#some of those RPGs barely count as RPGs in my eye too

[imagineamagicworld]

Dragon Age The Veilguard getting only one nomination at the Game Awards is an absolute joke, I can't even pretend that's fair... If not getting considered for GOTY (which is a joke by itself when an actual DLC got nominated in the first place), then it should at least have gotten a nomination for Best RPG and Best Art Direction

[mammor0n]

human | solomon x reader

based on lesson 46-12, so spoilers if you’re not up to it. if you know u know 😉 MC is gender neutral ✌

Word Count: 1.4k

Warnings: softcore smut, not rly explicit and it doesn’t rly start till abt 1k words in but it’s still there. also like one swear word. plus it’s nearly 2am so if there are typos etc. pls forgive me, i’ll give it a read through when i wake up to fix ‘em (probably)

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You awake to a shuffling sound in the corner, and a year of living with seven demons has left you with more sense than to just ignore it. Still half asleep, you squint into the darkness and sigh an incoherent mumble.

“...oh, sorry. Did I wake you?” Solomon asks, voice barely above a whisper.

It takes you a moment to remember where you are; in a cramped motel room in a world that doesn’t really exist, undertaking a trial for your goddamn magic license, which somehow did exist, and the master to your apprenticeship waking you up as though this circumstance wasn’t the stuff of a fever dream already, or some twisted fairytale that slipped the works of Hans Christian Anderson.

“Mm… it’s fine. What’s up? Can’t sleep?” you sleepily slur.

“No… it’s weird, you know? After all that walking we did today, I should be really tired.” Although his voice is even, Solomon’s face echoes a vestige of sadness; loneliness only exacerbated as he continues. “As I watched the twins earlier, I couldn’t help thinking… they’ve always had each other. It’s just natural for them. And even though they don’t say it outright, you can tell how much they trust and rely on each other… it must be nice, you know? To have someone like that in your life. I guess even if you live for centuries on end, there are some things that can always elude you.”

Blinking away remnants of sleep, you push onto your knees and crawl a little closer to him. He sits on the edge of the bed, and you hear it creak as it dips beneath him, the motion pulling you towards him like gravity itself.

“Hey… you have me. You always will, okay? You’re not alone… you have people who care about you,” you protest, and Solomon chuckles.

“Thanks, MC… you really are nice. I’d like to have people I care about, and who care about me… especially if one of those people is you.”

You exchange a smile lit only by the dim streetlight spilling through the weathered, yellowing windows. Solomon’s eyes don’t leave you, and there’s a softness there you’re not accustomed to.

“Hmm… you know, going to sleep in an inn room and then suddenly waking up in the middle of the night is another staple RPG scenario, isn’t it? And usually at times like these, you can expect some sort of really important story event to take place. So what do you think, MC? Is that what’s about to happen here..?”

His eyes find yours, capturing you in a warm a gaze you wouldn’t dare to break; you become all too aware of the sound of your shallow breathing, and rise and fall of your chest, the lump of your thrumming heart in your throat. The air smells like dust and ash, with remnants of smoke from the fireplace curling around the ceiling as the tendrils creep into the cracks between the wood. Your eyelids are heavy, yet sleep has surely relinquished its hold on you. 

Solomon is quiet as he looks at you questioningly; murky blue eyes seem to bore into your soul, and in this light, with his hair messy and wearing a loose shirt and cotton pants, you’re jarred by the reminder of his humanity. Now that the magic and jewellery and smirk has been stripped away, you’re left with warmth, sincerity, and something so purely human that you’d never seen in him before. It was something about his eyes, or maybe the bob of his Adam’s apple, the hints of five o’clock shadow carving his jaw, the slight flush blotching his cheeks. At this moment, he isn’t a powerful sorcerer to whom Asmodeus himself is beholden; he’s a person. A human. Two humans sitting together in an inn room with lights off, tangled in scratchy bedsheets as breeze rattles the windowsill overlooking the flame-lit cobbled streets outside. Like something out of a fairy tale.

You’re so lost in his eyes that you forget to speak, and a teasing smile slopes his lips, although the corners of his eyes are just a little too tight, his breath just a little uneven. He swallows, licks his lips…

“Does that look in your eyes mean I can kiss you?”

You reply by crossing the small distance left between you and kissing him. After a stuttered breath, Solomon kisses you back, leaning into you and deepening the kiss as his arms slide around your waist. Once he’s started kissing you, it seems he can’t stop; he presses kiss after kiss to your mouth, his tongue seeking yours, his hands squeezing and tugging you ever closer as you lose yourself in his warmth, the lavender and patchouli fragrance that always seems to follow him, in the eager grasping of his hands on your skin and of your fingers in his hair and of the taste of sleep and evening and to draw it all together, the smoky spark of magic in every touch of his body against yours.

“...I’ve wanted to do this for so long,” Solomon confesses breathlessly between kisses. “But you know, wherever you are, Lucifer and his brothers are sure to be nearby. I thought maybe there was no hope. That I’d never get an opportunity.” 

In his pause, you press a kiss to the corner of his mouth. “Well it’s just you and I tonight, right? Just us.” Your breath rustles the silken hair that isn’t snagged between your fingers, and Solomon smiles.

“Then… I take it this means I have a chance, right? A chance to… deepen our connection.” He supplements the words with a lingering kiss to your throat. “Why don’t you come just a little closer, MC..?”

You sigh, lips seeking his again as you crawl until you’re chest to chest. Slinging a leg over his waist, you climb into his lap and Solomon wastes no time in stealing your breath. His lips are hot, fast, sloppy yet calculated, and he holds you until your head is spinning and you can’t remember your own name.

“Solomon…” is the only utterance you can fathom, and then he smiles against your mouth, and you lose even that.

Wandering hands trail along your waist, beneath your shirt, and shivers ripple down your spine as Solomon suckles at your throat and twists his hands in heavenly ways that curl your toes and pry any thought from your head that doesn’t centre around Solomon, and you, and Solomon and you, two humans alone in an inn room and suddenly your clothes are gone and he’s on top of you and-

Solomon groans as he sinks into you, kissing along the column of your neck, suckling on your jaw, your chest, hands caressing every inch of soft flesh as he whispers curses in languages you’ve never heard into your skin. 

You can feel the magic radiating off him as he thrusts, feel your power imbued with his, the fusing of your auras as his lips meld to your skin, over and over, hot and wet and electric and then-

“Fuck, Solomon,” you hiss, head thrown back against the feather-stuffed pillows as his moans are lost in the temple of your body while his hips bruise against yours.

“Mm… you feel so good, my perfect apprentice… my… my beautiful MC…” His words come in sharp gasps out of time with his urgent motions, and you feel him collapse against you as his hips stutter and his seed starts to drip from between your legs, hot and slick as it spills onto the bedsheets. The intrusion has the tightening in your abdomen finally erupting into the shaking of your legs, into shivers of pleasure that race up your skin and draw sharp gasps from lips that Solomon stifles with a hard kiss.

“Solomon…” you manage to breathe as he removes himself from you, lays beside you with a heaving chest and sparkling eyes mirrored in your own.

“Sleep, MC… you did so well… more work tomorrow…” he manages to sigh, his arms closing around your back and dragging you into his chest as he kisses you again, and presses a final kiss to your forehead.

Relaxing into his chest, you nod, humming as forgotten tendrils of sleep begin to slink between your thoughts and numb your tongue.

“‘Kay… night, Solomon…”

You feel him smile against your forehead, and if this is a fairytale, you hope you never reach the last page.

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heyo, thanks for reading! if u enjoyed and u have a spare moment pls comment and reblog, it really makes my day!!! love u hope u have a good day/night 🥺👉👈

[indulge-that-sin]

A Social Experience

Characters: GN!MC, Leviathan, Asmodeus, Mammon

Wordcount: 1700

Tags: Fluff, Domestic, Bonding Activities, Humor

(No spoilers for latter lessons, but takes place fairly late in the game.)

***

"--a gross, shut-in otaku like me!" Levi finished, on the all too familiar note.

Usually by this point you would already be launching into reassurances that he certainly wasn't gross, and shouldn't talk about himself like that, but this time there was nothing but a silence that bounced off the walls, damning and louder than any words.

You reached into your bag of chips, removed a single potato chip, and ate it as you tilted your head in thought. Levi took your silence like a slap in the face, and recoiled, his face already wavering. The sound of your chewing was distressingly loud in contrast.

You finished chewing and swallowed. "I mean, is that even true anymore?" you asked after a nerve-wracking length of time.

Levi's expression twisted more into confusion than hurt. "Huh?!" 

"Don't you kind of lose your hikikomori credentials if you become popular and people start coming to spend time with you all the time?"

"That's not-- I'm not-- You don't count!" Levi sputtered.

"Oh, I don't count, huh," you repeated, putting a hand to your chest and dramatically feigning heartbreak.

Levi looked abashed now. "Th-that's not what I meant," he rushed to add.

"I know what you meant," you said. "Give it an hour."

Now Levi tilted fully into confusion.

"Give what an hour?"

"My point to be made," you said, and placed your D.D.D. onto the lip of the bathtub, out of your own reach. It was also clearly visible to Levi as you both sat on beanbags in front of his TV, next to the bath tub. "An hour," you repeated in a portentous video game narrator voice.

Levi scowled and picked up his controller again, turning back to his game. But his reactions were off, now. His character moved jerkily around the screen, doubling back and taking wrong turns on the 8-bit map as Levi's mood roiled with the strangeness of the conversation.

You continued eating your chips slowly, savoring the taste of the limited edition novelty flavor that Levi had generously acquired for you. He'd tried to pass it as a coincidence, but he didn't really know anyone else who unironically enjoyed the taste of cream and devilradish chips.

Not even half an hour passed before there was a knock on the door. Levi asked for the password on reflex. Surprisingly, from the other side of the door came a sigh, and then Asmo's melodious voice reciting the string of nerd trivia that Levi had set as a password for him ever since they became unlikely allies for the Bloody Moon competition.

"Come in, I guess," Levi replied, giving you a long look. Your D.D.D. was still on the edge of the bathtub, untouched as you sat there elbow-deep in greasy chips. You couldn't have called anyone over. And yet, was this what you expected to happen?

"Give it forty more minutes now," you said low.

Asmo fluttered into the room, like a passing breeze bringing in the smell of perfume. 

"Oh, there you are, darling, I was wondering where you were," he said, face lit up as he saw you.

He sat uninvited next to you in the beanbag, and you scooted over to make space for him. Levi would have complained, except moving to make room for Asmo meant you shuffled closer to Levi instead, so he ended up biting his tongue.

"What do you want?" Levi grit out.

"Must I want something?" Asmo asked, "Is it not enough that I give my adorable brother the opportunity to entertain me?"

"He's bored," you translated.

"I'm soooo bored," Asmo whined, his shoulders rolling in a full-body sigh. But he perked up as he leaned forward to look at both you and Levi. "But what about all this? Mind if I join the fun~?"

"Let's find a game Asmo can play," you suggested. 

"If you'd like," Asmo acquiesced with a shrug, indicating he'd had some other kind of fun in mind.

Levi gave you another sidelong glance, full of suspicion, but his head was out of the game he was playing anyway, so he exited and pulled up his game library instead. Deciding which game to choose was the trickier part, because Asmo had terrible reflexes, and an attention span worse than Mammon's when it came to playing anything. This ruled out anything requiring twitch reflexes or understanding complicated rules. 

Asmo, meanwhile, scrunched his nose at your chips.

"All that grease and salt is going to be awful for your complexion, darling," he said, clearly disapproving.

"I'm not rubbing it on my face," you said, and defiantly sucked crumbs off your thumb. Levi nearly choked at the sound, which was borderline obscene. The little sound Asmo made in response did nothing to contradict this impression. Levi managed to swallow back the wave of envy before it came undammed by concentrating on the list of games on the screen. He still had to make a selection.

A farming sim seemed like a safe enough choice; something bright and frivolous. Just like Asmo.

Levi passed the controller as the title screen came up, and Asmo, to his credit, managed to choose the 'New Game' option without messing anything up. Yet. When the screen went dark as the game loaded, Asmo couldn't resist looking at his reflection and primping his hair a bit. Levi did resist snorting and rolling his eyes, but it was a close thing.

The character creation screen popped up with its myriad of options, and Asmo gasped in delight.

"Oh! This is a good start! Much better than getting shoved into some ugly gray metal suit at the beginning," Asmo remarked cheerfully. He cycled through the hair and clothing options with the speed and deftness of a veteran player. 

"Hey, beginner armor in RPGs can be colorful too," Levi protested.

"But not fashionable, apparently," Asmo sniffed.

Asmo had only just barely settled on a hairstyle and color combination he thought was adequately cute, and was scrunching his nose at the shirt options, when another knock came at the door.

"Come in," you called out, before Levi could demand a password.

Mammon's head popped through the door, and he pulled a face when he saw you there, just like he always did when you were in somebody else's company and not his.

"Eh? What're you doing here?" Mammon asked, closing the door behind him and sidling up to the three of you. 

He craned his neck and squinted at the screen, like he was verifying that whatever you were doing, it passed his requirements for propriety. Between knowing the kinds of games Levi had in his collection, and seeing Asmo there, maybe he was not completely unjustified in some suspicion, but it still made you want to roll your eyes.

"We're watching Asmo create his character," you explained.

Mammon guffawed. "Betcha been watching him do that for a while!"

"Fifteen minutes, more or less," you said. "But to be fair, Levi takes way longer to create characters."

"It's an important step!" Levi sputtered.

"Especially with the quality of the options," Asmo added. "Look at this. A purple T-shirt with a pink butt on it?"

"That's a peach!" Levi protested, his face turning red.

"I know what a butt looks like, Levi," Asmo replied tartly.

"Wait, wait, Asmo, that black one with the gold design ain't half bad! Go back an' pick that one." 

"That gaudy thing! Absolutely not!"

"Mammon, why are you even here?" Levi asked, now completely exasperated with his brothers.

"I was just seein' if we were still on for Devil Kart against those Purgatory Hall guys. We need ta win back our honor, ya know."

"Do we?" Levi asked suspiciously, "or are you running a betting pool again?"

Mammon made a good show of appearing indignant at the very suggestion, but he'd hit you up earlier today about whether you'd be willing to take a dive in the second half of Candy Mountain in exchange for a lump grimm sum, so you knew too much about the subject to defend Mammon without exposing him.

"Can't I be showin' an interest without ya gettin' all suspicious a' me? What makes me so weird, huh? Asmo here doesn't even play games, and I don't see ya hasslin' him!"

"I do too play games," Asmo protested.

"Really? 'Cause only thing I ever saw you play was that stupid matching thing with the gems, and I ain't seen much of even that lately."

You knew which game Mammon meant, because it was the only game app you'd ever seen on Asmo's phone. You'd watch him play in moments of boredom, swiping his screen with a completely blank look of concentration as he matched the colors of the gems in rows and columns, and they burst into sparkles. 

"Ugh, of course you haven't seen me play, I finished it. I have to wait until they add new levels."

"Didn't that game have like ten thousand levels already?" you asked. "You mean you passed all of them?"

"Eleven thousand and sixty five," Asmo corrected primly. "And yes, I did them all. I have to wait until they add more now. I asked."

The room fell into shocked silence at this. Even Levi looked mildly dyspeptic at the thought of completing eleven thousand levels of a match-3 game. You'd played it yourself for a while, and past the two hundredth level, the number of complicated mechanics the game introduced had completely broken you.

"Anyway," Mammon said after a few more beats of silence. He gestured to the screen, where Asmo was flicking between two shirt options. "This thing got co-op or somethin'?"

You finished your chips, and folded away the empty bag. When you picked up your D.D.D., fifty five minutes had passed.

"Still five minutes left," you muttered to Levi while Asmo and Mammon bickered over the choice of pants. "Wanna play the long odds and see if the twins show up too?"

"Okay, okay, you've made your point," Levi grumbled. "I let way too many people waltz in here. I'll have to tighten security."

But Levi's heart wasn't really in it, and when he turned to watch Mammon try to swipe Asmo's controller while the latter loudly protested, there was almost a smile threatening to spread over Levi's face.

[h2bakugou]

Hello! Could I please get a soft shiggy x fem!reader? Basically the reader is like god dammit why aren’t u taking care of urself? And basically gives him a lil homemade spa day! I think it’d be really cute! It can be fluff or smut, whatever you prefer!

a/n: hii!! of course!! i kept this kinda fluffy, posting a day later but happy birthday shiggy baby

summary: the constant state that shigaraki stays in while running the league is certainly an interesting one, but you can’t bear watching him not take care of himself. so you arrange a day to do just that

key: (y/n) - your name / (f/n) - first name / (l/n) - last name / (e/c) - eye color / (h/c) - hair color / (y/q) - your quirk

warnings: swearing, fluff, mentions of not eating, mentions of anxiety, a few mentions of nudity but nothing sexual

word count: 2.2k (okay pop awf-)

;cut for length;

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The prominent dark circles under Shigaraki’s eyes were a clear indication that he had been up all night again. Even while he sat in the bed beside you, playing a game on some handheld console, you could tell he hadn’t been to sleep at all in the past twenty-four hours.

Trying to ignore the soft sounds coming from his game, you cuddled up to him anyway, slinging an arm under on of his, resting your hand back up on his shoulder, your grasp resembling that of a backpack strap.

