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theanimeroom · 3 months ago

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BOMBSHELL | TEASER

synopsis: five men, five women, one villa. with hearts and a $50,000 cash prize on the line, who will win the race to find love?

warnings: love island au featuring: tokyo revengers, blue lock, and jujutsu kaisen, lots of kissing, smut, multi characters × reader, lots of mixed pairings, very random challenges, fluff, slow burns, mentions of cheating, drama, angst, plenty of tears, multi fandom, and playlists included!

a/n: content warnings will be posted with each chapter, so be sure to read thoroughly before indulging! i haven't written a full fic in a while, so any beta readers would be appreciated to make sure that the story comes out as best as it could <3 the story will progress through my own discretion as well as voting at the end of each chapter, so make sure to cast your votes to see how the plot will unfold!

BOMBSHELL MASTERLIST

your heartbeat was erratic as you stood in front of the fire pit and your host, eyes scanning the expanse of the large, beautiful villa that you'd been staying at for the past four weeks.

you still remember the first day that you walked in here; a plethora of pretty faces greeting you with happy smiles and intrigued expressions. you reminisced the way that you were almost as nervous as you are now, eyes wide and palms clammy as you tried to ignore the growing anxiety surging through you. you thought about all the experiences you'd had up until this point, all the friends you made, all the things you learned about yourself, and most importantly, him.

out of everything that you had been through in your time at the villa, one thing that made the whole experience worth it was finally meeting the person of your dreams. you came onto the show thinking that it would be something fun, maybe slightly embarrassing, but fun nonetheless. you never thought that you would come out the end with someone that you could call your own, someone who understood you seemingly better than you knew yourself. despite all the fights, all the tears, and everything in between, you managed to come out the other end okay. happy even.

and you weren't the only one.

your gaze fluttered to your best friend, who stood two people away from you, a proud smile crossing your lips even with your nerves consuming you. you weren't the only person who came into the villa with baggage on their shoulders, yet none of you let it stop you. a brief image of you holding her as she cried into your arms flashed through your mind, the sadness and betrayal leaving her a wreck in your makeup room. you'd thought for a moment that it would be the end of your time together, yet you were happy to see her pull through and find happiness in the end.

everyone here had done their absolute best, even with their rights and wrongs, and that thought alone was enough to quell the queasy feeling building up in your stomach.

"alright islanders, it is officially time," the hosts' voice chopped through the nerve-wracking silence with ease, her calm expression giving no hints as to how the end of the night would go. a long sigh escaped your flared nostrils as you closed your eyes, teeth grazing your bottom lip as you forced your emotions to stay in check.

a soft hand turned your attention to your left, air escaping you as you looked up at the man you could truly say you were starting to love. he smirked at you, his own expression laced with playfulness as he tried his best to calm you down. a large grin spread across your face when you felt fingers interlocking with yours, a gentle squeeze giving you all the reassurance you needed to keep yourself grounded for the time being. your breath halted as he leaned down, lips just barely touching the shell of your ear as he whispered to you softly. "we'll be fine, baby."

you pulled away so you could glance into his eyes, a small nod giving him confirmation that you heard what he said. you trust him, probably more than you should.

"it has been a long, hard journey for those of you remaining," your host started, giving a soft smile to each of the islanders standing on the other side of the firepit. "yet, each of you has managed to find a connection here in the villa. although some of you have been through more struggles than others," you could feel the heat rising onto your face when your eyes made direct contact with hers, a snort escaping you as you laughed with the rest of the islanders that you could now call your best friends. "you all have made it to the finals, and are now in the running for the 50,000 dollar prize on the line."

you subconsciously tightened your grip on his hand at the mention of the prize, your body weight shifting from one foot to the other. you wanted to win, wanted that 50,000 so badly so you could finish your schooling without issues. yet, you were content with whatever outcome was prepared for you. in the end, as long as you had him next to you, you would give up the money in a heartbeat.

"since the start of the show, the country has been voting for their favorite love island couple," each word she spoke left your anxiety spiking, your mind begging her to just hurry up and give the results before your heart exploded from suspense. "but now, they have voted for their official love island winner."

you held your breath as you stared at the host, silence taking over the villa as she picked up a small envelope from the couch behind her. you eyed the paper with angst as she peeled it open slowly, reading the results before looking up at the lot of you behind the fire pit.

you watched as her jaw flexed, a breath getting sucked into your mouth as your heart started to beat so fast you thought it would jump out of your chest.

her mouth opened, eyes scanning the crowd before the first words left her lips. "and the winner... of love island is..."

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ckret2 · 9 months ago

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Chapter 45 of human Bill Cipher would give anything to be trapped in the Mystery Shack again; The Eclipse, part 3.

Whatever's making gravity disappear in Gravity Falls is accelerating; Bill continues to insist he knows exactly what it is but won't say what; Ford's getting pretty fed up with him; and poor Dipper's just got to put up with them.

Oh, and totality arrives.

Bill woke up before full dawn with his cheek in half an inch of water.

He sat up with a gasp. The movement flung his bedsheet off; it floated gently in the air. Bill's exhalations moved it faster than gravity did. The lake was flooding the tent.

He was collapsed halfway out of his tent. He crawled the rest of the way out, dry heaved, splashed some water on his face, forced himself to his feet, and looked at the golden sky.

He didn't like what he saw.

####

Ford and Dipper were woken up by "Reveille" playing on a kazoo. "Rise and shine, puppets, the situation's gotten worse!"

Ford sat up with a groan. "The devil's going..." He lifted his hand to rub his eyes, and instead splashed himself with water. He gasped. "What?"

Bill kicked at the zipped tent flap. "You're flooding, and that's the least of your bad news."

When Ford got out of the tent, Bill was pacing back and forth on top of the water, wringing water out of his bedsheet. "My estimate was wrong. Totality's happening today," he said. "The eclipse must have accelerated."

"Oh, that's ridiculous," Ford said. "How can an eclipse accelerate?"

"You don't know everything! You study the paranormal, you should be used to the inexplicable!"

"My job is to explain the inexplicable."

"Split hairs later!" Bill pointed toward Tate & Backle's Bait & Tackle shop at the far end of the lake. From that distance, it seemed to be sitting on the surface of the water as well. "The closest shelter's the bait shop. We can wait out totality there—"

"No," Ford said.

Bill stared at him. "What do you mean no. You don't still plan on hiking up to Gravity Peak—"

"I do."

"Are you insane!"

"That's an interesting question out of you."

"It's going to be here in hours! And you want to be at the highest point in Gravity Falls?!"

Dipper shuffled out of the tent, blinking groggily. "Why do you have a kazoo?"

"Not! Important! Now!" Bill resumed pacing. "What'll it take to convince you to take this seriously and stay low?"

"You could start with a proper explanation."

"I've explained as much as you need to—" Bill abruptly fell silent and stopped walking, eyes wide with horror.

Dipper and Ford turned to see what he was looking at.

There was nothing. Just a few pine trees in front of a line of gray rocks still tall enough to stick up out of the shallow water in front of the sheer cliff face below Gravity Peak. Dipper turned to Bill. "What?"

Bill didn't answer. He just took off his backpack and started stuffing his damp bedsheet inside. "With gravity so low, the climb through the tunnel to the peak should be a lot faster than humans can usually go," Bill muttered. "If we can get up there in an hour or two, do your stupid scans, and at least get back to the cave before totality..." He looked worriedly at the sky, then slung his backpack back on. "But we need to leave now."

Ford said, "I suppose we could have breakfast on the go. As soon as we pack our tents and change into dry clothes..."

"No time," Bill said. "You can change in the cave, you'll just get your clothes wet again if you do it here. We'll come back for the tents later."

Dryly, Ford said, "Who put you in charge of this expedition?"

"If we waste any more time, the lake will rise higher than the cave opening and we won't be able to get in."

Ford mentally measured how high the lake had risen already. "We'll come back for the tents later."

The survival equipment Ford kept in his backpack included a self-inflating raft with two collapsible paddles, which was well worth the slightly-unstable magic he'd used to get it to fit without being too heavy to carry. He inflated the raft, everyone climbed in, Ford gave Dipper the second paddle, and they set out across the lake in the pinkish early morning light.

Bill looked back over his shoulder one last time at the the line of sharp, gray rocks, and the beforeimage of brilliant red blood drying on their points, such a dramatic and permanent change to their appearance that even hours beforehand he could see it; and then he forced himself to turn away. The only way they were avoiding that was if they were off the cliff before totality.

####

As they crossed the lake, Bill ran his hands beneath the surface next to the inflatable raft and scooped up a handful of water. With the water came eight small, wriggly, ghostly axolotls, clear as glass and shining in the thin rays of dawn.

Dipper gasped. "What are those?"

Bill gave him a sharp look. "You can see them?"

"See what?" Ford asked, leaning over to peer at Bill's hands.

Dipper said, "The—the axolotls?" At Ford's frown, Dipper asked, "Can't you see them?"

"He can't see them," Bill said.

Uncertainly, glancing over the side of the boat, Ford asked, "In the water? Where?"

"No, in Bill's hands."

"He can't see them," Bill repeated. "You shouldn't be able to see them, either." He spilled the axolotls back into the lake. They melted into the water as though they'd never existed. "You really, really need to get inside."

Dipper did not like the sound of that. He swallowed hard.

"What exactly did you see?" Ford asked.

"Bill just... scooped a bunch of tiny axolotls out of the water," Dipper said. "Like the one in the fish tank, but smaller. And they were completely clear, like they were made out of ice."

"Were they alive?"

"Yeah, they were wiggling around. They disappeared when he dropped them back in the water."

"At least they're still transparent," Bill muttered. "And I suppose you won't take this as proof that I've been right about everything."

"Wh—" Ford lowered his paddle and gestured at the lake, "How do invisible axolotls that only some people can see prove anything about 'gravitational eclipses'! If anything, that sounds like the exact kind of weirdness that would come from the Nightmare Realm ripping open!"

"Oh, I wish it was the Nightmare Realm, I would love for it to be the Nightmare Realm," Bill snapped. "You know what, never mind! I changed my mind! Keep saying your thing about the sky ripping open and pouring all my friends into town! Maybe if you say it enough times I'll be wrong and it'll happen, that'd be great!"

"It at least makes more sense than your story! What in the world are a bunch of invisible axolotls doing in the lake, anyway!"

"Migrating."

"Axolotls don't migrate to Oregon, their native range is in Mexico!"

"Fine. Harbinging. They're harbingers."

"Of what?"

"The eclipse."

Ford dropped his oar, made a gesture like he was fighting himself not to strangle Bill, and finally dragged his hands down his face. "Why. Are invisible axolotls the harbingers of an eclipse."

"I don't know, it's just one of those things! Are we going to the cave or not?!"

Ford furiously started rowing again. Dipper had to hurry to keep up.

As he paddled, Ford snapped, "And for as often as you've told us not to look up, now that this 'eclipse' of yours is nearly at 'totality,' I still don't see anything out of the ordinary in the sky!"

"Of course you don't," Bill snapped back, "it's not in the sky."

"Then why can't we look up?!"

"I don't mean up, I mean up-up."

Ford stared at Bill like he'd grown a second head. "WHAT?!"

"I mean... ahhh," Bill made a frustrated noise, snapping his fingers, "English doesn't have a word for— upward-but-not-skyward! You know what I mean!"

Ford almost snapped at Bill again; but then paused. "Hold on," he said slowly. "That's from..."

"Who cares what it's from, you at least know what it means—"

"Flatworld," Ford said. "That was the name of it, right?"

A brief grimace flashed across Bill's face. "Yes, that."

Dipper looked between them, confused. "What?"

Ford said, "It's a novella that explains the concept of higher dimensions by using a metaphor about lower dimensions. A sphere visits the second dimension to teach a square about the third—but where the sphere intersects the second dimension, all the square can see is a circle."

Bill muttered, "Would you drop the wise mentor schtick for five minutes—"

Ford raised his voice. "The sphere tries to explain that the rest of its body is above the second dimension—but having never seen the third dimension, in the square's language 'up' and 'above' mean the same thing as 'north.' The sphere resorts to calling the third dimension up-but-not-north to indicate that it's a different, unseen dimension."

Dipper nodded slowly. "So, if the eclipse is upward-but-not-skyward, then... what, you're telling us not to look in the fourth dimension?"

"Finally!" Bill sighed. "It's not exclusively in the fourth, but—it's close enough, you get the idea!"

Ford said, "But we can't see the fourth dimension."

Bill gave Dipper a dubious look that Dipper didn't like at all; but Bill only said, "Then you've got nothing to worry about, just like I've been saying! Keep your eyes shut just in case."

"Convenient that your proof is only visible in a dimension we can't see," Ford said wryly.

Dipper looked up, squinting at the sky. Bill shoved his head back down.

####

The waterfall was more of a waterfloat. Large orbs of water gently descended from the cliff high above, catching the early morning light. Ford and Dipper stopped paddling to watch in wonder. Bill muttered a spell under his breath, and a foot over their heads the waterfall landed on an invisible umbrella and rolled to the sides rather than land in their raft.

The water level had risen so high they had to lay nearly flat in the raft to get through the cave entrance; rather than paddling, Ford pushed them through with his hands on the tunnel's ceiling. Bill was out of the raft and walking across the water to the shore while Ford and Dipper were still getting their paddles positioned again.

"Gravity's currently—what, about twenty-five percent?" Bill tugged off a shoe, dropped it, and observed how fast it fell. "Twenty to twenty-five percent." He took off his other shoe, rung out his socks over the lake, and stuffed them in his backpack, preparing to climb barefoot. "And it's only going lower. You should be able to just jump up most of the way to the top of Gravity Peak. So if you waste my time trying to climb..."

"Would you relax?" Dipper said irritably. "You should be glad we got up at the crack of dawn for you at all." He climbed out of the raft, copied Bill's attempt to dry out his socks and shoes, and then rung out his wet hat.

"You should be grateful I warned you totality's getting closer! Weren't you the ones convinced the world's going to end if you don't chuck a glue bomb at the sky?"

Ford muttered, "I'm surprised you didn't just have us waste time until the cave was inaccessible."

Bill processed that. He pressed his lips together, squeezed his eyes shut, and his face contorted in an expression of exquisite pain and regret. Through gritted teeth, he muttered, "Happy to help."

