#something something both of them feeling so lonely throughout the first book

[briannaswords]

okay but why is

used to lie to your face twenty times in a day it was my little strange addiction but you still tried to stay while I'd self-isolate and I knew but I stayed hidden

lowkey zahra and jessica coded

[yuurei20]

Good morning/evening! Would you consider comparing the personalities of the twst guys in the novels to their personalities in the game at some point in the future? I’ve heard that the guys are depicted as crueler or more villainous with the extra space the novels give. Thank you!

Hello hello! Thank you for this question!

This answer is very long m(_ _)m (thank you for this opportunity to share novel 2 fan art 🦁)

Riddle (novel 1): I do not believe there were too many changes made to Riddle in the first novel? A lot of things may come down to personal feeling/subjective interpretation (re: Riddle’s desperation for his mother’s affection maybe put across more effectively in the novel? etc.).

Riddle (novel 2): Riddle’s admiration of Leona is new! And not requiring conjecture or reading between the lines, as Riddle outright says that he has always respected Leona. (Ref: Riddle on Leona: The Housewarden Meeting / Riddle’s Confession)

Riddle is also described as being envious of how Malleus is so adored by his dorm’s students, saying that he doesn’t think Malleus is a good Housewarden but there must be something he can learn from him, as he is so respected. (ref: Riddle on Malleus)

Trey/Cater (novel 1): Both Trey and Cater seem very similar to their game counterparts.

Trey (novel 2): Trey does not appear very much in novel 2, seeming very similar to his game counterpart.

Cater (novel 2): This may be a subjective interpretation, but it seemed a little as though Cater was more protective of Riddle in the 2nd novel than in Book 2 of the game, with his grudge against Leona possibly inspired more so against Leona’s insult of Riddle than his physical thrashing in the mock spelldrive match. (Ref: Spelldrive Practice Match (pt5) / Trusting Riddle )

There is also emphasis in narration of Cater’s loyalty to those around him (Ref: Cater and Yuuya).

Ace (novel 1): I wonder if maybe Ace is where the “crueler or more villainous” rumors are coming from? 👀 Ace is certainly rude to Yuuya in the first novel, calling him a bore and repeatedly yelling at him to say what is on his mind.

But unlike Game-Ace, he also apologies to Yuuya for being so aggressive (Ref: Ace Apologizes).

There is a lot more depth to Ace’s character overall, with his motivations and personality really shining! He is a great character in the game, of course, and maybe even greater in the novelization. (Ref: Yuuya and Ace / Yuuya Apologizes)

Ace (novel 2): Ace refuses outright to help Yuuya interview people about the injured students. He explains that he does not have anything else to do but he still will not be helping, and Yuuya goes to Pomefiore alone as a result.

Carried over from the first novel there is a theme of both Ace and Deuce not being able to trust Riddle and speaking disparagingly about him throughout the story.

This culminates at the end when Riddle cheers for them in the exhibition match, and it is hinted that, one day, Riddle may be accepted by the students of his dorm. (ref: Trusting Riddle)

Deuce (novels 1&2): We get to see more of Deuce’s efforts to be an honor student in the novel, such as when he sits with the lonely Yuuya at lunch (ref: Yuuya and Deuce).

He consistently tries to defend Riddle to Ace, not out of affection or respect so much as wanting to overcome his own past self. His resilience wanes as Ace’s belittling of Riddle continues throughout the two novels and he does not have much ground to stand on to defend him. (Ref: About Riddle (pt1))

Leona (novel 1): The rewriting of Leona’s introduction is maybe one of my favorite things about the first novel (ref: Meeting Leona). Rather than threatening to harm the prefect as in the game Leona goes to Yuuya’s rescue, saving both Yuuya and Deuce from the bullies that break the eggs they bought for the chestnut tart.

Leona (novel 2): There is much more to novel-Leona than was in the game, with Riddle reflecting on his dazzling confidence (ref: Riddle on Leona).

On the "more villainous" side, it is insinuated that he intentionally injures Cater during their mock spelldrive match (ref: Spelldrive Practice Match (pt3))

In the game Leona laughs in response to Lilia driving him to overblot but in the novel he loses all emotion, which Yuuya reflects on later as being far more terrifying than his rage. (Ref: The Transformation / Cheka (pt3)).

We also get much more detail about his unique magic: while we know from the game that he does not need to touch things to turn them to sand, in the novel he has the ability to kinetically manipulate the sand that he creates.

There is an amazing description of insects falling, dead, out of the sky, having been reduced to dried-out husks in mid-flight, combined with what is maybe the only description we ever receive of Leona looking afraid.

And what he is frightened of is not Riddle, Lilia or his enemies, but the adoring members of his own dorm, whom he is terrified of failing. (Ref: Leona’s Unique Magic (pt1) / Leona’s Unique Magic (pt2))

Leona’s relationship to his dormmates itself may have been rewritten for the novel, but nothing in the game seems to refute it, so it is not difficult to imagine the same situation playing out behind the scenes in the game as well.

Leona himself says in the game that he is fighting for the futures of his dorm mates, but he is always so sarcastic that it is easy to dismiss this as an excuse he is making to Jack, when he may have just been telling the truth.

Unlike in the game Leona interacts directly with the phantom that is born of his own despair and he is described as crying tears of blot. (Ref: The Overblot Battle)

I was a little more organized with the release of the second novel than the first, and have a small collection of fan art by others who illustrated the before-and-after-novel of their impressions of Leona!

(↑ How the situation at Savanaclaw appears to be vs. how it is from Leona’s point of view)

(↑ Cheka’s game scene vs. Cheka's novel scene)

Leona’s post-overblot flashback is also fleshed out very much in the novel, with added details about how hard working and isolated he had been until the birth of Cheka, which led him to giving up, and how much he hates himself. (Ref: Leona and Falena / The Flashback Monologue)

(↑ Leona’s phantom is described as nuzzling against him in the novel)

The monologue also explains a lot of his inner turmoil, how frightened he is and how he actually doesn’t have the strength to give up on his hopes and dreams, despite everyone around him talking as though he already has.

(↑ Artist’s rendition of game-Falena vs. novel-Falena)

We also receive more details about the Spelldrive match, showcasing Leona’s non-UM magical power and athleticism, and how the students of Savanaclaw still trust in him even after his mental break, in contrast to the students of Heartslabyul and Riddle. (Ref: The Exhibition Match (pt3))

Ruggie (novel 2): There is some wonderful detail added to Ruggie in the second novel, including an interesting new dimension to his relationship with Leona.

(↑ Artist’s interpretation of their impression of Ruggie and Leona’s dynamic before reading the novel vs. after reading the novel)

In the Botanical Garden scene Ruggie reflects in narration on how Leona would surely throw him away if he ever tried to stand up for himself, and how captivated he is by Leona’s ambitions (ref: The Botanical Garden Scene).

In the scene where Ruggie offers to “take care of” the troublesome Jack, we receive a look into how it is Ruggie is walking on eggshells around Leona, for his own safety. (Ref: Leona and Jack (pt3))

The scene of Ruggie running away in Book 2 also had added details, with Ruggie briefly losing his apathetic mask and revealing a hint of the trauma of his upbringing. (Ref: Ruggie Escape (pt5))

There is much more detail into Ruggie’s inner turmoil as well, and particularly in the scene where Leona confronts him for being nearly caught out by Riddle and the others. (Ref: Savanaclaw Dorm (pt2)). He reflects on Leona’s arrogance, his struggles back home, and the desperation of his situation. 

Their interaction during Leona’s overblot was also expanded upon, with an overblotting Leona threatening Ruggie with his life if he does not agree to give up on his dreams, and Ruggie refusing to do so (Ref: Leona and Ruggie, to overblot (pt2))

Jack (novel 2): We receive a little more detail in Jack’s admiration for Leona, and how Leona’s words actually do resonate with Jack, though he may try and pretend to be unfazed. (Ref:  Leona and Jack (pt1)) / Leona and Jack (pt2)) 

(↑Jack remembering how moved he was watching Leona lose to Malleus in his second year)

There is added detail to Jack’s relationships with Ace, Deuce and Yuuya, as he seeks them out intentionally before the spelldrive match. (Ref: Jack and Yuuya) 

Also unique to the novel Ruggie overtakes Jack’s body to take down Leona’s phantom, while Jack come close to refusing to participate in the spelldrive tournament and Yuuya steps in to reveal how much Jack respects Leona to Leona himself. (Ref: The Overblot Battle / Jack and Leona (pt4))

We also see Leona and Jack working together during the exhibition match, just as Jack had always dreamed. (Ref: The Exhibition Match (pt2))

(↑ Also there is Azul’s introduction to Yuuya, Ace, Deuce and Grim, added to Novel 2 while it did not happen in Game-Book 2. Ref: Meeting Azul (pt1) / Meeting Azul (pt2))

This went very much off-topic from the original question 💦 But while I do agree that there is increased villainousness in the novels, there is also an increase in depth, feeling and detail overall! ^^ Highly recommended!

[5five5five5five5five5five]

Bored take some Viktor five content:

* five and Viktor end up being roommates due to everyone else not having the strong tolerance to handle his ass. Viktor doesn't either but they wanted to go back to the start and rebuild a dynamic after all the chaos and drama.

* they end up getting really close. It's easier for Viktor to listen to five talk about his past now that they have experienced all sorts of weird shit and five is less bitter about viktor's new found independence and choices now that the world is saved.

* I hc that five has trouble using Viktor's preferred name and five HATES IT. It's not to be disrespectful or not understanding gender, he's all cool and very respectful. It's that when you have truama as deep rooted as his, calling out his siblings names on a daily basis in a lonely ruined world for 40 years. Carrying around viktor's book as a lifeline to stay close to him....it's just not something your brain can let go. he wants to let it go, he feels like a ass everytime he slips and apologizes like 3 times even when Viktor said it's ok. his truama CLINGs to viktor's dead name like his life depends on it. He does get better at it as they start live together and it was a 1/9 chance anyway so Viktor wasn't too bugged by it and understood that it's not meant to be disrespectful. Trauma's a bitch. They both get that.

* they take turns making lunch and dinners. Breakfast is always coffee and peanut butter and marshmallow sandwiches.

* Five starts collecting vintage cook books because he's had food from other timelines that aren't as popular anymore and wishes to make them.

* Viktor LOVES Chappell Roan. Five is unimpressed but likes watching Viktor just jam out well doing chores or studying.

*Viktor would drag five to a lot of queer centric events and five would feel out of place at first like "I'm your 60 year old straight cisgendered brother that looks 15. I don't fit in and I don't think that drag show bouncer is going to be as lenient as that strip club in the 60's...long story." But over time, five actually starts to enjoy himself. And maybe learning his gender and sexuality along the way (I don't have strong opinions on that yet. All ik is he's such a fruit and has no idea /pos. When Viktor and Klaus are your favorite siblings....ask yourself whyyy)

* they host small dinners with a handful of siblings at a time. They can't host all of them at once due to their apartment size (it would be a disaster) but sometimes Diego, Lila and the kids come over. Or just Luther with fast food well he was walking home. I think the biggest group would be brother nights (sorry Allison....i feel so bad for her lmao I think her and Lila hang out on those nights. )

* five and Viktor realized that giving the other puppy eyes breaks the other easily. I think both have trouble saying no to the other due to feeling bad about how much they fought and were butting heads throughout Dallas and the hotel. Five doesn't want to let his bs behavior under "gotta save the world" distress linger between them. And Viktor doesn't either, he also misses his brother and just wants to see him happy and relaxed for once.

*that doesn't mean they don't fight. They bicker consistently about such basic things . From where the remote is to when the other will be home to the past. They don't don't do a good job at not throwing the past in each others face......but they useally settle down.

*Viktor LOVES to try and use therapy talk with five, who hates it at first. But overtime, I think after a very strong breakthrough in his issues and realizing how much not being under survival adrenaline is effecting him, he becomes more accepting of it. And it's helped their fighting and understanding each other a lot.

* I feel like they get rather touchy together over time. Fixing each others hair, leaning on the other well sitting on the sofa, etc

*five has to tie viktor's ties ALL THE TIME.

*(tw drugs) I feel like they have "rekindling our Lost teen years together" nights where they get high (they only take edibles bc neither like smoking) and watch all the cartoons five has missed. Wear comfy clothes. Talk about nothing. They try to make it a point to talk about anything BUT family and the past. Witch helps them grow closer.

*five wants bees. They have no room. Five is very sad. Viktor hopes they one day get a bigger place to have bees.

* five gets a emotional support animal with viktor's help. mr.pennycrumb! They do all the training and five loves that boy with his life. He really helps him with episodes and panics.

* Viktor ends up helping five with rather basic things. Again, no more survival adrenaline to make him speed learn everything all the time. He can afford to be confused and frustrated. "Egh How does the tv remote work again?" "The pepper grinder has stopped wo- oh the other direction..." Five starts to feel rather useless but Viktor likes helping. five bitterly jokes at Viktor being either his elderly care nurse or babysitter. Viktor reassures him it's not like that and they are just brothers and he needs help.

