the water dripping off his hair.

"You know, I just finished cleansing my body, and now I'm getting back to square one."

Humming a tune, "Is that so?" he replied lazily with his chin resting atop your head, "I'm sorry, Sunflower."

You turn your body around to cross your arms over his broad, muscle-bound shoulders, sketching out the scars littering his body, some light scratches others with a firm texture. Your eyes lingered all over him as you slowly caressed the back of his head, placing kisses all along his collarbone and neck. Stopping at his jawline, Mirio cups your ass with his strong hands.

He leans down to reach your ear, "If you start, I'll finish."

You raise up your head innocently to look at him, eyes armored with honesty and lust. Pushing your luck, you lather him in soap and rubbing his chest in circular motions, moving lower to his abs. Pretending to graze his cock, then lather his shoulders down to the wrists and giving eye contact through the whole ordeal. Your lips curve into a sweet smile that causes him to groan.

The motions are simple yet affect him like the ripples from a waterfall. You lightly graze his collarbone with kisses as his muscles tense, placing your hands low to his sides, tracing his adonis belt. A light sigh leaves his thin lips, instantaneously, he picks you up, pushing your tiny frame against the cold wall. The chilliness gives you goosebumps all over, erecting your nipples — Mirio's grip firm around you and his breath heavy on your wet shoulder.

"See, you're pushing it, Princess." His chuckle fanning over your ear.

A tiny snicker escaped as he pressed his lips close to yours, smothering you in kisses, eliminating any free space between you two. His cock stood at attention, the tip tickling your flower. His soft, thin lips left no part of your neck and collarbone untouched. Your nectar seeped onto his thumper as you whimpered with impatience.

"Fill me up, baby."

"Be patient, my Sunflower," He hooked his arms under your thighs, positioned himself to kneel under you while gently sliding you down where your inner thighs touched his cheeks.

Facing your pretty essence, he bulldozes his tongue into your bud. The instant tremor to your clit as your legs quiver as his tongue swivels and explores every part of you. The jolts in your legs leave your voice hoarse as moans break out from your lips. His obligation to pleasure you is selfish and greedy as if his way of controlling you is to give you what you want. Your body rolls as his grasp around your plump thighs tighten, keeping you in place.

Your soft whimpers leave him to groan against your tingling golden arches, "You taste so good, baby." He gives a quick love bite to your shaking thighs, still balancing you against the cold wall as you thrust into him enthusiastically.

His body tenses under yours as he pulls your body close from your ass. He takes hold of your soft cheeks and does a solid lick to your clit, making you quiver. So deliberate with his actions as he purposefully teased you close into edging. You start to whine uncontrollably and grab hold onto his hair to push him closer to you. Resulting in a chuckle that reverberates through your bud, your cry is sensual as you let go of him and hold onto your breasts, playing with your nipples.

"Fuck, you look so hot." Mirio looks at you from between your legs, his blue eyes peering into your glowing, erotic ones. "I'll give you what you want Sunflower, but do me a favor: Don't hold back. I don't care who hears, let them know who you belong to."

You stare back at him flustered, the fault of hot water, or the excitement your powerful boyfriend brings to your flesh cavern. Your nod is subtle, but he catches it quickly, sparking him to make you lose your mind as Mirio dives back in. Without haste, his tongue thrashes around, promising with each taste of you he'll leave you screaming out his name.

The morning after, your body felt tight near your thighs, wishing you washed your hair instead of getting thrown off. Looking a mess, but filled with leftover pleasure. Your voice was loud since you lived to the expectations Mirio requested. Clearing your throat did nothing for you, either. You tried sitting up in the king-size bed but was wrapped in a firm bear hug and a kiss to your fuzzy mane.

"Where are you going, Princess?" His morning voice groaned into your ear.

"Nowhere now with your thick arms around me."

"Because there's no reason to stay up, right? This is where the trip ends, and I'm happy with this."

Mirio snuggles closer to you, your heart flutters, and your smile stretches wide and goofy-like. You're happy that he's in a state of happiness, you can feel the radiation more than usual. "Well, actually, this isn't where the trip ends; I have one more surprise for you."

His messy blond, bed head shuffles behind you; he rotates your waists to stare at you, "What are you talking about, Sunshine?" He tries to rest his shoulder on the pillow while the other hand lays tenderly.

"Get dressed, and I'll show you exactly what I mean."

There was an exception in getting ready; you took your time fixing your hair into a comfortable style deciding whether to leave it in or out, Mirio being a sweetheart asked you to keep it simple to avoid what may come of the day. After leaving the room, you made your way to the massage rooms. The masseuse present was fair and gentle. Making small talk with you, one of them mentioned a noise complaint from an older man. He was complaining about his hotel neighbors yelling about mangoes and cereal in the middle of the night.

"I believe it was the third floor he resided in," The masseuse cooly responded while working the muscles in your calves.

A shock shoots through your body as the dots connect, you try to hide your face further into the cushion. Mirio laughed out loud, "I guess he was hungry but had to wait till the morning, you know?"

"I guess so." 

 The rest of the massage went well, laughing here and there. It was the most relaxed you had been in a while. You remembered to check in on Mirio since he wasn't used to massages and was prone to outbursts of laughter since he's so ticklish. After the massage, he pulled you into a bear hug and smothered you in kisses, declaring, "I wish it were you that touched me like that."

With more trekking, you reached your final destination. Mirio blissfully bounced about, continuously looking at you and back at the environment. "Hot springs? Oh, babe!"

He was so excited; he couldn't form any other words other than how much he loved you. He pulled you close, littering your face with kisses and tight hugs. Couldn't even break his grasp or stop him from being excited, Mirio treasured the way he would love loud, concretely when targeted to you. His smile was just as infectious as your boyfriend made a scene in front of the entrance. Older couples passed by with sweet looks, whispering to themselves, 'the enchantment of young love.'

Management provided a private unisex bath usually reserved for a group of four or less that pass by. Mirio separated from you with a quick peck to the cheek and sprinted into the changing room for something more comfortable for the water. Women mainly littered the hot spring except that not a lot of people occupied the space today. Leaving the worry of interruptions or disturbances to diminish. You were the first to leave the changing room, wrapped in your bathrobe given to you by staff, and you brought your favorite towel for whenever you would go to the beach or spa.

You walked into the unisex area, finding the way into the pool of warmth. As you found your spot, you took off the towel revealing your nude body. Sinking slowly into the hot water, the sensation of heat traveled throughout your being. You took your time getting used to the pool of warmth, making gracious moves to familiarize yourself with the temperature and size of the domain. Momentarily wrapped into a warm blanket of water before you could be covered in the embrace of your sunny beau.

As you looked around, the space was stunning; a subtle but luxurious set up outdoors littered with banzai and bamboo trees all around the wooden barriers. The stones around the water resembled ashy grey marbled crystals, exquisitely scattered. Swishing in the water, you laid onto a pile of smoother rocks. The rocks were gracious to your back as you rested against them. As you reached comfort, the blond-haired man entered the serene environment. His beam caught your attention as he admired you from outside the water. Your smile allured him as your fingers motioned for him to come closer. Not wasting any time, Mirio recklessly dived into the steamy water.

Face colored in horror as he sloshed his way to you, still smiling. Mirio used his body to cloak yours as he grabbed your ass, sneaking a kiss to your cheek. "Who knew you could make the water look so good, Sunflower."

"Since we took that long shower last night, you don't remember?"

"Perhaps, but every shower you take is noteworthy."

You giggled softly in his embrace as he chuckled in response. Hearing his laugh was too divine, while the smile on his face is sickly sweet. He pulled you by your waist, eliminating the space in between you and his muscular figure. He feels warmer than the pool of water you are standing in. You look up to allow him to peck your lips, his index finger traces your jawline, thumb tickling your neck with subtlety. The touch is simple but intensifies the pleasure forming between your legs. He pays attention to your face, knowing it's hard for you to hide your need for him.

"Are you that anxious to be touched?" His question was hiding a seductive undertone. He peers into your eyes while holding your waist with his other hand, pulling you into his thighs, not shying away from how you're making him feel. His hardon grazes against you, "Can't say you're alone in that, my love."

He trails his hands down your body, kneading his fingers into your inner thighs, rubbing any tension he knows the masseuse didn't work out. The motions are gentle but firm as he hums a little tune. It's corrective in further easing your mind. Mirio came closer to your ear with his hums, placing sensual kisses on the sensitive spots of your neck. Freeing one hand, he takes your breast in his grasp, lightly pressing into it. The grip is just how you like it as he pulls his lips away from your neck and hunches over to meet your nipple with his tongue. The first flick leads to a sharp breath of air. He sucks in your supple flesh circulating your sensitive nerves.

Drowning in the feeling of him touching you, it's reminiscent of the first time you became intimate, and your body is over the moon. His other hand cups your free breast as he smothers them in the kisses they deserved when he wasn't able to see you and had to heal. Mirio's sensuality builds within as he's already beading precum from his love throbber. The eagerness to touch you as he feels your heart beating out your chest eggs him further, challenging himself to grab both with one hand as he rubs your inner thigh in circular motions.

Too anxious to neglect or half-ass any part of your body, he brushes against your dripping essence, still rubbing circular motions into your thighs, pulling his right hand back close to your face, "I know I'm keeping you in suspense, Sunshine. But I can't control how much you're affecting me right now."

Staring into his eyes, you saw a light that was once dimmed, almost dying to a burning lustful glaze. Nearly intimidating as his hands roamed all of you since he could no longer pay attention to just specific parts of your body, he made a swift move to lift you. No longer on your feet, your legs rest at his sides as he pulls you close. Your legs wrap tightly around him as he places kisses between your nipples, breasts, and neck. Airy moans leave your lips that only he could hear, purposefully grazing his ear with your sweet sounds. Heightening his sense and forming goosebumps on the traps of his neck and ongoing down his arms. A deep grunt escapes from Mirio's thin lips as he balances himself with you.

You rub the back of his neck, a trigger that always sets him off. He breathes in through his nose controlling his urges. Whether the reason is the way you would tip-toe to do it, the feel of your hands caressing him or the glow within your eyes that makes him grip you carefully. No way would he drop you, but you could feel his urge to melt. While preparing you for what's been on his mind since entering the luxury hot spring, he prods you with his cock. Pressing into your bud to tease, almost tickling. Still breathing down the side of his neck, you whimper, "Mir, please..."

"Nice try my sunshine, I'm just feeling how ready you are for me, I'll give you exactly what you want."

Deliberately and poise is the impact Mirio places into the junction of your thighs. Your arms wrapped around his shoulder blades, daring to bite at his shoulder to make contact quicker. His thrust made the perfect adjustment to your sopping core. You are gasping harshly into a sensual moan, as he licks the side of your neck behind your ear. The sensation makes you shiver close to him.

"Damn, Sunshine, you're sucking me in. I feel so connected to you."

"I agree, baby. Now, are you gonna move?"

A low chuckle escapes as he grins, "You're so greedy."

His thrusts are scarce as he relishes your inner muscles squeezing onto him tightly, refusing to let him go. Without warning, Mirio thrusts deeply within you. You grip onto him tightly as he licks the sensitive spots on your neck. The thrusts match how quick his hips roll into you, stretching your flower out with ease. The muscle memory of him coming into play as the sensuality leads to chill all throughout your body and hardening your nipples.

Mirio's passionate grunts reverberate through your ears, sending the shock waves straight to your silk igloo. The divinity in hearing them makes your moans louder and higher in pitch. He holds onto your frame like he'll lose you all while hitting your cervix, insanely intoxicating. Your legs tremble as you feel your body ready to give out.

"I hope you're not trying to cum just yet, my Sunflower." Pushing his cock further into you with each bounce, fucking you speechless. "I haven't even fucked you into every nook and cranny here."

His voice in your ear made your pussy turn into a waterfall. The sloshing rampage in your pink pearl wouldn't stop as Mirio kept a pace matching each broken moan coming from you. Your thighs were a clear indication when the coil within you read itself to be snapped. There was no letting up and stopping yourself from crying out his name or how hard the pounding jogged your brain.

With his rod expanding within you by another inch, you knew he was close. Readjusting his hands to grip your thighs, not before a playful smack to your ass. You wasted no time hooking one of your arms behind his neck before he pounded your flower. Too delicious to feel anything but pleasure, reaching your peak, you take soft nibbles into his shoulder in hopes for the coil to pop and overrun you into oblivion. Your body shivers within his hold as your cup begins to overflow. You grasp desperately to Mirio as he maneuvers your body to bounce on top of him, continuously smacking your ass.

You jolt from each smack as you tighten around Mirio's love rod, making less than unintelligible noises. His smirk is hidden from you, but you know it's there as his voice reaches a level of cockiness, "I feel how close you are, Princess."

No time to respond with a smartass remark, you're too enveloped in the sensations given. Short of breath, eyes closed tight as your chest tightens, the pressure rises until it's too much to bear, alluding to the build-up of your cream canal. The coil pulled so tightly finally snaps, as your body unravels within your buff boyfriend's arms. The orgasm hits and sticks, achieving the takeover of your nerves and sinking your body low into Mirio as he finishes inside of you, spreading both your cheeks to gain control.

His growl fluttered your pussy as he filled you with his seed, his hands imprinting your pert ass as the force of his thrusts stopped his touch from being gentle at the moment. You wince from the impact of his tense fingers against your supple skin, knowing a bruise will linger soon. You let out a deep gasp as you stare at your boyfriend. He regains composure quickly while holding you, making a noble face, with a goofy smile as he stares back. You shy from him as his face is too angelic compared to what you just finished doing.

"Hey babe, could you let me down?"

"Of course, Beautiful."

He rests your feet back into the warm, soothing water. You cup his face gently, pushing him into the corner where your towels and bathrobes laid. Your legs wobble as you push him back onto your robes, eager to drop to your knees. The water rushes through your thighs, tickling you, sensationalizing your clit in the process. There's no other way to stop it than to stand, and yet as you're steady in crouch form, your mouth envelops onto Mirio's love rod. A sharp gasp escapes and a fist clenches as he restrains himself from pushing your head down.

His gasps are loud with each soul-suck you perform, even yelling out your name at times. Surely some neighbors are above and below, but there are not enough hands in the world to cover your lover's mouth. He stares intently at you as his throbber expands with each slurp you provide. You return his gaze, his face is overly flushed as he calls out to you, fiercely.

"Fuck, you look amazing, babe. Your eyes are so beautiful." The passion he feels within achieving all the pressure you put and knowingly feel like he's curling his toes underwater. He's so close you can feel his balls twitch, even his growl is becoming more prominent. You push to get him to finish in your mouth, and yet he advances beforehand, raising your mouth off his cock and turning your body around to lift you and rest your tush onto his wide thighs.

"Not so fast my Sunflower, I'm not ready to blast off." Mirio easily controls your body, keeping your frame close to his throbber near your slit, dripping with essence, causing him to slip in with ease. You gasp in unison as your rosebud tightened around him, "Damn, there you go sucking me in."

"At this rate, I have to make you scream and shout to the whole world." Wasting no time, Mirio planted your face down, ass up into your robes while still inside you leaving little time to react.

Without warning, he propelled deep into your dripping flower. The impact indeed rough was enticing as he bent over close to your ear, breath huffing as he kissed your neck. Jittery to your sweet spot being acknowledged, he stands to smack your ass listening to the echo through the resort. It's enough to rattle you into oblivion. His hips roll fiercely into you as if the spanking was the sound to begin a race: Whether it was against himself or you was the mystery.

On the verge of tears, you felt your body surge with mighty ripples of water controlled by earthquakes. A well-acquainted feeling, and yet it was estranged. You murmured how close you were, and Mirio's grunts shook you to your core, tightening around him. He groaned rather harshly as he smacked your ass again, loading you up with all of him. The coil within you once again burned, binding brashly.

"Babe, I can't hold back," Your legs tense as each of your moans shudders out your full lips, "You feel so fucking good."

The master of positions, he places you onto the flat surface of the hot tub. His intent to drive you mad working as his hands lay firmly at your sides, to rub into your thick, soft ass. He holds you from behind, drilling his love rod into you deep. Your pussy clenches to him with unfailing devotion, as your final moans end your build-up. You stretch your hands out to grab Mirio's wrist as he deeply grunts for the last time as he finishes inside of you again. His cock twitches with ferocity as he clenches your hips. His breaths graze the back of the neck roughly, you stand slowly to gather feeling back in your legs.

Your body tries to adjust to the position as you stretch as high into the sky as possible. But your thighs hysterically give out, and you stumble into the embrace of Mirio. He's holding you from behind with a tired, yet satisfied smile. It's enough to release a light chuckle as sweat drips from his now messy hair. You lean back onto his chest with a huge exhale.

"Did I go overboard, Sunshine?" He crossed his arms around your waist.

"Not at all, you went above and beyond. I can stand now, but when we get back to the room, I think I might pass out."

A hearty laugh erupted from your blonde beau, loud enough to echo, and you could have sworn you saw a tear from his cobalt eyes. The vibration of his laughter traveled to his chest, feeling like the ground under your feet would crumble, jumping your heart rate. 

"I'm sorry for laughing, Princess, but I just think you're so funny."

"What did I say that made you laugh?"

"The fact that you thought you would be sleeping when we're back at the room."

[thelastspeecher]

Best Revenge AU - Finally, Some Ford Content

Ford has been suspiciously absent from all of the ficlets I’ve posted thus far in this AU, and while I’ve talked a bit about his role, I haven’t gone too in depth.  So, here, for everyone craving some Best Revenge AU Ford, I’m here to satisfy that craving.  Finally, some Ford content.  Enjoy.

—————————————————————————————— 

              Ford slowly woke up.

              Shit.  I stayed the night, didn’t I?  He sat up. The man he’d slept with the night before was already up and getting dressed.

              “Mornin’.”

              “Good morning,” Ford said hesitantly, realizing to his horror that he couldn’t remember the man’s name.  “Um…”

              “I can make ya some breakfast ‘fore I send ya on yer way,” his one-night-stand said.  “I’ve got to check in on my sister first; she’s startin’ a new job today. You can find yer way to the kitchen and make yourself some coffee while I’m talkin’ to her.”

              “…Okay,” Ford mumbled.  The man finished dressing and left the room.  Ford hesitated for a moment before dressing as well.  He exited the bedroom.

              Which way is the kitchen?  Ford chewed on the inside of his cheek and turned left. He followed the hallway down to a living room.  One corner of the room had a colored rug, baby toys, and a playpen.  He said that he lived with his sister, right? Maybe she has a child.  Ford wandered into the adjacent kitchen.  His jaw dropped.  There was someone sitting at the kitchen table.  Someone he recognized.

              “Holy shit, Stan?!” Ford said.  Stan looked up with a frown.

              “Hey, keep it down around Junior.”  His eyes widened.  “Ford?!”

              “I- you-”  Ford’s gaze landed on the infant in Stan’s arms, greedily drinking from a bottle of milk.  “Is- is that your child?”

              “Yeah.”  Stan rubbed the back of his neck.  “…Sorta.”

              “What do you mean by-” Ford started.  He was interrupted by the arrival of his one-night-stand.

              “Oh, I see ya met my sister’s boyfriend,” he said. Stan groaned loudly.

              “Lute.  How dark was the nightclub where you found last night’s lay?”

              “Didn’t pick him up at a nightclub.  Found him at the library when I dropped off books fer Angie,” Lute said cheerfully.

              “Look at his face.”

              “Hmm?”  Lute looked at Ford.  He paled. “…Oh.”

              “You managed to hook up with my no-good twin,” Stan said.  The infant in his arms began to fuss.  “Aw, it’s okay Junior,” Stan cooed.  “I know, Uncle Ford is scary, especially his face.”  Ford crossed his arms.

              “We have the same face, Stanley.”

              “Since Lute didn’t realize we were related when he picked you up, I don’t agree,” Stan said tartly.  Ford sighed.  “You better get going before you make Junior even more upset.”

              “I’m not going anywhere until I find out what you’ve been up to and why you’re holding an infant that you said is ‘sort of’ yours,” Ford said firmly.  Stan scowled.

              “Lute, kick him out, will ya?”

