#there is so much more bullshit happening now and before

[princess-of-purple-prose]

[ID: A collection of tweets by bobby 🐀 #BENIGN DEVI… @/bobby_speeds that read:

"the System really convinced Shen Qingqiu that the Jade Guanyin token could be used to save his life later, so he held onto it despite wanting to return it, and then when the time finally came to use it, the System withheld it until it was too late to actually save his life

"I know I'm just theorising but like, it's SUCH bullshit that it had to "load" the item. That had literally never happened before, but it just soo conveniently meant that SQQ had no choice but to choose another "scenario pusher"

"It wasn't enough for SQQ to just pull out the token, calm Binghe down and let them talk about their feelings, which by ALL rights should have been what happened, if SQQ and Binghe had just been people in a real world instead of characters in a narrative

"but it just doesn't make for an interesting climax, so it couldn't be allowed to happen. the audience (the in-universe readers of the revised PIDW, but also, like, us) would have found it underwhelming, so who cares how badly it traumatised the people involved??

"The System is just so fucking horrifying when you look past the cutesy emoticons. It acts cheerful and silly all while threatening SQQ with death or punishment and will happily make anyone suffer in the interests of "the narrative"

"I won't ascribe malicious intent to the System. It's an unfeeling entity that exists for no other purpose than to create an interesting story without regard to its characters' lives, but that in itself is way more scary.

"people LOVE watching characters suffer. I love it!! I like happy endings but I NEED an interesting middle. reading it, analysing it, thinking about it. the maigu ridge scene is horrific, but I'm literally deriving entertainment from it right now!! I'm having fun writing this!!

"and I hate the system so much, but what would this story be without it?? can any of us honestly say we'd enjoy this story half as much if SY had woken up in PIDW and lived a peaceful life of spoiling his disciples with no abyss and none of the major conflicts that resulted?

"The System is just the most incredible villain. It's terrifying and uncomfortable but it's us!! it did those things for US!! for our enjoyment as readers!! and we ate it up. we loved it. WE did that to them.

"The Scum Villain’s Self-Saving System (Image of a Tumblr post that says: “Based on my obsession with the concept of The Narrative I think we should invent a new kind of tumblr/twitter discourse where we argue that it's inherently immoral to write fiction because its prevents characters from exercising free will” / “'girl help my characters are unionizing'”)" End ID]

[pboogerswbb]

SO IT GOES - chapter 6

Paige Bueckers x oc Warnings: language, sexual content and language, being sick? overthinking? p being melodramatic Wordcount: 4.4K A/C: was feeling inspired :)) anyway pls be patient with me posting, i'm applying to schools rn!! anyway this went a direction i hadn't planned but... uhh... i have no excuses i was going with the flow. anyway enjoy x (also what a scare yesterday just hoping p is doing fine and i'm sure everything's okay!)

-

Before London

You need a ride to work tmr?

I don’t but thank you x

My eyes roam the texts as they had repeatedly since last night, trying to decipher each letter as if some ancient code I couldn’t understand. Is she seriously gonna be like that? Like she wasn’t the one who pulled me in. She kissed me. Why was she taking it out on me now? I don’t got time for this anyway, to be stressing about something like this. 

I hadn’t seen Izara since Saturday, not at work, not in the apartment building, hell, I’d even gone to the gym every morning praying that she might show up but it was as if the girl had disappeared from the face of the earth. I knew she was avoiding me, and I guess she had reason but fuck, I thought she’d be better than that. Not a word since Saturday, other than those strange cryptic texts. Fine. Be that way.

“My favourite girls!!” Trey’s voice blatantly interjects my spinning thoughts as me, Arike, Satou and Lou are sat at a circular table, eating lunch. Not that I had been eating per say, more so poking my fork here and there trying to stomach a piece of chicken now and then. The heaviness in the pit of my stomach made it hard to eat at all.

I lift my eyes, hoping Izara would be trailing behind the man as usual. But it’s Ava instead, holding a notepad and taking quick steps to keep up. I mean I knew it wasn’t Iz before even looking up - there was an uncomfortable void of heels tapping against the hardwood as the pair approach us eagerly.

“Oh hey!” Lou smiles from her chair next to me. “What’s up?”

“So we were thinking,” Trey starts, leaning forward against the table. “If y’all could film some clips answering comments on your own since our dear Zari isn’t here.”

“Uh, where is she anyway?” I ask as casually as I can - though the way everyone’s heads snap to me tells me it was a feeble attempt.

Trey’s dark brown eyes study me for a while with an expression I can’t quite read before answering. “She’s home sick, poor girl.”

Bullshit. She’s trying to avoid me, I know it. I can’t believe it, I thought she would be more mature than this, than faking being “sick” just to get away from an awkward conversation with me. Why was she assuming how I felt anyway? Like the kiss mattered to me? Like I’d want more?

I mean all that was true. God did it matter and God did I want, no, need more. Much more. But she didn’t know that, so why was she assuming. I thought we were friends. You know what this is? Bad friendship.

“Oh damn, hope she feels better,” Arike answers for me, noticing the way I’m gone in my thoughts.

“Y-yeah for sure,” I mumble, letting out a frustrated sigh. “I’mma go to the weight room.”

I place the fork down on my half eaten plate harshly, getting up abruptly making my irritation quite clear to everyone around me.

“Paige you gotta eat a little more,” Lou encourages but I shake my head.

“Nah, m’ not hungry,” I murmur and take my plate back, preparing to take out my aggravation at some weights, ignoring the way Arike and the rest of the girls eye me as I walk away.

-

“So how are we feeling about the first game soon?” My dad’s voice echoes through the speaker but I barely hear him, pacing my apartment’s living room. Truthfully I hadn’t thought much about the upcoming game. I knew that was bad. That I should be ecstatic, or scared as hell, but I didn’t feel anything else besides the dread of what happened between me and Iz. 

Matter of fact, I hadn’t been able to think of anything else but the way she looked all night, the way her green smoked out eyes twinkled at me, the way she threw her head back when she laughed at my jokes, when she pressed her front against me. The way her full breasts felt against my chest, the way her round ass felt under my hands. God, the whimper she let out when I squeezed it as gently as I could.

“Paige?”

“Uh what?” I mumble, ears burning, completely forgotten about the call with my dad.

“What’s going on with you?” His secure, steady voice asks, grounding me.

“Nothin’ dad,” I murmur, rubbing my eyes and looking out the window into the street, eyeing every dark haired woman just in case they were Izara.

“Paige Madison.”

I groan. I might be 23-years-old but my dad’s stern voice turns me into a teenager without fail each time.

“You’re comin’ to the first game still, right?”

“Yes, of course,” he says, like it’s obvious. “Why?”

“Nothin’, just miss you,” I mumble, coming up with an excuse for my low mood - though it wasn’t far off. Everytime I felt sad or anxious I just wanted my dad.

“I miss you too, kid. You know you just say the word and I’m there, okay?”

“No I know, I know. I’m just tired I think,” I sigh, my chest warming at my dad’s comforting words.

“Uh oh,” he starts. “Paige Madison… Don’t tell me.”

“Huh? Tell you what?”

“Is this about a girl?” He asks.

I pause, coming to a halt with my pacing. “Hu- I- What?!”

“You always say “I’m just tired” when you got a girl on your mind,” my dad laughs, doing a horrible impression of me.

“No!” I argue a little too fast and a little too passionately. “I mean, no. Just tired. Long practice.”

“Mhm alright,” my dad mumbles, an amused tone in his voice that irritates me in a way only a parent could. “So no girl?”

“No dadddd,” I whine like a teenage girl. “There’s no girl.”

I didn’t like lying to him. I wanted to tell him all about Izara. I knew my dad would adore that girl. He always said I needed a woman to keep me in check - Izzie did just that. But I also didn’t want to tell my dad about this girl knowing it likely wasn’t going to go anywhere, especially now that she had been hiding from me since our kiss.

“Okay dad tell Drew I said hi and I’ll play Fortnite with him tomorrow,” I say into the phone, ready to hang up.

“Okay kid, love you.”

“Love you dad.”

The silence is deafening, again. Like it used to be before I became friends with Iz. I felt alone, anxious, my head spinning with thoughts I couldn’t turn off. I thought she was mature enough to handle this like two adults. If she just wanted to be friends then she could just tell me, at least we could continue our friendship like that.

But usually when I kissed a girl, they didn’t run away like this. Quite the opposite. Did she not like the way I kissed? Was I off my game? Maybe the tongue was too much? Maybe she didn’t like my outfit. I’m a good kisser, I know I am. Good enough to get girls into bed with ease. So what is the trouble now? And I also know that that was the best kiss I had ever had. That our lips fit together just right. Fuck this girl had me going out of my mind. And now I just had to wait for her to reach out, it didn’t feel fair.

No. It wasn’t fair. Why did I have to wait for her? Who said I had to? Fuck that.

Too frenzied to even throw a shirt over my sports bra, I walk downstairs determined, knocking on Izara’s door angrily, preparing a speech of everything I’d been thinking the past few days: Look, Izzie, we’re both adults. You clearly think the kiss was a mistake. But avoiding me and acting like this is ridiculous and stupid and we don’t need to be acting like teenage-

“Paige?” 

Izzie opens the door, voice weak and nasally. She’s in a pale pink pyjama set, hair up in a clip and nose red and irritated. She wasn’t lying. Definitely not. She is sick. 

Quick, improvise.

“Uh, hey,” I mumble, my cheeks turning pink, her red eyes staring up at me reminiscent of Saturday night and the moments before our kiss on the balcony. “Trey told me you were sick.”

She chuckles, looking down at her dishevelled appearance and returns her gaze to me. “How did you know,” she jokes. She’s acting like nothing happened between us. How could she act like that? I guess it’s better than if she actually had been avoiding me.

“Was worried, haven’t seen you since… The party,” I say unsurely.

“Uh… Yeah. Crazy party huh,” Izzie says almost to herself. “Well, anyway, thanks for checking in but I’m perfectly okay. Just a cold and I think it’s passing.”

She begins to close the door but I grab it, holding it open.

“You been resting?” I ask concerned.

The girl shrugs. “Well at first but now I’m just getting bored so I’ve been doing some work from home.”

“Izzie…”

“What?”

“You gotta be restin’ if you’re sick,” I argue, which makes the girl roll her eyes.

“I’m fine Paige,” she answers, but I step inside.

“Let me in.”

“No, you’ll get sick,” she complains but I shake my head.

“I won’t. I’m built different.”

Izzie laughs, deciding it was pointless to try to argue and lets me in.

Her apartment is spotless as always, laptop open on her dining table with schedules and notebooks piled next to it. This bitch hadn’t been resting, no she’s been working and cleaning.

“Izzie!” I groan and close the laptop.

“Shoes! Shoes shoes shoes!” She yelps, voice breaking as she does. 

“‘M sorry!” I gasp and take my sneakers off quickly, placing them neatly by the entrance. I feel her eyes fixed on me. 

“Do you ever wear a shirt?” She asks, blowing her stuffy nose, which makes me let out a single laugh.