* Viktor gets into the habit of calling five "bud" as a loving brother pet name.

I've ran out of brain fuel. I could go on for hours about them though.

(PRO SHIPS DNI THIS IS ALL PLATONIC)

[mirai-e-jump]

Kikai Sentai Zenkaiger: Zenryoku Zenkai Book Kiita Komagine x Ryo Sekoguchi Cross Talk (translations below)

Publication: April 15, 2022

-From, "What's with this guy?" to sworn enemies-

"Although Kaito and Stacey were enemies, it was a relationship where a type of friendship gradually developed, but how did you both feel about your roles?"

Sekoguchi: In the beginning, when it comes to Kaito, you feel like, "What with this guy?" He's a completely different person from Stacey, so he couldn't accept him. That's why I felt that he wasn't good around Kaito, and the more he met him, the more he felt against Kaito. If they both weren't interested in each other, they wouldn't have gotten involved with each other. However, they fought each other many times, and there were times where Stacey cared about Kaito, so even though they had different ways of living, I felt that they were attracted towards each other because they had similar cores. I think of them as a comedic version of the relationship between Naruto and Sasuke in "Naruto" (laughs).

Komagine: As Kaito, it wasn't like, "Because it's Stacey" or something like that, he wanted to be friends with everyone, including people and Kikainoids, so I played the role while genuinely wanting to get along with him. Every time they met, Kaito was rejected, but that didn't mean he gave up, and for a year I kept thinking that someday their feelings would reach each other. I didn't waver in that part, and I played the role without abandoning his desire to become friends with Stacey.

"For Kaito, he treats Stacey the same way he treats Juran and the others."

Komagine: That's true. Kaito doesn't really care about appearances or where someone comes from, he just sees them as human…..which not all of them are (laughs), but, he wants to get along with a guy named Stacey, and that's the one thing that never changes.

"He really never got discouraged, huh?"

Sekoguchi: He's really strong mentally (laughs).

"As for Stacey, he's annoyed by the fact that Kaito keeps approaching him, but isn't it more accurate to say that he's someone you can't help but face?"

Sekoguchi: Stacey isn't interested in other people to begin with. However, the first time he met a type of person like Kaito, he stuck with him somewhere in his heart. I don't think even Stacey himself understands how to express the feelings that were created by him. So, I think the reason he has to defeat Kaito is because there's a part of him that's worrisome to Stacey. There's also Zox and the others, but he only thinks of them as troublesome or an annoyance. However, he has to face Kaito, so the way he looks at him is completely different from the way he looks at the other members.

Komagine: This is going to be abit more focused on Kaito, but throughout the year, Kaito seems to have everything, but he doesn't have his parents, and Juran and the other Kikainoids also have lonely pasts because their families are missing. Because of these pasts, Kaito's trying to do his best, so I wonder if he felt the same thing as the Kikainoids, and reached out to Juran and the others. At first, I played the role with straightforward feelings, but Kaito's old friends don't really make an appearance, and there was a side of him that tried to force himself to do his best, which I thought was normal for a boy his age. That might also be why he decided to reach out to Stacey, who was all alone.

"Even though the tone is usually lighthearted, for episodes involving Kaito's parents, the heavy parts are hidden and revealed at crucial moments."

Komagine: This show has the perfect balance of funny and serious.

Sekoguchi: If you don't pay attention, it'll suddenly creep up on you.

Komagine: It's a funny seriousness, or so to say. Like even when Kaito found out his father's true identity (No. 35 Kai!), everyone was saying, "Dia! Dia!" (laughs).

-We learned about each other's personalities through switching places-

"We'd like to ask about each of your performances, but when it comes to the comical aspects, we were impressed by Stacey rushing into the tennis match in No. 29 Kai!."

Sekoguchi: I think that was the first time Stacey acted for someone else. He tried his best to camouflage himself, but it was obvious who he was (laughs).

"When filming scenes like that, do you have to think about how far you want to deviate from your usual character?"

Sekoguchi: I felt that Stacey's character would change once his costume changed, so I played him without changing his inner self at all. It feels like he acted for Yatsude's sake. I think his seriousness is what makes him interesting (laughs).

"Did you enjoy filming it?"

Sekoguchi: I enjoyed it!

Komagine: Since we always do something like that, we're always like, "Here comes the next one!" But in this episode, Ryo-kun was dressed up as Stacey in the form of a tennis player, which was even more refreshing and interesting than usual. Another one, is that he also became a teacher at the school! (No. 33 Kai!).

Sekoguchi: It was because of that World's power (laughs). I was also on the side of the viewers the whole time, so I was able to enjoy it. I felt like I was getting caught up in that position. In No. 32 Kai!, I can't help but think that the two of them swapping places due to Inverted World's power was comical, but also an important episode in the sense that the two of them confirmed things about their respective positions.

Komagine: Since Ryo-kun and I were switching roles, we had alot of discussions with Director (Kyohei) Yamaguchi while reading the script, which we hadn't done since the beginning of filming. We always see each other on set and in the finished footage, so we know each other, but when it comes to acting, it's a different story. Only Ryo-kun understands the details of Stacey, and only I understand the details of Kaito. I felt that there were alot of things that I learned for the first time because we switched roles.

"Like what specifically?"

Komagine: When I'm Kaito, my emotions go from 0 to 100 all at once. It feels like I unknowingly do things as Kaito that I normally wouldn't do. It's done completely unconsciously, so when I looked at Ryo-kun's Kaito, I realized, "So this is how he looks, huh!" We also studied standing posture together, and we learned alot from looking at it objectively.

"What does Sekoguchi-san think?"

Sekoguchi: I felt that Kaito's much more sensitive to various things happening in front of his eyes than we see in the footage or on the set. He looks simple but is complex, looking like a perfectly straight tree with fine branches growing from it. It was a great discovery to find out that our main character has a sensitive side to him that requires constant attention.

Komagine: Speaking of which, I also thought that Stacey would've been fine if he just spoke in a smooth voice and without hesitation, but he's totally different from me in terms of looks, and even when he did the movements that Ryo-kun did, he doesn't look like me, so I wondered what would be the best way to go about it. Kaito faces his opponents head on, but Stacey turns his head the other way. However, if someone's talking to you, you reflexively turn in that person's direction. Ryo-kun doesn't do that…..but, sometimes I wanted to turn, so it was very difficult to get the hang of it (laughs).

Sekoguchi: Also, there were our voices. We each did the actual voicing during the dubbing, but on set, the voices and movements had to be linked. The performance of Kaito, who raises his "voltage" all at once, was the complete opposite of Stacey's, so we had to rewatch past episodes multiple times while working on it.

"Saying that, was the dubbing also difficult?"

Komagine: It was difficult! We had to match the movements of the other's mouth, and I think Ryo-kun felt this way too, but there were parts of him that I couldn't quite match. Still, the viewers who watched it were satisfied, so I'm really happy about that.

Sekoguchi: I wasn't really sure what to say, but somehow the results turned out alright! (laughs).

Komagine: We cleared it with passing marks (laughs).

"Were you aware of any of the characteristics that the other said they discovered?"

Sekoguchi: I feel like I'm already doing things unconsciously. I've been doing this from the beginning, so by the time it was completely ingrained in my body, I was behaving as if it were normal.

Komagine: Maybe we were thinking about it in the beginning, but at this time we were already very familiar with it, so we weren't really conscious of it at that point.

"Listening to you talk about it, it seems like while the swap was fun, it was also a very difficult challenge."

Komagine: It's not just limited to that episode, but even if you think, "It made the cut, so I did a good job," isn't that just a self evaluation? We're doing this so that everyone can see something good, so we can only feel at ease after hearing everyone's reviews. We have to constantly check with all the viewers feedback. Even if I think I did good, if there's a discrepancy in the viewers comments, it's just a difference in my own judgment, so I have to adjust and correct it. I'm definitely nervous until the broadcast date. Especially since I also played the role of Stacey being swapped.

-Stacey welcomes change with friends-

"The development of working with Hakaizer is a turning point for Stacey, and in No. 34 Kai!, the sight of Kaito looking happy saying, "You're working with Hakaizer, right?!" was also memorable."

Komagine: Kaito originally thought that Stacey was all alone, but when he switched places with him, he found out that he was being oppressed at Tojitendo, which convinced Kaito that Stacey was completely alone. When Stacey brought along a comrade for the first time, it made Kaito really happy.

Sekoguchi: At first, Stacey wasn't interested in friends or anything like that, and he was a character who didn't trust people to begin with. However, when switching places, he realized how important human connections are and the things that can come from them. Then, in No. 34 Kai!, when he was told by Kaito, "Isn't it much better to win a whole lot by working together with some friends?," up until then, he couldn't accept it, but he decided to give it a try…..I think that's how he felt.

"Later, in No. 38 Kai! in which Bon World's ability brings him face to face with his mother, Lise, when he's attacked, he's shocked and thinks, "Is the same thing happening to Hakaizer and Goshikida Kaito?……" and we wonder if that was the catalyst for the change."

Sekoguchi: I don't think he would've been able to realize it on his own, but as he interacted with more and more people, he came to learn alot of things, and it may have been because he was attacked by his mother that helped him look at his own actions objectively. At first, he started out wanting to beat and surpass his father, but he came to realize how pathetic he was for acting the same way.

"What did you think of Stacey's development at that time?"

Komagine: Kaito wanted him to be happy, that goes without saying, but he also cared about him and wanted to save him. That's why he went to help him with Hakaizer at that time. Of course, Kaito wanted to become friends even towards the end, but I thought, "What should I do to make Stacey the happiest?"

"While having to win the battle against Tojitendo, Kaito also has to worry about his parents and Stacey, so he's quite busy."

Komagine: I feel that way too. However, he's not the type to try to figure out things. He acts on instinct and intuition, so he just does whatever he wants to do. In No. 5 Kai!, when he says, "Instead of mom and dad, I should've focused on saving everyone by taking down Sushi World," at that moment, Juran intervenes with, "Of course it's important to take care of your own business." Because of that episode, if we don't keep his stance of, "Always ready to go all out for anything!" Kaito's character will be lost. I didn't over think that part, and just went with what was written in the script.

-The difficulties of playing God-

"Towards the very end, there was a twist in which Stacey was possessed by God. As the climax approached, you had to make a big change in performance."

Sekoguchi: It was challenging. Until I read the script, I had no idea what Gege's purpose was, so when I finally found out I was like, "Really?!" (laughs). I felt that I had to break down or forget about Stacey once the mysterious guy entered him, and his character was completely different from my usual way of speaking and facial expressions.

"When your body was being taken over, "(Sweetly)" was written in the dialogue part of the script."

Sekoguchi: I was like, "What do they mean by (sweetly)"?! (laughs). So, I started thinking about whether God has a gender in the first place. I didn't want God to have a gender, so I was conscious of the neutrality of the image, where it's hard to tell whether they're male or female. In addition to God's composure…..I thought that it had to come from within, but that part of the performance was difficult.

"How was it working with Stacey, who was in a different state?"

Komagine: Hmmm…..He’s clearly different. He made me think, "Even if it's not me, you'll notice!" (laughs). But, it was really cool to see Kaito go to God and say, "Is Stacey even fine with this?!" I was like, "That's it!" it's just like Kaito to make a point like that.

Sekoguchi: He says the most straightforward things at any moment (laughs).

"We were surprised to hear him say lines, "I'll become your friend" while he was being controlled."

Sekoguchi: I didn't say it in the original state of Stacey, so it was beyond my own image. I'm alittle sad about it (laughs).

"God leaves Stacey's body after No. 46 Kai! Then, a series of exchanges with Kaito saying, "I mean, Stacey, you're really nice," and Stacey replying, "Stop that!" was also memorable."

Komagine: For the first time, Stacey complained to Kaito with, "I'm tired…." so my feelings when acting were, "I have to do something about this!" Still, I thought the viewers would be nervous to see Stacey leave, and as Kaito, I felt that Stacey's state of mind was wavering between the Zenkaigers and the position he held up until now. There was a feeling of suspense about what was going to happen in the next few episodes. I'm sure that even when he's with everyone else, Kaito is thinking about Stacey, and Stacey is thinking about Kaito. But, the parts that didn't work well together kept coming up, and I kept thinking, "What's going to happen in the end?!"

Sekoguchi: It started with the scene where he looks sad as he watches the Zenkaigers take back Hakaizer. Not only is his only comrade gone, he now has no place to return at Tojitendo. He had to meet Kaito in such a situation where he's lost everything, so at that time, Stacey was in a very weak state of mind. He was already past his limits.

"It was quite a painful development to watch."

Sekoguchi: If I'm allowed to say it, he's simply not good at living…..(laughs). Of course there are many things that make me feel sorry for Stacey as well, but it's definitely due to his own actions up until now. It's no one's fault but his own, and if he doesn't change, nothing will change. In No. 46 Kai!, he's on the verge of understanding his interactions with Kaito. Up until then, I think there was always a part of him that was blaming his surroundings or the people around him.

