#the story was interesting and complex. maybe slightly too long

[poetlcs]

books read in 2024 - no. 10

lady joker by kaoru takamura (trnsl.  marie lida &  allison markin powell )

[girlsworldillusion]

When pretending doesn't matter anymore  

Alpha!Aemond - Omega!Reader

Summary: An unexpected heat. An unclaimed Omega. An Alpha fighting for control. An intense combination of events that change your life completely.

Rated: Explicit (+18)

Ella's Notes: This story, as the summary says, explores a bit of the A/B/O dynamic. Which, of course, touches on subjects like heats and ruts, secondary designations, bonding bites, knots and the like. I tried to approach it in a simpler way, because I understand that this universe is very complex and goes beyond such things. Anyway, if this is something that sparks your interest, enjoy!! It was a challenge in some parts, but I'm pleased with the result. I hope you like it too.

(I left out a good portion of the dance events excluded in this story, since the goal was to focus on the Alpha and Omega dynamic. So it's very subjective whether there's a dance about to happen or not, and I'll leave that to your imagination.)

Happy reading!

Word count: 11k

Dividers: @saradika-graphics

English is not my first language, I apologize for any mistakes you may find.

You couldn’t remember ever feeling so immensely uncomfortable as you did now.

“No, no, no…This can’t be happening now.”

You felt heated and heavy in your body, as if you had been soaking in a steaming bath for too long. As if you had been lying too close to the scalding breath of your dragon’s flames. Your fever was getting worse. Your steps were starting to stagger slightly, sweat dripping down your forehead as you let yourself lean against the stone wall of the hallway for a moment.

There was no doubt what was happening, you had been in enough heat over the years to know when you were sinking into one. The thing was, you weren’t supposed to be in one, not for at least another whole month. In fact, up until a few minutes ago you had been stuck at a normal dinner with your family, listening to Aegon’s disgusting and disrespectful jokes and trying to calm the silent tension between Lucerys and Aemond. Nothing was different there. Everything was going as dull and tedious as ever.

That is, until Aemond reached out to grab a piece of bread from your side. And that simple, seemingly harmless gesture was the catalyst for everything that was deeply held inside you. The movement brought his side closer to yours, almost unnecessarily closer you would say, and you were about to voice that thought out loud to him when it hit you.

The scent.

You couldn’t say what was different, what made you so intimately aware of that smell, since you had been around the man since you were children. Maybe it was the unprecedented fact that you were sitting next to each other at the dinner table after the deliberate distance you had forced upon yourself and him over the past few years. Maybe he was about to come into a rut of his own and hadn’t even noticed yet. Or maybe Aemond had been drinking some tea or some herbal substance to suppress the worst of his own smell all this time and for the first time he was free of it...

The thing was, with that simple movement of picking up a damn piece of bread from the table, he had shoved into your nostrils a whiff of the most delicious scent you had ever smelled in your life.

Dragon scales, the burning flames of a fire, open parchments and green apples. The memory of childhood, of an old feeling. Familiar and comforting, soothing your inner omega, making you want to delve deeper into the scent and wrap yourself around him. But it also aroused you. His scent was undeniably masculine and Alpha, with a dangerous and dominating richness that made you want to submit - right there, at the dinner table, in front of the whole family.

The whole thing mixed together in a spiral of aromas that flowed straight into your lungs, pulling an absolutely embarrassing and undignified meow from your lips before you could even realize it. Judging by the annoying chatter that continued at the table, no one had noticed that sound, thankfully. No one except Aemond - who was right there next to you, unfortunately. He stared at your tense profile with a sharp gaze, his hand extended for the bread, but frozen in the air before he could reach it, not even disguising that his focus was now elsewhere.

Even staring fixedly at a bowl of sauce on the table as if it were the only thing in the world that mattered, you could clearly notice when he was about to say something and, at the same time as he parted his lips with a sigh, a strong and sudden tightening in your lower abdomen was present, the space between your legs contracting and relaxing to emit a pool of absolutely unexpected moisture on the delicate fabric of your underwear.

Your body's reaction horrified you so much that you immediately pushed your chair back, the loud creak of the wooden legs on the stone floor drawing the attention of the others at the table. You could only quickly mumble that you weren't feeling well, that you were going to get some sleep and asking please for no one to worry, before practically running out of the place, barely hearing your mother say that she would send someone to check on you later.

Which brings you to the present moment.

Emotions were already starting to get the better of you. The intensity of the sensations leaving you on the verge of tears, the sheer desperation born of falling into a heat without being in the least bit prepared for it making your fingers tremble.

Usually there would be a prelude, signs that would serve as a warning of the approaching heat, giving you time to properly prepare yourself for the intense days ahead. But this time you seemed to have skipped all the stages straight to the peak of the sensations, without warning and without preparation.

All you could do was force your staggering body through the hallways to your bedchamber, knowing there was no other alternative. The heat was here, whether you wanted it or not. And despite everything, this was one of those few moments when you felt grateful to have been born into such a noble house.

Omegas comprised the smallest part of the population, followed by Betas and Alphas. But although fewer in number, omegas were violently desired - especially by alphas. Their smaller, gentler build, delicate features, natural predisposition to submission and, of course, their heat, were just a few reasons why the rest of the population would go to great lengths to keep an omega for themselves. And you knew what happened to those poor omegas scattered throughout the streets of King's Landing and throughout the Seven Kingdoms, without any choice over their own desires, nothing more than slaves to their unfair biology.

There was no mercy when one of them went into heat, yearning intensely for the claim of an alpha - no matter who was. Which led to unwanted pregnancies, sexual slavery, omega trafficking and other heat-induced atrocities. The alphas, in turn, gave in to their most basic instincts when faced with such need, acting more like animals than humans. The brutal confrontation for the claim of an omega most often ended in blood and death - not only of alphas, but death of the omega in question many times, caught in the middle of such unbridled violence.

Despite being rare and desired for their instinctive subservience, omegas were constantly discriminated against, treated with disdain and irrelevance once they are claimed; as pariahs of society, nothing more than perfect breeding mares for the alphas. More than once you vehemently cursed the gods for making you one of them. The burden caused by your designation was almost unbearable. You would give anything to be a Beta; to fit into a standard of normality in the eyes of the people for once in your life. Wasn't it enough to suffer ridicule and discrimination for the questionable origin of your and your brothers birth? Did the gods still need to come and make you an miserable omega?

Ever since you had your first heat at fourteen, you had suffered this fate alone, since any omega of noble lineage could only be claimed when they were of suitable age to marry. Servants stocked your bedchamber with everything you might need in the days following the heat; the finest towels and blankets for your nest, personal beta guards posted day and night at your door for protection, servants discreetly entering to change your bath water and replenish your food and drink supplies. You had all the comfort and privacy that wealth could offer, but your body still yearned for an alpha — your omega begging for a knot, for large hands to hold you close, for sharp teeth to sink into your flesh to claim you as his. It was instinct, uncontrollable, a need so primal and overwhelming that you cried for days, sweating and writhing in the large, lonely bed as you screamed for an Alpha.

But when your heat was gone and this ordeal finally came to an end, you felt grateful to be safe within these walls, hidden from the violence of the alphas who would only desire you for your secondary designation.

And your foggy mind whispers it to you once more. Despite everything, you are safe. Just go to your chamber, make your nest at some point of relief and you will be fine. Like always.

And so you almost do - the large, ornate doors of your bedchamber visible at the end of the hallway, making you sigh in relief. Until a voice halts your final walk.

“Do you need help, Princess?”

The booming, recognizably Alpha voice makes you flinch where you stand, eyes widening as you turn to the source of the sound. Standing there is one of your Personal Guards, Ser Adrian Redfort.

“I-I’m fine, Ser.” You reply hoarsely, straightening your posture as best you can to support your false statement, your heart racing in your chest at being in front of an Alpha just as your heat begins to build.

“Are you sure?” he asked slowly, tilting his head slightly in curiosity — but also with something hard to describe shone there, something dark and shrewd. “You don’t look well.”

And by the gods, you really didn’t. Your face was flushed to the point where you could feel the heat radiating from your skin, a few loose strands of hair beginning to stick to the sides of your face from the sweat. Your intricate dress were wrinkled and uncomfortable on your body where it clung to your damp skin, and you were breathing hard, as if there wasn’t enough air in the castle.

“Yes, I-I’m sure!”

You had never been afraid of the man in front of you — he was one of your Personal Guards after all, someone who was there to protect you. And that was why he was never around when your heat gave signs, replaced by Beta Guards. For your safety. His being assigned to protect your chambers tonight was proof that this heat shouldn’t have happened now.

He sniffs you, a slow twitch of his nostrils that could have sent your entire world crashing down, growling low in his throat at whatever scent he can pick up coming from you. The alpha in front of you is tall, with a dark mess of curls on his head and equally dark eyes. The stubble on his tanned cheeks makes him look rough and sullen. His broad shoulders beneath his armor seem to swell even more under your shy scrutiny and his posture straightens to full height, a show of strength to win over a potential mate.

You weren’t afraid of him. Ser Adrian Redfort, despite his intimidating appearance, was a man of honor, you knew.

But not even the most honorable men were immune to the powerful pheromone an omega released during a heat. They were all alphas, after all, driven by the primal instinct to claim a small, unmated omega.

And when he stares into your eyes like that, his expression as intense as a forest fire, alpha pheromones seeping from his pores so suffocatingly that you might as well have a bag over your head, you feel like you’ve never in life truly experienced the instinctive compulsion to bow and submit to a male like you do now.

And that’s what you’re afraid of.

You’re afraid because you know it’s not you wanting it. It’s your instincts, your pheromones reacting to his and he reacting to yours in an endless loop, the stupid biological compulsion to let an alpha take over your body and use you as he best serves him. Be good, be good for the Alpha.

You know that very soon your mind will be so consumed with heat that you won’t have such qualms or uncertainties, you’ll want — no, you’ll need — an Alpha, and you’ll beg for it, no matter who it is. But there’s still some coherence and lucidity left in your mind, reeling as it is. And using that shadow of sanity, you shiver just thinking about Ser Adrian with you in your nest; his hands on your body, his teeth in your flesh, his knot deep in your cunt.

No, no. Wrong. It’s wrong.

“I could help with that, princess.”

He proposes and you both know very well what he’s referring to. The darkness in his gaze more prominent; a thin, golden ring at the edges — evidence that his alpha was taking control of his emotions.

It’s wrong, but still you feel more moisture forming between your legs, making a sticky mess on your inner thighs, reacting against your will to the alpha pheromones exuding from the man - and you almost sob, because it’s horrible. It’s horrible and no one talks about it; about how absolutely terrifying it is to have no control over your own body, even when you’re undeniably uncomfortable with a situation like that.

Your mother had raised you fierce and resilient, just like Daemon had when he came into your life as another father figure, but you still felt like a child after all, holding back tears and clenching your fists. Your only salvation was your stubborn nature and thirst to prove yourself, to prove that you were more than just a delicate and submissive omega.

Yes, a part of you was aroused to the point of being intoxicated by the sensation, but the more rational side, which was disappearing by the second, fought even harder, squirming and grunting, rebelling against your most basic instincts. Fearing the alpha more than you wanted his knot. The pungent smell of stress and heartbreak tangling deep in the air with the sweet scent of your heat.

This alpha was no good...not the right one.

"N-no, thank you," you reply, gathering all your willpower, desperately trying to think of a way out. You were trapped in an empty hallway, at the beginning of your heat, with a strong, intimidating alpha - it was not a good situation.

"Please," you find yourself arguing with him suddenly when he doesn't back down, your mouth moving before you can even think, "I know you're not that kind of alpha, Ser Adrian, it's just the pheromones getting the better of you, you'll regret it once your mind clears. I said no, please listen to me."

He steps forward anyway, invading your personal space. And as scared and aroused as you are (an honestly disturbing mix of emotions to have) you find yourself baring your teeth at him - a small growl building in your throat, standing up to the alpha who dared to disrespect your decision.

"Poor thing," Ser Adrian chuckles, the golden ring in his eyes growing more evident, your little, thoughtless act of confrontation only stirring the alpha inside him. "You don't know what you need, omega, not really. But I do."

The next thing you know, he’s advancing, so much so that you immediately back up against the wall in response, flattening your feverish, sweaty body against it as best you can to get away from him. A whimper leaves your lips as he reaches out, your body disgusted and craving the action in equal measure, making your eyes brim with tears. He’s going to touch you, he’s going to do it. He’s going to do it and still claim that you wanted it, because…well...you don’t want it, but you do too, don’t you?

A sound rings out behind the two of you.

“Get away from her, Ser Adrian.” You recognize Aemond’s voice quickly; a sharp, relieved sigh in response, your omega instantly perking up inside you. “Now.”

His voice is as calm and deep as ever, but you hear the warning there; the dark tone gnawing at the edges - a tone that promised danger if not heeded. It does something to you, fills your stomach with little butterflies - all fluttering their wings at once. A purr wanting to escape your throat. Safe, the Alpha will keep you safe. Finally.

Ser Adrian’s expression darkens as he senses your relief through the pheromones in the air, slowly turning his body to face the unwelcome presence. He shows no submission at all when he sees Aemond standing there, even though he knows he was his prince. You know he’s too far gone for that now. No hierarchy matters here. It's just two Alphas facing each other over an Omega.

He exchanges an intense look with Aemond, obviously communicating that you are worth the confrontation.

"What are you going to do?" Ser Adrian challenges, his hand slowly descending to rest on the hilt of the sword strapped to his waist. "I bet you don't have the guts, boy."

You swallow hard, trembling for Aemond, scared at the prospect of a fight. Your omega, once relieved, is now agonized at the thought of this Alpha getting hurt.

Aemond, for his part, remains seemingly unfazed by the older man's threat - in fact he smiles at the guard's words. A cold and sharp smile, disdainful really, tilting his head in mock consideration, his hands still casually clasped behind his back. "Do you really want to test that theory?"

Ser Adrian pulls his sword a little from where it is kept, offended by the younger Alpha's reaction, but he still doesn't remove the blade completely from his waist. Aemond, though he makes no move toward his own sword, stares at him with such acidity and defiance in his eye that it’s almost as if that was the only weapon he’d need tonight.

Alphas fighting over an omega in heat become wild, territorial, aggressive. Ser Adrian, from where you can see, is vibrating with tattered restraint, with the tension of a possible confrontation unfolding. He’s acting on instinct. But Aemond isn’t. Although there’s a hard shadow in his one good eye, a warning to his dark and unpredictable interior - he keeps himself perfectly in control. His hands are clasped behind his back, a provocative smile on his lips.

“She doesn’t smell like you,” the other Alpha growls through his teeth, straightening his shoulders, gripping the hilt of his sword tightly.

“Hn, maybe I’m a gentleman and I’m going slow so as not to scare her,” Aemond replied in affront, the corner of his lip still pulled back in a lazy smile. "A concern that has not crossed your mind, obviously."

The older Alpha grunts in displeasure in his throat, casting an appraising glance at you over his shoulder, his nostrils flaring to catch your scent. And if you had control of your legs, you would be long gone by now. But not only is your heat consuming your to worrying levels, but the overwhelming pheromones that both Alphas exude in this confrontation are strong enough to make you flinch in response, exhaling your own cornered and fearful scent into the air.

"Are you saying you are this Omega's Alpha?" Ser Adrian snorts in annoyance, turning his narrowed gaze to Aemond.

"Yes." He doesn't even hesitate before answering. "Do you have anything to say or...do...about it?"

The clean and immediate statement coupled with the unspoken challenge makes you gasp, your legs shaking and threatening to give way beneath you, the viscosity in your pussy increasing in response to that easy words.

Did...did he say he was your Alpha?

Could it be that you heard him correctly? Could it be that the only man you'd ever wanted to be courted by had felt the same way all this time?

A thought you'd never dared to voice out loud, knowing full well that doing so would be nothing short of a confession. And you definitely didn't feel ready to confess any tender feelings for Aemond yet. Despite what your stupid heart told, you knew what a conflicted person he was. His sarcastic and unpredictable personality, even his tendencies toward cold words and actions at times.

But he was also...he could also be...

The truth was, you knew how you felt about him. You knew it all too well.

And while you usually managed to keep your unwanted feelings well caged and hidden from outside knowledge, falling into a sudden and intense heat like this made it significantly harder to maintain this charade, especially when his scent hung imposingly and proudly over the other alpha, all possessive and icy intentions. And especially when he so easily claimed to be your alpha.

Amidst the surprise of the declaration, you almost forgot about the challenge between both men, only coming back to the present when Ser Adrian growls something between his teeth (something that sounds very much like a curse), shoving his sword back into its sheath with much more aggression than necessary. He straightens himself before the other alpha - but even so Aemond towers over him, with his imposing height. The older one reluctantly steps away with a murderous look at the prince, maintaining contact as long as he can - it was not in an alpha's nature to give in, especially in the presence of another. Which shows that, on some level, Ser Adrian was still there, clinging to the shreds of control he had left over his own primal instincts.

Aemond holds his gaze, but looks at you again as soon as the guard disappears around a bend in the hallway, his steps deliberately heavy and dissatisfied.

"Come," he says as he approaches where you're leaning against the wall, his cold, affronted expression giving way to one that's almost angry. You feel yourself wilt a little at the abrupt change, but try not to show it, for fear of upsetting the alpha even more. "Let me take you to your chamber, it's not safe to be out here with so many alphas around the castle, especially when you smell like that."

He takes a step closer and you meow in response, your body so fragile and small next to his, his scent invading your nose again. Green apples and parchment, dragon scales and fire. Your omega immediately purrs, wanting to snuggle into this Alpha, let him protect you and take care of your needs.

“Can you walk?” He asks slowly, looking much more tense with you than he had when he’d challenged an older, more experienced alpha, his jaw clenched and his violet gaze refusing to stay on yours.

You feel something ache in your chest, not understanding why he was suddenly being so distant, even though he’d proudly defended you not long ago.

“Y-yes, yes, I can.”

Your legs are definitely shaking, but you still force yourself to take the final steps to your chamber, your dress clinging to your body in the most uncomfortable way, your damp thighs rubbing against each other and creating a friction that makes your skin crawl all over.

Aemond stands rigidly beside you, walking at a respectful distance, looking like he’s barely breathing. Clearly wanting to avoid smelling you. But…but why? Doesn’t he like the way you smell? Don’t you please the Alpha?

You suddenly feel frantic, scared by the knowledge that you’ve lost him before you’ve even reached him.

This is something you could handle normally. Gods, you could handle worse than this, normally. You’ve been putting up with your conflicting feelings for him for years. The heat is just making you feel silly and sad and…pathetic…

But knowing this doesn’t make it any better. It doesn’t help. And before you can stop yourself from doing something stupid, your mouth is moving.

“Why did you say that?” You ask as he opens the door to your chamber for you to enter, staggering and panting, nearly tripping until you fall onto the ornate sofa to catch your breath as if you had run all the way across the Red Keep to get here.

“What?” He asks vaguely, glancing discreetly into your chamber, but not entering it. Looking at your space. Where the things that please your omega are. No alpha has ever had such a view. But he can, you decide. You want him to look.

“Why did you say you were my Alpha?”

For a few seconds, all you can hear is the rapid beating of your heart and your breathing. He had left you in your chamber as he promised, and you began to fear that he would simply ignore the question and leave now.

“I don’t know,” he finally answers, interrupting his checking of the environment to look at you; though his gaze is vacant and distant, as if he is trying hard to just pretend to look at you. "I thought that would drive him away without the need for a physical confrontation. You wouldn't have been satisfied with such aggression, I imagine."

