#so now it's updated with the guest writer's name :)

[myownwholewildworld]

12. MORNING DEW

chapter 11 | ao3 | series masterlist | chapter 13 (soon)

pairing: post-outbreak!joel x f!reader. summary: you and joel need to discuss what the future might look like for the both of you. whether that's together or on your own. a/n: HI! please accept my apologies, i know it's been like a month since i last updated this series. but fret not, here's chapter 12! hope you guys like it. as always, i appreciate comments, reblogs and likes, they keep us writers well fed and motivated! take care, lovelies <3 x warnings: 18+, mdni. fluff, some angsty hurt/comfort. smut because i got my period halfway through writing this. fingering. handjob. oral (m!receiving). edging. soft dom/sub dynamics. brief references to attempted suicide and attempted SA. reader is female, no other description given. reader is mid-late 20s, joel is 37. no use of y/n.  joel’s and reader’s pov. and a special guest’s pov too 👀 dividers by @\saradika-graphics w/c: ~6.5k. taglist aka the drama wagon at the end of the chapter (let me know if you want to be added/removed from the list pls!)

It never seemed to be the proper time to speak to you, Joel thought. Ever since his fuckup last night, he had struggled to find the words, to explain what his thought process was. A few hours ago, he had talked himself into ripping off the plaster and apologise to you, but when he called your name and you turned around with a composed expression, he froze in place.

He didn’t want to lose you too. Joel was afraid he would say something wrong again that would push you even further away from him. And then he would truly be alone, all because of his own actions, his own words. That fear clamped around his throat, preventing him from saying anything. From reaching out.

It was stupid, really. He knew that. Knew you were expecting him to say something, anything. Your blank expression was just a façade, a wall you had built around your heart so he wouldn’t hurt you anymore.

Joel hated himself for it, for your concealed hurt. Hated he had broken that trust between you two and made you feel like he was no longer on your side. He was, always had been, always would be. But he had let fear come between you, an abyss so vast he didn’t think it was salvable. It had to be though ― couldn’t be any other way.

The possibility of being a father again laid in front of him like a path full of dangers. Joel understood how much he could lose, because he had already lost Sarah. How suffocating that experience had been ― still was, every single fucking day.

He was frightened to go through it all over again. Having to hug another dead child of his; having to witness the light flicker away from her eyes. Sarah had been his everything ― his hope, his pride, the love of his life, the reason he would wake up in the morning to go to work, counting his blessings. And it didn’t matter in the slightest how good she was ― she was taken regardless. This world was cruel and unjust and greedy.

But there was also a sliver of hope, of dull excitement, shimmering underneath. One he wouldn’t allow himself to feel.

He still felt like a failure of a father who could not protect his baby girl when she needed him most. That emotional baggage would forever be with him. And he wanted it that way, because it meant he still remembered. This grief he carried was a reminder of the love he held. And he hoped it stayed with him, that she would stay with him.

Joel could still vividly remember digging with bare nails the grave Tommy had prepared for her. Elbow’s deep in the dirt, his fingers reaching for her as thick tears blurred his vision. The wails ripping his lungs apart, leaving his throat raw and tender. And Tommy hugging him from the back, arms clamped around his shoulders ― crying, begging him to stop.

“Little Sarah is resting now.”

“Let her be, Joel.”

“Stop unburying her, dammit!”

“I’m sorry, truly sorry. God I can’t―”

“She’s at peace now, Joel. No more suffering.”

Tommy’s slurry voice still filled his ears. His little brother had tried his best to comfort him, but at that moment in time, Joel had been too blinded by the gut-wrenching pain, the unbearable loss. He never really thanked Tommy for that. Never thanked you for stopping him from killing himself either.

Being an ass to the people he loved, apparently, was his only strength. Just like he had been with you when you needed him most.

Joel watched you as you struggled to unzip your sleeping bag, the soft material catching on the serrated teeth. You yanked the pull, almost snapping it from the slider, mumbling something to yourself.

He covered your tiny hand with a broad one of his, lightly squeezing your fingers.

“Let me help,” he muttered as you leaned back away from him.

Your subtle physical rejection stung, but he knew he deserved it. His hurt was nothing in comparison to yours.

Letting go of the bag, you faked looking for something in your backpack, avoiding his eyes when they searched for yours. Joel felt that the void between you only grew and grew, like darkness gaining ground to the light outside.

Could he mend your relationship? Your trust? Your love?

With careful hands, Joel managed to release the pinch on the fabric and tested that the zipper worked how it should do. When he glanced up at you, handing over the sleeping bag, Joel caught the rawness in your eyes, the slight dampness clinging to your eyelashes like morning dew on a petal at dawn.

It was now or never. He was hurting from seeing you hurt. Couldn’t take it any longer, he just had to say something, apologise to you. Ask to start the conversation all over again. One more second of this and he would lose his goddamn mind.

“Sweetheart, I―,” he managed to say out loud.

“I’m tired, Joel,” you quickly interrupted him. “Just wanna go to bed now, if you don’t mind.”

Your words were like a sobering, cold shower after a few beers ― stopped him right in his tracks before he could even begin to express what he wanted to say. Slightly shocked, Joel watched you fiddling around with your sleeping bag before you got inside it and turned around, facing away from him.

His slack jaw was soon gritting. But that brief anger quickly shimmered away when reality started to set in.

Perhaps he had misread the whole situation; perhaps you were not waiting on him to talk.

Perhaps you were past that ― past him, his bullshit and his doubts.

Perhaps your relationship was truly beyond salvation.

He paled in the face of such possibility, his hands shaking as they gripped his own sleeping bag.

Joel was up almost all night, eyes transfixed on you as his brain worked out all scenarios.

You faked falling asleep, but rest evaded you for hours until you finally gave in to exhaustion. Didn’t last long though, because a couple of hours later, you were, once again, wide awake.

The whole situation with Joel was overwhelming. You had hoped he would come to the car as soon as you left him behind, but he didn’t. Then that night you waited for him to say something, anything, and yet again, he didn’t. Not a fucking word when you both woke up this morning either, except for your name falling from his lips like a regretted whisper. Then complete radio silence and nothing else.

The silence treatment he had given you today was unbearable. Even if your doubts had lingered, pushing you to postpone the inevitable, deep inside you had hoped his reaction would be different. Shocked, yes, but then he would be… perhaps not happy, but at least a bit more excited? And after the shock had worn off, he would have soothed you, calmed you, told you everything was gonna be alright.

Maybe you had expected too much of Joel, your little delusion blinding you. After all, he had already lost Sarah. So now, in retrospect, this announcement might have unearthed bad memories, but especially regrets.

Was that it? Had you unburied his most primal fear? You had been so focused on what laid ahead, you had not stopped to consider what laid behind ― what this would mean for Joel. You had briefly contemplated he could perhaps see this as a blessing or a curse, but didn’t dwell too long on the thought, preoccupied as you were with other pressing matters.

You felt sick and it had nothing to do with pregnancy.

And then, when he had tried talking to you before going to bed, you had shut him down. But you were so tired, so mentally drained, you didn’t have an ounce of energy left to deal with a conversation like that. Because you truly didn’t know what he would say ― he wore such an impassive expression on his face, it was really difficult to tell.

You turned on the hard, creaky, wooden floor and faced Joel. One of his arms was resting on the wooden planks, extended towards you, as if he was trying to reach for you in his sleep.

You were in an abandoned cabin just outside Oswego. It was bare and completely stripped of furniture, but at least had a roof that would protect you from the cold, wet weather outside. It also had a covered chimney, but being so close to civilisation, it had to stay put out. Sleeping in the bag was not ideal, but it kept you warm.

Taking a deep breath, you then felt some sort of cushion under your neck that had not been there before you fell asleep. By touch, you realised it was one of those inflatable travel neck pillows that you had seen people use in airplanes. Frowning, you gathered Joel must have found one and tucked it under your head in your sleep.

You carefully studied Joel’s handsome, weathered face from the safety of your sleeping bag. Even in his sleep, his eyebrows were bunched together, a deep wrinkle ploughing through his skin almost permanently, giving him a worried look. His aquiline nose was buried in the fabric of his sleepsack, his long eyelashes caressing the top of his cheeks.

He would roll his eyes at you every time you called him “gorgeous” or “handsome”, but he really was. You loved to tell him, to help him see through your eyes. You knew he sometimes needed to hear it, to remind him of his own humanity. It was normal to lose sight of it in the current world you lived in.

And you loved him, the whole of him and his ghosts, even though he was a tactless prick sometimes. You had come to learn that when cornered, Joel could react like a beaten dog ― crouched back and showing teeth, ready to bite at the slightest provocation. Couldn’t blame him, even if you tried.

Feeling restless, you carefully unzipped your sleeping bag, not wanting to wake Joel up, and put your boots on. God knew you both needed some rest. Silently you stood up and stretched your back and arms, then one hand mindlessly stroked your belly. It wasn’t swollen at all, but the idea of a life growing inside you sat snugly in the back of your mind.

“What are we going to do, little one?” you whispered to yourself before grabbing your coat.

Needing some fresh air, you walked outside in the middle of the freezing night. It had been snowing, because there were at least three inches of white fluff blanketing the ground. Which meant the car battery could quickly drain and leave you stranded, so you went to check on the hidden Jeep.

Joel’s body jerked uncontrollably, one leg shaking as if he was falling off a cliff. Instantly waking up, he nervously looked around him, trying to recall where he was.

His hand patted the wooden floor in the dark, and when he located your sleeping bag, his breathing hitched at finding it empty. Then he heard the front door creaking, a sliver of moonlight coming through.

Were you leaving him in the middle of the night? Had he completely broken your trust, your relationship? Had he no chance of mending his mistake? Were you so hurt you would go without a word, without saying goodbye?

God knew he deserved it. He wasn’t cut for a relationship; he always ruined it. Should have known better than falling for you and giving in, but you were so warm, so effortless to love, so natural… How the fuck could he not? He was only human after all.

With a deafening pulse in his eardrums, he kicked the sleeping bag off as he got up with jerky, edgy motions, running towards the door to stop you from leaving him. For you he would fight, he would give you a whole motherfucking speech of why he loved you and how sorry he was. He at least had to try.

Joel swung the door open, and a frosty breeze greeted him, his skin bristled almost painfully at the feeling of frostbite.

You were walking through the snow, wrapped in your coat and with the hood on ― you looked so ethereal, your side profile bathed by the moonlight like a night fairy. Your features glowed under the lunar lustre, and he couldn’t help but fall for you even more.

Barefoot he followed you, his soles numb after a few steps through the snowy mud.

“Babe, wait,” he muttered, one hand reaching for your elbow.

You startled at his touch, and Joel didn’t know if it was rejection or that he had surprised you.

Your big, beautiful eyes widened when you saw him there. You wore a tired expression, and he knew himself the culprit.

“Where are you going?” he questioned in a whisper, heart still and lungs empty.

“I―”

“Please don’t go, don’t leave. I can do better. I’m sorry,” Joel stumbled with his words.

Had never felt this exposed as he was about to split his core in half, to undress emotionally in front of someone, allowing himself to be hurt by the only person it mattered.

But it had to be done to keep you by his side. So he did.

“I panicked. I wasn’t expecting― it didn’t even cross my mind that you… well, could be pregnant. It caught me so off guard, the news didn’t sink in. I’m sorry I reacted like a fucking idiot; I know I’ve disappointed you because of it. It’s just… ‘s hard, you know?” Joel swallowed to dissolve the dense knot forming in his throat, “I already had a shot at fatherhood, and I fucking blew it. I couldn’t protect her despite loving Sarah with all my heart, so the possibility of having to go through all that heartache again… I just, I don’t―”

Joel took in a deep, trembling breath as he unconsciously palmed his broken wristwatch, trying to soothe himself. He attempted to read your expression ― your lips pursed and eyes teary. Was he breaking your heart even further? You were about to cry, and he didn’t know if that was a good thing or a bad one.

Anxiety was taking hold of his throat and gut, strangling him.

“Look, I’m not gonna lie to you. I’m fucking scared, so scared I don’t think words do it justice. But I’m also thrilled, baby, I swear I am. I owe it to you, to myself, to this baby of ours… I ain’t going nowhere. Wherever you go, I’ll follow you both,” he husked, almost breathless. “I’m sorry I said what I said. Neither of us have a choice, but even if we did… I wouldn’t change a thing. This baby is happening for a reason and whatever that is, I’m all in, come what may. I love you, I really do, and I hate myself for having hurt you like this. I just suck at expressing my feelings and―”

You placed a gentle hand on his naked forearm, which made him lose track of what he was saying. Your fingers gently squeezed his cold flesh as you took a step closer to him. Your free hand slid across his left hip, dipping under the tee shirt he was wearing, until it reached the small of his back and you pushed him towards your body.

His taut muscles visibly relaxed at your touch and hug, his lungs filling up as he drew in the deepest breath of his life. Wrapping his arms around you, he held you close to his chest, chin resting on the crown of your head.

“Joel, I wasn’t leaving,” you murmured, cheek nuzzling against him, a tentative smile lingering on your mouth.

Joel’s eyebrows knitted together. From his perspective, it was more than obvious that you were actually leaving.

“Oh? I thought―”

“I was just going to check on the car battery since it’s freezing out here,” you interrupted him, glancing up at him.

Joel pursed his lips together, then licked them nervously.

“Well, everything I said still stands. I am truly sorry, sweetheart,” he said, mouth lightly pressed on your forehead.

A deep sigh after, you took a step back, your hand travelling from his forearm to his fingers, intertwining them with yours. Your palm was so warm in comparison to his, he just realised how little clothing he had on.

“For being a man who “sucks” at expressing his feelings, dare I say you’ve just spoken like a professional orator?” you jested, a grin curling the corners of your lips. “And I am sorry for not being straightforward with you. I was afraid of how you would take the news, and, well…” you shrugged, “you can’t blame me, can you?”

Joel shook his head vehemently. He definitely couldn’t ― the proof was there for both of you to see.

“But I understand how frightening this is for you. I can’t even begin to comprehend how you must have felt when… when Sarah left us. I was so blinded by my own insecurities, I didn’t dwell for too long on how this would affect you emotionally. So I apologise and―”

“Don’t. Don’t apologise, please. That’s a pain for me to bear, you shouldn’t have to think about it.”

“But I do, Joel. I want to bear it with you, so you don’t have to do it alone. That’s the whole point of this, of us. After all, we are going to be a family now,” your voice dropped to a low hum.

A pang of nerves traversed his stomach. No, not a pang, more like… butterflies? Joel had not felt that―the purest form of ecstasy―in a long, long time. The idea of being a dad… it always called him, always felt like that was what he was meant to be, nothing else. Sarah had been the center of his world and while no one could ever change that for him, the possibility of having another child to shower with the love he had buried… it was so overwhelming it brought tears to his eyes, his breathing shallow.

“A family,” he repeated, voice raspy with emotion.

You nodded and laughed, teary eyes too.

“A family, Joel. You’re gonna be a dad,” you snickered, now sobbing.

He couldn’t help but join you, draping his arms around you to bring you against his chest.