“Why, you want me to?” I ask confidently, easily falling into the same effortlessness as before.

My words make the girl blush. Perhaps the kiss wasn’t that bad? Fuck, I don’t know. Maybe I should just ask… Ask what?! If the kiss was good?! Bro… Get a grip.

“Well you’re going to get cold, it’s freezing here,” she tells me, turning away and walking to the couch where pillows are neatly arranged, an expensive looking blanket neatly folded on the armrest. I didn’t have the heart to tell her it definitely was not cold, that her apartment was scorching hot already making me sweat.

“Yo, you’re kidding right?” I laugh as I watch her somewhat pitifully curling up against the corner of the couch on her single throw pillow.

“What?”

“Iz, you’re sick!”

“Wow, thanks for rubbing it in my face,” she says nasally, blowing her nose again.

“Bro, that pillow is just sad! You need a nest,” I gasp, walking to her bedroom.

“Wait wait wait, it’s a mess in there,” she yelps, following after me. Mess, it is not. There is one hoodie on the bed, which is unmade. That’s it. I pull the heavy blanket off her bed, grabbing all four pillows and walking decisively to the couch with the dark-haired girl on my tail.

“What are you doing?” She asks as I begin to set up each pillow into a nest against the corner of the couch. She’s grabbing my arm and peeking at my actions from behind my back, clearly confused.

“I’m makin’ you a nest,” I explain, brows furrowing as I focus. This is serious business. “My stepmom does this when we’re sick.”

“A nest?” Izzie laughs.

“Yeah, get in,” I order, grabbing the girl’s shoulders and sitting her down. “Now lie back. Get comfy.”

Hesitating for a moment, Izzie curls up against the pillows as I place the blanket over her, watching as she gets comfortable with a smile on her face.

“There you go,” I coo, trying her forehead which is burning hot. “You have a fever Iz, I’m gonna get you some meds.”

“Paige, you don’t have to do this,” she sighs, looking up at me softly. I want to lean down and kiss her again. Instead, I bring my hand to her warm cheek, stroking it softly. She looks vulnerable, gentle for once. It made me want her even more.

“Lemme take care of you ma.”

She doesn’t comment on the nickname, matter of fact there’s a hint of a smile on her face when she nods. 

“The cabinet above the microwave.”

“Got it,” I tell her, pretty much scurrying to the kitchen, gathering everything you could think - water, painkillers, nose spray, I even cut up some fruit for her. But when I return the poor girl is in her nest, cuddled up, fast asleep. It hurts my heart to wake her up, but she needs these meds in her.

“Iz,” I murmur carefully, brushing dark locks away from her face. She blinks herself awake, rubbing her face. Everything about it makes me want to wrap her in my arms and never let anyone close in case they hurt her. 

“Fuck, I fell asleep,” she yawns. “I’m sorry I’m a mess.”

“You’re sick ma,” I remind her, sitting next to the girl on the couch and watching as she takes her medicine.

“This is so embarrassing,” she murmurs, sipping on the glass of water. Her cheeks are bright red, hair undone and eyes tired - I swear it’s the most beautiful I’ve ever seen her look.

“Izara,” I say sternly. “You’re sick, lemme help.”

“You’re gonna get sick too, and you have your first game soon love.”

“I’ll be fine, I got mad immune system powers.”

She giggles. “Immune system powers?”

“You heard,” I nod, fighting a grin. She coughs a little.

“Paige?”

Oh God. She’s gonna bring up the kiss now. I know it. I can feel it.

“Y-yeah?”

She takes a deep breath. “Can we watch Lady and The Tramp?”

-

“How are you already crying?” Paige asks with a giggle, leaning against the opposite corner of the couch. 

“Lady as a puppy always makes me cry! How could it not?” I sniffle, wiping my nose, watching the scene where Lady doesn’t want to sleep in her dog bed, the poor puppy crying for her dad. 

The blonde is chewing on an apple in her sports bra and black Nike sweats, muscles grown more prominent over her training period with the Wings, arms bigger, shoulders wider, outline of the muscles on her abdomen faintly visible even as she slouches. 

“What kinda names are Darling and Jimmy Dear anyway?” She asks, dramatically frustrated.

“Paige, you’re slow,” I laugh. “Lady thinks those are their names because they call each other those as like, pet names darling.”

The blond thinks for a while, and then grins. “Oh.”

We both burst into a choir of laughter, though it feels rough against my scratchy throat. Still, I could feel the medication already making me feel better. Or maybe it was the company.

My mind had been a mess after I escaped the party. I felt embarrassed, childish even for running away like I did, leaving Paige high and dry. Once I woke up the next morning it was hard to figure out what truly happened and what was my mind playing tricks on me. But I knew the kiss really took place the moment I remembered it, the weight of Paige’s kiss a mere memory on my lips. One wouldn’t forget a kiss like that. It was impossible.

Getting sick had been a lucky coincidence, giving me time to think and take some distance from the situation. I found it impossible to figure out where my desire for Paige and desire for physical contact differed. I couldn’t tell if I was just lonely. Or if I really liked her. I never considered it, me having feelings (if you could call it that) for a girl again. But now as she sat there, looking like that, I wanted nothing but to get on her. To climb onto her lap and kiss her again like we had on the balcony. Without the drunken hue, just us feeling each other.

Even as sick as I am, the familiar burn and ache that always showed up around the blonde begins to grow between my legs, making me squirm. Fuck, maybe I did like her. All I knew I definitely wasn’t in a place to start anything - that no matter what this was it would have to stay casual. I haven’t gotten rid of the ghost of my past relationship. No, not at all. I could see it looming around every corner, peeking through windows, just right outside my line of vision. I wasn’t ready.

Paige’s hand comes over to my bare feet poking out of the blanket, bringing them to her lap and beginning to rub them almost as if subconsciously, like unaware of the entire thing. Except her cheeks turn red as she does. My entire body relaxes, and I let her. For almost half of the movie she massages each toe, the arch of my foot, my ankle, leaving goosebumps everywhere. 

“I’m cold,” I complain, pulling my feet back under the blanket, feeling like a block of ice.

“I’m so hot,” Paige groans, now more invested in the movie, making small comments here and there.

“Lucky,” I groan which makes her snicker.

“Scooch,” The blonde tells me. Before I can resist she’s made her way under the blanket, into the nest, lying behind me and wrapping an arm around my waist. I fit in her arms perfectly, like I was made to be her counterpart, born to be in her arms like this, every curve of her body slotting with mine just right. My ass pressing into her, the blonde’s chin brushing against my shoulder, hot breath tickling against my ear nearly making me moan. Fuck.

“I- I thought you were hot,” I mumble, beginning to lose my composure.

“But you’re cold,” she murmurs into my ear, nose nuzzling into my hair as we keep watching the movie. Though I can’t concentrate. Even on my favourite movie. My head spinning too fast, speeding up even more when my pyjama top hikes up and Paige’s fingertips rub circles against my lower stomach, dangerously close to dipping into my pyjama pants.

“P-paige,” I almost whisper, my voice coming out breathy.

“Mhm?” The blonde’s voice is shaky too, a hoarse hum straight into my ear making me even wetter than I already am.

“You’re gonna get sick,” I remind her, my chest heaving.

“I’m good,” she breathes out, shifting a little, her head fitting just in the crook of my neck. Perfectly. “Are you?”

She’s asking for consent, I can tell. To dip her fingers underneath the band, to slide them into my panties. And God I want to give it to her. To let her have her way with me. The temptation is growing nearly impossible to resist.

“I-” I nearly say it. But then I shift to my back, to meet her gaze. Paige’s face is flushed, nostrils flaring as she breathes, hand remaining on my bare stomach. “How are you feeling about the game?”

“Oh, uhh,” Paige is taken aback, pulling her hand back to my dismay, bringing it to her jaw and rubbing it. “I mean, I haven’t really thought about it if I’m honest? I’m excited to see my dad and Dorka.”

“She went to Uconn with you, right?”

The blonde nods. “I mean issa big moment for sure, but I just wanna take it one day at a time.”

I hesitate. “Are you not nervous at all?”

She lets out a single laugh and looks around the room. “Nah I am. Just tryna keep my mind off it.”

I nod, understanding. I wish I could carry some of her worry, I could tell she was more nervous than she let on. But instead of talking I slide my hand into hers, which seems to comfort the girl more than words, her blue eyes locking with mine. She’s thinking, mulling something over in her head. I can tell.

“The party… Iz, I-”

“Shh,” I tell her before she can keep going, my throat going dry, the ache between my thighs nearly painful. I wasn’t ready to talk, at all. All I wanted was to feel it again, the weight of her lips on mine. So bad I felt dizzy.

“Nah, Izzie, c’mon. I think we both feel we-”

“Paige?”

“Yeah mama?”

“Kiss me.”

-

It makes no sense. But I don’t hesitate. Leaning down, my lips crashing into hers with such hunger it makes me uncharacteristically whine. My body is on fire, every inch burning up as our lips slide against one another, boxers growing damp quickly. My hand carefully holds her cheek, like the girl next to me might break. But to my surprise she pulls me on top of her by the back of my head.

I’m tasting for every inch of her, slowing down and taking my time, unlike that drunken mess on the balcony. Somehow this is even better, the kiss of the century even. Her body is cool to the touch, a sign of the fever going down. But I barely register, kissing her bottom lip affectionately, my hands holding her face. Izzie responds, her teeth pulling on my lip harshly making me groan. Her warm tongue brushes over it, soothingly.

I open my mouth further, my tongue meeting hers, other hand moving to the bare waist of the girl underneath me. I can’t believe this is real. That I’m kissing Izara. It feels like some type of dream, but the ache between my legs proves that every second is real. That she’s really underneath me. And If I’m feeling my core throbbing just from the kiss, I’m certain the dark haired girl feels something similar and the idea of my girl feeling such pain and not having it taken care of breaks my heart.

So my thumb dips underneath the band of her satin pyjama pants, feeling the lace of her underwear as it does. Zari lets out a shaky whimper, her eyes fluttering open.

“Paige,” she whines, brows furrowing.

“Yeah?” I ask breathlessly, leaning down to kiss under her ear which makes her squirm under my weight.

“C-can you keep your hands,” another moan as I suck on her neck, careful not to leave a mark. Izara didn’t seem like the type of woman you marked. “On top of the clothes.”

God she’s gonna be the death of me. But I oblige happily, pulling my hand back to her bare waist.

“Whatever you want Izzie,” I say between ragged breaths, making the girl moan as I keep kissing her neck. Izara’s hands wrap around my back, long acrylics scratching at the skin there.

“Shit,” I cuss under my breath, feeling like I might die or cum in my pants if I don’t get to have her. Still, I keep kissing her, fully aware what a privilege it was just to be on her like this. I do everything to try to stay composed, to keep my cool, to focus on putting on my best show as I return back to sloppily kissing her lips, shifting on top of her, my other hand beside Izzie’s face to hold me up. 

As I move my hips, my knee presses into her core, against the sheer fabric of the pajamas making her gasp straight into my mouth. I repeat the movement with purpose now, and can feel the heat radiating off her, the fabric between her legs growing damp. She wants this just as bad as I do.

