#the trope at the end might be a bit cliché but I felt it fitted both their characterisations so well sooo I feel no guilt using it :P

[greenleaf4stuff]

Of Convenience 7.2

(all previous parts of "Of Convenience")

Adar x Celebrimbor (silverscars) political marriage AU, 7th snippet, part 2. Celebrimbor finds a project to occupy himself with and makes another friend. He also happens to forget the time in the process. It leads to an unexpectedly intimate moment between the two husbands.

I originally planned to make this a short chapter of Brimby at the forges and Adar’s reaction to that, but then I had a sudden cute idea and well, the chapter grew to the point I needed to split it up (again). Oops? Like always, thank you guys so much for the likes, reblogs and comments, I love you wonderful people. <3 Still blown away by the support – and by the fact I have written this much. What an AU, what an experience! Now, enjoy!

Gurlak hadn’t lied when she told Celebrimbor that her forge wouldn’t be comparable to his elven one, the smith realized in dismay. His smithy had been expertly assembled to suit his needs, constructed by the most gifted builders and with only the finest materials. All this to hopefully bring about something that could, one day, enable him to create wonders which would rival those of his grandfather.

Gurlak’s forge was, in comparison, an oddly-shaped amalgamation of whatever the uruk had been able to get their hands on, with little leeway to consider quality or utility. From the bellows to the tuyere, the forge itself and even the fuels and raw materials used, it was clear that the uruk were reshaping, reusing and improvising much of what they had, and with limited resources in less-than-ideal conditions as well.

And honestly, the elf couldn’t fault them for any of it – as he understood it, the uruk had little natural resources of their own in what was now called Mordor. The area might be rich in charcoal after the eruption of the Orodruin, perhaps, but not much else remained of the fertile former Southlands.

He guessed that this might be how he ended up sidetracked so quickly; he’d started out working on some simple iron nails – which, to his credit, he did finish and which actually served to convince Gurlak that he might indeed not be lying about his smithing skills –, but after that, things had quickly taken a turn to him focusing on other things.

"I think the airflow could be improved upon," he told Gurlak as they stood next to each other, inspecting the tuyere. "Might be because your bellows are made from a patchwork of materials, or because the charcoal you are burning is not of good quality, but the temperature fluctuation makes it harder than neccessary to work with the metal."

She grunted. "Well, we take what we can get. S’not like we can trade for better parts, and the last trees we burned, we had felled during heavy rainfall," a shrug. "Sometimes we even burn wood from furniture and such. It’s what it is."

Celebrimbor felt his face pinch at her words, then turned towards her. His tone was careful. "Would you mind if I...tried to tinker with this?" he pointed at the forge itself, but mostly the aforementioned bellows and the tuyere. "Maybe I’ll be able to mitigate some of the problems."

She glanced at him much the same way as did her, but by now, her gaze was one of curiosity – and, dare he say it, perhaps even respect?

He felt weirdly accomplished to think that it might be.

"Don’t burn yourself – wouldn’t want Adar to have my hide for getting his favorite elf damaged," she replied, and then took obvious delight when Celebrimbor got ready to argue her choice of words, "Looks like you know what you’re doing. I’ll leave you to it. As I said, just don’t get yourself hurt."

"Thank you, Miss-," Celebrimbor tried, but she scowled him into silence.

"None of that ‘mistress’ stuff. Makes me feel weird. The only one here who has a title is Adar – we are all equal, otherwise."

The elf nodded. "Understood. In that case, Celebrimbor is fine for me too," he replied. He turned back to the forge before him, and got ready to work.

"While you’re at it-," Gurlak spoke up again, and her tone made him pause. It sounded far too mischievous for his liking. "Out of curiosity. How is married life with the Lord Father?"

This time, Celebrimbor could not avoid a groan in response to her words. Her resulting laughter seemed loud enough to shake the walls of the shed.

Time, as it so often did when he was in the middle of his work, ended up slipping away from Celebrimbor. He was somewhat aware of it when Glûg, visibly bored out of his mind, came up to him and insisted they’d have to return to the tent now or they’d risk going against Adar’s wishes.

But with how much good progress he was making at improving the forge, it was just too easy to fall back into old habits – he waved the other off and said, "I just have to finish this one thing first, Glûg. You can go and tell him I’ll come back to the tent later, if you’d like. That way he won’t have to worry. You know where I am anyways, and it’s not as if I’m alone, or unarmed for that matter."

He pointed at the variety of weapons in the smithy – a topic that he’d already begun to discuss with Gurlak. While the smith was awed by the ingenuity the uruk possessed when combining swords, axes and various tools to make new weaponry for the soldiers, there were things that could be improved upon in that as well, and she’d been quite content to go over materials and their advantages with him.

There was just so much Celebrimbor could do – from working on the forge itself to helping Gurlak with various projects, the smith was truly giddy about his craft for the first time in what felt like weeks, and he was loathe to stop now that he was allowed to partake in it.

Glûg had tried to argue about the elf not even knowing the way back – to which Gurlak had snarked that she knew the way just fine and could go drop the elf off later – and then finally thrown up his arms with a frustrated, "Fine, then!" and left in a huff.

The smith had no idea how much time had passed since then, only that when all too familiar steps walked up to him, the hour wasn’t exactly midday anymore.

"Glûg tells me you asked him to leave you here," Adar’s smooth voice called out from a little distance away. Celebrimbor couldn’t help but think the uruk was deliberately announcing himself. Which was a good thing, because even so, he startled out of his work and then turned around in confusion to face his husband.

It was still astonishing to see how the other uruk visibly deferred to their leader when he walked among them; some inclined their heads or even bowed in respect, multiple took a step back as he walked up to the smithy, and even Gurlak seemed to stand straighter as she watched him approach.

"Adar," Celebrimbor said, and then realised he’d completely forgotten the uruk and his request for them to meet for supper. He felt himself blanch in shame at the realization. "Oh no, I am so sorry- I missed our meal, did I not?"

The uruk was tilting his head at Celebrimbor, gaze questioning, as he took in the other uruk and the forge, before his sight settled back on the elf. "You did. I was...worried." He seemed to almost be surprised at his own words.

"I- I appreciate that," the smith replied, and definitely was surprised at his own words. Or how sincerely he meant them.

Another look about the smithy from Adar. "What happened? Did someone rope you into a conversation you couldn’t escape from?" His words were mild, questioning instead of accusing. But it was clear Adar was confused by the circumstances of why Celebrimbor had chosen not to come back to the tent.

Celebrimbor was quick to reply, "No, no, your smith has been most kind in answering my questions, in fact – it was I who got far too involved in my work here and forgot about the time. It...happens, sometimes, when I am in the middle of work. My apprentices always-, well it doesn’t matter now. I should have gone with Glûg instead of making you worry. I apologize. It won’t happen again."

It was a bad habit of his, Celebrimbor knew that. Even more so now, when their circumstances were not exactly peaceful, despite the rather successful negotiations so far. He shook his head at himself.

Adar stepped closer towards him. "At least you sent my lieutenant to tell me. Though knowing you were without a guard did not exactly put my mind at ease," the uruk said pointedly. Celebrimbor rubbed the back of his neck and looked ruefully at Adar from beneath his eyelashes.

To his surprise, his husband dropped the issue. "So you’ve discovered our forges, hm? What do you think – grandson of Feanor? Not much like your great forges in Eregion, I’d presume?"

"Yeah, Gurlak suspected much the same thing," Celebrimbor couldn’t help but remark, glancing sideways at the uruk smith who seemed undecided between trying to inch away from her leader and the elf to leave them to their business, and remaining rooted to the spot to watch how things would unfold.

"I think your people did well with what means they have, but there are still plenty of ways to better the conditions that haven’t been made use of yet. Gurlak has actually been kind enough to let try my hand at some things."

A moment of silence, and then Adar hummed. "You are aware that this would give the uruk an advantage, if the greatest living elven smith helped them with their craft?" Celebrimbor could hear Gurlak suck in a breath at that. He guessed he ought to speak to her again, once he had made sure to reassure his husband.

"I mean- Eregion is technically your city just as much as mine due to our marriage, so technically, your army is mine as well," Celebrimbor started, but made sure that his tone was humorous. "Mirth aside, I know you care about your children. And we are hoping for this to be a long-lasting alliance so yes, of course I’d want for them to have a chance to improve their craft. It’s going to benefit everyone, isn’t it?"

Which was, he supposed, what it came down to – trying to right some of his wrongs and make things better, to give them a fighting chance against the evil that had taken hold of Eregion. He wasn’t a fighter, he couldn’t hope to kill Sauron on his own, but he could help the people who did.

The smith had seen Adar look at him with a vaguely mystified expression more than once now, but it still sent a thrill through him whenever it happened. He supposed it made sense; the uruk as a whole hadn’t gotten a lot of aid from the other races over the centuries, so perhaps this was just a natural reaction to finally getting it. Which was a rather depressing thought, all things considered.

Celebrimbor would do his best to change that.

Finally, Adar nodded and cleared his throat as he looked around the forge once more – it almost seemed as if he was uncomfortable, though the elf hoped he was just reading the other’s reaction incorrectly, before his eyes settled back on Celebrimbor.

The uruk jutted his chin out at the smith. "You have something on your face, by the way."

"Oh, I do?" Confused, Celebrimbor reached up and rubbed his fingers over his cheek, only to remove them and realise that his hands were still covered in soot and he’d likely smeared more of it onto his face now. "I- oh bother, that isn’t-"

"Here," Adar said and suddenly, he was standing directly in front of Celebrimbor, close enough that the elf could marvel at the length of his eyelashes. "Let me-"

They’d gotten more comfortable touching one another without asking for permission each time; handing each other dishes during meals, hands next to each other pointing at something on a map. And so Adar didn’t ask and Celebrimbor didn’t move when the uruk reached up, and tried to draw the edge of his sleeve over the elf’s cheek to wipe off the black smudges.

His gaze was wholly fixed on the spot, but Celebrimbor felt his breath still in his lungs and couldn’t look away from the uruk’s face. The way he looked as he performed his task in concentration was arresting. Celebrimbor had never noticed the blue-green color of his eyes before, and found himself searching his mind for gemstones that would fit their shade.

After a moment, Adar pursed his lips, and then held the back of Celebrimbor’s head with his gauntleted hand as he released his sleeve and began to smooth his thumb over the smith’s cheek instead.

Both the feel of the gauntlet in his hair and the touch of Adar’s thumb on his face made the smith fight to not suck in a breath lest Adar would stop what he was doing, and instead continued to hold very, very still as let his eyes drink in the other’s face.

Even with the scars, the pale skin, Celebrimbor could admit Adar was quite beaut-

Wait.

This time, Celebrimbor did suck in a breath.

Adar’s eyes snapped up to the smith’s, and then widened slightly as they stared at each other.

But they did not move. Both remained, motionless, staring into one another's eyes.

Celebrimbor felt warm all over, the way he’d done when Adar had asked after his wellbeing, when he’d saved him from Damrod, when they’d been wed and k-

‘Aquamarine,‘ the smith thought, faintly. ‘His eyes look like aquamarine.‘

His attention couldn’t seem to settle between Adar’s thumb on his cheek and the way he was watching him.

There was an embarrassed coughing sound from the side, and Celebrimbor looked over to see Glûg stand close to the shed, stepping from foot to foot while visibly, tensely uncomfortable.

Slowly, Adar stepped back from Celebrimbor and removed his hand – though not without one last swipe of his thumb. "There, I think it’s gone now," he said. His voice came out rougher than the elf had expected. It almost made him shiver.

And then Adar had turned to Glûg, taking the warmth of his touch with him, and Celebrimbor felt himself deflate where he stood. "What is it, Glûg?"

"Galadriel has returned to the camp, Lord Father. Says she has brought word from the king – looks like he wants to come in for talks himself next time."

Celebrimbor felt his eyes snap open wide in surprise at Glûg’s words, just as Adar said, "These are indeed unexpected, if welcome news."

He turned to Celebrimbor, and beckoned him over. "We should go and greet her, see what else she has to report. Will you come along, too?"

Celebrimbor quickly looked at Gurlak, who made a shooing gesture. Her face was going through some weird motions that made it look as if she was doing her damnest to fight down a wide grin. The smith turned back to Adar and nodded with a smile. "Of course. Maybe we can still have a meal together, after?"

There was the faintest quirk of a smile on Adar’s lips. "If it would please you."

‘Yes,‘ Celebrimbor thought as he walked to his husband’s side and the two began to walk back to their tent together, Glûg in tow. ‘I think it would please me very much indeed.‘

[zarisdonut]

My thoughts after watching Wednesday

Okay so since Wednesday came out only yesterday, there's still a bunch of my moots on twt that haven't seen it yet so I decided to express myself here since it's more of a safe space for spoilers and stuff and I will explode if I don't talk about it.

(Wednesday spoilers down below btw)

Okay so first, it was a pretty good show. I think I would've liked it much more if it didn't have that many ∼straightness∼ in it but that's just my very biased opinion cause straight people tire the shit out of me but what are you gonna do lol.

Also, these are my thoughts. If you do not agree, it's okay. I don't want to fight anyone (basically bc I don't have the energy for that) but I am always up for debating and exchanging different ideas.

PLOT

I think that plotwise, the show was pretty awesome. They didn't do anything completely new, never-seen-before or anything like that, but it was enjoyable. Some parts were a bit predictable but I also can't complain because this is, after all, a tv show about teenagers so there are obviously some tropes that are always gonna repeat themselves, which isn't exclusively bad. For example, I always love a good prom/ballroom scene, so yeah. Also, I think that even tho there were times everything was a bit cliché, they still found a way to make it interesting and not want to make me turn off my computer lol.

Also there were a bunch of times when stuff didn't make much sense? Like for example in the competition part. If there are no rules, why didn't they just exploit that? Like, if I had been in there, I would've used an engine for the boat, for example. It's little things like this that make me v mad, cause I feel it doesn't make sense. But I understand that it might just be me cause I tend to think in a more logical way than anything else and also, I'm a hell of a perfectionist, so yeah.

WRITING

This part is one of the most important ones for me (along with character development) and even though I thought that it was overall brilliant, there were some parts of the dialogue (not lots of them, but a few) that felt a bit cringe and that took me a bit out of place. Like, most times when I was watching the show, I felt totally immersed in the story and then BAM. There's a line where I'm like "oh. That's- No." Like, idk how to explain it but they just took me out of the story and I came back to myself, watching a TV Show abt teenagers instead of living in it. (idk if this makes sense lol)

ACTING

Special section to literally BOW to miss Jenna Ortega cause hOLY sHIT girl. I couldn't have imagined anyone better as Wednesday Addams.

THE CHARACTERS

Okay so here is where ∼probably∼ I'm the most conflicted of it all. I found the Addams family (special mention to Wednesday, obviously) truly amazing. It's true that I've known the Addams for a long time and I was already emotionally attached to them, so idrk if I find them amazing because I already knew abt them, or bc they are one of the few characters that are well-made in the show.

But apart from them, all the other characters I found them a bit bland. Where's the flavour, babes? Put some goddamned spices in it, god. Like, all of them fit a certain trope, which I'm not mad about cause at the end of the day all the characters in the world fit a certain group, but the thing is that none of them really stand out. There's nothing really special abt them, and considering that this is literally about a school full of vampires, witches (well, idk if they're actual witches but you get it), werewolves and sirens.... is deeply concerning to me. Like, there's not one character in there that I feel could be remembered, and the bad thing about all of this is that there is so much potential. It's physically painful, actually. (I might do another post with my ideas of how to improve some of the characters to make them seem more interesting according to myself, but we'll see)

I do understand, however, that this show is abt Wednesday, and she is supposed to be the 'special one' since she's the main character, but that doesn't mean you have to write the other ones as plain as a blank sheet of paper. I certainly could go on and on, but I don't want this post to be longer than it needs to lol. Maybe I could do another one where I get into the characters a bit more (cause analysing shit is like, my only thing) so yeah.

RELATIONSHIPS

Yep, here's where my ∼most unbiased∼ opinions end, cause yes, I'm obviously gonna trash all the romantic relationships of the show.

First: what the fuck was that.

Second: No, but fr. What the fuck was that.

I thought we were over the phase of guilting girls into going on dates with guys they're not interested in, but I guess not?

It still astounds me how none of the romantic pairings have a single atom of chemistry in them. And my question is, did they even try? Cause holy shit bro it was hard to watch. (Not talking abt the acting. Its more of a writing problem, I think)

Also, these romances added literally nothing to the storyline. Especially Enid's. Why are yall wasting screen time with useless plotlines and uneventful couples? Can't you use those minutes for something better? Like, literally anything atp. I have at least 20 ideas off the top of my head.

N e ways, moving on... Like I said in the beginning, I barely tolerate straight ships anymore, and sometimes I even gaslight myself into believing they're not that bad, that it's just me, but not here.

Wednesday Addams is the kind of character you can't just push to have a relationship with the first person she meets. And you certainly cannot write her in a love triangle because it just won't work. And what happened in the show? It didn't work. I'm actually really mad at this because that just tells me the writers/the people who were in charge of the show didn't get her character.

First of all, I don't think Wednesday should have a love interest, but if you, for some inexplicable reason wanted this, you need to play the long game. And by long game, I mean SO. MOTHER. FUCKING. LONG. I could make an entirely separate post abt this but I'm going to try to sum it up as well as I can.

Wednesday doesn't get attached to people. In fact, she hates people. So making her fall for someone to me is straight-up bullshit, but we're not gonna go there right now.

She is an egomaniac. If she doesn't find someone useful, she's not gonna talk to them. Obviously, that's not love. So apart from the "regular" process of liking someone, you also need to take into account this extra process that needs to happen. She has to go from "only seeing X as a tool" to "starting to acknowledge X as another human" ending in "holy shit I might like X".

So what I think they shouldve done is invest in friendships first. Build a good relationship with her love interest first, and everything else will come along when it needs to come along.

For example with (and yall prob know who I'm gonna say) Enid. I wouldn't say I ship them per se, but the development is there yk. I like the way their relationship evolved, and I think that if they were gonna give our main girlie a love interest, it would have to be like this (I'm not saying it necessarily needs to be her, but also I wouldn't be mad abt it).

Anyways, those are my main thoughts rn. Believe it or not, I did try to keep it short (lol) but I just get so motivated talking abt these things hehe.

If you stuck around to read what a random stranger on the internet had to say abt a tv show abt teenagers with weird abilities, you're the real one. If my brainrot continues, I'll probably make more of these posts analysing different stuff but with more depth n stuff, so maybe we'll see each other again, who knows.

Until then, have a very nice day and drink water.

Kindly,

The random stranger on the internet

[anika-ann]

3+1 (Un)Wanted Mistletoe Encounters

Type: One-shot, Reader Insert               Word count: 4200

Pairing: Steve Rogers x Reader

Summary:  Kissing under the mistletoe is one of the most famous Christmas traditions; so obviously, it is not Christmas without it at the Tower.

Unfortunately for the occupants, you are not fond of the tradition – at all. 

...or are you?

Warnings: cliché trope, pushy Pietro, discussion of dub-con I guess, language, fluff

A/N: Idea born from this video where John Mulaney says: “If any decoration needs to be MeToo’ed…” and goes on.

Beatiful divider by firefly-graphics

1.

You were no Grinch.

In fact, you actually liked Christmas and the Holiday season, you enjoyed both giving and receiving and you appreciated when people found time to spend it together, whether in their own family circle or with their chosen one.

But. There was one significant ‘but’.

And with this being your first Christmas with the Avengers, Sam Wilson was about to learn about the said but first-hand, because that sweet kind-hearted dumbass with a sass streak walked right into it.

Quite literally.

December 23th, you woke up well-rested, got breakfast, wrapped several presents and were on your way to hunt down a lunch in the communal kitchen, when a voice stopped you in the doorway, where you nearly ran into Sam. Nearly.

“Ah-oh,” he hummed, a shit-eating grin spreading on his handsome face and you stopped dead in your tracks, frowning at the ominous sound.

“What?”

And then came the fateful words: “You’re standing under a mistletoe.”

You see, here was a thing; the tradition of hanging a mistletoe and meeting people under it by chance as an excuse to get a kiss from someone was… stupid. Downright idiotic. Pushing people into something they didn’t have a chance to back out from. Forced affection.

Yeah, that was not happening even if Sam was a real swell guy and you did find a newly hung mistletoe above your heads indeed as you briefly looked up to check if his words were true.

“Okay. And?”

His eyebrows rose in surprise, his tone turning slightly wavering.

“…And so am I?”

“And?” you continued, crossing your arms on your chest defensively, already preparing a rant that would hopefully spread like wildfire and ended this dumb tradition altogether. Or well, at least spread around the Tower so no one would ever try to corner you again.

“Really?” Sam deadpanned and you stared right back at him, your face probably displaying precisely how you felt; unimpressed.

“Yes, really,” you emphasized and pointed up at the offensive plant for a good measure. “This is a stupid concept, objectifying people, women especially. It’s about people being forced into showing affection they might not even feel. It’s bordering on a damn dub-con if not non-con.”

Sam blinked a few times, instinctively retreating as he felt you heating up. He raised his hands in a no-harm gesture to show he got your point.

But you were already on roll and you glimpsed Tony in the kitchen, so you thought that there was no harm in him hearing your speech too, just to make sure that the smug loveable bastard of a billionaire got the message as well.

“It’s like all those poor kids being asked why don’t you give your granny a hug before we go and a kiss to your granddad— well, it’s because I don’t want to and it’s my choice to give affection to someone! And now this thing, this is the tip of the iceberg, really, the last fucking drop- it needs to be Me Too’ed, I swear.”

You found yourself panting as you finished, your hands on your hips now – not that you realized you had put them there – and your belly hot and angry for some inexplicable reason; maybe it was the fact that it was Sam, amazing, friendly and understanding Sam Wilson, who had to go and point this stupid poisonous plant out for you; and have the audacity to ask for a kiss.

Dammit!

“I’m sorry, Y/N,” he apologized sincerely, voice kind and without any hint of hurt or mockery. “It won’t happen again. I see that you might have a point in this.”

All the fight instantly left your body, replaced by warmth of friendship, mingling with a shiver of shame for your quick judgement and outburst. You sighed, easing your posture and offering and apologetic smile in return.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to make a big deal of that-“

“No, it’s fine. Like I said, you’re kinda right.”

“Damn right I am,” you hummed, feeling the corners of your lips rise automatically as Sam chuckled and shook his head at your antics.

But hey – you were right. You were not sorry for that.

Still snickering to himself, Sam sidestepped you in the door and patted your shoulder.

As you continued your path as well, you would swear you heard Tony mutter under his breath that you were a Grinch.

Jerk.

2.

“Hey! Don’t I get a kiss?” Clint called out a complaint as you met both stepped into that damn doorway at the same time.

As he pointed up, all you could do was to sigh, close your eyes and count to ten.

It had only been like four hours maybe; perhaps the word hadn’t gotten to him yet that you were not a fan of making out with random people – even if they were family – just because it was Christmas; or as Tony had put it, that you were a Grinch.

Personally, you thought that his insult had been inaccurate; you had given it a thought. Maybe you were more of a Scrooge. Perhaps you should tell him next time you saw him, just to see his face; Tony did pride in his ability to come up with witty nicknames.

You almost spitted out Bah, humbug now, just because.

“No, you don’t,” you said flatly instead, causing Clint’s jaw to quite literally drop as he looked at you with indignation and horror in his eyes.

“But--- but- mistletoe!” he stuttered and you sighed, deciding to explain it to him too – patiently.

“Why should some stupid plant tell me when someone is worth my affection? Someone who allegedly deserved it by simply standing under the same plant as me, no less? Get. Out. Not happening.”

You winced a bit as you registered the snappy tone you used.

Well. Half of the task of explaining it to him patiently went right, you’d call that a success, you supposed.

The poor archer just blinked, staring at you dumbfounded and mildly hurt; as if you had just told him that Santa Claus was nothing but a trick. Phew, as if you were that heartless…

Just-- logic. In fact, you had given this tradition a generous amount of thought since your last encounter under it and you figured out where it came from, historical inaccuracy be damned.

“I mean, where did the idea even come from? I bet it was just because some dude saw another guy mouth-to-mouth a girl, who happened to eat some of this poisonous parasite, may I add, and she was dying, so he gave her rescue breaths before continuing CPR. And the dude thought, that’s a great idea! Let’s make this a habit, just without the poisoning! Yeah, no. You’re not getting a kiss, Clinton,” you finished, satisfied with yourself as you managed to sound calmer this time.

Also, you were kinda proud of yourself for coming up with this story; it seemed very likely.

“That’s, uhm… an interesting take on history,” Clint hummed, watching you with uncertainty and hesitance and your heart stumbled in your chest as you guessed he was about to say something… cheeky, and outraging, in his cute brotherly way. “I need a hug at least tho.”

There we go.

“Nice try.”

You smirked and sidestepped him to be on your way and almost bumped into Steve, quickly shooting him a smile and disappearing out of sight before a silly idea about him and the stupid plant could form in your head – that would be bad and highly inappropriate, as was your crush on him, not to even mention your feelings—bah -!

“What did you do to her?” you heard the sweet supersoldier ask, a hint of accusation in his voice. Your smile widened, heat rising to your cheeks. Always so chivalrous; your heart could fucking melt.

“I asked for a hug after she refused to give me a kiss under a mistletoe,” Clint ratted you out, still hurt and honestly confused.

You stopped in your tracks as you rounded a corner, chewing on your lip guiltily.

Poor Clint; perhaps you had gone too hard on him… he couldn’t have known. You had to be kinder about it next time – after all, you might have been with them for almost a year now and they made you feel like you fit despite being so-so late to the Avengers party, but all of you still had things to learn about each other.

“Ah, you haven’t heard from Sam. Sorry,” Steve’s voice reached your ear, a notch kinder than before, compassionate even.

Compassion; another quality of Steve’s that you loved-

Bah, HUMBUG, that is not that, the L word is a bit much, that is not what’s happening-

“Wait, you knew- oh… Yeah, a heads-up would be nice,” Clint grumbled and made a pregnant pause, the sign of another prefect line coming. You held your breath in anticipation. “So are you gonna give me a hug or should I just get coffee, aka the hug in a cup-“

You held back laugher and swallowed the fondness for the good-natured archer before you could rush back and give him the damn hug.

“Coffee’s always a safe choice,” Steve replied and you thought you heard a chuckle and a grunt, unable to supress a giggle as you jogged away before they could notice you were still within hearing range.

Clint’s following monologue faded away as you walked.

“Nobody likes me. Nobody. I’m gonna die alone, surrounded by people who are too emotionally constipated to give a man a damn hug…”

Yeah, maybe you should give him a hug next time you saw him… no mistletoe though.

3.

You truly believed that that would be the end of it; after all, a day had passed since the first incident, the incident that was left without a kiss, and you doubted anyone was out of the loop at this point.

That was stupid of you. Naïve even. You jinxed it.

You were just after light breakfast, ready to get a little work out in – complete with tacky remixes of Christmas songs prepared to cheer you up – when the supposedly fastest man in the Tower, and possibly the whole world, pretty much bumped into you.

And he had to bump into you just as you were walking through that fucking doorway with that fucking plant which you were supposed to put down right after the encounter with Sam, dammit.

But no, you didn’t want to ruin everyone else’s fun; in fact, Clint had taken it his personal mission to meet as many people as he could under the mistletoe to get a kiss… or a hug. Wanda hapilly shared affection with others, either kissing their cheek of hugging them. People were having fun.

So, obviously, you let it be, confident everyone knew better than to corner you.

No good deed ever went unpunished, especially in the Holiday season.

Pietro grinned as he spotted you, downright delighted, and spread his arms almost as if creating a cage around you, leaving very little room to escape.

You did not like that.

“A kiss for a guy who caught you under a mistletoe?” he hummed warmly with a sprinkle of cheek and despite his cheery demeanour, you couldn’t help yourself and rolled your eyes.

“In your dreams, Maximoff,” you huffed, trying to duck under his arm, only for him to move it so quickly it was only a blur to you.

Quick to move, slow to take a hint. Yep, that kind of behaviour had Pietro written all over it… Okay, now you were being mean, but he was being an ass, grinning wider and adding a wink to the mix, so it was only fair.

“How did you know? I thought it was just my sister who was telepathic?”

“Pietro, leave her alone,” Wanda spoke as if on cue, eyeing her brother with a frown from her spot behind the counter where she was trying to figure out a recipe for a special Christmas pastry from her old country.