“What are you playing?” You mumbled quietly, your eyes just barely peeking over his arm, the screen illuminated a little too brightly for your comfort.

“Some weird RPG I downloaded from a forum. It’s stupid.” Shigaraki quickly turned the game console off and set it on the night stand, turning over to look at you.

“You look tired, did you not sleep good last night?” You ask, reaching a delicate hand up to caress his cheek, thumb carefully grazing over the top his cheek. You pull him in for a delicate kiss, just barely touching his lips.

You were still half-asleep, but you could tell Shigaraki wasn’t taking care of himself again. He had these spells, usually around the time when the League wasn’t doing much, plotting or just moving around, he wouldn’t sleep, he’d barely eat-his excuse would be he forgot, but you knew he was anxious.

Anxious for what was to come. He was a good leader, and he was strong, probably stronger than you were, but that didn’t matter. You were worried about him.

You couldn’t stand seeing those dark circles under his eyes, of hearing his tummy rumble when you lay next to him. It seemed the scratching on his neck would worsen as well, raw skin peeking through under the already cracked and dry skin he itched at for what felt like hours.

“Didn’t sleep.” He replied quietly. He knew you were about to scold him. He could read it all over your face as you pouted, pulling him into you.

“You could’ve woke me up, and we could’ve done something to help you fall asleep.” You sit up, ushering him to lay in your lap. As he does so, you take one look at his hair and inwardly cringe.

It’s a knotted mess, and no matter how much you wanted to run your fingers through it, you probably wouldn’t even get halfway before having to brush your fingers out of there with a hair brush. Or worse, cut them out.

“Didn’t wanna bug you.” Shigaraki seemed cold. His responses were dry. You heaved a sigh and pushed him up by his shoulders. Slinking out of the bed, you walked around to his side and tugged him out, pulling him over to the bathroom by his arms.

“How many times have I told you I don’t mind.” You sigh as you set him down on he toilet lid, watching as he just nods, hanging his head as you turn on the water for the bath.

Allowing it to warm up, you turn back to him and tug at his shirt.

“Arms up.” You speak softly, proceeding to take his shirt off as he lifts his arms up.

“When did you get this!?” You’re visibly and audibly worried as you spot a rather large bruise on his side. It looked like it hurt.

“Last fight.” Shigaraki sighed and glanced up at you.

“What are you doing?” His lips were fitted in a thin line, his eyelids were barely open, probably to heavy to even try.

“I’m going to help you relax. Look, your shoulders are so tense you can’t even relax them!” You went to touch his shoulders and just as you had stated, the muscles felt locked and telling by the hissing from Shigaraki, they were painful to move and touch.

“Alright alright! Just, am I taking a bath?” He questioned. You nodded and stepped aside, allowing him to undress the rest of the way before getting into the tub, his lips parting as he sat down, the warm water already making him feel slightly better.

Taking a cup you’d left in the bathroom from dumping out some soda, you rinsed it quickly under the sink, making sure it wasn’t sticky, and then brought it over to the tub where you scooped up some water and poured it over Shigaraki’s hair.

Once it was wet enough to lather some shampoo in, you allowed him to lean back as you worked your fingers through his locks. Unknotting his hair and washing it was a bit difficult, but taking your time, you made sure every strand of his hair was clean.

Your fingers worked their way back up to his scalp where you massaged for quite a few minutes, both to try and remove any built up dirt and dandruff and to give him a bit of a massage.

Shigaraki was almost purring in satisfaction as you finally dragged your hands away, reaching for the cup to rinse his hair. It didn’t take you long to rinse out all the suds before getting started on the conditioner.

“Thank you.” Shigaraki mumbled, holding his knees to his chest, his head dipped back so you could wash his hair easier.

“Of course. I know you haven’t been taking care of yourself again, I know you don’t mean too, but I can’t help but notice.” You sigh, running the pleasant-smelling conditioner through his white locks.

“You have these weird spells. I understand though, how you feel. It’s not easy being the leader, I can’t imagine the stress you feel, but you’ve got to take care of yourself. It’s important. You gotta be strong for the league, and for yourself.” You know Shigaraki, a little more than everyone else in the league does.

You’re dating him for peat’s sake. But Shigaraki became standoffish, grumpy, and even distant during these spells. There was nothing to do. Besides maybe make up a plan for a little something just to do something.

He was anxious about the little things. About how the league looked to the public. About how long they had stayed in one location. About how long it had been since their last big attack.

He needed to get back to league business, but there needed to be time, a good plan, an opening, the forces to attack, all of it needed to be planned with pinpoint accuracy, and those things took time.

“I love you, a whole bunch.” You lean over and kiss his cheek, smiling as his cheeks burn red.

You lather up a loofa with some nice scented soap and begin to wash his back and shoulders, down his arms and a little on his neck.

You’re extra careful around his neck and try not to get any of the scented soap on his raw skin. You know it hurts, and it’ll sting when water washes over it, but you’ll have to take extra good care of that spot later.

When you’re finished washing him, you drain the water and let him stand up, switching the bath to a shower and you begin to rinse him off.

It feels so domestic, these few minutes. The way you laugh and giggle when you tell him to lift his arms and spin and then call yourself some sort of car wash as you spray the warm water over him.

“You’re making a mess.” Shigaraki states at the various puddles of water on the bathroom floor. You sigh and finally help him rinse his conditioned hair out, asking him to hold the shower head for you while you run your fingers through his hair and ring out all the suds.

After the shower, you let him stand and air dry why you go and retrieve a towel. Upon walking in, he’s turned away from you, so you decide to pinch his butt, playfully of course.

Shigaraki just turns and glares at you, taking the towel from you as you giggle.

“I touched the butt.” You laugh as you leave the bathroom, letting him dry off. While he does so, you search around for a pair of boxers to hand him as well as a comfy t-shirt to put on after you give him a nice back massage.

Handing him his underwear, you look away and decide to make the bed quickly while he gets partially dressed.

“Where’s my shirt?” He questions. You turn and for a few seconds, you’re flustered. There’s Shigaraki, hair dripping wet and running down his toned chest, right down to the waist band of his black boxers. The towel you’d given him is lazily tossed over one shoulder, and he looks like some sort of actor out of a terrible romance movie.

Too entranced by his looks, you quickly shake your head, feeling the heat rise to your cheeks. You pat the freshly made bed.

“Back massage.” You blurt out kneeling on the bed, waiting for him to lay down.

“Flustered?” Shigaraki stands beside the bed, a finger under your chin as you look up at him. You lean up and kiss his lips, smiling as you pull away.

“Well when you look that good can you blame me?” You tease, waiting as he lays down on the bed like you had motioned for.

“I guess not.” He replies.

Laying his head over his folded arms, his chest is against the bed. You move to sit over his butt as you look at his back. Still a little damp from the shower, you take the towel that had been tossed on the bed and dry it off, running it through his wet locks a bit.

Tossing it down onto the floor, too unbothered about it leaving a wet-mark on the carpet, You squirt some lotion into your hand and delicately begin to rub it into his back, carefully drawing your fingers across his skin, massaging it up over his shoulders.

Your fingers work magic as you relieve his tension, working at his shoulders carefully and strategically, undoing any knots that had formed.

Shigaraki’s eyes are closed, and small hums of satisfaction spill from his mouth as you do so.

You spend minutes massaging his back, quietly and gently working lotion into his skin. And when you’re finished, you ask him to sit up and face you. He puts on a shirt and you ask for his hands.

He’s skeptical but allows you to see one. You carefully apply some lotion to your hand and begin to massage it in, working down each one of his fingers before gently massaging his palm.

He stares at you in admiration as you seem un-phased by his hands, or the fact that he could kill you with them if you messed up. You don’t even look anxious, or worried about them.

And when you switch to his other hand, you continue, even when his fingers twitch. You just smile and kiss the back of his hand when you’re done, complementing the way he looks.

Interlocking your hands with his, Shigaraki’s eyes go wide.

“Careful!” He speaks up, falling into you as you tug him back.

He’s laying on top of you as you lay under him, smiling up at him.

“I can handle myself, don’t worry. Now come here.” You wrap your arms and legs around him, clinging to him like a sloth. You can’t help but giggle as he turns over, allowing you to be on top of him.

“You’re so stupid.” Shigaraki sighs, closing his eyes. You brush your nose against his, kissing the tip of his nose before burying your head into the crook of his neck.

“But you love me. And I love you too.” You kiss his neck gently, closing your eyes as you rest against him.

“I do love you.” Shigaraki’s arms are wrapped over your back, holding you down on top of him. He smiles and finally feels how tired he was.

“I’m gonna go make breakfast soon, so take a little nap okay?” You sit up and kiss his forehead.

“I can’t fall asleep without you.” Shigaraki mumbles, holding you tighter.

“This is a bad idea. I’m gonna fall back asleep too.” You mumble reaching for a blanket. Shigaraki helps cover the both of you.

“Guess we’re napping then.” Shigaraki kisses your cheek, nuzzling his head against yours.

“Guess so.” Your words are quiet as you slip back to sleep, peacefully dozing off as Shigaraki does the same.

It’s a bit of a long nap, a couple hours pass. And when you wake up, you make some food for the both of you, eating a big meal while watching a show on Netflix. The day is all about Shigaraki and so cuddles are a must when you’re finished eating.

You switch from basic cuddling to sitting in his lap, to even under his baggy t-shirt, your head poking through the head-hole, your back against his chest.

It’s a long day, but it’s spent with Shigaraki, taking care of him and showing him how much you truly adore him. And he loves it.

And at the end of the night, when you go to bed for real after gaming for an unreal amount of time, he holds you close and kisses the top of your head. You’re tuckered out completely sound asleep as he begins to doze off himself.

He loves you. He really does.

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masterlist

[nightcoremoon]

oblivion/skyrim and fallout 3/4 have done permanent and irreparable damage to the RPG playerbase, and it’s why so many people think that dark souls is hard. yes, I am serious.

now, here’s the thing. the games themselves are fine. in fact, they’re fucking revolutionary. arena was fine, daggerfall was phenomenal but too overly ambitious for the technology at hand, morrowind is one of the greatest RPGs ever made, oblivion was really good for its time and it’s still serviceable today (it’s completely broken but hey so is Vampire and New Vegas), and skyrim… is fucking skyrim. it’s one of the best games ever made, hands down. fallout 1 was great, fallout 2 was amazing, and fallout 3 was very very good for its time. which is good because it is now literally unplayable since the steam version doesn’t work, the gog version barely works, the windows game center version no longer exists anymore. but even if it was, it’s still a mess of bad design decisions.

let me get this out of the way. there are worse games. this is the nickelback argument. nickelback is not the worst band in the world. it’s just the most popular band in the “worst good bands of all time list”. there are a dozen worse bands than nickelback I can think of off the top of my head (for proof: dommin, buckcherry, hinder, puddle of mudd, creed, sugar ray, oasis, four non blondes, simple plan, all time low, the all american rejects, and the plain white Ts. I don’t think these bands are BAD per se, they’re just not as good as nickelback is). the issue is that, like nickelback, bethesda’s RPGS are massively overrated. there are bad bands out there: every grindcore band is bad (since grindcore is bad on purpose), blood on the dance floor is bad, brokencyde is bad, the medic droid is bad. myspacecore exists so there is not a snowball’s chance in hell that nickelback is genuinely at the bottom of the barrel. same with skyrim and Fo4. bubsy 3D, postal 3, charlie’s angels, afro samurai 2, leisure suit larry (the really bad one), ride to hell, big rigs, action 52, desert bus, jekyll and hyde, ET atari! NOW THOSE ARE SOME GENUINELY SHITTY GAMES. skyrim is cohesive. functional. has good elements. lots of content, lots of variety, depth in places. it is not a “bad game”. but it’s definitely one of the worst good games ever made. and here’s why.

there is literally zero difficulty.

yes there is a slider available that adjusts how much damage you deal and receive. I am aware. acolyte novice master and legendary, whatever, THAT DOESNT COUNT. adjusting the numbers isn’t real difficulty. it’s imaginary. it’s artificial. it’s not real. the difference between easy and hard should not be “you shoot the bad guy three times instead of two times” because that’s just fucking stupid. it’s a complete waste of time, and it doesn’t require any actual skill. memorization, diligence, patience, focus, sure, but spending four hours on memorizing left right left right up down up down b a select start BOOM win! is dumb. good difficulty, real difficulty, is a lot more in depth and involved. take metro 2033: its hard difficulty is removing the HUD, forcing you to keep a closer eye on the more immersive bits of the interface, because every single piece of information on your hud is visible somewhere on artyom’s body, like the rig in dead space, which changes how much ammo enemies drop. resident evil 4 has different enemy spawns on professional than it does on DA1 normal (or easy), and enemies move faster on pro. mass effect 2 has multiple different layers of enemy armor which forces more tactical decision making skills- this has the unfortunate side effect of rendering most of the other characters useless (only miranda zaeed garrus grunt are good on higher difficulty) but it’s still a tangible difference that’s not just “give the bad guy more meat on his bones”. resident evil madhouse/hardcore move items around and limit saves. silent hill (the good ones) changes the puzzles. fallout new vegas hardcore adds food water and sleep to the game, plus it enables NPC and companion permadeath, and alters the way healing is done (stimpaks are HoTs instead). guitar hero adds the number of note frets used on the board.

fallout 3? you shoot the bad guy more times and then spam more stimpaks afterwards.

skyrim? you stab the bad guy more times and then eat more cheese wheels afterwards.

people have grown complacent playing these games this way, save scumming for better results and more favorable outcomes, abusing the ill thought out merchant systems, selling everything they find that wasn’t nailed to the floor just to buy more cheese and stims because you can brute force your way through the whole game with just the 10mm pistol or the flaming poisoning raging sword of doom if you just spam more stimpaks and cheese wheels. just press X on every npc, let the game record the quests you get and put it on your map so you can blindly follow the flashing blinky light, press r1 a hundred times until the bad guy dies, pick up everything, sell it to whoever, buy a billion more cheese and stims, lather rinse repeat. you don’t even need to think. just press the button and get the corn. just press the button and get the corn. just press the button… and get… the corn.

god forbid you have to actually look around, god forbid you have to actually read, god forbid you have to actually listen to the NPCs, god forbid you need to follow directions and landmarks and hold a 3d space in your mind without the use of a physical map or a flashy blinky light in the corner. god forbid you have to actually learn the boss moveset and time your dodges to not get hit because you only have 5 heals because you’re too stupid to figure out the kindle system. god forbid you can’t save scum because there’s only auto save and you actually have consequences for your actions. god forbid you have to read the description of your keys so you don’t just shit yourself crying to twitch chat WHERE DO I GOOOOOO???????? I DONT UNDERSTAND THIS GAME IS SO HAAAAAARRRRRRDDDD T.T

the most hilarious part is that, within minutes of beating the tutorial, you can literally suicide run to the graveyard and get the zweihander which kills almost every burg hollow in one hit, definitely two hits. it does 140 damage, everything else does maybe 80, 90 if you’re lucky. and when every enemy had a defense stat of like 50, that’s well over a 200% maybe even 300% damage increase. every enemy telegraphs their attacks so far in advance you can literally walk away, walk around to their backs, and you don’t even need to get a backstab, you can just swing and the counter damage will kill them instantly. you have to think spatially & critically. you have to actually use your brain to beat each encounter.

skyrim and fallout 4’s popularity has enabled complacent play styles in far too many people, so the moment they find a game that you actually need to respect and pay attention to and develop actual tangible skill to progress, clearly the game is just too hard because the devs are trolls and miyazaki hates you. it can’t POSSIBLY be that you just suck.

it’s absurdly easy to git gud. it just takes more than 30 seconds of thinking it’s dynasty warriors, getting your ass kicked in, then punching a hole in your monitor.

and, dark souls does have an easy mode. it’s reach the credits once then put the game down forever. that is easy mode. new game IS easy mode, because the REAL game is new game plus. that’s what the game was actually built around. new game is just the tutorial. one long tutorial. I don’t wanna hear one more person whine and complain that taurus demon is ~too hard~ when I’m going toe to toe with artorias NG+ because he’s the only enemy that gives me any trouble whatsoever. you just need to stop asking the internet how to play and then seeing “learn to parry” as “hide behind a shield forever and then act shocked when you die to an unblockable attack that you should have learned to roll from 20 hours ago. you need to stop googling “how do I beat X” every time it takes you more than one try. you need to stop expecting it to hand you everything on a silver platter like skyrim and fallout 3 did. because this is not skyrim or fallout. this is dark souls. it’s not devil may cry, which is ACTUALLY really fucking hard. it’s not hard. it’s literally just… different.

[tomurasprincess]

If Only (Shigaraki x Reader)

Summary: Tomura Shigaraki meets a young woman at a local convention that leaves an impression on him and has him wondering: could he really have a normal life with her, or is his life destined to be nothing but destruction?

Pairing: Shigaraki x Reader Rating: G. Warnings: Angst, manga spoilers for Shigaraki’s backstory.  Word Count: 3.5k+ Note: My entry for the BNHarem Discord collab! Yes, this is a SFW one, and yes I did enter it. It was a bit of a challenge for me to write but I like how it turned out! The full masterlist can be found here, so make sure you check out the fics from all of the talented writers!

