#this took about an hour and a half in its entirety

[ekingston]

SO HERE IS THE WHOLE STORY (SO FAR).

I am on my knees begging you to reblog this post and to stop reblogging the original ones I sent out yesterday. This is the complete account with all the most recent info; the other one is just sending people down senselessly panicked avenues that no longer lead anywhere.

IN SHORT

Cliff Weitzman, CEO of Speechify and (aspiring?) voice actor, used AI to scrape thousands of popular, finished works off AO3 to list them on his own for-profit website and in his attached app. He did this without getting any kind of permission from the authors of said work or informing AO3. Obviously.

When fandom at large was made aware of his theft and started pushing back, Weitzman issued a non-apology on the original social media posts—using 

his dyslexia; 

his intent to implement a tip-system for the plagiarized authors; and 

a sudden willingness to take down the work of every author who saw my original social media posts and emailed him individually with a ‘valid’ claim,

as reasons we should allow him to continue monetizing fanwork for his own financial gain.

When we less-than-kindly refused, he took down his ‘apologies’ as well as his website (allegedly—it’s possible that our complaints to his web host, the deluge of emails he received or the unanticipated traffic brought it down, since there wasn’t any sort of official statement made about it), and when it came back up several hours later, all of the work formerly listed in the fan fiction category was no longer there. 

THE TAKEAWAYS

1. Cliff Weitzman (aka Ofek Weitzman) is a scumbag with no qualms about taking fanwork without permission, feeding it to AI and monetizing it for his own financial gain; 

2. Fandom can really get things done when it wants to, and 

3. Our fanworks appear to be hidden, but they’re NOT DELETED from Weitzman’s servers, and independently published, original works are still listed without the authors' permission. We need to hold this man responsible for his theft, keep an eye on both his current and future endeavors, and take action immediately when he crosses the line again. 

THE TIMELINE, THE DETAILS, THE SCREENSHOTS (behind the cut)

Sunday night, December 22nd 2024, I noticed an influx in visitors to my fic You & Me & Holiday Wine. When I searched the title online, hoping to find out where they came from, a new listing popped up (third one down, no less):

This listing is still up today, by the way, though now when you follow the link to word-stream, it just brings you to the main site. (Also, to be clear, this was not the cause for the influx of traffic to my fic; word-stream did not link back to the original work anywhere.)

I followed the link to word-stream, where to my horror Y&M&HW was listed in its entirety—though, beyond the first half of the first chapter, behind a paywall—along with a link promising to take me—through an app downloadable on the Apple Store—to an AI-narrated audiobook version. When I searched word-stream itself for my ao3 handle I found both of my multi-chapter fics were listed this way:

Because the tags on my fics (which included genres* and characters, but never the original IPs**) weren’t working, I put ‘Kara Danvers’ into the search bar and discovered that many more supercorp fics (Supergirl TV fandom, Kara Danvers/Lena Luthor pairing) were listed.

I went looking online for any mention of word-stream and AI plagiarism (the covers—as well as the ridiculously inflated number of reviews and ratings—made it immediately obvious that AI fuckery was involved), but found almost nothing: only one single Reddit post had been made, and it received (at that time) only a handful of upvotes and no advice. 

I decided to make a tumblr post to bring the supercorp fandom up to speed about the theft. I draw as well as write for fandom and I’ve only ever had to deal with art theft—which has a clear set of steps to take depending on where said art was reposted—and I was at a loss regarding where to start in this situation.

After my post went up I remembered Project Copy Knight, which is worth commending for the work they’ve done to get fic stolen from AO3 taken down from monetized AI 'audiobook’ YouTube accounts. I reached out to @echoekhi, asking if they’d heard of this site and whether they could advise me on how to get our works taken down.

While waiting for a reply I looked into Copy Knight’s methods and decided to contact OTW’s legal department:

And then I went to bed.

By morning, tumblr friends @makicarn and @fazedlight as well as a very helpful tumblr anon had seen my post and done some very productive sleuthing:

@echoekhi had also gotten back to me, advising me, as expected, to contact the OTW. So I decided to sit tight until I got a response from them.

That response came only an hour or so later: 

Which was 100% understandable, but still disappointing—I doubted a handful of individual takedown requests would accomplish much, and I wasn’t eager to share my given name and personal information with Cliff Weitzman himself, which is unavoidable if you want to file a DMCA.

I decided to take it to Reddit, hoping it would gain traction in the wider fanfic community, considering so many fandoms were affected. My Reddit posts (with the updates at the bottom as they were emerging) can be found here and here.

A helpful Reddit user posted a guide on how users could go about filing a DMCA against word-stream here (to wobbly-at-best results)

A different helpful Reddit user signed up to access insight into word-streams pricing. Comment is here.

Smells unbelievably scammy, right? In addition to those audacious prices—though in all fairness any amount of money would be audacious considering every work listed is accessible elsewhere for free—my dyscalculia is screaming silently at the sight of that completely unnecessary amount of intentionally obscured numbers.