“Lemme keep going, please,” I whimper, brows furrowed and barely conscious of what is happening at this point. “Lemme help ma, won’t even touch you.”

Her face is contorted with need, chest heaving desperately. 

“It hurts don’t it? Lemme help,” I coo, my lips wrapping around her earlobe and sucking softly. “Please.”

“Paige,” she whimpers, her body shaking with need. But I feel her shift, legs wrapping around my body. “Please.”

Oh God, I might actually cum in my sweats.

I kiss her all over, her neck, bare shoulders, mind spinning with need, my cunt growing wetter and wetter with every moan that leaves Izzie’s lips as I push my knee against her core, gently, so as to not hurt her.

“P-paige,” she moans my name. My name. 

“Ohh fuck,” I cuss, squeezing my eyes shut at the way her voice sounds, deep and gravelly, turning more high-pitched each time I grind my knee into her cunt.

“Let me get you right ma, please,” I beg breathlessly, shaking my head to myself trying to keep myself present. “Please, Iz, would do anything to fuck you,”

She’s speechless, whimpering desperately, but I can feel her muscles turning tense from the pleasure I’m giving her, legs shaking gently.

“Would be so good, just lemme eat that pussy,” I moan into her ear. “Gimme five.”

Pulling back, I meet her gaze. Her contorted face, dark brows furrowed and lips parted, green eyes blown out black. This is the most beautiful she has ever looked. Easily. Could look at her like this forever.

I can tell she’s considering, mulling it over in her head. Just as her lips part the ring of her phone interrupts the moment, the obnoxious sound blaring over the movie playing in the back. Of course. I can never have anything good. Just little tastes.

“Fuck,” Izzie mumbles and abruptly sits up as if suddenly thinking clearly. I climb off her, watching as she fumbles to find her phone.

“Here,” I catch it, handing it to her. It’s Kiran, her brother.

“Fuck, I promised I’d help him with his paper,” she groans, still trying to catch her breath.

“Uh, okay,” I murmur, attempting to catch mine, awkwardly shifting further on the couch, watching as the girl gets up and walks into the bedroom, closing the door behind her, leaving me there once again. Wanting more.

-

taglist:@wbbgetsmewetter @thaatdigitaldiary @pb524830 @bueckersfive @lupinqs @sierrale8ne @d3arapril @lovegalor333 @avvwritesstufff @rosemariiaa @bueckers22 @taylynbueckers44 @unadulteratedcyclepaper @rizzlerbuckets @wosolipa @bridgetloveswomen @paiges-1vur @slut4uconnwbb @xxloveralways14 @bueckersbitch @janaelalfysblunt @omg-imtumbling @angryflowerwitch @ohbueckers

[rikiislvr]

unavailable . 2 - nishimura riki

pairing: afab!reader x nishimura riki

summary: fresh out a relationship with a heavy heart, niki seeks comfort in his best friend, not knowing you were falling for him

warnings: cussing

ps. read part 1 if you’d like! :)

the next morning, you woke up first, looking down, you seen niki laid against your arm, dried tears stained his face, you couldn’t help but feel horrible for him.

you were knocked out of your thoughts from the sound of his phone buzzing on your nightstand, you reach over just incase it was his parents,

but no… it was ivy.

- 3 unread messages -

vy <3 : niki? it’s morning now.. can you reply?

vy <3 : i’m sry i ended things that way, i meant to do it sooner!

vy <3: pls can u call me?

you couldn’t help but scoff at the messages, you cared about ivy, but you would’ve never expected for her to do what she did, you were hoping there was a truly valid reason on why she ended things off 5 months into the relationship…

you look down as you felt niki shuffle in his sleep, his eyes fluttering open, he blinked softly before looking up at you,

“was that my phone going on?” he mumbled, you nod and handed him his phone, he read the screen and sighed, putting his phone down on the bed and laying his head back down on your arm.

“don’t force yourself to reply. it’s bullshit ki..” you reassure, he nods, “i just don’t know why.. she wouldn’t tell me when i asked.” he sighs, “what actually happened?” you say.

he sat up, making you sit up too, his pushed his hair back before clearing his throat, “we were walking in the empty park after we got dinner.. it was going fine, she was smiling and… i was laughing. we were holding hands. suddenly a change in her energy was shown..”

you tilt your head,

“she suddenly stopped walking and.. told me she didn’t wanna hurt me but.. she couldn’t do this relationship anymore. i tried to ask for more of an explanation but she let go of my hand and ran home..” he sighs.

you couldn’t help but shake your head, niki felt tears forming in his eyes again, “don’t cry ki… i’m so sorry.” you frowned, “how about we do something today? get your mind off things?” you try,

he nods slowly, wiping his eyes, you sighed again, you couldn’t handle seeing him this way, you quickly got up, “alright. you have to sneak out my window, go home and get cleaned up and come back, we’ll go do something fun okay!” you smiled, trying to break the sad barrier.

he chuckled at your consideration, he nods and got up, you helped him out your window before turning to your bathroom to get ready.

-

you were waiting for niki to ring the doorbell downstairs, wearing a white skirt and a pretty pink sweater, you grabbed your bag before you heard the doorbell,

you quickly ran downstairs to see your mom opened the door already,

“niki! it’s nice to see you, i’m assuming you’re here for y/n?” she says, niki nods, your mom steps aside as you walk up to him, “hey,” you smile, “hi.” he replied,

your mom chuckled before closing the door, “okay so, where are we going?” niki cleared his throat. “sh! let me surprise you, you’re gonna have to put this on when we get somewhat close.” you pull out a bandana to cover his eyes.

he chuckled and rubbed his neck, “alright then.” he nods.

-

on the bus, you two got a couple of weird stares due to him having on a bandana, but you brushed it off and dragged him off the bus when the stop arrived.

“i just tripped over so many people’s feet..” niki groaned as the bus took off, you two stood outside your favorite childhood spot.

it was a pretty park, a nice trail with so many flowers, and of course, the bench you two always sat on to do everything.

you lead him over to the bench, it still had the painted hand marks on the seats.

one pink hand mark, and one blue hand mark, you smiled to yourself. you two haven’t been here since highschool started, due to how much you’ve been busy.

“y/nnn.. take this off of me nowww.” he groaned again, you chuckled, “go on.” you smile,

he removed the bandana with ease, blinking to adjust to the world again, his eyes drifted around the familiar surroundings, and down at the bench. he smiled softly.

“gosh. we haven’t been here in so long.” he says softly, you nod, he aligned his hand to his old hand mark, which didn’t fit since his hands grew a lot from when you two were young.

you giggled and aligned your hand to your smaller hand print too, “damn, we’ve grown haven’t we.”

“i’m shocked no one’s painted over it or.. scraped it off.” he chuckled and sat down on his side, you sat beside him, “they better not! or we’ll just redo it.” you shrug,

niki chuckled to himself, he looked around, you couldn’t help but stare at him, the wind blew his bangs away from his eyes, giving you a better access to his full face, you couldn’t help but smile.

you felt so bad.

his heart was pure gold. it hurt to see him like this, you knew he was trying to put a smile on around you but, deep down you knew his heart was breaking..

him and ivy have been dating since freshmen year, you guys are seniors now.. so you can only imagine how bad this must be on him.

suddenly he looked down, and before you knew it.. he burst into tears.

your heart breaks.. literally.

“oh.. ki.” you frown and pull him in your arms, he sobbed softly in your shoulder, you closed your eyes at the sounds of his crying.

“i’m sorry..” you whisper, suddenly he lifts his head back up, looking at you with teary eyes, tears streaming down his face.

you instantly wiped the tears from his cheeks, sucking in your lips in guilt. “i should’ve waited until i got you out huh?” you chuckled awkwardly.

“no..” he shook his head, “i’m glad you did actually.. i feel…” he cut himself off..

“i feel complete being back here again.” he smiled, you smiled back at him, “ki?” you call, he raised an eyebrow softly,

“you know i’m always here for you? even if we grow up and.. meet other people. you’ll always hold your spot in my heart.” you reassure, he smiled softly and shifted himself,

he laid his head on your shoulder as you two stare out to the flowers.

he didn’t say anything, but you didn’t need him too.

you look down at him, you admired his face, his faint freckles, the way his hair laid on his forehead so nicely.

for some odd reason.. you felt your heart flutter, you quickly looked away..

no.. you can’t catch feelings for your literal best friend, especially when he’s fresh out a relationship. he needs a shoulder to lean on, not a new problem.

you cleared your throat, “should we go get ice cream? that always cheered us up.” you say, he nods and stood up slowly, lending his hand out for you.

you hesitate, niki noticed and tilts his head slightly, you clear your throat again and grab his hand before lifting yourself up.

“lead the way” you say, he nods slowly and you two began to walk in a comfortable silence.

you thought to yourself.. get yourself together.

now’s not the time.

a/n: so do i keep continuing this ooorrrrr lmk !

taglist : @certified-ni-ki-lover @noblub-4ulolz @yourmyst4r @vixialuvs @ni-ki-ismyluv @judeduartewannabe @soobs-things @en-chantedtomeetyou @definitelynotherr @heyniki @wntersm @geniejunn @pkjay @baevsxii @k1ttylvr @geniejunn @pkjay @chaevibes @jiyeons-closet @bananna-12

[natalievoncatte]

Cait wouldn’t leave her alone.

Every way Vi turned, she was there, but never more than a moment. Vi would turn sharply and see Cait in her stolen clothes from their first jaunt into the Undercity. The costume that Vi had taken for her was one of a dozen attempts to get rid of the mousy, timid little burden that was getting in her way as she hunted for her sister, for answers, for Silco. For someone made of meat that would bruise and split under her knuckles until she could beat ten years of her life out of them, ten years in hell.

Once she saw her dancing, free, without the grief that weighed her down like a suit of armor and choked the life and joy from her. This was another punishment- to see flashes of the girl she was before Vi’s *bullshit* wrecked her life. So full of life, so devastatingly beautiful, dancing in the dark with her skin aglow, and then she was gone and some shitbag was making over on her and got a broken jaw for his effort.

Cait was there when the world spun from the booze, and when ham sized fists cracked ribs and bruised organs to the point of bursting, when the grain alcohol scoured her throat with hot whips and hard knuckles chipped her skull and scrambled her brains. When her cheek hit the dirt she would come in brief flashes, soft fingers curled lovingly around her chin, huge eyes liquid with grief.

On those nights she made it home -or at least, crawled back to her shithole flip house- she would lie on her side and see Cait’s face filling her vision again, only to slide inevitably into nightmares and dreamscapes made torture by her absence.

She had done everything wrong and Cait was gone.

Most of the times. Sometimes she raged. That Piltie bitch promised she wouldn’t changed but she’d lied, she already had. Vi had given her everything, everything! Her name was shit down here, her family gone, her life gone. She was nothing but a rabid dog mauling other beasts until one day she’d get her throat torn out, just more trash. What had she called them? Animals?

She’d scream her name in a rage as the bottle shattered on the wall and plead for her as she gulped from the next one. Eventually even Loris stopped coming around.

