#the trick is going to be deciding which blog to post this on first

[hnnny]

I got Fable brain rot like it's the plague recently, and now I've been re-inflicted with Kotor brain rot ever since I accidentally included Zena and Atton in the background of a recent Fable post I made.

So needless to say, I've been writing and drawing these two fools like crazy. This is when Zena first meets Atton after rescuing him from a Balverine attack (and also jail, but that's for another day). She's a Hero who is struggling with her sense of self ever since the Hero's Guild was disbanded.

This story takes place sometimes between Fable 1 and Fable 2 since there's about 500 years between the two to pick from. I'm making it real vague cause I deserve a break from extremely complex world building (she says, having put together a chart and compared maps of Fable 1, 2, and 3, and even some of the lesser-known titles just to figure out where these two are at all times lol)

Another reason for this AU: Zena pretty and I love her :3

[cryptictongues]

The Thrill of the Chase

pairing: Logan Howlett x Female Mutant!Reader rating: Explicit (MINORS DNI; 18+) word count: 7.1K summary: Logan ate part of your sandwich, so you stole his cigars. Things turn out differently from what you were expecting.

warnings: fluff and smut, teasing, slight predator/prey trope, banter, making out, dirty talk, oral (f and m receiving), vaginal sex, vaginal fingering, squirting, soft!dom Logan

Author's Note: My first Logan fic! X-Men used to be my world and the fact it is making a comeback has rejuvenated me. Also, I was picturing Logan from the first three trilogies but DOFP!Logan also crossed my mind so :)

Please read my pinned post before following me! Minors and ageless blogs will be blocked as this blog’s content is NSFW.

[AO3 link]

It was getting close to evening, everyone doing their own thing to unwind after a long day of classes and teaching. You had planned to do the same thing, planning to grab a quick bite in the kitchen before getting ready to relax in your room. You were whipping up a quick and easy sandwich, assembling it onto a plate before moving it to the island in the middle of the kitchen. You went to get a soda from the cupboard, only for your skin to raise as you sense something is about to happen: a certain someone was about to come take your sandwich. 

“If you take one bite out of my sandwich Logan, I will kick your ass.”

You turn to see him, eyes wide along with his mouth, about to chomp into your dinner. He closes his mouth, only for him to keep the sandwich in his hands and an “innocent” smile on his face. 

“Oh, you mean this sandwich?” 

You shut the cupboard door, walking over to him with a stern, playful look. You know he is messing with you. That has been the dynamic of your relationship with him. Ever since he decided to stay here at the school and join the X-Men, you two have grown closer and closer, enjoying each other’s company over anyone else. It didn’t matter what either of you did. You both thrived in the presence of one another. 

But something that has become common practice as of late was playful in nature. You both have always teased, but it has recently ramped up. If one of you started it, the other would find a way to end it before starting again. It was the push and pull between the two of you that you loved, and it has only made you long for him. You want to believe he feels the same, but even your mutation of precognition can’t fully confirm that. 

“Yes, that is my sandwich. I worked very hard on it. I'll have you know.” You are standing in front of him now, having to look up at him slightly as you wait for his next move. 

“I’m sure you did. It looks delicious.” He says, but rather than looking at the food, he is looking right at you. Cheeky bastard.

“Y-yeah, which is why I am asking you to put it down so I may enjoy it.” 

“I don’t know. I think I wanna have a taste first.” 

His hazel eyes are staring you down, almost begging for you to make a move. In reality, you really didn’t care if he ate it. You could easily make another and enjoy dinner with him. But you know that isn’t what he is doing right now. He is playing with you, wanting to rile you up. Well, it takes two to play that game.

“That sandwich is very precious to me. I’d think before you act.”

“Oh yeah?” He smirks, bringing his face closer to yours. “What are you going to do about it?”

“I’ll take something precious of yours.” 

He chuckles, turning his face to the sandwich. “I’d like to see you try, sweetheart.”

He takes a huge bite out of your sandwich, his eyes closing as he chews. You purse your lips, watching him savor your meal with gusto. You know he is overexaggerating to truly get at you, but little does he know you have a trick up your sleeve.

“Enjoying my meal?” 

He turns back to you, swallowing before licking his lips. “Very much. I may have to take another bite.”

You get up in his space, settling onto your tippy toes so your face is by his ear. You let your breath waft against his skin, causing a shiver to shake his core. You can tell he is anticipating what you will do, always highly enjoying your responses to his antics. Oh, he is so in for it.

“That’s okay. You can have it.” You let your pointer finger trace his collarbone that is very much on display from his white, fitted tank. “And you want to know why that is, Logan?”

He takes a deep breath, very apparent that your actions are doing something to him. His left hand lets go of the sandwich to settle on your hip, squeezing the flesh slightly to ground himself. It is actions like that that make you believe you do something to him. Like you drive him just as insane as he does to you. You bring your left hand to his head, pulling him down so you can really get into his ear. 

“That’s because I know where you keep your special cigars from Cuba, and I am going to take them.”

You couldn’t have run fast enough. You are already shooting for the stairs, taking two steps at a time as you speed to his room. You knew it had taken him a second to realize what had happened because by the time you got to his floor, you heard him yelling your name. 

You burst into his room, locking it quickly. It was only to buy some time, for you knew he had a key. You were giggling as you went to his bookcase, plucking out the blue, hardcover history book. You open it, and smile as you see the unopened cigars there in the deep hole where text used to be. Just as you close the book, you hear heavy footsteps reach the door and a jingle of keys.

You panic, needing to find a way out before he opens the door. You could run around him, but you needed a head start. You could hide and wait for him to leave but you knew he’d sniff you out. There was only one option left, and that was to go out his bedroom window. You hear the key enter the lock, and with a quickness you didn’t think you had, you unlocked his window and flung it open. Just as the door busted open, you crawled out. You grasped onto the ivy that clung to the school’s exterior and began to climb down. 

“Oh, when I get my hands on you, you are in for it!”

You look up to see Logan’s head popping out the window. He has a scowl on his face, but you could see the wild look in his eyes. You knew he was enjoying this, for he loves the chase.

“This is for taking my sandwich!” You yell, and continue making your descent. 

You hear the window close, which makes you go faster, knowing he is rushing down those stairs to meet you at the bottom. You could sense that he would go to the front door, so once your feet touch the grassy floor you run to the back door. Opening it quickly, you determine your next move. He is probably at the front, ready to intercept you, giving you the opportunity to hide somewhere. 

You rush to the hallway where many of the classes are held. You run into the first classroom you see, its door already open. You see the large oak desk at the back of the classroom, and quietly walk up to it. It has a space for leg room, so with haste you crawl in it, pulling the chair in carefully to not make any sound. 

Your heart was racing, adrenaline thrashing as you hid. You try to steady your breath, trying to keep quiet. The atmosphere has become eerie, the silence defying as you try to keep it that way. You try to listen for any other sounds over your pounding heart, when another wave of cognition hits you. You can see it clearly, where he finds you under the desk, hands on either side to block you in. You know you need to move on, so you go to move the chair, but you suddenly halt when you hear his voice boom nearby.

“Where is she?” 

You cover your mouth, trying to hold in your breathing as well as the gasp that almost shot from your mouth. His voice was coated in gravel, and absolutely primal. Even from afar, it was clear he was worked up, and it made you embarrassingly wet. 

You hear footsteps enter the hallway, heavy boots against the shiny wooden floor. At first, you think you may have a way out, hearing him pass the room you were in, but you aren’t so lucky because you hear him stop. You grip onto the book and your mouth, even though you know it will do absolutely nothing. You know he senses you, and it is confirmed when you hear footsteps enter the room. You hear him inhale deeply, exhaling with sigh only to turn into a deep rumble. 

“I know you are here.” He is slow in taking his steps, and each step gets closer and closer to your hiding place. 

He sniffs deeply again, growling this time around like he was a wild animal. “No point in denying it. I could smell you the second I walked into the hall.”

You know he will find you, and he will block you in. So you decide to take a risk before he closes in on you. You push the chair out far enough to crawl out, before standing up behind the desk. You put your hands up with the book in your left one, trying to show off a sign of surrender. 

“You have nowhere to go, dollface. No point in trying’ to run for I’ll snatch you up real quick.” 

“You must really want your cigars back to block me in like this.” 

He steps even closer, with him now standing right in reach of the book. He could easily grab it and take it, for he is much stronger than you. But he doesn’t make a move, staying glued to his new spot. You don’t know what’s running through his head, his eyes trained on you. It isn’t until he places his hands onto the desk that you take a step back and drop your hands. 

“You’re wrong.”

You raise a brow, not sure what he is getting at. “What do you mean?”

He smirks, leaning his body over the desk. “It isn’t the cigars I’m after. Not anymore.”

Your heart is in overdrive. You know the answer, it is becoming obvious. But you ask anyway. “Then what are you after, Lo?”

“I think you know the answer. Now it is a matter of will you let me take what’s mine.”

You want to give in. You are becoming more aroused by the second, but you are starting to really enjoy the chase. Seeing how much it gets him going, to see this side of him, only makes you want to push him more. You want to see what he will do, especially when he gets his hands on you.

You walk around the desk, book of cigars still in hand, getting closer to him until you are toe to toe with him. “What’s the fun in surrendering?”

He quickly blocks you in, the desk pressed against your back. He has the most seductive, but feral grin upon his lips, like he thinks he has won his prize. His head leans down to yours, forehead against forehead, before he whispers his next sentence against your lips.

“The fun is in what follows.”

His lips are on yours, desperate and needy. You can’t help the moan that leaves your throat, mind going hazy as his lips devour. You have craved him for so long, you want this to last forever. However, you cannot give into him like this. You will not make this easy for him.

One of your hands goes to the hem of his tank, fingers lingering before going under. He feels so solid, the coarse hairs on his tummy spread thick as you go to his left side. You can feel him shudder over you, and you try to hold back the smirk that wants to curve onto your lips. You move your fingers sporadically over the left side of his ribcage, causing him to jump back. This gives you the chance to run like hell.

“Hey! That’s unfair!” You hear him yell and it makes you giggle profusely. You must thank Jean later for letting you in on that little secret; that the broody, grumpy man with the metal bones was insanely ticklish. You wish you could turn to see his full reaction, but you are too determined.

You can hear him running right behind you, and you have never been more aroused. You shouldn’t feel so turned on by Logan chasing you around, but the thrill of the chase was seeping into your loins and you were addicted. 

More people had shown up around the school, meeting with friends to study or hang out for the evening. You were dodging people left and right, and everyone looked perplexed as they saw Logan charging his way towards you. Many of them probably assumed it had to do with the book you were holding, and while they would have been originally right, they are no longer even close. 

You don’t have time to hide again, not with him so close behind. You make it back to the stairs, hauling ass as you try to make it to your room. You can hear him right behind you, breathing heavily and grunting with each step. Your room is at the end of the hall, and you are basically flying with how fast you are running. The second you reach the door, you swing it open and throw yourself in before slamming it. You had gotten it shut, mentally pumping your fist in victory, but by the time you went to turn the lock, it was too late. The door flies open, sending you back a couple feet back as Logan stands at the door's entrance. 

“I have you right where I want you. No more running.”

If looks could kill, you’d be ash. He enters your room, closing the door behind him with his eyes staying on you. He takes one step forward, with him now hovering over your smaller form. The way he is looking at you makes your knees faint, for you felt you could hear what he was revealing with his stare. 

“I still know your weakness, Logan.” You smirk, holding the book up to your face to dodge any attack he was planning. It is pointless, you know, but it is the best defense you’ve got. 

“Do you now?” He walks towards you, in step with you as you go backwards. The back of your knees hit the edge of your bed, telling you that you truly have nowhere else to go. He is right on you, grinning now that he has the upper hand. 

“I’m afraid that book won’t save you from me.” He snatches the book, tossing it to the side of the bed. 

You are in for it. You don’t know what he is planning, and the element of surprise has overcome you. However, with the way he is looking at you, you guarantee that what is about to happen will be just as exhilarating as when he was hunting you down. 

“What do you plan to do with me, hm?” You let your fingertips walk along his chest, dancing all the way down to his side like you did earlier. 

He is quick to grab your hand, bending down to lift you up in his arm before tossing you onto the bed, following swiftly as he pins both hands above your head. 

“Don’t even think about it. I know you all too well.” He growls through his teeth. “As for what I plan on doing, what’s the fun in telling when I can just show you. Would you like that?”

You simply nod, breathless at how he is handling you. However, that wasn’t good enough for him, as he takes hold of your wrists in one hand so his other one can grip your chin.

“I wanna hear you say it, pretty girl.”

You huff, getting frustrated already that he is dragging this out. With your legs still free, you wrap them around his hips, your heels digging into his back causing him to grunt. Your lips are practically on his, faint contact making you antsy. “Show me what you’ve been wanting to do with me.”

Your lips are squashed by his instantly, hunger and desperation clear. His hands go to your thighs, grabbing at the flesh. With your hands free, they go straight to his hair, gripping and tugging on it which causes him to moan hotly into your mouth. 

His hands travel up to the hem of your blouse, pushing the fabric up past your stomach before his hands go under. You moan at the contrast, rough hands, that have been through so much running along your unmarred body. He swallows what you give him, groaning happily at the effects he was causing.

You are in heaven. You never thought you would be here like this with Logan. You never thought you would be under him at his complete mercy. It makes a shiver travel down your spine, traveling right to your core that is a heated mess because of the man before you. To be with the man you have pined for is riveting, and you could cry that he seems to return those feelings.

You don’t know what triggers your mutation, but it is sudden. Your vision goes blurry, a strong aura surrounding you. It is overwhelming, a whimper bubbling from your throat as you see what is about to happen. Logan releases your lips with a grunt, looking at you intensely as you start to shake. You feel his rough hands cup your soft cheeks, stroking them gently. 

Your cheeks feel hot, your vision turning you into a horny mess. Your hands grip onto Logan’s chest trying to ground yourself to reality. It’s too much. Your visions rarely last long for they are just snippets of future events, but this was different. It was as if you were in a trance, and could feel everything he was doing to you. You don’t know if it is your heightened emotions, especially with him right on you. All you knew is that pleasure was present, and you were starting to fall apart. 

“Hey, what’s wrong?” You can hear his demeanor change, worry laced in his tone.

“Fuck,” you couldn’t help but moan, unable to control yourself. “I can feel everything, Logan.”

There is a pause, hands still touching your face. A few beats later, he lets his right hand go down, only to stop at your thigh squeezing tightly. 

“Tell me what you see, baby.” 

The rumble in his voice intensifies everything, causing you to grip onto him tighter. “Oh God please don’t make me say it out loud.”

You try to look away, but his left hand shifts so it is grabbing your chin. He forces your head back up, bringing his face down to yours like he had in the classroom. His breath fans over your lips, taking in the way they move as sounds leave them. 

“I’m fucking you, aren’t I? Making you lose yourself on my cock? Is that what you are seeing?”

You can barely talk, too enthralled in your vision. You grab the hand that is on your thigh and bring it to the top of your black pants. Logan gets the idea and angles it so he can slide his hand into them. His fingers brush over the fabric, feeling the damp spot that has formed drastically. You hear him curse under his breath, the vibrations hitting your lips as they brush against one another without full pressure. 

“Oh sweetheart, you are so wet.” He murmurs, pulling his hand out to bring it up to his nose, inhaling deeply before releasing a sound so feral that you could sob. “And you smell so fucking good.” 

You can’t help but nod, not knowing how to respond. All you know is that you need him. Need him to take you on your bed and do whatever he wants to you. You’ll take anything he is willing to give you, for all you want is for him to make himself known to you. 

His hand had gone back down to your crotch, cupping your pussy through the material. “Does she want more attention?”

“Logan, please do something.” You choke, your mind steadily coming back to reality, but still not fully letting go. You start to grind down on his palm, desperate for anything he will give you, but he removes his hand, going to the back of your head to grip tightly.

Damn him!

“I know she deserves something, but do you? Do you deserve me after getting me so worked up like that?”

“Logan, I am begging.” You cry out in frustration, your nails digging into his chest causing him to groan lowly. “I want you. God, I’ve always wanted you so please take what’s yours!”

He is back on you, kissing you till the air in your lungs dissipates. He starts to kiss away from your swollen lips, kissing down to your neck. He nips at your pulse point, going up to your ear to give it a light lick before going back down. With every kiss, he takes a deep breath in, which only makes him get more aggressive. Soft kisses turn to an open mouth lather to nips that could have easily broken the skin.

“I don’t think you know what your scent does to me. It draws me in every time.” He bites down particularly hard at your collar bone, and you wouldn’t be surprised if blood had come to the surface. 

His hands come back up to the front of your blouse, carefully unbuttoning the garment before revealing your breasts that are almost spilling out of your bra. His hands mold over the cups, squeezing hard and slow as he makes his way to your sternum. 

He is being so gentle with you, a complete 180 from how you thought this was going to go. He was so rough with you in your head, fucking you until you couldn’t even say a word. This side of him was endearing, but you crave more from him.

“For someone so feral for me, you sure are taking your time.”

He bites the top of your left breast, making you gasp at the sudden pain. “I don’t think you are ready for that side of me, dollface.”

Your right hand goes to his head, taking a handful of his hair and yanking his head up. You know he wants to absolutely ravish you, and if it’s some convincing he needs, some convincing he is going to get. 

“When I said to take what’s yours, I meant it. I want you to make me beg until I’m dumb, so fucking do it.”

“Fine, but don’t say I didn’t warn you, Princess.”

His hands go under your top from the back, unclipping your bra before letting them resurface. He starts to yank your top off from the shoulders, only to smack your thigh that causes a light sting.

“Arch that back for me.”

You do as he says, allowing him to take the rest of your top off along with your bra. He flings them both across the room, only to do the same with his tank. You’ve seen his upper body plenty of times, as there would be instances in which he disregards it for a training session. But this? This was very different. It’s a different atmosphere, and rather than everyone getting an eye full of his muscular, hairy body, it is now for your eyes only. 

He’s looking down at you, pupils flared as he takes you in. You shiver as his palms stroke your tummy, slowly going up until they encompass your breasts. Your nipples pebble from the rough texture of his skin, and you can see it excites him. So much so that he takes the opportunity to take your nipples between his fingers and pulls them gently with a pinch. Your back bows off the mattress, adoring the pain he is providing, and let out a mewl as he lets go to run his thumbs over the tender peaks.

“You sound so good,” Logan murmurs. “I need to hear more.”

His right arm goes under your back to keep you up, holding you there as his mouth goes to your left breast. He takes your nipple into his mouth, sucking with his eyes still on you. Your cheeks flush, head tilting to the side to avoid looking at him. It’s too much. It’s too fucking much. 

Whimpers slip from your mouth, his treatment of your breasts making you want to rub your thighs together to soothe the ache, but he keeps your legs open. He eventually does the same to your other breast, working to match the work he left on your other nipple: hard, and tainted red.

He lets up, sitting on his knees as he unbuttons your pants, hands sliding the material down your legs in earnest. He tosses your heels off before stripping away your bottoms, and he hums as he admires the black, lacy thong you adorn. 

“Fuck,” he snaps the elastic, eyes entranced. “You sure you didn’t see this coming earlier? Wearing something sexy like this?”

“They work better with my pants.” You huff, his fingers lightly running along your covered slit.

“Hmm, no wonder your ass looked so good today.” He grins. “But this pussy? I could play with her all day.”

He lowers himself, sliding off the bed only to bring you with him, your body gliding across the comforter with ease. He clutches onto your thighs, letting your legs rest in the crook of his elbows. He keeps his hold tight, bringing his lips down to kiss and suck on your thighs. You gasp at the aggressiveness, swearing you will see dark purple marks on you later. You moan at the idea, as it feels like he is finally claiming you; like are his to mark, to claim, to fuck, to love. 

