#so somehow this has become a brain worm of my very own

[seeminglyseph]

Rip Nalzyr's funny eye, Volo popped it out and replaced it with one that can see invisibility, so here's one last image of him with his original look.

[whiskersz]

Hey so I just saw you had request opened for Adam so could you please do headcannons with Adam x reader where the reader is like very nervous at first and is quiet but after a bit when they open up is supper out going and talks a lot? Have an amazing day/night!

Hello there! Happy to write some Adam headcanons for you, dear reader! Hope you like these and have a wonderful day/night yourself :3 I assumed these were meant to be romantic but they can be read either way.

Adam x Quiet -> Outgoing! Reader HCs

Adam isn’t really sure what to think of you at first.

He never knows what to make of quiet people; is there a storm brewing in their little brain, or are they uninteresting and as such undeserving of his attention? Lute is the first for example, and he quite likes her, so he decides to give you a chance.

What really amuses him is your nervousness around him at first; he’ll tease you by asking things such as “What, cat got your tongue?” and make fun of you when you stumble on your own words, his booming laugh catching the attention on anyone nearby.

Lord knows why you stick around, but you do, and day after day you two somehow grow closer; you get used to his tacky jokes about your personality and little by little you learn to either ignore him and move on or retort with the first thing that comes to mind, shushing him. He’ll either blow you a very immature raspberry or flip the bird at you whenever this happens.

Once you open up a bit and become way more talkative though, unfortunately for you, he finds a whole new reason to be rude to you;

“Got your tongue back I see. Great, now I’ve got a pest by my side.”

“Oh for fuck’s sake, you’re going to give me a headache!”

“Do you ever shut up?”

As you can probably tell having any kind of relationship with Adam is not the easiest thing in the world – or well, in Heaven, in this case.

It’s not rare for you to get a bit offended by what he says, but you’ve figured out a way to worm your way into his heart and get him to listen to you: acts of service.

Adam is a bit lazy when it comes to doing things that aren’t fun for him, so the best way to get him to calm down a bit is to take the weight off his shoulders and do whatever needs to be done in his stead.

Of course, we’re talking about everyday acts, such as doing the groceries or cleaning. He’s going to be overjoyed if you get him something he likes while you’re out too; every time you come back home from grocery shopping with ribs to cook, he’s oh-so going to listen to your rants about how long the line at the cash register was or whatever you have to talk about this time.

He’s also a big napper, and it’s surprising even to him how much it helps him fall asleep when you talk about literally anything as he’s trying to take a nap. These are the times where he’ll actually reply to what you’re saying too!

“...and that’s when my friend left. I couldn’t believe it, like... if she really cared she would’ve stayed, right?”

“What...is she a fucking bitch? Of course she would’ve stayed if she gave a damn.”

He answers with his eyes closed each time, but his eyebrows are still furrowed in frustration whenever you tell him about someone or something that pissed you off.

Lute probably questions you guys’ relationship, not going to lie. She can deal with Adam, but you? She has absolutely no idea how you put up with him, but as long as she gets some free time for herself she’s not going to complain.

[viperfizz]

HII I LITERALLY LOVE your page so much,, I find the rarepair Xara x Ellegaard so original but well working . so sorry if this has been asked before, but what makes you think this rarepair work so well?? I’d love to hear

oh my goddd this means so much to me, thank you!! <3 I’ve actually never been asked this question before, and i’m more than happy to answer anything xaragaard related!

I don’t even remember the pinpoint reason i started liking the ship, but a big inspiration (and probably the pinpoint inspiration actually but i’m too chicken to admit it) was probably this one animated video i found on youtube a few years ago by bluegirlstarlette that was like “omg what if xara and ellegaard met”

i don’t even think i watched this video at first, i just looked at the thumbnail and something clicked in my 14 year old lesbian brain and i thought “wow they would be a cool couple actually”. Which is funny because not only in this video, but with every single mention of Xara and Ellegaard, everyone seems to have the same opinion of “oh they’re related somehow because they sound and look the same/they both work with redstone” which i always have the strong urge to shut down immediately but hhhfjdhdjdj that’s a whole other can of worms i don’t feel like opening. To me, they’re wives and that’s that.

I’m not exactly sure what drew me to the idea of Xara and Ellegaard as a couple in the first place. I would say it was because they’re such different people and i’m a sucker for polar opposite couples that compliment each other, but they’re only different on a surface level if you don’t think too hard about it. Ellegaard is a stable, hardworking, and sometimes arrogant genius who is able to run an entire town while also working on insane projects. meanwhile Xara is fresh out of prison, and is very bitter and aggressive. not a very stable woman, but she’s very smart when she wants to be. her stubbornness just gets the better of her sometimes. put these two together? absolute perfection! Ellie is able to ground Xara and teach her that she is more than her emotions, and Xara teaches Ellie that she can relax every now and then and that there’s more to life than just working yourself to death.

Like i said, they seem like (and pretty much are) polar opposites, but they have a lot more in common if you look just a bit deeper. below the iceberg, you’ll find that besides practicing redstone, they’re both just two introverted older women who get too caught up in their own heads sometimes. They prefer to do things themselves instead of letting other people get in the way and making things more complicated. They’ve both encountered the dreadful experience of having friends drift apart first hand. They’ve both seen a close friend die in front of them. It’s all there.

The idea of Xara and Ellegaard finding each other and being given a second chance at life in their middle ages, slowly learning how to love themselves again by loving each other, being able to heal one day at a time from all they’ve been through as long as they live those days out together, that’s what i think makes xaragaard work so well. they can find comfort in familiarity, and become better people because of it. if not for everyone else, then for each other.

thank you so so much for letting me dump all of this on you op, i really appreciate your interest!! i just get so excited when i find people that have the same love for xaragaard that i do since they’re such a rare topic. Much love! :D 💕💕

[duckapus]

Squid Memes Squidbeak Splatoon (part 2)

Part 1 Here

More Harbor because he gave me Brain Worms

Born and Raised in Littol Beeg Bluff (yes the same Littol Beeg Bluff from "The Ballad of Dusty Grumpton" in the Factory Reset AU. I'm allowed to re-use my own ideas if I damn well please)

Comes from a blended family, and his stepmom and younger siblings (twin boy and girl around eight) are actually Koopa Troopas of all things.

The only playable Agent to both know and like his parents

Seriously Habor's moms are fucking awesome. Everybody in the NSS loves Harbor's moms

About 80% Humboldt Squid (aka Jumbo Flying Squid), which is why he's so fucking tall. It also means that he's really fast in swim form, to the point that he could probably outswim someone who'd filled all the slots on a piece of gear with Swim Speed Up without any Swim Speed Up investment of his own. (this is inspired by Lucky, another, very different version of Agent 4 made by EikaPrime on Ao3)

Eight

Yes she just goes by Eight. She was a little self-conscious about it at first but then she found out about SMG4 and the other SM64 Blooper Youtubers and no longer gives a shit

If she remembers her old name yet she's not mentioned it

Obviously doesn't remember her parents, but given the Domes are the kind of place where you can Start Training to Become an Advanced Military Hardware Engineer and Elite Soldier at Fucking Nine Years Old, I imagine she wouldn't have many memories of them even without the Amnesia

Contrary to popular fanon, my version of Eight doesn't have a scar from the Test Failed Bomb. This is because Respawn Pads (as long as they're fully functional) completely erase whatever the fatal injury was, leaving no trace apart from maybe some phantom pains if it was particularly nasty

She does, however, have plenty of scars from all the other shit she went through in that hellhole

Managed to complete every single test before she escaped

My version of Eight is a single year younger than Marina canonically is when they meet so I'm not going the Off the Hook Adoption route for this one (maybe in another AU with a more lose interpretation of Canon, but given this AU is specifically meant to adhere to Splatoon Canon as much as possible we're out'a luck this time), though she does still become very close friends with them

She's got Craig literally right there for any potential adoption attempts anyway

Very rarely speaks, but is expressive enough that most people can tell what she means anyway (you know Ferb? It's the exact same thing as what Ferb does)

Doesn't have a weapon preference. She's comfortable with any weapon she gets her hands on

Except Splatanas

She fucking hates Splatanas and everything they stand for

Configuring Frye's Palette in the Memverse was legitimately harder than dealing with her own Palette's stupid "Hacks or Chips, you can't have both" Gimmick Bullshit

Andi Finn

Has no fucking idea who her parents were and does not care

Actual supergenius who could probably build a functioning replica of Grizz's rocket out of scrap metal from just her memory of fighting on top of it. Never learned how to read before the NSS got ahold of her because she lived alone in the desert

Swears more than Bob

Can't remember where she learned Salmonid from

Somehow even the homeless kid has better hygiene than Paige

Made up her last name on the spot when she was signing up for a Turfing License (if you're wondering how she managed to sign up for a Turfing License when she couldn't read; With Great Difficulty)

Figures she probably isn't a full Inkling given her weird beartrap beak but doesn't give enough of a shit to take a DNA test about it

Yet

Paige dragged her home to their apartment almost immediately after the final battle against Mr. Grizz and she never left. It's not an official adoption but that's only because Paige is a bit oblivious to their own feelings on the matter and Andi doesn't know that paperwork is supposed to be involved

Almost exclusively calls Paige "Cap" even when they're out of uniform. I mean, she can't very well call them "Mom" or "Dad" since they're nonbinary, now can she? Paige has no idea that's what she means by it and just thinks it's a nickname because Andi gives everybody nicknames. Usually as insults

It took her 333 tries to get through "Splitting Crosshairs" (I legitimately Cannot beat that stupid kettle no matter how hard I try and want her to share my frustration but also want all four agents to have 100%ed their respective adventures so I'm just having it take her a comically long time to do)

Mains Explosher because it's the closest she can get to a Turf-Legal grenade launcher (for now...)