You bite your lip to contain a moan as you feel a strong wave of cramps in your lower abdomen, your head swimming in the rising heat, as if reacting instinctively to those words. He worried about you, about what would leave you unsatisfied.

And later, you would tell yourself that the next question was solely guided by your messy, chaotic hormones, by his enchanting scent filling your sensitive nose. Anything to exclude your conscious guilt.

"What if it were true?"

Aemond blinks, finally looking at you. For real this time. "If it were true what?"

You take a deep breath, your heart beating so fast you can feel it straining against your ribcage.

"That you're my Alpha." You mumble, cursing your own mouth as soon as the words come out. But it was too late and he had already heard each one of them. "What if...what if you really were?"

For a long moment he says nothing, just stands there, stoic and magnificent in his white hair flowing over his shoulders, dark clothes and hands behind his body, staring at you with an almost alarmed expression. And you are so nervous, so messed up with all these intense emotions and this miserable heat burning your body that you find yourself mumbling to fill the maddening silence he maintains, your hands fidgeting as you gesture them in the air.

"Y-you could come in. You could stay here, with me, if...if you wish, of course. I really-"

Aemond shakes his head suddenly once, his gaze darkening at you.

"That's not a good idea."

The way he says it, so firm and direct, his expression hardening into something determined, makes you shut up immediately. The saliva in your mouth is suddenly too thick, your heartbeat painful.

“Oh.”

The rejection stabs you like a sharp dagger, piercing your chest through to the other side in one fell swoop, and you feel like crying. Your bottom lip trembles, and you stare at the opposite wall, nodding weakly. Honestly, how many more ways did the gods plan to humiliate you?

All those years of hardening your feelings for him, keeping yourself away to keep them from growing any further. And you were doing well. Everything was going well. But then, the one time you let yourself harbor a small flame of hope, he rejects you so easily that you wish you could eat the words back, pretend it never happened.

“Right, yeah,” you mumble, limiting yourself to a few words in case you start sobbing out loud. “I understand. You don’t…” You sigh, hurt in a way that only an omega rejected right during their heat, the most vulnerable moment, could sound. Stupid, stupid hormones, you hate feeling this way. “You don’t want me. It’s okay.”

“Wait — what? You think it’s because I don’t want —” Aemond breathes out an incredulous laugh, finally pulling his hands from behind his back to rub them down his face, frustration clear in each of his sharp lines, making your omega shrink even further inside you. Alpha is dissatisfied, help him, calm him down. Despite your increasingly stronger instincts, you manage to stay in the same place, with your shoulders slumped and your breathing anxiously in your chest. "Of course I want you. You have no fucking idea, Y/N, I swear. But this..." he points to your body, to your disheveled condition and watery eyes, "...this is just the heat. You don't really want me to come in there with you. It's just the heat and when it passes, you'll regret this request."

You sigh shakily at his statement, at the restraint he's showing even as he lowers his clenched fists to his sides; jaw tense, preventing himself from breathing too deeply and taking in more of your scent. The intensity in his gaze making your heart race as he stares at you, his brow furrowed in an unreadable expression.

It all makes sense now.

So that's it, huh? He was trying to stay away because he thinks you only want him because of the heat. He thinks you would regret this. He thinks you only want him because he is an unbonded alpha who conveniently happens to be here at this moment.

God heavens, you wish that was all it was.

"It's not just the heat."

You whisper to the imposing room and he sighs deeply.

"Y/N..."

"Let me speak, please."

He holds your gaze firmly and dominantly, almost making you tilt your head down in a natural response of submission, but to your relief he ends up giving in after a few seconds with a stiff nod of his chin.

You wet your lips. "Yeah, I'm going into a sudden heat and I might be partially driven by instincts here..." You mumble weakly, the heat making your body shiver and your mind swim, but you fight to keep yourself together as much as you can in order to convey to him what you really need.

"But Aemond, I shouldn't even be having a heat right now, I'm nowhere near my normal cycle. Y-you, oh fuck -" you gasp in pain as an intense cramp makes you curl up completely over your own body on the sofa. Aemond instinctively reaches out to help, but stops when you hold up an open, shaking palm to him. "N-no, wait. I need to finish saying this." He doesn't look pleased, but he does as you say, waiting impatiently as you shift back into a sitting position, breathing slowly through your teeth to try and calm yourself.

“Do you know what sent me into this sudden heat in the first place?” You ask quietly when you’ve finally gathered yourself enough, your watery eyes glaring at the man in front of you, begging him to hear what you really mean.

“What?” He asks back, holding your gaze with just as much intensity.

You take a breath. “It was you. It was your scent, Aemond.” Your brows furrow at him, trying to hide the shiver that shakes your body as another painful cramp wracks through you. “I-I’m surrounded by unbound alphas here at the Red Keep; Aegon, a few Gold Cloaks, the Kingsguard, my Personal Guards, a few nobles from the court. Every day I see them and interact with them and yet none of them have ever sent me into an uncycled heat. Never. Only you.”

His gaze is dark and heated, a stormy violet, his expression tense and expectant.

"B-but even if my omega didn't feel that way, even if you weren't an alpha...heavens, you could be a beta and I'd still want that, with you." Your mouth is worryingly dry, which you find to be a fair contradiction to how absolutely soaked the middle of your legs is. "Because I've always liked you. Ever since we were children and you would teach me Valyrian late into the night in the library, hidden from our parents and the guards, far better than any Maester could. Or when I claimed a dragon and you were so genuinely happy for me, even though you didn't have your own dragon then. And when everyone laughed at me at court? They made jokes about my birth, but you always defended and protected me - even if you happily let my brothers be fed to the wolves." You smile shakily with the little self-control you have left, which elicits a small snort of disdain from him. "Y-you've taken care of me and protected me all along the way and I've always felt safe with you. And that had nothing to do with your designation."

Aemond exhales heavily, a husky and unmistakably masculine sound, his alpha clearly pleased to hear that you felt safe with him. A shiver runs through your body in response to that primal sound, your belly tightening and you want nothing more than to beg him to take you, or to leave altogether and let you take care of yourself - alone and apart, as you always have, but this time suffering from the rejection of the only alpha you've ever truly wanted.

Still, you force yourself to continue.

"B-but then you introduced as an Alpha and I as an Omega and everything changed. I pulled away because you didn't seem like the same Aemond I knew. You had changed. You were quieter, more mysterious, darker. You didn't invite me to go to the library or to fly with you and Vhagar. You pushed me away. I-I didn't know how to deal with it, it felt like a wall had been built between us and I didn't know how to deal with it...walking away was the easiest way, I guess. But I never, I swear I never forgot...I just-"

You didn't realize you had started to cry. Then everything you had said just hit you like a punch in the stomach. How exposed you had left yourself to him, open and raw as a nerve. But there was no going back.

"If you don't want me, that's okay. I-I'll deal with it. But I need you to know that it's not just the heat, Aemond."

You end with an almost anguished sound, another storm of emotions rising up inside your chest, too strong to be repressed. Your hands release their grip on the upholstery to move restlessly up to the scent glands on your neck, scratching and clawing at the sensitive, pulsing skin with a degree of desperation that only makes your true feelings clear. Everything hurts, everything burns, everything screams for relief, for large hands and sharp teeth. The Alpha's scent so close, yet so far away...

You're going crazy as he remains silent and it's almost like torture, his presence becoming both a delight and a punishment for your omega. The next wave of heat hits so intense that it makes every hair on your body stand on, a shock of cold and extreme heat on your flushed skin. You bite your lip hard to stop from moaning, legs squeezing together to ease the aching throb in your clit - the torturous emptiness of having nothing inside your body when it's all it's needs.

"P-please, if you don't...if it's not what you want...leave me alone. I need to be alone now Aemond-"

“I always know when your heat is here —” he cuts you off in a calm voice, his nostrils flaring slightly as he inhales deeply; a husky, appreciative sound vibrating in his throat as he allows himself to feel you properly for the first time all night. He enters your chamber with careful steps after that, but it’s the sight of his hand splayed on the wood of the door that makes you feel like you could faint right there; thick veins beneath pale skin, fingers long and elegant, adorned with thin, regal rings. You hold your gaze there as he gently pushes the wood shut with an audible click that makes you shiver in response, heart thundering in your chest.

He’s here, in your place. Just the two of you. The Alpha is here.

“No matter how much your mother, your maids, and the Guards do their best to hide you in this secluded chamber, I can always tell when you’re in heat. Even from across the Red Keep I can still smell you — warm, buttery, sweet as vanilla and cinnamon; like something that just come out of the oven, familiar and comforting like home. Like you belong to me —”

Aemond’s bright gaze is fixed on yours, watching you with predatory focus, like a carnivore about to sink its teeth into the tender flesh of a poor deer. Your chest tightens. Instantly, it’s as if an imaginary rug has been pulled out from under you and you’re weightless, even sitting as you are. The moment stretches between you like caramel, tantalizing and promisingly sweet. You arch your back and undulate your hips against the soft upholstery, as if that will soothe the itch. Instead, it spreads across your abdomen like a cloud of fire. You shiver and moan.

“I hear you crying, screaming as your heat is at in peak, begging for a knot. The whole damn Red Keep can hear it, sweetheart.” You’re panting and very, very aware of the slick slide of your poor cunt sandwiched between your thighs as you moves in restless undulations, of the blood roaring in your ears, and of the hungry look in Aemond’s eye, whose pupil is so dilated that his eye, once a pale shade of violet, is almost entirely black. He breathes very slowly, savoring the increasingly intense pheromones you exude. "Aegon usually runs to a brothel whenever you're in heat, as do most of the castle's Alpha Guards. But not me. I stay here...smelling your disturbing scent, enduring the miserable torture of hearing every muffled sound - fucking my cock between my fingers as I imagine doing this, giving in to your tearful plea. You have no fucking idea how many times I've had to stop myself from walking through these doors and giving you what you so desperately beg for, pup."

"Alpha," you sigh, cry. You've never called him that — or any other man directly — but the familiarity and naturalness tastes like molasses on your tongue now, and you repeat it helplessly. "Alpha…"

You could hear his harsh breathing, see his hands tightening into fists. He tried to hold back, but all you could think about was having him buried inside you. Having him rock his hips against you. "You were right, all this time. Ever since we received our designations I feel like something in me has changed. Sometimes it's like I have no control over this new side of me..."

Your breath hitches in your chest and you unconsciously lean into him, breathing him in. "W-what side?"

He sighs; hoarse, troubled. "This side that desperately wants to bend you and fill you until you're leaking with my seed, until the only scent that comes from you is mine...only mine. To sink my teeth into your soft flesh to claim you, to make everyone know who you belong to. It's maddening. It's dark. I'm constantly consumed by primal desires that scare even myself."

"Aemond," you beg, savoring the name, rolling it across your tongue like caramel.

He crouches on the floor, right in front of you, letting your heights equalize for the first time, both hands resting on your knee. You moan at that, tilting your head closer to him to breathe him in, letting the strong, warm, and safe scent of this alpha wash over you.

Your stomach tightens and you grip his arm tightly, bracing yourself, gasping as your inner muscles flex and spasm. Aemond strokes your knees with his thumbs as you shiver. The weight of his hand on you is equal parts comforting and tempting.

You were in the prime of your life and you were going to die.

There was no other explanation for the way your heart was beating fast, like a rabbit’s, at the way he lingered on your skin — at the way Aemond remained still and stared at you, in a way that, frankly, would have been quite flattering if it weren’t for the way his nostrils kept flaring.

“I’m sorry for putting you through this,” you truly did, but you also felt like you couldn’t take it anymore, “but I want you so much, Aemond. I can’t stop thinking about you.”

“Don’t be. I want you too,” he growled, leaning down to whisper against your ear, his nose gently brushing the curve of your neck. "So fucking much."

Submission was instantaneous then, without the slightest hint of reluctance or rebellion. Your neck tilts back, throat exposed to the alpha, letting him nuzzle your scent gland and inhale deeply, whimpering happily at having him there, his warm, familiar scent enveloping you safely. Omega condescending. But it’s more than that. Omega eager, the scent of your heat intensifying, overflowing between your thighs, which open instinctively as he encloses you with his hands braced on the sofa, and your happy little cry turns into a needy mewl.

His nose slowly moves up to caress your face, gently nudging the curve of your cheekbone. “Can I kiss you? Fuck, I’ve been wanting to kiss you for years.”

You nod enthusiastically against him before he even finishes the question, your eyes closing as his sweet, warm breath blows across your lips. You’ve dreamed of kissing him too, ever since you could remember.

The first touch of his lips against yours was like coming home, so right and so familiar that it almost scared you, if only the heat haze wasn’t disorienting your mind.

You wanted to enjoy it more, to take it slow, but by all the gods, the level of desperation in your body was unhealthy.

Your lips open like a flower beneath the alpha, hands gripping those long, silky silver strands, pulling him closer and closer. Feeling his jaw move rhythmically beneath your fingers as he opens and closes his mouth to lick your tongue, catching your bottom lip between his teeth in a teasing bite. Your legs swing to wrap around his waist, pressing inch by delicious inch of your bodies together. You moan into his mouth, feeling your pussy rub indiscreetly against the hard planes of his stomach, blood rushing to your groin as sticky moisture flows dramatically from your intimacy.

Aemond was perfect, you swore the alpha tasted like chocolate and wine on your tongue, that he felt like heaven against your fingertips. You could smell the arousal in the air, the way he growled into your wet kisses, and the way his large hand clenched in the fabric of your dress on your thigh.

He nestles his hands between your ass and the upholstery, helping your hips sway against his body, not wanting to let you go. His gorgeous, dilated gaze flickers to you as he breaks the kiss, gently kissing your tear-stained cheek.

“Sweetheart…tell me you accept my claim,” he demands in an eager tone, tracing the soft skin of your jaw with his lips to brush the nape of your neck again, where your swollen scent gland burns and throbs. The gentle pressure of his lips there has you squirming, practically melting into his strong hands. “I need you to understand what I’m asking. Please, focus on me, omega.”

You nod, tears weighing down your lashes. “I do, I do. It’s always been just you. Please, Aemond!”

He pulls back at this, a sheen of sweat breaking out on his pale skin as his breathing becomes shallower. His scent seems to increase, overwhelming every inch of your chamber with his pheromones. Running the tip of his tongue over his upper teeth, you see a glint of his slightly elongated incisors. The golden ring at the rim of his eye. His body, no doubt, reacting to the omega’s pheromones, pushing him into his own rut. You feel like you can vibe to this, the omega pleased to know he has this effect on the alpha.

“A-alpha, it hurts,” you whisper.

“Shhh, I got you, love,” he soothes you, though he’s losing control himself, gently nuzzling your noses together. “Put your arms around my neck. That’s it, good girl.”

He stands with you wrapped around him, carrying you toward the four-poster bed. The thin silk of your skirts soaks where his forearm braces your thighs.

“Fuck, baby, you’re so wet.” Aemond barely holds back a rough groan as his lips come close to your ear, clearly enjoying the way your body is already ready for him. His knot. You whimper, licking the salt from his throat and moaning. You try to straddle his waist once more, try to lower yourself and bend over, feel the thick, hard line of his cock, the bulge of the knot you know is already forming.

You barely realize you’re being placed on the bed. You barely notice his fingers undoing the knots of your corset and pulling the delicate fabric of your dress off your body. You barely notice the gentle words he whispers in your ear, the praises for your omega. The haze of heat takes over your mind and leaves you adrift, confused, needy. It's all a blur of desperate pleas and crying.

It's only when his body, naked and as absurdly heated as yours, lies on top of you that some coherence returns. The sensation of his feverish skin on yours makes you shiver all over, your cheeks burning - although you can't tell if it's just from the heat or the embarrassment of feeling him like this.

He looms large over you, as alphas tend to be, but in a way that makes you feel secure rather than intimidated. His lean, elegant muscles tense endlessly beneath his soft skin, the flames of the fireplace bathing his pale, sweaty complexion in a beautiful orange glow. The tips of his hair slide hypnotically over your skin, sending shivers down your spine with each contact.

"There she is..." he shivers with satisfaction when he feels the heat allow some of your consciousness to return, his hand wrapping around the delicate curve of your jaw to drag you into a feral kiss while he presses your body against his as if he would die without it. Rut, your confused mind answers. He is falling too. And yet, you were still empty and needy. 

"N-no nest...there is no nest, Alpha...I couldn't make it...I didn't know, I d-didn't have time - please, I'm so sorry -" You stammer between gasps and sobs on your lips, your omega dissatisfied with not having a nest where the Alpha could curl up comfortably with you, let his knot sink in and keep you warm and safe throughout your heat.

"You're such a good omega, worrying about this..." he mumbles, kissing your chin and jaw, his hands fidgeting at your sides. "But it's okay, love. Your heat will last for days and I'm not going anywhere. We'll have time. We'll use the breaks between heat waves and I'm sure you'll make the most comfortable, cozy nest for us. I can't wait to see it, omega. Promise you'll make a good nest for your Alpha?"

"Yes, yes! I'll make the best nest, alpha..."

"Yeah you will, my good girl..."

When his mouth reaches your glans on your neck again, you know it's red and raised, waiting for him to touch it. 

"Stay still baby," he whispers and you're not sure if he's talking to you or to himself.

His first lick against that spot hits you right in the heart. Your breath is ragged with each press of his tongue, and you can’t help the small purr that escapes your chest. When he growls in response to the sound, vibrations coursing through your glans, your hands grip his broad shoulders in desperation.

“Please, gods, please—alpha, please!” Your skin is feverish and taut, tight as a coiled spring, and you need…more. Your hips roll upward, and at the feel of him hard and solid and huge against your core, you almost come right there. Your wrists move, one behind his ear and the other toward the top of his shoulder, and you rub them subtly against his skin, the only thought in your head is for him to smell like you.

“Alpha, please—” That needy plea seems to be enough to rob Aemond of what little control he has left. He wraps those soft lips around the glans and sucks hard, making your eyes roll to the back of your head, your entire body trembling and flushing with heat.

“Omega,” he growls into your drooling skin, his primal instincts kicking in harder than a sword blow, thrusting his wet cock into your belly. “Tell me what you need.”

You barely blink before begging. “Fill me, please.” Your fingers tangle in the leather of his eye patch, pulling it away so you can take in the full extent of your alpha’s immaculate beauty as he takes you. The turquoise stone glows for only a few seconds before you sink your fingers into his silky hair, guiding his mouth back to yours, pulling him in for another heated, hurried kiss.

And with that touch of his lips, you both lose yourselves. With a guttural sound that goes straight between your legs, Aemond is everywhere.

A large hand is on your neck, his thumb pressing against your chin, opening your mouth for him as his tongue meets yours. Using his other hand, you feel the gentle pressure of a finger against your swollen, throbbing clit, eliciting a cry from your mouth clamped to his. You’re lifting your hips, stroking your own tongue against his as he rolls your clit on his thumb, his cock sliding against your hip again and again, leaving your skin wet with pre-cum.

It’s all a cacophony of sensations, too much and not enough. It’s magnificent, but not what you need.

What you need is him, right now. 

Gods, you wanted to enjoy this moment, this first time, savor every touch, every new sensation, every taste and smell, but you both knew that you were at the height of this unexpected heat. Anything other than him inside you at this moment would only be torture for your body and your needs. You sob with desire on his lips, tears streaming down your face as your arousal reaches a level beyond painful; unbearable.

He pulls his face away from yours.