A hint of a pout appeared on Pietro’s lips as he reciprocated Wanda’s gaze; unfortunately for you, he was still aware enough of you attempting to escape his cage, so far without using force; though you were inclined to violence should it be necessary.

“What?! It’s tradition! I thought Americans loved that!”

“Well, not all of us, so-“ you explained with a sigh, catching a glimpse of Steve as he now looked up from his spot on the couch where he had been nestled with a sketchbook for the past twenty minutes.

“I could kiss you before you even notice,” Pietro argued smugly, his expression earning a wolf-like edge as you glared back at him.

Well, it seemed your workout was just about to start, you thought, as you balled your hand into a fist, subtly testing the readiness of the muscles of your leg, prepared to kick the damn man-child to his shin or worse.

“She said no.”

Both your and Pietro’s heads snapped to Steve, who was watching the other man with intense displeasure, all complete with the mildly adorable wrinkle on his forehead – a sign of disappointment and irritation – and a voice that carried the gravity of a Captain’s order.

Which in this situation stirred something in your belly, warmth swelling in your chest as he rushed to your rescue; one not needed, but still appreciated. You didn’t react to Steve’s words aside from giving him a quick grateful smile and shooting Pietro a childish told-you-so look.

“She doesn’t have to do things just because it’s considered a tradition. Leave her be, Pietro,” Steve added, less snappy and simply requesting from the speedster to have a tiny bit of respect for your wishes.

Pietro was most definitely pouting now, but he dropped his arms and released you, still blocking the doorway.

“This is ridiculous,” Pietro muttered under his breath, only for you to hear and you gritted your teeth, irritation spiking again.

“You are being ridiculous. Now move or I swear I’ll slap you.”

“I’d like to see you try, Eagle.”

Oh, we’re doing nicknames now? He could use your title earned by being fast and occasionally deadly all he wanted, flattery would get him nowhere at this point.

“Wouldn’t even see it coming, Speedyboy,” you challenged, chin raised in defiance.

It was ironic, really, how much everyone seemed to insist on following this stupid tradition, even with you. At this point, it was practically everyone but Steve; everyone but the one person you’d be willing to kiss – mistletoe or not, though the plant would at least give you an excuse.

But nope, you just had to get stuck in the doorway with this moron instead.

“Ooookay, you two,” Natasha sing-sang, as she was approaching you from the corridor; you completely missed her arriving, that was how much Pietro irritated you. “Maximoff, move, you’re blocking the doorway. And if you corner her like this again, I’ll kill you in your sleep and you’ll never see that coming,” she promised, voice icily serious despite the twinkle in her eye.

You had no doubt she would deliver just what she promised.

Which was exactly why you leaned over to kiss her cheek, earning a brilliant smile from her and a light brush of her lips against your own cheek.

“Thanks, kotenok,” she hummed just as Pietro gaped and complained.

“That’s so unfair.”

You smirked at him, throwing the smugness he had treated you with right back at him as you went to walk away.

“I give affection to whoever I want and whenever I want. Let your super quick brain process that. Happy Holidays.”

You completely missed the slow smile that spread on Wanda’s face at one point of the whole exchange.

+1

You decided to stop walking through that damn doorway altogether – just in case.

But at the moment, no one was around, so you made an exception since you considered yourself safe. Though main part of the feeling of security was that you didn’t think there was anyone left of the Tower tenants (who didn’t pay rent at all, somehow) who wasn’t aware of your opinion on the dumb tradition. No one who would be stupid enough to try.

Yet, when you glimpsed a large figure about to walk through the doorway just as you were few feet from it, you halted in your steps, letting them pass first.

And then there was a gust of wind, a warning coming a second too late and a harsh push to your shoulder from behind.

“Running through!”

You, the newest addition to the Earth’s mightiest heroes, Eagle, known for her quick reactions and not losing her cool easily, only managed to yelp in fright as you were knocked over, unable to hold onto anything and falling straight to the ground.

Two strong hands caught you and pulled you back up before you could hit the floor and you gasped, head spinning from the swift movements-- only to blink your eyes open to meet the prettiest pair of eyes you had ever seen; determined, kind, compassionate, loveable. And so damn blue despite the drop of green in their irises.

Your heart was trying to beat its way out of your ribcage as Steve instinctively pressed his chest against yours, holding you close and secure, grasp firm but careful.

Your gaze couldn’t but wander all over his face as you found yourself in such close quarters with him, his own eyes and his lips – gosh, those lips – working as magnets, always alluring your gaze to linger.

“You okay?”

Mesmerized, you watched those lips to move, barely comprehending what he was asking. His voice was warm; honey sweet and rich in spice, delicious, causing your stomach to flip pleasantly, your heart stammer.

It might have taken you a while to stutter out a reply, but no one ever needed to know about that.

“Uhm… yeah. Thanks-- thanks to you… thank you.”

Steve graced you with a small but no less meaningful smile. “Of course.”

Torturously slowly – as if he didn’t want to let you go any more than you wanted him to – he helped you stand straight and let go of your arms.

The moment you lost his touch, you lost your sanity too. You must have.

Before you could change your mind – or to think anything through – you leaned back to him and pressed a quick kiss to his cheek. And perhaps on instinct, you kinda aimed more for the corner of his mouth than the cheek.

He felt warm now too – the tips of his ears turned red in an instant and you, with horror, finally realized what you had done; and just how good it felt to finally show at least a little of what you had been trying to ignore and hide for so long.

Despite his apparent surprise and mild embarrassment, his smile widened a fraction, turning pleased.

“What was that for?” he asked lowly, gaze intense as he studied your face, a hint of a glow in his eyes, something brighter than hadn’t been there before. Hope, maybe?

You certainly hoped. Because you just made an ass of yourself, having acted without thought… and it never felt so good and so awkward at the same time.

Your brain had never been so quick and dumb to come up with a poor excuse either.

“We’re…. we’re under a mistletoe?” you offered reluctantly, your lips still burning after the brief contact with his, head once again nearly spinning due to the proximity – was it just the dizziness or was he leaning in closer?

“I thought you didn’t follow that tradition,” Steve hummed with a grin slowly spreading on his face and through the fog of lovesickness, it finally dawned to you.

You had done exactly what you scolded Sam, Clint and Pietro for – you just went and kissed Steve, no questions asked, no consideration of his possible discomfort.

God, you were such an idiot!

See, that’s why you have banned yourself for as much as imagining kissing Steve and meeting him under the mistletoe! Because when your brain went down that road, it stopped working altogether!

You swiftly retreated a few inches, horrified.

“I—I don’t. I mean. I-- I-I’m so sorry!” you blurted out, words spilling from your lips as the panic rose in your chest. And yet, there was warmth, a pleasant feeling coiling in your belly, breaths coming out short as Steve seemed to erase the distance you had created, his gaze studying you, landing on your mouth. “I shouldn’t have done that! What was I thinking—gosh, I didn’t want to make you-“

You stopped as Steve’s lips kept erasing the distance and ended up a breath from touching yours, tempting, his eyes shining bright with a simple unspoken question. You instinctively licked your lips, heart stumbling in your ribcage.  

“---uncomfortable. Yes, please-“

And then he was kissing you, a little smile playing on his lips as they danced with yours, sweet and soft, hand moving to your nape, thumb caressing the side crook of your neck, drawing a content sigh from you as your eyes fluttered shut, letting you sink into the kiss you had been craving for almost a year.

Your hands sought out his shoulders as he cradled your face, gentle and guiding so he could take more and all you wanted was to give it to him, give him everything he asked for and take it from him too.

Your toes definitely curled in the thick fluffy socks you wore when his fingers squeezed your nape briefly before he withdrew – as if he once again didn’t want to let go for something so boring as oxygen. You wholeheartedly agreed with that sentiment, dizzy from the blissful turn of events.

As you inhaled nevertheless, you were grateful that Steve stayed close enough for you to breathe in him, relieved and delighted smile on your face as you licked your lips, savouring the sensation.

When you met his gaze, you saw nothing but fondness; and your heart could melt.

Steve liked you too. Steve kissed you like he meant it. Now you could die a happy woman but you rather not. You’d rather kiss him again if he was willing.

“Still sorry I did it without asking first,��� you whispered an apology even though you were not sorry at all since it led to this.

“It’s okay. I just hope it wasn’t just the tradition that pushed you into kissing back.”

You chuckled and then chewed on your lower lip when thinking of a propriate retort, not missing that his eyes followed the action. Oh, he definitely liked to back, okay. Why had you never kissed before, again?

“I only give affection to whoever I want, whenever I want,” you threw back at him, the words that had a whole new meaning in contrast to when being told to Pietro; not a turn-down, quite the opposite in fact.

And you leaned in, greedy for at least one more kiss, Steve just watched you with a smile, eyes flickering to your lips.

“That’s good to know.”

He didn’t sound like he complained at being at the receiving end of your affection whatsoever.

Maybe, mistletoe wasn’t so stupid after all…

Three rooms over, the red-haired witch was smiling widely as she, thanks to her mental powers, caught a glimpse of what was happening in the kitchen doorway.

“It worked,” she announced, blinking to fully return herself to the present. “Nice work this time, brat moy.”

Pietro scowled at Wanda and couldn’t but wonder about the plan she had orchestrated and asked him to execute.

“How did you know, sestra?”

Wanda just shrugged.

“I had my suspicions before. But when you ran into her the last time, I checked her mind to see just how uncomfortable you made her,” she explained, giving one more scolding glare for his inappropriate behaviour. But well, it led to this and he helped now, so… he was good. “She literally thought she wouldn’t mind being under the mistletoe with the Captain.”

“Lucky bastard,” Pietro muttered, expression only half-sour.

“Shush. Be happy for your teammates. You just flirt anyway.”

The speedster pouted, but didn’t protest; he in fact was happy for the two members of the extended family him and his sister had found. And he indeed was only flirting, enjoying your reactions, talking back and teasing. It was all good fun and he did wish you and the Captain well…

But.

“Well, yeah, but now I won’t be able to do that or to look at her twice. Not without Captain having my head,” he grumbled and Wanda nodded with a grin, not feeling all that bad for him.

It wasn’t like he had his heart broken – more like had his ego tickled; and he had been needing some of that for a while.

“That’s true. Looks like you gotta be faster with the next girl you get your eye on, brat.”

The speedster gasped, shocked at her audacity. “I’ll show you fast-!”

Wanda laughed as she used her powers to freeze him on spot to get a head start.

Now, the Holidays felt truly happy indeed.

S.R. Masterlist

Thank you for reading!

If this fic feels like it’s written differently, then I guess that’s fair… I tried to make the style more drabble-like and failed epically, because I just cannot write short and without too many feelings :D

Anyway.

Happy Holidays to you all! May you be given love and affection!

[jaeminscoffee]

Let me in. (m.)

Pairing- Lee Donghyuck x reader

Genre- Fluff, Smut, tiny bit of angst..?

Word count- 6.03k (ily I'm sorry oof)

Warning- sexual themes suggested, written horribly, slight corruption kink, bestfriend!haechan, slight possessiveness , fingering, praise kink, friends to lovers trope, cliché af. Also definitely not proof read.

Summary- When you let him in, paradise unfolded is an understatement.

(literally the first time i wrote based of a song and it was a really challenging but! fun experience so thank you for requesting this! This also gave me an idea of closing off my previous prompt as starting a song prompt..? )

➳ listen to Ooh La La La by Exo.

When i turn my head

My eyes meet yours

Once again I'm staring at you

That smile is a bit too much for me

It's hard being friends with a girl, so beautiful, so generous and giving and still not having her all for yourself. Or so was how Haechan felt. 

You were so close to him, yet so far. You always looked out for him as though he was your top priority, and that boosted his ego. You were his, to an extent. It's when Haechan thought it'd be the best to have you come over to the party his frat's throwing, wanting you to loosen up a little, he couldn't hold himself back. 

After the last bell to class rang, Haechan immediately started packing his bag, remembering Mark, his other half as you exclaimed had warned him not to be even a second late, saying something along the lines of 'apparently Johnny won't DJ for us unless we actually give him something materialistic' or something.

You watch with a wide smile, your best friend frantically reaching out under his desk to get out all books only to shove them carelessly into his bag, 

"Calm down, Hyuck. You still have 2 hours to reach there and the frat house' barely half an hour away" Haechan let out a curse having dropped around 3 of his books alongside that one pen he carries around, he turned towards you with his eyebrows furrowed.

Seeing you smile wide at him, laughing even at his misery weirdly had his heart skipping beats. It was a normality now to him. It wouldn't take a genius to guess he's whipped for you, everyone, other than you apparently knew about that. 

Filled with an ease leaving me to burn

I can't breathe when i see your eye smile 

It's like you know that's your charm

"Hey don't smile at me like that! What type of a friend are you even?" Haechan exclaimed dramatically, completely ignoring how his heart had started beating just a little faster, breathing growing just a little frantic, face heating up just a little. 

"What?? I'm not supposed to smile now?" you ask with the same exaggeration, lifting your hands up to hit him softly when he got a hold of your hand, pulling you in for a hug,

"Don't ditch me at the party, I'll be waiting, love you bye!" he said it all in one breath, patting your back, placing a peck on your forehead before leaning down and picking up his  bag before dashing out of the door. 

You stood there still, bringing your palms up to your cheeks to calm the heat down. 

It's the thoughts or prejudice that you had that friends are supposed to stay friends that had you constraining your feelings for the lad. You'd be an idiot to have a whole package of what a good, ideal man is supposed to be like right beside you but still not fall for him. That's impossible even, worse than mission impossible.

"Love you too.." you say out low, mostly to yourself as you give yourself a second to calm down before moving forward to pack your own things up, leaving the classroom as soon as you're done to go set things up before the 'party' tonight. 

It didn't take long for you to decide what to wear. Simple, a skirt and a blouse. They were your usual fit anyway and you didn't like all those jazzy, flashing, revealing clothes people usually wear to parties. A pleated white skirt that fell mid thigh, a black and white striped long sleeve turtleneck shirt which you paired with a silver butterfly pendant, ending it with  black suede boots. 

 Sandra, your neighbor ergo a close acquaintance of yours, offered you a ride to the venue, having her boyfriend DJ there. She informed you how she'd be one of the ones to serve the drinks, adorning a shocked expression when you told her you don't drink. 

"Friend's with Lee Haechan yet you don't drink? No way" the elder exclaimed, you let out a laugh, remembering the last time the said boy had forced a drink down your throat, an action he regrets till date. "He might be a heavy drinker, i think the max i can handle is either a glass of wine or a bottle of breezer, nothing more and nothing less" 

You arrive at the frat house relatively faster than usual, thanks to Sandra's amazing driving skills, but you were immediately abandoned as she spotted her boyfriend, Johnny, in the yet to fill room. No doubts you had arrived early as the boys that you recognize as Felix, Han, Renjun, Jaemin, Jeno, Yangyang, Mark, San, and three others you didn't know quite well off, were arranging the red party cups and bottles on the kitchen counter. 

You scan your eyes all around the room to locate your possible crush, well, best friend in the crowd. Eyes landing at the figure leaning against the wall towards the stairs as he spoke to Hyunjin, a white tee tucked into his usual black knee slit skinny jeans topped with a blue checkered oversized t-shirt which was left unbuttoned made him look absolutely breathtaking. Not to mention, his hair was gelled back, with only a few strands let loose to hover over his forehead. Godly. The only word that could describe him. 

Maybe you might've stood there looking at him for way too long, potentially drooling even because he should've felt your intense gaze upon himself, as he turned his head away from the long haired boy, looking all over the place mimicking your actions from before to spot the gaze, landing upon you. 

Haechan physically shudders, how could one look that flawless? He pats his friend on the shoulder, making his way around him with slow strides towards you. It's hard to keep his feelings intact when you look like that, that ethereal, and his hands to himself. That's a catch. He loved seeing you in your plaid skirts. But he hated that it's not just him who gets to see you like that. Haechan wanted you to dress up for him. Look pretty for him. Be pure for him. Be his. And maybe, just maybe, tonight he'd have enough courage to ask you out. 

Your eyes are whispering to me

It's like they're asking me to approach. 

Intoxicated by his looks, being able to see no one but him, you make your way towards him too, replacing the fangirling face with a smile that he adored oh so much. 

"Hyuck! Hey!" you walk faster stepping out of your daze, pulling him into a hug, before hitting his shoulders slightly, "Next time, learn to pick up your phone" you exclaim, pulling away not too far, having his hands rest on top of your hips as you look into his eyes. Haechan mumbled something incoherent under his breath, shaking his head subtly. "sorry sorry, my phone was in the other room and pretty sure you called me when we were checking the music systems" 

"you're lucky Sandra lives like, right next door. I was actually planning on ditching the party and just binge watch the office" you playfully nag at him, hitting his shoulder this time. You push yourself away from him, involuntarily, wanting to cherish his warmth a little longer, but that'd be sketchy.

"Anyways! How do I look?" you wriggle your eyebrows before doing a twirl, which had your skirt slightly lift up a bit, Haechan visibly gulps, stopping you with your hand, "ugly as usual" he said, sarcasm dripping from his voice. Seeing your face dim down a bit, he lets out a chuckle, "do you really need me to tell you that you're beautiful, doll?" he pulled you in again, lifting his head up when he heard sounds of gagging, a sign of disgust from somewhere around the pair of you. 

" 'do you really need me to tell you that you're beautiful, doll?' oh cut it out you filth." exclaimed a voice in a distorted manner behind you. You turn around to face a senior of yours, a close friend. "Mark!" you extend your hand out to do your infamous handshake, that lasts at least for over 15 seconds that had Haechan roll his eyes. 

"says the filthiest himself" he let out, making you snort in a not so attractive way. "Hey, at least i'm not the one flirting with my best friend here" Mark pointed out, fingers wrapped around the party cup with god knows what drink. "you flirt with anything breathing" you add, laughing as he sends a wink your way. 

"You look stunning, Y/n" "Now who's flirting huh?" Haechan said, suddenly all up his guard. "woaw, not flirting because someone would whoop my ass later, but stating facts is all i did" Mark smirked, turning back as someone screamed out his name, "well I'll catch up later, gotta blast! Byeee!" he let out hurriedly, making his way towards the back of the house.

"I'll go get us some drinks, cranberry? Or lemon?" he asked, knowing the obvious answer. "Cranberry, duh" you reply with sass to which he let out a loud laugh. 

"You got it"

Maybe you believed that it's time you break your own limits, or maybe you just wanted to seem cool to Donghyuck. Whatever the reason was had you drink more than what your tolerance allowed you to. You felt euphoric and sick at the same time. You weren't completely gone just yet, you were still sober, surprisingly. The actual surprise is that Haechan, the usually 'I'll end all drinkers carrier' type of guy, stopped at just a bottle of beer. 

Reaching out to the glass Renjun held out towards you as an offer, you felt your hands being swatted away, making you flinch slightly. 

"That's enough drinks for her tonight" he said, shoving his friends hand away slightly as you whined. "i can handle a drink more" you reply, reaching out again, "no you can't, and no you won't" he insisted, raising his eyebrows at you in a challenging way, wanting to see if you'll oppose him. 

It might've been the intoxicating liquid in your system at the moment, but staring back at Haechan had the bottom of your stomach churning. You look away with the same speed you initiated the eye contact with. 

"You're not my dad.." you mumble, puckering your lips into a small pout as you hear his friends laugh at your slight quarrel. 

"but i am your boy- best friend. And for a fact, i know you'll fall unconscious if you take another drink" Jaemin starts hooting slowly at Haechan's slight slip up.

"Tsk, whatever" you reply, rebelling against him and taking the bottle out of Renjun's hand as he stared at you, amusement clearly evident on his face. 

"Feisty. I like how you don't listen to hyuck, maybe we should be best friends" he let out, holding out his fist to fist bump yours, which you do, sticking your tongue out at your best friend. 

"Okay! Let's play, put a finger down if you have!" Yangyang suggested, eyes scanning all your faces to see if anyone's not feeling the game today. Seeing everyone do nothing but nod, he starts dictating, asking them to put up five fingers. The first person to lose out apparently has to either take shots or confess their deepest secrets. 

The first rounds went well, easy questions which made you feel bored, slight headache striking in, making you rest your head on Haechan's shoulder. Sensing weight on his shoulder, he turned his head towards the side, looking at you with concern, a glint of 'I told you' shining through the orbs. 

"tell me off later, my head hurts real bad" you mumble, soft enough for only him to hear before he could nag at you. Saying nothing else other than shifting closer to you for you to get comfortable he said, "Just sleep, I'll take you home".

The moment you close your eyes after his words, you hear Jeno blurt out the next question, it being his turn to do so. 

"put a finger down if you've ever been head over heels for your best friend", His other friends chuckle, while Jeno smirked at Haechan, too tired to open your eyes to see who put a finger down, you fail to notice Haechan put a finger down, looking down at you all worn out on his shoulder, his circle feigning disgust. 

The game was probably long done, the party might've also ended, you must've fallen asleep because the next time you open your eyes, you find yourself in your best friend's bedroom, still feeling tired. Looking outside the window, seeing it's still dark outside, you turn to the side, flinching just a bit when you find Haechan at the side of the bed, arms folded over the sheets as he rests his head on top of it. It must've been uncomfortable kneeling on the floor for that long. 

You take the chance to look at him properly, well, better than the past god knows how many years into your friendship. You take your time to roam your eyes all over his facials. Gawking at the moles adorning his tanned skin, lifting your fingers up to feather over them. Your hands then move to the scars at each corner of his eyebrows, chuckling as you remember how he got them. 

You brush his dishevelled hair out of his face, the action making Haechan stir in his slumber which had you stop your moments completely. Running your fingers through his hair one last time, about to pull your hands away from him to not wake him up you feel his hands grip your wrist, holding it in place. 

You yelp, not expecting him to be awake, "why did you stop? I was about to fall asleep" he whines out, getting up from the floor, standing to his full height which makes you shift, leaning your back against the headboard to look at him more comfortably. 

"Did you carry me up here?" you asked, voice a little hoarse as the alcohols after effects had your throat burn. "Nope, you just zapped here. Of course I carried you" he replied, masking his flustered look at how you looked, face glowing, eyes hazed and on bed. His bed. 

"Does it hurt for you to reply normally for once..?" you open your eyes a little wider in genuine curiosity 

Oh la la la, please allow me 

Oh la la la, into your imagination 

I'll go right in, so let me in

I'll dance in your eyes 

Oh la la la, the moment our gazes meet. 

Replying is hard, keeping his eyes away from your lips is hard, to stop himself from slowly leaning forward was hard too. You're killing him. The alcohol in his system did nothing more than fuel his desires for you.

It's weird, how one moment, you're whining at your best friend being a sarcastic hoe to how your breath gets caught in your lungs the next moment at the sight of your crush leaning closer to you. 

It's weird how all those thoughts of, 'friends should stay friends' were thrown right out of the window when he was now, just inches away from you, noses grazing each other.

The proximity was that where you could feel his breath fanning your lips. Now that's weird too, weren't you just having a normal conversation? 

Haechan snaps out of it, you're probably drunk. He pulls away just as you close your eyes, ready to bask in the feeling of his lips against yours. 

"I can't.. You'll forget all this by tomorrow, I'll wake you up before class, have some rest." He said, avoiding eye contact as you felt a pang of disappointment hit you. 

That night, all Haechan could think of was your slightly parted lips, eyes fixated on your lips and your slow, shallow, small breath. 

You've never felt awkward around Haechan, neither do you want to feel awkward around him, but each time you see him, all you're reminded of is how close you were to change your friendship into something else. 

On the other hand, Haechan wanted to hit himself for cowering out once again. He was so close to finally making you his. But now all he's left with is a sexual tension so thick that could be cut by a knife. He wanted you. He craved you.

It only started working him up more the day you called him over to your studio apartment for a movie night, ignoring all past events over the week. Them being, Haechan becoming a much touchy friend. He's always been a physical affection shower either ways. 

Haechan complied, arriving at your place with a large bag of Doritos. Greeting you with a huge smile, ignoring the fast beating of his heart when you reciprocate the same expression. 

"Heyyy! Missed me? I know! I missed me too" Haechan said, making his way around you quickly to hide the crimson that took place on his cheeks, not wanting you to see it. 

"I did" you say quietly, closing the door as Haechan made himself comfortable on your couch, having set the chip packet in the kitchen counter. 

He mentally took a note of your outfit, plain black shorts that were a little too short for the sake of his heart not falling right out, and a white shirt, a crop top, to be precise.

"It's your turn to choose the movie" you say, making your way towards the other side of the couch. "Monsters inc?" he answers as you whine, having already regret the choice of giving him the liberty. 

"Hyuck we watched that movie about like, 5 times, when will you get over it?" you ask

"Never so stop whining and watch the movie with me." he replied with the sass you were oh so familiar with, making you roll your eyes. 

Ah, it's going to be a long night. 

You were lost in your own thoughts, not paying attention to the movie much as you remember the night at the frat house. It's impossible to get Lee Haechan out of your mind. It's impossible because you know he has his eyes on you right now. Looking at you, oblivious to the fact that you knew of his gaze. 

"Hyuck.. " you call him out, turning to face him from your side of the couch. Haechan looks away momentarily, flustered as you caught him stare at you. He hums in response, keeping his eyes fixed on the screen. 

"About that night in your room" you start, turning completely, your body facing him as you sit criss cross. Haechan visibly tenses up, thinking you're about to tell him off for crossing the line, "Y/n, about that, i'm- i'm sor-"

"Do you like me?"

Right now, in this moment, the space between us

Is filled with this strong trembling 

Becoming a rhythm and drawing me in

Let your body move to it however you'd like. 

Haechan was caught off guard by your question, blinking, once, twice, even shaking his head to see if he's imagining things, "Huh?" he asked just for confirmation. 

"Do you like me..?" you repeated, slower, heart racing in anticipation as you lean forward a bit, waiting for his reply.

"What are you going to do if I say.. Yes?" he asked, eyebrows raised as he leaned forward a little too. You had the strong urge to want to lean back from the proximity, feeling blood rush up to your cheeks but you stood your ground, wanting to do this right here. Right now. 

"Then I'll continue what we almost started" you exclaim, the smile he loves so much finding its way onto your face.

"Will you? Really?" he asked, scooting closer to you, something about his eyes switching gazes when you lean further, making your shirt come down a bit. You nod, that's when he pulls you forward by your arms, making you let out a sound of surprise as you crash onto his side, looking at him with your eyes widened. 

"Then yes." he whispered after leaning close to your ears, you feel yourself growing hot each passing second. The position is extremely intimate. You pull away to look into his eyes, to spot any signs of all this being nothing more than just a joke. You lose it when he looks at you with a strong gaze, eyebrows slightly raised, lips drawn into a small smile, immediately pressing yours onto his after staring it for way too long.

His hands found their way around your waist, tugging at you slowly, gesturing you to get onto his lap. 

An odd smile that doesn't let on

Seeing through the curiosity driving me on

And sending a sign

You oblige, as your lips move in unison, Haechan shifted in his seat to a better position, man spreading to let you sit better on his lap all while still not letting go of your lips. 

His hands find their way under your crop top, letting his arms wander the bare skin of your back, his cold touch in contrast to your warm body making you gasp. Haechan takes the opportunity of your parted lips to enter your mouth, tongue pressing against yours making you whine. 

You pull away only when you feel your lungs practically begging for a puff of air even, tugging softly at his slightly grown hair, letting out an airy giggle at the sight of your lip color smeared at the corner of his lips. 

"That was way better than all I've imagined it to be" Haechan smiled at you, pressing his forehead against yours, pulling you closer by the hips. You look away from his gaze, "you've imagined kissing me?" you ask softly, playing with the charm hanging off his neck.

"way too many times to keep a count" he replied, placing another peck on your lips, pulling away immediately, laughing as you subconsciously follow his lips. 

He finally let's you press onto his lips once again, groaning as your teeth clash from how fast you were at finding his lips. You whimper when his hands squeeze at your sides.

You jerk forward, testing the waters as you move your lips from his lips, to his neck, peppering the skin with kisses, giving extra attention to those moles you adored that were scrawled all over his skin, occasionally nibbling at the spot you left a wet trail at. 

It's like you're telling me to open the door

To your slightly open heart and come right in

Please allow me 

Into your imagination 

I'll go right in, so let me in

I'll dance in your eyes

The moment our gazes meet. 