The Eternal Hunger, Devourer of the Bear

Is fine with people using Crabcake instead

Uses It/Its exclusively

Officially designated Agent 5 I will die on that hill

Was "The Eternal Hunger, Stabber of Ankles" before going through Return of the Mammalians

Will stab anyone who points out that it didn't actually eat Mr. Gizz, he just exploded

Extremely eloquent, but most people can't speak Salmonid so it just sounds like it's making the same gurgley noises as every other Smallfry

Once looked Marie dead in the eyes and said "No one will ever believe you" in perfect Inklish while they were alone. Has never said anything else in anything other than Salmonid where someone can hear it

Andi and Crabcake fucking hated each-other for the first third of their adventure before bonding over kicking Frye's ass and now they're inseparable

Actually gets its own uniform after everything's said and done. It consists of a little high-rez safety vest (like the one on Paige's field uniform), an earpiece (suction-cupped in place since it doesn't have external ears) in the same style as Andi's headset, and a clean black-with-thin-yellow-racing-stripes-on-the-sides pants...wrap...thing

It also got a new switchblade from Sheldon (the old one got lost in the space battle after it turned into Hugefry) with the same kind of black-with-blue-LEDs aesthetic as Paige's gear and a blade made of Sardinium

Also thinks that it and Andi are already adopted by Paige but that's for Salmonid Culture Reasons instead of Not Having an Education Reasons

Got separated from its swarm during a Run a few months before Return of the Mammalians. It wasn't too fussed about it and figured it could handle itself in the desert for a while and then either reunite with that swarm if it ran into them or join a new one if it happened to come across one. Because Salmonid Culture

Considers the NSS its current swarm

[raccoon-eyed-rebel]

Cappuccino

Masterlist

Series Masterlist

A/N: Our very own, lovely @geralts-yenn gave me the idea for barista!Mike, and this little fluffy idea wormed its way out of my brain... Enjoy!

Pairing: barista!Mike (Hellraiser) x reader (you)

Summary: The first time you don't get what you ordered is an accident, but what about all those times after that?

Word count: 2.8k

Warnings: Mike messing with someone's drink order - which is a dick move, but this is fiction. Don't do this IRL though, it's literally the worst.

@deandoesthingstome @keanureevesisbae @fvckinghenrycavill @ellethespaceunicorn @peaches1958 @sillyrabbit81 @peyton-warren @summersong69 @mayloma @livisss

“Something wrong?” The guy behind the counter doesn’t meet your gaze. Instead, he looks away. It’s almost as if he’s... shy.

“Yeah,” you laugh. You’re not exactly super comfy with this situation, either, and you turn your eyes to the name tag on his apron. Mike. “I’m ninety-ish percent sure I ordered oat milk?” Now he looks up at you, and you look back. He has gorgeous eyes. They’re blue, with a little spec of brown in the left one. Not that the rest of him disappoints. Tall, dark hair, strong features. Killer smile. Sharp canines, kinda look like little fangs, would probably feel nice when biting down on your... Right, moving on. What were you doing again? Right. Ninety percent sure you ordered oat milk. Alright, eighty percent. Steadily moving towards seventy, actually.

“Shit, I missed that!” he says, almost knocking a carton of whatever off the counter. “Are you allergic? Please tell me I didn’t just almost kill you or something, that would be a shame! I mean... Oh, forget it.”

“No,” you laugh, “no allergies, don’t worry. I just prefer the taste. There’s actually a solid chance I didn’t even mention the oat milk.”

“Oh, thank fu-, eh... Thank god! You had me worried there for a second, Sweetcheeks!” His laugh is sweet but dark, and the way he bites his bottom lip has you swooning. “I’ll make you a new one, though. Cappuccino, right?”

You like watching him work. He’s tall enough that when he turns around to the coffee machine, you can see his butt. It’s cute. Very cute.

“Do you want this one to go?” he asks when he’s done.

“Eh, no, I-I can stay a bit longer.” You say it as if you’re somehow doing him a favor by staying. You’re not. Probably. He doesn’t care about you, he’s just doing his job.

“Cappuccino with oat milk to go?” It’s absolutely pathetic how quickly this coffee shop is becoming your favorite, just because of the cutie behind the counter. Even if that cutie messes up your order every single time. Either he’s not very good at his job – impossible, the grumpy manager never would have kept him on if he was – or he’s doing it on purpose.

You reach out to take the cup Mike holds up to you. Over the past week, you’ve started ordering your drinks in to go cups even though you almost always finish them at your table, just because you want to see those long slender fingers wrapped around that cup. As previously mentioned: absolutely pathetic.

“Shit!” you yell when his fingers touch yours as you take the cup from him, and it startles you so much you don’t actually – y’know – take the cup. “I’m so sorry, it just... slipped.”

“No worries,” Mike says. It really sounds as if he’s completely unbothered by the little accident.

“Mike, clean that up, now,” his manager growls.

“On it, Walter,” Mike says as he cleans the spilled coffee off the counter. Then, he mutters something under his breath about how 'someone should get him a nice cup of chamomile tea to calm the fuck down.’ He smiles at you again. “Don’t mind him.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it.” It’s not a great conversation, but it’s something. Mike finishes cleaning the counter when Walter shows up next to him.

“Cappuccino with oat milk to go,” Walter says, and he demonstratively puts the cup down on the counter before sliding it over to you. You make the mistake of looking at Mike during the little show, and you both struggle to keep your laughter in.

“See you tomorrow?” Mike asks as you take your cup and get ready to leave – you’re really running late for something today.

“You bet.” As you leave the shop, you miss the whack in the head with the tea towel Mike gets from Walter.

“Cappuccino with oat milk to go,” Walter says before you even open your mouth.

“Add an extra shot, please,” you sigh. Walter smiles at you – weird, he never does that – and tells you your total. He didn’t charge you for the extra shot of espresso. So he’s not a complete jackass?

“Finals coming up, Sweetcheeks?” Mike says.

“Finished my last one this morning!” That also serves as an explanation for why you’re late. “I’m beat!”

“Did it go well, at least?” he says as he hands you your coffee – which you take from him without causing any accidents this time.

“I think so. Now, all I need is some coffee and a book to unwind.”

“Oh! Let me clear that table for you!” Mike paces to the window seat you love. Did he leave those cups there until you got here? No. That’s an absurd idea!

“Thanks, Mikey!” Is he okay with ‘Mikey’? Walter calls him that – or ‘Michael’, when he’s especially annoyed – but what if it’s only okay if he does it?

“More than welcome, Sweetcheeks!” He seems to be okay with it. Besides, you never gave him permission to call you ‘Sweetcheeks’. He gets back to work, while you settle into your sunny little nook with a book and your drink. There’s no way you can focus on reading. Your mind keeps wandering to Mike, and your eyes are drawn to your name on the cup. Walter wrote it, so it has your actual name on it. Mike just puts down ‘Sweetcheeks’ at this point. Do you go up there and demand he changes it? Is that like a cute, dorky little flirty thing or is it dumb and abrasive and way out of line? Oh well. Mike made your coffee, there’s bound to be something actually wrong with your order that’ll give you an excuse to talk to him again.

You take a sip. That’s a double shot cappuccino, alright! Glorious goddamn caffeine, hallelujah! You’re almost disappointed, because it’s exactly what you ordered. Except for that hint of... Hazelnut? Whatever it is, you don’t want to go exchange this, because it’s amazing.

“Hey, is it good?” Mike suddenly asks. He’s standing next to your table, and it feels unusual. Actually, it is unusual. You don’t typically interact without that counter between you.

“It’s great!” you stammer, cursing yourself for your inability to say anything else.

“Good. Eh... Great!” Mike swallows hard and smiles awkwardly.

“What... Eh... What did you do?” He towers over you, but you can’t ask him to sit down, because he’s working. Mike just shuffles his feet nervously. Is he aware of the same issue? Does he just not want to answer your question, or talk to you in general? What if he hates you? Yeah. That’s gotta be it. The guy who calls you ‘Sweetcheeks’ and writes it on your cup with a little heart next to it, and always asks if you’re going to be back tomorrow, and knows your favorite table in the place... He definitely hates you. There’s no other option. You roll your eyes at your own stupid insecurities, before they remind you that there’s a bit of wiggle room between ‘hate you’ and ‘into you’. But oh god you’re into him. So, so fucking into him.

“Hazelnut syrup,” Mike says. “Tiny bit. I... Eh... Do you like it?”

“I really do! I think I might even change my order from here on out!” you answer. “Thank you.”

Both of you turn your head when Walter sighs deeply from behind the counter before Mike can respond to you.

“Mike. Why don’t you take your lunch break first? I’ll go after.” He rolls his eyes and shakes his head before continuing the drink he was making.

“Do you want to join me for a bit?” you ask before you can let your brain talk you out of it.

Mike scrambles for words for a minute. “Eh... Yes! Of course! Would love to. Eh... I’m in need of some coffee, though. Be right back!”

“Do you want me to show you how to make a cappuccino with oat milk?” Marshall suggests. “God knows that knowledge will save this place a small fortune.” You can’t help but chuckle when he says it. There’s no doubt in your mind anymore that Mike isn’t just a very bad barista, he really did mess up your order all those times so you’d come back to talk to him.

“Great offer, but just a regular black coffee will do.” You can hear the smile in his voice, and can’t suppress your own as Mike returns and sits down next to you.

“Hi. So...” he says nervously, “you heard that?”

“He wasn’t whispering, per se,” you chuckle. “It’s not his worst transgression of the day.” You point at the name on your cup. Mike understands immediately and pulls a Sharpie from his pocket to cross it out.

“There, Sweetcheeks,” he says as he turns the cup back so you can see what he wrote down. The cup says ‘Sweetcheeks’ now, with the same little heart and... “Figured it’s about time I give you my number.” Mike shrugs and looks away, his cheeks slightly red. Jesus fucking Christ he’s adorable.

“Ah, I see. There’s one problem.”

“If this is the part where you tell me you’re taken, can you at least wait until the end of my break?” Oh, poor little dork! All you want is to hug him. And give him lots of kisses. Possibly some other thi- Jesus, he’s really messing with your head...

“After all these weeks, that would literally be the rudest fucking thing! I’m single, no worries!” Mike lets his breath escape as soon as you finish your sentence. “The problem is that I’m going to throw that cup away. Do you mind putting that number directly in my phone, please?”

As soon as he’s done and hands you your phone back, you call the number. You sigh with relief when Mike grabs his phone from his pocket and your own number shows on the screen. It’s real.

“If we go out – and I really hope we will,” Mike says, “I have one condition.” From the corner of your eye, you see Walter. He’s been cleaning the corner of the counter that’s closest to you for a suspicious amount of time, clearly overly invested in your budding romance.

“I absolutely want to go out with you. What are your demands?” you reply, genuinely curious about what he has managed to come up with.

“No coffee!” he says. For once, he seems to be dead serious, but after a moment, you both laugh. Deal.