Komagine: Kaito wanted to help his father, and he achieved that goal, but the fact that he took Stacey's comrade away has always remained with him. In regards to that, when his father told him in No. 41 Kai!, "If you don't want to leave Stacey alone, you need to do something Kaito," I felt that his resolve to save Stacey was strengthened once again.

"Speaking of, when it comes to the Goshikida family, Yatsude is obviously an essential part of Stacey's life, isn't she?"

Sekoguchi: She really saved him. The scene at Colorful where Stacey confides everything to Yatsude was really great.

Komagine: I'm really glad that Yacchan is played by (Sakakibara) Ikue-san. In the scene where Stacey confides in her, there was a part where she stood tall and firm, so as Kaito, I was proud of Ikue-san for taking it seriously. The way she carried herself on the set was wonderful, and I thought I should learn many things from the way Ikue-san makes everyone on the set smile.

Sekoguchi: Stacey 's grateful to the Goshikida family because they gave him so many things. He received love from Yatsude, the father taught him camaraderie and bonds, the mother gave him her blood, and in the end, Kaito taught him friendship. Stacey receives everything that's important to him from the Goshikida family.

Komagine: Since he has the mother's blood in him, he and Kaito might actually be brothers (laughs).

-The two who have finally became friends-

"We were moved by the sight of him finally rushing over to Kaito after his admission to Yatsude in No. 47 Kai!."

Komagine: Up until then, if I grabbed him by the shoulder, he'd shake me off, but this time I was happy because we were able to say things like, "Let's go back together to Colorful," and "That's the plan." I felt like this was the first time someone accepted me, so it was like I was both myself and Kaito! It's hard to imagine Zox and Stacey teaming up to fight together (laughs). That's part was cool too, and I could see the passion these two have, so from No. 47 Kai! to Final Kai! it's really interesting!

"What was it like playing the role of Stacey, who was finally forgiven?"

Sekoguchi: Stacey wasn't thinking about anything in particular at that time, but he was able to become more honest, or rather, he regained his sense of identity. I had the scene with Yatsude-san before that, and based on that scene, he felt embarrassed, but I'm glad he was able to be honest with himself…..I played the role with that kind of nuance. He felt relieved when he saw Kaito, and couldn't help but laugh when Vroon said, "I'm also a former Tojitendo," and it was a moment where I could see the happiness of everyone fighting together.

Komagine: Then there's the final episode, where Kaito has to fight alone in the spirit world, but he realizes that he's not fighting alone, which gives him confidence. I think this also embodies the best part of Super Sentai, where they fight as a team, and the fact that it ends with rock paper scissors is typical of Zenkaiger (laughs). Since the ending seems like a continuation, I can also imagine how each of us will go on our own journeys and become happy, so I'm glad things didn't end with Sushi World! (laughs).

Sekoguchi: The real thrill of Super Sentai was felt towards the end. Each of them had their own problems and were born in different environments, but Stacey, for example, could achieve his goal of defeating Barashitara not alone, but with his friends and comrades. It made me think once again that Zenkaiger is a show filled with such qualities.

-Reflections on the days of our strange friendship-

"At first, where did you think the relationship between the two of them would end up?"

Sekoguchi: I was thinking of all kinds of possibilities, but I stopped thinking about them halfway through and just hoped that the story would progress well. And then God appeared! Whether they're defeated or become friends, each has its own merits.

Komagine: I truly thought that Stacey was going to be defeated. He helped Kaito when they were fighting Barashitara, and at the end, he fought with everyone else as Stacaesar, but they ended up fighting each other. It made it seem like he'd say," I wish I had joined you sooner…..please give my regards to Yatsude….." *whoosh* (disappears).

Sekoguchi: I predicted something like a good ending would happen for "the villain" (laughs).

"It's understood that you all sometimes predicted what was going to happen next."

Komagine: We all did it. I had suggested to the staff that Final Kai World should appear and that it ends with a bang, but they rejected it. "Today is the final episode of Zenkaiger, Final Kai!" and then it would abruptly end…..

Sekoguchi: Who would be satisfied with that?! (everyone laughs). Well, it definitely fits with Zenkaiger (laughs).

Komagine: But, after filming the final episode I thought, "I'm glad it didn't happen!"

"Has your impressions of each other changed up to this point?"

Sekoguchi: They've changed. At first, I heard that he was shy, but now I don't find that to be the case at all.

Komagine: Ryo-kun's appearance is very cute, so I imagined him to have a selfish personality. I thought he was aesthetically pleasing and very beautiful….However, his personality is that of an old mans! (laughs).

Sekoguchi: That's for sure (said straightforwardly).

Komagine: He's so carefree, that he'll even take his clothes off when eating! In a good way, I felt that he wasn't high class or too distant. So I felt that we didn't have to worry about things, and in that way, I felt close to him. It's completely different from my first impression of him when we first met, that's why Ryo-kun feels younger than me even though he's older than me, and I can talk to him freely.

"During filming, there was no particular reason for you not to speak to each other just because your roles were that of enemies."

Komagine: There were none at all (laughs). When the cameras are rolling, I think Zenkaiger is a show where everyone does whatever they want to do in an interesting way, so I usually interacted with Ryo-kun without thinking of him as an enemy or an ally.

"Moving away from the main story, we saw the third part of the Unmasked Warrior series at G Rosso. We thought the part during the play where Kaito encourages Stacey's competitive nature and dances, as well as the teasing relationship between the two of them was adorable."

Komagine: You won't see that in the main story (laughs).

Sekoguchi: Stacey was acting alittle different than usual, so it was difficult!

Komagine: Well, it had a nice feel to it, even if it deviated abit from the regular TV version.

"Was it difficult to perform on stage?"

Komagine: When Stacey says, "Next time we meet, we'll be enemies, so be prepared," and tries to leave, Kaito says, "Why don't we go home dancing?" and Stacey was like, "Why should I…?" But in that scene, they start dancing, and the line shows that Stacey took what Kaito said seriously and as a challenge. I was honestly just trying to say that we should dance (laughs). So when Stacey said, "Oh no!" I was like, "Eh? Eh?"

Sekoguchi: It was difficult to get the timing down for "Oh no!" It's because the lines were different every time.

"The third part is also available on DVD, so we hope everyone will take this opportunity to watch it again (laughs). Could you tell us about some highlights of the fourth part?"

Komagine: We're more involved in it than in the third part, and there's action scenes, so I feel like it's more Zenkaiger like. Some highlights include seeing the transformations of the 5 Zenkaigers, as well as the secret transformation of Flint. Also, Gaon, played by Tsuta (Tsutamune Masato-san), will also appear.

"Wouldn't it be better if it was already played by the actors themselves?"

Komagine: That's true. The person who had been playing Gaon up until then saw Tsuta-san during rehearsal and said, "Ah, the real guy…" and even though he's the same Suit Actor, I thought it was different. It's very reassuring to have Tsuta-san in the fourth part, and it's very easy to work with him. We'll be performing for a while, so I hope you'll enjoy watching it.

Sekoguchi: The overall atmosphere of the fourth part is "cute" (laughs).

Komagine: The relationships in the stage play change before and after the final episode, so I hope you'll enjoy that as well!

"How do you feel looking back at the relationship between the two of you?"

Sekoguchi: Rather than the bond between Kaito and Stacey being formed in the traditional Super Sentai style, they gradually became more aware of each other from a distance, and I thought it was wonderful that in the end, although we didn't express it in words, our hearts were firmly connected. I was thinking about this myself while playing Stacey, but I like the atmosphere that seems to exist between the lines of the story, which isn't captured on film, as their hearts move through the process of becoming friends.

Komagine: Looking back on Zenkaiger, I had alot of fun, and it was so fulfilling that I thought, "There's no better place to be on set than this, huh?" Ryo-kun joined us later, so I wonder if I could've supported him better since I was there from the beginning. But, I was really impressed by the way he played Stacey, to the point where he became a popular character. I'm glad that the actors I was able to work with this time were Acchan (Mashiko Atsuki), Hina-chan (Mori Hinami), and of course Ryo-kun. The popularity of Zenkaiger is largely due to Stacey, so I'm grateful for that as well! (laughs).

Sekoguchi: No, no, don't be ridiculous! It's all thanks to everyone's power in Zenkaiger that it's as popular as it is now!

Komagine: (laughs).

[actual-changeling]

The hypocrisy of completely dismissing Crowley's trauma from the Fall, indeed denying that he was traumatized in the first place, and at the same time infantilizing Aziraphale claiming he’s suffering so much because he likes tragedies and sad books and even believing that it was “an act of kindness” to say I forgive you to Crowley

The actual tragedy here is that it's not even a unique point of view to hold. Ableism is ingrained so fucking deeply in society, and that extends to trauma survivors.

There is the idea of a "good" survivor, the one that is soft and over apologetic, the one that people pleases and is easy to see as a victim, the kind that allows you to feel better about yourself by pitying them or being their friend. That's what people want—and Aziraphale largely fits that bill.

They look at him and see someone who is fawning and anxious, someone who does not outright goes against their abusers but plays along, someone you can look at and go "oh, but the way he is behaving is not his fault, he has trauma :(". I'm not exaggerating, I have seen this exact line of thinking over and over again, whether people are consciously doing it or not,

Meanwhile you have Crowley—who doesn't fit into that ideal. He is the "bad" survivor. The one that got angry, harsh, and built spiky walls to keep himself save. The one that never stopped surviving and keeps disobeying, keeps pushing, keeps questioning and doing things that make others look at him and go "oh but he is 'provoking' it, so it is his fault".

Once again, something I see in this fandom way too fucking often.

Both takes are incredibly ableist, one is infantilizing and robs Aziraphale of autonomy, the other is mean-spirited and fucked up. Crowley isn't a palpable survivor. Trauma did not make him soft, it made him angry, and society hates that.

Society wants us to forgive and forget—which is EXACTLY why people think Aziraphale and his forgiveness shtick is him being "kind".

People in this fandom refuse to examine their own bias and it fucking shows.

Trauma made me angry, it made me rough, it made me lonely and protective of myself, it made me untrusting and unforgiving and unapologetic for how I am keeping myself alive and safe. I cannot count how many times throughout my life I was blamed for the abuse I was tortured with. How many times people told me to forgive because it was my "family". That forgiveness is good and every survivor must forgive or they're doing it wrong.

Fuck that and fuck every single person that treats Crowley the way too many of us are treated ourselves.

[brainwormcity]

Crowley's behaviour in S01xE02 is that of an extremely conflicted demon. He had been in love with Aziraphale for a very long time and though he had never outright expressed it, he tended to wear it pretty openly on his sleeve when it was just the two of them. Then bam, everything starts going to hell in a handbasket, literally:

So he immediately meets up with Aziraphale and makes a plan to stop it and as soon as they plan to work together, Crowley starts to feel optimistic:

Then they spend the next eleven years trying to stop the apocalypse and for a little way they may start to think that it's all going to be okay but then they realize.

So then it's time to switch gears. Things are becoming more dire and he's starting to lose hope so when he and Aziraphale head to Tadfield, he's already switching into his most cantankerous version of himself, knowing that every moment he wasn't uniquely focused on preventing the apocalypse could be catastrophic. He tries to build up an emotional wall between him and Aziraphale and he fails almost right away. At the first sign of Aziraphale's classically trained puppy dog eyes, his resolve cracks.

After he's reminded of Aziraphale's loyalties to heaven, i.e. 'weight to a moral argument,' he tries to double down by giving the humans real guns, yet he still can't bring himself to lie when Aziraphale asks him if they're killing each other. And when Aziraphale points out Crowley's privately good heart, the demon thinks, "This is my chance. Gotta really sell it." So, he does this little number.

He bares his teeth and snarls about how very not nice he is while uncharacteristically behaving in what would typically be seen in a violent manner.

And it doesn't work. Aziraphale sees him growling and hissing and all he's aware of is their contact. He still looks at Crowley like he's kind... He's still looking at him like he might just smile if Crowley ever had the nerve to tell him that he means, not just the world, but also the universe to him.

He tries throughout the rest of the episode to maintain his facade of angst and indifference but after this, it's half-hearted at best. There's a subtle nod to it all right before Anathema hits the Bentley.

It's been suggested that demons are incapable of detecting love as a palpable emotion but it's the specific wording that denotes something deeper.

Why wouldn't it feel out of the ordinary if you were surrounded by love suddenly? Well, maybe if that's something that you experienced all the time in certain company.

Then comes the biggest revelation of them all! His hot and cold attitude, the shoving, the vehement denial of his kindness towards both Aziraphale and humans. It's all for a reason. This is the one folks.

His love, in his eyes, is dangerous to the cause. There's too much at stake and he's so emotionally volatile at the idea of never being able to, uninterrupted, be with this creature he loves that he's terrified to give into it for even a moment, lest that moment be just what Heaven and Hell need to take it all away from him for good. To take Aziraphale from him.

It doesn't work, in the end. In fact, at the end of the episode, Aziraphale actually is the one who manages to hold him at arm's length, and in both the book and the series, it's made obvious that the whole 'tickety-boo' interaction leaves him feeling very lonely. In the next episode, he bares it all anyway when he asks Aziraphale to run away from it all with him, the first of many times. He tried to pretend and push his Angel away but the real Crowley couldn't help but shine through.