Ford reeled out a few feet of cable from his infinity belt, looped it around Dipper's waist, and tied it securely. An infinitely-long cable wouldn't be very helpful on a real climb—if Dipper lost his grip, it would just keep unreeling rather than stop his fall—but this wasn't much of a real climb, and at least it would ensure they couldn't get separated. Dipper took out a flashlight, Ford lit his antique lantern—instead of rising up, the flame inside looked nearly like a ball—and Bill hurried ahead of them, not bothering with any light source, eyes occasionally flashing like a cat's in the dark when he glanced back to check the humans' progress.

This was the fastest Ford had ever climbed the tunnel path up to the top of the mountain, easily leaping nearly twice his height to grab handholds that would previously have taken several minutes to climb to; and before long, he was all but ignoring basic spelunking safety to keep up with Bill. Losing his footing simply meant a slow, gentle fall back to the nearest level ground to try again. The only thing holding Bill back—who, Ford suspected, was now simply flying through the shadows—was Dipper, who was also climbing as fast as he could.

The only time Ford even came close to catching up was when Bill paused to look down the path that, if Ford remembered right, led to the thousand-year-old cave paintings where Ford first learned about his "muse"; but then Bill was gone again, rushing ahead into the dark.

While Bill was at the furthest end of his tether, Ford dropped back to keep pace with Dipper. "Keep your voice low," he said, "but—Dipper, are you absolutely positive that what you saw in the lake were axolotls?"

"Pretty sure. They had the frills and everything, I don't know what else they'd be," Dipper said. "Do you think that's important? In your third journal..."

"That's just what I was thinking."

When Ford had documented his interdimensional travels in Journal 3, he'd included a few strange references to axolotls he'd heard over the years: refugees in the Nightmare Realm who'd cried "praise the Axolotl" when Ford had said he would kill Bill; an oracle who mentioned Bill's history and prophesied his defeat, whose temple was filled with tapestries and paintings of axolotls.

"Maybe they're connected?" Dipper asked. "Maybe the axolotl they're talking about is some kind of... ancient enemy of Bill?"

"I think it's more complicated than that," Ford said. "I was only able to describe a few of my travels in Journal 3—but I heard 'the Axolotl' mentioned in multiple dimensions."

Dipper processed that. "What, so... do you think they're all talking about the same god or something?"

"Yes and no. Some societies referred to this Axolotl as a divinity—although not a creator god. But nobody seems to agree on what its domain is. I heard some say it's the god of goodness. Other, the god of justice. The god of luck. The god of second chances. I've rarely seen the same label twice." Ford shrugged. "But then sometimes it was described like a vast animal or a force of nature—something that travels between stars and watches astronautical travelers, like a curious dolphin watching a boat. I never learned if they were all describing the same being, a group of beings—or if it was a simple translation error for some other term like 'demigod.'"

Dipper scrunched his nose. "'Translation error,' what? Across multiple civilizations?"

"The dimensional translator I received was somewhat buggy," Ford said. "From time to time it would offer wildly incorrect translations for individual words. For instance, it consistently replaced the word 'soccer ball' with soccer ball, of all things. You can only imagine what kind of trouble that got me into."

Dipper blinked in bafflement, opened his mouth, decided maybe this was a can of worms best opened later, and shut his mouth.

"And on top of all that, not all the cultures I encountered respect this 'Axolotl.' In some places, it was called the god of injustice, inequality, or cruelty. The patron deity of criminals and tyrants. Sometimes it's a villain in folklore—a legendary thief, mercenary, liar, or thug. I don't know why the stories vary so wildly," Ford said. "But that Axolotl certainly doesn't sound like someone who would be Bill's enemy."

"I guess not." But how could one being be the god of both justice and injustice? Second chances and cruelty? Either some of the stories had to be wrong, or else they were about different axolotls.

"So in the end, I have no idea what the Axolotl is. But," Ford said, "I wouldn't be surprised if it has something to do with whatever Bill's hiding."

####

When they reached the tunnel's exit, Bill was standing beneath a tree, staring fixedly at something unseen in the sky. "I think it's still speeding up," he muttered. "Not that either of you care. I suppose I'm just talking to myself."

Ford elected to ignore Bill as he untied the infinity belt's cable from around Dipper's waist and reeled it in. He started the walk to the highest point along the cliff's edge. Dipper followed, and reluctantly Bill did too.

The tunnel had meandered sideways as it rose through the mountain; the stream that fed the waterfall they'd passed under was far to their left side, and the cliff looked out not over the lake, but over what used to be the shore, which was now submerged in several inches of water.

Dipper followed Ford to the edge so he could look over at the waterfall. For a moment, he couldn't figure out why the lake below looked wrong; but then he realized that the sun had risen high enough that the sky had changed from pink to pale blue. Which meant the lake should have been reflecting blue. "Why's the lake pink?"

When Ford just gave him a puzzled look—"It doesn't look pink to me."—Dipper turned to Bill.

Bill didn't even glance toward the lake. "Congratulations on being able to fully see the axolotls."

"There can't be enough to turn the lake pink," Ford protested, a tad irritably. "Leucistic axolotls are rare in the wild, they usually come in shades of brown and black."

"Oh you'll find anything to—" Bill pointed toward Dipper. "If you don't like their coloration, take it up with him! I'm not the one that told you how they look! If there weren't an independent witness here, you wouldn't have even believed me if I said there were axolotls."

"If there weren't an independent witness here, you wouldn't have told us there were axolotls." Ford slung off his backpack to rummage through it for the micro-rip scanner.

"Why am I seeing axolotls?" Dipper asked. "I mean, why... just me?"

Bill didn't answer for a second. He was still staring at the sky, watching something. He finally muttered, "Good question."

Dipper wasn't reassured by the fact that Bill wasn't even interested in pretending he knew the answer.

Bill said, "Remember when I told you that meeting some things—even just looking at them—will drive you mad? And that you almost met one?" He finally lowered his gaze to give Dipper a cruel smile. "Well, lucky you, you don't even need to build a portal. One's coming here."

Dipper swallowed hard. "So, don't look up?"

"Look who's finally catching on." Bill's gaze drifted away from Dipper's face and back to the sky.

"If just looking at it can drive you crazy, why are you looking?"

Bill laughed bitterly. "I've already taken as much damage as I can." With considerable effort, he tore his eyes from the sky. He floated to the edge of the cliff and peered over the edge.

Below were the sharp gray rocks near last night's campsite. Even from this high up, the future bloodstains were visible, bright red. They looked soon. Bill suppressed a shudder; his feet settled back on the ground and he backed away. "We're running out of time," he said. "You're as high as you can get, and you're still hundreds of feet below where the rift was. What now, smart guy?"

"I'm working on it." Ford was tying the end of his infinity belt's cable around the scanner. He gave the cable several feet of slack; twirled it in the air a few times to build up speed; and then let it go, sending it soaring into the sky. With gravity practically non-existent, the act of throwing it knocked Ford back a few inches, and the scanner simply kept on flying into the air.

Bill watched with his hands on his hips and a sour look. "Yeah, okay, all right, I guess that works."

"If anywhere is likely to have enough micro-rips to threaten reality, it'll be here," Ford said. "Here, we may need this." He took out the glue grenade, poured in his remaining adhesive, and handed the grenade to Dipper.

When the scanner reached its apex and began slowly falling, Ford pressed a button on his belt to retract the cable. He caught the scanner, examined the numbers, and frowned.

"Well?" Bill asked. He'd backed under the protective shade of a tree and was leaning on it with his arms crossed.

"Twenty-seven thousand micro-rips," Ford muttered. "The highest number so far. Nearly double the amount by Mabel's Fault."

Bill cupped a hand around his ear. "Sorry, did I hear you say 'a quarter of the danger threshold'?"

Ford didn't answer, still glaring at the numbers.

"So can we go now?" Bill asked. "Totality could be here any minute, and I do not want to be exposed on the highest spot in town."

Ford twirled the scanner over his head and chucked it again at another spot.

Bill let out a very quiet, very long, very high-pitched scream.

Ford whirled around. "Would you stop complaining!"

"SORRY! I've been seized by the FATAL HUMAN DELUSION that my actions might have an IMPACT on my FUTURE!" His face flushed with rage and his feet lifted several inches off the ground with the force of his screaming. "Or that MAKING SOUNDS with my MOUTH will COMMUNICATE MESSAGES that the HUMANS AROUND ME CAN COMPREHEND! But don't worry! I'm QUICKLY being proven wrong!"

Ford actually bared his teeth at Bill, and immediately felt stupid for it. He turned away and reeled in the scanner. Catching it bounced him into the air; it took him several seconds to settle back on the ground. "Twenty-five thousand."

"Great!" Bill snapped. "Let's go!"

"So... does that mean we don't need this?" Dipper asked, holding up the glue grenade.

Ford hesitated, looking out over the town. Maybe the danger threshold was lower than Fiddleford had calculated. Or maybe Ford hadn't thrown the scanner at the right spot. Or maybe the problem was dozens and dozens of sites that didn't reach the danger threshold alone, but compounded on each other to destabilize the whole region. Maybe throwing the glue grenade and dispersing it over town was still necessary to stop all this. Bill was right about one thing: "totality," whatever it really was—the full disappearance of gravity—was close. Every movement seemed to knock him minutely off the ground, and he could see his clothes floating.

But he had no evidence the glue grenade would do anything but wreck the environment. Plus, axolotls were endangered; he couldn't imagine invisible leucistic ones were doing much better. He sighed, stuffing his scanner away in his backpack. "I suppose not." Dipper nodded and stored the glue grenade in his own backpack.

"Great," Bill said. "Let's go."

"The micro-rip theory doesn't look likely," Ford said. "But that means something else is going on. And we don't have any backup explanation." He turned and gestured impatiently at Bill. "Except your stupid eclipse story, which is too vague to explain anything and probably riddled with lies."

"GREAT! Let's GO!"

"I came up here to find out what's going on. So what's going on?"

Bill's worried gaze flicked from Ford's face to the sky, back to Ford, over to Dipper. "Your uncle's gonna get himself killed, kid. We don't have to join him. Get over here, at least we can get back in the cave."

Dipper glanced at Ford, crossed his arms, glared at Bill, and stood his ground.

"Hsgd—Fffss—shhk." Bill covered his face, whimpered, and dragged his hands down his face so hard his nails left red lines. "I hate you both so much."

They weren't getting anywhere unless Ford caught Bill off-guard enough to accidentally reveal something. "Bill, what's the Axolotl."

Bill's gaze shot to Ford's face. He pointed past him toward the lake. "Kid saw as much as I did, he can tell you—"

"No, Bill. What is the Axolotl," Ford said. "Friend of yours?"

All the blood drained out of Bill's face.

Ford had struck a nerve. "What does it have to do with all this?"

"How much do you know."

Ford laughed harshly. "And give you an opportunity to mold your lies around my knowledge? Tell us what it is!"

"It's—a curse," Bill said. "It's a curse in living form."

"No. Tell the truth."

"What do you want to hear! He's my defense attorney, okay?!"

"I said the truth, Cipher!"

"WHY?! How would you know the truth if I told it?!" He flung his arms wide in defeat, voice climbing toward a desperate shriek, "I haven't lied once since the eclipse began! What else can I do?! Should I start making up plausible stories again?! Why are you pumping me for information you don't even believe! How can I tell you the truth if you won't give me any trust!"

Ford didn't have an answer.

Bill didn't deserve trust. Offering him even a sliver of trust could be fatal. Ford was 100% certain of that. And if Ford never trusted a single word out of Bill, then they'd never be able to hold a conversation, about anything, ever. Which was fine. He didn't want a conversation. That bridge burned over thirty years ago. Don't trust him.

So then why was Ford trying to hold a conversation with Bill? If Ford didn't believe him, why did he keep trying? What was he hoping for?

What did Ford want to hear?

He didn't have a chance to figure it out. Bill's gaze flicked behind Ford, he screamed, "Anchor yourselves!" and he flung his arms around the tree.

"Wh—" Ford dropped to one knee as he turned to look where Bill was looking, and Dipper tried to fling himself to the ground; but neither had a chance to get a grip in the grass before the last little bit of gravity disappeared—and was replaced by something new.

The waterfalls stopped flowing, then curled up into the sky. The grass and trees tilted toward the center of Gravity Falls, as though blown by an unfelt breeze. Water slowly rose up out of the lake. The Island Head Beast was lifted into the air, eyes frantically rolling around and groaning in alarm.

And an unseen force pulled Dipper and Ford over the edge of the cliff and into the sky.

Dipper only made it five feet before the bracelet's invisible thread pulled taut. It took him another second to realize he wasn't moving and stop screaming. Bill was still clinging to the tree. The bracelets' thread could pass through objects when it was invisible, but if you tried to grab onto it, you could; could Dipper use it to climb back to land?

"Don't let go! I'm gonna reel myself in!"

Bill laughed hysterically. "Do anything you want, I'm not going anywhere."

Dipper groped blindly around his braceleted wrist with his free hand; caught the thread; and started dragging himself, hand over hand, down toward Bill. But even as Dipper tried to reel himself in, the unseen force continued to pull him back—in more dimensions and planes than he could see.

Something poorly attached tugged loose.

His vision swam and the world went gray.

And his soul popped out of his body.

Dipper's ghost looked at Bill. Bill looked at Dipper's ghost. They both looked at Dipper's dead body. They started screaming.

"What happened?!" Dipper groped at his ghostly torso—and through it—and then flailed his arms in a desperate attempt to make them more corporeal. "Ohmigosh what happened to me!"

"It's not me!" Bill shouted. "I didn't do it, you saw me, I wasn't even touching your body, I'm innocent!"

"I'm in the mindscape," Dipper said, "this is the mindscape, right?" It was unmistakeable; the world was cool and gray and muffled, just like last year, just like in all his nightmares. "Why am I in the mindscape! What am I doing here!"

And then the gray landscape fell beneath a reddish-pink shadow.

Dipper turned around.

A massive shape, winding slowly through the air as though it were swimming, descended over Gravity Falls, sunlight filtering through its translucent pink body. So massive that Dipper couldn't see both ends of it at once. So massive that even though only a tiny cross section of its body passed through the third dimension's mindscape at once, the full mass of its unseen higher-dimensional body was vast enough to eclipse Earth's gravity—and cause every loose object in town to slowly fall skyward toward its body.

