#some of them entirely unprovoked may i add

[lilyliveredlittlerichboy]

this is a great example of antisemitic propaganda.

critical thinking questions:

1. is israel the only country on earth dropping bombs, even right now?

2. are there any sources listed, here or in the original post, for where these numbers come from?

3. what does it imply to have a graphic with a pair of hands holding the entire globe, with israel the only country mentioned?

3. a. And does this, by any chance, correlate to any well-known antisemitic conspiracy theories?

4. what emotions does this make you feel? who benefits from these emotions? who is harmed?

by studiosalud (2024)

[raayllum]

For some S4 positivity:

I am loving the different outlooks on Aaravos we are getting! I know people were/are ranting about how Zubeia did an exposition dump on Aaravos’s backstory. But we have to remember: a) the entire arc of s4-s6 is called the mystery of aaravos, not the season. and b) she’s a bias party who does not have all the information (and at one point, she did like him too. since he was “respected and loved by all” she’s not excluding herself from this, notably). in contrast with claudia’s words to soren during their conversation, it’s so *chef’s kiss.*

it honestly makes me excited to see what other views we’ll get on aaravos, and his true motives.

I also really enjoyed terry’s coming out to viren, viren’s panic attacks and how they were handled, claudia being a badass and no longer passive, and all of soren’s scenes. aaravos’s single scene in episode 4 was also 👌🏻 delicious. the new intro is also fun to listen & watch to! i love going back just to analyze it.

i’m sure i have more to say, but this is what i can think of off the top my head!

Right, like S4 pushes what we already knew (there was a mutual history of some kind between the Draconic Royal family and Aaravos) and then just amplifies it

Then we S4 we get hints at both of their perspectives on how they felt about each other personally

Like all we learned was that

Aaravos may have been involved in getting rid of the previous dragon monarch, Luna Tenebris. This is not confirmed.

Aaravos was likely involved in getting rid of Queen Aditti but we already knew that thanks to be the audience in 3x07

Aaravos has done what he did to Viren (and is doing to Claudia) many times across history. This doesn't tell us much of anything new, merely that his current machinations aren't anything new, either.

The Orphan Queen exposed his treachery in some way, according to Zubeia. The Key of Aaravos was symbolically or literally involved in doing so

Claudia confirms that Aaravos did, or at least tells humans that he did, give him magic through dark magic. This was implied all the way back in 3x01. Now it's confirmed

And... that's it. We still don't know exactly how the prison was constructed, or what crimes he was precisely imprisoned for, or what exactly he wants besides Zubeia and Soren's best guesses that are vague, but communicate intense destruction and upheaval. There's still plenty of mystery, but given that 1) this information had to be communicated orally to some degree (as Aaravos' name disappears when you read it) and 2) Zubeia has been alive for 300+ years to know what happened, even if her mate wasn't involved, I'd take this any day over only hearing from Aaravos himself, because that's about as untrustworthy as they come

It makes me think about how we hear about the death of the Dragon King and Zym over and over again. In 1x02, Rayla claims that humans attacked them unprovoked and Callum doesn't dispute it, even if we only learn in 2x05-2x06 this isn't true at all, thanks to his mother's dead at Thunder's hands. We're led to believe in the 1x01 intro that something rivalling an army took Avizandum down, and then learn in 3x06 that it was literally just Viren and King Harrow with two big dark magic spells that are extremely rare and powerful to manifest. We learn about Rayla's parents fleeing in 1x05 and only get the truth of how that encounter (and how indeed how Viren played into it, after it was hinted in 1x08) played out in 3x08. The show loooves to recontextualize and build to / add to things and perspectives over time. At this point I don't think they have to spell it out

[quillheel]

"Death cannot stop true love. All it can do is delay it for a while." (Harry to Kim)

They’d been standing outside of the Martinaise bookstore ( Crime, Romance, and Biographies of Famous People ) for upwards of 20 minutes by now, not entering, not perusing, the time occupied exclusively with the Detective’s staring; eyes clouded the way they become when something occupies him, the edging-on-vacant look he sometimes acquires when he looks up into the cold sky and murmurs under his breath. Locations. Distances. A gridwork of nerves under the city streets; or rather what they were built atop; that despite the efforts of the shivering, terrible absence of memory in his brain persisted in reaching him. Useless information heralded as jewels. The names of streets. Seeing from another angle.

For the last 5 of those 20, Kim was beginning to worry on if Harry had suffered some kind of stroke, perhaps caught between the conscious and unconsciousness, the way fainting seemed to be becoming a habit for him ( or at least, so he’d learnt. ) and his body simply hadn’t fallen, knees locked, keeping him stable. There’d been the temptation to gently nudge his shoulder, a tap to see the structural integrity under that disco blazer, on those snakeskin boots, but he answers before he fully settles into it & the consequences it may harbor; the words soft and raw like fruit fuzz left to rot, quiet on the wind, and all the Lieutenant can do is nod sagely, peering over at whatever it’d been to occupy him so thoroughly. Nothing interesting to Kim, maybe, but all encompassing to the other. Some days, Kitsuragi considers spending entirely on dissecting- ━ no. not dissection. he would not to kill it. ━ considers spending entirely on understanding what it is that goes on inside his head. Part of him whispers that to do so would be to ruin the magic.

Another part of him offers the refute of ‘I wouldn’t know’ in answering Harry, but he decides against that, too. It was too critical, too good at shutting things down. I wouldn’t know is to say I don’t know and I have nothing to say so can we please move on? ━ at least sometimes, it was, to him. Too vulnerable. Too much. Too little.

Kim adjusts his glasses, removing them. " I suppose that is true, Detective. " he relents, almost, but curious eyes give way to his unprovoking answer; an unspoken question of continue?; as the Lieutenant adds on, offering more as he cleans the lenses of the water built up from snow with a handkerchief. " Something about the eternity of a love that can persist past everything, even death, is an appealing thought to many people… " ━━ he tries not to study Harry as he says that. as if anticipating, as if proving himself correct.

[talkingbl]

The Good and Bad of KinnPorsche

SPOILER WARNING. TW: date rape, dubcon.

The Good -

The setting/trope. We love a mafia story. And while I'm not a fan of bodyguard romances, this one is interesting because the bodyguard (who is equally as strong and chiseled as the man he's meant to protect) is coded as a bottom.

Bible, Bible, Bible. And a bit of Apo. These two had moments of brilliance. Save for Bible's English dialogue, I found him the most captivating in emotional scenes. Apo did a great job making Porsche a multifaceted character. Porsche is neither masc nor femme, he's neither overly serious nor silly. For the most part, he exists in the middle of every spectrum, dipping more into one side or the other depending upon the circumstances.

The twist. I may be in the minority here but I thought the reveal of Porsche’s mother being alive was the best move the story could make. It had begun to stagnate toward the middle and needed some drama to wake it up, which this reveal did. I also think it adds a layer of intrigue to KinnPorsche and KimChay because we now know that Kinn and Kim's grandparents adopted Porsche and Chay's mother who is still alive despite what we thought. This begs the question: how will Porsche and Chay deal with the news going forward?

The visuals. It is so refreshing to see a cast of people who all have their own look, and with lead characters who have a more tanned skin tone. Thailand is quick to whitewash the fuck out of people (especially lead characters), which is sad because the actors are perfect the way they naturally look. I mean, Apo is probably the most conventionally attractive ML in a Thai BL and rather than trying to imitate the Kpop-overly-made-up, whitewashed aesthetic, he just looks like himself. This is not to shit on naturally lighter people, just to say that it's important to show people of all skin tones, facial features, etc., receiving love.

The NC scenes. Mile and Apo create very passionate (albeit not very realistic) sex scenes that go beyond what we typically see in BL. Porsche gets a handjob in the middle of an argument. Kinn gets his dick sucked, unprovoked. Pete gets his ass ate ON CAMERA. And so much more sprinkled in to give the relationships a more realistic feel. Most BLs will do one NC scene (if that) and it'll be half-assed extreme close ups of cheek-sucking, ab caressing, and neck pecking. KinnPorsche showed thrust action, it showed different positions, it showed different types of sex (gay couples don't always do anal!) and sexual situations (handjobs, playing with the dick, etc. lmao). You can't deny that the story actually tried, the actors actually gave, and the direction was not timid.

Porsche's...interesting responses to Kinn's insults. Kinn all but calls Porsche a slut multiple times and Porsche never reacts the way one thinks he would given his character. Seems like he gets more into the moment when Kinn says those things. I'd be interested to see them explore this side of Porsche more in S2.

The Bad -

The inconsistent tone. This was by far the worst part of the show for me. In one scene Vegas savagely tortures Pete in a makeshift dungeon far away from civilization. In the very next scene Porsche is passing gas in Kinn's face (which...if you know me, you know I can't stand toilet humor). Almost none of the mafia stuff seemed that dire because it was always played for laughs in the end, typically at Porsche's expense. It really took me out of the show.

The unfocused/nonsensical plot. There were several moments in the show where I was like..."and what did that do?" Like the entire Tawan plot line (especially the beginning of it where we think Tawan is dead/is a ghost) was the most unnecessary addition to an already long story I've ever had the displeasure of watching. We could've done the jealousy plot without bringing Tawan back from the "dead" only to kill him off in the end anyway. Even for its little effect on KimChay...I mean, we saw how much Kim cared about Chay, we didn't need Chay kidnapped to see it. We also didn't need the 10 seconds of Chay rebelling nor did we need VegasTawan... That went NOWHERE and I'm just left feeling like my time has been wasted. Also, why was Kim stalking Porsche and Chay? Can someone enlighten me because if they ever said why, I surely missed it.

Outside of VegasPete, how do any of the relationships happen? Like, I get VegasPete because Pete felt bad for Vegas and sought to comfort him and Vegas confided in him. I also get Chay's admiration of Kim. Teenagers have crushes all the time based solely on looks/parasocial relationships. What I barely get however is Kim's interest in Chay. Sure, he's flattered by Chay's crush and wants to protect him but throughout the story it just seems like Kim is into Chay because Chay is into him. He never voices any real reason for falling for Chay and, again, we never really find out Kim's motive for stalking Chay and Porsche earlier on in the series. But what I really don't understand is KinnPorsche. It seems like Kinn just looks at Porsche and is in love, which, sure. But Porsche? Porsche has 0 reason to actually like Kinn and actually has more reason to dislike him due to the situations Kinn has put him in. He has even less reason to trust Kinn given that Kinn took Tawan's word over his. No matter how the story tried to explain this away, it was still weirdly out of character and dumb as hell for Kinn to imprison Porsche and not trust him. It doesn't help that before the Tawan plot, Kinn NEVER shows that he is an untrusting person. There's not even a single hint of it. If a person is that distrustful of everyone, surely they'd show it at some point? And the killing part is that this distrustful nature never comes up again. Almost like it was just for the sake of a not very well thought out plot point... But I digress. I just don't understand why these two grown men actually fell in love (though it's clear as day that they work well together).

Kinn as a concept. How has this man managed to survive up until now? His fighting prowess is woefully inconsistent, he thinks with his emotions, I have yet to see him make any money moves, and he just all around seems like a lovesick puppy waiting for his bodyguard to acknowledge him rather than the ruthless mafioso he's billed as. Simply put, Kinn doesn't act the way one in his position and with his backstory, should/probably would act.

VegasPorsche. Sigh...this relationship was heavily baited and it made no sense. Honestly, Vegas's character in general isn't very well executed. Vegas's character traits are great (inferiority complex, depression, trauma, etc.). Vegas's actions, however, are just not very well-written. Most of his plot lines feel half way done. Like the whole Tawan thing and then making him a rapist for like 2 seconds, I don't get it. This all feeds into VegasPorsche. KinnPorsche writers thought I forgot about the early scene where Vegas tries to date rape Porsche. Surprise, bitch! I remember!! It is so odd (and honestly a testament to bad writing) that it was never reconciled. Vegas was never actually caught and punished for it, and all-in-all it just seemed like fodder for, what was at the point, an episodic drama. It shows lack of planning on the writer's part to not resolve that and then immediately have Kinn do something similar to Porsche (but play it as romantic). Sad part is that I wouldn’t be so critical of it if it actually made sense in the story (I don't get bothered by violence when it makes sense). But it doesn't. We see Vegas around the main family and Porsche so many times after that moment and yet it never comes up again. Porsche just goes on trusting Vegas like nothing ever happened. It's just plain bad writing to show the proverbial gun and never have someone shoot it.

[lostelfwriting]

Chapter XVII – you took off your mask, and I recognised your face from my dreams

[Read on AO3]

It takes him longer than he would like to work up the courage to visit The White Rose without the excuse of coming to the studio. There is nothing left to be done – the studio is closed. If Dream visits his street now, it’s for nostalgia’s sake, and if he goes to buy some flowers… It’s to see Hob and his smile. Hopefully, Hob won’t turn him away.

When he arrives at the street that is lined with red brick buildings, and it is entirely bare of any music, Dream’s limbs begin to feel heavy. He nods to a coffee shop owner who is smoking outside of their building, who never said anything about minding his music, and they look at him wearily. Are they sad that he’s gone, or relieved? He feels better without knowing the answer to that, so he doesn’t ask.

The people at the specialty liquor store nearby used to like his music. They talked about it often enough. But nobody is standing outside to say hello to him. The crushing loneliness radiating from the place that used to be his home more than his own flat is almost strong enough to turn him away.

And then he sees them. The yellow building, the table, and the chairs. His table and chairs that Hob took because a dying man has no need for them anymore. He is tempted to go and kick them over, or carry them to the right side of the street, in front of his former studio, where they belong. But as he comes closer, he notices a sign on one of the chairs, and curiosity gets the better of him.

‘RESERVED FOR DREAMING’

Dream almost staggers with the force of the feelings that hit him. There are so many that he has trouble putting a name on all of them. The man whom he fell in love did this for him. This is the Hob who stole Dream’s heart – a man who is effortlessly nice, who knows how to put a smile on any face, who is selfless, and who is not an unprovoked asshole to people.

“It’s strange,” Hob speaks up nearby. Dream didn’t even notice he was there. “It’s quiet here without you, and I miss that dumb noise.” He’s smirking, looking like he’s in disbelief himself. “Sit down, mate; you look like you’ll fall over if the breeze hits you.”

Dream feels like a tree that will topple over if someone looks at it for too long, so he doesn’t argue. He moves the sign to the side and sits down. Relief washes over his body like a cold shower in summer, making him sigh as overworked muscles relax and he can breathe more freely.

“You liked drawing outside,” Hob goes on, hands in his pockets as he leans against the yellow wall of his store. “You can come here and draw anytime you want. They’re yours, after all.”

“Thank you,” Dream says genuinely.

“I’m afraid there is a downside to this, though,” Hob adds. “You might actually catch some colour if you spend some time in the sun. I’m still not sure you aren’t a vampire, so I hope the sun isn’t a deterrent.”

Dream huffs a quiet laugh. “I suppose I will lose the colour again soon enough.”

Hob bursts out in laughter, wide-eyed and trying to muffle himself with his hand in front of his mouth. He is into dark humour, then. Dream laughs at his guilty expression.

“You’re gonna take me with you, Jesus Christ on a stick!” Hob wheezes out. “Give a man a warning next time. I’m so sorry for laughing, fuck, that was…” Contrary to his apology, he continues to chuckle as he trails off. “May I sit down for a while? At least till the next customer comes around?” he asks eventually, pointing at the other chair.

“Of course,” Dream agrees. “This is still your place. And I gave you this furniture.”

“Nu-uh, the sign says clearly that it’s yours, and you can’t argue with a paper sign.” Hob shakes his head but he sits down opposite to Dream and stretches his legs. “I’ve already gotten a compliment on it, you know. From Mason. They were glad you still had your place here.”

Mason is one of the liquor store employees who shares Dream’s music taste. He smiles. “My sister will surely also appreciate this gesture, as do I.”

Hob waves his hand dismissively. “Let’s move on before I start blushing. So, what have you been up to? More painting?”

“Mostly doctor appointments, now that Teleute, my sister, can drag me to them,” he says sourly. “A little bit of painting.” How does one make a conversation with a person who makes their heart soar? Dream remains silent after his simple answer, but Hob doesn’t seem to mind, taking lead over the conversation until Dream relaxes.

Talking to Hob in neutral or even slightly – if he dares say so himself – familiar way is better than drawing, better than painting, better than tattooing. He may bot be leaving anything behind right now, perhaps not even a positive impression. But he feels warm, like being held in a loving embrace.

He is not cured. Hob doesn’t love him. He probably doesn’t even like him, still. But talking to Hob, sitting in the sun on his chair, breathing – still breathing – and living – if this is what the end is about, what dying feels like, then he can make peace with it. It feels almost better than living used to feel sometimes. Dying shouldn’t feel so nice. But at least he’s found his peace again, in the calm resonance of Hob’s voice.

“You know, I have to admit to something, and you might strangle me for it,” Hob says.

“Really?” Dream raises his eyebrows in amusement. He can’t imagine being mad at Hob right now.

“I actually listen to the same music as you. I even liked your playlists. I just hated the noise. But I’d absolutely go to a concert with you.”

Dream thinks back to all the times Hob called his music stupid, garbage, and even Satanic, and imagines how he then went home and listened to the very same music. Should he be angry? Who knows? He laughs, throwing his head back as he does so.

“Okay, but I mean this,” Hob chuckles, “your laugh is horrendous.”

+*+*+

“I resented you and your privileged ass. You had no idea what it’s like to wait until 2 AM to see if dad brings any food from his late shift. You had no idea what it’s like to give up the only apple you managed to steal for your younger siblings. You had no idea what you were threatening to take from me – decades of hard work. I worked my ass off every day of my life to make sure me and my family are secure. I only opened this store when I knew they would be safe even if I fell on my ass. And you threatened it, just like that.”

“I’m sorry…”

+*+*+*+*+

Bury Me with a Rose, We Both Have Thorns (Prologue)

Rating: Explicit

AO3 Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply

Relationships: Death & Dream, Dream & Hob, Dream/Hob Gadling

Characters: Dream of the Endless | Morpheus, Death of the Endless, Hob Gadling, Jessamy, Matthew, Corinthian, Lucienne

Additional Tags: NO Major Character Death, Hanahaki Disease, Terminal Illnesses, Thoughts about death and dying, Decaying Health, Refusing Treatment, Strong Language, Unrequited Love, Enemies to ?, Past Minor Characters Death(s), Protective Death of the Endless, Doctor Human!Death of the Endless, Alternate Universe - Human, Tattoo Artist Dream of the Endless | Morpheus, Flower Shop Owner Hob Gadling, Blood, Angst with a Happy Ending

Word count: 32k

I'm posting the whole work here on the 1st of March, but I strongly reccommend you read it on AO3, where I will be posting one chapter per day. Either way, click Read More or go to AO3 to read the Prologue!

Written for the event @the-centennial-husbands-bigbang. With beautiful art by @five-and-dimes!

It is a slow day at the studio, so while he is waiting for his next appointment, Dream is – like he does almost all of his free time – sketching new tattoo designs to add to his portfolio and listening to music loud enough to completely shut out his own thoughts. He is sketching a snake, having no doubt that it will catch someone’s eye. There is always someone who wants a tattoo of a snake. He pauses to look at his progress and ends up snorting in disbelief.

The drawing is truly a snake, but the reptile is weaving among the stems of flowers instead of a dead branch like Dream had intended. And they are ugly flowers at that. He is pretty sure that he gave a pot of those flowers to his secondary school teacher, who always called him Murphy, even though he hated that nickname. He can’t resist snapping a picture of the flowers with his phone and trying to look up what they are, but once he finds the name – cyclamen – he refuses to look up their meaning. It would surely be something stupid, like forbidden love, or maybe hopelessness.