He sighs in content  at the feeling of your plush lips pressed against his skin, "I won't be able to control myself if you keep going, doll" you continue your ministration.  Then don't" you say, trying to sound as sultry as possible. Having waited so long to have Donghyuck as more than just friends had you desperate for any sort of contact from his side. 

You could sense his slight hesitation, maybe he didn't want to rush things, maybe he just couldn't get himself to do it, or maybe, he was just nervous.  

Should I really try making a move now? 

What should be the first thing I say? 

The moment I hesitate, thinking it over

You get up and walk away. 

You stand up, from his lap, looking at his eyes, nodding so softly that he'd miss it if he'd blink as you make your way towards your bedroom, smiling. You tug at your shirt, slowly, above your head, not daring to turn to look back at Donghyuck's reaction, a triumphant look washing over your facial as you hear him growl with that honey voice of his. 

He must've stared at your back a little too long, seeing your hair cover the top half of your torso as you turned towards your bedroom, looking at him one last time before entering the room which was illuminated with just your fairy lights. 

Even as I look at your bold back from far away

Your slow pace is telling me to follow

Girl just tell me what you like

It's like you're telling me to hurry

"she'll be the death of me.. " he ruffled his hair, before getting up to walk down the same pathway as you. 

Walking into your bedroom, Haechan was more than sure that the sight before him was the most ethereal sight he'd seen his entire life. 

You sat by the foot of the bed, adorned in only your black lace bra, the black shorts, and your hair left open in all glory. He swallows the lump forming in his throat, mood switching so fast because the boy you walked away from, Lee Haechan, the one hesitant to take it this far, was now replaced with the Lee Haechan, walking towards you with long, confident strides. 

As he comes to stand in front of you, he bends down, snaking one of his arms around your waist, pulling you up and close to his body. 

"tell me, have you been dreaming about me just the way I've dreamt about you?" he leans closer to the nape of your neck, running the tip of his nose along the unexpectedly sensitive skin up to your ears, nibbling at the earlobe. 

"Have you waited for all this just as much as i have? Tell me, princess" he rasps out as you place your hands gently by the belt loop of his jeans. 

Please allow me

Into your reality 

Not trusting your voice, you nod, wanting to feel his lips against yours once again but Haechan held onto you with a firm grip, 

"Tell me, baby. Words, those are the keys. Use your words" He moved from nibbling onto your earlobe to marking territory onto your skin that had you jerking forward, further into his body. 

I'll approach you, so hold onto me

Tell me that you were waiting

The moment i reached you

You huff out, opening your mouth the exact moment he took hold of your chin with a gentle grip, looking at your orbs with so much expectation, so much adoration, so much love, so much lust. 

"I've waited a long time too." you start 

"I waited for so long; the day in your room, during that night, I was so happy when you approached me, but then you pulled away. You made me wait enough Hyuck, please let me feel you now? I want you. No. I need you" 

You didn't pay attention to his heaving chest, or how his eyes were turning into a whole darker shade of ebony, instead, stood on your tip toe and engulfed his slightly puffy lips with yours. 

Haechan didn't deny the kiss, dying to take you quick there itself when the first sentence left your lip, but he wanted to take it slow, he wanted to show you how much he's waited for this too. How much he likes you and he wanted to make sure you felt it from each action of his. 

He urged you to move backwards, closer towards the edge of the bed, not breaking the kiss even for a second, his hands securing around your waist as he slowly bends down to place you on the quilt. 

His hands make their way back, fiddling with the hook of your bra as he breaks the kiss with one last peck at the corner of your lips. "i need you too, doll. I need you just as much as you need me, maybe even twice as much" he mumbles against the soft skin of your collarbone, tapping at your back with the tip of his finger once he had the hooks undone to pull the material away from your body. 

Shyness suddenly overpowers all lust, you bring up an arm to cover your now exposed breast while Haechan is busy throwing your clothing behind him. 

Turning around, facing you, he smiles at you, gently prying your hand away from your chest leaving your torso bare naked in front of him which had you shut your eyes with embarrassment. 

"Look at me, baby." Donghyuck urges you. 

You give yourself a second, inhaling sharp as you flutter your eyes open, looking straight into his eyes. "You have no reason to hide yourself from me" he pulls away after placing a peck in the valley of your chest. He tugs at the edge of his hoodie, pulling it over his head before discarding it behind.

"Here. Now we both are half naked" he smiles at you as you mirror his expression. 

Donghyuck wasn't all that built, he wasn't not built either. Ever since Renjun started forcefully dragging Haechan to the gym, he'd lost that baby stomach that you loved to poke at during class just to annoy him, now replaced with very faint ab lines which, you were sure you'd grow a liking for pretty soon.

You whimper at the feeling of his lips graze over hardened nipples, jolting forward when he lifts hands from above your hips to your neck where he'd previously left his mark, tracing the reddish purple/brownish skin. 

He latches his lips onto one nib, swirling his tongue around the hardened muscle, his free hand making its way south, waiting for any signs of protest before dragging the short down, shifting his attention over to the untended nipple. 

"beautiful.. " he mumbles against your wet nipple, blowing onto it later, all sensation making you feel ecstatic.

"Hyuck, I need-..need you" you choke out.

"I know, princess. But we need to prepare you a little, hm?" he lets out, voice a few octaves deeper than usual, as he finally tugs your panties down your leg, letting it slide itself onto the floor.

Haechan looks at you, expression blissful from all the attention you're getting. You quickly nod, looking at him giving him a hundred percent access to do you however he likes when you notice his eyes silently ask for consent. 

He feathers his thumb over your clit, smiling at how responsive you are to his touches. He slowly starts drawing circles onto the sensitive bud, pressing his lips to the side of your face, whispering sweet nothings into your ears. 

"Haechan!" you whine out, his words only adding to the pleasure. Experimentally, he moves his finger down to your slit, feeling your slick wetness coat his fingers making him let out a throaty sound of satisfaction. 

He did this to you. 

That had his ego boost shoot right up the roof. He let the tip of his middle finger poke at your entrance, cooing at you while pressing it inside of you. "So wet, baby. All for me?" he questions, slowly moving his wrist back and forth.

You nod frantically, "Hm? Words?" he pushes, slightly picking up the speed. 

"All for you, H-haechan. It's.. It's -all for you" you cling onto his forearm, as he coax you closer to your orgasm. "That's right baby, it's all for me" he presses his lips against your cheeks once again.

He adds in another finger when he knows you're close, speeding up even further, curling the digits in you which had your eyes roll back. 

Your orgasm washes over you with so much intensity the moment he engulfs your nipple once again. Slowly helping you ride out your orgasm, only removing his fingers from within you when you started to writhe from overstimulation. 

"You did so well doll, can you take one more?" he asked sweetly as you calmed down. That's when you realized how selfless he'd been, now looking down at the dent on his jeans which looked a little painful. 

You get up after nodding as you watch Haechan unbuckle his belt, removing the jeans along with his boxer, adding it to the pile of clothes behind him, you lean forward, "Your turn" you tell as Haechan's face contorts into confusion. 

Finally realizing what you mean, he smiles at you, pulling you into another loving kiss as he runs a hand down your messed up hair. "Maybe another time? I just want to feel you around me now, princess, i can't wait longer" 

With that, he made you lay back down, "condom?"

"It's fine, I'm on pills" you rub your hand up and down his hands that were beside you, balancing his body above yours. The thought of going raw inside you made Haechan's member twitch. 

He runs his member up and down your wet sex, coating it with your essence before letting the head poke at your entrance as it expands with each inch he enters in, the wetness making it so much easier to enter. 

He lets out a groan that sounded so much like a whine, finally having been able to feel your walls perfectly fit around his shaft. He leans down, now balancing himself on his elbows as you finally give him the go ahead sign. 

He interlocks your lips with his as he slowly starts moving his hips into yours. "You feel so good for me, doll. Fuck." he rasps out against your lips. 

He had to hang onto the last of his rationality to not ram into you, you just felt that good around him, and he felt so good inside of you. 

Haechan slowly picks up the pace, now moving a little faster against your hips as you reduce down to a moaning mess, chains of his name leaving your mouth continuously.

"Hyuck, i..I'm close" you moan out, the little sensitivity you'd left from your previous orgasm slightly striking in. Your moans encouraged Haechan to go faster.

Testing the water, he pull moves back completely to a point where only his tip's inside of you, "Yeah?"  he questioned while slamming back inside of you, making his tip brush against your soft spot which coaxed you closer to your high. 

"Yes-" you whimper, when he finally let go and snapped, desperate to chase his high. The new pace having him constantly hit the pleasure spot. 

You start clenching around his member, not wanting to orgasm before him. "Fuck baby, me too. I'm close too" 

"Haechan im.. I'm coming-" you let out a long loud moan as you feel yourself being thrown towards your edge, face contorting into that of pure bliss, as the constant clenching helped drag him towards his high. 

"Shit, Y/n" he immediately pulled out, feeling his own high wash over his, pumping the wet shaft a few more times before spurting ribbons of his essence all over your lower abdomen. He kept going until he felt himself grow soft in his grip. 

He clashes down beside you once wiping his hands down on the sheets which you most definitely have to wash the next day. 

"Don't fall asleep on me baby, i want to ask you something" Haechan lets out quickly as he finds you blinking slowly, most probably out of exhaustion. 

"I'm not.." you hoarse out. 

"I mean it when i say, i like you, Y/n. Heck, i think I'm in love with you" he starts flipping so that his back was on the sheets with you on top of him. 

"So.. Will you.. Will you be my-"

"Yes!" you reply fast, suddenly having sparks of energy flow through you. 

"you didn't let me complete my question though" he chuckles, pressing a peck onto the crown of your head. 

"Yes. I will be your girlfriend!" you make yourself a little clearer this time around. Girlfriend. His. 

"That.. Means.. You're mine?" he asks, unsure if he should ask so or not. 

You nuzzle further into his chest, tightening your grip around his bare torso. 

"I'm yours"

Now i approach you,

You and I have grown closer.

[breitzbachbea]

#11 and #41 for turgre!

Thank you for sending the prompt in!

Fanfic Trope Mash Up

#11 Neighbour AU + #41 Big Damn Kiss =

Herakles & Sadık are both recent university graduates from Athens & İstanbul, but find themselves lacking opportunities to work in their homecountries. So they go abroad to try their luck elsewhere.

Both end up in Germany. Herakles' is living with the Simonides old family friends who've either migrated decades ago or are living as expats in Germany. Natasa and Ibrahim welcome Herakles with open arms. He immediately makes friends with their twins, only a few years younger than him. Omar and Timothea, as they're called, are still living with their parents while they're attending the local university. They're not living in luxury, but they're happy.

Sadık manages to get in contact with Havva Be Yauno via some university acquaintances. They migrated to Germany a while ago, after being kicked out working in local administration. Sadık gets to share a small flat in the building Havva manages for the landlord, together with a Kurdish Woman called Dilan Taş. After some initial hiccups, the two become close friends.

The hiccups with their neighbours next door are less initial. No, that's a lie - The Simonides don't mind their new neighbours, even invite them for coffee and tea. Omar pretty quickly evolves a crush on Dilan.

It's just Herakles and Sadık who keep butting heads.

They argue about petty semantics that only people who studied 'breadless art' would care about. Herakles complains that they're too loud at night. Sadık says Herakles is dragging stray cats into the house by leaving out food & now the whole staircase stinks. There's always something.

As time goes on, they get over themselves a little. Too busy with their own life. Sadık feeds the cats with scraps he gets from the Turkish butcher. Herakles comes over after it's been eerily quiet for weeks and finds out that Sadık's latest odd job makes him work at night. He actually finds him slumped over on the kitchen table when Dilan lets him in before she leaves for work. He goes back and leaves him a package of expensive coffee beans that he had imported from Greece.

One night, they end up together on the university campus. Sitting on the steps surrounding a piece of green near a small river. The city's barely still awake, there's only music, TV and chatter from the dorms. The occassional student crossing after they stayed late at the library.

"What did you actually study?" Sadık asked and put the lighter back into his pocket. It was a cheap one with a wheel. Pain in the ass to get working at this point. His last money had been spent on the cigarettes themselves.

Herakles took a deep breath through his nose. He stared at the water, flowing invisibly except for a few dancing white and orange specks. "Philosophy," he said.

Sadık chuckled and the chuckle quickly became a laugh. "Oh, what a surprise that you couldn't find a job with such a prestigious degree." He grinned and exhaled some smoke.

"And history. Archaeology, Politics, Linguistics, Architecture, Maths... I dipped my toes into physics, too, for a little bit, but couldn't really make it."

Sadık's grin had long faltered. Herakles looked to the river. A smile replaced the initial surprise on Sadık's face. "Oho, a real Renaissance man, aren't you?"

"I like to learn. But all I could do with the few fields I actually managed to acquire a degree in was teach in school. And I'm just not... very good at that." He sighed. Long. "But my dad had stopped paying once I had gotten a job, not that he had ever really paid me enough, mind you, so... I had nowhere to go if I had quit."

"Except here." Sadık wished Herakles would have looked at him. To even catch a glimpse of him, a little bit of that beautiful face illuminated by the pale moon or the orange streetlights.

"Except here." Sadık finally had his wish granted. "What did you study?"

Sadık took a deep breath through his nose. His cigarette was almost finished. "Architecture, too. Tried to get into engineering, but couldn't quite make it. Would have loved to do Literature, frankly. I dunno, get a teaching position at an university, but Anne* always had higher plans for me. Career woman and all that, only wanted the best for me, too, so studying something almost as useless as philosophy wasn't really up for debate."

Now he was the one to stare into the river while he took another drag. He looked at his feet. His shoes could need a good cleaning.

"A smoking literature professor, how cliché," Herakles said and the deep shadows on his face hid how much it reflected the amusement in his voice. He leant in closer to Sadık and put a hand on his thigh. His inner thigh. "All the women would have gone wild over this."

"You think so?" Sadık asked, an expectant but cautious smirk on his face. Rest of his cigarette between his fingers. Herakles' weight on his thigh. He enjoyed his touch. The nights were so cold here in Germany. He leant in for a kiss.

Herakles' hand disappeared. "But I don't kiss smokers." The next moment, Sadık was engulfed in darkness as Herakles stood and blocked the streetlight. He turned and adjusted his jacket. "I have a job interview tomorrow, so see you around, I guess." He turned to just the right angle that Sadık could catch his grin.

He only had a dumbfounded stare as goodbye while Herakles climbed the stairs back to street level.

Some time after this incident, Herakles gets a job as research assisstant at the local university. It's initially only for a project of the history facculty, but he's happy nonetheless.

Now that he knows Sadık enjoys literature, he tells the Simonides one time the topic crops up & they know of a regional literature club, who's holding public reading nights. Any author can show up and read their pieces for 10 Minutes to an audience. Omar tells Dilan, who knows that Sadık writes poetry. She thinks he should go and so after she bullied him into it, they do.

Sadık becomes a regular guest there and ends up meeting other literature enthusiasts, like the Beilschmidts. (He and Gilbert bicker a lot about what the other writes, both trying to take the other down a peg). Sadık never tells Herakles any of this.

So imagine his surprise when he spots him one night in the audience. Afterwards, he's torn between sneaking out and going straight up to him, but Herakles makes the decision for him.

"I didn't know you wrote poetry," Herakles finally broke the awkward stare-off.

"Well, now you do." Sadık closed his book and shoved it under his arm. With a grin, he asked: "You think it's good?"

Despite what followed, Herakles couldn't wipe the smile off his face: "I enjoyed it more than the other guy's crime story, at least."

Sadık gave a short bark of laughter. "Oh, you don't know half of it, Gilbert's been trying to make it work since forever. You got time for a coffee?"

So life's good. They're hanging out, they're working, they're pursueing their passions. One time, the heater in Sadık and Dilan's flat breaks and despite Havva trying their best to get it repaired and them a temporary replacement, they're freezing their asses off. So they go and visit their neighbours, who offer them to sleep over. Sadık is supposed to sleep on the couch. Dilan is supposed to sleep on a mattress in the Simonides' room. Both somehow end up sleeping in a Greek's bed instead. (Herakles has a really small room - his desk is even in the twins' room cuz it wouldn't fit in his own. Sadık asks if he wants coffee and they end up drinking coffee in his bed together and talk until they fall asleep.)

Life could be rosy. That is until one day, the Simonides get into real trouble with the landlord. You see, Natasa and Havva always had a tense relationship, because Natasa doesn't believe in playing by the rules too much, while Havva is a very organized person. However, now some things - like mayhaps Herakles living with them - have gotten directly to the landlord of the building and they're not amused. They threaten to evict them, unless Herakles is going - and want a hefty fine from the Simonides either way.

Getting a new home would mean severe financial strain, not to mention the fine. Omar and Thea may would have to pause or drop their studies. Herakles would have to go back to Greece and start from scratch.

Which he's willing to do, seeing how much trouble he caused the family, even if it breaks his heart. Natasa is having none of it - "I'm not sending you back to your son of a bitch, deadbeat dad, Iraklis" - and insists he stays.

Dilan and Sadık get wind of all of this and they're just as devasted as the family itself. They don't want to lose their neighbours. They don't want this to ruin Omar's and Thea's future. They don't want Herakles to leave. Sadık doesn't want Herakles to leave.

So he pleads with Havva to do something, anything, he'll help them do whatever it takes. Natasa is far too proud to do so. Maybe she even suspects that Havva had something to do with it. (They don't).

And through a lot of negotiation, bribery and running errands, the Simonides get to stay. Omar and Thea can continue pursueing their degrees in peace. Herakles gets to stay and keep working in Germany.

"You... You've spent your past weeks on this?" Herakles' stare pierced Sadık as much as it seemed to look right through him. His mouth hung open, jaw slack. "This was all your doing?"

Sadık took a deep breath, but had to settle for a rather unintelligent "Well, yeah." Herakles' stare unsettled him. He had never seen him at a loss for words before. He was even afraid the other might faint.

A heartbeat later, Sadık was afraid he might faint. Herakles had taken a step towards him, grabbed his face and pressed his lips onto Sadık's. It knocked the breath out of him.

His lips were soft. They were so soft and hot and melded with his own effortlessly.

He kissed back, hands on Herakles' face, fingers buried in the messy hairy. The pressure between them was right, felt right, made them one for a brief eternity.

It ended as abruptly as it had begun. They both took a deep breath through their nose and Herakles panted loudly as he exhaled through the mouthm He swallowed.

"Herakles, I don't think that that's an appropriate enough Thank you", Ibrahim said, but neither of the two barely even registered it. Natasa laughed. Loudly.

"Oh, no, I think it's more than enough," Sadık replied as he stared at the wall next to Herakles' head. His hands were still on his face. "Although..." Ibrahim and Natasa were talking in Greek when he faced Herakles again. She still chuckled while a grin stole itself onto his face. "I think I could go for a little bit more gratitude, after all we've done."

"Don't push it," Herakles warned him. Yet, his cockyness was rewarded with another kiss.

Sadık's tongue slipped between his lips effortlessly. As if it belonged there.

Like Herakles belonged here.

So... yeah! I hope you liked it!

[angst-fairygodmother]

May I send in a request if it’s not too much trouble? Maybe some mutual pining/yearning with Diego, and it’s just really fluffy? I know it’s not a lot plait wise, sorry, so you can kinda do whatever, as long as it’s fluffy(I love your angst but i am in desperate need of some fluffy with my #1 stubby husband) 💚💚💚💚

A/N: Hello darling! This is a fantastic trope! Thank you so much for your request. Hope it’s everything you were looking for 😊 Word Count: 1861

You had known Diego Hargreeves for years, shared laughs and tears and secrets with him and he had shared them with you. You had met his mother. You were confident in calling him your closest friend. So of course, like a romance movie cliché, somewhere between bickering over the last slice of pizza and trying to stay up long enough to watch every Star Wars movie in one sitting, you’d fallen in love with him. But, like any good protagonist, you were too stubborn to admit it, too sure that he was still in love with Eudora Patch and would never see you in that way and it would only ruin your friendship.

So you tried to move on, kissed frog after frog, hoping for one of them to be Prince Charming, even though you knew he was standing right beside you, ready to throw knives if any of them treated you wrong.

He also did things like warn you that it was dangerous being friends with him or try convince you that he wasn’t worth it, whatever ‘it’ was. Eventually you convinced him to stop that nonsense by agreeing to take some sort of self-defense class, which turned into him teaching you self-defense, and then basic self-defense and boxing.

And then you found yourself rearranging your entire schedule so that you could go down to the Fighting Lion and get your first lesson, and then maybe hang around to watch Diego’s match. But you definitely weren’t in love with him and had totally moved on. Absolutely.

“Didn’t you have a date tonight?” Diego asked, trying hard to play the question as an off-hand curiosity as he gave you a greeting hug. And if he held you a little tighter or for a few seconds longer than he had in the past, who would know.

“I, um. I cancelled,” you replied, not meeting his eye.

“Oh?” his brows shot up in surprise. You had been talking about this date for weeks, and sounded really into the guy.

“Yeah. I just, wasn’t really feeling it, you know?”

“What?” he laughed incredulously. “Two days ago you wouldn’t shut up about him.”

“Well, things change, alright?” you snapped. “Now are we going to sit around gossiping like old hens or are you going to teach me how to fight?”

He sighed, shaking his head ruefully. “Yeah, yeah. Go change and I’ll get set up.”

When you walked back out of the locker-room in your tight-fitted workout clothes a few minutes later, pausing to use the wall to help you stretch your limbs, Diego couldn’t help trailing his eyes over your form especially lingering on your ass and the way it filled out your shorts. He bit his lip, forcing himself to turn away before you noticed.

“Alright, Hargreeves,” you said, and he looked over at you, trying his best to pretend he had just noticed your return. “I’m all dressed up. What’s next?”

You flashed him a smile, the kind that he wished he could believe was specially reserved for him, but in fact was the same bright and enthusiastic one you gave the whole world.

“Wrap your hands and wrists for support,” he said, tossing you a roll of tape.

Fumbling a bit, you caught the tossed object and stared at it as if it was a snake threatening to bite.

Diego chuckled. “Do you need me to show you what to do?”

Biting your lip, Diego’s eyes flicking down to them at the motion, you shrugged. “That would probably be for the best.”

Almost immediately, you regretted agreeing to that as he walked over, taking one of your hands in both of his. You knew that it was just to keep you steady and still while he wrapped, but still it made your heart race and you could only hope that he didn’t notice. You looked up at him through your eyelashes, watching the intense focus on his face, hearing him speak but not the words he said as he explained how to do it so you could for yourself in the future. In your head, he was saying sweet nothings and holding your hand just to hold it, and you felt frustrated with how much you wanted that thought to be real.

“There,” he said, securing the end of the tape on your second hand with a pat and shaking you out of your dream-state. “You’re good.”

“Huh?” you frowned, mind slow to catch up to reality. “Oh, right. Thanks.”

From there, you did all you could stay focused, especially when he decided the best teaching method after the most basic information to keep you from hurting yourself was to just throw you into a fight against him and tell you to do your best. You were impressed with how you held your own, dodging more than striking sure, but he was meant to be a superhero and you had the reflexes to avoid his blows. (It at no point occurred to you that he might be going easy on you.)

“Come on, Y/N. You can’t win a fight if you don’t hit me,” he scolded, laughing.

“But I can’t lose it if I don’t get hit either,” you panted, struggling not to let your guard drop as you grew tired.

“Yes you can,” Diego stopped, dropping his hands and shifting into lecture mode. “Exhausting yourself is just as dangerous. If you’re trying to avoid a fight, which you should, get one good swing in to stun the other person and then run. Don’t just dodge and duck like you’re toying with them. Because you will screw up.”

You huffed. “Fine, I get it.”

“Do you?”

“Yes,” you snapped. “Any other tips?”

“Every time you dodge, you drop your left side, leaving yourself vulnerable.”

“Noted. Back to the fight now?”

“Are you actually going to fight or just keep dancing?” his eyes crinkled in a smile and your heart skipped a beat, again.

“If you want to see dancing, I can dance,” you suggested with a smirk. “But yes, I promise I’ll take your suggestions and use them to beat you, and actually do it this time.”

He rolled his eyes, shaking his head, and raised his hands back up, stance shifting. “Bring it then.”

“Sure you can handle that babe?” you taunted, darting in on a feint.

Only he froze at your teasing nickname, and your fist connected with a solid ‘crack!’ Diego stumbled backwards on the mats, hands coming up to cup his now bleeding nose.

“Ow!” he groaned.

“Shit! Oh god Diego, I’m so sorry!” you yelled, panicked, rushing over to him and placing your hands over his, trying to guide them down so you could inspect the damage you caused. “Is it broken? Do you need tissues? A doctor?”

“No, no it’s fine,” he assured you, shrugging you off, voice muffled and distorted by his hands and the rapid swelling of his face.

“What happened?” you snapped, voice still high with fear. “That was an easy shot to block!”

“I…I don’t know,” he muttered.

His eyes locked with yours and you stood there, staring at each other.

“I just…you called me babe…”

Your stomach lurched. You had, without thinking anything of it. It had been a joke, or maybe a subconscious slip of the tongue. Had it upset him? Or did you dare to hope…?

“That was an excellent hit,” he continued, finally bringing his hands down, checking to see if his nose was still bleeding and sniffing dramatically to clear the airway. “If you do that any time someone gives you a hard time, no one’s ever going to dare mess with you.”

You smiled weakly. “I don’t think most of my enemies would be so in love with me I could distract them so easily…”

“I wasn’t…I’m not…what are you talking about?” he scoffed.

“Relax, Di,” you sighed. “It was a joke.”

You both lapsed into a momentary silence.

“What if…I was?” he asked hesitantly a moment later, just as you were about to ask if the training session was over.

“What if you were what?” you countered, frowning and puzzled.

“…in love with you…” the confession was so low and mumbled that you wouldn’t have caught it at all if you hadn’t been so familiar with Diego and all of his moods.

You laughed nervously. “I must have hit you harder than I thought, cus you’re not making any sense.”

“I’m serious, Y/N.”

“You…what?” You blinked at him, dumb-founded. “You can’t be.”

You thought you must be dreaming, there was no way this conversation could possibly happening, so you settled firmly on denial, not wanting to fall for his prank or whatever this was. Because if he were telling the truth, then you had denied yourself and hurt yourself for years for no actual reason, and that wouldn’t be fair.

“Why can’t I be?” he asked, stepping closer, frowning.

“Well…because…” you cast about for any good reason why your best friend that you were in love with shouldn’t or couldn’t be in love with you right back.

“Y/N, you don’t have to make up excuses. I won’t be upset if you don’t feel the same, and I won’t let it ruin our friendship. It hasn’t so far.”

“How…how long?” you choked out, now fighting back tears.

He shrugged. “A year or two at least. I can’t really say when it happened.”

“Oh, Diego…why didn’t you say anything?”

He shrugged, unable to meet your eye. “I don’t know. It didn’t seem like the right time? And then you were dating other people.”

“Because I was trying to get over you!” you shouted, your frustration at the ridiculousness of it all spilling over. “I thought you were still in love with Patch or some dumb shit so I was dating other people. I thought if I found someone good enough, someone fine, I could make myself feel for them what I feel about you, you asshole!”

He stared at you, mouth agape. The horror of everything you just admitted hit you like a brick to the face and you felt the intense blush flood over your face and neck and like you were going to be sick; you wanted to actually vomit.

"W-what?"

The tears that had been stinging spilled down your cheeks. Rough, calloused fingers and tape wrapped palms reached up to brush away their wet tracks.

"Y/N…?"

"I've been in love with you for years, dammit. I just...never had the guts to tell you'" you admitted at a whisper.

And then his lips were on yours and it was...actually kind of awkward, wet with tears and tangy with the lingering salt-metallic taste of his blood and both your sweat. Pulling back to rest your forehead against his, you smiled softly.

"Not that I didn't appreciate it, because I have been wanting to kiss you for a long time now, but maybe we should clean up a little first?" You suggested.

He laughed. "Yeah, probably. And I have a fight later to drop out of."

"What? Drop out of? Why?"

"I've waited too long to take you on a date. I'm not waiting another minute."

[firefistlaw]

Request:

Imagine how extra Law and Ace would be if they experienced, in full, the 'love at first sight' trope with their future (fem) s/o. Like full on, she's just there doing her own thing, not even noticing them - but when they see her, they basically have every 'love at first sight' cliché smack em in the face. I think Ace would just about manage stumble out an introduction. Law, I think would get stuck trying to figure out if he's hallucinating. You decide! Hope this is a fun ask ^_^ X

a/n: it was very fun. i hope this is alright and you enjoy to read it! i kind of changed it up a bit... thank you for requesting <3 

or... Law and Ace experience Love At First Sight. 