It was awe-inspiring and terrifying and majestic; and Dipper was sure he'd seen it before.

The Axolotl twisted back on itself, doing a loop in the sky that carried it halfway to the moon, to position itself to look down at the peak over Gravity Falls with one huge, black eye. Bill looked at the ground. Dipper looked at its face.

As Dipper made eye contact, the world froze. Everything slowed down. A hole in time and space opened where only the two of them existed; no one else could hear them and they could hear no one else. The Axolotl was so massive that Dipper could feel its thoughts like the static charge in a lightning storm and hear them like the echo of thunder. It thought—thunderously, apocalyptically, infinitely kindly—"Ah, yes. Hello again."

Dipper swallowed hard. "Hey," he croaked. "Have—we met?"

"Yes," the Axolotl said. "I'm afraid that's the only question I have time to answer. Tell your sister I said hello." Its world-making gaze moved off of Dipper, and he was back in the mindscape.

And the Axolotl turned his attention to Bill.

####

(Congratulations to the three people who saw it coming. Hope y'all enjoyed, would LOVE to hear what you think, and next week Things Get Worse, Again!!)

#bill cipher #human bill cipher #grunkle ford #stanford pines #gravity falls #gravity falls fic #gravity falls fanart #fanart #my art #my writing #bill goldilocks cipher

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whateversawesome · 8 months ago

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Spy x Family Chapter 98: An Explosion

Let's start with the most important thing and we'll go from there. Ready? This panel:

Blink and you'll miss that insignificant comment from someone we don't even know their name. Nevertheless, given the implications of Project Apple, this panel is huge! Because, even if back then it was just a rumor, there's a chance it could also be true. Project Apple could have started during the first conflict. This leads me to the following theory:

Anya's biological parents were prisoners of war.

The story about Twilight as a soldier, Martha and Henry, as well as Millie, Franky, and even the Lady Patriots Society tell us about the dehumanization of the enemy. So yeah, it's very possible that it was acceptable for either side to do anything they wanted with captured enemies, that includes experimentation.

And by prisoners of war, I'm not only referring to soldiers and medical personnel, but also spies. Wouldn't it be funny if Anya's birth parents were also spies? It's too soon to tell, but it's so much fun to speculate 😆

At the beginning, it's stated that Anya was created by accident:

Maybe she was "an accident" between two prisoners of war or between a prisoner of war being experimented on and a scientist 🤔

So here's another crazy idea: Everyone thinks that Anya learned Classical Language because it was used in the lab by scientists, but what if it was her biological parents the ones who taught her that language in order to be able to communicate with each other?

At some point, I thought that even if we learned about Anya's past there was a possibility we would never know about her parents, now I think we will.

About the Chapter

Clearly, SXF is an anti-war story that wants to show us how terrible war is for EVERYONE. That's why big and small characters, side or main, have been affected greatly by war.

I'm sure plenty of people will talk about Martha and Henry's love story. After this chapter, I think it's clear that they probably were separated by war and that Henry had to marry to save himself, leaving Martha up in the air. (I know I am a fool, but I keep hoping she's the one he married, but I don't think so 😭)

Anyways, leaving the cautionary semi-tragic love story aside (Ahem, watch out Twilight and Yor)...I see what the author is trying to do: The story shows us very clearly what happens to every person when pushed to their limits, when they and their families are in danger. It's a story about loss, loss, and more loss.

The story is trying to make the readers root for peace and be very adamant against war. This is a masterclass on "Show, don't tell." So even if a lot of these stories seem insignificant because it's about side characters, they are meant to influence the readers' point of view about war, so when it reaches the main characters, we all know what could happen to them. These stories are meant to raise the stakes for the main characters.

Now, I've said it before: It's very possible that close to the climax of the story, Ostania and Westalis will be at the verge of a third conflict. By then, we'll know much more about the main characters' background as well as many other stories of side characters affected by war (don't be surprised if The Garden was created as a consequence of it). So when we're close to the end, when war is about to happen, we'll know exactly what could happen to the Forgers, because it has already happened to so many people: loss.

Something to Keep in Mind

The more the story moves forward, the more curious I am about the Desmonds. Since all of the characters were affected by war, I'm wondering how were the Desmond affected? Melinda certainly has issues (did this happen during and because of the war?) and Donovan Desmond is still a BIG question mark. It easy to relate to what normal characters feel. If any of us were going through something similar, we would be terrified too. However, how is it for someone in charge? How did Desmond see and suffer war? I really want to know.

One Last Thing

If in two chapters focusing on two side characters Endo has managed to create such a beautiful love story, can you image what he plans to do with Twiyor, which is the main couple of the story??

I know I say this a lot, but after seeing this my expectations are high and I am convinced it'll be worth the wait.

Food for thought.

#spy x family #twiyor #sxf #spy x family analysis #Sxf meta #Sxf chapter 98 #loid forger #yor forger #martha marriott #henry henderson #loidyor

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littlewriters-posts · 8 months ago

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Stranger - CooperHoward/TheGhoul x reader

Plot: Cooper finds himself in a bit of a pickle with the settlement he stumbled into, only for you to help him out

Warnings: Mentions of Sexual Assault

Being a Ghoul did have its advantages, including the quick healing and being on the brink of immortality.

But it did have its disadvantages, like how a lot of normal people or 'smoothies' as he liked to call them, hated them.

Which is how cooper found himself in a bit of a pickle.

One of the bullets had lodged its way uncomfortably close to his spine, and no matter how he twisted, he just couldn't get it out. He knew he needed to, and fast or his granted immortality would be no more.

But when you're as well known as he was, enemies were everywhere.

He thought he's found a quiet place, a little alleyway down the side of a bar, to recuperate. As he wracked his brain on what to do next, the sound of a sweet voice caught his attention.

Was that music?

It couldn't be, there was no music in the wasteland, there just simply wasn't the recourses to do anything like that. But it was what he could hear. The sound of a sweet voice singing a melody he couldn't quite make out.

He sat up straighter, trying to gain his strength in order to stand.

"And where do you think you're going Ghoulie?" a sneering voice snapped him back out of his thoughts. He tried to stand, the sharp pain in his spine bringing him back down again, heavy to the ground.

He moved anymore that bullet was going to render his legs useless.

So there he sat, down the side of an old bar, as three men approached him with sickening grins on their faces.

He couldn't reach his gun, and silently cursed himself for dropping it where he did, just out of reach and unable to use.

"Now boys, don't do something you regret," he drawled, the fake confidence oozing off of him. But that was all it was, fake.

"Sorry, we don't listen to your kind," The shortest of the three men laughed as they approached.

Cooper sighed, faintly realising that the music in the bar had stopped.

How poetic that it should, if this is where he was supposed to die then so be it. He'd killed enough to know that there wasn't anything stopping death when the time came to it.

One of them men struck his face with something sharp, and Cooper hissed in pain. It felt different, the pain not subsiding like it usually did.

He wasn't healing.

So maybe it was his time to die, maybe this was the end.

"Maybe we'll have some fun with you before we kill you," One of the man laughed maliciously "Always wanted to see what's underneath a ghoulie's skin," he said raising his short blade and licking his foul lips.

"What the FUCK do you think you're doing?" Came a voice.

Cooper turned, squinting slightly as he saw you. You were stood, hands on hips, glaring at the three men. Cooper sighed, you had no chance against these guys, which meant, he had no chance.

But to his surprise, the three men coward slightly, as if being scolded by their mother.

"He was stealing Miss. Honest!" One of the men said. You eyed him suspiciously, walking over to examine the poor ghoul.

"And were you Mister? You stealing?" You asked him.

Cooper was perplexed. The way of the wasteland was that fear was the main ruler, and from the looks of it, you weren't something to be feared.

"No Ma'am," he said truthfully "I make enough caps not to have to be a thief," he said glowering at the other men.

You turned to the three others, your eyes icy. "Get lost - and give me that damn blade Adrian, you clearly don't know how to use it,"

The man, Adrien, gave the blade up that he cut Cooper's face with, sighing heavily as he did so.

"Now fuck off, before I tell the boss" you commanded waving your hand.

"What about him?" The short man said, eyeing Cooper distastefully. The Ghoul grinned at him, making the other man step backwards "We don't allow ghouls here,"

"Leave him to me," You waved them off, and watched silently as they retreated, muttering to themselves.

Cooper watched you, not quite knowing what to do. Of course there wasn't a lot he could do, apart from accept what was going to happen.

You turned back around, expression softening.

"It's alright honey, I aint gonna hurt you. Now tell me, where does it hurt most?"

Cooper opened and shut his mouth in slight shock. Kindness was not something you came across in the wasteland, and it had been years since someone directed that kindness at him alone.

He didn't quite know how to respond.

You sighed, crouching down to his level and brushing your fingers along the slice down the side of his face. He shivered slightly at your touch, your skin was warm and smooth and brought back a warm comfort he wasn't even aware he missed.

"I'm here to help honey, I might just be a singer, but I'm also the town Doctor. Best one you'll get for miles so you tell me what's wrong and I'll fix you right up," you promised, looking at him with wide eyes.

He stared back, as if trying to determine whether or not you could be trusted. But your eyes looked so innocent, and your skin was so soft, it was almost difficult not to trust you.

"My back, got shot a couple yards back," he said gruffly after a pause "And that man of yours did this to my face," he added.

You grimace "My fault you're not healing I'm afraid. Town got overrun with Ghoulies, rabid ones, not like you mister. No matter what we did they were hard to take down. I found that dipping blades in Iodine stops the wound from closing up - I don't know why,"

Cooper groaned "So you gonna get me killed sweetheart, that what you're tryna tell me," he coughed, retching as he did so slightly.

You shook your head "Not at all Mister, just gotta clean your wound, that's all, and you'll be fine - can you walk? Stand?"

Cooper shook his head.

"No matter," You said "I guess that'll be the bullet doing that. I'll get it out for you now, and take you up to my place to get you properly cleaned up. That sound good to you cowboy?"

Cooper eyed you suspiciously "And how do I know you ain't gonna kill me?"

You frown "You don't I guess. But I ain't killed you yet, and I have a feeling you're quite the cowboy when you're on form, I doubt I'd be able to leave a scratch on you,"

Cooper snorted "You're certainly healing my ego sweetheart, even if you are just tryna butter me up,"

"Do you know who shot ya?" You asked, helping him scooch forward so you could examine his back.

"Do I fuck," he grumbled "Some guy down near that butcher's place you got going. Didn't even do anything,"

You hum "Yeah, a lotta people here got something against your kind. Luckily for you, I think he makes his bullets out of magnetic metal,"

"Why is that good for - OW!" Cooper yelped as he felt himself jolt upwards from the pain.

You smile sheepishly holding a magnet in your hand. "Safer than digging round in there. Lemme know when you can walk honey, then I'll take you upstairs,"

"So what's a pretty thing like you doing, helping out a ghoulie like me then?" Cooper asked, rubbing his back slightly. It was healing, thank god, and the pain was slowly easing.

You shrug "Ghoulies are just people that drank the wrong thing ain't they? Still deserve to live,"

Cooper frowned, he's never met anyone who didn't want anything, but there wasn't any giveaway for you. It was like you were actually doing something out the goodness of your heart.

"You gotta be careful, caring about people like that. You'll get hurt," he said shortly, before using the wall to get to his feet.

You smile "Maybe Mister, but doesn't it get lonely all be your self?"

Cooper didn't say anything, but allowed you to take his arm and lead him into one of the buildings, helping him up the stairs, and into a large empty room. Save a couple of bottles on shelves, and a mattress at the bottom corner, it was completely empty.

"What's this then?" he asked.

"Where I perform most surgeries," you say "Being empty helps to keep it clean,"

"Well I don't need surgery do I?" Cooper said, his guard suddenly up again. If this was another trap he'd kick himself for falling for it just because you were pretty.

"No," you says looking at the floor. "But if the boss finds out I was helping a ghoulie I don't want to think what he'll do to me,"

It was then that Cooper noticed the patterns of bruises on your arms and legs, but especially on your thighs.

"Those men ain't scared of you, they're scared of your boss," he realised. "Or husband?" he asked, glancing at the marks on your neck.

You shrug "I endure what I gotta to keep me alive. I give him what he wants, in return I don't have to endure it from every man that comes my way," you say bitterly.

Cooper relaxed slightly, he couldn't trust you when you were leading the lie of your perfect life. Nobody had one, it didn't make sense. But this, this made sense.

"So what am I doing here?" he asked as you sat down cross legged on the mattress.

"That Iodine won't clean itself, and even then it'll take a while to heal. You'll need stitches," you said, holding a needle in a bottle of alcohol.

"And if your boss walks in?" Cooper asked.

"You've got your gun," you say sullenly "I doubt you'll let him kill you,"

You patted you lap slightly "Come lay here honey, it ain't ideal but it's the easier than sitting up,"

Cooper hesitated for a moment, staring at you. He wasn't about to go all soft just because a pretty girl looked at him gently, or showed him any ounce of kindness.

But it didn't mean he couldn't enjoy it whilst it lasted.

He complied, taking his hat off and collapsing onto the Mattress, with his head resting on your knee. He kept one hand on his gun, the thought of you turning out to be one big trap not quite leaving his mind.

"You try anything, I'll shoot ya dead sweetheart, got that?" he warned, an attempt to be threatning.

His harsh words fell on deaf ears as you smiled gently at him. "It might sting a little honey, but I promise I won't hurt you okay" the way you were talking to him made his stomach lurch a little, the reassurence in your voice was like honey over glass.

He closed his eyes as he felt your soft touch on his face, wiping away at the cut as gently as you could. He listened to your slight humming as you did so, the noise ever so soothing as you tended to him.

You couldn't help but stare at him a little as you cleaned the wound. You'd helped a dozen or so ghoulies in the past, but there was something about this one that caught your eye. Something about him that made him stick in your mind.

"So what brings you down here honey?" you ask.

"Non of yor business," he grumbles.

You didn't say anything. Maybe that was it - most Ghoulies were itching to talk to someone, many poured out their whole life story just to anyone who will listen. They were lonely, you realised, cursed to live forever alone.

But this Ghoul was different, closed off.