Even the snake’s scales seem to actually be made of flower petals, and Dream rolls his eyes as he flips the page of his sketchbook. The downside to trying to tune his mind out is that he doesn’t notice when his subconsciousness begins to interfere with his process, and it has led to many flowery paintings in the past months. With a sigh, he starts copying the usable parts of the design onto another page until an insistent thought makes him pause mid-movement.

Just a few weeks ago, he would have been furious if this had happened. He used to tear those ruined sketches to pieces and then go outside into the late winter chill and glare at every passing person who dared to look his way. He wished they all felt as bad as he did, and most of all, his neighbour with his shop opposite Dream’s studio, with its bright, flowery logo.

Today’s drawing incident feels like just a small inconvenience. He feels zero anger, though he might still opt to destroy the sketch later, just for the miniscule satisfaction that the action will bring him. Or maybe he will keep it. Pin it to the wall next to his bed and look at it every night. He will look at the ugly flowers and realise with wry amusement and aching hollowness that he has finally accepted his fate.

He, Morpheus Endeles, is going to die.

He thinks about it and waits for anger or grief to appear, but they don’t. Good. He was getting sick of the self-pity. It has been months since he noticed the first symptom – the occasional cough – as something seemed to tickle his throat, easily blamed on a bit of dust. And then, a bit later, when he lay awake late at night and everything around him was quiet, he heard the soft rustle of leaves as he breathed. He didn’t need a doctor to tell him that he had the Hanahaki Disease. He tears the ruined sketch out and shreds it into tiny pieces, enjoying the bit of satisfaction that it brings him. Maybe he is still harbouring some badly suppressed anger. He doesn’t need a fortune teller to tell him that he has no chance of getting affection from the person he hopelessly loves. Because it is his neighbour, the owner of The White Rose, Robert Gadling, a straight man who rightfully dislikes Dream.

+*+*+*+*+

Cyclamen: resignation and good-bye

[aanteater-nose]

Dennis’s borderline personality disorder analysis

Let me just start by saying that I’m not a psychologist/therapist or doctor of any kind, I’m just very interested in psychology & in depth character analysis/involving perspective from my own experiences w bpd. That being said, this is going to be very long.

So that episode where Dennis gets diagnosed with borderline personality disorder, I completely agree.

For those who don’t know, BPD is categorized by an intense fear of abandonment, mood swings as well as difficulty controlling emotions, especially anger, impulsiveness, unstable or fragile self image, ongoing feelings of emptiness, and again: some intense displays of unwarranted anger.

I know most fans interpret Dennis as a sociopath, or more accurately someone with antisocial personality disorder, and I can see why, he checks a lot of the boxes; but personally I feel he lacks the main characteristic of that disorder and that’s the ability to feel and interpret emotion.

I doubt any of you forgot the “I have big feelings!” scene in The Gang Tends Bar. Dennis actually admits to being emotional, he cries “of course I have feelings! And it hurts!” after being vulnerable with the gang about how never receiving any gifts actually really hurt him. I believe this to be veryyyy true, especially taking into consideration Glenn’s own description of Dennis being the most sensitive of the gang despite his perceived sociopathy.

Here are a few other reasons I believe Dennis to totally have BPD.

He is very perceptive to others and their body language when speaking to him, sometimes he can even imagine hostility or judgement, which causes him to lash out. Being extremely sensitive to vocal cues, body language, and other little signs that other people may not take into much consideration is another symptom of BPD. For example, when Mac comes in to talk to Dennis about the chicken and air miles scam in Charlie Work, Dennis immediately knows what’s up. He also gets extremely irritated when Mac doesn’t look at him when he’s speaking to him (and then flips a second later/ mood swings). To add onto this, he also becomes enraged when he feels he’s losing the attention or control in the room, specifically when no ones listening to him. (Ex. The multiple times he’s presented something to the gang and they end up going completely off task before he’s even done presenting)

Another thing is his undoubtedly extreme bouts of rage or easily irritable nature. This one’s pretty obvious, as he has the worst temper of the entire gang, especially if his ego is threatened. (Fun fact: bpd can cross with narcissistic personality disorder, which doesn’t change the initial grounds of bpd but changes how someone with the disorder might react). Many times the rest of the gang doesn’t understand what he’s so worked up about and he’ll earn a “calm down dude,” or more often then not they’ll just step aside and let him scream and holler. This includes intense mood swings. Dennis can be seen getting very upset, very quickly, and then cooling down seconds after. (Everybody, everybody get a weapon!)Think anytime he’s suddenly raised his voice as if his emotion was literally bubbling up under his skin. (Yelling at Dee in the Paddy’s van(admittedly hilarious), yelling at Mac to look at him when he’s speaking to him despite being overall unprovoked, immediately switching gears with Dee after she criticizes his plan of becoming a veterinarian, etc.) it’s like a literal switch is flipped.

Or sometimes he can get heated from something very small that others don’t perceive as that big of a deal. In “The Gang Dines Out”, the kitchen door is constantly hitting the back of Dennis’s chair, the seats are lousy, the chair is wobbly and Dennis is just struggling to keep it together. He becomes visibly more irritated when Frank and Charlie don’t come over to pay tribute, taking it as a personal hit, meanwhile Mac reminds him they agreed they wouldn’t let it get to them. Mac even tells Dennis not to let it ruin their night, but Dennis can’t let go and only becomes further irritated throughout the episode. It’s very difficult for people with bpd to let the things that anger them go because it’s so intense or even personal to them, even if others don’t interpret that way.

Next is the “empty or hollow feeling” symptom, which Dennis has actually complained about before in “Sweet Dee Gets Audited.” While in the back room with Frank, Dennis talks about “the big gaping hole” inside of him, which most people would fill with something substantial and meaningful like religion, but he doesn’t believe in any of that. Guess what??Often times people suffering from bpd can feel this emptiness in them where they lack a sense of self (but again, if you cross this with narcissism overlap, they won’t admit it, because their sense of self is so important). However you can see this self image waver in “How Mac Got Fat” where he’s cowering in bed with a terrible chemical peel completely derailed of his sense of importance, he now relies on Mac and Dee to tell him how he looks. “If there was a mask of myself..would you guys wear it?” (Lmao). This is also visible in “The Gang Exploits A Miracle” where Dee convinces him his face looks fat and he just stops eating.

Most importantly, Dennis clearly has some abandonment issues. In general terms, people with bpd feel attached to others and blame themselves when things go wrong, they can then beg or threaten to hurt themselves if this person in their life leaves. I was thinking, huh, that doesn’t sound like Dennis, he hates to debase himself like that, and rarely sees things as his fault. Then I remembered a subtype of bpd (angry externalizing bpd), and how people with this subtype will often respond to rejection, abandonment, and disappointment through anger, manipulation or blame towards others rather than taking it out on themselves. (This subtype also contains a large crossover into narcissistic personality disorder, something I’m positive Dennis has).

Dennis responds intensely to rejection and disappointment all the time. The whole 5 star man thing was him lashing out in regards to rejection, the dude lost it, all the while keeping up his grandiose image of “I don’t need others validation,” and then throwing a fit and smashing the phone on the ground directly after.

People with bpd don’t like to be ignored, and often as soon as the group isn’t paying them any attention they can feel very disconnected and upset. In “Macs Banging The Waitress,” Charlie and Mac have a best friend duo going on and it actually really bothers Dennis to not be included. This is why often times he tries so hard to remain in control of the gang, that way he can never be left out, or more importantly, left ALONE.

Now back to the big one: the intense fear of abandonment. I’m going to bring up a few short instances.

In “The Gang Goes To Hell” Dennis tells Dee that he loves her before they all sink to the bottom to accept their fate. Dee responds with “whatever,” Dennis responds in hysterics, “whatever??” While we’re on his attachment to his sister, think of “The Gang Broke Dee”, where Dennis (1) tries to manipulate Dee into listening to him and staying under his heel because she’ll fail if she continues stand up comedy, and (2) begging she take him with her when the manipulation fails. When it’s revealed that it was all just a big elaborate prank on Dee, Dennis is just as unaware as Dee was, and goes on to have a meltdown in private over it, probably because he had to confront or at least recognize how terrified he was about being abandoned by his twin sister.

“Mac and Dennis Break Up” is another example, putting aside the fact that Mac and Dennis have a very dependent relationship, Dennis has a few specific bpd symptoms in regards to separating from Mac. As soon as he shows up in Dee’s apartment, he tries to get her to watch a movie with him, along with Charlie. While Charlie and Dee are discussing how to get the cat out of the wall, Dennis is in the back the entire time trying to garner attention just so somebody can come watch the damn movie with him. He doesn’t want to sit there alone on the sofa, and is constantly watching Charlie and Dee, even chiming in repeatedly, which further annoys Charlie. This dependent nature is just fine when he has Mac, since Mac is just as dependent and loves caring for Dennis anyways, but it becomes obnoxious and overbearing with the rest of the gang.

Most evidently when it comes to fear of abandonment, I think of “The Gang Misses The Boat”. Each member of the gang ends up storming out and separating to move on with their own lives, almost like they are leaving the group to better themselves individually. Predictably, they all come back, but why? Dee and Charlie cross a territory they’re uncomfortable with and need to reunite with the rest of the gang to make sure it doesn’t happen again. Frank jumps to another group like a virus, ruins their business, gets bored and returns to the group dressed as a man cheetah. Mac is prompted to return to the group and in return they’ll forget all about him going deeper into the closet with Dusty. But what about Dennis?

While the gang is off separately, he’s trying to sell his Range Rover he so idiotically drove into the river. We see him lose his temper at the drop of a hat when shown any resistance to buying the car, he even catches himself afterwards as if he recognizes he’s acting out. But what I find particularly interesting is the part of the episode where he storms into Dee’s apartment while her and Charlie are practicing slam poetry, and it’s clearly evident he’s been crying, runny mascara and all. I think this is because he needs the gang, and abandoning them/everyone splitting genuinely affected him. He later comes storming in saying he wants things to go back to normal. It’s the overlap of narcissism that makes him (for the most part) unable to admit he needs the gang, or that he needs Mac for that matter, when he so clearly does. This is also pretty evident anytime Dennis wants to do something, he wants at least one member of the gang to join him. He’s not the type of person who likes to do activities alone (think “Charlie Rules The World” when he’s repeatedly trying to get everyone to go out w him and “experience the real world”).

So yeah, in conclusion, I think the bpd diagnosis rings true for Dennis + the sociopath route is just so lazy and simply not true to his character. He states he’s created “a cold shell” around himself for protection, so when you consider that someone who experiences emotion so strongly is attempting to protect themselves the best they can, this makes a lot of sense. Again, I’m not licensed in any way shape or form, I just read about mental disorders just cause I find them interesting & needed to write all this down.

[irandrura]

Found I had something half-written squirrelled away somewhere. I doubt I will ever finish it, so have some unfinished thoughts on Edelgard:

Let’s talk a bit about Edelgard!

(Thoughts occasioned by spoilery discussion and speculation about Three Hopes, but I will not comment on any of that here.)

It was suggested to me that Edelgard is ‘stupid and evil’. The tl;dr version of this post is that I think she (mostly) isn’t stupid but she (mostly) is evil, but in both cases it’s a bit more nuanced than that.

Specifically, what I want to suggest that Edelgard as a character makes much more sense if you realise that Edelgard’s goals are not what she says they are. Edelgard says a lot of things about her intentions – destroy the Slitherers in the Dark, create a better world, somethingorother equality, and so on – and for what it’s worth I think Edelgard herself might genuinely believe this.

But there’s a difference between Edelgard sincerely claiming her motives are X, and her motives actually being X. Self-delusion is very plausible in this case.

If we look at Edelgard’s actions, setting her self-description aside entirely, they all seem to make the most sense if what Edelgard really wants to do is to conquer all of Fodlan and rule it with supreme dictatorial power. She says that she wants to save the world from monsters, give humanity its freedom, and achieve peace for all… but in practice she is remarkably hesitant to actually turn on and fight the monsters in question (and in fact works with them and creates more monsters), and, well, she launches multiple unprovoked invasions to conquer all lands outside her, which doesn’t seem to have much to do with either freedom or peace.

I know I harp on the ‘Edelgard = Hitler’ comparisons a lot, and I think they’re justified (and speaks to a troubling sympathy for authoritarianism in some corners of fandom), but in all seriousness – what Edelgard actually does suggests that her motive is that she wants total power and she will crush anyone who gets in her way. If we’re going to talk about comparisons, Edelgard is in many ways just a genderflip of Walhart, with the major difference being that Walhart is clear and undeluded about his goals, whereas Edelgard is not.

There is a reasonable argument that the reason Edelgard wants all of this is as a result of being traumatised by being tortured by the Slitherers as a child. The loss of power represented by that childhood experience leads her to now obsess over gaining power, so that nothing like that will ever happen again. Dimitri’s dagger might be read in the same light: what he meant to express with it (you can find your way to a bright future) might be very different to the lesson she took from it (you need power to kill or cut in order to shape the world).

There’s also a more explicitly political reading where this is all about patriotism and revanchism. The Adrestian Empire once controlled the entire continent, but it has been chipped away at and divided and now it’s only a shadow of its former self. That this division may have been influenced by external manipulation (one of Loog’s allies was a Slitherer, and the church also supported Faerghus’ independence) only adds to a sense of historical grievance. I am not sure how much Edelgard is motivated by Adrestian patriotism rather than more personal factors, but it’s certainly an effective propaganda line.

[calliecat93]

ST: The Next Generation S3 Watchthrough Episodes 22-25

The Most Toys: Dear TNG writers, I know that the show has been over for about 30 years now and this is therefore redundant to say, but… can you please quit doing bad things to Data?! He doesn’t deserve bad things! So Data gets kidnapped by a manchild/lunatic to add to his ‘collection’. Kinda reminds me of that two-parter in Superman: TAS that introduced Lobo… except Fajo somehow pisses me off even more than the bad guy there. Kinda makes me think of the bad guy from The Squire of Gothos in TOS except somehow more detestable. At least that guy was more or less a spoiled child, Fajo has no excuse. Anyways, Fajo’s obsession with Data comes of as… insanely creepy. It gives me very bad vibes and I was thoroughly uncomfortable. Though at least Data, in his Data way, wasn’t at all complacent and remained as inquisitive as ever, so at least he maintained some sense of agency unlike in say The Schizoid Man. That all said, the episode was good. The crew’s reactions to thinking that Data was dead all made sense and scenes like Geordi and Wesley going through his things and Picard giving an order to Data before remembering that he’s not there anymore… those were heavy. And again as painful as it was to watch, Data at least trying to retain any agency was appreciated especially at the end. I’m glad that he didn’t have to kill, but seeing him finally put Fajo in his place was especially after he killed Varria as callously as he did was extremely gratifying. Another solid episode overall… but again, please let Data have happier things up ahead. 3.5/5.

Sarek: You can only imagine how wide my eyes got when I was going down the episode list and saw this one. I know that Sarek has mixed reception due to the issues between him and Spock and IDK if Discovery is going to change my opinion or not, but I find him to be a very interesting character. Journey to Babel kind of had this sense that he’s a hardass not that different from his son tbh, and those similarities and being displeased with Spock’s life choices made things difficult. but Sarek did still care about him, IDT he’d have gone through the effort of going to Kirk in hopes of recovering Spock’s katra when he had no reason to believe that Spock did the transfer and even outright saying at the end that his logic is more or less impaired when Spock is concerned if he didn’t, and The Voyage Home had him outright finally tell him that he made the right choice and that he was wrong in the way only Vulcans can say things. There was just kind of this feeling that he realized that he had been wrong and regretted it and wanted to make amends… but didn’t know how and it took Spock dying to finally do so. He’s not necessarily a good parent, a lot of Spock’s issues are due to him not understanding his struggles, and yeah more or less disowning him for several years was shitty, but he’s not even close to the worst and he at least tried to make it right and I can respect that. If anything though, Sarek was at least shown to be a capable ambassador and genuinely loved and was good to Amanda. So seeing him in TNG and thankfully still played by Mark Lenard, I was interested to see what they’d do with him and how he’d interact with the new cast. The result?

Sarek, did hiding your heart condition in Journey to Babel teaches you nothing about revealing vital medical information?! Is this just a Vulcan thing?! Anyways, the revelations here were… sad. Sarek has essentially the Vulcan version of Alzheimer’s which is causing him to be unable to control his emotions. Which for a Vulcan… that has to be outright horrific. Not to mention it’s causing rising, unprovoked violent responses from the crew like Crusher outright slapping her own son. To no one’s surprise, Sarek’s the reason why, albeit he’s causing it unintentionally. While Mark Lenard has been excellent as Sarek alll across the board especially in the films, he gets to do a lot more here due to Sarek’s unstable emotional control and he is just fantastic. The whole confrontation with Picard was truly excellent acting from both him and Patrick Stewart. Sarek truly feels unhinged and it is both horrifying and just sad to watch especially to how dignified and composed he was in TOS. The mind-meld with Picard may help in the short-term, but... it’s likely inevitable that he won’t last much longer. My only real complaint is that Spock and Amanda are saved as a brief mention and technically not even by Sarek but by Picard enduring the aftereffects of the mind-meld, though it does reflect Sarek’s mindset/emotions. Seriously Picard-as-Sarek reflecting how much he loved them and regretting not being able to ever truly express it or outright say it… it’s just heart-breaking, thoug it does confirm everything I had already thought so that’s good~ Still, this was a great episode! I’m glad to finally have some Vulcans again, Sarek was very well done, and the entire episode is very well acted especially the previously mentioned confrontation and everything involving the mind-meld especially after when Picard loses it. I know that Spock will show up at some point in TNG so I hope that this episode comes back up because Dear Lord please allow Spock that closure before he has to be sent to AOS. Regardless this was excellent~! Thanks for reaching my expectaitons TNG~! 4.5/5.

Menage a Troi: Oh great, another Lwaxana episode… albeit she actually has my sympathy in this one cause a Ferengi is pursuing her. I might find the woman annoying, but considering what we know of how Ferengi treat women, no one deserves that. So… if anything I am fair or at least try to be, so I will say that Lwaxana is better in this episode. She’s still obnoxious, but with the aforementioned horrid way that Ferengi treats women (seriously the nudity part was an utterly unnecessary show), refusing to be treated as property, and her genuine love and concern for Deanna make her much more likable. She certainly didn’t deserve to be treated the way she did. Troi being sick of being talked down to as a child and her mother butting into her romantic life no matter how well-intentioned instead of just letting her take it at her own pace and when she’s content as she is now is very relatable as well. Look I’ve grown to like Riker/Troi and I’m all for them getting back together… but they should do so if and when they’re ready, not be pushed into that direction. Still overall, didn’t care for this one. It’s better than Lwaxana’s first two episodes, but still makes me uncomfortable in other ways that aren’t funny, and the fact that she’s still pursuing Picard and he gets forced to go along with it at the end (albeit Patrick Stewart getting to go full Shakespearian was the funniest part of the whole episode) still doesn’t sit right with me. The Wesley subplot was also utterly wasted, feeling like it was just shoved in there and he did nothing to deserve promotion to Ensign. Yes, he gave up his chance to go to the Academy when he has his aha moment, but he did barely anything all season or the last two seasons to have earned it, or at least shoving it into this episode made it feel undeserved. Wesley himself is fine as a character, he’s nowhere near as bad as some make him out to be, but the concept of his character is just… not suited for ST. But the was funnier than the past two and Lwaxana has her better traits higlighted such as her intelligence and acting skills. If anything she does genuienly love her daughter and is not a helpless victim. Majel Barrett also owns it, I can respect that. 2.5/5.

