#things had the comedic timing to add up all at once

[icharchivist]

The universe is mocking me, I've always loved every members of Fuyu but i felt like the one i related the least to was Tasuku (which is also why i love him so much, it took me a while to get him and I'm even more invested in understanding him), and now the universe is throwing my way some weird specific life experiences that make me stares at the void going "wow just like Tasuku", because I'm having this very healthy way to only process my emotions if i associate them to a3 characters apparently, but now the irony is that i TRULY relate to all of Fuyu now, what a joke.

[jevilowo]

Not sure if ive already done this. But.

Predictions for COMIC 7

CHARLES DARLING WILL BE THE FINAL ENEMY besides Helen. Trust me on this one I swear they wouldn't have brought him in if they didn't have plans. ALSO the mother of the Mann triplets (Bette Mann neé Darling) was RELATED TO HIM HE'S RELEVANT. I'm so convinced he's the one Helen made a deal with and he's going to make a grab for Mann Co.

We'll get to see Bilious Hale in a flashback and find out what happened to him. Bilious Hale, oh guy who punched coal out of mines and sat on John Wilkes Booth while other people shot at him, my beloved. I hope they don't reveal he was a bad father or anything.

A woman is nice to Ms Pauling for once and she gets a smooch. She deserves it. Hopefully it won't be a smooch from Helen (DAMN YOU 4CHAN LEAKS), the old lady's had her hired since Pauling was in her mid teens.

WE GET HORSEMANN LORE! this is just wishful thinking on my part the Horsemann makes me insane. Shout out to Silas Mann fr. If he doesn't show up, I hope they at least acknowledge or reference him. I swear they had plans for him back in 2010. Which they then immediately abandoned in favour of developing Mann vs Machine.

Spydad reveal. Pretty much a given. No need to elaborate. I hope Scout’s mother shows up I love her.

Demo gets something important to do! He's only been there for comedic bits so far really, so I think he deserves some Serious Plot Stuff.

Build up to and cop out on Pyro face reveal. The whole thing of Pyro's character is the mystery, so I think the funniest way to go about a face reveal would be for us to only see the team's reactions and have them all react very differently e.g. Scout vomits, Demo gives them the thumbs up, Spy starts taking horrified notes, Engie looks vaguely lovestruck, Saxton Hale expresses annoyance that they aren't actually *insert obsucure species of something here* like he thought.

CONAGHER LORE!! By which I mean Engie shows up and has a chat with Fred about Radigan and immortality and whatnot. Fred has to have been spared from the bloodshed for a reason, right?

Classic Medic shows up! Or they confirm he is dead. Or they confirm he is Pyro which is a funny theory I read once but sincerely doubt. Maybe they'll pull a Bea and have him have been a girl the whole time.

I have a crackpot theory that Helen/Elizabeth is actually Bette Mann (again, mother of the Mann triplets), and while it's unlikely to be true, it would genuinely be so funny if I'm right so WATCH THIS SPACE. My main reasoning is Helen started her Australium search the year the triplets were born, aka the year Bette DIED, and also Bette is a nickname for Elizabeth. Also also it adds to my theory that she will team up with Charles Darling, who is, as I've already said, related to Bette.

Olivia gets to do something important also. Saying this bc she's mostly been a prop so far. I'm manifesting a sideplot where she summons the Horsemann to beat up Charles Darling for her.

Merasmus returns! Last we saw he was arrested, but Jay Pinkerton really likes his Soldier/Merasmus interactions so chances of him coming back are high.

There will be a joke like "geez it feels like it's been seven years since we beat grey mann" and a panel where everyone just lets that process before going back to plot stuff

Chances are, a new comic after so many years means there will be new writers, and the fandom has changed quite a bit since the last one. There will be SUBLIMINAL SPEEDING BULLET SHIPPING. There will be MORE FOCUS THAN IS REALLY NECESSARY on Scout. SOMEONE WILL THEY/THEM PYRO which sounds great actually you know what I forgot where I was going with this godspeed.

ZHANNASOLDIER WEDDING FINALE!!!

[madlori]

West Wing rewatch

(Yes I posted about this last night and then deleted it - initially i was thinking I might do a episode-by-episode reblog but ain't nobody got time for that)

There's a new book out called "What's Next" about the making of TWW and I thought it was time for a rewatch (it's been awhile - for some time there it was too depressing to watch it). I'm on episode 4, so here are some thoughts.

No other show has ever done "initial character introductions" as well as the pilot episode of this one. There's a lot of characters, and they're all so clear from minute one.

Even in their first episode appearances, it is SO CLEAR that Moira Kelly sticks out like a sore thumb. There's a thing with Sorkin's writing that you can either get it in your mouth, or you can't. She can't. The energy is off. She doesn't match the others' freak. Every time I've rewatched this show, this fact is more and more obvious.

Bingeing also reveals some of Sorkin's writing crutches...like the "characters repeat the same line several times to different characters or even to the same one for comedic effect" thing he does all the time.

I'm not here to suck Sorkin's dick or anything but damn, a lot of this dialogue is amazing.

The dramatic technique in the pilot of everyone talking about the President but nobody seeing him until That Entrance he makes is freaking genius.

God, Sam Seaborn is a douche in these first few episodes. His patronizing, aggressive behavior towards Laurie is really inexcusable - happily a lot of the other characters call him out on this but I always feel like the show's kind of on his side.

Also...Sam. You spent several years with Leo McGarry almost 24/7 on the campaign trail, and somehow were not aware that his daughter is an adult and not a 4th grader? Paging narrative continuity.

John Amos as Admiral Fitzwallace is one of my favorite recurring characters. The scene where Leo's asking him about the optics of hiring Charlie, a young black man, to be the President's personal aide and he just has no time for it. "I have plenty of real battles to fight, Leo. I don't have time for the cosmetic ones." Good advice, that.

This show does not work without John Spencer.

Martin Sheen somehow conveys all at once that this President is both very smart and very naive at the same time, as well as that his personal ethics may not be entirely compatible with his job.

God, every time Mandy shows up it's like a needle-scratch and the entire scene grinds to a halt.

Charlie is a great character but I always suspected that after the pilot, they suddenly realized they had an all-white cast (well, apart from Martin Sheen who is Hispanic but isn't playing one here) and were like...um let's add a character who isn't. Maybe that'll be discussed in this book I'm reading.

[connorsnothereeither]

How do you make Virgils boards, is there a system or do you just like go ham? I find them very neat and am curious

(idk if this has been asked before but if it has i couldn't find it so-)

I don’t think it’s been asked but I would LOVE to ramble about it omg for sure-

It’s sort of a mix of both! I have the advantage of like,,, Virgil canonically thinks the way I think, when it comes to connecting dots, so it’s sort of just a visual representation of my brain and how I picture the lore, lol. In terms of a “process” though:

I tend to start with a list of important plot points, bits of information, and character details Virgil does know. And obviously most of the time, it’s a a bunch of questions that he’s asking, which I’ve woven those into

From there, I make a list of assumptions Virgil makes based off those facts. Sometimes those are correct assumptions that I know are right because they’re planned lore. Sometimes they’re things that I’m spitballing because we haven’t landed on an actual answer, and it’s sort of like,,, testing the waters with an idea I think is fun, but that might not be canon. Sometimes, my favourite, they’re just completely bullshit assumptions that make sense but are so wild and silly, either for the comedic effect or as a red herring.

Once I’ve got all of those, I do just sort of go ham sketching them out! I tend to cluster them based on vibe and theme, so it looks like an evolution of thought. Here is this idea, here is this idea that relates to it, kinda thing. I also try to make sure that there’s a drawing or diagram per cluster of information, to add more visual interest! I tend to shuffle things around once they're drawn out, trying to see what fits best where, the sizing of things, and whats like, an appropriate connection/space for things to go! (for example in the upcoming draft of the board, I had to decide if i put the section on Luxtant near Avianism, near the Avicane, near the Sorcerers, or near Vast and Rune!)

Also before I do the line art, I tend to add the strings on a seperate layer to test the placement! actually connecting things with the red string is less important to me then how it looks visually. I want “main things,” whether it’s drawings or notes, to be visible. Like I try my best to not have string lines being directly over the top of people, or important concepts! You can for example in the current board in Virgil’s office that like,,, the note about Kalia isn’t covered, or the pictures of Vast and Pietro, but things like random questions about Viviana are covered by strings, because they’re less important to notice upon first glance. It’s a lot of finding a way to use the strings to draw the eyes in places I want them to go.

Then the last step of the process is line art and colouring and finalising placement :D

That all makes it sound like it’s a properly like, thought out process but honestly it’s a big mess of back and forth editing and scribbling and deciding last minute to add things to fill up space and just hope things turn out looking okay lol! But I have a lot of fun with it, Virgil and his investigations and investigative process (especially upcoming with things like Void Sickness) are very fun to play out 🫶

[ceruleanwhore]

I know it's been a minute since Hazbin dropped and I'm late to the hate train but I have things I want to say, so I shall.

First off, the whole thing makes absolutely no fucking sense, conceptually. There is really no good way to execute this batshit idea of Lucifer having a daughter and that daughter deciding to start a fucking hotel in Hell to redeem sinners so they can go to Heaven. Also, the culling shit with the angels showing up to just kill already dead souls for no reason also makes no sense and there really isn't any way to make it make sense.

Secondly, when making yet another piece of media inspired by Christian canon, even if it is Christianity and you hate the religion, you absolutely have to know the source material before you go fucking with it. That's why, for example, Dogma is such a good movie but this series falls flat even though both are comedic critiques of Christianity - Dogma understands the subject well enough to criticize it intelligently whereas Hazbin feels like it was conceptualized and made by someone who only watched like two episodes of Veggie Tales and otherwise knows jack shit about the religion. Throwing Lilith in there is worse because she isn't even in Christianity and it has the same vibes as when CCD classes host a Passover Seder by and for a bunch of gentiles to 'teach' about what Jesus was up to when he was around. It's just so disrespectful. Actually, that's what it is - the creators learned everything they know about Christianity, Heaven, and Hell from Tumblr posts which is definitely why she's in there.

If they knew more about the thing they're trying to make a whole ass show about, Adam and Eve wouldn't have been angels, there would be no hotel because you could just have the creation of Purgatory instead or, at the very least, some take on the harrowing of Hell and salvation of the virtuous pagans in Limbo. Also, even if you don't want to touch the Bible because it's icky (and I mean yeah), all you had to do was read like Dante's Inferno and peep the Ars Goetia and then actually make a structured Hell with a hierarchy and everything. I think kinda like what Rachel Smythe did with the worldbuilding in Lore Olympus, they wanted to modernize Hell for some reason, so the turf war/mafia type shit was supposed to replace a stronger hierarchy of Hell with princes and dukes and presidents and such, but I fucking hate it and there's no goddamn structure.

More importantly, the worldbuilding of Hell itself completely misses the fucking point of Hell as a thing. Hell is there both to contain Satan and the fallen angels who joined him in that uprising thing that one time and also to serve as a place where sinners go when they die and are punished for their sins. We never see even once any sort of actual system for sorting all these souls and punishing them for their sins. On the contrary, characters like Angel Dust appear to get to do drugs for the rest of their immortal lives and, since they're dead, it's not like those are going to kill them so it really doesn't read like a punishment. The closest we get to actual punishments are when the sinners/demons have gone and made deals that give other residents of Hell control over them, like how Husk is under Alastor's control and then Alastor apparently also has some kind of deal screwing him over, and Angel's situation with shitty boa dude is pretty similar too. It feels like they did the extermination shit to replace punishment in Hell along with these deals we see here and there, which is utterly fucking ridiculous and makes absolutely no sense.

The other thing I'd add kind of going off that is that Heaven in this series also makes literally no fucking sense. It's actually also the biggest issue I have with Good Omens that it makes NO SENSE for the angels to have no clue what God's plan is or, in this case, how souls even get into Heaven. The whole fucking point is that there's an entire, nicely structured hierarchy for exactly this. Seraphim, cherubim, and thrones are all closest to God, so they can get the info from Them and pass it to the lower ranks. Hell, this could even be how you get problems, like you make it a bit of a gimmick that Heaven runs on a massive game of telephone. It also could've been a way to have some really cool variety in character design, so maybe some of the higher ranking angels look like the weird biblical shit with all the eyes and fire and they get progressively more normal as you go down the hierarchy. Instead, they picked like three recognizable names, made them into pretty people with wings and potentially also stupid Homestuck looking masks, and threw them in our face while just refusing to actually bother with worldbuilding or character design.

That brings me to the third thing which is that, when doing a series like this based on something like Christianity, you really have to sit down and figure out what kind of God your Christian God in your series is going to be, even if They never show up on screen. Is this God distant and neglectful and that's how all this shit is happening? Or do we have the wrathful God of the Israelites who regularly exterminates Hell out of pure sadistic rage? Or do we have a weak God on the verge of death who is barely present out of necessity while the angels take advantage of that absence and run amok? And it's not even just that determining what kind of God is supposed to be the God of this series would inform why stuff happens like it does, it would also help the writers to have a sense of direction and motive for what happens.

The writing in the show is all over the fucking place and figuring out what kind of God this God is meant to be is the very first question they should've asked themselves and it would've prevented most of the problems that currently exist in the show. If we had that, then maybe we wouldn't have weird shit with Lucifer where he very much does not feel like he's the devil at all and also Charlie is supposed to have daddy issues but then he shows up and is just a really adoring and supportive dad so that doesn't make sense. If we had that, then maybe Hell would have a fucking structure because we would actually have the motive behind Hell itself and why it exists. If we had that, then maybe we could get into the nitty gritty of the ethical/theological complexities of Hell and how, no matter how you slice it, it's really God's will at the end of the day so we could get a whole debate over if Lucifer is even evil or if God is just controlling and sadistic and all that. If we had that then maybe we could even have some reveal about how sin isn't even a concrete thing and the true nature of Hell is that it's a place people choose to go when they die because they don't feel worthy of salvation and they feel in their soul that they need to be punished. Anything, really.

Fourth is that it really, really shouldn't be a musical series. The pacing fucking sucks and they overexplain everything and I just feel like if you took all the time spent on shitty musical numbers and instead put it into showing, not telling, and also developing characters and relationships, it could be a lot better. If there was more time for shit, then maybe Charlie could not be a Mary Sue and Vaggie could have a personality and Angel could be an actual fucking character that isn't just an animated twink with trauma who gets off on violating people's boundaries. Also, I just really didn't like most of the songs in the series (outside the series they're fine) and I skipped a lot of those scenes.

Fifth and final is that it really just wasn't funny. A lot of the stuff that was supposed to be funny was just excessive swearing that felt completely unnatural, like that tiktok going around of that girl saying the n word. If you're bothering to do a whole series set in Hell that's ostensibly about Christianity, then why tf aren't you leaning more into biting criticism of Christianity for your humor? If they'd just gone full Dogma with this, it would've been so much better but no.

So yeah, it fucking sucked and so did the character design.

[bursonafied]

Vampire simpbur would be most pathetic loser ever I think maybe

-🍡 anon !! :3

OHH MY GOSH YES!! He would be so pathetic and cold all the time… he would just want you to hold him so he could feel warm… and probably some of your blood too

I love him sm :(

ALSOOOO sorry it’s late! I got busy with classes and other things… I’m working on all requests! I have a doc with all of them on it and I’ll do my best to post one at least once a week. :)

Thank you soso much to my friend honey-with-tea for helping me come up with ideas and inpso for my piece :)

Warnings: blood, biting

Pairing: vamp!wilbur x gn!reader

Pronouns: you/yours

*not proofread*

"Please, y/n…” Wilbur begs, following you around the dim flat like a lost puppy. Ever since he’d revealed to you that he was a vampire, (crazy, right?), he would not stop pestering you. “Just a taste!” He would whine, wanting nothing more than a taste of you. your blood would be like liquid rubies to him. Like a fine wine of the highest cost.