Pupil dilated and his tongue darting out to wet those sinful lips, flushed and swollen from your kisses.     

Hungry. 

He looks hungry. 

"Y/N," he says breathlessly, dropping the designations for a moment, even giving up his own rut-driven instincts, to call you by name, and your eyes widen in response, pupils dilated like an endless abyss. "Do you want my knot? Is that what you need right now, baby?" You hold his gaze with a lucidity that no longer exists, but unconsciously understanding the seriousness of this moment.

"Please, please, I'm going to go crazy if you don't do this. I need it, Aemond. Now."

His growl vibrates in his chest and through yours, making you moan in response and wrap your legs around his waist. Your pussy is absolutely soaked with your own arousal. You had never produced so much fluids before, even during your heats. On the other hand, you had never had an alpha promise to give you his knot before.

Something itches in your mind, driving you to present yourself to him now, whispering for you to turn your body and let him take you from behind, this position would be better - more chances of a successful knot. Instinct, obviously, since you wouldn’t have any previous experience to draw on. And you almost do, placing your hands on his shoulders to push him away. The turn, however, is interrupted by large hands on the sides of your waist, firm but still gentle as he keep you lying with him between your legs.

You frown at him in confusion.

“Please, no. Not this time.” He whispers feverishly, leaning his sweaty forehead against yours, breath puffing across your parted lips. “I know instinct tells you otherwise, just as they are telling me, but I want to see your face. I need to see your eyes as I take you for the first time, sweetheart.”

It’s not an order. Not exactly. It’s more of a request than anything else. But you obey anyway, captivated by his need to have you in this way, for his strength in resisting his own Alpha's demands and take you the way he, the men, wants.

Warming up to the desperate cadence of your low mewls, he lines his hardened member up toward your center, your omega more than ready for this. The tip pokes a few times into your soaked folds, seeking warmth as he settles himself.

It’s an almost sacred moment, even in the haze of heat.

The chamber goes silent as he enters you for the first time, thrusting inside, slowly and steady, one hand coming up to the side of your face, the other gripping your hip possessively, his gaze locked on yours. Your hearts beat in sync, the fierce need to be joined to each other growing like a wildfire. The head of his cock barely enters before the world simply stops. He begins to rock his hips, slowly at first, so slowly that it’s almost provocative, but it’s delicious and cathartic, and you never want it to end.

Besides his hungry gaze on yours, the second thing your drunken brain registers is that it doesn’t hurt.

First time penetration should hurt, right? You’ve never had sex before, obviously, but you know that the first time should be uncomfortable, at the least. However, your body accepts him with easy submission, with your own abundant sticky wetness easing the way, and all you can feel is the same relief that his arms offer, the smell of him. You moan between teeth, satisfied, and reach out to grip his arm as he thrusts into you, feeling the muscles ripple under your touch. He groans your name once more and his erection pulses against your walls.

“Tell me you’re mine,” he demands. “Tell me you’ve kept that perfect pussy for me all this time.” 

Of course you were his. The fact hadn’t always pleased you, but you’d known that since you were children and running through the halls of the Red Keep. You always knew you were made for him, and you held on to that bitter dream even when you tried to pull away from him. So it was only natural to let your animal instinct take over, exposing the truth as if it were the only thing that mattered.

“I’m yours, Aemond. I’ve always been yours.” You whisper, wrapping your arms around his neck to keep him close. "Only yours."

“F-fuck,” he stutters, your pussy greedy and desperate as it molds itself to accommodate him. “You’re going so well for me, pup. Such a good little omega.”

His lips press against your cheek as he pants, struggling to hold himself together as he feels the full length of his cock inside your folds. And you sense that this is your weakness. Green apples and parchment, flames and dragon scales. He’s warm and comforting, fitting between your legs like he belongs there, like you’re his home. It’s divine how you mold yourself to accommodate him. Easy, as if it were a normal thing, and you had done this together a thousand times before.

Aemond takes a deep, shuddering breath.

And then he begins to thrust. Slowly.

You were soaked and desperate, but Aemond was an Alpha and, well, you were a virgin just a few minutes ago. His restraint was understandable. But you wanted more, needed everything he could give you...

You didn’t realize you were speaking out loud until he answered. “I’ll give you. Fuck, I’ll give you anything you want, baby. I’m yours.” His voice took on a deep, husky tone that sent goosebumps across your skin. “But I need to make sure you’re ready first.”

You whimper. “I can take it,” you promise. “Come on, Alpha. Make me yours!”

Aemond’s large body trembled with the restraint of going slow, his muscles contracting restlessly beneath your fingers. At your words, he groans and suddenly thrusts deep. The air rushes from your lungs, and you dig your nails into his back, gripping tightly as your body struggles to adjust to the massive intrusion.

He pulls back to get a better look at your face, to make sure you’re not uncomfortable. And by the gods, you’re not. Your omega rolls over and shows the belly, satisfied and purring, vibrating with joy at finally having his alpha take you. His thrusts don’t stop, his gaze never leaving yours.

“Fuck, fuck, you’re so beautiful, omega, so fucking beautiful. So good for me, pup.”

Your eyelids flutter with the long, delicious drag as he pulls out, pussy clenching his cock like it doesn’t want to let go, and the emptiness he leaves hurts, no matter how quickly he pulls away. Then he thrusts back in and you breathe once more.

“Yes!” you cry out, wrapping your arms and legs around him, clinging to his lean but strong body. “More, Alpha. Please!”

Aemond curses and then sets a steady, pulsing rhythm in his hips. Each entry was slow, each thrust back hard and intense. He fucked you like he flying on Vhagar’s back: confident and assertive, teetering on the edge of control but never losing it. The extent of his control was crystal clear as he breathed into your lips, his gaze keeping yours, his forehead sweaty and his eyebrows furrowed, even as you shuddered and moaned and clawed at his back.

You were wetter than you’d ever been, drops running down between your thighs to soak the sheets. The sounds of your joining were loud and filthy, filling your chamber with moans and growls, the wet, rhythmic slapping of skin on skin, and the harder he went, the more animalistic you both became. You were soon moaning and sobbing with every thrust, while he grunts and growls in your face.

When he swallowed hard, his gaze was, without any choice, drawn to his throat; the Adam’s apple bobbing, the veins high in his neck, his scent glands. He nods at your gaze, and you’re suddenly overcome with the need to touch him — to taste him.

You lean forward and place your mouth over his gland, alternating your tongue and lips between sucking and licking the heated skin, panting into his skin in time with his thrusts. He groans, broken and hoarse, his hips slowing to fuck you less hard, more slowly.

“Y/N, fuck, I need—”

He’s worryingly heated against you, his own rut peaking, silver strands of hair sticking to his sweaty face.  

“Me too, Aemond...I need it so bad it hurts,” you cry, pressing your face against his scent gland, breathing hard. He nods, settling into a rhythm that, while less frenetic than it was a moment ago, is brutal in its intensity. Your thighs tremble around his waist, though Aemond is definitely the one doing the heavy lifting. His knot nudges against your pussy, pressing, clamping, and pushing against your entrance with each thrust.

“I can feel you getting close,” he whispers in your ear. “Do you want to come in my knot, pup?”

Your head falls back and you moan loudly as he hits you again, and again, hard and stand, and you’re right on the edge — close enough that you can feel your orgasm building in your lower back, threatening to overtake you at any second.

Yes, yes, yes, your omega cries out in response to his question. It’s all you want, all you need. To come with the Alpha’s knot inside you.

“Yes,” you sob. “Please!” 

As his knot begins to force itself inside you, everything becomes shockingly clear. You know, without a shadow of a doubt, that you were made for this. To take his knot, to sit on it, to come and clench around him until he paints your insides with his seed.

“Oh, good girl, almost there—” His voice grows lower, rougher, darker. “Yeah, that’s it, spread those pretty legs a little wider and let me—fuck, yeah, that’s it, puppy—”

Your purpose is singular now, as his knot stretches your entrance. He forces your opening almost to the point of pain, even as wet and stretched as it already is, but biology is on your side. You strain for his next thrust, and with a searing ecstasy, you feel his knot push a little deeper inside you.

The next movement, like everything else tonight, is guided only by instinct and basic need. You hold the back of his neck, guiding his lips to the junction of your neck and shoulder, tears streaming down the sides of your face until its soak the sheets.

"P-please, make me yours, Alpha. In every way."

Aemond sighs longly on your skin, leaving wet kisses there, his breath warm and tense. His body is so intimately attached to yours that each thrust makes your breasts drag against the hard planes of his chest, teasing your sensitive nipples. Each undulation of his hips rubs your throbbing clit against the trimmed hair of his pelvis. It is torture, the most delicious torture.

"You're going to fucking kill me, love." He half smiles half growls, gently nipping at your shoulder, just a shadow of what you really wanted from him there. You grip him tighter, frowning as you mewl dissatisfiedly through your teeth.

He silences your mumbled protests with whispers of your name and designation, intoned in an encouraging tone against your skin as he guides you closer and closer, and you feel your thighs tremble around his hips as you prepare to be pulled under. Your toes clench, body ready to jump into the waters that threaten to drown you, all you need to do is let yourself sink. Let your body surrender to what you were designed to do.

“Come for me, Y/N,” he growls into your shoulder, the vibrations coursing through your body, his fingers digging into your hips, leaving marks on your skin that your omega accepts with pleasure. “Come for your Alpha and then I'll give you my knot, I swear.”

And with that encouragement, you submit completely. The command to surrender to the pleasure was all your body needed. A primal scream rips from your throat, and your body shudders beneath his. Your pussy clench around his cock, desperate and needy for what only he could give you. And it’s nothing like cumming with your own fingers.

Aemond, feeling your walls tighten around him, thrusts harder; a long groan through his teeth before biting down hard on your shoulder, his sharp incisors tearing the skin until you’re screaming. Despite the shock of pain, your fingers dig into the back of his neck, pushing his face into the bite, wanting more. He growls at this, thrusting his hips forward one last time, burying his cock deep as his knot finally expands inside your pussy, locking him in place and joining you together.

Your spine arches, your breasts pushing against his chest with a long, broken groan that seems to escape straight from your core, your body clenching around his cock before contracting almost painfully. Aemond grunts, nearly falling on top of you as he shoots inside your pussy, filling your insides with his cum.

Entire galaxies shimmer behind your eyes as a second orgasm rips through you, just by the sensation of it being his, irrefutably. And you cling to your Alpha as he graces you with slow, shallow thrusts, his seed filling you beyond your limit. You can almost feel it filling your womb, spilling from your core and dripping down from where your bodies join to coat the sheets beneath you.

He licks your raw flesh when he releases you, whispering praise as he wipes away the blood dripping down your skin, and the throbbing in his cock begins to slow.

But though your orgasms are over for now, you know you’ll stay glued together until his knot comes undone. Your arms tighten around his shoulders until he sags, letting the weight of his body collapse onto yours, and you savor the comfort of being smothered by him. Your omega purrs, rubbing your cheek against his sweaty shoulder, trying to cover yourself with as much of his musk as possible.

The chamber is silent, except for both heavy breathings and the crackling of the fireplace.

It takes you a moment to recover. Your mind is drunk but relaxed, satisfied. And then a hand slides down your arm, broad and warm and absolutely everything you need. He takes your hand in his, so small and fragile in comparison, noting how both are trembling before lowering his lips and placing a kiss on your knuckles.

Your eyes open into lazy slits at the feeling and it’s only after what feels like an eternity that you realize it’s raining; thunder rumbles around the castle as flashes of light illuminate your chamber through the windows. But you don’t feel afraid. Because inside you are warm and safe beneath your Alpha. You both gasp together as he locks his gaze with yours, his lips swollen and a little red with your blood. An unspoken question flashes across his expression, the tops of his cheeks flushed and his skin sweaty, his gaze beginning to return to its usual violet hue. You smile in response, something vague and lazy, but enough to show that everything is okay.

With a relieved nod, Aemond can’t help but gently stroke the damp hair stuck to your sweaty, flushed face, slipping an arm under your back to cradle your head with his other hand. “Good?” he asks, his voice hoarse and rough, punctuated by another small burst of semen that makes you shiver and laugh softly.

“You’re big,” you say, flexing slowly with a fragile sigh, eliciting a breathy laugh from him as well - his head turning in a weak reprimand, as if he doesn’t surprise with your cheeky response at a time like this.

When he rolls to the side, you hum happily as feel him wrap your body around him to bring you with him, still intimately embraced and joined by the knot. He lies on his side, arranging one of your legs over his hip, your head hidden in the crook of his neck. Both of you bracing yourself for the time it would take for his knot to deflate.

You feel completely exhausted, sated now that you’ve received what you needed from the Alpha. Your mind is clearer and more aware, finally letting the extent of what you’ve just done sink into your bones. But you know it won’t last long, another wave will soon arrive, your heat had only just begun and the days ahead would demand a lot from both of you.

“Shhh, just sleep, pup. I’ll be here when you wake up.” Aemond whispers into your hair as he feels your restlessness begin, a large, warm hand slowly running up and down the curve of your back and thigh in a soothing gesture, the other arm stretched out beneath your head to serve as a pillow. “I’ll take care of you from now on. Trust me.”

With those words your eyelids begin to grow heavy, the almost painful stretch of Aemond’s knot, still deeply trapped inside you, fading into a comfortable tingle. And with a sigh of relief, you allow yourself to snuggle closer to his body, his familiar scent now ingrained in every inch of your body, feeling protected and cared for - without any doubt that he would keep his promise. The soft throb of his bonding bite on your shoulder confirming it.

He is yours now. And you are his.

[rei-ismyname]

I loved your Exodus Was Right essay and wanted your thoughts abt if/when Hope summers will be back. Exodus and Hope were my favorite duo during Krakoa and I really thought it was gonna be her in the last Krakoan egg

Hey there! 

Thanks! It's a piece I'm really proud of and had a great time researching and writing it. In case you missed it, here it is. Oh boy, do I have thoughts!

Hope and Exodus are faves of mine too. Hope was mostly a background character before Immortal X-Men while Exodus had a mini arc/great moments and generally being extra, he didn't receive a lot of depth. Fortunately, Kieron Gillen saw the opportunity for an odd couple made up of the mutant Messiah (who thinks it's bullshit/has already done the job) and the true believer whose remixed Catholicism has her superceding The Prophet Magneto and Jesus Christ The Nazarene Mutant in importance. 

Fuck, I love them so much and could talk about them forever but I should answer your question. TW a shit load of blasphemy below the cut.

I miss them so much.

My cynical answer is 'in about 3.5 years when they decide to stripmine Messiah Complex and/or Second Coming and redo it with a new coat of paint.' 

My slightly less cynical, more pragmatic answer is 'in some dogshit event/time travel one shot/mini that undoes the wonderful White Hot Room utopia like they did with Tempus in Timeslide.' I don't trust editorial to recognise the extradimensional Krakoa's importance as the one solid W the mutants got. Children and C listers left behind while the main characters fought for the future of everything, nobodies who learned from the mistakes the Quiet Council and others made. Just mutants who lived without the threat of genocide or capitalism and built a post-scarcity society then resurrected ALL the dead mutants and came back for everyone else. 

Just as R-LDS shits on the mutant miracle (and makes Hope/The Five look incompetent) I fear that Marvel has difficulty telling superhero soap opera with oppression analogy and endless misery apart. I wouldn't be surprised if they decided to drag it out the back and shoot it in the head. Err, maybe that one is even more cynical. 

The thing is that Hope was a really interesting character concept that had solid development and an interesting arc until about the second act of AvX. Generation Hope was especially great. After that, she spent a bit of time in X-Force but it didn't last very long and she didn't have a hook. In many ways, Messiah Complex to AvX was a complete arc for her as the Messiah who reversed M Day with Wanda, even though they didn't really stick the landing.

She languished for a few years and eventually showed up leading the MLF murking populists with Zombie Banshee. I thought her actions were in character and her disillusionment with life in general was a fantastic beat. She shot Cyclops in the eye and optic blasted Logan away - I love that for her. Unfortunately Rosenberg didn't do much with that and she was mostly just there for the rest of the run though interestingly Age of X-Man had her as a pseudo-religious figure and symbol. part of the creation myth.

HoxPoX was huge for her as a symbol and plot device that made her the most important person on the island, but she wasn't really explored as a character. The Five were in the background here and there, often in resurrection scenes. They got a closer look in X-Factor but weren't part of the cast. Hope was mad at young Cable for killing her dad, but it only came up once and she didn't spend much time on the moon. Gillen zoomed out and looked at her whole history, identifying that her story wasn't done yet. The Quiet Council wasn't a representative body, but Hope (nudged by Exodus) insisted that she be The Five's voice on the council. It was a genius idea, as she was a counterpoint to their feet of clay and it put her centre stage. I really need to write about Immortal X-Men more as it's fantastic and underrated, with Hope and Exodus' dynamic a highlight. After Judgement Day they really started to hit it off and Sins of Sinister drove a wedge between them, though it didn't last. Hope kicking the shit out of Exodus was excellent, but the peak was them as leaders in the White Hot Room (with Destiny as a almost a Greek chorus hating every second.) 

When X-Men Forever, RotPoX and Uncanny 700 was done and dusted, her arc really was complete and all her history welded together to make sense. An unbroken circle of fire with the Phoenix - birth and death - willingly sacrificing herself so everyone could live. That her presence is felt in the WHR closes the loop and writes a coda for her decades long Messiah arc, even the shit parts. 

Exodus begging to die in Hope's place

A big part of me really wants to let that be the end of her story, a comic book character who truly gets to end on a high note. It sucks that she died but at least she had agency and went out with a bang. Her story has been told and now she's a symbol, or at least she should be. If they bring her back I'd want that to be established first. 

How I'd do it is to have Exodus' religion actually take off. They're a great couple (not like that) and squeezing more juice out of that orange is definitely possible. Hope didn't really like the Acolyte thing and thought Exodus was crazy (he kinda is NGL,) though she eventually leant into a little bit. I wanna see how she'd react to a full fledged religion with her as the Messiah figure. She's been struggling with those expectations since Second Coming, hated by strangers, resented by unbelievers - heretics who thought she was the antichrist tried to kill her before she was even born. Consider what Scott Summers' attitude towards Hope was right from the start up to AvX - he believed without proof that Hope was destined to save the mutants. That's faith right there. He lost his faith when The Romans The Avengers meddled and created The Phoenix Five but Hope was the real deal. 

As I detailed in Exodus was right, Hope rebirthed the Phoenix and the Phoenix impregnated her mother. Immaculate conception shit. She saved the mutant race in AvX and all of existence through bringing the Phoenix back. Her presence in the White Hot Room can be felt in an unexplainable way - enabling resurrection of 16 million slain mutants, some of whom returned to Earth. That's beyond miraculous, it's divine - Hope is much better than Jesus, lol, and Exodus somehow called it. As much as he can be trusted as a reliable narrator, he had a vision of The Phoenix in the 12th century. He reconstructed his faith around it and faith is a powerful thing. Religions have been started from a lot less and all Hope's miracles have proof. 

Rasputin IV would join up in a heartbeat, maybe Cypher the golden idiot too. Not sure how Exodus would do as self-appointed Pope but he's grown a lot and there's a good chance he'd reconstruct his faith again without the Catholicism. Human nonsense. Jesus has been holding out on a second coming for 2000+ years, whereas Hope had access time travel and did it in a few years. Jesus resurrected a couple, that's a lazy afternoon for Hope. She shoots bad faith assholes like Selene in the head and Jesus would never. Jesus died for our sins, but Hope died for our lives. There were 250K Krakoans and 16 million mutants returned in the White Hot Room - that's a huge base of potential followers. I'm an atheist but if Hope resurrected me and I watched her die rebirthing the Phoenix I'd believe the hype. Maybe even subscribe to Exodus' newsletter. 