"You didn't tell me your name Mister," you say, threading the needle.

"I didn't," he replied, not even wincing as you threaded his skin.

You chuckle "Well what am I supposed to call you then?"

Cooper sighed. He wasn't used to people just talking to him for small talk. Usually they wanted something.

It felt Alien.

"Cooper." he eventually said.

"Well Cooper," you smiled, stroking the cut gently to sooth it. "You're all done and dusted. You'll feel a little sore but after a day I'll be ready to take those stitches out and you'll be brand new again,"

Cooper sat up quickly, the warmth of your skin on his not quite leaving.

"I ain't got a day sweetheart," he said gruffly "I can take em out myself,"

You bite your lip, you didn't want him to go, not just yet.

"I wouldn't recommend-" you started but Cooper was over to you like a flash, pinning you against the wall with the gun to your head. You stared at him in surprise.

"And why you tryna keep me here?" he growled "So you can go and wake the boss up?"

"No!" you cried indignantly "I just told ya I didn't want to hurt ya!"

"Great," Cooper said, drawing back from you. "I'll be off then,"

He turned to go and you felt your heart tug slightly. He couldn't leave, not yet. You still had more time.

"Please Mister," you say urgently, crossing in-front of him "You can't go yet,"

Cooper raised his eyebrow, and his gun "And why's that missy? Thankyou for patching me up, but that don't mean we're friends," he said. Your face drops and you realise what you've been holding onto, a dream. A dream to just have a friend, to not have to endure your stupid husband and his stupid friends who just viewed you as a fancy fleshlight to do what they wanted to.

"You're right Mister, I'm sorry," you say, your head dropping. "Try not to be seen on your way out,"

Cooper didn't stop looking at you as he walked past, the cogs in his head whirring.

You did want something. He realised, as everybody does. You wanted a friend.

That very thought almost made him turn around and accept, but he didn't. He couldn't. In the long run he couldn't stay here, he'd have to leave you eventually. Better to not get attached.

But something in him couldn't leave you completly. So after he left, he hid, watching as you came out of one building and into the next. So he followed you. Followed you and hid as he saw other people coming towards you.

"You're back late," a fat man spat at you.

"Sorry Max," you mutter "I was helping one of the townspeople. Their kid was ill,"

The fat man, Max grumbled a bit before turning to his friend who let out a booming laugh.

"Sweety, I was just telling my friend here, how good you've been recently. He wanted a go," Max laughed and you flinched. You knew it was useless to run - where would you go? And protesting only made him angrier, which would leave you bleeding and bruised for days.

"Now you sit down mate, my wife here will see you're satisfied," he sneered at her "Now get on your knees girl, and show my friend how good you can be,"

From his hiding spot in the next room Cooper snarled. He could see your tears even from here, and your shaking hands didn't fool anyone.

"Actually Max," the other man said "It's not her mouth I want,"

Max let out another laugh "Well that's gonna cost you extra I'm afraid my friend. And extra if you want me to leave,"

To your horror, the man drew out several extra caps, his hungry eyes never leaving your scared ones. This is what you were being reduced to, an object.

"Don't damage her too much my friend, nobody want's damaged goods," Max said with a hearty laugh, getting out of his seat. He pulled your hair, making you squeak from the pain "And be good," he warned, letting you go as you rubbed your scalp.

He left from one of the other exits as Cooper decided what to do. On the one hand, it was all good and well shooting the guy in the face, but what of you? There were many other men out there who would do exactly what this man was about to do to you, if not worse.

A whimper caught his attention as he watched the man grab you by the arms and forcibly bend you over the desk. He watched your pained and fear stricken face scrunch up as you tried to brace yourself for what was about to come.

He couldn't take it anymore.

Bursting through the doors, he shot the man dead in the face and you jumped. You shot up, almost falling backwards as you did so, and let one of the tears fall freely down your face.

"I ain't your friend sweetheart," Cooper said, lowering his gun "But I owed you one,"

You glance at the man on the floor, to Cooper with a a fearful expression. "Thankyou Mister, but I'm afraid you've caused more trouble than it was worth,"

Cooper frowned "I stopped him raping you, what's worse than that?"

You let out a humourless laugh "And what do you think the boss does when he gets angry? He ain't gentle Mister, and this guy would have been a real treat compared to him,"

"Ah hell," Cooper said scratching his head with his gun. He saw your point, and even killing the boss would not get you out of trouble. There would always be men like him. "Alright come with me,"

You blink, you hadn't been expecting that. "What?" you ask.

Cooper beckoned you over "Don't worry sweetheart, I may not be a real gentleman but I ain't gonna hurt ya. I'll kill ya, if you get on my nerves, but I'd never do what these would,"

You nod slightly, not quite believing your luck. You stepped over the body, pulling your dress back down where it was riding up, and looked at Cooper with doubt in your eyes.

"Why you looking out for me if we ain't friends?" you ask as you walked besides him.

"Maybe I'm lonely," he said in a lazy drawl.

You freeze "Look your handsome Mister, but I don't want to fuck you. I've never found it anything but painful, and I never want to do it again," you say, your voice shaking a bit.

Cooper looked at you with an unreadable expression. "I just said I'd never get you to do that sweetheart. Conversation does wonders for loneliness too you know,"

You relax a lot, walking besides him once more.

"Besides, if it's hurting they ain't doing it right," Cooper added "It's not supposed to hurt, it's supposed to feel good,"

You scrunch your nose up "Well it feels anything but that - but boss always said I did a great job," you frown at the floor.

Cooper sighed, handing you a canteen of water "Drink up," he said "There's a place I can get more from down the road, after that we ration it,"

"What about you?" you ask with a twinge in your lip. He said nothing, but refused to take the canteen back, so you did as you were told.

"You have anything you need to get? When we leave, we ain't coming back, you get that right? Anyone you wanna say goodbye too?" he asked once they left the building.

You pause "My chems, I got Radway if you need it. And some medicine,"

He nodded "Show me where then little lady, I'll make sure no-one gets ya,"

You give him a smile, the first genuine smile you felt in years, and you could swear the the corners of his mouth twitched as well.

"Thankyou Mister," you said honestly before scampering to get your things. They weren't far, in fact you had already packed them all.

Cooper raised his eyebrow "You wanted to leave for a while?"

You nod "First time Max-" you shudder, thinking of the memory "The first time hurt the worst, so I ran away. When Max found me I thought he'd be angry, but he was so gentle...until he wasn't. It was a viscous cycle I could never get out of," you hum slightly as you tie up your bag, tossing him a vial of yellow liquid.

"I only got eleven of those mister, so use them sparingly." You warned. "But I'm good at making money,"

Cooper nodded at you in thanks, before opening the door and beckoning you to follow him back down the road.

"Your boss hasn't noticed then," he said, noticing the distinct lack of commotion from down the road.

You nod "You won't. He likes to give each guy that pays him around two hours with me," you yawn slightly.

Cooper tries not to let his disgust show. It wasn't that he didn't find you attractive, you were certainly pretty, you were an easy target for things like that. But he couldn't imagine doing something like that to anyone, much less you.

"Well like I said sweetheart, I'll kill you if you get on my nerves, but I ain't gonna hurt you,"

#cooper howard #cooper howard x reader #cooper howard x you #fallout #the ghoul

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glitterjay · 9 months ago

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— staring contest

⠀⭒ paring heeseung x afab!reader. friends to lovers(?, makeout, pet names, drabble, mention of alcohol(?, short, semi suggestive content under the cut (minors DNI)

parties like this were often in this side of town. big houses, loud music, it was what you and your friends called the rich kids neighborhood as kids. and here you were now, walking into one of those big houses for a party you were invited.

you had met jake in one of your classes and you had both hit it off instantly. it would be too fast to call him your best friend, but he was definitely making his way up to that title.

you heard about this big party invitation going around, to which jake gladly filled you in. it was lee heeseung's party. ironically, he and jake were really good friends, which made the latter earn a plus one to the invitation he had received.

jake had told you before that heeseung limits a lot who he hangs out with, which just makes him even more popular for his "mysterious" reputation. you weren't going to lie, he was handsome, but you wouldn't try to get to know him if he didn't want to.

once you both made it into the house, jake grabbed your hand to lead you to his group of friends (which included the host of such party) who seemed to already be playing around with each other. "damn jake, i didn't know you had a girlfriend" one of the boys teased.

"she's not my girlfriend, jay. but at least i have a pretty girl to accompany me." the comments made you blush furiously, coughing as if that would make the redness leave your face. "we'll see about that" a voice called. it was the only face you could put a name to besides jake. it was heeseung.

"you're just in time, yun. we were just about to play some games."

it had been 3 hours since you arrived at the party. cans of beers flooded the table where you guys had originally started playing beer pong. "i know! why don't we have a staring contest?" the one who you had learned was named sunghoon suggested.

"i think thats a great idea!" jay exclaimed. "jake can hardly look at anything without giggling anymore, this should be easy." as the other two kept pestering jake for his clumsy and drunk behavior, you had felt someone else starting the staring contest.

heeseung's eyes were locked on you. it was as if a lion had just seen the perfect pray. he looked hot. you turned around nervously, trying to find the one who brought you here in the first place.

"jake is long gone. probably playing around with hoon and jay." he said.

your body tensed a little after hearing his voice. it was much deeper and heavier for some reason. "yeah, i guess you're right." you could see heeseung eyeing you up and down, licking his lips. it made you feel insecure for a moment, until you realized how close he had gotten. "i could kiss you right now."

"so do it." you said, feeling bold. heeseung didnt think twice, rapdily grabbing your face and slamming his lips into yours. it was quick at first, but then it turned more romantic. your hands rested on his broad shoulders while his held your face steady.

"your pretty dress kept calling me all night. it wants me to take it off."

i feel like this is sooo bad... | © glitterjay | tumblr

#— ✿ c's work!#kpop #hard hours #enhypen #enhypen smut #kpop smut #enhypen hard hours #engene #enhypen heeseung #enhypen heeseung smut #enhypen heeseung hard hours #lee heeseung

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snowdropluck204 · 8 months ago

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A Date With Death - Spencer Reid x Unsub Fem! Reader

Hi my lovelies! After a lot of people seemed interested in this story, namely a few that commented who I am tagging below! If anyone wants to be tagged in these chapters from now on, let me know! I am going to try and plan this out okay, I'll post a separate post with the release dates of the chapters! With that! Enjoy!

Also, I'm a Brit writing about America... Specifically Colorado! So if there is anyone from there that would be willing to help me, please do!

Tag List: @vexis-world @inexplicableeee @flowercrownsandtrauma

TW: Murder, gore, blood, vomit, mentions of rapists, pedophiles, abuse, y/n being mistaken for male.

Spencer pov

The BAU hadn't had a case like this for a while...

This case had gotten media attention across the country, further even. All because this unsub was doing things that many a soul had thought about, hell even acted upon, the difference between their unsub and the average person, is that he was getting away with it.

For the last month, bodies had been cropping up all over Denver, Colorado, all with the same MO. People, both men and women, had been found dead in different locations, the only things that the victims had in common were the ways they were killed and that they were all once convicted of a crime. These crimes have ranged from rape, domestic abuse, paedophilia and stalking, but each of the victims had been killed using three consecutive methods.

As the car arrived at the scene of the crime, the body being found outside his own home, I wasn't massively shocked to see the crowd of media representatives surrounding the scene, I was a little perturbed to see a separate crowd of protesters.

"How many of them are there?" I asked confused, "God the street is crawling with them!" Morgan nodded from beside me, as we both stepped out of the car. Hotch grumbled under his breath, "Clearly the local cops didn't secure the area very well." The reporters seemed to have noticed us, we weren't exactly inconspicuous in our suits and sunglasses, but we still flashed the badge, asking them to move as politely as we could.

Immediately we were swarmed, questions being fired at us left and right, "Do you have any idea who was behind this killing?" "What is being done to keep this community safe?" "Why has it taken this long for the FBI to become involved?"

We tried to answer as many as we could without giving away too much of the investigation, including how little had been discovered so far. The police here had no leads, so we were working off of very little, and, until we had analysed the crime scene, we had no working profile of the unsub to make up a suspect list. This was square one...

Morgan walked over to the protesters, myself following close behind, they were all carrying banners or picket signs, they each read various forms of propaganda, 'He's Saving Lives', 'Let Him Live', 'Grim Will Save US.' I tilted my head as we walked closer to the crowd. Derek very clearly hadn't assessed the situation as strongly...

"Don't you worry folks, we'll have this guy behind bars soon!" He called out, trying to get the group to leave peacefully, only to get angry faces and practically being spat at.

"Why? He's doing what our government is too scared to do now! I say let him go!" A woman cried, beginning a chant of, 'Let Him Go.' The chanting became louder, Hotch began seeming more nervous as they advanced. He turned to shout over his shoulder at the local police.

"Can you hold them back please?" At the authority in his voice, the cops quickly rushed to attention, herding Morgan and myself into the front yard. The crime scene.

The body had been placed, almost gently, into the flowerbed in the front yard, some of the blood that decorated his body had even been mopped up. "Do we have an ID on the victim yet?" I asked Hotch, receiving a negative, apparently the neighbours knew of the victim, knew that he lived here, but rarely spoke to him and didn't know his name, so I crouched down to see what we were working with.

This victim's demise, also followed the same MO of the last seven victims the unsub had killed. Each of the victims before this one, had been killed with three separate methods, asphyxiation, the throat was slit and then the victim was garroted. "Reid." Hotch asked from behind me, I turned to look at him, showing him he had my attention, "What have we got?"

I looked back to the body, fiddling with the gloves on my hands, "The victim seems to have been killed in the same methods of the unsub's MO, it's called the threefold death, it's a religious method of killing going as far back as Druid-Irish folklore. The threefold death obviously entailed a person being killed three separate times, in this case, asphyxiation, a form of stabbing and then a mixture of the two... It was said that this method of death was saved and used as a punishment for those who didn't deserve to die only once..." I told them, trying to be as concise as possible.

Hotch nodded, whilst Morgan began taking a closer look at the garrote around the man's neck. Each of the previous victims had been convicted of a crime, violent and sometimes sexual in nature. Each of the garrotes used seemed to be personalised, a single word scratched roughly into the wooden handle of them, this garrote in particular had the word, 'ABUSER' carved into the grain of the wood.