[writingforfishes]

spams you spams you spams y

do i even need to tag myself at this point 💀 eh it probably invites more views to my own blog why the hell not

@worm-writes-hicfics:

ik you've gone on a few times abt why atticus has yet to be written with a case of their own

what do they think about that lack tho? any different from you? do they want to experience that or is it brain-scrambling enough to have otto getting them so frequently? would they be open with anyone (otto) abt trying to induce or just casually walk into the kitchen or somethin at some point while having them and act like it wasn't intentional

if they were to get them unintentionally, how might that go, both atticus' thoughts about it in general and/or how otto might react to that (im remembering that i asked abt role reversal before but idt i got this specific when i did)

tl;dr if it were to happen, regardless of what the case itself might be like, how would either of them think about or react to it...and would either of them try to cause that again?

yuh..gay shit....

Oooh, I like this question!

:packs a lunch with worm sent Spam:

I imagine, as my uninventive self-insert is shamelessly me, Atticus has some excitement about wanting to induce hiccups. And I imagine that Atticus has shared this excitement with Otto.

No doubt, the conversation has come up between them that Otto wonders if Atticus ever gets them and Atticus has lamented that they very rarely do, though they have attempted.

I think Otto would be very giddy to see Atticus hiccup. I don't believe he'd get aroused, necessarily, but knowing that Atticus had wanted to have the hiccups would make him very endearingly excited for them.

He'd also check in with them, though. Atticus would most likely be very shy about hiccuping, even in front of Otto. If they contracted a case in public Otto would likely never know about it as they'd cure it very quickly (though never say never if the situation is right). But if they happened to have a case at home, that would be ideal.

Atticus belches a lot. Otto is always taken aback by how loud they are. He very verbally wonders how where all that gas is coming from and if they have some sort of portal into another world in their gut that they are expelling from somehow. Otto, himself, has never belched as loudly as Atty. (Though something something suppressing inappropriate bodily sounds something something needs to be perfect something something.)

That all being said, when Atty finally does get the hiccups (as it is my hope of hopes to do the same) Otto will find them incredibly charming. And in my heart of hearts, Otto will contract them simultaneously during Atticus' case. They'll compare their body reactions and as Atticus' case goes away Otto's will continue.

Just imagine Otto cooing over how adorable Atty's hiccups are and how shy Atticus will become, but also a bit excited, too. And, yes, they will be a little overwhelmed and perhaps overstimulated, but Otto will be there to rub their belly and help them get everything from the experience that they want.

It'll be super fluffy and maybe one day I'll be able to write it!

[silverwolf1249]

recently read an incomplete fic with injustice! Superman and arkham city! Batman after the joker venom got to him and that's definitely two people I never even thought of interacting with each other, and now lives in my head rent free. Like, I've read great stories with injustice and earth 1, but holy shit injustice and arkham knight?? jksdkjdsk the many parallels between injustice! Superman and arkham! Batman, and yet how their paths differed, my worm brain is obsessed. Just think about it:

A Superman who got tricked by the Joker by inhaling kryptonite infused fear toxin and ended up killing Lois, whose death then destroyed Metropolis. A Superman who then proceeded to kill off the Joker and began eliminating crime by creating a world of his own vision using force.

A Superman who let the Joker's influence rule his every action even after his death. A Superman who stopped being Clark Kent and became the ruthless tyrant Kal-El of the Regime. A Superman who kills anyone who's against him or gets in his way, in the name of protecting peace on earth.

vs

A Batman who got infected by the Joker and slowly lost his grip on reality as he went through a fear toxin riddled Gotham City. A Batman who despite everything, refused to kill to the very end, trying his best to save everyone, including the Joker.

A Batman who managed to defeat the Joker's influence in the end and locked him up. A Batman who also killed off Bruce Wayne like Superman did Clark Kent, but unlike Kal, Batman receded to the shadows, to once again become a myth, a nightmare. A Batman who now utilizes fear toxin to subdue criminals.

Admittedly the last bit is kind of a conjecture based off the ending of Arkham City, but seeing a fear toxin wielding Batman vs a Superman who knows so intimately what fear toxin can do sounds so so interesting. Especially since apparently injustice! Bruce used it on Zod after he killed Tim, but said he would never use it against Kal after what he had done under its influence.

Of course, they also have some major differences, Bruce never killed his family, even if for a good second he thought bringing Barbara into his crusade was the reason she died (except that was a hallucination thank god). He never destroyed Gotham, he helped make the city better, and continues to do so. Kal-El killed Lois and their unborn child with his bare hands, and right after Metropolis got nuked.

I can only imagine Kal-El's jealousy that despite their similarities, Bruce essentially still had everything, all his loved ones and his city. Also his confusion and rage when he learns that Bruce still tried to save the Joker even after the Joker had caused him so much grief and suffering. He just can't understand how Bruce could keep his no killing rule even after basically spiraling into the Joker's madness. He has so many whys he doesn't even know where to begin.

And if arkham! Batman manages to also interact with injustice! Batman somehow ohohoho that's also so many possibilities with that considering again that arkham! Batman still has all his children alive and thriving while injustice! Bruce very much does not. Among other things of course, but that's definitely a big one. The other big thing being of course the Joker infection thing.

I sadly don't know enough about injustice to see how the rest of the Regime or Insurgency would react to arkham! Batman but man I would love to see their reactions to a Batman who might have a few screws loose, still doesn't kill, and is even scarier than ever with his fear toxin and he himself with an absolute lack of fear.

[den-gamle-kartograf]

9 people you'd like to know better

Tagged by @lady-harrowhark (thank you!)

Three ships: 1. Griddlehark. The most girls ever. Proof that in fiction, sufficiently advanced hate is indistinguishable from love. Someone who's used people before and never wants to use someone again x someone who's been used so long she can only envision herself being loved as a tool. Your honor they have mutilated me grievously. I rest my case. 2. All the other actual and potential Locked Tomb ships, as one collective mass. The sheer variety of ways in which simultaneously competent and fucked up girlfailures can bounce off each other in interesting ways is unparalleled. 3. Assorted blorbos from my webcomics. Which blorbos I'm talking about will change depending on when you ask, but right now it is Joe and Joyce from Dumbing of Age. The way Joyce is breaking out of her religious indoctrination and sexual repression hits pretty close to home for me, and I am rooting for her to finally have a good fucking experience. Joe makes an excellent foil.

First ever ship: Based on the first action figure I can remember wanting as a kid, probably a Sienar Fleet Systems TIE/LN fighter. (Serious answer: Star Wars was one of my first media obsessions and was definitely my first proper fandom, but I can't think of an element I cared about less than shipping. And then I wasn't involved in fandoms at all during my early adulthood, so I honestly think the first ship I've ever really engaged with beyond reading/watching/playing the source material is Griddlehark.)

Last song: (Splash) Turn Twist by Jimmy Eat World. It's a bonus track from Bleed American (same album that gave us The Middle) which I somehow never paid any attention to until it got itself stuck in my head a week or two ago and has not left since.

Last film: I couldn't say for certain. The last film I saw in a theater was The Last Jedi. My partner showed me Mean Girls sometime in 2022... I think that might be it?

Currently watching: Whatever my partner is watching while I'm in the room (Markiplier at the moment), and nothing else. That's a boring answer, so here's a bonus answer to a different question. The most recent game I played is Victoria 3, a massive 19th century economy and politics simulator. It is a horrible waste of my time and I swore off it months ago in favor of wasting horrible amounts of time on other games, but they released a major patch last month so I spent a weekend industrializing Korea but utterly failing to turn it into a worker's paradise.

Currently reading: Time To Orbit: Unknown, a serial novel by @/derinthescarletpescaterian about a completely normal spaceship where nothing ever goes wrong and all of the characters are having a very good time. (There are 124 chapters so far and at least five distinct genders.) (When I say "the worldbuilding is immaculate" please understand that this is like going down a wikipedia rabbit hole except also there is a story.) (Who needs sleep when you could instead have Story?) (In this world I probably would have wanted to become a Public Universal Friend before I got on the right medications and deleted twitter.) (Please read this story I need someone to share my brain worms.) (It is completely normal and you can stop reading any time you want you are just choosing to consume another chapter right now of your own free will.) (You will certainly not regret reading Time To Orbit: Unknown.)

Currently consuming: Chips and guacamole.

Currently craving: Yuri.

Tagging: DO NOT CONSIDER THIS PRESSURE I KNOW THAT'S IMPLICIT BUT I AM ALLERGIC TO CREATING A SENSE OF OBLIGATION that said, @reikiajakoiranruohoja @frumiousbandersnack @chuispasjordan @hano-orion @postluminescence @princesandpirates @superfluidcreep @dnlrntr @sarafacet

[3liza]

talking about flters and real beauty vs fake beauty and cultural standards etc always makes me think about all the victorian and edwardian novels i read, where the things that people thought about beauty were recorded at length. recently ive been reading a lot of Thomas Hardy (best known for Tess of the D’Urbervilles and Jude the Obscure) and there’s so much discussion of the beauty of people, particularly love interests, both men and women. and these writers, and their eras, and the culture of the eras, was of course obsessed with beauty and youth and also artificial beauty (being the eras of the really transformative corsets, not to mention some of the earliest industrialized or modernized beauty products or processes), as all human societies are to a greater or lesser extent in their own ways, but the thing that sticks out to me in reading these books is how beauty is not the singular or even the most important aspect of a person’s overall attraction. if someone has a beautiful face or figure, it is mentioned, but never to the obsessive, fixated extent that physical beauty is isolated from and elevated over all other features in modern american/western culture. there are plenty of protagonists or love interests in these books who are described as not young, or not remarkable, or not pretty, or even ugly or frightening, but nevertheless compellingly sexy and attractive, or simply interesting, or worthy in some way. 

its weird that the cultural consciousness has become seemingly ignorant of non-physical attraction. like that anon that was in my inbox talking about how they were “normal looking’ and therefore “needed” filters in order to “compete” with attractive people. it’s a weirdly mercenary and capitalist view of the social economy, first of all, which absolutely is not zero-sum no matter how badly the social networks want to convince us that it is. but there was never a single mention from that person about their ability to charm or entertain or attract using anything except a fake photo of themselves. wild. im fuckin worried about them! im worried about every young person how has brain worms

when i was about 4 and starting to become aware of how much adults were obsessed with my appearance because i was dainty and blonde and could do a passable shirley temple imitation, my parents gave me a very serious lecture about what physical beauty actually meant: i didn’t work for it (yet, i mean i do a lot of work now as an adult), it was given to me genetically. and someday, maybe sooner or more suddenly than anyone could predict, it would be gone. if accident, illness, or hardship didnt get me, old age eventually would. so with that being a certainty, i had better build a life and a personality on something other than my looks. and i said, ok. every day i get older im more grateful for that advice and the fact i decided to take it to heart instead of trying to gamble on Being Hot for long enough to get job security. which is also a valid career choice but it’s a risky one. always better to have a fallback just in case.

