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ultfreakme · 6 months ago

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I've read the WarWorld saga and I love the twins. However, like Chris, they are also sidelined and underdeveloped. Otho is the only one with agency, while Osul feels like another version of Chris. All three characters needed more time and development beyond Clark rescuing them.

Regarding Zod and Ursa's abuse, I understand this may not be what you meant, so this isn't an attack on you, but rather a statement. No child abuse ever makes sense. There is no justification for a parent to hurt their child. Ever. Unfortunately, there are people who want kids and still end up abusing them. Abuse never makes sense—some people are just awful. Zod and Ursa are simply terrible people. A wanted child doesn't always equate to a loved child, which is a sad reality. Zod and Ursa are just bad parents—monsters without any real motive, just inherently cruel. Just like all real-life abusive parents. There's no point in trying to rationalize their abusive behavior because there is no reason parents should ever abuse their child.

Anon, again oh god I hope this does not come off as me condescending to you. I have no personal anything for Chris. I'm mostly indifferent to what he is to people in fandom, all of ym gripes lie with writing decisions. I personally disagree about Otho, Osul and Chris being similarly dismisses, and I think I have textual proof Otho & Osul got more investment as characters independently, and as children to Clark more than Chris ever was, and with more intention behind WHY they act the way they do. This will not be about Chris or Osul or Otho as characters, but about how Geoff Johns wrote Chris & PKJ wrote super twins. I'm doing this to dissect storytelling and characters. I genuinely wish you all the happiness and fun for liking Chris. I am personally simply not compelled by him and I think the text doesn't provide me nearly enough of him in comparison to his counterparts and alternatives. That's all, this is just me showing why.

Right off the bat, introduction scene; this is pivotal, this is where your character makes an impact & shows us what they're about. How they talk, what they do on the regular. This is the establishing moment.

PKJ with Otho & Osul's very first scene:

I don't need to speculate or think too hard to know that Otho's the hardass who doesn't give a crap- she's resourceful, motivated entirely by survival and being warzoon. Osul's the more empathetic one, he tries to be the same kind of tough his sister is with the way he sneers and talks, but he tells her to go easy and is clearly the more open and kind one.

Sibling dynamic establish. Individual character and action established(along with individulistic design).

What was Chris's introduction scene? I'm dismissing the very first page we get of him in the pod because he isn't really a character there, but going to the scene where he does something character-wise

K, nice dramatic shot. What does this tell us about Chris Kent? He's smiling as he says "I'm hungry" and lifting up a TV set. What does this tell us? What does this mean? Why is he doing this?

In-text, this entire issue, I don't get an answer for this. We can speculate, but it's not factual. I can make up that he's lifting the cabinet to draw attention because he comes from an abusive home but I can also just as easily defy this by saying Zod & Ursa would never allow this level insubordination and disobedience by randomly lifting objects. I can say whatever I want to explain this behaviour of smiling, lifting an object and saying hes hungry but in-text, in canon, we are given no explanation for why he does this as a character.

This scene is actually in service of the audience. This is just to show us the reader, a kryptonian feat, which is simply visually repeating a thing Clark's already verbally confirmed.

But I do have a answer for why Otho & Osul said every single thing they did in their introduction scene, down to their expressions. Otho's cool with Clark being dead because dead people have resources on them she can steal to better defend herself. She's sneering because she doesn't give a crap if he's 'Superman'. Osul is looking unimpressed up there because Clark is looking rough & he is in disbelief that this is apparently the famed "Superman" who they held admiration for. His expression softens because yeah Superman is weak, but he still admired him at some point & he's trying to calm Otho. I don't need to dig or search because the writer is telling us "hey this is their deal". Otho's the more aggressive one and we spend more time with her because she's taken on the role of being the tough one, protecting Osul.

Chris? We never learn why Chris acts the way he does. In fact, we see a page immediately after the cabinet scene that puzzles me as to why Chris was lifting it in the first place. He doesn't KNOW he has these superpowers, he tries to fly like Clark and almost falls. So why is he smiling? Is he happy he's strong now? I'm purely guessing because the writing and art don't convey anything congruent. He says he doesn't have a name. He is entirely unfazed. And we never get an actual, canon explanation for why. We need it though, because these things are character defining and this behaviour especially is highly odd for a kid who just landed in a planet he doesn't know, away from the only world he understands, among complete strangers crowding around him to observe. The entire time, he smiles serenely and for some reason, trusts Clark after an extremely brief conversation. It can't be just because he's kryptonian because Zod & Ursa are also kryptonian.

Otho & Osul's reason for trusting Clark? Established immediately in the next two chapters. Otho & Osul are the most precious things to each other > Mongul says they must kill each other > But Clark says absolutely not > Twins like Clark better than Mongul because they figure out if they must become the people Mongul wants, they must destroy one another which is NOT on the table > Clark's the better bet. This is why Otho chooses to somewhat warm up to Clark and Osul goes from "hesitant" to "yeah I trust him entirely". Their trust in Clark develops slowly, we know why they're hesitant, and we know why they open up.

Chris? Why does Chris trust Clark? Is he the first kind person he encountered? What did he mean when he say "you don't belong here either, do you?" Again I can personally hc a bunch of things but it is not clearly intended by the text. GJ doesn't ever allow Chris to talk. And when Chris does, it's singular words and are rarely insightful into Chris's psyche, even in Kryptonian. Like why does Chris want to be adopted by Lois & Clark, specifically Lois, when he himself says "Lois doesn't like m" and Lois does nothing on-page to subvert this? If kindness is what made Chris attach to Clark, shouldn't he be averse to Lois the entire time?

Chris is entirely well-adjusted with Clois. We see no evidence of abuse, the stories never discuss Zod & Ursa, or what Chris specifically thinks about them. There's nothing reflected in his behaviour or character other than "he's nice". Which is fine, but again, why?

Even Jon, who experienced extreme abuse for years is now very nice. But there's an in-text reason for this. Jon refused to bend to Ultraman and kept fighting, and this meant holding onto hope. He refuses to be unkind because then he'd become like Ultraman(which was Ultraman's point). He also shows the after effects of this time through his insecurities with his powers and abilities as a hero.

Chris? Where? I read the action comic arc and the Tim stuff, there's little to nothing. He's got your typical kryptonian struggles but every Kryptonian's got em and after that it's up to the chraracter to react how they do. Otho was frustrated and immediately getting into fights, Osul was trying but still not getting the hang of it and both of them exhibited their inability to adjust through a penchant for violence because of Mongul. Chris just, he just says "this is difficult" without any unique expression as to why. He just says it's hard and reports generic symptoms.

Otho and Osul each got a separate arc btw. Otho got the final PKJ arc with the Blue Earth Movement with Ra's Al Ghul's alternate dimension granddaughter trying to force her further into being a ruthless warrior. Osul got the opening arc on Earth where he had an entire go inside him and Mongul's lackeys were hunting after him.

Chris got.....afaik, individual arc only after his spontaneous age-up. I'm not counting it because atp he's not Clois's kid anymore.

Onto the next point.

Abuse itself is senseless, but we are not dealing with real people here. These are characters, and characters have motives, that's their entire deal. Zod isn't just generically evil, he's like that because he wants Kryptonian supremacy dictated by violence and might. Same goes for Ursa. You cannot just say "these characters are simply evil" because then I can replace Zod and Ursa with two robots if all we need is "generic evil person".

Characters, be they good or bad, stand for something. They have to, otherwise it's just bad writing.

These character motives define actions. So when I say the abuse doesn't make any sense, I'm talking about it in terms of character, and what the writers and creatives intended to tell the audience through these choices. Zod and Ursa arent just inherently cruel, there's a reason for why they're like that. Their families value military might and strategic importance, they consider kryptonians to be superior to humans and shun any intermingling with "lower species". If you paint Zod & Ursa as just "simple evil", then you dismiss the message CLARK is trying to convey by defeating them.

When Clark defeats Zod, it's not just "good guy defeats evil". It's showing that this kind of exceptionalism and what's basically an analogy for racism and colonization, THAT is what is bad. If Ursa and Zod are just evil, it's not about child abuse as a story arc. It's just "child suffers under villain".

If the message was "abuse bad", it was lackluster and stating the obvious. We all KNOW parental abuse is bad. Now what does that mean for Chris Kent? How is he impacted? You can't say Ursa and Zod abused Chris and then not explore such a severe topic. The entire Chris arc in Action Comics fully ignored this aspect until the final 2 issues, and even then it didn't show Chris's turmoil. He had all of 10 lines across the issues dealing with his abuse. There is no exploration, no insight, no genuine engagement by Geoff Johns with the topic of child abuse.

I am saying all this not because I think Ursa and Zod can in any way be justified. I want to reiterate that, nothing will justify what Ursa and Zod did. With that in mind, an explanation for their abuse is NOT a justification.

Abuse and its cruelty makes no sense. But every abuser has an explanation for why the do it (again this is not a justification, this is still bad, explanations don't make a single thing better). The point of a story is to give a believable explanation for the things that happen and Geoff Johns didn't even TRY to explain.

I feel like I grew less and less coherent as the post continued but I hope I got my point across. You are not going to make me enjoy Chris as a character. And in turn I am not going to make you hatete Chris as a character. That's not what I want, I don't care about asserting which character is better. My current favorite is an anime character who showed up for 4 episodes in a 40 episode anime who people say I need to move tf on from. I am doing this not to bash Chris, but to bash Geoff Johns, who failed to deliver a compelling story.

This is again, a criticism of writing. You can love Chris all you want, I just don't think the Chris arc is a well-crafted story, and there aren't enough well-crafted stories of him for me to try to like him.

#riki asks #chris kent #otho ra #osul ra #super twins #superfam

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clotpolesonly · 2 years ago

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📖👀

Ronan accidentally dreams up a child version of Declan. it's completely unintentional, maybe manifesting some subconscious thing as the two of them struggle to mend their fractured relationship and Ronan tries to reconcile the parts of their childhood that he thought were true but is not realizing were not, etc etc. however it happens, they've now got a 6yo Declan clone on their hands.

and the series made clear that dreaming is not like most fantasy series magic systems. they go out of their way to establish that dream people are real people. so there's no getting rid of this kid, he's not an illusion or a spell that can be broken, he's real and he's here and he's permanent.

