#the serious answer is that there isn't one

[moghedien]

lae'zel, permission, and what she actually wants

the thing about Lae'zel is that she's always looking to someone to give her permission

basically her entire life up until the beginning of the game has been a fight to be allowed to live. she has to prove she's better than her peers. she has to prove that she's worthy of fighting for Vlaakith. hell, even when she was an egg, she would have had to prove she was worthy of hatching because if she'd been a bit late she wouldn't have even been allowed a chance.

she doesn't really do anything unless its what her goddess and her society allows and she'll do exactly what is prescribed. she bristles at any attempts to find a cure for the tadpoles that aren't going to the creche because that is what she is supposed to do as a good githyanki. anything else is a deviation from what is allowed, even if it might work.

so you look at her romance through that lens, it really sort of pulls everything together.

In the act one scene, she's still following the rules like a good devoted of Vlaakith. She will sleep with you one or two times if you ask her to, but will bristle at anything more than that. She's a totally typical normal githyanki after all (she isn't), and it isn't normal for githyanki to have any kind of serious romantic relationships. "love" isn't even a real thing, and is just a strange mental illness that cowards use as an excuse (all of these are things she actually believes at the beginning of the game based on various bits of banter and dialogue where she's reflecting retroactively on her previous beliefs). Straight up, anything beyond casual sex is not allowed, so she doesn't even question it as an option.

Then by the time you get to the Act 2 romance scene, Lae'zel's entire world has been upturned for unrelated reasons. She did everything as she was supposed to and nothing she wasn't and Vlaaktih betrayed her. Her entire culture and society betrayed her despite her never doing anything without their permission.

It seems like she is somewhat quick to accept that and switch her allegiance. Her entire existence was because Vlaakith gave her permission to exist, and then Vlaakith betrayed her no matter how devoted she was. So Vlaakith is a liar and she learns that Orpheus is a possible answer to solve the Vlaakith problem, so now she's committed to Orpheus.

It seems like a quick turn, but if you look at Lae'zel as someone who needs permission, then it makes more sense. Vlaakith can't give her that anymore, so she needs someone else to tell her how to live, so that becomes Orpheus, who of course conveniently isn't there to actually tell her to do anything. So she does as Voss says to try to save him and that becomes her entire life motivation. Because what else can she possibly do? She needs someone's permission to decide how to move on now.

By the time you get the Act 2 romance scene, Lae'zel is on this path, right? If you look at the actual Act 2 romance scene, its basically her asking for permission again. Not in the way you'd immediately expect, because while she is asking like, your permission to develop your relationship into something further, its not just you she needs permission from. She needs her societal expectations to give both of you permission.

To elaborate, you're a fucking wrench in all her expectations of what is right. You were supposed to be a one or two night casual fuck, and then she went and got fixated with you. She calls it an obsession. She says its bothering her more than Vlaakith's betrayal, more than her people hunting her, more than the worm in her head. Those are all problems that she has some instruction on how to address. You, she has no fucking clue what to do about. Rebel githyanki aren't exactly giving instructions on how to pursue romantic relationships with people while planning on how to take down Vlaakith. Even if they are more lenient and accepting of those kinds of attachments (which we have no idea if they are or not), she hasn't been around any of them long enough to figure that out.

In her feelings for you, she's confronted with feelings that to her culture are perverse and which she has no societal context for. Even if there was someone who might give her the go ahead to pursue that relationship, she has no idea who they might be. She's someone who's entire life has revolved around what she has permission to do within her society, and she finds herself drawn to do something that she has no way of even figuring out how to approach in an acceptable way.

And despite all of that, and all the complications around what asking more from you would mean from a githyanki standpoint, she still gets to a point where she wakes you up in the middle of the night and begs you to do something about it.

She's frantic and confused and its clear she doesn't even really know what she wants from you, so she asks you to prove yourself and fight her. Its not because she thinks you're too weak for her. She admits she finds you strong the first time she comes onto you. Alternatively, she basically negs you after having sex with her by calling you weak and a coward and she is more than pleased to have sex with you again after doing so. Strength or weakness has nothing to do with why she needs you to fight her.

She needs you to fight her because that's how she's always had to prove herself worthy of existence. Her entire life has been a series of peers and comrades she had to fight in order to prove that she could go on. So when she doesn't know what else to do about you and there's nothing else to tell her how to proceed, she needs you to fight and prove that you (and her) can go on.

But the thing about the duel you have, is that the outcome doesn't actually matter. Regardless, it does give her what she needs to know to go on your relationship, but not in any ways she expected. Regardless if you win or she does, she gets overwhelmed and realizes that she wants you and she wants you to want her. Something definitely starts to shift in her mindset after the fight.

If you win, she's alarmed by the contradiction that she should feel ashamed for having lost. If you lose, she's alarmed by the contradiction of feeling no joy in having beaten you. She realizes that she doesn't want to be doing the thing she's supposed to do (fight to prove her worth) and instead wants to protect you. She also says that she wants you to protect her, which is something that she only says if you lose the fight, which I think is notable and makes the shift a bit more obvious.

Because she only says it if you lose. You lost. You just showed you were weaker than her. And she still wants you to protect her. By all githyanki standards, you shouldn't even be worthy of living if you couldn't win the fight, but she not only doesn't want to see you hurt, but she wants you to see that she doesn't get hurt. Not only should this not make sense because you lost, but it is maybe the first time Lae'zel has admitted she doesn't want to have to rely only on her own strength. She wants to rely on you, even if you're weaker and couldn't beat her in a fight. That challenges everything she has ever believed in her life probably as much as being betrayed by Vlaakith did.

If you win the fight, she doesn't admit that, but I think the sentiment is still there. It just isn't something that she has to directly confront in the moment because you proved that you can protect her. In that instance, she's coming to terms more with the fact that she should feel weaker or ashamed but isn't. In either instance, she was asking for permission from her ideals on how to deal with the You problem. In either instance, she's confronted with something that challenges that. Either you fail to meet the expectations she thought she had, and she finds out she doesn't care, or she fails to meet the expectations of a githyanki soldier and she finds out she doesn't care. Because either way, she figures out she wants you more than she wants to be the good githyanki that does what she's supposed to and act like she's supposed to act. Being "obsessed" with you should be perverse and wrong, but she embraces it whether she has permission (from her society) to do so or not. That is an extremely big deal.

And even before we get into Act 3, there are some interesting beats here about Lae'zel's romance in Act 2 still. One of the two things I want to discuss is the kissing. After the main Act 2 romance scene, you get new dialogue options, including asking her to kiss you.

This is kinda where we get into my opinions on the best choices to make with her romance, and I'm aware that these are my opinions and people deciding to do other things isn't incorrect. I'm pointing this out because I'm gonna start talking a lot about choices soon and which ones I think are the best thematically and from a character standpoint. They are my opinions. You are allowed to disagree. I will however be defending and arguing my opinions here. You don't have to get angry or defensive if you did something else or don't agree with my conclusions.

Now, back to kissing Lae'zel. The notable thing about asking Lae'zel to kiss you is that her initial reaction is embarrassment. It's somewhat of a turn from how she is open about talking about your sexual encounters before this. The entire fight scene, which may have ended up with the two of you making out in the middle of camp until it faded to black, was seemingly in front of everyone and she had no concern about that.

Kissing just out of the blue though? She's shy about that.

Because just kissing for no reason is soft and pointless, really (and if you watch the Lae'zel kissing animations, they are all in fact very soft and sweet). You don't really need to do it. Before hand with the sex and whatnot, she fully has arguments about why that was ok and even beneficial for the overall task at hand. Soft little kissing though? There's no reason to do that unless she wants to. Hence her embarrassment.

Now, she won't kiss you in Act 2 when you ask because of her embarrassment. Not unless you persuade her to do it. You only have to persuade her once and if you succeed, the first time she is clearly nervous and looks around uncomfortably. In all honesty, it seems somewhat uncomfortable to persuade her especially given her initial reaction. I do, however, think its the best thing to do for her.

Yes, she's uncomfortable. She's uncomfortable with your entire relationship now because she's has no experience even knowing about a situation like this and from a githyanki standpoint, affectionately kissing in public for no reason is basically outing yourselves as being perverts. She also very, very clearly wants it. The way you persuade her, is by pointing out that she probably wants this. And if you succeed in pointing that out to her, she is smiling and afterward when you ask her to kiss she is clearly happy and very soft about it all.

If you don't persuade her, I believe you can still kiss her without the check if you wait until after the Act 3 scene, so she is clearly comfortable with it at some point. Persuading her might seem like you're pushing her past her comfort zone. That's honestly why I didn't do it for a while. But looking at how she reacts after the fact and what happens after, I do feel like its not so much pushing her out of her comfort zone. Its more challenging her to push against her initial ideas of what she thinks she should do and instead encouraging her to do what she wants. More on that later.