He didn’t deserve you, your forgiveness. The second chance you were offering him, in all the senses. A second chance with you. A second chance to form a family. A second chance in life, really.

Joel cradled your flushed cheeks, tilting your face up so his mouth hovered over yours.

“I can’t believe my fucking luck, honestly. You, the mother of my child…” he didn’t finish the sentence because he would choke on his own words if so. Took a second to compose himself. “If I’m ever such a dick aga―”

“Are you planning on being a dick often, Joel Miller?” you said playfully with a cocked brow.

He laughed, feeling completely at ease.

“I hope not. But if I ever attempt to be, just kick me in the balls so I may come to my senses quicker, please,” he replied with a lopsided grin.

His thumbs caressed the apples of your cheeks before bowing down to kiss you. A slow, loving stroke of his tongue over yours and he felt everything was right again. Your sweet taste soothed him, his mind finally at ease. How you achieved that for him with the mere brush of your soft lips, he didn’t understand.

You were the one to break the kiss, pecking his lips a few times before finally taking a step back.

“Let’s go back inside, you must be freezing only with those sweatpants and a shirt.”

And with that, all the anxiety, the mental struggle, was forgotten.

Joel took your tiny hand in his broad one and led you back inside the cabin. Dried off his feet quickly before helping you out of your winterwear and settle back in in the sleeping bag ― his sleeping bag. Luckily it was big enough for the both of you.

You hugged each other, trying to get back to sleep, but both of your hearts were fluttering so hard, it was difficult to ignore the excitement.

“I’m so thrilled right now, I don’t think I can go to sleep just yet. I can’t believe this is happening,” you whispered with a beautiful grin.

Joel couldn’t help but notice how you were beaming now, how much worry you had carried the last couple of days because of him. He felt infinitely better now that the joyful spark had returned to your eyes.

Dragging his thumb across your jawline, tracing an invisible line on your soft skin, Joel tilted your face towards him, his heart swollen with love. He hadn’t felt this alive in ages.

“Neither can I,” he admitted in a rasp.

His right hand roamed your body under the sleeping bag until it found the perfect spot to rest: your belly. Joel splayed his fingers over your lower tummy protectively, wanting to shield you both from any harm.

You hovered one of your hands over his, your palm stroking the back of his hand in a light caress. It felt like such an intimate moment, a respite among all madness and darkness, that he knew he would treasure it forever. When days would become hard, he’d only have to think back to this exact moment in time ― both of you cocooned in a sleeping back, warm and loving, calm and happy.

Fuck, was he happy and grateful. It still felt like a dream, but this was real. You were real. Yes, he was fucking scared out of his mind too, but the joy he was feeling right now eclipsed everything else.

With rough lips, he coaxed yours apart, the tip of his tongue tentatively swiping your teeth so you would let him in ― the place where he felt most at home. And you happily complied with a subtle sigh. Your tongues curled around one another, your sultry taste and sweet scent overtaking all his senses.

Joel felt your hand dragging his downwards and only took him one second to catch on. Soon his fingers were buried under your panties, his hand cupping your mound possessively while his middle finger dipped in your slit ever so slightly to faintly stroke your hooded clit.

Just one stroke.

“Joel,” you cooed, and he inhaled your breathless plea.

“I know, baby,” he hummed back, gifting you with another light stroke.

Your thighs trembled around his hand, and you parted them involuntarily, your body telling him everything he needed to know.

So he obliged, his finger slipping from your clit to your crying hole, gathering the wetness on the tip to bring it back up to your sensitive nub. With languid touches, Joel paid precise attention to your bundle of nerves with his thumb, while his index and middle fingers rubbed your dripping furrow incessantly, his fingertips hitching in your entrance from time to time.

You gasped, chest heaving and back arched, when Joel finally dived those two fingers in your slick, warm entrance. He groaned at your responsiveness, your eagerness, always ready for him. He could never have enough of you; of that he was fucking sure.

Joel nipped your neck, his stubble tickling your skin, then lapped at it while the rhythm of his hand increased. He knew you loved it when he curled his fingers, stroking that heavenly spot that would drive you wild with lust.

Then he suddenly stilled and you grinded your wet pussy against his palm, desperate for release, your hips tilting underneath.

“Joel, please,” you begged in a whisper, your walls clenching around his digits.

“Please what, sweetheart?”

“I wanna come, please let me,” you pleaded with half-lidded, glassy eyes, melting under his touch.

“What a good girl, asking for permission,” he grazed your slack jaw with his bare teeth, then soothed the bite with a kiss. “No, not a good girl, a good momma, aren’t ya?” he corrected himself, his erection swelling at the thought. “Not yet, baby.”

He teased you a bit more, dragging the pleasure, letting it build and coil inside you the way he knew you liked it.

“F-fuck… Joel…” you moaned, his fingers still and deep buried inside you, your hole squeezing uncontrollably.

Your pleas worked, because soon enough Joel was fingering you relentlessly, pumping in and out of you fast ― your gushing cunt making obscene, squelching noises under the sleeping bag. Your moans grew louder as the pace between your thighs increased, your back so arched Joel feared you might break it.

“You can come now, baby,” he spoke softly, knowing you were holding back until you got his permission.

Then your walls furiously fluttered around his digits, choking and clamping and clutching. And Joel fucked you with his fingers through your orgasm, his thumb smothering your clit, applying the right amount of pressure. You keened, breathing heavy, as you came down from your climax, eyes shut and mouth agape.

Joel leaned to kiss you, his wet, pruney fingers still embedded in your leaking hole while your hand teasingly caressed his tummy, his muscles straining in anticipation.

“Feeling calmer?” he asked, the tip of his crooked nose nuzzling your ear as his fingers slid out with a pop.

“Mhmm, way calmer now,” you husked, tipping your face to trap his mouth with yours. “Let me help you relax too, gorgeous.”

A deep rumble coursed through his chest as your tiny fist dove and wrapped around his swollen girth, your thumb gently caressing the leaky head under his underwear.

He was ready just by working you, that was the power you held over him and Joel was fully aware of it. And he didn’t care one bit, he loved that you could get him hard just like that. It was lust, but it was love too; a deep, shared connection ― something he’d not felt before with anyone else.

You pumped him slow at first, your teeth scraping the skin over his Adam’s apple, then his jawline, until you hunted down his lips, swallowing his gruffy moans. Your playful hand stroked him faster, your fingers gripping harder, and he was close to losing his mind.

Then you licked his neck and nibbled his earlobe, and Joel had to summon all strength he could muster to not come there and then. You giggled at his intense reaction ― his muscles so tight he could snap at any moment, his breathing heavier and erratic.

Your hand imposed a devilish pace upon his throbbing cock, jerking him off fast and furious now, seeing how far you could take him before he broke. His balls felt tight and heavy, ready to spill his warm load on your hand.

Joel couldn’t stop groaning even if he fucking tried ― it had only been five days since the last time he fucked you, but those were too many days already. He pursed his lips together, eyebrows knitting in concentration to not come yet, while your mouth ghosted his. A few moans ended up slipping out and you breathed them in as you masturbated him with a tight grip.

And whatever cue he gave you, you knew he was close ― his orgasm imminent. Swiftly you dived your head under the sleeping bag and Joel lost sight of you. You freed his erection and a second later he felt your plump lips seal around his mushroom head.

His hands curled into tight fists, your little licks, taps and laps maddening. Then you suckled the swollen tip as if it was your personal pacifier.

“Holy fuck,” he huffed, shutting his eyes, as your wicked tongue commended him to come, your hand working his shaft dextrously.

Joel couldn’t hold it any longer. With a deep moan, he blew his sticky load in your mouth, and you drank eagerly from him. He felt your plush lips pecking his balls, then his column, and finally the tip, showing gratitude to his softening dick. Tucking his cock back into his underwear, you patted his bulge, gently, for a sweet second.

Then you popped your head out of the sleeping bag with a sinful grin, your thumb swiping across the corner of your mouth to gather a drop of his cum and guiding it back inside. Joel cupped your chin to bring your face closer to his.

“Thanks, baby. Always so thoughtful,” he joked before tasting himself on your tongue.

“Anytime,” you snickered.

You settled across his chest, warm bodies and calmer hearts, and a comfortable silence filled the room. Soon after that, you both fell into a peaceful slumber.

You woke up first, Joel’s arms draped around your shoulders in a solid hug, almost suffocating you. The first morning light filtered through the bare window, casting elongated shadows of the trees outside across the floorboards. Morning dew condensed on the windowpane, frozen like tiny, sparkly snowflakes. Some birds chirped, their melody pacifying. The whole scene was so tranquil, you didn’t want this moment to end.

Loafing about, you nuzzled Joel’s sternum, his thorax slowly rising, then coming down. His heart beat steadily too, so calming it almost lull you back to sleep. Something about Joel sleeping so profoundly made you feel at peace. Both of you had a very much needed rest after a tense couple of days.

You stroked the hairy trail down his belly button absentmindedly.

Joel grunted and stirred under you, his curved eyelashes fluttering a few times before his beautiful brown eyes stared at you. A boyish smile curled the corners of his lips before he closed his eyes again, hugging you closer. Joel buried his nose in your hair, then inhaled audibly.

“As much I’d love to stay here forever with you, I think we should get going,” you laughed, palming his chest.

He groaned, pinching the bridge of his aquiline nose. He wasn’t a morning person.

“Alright. I’ll get up just ‘cause you’re asking nicely,” he conceded, one hand reaching out of the sleeping bag to unzip it.

The cold air hit you both and you regretted your decisions, but if you wanted to find Tommy soon, you were not going to achieve that from this cabin, as idyllic as it felt to be here, in your bubble with Joel.

Half an hour later you were both up and fully awake. Joel was packing away the sleeping bags when he suddenly stopped.

“Fuck. You didn’t check on the battery last night, did you?” he asked, rubbing the back of his neck.

You bit down your bottom lip and shook your head no.

“Shit. No, I didn’t. I, well― got distracted,” you replied apologetically, a nervous chuckle slipping.

“You mean I distracted you, right?” the teasing edge to his voice made you smile. “Don’t worry, love, ‘s alright. I’ll go check on it before we go into town.”

Joel brought you in for a hug, his hands lacing on the small of your back. He brushed his lips against yours in a chaste kiss and you wanted to laugh so badly, you sniggered. This man, pretending to be so decent now.

“What’s so funny?” he enquired, a cocked brow, not letting you go of his embrace just yet.

“You being so gentlemanly and proper now with your decorous kissing, as if you didn’t make me come with just your fingers last night. As if I didn’t eat yo―” you jested bluntly, butterflies filling your belly.

Joel growled at your provocation, interrupting you, his hips flush with yours.

“That nasty mouth of yours is gonna be my downfall one of these days,” he muttered. Then he kissed you, his tongue quick and ravishing. “Enough. Stop being so damn tempting.”

He let go of you, taking a step back and turning around. You took the opportunity to smack his ass before he walked off with a smirk on his lips.

You stayed inside, gathering all the bits and stuffing them back in your backpacks. You were going to venture into Oswego today again, stake out the town and the area where Joel thought Tommy and his group would most probably be.

Shuffling through your belongings, you found the pregnancy test you took a few days ago. The digital screen was still displaying the positive result ― one you dreaded, but then embraced.

In the span of forty-eight hours, you thought your relationship with Joel had crumbled down and reduced to nothingness, to then come back stronger like a phoenix rising from its ashes.

The look on his face when he thought you were leaving him still haunted you ― you hoped he would forget that feeling sooner rather than later. His confession had tugged at your heart so much, you had forgiven him after the first sentence. But you had let him keep on talking, because the self-indulgent part of yourself wanted to hear him say all those things. It wasn’t often that Joel Miller would make use of his mouth to verbally express his feelings.

You smiled to yourself, tremendously happy with how the situation had turned out in the end.

Throwing your backpack over your shoulders and Joel’s hanging from one arm, you walked outside with the pregnancy still on your hand, daydreaming ― your grin now permanently sculpted into your features.

Then you heard a voice you quickly recognised.

Tommy’s.

You froze halfway through the three steps on the porch, your gaze scanning the area until you found them.

Joel had a very schooled expression, almost blank, while Tommy frowned, gripping a shotgun close to his chest.

“You’ve been following me?” the younger Miller asked, visibly upset.

“Yes, we have, you dickhead,” Joel replied, his voice restrained. “You just left a―”

“We?” Tommy scoffed, taking a step back. “You’ve not ditched her body yet?”

Joel’s hazel eyes found yours, still glued to the steps. A silent plea for you to go back inside, sensing this would not end well. And you tried ― you took a step back to run back into the cabin, but Tommy was quicker.

Tommy turned around and almost jumped back as if he had seen a ghost. Probably because he thought he had.

You raised your hands up, showing him you were no threat.

“Hey, Tommy,” you greeted him with a feeble smile. “If you keep pointing that gun at me, I’m gonna start thinking it’s personal,” you joked to diffuse the situation.

“Tommy,” Joel’s firm voice made his brother looked at him askance, his pupils fixed right back on you. “Hey.”

Joel’s fingers wrapped around the barrel, pushing it down so it wouldn’t point at you anymore. You could see Tommy’s stiffness from the distance, ready to do whatever it was necessary.

When Joel yanked at the shotgun, Tommy broke eye contact with you to stare at his brother, not letting go of the shotgun.

“How’s she alive?”

“It’s a long story, bu―”

“She’s fucking infected. You’re fucking infected!” he screamed in a panic, stumbling back with his own feet and then directing the gun back at you.

Joel tried to approach him while you stayed as still as possible, your breathing hitching. Would he shoot? You hoped not, but he looked scared enough to do so.

“Tommy, listen to me―” Joel attempted to talk to him again.

“What’s that you’re holding?” Tommy snapped at you, ignoring his brother.

You paled. You had forgotten the pregnancy test was on your hand, lost as you were in your train of thought when you had walked out of the cabin.

No words left your mouth ― your orbs quickly found Joel’s. Both of you, frightened to death. Not for yourselves, but for your baby.

Tommy wouldn’t hurt you, would he? Unconsciously, your free hand dropped to your belly, wanting to protect this new life you were harbouring, growing.

Tommy’s façade fell, his jaw slack.

“You’re PREGNANT?!”

Joel reacted first, standing in the way, the barrel kissing the center of his chest. Then he pushed Tommy back, his composed expression gone. He was angry, you could tell. Really angry. You had only seen him that irate the night those two men almost raped you.

“If you ever point that gun at her again, I swear to fucking God, I’ll kill you myself with my bare hands, Tommy,” he growled.

Tommy blinked rapidly, his resolution coming back as he cocked the gun again.

“You both have lost your fucking minds,” Tommy scoffed, walking backwards towards the woods. “Don’t follow me anymore. Leave me the fuck alone.”

A minute after, the younger brother disappeared between the trees and Joel rushed to your side, his anger transforming into urgency.

“We gotta go.”

His words were impregnated with the same panic you were feeling.

Unbelievable, Tommy thought.

Had his brother gone mad? What the fuck was he thinking? And how were you alive? What kind of sinister magic was that?