Speaking of which! As soon as the post on r/AO3—and, as a result, my original tumblr post—began taking off properly, sometime around 1 pm, jumpscare! A notification that a tumblr account named @cliffweitzman had commented on my post, and I got a bit mad about the gist of his message :

Fortunately he caught plenty of flack in the comments from other users (truly you should check out the comment section, it is extremely gratifying and people are making tremendously good points), in response to which, of course, he first tried to both reiterate and renegotiate his point in a second, longer comment (which I didn’t screenshot in time so I’m sorry for the crappy notification email formatting):

which he then proceeded to also post to Reddit (this is another Reddit user’s screenshot, I didn’t see it at all, the notifications were moving too fast for me to follow by then)

... where he got a roughly equal amount of righteously furious replies. (Check downthread, they're still there, all the way at the bottom.)

After which Cliff went ahead & deleted his messages altogether. 

It’s not entirely clear whether his account was suspended by Reddit soon after or whether he deleted it himself, but considering his tumblr account is still intact, I assume it’s the former. He made a handful of sock puppet accounts to play around with for a while, both on Reddit and Tumblr, only one of which I have a screenshot of, but since they all say roughly the same thing, you’re not missing much:

And then word-stream started throwing a DNS error.

That lasted for a good number of hours, which was unfortunately right around the time that a lot of authors first heard about the situation and started asking me individually how to find out whether their work was stolen too. I do not have that information and I am unclear on the perimeters Weitzman set for his AI scraper, so this is all conjecture: it LOOKS like the fics that were lifted had three things in common:

They were completed works;

They had over several thousand kudos on AO3; and

They were written by authors who had actively posted or updated work over the past year.

If anyone knows more about these perimeters or has info that counters my observation, please let me know!

I finally thought to check/alert evil Twitter during this time, and found out that the news was doing the rounds there already. I made a quick thread summarizing everything that had happened just in case. You can find it here.

I went to Bluesky too, where fandom was doing all the heavy lifting for me already, so I just reskeeted, as you do, and carried on.

Sometime in the very early evening, word-stream went back up—but the fan fiction category was nowhere to be seen. Tentative joy and celebration!***

That’s when several users—the ones who had signed up for accounts to gain intel and had accessed their own fics that way—reported that their work could still be accessed through their history. Relevant Reddit post here.

Sooo—

We’re obviously not done. The fanwork that was stolen by Weitzman may be inaccessible through his website right now, but they aren’t actually gone. And the fact that Weitzman wasn’t willing to get rid of them altogether means he still has plans for them. 

This was my final edit on my Reddit post before turning off notifications, and it's pretty much where my head will be at for at least the foreseeable future:

Please feel free to add info in the comments, make your own posts, take whatever action you want to take to protect your work. I only beg you—seriously, I’m on my knees here—to not give up like I saw a handful of people express the urge to do. Keep sharing your creative work and remain vigilant and stay active to make sure we can continue to do so freely. Visit your favorite fics, and the ones you’ve kept in your ‘marked for later’ lists but never made time to read, and leave kudos, leave comments, support your fandom creatives, celebrate podficcers and support AO3. We created this place and it’s our responsibility to keep it alive and thriving for as long as we possibly can.

Also FUCK generative AI. It has NO place in fandom spaces.

THE 'SMALL' PRINT (some of it in all caps):

*Weitzman knew what he was doing and can NOT claim ignorance. One, it’s pretty basic kindergarten stuff that you don’t steal some other kid’s art project and present it as your own only to act surprised when they protest and then tell the victim that they should have told you sooner that they didn’t want their project stolen. And two, he was very careful never to list the IPs these fanworks were based on, so it’s clear he was at least familiar enough with the legalities to not get himself in hot water with corporate lawyers. Fucking over fans, though, he figured he could get away with that. 

**A note about the AI that Weitzman used to steal our work: it’s even greasier than it looks at first glance. It’s not just the method he used to lift works off AO3 and then regurgitate onto his own website and app. Looking beyond the untold horrors of his AI-generated cover ‘art’, in many cases these covers attempt to depict something from the fics in question that can’t be gleaned from their summaries alone. In addition, my fics (and I assume the others, as well) were listed with generated genres; tags that did not appear anywhere in or on my fic on AO3 and were sometimes scarily accurate and sometimes way off the mark. I remember You & Me & Holiday Wine had ‘found family’ (100% correct, but not tagged by me as such) and I believe The Shape of Soup was listed as, among others, ‘enemies to friends to lovers’ and ‘love triangle’ (both wildly inaccurate). Even worse, not all the fic listed (as authors on Reddit pointed out) came with their original summaries at all. Often the entire summary was AI-generated. All of these things make it very clear that it was an all-encompassing scrape—not only were our fics stolen, they were also fed word-for-word into the AI Weitzman used and then analyzed to suit Weitzman’s needs. This means our work was literally fed to this AI to basically do with whatever its other users want, including (one assumes) text generation. 

***Fan fiction appears to have been made (largely) inaccessible on word-stream at this time, but I’m hearing from several authors that their original, independently published work, which is listed at places like Kindle Unlimited, DOES still appear in word-stream’s search engine. This obviously hurts writers, especially independent ones, who depend on these works for income and, as a rule, don’t have a huge budget or a legal team with oceans of time to fight these battles for them. If you consider yourself an author in the broader sense, beyond merely existing online as a fandom author, beyond concerns that your own work is immediately at risk, DO NOT STOP MAKING NOISE ABOUT THIS.

PLEASE check my later versions of this post via my main page to make sure you have the latest version of this post before you reblog. All the information I’ve been able to gather is in my reblogs below, and it's frustrating to see the old version getting passed around, sending people on wild goose chases.