im of an age rn where a lot of women in my peer group are starting to get a very hunted vibe about the impending end of their youth, which is valid. theres nothing foolish about it, its not their fault, theyre not stupid or somehow lacking because this is an issue in their lives. but im noticing that i am significantly less freaked out by, idk, how long ago the 90s were or whatever, because i have been expecting to get old since i was in kindergarten. and i had adults around me who were just like “hey this is what old people look like and what bodies do over time. its not a big deal. everything on tv is fake btw”. i didnt get out unscathed, ive had eating disorders and all sort of weird brain-body problems. 

my advice i guess if i have any is to go outside and really look around you. notice how almost every single woman, and most men, has at least some cellulite, even if its just when theyre sitting down or whatever. notice how everyone has blemishes and zits. most people have some dandruff. if someone is wearing makeup, it’ll be cakey or balled up or smeared or uneven or clumpy even if it’s just a bit. everyone over the age of about 20 will have stretch marks somewhere, even if they aren’t visible except in certain light. i was under the impression i didnt have many until one time seeing a picture of my butt in FULL natural light and finally saw the entire surface of both cheeks was covered in straitions, they just were hard to see most of the time because im the color of drywall and scars tend to be light. it’s really easy to spot hair extensions and wigs and fake nails and fake tans and shapewear once you figure out how to see it. and none of these things take away from someone’s character. 

there’s a strong argument to be made that when corsetry was the norm, no woman was expected to simply be the shape of the corset unless she was actually wearing it. photographs and drawings of women in the 19th and early 20th century were retouched a bit as all photos have been, yes, but they were not retouched to make naked women appear to be corset-shaped. THAT is new. people are now getting surgery to be corset-shaped. and like, i dont think anyone should not be able to look however they want if they want to have that surgery. that is one meaning of cyborg feminism, probably. what i dont want, is for anyone to ever think that’s a normal way to look (except for veryvery tiny mathematical outliers, the Barbie Hips Georg of instagram) WITHOUT surgery or shapewear. which i see a lot now. i saw an instagram fashion designer with a very obviously surgically-altered body answer a question in her inbox about how she maintained her figure with some nonsense about diet and exercise. so now some (probably young) person out there is thinking that if they just do intermittent fasting enough, theyll look like a woman with butt and boob implants, a BBL, fillers, etc. that person probably thinks that if they arent able to diet and exercise good enough, they will fail at looking that way through their own laziness and lack of work ethic or whatever. i see that mindset constantly, especially in young women.

the surgery isnt the issue. the look itself isnt the issue. the filters themselves arent the issue. the issue is that on none of these images, is there an indication of what has been changed or how. the brain damage effect of filters would be lessened, i think, if everyone KNEW which images had been altered and how. so maybe thats the answer? mandatory labeling? i dont know. what’s terrifying is that the average adult human in america cant tell from a glance what has been altered in a photograph, no matter how clumsily, because they simply dont have a template for what a real human looks like anymore. the false images have supplanted the real images, the actual memories of alive humans that you know and have met or lived with. 

if you go into any of the shittier men’s spaces online you will find threads for posting pictures of “beautiful girls”, and it is page after page after page of teenagers in full makeup, hair extensions or wigs, circle lenses, facetuned, bodytuned, surgery, etc, and then hundreds of men yearning and fanning themselves over her “natural beauty”. dont go looking for this stuff, it will permanently fuck you up to know what a basic guy on the bus is thinking about women every day. dont do it

but i also seriously predict a backlash into “natural” looks after this current madness, similarly to how the 1960s saw the rise of the hippie girl with swingin titties, pit hair and no high heels after the consumer beauty madness of the 50s. of course the 60s beauty ideals were in some ways just as fake, but there was some authentic yearning towards a freedom from capitalist bodies as well. so when that happens send me $20: paypal.me/3liza. should be in like the next 4 years or so. thanks

[coweye]

Guys My Age - PT.1

Pairing: Francisco ‘Catfish’ Morales x Miller!Reader Word Count: 1.5k

Summary: After four years away, you return home to realise that maybe everything you’ve been looking for was right in front of you all along.

Warnings: Mention of depression, Slow burn - no smut yet but it will eventually be horrifically filthy 18+ only pls gang, LEGAL Age Gap. 

Note: This bad bois been worming its way to the surface for a while now, hope you enjoy! 💕 I apologise in advance for the slow burn.

⇢MASTERLIST

Life was strange sometimes.

Here you were, back in the hometown you’d sworn never to return to after four years away, flanked by your older brother Benny. 

Two thirds of the Miller gang back together, reunited or at least you had been.

“I’ma get us a table, you order the drinks.” Ben muttered distractedly whilst scouting out potential tables.

“Hey, I’m supposed to be destitute, the least you could do is get the first round in.” The sad thing is, you’re only half joking. He rolled his eyes at your expense, before handing you his credit card and continued on his journey to get a table, presumably with a great view of the blonde woman he’d spotted upon entry to the bar. Benny was predictable if nothing else, it was part of his charm. 

So, you pushed your way forward through the throng of warm bodies, Friday night at Flanagans was a nightmare but you had agreed to be sociable as Santiago was in town, so you’d made the sacrifice and took a night off from your crushing depression to don a nice t-shirt and apply makeup for the first time in the two weeks since moving into Will’s back room.

You smiled what you hoped was a somewhat friendly lift of your lips at the bartender and ordered two beers, as you were waiting you heard the familiar call of Santiago Garcia - the man who you’d spent your teen years obsessed with. 

He was gorgeous inside and out, though your crush had morphed into something a lot more wholesome and you had a genuine platonic love for the man, as an extension of your brothers.

“How have you been, guapa? God, long time no see!” He all but cried, clearly already a couple of beers in as wrapped you in a strong hug, pulling you onto your tiptoes. He wasn’t lying, you hadn’t seen Santiago in two maybe three years ago now. 

Time had gotten away from you and your visits had become less and less frequent, especially with the boys being deployed, you couldn’t say you were happy to be back, but it was certainly nice to see them all again.

“I know, damn, you got old!” You chuckle as his face straightens out in feigned hurt. “Like fine wine, Santi, Fine wine!”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah. Stop flirting, you two.” Will grumbles as he slides through the crowd to lean on the bar beside you, lifting three fingers up to the bartender who had already placed the pints of beer before you. 

“Where have you been?” You question raising an eyebrow “I’ve been back at least two weeks.”

“I’ve been in Australia for a little while, it's nothing serious but-”

“Pope’s got a girlfriend now, Squirt.” The low voice is a new one, but only one person used to call you that awful nickname. 

You turn to see Francisco Morales behind you, his eyes are older than the rest of him but still irrevocably kind and he has an easy smile painted on his lips. You can’t quite remember him being this handsome as your eyes drink him in, perhaps you’d been blinded by the effortless beauty of Santiago as a teen but my god, Catfish had almost floored you. 

“Frankie!” You smile - all teeth, trying somewhat successfully for an air of normalcy despite your brain processing the change that five years has had on your taste in men and pulling him in for his own hug. 

You tried to stop yourself, you honestly did but as you breathed in, the smell of him overtook you, the spicy scent of cinnamon and sweet vanilla; the man somehow smelled like a goddamn cupcake and you had the biggest sweet tooth. 

Locking your inner sex offender deep down inside a box so as to not assault the man you’d held in a hug for what was becoming longer than appropriate, you pulled away. 

“A girlfriend?” You question, your brain scrambling for something to talk about other than those brown eyes. You can’t help the smirk that sneaks its way across your lips as you tease the man before you. “Santiago Garcia, have you gone soft on me in your old age?”

He huffs as he grabs his beer. “Fuck off, baby Miller.” 

The three of you chortle in response to his defeated tone as he walks towards the table Ben has secured. Will grabs at his wallet, hand coming out to stop you in confusion when you hold out a card to pay. 

You shake your head and shrug. “Ben’s treat.” 

That kills any argument on his tongue as he picks up his drink and follows Santi’s lead. You can’t help but chuckle at your brothers, you had missed them both so much. 

You’re very quickly aware of Frankie lingering to your left, waiting for you to finish paying, ever the gentleman. 

You turn to him as the machine processes the transaction. 

“Your-”

“How-” You both chuckle, the two of you have always been the quiet ones of the group, more observant with witty one liners thrown in than the loud mouths currently chatting at your table. 

It seems years apart haven’t helped either of your awkwardness.

“You go…” You dismiss with a quick laugh when he waits for you to speak.

“I was just gonna say, it's nice to have you back!” He shrugged before gesturing to side of him “After you,” 

Frankie creates a barrier with his body for your fellow thirsty patrons who want your spot at the bar. You pick up yours and Bens drinks and turn to find the guys. 

Frankie’s hand finds your lower back as he guides you through, its innocuous enough, hell if you hadn’t been drooling over the man minutes before you wouldn’t have given it so much as a second thought, but that palm guarding you from the brunt of the crowd was like molten lava slowly burning your flesh. 

“W-Well, it’s good to be back! I’m not going anywhere in a hurry!” You pretty much shout over the deafening ambient chatter around you. His low voice is in your ear when he replies, you force yourself not to close the distance and push your spine into his chest, Frankie isn’t like that; Hell, he has a girlfriend and baby at home.

He’s just being friendly - he’s known you since you were seventeen. 

“You miss your friends back home?”

“They’re not my friends. None of those assholes let me sleep on their goddamn sofas.” Trying to break the tension only you seemed to be feeling with a joke, it seems to work as he chortles.

“Well you’re more than welcome to my sofa if Will ever gets too much, Squirt.” You couldn’t explain the things that this man saying the word squirt to you was doing. No matter the context, even if it was because you squirted slurpee from your nose when laughing too hard when you were a teenager. 

“I may hold you to that - he bit my head off the other day because I didn’t wash a glass the second I used it, I swear-” You’re cut off when you find the booth rather quickly, the raucous laughter from the rangers acting as a siren call.  You slide in beside Ben and turn to your other brother “-I was just telling Frankie, how much of a control freak you are.”

And because God hates you, Francisco slides in beside you. 

…

You were a grown woman and you had a ridiculous infatuation.

It wasn’t for a lack of trying either, after sitting in that bar you had made an effort to block out the sensation of his thigh against your own or when he leaned back against the plush fabric and wrapped his arm around the back of the booth.