[ghostthewriter09]

dead boy detectives

Yesterday I started watching Dead Boy Detectives. Yesterday, I finished watching Dead Boy Detectives. I have thoughts

First,

Edwin:

Gay (canon)

autistic (head cannon)

Demiromantic (hc)

When he was alive, he’d pray and pray that his thoughts about liking boys would go away. So when he went to hell, he felt like deserved it. But upon meeting Charles, he realized that his feelings couldn’t be all bad. He hides his feelings a lot just because he had 73 years of hiding them

Charles:

Bi (canon in books i think)

would’ve been a damn good lawyer

He is a protector. He doesn’t care who he needs to protect but if someone on his side is in danger, he will fight. We see this throughout the series. He’d do anything for the people he loves.

Crystal:

Bi or straight (def likes men)

has a strong sense of morals

absolute legend (Lilith scene)

I honestly think she’s just going to live on as her new self when she gets back to London

Niko

lesbian or aro spec (or both)

she is hands down my favorite non dead person in this show (sorry Jenny)

Her friendship with Edwin is precious. (We don’t talk about episode 8)

Ok so I should probably explain why I think she’s a lesbian. Ok first, her first meeting with Crystal. I know it wasn’t pink for love but yknow it’s something. Second, her room is really pink. She isn’t afraid of what others think and that’s a trait a lot of gay people have to learn. She is completely supportive of the community. Her gay manga. Her friendship with Edwin is so wlw mlm solidarity.

Bonus:

Cat King:

No label , just vibes

I like him but he took advantage of Edwin at first. I understand he gave him a choice but it wasn’t right to do.

however, I do love him and feel that he is lonely and at this point would go for any attractive guy

he’s afraid of himself still. He puts on the mask of confidence but really, he’s scared. He’s lived a long life and has never really gotten to be himself. No one has wanted him for him

[humanitys-strongest-bamf]

"get me a damned matcha" | Chapter 25: June III

{{ Chapter 24: May II | Epilogue }} Chapter Directory

I for real feel like I'm grieving! This was my first published and completed fic in a VERY VERY long time and, as frustrating as it was sometimes, I'm so glad that y'all took this journey with me 😭

✧ pairing ➼ levi ackerman x fem!reader, college x coffee shop x roommates!au ✧ summary ➼ After you find yourself plagued with misfortune due to struggles in your personal and family life, you find yourself needing to move last minute. As a junior in undergrad with little money and little social support, you considered yourself lucky when you found a sublease that was close to campus and was relatively cheap. Unfortunately, it seemed that your roommate did not seem to be so excited regarding your presence. ✧ content/warnings ➼ fluff, alcohol, reader finally coming to terms with herself ✧ word count ➼ ~5.2k

School was over, but it didn’t mean you were entirely free of responsibilities.

Paradis University hosted a graduate banquet every year, specifically to feature students that excelled academically or contributed to the community. 

You didn’t originally want to go. Your grades weren’t the best and you didn’t feel like being surrounded by your classmates that would no doubt boast about their near perfect GPA’s. However, you did start the Honors Society and it had taken off within the past few months, so you felt the need to attend since you participated in an important extracurricular. Sure, you could have just dipped out on it, but it could have been a chance to network if you decided to go down that route.

You couldn’t see it happening in the meantime. You just wanted to focus on your book, but if the opportunity arose to network, you told yourself that you’d take it.

You were dragging Levi to the banquet with you, which was met with surprisingly little resistance. The idea of spending the night wearing a formal outfit and being surrounded by people didn’t sound great to either of you, so you were more than surprised when Levi simply responded with a “sure” when you half-heartedly asked him if he’d be your emotional support throughout the night. 

You were currently trying to focus on just the next hour or two to keep your mind off the banquet. The tickets were paid for and the outfits were bought. Even if you really wanted to skip out on it, you had already spent time and money preparing, so to have that go to waste would feel just as bad as forcing yourself to go for the night.

Sighing, you looked down into your bag, double checking that you had picked up both sandwiches that you had ordered. You were dropping off lunch for Levi before planning to hang out in the cafe for the rest of his shift before heading home to get ready for the banquet. 

Your head shot up as you saw something orange moving out of the corner of your eye. It was small and barely drew your attention, but you looked off into the distance and your eyes fell on a nearby dumpster. You saw something shuffling around near the corner before disappearing under it.

Any intention for you to shrug and move on disappeared as soon as you heard a meow. 

Your eyes widened as you immediately set your bag down on a nearby bench and headed directly towards the dumpster, doing your best to ignore the subtle foul smell coming from the opening. You got onto your hands and knees and knelt down to peek underneath the dumpster, a small gasp coming from your lips when you saw a lone kitten squatting in front of you. The kitten was thin, but didn’t look like it was starving. They were definitely dirty and you could already imagine Levi’s face if he was the one staring at the kitten. Some of its fur was matted and the dirt covered what you assumed would have otherwise been a vibrant orange coat.

It didn’t seem actively afraid of you, so you reached out your hand towards it without fully extending your arm, to offer that you were friendly but to not be too intrusive or scare them off. It made eye contact with you before gradually approaching you, tentatively watching you before deciding that you were a nice human and immediately crawled onto your lap.

Clearly more smitten with the kitten than you were disgusted by the amount of dirt and grime on its coat, you picked them up and brought them over to the bench, suddenly remembering your tuna sandwich. You carefully unwrapped the sandwich as the kitten watched you curiously, smelling the tuna as soon as you exposed the sandwich from its wrapping.

You scooped up some of the tuna with your pinky and extended your hand out to it again and it took all of your willpower to hold back the massive smile building on your face as you watched it happily lick at your finger. All that willpower was immediately thrown out the metaphorical window as soon as you heard it begin to purr.

You felt your heart ache as you stared at it, noticing that it wasn’t wearing a collar. You kept telling yourself that no matter what, you were not going to take it home with you, despite already being unable to part from it. You already knew that Levi was going to question why it took you so long to pick up the sandwiches, yet you couldn’t get yourself to get up and walk away.

You weren’t going to take the cat. You didn’t have the capacity to adopt it. You told yourself you wouldn’t do it.

~~~~~

You ended up taking the cat. 

Your hands were full with your bag and the sandwiches, so you settled for placing the kitten in the hood of your jacket. Although he seemed to shuffle around a bit, your hood was large and sturdy enough that there wasn’t a risk of him falling out, even if he was wiggling around.

Once you finally arrived at the cafe, you let out an internal sigh of relief once you saw that there weren’t a lot of people inside. You opened the door to the cafe with your foot since your hands were occupied, making eye contact with your grumpy barista-turned-roommate-turned-boyfriend. 

Levi was in the middle of making you your Matcha before looking up and seeing you slowly make your way inside, noticing that you seemed a bit more disheveled compared to usual. That, plus the fact that it took you as long as it did for you to pick up sandwiches from a deli shop two blocks away made him immediately suspect that something was up.

“You get lost again?”

It took you a second to respond and Levi could immediately tell that your attention was directed elsewhere.

“What?”

“Really took you 30 minutes to walk down the street?” he asked with a raised eyebrow.

“Yep,” you immediately responded, somewhat avoiding eye contact with him. You were stiff and moving slowly, as if you were afraid of knocking something over. 

The more he looked at you, the more suspicious Levi became over what the hell had happened on your little field trip to the deli shop. He watched as you reached into your bag and handed him a sandwich. 

He eyed you skeptically as he took the sandwich from you, immediately grimacing upon opening it and smelling the tuna coming from within the loose wrapping.

“I didn’t order tuna,” he commented with a disgusted expression.

“You’re so extra,” you sighed as you rolled your eyes at him, swapping out the sandwich you grabbed for yourself after realizing that you accidentally gave him yours.

Levi grabbed the correct sandwich but then looked up as soon as he began to unwrap it. He had heard a certain noise coming from the back of your hood. Raising an eyebrow, he gave you a skeptical look and noticed that you were purposefully avoiding eye contact with him. If he didn’t know you better, he would’ve assumed that you were just focusing on eating your sandwich, but he knew that was bullshit.

“Did I just hear meowing?”

He saw you pause for a split second, making it glaringly obvious that you were hiding something.

“I don’t know, did you?” you asked innocently while still avoiding eye contact.

You couldn’t see it, but you could essentially feel the glare that Levi was shooting in your direction.

A meow came from the back of your hood again. It must have been the tuna.

Levi’s unamused expression turned into a full frown as you continued to awkwardly look away.

“Show me your hood,” he demanded in a stern tone of voice.

“What?” you asked, looking up at him, trying your best to maintain a neutral expression. “Why?”

His gaze was unwavering, and his expression was unchanging. You could tell that he wasn’t going to back down from his request.

After a few seconds of desperately trying to maintain your mask, you sighed and pulled your hood to the side and grabbed the kitten from within, having it rest on one arm while you used your other hand to poke at your sandwich, offering more tuna to your new furry friend.

“Really?” Levi asked with an exasperated sigh.

“What?” you responded defensively. “I found him underneath the dumpster. I think he’s orphaned.”

You looked up towards Levi and saw an expected look of disgust appear on his face as soon as you mentioned the dumpster. His eyes fell from you down to the cat, noting that its fur looked a little matted, but otherwise didn’t look completely filthy. He watched as it happily licked the tuna off your finger, noticing that it was purring.

“Please don’t say you’re taking it home.”

“Where else am I supposed to put him? Back near the dumpster?” you responded nonchalantly, indicating that you had already made up your mind about adopting the dumpster kitty. “Look how much he loves the tuna.”

Levi had moved on from glaring incessantly at you to having an intense staring contest with the cat, adamant about not allowing it to come home with you. It got harder and harder to keep that frown on his face once he saw you smiling endearingly at the cat.

“Fine ,” he grumbled with a groan, rolling his eyes as he brought his attention back to making your Matcha, “but you’re feeding him something other than tuna from a cheap deli shop.”

You tried to hide the shit-eating grin that was beginning to appear on your face as you finally heard Levi give in to your somewhat impulsive decision to adopt a cat. Seeing that the cat was no longer sniffing at your sandwich, you scooped him up out of your arm and back into your hood.

“He’s going to get our clothes for the banquet all furry,” Levi mentioned as he looked back over at you.

“Well, I guess we’ll buy a lint roller on the way home,” you rationalized, earning a quiet grunt to come from Levi’s lips.

You rolled your eyes.

“Full of problems today, aren’t you?” you grumbled. “Just get me the damned Matcha.”

He looked back up at you with a frown as he hesitated in sliding your Matcha over to you.

You stuck your tongue out at him as you reached for the beverage, your eyes widening once he moved it away from you so you couldn’t reach.

“Only if you quit being a little shit.”

You glared at him and reached across the counter, dodging his efforts to shoo your hand away, smirking once you finally wrestled the cup away from him, although he wasn’t trying very hard to keep it out of your grasp in the first place.

“You’re so annoying,” he scolded.

“And you’re a dick,” you retorted.

“You’re distracting me.”

“And you’re choosing to get distracted.”

He rolled his eyes at your response, but you saw the slightest hint of the corner of his lips tugging up as well as the presence of an amused look in his eyes. He was enjoying your banter, despite his multiple claims regarding how annoying you were being to him at this moment.

Levi eventually walked away to tend to his station since he was still on a shift, but it was next to impossible for him to take his eyes off you for the rest of the shift. You were doing nothing other than sitting at your usual seat as you made your way through your sandwich, occasionally throwing a comment back to your new fur child when you heard him calling from behind you, musing over potential names for him.

“Mr. Whiskers? No? Don’t like that?” you proposed, gauging the cat’s reaction as you muttered off a list of potential names. “What about…Mashed Potato? I think you can look like a scoop of mashed potatoes. Don’t like that either? If you ask Levi, he’d probably just constantly call you a little shit, would you prefer that?”

Levi snorted to himself as he watched the ridiculousness that was the conversation you were having with the small furry creature that was meowing at you in response.

“Marmalade?” you asked, your eyes lighting up when you weren’t met with a meow of protest. “Nice to meet you, Marmalade.”

Levi watched closely as you introduced yourself, saying your name and some random facts about yourself, before pointing at Levi and introducing him as the one Marmalade will have to answer to if he leaves too much fur on the furniture. 

You looked up, making eye contact with Levi again, realizing that he was listening in on your conversation. 

“Levi might still refer to you as a little shit regardless, so I guess we’ll have that as your backup name.”

~~~~~

You were in a rush to the banquet. You had stopped at a pet store on the way home, buying a comfortable kennel, a litter box, a food and water bowl, and some kibble and canned food, although Levi was mumbling about being unsure if the kibble was good enough for Marmalade, clearly indicating that he was going to take this cat dad thing seriously. After taking Marmalade home, giving him a quick bath so that he wasn’t tracking dirt all over the apartment, and setting everything up for him, you were more than pressed for time.