Morgan pulled out his phone, pressing it to his ear, "Babygirl, newest victim apparently has a history of abuse or domestic violence, can you work your magic?"

I focused back on the body.

Like all the previous victims, the body was as clean as the unsub could get it, he seemed to have cleaned up any blood that pooled on the skin, before laying them to rest, in an almost respectful manner. Laid flat on their backs, hands and arms crossed over their torso, with a single white lily laced delicately between their fingers. The only thing that didn't seem as respectful, was the plastic bag tired around their face, using the same garrote that was used to kill them. I decided to speak up my thoughts to Hotch.

"The unsub almost seems to have feelings of remorse, the funeral like way of displaying the bodies is another part of his signature, strange for what we would assume is just a spree killer, it's more likely that he was targeting these people, or that there was an extreme trigger involved.

"The white lily represents the transience of life and the emotions of grief and mourning, also strange for your average serial killer. There is the possibility that the unsub knew his victims before he killed them... That could prove that he has anti-social personality disorder, he's trying to replicate an emotion he has seen around death, like copying the process of mourning at a funeral." I finished, even I felt confused...

Hotch nodded along, before the three of us walked over to the front door of the victim's home, judging by the track marks through the blood, the victim was murdered in the home and dragged out to the garden. "The unsub must have been surveying the house and the neighbours, because most of them work nights or have late night activities, the victim was found outside his home at around one in the morning. Somehow, the unsub made his way into the home, killed this guy using three separate methods and dragged the body out of the home and positioned it the way he wanted in a small window of about three hours." I told the room.

Hotch nodded, following the trail of blood around the house, leading to a chair in the middle of the kitchen, the kitchen tile had a clear tarp laid over it, the chair on top, both were coated in a thick layer of dried blood, the knife used to slit his throat wasn't at the scene, so the unsub still had it...

(y/n) pov

The sting in my throat and eyes was horrid as I retched into the toilet bowl, the tears running down my face were falling hot and fast. Eventually, the vomiting stopped, I took a deep breath, now that I could, I flushed the toilet and shuddered.

I stood up, my legs shaking, almost buckling underneath me, I stumbled my way to the sink, looking up I saw myself in the mirror, the blood spattered across my face, my arms, my hands. My eyes were different to how they used to be, they were clouded by this grief, this agony I didn't know how to get rid of anymore. The colour was faded, the whites were blemished with deep red veins and my pupils were so dilated, so scared. Memories of the night flashed behind my eyes.

I was walking slowly, stalking forward, making my way to the front door of the house. I'd been watching the house for the last few weeks, he was a monster. Beat his previous wives, now he was alone. Beat his children, now he wasn't allowed to see them. The bastard was too scary for those poor women and children to keep charging him with the abuse, so now he was a free man...

Once I got to the door, I smiled seeing the electronic lock, I pressed a small device to the side of the lock, hearing a small buzz before the door clacked open. Taking my time, both so as not to alert my target and also partially dreading what I was about to do, I pushed open the front door, sneaking through the hallways, until I found the kitchen. The pig was drunk, he hadn't been home longer than half an hour, and he was almost passed out wasted, beer bottles lying around where he was sat on the couch, staring listlessly at the television.

I wobbled over to the shower, flinging back the curtain, my head reeling, I waddled carefully in, trying not to slip. I turned the shower head on, full blast, almost blistering hot, and began to scrub at my skin as hard as I possibly could. The water ran off of me in dark red waves, before they faded to pink and then clear. Once all the bloody water was sucked down the drain, I finally began to relax, which was a mistake.

I slunk up to the guy, leaning behind him before pulling out a plastic bag, the crunching sound of the bag alerted him. He turned and met my face, hidden by a mask, a cheap, crappy masquerade mask, a candy skull, hiding my face. A flash of realisation on James' face made me fear he had recognised me, instead, he began to stutter. "You're h-him, aren't you? The k-killer, t-the Reaper?" He whimpered. Coward. I leapt forward, wrapping the bag around his face and pulling.

I curled myself into the corner of the shower floor, the hot water making me more dizzy and in a deeper haze as tears filled my eyes.

"Please..." He kept begging, pleaded with me to spare his life as he tried to rock himself back and forth in the chair he was now tied to, "I'm sorry! I haven't gone near my family since the restraining order!" He shrieked, the most pathetic sounding noise. I almost spat at him, "Then your a liar as well as a beater." I growled, once he heard my voice, he realised that I wasn't the guy everyone was thinking of. "You're a pathetic excuse of human life, weak. You target the people who you're supposed to care for, children, your own wife." I snarled, stalking forward with a small, but extremely sharp, hunting knife.

The blood went everywhere, the walls, David James' face and clothes, the floor, me. The smell was metallic and bitter, it made me feel vile, hideous, tainted.

He was gasping, struggling for breath as I wrapped the bag around his face again, pulled out the garrote, bound the bag taut around his neck and began twisting, the wire digging painfully into the deep gash already across his neck. Eventually, he stopped struggling, stopped breathing. I let go of the garrote, the handle provoking me with my own handwriting, PAEDOPHILE. Taunting both David James, the beater and myself. (y/n) (l/n), the reaper.

I placed him in his car, and drove the short while down to the cemetery, I huffed as I pulled James' body out of the trunk, dropping him rather unceremoniously outside the gates, in a patch of half dead grass. I closed his eyes through the plastic bag, crossed his arms over his chest, and threaded a single white lily through his hands. After I had finished, I stood slowly, bowing my head, a moment of silence for the deceased, however undeserved it may be.

I left the shower, the water still dripping off of my body quickly becoming cold. I knew there would be little to no physical evidence that I was at the scene. I shuddered once again, the shiver continuing down my body. I quickly got changed and curled up in my bed, trying to remember who I was doing all of this for...

Spencer pov

After examining the crime scene, we all went back to the station, Garcia's face appearing on the laptop screen as we began to review the case, what we knew so far. Gideon was writing on the whiteboard, pictures of the victims taped to the surface, annotations lining them. Elle was pacing the room, fiddling with a pen as she asked about the scene and, in turn, the unsub.

"The protesters outside, they sounded like they were supporting him, how popular is this unsub?" She asked, Garcia quickly typing up on her computer, finding the information in quick keystrokes.

"Oh, he's huge, most of Denver population believe that he's saving their children and friends, he's only killing off people who were convicted of a crime, there's never any witnesses, never any tips called in. These people believe that the government was wrong to get rid of capital punishment in Colorado, that these people deserved it.

"A lot of people also think that the unsub deserves the death penalty too, but that he's some sort of public figure, he knew the risks and the punishment, but took out those who were a risk to their society. The unsub has a lot of names, The Grim Reaper, Charon, The Wraith, lot of mythological connotations..."

I sat, stuck, staring at the whiteboard. "What's going on in that big, beefy brain?" I heard Garcia ask, I finally looked up at the team, all looking at me worried. I felt my brow furrow further as I stood and walked quickly, over to the board. There were seven victims up on the board, the ones we had found, who knew if there were more. Now there was an eighth.

"None of this makes sense." I murmured, "All of the evidence contradicts itself, we can't make a linear profile of the unsub..." I trailed my hands along the pictures, "The unsub should be someone who shows little to no emotion, but he sets his victims to rest in a nice place, with flowers, almost mourns them. He gruesomely murders his victims with an ancient religious process, only to have no showing of any other religious motif or ritualistic killing.

"They clearly have been watching their victims, their neighbours, their homes, but there is no physical evidence of that! The places the victims are left were proved by relatives to be special to them, so the unsub leaving the bodies there shows some sentiment and that, somehow, the unsub knew them but none of the victims had ever met each other and have no social circles in common with one another!"

I had never felt so frustrated and confused. Hotch patted me on the shoulder as I sat down again, running a hand through my hair. He began a pep talk that always begins the investigation, "True remorse from the unsub might only be capable if they were compelled to commit the killing for reasons unknown to even them, or he's being forced to..."

#cute #love #fanfiction #romance #x reader #comfort #open requests #spencer reid x reader #criminal minds #x fem!reader #murder #unsub!reader #angst #cw: gore

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lazyneonrabbitt · 1 year ago

Text

Mommy?

Single dad!Carmen x reader

Carmen's daughter likes you and doesn't know the meaning of the word 'no'.

~~☆☆☆~~

You stepped into the sandwich place, your laptop bag slung around your shoulder as something collided with your leg and clinging to it.

"Oh shit, sorry I- she slipped away from me." A man apologises for the little child around your leg, lowering himself to her level and tiredly begging her to let you go.

You took a better look at the toddler at your side. She had the man's curly hair and wore a fluffy teddybear onesie.

The man in front of you was tired. No question about it and his attire told you he worked here.

"Hey, you know what?" His focus moves from the child up to you. "How about I watch her for a bit? I'm planning on getting some work done here anyways and I'll probably be around when your shift ends." You shrugged at your own suggestion, placing a hand on the child's curls making her giggle at you.

"I uh- my shift ends a couple hours after we close." He wasn't declining your offer, he just didn't want you to waste your whole day here. He had gotten up again by now to talk to you at eye level. "I'm Carmen." He extends a hand to you to shake. "I own this place. And this here's Alex," he motions at the babbling todddler who was now casually hanging from your hand. "She's my kid. Daycare wouldn't take her cus she sneezed one too many times on drop off this morning." A tired hand runs over his face as he recalls why she's here.

"Hey, I'll watch her for you. Just come say hi a couple of times and we'll be good." You shoo'd him off and he went back to the kitchen. But not before making sure he got your food order and saying goodbye to his daughter.

Over the course of the day he swung by your table to watch you type away on your laptop while Alex was no doubt ruining your highlighters and scribbling on the back of your notepad. During food breaks she was in your lap and you'd watch some kids videos on Youtube with the sound low enough to not bother anyone.

Little Alex had been an absolute sweetheart the whole time, clinging to you and showing off her artworks that had rendered your notepad entirely useless.

Around dinnertime Carmen had come back again, insisting he'd be fine watching her himself now, but you assured him you were good and didn't mind staying the few extra hours. He accepted reluctantly and rought you two dinner on the house, dessert included.

When the placed closed down and Carmen was finished cleaning everything he came by one last time, to pick up his daughter and thank you again for watching her. You exchanged phone numbers in case he ever needed a babysitter.

Leaving was a lot more difficult than you had thought. Alex threw the biggest fit the second you turned to the door, running up to you and clamping herself around your leg, sniffling No's leaving her lips as she sat down on your foot with her arms around your calf. Tears staining your jeans.

Carmen stood there, a hand on his hip, pinching the bridge of his nose and sighing deeply. "Come on, teddybear. She's tired too, we're all going to our homes and sleep, okay?" He tried bribing, any and all promises he could think of, even physically prying her off your leg resulted in the biggest drama he had ever seen her make.

You felt bad for Carmen. The permanent bags under his gorgeous blue eyes and the mess of curls you wanted to run you-- "what if I tag along and put her in bed?" The suggestion seemingly came out of nowhere amd it took Carmen a moment to register your words.

His place was an even bigger mess than he was and he'd be ashamed if she saw Alex's living situation. But then again, he was a single dad with an extremely demanding job, so the mess did explain itself that way..

"Yeah, okay." A simple, soft answer that had Alex screech with joy.

The three of you made your way over to his car. Since Alex wouldn't let go of you, you carried her while Carmen carried your bag for you as well as his own.

His place wasn't big. But it was big enough for him and Alex. On your way through the livingroom you had to watch your step and not trip over the large amount of toys on the floor. The coffeetable held day old mugs and coffee circles permanently staining the wood. The dinnertable was covered in paperwork but the kitchen looked decent enough, besides the dishes in the sink.

Carmen could feel you judging him, trying to speed up the whole going to bed ritual Alex had so you could stop being grossed out by the mess.

After watching Carmen struggle with the currently very difficult child you stepped in and offered assistence.

Carmen stepped aside and mimiced his steps but in your own way. Suddenly she was the sweetest child ever and did everything you told her to.

"Are you serious? Now you can listen?" The soft complaint didn't go unnoticed and made you giggle as you tucked her in and wished her sweet dreams. Besides you Carmen leaned over to give her kisses and said goodnight as well.

"Why does she listen so well to you?" The question wasn't meant in a bad way, even though it sounded like jealousy. "Guess she just wants a mom." You answered from across the kitchen island. Carmen insisted you stayed for a drink and talk about your day with her. "Neither you or her ever uttered anything mom-related so I guessed it's just you two." You sounded like a prying therapist right now, but you meant it in a kind way.

Clearly both of you sucked when it came to words.

"Her mom was a drunken mistake." He downs half of his drink and decided right there he was gonna talk about it. If you deleted his number and walked out afterwards, so be it.

"I didn't even know she had a kid until kne day she stopped by the restaurant. I barely recognised her but she still made a whole scene about some mistake, dropped the carrier with a crying baby at my feet and shoved a stack of paperwork in my hands." He downed the other half of his drink, not liking how recalling those memories felt. "I barely knew her, only saw her twice before moving back here from New York and found me all the way here to drop the baby and all her papers stating I was the one responsible for her on me and leave after screaming at me amd blaming me for leaving."

Carmen's story shocked you. You sat in silence after he finished, not sure how to respond to such a confession, so you offered your help once more.

After a while babysitting Alex at work and tucking her into bed turned into babysitting, tucking her into bed and moving into the next one together with Carmen. His early shifts really messed up Alex's sleep scedule so he suggested you staying the night and working from his apartment and do Alex's morning routine at a more acceptable hour than 6am, when he's kiss you goodmorning, wish you some good few more hours of sleep and went off to work.

Carmen was enjoying your time together so much, and Alex was almost permanently attached to you when you were around so his only thought was how he was going to ask you to move in with him. You already had a spare key so giving you one of those in a fancy little box wouldn't work.

Eventually he thoight of an idea that just had to work.

He wrote a note from Alex's point of view, rolled it up and tied a little bow around it and handed it to his daughter. "Can you go give this to her, please? It's a gift."

Alex immediately ran over to you, waving the paper roll at you and smacking it against your leg. She mumbled a quick "foyou" before waving it up at you again.

You accepted the gift with a grand display of thanks, with kisses and a hug, a whole scene amd read the note in silence. You recognised Carmen's handwriting immediately and smiled your way throigh the creatively written sentences.