Thank you all so much!

[markleessodalite]

Relationship Quirks: NCT Dream

content: just a headcanon about little quirks you had to get used to in your relationship with bf!dreamies :)

warnings: none really

a/n: i'm at that stage where i have 5 million different ideas of what to write and i have started on... none of them :/ but i WILL i MUST

Mark:

He needs absolute silence during his night-time routine. Like, completely silent.

At some point you just stopped trying to be in the bedroom while he washes his face in the attached bathroom, bc even the slightest giggle at something on your phone would bother him.

His night routine is his relaxation time and he cannot have any disturbances

(and he works so hard every day that you don’t mind moving to another room while he decompresses)

Renjun:

He has a specific way of organizing the closet. But you don’t know how he does it bc he won't tell you.

You’ve tried to just watch him and figure it out but no matter where you put something, it's somehow always wrong.

Like you’ll hang up a shirt with the other shirts, but actually it was a blouse and you put it with the t-shirts and he has to go behind you and fix it.

And he’ll always tell you when its wrong too.

So now laundry is his special designated chore and you’re not allowed to do it

Jeno:

He spaces out. A lot.

Even in the middle of a conversation.

You eventually learned that you need to watch him as you talk to see if his eyes are unfocused, that's your clue.

And you have to pause between sentences to wait for a response, just a little nod or a ‘mhm,’ instead of yammering at a thousand miles an hour.

Its not like he’s purposefully tuning you out, he just has a mind that wanders. He can’t help it!

Haechan:

He can dish it out, but he can’t take it.

Meet lee donghyuck, the whiniest bf in the universe.

He loves to tease you if you say something weird or have a dumb moment, but the second you say something even half as sassy, you get the sigh.

And the eye roll.

And the slumped shoulders and silent treatment.

The only thing that can settle his mood is reassurance in the form of lots of physical affection ;)

Jaemin:

Forgets things. Everything. All the time.

If you want him to remember to do something, you have to write it down for him.

But he’ll also forget to keep that note with him, so you’ll either end up texting him or setting a reminder on his phone.

For a while you thought it was weaponized incompetence, but when he does remember something, he remembers every single detail.

He does everything just the way you want it, and he never complains about doing things for you.

He just has an absolute shit memory lol

Chenle:

He has to plan when to share a bed with you.

Chenle is just a very neat and tidy person. He likes his systems.

He also finds it hard to sleep when there’s too many distractions.

Its not that he dislikes sharing a bed with you, he likes it too much.

So if he’s got things to do or places to be in the morning, he must sleep by himself, or else he’ll spend all night yapping at you and try to spend the entirety of the next day in bed with you too.

Jisung:

Needs to plan everything with plenty of advance notice.

Jisung is just not spontaneous. By any means.

If you decide you wanna go shopping tomorrow, you better be ready to beg him to go with you.

And if you do get him out of the house, don’t you dare suggest going to a new, not previously discussed location, or he might literally cry.

To be fair, he has tried to improve on this ever since the two of you made plans for your first date… and he tried to set the date for 2 weeks later, which you took as disinterested obligation.

Now you know that Jisung would pretty much say yes to whatever you asked him to do– just give him enough time to mentally prepare for whatever outing you have planned!

[lipringlrh]

HE DOESN’T WANT ME WHEN HE’S SOBER PART 2 (LANDO ENDING)

read: part one | logan ending

summary: lando’s your best friend but seems to like you when he’s drunk. but then again, he seems to like everyone when he’s drunk.

pairing: lando norris x gn!reader

wc: 1.8k

Lando wouldn’t admit it to anyone but that night was the worst sleep he’d ever had. He left as soon as he found out you’d left with Lily and Alex, and made his way to your house just to find out you weren’t there. He messaged Alex to get no response and contemplated waiting outside your door until you came back, whether it be days or months, he’d wait for you. But, after almost falling asleep numerous times and getting laughed at by a group of teenagers, he made his way back to his apartment, knowing you’d be looked after.

He was awake almost all night, messaging and calling you and regretting everything in its entirety. He didn’t fully know if you had even seen him kiss the person that resembled you, he only felt it deep down, but even if you hadn’t, he shouldn’t have done it, and he could never apologise enough. He thought of how to explain his thoughts but nothing would suffice; nothing would ever be able to explain how he felt.

At some point in the early hours, he finally drifted off, but awoke not much later to an aggressive banging on his door and a voice screaming at him to hurry up. He wished the voice was you but it wasn’t and he hated it. He rushed to his door, barely having time to pull on some grey joggers before opening it to an angry Alex, very close to breaking the door down.

“Are you stupid?” Alex questioned, fuming, pushing his way into Lando’s house, “I know that you’re in love with her so what are you doing?”

Lando looked like a deer in headlights. He couldn’t explain his actions, he didn’t even want to think about them. All he remembered feeling was grief at watching you walk away, so when he found someone that looked eerily similar, he took the chance to kiss them and create the image in his mind of kissing you. It didn’t last long. He realised too quickly that they didn’t smell like you and the way they kissed wasn’t the same. He hated it, he didn’t want to kiss anyone but you.

“I know, I didn’t mean to-”

“What, you just tripped into her mouth then?” Alex questioned, pushing a finger against Lando’s chest.