“Told you he was going to get fur all over our clothes,” Levi grumbled from the driver’s seat as you picked off some stray strands of fur that the lint roller had failed to catch.

The drive to the banquet was relatively quiet, likely due to your nerves regarding having to be around that many people, but Levi’s brows furrowed together as he heard you incessantly squirming around in your seat. His eyes flashed over towards you and he saw that you were fumbling around with a waist-clincher that you were wearing underneath your dress. It looked more than uncomfortable and you kept on adjusting it in an attempt to make it more bearable to wear. 

“Tch, just take that damn thing off,” he scolded. “You look fine.”

You paused, holding still without further adjusting it or taking it off, hesitant to fully remove it. You haven’t ever worn a formal dress without it, although you knew that it was due to lingering traces of that facade you had spent the past few months trying to unravel.

Realizing that it wasn’t worth the discomfort, you unbuckled the back of the waist-clincher and tossed it into the backseat, immediately feeling better and like you could finally breathe after taking it off.

Levi was right. It was unnecessary and barely made a difference. Even if it did, you realized that you really didn’t care anymore.

The amount of students that showed up to the banquet wasn’t terrible, but given the fact that most of them brought someone with them, you began to feel cramped fast. Most of the students walked in with their parents, with some that were like you, bringing their significant other instead. 

The general expectation was to bring family and Levi was the closest person that you could realistically call family. You had cut your aunt off and had no intention of reconciling with her. You vaguely recalled a phone call two weeks ago from your aunt to chat about ‘future plans’. The question itself was innocent enough, but then she started going on about how writing isn’t an ‘actual job’ and you finally decided you had enough. You remembered snapping at her about how it was none of her business and then hung up. You haven’t responded to her since.

By the time you sat down at the table after finally locating your placecard, you were already beginning to feel overwhelmed from the amount of people cramped into a small conference room. 

“This was a mistake,” you grumbled.

“Was it?”

Levi took a seat next to you and adjusted the tie that he had neatly put together about an hour prior when you were in a rush to leave. You watched him closely, paying particular attention to how his dress shirt seemed to fit his shape perfectly, with the color of the tie further accentuating his eyes. His fingers neatly dug into the collar of his shirt to adjust his tie, and you found your mind immediately wandering elsewhere as you became fixated on the dexterity of his fingers.

Feeling your cheeks heat up, you immediately ripped your eyes off him and shook your head a bit, sipping on the glass of water in front of you to keep yourself from feeling a certain way that would have made getting through this night even more difficult than it was already going to be.

“Oh, you came.”

You looked up as you saw Petra’s somewhat skeptical expression. Her tone of voice indicated that she legitimately did not think you were going to show up despite the fact that you turned in your RSVP and had a table card.

“Did you expect me not to?” you asked with a frown.

She shrugged as she sat down, hanging her purse off the back of the seat as she got settled. 

“You just sounded pretty disinterested when we were chatting about it. That’s all.”

You took a second to recall that conversation that you vaguely remembered. It was a few weeks ago, roughly around the time that you had spent on figuring out how to move forward with properly grieving your parents’ death. This banquet was the last thing on your mind.

“Was distracted,” you eventually remarked. “Sorry.”

Your eyes shot up as you watched some other students sit down at the table with their family members. With everyone taking a seat, the crowd seemed a little less chaotic, so that was a plus, but you’d be expected to maintain one-on-one conversations now, which seemed just as draining.

“Honestly, I probably would have run it differently.”

“Hmm?” you said as you looked towards Petra, her comment pulling you out of your thoughts about how dreadful these next few hours were going to be. You knew she was referring to the Honors Society, since that’s what you were specifically invited to this banquet for. You already knew that she was going to say one of her comments that were genuine and did not come from a place of malignant intent, but always seemed to rub you off wrong.

She began giving examples of some things she would have done differently had she been the one that started it and you felt yourself getting increasingly irritated the more she spoke.

“Like any financial issues could’ve been mitigated through having member dues-”

“Should’ve run it yourself then,” you finally snapped as you scowled at Petra, whose eyes widened at your sudden remark.

You didn’t even notice the upturn of Levi’s lips that appeared as soon as you snapped, no doubt proud that you were finally standing up for yourself. You stood up, grumbling under your breath about how you were going to need a drink if you were going to have to deal with this type of thing all night, and headed straight for the bar.

It was the subpar university catering service, so you were less than impressed with their cocktail options, electing for the first fruity one that you saw. It tasted more like watered down juice than anything else.

You took a sip through the straw, looking over to the side as you saw Levi take a seat next to you.

“She send you to talk me down?” you asked dryly.

“No,” Levi said as he motioned for the bartender to get him a glass of whiskey. “Was too surprised to say much of anything.”

You kept your gaze fixated on your drink, watching the ice spin around as you stirred the liquid with your straw. You had known about how much your friendships were lacking for quite some time now, but you really did question why you kept all your friendships at surface-level. You legitimately couldn’t think of a reason as to why, other than maybe falling under the influence of your shitty ex-boyfriend.

Clenching your jaw, you let out a frustrated breath. You were going to resolve to do better and set boundaries when needed, instead of being the person that tedious tasks got thrown on to. You were going to be seen as a person and not as a means to an end.

You knew it was going to take a while. This part of you had been deeply engrained into you ever since high school. You’d have to fight back against any instincts you’ve developed since then, and then unweave all of the relationships that you had made based on this facade.

It was going to be hard and take a long time, but you knew that it was what you needed to do to continue moving forward. 