He makes his way to your center, sniffing deeply before releasing a feral growl. He lets the tip of his tongue lightly drag from the bottom to the top of your heat, still fully covered by the damned thong. He flicks at your clit, a ghost of a touch that has you bucking your hips. And he draws back every single time. His self-control is impressive but frustrating all the same.

He starts to suck on it through the material, creating a bigger wet spot with his spit. The more he pushed his tongue against your folds, the more the material would rub just right against you. It made you clench, panting at how much he is teasing you. He pulls away, blowing on your sensitive spot which only makes you whine.

“Awe what is it?” He chuckles, the vibrations barely hitting where you need him. “You want my tongue to play with you?”

His hand lets go of your thigh, fingers tracing the fabric before pulling it to the side. “Lucky for you, I love to play.”

He goes right in, mouth over your bud as he consumes your very being. Your hands shoot to his hair, not prepared for the onslaught of pleasure he is delivering. The swirls he is landing on his target is mind numbing, a tangible pressure that makes you want to curl in on yourself. 

“Fuck, sweetheart,” he groans, the sound vibrating right on your clit. It makes you buck your hips up, but his left arm presses you down to keep you secure. 

“I know you want more, but you are going to have to be patient. I’m not done tasting this sweet pussy. Fuck, you are so sweet.”

You feel one of his fingers near your hole, circling it teasingly before pushing in. His tongue is back on your nerves, mouthing covering it to add slight suction. Even with his big fingers, it’s not nearly enough. 

“Logan, please add another.” You say, emphasizing as you clench down on his single digit. 

He sucks a little harder, ripping a yelp from your throat. Still, he listens and inserts a second finger with the first. He goes in and out, drawing sighs from your lips as he builds you up. His mouth is going crazy, moving his lips with a vengeance. Your blood is hot, traveling down as your release starts to come to the surface.

You can’t stop clamping down on his fingers, your pussy having a mind of its own. He is pistoning them now, causing your fluids to make its way down your ass onto the comforter. The sounds coming from his handiwork edge you further, your release imminent. 

“Oh God, Logan! I’m cumming!” 

Big mistake on your part.

He pulls away, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. A smug look appears on his face, and you have the urge to shove his face back into your aching cunt.

“Your first time cumming with me will be on my cock, sweetheart.”

He pulls your thong down your legs and moves you back to the front of the bed. He stands before you, making light work of removing his belt from the loops of his jeans. His jeans are next, pulling them down with his briefs. 

You don’t know what you expected. You weren’t surprised with how well endowed he was, not with the way he is built. But to see it in person is so much different from your imagination. The details that your mind didn’t conjure up, especially the vein that starts from his lower stomach to the tip of his cock. It makes you salivate, wanting to run your tongue along it. 

“You like what you see, darlin’?” He noticed you staring, but you have no shame. Not anymore.

“Yeah, want it in my mouth so bad.”

He walks over to you, his cock in your face. His hand goes to your head, stroking the baby hairs that are starting to stick to your temple. “As much as I would love that, I am dying to give you the fucking you deserve, sweetheart. However…” he brings your head up closer to his cock, your lips not even an inch away. “How about you get it nice and wet for me.”

You don’t have to be told twice. You work up a good amount of spit, letting it drip from your mouth onto his hard cock. You start to lick at the sides, spreading your saliva all over until he is covered. You are basically making out with his dick, your lips and tongue moving like you had when you were kissing him earlier. It isn’t until you get to that vein of his that you start to go wild, licking it up and down. 

Logan is groaning deeply, and pulls your head back, a string of saliva connecting before breaking apart. You hear him curse under his breath before crawling back onto the bed, his hands holding your face as he brings his lips to you. His kisses are slow this time, letting it sink in that this is happening; that you two are about to be connected. 

“You did such a good job. You are such a good girl.” He murmurs against your lips before sitting up. 

His dick is now sitting heavy on your mound, and the weight of it feels delicious. He taps it against your clit a few times, your hips thrusting up in kind. 

“You ready for me, sweetheart?” He lets his cock rut into your folds, thrusting up into your clit. “I think that sweet thing of yours is.”

“Give it to me, Lo. I need you so bad it hurts.” 

“Don’t worry, baby. I’ll take that pain away.” He promises.

And as promised, he places the tip right at your aching hole and pushes in slowly. Your jaw slacks, the pressure as he continues his descent much more intense than you anticipated. It’s been so long since you’ve given yourself to someone. It all feels new, and you are thankful; thankful that it's with him.

He is fully seated in you, and you can only describe it as euphoric. With the way he sits heavy in your cunt, filling you up completely, you can honestly say that this was meant to happen. Logan was meant to be with you in every single possible way imaginable. It’s the only explanation.

“How does it feel, baby?” Logan asks, hands rubbing up and down your thighs soothingly. 

“It feels,” you whimper, gripping down on him. “It feels so good, Lo.”

“Yeah? My cock makin’ you feel good, doll?” He groans, clearly being affected by your behavior. 

Before you can mutter a pathetic answer, your brain turning to mush, he shifts back. His cock slides out until the mushroom head is at your entrance, and then he slams back in; hard and slow. 

The constant back and forth of his cock has you shaking, his hard thrust knocking the air out of your lungs and the slow thrusts feeling oh so good. And with the way he is watching you, his face mimicking yours as he receives his own pleasure, is sending zaps of electricity to your cunt. It makes you grasp onto him hard as he gets you more worked up.

Logan sits up straighter, grabbing your right leg and bringing it up to his shoulder. His left hand keeps it steady as he speeds up slightly and presses gentle kisses to your ankle in the process. It lets him go deeper, kissing your cervix every time it goes in. The pressure feels incredible, and the more he speeds up, the more your cunt starts to spasm out of control. 

“That’s it, baby. You are taking me so well, like you were fucking made for me.” He growls out, biting your ankle. 

“God yes, Logan! I’m yours!” You cry out, him and his cock making you utterly delirious. “You were made for my pussy!”

“Fuck, you got a mouth on you.” He chides, his right hand going to your right breast.

He is squeezing your tit so tight; his hips are on autopilot with how fast he is taking you. Your hands don’t know where to go, going from gripping the fabric below to holding onto his wrist. He is putting you into a completely fucked out state, and you can’t get enough of that treatment. 

You can tell you are on the precipice of cumming. You are clenching on and off rapidly, no longer in control of your muscles. The sounds coming from your coupling, wet smacking echoes that are music to your ears. You can feel the telltale sensation of being overwhelmed, and you know you are now on the track of no return. 

“Logan, baby, I’m gonna cum!”

He snarls at you, a crazed look in his eyes as he slams into you. He lets go of your tit to grab your chin, keeping your eyes on his. “Do it, darlin’. Cum around my cock.”

You are over the edge in seconds, a silent scream taking over as you tremble and quake. Your pussy is convulsing like crazy, small gushes of liquid coming out. You see Logan look down at where you two are connected, and he is grinning like crazy.

“What a fucking sight. There isn’t one thing about you that isn’t pretty.”

You could sob at his words, especially with how overstimulated you are becoming. You work his cock, wanting him to cum inside of you. 

“Give me your cum, Logan. Fill me until I’m dripping.”

Your words must have triggered something because next thing you know he has let go of your leg and face and is falling onto his forearms with his mouth landing on yours. You hear the sound of his claws, completely unsheathed from his skin, causing him to bellow into your mouth, rutting like a madman which causes cum to leak out from your hole onto the bedding. 

He slows down, milking out the rest of his spend before stopping all together. He lets go of your lips gasping, face buried in your shoulder as he tries to calm down. Your hands go to his back, massaging the taut muscles as he shakes. 

“Fuck, Logan,” you sigh, catching your breath as you come back to earth. You feel so relaxed, even with your guts feeling completely rearranged.

You hear his claws sink back into his skin, and it is then that he pulls out, falling to the other side of the bed. His chest is going up and down with every heavy breath, and you can’t help but admire him like this. 

He turns his head over to you, his hand coming to grab the hand by your side. “C’mere, sweetheart.”

You make it over into his side, head laying on his chest as you both bask in the post-sex glow. You can’t help but smile at this turn of events, not expecting to have been in this position with Logan. But here you are, laying on his chest with his arms around you. 

You notice something in your peripherals and see splintering from the headboard of your bed. There are six holes in the wood, and it sends you into a laughing fit, a euphoric glaze covering your entire body. 

“What’s so funny?” He asks gruffly, pulling you into side as you continue to laugh.

“Your claws pierced my headboard.”

You see him glance back, and you see him sigh, relaxing more into the mattress. “I’ll fix it up for you, darlin’. I’m sorry about that.”

“No need to say sorry.” You snuggle your face into his skin, breathing in his natural musk as you relax more into him. “I just can’t believe we did that, but I’m glad it did.”

“I can say the same.” He murmurs, stroking your hair gently. “Seriously, I gotta know, did you see this coming?”

You shift up, going to lay your arms across his chest only for you to rest on them. You look into his eyes and the need in them is still there, but not in the way they were before. They were searching, looking for any confirmation that what you both just did truly meant more. It makes him look vulnerable, something he rarely shows. It makes you smile at the prospect of him opening up even more. 

“Not until today. It’s strange now that I think about it.”

“And why is that?”

“I never saw you coming, I guess. Even when it is clear as day how you felt about me, I never got anything that told me it was real. I didn’t want to potentially screw anything up between us.”

He hums, a look of contemplation on his face before taking a hand and rubbing his face, a long sigh coming out in the process. “I suppose that’s my fault.”

You can’t help but look confused. His fault? “Why do you say that?”

“I haven’t been fully honest, but ever since I came here, no matter how welcomed and appreciated I am here, I have contemplated leaving.” His hand leaves his face to go behind your neck, lightly scratching the skin at the nape before continuing. “I’ve been alone for a long time. Having a family has never been in the books for me. It is easier to not let people in.”

“So, that’s why I couldn’t see you coming. You hadn’t made up your mind?”

“It’s possible, but it’s just a theory.”

“But, if that’s the case, have you made your mind up?” You start rubbing his chest with your palm, feeling his heart pulse slowly. You are confident you know the answer now, but you want to hear him say it.

He grunts in laughter, shaking his head slightly before letting his fingers curl around the back of your neck. “I think you know the answer, princess. But if you really want to know, come up here.”

You push yourself from him, moving so you are straddling his torso. He brings his hands to your face once more, pulling you down so you are face to face with him. He kisses you, slowly initiating intimacy with his lips. He isn’t saying anything, but you can feel what he is saying through the act alone. 

“I can’t close myself off from you,” he says between kisses. “And I don’t want to. Especially if you’ll have me.”

“I think you already know the answer to that, Lo.”

“Still, I wanna hear you say it.”

You pull away so you can look into his eyes, giving him all the sincerity you can muster. “I love you, and I want you to stand by me.”

He smiles teeth and all, and pulls you back down, kissing all over your face causing you to squeal. “Hmm I love you too, sweetheart. Always have.”

You both stay like that for a while, basking in each other's company in post-coital ecstasy by continuing to taste one another. Another thought came over you, and you can’t help but laugh again.

“If I had known sex would make you like this, I would have made a move a long time ago.” Logan jokes, breathing them in. 

“I’m sorry, but I’m laughing because it took me taking your cigars hostage to do it.”

Logan throws his head back, chuckling at what you presume is the same thing you are laughing about.

“Speaking of those cigars, can you grab them for me?”

You perk up, pushing away from him to lean over to your side of the bed. Your fingers stretch for the book, getting a grasp on it before getting settled back with Logan. He pulls you in quickly, hurdling you into his side. You see he has his lighter ready, which he must have grabbed while you were getting his cigars.

“You gonna smoke one?”

He hums, taking one out. “I only smoke these on special occasions. I think this qualifies.”

He carefully unsheathes a claw, cutting the end before it sinks back under his skin. He flickers the lighter, letting the bright flame linger on the end to get a good burn going. He then lays back, pulling you even closer into his side, before taking his first puff. 

You smile, laying your head against him as you let your eyes drift closed. You feel yourself drifting away, the smell of his cigar and the sound of his pulse lulling you to a deep sleep; a sleep with dreams that you hope feel like déjà vu in the near future.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

“That Makes Me Smart”

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/12/04/its-not-a-lie/#its-a-premature-truth

The Biden administration disappointed, frustrated and enraged in so many ways, including abetting a genocide – but one consistent bright spot over the past four years was the unseen-for-generations frontal assault on corporate power and corporate corruption.

The three words that define this battle above all others are "unfair and deceptive" – words that appear in Section 5 of the Federal Trade Commission Act and other legislation modeled on it, like USC40 Section 41712(a), which gives the Department of Transportation the power to ban "unfair and deceptive" practices as well:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/01/10/the-courage-to-govern/#whos-in-charge

When Congress created an agency to punish "unfair and deceptive" conduct, they were saying to the American people, "You have a right not to be cheated." While this may sound obvious, it's hardly how the world works.

To get a sense of how many ripoffs are part of our daily lives, let's take a little tour of the ways that the FTC and other agencies have used the "unfair and deceptive" standard to defend you over the past four years. Take Amazon Prime: Amazon executives emailed one another, openly admitting that in their user tests, the public was consistently fooled by Amazon's "get free shipping with Prime" dialog boxes, thinking they were signing up for free shipping and not understanding that they were actually signing up to send the company $140/year. They had tested other versions of the signup workflow that users were able to correctly interpret, but they decided to go with the confusing version because it made them more money:

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2024/05/amazon-execs-may-be-personally-liable-for-tricking-users-into-prime-sign-ups/

Getting you signed up for Prime isn't just a matter of taking $140 out of your pocket once – because while Amazon has produced a greased slide that whisks you into a recurring Prime subscription, the process for canceling that recurring payment is more like a greased pole you must climb to escape the Prime pit. This is typical of many services, where signing up happens in a couple clicks, but canceling is a Kafkaesque nightmare. The FTC decided that this was an "unfair and deceptive" business practice and used its authority to create a "Click to Cancel" rule that says businesses have to make it as easy to cancel a recurring payment as it was to sign up for it:

https://www.theregister.com/2023/07/12/ftc_cancel_subscriptions/

Once businesses have you locked in, they also spy on you, ingesting masses of commercial surveillance data that you "consented" to by buying a car, or clicking to a website, or installing an app, or just physically existing in space. They use this to implement "surveillance pricing," raising prices based on their estimation of your desperation. Uber got caught doing this a decade ago, raising the price of taxi rides for users whose batteries were about to die, but these days, everyone's in on the game. For example, McDonald's has invested in a company that spies on your finances to determine when your payday is, and then raises the price of your usual breakfast sandwich by a dollar the day you get paid:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/06/05/your-price-named/#privacy-first-again

Everything about this is "unfair and deceptive" – from switching prices the second you click into the store to the sham of consent that consists of, say, picking up your tickets to a show and being ordered to download an app that comes with 20,000 words of terms and conditions that allows the company that sends you a QR code to spy on you for the rest of your life in any way they can and sell the data to anyone who'll buy it.

As bad as it is to be trapped in an abusive relationship as a shopper, it's a million times worse to be trapped as a worker. One in 18 American workers is under a noncompete "agreement" that makes it illegal for you to change jobs and work for someone else in the same industry. The vast majority of these workers are in low-waged food-service jobs. The primary use of the American noncompete is to stop the cashier at Wendy's from getting an extra $0.25/hour by taking a job at McDonald's.

Noncompetes are shrouded in a fog of easily dispelled bossly bullshit: claims that noncompetes raise wages (empirically, this is untrue), or that they enable "IP"-intensive industries to grow by protecting their trade secrets. This claim is such bullshit: you can tell by the fact that noncompetes are banned under California's state constitution and yet the most IP-intensive industries have attracted hundreds of billions – if not trillions – in investment capital even though none of their workforce can be bound under a noncompete. The FTC's order banning noncompetes for every worker in America simply brings the labor regime that created Silicon Valley and Hollywood to the rest of the country:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/26/hit-with-a-brick/#graceful-failure

Noncompetes aren't the only "unfair and deceptive" practice used against American workers. The past decade has seen the rise of private equity consolidation in several low-waged industries, like pet grooming. The new owners of every pet grooming salon within 20 miles of your house haven't just slashed workers' wages, they've also cooked up a scheme that lets them charge workers thousands of dollars if they quit these shitty jobs. This scheme is called a "training repayment agreement provision" (TRAP!): workers who are TRAPped at Petsmart are made to work doing menial jobs like sweeping up the floor for three to four weeks. Petsmart calls this "training," and values it at $5,500. If you quit your pet grooming job in the next two years, you legally owe PetSmart $5,500 to "repay" them for the training:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/08/04/its-a-trap/#a-little-on-the-nose

Workers are also subjected to "unfair and deceptive" bossware: "AI" tools sold to bosses that claim they can sort good workers from bad, but actually serve as random-number generators that penalize workers in arbitrary, life-destroying ways:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/11/26/hawtch-hawtch/#you-treasure-what-you-measure

Some of the most "unfair and deceptive" conduct we endure happens in shadowy corners of industry, where obscure middlemen help consolidated industries raise prices and pick your pocket. All the meat you buy in the grocery store comes from a cartel of processing and packing companies that all subscribe to the same "price consulting" services that tells them how to coordinate across-the-board price rises (tell me again how greedflation isn't a thing?):

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/04/dont-let-your-meat-loaf/#meaty-beaty-big-and-bouncy

It's not just food, it's all of Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs. Take shelter: the highly consolidated landlord industry uses apps like Realpage to coordinate rental price hikes, turning the housing crisis into a housing emergency:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/07/24/gouging-the-all-seeing-eye/#i-spy

And of course, health is the most "unfair and deceptive" industry of all. Useless middlemen like "Pharmacy Benefit Managers" ("a spreadsheet with political power" -Matt Stoller) coordinate massive price-hikes in the drugs you need to stay alive, which is why Americans pay substantially more for medicine than anyone else in the world, even as the US government spends more than any other to fund pharma research, using public money:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/09/23/shield-of-boringness/#some-men-rob-you-with-a-fountain-pen

It's not just drugs: every piece of equipment – think hospital beds and nuclear medicine machines – as well as all the consumables – from bandages to saline – at your local hospital runs through a cartel of "Group Purchasing Organizations" that do for hospital equipment what PBMs do for medicine:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/09/27/lethal-dysfunction/#luxury-bones

For the past four years, we've lived in an America where a substantial portion of the administrative state went to war every day to stamp out unfair and deceptive practices. It's still happening: yesterday, the CFPB (which Musk has vowed to shut down) proposed a new rule that would ban the entire data brokerage industry, who nonconsensually harvest information about every American, and package it up into categories like "teenagers from red states seeking abortions" and "military service personnel with gambling habits" and "seniors with dementia" and sell this to marketers, stalkers, foreign governments and anyone else with a credit-card:

https://www.consumerfinance.gov/about-us/newsroom/cfpb-proposes-rule-to-stop-data-brokers-from-selling-sensitive-personal-data-to-scammers-stalkers-and-spies/

And on the same day, the FTC banned the location brokers who spy on your every movement and sell your past and present location, again, to marketers, stalkers, foreign governments and anyone with a credit card:

https://www.404media.co/ftc-bans-location-data-company-that-powers-the-surveillance-ecosystem/

These are tantalizing previews of a better life for every American, one in which the rule is, "play fair." That's not the world that Trump and his allies want to build. Their motto isn't "cheaters never prosper" – it's "caveat emptor," let the buyer beware.