              “No.”

              “Lute-”

              “I think it might be good fer the two of ya to reconnect,” Lute said.  “Don’t you think the lil bean would like an uncle from yer side?”

              “He won’t know what he’s missing.”

              “Okay, fine.”  Lute smirked.  “How do ya think Angie would want ya to act under this circumstance?”  Stan glared at him.  “You know full well that Angie would want ya to use this opportunity to reunite with yer twin.”

              “…Fine.”  Stan adjusted his hold on the infant.  “Why didn’t you come to the kitchen with Ford, Lute?”

              “I wanted to check in on Angie, but she’s still sleepin’.”

              “Yeah.  Since she’s starting her new job, I figured I’d feed Junior.”  Stan grinned down at the infant.  “He can’t be happy he’s getting his breakfast from a bottle instead of a boob.”  Lute rolled his eyes.

              “Crass, Stanley.”

              “Yeah, yeah, whatever.”

              “You catch up with yer twin while I whip up some eggs,” Lute instructed, already opening the fridge.  Ford walked over to the table and sat in the chair next to Stan. He peered closely at the infant.

              “So…”

              “So…” Stan parroted.

              “What’s his name?”

              “Stanley Junior,” Stan said.  He frowned.  “Well, he’s not really a Junior, since he’s got his mom’s last name instead of mine. But he’s named after me, so we call him Junior.”

              “Ah.  And, um, how old is he?”

              “Four months.”

              “Four months?  Are babies supposed to be that small at four months?”

              “Doc says he’s definitely smaller than average, but that he can probably catch up pretty quick,” Stan answered.  He removed the now empty bottle from Junior’s mouth, then burped him.  “He’s a good kid.”

              “Is he yours?” Ford asked.  Stan set the empty bottle on the table.  “You said he ‘sort of’ was.”

              “If you were anyone else, I woulda left that part out,” Stan muttered.  “I hate your guts, but I’m not used to lying to you.”

              “Pardon?”

              “Biologically, he’s not mine.  He’s my girlfriend’s ex-husband’s.  But with how bad things got between Angie and Max, she decided not to tell him about Junior.”

              That’s a strange coincidence.  Didn’t Max Hillcrest at work recently go through a divorce?  What was his wife’s name again?

              “I was dating Angie, so I stepped up,” Stan continued with a shrug.  “And Angie named her kid after me.  I’m the only dad this little bean’s ever known.  If things go well, I’ll be the only dad he ever knows.”

              “Little bean?”

              “That’s what Angie called him while she was pregnant with him.  It stuck.” Stan smiled fondly at Junior. “Isn’t that right, bud?”  Junior giggled.

              “You’re raising another man’s child as your own?” Ford asked, his brain desperately trying to catch up with all he’d been told.

              “Yep.”

              “Why?”

              “I love Angie.  I love Junior.  Why wouldn’t I?” Stan asked, a hint of a bite to his tone.  Junior settled in his arms, smacking his lips happily.

              “Fair enough,” Ford said, deciding to back off. Some tension left Stan’s shoulders. “Other than dating pregnant women and taking in their children, what have you been doing since we last spoke?”

              “You mean, since Pops kicked me outta the house and you didn’t say anything or use your power to summon me in secret at any point for years,” Stan said flatly.  Ford opened and closed his mouth a few times.

              “…Yes.”  Ford cleared his throat.  “When we were younger, I remember you wanting to follow in Mom’s footsteps.  I haven’t seen any pyro heroes around here, though.”

              “Hold up, what?” Lute asked.  The brothers looked over.  Lute stared at Stan in shock.  “Stanley, you wanted to be a hero when you were a kid?”

              “Most supers do.  And like Ford said, our mom was a hero.  I looked up to her.”  Lute was still staring at Stan.  Stan sighed. “Obviously I didn’t do that, Gucket.”

              “Yer mom is a hero?”

              “Retired.  What’s with the third degree?”

              “You understand why that information is important in our line of work, right?” Lute prompted.  “Does Angie know?”

              “Duh.”

              “Why don’t I?”

              “‘Cause I’m not sleeping with you,” Stan snapped. “Even though I’m apparently your type.” Lute turned red.

              “Wait.”  Ford held up his hands.  “Wait. Stanley, am I reading between the lines properly?  Are you- are you a villain?”

              “Maybe I am.  Maybe I’m not,” Stan said.  He met Ford’s eyes.  “But whether I am or not, you know better than to snitch.”  Footsteps sounded.  Stan looked over.  An exuberant smile broke across his face.  “Look who it is!  The hot new professor!”  Ford looked as well.  A young woman stood in the doorway, wearing athletic shorts and a T-shirt she was practically swimming in.

              Presumably, it’s one of Stan’s.  The woman smiled at Stan.

              “I don’t mind it much when ya say it, but I sure hope no one at work calls me that.”

              “If any creepy coworkers do, let me know,” Stan said.  “I’ll handle it.”  The woman grinned viciously.

              “Oh, darlin’, ya know I’m fully capable of handlin’ it myself.”  Stan grinned back.

              “Good point.”  He held up Junior.  “Junior, say hi to your mama.”

              “Aw, he’s too young to talk yet,” the woman cooed. She walked over to Stan, took Junior from him, and sat at the table.  “And I don’t know if his first word ‘ll be ‘hi’.”  She began to lift her T-shirt.

              “Whoa, hey, uh, Ang, you don’t need to whip your boobs out,” Stan said quickly, glancing at Ford in distress.  “I fed him while you were sleeping.”

              “Oh.”

              “Also, we have a guest.”

              “Hmm?”  The woman lowered her shirt and looked up.  “Oh, my apologies.”  She smiled at Ford.  “My name is Angie McGucket.”  Ford felt himself pale.

              McGucket?

              “Dr. Angie McGucket,” Stan corrected.  Angie chuckled.

              “Yes, I have a doctorate,” she said.  She cocked her head, her eyes boring into Ford. “I’m guessin’ yer Stan’s no-good twin I’ve heard so much about.”

              “I- uh-” Ford stammered, still reeling from hearing his ex’s last name dropped so casually.

              “Geez, you make it sound like all I do is talk about Ford,” Stan said, rolling his eyes.  “That’s wrong.  All I do is talk about you and Junior.”  Angie laughed.

              Angie and Lute do appear to have the same nose as Fiddleford.  How could I have been so blind?

              “So, Stanford, what brings ya here?” Angie asked.

              “I brought him home last night,” Lute said.

              “Hmm, that seems out of character fer ya,” Angie said to Ford.  She shrugged. “Just goin’ off the stick-in-the-mud that Stan described to me.”

              “Why do you keep insulting me?” Ford asked. “This is the first time we’ve met.”

              “Maybe, but I also feel like I know ya pretty well,” Angie replied.  She bounced Junior in her arms.  “Stan took a while to start tellin’ me ‘bout ya, but once he did, he had a lot to say.” She smiled.  “Most of it was negative, sure, but some of it was positive.”

              “Angie, shouldn’t ya be gettin’ ready fer work?” Lute asked.  Angie groaned.  “I’ll make ya some nice breakfast while ya dress ‘n whatnot.”

              “Ugh.  Fine.” Angie handed Junior back to Stan, kissed his cheek, and left the room.  Ford coughed politely.

              “I, um, I should probably leave,” he said. Lute looked over.

              “Ya don’t want to stay fer breakfast?”

              “Your sister isn’t the only one who has a shift starting soon.”

              “Shift, huh?” Stan said, raising an eyebrow.  “Where’s the big shot genius working?”

              “Well, uh…”  Ford rubbed the back of his neck.  “I have been working on my own personal research, but to pay the bills, I’m currently employed as an executive assistant.”  Stan snickered.

              “Isn’t ‘executive assistant’ just a fancy word for ‘secretary’?” he asked.  Ford flushed. “You better get going, then.  Whatever doctor’s office you work for definitely needs you manning the front desk.”

              “Stanley,” Lute scolded.  Ford swallowed his retort.

              He’s been remarkably civil, let him be childish for one moment.

              “…See you later?” he suggested.  Stan froze.  “I mean, the fact that we were able to talk without fighting is, I think, a good sign that we can bury the hatchet.”

              “Ford.”  Stan met Ford’s eyes.  “Junior was here the whole time.  That’s why I didn’t shout or knock your block off.”

              “…Oh,” Ford said softly.

              “But…”  Stan sighed. “I’m not against making up.  Just know that the next time you and I are in the same room, it’s open season if Junior’s not there.”

              “Fair enough.”  Ford managed a smirk.  “I think you’d be surprised by how well I can hold my own now.”  Stan rolled his eyes.  “Goodbye, Stanley.”  Ford leaned over to smile at Junior.  Junior stared at him with wide eyes.  “Goodbye, Junior.”  Junior giggled.

              “Bye,” Stan grunted.  Ford waved goodbye to Lute and walked out of the house.  Beeping sounded from his pager.  He pulled it out of his pocket with a sigh.  The message made him sigh again.

              I swear, I’m the only person who can fix the wifi at work.  Everyone else either doesn’t know how or isn’t willing to do one of the secretary’s responsibilities.  Ford shook his head.  He put his pager away and began the long walk to work.  A building full of superheroes and not one of them can unplug a router.

[tyonfs]

🤧: did you ever feel embarrassed the first time you posted smut? Cause meeee rn lmaoo

I posted a oneshot of smut and I’m like going through the aftereffects of feeling awkward like sis I really did that haha

I’m impressed you can continuously write smut cause like how do you get over that embarrassed phase? loll

Hope you are well ❤️

HELLOOO i’m doing well !! just nervous bc final tomorrow AHHH but hopefully it’ll go good 😳 how about you? i hope things are good 💖

AND PLS 💀💀 I WAS NERVOUS AS HELL THE FIRST TIME I POSTED SMUT

tbh i created this blog to practice smut bc i want my main blog to just be horror/angst fics, and i didn’t expect it to get a big response here 👁 and tbh it taught me that smut is HARD, like horror always came naturally to me bc the ideas are so fresh in my head but smut is like 🧎‍♀️ okay how do i describe intercourse differently this time than how i described it in my last fic

and i’ll have to read your smut soon !! after my final tmrw i’m def getting to it 😽

and pls i still get embarrassed over my smut 💀💀 that’s a big part of why i don’t take nsfw asks on this site bc it makes me uncomfortable and embarrassed to read/answer them LMFAO i’d rather just post my own nsfw content and run away

like requests are cool w me 👍 but if you ask me to imagine jaemin fingering me or someone else then i’m gonna have to pretend i never saw it 🏃‍♂️ plus idk if anons are adults or minors so i’m not gonna answer with a “imagine jaehyun doing this and that to you”

but trust the buildup to getting to write and publish smut was a courageous decision ✊ i was VERY hesitant LOL i think i started with a suggestive fic and built up to an actual smut and even then i was still wary about how it was 😭

but honestly smut isn’t my go-to all the time HAHAH like i love to self indulge sometimes 💆‍♀️ but sometimes i prefer the story so i do post fics without smut on other blogs so it’s not all i have to show for my writing

also my fic “that’s rich” could’ve worked just as well without the smut now that i look back on it LMFAO when i was plotting it, i made it super smut heavy and it was pure self indulgence but as i wrote it, i suddenly wanted to incorporate all these little things and tbh i like it a lot better !! it was pretty much a big projection of my commitment issues LMFAO but my intention was for people to be able to relate to the characters and i’m glad it conveyed that

tbh i was super scared about publishing it because when i wrote on wattpad, people tore down my ocs a lot 😭 that was the one thing that kinda scarred me about writing about topics close to heart bc i tend to give my mcs flaws that some readers don’t want, and on wattpad my mcs would be dragged through the dirt

like i had this fic based on russian roulette, so like seven girls playing a game of russian roulette and the winner gets the guy they all like. so obviously most of them were toxic and hating them is understandable bc they were bitches LMFAO but when ppl started to slut shame them i was like 😭 wait outta pocket that’s too far

and then my other characters would breathe and get hated on for no reason. like there was this scene where jimin opened a letter and the comments were like “NO JIMIN YOURE SO DUMB” and then in the next chapter taehyung throws his letter instead of opening it like jimin and the comments were like “TAEHYUNG WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT”

so i eventually felt exhausted and felt like i couldn’t make my characters do anything without them getting hated on so i scrapped that book and lost motivation to write it 😀 i even wanted to rewrite for nct it the other day but i took a look at the comments and went 👨‍🦯 okay nvm

and i’m SORRY this went on such a LONG tangent but basically i think i rlly prefer writing smut on this website bc the community is much more accepting of character flaws and gives them the chance to see them develop !! and i hope you can apply that mentality to your smut fics and realize that we’re all here to support you 💕

[shiny-procrastinates]

(re)Watching Magia Record S1 - part 6

part 5 here

Hello everyone, welcome back! Today, we will be watching episode 6. Last time, some really weird (well, weirder than normal), pre-established rule breaking things happened to some of our girls. How come? Is Kaede going to be alright? Will Yachiyo fill Iroha in on what happened? We'll have to watch to find out.

Puella Magi Madoka Magica Side Story: Magia Record S1 episode 6

We open this episode with a, uhhh... alluring...? Witch show. A group of unknown magical girls is hunting this witch. Seeing the amount of familiars, the girls in front decide to revise their plan, but the girl called Felicia just barges right in, forcing her team to follow after her.

Seems this girl has a real beef with witches.

Hey, Tsuruno's now in the opening!

Rather than continuing the scene before the opening, we are now back to Iroha, who stayed over at Yachiyo's place after the events from the previous episode.

The two eat breakfast, and we learn that Yachiyo's place used to be a bording house. That explains why it's so big.

Iroha thanks Yachiyo for cleaning her Soul Gem, to which Yachiyo is like "?" for a moment before connecting the dots. As it stands, it seems like Iroha doesn't know what happened and Yachiyo's not telling her either. On the one hand, that seems like a bad idea, on the other, well, we saw Kaede's reaction.

Yachiyo changes subject to Iroha's plans for today.

...thanks, Takarazaki Milk, for reminding us where Iroha's from.

Iroha's going to be investigating Kamihama some more, so Yachiyo advises her to keep being a magical girl a secret as best as she can, particularly if she's going east beyond Chuo Ward. Wonder why the direction matters.

...not really important, but I'm bothered I can't remember what this place is.

Iroha takes a walk around Sankyo Ward looking for Ui, finally arriving at a weeeird part of town.

Other than telling her not to walk around at night, maybe Yachiyo should've told her not to enter places that seem out of a horror movie. Also, maybe Iroha's just so used to witch Labyrinths this doesn't even register as bizarre to her anymore. (It's probably just Shaft being Shaft).

This... really is almost a Labyrinth, isn't it.

This couldn't get more suspicious if it tried. It might as well have someone screaming "scam!".

Iroha is offered a bottle and hesitates to accept until she sees

the kid berserker from before drinking it.

Still, I get Felicia, but did your parents not teach you not to accept things from strangers, Iroha?

But well, for the moment, the water itself seems to be fine, other than it being drugs. No way this'll blow up on their faces or anything.

In any case, Iroha goes back to her wandering. It seems she's in Kosho Ward right now.

Now, not only did Iroha accept things from strangers, she also did the one thing Yachiyo warned her about: she got outed as a magical girl.

Good thing the Soul Gem rings work as name tags too. It's written "Felicia".

Iroha's now being extorted by a 13 y.o.

Not that she's that much older, but still.

Thankfully(?) she's saved by a witch appearing.

This witch seems a bit like the one on the start of the episode. Felicia, of course, doesn't even need Iroha's help, she just wrecks everything with her big ol' hammer. Rather, it's more dangerous for Iroha herself to be there lol

Look at that cute smile.

Felicia goes right back to extorting... I mean, asking Iroha for payment. Iroha makes the fair point that she didn't ask for her help, but Felicia makes the even fairer point that a weakling like her would be dead if she hadn't, so Iroha finds herself with no choice but to pay up... in ice cream. Seems her allowance's running dry from coming to Kamihama every day.

The two go for some ice cream and start bonding. This girl is Felicia Mitsuki, and she makes a living as a mercenary who takes on jobs from other magical girls.

While Iroha's out doing ill-advised things and making new friends, Yachiyo's dropping by the Coordinator's and happens to overhear the team who had hired Felicia before, and...

Oh my god Mitama what have you done this time. This is blasphemy towards food, you know.

Alas, a wanted sign is kinda too much for a simple warning, don't you think?

Seems like Felicia's (un)famous for her berserker tendencies.

Yachiyo came here to hear some new information about the rumors, but first she has to deal with a new guest.

Ohhh talking about food, look who's here. It's Kyoko!

Apparently, Kyoko came here due to the decrease in witches in the surrounding regions. She expected she'd get into trouble hunting witches in another magical girl's territory, but Yachiyo says it's fine as long as she doesn't pick a fight with anybody. She's let down by how easy it was but says she'll just do whatever then. While she's at it, she also pokes at the same thing Mami said about someone gathering witches, but Yachiyo shoots her down right away. Did Kyoko hear something from Mami or did Kyuubei tell her this?

Back to Iroha and Felicia, the two are still on their lucky strike. Hey, seems the Lucky Owl Water wasn't a scam after all!

The two just keep on winning and winning (also who let kids into casino) and as expected Iroha's starting to get suspicious about their unnatural luck.

"I still got a dupe"

After winning amounts of money that would probably make broke college student Yachiyo jealous, the two go out to have lunch.

Felicia compliments Iroha's guts to enter the east like that, and Iroha takes the opportunity to ask her if she knows her sister. (not related but the way the table is set gives a great sense of the difference in age and tastes between these two. Iroha's a simple and responsible girl, so her food is only japanese cuisine and problably only as much as she can eat, while Felicia is a kid who probably never had this amount of money, so it looks like she just went ahead and ordered everything she wanted to eat.)

Felicia offers making an exclusive contract with Iroha, and Iroha asks why is Felicia even a mercenary at all. Felicia says if she doesn't work she can't eat, so Iroha asks where are her parents, to which Felicia responds, well...

They're dead. They were killed by a witch. That explains why Felicia's got a thing with witches.

As if she had guessed the uncomfortable atmosphere, Yachiyo calls. Iroha glances hesitatingly a moment at Felicia before answering. Seems Yachiyo has information about a new rumor.

...wait, isn't Lucky Owl Water the thing Felicia and Iroha drank just earlier? So it was a scam after all!

Perfect fashion sense there, Tsuruno.

Iroha and Felicia go meet up with Tsuruno and Yachiyo. Tsuruno knows who Felicia is, and Felicia knows who Yachiyo is, but has no idea about Tsuruno. While Tsuruno protests this, Yachiyo scolds Iroha for failing her one job, and warns her about Felicia's berserker tendencies.

Yachiyo confirms that Iroha has drank the Lucky Owl Water, and tells her the contents of the rumor about it. So basically, once you drink it, 24 lucky things will happen to you and after these 24 things are over a barrage of bad luck will follow. Yachiyo doesn't know what that "bad luck" actually entails, but she has found that even magical girls have gone missing this time.

Felicia thinks all this is a bunch of nonsense so Yachiyo tells her to just go away then. Felicia does just that, but kind-hearted Iroha stops her from going away by hiring her.

Felicia names her prices and Iroha's about to pay, but Yachiyo tells her to make it something besides money, so Iroha offers making Felicia dinner instead.

Look at her, Felicia really is a nice kid. Not only did she half her price instead of doubling it if it's not a witch, she's totally fine with being paid in food. I mean, there is the fact that she needs to work to eat but... she's not cut out for running a mercenary business.

Still, for the moment, Felicia's not part of the team.

Iroha and co. go back to where Iroha drank the Lucky Owl Water and, although everyone's still blissfully unaware of how bizarre this place is, it seems they now can see the familiars(?) as familiars. Is it that thing? The one where you can only perceive what you are looking for?

Felicia picks a fight with the... uh... Thing, please give us a name anime, and it disappears. Yachiyo chides Felicia for jumping the gun, and the two start fighting.

*Kaos noises*

Tsuruno appropriately cuts in, and Yachiyo theorizes that, just like the previous times, they'll have to find and beat the rumor's true form in order to undo it. Preferably before Iroha and Felicia's luck runs out.