Law

There weren’t many times in his life where Law felt completely und utterly calm. He was easily lost in the fast dynamic of the life as a pirate and sometimes he just felt comfortable in it. But there was nothing more relaxing than spending time in a library, he was sure of it.

He lets his grey eyes gaze through the countless backsides of the leather books, the shelf reaching meters above his head and again, he felt a wave of calmness embrace him. Law grabs one of the massive books in front of him, sighing at the faint smell of old ink that surrounds him and starts to waver through the pages as his feet start to walk along the hardwood floor, the shelfs creating a dimension close to a labyrinth. It doesn’t take long for him to reach the end of the way and when he looks up from the words written on the paper, he sees the reflection of himself in the window in front of him. Before he can continue, however, he notices a small movement in what he thought was an empty library.

Law huffs and turns around as the movement begins to come closer and before he can flee into the next path of shelfs, a soft hand touches the side of his dark blue sweater.

“Excuse me,” he hears you mumble and even though he would have considered any other noise a waste of his hearing sense, he can’t help but notice how warm and fitting the two words carry themselves between the silence of the room. “Can I ask you a question?”

The pirate stays silent. He even stays frozen, thinking that if he doesn’t react, you will leave. But when you don’t, he finally turns himself around and looks at the person still gripping the side of his sweater. He lets the book in his other hand shut close, mostly for dramatic purposes, and raises an eyebrow when he finds your face standing in front of him.

You stand there with your big eyes, lashes curled up towards him and rosy lips opened slightly as you study his face the same moment he studies yours. His eyes have a darkish colour around them, the black hair on his head is hidden underneath a soft looking black and white hat and for a moment, you think he looks a bit taken aback. You clutch your own book, hands looking tiny compared to the size of leather. Your figure is hidden underneath an oversized sweater, the skin on your cheeks painted a soft colour and it takes a moment for the pirate to understand your whole being. What is someone like you doing here all alone? And why did you talk to him?

“Did those hurt?” You whisper after you receive no answer to your previous question and meaningly look down at his tattooed knuckles gripping the leather of the book. When you look back up again, he can see your eyes glinting and the breath gets stuck in his throat.

His body is not reacting towards him anymore.

Law’s fingertips twitch as he feels your eyes gazing down on them again. He must be paralysed. A nerve being stuck somewhere in his body and causing him to freeze in his movement. But his heart thumps against his ribcage fast, nervously and for some reason, excitedly. Law wonders if you can hear it, but from the way you patiently look up to him he doesn’t think you do, or at least, you hide it well enough. Is he having a heart attack?

“Do you ask every stranger you don’t know questions like that?” His voice is breathier then it should be, he notes. But you don’t notice as you softly turn your head to the side, a strand of hair now falling in front of your eyes. Law wants to tuck it behind your ear and, as if finally coming back to his senses, stares at the floor in surprise when he catches himself thinking those exact thoughts. What even is going on with him?

“Only those that have death tattooed on their knuckles.” You giggle softly, still trying to stay quiet in the library. Law feels his heart tugging when he hears the sound and without noticing, the corners of his mouth rise. He pushes against them. “So, did it?”

They did hurt, he thinks. “I don’t like sharing my secrets with people whose name I don’t know.” He answers and wonders if he is scaring you off with his words. Should he say something else? Probably.

To his surprise, you smile. A soft, warm and, Law notes yet again, addicting smile. He could look at your smile for the rest of the day. The rest of his life. For eternity. Is he okay?

“Y/N.” You introduce yourself and he catches himself thinking how much the name fits you. As he introduces himself, he wonders if he is being tricked. Maybe the smell of the library is the smell of a drug that makes him hallucinate and the person he sees is not more than an illusion. Maybe you’re not real. Maybe, Law thinks, the calmness he felt when he walked into the library was the effect of you and you are the drug. What Devil Fruit do you have? Is he going to die? Maybe he should room himself out of the window.

You push your hand out. “It’s nice meeting you, Law.”

He takes your hand in his. He nods.

You’re real. Your skin is soft against his and even though he tries not to, his eyes glance down to your hand - especially the way it fits into his. It is tiny compared to his. Law wonders if you get easily cold in winter. Your hand would fit into his pocket. He could keep you warm.

“Will you tell me about your secrets now?” You mutter in soft delight after your hands part. Law sighs.

Whatever you did to him, whatever spell you cast on him or whatever Devil Fruit you used to make him feel the way he does, he can’t ignore it. There is something about the way you stand in front of him, next to the dark window in the middle of the silent library, that pulls him towards you in ways he can’t explain. Even with his years of studying and learning all about the ways of a human – he doesn’t think that even the best doctor could explain what is going on inside of him. All he does know, however, is that he can’t turn around now.

Even if he wanted to, his feet couldn’t turn themselves away from you anyways and as you smile up to him, he knows he would maybe not share all of his secrets with you, but hell, he sure will give you the chance to.

Ace

“Aw, come on! I was just playing with you!” Thatch babbled happily into the round of men, glossy eyes squeezed shut. The beer in his left hand was swinging to the beat of the music box across the pub they were currently sitting in and Ace knew, the night was going to be long. With a shake of his own head, he gets up, an amused smile gracing his freckled features.

 “You’re an idiot.”

“I might be, but damn-” His hand smacks onto the table, causing some liquid to spill from the glass. “I do make some mean Pasta, though!” His words cause the wave of men to cheer loudly into the night and even making some people that are across the room snicker.

“This must be my cue then.” Ace whispers to himself, patting the top of his empty stomach. He looks to the side and sees some people sitting on the stools of the bar, munching away on their plates of, what Ace thinks, is amazing looking food. Must be the locals. He shrugs and walks across the wooden floor. The stool squeaks with Ace’s weight on top of it and with every glance he takes to the sides, another round of soft squeaks erupt from the furniture.

Even though there are plenty of people sitting and eating, Ace doesn’t see one waiter or waitress across the room. He can hear the ding from the kitchen, announcing the dish to be ready and causing another wave of delicious aroma to swift through the opening. With a frown on his features, his stomach rumbles.

„Hello?“ Ace calls out, propping himself up on both of his elbows. „I’m starving.“

„One, ugh… second!“ An undefinable voice answers. 

The second division commander looks around, but much to his confusion - there is no staff around. From the corner of his eye, he takes a glance at the old man next to him, who happily eats his chicken, wondering if he was making fun of him. But when he continues to munch on the meat without casting a glance at the dark haired man, he shrugs. „Are you a spirit calling out to me?“

There’s silence. Then a soft female giggle. Something is pulling in his tummy at the sound. With a soft smile that quickly turns into a frown, he notes that he needs to eat. Soon.

„Are you calling me dead?“ The voice calls out and now Ace can locate the sound from underneath the bar, directly in front of him.

„Well,“ Ace smirks, leaning across the wood to take a glance at the figure. There is someone crouching there, cleaning up something that looks like a broken plate of food. „I am calling to someone who I can’t see, so I will let you decide whatever you are.“ Hair is covering the figure’s eyes and without noticing, Ace is taking glances at different angles, hoping to see a hint of the colour gracing your orbs. But you’re making it hard for him, moving around quickly with, he leg starts to jump, a smile? Are you smiling because of your small conversation? He leans back, tapping the wood with his fingertips impatiently. He’s curious now.

„If that’s the case,“ you say then, jumping up from your position and tapping your hands against the denim of your jeans, searching for a pen and a piece of paper. „I want to be something cool and since that is a heavy decision to make— I will think about what I choose to be.“ You giggle again. Something is pulling in his heart again. „Anyways, you said you were starving. What can I get for you?“ And then you finally look up to the male sitting in front of the bar.

Your eyes are bright, glimmering with something that he can only describe as a summer night. Your hair is shining healthily with every small you step you take and when the pen falls from your hand, you turn long enough for him to see the curl of your eyelashes in the light. You look like a masterpiece. And fuck, are you even real?

His brows are furrowing. No answer.

„Hello?“ It’s you asking again. He can see your facial expression shifting and you look as confused as you are amused. Fuck, he’s staring, isn’t he?  „What can I get for you?“ You repeat, voice laced with a hint more than just amusement.

You take a glance at him and then back to your empty paper and it seems like slow motion. Everything is slow for him, the way your eyelids drop to the way the corners of your mouth quirk with every second that passes. He imagines the way your hair blows in the wind, the way you’d tuck it behind your ear gracefully, the way the light shines at your profile — what if he woke up beside you? What would you sound like, all sleepy? His heart jumps.  What he wants? He gulps.

Your heart, please.

„Uh.“ Ace looks to the side and feels his cheeks flaming up. „I don’t know.“ He’s mumbling.

He doesn’t know? Ace wants to smack himself across the forehead, but he opts to squeezing his eyes. He can be lucky that no one is caring about him at the moment. If any of his mates saw how he’s behaving, they would clown him for eternity. He needs to gain his senses back.

„Hey,“ you whisper then and lean a bit across the bar, causing some of your perfume to hit his nostrils. He sighs out. You smell like flowers. A sweet, floral smell. Of course you smell like spring. „Are you okay?“ And now you’re concerned about him too? „You’re kind of red. Are you getting enough air?“ You wet your lips with one soft brush of your tongue, his eyes following the muscle as if hypnotised.

„I haven’t decided yet.“ He then says. „I need to think about it.“

You’re probably thinking he lost it.

There are only three types of dishes you can get at a pub like this and even though you and him both know that pirates like him usually go straight for the meat, you just politely nod your head and put the pen back into your back pocket. „Take all the time you need.“ You laugh and now he feels his tummy erupting into something concerning. Either his body is warning him of starvation or he just felt butterflies in his stomach. Ace huffs out, it certainly feels like a whole zoo, not just some damn butterflies.

„Call me whenever you’re ready. I’m Y/N.“

Y/N. He whispers your name quietly, liking the way it sounds on his lips.

And then you turn your back and grab the dish that was the cause of the ding from earlier. With another smile towards him, you leave and let him be.

„Fuck.“ He lets his head fall back into his hands and lets out another frustrated huff. „What a fucking fool you are!“

„Truly.“ The old man next to him suddenly says and takes a sip from his beer, startling the pirate for a second. „I think you caught it, young man.“ And then he laughs, pulls out some money and lays it next to his plate. „Better make it worth it.“

Ace turns his head and watches your figure now standing in front of Thatch and the rest of the group, writing down things quickly. He can hear the way his mates chant for more beer and for one second even, he’s jealous at them for having your attention.

His heart is throbbing. Ace turns around again and sees his reflection in the glass in front of him. He needs to get to know you better. And if that is the last thing he does.

„So, freckles. Decided yet?“ You sing song as you walk up to the counter again, calling out some things to the cook in the back.

Ace takes a breath. „Yeah.“

„So, what would you like to have?“

„You.“

[saltlordofold]

Tumblr ate the ask  because of course it did but a good while ago @ma-suranas prompted me with number 50 from this great list of cliché tropes and prompts by @bucky-plums-barnes : “ I’m scared but won’t admit it so you take my hand,” for Alistair and Aedan.

I went a bit all over the place with this but it’s been so long since I posted any writing, i thought this was a good time to get it out at last XD Thank you for the prompt!!! 

Characters: mainly Alistair and Aedan Cousland (oc), rest of party briefly featured (Wynne, Zevran, Leliana, Morrigan, Shale, Sten, Oghren)

Pairing: (Unresolved pining) Alistair/Aedan

Raiting: G

Warnings: Pining, Unresolved emotional tension, claustrophobia, scotophobia

Words: 2007

>Read on Ao3

Alistair had no clue what it was that caused the carved vault to collapse. It could have been anything, really: a shift of the terrain, a sudden whim the many miles of rock and dirt above their heads, a trap laid by the Spawn, or even simply, for all he knew, the sound of their footsteps, heavy with armour and supplies, echoing too loudly against the stone corridors of a dwarven thaig left so silent and still for so long. Not that the why mattered much: all that Alistair had needed to know was how, with just a dusting of warning pebbles and a long, worrisome groan of stone, a whole section of the ceiling had come down in one swift, murderous go, and it was all Aedan and him could do but to pull each other out of the way of the deadly weight plummeting down.

Gravel drummed and trickled down the back of Alistair's armour. The air was full of a fine-grained dust that left a trail of fire down his throat at every inhale, forcing him into a painful coughing fit. Under him, Aedan seemed to be in no better condition, because his voice sounded more a rasp when he grabbed Alistair's shoulder and asked, between two hacks of his own:

“Are you hurt?”

Alistair wanted to say something like “what do you think?” and “you're asking me?”but after counting, he was pretty sure he could feel all his limbs, which was enough to warrant a mumbled “'think so” instead. Alarm rung loud in his ears, a dangerous buzz, and in an effort to not give in to it, Alistair forced himself to push up, which he managed more than precariously. Still, Aedan didn't turn down his offered hand to help him do the same, and as soon as he was standing, the Warden was already stumbling to the wall of rock that now closed off the corridor they'd just been walking.

“Zevran?” Aedan called, with as much breath as he could manage, “Wynne?”

The second that followed felt as frozen to Alistair as the sweat pooled down his back. In the trembling flame of their weakened torch, half-buried under rocks on the ground, he could see the worry on Aedan's dirt-plastered face, and there was no doubt in his mind that he wore the exact same expression on his own.

But the crease between Aedan's brows soothed down at once when friendly voices mercifully started answering from behind the wall of rubble.  

“We're all fine, here,” Wynne's voice carried first, “Are you boys?”

Aedan dipped his head in relief, hand resting against one of the largest rocks. Somewhere behind it, Dog was barking, distant and muffled.

“Yes!” Aedan replied, while Alistair closed his eyes for a second, letting relief wash over him too,  “Yes, we're alright, both of us. Maker be thanked.”

The corner of Aedan's mouth tugged upwards at the sound of Zevran's voice.

“So much for fine dwarven stonework,” the elf jabbed, from behind what felt like meters of rock.

Oghren's answer soon followed, short of both breath and patience, to deliver the curt yet eloquent response of:

“Sod off, elf.”

Ever the good sport, Zevran did not seem to take too badly to the blunt answer.

“Would that I could, my friend,” he simply said, “but sadly it seems my way to do so has become quite impracticable, has it not?”

“Would you both shut it?” Morrigan sneered, “Just for once? My head is hurting enough as it is without you jabbering in my ear.”

“Maker,” Leliana said, very purposefully cutting the bickering off before it could spread, “What a mess. It'll take a while to move all this rubble...”

Sten's voice sounded as stern and level as always, as if pounds over pounds of deadly rock hadn't just come close to sealing them all into an unmarked tomb.

“Not if the Golem puts her back to it.”

“The Golem has a name,” Shale drily reminded, “not that it cares much for it.”

Oh, they were all alive and well alright. Alistair would have managed in a quip of his own, but Aedan urgently cut him off.

“Don't!” he shouted, “Don't try to dig through. We don't know how sound the tunnel is, displacing the rubble could bring it all down again.”

A sullen silence followed that realization, and Aedan wiped a hand down his face, grimacing and blinking away the dust best he could.

“Walk back to the crossroads and wait for us there,” he instructed, “We'll find a way around.”

“Are you sure?” Wynne asked, “You might get lost.”

Aedan glanced Alistair's way, who returned an uncertain wince. He remembered the way, sort of? They were leaving a Thaig, and he was pretty certain there had been more than one tunnel connecting it to the main Deep Road. If they managed to find one such way, they could meet with the rest of their party there. Granted they found it too, of course. And made it there safely. Given where they were, and in what sort of company, that was everything but guaranteed.

Overall, not much of a sound bet, but the only bet they had, nonetheless.

“We'll be fine.” Aedan said, managing to sound sure of it, somehow, “Hurry back, now, and stick together. It's dangerous to linger here.”

“Very well,” Zevran said, “But don't be too long.”

He had to keep his voice raised to be heard through the collapse, but Alistair still heard it soften as he added:

“Or I'll have to come look for you.”

The light was growing too dim for Alistair to discern the exact expression on Aedan's face from where he stood, but the hint of a smile was easy to hear in his reply.

“Understood.”

Slowly, the rustle of footsteps and Dog's worried barks subdued, leaving behind only silence, and Alistair knelt down to recover their torch. Ever so carefully, he picked it up, making sure to hold it angled just so it would keep burning best it could. Which wasn't well, but still a lot better than not at all.

“I don't like them alone,” Aedan said, quieter now that they were the only two left, and without a mount of rock to shout over, “They can't sense them coming.”

Aedan often confessed things to him as such, Alistair had noticed. Low, when it was just the two of them, out of reach of the others' ears. Granted, it was rarely under such extreme circumstances, but it had happened more than once. Worries. Questions. Doubts he wouldn't share with the others.  

For the life of him, Alistair couldn't understand why Aedan would want to do that with him, who so rarely had a smart answer to supply.

“Even if they don't, there's more than enough of them to hold against Spawn, should any show,” Alistair still tried, doing his best to sound reassuring, “They'll be fine. They can handle themselves.”

After a moment, Aedan sighed.

“You're right,” he said, a sentence that Alistair only wished he could say as well about himself, and with as much conviction, at least once in his life.

The torch finally recovered some health, making it safer for Alistair to hold it straight. Without the flame of the others' beacons, though, and the eerie glow of Shale's crystals and Morrigan's and Wynne's staves, the light didn't reach to much more than a few arms around them.

After it, there was pitch black, total darkness. Alistair tore his gaze from it to focus it on Aedan instead, who had come closer. Much closer, actually. The bubble of light was faint and tight enough around them that if they wanted to see clearly, they had no choice but to practically brush shoulders under it. Alistair could count the specks of dust caught in Aedan's lashes, as the man rustled beside him, still blinking out dirt as he tightened a loosened fastenings on his belt.

“Bloody Void,” Aedan muttered under-breath, “I hate this place.”

Despite the circumstances, and having to refrain the urge to brush away the small rocks he could see stuck in Aedan's curls, Alistair couldn't help but scoff.

“You steal the words right out of my mouth,” he said.

Mouth which was still full of dust, he realised, and grimaced at the unpleasant taste and crunch of dirt under his teeth. Luckily they had some water with them, and Alistair reached for it. They would be wise to save it, just in case, but a sip to wash the taste away couldn't hurt.

“Good thinking,” Aedan said, grateful for the offered flask.

They sipped in silence. Slowly but steadily, the weight of the situation was starting to fall on Alistair's mind, an uncomfortable blanket, clinging to his shoulder like a wet cloak: Maker, but this could have been it. They could have died, right there and then, crushed by the mountain in less then the blink of an eye. It was a miracle they hadn't, really.

“It could have ended like that,” Aedan said, as if reading his mind.

His look was to the distance, his voice quiet.

“The lot of us, under rubble.”

Alistair swallowed hard. His ears still rang from the noise of the collapse, he realized. In the silence, the high-pitched whistle felt painfully loud. Despite the torch, the darkness around them seemed to inch closer.

That would have been the last thing they saw, wouldn't it? Darkness, and then nothing but more of it. And then nothing at all, eventually.

“Yes,” was all he found in him to say, “It could have.”

Shaking himself, Aedan breathed in deep, and landed a hard pat on Alistair's back. He even managed to throw him a hint of his usual grin, which gleamed fleetingly in the flickering light of the torch.

“But it hasn't,” he said firmly, “So let's keep at it.”

Adjusting the shield on his back and the sword to his side, he started in the direction they had come from.

“Come on, let's hurry around,” he said, walking off at his brisk pace, “We're not much safer here ourselves.”

Walking off. Into darkness. Just a few steps away from Alistair, and the wall of shadow had already started to swallow Aedan away, licking past his shoulder like the surface of deep, dangerous waters.

“Don't!”

Alistair had moved before even realizing it, and his voice had rung far too loud in the enclosed space of the corridor. He winced, embarrassed.

“Stay close,” he said, quieter.

His hand had grabbed Aedan's forearm, without him meaning for it to do so, but rather than letting go like he should have, Alistair tightened his hold instead.

“I can barely feel you on most days,” he whispered, “so with this all Corruption around us...If you wander off, or if this torch goes out, I might not be able to find you anymore.”

And that terrifies me, he thought, but did not say aloud. All at once the idea of that dense, cold shadow engulfing Aedan and leaving the both of them wandering, alone and lost, in those cursed tunnels, had sent shivers down Alistair's back that even shame wouldn't let him hold back.

“Right,” Aedan said, “Of course.”

Alistair fully expected him to step back, but instead, he raised his armored hand, and firmly landed it on Alistair's.

“Let's stick together,” he agreed, “It's safer this way.”

Alistair could only nod back.

Soon the small, dark tunnel would give in to a larger corridor. The faint gleam of deep mushrooms, exposed lyrium veins, as well as a a few surface rays, expertly-guided to the Thaig's hall by the Dwarves' engineering, would allow them to see clear enough to let go of each other and walk normally side by side.

But as they did, and even, much later on, as they finally joined back with the rest of their party, Alistair could not shake from his head - just like he couldn't shake the ringing from his ears - the firm touch of Aedan's hand holding his back.

[fae-fucker]

Review: The Songbird’s Refrain

by Jillian Maria

When a mysterious show arrives in town, seventeen-year-old Elizabeth Brighton is both intrigued and unsettled. But none of the acts capture her attention quite like the blue-eyed woman. Locked in a birdcage and covered in feathers, the anguish in her voice sounds just a little too real to be an act—because it isn’t. The show’s owner, a sadistic witch known only as the Mistress, is holding her captive. And she’s chosen Elizabeth as her next victim. After watching the blue-eyed woman die, Elizabeth is placed under the same curse. She clings to what little hope she can find in the words of a fortune teller and in her own strange dreams. The more she learns, the more she suspects that the Mistress isn’t as invulnerable as she appears. But time is against her, and every feather that sprouts brings her closer to meeting the blue-eyed woman’s fate. Can Elizabeth unlock the secret to flying free, or will the Mistress’s curse kill her and cage its next victim?

Full disclosure without the fancy wording: Jillian straight up gave me a free copy of this book, and I’ve followed the development of this novel since pretty early on because it sounded like it was My Jam. Spoilers: it was, but that doesn’t mean I won’t be honest with my opinions! With that said: Jillian, don’t read this. And also, holy shit congrats on writing a book, we stan!! <3 But seriously, don’t.

This review contains vague character spoilers to serve as examples. No names are mentioned.

The Writing

Having read a couple of early versions of the first chapters of this book, I can’t express enough how amazing it is to read it in its final form, how far it has come from the days when an early draft was posted on a tumblr page which the author coded herself. That’s not to say the early versions of it were bad, but I don’t want to undermine and deny how far it has come and how polished it is.

As you all know, I’m not a huge fan of overly flowery prose because it often takes me out of the experience, and luckily, I can’t remember a single time I thought something was overwritten or took me out of the story. 

The writing is evocative without being flashy and Elizabeth has a clear, wonderful voice that feels fresh and easy and intimate at once. The dialogue feels natural and I’m honestly impressed with how characters rarely swear despite being in terrible situations, and how it never felt like a copout or like the author was censoring herself for the YA age range. 

Probably a weird thing to point out, but my characters swear constantly and I have no idea how to stop them from doing that without making it very silly, so props to the author for succeeding where I would definitely fail. 

The Characters

Oh my what a smörgåsbord of fun people! I won’t dwell too much on this section because the mystery is very much tied deeply into the characters themselves, and I don’t want to spoil things before the book is even out.

Elizabeth is a bean. She’s self-aware and relatable without losing her own individuality in the process. I hated seeing her suffer but loved watching her grow stronger through it. She has standards and opinions yet she doubts herself on nearly every step and all I wanted to do was to reach through the pages and give her a slap and go GIRL, YOU A STAR. She’s what a YA protagonist should be, in my humble onion. My only complaint would probably be that she’s a bit too self-aware for a reglier teenager, but it makes sense for the story and the premise and the growth she goes through, so I don’t think it’s something that ruins her in any capacity. Maybe she’s just way more clever than I was at 17, lmao. 

The Mistress. What can I say without saying too much? Man, what a villain! Like, damn! Yes! Gurl! Yes! Terrifying! I hate her absolute guts! Every time she was in a scene I wanted to crawl under a blanket and bring Elizabeth with me to protecc her. This woman’s aesthetic and evil-ness rivals a Disney villain, and like, not in a bad way, but in the best way. The panache with which she does all her evil shit is just *chef kiss* I wanted to do violence to this woman but I knew if I’d existed in this story she’d absolutely destroy me if I looked at her wrong, and I think that’s what my ideal villain archetype is. The Mistress is deliciously, stylishly evil. You read the book half because you want Elizabeth to win, and half because you want, nay, NEED to see the Mistress lose. Some might say they need a villain to be more complex or whatever, but I’m firmly in the “evil people exist and evil antagonists are fun to write if you do it properly” camp, and here it’s done properly, IMHO. The Mistress doesn’t need a sad backstory or a complex motivation to be an effective, intimidating, and interesting antagonist. 

I also really liked Madame Selene. At first I found her to be kind of cliché as a mystical fortune teller, but there’s actually a very interesting spin on that trope in her character, and I found her to be endlessly interesting as a result of it. I can’t say much more without further spoilers, but let’s just say there’s a reason she’s all cryptic and weird and refuses to speak plainly. My biggest gripe is that she didn’t get as much screentime as I wanted. I just need more of Madame Selene.

I honestly can’t say I found any of the other side characters to be lacking (even Bridget, whomst I need to strangle, was fun to hate), but I will say that my favorites were definitely one of the couples. The older one especially.

I will also repeat that I love Elizabeth. Very much. I love Elizabeth twice. Ahem.

Anyway, special mention should be made that the cast is quite diverse despite being fairly small. I didn’t expect anything less from Jillian, of course, but I just wanted to point it out for those who had doubts. 

The Negatives and the Mehgatives

Because oh yes, it ain’t a review by Eff if they don’t complain about shit.

Now, some of these are things that aren’t necessarily bad, but others did feel like they were in the way of making this book as good as it could be. I usually split my reviews further up into “worldbuilding” and “plot”, but since I don’t feel like I have enough to say about those to justify their own sections, I’ve decided to just throw them in here. 

The worldbuilding is sparse, and that’s fine for this genre and this specific story. It plays out (mostly) in the reglier world with sort of reglier people, so I wasn’t expecting Tolkien levels of depth going in (in fact I find Tolkien levels of depth to not be necessary more than half the time but that’s another discussion). I got glimpses of some very interesting things that I’d very much like to see more of, but it feels more like stuff that would fit an “extended universe” sort of series and the lack of more supernatural/unique elements felt fine and didn’t really bother me.

Now to the less than good stuff. As much as I enjoyed the progression of the plot and Elizabeth’s character, and the steady flow of hints and developments felt elegant, I did feel like the mystery was a little bit predictable, and the foreshadowing a bit on the nose, especially in the very beginning. (Elizabeth’s shoulder scar was mentioned probably half a dozen times more than necessary.)

For example (mild spoilers, skip to next paragraph if you want to avoid), there’s a section where a character is taken away and Elizabeth hears them scream. After that, she keeps mentioning how that character is definitely, 100% dead, there’s no way they survived, they’re totally a corpse now, someone dig a hole and find a coffin. I thought it made sense for Elizabeth to feel fear and grief and assume the worst, so I’m not as bothered by it as I would’ve been in a worse book, but it did feel a bit like she was trying to convince the reader more than like she was mourning.

The foreshadowing being on the nose and the mystery being predictable are sort of intertwined, and I think it’s probably the book’s biggest flaw? That said, if you don’t consider yourself super savvy with writing and storytelling techniques, you might not pick up on this stuff at all. I also liked the plot despite finding it predictable, so if you’re not really interested in a super complex mystery but are interested in a good story, you’ll probably find this intriguing enough. 

The second biggest flaw of the book is the ending, in my opinion. It felt a bit rushed, and I would’ve liked to see side characters tied up as neatly as the plot itself. Not ... in a sexy way, yikes. I mean their arcs and stuff. There’s one in particular I felt was lacking, where I would’ve wanted to see more of a reaction and conclusion to something terrible that happened before. The character in question was pretty important during the whole middle of the book, and in the end they’re just sort of glossed over and exit the narrative, literally. The ending is supposed to be sort of open, I think, so I can respect that, but it could’ve been open while still feeling complete, ya know?

And the romance ... Well, let’s move on to the next bit, shall we? 