Transfiguration: Okay, so we have an injured alien known only as John Doe wo is both amnesic and has some impressive regenererative abilities. He also turns out to have mass power such as powerful healing abilities as his body is udnergoign some kind of rapid change,. Meanwhile, Geordi gets some kid of sudden confidence boost and is finally making progress with his love life. If I’m gonna be honest… I don’t have anything to really say on this one. It was fine, but I don’t really have any thoughts regarding it otherwise. There’s this sense of spirituality in there and the ending makes it feel like religious opression. The Zalkonians killing their own kind who undergo the transformation just to maintian their power… yeah that was… yeah. Anyway, it was fine. I felt bad for John Doe and Crusher was good. All I’ve really got to say for this one. 3/5.

Alright, one more to go! Next time I’ll only be covering two episodes, the S3 finale and the S4 premiere. But they’re the same story so…. I’ve heard good things about this one, so we’ll see if it delivers.

[flightofaqrow]

mothering (on mother’s day)

qrow + Sun Wukong ( @ultravioletvoleur​ )

fighting clearly hadn’t been what was on the kid’s mind. maybe he just wasn’t thinkin’ at all; he definitely isn’t right now as words tumble from his mouth, barely coherent. qrow still doesn’t need to hear these things about his niece, but he’ll let this one slide.

Sun leans his back against the wall, tail swaying to and fro. His face spoke to the internal conflict he was struggling with when it came to this, “I was hoping I could actually… Ask for your advice?”

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"Quick update, may wanna say Happy Mother's Day to your niece. ...Kaybye!"

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qrow whips open Harbinger faster than a nevermore diving upon its prey, and fires a warning shot off as Sun makes a break for it, near missing the base of his tail.

he knows the kid well enough by now, and trusts Yang even more, than to truly buy into the implications of his statement. oh, but if playing this cat and mouse game makes the cheeky monkey so happy, qrow will absolutely go a round.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

“YIPE!”

That was a much faster reaction than he’d anticipated, barely making it ten feet before the crack of exploding gunpowder rang out. There was a hole smoking in the wall in front of him- dangerously close to banana height, and Sun began sweating. He turned very jerkily, with the closest approximation of a cocksure grin he could manage through his abject terror.

“Oh, uh. D-did you… Need something?”

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well, at least qrow got to make a point, should he ever actually need to act on teaching the kid a thing or two. alternatively, about picking fights one may not be able to win. a similar tough past he may have, thieves at least tended to work from codes of honor. not every struggle is the same.

he prods, sarcastic, feigned anger lining the sharp curve of narrowed eyes, sword still deployed at his side, “what in all of remnant makes you think you can just say things to me?”

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

There is a very audible gulp as the Hunstman advances on him. Every other time they’d traded barbs, he’d gotten the sense that Qrow was something of an old glory days kind of person, who had lost their touch a bit. However, that split second action, and the pointed glare burning through his confidence like a hot knife through butter, told him a whole new story.

Qrow Branwen was what his nightmares were made of.

“Well you see I thought we were buddies and I thought you would know it was a joke I swear I haven’t laid a hand on your niece like that I would never well not never possibly in the future but definitely not right now not that I don’t think she’s attractive she’s very attractive oh but that’s not the only reason-”

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

tch. forever a curse, even at his best. maybe he laid on the drama a bit too thick. honestly, he thought a bit of zeal is something Sun could appreciate. he’s far too much talk still, isn’t he? all bright light and translucent beaming rays which still questioned their own substance. he might be further ahead than he seemed at first, but still has a ways to go. …kids these days.

“of course I knew it was a joke, golden boy.” qrow folds away his weapon, drops his stance, while raising a brow. he lessens his posturing, but not his attention, hand still remaining on Harbinger’s hilt in the case of some trick.

“but I also took it as a taunt, tellin’ me you’re finally ready for a real man’s brawl. heh, guess i was wrong.”

fighting clearly hadn’t been what was on the kid’s mind. maybe he just wasn’t thinkin’ at all; he definitely isn’t right now as words tumble from his mouth, barely coherent. qrow still doesn’t need to hear these things about his niece, but he’ll let this one slide.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

“What?!”

He’d almost lost his stones by way of his ass for a sassback?! Their Uncle was even more intimidating now, and he was going to die on that hill. Still, though, knowing that he wasn’t actually angry was a huge relief. The tension left his body and he slumped down with a sigh-

And then he noticed Qrow’s weapon was still out and ready.

“He-hey, uh. N-no need for that. I didn’t come here looking for a fight. I actually wanted to get you riled up so we could then use that energy into doing something for her. I- I know her situation with her mom isn’t great. I dunno the specifics, that’s for her to tell me when she’s ready, but…” He trailed off, trying to find the words.

“Well, I guess… I just want to make today lively for her, instead of having people walking on eggshells around her. Make her excited and happy that today happened, rather than add it to a growing pile of disappointing holidays.”

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

“you moron,” finally, he fully releases, instead staring dumbfounded at the other. he really did think he could just come around and say whatever, and still get his way without consequences. what single-minded, reckless, stupid drivel. yeah, qrow had been an idiot brained teen at one point, but seriously never that bad. he didn’t have that kinda energy. different plans took different tactics, did they not teach anything at Haven or Shade anymore?

“i don’t need to be ‘riled up’ to do something for my family, kid. couldn’t you just ask like a normal person? i promise you, me bein’ jazzed up ain’t the kinda lively she needs.”

eyes now round with sadness; his chest deflates; pointed corners of his mouth turn down. it’s too close to the belligerence he used to have - unprovoked, but drunk. he’s trying so hard to be better than that. for a lotta reasons, but Yang too.

he breathes in, and out, fingers running in and out over his forehead. once satisfied in processing all these thoughts, in having switched gears, he turns to Sun once more, hopefully coming off with the same rational attitude he wants in return, “so, then, turn your brain and your sense of respect on, and just tell me what you had in mind, huh?

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

“Well… That’s kinda the thing. I was hoping I could actually… Ask for your advice?”

He leans his back against the wall, tail swaying to and fro. His face spoke to the internal conflict he was struggling with when it came to this. In truth, he’d wanted to go about this like a normal person, more than anything. Something in him, however, be it a defense mechanism or just a general need for attention he’d never really received drove him to do everything to an excess.

Truth be told, nobody hated Sun’s antics more than he, himself.

“I… I’m going to try to be serious here, for a minute. It’s- It’s not something that comes easy.” He sighed and pinched at the bridge of his nose. “I’m… scared. I’m really, truly scared, Qrow, of how she makes me feel. How much it would hurt to lose her, or even see her hurting. I just get so caught up in my own head that I can’t think straight, and… I’ve never…”

Another sigh. “I’ve never had a family before. So I don’t know what to do to help someone who’s mourning theirs. But I see her hurting, and I want to help, and when I came to you, I swear, I wanted to just ask, but. …That would mean… Admitting I love her.”

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oh, here we go. this roller coaster again. what about his look or his life or any of his choices made him seem like someone to go to for advice? qrow barely scraped his own life together, and still dropped the pieces too many times. but somewhere along the line, somewhere in just trying to do good - for his team, for Oz, for his family, for Ruby, something must have slipped in to his very psyche, huh.

Ruby somehow always knows the right thing to do. Yang had told her.

I had good role models. Ruby had told him.

he’s cursed. and he wrestles with it every damn day. and while he’d never call it a good thing, maybe some people see themselves in that same fight. maybe he sees himself in theirs and their struggle to understand and express themselves, and that’s why even in the times he wants nothing to do with other people and their decisions, and he’s sure he’ll just mess everything up, he can’t help but listen. he can’t turn them away. doing so would do nothing to mend the wounds of a broken world. and in the end, continuing to try is the only way to stick it to Salem.

he takes a spot next to the young man against the wall, knee bending and sole kicking up as he leans, crosses his arms, turns his head to Sun and fixes his gaze on him.  

“yeah. loving people is scary. probably means you’re doin’ it right.”

qrow doesn’t know a damn thing about romance. not like that, anyway. he’s never been brave enough to face that very fear, to let someone that intimately close. almost, sometimes, maybe. somehow his chances always disappear before he’s quite there, only confirming those very fears. a great and terrible feedback loop, that. although, he can’t say such words are entirely unfamiliar; admittedly, the whole conversation is nostalgic. thrice over. he laughs, a bittersweet little huff, “…you sound just like her parents.”

that kinda love he knows, found, eventually. family. and if you ask him, they’re equally as scary to think of losing. “our family has never been the typical picket fence dream either, so don’t think you’re missin’ pieces of some non-existent normal. there’s no big secret about bein’ one, kid. you just gotta be there for each other.”

a palm-down hand raises to sweep across his body in a dismissive motion, “an’ not everything has to be some grand production to top the one before. trust me, i’ve screwed that up enough times to know.” qrow looks towards the ground, slides the toe of his shoe back and forth. “Yang, she… she’s used to people comin’ and goin’ in her life. if they come back at all. so, seriously… just go to her. be with her. she’s a tough egg, and too smart. she’ll tell you what she needs if you can just shut your giant trap enough to let her.”

[xxxrubytuesdayxxx]

If you give him the benefit of the doubt...

Word Count: 3,230

Disclaimers: This is part (47) of a Choose Your Own Ending!

Check at the end for glossary of Korean terms*

This one was also VERY hard to post as it’s got a little too much of my own personal stuff about JK in it but hopefully, if it makes even just one person smile, it’s worth it :) 

Start here:

“Aren’t you going to check on him?” Namjoon asks you, clearly itching to do so himself. “He can’t just wander off like that. Besides aren’t you guys…” he stops, embarrassed. You grin at him, even though you’re feeling far from jovial.

“Aren’t we what, Namjoon?” you prompt him, pretending to be genuinely curious. He mutters something about ‘never mind’ and returns to his coffee. 

Hoseok apparently has no such qualms.

“Fucking. Everyone knows you guys are fucking! I’m not playing these stupid games anymore, where everyone pretends they don’t know what’s going on with you two. Or with Yoongi and Mai, for that matter,” he adds as the others stare at him. You sigh and he looks a bit guilty, like he knows he’s crossed a line, and apologises hurriedly. You shake your head and smile at him to let him know he’s off the hook.

“Are you okay Hobi?” you ask him gently, leaning into his ear. “Do you want to come have a chat for a bit?” He looks hesitant, but nods slowly and you gesture across to one of the private rooms behind the meet and greet area. 

You address Namjoon as you follow Hoseok over:

“I’m not paid to babysit Jeon Jeongguk, Kim Namjoon. I love all of you equally on a professional level, and I’m currently on the clock. If you want to check on him, be my guest. I’m just going to trust him to come back when he says he will. If he doesn’t, we can both go find him, and I’ll owe you a beer.”

It turns out Hoseok has a personal issue he wants to deal with, but being J-Hope he has been trying to keep up his usual merry antics to the detriment of his own wellbeing. You scold him gently and arrange for him to have the next couple of days off to deal with some of his stuff. He doesn’t offer details and you know enough not to pry, but you wonder whether any of it is to do with his obvious feelings for Mai.

You manage to hold off on worrying about what Jeongguk is up to and he does rematerialise shortly before his half-hour cut-off, looking somewhat sly, which doesn’t exactly make you feel any better, but you shelve it for later…more specifically, when you find him sneaking off in a taxi, instead of getting in the van with the others…

“Spill Jeongguk,” you instruct him, saving the preamble. He licks his lips nervously, clearly not wanting to tell you.

“Look...it’s not what you think,” he defends himself, with all the cliche gaucheness of an adolescent surprised in an affair.

“And what exactly do I think?” you ask him, refusing to play his games.

“I’m...I mean...I don’t know,” he admits, scuffing his shoe on the road.

“I think you need to let me know where you are at all times for your own security, as well as that of the other members,” you remind him, more gently than you had intended to, taking in the crestfallen look on his face. He doesn’t look guilty, just embarrassed. Which is odd if your suspicions are correct.

“I told Namjoon and Taehyung,” he murmurs. You fold your arms.

“Shouldn’t they have updated me then?” you point out.

“I asked them not to...until after tonight…” he whispers, wretchedly.

“Oh…” you hesitate, now utterly confused. “Well okay. I’m assuming you have your reasons,” you allow. “But you know you can tell me anything, right?” you assure him. He nods, but doesn’t volunteer any further information.

"Off you go then,” you tell him, returning to the van pondering what to ask Namjoon and Tae about the whole situation, if anything. At least this somewhat explains their earlier shared look. You decide to just check that you needn’t worry and that Jeongguk is okay and safe. Namjoon assures you definitively that if he wasn’t then he and Tae wouldn’t have kept his secret. Curiouser and curiouser...you ponder.

Obviously your curiosity is further piqued when you subsequently receive a text from Jeongguk asking you to jump in the car he is sending to the apartment wearing ‘something seksi’ and not ask the driver any questions. You do as he asks, your brain whirling. What on earth is the boy planning? You smile at his phrasing, understanding at last why Namjoon and Tae looked less than thrilled when he snuck off earlier. The driver lets you out in front of an exclusive but little-known hotel, leaving you a note in Jeongguk’s handwriting, and you start to put the pieces together. Including why he hasn’t been spending as much on luxuries lately.

You step into the lobby wishing you hadn’t just blindly followed Jeongguk’s sartorial request as you’re drawing more attention than you generally want from strangers. You give your name, and ask for the room number the note specifies, upon which you’re handed a key by a sullen-looking concierge and directed up to the penthouse floor. The little minx is nowhere in sight when you finally open the door, but he’s spread the entire bed with rose petals and he’s obviously ordered room service, as there’s covered dishes laid out and champagne on ice. Your attention is pulled away from the table to the open french doors and you step onto the balcony. Jeongguk waits for you to draw in your breath, which you do at the view over Seoul and Hangang, before revealing himself. You’re barely able to draw in another breath as he comes into view, dressed as if he’s about to step on stage and looking like a snack. He steps across to take your hands.

“Be mine,” he asks you, sweet, but confident. You’re floored and you let him see it in your eyes. You smile and kiss him softly, lingering on his lips.

“I already am yours, Jeon Jeongguk. You’ve owned me since the day I met you,” you admit to him, finally able to speak those words. He shrugs, cute.

“Properly though. Not just in secret,” he clarifies. Unable to think of anything to say, you kiss him again. A different kind of hunger in his eyes, he pulls you insistently towards the bed, forgetting all his careful preparations.

“You look too seksi for me to eat dinner first,” he defends himself preemptively.

“You told me to wear something seksi. Your exact words,” you laugh gently. He smiles, unrepentant, and kisses you messily, drawing your tongue out with his.

“Your dinner will get cold,” you provoke him, placing your hand on his chest. “Besides you look pretty damn banging yourself, but you don’t see me trying to rip your clothes off. It’s good to wait for things sometimes. Anticipation heightens the reward.” You pull him back to the table, ignoring his protests.

“Argh! You tease!” he objects, desire making his eyes sparkle.

“You’d know something about being a tease, wouldn’t you Jeongguk-ah?” you remind him. “You think I didn’t notice you undressing me with your eyes while you were meant to be answering fan questions this afternoon? Joonie was about ready to kick me out of the room, before they started asking really uncomfortable questions.

“I wanted to be in bed with you, not up there on stage,” he states simply. “You know that I can’t give you me the way you can give me you: it’s too tricky with ARMY and BTS. But sometimes I wish I could.” Too many emotions are running through you, so you just kiss him softly, then change the subject.

“So this teasing...is there a particular part of you I’m teasing?” you enquire, letting your fingertips brush the front of his tight, black jeans. He gasps and drops his hands instinctively to protect himself, biting his lip and squeezing his eyes shut to shift his focus. You guide his hands up to your chest, letting him slip them inside your bra under your dress to fondle your breasts. You can feel your nipples getting as hard as his dick. He slips the dress off your shoulders and catches one nipple between his lips, making you experience an insistent pulse between your legs, then lifts you up onto the edge of the little table, pushing the plates carefully aside to make room.

“Your dinner…” you protest weakly.

“Can you please…[he gathers the English words carefully from his memory] Ah! Sit down...on my...face?” he requests. You give him an incredulous look, but a smirk slips involuntarily across your lips.

“Oh my God  Kookie! You didn’t get that from papago…What have you been watching, you pretty little chang-nyo?” you ask him rhetorically, figuring he’s been into Namjoon’s not-so-secret stash of western porn as well as his own hentai. He hooks a finger into the top of your knickers and tries to pull them off, but he’s impeded by your hand, firmly gripping his. Undeterred, he slips two of the fingers from his other hand into your knickers and up inside you, making you gasp.

“Jojotkkuna. Naege manneul juda,” he whispers, lifting his fingers to his tongue without waiting for a reply.

“Wow. Such an impatient brat,” you tease him. “Look...how about I feed you some of this food you’ve gone to so much trouble to organise?” you suggest. “Would that be an acceptable compromise?” He mulls this over then hops off his chair to collect one of the champagne bottles, some strawberries and, somewhat incongruously, a can of whipped cream. Uh-oh...His lips twist in that distinctive way he has when he’s about to cause trouble.

“Don’t you dare…” you warn him futilely, with your hands up to stop him. He grins wickedly, before attacking you with the whipped cream, then spraying you with the champagne. “I kind of don’t want to ask about the strawberries…” you comment, catching your breath after the unprovoked attack. He doesn’t answer, but lifts you back up onto the edge of the table and licks some of the cream and champagne off your chest and neck.

“Yum,” he appraises, giving you one of his utterly adorable little smiles, before slipping your panties off with one swift motion and then, to your startlement, inserting one of his damn strawberries up between your legs, right where he wants it. You figure he did ask politely before taking matters into his own hands, so you just sigh at his sass.

“Kookie, ani,” you try faintly, as you feel his tongue teasing around the fruit. “Oh fuck...Jeongguk...oh God, you feel good…” You give up as he extracts it, slurps it into his mouth, and then replaces it with his way-too-adept tongue. He sits back, when he’s done, looking somewhat like the cat that got the cream, and licks his lips. You stare at him incredulously. “Wow! I never realised just how much of a little slut you were that whole time I thought you were an innocent bunny,” you blurt out. “I mean I know, I know - that whole ‘what tastes good in Busan?’ thing but holy shit! Do you even have a conscience? You must have driven so many girls wild for you to just walk out of their lives the next morning.”

“Who says I waited til the next morning?” he sasses you. “Besides. I’m your slut now, aren’t I?” he reminds you, sulking a little. You laugh gently and kiss his pout.

“That’s weirdly the sweetest thing I’ve ever heard,” you acknowledge. “I’m sorry, baby. I was just a bit...taken aback…” you explain. “So do I get to make you scream now then?” He smiles slyly.

“Dinner first?” he suggests.

“Ugh you minx!” you yelp, knowing he’s only doing this to punish you. “Fine. You make everything how you want it and I’ll go wash up seeing as somebody made me all sticky.” His smile turns into a smirk, but he nods his agreement.

“Anyway what happened to you being all hot for it before?” you ask. He shrugs.

“I just wanted to make you as wild for me as I was for you,” he comments.

“I always am, you little monster,” you assure him, leaning down to kiss him again. But you can’t resist needling him just a little, so you whisper “it’s just that I’m older than you, so I can keep it in my pants.” He twists his lips into the same defiant look he conjures when he thinks he’s being ‘challenged’, then ruins his ‘too dignified to enter into this’ charade by sticking his tongue out at you. You capture his tongue with yours and climb onto his lap, as his kisses become more and more passionate. You stop him, pretending you can’t see his erection straining against the tailored black denim of his jeans, when he slips a hand up your skirt.

“I’m going to tear your clothes off the second we’ve eaten, sex-kitten” you tell him, deliberately echoing his words at Bambam’s party, and making him smile and lower his lashes in mock-submission.