“No- no. I don’t know why I did, I really love them I promise. We almost kissed but then they walked away, I was hurt, I didn’t think they wanted me,” Lando almost cried, his voice cracking.

“You do this every time you go out. You kiss her every time you go out and she follows, you don’t get to pull that card. You might be upset but I promise you’re not even feeling half of it,” Alex spat, not caring if he hurt Lando because he hurt you much more.

“Help me apologise. I need to apologise, please Alex, please help,” Lando begged, wanting you to more than anything, “Please Alex, I’ll do anything.”

Alex sighed. At that moment, he hated Lando for what he did, but he’d been wishing for you both to get together since he first saw you both together, making heart eyes at each other. He contemplated in his head whether to help or not. He always envisioned you together but always wanted what's best for you and right now he couldn’t tell if that was Lando or not. But looking at the state of him, red, wet eyes, begging for his help, he wanted to believe Lando regretted everything and would do anything to prove he loved you.

“Okay, but I’m not letting you be forgiven easily, I want you to prove it,” Alex sighed, running his hands over his face. A feeling of simultaneous relief and guilt eating him alive.

Lando promised Alex over and over again, and in between each syllable, promising himself also that he would give you the world in apologies, and whatever happened he deserved it, but even if there was the slimmest chance you could forgive him, Lando would take it and cherish it.

Alex messaged you and you told him it was fine to bring Lando over, as long as he didn’t expect much, and so they turned up less than five minutes later. Alex left you both alone in the kitchen to sit with Lily in the living room after repeating countless times he was a shout away.

You almost broke down just seeing him but managed to keep it in. You didn’t want him to explain, you didn’t care to hear it at the moment, but as soon as Alex left he began spilling out apologies and trying to explain himself, which you quickly shut up.

“I want some space,” you sighed. You wanted Lando close but you wanted everything you felt for him gone first. You couldn’t believe he ever felt the same, not after that.

“Of course, I understand,” his voice broke as he stepped back, trying to show you he would do anything you said.

“Not like that, Lando. I mean it, I don’t think I can see you for a while.”

“Oh-” he said, “When can I see you again?”

“I’m not sure, I’m sorry-”

“Don’t be, this is my fault,” he sighed, clearly upset and looking at the ground, “I’ll go, I’ll see you soon.”

After he left, you broke down crying, debating your decision on if you handled it right. You already missed him, and still loved him, but you also didn’t want to see him. Alex explained the whole morning, and his perspective, giving you hope you could fix it with Lando, especially after Alex’s approval, which you trusted more than anything.

The next few times you saw him were at hangouts with your shared friends. You knew he’d be there as none of your friends would invite him unless you were completely sure you didn’t mind him there. He stayed away, but didn’t make it awkward to the people around you, and always gave you a shy smile when you caught his eye.

He didn’t try to text or call again, despite wanting to more than anything, and instead waited for you to make the first move whenever you were ready. You had missed him more than anything, in both an “I love him” and “he’s my best friend” way, and it was killing you from being away from him, especially after how well he listened to your instructions.

You were at a mutual friend's get-together, a small barbecue in a back garden when you decided it was time. You had been debating texting him but after seeing him, you decided you couldn’t wait.

He was standing alone in a corner beside a flower patch and some grass, drink in hand, and surveying everyone that was there when you walked over. He didn’t know how to greet you and so awkwardly moved his hands between going for a hug or a handshake. You laughed and hugged him, both of you holding on tightly, unhappy to let go.

“I’ve missed you,” you whispered gently, looking down and playing with your fingers, slightly nervous to admit it to him after all this time.

“I’ve missed you too,” he grins, adding on, “So much,” with a quiet whisper.

“How’ve you been?” you asked, trying to make small talk before delving right in.

“Okay, I’ve not really done much. Races have been okay.”

“I saw,” you smiled, “You’ve done really well.”

“You watched?” he questioned, a little surprised. You met his eyes and nodded, explaining how you could never miss one.

“Do you want to talk inside?” you asked, heart pounding as you said it. He nodded immediately, without hesitation, and followed you in through the double glass doors into the kitchen, but only after picking out a daisy from the grass next to him and offering it out to you, causing both of you to grin.

He closed the doors behind you both, blocking out as much other noise as possible, ready for you to begin. “I want to know how you feel about this and about me,” you started, voice shaky.

“I’m sorry, I’m still so sorry. I love you and I want what’s best for you and I can’t even find an excuse, I was being stupid and thinking how you’d never want me. It was all nothing, you’re the only person that’s ever meant anything, I’m so sorry. I will do anything to fix this- anything.”

“Lan,” you let out a breath, “You still want me?”

“More than anything,” he grinned and you stepped forward to reach him, locking your arms around his neck.

Your fingers tangled themselves in his hair as you pull his face down until his lips are almost touching yours. He was smiling so much you thought it might be impossible to kiss him but you pulled him into you anyway, finally kissing him again.

“Stop smiling,” you laughed, pulling away to say it before immediately kissing him again.

“What? Can I not be happy? I’m getting my girl back,” he pulled away, grinning harder, then trying to drag you back in, which was almost successful until you pulled away at the last second.

“I can barely kiss you like this and I’d really, really like to,” you giggled, tugging him back again to enjoy another impatient kiss.

Your hands were running all over his head, completely ruining his hair, but he didn’t care. His hands were wrapped around your waist, holding you impossibly close. When you finally parted he still kept you close, resting his forehead on yours.