No boring holy wars or wackadoo fundamentalism. No exploding communion wafers written by someone who doesn't understand religion at all, let alone Catholicism. No inquisitions or crusades, except against Mister Sinister. Schisms, though? Hell yeah. I wanna see Exodus get excommunicated for declaring himself an anti-pope. I want arguments over the canonisation of Magneto, a reformation to include Louise Spalding as a prophet and objections to Apocalypse as Satan. Quibbling over Exodus' translation of scripture and the disaster of writing the new new testament. A rando former Zoroastrian getting all Manichean. Jean being like 'sure, I'm the Holy Spirit. Glad you're having fun.' White Hot Roomers and Krakoans with very different perspectives, maybe even an East-West Schism deal. Exodus trying to canonise his dead boyfriend. Everyone calling bullshit on his vow of celibacy (Krakoa is for lovers!)

I need it to break containment ('wow, that really is some Messiah shit') and then another schism over whether humans are allowed. Mutant supremacists becoming the minority. Reverent predictions of the Second Krakoan Age. Sure, we could take the obvious predictable route of having it be a violent disaster, but I want it to go really well. It's the mutant link to the numinous and metaphysical, not some dreary temporal modern nation state. It's Hope, faith, love, and saving the fucking world. Everyone is important. 

That should be democratic and complicated! Secularists with purely cultural involvement trying to decentralise the faith. Pagan offshoots that celebrate Krakoa the miracle genius loci but reject Hope's divinity. A strong movement from Buddhists arguing that they have a duty for a Bodhisattva Vow - to bring the Second Krakoan Age to the entire universe. 

Arguments - Is Cable, who raised the Messiah, a prophet? What about Cyclops, the prodigal Grandfather who's married to the Phoenix and hosted the Phoenix when the Messiah doubted herself? The rest of the Phoenix Five? What about Destiny? Sure, Hope is the Messiah, but is Phoenix the Holy Spirit? Is Mass/Scripture in English or Latin? Or Krakoan? There's plenty of other gods cruising around and wandering the earth - how do they feel about that? Someone would float the idea of a polytheistic pantheon. And on and on and on. 

So yeah, I'd set that up, make it a wondrous thing that unifies a lost people. Then have Hope return for some kind of save everyone mission, and be like 'what the actual fuck dude? Stop kneeling and chanting please, I'm not the fucking Messiah. Get out of my way, I need it to do the thing to save all of existence ... ... ... FUCK! Goddamn it. What's that? Yeah, I did that. No I haven't been in Heaven, I've been in the White Hot ... God fucking damnit. How many of you motherfuckers are there? I can't deal with this.' Hope manifests some Phoenix flame in anger and believers start speaking in tongues and chanting 'Exodus was right' in Krakoan that's drifted 15-20 years from the Krakoan Hope knows. 

I want to really lean into the Messiah thing and explore the tension of a living Messiah. The awkwardness of being worshiped and the inevitable ecclesiastical drift. I want to see Exodus committed to building the mutant church and dealing with people actually listening to him for once. Continuing his growth as an altruist who cooperates with people - balanced against the fact that he is literally a prophet. This will never, ever happen, but I would love it so much. Would she reject it completely? Her messianic works and link to the divine are empirical, plus it seems to be a positive force in the world. How would believers react to the rejection, to her presence? Does it matter?

It'd be the equivalent of the Second Coming of Christ, except he's a gun girl that grew up drinking piss who DEFINITELY performs miracles on the reg (even by mutant standards.) Exodus would be delighted yet troubled. A symbol that's walking around swearing and picking their nose is more complicated than a perfect dead Messiah.

[deception-united]

Hi,

I'm rewriting an one-shot with OCs. They are both women in their late teen years, early twenties. A fancies B in a slightly obsessive way, and B is going to get married, so they don't get together at all. I thought about how should I write it being angsty, on A's pov, without ending up boring or whiny.

Have a great day/night :)

Hi, thanks for asking!

Writing Unrequited Love

This is a classic trope with a lot of emotional tension involved, but there's a fine line that falls between deeply evocative storytelling and a protagonist who comes across as melodramatic or pitiful; so, when writing from the POV of a character (A) who obsessively fancies another (B)—who is about to marry someone else—you want to capture the intensity of their emotions without exhausting the reader with endless self-pity. Here are some tips!

1. Make the obsession feel real, but not over-explained.

A’s feelings, albeit visceral, would be better woven into the narrative through sensory detail and subtext rather than outright declarations. Instead of repeating things like, "She loved B more than anything. It hurt. It wasn't fair," try showing the longing through her reactions—things like stolen glances, hesitations, or memorising B's habits as if hoarding the last pieces of her. Examples:

The way A's stomach tightens when B laughs at her fiancé’s joke.

The way A’s hand twitches, itching to reach out, when B absentmindedly brushes a lock of hair behind her ear.

The way A studies every micro-expression, searching for doubt or regret or anything that says she doesn't want to marry him, either.

2. Resist the urge to rant in internal monologue.

A bit of this is good and can add insight into A's exact thoughts and feelings, but it can be tempting to let her spiral into pages upon pages of why won't she love me back, which can get tedious. It may be more difficult to connect with excessive wallowing, but keeping internal monologues sharp, poignant, and purposeful can keep readers engaged. Include them mainly in moments of heightened emotion, rather than drowning the narrative in a flood of self-pity.

3. Let her have moments of denial and delusion.

A character in unrequited love will likely have fleeting moments where they convince themselves they still have a chance, no matter how irrational. Maybe B holds A’s hand for a second too long, or says something wistful about their past together, and A clings to it like an addict chasing a high. This emotional whiplash between hope and despair can add a lot of depth to her internal conflict throughout the story. Here's an example of how you can depict this in the narrative:

She's sitting on my side of the table. She still looks at me first when something funny happens. Maybe that means something. (hope) Then again, maybe it doesn’t. Maybe I’m just a memory she keeps around for nostalgia’s sake. (reality)

4. You don't have to paint B like an unattainable angel.

It’s easy to write B as a perfect figure—someone A puts on a pedestal. And this may be how you choose to write it, which can make for an interesting story of its own! Maybe she sees B as radiant and untouchable, and every smile she gives someone else feels like a dagger. But it's also important to show B's flaws as well (though this may not work as well in a one-shot with only one POV). Maybe she’s oblivious to A’s pain, leads A on unintentionally, or is struggling with her own uncertainties. This adds more complexity: A isn’t just losing something; she’s also struggling with the fact that B chose someone else over her.

More tips and things to consider:

Suppressed emotion: let A's emotions simmer beneath the surface and show her turmoil through the little things, like a lingering glance or a hand that hesitates before letting go.

Instead of drowning the reader in raw, explicit yearning, let them feel the gaps. Make A's world feel off-kilter, distorted by B’s impending marriage. Maybe the wedding preparations invade her senses—the clink of glasses, the rustle of silk, the scent of flowers that now feel sickly sweet.

Self-delusion: give A moments of near-normalcy, where she's pretending to be fine and almost manages to be—until something tiny unravels her again.

How does A cope? Does she act out in small, destructive ways, grow distant and quiet, or lean in, helping with the wedding like it's some self-inflicted punishment?

---

Unrequited love rarely gets neat closure, which is what makes it so miserable. Maybe A finally accepts the loss, or maybe she doesn’t—but keep in mind that angst isn't just about drowning the reader in sadness, but about making them feel the weight of what's lost.

Hope this helped ❤

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[kiraridertime03]

We need to free the Weasel

A brief discussion about the way that Creature Commandos uses politics in its narratives.

Spoilers for it and everything else James Gun DC up to this point though, below the cut.

Also, it is a busy post, content warnings for discussions of white supremacists and cops, as it is necessary.

With the release of the trailer of James Gunn's Superman film, hype for his grand DC Universe has kicked into high gear, and for good reason. That trailer, no matter the quality of the final film, is a goddamn work of art. A piece of film that understands Superman better over the course of 2 minutes and 20 seconds than Zack Snyder did over the course of 3 overlong movies. That mixed with his solid back catalogue of Superhero films. However, slightly more obscurely, this universe has already started with the animated series Creature Commandos, and especially with the fourth episode, which released hours before Superman's trailer, shows the kind of skill and thought Gunn and co. are putting into this new universe.

At its front, Creature Commandos feels very... blunt, in a lot of ways. It's like The Suicide Squad but with Creatures! It's big and raunchy, being an animated series with blood and swearing and sex and whatnot. And, when it comes with its politics, some of the early villain's mooks are a bunch of weird incels, and one of the main characters constantly advocates for killing Nazis. It is a work that immediately shows its hand, making the type who would decry the wokeness of modern movies and games or whatever. However, with these early examples, it can feel like a bit too much, maybe. I love it, don't get me wrong, I'm the type to really enjoy blunt earnestness. Though, given the more comedic approach that many of these elements take in the early episodes, it can feel a bit like it's only there for the bit.

Where the series really starts to excel, though, is when it starts integrating its flashback segments. As a whole, even outside the point of this post, the flashbacks feel like a wonderful decision. A way of fleshing out our characters while giving each episode a distinct feel, justifying the series as, well, a series rather than just one long movie. However, here, I want to discuss some of its political ideas, and how they integrate. Because, for these, they integrate more thematically, being an undertone to each character's own story.

For the bride, her story is centered around this idea of the objectification of women. I mean, it makes sense. She was literally made to simply be the bride of Frankenstein, an object of his affection. However, as she gained her own independence, the masculine figure who feels he is owed her hand in marriage breaks out into a rage, harming her and the person she actually loves. This story is what gives her the cynical edge she gains in the series proper, giving her an interesting, sympathetic story while using the elements of said story to say something about how many men perceive woman. A strong enough parable that acts as an undercurrent for her character.

Then, we get to G.I. Robot's episode, a real tear-jerker of a thing about a silly robot character, the exact thing to set my brain off in all sorts of ways. Much of this story is designed to set up his tragic past, so that we can feel catharsis once he gets his big moment, then feel the tragedy when he gets brutally murdered. However, it again is saying a lot of complex things. Many have discussed the PTSD angle for GI, which I do see, however, in GI's story specifically, I see the way that the American state treats veterans. Like, think about it. This being who was forged and created for the purpose of making war, goes to war, then once the war is over, they are, best, used for spectacle on live TV (Where they are unable to properly adjust to the tone of peacetime, accusing the audience of being Nazis themselves), studied not to help them, but to make the next generation of soldiers even more efficient at their goal of warcraft, then thrown to the side when they are no longer useful. The man selling GI to the collector literally says he slipped through the cracks. It, again, is a wonderful metaphor that takes advantage of what GI is, and uses it to emphasize these issues in a more literal way. It is a lot easier to show a robot who was programmed in a specific way weird the room out than the rocky adjustments a veteran may have to go through. It then, also, shows the kinds of people who really benefit from this warcraft, those it appeals to. The collector who buys GI turns out to be a part of a White Supremacist group in America, a group of people who gladly use Nazi iconography, identify with it, and gladly push it. Those also happen to be the types who want to buy old war memorabilia. Obviously, not all war collectors are Nazis. But these are people who see this kind of might makes right ideology that America so often employs with its military, and latch onto it. GI, rightfully, finds this appaling, and kills them on sight. It is this wonderful moment from this delightfully twisted series.

However, even that could be seen as a tad blunt. Again, GI is very clear with his words, he doesn't hide much. So, where I see this series going from good to great is with Weasel's flashback segments. This begins when a lawyer, a member of a nonprofit, demands she see Weasel, as she is putting on a case for him. In essence, she states that, at least to her and her organization, he was unjustly prosecuted. To both Rick Flag and us, this seems absurd, as we have a lot of predisposed biases towards Weasel. You see, he is one of the few pre-existing characters in this cast. Weasel was previously seen in James Gunn's The Suicide Squad, though only briefly. There, as a member of the Decoy Team, he makes weird, gross noises, they make a joke about him having killed 27 kids, then have him promptly drown before the mission even starts (Though, in the post credit, it turns out he survived, because that's even funnier). Even if you hadn't seen that film (Which you should if you haven't), they reestablish all that in this series in the first few episodes, portraying him as a stupid, vulgar, violent creature who isn't worthy of rights. However, expertly, this is all a front.

In the flashbacks, we learn that Weasel only interacted with about 8 kids, a bunch of students left at an after school program. Contrary to what we had been told, he really just played around with the kids, chasing around a ball. They eventually get inside the school and, while messing with stuff they shouldn't have, start a small fire. However, some antics are afoot. While he is playing around, an old senile man sees this and, rather than asking about what's going on, decides to run back to his home, call the cops about what is a clear, if odd, misunderstanding, then grab his gun to try to take things into his own hands. And, as he does, shakily trying to shoot Weasel, he makes the problem of the small fire worse, shooting a gas canister behind them, turning the small fire into a school-destroying explosion and fire. Then, the cops show up. Many of the kids are already dead, seemingly, but one survived. So, as he pulls her out of the wreckage, what do the cops do? They start shooting. Throughout this whole sequence, the cops do nothing but shoot and get in the way of things. It all culminates in the final shots, where Weasel has dropped the kid after being shot. And, instead of either of them going to get the kid, they both pin Weasel down, try to pull him out. This leaves the young girl to be crushed.

This is a massive tragedy, a game of tragic misudnerstandings that gets kids killed. However, again, it does this by hiding its politics into a genuinely moving character based story to make them more effective. It is a story, in part, about our predisposed biases. I mean, the narrative literally sets this up. Characters around Weasel say things about him without him being able to have a say. Because he's a Weasel. Then, our characters make judgments based on what they believe and what they've heard from secondhand sources over what they actually see. Even when Weasel is his most violent (taking down Circe in episode 3), he does it to protect his teammates, and he doesn't actually kill her. In his backstory, characters make rash decisions based on their misinformed judgments in hopes of "protecting the kids," when all they are actually doing is harming them. They get 8 kids killed all because Weasel is a little freaky.

Then there's the cops themselves. It so masterfully uses showing rather than telling. The most it tells us is of the trail at the start, and again, this is moreso used as setup, playing into our dispositions. However, when it is time to actually depict the injustices, it shuts the fuck up. It doesn't just say that cops are bad with a couple of clear shitheads and moves on. It shows how cops are bad. Their only answer to this situation is violence. They don't actually serve their community, in this instance the children stuck in the fire, their only answer is to start shooting things. Because they have no other answer than state sanctioned violence. And they did this all with an episode about FUCKING WEASEL!

Now, imagine what they can do with Superman. It doesn't even have to be political, like these previous examples. However, to me, this shows that he can do what, to me, some of the best storytellers do. They weave every element of their story together with deliberate choices that strengthen each other. If anything, more than any well edited trailer, it is that that excites me about everything James is working on. Of course, he is doing this with a team, but James is the type to surround himself with smart people who understand these things inside and out. That one David Corenswet quote about the shorts proves that to me in shades. That's what gives me hope about these works. That they will be movies and shows that mean things. Which seems like a low bar, but hey, so many fail at it that it's kind of impressive.

[arcane-ish]

@vi-is-badass pulling this out here, since the thread is getting long.

I think you're completely right that the most common reason people would write off Vi hitting Powder and not Caitlyn hitting Vi is simply that they like/love Vi and hate Caitlyn.

I think it's a frequent way that people interact with arts, particularly tv shows (multitude of characters, longer duration, not as tightly bound to point of views as books), that they emotionally attach to a character and view the show through that characters lense.

Ie "I love Jinx and because I love Jinx I hate Vi because Vi hit her and I don't really take Vi's actions outside of Jinx as seriously". Or "I love Vi and because of that I hate Caitlyn because she made Vi cry". Or "I love Caitlyn and so I like Vi because Vi likes Caitlyn and Caitlyn wants her". Or "I love Silco and so I hate Vi and Caitlyn because they get in his way".

But that doesn't mean that your summary wasn't good or important. I do think there are people who don't attach like that/who view a work more distant, or multiple characters and who have attached to characters who don't have much to do with either Caitlyn or Vi, like Viktor or Mel.

(I think it would actually be kind of interesting how people who attached to the comparatively unrelated Mel/Jayce/Viktor story see Caitlyn and Vi. My guess is that you have this "I watch the show through the lense of my characters and anything they do outside is not as important to me". Ie that Caitlyn might continue being used as the cute little sister character to Jayce in their fanfics simply because from a Jayce point of view, it's useful to have that kind of character, even if she did some pretty dark stuff outside her fairly limited interactions with Jayce. It would be curious if people who favor Viktor have a more negative view on Caitlyn than people who favor Jayce or Mel etc)

That said, in that previous post I did mean it more the other way around, that people do this complex "guilt math" subconciously in their head, but it comes out as "like/don't like" in fandom debate.

And I do think it's worth noting that Caitlyn probably has a few cases of "I liked her more in s1, I like her less in s2". Granted, some will probably be due to point of view-ism ("I attach to Vi, in s1 I liked Caitlyn because she was nice to Vi, I like her less in s2 because she made Vi sad"). But I think it shouldn't be ignored that Caitlyn just stepped across some thresholds that trigger more dislike.

For example:

If you POVed Silco or Jinx in s1, Caitlyn was still opposed to their goals, so maybe some of those fans didn't care for her, wouldn't put her high on the "characters I like list" (knowing fandom dynamics I would expect more Jinx fans to like her and classify her as "a fun opponent to Jinx because she makes Jinx so angry" [I think there's also more Jinx/Caitlyn shipping that Silco/Caitlyn shipping simply because Silco and Caitlyn had no meaningful or interesting scenes]). But I think people still understood that s1 Caitlyn was a relatively nice/good character who hadn't done as much damage. So people would "not care for her" more passively or criticize her more for being boring or lame. When she does actual harm in s2, it's more likely to trigger people to a "wtf, she's awful" type of critiicism. (especially since so much of Jinx and Silco criticism in s1 focused on the harm they were doing)

You could argue that if you POV Vi, both Caitlyn and Jinx cause her pain, both physically and emotionally. But I would expect Vi fans to have a more nuranced/slightly more positive reaction to Jinx in s2 in particuarly because Jinx's reactions are more nuranced too, signs of regret, punishment and self-punishment by the narrative, many signs of showing concern for Vi.

So the factors you listed still come into effect, not just for more "neutral" viewers, but also within POV type watching. (In general I think the dynamics of how people react "on behalf of" their fave are pretty interesting. Because I do think people are capable of seeing a character positively even if they are aggressive towards their fave or in the way of their fave reaching their goal. Usually it's tied to "does this character give the character I like good scenes" but I do think acknowledging that a character shows regret is given a hard time by the narrative are things people are more likely to react to.

My impression is that the writers were acting more from an "in character" point of view. ie, Caitlyn is the character who will double down when in focus mode. Or Caitlyn is the kind of character who would bury herself in work rather than having an emotional meltdown. Or Caitlyn wouldn't cry and plead and apologize, but more try to show it through action. Or Caitlyn who is more likely to shut down emotionally when faced with trauma/attacks (such as Jinx's capture of her).

And that is just something that rubs a lot of people the wrong way, strikes them as abrasive, that maybe some would have had more sympathy if we had visibly seen Cait miss Vi in the same way Vi missed Cait during her pitfighter montage. The implication of the show is still that Cait misses Vi, too (hence Ambessa being aware of Vi), but Cait is expressing it in an much more undercooked way, compared to Vi's open anguish.