Declan hates everything about this. he doesn't like kids very much in general, but this kid in particular is........him. and it's a version of him that is young and stressed and sad and closed off but who isn't good at hiding it yet. a child who reminds him of all those emotions he refuses to admit he still has. he doesn't have any patience for his own emotions as an adult, he would have even less patience for them in this context.

it's Matthew who asks him "why are you so mean to yourself?"

nobody's ever really noticed that he's mean to himself as an adult -- all the shaming and berating happens inside his own head behind the blandly pleasant businesslike face, and he'd never admit to it if asked. now he's being forced to externalize all the internalized bullshit that comes with his eldest daughter syndrome and parentification.

"i'm not being mean, i'm just…………he needs to learn. life isn't fair and it'll be better for him if he understands that now. he's acting like a baby. he needs to grow up."

Matthew is so protective of this kid, right off the bat. both because that is his BROTHER, thank you very much, and he loves all his brothers, even the new spontaneously generated doppelganger ones, and also empathetically as another dream. he flat out refuses to allow Declan and Ronan to lie to bb!Declan about the situation like they did to him his entire life, even if explaining it in full to a 6yo proves challenging.

the first thing bb!Declan says after grasping you're a dream thing is "am i a secret?"

he doesn't quiiiite understand dreaming conceptually, it's complicated, but he does understand that dreams are things that no one talks about. dreams are dangerous. dreams get swept under the rug or sucked into that big vacuum bag to disappear forever or buried in the fields where no one will find them.

that might be the first moment that Ronan truly understands why Declan hates their dad.

Ronan's feelings on this clone are mixed. on the one hand, it's Declan, ew. on the other hand, Ronan actually does like kids, he's a SUCKER for kids. bb!Declan is alternately quiet/serious/well-behaved and visibly, obviously anxious/edgy/clingy. he starts out avoiding Ronan (once he understands that this is Ronan) because at 6yo he's lived with his brother's dreaming long enough to have developed a healthy wariness of the dangers of it, but grown up Ronan doesn't bring back dangerous things like he did as a kid, and it's not long before bb!Declan is firmly attached. grown up Ronan is fun and funny and more patient than grown up Declan is, by far.

(like with Mór, bb!Declan can always tell when his older self is getting tired of dealing with him, even when he's not angry. dad used to tell him that mommy wasn't mad at him, she just needed space. bb!Declan says this to Ronan, Declan goes white in the face, and this is how the younger Lynch brothers find out about Mór in this 'verse, cuz Aurora was never angry a day in her life, nor did she ever need space from her boys.)

(which would be worse for Declan? becoming his father or turning into his mother? both existentially horrifying concepts for him.)

the question remains of what to DO with this child. Declan tries desperately to think of some way to get rid of him, with Matthew getting increasingly angry that he would even consider that, while the Gangsey take turns babysitting.

Blue charges for her services cuz she knows Declan's good for it, lol. Gansey has absolutely no idea what to do with a child and falls back on dramatic retellings of Glendower, which bb!Declan eats up cuz they remind him of his dad's bedtime stories. Adam is trying really hard not to get too attached but bb!Declan is so inquisitive and asks him so many questions and LOVES that Adam gives him full unabridged answers and doesn't talk down to him. Ronan has decided that bb!Declan is fun, "when did you stop being fun, Decklo??" (he looks up to find that Declan has already fled the room -- seeing Ronan so openly fond of his younger self when he's long since given up on connecting with the normal version hurts way more than Declan is willing to admit to out loud.)

Declan is at wit's end. it's already been weeks, probably, and there's no solution in sight, and he's had people in his space non-stop the entire time, and taking care of an actual child is way more labor-intensive than looking after Matthew had been, and all this goes double if we have autistic flavored Declans 😂 they're both chronically overstimulated, their routines have been thoroughly disrupted, and their preferences and comfort foods and whatnot have changed over the years and no longer align.

it's a goddamn mess and at some point, Declan just leaves. he gets in the car and disappears for like 3 days without warning. it's very uncharacteristic of him, Matthew is freaking out, Blue's threatening (concernedly) to charge him double for the last minute babysitting, even Ronan is texting him. but he comes back eventually, slightly more settled. he cuts all the tags out of bb!Declan's shirts. he buys the brand of crackers he remembers liking at that age even though he doesn't like them anymore. he makes a conscious deliberate effort (so, so difficult) to remember that this is an innocent child, he is not at fault for experiencing emotions, he deserves to be treated gently."

it's better, for a few days. but his -- their -- birthday is coming up, Declan turning 20 and bb!Declan turning 7, and it hits Declan all at once that this truly isn't going away. that there's no way out of this, there's no magic fix, there's no escape. that he's going to be responsible for this child for another 11 years.

that's when Ronan finds Declan on the floor in his own closet, head between his knees, struggling to breathe because he can't DO this. keeping track of Ronan and Matthew until they reached majority was one thing, and he's been white-knuckling his way through it as best he can, but he cannot be responsible for raising any child, much less him-fucking-SELF. he was supposed to be free in another year when Matthew turned 18, he was supposed to go to college, he was supposed to have a life, he was supposed to finally get the chance to exist as his own person, and what now? what now?

and Ronan, witnessing this, has his own (surprising to everyone except maybe Adam) revelation. that he's not planning on college. he's not career-oriented. he's independently wealthy, he's settled and (more or less) stable, and he likes kids way more than Declan ever has. hell, he's already got one, weird feral little creature that she is.

before he even realizes it, Ronan is making the offer. he'll take bb!Declan. as long as Declan promises to have some kind of relationship with the kid and not just fuck off forever, Ronan will raise him at the Barns, claim him as some illegitimate half-brother they just found out about, dream up a paper trail for him. it's not perfect, but no solution was ever going to be in this situation, and really it should be his responsibility, shouldn't it? since he was the one to dream the kid in the first place?

he sort of expects Adam to run for the hills upon announcing this, especially because he made the decision without consulting him first, but Adam is more resigned than surprised. he'd seen this coming from a mile away. he's not overly thrilled at the idea of being a co-parent of two by the age of 18, but this is what he gets for falling in love with such a big-hearted Lynch, so.

it works, honestly. it's weird and it's messy and there's plenty of bumps in the road, but bb!Declan thrives at the Barns when there are no secrets to keep. when his guardian is present and makes no demands of him except chores. he comes out of his shell bit by bit, and he's happy, enthusiastic and curious and effusively loving, and Ronan fucking adores that kid, even if it is Declan in miniature.

and Declan himself gets to go to school, he gets to disentangle himself from the responsibility of his family enough that he can fucking breathe for the first time in his life, and he comes to terms (painfully, but necessarily) with the fact that this new version of him is going to get the childhood that he didn't. he's going to be loved and safeguarded and allowed to be a fucking kid.

weird as it is, there's healing in that.

send me a book emoji for the plot of a fic that i haven't written but daydream about!!

#and the answer is #Anonymous #sorry this took forever lmao #i have so many thoughts and feelings ok #Declan Lynch #kid!Declan #Ronan Lynch #TRC #fics by me #in a manner of speaking lol

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quirkwizard · 1 year ago

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So is it just me or is Manga just a better thought out version of what New Order was supposed to be. Like New Order in the story just let’s her change the property of anything she touches with its only limit seeming to be requiring contact and the naming convention thing with living targets and that’s it. I think if it was just a slightly stronger version of your QM Imprint then the quirk would better defined and easier to explain within the world. Having a hard limit on the type of orders she can make by being tied to language and word choice provides at least some conditions to give a decent handicap to the power but by having unintentionally consequences to any order Tomura could exploit them due to his unknown number of quirks can show he’s tactical abilities, also by limiting how many times she can use her quirk due to a physical toll it takes on the body it would show the quirks main strengths come from her creativity in using it in very selective ways but her endurance could also parallel to Midoriya repeatedly breaking his arms in their prior fight, and it’s a better alternative than being just a broken ability that undermines the entire power mechanics of the universe.

I half agree with this. While I appreciate you wanting to use one of my Quirks, and certainly a powerful one at that, I think you did a good job of explaining why you'd want to use it, I think you'd be hard-pressed to find any Quirk to replace "New Order". I ultimately believe that part of Stars and Stripes' power problem is a fundamental one. You need someone who isn't a wielder of "One For All" to be a reasonable challenge to Tomura. Which has been well established as impossible for anyone who isn't a wielder. They can only have one Quirk, so you need to expand it as far as possible to make it work. It's just that "New Order" was probably the worst way to go about it, trying to push the themes of Tomura's at the cost of consistency. It's why when I tried to rewrite her power, I went with things that could match the variety of his Quirks, whether that be through the advanced technology of the setting or through utilizing the powerful Quirks of her teammates.

#My Hero Academia #Quirks #Cathleen Bate #Stars and Stripes #New Order #MHA Meta #MHA Theory

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mrdrhenwardhykle · 1 year ago

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I was in a silly goofy mood, so here’s a Bad End/Goons Dragon’s Lair AU +drawings c:

(Body horror, blood, rotting flesh, +kinda sad tw ig)

Idk, this may be set up like partially disorganized DND stats

Hollow:

Alrightly, so the first one we're talking about is more of a remake/redesign on an established character in the franchise. 'Hollow' is a character from the possibly non-canon 3D game, and is like the evil Dirk or something (idk-I tried to look into it, but looking at this game for too long makes me cringe)

Yeah, this guy.

But instead of just being a recolor and a copy of whatever Space Ace did that one time, in my version he's just Dirk from an alternate timeline.

So basically, in this timeline either a. this follows one of the deaths where it doesn't fully show him die/just shows him fail and get stuck somewhere, or b. a timeline where Mordroc and his goons take another route and attack him all at once when he first enters

Anyways, Mordroc (with intention of getting another servant to his castle) gets to Dirk and places an amulet over his neck, explaining he just gave him the 'gift' of immortality; confusing Dirk, wondering why he just did that in the first place. In a turn of events Mordroc stands back and allows his goons to tear Dirk's eyes out and throw him in a random room.

With the amulet, the victim cannot remove it themselves- but have to rely one someone else taking it off for them. You can gain fatal injuries with the amulet and not die, but the injury will likely never heal (other than maybe bleeding stopping), and the one who wears the amulet will never have the pain ease.