Remember the 2016 debate where Clinton accused Trump of cheating on his taxes and he admitted to it, saying "That makes me smart?" Trumpism is the movement of "that makes me smart" life, where if you get scammed, that's your own damned fault. Sorry, loser, you lost.

Nowhere do you see this more than in cryptocurrencyland, so it's not a coincidence that tens – perhaps hundreds – in dark crypto money was flushed into the election, first to overpower Democratic primaries and kick out Dem legislators who'd used their power to fight the "unfair and deceptive" crowd:

https://www.politico.com/newsletters/california-playbook-pm/2024/02/13/crypto-comes-for-katie-porter-00141261

And then to fight Dems across the board (even the Dems whose primary victories were funded by dark crypto money) and elect the GOP as the party of "caveat emptor"/"that makes me smart":

https://www.coindesk.com/news-analysis/2024/12/02/crypto-cash-fueled-53-members-of-the-next-u-s-congress

Crypto epitomizes the caveat emptor economy. By design, fraudulent crypto transactions can't be reversed. If you get suckered, that's canonically a you problem. And boy oh boy, do crypto users get suckered (including and especially those who buy Trump's shitcoins):

https://www.web3isgoinggreat.com/

And for crypto users who get ripped off because they've parked their "money" in an online wallet, there's no sympathy, just "not your keys, not your coins":

https://www.ledger.com/academy/not-your-keys-not-your-coins-why-it-matters

A cornerstone of the "unfair and deceptive" world is that only suckers – that is, outsiders, marks and little people – have to endure consequences when they get rooked. When insiders get ripped off, all principle is jettisoned. So it's not surprising that when crypto insiders got taken for millions the first time they created a DAO, they tore up all the rules of the crypto world and gave themselves the mulligan that none of the rest of us are entitled to in cryptoland:

https://blog.ethereum.org/2016/07/20/hard-fork-completed

Where you find crypto, you find Elon Musk, the guy who epitomizes caveat emptor thinking. This is a guy who has lied to drivers to get them to buy Teslas by promising "full self driving in one year," every year, since 2015:

https://www.consumerreports.org/cars/autonomous-driving/timeline-of-tesla-self-driving-aspirations-a9686689375/

Musk told investors that he had a "prototype" autonomous robot that could replace their workers, then demoed a guy in a robot suit, pretending to be a robot:

https://gizmodo.com/elon-musk-unveils-his-funniest-vaporware-yet-1847523016

Then Musk did it again, two years later, demoing a remote-control robot while lying and claiming that it was autonomous:

https://techcrunch.com/2024/10/14/tesla-optimus-bots-were-controlled-by-humans-during-the-we-robot-event

This is entirely typical of the AI sector, in which "AIs" are revealed, over and over, to be low-waged workers pretending to be robots, so much so that Indian tech industry insiders joke that "AI" stands for "Absent Indians":

https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/29/pay-no-attention/#to-the-little-man-behind-the-curtain

Musk's view is that he's not a liar, merely a teller of premature truths. Autonomous cars and robots are just around the corner (just like the chatbots that can do your job, and not merely convince your boss to fire you while failing to do your job). He's not tricking you, he's just faking it until he makes it. It's not a scam, it's inspirational. Of course, if he's wrong and you are scammed, well, that's a you problem. Caveat emptor. That makes him smart.

Musk does this all the time. Take the Twitter blue tick, originally conceived of as a way to keep Twitter users from being scammed ("unfair and deceptive") by con artists pretending to be famous people. Musk's inaugural act at Twitter was to take away blue ticks from verified users and sell them to anyone who'd pay $8/month. Almost no one coughed up for this – the main exception being scammers, who used their purchased, unverified blue ticks to steal from Twitter users ("that makes me smart").

As Twitter hemorrhaged advertising revenue and Musk became increasingly desperate to materialize an army of $8/month paid subscribers, he pulled another scam: he nonconsensually applied blue ticks to prominent accounts, in a bid to trick normies into thinking that widely read people valued blue ticks so much they were paying for them out of their own pockets:

https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-65365366

If you were tricked into buying a blue tick on this pretense, well, caveat emptor. Besides, it's not a lie, it's a premature truth. Someday all those widely read users with nonconsensual blue ticks will surely value them so highly that they do start to pay for them. And if they don't? Well, Musk got your $8: "that makes me smart."

Scammers will always tell you that they're not lying to you, merely telling premature truths. Sam Bankman-Fried's defenders will tell you that he didn't actually steal all those billions. He gambled them on a bet that (sorta-kinda) paid off. Eventually, he was able to make all his victims (sorta-kinda) whole, so it's not even a theft:

https://www.cnn.com/2024/05/08/business/ftx-bankruptcy-plan-repay-creditors/index.html

Likewise, Tether, a "stablecoin" that was unable to pass an audit for many years as it issued unbacked, unregulated securities while lying and saying that for every dollar they minted, they had a dollar in reserves. Tether now (maybe) has reserves to equal its outstanding coins, so obviously all those years where they made false claims, they weren't lying, merely telling a premature truth:

https://creators.spotify.com/pod/show/cryptocriticscorner/episodes/Tether-wins–Skeptics-lose-the-end-of-an-era-e2rhf5e

If Tether had failed a margin call during those years and you'd lost everything, well, caveat emptor. The Tether insiders were always insulated from that risk, and that's all that matters: "that makes me smart."

When I think about the next four years, this is how I frame it: the victory of "that makes me smart" over "fairness and truth."

For years, progressives have pointed out the right's hypocrisy, despite that fact that Americans have been conditioned to be so cynical that even the rankest hypocrisy doesn't register. But "caveat emptor?" That isn't just someone else's bad belief or low ethics: it's the way that your life is materially, significantly worsened. The Biden administration – divided between corporate Dems and the Warren/Sanders wing that went to war on "unfair and deceptive" – was ashamed and nearly silent on its groundbreaking work fighting for fairness and honesty. That was a titanic mistake.

Americans may not care about hypocrisy, but they really care about being stolen from. No one wants to be a sucker.

[brehaaorgana]

ADHD money/budgeting system I'm currently using for my benefit is going well (I've been using it for like half a year now?), and I wanna recommend it.

You Need a Budget is EXCELLENT. 10/10 do recommend. Uhhh rambling about it and my generic disclaimers + gushing extensively under the cut but TL;DR I think it's great for ADHD ppl, I've used it for 6+ months now and I find it super SUPER helpful. also weirdly fun.

DISCLAIMERS:

Budgeting helps you understand/know your money, it can't make money appear where there is none.

Everyone should learn to budget even if you don't have much money (especially then)

This is NOT a magic trick solution. Just like everything else, it is an assistive tool. This is one of those adult things we can't simply opt out of without negative consequences, though.

My advice is based on something I am currently able to do. That is, I can spend an amount of money on this specific thing that works well for me. If you have no extra money to spend then previously I was tracking things in a notebook. So you can still do this.

I believe Dave Ramsey is a fundie fraud/hack and no one should listen to him about money.

DID YOU KNOW THEY CANCELLED MINT???

Okay? OKAY.

Ahem.

You Need a Budget is EXCELLENT.

It is called YNAB for short. The first 34 days are your free trial, and that is my referral link. If anyone uses it and then signs up for a subscription, we both get a month free. Also you can share a subscription with up to six people (account owner can see everything but individuals can pick and choose what they share amongst each other) so like...idk your whole polycule can be on one account. Or your kids. Whatever.

If you are a student, it's free for a year. If you aren't, a subscription is $99 for a year (paid all at once) or $14.99 monthly, which is equivalent to paying Amazon prime. Go cancel Prime and get this instead tbh.

They got a whole article just on ynab and ADHD. They also have like...a big variety of ways to access their info? They have a book, podcast episodes, YouTube videos, blog posts, q&A's, free live workshops you can join (you can request live captioning), emails they can send (if you want) a wiki, and so on. They got workshops on all kinds of topics!!

So whatever ends up working for your brain. It also has a matching app.

If you lost Mint this year they have a gajillion things for moving from Mint.

Also they have a "got five minutes?" Page which has a slider so you can decide how much attention/time you have before going on lol:

They only have 4 rules of the budget, they're simple and practical, and it doesn't get judgey or like...mean about your spending.

1. Give every dollar a job 2. Embrace your true expenses 3. Roll with the punches 4. Age your money.

THEN THEY BREAK THESE DOWN INTO SMALL STEPS FOR YOU! They even have a printable! Also these rules are great because there's built in expectations that things WILL HAPPEN and it's NOT all or nothing with a fear of total collapse into failure. Reality and The Plan don't always align, especially if you have ADHD. So it's directing our energy towards the true expenses and not clinging to The Plan!! over reality.

You can automate a lot of shit (you can sync with your bank accounts just like mint, but also automate tagging the categories of regular expenses/transactions). And if for whatever reason you accidentally do something that makes the budget look weird or wrong:

A) you can usually fix it somehow OR b) they have like, a button you can press that gives you a clean slate and archives the previous version of the budget for you.

So if you forget for a few weeks or months, or accidentally input something wildly wrong, or just don't want to look at a really terrible month anymore and feel like you need a fresh start you can usually either fix it or start fresh which is really nice.

The app also (for whatever reason) scratches my itch to have things like...have incentives or little game-like goals in a way mint never did? I don't know why. Filling up the bars or putting money into the categories to cover my expenses is satisfying lmao. You can also make a big wish expense category for all the fun shit you want, and fund it whenever you can and then you can see the little bar go up and that's fun.

Anyways I've been using it for like 6+ months now and I think it's really helped me when I use it.

[versethetic]

NOT PERFECT. JUST LOYAL.

i like to keep things real here so i tend to share my slight struggles with loa so that others who’ve gone through the same thing don’t beat themselves up over it.

but i’ve actually only fully understood what it means to live in imagination for a little while now;, and then put it to good use just a couple weeks ago.

despite knowing about the law for over a year…💀

OVER. A. YEAR…💀💀💀

even then, i got so caught up in making the images in my head perfect, or making sure i’m “saying the right affirmations" which obviously didn't help my case

i love reading loa posts because they make me feel nice and inspired and just remind me of my power but i somehow equated that as me overconsuming info and then i would spiral within my own head.

i would barely think of my desires as mine and when i did for only a day or two, i’d then turn around and believe that i wasn’t doing enough, that i need to affirm more or visualize for an hour and walk through every step of my day in my new perfect life or else it wouldn't manifest.

loyal according to merriam webster is "unswerving in allegiance"

all the way up until a couple weeks ago, i was not loyal to the idea that my imagination is all i need. i was not loyal to the idea that the 3d means absolutely nothing in terms of “getting” what you want, because there was nothing for me to get. now, i have become loyal to already having my perfect life.

i am that bitch. i am the prettiest princess. i am the smartest in school. i am the most famous. but i didn't need to have the perfect mindset with loa to realize it.

do you see where i’m going with this?

IMAGINATION IS ALL YOU NEED

granted, i had my days after this realization where i still struggled with techniques or accepting my new life as mine, but now i know that if i don’t identify with these things, it has not a single setback on my manifestations.

no matter what i was feeling, i told myself “i have it, my life is perfect, i am calm, i have it in imagination, the old senses are dead to me, i know what’s in my mind is the real truth”

when loa blogs say that you know you have it, it’s not some cheap trick they spew out because everyone else is saying it. if you imagine what you want, it’s officially set in stone. what you think comes to life.

the 3d is the afterimage, the product of a movie you directed, wrote, produced and starred in. you just need to stick with this fact through thick and thin, sleet or snow.

YOU are what the 3d answers to.

YOU are what the mirror reflects.

YOU decide how simple things are for you.

if you woke up and the old senses in front of your human eyes still show something you don’t like, are you gonna take that as a fact?

when you know and are loyal to the fact that your godly brain is showing you that devoted sp you have? that grand big mansion you live in? that whole new life you’re dwelling in?

NO. you’re not. think of you and you're 4d as BFFs who'll never separate, who tell each other everything and have those bff necklaces and go everywhere and do everything with each other. or imagine you're a ceo and your 4d is a loyal secretary who never asks questions and simply obeys whatever you tell it to do, because it trusts YOU. it works for YOU. however you wanna see it, you and your 4d are locked in 🔐🤞, okay? it is not separate from you, it does not seek guidance or information from anywhere other than YOU.

IT IS YOU.

and it took me a long time to see that.

it might be hard at first and the acceptance might not always be there. but i am making a conscious effort to at LEAST continuously tell myself that my imagination is all that matters. to at LEAST believe that what i want is already mine, and that’s the LEAST you can do as well.

your journey does not have to be perfect. your mindset does not have to be perfect. your feelings do not have to be perfect. mine definitely weren't. you just need to be loyal to your imagination.

[spacelazarwolf]

y’all i found it, i found the post that originated the claim that i’m a ZionistTM and it’s even more ridiculous than i expected.

—————————————

—————————

this is, of course, the same person who labeled me a MisogynistTM for making a half baked joke reblog basically saying “jewish standards of masculinity are different than white western standards of masculinity” then cited orthodox judaism, a community i’m not a part of, as why Actually The Jewish Community Is Horrifically Misogynistic And Bad (as if i haven’t faced misogyny from jewish cis men before???????)

anyway, my post in this screenshot didn’t once mention israel. it didn’t mention zionism. it was talking about antisemitism. i turned off reblogs because people were making it about zionism and israel, which was derailing my original point. i set a specific boundary and people kept crossing it, so i turned reblogs off and blocked people who wouldn’t leave it alone. absolutely nothing about that could possibly indicate that i’m a zionist unless you think that diaspora jews setting boundaries about being forced into a conversation about israel, especially one where we are essentially being blamed for the antisemitism we face because of the government of a country we don’t even live in and have no control over (there’s a phrase that, it’s called dual loyalty and it’s been getting jews killed for decades) or if you think simply talking about the history of antisemitism and current rising levels of antisemitism is somehow “zionist propaganda” in which case you might want to get your head out of your ass and question why you’re agreeing with literal nazis. also bonus points for this person literally just blatantly blaming jews in the tags for the rise in antisemitism because we’re apparently not being antizionist enough to deserve basic human decency and safety! not even trying to hide it anymore huh!

and of course it worked like a charm bc now, months later, you have people saying this:

“the jew is trying to disguise himself as one of you to trick you!!!!!! he is actually evil and trying to manipulate you to further his evil (((zionist))) plans!!!!!!!!!! beware!!!!!!!!!!!” which is literally just repackaged antisemitic tropes that are centuries old. i’ve never interacted with the person in this screenshot in my entire life, and yet they seem to think they have insider knowledge into my Evil Zionist Plans to infiltrate the community and spread Zionist Propaganda because they interacted with one gentile witch that threw a hissy fit about being told not to be antisemitic in discourse about gentiles appropriating lillith. this gentile decided that every single jew who disagreed with them was a zionist, and when i told them it was antisemitic as fuck to call any jew they disagree with a zionist they went on about me being a “raging zionist” and “faking being queer” for DAYS. so it’s not a mystery where the person in this screenshot got the “ooh scary (((zionist))) pretending to be queer and trans to spread his evil (((zionist))) propaganda” rhetoric from. it’s word-for-word from the gentile witch who was pissed about fucking LILLITH DISCOURSE.

bc the thing is, these ppl don’t actually care if i’m a zionist. if they did, they would be engaging with what i’ve said (which is practically nothing because i knew the second the word israel touched my blog that this would happen — which is why i didn’t want people going on and on about israel on a post about antisemitism). they know that labeling a jew a zionist is an immediate death sentence in progressive circles. they know it’s the easiest way to discredit a jew you don’t like. because it doesn’t matter how many times you say “no, i’m not” you will be forever tainted in the eyes of gentiles by that accusation. that’s why they made the accusation in the first place. and so i will continue to not share any of my thoughts or opinions other than “i’m pro palestinian liberation” and “i’m not a zionist” and people will ignore that to play yet another game of Zionist Telephone to target a jew they don’t like. it’s not the first time it’s happened, to me or in general, and it won’t be the last time. i just hope people seeing this and reading this will help people understand how fucked up and antisemitic it is.

so yeah. if you see accusations floating around that i’m a zionist, this is where it came from. a situation that is textbook dual loyalty, being punished for setting boundaries on my own blog, and people who hate trans men jumping at the chance to demonize one with one of the easiest tricks in the book as soon as they see he’s also jewish. the fact i keep having to address this when the origin of the rumor is literally just antisemitism should heavily inform how seriously you take random claims online that a jew is a zionist. most of the time it’s just blatant antisemitism, and very often it’s a way to silence an unrelated conversation that person was trying to have.

[theragethatisdesire]

much ado about nothing chapter 3 - plug!eren x reader - 18+!!!

DISCLAIMER: this post contains MATURE CONTENT that is intended only for those over 18. minors and ageless blogs, please do not read below the cut.

finally!!!!!!!!!! finally all the tension has led to something.....well, some of the tension, anyway. you and eren are both idiots in denial, but you're horny idiots in denial, which makes all the difference. hope y'all have your a/c on, bc it's about to get hot in here.

corny jokes aside, pls enjoy chapter 3 of plug!eren and get ready to get steamy (finally!!!! sorry for holding out on you<3333)

miss the first couple chapters? find the series masterlist HERE

specific cws: smut, nasty nasty smut. mentions of drugs/alcohol. use of pet names, squirting, oral (fem!receiving), eren being a cute little shit

-

“That’s a fair thought to lie between maids’ legs.” - Hamlet by William Shakespeare (Act III, Scene 2)

You make your way through your weekly routine, but Eren follows you everywhere you go. You see him in the dark-haired man two rows over in the library, the smell of weed walking down fraternity row, in the kissing couple sitting on the campus’ main water fountain. It doesn’t help that Historia won’t shut up about him, scolding you day and night for not bringing him to your bed that night.

Part of you agrees with her, but another, more sinister part of you relishes in the denial of it all, the hot anticipation that courses through you each time he sends you a cheeky text about nothing. You promised yourself one fuck, one good, long fuck, and you were leaving him in the dust, and you weren’t going to rush to get it out of your way.

You’re busy anyway, heading over to The 104th Bean, the campus coffee spot, on quick feet to make it in time to the study group you were hosting for a few of your students. You didn’t think the sonnets you’d assigned for this week were too complex, but a good chunk of them were struggling with the meter of the lines. It was the least you could do to offer them an opportunity for one-on-one help, and in lieu of an office, 104 was the best spot to get it done.

“Hi guys,” you breeze in, breathless and slamming a stack of papers down on the table your students have gathered at, “sorry I’m a little late.”

“We just got here,” Falco, a precious, blonde wisp of a kid smiles brightly up at you, “and we went ahead and got you a coffee. It’s still hot.”

“Aw, thank you guys,” you gratefully accept the paper cup he offers you. It’s your favorite brew, and you raise your eyebrows in surprise. “Which one of you figured out my coffee order?”

“All of us,” Gabi shrugs, “you bring the same thing to class literally every day.”

“We have a whole thing about it in the group text,” Zofia wiggles her phone at you.

“I might need to offer some extra credit.” You take a sip, closing your eyes at the blissful feeling of caffeine rushing into your half-conscious brain. You jump straight into the material, deciding to tackle the sonnets one by one, line by line until they’ve all made perfect sense to your little group of college kids. They’re all smart, evidenced by the way they question their way to the answer before you can give it, and in their defense, some of the sonnets you pulled have been from your graduate classes. You spend the next hour working through everything with them, a welcome reprieve from sitting alone in front of your laptop, tugging at your hair.

“I…um, need to go to the restroom,” Gabi checks her phone and stands suddenly, looking frantic. You frown, but wave her off in the direction of the bathroom, making a mental note to send Zofia after her if she didn’t return soon.