Aaand Kyoko was listening in on them.

Iroha and co. start investigating the rumor. Seems the storyteller from the scenes explaining the contents of the rumors aren't just for show, they actually exist, though the girls hearing the rumor from it don't seem to notice it's not human.

Oh, there. That'd explain why Iroha and Felicia didn't notice the Owl Water the first time... still doesn't excuse them from accepting things from strangers though, lol

...look at Yachiyo's cool composure as she pins down poor Felicia. Brutal.

The girls chase after the storyteller familiar. Now peeps, if you've been paying close attention, you'll notice this episode has been counting down Iroha's and Felicia's luck ever since they drank the Lucky Owl Water. Neat, right? I won't post all of them since 24 is a lot, but did you guys catch it?

Anyways,

while chasing down the familiar, the girls are surrounded by a group of weirdos in hoods. Managing to string together a sentence with their impeccable coordination, they tell our girls they are obstructing the Magius's plans, whoever that is, by chasing the Rumor. It's just for a moment, but the screen flashes that one paper slip that's slapped everywhere there's rumors involved. I'm also pretty sure there's one inside Yachiyo's notebook too.

The group continues their speech and Yachiyo conveniently translates for us: they're saying they'll give them the water everyday, as long as they keep away from the Rumor.

Tsuruno protests that there are magical girls who got caught up in this rumor, but the group continue with their talk of Magius and telling them not to interfere.

I really like the panning in this one shot. You clearly get a sense of how while the older girls, Yachiyo and Tsuruno, know something's up and are willing to bonk the weirdos, Iroha and Felicia are in doubt about what these girls are saying. Their mind spaces are so different separating them just with the shadows wasn't enough: they had to be in different frames altogether.

...I don't think the person who decided on this thought that far, but still.

Anyway, Felicia bites their bait and asks about the "all witches will disappear" part. The weirdos, who know about Felicia, say they'll hire her. The reward? The elimination of all witches.

Too bad Iroha, seems your handmade dinner wasn't an appetizing enough reward.

So! Felicia decided to go with these weirdos, the Wings of the Magius, who say they know a way to get rid of all witches. Well... that'd better be a more efficient method than the one Suzune thought, or else they're not getting anywhere.

Going by what they said, these girls have something to do with the rumors... or rather, Rumors, because that's not confusing at all. They also said something about salvation, so they probably have something to do with the rampant dream-ads that the magical girls outside Kamihama are having. How rude. I wonder how much would you have to pay for one of those?

Jokes aside, with this, we finally have a new lead on the weird things going on in Kamihama. And not only us, either. Kyoko also learnt something about the Rumors. Which brings up the question: where is Mami? She should be investigating Kamihama, but she hasn't shown up since she tried to shoot Iroha. Weird.

Well, the only way to answer the obscene amount of questions this show likes to bring up is by watching, but before I finish this up I'd like to write down the numbers on this episode:

24-23: Felicia's ice cream's package; 23-22: raffle ticket; 22-21: raffle drawing; 21-20: falling coins; 20-19: slot machine's label; 19-18: bet nº; 18-17: fever!; 17-16: Magireco's game currency (lol); 16-15: the table's number; 15-14: the paper one of the familiars is holding; 14-13: formed by the light on the ground.

Nothing lucky happens after that one, so I think these are the ones in this episode. I feel this was the first time in all my rewatches I caught the one on Felicia's ice cream and the one the familiar was holding, so maybe I got some of that luck too, haha.

This ran on longer than I thought it would for Felicia's introduction episode. I'll be releasing you people from this barrage of text now, so I hope I'll still see you next time when we watch episode 7. Have a good morning/afternoon/evening! Bye-bye!

[bubonickitten]

Summary: Jon goes back to before the world ended and tries to forge a different path.

Previous chapter: tumblr // AO3

Chapter 5 full text & content warnings below the cut:

CWs for Chapter 5: flashbacks re: canon-typical trauma (each of Jon's encounters with the Fears is mentioned, some more detailed than others - worms and Circus-related horror in particular); brief mentions of eye horror/gouging. SPOILERS through S5.

   Chapter 5: Second Chance

   “Hi, Georgie,” Jon says meekly. There’s a raw quality to his tone that he didn’t anticipate. Don’t cry, he warns himself. Don’t you dare cry.   

  Georgie surveys him – not with fear, of course, but with a combination of caution and interest.

  “My eyes are up here,” Jon says with a small, hesitant smile.

  “Jonathan Sims, was that a joke?”

  “People might assume otherwise, but I do have a sense of humor.”

  “Not like that you don’t.”

  “It’s Martin’s,” Jon admits. When he feels himself start to flush, he averts his human eyes. Useless, really, considering how most of the others are still concentrated on Georgie, but it’s just force of habit at this point.

  Georgie grins for a brief moment. Jon is suddenly struck with the magnitude of how long it’s been since he’s seen her smile, and then it fades.

  “You’ve picked up quite a few more…” Georgie raises an eyebrow and motions vaguely at Jon and his general vicinity.

  “Yes.” Jon shifts his weight from one foot to the other, embarrassed. “They aren’t, ah… manifesting in my hospital room, are they?”

  Georgie looks at him like he’s grown an extra head. Though, that may have less to do with his question and more with yet another eye that just emerged unsolicited on his left cheekbone. Great timing.    

  “Uh… no?”

  “Oh, good.” He doesn’t bother to understate his relief. Everyone already saw him as a monster last time; retaining his post-apocalyptic nightmare ‘he’s-all-eyes’ look would make an already difficult challenge nearly impossible.

  “So you… you know where you are, then?”

  “Yes.” 

  When he doesn’t elaborate, Georgie’s eyes sweep up and down his figure again, and Jon feels exposed. Seen. She folds her arms and jerks her chin in his direction.  

  “You’ve got mud all over you.”

  “I… had to help someone climb out of a grave earlier.” In an attempt to distract himself from his own self-consciousness, he begins playing with a lock of hair at the nape of his neck.

  “And the blood?”

  “Dream pica,” Jon says guardedly. “And a dissection lab.” He looks around the pristine room they’re standing in. “A – a different one. With more… blood.”

  “Right.”

  The awkward silence drags on a bit too long.

  “It’s… it’s good to see you, Georgie,” he ventures.

  “Jon, is it really you?”

  “Yes.” Georgie doesn’t respond, and her expression is unreadable. “I – I don’t have any way to make you believe me, but… listen, Georgie, I – there are some important things I have to tell you before you wake up.”

  Before Georgie can stop him, he plunges into the first bullet point on his agenda.

  “First, Melanie. I don’t know how much she told you about her trip to India, but she still has a bullet in her leg, and it’s poisoning her. It didn’t show up on any scans then, and it probably still won’t, but it needs to come out. I know she’s been hurting, growing angrier –”

  “How do you –”

  “Please trust me, Georgie. I don’t know whether Melanie will listen to you, especially when you tell her the information came from me, but – but I think she already knows about the bullet, knows what it’s doing to her. She might not want to give it up, and – and it’s not my place to make that decision for her, but – the Slaughter wants to claim her, and I don’t think any good can come from becoming an Avatar.” He laughs bitterly. “Maybe – maybe that would be enough to convince her. Just tell her she could end up a monster like me.”   

  “Jon –”

  “I just wanted to let you know,” he interrupts again. “You know her better than I do, and she can trust you more than she can trust anyone at the Institute. I don’t know what your relationship is like right now, if she would listen to you, and – and you don’t have to tell me. But you both deserve to know about it. And she… she deserves a chance to heal. She deserves to know that she has a choice.”

  “Okay. That’s... a lot to unpack.” Then, businesslike: “What else?”

  “Martin. He needs to know that I’m coming back. It – it might take another month or two, but I’m going to wake up.”

  “Jon, I’ve never even spoken to him.”

  “I know, and – and right now, he’s distancing himself from the others, too. But he’s in danger.” Georgie raises her eyebrows. “A new kind of danger. If you could ask Melanie to get a message to him, to just – tell him that I’m asking him to wait a few more months before giving up on me.”

  “I’ll pass the message on to Melanie,” Georgie says evenly, “but I’m not going to pressure her about it.”

  “I understand.”

  “You… you think you can wake up, then?”

  “Yes. And I will.” He pauses. “Soon, I hope.”

  “You going to explain, or keep being mysterious?”

  “I… listen, Georgie, I want to tell you, I do –”

  “But you can’t, because as usual, you think you know what you’re doing and you’re going to rush ahead and throw yourself at –”

  “No,” he says firmly. “I know it seems like I’m falling into a – a familiar pattern, but that’s not what this is. I want to tell you, and I will tell you, it just – it can’t be here.”

  “And why not?”

  “Because Elias is probably watching us right now.”

  “Your boss Elias?" Georgie gives him a blank look. "Your boss Elias who is in prison right now for the murders he framed you for? That Elias?”

  “Yes.”

  “You think he can, what, snoop on your coma dreams?”

  “And most places in the physical world aren’t safe from him, either.”

  “Right,” Georgie sighs. She’s known Jon long enough to tell when he isn’t going to budge. “Where, then?”

  “The tunnels under the Institute. It’s a universal blind spot, he can’t See there.”

  “And you aren’t worried about him overhearing that?”

  “No. He’s likely aware that we know about the properties of the tunnels. Besides, this isn’t some secret battle we’re all fighting. Everything is out in the open. I don’t have to hide my suspicions, and he’s stopped pretending not to be evil. He can safely assume that I’m keeping secrets and plotting behind his back just the same as he is.” Jon glares up at the ceiling and the Watcher beyond it. “I just don’t want him to know the details.” 

  “Can’t he read minds?” Georgie looks away. “It’s just – Melanie mentioned –”

  “It’s… complicated.” Jon folds his arms and starts pacing slowly, retracing the same six-foot space back and forth as he pieces together an explanation. “Elias can See things that happen almost anywhere, but he has to concentrate in order to do it. He can Know a person’s secrets and details about their past, but I don’t think it’s mind-reading, per se, it’s just… Knowing, and – and there are limits on it. And he can implant images and knowledge into a person’s mind, but I think he has to actually be within eyesight in order to do it.”

  Jon abruptly stops pacing and stares transfixed at his feet.

  “It sounds like there’s a ‘but.’”

  “But… I don’t think he can actually read a person’s thoughts in real time. Sometimes it seems like it – he has a gift for reading people, and he always seems to know how best to manipulate or… or break a person. But I think… I think it’s an entirely non-supernatural gift.” Jon hugs his sides and draws his shoulders in, suddenly feeling both too small and too noticeable. “It’s monstrosity, but of a very human sort,” he murmurs softly. 

  “You’re sure?”

  “Fairly sure, yes, though it doesn’t hurt to take as many precautions as possible. I do plan on explaining things after I wake up, but only in the tunnels.” He gives Georgie a pleading look. “I wouldn’t ask you to come to the Institute if there was another option, but it… it has to be there. And I – I get it if you don’t want to see me in person, I can tell Melanie and then she can tell you, but it just – it still has to be in the tunnels.”

  “Jon, it isn’t that I don’t want to see you. I’ve been visiting you in hospital –”

  “I know.”

  “You could hear me?”

  “Not – not quite. I only just started being able to hear what goes on out there. But I… I know you’ve been visiting. Thank you.” Jon pauses, biting his lower lip. “Though I know that you… weren’t expecting me to recover.”

  “It’s been four months, Jon. You have no heartbeat, you’re not breathing –”

  “I know. And you’re thinking I’ve passed a point of no return and that you should cut ties with me before I drag you down with me.”

  “Well, have you?”

  “Passed a point of no return?” He looks up at the ceiling and closes his human eyes. “Yeah. A few of them, actually. I’m not fully human anymore, and I don’t think there’s a way to reverse it. But I – I’m still me, and I want to stay that way. You told me once – not long ago, I suppose – you said that if I was becoming something inhuman, I needed people in my life. To remind me of my humanity. You were right. There are more points of no return I could stumble into, I could get worse, and I don’t…” He swallows hard, fighting back the threat of tears. “I want to get better.”

  “Do you, though?” Georgie’s voice is gentle, but firm. “Actually?”

  “Yes,” Jon says without hesitation. “I really, really do. I can’t escape from the Institute, or from the Beholding. Not any time soon, anyway. Even when I was staying with you, I was physically dependent on reading statements – I just didn’t realize it yet. Running away and staying out of danger isn’t really an option for me anymore. It… hasn’t been for a long time. Maybe ever since I took the job.”

  Georgie presses her lips into a thin line, and Jon can tell he’s losing her.

  “But I’m not – I know you don’t believe me, but I’m not seeking out danger or heroics. I’m not… I’m not playing the martyr, or – or trying to court tragedy. I would love to go a month – hell, a week without the threat of death or worse hanging over me,” he says with a short, humorless laugh, “but that won’t happen as long as I’m the Archivist. So I – I don’t know what ‘better’ looks like for me now that I’m like this, but I want to try. I think this is a second chance, and I… I want to take it.”

  “I want to believe you, Jon. It’s just…”

  “You’ll believe it when you see it.” One corner of his mouth twitches up in a rueful smile.

  “Yeah.” Georgie’s answering smile doesn’t quite reach her eyes.

  He can’t really blame her for being skeptical. They’d had a conversation remarkably similar to this one before, shortly before their breakup – minus the supernatural elements, of course. He’d had a breakdown, finally admitted that he needed help, agreed to go to counseling – and then quit after two sessions. She’s seen his obsessiveness, his refusal to take care of himself, the self-destructive patterns he falls into, his apparent allergy to emotional vulnerability. He’s never shown her any other side of him. Come to think of it, he didn’t know he had another side until… all of this.

  “Look,” Georgie says after a moment and a sigh, “I – I’m not going to cut you out, not completely. But I may need some distance, you understand?”

  “Of course.”

  “And I can’t be your only support.”

  “I wouldn’t want that.”

  “And I have to decide how much I’m willing to get involved in… all of this.” Georgie frowns. “It’s just complicated, what with…”

  “Melanie.”

  “Yeah. I mean, I don’t want you trapped there, either – I think all of you should quit, actually. If you ever figure out how. Maybe even burn the place down just to be safe.” If she’s joking about the latter, Jon can’t tell. He doesn’t disagree with her, per se, but he does take a moment to wonder, not for the first time, how he’s managed to surround himself with so many people who see arson as a first resort. “It’s just –”

  “Listen, that’s actually the last thing I wanted to mention – I might have a way for Melanie to quit.”

  “What?”

  “I – I think the only reason she hasn’t been completely taken over by the Slaughter is because of her connection to the Eye, so it would be safest to remove the bullet first, if she decides that's what she wants, but – yes, there’s a way for her to quit.” He runs one hand through his hair and grimaces. “It’s drastic, but everyone needs to know they have the option. I can’t talk about the details here, though, and I – I’d rather everyone hear everything I have to say before making any decisions.”

  “You get more and more cryptic every time I see you, you know that?” 

  “Trust me, this is an improvement on…” Being the voice of the Archive, he does not say. “It could be worse.”

  “See? Cryptic.”

  “That can’t be the most off-putting thing about me.” As if on cue, another eye opens on his throat, centered on the scar that Daisy left him, and he cringes. More impeccable timing. 

  “Nah,” Georgie says after a contemplative hum. “I think the weirdest thing is how you just had an entire conversation about your feelings and didn’t once try to change the subject. Who are you, and what did you do with Jonathan Sims?”

  Jon laughs. “I guess I’ve… grown, a bit.”

  “Yeah, but when? Since you’ve been in a coma? This place doesn’t exactly seem ripe with opportunities for personal growth.”

  “I…”

  “Let me guess: you can’t talk about it.”

  “Not here.” Jon gives her an apologetic smile.   

  “Right.”

  Jon looks down again, scuffing one foot against the floor to fill the quiet.

  “So when can we expect you back in the world of the living?”

  “No more than a few months, I think. Hopefully sooner. It depends on how long it takes me to figure it out.”

  “Are you sure you’ll be able to?”

  “If I can’t do it on my own, someone else will do it for me. This in-between state doesn’t suit the Beholding, and there are at least a few interested parties who will force me to make a choice if I take too long. The Archivist has a role to perform, and right now, I’ve removed myself from the game board. Either I submit to the hand that moves me, or I die and make room for the next unsuspecting pawn in line.” Jon looks up. “Sorry, that came out more dramatic than I intended.”

  “A bit,” Georgie says, not unkindly.  

  “What I mean is, the coma has a time limit no matter what I do or don’t do. I’m not human enough to die, but I’m too human to live, so I have two choices: I accept what I’ve become and I wake up. I’ll still be me, but I’ll be even less human than I was before, and I’ll have to… make the best of that. Or, I sever my connection with the power that’s keeping me alive, and I die – not quite human, but not a monster, either. A slow death, though,” he adds bitterly. “To make sure I have plenty of time to change my mind.”    

  “Sounds to me like you haven’t made up your mind.”

  “I have, actually. It’s just… I don’t know how to finalize my choice, I suppose?”

  “You can’t just ask to speak to a manager?” One look at Georgie’s playful grin, and Jon feels himself smiling in return.

  “I wish. No, I – it’s… hm. Like I need to find my way to a crossroads, but I don’t have directions or a map.”

  “Maybe you just need a chaperon.” When Jon gives her a serious look, her teasing smirk fades. “What, seriously?”

  “Yeah. I haven’t given up on finding my own way, but if I take too long, a guide will pass this way and… encourage me to choose a path and follow it to the end.”

  “I’d ask you how you know all this, but I doubt you'll tell me.”

  “I Know it because of the Eye, broadly speaking, but there’s a more specific answer I want to give you. Just… not here.”

  “Fine," Georgie says, but she doesn't sound upset, much to Jon's relief. "Anything else?”

  Jon almost says no, but…

  “Maybe… maybe one more thing,” he says, lowering his gaze, suddenly very interested in the floor. “I’ve never had any control in these dreams, and I’m terrified that I’ll lose it again. If I do, just… behind all the eyes, it’s still me. I can see you, and hear you, and I was wondering if… I know it’s stupid, but if it’s alright with you – and I completely understand if it’s not, I don’t want you to feel obligated –”

  “What, Jon?”

  “I… could you still talk to me, maybe?” Jon says it so quickly that it comes out all as one word. “I won’t be able to answer, but it would still be nice to hear your voice. Tell me about the Admiral, or your current knitting project – or the newest What the Ghost, and the weirdest listener feedback it got, or… or the latest dick move your landlord pulled. Anything.”

  When Georgie doesn’t reply right away, Jon keeps his head down and braces himself for disappointment. He didn’t mean to sound so desperate, and now he’s made things weird. He probably shouldn’t have –

  “Huh,” Georgie says finally. “Are you sure you haven’t been able to hear me talking to you out there?”

  “Not… not that I know of?” Jon cautiously looks up at her. “Not consciously, at least.”

  “Hmm. Well, next time I see you, if you’re as unresponsive in here as you are out there, I’ll just do what I usually do when I visit you in hospital, which is natter on about my personal life and tell you all about the Admiral’s latest adventures in protecting the flat from spiders.”

  “Brave boy,” Jon says fondly, and Georgie snorts.

  They spend some time talking about the Admiral and his newfound obsession with bread ties until, mid-sentence, Georgie wakes. Jon is left alone in a sterile dissection lab, the harsh fluorescent light underscoring the emptiness of the place.

  The conversation went… better than he had dared to hope, really. He’s both stunned and relieved that Georgie hasn’t written him off yet, but also terrified of messing things up again, of squandering his second chance. He can’t count on getting a third. This is his one opportunity to fix things, to do better, to be better, and he needs to make it count.

  No pressure, he thinks to himself grimly, and he heads for the door.

   Time is difficult here.

  Well, it was difficult at the end of the world, too. Towards the end, Jon didn’t even bother to keep track of it, but he could have Known, if he had wanted. Here, though, he can’t seem to Know anything about what’s happening outside of the dream.

