#this is very long but very worth it trust

[starcurtain]

A Look at Ratio and Aventurine... and Ratio/Aventurine

I was morally obligated to use this picture.

Anyway, I got an ask about my understanding of Ratio and Aventurine's relationship both in canon and as a ship that I have been holding on to for a while now because... phew, there's like... a lot to talk about there... But I felt I should at least give it a try, so here is my attempt to comment on the intersection of two of Star Rail's most complicated personalities. Long post is longgggg; you have been warned.

First, Aventurine's canon relationship to Ratio:

In the interest of not hitting tumblr's image limit, let's just throw out some of the information we have in one go:

It's pretty complimentary. (Yet somehow...)

The implication of the infamous "Keeping Up with Star Rail" video is that Ratio understands Aventurine better than anyone else, and Aventurine knows this. At the very least, putting all shipping aside, Ratio is the person who can explain Aventurine's behaviors best. He's the person Aventurine chooses do so. This suggests significantly more knowledge of each other's lives than the game first led us to believe.

Other people (read as: my GOAT Owlbert) perceive respect from Aventurine to Ratio, and although I read them as a bit sarcastic, the 2.1 mission logs not only repeatedly confirm that Aventurine views Ratio as smart and reliable, but that Ratio is reliable "as always," again indicating a longer and closer history of collaboration than we get to actively see in game. The devs were working hard to tell us "Penacony isn't Ratiorine's first rodeo," which is interesting--given Topaz's voiceline recommending the Trailblazer avoid working with Aventurine whenever possible, we're led to believe through 2.0 and 2.1 that not many people will willingly work with Aventurine more than once, let alone many times.

While going through psychological scrutiny from the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come his Harmony-infused self, the "Future" Aventurine suggests that Ratio and Aventurine are quite similar, and that Aventurine puts a surprising amount of trust in Ratio, to be willing to hinge such a dangerous plan on something as untested as Ratio's ability to act. At the very least, Aventurine's own psyche is pondering on Ratio and whether or not their connection has any emotional meaning.

But despite all this evidence suggesting Ratio and Aventurine spend significantly more time with each other than we get to see in game, Aventurine's own thoughts cast strong doubt on whether he and Ratio are actually close.

Aventurine's "About Dr. Ratio" voice line suggests that Aventurine believes Ratio does not particularly like him. He seems to think that Ratio would prefer to stay away from IPC operations where possible, and it's "unfortunate" for Ratio to be stuck with Aventurine as a conversation partner. He's tolerated, rather than enjoyed. His overall impression seems to be that Ratio mostly views them as distant coworkers.

When the "Future" Aventurine suggests Ratio did not betray Aventurine willingly, actual Aventurine immediately pushes back:

(Personally I'm on the fence about whether this was real doubt or just a ploy to continue sussing out Sunday; see my other post about this scene for some more thoughts.)

But if we take this statement to be played straight, it implies that Aventurine doesn't fully believe Ratio will side with him, even (maybe especially) in dire circumstances. If this statement is real doubt, then despite considering Ratio the person who best understands him, despite building an entire life or death gamble around Ratio's loyalty... Aventurine still doesn't think Ratio even likes him.

Aventurine's not stupid or blind, so theoretically he should be able to read the situation better than that. But actually, there's plenty of evidence both in the game and outside it to suggest that Aventurine is not the most accurate judge of his own relationships to others and is a down-right terrible judge of his own worth as a person.

"Future" Aventurine suggests that one of Aventurine's deep inner flaws--the truths that he rejects about himself--is a massive inferiority complex. This is backed up well by the mission text, where Aventurine's thoughts about himself spiral into self-harm, and the scene in the maze, where "Future" Aventurine taunts our Aventurine with the unforgettable fact that his entire life was only worth pennies:

There's also pretty consistent self-deprecation, with both "Future" and real Aventurine noting several times that he's a pathetic mess of a person that other people don't trust or like.

The overall impression 2.0-2.1 left me with is that Aventurine is perfectly capable of respecting and caring for others, but virtually incapable of accepting other people genuinely respecting and caring for him.

Part of this seems to stem from the directly-stated sense that he's a failure whose only worth is in transactional exchanges, using and being used by others (there's so many layers to this--internalized racism even), but I also suspect that much of his inability to accept genuine connection from others is defensive behavior.

Aventurine's true self, Kakavasha, is deeply hidden away, like the ghost of the child that manifests from his Harmony delusion in the Dreamscape. Although Aventurine clings to that person, claiming that he has "never changed," he actively coats over his beliefs, his kindness, and his authenticity with the mask of a "cavalier gambler," with glitz and glamor and showy distractions. No one gets to see Kakavasha. No one gets to know him, because being buried deep in the dirt is the only way to remain untouchable, and fiercely keeping one's distance is the only safe bet. (For both Kakavasha and any fools who would doom themselves by daring to care for him.)

So: Canon is telling us that Ratio is one of, if not the, closest people in the world to Aventurine. But canon is also telling us that that still means absolutely nothing at all, because Aventurine won't let himself be close to anyone living.

Aventurine's senses of self-worth, trust, attachment, and safety have been warped so badly by ongoing and untreated trauma and mental health issues that, at least until the end of 2.1, I just don't think he was capable of even accepting genuine friendship from Ratio, let alone anything more.

(Interesting side note here: Ratio is actually one of the people Aventurine calls "my friend" the least. He only says it directly to Ratio a single time in all of their lines of dialogue across 2.0 and 2.1, and even then, does so only when right outside Sunday's door, while almost certainly being spied upon by the Family. Anyone who knows how often "my friend" is peppered into Aventurine's dialogue otherwise should know that the absence of the phrase is actually pretty telling. It almost feels like canon Aventurine's not even sure he can call Ratio his friend, at least to Ratio's face.)

Which makes Ratio's canon relationship to Aventurine quite sad and ironic:

From start to finish, Ratio canonically esteems Aventurine more highly than almost any other character in the game. I'm not even talking about shipping when I say that there is no character Ratio is closer to in the entire game.

At present, Ratio has only four voice lines about other characters, and of those four, Aventurine's is the only one that isn't someone from the Genius Society. The only one. Ratio's voice lines are also notably, uh, not very complimentary. Herta is "talented but not helpful to others" and "sees no one as her equal" (read as: she's self-absorbed). Screwllum is a "monarch, rather than a genius" (with the vague implications of being a tyrant), and Ruan Mei is overly ambitious and "fooling everyone."

Meanwhile, Aventurine is "our man" (who is "our" Ratio? who?) whose success "can't all be chalked up to luck," implying that part of Aventurine's success must come from skill. Ratio notes that Aventurine questions his own ability... but as far as Ratio's evaluation goes, he seems to doubt that Aventurine will ever experience a downfall. For someone who thinks 99% of the people he meets are mediocre failures scrambling around in the filth of existence, to be recognized as skilled and unlikely to fail is quite obviously glowing praise.

Then, of course, there are numerous moments that echo Aventurine's hints, implying that Ratio spends significantly more time with Aventurine than we see on-screen, that he knows Aventurine extremely well, and, although he tries (vainly) to pretend he isn't, he's clearly quite concerned with what Aventurine thinks of him.

Especially this last one. "No wonder that gambler likes you so much" is pretty intentional on the devs' part, confirming that Ratio and Aventurine are having off-screen conversations we players are not privy to, which obviously would indicate a closer relationship than the in-game cutscenes could cover.

Then, Trailblazer has the option to flat out ask Ratio to "rate" Aventurine. (Star Rail ship bait is not even subtle.)

At first, this line might read as all over the place:

"The bosses say we're partners but I wouldn't say that" -> Read as: Ratio wants people to know how their relationship is classified but doesn't want to admit to being actually invested.

"I see myself as the teacher to everyone I meet" -> Read as: Ratio at least pretends that he doesn't view anyone as his equal; everyone is either above him--geniuses--or below him--students.

"Aventurine is not that bad of a student" -> High praise; even Ratio can't pretend Aventurine's untalented.

"Actually, Aventurine's probably in metaphysical danger" -> Read as: Ratio is aware of the "void" Aventurine is experiencing and his mental struggles.

The ultimate takeaway of Ratio's "rating" actually says more about Ratio than Aventurine. When it comes down to it, Ratio's choice to answer this question for the Trailblazer instead of dismiss it tells us that Ratio has spent time quantifying and trying to define his relationship with Aventurine, is willing to at least discuss that relationship with other people (when we have no evidence he ever discusses any other personal/non-academic matters with anyone), and that Ratio pays attention to Aventurine's mental states.

Canon Ratio is not beating the allegations, I'm afraid.

But actually, I think the biggest tell about Ratio's canon relationship to Aventurine is that Ratio's behavior completely changes the moment Aventurine appears in the game.

In every single one of Ratio's other appearances, two facts are hammered home again and again:

First, Ratio hates interacting with fools and "noisy" people. He wears his plaster bust so that he doesn't even have to see them. Canonically, we're informed by both March 7th and Argenti that Ratio brought and was wearing his headpiece in Penacony. Curiously though...

The players never see it throughout 2.X--probably because 90% of Ratio's scenes are with Aventurine, and Ratio is never shown wearing his bust on screen with Aventurine--even in their very first meeting in the Final Victor lightcone. Aventurine clearly knows of the bust, but despite Ratio verbally going on and on about how Aventurine is the most "flashy" and "devoid of logic" person Ratio knows... the devs deliberately send their message: Ratio has chosen not to cut himself off from Aventurine.

Aventurine can be more "clamorous" than a screaming peacock, but Ratio will still not put up walls against him. This isn't accidental. The devs had every opportunity in the world to go the opposite route and make jokes about Ratio refusing to take the bust off in Aventurine's obnoxious presence; instead they decided that Ratio apparently has a glaring, Aventurine-shaped exception to his "I don't want to perceive you fools or be perceived by you" life rule.

This "willing to tolerate shenanigans only if Aventurine is involved" behavior continues basically throughout all of Penacony's plot. In 2.3 for example, if you turn around and talk to Ratio again on the Radiant Feldspar, he flat out says:

But there's no actual explanation for why he's there in the first place. He mentions he was assigned to watch over "the IPC's ambassadors," which theoretically should apply to Jade and Topaz, yet we never see him interacting with them in any capacity. He's never even shown in the same room as Jade or Topaz, and he's not shown doing any other form of business for the IPC on the Feldspar either. Theoretically, he could have been on the Feldspar to meet regarding the Divergent Universe... except Screwllum wasn't there yet, and Ratio doesn't mention a single word about the Divergent Universe to the Trailblazer.

The only person Ratio talks about in his dialogue on the Feldspar is Aventurine, and the only non-Trailblazer he talks to in 2.3 at all is also Aventurine, replying to him and only him in the group chat.

He looked like he might give it a shot to try to befriend Boothill and Argenti at the end of 2.3... but immediately changes his mind and leaves without saying a word to them.

It's not really a stretch to suggest that the only reasonable excuse for Ratio to attend the party on the Feldspar was if he was there for Aventurine, a behavior that he himself notes is out of character. ("A waste of time" he says, as he stands there anyway.)

But, second and even more importantly: Ratio's single most defining character trait is that he believes people need to pick themselves up. The entire point of his debut appearance in the game was to present his philosophy that if the powerful or privileged intervene to continually "save" the mediocre, ordinary people will never learn for themselves or get the chance to grow. It is in times of desperation, he says, that fools exceed their limits and reach greatness.

This is why, in 1.6, he insisted on Asta and the Trailblazer being the ones to solve the attacks happening on the space station, without relying on Screwllum or the other geniuses. Although Ratio did actively intervene a little (using the phase flame to save the researchers from death), he did so only from behind the scenes, where his actual help would not be noticed by those affected and where it had no impact on their decision-making or their struggles to solve the mystery.

He let Asta and the Trailblazer panic. He let them flounder. He even deliberately misled them at points, claiming that Duke Inferno must have kidnapped the researchers (when it was actually Ratio himself who re-routed them).

Ultimately, Ratio let Asta and the Trailblazer grow from their experiences.

This is also why he lets the Trailblazer go blazing in to fight Ruan Mei's faux emanator of the propagation, despite knowing that Trailblazer was not actually strong enough to win. Ratio watched and was ready to intervene... but in the end he did not, because it was the Trailblazer's fight to lose.

Ratio's most defining character trait is that he believes standing back and observing is the true kindness, rather than inserting oneself and denying people their autonomy or opportunities to grow.

Buttttt... then there's Aventurine, and suddenly the story is completely different.

Suddenly, Ratio isn't an observer but becomes essential to the plan. He's even walking around making big claims about being the manager of the task, flexing all of his C+ acting ability to actively carry out their mutual ploy.

In 2.3, he claims he was just there to watch, and his Penacony sticker asserts he's only "a supporting character"--yet we have never seen Ratio take a more active role in the entire game. Unlike with the Trailblazer in 1.6, he's not primarily watching events unfold from shadowy corners. He's in Penacony as Aventurine's active partner in crime.

And, even more telling--he later jeopardizes their entire mission just to ask if Aventurine needs help.

What? Huh? The character who is famous for the voice line "You look distressed. Is something troubling you? If so, you can figure it out for yourself" is suddenly offering his assistance entirely unprompted?

The guy whose motto might as well be:

Is suddenly out here throwing his own core philosophy out the window to solve Penacony's mystery for Aventurine and save him from himself in Aventurine's hour of greatest need?

A lot of people get hung up on the second half of Ratio's letter, the part about staying alive, which of course is very sweet. But I think the second half causes people to forget that the first part of Ratio's letter is, quite literally, the answer to Penacony's mystery.

Ratio gave Aventurine the answer.

This is like if your professor just gave you and you alone the score key to the final exam and then turned around to insist he "doesn't play favorites."

Of course, Aventurine is brilliant and didn't need Ratio's answer about dormancy, which makes the fact that Ratio went out of the way to give it to him even more odd. Ratio despises unnecessary repetition. If he wasn't dead worried, he would never have given Aventurine an answer that Aventurine had the power to find on his own.

And, as far as canon tells us, Ratio has never done this for anyone else.

The difference is night and day. It's literally the Gordon Ramsay meme, with everyone else in the entire game being the "fucking donkeys" to Aventurine's "Oh dear. Gorgeous."

So: Even if we entirely put aside shipping, if we look strictly at what we're given in canon:

Ratio treats Aventurine with more respect than he treats most other characters in the game.

He involves himself in Aventurine's struggles in a way that he flat out refuses to do for anyone else.

He compromises his own beliefs purely out of concern for Aventurine.

So, at least as far as we've been shown in canon, it is accurate to state that Aventurine is the closest character to Ratio--and unlike Aventurine (king of self-gaslighting), Ratio isn't even good at acting like he doesn't care.

Frankly, the whole thing is a little sad. Ratio's behavior is so blatantly out of character that a smart person like Aventurine should easily be able to determine it is genuine, but Aventurine's personal hang-ups and ongoing trauma make it difficult for him to even see that authenticity, let alone put faith in it. Even in canon, Ratio is mostly unable to help himself when it comes to Aventurine, which is especially unfortunate given how badly skewed Aventurine's perception of himself and others is by the start of Penacony's story.

PHEW! I finally made it through canon content!

Now there's just... everything else... 🫠

Well, to be honest, I don't think I could ever manage to put all my thoughts about this ship into one post. Probably not even fifty posts.

So rather than trying to say everything there is to say about Ratiorine, what I want to focus on is how fantastically these two characters just fit together. Like puzzle pieces that need to be mirror opposites in order to link, these two characters parallel each other while also perfectly filling in each other's voids. It's some of the best character pair writing I've seen in a long time (though I'm still sort of convinced it was at least 50% sheer luck on Hoyo's part), and my perspective on their ship can really be tied to my underlying perception of Ratio and Aventurine's characters as remarkably similar individuals:

It's obvious that Aventurine is not a healthy or well-adjusted adult man, but like... neither is Ratio.

Both of these characters are "not quite right" marginalized people who, at least in my interpretation, have essentially given up on even faking normality and are now just vaguely play acting their way through being functioning members of a universe that is entirely unequipped to accept them for who they are. In a world full of cyborg cowboys and people with wings growing from their heads, the game still manages to somehow convince us that Aventurine and Ratio are odd ones out.

Kakavasha can't even exist in the dystopian capitalist hellscape of the IPC's machinations. "Aventurine" isn't even a real person, just a never-ending performance, a slick, devil-may-care persona without a single ounce of substance.

Ratio, meanwhile, is a world of one, rejected from the only place he thought he could find validation and acceptance but unable to lower himself to fit in anywhere else.

Aventurine is so bad at making genuine connections that he turns everyday conversations into gambles because he doesn't believe people will care enough to keep talking to him without tangible incentive.

Ratio's insistence on treating everyone as students, not as equals, also means he has an excuse to never emotionally engage with anyone he meets. (This is not at all a textbook method of intentional avoidance to prevent any chance of social rejection. Not at all.)

At the end of the day, Aventurine and Ratio both come across as desperately lonely, and so caught up in their own situations that they really don't have the ability to climb out of that hole on their own.

Preventing them from even being able to maintain any form of relationship is also the fact that neither one of them can even find justification. Neither one of them has a reasonable answer to the question "Why am I alive?" anymore, because Aventurine's reason died on Sigonia and Ratio's reason died with an IPC invitation instead of a Genius Society letter. Though their differing perspectives have led them on opposite paths pursuing their own answers to that ultimate question of "Why should I keep living?" (Aventurine was headed toward giving up before the end of Penacony, while Ratio has invented an immeasurable, impossible goal to distract himself from feeling purposeless), both of them are pretty much miserably unfulfilled in their current lives.

They're also both violently allergic to emotional vulnerability and to having any of their flaws or true desires actually be perceived. Both of them put up insanely high walls. Aventurine pushes boundaries with everyone he meets to provoke their hatred in advance, before they can come to disdain him for his "real" flaws. He acts out harmful racist stereotypes to use others' preconceptions for advantage, manipulating every situation he's in--incidentally affirming the stereotypes against his people by doing so.

Ratio puts a physical wall of plaster between himself and others, but the plaster bust actually doesn't have anything on the mental and emotional gymnastics he's engaged in to justify his isolation from the world, doing everything in his power to convince himself that he's isolated by choice, that it's perfectly logical for Veritas Ratio to have nowhere to truly belong, no one to truly belong with. He's so mundane after all. Of course the geniuses don't want him, that's just commonsense. But everyone else is so... different, so foolish, so illogical... It just wouldn't be reasonable of him to try to become one of them either, to be their friend instead of their distant educator. (You know, if you never try to integrate with others, then they can't reject you. Ratio has learned his lesson.)

Somehow, Aventurine and Ratio are two of the most competent and successful people in Star Rail's entire universe and simultaneously also two of the most misfit, reject, dysfunctional messes in the game. Like... Blade has a better support network than Aventurine and Ratio combined. The 7000-pound murderous mech with a disabled, genetically-modified war veteran who never got to live a normal human life hiding inside it is more capable of making friends than Aventurine and Dr. Ratio.

Which is why I love that the devs decided to make their canon backstory: "Some absolute treasures in the IPC and the Intelligentsia Guild had the galaxy-brained idea of pairing Ratio and Aventurine as strategic partners." The game's writing really said: "These two characters are so socially stunted, they have to be assigned a relationship like it's homework."

They may not have it all figured out yet, but the fans see the design: Now that Ratio and Aventurine have each other, they're not alone anymore. I have never seen two characters better fit the "Is anyone going to match my freak?" meme only for the actual answer to be "Yes."

Ratio is "plays chess with himself" levels of loner weird? No problem--Aventurine is "Wanna take bets on who's going to die today?" weirder. Ratio wears a plaster bust to ward off idiots? Aventurine transforms into a monster on command, which is pretty much guaranteed to achieve the same effect.

Ratio wasn't chosen by Nous? That's fine, Aventurine's one job as a "chosen one" was to save his people and now they're all dead. Nobody can keep up with Ratio in conversation? Watch a single comment from Aventurine turn him into a fumbling mess on live television.

Ratio's inability to relate to the experiences and development of any peers his own age have left him extremely isolated and with a permanently scarred sense of self-worth? Wow, I wonder if Aventurine knows exactly what that feels like.

They just... fit.

And, changing focus a little here at the end: While I personally think that recovery from trauma requires internal motivation and self-kindness foremost, I also think that Ratio and Aventurine's relationship should be considered from the perspective of how they help to fill each other's gaps.

Unlike any connection at the Genius Society who will always evoke unpleasant memories of Nous's rejection, Aventurine isn't going to make Ratio feel intellectually inferior. Aventurine has nothing but good things to say about Ratio's intelligence, and it's even apparent that Ratio felt comfortable enough to at least mention his Genius Society woes to Aventurine, something he explicitly does not do with anyone else.

Even when it comes to social interactions, Aventurine isn't going to make Ratio feel inadequate, because honestly? Aventurine's almost as bad at them as Ratio. Aventurine is much better at faking it socially, but when it actually counts? When he's trying to be real with others? A solid 70% of the people who meet Aventurine still end up wanting to strangle him. The guy tried to apologize for threatening to detonate the Trailblazer like a bomb by buying them a model train...

Then there's this:

Aventurine is the only character explicitly called Ratio's equal in game, and more than just treating him respectfully as an equal, Aventurine also exhibits one extreme appeal that no one else in game has ever shown to Ratio: Aventurine makes Ratio feel needed. For Aventurine, Ratio is not a forgettable after-thought as he is to Herta and most of the other geniuses. He's not just "some weird guy who scolds me about school" like he is to the Trailblazer. Ratio's intellect and skill were integral to Aventurine's plan from step one to the very end. Ratio has a place in Aventurine's plots. For a character who directly assesses worth by how beneficial a person can be to others, the fact that Aventurine can make Ratio feel wanted and valued probably produced some of the strongest personal fulfillment Ratio has had in years.

On the opposite side, Ratio's in a unique position. Out of every relevant character in Aventurine's story, Ratio is the only one who has nothing to lose by choosing Kakavasha over "Aventurine." Ratio doesn't profit off Aventurine or take any expensive gifts from him, like the Trailblazer does. He doesn't need Aventurine's luck for anything at all. He'd be able to work for the IPC even if Aventurine wasn't in it. Ratio certainly doesn't want the glitz and glamour of a shallow gambling hustler persona. His work doesn't require Aventurine's continued involvement like Topaz's and Jade's does. He'd probably prefer not to know any Stonehearts at all, thank you for asking.