You had to find out who you really were and how that ultimately changed the relationships around you, taking apart each superficial thread one by one until people began seeing you for who you really were.

~~~~~

Even after you gathered yourself and conversed your way through the dinner and beginning speeches, you got quickly drained again and found yourself back at the bar. You were more than annoyed, with the crowd being a bit more scattered as people began to socialize amongst each other. 

You noted that Petra was chatting with the dean, likely doing some sort of elevator pitch to get into medical school, and that Oluo was chatting with Shadis, likely to ask about Shadis’ graduate program. This was essentially what all of the students present were doing: networking.

Now that you were here, you realized that you couldn’t really care for networking. You had no plans. You had no elevator pitch to give, and you were over pretending to be someone you weren’t.

You quietly groaned to yourself as you sipped on your cocktail, having ordered another one from the menu in hopes that it was better than the first one. It wasn’t. You grimaced upon tasting the liquid. It was too bitter and the ratio of alcohol to mixer was off. You’ve had better drinks at fraternity parties than whatever it was that the university catering service decided to deem as quality alcohol.

“Wanna get some air?” 

You looked over as you saw Levi approaching you again after he went off to converse with Erwin, who was there to recruit more potential students for his lab. The extra personnel was much needed. Your eyes immediately lit up once you heard the offer.

“Please ,” you responded, although it sounded almost like begging, indicating how desperate you were to get out of that stuffy and noisy room. 

Levi led you through the crowd and out one of the side doors that led to a balcony overlooking the downtown area. He shut the doors behind you to dampen some of the noise from within before leaning on the balcony railing next to you. It was much quieter outside. There were a few stragglers, but most of the guests had either gone home or were inside socializing. As far as you were concerned, it was only the two of you here, enjoying the cool night breeze and the beauty of the downtown lights below you, the street lamps illuminating up the street in a way that made you almost want to leave the building entirely just to walk underneath those lights.

You sipped on your drink again—likely just out of instinct since you still held the drink in your hand—and immediately grimaced again, being rudely reminded of how shitty it tasted.

Levi grabbed the glass by the rims and placed another drink in front of you. While yours was clear and flat with an orange slice inside it, the one he just handed you was bubbling from the carbonation and had a pretty mix of red and orange colors leading to the bottom of the glass. 

You took a sip, not being all that surprised when it tasted much better than the one you previously had. Whatever he ordered tasted more fruity than it did alcohol, while still providing that slight kick. Realizing that he likely customized the drink instead of directly ordering something from the menu, you eyed him as you sipped on the thin straw.

He knew your flavor profile. It wasn’t that surprising to you. After all, he had been making you your drinks for two years while also living with you. The drinks that he made were clearly very different from the ones served from behind a traditional bar, but he knew your likes and dislikes enough to craft you a cocktail you’d actually enjoy.

Levi sipped on your old drink, underestimating how bad it actually was, immediately scrunching up his nose in disgust upon tasting it.

“Really?” he questioned as he shot you a skeptical look.

“It’s what they had on the menu,” you said quietly, your cheeks slightly heating up in embarrassment.

“And by ‘they’, you mean the shitty university catering.”

It was the graduate department that was hosting the event, so their catering events included alcohol, but it was still university catering, which usually resulted in their menus being written from a more economic standpoint instead of one designed to provide the guests with satisfactory food and drinks.

You shrugged in acknowledgement, having accepted that you probably should have just tried to mix something up yourself. Still, the fact that Levi went out of his way to get you a drink you’d like brought a small smile to your face. 

You swirled the drink with the small straw for a while before sipping at it again, looking over towards Levi afterwards. He had turned around to set your old drink down onto the mini-table behind you, and was now headed back towards you. 

As he turned to face you, you couldn’t help but notice how his hair moved about in the wind, revealing his undercut, or how his dress shirt had the two top buttons undone, showing off his collarbones. He elected to also undo his tie and have it hang around his neck. His suit jacket was off due to how warm it was inside, and he had his sleeves rolled up to his elbows. Your eyes drifted down to his hands and you felt your mind wandering off towards your memories of how his hands felt on you, recalling some of the more intimate things he’s done with them to you.

You found yourself staring straight at him as your face rapidly heated up again as you desperately tried to pull your mind out of the gutter.

“What?” he asked, noticing the fact that you were just staring at him, ripping you out of your daze.

“Hmm?” you responded as you slightly shook your head to reorient yourself. “Nothing, just…”

You trailed off as you awkwardly shuffled from side to side, scratching at the back of your head.

“Just what?”

You took a moment to look directly into his eyes, noticing that they had softened in the past few minutes that he was standing outside with you. Part of you didn’t believe that this was the same person that pissed you off so much two years ago, but you were able to acknowledge that pretty soon after you moved in, he was there for you in a way that you desperately needed, but could never get prior to him.

“Just…thinking about how making me hate you was probably the best thing you could have done for me.”

That was not the answer that Levi was expecting, as evidenced in the way that he blinked at you as his eyebrows furrowed in confusion.

“What?” he asked, bewildered at your response.

You looked down at your drink again as you tried to gather your thoughts into something that would make sense.

“...I remember how pissed I was those first few weeks of living with you,” you began, your voice gradually rising from a quiet whisper as you continued to speak. “Kept on questioning how I was going to survive even another week with you…but I think that it’s because I hated you so much that I was able to be myself around you.”

A gentle breeze blew through the both of you, as if it was trying to carry your words directly to him.

“...because I hated you so much, I was able to form something…real with you.”

His eyes softened again as he looked into your eyes, shifting his stance so that he was facing you more.

“Well, you were pretty easy to hate,” he mumbled nonchalantly, immediately earning himself a gentle shove from you in retaliation, the edges of his lips pulling up into a subtle smirk.

“I’m serious,” he continued after readjusting his positioning after you rudely forced him to move. “I remember dreading coming home because I knew your annoying ass was going to be waiting for me.”

“And I remember grimacing every time I heard the door open because I knew I had to see your cocky face again.”

He scoffed and flicked at your forehead in response to your comment and you swatted his hand away, rubbing at your forehead afterwards as you pouted at him.

You felt your face heating up again once you saw the affectionate look in his eyes as he watched you.

“...just strange…”

“What is?” he asked, slightly tilting his head, never taking his gaze off you.

“...that within the span of two years,” you spoke quietly, “I went from hating you…to loving you.”

You felt your breath get caught in your throat as you realized what exactly you had just said and admitted to—that you loved him. You felt your heart beating through your chest as your entire body heated up in embarrassment—but there was also truth to the sentiment. You really did love him. He had been there for you in ways that no one ever had been before. He pulled you out of the shitshow that you found yourself drowning in and helped push you forward, even if he was being a bit of a dick at times.

You thought back to how sneakily he had snuck up on you, and how devastated you were when you thought you had lost him. Even through all the fighting you had at the beginning and how difficult he was as you tried to sort through your feelings, you’d be willing to go through them every single time if the result was you standing here next to him in this moment.

“...love you too, brat,” he whispered, gently running his fingers down the side of your face, before pulling you into a gentle kiss.

You pressed your lips up against his, smiling into the kiss as you ran your fingers through his undercut, stepping closer to him.

Once you finally pulled away, you looked directly into his eyes, the two of you now being close enough that your lips were just inches apart.

Nothing else mattered to you right now except for him. Being able to hate him, meet him, and fall in love with him made going through undergrad worth it, even if it didn’t feel like it at first. You’d do it over and over again if it led to this conclusion.

You parted your lips to speak, your voice barely audible as you whispered to him.

“Thank you for being my found family.”

#: @levisbrat25 @gothgril69 @sckerman @berrijam @notgoodforlife @meowjaa @averysmolbear @roseofdarknessblog @bejewelledd @hhighkey @ayame236 @sad-darksoul @velouria17 @kamyru @l1zk4 @layenacreates @lamees004 @whoami-72 @highgoon69 @chaotic-on-main @levishotgf @nube55 @chosos-mascara @heichoucleanfreak @svftackerman @v4mp-wife @moonchild-angel @astri-ackerman @auriuswolve @noctemys @you-always-made-me-blush @raginginferno267 @sugurusdiscordmoderator @jennamelinda12 @noodlejitsu @nalu-trashytrash @creigh-h @gina239

[tychodorian]

Character Introduction: Darius – The King Without a Crown in King of Dust

Here he is! Darius! The main character! A man burdened by the weight of duty, loss, and personal conflict, he sits at the heart of the story as a figure who both drives and resists the forces shaping his world. So, who is Darius?

At first glance, Darius seems like a character who has it all together. After all, he’s a respected leader, someone whose influence and tactical brilliance have made him indispensable in the war-torn world of Starkovia. He's even a powerful vampire! But scratch beneath the surface, and you’ll find a man quietly crumbling under the weight of his responsibilities and the ghosts of his past.

Darius has spent two decades in a deeply committed relationship with Yra, his last boyfriend. But, as the story unfolds, it becomes clear that not all relationships are meant to last forever, even those that seem unbreakable. Before that, Darius suffered through three awful ex-wives, and before that... the love of his life fell to her death.

The 20-year relationship between Darius and Yra begins to fracture as the novel opens, and it’s not an easy breakup for either of them. They’ve shared an adult lifetime together, and their identities are intertwined in ways that make their separation feel like a tearing of flesh, a wound that may never fully heal. And yet, it’s this very breaking point that allows Darius to begin to question who he is and what he truly wants.

Enter Astrid. She's lost, lonely, and most of all nice. Where Yra was a partner who brought out the monster in him (in a good and bad way), Astrid becomes something else entirely—someone who sparks a sense of desire and vulnerability in Darius that he’s long kept buried. His growing feelings for her are complicated, messy, and far from straightforward. He struggles with guilt over the dissolution of his relationship with Yra, and now, these unbidden feelings for Astrid surface at the worst possible time.

It’s not just a love triangle. Darius’ arc is about more than the relationships he has with Yra and Astrid—it’s about his relationship with himself. He’s constantly wrestling with the man he wants to be and the man he is. He’s torn between duty and desire, between the mask he wears for the world and the person he feels he’s becoming beneath it all.

In many ways, Darius embodies the theme of identity that runs throughout King of Dust. He is a man who has been shaped by war, by duty, and by love, but he’s also a man struggling to reconcile all of those pieces into a cohesive whole. His decisions ripple throughout the story, affecting the fates of other characters and the world around him.

At the core of it all, Darius is a king without a crown—a man caught between the remnants of his past and the possibilities of his future, unsure if he’ll ever be whole again. And that, perhaps, is what makes him so compelling. Darius’ journey is not just about saving Starkovia—it’s about saving himself.

You can read all about him in my new book King of Dust! The preorder link is in my pinned post.

[michelle-is-writing]

Baking, Ben Hardy

Word Count: 1.9k~

Baking has always been a fun pastime for me, whether something sweet was needed for an event or it was a spur-of-the-moment decision. When I was seven years old, my grandmother brought me into the kitchen one early morning and made me help her fix breakfast, causing me to fall in love with baking at such a young age. From then on, I began cooking and baking whenever I could, getting better with each year I grew older.

Thankfully, this valuable trait lasted me throughout my time as a teenager and into my young adult years. When I moved into my first-ever apartment, I was the only person living there, and cooking for myself and eating by myself every day became a bit lonely. The two activities became a bore for me until I baked cookies one day and brought them to my neighbor, whom I had never gotten to meet. The recipe for the cookies was from an old cookbook from the fifties that my grandmother gave me when I left home. Out of the things left by her in her passing, that was the most important to me as it led me to one of my lifelong passions.

I would soon find out that the recipe book would lead me to more than just a hobby, as those cookies would give me the chance to meet my neighbor and ultimately fall in love with him as well. Ben was the nicest guy when I met him, and when he came back with the empty Tupperware container the cookies were once held in only a day later, I knew he was a keeper.

We soon began dating, and nearly twice a week, I found myself baking anything he asked for while he talked to me or practiced his lines for movies he was staring in. It was almost as if we lived with each other as Ben and I were constantly sharing my bed, and most of his stuff was left at my apartment. I even began doing his laundry for him (which he was eternally grateful for).

Only a year passed of us sharing sweet and unforgettable moments before we were engaged, and soon enough, married. Of course, with the marriage, we both decided we'd need a place with more space, leading us to move from our small apartments and into a much bigger house with a gigantic kitchen. Ben said it was just a coincidence, but I saw those gears moving in Ben's head, and I wasn't mad at all.

Looking over at the sleeping blond man lying beside me, I can't help but think about the time Ben and I met. Just thinking about how he practically gushed over how good the cookies were (while stuttering) makes me want to go bake some for him now. However, I don't feel like rolling dough out, and instead, I'd rather make something I can just combine the ingredients and pour it into a pan. Are brownies okay at eight in the morning? Yes?

Gently sliding out of Ben's grasp and onto my feet, I take a glance at the calendar hanging over our bedroom desk, only to feel the date put a damper on my happy mood. It's a typical day for many other people in the world, but to me, this day is a reminder that the person whom I loved and looked up to as a child passed away. It's been a few years since my grandmother's death, but the anniversary still hits me as hard as the day it happened.

Although, I know that my grandmother wouldn't want me to be upset over her death, and instead, do something that made me smile. Baking was always something we did with each other, and since that makes me happy, I know she would want me to do so.

Heading into the kitchen, I pull my favorite cookbook off the shelf above the counter and flip it open to the recipe for the brownies my grandma used to make. I've made them many times before, and I remember the ingredients and instructions to a T, but I don't want to mess anything up and be left with flat or horrible-tasting brownies.

Combining the dry ingredients with the liquid ones, I push the stationary mixer down and let it mix the ingredients together while I stand at the counter, watching the dark brown brownie mix form before my eyes. As I do so, I barely hear the soft thuds of Ben's footsteps before his warm arms wrap around me from behind. His sudden touch surprises me, causing me to jolt with a small laugh as I immediately realize it's just him.

"You scared me," I state, turning in his hold to face him. His hair is going in every direction while his eyes are still clouded with sleep. This doesn't affect the smile on his face, nor does it change the firmness of his hold on me. He always looks adorable when he's just woken up, and this morning is no different.

"You scared me when you weren't in bed," Ben tells me, his voice showing that he's still partly asleep. Leaning down, he kisses my forehead before moving to my lips, where he stays there longer. Kissing back, I slide my arms around his neck and pull him close, only making him hold onto me tighter.

Pulling back with a giggle, I smile up at Ben with a sigh as he looks at the mixer behind me, a slight smirk appearing on his lips. "It's early in the morning," He points out, his fingers tapping against my waist. "And you're making... chocolate cake?"

With a small laugh, I turn back around in his arms and turn the mixer off. "Brownies, actually," I tell him, feeling Ben's fingers move from my waist and onto my stomach. "They're ones that my grandma and I used to make with each other," With that, I feel tears begin to form in my eyes, but I blink them away. However, Ben somehow notices this and nuzzles his head into my neck, his cold nose causing me to slightly shiver.

"I know you miss her," Ben murmurs, gently kissing the skin on my neck. "Why don't you tell me about her?" He suggests, making me smile once again. That's not a bad idea.

"Well, for starters, she wouldn't want you kissing my neck like this," I begin, making Ben laugh before he pulls his face away and places his chin on top of my head. "And secondly, you already know that she's the reason I know how to bake in the first place."

"But, what else did she do?" He asks, releasing his arms from my waist as he moves to lean against the counter beside me. The sight of him shirtless and leaning back on his arms makes me want to jump him, but for the sake of the moment, I can hold back.

"She did a lot," I tell him, walking to the cabinet to take a glass pan from the shelf. "God, I wish you could've met her - she would have loved you," I note, walking back to the counter with the pan. Placing it on the marble countertop, I sigh and look over at my husband, watching as he dreamily gazes at me with his green eyes. "I wish you could've been there when she could still bake."