  Jon relies on his conversations with his fellow dreamers to gauge the time and date in the outside world, and it doesn’t take long for him to realize that his perception of time is wildly inconsistent. Sometimes what feels like hours to him translates to a week on the outside; sometimes a single night in the real world is stretched into days for Jon. There are indeterminate stretches of time in which he drifts in that directionless void again – times when, he assumes, all of the other dreamers are awake, leaving no nightmare settings for him to occupy.

  At least the passage of time seems to be progressive. Time travel is difficult enough without hopping around to different points on the timeline. He’s glad to see that, his initial leap backwards notwithstanding, time still seems to be moving in one direction.

  It took a long time for Jon to stop waiting for the moment when he would lose his agency and become the Watcher again. A small part of him is still waiting for the rug to be ripped out from under him again, but for the most part, he’s allowed himself to relax into it and silence his customary pessimism. He still isn’t sure exactly why he has so much control now. It’s a… well, not best-case scenario – that would be freedom from the dreams altogether, for himself and for the others – but it’s still an unexpected boon that he never would have even imagined. Every time he searches for an answer, though, he gets nothing but noise and a blinding headache.

  The best theory he can come up with is that he’s simply stronger now, after completing his metamorphosis into the Archive. If so, it’s somewhat worrisome. It would mean that coming back in time rewound most of the timeline, but he remains a product of its original trajectory. He is an artifact of a cascade of disasters that never happened – that will never happen, if he manages to foil Jonah’s plans. There’s no way of telling how the world might react to his presence in it. Is he an allergen of sorts, a paradox that cannot be reconciled? Is he something akin to the rift itself? God, he hopes not – it will be difficult to convince anyone of his humanity if he radiates the same sort of wrongness as the crack in the foundation at Hill Top Road.

  Most of all, though, he wonders what it means for the Archivist’s progress.

  At this point in his original timeline, he had been marked by the Web, the Eye, the Corruption, the Spiral, the Desolation, the Vast, the Hunt, and the Stranger. If he isn’t already marked by the End, he will be by the time he wakes up. That leaves the Slaughter, the Buried, the Dark, the Flesh, and the Lonely. He still has to rescue Daisy, so receiving a mark from the Buried is a given. Avoiding the Slaughter and the Lonely may be difficult, considering they’ve both already taken up residence in the Archives. He can try to avoid Jared Hopworth and Ny-Ålesund, but that doesn’t mean that he wouldn’t stumble across the Flesh and the Dark some other way, and Jonah Magnus is nothing if not resourceful. He won’t give up just because Jon happens to evade two of his traps.

  Not to mention, Jon has an unfortunate tendency to serve himself up to the Fears on a silver platter. He’s gotten better at tempering his recklessness, at trusting others, at not going it alone, but still – in the past, he’s had an almost supernatural ability to make Jonah’s job easy. It’s possible – probable – that the Web was – is – pulling strings, but trying to account for the Web is like searching a beach for a single grain of sand.

  Then there’s Jonah Magnus’ suggestion that Jon’s life amounts to a truly unfortunate streak of bad luck, but luck is a nebulous concept, and a lot of Jon’s so-called chronic “bad luck” could be a direct result of the manipulations of – speak of the devil – the Web and Jonah Magnus. At this point, Jon suspects his misfortune probably has more to do with his being easily manipulated than it does with any sort of intrinsic unluckiness or tragic destiny.

  Jon’s initial encounter with the Web may or may not have been chance, but becoming the Archivist had nothing to do with luck. Jonah chose him because he knew that Jon would be easy to isolate, terrorize, and control. It was a deliberate action, not some passive twist of fate. Everything that unfolded from that point onward was carefully orchestrated and monitored by Jonah, and he always had contingency plans to keep Jon on the intended path. Yes, Jon made it easy for him in many ways, and he’s still responsible for his choices – but he’s also had to acknowledge that regardless of what choices he made, Jonah likely would have been ready with an equally effective backup plan to counter any move Jon did or did not make.

  Which is exactly why even now, with the advantage of foreknowledge, Jon is still absolutely terrified of Jonah Magnus.     

  But the more Jon thinks about it – and the more his attempts to Know yield nothing – the more he worries that all of that is moot. He recalls Jonah Magnus' statement with a full-body shudder.

  …if I could find an Archivist and have each Power mark them, have them confront each one and in turn instill in them a powerful and acute fear for their life, they could be turned into a conduit for the coming of this nightmare kingdom. Do you see where I’m going with this, Jon?  

  It wasn’t enough to have the Entities cause him bodily harm. The scars are just physical reminders of the encounter. Some of the Fears didn’t even leave him with visible scars. No, the real mark always depended on Jon’s lived experience of the confrontation: the terror, the pain, the confusion, the desperation, the alienation from himself, and the lingering, compounding trauma.  

  Knocking on Mr. Spider’s door, looking on as the monster took its substitute victim and saddled him with lifelong survivor's guilt. The worms gnawing and tunneling through his skin, wriggling against bone, lavishing praise on the give of his flesh, crooning that he will be cherished, he will be perfect, he will be a home. The pandemonium of the Distortion’s corridors; the razor edge of the bones in its hands. The white-hot agony of melting flesh; the terror of terminal velocity without an end; the inexorable press of a knife against his throat.

  An entire month of nothing but raw sensory input, disjointed and unfathomable: chittering, faceless things; ropes chafing and eroding furrows into skin; the ache of a jaw forced open by a length of cloth; cramping muscles and screaming joints; chill air and tailor’s tape on bare skin; layer after slimy layer of lotion; the scent of lavender cut through with the metallic tang of blood; so many hands, hands, hands, ever-present and unyielding. Nikola would mark dotted lines onto his skin with a felt-tip marker, providing a cheerful running commentary as she worked – the sorry state of his skin and her promise to get it into proper shape; vivid descriptions of how it would feel to be flensed alive, exquisitely painful yet so very liberating; how grateful he should be that he will get to be part of something so much greater than himself – all of it overlaid with Jon's unquestioning conviction that no one was coming to help him. 

  And encore after encore: an explosion, an endless nightmare, an impossible choice; the aching strain of bones bending, the agonizing snap of bones breaking, the unsettling vacancy left behind; the damp, earthy press of the coffin; the terrible beauty of unknowable darkness burning holes in his Sight.      

  Martin paling, fading, vanishing –

  “Are you scared, Jon?”

  “Yes.”

  “Perfect.”  

  – almost disappeared, almost lost, almost alone. 

  Jon remembers it all in perfect, visceral detail, every sensation and panic-stricken thought seared into him and easily accessible at the merest twitch of an overactive imagination. He witnessed and experienced worse during the apocalypse, but still those tired old flashbacks would overtake him and bring him to his knees without warning as he passed between domains.

  The question of mind-body dualism is well-settled at this point, at least as far as Avatars are concerned. Jonah Magnus has been body-hopping for centuries, discarding vessels and possessing new ones on a whim; Jon himself is currently a living mind tethered to a body that is in most other respects clinically dead. What if the body is irrelevant, and what really matters is the conscious mind?

  It might not matter whether Jon’s body encounters those final five marks. As long as he remembers receiving them, his consciousness is still scarred by all Fourteen of the Dread Powers. What’s more, traversing the ruined earth retraced those marks several times over, branding him more deeply with every passage through an Entity’s domain. That might be more than enough to initiate the Watcher’s Crown Ritual.

  If so, Jon is still a living chronicle of terror, fully prepared and ready and marked, and he’s delivered himself to Jonah Magnus months ahead of schedule.

  And if that’s the case, Jon has once again played right into Jonah’s hands.

  He can only hope that Jonah doesn’t Know it – and even if he doesn’t, it seems foolish to hope that he won’t find out eventually.

   “You’re never going to let me live this down, are you?”

  “Absolutely not,” Naomi wheezes, doubled over with laughter.

  Jon groans and covers his face with his forearms, still lying on his back in the mud. He had been helping Naomi out of her grave, as had become the routine, but she had lost her footing just as she reached the top. In his scramble to catch her, he had lost balance and toppled in after her, and now they’re both stuck down here. Jon sits up and half-heartedly wipes the dirt off his hands, to little effect.

  “Break any bones, old man?”

  “It’s a dream, Naomi. Also, I’m only thirty.”

  “Could’ve fooled me.”

  He glares at her, but it’s tempered by an amused twist of the lips that he can’t quite suppress – which just makes Naomi snicker again.  

  “So,” she says after a moment, “still haven’t woken up?”

  “Still trapped,” Jon says, all the levity bleeding out of him in an instant.  

  “No luck with the anchor?”

  “No luck.” Jon leans back against the wall and crosses his arms. “Not for lack of trying – or practice. Just the thought of him has saved me more than once. But I guess it’s… different, when it involves trying to manipulate the hour of your own death.”    

  He should have suspected as much, really. Escaping a pocket dimension is different from trying to meddle with the End’s sphere of influence. In all the statements he’s consumed regarding Terminus, no one has ever been able to truly hold sway over it in any direction. It does not want anything, because everyone and everything succumbs to it eventually, given enough time. It doesn’t answer to summons or worship or pleas. Sometimes it elects to play games, but it engages only on its own terms, and no one ever wins – they simply accrue enough debt to delay the inevitable for as long as it takes to repay their dues.   

  “You’re being spooky again,” Naomi says brightly.

  “At this point, I think it’s my default setting,” Jon deadpans back. “More importantly – did you end up going to meet the distinguished Duchess Jellybean Toes?”

  “Yes!” Naomi leans forward with her hands on her knees, practically buzzing with excitement. “She’s gorgeous. A bit rude, though – she climbed up under my shirt, stuck her head out though my collar, and refused to budge for the entire visit.”

  “Are you going to adopt her?”

  “Mhm. I still need to buy some things and get the flat ready for her, but I already paid the adoption fee. Her name is a bit of a mouthful, though. Might have to change it.”

  “Don’t you dare,” Jon says, giving her a severe look. He meant it as a joke, but when his voice dips lower than intended and too many eyes join in on the staring, he winces.

  Naomi doesn’t react, though; she’s well past the point of finding him intimidating. “Hm. Well, I’ll have to shorten it, at least.”

  “Could just call her the Duchess,” Jon says, regulating his tone more carefully this time.

  “It doesn’t sound too… I don’t know, pretentious?”

  “Not at all. It sounds regal,” Jon insists. “I’ve told you about the Admiral, and he carries his title admirably.”

  “If that was a joke, it was terrible.”

  “That one was unintentional, actually.”

  “Good. I almost had to reevaluate my opinion of you.”

  “Can’t have that,” Jon says drily, and then his expression softens. “Seriously though, I’m glad the adoption worked out for you.”

  “Yeah. I think it’ll be good for me. Less lonely, you know,” she says, voice growing so faint that Jon can only barely hear her. Then, in a louder, more conversational tone: “Besides, I’ve always wanted a cat.”

  “Me too,” Jon admits. “By the time I finally got a flat that allowed pets, I was… well, always at work. It didn’t feel right, adopting a cat and then leaving it alone all the time.”

  “Well, you’re not dead yet. Not too late to develop a better work-life balance, even if you are…” Naomi wiggles her fingers. “You know, spooky.”

  “Maybe,” Jon says, pointedly ignoring the jape.  

  “Oh.” Naomi sits up straighter and looks at him. “I just realized – are you going to be able to get out of here once I wake up?”

  “That… is a very good question.” Jon smirks at her alarm. “I’m kidding. It’ll fade out when you do. Then it’s either back to the void, or on to the next nightmare.”

  “Spooky.”

  “That’s your third strike. Quota met for the day.”

  “You really are a buzzkill.”

  “So I’m told,” Jon says. “Now, if you’re finished harassing me, tell me more about the Duchess.”

  “Well, she’s a calico – unbelievably fluffy – and she’s only a year old…”

   Jon has never been the most social person. He doesn’t go out of his way to make friends, conversations typically feel like minefields, and he has a propensity for going off on informational digressions that most people find annoying. He asks too many questions, frequently misses social cues, and has always had difficulty modulating his tone of voice. Becoming the Archivist only made things more complicated, since now a conversational misstep can easily mean unintentional compulsion or Knowing (and sharing) something that he shouldn’t.

  But in recent years, he’s nonetheless become more dependent on human interaction and less tolerant of being alone. He knew he had been starved for companionship since he lost Martin, but he didn’t realize the extent of it until he started talking again, and in his own voice. So, when the voyeuristic nightmare sessions turn into social calls, he finds himself thriving on it in a way that he never expected.   

  There’s his budding friendship with Naomi – unexpected, but far from unwelcome.

  He still finds Dr. Elliott a bit insufferable, but Jon finds himself insufferable as well, so he can’t judge too harshly. He always peeks into the anatomy lab to check that Elliott isn’t in the throes of the nightmare. Sometimes they find some shared academic interest to discuss; other times, Elliott dismisses him, citing a disinterest in conversation at that moment. Jon never asks him to elaborate.

  Tessa usually declines his company, but occasionally she’ll wave him over and immediately launch into a discussion about neural networks or machine learning or some other tech-related subject that’s been on her waking mind. Well, it’s usually more of a one-sided lecture than anything else, but Jon always finds himself riveted, listening hungrily as Tessa shines light on an unfamiliar subject. The first few times he asked follow-up questions, she took it as feigned interest or ridicule, but once she realized that he was actually interested and not just humoring her out of guilt, she began to brighten every time he offered a new tangent for her to explore. He wouldn’t call them friends by any stretch of the imagination, but she seems to enjoy talking to someone who doesn’t tune her out when she begins to ramble. If nothing else, it’s better than devouring a computer.

  Jon doesn’t have much in common with Jordan, to be honest. It doesn’t take long for them to exhaust all avenues of conversation and lapse into an awkward silence. Jordan is skittish, though; he finds Jon’s less-than-human appearance perpetually unsettling, but apparently prefers it to being left alone in this place. Eventually they settle on an unspoken arrangement of just staying within eyeshot of one another for the duration of the dream, even when the conversation runs dry.

  In the silence, it’s more difficult to stave off the Knowing, though, which means Jon gets treated to ceaseless updates on Jordan’s mental state – and Jordan is more repulsed by all those eyes than he is by even the worst infestations he’s encountered on the job. By the time Jordan wakes up, Jon usually feels like an insect half-dead and twitching in the aftermath of an insecticide assault. He can’t blame Jordan, but it does still take its toll on Jon’s already abysmal self-esteem.

  Karolina remains largely unresponsive. Jon sits with her, talks to her – at her, really – and hopes that he isn’t just annoying her. Her eyes follow his movements, and sometimes she smiles, but otherwise, she’s uncommunicative – whether by force or by choice, Jon doesn’t know, and the Beholding doesn’t seem inclined to tell him. Although he has yet to completely interrupt the dream sequence, there have been a few instances where the train car didn’t collapse. He can’t say conclusively whether that indicates progress, but at least it’s evidence that the script can change. 

  On the one hand, it’s probably a good sign that Jon doesn’t have as much control over the Knowing as he did in the future. On the other hand, it’s like having his wings clipped after learning to fly, and he hates it. The Beholding did withhold some things from him during the apocalypse, but for the most part, he had unfettered access to an ocean of knowledge – and it’s maddening to have it restricted once again.

  Even before becoming the Archivist, he always hated unanswered questions; it may as well have been a core facet of his personality. But after so much time with the Archive at the forefront, to not Know is wholly incompatible with his nature in a deeper, existential sense. For the human part of him, it’s like having an itch that can’t be scratched; for the Archivist, it’s excruciating; for the Archive, it’s utterly incomprehensible.

  The balance he’d found in the future is shifting, and he isn’t sure what that means for him just yet, or how he feels about it.

   “How is Melanie?”

  “Struggling,” Georgie says, “but hopeful, I think. It’s really not my place to say much more than that.”

  “Yes, of – of course. I’m… glad to hear that she’s recovering.”

  “She’s still angry that you won’t tell me how she can quit.”

  “I will, I promise, I just… I need to explain everything first.”

  “She said to tell you that it’s patronizing to assume she can’t make her own decision without you holding her hand.”

  “I’m not – I just want it to be an informed decision.” Jon frowns. “That sounded condescending, didn’t it?”

  “A bit, yeah.”

  Jon looks down and rubs his temples. There’s a likelihood that if he tells Georgie right now, Melanie will blind herself before he even wakes up. It’s her choice, of course, but a choice never really feels like a choice when it’s presented as the only option, when vital information is being withheld that might affect your decision.

  There’s also the fact that his death would free all of them without a need for eye-gouging. He’s going to tell them – it doesn’t feel right to keep it to himself – but that’s something that he would rather Jonah not overhear. Jonah might be willing to lose Melanie if she takes an awl to her eyes, but if he thinks there’s a chance that she or any of the others would kill his Archivist just when he’s starting to show some promise, well… there’s no telling whether or how Jonah would choose to intervene. 

  “It’s not just that.” Jon glances up at the ceiling and the Eye just beyond it.

  “Tunnels-only information?”

  “Yeah,” Jon says, contrite. “She might not want to hear it, but please tell Melanie that I’m sorry. I’m hoping – what’s the date right now?”

  “First of February.”

  “She shouldn’t have to wait too much longer.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I just… do.” Jon winces at his weak delivery. He hates being so cagey, but he really has no other option.

  “Right.”  

  “How is… how is Martin?” Jon asks tentatively, perking up ever so slightly. Georgie’s expression turns sympathetic.

  “Melanie says they haven’t seen him,” she says gently.  

  “Oh.” Jon deflates, his cautious hope abruptly snuffed out.

  “I’m sorry, Jon. Melanie did send a few emails, and when that didn’t get a response, she slipped a note under his door. But it’s been radio silence.”

  “Oh,” he says again, almost a whisper this time. He covers his face with both hands and takes a minute to collect himself. “Um, c-can you tell Melanie I said thank you for trying? I –”

  Georgie is gone before Jon can finish his sentence. The Admiral must have woken her for breakfast. He always has been a natural alarm clock.

  Left alone with his own thoughts again, Jon immerses himself in worrying about Martin and a rotating litany of what-ifs. 

   End Notes:

Sorry this chapter isn't very plot-heavy!! It was getting really long and I had to split it into two chapters. Things will move along at the beginning of Chapter 6. It should be ready before the weekend. (Probably by tomorrow or Wednesday. I'm almost done with it.)

There are two excerpts from the show in this one. The clip of Jonah's statement is from MAG 160; the brief "Are you scared?" interaction is from MAG 158. 

[monsterrlover]

I had a dream last night that I was in a land with faerie tale creatures, and it was lovely and funny at first, but it became darker and more lurid the further I traveled. 

One thing to know about me is that I have always had incredibly vivid dreams, even since I was little. It actually became a problem in high school, as I was having stress nightmares. But now I only have the occasional nightmare, and most of my dreams are just interesting. And in this case, sometimes rather lurid.

I decided to expound upon all what was in my dream, and write a more coherent thing based off it. ~2.5k words, explicit content at the end.

I found myself in a large, beautiful expanse covered in autumnal birch trees, carpeting the ground in their fiery leaves. At the end of it, a large, impossibly tall wall of rock, with a cleave so thin you’d miss it if you weren’t looking. I traveled to the cleave, and it as I walked through it, it grew darker and darker, until I saw a light at the end, and could hear water rushing.

At the other end, something that looked relatively similar to what I had just left, only with a wide, clear river. It was safe enough to cross over, and I did, with little hesitation. I continued to walk, and found myself in a large forest, just like the expanse I had come from, only with light, giggling voices all about, and butterflies, of the largest kind I’d ever seen. They seemed to frighten me to a degree, but I did not know why. I did not want them to touch me, that much I knew.

I passed by a tree that seemed to be stifling a laugh, and I turned to it.

“Hello?” I said, looking the tree up and down. Its leaves were pink, and the wood a dark brown, unlike the white of the birch trees all around.

Suddenly, a section of it broke off and took on the form of what looked like a woman, brown and woody with pink-leaf hair, and it beckoned me over.

“Yes?” I said, approaching it.

“Who are you?” it asked me.

I hesitated. I knew the rules. Never give the fae your name.

“Ah, no-one of consequence,” I said, “Just a passerby.”

The figure pointed at me, smiling and winking.

“Smart girl.”

I smiled and nodded.

Suddenly, a small faerie tumbled out of the tree, and flew into my face.