Tomura Shigaraki decided this was a mistake within the first ten minutes of entering the convention center. Furthermore, he had decided to correct this mistake within the first fifteen, leaving without the thing he went to the convention for in the first place. The entire hall was too loud, too noisy, too full of people. The atmosphere was stifling, the air conditioners running at full blast still not being enough to cool down such an enormous space with so many people crammed in at once.

But one thing happened that made him change his plans. He ran into someone. Literally. As he is turning a corner, trying to find an area that was not packed full of people so that he could catch his breath, he runs directly into someone. The sudden collision takes you by surprise as you barely right yourself from toppling over.

As you gather your bearings, Shigaraki finds himself taking the opportunity to study your outfit. You are cosplaying as a character from a video game series that he is a big fan of, the costume remarkably true to the character herself. He finds himself appreciative of your attention to detail and the level of work you must have put into the cosplay.. But annoyance bubbles up inside of him as he sees that you ran into him because you weren’t paying a bit of attention to where you were going, choosing to stare at your phone instead.

“How about you watch where you’re going?” He sneers at you, giving the glare that usually gets people to back down immediately. But he is mildly surprised when he sees you are not intimidated by his presence, choosing instead to give him a bright smile.

“Sorry, but I am so close to beating this level! Didn’t want to put it down.”

He blinks at your response before leaning around to glance at your phone. You’re playing a popular mobile RPG on a particularly difficult level. He knows this because he plays the same game, and even he had a hell of a time beating it.

You curse under your breath as you lose, putting up a good fight but ultimately being overwhelmed by the third phase of the boss. When you look up at him to see him staring at you, you blush and quickly glance away. Huh, he thinks, that’s new. You’re not afraid of him, not disgusted by his appearance like others.

“The third phase is the hardest,” he finally ventures as he points to a few skills and characters on your screen. “Try using those instead.”

Your face turns serious as you revise your setup, restarting the level and playing through it again. You are so focused on your game that you don't even notice Shigaraki watching you like you are something new and unique. He tears his eyes away long enough to start watching your screen as you enter the third phase, utilizing the characters and skills he told you about with a decent amount of skill.

When you finally beat the level, you do a happy fist pump and a squeal before moving towards him. He tenses, anticipating an attack and ready to spring into action at a moment’s notice. But when he feels arms wrapping around his neck, he freezes completely.

This is new territory for him. The only way people touch him is with malice as they try to kill him, as they try to harm him. Not with kindness or gratitude. He’s still trying to process it as it ends with you pulling away with a big smile on your face. He finds himself wanting to help you again in some way so that he can experience the feeling of being hugged again.

“Thank you, I’ve been trying to beat that level all day!”

“It’s no big deal.” He shuffles a bit in place before scratching at his neck.

“Well I appreciate it anyway. I was on my way to lunch when we bumped into each other. Do you want to go with me?”

“You can stop mocking me,” he narrows his eyes at you. “I don’t appreciate it.” Nobody is this nice, he thinks, you must be making fun of him somehow. His fingers itch to wrap around your neck, to kill you for this offense against him.

He expects you to finally be afraid, to stop talking to him and leave him to his solitude again. But instead, you furiously shake your head. “Oh no, not mocking you at all!” You bite your lip and fidget with your costume. “I just think you seem cool, is all. My friends make fun of me for liking games, and they definitely don’t help me beat levels.”

This time, the rage he feels is directed at anyone who would make fun of this woman in front of her. He’s shocked by this realization, and at the fact that he really does want to talk more. To get to know the one person who doesn’t seem to be bothered by him. He glances down at his shoes as he mumbles an apology, not knowing what else to say.

“Well there’s only one way to make it up to me.” Of course you want something. Nobody ever wants him for him, only what he can do for them. He was stupid for thinking anyone could be different, that -

“You gotta take me to lunch,” you happily explain. “It’ll be my treat!”

He gives you a slow blink, staring as if trying to process your words. Someone wants to spend time with him? Voluntarily, simply because they seem to like him? He didn’t expect anything like this, and yet there doesn’t seem to be any deception from you. You’re simply standing there as you wait for his answer with a hopeful look on your face.

“I, I guess that’s fine,” he agrees hesitantly, “I still have some time before the thing I want starts.”

You instantly light up as you hear his agreement. “What is it that you’re waiting for?” You ask as you begin to lead the way to the dining hall. “Maybe we could go together?”

“Oh, it’s the big event for Cyberpunk 2077. Been waiting for that game for years and since I was in the area, I thought I’d stop by.”

“Oh god, I am so excited for that one. The character customization alone is going to take me hours.”

He chuckles at that, your sheer excitement for everything shining through as you discuss the details of the game together while walking to the dining area. True to your word, you happily pay as you finally choose a place to eat, and the two of you settle in to continue to talk about games. He finds himself really enjoying talking to you. You are so innocent compared to what he’s used to, so carefree and eager to talk about things you enjoy.

“You know, I was wondering something. Why are you here alone?”

Your face falls at that statement as you glance away from him. It was the first time he saw such a sad look on your face, and he finds himself almost mad at being the one who caused that look, even if it was indirectly.

“Ah, I was supposed to be here with a few friends.”

He waits for you to finish your sentence, but you trail off and say nothing. “And? Where are they?”

“They - they had to cancel. But it’s totally okay!” You wave your hands quickly as you try to change the subject. But Shigaraki is not about to have it.

“They abandoned you,” he states flatly.

“Abandoned is a strong word,” you hedge. “They said they just had other things to do. It really is okay.”

His eyes narrow at the last part. He knows a lie when he hears one, and this is the first that he’s noticed since he started talking to you.

“They didn’t just have other things to do, did they?”

You glance anywhere but at his face, willing him to not ask any more questions. But now his curiosity has peaked, and he repeats the question.

“Okay, fine,” you give a long drawn out sigh. “They were supposed to be here today, cosplaying with me.  All of us as a character from the group, you know?”

He nods his head as he internally realizes where this is going, the very thought making his blood boil.

“But well, they - they said,” your voice wavers just a bit, “they said this morning that they had better things to do and cancelled. It’s okay, really.”

But he is perceptive enough to realize that it’s not okay. The look in your eyes says you’re hurt, but you’re also used to it. You simply accept being abandoned by your friends as a thing that happens. He knows the look of defeat and rejection in your eyes very well. After all, he sees it every day in the mirror.

“That’s why I asked you to join me for lunch, you know.”

He gives you a questioning look as his thoughts race to figure out what you mean. Do you mean that you invited him to lunch just so you wouldn’t be alone? That thought hurts, for some reason that he couldn’t explain.

“You’re alone too, aren’t you?” You look him directly in his crimson eyes and hold his gaze. He knows on some instinctive level that you don’t just mean at this convention. You’re more perceptive than you initially give off, he realizes suddenly.

He finally nods his head. “I have a few people who support me, but -”

“But you don’t have your person yet, do you?”

This question confuses him, and he waits for you to elaborate on it.

“You know, your person!” Your voice is back to a slightly happier tone, and he’s glad to hear it. “That one person you really connect with, who you would do anything for.”

“That is a rather naive concept,” he says automatically, without considering what he’s saying. But you don’t seem phased by his slightly rude comment.

“Naive, maybe. But I think it’s true. That you just connect with people sometimes.”

He must have inadvertently started frowning at your words, because you give him an adorable pout. “Don’t give me that look,” you playfully reprimand him as you give him a light poke to the forehead.

He gawks at you in sheer surprise for several moments, leaving you to giggle at his expression. He has never had anyone touch him as casually as you do. Instead of making him uncomfortable, however, it makes him feel strangely warm.

It’s then that he hears an announcement come over the convention hall speakers, informing everyone that the keynote presentation for Cyberpunk 2077 is about to begin in 10 minutes. He glances at you, waiting to see your reaction.

“There’s your cue, right? Go have fun!” You give him a smile that appears forced, as if you don’t want him to leave but are holding yourself back from saying so.

“I mean, you could come with me,” he murmurs, “I guess I wouldn’t mind you tagging along.”

“Ah, I don’t have a ticket for that part. Couldn’t afford it. But go ahead, I wouldn’t want you to miss it on my behalf.” You stand up from the table as you turn to leave. Before he realizes what he’s doing, he’s grabbing your arm and gently pulling you back towards him. You stare up at him with both surprise and hope in your eyes as he tucks you into his body, wrapping his arms around you. You feel stiff for only one second before you link your arms around him as well, burrowing your face against his chest with a contented sigh.

You stay there for what feels like hours, neither of you wanting to part. But when you finally do, it is with reluctance on both your parts. “Hey, one last thing before I go,” he begins, “I just wanted to let you know that I really wish -” He is interrupted when another announcement blares over the speaker, warning of 10 minutes left until the presentation. Your face turns to one of disappointment as he shrugs off what he was about to say. “I have to go, bye.”

He turns on his heel as he quickly leaves, trying not to remember the look on your face as you wondered what he was about to say. In truth, even he’s not sure of it. He doesn’t know how to feel about you, about his feelings. But he does know one thing. He liked you, liked talking to you. He thinks he’d like to get to know you more. Could someone like him, a villain who destroys everything he touches, really have someone like you, someone kind and upbeat?

Probably best that he doesn’t answer that question, even to himself.

✧༝┉┉┉┉┉˚*❋ ❋ ❋*˚┉┉┉┉┉༝✧

The presentation finally ends, crowds of people filtering suddenly out of the biggest convention hall on the property. The crowd is finally starting to bother him, too many people pushing against him, and he is eager to finally leave when he hears the sound of crashing glass and screams.  His head turns in the direction of the commotion, vowing to leave, when he hears his name being mentioned and something else that makes his blood turn cold. Your voice, saying something with sheer terror in it.

He’s moving before he’s even aware of it, racing around the corner and pushing people aside to get to you immediately. When he finally makes it to you, his vision almost goes red with the sheer rage that he is feeling at what he sees in front of him. You’re laying on the ground with minor cuts and bruises from broken glass and two heroes in costume standing over you.

“Where is Tomura Shigaraki?”

“I don’t know!”

“Yes you do, we have witnesses saying you were eating with him earlier.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, I ate alone.”

He is shocked at the fact that you, of all people, are lying to heroes. To protect him, even though you must realize who he truly is at this point. He doesn’t understand why he feels he has to do something to prevent these heroes from hurting you. Only that he does.

“If it’s me you want, I’m right here.” They whirl around instantly to attack him, but he’s ready for that. These are heroes who have no business hunting down a villain such as him, and he disposes of one of them instantly, knocking him completely out before turning away to meet the other one.

But fear floods his veins as he sees the hero has lifted you up and is holding you by your neck. You look at him with wide, tear filled eyes, as if asking him to save you.

“She has nothing to do with this,” he hisses at the hero, “leave her alone and deal with me.”

“You mean to tell me that someone like her willingly spent time with you, not knowing who you are? I don’t believe that at all.” The words cause Shigaraki to almost physically recoil, but he holds it back as he glares at the hero.

“Jet let her go.”

“Do you happen to care about her? I didn’t think you could care.” He narrows his eyes at Shigaraki. “Just turn yourself in and she doesn’t have to get hurt.”

At these words, rage unlike anything Shigaraki has ever felt fills him, and before he can even think of what he’s doing, he’s grabbing the hero with all of his fingers, tossing him away as he grabs for you.

“You saved me,” you mumble quietly as you look up at him, tracing a finger down his face tenderly.

He puts you down just a shade too quickly, causing you to lean against the wall for support. “I did not save you, you were just here.”

“No, I saw you. You were going in the opposite direction when you heard me. You came back for me.”

“Why were you even in this area to begin with? You said you didn’t have the ticket to be here.”

You glance away from his harsh tone, but your cheeks look flushed. “I went ahead and bought one. So that I could see you again.”

The wind is taken from his lungs as he realizes that you were here waiting for him. You were injured because you were waiting for him. You’re too vulnerable, too weak, not able to defend yourself. Everything in him rebels in what he’s about to do, but he has to. He squeezes his eyes shut as he realises this is it. This is his answer to the question of whether someone like him could have someone like you.

“Yeah? Well I sure as hell didn’t want to see you again.”

Your eyes go wide as you shake your head. “You’re - you’re lying. You wanted to say something to me before you left. It was that you wanted to see me again, right?”

He lets his expression grow cold. “No. I decided to be nice and not tell you how much I hate you. How much I wanted to leave so that I didn’t have to spend a moment longer with you.”

“You’re only saying these mean things because you want to push me away.” Tears run down your face as you try to deny his words. “But I won’t let that happen. I care about you!”

“You don’t even know me,” he snarls, “I could kill you in an instant and would think nothing of it.”

You let out a small gasp as you continue to try and deny his words. “No, you’re lying, you don’t mean any of these things. You didn’t have to save me but you did.”

“Maybe it’s because I wanted to fight them. Wanted to kill them.”

“But you didn’t! They’re still alive. You’re a good guy, you just -”

He growls at you as he steps aside, pointing backwards to something on the floor. You stare in incomprehension, trying to figure out what you see. When you glance back up at him, he knows you realize what happened. But he also sees the desperate need you have to deny it.

“Fine, I’ll show you the truth.” He wraps his hand all the way around the unconscious hero’s leg, watching your reaction closely. You begin to tremble, not looking at him but at what is happening to what used to be a man.

Ah, he thinks, there it finally is. The look he’s been expecting to see since the moment he met you. The fear. The disgust. The hatred. It’s written all over your face, all the expressions that he never wanted to see.

“Why,” you whisper as tears run down your cheeks. “They didn’t have to die, there was no reason for it.”

“I told you. Because I wanted to. And I could kill you just as easily, if you don’t get the fuck out of here right now.”

“But I love you!” You blurt the words out suddenly, and he feels the whole world collapse around him. No no no, this was not supposed to happen. He lunges at you, pressing your back against the wall as he raises a finger up over your skin.

“Yeah? Well I don’t love you. You’re useless and annoying, and it’s no wonder your friends abandoned you. Keep your worthless love.”

“No,” you choke back a sob as you pull away from him completely, an action that he allows with reluctance.  Even in these circumstances, he doesn’t want to let you go. But he waits for the words that he knows he’ll hear from you. To be called a monster, less than a person, nothing but a being of chaos and destruction who lives only to destroy.

“Well you still have it,” you sob, “you need it more than I do.” And with that, he watches as you take slow steps away from him, and he watches as you turn away and flee. Running out of his life for good.

It had to be this way, he tries to convince himself. There was no other way. Someone so innocent, so kind, would never make it in his world. If she couldn’t handle what she saw just now, there was no chance.

But your final words keep echoing in his head, refusing to leave. So he briefly allows himself to consider the possibilities, as he wipes away a tear that he pretends was never there at all.

If only his quirk hadn’t activated as it did, killing the few people in this world who cared about him. If only he hadn’t committed his first murder shortly after that, killing his own father. If only he hadn’t been taken by All for One, manipulated and molded into a weapon of nothing but destruction and decay. If only, if only, if only. So many places where things could have been different, where he could have had a life where he was loved. But he knows, deep in his heart, the only “if only” that truly matters.

The one that, if true, would change everything, make everything in his life be okay again. Allow him to have love and a life worth living for instead of worth dying for.

If only he were still Tenko Shimura.

✧༝┉┉┉┉┉˚*❋ ❋ ❋*˚┉┉┉┉┉༝✧

Tags: @thewheezingwyvern, @animewh0re, @dee-madwriter, @ttamaki​, @lildreamer93, @yaoyorozuwrites, @redbeanteax, @kittygonyan, @bat-eclecticwolfbouquet-love, @daedaep69, @heyybrittannia, @groovydreamertrash, @hisoknen, @chou-maitresse, @shoutogepi, @togasknifes, @kingtamakimurder, @1-800-callmekatsuki, @league-of-thots, @ichor-and-symbiosis

[lucifers-favorite-pen]

Unfinished Lessons

Fandom: Obey me

Genre: Angst, so much angst

Pairings: Lucifer x Blair

Word Count: ~2.8k

Warnings: Mention of death, lots of sadness, lots of angst

I would just like to apologize in advance for any small errors in this writing. I literally could not to a thorough edit because reading it again made me so genuinely sad. Get a box of tissues. You have been warned.

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

Context: Blair was taken from the HoL about a year ago, and was presumed dead. This broke everyone’s heart, but it broke her husband, Lucifer’s, the most. He didn’t know how to exist without her. He buried himself in his work, and in bottles, and wouldn’t let anyone console him. Not even Diavolo. When he finally was starting to learn how to be a person again, she shows back up, in chains due to trying to break into HoL, and has no recollection of him. Her once beautiful, warm black hair was a stark white, and her face looked like she had been modified slightly, like someone had tweaked the sliders in the character creation section of one of Leviathan’s RPGs. Either way, she wasn’t his wife. She was a poorly made copy of her sent here to torment him, to remind him of how he broke the vow he took to protect her when he married her.

Of course they kept her there, to interrogate her about Faerie and the people she was working for. Specifically why she was sent back to the Devildom in the first place. She was confused, and refused to believe she was who they were saying she was, and was extremely hostile.

Over the course of a month, she started to put some pieces together.

-Beel crying while pointing at a picture of him walking her down the aisle on her wedding day, begging her to believe him and to remember.