After a few minutes have passed, Gabi sits back at the table, looking much calmer than when she’d left. You don’t make any note of it, until a tall figure catches your attention out of the corner of your eye. You’re positive that it’s your mind playing tricks on you like it has been all week, until you hear a familiar timbre calling your name.

Eren’s sullen mouth widens into that heartstopping, crooked grin as he walks over to wrap his arms around you in a hug that makes your knees weak. “What are you doing here?”

“Study group,” you gesture at your students, noticing that Gabi’s blushing heavily and pointedly avoiding eye contact with both of you. Ah. “Working?”

Eren glances at Gabi and looks at his shoes. “Nah, just needed a coffee.”

“Uh-huh,” you roll your eyes. He’s not even holding a cup, and you’re not buying his story for a second. As her professor, you should scold Gabi for buying drugs which are definitely banned on campus, but considering that you’re plotting to get into her dealer’s pants, you figure that might be a tad hypocritical.

“You didn’t text me back last night,” Eren pokes a finger into your ribs playfully. You’re well-aware of your students’ eyes boring into your back, watching intently as their professor’s personal life spills into their study session. Great material for the group text.

“I knocked out! You know I’m busy.”

“Too busy to reply to my memes about Jujutsu Kaisen?” Eren cocks an eyebrow.

“Apparently so. I woke up with my phone still unlocked and stuck to my face.” That draws a laugh out of him.

“Okay fine,” Eren concedes, “but if you’re not going to pay attention to my very funny memes over text, then you’ll have to check them out in person.”

“Eren,” you hiss, flicking your head in the direction of your suspiciously-silent students, “Would it kill you to behave?” Eren scoffs.

“They’re not listening. What about tonight? We can watch a movie or something.”

Watch a movie. You want to inform him that each one of those students is very much listening to him shamelessly flirt with you, students that absolutely know what “watch a movie” is code for. Especially Gabi, who knows exactly what Eren’s occupation is from experience and will likely be all too thrilled to inform her classmates that you’re banging her hot drug dealer. Simply getting Eren to leave is probably your best bet at retaining any shred of respect your students hold for you.

You can’t resist teasing him a little first. “Is that what an old man does on a Friday night? Watch movies?”

“Mikasa’s covering some clients for me,” Eren admits, “if you come over, that is.”

“I think I’m free tonight,” you scan through your lengthy list of obligations in your head, trying to ignore the way your heart flutters as you realize he’s already gone out of his way to cover work and give you both your alone time, “as long as you don’t mind if I bring some quizzes over with me. I still have my 9:00 am’s to grade.”

“Can I help?” Eren’s eyes light up, childlike and excited.

“You don’t even know the answers.”

“Straight As for everyone,” Eren smiles, changing his tune when you shoot him a look, “straight Fs, then?”

“It won’t take me long, twenty minutes tops, and then you can pester me with all the memes you want. Deal?”

“You got it, teach.” Eren’s tone is suggestive enough to make your face warm, and you shoo him away from the table of young adults that you literally must remain respectable in the eyes of. Eren bids you goodbye with a wink that goes straight to the warmth pooling between your legs. You allow yourself one deep breath to regain your composure, turning back to your students with a wide, nervous smile.

“Sorry about that, guys.”

“Is that your boyfriend?” Zofia flinches when Gabi kicks her under the table with a loud bang.

You hesitate. No, just the hot guy I have no business getting wrapped up with that I’m going to let fuck me stupid later. “Just a friend.”

“He seemed pretty into you to be just a friend,” Falco teases.

“Do you want to fail your next three tests?” You raise an eyebrow at him, and he balks, turning back to his notebook with a mumbled apology. You don’t miss the way Gabi’s looking at you, something between embarrassment and curiosity on her face. You can’t blame her; you’re not far enough in age from your students to be completely out of touch, and if you found out one of your professors had been sleeping with someone as deliciously dangerous as Eren, you would have been all over spreading that rumor.

Friends with someone like Eren, you correct yourself in your mind, remembering that you haven’t slept together, not quite yet. Tonight’s apparently the night, though, and your chest is tight with anticipation. It’s all you can do to pull yourself together and make it through the day, breaking out in a cold sweat when Eren shoots you a reminder text to head to his place around 7:00.

“Oh you’re getting laid. You’re so getting laid!” Historia squeals excitedly through your phone speaker. “I never thought this day would come!”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence,” you say, letting the sarcasm drip freely from your voice. Your nervous hands had started shaking in your pockets as you rode down the elevator shaft to embark on the twelve-minute walk to Eren’s, so you had Facetimed Historia for a distraction. All you had gotten in return so far, however, was a whole bunch of shrieking.

“You just second guess yourself too much,” Historia says, shaking the camera, “let loose, live a little like we used to.”

“Living like we used to is what had me crying in the shower over a frat boy every two weeks, remember?”

“Eren’s not like that,” Historia dismisses you, “and honestly, he seems into you.”

“He invited me over to come fuck in broad daylight, so yeah, Stor, I’d say he’s fairly into me.”

“Not like that, like actually into you. I’ve never seen him get all touchy with anyone like he did the other night. Plus, he drove you home, which was super sweet.”

Oh, calling Historia was a mistake. Big mistake. That’s the last thought you need in your mind on your way to your one-and-done, already being a repeat offender for catching feelings from basically nothing. Eren’s too volatile to play with, too charming, and if you’re not careful, you’ll fall right into a trap he probably doesn’t even know he’s setting for you.

“I don’t know,” Ymir chimes in from somewhere off-camera, “guys will do a whole bunch of shit to get laid. Probably doesn't mean anything.”

“You’re literally a lesbian, Ymir, shut up,” Historia snips. You raise an eyebrow.

“Do the words ‘pot’ and ‘kettle’ have any meaning to you?”

Historia rolls her eyes. “Ymir’s like, allergic to penises, don’t listen to her. I, on the other hand, have a million guy friends and, with no emotional or sexual interference in my male-female relationships, I have learned to read them like books. Deny it all you want, but he’s totally got a little crush on you.”

“This is the last thing I need to hear,” you groan, “he’s too pretty for me to think he has a crush on me. We’re fucking just this one time, and then I’m done with him.”

“Sure,” Historia smirks knowingly, “I’m sure Sasha’s roommate said that too.”

“And they never dated either, so that’s on her for breaking her own rule.” You’re pushing back a little too hard to be described as anything but defensive, you know it, but a small, wavering flicker of hope in your chest wants Historia to keep going, wants her to be right. Because Eren’s dreamy, makes you want to kick your feet and twirl your hair like a schoolgirl, and if anything actually came of this, you wouldn’t be the one to say no.

However, you’re heading over for a meaningless, one-time fuck, so feelings need to be pushed to the back of your mind.

“You’re never any fun,” Historia pouts.

“Two days ago I drank an entire bottle of wine with you for zero reason other than the fact that you wanted to get drunk and cry to Taylor Swift. That’s plenty of fun.”

“She does that to you, too?” Ymir commiserates, still off-camera.

“Okay, it’s Eren-talk time, not shit-on-Historia time,” Historia huffs, blowing a strand of blonde out of her eyes. A notification pops up on your phone: destination in 200ft.

“Oh my god, I’m almost there,” you practically moan, covering your face with your hand, “what if he does have a massive dick and it like, impales my uterus or something?”

“No dick talk!” Ymir snaps. Historia shushes her.

“Relax, for every rumor about a guy’s dick, you have to knock, like, two inches off what you hear. Trust me.”

“What if I choke on it and throw up on him?”

“I’ve seen you deepthroat an entire banana without batting an eye,” Historia pulls a knowing face.

“What if this whole thing is a prank and Ashton Kutcher pops out and they’ve somehow started up a Punk’d remake that I don’t know about–”

“Then you get a selfie with Ashton Kutcher and call it a day,” Historia laughs, “you’re working yourself up way too much. Remember when you used to be a slut and do this, like, five times a week?”

“Jesus,” you hear Ymir mutter.

“Thanks, Stor. Thanks so much.”

“No, but seriously. Eren might be hot and funny or whatever else you like about him, but he’s just a guy. You are also hot and funny and totally a catch, you’ve got the upper hand here!”

“Ugh,” you stop a few feet from Eren’s drive, knowing you would fully die if he overheard you gossiping about him on the phone. “I’m here. Let me just get this over with, and I’ll see you at home later.”

“Yeah, when Eren answers the door, try to sound a little more excited that you’re going to get laid and less like you’re going to your execution,” Historia traces a smile onto her cheeks with a pink fingernail, “good luck!”

“Use a condom!” Ymir pipes up just as the call ends.

You look over at Eren’s house, cute and squat with its little red door, and trudge up the sidewalk before you can lose your nerve. You wince at the tremors shaking your fist as you knock, wanting to run away or throw up or disappear–

“Hey,” Eren answers the door with a broad grin. You eye his gray sweatpants, essentially straight woman kryptonite, and gulp. He knows too much.

“Hey,” you force a smile, letting him beckon you inside. It smells…very nice. Not as boyish as it should. You take note of the candle burning on the coffee table with a little smile.

“Want anything to snack on? I have popcorn, stuff for quesadillas, cosmic brownies…” Eren’s eyes twinkle at the last suggestion. You’re not surprised; he seems like the type to have an insatiable sweet tooth.

“I ate before I came over, but thanks anyway,” you say, fiddling with the zipper on your jacket. Eren takes note of your twitchy hands, raises an eyebrow at you.

“You okay?”

“Yeah,” you say automatically, embarrassed that he’s caught you flustered. He’s just a guy. “It’s…okay, it’s honestly just been awhile.”

You expect him to laugh or tease you, but Eren just smiles that stupid fucking canine-heavy, disarming smile. “We’re just chilling, okay? No sweat.”

“No sweat,” you repeat, admittedly feeling a little better now that you’ve gotten it out. Eren’s new to you, still unfamiliar and full of surprises, but for some odd reason, you trust him. There’s something comfortable and steady in his casual confidence that eases your nerves and ignites a pounding in your heart all at once.

“So, I was thinking Texas Chainsaw,” Eren goes on like you hadn’t just shared a little moment in the hallway, flopping onto the couch, “but if you’re not into horror, I’d be down for Pineapple Express.”

The irony’s so blatant it’s almost not funny.

“So, the drug dealer wants to watch Pineapple Express?” You plop down beside him, relieved that he’s drawn you to the living room as opposed to his bedroom. Sure, you feel better, but you know one look at Eren’s bed would ignite a fresh wave of nerves. Eren rolls his eyes as you poke fun at him.

“It’s a classic!”

“For seventeen-year-old stoners, definitely. What about Grease? That’s a classic.”

Eren lolls his head on your shoulder, pretending to snore. You smack his face lightly, still giggling under your breath, and he fakes jumping awake, shaking his head. “Sorry, I dozed off. Boring.”

“Okay, fine, let’s just do your horror movie,” you sigh, knowing that if everything goes according to plan, you won’t be stuck watching the movie for long. “I’ve never seen that one, and isn’t it sort of a pillar of the scary movie realm?”

Eren pauses his thumb on the remote to gape at you. “You’ve never seen Chainsaw Massacre? Like, ever?”

“Nope.”

“Holy shit. Prepare yourself to be educated,” Eren mumbles disbelievingly under his breath, finding the movie quickly and standing to turn the lamps in the room off, leaving nothing but the cozy glow of string lights and the TV. “Ready?”

You snuggle into his side, letting him pull you close enough to feel his chest rise and fall under your face. “Ready.”

The movie doesn’t hold your attention, too caught up in Eren’s embrace to pay much attention to the plot. He’s got one arm around your shoulders, hand dangling down far enough that you can reach your hand up to play with his large fingers. It’s comfortable, probably a little too comfortable for a quick fuck, but you’re content, trying your best to focus on the film until he makes his move.

“M’bored,” Eren says abruptly, after not even thirty minutes.

“You picked this movie,” you argue, peering up to look at him. He’s feigning a pout, but there’s something mischievous glittering in his eyes.

“Yeah because I thought you’d scream,” he says, shrugging, “but for someone who didn’t want to watch a scary movie, you don’t seem very scared.”

“I’m not screaming because it’s predictable.”

“You’ve never even seen it, you should be screaming.”

“You need a horror movie to make me scream?” You’re tired of the games, confidence restored as you remember just how badly you want what you came here for. Historia was right, he’s just a guy, and you’re ready to get laid. Eren blinks for a brief second, caught off guard, but a slow, wolfish grin slowly begins to spread over his face.

“Is that what we’re doing now? Talking shit?”

You’ve dug your grave now, blood running hot with anticipation. Might as well get comfortable. “Maybe.”

Eren shifts, pulls you into his lap to straddle him chest to chest. Through your leggings, you can feel the outline of him, intimidating and hard, rubbing against your core. It draws a little gasp from you; no running from him now. “Yeah? Where’d that mean mouth go?”

You lean in, already eager to feel his lips on yours, but Eren reclines further, making you chase him.

“Cat got your tongue?” Eren chides, tongue darting out to wet his lips. “Thought you wanted to be mean to me.”

“That’s not what I want.” Your voice already sounds gone, breathy and heavy in your mouth.

“What do you want then?”

“Wanna kiss you,” you admit, hating how strung out you already are, hot between your thighs and shaky in the hands. Eren smiles at you, so sweet and easy on the surface, but you can see the danger lurking behind it. He’s going to eat you alive.

Eren leans forward, leaving a chaste peck on your lips. You make a discontented sound as he pulls away. “What’s that for? Gave you what you wanted.”

“Not like that,” you play with the strings of his hoodie, not even able to look him in the eye, lest he see the unadulterated want pulsing through you, “like…”

“The other night?” Eren finishes for you, a shit-eating grin plastered on his face. “Been thinking about it?”

“Mhm.” He puts his hands on your hips, and you hum at the heat of his hands through your clothes. Unexpectedly, Eren pushes you down, grinds you against the erection growing in those damned sweatpants, ripping a humiliating, choked sound out of your throat. You aren’t sure what you’d expected of him, but you definitely hadn’t anticipated this level of boldness.

“Been touching yourself? Thinking about me?” Eren asks, low and expectant. You nod, hating yourself for admitting to your late night transgressions, giving into him so easily. “Good. ‘ve been doing the same thing.”

Eren swallows the little moan that spills out of your mouth, crashing into you, all teeth and tongue. He’s sloppy, far more demanding than he had been the first time around, licking into your mouth and fisting a hand into your hair. His other hand’s still hard at work, moving your hips against him, letting out little grunts when you grind down particularly hard.

“Not here, need to,” Eren pants into your mouth, trying to speak around your tongue slipping between his lips, “need to take you to my room. Is that okay? Need you to tell me now if it’s not.”

Your heart melts; you want to kick yourself for ever calling him ‘scummy’. Even in the midst of your heated moment, Eren’s eyes are blown wide, scanning over your face for any sign of hesitation.

“Please,” you purr against him, peppering his jawline with kisses and rubbing yourself on him wantonly. Eren groans deep in his chest, a sound that makes your cunt throb between your legs. That convinces him; he scoops you up, legs around his waist like you weigh nothing– god, it always strikes you just how strong he is– stumbling through the house and letting you plant sloppy, open-mouthed kisses down his throat.

You bounce on his bed when he tosses you, not even taking your eyes off of him for a moment to do a quick inventory of the room. You decide you’ll take the time to investigate afterwards, greedy for any details that might unravel the mechanisms behind the man in front of you. Eren’s practically ripping his hoodie off where he towers over you, revealing an expanse of hard muscle nestled under olive skin, random little tattoos etched into his physique here and there. You want to trace those tattoos with your tongue, feel how the skin gives under your teeth. Your jaw drops an inch or two; you reach a hand up to ghost your fingertips under the ripples of his ridiculous six-pack.

“You’re a drug dealer. What do you even need muscles like that for?”

Eren snickers, letting you have your fun for only a moment before he’s reaching down to tug your top over your head.

“I have a lot of down time, I guess. You’re one to talk anyway,” he sucks in a breath, crawling over you and forcing you back on your elbows, “I mean, just look at you.”

You bring your hands up to your face to hide where your cheeks are growing warm under his lecherous gaze, but Eren’s having none of it, pulling them above your head and securing them by the wrists.

“Ah ah ah,” he tuts, mouthing his way down your neck, “why so shy all of the sudden? Don’t hide from me now.”

“S-sorry,” you stutter, back unwittingly arching, shoving your chest closer to his eager mouth. Eren releases you to unclip your bra, slide it over your shoulders. His eyes darken even further, bright green deepening into the shade of a dark, forest floor.

“So fuckin’ pretty,” Eren mumbles, leaning down to drag his tongue over the tops of your breasts. It’s lewd, sloppy, the way he licks at you like you’re something sweet, something to be eaten, but you like it, fisting your hands in his dark hair and clutching him to your chest. Eren’s large hands palm at your tits; he takes one nipple in his mouth and you sigh contentedly as he sucks, nips at you in all the right places. “You've got the most beautiful body, baby. Feel good?”

“Yeah, feels good,” you whisper, cradling him so close you might be suffocating him, but you don’t care. There’s something akin to a Greek god licking at your tits, looking up at you like you’re the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen, can you really help yourself?

Eren kisses down your stomach, tugging your leggings and panties down easily, propping your legs open for him. You frown, popping up on your elbows, more than ready to just get him inside of you as fast as you can at this point. What stops you is the extremely sexy noise he lets out at the sight of you, bordering on a growl.

“Such a pretty pussy,” he absentmindedly circles your clit with his thumb, dips it into your hole a few times, testing the waters.

“Eren, no– want you in me,” you pull at his shoulder pointedly, but Eren just chuckles, breath fanning over your sensitive cunt, making you jolt.

“Gotta get you ready for me, yeah?” Eren tilts his head innocently, rubbing a little faster against your clit. Your words die in your throat, nothing but a broken whimper slipping out in place of your protests. “See? Just want to taste you, know you’ll be so sweet.”

“Fine, knock yourself out,” you say, trying to appear at least slightly less wrecked than you are. Eren looks up at you, amused.

“Gonna fuck that attitude right out of you if you’re not careful.” Jesus, the mouth on him. You bite your lip, too afraid of what might come out if you dare to respond. You believe him.

Eren’s leaning in, licking through your folds lazily, no clear plan in mind, just getting a taste for you like he said he would. Somehow, even with his warning, it still catches you off guard, the hot lathing of his tongue into your center.

“Shit,” Eren groans into you, “you taste so fucking good.”

His words go straight to your pussy, and you twist your fingers in his hair shamelessly, pulling insistently. You need far more than what he’s giving. You need what you know he’s capable of.

“Where’s all that shit talking now?” Eren chuckles under his breath, the vibrations sending a fresh wave of heat through your body.

“C’mon Eren, quit fucking with me,” you pant, making the mistake of looking down. Whatever you were about to say gets lodged in your chest; Eren’s looking right back up at you, bottom half of his face tucked into your cunt and one eyebrow cocked smugly.

“Need something?”

“Your mouth, your f-fingers, please–” you’re off the deep end, feeling yourself spiral further down into Eren’s little world of hot hands and devilish lips, bottomless need threatening to swallow you whole. You’re not the begging type, but for him? You’re as good as on your knees.

“There you go,” Eren coos, sinking a long finger into your heat, crooking it just right to punch a groan from you, “can have whatever you want, baby, just gotta ask.”

His mouth closes around your clit, sucks hard just as his finger nudges into the perfect spot in your walls, that spot that makes your head spin. You’re crooning above him, muttering something about how good it feels, how you need more, putty in his experienced hands. When he slips another finger into you, picking up his rhythm, you nearly cry, tears welling in your eyes as he works you open.