“I’m not going to let you kill yourself, Violet. I’m definitely not going to help.”

“Then fuck off,” Vi snarled.

She didn’t know how long that had been. Down here in the lowest parts of the undercity, day wasn’t much different than night. She crawled back to the pits. She fought. She won, sometimes she lost. With blood knuckles and a feral grin or a busted lip and a feeling of coming apart inside her ribs, she’s take a bag of coins, give a few to the landlord and spend the rest on drink.

It was Cait’s voice she heard in the dark.

You’re not even eating.

“Go fuck yourself, cupcake,” she’d mutter, and some sump rat would stare at her like a madwoman, sometimes run his yap and get a pop in the jaw for it.

Eventually it’d happen. The booze-rot would eat its way to the outside, or something would break inside, or she’d throw hands with someone with a blade or a club and be too tired and drunk and fucked up to fight it and she’d be fucking free.

No more ghosts. The living do not haunt the dead.

She wasn’t sure how she got back here. She wasn’t even sure if she won the last bout. They were all melting together in a stew of pain, the meat within falling to shreds from boiling too long. Vi stared at herself in the cracked mirror, one little Vi surrounded by a dozen little ones, all splitting the same face, drawn and waxy and pale and marred by sooty black. She took a drink of her poison and shook the bottle, hearing the hollow slosh of the dregs, and tossed it, uncaring of it broke or not, if there were enough coins in the black bag to buy another.

Vi fell more than sat on the bed. Gravity did the rest and she fell on her side, wincing at the explosion of pain radiating from her flank. Cracked rib, most likely. She remembered now. She’d been careless, slow, tried to trap an uppercut meant to crack her sternum and kill her and took it in the rib instead. Every breath hurt. It would be easier to just not to, but she couldn’t stop.

Of course she was there. Cait lying in a silken heaven, big liquid eyes drinking Vi’s soul, full of such compassion and love. No one had looked at Vi like that since she was a child, looked past the grime and the scars and the hurt to just see her.

No one but Cait, and Cait left her.

Vi closed her eyes, ready as ever not to open them. When she felt a soft brush of fingers on her cheek she brushed them away. The visions could fuck off, she was tired.

“She’s not waking up,” Cait said, her voice tight with concern, stretching the clipped professional tone she used round her subordinates to its limit.

“She’s hurt badly,” a man said.

“Commander, we have to go. If someone spots you here they’ll tear us apart.”

“Loris, help me carry her.”

The worked carved red lines of pain through her as powerful hands lifted her from the bed.

This was odd. She’d imagined Cait everywhere but she’d always been alone. Why the hell was she hallucinating Loris? Sure, he was a fine drinking buddy and reminded her a little of Vander but he was hardly-

Oh.

Vi forced her eyes open, a struggle with how gummy and dry they were. The big man was carrying her in his arms and Maddie was comically struggling to carry an oversized bag weighed down by Vi’s atlas gauntlets.

Cait.

Cait was there. It was her. It was really her. Vi could feel her fingers probing her broke rib and see her and God she could smell her, Cait smelled like lilacs and how could anything smell so good in this fetid shithole?

“Cupcake?” she rasped.

“What is she, hungry?” Maddie muttered.

“Cait, get your hood up,” said Loris. “Vi, stay quiet. We’ll take the ventilation shafts, stay out of sight.”

Vi obliged the request by passing out.

It felt like hours in the dark. She’d wake, not knowing if she was in the dream world or the real, if these figures were carrying her to Piltover or hell. She would hear Cait’s voice, soft words to steady her and a gentle hand clasping hers when a jolt made her cry out in agony.

It was strangely easy to sleep while someone as carrying you.

When she woke, she knew she had to be in a dream. She’d dreamed this before- opening her eyes and seeing the elaborate silk canopy of Cait’s expansive bed in her palatial bedroom, big enough to build a Zaunite tenement inside. She would sit up, and Call Cait’s name and hear no answer. She’d rise and wander the halls and eventually make her way to the gardens and still no one would reply.

Vi would wander in an empty world forever, a specter with no one to torment.

No, it was different this time. She’d never dreamed of a thin tube connecting a bottle hanging over the bed to a needle taped in place on her arm. He dreams had never had the constricting feeling of bandages around her trunk, or wrapped around a dozen cuts on her arms and legs. In dreams her lips had never been dry, her throat never parched. The dream world traded in other kinds of pain.

She tried to speak but it was like her tongue was sandpaper, so she moved to sit up instead, gasping in agony as pain exploded in her side. She felt like shit, skin clammy with sour sweat, hurting all over and her head was pounding.

“Try not to move,” Cait whispered, suddenly there, a gentle hand pressing her back down. “You’ve a broken rib and internal injuries, and the withdrawal.”

“Caitlyn?” Vi managed to choke out.

Cait gently lifted her head, guided a glass to her lips. The water was ice cold and it was bliss. She closed her eyes and savored it as deeply as a fine wine. Not that she’d had much experience with that.

“Where am I?”

Cait hesitated.

Vi’s eyesight was clearing now as she blinked the gum away. Cait was pale and drawn, dark circles under her eyes from nights without sleep. There was a deep weariness in her eyes that made Vi’s heart ache. She looked for the spark that had always been there, but saw only faint embers, ready to be swept into nothing by the slightest air.

“I brought you home.”

Vi closed her eyes.

“You should have left me where you found me.”

“I shouldn’t have left you at all. I’ll never forgive myself.”

Cait curled her fingers around Vi’s, and squeezed.

“Yeah,” Vi rasped. “I know that feeling.”

[nostalgebraist]

Thanks for this thoughtful review!

(BTW, for others – this is probably obvious but there are spoilers below the readmore, don't click unless you've read the book)

I'm going to use this as an opportunity to talk about one specific thing that bugs me about some reader reactions to my stuff. Therefore, most of what I say below will be negative (about your review), but I want to emphasize first that that's not a reflection of what I thought of it overall.

----

What I'm here now to talk about is this kind of thing:

There are parts of all his books, where I really think that the explanation for why they are the way they are is that they are "bad on purpose", and all the bullshit [note: in context "bullshit" seems to be meant as a neutral term for non-realist elements -nost] is a way of turning these shortcomings into strengths. The self-effacing voice which whispers that the characters aren't sufficiently well-drawn, are too cartoonish—well, what if that was the point? What if there was a reason for that, in the story?

And like... okay, there is sort of a sense in which this is true, sometimes, kinda. There is a grain of truth to this; it is getting at something real.

But it pains me to say that, because I don't want to encourage this kind of reading. Interpretations like this are occasionally correct but IMO they're much more common than they should be. IMO the right intuition is that this is a galaxy-brained, contrarian sort of take, a last resort you land on when you've ruled out everything else.

And not just with my work, with everything – I'm simply more aware of the problem when it comes to my work, because I wrote it and I'm aware of why I actually did things the way I did.

I've said this before, but watching the way that people react to my own fiction has been an eye-opening experience, one that has taught me things about reader (and viewer, etc.) reactions in general. Specifically, what I've learned was:

People's tastes are way more diverse than I had realized (before I started writing and sharing fiction). And they are diverse in a very fine-grained way; even if two readers have the same preferences about 90% of stuff, or 95%, they'll still diverge on some things. While it's not literally true that "every reader is a unique snowflake with a preference set that no one else shares," that is a very good first approximation of how things are.

Readers (including me!) have been trained by a lifetime of reading book/movie/etc. reviews to frame their preferences/reactions in a pseudo-objective "this is just how it is" way, like their own tastes have some special viewpoint-independent priority, a quality of "reality" or "accuracy" lacking in everyone else's tastes (which are all different, cf. 1). And this is not just a stylistic quirk of the way people write about fiction, it actually (IMO) feeds back into the underlying opinions behind the written commentary. It degrades people's ability to understand what it is they're looking at and their ability to make accurate inferences about the process of its creation.

----

Here's a sort of cartoonish schematic of the type of experience that led me to draw these conclusions. (And I suspect this is not just a thing that happens to me, I imagine it happens with any sort of work that "contains a lot of different types of stuff" the way mine does.)

Writer makes something that has X and Y and Z in it. Writer thinks X/Y/Z are "great tastes that taste great together." Writer is very pleased with the result.

Reader 1 has similar tastes to writer, says something brief about how they loved the book and it's a new favorite for them.

Reader 2 loves X, is OK with Y, hates Z. They write a lengthy review saying that the book was a mixed bag and could have been great if the writer had stuck to X and not messed things up by doing so much Z.

Reader 3 is the reverse of their predecessor: they hate X, are OK with Y, love Z. They write a lengthy review saying that the book was a mixed bag and could have been great if the writer had stuck to Z and not messed things up by doing so much X.

Reader 4 loves X and Z – but they hate Y. They write a lengthy… you can fill in the rest. Imagine a whole bunch of these guys (readers 5, 6, etc).

Reader 17 has the same tastes as Reader 2: loves X, is OK with Y, hates Z. But their lengthy review takes a different, in some sense "more charitable" angle, speculating that the inclusion of Z was a load-bearing pillar in the overall structure, a thing that unfortunately had to be included to "unlock" all that sweet sweet X.

Reader 18 has the same tastes as Reader 3: hates X, is OK with Y, loves Z. But, they explain, X was a load-bearing pillar in the overall structure, a thing that unfortunately had to be included to "unlock" all that sweet sweet Z.

Writer reads all these reviews and feels strange, dizzy. The "nicer" reviews like 17 and 18 are actually more uncomfortable to read than the "meaner" ones like 2 and 3.

"I don't know how to convince you guys," Writer thinks, "but I... I just liked all of it? I thought it was good? That was why I wrote it? (Why else would I have written it?)"

----

Or, as I wrote in that previously linked post from 2021, w/r/t TNC specifically (and making a slightly different but closely related point):

Some people say X was the worst part of TNC, some people say X was the best part. The story was a celebration of Y; the story was about how Y is laughably futile. It’s a letdown that we were never told more about Z; the reason TNC is good is that it leaves stuff like Z to the imagination. It was obvious we were meant to believe P; it is obvious we were meant to believe not-P; the ambiguity about whether P is tiresome literary masturbation; at least the story didn’t jump the shark by spelling out whether P! The reason people like TNC is, of course, that it has A, although nostalgebraist insisted on putting B in there too because he hasn’t fully perfected his formula yet / he somehow thinks B is good even though it isn’t / he thinks it’s funny how bad B is (but the joke tires). …and then someone else has same take, but with A and B flipped.

This exact sort of thing is of course happening again before our eyes with reactions to TAoHS.

I've encountered multiple readers who disliked most of the story but felt the ending (sort of) "redeemed it," and I've also encountered multiple readers who liked the story up until the ending but disliked the ending (or at least thought it was worse than the rest) – to say nothing of the many readers who liked (or disliked) the whole thing all the way through.

And this ending-related stuff is just one particularly obvious facet of a broader diversity in the overall reader response.

By now I know not to be surprised by this stuff, and even to find it kind of fun to watch... but I have to admit, it is still a dizzying and uncomfortable experience.