“Oho, a very smart girl indeed,” it said, “But you can not simply walk in here with a gift! Tis rude.”

I looked down at my person. I had nothing on me of any value, save the clothes on my back.

“I have nothing to give,” I said.

“Mayhap nothing of monetary value,” it said, “But surely, there is some knowledge you might share with me? Knowledge that I do not currently posses?”

“Like what?” I said, with a laugh, “I fear I may be of no use to you. The only kind I have is nigh-encyclopediac knowledge of the fictions I like to read.”

The faerie’s eyes grew wide.

“En-sike-low-pee-dee-ack? What is that? What does that mean? Tell me!”

“Oh, well, an encyclopedia is a big book, or series of books, that have comprehensive information of all kinds, depending on the subject. For instance, an encyclopedia of botany will have lots and lots of information about plants.”

It flitted in the air, with a squeal.

“Ohh, I did not know such a thing! Thank you so much! Oh, I’m going to get as many en-sike-low-pee-dee-uhs as I can find!”

The tree smiled and nodded.

“That means you may pass through here unmolested,” it told me.

“Thank you,” I said, continuing onward.

————–

The journey was pleasant, but as it grew dark, I became tired, and lost. The forest grew denser, and full of whispers and other strange noises. I was not fearful, but I did think to myself that I ought to find somewhere to safely stay the night.

Almost the very moment I had the thought, I found my way to a little cottage, buzzing with life. The lights inside glowed, and smoke lazily pumped out of the chimney.

I approached the door, and it opened before I could even knock.

“Oh, a weary traveler?” a friendly looking woman said.

“Ah, yes ma’am. If it is not too much trouble, might I stay the night? I would be happy to pay my way with any chores you might need done,” I said, “Twould only be for the one night.”

The woman smiled.

“Of course, dear. We would all be happy to have you,” she said, herding me inside.

“Someone put the kettle on, we have a guest!” she said. 

I walked in to a homey little place, with a very crowded dining room. I walked in to see several folks at the table, no one seemingly related, but all very chummy and jovial with one another. I felt quite at home right away.

“Now, darling, when’s the last time you ate?” the lady of the house asked me, setting me down in an empty chair at the table.

“Oh, ah, well… I suppose… it has been a spell…” I found myself saying, suddenly feeling quite hungry indeed. 

“Ah, well then, have some of this, love!” she said, putting a generous bowl of stew and a loaf of bread before me.

“Ohh, my, thank you ma’am, this looks wonderful,” I said, taking a bite without thinking. 

Indeed, it was possibly the best thing I’d ever tasted. The stew, the bread, and the glass of wine the lady set in front of me as I ate. Everyone at the table seemed to watch me as I ate, with smiles on their faces. They would strike up conversation with me, and I indulged them happily, sharing things that I realized later I maybe should not have.

That night, I was ushered into a cozy, rather sumptuous guest room, and I found myself lying in bed right away. 

“Pray, forgive me,” I said, my lids drooping, “I am suddenly quite tired. Might I rest here now?” 

“Oh, of course, darling,” the lady of the house said, “Sweet dreams.”

I was too tired to think about the things she muttered as she walked away, and my eyes closed as I drifted to sleep.

I seemed to awaken the very instant afterwards, to very strange noises coming from below. Whimpering, scratching, whispering… it was all very unsettling, and I looked around me, noticing that the very air around me had taken the same sort of still, stifling feeling, as if all the warmth from before had been siphoned away.

The noises grew more frantic, and I took the lantern at my bedside. I reached for the door, only to find it ajar. Most distressing, I thought.

Then the noises came again. Whimpering, scratching, whispering.

I listened intently, and realized they seemed to come from the outside. The impossibly dark outside. Slowly, I looked around the common room of the house. I thought to shout, to see if anyone were home, but thought better of it. No, something was not right here.

I swallowed as I tiptoed out the front door, listening to the noises. They grew louder as I walked around to the back of the house, and I realized they were coming from a storm cellar. I could now distinguish the words that were being whispered, and I leaned an ear towards the cellar to hear them.

Help… help me… they will kill me… help me, please…

My heart raced as I quickly wrapped my hands around the chain keeping it locked, and I cursed that it was so well locked. But then, a thought occurred to me, as my eye fell over the door handles. While the lock was most certainly new, they were not. I rushed quietly to the shed, finding a hammer. I took it to the handles, and pulled away the nails, quietly as I could, until they were gone.

I grabbed my lantern and delved deeper into the cellar, and covered my mouth to suppress a scream of horror. Blood, everywhere, everywhere, trailing all the way to a very large cage. I thought to run, but then I realized that it was the one caged who begged.

“You… you there! Please, please help me,” the trapped one said, hoarsely, more like a growl.

I raised the lantern up to the cage, saying nothing. A dark, furry creature, hunched over and bleeding.

“Are you… are you hurt?” I asked, “Is all this blood yours?”

The creature laughed weakly.

“Werewolves have a lot of blood,” it said, “Especially males. Think nothing of it. I am fine. Other than being trapped in here, of course.”

I felt oddly at ease when he spoke, and approached him. 

“You seem so strong. Why don’t you just break out yourself?”

“Tis made of silver,” he said, “Cheap, alloyed silver, but still silver. I cannot touch it without being harmed. Even now it burns at what skin it does touch…”

I sighed, pitying the poor thing.

“Is there a key somewhere?” I asked.

“Hanging over there, actually,” he said, a clawed finger pointing a little ways away. 

Sure enough, a key hung on a nail on a post just to my right. I took it and approached his cage, attempting to unlock it.

“Why do you trust me so?” he said, “They are the ones who fed and sheltered you, and I am a monster.”

I looked up into his yellow eyes.

“Call it an instinct,” I said, “Nothing in this realm is as it seems, I have noticed.”

I freed him, and at once he let himself out, and stretched.

“Ohh, I thank you, my friend,” he said, “Now, hurry. We must away, before they find us. Tis nearly time for the sacrifice.”

“Sacrifice?” I hissed.

“Yes,” he said, “Tis as the old legends. Feed a maiden to a werewolf under the harvest moon, and you shall have power beyond comprehension when you skin his hide and wear it. Fools, they are. Such power is truly beyond comprehension, and it destroys the wielder from the inside out. But come, hurry. I know the way.”

I followed him out of the cellar, away from the house and into the woods. Almost instantly, I heard shouting and screaming, and he grabbed my hand, goading me to go faster. He was limping, but still ran more quickly than I could keep up with, and I tripped, hitting my knee on a stone jutting from the ground. I called out to him, and suddenly felt the cold grasp of fingers at my ankle. A man. He pulled me under him, and he hovered over me, putting a cloth over my mouth and nose. I kicked and screamed and fought, but ultimately felt myself succumb to a sleep, as the sounds of screams and howls and the grisly sounds of flesh being rent apart faded away as quickly as they began.

————–

It was dawn when I awoke, and I found myself lying against soft, black fur. I looked up, and the werewolf was different; still quiet wolfish, but his face was more of a man’s than a beast’s. His claws were smaller, but still quite beastly, and his tail was all but gone. I felt warm, very warm, and I sat up to look around me, wiping my brow. He awoke right after, reaching for me.

“You… are unharmed,” he said, a crooked claw caressing my cheek. I found myself blushing.

“As are you,” I replied, my hand snaking around his wrist.

This was very strange, this warmth and intimacy we suddenly had between each other, but it felt so natural that I did not even think to question it. My heart thudded away in my burning chest, and I took another hand to brush just under his eye.

“You are lovely,” I whispered, not really thinking.

“As are you,” he replied, his hand at my waist.

I swallowed, and my mouth grew dry. I seemed to grow hotter by the moment, and I could feel sweat beading at my chest, trailing downwards. Every touch of his seared my flesh, but I wanted more.

“I… I don’t quite understand what I’m feeling right now,” I confessed, “But I like it.”

He smiled.

“I like you,” he said, his voice breaking.

I laughed, and he licked his lips.

“Forgive me, but… I desire you,” he said, “Most ardently.”

My chest heaved, gazing into his fiery eyes. I could feel the warmth radiating from him, and it made my skin itch for more of his touch.

“Will you have me, even as I am now?” he continued.

I answered without hesitation.

“Yes.”

He was upon me in an instant, and I quickly threw my clothes off, allowing him to kiss me, strange and large and toothy as it was. It set a fire within me, and I found myself groaning into his mouth. He growled hungrily as he traveled down my body, claws dancing gently across my skin, tongue tasting my sweat.

His breath ghosted over my shoulder, and he bit into the flesh gently. I moaned, and he increased his pressure, sucking languidly as the skin. The pain was replaced immediately by pleasure, as his hot, wet tongue lapped at the wound. He repeated the act on my other shoulder, and I felt my eyes roll back.

I felt a frenzy overtake me, and I ran my hand along his chest.

"Please, now,” I begged, “Take me now.”

He growled with delight, and he gently laid me down, opening my legs with his massive hands and dipping his head between them. I writhed as he tasted of me, and he moaned with longing.

“Ohh, how long has it been? My dear, you taste… so wonderful,” he said, hungrily.

I gripped at his hair as I came, and he was upon me once more, easing his hard length inside me. I cried out from his girth alone.

“Yes, yes, please,” I begged, my heart beating more rapidly than I had ever recalled it doing so before.

His thrust wildly, not sparing me a single moment of respite. His teeth dug into my flesh once again, and I hissed as the sensation drove him to delve even deeper inside me. I pushed my hips back towards him, attempting to gain even the tiniest bit of extra depth. 

My whole body shivered as my orgasms chained with one another, almost  never ending. A small part in the back of my mind wondered if this was the result of magic, or… something else? But it all felt so wonderful, I did not care.

Then he was coming undone, howling as he spilled his release inside me. I frowned, thinking the moment over, but, to my surprise, he kept going. He remained erect, and thrust even deeper than ever, causing my back to arch as I reached my pleasure once more. He moaned loudly, almost painfully, as he continued.

“Forgive me, forgive me,” he begged, “I… I long to fill you with my seed, over and over again, until you are dripping with it. Long to make you mine… Oh gods, forgive me.”

I shook with realization: he was in a heat. We were in a heat. A small feeling of shame crawled up within me, wondering if I had only wanted him because of it, but then he was coming undone again, and the sensation of his hot seed pouring inside me caused me to dash the thought away.

“There is nothing… to forgive…” I breathed, “Take me. Fill me. Mark me. Make me yours.”

And he would, for hours upon hours, until we both lay in a heap in the grass. By this time, he was now almost entirely a man, albeit still quite wolfish, and very handsome, at that. Our senses had returned to us, and he stroked my arm as I laid upon his chest.

“Forgive me,” he said again, “I… hadn’t realized it was my time already. I had been locked away for so long, I lost track. And then I held you, and breathed in your scent… and it ignited it within me.”

I shook my head, burying my face into him.

“I told you, I care not. I… I wanted it as well,” I admitted, “And besides… I am quite in my right mind now, and I am still here, am I not?”

He laughed.

“I suppose you are,” he said, holding me close, “I suppose you are.”

[violetemerald]

Crying Over A Fictional Kiss

This is my submission for the September 2019 Carnival of Aros, hosted by aceofarrows, on the theme of “Aromanticism and Fiction”. The Call for Submissions was here. This post has also been cross-posted to my WordPress blog. Please follow that blog of mine too, as I don’t cross-post everything.

Content Note: discussion of varied kissing experiences, including my kissing-aversion. Let me know if I should’ve warned for something else.

Also… I’m not sure how much of what I am focusing on is about my (gray-)aromanticism and how much is my asexuality… it’s hard to really categorize some of this into one or the other category. But I know this is meant to be aro-centric and if you stick with this post I’ll make sure it ties back to aromanticism.

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

Last month, I listened to the audiobook version of Alice Isn’t Dead by Joseph Fink.

Potential spoilers are in this blog post below by the way, so you have been forewarned. I’ll try to minimize the spoilers (and I’m not spoiling the ending or anything). I’ll also mention, later in the post, details from over halfway through the book All the Wrong Places by Ann Gallagher, and a few details from The Flash (2014 TV series) season 2 and the Veronica Mars 2014 film and 2019 revival for a season 4.

I loved the audiobook of Alice Isn’t Dead. I found it really compelling. I have heard the podcast was probably a better way to first be introduced to the story, but I instead only consumed this fictional tale in its book form, because my asexual meetup group had decided to read it for its book club. It’s a story with a lesbian married couple at its heart—a romance.

Keisha is the main character. Her wife, Alice, went missing and was presumed dead before the start of the story. When Keisha first sees Alice in this story, Keisha is so angry about the depth of grief she’s been in, grief which is all Alice’s fault due to the circumstance of Alice faking her own death and then… they passionately kiss. And I kinda felt like I was triggered by the way the kiss was used in this work of fiction. I don’t know how else to describe it. I had a visceral negative reaction to it.

This is the paragraph:

Keisha could have hit her. Could have killed her, honestly. Let Alice finally actually be dead if she wanted to be dead that badly. But what she did instead was pull her toward her, and their lips met, and it could have been the day they met, could have been the day they got married, could have been any weekday evening before she disappeared. Keisha felt love, right where she had left it, and kissed Alice so hard that it hurt both of them, because what she really wanted to do was to find her way into Alice’s chest and live there among the bones and blood. She wanted them to be one person, but also to be two people; she wanted so many things, most of them contradictory. She pushed Alice away.

I just said I loved this book. I swear, I really truly did. There was so much I loved about this book, the #ownvoices portrayal of anxiety with a ton of depth (and kinda turning it into a superpower without minimizing how hard it is to live that way), the way the horror played out, the characters, and even the way the romance was written. (I’m usually a pretty big fan of romance in fiction even though I’m not alloromantic. I enjoy romantic arcs, and I even feel shipper type feelings a fair amount of the time.)

But also, listening to this audiobook in my car on a drive home late on a Sunday night, hearing about kissing, and how through kissing a character (whom I could otherwise actually emotionally- and personality-wise relate to quite a bit) was feeling a strong positive sensation of love coming rushing into her… it made me cry. I shed real, actual tears. I got distracted by my own thoughts and angst and had to pause the book and switch to playing music on the radio for a little while. I had to rewind it later because I’d missed parts of what came next. I was just. Not in the right headspace for this romantic kissing situation. Not at all.

The timing was partially to blame. I heard this moment in the book while I was driving home from a day spent with the person I’m dating, Asher. (Asher is the pseudonym I use on this blog for my alterous partner.) We had, just that evening, explored if maybe my kissing-averse self might be able to handle closed-mouth chaste kissing on the mouth, but first I had gotten confused and thought I was agreeing to trying open-mouthed kissing for the first time in nearly 6 years. I had indeed agreed on a previous night that I’d try that too, but when we’d get to trying a number of things had still been unclear. But I knew making out would be a thing we tried at least once… eventually.

I knew that I was kissing-averse after my experiences trying kissing in 2012 and 2013, but I wondered what if my partner being a different gender this time around mattered? Or what if it mattered that I have a demi “sensual” attraction switch that has flipped for Asher, considering the fact that that switch hadn’t flipped for the only two people whom I tried kissing back before I knew my orientations? Or what if it wasn’t really that bad and I was exaggerating in my memory how averse I felt to it all? And what if I could be neutral to “making out” briefly?

Asher asked me, “Can I kiss you?” and I was finally ready to give open mouthed kissing a chance with them. I mean, I guess I thought I was. I braced for the experience. I said, “Yes,” then asked what kind of kissing. Oh. Not open-mouthed, after all. It ended up being Asher just… giving me a light peck on the lips. And then asking me if I was okay. And I said I was. But then I was crying anyway, as I do far too often with Asher. I feel hyper-vulnerable when I’m with them or messaging them or thinking about them and I seem to cry at the drop of a hat. And I’m not entirely sure why, in this instance, the tears were streaming but I kept insisting I really was fine with that kind of kissing. It was maybe a little awkward but I didn’t feel averse to that. And it would get less awkward with more time/practice, I was sure.

(I still think it’s often a little awkward, but in the over-a-month since we started those, I’ve never again cried after being given one of those little kisses.)

I think maybe, though, it seemed fine and neutral to me at first but over time it’s maybe felt more awkward to me, more like I have to be extra careful to keep my mouth closed because I’m scared of an aversion sensation I’d feel if my mouth was open, so I can’t just appreciate the little loving gesture. I overthink it each time.

And as I have been writing this blog post and sharing the unfinished draft with Asher, we discussed this more. Now, I’ve requested to instead try goodbye quick kisses on the cheek or maybe blowing a kiss instead of the goodbye peck on the lips. We tried one cheek kiss this morning. 💜💚 We’ll keep testing this out.

Dating Asher for five months now has been a rollercoaster of emotions for me. I’ve been so happy to be in an alterous partnership which in many ways resembles the established “perfect” romance I saw described in Alice Isn’t Dead—cooking together, cuddling while watching TV, having long conversations that the participants never want to end. Deciding to build a life together with another person. I feel so much love for Asher and know they have brought so much that’s positive to my life.

Nonetheless, it’s been very stressful. Lots of aspects of it have been. I’m not touching on all of it in this post. Waves of excitement or joy are interrupted or overlayed and mixed with other things. Some of my emotions are difficult for me to fully understand or process. But I’ve been thrown back into a situation of mismatched orientations, where my partner feels romantically for me, in certain ways I can’t reciprocate. For Asher, the desire to kiss me is connected to their demiromantic switch. When this switch is engaged and “on” (and it fairly consistently stays on for me), they feel this desire to kiss me. For Asher, kissing is very much non-sexual, but it is romantic.

Asher also feels sexually for me in ways I can’t reciprocate, but that is a topic for another time.

We did eventually, not particularly long after that night when I cried in the car listening to Alice Isn’t Dead, try open-mouthed kissing. Compared to maybe the “making out” that I was envisioning, Asher was… gentler and more hesitant; it was a subtler type of kiss. It wasn’t passionate in that way that I imagine is definitely sexual for characters in stories when making out is described. It wasn’t as full tongue deep into each other’s mouths as what I’d experienced with two guys in 2012 and 2013. We tried this kissing because Asher was so full of a desire to try expressing romantic love that way.

I probably already deep down knew, crying in the car, that while I feel deep alterous love for Asher, love that lets me relate enough to the love described in Keisha & Alice’s marriage, I would feel the opposite of all that amazing love in a moment where I would get even close to that kind of kissing. And indeed open-mouthed kissing I just am so viscerally averse to. It’s hard for me to explain, but I’m not neutral. It’s not just a lack of feeling anything like love. It’s the saliva interacting that is a very specific thing my body seems to react to. It feels uncomfortable in a way that’s almost like anti-chemistry, like people are supposed to notice a spark that’s good between them (and they call this “having chemistry”) and for me the spark isn’t exactly missing—there is still a spark, but it just feels bad. I’ve never felt anything like this feeling except for when I kissed two different guys, nearly a year apart from one another, back in 2012 and 2013. But here we are in 2019 and only once I found myself in the midst of an open-mouthed kiss again did I realize my body remembers exactly what this anti-spark feels like. All 3 people I’ve open-mouth-kissed trigger this exact same kissing-aversion feeling in me.

In the book All the Wrong Places by Ann Gallagher, which is an ace/ace romance, there is a part around the middle of the book, slightly over halfway through, where Zafir says he can’t stop thinking of how much he really wants to kiss Brennan. Brennan thinks it might be weird for asexuals to be kissing one another. (Brennan is new to asexuality and Zafir is more knowledgeable.) I’ll share two select passages from pages 139 and 140 of my paperback copy of the book, from a chapter that happens to be Brennan’s point of view:

”And who says it’s sexual? It’s just affection.” He ran his hand up my forearm. “People can touch without it having anything to do with sex.”

And

His hand slid around to the back of my neck, and with the faintest pressure from his fingertips, he drew me toward him.

Our lips met.

And everything… faded.

The ocean was suddenly a million miles away. The seagulls were distant background noise. There were people and cars, but my senses were too busy exploring the softness of his lips. His stubbled chin hissed across mine, driving home that I was kissing a man for the first time in my life. That I was kissing Zafir. And I liked it.