“That’s– fuck, that’s so good,” you whine, fisting the sheets, his hair, your own chest, anything you can sink your claws into to keep you grounded in the moment, keep you from floating away like you feel like you’re going to. Your hips are canting up into Eren’s mouth of their own accord; you buck so violently that Eren has to throw his free arm over your stomach, locking you in place so that you have no choice but to stay and take what he’s giving you. “Eren, I–”

“Hm?” He hums against your swollen clit; you can even feel his lips stretch into a grin against you.

“Don’t stop, I’m gonna– gonna cum,”  you manage, legs already beginning to shake. Every part of you feels like it’s on fire; when Eren presses his arm down a little harder on your lower abdomen, a strange, sticky heat starts building in your stomach. “Eren–”

“Come on, baby,” Eren huffs, sinking a third finger into you, stretching you impossibly wider. You’re wet enough that it doesn’t hurt, but the shock of it is enough to make you cry out. “Don’t fight it, want it so fucking bad. Let go for me.”

That’s enough to hurl you over the edge, obscene sounds spilling from you as you jerk in his hold. You’re vaguely aware of the squirt dribbling out of you, soaking the sheets, but you’re preoccupied with the earth-shattering orgasm rocking through your body, the lewd slurping sounds Eren’s making between your legs, groaning into you as you cum violently on his face. You finally begin to settle, shoving at Eren’s head and whimpering from the overstimulation.

He presses his lips to your hip bone before he comes back to you, pulling you into a filthy kiss, both of your faces drenched in your cum and sticking together. When he pulls back, you nearly cum again at the sight of your slick literally dripping from his chin.

“How was that?”

“Fine,” you pant, “just fine.”

Eren laughs, a real laugh that pulls a giggle out of you too, makes everything just a little less intense. “So you’re good?”

“I’m very good,” you grin up at him, bleary-eyed and blissed out. Eren falls back against the headboard, sitting himself up. You notice two things right off the bat: 1. that his gray sweatpants are gone and 2. that the rumor mill wasn’t lying.

His dick is massive, wide enough that your fingers wouldn’t touch if you wrapped them around it and long enough that you’re pretty sure it would slap against your belly button if you laid it just right. It’s pretty, too; flushed red tip leaking precum down his shaft in a way that makes your mouth water. Your eyes widen, apparently enough for Eren to notice.

“Quit drooling and get over here,” he chuckles, grabbing you under your arms and pulling you to his chest, forcing your legs to spread over his thighs, “wanna see you ride me first.”

“I’m not drooling,” you scowl defensively, trying to regain some of your composure after whimpering and crying for him only a minute ago. He’s just a guy, Historia’s words echo in your mind.

“Go for it, then,” Eren smirks, landing a light smack on your ass that makes you jolt. You steel your gaze against his, determined not to give him the upper hand.

You take him in your hand, slide the head through your wet folds, earn yourself a hiss from him. Shit, even the tip catching on your eager hole has an intimidating stretch to it. He wants you to sit on this thing?

Either Eren’s a mind reader, or your hesitation is written all over your face because he cups your chin, pulling you down to him for a troublingly tender kiss.

“Just a little at a time, okay?”

You’re humiliated by his encouragement, but you tuck your lip between your teeth and nod, pressing just the head into you, pride forgotten on account of the slight burn between your legs as you sink down on him.

“Oh,” you sigh, long and languid, head rolling back off of your shoulders at the stretch. Eren’s grin has fizzled out into a look of fascination, his eyes glued to where he’s splitting you open. You inch down a little further, wincing at the ache in your thighs and in your walls; he feels even bigger than he looks. Eren notices, wipes a thumb under your eye at a stray tear.

“You good?”

“Yeah,” you hiss out through your clenched jaw, “s’just…so much.”

“Doing so good for me,” Eren’s thumb returns to your clit, swiping across it softly, “does this help?”

Your answer is nothing but a heady whine as you drop down another inch or so, cunt pulsing around the welcome intrusion. Eren’s trying to comfort you, holding you tight to his chest now and murmuring little encouragements into your ear, but his voice is strained and you can feel his hips twitching, begging to buck up into you, just as unraveled as you are at this point. After what seems like eternity, you’re almost there, feeling him deep in you, nudging against your cervix, but there’s still a small space between you, one you can’t manage to close.

“I can’t, Eren,” you whimper, fucking yourself up and down on him in an effort to get that last little bit in, “won’t fit.”

“Yeah it will,” Eren simpers, taking you by the waist, “lemme help.”

Eren adjusts the way you’re sitting, leans you back just a little, and he’s right. The small space between you disappears, both of you groaning when your clit meets his stomach.

“Oh, f-fuck,” you stammer, rolling your hips against him experimentally.

“So goddamned tight,” Eren huffs, voice gruff with the strain of keeping himself under control, “so fucking perfect for me.”

You move, rocking this way and that, marveling at the way each new angle feels. Eren’s digging his teeth into his bottom lips, squeezing your hips hard enough to bruise, but he holds himself back, letting you work yourself open and get a feel for him. When you lean forward, brace your hands on his shoulders and grind your hips back, his cock nudges a spot in you that makes you see stars. You collapse onto Eren’s chest, rutting your hips into him desperately, panting.

“Right there?” Eren’s hands finally move, pulling and pushing your hips back and forth against the spot that has you mewling into his chest.

“Right there,” you gasp, feeling your orgasm building upon itself embarrassingly fast, still raw from his fingers.

“That’s right,” he grunts, moving your body against him faster, “not so mean with my dick up in you, are you?”

You mumble something unintelligible in response that would have been muffled by Eren’s shoulder between your teeth even if it had been a coherent sentence. Your eyes roll back in your head as the pressure builds, and Eren releases his grip from one of your hips to rub hard, fast circles against your clit.

“Come on,” Eren licks up your neck, “give me one more. You can do it, baby, just one more.”

And just like that, you’re cumming again, wailing into his sweaty skin as tears fill your eyes. Eren guides you through it, working your hips into a slow grind, groaning deeply in your ear as you ride it out, moving your hips along with the rhythm he’s set. He rubs circles into your back as you come down, leaving a litter of kisses along your shoulders while you tremble on top of him, nails dug into his biceps.

“That was a big one,” Eren grins at you, all cocky and stupid, when you pull back to look at him. You’re too exhausted to berate his smugness, laughing breathlessly.

“It was good,” you agree, whimpering when Eren lifts you off of him. He tosses you to the side, propping you up on your hands and knees.

“Gonna let me have my fun, now?” Eren asks from behind you, landing a few light spanks to your ass.

“That wasn’t fun?”

“Oh, it was very fun,” Eren slides back into you, all the way to the hilt, punching a groan from your throat, “but doesn’t this feel so much better?”

Before you can respond, Eren’s got his hand around your throat, pulling you up onto your knees until your back is flush with his chest. His fingers sneak up, grab your chin, force you to look down.

“See? Like this, you can even see where I’m fucking all the way up into your little tummy.” His free hand rubs lovingly over the little bulge in the bottom of your stomach pulsing in and out in accordance with his slow thrusts. At this angle, Eren’s hitting that gummy spot in your walls dead-on with each snap of his hips; all you can do is cry and whimper pitifully as he picks up his pace, skin on skin echoing throughout the room. 

“E-Eren— fuck,” you can barely form words, overcome by the way he’s just using you, manhandling you and bullying you into the shape of him. Your fucked out mind struggles to grasp onto Historia’s reminder; Eren’s not just a guy, he's ruining you for any man to come after him.

“Feel good, baby?” Eren releases you, placing a hand between your shoulder blades, shoving your face into the mattress creaking underneath you and shoving himself that much deeper, fucking up against your cervix. “You feel so good for me. Best pussy I’ve ever had baby, s’like magic.”

You notice the slur in his words, like he’s drunk on you, getting lost in you as much as you’re drowning in him. You shove your hips back towards him, trying to line up in rhythm with his thrusts, make this good for him too instead of being a complete pillow princess. Eren slaps his hands onto your hips and grabs hard, hard enough to leave little fingerprint bruises and move your hips for you.

“Look at you, pretty little thing all slutted out just for me,” he sounds strung out, like his inner monologue is just spilling from his lips, “lemme take care of you, bet I can-“

A hand wraps around your body, thrumming insistently against your puffy, sore clit. You’d like to think the sound that erupts from you is more akin to a moan than a scream, but you’d be lying to yourself. You claw at the bedsheets, desperately trying to run away from the overstimulation- it’s so much, he’s so much-

“Don’t run from me,” Eren slaps your clit sharply, “you can cum again for me, can’t you? After all that fucking talk earlier, I know you can.”

“I can’t, I can-“

“Yes you can,” Eren’s whispering all sweet in your ear like he’s not fucking the life out of you, “just one more, baby, then I’ll give you mine. Promise you can do it.”

Your abused cunt tightens around Eren so viciously you nearly push him out, sobbing into the bed sheets as Eren shoves you over the edge for the third time that night. Eren’s murmuring in your ear how good you are for him, how good you feel, how pretty you look crying for him, only making it all that much sweeter. His hips begin to stutter behind you, and he cums deep in you with a loud groan and a generous amount of swearing.

You collapse in a sweaty heap, Eren pulling you to his chest and affectionately rubbing circles into your back, whispering sweet nothings as you sniffle into your chest. When you start to come back to yourself, giving Eren a meek smile, he runs off to the bathroom for a washcloth to handle the wreck between your legs. That gives you the opportunity to sit up, clutching the sheets to your chest to protect any sense of modesty you might have after that, and take a look around his room.

There are some anime posters on the walls, Jujutsu Kaisen (naturally), Death Note, Bleach, and a framed picture of Eren, Armin, and Mikasa as children. You notice there’s nothing resembling a family photo, and your heart thuds sadly. There’s a desk in the corner scattered with papers, and your curiosity wins out over the trembling in your legs. You toddle over on weak knees, sheets wrapped tightly around yourself, wincing at the feeling of Eren’s cum dripping between your thighs.

To your surprise, most of the papers littering the little desk are sketches of buildings, measurements and keys to each drawing detailed on the side in neat handwriting. They almost look like blueprints, professional and meticulous. You pick one up and study it, missing the creak of the bedroom door.

“What are you doing?” Eren’s got a suspicious look on his face, holding a little cloth and a cup of water in his hands.

“Sorry,” you’re flustered, dropping the paper onto the desk, “I was just–”

“Snooping?” He cocks a knowing eyebrow, walking over to you. Your cheeks warm.

“A little. What are these?”

Eren joins you by the desk, spreading a large hand over the collection of drawings. “Designs.”

“For what?”

“I was an engineering major,” he says simply, shrugging. You can tell he’s a little uncomfortable, but when he doesn’t elaborate, your curiosity outweighs your manners.

“You went to college?”

“Don’t say it like that,” Eren chides, scooping you up bridal-style, sheets and all, and walking you both back over to sit on the bed. Your stomach does somersaults; you don’t think you’ll ever get tired of how easily he can just move you where he wants. “Yeah, I sell drugs or whatever, but ‘m not a complete idiot.”

“I’m sorry,” you say earnestly, letting him open your legs and gently wipe at you where you’re sticky and dripping, “I didn’t mean it like that. I’m just surprised s’all. Why didn’t you do anything with your degree?”

Eren frowns, clearly you’ve hit a sore spot. “I couldn’t stand the idea of the nine to five, wife and kids shit. My dad and my brother really pushed it on me, so they haven’t exactly been gung-ho about the fact I never used my diploma. They still think I’m just bartending somewhere.”

You wince; from your conversation at Scout’s, you know you’ve now tread into completely inappropriate territory for a one-night stand. “I didn’t mean to bring it up, I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Eren offers a tense smile, “you didn’t know.”

“Your drawings are actually really good.”

“They’re designs, not drawings,” Eren corrects you with a chuckle, “just because I finished school doesn’t mean I stopped liking the work. Just…don’t really want to settle yet, you know?”

You nod. “I know the feeling. Want to just drop it?”

Eren smiles gratefully, pulling the sheets back around you. “You cold? I can find something comfy for you to throw on while I cook.”

You scrunch your nose. “Cook?”

“Think I’d put in that much work on you and not take care of you after?” Eren snorts, already having set you on the bed and started rummaging through his drawers. “What kind of man do you take me for?”

You blush, having expected nothing more than a pat on the bottom and a goodbye after Eren added you as another notch in his belt. “Didn’t particularly take you for any type of man, but definitely not a chef. What are you cooking?

“Burgers,” Eren turns around with a triumphant grin, holding out a corny t-shirt that says Kiss the Chef on it in enormous, white letters. “You want this one, or the Grill Dad shirt?”

[mrs-gauche]

Hey guys! 🙂 It's the end of 2024 and I realized today I haven't posted on here since finishing Veilguard.

Well, to make it short.. since then, I've spent a lot of time thinking about it, replaying it, watching my friends who are DA casuals and not into fandom play it (which was very enlightening but also hilarious 😂), so now.. I feel like I'm at a point where I know exactly what my issues with this game are and I've made peace with it. I still love Dragon Age! And I love parts of Veilguard and I had a ton of fun playing it (though probably for all the wrong reasons 🥲). When I first finished the game, I cried tears of happiness that after ten years my favorite character actually somehow got a beautiful Happy Ending and closure, but also tears of sorrow that this marks the end of the story that was set up back in 2009.. and tears of mourning that this story had all the potential to be so so SO much more.

Dragon Age is a very weird franchise in that all the games have been, in many ways, vastly different from each other and to be a fan of the whole series means to recognize all its flaws and changes, but still loving it because of its unique core elements that glue it together and make it so special. I could sit here for hours trying to put into words what I think went wrong with Veilguard, but I know many people have already done so far more eloquently than I ever could. This blog was always meant to be just a positive little corner to share my love for these games and silly VA stuff with other people and I'm sure I will eventually reblog all the two million posts I've liked over the past month, both positive and critical. But for now and the new year, I want to focus my time and energy on just being creative, getting back to drawing and trying to realize ideas about DA I've had for a looong time and that's my way of "emotionally recovering" (that sounds so dramatic 😂). 💜

With that being said... What a crazy decade year it has been for me personally in this fandom... So I want to look back at it, just some rambling under the cut, 'cause I'm a little sentimental now, I guess. 🥲

Before I created this blog, I was mostly just a lurker on here for many years, despite being a fan of BioWare games since.. uh.. forever? lol But I was always waaay too insecure about my English, let alone my own art. I also have social anxiety, so maybe that was part of the reason why I decided to finally create this blog at a time when the fandom was at its most dormant? lol (There is also a whole separate post for another day about how Mass Effect influenced me personally and how it made my biggest dream come true, the enormous honor to voice a few NPCs in (the German version of) Andromeda. Still the craziest thing to ever happen to me. lol)

So, seeing all the crazy excitement and the fandom fully revived this year and all these months leading up to Veilguard was both incredibly overwhelming, but also the most fun I've ever had as being part of a fandom! This year also marked the first time I posted my own art online and I can't even put into words how crazy it was seeing the response to that and I still can't believe that Trick Weekes not only commented on but also reposted it, that is still f*cking insane to me and I'll never forget the morning I woke up to see that. lmao

So yeah.. THAT happened. Followed by what I think has to be one of the weirdest, craziest marketing campaigns I've ever seen. lol Going back to 2022, we truly had it all...

A title announcement on a random Thursday that was probably done so that it would not be confused with the Netflix series announced a few days later. A tie-in comic more than a year before release that was... a little pointless? lol A vinyl collection that spoiled the composers a year before release. A title change literally two days before the first trailer. A reveal trailer that left many in shock because of its tone shift and complete lack of the former title character. A line of Game Informer articles that left us often times with more questions than answers. Every single article being deleted the very next month due to GI shutting down. An actor panel at SDCC happening right as Sag Aftra went on strike. A "fandom" party that had nothing to do with Dragon Age. Jason Derulo. An artbook that accidentally revealed the release date with its pre-order, which was then deleted. Twice. Memes about roadmaps. A second trailer that in hindsight probably should've been the first one. An audio drama by a different writing team with some baffling (but funny) lore mistakes. A combat showcase starting off with a disclaimer that "footage had been edited due to spoilers"... followed by THE biggest spoiler in literally the first ten seconds. The first IGN video with super spoilery dev commentary. A hand-on preview event with 140 people leading to spoilers galore... Did I mention spoilers? lol

That was when I stopped looking at stuff online, so I don't know what happened after that, but WOW, what a crazy ride that was. 🥲 Truly a DA4 Summer to remember and I'm unironically so grateful to have witnessed it in real time with all of you. 😂

Then finally, after ten flippin years of tinfoiling, speculating, reading crazy development stories and clowning around at every gaming live event, Veilguard was finally released and it will probably go down as the most emotionally charged Halloween of my life. lmao

Then it was time to actually play The Veilguard. Which took me about a month.

A month filled with what I can only describe as a crazy rollercoaster of conflicting emotions. Aside from everything having to do with Solas, I'd say my personal highlights of the entire experience was seeing Felassan (I screamed), the PHOTO MODE and even one hilarious "breaking the fourth wall" moment, where I would frantically run around in Elgar'nan's trap in "Blood of Arlathan", to a point where I would yell at the screen "SOLAS, I COULD USE SOME HELP NOW, HELLO???" and hearing his flippin voice literally two seconds later going "Yes, you called?" and I freaked out so hard I dropped the controller. 😂😂😂 Also, as someone who romanced Alistair in my first playthrough of DAO and brought him to the final battle not knowing he would sacrifice himself, you can imagine my flashbacks when I saw Davrin dying at Tearstone.. who I had romanced. 💀 Or the Dark Ritual flashbacks when I saw Morrigan wanting to talk to me right before the final mission. lol Getting the Felassan rune actually made me tear up a little. There are many little moments like that that I loved or that made me emotional, but ultimately.. Veilguard is a game that, for all the amazing graphics and cutscenes and flashy combat.. the more I think about the story and the lore (or lack thereof), the more I end up confused and trying to figure out what it is that's breaking the immersion to me in a way that the previous games didn't.

But anyway... I finished Veilguard, though the DA craziness of 2024 wasn't over just yet and I didn't know that the best was yet to come in December. lol

So.. Years ago, one of the main reasons I created this blog was to make silly "appreciation posts" about Solas' German VA and ramble on about my love for his performance.. I even remember making a post on here like three years ago talking about how I would sadly never EVER get a chance to meet his VA personally, because that man never ever goes to any fan conventions or public events. lol

Well... GUESS WHO I MET AT THE GERMAN COMIC CON EARLIER THIS MONTH!!!

YES GUYS, without sounding like a weirdo (because despite my obsession with voice acting, I don't care for VAs social accounts or anything beyond their work as a VA), but after years of jokingly referring to this blog as the "Ozan Ünal Appreciation Blog", and kinda the reason I made this blog in the first place, I finally met the man himself and it was probably the best friggin fan experience I could've wished for. 🥲🥲🥲

See, I've met a lot of different VAs at Cons before, who were all super nice and awesome to talk to.. but let me tell you, this guy has such an incredibly contagious positive attitude and charm!! lol Me and my friend were literally the last to stand in line at his booth before the event closed, there were TONS of people (there were quite a few VAs at the Con, but his booth had BY FAR the most people in line the whole day lol) and yet he made sure to take the time to talk with every single person, asking questions, was genuinely interested in our opinions, joking around and just generally SO FRIGGIN NICE. And he's just a very chill and funny dude? lol

And it was so funny, because there were SO many people and yet apparently I was the only person that day to talk to him about DA and Solas and he was SO excited about it 😂😂😂 (I bet like 90% of the fans talked to him about his VA work on Vampire Diaries, The Big Bang Theory, Gravity Falls and Nicholas Hoult lol).