----

Now, as I said, it is sometimes true that things really are "bad on purpose."

But I think the interpreter's default hypothesis – which should be maintained by default unless convincing evidence against it can be brought forth – should be:

The writer thinks that the thing they wrote is good. They think the ideas are good and they think they executed them well. And they think this more-or-less homogeneously for everything in the work – there are no "bad but unfortunately necessary" parts from the writer's POV.

(At least, this should be the default with works that aren't making the writer much/any money. Obviously things are different with lucrative commercial fiction; there are plenty of well-paid hacks who know they're hacks and do it for the money, etc.)

Why should this be the default? Multiple reasons.

First: it takes a lot of effort to produce any sort of creative work. The writer thought that effort was worthwhile, for some reason – why?

The most straightforward explanation (and a very common one IMO) is that the writer simply believed in the thing that they were making. They believed the effort was worthwhile because it would yield a good product.

Second: as a writer you have an immense amount of freedom. It's difficult to overstate the extend of it. You are playing God, you decide the way that literally everything will be.

Obviously there are some constraints, cases where one part of a story will imply the existence of another or whatever.

But it's very rare that you actually get forced into "doing a thing you know you are bad at, badly." After all: why do that? No one's forcing you! Just do something else! You're God, you control everything!

(Note that this applies also to the very act of writing anything. No one is forcing you to write at all. If you can't come up with good ideas, nothing prevents you from just not writing your bad ones.)

Third: at least in my experience, "playing God" in this way requires a certain state of mind, a certain boldness and self-assurance, which is incompatible with thinking "yeah this is gonna suck but I have to do it" – but is very compatible with thinking "I am making something excellent and every part of it is excellent, hell yes."

Fourth: because of the previously noted diversity of reader preferences, it should not be surprising to any given reader that they find some parts of the work much better than others, even if the writer thought it was all excellent.

This outcome is predictable from the X/Y/Z stuff I talked about above. No clever interpretive work is required to explain it; it arrives pre-explained; it's simply what happens by default.

And finally: because, as I noted above, I think all of us are infected with "reviewer brainworms" and we need to be mindful of this fact.

We've grown accustomed to the casual conflation between our own tastes and some (usually hazily imagined and under-theorized) sort of "objective, ideal artistic standards."

Outside of a few edge-case eccentrics who can be ignored for my present purposes, we do not do this because we've become intellectually convinced that

(a) such objective standards make sense and really "exist" or at least really matter and

(b) they just so happen to match our own preferences.

Rather, we've fallen into this habit because it's what the pros do: there's a standard style that professional critics and reviewers write in these days, and that style implies these stances. And if one writes (and thinks, in one's inner monologue) in this style, one can easily fall over backwards into uncritically believing (a) and (b) for no better reason than "I seem to already be talking as though I believe these things, hence it would be simple and convenient if I really did believe them."

But – even if we bracket the philosophical questions of whether (a) is in fact true, and (if it is) whose tastes in particular ought to be elevated in the way (b) presumes – even if we table all that for another day, still we ought to keep in mind how weird and audacious a move this is, this simultaneous assertion-without-explanation of the (a)+(b) pair.

We've gotten used to it by exposure, because "the pros" have normalized it. But in actual fact it is a pretty wild thing to just go and assume, given the X/Y/Z/etc. diversity of actual opinion!

If (b) is true for you (general "you" not OP), then it can't be true for me, because we're both unique snowflakes to a first approximation; indeed if (b) is true for you then (to a first approx.) it is only true for you. No one else's tastes have this magical relation to reality, just yours.

Holding the belief (b) about a given reviewer is conceivable-but-wild if we're only considering them in isolation. But once we bring a 2nd reviewer (with non-identical tastes) into the picture, who also believes (b), it's literally impossible to maintain that both of these people are fully right.

And then of course in real life there are not 2 but many, many readers out there, all of them unique snowflakes. And, while it is socially normal in our social context for each one of them to write like they're the chosen one blessed with that special (b)-magic, if you read enough such writing and actually think about what you're reading, it can't help but feel like a sort of game, like playing make-believe. As with most games, it can be very entertaining (for all parties involved), but we shouldn't confuse its amusing conceits for properties of the real world.

In the real world, the writer has their tastes, and you have yours. These tastes are probably not identical. The writer may be aware of the diversity of readerly tastes, and may thus be aware that tastes like yours are out there, but they have no special reason to consider you in particular, elevating you above all the other readers who are non-identical with them (and with you). The writer is dimly and abstractly aware of you, at best, as just another one of the people who will come along later, dislike some of their choices, assume that these choices were wrong in some "objective" way the writer knew about at the time, and then speculate as to why the writer would do something they know is wrong. For every choice, and every way of making every choice, one can imagine a reviewer who responds to it in this way, and quite often these reviewers actually materialize once the work is available for consumption. If you try to reason about these guys in advance, as a writer, it'll stop you in your tracks (if nothing else because there are 2+ of them whose takes are mutually inconsistent with one another). You've gotta have some other standard of value to rely on.

So, as a reviewer, if you ask "why would someone ever make a choice I don't like?" and try to pick at this question, you are quite likely heading toward a dead end. The writer wasn't thinking about you (or people like you). They were applying their own, distant standard of value.

Better to ask: "suppose there was a person who actually liked all of this. What would they be like? How would they be similar to me / different from me? And what, if anything, can I conclude from that?"

(Just to be clear, I am not accusing OP of being more infected with said brainworms than anyone else; I'll still on my soapbox, giving a generic rant about a general issue, with OP as merely a jumping-off point.)

The Apocalypse of Herschel Schoen

My fourth novel, The Apocalypse of Herschel Schoen, is now available in full.

Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!

[its-your-mind]

Something something timkon and hair and how lex lichrally programmed Kon to shave his head before he went all luthor and was forced to attack his team, his best friends, his family. and then how most of the hair on the back of Tim’s head got burned off when he got blowed up (thx Steph) and he had to cut or shave the rest of it off so it could grow back semi-evenly. and how kon was a #rebel esp compared to all-American Boy Scout Superman; Kon’s rockin around with the side cut and the leather jacket and the buckles and the spikes or the (ill-advised and made me sad) black t-shirt and jeans but even the “I am a totally normal bro” getup made him distinct and different from Kal and that is really important to Kon because he wants to be his own person, not a Superman-stand-in. and THEN fucking LEX made it so Kon would look more like Lex! his other DNA donor!!! And Tim!! He kept his hair short — just long enough to spike it up as Robin — until both of his parents were gone. which suggests to me that he kinda always wanted it long (hello Tim Drake, #1 Dick Grayson stan) but that just wasn’t an option allowed to him (not uncommon for parents who care Very Much about Appearances — my own parents were the same about my brothers’ hair growing up, not least because the private all-boys school they went to dictated that their hair couldn’t be long enough to touch the collar of their shirt (with exceptions for [insert kinda racist and vaguely xenophobic language here] hair styles). As soon as he turned 18 my baby brother got a rocker-style mane. But I digress. Anyway). Then, post-tragedy, Tim’s hair got long enough to flip down over his forehead and stream behind him when he swung through the city (perhaps one of his ways of clinging to control and his sense of self in the whole awful situation). But then… Tim got fucking exploded, betrayed by his ex-girlfriend who had only just returned after letting him grieve her death for a year, and now she’s following Tim’s dead father mentor’s instructions to challenge him or whatever the fuck bullshit Batman told her, (a young girl whose own father was an asshole criminal, who so desperately wanted Bruce to be proud of her) and now Tim has to cut his hair all the way down to the scalp again and listen. I’m sorry dc tim looks fucking amazing in adventure comics and I’m in love with how he is arted but hair cannot and does not grow back that quick!! Mf had to wait!! I bet it grew in fucking patchy!! I bet kon’s did too!! (prolly not as bad as Tim’s cuz Tim’s got scar tissue and shit.)

but I just think tim and kon deserve a chance to sit down and just commiserate with each other about growing their hair back out (growing back out a sidecut is a BITCH I speak from experience) and Tim’s prolly having to trim his own hair super often to keep it nice-ish while it comes back in, and Kon’s curls are just a fucking MESS until they grow out enough to like. Curl. (Again, speaking from experience) And they’re just shooting the shit (“well MINE was worse bc I looked like fucking LEX. LUTHOR.” / “well you didn’t have to wait to figure out which parts of your scalp we actually gonna bother growing hair again”) until it gets quiet for a minute. And then one of them asks if the hair also reminds the other one of The Shitty Thing That Happened. And then they fucking talk about it. About how they can’t look in the mirror without having a flashback of pain or rage. How it makes them feel like they don’t even get to control their own bodies, their own appearances, and how much that fucking sucks. How they go to run their hand through their hair and there’s just. Not enough of it to do that. How Kon is terrified that somehow looking like Lex means Lex will use him to hurt the people he loves again. How every time Tim sees another Bat or Bird looking at the back of his head, all he can think about is how they might be planning to lure him into another Bat-mandated trap test. How both Tim and Kon kinda really miss the feeling of people playing with their hair. How they miss playing with each others’ hair.

And maybe then one of them extends an offer and the other does the same and they agree to do each others’ hair. Maybe it’ll help paint a new layer over those awful memories.

So Kon finds Tim once a week (he’s never in the same place, he’s rarely even in the same country) and he trims the hair until it looks even, gives Tim the #sitch on how much hair is growing back in. After the second or third week he realizes that Tim’s not keeping up with his burn-care routine, so he starts bringing burn and scar cream with him too. Then he remembers Tim’s lack of a hair care routine and starts trying out different products on Tim’s hair to see what works best. Tim doesn’t say anything, but he thinks all of this feels even better than when Kon and Cassie used to twist little braids into his hair.

Kon insists that Tim doesn’t have to help until his hair’s grown out more, (that he doesn’t want Tim nearby and distracted while Kon still looks like Lex) but Tim outright refuses to let Kon push him away and he will NOT be outdone in the caretaking game. He waits until Kon’s busy fighting some giant alien robot in metropolis and sneaks in to the Kents’ house to scope out what products Kon uses. When he leaves the bathroom, Ma Kent is there, eyebrow raised. She tells him he “could have just knocked on the front door, sweetheart, we know how’ta keep secrets in this house. Now, let’s get some food in you before Conner comes home. You’re all skin and bones, hun.” So Tim goes downstairs and takes some mini meat pies for the road, and then researches the products Kon uses, what they do, what the ingredients do, if there are other (more expensive) options that people have sworn up and down are better. He amasses a collection, and the next time Kon shows up with clippers and healing creams and a new shampoo to try, Tim’s already got ten different products lined up on the sink — everything from shampoos and conditioners to serums and masks. Kon asks if these are things Tim wants Kon to use in Tim’s hair. Tim tells him that no, all of these are for Tim to try on Kon. Kon almost cries. (He does cry, he just doesn’t let the tears fall until Tim isn’t looking.) (Tim notices anyway ofc.) And Tim’s made a spreadsheet to track the effectiveness of different products, different ingredients, different combinations, so he tells Kon to start coming every 2-3 days instead, so he can establish results using a realistic timeframe. Sometimes, if Tim’s gonna be in one place for a few days, Kon just crashes with him. (Neither of them say it, but they both fucking CRAVE the old Core Four cuddle piles.) Eventually, when Kon’s hair is long enough that he’s ready to switch back to his side-cut again, Tim surprises him by not only shaving the hair down, but shaving a few racing stripes (“they’re flight patterns!” / “rob, I dunno what to tell you. everyone’s gonna think they’re racing stripes. doesn’t mean they aren’t dope as fuck, though.”) into Kon’s hair. Every time Kon’s hair grows out enough, Tim shaves it back and stencils in a new design. Kon starts making requests (“gimme the Super ‘S’!” / “It’s the House of El crest, Kon. You know that. Also, you have a secret identity to maintain.” / “C’mon, I’ll just say I’m a fan!” / “With the same El family crest shaved onto your scalp as Superboy?” / “No one’s noticed the identical head decor yet!”) but it’s the day Kon asks (with the same confident and mischievous tone as always) for Tim to shave in the Red Robin crest that something in Tim’s chest, something formless and warm that he hadn’t really paid attention to before, seers a burning path through his heart, takes root, and solidifies.