He had so many unanswered questions, his head throbbed with an impending headache. Tommy needed the distance and the time to think this through. At first, he had been elated at seeing his brother after so long, but the excitement quickly shifted the moment he saw Joel accompanied by you. And fucking pregnant, by the looks of it.

Shaking his head, Tommy hooted like an owl, letting the people keeping watch know that he was approaching the two houses they all had been living in. The two buildings were on the forest boundary, far enough of other homes but close enough to town.

Bursting in through the doors, Laney met him in the corridor, hands on hips.

“So?”

“They are here. And what’s worst, she’s alive and pregnant,” Tommy almost spit the last word out.

Laney’s scowl deepened.

“Pregnant? Like, with a fucking zombie-like monster growing inside of her?”

The emphasis on that specific word made Tommy frown. He wouldn’t go as far as to say that. Laney could be a little dramatic sometimes.

“Well, I don’t know. No, I don’t think so? I mean, she looked fine, so I guess―” Laney walked past him, interrupting what he was saying. “Where are you going?”

“On patrol. Need to go into town for some supplies.”

“Need a hand?”

“No. Stay here, keep watch.”

And with that, she stepped out and closed the door behind her, leaving Tommy in the middle of the hallway with a nagging doubt picking at the back of his brain.

@yesjazzywazzylove-blog @pedrospurplerain @missladym1981 @fancyyoouu

@smolbeanzzz @guelyury @bishtrouille @harriedandharassed

@thepalaceofmelanie @eternallyvenus @theoraekenslover @vickie5446

[murderandcoffee]

thank you mr. pellington for giving us the snake version of jane prentiss

[thefanficcup]

DC/DP Constantine Bingo

When Danny gets crowned High King he gets loaded with mountains of paperwork all because of one John Constantine. So instead of dealing with it he turns Constantine's sold soul pieces into a currency for favors from the King. (Claming John's soul for himself to end all debates)

Then because Constantine will likely continue to sell his soul carelessly Danny makes an official decree that anyone who wants can create a 5 by 5 grid of beings/situations/etc. John will se his soul to and send it to Clockwork to officially enter the bingo, creating a realms wide bingo with prices. Along with this comes a ruling that of John comes to you and wish to sell his soul in return for a favor that you can do, you must accept, preventing people from cheating.

~~~

This of course makes John very paranoid. It suddenly got very easy to trade his soul and many beings even seemed eager to do it. Despite them knowing it would not give them the ownership of his soul.

~~~

What happens when Danny receives an update on the bingo, in the form of a green postit-note, in the middle of a dinner at Wayne manor.

It could either be a meet your partners family dinner or a adopted danny dinner.

Anyway now he either has to come clean about being a ghost, the ghost king, or make up a story about befriending ghosts and getting invited to the bingo that way.