“Are you sure you want this?” he questioned, his breath still heavy.

You kissed his cheek and looked straight into his eyes, “More than anything, I promise,” you paused for a moment, “But you’re going to have to grovel to repay all the lost time we’ve had.”

“I’m going to prove to you that I’m all in, that I want this more than I could possibly explain,” Lando promised, meaning every word. He was already planning out exactly what he wanted to do - he knew he had to work to become your official boyfriend, but he would do everything possible for you.

You just stared at him, showcasing the biggest smile you’ve ever had, eyes full of love, knowing you weren’t ever going to let each other go or even risk it again.

“God I love you,” he grinned, ignoring the fact he still hadn’t caught his breath and pulling you into another, more intimate, kiss.

taglist in reblogs

[fuckyeahgoodomens]

The Good Omens Musical Masterpost🎵❤

How it started :)

Some time before 2013: Vicki Larnach, the australian composer and lyricist, read the Good Omens book, imagined figures dancing on stage with brilliant music and thought, ‘Ah, I’m gonna ask Terry Pratchet and Neil Gaiman if I can turn it into a musical.’ and sent an email to the publishers. The next day she got an email saying, ‘We don’t want a musical but Terry’s coming to Australia, so come and say hello and tell us what you got.’

Rob Wilkins came down to meet Vicki and Jim Hare - Vicki's husband and writer - and took them to meet Terry. They spent an hour and a half with them where Terry asked ‘piercing questions’, had tea with them and they showed Terry a song that Vicki wrote (about the Chattering Nuns). Terry said to Rob, ‘Rob, write and email to Neil, “Dear Neil, this is Terry. I’m sitting in front of two hippies from Sydney and they want to make a musical out of Good Omens and I’m tempted to let them do it.”’ which was the best email they ever heard and then Terry said, ‘Okay, you have me curious.’ - it was because of the Nuns song which sounded like the book. ‘I’m gonna give you six months, come back with a first draft libretto and five songs.’

They then sent it to Terry who sent it to Gaiman. Terry said, ‘I really like it, you’re moving story, you’re doing all the right things, but where’s showstopper, where’s the toe-tapper, you know I need people to go to intermission just snapping their fingers with the song they just can’t get out of their head, and I haven’t heard that.’ - and they realized that they were so busy serving the story they forgot to do the wow-factor, but found it very encouraging from Terry that he wanted to make it better.

They went through the whole book again to find a centrepiece - and they found it  when Warlock is growing up and Aziraphale and Crowley are with him, and spent months working just on that one thing and called ‘All Living Things’ [the song at the start of this post :)] which is a line from the book.*’ Terry gave that song to a person he knew and asked him to play it to his wife with no context and when the next day the person said that his wife woke up still singing the song Terry said to Vicki and Jim: ‘Well, that’s what I asked you to do.’ 

* [“This here’s Brother Slug,” the gardener would tell him, “and this tiny little critter is Sister Potato Weevil. Remember, Warlock, as you walk your way through the highways and byways of life’s rich and fulsome path, to have love and reverence for all living things.” “Nanny says that wivving fings is fit onwy to be gwound under my heels, Mr. Fwancis,” said little Warlock, stroking Brother Slug, and then wiping his hand conscientiously on his Kermit the Frog overall.]

Vicki and Jim got the permission to being adapting it as a musical in 2013.

Vicki and Jim on it a couple of years ‘fumbling about’, took it as far as they could and decided to bring another person into it: Jay-James Moody

In 2015, Jay James-Moody joined the collaboration initially as a dramaturge and directorial eye, eventually evolving into co-book writer. Vicki, James and Jay have continued to evolve through countless more revisions and a number of private development readings with the support, time and talent of numerous wonderful Australian performers testing the material.

In November 2017, the musical was presented in its then-current form and entirety for the first time before an audience of over 500 eager attendees. The cast included Luke Joslin, Lachlan O’Brien, Nancye Hayes, Barry Quin, Brett O’Neill, Lauren McKenna, Nicholas Craddock, Paul Capsis, Rob Johnson, Amy Lehpamer, Debora Krizak, Blake Erickson, Nat Jobe, Ana Maria Belo, Jordan Hare, Bella Thomas, Anthony Abrakmanov and Samson Hyland.

Following a rapturous response to this reading it continued to be refined and developed.

In 2019, ten days before the show came out they did their last presentation, since then they’ve been to London and shown a videotape of that workshop to Gaiman and Rob Wilkins which was ‘a pretty heartstopping experience’.

Differences between the musical and the book

The ending of the musical is a bit different.

It opens with the burning of Agnes Nutter and Aziraphale and Crowley are introduced there. 

Act One ends with them ‘essentially breaking up’ because of a huge argument and they dissolve their friendship, Act Two starts with the first time they meet.

The Future?

What is the future for the musical: in 2021 they said that they need to work on some things and then they hope to do another run, initially in Australia.

There will be a CD of the soundtrack available when the show is produced in it’s full version.

In 2024 on insta they said that it is in "complicated process of rights to stage Good Omens" and "We appreciate your support and patience of the progress or seeming lack therof, of Good Omens the musical but we assure you, we will bring you the show in the next few years."