The Gay

Full disclosure: I’m straight. Well, that’s the word I use, and some might disagree with it because I’m nonbinary and say my attraction to men would make me “queer”. But that’s the word I use for my general thing, not my sexuality specifically.

ANYWAY. This is all fluff that I’m using to ease you into the real point: I’m, like, not into reading wlw romance. Or mlm romance. At all? I’m not against it by any means, go wild my dudes, and I hate 90% of all “straight” romances because straight people largely can’t write love for shit.

I’m saying this because I think there’s a lot of fellow straighties out there thinking they’ll be made “uncomfortable” by the gays or that it’ll make them question their sexuality and stuff. And 1) lmao cowards 2) I get it, it feels “”””weird”””” and you don’t relate but like 3) stop being a lil bitch and open your mind.

If you’re a straighty and you’re curious about this book but think that the lady-kissing is spookie, I’m here to inform you that yeah, romantic love between women is heavily, and I mean heavily, tied into the main plot. But it’s not really a book about homosexuality or homophobia. It feels natural, and normal, and is never made out to be a Thing, except when Elizabeth speculates about her parents’ reactions to her coming out. It’s not a book about TEH GAYS specifically, it’s a book about love, that just happens to be between women. If you can accept that and go into it with an open mind, like I did because I am Very Woke, I think you’ll find a new appreciation and perspective for romances that aren’t straight.

Now, back to the actual book. The romance in TSR is frustrating to me because one of them is amazing, so amazing that even I, a filthy man-lover, found it melting my heart. It’s lovely, it’s beautifully written, it’s got a gorgeous aesthetic and an excellent pairing with plenty of warm and fluffy chemistry without shying away from their sexuality. I loved this relationship and I wish there was a book just about these two ladies. It’s honestly #romancegoals. 

The second one is ... not that. It felt sort of rushed and like it was constantly trying to justify itself. It wasn’t instalove, but it also sort of was? I can’t explain it without spoiling so you’ll have to read it for yourself. It could have something to do with the fact that the other couple are teenagers and the previous one are adults so their relationship felt more mature and established, but both get roughly the same amount of screen time and I’m quite frankly baffled by how differently they’re handled.

Given how dark and honest and real most of this book was (despite the magic stuff), it felt really jarring to have the second romance be so empty.

To its credit, I was very much rooting for the teen couple. I even imagined how they’d meet up and fight the villain together. If their ending had been just a little bit more open (as opposed to the general ending, which I wanted to be less open lol) and their romance not quite as definitively sealed, I think I would’ve loved it too, because it would’ve fit better with the tone of the rest of the storytelling.

As it stands, I think the different romantic relationships shown in this book are interesting and show off different dynamics and are a good starting point for important conversations baby wlw (and other romantically inclided peeps tbh) might want to have. Yes, even -- and possibly especially -- the abusive ones. 

This story has a lot to say about love and I think it’s important stuff people need to hear nowadays, especially YA audiences.

The Conclusion

If you’re looking for a paranormal YA mystery with a bit of gore thrown in, complete with a lesbian protag and a diverse cast, self-contained and tasty like a very small hamburger, The Songbird’s Refrain is well worth your time. 

It’s got a great romance, an excellent protagonist, an unsettling atmosphere, a fun villain, and a genuinely touching story dealing with important subjects like healthy love, abusive relationships, and self-worth.

If you’re not a fan of one aspect of this book but the rest seems appealing, I think you should go for it and maybe realize as you’re reading that it doesn’t matter that much because the rest of the package deal is excellent.

[azawrites]

11 Questions (Again)

I don’t know why I like it so much, but luckily I was tagged by two more people

questions by @childrenoflight-darkness-nothing, thanks:)

1. What’s your current word count for your WIP? 31683, but I’m planning on getting to 32k by tonight:)  

2. Is there a genre that you absolutely refuse to write? I won’t refuse, but I’m not a strong fantasy writer, not my style..

3. What’s your favourite quote? “Don’t dream it, be it”. It’s from The Rocky Horror Picture Show, which isn’t supposed to be inspirational or anything but it stuck with me.

4. Are there any authors that you look up to for inspiration? I have a friend who is a teen writer, she published her novel a few months ago and she’s only seventeen. It gives me hope I guess.

5. If you could cast anyone to play your MC in a movie adaptation of your WIP who would you pick? I think Billie Eilish fits the physical description of Azalea best but she’s not an actress so Idk?

6. What is your ultimate goal for your WIP? Obviously, I constantly think about huge success and getting a movie adaptation and fans and this shit, but realistically, I would like to publish in the US.

7. When you write do you have a clear picture in your mind of what’s going to happen or does it just come to you as the scene progresses? I have a general idea where I’d like to start and finish a scene, whatever happens in the middle is RANDOM.

8. What inspired your current WIP? Volunteering with young sexually abused girls, really opened my eyes. I felt like I should somehow open the world’s eyes.

9. How do you choose names for your characters? Just whatever fits the aesthetic I guess? For Azalea, I felt like she should be named after a flower, and so I looked for many names (and Rose just didn’t feel right). The other option was Lilach.

10. Would you ever co-write with someone? I’m VERY stubborn and a perfectionist, so I think that even if I’d begin to write with someone, I might lose my shit because I’ll need everything to go perfectly according to my plan.

11. Would you rather live in the world your WIP is set in or our current one? Why? it’s the same one:) Questions from @wordlegacy, thank you:) 1. What made you want to be a writer? Or not, if that’s the case? I don’t really know, I’ve been writing ever since I was five years old. I guess it’s just the fact that there are so many stories at the back of my head that just WON’T LEAVE.

2.  What makes you instantly dislike a main character? Too heroic, I just can’t deal with characters who are too good and have minor flaws. Also, characters with very little personality can annoy me!!

3. What types of romance you love, in fiction? Any romance will do, I’m a sucker for romance novels, I have about thirty in my personal library...

4. What types of romance you hate, in fiction? I guess maybe when one part of the romance does not support the other, and is not happy for them. Also, a perfect relationship can sometimes get on my nerves.

5. What do you think about the popular “show, don’t tell” advice? you do you. Like showing? show. Like telling? tell. Just keep your writing authentic to you, be your own biggest inspiration. There is no right way to write, so just do it.

6. How do you usually outline your stories? Just take my notebook, scrabble the first few lines that come to mind, sketch some characters very quickly. Then I make a short list of the main four or five scenes that I think should happen. After doing that, I go to sleep, possibly dream something inspiring, and then just start writing.

7. What are the clichés or recurrent tropes you just can’t stand anymore? The one girl who is very pretty but doesn’t realize it until a boy tells her so. Also, dumb jerk jocks.

8. How did you choose the title of your current WIP? It’s the MC’s name, and the story surrounds her. There’s also a metaphor about her name (An azalea fading away, getting dried out).

9.  How would you give a negative description of your WIP’s main character? Azalea is very stubborn, yet is very passive. she’s controlled by her feelings and emotions instead of controlling them. Azalea is way too trusting in others and is many times fooled. Furthermore, Azalea is a bit ignorant.

10.  How far along are you with your WIP? Soon writing the last part (where things begin to look up). Hoping to finish the first draft by July.

11. What is your sign and how much do you take Astrology into consideration when it comes to character development? I’m a Libra, but I don’t pay much attention to it in the story. Though I’ve never stated it in the novel, I can figure which signs are my ocs by their personalities. I’d like to tag @ld9-the-draft @shattered-starrs @gypsydraig-thevetstudent @writer-jessicac​ My questions: 1.  What color resonates with your MC the most? 2.  What’s the first thing you remember writing? 3.  Are you a WIP playlist person or a WIP aesthetics person? 4. What’s the most difficult thing about writing characters from the opposite sex? 5.  What’s your favorite type of character to write? 6.  What’s easier for you to write– opening lines or ending lines? 7. If any of your ocs were to write a novel, what genre would it be? 8. Something you learned about yourself in 2019? 9. What do you love about the last book you read? 10. How do you like to begin your stories? 11. What kind of stories do you like to read? How different are they from what you write?

[goldenchildkatsuki]

Could you write a kacchako at the beach drabble?

Thank you so much for waiting!

Summary:  A continuation of ‘Red bike, purple Bellflower’, where Bakugou finally takes Uraraka to the beach.

Writers note: I asked on Tumblr to send a cliché fanfiction trope in my ask box and I would make a decent Kacchako drabble out of it. This is for the ninth ask I received. Someone asked me to write a beach drabble. And man, who would’ve thought I would ever make a sequel to 'Red bike, purple Bellflower’? I didn’t. But I sure enjoyed revisiting this version of Bakugou and Uraraka. This version is so packed with love and adoration and I loved writing it. (see the end for notes)

Word count: 8.292

AO3 link: (x)

WHITE SAND, BLUE RIBBON

“Don’t yawn, you’re making me yawn!”

Uraraka lazily put a hand in front of her mouth and blinked away the tears that were forming in her eyes.

“I can’t help it, it’s so early after all.” She moaned.

It had been a while since she had woken up before noon. Since it had been one of the warmest summers she had ever experienced she started living in the night when it was significantly colder and she didn’t feel sluggish.

After ten is when she came up with most of her ways to enliven her summer. Around the time where people would fold their chairs, get their last drink from their koolbox, switched from flip-flops to slippers and called it a day. Uraraka would lie down on the floor in the hallway, with their house phone on speaker next to her head and talk to Bakugou about all the things she felt like doing. She had been watching a lot of films lately, those ones where teenagers have the most outrageous summers. On one hand, it was comical, how extravagant those summers were. But on the other hand, she wouldn’t have minded being in their place. So it was only natural that most of her ideas were inspired by that.

Bakugou would laugh at her and tell her to lay off the films for a while. But he would still listen to her ramble on and on about them. He sometimes even thought along with her, thinking about if it was possible for them to do something like that, right at that moment. Uraraka would tell him it could be more likely than they thought, Bakugou would keep thinking. And there would always be a moment where he would stay silent for too long and he would suddenly hang up on her.

That’s when she knew she should probably get up and change out of her pajama’s and take a shower because it wouldn’t be long until he would be standing there with his bike laying on the curb. Often he would meet her there having done neither of those things.

“You sure smell great.”

“Oh shut it.”

They would sit down on the front doorstep and Bakugou would tell her his plans. They were less farfetched than hers, but came to close to what she wanted to do and were still fun. Since it would be past Uraraka’s curfew at that time, they were only allowed to go as far only two blocks away from her house. Bakugou could make it work. He had once dragged a shopping cart from someone’s front yard and managed to make it look somewhat like a car. Uraraka would sit in the cart and a paper plate would be her steering wheel. Bakugou pushed her through a drive-through just on the edge of the two-block area, as she squirmed that it was not going to work. Somehow they ended up ‘cruising’ away from the restaurant with two brown bags full of fries. Uraraka could hardly catch her breath.

They would also have water gun fights in her backyard with the sprinklers on and set up a hammock in between street signs and talk for hours on end.

Bakugou didn’t have a curfew, she thinks. Regardless of that he always ended up staying by her side until all the energy was drained from her body and she was nodding off. He would stay in her street until he saw her bedroom lights go off and then bike home. And the next day they would do the same.

Today, however, Bakugou was at her bedside at 8:30 in the morning. He threw her blankets off her and opened her curtains. Thinking she was getting ambushed she jolted up and jumped out of bed. She groaned as she saw it was just her boyfriend.

Actually, it wasn’t just her boyfriend, it was her boyfriend, in her room, at 8:30 in the morning.

“Oi sleepyhead, get dressed and grab some breakfast, we’re going to the beach today.” He said before quickly kissing her forehead and going downstairs.

Uraraka thought he was somehow joking at first but there they were, on a familiar long road, Bakugou pedaling and Uraraka on the carrier.

“My parents looked really happy to see you again,” Uraraka spoke softly to his back.

Bakugou stopped pedaling for a second and turned his head around. “You think?”

“Couldn’t you tell? They were almost late for work because they couldn’t stop talking to you.”

Bakugou’s cheeks turned pink and he turned back. Though he didn’t want to admit it, he cared a lot about what kind of impression he made on her parents. She thought they were one of the few people Bakugou actually worried about of what they thought of him. Uraraka tried to reassure him that even though they try to scare him with being overprotective, they absolutely adored him. He still found it hard to believe. But it was among those things that he was currently trying to work on.

And it was going well. Three weeks ago Uraraka wouldn’t even have known that Bakugou genuinely felt that way, it would’ve remained a simple guess of hers that would take her all of her might to confirm.

Uraraka hugged his waist tighter and mushed her cheek against his back.

“They love you.”

“Sure.”

“They really do.”

The boy leaned forward and picked up the pace. They had been on their way for only half an hour or so, maybe a bit longer? She thought they already passed the city sign at least. They had quite the journey ahead of them, therefore the early departure. Bakugou had properly planned the trip this time, unlike the first attempt to reach the beach by bike. He went out of his way to make them lunch, bring his own money along with the beach supplies they once bought. He knew the way and it knew exactly how long it would take them to reach the beach,

Three hours by bike to be exact.

However, it didn’t take a lot of Bakugou to calm Uraraka down when she heard that. The pillow on the carrier and the promise that they would take many breaks during the trip was all it took. She still felt slightly bad about Bakugou biking the entire way. Offering to switch was not an option since the boy had too much pride and was the most stubborn person she had ever encountered. So Uraraka decided that when they got to the beach, she would make sure they would have the best day the possibly could have. That wasn’t hard since she had waited for this day the entire summer. Heck, she even dreamed about this day.

“How are things with your parents?” Uraraka asked as she slowly blinked.

“They haven’t seen your round face in a while so they can’t shut up about you. Especially the old hag, she misses you a lot.”

“I should stop sleeping in so much.”

“You definitely should. I can’t have you falling asleep right now or else I’m going to be so fucking bored.” Bakugou scoffed.

Uraraka doubted Bakugou could get bored if she fell asleep. She might have thought that since she was getting close to dozing off and didn’t want to feel bad about doing so, but there was also no way he could get bored riding the long and empty road. The atmosphere felt grand to her, the silence wasn’t deafening but it was peaceful, the scenery wasn’t annoyingly repetitive but a very welcomed sight. She thought it was almost impossible for him to not feel what she felt.

And if for some reason it was. Then her presence should be enough. It had proven to be many times.

She placed her hands on Bakugou’s lower back and began to graze her fingernails along and across it slowly, to make up for her nodding off in a small moment from now. He adjusted and leaned into her touch. If they were anywhere else he would’ve been sleeping as well, in a matter of seconds. The longer Uraraka went on the slower their pace became.

She hoped Bakugou’s eyes weren’t closing like hers were. Her fingers started to droop of his lower back and slid to the end of his shirt, which she loosely clung onto. Her body let itself give in to the tiredness and with all of her weight, she leaned against Bakugou. She felt his muscles move beneath her cheeks, stretching and loosening themselves. The tempo and the rhythm lulling her to sleep.

Uraraka didn’t manage to rest her eyes for long. Bakugou had been leaning in all different directions and holding onto her every time she shifted, trying to make sure she wouldn’t summersault of the back of the bike. Causing her to be in a light state of sleep for the majority of the time, waking up every few minutes or so, and jerking because she kept forgetting where she was.

Her boyfriend cursed under his breath and mumbled to himself to keep himself entertained. After some time he seemed to be at a loss for words, last syllables of his words were spoken inaudibly. That’s when she decided to force herself to wake up. As she moved into sitting upwards Bakugou pulled at her shirt. Quickly she pinched his sides and tried to look over his shoulder.

“I’m awake.”

“Good, I was about to wake you up anyways.”

Her eyes had to get used to the sun that was getting higher and chattering started to fill her ears. Looking around she saw a scenery she was familiar with and had a good idea of where their first break was going to be. The town was quite lively for this time a day, many had decided to run their errands and get together early in the day.

It felt like she hadn’t moved a mile. Like she was still at home. She had no idea a place other than her house could make her feel that way. Maybe it was because of Bakugou. Maybe it was because she was convinced that she fitted in here. Not just her as a person, but her dreams, fantasies and ideas, her future. They all worked in this town. Something she had never felt back in her hometown. It made sense to be here. Ever since they first rode in.

She tried to explain to Bakugou how she felt, it was hard to translate her feelings into something that wasn’t vague and to give it to him straight because yes, it was strange. She never expected Bakugou to completely understand since he said her thoughts sounded stupid the first time she voiced them. But Uraraka had the feeling he could see where she was coming from, just a little. And maybe he felt the same, just a little.

He was more than happy to bike her to the town whenever she missed it. He didn’t care if they had to travel 13 miles just to grab a bite to eat or go for a walk in the park. Bakugou was fine with whatever. They made a promise after all. They promised to come back at least once but it wouldn’t hurt to come back as often as two, three times a week, right?

As they biked on the broad main road of the town Uraraka had started to recognize people’s faces. And at the way they looked back at her, it made her feel that they recognized her too. What could they be thinking about them? They could be asking themselves if they had perhaps moved here since Uraraka smiled and greeted the locals as if she had.

The short, blonde girl with the colorful bows in her hair was chalking in front of her house again. The woman who’s always carrying too many things has managed to drop a carton of milk right after exiting the supermarket.

Just like she got to know the people, she got to know the town, which wasn’t that difficult considering the size of it. Bakugou and her have inspected pretty much every nook and crevasse of it and now know their way around as if they were born and raised here.

A week and a half ago, they discovered something. Uraraka knew that they were headed there again. As he predicted Bakugou came to a halt in front of an empty plot of land, surrounded by a metal fence. The weeds had started to grow next to the poles of the fence and more sand had been blown onto the sidewalk. Uraraka slid off the carrier and sat down on the ground. Bakugou parked his bike against the fence, went up behind her and unzipped the backpack she had been carrying. Over her head, he handed her a fruit sandwich and a bottle of water and then sat down next to her. Bakugou was barely panting, which was quite remarkable considering all the trouble he went through of getting Uraraka to stay seated on the carrier. He probably didn’t need a break yet. He had biked this distance a lot of times by now and it seemed to get shorter every time.

But he knew Uraraka would’ve asked him to stop by anyways.

He was very hungry though. Devouring his sandwiches in a matter of minutes and chugging down his water as if that was the first drink he had that day.

“Did mom make these?” Uraraka asked.

“Yeah.”

“I thought so. You always put in more strawberries than kiwi’s.”

“Because kiwi is fucking disgusting and should not even be classed as edible.” Bakugou scowled as he glared at Uraraka’s half-eaten sandwich.

Uraraka giggled. “You’re dramatic.”

“And you don’t have working taste buds.” he went through his hair with his hand and scratched the back of his head, where the hair had started to grow back.

Uraraka stayed silent and continued eating, turned around and looked across the empty plot of land. If they were a couple of years older and had a bit of money, this would be theirs. At the border of the town, they would build their home from scratch. And it would look like any other house in the town, it would look like it had always been there. They would have a green front yard and backyard, surrounded by a white picket fence. Undoubtedly that would get broken at some point, and Bakugou would fix it again, give it a new coat of white paint even and it would like nothing ever touched it.

She wanted large windows, Bakugou hated them. Bakugou wanted a garage that fits two cars, Uraraka thought one of them was enough. So they discussed what kind of house they wanted to build on the piece of land. Uraraka would do most of the talking since Bakugou struggled to get his words out. It was quite a sensitive topic after all. By speaking about it they confirmed their bond to last for years and years and that’s not something that rolls of the tongue easily for a person that continues to find it hard to put his emotions into words.

It was fine with her if he mostly listened, and give his opinion when she asked for it.

“If you keep changing your mind I will never be able to fucking finish this you know?”

“I can’t help it!” Uraraka laughed as she playfully bumped her shoulder against Bakugou’s to make his frown disappear.

She could imagine how frustrating it was, to keep erasing and adding new things to the drawings and the blueprints. Bakugou planned to be an architect, and since he didn’t have the patience to wait until he learned about it after he graduated,  he read the books his dad had displayed in the bookcase in his office. Since the day they first talked about the house he started practicing drawing, by using the house they had in mind. It was meant to stay a secret until her birthday came up, but it slipped out when Uraraka changed placing of the windows for the third time, causing Bakugou to lose his mind and reveal her present in anger.

It was the quite possibly the best present she had yet to receive. Uraraka was completely over the moon when Bakugou explained himself. She was eager to see the progress since her boyfriend rarely showed his designs and all she could remember was the scribbles he made when he was a few years younger, and those were not exactly the best of drawings. She also wanted to help, seeing as it was a thing that was essentially theirs. But of course, she wasn’t allowed. It was her present. Uraraka decided to ask her dad, for his books on architecture instead, whilst awkwardly avoiding the exact reason why, and lent them to Bakugou. That was her way of helping.

“Is it actually close to being done?” Uraraka curiously asked.

“Do I look superhuman to you? Of course not! It’s going to take a lot of time before it’s actually done done. When I go to university I’m going to alter it with the shit I learned, make it even better.”

The girl sighed and cupped her own face. “Bummer.”

“Though, it would be done sooner if you would stop changing your damn mind all the time.” Bakugou teased.

“Hey!”

He mischievously grinned as Uraraka glared at him with puffed up pink cheeks. Her face quickly softened which Bakugou’s cheeky smile always managed to do to her. When she broke out in a giggle he started packing up all their stuff and putting it back in Uraraka’s backpack. He offered his hand to help her stand up and she gave the land one more look before walking back to the bike.

The two had one more stop to make before they could leave town and continue their journey. Uraraka felt tingles all over her body as if she laid down in a field of high grass when she saw the purple colored front garden of the old people’s home. What was once merely just a bed was now a small field of bellflowers. Th eyecatchers looked healthy and beautiful and made the white frames of the window really stand out. And to think this was the result of her work.

Today they had put the rocking chair outside and the old lady that had waved at them the first time they passed through the town was smiling from ear to ear the second she heard the rattling of the card in the spokes. Even she looked healthier and more beautiful than usual.

Uraraka jumped off the bike before it came to a stop and rushed to the porch.

“Good morning Suzuki, have you been admiring the garden this morning?”

The woman slowly nodded, closed her eyes and let the sun shine on her face.

“Enjoying the sun as well I see, today is a lovely day after all. Bakugou and I are going to spend it at the beach!” Uraraka looked back at Bakugou who sat waiting on his bike in front of the home.

Suzuki slightly opened her eyes and looked at Bakugou. She slightly opened her mouth and took her hand from underneath her blanket to raise it in greeting. She managed to create a small noise.

Uraraka had come to learn that the woman was mute. When watering the bellflowers one day like she always did when they came to town, a caretaker approached her with Suzuki attached at her arm. The caretaker explained that how Suzuki had been watching the bellflowers get watered and waved at them every time they left, how she wanted to properly meet Uraraka and Bakugou.

Uraraka felt flattered in a way, that a stranger wanted to meet them. After shaking hands with the both of them they sat on the porch and talked for a long time. That day the caretaker translated Suzuki’s sign language for the two kids, the other times Suzuki wrote in her notebook what she wanted to say.

Apparently, Bakugou looked exactly like the boy she fell in love with on her first day of high school, and Uraraka reminded her of her sister, who also admired flowers and plants and whom Suzuki loved very dearly.

Suzuki arranged for Uraraka to have a watering-can, which was much needed since the bellflowers had started to spread and a bottle of water wasn’t enough anymore. She would sit there and watch Uraraka do her thing with the most content smile on her face.

Besides seeing them two, she liked drawing, which she was very good at. She liked cherries, especially cherry jam. She liked old sports cars with pretty bold colors, just like the shiny red of Bakugou’s bike. She liked nature and she wished there were more plants inside of the home. But since a couple of elders reacted badly to them, Suzuki had to admire them from a distance.

Uraraka watched Suzuki take her time to scribble a sentence down in her notebook on her lap.

“Has it really been that long since you’ve been to the beach? Don’t you want to go someday?”

She shook her head and continued writing.

“You can’t imagine leaving this place? Well, I can’t really blame you, especially since the garden is looking so beautiful now!” Uraraka chirped.

She went to the side of the house to fill the water-can to the brim and showered the plants in the cold water. Bakugou walked past her to Suzuki that waved him over, after glancing over the notebook he disappeared inside and came back with another notebook, this one bigger.

The woman beamed and held the book to her chest until Uraraka approached her.

“What’s this?” curiosity gleamed in her eyes as she glanced from back and forth between the two faces in front of her.

“She wants to give something to you,” Bakugou explained.

Suzuki flipped the book open and revealed a beautiful piece of hand-drawn artwork of Uraraka watering the flowers in a sundress and Bakugou leaning against the fence, watching her. It was so accurate it made Uraraka and Bakugou’s jaw drop. The folds in Uraraka’s dress, the expression on Bakugou’s face, all so neatly done it might as well have been a picture.

“My blueprints are like a kid’s drawing compared to this. She’s totally outdone me.” Bakugou mumbled.

Uraraka chuckled and took a hold of the drawing. With her thumb, she stroked over the signature and thanked the elderly woman for her gift. Carefully she handed it back over, explaining that If they would bring it to the beach with them it would get ruined. She promised that she would come and collect it on the way back. Once more she thanked Suzuki and expressed how beautiful the drawing was.

She gave her a hug, told Suzuki she would be back soon and walked with Bakugou back to the bike. Suzuki waved them goodbye as the two continued their journey.

When they biked out of town it was 10:45 and had to travel for another two hours. Bakugou was feeling pretty energized and was boasting about how he could probably cut fifteen minutes of the trip. Uraraka simply hummed after every sentence, her head in the clouds and her thoughts hazy as she kept seeing the drawing in front of her.

It didn’t take long before her boyfriend demanded her full attention. Jokingly swerving around the road to keep her in the moment. She yelped and took a handful of his shirt as he laughed and asked her to at least properly pretend to listen to him. Even though after his antics Uraraka properly listened to him, he kept swerving, to make sure she was.  

He needed to be kissed. He tended to act up when he was touch starved. In moments like this, his craving for her attention seemed endless but all he really wanted was some physical affection. Like a baby that didn’t get too much sleep he could get cranky, or like a playful child, he could act silly. This time he went for the latter and did so in a rather dangerous manner.

So for their safety, and for that reason only. Uraraka practically demanded the boy to stop at the side of the road, went to stand in front of him and kissed the silly out of him. The longer they went on the more annoying the bike in between them was. Uraraka laughed against Bakugou’s lips as he awkwardly tried to step of it and throw it to the side. But before he could trade in ‘silly’ for ‘annoyed with a large amount of lust’ she pulled away.

She stuck her tongue out as Bakugou frowned and went back to her seat. They resumed the journey with Uraraka teasing Bakugou for the cute habit he had and him fully denying that this happened regularly.

‘A stupid coincidence.’

A stupid coincidence that has stopped him from going from one side of the road to the other.

The landscapes started to slightly change and both of them started to question each other if they’ve ever seen something like it. It’s been a while since either of them had been this far out of town and when they were it was by car. They were either sleeping during the journey or not paying attention, so now the teens were ogling at the land, pointing out things that stood out the most to them.

More and more cars started to pass them by and Uraraka’s eyes got itchy from the dust they left behind. Bakugou kept cursing at them, speeding up every time one past them by.

At this rate, it looked like he was truly going to cut the trip short by fifteen minutes.

After the conversations died down, Uraraka asked how many songs it would take them before they got to their destination. ‘Ten or nine songs’, Bakugou answered. And so she kept humming songs from start till finish. She only knew a few songs by heart. After the fourth song, she kept repeating her favorite song at the moment, which happened to be in the soundtrack of her favorite films she ha watched this summer, maybe even her favorite film ever. By the eight time Bakugou softly hummed along with her. He did it so softly she only noticed by the vibrations that went through his back to her arms.

The tenth time Bakugou didn’t hum along since he was busy fighting the steep rocky road they were on. The sun was getting close to it’s highest point and the beach breezes weren’t cool at all. He damned the absurd increase in temperature and the annoying screeching seagulls that were zooming over their heads.

Uraraka started singing, to distract Bakugou from them, to encourage him, hopefully, cheer him up. They were so close after all. So close to the bright blue of the ocean, the jam-packed beach, filled with parasols and towels.

The pedals had to go around just a few times and they would rocket down the hill and be down there in no time.

Two times around, one time around.

And there they went, the bike went so fast Uraraka had to close her eyes. When she blinked her eyes open she met one of the most amazing sights she had ever seen. She wasn’t seeing this on a television screen, she was inside the tv, she was there.

“Finally,” Bakugou said, rubbing the sweat off his chin.