"I don't think she baked better than you, love," He sucks up to me, making me snort. He knows better.

"Who do you think taught me?" I ask him with a grin. "Everything I know is because of her," I tell him, turning my body toward him. Leaning my hip against the counter, I cross my arms as happy memories come to mind. "I can remember making sugar cookies on Christmas Eve with her, and she taught me the importance of being creative with anything I made,"

Pausing, I start telling another memory. "There was one time when my aunts and uncles were coming down for a visit, and despite being weak from her age, she still put everything together and tried making a bunch of things," Slowly, the smile on my face begins to drop, remembering her frail state toward the end. Ben notices this but doesn't say anything, waiting for me to continue on.

"I had to finish everything for her, of course, and I didn't mind a single bit," I clarify. "The best part of it all was that she got to tell me stories from her childhood while I did so. She told me about the Great Depression and what it was like to bake during that time," Shaking my head, I smile once again before turning to the bowl of brownie batter and pouring it into the nonstick pan, scraping it with the red silicone spatula to get the excess in as well.

"She even told me about the time she baked a wedding cake for a friend whose mother wanted to bake it, but in all honesty, she couldn't bake for her life," Both Ben and I share a laugh before I continue on, placing the messy bowl back on the counter. "Plus, anytime she baked, and no matter how old I got, she always let me lick the spoon and bowl. I guess it was a southern thing or maybe just a grandmother thing,"

With a happy sigh, I look back to Ben to find him still listening to me, an interested smile marked on his lips. "Now, when I think about it, I can't help but become giddy when I think about kids, our kids," I correct myself, watching the sweet smile on his face grow. "Doing the same thing I did when I was young and licking the bowl like my grandmother would let me."

Turning my attention back to the glass pan full of brownie batter, I place the spatula in the bowl with the bottom and sides still partially covered with the batter. Just before I begin to clean up, I see Ben move in my peripherals, his naked chest and sweatpants-covered legs disappearing as he stands behind me once more, wrapping his left arm around me like he previously did as he reaches over me with his other arm to run his fingers in the dirty mixing bowl.

Turning my head toward him, I watch as Ben lifts his now brownie batter-covered fingers to his lips and licks the dark brown mix while maintaining eye contact with me, causing me to blush. He then leans forward and kisses me, remnants of the sweet mixture still lingering on his lips until he pulls away. "Until we have kids," He states, his smile now a smirk as his hand on my waist tightens. "I guess I'll just have to do."

"Love, if you don't stop licking your fingers like that, we will be having a kid very soon!" I joke, earning an almost playful, animalistic growl from Ben. The sound emitted from him causes me to burst with laughter just as Ben picks me up and tosses me over his shoulder, walking back to our bedroom as the uncooked brownies remain on the stovetop.

Probably, somewhere up in heaven, my grandmother is laughing at the sight of Ben and me, happy that her baker of a granddaughter found someone who loves her with all of his heart... and stomach.

[eldritch-spouse]

I have no idea how I stumbled upon ur content, but I’m so glad I did! What would it be like being in an arrange marriage with Adrul?

(Also, Adrul and Adelo’s relationship sort of reminds me of Aemond and Aegon from House of the Dragon. And I’m definitely an Aemond/Adrul kinda gal!)

[Hhhh, I'm sorry, I don't watch that show. But hey, glad you're having fun.]

An arranged marriage... Is not that likely to happen. Maybe Belo would advocate for it, as angels trusted their highers to set them up with compatible mates for procreation. Krulu would be too picky to ever settle on someone for his children, but let's say that both him and Belo did find a human that looked adequate enough to perhaps pair with their son, and Admin agreed to start a test.

Adrul is extremely conflicted about all of this. If there's one thing the demigod can't stand, it's not getting warned about things. Adrul doesn't like getting caught off-guard, not having enough time to prepare for anything stresses him out, and he's inwardly screeching when you're offered to him by his parents like some sort of reward. Immediately, he's overthinking it. Did he meet you somewhere? It can't be, his memory wouldn't fail him like that, you're a total stranger to him. Do his parents think he's inadequate at courtship? That he needs help? That he's frustrated? It's so very odd to him, the King of Perdition can't help feeling inadequate. Adrul takes you home because he's frankly too embarrassed to reject the offer... And, well, if his parents put that much thought into it, if they deem you acceptable, then you must be something special, right?;

The first few days are marked by a lot of awkward, overly formal interactions. Adrul isn't sure how to address you, so he focuses on what he thinks is imperative, providing minimally comfortable housing for you in Hell. You have more contact with a myriad of servants than you do with your supposed, would-be betrothed. Sometimes, it feels as if the King is directly avoiding you, like he's afraid of you, which is all too silly, considering it's essentially the same as an elephant running from a mouse. He can't avoid you forever though;

The times you meet the most are during meals. Adrul is perfectly content to stay quiet throughout these events, actually not minding the gentle company of another soul. He's not a talkative monster, and he doesn't trust himself to not say something that completely kills the mood, so he opts to stay quiet and mull on his tasks for the rest of the day. He asks for your favorite types of dishes, and settles for that. You might have to be the one to break the suffocating silence, which is a scary thing to do, admittedly. The King almost sighs in relief when you do, having at least some form of a lifeline tossed out to him. Although he's cultured, Adrul would prefer to hear about yourself and your opinions on a wide variety of topics before he chimes in, so it'll be even more relieving if you're naturally the talkative type. It's through these oftentimes curt but still enjoyable conversations that Adrul starts taking a real liking to you, how different you are, how sweet, how pleasing your voice is... He really was starting to get lonely;

Eventually, after a lot of plotting various possibilities, and bracing himself for rejection, he'll get the nerve to personally escort you out of your room and bring you out for strolls, perhaps take you to the more interesting parts of Perdition, tell you about its peculiarities. You'll start getting your first gifts then, dainty but decidedly elegant jewelry, books about whatever topics the two of you talked about prior, flowers even. Frail things not many here care for. Although Adrul would like to hold you, feel the warmth of your skin, kiss you even- He struggles with displaying affection through words and touch, so he hopes that you can catch on from his actions. There's a level of desperate vulnerability in his four eyes when he gifts you a massive garden. I love you, it screams, I love you so much;

By that time, he's already declared to his parents that he accepts you as a mate. If you were to reject Adrul now, the ruler of Hell might just do something rash. After all, who are you to crush his heart the one time he's foolish enough to open up?

[brighteststar707]

Telepathy

I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about V and Jumin’s friendship in the context of Seven’s route and the Secret Endings. I really enjoyed writing this and I’m excited to finally share it.

✦ Words:  2.19k

✦ Genre: angst

✦  Warnings: alcohol, death, vague mention of drug use

Throughout Jumin and Jihyun’s friendship, they always shared a mutual fascination for magic. Their young childhood was spent discussing the supernatural, making potions out of the contents of fancy bottles borrowed from home and singing chants they had memorized on the way home from choir.

Jumin can’t say where this fascination started from, only that it became an intrinsic part of the way they viewed the world.

They didn’t lose this fascination as they grew older. Instead, it grew alongside them. They started seeking out new experiences in the hope of experiencing ‘true magic’. Drinking for the first time, staying out all night to watch the sun rise (none of the books they read could agree on a definitive ‘witching hour’) and consuming strange herbs that promised a mind altering state. They’d stay out late in the garden, under the same trees they played under as children and watch the stars, and that in itself was a form of magic. 

As adults, they like to reminisce about their childhood. Memories of old notebooks filled with runes and candlewax, stained fingertips still smelling of perfume, doodles in the margins of textbooks. It’s like a language of their own. Then, over drinks later in the night, their conversations become reverent. Jihyun talks about the things he has seen while travelling, beauty beyond any rational explanation. He speaks so passionately that his cheeks turn pink, and Jumin can’t help but smile.

Even though they talk about it all in the past tense, Jumin is not convinced that they weren’t touched by magic somehow. He doesn’t ever share this, either out of self-consciousness or just because it feels too personal to explain.

It was Jihyun who had come up with the idea of telepathy. It was after they were both let off their punishments for stealing expensive perfumes from home, and they decided it was better if they gave up potion-making for the time being. He had found it somewhere in a book, and Jumin was intrigued by the idea of being able to communicate even when they were apart (he would never admit it, but being alone in his house could get quite lonely).

They spent the next few weeks reading up on the art of telepathy. They sat outside in the garden opposite each other and tried to sending telepathic messages (and more often than not Jihyun would burst into a fit of giggles).

They tried rituals, chanting, drawing matching patterns over their hands, but their heads remained silent. They eventually gave up and decided to move onto magical creatures (their hours sitting on the grass had made them curious about what secrets nature could hold).

It’s easy to write that time off as childhood games, them just playing pretend for a few weeks. Jumin definitely saw it that way for a long time. However, a string of coincidences throughout his life have made him question just how legitimate their rituals were.

Each one of these events went the same way: Jumin feeling a strange sense of anticipation, the hairs on the back of his neck standing up, a bubble of excitement in his chest. All feelings that he was certain weren’t natural reactions to his environment.

Then, he would talk to Jihyun some time later and find out that something had happened (he had broken his leg while out taking photos, he had proposed to Rika, he had gotten into a car crash).

Call it a best friend’s intuition. Call it a sixth sense.

He calls it telepathy.

Over the years, he has grown accustomed to this sequence of events. Strange, unexplained feelings accompanied by a call from Jihyun detailing something that had happened in his life. He just accepts it as something they share, another aspect that makes their friendship unique.

At least, that’s how it used to be. He cannot pinpoint the exact moment when things changed, but there is one event that he considers the turning point.

It went the same way it always did. He was sitting in on a very boring meeting, trying his best to look immersed instead of bored, and already anticipating lunch with his father. Out of nowhere, he was hit with a strong wave of fear. His heart started pounding like he had just been running for the past half hour instead of sitting in the conference room. His stomach started doing backflips, and he suddenly lost his appetite.

The feeling had disturbed him so much that he left the meeting early to go and phone Jihyun. He knew with absolute certainty that something bad had happened, and he needed to know how to make it better.

All his calls went to voicemail, and when he finally got through, it was Rika who picked up.  He couldn’t get a clear response from her as to what happened, just empty words meant to pacify him. 

It was a week later when he found out about V’s eyes.

Despite how many times Jumin asked, he refused to speak about the incident and insisted that he was fine. It frustrated Jumin to no end that his friend couldn’t see just now not fine everything was. Despite all his resources and power, he had never felt so useless in his life.

V started to become more secretive, disappearing for long periods of time without any concrete explanation. Jumin’s questions were dodged, and their conversations rarely went beyond surface-level pleasantries.

Despite the growing distance between them, Jumin was still hit with the occasional flashes of telepathy. These days, he considered them more of a nuisance than a gift. They served as nothing more than a disruption to his day, and no matter how many times he tried to reach out, V refused to admit that anything was wrong.

He filled in the space V left in his life by returning to his love for the supernatural. He met strange new contacts through C&R who claimed to partake in the occult. He talked to Elizabeth (and he looked into her eyes and believed she understood him better than anybody else). He sourced rare books from questionable second-hand dealers.

The nostalgia that came with uncovering new information was almost enough to distract from the fear that he was losing his best friend.

It was uncomfortably quiet when Rika died. He had just settled down to enjoy his evening when V called him with the news. He felt his whole body freeze up and go cold as the realization hit him. It only took him a few hours to realize that he hadn’t felt anything at the time he was told she died. His telepathy had failed him when he needed it most.

His grief was compounded by the fear that he and Jihyun had drifted so far apart that he had lost his telepathy all together. He couldn’t handle the idea of losing them both at once.

✧✦✧ ✧✦✧ ✧✦✧

The next two years slip by in a blur of mourning and monotony. Work goes on, and the world keeps turning. Sometimes, he gets goosebumps on a warm day or feels himself growing anxious over dinner, but he writes them off as freak occurrences (and ignores the voice in the back of his head telling him that something’s wrong).

Then, the monotony is disturbed. A stranger appears in the chatroom, causing it to dissolve into chaos. If it wasn’t such a worrying security breach, Jumin would find it amusing.

As if that wasn’t enough, he is hit with a second disturbance, this one more jarring than the last. Like a dulled sense coming back to life, he feels a spark of hope flaring up in his chest. A warmth towards this stranger that is completely foreign to him.

A message.

This is the first real thing V (and by extension Jumin) has felt in a while, and he refuses to let it slip away unnoticed. He knows that this person is important somehow, and so, against his better judgement, he decides to trust them.

V decides to hold a new party, and it feels like the whole RFA has come alive again at the mere thought of holding a party again.

Jumin can’t help but get caught up in the excitement too. His mind is already running through all the possibilities this party will bring. A chance to honour Rika’s memory and to bring everyone together again. An opportunity to see V in person, and for them to patch up the cracks in their friendship. It’s a chance to set everything right again.

The warmth that floods his chest this time is entirely his own. He will do anything possible to make this party a success. For the RFA’s sake. For V’s sake.

It’s a pleasant surprise when V starts appearing in the chatrooms more frequently, another indicator that things are slowly healing. They talk comfortably in the chatrooms without any uncomfortable formality. They poke fun at each other and they even talk about the past. He never realized how much he has missed these moments.

However, his happiness is disturbed by uncomfortable revelations over the next few days. The bomb, the documents, the secrets that still follow V wherever he goes. He hates to admit it, but he feels like he is out of his depth.

He continues to trust V. All they need to do is make it to the party, and then he’ll explain everything. Why can’t anyone else see that? He needs to believe that there is a rational explanation for all of this.

Even when everybody else has lost faith, he will not.

V’s last string of messages in the chat shouldn’t surprise him as much as they do. He should have known better.

There has been a dull pain thumping in his chest since the last message was sent. He’s not sure if it’s V’s or his own. Their pain has become one combined entity, and it’s threatening to consume him completely.

He ignores all of Jaehee’s calls, turns off his phone and digs out a bottle of wine he had been saving to share. 

When he has drunk enough to dull his senses, he lets his mind wander back to his childhood (he always ends up here somehow). He squeezes his eyes shut and conjures up the memory of the garden at his childhood home. Jihyun sitting opposite him, his face still round and boyish. He can almost hear his laugh.

He remembers that feeling of concentration, his entire being focused on sending a message from his mind to Jihyun’s.

It’s a last-ditch, childish attempt, but he tries it anyway.

Can you hear me? I am trying to reach you. Where are you?

Of course, just like all those times before, he is greeted only by silence. He falls into a fitful sleep that night and dreams of sunny back gardens, strong perfume and childhood giggles. 

He loses himself in party planning in the next few days. He only checks the chatroom for updates from Luciel. He is still hopeful that they’ll be able to bring V home, and that he’ll get the chance to make it all right again.

Until it turns to silence.

✧✦✧ ✧✦✧ ✧✦✧

A string of coordinates. Unfinished. No matter, Jumin will find them, one way or another.

*

A message from V (?!). The rest of the coordinates. SOS.

He has never needed a clearer call for help.

*

He remembers ordering Jaehee to call for flight permits. He remembers pacing around his house until it was finally time to leave. He remembers snatches of conversation on the helicopter, only parts of the bumpy flight through the mountains before-

The rest, he cannot (will not) remember.

✧✦✧ ✧✦✧ ✧✦✧

It haunts him in quiet moments. How painless the cut was. One moment he was listening to the security team’s plans, and the next he was aware of a gaping hole in his chest. Like some vital organ had not just shut down, but disappeared all together, leaving an uncomfortable gap in its place.

Even before the helicopter landed, he knew it was all over.

It was cruel, just how quietly V left him. He wishes that it hurt. He doesn’t know what to do with all this emptiness.