'Hollow', as the inhabitants of the Dragon's Lair have come to name him, isn't inherently evil; nor has any forced villainy caused by the amulet, and is still just normal Dirk- but cannot hear or see, and is thriving off of desperation to leave the castle without adding anything else to his anguish. Having a good intuition at first, he has forced himself to concentrate enough so his instincts can help him 'survive'. But no matter who you may be, good or bad, Hollow takes no chances and swings first.

To survive, remember to be smooth and agile in your movements if you see freshly killed goons/knights, smell old blood and rotting flesh approaching, or hear a man crying, screaming in anguish, or calling out 'Daphne' or help. Remember that harming him only makes him more desperate and hostile. If you have his well being in mind, avoid harming him at all costs and just sneak and dodge- and barricade the nearest door if possible.

If you don't care and just need to get closer to saving the princess, just disarm him by cutting off his arms and/or legs but that's pretty cruel. It's actually frowned upon to do that and should only be the last resort.

You can actually befriend Hollow, and it's one of the most recommended routes (other than taking the amulet off yourself). To do this, you need to dodge his attacks, and reassure through some way of touch or presence to show you are a friend or to reassure that he's safe. Show though grabbing his hand or arm that you're going to be guiding him, and just stay in literal touch or out of range when enemies are near-and he should take care of the issue. If you are able to lead him out, let him know he's safe and comfortable before paying your debt by taking the amulet off.

It's unclear if you can save Hollow, as taking off the amulet will just let his fatal wounds catch up to him and instantly kill him (Aka the amulet keeps him alive). Asking most guides, they would just tell you that yanking the amulet off is the best you can do, as he's 'cheating' death and won't suffer any longer- but there may be a 1% in reversing it. That is, to begin the route; take Hollow out and find the best healing mange you can. It's hard to say if healing magic or medical attention can actually 100% help him out, as there's plenty of issues causing him anguish, and either magic or medical care can miss that. And that being said, it's likely difficult to find a good mange in the kingdom, and an even better mange to cure full blown missing eyeballs and other organs- and he might still live with difficulty. This isn't the most recommended route to deal with Hollow, but taking the chance is by no means frowned upon.

Any time Hollow gets close to the exit, a goon is sent to pull him back to another room to screw him up again. It's unknown if they would do this if he got close to the gold room. They've lost a few goons while doing this, but Mordroc insists in keeping him as a guard and a good selection to his 'collection' of knights.

Anyways, ignore the quality of my horrible colored pencil drawings

The Banshee Princess:

After Dirk's 'failure' to save her, Daphne officially became another new 'toy' to Mordroc's collection. Mordroc basically went through the same ritual as seen in the second game, and casted the Banshee curse on her through marriage. The Banshee curse itself forms out of loss and grief, and being that Daphne was in a slightly different position of grief (Aka, no children or husband to lose-but rather just a whole kingdom and boyfriend((?)) ) her form composed into a different and lesser variation.

After she was let out of the bubble, she claimed Singe's room-even to the point of becoming to agitated with him to the point that she killed him by eating him from the inside-out while he was sleeping.

This rendition of the banshee is smaller and more agile like a lizard; and can be found mostly at the back end of the castle. She can crawl on walls, and uses that to her advantage to sneak on her prey. While she can attack goons, she mainly aims for and lives off of knights (as Mordroc won't announce her change to the kingdom and also won't bother to come close enough to feed her).

Her scream is loud and shrill enough that it instantly paralyzes her victims- however she only does this at a very close perimeter.

Look for signs of the Banshee once you enter this area. Keep alert if you feel like your eyes are making up something crawling on the wall beside you. Don't follow if you hear a woman's voice crying out anything like 'help me!', 'save me!', 'mom!' or 'Dirk!'.

Unlike Hollow, there's more of a chance to save Daphne from this fate (albeit she will revert back due to fatal injuries). The one and only cure is a kiss of true love (maybe where befriending Hollow comes in,, but you can try if you wanted to ig)- but the issue with that would be in getting her to remember who she was before so she could stop attacking. Memories are quite rare to get, but it's at least worth the try. Memories are also quite temporary, and she'll just quickly revert back to her animalistic instinct if you're not quick enough to communicate to her.

The ring is no longer there, and the deadline for the ring to enact the curse is long past due. She ripped it off herself while she still had a little bit of control at some point.

Anyways, hope you enjoyed the random angst

#idk if you can foreshadow the tragedy I'm thinking of in my head #aka nobody comes for hollow and he makes it into the gold room thinking Singe is attacking him #gore tw #bad ending au #blood tw #body horror tw #rot tw #angst au #banshee #curse #dnd #you can use it for dnd idk if it works that way but ig it's cool #dragon's lair

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struggle-but-its-all-ocean-floor · 1 year ago

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for a second I thought maybe the collabs are because (aside from him probably wanting them) he didn't nearly have enough time to do his own things but that doesn't make sense because

pretty sure a lot of those songs were already made, he just needed to sing them and create/learn the choreography &

yes they're all English and created by other people (not a criticism just an observation) but those could've still been solo songs? Like them being English singles doesn't mean they needed to be collabs

I'm not sure why I had that original thought lol.

I think maybe it's the label's influence (the American label). something to do with the marketing and introducing him to different audiences in America. Plus It's not like JK would be opposed to working with different artists he finds cool.

I am hesitant about his album though. The tracks might not all be collabs but at this point I don't think any of the songs are gonna feel like him at least the him prior to chapter 2. And I think they'll all be English (which isn't necessarily a bad thing because English songs can be meaningful, but I don't think they'll go for that. Hope I'm wrong)

I would've said differently before I discovered 3D and Seven were part of the album, but now I think this is the case.

They want his name out there and known across America as much as possible before military and before he'll literally be absent for almost 2 years.

But then that makes the whole thing so confusing!!

Well, collabs have the obvious advantage of getting fans of the other artists to listen to Jungkook's songs as well, and possibly becoming fans. I think it also helps Western audiences accept Jungkook, since he's already been "accepted" and "vouched for" by American artists. It gives him more credibility? If it was just Jungkook, maybe his solos would be regarded as side projects, and maybe his streams and records would be seen as the BTS fever effect. But with popular artists credited to his songs, I think that confers Jungkook a certain degree of legitimacy, and maybe shows he's interested in reaching a broader audience and in really building a name and career for himself. I can see the pros of the collabs. At the same time, those can quickly become cons if Jungkook just becomes the dude who only does collabs and can't succeed on his own. So far, all of his solos that charted well and had radio play have been collabs - L&R, Seven and 3D. Now that people know who he is he definitely needs to establish himself solo.

Regardless, he did a poor job choosing the collabs. It's obvious that the alternate version of 3D's better than the main one, and the reason why 3D isn't doing nearly as well as Seven is that, apart from Seven being his anticipated solo debut and having a trendier, and I'd say more tasteful, sound, even Armys didn't like Jack Harlow. The fandom itself isn't responding very well to the song. The MV was lackluster compared to Seven, which had made every Army's Y/N fantasy come true, and if the first song about sex shocks people, the second one is just more of the same. Worst of all though is probably Jack's feature. The lyrics are terrible and sexist, he's not a particularly liked rapper, many fans (like me) are only streaming the solo version and the solo and alternate versions doesn't even combine on Spotify. The way Big Hit lets BTS collab with problematic or not very well respected artists is insane. It's like they'll take anyone and don't even bother understanding what fans want. There are tons of respected, liked and very popular artists that would love to work with BTS and they chose Jack Harlow? They could've fucking asked Cardi B (who is problematic too but generally well liked), and she probably would've said yes. They could've brought back Megan.

The thing is that I don't think Jungkook even knows or understands that Jack Harlow ain't shit. He likes him, but not that many people seem to, which actually surprised me because I thought he was a big name. It's Big Hit's job to at least inform Jungkook of that or suggest other artists. With Latto the problem (aside from the racists tweets that I either misinterpreted or everyone chose to ignore) was more that no one knew who she was and he helped her career more than she helped his. However, since she's an up and coming rapper, it's a much more interesting feature, introducing him to a more specific type of audience and also showing that he's serious about music because he noticed her talent and chose to work with her even if she's less known.

The point is, people loved Seven, including Army, and mostly liked Latto, but the response to 3D has been very lackluster, and Jack is a big reason why. I wonder if Bad Decisions wouldn't have done better with different people, even if the song is Benny Blanco's.

I also think the 3D MV was a huge mistake. I saw someone on Reddit say Jack Harlow's parts give Blurred Lines and it tracks. I watched the MV yesterday and even Jungkook's parts aren't great though. The choreography is poorly shot and Jungkook's dancing doesn't look that good, the dance practice video is miles better. After Seven, which was a huge production, with a beautiful, famous actress and Jungkook being the goofy lover boy, the 3D MV is so low effort. It killed the hype for the song. And Jack dominates the track too much, it's ridiculous. I like the alternate version quite a bit, but Big Hit and Jungkook need to be smarter. I think Jungkook lacks self-confidence and is too humble to realize he's better on his own. He still has this mentality of "the more the merrier, I'll take anything", when he should've listened to the alternate version and realized the feature needed to, at least, be shorter.

As for collabs in other artists' tracks, those are an easy way of having more songs and getting his name out there, since he doesn't need to look for the songs or perform them. He just does a bit of work in the recording booth and that's it. Hybe doesn't even need to promote the songs much either, since that falls more on the main artist. However, again, it's not just about having more songs and exposure. His image matters, the kind of discography he cultivates matters. He needs to be choosier. He can't just take anyone, which at this point feels like what he's doing. It gives less "I'm a pop star" and more "I'm just a nobody from Korea who will take anyone who will help me and isn't big enough to attract more high profile names". I don't know how to express that in a non cruel way. This is really the vibe I'm starting to get, despite Jungkook carrying all of those songs and being so big already.

I don't know what to expect of his album, but 3D didn't help build up anticipation for it. I don't even know if 3D will debut on the top 10 of the Hot 100 and Army is way less excited about Golden now. At least Seven is still going strong. I remember when Seven dropped. 3D only had a week's notice which didn't help, but when Seven dropped the timeline was insane. The horniness was off the charts. The explicit version, as cheesy as it was, had everyone grabbing their hair. When 3D dropped, the reaction was much smaller, and a lot more negative. Visuals matter a lot, and 3D didn't have them. Jungkook also showed everything with Seven, so flashing his abs and talking about sex isn't going to shock people anymore.