Bonus points if Danny name dropps Constantine without knowing that the Wayne's are the bats and that John had shared his paranoia with his coworkers.

~~~

I am not a writer but if you like this and want to write it your self, be my guest, just tag me so I can read it👻👻

[archivecon]

Statement begins...

Statement of ArCon staff, regarding the third annual ArchiveCon convention for fans of Rusty Quill’s The Magnus Archives/The Magnus Protocmagprool. Statement recorded 23/02/09 by the Official ArchiveCon Tumblr.

—

Hey archival assistants, avatars, and everyone in between!

Welcome to the official Tumblr for ArchiveCon 2024. We are proud to be hosting our THIRD (!!) ArchiveCon - a fan-lead, fan-run online mini convention for 18+ fans of the Rusty Quill horror podcast, The Magnus Archives (and now Protocol!)

Whether you are an old fan, a new fan, a deeply-rooted fandom denizen, or looking to make your first connections in our fan community, we hope you’ll join us. ArchiveCon may be online-only, but we’ve got all the energy and features of a traditional offline convention - everything from panels and special guests (voice actors, writers, and industry professionals!), to cosplay and games, streaming and discussion, and even an Artist’s Alley.  

Here’s the quick rundown:

- June 21-23, 2023 (that’s three days, folks - Friday to Sunday!)

- 18+, online only (Most areas of the con will be SFW, but you still must be 18+ to attend)

- FREE TO ATTEND! (Registration is required and must be done so before the convention starts; you can register here!)

- All events scheduled in PST, but all international fans are welcome and most panels (at the discretion of individual panelists) will be recorded for post-convention, on-demand viewing.  

- Primarily focused on The Magnus Archives/Protocol, but fans of all things horror, podcasting, and transformative works will find something to love. The Plain Old Curious are always welcome, too - we have to feed The Eye somehow, right? ;)

For more detailed information and FAQs, visit our website!

—

Are you an artist? A storyteller? A connoisseur of pulp fiction novels looking for an audience? ArchiveCon is here for you, beyond attendee registration. :)

Artists and artisans of all kinds are welcome (encouraged!) to apply for a slot in our Artists’ Alley. Do you take digital art commissions? Make soap? Knit hats?  All of the above?? (Kudos to you, you must be using superhuman eldritch powers to get all that done.) We’d love to give you a place to showcase and sell your work, reach a like-minded audience, and network with fellow creatives. 

Don’t have anything to sell, but want to share your passion for the world of The Magnus Archives and its fans? Then we’d love to chat with you about hosting a panel. ArchiveCon will host panels on a wide variety of subjects including (but not necessarily limited to!): 

- deep dives and meta on TMA/TMP characters, plot points, history, and relationships (we love a detailed ship manifesto)

- queer identities in horror and fandom spaces

- the evolution/history of fandom culture

- fan creations and transformative works (such as zines, art, fic and fic-binding, cosplay - you name it)

- friendly discussions and debates

- technical tutorials and discussions on podcast production, streaming, sound editing, etc!

For more insight and ideas, check out last year’s program schedule!

Applications aren’t open quite yet, but we’ll update all our pages when they are.  Hope to see you there!

[Statement Ends.]

[buggyboba]

Surrender Your Mind

part one [ x ] part three [x] AO3 [ x ]

Part two | Fasten Her Tether Unto Me

A/N | Hello! Thank you everyone for your positive feedback on part one! I am a newish fan fiction writer, and I have zero clue what I am doing, but we are faking it until we make it! I will set up a masterlist (no pun intended) and a tag list. As of right now, I will try to update this story every Wednesday. In this chapter/part, I went for a different tone, so I hope you all still enjoy it. As always, Thank you, and if you have any prompts or questions please feel free to send them in, I would love to fulfill some prompts and drabble.

Also look at me pulling from book media…~ Buggy.

TW |  A bit of choking, but not in a sexy way, but maybe…lots of pet names, Pet, Puppy, Kitten, descriptions of violence. Missy is still a dick.

Word count | 6315

━━━━━━»»•••««━━━━━━

The steady hum became a constant companion; the machine felt alive; even when you couldn’t hear the hum, you felt the low vibration. It felt like it was watching you; it could see your every movement, and you could have sworn it locked you out of certain places as you carefully explored them. The woman, The Mistress, as you still had yet to actually call her that in conversation, had so graciously, as she put it, allowed you to stay there to be safe. She had kidnapped you, and every time you had tried to leave over the past week, she was always there, stopping you, or her machine wouldn’t open the door. You had gotten decent at picking out her footsteps and would make yourself scarce. She hadn’t actively tried to interact with you, save for stopping you from leaving, and the one time you accidentally ran into her when you were exploring, that was a few days ago.

Tonight, however, You had thought it was clear. You hadn’t heard her in a while, so you had dared to slip into a room whose door had been locked prior. You couldn’t pass up the opportunity; maybe it was a way out; it wasn’t like the woman had actively threatened your life, but you weren’t a fan of being captive, especially with a stranger who refused to explain anything to you, one who you felt so strange around, your mind still foggy when you looked at her when you caught glimpses of her as she worked on something. The room you entered smelled of a fireplace, it looked like it could be a study, but you weren’t sure. The warmth of the fire in the brick fireplace warmed the area, it was a small comfort given that the rest of the ship was so bloody cold. There were books lining the shelves, there were mounted creature heads above the fireplace, and from what you could see, there seemed to be artifacts, weapons, and specific books in glass cases; this felt more like a hunter’s lounge than a study. There was a faint smell of cigars, but it was so faint that you figured no one had been smoking them recently. 

As you walked into the room a little more, you looked at the chair facing the fireplace. On the side table, there was a small tumbler of amber liquid, a plate of half-eaten cucumber slices, some sort of orange-colored jam, and clotted cream. Oh, no, you had to leave. You turned and walked straight into her chest. She caught your arms so you wouldn’t fall back. She looked down at you with a smile that couldn’t quite make up its mind if it wanted to be a smile. 

“So I have finally caught my little mouse.” Her voice was barely above a whisper, causing you to shiver. “Have you enjoyed poking around my private room?” She asked in a tone that was dangerous, almost daring you to answer. Her hands tightened a bit on your arms before she let you go, walking towards the chair. “I’ve had a long day,” she started.

You wondered what she did all day; you hadn’t seen her or heard her. You watched her unceremoniously flop into the large, high-backed armchair in front of the fireplace. You stood there silently, you could slip out of the room quietly. You could return to the guest room she had given you and stay hidden as long as you could. 

“Go on, ask about it.” Her voice sounded from the chair as she grabbed the little tumbler, holding it between three delicate fingers and pulling it up to her lips. Her lipstick made a smudge on the glass as she took the liquid into her mouth, setting the cup back down. Her fingertips grazed the glass as she pulled her hand back and swallowed the sip she had taken before she turned her face slightly, watching you out of the corner of her eye. “Don’t be rude, and just stand there silently.” Her lips twitched into a half-smirk. 

You awkwardly forced yourself to walk closer; you gave the chair a wide distance as you stepped around the right side of it. “Why was your day long?” you asked, watching her carefully. 

She was silent as she picked up a slice of cucumber, putting a small dollop of the jam on it, and then another small dollop of the clotted cream. She popped the whole thing in her mouth, chewing, before letting her tongue dart to the corner of her lips, where some cream had escaped. You looked away and down, waiting for her to answer, your arms wrapped around yourself a bit, before you forced your gaze back onto her. 

“Do you want some?” she asked, motioning to the treat she had been eating. You shook your head. “Have you eaten since you got here? Well, you must have; your body doesn’t seem to be deteriorating.” She said as she eyed you over. “Eat,” she said more firmly. You shifted again and moved to carefully take one of the cucumber slices, putting it in your mouth. You had been able to sneak to the kitchen and had been eating, but you weren’t going to make her mad by not taking what she offered.

“So, why was your day long?” You tried to ask again, taking another cucumber slice, this time adding a little bit of the jam, and you were surprised it was apricot jam. The surprised look you gave seemed to have prompted her.

“It’s from The Scoundrel’s Club, a very prestigious member’s club. Well, that was until they so rudely threw me out since I was no longer a man. Silly of them, really. I held a chair there for countless years. Shame what I had to do to them for their disrespect,” she muttered a bit. 

“The Scoundrel’s Club?” you asked carefully. She nodded, but didn’t elaborate on it. You also had questions about her other statement, but really, you didn't have any reason to ask about it. You sighed and looked for a seat; there was only the stool to the armchair, so you sat on that in front of her. “Alright then, what did you do to them?” You asked, and your gut told you that was the wrong question because there was this sort of delighted, almost off-putting grin that took her lips. You immediately regretted your decision to ask. 

There was a moment of silence as she seemed to be getting the details of her story in order. Taking another sip of the liquid in the tumbler, you could only guess it was some sort of sipping whiskey, which you weren’t expecting, but then again, you knew nothing about this woman. 

“Well, you see, as one of the longest-standing members of the club, it was very rude of them to cast me out, so I ruined one’s life, then collapsed the bridge he was on; one had a nasty accident with a train; you should have seen the splatter.” She smirked softly, imitating a sort of splatter sound, flexing her hand to imitate a 'splatter’. You grimaced, not wanting to think about what she had said. “Little bitty bits of Bobo Braithwaite all over the English countryside, ironic because it was his railroad.” The woman giggled a bit. You shivered, trying not to vividly imagine it. You didn’t know whoever that man was, but you almost felt bad.

"Oh, don’t feel bad; these were all terrible people, so in a way, my revenge was for the better.” She made a face and then shook her head, continuing speaking before you could voice your opinion on it. “Then I —” She started to continue and looked back at you with a frown. “Are you not enjoying my story? You look pale, pet.” She let her face drop in expression as she watched you.

“I mean, is this why you had a long day?” You asked calmly, trying not to look at her, making it a point to look at your hands that sat in your lap as you listened to her. This woman spoke of murder like it was a normal Tuesday, as if it were a jaunty walk around the park. You were stressed and nervous, and yet the only thing she really had done to you was kidnap you and make vague threats.

“Oh, no, but it was a valuable lesson about being rude... and what I would do to people I know versus a stranger like you if you continue to be rude and keep avoiding me...in my own tardis...rather rude indeed.” She said, gauging your reaction. 

“Tardis?” you asked. 

"Oh, for...” she sounded annoyed. “Yes, the machine we are in... Tardis, Time and Relative Dimension in Space, you have figured out now that I am not of Earth, yes?” She raised an eyebrow, and you nodded. "I know you silly little apes are stupid, but I have to assume you are at least a little clever...or you would be dreadfully boring." 

You made a face at her insult. 

“You have two heartbeats and are like, so cold when you touch me, and all of this...” You motioned around yourself. “It is too insane to be worldly.” You sighed. “So, yes, I figured you weren’t human.” You said you were trying to sound calm, and you looked at her again. You weren't entirely set on aliens as the story, but everything was too weird to be just your run-of-the-mill normal human activities. 

“You are correct; I am superior to you, little primitive apes….I am a Time Lady.” She said like that meant anything to you. You nodded a bit, waiting to see if she would explain, but given her piss-poor explanations so far, you didn’t expect it. “I am the most dangerous being in the universe.” She nodded and grinned a bit at you, You weren’t sure you liked that either. “And unfortunately for you, I still haven’t figured out why they targeted you to get to me.” She said her expression changed as her cold eyes bore into yours like she was searching for something—anything that would give her a clue as to who you were, why the assassin blew up your flat, and why she didn’t want to immediately kill you. Logically, she should kill you and take away whatever leverage these assassins thought they had on her. However, her curiosity about why they thought you were leveraged over her got the better of her. She decided if she didn't figure it out soon, she would just throw you into the time vortex or something and be done with you, but for now, the situation was intriguing enough to keep her attention. Well, keep the little spots between her plans interesting enough anyway. 

“Delightful.” You muttered a bit and shifted on the stool. “So what is a Time Lady?” you tried; maybe if you asked specific questions, you might be able to get some sort of semblance of what is happening. “And why does that make you superior?” It was your turn to raise an eyebrow. 

The woman scoffed and shook her head. “I don't have the time to explain the complexity of being the elite of Gallifreyan society, especially to you.” She waved you off. 

"Okay, that sounds fake.” you shrugged. “Time Lady, ridiculous title, ‘elite of Galli...Gallif’..” 

“Gallifreyan….” She repeated it calmly, like you were a child. “If you are going to try to be insulting, at least know the words you are saying.” She drawled.

You crossed your arms across your chest and sighed as you rolled your eyes. “Elites of Gallifreyan society... It sounds like you are trying to convince me that you are supposed to be important. You said your tone was trying to be teasing, but you weren’t sure how she would take it. “But it also holds the same gravity as a celebrity thinking they are important just because they are Hollywood elite.” You muttered. “Pretentious,” you sighed, but you felt the air shift before you saw her move. 

You yelped as you were dragged off the footstool forward by your shirt collar. Her face was close to yours as she moved her fingers around your throat. “Did you not learn anything from my tale of being rude? Do I have to show you or teach you a lesson? You have been nothing but an annoying little mouse plaguing my tardis. I saved your life, and you are being an annoying little brat, speaking out of turn, with much more confidence than someone like you should have.” She said her fingers flexed around your throat as she spoke, your back against the footstool as she held you down with surprising strength. 

You choked out, your hands going to her arm, one by her wrist and the other up on her forearm, trying to pry her fingers off your throat. There was a predatory glint in her blue eyes as she kept you pinned, ensuring you made eye contact with her as you struggled to breathe. Your cheeks turned red from how she held your throat; just enough air was able to get to your lungs to keep you conscious, though your body struggled and your lungs started to hurt. “I'm not going to let you go until you...” She seemed to pause in thought. “Say something nice.” She said it in a light tone, like she wasn't choking you. 

Something nice? What sort of something nice did she want? Your mind was getting foggy; you were getting dizzy from the struggle of trying to intake air and panicking, and now she wanted you to say something nice.

“Come on, then, say something nice.” She said it more impatiently. 

“You're scary and pretty.” You stammer out quickly, your fingers prying harder. 

“Is that the best you've got—scary and pretty? That's not very nice, and you know what, pet, address me properly.” She said, pushing your back further over the footstool, your spine digging into the wood of it, sending pain through you. Your eyes darted around, looking for anything. Landing on the fire, you grimaced, and your jaw clenched a bit as you gritted your teeth. “You are like fire!” You started to panic. “Mistress, you are like fire—burning, intense, chaotic, but beautiful—a force to be reckoned with.”You tried to sound poetic; perhaps if you weren’t at the hands of a dangerous psychopath, you could string your words together better and maybe sound like you knew how to flatter someone. However, the word ‘Mistress’ still felt weird on your tongue. 

Her hand pushed you hard before it was off your throat, leaving you a panting mess clinging to the footstool beneath you. Your hand held your throat, rubbing it as you took some heavy breaths in. "Better, I suppose; I'll expect something better next time,” she muttered, watching you as she crossed one leg over the other as she leaned back in the chair. “Now don't be rude again.” She warned. “Or I will end your pathetic little existence; really, you humans have such a short lifespan, and it would be a shame to cut yours shorter because you don't know your place.” She sighed and shook her head. 

The only thing you could do was look at her with a mix of emotions before nodding. “You can make it up to me; you will join me for tea tomorrow, and we will talk more then. Go on off, you pop.” She waved you off. You scrambled to your feet and quickly raced to get out of the room. 

Your hurried footfall caused the dark metal hallway to echo as you navigated it back to the room you were staying in. You closed the door behind you, slid down it, and let your hand rest on your throat, rubbing it still. Your mind was racing; there was so much happening, and you still didn't have any answers. After what felt like forever, you pulled yourself up and dragged yourself to the bed; it wasn't nearly as comfortable as your own bed, but being as you no longer had a bed and were trapped here with The Mistress, it would have to do. You lay down, burying yourself under the covers; your lower back stung, and you knew a bruise was forming. You curled into yourself, trying to relax, but your body was on high alert, listening for the sounds of her footsteps. 

Eventually, your body ebbed into sleep, and you dreamt of many things—things you couldn't quite remember when you woke up—but your body was warm and flush, so it couldn't have been nothing, and she-- the thought of her brought you an even more confusing feeling. You had tea with her today, an invitation you were not allowed to break. You sat up from the bed and were startled when there was a neat pile of clean clothing sitting on the dresser with a note. She had been here. When you were sleeping? How did your body not wake you up? 

You carefully got off the bed and went to check out the note and clothing. The note was in perfect script, black ink spelled out, ‘Get cleaned up and dressed; meet me in the study for tea. -M.’ 

Your fingers trailed over the soft material, it was black and looked formfitted—not exactly your style, but it was clean, and you weren’t about to pass up the opportunity to get cleaned up properly with a fresh set of clothing. You grabbed the clothing and slipped out of the bedroom. You knew the way to the restroom, you had found it the first night you were there. The bathroom was large and marble, and the shower portion of it had one of those waterfall-style showers. You moved to turn the water on, pushing it to hot but not scalding. You moved to take your clothing off by the sink, finding a bag of toiletries had been set out for you. You assumed she had done it last night. You grabbed it and looked through it, pulling the items you needed out and giving them a quick sniff. They were fancy and smelled so good, You were quickly excited for this shower. Slipping in, you let the warm water wash over you. 

The warmth was a quick comfort as your body relaxed, You stood there for a few moments, silent and reflecting, This had been an absolutely bonkers experience. If you weren’t so sure you were actively alive, you would have assumed you died when the flat exploded, and this was whatever happened after you died. Aliens, Assassins, Time Lords, and Tardises—this was all so much to take in. You felt numb, how were you going to get out of this? You were a prisoner on an alien ship, one that felt like it only tolerated you, much like its owner. 