You’re as quick as you can be in the shower, but when you come back out Jeongguk has already set up the table and barbecue equipment and you can smell meat cooking. He looks up at you with an odd mixture of pride and anxiety on his face. “I’m doing the meat for us,” he mutters, blushing and looking back down at his handiwork. You sit in one of the chairs backwards, to watch him. He picks up one of the finished pieces and gently feeds it to you with the beautifully-lacquered hotel chopsticks. “Is it okay?” he checks.

“Mm, yes. Delicious.” you reassure him. He smiles sweetly. After you’ve both finished eating, you place your hand on his leg and squeeze it lightly. It doesn’t seem right to keep your promise to just callously ravish him, when he’s gone to all this effort.

“Gomapssumnida, Jeongguk-ah,” you tell him. “This whole night is really special and thoughtful and the dinner was perfect.” He gives you another of his cute bunny smiles, then comes around the table to lift you in his arms, causing you to throw your own arms around his neck and kiss him passionately. He returns your kisses hotly and sloppily as he carries you carefully across the carpet then onto the tiles surrounding the hot-tub in his fancy cuban-heeled dress boots. He lets you down and sits on the edge of the tub, looking at you, doe-eyed and expectant.

“Can I please undress you, yoppeun kkonminam?” you ask him, overwhelmed, as ever, by his delicate beauty.

“Algesseo,” he murmurs, looking shy. You remove his gorgeous, brocade jacket, and then pull his black, tailored shirt loose from the waistband of his jeans, kissing him deeply as you do so. He tosses his bangs coquettishly, making his silver earrings dance, and you kiss his neck, lingering on his collarbone, as you let your fingers work blindly on his buttons. You slide the sleeves of the silky shirt down his arms, and he flings his head back, letting his breath out in an extended sigh as the garment slips to the floor. You bring your hands back around to stroke his now-naked chest and play with his swiftly-hardening nipples.

“Ssibal...Fuck me already, noona,” he breathes. “I can’t wait any longer. Naneun neoreul wonhae.” He takes your face in his hands and bewitches you with his kisses, nipping your bottom lip impatiently, as you fumble hurriedly with his belt buckle and zippers. You put a hand up to his lips and he draws one of your fingers into his mouth, his breath hitching as he bites down gently on it. You ease his jeans down his beautifully toned legs, then lean down to remove his boots and socks, making him giggle. You pause to drink in his loveliness, as he closes his eyes and inhales deeply.

“Jebal,” he begs, his voice coming from somewhere deep in his throat. You slide his Calvin Klein briefs down and drop them with the rest of his discarded clothes,  letting your hands caress every inch of him with languorous strokes.

“I can’t believe how lucky I am to be yours,” you murmur. He smiles cheekily and raises his eyebrows, his eyes still closed.

“Do me a favour then, and take your clothes off,” he tells you. You laugh and do as he asks, then come over to him. He opens his gorgeously-dark eyes and winks at you, reaching for you to pull you into another kiss. This time his hands explore your body as avidly as yours are caressing his. Eventually he stands up and pulls you with him into the bubbling water, tapping your legs to indicate that you should straddle him when he sits down. You lower yourself onto his erection and he gasps loudly, then groans softly. You share feverish kisses as you bounce yourself up and down on him, both of you giving free reign to a litany of moans as you enjoy each other.

Feeling your orgasm threatening, you tense yourself up and look down at your angelic-faced lover, who is biting his own lip in an obvious attempt to outlast you.

“Uh...Oh God...Noona...wait...” he pleads, his voice coming out of his throat with a husky edge to it. The feel of his cock sliding up and down inside you is making you tingle and his voice sounding so needy like that makes it even harder to hold back, but you manage, tightening your muscles around him and speeding up to coax him to climax first.

“Oh fuck,” he cusses, in English, as you feel him cum. His eyes are at half-mast and his lips parted just the right amount. He looks sexy enough to tempt even a saint to indiscretions. Being no saint, your body swiftly succumbs to its delayed orgasm, and you collapse by his side, snaking your arm around his waist to pull him against you with your last remaining strength. He cuddles into you like a kitten.

“Take me to bed jagiya?” he murmurs sleepily, his head falling onto your shoulder against your neck, his dark hair damp and curling prettily where it’s been touched by the water and the mist. You kiss his perfect mouth, then lace your fingers with his, guiding him up the shallow stairs, towards the rose-petal strewn king-sized bed. He crawls under the covers and pulls you in after him, wrapping you in his arms and legs. You’re drifting halfway to heaven when you hear his phone chime.

“I’m not here,” he sighs into your hair, tossing you the phone from under his pillow. Shaking your head indulgently, you unlock the screen and read the message from Namjoon: “BigHit want you to do fanservice tonight, due to your extreme lack of enthusiasm this afternoon. Can you please do a V Live before you go to sleep?” You read this out loud to your pretty baby, who grunts noncommittally, clearly unimpressed with the content.

“Tomorrow,” he mumbles. You text Namjoon back from his phone, telling him Jeongguk is already asleep, but you’ll ask him when he wakes up. It’s the first time you’ve outright lied for him, but you suspect it won’t be the last. You slip the phone onto his nightstand, turn the light out and drift the rest of the way to heaven in his arms.

THE END

Glossary: (feel free to submit corrections for these ^.^)

Chang-nyo (창녀) Whore (Obviously affectionately here though!)

Jojotkkuna. Naege manneul juda (젖었구나. 내게 맛를 주다) You’re wet. Give me a taste.

Gomapssumnida (고맙숩니다) Thank you (formal/polite)

Yoppeun kkonminam (여쁜 꽃미남) Pretty “flower boy” (traditional Korean, not properly translatable)

Algesseo (알겠어) Okay/Alright

Naneun noreul wonhae (나는 너를 원해) I want you.

Jebal (제발) Please...

[mikauzoran]

Marichat/Adrienette: The Rejects Club: Chapter Twenty-Six: Embrace

The Rejects Club: Chapter Twenty-Six: Embrace

(One day, I need to go back and make sure all of these chapters are on here because they definitely aren’t at present. -.-;)

“Does Plagg have unsupervised access to the internet?” Marinette texts Chat as they sit in homeroom, waiting for classes to start for the day.

Adrien blinks down at his screen. “I let him use the computer while I do homework or practice piano or whatever. This sounds ominous. Why do you ask?”

Marinette replies with a link which he forwards to Adrien’s phone before he can open it.

He is not expecting a Princess Noir comic. He’s not expecting to get sucked into a fictionalized version of his life where Marinette—or “Adrienne”, rather—is in love with him and he loves her and things are so obviously going to work out after a few trials and some tribulations.

He only remembers that Marinette is probably waiting for a response after he’s read the first scene—the balcony scene where Chat Noir saves Adrienne from being akumatized after her boyfriend breaks up with her.

He switches back to Chat’s flip phone where a string of texts from Marinette is waiting for him: “Do you think Plagg would do this?” “It’s pretty obvious that the creator was present to hear our actual dialogue.” “I mean, some things have obviously been changed to protect our privacy,” “but sometimes APlaggOnBothYourHouses lifts direct quotations from our conversations.”

“Yep. This looks like Plagg’s drawing style,” Adrien types back.

No wonder Plagg could doodle that chaise sketch of Marinette so quickly. He had had plenty of practice drawing Princess.

“I’ll have him take it down” After Adrien binge-reads the entire thing and saves the files for personal viewing. “and talk to him about acceptable usage of the internet. I’m so sorry, Princess.”

Marinette deliberates for a minute before she answers, “He doesn’t have to take it down.” “I’ve only read bits and pieces,” “but it doesn’t look like there’s anything too objectionable in it.” “You’ll notice that while Princess is an exact representation, Adrienne doesn’t look much like me.” “I’m sure it’s the same for you and Marin.” “Alya is obsessed with this,” “and I’d think my best friend would be the first to accost me” “if there was anything in there that outted me.” “If you don’t mind this being out there, I’m okay with it.”

Internally, Adrien does his victory dance. He will still be giving give his kwami the scolding of a lifetime, but he’ll let the artist continue. Maybe it will give Adrien some idea of what to do. Maybe he can plagiarize some of Marin’s best lines because, just going by the first scene, there are a lot of them in there that Chat has never actually used.

“Okay. I’ll monitor him. If you’d like, you can review the existing content and let me know if there’s anything you want him to cut out,” he offers judiciously.

“That’s okay.” Marinette knows better than to let herself get caught up in a romcom of her life. “I’ve already lived it.” “I don’t need to read it.” “Some ground rules:” “No explicit sex scenes or sex acts.” “Sex can be implied, but not depicted.”

Adrien nearly drops the phone as his brain plummets into the gutter.

“No nudity.” “Drawing me in a bra or swimsuit is fine,” “but I demand my breasts remain covered and my pants stay on.”

Adrien really wishes she would stop giving him ideas when he’s trapped in a classroom and going to have to focus on school in less than ten minutes.

“Don’t give away my true identity.” “That’s it for now.” “I’ll let you know if I come up with anything else.”

“Okay. I’ll let him know,” Adrien replies simply, trying to get himself to breathe regularly and not think about anything Marinette just typed.

“You okay, Mec?” Nino whispers from beside him. “Your face looks like a cherry.”

Adrien puts his phone away and groans softly. “I’ll be fine once I’m distracted. Secret Girlfriend has been unintentionally yanking my chain this morning.”

Nino’s concerned frown intensifies. “What’d she say?”

Adrien shakes his head, hiding his face in his hands. “She didn’t mean it in a suggestive way, but she was talking about…sex involving the two of us.”

Suddenly a thought occurs to Adrien, and he lowers his hands with a smack against the top of the desk, whipping his head around to give Nino a warning glare. “I’m swearing you to secrecy on this, by the way. Tell Alya that I have a secret girlfriend, and…” He lets the threat hang between them, unfinished. “I don’t want this getting back to Marinette. I will be livid, Nino.”

Nino nods, suitably cowed. “My lips are sealed, but…Adrien…are you sleeping with this girl?”

Adrien nearly chokes on air, and his face lights up red like a Chinese lantern once more. “N-No! I’ve…” He lowers his voice. “…never slept with anyone. She’s just…we’re not even together.”

Nino nods slowly. “So you’re not cheating on her by pursuing Marinette?”

Adrien shakes his head emphatically. “I would never cheat. Especially not on Marinette.”

Nino continues to nod. “Well. I’m seriously confused. Shall we drop this?”

Adrien sighs and agrees. “Probably for the best. It’s too complicated to explain.”

“So long as Marinette doesn’t find out and think you’re playing with her,” Nino warns.

Adrien gulps. He could explain his “secret girlfriend” away simply by showing her the texts, but that’s not the way he wants the reveal to go.

He reaches up to run a hand through his hair, but then he remembers the gel.

 Roll call is well underway when an announcement comes over the PA system: “Adrien Agreste. Marinette Dupain-Cheng. Please report to the principal’s office.”

Adrien looks up from Scene Two of Plagg’s Princess Noir comic and blinks in owl-eyed surprise.

The message repeats, and he can hear Marinette groan behind him.

“I’ve been here less than an hour, and I haven’t even done anything yet today,” Marinette grumbles as Adrien opens the door for her. “Thank you.”

They step into the hall, beginning their trek, and it abruptly hits her.

“Unless Chloé lodged a complaint about me physically assaulting you in the locker room this morning. Shoot.”

“Chloé wouldn’t do that,” Adrien protests. “She knows how I—uh…”

What? “feel about you”?

“Adrien, I know you two are old buddies, but that is exactly the kind of thing that Chloé would do. Getting other people akumatized, in trouble, and/or blamed for something that’s her fault are her specialties, and she kind of hates my guts,” Marinette patiently explains over her shoulder. “This reeks of Chloé.”

“Then why was I summoned?” Adrien wonders.

“To testify against me,” Marinette answers with a nod of certainty. “So, you do realize this is every man for himself, right? I’m totally throwing you under the bus and saying that you started it. Who would believe that you’re the victim here? You’ve got a full head on me and at least fifteen kilos.”

Her tone is light, and he can’t tell if she’s joking. It doesn’t sound like something Marinette would do, though, even if she were cross with him.

“But I did start it,” Adrien replies, confused as to why there’s any doubt surrounding the chain of events.

Marinette stops and turns to arch an eyebrow at him. “I kicked you in the shin and shoved you.”

He shrugs and keeps walking. “I was sexually harassing you. You acted in self-defence.”

“How was any of that sexual harassment?” Marinette scoffs, hurrying to catch up.

“What? You mean the way I kissed your wrist and your hair? Blatantly flirted with you? Called you pet names even after you told me to stop?” Adrien recounts miserably, revisiting all the ways he has messed up.

“Well, I was harassing you too, then,” Marinette argues, determined to take the blame. “I called you Minou and scratched behind your ear and rang your bell.”

“Princess—Sorry. Marinette,” he corrects. “I liked all those things. It’s different if the person you’re doing things to consents. As it stands, you’re only guilty of bruising my fragile feelings.”

“And your shin,” she adds woefully. “Is it starting to bruise? Does it hurt? I’m really sorry about that. I wasn’t thinking.”

“My shin is fine,” he lies. It’s still painfully throbbing. “You didn’t get me that hard. There’s not a mark on me.”

She comes to a halt in front of him. “Prove it,” she challenges. “Lift up your pant leg.”

He complies, lifting the right leg to reveal a spotless shin. “See?”

“I kicked your left shin. What? You thought I wouldn’t notice?” she inquires wryly.

“No, it was definitely the right one.” He sticks to his guns, hoping he can bluff his way out of this.

“I may be slightly ambidextrous with my hands, but I’m definitely right-footed. I kicked your left shin. If there’s nothing there, it won’t do any harm to show me that one also, right?” She corners him.

He hesitates.

“Don’t make me pull up your pant leg myself. I don’t want to assault you any more than I already have today,” Marinette coaxes.

With a sigh, Adrien lifts the other pant leg and observes with her the beginnings of a bruise.

“…That’s from basketball the other day,” he insists, voice level and impassive.

She shakes her head and whispers, “Sorry” once more for good measure. “Adrien, if someone ever hurts you, don’t hide it. Tell someone, and tell them the truth, okay?”

“I would,” he assures, resuming their walk and picking up the pace. He most likely wouldn’t. “but this kind of thing doesn’t really happen anymore.”

She gives a start. “Anymore? Someone’s hurt you before?”

“No,” he answers firmly. “It’s not like that. I’ve never been abused. I just meant…sometimes my mother had one of her meltdowns and slapped me—not hard,” he hurriedly amends. “Not hard enough to leave a mark, and she was always sorry for it afterwards. I was a complete brat anyway. I pushed her until she went over the edge sometimes; it’s not like it was unprovoked…. That’s all that I meant. No one’s hit me since my mother went missing, so…it’s not an issue. Father would never hit me. I heard from my mother that his father used to hit him, so…so my father would never hit me.”

Marinette doesn’t know what to say. It reminds her of Chat, and she never knows what to say to Chat either. She settles on a comforting sigh of, “Oh, Adrien.”

“It’s not like that,” Adrien reiterates softly. “I’ve been modeling since I was two. Someone would have noticed if I had marks on me often. It wasn’t like that.”

Marinette relents, unable to say for sure what it was or was not like without further evidence. “Okay,” she agrees. “But if someone does ever hurt you, that’s not something you hide and forgive and cover up for them, even if you do love them and want to protect them. You need to say something.”

Adrien stops dead as Marinette’s words strike a chord she hadn’t been aiming for, hadn’t even known existed.

“Adrien?” she calls, expression slowly twisting into a deep frown of concern at his sudden pallor and the horror evident on his face.

“Marinette, what would you do if someone you loved was doing something bad?” he wonders quietly.

“Talk to them about it and see if I could get them to stop,” she replies without thinking too hard. “Do they know they’re doing something bad?”

“I don’t know if they see it as bad. I don’t know if they understand the impact of their actions on others,” he mumbles, starting to walk again. “…I don’t know if I can ask him.”

“…Is your father hurting anyone?” she carefully begins to pry.

Adrien considers for a moment, even though he knows the answer is yes—mentally, if not physically. He knows many a Parisian has been scarred by Papillon mentally, even if Ladybug fixes all the physical damage.

“No,” Adrien lies. “He’s not physically harming anyone, no. Just…honestly, it’s not much different than his usual verbal abuse and emotionally traumatizing people,” he reasons.

A thought occurs to him, causing him to stop and catch her by the wrist. “Marinette, never work for my father, okay? I have contacts at other houses; we can get you an interview anywhere else you want, but don’t apply at Gabriel, okay?”

She nods, obviously taken aback by the intensity of his words.

He nods in return, satisfied, and lets go, moving forward once more. “I’ll…try to talk to him.” There has to be some way to get Gabriel to realize the magnitude of what he’s doing.

“But what do I do if he doesn’t stop?” Adrien wonders, terror-stricken at the thought.

“Is this something the police should know about, or something more benign?” Marinette holds her breath.

“Something he should probably be in jail for,” Adrien whispers, trying again and again failing to wrap his mind around the thoughts, “Your father should be in jail”; “Your father is a criminal”; “Your father hurts people”; “You’re not stopping him”; “You’re just as bad”.

“Is it unforgivable of me to keep quiet about something like this? I feel like…maybe I’m just as guilty as he is for letting this go on,” he adds in a small voice, letting her see a tiny piece of his shame.

He doesn’t know how he’s actually going to tell her. “Will you marry me? By the way, your future father-in-law is Papillon. Hope you don’t mind” does not sound like a wise idea.

Marinette hesitates. It takes her the entire length of his speech plus an additional few seconds to gather courage enough to slip her hand into his and squeeze. She doesn’t allow herself to think about how this is her crush she’s touching. She forces herself to remember, “This is your friend, and he’s in pain right now”.

“Don’t let your father’s wrongs weigh on your conscience, Adrien. If he gets caught, cooperate. Until then, talk to him and do your best to get him to stop and make reparations on his own where possible. I don’t know what your father has done, and I don’t need to know, but you are not your father, and what he’s doing is not your fault.”

Adrien sighs deeply, tightening his grip on her hand as if she’s tethering him to sanity. He realizes that his grip is perhaps a bit too hard and forces his hold to relax a bit. “You know, I’m really relieved that you didn’t yell at me,” he whispers.

“Why would I?” she asks, baffled and wondering where this is coming from. Where any of this is coming from.

“I’m a selfish coward. I’ve been dithering over this for a long time; this isn’t recent,” he laughs darkly.

She increases the pressure of her squeeze. “…I don’t think I’d be able to turn my parents in to the police,” she offers.

He shakes his head. “You would find the strength to do the right thing. You’re like Ladybug. You would sacrifice your comfort and happiness for others. You would do the right thing.”

“It’s not just comfort and happiness.” she remarks. “It’s your family.” She knows how important that is to him. She knows some of the personal injustices that Adrien has forgiven his father for over the years out of love and desperation not to let what little remains of his family fracture further.

“Try not to let it weigh on you,” she urges. “Talk to him the next chance you get. He loves you, Adrien. I’ve seen evidence of how much he loves you. If anyone can convince him to stop, it’s you.”

A fragile smile begins to form on Adrien’s lips as he gives in and lets her reassurances wash over him. He knows her answers would probably be different if he came out and said, “My father is Papillon”, but, for now, he lets himself enjoy the simple pleasure of feeling her skin against his, no leather suit between them.

His thumb traces lazy circles on her palm, and he slows their pace, greedy for more time in this moment.

They’re alone in the hall, holding hands as they walk, and he can almost imagine a future where she knows everything and chooses him anyway.

“I love…your friendship.”

He can feel her give a start through their joined hands.

“You’re really amazing, and I’m glad to have you in my life.” He says what he wants to say without really saying what he means. “Thank you, Marinette.”

“Y-You’re welcome,” she manages to reply. It strikes her how not over him she is. His words make her insides melt. “Anytime,” she adds breathily as every swirl of his thumb over her flesh makes her stomach flutter.