Uraraka jumped off to let him park the bike among the mass of vehicles. Impatiently she hopped from one foot to another when other visitors past her, like her they were all smiles. The second Bakugou turned around she already started skipping towards the beach. As soon as she reached the sand she kicked her flip-flops off and dipped her toes in the sand that was too hot to stand still in.

Before she could sprint as fast as she could into the sea to cool down her toes that felt like they were getting deep fried, Uraraka got tugged back out of the sand by her backpack.

“Fucking hell, don’t go running off like that! I don’t want to spend the day searching the entire beach looking for you.”

“But-!”

“I get you’re excited, but let’s get it together now.”  

He pulled her back once more and threw his arm around her.

“The first one to find an empty spot has to buy the other ice cream,” Bakugou said.

Uraraka jolted and scanned the beach. It looked like it couldn’t be any more full. Like half the country decided to go to the beach today. Just when she was about to give up, she spotted a tiny bit of space between towels and pointed at it. At the same time, Bakugou did.

“A tie!”

“Pink cheeks, I don’t do ties. We’ll have to settle this one later.”

Bakugou kicked his own flip-flops off and together they walked over towels, legs, underneath parasols and avoiding koolboxes to the empty spot. Jumping from foot to foot they unloaded. Uraraka threw down the towels as Bakugou went to pluck out a random parasol to put over their heads. She kicked off her denim shorts and with her fingers, she went underneath and along the lines of her blue and white striped bathing suit. With a loud groan, she fell down on her towel and flung her backpack on her lap. She took out sunglasses and Bakugou’s cap which she put on backwards.

A large shadow cast over her and a shirt got chucked next to her in the sand. Bakugou sat down next to her on his towel and bent over to feel his feet. As he was bent over Uraraka took the opportunity to put sunscreen on him.

The boy was still too exhausted to refuse it like he usually did. For some reason, he didn’t want to admit he wasn’t tougher than the sun and did, in fact, get burned very easily. At least now when they’re laying next to each other tonight he wouldn’t moan and complain about burned areas on his body and she could hug him as tightly as she wanted.

After spending more time than needed on his shoulders, Uraraka went to sit in front of him and raised his face. She went around his nose with her ring fingers, rubbing his cheeks and the bridge of his nose with her thumbs, rubbing the folds of his frown away. The remaining bit of sunscreen she carelessly wiped across his chest and stomach.

Bakugou followed her hands with his eyes when she smeared her arms and legs in, face flushed red from either the heat or her. He looked away to the ocean when she glanced at him.

“Oi.” He suddenly said after a while.

“Hm?” Uraraka replied.

He placed his hand on her neck and pulled her in close. Uraraka’s eyes started darting from his eyes that were focused on her, to their surroundings. She felt her cheeks get even hotter by the sudden display of affection.

He came in closer, slowly shutting his eyes. Quickly she shut hers and waited for the touch.

“The first one in the ocean has to buy the other ice cream.”

“What?”

Uraraka’s eyes shut open, and before she even got another word out he tried to pull her backwards. She pushed his smug face away and tried to stand up, but Bakugou pulled her back by the hips and launched himself off his towel. Uraraka adjusted her hat and ran after him, careful not to kick sand in anyone’s face or get hit in the face by a beach ball. She could see all the annoyed looks Bakugou was getting from a distance. Since all he cared about was replacing the tie with a victory, he didn’t even look twice at all the people that got sand on them because of him.

Uraraka tried to speed up, lifting her knees up higher so her feet wouldn’t get stuck in the heavy sand. She was getting closer to him, she could probably just about pass him where the waves were crashing.

He turned around, started running backwards, that confident he was going to win. Oh, how she couldn’t wait to see his stupid face after her foot first touches the water.

“You better-WAIT!” Uraraka yelled at Bakugou.

Backwards he bulldozered through a sandcastle, completely destroying every tower and almost tripping over the canal.

The girl cursed and went to stand beside Bakugou. Together they stared in silence at a sorry lump of sand.

“…If we go now then…” Bakugou murmured.

He turned around and staring at his legs was a little boy with the most devastated look on his face. With a bucket full of sand in one hand and beach shovel in his other.

“Oh no,” Bakugou whispered.

The kid dropped his utensils and tears started appearing in his eyes. He started sniffling and hiccupping, then he sharply breathed in to belt out one of the loudest cries a kid could make. So loud it could pop eardrums.

Uraraka kneeled down beside him to calm him down but then the tantrum started. He stepped forward to kick Bakugou’s shins and punch his knees, barely getting his words out as he did so. As Bakugou tried to back away from the attack he went to step on the broken castle again, making the kid even more upset.

“Bakugou get off the castle!” Uraraka tried to yell above the screaming.

“Get that tiny gremlin away from me then!”

She went in between the two, dodging kicks and held on to the little boy’s fists. He instantly cut his screaming off and looked at her with wide eyes.

“Can we stop the kicking now please?” Uraraka asked him, making her voice as sweet as her mother’s voice.

The boy pointed at Bakugou. “B-b-but he d-destroyed my sandc-castle!” He hiccupped.

Uraraka dried his face and hushed him as he was about to start crying again.

“It was for the contest. Now I’m definitely going to lose. And I already told mommy I was going to win!”

She looked around the beach and only then noticed that there were surprisingly many sandcastles being built all across the beach. How this one was the only one Bakugou trampled over baffled her.

“We can help you rebuild your sandcastle for the contest if you want?”

“Uraraka!”

“Bakugou!…and I would love to help you if you let us.” Uraraka glared at Bakugou.

The child pulled at the strings of his red swimming shorts and took his time to think it over.

“You can help me, but he can’t. He’ll just ruin it with his big ugly feet!”

Uraraka sensed that Bakugou was close to flying past her and launching the kid into the ocean, so she laughed his comment away.

“He won’t! He’s actually really good at building sand castles. He wants to help to build a lot of things when he’s older. Right Bakugou?”

“Yes.” He gritted his teeth.

“So you’ll be good at helping us, won’t you?” Uraraka asked.

“Sure.”

She smiled at the little boy. “Is that okay with you?”

He nodded.

“So what’s your name little guy?”

“Kaito.”

She took his hand and shook it. “Nice to meet you Kaito! My name is Uraraka Ochako and that’s my boyfriend Bakugou Katsuki.”

Uraraka handed the bucket and the shovel back to him, she stood up and pointed forwards. “We’re going to get first place alright?”

Kaito looked back at what used to be his sandcastle and then back at Uraraka. He pointed his shovel in front of him and smiled.

“Yes! We’re going to win!”

The kid ran closer to the ocean and plopped down, determinedly shoveling wet sand into his bucket.  

Uraraka went over to loosen Bakugou’s crossed arms, she held his hands and stared at him until he turned his face back to her.

“Thank you for being civil.”

“Whatever, let’s build this stupid castle.”

They crouched down and inspected the remains, looking if there was anything they could salvage. But to their disappointment, there really wasn’t. The kid had a good thing going too. Bakugou suggested that they fill up the canals and make the surface flat again for a fresh start. Then he ordered Uraraka to draw a big circle around them, that being the new canals. This might not be exactly how he wanted to spend his day at the beach but if this is what they were doing, he wanted to do it well.

It was a competition after all and since he had all the knowledge about buildings, losing was definitely not an option.

When Kaito collected enough sand he waddled back and told them more about the contest. The competition was for kids ages four to ten and were allowed help from parents. But the child was so determined to do it on his own and impress his mother that he refused her help. They had a little less than three hours before the competition ended and the sandcastles would be judged.

Kaito had a castle in mind that was as large as him, with a lot of towers and a bridge that goes over the canal. He wanted tunnels through the castle and windows to place his little figurines behind. And of course, he wanted the castle to have a flag on top.

As he got excited about his plans, Uraraka saw Bakugou’s facial expression change from bitter to thoughtful. He started pulling his bottom lip, meaning he was actually deep in thought. Before Uraraka could praise Kaito for his wonderful ideas, her boyfriend jumped in and added a few suggestions of his own. He talked about possible additions and adjustments, promising the kid a certain victory if they did it that way.

Using words like ‘bigger’, ‘cooler’ and ‘more awesome’, caught the child’s attention.

So they created a building plan that was still very much Kaito’s but strengthened with Bakugou’s knowledge of architecture.

The way Bakugou spoke about the castle even got her fired up. Uraraka would be lying if she said she hadn’t become almost as excited as Kaito.

“Mr. Bakugou, you really do know a lot about building castles!” Kaito chirped at him as he smoothened a tower.

“Are you going to build a real castle someday? When you become an archimetecturer?”

“Sort of.” He replied.

It made her heart flutter.

The child kept asking Bakugou all sort of questions, now that he had forgiven him and warmed up to him. Chatted his ears off whilst giving him and Uraraka commands. Bakugou replied with short answers, mostly because he hadn’t had many conversations with kids and had no idea what to say. Uraraka could tell he was starting to find it less and less of a nightmare and started to actually like the kid that started to think the world of him.

The innocence, broad fantasy and brutal honesty managed to crack Bakugou up every once in a while. She wondered if Bakugou also saw the similarities between the two. It was a sight, she had to admit. Really thinking about it, she had mostly been staring with a dopey look on her face then doing much building.

They were halfway done when Kaito’s mother came to check on him. Obviously surprised at first when she saw her son hanging around two teenagers but as Uraraka did the explaining she became less nervous. She was even able to chuckle at the whole situation.

The mother thanked them more than enough times for taking care of her son and told them she was rooting for them. Lovingly she placed a kiss on Kaito’s temple and returned to her towel.

“You sure have a great mommy Kaito,” Uraraka said.

“She’s the best! She always tells me how awesome I am, reads me stories before bed and gets me ice cream whenever I want.”

He turned to Bakugou. “What about your mommy’s?”

Uraraka felt her heart skip a beat, she had no idea how Bakugou was going to answer. She knew things were getting better between him and his parents but it wasn’t like everything was fine. There were still bad days. Days that he had to get out of the house again. But those days went much differently then they used to. Bad days had turned into a bad few hours.

“My mom’s alright. She also gets me ice cream and sh-.”

“Ice cream and sugar honey ice tea.” Bakugou corrected himself. “But sometime’s she’s not so alright. And then I go to my second mom, she doesn’t live so far away, she’s always good to me. But she’s not my mom. Nothing can compare to my mom.”

Wow.

He had grown so much. Never in a million years did Uraraka think that would come out of Bakugou’s mouth. Or at least not now and to a stranger for that matter. Maybe he was just able to say it like that because it was a child that asked an innocent question that couldn’t be left unanswered. Or maybe because he knew Kaito wouldn’t look too deep into it, only really taken in his first sentence. Whatever motivated Bakugou to say that out loud, she was proud.

Could it be that he was finally getting used to saying things out loud?

Uraraka wanted to ask him a million other questions. When he started seeing Uraraka’s mom as his second mom and if he has ever told his mom how much he actually admired her. Did he even notice his own development, could he tell by how tight she was gripping her shovel how proud she was of him?

But instead she said:

“Yeah, my mom is alright too.”

At this point, when Kaito stood next to the castle it only needed a few more towers to reach his height. The canal had been dug out and filled with water and some of the windows already had little people standing behind them.

They all agreed it still needed something more, and Uraraka was the one to think of shells, that could easily decorate the castle. The two boys groaned as they couldn’t believe how they didn’t think of that.

“Of course, how the frick could we forget!” Bakugou said.

“Do you think we’re going to find enough shells before the contest ends?”  Kaito shot a worried look at Uraraka.

She picked up a white shell she had brought back from the shore when she had to collect water for the canal. Held it in between two fingers and smiled from ear to ear.

“Don’t worry boys. I’ve seen a lot of these lying around. We’re going to be fine, just leave it to me!”

The pouts slowly disappeared and their eyes widened. Mouths a little agape but neither of them could bring themselves to say a word. They kept staring at her for so long it made her smile even brighter, making her cheeks almost push her eyes shut.

When picking up a bucket and running off she could hear them whispering.

“Your girlfriend is really pretty and cool.”

“I know.”

Uraraka came back with a more than satisfactory amount of pretty seashells and took it upon herself to decorate the towers as Bakugou was circling the castle looking for last adjustments they could make in the remaining ten minutes.

She had to say it looked pretty impressive. When looking for shells she had a quick look around and it had made her more and more confident that they were going to win.

Bakugou picked up Kaito so he could put the flag on the top tower that was higher up then they originally intended it to be. The kid excitedly jumped up and down as soon as his feet touched the sand again, clapping in his little hands and whooping. Uraraka couldn’t help but clap as well.

The judges started to make their rounds around the beach at three o'clock exact. The closer they came how more tense the three became. They became fidgety and kept looking back at the castle as if it would collapse behind their back at any second.

“I don’t even know what I’m going to do if we don’t win,” Bakugou whispered in Uraraka’s ear.

“Nothing too violent I hope.”

“Something between lashing out and homicide.”

“I can’t even say anything because in your eyes that truly is ‘not too violent’.”

When the judges arrived at their castle, they immediately had a good reaction. Some good ‘ooh!’s’ and ‘wow!’s’ came from them. They continued to walk around in circles in a clump and mumble things only they seemed to understand. It looked so silly when given it much thought since they were taking it far too seriously for a contest for children.

After scribbling a few things down on a form, one of the judges took two polaroid picture of them in front of the castle, left one with them and then went to the next castle.

As soon as the judges were far enough away, Kaito dropped his cool and repeatedly tugged at Bakugou swimming shorts and Uraraka’s bathing suit.

“And, and, and? Do you think they liked it? Do you think we’ll win?! What if we don’t win?!”

Uraraka looked at the picture, still catching color. She couldn’t help but giggle at Kaito’s obvious wobbly smile and the tight grip of Uraraka’s hand. And that to think that this was the boy that had been so confident the whole time.

Bakugou kneeled down before Kaito.

“Hey…hey! Look at me. Don’t start crying. What did you tell us?”

The child rubbed his eyes. “That we were going to win.” He said softly.

Bakugou raised his chin and turned away. “What did you say?”

“That we were going to win!” Kaito yelled.

He pat him on the back.

“That’s the spirit kid.”

They ended up coming second place.

They got handed blue ribbons as they watched the kid that snatched first place get a small trophy and a children’s surfboard. Uraraka could almost hear Kaito’s heart break when they handed the prizes over. When Bakugou took his time to argue with a judge over the points they received Uraraka pinned the ribbon to Kaito’s swimming shorts.

“Well that was a bit unexpected, wasn’t it? I thought we had this one.” She awkwardly started a conversation with the boy that had a gloomy look on his face.

As she expected, he didn’t reply to her.

She thought hard of how to cheer up the devastated kid, luckily the answer came walking up to them.

“Oh Kaito, did you win?” His mother asked.

He turned his hip to show the ribbon.

“No mommy, we didn’t win.”

“We should’ve!” Bakugou growled as he threw back the pen on the judge’s clipboard and walked back to them.

Kaito’s mother picked up her son and laughed at his clouded face.

“There’s no reason to be so sad sweetheart! You still made a really good castle, you still won a prize. And you know you’ll always be my number one right?”

Kaito’s lip started trembling. “Really?”

“Of course! Always and forever. Now cheer up okay? You don’t want these two to see you sad the last time they see your face?”

The little boy nestled his mother’s neck and hugged her tight.

“No take back’s mommy!”

“No take backs!” the woman laughed.

He then continued to struggle out of his mother’s arms and walked right up to two teenager’s feet.

“Thank you Mr. Bakugou and Mrs. Uraraka. I had a lot of fun.”

Uraraka wrapped her arm around Bakugou and looked up at him.

“No problem, we had a lot of fun too, didn’t we?”

Bakugou wrapped his arm around her shoulder. “'Guess you could say that.”

He smirked at her and kissed her on her smile.

“Gross!” Kaito smeared out the word.

He scrunched up his face and ran back to his mother, hiding behind her legs.

“Get over it kid.”

The mother laughed at the scene, picked her son up and thanked the two again for taking such good care of her son, hoping it wasn’t too much trouble.

Bakugou and Uraraka waved it off, saying they genuinely did have fun.

Kaito and his mother left the two behind at the sandcastle.

They only had three hours left before they should start heading home, both of them determined to make the most of that little time. Heading into the water as fast as they could as soon as the child and his mother disappeared from their sight.

Bakugou had to pay for Uraraka’s ice cream.

In the water, they played and fooled around. Let the waves that crashed onto shore take them along and tickle them with the white foam of the sea. Tightly they held onto to the blue ribbon, attached to their swimming suits, not intending on losing their prize today.

Uraraka’s eyes got prickly, her fingers were wrinkly and all of the kisses she shared with Bakugou tasted like salt. The cut in her lip burned with every impact, but she could not resist the urge to put her lips on his. Not when his skin had started to turn into a beautiful golden-brown color, not when a romantic shade of the sun started to drown his face, making her squint at her so innocently.

She kept thinking about how much she loved him.

How much she loved the way he looked, how much she loved him for taking her here.

This was better than any film she ever watched.

Writers note:  

“Suzuki”, meaning: From Japanese 鈴 (suzu) meaning “bell” and 木 (ki) meaning “tree, wood”.“Kaito”, meaning: Sea, Ocean.

[cococrazies]

Lovestruck Series Review: Starship Promise (Season 1)

Personal playing order: Orion - Jaxon - Antares - Nova - Atlas

Warning! Minor spoilers ahead for Antares’s/Nova’s/Atlas’s routes, as well as CGs under the cut.

Orion: I’m torn on this one. I really enjoyed the story -- a lot more than I thought I would, given my lack of enthusiasm for the series concept -- and Orion himself. (If anyone ever wanted Shang from Mulan but in outer space, this is it.) The writing also had a very natural cadence and flow; it pulled me in easily, never getting too heavy-handed with sudden plot twists and cliffhangers... except for one instance, but more on that below.

And the MC! She was a pleasant surprise. I hadn’t been too impressed by her in the first-ep sneak peeks we get in each route, but she’s really cute -- she can be a bit of a space cadet at times (sorry, bad pun intended), but she isn’t dumb. Furthermore, she really develops over the course of the route, which is impressive given everything else stuffed into these mere 12 episodes.

So now to the things I didn’t like about this route: for one, the romantic development. It seemed really sudden and almost shoehorned-in as a result of the route length, which was jarring given how well-paced everything else had been up to that point. 

Also, the Antares plot twist; it felt cliché and gimmicky, especially since I could see it coming from a mile away. I think I would’ve preferred for it to be a Season 2 reveal, or at least presented to us right from the start -- as it was, it just seemed like it was there for the “shock factor” + to forcibly give us a reason to care about the antagonist if we didn’t already. But since this was a pilot season, I guess I can understand how they wanted to tease at an intriguing backstory as early as possible to get players invested.

Overall, they still did succeed with the latter, because now I’m pretty curious about where they’re going with this. And also because I need more Orion/MC in my life; rushed or not, those two are simply way too cute.

Jaxon: Whoa, this story was jam-packed with action scenes and chemistry between the OTP. The pace is hella fast, but you never get the sense that we’re skipping past important details; the writing makes the most of every episode it has got. Not a single scene is wasted or filler-like.

Jaxon himself is a bit of a harder sell. His gargantuan ego, jokester personality, and YOLO take on everything make him one of those characters that you either love or hate -- although for me, he fell somewhere near the middle of the spectrum. I like his concept and find him a refreshing addition to Lovestruck’s character lineup, but he’s not really my type as far as romance goes; and sometimes he toes the line for being near annoying.

(The fact that I constantly seemed to make the wrong choices -- at least judging by the sheer amount of weird looks or lukewarm responses he gave me after 90% of my choices -- didn’t help. Heads-up: don’t try to play it cool. This MC really, really can’t do cool. I had several near-death experiences from sheer secondhand embarrassment while playing this route.)

That aside, he makes a surprisingly good team with MC. Except from some cringey non-heart options (which were brutal this route, by the way), they naturally eased into working as a combo. I like how they both are able to pull each other out of their respective emotional ruts, as well as complement the other’s shortcomings. Jaxon’s character turnaround near the end felt a little sudden, but I like the teased insight on his past, and am looking forward to learn more about it.

Antares: Oh, MC. Trust me, I of all people totally understand crushing on the hot, mysterious, and possibly noble anti-hero holding you captive for unknown reasons, but even so. Being constantly unable to focus on anything but your attration to him -- and using it as a basis for your foundation to trust him almost straight away despite how he works for the Big Bad, and is literally using you as a tool(-fixer) for whatever evil purposes the Empire has in mind for the galaxy -- is like a whole new level of uncool.

(Also, how is a sheltered colony girl’s reaction to seeing a military leader telling his troops not to leave a single ship standing “swoon, he’s so charismatic” instead of “holy shit, he kills people”? Priorities, MC.)

Beyond that, Antares’s route was very intriguing to me. Out of Lovestruck’s villain routes so far this is the one that has done the least to paint the love interest as less of an antagonist, or the side he sympathizes with as more morally grey. I also appreciated seeing another side of Antares himself that actually knows the definition of the word chill  isn’t perpetually dressed in bunny-ear mecha armor  that’s not completely absorbed by his thirst for vengeance against his brother.

Similar to Orion’s route, the romantic development also dropped on us out of the blue here... but strangely, I didn’t mind. In a way, it seemed to make sense for Antares’s emotionally dysfunctional personality (to the point that it gave me Chance S1 in GiL flashbacks). I think I almost preferred this to him doing a sudden 180 and going all mushy on MC when any potential romantic build-up outside of premium choices has been minimal. I’m holding my thumbs now for a gradual turnaround -- much like Chance got -- in his future seasons.

Nova: I keep going back and forth re: how I feel about this route. To again start with the positive -- I’d been worried that Nova would be a Space Medusa 2.0, so I was pleasantly surprised to find that she wasn’t. For all the kuu in her kuudere demeanor, Nova still spends a fair amount of the route bonding with MC through actual conversation, and unlike Orion’s/Antares’s routes this season the romance didn’t even seem that rushed. Furthermore, I was intrigued by Nova’s backstory (not to mention that she’s hot as hell).

But to be entirely honest, this story is also the most formulaic, “typical otome”-esque route I’ve read so far in Lovestruck -- not so much in concept as in execution. It reminds me of one of those Voltage JP fantasy routes where we spend the first 1/3 of the route with semi-slice-of-life scenes interspersed with action, the middle 1/3 of this route discovering the LI’s angsty past and them distancing themselves to protect MC, and the final 1/3 with MC dissolving into hysterics/apocalyptic depression, stupidly running after LI alone, and declaring their undying love for them after having known them for a couple of days in the middle of a life-or-death situation.

Since I do play Voltage JP games I’m not saying it’s necessarily a terrible thing, just... jarring. I might seem like I’m awfully hard on Lovestruck’s writing a lot of the time, but that’s because I have high expectations of it. In a sea of near-identical mobile otome clones Lovestruck stands out with a more Westernized and creative take on standard otome tropes, hence often avoiding common pitfalls associated with the genre. The writing in general is a cut above what I expect from mobile games as well, hence all my criticisms; I don’t balk (as much) at LIs doing sudden 180s or MCs being stupid in a Solmare game, but I do with Lovestruck because I know -- and have seen firsthand -- that they can do better.

So this route was confusing to me. Because, if I were to go for my usual standard from what I would expect run-of-the-mill Voltage JP route, for example, or a Shall We Date? one -- then I’d think it’s fine. Or even good. But for Lovestruck? I don’t know. I wouldn’t say it’s bad, just not... good. (The GiL-esque Pokémon-battle narration for action scenes -- yes, this is my official pet peeve now -- didn’t help.)

With all that said though, I didn’t dislike Nova’s route. (Hence the confusion.) And definitely not Nova herself. I just don’t really know how I feel about its writing direction, and how it measures against my expectations of a Lovestruck route.

Atlas: I fell head over heels for this route. Seriously, this was Astraeus-in-season-3-of-AFK level instant love, except without the devastating angst and with a decent helping of fluffy feels on top. Not that it was all fluff -- we had our share of prospective angst here too, if less literally earth-shattering. And hell of a lot of action, character development, and tons of other goodies tightly stuffed in a 12-episode-package of awesome.

Similar to my review for Astraeus, I don’t even know where to begin talking about this route’s good points. The prose, for one -- there were just so many beautifully worded narrative transitions, and the dialogue didn’t lose out in that aspect, either. The sass, sarcasm, and the humor were well-timed, but didn’t go overboard/seem out of character for MC or the rest of the cast.

Then there’s Atlas himself. Breaking down tsunderes is one of my favorite otome pastimes, and doing exactly that to our resident grouchy pilot was no different. First of all, I love that he maintains a healthy balance between insults that are obviously all bark and no bite, and genuinely worded criticism that should logically be voiced. In fact, there’s so little unnecessary tsun here that he could almost pass for a kuudere. 

Regardless of whatever mold he’d better fit into, finally crumbling down that cranky demeanor of his and seeing him dere was a sweet, sweet reward. (I actually caved and went premium twice despite my agonizing wallet because I couldn’t resist seeing more of it.)

Or heck, even the platonic moments building up to that were great. Because the romance with Atlas was really well-paced; I love how we went from almost-hate (my favorite trope!) to begrudging respect, then to friendly equals/teammates, and finally something more -- all the while there was obvious chemistry between him and MC interlacing every interaction. I was kind of worried whether we’d get some last-minute romantic confession slapped on near the end, but thankfully we got a development that, for all its unrealistic corniness, still had me squealing. Especially with that cliffhanger; dammit, how am I even supposed to emotionally last until I get to his second season?

The main plot was really interesting, too -- probably my favorite premise out of the ones we’ve been offered so far. Even though it starts out similarly with MC on the run, I like how 1) we see the Union as evil right from the bat, avoiding having another MC-gets-out-of-her-naïve-colony-girl-mindset mini-arc; 2) rather than being perpetrated for some valuable information/artifact that the Starship crew might benefit from, MC is in a situation where they actually have no reason to keep her around, adding more tension to the intro; and 3) how all of this tied into Atlas’s own personal character arc. (Not that I minded how the other premises played out, it just made for a fresh change of pace.)

To wrap this gigantic word-vomit ramble up, I’d just like to conclude by gushing one last time how fantastic this route is -- I’d warmly recommend it to anyone interested in giving Starship a chance, because after this, the series personally had me hook, line, and sinker.

Final character ranking: Atlas > Orion > Jaxon > Antares > Nova

....This got a little longer than I intended it to be, oops. Kudos to anyone who has made it to the end of this season review. (I’ll try to be a little more concise in my next one, i.e. GiL S7.)  You can follow my tag #coco reviews lovestruck for more reviews of Lovestruck games, or check out the ones I’ve done so far on this list.

[rad-puppeteer]

I got tagged by @goodbibarbarella ! Thanks!!

Posting late. As usual.

Rules: Answer the ten questions given and write ten new ones for ten other people.

1. Is there a piece of modern media that has inspired your creativity the most?

Usually the things that inspire me the most is whatever I’m into and it can change at the moment. I do have some things that I do enjoy for a lot longer. For a while, it’s been Dragon Age, now I’m kind of looking into past fandoms that I enjoyed but was never a part of.

2. Do you have to finish a book once you’ve started it, or are you able to walk away if it doesn’t interest you?

I used to be able to read an entire book before I move on to the next one. Sadly, I can barely read two pages before my mind wanders (even if it’s something I’m interested in - I’ll still read comics) and I put it down. Hence, I haven’t read a whole book in a long time and prefer audiobooks since I’ll be able to do other things while I listen.

3. Do you wait until you’ve finished a current project before you start a new one, or are you the kind of person that has a folder full of WIPs?

I usually have multiple projects running simultaneously, although I can only focus at one at a time. For a few months, I was only drawing patterns, now I’m focused on doing Inktober featuring my own characters because I haven’t drawn them in ages. Also that gives me chances to develop some of them further.

Inktober has since passed but now I’m working on my sketchbooks and patterns and planning to go back on working on my personal projects like my story hopefully soon!

4. Do things have to be just right for you to be able to write, or can you write wherever/whenever?

Has to be just right, unfortunately or else I won’t be able to focus at all.

5. Do you have a favorite terrible book?

If favorite terrible book means something that’s fun to riff and make a bit more tolerable, then 50 shades :| :|

6. Do you have a OTP? A NOTP? A BROTP?

Not at the moment! There’s a few that I don’t like, especially if the character feels unredeemable or are generally terrible, although a few of my faves are problematic. Some of my own OCs are BROTP! Sorry it’s so vague!!