The juxtaposition between his height and his intimidating energy was pretty comedic. Standing at a solid 5’4 seemingly made him even more pathetic. He looked like he should be taller, right?

“No! I don’t know how many times I have to say it. I swear to god, Wilbur. I had a long day at work. Someone’s dog threw up on me after waking up from surgery.” You complain, hurrying to your room to change out of your work clothes, putting on a pair of comfy pajama pants and a t-shirt. You shut the door behind you, and Wilbur just whines behind it. “Seriously?” He groans and you can her him stomp away. You step out of your room, running your fingers through your hair. your room was the only place you could get privacy in your shared place.

Wilbur is immediately beside you again.

“You’re.. pathetic.” You mumble to him. He rolls his eyes yet still follows you. He figured that bothering you would be the only way to get you to say yes. You go to the kitchen to start your dinner, and while Wilbur can eat things other than blood, but nothing could satiate his hunger for it. you start up a pot of water, taking out the pasta and sauce, then grab some frozen meatballs from the freezer. It was a simple meal and you were too tired to make something complicated. As you stir in the pasta, you feel Wilbur creep up behind you, his arms snaking around your waist. You freeze for a moment, but sigh loudly as you feel his breath on the side of your neck. He could practically hear the blood flowing through your veins. You shake your head.

“Wilbur.” You say sternly. “Don’t you dare bite me.” He listens to that much. Instead, he leans close and licks a stripe up your neck, stopping up by your ear. You shiver beneath his touch and turn your head.

“What? I listened.” He speaks in a low, snarky tone. You glance down to his mouth. his fangs. If he wasn’t a vampire that wanted to drain you of your life, maybe you’d be attracted to him. Maybe you already were, and just refused to believe it.

“You’re a pain.” “You love me.” You share a short exchange before it falls silent again. “Whatever.” You add before stirring the pasta, allowing it to boil. You cook the rest of your dinner and happily plate it, eager to dig in. You make a plate for Wilbur, just in case. You hear some light chuckles from Will before he turns to sit at the table.

Now, a few minutes later, you two sit silently at the table. You scroll through social media as you eat. Wilbur sort of pushes the food around on the plate and nibbles on a meatball, but his gaze is mostly on you.

He watches your neck, the way it moves when you swallow. The way your collarbones seemed so prominent and bite-able. He scratches at his hands, his nails scratching harshly along his skin to leave red marks. He was hungry, starving! He could barely contain it! He stares at you for a second before he stands up, the chair he sat in flies back and bangs against the wall.

“I’ll be back!” He shouts, hurrying to the bathroom. You watch him for a moment, then hesitantly turn back to your food. Suddenly, you’re not hungry. You dump the plate as well as Wilbur’s, since you know damn well he wouldn’t eat any of that. Meanwhile, Wilbur stares into the sink as his stomach cramps, he turns on the cold water and runs it over his pale hands, then splashes it over his face. He stands up and stares at himself. His hunger only increased. He would grow weaker if he continued to refuse to eat even mortal food. Would he have to resort to his vampiric tendencies and go out during the night, scouring the streets for any poor soul who happened to be alone and were weak and too nervous to fight back? Or, would you finally give in? It wasn't that hard! Was it? No! Wilbur groans. He shuts off the sink and takes a breath before slapping himself lightly to psych himself out. “Come on Wilbur. Be better, fuckin’ creep.” He mutters to himself before going back out to the living room, where you’re sat on the couch.

“Sorry! Had an emergency!” He smiles at you, but you only blink a few times out of confusion and stand up. “What happened…? You were fine five minutes ago.” “Oh! You know. Drank a lot of water today.” He lies, and you easily catch on. Curse you for paying such close attention to him. “You never drink water, you damn liar.” You cross your arms and shift your weight on your feet. Wilbur gulps, shaking his head. “I felt like it today.” “God you think I’m stupid.” You scoff with a disbelieving laugh. “What?? When did I ever say I thought you’re stupid?” Wilbur shakes his head, eyebrows furrowing with confusion. “You didn’t have to say it!” You retort, “You thinking your lie would work said enough.” You cross your arms over your chest and Wilbur puts his hands up in defense. “Okay, whatever. Sorry.” He mumbles. “It’s always sorry with you. Either sorry or, ‘can I please have some of your blood? Can I please have a taste? Just a bit?” Wilbur seems to shrink into himself and his face flushes, if that was even possible for him. Could vampires blush? “It’s pathetic and embarrassing! I don’t get it. Maybe the fact you—“ You pause and take a long breath.

“Wilbur.” You say after a long silence. There was only one way to get him to stop begging, and that was just to give him what he wanted. He looks up from his shameful slump and looks at you. “…yeah?” His voice is as small as his height. What a loser. “Shut the fuck up, and I’ll let you,, um, I’ll let you.. feed.” Wilbur’s eyes instantly light up. He nods rapidly and does his silly little hand-flaps he does when excited. “Yes! Really?? Oh, thank you!I’ll never ask again!!” He says, absolutely elated that you finally agreed. You take a deep breath and approach him, his eyes glimmering. “Just... don’t make it awkward.” You practically beg, not wanting it to be weird as he quite literally feeds of your blood. What am I saying,,, of course it would be weird! Your roommate would be just drinking your blood. “I’ll do my best,” He chuckles nervously and approaches you. “Are you sure this is okay?” He asks, nervously fidgeting with is hands. You shift your weight awkwardly on your feet before nodding. “As long as you leave me alone when you’re done.” “Of course.”

Another moment of awkward silence… it seemed like there were a lot of those lately.

“I…” he pauses, nervously tapping his fingers against your shirt. “Your wrist.” He says after a moment. “What?” You ask, tilting your head. “It— it’ll hurt less. And um, won’t be as much blood. Like, imagine just getting a blood sample at the doctor.” You could tell Wilbur was growing nervous. He never really expected you to say yes to… this. “Oh, right.” You whisper and nod, holding out your wrist. He grabs your arm and guides you to the couch, sitting you down, “Just incase you get.. dizzy.” He runs his thumb over the blue vein that ran along your arm, displaying the precious liquid he’s craved for so long.

His breathing picks up as he lifts your arm to his mouth. He shudders as he can feel the heat radiating off your body, and his mouth waters. He can’t take it anymore. You notice his grip tighten on your arm. “Go ahead.” You whisper after a second. Wilbur nods and then finds the perfect spot, the pulse of your wrist. He opens his mouth and without warning, sinks his fangs right into your vein. Making sure his teeth went deep enough to draw blood. You gasp at the pain, flinching slightly despite expecting it. Wilbur pulls his mouth away for a second and allows some of the blood to pool before sticking out his tongue and lapping up the blood, humming with contentment as he licks up each and every drop. You see the blood, the way it smears over his tongue and lips as he messily drinks it up. your breathing picks up, uneven. He slows down and looks up so his eyes meet yours. You two hold eye contact, Wilbur’s tongue slips out and slides along your skin, stopping the blood that beads up every time he pulls away. Your hand finds it was to his chin, light cupping it as he holds your forearm. “What’re you-“ he whispers, his face lifting from your arm so it was more level with yours. “I— I just..”you shake your head, not so sure what had taken over you. “Is this going to.. change me? You know… like..” You gesture to the bite marks on his neck that were poorly hidden with makeup, and he tilts his head. “Uh- um-“ he stutters out, shrugging. “I don’t know..” He whispers nervously. “I hope you do.” his voice is quiet. “Because I would love to spend the rest of time with you.”

Your eyes widen and your face seem to burn. The stinging in your wrist fades right before Will glances down at it once more. The blood was pooling, threatening to drip over your wrist and right onto the grey couch. You tilt his head back up to meet your gaze again. “You.. want to stay, with me?” Your voice is a bit shaky, head tilting. “Ye— yeah.” Wilbur’s gaze holds yours, he leans closer. And closer, and closer. “I don’t think I would want to spend my life with anyone else.” He adds. Just another inch, he thinks. You swallow the saliva filling your mouth, feeling slightly sick as the blood still spills from your wrist. You have no words for Will. Nothing to say in response to his sudden confession. Not that you had the chance to, because as soon as you went to speak, his lips collide with yours. You momentarily forget the feeling of blood running down toward your fingers as you feel his cold lips on yours. They’re cold, but soft. Softer than you expected. It’s slow at first but soon he scoots himself further, his lips part and his tongue hungrily presses to your lips. He’s practically begging to let him in. So, you do. You part your lips and are instantly met with the metallic taste of your own blood. Your hand moves from his chin to hold his cheek, your blood spreading across his face, in the shape of your hand. The kisses spread, his lips moving down your neck where he simply kisses your skin, but after a moment, his teeth graze your throat. his breath is hot and wet against your skin. You let out a quiet, choked sound at the feeling. Your stomach twists into knots and you can feel the emotions you’ve packed away rushing through your veins, almost at the same speed as your blood pumping through them.

“Do it,” you whisper, tilting your head back a bit. “Please..” You nearly beg, and he nods, smirking against your skin. It’s another second before you feel his fangs sink into your neck. he makes sure it’s higher up on your carotid artery so it bleeds less, hopeful you would turn, joining him in immortality. His teeth remain in your skin and your hands begin to tremble with the pain that’s followed by pleasure. Your eyes pinch shut tightly, ignoring the pain as best you can. He soon pulls away and sweetly licks away the blood before kissing the area.

You aren’t sure how long it’s been since the first bite, nor what time it was now. But Wilbur was fed and happy, so that’s what really mattered.

He comes back with a towel and glass of water for you, wiping up any of the left over blood that began to dry on your skin. You sip the water and lean back against the couch. As soon as he’s done, Wilbur sets down the towel and curls up next to you, looking up at you with loving eyes. “Thank you.” He whispers, running his fingers over the bite marks on your neck. “Hm?” You hum, looking over to him. “For.. letting me bite you and stuff.” You smile and nods, It wasn’t as big of a deal as you initially thought. “Anything to get you to stop whining.” You tease, and he just grins before rolling his eyes. “Whatever, you seemed to like it.” You couldn’t deny that so you remain silent. Wills arms snake around your waist and he pulls himself close to you. “You excited? Get to deal with me for all of eternity now.” He teases with an obnoxious kiss to the cheek. You nod.

“I can’t wait.”

[harukamitsuki]

Okay... I am currently back on my Voltron bullshit and continuing my rewrite of Voltron. And I'm constantly reminding of HOW MUCH I HATE LANCE.

Don't get me wrong. I am still treating Lance fairly in my fic, making sure he gets screen-time and a proper character acr and stuff.

But by GODS. This man pisses me off so much and that's only made worse by his stans. I was scrolling through Keith's tag here on tumblr. I also have Kl@nce filtered out. I cannot see a single post without at least three pages of scrolling and then it's only ONE POST. AND IT'S STILL KLANCE BECAUSE IT HASN'T BEEN TAGGED CORRECTLY.

Anyway. Onto the actual things I hate about Lance and not just his fandom.

Lance is a fucking asshole. I mean that on the deepest level. Let's go through it chronologically because I cannot rank it from least to most assholery, because some things are on the same level.

1 - Allura wakes up from the cryopod and Lances catches her. She's confused and dazed and the first thing you should do is ask if she's alright. Oh, but Lance is above that. Instead, he flirts with her. Karma given immediately as she calls his ears hideous and puts him in a submission hold, which is why I kept that scene in my fic, but that was still wrong. I know it was played for comedic effect, but that doesn't make it not canon. It's canonically accurate that if you've awoken from a coma, Lance's first instinct is to flirt with you if you're pretty.

2 - Literally throws Hunk into the middle of a battle. I get that Hunk was supposed to leave the Lion anyway, but just shoving him out when there are lasers everywhere and Hunk has no protection? Yeah. So much for 'best friend'. Add on the fact that Lance never really treats Hunk like a friend. At all.

3 - Okay. Season 1 Lance isn't bad outside of those two examples, even if he has his dumb moments, so let's jump to Season 2. Starting shit with Keith for no reason. People can go 'oh, Keith obviously did something to him at the Garrison' but he DIDN'T. The writers themselves confirmed that Keith did nothing to Lance, he just started shit with Keith all the fucking time. Like accussing Keith of wanting Blue and cutting him off when he tried to explain what was actually happening, even though Lance is the one who was outraged initially that Keith had Red. Or how about Lance getting up in Shiro's face and screaming his head off about how Keith would rather kill people than listen to them, as if he knew Keith at all after bullying him the entire time.

4 - Okay. This one pissed me off the most and is the biggest reason I'm making this post. The fact that Lance used Shiro's death/disappearance against Keith. Keith outwardly expresses his lack of desire to become the leader and accidentally let it slip that Shiro wanted him to do it. To which Lance is all 'convenient that you say that when Shiro's gone'. What. What the fuck. Stans really say that Lance is precious but how the hell are you justifying that? A blind man could see how much Keith loves Shiro, and Lance has the fucking gall the say that Keith is USING his death/disappearance for a position he doesn't want? He didn't even apologise for it. He just told Keith to suck it up later on. This is one of the reasons I hated Lance as the Red Paladin, the others being explained in an earlier post of mine.

5 - Oh, yeah. We're not done. Because after Keith, it's Allura. Allur@nce is probably the worst ship that could have happened, apart from Kl@nce. If you wanted a straight ship, how about what was canon for the past Voltron series? Kallura? Anyway. Yeah, Lance treats Allura like a prize instead of a person. He's posessive in a way that he has no right to be because they were not together. He glares at Matt for flirting with Allura, something he only does once. He gets mad at Lotor and tries to stop them from spending time together, EVEN THOUGH LOTOR IS HELPING ALLURA AND BONDING THROUGH ALTEAN THINGS. HELPING HER KEEP IN TOUCH WITH ALTEAN CULTURE. In Season 8, he literally yells that it should be Lance and Allura?? What a fucking weirdo?? You can't claim that you're destined to be with someone without being together. That's not how healthy relationships work. That's how a stalker's mind works. Lance is constantly flirting with Allura throughout all of Voltron and she never once reciprocated until Season 8 where it's so obvious that Lance is just a rebound but the writers wanna make it so that it's 'true love' and they want Lance to be happier than anyone so they just gift her to him like some sort of trophy. Lance didn't care about loving Allura, he cared about winning her. At least Lotor actually cared for and respected her. I still don't like canon Lotor, but that's mostly because the writers didn't want to deal with gray morality. Cowards.

1 - Honestly the worst example of a leader. It's shown from episode one. Now, there is the argument of learning to become one, but Lance just never learns? He's never facing the consequences of his actions and, if he is lectured, he ignores it. Keith actually takes lessons to heart and tries to improve and he does. If Lance became the Black Paladin, the universe would have been doomed because he can't get over himself for a single moment to even bother listening to anyone else's advice.

So. Yeah. Those are the main reasons why Lance is an asshole. Now to make the Lance stans really pissed.

Reasons why Lance would have been a terrible leader and could never have been the Black Paladin.

Remember episode one? Remember how the hydraulic stabiliser was out in the simulator and Lance still tried to push on, even though Pidge and Hunk advised him not to? Totally great leadership qualities there. There's nothing better than a leader that refuses to listen to you. 'Oh, but Keith is stubborn and didn't listen--' yes he did. He's stubborn and unrelenting at first, but he eventually realises that they're right.

Remember episode three? Remember when Lance bragged about kicking, which made Voltron fall, then proceeded to try it again and failed again even when Keith advised him not to? Yeah. Lance does not make good decisions and does not listen to any advise. Even from the leader's right hand man.

Remember Season 1 Episode 12? Remember how they were waiting for Shiro and Allura to get back and then Keith saw someone taking quintessence so he decided to follow them? Remember how Lance said no and was ignored but did nothing more to stop Keith? He has no authority and no charisma to keep anyone at bay. Pidge herself mocks Lance for being the pinnacle for leadership. Sarcastically. Because he's far from it.