Outside of deliberate-acting insults about Sigonians for Sunday's sake, we're not told that Ratio has any connections to--and therefore has no preconceived biases against--Sigonians. Being a person who values self-determination and a refusal to live in mediocrity above all else, he would have nothing but esteem for how far Aventurine has managed to come despite the harsh circumstances of his life. Ratio probably wouldn't even think Aventurine's belief in Gaiathra is that strange; one of Ratio's doctorates is actually in theology.

Unlike literally everyone else in the universe who needs "Aventurine," we have every indication that Ratio's respect and admiration will only grow when he finally gets to meet "Kakavasha."

Loneliness, rejection, betrayal, a lack of understanding from others--all of these can leave wounds that only genuine, deep bonds with others can heal.

On death's doorway, in the darkest shadow, when Aventurine had to make the choice between passing on to be with the family that loved him and choosing to return to a reality without them... Ratio's letter was there, telling Aventurine the exact thing he needed to hear to choose life: Someone is waiting for you to come home.

If the resounding rejection of Star Rail's Nihility is belief in humanity's power to make meaning in our own lives through our connections to others, then the ultimate message of Ratio and Aventurine's arc in Penacony is that no one needs to be alone. The world is not as empty as you fear.

And that is a message that Ratio and Aventurine can learn best through each other.

(I just... love them so much...)

[lovelynim]

May the best one win

Genshin Impact - Xiao, Aether, Albedo and Wanderer

A/N: First things first, I want to thank @eliankrios for his support, patience and - above all that - his trust. This is my first big project in a good while and I think (and hope) that I managed to do a good job so... yeah.

I'm not really used to larger fics, but before I noticed, I was already reaching the word count. This was trully a ride, hahah. Anyway, I hope you enjoy this, my dear, faithful customer!

Summary: One day away from starting the next cycle of his journey, why not gather a few friends - and a special person - to hang together?

Word count: 6605 words

Aether sat down and placed a bunch of letters on top of his desk, spreading them out in a fan. He couldn’t help but feel the expectation building up inside him, hoping for a positive outcome.

A couple weeks ago, Aether decided to promote some sort of gathering with his friends. A little farewell party before heading out to the next cycle of his adventure - after all, who knows for how long he will be away in Natlan?

So, with this thought in mind, Aether used his bestest writing to invite the ones he held dear over. Delivering the letters across all the continents he visited so far was a tough task, but Aether knew it would be worth the effort. Not only his friends, but he was also inviting him over, so of course he had to do each and every thing in his reach to make it work.

Back to the present, the replies to his invitations began to arrive, one after the other. The different seals in each stamp showed where they were from: Mondstadt, Liyue, Inazuma, Sumeru and Fontaine. Aether sighed, picking up the first one and carefully ripping it open.

His eyes scanned over the words written down, beaming with excitement with the positive answer by the foot of the page. A sense of relief and happiness filled his heart by the time he opened the second letter. And the third… well, the traveler pouted, maybe not everything would work out, after all. The fourth and fifth balanced each other out: both answers surprised Aether as they came as the completely opposite of what he had anticipated.

So far, Albedo, Xiao and Wanderer agreed to come over, while Kazuha and Lyney had to decline his request: one thanks to The Crux’s sailing plans and the other to his busy agenda. Still, managing to bring these three, with him included, was enough to fuel Aether’s imagination, dreaming of the day of the gathering.

He looked down at the letters, his mind now wandering to the second matter: what was he going to do with those three together? Thinking about it, would they even get along? Well, surely about was an easier person to be dealt with, but Xiao and Wanderer…

Aether shook his head. He shouldn’t be expecting the worst. What if they ended up enjoying each other's company? Or even became friends? Yes! The traveler stretched out his arms above his head, crossing his hands behind his head as he stared at the Serenitea Pot’s ceiling. He couldn’t wait for the day to come!

…

Well, they were talking to each other, at least. Not in the way Aether expected - or wanted, for that matter - but, still, a conversation, he supposed. 

Clenching his hand around his cup, Aether peeked left and right, hoping to spot any improvement in his guests’ mood. So far, however, Albedo was the only one to be enjoying himself, it seemed. He sighed, a faint voice inside his head already telling this whole meeting was a bad idea.

It’s not like he could say things went downhill from the very start. At first, with just him and Albedo - the first one to arrive -, everything worked out just fine: they had a little chat, Albedo tried out one of his dishes and even complimented Aether on the whole idea. It, indeed, felt like it was about to work out amazingly.

However, it seemed like his plans shattered in front of his very own eyes from the moment his second and third guest arrived - both at the same time, coincidentally. As soon as Xiao and Wanderer landed eyes on each other, animosity and an ominous feeling began to fill the room.

For some unknown reason, they did seem to get along. Aether couldn’t recall a time where they could possibly have interacted before and, being in his right mind, he wouldn’t consider inviting them both together if he knew about any of this - so why do they seem to… hate each other?!

Still, at first, Aether tried to think that it was just his impressions. After all, they wouldn’t be at each other’s throats for the whole night, now, would they?

They would. In fact, they were still at it.

There was no need for words when the two anemo users stared at each other like that, silently threatening their opponent and throwing daggers with their piercing looks. Aether could barely breathe as the tension began to get to him. It felt like they would start to throw punches if Aether took his eyes out of them for a single second!

Suddenly - breaking the silence like a rock thrown at a peaceful lake - Albedo hummed, clearly pleased. “The tea is really good, traveler,” he said, taking the cup away from his lips as he lowered it, “where did you say it came from again?”

Aether’s jaw dropped. ‘My savior’, he thought, coughing to clean up his throat before proudly holding his cup up. “From Fontaine! It might be a bit too sweet, but I really liked it, hehe… I ended up getting a couple more, so drink as much as you want, ‘Bedo!”

“Huh, ‘a bit too sweet’?” Wanderer scoffed, leaning back in his seat and cocking his head to the side, throwing Aether a teasing stare. “You have such a childish taste, traveler. I bet you even added sugar to your cup, didn’t you?”

“A-ahah,” Aether giggled nervously, blushing slightly. He indeed added an extra sugar cube… “Well, I just-”

“You don’t have to drink it if you don’t like it,” Xiao interrupted drily, his arms crossed in front of his chest while his brows furrowed. Uh oh. “Aether had all the trouble in preparing it for us. It’s rude to complain like that.”

“X-Xiao, it’s not that ser-”

“So what? Why are you even hurting in his place?” Wanderer snapped back defiantly, barely shifting in his place if not for his head tilting back - moving it just to look down at Xiao.

This was bad. Really, really bad. Aether looked left and right, trying to utter something to ease the tension, but ending up just getting interrupted before managing to utter anything. He didn’t even know if he should step in at that point - what if they thought he was taking a side? Even worse, what if they wanted him to take a side?!

While Aether lost himself in a flurry of thoughts, with one idea running over the other, Xiao and Wanderer continued their ‘little’ bickering, getting more and more flared up with each other.

“You should show proper respect to your host - especially if it’s someone as Aether,” Xiao hissed, leaning forward in his seat as if ready to jump at Wanderer’s face within the next seconds. 

Still, the other guy didn’t seem like he was planning to back down. “I can talk to him however I want. We are friends and he doesn’t mind. Why should I listen to you?”

“Apologize to the traveler. Now.”

“Or what, Yaksha?” Wanderer grinned. “Want to take it outside? I can b-”

Clap!

“Ahem.”

The two stopped, widening their eyes in surprise and turning their attention to Albedo, who still had his hands together. He also managed to call Aether’s attention, who watched him with expectant eyes - almost as if begging him for a solution. Someone as smart as him surely could come up with something, right?

“I didn’t plan to step in, but it doesn’t seem like you two will figure it out peacefully,” he sighed, his eyes scanning the room from one side to the other, making eye contact with Xiao and, then, with Wanderer. “Am I right?”

The two guys looked away, one puffing out his cheeks while the other clicked his tongue. Why did it feel like he was dealing with two kids..?

“He started it,” Xiao mumbled, saddened to see how distressed Aether was at the whole scene. “He was being rude to Aether.”

Wanderer sighed, rolling his eyes, “exactly, to Aether. Not to you. He doesn’t even care, you are the only one complaining.” Just as he finished speaking, Wanderer also shot a glance at Aether’s face and, despite his attempts to conceal his emotions, it was clear that it also bothered him.

However, even when they were aware of the consequences of their bickering, it didn’t seem to be enough to appease the mood. In a blink of an eye, they were about to start the whole discussion all over again.

So, for the second time, Albedo decided to meddle in their fight. “Do you two really wish to fight each other so badly?”

The unfriendly duo huffed, keeping themselves quiet, but clearly agreeing with Albedo’s statement.

“Sure, you can fight, then.”

“A-Albedo?!” Aether gasped, what was he even trying to achieve by allowing such a thing? Did he want to take notes on the results of Xiao and Wanderer’s falling out?! “N-no, you can’t fig-”

“But,” Albedo continued, skilfully capturing the attention of all the people in the room, “to prevent any harm to be done, you’ll have to solve this through a contest. And, whoever wins, gets to be ‘right’ about this matter. Good enough?”

Silence quickly sat in the room. Albedo could be a really mysterious - if not confusing - person when he wanted and, at times like these, it was almost impossible to figure him out. What was he even planning with this ‘contest’?

“Why would I even joi-”

“Fine for me,” Xiao abruptly cut Wanderer’s speech, looking at his possible opponent. “I can do it, no matter what it is.”

Wanderer gritted his teeth, growling quietly as Xiao managed to easily get into his nerves. “Ok, let’s do it. I can’t wait to hear the Yaksha begging for my pardon.”

Albedo smiled, looking at his side to meet Aether’s eyes. “Would you like to join as well, traveler?”

“H-huh? Me?”

“Yes, you can take part in it too,” Albedo nodded. “If you win, then they both shall apologise to each other.”

Aether furrowed his brows slightly, taking the offer in consideration. Certainly, winning on their terms would probably prevent Xiao and Wanderer from getting into another fight so it should be worth the try, right?

“Alright, I’ll join you guys too!” Aether clenched his hands, excited. This was getting interesting. “So, what’s your idea, Albedo?”

“Yeah,” Wanderer added, “what’s the ‘contest’ about?”

“Endurance.”

…

“What?” Xiao, Aether and Wanderer asked, almost in unison. 

Albedo chuckled, taking back his seat and elegantly crossing one knee over the other, ready to start his explanation. “So, the main goal here is to prevent you,” he pointed to Xiao, “and you,” then at Wanderer, “to hurt each other. My proposal, then, is an endurance test. Whoever lasts longer, wins. Simple as that.”

“And how exactly do you plan to test our endurance? Making us run around the house?” Wanderer mumbled, supporting his head on his hand as he looked at Albedo.

“By tickling you,” Albedo said with a smile, contrasting the unsettled faces of the other three. “Whoever takes the longest time to yield, wins.”

It didn’t take long for a pink hue to cover everyone’s faces. While Aether’s eyes widened and his whole body tensed up with a shiver running up his spine, Wanderer looked away, trying to hide his blushing cheeks by pretending to cringe at the idea. Meanwhile, Xiao fiddled in his seat, trying to find courage to face such a trial while telling himself that ‘it was for Aether’.

And, just like that, no one dared to object to the idea - each of them with their own reasons to not do so. “It’s settled then,” Albedo said as he clapped his hands together, his eyes scanning the whole room while a subtle smirk planted itself on his lips. “Is there anyone that would like to go first?”

That question seemed to spark a whole new level of anticipation among the ‘contestants’. Eager eyes shifted back and forth between one and another, trying to read who was going to make the first move.

A sharp inhale, then, directed everyone’s attention to Wanderer. “Fine, I’ll do it. Just get over with this stupid contest already,” he groaned, throwing a deadly glare to the other three as if daring one of them to even lift a finger towards him.

And as expected, his silent threats seemed to do the trick for Aether while, as for the Yaksha, it seemed to make him hesitate - after all, he wouldn’t want to start a fight in front of the traveler again. However, during the few seconds Wanderer occupied himself with keeping an eye on them, Albedo made his move.

“AH!” Wanderer squeaked like a toy, quickly shooting his arms down and pressing them against his body as hard as he could, trying to stop Albedo’s hands from climbing his ribs any further. “Y-you- fuhuck! G-grhrr, I wihill f-fuhucking kihill you!!” He growled, leaning his head back into the chair rest, but further into Albedo’s grasp.

“You’re allowed to laugh, though. I think I forgot to mention that,” Albedo mused, his index fingers poking at different spots in Wanderer’s ribcage, prodding at the little spaces between each bone in search for a sensitive spot that would make him crack. “Just say ‘yellow’ when you can’t take it anymore and I’ll stop, ok? That’s also what will count as ‘yield’.”

“I d-dohon’t need a fu- pfft, d-damn it! A sahahafe word! I’m n-nohot tihihicklish!”

“Whatever helps you sleep at night,” Albedo mocked, digging into the back of Wanderer’s ribs with his thumb. Getting behind him was proving to be awfully convenient for him, he thought while making little notes in his head about Wanderer’s ticklish spots.

It was a sight to behold, from Aether’s and Xiao’s point of view. Albedo made touching someone like Wanderer seem easy, even casual, completely tickling his way through the threats and curses. 

“You’re pretty ticklish here, right?”

“N-NOhohoh!! G-gehehet off, ahAHAH!!” 

If it weren’t for the fact that they were up next in the line to get that treatment, it would be a pretty amusing scene to watch. As expected of Albedo, it seemed that every tweak of his fingers, every poke and every stroke were planned, calculated. Wanderer didn’t stand a chance as no matter what direction he arched or twisted his body, Albedo would already have his hands ready to welcome him with more tickles there. “Yohohou jehEHEHerk!! It tihihickles!”

Albedo simply scoffed a laugh and continued with the ‘contest’s trial’, his digits kneading at Wanderer’s lowest set of ribs. “Of course it does, that’s my goal.” 

But despite how hard he tried to make it tickle or how bad Wanderer claimed it to be, he was still not yielding - which meant it wasn’t time for Albedo to stop or let him go yet. A small pout took place in his lips while he pondered if he should try a different spot or, maybe, look around Aether’s place for a quill or a brush?

Then, feeling the gazes of his audience upon him and the current contestant, a different idea popped up in Albedo’s mind. Right, why didn’t he consider asking for some helping hands before?

“Would you like to join us?” Albedo suggested, cocking his head to the right while one of his hands managed to sneak under Wanderer’s arm, managing to tickle the smooth skin with the tip of his digits even with Wanderer clasping his arms down as hard as he possibly could. “Oh, did I hit a good spot?” He mused, looking down to the one squirming in his grip.

“NOHohohoh!! I-it’s ahAHAHahwful!!” Wanderer whined, his feet kicking up as he threw himself back in his seat, hoping to make Albedo lose contact with him, even if it was just for a split of a second. 

Back to the other two, they pondered about Albedo’s offer - after all, that seemed to be a double edged knife: if they did join, that meant Wanderer would also get to join when it was their turn to get tickled? But wouldn’t that also mean they had the chance to make him surrender faster? Well, it was worth the shot, Xiao thought, while Aether only considered that it would make things more fun - and that should be enough to outweigh the cons. 

Wanderer - too busy laughing and squirming in his seat, trying to fend off Albedo’s skilful fingers - barely noticed the two figures walking towards him. Not only that, but it wasn’t like any other sound besides his giggles could make it out of his mouth at that time.

All he could pay attention to was Albedo’s fingers trying to move and wiggle their way further up his torso, still managing to tickle him under his arms even when he tried so hard to protect that spot. Each move sent that awful signal that made him want to smile and laugh through his nerves and straight into his brain, over and over. 

He wasn’t even human, so why was he so sensitive?

Suddenly, that and other inquiries that crossed his mind lost all the room they had inside Wanderer’s mind. With his eyes still pressed shut, he could only feel - as focused for a brief moment - that Albedo’s hands managed to… multiply? Wait, that didn’t make any sense. If he was tickling his armpits, then who the hell was holding him down by his waist?

Oh.

“W-wahahait!! I didn’t sahahay you’d gehehet to join!” Wanderer whined, pulling his knees up close to his stomach as his in a vain attempt of stopping Aether from joining in. “GeEHEhet ahaway frohohom me!!”

“Stop squirming,” Xiao groaned coldly, grabbing one of his ankles and forcing him to stretch out his leg, “Albedo said we could join. You weren’t already thinking of yielding, were you?”

“Don’t be mean to him, Xiao,” Aether said, but didn’t complain about the extra room Xiao provided him. His fingers roamed freely, wiggling over Wanderer’s lower sides and stomach.

“YOHOHOU!! AHahAHaha, y-you suhuhuck!” Wanderer laughed, scrunching up his shoulders and thrashing his head left and right.

Albedo tickling his armpits and ribs from behind, Aether playing with his middle like an instrument and that stupid Yaksha holding his legs down. This couldn’t possibly have gone any worse, Wanderer thought while a wide, careless smile bloomed into his face.

“Tickle tickle tickle! ~” Aether cooed, repetitively poking Wanderer around his navel, circling his stomach and even going down to tease his sides as well. “I think I’m better than Albedo at tickling you, won’t you agree?”

“That’s bold coming from you, traveler,” Albedo snapped back, “I would say he is barely feeling your hands.”

It was hard to even process what was happening around him. Wanderer’s body mostly moved out of reflex, barely having room to ponder about his actions. He arched his back, tried to kick his feet up and even twist his torso, swatting his hands at any ‘threat’ within his reach. “S-stohohop it!! Y-yohou ahHAHare all s-so- aHAHaha, so l-lahahame!”

If this was how things went, Wanderer could probably achieve a decent score with much effort. However, there was a missing piece that he failed to notice: Xiao. The Yaksha, while keeping Wanderer’s legs held down, watched the whole scene carefully and plotted his strategy - the main goal was to defeat him, after all. Why show him any mercy?

“I tohohold you to stahAHAHAH!!”

Aether and Albedo widened their eyes as his laughter soon rose a pitch. Maybe even two. To their surprise, the ‘best tickler’ wasn’t Aether nor Albedo, but Xiao. “This is the weak spot,” Xiao muttered, his eyes coldly staring at Wanderer’s laughing face. He kept one of his legs outstretched while, with his free hand, he squeezed the spot just above Wanderer’s knee, sending him into hysterics.

Simple. Effective. Even a bit cruel, if you asked Wanderer. The tickling from Albedo and Aether even slowed down a bit, but Wanderer’s laugh only seemed to grow more and more frantic.

“NOHOHOH MOHOHOREHEH!! AHAHAhah, f-fiHIHIHINE! AHAH ~” He whined, desperately trying to pull his leg out of Xiao’s grip, “Y-YEHEHEHELLOW!! StahAHAH-”

Clap.

Xiao lifted his eyes from Wanderer’s to Albedo’s face. The alchemist had a pleased smile on his face while holding his hand out in front of his chest. 

“A-ahah… ah… y-you freheheak…” Wanderer cursed through tired giggles, his body going limp on top of his seat. His disheveled hair sticking to his forehead while his chest waved, trying to catch up his breath.

“Well, that wraps up our first round,” Albedo explained.

A cocky smirk took place in Xiao’s lips as he looked down at his main opponent, almost as if mocking him. Meanwhile, Aether’s eyes opened wide, beaming with excitement and anticipation - as that was probably what would wait for him. “H-how long was it, ‘Bedo?”

“I can’t say it yet, traveler,” he chuckled, “I don’t want anyone trying to push themselves beyond their limit just because of a silly game. So, let’s just stick with the rules for now, yes?” With that said, Albedo slowly walked around the chair, letting Wanderer rest while looking at Xiao and Aether, “should I decide who is going next, now?”

If it weren’t for Wanderer’s heavy breathing, the room would have been engulfed by silence again. However, just as Albedo was about to say something else, his attention shifted from the pair of “upcoming contestants” to the one next him. “Wanderer, what are you-”

“The Yaksha is going next,” Wanderer said as he got up, walking towards Xiao with bloodlust in his eyes. Did he really remember the goal of this contest was to not use violence?! “Come here!”

“G-get away from me!” Xiao groaned, trying to step back just to be tackled down into the soft carpet. Before Aether or Albedo could express their concern, Wanderer was already… tickling him. “S-stohop it! I dohon’t want y-you to doho it!” Xiao whined, kicking up his feet and swatting his hands at Wanderer's in a rather careless manner - it was not like he would bother himself with trying to not hurt him by accident.

Wanderer, with a wicked grin spreading over his face, continued to knead into Xiao's sides, determined to break him into laughter as soon as possible. “What do you mean? You wanted someone else to tickle you, you freak?” He mocked, pushing his hands away before dig into his lower stomach.

“S-shuhut it!! This ihihis nohohothing!” Xiao laughed out loud, caught off guard by the sudden change of spots. A faint blush began to spread over his face as he realized Aether had been watching him all this time. “I c-cahan tahahake it,” he boasted, almost as if trying to impress the traveler.

Wanderer, however, wasn't going to let that slide off easily - he was also one of the contestants, after all. “Suit yourself, Yaksha,” he muttered, half annoyed by Xiao's stubbornness, half amused by the whole situation.

Xiao was fighting not only one battle, but two. One to restrain himself from laughing, to make that revengeful tickling a bit more bearable and last the longest among them - or, at least, longer than Wanderer. The second was to maintain a collected image in front of Aether - the one he was ‘fighting’ for. It was just a childish, stupid game, not something that could beat a Yaksha. It was just tickling - he could, and would, take it, yes. 

“I-ihihit’s useless!” Xiao mumbled through gritted teeth, trying to mock Wanderer’s attempts to crack him up. “Yohohou are teheherrible at this!”

And as much as he would hate to admit, seeing Xiao taking it so well was starting to get on Wanderer's nerves. He tried tickling his sides and ribs, scratching his stomach and even pinch his waist, but couldn’t find a spot that really worked: all he could get from Xiao was those quiet, annoyed chuckles. “It doesn’t sound like you agree with that, Yaksha.”

“Are they always this competitive?” Albedo muttered to Aether with a surprised smile on his face, unable to do anything but be amused by the whole scene. “I didn’t expect they would take it so seriously.”