"So, you want me to be mommy, huh?" You asked Alex, but not without moving your stare up to meet Carmen's, who looked away quickly to hide his blush.

A string of Yes and Please and happy giggles were all the convincing you needed before agreeing to move into Carmen's apartment officially.

#sometimes i write #carmen berzatto #carmen berzatto x reader #carmy berzatto #the bear

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lurkingshan · 4 months ago

Text

Japanese QL Corner

In which I cling to the last vestiges of two of my favorite shows of the year, write a eulogy for one of the most disappointing, and rejoice over the entry of a new fav. These shows are available for weekly streaming on Gaga unless otherwise noted.

Mr. Mitsuya's Planned Feeding

Farewell to a wonderful show. @isaksbestpillow has posted all seven episodes as of last week, so if you've been waiting for a binge, now is your chance. I already said a lot about why I loved this one, so I'll just use this space to urge you again to watch! This show is a goddamn delight.

Takara's Treasure

The main narrative ended last week, but this week we got a sweet little epilogue and one more visit with Takara and Taishin. I enjoyed the brief glimpse into their near future and getting to see Taishin turn 20 with his very first fuzzy navel, though I was a bit sad we got a repeat of the finale's themes rather than treading new ground for their relationship (I could not have cared less about the fujoshi writing RPF). This was a lovely show and I will miss these characters.

Happy of the End

CWs: Assault, child abandonment, child molestation, childhood sexual slavery, dubcon (including between the main characters), human trafficking, rape, sexual coercion and exploitation, suicidal ideation/possible attempt, unsafe S&M practices, violence

A very rough week for this show in terms of the content--please mind the triggers above because these are explicit depictions and it can be hard to stomach. I am waiting to see where this show is going with its themes before I make a final judgment, but watching the fourth episode in particular, some parts felt like crossing the line into gratuitous trauma porn that provided little additional illumination. We'll see how it shakes out in the end, but please take care with this one. I continue to find the characters and relationship dynamics compelling, and I am invested in Haoren and Chihiro's attempt to have a relationship despite the metric ton of baggage they are shouldering between them. Neither is equipped to even have any idea what a healthy relationship looks like, but they see something in each other and they want to try. That tiny bit of hopeful but likely doomed thinking may be all we have to cling to in this story.

I Hear the Sunspot

Sigh. I am sad about what this show could have been. For me, the finale definitely did not succeed at sticking the landing and making the last six weeks of wheel spinning feel worth it, and this show is going down as one of the big disappointments of the year for me. As you know if you've been keeping up with this weekly post, I loved the first half of this show, and Taichi's original characterization, so much. And I don't understand what happened here. The second half has felt like a completely different, confused, demonstrably worse show. Taichi hasn't felt like himself in weeks, the plots with Maya and the job at Sign were poorly grounded, inconsistently executed, and offered little pay off either thematically or in terms of character development, and the romance writing was a complete failure. It was actually painful to see Kohei run after Taichi and confess to him again, and the directing and editing of that sequence was so muddled that I had no idea what I was supposed to understand about Taichi's emotional journey or why this was the moment he was suddenly able to reciprocate. After all that brooding and his big speech about communication, he did not communicate much of anything to Kohei in the end. And I'm supposed to be content with leaving them here? Deeply unsatisfying on just about every level.

I understand from @twig-tea that while the story followed the beats of the manga's first two volumes at a high level, this production chose to remove many of the contextual details that actually made sense of the characters' behavior. It also seems they didn't understand they were setting up character arcs that did not get resolved until a later volume the show will not cover, thus ensuring the story would end at the wrong place. Just a baffling set of adaptation choices, and so much wasted potential. It's a shame.

Love is Like a Poison

But at least we have a new favorite coming in hot a week sooner than expected! I absolutely loved this first episode, in which we meet Shiba, our cold-hearted lawyer with delusions of grandeur and a sexually charged fixation on his house plants, and Haruto, our flirty scammer who has his number. This show is really well written and packed a ton of story, comedy, and deep characterization into its first episode. It's a promising start! For now it’s only available grey outside of Japan; I am hoping it will get picked up for proper international distribution soon.

Tagging @bengiyo to add this week's anime update.

#japanese ql corner #takara no vidro #takara's treasure #happy of the end #i hear the sunspot #hidamari ga kikoeru #love is like a poison #doku koi: doku mo sugireba koi to naru #mr mitsuya's planned feeding #mitsuya sensei no keikakutekina ezuke #twilight out of focus #japanese bl #shan shouts into the void

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forever-rogue · 2 years ago

Note

Daddy Eddie melts my heart 🫠 I have such a cute idea! As we know Eddie loves his guitar like hell and maybe Ollie accidentally breaks it? When the little girl realizes what she's done she starts to cry and panic, because she knows how important it is to her daddy, but Eddie calms her down, hugs her, gives her lots of kisses on those chubby baby cheeks and assures his daughter that he loves nothing more than his little princess 🥹🥹🥹

AN | Dad!Eddie makes me so soft🥺🥰

Warnings | None

Pairing | Eddie x Fem!Reader

Word Count | 2k

Masterlist | Main, Eddie

─── ･｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

“Ollie?” it had been silent for too long - at least too long when there was a little Munson underfoot. You wiped your hands on the tea towel, cooing softly at the baby strapped to your chest. Jamie grinned at you, babbling happily as though he could understand what you were saying. When you heard no answer to your call you let out a small sigh, “let’s go and find sister, bub. I’m sure she’s up to something.”

You made sure the oven was off as you took the last tray of cookies out of the oven. Making your upstairs, you tried to listen for any signs of your daughter. Eventually you made it into the spare room which served as both a playroom for the kids and your husband, and found Ollie standing there with a guilty little look on her face.

“Hi Mommy,” her sheepish smile displayed her gap-tooth grin as you sighed softly at her, “is everything okay?”

“That depends,” you stated softly, her big brown eyes widened in surprise, “what are you up to, kiddo?”

“Nothing,” her reply came way too quickly for it to be true. You cocked your head to the side as Jamie squealed in delight. Her eyes softened as she looked at her little brother; the two of them already adored each other so much, “‘m just playing in here.”

“You were so quiet,” you raised your eyebrow at her, “were you playing with Daddy’s guitar?”

“No…” it was a bold faced lie and you both knew it. She took after Eddie in so many ways, including the fact that they were both terrible liars, “maybe I touched it a little bit…”

"A little bit huh?" you ran a hand affectionately through her dark curls, as she grinned at you, "I'm sure Daddy won't mind, but maybe for right now we can leave it alone. He can play with you later."

"Okay," she nodded solemnly as she reached for your hand, "can I have a snack?"

"Sure babe," you promised her, "let's have a snack then maybe we'll go to the park for a little bit."

"Yay!" she practically bounded down the stairs exactly, "I can play with Jamie!"

"We'll see honey," you patted the grinning baby's head, "he's still really small, babe. We have to be careful."

"I'm careful!" she insisted, immediately followed by a small oof as she almost tried in excitement. You couldn't help but laugh in amusement at her.

─── ･｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

After dinner, you and Eddie decided to watch a movie and cuddle on the couch after you’d put the baby down for some sleep. Ollie still had plenty of energy - which you truly envied - and was running around and playing. She wasn’t in the mood to be still and watch a movie so she was off in the playroom. Meanwhile you had been watching the movie but you were slowly falling asleep, cuddled up into his side. His arm was around you as he traced aimless shapes into your skin. Yeah, this was definitely your favorite spot in the world.

“You’re snoring,” you heard his teasing lilt cut through the fog that was slowly falling over you. A huff escaped your lips as you turned to him with a little mock glare. He laughed as he pressed a kiss to the crown of your head.

“I am not,” you sat up so you could face him, a pretty little pout on your lips that he just wanted to kiss away, “I wasn’t even sleeping! Just resting my eyes.”

“Whatever you say, angel,” he brushed a few rogue looks of hair out of your face, before resting his hand on your face, thumb stroking over your cheek, “I think if anyone deserves to rest, it’s you. Even if you’re missing out on a quality movie.”

“A quality movie,” you snorted in amusement, wrapping your fingers around his wrist and giving it a gentle squeeze, “this is some random b rated comedy, my love. I highly doubt you even remember the name.”

“I do!” he insisted as you raised an eyebrow and motioned for him to go on, “it’s…something.”

“That’s what I thought,” you laughed and he took the momentary advantage to tickle your sides. Your eyes widened in surprise as you squealed, meekly trying to miss him off of you, “you’re cheating! This is cruel!”

“Well it’s fun for me,” he grinned, leaning over the top of you on the couch. He took your hands and pinned them to the side as he leaned down to kiss you, “is this really so bad?”

“I’m pretty sure this is how our son happened,” you laughed, “speaking of which, if you wake him, I might have to-”

Almost as if on cue, a few soft cries came over the baby monitor that was on the side table next to the couch. The two of you exchanged soft smiles of amusement. Eddie quickly pressed kisses all over your face before maneuvering off you and helping you to sit up.

“I’ll go and get him,” he whispered softly, “you just stay here and relax.”

“You sure?”

“‘course,” he promised as you immediately started to curl yourself back up in your blanket. Eddie, besides being an amazing partner, was an amazing and doting father which was one of the many things you loved about him, “I’ll be back in a bit.”

“Will you check on Ollie too, pretty please? She’s been awfully quiet for a bit,” which if you knew anything by now when it came to your Munsons, was never a good sign.

“I’m sure she just crashed,” he didn’t think anything of it, “but I will. Save my spot!”

“Always,” you watched him head up the stairs, admiring the view before he disappeared.

─── ･｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

“Hey bub,” Eddie’s voice was soft as he stepped into the nursery, the soft night light illuminating the room in a pretty glow. When he peeked into the crib, he found big brown eyes looking up at him curiously before a gummy little smile appeared, “what’s wrong, cutie? You hungry or do you wanna be held?”

Jamie babbled at him, as though he understood what Eddie was saying before looking his chunky little arms towards him. Eddie gently picked up and cuddled him to chest, pressing big kisses to his chubby little cheeks, “I’m sensing you just want some cuddles, huh?”

He sat down in the rocking chair, both of them relaxing as he gently rocked them back and forth. The baby was sprawled out on his chest, clutching at a lock of Eddie’s hair, as Eddie rubbed his back and sang softly under his breath. He’d never imagined himself as a father, really not until you told him you’d been pregnant with Ollie, but now? Now it was his favorite thing in the world, along with being your husband. He couldn’t imagine any other life.

Once the baby was back asleep, he tucked him back into the crib, making sure he was comfortable before gently stroking his cheek, “good night, Jamie. I love you so, so much.”

He stepped out of the room and closed the door about halfway before making his way over the playroom. You were right - your daughter had been too quiet.

“Ollie Pop?” he called out softly as he stepped into the room. Before he knew what was happening, he felt a pair of arms wrapped tightly around his legs, the force almost knocking him over. He looked down to find the small girl hanging onto him with a worried expression and tear stained cheeks, “baby, what’s wrong?”

“I’m sorry,” she cried, her big brown eyes glittering with tears, “I didn’t mean to, Daddy.”

“What are you talking about, kiddo?” he crouched down so he was eye level with her, tenderly brushing away her tears, “what happened?”

“It was an accident!” she insisted, still to Eddie’s confusion. He gave her shoulder a gentle squeeze in an attempt to get her to calm down.

“Shh, babe, slow down,” he dropped his voice to a softer tone, trying to show her that he wasn’t mad, “tell me this - is your body safe and sound?”

“Mhmm.”

“Is your heart safe and sound?” he asked and she gave him a half nod and shrug. It was a tactic the two of you had come up with when she was younger to try to get a better understanding of when she was upset or something had happened. She was still young and small, and couldn’t explain what was going on as articulately as someone older could. But she always understood this, “why is your heart not safe?”

“I broke it,” she whispered, pointing behind her between some sniffles, “I didn’t mean to break it. Now you’re going to be sad.”

“Olivia,” he looked to where she was pointing at his guitar, finding the strings either broken or loose. His first instinct wasn’t to be mad or upset, it was to make sure she was okay - the strings could hurt when they popped. He took her hands in his to make sure there were no cuts or injuries, “are you okay? Did you get hurt?”

“No.”

“Okay, good,” he kissed her forehead, “I’m glad you’re okay.”

“You’re not mad?”

“I’m not mad, baby,” he promised, “I’m happy you’re okay. But do you know what I’m going to ask you?”

“For me to never touch your guitar again?”

“Not that,” he said and her face lit up, “you can play with it and look at it any time, but only when I’m with you. That way nothing will happen and you won’t get hurt. Does that sound okay?”

“Yes,” she nodded. The two of them looked at each other for a few moments before he made a silly face at her. She broke into a fit of giggles, her worries just melting away at the lok on Eddie’s face, “will you be able to fix it?”

“‘course I will,” he promised; realistically it wasn’t that hard of a fix, just more annoying than anything, but it really didn’t matter in the grand scheme of things, “but that’s a worry for later.”

“I’m sorry,” she almost whispered as he picked her up and she wrapped her arms around his neck, “Mommy told me not to play with it but I didn’t listen. Do you think she’s gonna be mad at me?”

“No,” he perched her on his hip, “she’s going to be glad that you’re okay. She’s going to ask you to do the same thing. It’s not that we don’t want you to have fun, we just want you to be safe.”

“‘Cause you love me,” she smiled as he kissed the side of her head.

“Exactly,” he agreed with a soft nod, “its almost bedtime for you, kiddo. But do you want to come and hang out with me and Mommy for a little bit?”

“Yes,” her eyes lit up as he started heading back down the stairs to the living room.

By the time he made his way into the living room, you were already asleep, snoring softly and all cuddled up in your blanket. He shook his head fondly before sitting down at the opposite side of the couch so he wouldn’t wake you up. He made himself comfortable and when he took a look back at his daughter, she had nodded off as well.

“Oh my girls,” he said softly, “I love you all so much.”

It wasn’t long before he was asleep either.

#eddie munson #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson x you #eddie munson x fem!reader #eddie munson imagine #eddie munson one shot #joseph quinn #joseph quinn x reader #joseph quinn x you #st

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solradguy · 4 months ago

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Oh wise loremaster of everything Guilty Gear~

If there's vampires, succubi, and dragons, are there werewolves, or similar creatures, in GG? I think it'd be kinda cool...