Pidge doesn't respect Lance as a leader, Keith never would considering Lance treats him like shit, Allura can't take Lance seriously with him hitting on her every ten seconds, and Hunk is always questioning Lance's decisions. If nobody respects you, you cannot be a good leader.

2 - Easily distracted. Yes, it's a very popular headcanon that Lance has ADHD, and I agree with that, but that doesn't make it okay. And he's distracted in the easiest ways. Just shove a pretty girl and he'll instantly get distracted and lead the entire team to doom. Remember Nyma and how easy it was for her to steal the Blue Lion? How he didn't even warn anyone that he was taking her out for a ride because he didn't want anyone contesting his conquest? Yeah.

Don't get me wrong. It's fine to have ADHD or get distracted easily. Monkey D. Luffy from One Piece is a great example of a leader who gets easily distracted, but the second he sets his mind on something, he blocks everything out. Lance just doesn't have the capability to do that, nor do I think he'd be able to learn how to.

3 - Gets jealous really easily. As in. Really fucking easily. He's jealous of Keith from the get-go, starting a one-sided rivalry that he's constantly on the losing side of because Keith doesn't care. He gets jealous of Matt when he flirts a bit with Allura. He gets extremely jealous of Lotor for having actual chemistry with Allura. He's constantly jealous and a good leader is only ever in competition with himself. A good leader will only strive to become better for the sake of the team, not to say that they're better than someone else, much less if they're someone that you are in charge of. It's a horrible trait to have.

Jealousy in and of itself is not a bad thing. It's when that jealousy overrides your logic and controls you, instead of you controlling your jealousy: which Lance struggles with a lot. And getting jealous over anyone who even looks at your crush is a very bad thing to do because you do not own your crush. It's okay to be jealous, but not posessively like Lance is. Not to the extent of trying to scare off any potential suitors.

4 - Nowhere near as skilled as Keith or Shiro. Sure, the writers may claim that he is better, but the proof is in the pudding. Keith and Shiro are fucking unmatched. I've defended Lance's skills in a previous post, but I also said in that post that, while he is skilled, he is nowhere near Shiro or Keith's level. I mean, Shiro was the golden child of the Garrison and set so many records. He was known as the best pilot. Keith beat those records and his flying capabilities are always, always noted. I haven't heard a single character comment on Lance's skills, other than to point out how bad they are. Keith was the only one who could have flew through the astroid field, he was the only one who could fly into the Marmora base which was in a blue star surrounded by two black holes, he was able to fly a Galra jet just by pushing the right buttons and knowing what the do, and he's the one who unlocks the warping abilities of the Black Lion. Shiro was able to connect with the Black Lion far before anyone else, able to see through Black and connect with Black to the point of his soul being saved by her.

Lance hasn't done anything spectacular. And, no. He was not 'done dirty'. He was given almost everything he wanted except the Black Lion. The writers claim he's the best pilot, but have not shown it at all. In my eyes, Keith and Shiro will always be the best.

5 - Selfish. Again. Nothing against being selfish. It's perfectly fine to be selfish, so long as it doesn't actively harm others. But for a leader? You should be as selfless as you can be. The team comes before you. And that's exactly what Lance isn't.

Lance is selfish and that's okay, but it's not leadership material. The whole reason Black rejected him is because he wanted the position out of selfish reasons. When he enters Black, he says 'Come on, Lance. You can do this'. In other words, he wants to pilot her because he wants to prove himself. He wants the acknowledgement. He wants the title of the Black Paladin and leader. Black accepted Keith, both at the start of Season 2 and Season 3, because he piloted her for purely selfless reasons. For Shiro.

Lance wants things for himself. Keith wanted things for Shiro. It was only after Shiro came back, (or so they thought), that Keith started focusing more on himself. Even then, he put everyone else before him. He distanced himself from the team so that Shiro could pilot Black again, and he was constantly risking his life for the Blades.

Lance just... isn't the type. He has put others before himself, but he expect things out of it. He expects a parade and acknowledgement. Nobody knew what Shiro went through to rid Zarkon of his connection to the Black Lion. Nobody knew what Shiro went through in his imprisonment because he doesn't want to burden anyone with that. Nobody knew what Keith went through to save Black and Shiro from Zarkon. Nobody knew what Keith went through when they were all mad at him for missing an attack. Lance doesn't withold that sort of stuff. The only thing he doesn't talk about is his insecurities, which he ends up spilling to the mice and Laika (the Yupper) anyway.

6 - Last one. Promise.

Nothing fucking happened. While Keith was gone, nothing of importance happened surrounding Voltron specifically. There was the Lion mind meld and Lotor joining, but all that served to prove was, with the mind meld, if Keith was there, he would have heard Shiro. And with Lotor joining, all it proved was how immature Lance was.

The second Keith gets back, things start happening again. Lotor gets outed as cruel and manipulative (still an ass-pull, by the way), Shiro gets outed as a clone, and so on. If Lance was leading, they all probably would have died ages ago. I'm talking Season 3 Episode 2, ages ago. Because Lance just isn't cut out for it.

So. Yeah. Those are the main reasons I hate Lance and why Black Paladin Lance is an awful idea. Screw the people who believe in it. It is awful.

Like I said, this won't affect my treatment of Lance in my rewrite, because I can fix those issues that come up. I don't have an issue with Season 1 Lance, it's later on that gets problematic. I just hate people building Lance up by bashing all the other characters, then claiming that Lance is the most traumatised, sad character when SHIRO AND KEITH ARE RIGHT THERE. NOT TO MENTION ALLURA, WHO LOST HER ENTIRE SPECIES, AND CORAN WHO LOST EVERYONE INCLUDING ALLURA AND NEVER GOT TO SAY GOODBYE TO HER.

Fuck. I hate Voltron so much but I can't help but love it.

[lxmelle]

hi lxmelle!! I have another jp(?) and jjk related question that I'm too shy to ask anyone else again ... do you know why takaken (takaba x kenjaku) is called pinchan? 🤔

and also how are you doing? 😄

also also, I had another question, but I totally forgot what it was. I might come back to ask if that's okay 🥲

again you don't have to answer ! that's all thank you🩷

Edit: this has an update 😊 https://www.tumblr.com/lxmelle/766125746628542464/hi-lxmelle-i-have-another-jp-and-jjk-related

Hi lex!!

Thank you for sending me an ask!

Hehe, I think you’re thoroughly adorable 😆 I’m sorry this took a while - you can ask me anything, anytime! It’s nice to have something to write about on this platform - I probably get a bit too noisy on Twitter/X, so I appreciate the opportunity to do something here as well.

So about Takaba x Kenjaku… From what I understand, TakaKen being “Pinchan” is the equivalent to GojoGeto being “Harattare Honpo” - it’s their manzai name (stage name).

That’s the straightforward & simple answer to the question!

But I think… perhaps some context might be useful? I hope you don’t mind, I’ll just blab a little bit on the arc & manzai in general. If you want to skip it, that’s fine! More under the cut:

I will once again preface with that I’m not Japanese, and haven’t lived there, so my understanding is through research and from being… uh, I guess an otaku / fujoshi / someone who had an interest in Japanese culture once upon a time 😅

So if there are inaccuracies, please feel free to educate me and I hope it’ll also allow others to learn from your knowledge. The bottomline is, even if I dare to write about stuff and talk freely about what I think, I’m in no way trying to claim myself as a subject matter expert. I just like to ramble, and I’m no better than anyone else - these are just my opinions free for anyone to read and you’re all welcome to make up your own mind 😄

With that out of the way...

So I’ll take the opportunity to offer a little bit of what I’ve come to understand… there are comedic duos (combi / コンビ) who do manzai / skits with set roles of the boke and tsukkomi, and also solo comedians (pin-geinin / ピン芸人). Sometimes duos & solos alike will partner up for shows and variety programmes, making it a nice mix of characters and dynamics. Some of these are quite popular internationally.

Kenjaku making it up on the spot on the grand stage in the “finale” of his battle with Takaba is likely a nod / reference to this manzai culture, where the “pin” in “pinchan” is from “pin-geinin” (solo comedic act), which makes it humorously ironic because they’re a “combi” / duo.

To add to the irony, they’re a manzai duo / combi comprised of enemies… They are on opposing sides but get along? It’s funny!

The more I think about it, the more it appears to me that pinchan represents some kind of dark irony.

For example, Kenny appeared to have worked solo (“pin”) for decades doing his brain-hopping thing with his research & awful experiments and Takaba has always wanted a suitable partner to be a “combi” in his manzai career. They stumbled upon their amazing chemistry by accident, that it was fun, and discovered these feelings within the battle - it’s quite bittersweet and sadly ironic to enjoy something together but ultimately have to mean to harm the other until there is just one.

And as light-hearted as comedy is, what they’re doing is also ironic because it’s totally not light-hearted to want to kill the other. So it’s like proclaiming “we are a solo!” They’re a combi/soulmates! …but they have to kill each other.

The “cute” nature of the honorific -chan also makes it more ironic because, in actuality, the skit itself that brought them together is a battle to the death. It’s so dark. There is irony and duality intermingled in the entire scene. It’s a bit sad, too - which I guess is also shown in how there were mixed feelings between the duo with Takaba crying and Kenjaku appearing rather stoic.

Someone joked on X that with chan gone there can only be pin left. And who knows who is meant to be pin or chan, lol. So I guess it’s quite well understood that the term “pinchan” has some reference to a pin-geinin / solo comedic performance.

I hope my thoughts made sense 🤔 it sounded ok (well, better) in my head, so I never really know how it’s received.

Ah and honestly, lately my brain like Swiss cheese, so I forget a lot of stuff… there are times where I can’t remember what I’ve written, or where 😂 please forgive me if I sound like a broken record.

As for how I am, I’m constantly shifting gears in my head at the moment as I juggle this and that. But! I’m doing good, thanks for asking~!! 🫶 How are you doing? And btw, everyone else is welcome to also post a comment 😃 and tell us how you are!

Comments and thoughts welcomed! Repost, comment, do what you like 😄

[losersimonriley]

“Saw a picture of you today on my way to the store.”

Ghost raised his head slightly from his food, just enough to indicate he was listening, yet still low enough that he could hide his mouth in the popped collar of his shirt. “Where?”

“Around town.” Soap waved his hand dismissively. “Took a photo, even.”

Ghost merely huffed and got back to his food.

“Lemme see.” Gaz reached across the table for Soap’s phone. A moment later, he snorted. “Oh, that is one perfect drawing. Taking notes on how to improve, suds?”

Soap gave him a playful shove. “All those hours wasted on learning how to shade,” he whined. “How in the world should I have known that genius lies in simplicity?” He was playing up his desperation for comedic effect.

With a roll of his eyes, Ghost held out his hand and made a little gimme gesture. A moment later, the weight of Soap’s phone was placed into his hand. He looked at the photograph for a moment. Once again, he was glad he wasn”t in the habit of letting other people see his face. The grin that tugged at his mouth was a satisfaction Johnny would never see. 

The picture was of a badly drawn graffiti of a skull. The eyes were mismatched. It was scowling, or at least Ghost assumed so. With a huff, he put down his fork and started to draw on the picture, ignoring Soap’s protests, fighting him off easily with his elbow when he got physical. Only once Ghost was done did Soap get his phone back.

Soap glanced at Ghost’s work and broke out laughing. Ghost had added the soap emoji to the lower left corner and encircled the skull with a heart and a speech bubble. “Och, want me to add that next time I pass by?”

This time, Ghost didn’t mind Soap hearing his smirk in his voice. “Please, as if the whole world didn’t already know.”

“Yeah, then when will you let me take you out?”

“Never, Johnny.” Mostly because Ghost wanted to be the one taking Johnny out. He had almost finished his perfect, foolproof forever plan for the whole thing. Almost. For the past five months.

“Aw, you’re no fun. I’ll make this my profile picture everywhere.”

Ghost snorted. “Yeah, sure.”

[kumeko]

A/N: For the @vashwood-anthology! I wanted to do a bit more of a comedic piece for Vashwood, though Trigun being trigon, angst still found its way in…This story fought me so much along the way, I wasn’t fully settled on how to end it and every time I reread the story I kept adding scenes.

Which is not a good thing with a word count. XD I’m not sure if I’m fully satisfied with it yet, but if I read it again…who knows how much more I’ll add. XD

I'm so glad I got to work with the amazing @wisedo for this piece! Their art is perfect and so comedically on point <3

…

…

…

…

Nicholas had a stalker.

Probably.

Leaning back in his plastic chair, his feet on a tiny fold-out table, Nicholas slurped loudly from his slushie as he studied his surroundings. Fortunately, the food court was packed with people, so no one was paying attention to him—

“Mom! He’s putting his feet on the table!”

“And if you act like that, Santa won’t be giving you any presents.”

—most people weren’t paying attention to him. Awkwardly, Nicholas put his feet down before anyone else wandered by.

For the most part, he was surrounded by strangers. It made sense: he was a traveller who hadn’t been in the city for more than a few days. It’d be odder if he had recognized anyone here. That was how it was in most cities he’d visited—Nicholas made his living as a travelling handy-man, an entertaining busker, an overly relaxed priest. Whatever paid the bills as he spent his days wandering from town to town.

His eyes landed on a familiar, spiky-haired blond.

Familiar. That was the problem here. While the man was scarfing down donuts like he was competing in an eating contest, not paying attention to Nicholas in the least, he was the epitome of suspicious. It was rare enough for Nicholas to meet anyone twice, let alone thrice, and this was the fifth time he’d spotted that particular hedgehog of hair.

Hence, he was ninety-percent certain he was being stalked.

This required investigation. Nicholas smirked as he noisily sucked his straw. With how sloppy the guy was, it would be easy enough to trap him.

“Dad, there’s nothing in his cup anymore!”

“Shh, honey, inflation’s hitting hard these days.”

…maybe he should find a more discrete place to capture the stalker.

-x-

Nicholas tugged his collar, trying to fan in a little air onto his neck.  Most people would question why he’d take up buskering of all things in a suit, and they would be right. It was a stupid idea. He regretted it entirely. Between the heat and how it impaired his movements, it would have been better to wear literally anything else.

Unfortunately, all he owned were suits. At least he didn’t have a single tie, or he’d really be dying.

Flipping a dagger between his fingers, Nicholas put on his widest smile and called out, “I can hit anything!” After a pause, he added. “Great with daggers and funerals!”

It was a terrible sales pitch. He couldn’t really blame people for continuing to stream past him. His last few attempts were equally pitiful and the small white paper cup in front of him was as empty as ever. All it’d take was a little wind and it’d roll down the street, along with his last two quarters.

He’d need a more innovative speech. He’d need—

The blonde stranger was here too. Nicholas narrowed his eyes. Purposely ignoring his gaze, the stranger paced back and forth further down the street as he deftly juggled five balls. Once, Nicholas had done a stint as a circus clown and anything past 4 items was harder than it looked. The dirty hat in front of stranger looked just as empty as Nicholas’ cup.

Nicholas grinned. Maybe he could get two birds with one stone.

Slowly, he sauntered over, each step deliberate and slow. The blonde tensed slightly when Nicholas stopped in front of him, unable to completely mask his reaction.

So he did know Nicholas. Good. He didn’t want to accidentally harass a stranger. Nicholas called out, trying to keep the malice out of his voice, “Looks like you’re having just as hard a time as I am.”

Fortunately, the blonde didn’t pick up on his intentions. He glanced over his shoulder. Realizing no one was behind him, he stared at Nicholas in surprise. “Me?”

“Who else?” Nicholas rolled his eyes. If anything, judging by the bullet holes and dirt riddling the bottom of the stranger’s red jacket, he probably was having a worse time. While Nicholas had been chased out of a town or two, he’d never been in that much danger.