“Kon. I love you.”

Kon’s distracted, rifling through their hair-care bags for Tim’s razors. “Love you too, Robbie. Duh. That’s why I’m askin’ you to shave your cre–”

“No,” Tim shakes his head, mildly frustrated with himself for the lack of clarity. “I’m in love with you. I think I have been for a while.”

Kon is seated in the chair they’d pulled into the bathroom from the hotel room’s desk, so he has to look up to meet Tim’s eyes. The hand digging beneath sample bottles of leave-in conditioner freezes, still wrist-deep in hair products. Kon’s expression looks to Tim like one of his video games’ character builders froze between the settings for ‘bright smile’ and ‘shock and awe.’

So Tim just looks down at him. Waits. If this was anyone else, Tim would probably be losing his mind right now, but… it’s Kon. Tim’s safe. Kon would never do anything to hurt him.

Kon unfreezes, blinks a few times. “Could you–” he coughs. “Could you say that again? I think my brain maybe like, malfunctioned for a second.”

Tim takes a step closer, reaches out one hand to cup Kon’s cheek, scratches his fingertips through the stubble on the side of Kon’s head. “I’m in love with you, Conner Kent.”

Tears fill Kon’s eyes, and he blinks them away. “That’s– that’s what I thought you said.” His hand (the one not trapped beneath a sea of shampoos, some detached and unhelpful part of Tim’s mind remarks) comes up to gently rest on Tim’s hip. “Robbie, Tim, I– of course I’m in love with you. You– you’re– you’re amazing, you know that? You’re so kind and strong and you’re a genius and you’re a gift to everyone around you; I dunno how everyone else doesn’t see you like I do.”

Tim can’t help but reach out his other hand to wrap around the back of Kon’s head, to feel where the curls carve a path down through the shorter hair and come to a sharp point.

“I mean, damn Wonder Boy,” Kon tries to muster up his Superboy smirk, but the look in his eyes is full of too much genuine affection for him to pull it off. “I think I’ve been in love with you since Kauai, since you grabbed me outta free-fall and swung me to safety. You caught me. No one’d ever done that before. And then you just… kept doing it. You’re still saving me, still taking care of me.”

Kon reaches his other hand (no eruption of hairspray, thank you TTK, that same unhelpful part of Tim’s mind comments. Read the room! the rest of Tim yells at it.) around the back of Tim’s neck, avoiding the tender and scarred areas with practiced ease, and pulls Tim down until their foreheads touch.

“I love you, Wonder. I love you, Robbie.” Kon tilts his head up, waits until their eyes meet. He’s got the biggest smile on his face that Tim’s ever seen.

Tim smiles back, and Kon’s eyes soften. “I love you, Tim.”

Tim leans down and uses his hands on either side of Kon’s head to guide Kon’s lips up to his own.

This is what I want to remember, Tim thinks as he feels Kon’s fingers gliding softly against the sensitive skin of his burn, feels Kon’s TTK covering and protecting the parts still too tender to touch. Tim runs his own fingertips back and forth over the stubble on the sides of Kon’s head, before pushing them up until they’re tangled in Kon’s curls.

I don’t want to care anymore whether or not the people around me look at the back of my head and see weakness or failure. They don’t get to decide whether this mark on my body matters or what it means. I do. And I decide that these scars are important because they brought me here, to this moment. They brought me to Kon.

Kon tilts his head down to break the kiss. He stands up, and before Tim gets a chance to move away and give him space, Kon wraps his arms and TTK around him. He plants a kiss in Tim’s hair. “Damn, Wonder Boy. Having to grow all my hair back almost feels worth it if it got me here.”

Tim smiles and wraps his arms around Kon’s waist, nestles into Kon’s chest. “You know what, Clone Boy? I was just thinking the same thing.”

[intimidating-fettuccine]

This may be an odd request, but if you are into it, can I request headcanons of Smiley, Helen, and Jason (or characters you want to write) where their partner (reader) dies in front of them on a mission of something, but somehow and for some reason, time gets reversed to start at the beginning of the day, so their partner is alive and sleeping on their bed. Please and thank you!

I sort of imagined it as them going to sleep at the end of the day and waking up and it's the previous day, I hope that's okay <3 This request also made me remember Helen and his heart jar for his dead s/o so we're just gonna pretend that doesn't happen this time :p

This got so long I'm sorry I'm posting this so late-

Smiley:

He was never made for field work, with his preference for medical assistance at the mansion he was never meant to be standing out there in the field. He was never meant to watch you take that fatal injury, to do everything he could to save you out in the woods surrounding you and fail so miserably at it, much to his extreme distress. The following hours before he'd eventually passed out at his medical table had been a mash of absolute pain and misery, feelings he'd assumed he'd be waking up to once more the following morning, but instead, he was met with your beautiful face smiling at him. He'd thought he'd died himself for a moment, after all, he hadn't fallen asleep in bed, but here you are beside him, just as snug as you were the previous morning. It doesn't take long for him to realize what's happened, and Smiley isn't going to waste the chance before him. He's quick to come up with some bullshit but believable reason about why you can't go out on the mission you're meant to, citing doctor's orders and him needing to monitor a concern that came up on a pre-mission health check.

Nobody questions him, although you're left quite concerned by his actions. Nobody else can see it, but you can see the tenseness of his body, his eyes darting about anxiously, the heavy beating of his heart. You can tell he's worried about something, but he won't tell you what it is, he simply can't. He can't bring himself to admit what he saw, what he experienced, not when it's still too fresh in his mind. Perhaps he'll tell you later, but for now, he instead chooses to seek comfort in the fact that by the time the two of you go to bed that night, you're still safe and sound in his arms, just as you are the following, brand new morning, and nothing else other than that matters. It takes far longer than he thought to tell you what truly happened that day, why he refused to let you go on the mission, years down the line, and it's only with your comfort and love for him at that time that allows him to truly grieve and let go of those horrible memories. Suddenly all those days of him being more concerned about you going on missions makes sense, and you apologize for ever questioning his judgment or doubting him, promising to always come home safe to him, just as he does for you.

Jason:

The scream leaving his throat feels as though it should rip it apart, just as he feels like he's being ripped apart at the sight of your dying body crashing to the ground. Jason can barely tell what's happening in the next few hours, between trying desperately to resuscitate you, weeping for your death, and the others trying to keep him from doing something drastic. He barely realizes when he's falling asleep, his mechanical body simply powering off due to overcharge of his emotions, and when he awakes the next morning, he can't help but immediately begin sobbing once more when his eyes land on you. You're still in his satin sleep shirt, oversized on your body and revealing your skin just as it had the morning before, a sleepy smile resting on your cheeks as you gaze at him as he wakes up, but it's different this morning because now you're replaced with immense concern over his sudden outburst. You cradle him close and attempt to comfort him as best you can as he cries and crushes you against his body, so scared that any moment you could slip away again.

It must have been a dream, he reasons. A terrible, horribly bad dream, one that felt far too real, and so he tries to calm down, but he can't. Not when everything in the day progresses the exact same day, and so he shatters, begging you not to go on the mission. He tells you of his "dream", tells you of everything he saw, how he's scared it might actually happen, and you're so devastated by the clear distress he's in, so, of course, you switch out with someone else and stay home. He's so thankful you listened, so thankful a stronger creep took your place, considering the sorry state said creep was in when they got home. It could have been you, but it wasn't. Not this time, not ever again. Jason will never allow you to die in such a way, not now that he knows it's a definite possibility, no. He'll keep you safe and comfortable in his arms, safe from any dangers, just as he is right now, and will continue to do, for the rest of your life. He treasures you far too greatly to ever allow you to truly experience something like that again, and if he can help prevent it in any way at all, he will do so, for you, the love of his life, someone who deserves to live and die in peace.

Helen:

He had such an odd feeling. He'd elected to stay home last minute, as Slender had assumed not all of you would need to attend this mission. However, he felt this clawing, nagging feeling in his chest, and so he ran, ran faster than he ever had before, but he'd been too late. Your blood was fresh as you lay collapsed against a tree, your eyes unfocused as he sat before you. He tried everything he could to try and help you, but it was too late. Others had to find the two of you, as Helen had sat there before you for hours, crying and screaming, revealing emotions nobody other than you had ever seen before. He felt as though he should be dead, as though he should have died with you, but instead there he was, laying in your shared bed, now far colder than usual due to the lack of your body heat. So, if it had been so cold, why was it suddenly so warm when he woke up? Rare tears slip from his eyes as you snuggle into him, just as you had that morning, and he clutches you tightly. He feels as though some god out there must have finally taken pity upon him and done something good for him for once.

You ask what's wrong, and he simply asserts he'll tell you later, instead choosing to look after you that day, to be far more affectionate than usual. When Slender once again offers for someone to fall back, Helen disagrees, saying he has a bad feeling and that maybe someone extra should go to be safe, and so a few do, and Helen is so unbelievably thankful that he and the extra few went. He can't believe you were basically fighting all of these people by yourself, and he hates himself for so casually staying home. He kills the person who was meant to kill you with ease, and the mission is successful. You all make it home, and it's when you're cuddled up once more that night that Helen finally tells you what happened, how you had died, how it could have been his fault, how painful it was. You're momentarily confused, but with how earnestly he's retelling it, you feel as though it must have been true, and so you thank him for saving you this time, thank him for keeping you safe, and he swears to you that he'll continue to do so. For the rest of your careers for Slender, he'll always be there, on every mission, fighting to protect the one true blessing in his life.

[redsrooftopprincess]

Pls ignore me if your requests are closed buuuuuuutttt

Headcanons for a reader that can't stop 'mirin(staring full love and joy, especially when they're not looking) with infamously insecure Big Red ?

And if not, know that you're loved and appreciated regardless and I'm glad you and your blog exist

Hello my dear Gornack! Hope the new year is treating you well. Thank you for the ask! 🥰

Mountains and Sunsets and You

Raphael x Reader

No warnings

"You got something to say?"