She briefly remembers Chat and feels a twinge of guilt, but it doesn’t last long because Adrien turns and smiles at her vaguely reminiscent of the way Chat looks at Ladybug.

“I mean it,” he stresses. “You’re extraordinary, and I’m a blind fool for not realizing the extent of how magnificent you are before.”

He brings their joined hands up to his lips and sends one of Chat’s smiles her way.

She gulps as he lets go and pushes open the door to the principal’s office.

“Ah, Miss Dupain-Cheng. Monsieur Agreste,” Principal Damocles greets in a too civil tone that indicates storm clouds on the horizon. “Come in.”

“Monsieur Damocles, if this is about what happened in the locker room this morning, I can explain,” Adrien leads in while Marinette is still off balance. “It’s all my fault.”

Principal Damocles arches a bushy eyebrow and inquires, “What happened in the locker room this morning?”

Adrien blinks. “Nothing. Why do you ask?” he questions in a perfect counterfeit of confusion, as if he himself were not the one to introduce the topic in the first place.

Principal Damocles gives Adrien an odd look but clears his throat and then presses forward with the speech he had originally intended to give. “I’ve summoned you both to my office this morning because Madame Mendeleiev has complained to me about you two disrupting class yesterday afternoon.”

Marinette and Adrien wince in tandem.

“Passing notes, having side discussions, texting each other,” Damocles enumerates, ticking the offenses off on his fingers.

Marinette frowns. She knows the identity of her texting partner, but whom was Adrien talking to?

“Running out of class faking a medical emergency to play hooky together,” Damocles continues sternly. “I have to say we are quite disappointed in you two, and we cannot allow this to continue. Miss Dupain-Cheng, you are class representative and should be setting the example for your peers.” 

Marinette flinches at the accusation, feeling the words heavily upon her shoulders.

“Monsieur Agreste, we’ve come to expect better from you. I’m sure your father will be disappointed as well.”

Adrien bites the inside of his cheek to control the involuntary grimace threatening to materialize.

“What do you two have to say for yourselves?” the principal intones imperiously.

“I’m really sorry, Sir,” Marinette mumbles, scuffing at the floor with her toe, eyes downcast.

Adrien steps forward in front of Marinette, as if to defend her. “I’m sorry, Monsieur Damocles. This is all a misunderstanding, and it’s entirely my fault. You shouldn’t punish Marinette; she’s the victim in this.”

Marinette’s head snaps up, and she looks at him incredulously. “What?”

Damocles frowns, severe eyebrows folding together. “How so, Monsieur Agreste? Please continue.”

Adrien takes another step towards the principal’s desk wearing a contrite and pained expression of acute embarrassment. “Last week,” he begins. “Monday evening, I told Marinette how I felt about her and asked her to go out with me.”

Marinette’s eyes go wide, and she nearly falls over. She finds herself once again wondering what alternate universe she’s temporarily slipped into.

Principal Damocles leans forward ever so slightly in interest and nods for Adrien to keep going.

Adrien grimaces, averting his eyes and rubbing at the back of his neck. He drops his voice into a disheartened mumble. “Only…she said no because there’s already someone else that she likes.” He doesn’t have to feign the hurt undercurrent to his lines. He knows exactly what it’s like to be passed by for someone else courtesy of Ladybug.

Damocles frowns sympathetically.

Tentatively, Adrien peeks up, looking thoroughly ashamed of himself. “Unfortunately, I’m having a hard time taking no for an answer. You know what spoiled rich brats are like, Monsieur Damocles; you’ve been dealing with Chloé for years now.”

The principal nods, a sour, knowing look making its way to his face at the thought.

“And while I try to do a better job than she does,” Adrien explains, “I still have entitlement issues. I struggle with the concept of not being able to have what I want, so I’m afraid that I’ve been driving Marinette up the wall all week, trying to get her to change her mind.”

Adrien is quiet for a moment before he lets out an enormous sigh. “I’m sorry.” He looks back at Marinette and repeats the words, softer and more like a caress. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what I’m doing. I just want you to like me the way that I like you…but I guess hounding you like a fox isn’t going to accomplish that, is it?”

He turns back to Damocles and resumes his narrative. “Yesterday I was being particularly persistent. The reason she ran out of class was because I upset her so much she physically had to get away from me. Please don’t punish her, Monsieur Damocles. I’m the one in the wrong, and I’m really sorry.”

He looks at Marinette once more, and he doesn’t have to fake the regret in his eyes and on his face. “I’m sorry for Monday.”

Her eyes fly wide.

He knows.

Her lips tremble as she opens them to speak, to tell him, no, she is the one who is sorry for Monday. He didn’t do anything wrong. She’s the one who’s wronged him.

The words don’t come. All she can do is shake her head and start to tear up.

She might not know this boy like she thought she did, but, in moments like this, she knows she was right to love him. He may not be the person she put on a pedestal and worshipped for four years, but he is definitely someone she could well and truly love.

“I’m sorry for hurting you, Marinette, and I’m sorry for all the times I made you cry. You’re really important to me, so I hope we can find some way to repair our friendship.” He gives her a small, nervous smile as if unsure if his next step will find solid ground or thin air.

“Oh, Adrien,” she chokes, nodding emphatically. “I’m so sorry. I’m so, so sorry. I’ve been such a jerk to you, and then you go and do something like this, and…I don’t know how I’m ever going to apologize enough.”

He shrugs and gives her a patented Adrien Agreste wink. “It’s okay. We’ll settle later. For now, I’m just grateful that you’re talking to me in full and complete sentences.”

Marinette is tempted to smack herself in the face and hide behind her palms. It doesn’t take much tempting before she gives in and does so. “On Saturday, you implied it was cute when I stuttered,” she grumbles from behind her protective shield.

Adrien snickers, letting a little Chat slip into his voice. “Yeah, but it’s sexy when you look me in the eye, shove me, and verbally tear me to pieces. I like that razor-sharp tongue of yours.”

Marinette makes a high-pitched noise of abject distress and is only kept vertical by how rigid her body has become.

Adrien winces. “Sorry. I’m still coming on too strong, aren’t I?” He turns penitently to Principal Damocles. “I’m sorry. You see what she’s been dealing with all week? You can’t punish her. I’m going to try to get my act together and stop harassing her, but if you feel the need to give me detention or have a parent teacher conference with my father’s secretary, I more than deserve it.”

“No, you don’t,” Marinette interjects, finally finding her footing. “Monsieur Damocles, this isn’t Adrien’s fault; it’s mine.”

Adrien turns to Marinette so that his back is to Damocles and the principal can’t see his face. He puts a finger over his lips, silently urging her not to throw away the cover story he has constructed for her.

“Marinette, it’s not that I don’t appreciate it, but you don’t have to lie to protect me,” he gently informs.

“B-But…” Isn’t that what you’re doing for me? “He doesn’t even know why I ran out of class, does he? And he’s still…”

Later, she will site this as the moment she fell in love with Adrien Agreste the second time.

“All right,” Principal Damocles sighs, having seen enough. “You two may go back to class. Monsieur Agreste, consider this your warning. Don’t let this happen again. Miss Dupain-Cheng, if you continue to experience problems with Monsieur Agreste, I expect to be informed.”

“Yes, Monsieur Damocles,” they reply out of sync.

Adrien opens the door for Marinette, and they slip out into the hallway, Marinette collapsing back against the wall with a pronounced sigh.

“I didn’t mean for you to throw yourself under the bus,” she scolds. “Adrien, I was kidding.”

Adrien shrugs offhandedly. “It was a choice between both of us getting in trouble or just me getting in trouble. The correct answer was obvious. Besides, I’d say things worked out pretty well.”

She frowns, slowly taking him in in his black jeans, lime green t-shirt, and black leather jacket. He looks good in Chat’s colors, and she’s forced to admit that she’s still interested, despite her growing feelings for Chat.

“Thank you,” she whispers. “Thank you for doing that. It’s more kindness than I’ve earned.”

He rolls his eyes. “You need to stop beating yourself up. I don’t know what you and Chat were talking about yesterday, but it’s none of Monsieur Damocles’s business. I’m okay with him thinking that I was the one texting you who upset you. I don’t care if he thinks I’m a selfish prick, so long as you know the truth.” He gives her a smile fit to electrocute.

She has to wonder, “Who were you texting yesterday?”

Adrien’s brain freezes for a second. It recovers, and he smiles easily. “Chloé.”

“Oh.” Marinette nods. That’s an acceptable answer. “Well…thank you…Minou,” she tacks on as a reward and smiles when it makes him light up.

She reaches out and gives the bell on the choker around his neck a tentative tap. “You’re awesome, Minou.”

Every nerve in Adrien’s body is singing at the sinful things she’s doing to him. In his head, he chants, “Don’t kiss her. Don’t kiss her. Don’t kiss her. Don’t kiss her.”

All without breaking eye contact, he takes her hand and gives the side of her index finger a kiss that involves the slightest brush of teeth.

Marinette’s breath hitches. She may have found some of his buttons (touching the bell and calling him “Minou” are obviously turn-ons), but he’s got his fingers on her triggers too.

“You’re very welcome,” he purrs, nuzzling her hand.

Both Chat and Adrien seem to have a thing about her hands.

“I’d fall on the sword for you anytime…Princess,” he whispers the last word, kissing her hand deferentially and dipping into one of Chat’s bows.

Her breath catches in her throat as she sees double.

Twins. They have to be. How else could two people be more alike? But she’s already chased her tail concerning this theory. As much as it must be true, it every bit as much can’t be true.

Adrien straightens up and gives a look of concern at her silence. He lets go of her hand. “Marinette? I-I’m sorry. That was crossing a line, wasn’t it?” he sputters, once again afraid that he’s ruined everything. “I—”

“—N-No,” she quickly assures, shaking her head and scattering the tears that have begun to fall in the process.

One lands on the back of his hand.

“You’re fine. You’re wonderful, Adrien. I just…”

…am feeling confused and overwhelmed and pulled in two directions.

“You’re both so good and sweet and forgiving…” she mumbles. 

She shakes her head again. She shouldn’t be around him. He’s pulling her back in. It would be so easy to fall into his arms now that he’s finally interested, but…that would hurt Chat. Again…. Still. It would finally prove to her without a doubt that Marinette is still Ladybug, even without the suit…in the worst way possible. She needs to get away from Adrien and stay away for her own sake as much as for Chat’s.

“Sorry,” she hiccups. “Excuse me. I have to—”

She begins to make a dash for it, but she only gets two or three meters before she remembers the previous morning: the devastated, lonely, hurt look on Adrien’s face when she started to run away. The expression of misery that made her invite him on a picnic with their friends.

She turns back and catches the same pain and disappointment and confusion before he can hide it.

She’s hurting him. He’s done nothing wrong, and she’s torturing him for it. This has to stop. Even if it’s difficult, she has to suck it up and be there for both of her boys.

Marinette takes a deep breath and goes back to leaning up against the wall in front of him, even as her tears continue to fall.

Adrien quirks an eyebrow, looking like he wants to say something but is unsure what the correct thing is.

“I’m tired of running away,” she explains simply. “I’m tired of being a coward and freaking out and causing drama for myself and others. Is this okay? I know I’m probably making you uncomfortable, and I’m sorry about that. I’m trying to stop, but…” She shrugs helplessly. “Is this okay, or would you rather I go?”

“Stay,” he entreats. “I mean…Does it make you uncomfortable to have me looking at you while you’re crying?”

She shrugs again, wiping at her face with both hands. “I don’t care. I’m beyond caring right now. I’m sure it’s not very attractive, but I’m kind of over it.”

Adrien squashes the kneejerk reaction to tell her she’s always attractive. Somehow, he doesn’t think it will help. Chat is tempted to tell her how beautiful she looked in the moonlight last Monday with her hair blowing free and the tear tracks still fresh on her face.

“Not appropriate, Agreste.”

“I mean,” Marinette chuckles darkly, “you might as well get to see a glimpse of my ugly side.”

“I won’t hold it against you,” he assures. “I’m an ugly crier myself.”

She blinks in surprise. “You cry?”

“…All the time?” he laughs ironically, half-heartedly trying to play it off as a joke. “But don’t tell my father; I’m not allowed to have emotions.”

Her clear blue eyes pierce through him. “Oh, Adrien.”

“That…was supposed to sound more like I was joking,” he insists before she can get the wrong idea. “I’m allowed to have emotions.” So long as they’re ones Gabriel approves of. For everything else, there’s the privacy of his bedroom.

“Adrien,” she whispers, giving the bell another tap.

He’s made her feel sorry for him. Again. And the tears are still marching down her cheeks unchecked.

“I don’t suppose you would laugh if I told you how pretty your hair is, would you?” he tries. “Does that only work with Chat?”

She smiles sadly and nods.

“How about if you try imagining Chat naked? Wasn’t that one of the other things?” He’s getting desperate.

Surprisingly, Marinette’s cheeks flush a vibrant floral color. She looks down at her feet and starts spluttering. “T-T-That! That doesn’t work—um…” She gulps, getting her freak out under control. “That doesn’t work the way it used to. It’s not a funny image anymore.”

“Oh,” he sighs in disappointment and almost asks why not before it hits him. “Oh!” he yelps, his own cheeks lighting up. “S-Sorry. Right. That… Forget I brought it up.”

She smiles in embarrassment, fiddling with the lace bracelet on her wrist as she keeps her eyes trained anywhere but on him.

Adrien curses mildly under his breath.

Marinette looks up, startled. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard you curse before.”

He shrugs. “I typically don’t, but this kind of feels like an appropriate situation. I suck at this. I’m bad at cheering people up, and I feel like it’s my fault that you’re crying, so I want to do something to make it better, but I’ve been failing miserably all week, so…Yeah. I feel like cursing is called for in this moment.”

There’s pity in her gaze as the tears keep falling. “Oh, Minou,” she coos. “You’re not failing.”

He wants to argue with her and recount all the times he’s actually made her cry this week while attempting to show his support and cheer her up. More than that, though, he wants to hug her. He loves her for fibbing like that in an attempt to make him feel better. It’s working for her.

An idea strikes, sparked by a memory of her kitchen last Monday night. He has one last card to play: “Would you like a hug?” he offers. “Would a hug help? Hugs do make people feel better when they’re upset, right?”

Marinette bites her lip, appearing unsure.

Mentally, Adrien curses again, looking down at his feet and feeling lousy.

She registers his expression for what it is and relents.

Perhaps she has no business hugging Adrien Agreste; perhaps she really does need to get the heck away from him for her own sanity, but she recognizes that her boy needs her right now.

“Would you like a hug, Adrien?” her smile is pure affection as she opens her arms to him.

“God, yes,” he whispers, hesitantly stepping forward.

It’s so automatic for Chat and Marinette to embrace, but Adrien and Marinette is an awkward dance of timidity.

He wants to grab her and pull her in, but he doesn’t want to seem desperate or make her uncomfortable.

She is busy trying to squelch an internal freak out about finally hugging her crush while simultaneously wondering where she should put her hands.

Somehow, they meet in the middle, and once their arms are actually around each other, both parties relax, surprised at how easily their body conforms to the other’s. Marinette naturally places her head on his chest, snuggling into the crook of his neck, and he gently rests his cheek on top, careful not to mess up her hair.

Instantly, the world feels like a more hopeful place because Marinette is in Adrien’s arms without the gloves and protective suit getting in the way. It’s so much easier to feel her through regular clothing, even though he is still wearing a leather jacket. She’s warm and soft, and she smells fantastic. The scent isn’t as acute to his normal human nose, but with said nose in her hair, it’s fairly pronounced, and Adrien is sure he could drown in it happily.

“Thank you,” he whispers, pieces of her hair sticking to his lips.

He can feel cold tears on his neck, but they seem to be falling more slowly now.

“Thank you,” she returns. “For trying so hard to make me feel better. Not just now, but all week. I know I burst into tears pretty much every single time, but I did appreciate your kindness.”

“I am never going to get over this boy. I’m going to break Chat’s heart all over again. I’m going to end up like one of those two-timing witches in the dramas.”

“It’s okay,” Adrien mumbles, giving her hair a reassuring nuzzle. “I have to admit, I feel better now that I know why, though.”

Marinette tenses. “Chat told you?”

Adrien mentally kicks himself. “Stop getting drunk on her scent and pay attention, Idiot. You’re two separate people to her, so keep what each one knows straight already.”

“Not everything,” he hedges. “Apparently I look like your crush…and then there’s the Monday thing.”

Marinette shifts uneasily.

“I’m sorry. If I had realized that what I said would get back to you, I—”

“—Stop,” Marinette’s words are almost inaudible, but he can feel her lips moving against his throat. Her left hand tightens, grasping the fabric of his mother’s jacket’s collar. “Don’t apologize for Monday ever again, okay? You were set up. I should be apologizing to you.”

“But…” He wants to argue even though he knows how pointless it is. “I feel bad for making a day that already sucked even worse for you.”

She shakes her head to the best of her ability. “I’ve made the intervening week between then and now hell for you.”

And heaven, he mentally adds.

“Not that I’m narcissistic enough to think I have the power to ruin your entire week, but—”

“—You do,” he confesses.

A silent “Oh” hangs in the air.

“Sorry,” she whispers.

“Don’t be.”

What he doesn’t say is, “I like it. I have a thing about women with the power to ruin me with a word.”

“Adrien, I’m kind of involved with Chat Noir.” She tries to break the news gently, but there’s no other way she can think to say it.

“He told me. You two are just going to be friends for now, but in a month or two, once you’re over your previous crush, you’re going to decide what kind of relationship you two want to have.”

“He tells you a lot of things,” Marinette observes, her heart beating in her throat.

“Do you think I could get a similar deal?”

“W-What?!” she squeaks, pulling back to stare dumbstruck up at him.

His arms keep her more or less in place so that their faces are still less than a foot apart, and he smiles softly, anxiety plainly on display in his eyes.

“We don’t really know each other well, do we?” he observes.

She shakes her head distractedly. His eyes are so pretty close up.

“But we could fix that,” he suggests, tone hopeful.

She makes herself look away and pay attention to what he’s saying. It’s hard when her body feels like pins and needles at every point where it touches his.

“Adrien, I’d like to, but I’m not really at my best right now. I’m sure Chat has told you how messed up I am at the moment. I don’t know if I can… This isn’t fair to-to either of us, and—I really shouldn’t…I shouldn’t be…Chat is such a great guy, and I can’t…” She bites her lip as she trails off. She meets his gaze with a lost look.

How is she supposed to tell him she needs to stop being in love with him? How does she explain the need to separate the real him from the one she’s constructed in her head before she can even flirt with the idea of dating him? How does she tell Chat about her feelings for Adrien? How does she tell Adrien no because it’s Chat’s turn to be loved and adored like he deserves now?

“You deserve better than this, than me,” Marinette whispers.

He opens his mouth to protest, but she covers his lips with her fingers.

“You both do. I’m sorry,” she chuckles ironically. “What a mess.”

“It doesn’t have to be,” he mumbles against her fingers and gives them a little kiss. “Chat told me you’re not dating anyone right now. I’m not asking you out, Marinette. Not yet. But…will you be my friend for a month or two and then make that decision? I mean…I’d like to date you, but only if you want. If you decide you just want to be friends, fine. I’ll find some way to be okay with that. Just…be my friend and think about it? I’m not trying to pressure you or anything; I’m just putting my name in the hat. Okay?”

She bites her lip, knowing it’s in her best interest to say no but, at the same time, seeing how badly he wants this. It’s hard to deny him, long-term object of her affections.

“Please?” he urges, beginning to fidget. “I really like you, and I know you’re not indifferent to me.”