“Oh. Right.” The blonde chuckled and smiled sheepishly. He nodded, still juggling. The five colorful balls flew through the air like parts of a rainbow. “It’s a hard street.”

“It’d be easier if we worked together,” Nicholas suggested.

The blonde’s eyes widened slightly before he took the bait. Excited, he juggled faster. “Yeah! I’ve always wanted to do paired jugg—”

Nicholas smirked wolfishly before shouting, “Anyone want to see me throw a dagger at this guy?”

“—ling  with—Wait, what?” The blonde froze and gaped at Nicholas like a fish out of water. Five balls bounced off his head like bullets. “You’re going to what?”

“It’ll be fine, I’ve done this before,” he assured his new ‘partner’. Already, a crowd had started to gather around them, mostly comprised of blood-thirsty children dragging their parents over. Even better; children were easy enough to entertain.

“It’s a challenge,” Nicholas said louder now, directed at the audience. He ignored the stalker’s pointed glare. ”I’ll put an apple on—what’s your name?”

“Vash,” Vash replied, forcing a smile when everyone stared at him.

“Vash’s head,” Nicholas continued. Now he had a name at least. “And then I’ll toss a dagger at it and try not to hit him.”

“What do you mean try!?” Vash shouted.

“It’s no big deal,” Nicholas whispered as he turned around. Digging in his knapsack, he pulled out an apple and tossed it at Vash. “Just make sure to stay still and it’ll work out.”

“You’ve done this before, right?” Vash asked, staring at the apple doubtfully.

Nicholas shrugged, unconcerned. “Once? I think.”

“Once?” Vash bit out. The audience had surrounded them at this point and there was no easy escape this time. “Wait, maybe we can find something else, less risky, like jugg—”

“People want to see knife-throwing.” Nicholas spun Vash around and shoved him forward. “Now, get a little further or people’ll think I cheated.”

It was like a scene from an old western: two men, twenty paces apart. Vash stood stock still, an apple on his head, his smile nervous as he watched Nicholas. For his part, Nicholas kept a hand on his waist, ready to draw his dagger, his eyes narrowed as he stared at the gleaming red skin of his target. Around them, a circle had formed. People murmured as they made bets on how many holes Vash would end up with.

A kid laughed. As though that was the secret signal he’d been waiting for, Nicholas quickly drew and tossed his dagger. The blade narrowly grazed Vash’s right cheek, cutting a thin red line, and to the man’s credit, he recoiled after that, the apple rolling off his head and landing on the sand with a soft thud as he clutched his cheek.

That was an act.

Nicholas had done enough scams to know when he was being played. There were many issues with Vash’s terrible acting, the biggest of which was the fact that he’d hadn’t flinched until after the dagger had missed him. Most people would have instinctively tried to dodge as soon as Nicholas had thrown the weapon.

Vash had known it wouldn’t hit him.

“That stings!” Vash yelped, gingerly petting the wound with the pads of his fingers. As he picked up the apple, he gazed teary-eyed at Nicholas. “You hit me!”

“Barely,” he replied, already twirling another dagger between his fingers as he waited for Vash to put the apple back in place. “It makes it more thrilling. The crowd gets a show.” He flicked another knife, this time grazing his ear. “So, why’re you following me?”

“I’m not!” Vash yelped as he dodged dagger number three. He jabbed at the apple that was miraculously still on his head. The crowd jeered, some of them yelling at him to just stay still and get hit. “The apple! Aim for the apple!”

“I am,” Nicholas lied, pulling out dagger number four. “And don’t lie—I’ve seen you before.”

“Really, you remember me?” Vash grinned stupidly before realizing what he’d just admitted. “Wait, I mean, I’ve seen one of your shows!  I’m a fan!”

Nicholas scoffed, his eyes narrowing as he carefully held his blade between two fingers, his hand rocking back and forth as he aimed. If it had just been one show, he wouldn’t have recognized Vash at all. “Is that all?”

“It is!”  Vash was a terrible liar. His eyes gave everything away.

Deliberately, Nicholas lowered his aim, the blade pointing at Vash’s crotch now. The crowd gasped expectantly. “You sure?”

Vash crouched and crossed his hands in front of his pants, tears forming in his eyes as he shouted, “I thought you were also going to the Octovern Busker Festival!”

Despite his fear, his voice had held steady. While it wasn’t the whole truth, it wasn’t a lie either. Nicholas sighed, relenting, and flicked his knife, sinking the blade into the apple.

-x-

The crowd had all dispersed, leaving behind a tin filled with stray coins, a nail, and two coupons. Nicholas grimaced as he shook the can. Nothing else fell out. Cheapskates. He glanced up at the very worn Vash. “So you’re lost.”

“Yes…” Vash rubbed his neck with a sheepish smile. He pulled out a crinkled poster from his pocket and handed it to Nicholas. “I’m not very good with directions.”

He sounded oddly proud of it. Nicholas rolled his eyes as he scanned the paper. He’d heard of the festival before. “And you didn’t think to ask anyone else?”

“Well…it’s embarrassing,” Vash admitted. So he knew that much at least. “I thought you’d also be going there…since, you busker.”

“And you couldn’t just ask instead of stalk?” Nicholas held out the handful of coins they’d earned. The people in this city were stingier than any other he’d been in. “I don’t even do that often—this barely paid for the apple.”

Vash gazed at the money, puzzled. “But it’s not about the money.”

Nicholas’s jaw dropped. “The hell it’s not about the money, money is—”

A kid ran between them, bumping into Nicholas. Nicholas caught a glimpse of the ragmuffin with her short, messy hair and dirt on her face as she mumbled an apology.

“Kids these days—” His hand felt light. Nicholas stared at his now-empty palm. His other hand instinctively patted his also now-empty pocket. Immediately, he jumped to his feet and swore. “Fuck.”

Slow to catch on, Vash stared at the girl as she turned a corner into an alley. “Huh?”

“She mugged me.” Nicholas sprinted forward. A suit was the worst thing to run in and not for the first time, he regretted his life choices. “GET BACK HERE!”

“But she’s so young!” Vash shouted as he chased after.

“It’s easier to slip unnoticed.” Nicholas barreled down the alley, catching a glimpse of the girl’s dirty shirt before she turned a corner. His armpits were damp, his pants complaining with each step, and he didn’t know if he could go any faster.

While he’d visited December once before, he’d never taken the side alleys before. It was like a maze of corridors back here, the streets getting narrower and grimier as the girl eluded his grasp. From the corner of his eye, he spotted several children poking their heads out of nooks and crannies, a hungry look in their faces that he had known himself long ago.

One kid stepped out of the shadows and threw a rock at him. “Leave her alone!”

Nicholas dodged. “She’s with you?”

“I think I’m even more lost,” Vash panted, almost running into the kid as he caught up. The startled kid yelped, stumbling over his feet. Vash grabbed his shoulders, steadying him. “Woah, careful there!”

“Let go of me!” The boy shouted, terrified. When Vash’s grip proved too strong to escape, he screamed, “HELP!”

The girl had almost vanished down a side street but pivoted at the sound. Fear in her eyes, she ran back. “Darian! Don’t hurt him!”

Perfect. Nicholas snatched her as she bolted past him, wrapping an arm around her waist and hoisting her up before she could escape. “Gotcha.”

She squirmed, her flailing limbs hitting his chin and sides. “Hey! Let go of me”!

“Just gimme a moment.” Nicholas wiped the sweat from his forehead and rubbed his jaw. With some training, she’d have a killer punch. The girl was like a wildcat, and he almost dropped her reflexively as she struggled in his grip. Meanwhile her accomplice had frozen stiff in front of Vash, too scared to even make a peep.

“You okay?” Vash asked, crouching in front of the kid and peering up with concern. “Did you get hurt?”

“Leave him alone!” the girl shouted again, her struggles increasing.

Two street urchins. Orphaned siblings, most likely. Nicholas had been there before, had seen it before. “Don’t bit me, kid,” he warned as he released her before she could throw another stray punch.

Scrambling to her feet, the girl ran to her brother and yanked him away from Vash. It was like looking at a cornered cat. His wallet was still tight in her grip.

Nicholas sighed. “Just try not to get caught next time.” Vash and the kids stared at him. Rolling his shoulders to get the crick out of them, he added, “The next guy won’t be as soft as me.”

“Nicholas…” Starry-eyed, Vash covered his mouth.

“I’m not giving this back,” the girl hissed.

“Don’t,” Nicholas agreed. “You need it more.”

The siblings looked at each other, communicating silently, before giving him one last suspicious squint. Then they bolted, shoving past Vash and disappearing into the slums. Nicholas watched them before feeling a shiver run up his back. Turning around, he found Vash still giving him that awestruck stare.

“You’re a lot kinder than you act.” Vash smiled.

It was a nice smile. Nicholas shrugged. “I’ve been there before.”

“Oh.” For some unfathomable reason, Vash’s smile flickered, misery clouding his eyes.

He didn’t know why, but he didn’t like it. “I’m better now,” Nicholas clarified. “And they can eat for a few days with what I had if they’re careful.” He turned his empty pockets inside out. “More than I can say for me. I need a drink.”

-x-

A drink did not solve his problems. In fact, they just made them worse—even if he hadn’t lost his wallet, the tab he’d opened was bigger than the amount he’d lost. For a twig of a man, Vash drank like a bottomless pit. No one would call Nicholas a lightweight, but even he was starting to feel it.

Maybe they could wash dishes here for the next three months to pay it off. There’s no way Vash was carrying enough to cover both of them.

Nicholas ran his finger over the rim of his mug. He shot Vash a disbelieving look. “How did you get nearly get mugged three times on the way here.”

“Oh, I…” Vash chuckled as he took a sip, his ears turning a fetching shade of red. “It’s a gift.”

“A curse,” Nicholas corrected. He elbowed Vash. First there was the little old lady crossing the street, then there was the kid with a cat stuck in a tree—Nicholas was certain that if they ran across a mother with a stroller, the baby would try to rob Vash next. “And that wasn’t a compliment. Do you really have to help everyone you meet?”

“Whyyyy not?” Vash slurred, putting down his now empty glass.

“Another one!” Nicholas ordered loudly, as though they weren’t at the bar with the bartender right across from them.

As though the bartender hadn’t been shooting them increasingly irate glares as the night wore on. “I should just cut you off,” she said.

Probably, but it was a matter of pride that Nicholas didn’t finish before Vash. “Another one!” he repeated, louder.

“Me too,” Vash cheered. He seemed drunk, but it was an act. It had to be. His hands were too steady to be anything but sober.

Disgruntled, the bartender reluctantly grabbed two more glasses. “Fine, but last one. Then you’re out.”

It reminded Nicholas of a song. “You don’t have to go home—”

“—but you can’t stay here,” Vash finished.

They stared at each other before bursting into laughter. Nicholas wiped the tears from his eyes. “You’re not half bad, for a stalker.”

“You’re amazing.” Vash clinked his glass against Nicholas’s.

Maybe he hadn’t been joking when he’d said he was a fan. And he certainly wasn’t dangerous in the least—no one could get attacked that many times without losing their temper, yet Vash had shrugged off everything that had happened him the past few hours. Whatever Vash was hiding, it couldn’t be anything bad.

“You’re exaggerating,” Nicholas muttered, downing his drink.

‘I’m not,” Vash replied quietly, oddly somber, oddly serious.

Before he could ask, the bartender slid a check between them. She tapped on the bill with a chewed-up fingernail. “Let’s settle up.”

Nicholas stared at the big red numbers. That felt like one too many 0s. Could he argue that? He had to argue that.

Before he could say anything, Vash reached for the bill, a smile on his face. “I’ve got this.”

It was like watching a trainwreck in slow motion. Vash’s hand reached into his pockets, his fingers fumbling in the space. He paled as he checked his other pocket, then his shoes, then the small sack by his feet. “It’s gone.”

Nicholas had a sinking feeling that the little boy from earlier hadn’t been as shell-shocked as he had acted. “What is?”

“My wallet…” Vash laughed awkwardly. “You think those kids took it? Guess they picked a better target, just like you asked.”

The bartender leaned forward, a dark glint in her eyes. Despite her short stature, her muscular arms screamed danger. “So you can’t pay?”

-x-

Nicholas had been poor before, had been penniless for years, but somehow he’d never felt as broke as he did right now, sitting on a bench in the middle of a park. The bartender had practically turned them into indentured labour for the next few weeks. His hotel had kicked him out. All he had was his knapsack now.

“It’ll be warm tonight,” Vash hummed, rocking back and forth as he leaned back and stared up at the stars. “Clear skies too.”

“That doesn’t make it better.” Nicholas watched him from the corner of his eye. All he had was a knapsack and this stranger who refused to leave. His head was killing him. The hangover was going to be even worse tomorrow. And he didn’t want to imagine how sore his body would be come morning.

He hated sleeping on benches.

 “Better than a rainy, cold night,” Vash pointed out, sounding like he was speaking from experience.

He was right, though Nicholas didn’t want to admit it. “Marginally.”

Vash chuckled, shoulder bumping him. “You just want to complain.”

He was right about that too. Nicholas side-eyed him; in the short time he’d known Vash, he hadn’t seen a more cheerful man. “You’re too up-beat about this. You’re drunk.”

“Am not,” Vash retorted, kicking his feet. “And there’s nothing wrong with being happy.”

Nicholas should be angrier about this. He’d drank more than he realized too. “Sounds drunk to me.”

Vash shrugged, looking up at the night sky once more. “The stars are nice tonight.”

Nicholas peeked up. With the clouds hiding the moon, it was easier to see the billions of lights twinkling in the dark sky. “I guess.”

They sat there quietly before Vash muttered, “Sorry.”

That caught him off guard. Nicholas cocked his head. “Huh?”

“I…I messed things up.” Vash mumbled, slumping forward on his bag-turned-pillow. His expression was serious. “You should be sleeping in the hotel.”

“You are drunk.” When Vash didn’t say anything, Nicholas bit his cheek. Perhaps Vash had been too happy earlier, but now that he was somber, it bothered Nicholas more than he cared to admit. “It’s fine. It’s not like you’re the only one who was mugged.”

“But—”

“Seriously, it’s fine.” Nicholas propped his chin on his hand, studying Vash’s profile. Nothing about him felt like any of the other travellers Nicholas had met. “I’ve been in worse messes; it comes with the territory. Is this your first time?”

There was a long pause and Vash nodded. “Yeah, I haven’t travelled this far alone before.”

That didn’t surprise him. “Any special reason?”

A longer pause. “…I’m paying back a debt.”

“Debt?” Scrounging up spare change was perhaps the worst way to pay back anything. “And you’re doing this?”

The longest pause yet. Just when Nicholas was about to ask him again, Vash snored.

-x-

Nicholas had a head-splitting headache. His heart was beating a mile a minute and there was a strange queasy feeling in his stomach. Even his stiff back and sore neck couldn’t make his hangover go away and he’d run out of cigarettes. Nicholas rolled his shoulders, trying to get the crick out as he roamed the city.

He needed money.

Actually…Nicholas glanced at the blonde man walking beside him, looking as scruffy as he felt. The day-old stubble gave him a roguish appearance and he didn’t want to know how they both smelled.

They needed money.

Nicholas stuffed a hand in his pocket and his fingers grazed a crumpled piece of paper. Pulling it out, he unfurled it to reveal the poster Vash had given him earlier. Buskerfest. There was no better way to make money. And with a month left to go, there was plenty of time to find a way to get there.

Tapping on the paper, he turned to Vash. “Were you serious about this?”

“Uhh….” Vash stared at the paper owlishly before registering the question. “Yes?”

 “Why are you saying it like a question?” Nicholas shot him a pointed look.

Vash rubbed the back of his neck and smiled sheepishly. “I mean, yes.”