The other romance beat that happens in Act 2 occurs some time after the main scene in camp, when she get about as vulnerable as she's been yet. She asks you for softness. She wants to be with you and she doesn't want the rough, passionate, hedonistic type of night that has been all of your relationship up until this point. She asks for gentleness, softness, and she's terrified. She says outright that its terrifying for her to ask this and she's been working up the courage to do so.

This is meaningful in multiple ways, because its not only a sign that your physical relationship is becoming something more than just sex. Its a sign of how much Lae'zel has changed. Because Lae'zel is someone who needs permission in everything. Up until this point, we haven't seen her ask for permission, she simply waited for her betters to give it to her and denied herself if they didn't. When it was someone who isn't above her, she makes demands. She doesn't ask permission. Ever. Now she outright asking you for permission to be gentle and soft. She didn't just need to build up the courage to be soft. She needed to build up the courage to ask to be allowed something she wanted.

As I stated before, I think Lae'zel's instinct is to not take into account what she actually wants, but to just go ahead with whatever she thinks she's supposed to do. That's how she was raised and indoctrinated after all. Gently pushing against her first reactions to things allows her a chance to push against that instinct of behaving how she was indoctrinated to behave. I think her asking for a softer touch is a sign of this changing for her. The Act 3 scene is even more so.

The Act 3 romance scene is sort of the height of Lae'zel's character growth. One thing that makes me sort of sad is that I feel like you don't really get to see the fullness of her character unless you romance her. That's true with other characters I've romanced so far to some extent, but not as much as with Lae'zel.

But here you romanced Lae'zel, so you get to see her admitting how much her perceptions have changed because of you helping her see things differently. She has different perspectives and she finds beauty and bliss in things she used to find dread in. She loathed the sun, and now drags you to a roof top just to stare at it coming over the horizon (please don't stare into the sun). She finds herself liking Faerun and the colors in it. She admits all of this before she brings up what she actually wanted to talk to you about.

Lae'zel has no terms in which to describe your relationship. She doesn't know about dating (or courting) or marriage and she doesn't actually even know what the word love means. She doesn't ever say the word until six months later in the epilogue, but what she's describing to you on how she feels is without a doubt love and what she's asking of you is more or less marriage. She doesn't have the terms or any cultural context to make it easier to ask, but she wants you to stay with her, whatever happens. That's the only way she can really describe it. Staying with her. Because even if you've only actually known each other a short time, you might be the most constant thing she's ever had in her life, and she's probably terrified of what it means when the Absolute is dealt with and there is no mission keeping you together. She isn't asking for permission now to stay with you, but is asking for you to stay with her. Where you might be and doing what, who knows, but she is for the first time just pursuing something she wants that she hasn't been given explicit permission for beforehand.

And then, we get to saving Orpheus.

This is where my thoughts might get controversial, but as I said, you're free to disagree but I'm arguing for my ideas here.

I'm not sure how any of this changes if you go a different route in the final parts of the game, so I can really only speak on the options you get if you saved Orpheus and he became Illithid.

So you do the thing that Lae'zel has been lead to believe she needs to do and free Orpheus. I personally cannot blame the man's attitude given his being imprisoned for who the fuck knows how long and the fact that he is still willing to sacrifice himself. However, it is clear that he is perhaps not quite as understanding as Voss lead you to believe he would be. Given that he tells you that you should have let his guard kill you if you were actually on the same side as him, which notably would have doomed everyone and lead to the Absolute's victory. But again, centuries of imprisonment, we cannot blame the guy.

The point I want to make with bringing that up at all, is that, even in these little bits of conflict that don't really amount to anything in game, its a crack in the ideal of Orpheus. He isn't every grand thing that Voss promised you and Lae'zel he would be. He's not bad here and gives us no reason to think he is, but its a crack. Lae'zel didn't have any reason to doubt Vlaakith or see her imperfections until it was too late, after all. I'm not saying the two are equals, but Lae'zel went from worshipping an evil false-goddess to holding up that goddess's enemy in similar reverence in a shockingly short amount of time. The girl jumped from a cult that worshipped one powerful figure to a radical rebel movement that held up another. And we immediately see little tiny cracks in the facade of Orpheus.

Lae'zel won't. Lae'zel doesn't know how to be anything but utterly devoted to the highest figure of authority she sees as worthy to follow. Lae'zel won't know to be wary. But you should be wary as fuck about what Orpheus is going to ask of her.

Cut to the end. We win, the absolute is defeated, yay! Mind Flayer Orpheus is asking Lae'zel to kill him and take up his mantle and lead his rebellion against Vlaakith.

In that moment, you have really two options. Technically there are multiple dialogue options, but really there are two. You can let her go (and potentially go with her) or you can persuade her to stay. If you tell her to do what she wants, she and you will leave on dragons to fight the rebellion against Vlaakith.

I do not think this is what Lae'zel wants.

When Orpheus is giving her this duty, she doesn't look happy about it. She just finished the single most traumatic event of her life, which turned everything upside down and completely shook who she is as a person. Now she is being handed what she had said she wanted. The means to free her people and defeat Vlaakith. She has a silver sword. She's being given not one, but two red dragons. And she just looks fucking sad. She looks exhausted as Orpheus is commanding her to do this.

She is someone who has never lived a life where she was able to want her own goals or life. She was Vlaakith's. Now she's being ordered to carry Orpheus's legacy. And I do believe she wants to stop Vlaakith and save her people from her control. But she is being given all of the burden of doing so and commanded to begin immediately upon completing her previous ordeal.

Lae'zel has been following orders her entire life. She isn't one to even consider what she actually wants and instead does what she thinks she's supposed to do. So when Orpheus tells her to do this, she is going to obey the authority figure like she was been indoctrinated into doing. When you ask her what she wants, she will say you're coming with her because she's at least broken away enough to do that but not to consider that she doesn't want to go.

Gently pushing against Lae'zel's immediate reactions, as I said, is I think the way to get her honest, genuine desires. If you persuade her to stay and disobey Orpheus, she does seem suddenly energized. She will then say that her destiny is not for Vlaakith or Orpheus to decree. Her destiny is hers alone. Neither Vlaakith nor Orpheus will give her permission to do that, but you can. She doesn't obey you. You aren't an authority figure and you have probably shown yourself to be weaker than her at several points in the game. But you still give her permission to choose her life and she accepts that.

And this, is how you break the Lae'zel out of the cycle that she finds herself. in. The only way she isn't perpetually bowing down to some authority figure is if she stays in Faerun. Because she escaped the authority of Vlaakith and immediately went to Orpheus, who now she can't even escape because he's dead and she is the one holding up his legacy on his behalf. She can't choose to leave once she's accepted that responsibility, and she frankly does not look like she wants to accept that responsibility.

If she stays on Faerun, she is still fighting Vlaakith. Not only because she is literally hunting down and murdering Vlaakith's forces, but she's living completely free of Vlaakith's influence in a way she couldn't otherwise. She isn't living under Vlaakith's rules, nor having to live in direct antagonism to Vlaakith's rules by forming a new society from scratch for the githyanki. She's just living. Occasionally going and massacring Vlaakith's soldiers as a means of survival, but otherwise just living how she wants and with who she wants. And in theory, she could go and join the rebellion proper any time in the future. If she stays, her future isn't certain, and that, I think, is the best thing for her.

In the epilogue, if you are with her on Faerun, its clear she doesn't really let herself rest still. She busies herself (and you) by tracking down Vlaakith's forces to eradicate, and she tells you of another one she found, noting that she can't rest for long. You have the option to push against this gently, suggesting taking some time off. No persuasion needed. She not only agrees to take some time off, but she immediately has a vacation suggestion which she has clearly been looking into and is excited to check out. But Lae'zel is not someone who is going to consider what she actually wants. She's going to suggest what she thinks she should be doing, but with some gentle push back, will let you know what she actually wants.

Because you're not really rejecting her ideas when you push against the instincts that have been indoctrinated into her. You're giving her permission to decide what she wants to do, and Lae'zel is always someone looking for permission.

[firewasabeast]

The Ultimate Treasure Hunt

summary:

When the opportunity to go on another treasure hunt comes up for the 118, they all join together for the adventure. However, this hunt may be life changing for a certain member of the team.

disclaimer: I have never been to California, so I'm sure a lot of the information here is wrong, although I used google to the best of my ability. Please suspend disbelief (as we do each week while watching 911) and, if you see something wrong... no you didn't. Also, there's a dose of everyone in this fic, but it is mainly bucktommy. You've been warned!