Anyway, it's a shame, because I like the solo version of 3D a lot, the choreo is much better than Seven, the performance is better too, and I love Jungkook's vocals so much in the alternate version. I pray he does that high note live. I don't even mind the lyrics. 3D needed a much better MV and no Jack Harlow. I won't even complain about Latto anymore, since, in comparison, she fit Seven better, had less screen time and lines, and helped the song be better, and not worse, received. Maybe I'm biased because I only know what's happening in kpop spaces, but...

Thanks for the ask! Sorry for the rant...

#ask #bts #jungkook #text #thanks for the ask!#I went off #I was being so positive about 3d is asks too and now I'm the one slandering it

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kimberlyannharts · 1 year ago

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Did they give Rocky's sister a name in the TJ Cassie comic?

Also what are the chances that Tomberly will become canon or (crossing fingers) married in Amy Jo's comic? We need an alternate reality where Tommy/Kim is married!

Going to go offtrack and ramble a bit...

I love Kat and her character but my favorite version of her was in Season 3 (where they weren't trying to make her Kim 2.0 ... She was strong on her own right. She was the first to break free of an evil spell completely on her own, with the rangers not even being aware of her as a threat!) Even if they wanted another couple, they could have paired her with Rocky or Billy.

On top of that, I don't get why Kyle had to make Tommy Kat canon in SOTD. Tomberly was the OG power couple and the most iconic!

I think his sister's name is Riley? The same sister that's been featured in previous comics. Though admittedly her age hasn't been consistent - she was very young in Ryan's run, a teenager in Mat Groom's run, and now a middle schooler here. Then again apparently the story puts Rocky as 16 in what's very clearly late Season 3 so the timeline is pretty fucked for everyone

I'm still trying to keep my expectations low with how much Amy will and/or is allowed to do when it comes to Tomberly but at this point she's not being very subtle as to what audience she's marketing her book towards lmaoooooo She keeps tagging posts about it as tomberly (or 'tommberly' which i find hilarious) and she keeps liking and retweeting people posting about how happy they are about the Tomberly kiss panel. She must have SOMETHING up her sleeve

as for SotD......based on my own investigations it definitely sounds like a higher-up's decision, specifically Jason Bischoff and Melissa Flores, who were PR's heads at the time, rather than Kyle's. In fact, the book reads like including any wife at all was a last-minute decision with how little she impacts the plot or characters. For whatever reason they had for choosing her we'll probably never know, whether it's because they wanted to maintain what was "established" in A Season to Remember (because PR has never changed or walked back on decisions made throughout the years) or Catherine coming back along with JDF for Dimensions in Danger, and it's never even been outright said it was their decision, but Jason and Melissa's general attitudes and comments make it pretty clear they had the biggest hand in it (heck, Melissa is literally writing the Tommy marriage story in the anniversary book, which is already coming across as "eight pages of justifying TomKat because Tomberly is still the more popular and iconic"......but again, trying to hold off on my obvious bias until the book comes out)

#transmission #anonymous

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tillinghastcorporatemedia · 1 year ago

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Often Dystopia (And how its gonna affect my art)

As much as there are some seriously good dystopian fiction. (yes im enamored with sci-fi) personally to me it almost feels tired but i understand the appeal and popularity

But how does this effect my art, and turn TillinGhast Corporate Media

Well first let me explain what TillinGhast Corporate Media is

TGCM was and is me taking what little part of my previous project that never took off and i never made it very far with, Tillinghast

Tillinghast was my outlet for my anger and isolation, and originally began after the death of my grandfather and the falling out of the people i had tried to gather for a band

I had written an ep dealing with my loss and an album that was inspired by election day 2016 and the amount of anger that i felt towards the establishment that i was already growing increasingly tired of

I ended that project after 2-3 years of trying to find vocalists/funds/and start making art

after that died i didnt touch any project and just wrote shitty electronic again, much like everytime i get bored with writing metal, but this time i had much more fun making just beeps and boops with no expectation of vocals and just making basic looping music

So where did TillinGhast Corporate Media come from?

If you notice i did keep the tillinghast name, as i found out when i first started this solo shit, isnt wasnt in use by any active musicians, and i only found one band that hadnt been active in over 8 years

But i wanted something new

something different

So i kinda let my focus on music, the thing i had been doing for over 10 years, go to the side to try and create elsewhere, right at the beginning of 2020

the first thing i thought i would try?

Writing a book

Which as a lot of people on here know, is really really really really really fucking hard to do, especially when you start this shit working a 9 hour overnight shift and writing on days off while everyone else you care about is asleep

And in figuring out what i had wanted to write then, i decided to not go big, but to try and keep me entertained, i needed more than just a few characters

So using a small chunk of info i had written down when i was trying to get into dnd and make my own scifi version of the game, i created a few planets, each with different species and histories and lore and economies

and i made a decision

Each planet would have different stories

to try and keep me entertained

which worked for about a year, and i havent updated since because i have trouble making myself create anything other than music, but i dont wanna get too recent or on a tangent

But why the name TillinGhast Corporate Media?

Well, because it sounds cool as shit. I used to love vaporwave and alternative genres and anything i could find that was "weird"

but also at some point i decided that if i do ever blow up, i want to hire other creatives and actually pay them well, and give them a place to really get out a message for the future

But its just me

So i get to have all the say

at least for now

But why a universe you ask? Why is this so damn long? Get to the point?

well at least for two of those im trying to be verbose and explain myself, and honestly if you read this far i love you and hope that youll stay here on this journey with me

I've always wanted to be part of a group, art creative, touring band, etc.

Ive gotten close only once or twice, but ive always been diy and taught myself shit so i figured i wanted to combine all of my loves into one thing, one giant sandbox where i can be creative in my decisions

And once again, i didnt want it to be just me. So TillinGhast Corporate Media will always be changing and evolving as i learn more about this giant world im having to navigate

I will say there will probably errors or fails, but i want this to be inclusive and open and loving so other people can use this as a means to escape, if even for a little bit, the harsh reality we all face.

Much like i got an escape in music and books as a kid and teenager

So why a universe? because a universe is big and can hold many stories and many perspectives, much like a library can hold many different pieces of knowledge

So to get to the final point, for those of you who actually made it this far based on the title

TillinGhast Corporate Media both as myself and as a future idea or brand

at least for now

Will not ever be a dystopia story

I have not forced myself to change and grow and evolve and continue to sit in my negativity and apathy and just general poopy pants view of the world

To not try with all my might to maybe write something that while not a utopia, is not dystopia and imagines a brighter, better, future where people maybe dont have to worry about as much, because they learned from our awful horrible past and actually refuse to repeat any of it

To try and make this more about characters and stories and music and the things that make myself and others smile, instead of regurgitated dystopias where even basic life is rough

does this mean everything will be all flowers and butterflies and my little pony?

absolutely the fuck not

Truth is often stranger than fiction and anything can happen even in a shiny place, but the point is to not be a negative nancy and have a bunch of shitty stuff going on all the time

One of the planets is a floating colony with what little remains of the human race

One planet is basically in the middle of an uprising of an exiled group

The book im writing (kinda spoilery but idk if ever ill finish this damn thing) literally has an act of terrorism being planned from someone who was radicalized by a really bad group that is basically space religion and its many parallels

All of my short stories are slice of life stuff that happens in a few scenarios where each character reacts to an outside force

But this wont ever be some dragged out for purely entertainment type angsty or edgy or anything like some books do with trauma

i want to look at stuff like we're building to something better, not something worse. optimistic but not utopia or something like that

(honestly this point ive already kinda gotten myself choked up so im gonna wrap it up)

But TillinGhast Corporate Media is basically my idea for a better future

and maybe im wrong and my stuff sucks and i need to change it

i have no idea because no one really follows my shit

so i just do what i want within the dumb boundaries and expectations i place on myself

but it is has been better before and it will get better again, and i am tired of that place being only in my head

so im creating this big huge universe with aliases that i call "artists" so it looks like there is actual musicians in this universe, i at one point started on a medium length animation series, and im trying to use my shitty computer to learn 3d shit

So stick around, at least you'll get some music out of it

and on that note i will mention i do have a few singles and 2 albums out, all of which is on youtube and streaming sites (its on spotify but i fucking hate spotify both as a company and some of the people they sponsor stream on any other site please you'll give more money to your favorite artists)

#tillinghastcorporatemedia #scifi #science fiction #scifiart #sci fi music #aliendancemusic #music #romance #creative writing #writers #writeblr #on writing #iknowtagsaredumb #honestlythoughireallyjustwannamakepeoplesmileifevenforamoment #idothisforfreeandfunsothisisntsponsoredoranything

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talenlee · 8 months ago

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Planar Lensing

How many wheres are there?

There are three major media franchises these days that all work with the idea of multiplanar worlds. Sometimes this involves creating a huge and complicated network of just coincidentally competing brand merchandise lines, where two companies bickering about a contract results in a storytelling direction that explains why Uncle Ben is a different guy, but sometimes it’s a direct choice and it’s done because you want a new place to be, a new whole world to play with.

When building worlds, adding these ‘alternate worlds’ – referred to as planes hereon out – can be a great way to continue the ongoing need of the worldbuilder, which is where am I going to put all this stuff? What I’d like to present here are just some ways to talk about how you’re using planar spaces in your worlds.

Here, and There

Examples: Stranger Things’ Upside Down, Narnia as presented in the Lion, The Witch & The Wardrobe.

A Here-And-There model wants to have a familiar world and a single unfamiliar world. That other world doesn’t need to have a coherence to it, and it can even exist as a sort of parasitic world to the first. The economics of the Upside Down aren’t important. Narnia is the alternative, some place that has almost no connection to the original world.

Some versions of Star Trek land here, too, with a negative universe where everyone has a mustache. Same basic place, but what if the overall framework of the world was different and sucked.

This is specifically, though, about a binary view of alternate worlds. There’s one and there’s another and that’s it. Travelling to other possibilities isn’t a factor, it’s literally just about how these two places relate to one another.

Basically Protestantism

Examples: The Bible, Dragonball, Yuu Yuu Hakusho, Bleach

Not to make too much fun, but this is what you get when you have a small number of planes that are immediately important to one another. The fact they tend to relate heavily to afterlife stories is kinda a byproduct of dominant cultural framings – Christians did a big colonialism so that story structure is widespread as a result. In these universes, you have multiple alternate realities, but not many of them and they’re not readily accessible. Sometimes only a small number of people can move between them so it doesn’t matter how many of them there are.