It still sounded like a lie but he’d take it.  “Fine,” he said. “Let’s do it.”

Vash lit up, his smile reaching his eyes. He leaned forward, clasping Nicholas’s hands tightly. “Really?”

Vash was far more excited than Nicholas had expected. He winced as his head throbbed, the lingering headache reminding him of just how much of a mess they got into last night. If he never drank again, it would be too soon. “Don’t think we have much of a choice here or we’re going to owe that bar for the rest of our lives.”

-x-

When they’d agreed to work for the bartender’s sister’s niece’s dog’s father-in-law’s burger joint as waiters, Nicholas knew what to expect. Hectic rush hours, annoying guests, a manager who was perhaps expecting them to dine and dash again.

His main worry now, however, was that they might end up owing more.

Or rather, that Vash would make them owe more.

“Do you really have to carry the plates like that?” Nicholas asked, a headache forming at the memory of the past few hours. It hadn’t been his first time as a waiter; he’d done more than his fair share to earn train tickets and their ilk.

However, it had been his first time seeing someone carry six plates and two cups. Vash only had two arms (Nicholas had checked. Twice) and yet he had insisted on carrying everything in one go. Precariously stacking the dishes in ways that resembled a wobbly tower, Vash had dashed from table to table, narrowly missing dropping a meal each time.

Maybe it had been a ploy to stay in this town for the rest of their lives. After all, they couldn’t leave if their debt eclipsed the moon.

“It’s quicker that way,” Vash replied as he eyed the empty pizza boxes around them with pursed lips. “Did you order pizza again?”

“There’s nothing else cheap to eat.” Nicholas shrugged as he plopped onto the singular clear spot on the couch. Between the odd jobs and the buskering, they’d managed to book a motel for the week. Shabby as it might be, it still had four walls and a roof and that was more than they could hope (afford) at the moment.

He gave a side-long glance at his partner. Despite his complaints, Vash hadn’t dropped anything. “I’m amazed you didn’t break anything.” Maybe they could sell it as a miracle and rack up the big donation bucks instead.

Vash grinned as he set down the empty pizza box. “It’s a gift!”

“Again, not a compliment.” Nicholas rubbed his forehead. The more time he spent worry about this, the less time he had to work on his own tasks. And in case Vash lost his ‘gift’, he’d need the money to repay every dish. “Whatever. You still got your money?”

“Yep!” Vash patted his pocket, checking it once more. “I can’t believe that old man’s cat actually tried to fish it out of my pocket.”

“I think I’ve seen a whole new world to scamming because of you.” And it was true, each hour they encountered a new trick. It was impressive, if tragic. Vash was like a magnet for trouble.

“Sorry.” Vash sat down beside Nicholas, slumping against the side of the couch as he sighed. “I’m just giving you more trouble.”

“You are,” Nicholas agreed whole-heartedly. “Work on it.”

Another sigh. Vash slumped even more. “Sorry.” Before Nicholas could say anything, he sprang up once more, like a dandelion after being stepped on. “I’ll do better tomorrow.”

“You really don’t let anything get you down, do you?” Nicholas shook his head, smiling wryly. “I don’t know if I should be impressed or annoyed.”

Vash stared at him with a growing grin. “You’re impressed?”

Annoyed. Annoyed was clearly the right answer. “You really only hear what you want to.”

-x-

Nicholas sighed as he lit the last of his cigarettes. Hopefully he’d be able to get some after today’s work. “C’mon, we’re going to be late.”

Vash buttoned up his jacket as he trailed after him. “You should get breakfast.”

Nicholas gestured at the stacks of pizza boxes in the room—the joint next door wasn’t just cheap, it stayed open late, and he’d never realized how hard it was to find a place like that before now. “There’s cold pizza if you’re hungry.”

“We had that yesterday.” Vash gave him a pitying look. “And the day before that. And the day before that.”

Nicholas bristled. “Hey, don’t make me out to be some sort of pizza addict.”

“You deserve so much better.” Vash sighed. Immediately, without even a second of hesitation, he whipped a donut out. “Here, have a donut!”

Nicholas had seen through plenty of magic tricks during his travels, but he had no idea where the sugary confection came from. A pocket? His sleeves? Another dimension? He stared at it, then at Vash. “How’s that better than pizza?”

Immediately, he regretted the question. Glowing, Vash grasped his chest with his free hand. “Taste. Size. Perception.”

And then he waxed poetic about the donuts until their shift at the restaurant that night.

-x-

They’d been living together for over a week, in debt for slightly longer, and Nicholas didn’t even want to guess how long he’d been stalked. Yet, despite it all, he could count on one hand just how much he knew about his chaotic roommate. It wasn’t like him, to not ask a question for this long.

It was strange.

And dangerous. As they chewed donuts (Vash had taken to alternating their meals between pizza and donuts, despite Nicholas’s protests) on the ratty couch, Nicholas said, “You suck at buskering.”

“Ouch.” Vash glared at him. “I’m not that bad.”

“You can’t survive on the streets. You are lucky the customers like you at the restaurant,” Nicholas continued, as though he didn’t hear him. He licked the jelly on his thumb as he studied the blonde man. “So, why are you doing this?”

“That…” For the first time since he’d known him, Vash looked uncomfortable at the question. He nibbled his donut, as though he’d find an answer in the powdered treat. After a few minutes, when it was clear that Nicholas wouldn’t let it go, he mumbled, “Well, I…”

Nicholas craned his neck, unable to catch his mumbled words. “You what?”

“I had…a job.” Vash stared at his donut, refusing to meet Nicholas’s eyes. “I fucked up.”

Ah, a firing. He’d met more than one vagabond with the same story. It wasn’t a surprise it was hard for the blonde to talk about it. Nicholas shrugged. “I’m not surprised.”

“I fucked up, badly,” Vash repeated, his hands trembling. “I keep trying to fix it and I can’t.”

Keep. Present tense. Perhaps less a firing and more a suspension? Yet again, it was unsettling to see Vash like this, looking small, looking pathetic. “But you’ll keep trying.”

“I have to,” Vash whispered, turning to stare him in the eye. “I have to.”

The intensity of his gaze took Nicholas’s breath away, though he couldn’t understand it. He cleared his throat, forcing himself to look away. “You’ll do better tomorrow,” he said, echoing Vash’s words from days prior.

Vash froze before breaking into a big smile. “Exactly. What about you?”

“Nothing that…dramatic,” Nicholas said with a shrug. “After I left the orphanage, I didn’t have anything I really wanted to do or anything tethering me anywhere so…why not? Travelling’s interesting.” He looked up to find Vash staring at him with watery eyes. Nicholas scowled. “Don’t give me that look, I’m fine.”

“But—”

Nicholas flicked his forehead. “I get to see new things and meet new people. There’s nothing to complain about."

“Still…it sounds lonely.” Vash dropped his donut and leaned forward on the couch. His sticky hand covered Nicholas’s. “What about friends?”

He was too close. Nicholas pulled back but Vash’s hand held firm, keeping him anchored there. “I’ve got a few in each town.”

Vash pressed, “Anyone you’re close to? Anyone you miss?”

 “Not really.” Nicholas looked away. “It’s enough to visit every now and then.”

There was a pregnant pause.

“Like I said, I’m fine.”

Vash bit his lip thoughtfully before reaching up and patting Nicholas’s head. “You had it tough.”

It was oddly comforting. He wanted none of it. Nicholas swatted Vash away and pulled back. “That’s why I don’t get pickpocketed like you.”

“Hey!”

-x-

There were few ways to get to Octervan, and all of them involved passage on a ship. And boarding a ship required money; tickets were expensive even for the lowest class.

They needed two tickets.

It took a lot of scrimping, but Nicholas smirked as they stood in line to board the ship. “That was close; almost thought we wouldn’t make it.”

“I knew we would,” Vash replied with completely unfounded confidence, his hands on his hip as he craned his neck to stare up at the towering ship.

“We just need to be back in a week.” Nicholas glanced over his shoulder, half-fearful that the bar had sent goons after them. Technically speaking, they weren’t supposed to leave the city, but Nicholas had never been one to let technicalities stop him. “Or else we just never come back here.”

“That might be easier,” Vash admitted.

“It’d be far easier,” Nicholas agreed. “Should we?”

They turned, staring at each other, before bursting into laughter. Vash wiped the tears from his eyes as they joined the boarding cue. “You really think she’d let us go like that?”

“I think she has military connections.” Nicholas shivered, remembering the glint in the bartender’s eyes, the absolute certainty she had that they’d be paying. “Don’t even want to imagine who she’d send after us.”

“You don’t think she’d send someone now?” Vash whispered, squinting suspiciously at everyone passing by.

“No? I hope not. You can’t get money off a dead guy.” Nicholas nudged Vash as they reached the front of the line. He pulled out his id. “Get the tickets ready.”

“What if she makes us close to dead?” Vash reached into his pockets.

“We still won’t be able to pay.” Nicholas smiled winningly at the woman holding a clipboard in front of them. She flushed as she took his id.

“And the tickets?” she asked, handing it back.

“Vash—” Nicholas cut himself off.

Panicked, Vash patted all of his pockets—once, twice, thrice. He took off a boot, turning it upside down and shaking it. A feather fell out. Quickly, he took off his pack and knelt, opening every zipper and searching. “Just…It’s here, just a second. I know it’s here.”

Had he been pickpocketed? Again? Nicholas had a sinking feeling that the answer to that was a resounding yes.

“Are you serious?” he groaned.

“I’ll find it,” Vash replied desperately, emptying out his bag.

Behind them, the line murmured impatiently. The crew member attending them frowned, suspicious. There wasn’t much time to salvage this, if he even could. Forcing his nicest smile, Nicholas leaned forward and purred, “I don’t suppose you’re hiring?”

-x-

Nicholas had always had terrible luck, but he’d more than learned how to compensate for that with charm. While the woman hadn’t looked amused, he and Vash had gotten hired and that more than counted as a win in his books.

The work they had to do…not so much. Nicholas grunted as he lifted yet another heavy crate—whatever the first class passengers were packing, they definitely didn’t need. Instead of crew, the ship needed a herd of elephants to move all of this.

“You’ve got this,” Vash encouraged, swaying back and forth as he carried his crate. Despite his big show of effort, he wasn’t breathless in the least.

It was like drinking all over again. The bastard kept restraining himself. There were few things that Nicholas hated more than being pitied. Unfortunately, he was too tired to bring it up.

“This is your fault,” Nicholas jabbed, supressing a groan as he forced his feet to waddle forward a few more steps. He’d always considering himself strong until now. Yet, the other crewmates didn’t look half as tired as he did—was he getting sick? He couldn’t be the only one struggling here.

“See you at dinner?” a woman asked as she passed by with an empty trolley.

“Of course he will be!” a man said, clapping Vash on the back. “He promised me a drink.”

“I said I’m broke,” Vash whined.  “Why do you think I’m here in the first place?”

“What’s a little more debt?” the man smirked.

Despite Vash’s pout, he happily agreed when they told him to meet them in the mess in two hours. The pair gave Nicholas a short nod before ambling on. While Nicholas knew how to play up a crowd, Vash took it to a whole new level.

“When did you get so chummy?”  he asked.

“Huh?” Vash cocked his head, like a dog trying to find a scent, before giving up and shrugging. “I dunno, but you should join us.”

“I have to. Can’t let you get us into even more debt.” Nicholas shifted the crate in his hands, his arms burning from the strain.

“I don’t eat that much,” Vash protested.

“We have two very different concepts of much,” Nicholas grunted. Two more people waved to Vash as they walked by. It was just like when they were waiters all over again. “You’re good at making friends.”

“It’s not that hard.” Vash grinned, his ears red. “If you know how to smile.”

“…are you trying to pick a fight?” Nicholas glared at him. Or at the crate, to be precise—these things were way too big. While his hands were by no means delicate and soft, his roughened skin rubbed against the coarse wood.

There was a pregnant pause before Vash jested, “So you don’t know how to smile?”

“Just wait till we put these down,” he growled.

Vash chuckled and picked up the pace. So he had been faking his exhaustion, the bastard. Nicholas clicked his teeth as he glared. What else had he been hiding? And how long would it take to find out? Maybe Nicholas was more tired than he’d realized, because for some reason, he was thinking of the future. Beyond all of this. Despite all of the hard work, despite the pickpocketing and the endless money loss, this hadn’t been his worst trip.

It had been kinda fun, even.

Maybe, even after the trip, after the debt, they could keep travelling together. Like this. Chaotic and exhausting yet extremely—

Nicholas lightly bumped his head against the crate. What was he thinking?

-x-

Why had he been thinking of the future? The present was what mattered and in the present, his bad luck reared again. Half-way through the journey their ship had come under the attack of pirates. Ducking behind several crates in the hold with Vash, Nicholas groaned. “Seriously?”

Vash peeked up. A bullet whizzed by and he immediately flatted himself back down again as wisps of blonde hair fell. “I thought pirates were extinct?”

“Tell that to them.” Nicholas pressed a hand to his forehead. It might have been better if he’d just had a gun or a weapon to defend himself with. Instead, all he could do was cower and hope that they’d make it out of here in one piece.

“Think it’d work?” Vash rubbed his chin, seriously considering the suggestion.

“No!” Nicholas hissed. He scanned their surroundings. There was a door just ahead of them, leading up to the crew’s quarters. With all of the loot scattered about, the pirates wouldn’t bother following them there.

The only problem was that there was no cover between here and the door.

Following his gaze, Vash caught on. “On the count of three?”

Bullets flew overhead as some of the more…zealous crew members fought with the pirates. No one was paying them enough to protect the cargo. Nicholas shook his head. “We won’t make it.”

“Trust me.” Vash grinned, giving an encouraging thumbs up.

Nicholas gave him a flat stare. “You lost our tickets. And your wallet. And—”

“That was that, this is this,” Vash said sagely. It was the least reassuring thing Nicholas had ever heard.

He ran a hand through his hair, his nails scraping his scalp. It wasn’t like they had any other choice. With a groan, he agreed. “On three.”

“One.”

Nicholas shifted into a crouch, ready to spring forward.

“Two.”

Vash shuffled a little closer and adjusted his glasses.

“Three.”

Bullets rained down as they ran forward. Had someone noticed them? He wasn’t sure, the shots seemed to come from everywhere. Luckily, nothing hit them as they hurled themselves at the door. Vash reached first, yanking the metal door open like it was made of paper.

“Hurry!”

“What do you think I’m doing?” Nicholas shouted. From the corner of his eye, he spotted a pirate pop out from behind a crate, his gun aimed at Vash. He’d never considered himself a hero, but his legs moved before he could think and he shoved Vash through the door as a bullet tore through his chest.

Vash slammed onto the metal floor with a hard thud. Immediately, he pushed himself up. “Nicholas!”

“Fuck.” Dazed, Nicholas touched his chest. His fingers came away, blood red.

He was bleeding.

“Shit!” Vash stumbled as he turned around, dragging Nicholas though the door. His hands fumbled with buttons on Nicholas’s jacket.

“This isn’t good,” Nicholas groaned. His chest burned. Black encroached his sight. Was he dying? It felt like he was dying.

“No, no, no, this isn’t supposed to happen,” Vash mumbled, distraught. “I’m supposed to protect you. You’re not supposed to die, not like this. Shit, why’d you do that?”

“I don’t know,” Nicholas muttered honestly. “I didn’t want you to get hurt. We…we still have…” He grunted as blinding pain tore through him. “We…”

Vash’s face twisted. “You can’t die.” He tossed off his glasses and slicked back his hair. His skin started to glow.

Maybe he really was dying, because Nicholas could swear he saw white wings sprout from Vash’s back.

“You won’t die.”

-x-

“Keep your human safe.”

This was the first and only rule a guardian angel had. Keep your human safe. Happy, if possible. But safe, above else.