His sudden attention snaps you back into reality. 

Shit. Fuck.

Caught red handed, you try to keep cool as heat fills your cheeks. 

You were doing it again. He could see you out of the corner of his eye for the last hour. You were sitting on one of the benches, pretending to work, and watching him as he and his brothers worked through their katas. It had almost made him trip twice.

It's always new and exciting at first, but you've already known him for a few months. The novelty should have worn off by now. But it keeps happening. He catches you staring. It's only him, he's paid enough attention to know you don't watch his brothers like this. It's unnerving. Distracting. He'd taken a backhand to the jaw during sparring last week, and even spilled his midnight coffee on April's carpet. Twice.

"No..." you say a little too innocently.

Training had wrapped for the night, and it had been Raphael's turn to put the equipment away, leaving him alone in the dojo with you as you gathered up your paperwork. You stood, turning to leave, when your eyes landed on him. You couldn't help but follow the lines of his side with every stretch, and the way the muscles in his arms shifted under his skin as he almost reverently placed each weapon back on the wall. 

There isn't anything wrong with it, per se. You aren't looking at him with hatred or fear or disgust, if anything you look... fascinated. And not in a "weird mutant science experiment" kind of way. He can't explain it, and he can't explain the warmth that pools in his stomach every time he catches you doing it. And it's frustrating as hell.

"Then why the hell are you looking at me?" He growls, "Why the hell are you always looking at me?" He takes three steps towards you before stopping, instinct identifying pain and confusion as an an opponent, but you don't flinch. You know you're not in any real danger. Never from him. 

His scales catch the multicolored lights in the lair making him shimmer, and as he fidgets your eyes move over the gentle color shift that will only let you see his markings when the light is just right. You've never met anyone like him, seen anything like him, and everything he does is captivating. 

"Because you're beautiful," you say, simply, before you can stop yourself. 

This catches him off-guard, and he hesitates for a moment before he scoffs and looks away, "You're hilarious."

"Am I laughing?" You ask, without so much as a smile.

His eyes meet yours, hurt and suspicion deepset in amber. You can't be serious. When your features don't change, and he realizes there's no oncoming punchline, his eyes soften and fall away. 

Your jaw tightens. You hate it. You hate the way the world has ground imperfection and insecurity into every single scale. He's worth so much more than this broken place, and he's been beaten into believing he's unworthy of less than this. 

"Does that make you uncomfortable?" You ask, gently.

"Does what?"

"The fact that I find you beautiful." 

He hesitates, "... yes."

"Why?"

"Because it's bullshit." He snaps.

"Why?"

He looks at you incredulously.

"Why?" You repeat. 

He scoffs and rolls his eyes.

"Why?" You nearly demand, "Why not you? Why can't you be beautiful?"

"Because I'm not." The words ring out against the cement walls, as solid and true as the foundations of the earth.

He's not. He can't be. He's not human. He's not normal. He's a 6'5" turtle with chronic pain and a bad attitude. Covered in scars, shell cracked and gouged and broken in places, he's all thick hide and hard edges. How could anyone find that "beautiful?"

A few moments pass, and you gently break the silence, "Can I ask you something?"

"I got a choice?" He sighs, his frustration dissolving into exhaustion. He doesn't want or need a pep talk, and he sure as hell doesn't want someone like you trying to make him feel better. But somewhere, in the short time you've known each other, he's begun to trust you. He motions for you to continue.

"Do you think a mountain is beautiful?"

His gaze returns to yours and blinks twice, "... What?"

"Do you think a mountain is beautiful," you repeat. 

"Uh, yeah... I guess..." His brow furrows.

"Do you think..." You think for a moment, "a sunset is beautiful?" 

He sighs heavily, shifting his weight, "Yeah. Why. What's this got to do with anything?"

"Do you think I'm beautiful?" A small smile turns the corner of your mouth. He can't help glancing at it.

He hesitates. He just met you, and he really likes spending time with you. You're quick and kind and a hell of a good listener, he's vented to you about his brothers more than once already. You have a way of talking to him that makes things make sense. And Gods, yes, you're beautiful. Like a sun he can't stop staring at, even as his eyes are burning.

"Yes," he finally admits softly, holding your gaze. 

You try to ignore the way the word ricochets around your ribcage, and push on, tilting your head slightly, and questioning softly, "Would you ever consider me ugly for not looking enough like a mountain or a sunset?" 

"What? No! Why the hell -" he stops when you raise an eyebrow. It dawns on him slowly, and he blinks at you. 

You decide it best to let him turn that over for a while. He watches you wordlessly as you walk past him, bumping his arm gently with yours on your way out of the dojo. "See you later, Red," you say with a smile, before disappearing through the door.

....

Tag list:

@thelaundrybitch @the-cauldron-witch @fyreball66 @ninnosaurus @tmntngl @thegirlwiththeninjaturtletattoos @zagreustomb @ramielll @silverwatergalaxy @gornackeaterofworlds @daedric-sorceress @sophiacloud28 @iridescentflamingo @milykins

[anothersebastianblog]

Golden Globes ‘25 - win, hard launch, speech: some thoughts

So many things to say. Let’s start from the main event:

He finally won his first major award in Hollywood after winning his first important award last year. Awards are not just about acting, they are also about status, power and how good you are at promoting yourself. This is mainly why, ‘till they interviewed him before the ceremony (that gave me the feeling he was going to win lmao), i thought they had the insane idea to give it to Hugh Grant (or Glen Powell). Why losing the occasion to award someone iconic as Hugh? Thanks god they didn’t.

Sebastian’s performance was ABOVE the other 5. I hope the self proclaimed fans that think he is not good enough to be part of those 6 and that A24 bought his award, one day will understand that. Or, if they don’t, will leave the fandom and take their negativity and bullshits with them. Sebastian absolutely deserves his two awards for ADM, and we don’t like seeing your comments about how the movie is “boring”, “not well made”, “with too much screen time dedicated to Adam”. Shame on you.

He took this occasion to formally announce his relationship with Annabelle. It’s just a formality really, because wbk, literally lol. Nice to see it tho. Also because they looked amazing. Now, we know how he is: private, shy and work-focused. Exactly because of that, if you have been following him for a while, what happened yesterday should not have surprised you too much. Being an “old” fan or at least having seen/heard interviews/comments/etc made by him in the past should have made you realise two things mainly: 1) he changed (and matured) a lot after (i would personally assume) the death of his father + turning 40 + having more career opportunities, i have been saying this for at least 2 yrs!; 2) he knows he is there receiving that award thanks not only to himself but also to the people of his circle/family. He literally told us how important Annabelle has been during the time he filmed TA, especially: he admitted being selfish and sacrificing the time he could have spent with his loved ones to study and practice for that role. Not every partner would have tolerated that. She did. And she supported both movies since day one. We call it support, someone call it baiting. He evidently agrees with us.

So, don’t act too surprised (a bit it’s okay lol) if he brings one of the most important person of his life and the only person he loves (in *that* sense) with him, pose with her and publicly declare his love in front of everyone in his speech. A great one btw.

She deserves to be recognised but i am sure she doesn’t pretend to be.

Now some new year wishes, that as every new year wishes are too pretentious and too out of reach: i wish some people would stop pretending to be his fans, i wish they would leave the fandom and find help or at least a new hobby, i wish the accuse of not being enough, to have sold his soul to evil CAA, to be forced to act in a certain way would stop immediately, i wish ANY negative comments about Annabelle would stop immediately, especially the ones about her age, her body and her reproductive system 👍🏼

I wish many other days a joyful as last night was.

Cheers 🥂

[elleluvsjurin]

and i watch your demons cause me trauma

synopsis: becoming the infamous, queen bee’s girlfriend was not on your bingo card in high school

pairings: baek harin x fem!reader

cw: power imbalance, toxic!harin(as if she’s not already lol), suggestive, pet names

a/n: this song is mainly about y/n and Harin’s relationship rather than the game itself and the other characters!

being a new girl was not easy. catching the eye of a psychopath was a whole other ordeal. you and suji happened to be new girls together. you two ended up becoming best friends up until the 13th pyramid game. she was an F rank and you happened to be D ranked..which was odd considering you were new just like her. the next day came around and you watched the way that she had got treated by the bullies. the taunting, the laughter, and the physical pain of it got to your head.

luckily within the next pyramid game, she went up by two levels. the both of you ended up leveling up to C ranks. everything was going great until you caught Harin’s eye. you and suji knew of her but you never really got a chance to have a conversation with her, that was until she called you down to the principal’s office.

you complied and headed down to see what the principal wanted, not knowing that Harin called you. you open the door to see Harin smoking a cigarette, softly smirking.

“hi, y/n.” she says, her eyes beaming in happiness

“u-uh hi.” you ask and she smiles. harin walks up to you, looking at you with unreadable gaze. she softly runs her fingers through your hair. “such a pretty pup.” she mumbles to herself

“w-what?” you ask and she giggles a bit. “you’re pretty, wanna hang out?” she asks, she stares at you as if you can’t say no.

“sure.” you softly mumble. she walks up to you, throwing the cigarette on the floor and she steps on it. she leans towards your ear and whispers, “pretty pup. im gonna have so much fun with you.” she chirps before walking out of the office, leaving you alone.

“what the fuck did i just get myself into?” you ask yourself

————————————

the day comes to an end, fairly quickly. before you know it, you’re already over Harin’s house. she leads you up to her lavish bedroom. her whole room is the size of your apartment. you awkwardly sit on her bed, waiting for her to say something as she eyes you with another unreadable expression.

“so, y/n..are you and suji a thing?” she asks and your face starts to heat up. “no, we’re just best friends. why do you ask?” you ask.

“i was just curious..date me.” she says out of the blue

“huh?” you ask, in shock and she smiles. “date me.” she simply says

“is that a question or a command?” you ask and she laughs, finally an emotional response from her.

“im asking, silly.” she says, coming a bit closer to you. “o-ok.” you say.

if you become her girlfriend then maybe you could get her to stop this god awful game.

—————————

it’s been months since that convo with harin and the relationship isn’t bad at all. in fact, it’s going really great. of course, woo yi won’t leave your girlfriend alone but she’s not interested in her bullshit. there have been two more games since you and harin started dating. you and suji’s relationship have drifted because she figured that you were on Harin’s side, which was wrong.

you and harin often have sexcapades in her mother’s office. she loves the thrill of potentially getting caught being in between your legs and vice versa. which leaves you to the situation now.

you’re sitting on the desk and she’s in between your legs, giving you a long kiss. the kiss is possessive and passionate, she grips the sides of your skirt while you wrap your legs around her waist.

you pull away and she looks at you in confusion. “h-harin..?” you ask. “yes, puppy? is there something wrong?” she asks and you shake your head.

“can you stop the games..i-i don’t like seeing our classmates being bullied.” you mumble and she grips your chin harshly, forcing a strained whine to come out of you. she looks into your eyes, a cold gaze makes its way onto her face. “a-ah- harin you’re hurting.” you whisper. “did suji put you up to this shit? Huh? Answer me!” she exclaims and you shake your head. “N-no unnie, I promise.” you say, defending yourself. all of a sudden, you feel a sting creep its way onto your right cheek, you grab your face in pain and tears spill out of your eyes, you came to the conclusion that she smacked some “sense” into you.