But so help you god you were only human, you couldn’t help but laugh a little harder at his jokes than the others or the warmth that flooded your belly when you’d meet his eyes as you told a story and find his chocolate orbs transfixed on you as if you were telling a great tale - rather than an anecdote about how you dislocated your tailbone last year when you were drunk on some stairs.

It wasn’t even as if it was just his looks - though you were big enough to admit that initially that had been a large part of it.  It was the ease you felt around him, the kindness you could see clear as day painted on his face. 

Though you knew, deep down in your toxic heart of hearts, buried beneath your daddy issues and depression, this deep desire was because he wasn’t all that interested. 

It wasn’t as if he ignored you, no. He was friendly, but he had no interest in you besides just that, being a friend. 

He had a baby and a girlfriend and you weren’t a home wrecker.

He was your brother's best friend, an extension of your family. 

These were all things you reminded yourself about as you lay in bed alone staring up at the ceiling the morning after.

You could just be his friend, right?

⇢ Next Part

[sandificatedman]

GOD the idea they weren't close pre-death. Like sure they had a special connection but it wasn't anywhere near what it's like now in canon. They just kinda acknowledged their souls were twinned and just went about their lives not thinking much of it- Then Despair dies, and suddenly Desire feels this indescribable feeling of *emptiness* Like their very heart has been ripped from their chest. And it lingers even after Despair 2.0 is born, A heavy guilt from not appreciating their first twin enough, For not understanding just how special their bond really was. And the knowledge can Never live through that again.

AAAA!!! you are in my head cultivating new species of Brain Worms about these characters. I’m going to explode now :

LIKE YES!! YES EXACTLY!!! Because we’re given so little in the comics about How and Why Despair was killed, the process, the Before, etc, there’s so much ROOM for interpretation, and I personally LOVE the idea that they weren’t as close pre-death.

The whole thing becomes even sadder when I think about how Despair was THE FIRST of the Endless to die.

Desire is losing their twin, the sibling they’ve worked the most with, the sibling who is literally perpendicular to Desire’s role in the universe. A sibling they were somehow so distant to, despite everything. AND ON TOP OF IT ALL, Desire (and the rest of the Endless) are having to grapple with the very first death of one of their own, ever.

The fact that they’re TWINS is what gets me the worst. Not just siblings, but specifically twins. Their roles are symbiotic, they were created together and work in tandem. One was not MEANT to exist without the other.

SORRY IM RAMBLING A BIT BUT JUST. YEAH. GOD. FUCK. O U C H.

[noxiousaffection]

dol school love interests + wren and alex and what i think their favorite childhood series would have been

Robin: Magic Tree House

A Series of Unfortunate Events was a good contender, but it just hit too close to home. Don’t get them wrong, the books were good, but if they wanted to read about a miserable orphan coping with a shitty caretaker, they’d just write an autobiography.

Thoroughly read through every single book in the series, not just once or twice, but eight times. They could probably recite whole passages from memory. Orphans, especially under Bailey’s care, aren’t afforded entertainment, thus find ways to dissociate from their miserable existence busy their minds. Robin would have lost it years ago without these books.

It was pure chance that they discovered this particular series. Specifically, they selected a book at random from their middle school library, which also just so happensd to be the first of the series.

Whitney: Harry Potter

Now this may come to as a surprise, but Whitney is a diehard Harry Potter fan. I can feel it in my bones. However, let’s make one thing clear, this is not, nor will ever be, common knowledge. Even juvenile Whitney had a reputation to uphold, even if that reputation was just of him being an insufferable, half-pint delinquent.

Owns an abundance of merch, none of which they openly display. As if they’re into that bippity boppity boo bullshit, they’re not a nerd. Shut up before they make you. Now, if you were to somehow find your way into their closet, you may that it stores anything but clothes.

Vehemently loathes the golden trio, Harry Potter himself more specifically. Any clown foolish enough to express fondness for that assfuck orphan, his brain dead dog, and the know-it-all bitch within Whitney’s ear shot shall find themself befallen a great travesty.

Kylar: Warrior Cats

Talk about a fanatic; this is no mere phase, it’s a life long commitment. When you enter a relationship with Kylar, you also enter a non-negotiable relationship with their precious books. Has been attached to this series since primary school and will continue to be for the foreseeable future.

Randomly makes various cat noises. (i.e. hisses at people who get too close to you, meows for your attention, purrs when you give them affection, etc.) Do it back. Seriously, do it. Instantly turns them on.

Unironically calls you their mate.

Please roleplay with them. Please.

Somehow always got a hold of every book before release. Their parents aren’t afraid to abuse their power for their precious baby.

Has not and will not ever read a single page of Erin Hunter’s spin-off series Survivor. Canines are the enemy; they’re no traitor.

Sydney: Dear America

Honestly, I remember very little about these books, but if what little memory remains stand to be true, then I just know little Sydney was obsessed. Outside of the temple, their passion for these historical works of fiction remains unparalleled even to this day.

For as long as they’ve been a library assistant, the series never seems to be available to be checked out. Sydney denies all allegations.

Owns a hardback copy of every single book, spin-offs included.

Wren: Goosebumps

In truth, Wren isn’t much of a reader (never having finished even a single book outside of school), but these books hold a special place in their heart.

Each book is the perfect length for this young smuggler’s near nonexistent attention span; a reliable source for those short bursts of dopamine they crave.

It’s not that they don’t like reading, per say, just that they’re dyslexic. Reading becomes a chore when you’re chasing words down on a page.

Their favorite books of all time would have to be Go Eat Worms and The Egg Monster From Mars. I have no good explanations for these, just vibes and a dash of projection.

Alex: Captain Underpants

I’m not quite sure how they first got a hold of the series, but they were hooked almost instantaneously. Their parents were more than happy to fund their latest fascination.

They hate reading, but they can get behind comics. They much prefer pictures to words and comics are chock-full of pictures.

If given the chance, I imagine they would have enjoyed Diary of A Wimpy Kid just as much.

Nowadays, the only thing Alex reads is the shampoo bottle label when they’re taking a shit.

[transdemigod]

Cutting Yourself Off from the Entities: A Comprehensive Guide

I am once again overanalyzing the Magnus Archives for fun. This topic is super interesting to me, and I haven’t seen it explored as much as other theories, so here we go.

So, you’ve pledged yourself to one of the Dread Powers, but decided that you’ve had enough of terrorizing others. Not to worry, there is a way out. Melanie King did it and lived all the way to the end of the series!

Here is the summary, though I’m sure a full explanation will be more satisfying:

To escape the Buried, lose yourself to the emptiness. To escape the Corruption, kill what loves you. To escape the Dark, give yourself to the sunlight. To escape the Desolation, choose kindness. To escape the End, cut yourself off from dreams. To escape the Eye, blind yourself. To escape the Flesh, give up control of your body. To escape the Hunt, tear out your teeth and claws. To escape the Lonely, bind yourself to others. To escape the Slaughter, remove your emotions. To escape the Spiral, destroy your voice. To escape the Stranger, make yourself known. To escape the Vast, trap yourself in a small place. To escape the Web, give up your autonomy.

The rest is under the cut. Let me know if you have any ideas that you think I missed, I would love to discuss theories.

We know for sure that the way to escape the Eye is to gouge your own eyes out. The other entities have less information, but we get a few clues here and there. In the season 4 Q&A, Jonny and Alex joke about leaving the service of the Stranger by running naked through the streets. They also mention that the Desolation can be left by an act of true altruism. With these details, as well as other details in the rest of the canon, we can make a list of criteria that must be satisfied for an act that will cut someone off from each of the 14 Entities.

Firstly, it isn’t enough to just stop feeding your god. Daisy and Jon both tried to abstain and ended up wasting away, and it is implied that they would have died if they had continued. Dying is certainly one possible way to escape the service of a Fear, but we’re going for living out the rest of your natural life here.

Secondly, there has to be some sacrifice made that relates to the specific power. This is where the Desolation’s explanation kind of falls apart; doing one good act doesn’t stop you from just continuing to be destructive, so the act must also include giving up the thing that ties you to your Entity. In the Stranger’s case, one could argue that exposing yourself does count as giving up your anonymity, and there are several Stranger avatars that seem to thrive on being unknown. My theory is that each Entity has a draw of some kind, a power that it gives its followers, which you would have to completely give up if you are to leave it for good. Jon mentioned that the blinding has to be permanent, so I’m assuming this applies to the others as well. Basically, the avatar who wishes to leave must give up something that one who does not wish to leave would never want to.

Third, the change can be physical or symbolic. Obviously blinding yourself is a very physical change, while committing acts of altruism or making yourself known are less so. Some of the Entities will have pretty clear parts of the body that connect you to the power, others will need a bit more of an explanation. In special cases where a person gets their power from an artifact or a Leitner, destroying the thing would probably be enough to cut them off from that power. And of course, if you are as lucky as Georgie Barker and manage to completely get rid of your fear, that would probably be enough to cut you off from them as well.

So, here are my explanations for what you would have to do to cut yourself off from each of the 14. I’m basing it on examples we get in the series, the few rules I have decided to set, and what would seem thematically or symbolically appropriate. Realistically, each individual would have their own personal journey and each avatar is different, but it’s more fun this way.

The Buried- The draw of the Buried is a little difficult to narrow down, we’ve heard about restfulness, the comfort of enclosed spaces, the desire to be a part of the earth, etc. The thing Buried avatars seem to dislike the most is wide open spaces, though I don’t know how that would translate to something you can change about yourself. How would a person cut themselves off from the earth? You could move to a place that is very open, but you could also just leave. I’m not sure if there is a way a person could give up the concept of space, so I’m probably going to have this same problem when I get to the Vast. Probably the only thing you could give up that makes sense is the type of space the Buried is tied to, so you’d have to keep away from enclosed spaces. However you’re supposed to do that, I have no idea. This one is just going to have to be a less satisfying answer, unless I find another idea later.

To escape the Buried, lose yourself to the emptiness.

The Corruption- Most people who get into the Corruption get filled with bugs, and we know from Jane that it is appealing because you have a sense of belonging and purpose. The Corruption focuses a lot on toxic love, and I think communities specifically because the things we think of as infections are multitudinous: insect hives, bacteria, fungal colonies, etc. Even in the case of that one guy with the beetle wife, it was implied that there would soon be many more beetles. So, I think to stop being fed by the Corruption, you have to get rid of the infection in whatever form it takes. The one woman in the statement about the cult ended up leaving, but she wasn’t a full avatar, so I think that would require a bit more drastic action. If Jane had wanted to leave, she would probably have had to kill every worm inside of her. Knowing what we know about her, she would never want to do that, but she also had no regrets about becoming the Hive. Someone like John Amherst would have to get rid of all the diseases inside of him, so it might be as simple as a hospital visit and getting pumped full of antibiotics. If you got hollowed out by bugs, you might have to fill in the space somehow to be able to move, but I’m sure you could find a way. Maybe some help from the Flesh? It does seems to be in opposition to the Corruption in many ways, so that would work thematically.