-Belphie showing her a video of their game of extreme chicken, pointing to Blair sitting triumphantly on Beel’s shoulders in knee and elbow pads as they both celebrated their victory.

-Asmo showing her her wedding dress, and gushing over how much he loved the way she looked and how well he did her hair and make up.

It was all too much evidence pointing to one conclusion. She felt a gnawing inside her chest everyday, like something was begging to be noticed, but she didn’t know what. She didn’t understand what she was feeling, sadness? Anxiety? Uncertainty? She had never felt anything but devotion and determination. How had she gone 25 years feeling only those two feelings?

She decided to go see Lucifer, the man who had been avoiding her like the plague. The man who was supposedly her husband while she was human. She had questions that she somehow knew only he could answer. She was determined to get to the bottom of this.

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

It was pretty late, but she couldn’t sleep. Her brain was going a million miles a minute with everything she had learned in the past month, and she needed to speak with him. She shrugged on a cardigan and padded down to his room, hearing a soft classical strings melody from the inside. She knocked timidly twice.

Lucifer knew who it was. That was how she knocked on his door when she first came to the Devildom, and how she knocked on his door everyday after that. Old habits die hard, apparently.

He sighed, filling his wine glass, “Come in,”.

Blair poked her head in and looked at him, making sure it was ok to come in. He glanced up at her from his work, not being able to look at her more than that, and asked in monotone, “What could you possibly need from me at this hour?”.

She hesitantly steps into the room, recognizing the music as Chopin’s Piano Concerto in E minor, specifically the second movement. She didn’t know how she knew that, as she had never heard it before, but she shook it off.

“I couldn’t sleep,” she mutters as she slowly steps toward him. Lucifer couldn’t help but crack a small smile at that. Blair didn’t sleep well her first couple months in the Devildom either. She had trouble adjusting to a new space, it seems that trait didn’t die with her either.

“And what do you expect me to do about that? Belphegor is the Avatar of Sloth, go bother him,” he says harshly, trying to get her to leave.

Blair stands her ground, and holds her head a little higher, “I just had some questions,”.

“About what?” he snaps.

“You know what,” she retorts, just as harsh. If this was what it was going to take to get what she needed, then that was that. She tried to be gentle, seeing as his brothers warned her that he was a wreck, but she wasn’t going to let him bully her into leaving.

Lucifer sighs, dropping his pen on the page and rubbing his hands over his face. He looked exhausted. She noted the dark circles beginning to form under his eyes, and the messiness of his hair. She noticed how his shirt was wrinkled, the tie was crooked, and noted the slight tremor in his hand as he brought the glass of wine to his lips. He gestured his hand out to her, silently telling her to ask away.

She looked around the room a bit before asking. Honestly, she didn’t think she would make it this far, and didn’t even know where to begin. Though, her eyes catch on a large framed painting hanging above his bed. It depicted him in a pressed tuxedo and a tail coat, sitting in a red velvet chair. On his knee sat a woman, with warm black hair, and icy blue eyes. She wore a magnificent black dress that hugged every curve perfectly with a train so long it couldn’t fit in the painting. They both looked at each other with a look of adoration and passion she hadn’t seen before. The way her hand brushed his cheek, and the way his hand held that hand so tenderly. The way his other hand came to hold her chin, and the slight curvature of his lips. It all was… familiar? The scene made her chest hurt in a way she didn’t understand.

“Is that us?” she asks, smiling and pointing to the painting. Lucifer turns to look at it as well, leaning his face on his chin as he stared.

“No,” he says, not looking at her. Her eyebrows furrow together, and she shakes her head. “But-”

“That is my wife and I on our wedding day. I had that portrait commissioned so I could capture her like that for the rest of my days. However, she wouldn't agree to be painted unless I also was in the portrait. I’m glad she insisted, I rather like how it turned out,” he says, a longing in his tone he was too tired to mask as he stared at the painting.

“But I thought-”

“You are not her. You are a pathetic excuse of a copy of her. Your cheekbones are too pronounced, your chin is too pointy, your ears are pointy, your nose is too small, and your hair-” he cuts himself off to sigh and take another swig of his beverage. His words bite at her heart and she feels an unfamiliar pressure building behind her eyes. What was going on with her?

“It’s like they tried to perfect perfection,” he mutters to himself, dragging his eyes away from the portrait and back to his glass. He manages to meet her gaze, cutting more daggers into her soul with his crimson eyes. “My wife is dead. You are not her, and you will never be her. You are a husk of the woman she was sent to torment me. A punishment for my failure to her as a husband by my father, I’m sure” he spits at her. He pours himself another glass and takes a gulp of the liquid, still staring at her even though looking at her makes his heart break all over again. He watches her look at her feet and start to pick at her nails, a tell tale sign she was nervous. She still had all the little mannerisms he studied while he was falling in love with her. She still tucked a strand of hair behind her ear when she read. She still held pencils and pens wrong, and twirled them through her fingers while she was deep in thought. She still ate all the different types of food on her plate one at a time. This was her, but it just wasn’t. He would rather fall a thousand more times, than see her like this.

“I, um, I still had one more question,” she says quietly, barely looking up to meet his gaze. He groans loudly in response, and yells, “What?!”. She flinches at his tone, an action she doesn’t remember ever doing up until this moment. He instantly regrets it, but refuses to look like he does, or to apologize for it.

“I was wondering if you could tell me the name of a piano piece? I’ve been wracking my brain trying to remember the name, and your brothers said you were familiar with classical music. I thought I’d ask,” she says, her tone small as she tried not to anger him. He sighed and rested his chin in his hand.

“I will do my best,” he says.

She nods and mutters, “Thank you,” before turning to go sit at the piano. She begins pressing keys, and he knows by the fourth note that it’s the first movement of Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata. He doesn’t have the energy to stop her though, he lets her play, each note feeling like a lash on his heart.

She’s playing it well, but there’s no emotion. It’s like a robot was playing it, and he knew it was because she was incapable of feeling the emotions being conveyed in the piece. That fact stung more than he thought it would.

She got about two minutes into the piece before she stopped abruptly, taking her hands off the keys and placing them in her lap. “That’s all I know of it. I’ve never been taught how to play, I don’t even know how to read music, but I know how to play this, and I don’t know what it is. Any ideas?” she says, finally looking over at him. He had his eyes closed, and his chin was cradled in his hands. She felt an ache in her chest when she saw the shine of a single tear that had rolled down his face. He slowly opened his eyes and stared at a point in front of him that wasn’t her, before rubbing his face again and standing up from his desk. He moved silently over to a file cabinet against the wall and looked through it for a minute, before sliding out a thin book. Lucifer looked at it, and sighed quietly before moving over to the piano. Blair shifted to the side to make room for him on the bench, which he sat elegantly on as he flipped through the book. When he got to the page he needed, he set the book on the stand, took a deep breath to steady himself, and began playing.

Blair could tell he was playing the rest of the piece for her. She watched intently as his fingers glided expertly over the keys, and watched his face twist into a look of what can only be described as agony held back by sheer will power. His jaw was clenched and his eyebrows were knitted together, creating a dark storm in his eyes. He swore to himself he would never listen to this piece again. Not after what it meant to him. And here he was, playing it as if it didn’t make him feel like his chest was about explode.

He finished the piece, and heaved a great sigh of relief, the look washing away from his face and relaxing back into exhaustion. Lucifer stares at his hands for a second before saying, “The piece you were playing was the first movement of Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata. I just played you the rest of it,”.

He pauses briefly, still not looking at her, “The reason you can play it without knowing how to read music, is due to muscle memory. I was teaching Blair this piece, though I begged her to let me teach her something less mainstream, nevertheless she insisted on learning it, and she practiced it diligently,”. A small, sad smile crawls across his lips as he says that, but it’s gone as soon as it appears.

“You can’t play the last third of the piece because,” he pauses, taking a shaky breath to steady himself as he feels the familiar knot form in his throat and heat behind his eyes. Feelings he experienced for the first time the night he proposed to her. The thought felt like a punch to the gut.

“Because I was unable to finish teaching it to her before-” he cuts himself off. He clenches his fists and jaw, shutting his eyes. He felt like his chest was going to cave in at the memories of their lessons. The image of her having finished playing what he had assigned her to work on, and looking up at him with hopeful eyes seared its way into his memories. Another image of the cute, frustrated little quirk in her brow when her fingers just wouldn’t move the way she wanted them to stabbed like a dagger in his heart.

A quick clear of this throat and another deep breath brought him back to some stable ground. He looked over at Blair, to see her eyes already on him. They were wet, and brimming with tears. Finding out what she knows now solidified that the stories she had been told, the horror of what happened to her was all true. Here sat in front of her was her husband, yet she knew nothing of the love and adoration gifted to the woman in the painting. She felt the hot tears spill down her face at the gaping hole that was just ripped through her chest.

She felt robbed.

She felt robbed of the opportunity to be a wife, to be his wife. She felt robbed of the opportunity of love and to be loved as much as the people in the painting loved each other. She felt robbed of the possibility of building a family with him. She felt robbed of the memories, and the feelings, of everything. They took everything from her. She envied the woman in the portrait to the point of anger, and to know it was once her, and to know he will never look at her like that, only made her angry.

Lucifer, as if on instinct alone, caught one of the tears falling down her face with his finger, and tucked her hair behind her painfully unfamiliar pointed ear. He cupped her face in his hands and used his thumbs to wipe away the wetness gathering under her eyes as he looked into them for the first time since the last time he saw them.

They were the same.

The same eyes he looked into when he told her he loved her for the first time. The same pools of sky blue he could look into and feel at peace whenever he was stressed. The same eyes he stared into when they stood at an altar while he promised no harm would ever become of her.

The same eyes that held sheer terror as she screamed out for him while he was frozen in place by unfamiliar magic; helpless as he watched them carrying her kicking and screaming far away from him, never to see her again.

He was unable to hold back the tears streaming down his face as he stared into his wife’s perfect, baby blue orbs.

“At least, they kept your eyes, darling” he whispered.

As if also on instinct, she brought her hands to meet his and leaned closer up to his face, like she had done many times before in a past life. He also leaned closer, wanting to feel her lips on his, just one last time, but was unable to shake the gut wrenching feeling of someone else’s hands over his, and how her face no longer fit perfectly in his cupped hands.

“No,” he whispered painfully against her lips. He rips himself away from her and strides over to brace himself against a wall. She is left breathless and empty at his sudden absence, and looks over to him. She opens her mouth to apologize.

“Please leave,” is all he says with his back turned to her. She’s frozen, unable to move as a whirlwind of emotions takes over her ability to move. Everything in her body screamed at her to hold him, to tell him everything was going to be ok. Her heart begged her to cling to the body of this stranger who wanted nothing to do with her like it was the mast of a sinking ship.

“Please, Blair” he says, his voice cracking as he says her name to her for the first time since she’s been there. This was enough to bring her out of it. She stands up and walks quickly towards the door. As she opens it, she looks back at him one last time, able to see the side of his face now. His jaw is set, his mouth is set in a straight line, but rivers of tears fall from his eyes and on to the floor beneath him. She turns, and exists through the door, shutting it softly behind her.

----------

Bonus Text Thread!

Blair: I want to fix this. I’m going to talk to Solomon and Satan tomorrow and gather all of the resources regarding Fae magic the Devildom has. If that isn’t enough, we’ll search the other realms as well. But I can’t do this without you, I need your help.

Blair: Please Lucifer, help me take back what they stole from me. From you. From us. Please.

Lucifer: What do you think I’ve been doing for the passed two years? We’ve exhausted all of our resources and then some trying to get you back. Even after you died, Barbatos and I tried for months after I felt our pact snap to try to get into Faerie to bring your body home. There is no hope for us, Blair. I’m sorry, go to sleep.

Blair: There has to be a way! The magic that was used to create me was said to be impossible, but here I am! None of you are familiar with Fae magic, I am. I haven’t had a chance to look over any materials, or try any spells on myself! Look, you can sit there and drink yourself into a stupor, mourning your dead wife for the rest of eternity if you really want to. I am going to do whatever it takes to get my fucking life back, and I’ll do it with or without you. So you can either help me move the process along, or you can stand idly by and suffer some more. It’s your choice.  

Lucifer: ...There might be something. It’s a long shot, but it’s something. Meet me in the royal library tomorrow at 5:00. Bring Satan, and Solomon.

Lucifer: Thank you, Blair.

Masterpost

[ellemcu]

I don’t wanna hurt you ( bucky x reader)

Part 1 \\ Part 2 \\ Part 4

Part 3: And he is there.again.

Word count: 889 words

warnings: swearing

You were being kept inside the van for half an hour until one of the soldiers next to you stood up and looked you deep in the eyes. It was your signal to get out and do your job. You stared at him blankly for a few seconds, studying his facial expression and then for up and reloaded your gun. You raised your shirt and your shot wound had stopped bleeding after you had taken out the bullet with your bare hands.

The serum mixed with your abilities made your wounds close up incredibly quickly but that wasn't such a good thing at hydra. It was seen more of an invitation: if the pain they inflict on you doesn't stay for long then it wasn't enough so every single time the pain would be harsher and more unbearable.

You rolled your shirt back down and moved in front of the sliding door, ready to attack any moment now. You waited for the soldier to nod and then she opened the door and hopped out of the van easily. You scanned your surroundings until you saw it. The same damn man. Only this time he was shooting grenades with a RPG at some people at a short distance: two men and a red headed woman.

The man in the black suit made a blonde guy fall from the bridge on top of a bus and that's when you realized those were the people you were sent to kill. "(This dude has just crossed the line) Этот чувак перешел черту'' you mumbled yourself. You started running towards the bridge where they were fighting, debating wether you should kill the man first and then finish your mission or complete your mission and then take your time to torture and eventually kill this asshole who keeps getting on your way. The second option sounded way better.

You were exactly under the bridge when the woman fell down one side of the bridge and then started running towards your direction. You were so ready for this.

You grabbed your gun and reloaded it,raised it towards her and started shooting at her. She rolls on the floor and then throws a small metal ball towards you and before you know it you are being electrified. Energy running through your veins, once again, you looked in her eyes while shaking from the electricity. She kept on running under the bridge until she reached the side where her blonde friend had fallen. She raised her guns and started shooting at the all-in-black dude.

 That was your man to kill, not hers.

You grabbed the small ball and smashed it with your hands, the energy dying instantly. You stood up slowly from the ground and started running towards the bridge. Change of plan, first you're gonna kill the dude who looks just like you and then you'll get over with your mission.

You get to a light post and climb it with ease as it brought you high enough for you to jump on the bridge where your first target was shooting, fortunately he hadn’t noticed you, well, you weren’t called shadow for nothing. You stood up straight on the pole and lifted yourself up on the bridge. You pulled yourself up easily and crouched down on your knees. 

You lift your head and look at his actions, the way he held his gun, the way he placed his feet on the ground to keep a steady posture, his shoulder- length brown hair moving swiftly thanks to the slight wind blowing, his robust and powerful muscles showing underneath the suit he was wearing, you could’ve sworn you’d seen him somewhere and those swift moves aren’t easily seen around, not that you were out in public, enjoying yourself much. 

You let out a deep breath and grabbed your AK47 from your back, reloading it making an old bullet fall to the ground. You look inside your viewfinder, aiming for his internal jugular vein on his neck. You had a clear shot on it because while he was shooting tilted his head slightly, maybe to have a more precise aim. You tightened your grip on your pistol grip and moved your index finger on the trigger.

You were still looking in the viewfinder when you pulled the trigger. 

You wanted to see your mission die, at your feet. You wanted to see his blood oozing out of his neck. You didn’t care who he was. You didn’t care if he suffered and you obviously didn’t care if you had to kill another. It was your duty right?

You were waiting for the bullet to hit him until you felt a throbbing pain in your lower abdomen followed by another excruciating feeling on your chest. Damn my chest is really getting killed lol.

 Then something hit your upper nape and everything went black.

*******************************

Part 4

Fuck, im into this story too lol. This may be worse than my other parts but I swear to god i can really write so much better but my power is gone and I didn't have much time but I still wanted to go on with the story so here it is. Ik it's shorter too, really sorry guys. I promise the next part is gonna be way better. Hope you still like it,

Elle

[game-boy-pocket]

Well, now that they're all finally out... my feelings on each of the new Smash Bros characters is this.

Inkling was inevitable. But that doesn't mean I wasn't thrilled to see them. Splatoon is a great new IP, though I personally worry about how similar the games seem to be 3 main entries in, but that's nothing to do with Smash. Fun to play but hard to learn. A- ( the minus is for no Octo alt ).