And of course, because DA4 happened so recently, it was still fresh in his memory. He told us that he even watched some Let's Plays and asked what we thought of the game and I'm still laughing so hard, because he was literally like "Oh yeah, the lore is MASSIVE and it was so overwhelming and I could barely keep up with it, the whole time I had no idea what I was talking about.. like, what exactly IS Mythal??" LMAOOO His performance for Solas was so good and so convincing and now I'll always have to picture him standing in the recording booth, no flippin clue what he's actually talking about. lmaoo And then my friend was pointing at me like "She's actually a walking lore encyclopedia" and then he was like "Oh, you should've been in the booth then!" lol

And I'm actually quite upset on his behalf now, because he also told us how, when the English VAs were officially announced, he had actually made a post on social media about how he was returning for Solas in DA4 and how he got in so much trouble for that because EA told him they were going to make an official announcement.... AND THEN THEY NEVER DID??? Like, I was desperately waiting for an announcement about the German voice cast and they simply never made one, we literally had to wait for the credits to be published? (Also, the German and French version have only one female and one male voice for Rook and no one knows what happened there, we tried to contact them about it, but no response so far?? It's like they don't even care.) That's EA for you...

Anyway, we then chatted a bit more about his other work and stuff and he recorded an audio for me (I actually got him to say the "Vir shiral malasa, bellanaris" GUYS AND IT SOUNDS SO GOOD, like I was so nervous, asking "Could you do elven..?" and he was like "Sure, it's been a year, might be a bit rusty" and then he just knocked it out of the park?? lmao So I have both Lavellan's AND Solas' WEDDING VOWS NOW. 😭😭😭❤❤❤❤❤)

So yeah, that was my meeting with Ozan flippin Ünal and what an awesome guy and amazing VA and what an "epic conclusion" of this year of the Dragon (Age) 2024. lol And the timing feels so strange now, because, in a way, it feels kinda like coming full circle?

Like I said in the beginning, for years I was always mainly a lurker in the fandom and the reason why I created this blog was to join in on the hype/speculation train for DA4 and to talk about Solas' German and French voices and share my silly edits and gifs. And now I've played Veilguard AND I've met Ozan Ünal.. both things that, at some point, I wasn't sure were ever going to happen.....

So.. In terms of my fandom experience, this year was crazy and whatever 2025 brings and whatever happens with this blog or DA in general... I love this fandom (especially my little Solasmancer bubble <3) and I love Dragon Age and whoever's reading this, here's to 2025 and I hope you have a Happy New Year!! 💜💜💜💜💜

[authorsharonforester]

Organization of Multiple Story Projects Helps You Finish Your Writing 

There are countless times where the brain cannot handle juggling multiple writing/editing projects at the same time, but there are also days where switching between projects does the trick to keep you disciplined and not burn out with a single project that you end up rejecting for weeks to months at a time. At the end of the day, you have to do what works for you on most days so that you can keep the creative flow of your writing going. 

I have reached a point in my hobby where I needed to stop the messy editing routine I’ve been engaging in and organize all the stories I decided to prioritize for the editing process. This is what I did to make me feel good about the progress in my writing goal: I grabbed a blue binder and several sheet protectors, printed out all the projects I wanted to edit off my computer, then stuffed them inside the sheet protectors, and placed them into the binder. As I did this, I didn’t limit the number of writing projects I was going to edit. Instead, I pushed my brain aside and let my heart decide, and rolled with that. I have a list of unpublished stories, but nothing too crazy.

I have written a novella that has undergone two rounds of edits and is currently pending a third one. I have a copy of chapters 21, 22 and 23 for the novel I am writing based on my cartoon characters. The book has undergone two edits and is now pending a third one. I have a deleted chapter from this story that I need to add to the deleted scenes computer file. (I am setting these scenes aside so that I could one day publish this after people have read my book and I can show off my writing process with the world. This will be the most fun thing I do for myself and for others who feel they are alone or falling behind.) Lastly, I have written two separate episodes for the aforementioned cartoon characters that have already undergone one round of edits and are pending a second one. (I am planning to publish a show with them). On the first page of the binger (as you can see in the picture), I have a list of pending writing projects. That little list is there to keep me on track with the chosen writing material I need to finish before publication.

This blue binder isn’t the only thing I have. I also have other binders that hold other printed stories awaiting my attention, like the very first book I have written when I was ready to start 7th grade. I have journals that hold handwritten stories I produced when I was a little girl and a teenager. They are pending computer typing meanwhile I edit the rest of these stories.

This is a random strategy I am engaging in so that I can observe my thought process and determine which of my stories my emotions are taking me to. I think the reason I do this is because my brain gets bored and needs to zhuzh up my writing and editing routine before it can allow me to keep moving forward. This might sound like extra steps to some people, but others understand why I need to work with myself this way. I am sure there are others out there doing this exact thing.

It is a fact that we have different obstacles that stump us according to how our brains function individually as people. We see a lot of resources online that claim they have the ultimate method that works to get your writing done and published faster than expected. However, if I were to write a famous article, I’d tell you that there is no singular method that will work well for everyone to finish a project quickly. What works for you personally that you consider to be normal might be considered unorthodox to society.

Part of keeping yourselves grounded is knowing who you guys are as writers. I keep myself grounded on my writing and editing routines by making these blog posts. They make me happy. They allow me to connect with you guys out there in the world. They remind me that I am not alone as a struggler. I make the habit of occasionally reading about other people’s writing, editing and publishing struggles. Mentally, blogging helps me process my thoughts and feelings and helps figure out why I am or am not doing what I do or don’t do while I take the journey to make this writing dream come true. 

[supersoakerfullofblood]

do you have any tips for writing characters who have a lot of difficulty identifying their own emotions (and other people's)? specifically if the work is from their POV. thank you very much!!

I'll start by saying you're in luck--literature's finest characters are defined by their difficulties identifying their emotions! You're in great company.

As a general rule, don't let your character figure out their emotions until you want some resolution in the narrative (climax, ending, or anywhere in between. Or if you have some second conflict in the narrative, feel free to resolve this one earlier). If your character has clarity about how they feel and what they should do about it, you don't have a compelling narrative but a successful therapy. The trick is in misguiding your characters.

You and I and everyone in the world are misguided about our emotions constantly. We want to feel everything on our terms. If we want a coffee, we want our favorite hazelnut latte, not the Americano. If we go through heartache, we still want to be happy, so we turn to coping mechanisms, often unhealthy, to achieve this. We are emotionally greedy.

Your characters also want to feel everything on their terms, and they don't like that they can't, so they turn to something unhealthy, something they think will solve the problem. In previous posts on my blog, I talk about this in terms of "want" and "need." Your character "needs" to handle the emotions as they are through healthy means, but your character "wants" to feel how they want to feel, which in a strong narrative won't make the character feel better. Ask yourself: if my character was real, how would they react to the situation they're in? When you think of anything unhealthy, write it.

As an example in one of my WIPs, a girl is bullied by the popular kids at her school, and she doesn't like that, but she's also friends with one of the popular kids. Instead of talking to this friend about the bullying, instead of talking to the counselor about it, instead of doing anything that would actually resolve her situation, she decides that if she wants people to stop bullying her, she herself needs to become popular. She notices all the popular kids have boyfriends, so she decides she's going to pursue someone. These are pretty steep leaps of logic, but we do it all the time. Has anyone tried to use romance to bandage emotional sores? Of course!

Macbeth is scared of the witches' prophecy. Does come to peace with it? No! He and his wife kill a lotta people!

Think of your favorite book: how do its characters try and fail to come to terms with their emotions?

As far as "how to write," it sounds like you're writing in first person, and if you are, I can't help too much--I have next to no experience there. But if you're narrating through your character's thoughts, never let them land on the right thought, the idea that will get them out of their bind. It might help to focus on physical sensations and the things people say and do around them--how is your character affected, and how do they interpret these things? Never let them interpret them well and correctly until you want resolution.

[billybabearr]

Some BillyBabe fanfic-writing advice needed ⊂⁠(⁠(⁠・⁠▽⁠・⁠)⁠)⁠⊃

So I fell madly in love with the Thai BL 'The Sign'. So much so that it had a horde of plot bunnies run wild in my head.

It gave me so much inspiration that I decided to just start writing again, which makes me unbelievably happy because I definitely forgot how much I enjoyed it.

My story is a RPF about the cast of the show, specifically Babe and Billy, because I just love their relationship (other cast members are featured as well, primarily Heng and Akk).

I don't have a good summary yet, but it's roughly this:

Babe Tanatat never anticipated how much his life would change the moment he stepped onto the set of 'The Sign'. He finds incredible new friends among his co-stars, experiences things he never imagined he would and gets to be part of something truly special.

But every success has it's downsides. From mishaps to accidents to sheer bad luck, everything that can go wrong does.

And if that doesn't make his life complicated enough, Babe finds himself grappling with some unexpected yet very confusing feelings for one particular coworker.

Babe has no idea how he got himself into this mess, nor how he can get out of it.

(Seriously, trying to come up with a half-decent summary is way harder than any writing I've done so far. But I guess coming up with a title will be worse 🫠)

In my story I'm following the episodes, going through them one at a time, picking out scenes that have the potential to go wrong / be funny / etc.. I'm also using the bts-material, as well stuff they said in interviews or offhand comments in their reaction videos (I'm a sucker for details, if you can't tell 😆)

Also, it might have gotten a little out of hand. I've already written around 130k words (not edited or in the correct order, but still), before I decided it might be nice to publish it. And I'm not even halfway through the list of stuff I want for each episode.

And yes, I actually made a list. A (not so) little file for each episode, detailing what scenes and prompts I want there with bullet points for the actual plot. So basically I already have a rough concept/script, but with enough space in between for new ideas.

Since this will be the first time I ever upload a story (on AO3), I'd like to get some opinions on it first.

What do you think about the overall idea? Is it something you might be interested in?

What tense do you prefer while reading - present or past?

What is your preferred chapter length (especially in longer stories)?

What do you think about pictures at the beginning of a chapter? Since I'm following the episodes/bts, there will almost always be a specific scene tied to each chapter. I'm playing with the idea of adding a picture/gif at the start of these. For easy reference where in the storyline we are (or just because they're all cute (⁠◠⁠‿⁠・⁠)). Is that something you'd enjoy? Or do you find it more disruptive/annoying?

And I'm always open to new prompts or plot ideas (tied to specific scenes or not).

I hope some of you can share your thoughts, since I'm a complete newbie to publishing stuff. Any other tips and tricks are always greatly appreciated as well 🤗

Have a good one!

(+ I promise my actual writing is better than whatever weird rant this is. Never done a blog post either, and I'm guessing it shows 😂)

[meimi-haneoka]

Cardcaptor Sakura Clear Card Chapter 78: Comments + JP-ENG translation differences

Hello hello!! End of the month, just witnessed Harvest Moon high in the sky (the last Supermoon of 2023!), and we're back like clockwork with another chapter of Cardcaptor Sakura Clear Card!! I have to say the release of Clear Card chapters have often coincided with a Supermoon and I find that so funny, as well as fitting....the moon is such a big element in this arc!

And as we have seen in this arc, the moon is also a messenger of love, and there's so much of it in this chapter....feelings, conflicting emotions, but most importantly, talks of happiness. This chapter wrecked me with emotions even more than the previous one, as we finally got the Kaito/Akiho moment of "discussion" that we waited for so long....where the focal point of the entire arc is: how far can we push ourselves to make our loved ones happy? Is it right for us to arbitrarily decide for their happiness? Along the years, I've seen countless of complains for how the events of the story were unfolding, for how some characters did absolutely the hell they wanted and made decisions for others, but as I knew perfectly well, a story is something in constant development and the goal wasn't to show how helpless people are or how it was right for others to act in that way, quite the contrary. And we'll see with full force what that means in this chapter of the climax, which is surprisingly BIG (36 pages long).

I also have to (unfortunately) report a quite annoying translation mistake in the English version that can confuse people and trick them to believe that Sakura remembered about a certain someone. Along with the usual nuances and such.

BUT FIRST!!

Hehe, you know what's coming, right?

Akiho went THIS close to go full Greta Thunberg on a certain someone!!! 😂 Let's find out WHO it is under the cut!!

The Color Page

Our Sakura this month takes the color spread with one of the most beautiful portrayal of our little magician: dressed in a very elegant layered white dress with jewels, head covered by a white veil, immersed by half in a pond, she looks halfway between a bride and a priestess! And yes, I can already hear you screaming "Tsubasa!!1!1!!!!" because she vaguely reminds of little Sakura-hime at the reservoir....😆 But I think what really makes the atmosphere of this color page "magical" is the presence of countless spheres of light, which seem to be emerging from crystal water lilies and converge in a huge sphere, which really looks like the moon....just to go back to the incipit of this blog post, right? 😂 After observing this color page, I couldn't help but being reminded of the spheres of light that were featured in the color pages of chapter 52 and 63 (with respectively, Kaito and SyaoSaku). Back in my post of chapter 63 I had made an analysis about what the common thread between those two color pages could be, and especially the significance of those spheres of light. If they really are representing the feelings of love for your dearest person, then I'd like to think that here Sakura is being represented as a "fairy" fostering and releasing that love in the open, to help and save the people dear to her. Which is totally the image I'm getting not only from this chapter, but ever since we started to see what happened in the "re-written world". Sakura is literally a messenger of love. And I love that for her. ❤️

The editorial text in the JP version is referencing what Sakura told Akiho back in chapter 49, right after her "sister" shared with her the recount of her night walk with Kaito: "To me, you’re someone I want to see happy forever. Because you're my friend, and someone really precious to me"

"Blink To Say Yes"

The chapter starts with me making amends to Kaito for the nth time, asking for his forgiveness for doubting his intentions and emotional state way over what was due: as the dragon keeps flying away, Sakura grabs Akiho's hand and starts going after the creature, of course followed by Syaoran, Kero and Yue. Akiho (poor girl, still with a tear in her eye) notices with shock that the "portal" to the fake moon is completely disintegrating, revealing the real moon behind it. Flying side-by-side to the dragon, Sakura realizes that the creature got finally out of that place to avoid that Akiho would put herself in danger: in fact, with the portal disappearing like that, she might have been trapped inside that space forever! Sooo as usual, Kaito's actions are skillfully framed by CLAMP in a way that will make you misunderstand him and think he's being irrational or getting on everyone's nerves on purpose, but no, he was actually just putting Akiho's safety first, as usual. ❤️ I know there were some interpretations of him precisely doing this, but I thought it wasn't the case because Sakura broke the spell inside the fake moon, removing the pressure and all, so I couldn't see what danger he needed to protect her from: in fact, the looming danger was a different one, and it was well symbolized by those "bzzz" sounds and effects near the entrance when Akiho was getting in. I had noticed them but dismissed them as the instability of Touya's time magic. I should've known better! 😆 Sorry, Kaito. I know that the only one who can make you do anything at all is only Akiho! Therefore I'm still laughing at how Sakura tried to convince him to get out for half an hour, when all Akiho needed was to move an inch forward 😆😆😆 I also think that what she told him, the fact that she was sure to be in front of "her most important person", changed things for Kaito. His reaction was tangible, despite being hidden behind the eyes of a dragon. And therefore I'm still partially peeved and heartbroken at him, because before hearing that from her (and seeing her putting herself in danger), he was fully planning on staying inside that space forever. He was refusing to come out, knowing very well that the portal would've disappeared at any minute, eliminating any chance of saving him. How dare you.

Well. We were saying that Sakura realized the dragon's intentions right away, and we see her shouting, with a face halfway between shocked and fired-up, "This means she's important to you, too!" (good job ENG translation for not messing this up, I guess. I was worried). Damn right, Sakura. She must be so confused by this person dragon's behavior. It is all so crystal clear to her. It's not only in her head, all the signs keep confirming to her that he really does consider Akiho very important, even now, immutably. The time he spent in that cage didn't change anything for him (and that, if anything, makes everything even more heartbreaking because of how agonizing that must have been). Sakura just can't understand why this person is acting like this, since he truly does care about Akiho. Refusing to go back to her. None of the people around her behave in this way and for her it must be something very new to deal with - and this reminds me of what a blessing we had to get these new characters in this arc, so different from what she's used to, who sometimes pushed her beyond her comfort zone, hence expanding her experience and making her grow up.

Akiho seems encouraged by Sakura's firm statement, so she takes the matter in her hands and shouts to the dragon to please have a talk with her. She shuts her eyes tight, as if being desperate for him to listen to her.

And that's it. That's all it takes for Kaito to be ol' good Kaito and stop immediately at Akiho's request, looking intently at her. As if he's saying "I'm at your service". I've said it countless times in my blog posts, how Kaito is someone who really would do whatever he wants and listens to no reason, but when it comes to Akiho, he really cannot deny anything to her. Akiho sighs in relief at seeing him stopping, and she starts talking to him, so tiny in front of such a giant (is he supposed to look scary? To me he really isn't, he's quite cute) creature. Akiho is well aware, from the countless books she's read till now, that the ones who can have conversations with dragons are almost entirely people with marvelous capabilities (the ENG went for "strange powers" for this, I don't think it fits). She's got no magical powers, but she quickly comes up with a clever way of "communicating": blink your eyes to say 'yes', do nothing and stay like that to say 'no'. And so she immediately starts, because she needs to know, she needs to understand. It's her goddam*ed right to do so, and Kaito knows this very well, hence why he's not denying her the opportunity. Akiho fires the first question: "Are you the one who re-wrote the world?" Kaito blinks, admitting it. I can see a streak of sadness in his eyes as he opens them again. This doesn't make any good to Akiho, who looks pretty sad as well, at hearing that. It's like having one fear, and seeing it confirmed. But she goes on, explaining how the world she's living in right now is warm and caring, full of people who support her and dote on her as if she were one of their family. While she states this, we can see Tomoyo following the events from the tablet with a concerned face, and Touya looking more and more worn out by the time magic he's being keeping up, sustained by Ruby Moon and Spinel Sun.

Akiho is very intuitive, so it's easy to guess where the question is leading: "Did you rewrite it because I never had this, before? And for that, were you the one who erased any trace of you from inside of me?" The ENG version here adds a "Did you do it to bring me happiness?" which is not incorrect, of course, but it doesn't exist in the JP text, and as usual it's used to spoon-feed the readers as if they couldn't get there on their own (and to probably fill a bubble with something).

Kaito cannot lie to the burning question, and he blinks his eyes. We see appearing a "crease" next to his eye, a clever way from Mokona to show us that he's growing more and more distressed. The pain of remembering how her clan abused her, how they got there because of something he said, the pain that resulted from the decision he made when he was just a kid. And the next question is even more burning.

"Did I wish for it?"

Kaito does nothing, confirming he now understands that in fact, Akiho never asked for this. Never. And the girl herself confirms: "I don't remember (you), but I know. I would never wish for a happiness that did not include you". Kaito listens intently to her. I just can't imagine how it must feel to not remember a single thing about someone, and yet feeling all that love pouring out of you. Simply out of instincts.

I Want My Most Important Person Back

Then, with a very (very) resolute face, Akiho turns to her dear Sakura, and affirms: (JP) "Sakura-san. I want to bring my most important person back". Here it is again, the famous term that we CCS fans all know well, the code for "the person I love", that keeps being changed in the ENG translation to a less recognizable "favorite person", which I'm still not sure conveys the same meaning. Sakura agrees with a pleased smile, she's totally ready to do anything to give her true happiness back to her "sister". Then, she turns to Dragon Kaito, and here we start with the "parallels" that will enrich this chapter of many many additional emotions.

Yes❤️ it's a parallel with Lilie, from chapter 72. Same expression and all. Precisely from when she was telling her the words that Sakura is going to relay to Kaito now: "What is happiness, to you?".