Emotionally "buttoned up" characters have their own target audience who flock to them, but I think overall emotionally expressive characters have it slightly easier both in fandom, but also are just much easier to read for a general audience.

Best case scenario, Caitlyn kills Jinx and traumatizes a child. Even if Vi pulled Isha off of Jinx, Isha would still be traumatized watching someone she knows and cares about in some capacity die. This is a mirror to the first big trauma of Vi's life, finding her parents dead on that bridge after being killed by enforcers.

Hmmm, I have to say personally I didn't read it this way, that this harkens back specifically to Vi's parents. I read this more as part general "Vi is a protector, she protects the innocent" and maybe a dose of "Isha might have given her Powder vibes".

I think it's worth noting that Vi accuses Caitlyn of "becoming like Jinx" ("why are you the one acting like her?"). Rather than accusing Caitlyn of being like the enforcers who killed Vi's parents. When that actually would have been something that would have made sense in that scene. Cait accuses Vi of being just like all bad Zaunites and Vi accuses Cait or being just like all bad Pilties. It could have gone back to the scene where Vi doesn't want to take the badge. But they went for something else.

Maybe the writers didn't want to go there as shippers (to make it more explicitly about Piltover and Zaun), but the end result is still that it doesn't happen. Both use "being like Jinx" as their shorthand for "being bad" ("It's her blood in your veins."/"why are you the one acting like her?"). Which I think fits with the idea that Vi has made Jinx her personal boogeyman. Bad enough that working with enforcers and getting other Zaunites attacked and jailed in s1 seemed like the superior option, bad enough that she would give the counil Jinx's name, bad enough that she would tell Caitlyn to take the shot on Jinx.

To me that just harkens back to lot of debates I've had with "Arcane is too centrist" people, who often talk about how Vi should have been more traumatized by enforcers, big enough to not work with Cait even back in s1. And to me, whether one likes it or not, Vi being heavily traumatized by enforcers specifically (to the extent of flinching and cowering when she sees one) to me seems like just a popular fan headcanon that isn't really carried by the show. The show imo already made the decision that Vi doesn't feel that way about enforcers. She still doesn't like them, that's why she objects when Cait springs the badge on her. But I would argue that she didn't have many boundaries interacting with enforcers before that already. That when she opposes or looks down on enforcers it's more about long ingrained Zaunite tradition as something she feels inherently.

Again evidenced that Vi doesn't flinch from Cait, if you consider the music video canon she reacts more with anger, same in Act 1, she teams up with Jayce and enforcers for her raid on Silco. And to me that tracks with the idea that within canon, we see Vi experience as much, if not more violence from Zaunites (Deckard, Silco, Sevika) or from Pilties that act as Zaunite agents (Marcus). Enforcers might have killed her first family, but Zaunites killed her second family (plus there's a non-zero chance that Silco killed her first family too, even if Vi doesn't know that). If you take the supplementary material seriously, Stillwater violence was more about wardens, and other inmates. In fact that supplementary material suggests that Vi might have already gone to the point where she Stockholm syndromed on the Wardens and turned her focus and aggression towards other inmates.

That's why I do think Caitlyn giving her the badge is insensitive and not a nice moment ("you didn't think at all"), it just doesn't hold the same weight to me that others subscribe to it. It's still "bad girlfriend" material (ie putting her own needs/pain over Vi's, not being sensitive how that might come off, I actually think her going to the enforcers to talk up Vi is way more shady and unappealing to my personal tastes than asking Vi to take the badge in person), I just have a different read on how hard it hits Vi because I just don't think that Vi conciously has that deep of hangups about enforcers specifically (partly of how I read Vi and partly of how it makes sense for her situation that she has acquired a range of new traumas on top).

The 'Why are you the one acting like her" comment is meant to be an armor piercing question that points out to Caitlyn that she isn't the paragon of "good" in this situation, she's falling into more and more violent methods (she tried to point her gun at an informant to get answers and Vi had to step between them, she tried to shoot at a child and best case scenario traumatize her, etc) to achieve her goal and doesn't care about the collateral in the same way.

I think the fact that Vi used this accusation rather than "you act like the people who killed my parents" or "you act like the every shitty enforcer, I thought you were different", to me suggests that either that Vi is still deeply enough in that "Jinx is the villain" mindset that that really is the thing that worries her the most. Or that even after what Cait said to her that she was level headed enough to pick the insult that she thought would work best on Caitlyn.

Either one suggests that Caitlyn's comment didn't hit her as deeply to the core/wasn't as personal to her as "you're a Jinx" was to Powder. (aka what you already also said, that she seems to brush it off)

That's why I read this whole bit of the story as being genuinely more about "Jinx" than about "enforcerdom/Piltover violence". To me both of Cait and Vi's lines here "It's her blood in your veins." / "Then why are you the one acting like her?" aren't super well written. Both feel borderline non-sensical. Cait is behaving badly, but is she really behaving that Jinx-like? Is Vi really acting similar to Jinx?

So my read is more, that both are having a bit of folie a deux here, both independently have built up Jinx up as this ultimate evil. Vi in season 1 thinks that fighting Jinx and Silco justifies everything she does. We see Cait imagine Jinx mocking her. IMO s2act1 Vi bought into Jinx as the badguy (she made Jinx, she can end all the bad stuff by taking Jinx out). She saw what pain Jinx has caused Caitlyn, how much Caitlyn is suffering on top of how Vi was already pretty anti-Jinx in s1. She's willing to team up with Caitlyn and descend to the undercity as a boogeyman herself, for the purpose of taking out Jinx/the rest of Silco's people. I like to imagine that she's trying to tell herself if Jinx dies maybe everything can be better.

That she thought she knew how the badguys were, that Jinx was the badguy, and so teaming up with the people taking down Jinx is the good side. And to see Caitlyn "acting like Jinx" means that her moral system is being upended. She did all these acts of violence with Caitlyn under the premise that Jinx is bad. But now what if Caitlyn is the Jinx, the violent one? It means that Vi put guilt on herself by working with her. That she doesn't know right from wrong anymore ("I always choose wrong").

After this scene, Vi falls into deep depression, where she keeps dreaming of Caitlyn. I think this happens because she's aimless. She doesn't know what to do anymore, she doesn't know right from wrong anymore. I think at this point in her heart she still doesn't think Jinx is good which is why she's still suspicious of Jinx before Warwick comes back. So she doesn't believe Jinx is good, but Caitlyn isn't good either? She saw Cait go bad, but imo she doesn't want her to be bad, that's why she keeps dreaming of her, that's why she's in pain.

Vi came out of Stillwater with a mission with find Powder, apologize her, retrieve her. But she's slowly coming to a point where she thinks Powder can't be saved anymore culimating in her telling Cait to tell the shot. After seeing Jinx's behavior, her violence, Vi was already on a journey to give up on Powder (personally: I think on some level Vi had heard stories of Jinx before but didn't want it to be true), so her goal to get Powder back and get Powder's forgiveness was already beginning to slip away as she experiences Cait's kindness and Cait's impassioned declaration at the Firelight compound.

This is where she's falling for Cait, but also because Cait offers a ray of hope, a new mission. And when Cait acts violent, then Vi is losing any hope for that second mission.

And then of course the rest of season 2 is about how things are more nuanced. Jinx isn't the boogeyman, maybe there are shades of Powder in Jinx even if Powder isn't coming back. And since we know that Vi will rejoin the enforcers (and is already fighting with the Piltover side and wearing parts of the enforcer uniform in the final battle) maybe the hope for the "heal things Piltover and Zaun" dream isn't gone either.

___

The other angle I think is how Cait can feel herself slipping up, can sense that she's losing herself, that's why she asked Vi to be her failsafe.

And Vi is doing that, by trying to stop Cait as she's about to go too far, but Caitlyn is too far gone to accept that advice. There's tragedy in that too.

___

There was also all this subtext of "can Piltover and Zaun work together". Can Vi be the proof that not all of Zaun sides with Jinx, can Vi end the threat of Jinx on her own or was that lack of working with others the problem. Can Vi and Cait keep everything from coming apart by sticking together, can additional deaths be avoided, etc.

To me that was relatively undercooked when it comes to the emotions of the characters, but structurally it is still there.

If Viktor and Jayce share the hextech dream and Silco and Vander had the dream of Zaun, maybe Piltover and Zaun working together/Piltover doing right by Zaun could be seen as Cait and Vi's dream.

And all other dreams are in danger of being corrupted. Both other dreams have this situation where one of them walks away from that dream, because they feel their partner in that dream has overstepped.

Vi had to walk away. It wasn't enough to make Caitlyn reconsider. Caitlyn went far into the darkness till she saw the evil's of Ambessa and realized she had reconsider and reconnect with her partner.

And of course the "dream" gets fullfilled in a way by Piltover and Zaun actually fighting together in the end.

It just feels ... undercooked to me. Because they don't spell it out as literally for Cait and Vi as they do for JayVik and Vanco. And because they contribute more indirectly to Zaun joining the fight again (yes they were more kind to Jinx, so presumably Jinx helped convince people off screen, but we never get to see it. And they gave the big rallying speech to Jayce rather than Vi or Caitlyn).

I think the bones of it are there in the structure, maybe you can spin somethign from it with some effort. But as I said, to me the other angles (ie Vi built her moral system around villifying Jinx but if forced to question that) come through stronger when I watch that scene.

[moons-and-mobility-aids]

Hopeless

Pairings: Pre-Poly!marauders x disabled!reader Summary: James is a total goner. And he knows Sirius and Remus are interested too. [wordcount: 1.3k words] Tags: fem!reader, wheelchair user!reader, friends to lovers, james potter POV Sirius's Realisation | James's Realisation | Remus's Realisation | The Plan

The sun dips low in the sky, casting long shadows over the Hogwarts grounds. You're seated by the Black Lake, its surface calm and glassy, reflecting the warm hues of sunset. The water sparkles with dappled light, mirroring the orange and pink swirls painted across the canvas of the evening sky.

A gentle breeze stirs the air, carrying the scent of wildflowers and the distant promise of rain. It lifts your robes ever so slightly, an almost playful gesture that brings a sense of peace to this solitary moment. The soft rustle of leaves in the wind is punctuated by the occasional call of a magical creature from the Forbidden Forest, their songs intertwining with the natural symphony of dusk.

You pull your knees closer to your chest, arms wrapped around them in a self-embrace. Your wheelchair is parked nearby on the grass, but for now, you find comfort in the connection between earth and self, grounding you in a world that often seems to be spinning too fast.

James is lying on the grass with Sirius, pretending to help him with his Transfiguration homework. His friend's voice drifts over him in a continuous stream, mostly complaints about the complexity of the assignment. But James isn't really listening.

His attention is elsewhere, drawn by the sound of your laughter as you engage with Remus' stories. The late afternoon sun illuminates your face, casting a warm glow that highlights the sparkle in your eyes and the curve of your smile against the backdrop of an azure sky turning to dusk.

Something about you seems different this summer. It's not just the physical changes—although those are noticeable too. You've grown taller, your frame appearing stronger despite the health challenges you've faced. But it's more than that. James can see it in the way you carry yourself, even seated in the wheelchair. There's a quiet strength radiating from you, a resilience that wasn't there—or perhaps he hadn't noticed—before.

James knows Sirius likes you too. It's in the way his eyes linger on you, just a moment too long, or how his arm casually drapes over your shoulders, hinting at something more than friendly banter. James isn't surprised—Sirius has always been a charmer—but this feels different, deeper somehow. And it does something strange to James's heart when he sees those familiar grey eyes soften at your laugh, at your mere presence.

And then, there's Remus. He's more reserved, but even he can't hide the light in his eyes when you're around. His voice takes on a softer tone, barely noticeable unless one knows to look for it. And James does. He notices the small smile that plays on Remus's lips when you speak, the way he leans in just a bit closer, as if drawn by your warmth.

James knows because he feels the same pull, the same inexplicable tug at his heart whenever you're near. He's in love with you, and maybe with Sirius, and maybe even Remus. The realization is both terrifying and exhilarating, like standing on the edge of a cliff and deciding whether to jump or stay put.

"James," you call, breaking the silence that has settled over him like a blanket. He looks up from the grass blades he's been absentmindedly tearing apart, his gaze meeting yours. Your smile is soft, patient—an antidote to the storm brewing within him. "You alright?"

"Yeah," he mumbles, adjusting his glasses with the back of his hand. Heat creeps up the back of his neck, but he tries to hide it, focusing on the specks of dirt under his fingernails. "Just thinking."

"About what?" You tilt your head, your hair catching the sunlight. It's a simple question, but it feels heavy, weighted with all the unspoken words that have been lingering between you.

His eyes dart towards Sirius, who's now idly tossing pebbles into the lake, then to Remus, whose attention seems more focused on you than the book in his lap. James swallows hard, feeling the gravity of everything left unsaid. But with you, it doesn't seem unbearable; instead, it feels like possibility.

"About how... how incredible you are," he blurts out before his brain can catch up with his mouth.

Your eyes widen for a fraction of a second, and there's a flicker of something across your face—surprise or doubt or maybe even hope—but it's gone as quickly as it came.

"Incredible?" Your laughter is a soft melody, but a blush blooms on your cheeks. "I'm not that special."

"Of course you are." James's voice is low, almost a whisper now. It's as though he's entrusting you with a secret, hoping you'll guard it close to your heart. He swallows hard, his Adam's apple bobbing with the motion. "You're... you're amazing."

Sirius raises an eyebrow from where he's lounging, his expression unreadable. James fears he's said too much, given away something he never intended to reveal. But Sirius simply smirks, glancing between you and James.

"Oi, James," Sirius drawls, reclining further. "If you're going to declare your undying love for her, at least wait until I've finished my homework. Don't need to be scarred for life."

Your laughter rings out again, this time with more depth and warmth. "Like that'll ever happen, Black."

James tries to join in the mirth, but there's a tightness in his chest that has nothing to do with laughter. He looks at Sirius again, and their eyes meet for a moment—just long enough for James to see the unspoken agreement there. Sirius understands. He always does.

As the last rays of sunlight dance upon the horizon and the stars begin to peek from their celestial hiding places, you feel a collective sigh pass through your group. It's time to return to the castle, to trade the freedom of the lakeshore for the looming walls of Hogwarts. Remus stands beside you, ready to help you transition from the grassy bank to your chair.

A few steps behind, Sirius walks with James, their strides synchronised despite the silence stretching between them. It's not an awkward silence, but one filled with unvoiced thoughts and unshared concerns. The tension is palpable even as they keep their faces carefully neutral, their focus on the path ahead.

"You love her," Sirius states, his voice low and barely audible. It's not a question.

James halts mid-step, turning to look at his friend. Sirius' gaze is distant, fixed on some unseen point beyond the castle walls. His usual bravado is gone, replaced by a stillness that speaks volumes. The lines of his face are drawn tight, and his hands, usually animated with grand gestures, are tucked deep into the pockets of his robe.

"Yeah," James admits finally, because there's no point in denying it—not to himself, and certainly not to Sirius. "I do."

The silence stretches between them, a chasm filled with unsaid words and unvoiced fears. James watches as Sirius' jaw tenses, the only sign that he's wrestling with thoughts too complex to articulate. The seconds tick by, each one a testament to the gravity of their situation.

"I do too," Sirius confesses at last, his voice barely more than a whisper. The admission hangs heavy in the air, a secret laid bare under the weight of the moonlight.

James exhales, not aware he had been holding his breath. He wants to say something—anything—to ease the tension, but words fail him. Then Sirius looks at him and there's that familiar crooked grin, the one that always managed to reassure James they could face anything—as long as it was together.

"Guess we're both hopeless then, eh?" Sirius's tone is light, but his grey eyes hold a depth of understanding that goes beyond their years.

James returns the grin, feeling an odd sense of relief. "Yeah. Hopeless."

[rejectedfables]

rewatching House MD, and s1ep10 "Histories" is just such a masterpiece in crafting empathy for the unhoused, and it's striking me how much I miss characters who are allowed to be complicated and messy and deeply flawed even WHILE they impart a heavy-handed lesson to the audience. And how much more effective those lessons are when said characters ARE complicated and messy and deeply flawed.

In the episode, a homeless woman is brought to the ED, and House, Foreman, and Wilson clash over how to handle it. Wilson is immediately invested, Foreman is immediately dismissive, and House's interest in the case is piqued by wanting to learn why Foreman hates homeless people.

Foreman, who's perspective is the least sympathetic but the most like how the average irl person perceives and responds to unhoused people, is never given a backstory justification for his views. House assumes he's angry at an unhoused loved one, or perhaps he's just a snob, but the audience learns that Foreman's instinct to distrust Victoria was correct; she WAS trying to manipulate the system. AND she is also extremely ill. Foreman is merely forced, against his will, to observe her pain until he cannot ignore it anymore. He is dragged to empathy and compassion and emotional investment in her wellbeing, and he is rewarded with a lesson he will never unlearn.

Wilson starts the episode invested, remains invested, and is unsurprised by the ultimate tragedy of the episode. We are then told that, 9 years prior, he lost contact with his brother, who was homeless. We are shown that he was forced, in the past, against his will, to face the reality of homelessness.

In the beginning, Foreman dismisses Victoria's need to be there, saying homeless people lie about ailments so they can sleep in the hospital. In the middle, she admits that that is actually why she came in. He was right. By this point she is actually observably very ill with multiple serious ailments. In the end, she dies of something she would have been treated for long ago, if she were not homeless.

Wilson and Foreman dig into her past and discover that years ago she, while driving, had caused a car crash that killed her husband and son. We, the audience, are left to assume that that event led to a series of events culminating in her current unhoused status. She is an unreliable narrator of her own story, she is paranoid and scared and she attacks a doctor, she is an artist, she is a nice person, she DID lie to get help, AND she DID really need that help. And by the time she was in the hospital getting help from a team of atypically invested doctors, said help was too little too late to save her.

The complexity does not detract from this story or this lesson, it is an inherent part of it.

And I can't help feeling that the same episode, if it were filmed now (or perhaps what I mean is, if it were filmed at any time but with slightly less care), would give Foreman a backstory reason to distrust, and Wilson would NOT need a backstory reason to be compassionate, framing Goodness as default and Badness as other. Victoria would be a sympathetic victim of others evils, only ever kind despite her pain, dismissed despite pure intentions. She would be diagnosed with something that could affect anyone, showing that the homeless are just like the housed; we're all the same, actually. And maybe she would be cured, and offered help (money, a job, access to a shelter), to teach the audience, bittersweetly, that systemic problems can be overcome if you know the right people.

Instead, this episode was expertly written. Dismissal of the unhoused is commonplace and normalized. Compassion comes rarely and is hard won. People from any economic background can and do become unhoused. People in bad situations are inherently going to be complicated, and sometimes their situation IS their fault in one or many ways, and they still need help and support and medical care, and dismissing their needs is both easy and wrong. Unhoused people face many different problems than housed people do, their lives are different in many ways, and they are deserving of compassion despite and BECAUSE of this; being different does not make them less than. Systemic class oppression and the othering of unhoused people costs those people their lives in every way and at every level, and this is a tragedy. This is a tragedy.

This is a tragedy.

[ridiasfangirlings]

The top three blues, Kusanagi, Yata, the silver trio, and whoever else you want, play dnd regularly together. Who DMs? Who plays what class/ race? Does Fushimi’s character flirt with Yata’s as a ‘joke’ or kill any NPC that flirts with them? Does Kusanagi and Awashima let their characters flirt? Does anyone share backstories/ have their characters connected?