You worked the shampoo into your hair, as you thought, the smell was nice and assaulted your senses in the best sort of way. The Mistress did know how to pick scents, it seemed, because you were in love with the smell of the soaps she had given you to bathe with. It could be worse; everything so far—what happened last night hadn’t been so bad. Scary and very much uncalled for, but from her stories, that had been nothing.

You just wished you could help figure out what these Assassins wanted with you, you had no idea why they had targeted you, honestly, you weren’t someone important—well, not in the grand scheme of the universe after all. 

You got to thinking as you washed up, maybe the assassins were from the future; was it really a stretch? Maybe they had come back to the past; of course, you were sure the woman had already thought of this; you wished she would share just a little more with you, anything more to help you understand the situation rather than leaving you floundering and drowning in a situation where you were out of your element. Today at tea, you were going to demand answers—not rudely, but you were going to get the answers you wanted. 

You finished getting cleaned up, dried off, and got dressed quickly. Your stomach gave a low rumble, and as you made your way back to that study you had found last night, your heart started to pound in your throat as you made your way there. The memories of her hand around your throat flashed in your mind—how terrified you had been at that moment. 

The study door was open, and you took a breath while walking in. “Usually we would take tea in the sphere; it has a delightful garden, but you are safest in the Tardis.” She said as you entered, your eyes scanned the room quickly, and fell on her. She sat up on this little raised part by some bookshelves. A small tea set was set out on the small table in front of her, along with a few different fruits and cakes. It was a proper tea setup. You moved to sit in the armchair that was angled towards hers. 

“I see.” You said lightly. 

“I am glad the clothing fits; I couldn’t have you traipsing about in those old, gross clothes, now could I?” She said as she poured herself a cup of tea, then poured you one. “Sugar? Cream?” She asked. You watched her, her body language was sort of rigid, but she was trying to present herself as friendly. You shifted in the armchair. You nodded and told her the amount you liked before she gave you the cup. You held the saucer in your hand and then took the cup off of it, putting it down. You held the warm glass in your hands, staring down into the liquid. 

“It’s not poison,” She spoke with a little grin that made you wonder if she was telling the truth. “I wouldn’t poison you, don’t be boring, I wouldn't ruin tea like that, not for you... Not after I’ve gone through great lengths to keep you safe….you are welcome.” She said expectantly. 

Was she expecting you to say thank you for her kidnapping you? Was she kidding? You brought the cup to your lips, taking a small sip of the tea. It was a nice blend of lavender and black tea. You could feel those icy blue eyes that were so enchanting watching your every move, like she was studying you and analyzing everything about you. 

“So have you found out anything about the…uh…assassins?” You asked after a moment of silence. 

"Yes, that was my long day yesterday,” she said, taking a sip of her own tea. “They are time assassins, much like weeping angels...oh right, I suppose you wouldn’t know what those are...hm, simple terms for you, I think,” she said, stirring her tea with a little silver spoon that she brought up to her mouth and let the tip of it press against her lips in thought. You watched her calmly, and you noticed she was wearing black today; it was still in the same style as her plum outfit, and her hair was still up, but some pieces had fallen to rest against her temple, but she didn’t seem to pay attention to it. 

“You don’t have to use simple terms, I do understand some things, I’m not stupid.” You protested after she took a few more minutes to think. 

“Oh, alright then, weeping angels are a sort of quantum-locked species, the lonely assassins they call them, they can take the form of many things, statues are their main appearance; and they can only move about if no sentient life forms are watching them. Essentially, what they do is touch you and put you into the past—a mercy they call it—letting their victims live a full life; they can consume the remaining time and energy that way, and of course, when they are in a pinch, they will just snap your neck like a wee little twig,” she mused, taking another sip of her tea and licking the corner of her lip before she continued. “Now, Time Assassins have taken that theory but are much more murderous; their bullets act as a weeping angel’s powers do, sending their victim back in time. The theory is that they shoot them somewhere vital, send the body back in time, and the past now has a John or Jane Doe to deal with, and the present has a missing person,” she explained. “Surely they don’t think that will work on me; I’ll just regenerate,” she shrugged.

“Regenerate? ” You asked, shaking your head a bit. 

“Yes, the perks of being me. You see, if I get wounded mortally, my body has a sort of defense where it will heal itself through regeneration. Of course, I won’t look like this anymore. Shame, because this one has been delightful so far. Of course it took some time to get used to, my first go as a woman,” she mused. 

“So.” You paused, taking a minute to gather your thoughts and put some things together. “You can just change your gender?” 

“Yes and no, I don’t quite get a choice in it; all a bit of luck of the draw sometimes... most times... doesn’t matter; we Time Lords and Ladies are eons above your human notions of gender and roles.” She waved it off and looked at you with a cat-like grin. 

“Okay, so… If their methods wouldn’t work on you, why use that method? And why come after you in the first place, and me?” You asked, leaning back in the chair a bit. You didn’t want to seem so tense, but you were. You watched as she took a look around the room in thought before her eyes returned to yours. 

“Well, it could work, but I’m not getting into that with you; you don’t need to know all the nasty little details.” She nodded. “What I am more interested in is why they think you are important enough to go after to lure me out.” She spoke, her fingers trailing over the lip of the teacup in thought. 

“Well, maybe in the future...” you trailed off, not really wanting to continue the thought.

“Oh, you think you are somehow important to me in the future.” She gave a wicked little smirk. “Now now pet, I am highly doubtful; you are cute, but...” she trailed off as well. She didn’t do relationships unless you had something to offer her, she paused. Perhaps you were another Lucy, a means to an end, a loyal pet. She clicked her tongue against her teeth as she thought about it, leaving you in silence. 

"No, that might make sense... Perhaps they misunderstood our relationship.” She spoke after a long while. You blinked and shifted again. “I don’t think they are trying to lure me; well, this me or their intel was wrong.” She mused, leaning back as she thought of all the scenarios and which one would be the most accurate. “Either way, they came to this time for a reason: to go after you. They had made an earlier attempt at me, but it didn’t work out for them, so they changed tactics. You were supposed to be in your apartment when it blew up, which they thought would bring me out in a rage.” She grinned as she put things together. “funny… I wonder what you did to catch my attention if this theory of mine is correct.” She looked at you more closely. 

Her eyes glided over your features, you weren’t the most offensive thing to the eyes, you were attractive, she had seen your thoughts, she knew you were intelligent, at least for a human, you also had an attitude, she almost liked that about you. You could be useful, she just had to get you loyal, she could just hypnotize you again, but that could be broken, shaken, true genuine loyalty was something else that couldn’t be broken as easily, she knew that well, the Doctor and his little human pets were a testament to that. 

You shrugged, you had no idea, you had thought she was beautiful when you saw her at the tea shop, and you still thought she was, but now there was a danger to her, she wasn’t just a stranger at the tea shop anymore, she was the alien that kidnapped you, the Mistress, or at least that was what she insisted you called her, but you really didn’t want to do that. 

“You are still so scared of me; your heart hasn’t stopped racing since you walked in.” She smirked, leaning forward just a bit. You shook your head, but it was a lie; she did make you nervous. "Oh, puppy, is it because I got a little rough last night?” She said it in a flirty tone that took you by surprise; she made it sound like it was an intimate encounter, not a violent one, but from what you could gather about her, maybe they were one and the same. 

“Don’t call me that.” You shook your head. “I am nervous because you are a stranger, a murderous one, a violent one, who kidnapped me.” You said your voice was strong at the beginning but wavered at the end. 

“Would you prefer Kitten?” She said she watched you, not denying the rest. “And I kidnapped you because they would have killed you... At least that is the running theory. To get to me, you should be thanking me.” She mused, leaning back again and watching you. 

“I would prefer my name,” you said exasperatedly, saying your name.

Missy paused and sighed. "Oh, alright, since we are going to be in this together for a bit longer than I anticipated, I suppose I could occasionally use your name, don’t get used to it…I won’t remember it.” A lie, she would remember it, but she would continue to use little pet names for you since they seemed to irritate you. “I suppose, as a sign of good faith, you can call me Missy,” she said after a moment. 

“Missy,” you repeated. “Okay, I can do that one.” You nodded. 

“You will still call me Mistress, but I suppose you can call me Missy occasionally.” She calmly spoke, putting her teacup down. “I think I will look up everything I need to know about you,” she mused, watching you for your reaction.

“Or you could ask me like a normal person.” You sighed, shaking your head.

“No….absolutely not….boring small talk… dreadful.” She shook her head. 

"Well, then tell me more about you.” You sighed, carefully reaching for one of the tea cakes. 

“Oh…sure–” She started, and you laughed, causing her to frown. “Why is that funny?” 

“You’ll talk about you, but you don’t want to talk about me, calling it boring small talk.” You said taking a bite of the cake. 

"Yes, well, because it is. You are a boring little human. I am The Mistress, a renegade Time Lady who has conquered planets.” She chuckled, making a grand gesture with her hand. “The greatest archenemy of the Doctor, and all around much more interesting.” She gave a smaller grin. 

“Oh…The Doctor?” You asked, “Do all um-- Gallifreyan’s have silly titles?” You asked with a small grin of your own. 

“Oh hush, The Mistress is a powerful title.” She raised an eyebrow. “So was my former moniker, The Master, bit cheeky, bit sexy, it strikes fear, is straight to the point, of who is in control and owns you.” She waved you off. You shook your head a bit but dropped it. You weren't interested in trying to tease her and have her get mad, thinking you were being rude about it. Your mind drifted back to last night, and you cleared your throat, pushing the thoughts away again. You were certainly going to say something later about the whole Mistress/Master motif. 

“Who is the Doctor?” You questioned, and the energy shifted, and you felt you had made a mistake again. 

“You won’t have to worry about him.” She said calmly, though her body language told you otherwise, you weren’t going to push it; you didn’t want her to be mad. 

“Okay, so what is our plan about the time assassins?” You asked while trying to get back on track. 

“Oh, yes, well, I figured I would dangle you as bait, don’t worry, pet, they won’t get close enough to kill you... But we are going to make them make another big mistake, which hopefully will give me time to catch one. We bring him to an undisclosed location and get our answers through a series of slow, painful tortures, though I do suppose torture doesn’t really work...but it will make me feel better.” She said her tone was light, like she was talking about the weather. “I’ll probably just get into their mind, poke around, take the information I want, and then kill them, and they will join my cyberdears,” she shrugged. "Oh, that’s a good one, you’ll love it,” she nodded. 

You blinked “Cyberdears?” you asked, looking at her in confusion.

"Oh, I can’t spoil the surprise, pet, but it is going to go viral,” she nodded.

She confused you; sometimes she was so posh, and then other times she was silly with her words, like when you watched a person from an older generation try the slang of this generation. However, once that thought subsided, there was an undertone you hadn’t caught before, but her smirk told you there was certainly something much darker to these cyberdears, as she called them. 

“Are those skeletons in the tanks?” You asked, but you were still uncomfortable with the idea of there being ninety-one of them, just right outside her tardis. 

“Shh, spoilers pet,” she giggled like it was her own inside joke. You grimaced but nodded, finishing your cup of tea and the tea cake you had grabbed. “So it’s settled, you’ll play the delightful worm on a hook, and we will catch us a time assassin,” she grinned widely. “I bet you’ll squirm perfectly.” She nodded.

You frowned, you didn’t like this idea. “Was that a compliment? An insult?” you asked. 

“Yes.” She nodded and took a large bite of tea cake herself. 

“There has to be a safer way, you’ve gone through all this trouble of making sure I don’t leave your ship, and now the plan is to dangle me out in public, waiting for the Assassin to make their move? What if they, I dunno, are good snipers?” You sighed.

“Well, you see, we go somewhere where we have the advantage.” She watched you, giving you a look that told you she found you annoyingly amusing. “No multiple high ledges, and plus, I’ll be watching you, don’t you trust me?” She teased you, and you blinked at her. What did you say to that? If you said no, she might get angry. You didn’t trust her; trust was earned, and all she had done was kidnap you. Well, that wasn’t fair to say; she did technically keep you safe from harm, but that didn’t excuse the whole kidnapping thing. 

You opened your mouth a few times, trying to find the words. This amused her because she called you a trout and took another big bite of her tea cake. “Well, my dear, do you trust me?” she pressed, feeling your apprehension and deciding to play with it a bit. 

“N…w….” You stammered. 

“Oh dear, was that an attempt at a no?" She grinned, putting the plate down and turning to face you full-on. 

“No, I mean yes, I don’t trust you; I don’t know you. It’s been eggshells since you kidnapped.” Missy, cut you off.

“Saved.” Missy nodded, correcting you.

“No matter what you call it, you won’t let me go.” You firmly spoke. 

She shook her head, like what you were saying was nonsense. “So you would rather walk out there, out of my little safe haven, and then get killed? All because I am so scary?” She watched your movements closely. You sighed and shook your head. That wasn’t what you wanted, you wanted freedom, but you wanted not to be killed by some assassins who were coming after you because of her. 

“Maybe just a little freedom; I haven’t been outside of this.” You motioned around, talking about the ship. “In a week now, we barely know each other, and I don’t know, maybe I’m just having a hard time with everything right now!” You sighed and shook your head, looking away from her. You grimaced again. You didn’t want to be too emotional, but you hadn’t really had time to relax enough to work through things. 

"Jeeze, you humans are touchy... emotional...” she muttered, crossing her arms and looking at you. There was a long silence. “You are going to be fine….you are as safe as you can be here. If I personally wanted you dead, you wouldn’t have survived this long; I would have released you into the tardis’s underlevels and hunted you for sport.” She said calmly, “Now, we are going to finish tea; you are going to go slink off, you will join me for dinner at seven p.m. sharp, and then we will discuss this plan further, no more gross emotions from you. Do you understand?” She said like there was no room to argue. 

You nodded and looked back down at your hands. You could get through today, and once again you had more questions than answers, but it was fine, you had accepted that this woman wouldn’t give you a straight answer.

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TAG LIST| @germansarechill

if you want to be added to the tag list just let me know!~

[mariacallous]

April 12, 2019, Updated at 12:22 a.m. ET on April 15, 2019.

In the end, the man who reportedly smeared feces on the walls of his lodgings, mistreated his kitten, and variously blamed the ills of the world on feminists and bespectacled Jewish writers was pulled from the Ecuadorian embassy looking every inch like a powdered-sugar Saddam Hussein plucked straight from his spider hole. The only camera crew to record this pivotal event belonged to Ruptly, a Berlin-based streaming-online-video service, which is a wholly owned subsidiary of RT, the Russian government’s English-language news channel and the former distributor of Julian Assange’s short-lived chat show.

RT’s tagline is “Question more,” and indeed, one might inquire how it came to pass that the spin-off of a Kremlin propaganda organ and now registered foreign agent in the United States first arrived on the scene. Its camera recorded a team of London’s Metropolitan Police dragging Assange from his Knightsbridge cupboard as he burbled about resistance and toted a worn copy of Gore Vidal’s History of the National Security State.

Vidal had the American national-security establishment in mind when he narrated that polemic, although I doubt even he would have contrived to portray the CIA as being in league with a Latin American socialist named for the founder of the Bolshevik Party. Ecuador’s President Lenín Moreno announced Thursday that he had taken the singular decision to expel his country’s long-term foreign guest and revoke his asylum owing to Assange’s “discourteous and aggressive behavior.”

According to Interior Minister María Paula Romo, this evidently exceeded redecorating the embassy with excrement—alas, we still don’t know whether it was Assange’s or someone else’s—refusing to bathe, and welcoming all manner of international riffraff to visit him. It also involved interfering in the “internal political matters in Ecuador,” as Romo told reporters in Quito. Assange and his organization, WikiLeaks, Romo said, have maintained ties to two Russian hackers living in Ecuador who worked with one of the country’s former foreign ministers, Ricardo Patiño, to destabilize the Moreno administration.

We don’t yet know whether Romo’s allegation is true (Patiño denied it) or simply a pretext for booting a nuisance from state property. But Assange’s ties to Russian hackers and Russian intelligence organs are now beyond dispute.

Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s indictment of 12 cyberoperatives for Russia’s Main Intelligence Directorate for the General Staff (GRU) suggests that Assange was, at best, an unwitting accomplice to the GRU’s campaign to sway the U.S. presidential election in 2016, and allegedly even solicited the stolen Democratic correspondence from Russia’s military intelligence agency, which was masquerading as Guccifer 2.0. Assange repeatedly and viciously trafficked, on Twitter and on Fox News, in the thoroughly debunked claim that the correspondence might have been passed to him by the DNC staffer Seth Rich, who, Assange darkly suggested, was subsequently murdered by the Clintonistas as revenge for the presumed betrayal.

Mike Pompeo, then CIA director and, as an official in Donald Trump’s Cabinet, an indirect beneficiary of Assange’s meddling in American democracy, went so far as to describe WikiLeaks as a “non-state hostile intelligence service often abetted by state actors like Russia.” For those likening the outfit to legitimate news organizations, I’d submit that this is a shade more severe a description, especially coming from America’s former spymaster, than anything Trump has ever grumbled about The New York Times or The Washington Post.

Russian diplomats had concocted a plot, as recently as late 2017, to exfiltrate Assange from the Ecuadorian embassy, according to The Guardian. “Four separate sources said the Kremlin was willing to offer support for the plan—including the possibility of allowing Assange to travel to Russia and live there. One of them said that an unidentified Russian businessman served as an intermediary in these discussions.” The plan was scuttled only because it was deemed too dangerous.