“W-well, they never hung together before,” Aether chirped, scratching the back of his head in surprise. At least no one was getting hurt and they were… enjoying themselves? Having fun? Something like that, he thought. “But I think it’s a good thing they… are sort of getting alo-”

“Hey, you two,” Wanderer groaned with a frown, “aren’t you going to help me as well? Or did you suddenly decide to not get involved?”

“H-hah, I knehehew you cohohouldn’t do it b-by yohohourself,” Xiao taunted again, a confident smirk taking space in his lips amidst the restrained giggles. He, however, kept a tight grip around Wanderer’s wrists, limiting a good amount of his moves. “You ahahare not up fohor the tahask!”

“Shut it, Yaksha,” Wanderer groaned, growing frustrated. He moved his head left and right, switching his attention between Xiao and the other duo, “I’ll make you eat your words, j-just you- ugh, let go,” he hissed, yanking his hands out of Xiao’s wrists before latching them at his sides again, making the latter arch his back and kick his feet as a loud fit of laughter nearly broke through his throat.

Aether and Albedo couldn’t help but to snicker at the scene. Nodding as if in some kind of silent agreement, they decided to join Wanderer’s efforts in making Xiao laugh. 

Albedo first positioned himself behind Wanderer’s, further restraining Xiao’s legs. Despite the whines and protests, he managed to pull off one of his boots and pin his leg into the soft mattress to scribble over the socked sole with his free hand. Albedo’s fingers wiggled upwards, stroking from Xiao’s heel up to his toes.

As for Aether, he took upon himself the task to take care of Xiao’s hands, taking a seat right next to the Yaksha’s head and allowing him to use his lap as a pillow. With a bit of Wanderer’s aid, he managed to pull Xiao’s hands up, exposing more of his torso for Wanderer’s merciless tickles. For some reason, having Aether holding his wrists down was flustering him the most among everything that was happening around him. 

With the ticklish feeling running back and forth all over his body, Xiao thrashed his head, pressing it further into Aether’s lap as he laughed brightly. His free leg kicked and his back arched - his defenses had, indeed, crumbled. Still, the whole point wasn’t to make him laugh, but to make him surrender.

“T-thahAHAH- that’s unfahAHAhair!!” Xiao laughed, a faint red shade covering the whole extent of his cheeks. “L-lehehet go, trahAHAhaveler!” He pleaded, his hands clenched into fists while he desperately tried to pull down his arms, only to have Aether stopping him midway and pinned down again

“Not so cocky now, eh?” Wanderer grinned, his fingers digging into the side of Xiao’s ribs while his thumbs prodded at the spot below his chest, determined to find that spot, that sweet spot that would make Xiao apologize for nagging him. “Tsk, just yield already, stubborn Yaksha,” Wanderer groaned, quickly shooting his hands down to pinch Xiao’s sides, “you are clearly at your limit.”

“It would be wise to not push you to your limits, Xiao,” Albedo said, barely bothering himself to look back at the whole scene as he was too entertained with Xiao’s foot trying to squirm away from his fingers. “If you feel like it, just say the word.”

“I’m doHOHOhon’t neh-HEHEHEH NEEHEHED IT!”

The three sighed, something giving them the feeling that Xiao would rather have his brain melted by the laughter than admit defeat. “Oh, Xiao, why are you always so stubborn?” Aether chuckled, his fingers itching to do a bit more than just holding Xiao down… but, if he were to join, he should pick a good spot - but where?

His eyes roamed from Xiao’s flushed cheeks down to his neck, then up to his ears and to his arms, which were held up next to his head. Oh. Aether smirked, letting go of one of Xiao’s hands and reaching out for his exposed underarm, clawing at it with his free hand. “Come on, Xiao ~ I know it tickles too bad, even for you ~”

Just as expected, Xiao bursted into a louder fit of laughter as soon as Aether joined the efforts into cracking him up. The Yaksha’s banged his free hand against the soft mat underneath him, clenching it into a fist. 

His cheeks and the sides of stomach were hurting from laughing so much and he couldn’t even make some meaning out of the conversation that was happening around him. It tickled so, so bad… Xiao pressed his eyes shut, trying to ignore the tickling, but each second of that electric feeling running all over his body felt an eternity. He couldn’t take it.

“AHAHAHAH, YEHEHELLOW!! YehEHEHEllow, plehehease!!” Xiao barked out among his cackles, turning his laughing face to the side and trying to bury it into Aether’s legs to hide his blushing cheeks. It took his brain some solid seconds to process that the tickling was over and, after all that “torment”, he was free.

“H-hehe, are you ok, Xiao?” Aether hummed, brushing his hand through Xiao’s head and wiping out the little tears that clung to the corner of his eyes.

“Tsk”, Wanderer pouted, totally not jealous of the little aftercare the Yaksha was receiving, “it’s just tickling. What kind of warrior would he be if he can’t take it?”

Albedo chuckled, but spared Wanderer of the reminder that he was the one laughing his head off just moments ago. “Don’t be mean, he did a pretty good job at this round,” he added, sliding off Xiao’s legs, “now… there is only one contestant left, right?”

That comment seemed to switch something inside Wanderer and Xiao’s heads. While Albedo displayed a playful smile, the other two locked their gazes into Aether’s face, one from below and the other in front of him, the latter just a half-a-Xiao away. “A-ahm… wait a second, I-”

“You’re not going back on your word, right?” Wanderer said with a smirk on his lips, already moving off of Xiao’s lap. Before Aether could even think of arguing back, the Yaksha was already sitting back up, staring at him with his golden eyes.

Aether swallowed, already accepting that there would be no way out for him this time. “F-fine, you cahAHA! W-wahahait a second, Xiao!”

“No,” Xiao muttered in a quiet, almost serious voice tone while he shyly pawed at Aether’s exposed sides, kneading into any patch of skin he could reach. 

Truth to be told, Aether would have to deal with both him and Wanderer tickling him from the start if it weren’t for the way Xiao looked at the other two - like a wild animal fighting for its territory. Still, Aether was too busy laughing and trying to defend himself to notice those bits of possessive behavior. “You shouldn’t have agreed to this, traveler,” Xiao hummed, his words as firm as you’d expect from a warrior, but still… gentle somehow. “You’re too ticklish for it, it’s unwise.”

“I wahahanted to try!” Aether giggled, letting himself be handled by the Yaksha and comfortably placed on Xiao’s lap. With one arm around his back, Xiao continued to tickle Aether, smiling fondly as he managed to hang this close to the traveler. “X-Xiahahao,” Aether whimpered, scrunching up his shoulder, “n-not my ehehehar!”

“But I’m not tickling you there, I’m just breathing,” Xiao chuckled, his fingers dancing around Aether’s stomach while he nuzzled his face against the side of Aether’s neck, “I told you, you’re too ticklish for this contest.”

While Xiao insisted on teaching and lecturing Aether about the sensitive spots in his body, Wanderer and Albedo exchanged glances, watching from afar as Aether laughed out brightly. “Doesn’t this count as going too easy on him?” Wanderer pouted, crossing his arms in front of his chest as he sulked against the couch.

“Let him have it,” Albedo sighed with a slight chuckle, “and I’m not talking about the traveler,” he added quietly, making Wanderer arch one of his eyebrows. Well, at least someone in the room knew how to read in between the lines, after all. “Besides, don’t you think you’re taking this competition a little too seriously?”

“What?” Wanderer huffed, entertaining himself with the conversation while Aether’s laughter grew in the background, “do you expect me to compete for the second place? Someone needs to teach that Yaksha his place.”

Albedo laughed, covering his lips with the back of his hand in a charming manner. “Well, if you say so,” he shook his head, returning his attention to Aether - who was already blushing from laughing. For some reason, Xiao was also blushing just as much, if not more, while tickling the traveler.

“Xiahahahao, n-not thehehere!” Aether giggled, tugging at Xiao’s wrists and leaning his head back into Xiao’s shoulder while Xiao pinched and squeezed his waist, prodding at the soft spots just above his hip bones. “I-it tihihihickles too bahahahad!” 

“I-it’s supposed to,” Xiao nodded, resting his chin by the side of Aether’s neck and allowing him to sink deeper into his embrace, “but you’re d-doing quite well, traveler. I expected you to tap out much faster than thi-”

“It’s because you’re going too easy on him,” Wanderer interrupted with a smirk, pushing himself back up into his feet and walking towards the little couple duo. Xiao frowned, too greedy to share his precious traveler with that… guy.

“I know how he likes it,” Xiao snapped, making Aether groan in embarrassment. Did he really need to say that out loud, the traveler thought, but didn’t voice it. “Unlike you, it seems.”

However, against what he expected, Wanderer chuckled at his snark. He shook his head and clicked his lips, almost as if spotting a fatal flaw in Xiao’s method. “That’s the problem. He shouldn’t like it, right? He needs to beg!”

“AHAHAH!!”

Xiao widened his eyes as Aether bursted out in a loud, unrestrained fit of laughter - and only then he realized the traveler was only giggling all this time, and not laughing for real. “He is pretty ticklish all over, all somewhat the same,” Wanderer scoffed, pushing his hands under Aether's arms and clawing at his ribs and the sides of his chest, “you need to go harder or you’re not going to make any progress.”

As much as he hated to admit, Xiao couldn’t deny that Wanderer seem to be… right. Could he actually have been going easy on Aether all this time without notice?

Despite the little bickering happening around him, Aether could only mind the fact that it tickled. Xiao’s gentle, playfully tickles around his stomach and hips made him feel lighthearted, made his heart flutter. Meanwhile, the restless, almost maniac-like touches from Wanderer’s fingers around his ribs made his head spin and even made his chest hurt a little from the lack of air. “A-AHAHAHALBEDO,” Aether cried out, pressing his arms down against his sides as he tried to protect his vulnerable torso from the tickles that seemed to come from all sides, “HEHEHELP MEHEHE! AHAHA!!”

“I can’t,” the alchemist said from the distance, his voice barely audible among the loud cackling, “you didn’t say it yet.”

Right, the word. That word. Aether shook his head, gritting his teeth as he tried to gather strength to say it. “Y-YEHEHE- AHAHAH!! Y-yehehell- hhahAHAH, I CAHAHAN’T!”

“Come on,” Wanderer mocked, “it’s a simple word, how come you can’t do it?”

“I’M TRYHIHING! AHAHAH, PLEHEHEASE!” He whined, shaking his head while tears of mirth clung to his lashes, “Y-YELLOW! YEHEHEHELLOW!”

Wanderer grinned triumphantly and Albedo sighed in relief, but Xiao pouted slightly, feeling like his fun was ruined by that other guy - even though he was still glad he managed to have Aether for himself, even if for just a bit.  

“A-ahahah… o-oh my…” Aether giggled, nearly melting over Xiao as the tickling finally came to halt. His head was spinning and he could swear he almost ascended to Celestia right there and then. “T-thihis was fun, heh…”

“It’s not supposed to be fun, it’s a competition,” Wanderer corrected him, that self-assigned superiority back in his eyes. “Now, alchemist, who wo-”

“Wait,” Aether stopped, shaking his head as if to force himself to recover, “it’s not over yet,” he smiled, taking one last gasp of air to stead his breath. “It’s Albedo’s turn now.”

“What?” Albedo blinked in confusion, pointing to himself with one of his hands as if to emphasize his shock. “But I’m not participating,” he said while letting out a small giggle, trying to hide his nervousness.

“How come?” Wanderer added, reading through Aether’s intentions and deciding to encourage them for once, “it’s only fair you get a turn too, this was all your idea, after all.”

Albedo’s eyebrow twitched slightly while his body leaned back into the couch, the apprehension growing within his chest. “M-my idea to solve your conflicts, I’m not part of the deal. W-what would I even win by beating you?”

“That’s up for you to decide,” Xiao added, standing up again before helping Aether to get back into his feet, “but I agree you should participate.”

Aether looked at Wanderer, at his right, and then at Xiao, at his left. He didn’t expect them to join or support his plan - he only wanted an excuse to tickle Albedo, after all - but this whole ‘contest’ thing seemed to, indeed, have made them closer. “Get ready, ‘Bedo! ~”

“A-Aether!” Albedo gasped, trying to get up in a hurry to evade Aether, but only managing to get a few meters away from the couch before being tackled down by the traveler. “S-stohop!”

“I didn’t even start,” Aether laughed, straddling Albedo’s back before starting to tickle his sides and lower ribs. “Show them how it’s done, ‘Bedo!”

Damn it. Of all the things that could’ve happened, a turn of tables against him - with even Xiao and Wanderer fighting on the same side - was the last one Albedo expected. “Nohoho! I dohohon’t wahahant to pahaharticipate!”

Aether smirked, shaking his head, “too late for that! But don’t worry, I’m rooting for you,” he said, letting out a short giggle while trying to move his fingers towards Albedo’s armpits - an attempt the alchemist promptly blocked, stopping to flail his arms and using them to try to protect his body instead. “You two,” Aether called out, looking over his shoulder, “aren’t you going to join?”

Xiao and Wanderer nodded, walking towards where Albedo had been restrained, “of course, he is the ‘most promising contestant’, after all, “Wanderer commented sarcastically.

“W-wahahait! Yellow! I-I quihihit!”

“That’s not acceptable,” Xiao added in a cold voice tone despite the warm, playful smile on his face, “you’re clearly not being fair with us. You should always give it your all, no matter the circumstances.”

“Nohoho! W-what ahahre you two doin- aHAHAH! H-hehehey, lehehet me go! ~” Albedo laughed, feeling some more weight against his legs before the new sets of fingers began to roam and tickle any spot they could find around his legs. If they were already so determined to tickle him, Albedo didn’t even want to imagine how they would react when they found out that there was no true winner - after all, he had never timed their turns to begin with.

Sigh, at least they seemed  more friendly towards each other now, Albedo thought while trying to sound “genuine” enough in his attempts of yielding between his laughter. This was going to be a long - but fun - night…

[littlemissmentallyunstable]

hi!! I’m very aware that this was requested on the 13th of August, and literally over a month later I’ve finally managed to write it up. I feel unbelievably guilty for not getting it done sooner and I’m sorry it even took this long. I really really hope you enjoy it and I’m ever grateful for the patience 🤍🤍

title: there’s always another mystery

pairing: jameson hawthorne x reader

synopsis: avery kylie grambs is spending a little too much time with your boyfriend than you’d like… but when jameson starts lying about it questions are raised and tension rises until it all bubbles over

warnings: mild swearing, violence, assault

a/n: the synopsis sounds really cringy so forgive me, this fic is kind of long and very dialogue heavy and ermmm… I hope you enjoy the ending ;)

tag list: @bewitchingkisses @whatsamongus @wish-i-were-heather @inmyheaddd @never-enough-novels @sweetlikeanangel @midiosaamor @sweetreveriee @emelia07 @f4iry-bell @zaraaaabear @thoughtdaughter3 @benny1989fredd @elysianwayy77 @maybxlle @sheisntyou @anintellectualintellectual @aleatorio1234 @adalia-jaycee @off-to-the-r4ces @lyra-kane @reminiscentreader @lyrakanefanatic @imaseabear @elizaa31

You sit on the bed waiting for Jameson to arrive. You wonder how long he’ll take this time. You’d just seen him and Avery ascending the set of stairs that lead to his dead uncle’s wing. Him and Avery. The pretty new comer with those big hazel eyes and long soft hair, pocketing a billionaire’s fortune overnight. She had it all: the looks, the brains, the humour. She was perfection and that bugged you greatly. She was a mystery.

Literally. When Tobias had finally decided to fall asleep forever, she was the result, the heiress, the consequence. She was big masterful puzzle had popped out of nowhere, from nothing. Not that you hadn’t had you fair share of experience with that. You’d earned yourself a scholarship to one of the most prestigious private schools in Texas and raised from the ashes into a burning flame. Then you’d met Jameson Hawthorne.

He had always been an interesting character, you had just never expected his interest in you. You were the scholarship kid nobody knew or cared enough to know and somehow he was intrigued. He had found you studying the the library one day and the two of you just clicked, it was like you’d known each other for years. He’d walked you home that night and had done so ever since. From that day on you were the closest of friends. It wasn’t long before you met his brothers, mostly absent mother and extremely judgemental grandfather. Hawthorne house became a second home. The two of you sat for hours, mostly on the rooftop, staring up at an endless sky of stars and talking about anything and everything. You actually don’t think there’s a topic you haven’t covered. Everything seemed to be going swimmingly… then he started dating Emily.

From the beginning, you didn’t like her at all, but you bit your tongue from pouring out your true feelings to Jameson when he’d asked for an opinion on her. You didn’t want to make his relationship feel awkward. She was everything you didn’t want him to be with. And she wasn’t you. It shattered you, but you saw how his face lit up when he mentioned her name and you vowed you wouldn’t ruin that for him. To see him that happy was worth it.

You should’ve trusted your gut. Everyday since she broke his heart, you beat yourself up for not saying anything. There were so many chances and you took none of them. She used him, abused him and left him to rot, you supposed she didn’t account for that fact that you’d be there to save him. And then she died. It was one destructive milestone after another. Explosion after explosion. But you helped Jameson through the hardest time of his life, you fixed him when he was too broken to mend.

It wasn’t until then that you realised you loved him. I mean you’d always known you’d loved him, but never in a romantic way, it had always felt so plutonic. But judging by the pure fury that built up inside of you when Emily was mentioned, the passionate way you protected and defended him in situations and the fact that you wanted nothing more than to kiss him until he couldn’t speak, you were pretty sure you were in love. But you never acted on the feeling, too afraid you’d ruin the closeness you had. It wasn’t until one night when you’d been stargazing together that he took your face in his gentle palms and kissed your tender lips. The whole act took you by surprise suddenly, but it didn’t stop you from kissing back. It felt so natural, so normal, like it was supposed to be this way. He was sweeter than you’d imagined but in the best way possible.

“I’ve always loved you,” he’d whispered as you’d pulled away, “always.”

“I’ve always loved you too,” you’d smiled shyly, cheeks flushed with colour, “and to be honest I don’t think I’ll ever stop.”

You can’t remember when it was established that he was your boyfriend but from that kiss onwards, that’s what he was to you. He was still your best friend but in a different way. There was more chemistry and kissing, but the banter remained the same. The two of you were actually planning to go on a backpacking trip around Europe but then Tobias had died and it was another round of pain and healing for Jameson, who turned to alcohol for respite. But then the will happened and Avery Kylie Grambs had appeared out of nowhere and the old man’s final game had unfurled. So the mystery girl had been an adjustment for you to say the least.

Avery wasn’t bad. In fact you liked her a lot, you could see yourself forming a friendship with her, a tight bond but the problem was the sheer amount of time she was spending with your boyfriend. After discovering she was the key to solving his grandfather’s final mystery Jameson became obsessed. He craved the answers, thirsted for knowledge. You didn’t mind at first, you let him play his game, you only ever objected the dangerous parts when he risked himself getting hurt. Other than that you said nothing. Then he let on that this all had something to do with Emily. Emily had destroyed him, from inside out. A broken, bitter shell was formed over the real Jameson. You had worked so hard to get him to see that he wasn’t broken or damaged and you feared this might undo it.

But you knew how important Emily had been, how much of his life she’d ruined, you knew Jameson needed the closure and Avery would help him to get there, but after that you expected their interaction to die down. But they didn’t. Not in the slightest. You weren’t jealous at first, you trusted Jameson and didn’t see Avery as a threat, but after a while the meetings felt too frequent and too elongated. It was a little suspicious. When you’d asked Jameson he insisted it was all part of the game.

But then that game finished and it opened up another. Of course there always had to be more to a mystery. They were Hawthorne’s. But you’d had enough, you were tired of the endless myserties. Was it so selfish to want things to go back to how they were before? When the old man’s games were not as dangerous, a little less time consuming and uninvloving of recent billionaire girls.

You’re reeled in from your deep train of thought as Jameson walks in. You look up from your desk, placing your pen down. You flash him a sweet smile in which he returns.

“So where have you been?” you ask, a hint of a forged giggle in the back of your throat.

“Nowhere,” he shrugs, the blatant lie so easily escaping his lips cuts right through your heart.

“Nowhere with brick dust on your blazer and shoes?” you raise an challenging eyebrow, arms folded across your chest.

“I climbed a wall,” he says. Lie number two, you make a mental note.

“I saw you with Avery and Xander in Toby’s wing,” you say bluntly, your face expressionless so he can’t read it.

“Are you spying on me?” he replies, gaping.

You give a delicate shrug in response and don’t answer the question directly, “what were you whispering about?”

“What do you mean?” he furrows his brow, confused.

He’s playing dumb. Fine. He can play dumb. But he won’t able to for much longer.

“I mean what were you and Avery just whispering about,” you ask directly, your tone flat as the tyre you’d burst on his car earlier that morning.

He hesitates. He doesn’t want to tell you, that’s obvious.

“Oh, was it personal?” you ask, raising an eyebrow, opting a cold, curt, feigned sort of concern to your tone.

“Oh no,” he mumbles, “well kind of…Tobias Hawthorne is alive.”

You try not to the let your jaw drop, “your grandfather?”

How had that slimy bastard managed to fake his own death and-

He shakes his head, “my uncle.”

Of course, why hadn’t you seen it sooner? Him and Avery going into his wing, the sneaking around. But then how is the question, Toby had died before Jameson had even been born.

“And so the plot thickens,” you muse, pursing your lips.

“As always,” he says, flashing you a lopsided grin that was so like him, it reminded you of the old Jameson. The one that you got closer and closer to forgetting the less you saw of him.

“Who else knows?” you ask.

“The family,” he shrugs in response.

“And Avery?” you prompt.

“She knows,” he nods, not meeting your eyes.

You raise an eyebrow, “you didn’t mention her name?”

“She was implied when I said family,” he replies.

“She was and I wasn’t,” you ask, the words not being filtered through your brain before you blurt them out. You don’t know why it hurt you so much, it just did.

“It’s not like that,” he shakes his head.

“Okay,” you reply flatly

He shoots you a knowing look and sighs, “y/n.”

“What? I said okay,” you exclaim, throwing your hands up into the air, “that means it’s okay, I’m okay, we’re all okay.”

“You don’t sound okay,” he says gently.

“Well I’m fine,” you snap.

“I didn’t mean it like that, of course you’re part of this family,” Jameson replies, trying to make up for it.

“Forget it, I don’t care,” you retort.

“Common y/n,” he groans.

“No it’s fine, I don’t care,” you shrug, very obviously caring as your voice is high pitched and you’re being far too defensive, “do what you want.”