And here I have to introduce probably the worst mess of a translation mistake of this chapter, that will surely confuse people and make them believe things that actually arent' true:

ENG: "Someone asked me that once, too. In a dream. But, try as I might...I couldn't remember who it was. Not until she crossed time and dreams to see me. I think she did that for this moment. And...I think that's why she left me this card in the end, too"

JP: "These are words I've heard in a dream. I can't really remember who said them, no matter how hard I try, but...that person crossed time and dreams in order to come to see me. It was surely for this moment. And...this last Card remained, too...was for this very moment, right?"

I sincerely have no idea how they could mess up and make Sakura say that she actually remembers about Lilie, after she came to see her. Lilie had been so clear about it, in chapter 72, that the Forbidden Magic would've made Sakura forget as soon as she exited the dream, and so it happened, indeed. Why making her basically say that she remembered, afterwards? This is against the script! Moreover, not happy with messing that up, they even made Sakura say that the last Clear Card remained was left by Lilie herself! That's nonsense, that's not what the JP text says! Momo told her that there were some Clear Cards that were protected by her with a spell and they were waiting for Sakura to call them up, that's HOW the Clear Card that we're going to see now is able to be here. Not because Lilie gave it to Sakura. And before anyone points out "yes, but the one who paid for that spell with her ring was Lilie", I have to remind you that Sakura is not supposed to know that. Momo never told her WHO paid that price. So basically this is a mess-up on all fronts. But let's go back to our story because the emotional moments are just escalating. Before Sakura mentions the Card, we can see for a moment Lilie's reflection in the Dragon's eyes. A clear sign that Kaito understood perfectly who Sakura was talking about! And I think it's so beautiful that Sakura, always listening to her intuition (remember how she wasn't very good at this, before? That she dismissed her intuition, and Syaoran told her that his mother taught him not to?), understands that THIS is the moment to get this question out, because here she basically posed this question to Kaito. And this will help him decide in a few pages.

Proceeding forward, we can finally meet the big absentee ever since Sakura secured it back in chapter 33: the Rewind Card!!! One of the most beloved Cards, obviously for its appearance that was based on Syaoran and its cuteness! This card is the last one that still had to appear and that never showed up in Clockland, a sign that Kaito wasn't able to put his hands on it and "drag it" into the fictional world created with Momo's magic. It's the last Card that was waiting to be called by Sakura. And so she does! Syaoran is quite surprised and provides a "Spiderman meme" moment when he realizes that the Card looks just like him! 😂 Sakura explains to him that Record was able to record this Card as well, so that's how she knew of its existence (and not because Lilie gave it to her, once again!!!).

It's time. Sakura announces to the Dragon that she's going to bring him back to "himself". Our girl does so because she wants to implicitly give him the chance to have a say in this. She doesn't really "ask", but it's like she's implicitly doing it, because she wants to make sure that this is something he wants too.

In fact, in a very emotional moment, he and Akiho exchange again a long stare. It's like a silent conversation is going on between them. The dragon is depicted with a painful expression, while Akiho is staring at him firmly and determined. He's still, to the very end, thinking he does not deserve to go back to his human real form and go back to her. But she's unwavering, and uncompromising. She wants him back, and she's going to have him back. Because, after all, under a pile of self-loathing and pain, this is what he wants too. This is his happiness. So, with a very suffering expression, he blinks his eyes one more time to say "go ahead". In his condition, this must have costed him a lot of effort. You know who they reminded me of, in this scene?

Yeah, them. I've been saying it for long time, agreeing with other friends affirming the same in their own posts, how I could see a clear parallel between Clone SyaoSaku from TRC and YunaAki in Clear Card. They didn't exactly go through the same things, but their experiences often overlapped. And this in particular is overlapping really well. As I wrote already in my Twitter thread, he's given a chance to go back, but he's crushed by guilt. He doesn't think he deserves it. But she stares FIRMLY at him, pulling him towards life, a life with her. And he closes his eyes, and caves in. Because in the end, this is what he wants too. To be with her.

So Sakura proceeds. She says that she doesn't know who the Dragon is, but the pocket watch does. And as said pocket watch levitates in the air from Akiho's hands towards the Rewind Card, Sakura explains that it does know him because it used to "weave time" together with him. And so, combining the Card with the watch, Sakura activates Rewind on Kaito, exactly as I expected!

And the moment is absolutely emotional, as we finally see again after 8 long chapters (and relative months), our dear Kaito's face!!! The way the Rewind Card "works" on him is also quite spectacular, from a visual POV, since the pocket watch seemingly "enters" the dragon and frees Kaito from within. The fact is, we don't see the pocket watch after he changed back, so now I'm wondering: did it stay inside of him???

But, whoops, something didn't quite go alright. The black wings of the dragon stick to Kaito's back. Kero observes him and wonders with Yue if he's been a creature like them this whole time, but fear not, Yue dissolves the doubt right away: he thinks he's a regular human magician (the kanji says 魔術師, magician, while the furigana reads ひと, person), it's just that the spell that was active on him (the "Seal of D", as we know) was probably so damn powerful that even borrowing the pocket watch's power (as said in the JP version) wasn't enough for Rewind to bring him completely back to his appearance. Well, you want my opinion? Those wings look FANTASTIC on him and I absolutely want him to keep them!!! (maybe with a little spell he can conceal them when it's not convenient?) 😂❤️ He looks like a dark angel and it's amazing.

Don't Decide My Happiness On My Behalf

But the real, heartwrenching emotional moment starts here. This is also the moment when I started emitting all kinds of inhuman sounds, so I'm grateful I'm not one of those people doing a live reaction on youtube or something because this would be the end of my reputation on the internet 😂😂😂😂

Akiho and Kaito, finally in his original human form, exchange a long stare, again. His face is showing perfectly how he's absolutely heartbroken at what he realized he caused to her. It's guilt adding over guilt. And as she finally looks at the face of the person her heart knows is the one she loves, she can't stop the tears from forming again in her eyes, while she poses the only REAL question that she probably wanted to ask all along:

"Why?"

And as I always do with pivotal moments, I'm going to continue with the direct translation from the JP text, because the ENG added something ("why did you leave me?", which contributes to convey Akiho's feelings and possibly makes this even more romantic) that wasn't there in the original, and I have to be impartial.

Akiho, JP: "Why did you choose to disappear....from the rewritten world?"

I wanted to put the JP version here also because an important verb is missing from the ENG version: choose. Akiho is questioning Kaito about his choice. Because yes, this wasn't a result of a whim, Kaito chose to disappear from her life. And now he has to answer for that. Akiho's face is twisted in pain, as if she's trying to control the tears that now profusely fall from her eyes, and contain an immesurable grief in realizing that her most beloved person chose to remove himself quite definitively from her life.

His reply, though, proceeded to shatter my heart even further, cause it's exactly what I expected and have been saying this whole time.

Kaito, JP: "Because I thought I wasn't necessary to your happiness"

This is the only line we'll hear from Kaito in this chapter. For the rest of it, he'll listen in silence, giving space to Akiho and trying to elaborate. Besides, I want to point out that for the first time ever, he uses "ore" as a personal pronoun while talking to Akiho, and he's also seemingly dropped the use of keigo, the polite speech that he used with basically everyone before. Signifying that he's finally being honest and open, he's being his true self.

In his reply, there's all the self-loathing and hurt and pain he's been experiencing till now. Not recently, but ever since he was a baby. Remember that this boy grew up completely devoid of love in his life, completely abandoned to himself, exploited for his powers by a congregation of criminals. Kaito is, himself, a victim of abuse too, and I would want the CCS readers to acknowledge that more. Because if we have to wonder how we came to this situation, well, this is how. This is the damage that growing up in that kind of environment can cause to people. And we don't have to go that far because, if we remove the "magic" factor from the Association, we can find environments of that kind even in our daily real life. Growing up in that environment didn't stop Kaito from developing attachment to a person. From developing love for them. But, as he grew up not knowing what his self-worth was, being used as a commodity by other people, he's been convinced this whole time that he was nothing to her. That when he managed to accomplish his goal, he wouldn't need to be there because she didn't need him anymore. And I know, I can hear you, "How is it possible that he didn't notice how Akiho looked at him and how she loved him?" That's precisely because of his mental condition that prevented him from seeing or even believing what he was seeing. Kaito thought that he was born alone, and he'd die alone. That no one would ever be able to love him. That's why. And it's heartbreaking that someone would live their life like that.

With such a condition, Kaito's intentions were good but he went down a twisted path to make them true, completely missing the right way to go about it. Akiho doesn't know anything about this, but the heartwrenching scene that follows is something that's absolutely in her right to say. It is something I anticipated so so much.

Akiho, JP (lit.): "Please don't decide my happiness for me! Even if it's you! Please don't tear up and throw away my most important person!!"

Sadness and anger are mixed with Akiho's tears while she pours out all of her pain. I wanted to feature the literal translation of the JP text because I think the verb used, 破り捨ててしまう, depicts a very heartwrenching scene in my head. It is a verb that it's akin to when you tear up a piece of paper and discard it in the trash.

This is literally what Kaito did with his existence, when he went through with his plan.

So Akiho here is not only scolding him because he dared depriving her life of her most important person (and she doesn't care if it's he himself, he's not allowed to do that), but also BECAUSE HE DISREGARDED HIS OWN LIFE IN DOING SO. He's treated himself as a disposable object. And Akiho can't stand that. She loves him so much, despite not remembering a single thing about him, that she can't stand the thought of him hating himself to that point. I think, the way the ENG translation portrayed it, focuses too much on Akiho scolding Kaito for not having the right to remove himself from her life, and completely misses the other, implied, darker part of her line.

Akiho is understandably wrecked and she would want to scold Kaito more, but as she says herself, she doesn't even know what name to call him with. He erased so much from her that she isn't even allowed the luxury to remember his name. But I think this scene here might actually be a foreshadowing for him to reveal his true name to her later, so I'm waiting in anticipation for this (I've been actually waiting ever since chapter 51!). In the meantime, to break a little the drama with a funny moment, I think she wanted to call him baka, but as she doesn't even know his name, she can't do that! 😂what do you think???

And as I always say, Eriol suddenly opens the communication with Sakura to bring bad news! 😂Kaho is exhausted and can't hold the time stopped much longer (furthermore, it seems even Eriol is participating to keep the spell up), so he informs Sakura of that and she thanks him with a worried face. Syaoran looks up and notices that a hole is appearing in the stopped environment, signifying that the time magic is wearing off. So Sakura turns to Akiho and asks her what she wants to do from now. Notice that "from now" well, cause it's very symbolic: it's as if Sakura is saying "other people chose for you till now, but now you're given the chance to finally decide by yourself". With a painful face, eyes drowned in tears, Akiho ponders for a moment and then says that she's been really, really happy to be part of Sakura's family, but if that's not real, then she wants to go back, no matter how much hardships and pain is awaiting ahead. Please register how difficult it must have been for Akiho to wish that. Because right now, she's got all she wanted, love, a warm family, friends and even her most important person is here with her. But the fact is, this arrangement was created by someone with magic, it's not real, it's not how things naturally came to be. Moreover, no matter how strong her love can be, she still doesn't remember anything about her most important person and all she experienced with him, and that is something that is eating her soul away, because she recognizes that she lost something invaluable. So she's willing to let go of all this comfort to go back to the life she had before, WELL KNOWING (because Kaito confirmed it to her earlier) that in her previous life there will also be a lot of pain awaiting her. Moreover, she adds that if there's anything she'll be able to change, then she wants to do that with her own strength (again, a detail that's missing from the ENG translation). And then, turning to Kaito with a very assertive face: "Together with my most important person".

Kaito at this point can only stare in shock at her. Because I'm sure that he thought that after making her cry and suffer this much, she wouldn't have wanted anything to do with him anymore. But, as Kaito hopefully will have all the time to find out, this girl's feelings are no joke. It's no flimsy crush. This is the type of love that binds you to your soulmate forever, and gives you the strength to forgive them when they make you suffer, if you can recognize that their heart was in the right place. Akiho wants to grasp control of her life, wants to be the one to completely make decisions from now on, but she also wants Kaito with her, not only by her side but also participating to those life decisions. She doesn't want to cut him off.

Sakura, with the sweetest smile ever, tells her (JP)"If you two will be together....everything will surely be alright". And here I have to point out two things in the ENG translation: that single "together" that sounds a bit overcautious, not specifying who's together, when in the JP text it's clear she's referring to those two (because the context comes from the panel right before), and then the choice to translate Sakura's iconic invincible spell with "I'm sure it'll work out". That's not how the English speaking fandom knows Sakura's invincible spell as, and from what I've been told, it's not even how it's been translated previously! So this makes pretty difficult for the English speaking fans to recognize that she's uttering her invincible spell here!

Especially cause, look what a wonderful and touching parallel they have done...

The one you can see above is coming from Volume 5 of the old manga, and it's the very first time Sakura uttered the invincible spell, releasing the Light and Dark Cards from inside herself. This parallel, where you can see that Mokona sensei strived to redraw the spread exactly as she did back then, really gives off a feeling of "coming full circle", especially cause when you put them one beside the other it's so easy to see how much Sakura grew since then. Back then, Sakura told those words to herself to comfort herself in a moment of panic. Now, Sakura is telling these same words to a beloved person in a critical situation, to encourage her that if she'll be with her most important person, everything is going to be alright, no matter what awaits ahead. It also reminded me of the comforting words that Yukito told Sakura back in volume 12 of the old manga, the night before Sakura ran to the bus stop to give Syaoran her teddy bear. Yukito told her that as long as both she and her most important person wished to see one another again, it would be fine. I can kinda sense that Sakura wanted to comfort Akiho in the same way, that as long as she and Kaito stay together, they can overcome anything ahead. And I found that absolutely wonderful.

Unfortunately, the awesome moment full of courage and love is interrupted because Syaoran notices the time magic has given up and the arrows start attacking them again, as expected. We see a very worrisome panel with Eriol crouching to the ground next to a passed out Kaho (poor Kaho!!!!), while he hold his staff and sends a remote protective spell to shield the kids from the oncoming attack.

Without wasting time, Kaito grabs Akiho and holds her tight in a protective embrace, curling his beautiful black wings on her to shield her, while she's still shocked (and with tears in her eyes). I have no shame in admitting that THIS panel turned my screams in ultrasounds and it's become my favorite one of the chapter!! Especially cause here we have that magician who couldn't even bring himself to touch his beloved Akiho's head to comfort her, now finally not hesitating anymore and holding her in a very tight embrace to protect her (still giving all of himself for her, I guess it's just his way to love her). The situation is dire: Syaoran activates his Fuuka Shourai to fight the arrows off, while Kero and Yue shoot their own attacks, because the arrows just keep coming at them non-stop. Kero tells Sakura that they're going to take care of the attacks, and Yue says that she's the only one at this point who can change radically the situation. Then, Syaoran, our brave hero, says that he will absolutely protect what Sakura wants to protect (I didn't like the ENG phrasing, at all!! "Whatever it is that you want to protect" sounds so dismissing towards Akiho and Kaito?? Is it only me having a bias at this point?), so he urges her to focus on what she can do (to change this situation)!! I found this moment very exciting....everyone is placing their hope in Sakura and they're gonna do what they can to protect everyone, Akiho and Kaito included (and Kaito took personally care of protecting Akiho by himself).

Sakura is left wondering what to do. "To turn things back to normal, then I should use Rewind one more time" but she expresses doubt at it being enough to complete the task, so she wonders what else she needs to do, while the final page shows in her hands both the Time Card and the Rewind Card!

Aaaaaaand this is how the chapter ends, we finally reached the bottom oh my gosh!! 😂 This chapter was so long but also so full of emotions, I really wanted to touch all the important topics and parallels that have been portrayed in these 36 pages. I know the post became infinite, but I wouldn't feel right to know that I left something interesting out.

I am so damn proud of my Akiho girl. Her assertive discussion with Kaito, tinted with a touch of anger, was exactly what I wanted and expected from her. Because she's sweet, yes, but also got a strong personality. And once you get her fired-up, she's not going to stop. She's a bulldozer. I mean, haven't you seen what she did in chapter 52/53 and 58 with Kaito?? She's definitely not afraid to confront people thanks to her strong nature. This finally elevates her character development in this arc. I'm also grateful to Sakura and her empathy, once again, because it's so beautiful to witness what she's doing for these people. And she's so wonderful that even her loved ones are helping her in this quest, because they all trust her and recognize that this is a way to make her happy too. I'm absolutely thrilled to have Kaito back, finally. And my heart bled for him when he gave that single answer to Akiho.

Despite seeming like we're almost at the end of the run, there are still some important matters to fix and explain, especially in regard to the magical artifacts, and how things will be once Sakura effectively manages to "go back". Will they remember, first of all? And will the situation be exactly like before? Because then, Akiho will have the artifact inside herself once again and they'll have to do something about that too. Also, Kaito's lifespan was pretty bad by the start of the Alice in Clockland play, so of course one has to wonder what they'll do about that too. I also expect one more YunaAki moment because we haven't really heard Kaito's version of the facts, the origin of his quest to save Akiho and how that turned into a "I'm going to give her a happy life too", which absolutely seems beyond what he would need to do if what moved him was only guilt for what he caused to her. Of course it's not only that. And I also expect to hear his apologies to Akiho, of course! ❤️ But gradually, because he must be a confused, hurting mess right now. Whatever else CLAMP sensei will decide to give us regarding those two, I'll take it as a blessed present. We're slowly but inexorably going towards the finale. I really can't wait to read the next chapter, which is expected by Halloween on October 31st! And as a YunaAki fan I can't avoid remembering that even chapter 48, when Akiho confessed covertly to Kaito, came on the day of Halloween of 2020! Will we get a real, spelled out confession exactly 3 years later???

As usual, I await your comments here or in my inbox, see you at the end of this month!!

[sheinsidemymindvro]

could you explain this entire situation because im only catching bits and pieces of it

im rlly confused :/

hey, so elusin is a woman aged 26. she makes music. at the start of september last year i followed her on ig. i didn't know it yet but she is psychic and by looking at a photo of me she used her ability to connect with my brain and she can see my vision, hear my thoughts and because psychics are in ones consciousness they can also manipulate electrical currents that we use to move around (how we function) they can send pulses to your body's muscles like an electrical massage machine and make the muscles tense. they use this to annoy me and to do things like give me headaches, and constipate me. elusin is a person that acts like she is nice but is a horrible ugly person and im not the first to be the victim of her and her sister and friends psychic attacks. my blog is made to bring awareness to my experience and to out her for what she is. ive decided that i will tell people around me about what ive learnt about psychic abilities. let me know if you wanna know more about other things ive learnt, when i followed her at the time i was a listener of her music and just started to learn how to make music. it has been a year since. for the first six months she kept silent on abusing me through non verbal abilities such as stopping me from sleeping, mimicking my voice to manipulate me into thinking her whispers were my thoughts. making my body tense to try and trick my brain into thinking its anxious. after six months of that she and her companion psychics went into full psychic attack, and i get all the abuse plus i have constant verbal attacks as long as I'm awake. elusin is obsessed with trying to destroy my mental health and has changed her sleep schedule to my own. she is in norway and i am in new zealand. she is a neet who receives money from her parents and lives in one of their spare houses. that is how she is able to do this to me regarding time. my music is what has kept her around for so long. she wants to copy it, but i have made it very difficult for her by raising awareness of what she is doing to me on the internet to leave records, aswell as posting demo versions of songs. I'm only a beginner and she has been making music for ten years. it sucks that my creative journey is starting like this but i have decided to stop making music until she leaves me alone so that she has nothing to gain by remaining in my mind. i have stopped completely for the last two or three months and am just waiting this out. she constantly taunts me with immature mockery and the easiest way to describe her is that she is 26 and is extremely stupid. what has stopped me from having my mental health damaged from this is realising she is an idiot. she revealed to me her identity because she thought i wouldn't talk about it. i deal with a 12 year old in a 26 year olds body is the shortest i could put it. I'm doing ok now, i've learnt to ignore her and the worst she does to me is keep me up night so that I'm tired at work. I'm staying strong and positive and focusing on other areas of my life right now. thank you for asking me about it, i'm here to share my story and what i've learnt about human psychic abilities. it sucks that she decided to use her ability to try and break people and make their lives worse. i know there must be a lot of psychics out there, and they aren't going to be like her. the things i describe are very real and if a psychic would read them they might be interested and check it out. once they connect to your consciousness, they feel your being as if they are you, and when that happens they know your thoughts as you think. which isn't so bad. when that happens they have access to also your memories and can look through them, its like how you are able to think about your own memories and know them. this means other psychics will become aware of what she is and what she has done. I feel like if there are any other idiot psychics going on psychic attack sprees for years, people are going to become aware that psychics exist, i hope to make a place where other people that have gone through similar experiences can talk.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Private equity finally delivered Sarah Palin's death panels

Tonight (Apr 26), I’ll be in Burbank, signing Red Team Blues at Dark Delicacies at 6PM.