In these frameworks, the central plane, the ‘here’ is usually inferior in some way; important, yes, absolutely vital, like it’s the ‘proper’ one after all, but it’s a place where you can’t do as much cool stuff or where all the cool things are missing. Sometimes this is even explicitly the fault of being the place where all the rules make sense.

My D&D universe approach is more here than a big expansive planar cosmology: There are demons and devils and angels and things from ‘outside’ but ‘outside’ represents a sort of wildly different worldscape. In the core of the world, people are aware of the realm of the faeries (the Feywild), the realm of ghosts (the Shadowfell) and then the rest of everything (the prime plane).

A Planar Cosmology

Examples: Many Dungeons & Dragons settings, the DC and Marvel universe of the comics

At the next level of planar availability, you’re low-key just using Star Trek. Not Star Trek and its model of a limited alternate reality, but rather, Star Trek as a series where every week you can go to a new planet with its own established set of ways it’s weird or visually distinct. The model of Spelljammer and Planescape live in this space, where you have essentially multiple world-likes, which are segregated from other things, they can only really transmit from one to another by conscious agents doing things, but which are separated so their rules don’t overlap. You don’t have to think of them as metaphysics or magic or whatever, it’s just the rules of a place.

Conventional D&D models tend towards this because they need places for weird monsters to come from. Demons and devils are from their own special planes of constant war, which represent a punishment afterlife, a hell of sorts, and it’s even weirder that some cosmologies don’t tie those into the life-death cycle, but also, maybe that’s okay? Personally I find the ethical dimensions a little weird – it induces too much of the morality of the universe and diminishes the material reality I favour.

At this point you’re basically looking at a sort of multi-planetary position. I don’t dislike these, but remember that freely travelling between them diminishes their differences. You don’t want Jupiter to be Just Over There, right? I mean unless you do.

Misunderstanding Quantum Physics

Examples: Bioshock Infinite, the Marvel Universe, The Hitch Hiker’s Guide To The Galaxy

The next step is when you get to the idea of Many Worlds theory and start spilling over yourself. You have a limited pool of alternate worlds for alternate story types but then you just keep setting out chairs and you wind up with worlds that are so common that their distinctions become hard to tell. When you start having worlds where the differences are subtle it becomes hard to see these things as limited in supply and at that point you have the infinite potentiality space that in my opinion collapses everything into sludge.

Because, like, when you have worlds that are only minorly different, and a lot of them, the assumption flows that you have more, that are also only minorly different. Since a world is big and complicated, there’s a lot of it. What if the world you’re in is only different in that instead of Dave’s mother dying when he was a kid, she’s alive now, and the result is that largely, Dave’s life is majorly different… Which you may not care about because Dave is from Myrtle Beach California and your story is centered around Singapore.

Like, these worlds tend to bore and frustrate me because once you have this scope of variety already in place, it requires you to have a very narrow, very specific vision of reality and what you can cope with for that to not be a normal version of reality. Like imagine if it’s a world where the dominant flavour of soda is Fanta, and not Coke. No major changes otherwise. Is that really worth things being different? What if it’s that that dominant flavour is dominant in Perth, Western Australia. I live in Australia, and that doesn’t matter to my life.

But that’s me complaining about a thing I don’t like. What this kind of model gives you is vast, untapped, infinite possibility. It lets you have Mister Mxyzptlk and Bugs Bunny and Doctor Manhattan. Those stories can use that kind of thing.

There, that’s a handful of ways to approach it. Know what you like about them, know what you don’t, and make choices accordingly.

Check it out on PRESS.exe to see it with images and links!

#World Building #Making #Media

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thedivinevera · 2 years ago

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Meet the other you

So just one-day a unrecognizable power has put all of c/n in every alternative universe that exist in a room and that unrecognizable power just said “all of you come from different universe, kill each other or speak with them I don't know, just do your thing” and just leave them in the room

After that shocking thing happened all of the c/n speak with each other asking what's up with their au's some of does au are normal, some are sad and some are just.... unexplainable

Mutual pinning au : OK so before everything why don't we introduce each other first

Yandere au : fuck you!

Mutual pinning au : ok so is there any word you know other than fuck you

Friends to lovers : yeah right, why do always curse us, do you had some beef with us or something

Yandere au : do I had a beef with you HA! Bitch listen up here, Imagine being obsessed with someone to the point that you think you had done the most craziest thing in the world just to found—

Coffee shop au : but you actually had done the craziest, it's not "you think" its "you did" for your information *slurp coffee sound *

Yandere au: thank you very much coffee lover but you think i give a SINGLE fuck

Coffee shop au : not actually... *slurp coffee*

Yandere au : —I am saying is that why the FUCK I need to be in the single room with the most dumbest version of me, yes I am looking at you, cheating au, and also both of you one sided, and hanahaki!

Cheating au : hey and why i am the "dumb" in here

Yandere au : oh I can explain to you perfectly. First you fucking cheat on the only person who fucking love you with a whore and second you also lie about it and treat her like a dumb person and you still had the ball to ask why I call you DUMB huh

Mutual pinning au : I never thought I'm gonna say this but I agree to yandere au

Soulmate au : yeah me too

Second chance au : even me! I don't have enough balls to request a second chance after what you had done

The other au : yeah

The other other au's : we agree, you're dumb

Cheating au : oh really one side and hanahaki you too

Hanahaki au : sorry man, but were different

One sided love au : yeah, don't drag us down with you, we are not that shameless

Cheating au : ah- traitors

Domestic au : OK ok ok, stop everyone, let's just do what mutual pinning suggest it's a lot more easy to find someone we can go with while waiting for that power to bring us to our business once again

Domestic au : let's go with mhhh.... You

Secret admirer au : umm hello i am c/n and the power told me I come from secret admirer au. I am y/n secrets admirer for 1 year but they caught me and now I am in a established relationship with them

Domestic au : OK thank you so much— yandere what are you doing?

Yandere au : writing a Roblist why?

Domestic au : I don't get paid enough for this.. Ok next you, the man who look younger than us

Collage au : hi I am you from collage au, I study at a school where also y/n study and after some up and down we are now in a established relationships and in the way to graduate

Coffee shop au : I am coffe shop au, my honey pie, y/n is working for a coffee shop that I always visit and you know the rest

"Your dead" au : I am you but y/n, my beautiful y/n, she died *cry*

Domestic au : OK that's controversial, I am you but in domestic au both me and y/n are married, we had children and yeah y/n is my Sprouse and the parent of my children

Househusband au : oh cool, I am also married to her but we still don't have plan to had a child

Yandere au : I am you but yandere and not dumb *looking at cheating and hanahaki au* y/n loves me and—

Hanahaki au : no they don't, you kidnap her and kill most of her friends

Yandere au : listen fucker, I atleast don't drive my love from verge of death

Modern au : hold on what?, what do you mean by verge of death

Yandere au : oh you see hanahaki disease is a disease who kill people who experience one sided love

Modern au : god that's worse

Yandere au : yes i know right ugh. you, one sided love the different version why are you different?

One sided love(different version) : oh its because I found it out that I love her before it's to late not like the other version of mine who takes decades to found out

One sided love : oh please don't flex that to me where just both the same you're just faster

One sided love(different version) : that's my entire point dipshit 🙄

Meanwhile :

Coffee shop au : want some tea

Soulmate au : yah sure

Coffe shop au & soulmate au : *slurp tea while looking at the chaos*

And then they all fight

Même down bellow :

First of all sorry for wrong spelling or mutual second of all sorry for bad writing and third of all thank you for reblogs

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adelaidedrubman · 2 years ago

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part iii of the supernatural au. part i | part ii | read on ao3.

notes: vampire!john/werewolf!jestiny back at it. i know it’s officially past spooky season, but since i did already have the rough draft of part three from posting a version of it last year, i still wanted to finish up the redux now <;33

word count: 7k

warnings: explicit nsfw in this one. vampire/werewolf styles, so extra warnings for ample biting/scratching/blood drinking during. dw no one goes full furry. johnjess styles, so semi-public. and the usual warnings for mutual emotional manipulation. john’s is at points specifically geared towards fostering dependence in jessie so as to keep her with him, so it probably deserves an extra warning on his end. jessie’s is at points specifically geared towards degrading john to purposefully cause psychological distress in order to maintain perceived control in their relationship, so it probably deserves an extra warning on — you know what they’re both just awful and shouldn’t be near each other. enjoy.

“In absolutely no way, shape, or form are you even remotely ready for this!” John hissed under his breath as he paced behind the redhead, grateful the tight cinching at the waist of the cotton dress she wore at least prevented her from transforming to outrun him if she hoped to preserve it.

“Yes,” she barked, throwing her arms up in frustration but not turning around. “I am!”

“You are not,” he spat back, slinking up to her side to march in step with her as she rounded the corner to turn onto the road leading through Fall’s End. “Not even close.”

“I am fuckin’ too,” she tossed her head to the side to snap at him. “I’ve listened to your fucking human lessons for a full fuckin’ week like we agreed.” She jerked her wrist away as he tried to reach for it, increasing the speed of her gait but still resisting any impulse she might have to transform for the time being.

Fuck, he almost wished she would lose control and shift into wolf form — at least then he would be proven right before it was too late. And her outfit would be ruined, so she’d have no choice but to come home with him rather than continue venturing into town.

“Over a week,” she added in snippy half growl, officially bringing those extra days that had been hanging uncomfortably over his head crashing down, that sinking knowledge that he was on borrowed time as he basked in her presence. “I’m ready!”

“You most certainly are not,” he reiterated firmly.

Yes, a transformation, that’s what he would have to go with. Find a a way to provoke her, make her angry enough to change forms, then herd her back home where she’d be safe, and remind her why she needed to stay there and listen to him. It was risky in and of itself given how close to town they were, and the fact at least some residents were already on alert for werewolf sightings. But it was still less risky than the alternative, and wouldn’t involve hypnotizing her. Not technically.

“Perhaps you would be ready for a small date at some other bar or restaurant, which I would be happy to oblige,” he continued, hurrying along to better watch her reactions. “But not the Spread Eagle, and not all by yourself,” he said, happy to see her upper lip curl in irritation, a sign her resolve was beginning to break. “Which is what you would be, by the way — I wasn’t lying when I told you Mary May has never once agreed to invite me inside her establishment. I can’t go with you in there. You’d be completely alone!”