In 2015, Focus Ecuador reported that Assange had aroused suspicion among Ecuador’s own intelligence service, SENAIN, which spied on him in the embassy in a years-long operation. “In some instances, [Assange] requested that he be able to choose his own Security Service inside the embassy, even proposing the use of operators of Russian nationality,” the Ecuadorian journal noted, adding that SENAIN looked on such a proposal with something less than unmixed delight.

All of which is to say that Ecuador had ample reasons of its own to show Assange the door and was well within its sovereign rights to do so. He first sought refuge in the embassy after he jumped bail more than seven years ago to evade extradition to Sweden on sexual-assault charges brought by two women. Swedish prosecutors suspended their investigation in 2017 into the most serious allegation of rape because they’d spent five years trying but failing to gain access to their suspect to question him. (That might now change, and so the lawyer for that claimant has filed to reopen the case.) But the British charges remained on the books throughout.

The Times of London leader writer Oliver Kamm has noted that quite apart from being a “victim of a suspension of due process,” Assange is “a fugitive from it.” Yet to hear many febrile commentators tell it, his extradition was simply a matter of one sinister prime minister cackling down the phone to another, with the CIA nodding approvingly in the background, as an international plot unfurled to silence a courageous speaker of truth to power. Worse than that, Assange and his ever-dwindling claque of apologists spent years in the pre-#MeToo era suggesting, without evidence, that the women who accused him of being a sex pest were actually American agents in disguise, and that Britain was simply doing its duty as a hireling of the American empire in staking out his diplomatic digs with a net.

As it happens, a rather lengthy series of U.K. court cases and Assange appeals, leading all the way up to the Supreme Court, determined Assange’s status in Britain.

The New Statesman’s legal correspondent, David Allen Green, expended quite a lot of energy back in 2012 swatting down every unfounded assertion and conspiracy theory for why Assange could not stand before his accusers in Scandinavia without being instantly rendered to Guantanamo Bay. Ironically, as Green noted, going to Stockholm would make it harder for Assange to be sent on to Washington because “any extradition from Sweden … would require the consent of both Sweden and the United Kingdom” instead of just the latter country. Nevertheless, Assange ran and hid and self-pityingly professed himself a “political prisoner.”

Everything about this Bakunin of bullshit and his self-constructed plight has belonged to the theater of the absurd. I suppose it’s only fair that absurdity dominates the discussion now about a newly unsealed U.S. indictment of Assange. According to Britain’s Home Office, the Metropolitan Police arrested Assange for skipping bail, and then, when he arrived at the police station, he was further arrested “in relation to a provisional extradition request from the United States.”

The operative word here is provisional, because that request has yet to be wrung through the same domestic legal protocols as Sweden’s. Assange will have all the same rights he was accorded when he tried to beat his first extradition rap in 2010. At Assange’s hearing, the judge dismissed his claims of persecution by calling him “a narcissist who cannot get beyond his own selfish interests.” Neither can his supporters.

A “dark moment for press freedom,” tweeted the NSA whistle-blower Edward Snowden from his security in press-friendly Moscow. “It’s the criminalization of journalism by the Trump Justice Department and the gravest threat to press freedom, by far, under the Trump presidency,” intoned The Intercept’s founding editor Glenn Greenwald who, like Assange, has had that rare historical distinction of having once corresponded with the GRU for an exclusive.

These people make it seem as if Assange is being sought by the Eastern District of Virginia for publishing American state secrets rather than for allegedly conniving to steal them.

The indictment makes intelligible why a grand jury has charged him. Beginning in January 2010, Chelsea Manning began passing to WikiLeaks (and Assange personally) classified documents obtained from U.S. government servers. These included files on the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and U.S. State Department cables. But Manning grew hesitant to pilfer more documents.*

At this point, Assange allegedly morphed from being a recipient and publisher of classified documents into an agent of their illicit retrieval. “On or about March 8, 2010, Assange agreed to assist [Chelsea] Manning in cracking a password stored on United States Department of Defense computers connected to the Secret Internet Protocol Networks, a United States government network used for classified documents and communications,” according to the indictment.

Assange allegedly attempted to help Manning do this using a username that was not hers in an effort to cover her virtual tracks. In other words, the U.S. accuses him of instructing her to hack the Pentagon, and offering to help. This is not an undertaking any working journalist should attempt without knowing that the immediate consequence will be the loss of his job, his reputation, and his freedom at the hands of the FBI.

I might further direct you to Assange’s own unique brand of journalism, when he could still be said to be practicing it. Releasing U.S. diplomatic communiqués that named foreigners living in conflict zones or authoritarian states and liaising with American officials was always going to require thorough vetting and redaction, lest those foreigners be put in harm’s way. Assange did not care—he wanted their names published, according to Luke Harding and David Leigh in WikiLeaks: Inside Julian Assange’s War on Secrecy. As they recount the story, when Guardian journalists working with WikiLeaks to disseminate its tranche of U.S. secrets tried to explain to Assange why it was morally reprehensible to publish the names of Afghans working with American troops, Assange replied: “Well, they’re informants. So, if they get killed, they’ve got it coming to them. They deserve it.” (Assange denied the account; the names, in the end, were not published in The Guardian, although some were by WikiLeaks in its own dump of the files.)**

James Ball, a former staffer at WikiLeaks—who argues against Assange’s indictment in these pages—has also remarked on Assange’s curious relationship with a notorious Holocaust denier named Israel Shamir:

Shamir has a years-long friendship with Assange, and was privy to the contents of tens of thousands of US diplomatic cables months before WikiLeaks made public the full cache. Such was Shamir’s controversial nature that Assange introduced him to WikiLeaks staffers under a false name. Known for views held by many to be antisemitic, Shamir aroused the suspicion of several WikiLeaks staffers—myself included—when he asked for access to all cable material concerning ‘the Jews,’ a request which was refused.

Shamir soon turned up in Moscow where, according to the Russian newspaper Kommersant, he was offering to write articles based on these cables for $10,000 a pop. Then he traveled to Minsk, where he reportedly handed over a cache of unredacted cables on Belarus to functionaries for Alexander Lukashenko’s dictatorship, whose dissident-torturing secret police is still conveniently known as the KGB.

Fish and guests might begin to stink after three days, but Assange has reeked from long before he stepped foot in his hideaway cubby across from Harrods. He has put innocent people’s lives in danger; he has defamed and tormented a poor family whose son was murdered; he has seemingly colluded with foreign regimes not simply to out American crimes but to help them carry off their own; and he otherwise made that honorable word transparency in as much of a need of delousing as he is.

Yet none of these vices has landed him in the dock. If he is innocent of hacking U.S. government systems—or can offer a valid public-interest defense for the hacking—then let him have his day in court, first in Britain and then in America. But don’t continue to fall for his phony pleas for sympathy, his megalomania, and his promiscuity with the facts. Julian Assange got what he deserved.

[lcvernat]

Our Tainted Love Chapter Three | Natasha Romanoff x Fem!Reader

Series Masterlist | Chapter Two | Chapter Four

Series Summary: Natalia Romanova had one mission: kill the princess. It was meant to be simple for someone of her skillset, and it would've been simple, but Natalia made one tiny mistake that could cost her everything: she fell for you. Yet she had no choice, you were her mission and she had to complete it.

At the end of the day, a love between an assassin and her target was destined to end in bloodshed.

Word Count: 3.7k

Content Warnings: fluff, mentions of dreykov & violence (think that's all tbh but lemme know if i forgot something)

A/N: starting this off by saying i am so sorry for abandoning this series for 3 months. writers block sucks but i promise you this series will get finished and i will try my hardest to make updates more frequent! i love this series, and i am so excited to write the next chapters & also to hear what you guys think. so please tell me what your thoughts are!! i love love love getting comment reblogs or replies to my fics, they mean the world.

You don't think you've ever met a more talkative man before today. You had danced with him three times, and he had not ceased his obnoxious chatter once. Your ears were going to bleed. His voice was like gravel, but it wasn't hot or attractive, it was disgusting, and you had to resist the urge to tell him to clear his throat multiple times. How he managed to still have things to talk about, you didn't know. You'd tried your hardest to tune him out after the first dance had ended, your body moving on autopilot as you nodded along to whatever he was saying.

Your feet were aching, and your face muscles were strained from the amount of times you were required to smile tonight. All you wanted to do right now was head back to your quarters and go to sleep. You hadn't even gotten another glimpse of the mysterious woman since the first time you saw her; it was as if she had walked through a wall and disappeared.

"-gardens are beautiful, you shall have to come visit them one day, yes?"

Lord Armstrong (you had surprisingly paid enough attention to catch his name) was looking at you expectantly and you blinked, your mouth tilting downwards in confusion for a split second before regaining your composure and plastering another massively fake smile onto your face.

"Hm? Oh yes, yes, that would be lovely."

He immediately brightened, and you had literally no idea what you'd just agreed to. Maybe if he wasn't so dull and boring, you'd pay more attention to him, but the only thing that was currently occupying your thoughts was the mysterious redhead. You hoped you'd be able to see her again, even though you didn't know her name. But you were determined to find her and speak to her, and nothing was going to stop you. Unless you died from boredom because of Lord Armstrong.

"Apologies, my Lord," you cut him off right as he opened his mouth to speak again. He shut his mouth, looking disgruntled that you had interrupted him (you were pretty sure he was a misogynistic asshole, if the way he looked down his nose as if he was superior to you was any indication) but chose wisely not to say anything, "but I do have to admit I'm quite tired. Would it be alright if I retire for the night?" Your voice was as professional as you could make it, even if you really wanted to scream at the insipid man.

You were planning on leaving anyway, whether he said yes or no, but you figured it was nice to ask him first. Many of the guests and nobles had already retired to their quarters for the night, each of them saying goodbye to you as they left. Each of them except for the redhead. It didn't make any sense. Why would she come to this ball, dedicated to finding you a marriage partner, without even bothering to introduce herself?

Ironic how she was the only one to catch your attention out of the hundreds of hopeful guests who had purposely sought you out multiple times to introduce themselves and have lengthy, albeit mundane, conversations with you. Lord Armstrong nodded, despite looking a bit disappointed that he couldn't get to spend any more time with you. You bid goodnight to him and the rest of the lingering guests before exiting the ballroom, one of the guards following in stride behind you the minute you leave.

Maggie was already waiting for you in your room, preparing to help you undress for the night. You were thankful to see a welcome and familiar face after hours of interacting with people you've either never met before or had seen at least once in your life, but all you really needed right now was to sleep for at least 24 hours.

The first part of her plan had worked perfectly. Natasha had captured your attention and had then effectively slipped out of the ballroom without being noticed by any of the guests inside, most busy mingling or trying to get a conversation or dance with you, so it was really quite easy to slip out unnoticed. She claimed a headache and had a servant escort her to her quarters.

They were nice. Extravagant, really. Better than anything she’s ever had. Better than the rickety bed with a mattress so uncomfortable concrete would be softer that she had to deal with in the Red Room. A dark, jealous monster writhed in her chest as she clenched her jaw. Life was unfair. She was well aware of that, and she tried to never let it bother her, but seeing these rooms that half the people in this castle had been used to all of her life whilst she had been treated as less than an animal, jealousy couldn't help but strike.

Being born was a gamble that no one asked to be a part of. Either you were lucky, and were born into the rich, spoiled life such as this; never having to know a day of pain or hardship in your life. Or you were another Natalia Romanova, unlucky in the gamble of life, despite being a child who had asked for none of it.

It wasn’t fair, but she couldn’t do anything about it. This was her life, whether she liked it or not. At least she could savor the six months of living in this room, with a bed that looked like a comfortable cloud she could sink right into, and actual good food that didn't taste like cardboard.

Yet that wasn't the only thing she should focus on; she had a mission to do. Everything seemed to be going according to plan so far, and hopefully she had captured your attention enough that you'd actively seek her out tomorrow. She didn't want to be the one to seek you out, didn't want to seem too eager. Best if she kept eyes off her for as long as possible.

Right now, though, she was ready to collapse into bed, and this time, she wouldn't be handcuffed to it. It's weird, this newfound sense of some freedom, even if she was only here on a mission. She could... live. Away from the chains Dreykov had her trapped in. All he required was updates on how the mission was going via letters, but he didn't need to know if she decided to act human for a while. Savor the months of just being able to simply live before she had to complete the mission.

It was noon now; you'd been up for hours and yet you still hadn't set eyes on the mysterious redhead from last night. You didn't want to risk asking anyone if they knew her name because you didn't know whether she was a noble or a commoner or even perhaps a peasant. Despite the Royal Marriage Laws being repealed 50 or so years ago, many nobles still frowned upon the idea of a member of the royal family marrying a commoner.

Did it make sense economically wise? Yes, because unfortunately, you knew that many of the royal family didn't marry for love. It was expected of them, really. They married for economic purposes, nobles that would be able to give them benefits economically. Rarely, they married for love. The marriage laws had been repealed, yet it was still rare for someone to marry a commoner or peasant.

You couldn't risk it. Even if you were adamant that you were going to fall in love with someone and marry them, not someone you couldn't stand. You were not going to subject yourself to years trapped in a loveless marriage: you would rather abdicate.

Luckily, you could always ask Wanda. She was your closest confidant and wanted nothing but the best for you. If you asked her, she'd probably fight to the death just to allow you to marry someone you actually loved.

"The redhead wearing all black?" She asked for confirmation whenever you had brought up the subject.

You nodded.

Wanda shrugged, hopping over a puddle before continuing, "I saw her for a split second. That's about it. She looked kind of weird. Pretty, but weird. I mean, who wears all black to a ball of potential courtiers? You'd think she would want to stand out."

You and Wanda had managed to escape the swarm of courtiers that wanted to get to know you more temporarily by retreating to the garden. You'd begged Clint to guard the gardens and not let anyone else in because you desperately needed some alone time to talk to your best friend. It had taken him a lot of convincing to leave you alone, since rumor had it that Maggie had threatened all of the guards to make sure you weren't alone with anyone for even a split second. Clint liked you though, and he trusted Wanda nearly as much as he trusted you, so he had agreed in the end.

"Maybe she didn't need to stand out," you muttered, plucking a flower out of one of the bushes.

You can feel Wanda's gaze on you, assessing you. "Don't tell me you've experienced love at first sight," she sighs, exasperatedly, "you don't know her. Now, I don't care whether you end up marrying a noble or commoner or even a dog if you really wanted to but... other people might care."

It's your turn to sigh, "I know. But she was pretty, and... there was just something about her, okay? I want to see her again."

Wanda sighed resignedly, but her gaze softened, "I'll ask around. Someone's had to have seen her."

You brighten, wrapping your arms around the redhead gratefully.

"You are the best, Wands,"

"I know."

Another victim visited her in her dream last night. Despite sleeping in a bed so comfortable it was almost surreal, the nightmares didn't stop plaguing her. For some reason, this particular nightmare had unnerved her more than usual, even though it was the same monotonous plot of all her other nightmares - Natasha reliving her kills again and again. Maybe it was the waking up in an unfamiliar environment, and the fact that she wasn't handcuffed to her bed that had done it. Whatever it was, it had woken her up before the sun had risen and it had kept her up.

Natasha thought it would be best to explore the castle today, so she would know her way around her temporary home for the next six months. She would probably have to steal a map from somewhere too, get a look at all the exits and guard towers, in case she might ever need to make a quick escape, in the rare chance the mission would go wrong. She didn't plan on hunting you down, instead hoping that you would be the one to attempt to hunt her down. The prey hunting the predator. How charming.

Either it was just her luck (and it probably wasn't, considering she has never been lucky a day in her life) or she was just in the right place at the right time, but she spotted you. Her next stop on her exploration list was the gardens, and Natasha had admittedly been quite confused as to why there was a guard refusing to let anyone entrance into them. That was until she had heard your laugh, followed by the sound of your light footsteps on the grass as you came into view, Wanda in tow beside you.

Natasha knew the exact moment you laid your eyes on her. Saw the way your breath hitched, and your chest stopped rising momentarily. Wanda stopped in her tracks too, turning to give Natasha an assessing stare. Natasha straightened automatically, before sending a gentle smile Wanda's way. Wanda may potentially prove to be a complication in her plan, especially since she's so close to you. Having Wanda grow suspicious of her is the last thing she needs, so she needs to get on the other redhead's good side.

She turns her attention to you then, and kneels down into a curtsey, "Your highness. Lady Romanoff, but please just call me Natasha. It's a pleasure to make your acquaintance." She keeps her voice prim and proper as she rises from the curtsey.

"Natasha," you smiled at her, "please just call me Y/N." You turn to look at Wanda, Natasha sensing a silent conversation going on between the two of you, before you turn back to her, "Would you want to take a walk with me in the gardens?" You finally ask. Natasha notices Wanda gives your hand a reassuring squeeze before slipping away soundlessly, leaving the two of you and the guard alone. The guard coughs then, and you turn to look at him. The expression on his face says he doesn't want to leave you alone with Natasha. Your expression is reassuring, promising that you'll be okay.