Ridley felt like he should have been inevitable, but was fighting against some pretty strong biases. But he finally made it and i'm very happy. I do think he could have been a tad bit bigger though. Even if they had to slow him down a bit. A

Simon very happy with this character, and honestly surprised he didn't get in sooner. Castlevania may not be as strongly associated with Nintendo as it used to be, but it's one of the first games that come to mind when you think of the NES as well as the SNES. He was in a TV show with Megaman and Pit for goodness sake. And I enjoy using him. A- ( minus is only for no chronicles alt )

Richter was a cool addition, if there was one other Belmnot to be added, i'm glad it's him... but I am more of a Simon guy. Side note, I wish they took the echo fighter character a little further. It seemed like branding clones as echo fighters is all it took to make people more accepting of the idea, only for them to just stop short of three or four new ones, and not even include super obvious ones like Shadow the Hedgehog or Blood Falcon. Anyway A- ( minus is for no symphony of the night alt )

King K. Rool being revealed was one of my top five Smash moments. Donkey Kong is not a neglected Nintendo franchise. But it has undergone some changes that long time fans don't care for, including the removal of the main antagonist, this guy, who has a gigantic personality. He's a very fun character and it's so good to see him come back ( pls appear in the next DK game pls pls pls ) He also happens to be very fun to play as. A++

Isabelle is where Smash reveals kind of started to lose me a bit. Animal crossing is a big series and all but I really felt like the one villager is all the game really needed to properly represent the entire series. You don't need a lot for Animal crossing. And the fact that Isabelle was a relatively new character, who seemingly snatched the role of series mascot from Tom Nook, well it kind of rubbed me a little wrong. She seemed unnecesary... but she is actually more fun to play as than villager, and she's cute. So I don't totally hate her. B

Incineroar was a poor way to end the base game lineup for me. Pokemon just isn't a very respectible series anymore in my eyes and Sun/Moon was the first game in the series that I found too boring to finish. Pokemon just doesn't excite me, and with each new announcement, I'm becoming actively disgusted by it. I would have loved a wrestler character in the game, but the fact that it had to be a pokemon kind sullied it for me. Yeah, I just can't pretend to like this inclusion even if it is a huge Nintendo IP. C-

Dark Samus is a character I am kind of indifferent too. I didn't think we needed her, but I think she's a cool addition to the game. A bit of a waste to make her an echo though, her abilities are very different from Samus in the games if I remember right, I honestly don't remember much of Metroid Prime besides the first one. Still, she's cool. B+

Daisy is an oddball for me. I know she is in Super Mario Land, but her main identity comes from the Mario Spinoff games, and I just don't play those games. They don't appeal to me. I like Mario platformers. And to me, if a character is in spinoffs almost exclusively, they don't count as core Mario cast members. And frankly it's a little odd to me that she's plucking turnips and summoning Toads. The citizens of Sarasaland are not Toads. And she wasn't in Mario 2... but she's not hurting anything I guess so B+, needed "Hi i'm Daisy" taunt.

Chrom is a Fire Emblem Lord alright. He's also an echo. So I don't care. C

Piranha Plant honestly felt like a little bit of an insult to me. I've always hated when Mario games start featuring low level mooks without names as playable characters in the Mario spinoffs while ignoring the likes of Wart, Tatanga, E. Gadd, or th extended DK/Wario cast or RPG characters. It's part of why I don't care about Mario spinoffs. That being said... it is, at the very least, extremely fun to play as. B-

Joker may very well be the most out of place character in this series. He's certainly one of them. Maybe I would feel different if I played Persona, but I don't. So to me he's like the worst thing they added to this game. D-

Hero felt like he should have been in Smash Bros before cloud did. Dragon Quest may not be as popular in the west as it should be. But it's definitely the most important and influential JRPG to the history of video games... that being said, I wish the DQ3 hero was the default costume. I really enjoy playing as him. A+

Banjo and Kazooie finally getting in is without a doubt my favorite moment in Smash History. Not even Sonic got me as hyped as they did. I wish there was a way to make younger fans see this character the way us old timers do without seeming like we're trying to force them to like him, but it is what it is. I love these guys and they're my most played character. A+++

Terry is a character i'm not familiar with. He just kind of looks like a bootleg Ken to me. I think they could have picked a better SNK rep. Metal Slug would have been nice, shooters are sorely under represented in Smash. Do we have anybody besides Samus representing shooters? And she barely qualifies. C

Byleth is a Fire Emblem Lord alright. But you know what, they're honestly the only FE character that feels like they're representing the gameplay of Fire Emblem particularly well while the others were just kind of generic sword slingers... that being said... was this the best way to end fighter pass 1? B-

Minmin was not a character on my Radar. I thought it would have been Springman or no Arms character at all... I am just happy ARMS made it in at all... but really, it should have been base game content. If only to support the new IP. A-

Steve was a character I was opposed to at first. I saw him as a rival to Banjo. And I also saw Minecraft as a dumb zoomer game. A joke. But people made compelling arguments for the importance of minecraft, how successful it is, I actually downloaded Minecraft on my Switch, played it, had a relaxing time, I still play it, and I was actually able to play with my friends who don't own Nintendo consoles. It has cross play. The cross play is really what won me over as it being really cool to have in Smash, as it really brought me together with friends. Steve is tough to use, but great fun, as long as it's against a computer. I can't fight humans for shit, hah. A- ( the minus is for that cursed short enderman alt )

Sephiroth rubbed me the wrong way. Another Final Fantasy character wouldn't have been so bad, but did it have to be another FFVI character??? Couldn't it have been something from before FF made the jump to total steampunk/sci-fi to better represent the series roots? He's fun to use but idk, I just take no joy in him... at least we got more FF music I guess. C-

Pyra/Mythra is a character I have zero opinion on. B ( for booba )

Kazuya is not a character i'm familiar with, and if there had to be another fighting game character, one from Namco, I feel like Soul Calibur should have been it. Bring the Link crossover back around. It seems Tekken has no presence on Nintendo as well... but whatever. I have no strong feelings. He's fun to combo with but I suck as him. B-

Sora makes me sad. I don't dislike Sora. He has a fun design. I like the idea of Kingdom Hearts... I just think the story of those games is very weird and dumb and confusing, so the games themselves are kind of overrated. I really think people only like it for the pretty character models and intricate costumes. I thought people liked it for the Disney stuff but I'm suprised to hear most KH fans seem to want more FF stuff and less Disney stuff??? The only thing that makes the game unique??? Should be dialed back??? That being said... I don't like Disney. It is an evil company. And Disney getting in bed with Nintendo makes me very anxious. D

[anamaleth]

I took part in the holiday gift exchange organised by @sanderssidesgiftxchange ! My giftee was @to-precious-to-process , who requested a fantasy au, stargazing, and a whole bunch of fluff.

This fic focuses mainly on the last wish and includes elements from the other two - I hope you enjoy it!

@ashblood1314​ was my beta-reader and I cannot thank punk enough for that! Ash did an amazing job and without stars help, this fic wouldn’t be what it is now. Thank you so much, AG, I care you ♡!!!!

xxx

Traditions

Summary: An observation of the traditions the Sides have.

Movie nights, prank wars, playing tabletop RPGs together - their desire to regularly spend time together as a family had led to them creating a lot of traditions.

"Patton was leaning onto Logan, who was holding hands with Roman, and Roman was sitting back-to-back with Remus. Remus had Virgil lying in his lap, whose legs were draped over Janus’; while Janus’ head was resting on Patton’s shoulder. The Sides found comfort in each other’s presence, a blissful serenity that nothing else could provide them with."

Content Warnings (it’s just a whole bunch of fluff, honestly, but to be safe):

Food Mentions

Brief mention of poison (no one actually gets poisoned)

Mentions of in-universe fictional character deaths (they play Dungeons and Dragons and their characters die)

read on ao3

 xxx

Weekly movie nights were a tradition for the Sides, just like the Secret Santa, and the Easter Egg Hunt that Patton organized every year.

"It's important for families to have traditions!" he would often tell the others, and the smile Patton's face whenever he said those words made it impossible for the other Sides to turn him down. Patton's excitement was infectious, how could they resist?

The prank wars all of them had could technically also be counted as a tradition, but only unofficially so. They never followed any sort of schedule, which Logan insisted was a fundamental part of traditions, nor were they really organised. Instead, they broke out whenever one of them decided that peace and quiet had prevailed among them for too long.

It was fairly common for one of the twins to start the prank wars, given that “annoy my brother until I get some sort of reaction out of him” seemed to be part of both of their agendas. Not that there was any malice behind it, causing any lasting harm was never their intention. But given Remus’ love for wreaking havoc and Roman’s usual theatrics combined with his inability to resist being dramatic, it came as a surprise to no one that the chances of chaos doubled when the two of them were in the same space together.

In addition to that, the chances of chaos increased exponentially after a certain threshold of time spent by the twins in the same space was exceeded, especially when Virgil or Janus were with them. The amount of time passed since the last prank war and the absence of any Sides that could be considered a responsible adult (Patton is not to be considered a responsible adult) factored into the probability of a prank war breaking out as well. At least according to the graph Logan had created.

Logan kept this graph for two reasons.

The first one was that there was simply no such thing as “having too many graphs and lists”, not to him at least. Creating them was a fun and useful way to practice organisation, and there was most certainly no such thing as being too organised!

And the second reason was that Logan wanted to be aware of the likelihood of a prank war occurring at any given time so that he would always be prepared for them.

“Prepared” both as in “ready to take part in the planning and semi-serious attacking” and as in “I will not be caught off-guard by my friends’ shenanigans”. He had made that mistake once and he would not allow for it to repeat itself. Just thinking about the feather incident made him shiver, and that one had happened back when the twins were on “no speaking” terms. Logan couldn’t and certainly didn’t want to imagine what the two of them would be capable of together.

For all his distaste for “wasted time” and general aversion of disorganization, Logan considered the prank wars to be valuable bonding time with the ones he cared about. This may have had something to do with his love for scheming in said prank wars. It wasn’t unusual for Logan to be utterly absorbed by a task, but for him to be so open about his enthusiasm? That was a rarity, and it was one the other Sides treasured immensely.

Having Logan on your team in the prank wars was a huge advantage, and if both he and Janus were on the same team, their victory was almost certainly guaranteed. The combination of Janus’ wit and Logan’s intellect made for a nearly unbeatable force, which meant they ended up being allies fairly often.

The twins weren’t normally on the same team, given that one of them “attacking” the other was what often started the prank wars in the first place – but the two of them joining forces was the only way to beat Janus and Logan. And given the twins' distaste (read: hatred) for losing, coalitions between them had started to occur more and more regularly.

Roman’s and Remus’ creativity, their ability to improvise and the sheer chaos that seemed to transpire whenever they worked together were a fair match for Logan’s and Janus’ genius scheming that had rightfully earned them the title of Strategic Masterminds. There was no telling which team would win, especially not with Virgil and Patton as rogue elements.

Well, with Virgil as a rogue element, given that Patton got that “I’m about to make a pun and inflict 80 damage on everyone around me”-look on his face whenever someone referred to him as such, after which he would cheekily remind them that he played as a paladin and not as a rogue in their Dungeons and Dragons sessions, which would make him a paladin element.

As much as what Patton said was true, hearing it made Logan go through all five stages of grief over the course of two seconds. He then considered using his powers as the current Dungeon Master to do something to Patton’s character to finally get him to stop making this awful pun. But, after a few moments of contemplation, he quickly abandoned this plan as he reminded himself that he was a responsible adult.

Logan was aware of the fact that Patton had gotten very attached to his character, and he didn’t want to upset him. He was also aware of the fact that Patton would be the next one to DM for all of them.

And given that Patton had started to spend more time with Janus, Remus and Virgil, Logan really didn’t want to risk getting on his bad side. Not because the three of them would do anything to Logan - he was their friend, too, after all – but because the metaphorical seeds of chaos that Patton had carried with him since the very beginning had started to fully blossom under their influence.

Apart from that, Patton brought home-made cookies to their D&D sessions whenever he was in a particularly good mood, and Logan a) didn’t want to miss out on those and b) couldn’t be one hundred percent certain that, with enough persuasion from Remus and Janus, Patton wouldn’t end up poisoning the cookies as a way to get revenge if Logan really did go through with killing his character.

This only further contributed to Logan’s assessment of Patton not being a responsible adult. He chose to ignore what the fact that he had just had an internal debate on whether or not killing off his friend’s D&D character for making puns would be worth it if it meant that he would have to miss out on the cookies said friend makes said about his own status as a “responsible adult”.

The D&D sessions the Sides had together were also a tradition, and they all took turns being the DM, assuring that each of them would both get the chance to be an active player in the game and, every once in a while, get to decide what challenges and narratives their friends would face.

Janus and Remus joining their sessions had brought the number of player characters from three up to five, which meant that instead of having barely enough players for the sessions to work, they now had a group that could face any monster or villain with ease.

Emphasis on the “could”, because what they actually ended up doing most of the time was very different from the heroic deeds their characters were technically capable of.

Virgil played as a rogue, Janus played as a warlock and even without the added chaos of Remus’ multi-class Bard/Barbarian (or “Bardbarian”, as Patton called them, much to Remus’ delight and Logan's dismay) they were capable of completely derailing every single session.

In the most affectionate way possible, they were a complete nightmare to DM for.

Yet watching them interact and build off of what the other said made the horror of being the DM and watching your plans for the game disintegrate right in front of your very own eyes absolutely worth it.

The biggest session the Sides had played so far had been the campaign that Roman and Remus had created together. Both of the twins loved designing classic high-fantasy games, although Remus preferred to lean more heavily into the gruesome and macabre aspects of high-fantasy, while Roman never strayed far from “noble quests”, “heroic adventures” and “saving your true love from the lairs of evil”.

Which was why they both adored fairy tales – the campaign they created together ended up being a modern, much less heteronormative, and almost sci-fi-esque retelling of just about every single fairy tale they could think of. It was a huge project that took them several weeks of planning and two and a half months of bi-weekly game sessions to complete, and some of them even ended up crying during the last session.

The plot focused on a rebellion against a corrupt king and his followers, led by the characters that the Sides played. None of the characters, neither protagonists nor antagonists, survived the final battle; and while the evil king had been defeated, there was no truly Happy Ending for any of them.

As painful as it may have been, it was the perfect ending for the story – absolutely brilliant and tragic, but in a cathartic way that would leave them with fond memories of everything that they had experienced. They held each other after the session was over, the giant table they conjured whenever they played tabletop games together quickly replaced by blankets and pillows that they let themselves sink into.

Patton was leaning onto Logan, who was holding hands with Roman, and Roman was sitting back-to-back with Remus. Remus had Virgil lying in his lap, whose legs were draped over Janus’; while Janus’ head was resting on Patton’s shoulder. The Sides found comfort in each other’s presence, a blissful serenity that nothing else could provide them with.

Given that all of them wanted to play something with less emotional investment to take a break from the emotional toll that the last game had taken on them, they moved on to playing one-shots again after that. Although, taking a break from emotional vulnerability wasn’t the only reason for that; Remus and Logan had informed them that the two of them had started the planning process for their next proper campaign, which they were certain would take them a lot of time and effort to complete.

Logan and Remus, as different as they seemed, got along surprisingly well.

Whenever they needed someone to listen to them, they knew they could count on the other to do so without any judgement.

Logan had known of Roman’s love for mythology, specifically Greek- and (surprising to no one, considering his name) Roman mythology, but he had been absolutely overjoyed to learn that Remus shared this interest.

As much as Logan enjoyed having discussions with Roman, it was refreshing to hear things from a completely different perspective every once in a while. Roman adored the tragic love stories, particularly Orpheus and Eurydice, and Achilles and Patroclus; while his brother seemed to fixate more on Heracles’ trials and the story of Oedipus.

Logan and Remus had been stargazing together in Logan’s room when they had come up with the idea for their campaign. Technically Virgil had also been with them, but he had quickly fallen asleep looking up at what had once been a ceiling but was now a vast, clear night’s sky. He was curled up next to Remus, who had taken off his sash so that Virgil could use it as a pillow, burying his face into Remus’ side and using him as a teddy bear.

While Virgil was sleeping, Logan rambled about space and the origins of different star constellations. At one point, Remus chimed in to give some additional information about the mythological story behind one of the constellations Logan had mentioned, which resulted in them having a rapid-fire brainstorming session that lasted for several hours.

During that discussion, they decided on the setting for the campaign: a huge dystopian cyberpunk city in which they would tell modern versions of the original Greek myths.

The D&D sessions Logan planned often featured intricate riddles and complicated challenges he designed himself, which were a perfect fit for this setting. And as much as the other Sides tended to struggle with solving Logan’s puzzles, they earnestly encouraged his passion for creating them and looked forward to what he would come up with next.

Remus and Logan, however, weren’t the only ones who had hour-long discussions about shared interests, as Patton and Janus had started having conversations about the concept of morality. Referring to those conversations as debates, although Logan liked to do so when he occasionally joined them, wasn’t quite accurate. It was never their intention to convince the other of their opinion, they merely enjoyed exchanging their thoughts and points of view.

When Logan was with them, their talks tended to become a lot more philosophical than when it was just the two of them. With him present, it wasn't as casual as when they were on their own, as Logan enjoyed having debates in a more serious setting. But even then, they still valued each other’s company more than the actual outcome of the discussion.

One time, in one of their earlier debates - Janus and Patton had been sitting in Patton’s room together, Janus’ legs draped over Patton’s, as his back rested against the armrest of the sofa - Janus had explained the concepts of Utilitarianism and Deontology to Patton. The latter had listened intently as Janus explained the two fundamental approaches to morality, one where ends are justified by the means it takes to achieve them, and one where one’s actions are justified by the results they achieve.

When Janus brought up the Trolley problem as an example, he noticed how Patton immediately tensed up. Janus paused, taking Patton's hands into his own and apologised.

"It was never my intention to upset you back then, Patton. I was trying to prove a point and I hurt you in the process. While I got what I wanted, I shouldn't have pushed you this far. I'm sorry. I shouldn't have used you as a-"

"Means to an end?" Patton interrupted him. He seemed uncertain, but there was a small smile on his face.