“Good!” she shouted, fists balled at her sides tightly enough he couldn’t gauge the length of her claws. “I don’t need you!” she yelled while continuing to stomp forward, causing his chest to flurry with panic as she sped straight past the ‘Welcome to Fall’s End’ sign without hesitation. “You said yourself, this fuckin’ morning — and I quote — that I look indistinguishable from a normal human the way I’m dressed today!”

“Looking human isn’t even half the battle, my dear,” he replied with a sneer, making a point of using the term of endearment she so detested. “Your appearance may pass for human, but you’re not nearly well behaved enough to go out on your own.”

“I know how to fucking behave!” she finally spun around to yell, waving hands angrily in the air — disappointingly, with her claws still retracted. Damn. “Go ahead, quiz me,” she challenged, halting to stand still, posture stiff and tall with determination. “Ask me any human manners shit you want.”

He scoffed, crossing his arms and shaking his head dismissively. Obviously he wasn’t going to prove anything that way — she had been a shockingly adept and speedy learner, despite her unwillingness to take him seriously. He doubted there was anything he could really ask her that she wouldn’t know.

“Knowing the technicalities of how to behave isn’t exactly the issue either,” he droned in reply, attempting to conceal his worry with a mimic of snide boredom. “The issue is you actually being able to control yourself to conform to appropriate behavior.”

Her jaw dropped, her brow tensing in angry disbelief at the assertion as she spun back around to resume storming down the main road towards the heart of town.

“I have ample fuckin’ self control!” she screamed at him, loud enough to echo through the empty streets. “As is evidenced by the fact I haven’t fuckin’ torn you to fucking shreds yet!”

“Oh, yes, your discipline is simply irreproachable,” he evened his breath to coo with contrasting calm as he hustled to catch up to her again, growing all the more satisfied with the reaction he was coaxing. “We haven’t even gotten to the bar yet, and you’re already managing to make an angry scene.”

She skidded to a stop, this time just in front of the church near the edge of town (intentional? spiteful, spiteful thing) before spinning back towards the roadway with a flourish of her skirt to face him with a contrived closed lipped smile and narrowed eyes.

“Any reasonable human being would be pushed to the point of near violence having to deal with you,” she drawled, a mockery of venomous politeness stretching out the words in her mouth as she folded her arms over her chest. “I would be perfectly calm and controlled if you weren’t around to bother me.”

“Would you?” he chimed, matching the drawn out rise of her faux friendliness and mirroring her posture to fix onto his own body: crossing arms over his chest, pursing his lips to curl into a pert smile, adding the finishing touch of bending at the waist to lean over her — remind her that he was still larger than her when she wasn’t transformed, sure to anger her enough that she would do so.

She settled for taking a step back, darting through the opening of the gray stone fencing to retreat onto the church grounds.

Lovely, so they were back to this little dance again — this time with the threat of luring him into the hallowed ground of the chapel rather than sunlight. But he wasn’t going to fall for that a second time, anyways. Or allow the vindictive little beast to provoke him while he was working to provoke her. And she was so much more given to provocation.

He took an encroaching step forward, pausing just past the stone perimeter. He paused, reaching to suddenly clutch his chest and feigning a gasp, as if the intrusion onto holy ground had actually wounded him, holding the hand there as his chest boomed with laughter instead.

(And he swore he saw, as he did so, each flutter of expression lightening fast enough to be missed by mortal eyes: the little wolf girl grin victoriously, then her nose twitch with surprise, then her brow furrow with worry, then harden into anger, then her face styled itself back into contrived politeness. Oh, but he saw, and he knew she cared, that she wanted to stay with him — she was just too stubborn to admit as much on her own.)

“So you’d be using your most polished manners if I weren’t present, then?” he pressed, shaking off a hum of laughter with the words. “That’s strange, I believe I recall watching you break human form to chase a squirrel just this morning, whilst I was nowhere near you.” He waved a hand between them, as if in dismissal of the thought. “But I’m sure you’ll be fine, so long as I’m not around — and Mary May is up to code on pest control.”

“She must be, if she’s managing to keep you outta there,” Jessie growled, artificial smile falling once again as her features scrunched in annoyance. Good. “And besides, the squirrel thing was different. I was on my own lawn.”

“You were actually on my lawn, my dear,” he replied with a demure rise he knew would irritate her, lifting his hand to leave only fingertips pressed to his chest.

“Well I marked it,” she scoffed, rolling her eyes and taking a more measured step backward. Let the little thing hole up in a church all night in an effort to frustrate him, fine by him. “Doesn’t smell like your lawn.”

“The mere fact you think that’s determinative tells me you’re not ready for public appearances,” he retorted with a click of his tongue.

He inched forward, subtly pushing her to better cover, hoping to help conceal any transformation he managed to coax. If he could just get the slightest flash of fangs or sprouting of fur, something physical he could point to.

“And the list could go on,” he continued, raising the fingertips from his chest. “Lunging at food, barking at sudden noises, snapping at me for the slightest annoyance.” He sighed, dropping the hand he’d been waving on beat with the examples. “I’m sure you know what you should do, but I’ve yet to see you exercise any amount of restraint that would convince me you’d actually successfully do it.”

“Ooooh-hooo,” she forced out in a derisive laugh, arms now outstretched to her sides as she strode a longer pace back, retreating up the steps of the church and climbing until she towered at the top. “And I can learn it by hanging around you for longer?” she asked, a mocking curl returning to her lips. “Because you’re just the goddamn paragon of restraint and self-control?”

“Why, yes,” he replied, following along to plant at the base of the steps without yet climbing, content to allow her to get off on having the high ground for now. “I would say my restraint and self-control are exemplary.”

“Really?” she taunted in challenge, before flinging her arm to the side with a sharp whoosh of air and a quick flick of her fingers to extend claws outward on prominent display, poised for attack.

“Oh, yes, bring out those claws!” he cried joyously, now hopeful he might even manage to lure her into taking a few swipes at him. It would give him an excuse to subdue her, at least. And while werewolf scratches did heal more slowly than mortal injuries, he could tolerate a few scrapes to get her back home, and away from that godforsaken bar. “That’ll show me how calm and controlled you are!” he exclaimed, turning his head to the side to expose his neck in offering, eyes darting to the corner of his lids to remain locked on her. “Go on, prove your point!”

She growled, baring teeth but not yet lunging, not yet swinging the fully weaponized arm towards him.

Instead, she lifted her chin in challenge and brought her claws to her own outstretched neck, holding steady eye contact with him as she slashed the talons along her skin.

The smell hit him before his eyes even managed to process — that deep, rich scent soaking the air, coating the insides of his lungs the very second that skin broke.

And he felt that swirling, aching hunger jolt through him as soon as the smell did hit, ratcheting through him so forcefully that his mind stayed even a step further behind his senses, leaving him staring dumbly in an overstimulated stupor as he finally registered the sight of a thin, deep slice running across her neck to release crimson droplets.

The wound had already begun to heal by the time he bumbled along into proper understanding, skin weaving back together and thickening to seal the reservoir of fresh blood, the amount spilled already congealing and growing stale so that the sudden pain of hunger dulled as quickly as it rose in him, gnawing want turning in center.

He closed the jaw he hadn’t consciously realized had dropped to allow his fangs to feel cool night air and her scent to settle on his tongue in a ghost of a real taste, trying to stall the ragged breaths he took as they became more tolerable, less intoxicating.

“You are playing a very dangerous game, little wolf,” he hissed in warning, words still breathy and broken with need but strengthened with venom as hunger sharpened itself into anger upon understanding crystallizing inside him. She was strong, but he could drain her completely dry in one of her pitiful, fragile heartbeats, the ungrateful cur.

“Now why fucking ever would that be?” she asked, brightened with sarcastic pleasantry and innocence. “Worried you won’t be able to control yourself?” she cooed before hiking a leg back to steady herself and fall propped against the siding of the church.

She raised a clawed index and middle back to her neck, curling the fingers outward in taunt before jabbing directly into her jugular. She kept the sharpened ends inserted so that the wound couldn’t close itself, blood flowing freely and pooling around the points of nails.

And before he could even coach himself to grow desensitized to the one sight, she escalated — adding to his torment by brushing her free hand along the bare thigh of her bent leg, pushing her skirt upward and gently scraping nails along her skin without breaking it. She inched closer and close in, leaving light pinkened trails in the wake of her claws before finally retracting them entirely — flaunting exactly how in control of her form she was as she left nails on the other hand protruding and buried in flesh, while she shoved her freshly declawed hand up her dress and beneath the waistband of her briefs.

Fuck.

His jaw trembled with the need to bite, irritating the sudden scratchy dryness of his throat desperate to be quenched by the sensation of the hot, thick liquid leaking and sliding down flesh laid before him.

She was the cruelest monster he’d ever encountered. This was miserable, deplorable torture. Potent, crushing thirst now ached and buzzed through his very marrow, consuming every inch of his being. And the blood rushing between his legs made his veins feel all the more dreadfully hollowed and desperate to be filled, to be fed.

And the vile creature orchestrating his suffering merely closed her eyes in smug satisfaction as she worked one hand pawing between her legs, the other staying faithfully in place at her neck, nails puncturing her in the prefect mimic of a bite he could give. ( — if he could just — ) Not to mention the blood rising to her cheeks to dust them pink — a sign of her body responding to her own pleasuring touch, and an image almost as deliciously tempting as the weeping rubies dripping down the lengths of her fingers.

Her shaky breaths drowned out any other sound that might reach his ears, growing labored to match his own in quick, irregular rhythm. And every other available, supernaturally enhanced sense tuned to the blood slowly pouring from her neck — his eyes shaking with the strain of staying unblinking to gorge on the sight of velvety crimson painting her skin; his nose stinging with its heavy aroma as he gasped for air, as if he could fill himself on the scent alone.

And the overwhelming desire to have with every sense finally grew too great, the need to taste the intoxicating flavor and feel wet warmth too powerful to resist as he bounded towards her in a single fluid swoop, pinning her against the wooden doors of the church as his mouth found her neck and his hips found the space between her legs.

He burned with shame at how pathetic and needily he lapped at the crimson coating her throat while his hips rocked against her. He brushed her left hand out of the way to press his tongue directly against her wounds, grinding against her right in a frantic and uncaring rhythm as it stayed frustratingly nestled firm between her legs.