Read below or on ao3 (6.1k words)

“What?!” Buck groaned, exasperated as he cracked open the door.

First, there had been a single knock on the door, which he had gladly ignored in favor of taking Tommy's shirt off.

Then there were three knocks in a row, which caused them to pause, before Tommy continued kissing his way down Buck's chest.

Finally, a rapid and endless succession of knocks had Tommy flopping down beside Buck on the bed, declaring that he gave up.

Buck grumpily grabbed his own shirt off the floor and put it on before heading downstairs.

Which led to now, a sexually frustrated Buck standing at his door with all of his coworkers staring back at him.

Every. Single. One.

Even Ravi.

“Why are you all here?” Buck asked, both confused and annoyed.

“We need to come in.” Bobby sounded serious.

Buck stood straighter, his heart began to race. “Is... Did something happen? Maddie, is she-”

“Maddie's fine,” Chimney interrupted. “She's home with Jee. All good.”

“Christopher?”

“He's good too,” Eddie answered.

“So...”

“So we need to come in, Buck,” Hen whined.

“Yeah, you're being really weird, dude.” Eddie pushed his way past the rest of the group, getting closest to the door. “Come on, open up.” He opened the door, ignoring the resistance from Buck on the other side.

Everyone began to filter in, stopping when they noticed Tommy making his way down the stairs, tugging on his shirt.

“Tommy's here!” Hen exclaimed with a knowing smile.

“Yes, he is,” Buck replied. “It's the first time we've had forty-eight off together for almost two weeks.”

Buck had gotten right to it as soon as Tommy opened the door that evening. Tommy had suggested dinner first, but going two weeks without seeing his boyfriend naked made him hungry for something other than baked chicken.

“Hello everyone,” Tommy greeted, giving them a wave.

Chimney smiled. “Good to see you, Buddy!” he exclaimed, wrapping Tommy in a hug. “Solid as ever,” he noted.

“Okay, okay,” Buck pulled on Chimney's arm, “Let's not discuss the solidity of my boyfriend. Why are you all here, and how do I get you all to leave?”

“There's another treasure out there,” Ravi explained, speaking up for the first time since they'd arrived at Buck's door. He handed Buck a piece of paper. “Apparently, we all have to find it together.”

“Hey, if you wanted the treasure all to yourself,” Chimney said, eying Ravi, “you shouldn't have told Cap.”

“I didn't!” Ravi defended. “He read about it over my shoulder at the station.”

“Well, that's just a lesson on being aware of your surroundings,” Buck replied, looking over the paper.

“I'm confused,” Tommy said, “Another treasure? As in, there was one before?”

“There was,” Bobby replied, excited.

“Sort of,” Hen added.

“We were robbed,” Chimney explained.

“I was robbed,” Ravi corrected. “Technically, I found it first.”

“I don't really get what I'm reading,” Buck said, holding out the paper.

Hen grabbed it from him, “Different guy, real treasure,” she explained simply.

“This guy does treasure hunts around the US,” Ravi continued, “You get on a list, and when one comes to your area, you get notified.”

“How do you know this isn't a scam?” Buck asked. “What was found in the other hunts?”

“He posts about these hunts on YouTube, has a pretty big following,” Ravi answered. “I don't know what people have found. Everyone who participates has to sign an NDA.”

Tommy lifted a hand to speak. “But you guys have done this before?” 

“Ugh!” Eddie groaned. “We are wasting so much time. The hunt we did before was different from this one. Buck, please explain to your man so we can go.”

“It was a whole thing,” Buck said dismissively, “we searched for the treasure, showed up to a dead guy's house, were briefly accused of murder, blah, blah, blah.”

Tommy paused before answering. “Okay, I definitely want to circle back to the whole blah blah blah part later on, but yeah... yeah, I'm in.”

Buck's eyes widened. “You... you are?” He asked.

Tommy shrugged. “A treasure hunt sounds fun.”

“Excellent, excellent." Chimney clapped his hands together. “Let's get this show on the road. Grab your coats and shoes, boys, time's wasting.”

“Oh, wait, wait,” Ravi said, pulling something up on his phone and handing it to Tommy. “You both have to sign this.”

“What is it?”

“The NDA. All involved must sign. Once I send it, then we can start.”

Both Tommy and Buck signed, then handed it back to Ravi, who pushed a button that caused a whoosh sound on his phone.

“All good?” Hen questioned.

“All good,” Ravi confirmed. “Let's go.”

----------

“You rented a van?” Buck asked as Bobby slid the rear door open.

“There's a lot of us, Buck. You wanna ride in the bed of an F150?”

They loaded into the van one by one, Ravi calling shotgun since, “it was just supposed to be me”, and Bobby hopped in the driver's seat.

“Where are we even going?” Buck questioned.

Ravi pulled his phone from his pocket. “The first clue says 'LA is very bright, even so at night, but if you'd like to see the stars, come to me- you may even see Mars.'”

When no one spoke up, Buck rolled his eyes. “Come on, guys, that's like the most obvious clue ever. It's gotta be Griffith Observatory.”

“Oh, that's a good catch, Buck,” Hen replied.

Eddie poked at Chimney's shoulder. “I told you we'd need him for something.” 

Bobby put the van in drive. “First stop: Griffith Observatory.”

----------

“This is odd,” Buck said as the pulled up to the observatory parking lot.

“What is?” Chimney asked.

“There's no one here. This place stays open until like ten o'clock, it's usually packed.”

“People can rent it for private tours though,” Ravi suggested. “Maybe someone did that.”

“And what, never showed?” Eddie asked.

Bobby parked the van. "Let's go find out."

They walked up to the observatory entrance, where a piece of paper was taped to the door.

“Come on in,” Hen read. “We've been waiting.”

She glanced back at the group, met mostly with shrugs, before reaching for the door and opening it.

“Lights are on,” Tommy observed.

“Yeah, and no one's home,” Chimney added.

Buck began wandering around, eyes filled with wonder. “This is...”

“Weird,” Ravi said.

“Cool,” Buck corrected. “I, uh, I usually come with Chris on the weekends and it's a madhouse.”

“So, the first clue got us here,” Chimney said, “but did it say anything about where we'd find clue number 2?”

Ravi shrugged. “The first clue is the only one you get sent, the rest we look for.”

Buck walked over to Tommy, who was focused on a display that talked about gamma-ray bursts. “Hey,” he said, wrapping his arm around Tommy's waist.

Tommy smiled at him. “Hey back.”

“Are you really okay with this?” Buck asked. “It's, uh, kinda ridiculous I guess, and was thrown on us out of nowhere.”

“I don't think it's ridiculous,” Tommy replied softly. “It's kinda fun, actually.”

He could see the relief come over Buck. He got like that sometimes, too much in his own head. He'd worry that everything was going to come crashing down. That he'd be too much, or his coworkers- no, his family, would be too much. It didn't matter that they'd been together for close to two years now. That Tommy enjoyed the chaos, enjoyed the friendships and found family. Buck still had those moments, those doubts, and Tommy always found a way to make them disappear.

Tommy took Buck's hand, “Come on,” he said, leading them away from where everyone else was looking around.

“Where are we going?” Buck asked.

“The main attraction, of course.”

As they walked down the hall toward the Zeiss telescope, Buck made a few pitstops at some of the exhibits. He stared at a couple photographs taken from the telescopes, then he looked over at Tommy. “You remember when we brought Jee here last year?” He smiled at the memory.

“How could I forget?” Tommy replied, nudging Buck. “You found my way with children so attractive you asked me to move in with you two days later.”

Buck laughed, but the blush that rose on his cheeks let Tommy know he wasn't far off from the truth. “Actually, I think you found my planetary knowledge so irresistible that you had no choice but to move in with me.”

“That's not not true,” Tommy admitted. He leaned over and gave Buck a peck on the cheek. “Come on, let's go before the rest of the group catches up.”

When they reached the telescope, Buck looked at it like he was a kid staring at unopened Christmas presents.

Tommy let go of his hand, moving it to his back to gently nudge him forward. “Go on,” he encouraged.

Buck cautiously walked up the steps. “I feel like I'm committing a crime.”

“Well, it is highly possible we are. This is sketchy as all hell. Might as well enjoy it before we get formally charged, though.”

“Ha ha.” Buck looked into the telescope, his breath catching at the sight. “I- It's so... It's beautiful. Tommy, you gotta come look.”

Tommy walked up the steps as the rest of the group started filtering into the room. “Wow. That's... wow.”

“I know.”

“Alright, alright, no hovering,” Eddie said, standing at the bottom of the staircase. “We all get turns.”