Videos

Vicki, Jim and Jay talking 46min about the musical (this video was shown at the Ineffable Con 3 in 2021 :))

Sizzle Reel 6min

Anathema singing The Perfect Place

Crowley calling Dagon to check on the hellhound

Shadwell and Newt

Aziraphale vanishing Hastur 👀

Links

Webpage

Instagram - a lot of more bts videos and pics :)

How to support?

Subsribe to the instagram page and like and comment that you want the musical on posts :)❤. If you want to be a sponsor or donor, there is contact on their webpage.

[strwberrybils]

ok but being friends w benefits with miguel wouldn’t even work out because you’d fall in love—yes, you’d fall first. but he fell harder, the passionate sex didn’t help either because when when you got on top to ride him for the first time, he lost his shit mid round and threw you off him (and the helped you up of course <3)

this is nothing but facts…like the idea of being fwbs came up at work one day because you noticed he had this pent up steam he could never quite get rid of, plus he was attractive and so were you, no issue there right?

but the first time miguel touched you he was gentle with you, really caring and that shocked you because it was so contrast to his normal demeanor. something about the way he kissed your neck, the way his fingers curled within you, the way his mouth worked skillfully to work inside your tight walls, he was gentle all the way and it started to play on your heartstrings.

the first couple of hookups were solely about you. no matter how much you whined and cried for it, miguel wouldn’t have himself inside of you until he had worked you up to it, because although this was supposed to be just sloppy hookups when the both of you felt like it, he still cared about you, so he didn’t want to just rip you in half quite yet.

“gotta train you for it.” he’d tell you as his tongue lapped at your puffy clit, the same one he’d been toying with for literal hours. and every time you’d think about stopping…he’d grab a tight hold on your thighs, dragging you closer to him.

he knew he couldn’t keep doing this with you when you were completely nude on top of him, pretty cunt swallowing his length in its entirety as his hands took home on your hips. he cocked his head to the side, “okay, you’re g’na—“

you don’t even know what he was going to tell you, but your hands find his shoulders as you lift yourself off of his cock before slamming back down, repeating the motion at a slow, passionate pace, and miguel looked at you through half-lidded eyes, mouth unable to form words at how good you felt around him.

although he wanted so much more. he sunk his claws in the flesh of your hips, making you gasp at the mix of pain and pleasure. he feeds off of your reaction, cock prodding at your deepest spots as he held you steady with one hand, other hand coming to rub your sensitive clit, pussy clenching around miguel’s thick cock tightly as pesky tears soared down your cheeks.

“t-too much.” you whimper out, but his movements don’t cease, hips rutting into your cunt as he whispers, “you take it, slut.”

the degrading nickname makes your mind go blank as you fall into miguel’s chest, arms around his neck as you whispered into his ear, broken sobs accenting your words, “mig- miguel…’m g’na..”

“cum? no, not yet… shit- sweetheart, you’re gonna cum when i say to.”

you whine at that, a thick coil of pleasure bubbling in your lower abdomen as you relish in the feeling of fullness that miguel gives you, eyes fluttering closed as you feel nothing but heat all over you, skin burning with need.

miguel picks up on this and he kisses your check as he fucks into you, “h-hold it…”

it takes you a minute to realize what he wants, but it’s for you to cum with him, and you comply to his request as his thrusts become sloppier, dick twitching inside of you as you let go, his fingers rubbing your clit messily as your juices coat his chest, his own cum shooting inside of you, painting your walls a milky white.

you started to lay limp on top of him but his hands find your waist, tossing you over onto the other side of the bed. you perk up, and look at him with an inquisitive expression, “miguel?”

“sorry, just…” he whispered, “i don’t want to do this anymore.”

you frowned. “w-why? did i do something? i mean, whatever it is i can probably—“

“no.” he cut you off, eyes still boring into the wall, trying his best not to look at you. he looks down at his hands and then sighs, “i think i’m falling in love with you.”

it’s such a shock to you. you watch as he moves over to you, picking you up swiftly as you both sit back on his bed. he pulls you on top of him, chest to chest, forehead to forehead. “i’m sorry— for…um…throwing you off of me. it isn’t you, promise. i just….i don’t like…this feeling.”

“what, you don’t like the idea of having sex with your girlfriend instead of your co-worker who brings you coffee in the morning?” you giggle, and he laughs with you, a small, content laugh.

“no, no…i’m okay with that.”

[seresinhangmanjake]

Rather Be With You

Jake "Hangman" Seresin x Reader

Summary: Jake has been away for six months and he just hopes you waited for him.

Warnings: cursing. I think that's it.

Notes: this was inspired by an ask (💐) from a bit ago. Sorry it took so long. So much happened in the last week and a half, some good some bad, and it just got on top of me. Writing had to come second. I have probably written better in my life haha, but I tried.

Words: 1972

---

“You know he's only messing with you, right?”

He wasn’t sure how long he’d sat there, hunched forward with his elbows on his knees as he wrung his hands together. Surely it had been a while. For the entirety of the morning, perhaps? Rooster had made his teasing comments at seven a.m. sharp and they were due to dock at noon. Had it been that long? Or had he really managed to shove many hours worth of painful thoughts into just a few short minutes? Somehow, he figured, it was one or the other. No in-between.

When his eyes flicked up, Nat’s face seemed to hint at the former. 