It was something that Vash repeated to himself as he sat cross-legged in front of a pool of water, focusing intently on the still surface. Images flickered across it, scenes depicting a six-year-old boy meeting with his friends, playing pranks on his sister, getting scolded by his parents.

Nicholas Wolfwood was a mischievous boy, but a well-meaning one. Vash had heard about his type before. With age, he’d soften his tricks, maybe even become a charismatic leader. Probably. There was the possibility of Nicholas going down the wrong path entirely and becoming a roguish villain, but Vash refused to let that happen.

The scene in the water changed yet again, showing Nicholas leaning against a window, his hands gripping the windowsill as he searched through the night sky. Disappointed, he sighed. “I wish it’d snow.”

It was a small, simple desire. Vash could grant it in a heartbeat without impacting the greater scope of things. Perhaps Nicholas would look back at this moment as what led him to staying on the right path.

“As you wish.” He smiled.

-x-

The snow became a blizzard, burying the village for three days.

-x-

A wish for better grades led to an entire class failing. An ask to win the lottery led to a broken leg and settlement claims. Even wanting a book caused a fire at the library.

Vash clenched his fists, his nails digging into his palm as he stared into the pool. This wasn’t how it was supposed to go. His first assignment and he’d somehow messed up. Every. Single. Time. He hadn’t even succeeded at the basic keep your human safe rule.

No, he’d done the very opposite of that, especially now. Vash bit his cheek as he watched the newly-orphaned Nicholas wipe his eyes in front of a gravestone, his tiny shoulders trembling, an older man kneeling beside him and offering words of comfort.

The mangled wishes hadn’t directly caused this, but Vash couldn’t shake off the feeling that he was still responsible. Had he overcompensated again? Was this a side effect, a balancing of fate, where one fortune caused a misfortune? He couldn’t verify it either way and somehow that was worse, the not knowing, the uncertainty, the niggling feeling that he’d scarred Nicholas in irreparable ways.

This wasn’t right. None of this was supposed to be happening.

Nicholas shook off the older man and ran off, bawling as he cried for his parents.

Vash reached out. His fingers brushed the pool and the water rippled, disrupting the image. From here, he couldn’t even comfort Nicholas.

From here.

Vash stood up. He could still fix this. He could fix everything.

-x-

Going to Earth had solved nothing. Close up, it should have been easier to see the impact of his wishes, to make sure he used his powers in moderation, yet…the string of bad luck continued. Even worse, Nicholas had started living like a nomad, wandering from city to city, tied down by neither friends nor family.

The glittering promise of childhood remained unfulfilled—no degrees, no career jobs, not even long-lasting relationships.

And now, here they were: Nicholas on a hospital bed, a labyrinth of tubes hiding his pale body, a monitor beeping as it tried to keep him alive.

Sitting next to the bed, Vash grabbed Nicholas’s hand. It was clammy. Nothing at all like the warm man with a sharp mind and sharper tongue. Clasping his hand, he pressed it to his forehead.

As bad as everything had been leading up to this, this was the worst possible outcome. Nicholas was dying. Slowly, but surely.

You’ll do better tomorrow, right?

He couldn’t let that happen.

He refused to let that happen.

-x-

“You said you owed a debt, right?” Nicholas had said the first night on the ship, sleeping on the bunk above Vash. Not that it would have changed things if he’d been on the same level; in the dark, it was impossible to see anything. Their tiny, shared cabin afforded a single, tiny oval-shaped window. The moon was too weak to illuminate the sea outside, let alone the room inside.

“Yeah.” Vash’s mouth went dry. To you, he couldn’t say. Instinctively, he knew that if he told the truth, everything here, everything that was and wasn’t between them would collapse. And while once he might have been fine watching from afar, now…

After talking to Nicholas up close, after laughing and working with him, he wasn’t sure he wanted to go back to the shadows. He wasn’t sure if he could.

But fortunately, Nicholas didn’t ask for the details of the debt. “Knowing you, it’s impossibly large.”

A life-debt, so to speak. Vash’s shoulders slumped. “You could say that.”

“Knowing you, it’s not entirely your fault either,” Nicholas continued.

If only that were the truth. “No, it’s mine.”

A sock landed on Vash’s face and Nicholas grumbled, “I was trying to be nice. Anyways, need some help paying it back?”

That caught Vash off-guard. He jerked his head up, but the metal frame and mattress between them was impenetrable to human sight. Was Nicholas joking? He sounded serious. “After all the money you owe?”

“We owe and yeah.” Vash could picture Nicholas shrugging. “Why not?”

Vash bit his cheek, scrutinizing the dark bed frame above him seriously. “Are you sick?”

Another sock dropped on his face. “You want to do this alone?”

No. “I should,” Vash whispered. It was easier to admit this, in the dark, with no one to see, to judge. He did not like being alone.

No, more than that, he just didn’t want to leave Nicholas.

“Should is not want.” Nicholas retorted. “Just…think about it.” There was a long silence before he added, “And it probably isn’t entirely your fault.”

Vash covered his face. His victim shouldn’t be comforting him. “You said that already.”

“I know. And I’ll say it again if I have to.”

-x-

“It was my fault,” Vash said now, in the hospital. It was impossible to deny it. “I’m sorry.”

He closed his eyes, reaching deep into himself. There was still one last trick to try: if he shared his essence, if he poured his powers into Nicholas, then maybe, just maybe, he’d at least not have failed him.

-x-

Nicholas stared at his hands, then at Vash. His impassive expression chilled Vash to the bone; there was nothing warm in the way he studied Vash. It was like he was looking at a stranger, rather than a friend. Then again, after all that had happened, perhaps Vash should just be happy that he wasn’t glaring at him with hate.

Vash wrung his hands as he stood by the bed awkwardly and waited for Nicholas to say something. Anything. The silence was unbearable.

“Guardian angel?” Nicholas repeated.

“Yes.”

“Like what you hear about in stories,” Nicholas pressed.

Vash nodded.

Covering an eye with one hand, Nicholas squinted at him. “That explains the halo.”

Was that a joke? There were traces of fatigue in Nicholas’s voice; maybe he was still groggy from the pain-killers. Vash bit his lip. “I—I failed. I’m sorry.”

Nicholas shifted his hand to the other eye. “Yeah, never heard of a guardian angel getting protected. Shouldn’t it be the other way around?”

Vash flinched and hung his head, unable to defend himself. It was true, it was all true. “ You shouldn’t have gotten shot.”

“Look, I didn’t…” Nicholas sighed, his hands on his lap. “It’s not like I wanted to get hurt.”

“I would have been fine,” Vash rambled on. “You should have protected yourself.” He stopped himself—this wasn’t what he’d come here for. “…why did you do that?”

Surprised, Nicholas stared at Vash. His jaw tensed before he shook his head. “I…I don’t know. It’s not like I knew you were,” he gestured at Vash, “and I…I just moved.” His hands clenched the bedsheet. “I saw the bullet and I…just moved.”

“You…” Vash locked eyes with Nicholas and swallowed as an unfathomable expression crossed his face. What did moved mean? What did that expression mean?

What did he want it to mean?

Nicholas smiled lopsidedly. “Guess I wasn’t ready for this journey to end just yet.”

Vash didn’t know what to say to that. Unable to take it anymore, he broke his gaze and turned to the window. Despite himself, he whispered, “…me neither.”

“It doesn’t have to. We can—”

He didn’t want to look at Nicholas, didn’t want to know what expression he made. The raw hope in his voice was painful enough as it was.

“Next time, it could be worse,” Vash interrupted. He was a failure of a guardian angel, unable to guarantee Nicholas’s protection in any way. Not from pickpockets, not from debt, and now not even from bullets. Maybe he shouldn’t have been assigned to him.

Maybe he should never have signed up for this in the first place.

But it wasn’t too late to fix this. If he went back, got someone else assigned, then maybe, just maybe, the rest of Nicholas’s life could be saved. “I should go.”

“Go?” Perplexed, Nicholas shifted on the bed, trying to get out. “Go where—wait, where are you going?”

Vash ignored him, making a beeline to the door. His hand rested on the doorknob. “Sorry for everything.”

“I said, wait you fuc—” Nicholas yelped as he fell out of bed.

“Nicholas?” Vash turned around and something jerked him back, an invisible chain yanking him back and away from the door. He tumbled, falling hard on the floor. For a moment, he lay there, dazed, staring at Nicholas as he lay on the ground nearby.

They stared at each other.

Nicholas croaked, “That hurt.”

Vash patted his neck. There was nothing there. Yet, he could still feel the sensation of the chain, the tightness of a collar. Like—realization dawned and Vash swallowed hard as he stared at the space between him and Nicholas. It couldn’t, it shouldn’t—there was a thin, silverly thread of light connecting them.

A chain, of sorts.

“Shit.”

Nicholas snorted. “That’s not a very angel-like thing to say.”

Vash wasn’t listening. He tugged on the end of the chain connected to his chest but it refused to budge. With a groan, he pressed his face flat on the floor. “I fucked up.”

“Even less angel-like.” Nicholas pulled himself up to a seated position. Wiggling his toes and fingers, he shrugged. “Doesn’t look like we’re in danger and aside from a few bruises, I’m feeling pretty good right now. Everything seems accounted for.” A thought struck him and he tugged the waistband of the pants the hospital had provided and peeked inside. “Yep, all accounted for.”

“It’s…” Vash lifted his head, looking balefully at Nicholas. “I tied us together.”

“Buy a man a meal first,” Nicholas quipped. When Vash didn’t smile, he stilled. “What does tied mean?”

“Our souls are connected now,” Vash mumbled, wincing with each word. He couldn’t even rescue someone properly. “I’m…not sure exactly what this will do. I’ve heard rumours. It might make you live longer. It might change you.” He tugged on the chain. “But we can’t go too far from each other.”

“Oh. Literally tied.” Nicholas’s expression didn’t change as he stroked his chin, staring at the door, contemplating the situation. Was he disappointed? Angry? Vash could only hope it wasn’t hate.

Vash winced. Just how many times could a person screw up? “I…I’m sorry.”

“The door isn’t that far.” Nicholas struggled to get up, grunting from the exertion.

When he started to fall, Vash lunged forward, catching him. “Careful!”

“Got you.” Nicholas smirked as he clutched Vash. Despite his loose grip, Vash was stuck, feeling more tied than he had by the chain. “Thanks.”

 “I, I didn’t do anything worth thanking,” Vash mumbled stiffly. This was what he was supposed to be doing all along in the first place.

Nicholas shrugged and Vash could feel it—every gesture, every breath, every heart beat. Every sign that said I’m alive. “Still. You saved me.”

He relaxed, allowing himself to relax in the cage of Nicholas’s embrace. Burying his head in the crook of Nicholas’s neck, Vash mumbled, “It wasn’t supposed to be like this.”

“That’s the thing about travelling. Nothing ever goes to plan.” Nicholas half-laughed, half-wheezed. “It’s fine. I wanted to travel with you a little longer anyways.”

“It won’t be a little,” Vash warned.

“Even better.” Nicholas pulled back till their eyes met. “I thought I preferred going solo but that’s not the case anymore.”

And he shouldn’t just accept this, shouldn’t just melt into Nicholas’s embrace like this, but Vash had never been good at doing what he should do in the first place. “Nicholas…”

“And…” Nicholas’s smirk turned dark, his grip tightening. “When you tried to leave, you almost saddled me with all of the debt.”

Vash froze. “I…”

“Don’t worry. I know how you can make it up to me.”

Maybe he should try the door again. The chain had to be longer than he realized. It had to be.

[ravenalla]

Just watched the new helluva episode and..ugh okay opinions under the cut.

Some people are saying this episode is better than the others of season 2. And while visually it’s stunning and not as directly insulting as some of the others, I think this episode is one of the best examples of how these writers don’t understand pacing, comedic timing, or creating a coherent plot. The cuts between locations happen way too fast, some scenes feel like they were written under a minute just to add fluff (like the Moxxie hat fight, Blitz talking with the woman in the waiting room and the entire joke once again just being a character saying curse words or insults multiple times in a sentence, camera crews conveniently being at the hospital to see Stolas hurt for some reason.) Also god Stella. At least when they made her a one-dimensional boring villain she was competent at being one. Now she just looks like a whiny idiot so they could have her brother be there for no reason.

Speaking of which, that was a damn terrible introduction to Andrealphus. Unless your following updates about the show on Twitter, you don’t know who the fuck that is, why he’s here or what his connection to either Stella or Stolas is until now, there’s only been one passing mention she even had a brother before this. He’s just suddenly there with no proper introduction, and then Striker just appears now to kidnap Stolas in front of tons of other people (I guess him trying to kill Stolas with the angelic weapon hidden in the shadows didn’t matter that much after all) and take him back to an underground lair he has for some reason. He also brings up the classist system and Stolas’s bigotry but it doesn’t matter because he hurt the poor uwu prince baby 🙄 I swear it feels like this show is AI generated at this point, or at the very least the writers know that the pretty animation and shipping fuel will keep diehard fans around so they don’t actually have to make anything tightly written and can just do whatever random hodgepodge of scenes and dialogue they like. Which whatever its clear this show is just “the sex joke” show most of the time, but don’t then try to tell me this is some masterclass of writing and character development when the entire climax of Stolas and Blitz’s relationship problems at Ozzie’s was addresses ENTIRELY OFFSCREEN THROUGH TEXT MESSAGES. Even if you ship Stolas and Blitz, how the hell can you accept that? That’s the sloppiest way they could have handled that, I don’t even like this show and I feel disrespected lmao.

And just the way they tried to make us “feel” for their relationship this episode. Why the hell would Blitz be so shocked Stolas could get hurt, you literally fought Striker before because he was two seconds away from killing Stolas instantly otherwise?? You were hired to be his bodyguard in one episode! Like yeah maybe actually seeing it happen is causing the reality of it to sink in for Blitz, but everything we’ve been shown so far INCLUDING IN THIS EPISODE shows how much he does not care that much about Stolas and at best has a mild acceptance of him (at least outside of seeing stars which everybody’s already talked about how weird that entire thing was). I literally have no idea why we are suppose to be rooting for these two to get together at this point. It’s just watching uwu Stolas get hurt over and over again so we can pity the guy and wonder why Blitz wont love him boohoo 🙄 it’s annoying and not fun to watch. Also this might be more of a nitpick, but did anyone else think characters looked weirdly off model a lot in this episode? Like yeah the animation was impressive at some points during the action scenes but during regular dialogue it looked like it was done by a completely different studio than the other episodes, especially with Stella, Andrealphus, Millie, and Moxxie. Not sure what that’s about or if I’m just imagining it.

[crowleyholmes]

Flaming Sword Foreshadowing

Last night I was peacefully editing my video just vibing having a good time when I skipped over a scene that had confused me for a while and it struck me like lightning that it HAS to be foreshadowing because WHY ELSE would they have shot it that way????

And I have to add I'm relatively new to the fandom so I'm sure this has come up many many MANY times but to be fair I've spent the last few weeks basically living in the tags and the meta and I while I've seen the theory once in a piece of fanart, I haven't seen connections to this scene so I figured I might as well share my thoughts in case there are any other new fans like me out there who will appreciate (aka absolutely hate) it!

So one of my absolutely favorite theories is that Crowley used to be Lucifer, yes? I have many reasons why I believe this, maybe I'll make another post all about that, but for now let's just roll with it.

Okay so Aziraphale has a flaming sword. Which (I think, don't quote me on this, I'm not religious and don't know much about it at all, most of what I know comes from art and/or just general knowledge) in the Bible, is used by Michael (who is the supreme Archangel), who stabs Lucifer with it as they throw him from Heaven down to Hell, right?

And at first I wasn't too worried about that because like. Aziraphale isn't Michael. Michael, in Good Omens, neither has a flaming sword nor is the supreme archangel.