As they all took turns looking in the telescope, Buck noticed a piece of paper lying on the ground. He walked over to it and picked it up. “Guys!” he called out. “I found the next clue!”

The group circled around him, Bobby leaving the telescope last. “What's it say?”

“It's a menu.”

“Why would a menu be our clue?” Tommy asked.

“It's to the Churro Factory at the LA Zoo.”

Chimney reached over and took the paper. “The Churro Factory has a menu?”

“Well, I've never seen a printed one before, but I know that's it. I- I might get them every time I go,” Buck said, then quickly added, “for Christopher, of course.”

Eddie nodded. “Of course.”

“They don't have much there and, quite frankly, the churros are underrated.”

“He means no one likes them but him,” Tommy explained, rubbing Buck's back.

He was met with a glare that held no true irritation.

“Alright,” Bobby said, “to the zoo!”

Buck reached for Tommy's watch. “The zoo closed like three hours ago.”

“And no one is at the open observatory,” Hen replied. “Make it make sense.”

As they began to leave the room, Buck looked over at the telescope, biting at his bottom lip.

“Go,” Tommy said. “They won't leave without us.”

----------

“How do we just walk into a closed zoo?” Ravi asked as they headed toward the gate.

Hen shrugged. “The same way we walked into the observatory.”

Buck started looking all around, taking note of every security camera he could see. “We're going to end up on national news, aren't we? Group of Firefighters Arrested on Multiple Counts of Breaking and Entering.”

Eddie stared off into the distance, thinking. “I would not do well in prison."

Tommy smirked. “Oh, I think you'd be very well liked.”

For a second, Eddie smiled. “Really?” He asked, mulling it over for a moment before realization hit him. “Wait-”

“Okay, guys,” Bobby interrupted. “No one's going to prison. This has obviously been well planned out and okayed by the establishments we're entering.” He picked up the pace, leading them into the zoo, before mumbling out, “Hopefully.”

Red rope lined the sidewalk of the zoo, leading them directly to the churro stand. While all the other fast food stations were closed and locked up, the Churro Factory was open, with lights on.

Eddie looked down at a paper on the countertop. “Make your favorite, clean your mess.” He shrugged. “I could eat.”

Hen opened the side door to get into the stand. “They left the soft serve machine going. Churros in a warmer. Even have little donut holes.” She picked one up, throwing it over to Buck with a smile. “Since it's your favorite.”

Buck rolled his eyes, but popped the donut in his mouth anyway, moaning at the taste. “I swear, I don't understand how anyone could not love this stuff.”

“Alright, just gotta say I will not be taking orders.” Hen grabbed a cup for the ice cream, “But I will be serving myself first.”

They all fixed themselves a treat, then sat at some nearby tables and benches while they ate.

“You know, I've had a lot of really weird nights,” Buck said to Tommy, licking ice cream off his spoon, “but this one takes the cake.”

Tommy smiled. “In a good way?”

“Mhm. Great way. First the observatory, now this. I don't even care what the treasure is.”

Tommy reached over and stole a bite of Buck's whipped cream. “Great lie, Ev. You totally care about the treasure.”

Buck didn't argue. “Okay, I do. It- It's gotta be good, ya know? All this stuff is so... elaborate. It's gotta be huge.”

“I don't disagree. A little bummed we can't actually see any animals though.”

“Oh, the animals start resting around four-thirty every day, wh- which is why the zoo closes at five. It would totally screw them up if they were out walking around in the viewing areas right now.”

“Are you two plotting ways to steal the treasure and leave the rest of us behind?” Eddie asked, walking over and sitting down next to Buck on the bench.

“Oh we'd take you,” Tommy joked. “Christopher too. Flee the country, somewhere the rest of them would never find us.”

“Yeah,” Buck agreed. “But I'd need Bobby, and he'd need Athena.”

Tommy hummed. “I'd feel bad leaving Chimney behind.”

“Which adds Maddie and Jee.”

Eddie bit off a piece of churro. “Hen's a must. And Karen and the kids.” Tommy and Buck nodded in agreement.

“We'd have to take Ravi,” Buck resigned. “He'd be lost without us.”

Tommy wiped off his mouth with the napkin in his hand. “Well, Evan, I think this effectively spoils all of our plans to run away with the treasure.”

Buck patted his thigh. “Afraid so.”

Once they'd finished their snacks, they began searching for what was needed to clean up. “Found it!” Chimney yelled, pulling out a plastic tub of cleaning supplies. He removed the items one by one until a paper fell flat into the tub. “Explore nature and culture from the inside out,” he read, then lifted the page so everyone could see. “There's a picture of a butterfly on the paper.”

“That's the slogan for the Natural History Museum.” Buck didn't even have to think about it. “They have a butterfly pavilion there.”

“You're on a roll tonight, Buck,” Bobby said with a smile. “No one else stands a chance.”

----------

It took about twenty minutes to get to the Natural History Museum and, just like the previous places, there wasn't another car or person nearby.

“The butterfly pavilion is this way!” Buck waved them in his direction, practically hopping out of the van.

“He's been trying to see this for a couple years now,” Tommy explained to the group, no one able to match Buck's pace. “But it's seasonal and the timing was just never right.”

Hen watched Buck fondly as he opened the museum door and whined at Eddie to hurry up. “He's certainly not wasting the opportunity.”

Everyone was entranced when they got into the pavilion. Thousands of butterflies fluttering around them, some landing on them as they walked around.

“This is so cool,” Buck said in awe, staring at the monarch on his hand.

Tommy couldn't take his eyes off of Buck. “Yeah, it is.”

“It's like... It's like they know me, or something.”

“Who? The butterflies.”

Buck snorted and the butterfly flew away. “No, you buffoon. Whoever set this hunt up. It's basically been everything I love.”

“You're not too far off,” Ravis said, coming up behind them. “The guy who does this does research on the people he chooses for a hunt. I'm constantly hearing about the things you do on your days off, and sometimes tagging along, so...”

“So the hunt is kind of tailored to you?” Buck questioned.

Ravi shrugged. “Us, I think. Oh, I gotta see that yellow one!" He scurried off before he could be asked anymore questions.

Buck reached out a hand for Tommy to take. “Walk with me?”

“Always.”

“This treasure guy really goes all out,” Hen said, watching two butterflies as they did a dance around each other.

“Yeah,” Chimney agreed, “but I haven't seen anything that leads us to our next spot.”

Bobby came up to them, holding a little figurine in his hand. “Because you've been too distracted by these little guys. Look what I found.”

Everyone came over to look, staring at the tiny ferris wheel in Bobby's hand.

“No note?” Ravi asked.

Bobby shook his head. “No note.”

Buck took the ferris wheel from Bobby. “The pier?”

“Sounds good to me.”

Buck looked confused. “It does?”

“Well, doesn't it?”

“I don't know,” Buck looked around, eying each member of the group. “E- Everyone's agreeing with me really quickly and it, uh, it's throwing me off.”

Hen rolled her eyes as she reached behind him and started to push him toward the door. “We're agreeing cause it's obvious, you just suck at letting someone else have a turn.”

“Yeah, and we'd like to sleep sometime tonight, if possible,” Chimney added.

----------

The ride to the pier took longer than expected, and everything was in the middle of closing down as they began their stroll. Buck was surprised that neither of the security guards that passed by them said a word to them and, if he didn't know any better, he'd swear one even nodded in their direction.

“I got cotton candy!” Eddie yelled, and Buck hadn't even realized he had trailed off from the group in the first place. He walked over to Buck, pulled a chunk of the cotton candy out, and handed it to him.

Hen put a hand on her stomach. “Ugh, how can you guys even eat that after the churros?”

Buck would've responded, but he was too busy stuffing the cotton candy in his mouth.

“Popcorn?” Chimney had a huge bag of popcorn in his hands, walking up opposite from where Eddie had come from. When had he disappeared?

“I think we need to go to the ferris wheel,” Bobby said, looking down to where the wheel was still lit up, despite the lights going off everywhere else.

Chimney took a handful of popcorn and shoved it in his mouth before pointing and yelling, “to the wheel!”

When they got to the ferris wheel, the attendant was still there waiting. He let them on in groups of two, Tommy and Buck, Bobby and Ravi, Chimney and Eddie. Hen decided to sit it out, not wanting her churros to make a reappearance that night.

“This is where we said I love you the first time,” Tommy said quietly, snuggling closer to Buck as the wind picked up slightly.

Buck smiled softly, looked over at Tommy and gave him a kiss on his temple. “I remember.”