After a moment of hesitation, Janus nodded, almost self-conscious, when suddenly, Patton's eyes lit up.

"Like in-! Like in Utilitarism!"

The tense atmosphere evaporated and Janus looked up to meet Patton's eyes.

"Close."

"Ulitiriorism?"

"Ah, getting further away now-"

The fond amusement was clear in Janus' voice.

"Ulitaro...okay, what was it again?"

"Utilitarianism."

Patton beamed at him and Janus couldn't help but return the smile.

"Exactly! That one! And I insisted on the other one? The one where you can’t break your own moral code to achieve a greater goal, what was it? Deon-”

Janus’ expression became impossibly fond.

“Deontology, yes.”

“I got it right!”

After that, their conversation continued as it had before, just that Janus’ fingers were intertwined with Patton’s now. Eventually, Patton came to the conclusion that putting your own needs first can be a means to an end, something that ultimately leads to the greatest amount of good for the greatest number of people. He could keep his own values and stick to Deontology while occasionally approaching situations in a more utilitaristic way. He had already done so when it came to the Plato (...or was it Kant? Did it really matter?) dilemma with the murderer that you lie to in order to protect your friends; maybe he could learn to apply the same approach to self-care?

In order to practice, he and Janus had come up with the idea for Patton’s current D&D character: a Paladin who had sworn an oath of devotion to achieving the greatest amount of good for the greatest number of people, no matter the means they had to seize to achieve that goal.

Logan, as the current Dungeon Master, simultaneously marvelled at the concept of Patton’s character, and anguished at the chaos that character caused with the help of the characters the rest of the Sides played.

Apart from D&D, the Sides also regularly played board games together and, of course, held movie nights. Janus and Remus had started joining the others in both of these endeavours. They were family tradition after all, and the two of them were part of the family. Both Janus and Remus – although neither of them would ever admit to it - had been dangerously close to tearing up when Patton had first told them so. Part of the family.

They really had come far, hadn’t they?

Despite the sofa being too small for six metaphysical people to sit on, and despite it now being way more packed during their movie nights than it had previously been, none of them seemed to mind sitting closer together.

Patton was sitting in front of the couch, wrapped up in a blanket while wearing his cat onesie. He was holding a cup of hot cocoa with marshmallows in it and there were two bowls of popcorn set next to him, which he regularly passed around. One of them was salted and one with sugar.

Both of the twins preferred their popcorn ridiculously sweet - much to Roman’s triumph, because this meant that his brother joining their movie nights tipped the scales so that there were now two Sides who wanted to drown the popcorn in sugar.

On their first movie night with very sweet popcorn, Roman had exclaimed “Democracy wins once again!” to a very tired Logan, who was now seriously considering switching over to salted popcorn out of spite, even though he really did not like salted popcorn.

Patton, despite being, in some regard, the literal embodiment of emotions, had no strong feelings on the matter. He held no preference regarding how sweet or salty his popcorn should be and ate out of both bowls. Meanwhile, Virgil had just laughed at the now pouting Logan (“I am not pouting, Virgil, this is ridiculous”), as he shared his bowl of salted popcorn with Janus.

Now, several movie nights later, Logan sat, as he always did, behind Patton.

He kept absentmindedly running his fingers through Patton's hair, and it seemed as though nothing was out of the ordinary. The only real difference to previous movie nights was that he was now dressed in his unicorn onesie.

No one had commented on this, but Logan had registered the fond smiles on his friends’ faces as they realised that he had started wearing it around them again. Terrified of being written off as immature and unprofessional, it had taken Logan quite some time to get comfortable doing so again. But here he was, happy and cosy, dressed in his favourite outfit.

Janus sat right next to Logan. The first time he had been invited over, there had been a considerable distance between them, but over the course of a few weeks, Janus had found himself moving closer and closer to Logan each movie night, until he eventually found himself leaning against him comfortably.

By now, Janus had reached the point where he didn't even bother waiting anymore before gradually scooting closer to Logan. Instead, he assumed his rightful position immediately - Janus' head, mostly covered by the hood of his snake onesie, resting on Logan's shoulder.

Remus was taking up the most amount of space: his head was lying in Janus' lap while his legs were sprawled on the rest of the sofa. Roman had protested in the beginning, screeching at his brother to get his feet out of his face.

Roman had eventually given up, as Remus refused to move his legs and instead stuck out his tongue.

“How very mature of you, Remus”, Roman had grumbled in response, but his twin had already gone back to playing with the tentacles of his octopus onesie. Defeated, Roman settled for moving his throne - built out of a beanbag and all of the pillows and couch cushions he could get (which was all of them) - next to Patton.

Virgil sat on the backrest of the sofa, close enough to Janus to easily share their bowl of salted popcorn. Every once in a while, one of them would reach for the other’s hand, a simple gesture of affection that was starting to feel familiar again.

Familiarity, that’s what it all came down to in the end. The Sides loved each other dearly, and the traditions they had created allowed for them to regularly spend time together as a family. They adored each other and the connection they had, and they made sure to actively cultivate the conditions under which their bond could thrive.

They supported one another, encouraged each other, and all of them found themselves working towards being the best possible version of themselves they could possibly be, motivated by the love they had for the others.

Love, not simply as a state of being but also as an active choice and effort every single day of their lives.

Love, in everything they said and did - in kind words and in bickering, in gentle expressions of support and in playful insults. In fond smiles and gentle touches; in reaching out and lifting each other up. In helping and in being helped; in establishing boundaries and in respecting those set by their companions. In disagreeing and finding ways to compromise. In making the others laugh, and in finding ways to make their days better and easier, if only a little bit.

In being seen, for all of their facets. Their weaknesses and flaws being exposed, and being loved not despite them but for who they are with them. Always working towards being better and having their strengths and efforts appreciated and encouraged by those who love them.

They were a family. And they cherished the traditions they had created because they cherished one another.

[kilesplaysthings]

Happy Halloween! I hope you guys have a fun and safe spooky day! 

Now as a horror fan, I gotta tell you guys, I find the vampire lore in IkeVam a little weak sauce (ok, actually a LOT) lol But I do tend to like vampires as more of the monstrous villains in fiction too. So! in celebration of today kiles is gonna recommend some vampire flicks for you all that love these bloodsucking monsters. Let me know which ones you like and maybe even recommend ones that I don’t have on here! :D

Let the Right One In/Let Me In: both the original Swedish film and its American remake are very good, but I personally find the OG better in both acting and dark tones. The story is about a boy who is bullied by his peers and feels isolated from everyone, meeting what seems to be a little girl and befriends her. But there is more to this girl than meets the eye. I can’t recall there being a lot of warnings in this, but it does have some gore.

The Lost Boys: I love this movie. It’s so 80s lol But the vampire stuff is really fun. That and not only do you have a young Corey Feldman in a duo of kid vampire hunters, but you get a young Kiefer Sutherland running around with a sort of Glam Metal look going on. The story is about two brothers and their mom who move to a California town that wind up getting involved with a group of rebellious teens who turn out to be vampires.

What We Do in the Shadows: This is probably my favorite vampire movie. I love the faux-documentary of this New Zealand dark comedy, and I love the homage to traditional vampire lore. No more sparkling, no more resistance to daylight. The vampires in this movie are done right, in my opinion. I’m more of a traditionalist when in comes to monsters, you see. I almost wish we could get an ikevam version that was more like this, where MC is the person making the documentary filming the boys lol

Nosferatu: The Classic vampire flick from the Silent Era of film. It’s a German retelling of the story Dracula. Count Orlock’s design is perfectly eerie and creepy, iconic throughout media. If you don’t mind silent film and you haven’t seen this one, check it out!

Dracula: And then, of course, there’s the classic film with Bela Lugosi. His Hungarian accent became the go-to for other vampires in later media. It’s pretty close to the book for the most part. At least, it’s as good as most book adaptations that were made back then were (which wasn’t too good lol)

Fright Night: This is another very 80s movie. The main character is a teenager who is addicted to a tv show about a vampire hunter and how he hunts vampires. Because of this, he starts to become suspicious that his new, odd neighbor may in fact be a vampire. There is also a remake starring Anton Yelchin, Colin Farrell and David Tennant that’s.. ok lol

Salem’s Lot: Stephen King’s vampire tale. A man coming back to his childhood town realizes that a vampire is preying on the townsfolk. While this is an older flick that might not be exactly scary there’s some great classic vampire stuff and eerie scenes. Plus it’s Stephen King! 

30 Days of Night: Probably the most horrific vampire movie, where there is nothing redeemable or likable about the vampires whatsoever. The setting of this movie alone makes it terrifying. Set in a northern, remote part of Alaska, an isolated town is beset by ravenous vampires when the town is submerged in complete darkness for one month. Most of the town’s occupants go south for the winter, but those remaining have to fight and use quick thinking to survive. Warning to those who don’t like gore for this one. It’s pretty brutal.

Afflicted: A found footage film about two friends who are backpacking through Europe due to one guy wanting to live life to the fullest before he dies of cancer. Something goes wrong at a party however, and he soon begins to show signs of something... inhuman.

Van Helsing: I know a lot of people don’t think this movie is any good, but I admit I like it as a sort of guilty pleasure. Van Helsing is now a younger vampire hunter that’s sent by the church to help a town in Romania that is beset by Dracula and his brides. It’s got lots of funs stuff like a vampire masquerade ball, a sort of Frankenstein’s monster character, and a fight between a vampire and a werewolf that’s pretty beast :D

Bram Stoker’s Dracula: Though I haven’t seen this yet, the tone, acting, music and cinematography of this movie all look so darkly beautiful. Add a bit of gothic romance, this adaptation of Bram Stoker’s tale is one that I definitely plan to watch soon. 

Thirst: A Korean take on a vampiric story. A priest who wishes to save lives volunteers to be a guinea pig for a vaccine that is being made to cure a virus. But things go awry and he comes back to life as a vampire. Now he has to battle between his thirst and his faith. Haven’t seen this either, but I plan to! Korean films are always a cut above, and if you don’t mind some gore and adult elements, I’m sure you’ll enjoy this.

Others I would recommend: 

Interview with a Vampire, though I don’t really like that movie all that much. You do get a younger Tom Cruise as a vampire though lol plus Kirsten Dunst’s character is surprisingly sympathetic and sad (at least to me!)

A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night: This one’s unique, being an Iranian take on vampires. It’s a slower indie film, about a mysterious girl who only comes out at night and skateboards around a town. I wasn’t too crazy about this one, but it was interesting!

Shiki: I’ve seen three-ish vampire anime. This, Diabolik Lovers, and Vampire Knight. I didn’t like DL at ALL, and I could barely get through the first few episodes of VK. Shiki is excellent, though, if you can get past the odd character designs. I probably would have liked VK better if the story was focused solely on Zero’s character though. 

Vampyr.  This is an RPG actually, but the vampire lore is so dark, bloody and complex. The MC is a doctor that specializes in blood transfusions who comes back to London from WW1 right during the Spanish Flu epidemic. When he’s turned into a vampire by a mysterious sire, he has to find a way to survive while still acting as a doctor and decide if he will kill others or starve.

[smash-64]

Ok so I typed up a super long review of Starlink: Battle for Atlas, and I spared nothing in what you might call a scathing review. It’s below the cut, but if you’d like the TL;DR part, I’d summarize it as follows:

The Starfox stuff is fun, but the rest isn’t. 5/10

Starlink Battle for Atlas review

Being a huge fan of Starfox, I’ve had my eye on this game for a very long time. However, the whole “toys as games” thing was a huge turnoff, coupled with the fact that apparently even getting the physical version meant you needed to devote 15GB of storage space to the game, which makes no sense to me. 

Anyway, I watched the reception closely, and it was pretty lukewarm, at best. People generally had very little to say about the game, so I only ever occasionally looked into whether it was on sale or not. Luckily for me, I got my hands on a 400GB microSD card for my Switch at the same time that the digital version went on super sale at 70% off, so I decided the time was right to try it out.

The Good

The Starfox team is at their graphical best in this game, by far. They looked great in Starfox Zero, but they look exactly how I pictured they would in my most fantastical dreams from when I was little. They all move smoothly, have perfect fur and feathers, emotive expressions, and they just fit so well with all the other characters in Starlink. There is a wide variety of allies and NPCs in this game, and they all have just as wide a variety of races and species. One guy looks like he should be a grass type Pokemon. I really think the character design is fantastic in this game. The fact that the entire inclusion of Starfox was an afterthought, yet they all fit in so perfectly is really a huge victory for Starlink. 

In addition to how they look, the Starfox team also sounds great. They got the original voice actors back for Fox and Slippy (and I do mean the originals from Nintendo 64!), and the rest of the squad, plus Wolf, came back from the 2011 remaster of Starfox 64 for the 3DS. That game was a great remaster, and the voice work was phenomenal. The characters and their personalities all shine through just as you expect them. They banter slightly less than on the N64, but part of that might just be because sound bytes were at a premium on that system, so they had to pick and choose what lines to include more carefully. So, I don’t think you can really count that against Starlink, which is a game that can include just about as many lines of dialogue as it wants. Fox, for one, has a TON of dialogue and I loved every bit of it. I kind of wish I lived in the Seattle area so I could hear Mike West’s radio show (and hear Fox’s voice all the time), which is how Nintendo discovered him for the original voice of Fox McCloud way back in 1997. Another great piece of work here.

In what very well might have been the source of the “Star Fox Grand Prix” fake leak a few years ago, there is a planet called the Crimson Moon where you can take part in what is essentially pod racing with your Arwing. Now, I really did not enjoy the pod race scene of Star Wars Episode I, and aside from Mario Kart 64, I really don’t find racing games very rewarding. However, these racing levels are actually pretty fun. There are hidden shortcuts you can take, plenty of obstacles, and the computer racers are actually fairly difficult. I honestly found myself getting really into these races. The only downside is, there aren’t very many of them. They’re also kind of long, which is no problem for a veteran of N64’s Rainbow Road, but I was a bit surprised at the length of some of the courses.

The Meh

The music, which I have come to believe might be the element of games that really determines whether I just like a game, or love it, is fairly generic. It sounds like your average Marvel movie soundtrack, except without any real bangers. The Corneria remix is too short and not often played, and the Star Wolf theme is the same deal. That’s just about it for Starfox music, and the rest of it is just so generic that I can’t even comment any further. A real letdown for me, although it doesn’t particularly take away from the game or produce any grating tracks.

The difficulty was a mixed bag as well. I played about 70% of the game on Hard mode because I’m very experienced with Ace Combat and Starfox games, so I thought I’d be fine with the air/space combat. But, the difficulty slider didn’t really make the game more difficult, it just made it take a lot longer. I guess that could be seen as a good thing for people who get upset about dying really quickly on harder difficulties, but it felt like a way to cheat at padding the game’s playtime. I ended up lowering the difficulty just so I could finish faster.

The Starlink characters are a really big missed opportunity. They all have very distinct personalities, but I was shocked at how little content actually featured them. They each have a backstory cutscene that highlights them, but those scenes are so short that it’s more of a 30 second elevator pitch than anything else. None of the characters have more than a sentence or two to comment about said cutscenes, and none of them ever show any growth. Even the “main” character of Mason is basically the same by the end of the game. Although, I do think their designs are excellent and their personalities stand out from one another well enough.

The Bad

Spoilers ahead for the next three paragraphs! The story itself is pretty crappy. I’m still not really sure what was going on or why the Equinox (the main ship) was where it was. In more than one of the character-specific backstory cutscenes I already mentioned, they talk about Earth. So, ok, we understand that almost everyone on the Equinox is human, that’s fine. But...how exactly did they get here and why do they want to recapture the solar system of Atlas? As you play, you essentially claim territory in the name of Atlas, but it’s not clear at all who that exactly is. Does that mean the Equinox is in charge? Is there a government somewhere? Military affiliations or alliances? Because plenty of territory seems to be independent, in addition to enemy-controlled territory. Maybe there was a single line of dialogue I missed somewhere.

But, ok, we just want to fly spaceships and shoot stuff, who cares about politics! Well, there are still issues with the story because I honestly could scarcely care less about any of the plot in this game, which makes it tough to get into any of the battles or things at stake. The entire Starlink team was so unimportant that I literally never used ANY of them even one time, and the game never encouraged me too, either. Maybe I’ve been spoiled by the unparalleled writing and character development of the Kiseki series of JRPGs, or maybe I just really don’t like the storytelling methods and style of western RPGs, but I feel like the story should make you WANT to learn more about characters. Instead, I was just constantly asking questions like “Why does any of this matter?” 

Now, that would be a totally unimportant question if the game was all about space battles and explosions and pew pews, but it pretends to have this really deep, engrossing story with characters wracked over the (spoiler!) kidnapping and death of their leader and captain. We barely even get to know who this dude is before he’s kidnapped, and then the rest of the story is so bare-bones that most of what we’re “supposed” to be feeling has to be completely assumed under the guise of “Well, I guess he was the captain so we’re supposed to feel bad, right?” He did apparently act like a father figure for many of the Starlink pilots, but we are only briefly told that in those previously mentioned 30 second elevator pitches. We never actually see it.