BUT NOW. At the end of season 2, who is about to become supreme archangel, taking the position that Michael has in the Bible, and owns the weapon that Michael has in the Bible?? Yeah.

So even upon this realization I was like nahhh idk it's. A fun theory but there's SO many other ways things could happen I'm overthinking this for sure.

But then I noticed this scene again with this theory in mind and WHY DID THEY SHOOT IT LIKE THIS here look I made some gifs to illustrate:

Aziraphale is standing over Crowley, sword raised as if he's going to attack him, and Crowley looks up at him TERRIFIED.

Now, I realize there are explanations for all of this, but let me elaborate on my thoughts one by one.

WHY did they make Aziraphale pick up the sword in the first place? There is NO reason for him to hold it, I mean I GUESS he's afraid of Satan, who is about to pop up for a visit, but - what's Aziraphale going to do about it, right? He's just one small low/ish-ranking angel, and the way Satan is portrayed in this show, I doubt the sword would make much of a dent in him. So, okay, perhaps Aziraphale picked it up simply to have Something, Some kind of weapon ready to feel a Little bit safer, but STILL - why pick it up one second before he turns to Crowley, why not sooner, then? And why raise it AT CROWLEY in the way that he does, when what he says to him has nothing to do with the sword at all? He would NEVER want to actually hurt Crowley. And the way this shot is framed, the way the sword is so prominent and threatening, I just don't think they did this only for comedic value (in juxtaposing the threat of the sword with "I'll never speak to you again"). He also briefly looks at the sword right after "I'll -", almost as if he's actually considering it. (OR as if he's thinking "why the hell am I holding this and why am I holding it like this, Crowley's going to think I'm going to stab him?!" which was what I WAS THINKING.) But, again, Aziraphale would NEVER point a weapon at Crowley or threaten him in any serious way - centuries ago/millenia ago, maybe, but not for a long time now, under no circumstances, not the way they are now.

Another question I have is WHY did they make Crowley fall to his knees? Sure, the earth is shaking, everybody is quite wobbly, but Crowley is so sure-footed usually, I find it hard to believe that he would fall when even Newt manages to stay on his feet (no offense Newt, I love you). But okay, I guess, maybe they wanted to show how desperate Crowley was? Visualize him giving up? I can't really argue with that one, but in combination with Everything Else, it just seems like they put them in these exact positions WAY too intentionally.

I just know that this scene is going to come back to haunt us, it will happen again but with a very different, very serious threat from (a possibly/probably memory-wiped) Aziraphale, an actually FLAMING flaming sword, and an even more desperate and terrified Crowley.

Bonus:

[winterwhisperz-blog]

Hi, I really like your blog. I recently just found it, and I was wondering if you could do a part 2 of TouchStarved Characters reacting to MC, drawing themselves. Especially with Vere. Skip if you want to, anyway. Have a nice day. And make sure to eat, sleep, and drink some water.

HI HI !!! I am, so sorry for taking forever, I’ve still been in a huge writing slump )): BUT

I HAVE finally triumphed !! Thank you so much for the ask <333 I’m rlly happy u like my blog !! And I hope you have a nice day too !

Now les get into it !!

Leander, Mhin, And Vere Reacting to Mc Drawing them (a Sequel)

Warnings: Vere is flirty, a person gets snatched away in Vere’s too, (it’s played in comedic effect but just in case) maybe OOC

Notes: GN Mc, Fluff

Vere

ALR ALR ALR so, as we know, Vere draws. So having you two be like, drawing pals/couple ??? Muah muah

But I think it’d be really really funny, if he didn’t find out until you guys walk by a wanted poster—you both know who the subject is, but OMG THEY DO N O T look like that 🤨 also the lines??? So messy— effort ??? None

Determined to correct them, you stomp away, on the lookout to find the Wanted.

You find them waltzing out of a brothel, which is where you and Vere jump em.

Letting out a screech, (either that screech being from you or the Wanted that’s up to you. Could be a battle cry idk) you stuff them in a bag before quickly running off.

Vere of course, has no idea why you WANTED this random person, but he definitely wasn’t going to object to doing a crime with you <33

Plopping the Wanted into your room, you dramatically whisk off the bag, revealing a very frightened, and now hostile fellow.

“MC?? I thought we were FRIENDS, why the hell are you turning me in?”

You shush them, settling down in front, butter-fly legs as you slam open your sketchbook.

“I’m not turning you in, I’m redrawing your wanted poster.”

….

…..

“….What?”

“Vere, keep ‘em still!”

“Yes, darling~”

Your partner in crime does just that, and with your combined efforts, you successfully redraw the wanted poster. Now, it being far more accurate.

Which uhhh, did result in the fellow being captured, BUT— that’s not the point.

The point is, Vere now knows you can draw. And very well he might add!! Despite if your style is realistic or not, the wanted poster was STELLAR

And now as you’re back in your room, duty done, Vere droops himself seductively across the floor, any remaining sunlight catching the pink of his eyes and red of his hair.

“…what are you doing?”

“It’s my turn now,”

You raise a brow, “You want me to draw you a wanted poster?”

He rolls his eyes, running a hand through his long hair. “No, dummy. You can’t keep a secret like this from me and not use me as your new muse.”

“I wasn’t keeping it a secret—“

“Go on, i can’t stay in this position all day.”

Sighing, you kneel down, getting to work. “What am I going to do with you?”

Vere hums, and you know a flirt is coming before he says it. “Oh, MC, I have a list of things you can do with me~”

“Hopefully starting with throwing you in horny jail.”

“Rude.”

You snicker, returning to delicately sketching the details of Vere into the paper.

You draw the playful lift of his lips, the needle like pupils, and the deeper, maybe even rare soft side that he hides beneath flirts and cool remarks.

Once you’re done, Vere leans over your shoulder, humming his approval. A part of him, is both touched and uncomfortable how you managed to capture a side of him he didn’t commonly show.

After this, the two of you would often take turns drawing each other.

Leander

ALR ALR SO, WE ALL KNOW Eridia is like, dreary and cloudy all the time—and to set the scene—it’s storming—walls of rain slash against the roof of the Wet Wick (dang-it rlly be wet now. UHHH pls don’t hate me for that joke 😚)

The bloodhounds had been out doing jobs, leaving you with far less people to greet when walking downstairs.

Leander sits by the counter, large figure shadowed by the darkness cast by the storm. His eyes glowing eerily green in the shade, especially since he looks so deep in thought. His brows lightly furrow, his lips hinting at a frown.

You feel awfully like you’ve spotted something you weren’t supposed to. Especially since…there’s actually no one else around. You hear the faint snores of any other none-bloodhounds occupants still in their rooms, but otherwise it’s hushed against the drum of thunder.

Afraid of breaking some kind of spell, you stay where you are—though, you do tilt your head, taking in every angle of the scene in front of you.

…dang this would make a pretty cool sketch

Like a hesitant deer, you take quiet steps back up the stairs before returning, just as quietly with your sketchbook and pencils.

Though uhhh, Leander is no longer where you left him.

Curious, you take the rest of the steps down before searching the dark. Your only company being the crashing and howling of the outside storm—

“Good morning, MC!”

Out of pure terror, you scream and swing the sketchbook at the voice.

You’re greeted with low laughter and glittering green eyes as Leander reaches for the book, gently taking it from your hands.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you. Are you alright, MC? Did the storm wake you?”

You shake your head, a little thrown by the shift in tone—from laughter to genuine concern. You take your sketchbook back, but not until he’s caught interest.

“You draw?”

“How did you know it was a sketchbook?”

“I caught a glimpse when you whacked me.”

He laughs again, the deep sound nearly matching the thunder above. You feel oddly light when hearing it, though it sends a chill down your back.

For a distraction, you glance outside, the flash of lightning sparking worry into your chest.

“Will the bloodhounds be okay out there?”

Leander frowns, looking a bit confused, perhaps a little irritated before his smile quickly returns to his face. “Oh, they’ll be fine. You can’t live in Eridia without expecting storms.”

And before you can say more, he gestures to the sketchbook.

“What were you thinking of drawing?”

Ah, right. You shift on your feet, feeling a little awkward. You’ve asked to draw people before, and uhhh, with a few different reactions. Some thought it was weird, others annoyingly prodded at you to draw them before you even asked, (then changed your mind) and others kept whatever drawings you did like treasure.

You can’t guess how Leander will react to the question, but you end up asking anyway.

He receives the request with a bit of fluster, a flirt or two, before asking how you want him to pose. You decide you want to capture the moment you saw before—him standing in the dark like some kind of gothic statue, hoping you can somehow sketch in the magic and eerie wonder he had emitted.

Once you were finished, he definitely showed the picture to everyone he could—boasting at how talented you were…and how you chose him for a muse.

Mhin

ALR ALR, to balance out how kinda creepy Leander’s was 🧍🏻‍♀️ like man was just standing there in the dark like a WEIRDO—I wanted to do something cuter with Mhin’s.

So so so, this is for Mhin’s birthday. You know they like sweets, but wonder if they would appreciate a portrait instead

You’ve sketched them before, when they’ve taken care of the stray cats, when they’ve sat beside you in silence, just enjoying your company—but you wanted to make this special

So, after finding them after a little merry soulless hunt, you two get started on your little birthday plan. Mhin, to actually convince them to join you, Is completely unaware of said plan.

You just give excuse after excuse, like how starving you are and how you’re only craving their favorite type of cookies, how you want to explore the city and conveniently wind up where the stars are most visible, and you have NO idea how this romantically set table even came from?? 😮

Eventually, they do understand what’s going on, and look away, arms folded.

“I told you we didn’t have to celebrate.”

“We didn’t have to, but I wanted to~”

They roll their eyes, but like always, you can spot that flush of pink coating their cheeks.

After dinner, you pat a spot next to you, and when Mhin sits down, you stare up at the stars above. Millions blinking down at the pair of you between thin, grey clouds.

Mhin gets absorbed in the sight soon enough, occasionally pointing out constellations and then rambling about them.

Giving you just enough time to get out your sketchbook and get to work. While ofc still listening, because you always do. Hearing Mhin nerd out about stars is one of your favorite things.

The night is cold, biting at your nose, but it doesn’t bother you. Especially when you feel a warm cloak wrapped around your shoulders.

You look up from your book to see Mhin settling back down, ponytail and white shirt now exposed to the night air. They raise a knee and shrug. “Don’t look at me like that, you looked cold.”

Smiling, you pull them closer, reaching out the cloak so it covers you both. “Thank you, you big softy.”

You hear them grumble, but also don’t ignore how they lean into your side. After awhile, they glance at what you’re sketching, face growing confused as they start to recognize the person in the drawing.

“What is—“

You let them take the book, their eyes wandering over every detail so carefully thought out and drawn in with every pencil stroke.

Them in the portrait sit, gaze watching the sky with a wonder you’ve had the honor to see. Their mouth is open, talking about things that are more beautiful thanks to how they explained them. A little beauty mark seated by their lips.

After a few moments of silence, you lean your head on their shoulder(or head if ur tall), finding comfort in the warmth of the shared cloak.

“Happy birthday, Mhin.”

They didn’t say much, but you can see the appreciation in their eyes. How they look at your drawing with the same amazement as they looked at the sky.

Forever wondering why you’d use this talent to draw them.

Maybe celebrating their birthday wasn’t so bad after all. (Especially if they get to spend it with you <3333)

ALR ALR WE HAVE REACHED THE END

Tysm for the ask!! Again, I’m so sorry for the wait.

Anyway, I hope you have an amazing day, stay cool and hydrated, see three heart shaped things in nature, and watch/read your favorite show/movie/book !!

[jessanight]

Hey, I was scrolling through the offical pale beyond twitter account and found these sprites. During my playthroughs I didn't see them at all, so are they possibly unused? And if so are there a lot of unused sprites that didn't end up in the game? Just curious, because the game's art is amazing!

Hey there, good eye @niko-trash!! Thanks so much for asking, but this is probably going to be a longer answer than you anticipated, sorry!

Yes, there are a lot of sprites that went unused in the game. Kurt has the most emotes total I think, and therefore the most unused emotes too - the final count for him is well over 100, he's an expressive man.

Most of the reason why we made too many emotes was that a lot of them were designed before there was a script! We knew early on that we wanted a lot of emotes, and drawing usually takes longer than writing, so we started early. At this point the game design for Pale was more like a true visual novel, and we had yet to add many of the resource management mechanics, so we thought we would have to lean pretty hard on conversation emotes being important for basically everything.

This led to a lot of work being done without the full context of all the scenes that would be in the game. We made our best guesses, but it didn't all end up fitting! In hindsight some of the most effective emotes were the really subtle ones - head tilts, gaze aversions, that sort of thing.

Sometimes scenes that we had conversation emotes for were changed to isometric-only because it felt better for the kind of gameplay that was happening at the time (abandoning ship and Kurt vs Hammond are the ones I can think of off the top of my head)!

Katie (the character artist!) and I ended up going back and editing emotes, or making new ones to fit scenes better once we had them for testing. Most of the emotes that were done post-script were Hunt in the Captain's interviews, and the important conversations with your crew towards the end of the game, in their degraded costumes. We gave a lot of extra special care and attention to Cordell in the dog scene, and to Nutlee's scene in tent-city as well.

I DO have to say though, I don't personally consider the work that wasn't used to have been a waste. When I designed the characters, I did early pose concepts that were really useful for developing the individual characterisations of everyone in the cast. This bank of work was also really useful for helping Katie get used to the style when they joined, so all's well that ends well!

Next time around we'll have more writing done before we dive into emotes though haha. Hopefully we'll be a lil more efficient!

Going to continue with some endgame spoiler stuff under the cut!

To use Hunt as an example, when we first imagined the player meeting him again at the end of the game, he was going to be almost comedically mad, kind of Machiavellian almost.

But when I read the scene in preparation for emoting it, it was totally different. We had always planned to have the fruit mechanic, but now that I had to sit with the context of Hunt having experienced the loss of his crew over and over again, it became much more somber, you're finally taking a peek under the deceptive, jolly mask he had at the start of the game.

This is also the scene where he makes his final judge of your character, and could have to relent to you being a much better person and captain than he, or he might decide he hates you and your rotten soul. It called for a subtler approach. It was one of the last scenes I drew for the game, and I listened to the music over and over as I worked on it.

I think this is a lot better, and I'm glad we changed it.

[arabian-batboy]

What with Damian and other characters would you like to see more of?

EDIT: anon sent two asks that are the exact same except the 2nd one said "what conflict with Damian and other char-" and I accidentally answered the 1st ask that didn't mention the word conflict, sorry.

Gonna be honest for a minute here; I genuinely don’t want Damian to have any conflicts with any non-villain character for the next.......10 years lol

Yes, I know that characters having conflicts with each other is what makes them so interesting, but DC has been exaggerating Damian’s attitude and lack of people skills by making him an angry brat that butt-heads with everyone for so many years that I’m kinda over it at this point? Like he already had enough conflicts with other characters to last a lifetime, do we REALLY need to add more to the list? If anything I think it’s high-time we switched it up and actually had characters enjoying Damian’s company without first trying to fight him or mentioning how rude he is.

But most importantly the real reason for that is because I know that whenever he argues with a non-villain character, DC will never allow him to win the argument or be in the right. He has to always be the instigator who provokes other characters for no reason which always result in either him apologizing to them or getting reprimanded by other characters/the narrative. Seriously though, I have read every single comic that Damian has ever appeared in and I genuinely can’t recall any significant moment where a character has genuinely apologized or shown regret to the way they talked to/treated him and if they did, then its because Damian apologized to them first.

Except for maybe his parents, but I personally don’t like taking Talia apologizing to him into consideration since she’s only apologizing for things that she did due to character-assassination and with Bruce its always half-assed.