“talk about the game again and I’ll kill you. Do you understand me, puppy?” she says sternly, pulling out a cigarette.

“y-yes I understand unnie..” you reply and she starts to wipe your tears. “god y/n, you drive me crazy.” she mumbles, drawing a long puff of her cigarette.

“you’re my pretty puppy, you’re an A rank and you’re my girlfriend. stop worrying about those lower ranks and focus on me. I’ll protect you and keep you safe, ok?” she says and you nod your head. she throws her cigarette somewhere around the room and grabs your face to kiss your lips. you kiss back and she pulls away from you.

“now. can i get back to my lunch, hmm pup?” she asks, lowering herself to your aching core.

from that day forward, needless to say, you never asked her to end the games again. it was some sick and twisted game that you couldn’t escape, however, she kept her promise by protecting you.

[kalinara]

So recent posts have got me thinking about the Throuple, and how I personally feel about it. And I'll be honest. I dislike it and I love it.

I dislike it because, ultimately, there really isn't much there. A couple of suggestive panels, a house schematic, one scene of expressed attraction between the guys, one scene that seems really heavily implied that they'd intended to go to bed together (I'll post that later, it's from early X-Force and it's pretty suggestive, IMO), and a few cameos in pride issues.

If Marvel was advertising this relationship, I'd call it queer-baiting at best.

But I always kind of wonder about the background of things. And I tend to assume that the Throuple was never intended to be a thing by the suits and higher ups. I think maybe a few creative types kept slipping things under the radar.

It does mean, unfortunately, that, in terms of actual story or emotional development, it's lacking. I mean, look, biased Scott fan that I am, I would have REALLY liked to see Logan apologize for basically everything AvX onward before those two characters hopped into bed together. I'd like to see Jean get to have opinions about everything that happened while she was gone (many things that she'd now remember from her younger self's point of view), before that happened too. These are characters with a lot of history.

So in terms of execution, the Throuple is a fizzle. (Hell, even the Jean/Logan side barely got off the ground. Some bits where she kept him alive when he was trying to save Xavier through time - which she'd have done even if he were just a friend. And one sex scene in the hot springs. That really feels like a satisfying culmination of decades of yearning. If I were a Jean/Logan fan, honestly, I'd probably feel cheated.)

But you know, I do love it for other reasons. Because however shitty the execution, the IDEA is firmly planted and that idea isn't going away.

All you have to do is go on reddit or tiktok and see anytime one of those toxic masculinity fanboys starts bitching about how Logan is 100% straight "blah blah woke agenda", and you get at least three people jabbing back "yeah, except on the moon".

And that's the genius of it. Because NO one likes those particular fans. And so even people who are utterly indifferent to the idea of the Throuple. Even folks who dislike the execution are very pleased to troll that hypothetical dude at every chance.

Marvel can say what they want. Brevoort (whether he believes it or is just Marvel's spokesperson) can say what he wants. The fact that the annoying fanboys go "I'm so glad he didn't walk back his denial and cater to the wake agenda" are just admitting that there's something TO deny.

I'll be honest, I suspect the issue is Logan's fanbase. It's the largest by far and Marvel doesn't want to alienate the straight men in the crowd. But the thing is, they're aging out. And younger generations of fans are more openly queer than we are, and definitely more than our parents were. This is going to be a non-issue. Especially when the new generations start running the asylum.

It'll take a long time, of course, and there'll be a lot of bullshit before then. But you can't put the genie back in the bottle. The idea is out there. And like Kitty, Rachel, Betsy, Bobby, Mystique and Destiny, Rictor and Shatterstar, EVENTUALLY we'll get to the point where Marvel admits what we all know. (And we knew for a while. The Throuple didn't come out of nowhere.)

Marvel's most famous and popular X-Men character is queer.

More than half of the Original X-Men, that earliest dream that creators never seem to be able to stop revisiting, are queer*.

The flag ship pairing of the X-Men involves a woman and a man who are queer*.

That's pretty awesome.

(*I know technically we're talking about an MMF throuple and it doesn't rule out Jean being straight, but let's be honest here. Jean's got more than enough suggestive interaction with Storm, Emma, Lorna and Wanda to make a strong enough case for bisexuality in her own right.)

[everythingspokenfor]

Part 4

─ ・┈ ・ ── ・┈ ・ ── ・┈ ・ ─

No conclusion was drawn that day, Bakugou couldn't answer your question, you didn't bother questioning him further, the day continued in silence, he helped you organise things a bit more before leaving in the evening.

You didn't like being alone with your thoughts, especially ones that were regarding your unrequited love for Bakugou. On one hand you wished that he loved you back, that he could see how you were always there for him, on the other hand, your rationalized that he wasn't obligated to love you back, and that you should move on.

Life did continue as usual, your leave from agency was finished and you returned back to work. Mostly you avoided Bakugou, but with your work overlapping it was difficult at times. Unintentionally you ended avoiding your friends too, Kirishima had tried talking to you, he was the only one aware of your feelings, apart from that you hadn't really talked to anyone.

"I thought he'd be angrier than usual."

"Yeah, considering his break up, I thought someone would be fired."

"Still I am not crossing paths with Dynamight."

"What??" You blurted, not really ashamed that you were eavesdropping, the two employees looked at you shocked, before one of them uttered,"We were just discussing Dynamight's break-up."

"Sorry what?? When did that happen?" You questioned suddenly feeling guilty over something that may have been your fault unintentionally.

"Few days ago, I think."

"Okay, thanks. Also don't go around discussing your boss!" You abruptly left the hallway, swiftly moving towards the elevator.

Thousands questions arose in your mind, internally questioning why the break up may have happened.

You slammed the office door open, causing Bakugou to look towards the noise, and let out a breath upon seeing your figure.

"Finally you want to talk.", He crossed his arms and leaned against the table.

"Why did you break up with her?"

"I didn't." He admits, hand running through his hairs. Before you could question him, he spoke again,"She broke up with me."

"Why?"

"Why does it matter?" Bakugou scoffed, sharp eyes glaring at you.

"Because you were in love with her, Asshole, and you don't just let go of things you love." You yelled, hands coming up to rub your forehead, impending headache starting to settle.

"I let you go, tho." He walked over to you, noticing the slight widening of your eyes before you steeled your expression. "That was a mistake. But still I let you slip away."

"Don't speak bullshit, Bakugou." You grit out,"This isn't a fucking joke."

"She broke up with me, said you should date someone that doesn't fucking drain you." He said,"told me that I was happy when you were there." He moved to hold your hands,"I fucked up by not figuring out my feelings, dated someone because they reminded me of you." His voice broke, ruby eyes filled with tears as he lamented.

"Didn't apologise when I was given a chance, I love you, so, so much, and I wish everyday that I figured that out sooner" He whispered, head resting on your shoulder," I don't know if I deserve it, but I need you to give me another chance, let me love you right."

You let out a breath, chest suddenly aching more, the confession you always wanted, now suddenly making you bitter.

"I suffered for months, Suki." You sobbed, hands coming to first against his chest, trying to push him away, but Bakugou held your wrists, pulling you into his arms.

"You don't get to have me, Katsuki." You try to pull away from him, afraid that any second more and you'll start crying.

"Please, let me love you right, swear on my life I won't fuck up." He uttered, desperation evident in his voice, his grip loosened on your wrist, allowing you to make the decision.

Whether to stay or pull away. You chose to stay, collapsing against Bakugou's chest, sobbing in his arms. His arms encircled you, holding you tight, one hand rubbing the back of your head.

"I'll be good, this time I'll be good." He muttered, before pressing his lips against your forehead.

"This doesn't mean all that pain went away, Suki." You mumbled, cheeks smushed against his chest, you looked you at him eyes tired, nose and cheeks red from crying.

"I'll fix it, all of it." He affirmed, nothing was going to get in his way of fixing his mess up, he would prove to be worthy of your love till his last breath.

"Also either you are moving back with me or I am moving in with you." He stated with confidence, ready to settle in with you.

─ ・┈ ・ ── ・┈ ・ ── ・┈ ・ ─

[novella-november]

Is this fanfic friendly? I feel like an outlier.

I guess this is my sign it's time to throw together a FAQ post to link to lol.

Yes, every event for this blog is fanfic friendly :D

Though as I mentioned on my Ominous October post, for events that include multiple short stories, I encourage everyone to flex their creativity and take one of their planned short story fanfics, and at least *attempt* to turn one of them into something entirely original; rebuilding a character and story from the ground up to stand on its own two legs is no easy feat, and that is what makes it so fun!

It really gets your creative gears turning, to make an "au of an existing material" to be something entirely original, and you can be pleasantly surprised about the things you come up with!

As a few people say, its not just a matter of "filing the serial numbers off" -- you have to add in just as much *or more* as what you take out when you are turning a fanfiction into something that is original and completely divorced from its original source material / inspiration, and that is a hard, but very rewarding challenge!

Obviously, this is not a requirement (there's no hard requirements for any of the challenges, other than no cheating, including no using AI),

but if you would like an extra challenge for the short story events and you're planning on doing entirely fan-fiction, I highly recommend trying it out at least once, and seeing where it leads you--

you may find yourself pleasantly surprised by what you find down that rabbit hole!

[dazzle02]

Ya know, I'd be genuinely interested in what the reaction would've been if Buck had got with another male character on the show other than Eddie. Like, one that the fans already loved. Someone like Ravi or Albert. A character who people already love and were wanting more of, but ISN'T Eddie. And like, have pretty much the same exact story of Buck not really understanding why he wants this persons attention, maiming Eddie and all that. All the "controversial" moments still happen. But here, Buck is the older one. In fact, with Albert they've got about the same age gap as Buck and Tommy, only Buck is the older one. Albert was 20 when he first appeared in the show in S3 and Buck would've been 28/29ish. So it would've been a similar age difference. But we would never have them calling Buck a predator or anything. Because they're very aware that they're all adults. But it does make me wonder what the reaction would've been.

Having Buck realise he's bisexual and start dating a guy, and it's not Eddie, but it IS a character they claim to love. And there's no sign of it not lasting. No actual sign of Bvdd!e happening. All signs point towards this relationship lasting a while.

Would they start hating on this character they've always loved beforehand? Because we all know that the main reason so many of them hate Tommy is because they see him as a threat to their ship.

But like, imagine Buck and Albert for some reason started dating (which I could never actually see but I do know some people have shipped this...) and BUCK said the things that made people decide they wanted Tommy to be killed. They'd have a completely different reaction.

This is just something I was thinking about last night while I was trying to go to sleep... 🤣

[butnotbubblegum]

using the tags to vent my current emotional state into the void bc ig story feels like a bad plan for this, read at your own risk.

[strawbrains]

I'm exhausted from opening my huge can of worms regarding my life and traumas in my first appointment with my new therapist today, but I think it went well and she seems really nice and understanding I hope things continue to go well!