He still finds himself searching for that feeling. That part of him that was subconsciously aware of what Jihyun was up to. He brushes against the emptiness expecting to find that familiar feeling and instead finds himself falling, falling...

He doesn’t speak much unless it’s about work. He mostly just drinks instead.

✧✦✧ ✧✦✧ ✧✦✧

Jumin and Jihyun’s friendship was always rooted in a mutual fascination for magic.

He used to value his gift over everything else. Even when it did nothing but frustrate him, he was still thankful for the connection.

He has started giving away the occultist books that used to sit on his desk. He can’t bear to look at the covers and the spells that promise a wide array of powers.

What was the use of him being given this touch of magic just for it to fail him when he needed it most?

[foxys-fantasy-tales]

hi hi! what can you share with someone who's new to your blog?

This is a VERY wide net, but I'll do my best to be thorough yet succinct as possible. -Deep Breath- I am in my 30's and self published my debut book just over two years ago. Arigale: Spite in the Spirit, and the rest of the upcoming series I'm working on, is very dear to me as these characters have followed me since college for the most part. I also have another four projects brewing with some closer to completion than others. The second of the Arigale series and the first Made to Taste book should be out this year after having to have been delayed throughout last year due to my chronic health issues. As for what I post, it's mostly about my WIPs listed above and re-blogs for other writers in the community, though I do also post about some of my interests like anime, DnD, cosplay, and gaming less frequently. I just like my page feeling personable and relaxed if I can help it. Links section! I have my own website and (usually forgotten) newsletter you can get to at ArigaleFantasy.com. Here you can find a lot of info about the Arigale series in particular, though when other WIPs get closer to release I will be putting a section for each of those up as well. You can get character art and bios, book summaries and links to purchase, and some free short stories. I also had the first five chapters of Arigale right here on Tumblr, but since the recent link debacle with this site they aren't showing. Sad. If you want any sent later just let me know and that goes to anybody who sees this really.

There is also a trailer!

Made to Taste will be getting a trailer at some point too, though it probably won't have so much nice art since my artist is having trouble with her health and a deep backlog of art. I'll likely find a way to manage something still on Canva I hope. WIP Summaries Section! Arigale: Spite in the Spirit Judith and Chit are called to the lonely tower outside their city with little explanation. The one who summoned them is an old, elven wizard named Maleth, who will send them on a quest to lower their floating city of Arigale to where it once resided. Maleth is intrigued by Judith’s strange form of necromantic magic, yet he is also certain of the anxious young man in training to be a spearman and scholar.

Judith, a bubbly yet mysterious young woman, is eager to accept. Chit remains withdrawn and cautious, a remnant of being raised by the Order that presides over their land. Soon, both discover their meeting with the wizard carried dire consequences. Can they accomplish what has been asked of them and save Arigale by exploring the land below, no matter the lengths they must go to? Arigale: Bond in the Blood (2024) Judith and Chit's journey across the seas to Galavarn was not as smooth as they had hoped for. The standard of living here is much different than what they encountered on the mainland, and the newfound bond between them will be tested. Enigmas run rampant here, along with a woman from Maleth’s past who claims to hold the key to defeating them for good. Unfortunately, this woman has an unruly and strangely apathetic nature to her, along with a profound hatred toward their distant companion on Arigale. 

Meanwhile, back on the mainland, those left behind must bear their own struggles as a stranger appears and insists on taking one of their number with him. This man with red, sunken eyes bears a sharp grudge against Stemoss and worse obligations to a certain deity. 

Secrets of the past will come to light on this desolate isle, and the friends left behind will struggle to not become a cog in a plan devised long before they were even born. Made to Taste (2024) When Lyra Morley accepted a rough and tumble new hire from her bar, she didn't think he would end up her new roommate in a week. Noel Akatash brings his own debts, and the people holding the accounts aren't to be trifled with. Magical home invasions aside, Lyra is more worried about her business serving the city nightlife any food she can handle all made to order.

Cooking with a halfbreed's sense of smell comes with its perks, and one of them is that she can hide her skills in the kitchen so no one is any wiser about her true nature. The night-only diner called Made to Taste is meant to be a haven for those the city would rather keep buried. Lyra, the pacifist and abstinent dhampir, would fight to keep it safe. Good thing Noel knows a thing or two about being scrappy. Dream Escape (2025?) Emma Reed, 26, has a Master of the Arts and no place to put it but in her desk drawer. Once proud of her accomplishment, the lights quickly dimmed when she ended up living back in her old childhood bedroom at her parents place and flat broke. Helping Adrien with graphics for their streaming or Sarah with banners for her pet business is all well and good, but it's not at all how she imagined scrapping by. When her newest piece is rejected from the gallery she had finally convinced to give her a chance, Emma hits a downward spiral.

When she awakens, she finds herself in a strange new world with a strange man hovering around her. He calls himself Jasper, a dream painter, and quickly proves his prowess at sculpting others' dreams. Emma was in his care, but though he's petitioned her to wake up, she can't. Neither knows how she ended up in this place, but surrounded by the dreams of others quite literally brought to life around her, Emma makes the decision to stay.

Jasper won't let her. For one, if she stays there is no telling how badly that could go for her, or for his hopes of a promotion. Emma goes along with his plan to cart her across this new place, more as a sightseeing tour than the arduous task he finds it to be. Along the way, a bit of the light comes back into her eyes, and he can't help but remember how bright they both used to shine. Dulled and muddied palettes that they both became, can they start over? Bloodlines (2025?) Blood was her first memory. Not many can recall birth, but Gwyar is a special case. Though she looks like any old elf and had once been instructed to act as such, in her heart she knows that isn't true. Elves aren't born fully formed. Elves don't have memories spanning hundreds of lifetimes or more. Elves surely don't have her terrible taste in company. Until one does. A half-elf, half- orc bard shows up in town going by a name she would choke trying to pronounce. After he follows her and she threatens him and forces a blood oath of silence about her little vigilante hobby, or perhaps because of it, he sticks to her like glue. A vicious songstress with an even more intimidating old tree in her backyard meets a half-blood who loves sweets and suppresses his own inner rage. Together perhaps they can take on the mysteries in her heritage, whether Gwyar wants to or not.

Otherly (Future Trilogy only in planning stages) Daphne Bennet has been waiting her whole twenty-two years for someone to notice the strange events that follow her must be more than just her imagination. She’s never caught a cold, can follow the wind to find lost friends, and the one time she was in a photograph only her area of the picture bore smudges in the background. Believing she may be haunted afterwards, her parents take her to the witch at the edge of their town, only to discover their daughter is not their own. 

No, Daphne is actually a fae. Shocking revelations of child exchanges aside, now Daphne is enlisted at once to upend her life and attend a prestigious magic school to learn to control her burgeoning powers before they control her. Upon initiation day, Daphne is given a bitter drought with all the new students, which will prevent any of them from wandering off school grounds. Everyone is also given a diary to record their thoughts and experiences as a daily exercise, which will magically respond to provide advice and companionship. However, Daphne’s diary seems to be more on the condescending side. As she reluctantly writes, the diary begins to sound as scared as she feels. Every teacher looks less than enthused to be there. Strict rules for curfew, magic containment, and other safety precautions often hinder learning. When her snooping leads to a thinly veiled threat from staff, Daphne resolves to uncover the school’s mysteries within the pages of her diary. Only to watch the words “I’ll help” appear.

All in all, I have a lot going on and need to be more frequent posting on here and getting the word out. I like ask and tag games, but sometimes it can take me a bit to get to them. I hope all this helps and let me know if I fudged it or if you have any other questions! <3

[onesemesterfilmstudentta]

Sweet Bean

I clap my hands. Wonderful, amazing! It's so funny to watch this after Pulse's tirade (the word lovingly used by me) about the epidemic of loneliness.

The found family aspect was wonderful to see emerge between Tokue as the mother, Sentaro as the son, and Wakana as t

he granddaughter. It is such a gradual realization confirmed finally in Tokue's last message to the two of them that was so sweet to hear. I think what creates this strong feeling of becoming family are the scenes of Tokue and Sentaro working together to create dorayaki especially when compared with each of them struggling to create dorayaki on their own and also the conversations Wakana has with each of them. To begin with, Sentaro giving Wakana the rejects is already a sweet gesture that implies they have a strong relationship. Furthermore, Wakana somewhat sharing a meal with Sentaro (especially when it's clear her mother has abandoned her to go find dinner on her own) and giving him advice about Tokue's employment feels a little like a consultation between family members. Of course Tokue giving Wakana advice about how to live her life freely and offering to take care of the canary was very sweet and grandmotherly.

On another note, the use of sound was kind of interesting? I mostly noticed it whenever Sentaro was walking up and down stairs. The heavy thuds of his depressed steps when we are first introduced to him as well as a similar after the dorayaki shop starts to crumble are so loud that it's unreal and emphasizes the sense that something is going wrong for him. Otherwise, the contrast between Sentaro carefully crafting his pancakes while the middle school girls noisily chatter in the background was seriously hilarious. The film is able to use sound in ways that set the emotional tone of scenes in interesting ways.

To end, the relationship between Tokue and nature is interesting especially when considering that quote from the book about leprosy. Those with leprosy/Hansen's Disease want to live in society "where the sun shines" too. Tokue listens carefully to nature and this way she is alone and lonely but surrounded by beautiful and noisy nature. The film shows us and lets us hear the sounds of the nature that Tokue loves so much throughout the film as well. It feels like nature is also society, that both are one and the same, and by enjoying nature we can also become part of society as well. The ending scene of all the people cherry blossom viewing and Sentaro setting up his own stall, calling out to them, might be representative of this as well. Everyone loves nature! We're all looking at the same moon!

[noemyreads]

normal people - sally rooney

book sinopses

at school connell and marianne pretend not to know each other. he’s popular and well-adjusted, star of the school soccer team while she is lonely, proud, and intensely private. but when connell comes to pick his mother up from her housekeeping job at marianne’s house, a strange and indelible connection grows between the two teenagers - one they are determined to conceal.

a year later, they’re both studying at trinity college in dublin. marianne has found her feet in a new social world while connell hangs at the sidelines, shy and uncertain. throughout their years in college, marianne and connell circle one another, straying toward other people and possibilities but always magnetically, irresistibly drawn back together. then, as she veers into self-destruction and he begins to search for meaning elsewhere, each must confront how far they are willing to go to save the other.

my review

“marianne had the feeling that her real life confessed in another place, far away, inconsistent without her, and she didn't know if she would ever discover where it was and if she would be part of it.”

I read normal people and ended up shocked because the book has actually NORMAL PEOPLE.

what a frustrating book, I really don't know what to think about it. the story goes round and round and always stops at exactly the same place, it surprises me that I still cheered for marianne and for connel to get together.

first, I want to talk about marianne, the character that I liked the most in the book

If there's a character who needs therapy, it's her. throughout the book I felt sorry for her. marianne has such a distorted view of herself that I had a lot of agony reading certain parts. she lives in a self-deprecating role and doesn't see herself beyond it.

studying psychology, I can look at marianne through the cognitive model, she clearly has worthlessness and unlovability core beliefs, she thinks she is bad, that there is something bad inside her and that she is not worthy of love, and the behaviors that she has, keep this belief, because she only gets involved with people who treat her badly and always tries to keep connel away (which is sometimes a idiot). by doing this, she manages to “prove to herself” that she is bad and will never be loved.

now, let’s jump into connel and marianne, I must say, I had a love and hate relationship with these two, at the same time that I was rooting for them, I felt like they were so boring and problematic. there was a lack of basic communication between them, like saying what you want for the relationship, what you need to stay, that kind of thing, sometimes they didn't stay together due to lack of communication. it got to a point where it was difficult to know if they were good or bad for each other, because at the same time that they complement one another, they were delaying each other.

Now, what I thought about the author's writing and pace of the book. I found it boring how the author took the events, I felt that the story was jumping into something good and all of a sudden “three weeks later” and it was another event, it was difficult to connect with the story. another thing that bothered me were the flashbacks, during the chapter I was lost in where was a memory and where was the present, I think there was a lack of signaling by the author.

I'm not even going to talk about the lack of signal in the lines, a real terror!

I end here, giving 3/5, because despite being frustrating, I enjoyed the story.

[ginger-futch]

Return AU (prologue; introductory chapter):

The feeling came to her as she drove down the lonely path to the facility, on a road left to the thin mercy of winter frosts and weeds over the course of a decade of disuse, at first but a trickle of unease gnawing at her stomach. As she cut the rusted chains that locked the high fence closed, watching them fall and flake on the ground, it grew to a dryness at the back of her throat. Parking her van among the numerous abandoned cars in the front lot, she spotted her hands trembling on the wheel.

Sam looked up at the place she once called home.

Some of her favorite books as a child told stories of grown ups returning to places important in their childhood - quiet realizations about how time affects one's perspective, and how all the things that seemed huge and important as children seem small and insignificant in adulthood. A bed that doesn't fit so comfortably anymore, a tree that seemed to touch the clouds turning out to be not even big enough to support a tree house, a closet that isn't nearly as dark and scary as it was before.

The factory was just as imposing and oppressive now as it was the day she left.

She shook her head, spitting out her hair as it got caught in her mouth. She slapped her cheeks with her hands, then growled into them like a jet engine or perhaps a zombie. She swore, quietly but at length and with a poetic fervor that would make her tender-hearted father weep with both pride and embarrassment.

Eventually, she calmed herself down, and exited the vehicle. She looked at the factory...

Nope, still terrifying.

She knew that, logically, her memories of what she saw in there weren't the most reliable. She was an imaginative kid, and combining that with the mold that was likely growing in the vents of that musty old orphanage, she dreamed up a lot of surreal things in her time there.

But she knew for a fact that something horrible happened here. Some criminal neglect that caused her two best friends - her only friends at that time - to disappear without a trace or even so much as a goodbye. Some abusive working conditions that the memory of which would eventually rob the brave man who raised her of his voice. Something that linked the place to disappearances in the hundreds, culminating in its shut down in the mid 90s.

When Sam was brought to the surface for the first time since she was a baby, she promised herself that she'd return some day to bring her friends out too. To show them what the stars really looked like, to feel the sunshine on their skin and the wind in their hair. All throughout middle school she fantasized about all the places she'd take them to, all the simple luxuries no child was afforded in that colorful prison they'd been locked up in. She'd take them to her favorite ice cream parlor to get the giant swirly cones, then hit up the video store to rent a movie, and spend Friday night at her house watching movies so they could get up the next morning to watch Saturday morning cartoons.

As a young woman now attending college, she was well aware that she probably wasn't going to find them down there. Years of obsessing over missing persons cases, of sacrifices made to get any information at all on what happened, only solidified the hopelessness of finding them. They'd already been missing for months if not years by the time she was pulled out, but, if she was lucky, maybe she'd find something that pointed her in the right direction. She was hoping, praying, that they'd just been adopted. Because if not...

She didn't like to think about it.

After all they'd been through, Teddie and Mari didn't deserve to just vanish like nobody cared about them. Sam promised to come back for them, and she was going to do just that, even if she had to peel back the floorboards to see if anything was underneath.

She lugged her duffel bag out of the back, hoping to make camp in the building if squatters hadn't already done so.

If there were, she ensured she was well equipped to handle them.