Remember “death panels”? Sarah Palin promised us that universal healthcare was a prelude to a Stalinist nightmare in which unaccountable bureaucrats decided who lived or died based on a cost-benefit analysis of what it would cost to keep you alive versus how much your life was worth.

If you’d like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here’s a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/26/death-panels/#what-the-heck-is-going-on-with-CMS

Palin was right that any kind of healthcare rationing runs the risk of this kind of calculus, where we weight spending $10,000 to extend a young, healthy person’s life by 40 years against $1,000 to extend an elderly, disabled person’s life by a mere two years.

It’s a ghastly, nightmarish prospect — as anyone who uses the private healthcare system knows very well. More than 27m Americans have no health insurance, and millions more have been tricked into buying scam “cost-sharing” systems run by evangelical grifters:

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/02/health/christian-health-care-insurance.html

But for the millions of Americans with insurance, death panels are an everyday occurrence, or at least a lurking concern. Anyone who pays attention knows that insurers have entire departments designed to mass-reject legitimate claims and stall patients who demand that the insurer lives up to its claim:

https://kffhealthnews.org/news/article/khn-podcast-an-arm-and-a-leg-how-to-shop-for-health-insurance-november-24-2021/

The private healthcare sector is designed to deny care. Its first duty is to its shareholders, not its patients, and every dollar spent on care is a dollar not available for dividends. The ideal insurance customer pays their premiums without complaint, and then pays cash for all their care on top of it.

All that was true even before private equity started buying up and merging whole swathes of the US healthcare system (or “healthcare” “system”). The PE playbook — slash wages, sell off physical plant, slash wages, reduce quality and raise prices — works in part because of its scale. These aren’t the usual economies of scale. Rather the PE strategy is to buy and merge all the similar businesses in a region, so customers, suppliers and workers have nowhere else to turn.

That’s bad enough when it’s aimed at funeral homes, pet groomers or any of the other sectors that have been bigfooted by PE:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/12/16/schumpeterian-terrorism/#deliberately-broken

But it’s especially grave when applied to hospitals:

https://pluralistic.net/2020/05/21/profitable-butchers/#looted

Or emergency room physicians:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/03/14/unhealthy-finances/#steins-law

And if you think that’s a capitalist hellscape nightmare, just imagine how PE deals with dying, elderly people. Yes, PE has transformed the hospice industry, and it’s even worse than you imagine.

Yesterday, the Center for Economic and Policy Research published “Preying on the Dying: Private Equity Gets Rich in Hospice Care,” written by some of the nation’s most valiant PE slayers: Eileen Appelbaum, Rosemary Batt and Emma Curchin:

https://cepr.net/report/preying-on-the-dying-private-equity-gets-rich-in-hospice-care/

Medicare pays private hospices $203-$1,462 per day to take care of dying old people — seniors that a doctor has certified to have less than six months left. That comes to $22.4b/year in public transfers to private hospices. If hospices that $1,462 day-rate, they have lots of duties, like providing eight hours’ worth of home care. But if the hospice is content to take the $203/day rate, they are not required to do anything. Literally. It’s just free money for whatever the operator feels like doing for a dying elderly person, including doing nothing at all.

As Appelbaum told Maureen Tkacik for her excellent writeup in The American Prospect: “Why anybody commits fraud is a mystery to me, because you can make so much money playing within the guidelines the way the payment scheme operates.”

https://prospect.org/health/2023-04-26-born-to-die-hospice-care/

In California, it’s very, very easy to set up a hospice. Pay $3,000, fill in some paperwork (or don’t — no one checks it, ever), and you’re ready to start caring for beloved parents, grandparents, sisters, brothers, aunts and uncles as they depart this world. You do get a site inspection, but don’t worry — you aren’t required to bring your site up to code until after you’re licensed, and again, they never check — not even if there are multiple complaints. After all, no one at the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has the job of tracking complaints.

This is absolute catnip for private equity — free government money, no obligations, no enforcement, and the people you harm are literally dying and can’t complain. What’s not to like? No wonder PE companies have spent billions “rolling up” hospices across the country. There are 591 hospices in Van Nuys, CA alone — but at least 30 of them share a single medical director:

https://auditor.ca.gov/reports/2021-123/index.html#pg34A

Medicare caps per-patient dispersals at $32,000, which presents an interesting commercial question for remorseless, paperclip-maximizing, grandparent-devouring private equity ghouls: do you take in sick patients (who cost more, but die sooner) or healthy patients (cost less, potentially live longer)?

In Van Nuys, the strategy is to bring in healthy patients and do nothing. 51% of Van Nuys hospice patients are “live discharged” — that is, they don’t die. This figure — triple the national average — is “a reliable sign of fraud.”

There are so many hospice scams and most of them are so stupid that it takes a monumental failure of oversight not to catch and prevent them. Here’s a goodun: hospices bribe doctors to “admit” patients to a hospice without their knowledge. The hospice bills for the patient, but otherwise has no contact with them. This can go on for a long time, until the patient tries to visit the doctor and discovers that their Medicare has been canceled (you lose your Medicare once you go into hospice).

Another scam: offer patients the loosest narcotics policy in town, promising all the opioids they want. Then, once their benefits expire, let them die of an overdose (don’t worry, people who die in hospice don’t get autopsies):

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/12/05/how-hospice-became-a-for-profit-hustle

You can hire con artists to serve as your sales-force, and have them talk vulnerable, elderly people into enrolling in hospice care by convincing them they have nothing to live for and should just die already and not burden their loved ones any longer.

Hospitals and hospices also collude: hospitals can revive dying patients, ignoring their Do Not Resuscitate orders, so they can be transfered to a hospice and die there, saving the hospital from adding another dead patient to their stats.CMS’s solution is perverse: they’re working with Humana to expand Medicare Advantage (a scam that convinces patients to give up Medicare and enrol in a private insurance program, whose private-sector death panel rejects 13% of claims that Medicare would have paid for). The program will pay private companies $32,000 for every patient who agrees to cease care and die. As our friends on the right like to say, “incentives matter.”

Appelbaum and co have a better idea:

Do more enforcement: increase inspections and audits.

Block mergers and rollups of hospices that make them too big to fail and too big to jail.

Close existing loopholes.

They should know. Appelbaum and her co-authors write the best, most incisive analysis of private equity around. For more of their work, check out their proposal for ending pension-plan ripoffs by Wall Street firms:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/05/05/mego/#A09948

Catch me on tour with Red Team Blues in Burbank, Mountain View, Berkeley, San Francisco, Portland, Vancouver, Calgary, Toronto, DC, Gaithersburg, Oxford, Hay, Manchester, Nottingham, London, and Berlin!

[Image ID: An industrial meat grinder, fed by a conveyor belt. A dead, elderly man is traveling up the conveyor, headed for the grinder's intake. The grinder is labelled 'HOSPICE' in drippy Hallowe'en lettering. It sits in a spreading pool of blood.]

Image: Seydelmann (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:GW300_1.jpghttps://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:GW300_1.jpg

CC BY-SA 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/deed.en

[valentineshearts]

Fallin’ For Ya

A/N: Hi y’all!! This is my first fic I’m posting to tumblr. I have my AO3 account in my bio, and you can find all my previous fics + this one posted there. Shoutout to @dopp-likes-yanderes because one of the asks on their blog inspired this fic this past May, and it’s been sitting half finished in my google docs account from now until today. Thank you for giving me your blessing to post this!! Also note that I’m on mobile so if anything is formatted really weird that’s the culprit. Happy Valentine’s Day everybody!!

CW: female!reader, biblical references, Philip being a Puritan

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Philip Wittebane was seething.

His day had started out as it normally did these days. Go to the market, limp about, look pathetic in hopes of finding some abominable creature to trick into being his sacrifice. It had taken a turn for the worse however when the brother’s of that disappointment Blue Fang had shown up and demanded both payment and information, taking his journal and taunting him. He kept up the act, inwardly calculating whether they could be reasoned with or tricked, or whether or not he could kill them without repercussions, when he had been saved by a foolhardy young witch who was oddly eager to accompany him. Her knowledge of the Collector made her easier prey then he ever could have hoped for, and he had decided that things were finally coming up Wittebane, when suddenly.

“…and this is my Aunt uh….Dirtrude and uh-“

“(Y/N) will do just fine, Luzura.”

He felt something creep up his spine, both pleasant and unpleasant, turned his gaze slightly to the side, and felt his mouth fall open.

Caleb was laughing from beyond the grave, he knew it. In fact, if he didn’t know any better, he would say that Caleb had orchestrated this, some supernatural, eternal, annoying older brother ability to push him to his limits. Because there, in front of him, stood the most gorgeous creature he had ever seen in his life. Pure temptation, the likes of which he had only heard in sermons and in his brother’s voice when he talked about her.

Hence the seething.

He listened to ‘Luzura’ chatter on about something about crabs, or toe-gres, or something else of little consequence compared to the emotions he was trying to keep at bay. He was NOT like Caleb. Caleb had been weak, he had succumbed to temptation, fornication, and witchcraft. Philip was a good, God-fearing man, who would take a HUMAN wife, thank-you-very-much and be fruitful with HER.

His internal rant was broken up by a shriek, and he came to as someone crashed into his back. Hands clutched onto his chest and back, perfume filling the air, and he pushed down the sharp, breath-catching arousal that came with the feeling. He turned around sharply, gripping her waist with aggression, hard enough to bruise, and was stopped short before he could react in any way shape or form.

Her kerchief, the one that had been tied round her head, had slipped in her fall, and had revealed her ears.

Her round ears.

He finally allowed the attraction that he had been fighting back to flood his body, and he felt his blood coursing through his veins, warming him and turning his brain foggy as he stared at the woman, the human woman in front of him. The very sensations he had been attempting to drown out just seconds ago were allowed back. The feel of her body, warm beneath his, the scent of her. He had never been so aroused in his entire life, and all he could do was internally crow to his brother, to beyond the grave.

“See? I can only be tempted by a human woman! You who so quickly gave into a mistress of Satan, a follower of the Devil, but not me!”

His focus was returned by the sound of her voice, her face so close to his that he could feel her breath across his face and neck.

“Oh, Mr. Wittebane, are you alright? I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to grab you like that, I-“

“Don’t trouble yourself for one second Miss (Y/N), I assure you, I am not in the least bit angry.”

She seemed taken aback at this, and tilted her head to the side.

“….You’re not?”

He grinned, giddier than he ever had as a boy, and wound his arms tighter around her waist, pulling her close to him and delighting in the way her face flushed and breath quickened.

“On the contrary! My dear Miss (Y/N), I have but one question; why didn’t you tell me that you too were human?”

She paled, one hand darting up to cover her ear, and he found that he quite preferred her flustered to frightened.

“I’m terribly sorry for deceiving you Mr. Wittebane but, well…you know better than anyone how hard it can be for a human on the Boiling Isles. Besides, we didn’t know whether you would take kindly to another human…so we elected that it was best to hide it.”

We…we? Oh! Right. He’d been so enraptured that he’d forgotten that they had company. He looked over to their other traveling companions and found that they had reassured themselves of her well-being when he had caught her and had begun to amble ahead, moving slowly so as not to leave them behind.

“I understand Miss (Y/N). You’re quite right of course; I know the trials a human on the Boiling Isles faces all too well. I must confess to being a tad offended that you could think me hostile towards other humans, however the logical side of me understands your caution and finds it prudent.”

She turned her face up to him, her chin resting on his chest as she faced him fully, and he felt something within his chest clench. Dear God…

“Your forgiveness is deeply appreciated Mr. Wittebane.”

“Philip. Please.”

He spoke before he could stop himself, words spilling over his lips, which he clamped shut before any more of the contents of his heart and mind could be revealed.

He saw a flush rise up her cheeks, and felt one of his own creep up to match, heart pounding desperately in his chest she had to have felt it given her proximity.

“Alright Mr.- Philip. Then you must call me (Y/N). No ‘Miss’ in front of it. Just (Y/N).”

He grabbed her hand and raised it to his lips, pressing a kiss to her knuckles and lingering, savoring the moment as if it was the last meal he would ever receive.

“(Y/N)….it’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance.”

She exhaled shakily, eyes wide and lips parted, and Philip Wittebane swore he’d never seen a more beautiful sight. Like Adam before Eve, he had never felt such an assured sense of belonging to someone in his whole life.

“Hey, are you guys alright back there? You’ve been standing still for like, 10 minutes.”

He turned his head to look behind him, and saw Luzura staring at them with an expression of concern on her face, Dirtrude next to her still scribbling away in her little notebook and muttering something about ‘Deadwardian Balustrades’.

“We’re just fine Luz,”

(Y/N) called out, and he took a great deal of satisfaction in the breathiness of her voice.

That satisfaction was quickly replaced by disappointment and annoyance as she left his hold and his arms, though he was reassured slightly by her catching his arm as she walked past, holding onto the sleeve of his coat as they walked side by side.

“So…Philip. How much longer until we get to where we’re headed?”

Luzura’s voice piped up. For a moment Philip prepared to create the transportation circle of glyphs, body several steps ahead of him, when suddenly, he did what he was best at; he thought. And in this brief moment of thought, his mind stalling his body before he could move to scratch a single glyph into the dirt beneath his feet, he came up with a plan. It was a little rushed admittedly, and less a full fledged plan as much as it was a little subterfuge that he would use to shape the rest of the events that followed into the result he desired, but still. When the result would be marrying the woman he was increasingly sure was the yoke mate that William Whately had described in his sermon The Bride Bush, how could he resist enacting it?

“Oh dear! The time we spent lingering back there has cost us. I’m afraid we won’t make it before nightfall.”

Everyone’s faces morphed into varying degrees of horror and dismay.

“But it’s not safe to travel during the night! And we’re too far from Bonesborrough to head back now!”

Dirtrude’s voice was shrill with panic, eyes darting around as if she could see imaginary creatures swooping in and carrying them off as they attempted to travel safely. Perfect.

“Thankfully, I’ve explored these stretches of woods many times before. I know a safe place to spend the night nearby. I often find I’d rather risk the cruelty of nature as opposed to that of the townspeople.”

The whole party looked at him in pity, and he felt a thrill as (Y/N) laid her other hand on his shoulder, drawing his attention to her as she gazed up at him.

“How far away is this place?”

“Not far. A little ways behind us, but not enough that we shan’t reach it before the sun sets, and not so out of the way that it will inconvenience us when we get our start tomorrow.”

(Y/N) looked around at her companions, conferring silently with them until she nodded and turned her attention back to him.

“Lead the way then Philip.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Philip wrote in his journal, his work illuminated by the fire they had set for warmth. His description of (Y/N) was coming along nicely, her temperament and mannerisms unfolding easily beneath his pen.

He looked over to his side, and saw her face illuminated by the fire, resting and peaceful.

“Soon neither of us shall have to worry about any danger the Boiling Isles have to offer.”

He muttered, as he began a few detailed sketches of her. Her as she lay beside him now, her blushing as she looked up at him, her face broken out into a smile.

“Bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh.”

Never before had the meaning of the Word of God seemed so clear to him. William Whately’s words rang through his head once again, his teachings on the virtues necessary for marriage striking a chord beyond the academic and theological interest he had once observed the sermon with.

“We’ll find our way home (Y/N), don’t fret. Once I’ve rid this world of evil, I’ll be able to take you home to Gravesfield and marry you.”

He blew gently on the ink to dry it, observing her likeness fondly as he turned to gaze upon the real thing. He leaned over and pressed a kiss to her forehead.

“Sweet dreams my love.”

[lookingfortherightmistress]

Sissies - Stay Safe Out There!

Oh gosh - interacting with mistresses is so dangerous! I am fortunate, so far, to have avoided any issues, but I just want to warn Sissies to stay safe!

Here are some of my red flags:

1. RED FLAG - If they use Kik & Google Hangouts -> DO NOT USE

Neither of these chat methods have any sort of verification. They could be anyone. THEY COULD BE MEMBERS OF FOREIGN HACKING CONSORTIUMS!!

Kik is a notorious cesspool of predators and Child Sexual Abuse Material (CSAM). DO NOT USE.

2. RED FLAG - They want your picture

They can use a reverse facial-lookup software to find you and blackmail you. Do not send your picture. This is not safe!

3. RED FLAG - They ask you to chat via a text message / or they want to talk to you on the phone.

They can use a reverse phone # lookup your phone number to find you to blackmail you. Double-red flag if they say "Chat only".

4. RED FLAG - They want you to send them money via Bitcoin

Where is that money going? You have NO IDEA. This is almost certainly a criminal organization or state-sponsored hacking team.

5. RED FLAG - They are too eager

Do they text you all the time? Are they constantly asking "why are you not texting back?" Are they impatient with your responses?

I know, sissies, that it's flattering to think that a Mistress really thinks you could be the perfectly little subby for her. But seriously? Think practically. Subs to mistresses are like 100 to 1. Maybe 1000 or 10,000 to 1. Real Mistresses are not going to be so eager.

6. RED FLAG - They have no original material in their Tumblr

Real mistresses will have real, original pictures. Like pictures of their dungeon, sissies, etc. (see #8 below)

7. RED FLAG - Their Tumblr is recent and shallow

Are they recently on Tumblr? Do they only have re-blogs and maybe some text items? Big red flag!

8. RED FLAG - They send you pictures for someone else

If they send you a picture, or if they have posted a picture which they claim to be a picture of themselves or original content, do a facial recognition search and an image search. If it's not them then STAY AWAY.

9. RED FLAG - They are threatening, trying to create urgency, or giving you ultimatums

Do they threaten you when you don't respond? Do they threaten to leave you? Do they give you sales tricks like 'do this or you'll miss this opportunity forever' ?

This is a triple-quadruple red flag if you have just been contacted by the Mistress. If she/he is saying these sorts of things within the first few days of getting in contact - RUN AWAY!

- - - - - -

Yes, we all want to be owned by a mistress or master. Yes we are subs seeking a loving, stern, demanding dominant.

But do you want to be a sub to a real, actual dom? Or do you want to be a sub to some sort of faceless criminal syndicate who only exists to scam you out of all your money and perhaps to ruin your life in the process?

Personally, if I've decided to ruin my life, I'll go to the local bar and get myself fucked over (financially and otherwise) by the first asshole shit-head I can find. At least it will be someone I know! And at least it will be an actual person - who probably needs the money - and not providing funding for a truly evil organization which is buying arms for terrorists, human trafficking, or state-sponsored terrorism.

Sissies BE SAFE.