It made sense, he supposed. Spending hours thinking about you wasn’t exactly uncommon. Usually, though, those thoughts were a bit nicer, with you naked and smiling, laughing, or whispering sweet words to him. He liked those better than the ones that had plagued him for…well, however long he’d been sitting there.

“He knows what he said isn’t true,” she continued. “He wouldn’t have had the balls to make jokes like that if he thought they would hold any weight. Trust me, no one particularly enjoys pissing you off.”

He wasn’t pissed off, though. He was devastated at the seeds of doubt planted in his head; at the pain and insecurity that came with the twisted knife to his gut. He hated the images forced into his mind at his friend’s words; the ones of you with other men; the ones that made it terribly clear how little you considered or missed him in his absence. 

“Jake, she waited for you. I know she did.”

“Yea? How?” he asked. 

Phoenix opened her mouth quickly, just as he would have had someone asked him a few hours ago if you loved him like he loved you—ready to confirm with a smile on his face. But if made to think of the answer for more than a half-second, without the hope and giddiness fueling his enthusiasm, he realized he couldn’t actually say for sure if you loved him, just as Nat now could not say with certainty that you had waited for him. 

Her mouth closed. 

"Exactly. You don't know," he said. "It’s not like I was smart enough to ask her to be my girlfriend before we left. She has no obligation to me, so why would she have bothered to wait six months to have me when she could have anyone?"

The brunette shook her head. “I don’t believe she's like that."

Leaning back against the bench and crossing his arms, Jake just barely held himself back from a scoff. "Like what, Nat? That wouldn't make her anything other than a woman who found someone new to sleep with after the guy she was sleeping with disappeared for half a year.”

“But you didn’t—”

“I know I didn't disappear. But I’ve been gone longer than we’d been together," he said, his voice drifting as he imagined what he hadn't stopped to consider before; a nightmare that, if proven true, would cleanly snap his heart in half. "Joke or not, Rooster could very well be right.”

—

"You're overthinking,” Penny’s voice snuck in from your left. 

She reached out to take the beer glass from your hand, polished almost too clean after the twenty minutes you spent absentmindedly running a rag over it. Your mind had been too occupied with troubled thoughts to notice your unceasing drag of the dishtowel around the cylindrical shape of the glass. 

It came free from your hand with ease, and as Penny placed it back on its shelf, you spewed, "What if he hooked up with someone? What if he decided six months was too long to wait for a woman that isn't his girlfriend?” You finally faced her just to find her rolling her eyes. “He likes sex, Penny. A lot. There are plenty of willing women and he's practically insatiable."

"When it comes to you, maybe."

The tenseness in your shoulders from well-formed stress was heavy with your exhale, forcing your shoulders to fall forward and your posture to take a hit. "Penny…" you groaned.

"I'm telling you, there's no way he messed around with anyone,” she swore, leaning back against the bar. "Besides, it's frowned upon to get involved with your coworkers."

"You think that's ever stopped Jake?"

She pursed her lips and tilted her head from side to side as she considered. "Ok, fair enough,” she agreed. “Once upon a time, that definitely wouldn't have stopped him. But after meeting you, he hasn't looked at another woman."

You couldn’t say that provided you with any relief. Jake had always presented as an ‘out of sight, out of mind’ type of man. He wasn’t a worrier. Once something exited his periphery, it promptly left his brain, discarded with all past challenges or predicaments. And wasn’t that what you were? An obstacle? He hadn’t asked you to be his girlfriend for a reason. Holding on to you for more than just the night didn’t necessarily make you more special than any of the other women. Perhaps it simply made you convenient.  

"You don’t know, Penny. You’re not with him 24/7."

Penny muttered something under her breath. Her fingers rose to rub at her temple and when they dropped back to her side, the stare she shot you was imbued with determination. "Look, my bar is where Seresin used to do his "best work," as he liked to say,” she said, and you made a face. "But the only work he's been putting in since he met you has involved getting you to like him and making you happy after you two started your little…thing." 

"You may not pay attention, but I do," she practically scolded. "Now, a month ago you were excited to meet him when he got back, and then you let your thoughts get away from you and it’s fucking everything up." 

To your own shame, you couldn't deny that. So you didn't bother, rather opting to nibble on your thumbnail.

"They'll be back soon, so are you coming with me or not?"

—

He didn’t know what he was doing, standing there with his bag over his shoulder. But he felt like a heavy weight, an anchor in a sea of levity. Looking around, the men and women he’d been packed in with for the last six months were thrilled, the room sprinkled with smiles and laughs of giddiness in anticipation of having their families in their arms again. 

He didn’t have that. 

He wanted to have it, but that was fully reliant on you. Your feelings. Your wants and desires. Your plan for your future. Jake could imagine a world where he had the strength to beg to be a part of your life—to plead as desperately as if fighting for enough air to fill his lungs—but reality made that entirely out of his will and control. So he didn't shove his way forward when they made it home. He couldn't bring himself to jump in front of the others who had people waiting for them upon their return. Instead, he let them file out, his team included, until he was one of the final few to step back on dry, solid land. 

As he walked by couple after couple, family after family, his already weak composure began to crumble at its edges. The people milling around him felt like a mocking montage of the life he didn’t have. Men and women kissing their partners or spouses, hugging their children with no intent of letting go, their tears coating the ground with joy. 

Jake's chest constricted. He needed to get himself on the other side of it, but weaving through the mass of bodies proved harder than he expected. 