Buck had taken Tommy on a tour of what he called his “greatest hits” showing him all the spots where some of his biggest personal disasters occurred. They'd gone to the spot the firetruck landed on him, the lot where Bobby and Athena's home once stood- the spot of his pulmonary embolism; where he was struck by lightning, even the outside of Maddie and Chimney's old apartment- where he was basically told he was never actually wanted by his parents, just needed. But it was when they got to the pier, and Buck was in the middle of telling Tommy about losing Christopher, that he realized Tommy had actually listened to all of his stories. He'd asked questions, comforted him when the conversations got rough. Tommy always either had a hand on Buck's back, or he'd link their hands together tightly, so Buck knew he wasn't alone.

Buck had stopped mid story, stared at Tommy like he did the first time they kissed, and when Tommy asked if Buck was okay, he just said it.

“I love you, Tommy.”

He wasn't scared, didn't even care if Tommy said it back. He meant it. More than he'd ever meant it before. He didn't just love him, he was in love with him.

It didn't take long for Tommy to say it back, as soon as he got over the initial shock. “I love you, Evan,” he breathed out, as though he'd been holding it in for far too long, “so much.”

They kissed, giggled and whispered like little schoolchildren, then Tommy had asked Buck to finish his story.

Buck wrapped his arm around Tommy's, the memory leaving him feeling warm against the coolness of the night. “You made that day perfect.”

“You make every day perfect.”

He said it with such ease, like he didn't even have to think about it. Buck knew he should be used to it by now. This wasn't the first time Tommy casually informed him that Buck being in his life made it better. He did it regularly, often in passing, like it was the simplest, most honest thing in the world.

“Really?” Buck questioned once the butterflies in his stomach flew away. “Even the day we moved into our place and I tried to replace the toilet but somehow I ended up flooding the bathroom with neighborhood sewage?”

“Oh God, don't remind me,” Tommy said with a groan, although he couldn't stop himself from grinning. “I still have nightmares about that smell!”

Buck laughed. “That was a disaster.”

“Yeah, and Maddie loved us showing up on her doorstep at midnight with a week's worth of clothes.”

“A true bonding experience.”

“Mhm. Definitely.”

The ride ended too quickly in Buck's opinion, but he knew they had more important things to do.

“Were we supposed to see something up there?” Ravi asked. “Because I got nothing.”

“There was a definitely an arrow in the sky, pointing us toward the east.” Bobby was convinced.

“That was a plane, and it was not pointing us anywhere.”

“While you nerds were going on a ride, I actually talked to the kind attendant over there,” Hen said, pointing to the man who was now closing up the wheel, “and he handed me this.” She held up a paper. “It's coordinates. Two, actually.”

“We're supposed to go to two places?” Chimney asked.

“This is all I got.” Hen handed the paper to Tommy. “Top one's got a drawing of a chopper on it and says 'hope you can fly.'”

Tommy studied it for a moment before speaking. “Okay. Okay, Buck and I will go to the first coordinates, you guys go to the second and we'll call when we get there.”

Chimney put his hands on his hips. “Wait, why do you guys get to go to the chopper?”

“Uh,” Tommy looked around to the group, “do any of you know how to fly a helicopter?”

When no one responded, he nodded. “Thought so.”

“Well, a couple more of us could go with you,” Eddie suggested.

“Some helicopters are two seaters,” Tommy explained, eying Eddie. “Would you like to hang onto the landing skids should the situation arise?”

Buck sighed. “Okay, guys, it- it's obvious I get boyfriend-of-the-pilot privilege, so lets, you know, get moving.”

----------

Once Tommy looked up the coordinates and saw it was only about a ten minute walk away, he and Buck set off on foot while the others took the van.

They arrived at a building that, at the top, had a helipad. “I've landed here a couple times for emergencies. Actually, once was after the tsunami.”

"First of all, show off,” Buck said with a laugh. “Second of all, sometimes I- I still can't believe all the times we were so close to meeting but, just, never did.”

“I know. It kinda sucks to think about, but everything happens when it's supposed to, right?”

“I think we did.”

Sure enough, a chopper was waiting at the helipad. There was a note on the door with another coordinates, stating that coming here was only the first part of the clue. It also mentioned that, should there be any others joining the expedition, they would see them again once they arrived.

“Why don't you shoot Bobby a text,” Tommy suggested as they got seated in the cockpit. “We'll call when we get wherever we're going.”

Tommy put the coordinates on his phone, then did a quick check before getting the chopper up and running.

“It's so beautiful up here,” Buck said, looking all around at the city lit up against the darkness of the night. They'd been in the sky for a while now, and Buck had no idea where they were going, but right now he didn't really care.

Tommy glanced at Buck. “Yeah, it is. Reminds me of when we first met.”

“That was a little less beautiful,” Buck recalled, but he was still grinning from ear to ear. “But, yeah. We've been on a lot of these rides since then.”

“No opportunities for my fake mouth static since the first time though, which is severely disappointing.”

“And it was so good too.”

“Oh, it still is, Evan. Trust me.”

Buck motioned with his hand to encourage Tommy. “Well, please, let's hear it.”

Tommy let out a hesitant breath. “I'm not sure you're ready.”

“I think I can handle it. Come on, hon, give it to me.”

“Okay, okay, but hold onto something cause this is- it's serious.”

Buck dramatically grabbed onto his seatbelt as Tommy cleared his throat and began a round of fake mouth static that had Buck turning down the volume on his headphones.

“Wow,” he said once it was over. “That was...”

“Amazing? Incredible? Earth shattering?”

“Just as terrible as the first time,” Buck laughed out.

“Aye!” Tommy feigned offense. “I literally won an award for that.”

“It, uh, might've had more to do with the rescues, but-”

“Semantics.”

“Is it though?”

“Well, looky there,” Tommy said, changing the subject as he began to descend, “we have reached our destination.”

They landed in a clearing smack dab in the middle of what looked like nothing but woods. Buck couldn't be sure though, because it was dark all around them.

“I swear, if we get murdered, I'm gonna come back and haunt Ravi,” Buck said as he unbuckled and got out of the helicopter. “Should we, uh, should we call the guys?”

Tommy paused, looking off into the distance. “I see a light this way,” he said, pointing toward a clearing through the woods. “Looks like a path. Let's go look,” he suggested. “We'll call in a minute.”

As they started down the path, small lampposts with flickering lights began to light their way.

“Where are we?” Buck asked with wonder in his voice.

“I think it's a state park.”

They came upon a white bench, which Buck wouldn't have paid much attention to if not for the small, black box sitting on top of it.

“You think it's for us?” he asked.

Tommy nodded. “I'd bet on it.”

Buck picked it up, opening it to find an old looking key. He smiled. “I think we're getting close.”

Tommy grinned back, reaching out for Buck's hand and nodding toward the path. “Let's keep going.”

“It's weird,” Buck said as he moved closer into Tommy's space. He always found himself doing that; he loved being as close to Tommy as he could, and he loved it even more that Tommy loved it. “I've known pretty much all the spots we've gone to tonight, but not this one.”

“Hm,” Tommy hummed. “Yeah, that is weird.”

It got a little brighter as they went on, and eventually they found themselves in a large, open area with tons of brightly blooming plants, and a gently flowing creek with a wide white bridge over it, connecting two separate gardens. Buck would've been fascinated by it, but he was too focused on the fact that he and Tommy were not alone anymore.

The rest of the group was already there, plus a few more. Athena, Karen, and, “Maddie? What are you doing here?”

She shrugged. “Carla came over with Christopher to watch Jee. Chim said something about treasure, and I'm not missing out. ”

Tommy let go of his hand and Buck took a few steps forward. “How- How did you all get here already?”

“We're like a twenty minute drive out of the city, Buck,” Hen told him.

“But... What-”

“Alright, alright, you've got the key, Buckaroo,” Chimney interrupted, snapping toward Buck for him to get on with it. “It's all you.”

Buck hadn't even noticed the treasure chest, set dead center on the bridge. Bobby was closest to it, but he was just standing there, a softness on his face that would have had Buck asking questions if it weren't for the fact they found the treasure!

Buck continued until he reached the chest, then bent down, placing the key into it. He turned it, but paused before opening the box. “So we all agree to share everything that's in here?” He trusted his friends, he really did, but it never hurt to clarify.

Bobby gave his shoulder a squeeze. “I think this one's all for you, kid,” he said before walking over to Athena.

Buck barely heard him. He was already opening the box to see a single ring lying on top of a fluffy, velvet pillow.

This is when realization should have set in. Actually, when he'd think back on it later, there were many times realization should have set in, but it didn't.