And fuck her blood felt so good swallowed down. Like taking a shot of stiff liquor felt as a human, dizzying and stinging just right, spice lingering on his tongue and pooling warm in his stomach. He suckled hard at the column of her neck as the flow began to slow in healing, his tongue sliding along the entry points as he felt them close beneath his hungry licks.

He trailed his tongue up and down the now closed and repaired expanse of her throat once it had sealed completely shut, searching for any stray drop to chase another hit of the taste and using his only remaining willpower to restrain himself from sinking teeth in to reopen her veins and feast properly.

“Real fuckin’ big and in control, huh?” she teased in a playful rasp as he pulled away from her neck, mouth clamped tightly shut while his hips continued to jerk forward with need unsated. “Hanging off my neck like a leech and dry humping me against a church in the middle of town,” she observed with scolding mockery, drawing a low, pitiful whine from him. “That’s your idea of restraint?”

“Y-You have no fucking idea,” he finally stuttered out, stomach tightening as his eyes trained on the heavy throb of her pulse, grinding his hips harder to stoke the smoldering pleasure from the friction to eclipse the ache of his more destructive hunger, “how much I’m actually controlling myself right now.”

“Aw, are you?” she hummed with sarcastic pity, bringing the hand still coated with her blood to hover at his mouth. “Being a real good boy for me, huh?” she questioned, slicking her index quickly along his bottom lip to leave a trail of crimson, before jerking the fingers back to make him chase them.

Which he did — with an embarrassing lack of hesitation — bobbing his head forward to swallow them, giving a muffled whimper of an mmhm in reply as he sucked the fingers clean, consuming the stale and tacky scraps of blood clinging to skin in a ravenous fury. He slid his tongue up and down along their lengths, curling along the sharp edges of her nails with little care for how they sliced him, desperate to lap the blood from every nook and cranny.

And fuck he didn’t become even a touch less needy when she began pumping the fingers into his mouth in rhythm with the rocking of his hips against her, a delicious shiver traveling down his spine from the sensation of claws scraping the back of his tongue.

John could feel himself reaching a breaking point, when that last thread of restraint would finally snap and his body would chase what it wanted of its own accord. His appetite for her had only been whetted by the sample of curdling blood now fading on his tongue, and the indirect friction along his hardness dulled by the thick fabric of his pants. The demand to experience her at full potency was raging through him, reducing the last of his resolve to ashes.

“Fuck,” he cursed, jerking his hand down to undo the buttons of his pants, needing to feel the direct contact of his own touch if nothing else. He buried his brow in the crook of her neck with lingering shame as he exposed himself. “I need you, Jessie. Now,” he groaned in pleading admission. “Right now. I can’t take it anymore.”

“Mm, can sure see that,” she purred, far too sweetly, thick and rumbling in some sick parody of sympathy. “Such a strong, powerful immortal. Alive all these centuries,” she mocked, trailing her saliva wettened claws along his collarbone. “And still just a needy little mess, huh?”

She gave him no time to answer, scraping the claws up his neck to fist into his hair and pull, forcing him to look at her before she slid her other hand up from between her legs to once again thrust fingers into his mouth, this time giving him a taste of the slickness that had built inside her. He savored it just as sweetly, running his tongue along the wrinkled pads of her fingers to lick up every last drop.

“Do you even know what you really want from me?” she asked as she hooked her leg around his waist, mercifully pulling him in closer despite her mockery, allowing him to feel the warm plump outline of her through the thin fabric of her underwear. “To suck me? Or fuck me?”

“Y-Yes,” he gasped around her fingers — unsure exactly which question he was answering ‘yes’ to, only that it was all of it, he wanted to have all of it, anything she would give him.

And he made no effort to wait and ask before diving forward to taste the one part of her he still needed to taste, covering the sweet rosy mouth still open in a taunt with his and darting tongue out to give a kiss as hungry as he felt.

And there was no attempt at gentleness from either of them — all gnashing fangs and bruising pressure, consuming with greed and abandon. Every flavor of her coalesced and tingled along his tongue, the lingering tastes lapped from her fingers combining with the subtle, natural tang of her mouth. And he noted a moment later the more familiar taste of his own blood joining the cocktail, all the more aroused by the careless way her incisors scraped along gum as she met him in uncontrolled hunger.

She wants it just as bad, he thought with a rough jerk of his hips, delighting in the sting of her teeth scratching the flesh of his mouth. She needs me too.

“You want it too,” he whispered against her lips, reaching a hand up her skirt and pulling at the waistband of her briefs, ready to tear. “You want to fuck me, too. I know it,” he whined, tugging elastic in a request for permission. “So fucking wet, kiss me so fucking hard. So good,” he offered in clumsy explanation, littering kisses along her jawline. “You want it bad, too.”

She didn’t agree, nor did she argue. The sounds falling from her lips never formed more than an encouraging groan as she bucked hips forward to meet him.

“Jessie,” he sighed, slipping a thumb beneath her pantyline to tease, feel proof she was just as aroused with a light brush along slick folds, still waiting for the word to do more. “You want it,” he breathed against her lips, as if willing the words into her own mouth. “I know.”

“Then what the fuck are you waiting for?” she growled against him, making his lips quiver.

“Tell me,” he pleaded, still pulling but not tearing.

Tell me, he continued to pray silently. Tell me you want me Tell me to fuck you Tell me to rip your panties off and take you Tell me you’re mine Tell me I belong to you Tell me I can drink you up swallow you down Tell me you’ll come home Tell me you need me yes you still need me Tell me to cum inside you Tell me you’ll never ever leave Tell me —

“What?” she demanded, interrupting his jumbled thoughts. She squeezed the thighs she wrapped around him tight. “You need to be fucking invited inside first or something?”

“Can’t you just —” the words choked in his dry and sputtering throat, frustrated she couldn’t just give in and want him, just say that she wants him. “Do you want it?” he finally asked, feeling as if he was stuck back in the same fucking dance with her: inching forward just a hair, tugging elastic to pull to the side and slide his head along her folds, waiting for her to pull back and make him chase.

Jessie didn’t pull back or answer, not with her words — instead she slinked her own hand between them and sliced claws through the fabric herself, shredding underwear to fall to the ground before canting hips forward to take him with one swift motion.

His legs trembled from the sudden, unexpected sensation of finally being consumed entirely by that tight, crushing silk winding around every inch. He fell forward weakly to prop an arm against the building and press flush against her body, steadying himself to move with small, slow rocks of his hips, unsure he could take much more yet.

“God, Jessie,” he whimpered. It felt even better than he could have imagined, finally being buried completely, hugged by tightness he’d only dreamed of. And he wasn’t ready to surrender that warm grip for even the heartbeat it would take to give her a full thrust, limiting himself to pressing forward to rub along walls just enough to keep in motion and stave off the unbearable ache for more.

But it wasn’t enough for her, apparently — the hand that had shredded her briefs was now gripping his ass, nails digging into the cheek to push him forward into proper thrust. Her other hand held the back of his neck, scraping its side with trimmed nails still more human than animal.

The sharp jolt of pain there only added power to the frenzied sparks of ecstasy racing through him to build electricity in his base, rushing through every vein in his body as a particularly long drag of his cock inside her drew out a gasp and an outward jab of claws on her previously humanized hand to break the skin of his neck.

A second gasp signaled her realization, and she retracted her claws just as quickly, tensing and clearing her throat with a deep rumble as she straightened her limbs.

“Don’t,” he ordered, clear and firm, tilting his hips back. “Don’t try to hold back. Don’t control yourself,” he whispered, barely managing to do so himself when those warm amber eyes found him, narrowing to take him in. “Scratch me up as much as you’d like,” he purred, his own nails digging crescents in her thighs. “Do tear me to shreds if you’d like. Just don’t hold back. Not with me.”

Her response came in a crackle of deep piercing pain throbbing in sharp slices along his back. A broken cry vibrated up from her throat and fell against his neck as she buried fangs there, kicking the leg wrapped around him against his back to pull him in with a slap of skin against skin, arching to seek the angle she wanted to grind against him.

How ironic, he thought at the sharp jolts of pain shooting through his neck.

Before he couldn’t think anything at all, because fuck it just felt so good, so raw. He hadn’t truly lived in his body like this in centuries, feeling weakened by blazing desire as his shirt was ripped to shreds and she bucked hips eagerly against him. The most he could do was prop her up, do his best to meet thrusts in frantic rhythm as she fucked herself on him, using his body however she wished to chase her pleasure.

God, he hadn’t been fucked like this since he was human — his lovers since all vampires who kissed and touched with the same cold, efficient gracefulness and precision as him, or humans content to lay back in surrender and let him take what he wanted. But this — this made him feel fucking alive again.

“N-Not too much of that though, my dear,” he gasped with a jerk back of his neck as she lapped the blood trickling from it. Couldn’t have her really turning, after all, if she drank enough of his blood.

Her blood, he thought dizzily. The taste of her he had earlier was surely running through his veins by now, only to be swallowed back down by her, their lives mixing, boundaries of their bodies blurring.

“Still not your fuckin’ dear,” she growled back, craning forward to nibble at his lip instead.

“My Jessie,” he murmured through the bite of her canines in apology. “My sweet, sweet Jessie. My perfect little Jessie, my —”

“I’m not fucking sweet either. Or little. Or fucking yours,” she grumbled through his praise, determined to be difficult every step of the way. “And you just told me to — to do what the fuck I want.”

“You have to argue about absolutely everything, don’t you?” he answered in lazy complaint, forgetting any opposition just as quickly as she clawed to rip the last scrap of his shirt from his back.

“Well, if that’s what I want,” she snapped, yanking away the hand that had been cupping her cheek to pull down between them, her own talons digging into the backs of his fingers as she pressed down and guided them to work in rubbing circles. “You need to decide what — what you fuckin’ want,” she grunted, a clear final effort at hostility as pink bloomed along her chest and creeped up her neck to make it look all the more delectable.

“God, you can’t even stop being spiteful for a full ten minutes,” he bemoaned in his own last effort at keeping up bickering, needing the distraction himself as he felt his body try to reel toward the promise of release before he was ready. “Can’t even stop to just — ah, just enjoy getting fucked.”