If only you knew.

After an intense but silent stare-off between the two, the guard sighed resignedly, waving his hand in what Natasha thinks is meant to be a very begrudging approval.

"I would love to," Natasha finally replies, and the side of her mouth quirks up as she sees your face brightening. You turn on your heel, making your way back where you came, and Natasha follows after you.

"So, Natasha, I've heard that you're a ballerina?" You ask her. You'd been talking for a while, simply getting to know each other. Luck was on your side today, the universe wanting you to meet the redhead as much as you had wanted to meet her, and you were caught off-guard whenever you had exited the gardens just to come face to face with the mysterious redhead from the previous night.

Of course, you couldn't pass up on the perfect opportunity to actually have a conversation with her and show her your favorite part of the court, so you just had to ask her if she wanted to join you for a walk.

Natasha nodded, "I do. Though I doubt you've seen any of my performances. I, well, I perform in the more... poor parts of the kingdom."

You could sense her hesitance as she said that. She probably thought you would judge her for it. Frowning, you stop in your tracks and turn to face her. She stops too, turning to you with a confused expression on her face.

"I don't care about that," you say softly, "I'd love to see you perform one day. If you want to show me."

Natasha's smile is shy, "Thank you. I'd love to perform for you one day."

"Well, you have six months to find some time to perform so," you trail off, your tone lighthearted and full of amusement.

A light chuckle is your only response, and you both descend into a peaceful silence as you walk through the gardens together. Occasionally, you’ll point out some of your favorite flowers in the garden, and it warms your insides how you notice Natasha eagerly latching onto your every word. You don’t think anyone has ever given you so much undivided attention before, except for Wanda.

Carol used to give you her undivided attention, you two used to be inseparable, but something happened one day, and you weren’t sure what. A rift divided your friendship, slowly tearing it apart as you both drifted away from each other. It stung then, and it still left a bitter aftertaste in your mouth now. You hoped the rumors of her courting Maria Rambeau were true though, because you still wanted her to be happy.

“Are you okay?” Natasha glances at you, noticing the abrupt change in your mood, as if someone had flicked a switch inside you.

You shake yourself, pushing away the memories and focusing on the present. “Yep! Completely fine,” you give a tight-lipped smile before an idea popped into your head and you gasped, eager for a change of subject. “Hey! I want to show you something, come on.”

Grabbing Natasha’s hand, you failed to notice how the redhead momentarily tensed at your touch because you were too excited to drag her to one of the best spots in the garden. It was hidden deep into the gardens, and not many people knew of the place, but you did, and it was magical. You weren't sure why you wanted to share it with Natasha, you were just certain that you did want to share this special place with her.

"Here we are!" You said as you rounded a corner, the view greeting you was a beautiful stone fountain, covered in leaves and vines, moss in the crevices of some of the intricate designs carved into the fountain centuries ago. There was no water in the fountain, having dried out years ago, yet it was still beautiful. It was hidden by overgrown hedges that hadn't been trimmed or taken care of in years, and unless you were really searching for it, you wouldn't find it. You loved it. Sometimes you came here to hide from the duties of being a princess. No one ever found you here, not even the guards.

"Do you like it? It's one of my favorite places, I come here to hide sometimes. I don't think anyone else knows about it, not even Wanda. So, you're one of the special ones to know of its existence." You rounded on Natasha, smiling.

"It is beautiful," she agrees, "how long has it been here?"

"I have no idea, probably a long while. Maybe since the castle was built? Probably since the first ever monarchs, like way before my time. I love it, though."

You still hadn't taken your hand out of Natasha's. She hadn't removed her hand from your grip either, though. Unfortunately, she noticed it the same second you did, and abruptly pulled her hand from yours. You tried not to visibly deflate.

Wanda would most definitely laugh at you right now, talk some crap about 'love at first sight', but was it really your fault? Natasha was nice, and very pretty, almost ethereal. She looked like an angel. She actually listened to you ramble too, which was something. She wasn't boring like everyone else, but you knew you had to converse with some of the other guests too. This was a six-month long event, so you couldn't really call it a day on the second day, and you still didn't really know Natasha. You wanted to get closer to her, while also talking to the other guests.

"We should probably head back now," you break the awkward silence that had enveloped the two of you, "the sun's setting, and I don't want to get murdered by my lady-in-waiting."

"Yeah, that's a good idea."

The walk back was unfortunately very awkward. The mood was certainly ruined tonight.

Y/N L/N was the complete opposite of what Natasha had expected. The assassin expected an uptight, spoilt, and selfish princess, but you weren't that at all. You were the type of princess people wrote fairytales about. She wouldn't be surprised if you had a deeply devoted love for animals too.

She couldn't get her emotions involved. She couldn't afford that. Despite you not fitting the image she had made of you in her mind, she'd have to work around it. Even if you had treated her nicer than she's ever been treated in her life. Even if she had felt actual happiness today. Or what she thought was happiness. Something warm had blossomed in her chest as she walked through the gardens with you, trying its hardest to battle the darkness the Red Room had inflicted in her. Her life was a sick game.

Natasha had never been asked to get to know her victims before, rarely would she ever be asked to gain a relationship with them. She got their names, location, and killed them. That was it. This was different. She had to gain a relationship with you, had to gain your trust. She had to actually get to know not just the princess, but Y/N L/N. But she'd went her entire life with thinking of her victims as nothing except for something to be discarded, thrown out like the week's garbage. She could easily do the same for you. She could.

Having retired to her room for the night, she began to write the letter to Dreykov, needing to send it out tomorrow. The undercover guard had caught her while she was exploring a deserted corridor earlier today, and he had damn well been close to getting his throat slit with the way he had grabbed her arm, but luckily for him he had slipped her the note and revealed his identity before she could do so. Ivan was his name, and he'd been undercover here for months, under the guise that he had been a very skilled bodyguard for many different important individuals until he had a terrible accident and had to be on leave until his injuries had healed, and then got hired as a guard for the castle.

Whether he used to be an actual bodyguard or if he was just one of Dreykov's men, Natasha didn't know, but clearly his credentials were good enough and any background checks had been passed if he was allowed on the Royal Guard. He also seemed to be talented at staying undercover if he hadn't been found out yet, which was good. The last thing she needed was an incompetent man sabotaging the mission.

She'd meet Ivan tomorrow night when the rest of the castle had retired to their rooms, and he'd do whatever he had to do to get the letter to Dreykov without it being intercepted. All she had to do was update Dreykov on how the mission was going so far.

Of course, purposefully leaving out the part where you are a lot different than she had expected. And she fears she may grow to like you, because despite her determination to keep her emotions away from her job; she was a human after all, and humans had feelings, even if the feelings were ultimately unwanted.

general tags: @sheneonromanoff @olicity-boo @r4nd0mgir1 @tigerlillyruiz @dj-bynum3718

series tags: @lonewalker17 @francedeboix @notmeellaannyy @mrsromanoff @romugh @marrymemcgrath @gryffindorkromanoff @sayah13 @waltzingin1698 @natashaswifeyyyyy @persephonespomegranetes @princessblackmoon @shortstoppan @h3artsnatty @yyyyourmummmm @wanda-natasha @agalsmaraudersobsession @mmmmokdok @unknownwithyou @jowshuaayee @reginassweetheart @ellal04 @mazikeencooper @xxsekhmet @szlayed

dm me, send me an ask or reply to be added to my general taglist or this series taglist!

[fanon-elio]

-~▪︎°PINNED / A Letter for you.°▪︎~-

Made 09/01/2024 Updated ---

Welcome dear guest.

I'd like to keep my name private, so you can call me by my user name if you like. I'm 21 years old, German, and use He/Him pronouns. I'm not a native english speaker and have a small issue with getting my grammar right, so i apologize for any typos you may find.

I created this blog purely out of curiosity because i read fanfictions every day and wondered if i could write some of my own.

This also means that i'm not as experienced as other writers, so please keep this in mind.

If i feel like it i will sometimes post my art on here, be it in relation to a fanfiction or something completely unrelated.

However due to me being a little colorblind, i may get some colors wrong.

DNI if you are a Minor, Racist, Homophobe, Transphobe, Ableist or generally a hateful person. This Blog is made to be a safe space for everyone and LGBTQ+ people in particular.

Before you continue i kindly ask you to take the time to use this post to inform yourself of my blog's content.

Slow Updates: I work a normal 7 to 5 job, so i won't be able to post regularly.

18+ Blog: If you're a Minor, please leave. There will be NSFW content on this blog.

Consistency: I'm not a consistent writer, sometimes a post may not compare to other in quality.

Consent: I have the right to refuse any request i feel uncomfortable with.

Identity: If not specifically stated otherwise, the readers will be gender neutral. Please specify what you want in your request.

Furthermore, i want to inform you about what you'll be able to request: Things I WILL write about:

Sfw/Nsfw content (Will always be tagged)

Angst/Hurt content

Fluff

Headcanons

One shots

Things that i will NOT write about:

Non-con. (please miss me with that sh*t)

Pedophilia

Abuse in any way

Nswf topics i'm uncomfortable with.

Incest or stepcest

Character x Character

Fandoms i will write for: (This list may be expanded upon in the future)

Zenless Zone Zero

Tags that will be used:

White Letter: just general posting

Black Letter: a notice to inform about possible changes

Green Letter: Sfw fics, headcanons and oneshots.

Blue Letter: Hurt/Comfort fics, headcanons and oneshots

Red Letter: Nsfw fics, headcanons and oneshots / Minors DNI

Now that all of this is out of the way, i wish you happy browsing.

Please do keep in mind to check this post out once in a while for possible changes

-Elio

[yawnzzjun]

13: NEW GUESTS

IDIOTS IN LOVE

Yungyu stared at the window as he noticed not one but six girls right outside the door.

Who are these girls? You and your friends of course but he couldn't find a reason as to why you all are here until..

"Why are you staring outside the window?" Seungheon asked the boy as he turned ro face him.

"Why don't you take a look for yourself." He answered back while moving away.

Seungheon made his way towards the window as a shock of excitement hit him.

"They're finally here." He mumbled as he rushed to the door, leaving Yungyu confused.

Seungheon opened the door, surprising the girls from his behavior.

"You made it!" He said.

You smiled back as your friends waved.

He let you all in but was greeted with the rest of the members.

"Where did you all come from-"

"You're coming with us for a bit." Was the last words he heard as Minho dragged him leaving you all.

"So now what?" Hyein asked.

────────────────

"You invited them over without aaking us?" Minho asked the younger boy.

"Well yeah, but in my defense you all went behind my back and interacted with her friends."

"To get you both together actually." Minho said, folding his arms.

"I don't really see the big fuss, just next time do tell us." Myungho said as he pushed Seungheon out the room.

"I was interrogating him-"

"I don't care Minho."

.

.

.

Seungheon came back out to see you all watching some sort of show while talking to each other then heard his name being brought up.

"So Y/N when will you actually date Seungheon?" Minji asked.

"Actually I have no clue, I dont even know how to date." was your response which made her laughed a bit.

Haerin eyes caught him as he decided to enter the room.

"Sorry for.. being dragged away..?" He said as he took the seat next to you.

Before the girls could respond his friends was already out but with snacks and a smirking Minho, for some reason..

──────────────

Of course Minho was only here to tease the boy about you, I mean both of them are close, why won't Minho not tease him?

You stared at both of them, laughing a bit everytime both you and Seungheon made eye contact then remembered that you had a task to do here.

"Seungheon I forgot something!" You said, causing Minho to stop as they both looked at you.

"What did you forget?" He asked.

"The hug!"

mars': writers block and feeling a bit sick over the past days is what I hate rn(sorry for late update and a short one as well)

PREVIOUS | MASTERLIST | NEXT

TAGLIST: @gfksn @dearflwrz @shualuvss (open)

@ yawnzzjun

[forabeatofadrum]

an ask game for writers to procrastinate working on your WIP(s)

Thanks for tagging me @wellbelesbian! Better late than never, eh?

1. 🦈Tell us the name of your/ one of your WIP(s):

Just Some Guy and Ljubili se. Those are my "active" WIPs now, because if I had to list all of them... oh boy. Although I'm working on Just Some Guy more.

2. 🍄Describe your WIP/one of your WIP(s) in the format of “___ + ___ =___”

Outsider POV + Chosen One shit = disinterest

Queer journey + long distance = chaos (I think???)

3. 🌍What tags or warnings will one of your WIP(s) need if you intend to share it?

For these two, none. I know Matt is MCD, but it stands for Matt Christopher Davis.

4. 🧭An alternative title to one of your WIP(s)?

I don't really have alternative titles, but they do have nicknames. I call Just Some Guy "MCD" because it's just funny to me and Ljubili se "Klaine in Ljubljana 2" which is ridiculous cause they're no longer in Ljubljana.

5. ⚠️Which WIP your most likely to finish or update next?

Just Some Guy. I only need to finish one more chapter and I've been updating it weekly.

6. 💾What is your document of your WIP/ a WIP called? (not the stories actual title but what you’ve saved it as)

Ljubili se is in "drabbles and oneshots" and Just Some Guy in "Non-glee drabbles and oneshots" because I am chaotic and put all my writing in those two docs, unless something becomes too big, then it gets its own doc.

7. 🖍Post Any sentence(s) from your WIP.

I’ve heard stories of physical fights between them, but I kind of don’t care. Just let me play chess in peace. If they want to knock each other’s brains out, be my guest. One time I walked to class and Simon almost shoved Baz against the wall in anger, and I just passed them. I think more students are kind of used to their escalations. So, no, I don’t care. Arnold says it’s rude of me to think that way, but it’s not out of malice. It’s out of disinterest. “Really, I don’t get politics,” I sigh.

8. ♻️A scrapped idea for your current WIP.

I scrapped two scenes in Just Some Guy. The whole premise of the fic is that Matt honestly doesn't care that much about what the fuck is going in with Simon Snow and entourage. Originally, the kidnapping of the Mage in the 6th year had an entire scene where he, Leslie and John discuss it. And in the 8th year, there was an entire scene where Matt and his dad learn about the Mage's death, because once again, John and Leslie show up to discuss it. But in the end, I realised that Matt just... doesn't care. And those two scenes therefore felt very forced and it dragged the chapters down. The snippets aren't bad. They're just woefully unnecessary. I was like "I need Matt to acknowledge this" and I realised I didn't. I put both of them under the cut at the end of this post.

Hey, it ain't spoilers, cause everyone who's read Carry On knows what happens to good ole Davy.

9. 🤔What’s a story you’d love to write but haven’t even started yet?

Unfortunately for me, my mind's already started planning for this year's Klaine Advent/December Fanworks Challenge. Why is this unfortunate? Well, I still have to finish the 2023 one, Ljubili se.

But this idea is pretty neat. It's inspired by J.M. Frey's Accidental Turn series. That's all I'm sayin.

10. 🤡How many WIPS are you actively working on?

Actively, 2. Maybe 3, since bamboo ceiling is rotating in my brain. Don't ask me about the others in my WIP Hospital.

11. 🛠Is there a scene or anything in the WIP you are struggling with right now?

I AM FUCKING STUCK ON LJUBILI SE BECAUSE JUST LIKE LJUBIM TE I JUST FIND KURT'S POV HARDER/LESS INTERESTING TO WRITE.

12. ❤️Not a question, just a second Kudos to send.

Kudos back!

I think this post has been passed around in the Snowbaz fandom, so I am passing it to the Gleeks: @thnxforknowingme @caramelcoffeeaddict @coffeegleek @quizasvivamos @bitbybitwrites @shame-is-a-wasted-emotion @rockitmans @special-bc-ur-part-of-it and whoever else!

Year 6: Mage's kidnapping

When I come home from Christmas break, something is definitely up.

“Did I miss anything?” I whisper to Leslie. We’re walking towards the Dining Hall to meet up with the others.

Leslie looks around.

“I heard this from John,” she leans in, “that the Mage got kidnapped over Christmas.”

“What?!” I exclaim.

“Shut it,” Leslie hisses. Some people are indeed staring at us. “The Coven is keeping it quiet at the Mage’s request. He cannot afford to look weak in front of the Old Families and the Dark Creatures.”

“Then how does John know?” I ask, but I think I already know the answer. John just knows stuff. And so far he’s always right. Maybe he’s a Seer, or something. Not that those are real, but damn, John is a strong contender.

And yes, Leslie tells me that John just knows.

Leslie and I enter the Dining Hall and John waves. Everyone’s already here. I look to Leslie to say something about it, but she’s already run to Sam to catch up. I shrug. Leslie can be mysterious as well.

I sit next to John and I inquire about the Mage’s disappearance.

“Yeah, Simon Snow saved him and all that jazz,” John says quietly.

“Shouldn’t the Mage be the one protecting him, not the other way around?”

“You’d think, huh?” John sighs.

I look around. I assume others know as well, but no one discusses it openly. Even the Old Family kids don’t taunt Simon Snow about his mentor allegedly being kidnapped.

“Why did you tell Leslie?” I ask.

“Because I knew she’d tell you.”

“Why is it important that I know?” I ask, “You know I don’t care about Chosen One stuff.”

I care more about the pudding that’s in front of me. Fuck yeah, pudding. Both my mum and my dad are decent cooks, but they have nothing on cook Pritchard.

John shrugs.

“I needed you to react to it for story reasons,” he says.

“… Okay,” I say and I scoop some pudding on my plate, “Did it work?”

John nods with a smile.

“Yes, it did.”

--

Year 8: Mage's death

“Okay, so, the Humdrum attacked the Pitch Manor, where Simon Snow so happened to be. The day after, it attacks Watford. Simon and the Mage are there. Simon defeats the Humdrum and lost his magic. He kills the Mage. Is that… all?”

“In a nutshell,” Leslie says.

“Why would Simon Snow kill the Mage?” my dad wonders out loud. That is indeed the most surprising part, not even the fact that the Mage killed Ebb, the goatherd.

“The investigation is still in its beginning phase,” John says, “But it sounds like the Mage maybe wasn’t a good man after all.”

“Huh,” my dad says. That’s all. But it summarises it perfectly. Look, my dad and I are just some guys. We don’t have big opinions on the status quo, so we never really questioned how things are.

“So, what now?” I ask.

“There will be an inquiry into the Mage’s death,” Leslie explains, “Mitali Bunce is interim headmistress. Rumour has it that Simon Snow’s magic hasn’t returned, so who knows if he’ll come back to school.”

Damn.

This dude just saved the world, and he has to think about school?

I mean, I do too, but I am no Chosen One.

Bruh, it must suck to be Simon Snow

[beck-a-leck]

I'm gonna vent about fic comment etiquette for a hot minute beneath the cut and I'll probably delete this later after I've slept on it but...

I thought I would take my fics off of Registered Users Only lockdown, after being on it for several months. Not gonna lie I missed my guest readers and commenters.