“Did Chat tell you that?” Marinette grumbles through gritted teeth. She makes a mental note never to tell the chatterbox anything she doesn’t want Adrien to know ever again.

“You showed me that,” he corrects. “Saturday, when you were flirting with me. You wouldn’t have done that just to get information on Chat out of me. A part of you must be attracted to me on some level…at least…that’s what I’m banking on.”

She returns his sheepish smile with one of her own. “Guilty,” she whispers, her eyes tracking his tongue as it moistens his lips. “I’m not indifferent to you, Adrien Agreste, but I have to wonder when exactly you changed your mind about me. Didn’t you say last Monday that you had never thought about me romantically before? And I don’t think I’ve done much to improve your opinion of me between now and then.”

Adrien winces, averting his eyes and readjusting his arms around her. “Chat has told you about how messed up his life is, right?”

She makes a soft sound of agreement.

“Mine is too,” he mumbles. “It makes you really, really good at compartmentalizing. An example: ‘my father does bad things’ and ‘I love my father’ go in separate drawers, one of which I keep shoved in the very back of my mental closet behind all the Hanon I’ve ever had to play.”

His eyes meet hers once more, and he reaches up to wipe away the last of the tears. “‘Marinette is just a friend’ and ‘Marinette has eyes I could fall into and gladly drown in’ go in separate drawers. Just because I’ve never allowed myself to think about you like that doesn’t mean that I don’t have a mental drawer full of how bright your smile is, how musical your laughter, how amazing you look in your Princess dress, how kind and just and brave you are…”

He smiles bashfully, encouraged by the look of awe on her face but still embarrassed without the mask to hide behind. “This isn’t really as sudden as it seems. I’ve noticed you this whole time…I was just in love with someone else already, so I didn’t allow myself to think about the things I’d noticed. I’m serious when I fall in love. It’s all-consuming, so I only have room for one girl in my heart at a time. I’m sorry it wasn’t you first.”

She internally melts. If she weren’t already in his arms, she’d be falling in now. Mentally, she slaps herself. This is a trap. He’s sucking you in, making you forget about Chat.

“So…you’re finally giving up on Ladybug?” she inquires in a small voice.

His smile turns pained. “Yeah. I mean, if Chat can’t win her over, what hope do I realistically have? I was kidding myself this whole time. It’s not like a superhero and a civilian can have a successful relationship.”

Marinette goes rigid once more, and he’s surprised to find her glaring at him.

“W-What?”

“Maybe not you and Ladybug, but Chat and I can,” she snorts. “After all, Chat and I have actually spent more than five minutes together when he wasn’t just rescuing me. We have an actual foundation for a relationship.”

Adrien winces. “Sorry. I didn’t mean… I wasn’t talking about you and Chat. You and Chat will be fine, provided you don’t dump him the second you find out his identity.”

“I’m going to love him no matter who he turns out to be,” she growls defensively.

“Even if it’s me?” Adrien wonders.

She stares at him intently for a minute, a jumbled ball of emotions rolling across her face: anger, confusion, frustration, pity…

He’s expecting her to slap him or at least pull out of his arms and away from him, so he’s taken aback and stunned speechless when she leans in and places a solid kiss to his cheek.

“Even if it’s you, you idiot,” she snaps. “Now shut the hell up before I kick your other shin. Oh—!”

He knocks the wind out of her when he pulls her back in for a crushing hug. “It wasn’t just a celebrity crush, you know,” he whispers against the shell of her ear. “I’m not just being ridiculous. I need you to know that my feelings are worth something. The Ladybug I fell in love with isn’t the one on TV always saving the day. Not the perfect image she projects for the public. I know what it’s like to be loved like that; that’s how people love me, and I would never do that to her. The Ladybug I loved was Chat’s Ladybug: the clumsy, cocky, insecure, just-trying-her-best Ladybug whom I got to know through Chat. Ladybug and Adrien Agreste might not have spent much time together, but that doesn’t mean what I felt for her was invalid. I really did love her this whole time. Even though I’m letting go of that love, it was still real,” he insists with an intensity and desperation that get across what Ladybug meant to him…and how important it is to him for Marinette to understand that.

Marinette lets her eyes slip closed as she gives Adrien a butterfly kiss on the neck. “I’m sorry,” she mutters. “I’ve been really unfair to you.”

He rests his head on top of hers. “I don’t think I’ve been any better.”

“Meh,” she replies noncommittally. “Let’s start over with a clean slate. Let’s be friends.”

“I’d really like that,” he sighs, breathing in the scent of her hair once more.

“I don’t want to get your hopes up for a romantic relationship, though,” she quickly adds. “I’ll keep it in mind, but I’m falling in love with Chat, and if we decide to pursue a relationship, you and I can only be friends. He’s too wonderful a guy to have a cheating girlfriend. If I’m his, I’m his entirely. I don’t want to hurt you, Adrien, but I can’t hurt Chat. Okay?”

“Okay,” Adrien whispers, and it takes all of his acting skills and self-control not to let his excitement show. He wants to pick her up and swing her around and pepper her face with kisses…but that would be entirely inappropriate behavior for Adrien Agreste in this moment.

“Okay,” she sighs, relaxing once more into his embrace. “Good.”

They’re still for a moment, coming down from the emotional discussion and just breathing.

“You smell like Chat,” Marinette murmurs, her lips on his neck feeling like a series of pleasant shocks.

Adrien’s brain shuts down. “Uh…sorry? Is that…a bad thing?”

She knows what he smells like? He thought noting other people’s scents was a Black Cat Miraculous side effect.

“No. Chat smells wonderful,” she hums, somehow not noticing how she’s affecting him. “It’s a delicious smell. Chat’s smell is calming.”

“How do you know what Chat smells like?” he has to ask.

Does Chat smell that strongly? That distinctly? Could it be a clue to his identity that someone other than Marinette could pick up on? Should he be worried about this when a beautiful girl is in his arms telling him he smells good? That is what she’s implying, right? Chat smells good. Adrien smells like Chat. Therefore, the transitive property would say that Adrien smells good.

C (Chat smell) = B (good). C (Chat smell) = A (Adrien smell). Therefore, A (Adrien smell) = B (good). Right?

“Are you really doing this while a pretty girl is hugging you?”

“Of course I know what Chat smells like. I mean, I’ve fallen asleep on top of him twice in the past five days, and—”

She lets out a screech and pulls back, meeting his inquisitive gaze with a look of panic. “—Not like that! We’re not—! It isn’t like that. We haven’t—”

“—Marinette,” he calls, taking her by the arms. “It’s okay. I know. I know it’s not like that.”

She blinks, stunned. “…Well, are you sleeping with him then, since you two are so close that you share that kind of information? It sounds like he tells you everything, including whether or not he’s sleeping with me.”

Adrien grimaces. “Neither of us has ever been in a physical relationship with the other or anyone else, for that matter. Just putting that out there.”

“Well, it’s good to know I have nothing to be jealous of,” Marinette snorts. “…Sorry. I’m a little weirded out by the idea of you and Chat Noir discussing my and Chat Noir’s sex life.”

Adrien’s face glows Santa-suit-red, and he really wishes he could tell her that he and Chat are the same person and have her believe him this time. He’d try explaining it to her again, but he’s pretty sure he’d only get kicked in the other shin for his trouble. She’s not in any condition to listen.

With an enormous sigh, Adrien constructs a passable half-truth. “It’s not just you, Marinette. It’s everything. We talk about everything.”

She pulls a little farther back and studies his face inquisitively.

“We’re both socially inept,” he laments to the floor. “We spent our childhood mostly kept away from people our own age, so now it’s painfully difficult trying to fit in and not say or do anything too weird. We don’t know what we’re doing, and we’re always second-guessing ourselves, so we talk about everything. At the end of the day, we go back over and pick it all apart—everything we said and did, the way people reacted, the things other people said, anything we noticed other people doing that didn’t make sense… We study and analyze and try to figure out what to do going forward. Yesterday we agonized over whether it was a good idea for Chat to talk to you about Félix and what things were like growing up. Today it will probably be an ‘Oh crap!’-fest concerning whether and how to tell the girl you like that your father is a criminal.”

He forces himself to meet her eyes as he apologizes, “We’re sorry. We never meant to betray your trust. It wasn’t intentional, but…there’s just no barrier between the two of us. If there’s something you don’t want one of us to know, you shouldn’t tell the other. Marinette, it’s probably best for everyone if you just start trying to treat us like two halves of the same person…. Okay? Sorry.” He begins to backpedal. “I know lately with Chat and me there’s been a lot to process. We know we’re wearing you out, and we’re sorry. We—”

“—Shh.” Marinette smiles reassuringly as she gently places her fingers over his lips.

She’s never seen Adrien looking so frantic and vulnerable. It’s easy to see how much he wants to make sure she understands. It takes him even farther away from the cool and mature mental image of him that Marinette has been carrying around. It makes him look more like Chat: sensitive, innocently hopeful, and accosted on all sides.

Codependent twins.

She mentally updates her theory.

Marinette gingerly pulls him back into her arms and rests her head on his chest. “It’s okay, Minou.”

One hand reaches up to lightly tap the bell on his choker.

He goes still and relaxes, nuzzling her hair to comfort himself.

“Everything is fine. Chat is fine. You’re fine. I’m fine. We’re all going to figure this out together….” She hums thoughtfully. “This is what Chat meant when he said you two were a package deal, isn’t it?”

“Yeah,” he mutters into her hair. “Buy one, get more than you bargained for.”

She bites her lip, trying to decide how to reply. She can’t say anything to raise his hopes, but, at the same time, she wants to build him up as a friend. “…More isn’t always a bad thing…but let’s just be friends for now, the three of us. This is all too much too fast.”

He makes a lazy noise of agreement, getting comfortable in her embrace.

“…You really needed a hug, didn’t you?” she notes gently, careful so that he knows she’s not judging.

“Do you mind?” he wonders. “You said all Chat had to do was ask, but what about Adrien?”

Marinette’s mind screams that this is a bad idea. She was all set to give up on him, but now he’s drawing her back in.

“Feel free to ask, but know that there are times when I’ll say no,” she cautions.

“That’s fair,” he agrees, accepting the boundaries she chooses to set.

They hold each other loosely in silence for a minute or so before Marinette sighs, “God. What is that that makes you two smell so fantastic? Is that shampoo? Aftershave? This is going to drive me nuts.”

Adrien bites his cheek trying not to crack up. She’s like a frustrated hunting dog who has lost her quarry. “What does it smell like?”

“Something sweet—not baked goods, though. More like chocolate, but then it’s kind of herbal and minty with a touch of floral,” she reports, taking experimental sniffs of his hair, his neck, his chest.

“Oh.” He blushes, trying not to react. “That would be Bvlgari Blv. I have the shampoo and the shower gel.”

She nods slowly. “I’ve heard of Bulgari before. Didn’t you do an add for…watches, I wanna say?”

He blinks. “Uuumm…Oh! Yes. It was a couple years ago.” His brow creases. “You have a really good memory.”

She shrugs, pointedly looking away. “You forget I’m a fangirl,” she mutters wryly and then attempts to steer the conversation away. “Is the shower gel and the shampoo expensive?”

He shrugs. “Not really.”

Marinette overexaggerates an eyeroll. “Would it be expensive for me?” she clarifies. “Does it cost more than…say…fifteen euros for a bottle?”

He winces. “Yes?”

She gives a wistful sigh.

“Why do you ask?”

“I was thinking of picking up a bottle just to keep around the house and sniff from time to time like a stalker,” she confesses, throwing all shame out the window.

Chat knows she’s a weirdo, and he still seems to like her. If Adrien is going to decide that he likes her now, he might was well know the person he’s thinking about pursing.

“You can go ahead and tell him that,” she volunteers. “He’ll probably get a kick out of knowing I like the way he smells.”

She grins, and it makes his stomach flutter.

He suddenly feels less weird for wanting to buy a bottle of her shampoo to keep around the house.

“I’ll be sure to let him know,” Adrien chuckles, amused indeed. “Bvlgari Blv does seem to be a popular scent, though. You probably won’t be pleased to hear this, but Chloé likes it too.”

“Does she?” Marinette sniffs indignantly. “Well, at least she has good opinions about at least one thing.”

Adrien shrugs. “She says it’s…” He stops dead as he considers the appropriateness of Chloé’s opinion for the current time and place.

“Orgasmic,” Chloé herself completes as she approaches.

Adrien and Marinette spring apart, flushing furiously.

Chloé raises an eyebrow.

“Hey, Chlo,” Adrien greets with a watery smile.

Chloé shakes her head. “Adri-chou, I thought you only wanted to be friends with her so that you didn’t screw everything up.”

Adrien wilts.

Marinette looks back and forth between the two in curiosity.

“Chloé, Marinette and I were just talking about how we just wanted to be friends,” he informs through gritted teeth, hoping his oldest friend will let it drop.

“I think you’re both confused,” Chloé snorts, but then she sees the pained expression on Adrien’s face and relents. “I’m sure that’s none of my business, though, if you decide you want to seduce her with your shower gel. If you’ll excuse me, I have to go explain to Monsieur Damocles how my Daddy will not look kindly upon the school for unjustly punishing me for a misunderstanding.”

“Oh, Chlo,” Adrien groans, resting his face in his hand. “What did you do?”

“Nothing!” Chloé gasps, shocked that Adrien would even suggest such a thing. “It was simply a misunderstanding. The misunderstanding wasn’t even my fault…but if you two want to stand out here and make goo-goo eyes at each other, that’s probably not a bad use of time. If you go back to class, you might find Ivan has gotten himself akumatized. It certainly has nothing to do with me, though.”

“Oh, Bee,” Adrien reiterates. “We’ve talked about this.”

Chloé shrugs. “It was a misunderstanding!”

He looks at her with sad eyes, and she caves. “I’ll apologize later,” she mutters.

“Thank you, Chlo.” Adrien gives her a smile and pats her on the back as she passes.

Marinette feels oddly jealous. She’s aware that Chloé is no longer claiming Adrien as her betrothed, but there’s still a strange camaraderie between Adrien and Chloé that bothers Marinette.

Chloé smiles at Adrien and then pauses when her gaze locks with Marinette’s. Chloé cringes slightly at first before she’s able to school her expression into casual distaste. “If my Adri-chou has his heart set on you now, I suppose I’ll have to learn to tolerate you, Marinette Dupain-Cheng. After all, I’m going to be your children’s favourite aunt, so we had better start getting along, I guess.”

With a “hmph” of disdain, Chloé flips her ponytail over her shoulder and turns on her heel to complete her march to the principal’s office.

Once she’s gone, Marinette shudders. “I’m pretty sure Alya is going to be my children’s favourite aunt.”

“I’m sure it will be quite the knock-down, drag-out battle,” Adrien sighs, trying not to picture it.

Still shaking her head, Marinette points herself in the direction of class. “I’m heading back.”

“What about the possible akuma?” Adrien worries, not wanting Marinette back in danger.

Marinette smirks. “At least then I’ll be able to see Chat, right?”

“You could just text him,” he sighs, following obediently behind her.

[tragedybunny]

The Blade’s Edge - A League of Legends Fanfiction - Chapter 22 - Finale

This is the second part of a double update. Well, we've done it, we've arrived at the finale. I have some notes at the end.

They had a simple arrangement. She was the weapon to be used on his enemies. Things get more complicated when emotions bleed into what should simple. Now the two of them find themselves on the precipice of something that was entirely unexpected.

It is terribly late. The last of the troop maneuvers in the latest campaign to the west have been settled and the war room is emptying. Several of Demacia’s allies have been all but abandoned, there is no better time to strike. Unfortunately, I had to sacrifice theatre night to achieve it. I sigh and put my hand into my inner coat pocket, feeling to make sure the small box is still there. Relief washes over me, the way this day is going I wouldn’t be stunned if I’d lost it.

I stalk out into the corridor. At least she should still be awake when I return. “Finally finished?”

I look up, startled to find Kat lounging across a bench. One of those dreadful Piltovan novels she adores in her hands, her uniform collar fetchingly undone. “Yes, but why are you still here?”

She tucks the book back into a small satchel and stands up to stretch. “Intelligence reports. I got your note and thought I’d actually stay and get them finished for once. So now we can walk home together.” Her face lights up with that small genuine smile that has become so dear to me.

I lean in to give her a quick kiss on the cheek before anyone can see and offer her my arm. “It is very much appreciated.” Especially since, like everything else in our relationship, I have done nothing to deserve this gesture. It seems I have returned to old patterns of thought. I do not know why she came home, why she decided I could be forgiven, and I’m too fearful to ask. Although I had been determined to begin to make amends for my past behavior. Tonight was supposed to be the first step on that journey. Exiting the great wooden doors of the Bastion, we begin the trek home. I ignore the curious glances of the Trifarian guards on the stairs as we walk by arm in arm. The little display of tenderness is for them a small spectacle when it is between the two of us.

“Are you really determined to keep walking every day?” Her voice shakes me from contemplation.

“Of course. I’m not going to hide in fear that assassins could be lurking at every turn.” Is it bravery or bravado? I’m not sure, but either way, as Grand General I can’t be seen to be cowed. “Besides there’s one in my bed every night and that seems to work out fine for me.” I smirk at her.

She grumbles with exasperation. “If you really insist, but I’m putting my disagreement on the official record.”

We’ve gotten far enough away from the fortress to be lost in the general bustling of the city and she leans up to seal her disapproval with a soft kiss that leaves me clinging to her. “If I keep being disagreeable what will it provoke you to?”

A small laugh escapes her despite the glare she tries to give me and she leans her head against my shoulder as we continue on. The gesture has a wonderful familiarity to it, the best of us distilled into a moment. I’m struck again by the feeling that I have not earned this, her soft affections are woefully misplaced, and the box in my pocket is too little too late. I hadn’t even been able to give it to her because the Empire needed to come first, and it always will. I should let her go, surely it would only lead her to more happiness.

Walking along she lets out an unprovoked sigh. “It just occurred to me that dinner is cold by now since you probably didn’t think to send word home.” She’s not wrong and I pointedly look away from her accusing eyes. It had entirely slipped my mind. “The things I do for love.”

It’s meant in jest, but it only further drags down my confidence. How come I can never do right, even when I’m trying? “Kat, are you sure this is what you want?” My eyes widen, the words tumbled out without much thought behind them.

She gazes back up at me. “Yes, I would enjoy dinner and maybe a hot bath.”

We’ve come to a dead stop. Why did I start this while we were so publicly exposed? “No, I meant us. Are you sure you want ‘us’?

“Why? Are you having doubts?” A small bit of hurt creeps into her tone. Wonderful.

“Of course not, love.” I give her hand a squeeze and we continue walking.

We don’t speak much the rest of the way home. It feels like I’ve erred again even bringing it up. This is what I was trying to tell her, I’m not fit to be a husband to her. I invariably bring things between us to ruin. I should never have asked her to stay that night. It was weakness, not for loving her, but for putting that over her best interest.

Moira greets us as we enter, her attitude toward Kat has taken a dramatic turn lately. “Good Evening. I’ll see what Cress can do about dinner straight away.”

“Well, that’s not surprising.” She crosses her arms and stares me down.

Normally I’d indulge her playful needling, but right now I brush it aside. It is time to face what must be done. “That’s fine, we’ll be in the study.” Kat gives me a confused look but I guide her along, shutting the door behind us as soon as the lamps are lit. “We need to talk about something.”

She inhales deeply and before I can utter a sound words pour forth from her. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about resigning the additional post in Intelligence. I hate overseeing the War Masons and I’ve been overwhelmed helping with the efforts to track down the conspirators. Mostly though I need to focus on the Guild and salvaging it after Inara nearly destroyed it.”

She finally pauses for a breath as I stand there trying to absorb it all. It was entirely unexpected. “That’s fine. I was not aware you had resigned.” Her eyes widen. “But I will not stand against it if that is what you feel is best.” I hurry to add.