Slowly, I wrapped my arms around him. Nothing about this felt as weird as I thought it should. It was… God, it was perfect.

He broke the kiss and our eyes met.

“Wow,” I breathed.

“Yeah. Wow.” He searched my eyes. “Does that turn you on?”

I swept my tongue across my lips. “It, um ... not really, no.”

Zafir’s brow knitted, and he sounded more nervous than I’d ever heard him when he whispered, “But did you like it?”

“I—” My heart thumped against my ribs, and I caught myself missing the softness of his lips against mine. This didn’t make any sense, but … “Yeah. I did like it.”

So I pulled him back to me and kissed him again.

This scene was another scene in a book that made me feel a lot of emotions. I read this book after having been in a relationship (that had since ended) with a gray-asexual queerplatonic partner, and I related a lot to two aces dating each other throughout the book. I loved the portrayal that aces can also be parents, which thanks to Sara K. I knew ahead of time this book would have—possibly the only book out there like that—and I knew that this would be an appeal of the book for me as an ace who wants to be a parent. But I’m more averse to sex than both of these protagonists, and then when this happened on page 139 of the book, I suddenly felt very frustrated that kissing aversion seems to never ever be shown in ace romances. I’d been reading a handful of novels with ace characters, and kissing seems to almost always be utilized by authors as “proof” that a relationship without sex is still romantic.

This kind of thing made me feel more possibly aro, the more I realized I can’t feel what all the alloromantic ace characters seem to feel, but I also was skeptical. All The Wrong Places, as I researched and found out after finishing the book, was written by a bisexual woman. While the asexual representation was overall amazingly accurate and relatable (and the book at various points just made me cry because of its emotional resonance), maybe this kissing thing isn’t actually accurate to how all alloromantic aces feel. Perhaps that scene I just quoted was more exaggerated, hyperbole for the sweet romance of it than actually how first kisses tend to feel for people in their shoes.

Maybe it would be more a sex-averse ace thing than necessarily an aro thing to not feel so positively toward the softness of lips, for everything to not just “fade away”. I really don’t know. I haven’t heard enough from sex-repulsed aces who feel alloromantic. I don’t feel like I know their narratives. What I see instead around are aces who are more sex-indifferent or sex-neutral or even sex-favorable when they explain being alloromantic, so when they maybe say they do like kissing (depending on the person) I still don’t know if the reason they like something I don’t is because I’m averse more than them to sexual things and that kind of kissing is sexual, or if it’s because I’m much more aro than them. I don’t know how to parse out my feelings, my romantic orientation, or any of it. It’s so messy and complicated and I wish I had easy answers…

…but when a lot of what I have influencing my thoughts on all this is fiction, the theme of this carnival, it gets even murkier. Fiction doesn’t necessarily reflect reality. And when I read about what kissing feels like it’s almost always in fictional accounts. Whether it’s fanfiction or published novels, allo characters or aspec ones, none of this is really what I should be basing an understanding of reality on. None of this is necessarily quite accurate. I need more nonfiction accounts to fully make me understand my own orientations.

I recently edited a new, very romantic, fanvideo set to a recently released Taylor Swift song using 23 romantic couples featured on 20 different scripted (fictional) television series.

While I identify as gray-aromantic and classify my relationship with and my feelings for Asher as alterous, I basically feel like I could pretty easily sing 99% of this song to my partner and it be entirely accurate to my happy, excited feelings toward the thought of us one day getting married as nesting partners and everything else. I don’t feel like the song is too romantic for any of my current feelings. (The inaccurate parts are that Asher is not my “baby boy” as we don’t use the pet name baby, and Asher isn’t a boy… and I don’t want Asher in “dirty dreams” because I’m sex-averse and don’t have such dreams… seriously that’s pretty much the only parts that don’t really fit, I think? Well, I suppose we also don’t use the pet name “darling” and the idea that Asher and I were ever “friends” before becoming partners isn’t quite true, since we met via online dating, and other little tiny things don’t quite fit. But overall… I can still be aro-spec while relating a lot to this song. I can. It’s my reality.)

For a long while now, I’ve second-guess any of my choices when it comes to vidding kissing scenes.

As I’ve written about before, for my birthday this year I had friends participate in four collaboration fanvideos where I:

made a rule of no sexual scenes and no kissing on the mouth at all. These collabs were also, by the way, a mix of romantic pairs and platonic bonds. They could vid right before or after a kiss with the characters’ faces close but just not vid the kissing itself.

I told my dad about having made the rule and he turned to me and asked with a surprisingly high level of confusion and interest, “Do you really mind kissing scenes?”—or something like that. I don’t even know what I said but I don’t think I fully tried to explain how complicated it all was for me as someone vidding such kissing scenes for over 12 years. Whose attitude in reaction to seeing characters act sexually changed drastically once I realized 5.5 years ago I was sex-averse, how frustrating it was in my birthday collab in January 2016 when one of my friends vidded one of my OTPs (Jane/Rafael on Jane the Virgin) and she happened to choose, out of SO many scene choices, one of the absolute most sexual Jane/Rafael scenes with them making out while skinny dipping (naked in a swimming pool). How sex averse I felt in that moment and how much I wanted for my birthday collab to not have that happen again.

I think what I said to my dad was that it’s nice sometimes to feel more able to relate to the characters and kissing scenes I can’t relate to. I don’t know.

Now it’s closer to 6 years since I first figured out for sure I was sex-averse, and when editing my “Paper Rings” video, which is embedded above, I couldn’t stop thinking about when to include kissing and when not to. And also what kinds of kissing I feel comfortable with. 

I hadn’t met Asher yet when my birthday happened, so when I was making up the “no kisses on the mouth” rule for it I didn’t have much personal life experience with other types of kisses. Like the guy from 2012 kissed my cheek once but… basically zero experience, give or take. Yet, I still knew on some level that kisses on the top of the head, the forehead, the cheek, the shoulder, the arm… none of these would bother me and feel sexual and trigger my kissing-aversion, and I didn’t know if they’d necessarily feel romantic, in fact I still don’t know if anything feels exactly “romantic” for me which is part of why I’ve gravitated so strongly to the term “alterous”… But it feels sweet and affectionate and wonderful when Asher kisses my upper arm while I wear sleeveless shirts, or my shoulder, or my head.

When I was editing this fanvideo and I chose to include mouth-kisses during lyrics that weren’t specifically “kiss me” or “kiss you” lines of the song (lyrics without the word “kiss” at all), it was because of the surrounding details of the scene being really perfect for a particular lyric, combined with the fact that the kiss itself probably wasn’t that zoomed in on nor super open-mouth style “passionate”. For the lyrics specifically about kissing, as much as I easily could, I included kisses that were on the nose or head, or I vidded just enough of a scene that my fanvideo didn’t even show the actual kiss part of the scene once their lips touched, like in the case of the Barry/Iris during the lyric “’cause you waited your whole life”.

I had a number of my vidder friends and acquaintances on Twitter giving me feedback on my video as I was creating it, suggesting ways to improve it. One of my oldest vidder friends, with whom I’ve been friends for 12 years, suggested that when Logan kisses Veronica’s nose in my video, I should’ve instead used when they first kiss (very passionately and sexually) in the film as it fits that same “cause you’ve waited your whole life” lyric better than the cute nose kiss from later in the movie.

However, I told that friend of mine I checked that sexy Veronica/Logan scene from the film and if either character had kissed the other “Three times” in quick succession to really match that lyric amazingly perfectly i would’ve used it. But because that didn’t happen, so…

I’m kinda partial to using less sexual scenes now, more than maybe I typically would be, if I can avoid them. I just. Dating Asher and not wanting to open mouth kiss at all is proving really hard and I’m really insecure about my orientation(s) and how they manifest and makes me incompatible with almost everyone in the world. The nose kiss is much more a kind of kiss I feel happy seeing right now. Less fraught emotions for me in my super cutesy lovey dovey vid if I keep it this way lol. Also my two “dirty dreams” lyric matches are super tame and cute/sweet rather than actually dirty because of that. But no, I couldn’t think of a 3 kisses moment to use either time the lyric comes up.

It just. It’s all so complicated, my relationship to the way romance is portrayed in fiction. And in popular songs. I mean have you all heard the song “Kiss Somebody” by Morgan Evans? It’s on my local country radio station a lot.

It’s frustratingly catchy and enjoyable as a song for a person like me (see how I just vidded Taylor Swift, above – lol). The only reason it’s frustrating though is that it’s so anatonormative, and that it’s one of just so so many songs that imply if you really like a person you “gotta” kiss them, that such a desire to kiss is essentially inevitable. And that everyone feels these things. It is invalidating. It hurts. Even now. Even over 6 years into knowing I was probably asexual, and 6 years after the possibility of being aromantic first crossed my mind. It’s been such a long time, but it’s still not easy for me.

I’m not nonamorous. I’m not romance-repulsed. I don’t seem aromantic when you consider a lot of my interests and actions, when you quickly glance at my successful dating life. In less than a week I’m moving in to a brand new apartment with the person I’ve been dating and I’m happy and excited by the direction my life is going. I’m so very happy.

But I’m kissing-averse. Not averse to all kissing. I actually deeply enjoy certain kinds of kissing, but I’m very averse to open-mouthed kissing, so much so that I would rather not even engage in closed-mouth kissing, despite not even being personally averse to the closed-mouth type!

I’m not sure I like the phrase kissing-aversion as much anymore now that I realize just how nuanced my feelings on the subject are, but I’m not sure I know of a better alternative phrasing. I don’t want to imply ruling out sweet little kisses on my arm and shoulder and head and cheek. I love those so much. So maybe I should just say I’m mouth-kissing-averse, but that sounds so clunky and just… I don’t see myself really starting to say that. Lol. Maybe a whole descriptive sentence about it would be better in the future. I don’t know. I’ll keep thinking on it.

One of my alloromantic & allosexual (straight) friends actually recently let me know she’s not a big fan of making out, because I was sharing my own… struggles.

She said:

It’s funny, I am not super into kissing. I like it more on the top of my head or the cheek… That is more romantic to me than mouth kissing…that is kind of slobbery, lol.

So I guess to conclude, if you made it these 4,300+ words into this monster of a post, I’ll ask you all to please let me know your relationship to kissing, whether you love it, hate it, or are anywhere in the middle! I’m very curious to know how people feel and how they feel it does or doesn’t relate to their orientations. And I’m curious to know if you have any other thoughts for me after reading my post. Please comment. It means the world to me when people do. (Also I’m happy to answer personal questions; you can ask me more stuff if you’re curious!)

💜💚💜💚

[greengargouille]

AC x ML: Static, Part 1

((So... Do any of you guys remember when, more than one year ago, I posted something about Which Partner, and I mentioned something about an akumatized Mimura? And then I mentioned it here and there and never seemed to publish any actual content about it?

Well, one year, multiple changes on the costume/power idea and a lot of inspiration, I’m... still not done. But since it’s Which Partner’s second birthday, why not publish the first half as a way to mark the occasion? Besides it being a bad idea for editing in details I forgot, I mean.))

The days following a big project always had a special taste to Mimura.

The freed time was great, of course, nobody would argue that. And it was a relief not having to worry about his parents catching him working on that when he pretended to be studying (well, not so much pretending as not correcting them when they assumed it was the case). But, mostly? It was just the satisfaction of a job well done. One step further toward maturing his skills. Sharpening his vision and showing it to the world.

 …To think not so long ago, he was still settled on never letting others know about his amateur film productions. The second year of junior high certainly had dampened his enthusiasm over the creative process. If it wasn’t for Korosensei- if it wasn’t for becoming friends with other artists- he might have actually abandoned it all, letting this part of him rot and suffocate till he no longer felt anything toward cinema or directing. Falling into class E might have been what saved him.

 Still, nothing Mimura had ever done, even before that year, was comparable to how ambitious he has been this time. With how popular Ladybug and Black Cat were, not just on a town or prefecture level but actual national status due to the moon explosion theories making all of Japan aware of supernatural beings, any project related to them was sure to bring views. For this one-of-a-time opportunity, his work had to be flawless. He had spent days seeking the highest quality videos available on the two superheroes, pondering over and over on the music, the transitions… Even in his first year in the film research club, he never had spent so much time and effort in a single work- not for one of such a short length, at least. 

A fake trailer. By using fan footage of the akumatized fights and the TV news interviews of the town’s heroes, with some editing and a voiceover narration, making a pretend video for a movie about the miraculous holders. Especially tricky since he couldn’t go ask said holders to play out a scene for him to film. 

Boy did Mimura had felt his heart pound when he posted it online. He hadn’t been able to fall asleep without checking every five minutes if he actually posted the right thing, hadn’t made any glaring error or anything off-putting. And checking the ladybug forum for new messages and seeing the positive reactions… The excitement had kept him awake. Thankfully he posted it on Saturday afternoon and didn’t have to worry about dozing through morning classes. 

Still, this Sunday might be free of classes, but not of any event. As a sort of celebration- and partly because Mimura had put his social time aside while he worked-, the artist trio decided to hang out together at the mall and go see a movie. The boy wasn’t too sure about its potential quality, as he had very mixed feelings over the director’s previous works, but it was his first time making a horror story, and he was working with that music composer Mimura liked. 

“Hey, you guys! I didn’t make you wait too long?”

It was rare for him to be the last to arrive. Granted, whenever he went to an exhibit with Sugaya, the artist was dragging with him way too much supplies, a supplementary weight he brought ‘just in case’. God, how many times Mimura had to help him carry his stuff as they had to run away from the rain. Thankfully the boy had judged unnecessary to bring anything this time.

“It’s fine, don’t worry.” Okajima replied while getting up from the bench where he was waiting. “We’ve got largely enough time before the screening. -More importantly,” Sugaya interjected, “congrats for your video! I saw this morning, it was almost at fifty thousand views? -Wow, no way, let me check.” Okajima took his phone and started to type. “Well, there are a lot of people on the Ladyblog forum…” Mimura started to answer, all kinds of excuses rushing into his head. “Right, there was a lot of positive comments, wasn’t it? You deserve it.”

Mimura really didn’t know how to reply to that, and it was even tougher knowing Sugaya was probably sincere and he couldn’t brush it off as politeness. Being praised- having an undisputable achievement- those weren’t things he was used to. Not like this. Not on that.

But it’s not like he could deny he had done something, and that something was successful. How much time one had to wait for the other shoe to drop before having to admit they did a great job?

“…Thank you.” It was hesitant, but it was a start.

Sugaya replied with a smile, one of those soft smiles where he unconsciously tilted his head on the side, which made Mimura finally relax. It was fine. Maybe he did deserve it after all.

“Hm. Guys. You need to check that.”

Okajima turned his phone toward them. A single sentence, white over a dark screen. A single, ordinary sentence, one Mimura had read plenty of times; yet seeing it brought out an uneasy feeling, which increased as Okajima explicated the obvious:

“The video had been taken down.”

--

“It wasn’t great, but it was entertaining, at least.” Okajima commented before biting on his burger.

 Despite the unpleasant news, Mimura had insisted for them to go through what they had planned. After all, they were already close to the shopping mall, and just because he would skip a movie and fast food lunch, his video wouldn’t suddenly magically reappear. He would need to look into the details of it, of course. But, later. No need to rush. It wasn’t urgent. Nothing that mattered.

“I dunno, I feel like I wasted my time. Like, the special effects are clearly the main point of the film, but they felt uninspired.” Sugaya replied while grabbing some fries.

 Plus, a movie was distracting, which was welcome at this moment. No need to act before calming down. A great film would have been better, of course, one where Mimura could get immersed and forget all about his current worries as he analyzed it. That’s what he did back when his grades started to drop. It had bordered more on denial then, actually, ignoring the problem till he was too big to ignore, and at that point it was too late. But that wasn’t the case now. Because there was nothing to ignore. Just a silly little problem.

 “Yeah, I see what you mean. Instead of showing us the creature, it would have been better to leave it in the dark, it would have been scarier.”

 The thing was, Mimura didn’t have the authorization for some of the footage he had used. He had tried to contact whoever he could, all the small intrepid reporters that happened to be on place during an akumatized fight, but he had completely forgotten to check for the TV interviews. It wouldn’t have been a problem most of the time, but maybe, for a more popular video…

“There’s that, of course, but also the music, it was fine but I felt it wasn’t used very well? They should have just cut it at some place. I don’t really know how to explain… What do you think, Mimura?”

Or was it the music? He was pretty sure it was free of rights, was he mistaken? Either way it would be able to remake the video while cutting the faulty element. It was all structured together. He couldn’t correct it.

“…Mimura? -…Sorry, what? I was thinking of something else.”

Sugaya and Okajima shared a look of concern. Oh, that was what Mimura had wanted to avoid. Concern. He wasn’t especially upset- shouldn’t be, over such a trivial matter- but with all the akuma attacks over the town, everyone was a bit on edge over any potential crisis. Still, he was annoyed his friends would think he would break down over something so unimportant. Between the school’s ostracisation, the wall he had constructed between him and his parents, and now the assassination, he had gone through much more stressful. It’s not a little annoyance over a hobby that would change things. 

“…Dude,” Okajima said, “if you want to talk, we’re here, okay? -That’s great to know.” Mimura replied in a way he hoped was casual. “But I’m fine. I was just thinking about something else, that’s all.” He immediately switched on an excuse. “My father told me to stop at the convenience store on the way to buy something, but I couldn’t remember what. I think I should try to call him now before I forget. Can you guys watch my stuff? -Sure?”

Mimura got up from his seat and took his phone from his pocket while leaving the table, barely checking to see his classmates’ reactions. Only a phone call. It was normal to go outside- well, outside the restaurant at least, he wasn’t planning to leave the mall- when calling someone.

Right, that won him a few minutes to himself. Couldn’t do more, or that would be suspicious. He still had barely touched his own meal after all.

…Sometimes it was exhausting pretending to be fine. Mimura knew his face showed his emotions easily, and he wasn’t so smooth a liar he wouldn’t slip up if someone asked him directly what was wrong; he was more the kind to redirect the subject before said question came up. All of this… it made him feel resentful against those who were concerned over him, for all the stress that added to him. Couldn’t they just ignore him and leave him sulk? But at the same time, it was his own fault for feeling bad about the situation in the first place. Why did he had to invest so much into something that didn’t matter? Why did he had to bring his hopes up when it couldn’t be any different from usual? He should know by now he wouldn’t get any recognition for his efforts. It was stupid to think otherwise.

Mimura put back his phone in his pocket and felt a piece of paper inside that he took, intrigued. Ah, right, the movie ticket. Stupid movie. So bland and so overdone, so many things that would have been easy to fix- but he didn’t have any right to talk about that as an amateur, did he? God he hated this. Why did some people get so much money to make their movies while he was stuck seeing his videos taken down for some petty authorization- it’s not like he did anything bad with it, it wasn’t a whole song nor a complete footage- why did others got away with making mediocre works and his had to be perfect and it still wasn’t enough, why wasn’t he enough, he hated this, he hated them all, he hated- 

No, he had to calm down. It wasn’t the moment. Later, in private. No, not later. Never. Getting over it. He would close his eyes, breath deeply and count to three, and then everything would be fine.

One, two, three.

When Mimura opened his eyes, a dark butterfly just entered his field of vision.

 He barely had the time to register it, to see it land on the ticket without being able to react- And then it was sudden clarity. Pure feeling. All parasite thoughts numbed down to barely a whisper.

“Static”, a foreign voice spoke into his mind- and the name felt so fitting, somehow, “I am Kochou. I can give you the power to get revenge over the unfair treatment your videos have been given. I only ask for one thing in return. -The ladybug and cat miraculous.” Mimura- no, Static- completed, a smile on his lips. 

Sentences popped into his mind, distant, the shadow of a thought process. ‘Bad idea’. ‘What will others think of you?’ But, already, those words dissolved into the resolute feeling that had taken him.

“I accept with pleasure, Kochou-sama.”

 --

Okajima looked at the entrance, his fingers tapping on the table as he waited. Not necessarily for Mimura’s return, but… something. A form of acknowledgement on how the situation was wrong. 