7. Do you write fanfiction? If yes, what was the first piece/fandom you wrote?

The one I wrote and posted online many years ago was one for a game called Evolution Worlds but it’s bad because it’s also a crossover fic and I think some of my own OCs made it in. A revised version of it is still up on Fanfiction.net (rip)

8. Do you find drawing, writing, or reading more relaxing?

More for drawing. I’m still super critical of my writing so the very few that make it online may not even stay online. Even when I draw bad, I can see what I need to work on and fix the issue later. With my writing, I’m not so good with that and don’t really see immediately what I need to improve on.

9. What is your favorite cliché trope - to read and/or write?

Redemption arcs even if it doesn’t fully work 100% and it depends on the character, if they have a chance and are willing to take it and change.

10. How many journals do you have? Describe the prettiest one/your favorite

I don’t have pretty journals :[ I do have sketchbooks that I get binded in Office Max that I use for my art and/or notes. They’re quite plain with a plastic cover and a hard cover for the back.I like these because it’s with paper that I’ll use (I’m picky with papers :v )

I bind my own sketchbook now >D They’re super plain but I have it with a thick plastic cover and a black polymer back. I also threw in a page of no render paper so if I want to design my own covers for them, I can. And I can use whatever paper I want!

I also got tagged by @chupacabrasmustdie !! Will do both on one post because that’s how I roll because I’m too slow!

1. When it comes to character creation, what comes first to you, looks or personality? Something else?

Sometimes, I design the character first, then work out their personality and other times I kind of have an idea about a character’s personality, then I have to design a character based off that. I usually create characters wearing bland clothes, then have to go back and make them more unique. Remembers the time all my characters just have T-shirts and jeans.

2. Do you make playlists, inspiration boards, aesthetics, whatever? Why?

Sometimes I do, but usually I don’t because I usually get stuck trying to find stuff to use that I can credit back to and that’s also stock/creative commons for things that require photos I didn’t take. As for music, I’m not good with that because I’m not familiar with most music and I have a hard time trying to figure out what is fitting. I usually don’t pay attention to lyrics but more of the music itself either.

3. Have you ever changed/dropped a character because you felt you’d put too much of yourself into them?

There are characters I have the end up being overdeveloped and I usually take traits that don’t really fit the character and give it to another character. So it’s not much of dropping the character in this case but they might end up changinng enough that they feel like they’re a different character.

4. Do you have a Fictional Character Type™?

Don’t know what this is :[

5. If you write – how do you write? On paper, on computer? On your phone? Do you have a designated software / workspace?

I tend to go old school and write on paper, seeing most of the times I get inspired to write something, I’m away from the house. It would be awesome to have a designated work area where I can focus on stuff I need to get done.

6. Still on the writing topic – do you have a beta reader? Why?

No I don’t but I would love to hire someone to help structure the story for my comic because I still haven’t figured out how it should go. Also would like one for when I occasionally do writings, which is rare (planning to try to do NaNo this year)

7. Now for something more domestic – do you put music on to do chores? What genre/artist?

No, I suffer in silence when I do chores. I celebrate the completion of said chores with music afterwards and it’s usually whatever I feel like listening to and/or what shows up first on Youtube.

8. Do you like to cook for other people?

I don’t cook that much but sure! I’m hoping I’ll be able to cook more and experiment with new recipes!

9. Is there something you’re really enjoying atm? Hobby, sport, media, it’s all good.

Right now, I JUST started playing Grand Theft Auto V and I can see it already trying to take over my life. The world immersion is great and there’s cats and smartcars???

I’ve finally gotten over my GTAV obsession and now I’m playing Fallout 4 because I really, really want to beat that game. So far, I reached the Institute so I’m slowly getting there!

10. Anything you’re looking forward to in 2018 *knocks on wood*?

I’m looking forward to hopefully Titanic: Honor and Glory game finally getting released so I can explore the Titanic!! I’ve played the demos that have came out so far and it looks amazing so far!!!

Also finding a job and possibly moving out??

Possibly moving out in a few months and then hopefully finding a job afterwards!! Also, still looking forward to the game.

No tags.

[mariaashby64]

Random Review (2)

Voltron season 4 review.

Overall this season was somewhat darker while still enjoyable, and it had many thoroughly hilarious moments. The visuals were amazing and the plant designs still managed to awe me. Fighting and the choreography of the battles were stunning and well planned. We also get some good moments from all the characters, some more than others of course.

Like my last review I will be covering:

Plot

Characters

Feels

Graphics and sound

Any extra points

And that’s about it for the spoiler free overview. I will be getting into the good stuff below.

 Plot:

 It’s an, interesting carry on from Season three. It kinda felt like some of the stuff we were working towards in season 3 got discarded this season. Example, last season we saw Keith struggle with becoming the leader but this season he backs out and Shiro can now piolet the black lion. However I thought the coalition plotline worked really well and had a good payoff in the finale. I perhaps would have liked to of seen more of the alien races and how they would have fought in that battle.

Episode 2 was fantastic, though it could have perhaps been shuffled around with the other episodes because matt didn’t seem to show up in episode 4. Either way it wouldn’t have changed the narrative because ep 2 is pretty self-contained.

I know we had a short screen time budget but I didn’t feel as rushed this season. Plenty happened in each episode and they stuck pretty straight to the main narrative whilst providing some good side moments. The only noticeable things that were cut out were: 1, The Blade of Mamora mission. I know Keith went out on his own mission but we never got any updates or anything from their point of view. I can understand this decision but it just means we don’t get to see Keith or how his time away from the paladins affected him. At the same time it does put us more into the other paladin’s shoes as they don’t know what’s going on with him. 2nd, We didn’t see much of Lotor and his plans but I would also put that down to the writers keeping Lotor’s motives in the dark. So it works in their favour.

But overall the writing was good and I am interested for the next season.

 Characters:

I didn’t see this and anyone’s particular season but there were defiantly some highlights.

Pidge: Starting with Pidge because she is my fave. She has been working her butt off to find her brother and I’m so glad she finally did. I love her relationship with Matt and how they are both science nerds. (can relate). Also the scene where she gets mocked at school for being smart draws on similar feeling from me so it was a case of making my favourite character even more relatable. I love how her alias was actually the nickname her brother gave her. I didn’t know that before and it’s adorable. Her action scenes were great, and she makes a really good team with Matt whether it be in the science or combat department.

Matt: I was very interested to see how he would integrate with the team. Especially after Keith left. (My sister made a comment of, the reason they got rid of Keith was so Matt could replace him.) I thought episode 3 did a good job with that. I loved how Pidge, Matt and Hunk are now the nerd trio and that Matt gets to ride tandem with Pidge in the green lion. And how could I forget that Matt also fell head over heels for Allura,that was hilarious. But anyway from what I saw in the last episodes I think Matt will be hanging out with the rebels when he isn’t with the team.

Lance: Seems to be back to his usual self. I think the show business gave him a boost in confidence. Although he doesn’t flirt with Allura it’s funny to see that he still doesn’t want any other man with her. His speech to Allura in ep 6 was touching and really showcased why the blue lion picked him in the first place. It added to the side of him we saw in season 3. His ability to act as the heart of the team.

Shiro: Shiro comes back and the first thing we see him do is argue with Keith. But anyway it was nice to see him back in action. Whatever the writers had instore for him we didn’t get to see. Though I suspect it may come up in the future.

Allura: She fits nicely into her role and it was cool to bring up her quintessence abilities again. And she is still absolutely badass at fighting.

Keith: Yeah, I’ll admit I’m a sucker for Keith in his Mamora outfit. I can only hope our emo boy is able to re-join the team next season, he’s still one of my favourites. Despite being gone for half the season we still get a character arc from him. In the first episode we see him struggling to come to terms with the Mamora principal that the mission is more important than the individual. Then at the end Keith realises that sacrifices will have to be made in order to save the day. And that he is even willing to sacrifice himself for the effort. I mean kudos to the writers for putting that arc in there.

Hunk: My poor boy. Sidelined again. I really did like it though when Matt acknowledged Hunk’s work in the science department. I would like to see more of that trio nerding out in the future. I thought perhaps, when Hunk was made fun of in the coalition performances, that there might be a payoff where Hunk saves the day, but that didn’t really happen. But we did have that moment in ep 7 where he works out the planet is a bomb. So he does come through in small moments but it would be nice to see more episodes displaying his skill, like the first 2 seasons.

Coran: It was actually interesting to see Coran take a serious episode. It really showed another side of him that we don’t see. A less confident guy that only wanted the best for his team. However the episode still managed to be hilarious.

Lotor: Like I said earlier, we didn’t see too much of him but I think it works well with the end of the season. We don’t really know what Lotor is planning and we don’t know how Lotor will use Voltron to his advantage. We know Lotor has been exiled before and I hope we can get some good backstory next season. Also I don’t trust him, I think he will side with Voltron until he gets what he wants then break away. It quite interesting having him as a third party.

Lotor’s generals: Narti did not deserve this! But I did think her death did create and interesting dynamic in the group. Zethrid and Ezor feared for their own lives while Axca still tried to remain loyal. When Lotor’s plan failed that was the tipping point. I also noticed Azca said there was one last option for them to go, I assumed they were going to Voltron but it was Lotor who got there first. It makes me question whether she had the same plan or is talking about another party. (I wouldn’t be surprised if they turned up at the Blade of Mamora)  Last of all we didn’t get to see any hand to hand combat from these girls. And that’s a shame but I guess the screen time budget couldn’t allow it.

 Feels:

Boy we got the whole plate. Whether it be feeling sad, laughing at jokes, confused in shock or rallied in a powerful moment. The Voltron team did a good job in bringing out the emotion. A lot of this comes from the creator’s ability to make an atmosphere. Music and visuals played a big part. (Plus the voice acting, Bex how dare you make me cry). What scenes affected you the most probably depended which characters you cared about more.

Episode 2 was a great one for me. The Part where Pidge found Matt’s “grave” was gut wrenching even though I knew he couldn’t be dead. But it still made me get caught up in the moment. The only thing that ruined it was the overused trope of “someone died/it’s a funeral so it’s raining” cliché. It kinda dragged me out of the scene, but it was still great.

There are plenty of other scenes I enjoyed. There were heaps of moments where I laughed. Voltron likes to take the viewer on a bit of an emotional roller coaster and it works pretty well for me.

 Graphics/sound:

Holly flip! Where is this improvement coming from? Like man, I thought the last season look amazing but this one took it up again. The planet had awesome designs and the space background had me awed. I always love the environments they created. Multiple times I found myself caught out just admiring how good the graphics were.

There were also some examples of animation we don’t usually see, especially in episode 3. Though I did find it strange the absolute absurdity of it just made the scene even more hilarious.

Fight scenes were great, whether they were in the lions or hand to hand, they still looked amazing to watch.

Music was also another thing I noticed. It was done really well and added nicely to certain scenes. They were also probably good enough to listen to on its own.

 Extra points:

This season had a very military feel to it. The tactics of the coalition were cool and the final fight was awesome. Death seemed like a much more real threat this season. And there were plenty of moments that carried a lot more weight.

I’m also glad the Kaltenecker was included in this season after disappearing in the last one. 

Just like the first 2 seasons the writers have once again ended on a cliff-hanger and I will be excited for the next season.

Thanks for reading to the end. I’ve decided this will be a bit of a thing now, writing reviews (when I can). If you don’t agree with everything I’ve said then that’s fine, you don’t have too. This is my own opinion after all.

[seriouslyhooked]

Million Reasons (The CS Mixtape) Part 124/?

Series of CS oneshots inspired by music. Collection on FF Here.

A/N: Modern AU where Emma and Killian are best friends but she’s watching him build a life for himself that she can’t seem to fit into. She decides to do what she does best and run. There’s only one snag – she tries to leave and Killian admits he loves her, giving her the one reason she needed to stay.  Inspired by a reader request for the song ‘Million Reasons’ by Lady Gaga and the multiple requests I’ve had for more chapters with best friends to lovers tropes. Hope you all enjoy!

Her whole life fit in the confines of a duffle bag, and if Emma Swan had any emotions left to spare she’d probably despair over that sad fact.

As it was, her heart felt like it was going to give any second. She was running, and it wasn’t the first time she’d ever done that – hell her time in and out of the system as a kid had been filled with running  - but it was the first time since meeting Killian that she’d decided to pack up and leave the life she had behind. Emma was leaving her best friend and the person who had gotten her through more storms than she could even count and she was doing it to give him the out that he deserved.

Because Killian was brilliant and kind and constantly trying to make her happy while dealing with her crazy amount of baggage, but the time had come. She had intruded in his life long enough, and there was no way he was ever going to let her go. He probably felt like he owed her something as her friend, but she couldn’t bear to see him compromising anymore. He had a whole world of opportunity in front of him and he was stalling because of her.

Maybe he wouldn’t have to compromise so much if you would give even an inch. If you just let yourself be happy it wouldn’t be such a struggle.

Emma slammed her hands down on either side of the bag and hung her head closing her eyes. She’d been battling herself over this for weeks and the reason for that was clear: she was in love with her best friend in that totally cliché, hopeless way that made her hate herself a little bit. That love made it so much harder to go, even when she was convinced that he would be better off without her.

Emma couldn’t say exactly when things had changed. They’d started as friends. Actually that wasn’t quite right; they’d started as two people with this kind of charge between them. He was a cocky and charming law student and she was just trying to survive while being guarded up like Fort Knox on a good day. Somehow though Killian had thawed through some of her resistance and he’d done that with kindness and understanding. There was never a feeling of judgment with him, and since Emma wasn’t exactly an expert at having friends, she’d felt the impact of having Killian in her corner and in her life that much more keenly.

But letting him past her walls even as a friend was a risk. It meant that she was vulnerable and that hypothetically he could hurt her, though Emma knew Killian would never do that willingly. It was one of the reasons that her heart had allowed the friendship to grow into something more. After enough nights of laughing with him over a drink, watching an infinite number of stupid movie that he insisted they try out, and many a morning spent funneling coffee and finding the perfect diner to get pancakes in the city, she’d realized that this was love, the big, overwhelming, ‘I look at you and see forever’ kind of love.

When she realized it of course Emma was wracked with all sorts of emotions. There was the obvious thread of fear that came because love was crazy and if Emma’s life up to now had taught her anything it was that it never worked out in the end. Love was a weakness and a way to open yourself up to the worst life had to offer, even if hearing Killian’s laugh or seeing that smile he only ever seemed to save for her filled her with a rush of warmth that outshone the sun.

There was anger too, mostly because Emma was so annoyed with her heart for giving itself away without her even realizing it. She reasoned that she should have some sort of choice over how she felt and what she wanted. She was rational, a person driven by survival and perseverance over sappiness, but try as she might her heart wouldn’t yield, not when she an Killian were as tied up together as they were.

But the worst part of everything was the guilt. Emma knew that she didn’t fit in the life that Killian was building. She had seen the signs before, but now they were growing more apparent. Emma could see the way his colleagues wondered why it was that an up and coming lawyer was so close with a bail bonds person, and how Killian had to be different with them than he was with her. Emma realized she wasn’t clean cut enough, or well versed enough in constitutional amendments to mesh well with them, and the last thing she ever wanted was for Killian to suffer for that, or worse, for him to limit himself because of his ties to her.

That was why she was leaving at the end of the day: because the evidence that he was beginning to sacrifice too much for her was too prominent to ignore anymore. It had started off small by his opting out of some office parties or out of work activities to be with her, but now the stakes were higher. He had the chance to really gain momentum if only he would let go of her and New York and join his firm’s branch out in Boston, but Killian was adamant that he wouldn’t go.

Actually, he hadn’t even told Emma that it was a possibility. She had to find out by a circumstance of chance and when she did she realized that for once it was Killian who needed saving. He needed someone to defend him from his own impulse to protect her and after everything he’d done for her, Emma knew she had to save him from himself so as to give him the clean start he deserved.

With her resolve bolstered back into place Emma opened her eyes again and got back to throwing the last of the stuff that mattered to her (most of which had something to do with Killian or a moment they’d shared together) into her duffle. She had just finished with the task and was about to figure out what was next (would she say goodbye in person, or would she be a coward and leave a note?) when the buzzer to her apartment building sounded. She knew it was Killian and her heart plummeted knowing that a confrontation had to come.

Emma pressed the button that allowed him to enter, not even bothering to wait for whatever witty remark or funny joke he’d make and in a matter of moments he was knocking at her door. The thought that this would be the last time she saw Killian weighed on Emma like a ton of bricks. Her throat closed from the sadness that consumed her, but she had to toughen up. Just a few more minutes of being strong. She could break down later, but not now, not when there was so much on the line.

When Emma opened the door she was greeted by a sight she was already familiar with. Killian was leaning against the door and grinning at her, and in a very thoughtful move, he’d come bearing dinner. That was just like him, and Emma knew that whatever it was would be fantastic and exactly what she wanted. He had this way of knowing even before she did what she was looking for and she would miss that and every other part of him more than she could say.

“I know, I know, you told me to go out with the others tonight, but if I have to listen to one more person talk about corporate litigation I’m liable to lose it. You’re sparing me a great deal of pain, Swan.” When Emma didn’t smile Killian looked concerned and as he moved inside and set the bags down he noticed her open bedroom door and the duffle still spread out on the white sheets.

“You going somewhere, love?” Emma felt a flutter low in her stomach at the endearment. He’d been calling her that since their first day of meeting but it always did something to her. It made her feel so much more than was safe for someone who wanted to stay above sentimentality.

“Chicago.”

“You’re kidding. What kind of case is sending you that far?” Emma winced and she was thankful that she wasn’t currently facing him. She kept her eyes downcast as she replied.

“I’m not going for one case. I’m going for good.” He laughed at that but when she didn’t laugh in reply, it seemed to dawn on him that she was serious.

“Like hell you are!” Emma looked up, surprised by the tone but Killian looked actually angry. She could see something else in his eyes too, something intense, and she wondered if it was fear of her going or something more.

“Look, Killian, I know it’s last minute, but it’s for the best. I need something different and I’ve got some contacts out there and a lead on a place to stay. It’s all good.” He stood there staring at her and Emma could see the tick in his jaw that spoke to all kinds of tension. He let go of it though and surprised her with the craziest statement she’d ever heard.

“I need to give the firm two weeks notice. Can you wait until then or should I meet you out there?” Emma’s jaw dropped but she tried to collect herself quickly.

“That’s the thing, you’re not coming. I’m going alone.” He barked out a laugh at that which was cold and harsh. It was choked with emotions that were strong and familiar to Emma. She felt like she was about to burst from her own at the moment but she held on as best she could.

“That’s not happening, Emma. Over my dead body are you starting over in a new city again alone and without me. I made you a promise. We’re in this together. Always.” Her heart clenched at that and the voice inside her head begged her to let him come, or better yet, not to run at all.

“You don’t owe me anything, Killian. I’m a big girl, I can take care of myself.”

Killian moved forward and took her hand, zapping a current into Emma’s system that shook her to her core. She couldn’t understand how her body could crave his touch so badly but it did. She felt whole for the first time since coming up with this scheme of leaving, and just the simple connection healed away so many of the self-inflicted scars that this plan had bestowed over the past few weeks.

“I’m not trying to insinuate that you’re some sort of damsel in distress, Swan. You’re more than capable of taking on the world on your own merit. I’m telling you that you don’t have to. The time for going it alone is over. You have me now.”

Emma felt like she was about to cry, and as someone who never ever cried that only made the already existent fear in her system spike higher. She pulled her hand away, feeling the loss immediately as she did, and shook her head. She was about to put on the show of her life, because acting nonchalant about this was nearly impossible.

“You have a life here Killian.”

“So do you, Emma. But if it’s not the one you want then Chicago it is.”

“You can’t be serious.”

“I’ve never been more serious in my life. Where you go I go. End of story.”

Emma was forced to grasp at straws now, because his assurances meant the world to her but she couldn’t be so selfish. She had to sever ties, because if it didn’t happen now, they’d fall apart later. Nothing was ever really permanent in her life anyway. She just had to learn to accept that again. And honestly, she didn’t think she could handle one more day as just his friend. It hurt too much to want everything as badly as she did knowing it could never come to be.

“And what about that promotion, Killian?” Emma figured she might as well lay all of her cards out on the table if he was going to be so headstrong.

“What promotion?” He looked actually surprised that she’d brought it up.

“I heard you on the phone the other day. They want to transfer you to Boston and you should do it. You’ve worked so hard and you deserve it, but you’re sticking around because of me. Because you’re worried I’ll break without you, but I won’t. I’ve got Chicago and we can still keep in touch…”

Emma trailed off, not having the strength to keep up the front anymore. It hurt too much to talk about this. She looked away and heard the warble of disbelief in his tone when he finally responded.

“Is that really what you think? You think I’m staying to protect you?”

“Aren’t you?”

“I turned down that job because I’m in love with you Emma. You’ve got it all bungled up. It’s not that you can’t survive without me, it’s that I can’t make it without you.”

Emma was stunned by the admission that he’d so freely given. He loved her? Killian loved her? Like love-loved her? Or was this a ‘we’re best friends and I care about you’ love? If that was the case she might just up and die. At that moment he reached for her again and the warmth of his touch sparked something in her. She glanced up at him and saw in his eyes that whatever he was about to say would be the absolute truth.

“Bloody hell, I might be about to ruin everything, but I love you Emma. I’m in love with you and I think I always have been.” Emma gawked a little bit but finally found her words.

“You are? But you never said anything.”

“Because I can’t imagine my life without you in it, Emma. I was willing to accept any life with you in whatever way you’d have me. Nothing and no one else can ever give me what you give me. I’m yours, love, I always have been and no job or anything else is ever going to surpass that need to be with you. It never has and it never will.”

In all the imaginings Emma had of this moment she never anticipated this. She’d built up a million reasons in her head of why she should leave but now he’d given her the one reason that could keep her here. It felt miraculous, like the sun was breaking through the clouds her life. Her world had been overcast and gloomy since she decided to leave. Suddenly anything seemed possible and all that fear and guilt she was once grappling with gave way to something so much sweeter – hope.

“You love me?” Her question was whispered and he gave a subtle nod as one of his hands came to cup her cheek and the other moved to her hip.

“With everything I am.”

That was it, the final bit she needed to take the risk herself. She pulled him down, bringing their bodies to line up against each other as she tasted the kiss she’d been waiting for forever. It surpassed any fantasies she’d ever considered before, and the moment Killian met her in this embrace she knew they’d turned the corner. This was acceptance and love and goodness in its purest form, and she was happy, so ridiculously happy that she didn’t know what to do or say except to hold him close and never let go.

When the kiss eventually broke apart and their eyes met again, Emma knew that she had to try and give him the same comfort he’d given her. Even if it went against everything she’d ever believed, she was ready to trust him with her heart and to be braver than she had been before.

“I love you too.”

Saying those words was the single most liberating experience of her life, and the pay off was surreal. Killian looked positively elated and he swung her up in his arms, surprising her but thrilling her all the same. He made his way to the bedroom and she felt her blood humming, her body pulsing with need and joy and every good feeling imaginable.

“You should know, Emma, that I have no intention of letting go. You want to run? Fine, but you run with me. Wherever we go we go together. Deal?”

“Deal.”

They sealed that agreement with a kiss and then so much more and in the end they did end up running, not away from each other, but to Boston so Killian could follow his promotion and they could find more happiness together. Their move proved to be an adventure that was so much better taken together than it ever could have been apart, and the life that they built was one Emma could never have dreamed up. The truth was that their happily ever after was so much better than anyone would believe, and that was all for one reason: because their love was true and could conquer just about anything standing in their way.

…………….

You're giving me a million reasons to let you go You're giving me a million reasons to quit the show You're givin' me a million reasons Give me a million reasons Givin' me a million reasons About a million reasons If I had a highway, I would run for the hills If you could find a dry way, I'd forever be still But you're giving me a million reasons Give me a million reasons Givin' me a million reasons About a million reasons I bow down to pray I try to make the worst seem better Lord, show me the way To cut through all his worn out leather I've got a hundred million reasons to walk away But baby, I just need one good one to stay Head stuck in a cycle, I look off and I stare It's like that I've stopped breathing, but completely aware 'Cause you're giving me a million reasons Give me a million reasons Givin' me a million reasons About a million reasons And if you say something that you might even mean It's hard to even fathom which parts I should believe 'Cause you're giving me a million reasons Give me a million reasons Givin' me a million reasons About a million reasons I bow down to pray I try to make the worst seem better Lord, show me the way To cut through all his worn out leather I've got a hundred million reasons to walk away But baby, I just need one good one to stay Baby I'm bleedin', bleedin' Stay Can't you give me what I'm needin', needin' Every heartbreak makes it hard to keep the faith But baby, I just need one good one Good one, good one, good one, good one, good one When I bow down to pray I try to make the worst seem better Lord, show me the way To cut through all his worn out leather I've got a hundred million reasons to walk away But baby, I just need one good one, good one Tell me that you'll be the good one, good one Baby, I just need one good one to stay

Post-Note: I just want to say thank you to the lovely reader who requested this song, and to all of the other readers who have prompted songs I promise I am getting there. My writing schedule has been all out of whack and I have been following the muse around to a variety of different stories, but slowly and surely I will get there. In the meantime, thank you all so much for reading and I hope you all have a great rest of your day!

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9, Part 10,Part 11, Part 12,Part 13, Part 14, Part 15, Part 16, Part 17, Part 18, Part 19, Part 20, Part 21, Part 22, Part 23, Part 24, Part 25, Part 26, Part 27, Part 28, Part 29, Part 30, Part 31, Part 32, Part 33, Part 34, Part 35, Part 36, Part 37, Part 38, Part 39, Part 40, Part 41, Part 42, Part 43, Part 44, Part 45, Part 46, Part 47, Part 48, Part 49, Part 50, Part 51, Part 52, Part 53, Part 54, Part 55, Part 56, Part 57, Part 58, Part 59, Part 60, Part 61, Part 62, Part 63, Part 64, Part 65, Part 66, Part 67, Part 68, Part 69, Part 70, Part 71, Part 72, Part 73, Part 74, Part 75, Part 76, Part 77, Part 78, Part 79, Part 80, Part 81, Part 82, Part 83, Part 84, Part 85, Part 86, Part 87, Part 88, Part 89, Part 90, Part 91, Part 92, Part 93, Part 94, Part 95, Part 96, Part 97, Part 98, Part 99, Part 100, Part 101, Part 102, Part 103, Part 104, Part 105, Part 106, Part 107, Part 108, Part 109, Part 110,Part 111, Part 112, Part 113, Part 114, Part 115, Part 116, Part 117, Part 118, Part 119,Part 120, Part 121, Part 122, Part 123

[musingsofanangryginger]

31 Days of Horror 2017 Round up

Hello and welcome to the fruits of my labour. Below is a list and mini-reviews of each thing I watched during my 31 days of Horror. Some reviews are a bit beefier than others but I hope you enjoy nonetheless.

Day 1: The Invisible Man:

So I decided to start my horror by going old school…very old school, like 50 years before I was born old school. Back the 30’s Universal had a chain of monster movies which by today’s standards might be considered a bit on the tame side but from what’ve seen of that era and this one, this film stands up. So unlike the big-budget remake Hollow Man (come on now it is a remake), there is no transformation scene but instead, we meet our character after the damage has been done and we join him through his journey and his descent into madness which is excellently portrayed by Claude Raines.

Day 2: Shaun of the Dead: 

After telling a few folks at work about watching this as part of my 31 days of Horror they immediately claimed it was horror. I respectfully disagreed, at least I think it was respective. Yes, of course, it falls way more into the comedy genre but it’s very clearly a horror comedy. I can’t imagine that there are folks that have yet to see this film but for the uninitiated, Shaun’s life is going nowhere fast, content to frequent the same pub over and over, stuck in a dead-end job (Pun count 2) his lady kicks him to curb. Turns out you need a good zombie outbreak to give you that motivational boost. Directed by Edgar Wright and penned by Simon Pegg & Wright and what’s delivered a genre comedy which wears its love of that genre on its sleeve. Hilarious, Gory with some emotionally powerful punches throughout. If for some reason you’ve been in a bunker with the Mole Women your excuses are limited as to why you’ve never seen this slice of fried gold.