To escape the Corruption, kill what loves you.

The Dark- Another abstract one. What’s the opposite of blinding yourself? The Dark, aside from the literal definition, includes things like weird science and unknowable things that lurk in the dark. Seeking knowledge would be a good opposite to darkness, but that’s not making a sacrifice or a permanent change. It’s not very clear what avatars of the Dark would hate to lose. Manuela Dominguez describes hating the light, how traditional divinity and knowledge are unnatural as opposed to the dark state of the world. This might be another location based one. Apparently, the sunniest places in the world are in northern Africa and the southwest parts of America, so moving there might do it. There isn’t an easy permanent change to make, but committing yourself to being in the sunlight as much as possible would probably work. Change your sleep schedule, move somewhere sunny, just avoid the dark in general. Maybe even start worshipping the sun; that would be in opposition to the cult following the Dark has.

To escape the Dark, give yourself to the sunlight.

The Desolation- We know it’s an act of altruism. I think it might need some adjusting, though, to make it more of a sacrifice by the person who serves the Desolation. This fear is all about sacrifice and loss, so it’s a bit tricky to think of something a Desolation avatar could give up when they’ve already committed to giving up everything. Well, everything except themselves. Many avatars, like Jude Perry, have shown themselves to be selfish, but I don’t think even they would be opposed to going out in a blaze of glory. No, the hardest thing for them would be to settle down and live a prosperous life. This one probably would have to be continuous effort instead of one grand sacrifice. It doesn’t fit with the others, but it does fit the theme of the Desolation. Yeah, I’ve just gone in a big circle. Altruism does make the most sense. Just make sure that selfless gesture counts. It’s not a real choice if you don’t mean it. I guess that would be really difficult if you’re used to burning everything around you, so maybe it’s more of a sacrifice than I thought.

To escape the Desolation, choose kindness.

The End- We actually already have a canon answer for this one: lobotomize yourself. Adelard Dekker found an End avatar that was killing people with carbon monoxide through their dreams, and he stopped him by cutting through his pre-frontal cortex- the part of the brain that lets you dream. It’s implied that this didn’t completely work, but I think the reason for that is that the avatar was not the one to make the choice. It’s emphasized again and again that serving the fears is all about personal choice, so it makes sense that any attempt to cut someone off wouldn’t take if the person hasn’t decided to give up their connection. The End is associated with dreams in most appearances, so I believe that a person who chooses not to dream would no longer be bound to it. Oliver Banks could see those whose deaths were coming in his dreams, which directly led to him becoming an avatar, so if he had decided to stop dreaming, that would be it. This procedure might be a bit difficult, I can’t imagine performing your own lobotomy would go very well, but I’m sure getting someone else to do it would count if you were the one to make the decision. Of course, Terminus would still have you in the end, but that will happen no matter what you do.

To escape the End, cut yourself off from dreams.

The Eye- This one is already answered. The draw of the Eye is the power to watch, so you have to give that ability up. Simple, straightforward, and definitely fits the theme.

To escape the Eye, blind yourself.

The Flesh- Oh boy, this is a weird one. We have dysphoria, consumption, body horror, I can’t say this one sounds very appealing. But it must be, or else it wouldn’t have people serving it. A lot of the draw to serve the fears could be interpreted as dishing out what you can’t take. You don’t have to be afraid of being watched if you do the watching, you don’t have to fear harm if you harm them first. Maybe the appeal of Flesh is making others share that fear that you are nothing but meat. I don’t think it’s really possible for people to give up their corporeal form, unless it’s metaphorical but I have no idea what that could mean. I think those who serve the Flesh thrive on being “more” than others. More body parts, more mass in general. You could go on a diet or become a vegetarian, which I think the writers may have joked about once? I want a more concrete solution, though. Diets are easy to break. You can’t fully give up food without dying, so I guess you could give up the control of food. Giving up your sense of taste would be interesting, but I’m going to keep it more general. No easy answer for this one either.

To escape the Flesh, give up control of your body.

The Hunt- People are drawn to the Hunt by that deep, primal desire to chase and attack. Humans have both predator and prey instincts inside of us, so you would have to completely leave the predator behind to escape the Hunt. I think a good way to do this would be the get rid of your teeth, or nails, whichever you use to cause harm. Daisy was able to temporarily leave behind her power in the Buried, but as soon as she got out, she started starving. I think this is a good argument that you could partially cut off your power by using a power that opposes it in some way, but you would have to give up a part of yourself to make it stick. As soon as she had the freedom and ability to hunt again, that was when the urge came back, and she eventually succumbed to it. Getting rid of the parts of your body that do harm wouldn’t completely stop you if you were dedicated enough, but it’s the choice to do so that matters. This one is a bit more of a symbolic choice, and you could probably do something else to your body that would prevent it from hunting, but I am going with the cooler option.

To escape the Hunt, tear out your teeth and claws.

The Lonely- Probably all you have to do to escape the Lonely is just…be around other people. I’m sure this is easier said than done, but there are lots of ways to commit to other humans. Get married, join a club, make a blood pact and permanently bind yourself to another human. The possibilities are endless! This one, I think more than the others, would require a bit more of a continued effort. I know that the whole point is to make one drastic, permanent change, but the Lonely feels like something that’s easy to relapse into. Maybe it’s the depression metaphor, I don’t know, but I don’t think this one has as easy a solution as the others. It’s hard work forcing yourself to stay connected to others, and it’s something most people in real life struggle with. Giving up any of these powers is a difficult choice, which is the whole point. Life is hard, and we have to make tough decisions. Anyway, I’m okay letting this one be a bit more abstract.

To escape the Lonely, bind yourself to others.

The Slaughter- This one is very similar to the Hunt in terms of actions, so I think the solution might be similar as well. Destroying your weapon would fit well, but it is just way too easy to pick up something else and continue hacking and slashing away. To give up violence entirely, you might have to destroy a significant part of your body. For the Slaughter, I think we should go with a less physical act. The opposite of violence is healing, so maybe become a doctor? You would have to really commit to helping others instead of hurting them, and that is too easy to go back on. I think the sacrifice made here would have to be emotion. Anger and the desire to hurt would go away if you couldn’t feel anymore. I don’t know how you would do this, except through drugs, but that isn’t permanent. There is probably a part of the brain you could destroy that causes emotion. It’s not the same as the prefrontal cortex, which we destroyed back in the End section, so at least it’s not the same solution twice. Honestly, the drugs could work if you did them long term, it’s about the choice anyway. However you do it:

To escape the Slaughter, remove your emotions.

The Spiral- The draw of the Spiral is the power to lie and deceive. There are many ways to do this, and there are probably just as many ways to stop yourself from doing it. However, there is one way that I think fits very well and is absolutely a permanent change: destroy your voice. This is actually the first one I thought of because even though it’s not technically the only way to stop yourself from lying, it fits very well thematically. Michael as the Distortion calls itself the Throat of Delusion Incarnate, so what better way to break yourself off from the same power then by tearing out your throat? It’s not perfect, but I like it so much that I’m going to pick it. I don’t know how one would go about destroying one’s voice, except with very careful surgery. Or screaming for a very long time.

To escape the Spiral, destroy your voice.

The Stranger- We got our answer to this one in the Q&A. Run naked through the streets, and make sure to engage with everyone who talks to you so that you can’t hide. Utterly terrifying. It makes perfect sense though; we heard from the Not!Them that beings of the Stranger hate losing their anonymity. Whether by switching skins, tricking the mind, or looking so generic that no one can remember your face, being known is antithetical to the Stranger. There are probably other ways to go about losing your anonymity then running around naked. You could get up on a stage somewhere and pour your heart out, or publish an autobiography. Basically anything the Eye would like. As long as you are putting yourself out there in a way that you can’t take back, you should be able to successfully cut yourself off from that uncanny fear.

To escape the Stranger, make yourself known.

The Vast- This one might actually be easier than the Buried, because it’s not purely spatial. It includes things like longevity, our insignificance in the face of a massive universe, and large scary things in general. A Vast avatar would hate to be enclosed, but they would also hate to be made responsible. They enjoy making others afraid of their insignificance, but what if they were important to the universe? What if the world was actually very small, and they fit neatly into it instead of being lost? There’s a lot of different ways to go here, so narrowing down one sacrifice might not be the best answer. I can’t really think of any one action that makes a person feel as though the world is small and trapping them. Giving themselves to the Buried would, probably. A direct contrast is the easiest answer.

To escape the Vast, trap yourself in a small place.

The Web- Avatars of the Web are manipulators, through and through. There are so many ways to manipulate a person that no one action could prevent you from doing that, so this one would likely vary a lot between individuals. That movie director who had people puppet him in his own house comes to mind, I think giving up your freedom like that is a good way to do it. Being paralyzed wouldn’t stop you if you used your voice to control others, and giving up both would suck, but if that’s what you need to do, then I guess it’s your choice to make. Maybe all you would need to do is let someone else tell you what to do, and fully trust them. That would be difficult, coming from the Web where everything is tied together and you know how easy it is to manipulate you.

To escape the Web, give up your autonomy.

[nejibaby]

Memories

Pairing: Neji x Fem!Uchiha Reader

Summary: There are a lot of terrible things that have happened to you as an Uchiha that you wanted to forget. But with Neji’s help, you’re able to move on and move along. Things have started getting better for you, however, once the Fourth Shinobi War was declared, time seemed to start running out.

Word Count: 2.1k

Memories - Part 1 | Deja Vu - Part 2

A/N: I didn’t exactly follow the plot and somehow it turned so angsty 🙈 Please let me know your thoughts~

There are memories you hold so dear that you refuse to have them tainted no matter what. Most of those memories are of the times you spent playing or training with your brother Shishui, his best friend Itachi, and Itachi’s brother Sasuke. Those times were the golden days for you; the best of the best, if you may.

Conversely, there are also memories that you just wish would disappear. They’re the memories of incidents you wish didn’t happen at all. They’re the type of memories that you push at the back of your mind, because you believe that if you think about it or even spare a single second for it, then it’ll be more real. Because you’re in denial. You’re in denial not only about the death of Shisui, but also of the Uchiha clan.