Instead, Buck picked up the ring to take a closer look. Black silicone with a red line around the center. “It's a ring,” he said to the group. “And it... it says something on the inside, I think.” He squinted, trying to focus on the words, but the low light from the nearby lampposts wasn't nearly enough.

“Buck,” Maddie was practically pleading, “turn around!”

“What?”

Groans came from the people all around him.

“Turn around!” Hen echoed.

“For the love of God, Buck!” Eddie yelled.

“Okay, okay!” Buck stood, ring still held between his fingers, and turned around. His breath caught in his throat when he saw Tommy there, kneeling, smiling up at him.

“It says 'to me, you are perfect,'” Tommy began, his voice shaky, but not from nerves. “Which I know is a little cheesy,” he admitted, “but it's true. Evan Buckley, getting to share this life with you for nearly two years now has been my greatest adventure. They say love finds you when you least expect it, and I think I can speak for the both of us when I say ours was a little unexpected. I love you so much. Every part of you. Evan, will you marry me?”

Stunned was too light of a word to use, if you asked Buck. He was frozen in place, mouth hanging open, unable to find words until he heard someone clear their throat behind him.

“You... you did all this for me? Th- the whole treasure hunt?”

“Yeah, yes. Yes, it was for you. For this.”

Buck sucked in a shaky breath, reaching down to hold onto Tommy's shoulders and pull him up. He put his hands on Tommy's cheeks, rubbing his thumbs gently along the scruff, staring into his eyes as his own reddened with tears. He leaned in, pressing his lips gently to Tommy's before deepening the kiss, moving his arms to wrap around Tommy's neck.

After a few seconds, Tommy pulled away slightly, resting his forehead against Buck's. “Is that a yes?” he asked breathlessly.

Buck nodded, sniffling. “Yes,” he said through shaky laughter. “Always, yes.”

They didn't hear the sounds of everyone clapping and cheering as Tommy let out a breath he didn't realize he'd been holding, “Oh, thank God,” he said, his face scrunching up into a smile. “That could've been really embarrassing.”

Eddie cupped his hands over his mouth. “Put the ring on,” he called out, earning him a smack to the gut from Hen.

Buck laughed. He gave Tommy the ring, who then slid it on his finger. “I've got you one at home,” Buck admitted, using his other hand to wipe tears from his face.

Tommy was taken aback. “You do?”

“Mhm. Bottom drawer of the nightstand, my side of the bed. It says 'True love lasts a lifetime.'”

"I love you so much," Tommy said as he leaned in for another kiss.

"Love you more."

“Can we hug you guys yet?” Karen asked, bouncing slightly with impatience.

They laughed, letting go of one another to get hugs from their family.

When Buck got to Bobby, Bobby held onto him tightly. “I'm so happy for you, kid,” he said quietly, just loud enough for them to hear. “So, unbelievably happy.”

“Thank you, Bobby.” Once they let each other go, Buck asked, "You knew from the beginning, didn't you?”

Bobby nodded. “The second you walked into the hospital room with soot all over your face, I knew we'd end up here,” he said, giving them both a laugh. “You had the biggest smile I think I'd ever seen, and so did he,” Bobby pointed over to Tommy, who was laughing with Hen and Karen. “You're good for each other, Buck.”

Buck had to give Bobby another hug, tears filling his eyes once again. “I love you, Bobby.”

“Love you too, kid. Now, go,” he said, patting Buck's back, “be with your fiancé.”

They all headed to a 24 hour diner after all the congratulations had died down. Eddie immediately started on best man duties for Buck.

“You don't even have to ask. I already have a week's worth of bachelor's parties planned. We're starting with the 70's and working our way through each decade. I've got it all figured out.”

Tommy had already talked to Chimney a few days earlier, asking him to be his best man.

“You're getting beers and a movie marathon,” Chimney informed him.

Tommy breathed a sigh of relief. “I knew I chose correctly.”

After eating too many all-you-can-eat waffles and sharing desserts, everyone gave a final congratulations before heading home.

----------

Buck laid back on the bed, grabbing for Tommy's hand as he tried to catch his breath. He intertwined their hands and rested them on top of his chest, feeling his heart pound as he used his other hand to fiddle with the ring that now had a place on Tommy's finger.

“We're engaged,” Buck sighed into the dimly lit room.

“Would've done it a lot sooner had I known the sex would be that good.” Tommy turned onto his side as Buck laughed. He splayed his right hand over Buck's stomach, stroking up and down gently, giving Buck goosebumps. He pressed a kiss to Buck's bicep. “Did you like your proposal?”

“Like it? God, Tommy, it was... it was perfect. How did you get us into the observatory? The zoo? The history museum?!”

“I know people,” he replied simply.

"Of course you do. And you actually did know about the treasure hunt from before? I don't remember ever telling you about it."

"You didn't. When I went to Eddie about my plan, he told me. Not about the whole murder thing though, so I would actually like more info on that sometime."

"Noted. I- I can't believe you got everyone in on it. They all spent their entire night doing that for me."

"Couldn't have pulled it off without them."

“That makes it even more special.” Buck moved them around until Tommy's head was resting on his chest and he was running his fingers through Tommy's hair, slowly massaging his scalp. “I do have one more question though.”

“Hmm?” Sleep was already starting to take over Tommy. He never lasted long with a scalp massage.

“What was the NDA thing we signed with Ravi?”

“Oh, he was supposed to just send your sister a message saying we were getting started, but he came up with that whole thing himself. Probably should've read the fine print on that.”

“Oh God. It's something he's gonna use against me at work, isn't it?”

Tommy tucked himself in even closer to Buck, his eyes fluttered shut. “Most likely.”

Buck groaned, but didn't let himself stay annoyed for long. That was a worry for another day. Another day where he would clearly state to Ravi that whatever he signed was signed under false pretenses and would never hold up in court!

For now though, he reached up to turn off the lamp before pulling the covers up over him and Tommy. “I love you,” he whispered, pressing a kiss to the top of Tommy's head.

“Love you more,” Tommy muttered back before they fell into a peaceful sleep.

[walkingzombiegirl]

I NEED heavy butch 4 butch tension with abby anderson x nonchalant fem reader. Pleaseeee

too long to be a drabble, too short to be a full fic - i am having a brain block

The silence wasn't steady, your deep breaths creating a symphony in the air that seemed to only make the decision harder for her. She tapped her cards against the table, biting her lip while you watched.

Something was playing on TV - what - she didn't know. She tuned it out while deciding whether or not playing her hand was a good idea. But no matter what she was, or was not going to do, it felt you already knew the answer. It made her shiver.

She was aware your eyes were on her, however, she didn't look up. Instead, Abby reached forward and placed one of her two cards down, practically hearing your shit-eating grin appear.

"I win." You said, looking up at your friend with a triumphant hum and no cards in your hands. You had already put them down before she made her move, she could've punched herself.

"You've gotta be kidding me."

"You did better that time..." You shrugged, taking the cards in order to form the deck once again. "Better isn't good." Abby huffed, tossing the cards to your end of the table while you snickered in return. "You did good, Abbs, practice makes perfect. You'll be beating Manny in no time."

Your eyes flickered up at her, meeting her own for a moment. You gave her a smile, shuffling the deck as you did so.

"You're just not as good as me yet." You whispered, her blue eyes blinking in response, her head slowly moving to shake. "You're a dick." She said in the same tone, the girl then rolled her eyes and tried to not take notice of your gaze.

"I learned young, you're learning now. There's a difference." "Not when you look stupid." You shook your head, shifting, the movement making a noise in the cargo pants you wore. "You don't look stupid to me."

The silence rolled over again, the cards moving back and forth between your palms while you thought.

"Y'know... never mind." You paused, looking down while your fingers danced around the deck, moving the cards effortlessly while she side-eyed. "What?" Abby asked, but you didn't answer. "Nothing." "No, c'mon say it."

Her smile faltered, and she quickly became nervous that you noticed. However, you didn't seem to, staring at your rings with a patient look.

You startled her, eyes suddenly stared back.

"I was gonna say... you look really nice in that lamplight." "Oh fuck off." She tossed a beer cap at you, your eyes tracking it as it rolled away. "I'm serious, Abigail. Owen is an idiot." It was said so plainly she almost choked, ignoring the light pink dusting her cheeks that she hoped you didn't see.

"You think all men are idiots." She said with an obvious tone, a tight lipped smile on her face. "Yes because women don't deserve them." "And who does?" The room felt thick, almost suffocating you while you shrugged once more.

"Give it up and hand over the cards." She cut in. "No... I don't think I will." You shook your head, staring at her. "You're too... pretty. He makes me squirm." Abby rolled her eyes, reaching towards you to grab the cards. "Nothing makes you squirm, you're a-" "A what?"