Munakata definitely DMs, this was probably his idea and he spends all month plotting his scenario (he does let other people DM eventually though so he can play, Shiro probably has a fun time learning to DM, Kusanagi takes it easy and Munakata keeps making little comments about how perhaps their DM is not as prepared as he thinks he is, Anna gets to DM once and everyone in Homra helps her with her scenario and she’s very proud of it). Munakata thinks this would make for a splendid bonding ritual between the three clans, teaching them about fun and teamwork. Imagine he doesn’t even state on the invitation what exactly this meeting is about, only asking for everyone to be there, so Anna, Kusanagi and Yata show at S4 and run into the Silver trio, who also have no idea what this is about or why Munakata asked everyone to bring pencils. Awashima shows up and leads everyone to the common room in the dorms, where Munakata has made a whole set up with dice and books for character sheets and also he’s probably wearing a silly wizard hat.

Everyone gets to choose a class, I imagine Munakata having this whole long explanation for how to fill out a character sheet and figure out stats and then Fushimi clears his throat and explains he made an app for this and please just input your desired class and let the app do the rest, we don’t have all day here and I want to leave (Munakata wilts slightly but thanks Fushimi for his diligence). Yata wants a cool class and Fushimi taunts him that maybe he should be a cleric with the power of virginity. Fushimi himself is a rogue, while Awashima has chosen to be a female barbarian. Yata takes the fighter class and Kusanagi decides to be a ranger, while Anna considers very seriously before choosing a wizard. Shiro decides to be a wizard too and happily tells her they can team up, while Kuroh picks bard because it will allow him to work Ichigen Miwa’s beautiful haiku into the story. Kuroh and Shiro help Neko pick druid, so her character has an affinity for animals and she has an excuse to skip her turns when she’s bored by turning into a cat for half the campaign as she wishes. When Munakata plays he’s either a sorcerer or paladin, depending on his mood. 

The game is probably a bit slow at the start, especially since you know Munakata would have a whole complex scenario planned out with multiple puzzles that the team has to solve (imagine poor Yata keeps getting to the puzzles first and he has to roll for skills to solve them and constantly fails, which Fushimi gets to tease him about). I’m sure everyone’s pre-existing relationships start showing through the game, like Awashima and Kusanagi quickly become good at working together while Yata and Fushimi are always squabbling, and Neko is only interested when she gets to play with Shiro or Anna. However imagine this does end up being good for letting everyone talk to other people too, like somehow Kuroh and Fushimi’s characters get locked in a room together and have to work together to escape before Fushimi kills Kuroh for playing encouraging haiku too many times. Another time Yata’s character ends up in a storyline with Neko and he has to try and keep her on track while she’s trying to find excuses for her character to take her clothes off and sunbathe. One day when one of the others is DMing Anna, Shiro and Munakata all unexpectedly end up in their own little scenario and get to work together as ‘Kings’ to resolve it, Munakata is probably very proud that his plan has succeeded so well.

[kaiowut99]

Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters GX Episode 126 Subbed (Finalized)

(Previously: Episodes 124-125 Subbed [Finalized])

(Check out my Subbed!GX Stream Masterpost!)

TURN-126: Judai VS Manjoume -- Dark Sword the Dragon Knight

Judai pursues Martin as he heads towards where the three Phantasms have been locked away--only to find the zombified Manjoume standing in his way. As Manjoume refuses to make way for him, Judai ultimately duels him, with Manjoume summoning Return Zombie and Blood Vorse as he pounces on Judai. Elsewhere, having learned that Johan and co.'s duels were a ruse, the students rush inside to get to where the food is, but they are beaten by the zombie students, causing most of the students to have now become zombies. Just then, at the power-generator area, O'Brien hears a transmission from someone.

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

126 is now finalized! Just a quick 'un this time since I ran a bit late with myself for GX work--got a bit caught up in some interesting TFSP stuff along with my round of story-translation with Kite's story events lol--and since episodes 127-128 and 129-130 lead into each other pretty well, I thought I'd just work on 126 this time as a bit of a calm before the storm. And it does offer that vibe, as we get Martin dashing for the three Phantasms--remember them?--and Judai in hot pursuit, only for a zombie Manjoume to get in his way. The Dark Sword the Dark Demon Realm Dragon Knight (Dark Blade the Dragon Knight--OCG name be long here) he pulls out is kinda neat, its only having one appearance aside, while the conversation that Misawa has with Zweinstein later gives our group some hope to get out of this dimension if they can get past the zombie horde to get to the tennis courts (remember them?).

Animation error-wise, only a handful of quick things to work on for 126 (maybe a benefit of having two Animation Directors on board for this one?): two card edits, a split screen, and an odd quick flash of a Duel Disk part not being drawn in, lol. Also, two bits in the preview related to episode 127. As usual, edit breakdowns below the cut for the interested!

Quick housekeeping: quickly revisited and re-finalized episode 107's hardsub after noticing that I had Ed missing from the translated ending credits for that episode (instead accidentally listing Rei in both cast lists); links updated in the release post there and in the masterpost. oop

Anywho, enjoy! Hoping not to delay myself too much over the next couple weeks in getting 127 and 128 finalized, lol; before I fully work on them, I'll first be back in TFSPland hopefully knocking out both Kotori and Rio's stories to cap off ZEXAL's story events, along with some more incidental work on ARC-V "Dub-Uncut" episode 2. Stay tuned!

Fixes and Edits!

Clocking in as our first error around 12:43 (not too long after the second Animation Director's team kicks in after Flame Wingman's summoning [that's where you can tell the shift from Chi Man Park's style to Ok Mi Lee's]), as Manjoume summons Dark Sword the ... Dragon Knight and Judai looks on, there's a black square on his Disk where Flame Wingman's card should be. A relatively easy fix, as I just slapped on a proxy over it in AfterEffects.

A bit later, as Misawa tries to get into the Power Generator Complex's control panel but has trouble doing so, Kenzan and the others run over to help--but there's a quick movement frame (lasting three total frames) as Kenzan moves to run over where part of his inactive Disk is literally missing--you can see the background of some power-generator panels behind him through the gap, lol. Fixed using Photoshop to grab that part from a later frame in the shot, clipping it out and slightly rotating/adjusting it to fit into this shot; made a perfect fit! Once done, I threw the fixed frame into the footage in Sony Vegas. (Actually noticed this one after working on the other edits as I was revising the episode's subs.)

Later, as Judai summons Gran Mole and has him Contact-Fuse with Neos, there's a quick frame as we pan up to Neos and Gran Mole fusing where Judai has Gran Mole in Monster Zone 2 on his Disk, which should be occupied by Neos. Another quick and easy AfterEffects fix as I just applied a Neos proxy over it.

This one was interesting... After Judai summons Gran Mole and Manjoume notes he also has the same ATK as his Dark Sword the ... Dragon Knight, Judai clicks in on a split-screen to activate his effect; once he explains it, their split-screen splits apart, but Manjoume's moves first for two frames before Judai's finally rapidly moves as their uneven slide-out lasts just five frames (vs the usual 7-8). Fixed this in Sony Vegas by masking out and redoing their slide-outs to be simultaneously timed, making them smoother to last the more common seven frames.

In the preview for 127, as we see the Phantasms' silhouettes rising behind Amon's Eye of the Typhoon, Amon and Martin slide in on a quick split-screen before sliding out to show Eye of the Typhoon being made to dissipate--but for a quick frame on slide-in and slide-out, the border on Amon's split is a bit ghosty and faded, while on the slide-out, the close-up of Eye of the Typhoon being transitioned into is also briefly missing. Being fixed first for 127 proper then applied as I set up the translated preview, I redid the border on Amon's split for both ghosty instances to look more per usual, while on the slide-out, I masked in part of the close-up Eye of the Typhoon shot between him and Martin. (Couldn't really apply this fix to the original preview due to the Japanese title text over the shot.)

As the 127 preview wraps, we have a shot of a shrouded-in-darkness Raviel standing up, with his eyes ominously glowing red as he does so--in 127 proper, this was removed for some reason, so he stands up with his eyes looking normal. I thought it made more sense to still have his eyes ominously glow, so I took the preview version of the shot and masked out the glowing eyes over the footage from 127 to restore it for both the translated preview and the episode proper.

[ye-olde-sodor]

Ok so I just found something weird about Ryan and Thomas' classes…

I was looking into the LB&SCR E2s and GNR N2s because I wanted to write some fanfiction with Thomas and Ryan. As I was reading some Wikipedia articles, something caught my eye, and that was the difference in Traction Effort.

In simplest terms, Traction Effort is basically the amount of pushing and shoving forces that an engine has. The higher the number, the more the engine can pull and push. It’s measured in both Kilo-Newtons (kN) and in Pounds Force (Ibf). 1 kN is equivalent to 22.8 Ibf. There is a way to calculate an engine’s Traction Effort but the formula is super complex even in its simplified form and I suck at math. If anyone wants to double check this, be my guest.

So, according to Wikipedia and its subsequent sources, Ryan’s traction effort is 19,945 lbf (88.72 kN). Thomas, meanwhile, has 21,397 lbf (94.78 kN).

If this is accurate to both the E2s and the N2s, then that means that Thomas had nothing to worry about. Thomas is, at least from a traction effort standpoint, the better engine. Yes, there are other factors when determining which engine is better, but Thomas beats Ryan in one of the most important factors, that being how much he can pull and push.

“So Thomas was jealous for no reason? We already knew that, so what’s the point?" Well dear reader, you’d be half right. See, here’s where things get interesting.

I’m sure we all know that the E2s sucked at their job. They were too big to work on the lines they were meant for and had a plethora of other issues. Their small bunkers made them unfit for long distances, and the Second Series (the ones with the extended side tanks that were supposed to replace the first) had an inadequate water supply. Due to these issues, they didn’t last long and they were all withdrawn and scrapped between 1961 and 1963.

What I bet you’d probably figured out by now is that Ryan’s class faired far better than Thomas’ class. While most were withdrawn much sooner than Thomas’ (from 1955 and 1962), they were frequently used and considered reliable. Most of Ryan’s siblings worked at Kings Cross and Moorgate as suburban passenger services, meanwhile the E2s were kept mostly at docks and yards at London Bridge Stations and Victoria and hardly did anything but shunt. On top of all of this, Ryan's class had a much better fuel and water capacity.

Now take all of this info and place it in context of SLOTLT.

Imagine a SLOTLT movie that shows us that Thomas is insecure about his faults despite his numerous rebuilds. Then in comes this fancy new GNR engine that, while slightly weaker than Thomas, can travel farther thus can deliver more trains across Sodor. Now have that same engine show off this ability on Thomas' own branchline. On top of all of that, have everyone brag and comment on how better Ryan is as a passenger train than Thomas. Cut back to Thomas at the construction site hearing about this, and becoming furious (but moreso scared) about Ryan and becomes convinced he's being replaced.

Now imagine Ryan being the one to pull the shipwreck instead of Donald and Douglas. Now Thomas is convinced he's being replaced and either sent away to another railway or sold for scrap.

It's a small fix but it makes such a difference. It helps explain why Thomas becomes so reckless and irritable in the movie and when Sailor John rolls in with Skiff, he feels more willing to help him since "Hey, he bought Skiff, maybe he can buy me if I prove myself to him!"

There are so many other stories we can write using all of this, and you all know damn well I'm gonna abuse the hell out of this lol.

[moe-broey]

Okay as a treat just for me. I'm gonna post this long ass infodump about my sweetie pees I sent to the irl friend group art chat. Full context is we're doing a secret Santa esq art exchange, pick three characters, drop them in the chat (images/a little about/where they're from), and GO!

So this is me just being DEEPLY. LIKE WAY TOO MUCH MAYBE. Autistic about The Characters. And TRYING. VERY HARD. To introduce them in a digestible way. Without getting lost in the sauce (I did get lost in the sauce).

But all of this context is to say, this isn't a full analysis really, and some info might not be totallyyyy accurate or in-depth/detail BUT. BUT. It might be kinda fun to take a peek inside my brain, to see what's going on in here. What things I ended up focusing on, almost narratively...? Because Moe is here, too. I'm trying to Set The Scene, here. I AM just going off the cuff, trying to pick and choose and prioritize, but. If anything it's just really funny how I immediately tore into Alfonse. ON SIGHT 💥💥💥💥💥💥💥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥

OKAY. GO

/

Mine are Oops! All Fire Emblem (Heroes)! But like. I mean. I am deeply obsessed. With my Guys........

So, all FEH/FE Heroes:

1) Alfonse! Prince of Askr!

"Kind and serious, and eager to maintain peace". Going deeper... he's reserved, very polite (............ mostly). God I actually have no idea where to begin w him bc he is the worst concoction of contradictions and Issues ever. He's standoffish. He's painfully sincere. He's distant. He's so earnest it makes you flinch. He swears by emotional distance but is so PAINFULLY emotionally driven in almost Everything he does. "The more you have to lose, the worse it hurts when you do" ect ect. On top of this, he's simultaneously practical and pragmatic to the point of coldness. He's Calculated. Put him in the position and he WILL become judge, jury, and executioner. When you meet him (beginning of the story) he's going through his very first homoerotic best friend breakup and it's a category 11 event. He proclaims himself to be your sworn protector (eventually. Give him a little time to lick his wounds and he WILL get insane and intense about it). Attachment issues GALORE. Daddy issues also. Deeply ingrained sister complex if you have Divine Visions like I do. I cannot elaborate bc I would be here forever. Just know that he completely adores his baby sister so much I'm gonna thrup. He likes to study and takes great interest in old folklore and weaponry. Very nice proper young man with no problems I promise. Very responsible your mother would trust him w her phone number if anything went wrong or you and your friends found yourselves in trouble (he is the reason you found trouble.) Oh and he's killed multiple gods. He once threatened to kill god while wearing a bunny suit. Very normal guy.

1.2) Lif! Twink Death! Oh no!

That's Alfonse too, from an Everything Went To Hell (Literally) timeline. Cheating slightly so sorry BUT I wanted to include him for a little aesthetic variety, espppp if you wanna try your hand at a more monster-esq design. As you can guess, he's undead. He's got his bones all out like some kind of whore. He's also just so... so..... sad. Saddest most soggy man not-alive. He's running on fumes and sheer desperation, attempting to outsmart I mean Bargain w the gods to bring his loved ones and entire world back to life (category 999 like everybody every single person ever is fucking dead from that timeline. Event. Death god apocalypse style. He's currently working under said death god. Bummer!)

2) SHARENA MY FRIEND SHARENA. Princess of Askr!

"Cheerful and loves making friends -- especially with Heroes". Oh god there is so much more to her though. There is SO MUCH going on w her. She is a certified sweetie pie, she's enthusiastic and an UNWAVERING ray of sunshine, she burns so brightly it's almost blinding. She is absolutely the loadbearing extrovert in a group of people (main Order of Heroes cast, herself, Alfonse, Commander Anna -- the summoner as a mostly blank-slate player insert is a bit up in the air there but bear w me) who would tend to keep to themselves for one reason or another. She's a social butterfly!!!! She's the force that ties everyone together! But... she actually struggles to make genuine connections. She does too much, too much enthusiasm. She's not actively trying to lie or anything, but... she can come off disingenuous, anyway. Some of my favorite Sharena qualities are when you see little cracks in her endless positivity mask. She can be blunt! She has a bit of an attitude! Sometimes she accidentally hurts Alfonse's feelings (SO SAD SO SAD!!!!!). AND THAT PART. I LOVE TOO. She's soooo personable, but... not exactly Good, with people. Is it not enough to be so cheerful? To proclaim that you're someone's biggest fan? And GOD. Esp early on it was just FEH writing, but. If you're insane. Like me. The question of, "Who am I, without you?" is sooooooo. Who am I, if I'm not Alfonse's darling little sister? LIKE. They BOTH struggle w a degree of this, unable to conceptualize A Self outside of Their Roles/Who They Hold Dear. IT GOES SO CRAZY. ESP BC. Sharena and Alfonse on the surface seem to be COMPLETE opposites, but both are just as deeply lonely and susceptible to emotional enmeshment. As for hobbies I think you can safely say she likes to draw (the entire Meet the Heroes website reads like it's Sharena's artwork/words), and again! Befriending Heroes! She's a sweetie and nothing has ever gone horribly wrong. Don't worry about that. There's absolutely NOT an extremely emotionally devastating twist that completely turns everything on its head 4 Books in. Dooon't worry about it 😁👍 hehe.

3) Moe. What the hell IS THAT THANG (My Summoner OC!)

In Book 1, you meet Alfonse and Sharena after the mysterious disappearance of their dear friend. Devastating, for both of them. Moe is chronically the youngest of five and also divinely ordained Third Guy. It gets isekai'd. It has no one. Though many of these things would not come to light until much later, these are some of the dynamics at play when the three of them slot together perfectly. Also a few other things like Moe losing an important connection like Alfonse does (... failing to mention that it was Moe itself who severed the friendship, ghosting style. Which is the WORST style you could have chosen ESP in proximity to Alfonse and his friend -- who essentially did the same). And.... more. But don't you worry about that. Speaking more broadly, Moe is an autistic shut-in who's been forced to Be Here. It is The Struggler. It also has fake ass bitch tendencies. It's aromantic and demisexual (seems irrelevant, but DOES end up biting it in the ass Severely later). It has one million intimacy issues trust issues and complexes around desirability/undesirability. It's attempting to correct itself by un-correcting itself. A previous life spent "correcting" itself had LONG LASTING damaging psychological effects. A whole other guy may have spawned in there (its brain) due to this. But hey, it's just a silly little guy!!!!!!!!!!! Come ooooon it's just a silly little guy just a little birthday boy. Dropping the act immediately bc that's how easy it is to see right through it. It has So. So many Problems. But it is silly. At very least, it stays silly. And despite The Issues, Moe is Itself. For better AND worse 💪💪💪

/

TLDR. CAUSE. I INFO-DUMPED MAYBE TOO MUCH.

Alfonse: Reserved, earnest, has one million psychological problems esp around intimacy and relationships but he's like. A Normal Guy. Sooooo Normal Guy Core. But WATCH OUT!

Lif: The natural conclusion of Watch Out

Sharena: Sweetie. Has done nothing wrong in her entire life. Despite being a social butterfly, struggles a bit to actually Make connections and be herself without needing to perform.

Moe: Unauthorized Fucking Thing. Blow it up NOW‼️‼️‼️‼️‼️‼️‼️

[sweetpaintedladie]

mmm my spark notes after my first watch of the new anita documentary:

- it was good! i really liked it! loved hearing her story and being able to fit it in between others accounts of the same events. the archival footage was a really great bonus too, as you really almost felt like you knew the family by the end, incredibly intimate. i think her voice is so important in contextualizing so much of the stones history, and one that has been sorely needed in really understanding certain ins and outs of the band, their dynamics, and their music.

- by the same account, i feel as though you really need nuance to understand and watch the film through the appropriate lens. obviously, being anita’s story, it’s skewed towards anita’s perspectives on things. to watch the film is to understand you are seeing an image of anita that has already been slightly altered by time. there’s no discussion of her fascination with nazi propaganda [which is documented elsewhere and widely common knowledge on her], her violent outbursts and manipulative behavior are explained away [also documented rather widely]. obviously these things were inner circle knowledge for a long time, and in the past ten to twenty years have come out for the wider public to know, so her lack of acknowledgment towards them is to be understood - they aren’t flattering and can’t be explained away [even if that’s attempted].

i loved it for finally hearing anita speak on the world she was so instrumental in creating as her own. i think it’s valuable to hear about such a complex and singular woman through her own words, pictures, and videos. i will also be revisiting quite soon, i know that. i think she has an amazing knack for style in her work that make it so engaging and almost intoxicating, drawing you back. one of the most interesting and honest reflections on the stones era that has been given, from someone in the center of the nucleus. i almost wish it was just more of her perspective as opposed to others accounts of what happened around her. but that’s just first watch, maybe i��ll feel different in a while. i still really liked it though !!