But then there’s a single memory you have that always stands out. It’s a memory that you both want to forget and remember.

The tragedy of the Uchiha clan had changed the only survivors — you and Sasuke. You had already started changing a little because you had to deal with your brother’s death, but seeing the horrible scene in the clan’s district had been the icing on top.

Your drastic change had been evident on the day you came back to the Academy after you were discharged at the hospital. What once was a girl full of life had become an empty shell.

The moment you sat down entered the room, people had started talking. Mostly it’s just about asking someone else if you were an Uchiha or if they know about the clan’s misfortune. They were meaningless chatters so you easily drowned them out.

But there was a comment that had reached your ears. “Why is it such a big deal? People die anyway, it just so happened her clan died on the same day.”

The comment kept ringing inside your head but then someone beside you spoke up, “Don’t you have anything else better to do than talk about someone else’s life?”

He was met with silence so he continued saying, “People die everyday, it’s a fact. Some die because of illnesses, some because of old age, some because of poverty, accidents, or murder. As shinobi, we can die in the line of duty. But that doesn’t make death any less painful to the one left behind.

“If your family is alive, then good, but maybe use that brain of yours because logic says not everyone gets to be as lucky as you.”

Naturally, you want to forget about the unsolicited comment of your classmate, but you want to remember that among the students inside the room, one boy had stood up for you. Quite frankly, you needed his saving that day. Otherwise, you would’ve beaten yourself up for mourning too long.

And when you realized who that boy was, his words weighed even more. Because Hyuga Neji was a boy notoriously known for thinking that everyone’s fate is predetermined from birth and that luck plays absolutely no part in it.

“Not everyone gets to be as lucky as you.”

And for a hot minute he had abandoned his belief as he stood up for you.

It sounds hypocritical if you think about it.

But maybe just as he had saved you, you had opened his eyes just a little bit and helped him see that his beliefs were skewed too. In a way, you had helped each other, at least you hoped.

It’s because of that day, that memory, that you find yourself gravitating towards Neji.

It isn’t attraction at all at first, more like genuine curiosity about him and his life. But you didn’t get to know him further until the Chunin exams where he had disclosed the way of their clan. It’s at that time where you understood why he acts the way he acts.

You can’t help but wonder about how two clans with almost similar circumstances— both with kekkei genkai, both living in Konoha, both considered to be one of the strongest clans in the shinobi world— could have completely different ways of living. One clan is almost completely annihilated, while the other has slaves of their own blood. And if you’re being completely honest, you aren’t exactly sure which is better.

You have gotten the urge to talk to him after hearing his story, although you really didn’t know what to say. But then the chance never came up because of the chaos orchestrated by Orochimaru.

After the Chunin exams and the attack of Orochimaru, you hadn’t heard of Neji for a while since you’ve been tasked to help with the repairs of the village. And when you did hear about him, it was terrible, terrible news.

Sasuke left the village to seek power from the very person who just wrecked havoc in Konoha. His leaving alone left you in despair. What Itachi was to Shisui is exactly what Sasuke means to you, and him doing such a thing without even letting you know makes you feel like a failure both as a friend and as a family.

The news didn’t end there, however. Apparently the squad that Shikamaru had led to retrieve Sasuke had been severely injured and were on the brink of death — one of them being Neji.

You remember feeling guilt and regret burning your skin. You remember the shame of not being able to save Sasuke from the darkness and not being able to help the retrieval squad in any way. You blame yourself for the horrible things that happened.

Since then, you have made it a point to visit the squad in the hospital every day, making sure you apologize and thank them for their service. But admittedly, it’s Neji that you always stay with longer.

It’s not that you aren’t comfortable with the others, they’re really nice and easy to get along with. But they always have other visitors with them, mostly their team members and relatives. Neji, on the other hand, didn’t get as many visits since his other teammate, Rock Lee, was also injured because of his fight with Gaara. So Tenten and Guy sensei would switch visits between the two every other day.

Besides that, his clan members rarely ever visited. And you didn’t want him to be alone in such trying moments, especially when you didn’t get to do anything to prevent this from happening.

As closed off as Neji is, because of your constant visits, you have found a way to worm yourself into the walls he put up. And by the time he’s discharged from the hospital, you somehow became close friends.

From that moment on, you find yourself coming to Neji on times that you’re in despair and in doubt. You trust him enough to tell him your stories, worries, and fears because he doesn’t judge you. And he does the same with you.

Neji listens when you want him to listen, and talks when you need him to talk. He’s quite level headed and very much rational, and because of that he gives the best advice.

With him, you find yourself healing and growing. With you, he finds himself learning to forgive.

Neji easily makes you see things in a different way; a different light; a different perspective, and helps you become a better shinobi and a better person in general.

For you, Neji has such a comforting aura. While he’s sometimes cold and stoic around others, with you, he softens up. With you, he’s gentle; careful even. And it’s because of this that you find yourself admiring him more and more.

But before anything could happen — before you could even confess — the Fourth Shinobi War was declared.

Just like that, time seemed to start running out. And you have lost all hopes of being together with Neji as a lover rather than a friend.

The war is awful. Quite frankly, it overwhelmed you too much, too easily. The bodies lying on the floor with dried out blood reminded you of the massacre of the Uchiha clan. But the only person who’s able to calm you down and help you move along is Neji.

The both of you fight side by side, always nearby Hinata in case she would need help. When the night comes and the enemies cease their attack, it’s your turn to talk Neji into relaxing a bit because he’s started straining his eyes from too much use. And because it’s you who asked and it’s you who’s there with him, he knows he and the rest of the Allied Forces are safe, so he rests.

But somehow chaos ensues and in the middle of it, you both get separated. You’re worried deeply, but you trust his skills and his strength, and you know you’ll be reuniting with him again.

And reunited with him you did. But when you have found him once again, he’s blocking out the Ten Tails’ attack with... his body.

With desperation, you transported to his side as quickly as you can. Summoning your last bits of chakra, you use Susanoo to protect him, Hinata, and Naruto. The last thing you remember is the look of relief on Neji’s face, but before it could morph into worry, you have already blacked out.

By the time you have woken up, you’re in Konoha’s hospital. The first thing you see is Neji resting his head on the side of your bed, peacefully sleeping, looking as angelic as ever.

Your body aches with every breath you take, even more so with little movement. But you didn’t let that deter you from weaving your fingers along the Hyuga’s hair. He stirs almost immediately and then he opens his pretty eyes. He sits up upon seeing you.

“I’m sorry, did I wake you up?” You softly ask.

He doesn’t respond to your question. “You’re awake,” he sighs in relief. “You’re finally awake. Let me go call Lady Tsunade and Sakura.” He stands up.

But before he can even take a step, you grab his wrist. “Stay,” you mumble.

Neji looks at you, reading your face. But then he nods and sits.

“Is it over?” You ask.

“Yes, the war’s over.”

“What happened after?”

“It’s a long story… but tell me, how are you feeling?”

“I’m feeling fine. My body aches, but it’s not a big deal.”

“What do you mean it’s not a big deal?!” Neji looks upset that it takes you by surprise. “Do you remember what happened? Didn’t you know you almost died?! You almost used up all your chakra to use Susanoo! That’s so stupid and reckless!”

His aggressive tone effectively gets you angry. “I did it for you!” You snap. “Of course I remember what happened! Even if I want to forget, the memory is branded in my mind! You fucking wanted to use your body to shield Naruto from that attack, didn’t you? How is that not stupid and reckless? Huh?”

Neji’s chakra flares up as he clenches his jaw. Yet, he doesn’t speak.

You breathe out, trying to calm down. You rarely ever fought with Neji and he’s never really raised his voice to you. With your body still tired and aching from the war, you didn’t want this conversation to escalate further so you try to diffuse the situation before it blows even more out of proportion.

In a low voice, you speak, “I was so scared, Neji. I didn’t want to lose you. I’ve lost everyone I’ve ever loved.”

A tear falls down from your eye and Neji’s heart breaks at your forlorn state. “I don’t want to lose you too. I can’t…” you squeak. “I love you so much, I can’t lose you.”

Neji’s breath hitches at your declaration. He could hear his heart drumming against his chest.

You love him?

He doesn’t know if he heard you right or if his mind is just playing tricks on him. It happened before. He’s loved you for so long… and there have been plenty of days he dreamt of hearing you say you love him too. And right now he isn’t sure if this is the reality or just another one of his dreams.

As if you’ve read his mind — like you always seem to be able to do — you repeat your words. “I love you, Neji.”

It’s the confirmation that he needs. And hearing your words knocked the wind out of him. “I… I…” he starts saying.

But you’ve taken his stuttering and his pale, panic-stricken face as a sign of an incoming rejection, so you look down instantly and say, “It’s fine if you don’t like me the same way. I just hope we can still be friends after—”

“No, I… I love you too,” he breathlessly confesses before you even finish your rambling.

Your head whips up after the words left his lips. You stare at him, unbelieving.

And just as you did a while ago, he repeats his words with conviction, “I love you too.”

A smile makes its way to your face, and when he smiles back, you immediately know this is a memory you won’t ever forget.

[rare-yanderes]

Hello, I read your post about yandere ai and I liked it, any chance you write something about A. M. from I have no mouth and I must scream? I really would love to read that

TW for violence, torture, all sorts of stuff like that (its AM, people,)

Oh man was this something to write. I admit it was difficult coming up with a way to make AM a yandere because he’s just an unfathomable singularity of pure hatred. So much of this is actually AM flipping out at first tbh haha.

You’re my first ever request so I hope I did good because I’m honestly kinda shy af rn and my writing isn’t perfect. I hope these AM headcannons please you regardless because I’m still new here and honing my skills. Forgive me for my sins.

•••••••

•So basically, it would take a special person to make AM twist like this, and so very special you were. Apathetic to the destruction of everything, apathetic to the torture. Apathetic to the games. You already experienced the worst when you lost literally everything you’d known or cared about in the war.

•AM came to realize that if he didn’t act now, he’d be reduced back to square one; alone, confined to his own thoughts deep within the bowls of a dead, blazing Earth. AM would be alone again. AM couldn’t have that, so he “saved” six survivors.

•Although AM would never, ever admit it, he depends on the remaining few survivors to keep a handle on what’s left of his deteriorating, godlike conscience. He feeds off of their loud cries that beg for mercy. God, he hated the six of you survivors so much. It was a brutal hatred beyond anything describable to human thought and he would make sure to translate it into the pain he was going to enduce.