You'd moved the cards from her reach, her face inches from yours. Her breath fanned your lips, head moving to tilt just the slightest.

"You know I'm right, Abby." She only stared, moving like prey caught in a trap to look at your hand, fingers wrapped around the deck of cards. Ace of hearts resting on top. "You're way out of his league."

"Was. He's with Mel now." She grabbed the deck, backing up a bit, but not retreating. "Fortunately." She didn't have to ask why.

"Play again?" You then asked, holding up a card that you'd slipped from the deck, her eyes moving down to look at it. "How-" "I'll let you win this time."

The card flipped. Ace of hearts.

"You're a dickhead." "Yeah... but you love it, be honest."

i genuinely despise this yet loved the request, i love you anon know that at least

[a-dauntless-daffodil]

it hurts me. the parallel of Charlie at the start of ep 1, so excited about showing her plans for the hotel to heaven she doesn't see how VERY NOT excited about it Vaggie is (cough angel kicked out by heaven for not doing enough murder cough cough), even while getting literally up in Vaggie's face.....

and then Vaggie, when Charlie comes drooping home after that all crashed and burned spectacularly- now it's VAGGIE so excited to show CHARLIE the new and improved hotel commercial she got everyone to make while Charlie was away... now it's Vaggie, up close and basically physically pressing her excitement into her girlfriend, not seeing how utterly crushed Charlie is right then

like, clearly Vaggie expected the heaven meeting to not live up to Charlie's hopes for it. Clearly she REALLY wanted to have something GOOD AND HOPEFUL for Charlie to come home to afterwards

-which would have worked too, if the Extermination schedule update hadn't interrupted the commercial airing

look at how habby Charlie was finding out about the commercial

awww

"heaven isn't homophobic" well then what do you call them interrupting this lesbian's hard won cheer-up-the-girlfriend effort huh? what was that then. not only cruel but also an insult to us queers everywhere. one of the only real sins we ever see in the show, tbh

but gods, they give each other so much CONFIDENCE, chaggie and the mutual "I can do this for her" / "She thinks I can do this and I will" synergy...

and it keeps fucking their relationship up. GODS

how they mirror and act like they're trying to literally meld into each other, while both being So Bad at actually SAYING when and why they're upset about something Serious-

when they're also clearly wanting to share SO MUCH of what they feel specifically with the woman they love!!!!

and how that sometimes blinds them both, over and over again, to the moments when (ironically) their other half needed them to be a little less sure, for a second, that things are or would be okay. Share less of their own conviction, that they got from the other one in the first place

When instead of needing answers to the obvious problem, they both needed to be asked hey IS something wrong? is there ANOTHER problem here actually??

they both put so much of themselves into each other, they both rely on the other one for their sense of self-worth and the strength they need to be The One Who Get Things Done and The One Who Always Has A Plan

that's so DELICIOUSLY fucked up. the flip side to love,

(Vaggie freaking out feeling her existence is pointless while thinking she's failed Charlie, and Charlie losing so much hope just at the thought Vaggie might not really love or believe in her)

when someone else is walking around with your heart beating in their chest because you yourself put it there

heck, their resolution in s1 ISN'T even them hashing things out or communicating better! they don't NEED that- (yet) they JUST need each other! (soooooo fucked up I LOVE it) the thing that brings them back together is Vaggie fully letting go of her angel past to focus on her life with Charlie and tapping back into her whole self for first time since meeting Charlie, it's Charlie the singer and giver of heartfelt motivational speeches having her mind blown by words meaning less than actions as her partner who lied to her is also off right that moment doing everything she can to protect what they've built

the big moment is NOT them actually TALKING about what happened or why it happened. it doesn't matter!!! (to them) Their hurt came from being scared of losing each other, they meet up at the hotel gates and just seeing the other one there is Enough!

they happily return to status quo minus some secrets and plus some more confidence in what they have.... which means the rest of this stuff, the root cause of it all, the unaddressed subtext that they NEED to be fucked up together in an active, intentional, KNOWING way but are so good at inspiring and supporting each other that it just, doesn’t, happen..... that's all still there.

(i see you, Charlie sitting alone with your story of hell book and being shocked at your long time girlfriend coming up to your shared room, being around to see you sad, you putting on a smile and trying to wave it off bc yeah she's right you AREN'T alone anymore. technically)

(i see you, Vaggie asking to be left alone on a rooftop so you can deal with a devastating blow to your whole sense of self as 100% unintentionally dealt by your loving girlfriend who WANTS to be there for you through this but who YOU can't face until you're ready to shoulder the blame and apologize to her)

(i see you both trying so hard to help each other and not letting yourselves be helped)

(because no clearly you don't need it, clearly this is all already so much better that what you used to have and you're doing so much better, and what if you're still not good enough for it actually-)

chaggie is so happily, catastrophically entertwined and i hope they spend the next thousand years suffering through it together

[saintsenara]

🖤, 🤍 and 💀, please!

thank you very much for the asks, anons plus @poetryandbloods-blog!

which character is not as morally bad as everyone else seems to think?

i mean, given the level of reading comprehension in this fandom, pretty much all of them... with snape and dumbledore at the top of the pile.

but i'm going to go for a female character, for fun and profit, and say... petunia dursley.

petunia is - like vernon - primarily a children's literature archetype - the wicked stepmother/aunt/guardian who is constantly trying to assert authority over the child-hero, with very little success. she has to be pretty one-note - shrill and cruel and demonstrably non-maternal [and performatively womanly because she's innately unfeminine] - because it's what the narrative conventions which govern her demand.

but, nonetheless, when we look at her without the restrictions of these genre conventions, there's a lot about petunia which can be used to contextualise her actions in the series with rather more nuance than they're often afforded.

when petunia is - at most - twenty-four, she has no parents, her sister is dead, she's at home all day with one toddler [and she appears to have no other social support when it comes to caring for dudley], and she's just had another toddler dumped upon her in incredibly traumatic circumstances.

vernon appears to be considerably older than her - him complaining in the very first chapter of philosopher's stone about how "young people" dress doesn't make sense if he's in his twenties as well, and i tend to imagine that he's at least fifteen [if not twenty] years older than his wife, meaning that, since they apparently married before lily and james, petunia was twenty-two at most when they tied the knot and vernon was anywhere between thirty-seven and forty-two. vernon is also from a higher social class than she is - and so much about her canon behaviour can be explained by recognising how nervous she is about not disappointing him by revealing to their neighbours that her class-performance is a pretence, rather than something she was born into.

this isn't to deny her agency in her decisions - she is, of course, also confined in a prison which is directly of her own making [the bland domesticity of her perfect little house, all of which is an artifice constructed so she doesn’t have to admit how deeply she once longed to be magic] - and nor is it to deny that her treatment of harry is wrong.

but it's important to note that nothing is completely black-and-white. petunia's cruelty is intertwined with an obvious loneliness - which is only compounded by the twin societal monsters of class and gender conventions.

and she makes a great subject for a nuanced character study, and i'd love to see more!

which character is not as morally good as everyone else seems to think?

hagrid, who is a death eater.

if you had to choose one major character to die, who would you pick?

answered here.

what is a popular [serious] theory you disagree with?

"black family madness".

while many mental illnesses - and the personality traits which can be contributing factors to them - run in families, and while i'm interested in the idea that sirius' depression when he's trapped in grimmauld place mirrors walburga's own after he leaves home in a way which can be thought of as inherited, i really dislike the idea that there's some sort of inherent madness running through the black family like a generational curse.

this fanon attributes anything bad done by a member of the family - especially a female one - to madness. which is obviously an inaccurate and stigmatising approach to mental illness - but which i also think is also a very dull way of examining the cyclical, generational thread of prejudice and restriction which runs through the blacks in canon.

[pyromaniacblujay]

What's your AU's canon explanation for someone having the Judas' tongue trinket 🥴

idk

[canisalbus]

It's quite funny having followed you for years and years and knowing Machete as his dark, bloodied, cunning (and always on the edge of getting horribly murdered for his hubris) incarnation, and coming into 2024 and just... yeah he's gay now. Maybe he's even happy. Redemption at last... perhaps he DID get assassinated indeed and all those AUs are just his personal afterlife (does he get to go to Heaven? Seems so!)

.

[mattodore]

The BOLD THE FACTS tag with Theo (requested)

tagged for theo by @wldestluv-rs and @earthmoonz <3

The Rules are simple! Tag people and name a character you want to know more about! If you want to let the person you tagged decide who to showcase, then don’t name a character and they can pick somebody. Easy! The person who is tagged will then bold the remarks below which apply to their character &, if they want to, include a picture with their reply!