[topazadine]

Common Writing Issues that Reduce Readability

A short little Monday post so that we stop pissing readers off!

Beyond the usual issues that are easily fixed, like typos, there lie a few more pernicious problems that can drag readers out of a story kicking and screaming. Unfortunately, they happen to nearly everyone, no matter their skill level, and must be watched for carefully.

Now, I want to note that I am never attempting to prescribe how you should write. However, I want you to think back to the last time you read something that made you roll your eyes and give up - it's likely that at least one of these problems was present.

Here is the sum-up, and then we'll talk details. I will be showing examples of my own writing that include these deadly sins, so feel free to point and laugh.

Double describing

Overly long sentences

Overexplaining

Head hopping

Again, a big disclaimer.

I can't tell you how to write, this is just my opinion, you are the crafter of your own story, take what you like and leave the rest.

Alright, let's get into it.

Double Describing

Describing the same thing in two different ways right next to one another feels repetitive and annoying; it comes across as self-indulgent, like you're more interested in showing off how smart you are than telling a story. I have been a perennial offender in this, as shown by my story "Beyond Mortal Sight."

Here, I've highlighted the things that were double-described in blue. This includes:

The underworld

Higekiri

The crypt

The room being mostly empty

Pick the strongest descriptor and cut the other ones. You might think that this makes your writing weaker, but it actually strengthens it, as you're not diluting the description and can move along faster.

If you're not sure whether you're double describing, try removing one of the selections and see if you're still describing what you wanted to. Maybe you just need to tweak one of them, but both of them can still stand on their own; in that case, differentiate them more, or move them so that they are not right next to each other in order to provide better emphasis.

Now, sometimes you really do want to linger on a specific description, and that's fine. However, you need to ensure that you're looking at different aspects of the same thing.

I do end up lingering on the moths for a long while, and it doesn't get too repetitive (at least I don't think so) because I'm describing different elements of them.

Overly Long Sentences

The longer a sentence is, the harder it is to emphasize certain things, and the more likely that a reader will get lost aong the way and need to reread things. Of course, we want readers to take our time with the work, but paradoxically, readers are more willing to linger and reread with shorter sentences because they're not getting frustrated and glossing over key elements.

Take a look at this section of my story "A Tale of Two Citadels," which I've been meaning to rework for ages because it has chronic logorrhea. The sheer length of these damn sentences!

Right off the bat, we see that the first sentence blasts past the typical "four lines max" rule. The second one is slightly better, but it still has way too many clauses and can be confusing. The third one can easily be cut up into at least two sentences, maybe three, without losing the rhythm.

When reworked, you can see how much better it flows by the color coding.

The sentences are still complex, but they're more manageable for readers. The longer a sentence, the more difficult it is, and the more likely that your reader will get lost.

At the same time, you do want some complexity and variety in your sentence lengths. These are all about the same length, which can become a bit boring.

If I were really committed to editing this, I'd go further and add some very short sentences too.

Reading your sentences out loud, or using an auto dictation tool, can be very helpful to see whether you're overdoing it with sentence length. If you have to stop to take multiple breaths while reading a single sentence, then it is probably too long.

You can also color-code while you are editing to see whether your sentences are all around the same length. If so, see if you can cut a few of them up.

Overexplaining

This issue often shows up more when we are explaining why something happened, but it can start to feel boring and repetitive. As an example from my story "Shattered Pieces:"

This part happened right after someone was stabbed and, frankly, takes away a LOT of the tension from the story.

Is it really necessary at this exactly this second, when someone is lying on the ground bleeding, to explain why the incident happened? No, it's not. Half of this could be removed and the story would read so much better, like so:

Now we can move to the juicy stuff of Uguisumaru lying on the ground bleeding to death. Much more important.

A crucial element of writing is to reveal details as they become important, not before. This doesn't mean hiding things from your reader, nor throwing in things at random whenever you feel like; rather, it's about not forcing your reader to do the work of holding onto this information in the hopes that it will become important at some later time.

Is what Mikazuki thinking about here really that important to the overall story? No, we don't need that information. Maybe they can talk about it later, or maybe it will never be discussed.

Now, a quick sidetrack about foreshadowing here. Great foreshadowing works by not feeling like toil and by not beating the reader over the head with the information. They pick up on it, but they don't feel like they need to hold onto it. Careful foreshadowing sprinkled throughout a story feels effortless and natural, without imposing a cognitive load on the reader.

As I've mentioned before when discussing fantasy in general, we do not want our reader to feel like they are doing work. Few of us are at the level of someone like Mark Z. Danielewski, where we can create a book that is all about doing work but readers will still enjoy it because it is that entertaining. (I did not like House of Leaves personally, but that's just me.)

Therefore, our goal is to reduce friction as much as possible while still developing a fun, compelling, thought-provoking piece of fiction. We do this by avoiding infodumping, as I did in that above passage, and revealing information as it becomes important without seeming like things just come out of nowhere. That's where foreshadowing becomes crucial.

Head Hopping

This one is discussed often, but it's also really easy to accidentally do when you're working in third-person limited (my preferred POV). In small cases of dipping into someone else's head, it doesn't really cause concern for the reader, who might not even notice it, but it does make it harder to keep track of the main POV.

It's also important not to dip too often into peoples' heads while you're doing omniscient POV, either. Here, in this segment of "Dreams Within Dreams," we have at least four partial POVs, which I have color coded:

This is technically fine for an omniscient POV, but dipping into too many heads too quickly can become overwhelming and exhausting for the reader. Thankfully, it is an easy fix by simply removing the assumptions of judgment and focusing entirely on the actions.

I mean, it's still not the greatest writing, but we have a more opaque, birds-eye view of everyone, rather than constantly jumping in and out of everyone's head.

This is especially hard not to do when you have numerous characters all together in one scene, which is why it is often easier to avoid having a huge group of individuals together, especially if you're not confident in your skills yet.

The more characters you juggle, the more you need to ensure that you're not leaving anyone out and that everyone gets at least one line without it feeling choppy. This scene definitely could have used a lot more work so as to feel more natural. But that's the joy of fanfiction! It's all about learning and growing as a writer.

Nowadays, I try to limit my scenes to two "main" talkers and then add at least one line for other side characters if I have a big group, but I specify that they're off doing something else so people don't wonder where the hell they went.

And that's about it for today! Again, my posts are never about telling you how to write. I am sharing what I have learned as both a reader and writer so that you can make the choices that best fit your story. Happy writing!

If you enjoyed this, perhaps you'll consider purchasing my book, 9 Years Yearning, a gay coming-of-age romance set in a fantasy world. Which does not include any of these sins. Only $2.99 or ZERO DOLLARS with Kindle Unlimited!

If you're not sure about spending your hard-earned money, check out this review to learn more.

[evelhak]

Hey! So we talked about Kuroko and Haizaki, and now I’m curious in your vision of other Kuroko interactions.

Not shipwise, since I know you only do kagakuro, but in terms of dynamics, what are your fav characters to write Kuroko with?

Lets say, top 3 GoM and top 3 non-Gom?

Oh my friend how you're letting me go nuts again.

May I suggest you get a cup of your favourite drink and maybe some snacks?

Also how do you expect me to choose...? Hmm okay, to make things slightly easier for myself I'll exclude Kagami of course since I've been talking about them a lot already and I also believe I've talked about Momoi at length at least twice in relation to Kuroko so I'll define GOM in the strictest sense for this, but I also won't count either of them as non-GOM haha. I hope that makes sense.

Okay, not surprisingly, I'm going to start with Aomine. I love writing him with Kuroko particularly because when he's at his worst they are absolute poison to each other and they don't really even know it for lot of the time or at least understand why, and that makes for peak relationships drama. (It's complex and I love it.) They have a particular way of feeding each other's weaknesses. When Aomine is stressed out, average Kuroko's communication style and philosophy actually makes him worse in the long run. Also Aomine at his worst makes Kuroko worse. This is because Kuroko's weaknesses at his most stressed resemble some of average Aomine's weaknesses (anxious, lonely and pessimistic) while average Kuroko's optimism and understanding actually give Aomine more room to spiral down because what he's subconsciously looking for is pushback and someone he can trust to practically force him to get it together and average Kuroko is always going to be too accepting for that. However. Here's the cool part. Aomine at his best has some of the strengths of average Kuroko (loyal, secure, taking care of others) which is why when he's getting better he's drawn to Kuroko's typical idealism and particularly when Kuroko is getting worse, Aomine actually steps up, and can empathise with Kuroko at his weakest because while it's a rock bottom for Kuroko it's all actually pretty mundane to Aomine and he can stay quite level-headed about it. Meanwhile Kuroko at his best can direct the same qualities productively as Aomine at his worst does destructively (confidence, independence, stubbornness), and that's why at his best Kuroko appears like he has got the answers Aomine has been looking for after all, because Aomine is actually looking for trust but he needs hard proof for it unlike Kuroko who at his average is just able to trust that things will turn out alright for no particular reason. This is in a nutshell why I love writing the larger scale of their dynamic. It just makes for such interesting plot twists.

Also it's so God damn funny sometimes. Like, I was writing a scene where Kuroko is pretty significantly sick and Aomine is pretty significantly enlightened and although it was a rather serious scene in my story, I just happened to come across a song from some musical that illustrates the inherent comedy of their practically reversed dynamic a 100%.

For contrast here's bit from Kuroko's POV when he had to take care of drunk Aomine:

I just find them hilarious to write and they bring me so much joy.

Then, I suppose the next one will have to be Kise. I just love how they poke at each other's insecurities and how incompatible their communication styles are. You're probably seeing a theme here? I just love it when characters' personalities collide in a way that causes a lot of friction and ultimately provides opportunities for growth, so long as both are eventually willing to go out of their comfort zone. Of course it's only so satisfying because there's so much they can help each other learn, which is true here as well. Kise and Kuroko can both be particularly annoying to each other, because Kise has this habit of putting the burden of interpretation of how serious he is on the other person and that really doesn't work with Kuroko so he's often particularly dismissive of Kise. And while Kise seems like he's bothered by it I think he actually finds it reassuring because it means that with Kuroko he can be as goofy, flirty, needy and attention-seeking as he pleases with zero consequences because Kuroko just deflects it. Obviously Kise actually doesn't want the kind of attention from his friends that he gets from elsewhere, so at his core he doesn't actually feel rejected by Kuroko, he feels quite secure. Meanwhile, I think Kuroko secretly likes the attention he's getting from Kise, because everyone needs some attention. Kise is getting too much so he finds Kuroko relaxing and Kuroko is getting too little so he finds Kise refreshing. And annoying. Because Kuroko actually craves direct and genuine interaction the most, and that's why Kise's way of avoiding it can get really tiresome for him, meanwhile Kise becomes instantly self-conscious and evasive when Kuroko attempts to get some unambiguously genuine expression of feelings out of him (unless they're on the basketball court of course where it's suddenly okay to let things go to your feels). So, as I want to develop their communication I end up writing stuff where Kuroko is quite fed up with their shallow interactions and attempts to get more under Kise's skin, which of course is way too much emotional work for Kise. But it slowly gets better, of course.

A lot of their interactions for me are also based on how Kuroko needs more of Kise's easy breezy "do things for the heck of it and don't think about the deeper meaning" attitude while Kise obviously needs the exact opposite and Kuroko is a great person to make him think about what things he's just doing because it's easy and provides instant gratification, and which things he would actually find meaningful in the long run. Kise has opportunities to make Kuroko less serious and Kuroko has opportunities to make Kise more so. I think Kuroko very much dislikes any shallow or vain feelings that he has and rejects them, but Kise can help him be more comfortable with that part of humanity, while Kise is scared of his deeper feelings, and Kuroko can help him with that instead. So both can find that the feelings they dislike in themselves or make them anxious still have their place and it's better to get acquainted with them.

It takes quite some time for them to get to a point they can understand this because it's obviously not fun trying to consciously work on your insecurities, but when they get there it's really satisfying.

Now I kind of feel like showing this development. So, here are three scene's from Kuroko's POV. Although two of them are with Kagami, but they are talking about Kise.

First one is a conversation on the phone.

About ten chapters later with Kise:

And then about 20 chapters later:

I just wanted to show you because writing this kind of development makes me so excited. (The sport they're talking about is quidditch/quadball.)

The third place is a really tough one because I enjoy writing Kuroko's interactions with every GOM and I think the reason I'm going to have to pick Midorima is actually not because I inherently prefer him, it's because his interactions with Kuroko naturally happen more because he lives closer than Akashi and Murasakibara. But this is how it is because the more I write interactions with characters the more I begin to like them. Kuroko and Midorima are a blast because of their completely opposing conceptualisations of the world. The funny thing is that they might not actually be as opposing as they seem, it's just that they are looking at the same thing from different angles and describing it in language that leads them to believe they disagree more than they do. Yes they also have completely different strategies to getting where they want but maybe it's not as stark as they sometimes seem to believe. This is where the most friction in their relationship comes from and I have done my absolute best to be fair about it, because I am so much more likely to see things in Kuroko's way and I despise horoscopes. So I think another reason I like to write these two so much is that it challenges my objectivity in a particular way.

Anyway, basically Midorima describes fate as something that is above humans while Kuroko basically says you can make your own fate, if you really simplify it.

But. I have these song lyrics in my mind...

"You can plan a pretty picnic, you can pick the perfect time, but you can't expect the weather to be fine".

That thought is still true for both of them. They would both agree to that from their different perspectives. So their views are not actually complete opposites. Just their reactions and how they deal with it, are.

As funny as it sounds, Midorima is actually uncomfortable with the 'supernatural' or abstract unseen realm of things, and that's why he's looking at sources outside of himself to control his thoughts about that which is uncertain. Meanwhile Kuroko can just casually be like "hey what if a meteorite hit the bench" and "cool let's go look for ghosts I've never actually seen one" because he doesn't fear the uncertainty. He is the uncertainty. For Midorima that is his pressure point. Kuroko gets strength from the thought that anything can happen because he feels familiar with and in control of the uncertain, so he believes he can work it to his advantage. For Midorima the idea that anything can happen is daunting because it feels like it pulls the rug from under him and his hard work. He just genuinely doesn't understand that realm of things, much like Kuroko just genuinely doesn't understand cold hard facts and numbers. And that's why they have trouble understanding each other, because they are always approaching things so differently even when they desire the same conclusion.

Anyway. I wanted to do something with Midorima that I felt canon didn't really do. I wanted his way of thinking to get Kuroko off guard and even question his view of reality a little. I wanted Midorima to be able to foresee something about Kuroko because of his strange relationship with fate and I wanted Kuroko to dismiss it because he thinks his way of thinking is above Midorima's. And ultimately Kuroko would be wrong. I thought this would bring more depth to their relationship.

I'm going to show you one key scene in that plot to illustrate some of the tensions in their interactions. This is Kuroko's POV and they are at Suutoku's cultural festival where Midorima is doing fortune-telling from tea leafs.

Alright, that's it for the GOM. I wonder if there's a limit with post length...

Then the others.

Well, there's Ogiwara. And he was not so discussed in depth in canon that I have definitely developed some of his personality on my own. He was obviously contrasted with Kagami and Aomine a lot and explicitly said to have some similarities but the way I see him, he is also similar to Momoi and Kiyoshi in a particular and pretty defining aspect, and that is that he can control the emotional atmosphere of the room. So, while Aomine and Kagami have a lot of physical presence, Ogiwara and these other two characters have a lot of social presence. But the way I see it Ogiwara is also the least manipulative of these examples, pretty chill in the way that he has less of an objective, like it's rarer for him to try to manipulate things to a particular end although he generally could if he wanted to. And I think that's because he mostly just wants everyone to be happy and to have a good time, which aligns well with Kuroko's instincts, so it's no wonder if their friendship was a pretty uncomplicated one before shit hit the fan.

There's actually very little conflict between them in canon that has anything to do with them as individuals. However that's also what makes the relationship kind of stagnant and less interesting because when there's no outside force, then there's nothing about them as people that makes them push each other enough to create the level of conflict and opportunity for growth as there is with some other characters. In some ways that's refreshing, but only as a breath of fresh air. Basically in a story it just makes for nice filler. There isn't enough meat to write for an extended period of time.

That's why, if I wanted to keep Ogiwara in the story in any meaningful way, I had to make something up, and I do enjoy what I came up with. A lot. One key aspect is miscommunication that is due to the fact that although Ogiwara is socially very smooth he doesn't quite understand that Kuroko is actually significantly less so, probably because Kuroko still has emotional intelligence and the ability to match a more a dominant personality (I mean this in a broad sense, not like dominating or something) in a way that makes interaction feel smooth, because the other person is the leading force whether they mean to be or not because Kuroko can pretty much just make it so. (Like in Kagami's case it's more like Kuroko is redirecting a lot of Kagami's emotions so he's not actually dominating it's more like he's Kuroko's 'material' unlike Ogiwara who actually means to lead the interaction.) So, Ogiwara has a habit of implying things, hinting at things, speaking with gestures and believing that Kuroko understands what he's saying, but actually the implications go completely over Kuroko's head. For example, their whole promise: Kuroko didn't understand that more than anything, for Ogiwara it was about staying in touch. Of course facing each other in a game was important and exciting in and of itself, but Kuroko took that way more literally than Ogiwara meant it, and became so single-minded about this one thing he thought his friend wanted from him, that he actually kind of forgot about talking, which led Ogiwara to misinterpreted it as Kuroko not missing their everyday interaction as much as he does. Because Ogiwara thought the implication of their promise was totally clear, while to Kuroko it wasn't. It takes kind of a lot to start seeing why things that are totally clear to one aren't so for another, so they repeat this miscommunication several times and it stretches out into the future so much that it turns out Kuroko's view of their childhood is in some significant ways different from Ogiwara's view of the same events.

Writing more of them together I also found that Ogiwara sees Kuroko in a quite different way from most people and can sometimes say stuff that other people probably wouldn't say:

I'm not saying he's right or wrong, and out of context it may seem like he's undermining the fact that Kuroko didn't have much options, but it's more complicated than that, just too much to explain here. I just put this here because it's interesting contrast to write someone with a little bit different perspective to some things, because his key points with Kuroko have been so different from that of the other characters in the canon timeline which Ogiwara was mostly absent for.

A character whose interactions with Kuroko I actually write way less than I would like is Furihata. Because they have similar temperaments in ways pretty much no other characters do, and I feel they would make the kind of friends who are perfect for peer support and venting to, if either of them could just be a little more proactive about it, but that's the difficulty with a similar temperament, isn't it? It's not just my fault, it's not just that the story is already so bloated from these other relationships, it's that both of them are also going to respect each other's space too much and are generally the type to just sort of let things in relationships develop in their own time. Obviously they both have a lot of drive to make things happen when they need to, but when they don't need to, they are both the type to be more likely to just sit back and watch things develop. So circumstances would need to force them closer to get closer. So far such circumstances happen here and there but not that much. Most often it's Furihata needing emotional support and Kuroko being there, because he has already gone through the same thing. This happens several times in my writing. It takes a while for things to turn the other way around because Furihata is more likely to seek comfort from someone, and Kuroko is more reserved in that way, but once Furihata grows aware of their similarities and differences he also makes more effort to make sure Kuroko knows he can be relied upon too, which fits quite well with Furihata's growth into a captain which is part of my headcanon too.