Her relief is visible. “I thought you’d be upset. You seemed so proud of what I was doing.” More of my failings on display.

I reach up and cup her cheek. She is truly the best thing to ever happen to me. “Kat you are infinitely fearless, intelligent, determined, and capable. I cannot help but be proud of you. And I don’t want you doing something that makes you miserable.” I sink into the chair behind me and, wrapping my hands around her hips, draw her down to me.

Arms around her waist, I lay my head on her chest. Silence overtakes us as I listen to the steady beating of her heart. If this is to be the end I want one more soft, beautiful memory to carry with me for the rest of my life. I try to fix in my mind the way she feels in my arms, the scent of her hair, how perfectly she fits in my lap. “Tell me what’s wrong.” Her voice is soft as she gently runs her fingers through my hair.

No more running from it. “Kat...I think we should separate.” I keep my head against her and my eyes locked on the floor. Gods, I truly am a coward.

“You just said you wanted this!” She snaps, unwrapping herself from me. “Look at me.” I finally dare to raise my head and find her furious. “So now you don’t want it?” She crosses her arms and scowls at me.

“I do but Kat-” I cast about unsure how to say it, “have you considered that I can never put you first?” She needs to see this is for the best.

Her expression softens. “I know, ‘Empire above all’. I can handle that.”

“And I’m miserable at this. I know I will only continue my history of poor behavior. I am a terrible husband and you will be happier without me.” There, it has been said.

“No.” She uncrosses her arms.

“But…” She puts them back around me, holding me tightly. I’m caught off guard and my resolve begins to crack.

“You are no longer allowed to make all my decisions. I love you and I will not be moved from your side.” She leans down lips pressing to mine, as passionate as ever. “Understood?”

“I just want you to be happy.” I close my eyes for a moment, lost in the feeling of her.

“I am happy, right here, with you.” She speaks with that characteristic fierceness of hers that I can’t help but be enthralled by.

I yield, there is no dissuading her, and I should have known that. “You are the most obstinate creature in all of the world.”

She giggles and kisses my temple. “One of the many reasons you love me.”

“Obviously.” If we’re going to do this, it may as well be proper. “There’s something I want to give you. Close your eyes.” I fumble about for the box in my pocket. I’d had it made while I was on campaign against the rebels to help make up for the sham of a wedding I put her through. It’d come to Moira then and she’d held it until Kat returned. I don’t know if I’ll ever stop regretting not giving it to her when I came home. My hand trembles ever so slightly as I open it, nervousness is not something I’m used to it. “You’ll have to forgive me not getting down on one knee.”

She opens her eyes and lets out a small gasp. A black diamond sits in a swirling nest of gold, two deep red rubies complimenting it on either side. “Jericho.” Her face lights up with pure bliss.

“Katarina, I love you. Would you do me the honor of marrying me again? I want to do things properly this time.” I can’t breathe, even though I’m sure of her answer.

“Fuck you, I hate crying.” Her voice cracks and I see her eyes misted over with tears. “Yes, yes, absolutely.” I fetch it out of the box and slip it on her proffered right finger, recalling her word from that day so many months ago. So we match. Those simple words that betokened the love that was always there, invisible to me in my stubbornness. “I’ll need my wedding ring back.”

“Of course my love.” I pull her tighter against me, my heart feeling as though it will burst. I’d been waiting for those words, that promise she was home for good. “I do not believe I have ever known happiness so great as at this moment.”

“Get used to it. I’m going to make you happy forever, husband.” She says the last word with her characteristic little purr.

“As you command, my wife.” I kiss the top of her head. Perhaps I have not earned the love she so wondrously gives to me but I can repay it in kind. “I love you, Kitten.”

Hello, Lovelies.

I hope you enjoyed the ending! Thank you again for bearing with my slow updates and for reading my little passion project.

I wanted to take a moment to thank everyone who left me a comment or a like. I've appreciated them so much, they kept me writing even when I had rough times.

I’m a bit more active on Twitter you can find me  @tragedybunny. I don't know what I'll take on next - but I hope you will still love it.

[snakebitten-kitten]

Health, Power, And Energy

I would love to pay something slightly different in this article the mind and nutrition please, keep in mind I am not any sort of expert on the topic of diet as such, but I think it's pertinent to our subject matter that of self-protection and its principal objective is to help you improve your performance both physically and mentally.

But first, a little bit of information which you might find intriguing about a little known group of individuals that come live to be 145 years old and highlights the importance of having a healthy body and mind with the assistance of the right nutrition and physical exercise.

The first westerner to discover these mysterious people across the 1920s and 1930s was a Scottish doctor by the title of Doctor, MacCarrison, an adventurer by nature who spent seven years living amongst this very small group of individuals called the Hunzas. They live in the remote mountain peaks region of the Himalayas in the north point of India and more or less cut off from the outside world. Their origins are a mystery. However, among the first things that the Doctor discovered was that they had outstanding health, and as far as he could tell they suffered from no ailments what so ever.

Interestingly, they seemed to be entirely immune to all so-called contemporary diseases for instance: cancer and cardiovascular disease. He found their diet consisted mainly of fresh grains, barley, millet, buckwheat, and some meat, also, vegetables and fruits. The meat was consumed quite rarely and was earmarked for special occasions. However, the chicken was their most frequent source of animal protein. Nuts, walnuts, hazelnuts, almonds, and beech nuts formed a significant portion of the Hunza diet also, regular walks of 15-20 km were considered very normal, meditation and relaxation were also regularly practiced by both young and old.

Food for thought

It's said by people more knowledgeable than me that the mind is the best organ on your body. You see that it requires a very specific sort of nutrition from your diet, so you ought not to be surprised to know that your diet influences how your mind performs.

For instance, a fantastic start to the day is to add a hearty breakfast a salad that is full of antioxidants also, vitamins E and C as well as, Beta-Carotene. This will help to reduce damage from free-radicals, those harmful critters molecules which move around the body doing harm. Using this method you will give your brain the fuel it needs to keep working optimally throughout the day. Also, a fantastic burst of sugar works wonders if taken through the day.

Additionally, as you grow older, your mind loses its capacity to defend itself from those marauding free-radicals which may lead to oxidation and inflammation so as you get older you need more nutrition than when you're young. In addition to that, free-radicals can gradually build up if they aren't destroyed and may cause short-term memory loss. Because of this, it can slow down the crucial processes on your brain like believing. Therefore, anti-oxidants are crucial to maintaining good health and a fantastic memory.

Great sources of anti-oxidants are: Spinach, carrots vitamin A and Beta Carotene.

Vitamin C: Citrus fruits, Broccoli, Strawberries, and Tomatoes.

Vitamin E: Nuts, seeds, vegetable oil, and wheat germ to mention only a few.

Spicy foods cause clogging of the arteries and may disrupt the body's natural activities, to be able to prevent that cut back on fatty foods and replace them with foods rich in antioxidants. To make certain you get a well-balanced meal and your body does not lack any of the critical nutrients it may be a good idea to take food supplements which might help. Remember though, they're supplements and are in no way a replacement for a well- balanced meal.

Fish is also famous for improving your memory and scientific research indicates that eating fish that's full of polyunsaturated fatty acid DHA helps with brain development in children. In schools where children have sat IQ tests those who regularly eat fish scored significantly higher marks than those who didn't. Fish contains Omega 3 that helps your brain function at peak performance, which can be important should you end up having to manage any unprovoked violent confrontation in the road successfully.

Ultimately, if you train your finest you can win anywhere in the world against anyone. The actual contest nevertheless is between what you have done and what you are capable of doing. You measure yourself against yourself and nobody else, you need to give 100 percent, because in case you do not, somebody else will give 100 percent and will beat you once you meet.

So in the event, you need health, power, and energy recall, you are what you eat. Stay safe.

[mattzerella-sticks]

A Whole Lotta Love (a Dean/Cas Coda to 14x09 “The Spear”)

With a broken tape deck, Dean and Cas have a long stretch of silence to fill. But just how do they do it? And they say driving helps take your mind off of things... even forget dangling pianos hanging over one's head.

           “You know what would be good right now?”

           Cas glances at Dean from out the corner of his eye, the other man focused, for once, on the road ahead. “Some Zepp,” he says, “I can picture it – us tearing down this open stretch of highway with Immigrant Song playing in the background. Oh! Or maybe Kashmir…”

           “That would be nice, yes,” Cas sighs, “…if our tape deck weren’t broken.”

           “Yeah – yeah…” Dean drums his hands on the wheel. “Y’know, I don’t remember how long it’s been since I’ve driven this long in silence? Not that this isn’t nice. It is. Its just music –“

           “Fills the background,” Cas finishes his thought, “adds layers…depth… security.”

           Dean murmurs his agreement. They drift back into themselves, the tides of their conversation slowly receding from shore. It’s been like that since they left the Bunker. Every so often one of them would start speaking, only to lull back into the quiet. Dean would point out different road signs, crack a joke or two to Cas. And Cas would smile, respond with his own observation; maybe a memory that would have both of them grinning at each other. Enjoying the shared moment.

           “I feel like we haven’t had a lot of this,” Dean says, unprovoked.

           “A lot of what?”

           “This.” Dean circles his finger in the air. “You and me. Shootin’ the breeze instead of demons or vamps or whatever else supernatural creature the world throws at us.”

           “Really?” Cas asks him, “Has it been that long since you and I were… alone?”

           “Yeah,” Dean says, blushing, “Not that I’ve been… counting, or whatever. But between Michael, Jack, and the growing network of hunters it’s hard to just find time to think or… breathe.”

           “Those seem like things you don’t need another person for.”

           “I like having you near when I do those things.”

           “Even breathing?”

           “Even breathing…”

           Cas watches Dean pay the road more attention than he’s ever seen him give it. Like the stretch of asphalt holds all the answers their destination was promised. Its unnerving that he thinks good safety practices as weird behavior, but he misses having Dean’s eyes on him rather than what’s ahead. ‘We’ve had enough luck to not crash so far… I’m sure we can push it a few more times.’

           “Hey Cas?”

           “Yes, Dean.”

           “How was Heaven?” Cas pauses, unsure of how to answer. Dean fills the vacuum with his own drawling ramble. “I mean, you didn’t talk about it much after bringing Jack back and – you said it was in trouble? I know since Gabriel didn’t make it back, stuff up there was running kinda off and – I mean, if you needed to go and make sure… it’s not like I can stop you –“

           “My service to Heaven is over,” he tells him, “I have done… all I could. And I feel I have repaid my debts to the other angels. Naomi told me as such –“

           “Naomi? Ol’ girl’s still kicking?”

           “Apparently it takes more than one old scribe and a rebel angel to kill her.” Cas chuckles, “She has been keeping the peace among all seven of my brothers and sisters that serve under her now.”

           “It’s gotten that bad?” he asks.

           Cas nods. “I don’t know how Heaven might survive. And that might be a problem we deal with later, once our Michael problem is solved.”

           “We?”

           “Of course… Dean,” Cas says, “you didn’t think I would go back, after all this was over. Did you?” The thought stings, but he doesn’t let it fester. ‘Don’t get too far ahead of yourself, Castiel…’

           Dean shakes his head furiously. “No, no I would – not realistically, after all we… but…”

           “But…”

           “It’s stupid…”

           “If it’s causing you this much stress, I assure you it isn’t.”

           “Well, I don’t know,” Dean sighs, grip tightening on the wheel. “Sometimes, I feel like I’m gonna blink and – poof! You’ll disappear. It’s irrational and dumb but it… it sticks. Even though you’ve proven time and time again you’re here to stay and I want to believe it. Except this little part of me thinks it might be… too good to be true, y’know? Kind of why I wanted only us on this I… I needed you here beside me.”

           “Dean I…” ‘When you finally allow the sun to shine on your face… that’s when I’ll collect you.’ “I don’t plan on leaving. Ever. I wish there was something I could do to relieve you of that worry.”

           “I don’t think you ever can but… being here it – it shuts it down.”

           His heart aches, yearns, and reaches out to the other man. But Cas keeps it behind steel walls, ensuring his secret never comes out. ‘It’s for the best… for all of us.’

           “God that was – this is what I mean,” Dean warbles a laugh, rubbing at his eye. “If we had music we wouldn’t – it’s stuffy, isn’t it? Could you roll down – I’m gonna roll mine, I think we need some air, so could you…?” They leave the windows half-up. “Yeah… that’s better.”

           He still looks uncomfortable. Dean shifts continuously. Sliding his hands up and down the wheel, taking one off to lean either on the door or to fiddle with the radio. Cas suggested they turn it on, when Dean discovered the tape deck was broken. “I don’t… it’s not the music I wanted you to hear.”

           Cas understands how much music means to Dean. What it means to probably every person on Earth. Each vibration and note a key that unlocks a part of the soul. And when someone shares music, they’re giving you a chance to know who they are and what they feel.

           Dean handed him the mixtape ages ago. He barely looked Cas in the eye when he did it, muttering all the while. “I know Metatron beamed probably the entire discography of the world into your head but I… figured you might want to hear what good music sounds like for yourself.” Cas enjoyed it immensely. He found himself banging his head to the loud, fast tracks. He crooned along to the power ballads. Even in moments alone, Cas hummed the melody, the words on a loop in his mind as he performed for no one yet also one very special person.

           “You need coolin’… baby I’m not foolin’…” It’s a low whisper, his gravely voice shredding the words in a discordant tone. “I’m gonna send you back to schoolin’…”

           “Way down inside,” Dean joins in, his own voice just as rough to hear, “honey you need it.” He finally looks away from the road, to Cas, his jaw slack with awe. “I’m gonna give you my love…”

           “I’m gonna give you my love, oh…”

           Together. “Wanna whole lotta love… Wanna whole lotta love…” They’re smiling, infected with the rhythm. As Baby purrs down the highway, Dean and Cas Led Zeppelin’s “Whole Lotta Love” from the top of their lungs, voices echoing into the clear, blue sky. At some points, Dean forces Cas to play the air guitar. And he does, indifferent to how ridiculous he might look. Their singing mixes with laughter, and near the end the melody gets lost in the shuffle.

           Gasping for breath, Dean glances at Cas one more time before returning his gaze on the road. “What made you pick that song?”

           “I… I don’t know,” Cas confesses, “When I would listen to your… your mixtape I wound it back time and time again – just to that song. I think it’s my favorite.”

           “Not Stairway to Heaven?”

           Cas chuckles. “No this one… means more to me.” He finds something to distract himself, fiddling with the map in hand. Cas checks a passing road sign. “I think we’re coming up on the turn… you might want to switch lanes.”

           “Yeah, yeah…” Dean turns the wheel, Baby cruising over onto the right-most lane. They make it off the highway, closing the last couple of miles between them and the Spear. “Hey, Cas?”

           “Yes, Dean?”

           “That song means a lot to me, too. I’m glad you… appreciate it, same as me. S’why I put it at the end; kinda… ties it all together, in a way.” His neck is on fire, the red blush creeping up from behind his collar with unmatched speed. “I think we’re here… sheesh, what a dump.”

           “Well, it’s quite literally a dump, Dean.”

           “I know but you’d think she’d clean up since we’re paying her a house call and all.”

           “…She doesn’t know that we’re coming. It’s the element of surprise?”

           “Cas,” Dean says, his voice tinged with exasperation and something else, “…keep being you.” He drives Baby between two tall stacks of crushed aluminum and plastic. “Roll the windows back up, don’t want any stench messing up our ride.” Cas does so as Dean parks. He readies to leave, but something drapes over his hand, stalling him.

           “Hey, Cas…”

           “…Yes, Dean?”

           “I – um, I don’t know,” he rubs at his neck with his other hand, looking at Cas through his lashes. “I mean, I do know – it’s just…” Dean laughs, smile stretched wide across his face.

           The sight parts the clouds within Cas’s mind, and he feels a flicker of warmth burning inside his chest. “What?”

           “I think maybe I can get this out but… just give me a minute?” he asks, “There’s… a lot going on in my head.” Cas allows him to gather his thoughts, eyes never straying from his face.

           Except there’s a slight buzzing to his left, like a gnat flying to close to his ear. Cas turns to see what it is and –

           Duma stands a few feet away. Except it’s not Duma, it’s the Empty. They watch them, face etched in a cannibalistic grin. Behind them swirls a dark energy, a mass of shadowy tendrils swaying, as if ready to strike.

           The clouds roll back in.

           And Cas pulls away. “Maybe later,” he apologizes, “Dark Kaia might know that we’re here and… move. From what you’ve told me she can be very tricky.” Dean’s expression changes in an instant, and even though he tries to cover it up, Cas could see the flicker of disappointment flashing behind his eyes. As if Cas chopped down a tree in his emerald forest that took ages to grow.

           “Yeah… yeah.”

           Cas swings the door open, stepping out into the waste yard. Dean follows at a slower pace, head down, already readying the bag of weapons they brought with them. He watches the other man, pain and sadness welling inside of him, because of what he had to do. ‘Not now… I can’t – I can never…’ He slams the door. ‘I may never have it, but Dean deserves it.’

           “You seem good, lately. Happy, even…”

[theshatteredrose]

Move Forward Fearlessly - Etrian Odyssey 4 Oneshot

Summary: Logre and Jeroden spend a few moments together and Logre finally decides that maybe he can move forward after all.

Pairings: Jeroden/Logre

AN: Did someone say Logre fluff? …No? Well, that’s what you’re getting anyway, so enjoy!

Ao3 | Wattpad | FFNet

~*~*~*~*~*~

It was well after midnight when the inhabitants of the Researchers’ Clinic decided to call it a night. Those who were staying elsewhere lingered outside in the cool night air to talk for a few moments longer.

They didn’t chat any further about the Golden Imperial, however. Perhaps thought it was best not to mention them outside the walls of the clinic. Or maybe they didn’t want to worry or upset those who had encountered the supposedly “legendary” imperial.

Logre stood with them as they said goodnight to each other, reaffirming to them that he was fine and not to worry, before they parted ways. Logre had his own apartment in a quiet area of the city, and tonight he felt it best for him to retreat to his own place. He didn't want to impose on Isiah and his brothers for another night, even if they insisted it was fine. He had caused them enough worry and trouble as is.

Besides, Nitish could do with a night off away from Logre’s troubling emotions.

As the other members of his guild headed in the direction of the inn, Logre found himself standing alone with Jeroden. He wasn’t all that surprised, to be honest. In fact, he was relieved. Though a thought did occur to him and he turned to face the other man directly.

“I’ve been meaning to ask; where is it that you've been staying?” he questioned.

“Your guild had allowed me to crash at here the last couple of days,” Jeroden answered quickly. “And tonight, they've offered to rent a room at the inn for me.”

Logre furrowed his brow slightly, though he wasn’t sure if it was from curiosity or disappointment. “Hm? You know where it is?” He indicated in the direction opposite of where he was going, where his guildmates just disappeared in. “They just left.”

A half smile made its way upon Jeroden’s lips. “They've given me directions. I'm sure I can find it eventually.”

Logre felt a slight pain in his stomach. This one, he knew. It was of protectiveness. “Ah, want me to walk you there?”

Jeroden unexpectedly gave a short laugh in response before his shook his head. “I'm the one walking you home, wherever that may be.”

Honestly, Logre should have seen that coming. “Hm?”

“Don't look surprised,” Jeroden retorted with a grin, but the way he folded his arms tightly over his taut chest indicated that there was only a small amount of amusement from him. “After that incident that happened just a couple of days ago, I'm lucky I get to do this alone.”

“That?” Logre murmured. It came rushing back to him, though, and he sighed while simultaneously touched his forehead in exasperation. “That was-”

“That was not nothing,” Jeroden cut him off, the grin gone from his lips and a cautious but caring expression on his face. He even went as far as to bristle with protectiveness. It was…something he used to do during their years together training as knights.