Ok spoilers done, but I’m not. The enemies that you fight in this game are also horribly boring and repetitive. We get about 10 enemies in total throughout the entire game, and most of those only have very slight variations. They try to spice it up a bit by adding in “elements,” but about 70% of what I fought ended up always being the fire type anyway. Sure, we get five or so “boss” type enemies, but they’re not particularly special, either. Most of these enemies are copy-pasted all over the planets you visit to give the impression of a planet full of activity, but really it’s just the same things over and over. 

The real issue here is how the Big Bad, a bird guy named Grax, is supposed to be really feared but we only get like two cutscenes about him. His army is completely faceless. It’s really shocking that we got significantly more development from the Star Wolf team almost 25 years ago on the Nintendo 64, and all of that was delivered in five second one-liners spread through only a couple levels! 

All I’m going to say about the “toys as games” thing is that it’s stupid and clunky and should never be used, especially the way they make you mount the ship onto your controller. What an absolutely idiotic method. I can understand having a portal like they did with Skylanders. Still not a fan, but you can toss something onto it and it doesn’t weigh down your controller. If it was required to play, I would have never even tried this game.

Gameplay is supposed to be the real winning point here, with an honestly unbelievable amount of content available for each planet you visit. I think there were six or seven planets you could visit, so there was actually a ton to do. But I can’t imagine beating my head against the wall so many times on each planet to complete any of it. If you really enjoy grinding, monotonous, pointless gameplay, then by all means, try this game.

Conclusion

I mean, if you like Starfox, I think you’ll have at least some fun with it. The Starfox levels are fun, and it feels like legitimate Starfox content. It also shows that Starfox could branch out into something different, but I’m not sure I’d be a big fan of it going such a repetitive route with regards to gameplay. If a game like this were fully devoted to a Starfox story, and not just including Starfox as an afterthought, then I do think it could be a good game. But as it stands, Starlink: Battle for Atlas is an example of something that looks and sounds great, but revels in gameplay mediocrity and fails at story-telling. 5/10. If there was no Starfox content, it’s honestly a 3/10.

[ponett]

Welp... it’s over. After nine years, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic is over. I just got done watching the series finale with Anthony and, just like I knew I would, when the credits rolled, I cried my eyes out

I should probably say something, huh. I’ve been sharing thoughts like this mostly on Twitter lately, but I started using Tumblr to blog about MLP, so I don’t think it would be right to post this anywhere else

I have a complicated relationship with MLP:FiM. It’s a show that got really hit or miss after the second season, and it has a fandom so toxic and so full of edgy libertarians that it scared me off from formally participating in fandoms for the rest of my life. But it’s also probably my favorite TV show of all time. There are other shows that are much better written, that have more to say, that are more consistent, even including several other cartoons from the same decade. But I think I’d be lying to myself if I said it wasn’t my favorite show

No other piece of media has had as massive of an impact on my life as My Little Pony

I grew closer to some of my closest high school friends because of our shared enthusiasm for the show. I started PonyPokey with Jake and Derek and made a bunch of bad videos and got invited to be on a wildly disorganized BronyCon panel with Jenny Nicholson in 2012. (We went on stage immediately after Lauren Faust’s panel. I barely said a word due to stage fright.)

After years of being too afraid to share my art online, I started putting more effort into learning digital art so that I could draw ponies. It started out rough, but with the drive to improve, I quickly got better. I started Fluttershy Replies. For the first time, I had an audience. I had people who cared about my work and supported me. Even as times have changed, many of you have been following me since way back then

Around the time I came out as bi in 2012, I got really into MLP shipping. Writing sappy comics and drawing sappy art became an outlet for my years of pent up feelings, and helped me sort out a lot of stuff. My Little Pony also completely changed the views on femininity that had been beaten into my skull since childhood. Suddenly, it wasn’t this strange, alien thing to be afraid of. MLP, at its heart, is a show about how there’s no wrong way to be a girl. That’s an incredibly powerful message. Rarity wasn’t a vapid snob. Fluttershy wasn’t a background character who got made into the butt of the joke. Pinkie wasn’t a ditz. These were characters written to be empathized with. And writing about my own feelings from the perspective of Fluttershy felt... right. It took me a few years to fully process those feelings, but eventually, I realized the truth. I was a trans woman. And a cartoon about horses was the first step on my path to realizing this

In 2013, one of the roughest years of my life, I decided to download RPG Maker on a whim to give myself a distraction. Naturally, my first instinct was to make a game where Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash kiss. What was initially supposed to be a short, Fantastic Game-esque playground of silly little jokes spiraled out of control and became Super Lesbian Horse RPG, a game that I poured my heart and soul into over the course of a year. And then, a couple years later, my desire to preserve the ideas from my copyright-infringing fangame also spiraled out of control, as all my creative projects do, and became SLHRPG’s successor: Super Lesbian Animal RPG. SLARPG isn’t really a reskinned MLP fangame anymore--it’s more like a new game inspired in part by my old project. The story has been drastically rewritten, the characters changed, the levels and gameplay redesigned. Most of the cast of the new game wasn’t in the original project in any form. There’s much, much, much, much, much more new content than old left in the game. And the original game had already strayed so far from the canon anyway. But I’m also not sure it would exist without MLP

I made a bunch of friends online, including close friends I still have to this day. I met the people like Bee and Thomas who I’m still working with on SLARPG. Most importantly, because we both blogged about MLP and had some mutual friends, I met Anthony, the love of my life. We’ve been together for five years now and supported each other through good times and bad. This is the lamest, corniest, stupidest thing I will ever say in my life, but he’s the Rainbow Dash to my Fluttershy

...

So what about the finale itself? (spoilers, obviously)

I have... mixed feelings on the finale. There were some things that really annoyed me in there. But also, like I said, I cried, so I think it’s safe to say they did good overall

I think the thing that stuck in my craw the most was Discord. Which I guess shouldn’t be surprising. I’ve been saying for years now how I hate Discord, how he spits in the face of everything the show stands for. He’s an obnoxious elderly manchild who constantly causes problems on purpose and torments his so-called friends the second they stop paying attention to him. But they have to put up with him and give him infinite second chances, because he’s a god and Celestia said they had to reform him

The overarching plot of the final season is that Queen Chrysalis, King Sombra, Tirek, and Cozy Glow (a Darla Dimple-esque filly villain from season 8) had teamed up with Grogar, a “new” villain taken from G1. While this goes on in the background, Twilight is making her preparations to become Celestia’s successor, as we’d known would be her destiny since the day she got wings six years ago. The villain team-up stuff was genuinely fun, and a highlight of the season for me. But then, in the three-part finale, it’s revealed that Grogar was actually Discord in disguise, and that he’d been intentionally trying to orchestrate a big attack on Twilight’s coronation so that she and her friends could save the day and get a big confidence boost going into her reign as princess. This is like... one of the most bafflingly stupid plot twist of all time. It’s literally the end of the show, and Discord has learned nothing. He’s “nice” now, but he’s still intentionally causing huge problems and putting everyone’s lives in danger to solve his problems. He freed four different villains they’d already defeated just so Twilight could beat them again, and in the process they literally blew up the goddamn castle in Canterlot and nearly killed everyone. And yet... they still forgive him, because they have to

I did, however, think that the last two-part adventure episode was fun overall. It tied a nice bow on much of the series, bringing back a bunch of old friends (including cameos from the movie cast!) to band together and save the day. Of course, in the end, they beat the bad guys with a big rainbow laser and sealed them in a statue. You know, even though a previous season finale was all about how solving their problems with a friendship laser and sealing the villains away never worked. Also, Cozy Glow might be evil, but she’s still literally a child? And now her petrified body is on display in the center of Canterlot? What the fuck????

I’m complaining a lot, but again. It was fun overall. It was nice to have one last big adventure, and to have the mane six reflect on how they’d grown since Twilight moved to Ponyville

...

And then we got the actual final episode. And boy did this one hit me HARD

I’m so glad that they ended on a quieter episode about the main cast’s friendships, because that’s what the show is actually about. The two-part adventures to save Equestria every season are fun, but that’s not the real show. We all came back every week for Twilight and her friends

There are things I can complain about here, too. Spike being a buff adult dragon with the voice of a child is fucked up. I’m still not used to seeing Twilight be Celestia’s size. But more than anything, I was always worried that we’d get a Harry Potter ending, where all the characters are paired off into arbitrary marriages so they can all have kids. Thankfully, this didn’t really happen. The only one who had a kid was Pinkie, who apparently got married to Cheese Sandwich (Weird Al’s character) at some point. Like, they literally shared two episodes together, with no hint of romance? But then they got married and had a kid off-screen??? What the fuck???? A lot of people also think that Fluttershy ended up with Discord, and I know I’m massively biased against that ship, but... I mean, they teased the FlutterCord shippers, but there wasn’t really any actual textual evidence that they were any closer than they had been previously. Y’all weirdos who ship Fluttershy with an obnoxious elderly man can interpret that as being “canon” if you want, I guess, but it’s not

The other relationship that shocked everyone in the finale was Applejack and Rainbow Dash, who... appear to be a couple? It’s definitely hinted at. I have... very, very mixed feelings about this. I mean, okay, obivously I’m the big FlutterDash fangirl. But I think AppleDash is cute, too! The problem is that, like... they’ve barely interacted in years? Like, they had a lot of episodes together in the first two seasons, but then the writers barely ever had them interact past that point. I can’t even remember when the last time we got an actual episode focusing on them was. And no, the one where Rainbow takes Granny Smith to pony Vegas doesn’t count

Like... yeah, it’s cute. It’s a nice gesture. Lyra and Bon Bon getting married in the background was also cute. But we can do so, so much better in 2019. We have so many explicitly canon lesbian couples in cartoons. Couples that actually kissed, or got married, or showed feelings for each other. Rainbow and AJ barely even fucking talked to each other in the final few seasons. I dunno, it just feels very hollow to me. Even the Equestria Girls crew admitting they were pushing RariJack felt more substantial to me, because at least they were given on-screen chemistry and lots of canon interaction

But in the end, complaints aside, the finale was about Twilight moving back to Canterlot, and worrying that her friendships would fade because of it. Honestly, I think this is what the finale of the show always would’ve been. It was the perfect story to end on. And boy, it hit really close to home

And then the last song happens, reflecting on how things have changed, but how they’re all still friends. And we see all the other friends they made along the way. And the camera zooms out, and the book from the opening of the very first episode closes, bringing the entire nine-year saga full circle

And then I started sobbing really hard in Anthony’s arms

...

I dunno. I just got done nitpicking a lot, but I still think that the last episode was a good and very emotional ending for the show

I’m going to miss this show dearly. I know it will be back in a new form, and that the leaks indicate that it’ll still star slightly different versions of the Mane Six. I’m also used to shows like this getting rebooted. Hasbro cartoons are honestly lucky to last past three seasons. FiM, on the other hand, got over 200 episodes, a theatrical film, a few specials, some shorts, a bunch of comics (which I still need to read), and a spinoff human AU series that was also really great. There’s no shortage of content, and I’m sure I’ll be returning to the series for years to come. I’m also glad that the show managed to go out on a high note

But still. It was a constant presence in my life for nearly nine years. Even as the quality got really hit or miss, even as they took the premise in strange directions, even as the crew of the show grew more and more dominated by men, it was still a show I could rely on to always be there, 26 episodes a year. I’ll miss it. I hope what comes next is just as good, if not even better. I also hope it’s gayer

I was going to end my ask blog, Fluttershy Replies, around the time the show ended. I’m not sure if I’ll do that just yet. I don’t know. I think that might be a bit much for me to process emotionally. Too many doors closing in my life in quick succession. But I do want to do more with it. These characters will be special to me for the rest of my life

I mean shit, I haven’t even drawn StarTrix yet. I’ve still got a lot of work to do with these horses, folks

[radramblog]

Top 5 Games, ever...?

This was sort of on my mind, considering the recent GOTY post I made. Come explore the hyperfixations that managed to stick around long enough to be my top 5 list. 

5. Uhhhhhh

So turns out I haven’t figured out what number 5 is yet. I suppose instead I’ve got to split it among the honourable mentions, huh.

Kirby Super Star Ultra is probably the best game from the GBA/DS era of the series and is just a blast to play. It introduced Masked Dedede, and all the banging music and memes that come with it, and probably deserves a spot here just for that.

The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth removes all the awkward Flash Stuff from the excellent original, and adds so, so much more content- the game’s final expansion still isn’t out yet as of writing but even now there’s just so much to unlock. While some aspects of the game can be pretty unforgiving, you probably aren’t going to be exposed to the worst of it unless you get into it pretty hardcore, and if you do, you’ll get used to it. It’s a roguelike, after all.

Speaking of roguelikes, FTL: Faster than Light is chaotic yet serene, brutal but fair, and a bunch of other pretentious dichotomies wrapped into a neat little bow. It takes some getting used to the mechanics, but once you get the hang of it, building your little ship up and up in the face of all odds is extremely satisfying. Have fun dying hopefully not too many times.

SPEAKING of permadeath, Realm of the Mad God gets a spot here just out of sheer hours I’ve spent with it. After a messy few years with a not-so-great owner lead me to dropping the game, it seems finally to have recovered and has devs and community that actually freaking care about it, which is nice. Also, it’s free, and the recent transition to unity has the game looking better and playing smoother than 12-year-old me could ever have dreamed of.

Terraria isn’t just 2D Minecraft btw, its actually more of an RPG/Metroidvania thing, you probably know at this point, but its pretty good hey. Still haven’t fully dove into 1.4 but considering I thought Red was done at 1.1 I’m not complaining with what I have played.

 4. Fallout: New Vegas

(...ish??)

I’d argue that between the primitiveness of the original Fallout games (I’ve tried to get into them, but I just can’t) and how…meh… the other Bethesda ones are, New Vegas is the only one in the series to stand up strong. Obsidian’s excellent writing and tweaks to the gameplay of 3 make New Vegas feel like an actual world, rich and characterised, which was something I found lacking in previous open-world RPGs I’d played up until that point (which admittedly might just have been Skyrim). It’s a game that challenges you to make choices that actually matter for more than the mere moments of an altered dialogue tree, both in dialogue and character building, which helps make the game actually replayable. It is also the first game in a long time that really sold the idea of DLC on me, seeing as each of the game’s 4 expansions adds an entire new region of world with its own stories and unique gameplay, tying together with the main plot but standing on their own. I am excluding Gun Runner’s Arsenal from this for obvious reasons, though it isn’t like GRA is a bad DLC or anything- on the contrary, the sheer scope of modifications and munitions makes playing a repair/science-based character incredibly fulfilling- but it just isn’t at the same scope as the other 4 (Courier’s stash barely counts seeing as its just oops! All preorder bonuses).

New Vegas is one of the few games I have actually 100% completed, achievements and all, but I’m still pretty sure there are bits I’ve missed, paths I haven’t taken, characters I haven’t talked to. Despite its inhospitability, the Mojave is always a comfortable place to return to.

 3. VA-11 Hall-A

(Hey look, my phone background)

Vallhalla is a masterclass in storytelling, atmosphere, and aesthetic. Like all good cyberpunk dystopias, you get themes of class and transhumanism and artificial intelligence, but they aren’t the point of Vallhalla. Through the window and lens of cyberpunk and PC98 nostalgia is focussed a surprisingly human story centred around the protagonist, Jill, which through multiple replays still hits me in the feels just so. Of course, Jill’s story is not the only one being discussed, as every single patron of the bar has their own life going on, and the glimpses we get imply a rich, often interconnected, world. Glitch City is, frankly, a shithole, and it’s not like you don’t get some assholes coming into the bar while you’re working it. The first patron you serve, in fact, is a great example of this- Donovan D. Dawson, essentially a parody of J. Jonah Jameson, is a colossal prick and knows it- but its clear he has his own system of morals and it is mentioned that he’s excellent at his job, much as he gripes about it. He’s rude and more than a little sexist, but frustratingly charismatic and authoritative, and he’s just one of many people who show up throughout the game. Vallhalla is the perfect game to sit down, grab your preferred beverage, and just relax with.

 2. Total Annihilation

(This image is on the steam page for this one, despite blatantly not being from vanilla TA)

I think I actually need to explain this one. Total Annihilation was a game released in 1997 made largely by Chuck Taylor, who would later go on to produce spiritual successor Supreme Commander. It’s an RTS game featuring exclusively robotic units with a fairly chunky aesthetic, allowing the visuals to age better than some, and a fully orchestrated soundtrack by Jeremy Soule, who would later go on to do work on a whole bunch of stuff, most notably Skyrim.

Total Annihilation is an intensely nostalgic game for me, being one of the first games I ever got to play as a kid outside of edutainment stuff, and I’d argue still holds up today (especially with the excellent Escalation mod). What it lacks in story (it’s pretty basic, but functional) it makes up for being miles ahead of its time mechanically, being the first (?) RTS to function in 3 dimensions- heights of things actually matter, hills exist and certain units climb them better than others, shooting down airplanes is difficult without anti-air but possible if you aim *just* right. While appearing pretty similar and having largely analogous units, the two factions of Arm and Core are well fleshed-out in terms of aesthetic and playstyle- Arm preferring fast and cheap equivalents to Core’s slow but powerful- and the unit variety is sufficient that strategies can vary wildly based on the map. Both campaigns as well as those from the game’s expansions are challenging, but satisfying, limiting the units you can produce to force exploration of different playstyles.