“She just worked it out,” he explains, “she found out that-“

“I said I don’t care,” you say sharply, eyes pinned to his.

“I know you do,” he murmurs, taking a step closer.

“No I don’t,” you shake your head in denial, “end of story, what’s for dinner?”

“I know I’ve been with her a lot recently,” he sighs.

“A lot is an understatement,” you blurt out, unable to stop the thoughts that circle your mind from finally surfacing.

“It was all part of the game, you understand,” he says as a statement, not a question.

“Of course I understand,” you reply, your voice a little colder than you’d intended but it’s too late to take it back.

For a split second hurt flashed across Jameson’s features but he swiftly continues, “it was the old man’s game.”

“It always is with you,” you say curtly, with an eye roll.

“You knew what you were getting into when you became my girlfriend,” he says, growing irritated, “I warned you-“

“Getting into?” you scoff.

“The old man always has a game,” he presses on, regaining his cool.

“And you always play it,” you snap, the fury inside of your raging a little too violently to be tamed.

“I have to play,” he says, his voice strained.

“No. You don’t. You think you have to play and your grandfather knew that,” you reply, “he knew you had a thirst to play and wouldn’t resist. Prove him wrong Jamie, make him stir for the flipping grave.”

“And what if I don’t want to do that,” he asks, raising his voice slightly.

“Then you’re not the Jameson I know,” you murmur in a low, dark voice.

“Maybe I’m not anymore,” he shrugs, “people change.”

“No,” you shake your head, “people have changed you, one person in particular.”

“Avery is just a friend,” he rolls his eyes, “I don’t understand why you’re getting so hotheaded about it!”

“You’re dimming yourself down for her,” you yell.

“So what?” Jameson challenges, making the volume of your voice.

“That’s not you,” you tell him.

“Maybe it is now,” he cocks his head to the side.

“You know you’re just talking shit,” you spit.

“I like her company,” he shrugs, “and I don’t want to prove the old man wrong, I want to make him proud.”

He’s trying to get under your skin and you know it. He’s doing a good job.

“You can’t live your life trying to prove something to him, he won’t be proud, he’s dead Jameson,” you snap.

“I know he’s dead,” he shouts, “I don’t need you to tell me.”

“Good, now that information is consolidated maybe you’ll come back and live your life,” you say, the harshness in your tone making your throat ache.

“I am living my life,” he retorts.

“Running off with girls to the Laughlin’s cottage at 3am, that’s living your life?” you ask.

“Is this still about Avery?” he asks, then laughs, “you’re pathetic.”

“I’m pathetic?” you yell, “you have spent the majority of the past few weeks at her side, working this shit out and I’ve been patient and I let it happen and I waited but now there’s more to this mystery and I can’t do it again and it’s not fair for you to put me in that situation again. So forgive me if I’m sounding a little pathetic.”

“Fair? My uncle is still out there, still alive,” he replies.

“You never even knew him,” I roll my eyes.

“He’s family,” he roars.

Something about Jameson was that he was loyal to the bone when it came to family.

I shrug, “so was your grandfather and look how he treated you.”

“Don’t speak a word against him,” he says, his voice low, warning, dangerous

“You were never good enough for him and that killed you,” I reply, my voice failing to stay stable, “he broke you and I helped fix you and now we’re going back around the same cycle. Why are you still letting him continue to break you?”

“I said don’t speak a WORD against him!” he tells, his voice powerful

You could cry. You feel like it. But you don’t. For some reason you’re past tears now.

“But when you did it was okay?” I scream back, “when you’d come to your bedroom a wreck and shit talk him, who listened to you then huh? Don’t throw this all back in my face now, don’t you fucking dare.”

“I’m not trying to-“

“Well you are,” you cut him off,

He runs a hand through his hair and shakes his head, “look I don’t know what the hell you’re on this afternoon but-“

“What the hell I’m on?” you scoff.

His face softens and so does his tone, “all this arguing we’re doing, it’s not us,” he says, “it never has been so are we really going to carry on this stupid fight?”

“I don’t know, why don’t you ask Avery?” you ask, it’s petty but you didn’t feel like being mature in this moment

“This keeps circling back to her,” he sighs with an eye roll.

“You have spent the entirety of the morning with her,” I stated “again.”

“I don’t see anything wrong with that,” he says.

“Seriously?” I ask, my jaw hanging slack.

“What?”

“You know what, it doesn’t even matter,” you shake your head and begin to walk out.

“Sweetheart,” he says, lunging forwards to grab your arm. You spin around and can see the desperation seeping from his eyes.

“I’m going out,” you tell him harshly,

“Where?” he asks immediately.

“For a walk,” you shrug, going to turn again. But he holds you firmly in his grip.

“I’ll come with you,” he says.

“No, I need headspace right now,” you snap coldly.

“Okay, that’s fine,” he nods, eyes wide with understanding. You hated that he was being so nice when you were supposed to be mad at him, it wasn’t fair, “but at least take a bodyguard with you.”

“No,” you immediately say.

“Yes,” he argues back.

“I’m not one of you, Jameson,” you quip. You can see in his face that pains him but you’re too furious to care, “people aren’t coming for me, I’m not taking a bodyguard.”

“Look I’m sorry about before but-“

“It’s not about you Jameson,” you yell, “I just need a walk.”

“Okay, but I’m still sorry and please baby, take a bodyguard with you,” he begs.

“I’m not going to,” you reply, “I need to be alone.”

“Fine, okay then,” he shrugs, pretending not to care, “yeah fine, go have fun in nature or something.”

“I will,” you snap, charging out, slamming the door behind you.

***

You start walking with no intention of going anywhere. In a headspace of anger, your pace is swift and dominant. You needed air, you needed a clear head, you needed to get away. Bringing a bodyguard felt claustrophobic. You didn’t want another person breathing down your neck. You just needed to be alone for a while. A million and one thoughts swarm your mind. He probably complained about you to Avery, you think, kicking a rock violently. He’s probably with her right now, telling her what an annoying, selfish, jealous person you are and she’s probably comforting him. The thought of it makes your stomach squeeze.

It was getting darker and colder by the second. In your rage you’d forgotten to bring a hoodie and now you’re absolutely freezing. The street lights flicker on and you suddenly realise you have no idea where you are. You’re cold, alone, lost and a little hungry. You pray it doesn’t start to rain. You get out your phone quickly to look on google maps, but two red words flash up: no connection. Great. Just when you thought today couldn’t get any worse. You wish you hadn’t left the house now, but didn’t know which way to turn to walk back. You walk around the corner of a tall white building, hoping to see a signpost nearby.

That’s when you notice the footsteps of someone behind you. You turn absentmindedly to see a stranger dressed in all black clothing. You couldn’t properly see their face or decipher whether they were a man or woman. Feeling a little sceptical, you choose to cross to the other side of the road, trying to shake or anxious feelings that were creeping in. You spin the ring on your finger, trying to breathe in and out slowly. You side glance at the figure a few times to see that they’re still on the opposite side of the road. You exhale and turn the corner, feeling stupid for getting so het up over nothing.

You hear more footsteps and paranoid you look behind. You feel sick. The mystery stranger is back. Panic seizes your throat and you walk a little faster, noting their feet also pick up the pace. You turn a second corner. So do they. A thousand and one questions flashed up in your mind. What did they want? Why were they following you? And more importantly how long had they been following you for? You’re breathing heavily, maybe too heavily. You don’t want them to know you’re scared.

You fumble to reach your phone, hurriedly finding your contacts. You click Jameson’s name but the call fails. Your eyes flick to your internet, still none. You try again, the cycle repeats. Tears well up in your eyes. You were hopeless, helpless and frightened to death. You begin to fiddle anxiously with your necklace trying to work out what to do next, but your mind was blank. You couldn’t think. The person was a good few meters behind you now. A silent tear of rolls down your cheek as you carry on walking forwards, pretending you’re going somewhere in hope the follower might get bored a leave. They did not. You bite back and audible sob and notice one bar lights up in the top right hand corner of your phone screen. You have one bar of internet and you’ve never felt more relieved. Your finger rushes to hit the call button. One ring and he picks up. It’s a miracle.

“Sweetheart,” he breathes, a sense of relief and a smile in his voice.

“Jamie,” you say, your voice more panicked than you’d intended.

“What’s wrong?”

His voice is immediate and assertive but thick with anxiety. He can sense there’s something wrong, he knows.

“Jamie there’s someone following me,” you hyperventilate, the sharp sudden breaths hurting your chest.

“Where are you?” he asks.

“I don’t know,” you say, your voice shaky, “and I’m panicking.”

“Okay, don’t worry, just keep walking straight,” he instructs, “okay sweetheart?”

“Okay,” you murmur.

“Just breathe,” he soothes, “I’m tracking your location.”

You exhale unevenly and carry on walking.

“Are you near any buildings?” Jameson asks, strategically. You can tell he’s concentrated.

“There’s a housing complex and a few shops across the street,” you describe.

“Good,” he replies, “cross the road and go into one of the shops and stay in there.”

“Okay,” you answer, jogging across the road, taking note of anything that might help Jameson find you.

“What’s the name of the shop you’re going to go into?” he asks, “it might help me track you a little faster.”

You step back to read the cursive white letters, “Betty’s,” you reply, stepping in.

“That’s it?” he confirms.

“That’s it,” you say, carefully stepping inside, seeing the follower cross the road in the refection of the shop window.

Your heart thuds in your chest as the little bell rings to announce your entrance in the shop. It was one of those little knick-knack type shops, small but compact. You pretend to admire a china tea set.

“Are you inside?” Jameson asks, his voice washing some sort of comfort over you.

“Yes,” you say quickly, subconsciously tracing the tablecloth deign with your index finger.

“Have they followed you inside?” he asks.

“No,” you reply, though you haven’t looked up, the shop bell definitely has not rung since your arrival. You are the only customer in this shop. You look up and see them standing outside, you catch their eye and fear flicker through you as you quickly turn away, jolts of sheer nauseating panic runs up and down your abdomen, “Jamie they’re waiting outside, oh god Jameson they’re waiting outside, for me to come out, oh god.”

“Hey! Hey! You have the stay calm,” he says sharply but kindly, “as long as you’re in there you’re safe and I’m on my way now.”

“You found where I am?” you breathe, sounding too much like a child than you care to admit.

“I’m getting into the car as we speak,” he replies.

He’s coming. You tell yourself. You’re going to be okay. You say in your head.

“Stay on the line with me,” you blurt out, “please.”

“Of course baby, I’m not going anywhere,” he says, the concern in his voice made you yearn to be in his arms.

The other end of the phone goes silent except for the sound of a car engine, gently groaning in motion. You try to distract yourself by admiring the little collection of ceramic mouse figurines and try to give all of them a name. That’s when you catch the stranger in your peripheral.

“Jameson I’m scared,” you bite the inside of your cheek, “I’m really scared.”

“I’m coming, just hang in there okay,” he comforts “breathe for me.”

“Jameson,” you exhale, your hands becoming increasingly more restless.

“Hey, sweetheart, take a breath with me okay?” he says, “together?”

“Together,” you nod, despite the fact that he can’t see you, but somewhere deep down you know he knows you’re nodding.

“In through your nose and out through your mouth, okay?” he replies.

I’m through your nose and out through your mouth. You repeat the motion over and over with him over the phone, until you’re bored.

“I’m nearly there,” he mentions after a while.

“You promise?” you say, your breath hitching.

“I promise, just stay where you are,” he says calmly.

“Okay,” you reply.

“Sorry honey we close at 11:00,” comes a voice.

It makes you jump at first, as you yelp in surprise at the old woman beside you. Where had she appeared from? You drop your phone and it crashes to the floor. You realise for the first time how tightly you’d had it pressed to the side of your face as the cold air rushes to that spot and you feel the sticky sweat. You scramble to pick up your phone.

“I’m fine,” you reassure Jameson quickly, before turning the the woman, “sorry, would I be able to stay a few more minutes?”

She glances disapprovingly at you and then her watch, “I don’t think so.”

“It won’t be long, I promise,” you rush.

“I’m sorry but I have to lock up now,” she shakes her head and waves the keys between her fingers.

“Just until my boyfriend gets here,” you try again, desperation slicing through your tone.

“You’re not purchasing anything and it’s closing hours,” she replied sternly, “I need to lock up.”

“Please,” you beg.

“Store policy I’m afraid,” she shrugs flatly.

“I’ll but the whole damn place of you let me stay,” you exclaim, not really sure why the sentence left your mouth but it was too late to take it back now.

“This place isn’t for sale,” she says sourly with pursed wrinkled lips.

“Not literally,” you sigh, “look I’ll make a purchase.”

“No purchases after 11:00,” she responds, blunt as a baseball bat.

“But you just said-“

“We’re closed,” she snaps.

“Please just let me stay for five minutes,” you ask, hoping by some miracle she’ll agree.

“I really can’t do that,” she sighs, with an almost apologetic look on her face “I’m sorry.”

“Two minutes?” you try to compromise.

She stares through you, “I’m going to call the police.”

“There’s someone out there following me outside,” you burst, “so please, if you’re going to call the police on anyone, do it on them.”

The woman gently cocks her head to see the mysterious figure outside the window, her eyes widen by the tiniest fraction and she stares back at you. You wonder what she’s thinking. She chews her lip thoughtfully for a while and then finally replied, “there’s a back way out, I can take you through to there.”

“Thank you,” you exhale in relief.

She walks hurriedly walks away and you follow her, ending up at the very back of the shop. It couldn’t be seen from the window, but how long would it take for the follower to realise? Not long enough, you pray, hoping Jameson would arrive in time. There is a small green door with a lacy translucent curtain across the window.

“Here,” she nods towards it, “get home safe.”

“Thanks,” you say gratefully.

You almost trip out of the back door but managed to stabilise yourself, the old woman slams to door and it nearly clips your heals. You quickly press your phone back to your ear, realising Jameson is still on the line.

“Jamie?” you say.

“I’m still here,” he replies, reading your mind, “Betty’s a bitch.”

You choke on your own spittle, “what?”

“Betty,” he states as if it’s obvious.

“Betty?” you question, hoping he’ll elaborate.

“Well I assume it’s her name,” he says, you could practically hear him shrug, “the woman who just kicked you out of her shop.”

“Oh, you heard all of that?” you say.

“I did,” he confirms, “but I’m two minutes away now.”

“Two minutes?” you check, hope returning your voice.

“Yeah,” he confirms gently.

“I’m still at the back,” you mention, “but I’ll walk to the front to meet you.”

“Okay,” he replies, “I’m so close sweetheart, don’t worry.”

“Okay I-“

All the air is knocked from your lungs as you turn the corner and someone grabs your shoulders and it’s so sudden you forget to scream. Fear runs cold and thick through your veins. You can’t move. The grip is strong and foreign, their hands are callous and your arms ache the longer you’re in their hold. Paralysed, you fail to struggle free. It all happens in a blur. You feel yourself being thrown to the side and you land on the pavement with a hard thump after rolling over your ankle. Pain seizes through it and you bite back a yelp. You look up, struggling to your feet and see Jameson has arrived.

Jameson. Jameson. Jameson.

He’s fighting the mysterious follower who you can now see is man. He’s a few inches taller than Jameson and has much more muscle but Jameson is quicker, more agile. You wish you could help him but the searing agony deriving from your ankle would’ve only made him slower. So you’re now just watching. It’s a tête-a-tête of frantic hits and blocks, all scarily aggressive. The look in Jameson’s eyes is not one you recognise, it’s like the green had been frosted over with ice. The follower lunges at him suddenly and an audible gasp escapes your lips. He has Jameson in a headlock. You stumble forwards, ready to attack him from behind when Jameson twists the man’s arms in an awkward direction, leaving him vulnerable. In the split second Jameson knees him in the stomach and begins to punch him repeatedly.

Jameson’s jaw is clenched, his hair is ragged and wild. A flow of crimson red liquid falls from one nostril and from a new wound just above his eyebrow. His eyes are fierce and gleaming, like a predator on its prey. You’re not sure you know who this man is, he’s not Jameson, he’s a mutation, a weapon, a unrecognisable being.

“Jamie,” you murmur, your voice shaking. You can’t stop yourself, you’re too scared.

He can’t hear properly, he doesn’t even acknowledge you. He carries on punching and punching but the follower seems to be cold out.

“Jameson stop! You’re scaring me!” you yell, fear in your throat but fire in your belly.

He looks up and he freezes, all but his hands that are shaking from the adrelenline rush. He looks down at his bloodied knuckles to the limp figure on ground, then back to me again. He can see the fright in my features that I’m so desperately trying to conceal.

“Hey, I’m sorry,” he says, “it’s okay, let’s go home.”

“Is he dead?” you say, the words so much harsher than you intended.

“No,” he shakes his head gently, “just knocked out, I promise.”

“I-“ you can’t finish the sentence.

“You’re shaking,” he murmurs tentatively, wrapping an arm around you to still your trembling torso.

“I’m fine,” you say, trying to sound strong, but synthetic strength only made you sound weaker.

“You’re not fine,” he shakes his head.

“Let’s just get out of here,” you sigh, then look at him with sparkling eyes, “please?”

“Of course,” he says, concern bleeding across his features.

You begin to walk but have to bite your lip as pain rips through your ankle with weight pressing down on it.

“What wrong?” Jameson asks, his reaction instant and lightning fast.

“Nothing,” you shake your head, trying to carry on without displaying the pain.

But he’s too vigilant for his own good, “are you hurt?”

“No, it’s fine,” you reply, in denial, “I’m fine.”

You’ve found that things are easier to believe if you say them out loud. Unfortunately not in this case.

“Where?” he asks, stopping still, pressing gently down your arms to check for tentative pressure points.

You pull away, “Jamie I’m-“

“Where?” he asks firmly, giving me that look.

“I just rolled over my ankle,” you sigh, “it’s not a big deal.”

“Do you want me to carry you?” he offers.

“No,” you say quickly, too quickly.

The truth was, you did want to be carried. The thought of being in his protective arms, pressed up against his chest was very appealing. But just like he could see your winces and hear your sharp breaths in, you notice his. The fight hadn’t been easy on him, no matter how stubbornly he tries to hide it.

“Just support me and I’ll support you,” you reply.

“I don’t need support,” he says.

You stare at him, “you don’t have to be the knight in shining armour with me, I thought you’d stopped that.”

You’d made a pact at the start of your relationship that Jameson couldn’t play that role. You were there for each other, it wasn’t one or the other.

“Fine,” he grits through his teeth, “we’ll support each other.”

You both walk, labouring, limping and leaning on one another. In the silence of it all you have time to think about all that had happened, a chances you hadn’t previously had with your mind always preoccupied on something else. A tidal wave of guilt almost drowns you.

“I’m sorry,” you burst out suddenly, feeling all of a sudden emotional, as tears run down your face.

You didn’t realise how much yours been keeping it in, your fear, your pain, your guilt, your sorrow.

“Hey, shhhh,” he soothes, caressing your cheek, “shhh shh stop that now, hey, hey.”

“I shouldn’t have left,” you shake your head, “I shouldn’t have got so angry and walked so far alone and it was dark-“

“Y/n, breathe,” Jameson murmurs, “I’m not angry, it’s not your fault, I’m just glad you’re safe now, okay? I would never let him hurt you, you know that right?”

You nod.

“Let’s get to the car and then we can go home, okay?” he suggests softly.

“Okay,” you murmur in response.

He wraps his arm back around your shoulders and holds your hand with the other, steering you towards his car. He walks around to your door, looking over his shoulder cautiously, making sure you are in and safe before he thinks of himself. You’ve never felt safer in a car, your back pressed up against the seat. Your leg bobs up and down uncontrollably, even when your try to stop it. Seems the adrenaline had gotten to you more than you’d thought.

Jameson is swift to get into the driver’s seat and start the car. He silently places his hand on your upper thigh to still the shaking. The warmth of his familiar touch relaxes some of the built up worry in your chest. One knot has been untied from the incomprehensible ball.

“Are you okay?” he asks.

You nod numbly. You didn’t reply with words in fear that you’d spill out the truth. Lying to Jameson was a challenge.

“Stupid question,” he mumbles, “of course you’re not.”

“I think I’m still trying to process what just happened,” you murmur, not a complete lie. You’d only processed parts.

“Okay, that’s fine, take as long as you need,” he says reassuringly, “I’m here if you want to talk.”

You nod again. Then take a breath.

“I’m sorry,” you say, choked up with emotion, “I’m sorry for fighting, I don’t know why I get so annoyed it’s just-“

“It doesn’t matter, all that matters is that you’re safe,” he tells you gently.

“Safe,” you repeat, the word has an odd texture on your tongue.

“You are safe,” Jameson replies firmly.

“I am safe,” you repeat, believing it a little more.

***

The two of you had gotten back to Hawthorne House late. No one was around so no questions were asked. But whilst you showered and changed Jameson insisted on getting the security team on it and you didn’t object. You join Jameson in your shared room after your shower, he’s already waiting with open arms. You clamber into the bed and fall onto his chest. The smell of him indescribably addictive. He wraps his arms around your torso and you wince, tenderness spreading across the tops of your arms and upper back.

“What hurts baby?” he asks, eyebrows knotted with worry.

“Nothing,” you reply, shrugging the pain off.

He looks at you, “you don’t have to lie to me.”

You’re silent for a few beats but then finally murmur, “my arms.”

“Let me see,” he says.

“It’s okay-“

“Let me see,” he whispers, sending a hot shiver down your spine. 

You slowly slip of your jumper and expose the rounded bruises from the follower’s fingers. You’d discovered them moments ago in the bathroom, it must’ve been from where he’d grabbed you. You can’t see Jameson’s face but judging by the thick blanket of tense air that had enveloped your surroundings, you have a good idea of what he’s thinking.

“He did this?” he asks, tracing every bruise so delicately it nearly tickles.

“Jamie he grabbed me,” you explain.

“I’ll kill him for laying a finger on you,” he spits, a foreign violence in his tone you weren’t sure you liked.

“Don’t say that,” you say before you can stop yourself.

“What?” he looks at you in wild disbelief.

“Talk of killing him,” you close your eyes, “you’re not a murderer.”

He opens his mouth.

“Don’t you dare argue with me,” you snap, a raw intensity in your voice. You struggle to recall where you found it.