 Day 3: Gerald’s Game:

 King’s back in a big way thanks to the success of IT and so it seems there appears to be some clambering to get his work adapted, this one such effort being a Netflix offering. Directed by Mike “Oculus” Flanagan we’re treated to minimalist horror which takes place for the most part in a single room with some passionate naughtyness goes tit’s up (Pun machine). This is bolstered by two great performances by Carla Gugino and Bruce Greenwood. Unsettling and just that little bit harrowing this was an enjoyable surprise. I don’t want to elaborate too much on this one as I feel that going in blind is the key. I will say that Mike Flanagan has the uncanny ability to creep me out with violence. What I mean by this, is that I’m so ridiculously desensitised to film gore and violence that media would probably label me and some kind of mental. In 2 of Mike’s films to date, I’ve shuddered and shivered one being this and the other the aforementioned Oculus which is also brilliant. I also completely recommend Hush as well.

Day 4: Red State:

Again another debateable horror. I firmly plant this in the horror genre as it completely uses so many of the tropes. There’s the young high school guys looking to get laid and it going badly. By badly I don’t mean “oops an std and a paternity test” no I mean kidnapped by fanatics and faced with their deaths. Where this is different is that it twists all over the place it hardly gives you time to catch your breath. I loved how Kevin Smith described writing this, he said that each time the plot got familiar he skewed off in a different direction to what would be expected and it shows. Fitting in with the “this is horror” claim by myself there is an extremely unsettling vibe in the first half of the film that is perpetrated by the late great Michael Parks. Good god, his sermon monologue is downright terrifying. Brrrrr. One of Smith’s best films and a genre I think he should revisit….well of course there is Tusk. Ha ha Tusk.

Day 5: Ash Vs The Evil Dead (Episodes 1-3): 

 I had seen the first 2 eps a while back so decided to get some of this watched again. This harkens back to the brilliance of Evil Dead 2 (more on that later). Here the idiotic but pretty capable Ash sets loose the deadites once more to the gratuitously gory delight of fans and newcomers alike.  It’s hard not to love Bruce Campbell, He’s a genuinely charismatic presence. This is a show I desperately need to catch up with and feel there’s no excuse that I haven’t. I’m sorry!

Day 6: The Autopsy of Jane Doe:

It may be creepy to say, it may be weird to say, but I’m in love this film. These days you’d be very hard pressed to come across decent horror films which is sad. It’s a genre that has been limping along since the 70’s. Every once in a while though you get that gem that one in a thousand film that comes along and says “Boo” and you squeal. This is not one of these films. “But Mark” I hear you say “You seem to have bigged this film up” Why you backtracking. Oh contraire readers of mine, this here is the finest examples of the genre in last several years. The point I’m making is that it relies very little on the “Jump scare” formula and instead treats you a murder mystery with Horror along for the ride.

In wake of a horrific crime a body is found with no Id and who has no real ties to the crime that can be ascertained. It’s up to the Coroner and his son uncover why she was there, I will say no more. I felt that going into Gerald’s Game completely blind was the way to go, Jane Doe, I'd recommend a sensory deprivation tank of ignorance before going near this. Don’t even read the back of the dvd/blu ray case or google it. No trailers nothing, just rest in the knowledge that this film is entirely worth it. Creepy and gripping throughout with scares and revelations coming in equal amounts. Trust me when I tell you, you’ll want to know how this wraps up.

Day 7: The Scream Trilogy: 

20 years ago this series of films kicked off (technically 21 but who’s counting…oh wait I appear to be sorry!) 20 years since the immortal “What���s your favourite scary movie” line became engrained in popular culture. The premise was simple a killer who had seen waaaaay too many horror films went a bit of a slaughter. Their knowledge of movie trivia is used against unwilling victims…crap, this person sounds a bit like me. Don’t worry folks I use my trivia for good or at the very most to annoy folks slightly. So with the decline of the horror movie genre or more accurately during its current dip Scream was released in an attempt revitalise the industry and to be fair it did. It spawned 3 sequels (with 4th coming out way later) and a current TV series. Like the killer, this franchise stayed alive longer than it should’ve. While 2 was probably my favourite of the original trilogy, this was due to the fact that I owned it on VHS and watched it constantly and that, of course, Sarah Michelle Gellar was in it (What can I say I had a crush on Buffy), I also really like the first one. 3rd is a bit pants but has its moments, notably Parker Posey playing Gail Weathers is hilarious and Kennedy’s cameo is also great. It’s clear though that quite ironically that by the 3rd this franchise was pretty stale. Doesn’t seem to be able to stop it though!

Day 8: The Void: 

This film is absolutely MENTAL. A clear homage to the body horrors of the 80’s with the clearest being references to Hellraiser I felt, this starts off relatively sane and then skips down Insanity Drive, Crazy Avenue with a brief stop-over in Gross-ville. The films kicks off with a bloody bloke popping out the woods conveniently in front of a Sheriff’s car. The Sheriff takes him along to the local hospital where the weird begins. Cultists stop the folk from leaving and from there; well I won’t say too much more.  I will say right out of the gate that this is most certainly not for everyone, most notably my good lady Evonne. She hated it with the passion of a fiery star. I, on the other hand, enjoyed the unhinged nature, body horror creepy vibe. Give it a bash if you’re looking for some nostalgic originality.

Day 9: Slither: 

Before James Gunn was fanboying the crap out of Guardians of the Galaxy he made a horror comedy called Slither. This stars the always likable and charismatic Nathan Fillion as a small town sheriff having to deal with an alien invasion. Much like The Void, this seems to homage the body horror of old with truly Cronenbergian creatures, but unlike The Void this is flat out hilarious. All characters stretch their comedy legs keeping the laughs coming thick and fast but the stand out character for me is Mayor Jack McCready played by Gregg Henry. His intro as a crass a$$hole (there really is no better way of describing him) is comic gold and each time he’s on screen he kills it. I feel that this is a film that everyone should see once because it’s brilliant. Yes, there is a lack of articulation in that sentence so let me just say, It’s gross, a bit violent but extremely funny.

Day 10: Cannibal The Musical:

I want you to read that title again and know a few things. 1. It is not made up and 2 and one of my favourite things, of which there many, about this film, is that it is based on the True story of Alfred Packer. On their way to seek riches in a Colorado gold mine, a party lead by Packer end up being snacks for the would-be guide. Or so it would appear. I know what you’re thinking, this doesn’t sound funny. What if I was to tell you this was made by the guys responsible for South Park. I first caught this on Channel 4 back in the late 90’s as part of a Troma film season. It played late night and with good reason, within the first few moments, the blood and gore flowed in gratuitous and over the top fashion. Of course, that was nothing compared to when the songs began. Much of this can be considered a blueprint of the tropes that would end up furnishing the long-running and widely popular South Park. Poking fun at almost everything in the genre including but not limited Alfred Packer’s lost love Leighanne, it gleefully bashes all kind of clichés, notably of the musical numbers and horror variety. With musical earworms, you’ll find harder to get out of your head than human flesh out your teeth and many numerous comedic moments this is worth your time… or at the least is certainly worth mine, again!

Day 11: Dawn of the Dead (2004):

Oh man do I remember the uproar when this was announced: “Arrrrgh you can’t remake a classic, rah, rah rah etc.” Of course Hollywood was like “Shut it, ya pr!cks” but no doubt in a less Scottish vernacular. What we were presented with was a remake that paid homage to original but was in its own right also original. First off there is no shuffling but full pelt Zombies tanking it after folks, to the point where this out of shape chubby ginger bloke would be a Zombie entre, and while 28 Days Later may have had the same trope 6 years prior Danny Boyle is adamant the 28 Day’s Later is NOT a zombie film so Kudos to Zack. There is a larger group as opposed to original’s 4 which makes for a better character dynamic and there is care when likable characters go bye bye and catharsis when the bad characters join them. This is fairly relentless from the get-go, takes less than 10 minutes to get to speed and opening scene sets you up for a great movie. Potentially get some flak from DC folks over this but I maintain this is Zack Snyder’s best film. It’s Violent, Gory, Action packed as well as funny and emotional at all the right bits. Enjoy!

Day 12 Curve, Night of the Slasher, Blinky & Breathe: 

On the 12th day of Halloween, my true love gave to me 4 GOLDEN SHORTS. Yes I know I’m off on the song and the lyrics but I just can’t seem to care! So I’ll break these down Short by short without going too much into depth because too much means “why would you watch it?” 

Curve is the story of a girl who wakes up Clinging to a smooth, curved surface high above a sentient abyss. What more do I have to say about this that doesn’t have you intrigued; let’s just say that despite the simplicity, it’s very very tense. 

Night of the Slasher is shot in a single take and follows a young lady looking to violate the code of horror by committing all the sins in order to confront her would be killer. This wears its John Carpenter influences all over its blood-soaked sleeve. 

Blinky is the only Short I’d seen prior. The story a young boy and his robot who “just wants to be your friend”. Only he might be the most stable of friends, pretty sure we all have a fair share of those (if not you're obviously the mental one) I do love this short immensely. Emotional and a bit sad and pretty creepy.

Finally Breathe a very short piece in which a ghost who a young gentleman is enamored with, only appears when he holds his breath. Given how short this is I won’t say too much, but I will say it’s quite effective for the runtime.

Day 13: The Babysitter: 

This dropped on Netflix on the same evening and I thought I’d give it a bash. The film follows your standard nerd, bullied, disliked, my childhood before I became the cool hip awesome bloke you all know and love etc etc. The only person who treats him with a modicum of respect is his hot too good to be true, nerd sympathising Orthodontist....pffft, of course, it’s his Babysitter. On a standard evening of Babysitting our Nerd-do-well spies some truly nefarious dealings which features his favourite babysitter and things go pear-shaped. Hijinks and some pretty gratuitous violence are unleashed. A film that doesn't take itself remotely seriously and quite fun. The only pitfall is the shite acting, but I’m not sure if this is a stylistic choice or laziness. All cards on the table I enjoyed this film, though a bit silly, it was a good laugh.

Day 14: Christine: 

How many folks reading this have films that make you smile, that warm you no matter the genre. The equivalent of a comfort blanket? This is one such blanket for me, This here is one of my favourite Carpenter movies and Stephen King adaptation. This is a childhood classic for me and yes I was no doubt way too young to watch it but I’m so glad I did. This just your age-old typical tale of Boy meets car, boy falls in love with car, car turns out to be sentient and evil. No of course on paper this sounds guff and not too dissimilar to King's disastrous foray into Directing “Maximum Overdrive”, though trust me when I say this isn't that. What sets them apart is the creepy vibe present in Christine which is achieved by the acting talent with particular note of the leads decent into madness. The special effects are awesome and practically done and despite being 34 years old have aged better than me. My favourite of these practically done effects is the Flaming car scene. This still rings out a chorus from me screaming “HOW THE FUCK WAS THIS DONE?” The neighbours are not as appreciative as you might think. The final thread that ties this gem together is John Carpenters score. A cherished childhood memory and a long-standing favourite of mine which is yet to get old.

Day 15: Paranormal Activity: The Ghost Dimension: 

Ahhhh the never-ending gravy train that is the Paranormal Activity franchise. By this point I assume Oren Peli is surprised that this franchise just wont rest, yet it endures. Its a very hit and miss series of films with none really capturing the originality of the first. So far I’ve not liked one of them, which was the third. The latest entry is by no means good, in fact its predictably flawed but there is an inherent difficulty keeping things fresh. This one attempts the whole 3D thing, but to be fair that is probably just an obvious attempt to squeeze that little bit of cash. Thankfully I watched it on Netflix and so I didn't have to deal with the 3D. I did however liked the explanation, in that the 3D was due to a modified camera designed to catch spectral energy. Bit flimsy I know, but better than just ignoring why a found footage series is now 3D. The story is one of those predictable flaws mentioned earlier and is on the generic side. The scares are decent but of course because the film is devoid of score builds up a background noise rumble (if you've seen any of the films, you'll know what I’m talking about) which is that cue that basically is telling you when to be scared. I hate this trope in horror films which is usually marked by the rising music. “Get ready to get scared people, woooooooh” Its false tension. If a horror film is well done it doesn't need to rely on this cheap trick. But I digress. The film was enjoyable, there’s something very gleeful in being able to see the spectral entity that the characters can't. Even if looks a tad mucus-y

Day 16: The Sixth Sense: 

A film, like the original Planet of the Apes, that everyone knows ending of. However if for some reason you’ve never managed to see this gem, I shall remain spoiler free here. So why would you watch this a second time despite knowing how it wraps? Well because it’s a very well put together creep fest and a hell of a debut from M Night Shyamalan. Yes that guy who ruined Avatar the Last Airbender. It's hard to imagine but there was a time that he was held in pretty high critical regard, his first two movies are masterworks and The Village is critically divisive but I believe its one of his most underrated films, that's right I said it, come at me, bro, and by bro I mean the internet! Also in recent years The Visit and the excellent Split has Shyamalan on a pretty clear comeback. But back to his feature debut. For those cave dwellers, the film centres on the relationship between Broken psychologist Malcolm Crowe played by Bruce Willis back when he gave a shit and Cole Sear a troubled child with the darkest of secrets. Malcolm see’s Cole as his redemption case and Cole just wants to be helped and to be rid of his curse. You see Cole is visited by some pretty darned scary spectres and he just wants to not be, which is fair enough. The two leads work very well off each other and feel for both but it the relationship between Cole and his mother that really sell this film, at it’s hear despite all the creepiness you have this Mother/son relationship which is not only believable but filled with emotional heft, I challenge you not get overwhelmed by the scene between the two in the car. Another re-watch point is absolutely fantastic score by James Newton Howard, The scares though generic these days are still quite unsettling but what makes this different from other horrors is the aforementioned emotional depth from all involved. This is a movie I’m happy to revisit.

Day 17: The Final Destination: 

This series is an extreme guilty pleasure for me. There is not much in the way of the story of depth and all follow the same generic formula, Big disaster happens or supposedly happens as standard character get the old bit premonition and stops him/her and bunch of other him’s and her’s from being part of the disaster. However given that they’ve gone and wound up Death and he’s like “NO, I’M NOT HAVING IT, THAT’S JUST NOT ON” the survivors are dispatched in creative, over the top and pretty darned gruesome fashion. This entry sees the main disaster set piece taking place at a Nascar race and after all the carnage takes place, shock, our would be protector warns a group of folks off. The deaths come thick and fast after which. This film is probably the worst of the bunch but was put on due to the relative “brain switch offedness” if afforded. There is a few highlight, the swimming pool scene, and my particular favourite Red neck + Tow Truck but this is very much a meh movie. Marred by the whole 3D inclusion the death scenes look a bit pats and very CG’d but it’s enough to switch off and enjoy.

Day 18: 30 Days of Night: 

Imagine a town where once a year there is a month of no sunrise. Now that might be unsettling in its own right but imagine that vampires discover this place exists! Buffet time and humans are the snacks. The isolation and the threat at the heart of this are simultaneously brutal and subtle. Yeah, there are some pretty spectacular set pieces but the film decides to go down a route where the fight for survival is more central. The build-up is quite slow and creepy with strange occurrences happening before we're introduced the Vampires. Carnage ensues but We spend more time with the survivors to in their claustrophobic hideout feeling just as powerless as them. The vampires are dealt with is suitably terrifying fashion, totally selling the predatory habits and ancient lineage. Very few lines of English dialogue is uttered by them, instead opting for the use of an ancient sounding language. These days in the wake of Twilight, it's hard to think of Vampires as scary creatures, this film harkens back to a time where you know you’d sh!t yourself coming face to face with one these Scary b@stards. You should also check out the source material written by Stephen Niles and drawn by Ben Templesmith. Sorry, Niles but it’s Templesmith's artwork that always draws me back, which is not to say the writing isn't good, but pick it up and you'll know what I mean.

Day 19 Holidays: 

An anthology piece around certain yearly holidays Starting with Valentine's day and culminating in New years. There are some truly dark and fuckked up shorts in this film probably taking the cake for latter is St Patrick's day & Easter. The standouts for me were Fathers Day, Valentine's day and Christmas Day. As with most anthology films there are hits and misses and a couple fall short but all in a decent little bunch if segments, like an evil Chocolate Orange!

Day 20: Fist of Jesus: 

Tonight was Games night and so I introduced my friends to the wonder of Fist of Jesus. Now, this sounds like a very dodgy title but it's not that kind of sacrilegious, it's sacrilegious in a completely different. After Jesus performs the miracle to resurrect Lazarus, things go south in an undeady type of a way. It's then up to Jesus and his bestie Judas to dispatch these strolling corpses...with lots of fish. But don't take my word for it, here are quotes from watchers:

"Made me convert to Christianity"- Archie

“Too tired, for this pish Mark!”-Evonne

“I’m at Church every Sunday now”- Liam

This is definitely worth 15 Minutes of your time!

Day 21 The Blackcoats Daughter (February): 

The danger these days with horror is to make a relentless 90 minute to 2 hour Jump scare fest and therefore make the film ultimately forgettable at its conclusion. The horror films that stick with you are the subtle slow burners that will build atmosphere throughout and only employ the jump scare periodically. You see this with the likes of The Innkeepers and It Only comes at night and in this case with February (Aka The Blackoats Daughter). From the outset, there is already something not entirely quite right and the unsettling undercurrent continues to wash over you until the film's conclusion. Often showing very little and allowing you to imagine the scenario that’s unfolded just out of eyeshot. The premise see’s a couple of young girls left at their boarding school for a winter break due to the parent’s “forgetfulness” to come and collect them in time. There is an age gap between the two ladies with youngest of the 2 going through some unsettling changes. I feel in terms of giving a synopsis that this should be enough. I suggest just going in and watching without much prior knowledge. If you prefer your horror atmospheric and slow-burning then this is the gem for you.

Day 22: The Love Witch: 

This film is stunningly shot and immediately gives you the impression you’re watching 70’s era hammer type film. While not your typical horror, it brings you in with a captivating lead and Rom-Com type of premise. Elaine (Played by Samantha Robinson) just can’t seem to make love stay. More accurately every man she falls for kind of ends up not alive, it’s pretty unlikely. Being a practicing Witch she uses her oh so considerable power and allure to reel in the unfortunate gentlemen until of course, she meets the “right” one. She then does everything she can to get him to love her back. This is a gloriously mental, at points funny kind of horror. There not full on gore for those violence hounds and there isn’t an awful lot to be scared about. It skirts the edge of “horror” very well giving you a unique experience that is likely to linger Not for all and I suspect some folks, particularly the horror aficionados may not rate this quite as highly as I do but I suggest giving it a try, you might be pleasantly surprised.

Day 23: Evil Dead 2:

Oh man, this movie fills me with a genuine sense of giddy glee whenever I think about putting it on or previous viewings that have some pretty happy memories for me. Cheesy as it sounds Movies serve for a lot of my happiest memories, taking my mum to see Marvel films, my girlfriends and I’s first date and the source of many others and my collective entourage viewings where I drag a group of my friends to see the big releases or even the tiny ones. Evil Dead 2 has particular significance in my growing up and memories with my Aunt. A day many years ago, two young folks with horror in their hearts trawled the Jack Kane centre park where a car boot sale was taking place. Through the hubbub a young Mark spots Evil Dead 2 on VHS split seconds before his Aunt Claire does and before she knows it he’s bought it from a guy, who let's be honest, shoulda checked the young Marks Id. Claire's frown slowly fades as realises what our afternoon now entails of...we’re bloody gonna watch Evil Dead 2.

I watched these films in reverse order having been shown Army of Darkness first but this is my favourite given its history. That day, as Claire and I sat in front of her tiny TV and watched this splattering of genres was a day I fondly remember and as a result will get just slightly giddy when I hear the narrator say “Necronomicon Ex Mortis, roughly translated “book of the dead” or when Ash has his maniacal laughing fit, or Henrietta in the fruit cellar or the Iconic “Groovy” and punch the air moment. Each of these moments, as well as the rest of the film, will get me goosbumpy. For those who haven't seen this (and come on if you haven't, have a word with yourself) Ash played by the always brilliant Bruce Campbell takes his lady for a romantic getaway in an isolated cabin in the woods. Of course now one draws a line in the fucking sand and Ash reads the Latin, or the latin sounding words. Either way, it's a dead language (been a while since I punned, was getting the shakes). Anyhoo this awakens something dark in woods and what follows is a blending of some excellently brilliant slapstick comedy and genuine moments of terror. It's a mix that should never work, the serious dark tone of the horror and the outlandish ridiculous humour. But man does it work and work extremely well, there's gore, dismemberment, pratfall, hands with evil intentions and a laughing mounted deer head. It's hard to express praise any higher than I already have for this film. It has a special significance to me which will won't dissipate.

Day 24: Happy Death Day: 

Groundhog Day with stabbing. Oh, you want more than that, gosh needy lot are you not! Tree Gelbman wakes up on her Birthday in a strange blokes room and goes about her standard college (University) type of day. Goes to classes, get's off with folks she's generally not supposed to until, when on the way to a party, she’s brutally dispatched. Well maybe not brutally, as the violence is pretty gosh darned tame. She then wakes up in the same boy’s bedroom...at the start of her Birthday. TIME LOOP YAAAAAAS! This rinses and repeats until the film wraps. This film could've been standard plop if not for a charismatic lead played by Jessica Rothe. She is having an absolute blast and you're along for the ride! This is a lot of fun and made me smile. My only real criticism is the lack of gore being that it's a PG-13 in the states. Now neutered horror can be good, this is a prime example but I feel my bloodlust could've been pandered to  Just a little.

Day 25: Halloween: 

Remember what I said about Evil Dead 2? I mean how could you not, its the largest chunk in this. Well, Halloween is another of those memory makers but don't worry I won't gush...too much. So yeah Black Christmas may have come first but this film is almost predominantly responsible for the slasher Horror subset of the genre, it was in the wake of this that Freddy & Jason came along (more on them later). Michael Myers is the Grandaddy of horror villains and despite treatment in recent years, started his tenure as a bloody terrifying presence. John Carpenter uses his bogeyman sparingly first, building suspense before the inevitable slaughter-fest. He stalks the poor babysitters, with Jamie Lee Curtis center stage. It still stands up because of its subtle build up, creative dispatches of those horny teens and that score. Carpenter’s scores are all pretty much iconic and sound excellent live. If you haven’t, watch this film which I was obviously too young for when I first viewed!

Day 26: Jigsaw: 

Let's get this out the way, the first Saw film is an excellent isolation thriller with a gripping story and engaging characters and with the notable exception of the 2nd film the rest of the franchise is pure shite. The films central core is completely overshadowed in the previous entries by the increasingly elaborate gore creating traps and the convoluted ways the keep using to tie each entry into it's predecessor. None have been as clever as the first. The second comes close but it is ALL downhill from there.

So was Jigsaw any good? Well it's premise is suitably intriguing with Jigsaw murders kicking back off 10 years after the franchise villain John Kramer has gone to the trap creating factory in the sky, or perhaps more likely the ground. There are obvious clues pointing to Kramer's unlikely return but something is not quite right. That is   where the smartness ends as the film find it hard to decide what it's gonna do and therefore the big "reveal" is pretty much "saw it coming". Despite my misgivings, I did enjoy this film but more in an " awwww look it's trying so hard to be as good as the first". If you want to capture that previous macabre magic of the first, strip down the budget, the location and characters and tell what seems like a simple story. I suspect there's a Hollywood exec thinking of doing the complete opposite which is why this film and any subsequent entries will ever be as good as the original.

Day 27: Tucker and Dale Vs Evil:

You know the old horror genre trope of those backward Hillbillies being those to avoid horror films cause you'll be "doomed" if you cross them? Well, prepare to have your prejudices reversed. Tucker & Dale Played by Alan Tudyk and Tyler Labine respectively are off to fix up their summer cabin when these pesky kids start dying all over their property. The film pokes all kinds fun at those standard genre cliches by flipping them on their head and keeps poking fun until the end. It's violent but only in over the top to prove it's commitment to its irreverence. Laugh out load throughout and quite heartwarming at others. This is a particular favourite of mine and I'm glad I included it.

Day 28 Stranger Things Season 2 (Episodes 1-5- at the time but. season complete now): 

So we paced this. I firmly believe that binge-watching is not a good habit to get into. It's so easy to sit for 8/9 hours, or higher, straight and tank a series thanks largely to Netflix's model. The problem is that once it's done in record time...you have nothing for a year. Ordinarily, I prefer to watch 2/3 eps at a time over several days or sometimes weeks. Restraint means better enjoyment, so despite having the whole the season at your fingertips pace yourself. So now my rant is over on to How good was Stranger Things S2...VERY! Before I start gushing I'd like to address the Demogorgon in the room by saying Episode 7 haters gee yerself peace! There was absolutely nothing wrong with the episode and it's placement, Jesus they establish the fact that this will be addressed in the very first episode. It gives some much-enjoyed character development to Eleven and despite claims that it kills the pace I think it gives a needed breather, especially if you are binger. Also, anyone else I've spoken to in person very much enjoyed the episode so there is that. So this season kicks off a year after the events of the first. Will is still having a rough time of it with it being claims of him struggling with PTSD but something more sinister is present. Joyce is dating Samwise Gamgee and Nancy and & Jonathan are pretending they don't love each other and so on. Look the story is great and I could outline plot thread by plot thread but lets put it this way if you want to sit through a compelling nostalgia trip with some of the best ensemble of talented child actors to grace the screen in many years then this is your cuppa tea. There are some pretty great stand out moments, Farrah Fawcett Hairspray anyone? I'm curious to see where the Spielbergian Steven King by a jaunt through Silent Hill goes next and will be like the rest of you. Eagerly anticipating Season 3, which just in case you were in speculative doubt has just been greenlit! Can't wait.

Day 29: Brain Damage:

 Saw this back at Dead by Dawn a few years back, it's certainly a film. I have quite the fondness for this schlocky tongue in cheek affair in which Brian awaken one morning not feeling the best. it turns out that this is because he has a new companion in a smooth-talking symbiotic parasite known as Aylmer. Aylmer's friendship is not free, in exchange for some mind-expanding chemicals that Aylmer excretes, Brian must hep his new friend acquire Brains...human brains to be exact. Not to Brian's credit, he remains fairly oblivious to this for the most part due being trashed out of his gourd.

This film is more comedy than horror but there some pretty gratuitous moments of gore and the films core concept means that there is a whole of lot creative ways to dispatch the brain buffet's and I mean creative. For those who have seen this film, You'll know exactly what scene I'm referring to and those who haven't well go ahead and give it a bash. A great but insane 80's offering.

Day 30: Freddy Vs Jason: 

God this movie is stupid. I mean really stupid. But let's put some of the old bit perspective on this bad boy. Before the MCU, before WB was struggling with the DCEU we had a crossover that horror fanboys were geeking out over as much as I did watching the Avengers: Infinity War trailer. This was the showdown that was eagerly anticipated since Krugers Razor accessorised glove dragged Jason's Mask to depths of hell 10 years prior to the closing seconds of Jason goes to Hell. Was it worth the wait, well probably not but I was still excited to see it, to the point I nearly elbow dropped a boy for spoiling it while I was up a ladder adjusting a Finding Nemo banner. Reckon I'm going to leave that there with no hint of context. As stated the film is stupid but sets it's self up is sort of clever SORT OF. Freddy is in a bit of a funk as now he's all but forgotten due to a plot by local police to hide the truth about the previous murders (yup, that's not made up). The irked Kruger decides he'll dispatch a would be slaughterer for hire and goes about waking Jason up from his rest and sets him loose on the Elm st kids taking credits in a bit of a dick move. When Jason won't come to heel, well that's when the old "Vs" comes into play and the scraps take place in Freddy's dream realm as well as in the real world, and I have to say the set pieces are pretty cool. It's not the best film, hell it's not even a good film but it brainless as the "teenage" fodder in the film and pretty darned enjoyable.

31. Train to Busan: 

And finally, my horror films came to a close for the month with this South Korean cracker. A father escorts his young daughter to Busan by train to see her mum for her birthday. A journey the young girl insists she's capable of going alone, you'll be glad the Father decides not to listen to her as all hell breaks loose when some of those pesky living impaired board the train with a lack of tickets and etiquette of the biting of humans. The rest of the film thunders from one tense set piece to another ensuring the sphincter remains puckered throughout. There is some also very surprising emotional heft throughout and moments that make me test my manly non-crying limits. Director Sang-ho Yeon is definitely one I'll keep an eye out for.

So there you have it. Took me a month to write, next year if I do this I'll be sure to write the reviews as I'm going along. I would appreciate any feedback, comments or discussions you want to have as I require constant validation. This includes suggestions for 2018's 31 Days of Horror. If you have made it this far, thanks and I hope you enjoyed this Macabre Madness.