[ PERSONAL ]

$ Financial: wealthy / moderate / poor / in poverty / other (theo is financially dependent on his wealthy parents and technically has no money of his own) ✚ Medical: fit / moderate / sickly (he overworks himself, gets very little sleep, smokes frequently, and abuses drugs… he’s not doing so hot) / disabled / disadvantaged / non applicable ✪ Class or Caste: upper / middle / working / unsure / other ✔ Education: qualified / unqualified / studying / other ✖ Criminal Record: yes, for major crimes / yes, for minor crimes / no / has committed crimes, but hasn't been caught (theo uses illegal drugs) / yes, but charges were dismissed

[ FAMILY ]

◒ Children: had a child or children / has no children / wants children ◑ Relationship with Family: close with sibling(s) / not close with sibling(s) / has no siblings / sibling(s) is deceased ◔ Affiliation: orphaned / adopted / disowned / raised by birth parents / not applicable / other (while technically living with his parents and being raised by them as a teen, theo was raised more closely by his au pair when he was younger)

[ TRAITS + TENDENCIES ]

♦ extroverted / introverted / in between ♦ disorganized / organized / in between ♦ close minded /open-minded / in between ♦ calm / anxious / in between ♦ disagreeable / agreeable / in between ♦ cautious / reckless / in between ♦ patient / impatient / in between ♦ outspoken / reserved / in between (he can lash out but generally theo keeps a lot of his thoughts to himself) ♦ leader / follower (theo doesn’t like the spotlight) / in between ♦ empathetic / vicious bastard / in between ♦ optimistic / pessimistic / in between ♦ traditional / modern / in between ♦ hard-working / lazy / in between ♦ cultured / uncultured / in between / unknown ♦ loyal / disloyal / unknown (theo hasn't had enough people in his corner to answer this one with any amount of certainty) ♦ faithful / unfaithful / unknown (similar to the above, theo hasn't dated enough to give a general answer for this)

[ BELIEFS ]

★ Faith: monotheist / polytheist / atheist / agnostic ☆ Belief in Ghosts or Spirits: yes / no / don’t know / don’t care ✮ Belief in an Afterlife: yes / no / don’t know / don’t care ✯ Belief in Reincarnation: yes / no / don’t know / don’t care ❃ Belief in Aliens: yes / no / don’t know / don’t care ✧ Religious: orthodox / liberal / in between / not religious ❀ Philosophical: yes / no

[ SEXUALITY & ROMANTIC INCLINATION ]

❤ Sexuality: heterosexual / homosexual / bisexual / asexual / pansexual ❥ Sex: sex repulsed / sex neutral / sex favorable / naive and clueless / other (theo has sex regularly but that doesn't necessarily mean he's favorable... this isn't to say that he never wants or enjoys sex, but that he has a tendency to use sex in unhealthy ways. it's complicated.) ♥ Romance: romance repulsed / romance neutral / romance favorable / naïve and clueless / romance suspicious (doesn’t trust people not to hurt him) ❣ Sexually: adventurous / experienced / naïve / inexperienced / curious ⚧ Potential Sexual Partners: male / female / agender / other / none / all ⚧ Potential Romantic Partners: male / female / agender / other / none / all

[ ABILITIES ]

☠ Combat Skills: excellent / good / moderate / poor / none ≡ Literacy Skills: excellent / good / moderate / poor / none ✍ Artistic Skills: excellent / good / moderate / poor / none ✂ Technical Skills: excellent / good / moderate / poor / none

[ HABITS ]

☕ Drinking Alcohol: never / special occasions / sometimes / frequently / Alcoholic ☁ Smoking: tried it / trying to quit / quit / never / rarely / sometimes / frequently / chain-smoker ✿ Recreational Drugs: never / special occasions / sometimes / frequently / addict ✌ Medicinal Drugs: never / no longer needs medication / some medication needed (headache meds regularly and sleeping pills a few months out of the year) / frequently / to excess ☻ Unhealthy Food: never / special occasions / sometimes / frequently / binge eater $ Splurge Spending: never/ sometimes / frequently / shopaholic ♣ Gambling: never / rarely / sometimes / frequently / compulsive gambler

tagging @wldestluv-rs for faye (i've got you nene ☝️), @veone for nick, @stinkrascal for vlad and also maybe amarie if you wanna, @omgkayplays for malaika, and @lucidicer for pogo and vincent whenever you come back from your break ♥

[maxdurden]

73, 94, and 100 for the unusual asks!

73. do you want to get married?

i have,,,, no idea. we simply cannot get into my nitty gritty queer feelings about the institution of marriage as a tool of oppression and upholding the Ideal Of Whiteness (you often hear about the whole 'marriage is about owning women' which like yeah,, its primarily concerned with property rights which can get icky, but it's also an often racist, not to mention hetero/cissexist, institution). this of course!! isn't me dogging on people who want to get married! i might get married someday, i don't know, i just know that right now i have very complicated feelings about it and some of those feelings are probably chronic commitment issues but for sure a lot of those feelings are deeply political! there's an article i read during my last semester of college that really shaped a lot of these feelings and opinions (that for some reason i can't get my annotations off of soooo enjoy those if you decide to take a look rip). but anyway!!! yeah!!! marriage is a whole can of worms to me! who knows! maybe some day i'll get married but i can't imagine doing it before the age of like,,, 30 if i ever do wanna do it (sorry for rambling soo much woah)

94. favorite lyrics right now

"depollute me, pretty baby / suck the rot right out of my bloodstream / oh dilute me, gentle angel / water down what i call being grateful / oh you kissed me, just to kiss me / not to take me home" (we'll never have sex by leith ross)

"fear on my fingers and hate on my tongue / i trace words in cursive hoping they could be enough / condemn me in my most righteous form / for i have been weak in the eyes of the lord / the devil's known to tempt angels with apples and nothing more" (broken wing by evil)

"in your car with your head in your hands / at far end of the walmart parking lot / trying not to buckle under the strain / striking a bargain with the imp in your brain / prepared to take another knock for the short game / but you can ask any veteran running back / eventually your joints complain" (same as cash by the mountain goats)

100. who was the last person you cried in front of? 

probably my therapist lmaoo

[ariapmdeol]

sometimes I think people on this hellsite don't actually know how to make polls or surveys.

like... guys. If you want an unbiased poll, you need to stop writing leading questions. PLEASE, i am begging you. Write your questions so they aren't baiting people towards one answer or another. You will get inaccurate results.

[sheogorad]

you know i've got it bad when i come back to tumblr to rant about my fucking stupid baka life. i am just. i'm chewing and munching and crunching on my own limbs. i had therapy where i talked about [redacted] and that seemed to help it a bit. but i feel like a big stupid idiot that talks too much and lets too much info slip. i feel so vulnerable and i don't even get to be held and loved. i'm getting nearly all the anxiety and pain of being vulnerable and honest in love WITHOUT THE LOVE. i literally want to fucking choke myself out. i want to run into the woods and bite trees like a fucking beaver. i hate how much bigger he is than me because every time i think about it i feel like i'm going to die because i KNOW. i know. how good it would feel to be his little spoon. his hugs are already insanely good. they already make me feel small and held. i just lay here every single day. every single night. and just fucking Yearn bro. i just. imagine. being spooned. and i feel like crawling out of this 3rd story window so i land head first on the concrete. then i might be put out of my gay misery. i shouldn't have to suffer like this, during PRIDE MONTH. catching feelings is homophobic

[dolokhoded]

Why do you like Simon Z so much?

i don't, james is actually my favorite disciple. simon was just left on a carboard box outside the door of tumblr dot com slash dolokhoded eating trash, somebody had to take him in.

[aarix]

why do you remove image-ID captions when you reblog?

I'm sorry that my 20-follower personal shitposting blog, which I curate according to my own tastes for nobody's enjoyment but my own, does not meet your standards :( but if you like image captions and alt-text you should go check out my art blog :)

[hooved]

Wrt your poll, I follow you for aesthetic posts, funny posts, and your art! I orginally followed for tf2 posting too but I think both of us have shifted focuses away from that fandom? But the quark posting is endearing to me and it's interesting reading all the little details you notice about him. I haven't watched DS9 at all but I'm becoming progressively more tempted to cuz of your posting 👍

[buckttommy]

But with buck experienced ptsd wouldn’t it make more sense for Eddie to be in mondays recovery episode rather than death and taxes???

No. Lol. Does it make sense for him to be in Recovery? Sure. Does it make more sense for him to be in Recovery rather than Death and Taxes? I'm not really sure any of us can answer this question since we don't even know what 6x15 is about yet lol. I'm not in the habit of making snap judgments based on a title, so *shrugs*