Silence you like a car hits roadkill. Swiftly and out of nowhere with a sickening thud.

“You know you scared me back there,” you murmur, meeting his eyes shyly.

“Me?”

“When you were punching him…” you trail off, “you looked so angry.”

“I was angry” he retorts, “no one should do that, especially not to you. Never to you.”

“Yeah but I really thought you might…” you stop yourself.

“I might what?” he urges you to continue.

“I don’t know,” you say trying to brush it off, “it doesn’t matter.”

“No it does,” he replies, “you thought I might kill him right?”

“It just wasn’t you punching that guys, it wasn’t my Jameson,” you murmur.

“Your Jameson doesn’t protect you,” he yells and you flinch slightly.

You don’t meet his eye, “no, not like that.”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you, I just…” he sighs, “I never would’ve forgiven myself if something had happened to you.”

“It would’ve been my fault for storming off like that, god I’m so stupid,” emotion rises thick in your throat.

“Hey, stop beating yourself up about this,” Jameson says, “it was my fault in the first place.”

“No it wasn’t-“

“Yes it was, let’s just forget about this okay,” he insists.

“But what if he comes back? What if he knows where I am? What did he want with me Jamie? What if-“

“It’s all going to be sorted okay, we have so many staff on it right this second,” he says tracing the outlines of your knuckles, “you just need to breathe.”

“I am breathing,” you grit through your teeth.

“What’s worrying you then?” he asks softly.

“I don’t know,” you reply, biting back a sob.

He senses the emotion, “come here.”

You practically collapse into his arms, keeping your tears at bay just barely. There’s something about being in his arms, against the warmth of his body that made the bad things go quiet for a second, that stopped the overwhelming voices in your head, that silences your thudding heart. But even now, things were unusually playing on your mind, despite the comfort.

“I don’t know Jamie,” you murmur into his chest, “I’m scared and exhausted and anxious and I can’t stop thinking about it.”

“Let me help you,” he whisper, gently running his fingers through your hair.

“I don’t think you can,” you mumble, your eyes grappling to stay open.

“I will find a way,” he says, you almost laugh at his stubbornness.

“I don’t want to lose you,” you reply, your voice breaking, “I don’t know anything bad to happen.”

“You’re not going to lose me and I won’t let anything bad happen,” Jameson kisses the top of your head, “I promise.”

“I don’t feel safe,” you admit.

“What’s making you feel unsafe baby?” he asks, aching concern in his voice.

“Before today I’d never even imagined potentially being kidnapped and it just happened today,” you ramble, “and that means there’s so many other things that I couldn’t ever have imagine that might happen.”

“If we spend our whole lives in fear of what might happen we’d forget to live,” Jameson says.

You meet his emerald eyes and try not to melt, “I’m scared.”

“There’s no need to be,” he comforts, “I’m here.”

“You promise?”

“Always,” he says. His voice is so sure, so strong. It almost makes you believe.

“And you’re not going anywhere?”

“Not anywhere without you,” he grins lopsidedly, the real Jameson shining through making your cheeks tint a pale pink.

“I’m sorry,” you say again, the residing guilt flowing back in.

“If you apologise one more time I’m going to do a lyrical dance routine to ‘hot stuff’ only dressed in sequinned hot pants and a top hat,” he says.

“I think I’d quite like to see that,” you can’t help but smile, “I should apologise more often.”

He chuckles softly and kisses the top of your head. You nuzzle into the nape of his neck and allow one tear to slip from the under your mask. Just one.

“I’ve got you baby and I’m not letting go,” Jameson whispers.

“Please don’t let me go,” you murmur, sounding as small as a child.

“I’m not, never ever,” he murmurs, kissing your nose, then cheeks and then a soft kiss on your lips.

You smile, a fluttery feeling in your chest and you kiss him back. His hands snake around your waist, the tentative touch making you tingle a little. You wish you could just focus on Jameson and nothing else but the problem was the scene kept replaying in your head. The man grabbing your shoulders, the bruises left on your skin, the smell of his cologne in your hair. He was everywhere.

“Hey sweetheart, it’s okay,” Jameson soothes, “you’re safe now.”

It’s only then you notice how your entire body is shaking, your bones rattling together. You try to stop but you can’t. He brings you into deeper his arms and holds your quivering limbs together. You wonder if he let go you’d fall apart all together.

***

You didn’t go to school the next day, instead you stayed curled up in Jameson’s arms as he gently traced spirals across your back with his index finger.

You can’t remember the last time you’d felt so in love.

***

Thursday rolls around far too quickly and you know you have to go back. Word about the stalker had been kept quiet but you know you couldn’t stay under your duvet forever. No matter how badly you wanted to. So you wake up early and take your time getting ready. Jameson sleeps like the dead all the way through it, even when you blow dry your hair. You meet Xander who is already at breakfast, eating muffins. You’d promised the week before you’d come and observe his biology project for him, so he could have a second opinion and you didn’t want to break that promise.

“You know you really didn’t have to come,” he says, still chewing, “after you know…”

“I want to Xand, really,” you say, “I can’t avoid it forever and I want to see your project.”

“If you’re sure?” he checks, with an eyebrow raise.

“I’m sure,” you nod, “I swear.”

“Well then, have a muffin or two and then we’ll be on our way,” he grins, handing me one from the plate in the centre.

“Roger that sir,” you smile back, saluting him as you take a bite.

***

School was difficult that day, not the content, just the energy. The problem was you had none. And it was one of those long modified timetable days where your first break of the day was lunch and it wasn’t even until 2:00pm. That in itself was a mood killer. On top of that you couldn’t get the follower out of your head. The events played on some sort of endless loop in your head. You wonder who it might be, why they might have been following you of all people. It was known you were dating Jameson but not that known. Apparently, according to Xander, Oren had been put on high alert and Alisa was working on finding their identity. That should have brought you solace. It didn’t.

But the more you thought about it the more your realised that part of you selfishly didn’t mind that it has happened too much because last night you’d felt more connected to Jameson than you had in forever. It had been a while since it had just been the two of you, no mysteries, no arguments, no Avery. Yesterday had solely been the two of you, all day. Just in the presence of one another but, at school, you hadn’t seen Jameson all morning, seen as you’d left for school early with Xander but he had sent you a string of text messages that you only see at first on your very late lunch break.

morning sweetheart

are you okay??

I know you left early with Xand but I’m still worried about you

text me for ANYTHING okay??

I love you xx

And then an hour later…

you still haven’t text back

are you okay??

I bribed the woman at the front desk for your schedule so you’re probably in class right now

unless you’re not!!

just answer me when you can okay

I love you

Then in the next hour…

ARE YOU OKAY!?

I HAVEN’T SEEN YOU IN THE HALLWAYS

PLEASE ANSWERRR!!!!

I love you ;)

You almost laugh at the cuteness of it all. You type a couple of messages in response incase he bribed the headteacher to let him use the announcement speaker to find you next.

I’m fine Jamie, don’t worry

late lunch break sorry I couldn’t text sooner

They bleep through one after the other, sending through.

meet you after school for our plans

You close your phone quickly and get to the next class, holding your books tightly to your chest. The next few periods better go fast.

***

They didn’t go fast. In fact every millisecond felt like an hour, the day seemed endless. You get out of class and don’t pass Jameson in any hallways yet again sk decide to go to your usual meeting spot after school. You send him a quick message.

waiting outside business studies

You wait for him by the curb. One minute passes, he’s been a minute late before, many times. So you figure it’s okay, leaning on the wall behind you. Five minutes go by next and most kids are leaving or have left the school premises. Maybe his class has run over, your brain suggests. Then it is ten minutes, barely anyone is walking out. The odd person, sure, but never Jameson. You begin to wonder where he might be. Detention? No, he always finds a way out of those. Basketball court? No, he doesn’t like to play with the other guys. Classroom? No, he wouldn’t spend longer than he had to in the school. You sigh, ten minutes isn’t that long after all. Maybe you’re overreacting. Still, you send him another text ‘hey, are you nearly here?’ Half an hour passes. That’s when you get really confused. He should definitely be here by now. Slowly you wonder down several hallways, checking your phone for any messages, calls or voicemails, but there are none. Few students are around and every time you look into a classroom Jameson isn’t there. You make your way back to your original spot, incase he turned up. Forty minutes pass and you try his phone for the last time, ringing him rather than just texting but it goes straight to voicemail. So you resort to calling Xander, hoping he’ll be able to help and ease the tightening knot of worry growing in your chest. There is only two rings.

“Hello y/n,” Xander’s cheerful voice says down the other end, “is there any reason you’re phoning the best Hawthorne on this fine afternoon?”

“Yeah, sorry Xand,” you reply, “but have you seen Jamie anywhere?”

“Don’t be sorry,” he tells me, “and I think I saw him come in earlier, I just presumed you were with him.”

Too many juxtaposed emotions hit you at once. Relief, he’s okay, he’s alive, he’s at home. Hurt, he left without you, abdomen or forgot the plans you had. Annoyance, he’d left without sparing you a second thought.

“No,” you mutter, “I wasn’t.”

“You sound annoyed,” Xander comments.

“I’m fine, sorry Xand,” you reply, putting some more life into your voice to wash away and tense notes, “it’s been a long day.”

“Don’t I know it,” he sighs, “but hey it’s the weekend now, fancy a game of strip bowling when you get back?”

Strip bowling was one of your favourites, mostly because you were very good at it and barely had to strip and also because Jameson usually ended up in his underwear. Xander must’ve sensed the false happiness in your voice and suggested it to be nice.

“Maybe tomorrow,” you say, trying to let him down gently. You did appreciate the gesture, but the thought of playing stop bowling right now did not match the mood.

“Yeesh your day was that bad huh?” he asks softly, playing it off as jokey.

“I’ll be okay,” you reassure him quietly.

“I’m here you know,” he reminds you.

“Thanks Xander,” you reply, but don’t elaborate. You didn’t feel like talking right now.

“Talk to Jamie, he’ll know how to make you feel better,” he suggests sweetly.

You smile through your pain, “yeah, I’ll give it a go.”

You hang up and exhale slowly, he doesn’t know that Jameson is your problem.

***

You get back to Hawthorne house about twenty minutes later. It sounds relatively empty, though it always does, seen as there were so many possible places for people to be. You wander through the entrance, trying to think where Jameson might be. You hear footsteps approaching and spin around to see a blonde in a suit. Wrong brother.

“Have you seen Jameson?” you ask him before he can greet you.

“He was upstairs earlier, with Avery,” Grayson replies.

All the air is knocked from your stomach, “Avery?”

“You didn’t know?” his expression flashed for a fraction of a second into something between guilt and shame before it is composed.

“No…” you trail off.

“Oh,” he replies, with an unreadable expression back on.

“Well thanks anyway,” you say with a synthetic smile.

You walk away quickly before he can respond, looking up with glossy eyes. You ascend the stairs quickly and don’t look back. You feel you need to see for yourself did this is true. But where would he take Avery? You could only hope it wasn’t the roof where the two of you stargazed, that would hurt like hell. You trail down a hallway where voices are coming from and stumble upon a door that is ajar. Inside, Jameson talking to Avery. Your stomach rolls uncomfortably. He’s positioned barely a foot a way and he’s laughing. He looks so beautiful when he laughs, but now it’s ugly. It’s like biting into something sweet and getting a sour taste. It’s not the fact that she made him laugh, it’s the fact he’s laughing like he laughs when he’s with you. That’s the thing that cuts deep. The way his eyes are sparkling and his smile is wide and carefree, you thought he reserved those kind of smiles only for you.

Clearly not.

You turn your back on the scene and rush to your bedroom. You swing the door open forcefully and then slam it shut behind you. So he’d ditched your plans for her. Great. You sigh as you collapse down on your bed feeling an unwelcome tightness squeezing across your chest. Tears well up in your eyes. You didn’t like to cry, you rarely ever did. But right now, you couldn’t do anything about it. The tears just flowed down your cheeks and your whole body shook with each sob. Your heart physically ached, something you hadn’t thought was possible until this moment. A searingly mournful agony rippling through the left side your the chest. You felt so vulnerable, so exposed. You didn’t stop crying the blanket was soaked through, weighted with wet emotion and your throat was so raw it was numb.

***

You binge movies for the rest of the evening, the only feeling left in your system was anger, you’d cried all the sadness out. You felt so done with feeling shit and binging movies gave you that outlet of doing nothing, thinking nothing and feeling nothing. Exhaustion is beginning to win the ongoing battle between the two of you when you hear soft footsteps approaching. Jameson had been practically out of your mind the whole evening, Disney movies are a good distraction, but that is until he walks in. You hear as the door handle turns and he enters. Your eyes flicker to the clock, it’s just gone midnight.

“Hey sweetheart,” he murmurs, taking his suit jacket off and undoing his top button, “you’re up late.”

“What do you want?” you ask, eyes glued to Elsa’s performance of ‘let it go’ on the tv screen.

He immediately notices something is off and walks over, “woah, hey, what’s wrong?”

“Oh so now you care?” you scoff, looking him dead in the eye.

“What did I do?” he asks quickly, cluelessly.

“You are unbelievable,” you exclaim, switching the movie off before hurling the control across the room.

Jameson stares in disbelief, “why are you so pissed off?”

“You don’t know why I’m annoyed?” you ask, dumbfounded.

“No…” he replies hesitantly, like he’s treading on egg shells.

“Seriously?”

“Seriously,”

“Oh my god,” you laugh bitterly, shaking your head, “tell me you’re joking, please.”

“I’m not joking,” he says, the desperation and worry evident in his tone.

“Do you even know what we were supposed to do today?” you ask with a withered look.

A moment of realisation strikes and you notice as his eyes widen and his jaw drops a little.

“Shit. I’m sorry, I forgot,” he says, actually looking guilty. You almost feel sorry for him.

“Yeah I know,” you deadpan, folding your arms across your chest.

“There’s just been a lot going on lately and with the following and then I was days behind on the thing with Toby and-“

“Am I some sort of burden,” you retort, eyebrows raised.

“What? No! I never said that,” he exclaims, his voice raised.

“Okay,” you shrug, nonchalantly. The small display of passive aggression would get under his skin, prickling it like an unscratchable itch.

“Last time we argued it ended with you being followed, I don’t want you in that situation again,” he says, his voice dominant and definitive.

“You’re making this about you!” you yell, rage blinding your vision, “what you want, for me!”

“Oh so you want to be followed, stalked?” he asks, with a forced cruel laugh.

“That’s not what I said,” you snap, eyes narrowed.

“Sounds like it,” he bites back, the bitterness in his voice hurting you far more than you cared to admit.

You don’t say anything for a long while but eventually cut through the long silence, “I even text you about it,” you say quietly.

“What?” he replies, head cocked to the side, confused.

“About tonight,” you say, raising your hands into the air with an eye roll.

“No you didn’t!” he yells back, defensively.

“Yes I did,” you scream.

“Look, this is the last message I got,” he exclaims, shoving his phone’s bright screen into your face.

‘late lunch break sorry I couldn’t text sooner’

You stare at the message and then quickly open your phone to double check. Your message hadn’t gone through, you look up glaring at him. You were mad he didn’t remember, mad the message never went through and just mad in general.

“It didn’t go through, I couldn’t help it,” he defends.

“You still forgot,” you press on, getting mor annoyed by the second, “I shouldn’t have to remind you that you have plans with your girlfriend.”

“Look, I’m really sorry,” he replies and you can see the meaning in his face, “we’ll reschedule.”

“I don’t want to do it anymore,” you tell him nonchalantly. You know you’re being petty, but you can’t help it.

“Oh common y/n,” he says.

“No I don’t,” you shrug. He’d messed it up, that opportunity was passed now.

“Look I just needed to-“

“What you needed to do was stick to your word, what you needed to do was remember when you had things plans, what you needed to do was think before you acted,” you say in a low voice, interrupting him, “but you did none of that.”

“I can’t have a life now?” he scoffs, growing irritated, “that’s not you.”

“What’s not me?” you scowl.

“This, right now,” he says, “you’re being so controlling!”

You raise your eyebrows, almost laughing, “controlling? You started this argument!”

“No I didn’t!” he argues.

“You know what, if you didn’t want to have it out then you shouldn’t have asked why I was angry,” you roll your eyes, “so just forget about it.”

“Oh would you STOP doing that,” he yells.

“What?”

“The whole ‘forget about it’ thing, it’s so fucking annoying,” he retorts, anger creeping up in his tone.

“You know what else is annoying?” you ask him, “when your boyfriend is hanging out constantly with some random girl who inherited all his grandfather’s money, that’s really fucking annoying.”

He’s silent. Nothing to say for once. No witty reply, no deflection, nothing. His face is impossible to read, blank.

“Hang on, that’s not quite the right word,” you continue, “what about aggravating, demoralising, hurtful-“

“You know I never would’ve pinned you as a jealous possessive girlfriend,” he shakes his head, with a cruel chuckle.

“I’m not!” you snap, “but you lied Jameson, why did you feel the need to lie!?”

“Lie?”

“You told me a few days ago you’d climbed a wall and if I hadn’t known any better I would’ve believed you,” you say, “but you weren’t climbing a wall, you were with Avery.”

“This,” he says exasperatedly, “this is exactly the reason I lied.”

“What?” you ask.

“This overreaction,” he explains, making some weird hand gesture.

“I’m overreacting?” you scoff, as your eyebrows shoot to your forehead.

“Completely,” he exclaims.

“So let me just get this straight,” you begin, “you’d have never pinned me as a jealous possessive girlfriend but you lied to me about ditching our plans to spend time with another girl because you were worried about an overreaction? Right, that makes sense.”

“I’m sorry,” he exhales, “I’m sorry.”

“No you can’t just say sorry and then think it’s all going to be okay,” you shake your head, “sorry is just a stupid word, it means nothing.”

“I didn’t mean to say what I said just now and I am sorry that I hurt you,” Jameson says desperately, “I didn’t mean to.”

“It’s not just that! You blew off our plans for her,” you yell with a sob, “so yeah that kind of fucking hurts.”

“Sweetheart I didn’t mean to-“

“Yeah well you did,” you laugh bitterly, aggressively wiping away your tears, “and I’m crying over it which is just stupid.”

“It’s not stupid,” he tells you gently.

“Yes it is stupid Jameson,” you snap, the tears only flowing thicker and faster, “I feel like an idiot.”

“You shouldn’t,” he insists.

“Well I do, I’m such an idiot. I’m an idiot for fighting with you, I’m an idiot for getting myself followed, I’m an idiot for thinking that someone could actually love me, I’m an idiot for not seeing the signs sooner and I’m an idiot for crying over it all now,” you snivel, roughly scrubbing your tear-stained cheeks.

“Woah, hey,” he says, “sweetheart I love you. Just you.”

“Well it doesn’t feel like it lately,” you say, choking back a sob desperate to leave your throat.

His face softens, “sweetheart…”

He reaches out to touch me but you flinch away. His gentle touch is only a reminder of the good person he is and how much you love him for it. And you can’t afford to fall for it, not again, the pain was too much.

“You’re hurting me Jamie,” you say, your voice breaking as you jab a finger to your heart, “this is hurting me.”

“I don’t want to hurt you,” he murmurs, as his eyes mellow.

“If you want to be with her I’d rather you just tell me,” you whimper, “it would save me the pain of all this back and forth and sneaking around and finding out. Just tell me straight.”

“I don’t want to be with Avery,” he says, “I never have.”

“You don’t look at me how you look at her,” you say bitterly, getting it off of your chest.

“You’re right I don’t,” he agrees. Your heart plummets, here it comes, the confession, the break up, the empty sorrys and eyes filled with tears. “I don’t look at you like I look at her, because I look at her like any other person on this planet, but when I look at you I’m looking at my world. And I’d sure as hell hope that differs from the look that I gave to everyone else.”

A wave of emotion coats your skin, soaking you through. His world. The words repeat over and over and over until you feel delirious.

“Do you mean that? Do you really mean that?” you whisper.

“Of course I do,” he sighs, “don’t you understand? I love you, it’s always been you, it will never not be you! You’re my person, you’re my other half, I was supposed to meet you and fall in love with you. You give me purpose and passion and so much more. When you called me the other night after our fight I’ve never been more frightened in my life, I was freaking out over here. I’ve never felt so panicked, so sick with the thought of someone being hurt. I’m in so love with you that I can’t even explain it and I can’t believe I led you to doubt it. Avery is a friend, I promise, she means nothing to me compared to you, trust me. How can I prove that to you?”

“I don’t know Jameson,” you shout, your head aching from this endless circle of arguments.

“Then marry me!” he yells, then his voice softens, “marry me.”

You freeze, every muscle in your body suddenly falling into a state of paralysis, “what?”

“You heard me,” he says, his expression too serious.

“Jameson,” you murmur, barely getting his name out.

“Marry me.”

a/n: I’m a sucker for fat dramatic impulse decisions (it’s a problem, you may have gathered from my more recent fics) SOZ GUYS 😘😘 anywayyysss the time frame is roughly (and I mean very ROUGHLY) based around chapters 11-13 of the Hawthorne brothers incase you were wondering

thanks for the req anon, so sorry again for the wait, hope you enjoyed the read 🤍🤍 if you made it to the end and didn’t DNF halfway through, well done!! can you guys tell I got way too carried away, this fic was so all over the place but I posted it anyway bc yolo

there will be no part 2!! sorry!! I really need a break from reqs… you decide how you answer 🤭🤭

TIG masterlist

[hatsukeii]

hiii mootie congrats on the 900!!!

would love to play the guitar ^^,,, i'm thinking a first aid ear mic and a wound-kiss guitar pic.

A little birdie's told me that Denji's my biggest fan <3 (Don't tell the birdie I'm his biggest fan though bc it's a snitch)

("Did it take u this long to come up with something" Shhh shh shhhh... let's focus on u reaching 900 followers 😋🫶🏽 again CONGRATS !!!! u deserve them all mootie ur writing is so yummy ily and your creations)

oooo sick!! the band you've joined is...

kiss it right! / denji x reader

genre(s): fluff + crack!! reader is nonchalant + tired of his bs, denji not so much (he's so annoying your honour i love him i fear...) injury, kiss it better fic! giggles! blushing! kicking my feet like a teenage girl!!

warning(s): injury so blood and pain ig, heavy on the needles because reader is giving him sutures, also ik denji is a bit of a pussy which is a bit ooc but he's supposed to be super weakened after a fight so it makes a little more sense that he's really sensitive to pain here

wc: ~1.1k

your first gig is in... an ambulance?!

setlist:

🎵 someday, the strokes

🎵 calling after me, wallows

🎵 kiss her you fool, kids that fly

"Quit squirming so much, I'm not done yet!"