Like I understand how difficult Damian can be to deal with and how he can easily step on people’s foot, but there’s so no way you can convince me that’s he’s always the instigator every single time? Because I can count many times where other characters did him wrong without him doing anything to deserve it (at that moment at least), yet none of them have apologized, got reprimanded or shown any guilt toward their actions.

As for already existing conflicts? I’m not really interested in seeing any of them resurface again because all of them have been constantly repeated, stretched, exaggerated and dragged through the years to the point where all of them are now boring and unnecessary. Especially when the biggest two conflicts he has had are with characters that DC and readers has strong bias for (Bruce & Tim), so continuing them anymore will just end up making Damian look bad, since he will never be allowed to be in the right when it comes to them.

So yeah lets take a little break from all the fights, unless it was like harmless comedic banter, then sure, that sounds like fun and will not hurt anyone. Otherwise, just let him have unconditionally wholesome interactions with other characters for once please.

[canonicallysoulmates]

J2 JIB11 Panel

The stars aligned and this year both boys were able to attend JIB which means we got a j2 panel! 🙌

There was a cute and funny moment at the beginning of the panel because Jared went to give Jensen a fist bump but he didn't notice and I guess Jared told him and he cracked up laughing and then they fist bumped. Jared shares that their flight got delayed, and that morning he was signing something and a fan asked him how he was and he replied that he was good that he actually felt awake even though he didn't look it and she just went "oh, i know. your face" 😆 To be fair, both of them do look and sound tired.

Also, you'll notice both are wearing Gucci jackets, they were a gift to them and M from Daniela the organizer of this event.

Jumping into the questions, first one up is: Has there ever been a moment on set where they had to overcome their, or one of, their greatest fears to shoot the scene? For Jared the thing that comes to mind is French Mistake. He says it's one of the most nervous times he's been on the spn set due to all the comedic stuff. He didn't feel comfortable doing comedy as Sam, so he would get really nervous when Sam had to be funny because he was like "Sam’s not really funny he’s kind of just chill". He got really nervous shooting some of the comedic scenes but that otherwise it was pretty fun even the stunt stuff. 

Jensen agress and says he doesn’t think there was ever a greatest fear moment while they were filming spn. That they’re doing network tv which is pretty tame in the world of television and they don’t really write stuff that he thinks would be too out of their comfort zone, and after a few seasons the writers knew what their comfort zone was and kind of played in that and utilized it. He was more uncomfortable doing stuff in The boys.

Jared says he looked comfortable, and Jensen replies "it’s called acting dear boy. I was not comfortable". He says that he was very nervous in a few of those scenes, so much so that he called his mom and told her she'd want to skip the show, that she was not the target audience.

Jared asks him if he has ever shared the story about him calling Kripke and saying he was unsure about some things. He has. Jensen says there were a few scenes he was asked to do that he didn't know he had a line but Kripke found it and Jensen couldn't cross it, he has children who may grow up and see this. Says he thinks there was supposed to be more revealed when Soldier Boy was revealed for the first time and there was supposed to be a little bit more intimacy when Soldier Boy had his fun with the ladies. And he once again shares about how his first day on set, the very first scene he had to film was stepping out of the capsule in front of his new cast and crew butt naked.

Jared makes a joke that he has some of the behind the scenes stuff and he’ll post it later and Jensen quips no pun intended 🤣 We know you do baby 😏

Jared also adds that the most nervous he ever got on the set of spn for another person was the scene where Sam gets hit by a car. It wasn’t him, and their stunts while not dangerous were intense but they felt they could take the hit or do whatever but when his stunt man Mike Carpenter did that scene, he had short hair so they put a bald cap on him and put like a thick liquid padding and then the Sam wig and that’s all he had covering his skull for getting hit by a car. And with this type of stunt there's no way to really control it like the way you land, you just have to try your best not to land on your skull. So they do it the first time, they're watching it wondering if he's gonna get up he does, then the second time his foot got caught on the bumber and he got dragged, and the third time he got up and usually stunt actors and actresses they can have like a broken bone and still say they're all good and ask if they need to do it again but this time he got up and said he was done.

Going back to The Boys, Jensen tells the story about how there's a scene where he picks up Karl Urban's character Butcher, throws him over his head and slams him into a desk, obviously this was done with a stunt guy who was wired up cause Jensen's supposed to be super strong flinging this dude over his body with one arm. So at the appex which is when he's right above Jensen's head, they let the wires lose and Jensen actually slammed him as hard as he could into the desk, they’re not slowing the guy down and the first time he did it Jensen was surprised and was like "omg are you okay???" The dude popped back up, said he was fine, to do it again to which Jensen was like ' I don't wanna' but they did and once Jensen got used to it he felt like a beast. x

What's the stupidest injury they’ve ever got on any set? Jared asks, "how much time you got?"

Jensen says they both have a list of these but the first that comes to mind he thinks it was Wendigo, when he was pulling the gun out of the back of the Impala- Jared corrects him this injury actually happened during Hook Man. Basically, he was grabbing a riffle and he pulled it from the center of the gun and the butt of it got caught on the edge of the trunk and the barrel came up and hit him on the eye, and split him open. He says it was pretty stupid and self inflected too so he has no one to blame but himself.

Jared tells the story of how when they filmed the scene where Leviathan!Sam and Dean rob the bank, they’re supposed to fire off some rounds to get everyone’s attention but his gun was too high so it was out of frame and couldn't be seen so he was asked to keep it lower so he did thing is this is a gun he had never shot before- Jensen says that if it had been a normal gun Jared would have been fine but that this one was a weird russian fully automatic machine gun. Anyways, they do the next take with Jared holding it lower and as he starts firing, something is hurting, he can immediately feel something is wrong so he stops and says he thinks he has to do something different and he looks over at Jensen who's kinda looking at him- Jared had managed to burn himself with the hot brass casings as they were ejecting so he had a bunch of ash burn marks, some of which were bleeding from the impact, across his face. Jared also mentions that it was happening so fast that if it had been a bit lower it would have gone right into his eyeball. Let's all be thankful that did not happen! But also, Jared, how are you going to say y'alls stunts weren't dangerous and then tell stories like this.

Also, right before he tells this story he tells Jensen that he's going to know right away where he's going with this and he's right because the moment he says Leviathan!Sam and Dean in the bank Jensen laughs and says this is one of his favorite Jared bonehead moves, and when Jared is telling the story Jensen says that what he loves is that Jared kept going even though he was being hit in the face. x

If they were to attend a con to meet people who would their dream guests to meet be? Jared says this question is similar to the question of if you could have dinner with somebody who would it be, and his initial response to that is are they going to be honest like if he met Obama or some other world leader would they tell him the truth or would they give him canned answers. He thinks he would probably go mostly to musicians, like Eddie Vedder, he thinks actors bore him cause he is one. He finds himself boring so he feels like the soundtrack of his life is what he would go to; Jensen agrees, he goes with musicians as well even though they don’t really do cons that's more an actor thing to do that being said he thinks Keanu Reeves is an interesting guy. He’s trying to think of who he would want to listen to answer questions and speak about things involved in the industry, he wouldn't mind listening to some of the Marvel cast like RDJ strictly for curiosity purposes not like 'omg Iron Man!' but because he thinks RDJ is an interesting fellow who as a lot of interesting things to say about topics he could related to so he would do it more out of curiosity. x

Would they talk about their tattoos?

Jensen says he hasn’t gotten anything new in a while the latest was a little thumb one he got with JDM. Basically they were at a friends (he doesn't mention her by name but Sophia Bush) wedding in Oklahoma and D and Hil were doing something with the bride which meant they had the afternoon free so naturally as one does with JDM you go for beer and tattoos. Jensen says Jared has gotten a few more than he has recently.

Jared replies there’s a few on the list he hasn’t gotten yet, but he has the basquiat crown with JDM and Jensen which they got at JDM's wedding, the day after spn finished he got one with his friend Bruce which is like a geometric design that when asked about what it is he jokes it’s an iphone update it didn't actually have a meaning it's just a random design that he liked how it looked, a star on his bicep, a "come and take it" kind of thing which he says is really cool because he thinks a month later after he got it come and take it become a women’s right thing in Texas, and he also has an homage to Dr. Seuss story Oh, the Places You'll Go! with a T for Tom, A for Austin which is Shep's name and a little moon for Odette.

They ask if the fan has any tattoos, she does, she has an AKF one and also one for the band A-ha who sing Take On Me and Jared comments he and Jensen have both tried and failed to do the high note from that song. I would love to have seen that. x

If they were to go to comic con and dress up, what would they dress up as? Jensen says his go to would be Red Hood and Batman since he already has those costumes, but the fan says besides those and as he's thinking Jared says Bullwinkle 😂 And Jensen laughs and says, yeah, Rocky and Bullwinkle. I would pay money to see them dress up as Rocky and Bullwinkle 🤣

Jared also says Boba fett, he’d like something with a mask cause he’d like the experience of being around people who are passionate about stuff and not have it be flavored by like "aren’t you that guy who was on Gilmore Girls?” Jensen says he'd go as the screen character cause that just seems very comfortable.  x

What has made them remain best friends for so long? The boys joke, Jared saying it's been way too long and Jensen saying that for the most part it’s been contractual 😂

Jared says it's never been bullshit. Since day one they’ve gotten along and the why? Who knows. They have a similar up bringing and background and likes and dislikes and he thinks primarily it's that they got to see each other during their highs and lows. They went through a lot, 15yrs is kindergarten through college and he saw Jensen and what he was going through more than any other human being on the planet and vice versa Jensen saw Jared and what he was going through, his good times, his bad times, everything in between and so you kind of get to really know the soul of somebody not just who they are at their best. You go to a set anywhere you'll probably enjoy most of the people for the first couple of hours, then they get tired or they've had a bad day and they're an asshole or a jerk but he thinks for them it was just like 'hey, you all right?' That it's like they've known each other since birth even though they've actually known each other less than 20yrs. They kind of had a fastforwarded into the fire and they had each other's back and he guesses that's why, that he wishes he knew. Jared, my darling, you just described soulmates! That person who from the moment you meet you feel like you've known them your whole life with whom you have a connection and a bond that you can't explain- that's your soulmate! 🥹

Jensen thinks there's also that SPN is the biggest thing that has happened to their careers so far, and arguably it's one of the biggest things that has happened to their lives, it's certainly changed both their lives from pre-SPN to now and to have another person understand the multitude of levels on how that changed your life to the degree in which he and Jared know each other he thinks it kind of bonds you in a way that's really indescribable. Nobody understands what his life has been like for the past almost 2 decades more than Jared does because he was pretty much right next to him the whole time and he was also going through the same stuff both personally and professionally that Jensen was going through and that really bonds people in a way that's really indescribable. And that it's a good thing they got along and that they laugh at the same jokes, and like the same music, and cheer for the same sports teams that there's just a lot in common thankfully so when they were put in that situation where they were gonna be side by side for as long as they were it was really easy and enjoyable.

Jared also comments that he thinks in general, not just with working relationships or friendships, but with romantic relationships as well or family relationships he thinks it's extremely important to be able to tell somebody when something hurt you or bothered you, and vice versa to listen when someone goes like 'hey, this happened and it felt off base or it didn't feel cool' and for that person to listen cause if you're really good friends with anybody or are close with anybody you'll have disagreeements and you'll go 'well, here's where I'm coming from, help me to understand where you're coming from' and you'll listen and be like 'got it, let's move forward. ' So it's important just with anybody that you care about to shoot straight. x

A big part of acting is dealing with rejection how do they both deal with keeping motivation in trying to act when getting rejected? Jared says this reminds him of a story of when he was still on Gilmore Girls.

He was auditioning like half a dozen times a week for other projects, and he had bought a house in the valley in LA, and a friend of his then girlfriend came over for like a housewarming party and he was showing her around and by his bed in his bedroom he had a stack of 12 or 15 scripts all stuff he was reading and hoping to get an audition for, and she looked over and asked if those were all the auditions he'd been on, Jared kind of laughed and told her to follow him and walked her over to the garage where he had cardboard boxes full of scripts. He had 300 to 400 scripts of auditions he had been on in the past 3 to 4 years.

He thinks the way he deal with rejection now is to treat auditions or meetings as maybe it’s my performance, maybe this is my chance to play this character and also now that he and Jensen have been on the producing side he realizes how silly casting sometimes gets, there can be 5 people who do an amazing job but they're going to be acting with a brunette and they don't want them to look to similar so they decide to go with a blonde or vice versa, or someone is 5'11 and that's too tall to play a 14 year old because they'll be acting with someone whose 5'3 so it comes down to random things. And that's helped a little bit, seeing the vagaries of casting and subtle nuances that don't even really make sense so he tries to go 'all right, I do my best and if that's the last time I get to play the character then so be it'. (sidenote: Jared pulling out the fancy words, first time in my life hearing the word vagaries)

Jensen says he thinks as one gets older your way of dealing with rejection changes. He and Jared have had really great succes so far in their lives and in their career so when there's rejection now he thinks they can both stand firm on the fact that they've been validated by a multitude of people and their career reflects that so that if somebody says 'no, we don't want you for that role' or 'no, we don't like that idea for a show that you're pitching' they'd be like okay, maybe it's not the right time, maybe they just don't see that vision, maybe they're looking for something else- at this point he quips that maybe they want somebody that's not so oddly tall and Jared quips back or oddly bowlegged 😆 But also that as Jared said knowing what they know about being on the other side of it has really kind of drawn the curtain back and see how a lot of times how ridiculous this process can be in getting to that final stage. So, he thinks they deal with it a little differently now. That early on, when they didn't have that affirmation to kind of rely on it was just thick skin, you had to develop thick skin, somebody says you're not good enough you had to know in your heart that you were good enough and that person just didn't see it. x

Last question, what does Dean mean to Jared and what does Sam mean to Jensen? Jared starts to answer that now, after a couple of years of spn being over cause it's been around two and a half years since they finished filming and I guess the fan thought Jared was throwing an indirect about asking this question after spn has been over for a while so they say it's because this question was prepared a long time ago, and Jared has to clarify that's not what he meant- it was actually a little funny, the fan didn't say it in a rude way or anything like that more like a clarification.

But anyways, Jared says he has more hindsight now and that he'd rather answer this question now than 2 or 3 years ago so where he stands now it's difficult for him to try and differentiate what Dean meant and what Jensen meant all he can say is that he learned a lot from both and a lot of the reason he's the man that he is and the actor he is is because he spent 15yrs looking at Jensen and then they're calling action and he was looking at Dean so it's hard to kind of really parse out exactly what he got- says he got his dad voice from Dean to which Jensen says that so has he, Jared continues saying he learned every step of the way and he thinks it was really exciting. That a lot of what he really liked about Dean was his keep going attitude and that's very similar to Jensen kind of like 'yeah, this sucks but we gotta get through it' or 'all right, we're tired it's 16hrs, it's 4am, it's raining or freezing in Vand and we have to do a fight scene but all right it ain't gonna do itself let's go do it' so that kind of evoked something in him.

Jensen concurs that it's the same for him but also that he knows Sam is a part of Jared, that Sam resides in Jared's personality so getting to see as many times as he did Jared bring that element of himself forward and then take on the embodiment of Sam was like getting to see a specific micro aspect of Jared and how he can mold that and play with that and tell the story using that and he's always thought that he was very gifted in doing so and now he's doing it with another character. He thinks he and Jared, because they weren't classically trained as actors and didn't have any formal training to speak of at all they had to learn to use what they knew and that's essentially themselves, Dean is certainly a part of his personality that is exaggerated, Sam is also a part of Jared's personality that is exaggerated so they got to play this kind of exagerated versions of themselves with each other and then they'd yell cut and they'd go back to being themselves so he really feels it's just part of the package that he got with Jared and he'll forever be grateful for that and he looks forward to the next time he gets to see him morph into Sam. Those are lovely answers 💕

J2 JIB11 Panel