This is probably his sharpest moment so far, after Seirin's darkest moment in my story. (Kagami's POV)

Then there's Yagi who practically counts as an OC because I've invented like 90% of his personality but I love him so I'm going to talk about him. Yagi is sort of like if Aomine and Furihata fused in some ways. His insecurities come from lack of experience and skills but he reacts to them in a similar way as Aomine to his overwhelming skills, feeling like he's alone and no one can possibly help him. He's more even-tempered and timid, but his negativity comes through in a passive-agressive way and he basically needs someone to kick his butt at all times and he punishes people emotionally if they don't. You can imagine this creates some very intense conflict with Kuroko whose gentle approach to helping Yagi integrate into the team just... doesn't work AT ALL because he's an even harder person for Kuroko to be tough on than Aomine. Kuroko can kick butt when it's Kagami or another openly aggressive person as long as they are not being vulnerable. But Yagi is like... Nope. Nothing is getting through because he wants someone to boss him around but you're supposed to figure that out on your own and Kuroko wants someone who will tell him what they need from him. Match made in heaven right. Well, still it's not hopeless once Kuroko does figure out which string to pull (with the help of Aomine haha). But yeah, it's a minefield. (Not to mention Yagi also starts out as homophobic.) But they do develop when Kuroko realises that he needs something new to help him stay out of sight and Yagi is exactly that because he's radiating negative, passive energy as much as Kagami is radiating positive, active energy so when Kuroko uses both of them he has a double cover as the neutral point between these two energies. But what makes this difficult for Kuroko to figure out is that while Kuroko is technically using Kagami to hide himself he's not using Kagami in a sense that he would need to control him. Kagami is doing what Kagami wants, and Kuroko is using that which Kagami would be doing anyway. But Yagi isn't going to do anything unless someone makes him. It is when Kuroko realizes that Yagi is actually begging to be used, that the game changes. Despite of appearing otherwise Yagi has basically zero ego. He just wants to be useful but he wants other people to tell him how. (Akashi should have used someone like Yagi not Mayu lol.) This was difficult for Kuroko to get, because despite of being as team-oriented as he is, being a shadow was still always a sacrifice for him. Had he been able to he would have wanted to be more "normal". And he still does have enough ego to want to create something for himself and be in control even if it's in a less traditional more subtle way, and he mistakenly believed Yagi would want the same. But Yagi doesn't have that kind of desire. Kuroko is willing to sacrifice himself. Yagi enjoys it. Yagi is a "soldier". Well, in this case, Kuroko is the trickster and Yagi is the rabbit= the star of the magic show who isn't actually doing anything but who things are being done to.

Or...? (Kuroko's POV)

I just love to play with metaphors.

I don't have the best action writing skills to get the most exciting games out of this idea (and a lot of it is probably so out there that it wouldn't even work) but I am actually very proud of how it plays in the interpersonal and metaphorical realm of the story.

Okay. That's it for now. Looks like I didn't run out of space. I hope I managed to keep you interested.

[nomatterwhatnomatterwhere]

(Hustle) Like an Underdog II

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You wouldn't have called yourself an avid reader; it wasn't as if you never touched a book that wasn't scholastic, but it also wasn't as if the bookstore next door gave you the award for most frequent visitor or most profitable customer.

You don't call yourself an avid reader because you don't have a collection of books piled on top of each other on your nightstand waiting to be read; you don't sort books by color, height, or genre; you even happen to write in them sometimes, on books.

All things that horrify readers-the real ones, the ones who have the complete collection in different adaptations, the ones who can tell you the story behind the publication, the ones who know the author's life story inside out.

You were never interested in those things.

Reading was just another pastime, a way to keep yourself busy when you were bored and didn't quite know how to use your free time.

Sometimes, however, when you thought a book was worthy enough of your attention, you didn't even realize how much time was passing while you were reading and you were captivated by the story.

You don't have a favorite genre because any genre may be worthy of your attention, just as one genre specifically may not be enough to keep your interest high or may lead you to ignore other genres you might like.

Kind of like people.

To be appreciated or not, a book needs time and attention to be given to it, only then can you tell whether what you have read is the "novel of a lifetime"-the one you always suggest when asked what book to read-, a "boring and predictable nineteenth-century detective story"-the murderer is the butler and you figured that out from page 12-or a "frustrating romcom that relies on poor communication skills"-this one ended up in the fireplace burning.

Kind of like people: they need time to be understood even a little bit.

But people, unlike books, change, so the process of understanding a person is slightly different from understanding a book, regardless of whether it is "The Little Prince" or "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs."

Sometimes when you reread a book after not having read it for a long time, you notice things that you wouldn't have noticed at all when you first read it. It's not just the little foreshadowings of the plot that you recognize because you already know how the book will end, it's a different level of reading than before: if before you had only enjoyed, more or less, the story, now you understand the story and its motivations.

This does not happen because the book has changed in the time that you have not read it.

This happens because you have matured in that time that you did not read that book.

To understand a person you need time, but that person changes with the passage of time itself.

Being able to understand the human psyche is a rather interesting and complex skill to use despite the fact that it can be achieved in a simpler way than you think.

You just have to be able to read and know the different levels of reading.

Read their little ticks, the ones they are not even aware of, microexpressions or changes in tone. The way their eyes may light up when an interest of theirs is mentioned or how they will avoid eye contact when they are embarrassed and want to change the subject.

It is something that takes time, but when you work ardently for something you always get results. Maybe on the first try they won't be great results, but they will improve with time.

Time is a relative concept, and one does not need to know the theory of relativity to understand this fact.

Man is a bizarre animal: he has established how universally the flow of time should be measured, but this flow is perceived differently by everyone according to the events in our lives that we deem important or memorable.

Between the end of the first and the beginning of the second selection you had felt that time was running too fast for you to be able to do everything you needed to do.

You had gone through all the data of the surviving existences and noted their improvements, pointing out where they still needed to improve, their speed of adaptation, and how they could make the most of their potentials under their current conditions.

All this was then checked and reviewed by Ego, who always added something to your observations; once Ego approved them, the documents were passed on to Anri san. Once in Anri san's hands, the data were entered into the software that the boys would use in the first stage of the second selection.

In addition to that Ego had updated you on the Wild Card, which was what you considered his Side Project, but which you were not sure you could call a Plan B.

You knew from the beginning of the BlueLock Project that there was this Wild Card, but other than the fact that some sort of repechage of some players would take place, you did not know in what manner it would be done.

When Ego gave you the Wild Card guidelines the first selection was still in progress, albeit in its final stages, and you did not quite understand what Ego expected you to do. Initially you thought you would simply have to pass more papers to Anri san, then you realized that Ego expected you to act on that Side Project, and so between 'player analysis you found yourself sketching out something for the project.

You were not totally satisfied with your work, you could definitely do better, but apparently your basis for the project was solid enough for Ego, which was already a great satisfaction for you. Any person with any knowledge of soccer history-so not the boorish existences participating in the project-knows how much Jinpachi Ego strives for perfection in his projects.

You didn't know when the Wild Card was going to be integrated into the Blue Lock Project, you just knew that Ego had taken your fundamentals and elevated them to their fullest potential, and that worried you a little in truth: from your point of view, you had already been quite rigid in your ideas, and knowing that they had been made even more difficult made it difficult for you not to worry about the possible consequences that the repossessed players might face.

From time to time you had also found yourself acting as an assistant to Anri san, who between meetings to go to, meetings to arrange, and various personnel to contact seemed to have no respite. You had answered a few phone calls and negotiated a couple of meeting dates, nothing extraordinary, but Anri san seemed grateful for the help.

It had seemed to you that the time between the first and second selection had passed too quickly, but for the surviving existences you were pretty sure it had been an eternity.

Training without being able to touch the ball must have been comparable to torture for those existences that had little footballs in their heads instead of neurons, when they were thinking about something instead of the gears turning you could hear the footballs crashing into each other.

You had seen how that bunch of mainly pathetic existences had entered the hall for the start of the second selection: A bunch of zombies in a bad apocalyptic movie were more graceful than they were.

There were existences, some of which you could almost have called tragic, that still possessed some grace or some form of charisma, but most of the "lumps of talent" were really in a pathetic condition.

Had that training exhausted them that much? Then they were even weaker physically than you had anticipated.

It had been funny to see how everyone had been surprised by Itoshi Rin's presence. You weren't sure what was funnier: the reaction to his "warm-up"? The fact that he hadn't made the slightest fuss about starting the second phase? The realization that he was Itoshi Sae's little brother?

Overall, his entrance had been intriguing, exactly as you expected him to be.

After Rin had officially kicked off the second selection, the other amoeboid existences had remembered they existed and started walking through the doors, but your eyes had been fixed on Team Z for a while.

How could you look away when those idiots had decided to use Chinese morra to decide the order of entry for the selection?

The imbeciles had taken Ego's concept of selfishness too seriously and in the wrong situation.

The first step of the second selection was what in your head you had called " imprisonment."

It was not as if the Blue Lock itself could not be considered a prison, but for you those 90 minutes had been endless and tiring and at times even boring.

You already had half an idea of who would make the best of "Imprisonment," you had watched them all during the first selection and had not been surprised in the rapidity of some subjects in evolving their individual skills during the first stage.

"Imprisonment" had two main purposes to make it obvious to the pathetic existences how incapable they were in the absence of other truly capable players and to actually improve the physical performance of the players who had figured out how to turn 0 into 1 and make the most of their abilities and potential.

You had tried to observe more or less everyone, but if for some it had taken only a few glances now and then to realize that their neuron-balls and reactions were working well and improving rather expeditiously, for others you got a headache from watching them repeat the same mistakes over and over again.

And then there was Shidou Ryusei, who was certainly trying hard to annoy you, taking longer than you had budgeted to finish the first Stage.

The demon-as he had been named by his fellow students in the building-had come to socialize with you before you had even decided it was worthwhile to relate to the pathetic existences, and, despite the bad temper and questionable moral ethics, he had not made you the least bit uncomfortable.

He was one of the few people in his building who used the monitor room, and every time he watched the games he really looked like a kid who had been given his favorite candy.

He was adorable, if you put aside his being a foul-mouthed.

From your point of view, he had a major behavioral flaw: he did whatever he wanted, heedless of what he was told. He had a code of ethics, but you had yet to fully decipher it. On the soccer field, however, he was one of the best players in the Blue Lock and had earned hands down a place among your favorites; not that you would have admitted it in front of him, he was self-centered enough as it was.

He had approached you, trying to strike up a conversation, but with little result: you were having dinner in the cafeteria of his building at a really awful hour, but you had waited for the pathetic existences to dislodge from the room, and yet, after only a few minutes the chair next to you had been occupied by a very tanned guy with a shit-eating grin on his face who had continued to stare at you while you were eating and then had followed you around the building trying to have some sort of conversation.

The situation had remained the same for quite a while; when he didn't have matches or wasn't training, he would wander around the building until he found you and then continue to follow you around, trying to get you to talk to him, failing miserably.

Until your meeting with Bachira.

From there you began to answer some of Shidou's questions and even some of his flirtations; it seemed to amuse him and somehow you would dare say excite him. Of the boys you had socialized with in the Blue Lock he was the most affectionate of all, leaning on you at every opportunity and circumstance, pouting when you ignored him.

At one point he had started calling you 'Babydoll.'

And you were definitely confused by that.

Shidou was attractive, there was no point in denying it, and probably outside of Bluelock he was used to smooth flirting-and you were pretty convinced he did it pretty well, too-but the fact that he was asking you out seemed more like a playful joke than a real possibility.

It wasn't that you were ugly, but you weren't the prettiest girl in the world either; you considered yourself to be within the norm, and indeed, living in BlueLock you realized that there were much prettier guys within the project than you could ever aspire to be.

This is not a way of underestimating you, it is an objective thing… moreover, you are particularly idiotic when it comes to possible romantic relationships: you don't consider yourself a person who is so much worthy of attention so you find it hard to believe that said attention could be directed to you as a person - given your questionable character - when there are so many other people in the world who are surely nicer and more pleasant than you, and you often don't notice at all the effect you can have on others.

Kind of like what happened with Shidou; the fact that no one else in his building approached you is because the little camp demon somehow called dibbs on you and the other players care about having their limbs intact.

Not that you have heard that

The formation of teams of three was something quite interesting, especially when most existences had nothing to rely on but their prior knowledge.

You had identified three decision paths

1 ) Rely on your rational side

It is definitely unnatural to choose someone whom you have never seen in action and whose capabilities you do not know : they may have passed the first stage, but it may also have been luck-as it was for many survivors-and not having an objective demonstration of someone else's capabilities, it was much safer for your own survival to choose someone familiar.

This was the path most wannabe-players had chosen; you didn't have much to laugh at : it was a safe tactic, boring and obvious, but safe.

2 ) I don't care ( as long as I shine).

Then there were those who didn't care so much who they formed a Team with, as long as they kept going through the selection process.

Rin and Barou were two clear examples, although the outcomes of their Teams were markedly different, partly because of the way they played ( as well as their character on the field)

3 ) I want something extra

These were the cases that fascinated you the most: they were players who, though it may not have seemed like it, had analyzed those around them and decided accordingly. Two totally opposite examples were Shidou and Kurona, who regardless of everything and everyone had a way of playing that made them good elements for any group

( although Shidou was unmanageable on the field if they did not do as he said)

Seishirou Nagi was a mix between 1 and 3, but you couldn't say you expected otherwise: he was a being who was easily bored and needed stimulation to continue, and Isagi was the one who had interested him in soccer.

You should have seen how Reo would fare; you expected this situation, it would come sooner or later, even if it came slightly earlier than expected for you.

When you had seen Igaguri ask Shidou to join him you had begun to laugh in a way that worried Anri san

"That imbecile has no idea what awaits him" was what Anri understood between laughs.

Igaguri had been used to being the tail end of the team since he arrived and was probably the most aware of his shortcomings and the incredible luck he had had in making it through the second selection; seeing someone lower than him must have given him a modicum of hope in his meager abilities.

What he did not know was that yes, Shidou was the 111 player to complete the first Stage, but it was only because the little demon was playing "let's annoy BabyDoll."

" You know, you shouldn't live this situation as if you were an extra."

You had been sitting on the floor, with your back against the bed, not thinking that Reo would be pleased to see you saying these things to him: he would see it as a paltry act of pity toward him, which it was not, but when we are hurt we tend to get carried away by our emotional and dramatic side.

Before entering the room, you had felt like half a stalker: prowling around the dorms to make sure Reo didn't collapse in on himself over the situation with Nagi

"That's right, Nagi left you behind because your kick was no longer working. That's not a bad thing. Neither for you, nor especially for you,"

you had turned your gaze to the ceiling, your head resting on the mattress.

"So what?" you heard the decidedly annoyed tone " Should I have wished him good luck? ' Find your kick without me?" he forgot about our promise."

You had heard him approach the edge of the bed, so much so that you could see his legs out of the corner of your eye

"Um, I know you don't want to hear this, but you both have to find your kick without the other, otherwise you won't be able to advance. Besides, I doubt that Nagi can forget anything about you. Try to improve for when you face him."

You stood up, ready to leave but at the last moment you turned toward him and found him staring at you

"You know, for what it's worth, I like you more than Isagi, but his soccer has this absurd and unfair ability to attract others to himself, so see if you can commit to it if you want to win back Nagi's interest."

He chuckled slightly "Is that all?"

"No, not really. I hate it when my expectations turn out to be wrong, so keep that in mind. Oh! While we're at it, will you have lunch with me?

The Nagi - Isagi vs. Barou - Naruhaya match had been less interesting than you had expected.

It was not as if it had not been an interesting match, but given the history you had expected more.

In a rather disconcerting way Naruhaya had surprised you, not in a good way.

The first thing Ego had explained to all the players in the buildings had been to aim to defeat whomever they deemed to be superior; it had literally been the first thing.

The fact that Naruhaya had ignored this concept could only make it obvious that he would not survive for long in the Blue Lock; it was not wrong to say that Isagi was a mediocre player, but Isagi had evolved but had an innate ability to adapt and ample room for improvement; Naruhaya had not undergone much evolution and his room for improvement was rather limited.

Of course, Naruhaya's strategy is not wrong no matter what; in some cases, in order to survive, one targets the weakest link in the situation.

The Blue Lock does not fit into any possible case.

"You can't be serious Babydoll!"

Shindou had rested his chin on your shoulder as he hugged you from behind, and was looking at you with that hangdog air you were pretty sure didn't belong to him.

"Sure enough, I am. If you want to keep being here, you can't keep beating up everyone who doesn't want to play against you "

Already by the second Stage Shindou had gotten into the bad habit of roughing up anyone who didn't want to fight against his team, and it was bordering on the ridiculous.

"If you keep sending so many players to the infirmary Ego will put you in Time-Out and no one will be able to help you."

At that moment you had felt his grip tighten a little more as he leaned more on you

"So you are worried about me" she had said it smiling and you had not denied it.

You were really worried about him but you were also worried about the project. If Shidou had eliminated players for physical incapacity before the actual disqualification according to the project rules, you predicted there would be a problem, but if omitting this thought would make the little demon a little more manageable you would not have complained.

"Promise me," you had said it in the most serious way possible.

"BabyDoll ! " he had pulled away slightly to look into your eyes, as if assessing your words

"If I hear that you beat someone again I will start to ignore you completely."

That seemed to have done the trick, as the boy had nodded his head and gone back to squeezing you

Since your conversation with Reo, you had started to spend more time with him and consequently with Chigiri and Kunigami.

The latter had even asked you if it was ethical for you to almost always watch their training and give them some indirect tips.

You had asked yourself this question, too, and finally came up with an answer

"I'm here to monitor your improvements, and if I happen to think out loud, it's just to make you aware of your condition. It's not that I provide you with analyses of your possible opponents"

It was true, your role here was to collect any kind of data you thought was important, but you were not told anything about not sharing some information with the boys as well.

Ego did it too, he was more incomprehensible than you, but maybe he could do it because he was the creator of the project? Well, if it was a problem, he should have told you clearly from the beginning that the information could not be shared with the pathetic existences, but you were never told that.

You were the one who considered that information "confidential", but that was not a given.

You liked being with them; Chigiri and Reo had already had a chance to form an opinion of you, Kunigami on the other hand was still a kind of 'blank canvas'.

You liked him. He was generally one of those personalities that were nice to be around, and you didn't really expect him to accept an invitation to such an establishment; he was an egoist who played fair.

He was endearing to you, he was a nice person, you would have been very sorry if he had lost that way about him. So for the first time in your life you were probably afraid of something.

It wasn't just fear, it was concern.

It was stupid, but this feeling had been with you since the three had told you about the meeting with Isagi's team. No matter how the match would end, you knew that the result would leave a bitter taste in your mouth.

You had grown fond of Reo, Chigiri, and Kunigami, but the opposing team had what you considered to be your favorite player in BlueLock, and two geniuses whose path you would have liked to see.

You knew there would only be one winner in the end, but it was still too early.

Moreover, there was still Shidou in the Matching Gate of the Two Teams, and you feared for those who would face him. Due to this situation, you had deliberately avoided watching the clash between the two teams, at least in real time.

You knew that you would have to analyze it sooner or later. But for once, you wanted to put it off, at least until the bad feeling in the pit of your stomach had subsided.