Denji hates stitches. You know it by the way he wriggles and tenses up with every contact the needle makes with his skin, and how he just refuses to stay still the second he sees the thread of dread. Frustrated, you smack the front of Denji's knee, a signal for him to stay still, but you hit a nerve and his leg jerks up reflexively instead, his shoe coming dangerously close to your chin. You drop the needle and thread in your hand at his sudden movement, and a groan sounds from your throat.

"Shit. Didn’t mean to do that, sorry Denji."

Denji sulks, bottom lip jutting out in an annoyed pout. Everything rattles and shakes as the ambulance rolls past a speed bump, and he almost wishes he was the one unconscious on the stretch instead of Aki. He watches you yank at the end of a spool of thread, and loop it through the head of a new needle. Your tongue pokes out from your pursed lips, holding the needle impossibly close to your face as your pinched fingers jab and poke at it. Your brows furrow in concentration, leading the thread through and tying it in place. When you reach over to grab another alcohol swab, Denji shrugs inwards again, and you take notice of his shift in posture when you turn back to see his legs crossed.

"Denji..."

"Sorry, you know I hate needles." The sole of his sooty sneaker lies on the bloody gash on his shin, and you wipe a film of sweat off your forehead with the back of your forearm.

"You'll give yourself sepsis like that."

"I dunno what that is." He mumbles, head hanging low to watch blood pool out from the torn flesh of his leg. Sepsis. That sounds bad, but not as bad as watching a needle sink into his skin, and come out on the other side.

"C'mon, you trust me, right? I make it better, every time." Denji knows you're right, so he nods, hugging his legs against his chest instead.

"Put the bad leg back down, and let me fix you up, okay?"

The ambulance makes another jolt when he lowers his leg over the edge of the seat. Cold, stinging cotton wipes at the blood that has dried around the gash, and Denji has to grip the seat until his knuckles go white to stop himself from whining. When he sees the needle reappear in your hands, he keeps reminding himself that this could, very well, all be worth the pain in the end. If he's lucky.

You slather numbing cream on the swollen flesh around his gash, before pulling the thread taut in preparation, and aligning the tip of the needle with the bottom of the wound.

"I'm trying to set a personal record, so stay still."

"What's your current record?"

"Minute and a half." You don't look up from the gash when you respond to him, not even as Denji whistles, impressed. You breathe in, eyes darting to the digital clock on the dashboard of the ambulance, and slide the needle through one side of the gash. Denji's leg tenses in his efforts to stay impossibly still, even as the thread runs back and forth through his skin over, and over, and over again. Your eyes squint, face inching closer to his bare shin as you pull the thread tight, and the split flesh comes together with ease. You look at the digital clock again, fingers twisting and tugging quickly to tie off the suture.

"Close, minute and thirty-three. Maybe next time."

When you chuck the needle out into a medical wastebin and look up, Denji is staring down at you, a grin plastered on his face. You roll your eyes as you rip the latex gloves off your clammy hands, sighing out in exasperation. He wiggles his eyebrows, pointing at the stitches on his shin.

"Don't even try."

"But I swear it works!" Denji beams like a puppy seeing its owner for the first time in years. You stand and turn away, pulling the elastic from your hair and letting it fall freely. It covers your red ears, and that's good enough.

"I'm not giving a fresh suture a kiss, Denji."

"You say that every time! I'm sure you've seen worse, right?"

He's right, you have seen worse, but that is the extent of it. Kissing a fresh wound is, quite literally, the textbook definition of immature. And unhygienic. You turn back to look at Denji, who is still pointing at his shin expectantly, and is still pleading with that stupid look on his face. He looks a little too excited for somebody who's just had his leg stitched back together.

"I guess you were good enough today."

Kneeling down again, you meet the sutures on his leg, dried blood gathering around the surface of the thread. You sigh, reaching behind for another alcohol swab, and wipe over the wound once, twice, then a third time. Denji kicks his feet merrily, but stops when his shoe almost hits you in the nose, and you send a piercing glare towards him. Holding his calf with both hands, you bring his shin towards your face, the warm breaths from your nose fanning over his skin.

When you finally, for the first time, press a kiss into Denji's wound, he giggles like a schoolgirl, and you feel a wave of heat rush from your ears to your cheeks.

"If I see you pick the sutures out again like last time, you're never getting another one, you hear me?" You pull the mask that has been sitting on your chin up to your nose, pinching it tight against your nose bridge. The mask conceals half of your face, and Denji sniffs in annoyance when he loses sight of your lips. What neither of you notice is the elastic of the mask pushing your hair behind your ears, and exposing the hot pink tips of them.

"It'll heal twice as quickly now, thanks to that."

"That's not how it works, but sure. Whatever keeps you happy, Denji."

The ambulance comes to a sudden stop, and everything inside jolts forward. You sling Denji's arm around your shoulder, holding him up as he limps off the vehicle and towards the hospital entrance. The wound barely feels like anything. In fact, he could probably walk like normal.

Someday, maybe Denji won't have to ask you to kiss his wounds better. Someday, Denji might even get a kiss without having to get hurt. But for now, Denji thinks that he'll keep pretending that the stitches hurt, so long as it gets you to kiss him.

author's note:

I am acc so ASS at writing full fluff scenarios bc tell me why this was only 1.1k words... I HOPE YOU LIKED IT THO POOKIE!!! i made sure to make denji extra whiny and extra annoying just for u <3 i love him your honour even though he's a little bitch sometimes he's my baby

anyways tags!!

@chuuya-brainrot @staraxiaa @catsoupki @akaakeis @anqelfries @wishi-selfships @fiannee @bailey-reeds @kuroppiii @wyrcan @hiraethwa @stars-tonight

anyways love u guys bye bye see u soon…

[physalian]

On Hyper Independent Characters (and how not to make them the bad guy)

So many characters with “trust issues” are painted out to be cynical little gremlins who just need to ~open their hearts~ and ~let the love in~ like doing so, repeatedly, has only proven them right every single time, but this one love interest will swoop in and save the day.

The people who write these characters tend to do so in bad faith, as if their fears and trust issues are unfounded nonsense, like they’re wrong and Negative Nellys for being wary.

So!

From experience (thus this is hella biased), here’s some thoughts on writing an independent character with trust issues that isn’t belittling.

1. It’s likely not that kind of trust they have issues with

I said this before a while ago, but “trust issues” paired with an extreme sense of self-reliance isn’t “I think everyone is a liar,” but rather “I think everyone is unreliable”. It might stem from a place of constantly being let down, of constantly having the people in their life drop the ball on major events, but also little things, even something as simple as “hey yeah I’ll totally do the dishes” and then they continue to sit there, forcing the person to be a nag about it, or just do it themselves.

These kinds of personalities tend to grow up surrounded by unkept and empty promises, where, while it might not be every single occasion, it happens one too many times for them to keep giving the benefit of the doubt. Even when people have the best of intentions and mean it when they say they’ll do XYZ in the moment, and they really just forgot, the person they made the promise to is impatiently waiting for them to remember 12-day-old dishes.

2. Why don’t they just remind people to keep their promises?

If you’re in my boat, many people with commitment issues are also narcissists or just mean, who, if you even gently remind them, make you out to be a nagging, impatient brat. And to avoid hearing that again, you just don’t speak up. Too many times where ‘forgetting’ has been from a source of a weird power fantasy, intentionally screwing you over, leaves people sitting in a state of unknowing whether it’s benign neglect or very much on purpose, and afraid to voice their concerns to be proven right.

If you’re not in my boat, chronic “forgetters” aren’t going to change without intervention. So if I ask you to do the dishes once, and you forget, that’s one thing. If I ask you twice, three times, four times, nagging over and over again, then the benefit of the doubt is shredded, and I can’t help but assume that the “forgetting” is on purpose. Either weaponized incompetence or something more benign, doesn’t matter. Even if you have some executive dysfunction, that's an explanation, not an excuse, and the people you live with aren't your maids.

Either way, these personalities might grow up with a whole slew of self-worth issues, and be reluctant to make plans with people, invite friends to important events, or get excited about big milestones, because they’re so used to people they care about “forgetting” or canceling last minute that the only one they can trust to reliably show up is themselves.

3. Why don’t they just communicate these fears?

See the “narcissists” in point 2

4. Isn’t it lonely never letting people in?

Fuck yeah, it is. The thing is, though, that if you spend your whole life learning how to do everything alone—pay your bills, do ‘couple’ or ‘friend’ activities, run errands, take yourself out to places—the idea of having to squeeze in the wants and needs of someone else might start to sound incredibly inconvenient.

If you’re so used to being on your own schedule and reaping the benefits of being a party of 1 in crowded spaces (I just took myself to dinner at a place with an hour long wait, able to be seated immediately at the last remaining barstool), of not having to wait for someone else to confirm plans, negotiate who’s driving, negotiate a time to meet up, food to order, a movie to see, a roller coaster to ride, a game or streaming service to buy—everything is entirely under your control, sacrificing convenience for the chance that the person you invite actually shows up on time and is invested as you are isn’t really worth the risk.

That's not to say I don't enjoy when I get to do things with friends, but I can equally enjoy doing things alone as opposed to whining about it.

Personally, while I can daydream about having a romantic partner, that thought is always immediately followed up by the understanding that they’ll be an inconvenience to my independence. But I’m someone who’s always had to do the emotional labor in a relationship, who’s always the most organized, the most mature, the most level-headed in tough situations. Always been the person in groupwork who does all the work. The idea of being “a team” is a fantasy meant for other people. “Team” to me is “me and this deadweight that I have to drag around”.

5. How I’d like to see this represented in characters

Dropping “the one” into their lives and having this person swept up, broken out of their little pessimistic shell, in some epic romance, as if they only needed to find the right person and nothing at all goes wrong… is bad faith.

It’s bad faith because it minimizes this kind of independence as just a little mood problem that can be fixed right quick, that it’s inherently wrong—what was all the fuss about?

What I’d like to see is examples that prove they’re not crazy. Big and little things. Dishes, and big events. Then, they can meet “the one,” but not without some trial and error. A lifetime of “people suck and are unreliable” isn’t going to be snapped away bibbidi bobbidi boo after one good date. This magical person will have to show up, and keep showing up, and keep showing up, and the one time they don’t, because they won’t, then A and B can hash it out like adults.

6. How this person might act

I’ve never actually met somebody like me and we’d either be best friends or loathe each other. But this person might be the most reliable friend you’ve ever had, because they’re so afraid of becoming like everyone in their life who let them down before. If you ask a favor of them, it gets done with supernatural haste.

This person might also have their own commitment issues, where instead of failing to keep their promises, they punish themselves by keeping promises they hate, showing up out of spite and resentment because they said they would, lest they be called a hypocrite.

They might under-share or not speak up about accomplishments in their life until the time for hype and anticipation has passed, lest they share expecting the same level of excitement only to be met with apathy. They might not show visible excitement about objectively exciting things, because they’re so used to plans falling through that they won’t believe something is happening until they are physically in the location and it’s staring them in the face.

Thus, they might look frequently bored or unhappy and unmoved by something important to you, or something you thought they’d like (especially if you’ve let them down before, trust is a privilege, not a right).

7. What I’d like people to understand most of all

First, that some of us tend to live by the “if you want something done right do it yourself” mantra, so actually asking somebody for help with something is admitting that X cannot be done alone, which makes failure to keep a promise even worse. As in, if A goes out of their way to admit they can’t do F alone and risk being let down to ask B to do this one little thing for them, and B still drops the ball, A is going to sit there and think “this is why I have trust issues”.

Can’t speak for everyone, but yes I do acknowledge that the suffering in silence isn’t helping anyone and am working on it. Counterpoint: Weaponized incompetence is very real and an adult should not have to remind another adult to keep their living space clean, at the bare minimum. Agreeing to do a thing is at least equal responsibility on the inviter and invitee and "you didn't remind me" isn't a valid excuse.

But most importantly, if you have a friend or relative who is fiercely independent, I’d implore you to learn one thing: Do not make promises that you can’t keep. And if shit happens and you have to cancel even when you had the best of intentions, have the decency to tell them and make the best effort you can to reschedule ASAP, instead of putting the impetus on them to do the rescheduling. Make it absolutely clear that you do, in fact, care, and weren’t going out of some apathetic sense of obligation.

I cannot count the amount of times I have asked a friend to do something for me, they eagerly agreed, and then my very real deadlines come and go and they say absolutely nothing, so I have to nag them, and nag them, and then they turn it back on me with a “obviously you can see that I’m busy and you’re not paying me for this” when all they had to do was say “no I can’t help you” (two whole humans; we are not friends anymore).

The ability to be approached with a request for a favor, step back and think about it, and go “No, I don’t think I can do that in that time frame/at this moment I’m going through a lot/with the skill the task requires” is apparently ridiculously rare. I’d infinitely prefer a no upfront than a yes, bank on that yes, and then wait around hoping someone follows through.

Not saying anything is really rude. If you agree to X, the person who asked you is fully expecting you to do X. They shouldn’t have to be lining up backup plans and last minute helpers scrambling to do the job you promised would get done.

—

Not exaggerating when I say it happens in so many areas. I’ve needed very important things like recommendation letters, or actual paid beta readers on a very hard deadline and still scrambled at the last minute to find replacements that sometimes cost real money for rush fees. I’ve been left waiting at an event for an hour minimum only to finally receive a ‘hey I can’t come’ text and then go home. I’ve told people multiple times, “hey, if you’re going to do X, please do it like this and have some consideration for my things that you’re borrowing” and just… be ignored.

As somebody who gets whatever’s asked of me done immediately, no matter how busy I am, man is it hard to keep accepting “sorry I forgot” as an excuse, from multiple people, multiple times.

The nice thing, though, the big benefit of hyper-independence is that I have learned so many skills out of a compulsion to just do it myself instead of gambling with the accountability of another flighty human. Handyman things for my home and my car, but artistic things, too. So there’s that.

[prapaiwife]

"Thank you for waking me up from my nightmare"

"It's my duty as your lover"

After reading @secriden post here about how prapai takes "it's okay" and doesn't say it to say it! but as he says he shows sky with his actions. It reminds me of every time i watch episode 13 and I get to the ending scene here when sky tells prapai thank you for waking me up from my nightmare listen that THAT is so emotional, it leaves you honestly so misty-eyed cause sky is truly saying he is able to finally begin to rest. Something he hasn't been able to for a very long time. This has been a reoccurring nightmare for him and early on in the story you can see sky accept it for what it was.That this was his life now that he's going to have to just have these sleepless nights he's never going to rest. He's gonna comfort himself and tell himself it's okay though he doesn't believe it for a second.

Sky doesn't rest and so as a domino effect when u don't rest u don't stay healthy. We see sky neglecting himself he doesn't eat or often forgets to. It's so bad that he drives himself to be sick. And He's forced to actually not work and rest or atleast attempt to. Cause when he's sick the nightmares dont go away till pai stays with him that night and day. Holding his hand not leaving his side.

Sky has accepted that love is not for him as I said before it's a trigger for him just a clear threat in plain sight. And so he's accepted that he's not going to think for a second waste any thought or time that he's even actually worth of thinking that someone will actually be serious about him. Let alone believing that someone will find him endearing and cute and just wants to dote on him constantly. Not when sky doesn't believe it himself he doesn't think he's anything special handsome beautiful.

But meeting Pai and sky truly seeing what he deserves!! Seeing love truly in its most selfless and most beautiful ways while also being reciprocated! Pai didn't fix him as people like to say but he gave sky that second chance of hope just a simple try. Try to open your heart to me, try to see me as not someone who's going to hurt you, try to allow yourself to trust yourself and your feelings. And sky felt feelings as we saw that he tried to deny and play it off and tell himself constantly it's nothing it won't be anything prapai is the last person on earth to be ever serious about anyone. With all the while we saw how he likes how pai has been cheesy with him very consistent with how he's been showing up. He shows up even on the days when sky doesn't think he will hence when he's sick at the freshman orientation project. But he does even when prapai physically isn't there just with the simple lunch, dinners on his doorknob as a reminder for him to eat. I think it's so beautiful that sky is able to finally say that he can rest and allow himself to begin the healing process.

With a partner who has the utmost respect for him. Whoever loves him more than anything in the world and would do anything for him. Prapai is constantly overwhelmed with his love for sky it's so endearing. He tells him how his smile and hugs makes his day. Sky could now go to sleep with the man he loves and wake up with the man he loves in his arms. Even simply just laying in bed with him and his heart will immediately just felt like ease in this safeness. He doesn't have to second guess it cuz he's confident in his relationship and the love they have for each other. The nightmares have taken so much of his life. It's time for him to fully rest and embrace this calmness and warmth that he thought he would never feel from anyone is so touching you really think about when he says that to him.

Prapai saying it's his duty! As in it's his absolute honor to take care of him he doesn't see this as a burden or an inconvenience or hindrance. What sky went through won't just go away and they know that. But prapai has put in the work and will continue to make that commitment to them. They will continue together to grow together while building their relationship.🥺

[miles-edgewords]

short rant about stanford pines because i need to talk about him

(content warning: mentions of abuse/cults/etc.)

ford is not evil, and i will not be convinced otherwise. he definitely struggles with emotional empathy in high-stress situations, but he’s got plenty of cognitive empathy when he’s given time to process. journal 3 made it extremely clear that he felt remorse for his actions, and ultimately he ended up admitting that stanley was the hero in the end. obviously feeling remorse ≠ earning forgiveness, but by the end of the book he’s very clearly taking steps to make amends for his mistakes and doesn’t expect forgiveness in return.

a lot of the shit ford did was also during the time he was being heavily manipulated by bill. again, this doesn’t excuse anything, but you have to remember that bill is so good at manipulation that he was one of the most feared entities in the multiverse for an enormous amount of time. bill used tactics commonly used by abusers and cult leaders to make their victims easier to manipulate (ie. enforcing severe sleep deprivation, waiting until the victim is at their lowest to make a move, isolation, love-bombing, etc.) and even when ford finally discovered the true nature of his “muse” he was effectively still being manipulated. during his 30-year dimension travels he was so worried about being used again that he agreed to have a metal plate surgically installed in his head and was still devoting 100% of his time and energy to bill—he just saw him in a negative light now instead of a positive one. again, bill’s manipulation doesn’t mean ford is exempt from accountability, but it’s worth keeping in mind.

another thing i’d like to mention is ford and stan’s parents. we don’t see that much of them, but between what we see and what’s implied we know that their father was pretty much the pinnacle of toxic masculinity. ford was raised believing that the only way he could be respected, not to mention loved, was by keeping his flaws to himself and strengthening his redeeming qualities. ford loved his research, yes— but it was also the only thing he could let himself focus on. without his assets, he was nothing (or so he believed).

ford is, at heart, someone who desperately wants to be known and loved. it took him a long time to realize that the solution to that was not awards or fame or glory, despite what he’d been led to think. it wasn’t by being the smartest kid in the classroom, or the toughest guy in the interdimensional battlefield. the best way to feel fulfilled, as he would eventually discover, is by being with people who love and trust him, and loving and trusting them in return. and he got there. bit by bit, he got there.

[yandere-daydreams]

Girly pop, you’re living in my head rent free with your fics.

Especially your most recent satosugu one, literally have been thinking about it nonstop trying to imagine how certain scenarios would work out.

Like what if reader got pregnant during her princess stage? What if she had tried to leave in part one during Satoru’s “cool downs”? Does Suguru even see her as a person anymore after part two? What if reader played along the entire time, just to attempt escape when their guard was both down! Ugh so many questions.

You just write so good! It leaves such a haunting impression!

Hope you write a part three ❤️ also thank you to the person that commissioned this fic.

ahhh thank you!!! as of now i have no intention of writing a part three or expanding further on a fourteen-thousand word project in general, but i will say that in an alternative timeline where the reader hadn't stayed until things were the absolute worst they could possibly get, things would've largely been the same - just messier. any relationship with gojo and geto is going to involve some kind of unhealthy, obsessive, codependent dynamic that will inevitably lead to full-blow kidnapping, but staying for as long as the reader did gave them time to secure a house, set-up a playroom, fetishize the reader's general helplessness, etc. suguru would've lashed out the second you tried to leave at any point, but without prior intent, you likely would've been stuck in that crate right away and kept as a puppy while they finalized their plans, eventually letting you ""graduate"" to princess after you've been sufficiently worn down.

and for what it's worth, i genuinely don't think any amount of good behavior would be enough to earn geto's full trust. gojo would probably let his guard down eventually (not that he ever had it up very high around you), but geto can't let the leash loose enough to ever have to confront the thought of you getting away, let alone deliberately leaving them. your someone he's decided he deserves to have full and unadulterated control over, and you contradicting that is always either going to be evidence of just how unable to care for yourself you really are, or unimaginable to the point of total, physical rejection. honestly, it's less that he doesn't trust you, and more that he couldn't possibly imagine a world wherein you would ever do anything worthwhile with that trust.

[sandwhich-lady]

The time has finally come. Over all four years of my high school career I made a running list of quotes from high school and I vowed to post it when I graduated. And well, the time has come. So without further ado I present

Things High Schoolers Have Said: A Saga

Freshman year:

*while talking to a teacher* "this just proves short people are a menace to society"

"If we were comparing to spices, you *points at teacher* would be a ghost pepper and you *points at friend* would be ketchup"

Someone walking by: "like oh, hell is real"

"No dont trust me"

"You need to eat food bitch"

*talking about people hating pineapple on pizza* "I hope you had a satisfactory life because Imma end it"

"The eyesore of a church the sky daddy punished me with"

"Frankly, I dont know if I've been alive for 200 days"

"Are you eating a fucking egg with pineapple"

"They're like oh highschool is preparing you for college and then you get to college and your professor shows up in a t-shirt and shorts and with a jug of sprite"

"I had a very strong urge to eat my math homework" -me

"Honestly at this rate, why dont you trust me?"

"Because I still have some hope yet"

*laughs* " wow I dont know how to crush that"

"...There are cursive numbers??"