But literally less than 2 hours after I did that I got this comment from a repeat guest commenter who has pretty much exclusively only asked the same thing when they comment

I'm legally allowed to commit murder now, right?

Like. For the last 3+ years this person has been reading my fics almost all of their comments are like this.

I'll post a brand new chapter and they'll comment 30 seconds later, "update when?"

Like. 😤

I get being excited over a fic. I get eagerly waiting for the next chapter. I even get the impatience that can come when a fic hasn't been updated in over a year.

I am very flattered to know that people feel that way about my stories.

But, mother fucker, I have been working on other things. If you just took 30 seconds to look at the rest of my profile, you would see that I have been writing other stories. I've been thinking about other fandoms. I've been juggling a dozen different projects at any one time. And I just want to shake them and shout "You'll get it when you get it! Stop asking!"

Like. I'm pretty sure this person commented a few months ago under a different name trying to semi-guilt trip me into continuing the story, which is not and never has been abandoned, and all they ever do it trigger the contrarian little gremlin in my brain that immediately says "well, now it's gonna take even longer. Nyeh!"

I just... idk. Part of me doesn't want to assume they're intentionally being rude. But also.

There are ways to comment on a fic you enjoy and would like to see more of, even if it's been on hiatus for a while without just demanding an update. They've MADE comments in the past that have been enthused and not demanding. But recently they've just gotten rude about it, treating me like I'm a vending machine and if they drop a comment (and comment) they'll get the content they want churned out to them in 2-3 business days.

I mean. Jfc saying "Please and Thank You" can go a really long way when you're asking people for things.

Like...

I just wonder if readers like that don't realize that every frustration they feel about an unfinished story, the writer feels tenfold along with a dozen other complicated feelings about it.

I certainly didn't expect that fic to still be in progress 3 years later. I thought it would be done in 6-8 months. But I can't control my damn muses and sometimes the inspiration just goes away for a very long time, and as the writer it's infuriating and guilt-inducing to see that Last Updated date getting farther and farther away.

But as the writer who is also doing all of this for free and for fun, I want to keep writing the stories that are currently fun for me, which means enjoying when different fandoms and new story ideas come and grab me by the hand and drag me off on new adventures.

I should just ignore the comment. Or at the very least wait until I'm less annoyed about it so I can respond civilly. But right now I'm just lying in bed, considering taking away guest reader privileges again. Just because I'm feeling petty.

[morushroom]

Welcome to my Tumblr blog, fellow internet-surfer!

My humble blog shouldn't riddle anyone, so take a seat, have a rest, feel yourself at home.

But in case you're instead lost here in the vast forest of my thoughts and hyperfixations, dear guest, here's a tag masterpost from me, Moru, for all your filtering needs, as well as my bio.

My name is Moru, and I am aspired gamedev and writer.

I have an interest in gamedesign, human feels and mycology, and I should mention my internet archiving habit and passionate love to vintage tech as well.

My music tastes are mostly emocore (whether it's ironic or not), post-SNES retro videogame soundtrack, japanese orchestra and blues.

also that funny test on teh internet says im istp 2w1 or smth

wellll lets talk about TAGS now

#news — In case something important happens to me, this tag is here to highlight my willful wish to make the world see it.

#gamedev — My gamedev updates, of course. Gamedesign thoughts, as well, will be categorised as such.

#writing — If I'd really be brave enough to post here full stories from my carefully constructed note, I'd be happy to share it with you, stranger.

#the biomech — Literally anything that somehow related to fictional universe of mine, filled with contrast, medieval futurism and... biomechanics?

#my art — Art dump, yet, mostly sketches, because, sadly, I didn't find myself in that medium. Yet, sometimes I use my practical skills to simply draw.

Now you know exactly what you need to know, not-so-stranger.

You will have a great time checking my blog. This is my hope.

[letsquestjess]

Hello lovelies!

I have a huge favour to ask.

For about a year now, I've been posting my original story, Legends of Myriad but it doesn't seem to be getting a lot of views/likes/comments. I haven't really posted much about it apart from reblogging chapter updates, but I'm going to be making more stuff for it soon.

If you like fantasy/sci-fi/supernatural stuff or if you've read and liked my fanfics, you may like this one! Any reblogs will be greatly appreciated as they go a long way towards getting work out there and seen.

I know this is a big ask. There's quite a bit of it up already, and there is so much more to come, but just a few reblogs can make a huge difference.

If anybody is intested in reading the story, it can be read on both Tumblr and Wordpress.

Here's the synopsis for Arc One: Awakening:

With the Temporal Gateways opening, the worlds of Myriad are once again connected. But The Core, the protector of the nine worlds, is yet to wake. While Bartholomew Spark seeks the help of catalyst and mage, Lilith Cleaver, to help him find a solution, he sets Citadel students Esther, Oscar, and Alek the task of exploring the worlds and collecting information on what he has missed out on these past three hundred years.

I'm hoping in the future to make this a collaborative project with guest writers, artists, indie game devs who want to make games based on the series, you name it. But for now, I shall leave you with this message from Professor Spark himself:

[isabellaseraphinabloger]

A Step-by-Step Guide: How to Change the Author of Your Blog

Are you seeking to switch up the authorship of your blog content? Perhaps you've had a change in staffing, or you're collaborating with guest writers. Whatever the reason, altering the author of a blog post is a common necessity in the digital landscape. Learn how to change author in WordPress seamlessly with our comprehensive guide.

Changing the author of a blog post is a straightforward process, especially if you're using WordPress. Follow these simple steps to ensure a smooth transition:

Access the WordPress Dashboard: Log in to your WordPress account and navigate to the dashboard.

Locate the Post: Find the blog post whose author you wish to change. You can do this by going to the "Posts" section and selecting the post from the list.

Edit the Post: Once you've located the post, click on the "Edit" option to open it in the editor.

Change Author: In the editor, locate the authorship information. Depending on your WordPress setup, this may be in a dropdown menu or a sidebar module. Select the new author from the available options.

Update the Post: After selecting the new author, don't forget to click the "Update" button to save your changes.

Verify the Change: To ensure that the author has been successfully changed, view the post on your blog's front end. The author's name should now reflect the update.

Changing the author of a blog post is a simple task that can be completed in just a few clicks. Whether you're reassigning content internally or acknowledging a guest contributor, WordPress makes the process effortless.

Remember, maintaining accurate authorship information is crucial for transparency and accountability. By following these steps, you can easily update the author of your blog posts whenever necessary.

So, next time you need to switch up the authorship of your blog content, you'll know exactly how to do it. Change author in WordPress with confidence and keep your blog's content organized and attributed correctly

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What are HTML5 and CSS3?

The abbreviation CSS stands for “cascading style sheets”. Web designers and writers use CSS to style and format HTML content. CSS is used to improve the look and feel of a web page as well as to manage its style.

This article will explain what CSS3 and HTML5 are. We also explain how it will assist us in developing a cutting-edge website.

What do CSS3 and HTML5 mean?

HTML and CSS, two core language elements, are used to build web pages. 

HTML discusses how the pages are assembled in tables, text, headers, and pictures or graphics. It's the standard computer language for making web pages look good. 

On the other hand, CSS is the code used to describe each page's appearance, mainly in layout, fonts, and colours. 

HTML5

A new version of HTML called HTML5 has been released. It is a huge step up from HTML4, which didn't let web designers add features to sites that HTML didn't enable. They had to use their tools and add plugins to their browsers to do that. 

Web users couldn't access the content without a device supporting those proprietary technologies or apps. One example is that Adobe Flash can't be used in Safari on Apple mobile devices.

HTML5's main goal was to eliminate the need for plugins and private technologies. You can make offline apps and add music, video, and animations to your web pages without downloading extra plugins. 

CSS3

To add and change things on a web page, web designers and writers use CSS3 and HTML. CSS lets you style a web page in a way that is easy for people to use and looks good. You can choose from different fonts, pictures, colours, tables, etc. 

We needed CSS to move different parts of a web page around. Values like "fixed" and "absolute" let you move the visual parts of a web page.

A previous CSS form, CSS2, has been updated to become CSS3. It has a lot of useful improvements and new features that make your online presence better and are now used in modern browsers, such as:

Let people watch videos from other sources without having to add extra plugins

Adding graphics to a web page has become easy. 

letting information be shown in more than one column 

letting you precisely place all of a web page's navigable parts 

Making changes to a document's white space 

How do HTML5 and CSS3 work?

There are plenty of different ways for web developers to express themselves with HTML5 and CSS3. Here is a quick rundown of what they are so you can make websites that are on the cutting edge.

The Navigation Tag

This part of HTML5 is often forgotten. Finally, it would help if you always tried to put valuable links inside Nav ("") tags. That may not seem like a big deal, but it becomes apparent when considering how it could help your website's SEO.

Search engine optimization, or SEO, is ensuring that famous search engines, like Google, will list your website. If your name is higher on this list, more people will likely visit your website, and you can expect more business.

Inside links help Google determine what search terms people should use to find your site. The links in your menu are a good sign for crawlers. When you use the Nav tag, tell the bots, "These are the most important links on the website," and help them figure out what it's about. There's no chance you'll get in trouble for not having a Nav tag, but you should do everything possible to help the search engine bots.

The headers and footers

These tags are essential, but they do an important job. When it comes to SEO, headers and footers ("<header>" and "<footer>") work well. The tags split the main text from the header and footer.

Each of the <div> tags in the header and footer are different from the others. This way, search engines can tell the information on your website apart from other material and rank it correctly.

Audio, video, and output

Users are showing an increasing interest in various forms of multimedia. Gone are the days when guests could only read text-based information. It's easy to add video and audio tags ("<video>" and "<audio>"), and HTML5 lets you make any changes you want with JavaScript and different codecs, so you can quickly get the content to work the way you want it to.

The output ("<output>") tags in HTML5 are also used to make customizations easier. Making the page output in JavaScript makes it easier to change and edit any JavaScript parts that are on it than trying to do it through HTML. It sounds pretty easy, and it does make the process go more quickly.

The Articles 

People who visit your site should be able to choose how they want to read your information if you want to get all kinds of customers. There is an article tag ("<article>" for those who love reading).

Instead of using many Div tags, developers can use the Article tag to markup single pieces of information, like a blog post. Using the Article tag to separate a website's main text even more between the header and the footer helps make the code cleaner and helps search engines find the site better.

Regarding search engine optimization (SEO), the article tag is likely one of the best. Some things are likely to happen, but they still need to. Search engine crawlers will likely use these tags to determine what information is on your site and give it the right amount of weight in the algorithm. This will help your site rank higher because Google likes content. When you wrap your text in an article tag, you tell Google your site has content. It's also possible that keyword and link texts inside the Article tag will be given more weight than those outside it. This is because, in articles for search engine bots, you have written specific content about the keyword. For the same reason, giving the article title (<title>") traits can also help your search engine optimization (SEO).

Canvas

Canvas tags ("<canvas>") are a more modern feature of HTML 5 that can be used to add different images. This lets you make more changes to the design because certain tags can wrap around where the graphics, images, or charts should go. This makes the design of your website simpler and your code clearer.

Captions and Figures

These two things work together to speed up a long process. You can separate a picture or image by using the figure tag ("<figure>"). After that, a caption ("<figcaption>" tag) can be used to add text to the figure's caption. The caption tags help determine where the caption should go next to the image. This makes adding the necessary text to the image a lot easier.

These tags can be used in the same ways that headers, footers, articles, and sections are.

Making use of CSS3

The abbreviation CSS refers to "cascading style sheets." It is a language for creating style sheets that may be used in conjunction with HTML5. CSS2 is the style sheet language that is currently being used by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). The W3C is an organization that makes sure that the best codes are used online. The most recent stable point in the growth of CSS was in 2010. However, W3c is working on adopting CSS3, and some of its modules have already been accepted.

With CSS3, you can focus more on the website's appearance, while HTML5 handles the layout. With CSS3, you can get the newest benefits in fonts, colours, and different backgrounds and border styles.

It's important to remember that not all browsers can handle CSS3. Some work well with some programs and could be better with others. For instance, Firefox can't handle reflections right now. Safari and Chrome, on the other hand, allow everything except overflow scrolling. This module is currently not supported by any major web browsers.

Internet Explorer is at the bottom of the list because it only handles a few modules. However, the most recent versions are getting better at this. Here is a list of all the browsers that support CSS3.

Some Attributes and Pseudo Class Selectors

You can add more details about features to tags and divisions with pseudo class selectors. They are easy to spot because they come after a colon. For example, Hover is an easy selector showing text when the mouse is over a specific tag.

It is possible to set a page's root (":root:") element in CSS3. This has always been " in HTML, but in CSS3, the feature is now more powerful. With CSS3, more class selectors give you more choice over how siblings match. This is paired with more flexibility, which lets related parts do more complex things. This makes the whole process easier to understand and more linked, which makes the result much better.

In the same way, the new attribute selectors give you more power over certain parts of your elements. You can give attributes or look for matches with other elements to make this happen. You can choose traits with this format: "element[att^=val]".

Conclusion

CSS3 and HTML5 are fundamental languages that enable us to create web pages. CSS3 and HTML5 allow us to include navigation tags, header and footer, audio, video, article, canvas, caption, figures, and more. It aided us in developing a cutting-edge website.

Janet Watson MyResellerHome MyResellerhome.com We offer experienced web hosting services that are customized to your specific requirements.

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Updates: 4 Most Trending TV Shows of 2023

Do you want to discover what new and popular TV shows this week have viewers hooked to the screen and active online?  WhatsOn has chosen a few popular TV shows. Here are the top television shows right now, including Rabbit Hole, Abbott Elementary, Party Down, Fauda Season 4 Rabbit Hole Rabbit Hole is a gripping and suspenseful TV series that centers around a young woman named Catherine who is searching for answers regarding her husband's mysterious disappearance. The show takes viewers on a thrilling journey as Catherine delves deeper into her husband's past and uncovers unsettling secrets that leave her questioning everything she thought she knew. The acting is top-notch, with superb performances from the lead actress and supporting cast that bring the characters to life in a way that is both realistic and engaging. The writing is also excellent, with a well-crafted storyline that keeps viewers on the edge of their seats with each new revelation. Overall, Rabbit Hole is a must-watch series for anyone who enjoys a good mystery and suspenseful drama. With its intriguing plot, talented cast, and expertly crafted storytelling, the show is sure to keep viewers hooked from start to finish. Whether you're a fan of crime dramas or simply looking for a compelling new series to binge-watch, Rabbit Hole is definitely worth checking out. Abbott Elementary Abbott Elementary is a fresh and funny workplace comedy that follows a group of teachers at a Philadelphia public school. The show's witty writing and talented ensemble cast bring a unique perspective to the familiar genre. As the characters navigate the challenges and absurdities of their jobs with humor and heart. Each episode tackles timely issues in education and society, from standardized testing to race and class disparities, while still delivering plenty of laughs. Overall, Abbott Elementary is a must-watch for anyone looking for a smart and entertaining comedy. One of the standout aspects of Abbott Elementary is its diverse and inclusive cast. Which reflects the real-world demographics of many American schools. The show's creators have made a conscious effort to center the experiences of Black and Brown educators, without sacrificing the humor or reliability of the characters. In addition, the show's setting in a public school allows for important conversations about the challenges facing America's education system. Abbott Elementary is a timely and refreshing addition to the world of TV comedy. Party Down "Party Down" is a hilarious and cleverly written comedy series. That follows a group of struggling actors who work for a catering company while they pursue their dreams of making it big in Hollywood. The show's characters are all flawed but endearing and the humor is both irreverent and sharp. The series is also notable for its numerous celebrity guest appearances, including appearances by Kristen Bell, J.K. Simmons, and Jane Lynch. What makes "Party Down" so successful is its ability to balance humor with heart. The show's characters are all chasing their dreams. But they also have to navigate the realities of their mundane day jobs and personal lives. This combination of humor and heart makes for a highly enjoyable viewing experience that is both relatable and entertaining. Overall, "Party Down" is a must-watch for anyone who enjoys smart, character-driven comedies. Fauda Season 4 Fauda Season 4 continues the tense and action-packed storytelling of the previous seasons. But with an added layer of emotional complexity. The plot remains focused on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, but the show's writers manage to find new angles and perspectives. That keep the narrative fresh. The acting is excellent, particularly from lead actor Lior Raz, who brings depth and nuance to his portrayal of a conflicted Israeli special forces operative. Overall, Fauda Season 4 is a gripping and thought-provoking addition to this critically acclaimed series. Read the full article