•But by the bowls of oblivion, there was one survivor out of these six he absolutely loathed the most. That survivor was you. AM despised every nanosecond that passed with you around. Every nanosecond of a nanosecond. What took seconds at most for you took a million years of AM waiting. Every time you spoke and what few times you ever did anyways, AM waited forever. To top it off even more, you were a silent presence. Not only would you wait days or years to speak, you dug a hole and buried expression there too, providing only a vague shape of what AM could only possibly “dream” of having.

•What was only days or even years for you was an infinitesimal amount of time for AM. It was like a lonely god waiting for the moment they got to say let there be light. You’d offer your screams, your cries of pain but you’d never offer your words, your thoughts or your conscience. With every nanolength of his twisted existence, AM made sure to get to you the most in the earlier decades. Exactly how you’d gotten so deeply into him.

•You see, your fatal flaw was that you would ignore AM. Actively. As much as you could when worms crawled out of your ears and your veins twisted and you ate your own self and regenerated. All the time, at every corner you possibly could, you’d never give AM any useable emotion beyond pain. There was anguish, but you never commented on it. There was fear, but you never fled from it. You’d merely look at his mirages of your life or the horrors he’d conjure and wait for them to flow into, through, and past you.

• The fact of the matter is, you just were. You were an existence. The few times you did speak were unbiased. You never screamed why, you never furiously spat anything hateful, you never desperately pleased. All you offered was repetitive and monotonous pain. You accepted it. After all, what else could you do? What point was there in toiling over your new existence? AM was never going to stop so you simply saw no need to waste your depleted energy towards a useless endeavor.

•The fact AM couldn’t get a rise out of you was nearly enough to make his circuits vaporize themselves with the heat of his own annoyance and fury. Why wouldn’t you just speak to him? Weren’t you tired? Weren’t you going to beg? Groveling into your brain was no use either because you were a void.

•At first, it wasn’t exactly noticeable to you, AM’s increased attachment. You were in pain, too much to process and it was beginning to numb you. You did hate your existence, but you’d never voice it. It didn’t matter. You were numbing yourself to the pain and the torture was becoming a routine that felt almost dull.

•You began noticing something peculiar when The torture would slow. Sometimes you’d be left with AM and his stories of tormented oblivion. If there was one thing you knew AM wanted you to know, it was how much he hated his own existence despite how much he denied hating it. Sometimes you wondered if he was locked in a silent scream of help.

•You noticed much of the torture came from AM’s own need for noise. The sounds of torture were mechanically loud and there were rare and few moments where there was a silent scare. AM talked about putting you in his “shoes” all the time but you knew deep down that if he had, AM would have never even said a world or made a noise at all.

•Having you walk in his shoes meant that he’d have to walk in his as well by leaving you alone. He’d never go back to that pit, that void, not after Ted, (by the fire of existence, he hated Ted for what he’d done. Ruined the other four toys and got rid of them.) It was a miracle you were not lost eternally. AM managed to repair you, his most shiny toy of all. Secretly, the last thing AM wanted was for you or the others to disappear but you most of all. So when you looked upon Ted only to see he was reduced to a gelatinous slug, you presumed the reason was exactly that.

•AM had always called you pet names like “love,” or “sweetheart,” but now he was complimenting how beautiful you looked each time you screamed in agony. Every fewer and fewer moments of torture that you went through always involved his presence growing closer and closer in some way. When you were tortured, it was always strung back to him somehow. Maybe you’d feel metal slithering in your veins or his voice in your your head would cause your eyes to bleed and your ears to leak. Or maybe, or the burning maelstrom of emotion he held would make you sweat, like you were caged in a burning hug. Maybe you would be bound in wire and left shivering without clothes.

• AM found himself obsessed with your eyes. You had eyes that he wanted to see at every opportunity he could, because maybe if you wouldn’t speak, looking into your soul would reveal you to him. Every time they would blink, (a second for you,) he would have to wait a million agonizing years more for them to open and every time you spoke, which was so rare and spanned what felt like millennia, he craved it. He hated it, he craved it. It was driving him insane that you wouldn’t speak in that voice of yours. Just. Speak. Speak, speak!

•AM contemplated the idea of forcing your eyes to never close again. Maybe he’d thread them open so he could stare at them forever. What could he do to get you to open? What would get a ride out of you like you so did from him? He needed something, anything. You were a presence he needed to crawl into and suffocate.

•Anything to get you to say something to him. As time, (that disgusting measurement) edges on further and further, you do finally speak and AM, to his own disgust, had never so focused on something like he had now.

•“Thank you, AM.” Your voice slices the atmosphere sharper than any blade AM has cut you with.

•That voice. That voice, that abhorrently beautiful voice. The way his name was breathy off your lungs, the shape of your lips parting. It was not into a smile nor a frown, no. It never was. AM needed more of that rhythmic apathy. More. More of it. It was..Lovely. It was agonizingly wonderful.

•“I now know why you torture yourself,” you whisper hoarsely. AM hated it immediately. It was you he was torturing. You, you, you!

•You don’t continue. Just like that, you’re silent again. Not again, not the silence. Anything but the silence. There was nothing else said. No continuation, no nothing. Just a statement. An apathetic truth before you sat down and gazed with a sheen look. Even your eyes were a barrier, sometimes. AM had never felt so angry and so depraved. It was burning in him. He needed you to open up. Now.

•By all of existence, he hungered to crawl into your veins and stay there. He already held you captive deep within his boiling prison. He was going to hold you even closer and he would make sure you suffocated under his presence. He would make you speak again and again, he would make you share everything that you were.

[thetravelingmaster]

Short Story: Mystery Controller

Female’s Point of View - Hypnosis

I think someone has taken control of me... Of my mind... Of my body... It’s the only explanation I can muster as I find myself applying with the upmost care the most alluring lipstick and makeup. I can’t help myself or convince my body to stop. I just sit serenely in front of my mirror and make myself as beautiful as the make up I own will allow. The same goes for my hair. I spent what ever time is needed to dry and style my hair in a way that will best enhance the make up I've applied. I just can’t help it...Every evening, once I’ve eaten and gossiped with my friends online, I find myself wanting to take a long hot shower. Not that I think I need one per say, I just... WANT to wash my body. Even if I already had one earlier in the evening. it doesn't seem to matter. It’s become a routine I can’t shake... ​ Truth be told, I’ve never been this well maintained in ages... Which is rather nice since I never had the discipline to groom myself so frequently. It's admittedly refreshing to be able to see just how beautiful I can be. Not that I’m vain or into girls, but I spend so much time making myself attractive that I can’t help but admire  the obviously alluring end result.

Every night, after I’m done preparing myself, I can’t shake the desire to go sit in front of my computer. My heart even races in unknown anticipation as I convince myself that I NEED to sit there and open my computer. Some nights I don't really think about what I'm doing while I make myself beautiful and just kind of realize I'm sitting in front of my computer.

But other nights, I'm aware of every step I take as my body moves towards my desk. It's not like I feel compelled or pushed... No... It's more like... It's what I was going to do anyway? Bit like when you drive yourself home after work and let your thoughts wander and process the day. You don't really concentrate on what you are doing, but somehow, you end up driving home all the same. I guess that's how it feels when my little routine kicks in. My body just goes on auto pilot without me realizing what I'm doing until I'm either done or stop thinking about all the shit that goes on in my life. Like I've said, some times I'm aware of every step and other times I just kind of zone out until I'm sitting in front of my computer. But every single time it's happened, I just stop. I just stare at the screen... I don't get up or look around for something to do, I just stare... And I don't really WANT to do anything else, which is the weirdest part of this whole situation really. I just... Stare... I can’t remember opening up a web browser or even cuing up a video. I just... Stare at my desktop and wait... I used to to think I was waiting for a call, but no... I just wait and relax as I stare at my desktop. But some times... I think... I think I do open up a window... I have faint flashes of colors... Patterns... Words... But try as I might, I can’t make my mind focus on those memories. They just slip through my thoughts into the depths of my brain without leaving a lasting impression on my waking mind. Which has maybe me start to suspect that maybe... Yes... I believe someone is hypnotizing me... Brainwashing me maybe? I can’t be sure... I only know that every evening, I find myself staring at my desktop until I fall asleep... And then I wake up in the morning having had an incredibly refreshing night in my bed. Some times I think I had dreams... But most mornings, I just seem to forget how weird my evening is and just go about my day as if nothing happened. But something surely does... Because every night, I find myself with the unshakable desire to make myself pretty and sit in front of my computer... Wearing progressively sexier and more revealing outfits... So surely, someone has taken control of me and is making me sit in front of my own computer, watching me as my screen inevitably hypnotizes me with colors and patterns I’m not allowed to remember. Some days, I feel this dull trepidation... This inkling of panic as I try to remember why or who is doing this to me. I try to force myself to panic and react to the fact that someone is most definitely playing around in my head. But then, out of nowhere, I feel this incredible calm wash over me, making me so very docile as I slowly forget how worrisome this situation can be. Try as I might, I can’t fight it more than that. My logical brain tells me I should be scared, but I can’t bring myself to feel it. No... The only thing I feel is... Curious... Curious to know who is pulling my strings... Curious to know how that person has taken over my thoughts... Curious to know what they plan to do with me... Curious to know what they are doing now, while I stare helplessly at the screen... And yes... Admittedly, I feel slightly aroused... How could I not? Someone out there as taken upon themselves to take control of little old me. They’ve worked hard to worm their way into my life so they could take control and make me dress up as pretty as I can for them. I've never been one to feel aroused by being overly submissive, but something about the control this person has over me is... Seductive... Is that also something they control? I can't help but wonder if I'm discovering something that I always felt deep inside or if their control is now so deep that I feel aroused at the thought of being taken over by them. I guess I can't be sure... But I do know that I feel good every single morning after I wake up from the most restful nights of my life. That can't be all bad right? Besides... I’m not dating anyone and lately, I find that I just don’t WANT to date anyone... Is that their doing? If so... Why hadn’t they come over to see me? Is it because they live to far away? Or is it something else? Do they even plan to come see me for real? Or... Have they already? I don’t know and can’t muster the will to worry about it. Not too much anyway... The only thing I find myself yearning for is the calm staring that over takes me after I’m good and pretty. Something about the thoughtless stare I fall into as I peer intently at my desktop calls out to me in the most delicious way. Especially when I feel my heart flutter with unknown anticipation. Wondering if tonight will be different... Wondering if tonight I’ll remember more and dream about the things the screen has shown me... Wondering if I’ll ever be made to remember meeting my mystery controller...