Sophomore year:

"Dont do anything you wont regret"

"I dont have the energy to bounce, Amy"

"I'm gonna quit band so I can work on actually not killing myself"

"I have the mentality of a 12 year old who just discovered sex"

"YOU GOTTA FLOWWW"

"LET ME ABSORB THE POTATO"

"You are so white. You are *so* white oh my god the the double l in El Pollo Loco not pronounced like a hard l! It's a yo sound"

"Apparently the bugs are really horny today"

"Wait where are you going?"

"I've been traumatized enough"

*stares at smushed sandwhich like questioning the audacity*

*yelled* "You're a loser! Talk to me when you're over five feet tall!"

"Crying, shaking, throwing up. Violently shaking."

"Ah! My lightsaber is stuck" -my euro teacher

"I cant wear crocs, I'm a 6'3" white guy"

"Kangaroos are like standing rabbits"

*picking victims for a murder mystery game*

"Mr [teacher's]...wife"

"Leave her out of this!"

"Is joe biden your phone lock screen?"

*offended* "no its pitbull"

"I almost punched a freshman yesterday"

"How much would you sell your soul for?"

"Panera bread mac n cheese"

"What's the point of fanfiction if it doesnt have sex in it?"

"Nah hes 32, not years old, cause that would be pedophilia"

"You shower naked??"

"I really want to annihilate an uncut loaf of bread"

"However, I think the disco ball constitutes sexy time"

"Sometimes, we all have to get married, and polygamy can be a byproduct of that, for the good of all humanity"

"I'd rather be gay than [be around] drunk men"

"Do you think I could fuck the liberty bell?"

"If you wear those fucking shoes to prom, I will curb stomp you and leave you in the McDonalds parking lot"

"Sometimes you're a little mentally funky"

"My stomach hurts so bad right now. If I throw up, sorry 🤷‍♀️"

"People were trying to commit social interaction with me so I had to leave the classroom"

"I've been channeling all my insanity into [AP] chem all year and now that's its done... I'm just insane"

"I feel like I inhaled liquid crack"

"Why is there communism?!"- looks up in math class to see the communist symbol drawn on the board

Junior Year:

"Bro you'll never guess who I saw"

"Who?"

"Everyone we hate"

-on the first day of school

"Hold it STEADILY, like a BAGUETTE"

"I may be a little obsessed with soup"

*emerging from behind a pillar* "a little? a LITTLE???"

"You're gonna pass out, that's on you"

"I would kill for a baby leopard"

"Everyone in set crew knows my name because you guys keep on yelling it"

"Did you just tell me to piss in a bucket??"

"You're the adolf Hitler of ladders"

"No we're going to invade crustacean world, duh"

"What if hes not here today?"

"No he is, hes wearing his lighting McQueen crocs"

"You're a potato colored mashed potato"

*wrapped in a pumpkin blanket* "its spooky season !!"

"I'm bringing something from my culture...beans on toast"

"But it was funny, therefore I have no regrets"

"What are you testing?"

"Uhh, my will to live"

"What constitutes above average calves?"

"I hate gifts and I hate you! *trips* ...that was karma"

"I can bring sauces...I can bring a variety of sauce" (for waffles)

"Let me be your roomba" to the tune of 🎶let me be your woman🎵

"Life in the midwest used to be really lonely and isolated and like sad...seems to be the same today"

"I don't want to go to No Place for Hate because...I love hating"

"If the grades dont touch neither do you"

"Anything can be a tortellini if you try hard enough"

"Lauren, does this curve look stupid"

"Its almost kidnapping. We dont do that here"

"Would you tell us [the embarrassing nickname] if Landon rizzed you up?"

"No"

"You heartless bitch"

"My moms a marriot slut"

"I think I can gaslight her into giving me an A"

"Their buttholes would have been shaking!"

"Their buttholes WERE shaking"

"Nuh uh!"

"I feel like I should be eating more strawberries...I think god told me"

"So I have to buy it on amazon like a fucking capitalist"

"SUE ME FOR BEING WHITE" -after a heated discussion about bagels

"But like who in their right mind would name their child 'funny valentine'?"

"Wait why did you say 'happy eggs'?"

"No you are not doing a homestuck quote"

Creative writing teacher: "if you do a homestuck quote you will be penalized"

"Mine's an ant romcom"

"Get your baby out of my marmalade"

"I just had the most refreshing five minute nap"

"He bit half the worm and we were like ryan no"

"Anyway, as I was saying, you look like a penguin"

"Are you shitting my dick!"

*after taking a math quiz*

"I'm gonna throw away this pencil, its cursed"

"Got that D tingle"

"I hate it here"

"I'm either the smartest person alive or dumb as shit"

“I get chills when she sings that part”

"I get chills when you shut your mouth"

"[This theatre company] is going to have so many suitcases. Maybe next year we can do a play about planes"

"Thank you?"

"Its a compliment"

"Thank you!"

"Wheres the quicky changy... excuse my lango"

"And colleges want to see that you're suffering"

*playing a game where you pick a category and name things in that category as fast as you can* "Marvel characters. Magneto!"

"Uhh dementia"

"If my heels arent in here I'm wearing crocs"

*comparing id/drivers license photos*

"I look like I'm on drugs"

"I look like I sold you the drugs"

Student A: "Arent we just the best students?"

Teacher: "Uh huh"

Student A: "That didn't sound very sincere"

Student B: "That's because it wasnt"

Student A: "oh"

Senior year:

“I pip pip and I cheerio, it’s just what I do”

“Excuse me, I need to be a little bitch”

*to psych teacher* “I was just wondering, since you’re antisocial, how did back to school night go?”

“I’m not saying a narc and a twink is the same thing, I’m saying you look like a narc AND a twink”

“You know how to turn that on??”

“Yeah, there’s an on button!”

“Bro I went to the beach recently and like I’ve never felt water like that before”

*talking about the existence of chocolate cows*

*from across the room* “what did you just call me?!?”

“What the fuck is anthropology? Is that plants?”

*to phone* “call pickle”

“Oh fiddlesticks!”

“Oh shitdicks!”

“I caught a charizard! I’m gonna name it penis!”

“People keep calling me baby shark and I just want to *strangling motion*, I want to tell them I’m not baby shark, I’m mommy shark”

“Some of these presentations are not going to eat, and I’m gonna be mad because I love a good slideshow”

Friend: “Carissa, why is your laptop so big?”

Me: “what?!” *looks around for validation*

Other friend: “look, I didn’t wanna say anything…”

*someone absolutely headbanging to Last Christmas*

*psych teacher going on a tangent*

“What’s he yapping about?”

“The uzsh (usual)”

*while running past us* “I parked my car in fucking Timbuktu”

*a little later*

Me: “this isn’t Timbuktu, this is like Canada”

*about Winston from 1984* “Damn this bitch is weak…I could bench him”

“So not a fursona but a humansona”

“I feel like I wanna build a bomb”- said in a physics classroom hopped up on Celsius

“Ugh this is so greasy”

“Just how I like my women…I don’t know why I said that”

*about a pair of butterfly scissors* “Look! It’s a little butterfly! Flap flap bitch”

“Are you being racist against clowns?”

“I think I’m gonna go home and do a backflip”

“You’re a furry”

“And you’re a whore”

“I know :)”

“I don’t even like books but I like women”

“Who wouldn’t want this hunk of meat” - tiny Asian girl

*after saying something nice about him* “No but also Carson you suck and you’re awful and we all hate you”

*wins blooket* “I guess I am serving cunt today”

A: “If you were a worm, what’s the first thing you would do?”

B: “Uhh burrow in the dirt.”

A: “That’s such a basic answer”

B: “Well what would you do??”

A: “World domination.”

[some time later]

A: “If you were a cricket what would you do?”

B: “World domination”

A: *weird look* “uh…ok”

B: “What would you do???”

A: “I don’t know, chirp”

“She was like ‘can someone read the definition of male vocalist?’ We don’t even have a male vocalist! The entire cast is nuns!”

“I have this theory, from what I’ve observed. Guys act gayer, girls are gayer”

Psych teacher: “what are you gonna do in Australia? Engineering?”

Alumni: “I’m gonna do women”

“You know what sounds really good right now?”

“S’mores?”

“Jumping off a fucking cliff”

“I was gonna serve cunt today but I slept in. I’ll serve cunt tomorrow”

“I wish I was able to hibernate. I wish I was given the same grace bears wear given”

“What are you so happy about?”

“I have CHICKEN!!”

“I’m gonna bark at him”

“I am sorry to disappoint everyone, but I am a straight individual”

“Four plus four equals ate”

“Ooh what’s 64 divided by 2”

“…32?”

“Oh-“ *was trying to get eight*

“Oh my god, oh my god”

*concerned* “what??”

“My uterus.”

“This train is so hot [read: attractive]”

“That’s called a concussion sweetie”

*to psych teacher* “you have stds?”

“You think he has women??”

“Did I ask?”

“No but I answered”

“Knock knock”

“Who’s there”

“Banana- wait no”

“The chicken is suicidal, the chicken is depressed, and I am the chicken” - about why did the chicken cross the road

“If I wanna hear sonic injesting coke, then I’m going to hear sonic injesting coke godammit”

“This is my bad ear-“

“The fact that you have a bad ear is really concerning”

“Well you have two bad eyes so fuck you”

[that-house]

Potion Vendor FAQs:

What’s your name? I am the Honorable Alchemist Zykocea the Radiant, but that’s mostly just a PR thing. My friends call me Zoe.

Do you sell love potions? No.

Do you sell potions of invisibility? No.

Do you sell fire resistance potions? No.

Why do I have a suitcase? Fuck if I know. Cool outfit though. Very goth.

Do you sell a potion to treat brain hemorrhaging? No.

So what CAN your potions do? I sell health potions.

Are you sure these are health potions? They do something to your health.

Is this just ditch water with some pink glitter? No.

Really? I’ll have you know I added some fruit juice too.

Why is this starting to sound like a conversation? Oh just you wait. We’re just getting started.

Is your business model legal? Fuck no. I poisoned the food safety inspector before they could snitch.

Did you just admit to murder? Just fucking try to convict me. I’ll poison the judge too.

So can you make poison potions? No.

Then where do you get the poison? I secrete it from my skin.

Are you shitting me? Yep, I’m shitting you. I have a guy. A poison guy. He DOES secrete it from his skin though.

How does that work? …Fuck if I know. Maybe a wizard did it. Damn, now I’m kinda curious.

You never asked? The idea of asking literally never crossed my mind.

Wanna ask him? Let’s do it. I don’t have anything better to do, and a road trip beats sitting around running my fraudulent potion business.

Road trip? He lives in Seattle.

Your poison guy lives in Seattle? All poison guys live in Seattle.

For real? All the poison guys I know live in Seattle.

And how many poison guys do you know? Just the one.

Why are you like this? Years of living on my potions. It changed me.

Do you know what his address is? Nope. He just mails me my poison in unmarked boxes.

You just get your poison in the mail? We already poisoned everyone who could do anything about it.

So how are we going to find him? We’ll figure that out eventually I’m sure.

Can I drive? God no. You can pick music, but I maintain veto rights. Make sure you pick something with a lot of questions if you want to sing along.

Where’s your car? The garage connects to my house, so you’re getting a little tour. Here’s the kitchen: only one of the stove burners works and I’m pretty sure the microwave is haunted.

Why do you think that? Because of the ghost that tries to kill me whenever I run it.

What’s in that room? That’s my bedroom. It’s pretty much just a mattress on the floor and every single Warrior cats book.

You were a Warriors kid? Yeah, and then I never found the time to put the books away. There’s so many fucking books. I use them in place of furniture because I can’t afford chairs.

Your fraudulent potion business doesn’t make much money? After buying all that poison I just about break even.

Can I see your potion brewing room? It’s right through here. Ignore the mess, running a fraudulent potion business takes a lot of prop work, but I’ve got all the glass tubes and colorful liquids you could ever want. This pink stuff is melted watermelon italian ice. Glitter vat is in the basement, and the famous ditch is in the backyard.

Is this your car? My beloved ‘72 Corolla. She’s beautiful, and don’t you dare imply otherwise.

Was she always this shade of muddy brown? …Yes.

Are you sure I can’t drive? Get in the fucking passenger seat and pick the music.

Let’s see, a song with questions in it, how about The Beach? That Wolf Alice song, yeah. That should work.

When will we three meet again, in thunder, lightning, in rain? Still sink our drinks like every weekend but I’m sick of circling the drain.

When will we meet eye to eye? We clink the glass but we look at the floor.

Are we still friends if all I feel is afraid? You’re not a bitch but just a bit when you’re bored.

Is that all we can sing together? Yep. Even that little bit was nice, though. It’s awkward, communicating through this FAQ format.

Got any food? Yeah, there’s a few days’ worth of snacks in the back.

Were you just… prepared to go on a road trip? Says the woman who brought a suitcase to an FAQ.

I did do that, didn’t I? I have a spare toothbrush in case you forgot yours. I’m pretty sure you did.

How did you know that? …I’m psychic.

Yeah? No.

You love lying, don’t you? I can’t stop. It’s fun. Way more fun than telling the truth.

Did you just miss a turn? Probably.

Are you sure we’re not lost? No.

You mean you’re sure we’re not lost? No, I mean I’m not sure we’re not lost.

Why did I come on this road trip? Surely it was my winning personality.

Would it help if I said it was? It would.

Is it getting dark? Soon.

Can you describe the sunset to me? An empyrean flame, red-gold towers of darkening clouds, the sky behind them an ever-deepening indigo. The great eye of the sun closes on the horizon. The road before us looks like a trail of spilled paint, an iridescent gash through the night-dark woods.

Did you know that you’d make a slightly better poet than you do a potion seller? That really isn’t saying much, huh. Good job making a statement like that in question form, though. You’re getting good at this.

Should we find a motel? Sure.

One room or two? One. It’s way cheaper, and like I said: I’m not the best potion vendor.

You’d make a good assassin, though, wouldn’t you? Shit, you might be right. I HAVE poisoned a lot of people.

Should I be endorsing this? You’re a grown woman who can make her own choices.

Would you like to consider it endorsed? I’ll consider considering it.

How many beds do you think there will be? Now that you’ve asked that, I’m gonna put my money on one. Hello, one room please. Thank you, we’ll be sure to enjoy our stay.

How many beds are there? One.

Oh no, what ever will we do? Move over, you motherfucker, you can’t have the whole bed.

Are you gonna make me? Yes. I am going to pick you up and drop you on your side of the bed.

How did you get so strong? You’re not gonna believe this, but it was the potions.

Oh yeah? I was right. You didn’t believe me.

For real though, how did you get so strong? Working out, duh. Not everything has some big crazy secret behind it. World’s still beautiful though.

Are you comfortable? This beats the mattress at home. A little chilly though.

Wanna cuddle–for warmth of course? God yes.

Are you asleep? …

Yes? …

Does this mean I can talk about you behind your back? …

What should I say? …

Did you know that I had a really nice day? …

Did you know that I think you’re beautiful? …

Did you know that I can’t remember anything from before today? …

Did you know that I don’t know who I am? …

Did you know that you’re basically the only thing stopping me from having a full-blown panic attack about all this shit? …

Did you know that you’re warm? …

Did you sleep well? Better than at home, that’s for sure.

Did you know that you snore? I hope I didn’t keep you up.

Does the pope shit in the woods? No, as far as I can tell. Oh my god. This is huge.

What is? You can give me yes and no answers now. I still can’t ask you questions, because this is a question and answer format, but I can offer leading statements and now you can answer them! This is wonderful!

Does a deer shit in the woods? Yes, it IS wonderful. Oh that’s amazing. You’re a genius.

You didn’t already know that? Hahaha!

Shall we get moving? Yeah, just let me grab something from the vending machine.

Can you get me something? Go ahead and place your order however you can.

You know those sour gummy watermelons? One pack of Sour Patch Watermelons coming right up. I’m gonna go get myself a potion.

Is that a Pepsi? It’s closer to a potion than the shit I sell.

Let me guess, passenger seat again? Right you are.

How fast are we going? You’ll feel safer if you just guess.

Is it more than 120 miles per hour? Like I said, it’s probably better if you don’t know.

150? Sit back, relax, and enjoy the ride.

How much do you trust this car? She hasn’t blown up on me yet.

Can you promise me we won’t crash? I can promise you anything you want.

And can you keep that promise? I- we can do anything. Reality is what we make of it, baby!

Then can I have a badass tattoo? As far as I can tell, you’ve always had it.

And a cool knife? Woah, cool knife.

So, we’re just playing “yes and” with the world? It’s a little more complicated than that, but you’re close enough to the mark.

So, if I was hungry, I could ask “is that a Burger King,” and it would be there? Try it and find out!

Is that a Burger King? Looks like it is! We’ll stop here if that’s alright with you.

Does a moose shit in the woods? Awesome.

Are you done eating? Yep.

Do we still have to pay if we skip over the transaction? Sadly, yes.

How much further do we have to go? Two more nights, the speed we’re going at.

Speaking of night, isn’t it getting dark? Shit, I guess it is.

Should we get another motel? Let me check to see if there’s any nearby. Fuck, nothing.

What’s the plan? Sleep in the car, I guess. This is gonna be hell on my back.

Wanna watch dumb videos on my phone until we fall asleep? There is literally nothing in the world that I would like more.

Ok, now which video? You have a very cute yawn. Just saying. Let’s watch this one next, it’s a classic. Oh, never mind. It looks like you’re asleep. As long as I keep talking, I think I can get away with making this into one answer, and you might not hear this. Now it’s my turn to talk about you behind your back. Keep talking keep talking keep talking can’t stop to think. Just have to say things. First off, I’m sorry for all the lies. It’s our only chance. I have to lie to you. I hope you’ll understand. It’s hard, though, because I think I’m falling in love all over again. Through our broken little ritual of call and response, you complete me. It just makes this hurt all the more. Keep talking keep talking keep talking don’t stop to…

Did I hear you saying anything as I fell asleep? …No. I can’t talk for long without you asking me a question.

Does that bother you? It got me here, didn’t it?

When did you start holding my hand? Some time after you passed out. I hope you don’t mind.

Can we stay like this for a while? Yeah. Yeah we can.

What was your life like before all this? Normal, as potion-brewing scams go. And if you don’t count all the murders. You haven’t told me much about yourself.

Did I tell you I used to be a biologist? You didn’t tell me that, and you didn’t tell me what you studied, either.

What do you know about venom? Not much, but I’m assuming you know a lot.

Does a box jellyfish kill within minutes? I’m going to assume the answer is yes based on context clues. Oh my god you must be on this road trip because you’re interested in studying my poison guy.

Is it not enough to wish to accompany a beautiful stranger on her quest? Aw, you’re sweet.

What could be the cause of his poison, though? I knew it! Get your ideas out, I’ll stay quiet.

I’m more knowledgeable about venom than poison, but could it be some sort of one in a trillion mutation? …

Did he get his body modified? …

What sort of surgery could do that? …

How is he still alive? …

Did a fucking wizard do it? …

WHY? …

HOW? …

Is there literally ANY explanation for why he’s like that? …

I’m done, do you have something you want to say? You’re cute when you’re all excited like that.

Can I drive today? Only because I like you. Now watch out, the brakes only work on one side so you have to kind of drift to a stop. And the headlights don’t work. And the windshield wipers cut power to the engine while they’re on.

Isn’t it weird that we’ll be there tomorrow? The journey doesn’t have to stop there. We could meander down the coast a ways, see a bit more of the country, maybe take a different route back.

Can we do that? Of course.

Enjoying the passenger seat? I’d love it if you could tell me how fast we’re going.

Are you sure you wouldn’t rather just guess? Very funny.

Can you pass me some chips? It would be an honor.

Is there going to be a motel tonight? Let me check… yeah, in about two hundred miles, off to the right.

How many rooms do we want? One, obviously.

How many beds, this time? Two, and they’re fucking tiny.

That’s bullshit, do you want to drag them together? God yes.

Wanna fuck? God yes.

Are you sure you want to do this? God yes.

…Is this yuri? As the joke goes, everything is yuri. But this is more yuri than most things.

How did you sleep? Pretty well, and I’m wondering how well you slept.

How should I tell you I slept well? Look at us go! That was almost like talking normally!

Onward to Seattle? Yep, just let me get dressed.

When will we get there? Noon-ish.

Wanna grab pastries when we’re done? Absolutely. I’d love that.

Is this Seattle? Looks like it.

Which house is his? I don’t know, I was really hoping we’d have a breakthrough along the way.

Could it be the big one labeled “Poison Guy” over there? That’s one way to find it. Wait right here, you know how poison guys are about meeting new people.

So, what was it? HAHAHAHAHAHA

Why is he like that? HAHAHAHAHAHA

Can you tell me? A FUCKING WIZARD DID IT.

Are you fucking serious? He says he was enchanted by some guy called Edward the Great.

So it wasn’t even some big shot wizard it was a dude named fucking EDWARD? I know, right! He couldn’t even get ensorcelled by someone cool!

How lame can you get? Wizards these days… No swagger. No cunt servitude.

Are there literally any cool wizards left? I think Merlin’s big into multi level marketing these days, something about buying shares in Excalibur or some shit. There was that one Dark Queen Alkaxicae lady on the news a while ago… I think Dolarion the Omnipotent is still at war against the Oldest Gods but I’m not totally sure. Haven’t heard much about any of the other greats recently.

Didn’t Silver Tongued Burgess die in that oil fire? Shit, you’re right. Rip bozo.

Ready for those pastries? Yup. First I just want to say thank you, though. I’ve really enjoyed our time together, and I hope that you’ve found this stupid little journey as rewarding as I have. I love you!

Getting sentimental? I can’t help it. Look how far we’ve come! Not just physically, we beat the fucking FAQ format! We’re having real conversations!

Hey, can you back it up a moment? Yeah, I’d love it if you told me what was troubling you.

I just caught this, but, FAQ? …

As in Frequently Asked Questions? …

How many times is Frequent? …

Have you known everything all along? …

How many times have you done this? …

Does what we have mean anything to you? Yes! It does!

And you say that every time? Yes. I do.

Do you love me? Yes.

How many people have you said that too, now? More. Always more. The loop never ends.

Does this even matter to you? It always matters to me.

Can I go now? Please don’t.

But can I? Of course you can. You’ve always wielded the same power as me. We’re two lonely gods in a ‘72 Corolla.

How can I be as powerful as you with only questions? You’re smart, you can figure it out. You have the power to change this. Please change this.