He hadn’t realised how much he missed actually seeing that. Sure, he didn’t like to cause worry or trouble for Jeroden. For anyone. But it was…still nice to see. Nice to have someone protective of him.

Especially that someone who…he thought…

“They targeted you personally,” Jeroden continued, either knowing or unknowing pulling Logre from his thoughts. “Even though those who were directly involved in that incident have been taken care of.”

He suddenly smiled brightly at that and chuckled at some joke that Logre had no knowledge about. “Spectacularly at that, may I add.”

…That didn’t sound ominous at all.

The amused expression soon dissipated into that of protective concern once more and Jeroden continued. “But the ones who instigated such an unprovoked attack have not been found. I wouldn't be surprised if numerous members of your guild are watching you from the shadows right now.”

Great. He was causing trouble for others again.

Jeroden stepped before him and suddenly snared Logre by his wrist, pulling his hand away from his forehead. “Stop that,” he instructed as his head slid to cover his hand in his. “It’s not you who’s causing trouble.”

Logre had to smile as he shook his head in response.

Even with ten years apart, Jeroden was still able to read his mind. Not entirely, but he knew him enough to be able to predict him. Infuriately, though, Jeroden left him guessing. Did back when they were trainees together. And even now, it seemed.

Jeroden kept a hold of Logre’s hand with his own as he suddenly turned to look at the far horizon. “Yggdrasil looks...different from here, doesn't it?”

“It does,” Logre said as he turned to look as well, making no attempt to pull his hand from Jeroden’s. “How…close were you to Yggdrasil?” he asked.

“Ah,” Jeroden murmured as a distant look appeared on his face. His lips drew into a thin line for a moment, his eyes somewhat glazed. “East of the tree. Upon the mountain side. Could overlook the entire valley. Had to remain low, though. Some…didn’t think much of farmers.”

Jeroden’s hand tightened around his, and Logre squeezed back. He would like to know of the hardships that Jeroden had endured all those years. He wanted to know his fears and pains, so…he could help him in return.

Wasn’t that ironic? No, perhaps hypocritical. Logre himself was hesitant to open up to anyone for fear of causing them unnecessary worry and concern. And yet he wanted Jeroden to open up to him. To tell him everything.

But…clearly not now.

“It’s getting late,” Logre said, breaking the silence of the night around them.

“Yeah,” Jeroden murmured absentmindedly. He soon placed that friendly smile of his on his lips once again and turned to face him.

“I have an apartment on this side of town,” Logre indicated with a tilt of his head. “Let’s go.”

“Of course.”

Logre pulled his hand from Jeroden’s hesitantly, reluctantly. And Jeroden’s hand resisted for a moment before allowing him to pull away. He gave Jeroden a small, almost shy smile before the turned on his heel to lead the way.

But he was pulled to an abruptly stop.

A pair of strong and familiar arms suddenly wrapped around Logre from behind and he instinctively became tense and still. Though, despite his sharp reflexes, he did not try to push the arms away. Not when he knew who they belonged to. Not when he realised how warm they were. Especially not when a chin rested on his shoulder and a nose nuzzled against the side of his head.

Still, the action surprised him and Logre tensed slightly as he peered at Jeroden from the corner of his eye. “What are you-?”

“Sorry,” Jeroden murmured, his breath ghosting against his ear and the side of his neck, which brought a light shiver down Logre’s spine. “It's just occurring to me now where I am in this world.”

Oh…Yeah, he had expected something like that.

Jeroden’s arms tightened around him and he buried his face against his shoulder. “I've really missed you…”

Logre’s breath hitched in his throat for a moment before he released it slowly. His hands instinctively reached up to touch Jeroden’s arms, gently brushing against the skin with his fingertips.

Scars. There were light scars on his arms. From war, training, or perhaps just the hardships of the Cloudy Stronghold. But they were there. Callous, noticeable. The same as the callouses of Logre’s own hands.

Here they were, two battle-scarred men. Together after years apart.

Another sigh slipped past his lips and his eyes slid closed. Maybe it was indeed time for him to look to the future instead of the past. It…won’t be easy. But he owed it to Jeroden, to his guild, to his prince and to his emperor to at least try.

Try…that was all he could do.

“I've missed you too,” he murmured as he tightened his hold on Jeroden’s arms and subconsciously sunk back against him.

One of Jeroden’s arms slid down to wrap around Logre’s waist as the other rested across his chest, allowing him to press himself further against his back. Holding him closer and tighter. Shielding him with his arms and body.

“It almost feels like a dream.”

Logre sighed. “I know.”

A dream they were both afraid of waking up from. They didn’t want to experience that pain. Waking to realise that it was all a dream. The joy turning into heart-wrenching pain.

But…it wasn’t a dream. It wasn’t.

Gods, this was real.

“It’s so peaceful here,” Jeroden murmured with his face against the side of Logre’s neck. “Will I really be able to accept it?”

“You will,” Logre immediately replied. “I know you will. I…I’ll make sure.”

Jeroden released a sigh that turned into a slow, low chuckle. “I don’t want to let you go.”

…He didn’t either.

But it would better if they didn’t do this out in the open. Unwanted interruptions and all that.

“…You’re going to have to, or do I have to carry you home?” Logre said with humour in his voice as he lifted a hand to lightly pat Jeroden on the head.

Jeroden didn’t remove his hold on him, though he did pull his face away from his neck to instead rest his chin on his shoulder. “Home, huh?”

That word sounded odd hearing it. His apartment wasn’t a place he had actually considered home all these years. Just a place to rest. A place that kept a roof over his head. A place where he plotted in how he was to return to his “true” home.

But Tharsis was his…home now, wasn’t it? With his guild, with his prince, and with…Jeroden.

“It’s not far now,” Logre said as he tugged on Jeroden’s arms as he tried to step away.

With a sigh that was both playfully yet sincerely disappointed, Jeroden allowed his arms to fall away from Logre. It was momentarily disconcerting how cold Logre suddenly felt when Jeroden pulled away from him. But he brushed it off and took the lead once more.

Despite such a bustling city, filled with explorers and adventurers coming and going as they pleased, the streets were thankfully quiet at this time of night. As Logre took the ever-familiar path to his apartment, the sound of echoing footsteps was for once reassuring. Jeroden matched his steps with his own, keeping pace and keeping close.

Finally, after a few minutes of silence, Logre paused out the front of his apartment. A small, two story apartment with steps and a porch, made from of sandstone like the other buildings around it. A small flowerbed was situated beneath the window, though empty as Logre had never thought of doing anything with it.

As he dug around in his pocket for the key, he turned once more to face Jeroden. The other man was looking up at the building. “So, this is where you’ve been living?”

“It’s not much, but it’s enough,” Logre said as he pulled out the keys finally.

Jeroden nodded his head absentmindedly. “It looks like a place that can be turned into a home.”

Home. Gods, that word was making his chest hurt for some reason.

“Can I stay the night?” Jeroden suddenly asked as he turned his gaze from the building to look directly into Logre’s eyes.

Logre honestly didn’t need to consider how to answer that. “Yeah.”

Despite the dim moonlight around them, Logre could easily see the way Jeroden’s eyes lit up with relief and…happiness. He really was happy just to be around him, wasn’t he? No matter where. No matter what.

“Jeroden?”

“Hm?”

Logre paused for a moment, that feeling of nervous, of hesitancy speaking to him from the back of his mind. But he pushed it back and continued. “…You can move in here, too.”

Jeroden looked surprised, hopeful, and Logre felt that nervousness again. But, no, it wasn’t nervousness. It was a strangely shy form of embarrassment.

“I divide my time between here, the clinic, and Mark’s Grand Court anyway,” Logre continued as he scratched the back of his neck sheepishly. “Besides, we’ve got some catching up to do.”

“Yes, we do,” Jeroden immediately replied as he stepped toward Logre once more, to stand close to him. As he did so, his hand reached out to take Logre’s, pulling his hand away from his hair to hold it once more. “I’d feel better being close to you again.”

Logre felt the tension he didn’t realise he had in his shoulders disappear and he smiled a small, but genuine smile at the other man. “Yeah, so would I.”

Hmm, he just might be ready to move forward after all.

[sanguinesorceress]

Marked for Death (Part 2)

[Part 1]

“Porter?! Another cask of Peaked Dalaran White, when you have a moment please!”

Porter.  It had supplanted his real name in people’s thoughts, but Oneth Sagestriker didn’t seem to mind the nickname at all.  Polite to a fault, the Kaldorei with boyish good looks and eyes as silver as a beam of moonlight always wore a smile despite the burden he carried on his broad shoulders.  “Coming right up!” he chirped, springing to his feet with the vigor of a Brewfest wolpertinger being chased by drunken buffoons to fulfil his coworker’s request.  Sure he had been offered a position as a bartender in the Ledgermain Lounge, but he declined for ‘personal reasons.’  Which his employer attributed to the rumour that his wife was sick and the change in his work schedule would conflict with visiting hours.  It was not entirely false, as there were other reasons for him to actively seek refuge in anonymity.  The busboy is but a thread in the Bartender’s tapestry.  It was the perfect cover for moonlighting as a hired assassin.

Waiting between two specially designated crates in the back stockroom was his next assignment, and Gods knew he needed the gold.  His current position didn’t exactly pay the best wages and the expenses for his wife’s treatment were piling up.  It wasn’t honest work, but it was a means to an end— or so he had hoped.  The recent diagnosis was handed down with the condemnation of a life-sentence unto an innocent soul.  Why did it have to be her?  If anything, he should have been the one to fall ill as a form of penance for his unconventional profession.

Closing time was just around the corner, and with the cask tapped and fitted in its proper place, Oneth excused himself from his shift.  Finding a moment of solitude, he peeked at the hidden piece of parchment that would direct him toward his next ‘target.’  Wiping his sweaty palms on his pants, the porter closed his eyes and took a deep breath to still the hammering in his chest before withdrawing, not one, but two papers stacked neatly together.  He recognized the first, it was from his usual employer, but the other was foreign in both penmanship and vellum.  Postponing the first in favour of the second, Oneth unfolded the note to read its contents:  

Despite what the doctors have convinced you to believe, your wife’s terminal condition is indeed reversible.  Meet me on the easternmost island in Stormheim and be sure to come alone.  Your every move henceforth is being monitored closely.  Breathe a word of this to anyone and she dies today.  I trust you will be discreet.

The other contained a name and a location written in code, so if the paper was discovered it would read as meaningless jargon to untrained eyes.  Oneth glanced up at the clock, his eyes darting from one number to the next as he calculated the time it would take to fulfill his given assignment as well as the impromptu directive.  If he left this instant, he would have enough time to complete both.

Off the coast of Morheim a long and narrow enclave hugs a large portion of the shoreline.  Comprised of mostly rocky terrain, the island is largely uninhabitable save for lichens, crustaceans, roosting birds, and a small colony of bilgefin murlocs who are to credit for its namesake of ‘Bilgefin Shore.’

Oneth arrived by nightfall on the back of his trusted nightsaber, Whisper, who was every bit as quiet as her name implied despite the hulking cat’s size.  When traveling through a murloc colony, it was best to bring a predatory feline with a healthy appetite for amphibious beasts, since these little monsters tended to move in swarms.  Blades drawn and ready to strike, he anticipated an unprovoked attack from the territorial fish-men wielding rudimentary spears as weapons.  It did not sound like much of a challenge until one found themselves to be overcome in an instant by a swarm of carnivorous halflings.  Razor sharp teeth, webbed digits, and bulging eyes offered a great advantage under water, but on land the only safety found was from gathering in overwhelming numbers.  Whisper’s experience took over, and with meals on flippers waddling all around her, she knew she would have her pick of the platter.  Already she was licking her chops and crouching low, her tail ticking like a metronome, waiting for the signal to pounce.

A rain of spears swiftly followed the aggressive battle cry of “Mrglmrglmrglll!!!” and one did not need to be fluent in Nerglish to know they had been spotted.

Whisper sprang into action, snatching a cerulean murloc with iridescent green stripes and snapping its neck in her powerful jaws.  In a single bound, the nightsaber had pinned five of them to the sand, where they met a violent end delivered mercilessly by sharpened teeth and deadly claws.  Oneth dismounted, and immediately jolted from the barrage of frigid water bolts hurled by one of the magic weilders.  Before he could retaliate, however, Whisper was on top of the violet murloc in an instant.  “Save some for me, will you?!” he teased as he sliced through rubbery flesh, inflicting them with a lethal dose of poison he had anointed his blades with earlier.

“Aaaaaughibbrgubugbugrguburgle!” came the cry of their chieftan, and it was followed in unison with a resounding “mlargh!” from the rest of the tribe.  It was unusual behavior for a territorial species, but it appeared as though the angry mob was now... retreating?

The murlocs’ diet consisted primarily of the crimson rockshell crabs co-habiting the area, whatever marine life they managed to spear, and the occasional traveler who wandered too close.  As a direct result of their lifestyle, the air surrounding a murloc dwelling was laden with the nauseating stench of rotting fish caracases.  Freshly added to this revolting bouquet was the odour of spilled blood from their fallen brethren, and in an attempt to diffuse some of the smell, Oneth pulled his mask over his nose.  Shiny bobbles strung into sun-catchers dangled everywhere around the shanty-town, which was the product of repurposed cargo that had washed ashore from passing Vrykul ships.

A chilling breeze blew in from the eastern shore, and with it came a low-rolling fog that chased away the worst of the fetid stench with an aseptic gust of salt sea air.  The sudden onset of this nearly impenetrable mist grounded the seagulls overhead, and had murlocs scrambling up the stilts of their grass roof huts in search of shelter.  Whether their behaviour was driven by instinct or experience, there was an unsettling change in their mannerisms that could only be described as sheer terror.  With a hand resting on the pommel of Whisper’s saddle, the assassin placed his absolute trust in her ability to lead him through the mist using her sharpened senses.

On the horizon, an ambiguous silhouette made manifest within the fog.  At first he believed it to be a ship in the distance, but as it neared the shadow gradually took on the form of a tall, feminine figure.  “Oneth Sagestriker,” she murmured while approaching the assassin, and her words echoed amidst the waves until they too collided with the inevitable shore, “I do hope the murlocs were not too troublesome.”  Her voice was a siren’s song, alluring, yet perilous to those who ventured too close to the water’s edge.

“I have come alone as you have requested.  Now tell me what I must do to spare my wife.”  Taller the silhouette grew, until the woman stood looming over him with the majesty of a Vrykul warrior, a race native to Stormheim whom are believed to be descended from giants.  “Who are you, and why have you called upon me?”  Was he, by some fortuitous chance, in the presence of a Val’kyr, a winged spirit capable of resurrecting the dead?

“I have been given many names,” crooned the mysterious woman, “but you may simply refer to me as the Tide Seer.”  Slowly, the mists parted to reveal a robust woman with seaweed in place of hair and scales shimmering across her verdant skin.  Barnacles clung to her dress, which appeared to be fashioned from the tattered sails of sunken ships.

“I know what you are,” Oneth growled, and the hair on Whisper’s back bristled in response to the contempt seething from her master’s lips as he spat the word, “Kvaldir.”  Not only did it explain the mist’s abrupt arrival, but the reaction it garnered from terrified murlocs as they scurried away from the danger it heralded.

“Tisk, tisk,” she chided while focusing a stare toward him as deep and mysterious as the ocean itself.  “We wouldn’t want your wife to fall into sudden cardiac arrest over a bit of prejudice, now would we?  Mind your manners, assassin, and sharpen your hearing instead of your blades.”  Although thought to be folklore, the Kvaldir were actually a ruthless and barbaric race of corrupt Vrykul who had taken to the seas as opposed to the land.  Primarily elusive humanoids, the only other location they could be found was on the blistering cold isles off the coast of Northrend.

Oneths’ moonlit eyes narrowed into waxing crescents as he countered with a pointed glare.  “Alright, sea witch, I’ll entertain you with an honest question. What makes you so confident you can cure my wife when she has already seen the best doctors gold can buy?”

“There is a way,” she hummed, “ although unconventional as it may seem, the outcome is guaranteed, I assure you.”  A slow smile crept across her pale blue lips as she watched his expression transform from malice to intrigue, “and for a man of your profession there should be no contest.  A life for a life.  Your dearly beloved will live a long and healthy lifespan free of illness, and all you have to do is add one more target to your roster.”  Could it really be that simple?

“How do you plan to accomplish that?”  By this point, his feline companion had nearly doubled in size.  Everything about this encounter rubbed her the wrong way, causing the fur on her body to stand fully erect and tingle with electricity.  

“It is a simple equation of give and take, really.  By trimming lifespan of one individual, it allows the opportunity to transfer the remainder to another.  As for the details, let us simply agree that I have my area of expertise just as you have yours.  Do we have a deal or not?”

Oneth gave pause as he weighed his options, studying every possible aspect and outcome of the business transaction.  “What sort of guarantee do I have that you will keep your word, Tide Seer?”  While he found her offer tempting, the assassin also had enough experience not to bargain blindly.

The creeping mist swirled to life, demonstrating its omnipresence by swallowing the entire coastal shore and the murloc village housed therein.  One by one, each of the aquatic monsters burbled and gasped like fish on dry land before flopping to the sand with a lifeless ‘thud’.  “The only guarantee I am willing to give… is the promise of carrying out my threats.”

A wave of dizziness swept over him and he leaned heavily on Whisper for support.  Unfortunately, the feline was also feeling a bit unsteady on her paws and she hissed, wide-eyed and panicked as her limbs betrayed her, forcing the nightsaber to fall on her belly.  A triumphant smirk pulled at the witch’s lips as she watched him choke on the fog; coughing like a man with a fish bone stuck in his throat, as he collapsed to his knees while clutching his neck.  Without so much as lifting a finger, she had asphyxiated nearly everything within her realm of influence. “Would you doubt my abilities at the cost of your own life?  Perhaps your beloved wife’s?  Or are you not motivated enough to save her?”  

“Alright!” he wheezed, “You have made your point!”  and with his yielding the mists slowly receded.  Oneth gulped down several breaths as though he had discovered the only break in a wall of ice trapping him beneath a frozen lake.  “Who do you want me to kill?”

“He who hails from the floating city, Magister Jadex.”

“A Kirin Tor magus?”  Every burning breath he took scraped like sandpaper against his ribs.  “What would a Kvaldir such as yourself hope to accomplish by killing someone like him?” he puzzled while massaging the center of his chest.

“The Violet peace keepers have overstepped their boundaries.  I intend to send a message for them to cease meddling in Vrykul affairs.  I do not care how you accomplish your task, only that you adhere to the following conditions.”  For each directive she named, the seer counted by peeling back one of her knobby fingers.  “First, he must suffer a slow and excruciating death, and the second is that you deliver a personal message.”

“What is the message you wish for me to convey?”

“One day I will return and he won't be around to see me rise again.”

“Very well,” he sighed reluctantly.  It wasn’t as though he had been given a choice in the matter.  “I shall do as you ask.”

“Take these pearls,” she directed, “place one in his home, and the other next to your wife.  When the elven magus dies, the disease will depart from her body and the remainder of his lifespan shall become hers.  You have precisely twelve hours to uphold your end of the bargain or I shall keep my promise and send her to an early grave.  The shifting sands begin their descent… starting now.”

Before he could protest or request more time to carry out such a daunting task, the Tide Seer dispersed with a splash of salt water and collapsed into a lifeless heap of seaweed on the shore.

Desperation was a cruel motivator, and Oneth understood he needed to make every second count as though it was his wife’s last.

( Image Source [1] [2] [3] [4] ) @hmratking @loveherdekay @lazraelbandtherion @safrona-shadowsun @puppet-master-jihye​