“You don’t like it?” she rasped, grasping onto his shoulder and snapping hips more harshly and unsteadily against him, constricting tighter and threatening to bring him to his finish as pressure built to a point of inevitable collapse.

“I fucking love it,” he admitted with a broken cry, fucking deeper into her, wanting to give her as much of himself as he could. Because of course he loved it, he loved the claws, he loved the fury, he loved the obstinance and the bloodshed and untamed spite, he loved —

“F-Fuck, John —” Her claws shredded the skin along his neck, surely leaving marks that would remain for days, and she wound even tighter around him, clenching so hard it was almost painful, so that he had to press his hips flush against her to stay inside and fuck her through her peak, savor the pulsing of her walls around him.

“Yes, Jessie, fuck yes,” he cursed in encouragement as he allowed the flutters of her finish to fade, holding out a moment more to let her fully bask in the release before he returned to selfishly feeding the needs of his own body. “Love it,” he repeated, pressing a kiss to her cheek. “Fucking love it. Love it when you let go.”

She let out a choked gasp as she threw back her head to thud against the wood, eyelids slowly fluttering open to gaze upon him, surely finding him looking just as ruined as she did.

“Fuck,” he groaned, his own forehead slamming against the door behind her as he buried his face in the crook of her neck, slowing and elongating his strokes, clinging to that last build of pleasure as it quickly became too much. “So fucking good, I’m — Fuck, I’m close, let me —”

She scraped nails along his neck as she resumed her motions rocking against him. “Not very in control now, huh?” she ground out, voice recovering to grow steady and clear with smug taunting once again. “Like you like this,” she purred, gripping the back of his neck, placing the softest kiss to the top of his head. “Want you to let go, too.”

“Can I?” he gasped, unable to speak and solidify exactly what he was asking for, only knowing that the hungry ache inside was reaching a pitch, and he was desperate for her to give him permission to let it take over.

And mercifully she didn’t ask him to explain, answering with a single word and the shifting of her body to give him access to everything he wanted. “Yes,” she sighed, tilting hips forward, tightening the grip of her legs around his waist to hold him in place, tossing her head to the side to offer the soft expanse of her neck.

That was all he needed, the pressure inside him finally crashing, all that hunger and want swirling to a final frenzy as he buried his cock in her center and his teeth in her neck in synch, gasping around the opened skin as he finished.

Finally. He finally allowed himself the luxury of a single full drink as he found release, draining and filling her, giving and taking.

He struggled to will his body back under his control, limiting himself to just one gulp of the thick crimson nectar as he pulled back with another, deeper gasp and a final few rolls of his hips to ride out waves of pleasure, savoring the relief of finally being sated.

Satisfied his restraint had returned, he brought his mouth back to her throat to lap the remaining drops of blood from the bite, ending the encounter the same way he had begun it.

He ran his tongue along the puncture wound one last time as he attempted to even the heaving of his chest, feeling the slight dips that remained as the flow of blood dammed. It would be slower to heal than a typical wound for her, same as the scratches along his neck and back, sure to stay visible for another day or two.

But he thought he rather liked that.

“Will you please —” he finally huffed, between a last few pants as he caught his breath. “Just fucking come home now?”

She grunted, lowering a trembling leg to the ground and taking a step back from the church. She looked down, smoothing a hand along her wrinkled shirt, then rubbing along the puncture wound at her throat, circling around to scratch the back of her neck.

“Be honest,” she started, voice still hoarse and gravelly from strain, so that she sounded very much the same as she did the first time she spoke to him, still easing into the habit of speech. “I don’t look like a normal human right now, do I?” she asked, running a hand through tangled copper. “I look like — I look like I just fucked a dracula, don’t I?”

“Well, you certainly look like you just fucked someone,” he replied, casually pulling up his pants. He allowed his eyes to fall along the bitemark at her neck, smiling at his work. “Who was very likely a vampire.”

She tensed the corners of her mouth and nodded in reluctant acceptance, picking up the scraps of torn underwear from the church steps and shoving them in her pocket. “And normal humans don’t fuck draculas outside churches, do they?”

“Normal humans don’t fuck in public outdoor spaces period,” he replied, descending the steps. He knew that she knew the proper term was ‘vampire,’ and that she was still just trying to get a rise out of him. He tried to not let it work.

“They don’t?” she asked with a cock of her head, brow furrowing in confusion that appeared quite genuine. “Like, not even when no one’s around?” she questioned, meeting him at the base of the steps. “Not even when the weather’s nice?”

He nodded in confirmation before turning in the direction out of town, slowly beginning to walk and coaxing her to follow.

“Fuck,” she cursed. He smiled, hearing the crunch of dry leaves beneath boots that told him she was following behind. “I guess I do still have shit to learn about being human…”

“I’ll say,” he replied, doing his best to flatten his tone with bored disinterest. “So will you please return to my home, so I can continue educating you?”

“My home,” she barked resolutely, accompanied by a rustling of footsteps to catch up. “I marked it.”

“Still going with that argument?” he responded in the same droll bickering tone, despite the way the words fluttered in repetition in his insides. My home, she said. She was home, her home was with him — but he couldn’t cling to that on the outside the way he did inside, couldn’t show how he wished to dig his teeth into it. She would surely bolt if he did. “Your first lesson can be my explaining to you why that won’t hold up in any human court of law.”

“Human court of law — isn’t that a bit of a fucking oxymoron?” she scoffed, leaning forward just enough to show him a flash of that mischievous crooked grin of hers, the glisten of a single fang peeking through lips and the dip of a dimple sinking into one cheek. “Since when are any lawyers considered human? Even the ones who aren’t draculas?”

“Hm, and I suppose your second lesson of the day will once again need to be on freshening up your jokes,” he replied, pointedly ignoring the ‘dracula’ bait.

“Fresh? That’s also pretty rich, coming from an undead fucking —”

“But I suppose we should shelve both topics for the time being to focus on your dinner etiquette,” he interrupted, sparing himself a subtle glimpse to gauge her reaction in his periphery, pausing and inhaling to ensure he didn’t smell the musk of fear wafting from her at the mention. “Now that it seems you won’t be skipping town before your presence is required at dinner with my family.”

She gave a grunt of laughter, shaking her head. “The fuck I will,” she replied with a dismissive wave of her arm. “You can still tell your weirdo family you got dumped. I’ll just be waiting out the freakshow at my house instead of a few towns over.”

“A few problems with that approach, Jessie dearest,” he said, purposefully skirting as close as he could to the forbidden term of endearment. “One is that our annual family dinner is traditionally hosted at my abode.”

“My fuckin’ abode. Mine. Unless you have a second tacky ass ranch somewhere I don’t know about, the place we happen to be heading right this moment actually fucking belongs to —”

“Secondly, it tends to not be possible for a fledgling to ‘dump’ their sire at all.”

The rustling of her footsteps halted. She stayed there, seemingly in thoughtful silence, face scrunching with an emotion he couldn’t quite place, no matter how closely he studied it. Until she broke the silence with an exaggerated retching noise — the little wolf girl making a dramatic pantomime of gripping her paws at her knees and pretending to vomit.

“Ugh,” she spat, holding out her tongue. “Ew. ‘Sire?’ Ugh,” she coughed, as if choking on the word. “Do not ever fucking call yourself that again. Fucking christ, John — Ew. I would rather eat a whole fucking field of wolfsbane than ever fucking hear you say —”

“Very mature,” he hissed, slowing but not stopping his own stride as he waited for her to finish the theatrics. “But your histrionics aside, it’s true. Once a sire —”

“Enough!” she yipped, covering her trembling ears and staggering forward as if truly injured, outpacing him. “I-I — I’ll make you a fucking deal,” she cried over her shoulder, looking back at him with eyes wide with a terror that failed to seep into her scent with authenticity. “I’ll go to your dracula dinner, if you just stop using that fucking word!”

John sighed. He would never have expected an undomesticated and until recently entirely solitary werewolf to require such intricate social rituals as pretext to being led to do any tiny, simple thing.

“On two additional conditions,” he huffed, hanging his head as if actually in defeat as he sped up again to flank her. “You actually listen and allow me to prepare you for it, and you stop using the term ‘dracula.’”

“Well the fuck else am I supposed to call you? Because it’s not going to be fuckin’ —”

“Just let me teach you how to behave at dinner, then,” he interrupted in offering, expecting from the beginning to be talked down. “I mean, you already look the part of a soon-to-turn fledgling,” he said, darting his gaze pointedly to the bitemarks standing out deep maroon on ivory skin. “Now if you can just prove to me that you can control yourself well enough to act like one…”

A twitch of anger, as expected — a spark of gold in her eyes he knew meant an irrepressible drive to meet the challenge issued, no matter her disdain. So easily provoked.

“Fine,” she snapped, snarling at him. “But not because I have anything to fucking prove to you!” Certainly, Jessie, he forced his accommodating smile to say. Of course not, Jessie; never that, Jessie. “Because it would be funnier if they thought you got dumped after you went through all the fucking work of turning me.”

“Of course, Jessie,” he replied plainly, with a flutter of his lashes. “We can start right away, as soon as we’re home —”

“Then the fuck are we waiting around taking a leisurely stroll for?” she grumbled, offering him one last scowl.

It was quickly followed by a hushed roar and the sound of ripping fabric that alerted him to her transformation before he saw the flash of russet fur — limbs twisting and falling to the grounds as she took the shape of a wolf.

“My god, you’re a slower learner than I thought!” he cried with exaggerated shock. “That’s still rule number one — do not transform in the middle of public!”

His cries were, naturally, futile, as she sprinted off ahead of him with no more than a vague growl — truly never too much progress ever to be made with her. As soon as he allowed himself to believe they’d gotten anywhere he found himself right back where they were that same night — one endless dance or another, her obstinately running off ahead of him yet again.

Except.

Except this time she stopped, just past the ‘Welcome’ sign, turning over her shoulder to look back at him expectantly with warm amber eyes he would recognize in any form. And waiting.

He gave her a last human smile before shifting with a pop and cloud of smoking to transform into bat form, flying the remaining distance to her to perch upon her shoulder. He gave a pleased little squeak as she took off, content to ride there as she lumbered the rest of the way home.

Perhaps they were getting somewhere after all.

#otp: stop bothering these nice folks #oc: deputy jestiny ellen #v: eternal flame #writies and wordies #ch: john seed

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