Chipp was originally going to be a werewolf in the *very* early drafts of his design (<1996). From Character Designer magazine, issue 1:

Above the box by his foot there, "Martial artist, werewolf." This obviously got scrapped, but I wonder sometimes if his red eyes and shark teeth maybe aren't a throwback to these early werewolf drafts. There are a few official illustrations of him set against a full moon too. I won't post them here because this is already getting long and it doesn't prove anything, it's just interesting. You can check them out on the wiki though: guiltygear.wiki.gg/wiki/Chipp_Zanuff/Gallery

Happy Chaos also randomly mentions werewolves in his stage 7 flawless run in Arcade mode. Because of course he does...

Okay, let's simmer down a little. No need to get spicy. You know what demi-humans are, right? Vampires, werewolves, that sorta thing? Well, if you thought Gears were neat, get a load of this. Demi-humans transcend genetics, physics, and even time itself. Put plainly, their very existence is essentially a bug in our world's programming. [...]

He's saying this to I-No and goes on about it for another 5 billion lines. You can read the whole thing over on the wiki: guiltygear.wiki.gg/wiki/Guilty_Gear_-Strive-_script/Arcade#Chaos

Giovanna miiiight be something like a werewolf too, but she's got peanuts for lore and it's impossible to say for sure right now. We'll have to wait. Elphelt mentions werewolves in her outro line against female characters in Xrd Rev/Rev2:

You promised, now set me up with your friend! I wonder what my husband's going to be like… A distant, brooding artist? A werewolf with a troubled past who loves me more than he can bear, but tells me he has to leave to keep me safe…? Maybe a librarian? All that really matters is that he has eyes for me! Heirat Galaxy!

Izuna's tribe in Overture are all yokai, which are, apparently, not Gears but sort of adjacent to them...? I don't know if they fall into the demi-human category or their own yokai category. In any case, it includes Nekomata (GG does have canonical catgirls, yes). None of them are werewolves, but it definitely blasts the door wide open on the list of things you could find scuttling around the Backyard:

Shame we don't have a page really breaking down what all these little freaks are, they're pretty cool. Each one of them has commentary by Daisuke and Junya C. Motomura in the Overture Material Collection. I don't have time to translate all those though, it's a lot. Maybe in the very distant future.

Anyway. Guilty Gear does have werewolves. We haven't seen any yet (unless Gio is one) but they're there, right alongside a whole fleet of other critters they haven't elaborated on much yet.

#asks #long post

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manicpixiedreamedwins · 7 months ago

Text

Alright. I've been talking about writing a meta about Charles and jealousy for a while, so here it is. It's a mess. I tried to make it more concise than it was, if you can believe that.

Be forewarned, below the cut we'll be diving into some canon compliant content like Charles' home life. Please, please, please note that now is the time to leave if you are not in a good space to read about those.

Okay. First I want to establish a few things before I get to analyzing the scenes, because I think it is important that we have empathy for Charles here. This might be a bit of a long preamble, but if you could stay with me I'd appreciate it. I promise I am going somewhere with all of this.

I think a lot of us have been told, perhaps by a parent or a friend, that jealousy is unbecoming or bad. Think about it. I know growing up that is a message I heard frequently even though I saw adults exhibit it. This was actually pretty confusing to try and work out. Anyway, now with this almost puritanical obsession with good pure and healthy relationships in media, it's gotten worse. We're told any human flaw we have is something we have to fix or we are not deserving of love. Yes, including jealousy.

Only if that's the case, Charles is fighting uphill here. Here's why:

For reference 41:30 -42:00 in episode 4 is the flashback that The Night Nurse shows Charles of his home. If we unpack this we can learn a lot of things, but there are two that I would like two draw your attention to today:

Charles' dad clearly isn't someone Charles could form a secure attachment to. He seems to only be acknowledging Charles when he's angry, and only acknowledging him in a very violent manner. He's also not really communicating with him, and expecting Charles to know what he's upset about I guess? Truly, this man is terrifying. He knows his family is afraid of him, and he knows they'll scramble to try and fix whatever his issue is.

Charles' mom doesn't intervene. Now, I do not want to hear any vile junk in my notes. She's a battered woman and has probably been in the same position that Charles has, considering Charles himself is worried about her once he is dead. He's worried enough that he checks in on her every week. It makes it all the more heartbreaking that Charles is the one who has taken it upon himself to try and "make it better" (although this is not uncommon among kids who grow up in abusive households, alarmingly).

It definitely drives home that there is a clear hierarchy in the home (everyone tries to please the most volatile person), and you're at the bottom of the pyramid. Even if it's just because you and everyone else in the household is too terrified to do anything about the most abusive person's behavior, you still feel the weight of never being put first. You will never be put first, because how could you be? "You never made it better than you died" (via The Night Nurse) holds a crushing amount of meaning here.

Alright. Now we have established that Charles had some messed up stuff happen at home. Let's take that a step further. Adverse childhood experiences can lead to a variety of attachment styles that are not secure and... you guessed it, jealousy can get thrown in the mix. (This link leads to an abstract of a very interesting research article. If you request the full test directly from the researcher they will provide it for free, but it takes time. The basic idea here is that if kids aren’t able to form secure attachments to their parents, then they will struggle to feel secure in their relationships as they grow up. Sometimes that can manifest as jealousy).

Still with me after all of that? You are god's strongest soldier, lmao. Now let's get into the good stuff.

Charles dies, but there in the attic he meets Edwin. Charles chooses Edwin over the blue light without a second thought. He comforted him when he was dying, and that tenderness is foreign for Charles. The choice is an easy one.

He enjoyed it, and he enjoys Edwin. Edwin, in turn, turns out to be is someone who unequivocally, continuously, puts Charles first. He also does something really important- Charles seeks reassurance, and Edwin gives it ("You ever think, what if Death did catch us? She'd force us to go to the afterlife and split up" Charles asks. "I will make sure that never happens" Edwin answers, all while they're hanging on the side of their office). This is one of the first things we learn about them in the pilot. Charles knows he can count on Edwin. This wasn't something he had from anyone in life.

So things go fine for Charles for a long while. Edwin hasn't given him any reason to feel insecure in all that time it seems. He’s done a great job making Charles feel safe. Charles even feels secure enough that it is his idea to try and integrate Crystal into the agency, although Edwin clearly hates it. Crystal isn’t a threat to his friendship with Edwin, so it would appear Charles still feels reasonably secure in their relationship at this point.

Charles even explains or excuses a lot of Edwin's reactions to try and smooth things over. He tries to mediate between them during their first plan to rescue Becky from Esther's house the best he can. He allows Edwin to have a leg of the case with just the two of them, but he tries to frame it as protecting Crystal.

But then it's Edwin's turn to shake up the foundation that their relationship is built on.

Edwin had a lot of issues to attend to this season, and he tried to deal with most of them alone. Most of the problems Edwin had to handle put definite distance between him and Charles- how couldn't they? He was being hit on, which was a very new experience for him. He probably didn't even know how to talk about that at first, as evidenced by his description of the CK speaking closely to his ear (oh sweet summer child). He also learned about his feelings for the first time, which Monty had to finish spelling out for him.

This all, however, is where we see a shift in the dynamic. It's significant.

Edwin uses magic on a cat and has to go and meet with the Cat King. Whoops. 🙃 Charles slides easily into his role as a protector, but… Edwin stops him.

Honestly, Edwin had a good reason to do this. He pointed out that cat scratches can cause serious harm to ghosts, and they were surrounded. As endearing as this was, this wouldn’t have been an easy fight. They can just talk this out, right? He gets whisked away for a few minutes to do that (and then winds up opening a bigger can of worms).

From Charles’ perspective though, Edwin doesn’t allow him to help him, and then vanishes for a long period of time. Then he absolutely won’t tell him anything about it when he does come back. Charles knew Edwin was a little mad at him in the pilot, but they were still communicating for the most part. The secrecy is a shift, and it’s not one he’s coping well with. He tries a few different ways to reconnect.

First he tries gentle. He just asks what happened from a place of concern. This might have worked actually, only I’m not even sure Edwin knows how to fully describe what happened during their encounter. He rushes through a description, and Charles still feels like something is missing. He doesn’t like that someone else has a secret with Edwin— for thirty years they’ve been connected. This feels frightening to him, and Edwin doesn’t seem particularly worried that they’re not on the same page.

He tries to pick the conversation back up later when they’re searching for the dandelion shrine, but Edwin doesn’t give any additional information. So he slides back into his role of being a protector again and defends him against the ambient skeletons, because at least he can protect him from that easily. For a moment, things almost seem normal again, but this resurfaces in a later case.

Edwin meets with CK again in episode 4. Charles is still raw after the events of the Devlin House, and now he’s just pissed. He’s hurting, and Edwin is still keeping this weird secret. They end up bickering back and forth. The bickering tells us something interesting about Charles’ concerns.

Charles: What did he want? He didn't whisk you away again? Got that bracelet off?

Edwin: I'd be back at the office right now if the bracelet was off. He wanted to know if I counted the cats, and my guess was unsatisfactory.

Charles: Thinks he can come and go... He can't show up in the middle of cases. Did you tell him that?

Edwin: Matter of fact, I did.

Charles: Can't believe you didn't tell us. I've had enough of secrets about that wankеr.

Edwin: Why are you getting so angry?

What stands out to me here is Charles is upset about a few things: he hates that Edwin is getting taken away from him by a being they can’t control (a logical fear, considering they’re running from death together). He hates that this is happening in the middle of case time that is supposed to be for him and Edwin (and their friends, who Charles trusts). He is still really upset that Edwin has a secret with someone else (I really don’t think he’d be bothered if the secret was with him).

That’s why he’s upset. Charles isn’t feeling secure. He doesn’t feel like their relationship is on good footing right now. Whether or not he knows how to phrase that or ask for support is a different question.

Onto Monty (sorry these are a bit out of order— I put them by character for this part).

Charles wasn’t aware of Monty. This probably already bothered him a little, considering the mystery surrounding the cat king, but he tried to be a good sport. Monty wasn’t outwardly threatening. He came with gifts. He seemed friendly. Charles tried to match that… only to get snubbed. Ouch.

Charles likes to claim he’s aces with other people, but he ultimately died because his friends turned on him and killed him the second he stood up for what was important to him. I think peer relationships are a particularly sticky situation for him. I think he knew how to fit in the same way he knew how not to rock the boat in a volatile home. With Edwin it was different though— Edwin just liked him. Edwin was special.

But of course yet another boy their age doesn’t like him (probably a little upsetting, considering how he died). The only thing that’s confusing to him here is he didn’t really do anything wrong— he was polite. He followed along with all the little niceties people do, even when they don’t want to. Maybe this wouldn’t have bothered him so much in another situation, but now Edwin is wrapped up with him instead of Charles. He's picked him instead (in Charles' mind).

He can’t even shake this when Monty isn’t there.

Charles tries to get Edwin's attention... and fails. so he begins to have a conversation with himself. Perhaps he was trying to make Edwin laugh. Perhaps he was trying something over the top. Still, he fails. Ultimately, he goes the broken record route and asks him the same question a couple of times.

This moment probably really hurt- there's actually no reason for Edwin to be ignoring him, in Charles' mind anyway. They're alone together. Usually they'd be talking or bantering or at least Charles would be able to get Edwin's attention. It's just that he can't, because now Edwin is stuck on that fucking book from that fucking bloke who blew him off earlier.

This was probably a little activating for Charles. Even if he didn't completely put together why it upset him, Edwin putting someone who just treated him poorly right in front of his face first is a dim reflection of what he went through in his home. Now, I am not saying Monty is anywhere near that level of bad- he's a literal cream puff. He could not kill them when his life depended on it.

What I am saying, though, that Charles perceives a subtle threat here. He's also not sure what to do with it, because he never overcame that hurtle in life. No one else ever put him first, and he never figured out how to fix that. Edwin kind of just centered Charles automatically when they met. Now he's not doing that anymore and it’s jarring and uncomfortable for him. He’s feeling this loss of stability, on top of the fact that Edwin still won’t tell him what’s going on with the CK.

"...try not to forget that we're trying to leave" is what Charles comes up with after that exchange. Edwin makes an attempt to console him finally and offers to talk, but Charles shuts it down and tells him it's that he wants to leave town. They start on a case after that.

(Note that I did this a little out of order for organization’s sake— some of their CK arguing happened during the case they went on next).

Charles does finally catch a break here. In spite of all of this, he’s missing something very important: Edwin has feelings for him. That’s probably the most pressing issue that’s gone unspoken between them.

So Edwin dresses nicely, catches Charles attention, and finally tries to initiate a conversation. Charles seems relieved.

He does assume Edwin is just trying to come out by telling him about his time with Monty, before the teethface incident. Charles isn’t bothered, since Monty isn’t really in the picture anymore as far as he’s concerned. Things are fine, it’s just the two of them again and Edwin likes boys. Wait…

... Fuck. Forgot about the Cat King.

He resorts to threatening the CK. I know lots of people have lots of different theories on this, but consider this perspective also: Monty is no longer a threat. He’s abstract. He’s a memory. The Cat King is still very real and is a thing that can come between them, has done so, and has successfully taken Edwin from him. And as accepting as Charles was trying to be in that moment, he just can't handle that (from the perspective of this meta).

Anyway, this is all interrupted by their foray into hell. Charles does rescue Edwin, Edwin confesses, and honestly I feel like that just needs to be a different thing entirely but I did type a little bit about how I think Charles interpreted all of that here.

They return. Charles is processing Edwin's confession on the roof. This whole scene mystifies me a little because yes, he didn't seem to know exactly what to say to Edwin's confession in hell (I think he did not want to ruin it by saying the wrong thing). The more rewatches I go through the more... satisfied he looks to me? He might be processing, but also he might be a little giddy that Edwin has feelings for him specifically. I'm still trying to figure out how to read this one because the lines seemed rushed but the microexpressions say so much.

Then he starts blatantly flirting with Edwin. Honestly Charles, what the fuck?(afffectionate) Truly I’m still trying to work out if he’s just testing out how Edwin reacts or if he is working through his own feelings here, but I really want more of this in S2.