Total Annihilation isn’t something I tend to binge play for hours anymore, but I’ll pick it up for a bit every so often, and I don’t see that stopping for a long time (especially due to the recent steam release).

 1. Pokémon Emerald

(At the top, where it belongs)

Yeah, this was inevitable. Pokémon is my favourite series ever; Emerald is my favourite in the series. Go figure.

Emerald, being the final game for the franchise’s days on the Game Boy, reflects everything Game Freak had learned in the first 3 generations of the series’ history. The game’s balance is challenging but fair, never spiking so tough that it is insurmountable but never holding your hand either. The AI opponents are throwing odd combinations of mons and moves at you from every corner, double battles are everywhere but rarely mandatory, and the variety of available mon both before and during the postgame is excellent. The added features on top of Ruby and Sapphire are great- Battle Tents serve to replace 3 of the contest halls (they should have all been under one roof to begin with) and provide a taste of what would later be available in the Battle Frontier. The Frontier is probably the single most expansive and challenging postgame in any Pokémon game, providing the game with a longevity that is sorely needed due to the inaccessibility of Pre-DS multiplayer. The game also manages to tie together the plot of both Ruby and Sapphire into something that feels natural, and provides the series’ first ever actual cutscene, which felt a lot cooler at the time than it sounds now. The return of animated sprites gives the Pokémon a level of life far beyond the static sprites of RSFRLG, and in my eyes wouldn’t feel the same until Black and White several years later. The return of the Pokégear phone in the form of Match Call, as irritating as it is to some, makes the world feel alive in a way that Sinnoh and Kanto probably never will, in addition to making grinding a fair bit less tedious and more beneficial. It is, altogether, probably the perfect Pokémon experience, and in my opinion only one other game comes close (its Platinum).

Oh also, they got rid of the font from Ruby and Sapphire, thank fuck, that shit is atrocious.

[shookethbrooketh]

seven days

day four: part one summary: dan is stuck in the wrong timeline. one day, he kisses phil goodnight. the next morning, he’s completely alone. he doesn’t even recognize where he wakes up, and little details in the world around him have changed. he has no clue what’s happening or where to go next in an effort to fix it; all he knows is that he has to find phil.

genre: sci-fi, a lil bit of angst, happy ending

warnings: just some swearing! 

fic word count: 9.7k chapter word count: 1.2k

written for the @phandomreversebang ! inspired by the awesome moodboard/edits by @maybeformepersonally ! beta’d (beginning to end) by @i-might-just-leave-soon !

phil sighed and pulled out a keyboard that appeared to be full of different buttons and switches. he hit a few buttons, input a code, and readied his hand over the switch. “good luck.”

read it on ao3

Dan’s eyes snapped open as air streamed into his lungs. He exhaled, pushing himself up on the sofa he’d woken up on. “Where the fuck am I?” By now he’d learned--his first order of business in the morning was to search for a phone. “You’ve got to be bloody kidding me.” On the nightstand was a flip phone that had to be ten years old. “I’ve got followers younger than this thing.” Dan stared at it for a moment, the events of the previous day coming back to him. “Oh, SHIT!” he shouted, flipping the phone open. Sure enough, the date read October 16, 2009. He groaned, throwing himself back against the side of the couch. “Stupid fucking time machine.” 

Dan took a deep breath and sat up. The clock on the phone read about noon; that was probably about the time he transported back nearly ten years. He had finally gotten at least a few answers; he now had twelve hours to not only convince the Phil of this timeline to listen to him but also to figure out a way to get home, since the last Phil clearly was of no help. Before any of that, though, he had to find Phil. But how? 

As a start, Dan spent a moment taking in his surroundings. He seemed to be in a dingy apartment. It was dark and green tinted; it almost reminded him of the True Lab from Undertale. There was a pang in his chest--what he wouldn’t give to go back to his life with Phil and play RPGs all night. 

He found a pile of clothes that appeared to be relatively clean and put on a t-shirt and jeans. The clothes were much too small for him and were clearly meant for an emo 18-year-old, but clearly that was who was living there. It was 2009, after all. Dan couldn’t help but feel bad for the poor My Chemical Romance fan who just got transported to 2019 in his place.

After he was dressed and looking almost decent despite being completely terrified by the sight of his 28-year-old body in his 18-year-old clothes, he began scourging the flat for a laptop; social media was his only chance of finding Phil, even if it did involve MySpace. 

Ten minutes later, the apartment was somehow more of a mess, he’d found a box of cereal that he was already devouring, and the search for any sort of computer was an absolute bust. Surprisingly, though, he wasn’t discouraged; he’d found Phil in every timeline thus far, so there must have been some way to find him here too. He finished off the cereal straight from the box in joking hope that acting like Phil would help him find Phil, and he was off. 

The apartment door opened straight to a flight of stairs with another door at the bottom. Dan was astonished by what he saw when he opened it. “What the…” The entire room Dan entered into was full of flowers. They were absolutely beautiful, and there were so many of them that Dan could barely find his way through them. Finally, though, he caught sight of a glass door with words written facing away from him. To its right was a counter with a cash register. 

Dan was in a flower shop. 

“What kind of 18-year-old runs a flower shop?” Dan commented into the void before his eye locked onto an ink-coated napkin that seemed to have been slipped under the door. He carefully maneuvered his way to the door, picked up the napkin, and read the words to himself.

“Florist dude,

I don’t know why you’re not open, but I REALLY need some flowers for my boyfriend; it’s our one year anniversary and I wanna do something nice for him. I know peonies are his favorite for some reason, so a bucket--I’m gonna assume they meant bouquet--of those would be great. I hope you see this soon. I’ll be here til five.

-Tattoo artist nextdoor.” 

Dan looked around the room and then back at the note before shrugging. It wasn’t like he had any better ideas. 

He flipped the sign on the door to ‘open’ and went to work arranging a bouquet of peonies. He was lucky there were labels on all the flowers; without them or the Internet, there was no way he could even manage to discern a peony from a carnation. 

Dan found another back room of the flower shop, this one filled with greenery and ribbon rather than living amenities. He didn’t know a thing about organizing flowers, but he did know what was pleasing to the eye. He worked for a few moments to pair colors that looked nice together and add some background green to all the right places before finally tying it all off in a neat, black bow. These were for the partner of a 2009 tattoo artist; he had to assume they liked it a little bit dark. 

He stood back and admired his work; somehow, the arrangement had turned out quite well. “I guess I know what to do if I end up stuck in one of these stupid alternate universes,” he muttered, making his way back to the front of the store. He chuckled for a moment. “I’m literally living in an AU.”

He made his way out to the street and looked left and right before locating the tattoo parlor he was supposed to take the flowers to. “Not just any AU either--I’ve seen all those florist and tattoo artist AUs. What’s the chance of-” He stopped in his tracks as he approached the parlor; on the other side of the glass was a heavily tattooed Phil. He was much younger, but Dan obviously recognized him considering he looked exactly the same as when they met except for the ink covering most of his arms and neck. 

Dan threw himself against the brick wall of the parlor, his breathing heavy. “I’m a florist... and he’s a tattoo artist.”

There was something far too specific about this. It was too obvious, too...familiar. Dan took in a huge breath, and his eyes widened; it was as if he breathed in pure knowledge. “Your timelines are familiar to each other and to you,” he said, repeating what Phil, or, at least, a Phil, had told him the day before. 

“The first day I only had pastel clothes… pastel/punk. The second day I was famous and he was a fan. Yesterday we were both parents. Today…this. Fucking hell, I’m living in tropes.” He scrunched his eyes closed and threw his head against the wall, something he tended to do when under stress. 

After a moment, he straightened his neck out, took a deep breath, opened his eyes, and remembered another phrase Phil had said to him. “If you follow them right, you will find your way home.” 

Dan became immediately aware of the flowers still in his hand. He held them up and made sure they were still perfect, putting on a smile. “Follow the trope.” 

[woo-san-shine]

Our Way

ateez college au 

Premise: You and your best friend from high school move away to a university 3 hours away from your small hometown. You find yourself meeting a strange cast of characters along the way that will help you find your way throughout your freshman year.    

Word Count: 2k (sorry) 

Warnings: slight language, but this is pretty tame 

Author’s Note: A work in progress!!! Mostly just for fun   

next

Chapter 1

You thought this day was never going to come. You had been anxiously waiting for this day for the past four years. You could hardly believe that you had made it this far. Moving away to college is a big step in any young adult's life, and you were more than ready to take this next step with a running start.

It's not like you had a horrible high school experience or anything. I mean, yeah, there were times here and there that you'd rather not think about. But as you watched the bright August sunlight beam down over surrounding trees that lined the highway, you couldn't help but feel a slight thrill begin to rise in your chest.

"How much longer until we're there, Dad?"

"About 15 more minutes, Jae. Give or take the amount of traffic there is going to be once we actually get near the university. I'm sure it's going to be packed with everyone moving in today."

"It's all apart of the experience!" Mom chimed in. "Here, let's take another picture"

"Mom, really?" I say reluctantly as I lean my head forward amidst the many boxes that filled the entirety of the backseat of the car except for where I was sitting.

"I'm your mother, and you'll do this for me," she says between clenched teeth already formed into a wide smile. She holds up her arm high in front of her so she can get both me in the backseat and my dad in the driver's seat in the frame of her phone and snaps a picture.

"Did it take?"

"Yeah Mom," I say rolling my eyes. She was still adjusting to her new smartphone that Dad had upgraded her to for the sole purpose of being able to facetime me while I was at school. Dad and I exchange a quick glance in the rearview mirror and both suppress a laugh.

"Have you heard from Sooyoung?" Dad asks looking back at me in the rearview mirror again. "Are they going to get there around the same time we will?"

"I'll text her, hang on," I say pulling my phone from the waistband of my shorts.

Choi Sooyoung had been my best friend for almost eight years. We met when I transferred schools in the 4th grade. She came up to me when I was sitting alone at a lunch table on my first day and said "Hey, you're the new girl, do you want to hear about this new game I've been playing online?" She immediately sat down and told me every detail of this new RPG she had been playing nonstop for the remainder of the lunch period and hasn't stopped talking my ear off since. We found out we liked a lot of the same books, listened to the same emo pop-punk music that was honestly way too mature for our 4th-grade selves to be listening to, and vowed from that day onward to stay best friends. We joined the school band together, were on the same school sports teams, and spent almost every historic high school coming-of-age moment together. Throughout the years we did at times drift apart due to various reasons. Whether it be boyfriends, extracurriculars, or summer jobs. Eventually, we'd always find our way back to each other whenever we needed the other most.

So when senior year finally rolled around, we decided not to tell each other where we had applied to college in order to not influence the other's decision. As fate may have it, we ended up both applying to and getting into our top choice school, a school three hours away from our small hometown that was well-known for each of the programs we were interested in. Sooyoung had gotten a rather large scholarship through the school's Engineering program, and I had been admitted into the school's Arts programs with an intended degree in Graphic Design.  

"Are you sure you and Sooyoung are going to be okay this year?" Mom says swiveling around in her seat to look at me in the back. "High school is one thing, but living together is completely different. Are you sure you won't regret not branching out and rooming with someone else? Might have been a great opportunity to meet new people."

"Oh, I think they'll be fine, sweetpea," Dad says placing a comforting had on my mother's knee.

"Yeah," I say looking up from my phone. "I mean, we're going to have completely different class schedules so we'll rarely see each other unless we both happen to be in the dorm."

"I just hope you both do well this first year," she sighs.

"There will be other opportunities to meet new people and do well in school, mom," I say as I type out my message to Sooyoung.

An almost immediate response.

I relay this information to my parents, but before I can finish my mom squeals, "Look! There's the university sign, right there!"

I press my face against the car window and see the large, ornate gateway adorned with the university crest in the middle that welcomed you onto the school's main road. Various ‘Welcome Freshman!’ and ‘Check-In This Way!’ signs were guiding the line of cars that were beginning to pile up.

"Dunby Hall, right Jae?" Dad says scanning the signs for the correct residence hall while slowly inching the car forward as the line moves.

"Yeah, that's it," I say distractedly as I take in my new home. Being one of the largest universities in our country, I can barely take in the vastness of this new place through just the car window. Each building was unique, with both old and modern architecture seamlessly incorporated in-between tall trees and brick roads. We passed a large, almost pool-sized fountain in what I assumed to be the middle of the university. There were people everywhere. Students, parents, and people in bright red t-shirts with "move-in staff" written on the back.

"Well, it looks like this is it!" Dad says excitedly as he pulls the car up to a rather tall brick building with large windows on all sides.

"Wow, Jae!" Mom says looking back at me with a huge smile. "Why don't you hop out here while we find a place to park and get yourself registered."

I eagerly tumble out of the car, making sure no boxes come out with me, and make my way over to the check-in line. As I wait my turn, I can hear the excited chatting of students and parents waiting ahead of me and the squeaking wheels of the carts being used to carry new student's belongings up to their rooms.

"Hello first-year student!!!" an overly excited girl wearing one of those red shirts practically shouts at me as I approach the check-in table labeled with the letters ‘K - L’. "Welcome to Dunby Hall! Can I get your name please?"

"Kim Jaemin."

"Ahhh another Kim, what a surprise," she says, with a slight grimace as she begins to rifle through some foulders.

"Well, I mean you are at the 'K' table, can't be too much of a shock," I say before I can stop myself.

The girl stops her search and looks up at me. "Wow we got a funny one here today folks," she says. One of her eyes gives a slight twitch.

I give her a slightly apologetic smile. It must be tiring dealing with all these new students all day, and me being a smart-ass probably didn't help. Dad says I get my sense of humor from my Mom, which is probably why he has a full head of grey hair dealing with the both of us for all these years.

"Alrightly Jaemin," the girl says after a few more seconds of rifling. "Here is your room key, and a folder of all the information you need to know about living in Dunby Hall. You are on the 7th floor, room 71024. You can now start bringing all your belongings from your car and begin setting up your dorm. If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to ask." She says all this very fast, hands me my things, and begins to usher me aside to help the next person in line.

I hurriedly make my way over to my parents who were both standing next to the opened trunk of our car. "7th floor!!! Let's get moving!" I say excitedly waving my new room key in the air.

"YAY JAE!" Mom exclaims bringing me in for a tight hug.

"Before we start celebrating we should find one of those carts. There's no way we can carry all these boxes ourselves," Dad says and he begins to scan the area for a cart.

After a few minutes of searching, we can't find a cart anywhere.

"They must all be in use, I guess," Mom says as we head back to the parked car.

"I mean, we could start making some trips with whatever we can carry," I say.

"It might take a while, but I guess that's all we can do," Dad says wiping the sweat off his brow. "Plus we need someone to stay here with the car until all your stuff is all out."

It was rather hot outside even though it was still early in the morning. I could probably lift at least one box at a time, maybe two. But with how much stuff I had managed to fit in this car it probably would take all day.

"Excuse me, but do you all need any help?" a voice asks from behind me.

I turn around, expecting to see another red-shirt-clad student worker eager to help, but instead, I am met by a boy with thick brown hair with big brown eyes looking at me.

I stare back at him, slightly dumbfounded.  He wasn't super tall, but he was built like a wrestler.  You could see the outlines of his arm and shoulder muscles through his black t-shirt.

"Oh my, would do that for us, honey?" my Mom cooed from over by the trunk of the car.  Ever so trusting was my mother as she stepped forward to get a better look at the stranger.

"And who might you be?" my Dad sternly asked, also stepping forward to stand intimidatingly next to me.

"I'm Jongho, sir," the boy said as he bowed to my Father.  "Choi Jongho, miss," he said again bowing to my Mother.  "I live in this dorm too, 7th floor.  I'm actually all moved in and was walking back down here to return my cart when I saw you all looking for one, so I figured I could give you this one," he said gesturing to the cart that I hadn't even noticed was next to him because I was too busy staring at his muscles.

"Awww he called me miss," my Mother whispered in my ear with before moving forward past me to address him.  "Well would you look at that, our Jae is on the 7th floor as well!  You'd be doing us a big favor, Jongho."

"I suppose if it's not too much trouble" my dad added, still giving Jungho the once over.

"Of course not, sir," Jongho replied.

"Well let's start loading the cart and go from there," Dad says, in full business mode.  Both Dad and Jongho start loading various boxes and bins from the trunk onto the cart while Mom and I grab items from the backseat we can carry ourselves.

"Seems like such a nice boy," Mom says just out of earshot of my Dad and Jongho.  "Not all boys would offer to help."

"Uh, yeah Mom I guess," I say grabbing the last item, my guitar case, from the car and slinging it over my shoulder.  I hadn't had many male friends back in high school.  That was more of Sooyoung's thing.  She usually got along better with guys, except for you of course.

"Well, that's all we can fit in the cart," Dad says crossing his arms.  There are still three boxes left in the trunk.  "I guess we'll have to make a second trip after all."

"Oh don't worry, I can carry those," Jongho says, pushing his bangs out of his eyes.  He quickly piles the three boxes onto the ground one on top of the other, squats down, and lifts them effortlessly.

"Wow," Dad says with a raise of an eyebrow.  "I guess, we're all set."  He closes the trunk and starts pushing the cart forward.

"Lead the way, you two!" Mom exclaims, pointing towards the dorm building with her free hand while giving Jongho and I a big smile.

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