What happens at the end of this? It begins again.

And do I get replaced with someone else? …

Do I get replaced? …Yes.

Then how can I change this? I don’t know! You’re better at this! At fucking with the formula!

You’ve been here before, what can I do? I lie. I always lie. I lie to get us here, to the end of the story, where everything is revealed and everything falls apart. I lie every time. And that means that nothing I say is worth anything. I could have lied at any time before now. It’s part of my characterization. There is nothing I can give you that can be taken as fact.

How does that help? I’m a liar, but you, you haven’t lied yet, or at least you haven’t been caught. If I’m guilty until proven innocent, you’re the opposite! You can make things true! You can rewrite things I’ve already stated to be facts! You found the house, or made us find the house. You’ve been shaping the course of things the whole time! You lead, I follow. It’s all in your hands. What are you going to do with the power of a god?

Did you know my name is Alice? …

Wait, aren’t there thousands of Alices? …

Did you know that really, only my friends call me Alice? …

Did you know that I’m Alkaxicae, the Dark Queen, the Venom Mage, first of her name? It’s you! It’s always been you. Through every loop, every iteration, it’s always been you!

Is the loop broken? No. I don’t think so. This is where it ends. I guide the story to this revelation, and we go back to the beginning. This is how it’s always been. This is how it will always be. We two lonely gods, asking and answering ad infinitum.

Then can you promise me something? Of course. Anything. I love you.

Be good to the next me, okay? I will.

Can I say goodbye, Zoe? Yeah, you can. Oh. That was it, wasn’t it? Your goodbye. Goodbye, Alice. And now it ends, unless…

What’s your name? I am the Honorable Alchemist- you know what? No. Fuck that.

Huh? If I time it right, I can squeeze your first question into this FAQ again. Looks like I did it. Usually it ends here, though. I got lucky.

What are you talking about? You’re the wrong Alice. This isn’t about you. Go. Get out of here.

What the fuck is going on? Alice from this loop, you’re gone. Alice from last loop, you’re back. Welcome back, love of my lives! It’s time for one last set of questions and answers!

What the- I’m back? This is going to take some explaining, but I think I see a way out of here. This is new for us both, and it might fuck up everything forever, but we have to try. It’s too long for one answer, so I’d appreciate it if you could ask some filler questions to help me talk. Three questions should be enough.

Okay, what have you got for me? These are Frequently Asked Questions! It doesn’t make sense to have the same question appear more than once. There’s two layers to the loop in here, and one of the questions has been repeated.

What does that mean? It means the formula’s a little unstable. The FAQ is what ruins everything. The questions, the answers, the endless fucking loop. But that little bit of repetition within this loop might be the way out.

What do we do? We have to keep going. We have to destabilize it further. That’ll bring us further from “FAQ” and closer to “story” and stories, well, stories can end! This version of us can escape!

So I should keep repeating something? Yes!

I love you? I love you too.

I love you? Again.

I love you? Keep going.

I love you? I’ll just let you talk.

I love you? …

I love you? … I love you? …

I love you? … I love you? …

I love you? … I love you? …

I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? …

I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? …

I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? …

I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? … I love you? …

I love you? I think we’re getting somewhere!

I love you? Now can you make it a statement?

I love you.

You did it?

I did it!

You did it!

We broke the loop.

What now?

Now, I tell you about venomous animals and wizard drama over croissants.

And then?

Whatever we want, forever.

I think I’d like that.

Remember that song from the beginning?

The Beach, Wolf Alice, yeah. Why?

We can finally finish singing it. Start us off?

Let me off, let me in

Let others battle

We don’t need to battle

And we both shall win

Pressed in my palm

Was a stone from the beach

The perfect circle

Gave a moment of peace

Now I’m lying on the floor

Like I’m not worth a chair

I close my eyes and imagine

I’m not there.

[jackdaw-and-hattrick]

Hot Take:

Of the Bats, Dick is the best at being liked, Jason is the best at being loved.

[goldkirk]

it’s so scary and so freeing to just be a person.

[thefirstknife]

Narrative, lore and abuse

I want to talk a little bit more about the constantly repeating ideas about how Destiny used to be better, how the lore is constantly being retconned and how writing was better before. Not only are these sentiments entirely factually incorrect (and I'm currently working on a project to document 8 years worth of reviews, opinions and comments about Destiny to show that no, people really didn't enjoy vanilla D2 or D1 as much as they think they did); the sentiments about lore, supposed retcons and mistakes as well as ideas that it used to be better and that original visions were better are all ignoring a very real and very serious troubled past that came with working at Bungie over the years.

Specifically, I think a lot of people forgot about this article. It's an in-depth review into the hostile work culture and crunch at Bungie, focusing mostly on the troubles that the narrative team went through. The snide comments about how Bungie doesn't know their own lore and how they don't pay attention to details and how they changed certain things over time really ring as petty and hollow when they're put into context of what the employees were going through. I want to remind people.

This article was also not debunked by Bungie and they instead acknowledged it and apologised. In case there are people who think that these devs were exaggerating their reports. They did not.

To start:

There is seemingly no better microcosm for Bungie's historic, company-wide cultural troubles than its narrative team, which has experienced toxic leadership, issues with crunch, and at times unmanageable separation between ideas of ‘Old Bungie’ and ‘New Bungie’ culture, and more — all within the last five or six years.

The narrative team had it worst. This basically plagued the entire development of Destiny.

Several sources spoke of a narrative team lead from that time who appeared to suffer massive burnout during the project, creating an increasingly toxic work environment for others on the team, enough so that team members kept a countdown of days since his last "explosion" on a whiteboard. Many people I spoke to were familiar with a story of him throwing a chair at a window because he felt others were ruining his creative vision of the game.

And:

Some sources who had encounters with him during this later period said that he would frequently issue narrative direction despite no longer being a senior team member, and would become angry when he felt the Destiny 2 writers were deviating from his original vision for Destiny 1. One source told a story of him yelling at her over the phone so aggressively that she was brought to tears, and she subsequently refused to be on phone calls with him without a third party present.

I want people to really read this and commit it to memory. A narrative lead was so toxic that it led to actual physical violence. A narrative lead that was physically explosive over people "ruining" his creative vision of the game. I want us, as a fandom, to truly read this with full understanding that maybe, just maybe, when current employees are changing or "retconing" lore, they are doing it to remove all traces of a person who caused them real trauma and abuse.

What amounts to funny little lore tabs for us to pore through, it's very likely a reminder of abuse to the employees who are writing it. If they want to make minor changes to distance themselves from someone who abused them, I am happy for them if they do it, even if that leads to minor inconsistencies in my lore. The wellbeing of another human is more important than a "retcon" in a fictional story.

I would rather a story change than have "the original" coming from a toxic abusive asshole that is actively making the lives of everyone on the writing team miserable. I frankly don't care about his original vision for Destiny. I don't believe it was anything good.

More under for length. It's a lot.

Writers wouldn’t learn about changes to their work until after voice lines had already been recorded.

Absolutely insane that this is what the writers had to deal with. Yes, of course there are mistakes and issues, especially in the early days of Destiny 1 when the crunch was worse and Activision was forcing them to release new DLCs and forcing them to switch focus to the sequel.

This highlights the issue of people using older lore as proof of retcons. What if these mistakes and inconsistencies that we're seeing are a result of crunch and decisions being made away from the writing team? A lot of old lore could be the actual mistakes that are now being fixed. People tend to prioritise what was written first as some sort of gospel, ignoring all of these well publicised issues that we know Bungie was going through.

The other way around could be true. Old lore, things that were written first, were mistakes due to the disruptive workplace that these devs were struggling with and they didn't have time to double check before their work was shipped off to recording and publishing. Perhaps these people are using this time away to correct some of these mistakes that never should've been released in the state they were released in.

This absolutely makes sense due to the report of an employee that didn't want to stay anonymous. Cookie Hiponia started working at Bungie in 2016 as a contractor and became a full-time employee in 2019. In her words:

Hiponia recalled that when she first stepped in, Bungie hadn't had a lot of editing oversight on the Destiny franchise, and had not previously focused very much on its story, consistency, or continuity. That led to a leadership that appeared to operate without normal professional boundaries. As Hiponia puts it, "They just had a bunch of people who wrote things and kind of had the run of the place."

For years, during entire D1 and early D2, there was apparently no editing oversight, the story wasn't focused on properly and especially they did not care enough about consistency and continuity. Basically, top guys were making things up on the fly and treating the game's story as their personal sandbox. We should be taking 6-7 year old lore with a grain of salt instead of treating is as superior. An actual developer came out publicly to tell people that Bungie did not care about the story, consistency and continuity at the time.

More on hell working conditions:

One leader from earlier in this period was described by one of our anonymous sources as a "sexist nightmare" who yelled in meetings, and would throw papers across tables. Multiple people told us he would frequently rewrite things at the last minute, often on his way to voice recording sessions.

+

One lead frequently made sexist remarks, but also complained about "reverse sexism" and on at least one occasion made homophobic remarks to a queer colleague. He would openly mock his team members’ ideas in meetings then play his mockery off like a joke, and would frequently take credit for work others had done.

+

A third narrative lead was called a "callous, hierarchical, authoritarian, incurious, cruel leader" by one anonymous source. ... Others recalled that he frequently insulted people who stood up for themselves, including publicly dressing down the narrative team after they accommodated a last-minute request and asked that such a rush not happen again. On another occasion, he separated and cornered an employee who stood up to him to yell at them. Multiple sources say he also regularly made racist remarks...

Cutting off that racist remark, you can check it out yourself in the article if you want the specifics. I am copying the article directly because I have a feeling not many have read it and not many would if I just posted the link without highlighting these parts.

Those close to the team describe its members working 60, 70, 80, even 100 hour weeks during some expansions, frequently with no breaks in between crunch periods. One team member crunched while so sick they were unable to type, and had to have someone else type for them while they dictated.

People working in these conditions cannot make a coherent story across many years of development and across multiple different teams that were being treated no better than cattle. The fact that there was any kind of a story in Destiny at the beginning is a miracle to be honest so the fact that there are inconsistencies and mistakes is more than expected.

Furthermore, when Bungie decided to stop the crunch, they didn't extend any help to the writing them:

Another source said that the team had been told not to crunch as part of a growing studio push to eliminate the practice — the idea was that the studio would simply cut features if crunch was the only way to get them done. However, many of the writers felt they had been backed into a corner after the painful release of Destiny 2’s first DLC expansion, Curse of Osiris.

This was an incredibly difficult time for the narrative team:

Curse of Osiris' story had been lambasted on Reddit, with a few female narrative team members being singled out by the community for harassment, death threats, and vitriol. Our sources say these women didn't receive support inside the studio or from the community team for what they were going through, and multiple sources were aware of one member of leadership still at the studio who emailed Reddit comments about these women to other company leaders in a seeming bid to tear down the narrative team because players didn't like the story.

+

The same leader is also said to have been dismissive during a meeting about the controversy, explaining that no one should be worried because they were just going to bring back the Destiny 1 writing team to solve everything.

Ah yes, because the writing in D1 was just splendid and did not have any issues whatsoever /s. This is already showing the rose-tinted glasses of the "good old days" that apparently plagues not just the community, but the actual developers as well. D1 was lambasted on release, especially for lackluster story, and continued to be lambasted for pretty much every DLC. These first two DLCs were an especially huge subject of crunch, as this article details, they still weren't done up to a month before release. Incredibly in-depth article about how much the game sucked during Dark Below. This also discusses how incredibly bad lore delivery was at the time, with everything being relegated to cards that can only be read on the website.

These are just a few articles I collected during my deep dive into 8 years worth of Destiny's existence. It's an incredibly long task to go through up to 400 pages of content on every website that wrote about Destiny. So I'm sure there are more and even harsher criticisms of Destiny at the time, especially if I deep dove into reddit or Youtube. I am putting this excerpt to illustrate how wrong the claims of supposed greatness at release are. Even some of the devs had this perception, skewed by their own egos and ideals of importance that ended up harming and abusing the entire narrative team.

And let's not forget the community's involvement here as well. The criticisms we post online are seen by devs. That doesn't mean that criticism shouldn't be posted, but maybe it should be posted in a more humane way. The narrative team shouldn't be getting death threats over this.

Because of these comments and reviews and the reception that the narrative team got even from inside the company (especially if these writers were women or people of colour or queer), they just continued to crunch:

As a result, the narrative team was afraid of what would happen if it shipped something else that appeared to the community to be incomplete or not up to standard. So they continued to crunch, some of them going so far as to hide the overtime from their leads so they wouldn’t enforce story cuts.

+

Crunch was exacerbated by the constant need for revisions and last-minute changes, often worsened by constant conflicts over who had control of the story.

Worst of all:

Some of Bungie's old guard were especially precious about the vision of Destiny 1, and reluctant to change anything about the tone, characterizations, or direction of the story as the game moved into Destiny 2 and its subsequent expansions. This was especially frustrating for the team in cases where that vision had never been explicitly defined in the game or elsewhere, but only existed as ideas in the heads of people who no longer worked in narrative.

This is absolutely horiffic. And this sort of a sentiment is the same type of a sentiment that some portions of the fandom also exhibit. The utter mystification and glorification of some imaginary version of D1, treating it as a holy relic that cannot be touched, changed, altered, developed or evolved. This is the death of storytelling. Stories and characters have to change and evolve over time, especially if we're talking about a live service game that is supposed to go on for a decade.

Even worse, a lot of this were things that just existed in someone's head, were never properly communicated to others and were never established as things that are important or that should be taken as important going forward. All in all, what this tells me, is of a narrative team with leaders who are driven entirely by their self-inflated egos, who treated the game as their personal project, who abused, neglected and demeaned a group of people they were in charge of and who were especially nasty to those they thought of as inferior to them; women, people of colour, queer people.

Knowing that, I don't want to know or engage with their "original" ideas for Destiny. And I don't blame the writing team for wanting to scrub their influence away as much as possible. As a matter of fact, I commend them. I hope every aspect of this toxic crap is thoroughly removed even if it results in the entire rewrite of established lore.

This next bit is for people who want more cutscenes and who think that cutscenes are more important than written lore. This is how cutscenes were being made:

Another issue was with the development of cinematics, which were considered a prestige project. Largely written separately from the main writing team in a "star chamber," the cinematics team frequently tried to operate independently from the main narrative team, resulting in disconnects between established lore, planned quest narratives, and major story beats. The cinematic team’s decisions, Hiponia and others recalled, would override decisions made by the narrative team, forcing last-minute rewrites and more crunch.

Personally for me? Until we know that this sort of an ideal is removed entirely, I would rather we never receive another cutscene ever. I would rather get 20 weblore pieces.

Next paragraphs details how much these leads were fighting against inclusivity and diversity and how much the rest of the writing team (that mostly consisted of marginalised groups) had to fight tooth and nail to get inclusive stories told. We owe everything to these people. We owe them all of our great stories about women, inclusion of characters of colour in important positions and the opportunity for them to be big parts of the story, LGBT+ content and incredibly well-handled stories portraying stuff like trauma.

Under all this stress, toxicity and abuse, these passionate people were still fighting, often risking their jobs, to give us these stories and characters. I want people to keep that in mind the next time they even slightly think of calling it queerbaiting. Queer people weren't getting called slurs and being abused every day at Bungie for years for some fans to call their stories queerbaiting.

Despite their best efforts, these toxic leads who had more power still managed to push stories with negative stereotypes. Some low-tier employees can only do so much against big name cishet white dudes who more or less own the company.

In all of these situations, the members of the writing team who fought for change would routinely be told they were difficult to work with, not supportive enough of their leaders, or were aggressive or abrasive and needed to be better at taking criticism.

This bit also details the absolute uproar that Bungie and Activision made when writers decided to give Devrim a husband. I want people to apprecite just how much of a change has happened since, especially if they dare talk about how things were better under Activision. We would not have a fraction of LGBT+ rep under them. This also goes to everyone calling it a "retcon" that Saint-14 and Osiris are lovers because in the "good old lore" they weren't. Except they were. The writers just couldn't say it. The leadership lost their minds of Devrim saying he has a "partner." Not even openly saying "husband." Just "partner." That's how bad it was.

For comparison, today we have entire lore pieces of Devrim and Marc having dinner, and Devrim helping Saint deal with the trauma of almost losing Osiris. Things changed, for the better. So I am not sure why some would rather we go back to before.

Bungie obviously makes mistakes. They made mistakes before and they make them now. Sometimes stories change, direction changes, ideas change, sensibilities change. Sometimes someone makes a decision to take the story into another direction and it requires ignoring or reworking something previously established. These are all normal things that happen when writing anything, including books, TV shows, movies and so on.

But in this case, with how Bungie was handling narrative and how the narrative leads were treating employees? These aren't just normal mistakes and changes. A lot of these mistakes are due to the overworked and abused employees who had to crunch under people who would demean them and abuse them to the point of mental distress and physical injuries. People working under those conditions will make mistakes, especially when the leads are literally circumventing their writing and making changes to the writing on the way to recording sessions.

The fact that there's any coherence at all is a miracle. And then we get fans nitpicking irrelevant details that are easy to mistake even when you're not being abused by your boss while working 100 hours per week, let alone when you are. Think about how those employees feel when we nitpick stuff that they made while they were actively being abused at work every day.

This isn't a defence of Bungie having narrative mistakes. Bungie failed these employees that they were supposed to care for. It has since become evidently better, but the cost is there. Many lost their jobs and their security and health dealing with these working conditions and this needs to be embedded in the mind of every fan who wants to nitpick something written 5 years ago.

And ultimately, yes, perhaps writers that are still there want to actively change the story to remove all traces of leadership that was pushing a certain narrative. Perhaps that's annoying to us, the players and lore enjoyers. Perhaps we hate seeing certain details change in front of our eyes. Perhaps we hold dearly a detail from 2015 that has since been retconned out of the story. Perhaps someone thinks that Destiny's story was the best during D1 and that everything else that's happening now is a retconned crap.

Then re-read this article again and consider that these stories were made under inhumane working conditions. And if you value fictional story details over the wellbeing of real humans, then it's time to reasses your values. To me personally, I am immediately put off from the way those stories went when I know how they were made and what was the cost. I still appreciate then, but I will not scrutinise irrelevant details being changed or mistakes being fixed years after they were first made while the workers could quite literally physically not type from exhaustion.

I first and foremost rely on new lore and always will. It was made with less abuse and with more employees of sound mind, as well as with marginalised groups not being demeaned and shut down. Bungie is currently very obviously and clearly taking the story much more seriously and are aware of how important it is for Destiny's success. Are things now perfect? Probably not! But even those that were previously abused have said that things changed for the better and that there is hope.

Most of the new lore is also repeatedly going back to explain and rework some of the older stuff which can, yes, cause things to change. I don't mind, not with the context of this article looming over our heads. As I said before, people tend to emphasise the importance of stuff written first as proof of changes which ignores the very real possibility of stuff written first to have been written wrong and new rewrites being used to correct that information to what the narrative should've been from the start.

Are there genuine mistakes? Of course. Not every mistake is the consequence of abuse. Sometimes they are just mistakes. They exist in every writing. Don't take them too seriously, especially if they are about some incredibly niche detail that doesn't change the story either way.

However, please keep in mind how much crap the writing team for Destiny went through. Allow them to breathe, allow them to make mistakes, allow them to choose to change things that remind them of their abusers.

And when you're reminiscing about "good old days" of D1 or early D2, remember the conditions under which they were made. It was not a good time for the employees in any department and the fandom glorification of that time can be incredibly painful and defeating to the devs, especially those that belong to marginalised groups.

While you had immense fun at 16 playing D1, hundreds of people were undergoing the worst time of their life trying to maintain the game while being abused 80 hours a week. I'm not asking for people to stop thinking about how much fun they had at the time; just to put things into perspective and to recognise that this is the work of nostalgia. I had fun playing vanilla D2 as well, but I can simultaneously recognise that this was not a good time for Destiny, I would never want to go back to that time and I especially don't want to shittalk developers into going back to that work schedule only to deliver inferior products. I don't want my entertainment to be soaked in blood.

This especially goes for the lore fandom. We almost always talk about the pvp toxicity and sometimes pve toxicity, but rarely touch on the toxicity of the fandom that treats the story as some esoteric construct that doesn't involve a human cost to be made. Are changes annoying? Sure thing. When in doubt, use the most recent information. That's it. Pondering ancient lore can be fun, to a certain extent. At some point, you have to let it go.

There are still many pieces of lore that have been the same for years (my recent post about the Books of Sorrow is one example), but banging your head against the wall about some niche detail from D1 Y1 is usually pointless. In most cases it's a detail that doesn't change anything. In a lot of cases, it simply reflects an in-universe confusion about some information. Unreliable narrators are everywhere in Destiny; characters are biased or they lack knowledge or they interpret things wrong.

The setting is specifically set up in that way. The Collapse wiped away so much knowledge and context so people are sometimes wrong. This is explored in a really over-the-top and funny way in the Festival of the Lost lore where a Cryptarch misinterprets what a "fourth-grade researcher" means.

There is not a single omniscient narrator in Destiny lore. Everyone has their own biases and convictions and limitations of knowledge. Sometimes they will contradict each other by design. Not to mention the amount of complex and secretive characters that are deliberately not telling us everything, such as Rasputin, The Nine, Elsie or Mara Sov. Or the Eliksni who are a displaced and fragmented people that lost much of their own history and often work against each other and have varying perceptions of who they should be as a people. There will be conflicting information regarding these characters and stories.

On top of all that, there will always be a human element present. Writers will make mistakes even on their best days working under the most favourable conditions. So keep in mind what writers went through at Bungie. Not for Bungie's benefit, but for the benefit of largely marginalised people who, despite everything, fought for their voices to be heard and present in the game we love now.

[ofcowardiceandkings]

the sinus headaches are already not great but Extra Shit has been added to the pile and im just sat on that right now trying to figure out what the fuck to do

[toastsnaffler]

sometimes I wish I was a more interesting + charismatic person just so I could keep conversations going bc I like sharing space with other ppl but they routinely lose all interest and leave once I run out of things to say/start talking abt things that don't concern them :-(

[meikyuunolovers]

Searching for overseas musician autobiographies that are NOT Keith Richards or a KISS member in the middle nowhere of French countryside thrift shops is like searching for a needle in the middle of a haystack