That’s about all the thoughts I think I can organize on this for now without it getting obscenely long (it already is pretty long for a half baked idea that turned into a meta). Thank you for reading 🖤

#Charles Rowland #meta #dead boy detectives #cw domestic violence #canon event Charles' home life #payneland #meta is slanted that way #I can no longer think of how to revise this so here it is #Jealous Charles Rowland #My posts #Fixed some small typos because some of this was done at 3 am whoops

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mysteryshoptls · 5 months ago

Text

R Leona Kingscholar - Outdoor Wear Vignette

"Beside myself with worry"

To the requestor: Outdoor Wear voice lines can be found here.

[Dwarfs' Mine – Campsite]

―First Day of Vargas Camp

Epel: Woah, here come the fairies again for our campfire! Everyone, be on your guard so it doesn't blow out…!

Spelldrive Club Members: YEAH!

Leona: ….Tch. Yer all so noisy.

Epel: Oh…? Leona-san, you're out of your tent already?

Epel: It was only 20 minutes ago that you said you were gonna take a nap…

Leona: This time of day's got sun so bright it's even lighting up the inside of my tent.

Leona: And right whenever I feel like I could get to sleep, there's you lot all yappin' about them fairies every time they show up...

Leona: There's no way I can grab a few z's like this.

Epel: I'm sorry… Oh, what about heading to the mine, then?

Epel: Just a bit ago, Ruggie-san said something to that regard as he was leaving the campsite.

Epel: He said, if you were to wake up saying it was impossible to sleep here…

Epel: That a "secluded, quiet, and dark mine would be the best place for a nap."

Leona: Ugh… I'm betting Ruggie's planning on roping me into something annoying.

Epel: Huh…? Something annoying?

Leona: Whatever, I guess I'll bite.

Leona: I'm heading to the mine. Don't let those fairies run you ragged.

Epel: Yessir, we'll definitely protect our campfire!

[Dwarfs' Mine – Interior]

[clank, clank, clank!]

Jack: Whew… I can't find a single magestone… What about you, Deuce?

Deuce: I've tried picking all over the place, but… No luck here.

Deuce: Looks like the Spelldrive Club down the way is having trouble too… Guess collecting magestones is actually pretty difficult.

Leona: Can't believe you're all getting tripped up by something this easy. You're all so pathetic, huh.

Spelldrive Club Member A: Oh, Leona-senpai! Did you come to check up on your club members?

Leona: Oh, yeah, sure. I was just so beside myself with worry, 'cause it was taking you all too long to get back.

Leona: …Hey! Listen up, each and every single one of you here! I'll teach you all the trick to finding magestones.

Jack: Eh, you are…?

Deuce: Every one of us…? Does that include all us other clubs too?

Leona: It's just a waste of time if you're just randomly swinging your pickaxes at the rock wall.

Leona: Don't you guys even know how magestones are made?

Leona: Basically, gemstones absorb power from its surroundings and become magestones.

Leona: When you're mining for 'em, you want to locate the faint traces of magical output from those magestones, and start digging in that general area…

Jack: Oh, right. Now that you mention it, we learned that in class. Guess I didn't look over it enough to remember to do that.

Deuce: I see!! Then, I'll get down to it…!

Leona: …Buuut, that's just what they say in the textbooks. That's just what inflexible blockheads would do.

Leona: If you just use your brain, you can get it done faster and easier.

Deuce: Huh? Faster and easier…?

Leona: Just think about what kind of "power" turned those gems into magestones.

Leona: For the Dwarf Mine here, that's "volcanic activity." You shoulda learned that in history of magic.

Leona: So, you just gotta look for tuff in the walls that show evidence of volcanic activity.

Deuce: Tuff?

Leona: It's a type of rock that's built up from an accumulation of volcanic ash. It'll look whitish here.

Deuce: Uhh… So basically… If we can find some white bits in the wall and dig, we should find some magestones!?

Leona: Sure, that's probably the simplest way to put it. It's probably more of a reliable method to find the locations to dig, than to ask some untrained novice to try and trace magical energy.

Leona: I'll even show you how as an example. Hey, you, Spelldrive guy. Come dig where I tell you.

Spelldrive Club Member A: Yes, sir!

[clank, clank, clank…]

[…thunk!]

Leona: …See, there it is. A piece of a magestone.

Deuce: He found one in 5 minutes, even though we had been digging for 2, 3 hours and didn't find anything…!

Deuce: Hey, Jack! Your Housewarden's amazing.

Deuce: Plus, he helped all of us, not just the Spelldrive Club guys. He's a real nice guy.

Jack: Y-Yeah.

Deuce: Hm? Something wrong? You're looking grim.

Jack: No, I mean, I know that Leona-senpai is a amazing, but…

Jack: I always thought he wasn't the type to just proactively help others out, so I was just a little surprised.

Jack: But yeah, you're right. He really is someone worth looking up to!

Deuce: Yeah! Alllright, I'm gonna try looking for a magestone using the method he taught us!

Deuce: Kingscholar-senpai, I successfully found a magestone.

Deuce: THANK YOU VERY MUCH, SIR!

Leona: Well, ain't that good for you.

Deuce: Yes, sir! We're going to head out to receive our badge from Vargas-sensei now. Excuse us.

[Deuce and Jack leave]

Spelldrive Club Member A: Leona-senpai～ Why'd you help out those guys when they're not even a part of our club?

Leona: Don't be stupid. It's not like we're competing against each other or anything. Ain't worth gettin' all heated for nothing.

Leona: No one wants to see their club get abolished. Doesn't that mean we're all on the same team?

Spelldrive Club Member A: You're thinking on a completely different level, Leona-senpai! I should've been as compassionate as you!!

Leona: Hmph… If you've gotten your hand on a magestone, go and collect our badge already.

Spelldrive Club Member A: Yes, sir!

[Spelldrive Club Member leaves]

Leona: …Finally, they're all gone. Ugh, what a pain having to help out all those dunderheads.

Leona: Yaaaawn......… Now I can get some quiet shut eye, at last.

Leona: …Zzz…Zzz…

Requested by Anonymous.

#twisted wonderland #twst #leona kingscholar #epel felmier #deuce spade #jack howl #twst leona #twst epel #twst deuce #twst jack #twst translation #twst vargas camp #mention: ruggie #mention: vargas

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barrenclan · 5 months ago

Note

This ending to the Death of barrenclan arc has left me with sooooooooooo many questions spining in my head.

Obviously the cats are going to try coping and picking up the pieces if what's left of their life, but how exactly will that happen? I assume they will still leave the territory eventually, but will they even remain together when barrenclan is dead?

After seeing what Defiance did to them how will the clan treat Egrettail and Commorantpaw? They were pretty mad at them before the fight and now that Mallowstar is no longer here i wouldn't put it past the MallowBlacknose sisters to resent them heavily for their father's death, maybe even try to kick them out?

And Pinepaw? How will the clan treat him after hearing Deepdark say he was the whole reason all of that happened because of what he told Saturn? I'm soooo worried for my favorite little blue guy i hope at least his family and Commorantpaw will stick by his side

And what about Nightberry? Will she becoe completely delusional and/or depressed after losing Cypressfoot? And Blacknose? What will be of her an her kits upbringing without one of her mates and her dementia becoming progressively worse? And Cootstorm! Ooooooh Cootstorm, she has to be the one I'm the most curious about.

Gotta admit, i'm disappointed that she didn't had a prominent role in any of the Death of barrenclan issues, but I'm glad she lived because i really can't tell what she will do next.

I wholeheartedly expect her to be a massive dick to Pinepaw but what else? I can't tell if after the battle she will finally see the error of her ways and grapple with the fact that, if she hadn't been so stubborn in her conversations with Mallowstar, they could have left this territory much sooner which would have prevented both his death and her mothers, or if all the bloodshed will make double down on the whole "Barrenclan needs to stay and pay for our sins" shit because perhaps because she survived she would see that as validation for her beliefs; they stayed, faced their "punishment", and most lived to tell the tale. I really wouldn't be surprised if at the end of this story the remainder of the clan leaves but Cootstorm is far too stubborn to do the same and stays behind on the Barren wasteland, completely alone

Lots of questions following this issue! I promise we'll be addressing what happens to everyone, have no fear.

In regards to Cootstorm, Beeface, and Plumstripe (among others) not having a prominent role in the arc, here's the thing about writing a story with a sprawling cast but issues that can't be more than a couple of pages of text long - ya just can't include everything ya want to. If I made every character equally important in an event like this, I would never be able to finish it because it would be a million pages long. I narrowed into the characters I was interested in and cut what I had to. Sad, but it's a good lesson to learn for being a writer!

#ask #anon #theory

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darkficsyouneveraskedfor · 1 year ago

Text

Off the Page 1

Warnings: non/dubcon and other dark elements. My username actually says you never asked for any of this.

Characters: skinny!Steve

Part of the Bookstore AU

My warnings are not exhaustive but be aware this is a dark fic and may include potentially triggering topics. Please use your common sense when consuming content. I am not responsible for your decisions.

As usual, I would appreciate any and all feedback. I’m happy to once more go on this adventure with all of you! Thank you in advance for your comments and for reblogging.

Maria brings you your travel cup as you acknowledge her with a quiet thanks under your breath. You try not to turn your attention from the person on the other side of the table. You keep your rehearsed smile in place, nodding as you open the cover of their book and write their name inside before leaving a message and your signature below. They ramble on but you don't mind so much, their passion is entirely flattering.

You still can't believe this is your life. You're a writer. Not that freelancer knocking out commissions for pennies, by an author. It's your second novel and by your publisher's declaration, a hit. You suppose you wouldn't be on a book tour if it wasn't.

You pause to have a sip of coffee. You've been here all morning. That there were people lined up before opening assured you of the long day but it just doesn't seem to stop. At the end, you're set to do a reading and giveaway a collector's edition of the book. Your longing for your hotel room only grows deeper as your hand cramps and your eyes sting.

The next reader steps up, his book well-worn and clutched in his slender hands. He's thin and short, with a swoop of blonde hair over his forehead.

"H-hi," he sputters as he goes to set his book on the table but it hits the edge and falls to the floor, "oh, s-sorry, I'm sorry."

He's almost frantic as he bends to retrieve it and places it in front of you. You smile at him as one of the store's branded bags dangles from his elbow. He has to buy a book to get a signature. You pull his well-read copy towards you, the cover wrinkled and the spine cracked.

"You know, I could sign both..." you offer, "since you spent the extra money."

"Oh, oh, n-no, that's... that's okay. Um, thanks. Just that one." He smooths his hair with a shaky hand, "sorry, I've been awake since two in the morning. Too much caffeine."

"Tell me about it," you kid as you hold his book open, "I can tell you really liked the book."

"Ye-yeah, yeah, so much," he seems ready to burst as his blue eyes light up, "you know, I really love Emeris. He... I don't want to be lame but... he's like me. You know?"

"Oh, yeah," you agree kindly, "he's one of my favourites."

"Most writers -- I read a lot -- they always have the typical hero. Big and brawny, but you mad Emeris strong in other ways."

"I tried," you reply. "Anything in particular you want me to put here?"

"I... I can't think of anything," his eyes go wide, "I've been looking forward to this forever and I didn't think."

"That's okay," you assure him and uncap your pen, 'Keep on the path, my brave Emeris,' you weave onto the page. You sign your name and slide the novel across to him.

He takes it and opens it, reading as his nervousness breaks into a smile. He peeks up at you, closing the book to bring against his chest.

"Thank you!" He beams.

"No problem, you sticking around for the Q&A?"

"Oh yeah, my friend wants to go get a snack but we'll be back," he proclaims. "Thanks so so much."

"Yeah, no worries," you subtly look to the line.

"Oh, uh, I won't keep you any longer," he waves his hand apologetically, "can't wait for your reading."

"See ya," you return and turn to the next person, a girl in deep red plaid, a brand new copy plopped down before you.

You just have another hour until you get to sit in front of all these stranges and try not to get tongue-tied. It should be easy by now but those butterflies in your stomach still flutter. More coffee, next book.

📖

The Q&A goes about as well as any other. It was good fun but entirely exhausting. You're ready to just go as the winter sky darkens fast outside the bookstore windows. Maria stops you to talk about your train ride tomorrow and the next venue. You beg her to let you go back to the hotel.

"I told you it was going to be a lot," she chuckles.

"You did. And just like you said, I'm tired, so please, I have a tub with jets waiting for me."

"Just make sure you don't stay up all night writing your next bestseller," she winks.

"You're telling me to get sleep?"

"I'm a great sleeper, I just happen to sleep best while commuting," she shrugs, "fine, go. I'm just going to talk to the owner quick."

"Alright," you utter through a yawn and cover your mouth, "I'll see you tomorrow."

You leave the bookstore and the chill air blows into your open coat. You shiver and clutch the strap of your bag. The bright sign of a Korean shop catches your eye. You're so tired of the bland hotel room service, you can spare ten minutes and a couple bucks.

You cross the street and enter the shop. The lights are low and the din is soft. You approach the counter, perusing the menu laminated on top and order some hoison noodles.

You hear muffled chatter from the corner and sway, trying to ignore it. After paying, you move over to wait for your take-out. As you do, you sense someone watching you. You peer over and see an eerily familiar set of blue eyes. It takes you a moment to recall the skinny man from the signing.

He's with another sat across from him. A bigger man with dark hair and wide shoulders. He shakes his head and catches the blond's hand before he can wave at you. He hisses something at him and you quickly look away.

You're still getting used to that. It doesn't happen too often but it's still awkward. You face the counter and take out your phone, a way to make yourself look busy.

You try not to hear but it's so quiet in the place, "Steve, quit, she doesn't wanna talk to you."

"I know. I just wanted to say hi," the hiss blows back.

Your order number is called and you grab it with a thanks, eager to flee before the situation can devolve. As you go to the door, you hear a groan under the jingle of the bell above you.

"Great, Buck, you always got be a buzz kill..."

You don't look back as you walk away from the shop, searching out a taxi as the smell of the noodles torture your empty stomach. You might just fall asleep before you can enjoy your prize.

#steve rogers #dark steve rogers #dark!steve rogers #steve rogers x reader #drabble #bookstore au #au #series #off the page #mcu #marvel #captain america

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