Okajima thought of himself as an honest man. If he liked something, he had no problem saying it, even knowing his opinion was unpopular. If he disliked something, he would complain about it with all the frustration and anger he felt- even when his classmates thought he was overreacting. He was just that kind of person. True manliness was to be totally shameless no matter the topic. That’s why dishonest situations like this one didn’t sit well with him.

“Say”, he addressed Sugaya who seemed absent-minded, “what do you think we should do? -Walk around in the mall? There’s a clothing shop I would like to see. -Not what should we do after eating,” Okajima corrected with annoyance, “about Mimura. He’s clearly not taking the video thing well, despite how he refuses to admit it. -Oh.” His classmate just replied with a small sound. “So I wasn’t just imagining things then. -Well, yeah, that was very obvious. I kinda want to force him to talk just for that, but he might just close up even more and we will go nowhere. Plus, you know. That might just add even more negative feelings to the pile.”

Sugaya stayed silent, clearly uncomfortable with the subject. His fingers idly played with his straw, twisting it as he seemed lost in thought.

“I don’t know what to do.” He finally admitted. “Neither do I,” Okajima replied, “but you know Mimura better than me. Plus, you’ve been akumatized already, so you should know how he feels. -That’s… I don’t think it can apply. I mean, I wanted to be left alone, but look at what that did for me. Do you really think Mimura could be akumatized over this? -Eh, dunno. Honestly I feel like bad luck is also at play, but it’s not like you can tell how important something is to someone, even if it seems silly. A man’s passion should never be ridiculed,” Okajima added on a serious tone. “…Wow, that would sound so cool if it wasn’t from you. -Hey, what’s that supposed to mean? -…If Mimura feel bad over this, then I want to help.” Sugaya totally ignored Okajima’s last comment. “But I never had this problem before? Like, with Chiba I trusted him to come to me if he felt like I could help him with something? -Dude, no offense but Chiba ended in class E with us and neither of us saw it coming. -Well, I did say something I could help him with, not sure what I could have done.” Sugaya sighed. “You’re not totally wrong though, I felt bad about it. -What about the other guys then? Didn’t you hang out with people of the art club sometimes? -Them? I… am not sure they counted as friends? Like, in the first place it always was way more casual, and it soured up quickly anyways. Because I’m ‘too much of a troublemaker’. -Oh, yeah, so they were this kind of guys, uh? I know what you mean. -…So, yeah, I don’t have much experience dealing with this. I want to help and I feel like there’s something I could do, but nobody is telling me what. It’s frustrating.”

Okajima wasn’t sure either what it was that they could do, but fortunately the noise of a door brutally closed and a scream stopped the conversation before he had to reply. 

“AKUMA ATTACK!!”

He turned his head toward the entry door, that an alarmed woman was closing, clearly terrified by what she saw outside.

“An akuma… Shit, Mimura’s still outside. -What, do you think he…?” Sugaya didn’t dare finish his sentence. “I don’t know if it’s him, but if it isn’t then he’s in first line to be attacked. -Crap, you’re right.”

People around them were starting to panic, some already diving under the tables, other running towards the kitchens, probably hoping to find a back door. Honestly, Okajima was tempted to follow them. He didn’t know what super villain would appear, but it certainly wasn’t going to be a fun experience.

…But, he already had made his decision.

“Let’s go,” he said to Sugaya, walking towards the entrance.

--

Hayami had to pull her nails into the palm of her hand to keep her face calm.

In front of her, on the other side of the small plastic table, Nakamura was currently playing with her nesoberi plushie’s pigtails. A Ladybug nesoberi. She wasn’t sure what was flustering her most, that her friend was so fond of her new acquisition, or the fact that it was sold at all. 

“It’s obvious,” Nakamura explained, ignorant of the girl’s inner turmoil, “if you have the blueprints and material to make nesoberi in a factory, then you’re not going to stop at fifteen. Probably, the collab with the arcade was to see how popular they would get. Man, I kinda want to see what kind of face the fans who spent so much on the game will pull learning they could just have waited a few months instead, it will probably be hilarious. -You don’t say”, Hayami replied, impassive.

How would Nakamura react if she knew Hayami was such a fan. She would probably be too busy harassing me over how I’m a Black Cat fan. The endless teasing… Thankfully she was good at keeping a cool appearance. 

At first, when the two of them had planned an afternoon at the mall together, she had thought it would just be a relaxing moment between friends. Some shopping, maybe a movie, trying out the new purikuma booth, checking out from afar that children live stage performance the mall was organizing- she vaguely remembered Chiba mentioning accompanying his sisters to see it sometimes, and it had intrigued her- just silly fun activities two teenage girls would do on their weekend. To be perfectly honest, Hayami would have tried to include some homework into that schedule, but Nakamura had loudly complained about it, and with Tikki insisting so much lately about all the work she did, she hadn’t pressed further.

 She would have never expected they would end up facing a shop window full of Ladybug and Black Cat themed goodies. It kind of baffled her sometimes, how popular was her other identity. She and her partner were just a pair of local heroes doing their job. Maybe it was the magic? Of course people would be all over something that proved the existence of the supernatural. She had seen some topics speculating on the subject on the Ladyblog, but she might have underestimated their importance. Usually people ask us more about our relationship… Well, revealing anything about the Miraculouses to the public would be a big no-no, even more than some hints about their true identities, so it made sense that interviews gave up on that.

Still, Black Cat goodies… She would have to come back there, maybe with a disguise. And to think they would end up selling that nesoberi plush… Would she have tried to win one if she knew the exclusivity would only last for a few months? Probably.

God, I really fell hard for him.

“Hey, I’ve got an idea.” Nakamura grinned with a face full of mischief. “Can you take a photo with my phone? I’m going to kiss my Ladybug and send it to Okajima. -Wh- I- Don’t do that!”    

Seeing her friend’s surprise, Hayami knew she made a mistake. It was uncommon for her to get excited over something, and she had tried to keep her composure the whole conversation. But, how could she stay cool over this. The idea of Nakamura kissing Ladybug- it’s not like she talked about some distant celebrity after all. And then thinking that Okajima could do the same… Now that was giving her chills. 

“My, my, seems like someone is jealous.” Nakamura playfully reacted by swinging her nesoberi in front of Hayami. “Do you want to steal a kiss? I’m willing to share~ -That’s not the problem.” Hayami replied as calmly as she could. “Oh, so perhaps you want to kiss m- -It’s unhygienic,” Hayami interrupted her, knowing very well how her friend would twist her words if she let her speak, “and you’re going to give him bad ideas. -Eh, I’m probably not the first. Heck, I bet someone among those who got the first fifteen have done it at some point.”

Hayami immediately thought about the Black Cat nesoberi in her room, and had to focus back on the conversation before having any weird ideas. She was too mature for that. She couldn’t- No, she should think of something else. Plenty of people might have kissed my effigy at some point. Yep, that sure calmed her. Oh, how she wished she never had this conversation. Popularity was terrifying sometimes.

“Akuma alert.” A voice resonated through the speakers of the mall, interrupting the girl’s inner troubles. “Our customers are invited to go walk to the nearest exit. No need to panic. We repeat- -Urg.” Nakamura’s face soured. “Goodbye, relaxing afternoon. Let’s go before we get caught up in the crowd. -I…” Hayami started to speak, while her mind was getting into a highly alert mode. She needed an excuse “We didn’t pay for our drinks, go ahead while I do it, I won’t take long. -What? Hayami, you can’t be seri- -It’s important! No need to argue, we’re only losing time. Trust me, I will leave right after. -Geez, why do you have to be serious like that… Alright, but only if you go along with me the next time I get a fun idea. -Accepted.” Hayami was certain she would regret it. “See you in a few minutes.”

She didn’t wait for an answer and went right into the shop, straight to the bathroom, while getting pushed on the way by intrigued people trying to leave. Thankfully the stall was empty; she opened her bag, from which flew a very familiar red creature. 

“It’s too bad,” Tikki lamented, “you finally had a day to relax… -No need to feel bad about it. Tikki, spots on.”

The familiar surge of power filled her body as her clothes changed for her more practical hero suit. Time to get into Ladybug mode. It wasn’t complicated, honestly. The focus, her shifting perception, the strength that filled her muscles, everything contributed to her feeling like an entirely different person. Maybe the glamour supposed to make her unrecognisable played a part too.

Still, I need to play it safe. She counted the seconds in her head, and when she felt she had waited long enough, left the shop’s bathroom. Nobody was there anymore. Good. She didn’t have time to think of excuses for anyone who might have seen the young girl enter- she had an akuma to deal with.

--

Ladybug walked around the mall, ready to react to any upcoming attack and directing any civilian she saw toward the exit, when she finally spotted an unnatural thing. In front of her stood a giant foggy pile of inconsistent color, minuscule spots of black, white and grey all mixed together; it kinda reminded her of TV static, in a way. The pile, if that was the right word for an accumulation without a specific form, didn’t seem to have any weight to it, as if it was superposed to the air rather than a solid mass, but she knew better than to touch it to verify. Who knew what it did.

She saw a black silhouette move from the corner of her vision, and, sure enough, when she turned her head her partner jumped to her side. 

“Good afternoon to you,” Black Cat greeted her, then immediately switched to the main topic. “Any information on our villain of the day? -No, I just arrived.” Ladybug informed him, hesitating to say anything more, then decided she was silly for doubting her every word. “I’m glad you could come. I was wondering if you would be able to show up before the fight. -Yeah, I wasn’t sure I would be on time either,” admitted her partner. “I was nearby, but surrounded by… well, it’s not important.”

Ladybug looked at him, but said nothing. Civilians, friends, family… Many ways to end the sentence, and none that mattered. They couldn’t talk about their true identity.

“What do we do with this?” She pointed toward the foggy obstacle with a move from her head. “Good question.”

Black Cat looked around, his eyes settling on a deserted chair from some shop on the side. Ladybug already understood what he was thinking about, and didn’t feel any surprise when he walked toward it only to throw it into the fog.

“Doesn’t seems solid, but I didn’t hear anything hit the floor. -Try to see with another chair what happens if you only put one partially? -That was the next step of my experience, yes.” Black Cat smiled at her.

Despite the situation, Ladybug couldn’t help but feel her heart warm up at the boy’s soft face. They might be in potential danger at any point, but at least she got him by her side, and he seemed to appreciate them thinking alike as much as she did. Well, maybe not as much, but at least a little? It sure made things easier for both of them.

“Hmm, it doesn’t seem to melt.” The second chair, that Black Cat put partially in the fog, still was intact when they pulled it away. “I guess it’s like smoke? Let me try putting my hand in it.” He looked at Ladybug for approval. “…It might not be safe. -All the more reason that I do it rather than you. Plus, you can always heal me afterward. -…That’s not wrong, but…” She would rather not see him get hurt, of course. Surely he could understand that? “Don’t worry, it’s just a test.” He put his left hand in the fog- it would only be silly to risk his ring hand, after all- and took it out. “See? Nothing happened. Actually, I didn’t even feel any pressure or change. It might be safe to walk in. -Even if it’s some kind of gas, it might be toxic.” Hopefully no civilian was caught in the middle of it. “Hmm.” The boy nodded, his green eyes still on the fog. “Only one way to know.”

Black Cat took a step forward, and soon his head disappeared in the smoky thing. Ladybug was uneasy about this- her partner always was the one who took risks in those situations. It was logical, of course, she was the one with the power to fix everything, and so had to be the last standing at the end, but… she didn’t have to like it. What did the boy think about it? Was he secretly resenting her for this? This didn’t seem in his personality, yet it was still a possibility.

I wonder how the previous Ladybugs felt about it.

Multiple times her and Tikki had spoken about the precedent heroes. Their powers, their strategies, their allies; most notably, how they still found time to relax and have fun. But as for their feelings… It was a subject Hayami didn’t want to bring up. Even if they were different people, it would break her heart to hear they didn’t get along with their partner. What if it was the case, and Black Cat heard about it from his own kwami? Would he assume she was the same? Even though I love him. No, it wasn’t even that. She cared about him. More than her crush, he was the partner she had come to rely on. Anyone could feel attracted to him, but their bond was special, important, in a way that would be hard to explain. If he told her he loved her, but couldn’t trust her… that would be just as terrible as the opposite.

The boy eventually got his head out of the fog, his face expecting something. 

“…So?” Ladybug asked, unsure what he was waiting for. “…Didn’t you hear me? -No? Did you say something? -Yes? That’s weird. I can breathe inside just fine, but I can’t see anything. Or hear, now that I think about it. And I guess you couldn’t hear me either? Wait, let me check again.”

Once again the hero’s head disappeared in the fog. Did that thing block all light and sound? That would be inconvenient. What if the akumatized was waiting for them insi-

“Ladybug, behind you!!!” 

It was only thanks to her quick reflexes she was able to react immediately. Her full body rotated, her hand in a fist ready to hit, but the person quickly jumped out of the way, a jump too big for a normal civilian. An akumatized. The villain made no sound when his feet hit the floor, which was, as Ladybug suddenly noticed, covered in the same foggy substance as the one behind her. So that’s how they were able to approach without me noticing, this removed the sound of their steps.

She looked around quickly on what was the source of the voice that alerted her. A very familiar voice… Barely hidden behind a pillar, she apperceived Fuwa and sighed internally. The girl had said she wanted to start investigating for the Ladyblog, and nothing Hayami had said had been able to convince her it was a bad idea.

She gently tapped Black Cat’s arm to alert him of the change in situation, as he probably hadn’t been able to hear anything, but her eyes were fixated on the villain, who didn’t move from his spot. Which was for the best, as they were closer to Fuwa if they had wanted to take her hostage.

The most noticeable thing in the akumatized’s appearance, the one that immediately popped out, was the giant color bars on the chest area of the suit. Like a malfunctioning TV, Ladybug thought despite never having seen the phenomena -it was a thing of movies, on older televisions. The rest of the costume, on the opposite, was all monochrome, mostly grey with little square spots of black and white, white the extremities of the limbs were all black.

When she finally looked at their- at his face, Ladybug finally recognized who was her adversary. No way she couldn’t- they might not talk on a regular basis, but Mimura was a classmate, and he sat next to Nakamura in class, so the both of them sometimes spoke while she was around.                         

“Another class E student,” Black Cat commented next to her. So he recognised him? Uh. He must have a good memory. “Right, it’s as if alienating and bullying a specific group made them more likely to have negative emotions.” Ladybug deadpanned as an answer. “…Seems like you feel a lot about this, uh?” Her partner replied in a sympathetic tone. “I just don’t like their school’s system.”

She couldn’t allow herself to say more. She couldn’t make it personal. Even just mentioning she was part of that school, no matter the class, would be too revealing. So Ladybug bit her lips and did what she had always done when she felt helpless about a situation: focus on the work she could do instead.

“Show’s over, you guys.” Mimura spoke to them in a harsh tone. “Hand over your Miraculous. -…Why do akumatized even ask this? Of course we won’t give them to you. -Maybe they expect us to make a special offer if they insist enough.” Black Cat joked. “’Congratulations, you’re the 100th akumatized, here’s a special prize for you!’”

Ladybug would have rolled her eyes for joking in this situation if this was anyone else, but she couldn’t help have a little smile instead. It was part of her partner’s charm to make silly jokes and puns in a serious moment. Their current adversary didn’t seem to appreciate it, though; he seemed ready to attack, whatever that would mean for him. Did he have another power besides that weird static-like fog? It was hard sometimes to tell with akumatized what skill sets did they have.

“I know where the akuma’s hidden in!” Fuwa shouted, momentarily distracting Ladybug. “It’s in his l-“

Before she finished her sentence, Mimura jumped on the heroes, filling the space between them with the static-like substance from earlier.

Then, only darkness and silence.

[unkindrewind]

L A W S

* Charlie, his setting, and plot were all developed and conceived by myself and Bunny @gcrefxed / @killerxquccn. While we’re totally fine with others adding their characters into the setting / plot, it must be discussed first by either Bunny or myself. Theft will not be tolerated and WILL be called out.

* Unless it's something applicable to our muses collectively, Please reblog memes or posts in general from the source. I'm not a resource blog and if treated as one, especially by blogs who never interact, I will soft block.

* I will NOT interact with blogs that use youtubers, social media influencers, or anime / drawn characters for their Fcs. Nothing against you, it’s just not my thing.

* I will BLOCK personal blogs that reblog, like, or follow, as I like to keep interactions here between fellow rp mutuals. If you have an rp side-blog, let me know beforehand so I dont mistake you for a non -rp personal.

* I WILL NOT interact with minors. Given the content on this blog and the fact I’m an oldie, I just feel more comfortable writing with people of age, not to mention feel more comfortable exploring the darker / horror themes of this blog with adult mutuals.

* As stated I am MUTUALS ONLY,   meaning i will only write with mutuals. While I do greatly appreciate people following and showing interest, if i dont follow back there’s genuinely no hard feelings. Its not a slight against you or in any way me thinking less of your character or taking some weird high and mighty attitude but : 1. I just get very overwhelmed with an overly busy dash and need to be a bit selective to prevent my anxiety from going nuts 2. At the time, I'm not seeing a way or know how our characters could interact. You’re more than welcome to unfollow. Alternatively please dont feel obligated to follow back if I follow first, aside from understanding this blogs content might not be for everyone, i don't believe in follow for follow. So if you're not genuinely interested in writing, I'd prefer a soft block.  If you want to interact but don't follow me, chances are I’ll say no as I take following as a sign of interest. I may take a while to follow back as my notifications on here are the worst. If I don’t follow back within a weeks time, feel free to unfollow. .

T H R E A D S  /   P L O T T I N G

*  I love plotting. If given my way I'd be plot exclusive but I know that's not everyone's cup of tea. If you're ever interested in plotting, know I am already onboard.

*  If you want to turn a meme or ask into a thread, I’d prefer to be asked before hand. Simply because sometimes its nice to have memes just be stand alone things or for fun.              

  -   Additionally I take the memes I send in to others as just memes for memes sake as well, so if you want a thread to continue off one you'll have to let me know , otherwise I'm clueless.

S H I P P I N G   /   D Y N A M I C S

As of 8/14/20 Charlie is no longer open to romantic ships with female muses specifically, and will ship only with Bunny’s female muses: Irene @gcrefxed and Sarah @killerxquccn  , with her characters being detrimental in Charlie's story and to his character. Sarah specifically has always been the love of Charlie's life with the likelihood of anyone (beyond Irene) able to come close slim to none. This in no way means I will not interact with female muses or am being exclusionary  from this point; I always want to explore the multitude of subtleties in dynamics between Charlie and muses of every gender - even female muses having feelings for charlie, flirting with him etc - but dynamics with those female leaning will not result in anything romantic. Male muses, however,  are still open to the possibility of such a dynamic as that aspect to Charlies sexuality and character hasnt been delved into and I would find really interesting to explore. If you have any questions, feel free to ask! But please respect this decision and don't try to pressure or force me to change my mind as that will result in an automatic block. I ship based on chemistry between muses, but Im also very okay with pre-established dynamics (whether that be romantic, friends with benefits, enemies, platonic, familial, whatever!) Considering that can be a bit easier thread wise for some people instead of starting from the very beginning.  As with most things, I like to talk through it beforehand. If you have anything in mind, you're more than welcome to approach me! But I also reserve the right to respectfully turn things down or offer alternate options if things don't mesh.

S M U T

While I, and my muse, are of age, I’m not entirely comfortable writing smut unless it’s with a mun 1.) I know well and 2.) Is of age. So for the most part any if it all suggestive scenes will lead to a fade to black, time skip, etc.

T R I G G E R S

My muse being horror related there may be some triggers here. There will be mentions, and maybe -though rarely- the occasional image, of : Blood,  Violence , Murder , Serial Killers . Knives / Bladed weapons. I will ABSOLUTELY tag NSFW material [ with the tag nsfw > ] and triggers where applicable, though if you would like me to tag something specific to your needs or if there’s something I missed, don’t hesitate to let me know and I will do so right away!

M U N

* I write under the alias Nox! ( She/Her ) and I am of age

* i am a-okay with questions, especially about my muse! if you have any about anything at all i will be more than happy to answer them the best i can! 

* Also totally fine with random IMs! despite being spacy as hell sometimes, I love talking to people. Even if we havent talked or interacted  before, doors always open. I also have discord which I'll hand out to those I chat with and ask for it.

* I am very forgetful and easily distracted! Its the ADHD / Anxiety in me, added in with my irl stuff going on. Sometimes I forget to respond to IMs, but I promise it's not me ignoring you or a sign of disinterest [if we're mutuals, Im interested]. Dont be afraid to give me a poke if i take too long.     

    - Adding onto that I also have Depression . Which tends to put me in a bad headspace not only fairly often but fairly easily and makes me a bit tentative about trying to start things with others, based on bad past experience and my own mind being a bastard and thinking most people don't want to interact with me. So I promise, if we're mutuals, even if Im not sending things, I want to interact but probably being a clown and just afraid to while admiring you from afar until I can make a move. If you want to go ahead and go for it, I highly encourage it! Your best bet would be to approach me first.

* You can also find me on my other blogs:

@rapturcd // Bioshock OC

@fullcfwoe // CAOS OCs

@synthend // Cyberpunk OC

@sxnned // Demon  OC

@disowncd // Dylan Massett from Bates Motel

@clovcn // Lucifer from CAOS

R E S P O N S E T I M E / A C T I V I T Y

As it is i have a hard time keeping muse, just the way i am sadly. i know this is something a lot of people, myself included, can find frustrating (especially when you’re really into a thread) but a fair amount of the time i may take a while to respond. as much as i love this, aside from being a hobby, i have a chronic illness that makes me exhausted most days or just not in the mood to write and not in any kind of state to type out a response you lovely people would deserve. though i will always try to quickly reply when i can.

M E M E S

Yes. please. send as many as you want, as often as you want. Even if we haven’t interacted, you’re free to send one my way; They can be a great place to start things off.

P O S T L E N G T H  /  F O R M A T T I N G

 * I tend to use icons and small - but not super tiny-  text,  and usually some form of para, multi-para , or novella, but it really depends on my mood etc. Though all these things can vary : If you dont use icons, I can do iconless threads. If my formatting is too small, obnoxious, or hard to read, let me know! And I'll change to whatevers easiest to read. Want something short and sweet, mostly dialogue based? I can do that too. I go with the flow

* You don’t have to match my length in posts! sometimes i can write far too much when i get really into writing (and alternatively not write enough), so don’t feel obligated or pressured to follow suit by any means! whatever you are comfortable with is totally okay! it’s not a contest, this is all for fun.

G R A P H I C S / C R E D I T

* all icons and graphics are created by me unless stated otherwise

* icon psd by plutocommissions

* border by venuscomissions

Thank you sm for taking the time to read!

[jundeccentmil]

I hate to be that person but I'm on mobile and the link didn't work. Sorry.

dhjlgfajfghd that’s fair, lemme copypaste it onto a post 

   General Info

Jun’s characterisation on this blog may be influenced by my own headcanons. You don’t have to agree with them and I won’t hold it against you if you don’t, but please, don’t be rude about it. I’m sure there’s a lot of other Jun blogs out there that more closely resemble what you’re looking for.

This blog is independent, multiverse/multiship and non-exclusive. Despite it being non-private, I may be selective in who I roleplay with.

I accept magic anons. The current m!a status is displayed in the sidebar.I use rpthreadtracker to track threads.I don’t have xkit.My timezone is CET and activity will most likely reflect that.

Please note that this is a side blog. If I follow, send asks, or like or comment on posts, it’ll have to be from my hub: viomuses.

   An Important Note on Mental Health

I don’t follow a lot of people because I have really bad anxiety around following (ask me about this if you want to know more), so it’s unlikely that I’ll follow you unless we’re really close friends and/or regular writing partners. This is something I am actively working on, as I do want to be more involved in the community. As things are though, me not following back does not automatically mean I’m not interested.

When things get too overwhelming, I will password protect this blog. This is usually temporary, and I will return after a while. IM won’t work during that time.

   What I’m willing to RP

I will write anything from angst to banter to humour to fluff, but be warned that some things come more naturally to this muse than others.

I will rp with:

YuGiOh characters - that includes other Juns, GX is preferred since I’m not as familiar with other generations

characters from other fandoms I know - Don’t be afraid to ask if I know a fandom or not. Just don’t be mad if I don’t.

characters from fandoms I don’t know - I live under a rock, so I might not know anything about your fandom and character. If you don’t mind that, the same things apply as for OCs.

OCs - Please have an about page that allows me to learn about the character. I’m picky about OCs.

I will roleplay nsfw themes, but I won’t write smut with you unless you’re over 18. Any nsfw content will be tagged as such.

I will not rp with genderbends due to personal reasons. There might be exceptions to that rule, so feel free to ask, but please don’t be upset if I refuse. Trans hcs do not fall under this category.

I will not write therapy plots unless I initiate them on my own terms.

   What about Shipping?

Mun is filthy multishipping trash and will write almost anything.

That being said though, I don’t rp just to ship, and would like to take the time to properly develop our muses’ relationship instead of just rushing things for the sake of a ship. I don’t mind working with established relationships though, as long as we’ve talked about it first.

This blog doesn’t have Exclusives, but it does have Mains. They can be found here.

   On the Subject of Triggers

I’ll do my best to tag common triggers and squicks when they occur, using the tags “insert-trigger-here tw”. Please tell me if I miss anything.

If you could tag any visual depictions of human teeth, as well as visual and written teeth-related body horror, I’d be very thankful. I’d also appreciate if you could tag the urls of people you thread with, and any group verses you’re a part of (if applicable).

If we’re writing partners it would be nice if you could do this even if I don’t follow you, since I tend to check the blogs of people I thread with manually.

   And lastly, a few basic Guidelines

I would like to keep my thread count at a maximum of three per partner at any time. If a fourth thread is started I will keep the reply in my drafts until one of the ongoing three is either completed or dropped. Exceptions to this rule may occur.

I don’t expect you to match my length, and probably won’t be able to match yours either. My replies are often relatively short and to the point, and I find it hard to make them any other way. I will try if matching is important to you, but please forgive me if I can’t.

Please enable non-followers to contact you via IM if you want to rp with me. (Unless you’re following me and have things set up so I’ll be able to contact you. The point is that we should be able to communicate.)

If you want to interact with Jun from a specific timeline/verse, please specify which one. If nothing is specified, I’ll default to my main verse.Here is a list of my verses.

Tag me as ‘jundeccentmil’.Tagging me in random things is absolutely okay and makes me feel appreciated.

Reblog Karma is in effect! If you don’t want to send stuff in, it’s not that hard to reblog from the source.

Please do not steal the icons that are used on this blog, or the images used in this blog’s theme and pages. They are all cropped and edited either by me or for me so don’t use them for yourself.

This isn’t a hard and fast rule, but I’d prefer if you didn’t use the reply feature for interactions, as those are a hassle to respond to. Asks and reblogs are much easier to work with for me, especially in large quantities.

The memes and open starters on this blog don’t have an expiration date, so it’s perfectly fine to send an ask based on a meme I reblogged months ago, as long as you make it clear which meme your ask is for. Event-based memes and starters are an obvious exception.

If you don’t like my reply or think you can’t properly work with it, it’s totally fine to ask me to change it and I’ll do my best to fix/improve it for you.

Uni homework/personal problems/life in general is a thing, but I try to be as quick and regular with replies as I can. Feel free to gently poke me when you think I might have forgotten about something.

English isn’t my native language. Don’t hesitate to point out mistakes I make, but please be polite about it.

Basically, just don’t be a dick. Please.

   More to be added if it becomes relevant.

[leagueofskully]

Rules for everyone not able to see the actual side, click on the tiny thingies, etc - and for me, if the browser crashes while I edit them to fit the thing

Basics

Don't be a scumbag. 

What does that mean? No random witch hunts out of personal vendettas, no starting wars about ships of any kind, no hating on Ocs (duh) or the insulting/hating on the portrayal of other people – simply put, I don't wanna be pulled into a war, especially yours. Your character can be the biggest piece of shit on the world, I really don't mind, go ahead but I really have little to no time to deal with people who make fun of others just to feel better with themselves.

Drama-Llamas: 

If you want to pick a fight, you won’t have any success here.

Godmodding:

No, thank you. However I'm perfectly fine if you decide to write what would happen if the plan of your character succeeded to lengthen your posts. I do that too after all.

As it stands – do not control my character. Unless agreed upon or for scenery changes aka moving from one place to another. For the sake of timeskips, scene skips, etc this is fine.

Relationships: 

Don’t just assume a certain relationship to my character. You can always ask me and I’m totally fine if your character knows mine, especially if you're Black – or Overwatch, just don't expect them to be official lovers, friends or family. Everything else? Is fine. I won't forbid you to have a purely visuals based crush on Feral, for example. He has one on a certain Blackwatch member too, so there's that.

Please don't be intimidated by me. I'm as scared of you, as you are of me – probably more even.

On writing

Selectivity:

I'd love to write with everyone but my anxious mind and horrible self-perception causes me to turtle and avoid reaching out. Even more so if a try for interaction ends in being ignored. So, if you want to write with me – are interested in Feral, by all means, come at me, send a meme, as random as it may be as long as it isn't romance or smut related I'll figure something out – and likely return to bother you later on. Still, all things combined I can be counted as semi-selective.

Universes/Alternative Universes/Crossovers

Given Feral is already – in one way or another – an AU version of my main RP character I'll limit interactions to the Overwatch universe and/or my AU verses listed under verses. If your character still works in these scenarios – as in for Overwatch a somewhat dystopian futuristic setting that I always feel hesitant to call Cyberpunk, you're more than welcome! Just please don't be upset if Feral might call your Robot character an Omnic.

More on verses

As it is now I operate on the following principle: Each version of Feral has one main verse. What this means? Everything that happens in the Blackwatch Era is in one Universe, everything that happens in the Recall universe is also one universe, and so on.

Duplicates

If I ever happen to get into the situation to RP with duplicates of canon characters, I'll break the former rule and set up multiple verses to the time era. I might then set up Mains though.

Activity

Hi, I'm slow and my mental health is giving me hell. Together with my other problems I tend to not get myself motivated to write, so when I say I'm slow, I mean I'm really, really slow. My sense of time is all kinds of fucked up and 90 days can feel like a week to me when it comes to writing. I'm sorry about that. I'm not disinterested, just fucked up.

Length:

From one line to paragraphs it really depends, on my mood, the alignment of the moon, how much something triggers Feral basically. Most of my writing is his thoughts because I like exploring those, so if you are one of those 'If I can't hear it anyways it doesn't belong into the RP' kinda people, you won't be happy here. You don't have to match my eventual wall of text anyways – as long as it feels like you put effort into it, that is.

Memes | Starters | and so on

Are free for everyone unless stated otherwise, or if they are smut. But please don't like starter calls if you will ONLY write ONE single reply and ignore the thread from there on. I hate that. Also don't like starter calls if you will never answer on the offered post – or at least tell me you don't know what to do with it. Otherwise you'll only shatter my motivation to write anything.

If you reblog a meme, please send something in or reblog from the source. I can understand if you don't wanna leave an IC meme but if it's just informative asks towards the character? It takes a second to send one random symbol in and save the day of a person.

Ocs:

I like Original Characters, more than canon ones at times. The universe has enough space  for unknown relatives, other former Overwatch members, civilians, random passerbys, superheroes and so on. Ocs give a universe more life and I like that. So you're welcome here.

Minors:

You are welcome here but I am not responsible for you. If you choose to look at content not suitable for you, it's not my fault. But I'll do my best to make avoiding it easy.

Everything nsfw will be tagged! Innuendos and gross flirting however will not. Everything going beyond that, naked skin, descriptions, getting turned on by danger and or violence will be tagged by my nsfw tag. Everything getting a definitive mature/R-rating gets my tag AND the nsfw tag, just to be sure.

NSFW:

I am of age. Feral is of age. Still, given not a single nsfw thread (smut) of mine has EVER been finished. I'll just resort to accepting the unsaid truth that I just suck at smut rp and I will probably not pursue them any further. Allow me a second of salt here: Thanks past people, I got it now.

Violence, innuendos, invitations for sex will be here plenty. Feral's young version has a very twisted worldview that drives him towards a very promiscuous, risky and unhealthy lifestyle. Whatever it takes to not having to sleep alone.

And that should be enough warning for:

triggering content:

Feral's past is a mess ranging from child abuse, cannibalism, violence, murder, twisted worldviews, mutilation, body horror and other things. His future, aka Recall Feral isn't any better. And both will mention snippets of their life from now and then.

I'll do my best to tag those. Due to my vast uncertainty what might be triggering to people, I'll put a general 'dark places' tag on everything I deem eventually uncomfortable to people.

Shipping:

Shipping with Feral?

Is easier than you might expect – and oh so much harder than it will seem. He crushes easily, if you're after bedding him? Just be nice and he'll offer himself up anyways just to make your character stay. Pursuing romance however is a completely different deal. Your muse will have to work for it. It takes time, understanding and care. At least for the Blackwatch version. And due to the timeline of the blog, he will have lost your character one way or another in the Recall verse. Which is likely rather unlovable.

As a general note? Shipping is only enabled for Blackwatch Feral but I won't deny you the fun of trying to get Recall Feral back if you managed to win over his younger version

multiple partners?!

Feral is polyamorous. So if you're fine with polyamorous ships? Great! He likely won't have a problem with it. If you are not. Your character will have to explain it to him. So unless that conversation has been held, all ships will be in the same verse! Unless with duplicates of course.

How to pursue a ship:

See if the characters work out, just let it flow. Be courageous. If your muse tries to make a move on Feral and he doesn't want to, he will let you know. While it's really nice that people come to me and ask “would ship xyz work?”, I kinda feel like it's betraying the character. I'd rather let Feral have the choice than me.

Other blabla:

Feral's opinions aren't mine. Seperate RP from real life – meaning, if he hates your character, we could still be good friends.

I'm really awkward. I have a hard time talking to people unless they clicked with me or it is about one of my obsessions. Those being shadowrun, megaten, dragon age and some random animes I watched. But even those might not work at times.

English isn't my mother tongue and I suck at grammar. His fucked up accent during dialogue is intended though.

Also, hey, if you feel better with showing you read those, why not Like this?

[lichlairs]

Checkout our new post over at https://lichlair.com/daily-monster-45-drowner-witcher-week

Daily Monster #45: Drowner (Witcher Week)

Surprise! We’ve been working on this one for a little while now. Here’s the thing, in view of the TV show and with half of our writers taking to replaying the video games, some of us looked at each other and went “you know what would be cool? Witcher week” and so here we are. Expect more Witcher related articles for the rest of this week! But for now, let us begin the departure from our regular dndbeyond schedule with the…

Drowner

That’s right! For our first Witcher Week bestiary entry we have none other than the biggest pest in the game! Humble beginnings and all, am I right?

As a bit of a disclaimer, this week’s monsters are not part of the Dungeons and Dragons world and as such have no official stats. I’ll be using Regerem’s Book of Beautiful Horrors which you can find over here.

The basics

Now that that’s out of the way, these are the two sets of stats presented for us:

That’s right! I can actually give you pictures of these ones rather than rambling about numbers like I usually do!

As you can see, we have two versions of this creature just like in the games. Speaking of “in the game”, these monsters originally fall under the necrophage category hence their ending up as undead.

Part of me wanted to question just how stealthy these statblocks make them but then I remembered my experience playing the games and… yeah, that checks out; call me a wuss but, even though they’re pretty easy to handle even on Death March (highest game difficulty setting) I’ve still gotten a couple of jump scares.

I think Regerem did some great work with this book and translating the creatures into Dungeons and Dragons statblocks, but I still have to point out that 22 hit points for a CR 1/2 creature that is known to show up in sizable groups might just be a little too much. I’d definitely consider lowering their hit points just a bit unless your party has some good sources of radiant or fire damage.

Let’s talk about features; the regular old Drowners get Pack Tactics, which, again, can be pretty scary for low level adventuring parties but that’s their one and only passive ability. As for the Drowned Dead or stronger variant of today’s monster, they don’t get Pack Tactics but a nasty Blood Frenzy feature that grants them advantage on damaged targets. We also get this bit:

You know? I’ve never had one of my characters straight up drown but now I’m kind of worried.

My only qualm with this is that I think it’s a little too similar to the regular Drowner’s Drag Under attack and makes it kind of moot, but hey, at least it’s still kind of thematic and it does free them up to simply dish out some damage with their Claw attack instead and I suppose it’s a passive ability.

On the complete opposite side of the spectrum, I think my favorite thing about these statblocks is the fact that the Drowned Dead have a reaction for Uncanny Dodge! I’m a firm supporter for monsters having more things in their arsenal.

If you want to check out their full stat blocks I definitely recommend taking a look at the Book of Beautiful Horrors.

The lore

One of the things I’ve always loved about this series is the heaps and heaps of lore that we get for even the weakest, least important of things. It is no different for today’s monster. In fact, I can tell you that there are plenty monsters from official D&D content that don’t get nearly as good a treatment in any of the various editions. Take note, D&D!

Why don’t we start with a bit of mythology? Drowners take inspiration from Slavic stories of vodnik: water spirits described as frog-like humanoids with green beards and black fish scales, and while this doesn’t quite match their video game counter part, the next part certainly does; when angered, vodniks are notorious for breaking dams, drowning the local townsfolk, and even taking their victims as slaves.

If we are to believe the various entries in the video game’s lore sections, Drowners are the result of those who drown or have their bodies tossed into lakes, rives, and such. Depending on whether you were a simple peasant back when you were alive or a notorious criminal you might end up as a Drowned Dead instead; a particularly strong and dangerous variants of the same monster.

These creatures inhabit all kinds of bodies of water, from the ocean and swamps to the towns abandoned well, and are specially active during storms or rainy seasons. They feast on any scraps or carcasses that they come upon but won’t hesitate to ambush any travelers or passersby who walk close enough to their watery lairs.

Although a single Drowner is no threat for most people able to handle a weapon, these monsters are known to work in packs upwards of three of them and prove surprisingly difficult to hit with their fast movements and slippery hides.

It’s important to note that, as reflected in their low intelligence, these creatures cannot speak any languages and don’t seem share any sort of society among them except for perhaps following the command of the stronger Drowned Dead.

The execution

First, for the sake of my sanity, I just have to point out that these things are a goddamned pest in the games; they’re absolutely everywhere so unless you want to make your players quit the campaign after rolling for encounters with these guys three times a day I would definitely consider making them just a tad more uncommon in your game. That said, one of my main goals for Witcher Week is to try to capture that special flavor, that je ne sais quoi that makes the world of the Witcher series so special. Here’s my idea: an escort mission.

As your players reach the nearby swamp area, they come across a bit of a sight: a caravan of merchants (or nobles, your pick) that has stopped in the middle of the road and a handful of NPCs arguing amongst themselves next to it. Our valiant heroes learn that, although crossing the swamp is the only way to reach the next city, the caravan’s drivers are more than a little on edge about doing so, what with the recent news of people going missing in the area. Upon seeing our heroes approach and noticing their weapons and armor, they offer payment in exchange for being safely escorted across the swamp.

I would definitely make sure to set up a few noncombat hints of what’s about to come as the players start treading into the swamp; maybe have them find an empty campsite with drag marks towards the murk or a few decomposing bodies here and there, but our main encounter would come in a bit later.

To make for some interesting terrain, I think I would have my Drowners ambush the party as they are halfway through crossing a low bridge but you could technically set up this encounter along the road if you prefer. You should do your best to make the players understand that the key here is that their characters must defend caravan. This way you could have a few Drowners whose sole focus is dragging down the NPCs rather than attacking our adventurers. Will your players defend their charges or will they focus on themselves? Choices one of the things that makes playing Dungeons and Dragons so unique.

Depending on your party level or how mean you’re feeling that session you could also add in a couple of Drowned Dead, just keep in mind that this might mean rolling for your NPCs as well.

Did you enjoy our first article for Witcher Week? Are you excited to see what else we have in stores for this week? Why not head over to our social media and make sure you’re following us there? We post new content every week and would love to hear your thoughts on it.