His shoulders bumped into theirs, his chest skimming across backs and limbs when he turned to his side to sneak through narrow openings. Little kids ran into his legs like spinning tops on the loose from their wound-up energy finally releasing, though each one quickly recovered and returned to their parents, maintaining the same level of enthusiasm they had prior to smacking face-first into a muscled calf. 

With each unintentional nudge, he apologized, but no one so much as noticed, too engrossed in their relief at making it home unscathed or in seeing their loved ones still intact. Somewhere, his teammates were doing the same. They’d found their partners, and he thought he’d found his, but his overconfidence in your feelings kept him from ensuring you were actually together. And maybe it was too late. Maybe he would have no choice but to watch you move on from him.  

Finally breaking through the edge of the crowd, Jake took his first deep breath. He didn’t look back as he made his way to his truck. He didn’t turn when rushed footsteps grew closer until they sounded as if right on his tail. 

“Jake.”

He paused and sighed. He should’ve known he would imagine your voice. Six months without that lovely sound, his only chance at hearing it being within his dreams, took its toll. It haunted him like a ghost on that ship. Of course it wouldn’t cease just because he was home.

“I was calling you, but you didn’t hear me.” There was a soft chuckle, then, “Well, at least I hope you didn’t hear me.”

He spun on his heel and was greeted with your smile. It lacked its carefree nature, instead just barely failing to conceal a twinge of nerves, but beautiful nonetheless. He couldn’t help but smile back. 

“What are you doing here?” he asked, taking a few steps closer. 

“I came with Penny.” The roundness of your cheeks turned pink from your blush. You lightly shrugged. “I missed you.”

With those words, Jake knew Rooster was deserving of a swift smack upside the head, one he very well may deliver. You cared. You missed him, even. 

Fucking Rooster.

“Oh, I, um,” you continued, your eyes falling down to your hand. “I got you these. It feels silly now, but at the time I thought they would be nice, I guess.”

He followed your line of sight to the small bundle in your hand. Five long stems were tight in your grip, the bulbs on their ends made up of layers of silky red petals. 

"I was thinking," you swallowed hard and met his gaze, "I don't actually know if you like flowers. And if you do, I didn't know your favorite. I just picked mine." The sweet grin that returned to your face practically demanded he kiss you. Your lips, your cheeks, your forehead, your nose. All of you. Every little bit. 

And you weren't wrong. He hadn't had a favorite. 

He did now. 

Jake swallowed through the tightness in his throat, fighting back the stinging in the corners of his eyes. 

He didn't get gifts, and certainly not from the women he was with. But then again, with the exception of you, he hadn't chosen to be with a woman for more than a night or two in the last decade. 

"I like the yellow ones but they symbolize friendship and that wasn't really what I was going for, so I—"

"I love you.”

Your smile, your jaw, your hand, fell. "You…what?"

He let out a chuckle and reached for you. "Come here."

You didn't hesitate sliding your hand into his and he quickly pulled you to him, your chests hitting, lips meeting with an intensity that he hoped expressed even just a lick of how much he missed you. You draped your arms around his shoulders and the petals of the flowers tickled the nape of his neck. 

"Six months was too long," you whispered when you separated. 

He nudged his nose against yours. "Way too long."

---

tags: @wkndwlff @kmc1989 @sagittarius-flowerchild @dempy @oliviah-25 @rosiahills22 @xoxabs88xox @cinderellasmissingshoe @leila22rogers

[shiorihyugawrites]

The Devil's Bride

Aurora Jaeger, Eren's long-lost childhood friend, was taken from him when they were children. After years of suffering under Marleyan control, Aurora is reunited with Eren while he’s undercover in Marley, igniting a bond neither of them expected. Despite her gentle nature, Aurora breaks her vow of pacifism to save Eren’s life, solidifying their deep connection. Secretly married before the Raid on Liberio, Aurora is swept into Eren's world of chaos and destruction. As the Scouts learn of her existence, tensions rise on the airship home. Mikasa’s heart shatters, and Levi demands answers. And Eren will stop at nothing to protect the only light left in his dark world—his bride, Aurora.

In this journey of love, loyalty, and war, Aurora must reconcile her innocent heart with the brutal reality of the man she loves, while Eren faces the truth of what he’s become. (Eren x OC)

Chapter Fifty

The final hours of the night stretched onward, a silent countdown to the invasion that loomed on the horizon. Shiganshina felt haunted, its quiet streets and solemn walls like sentinels observing the men and women gathered to defend this land. The air carried a stiff chill, and every breath of wind seemed to murmur the urgency of what was about to unfold. Yet, amidst the tension, the soldiers of Paradis stood resolute. They had long accepted that they might not live to see the sun set again, but if dying was the price for protecting their home, they would pay it gladly.

Groups of Jaegerists moved through the district, each soldier double-checking equipment and coordinating with teammates. It had taken weeks of hard training to master the Inferno Blades, those compact explosives that could set nearly anything ablaze with terrifying force. The plan was clear. When the Global Allied Fleet arrived, they would ignite Shiganshina in flames if that meant the enemy could not advance further. To the people here, the old saying rang true: better to sacrifice a piece of home than to lose the entirety of it.

Eren stood on a balcony high above the main square, his hand resting against the cold stone. He stared out at the flickering torches of the soldiers below. In the distance, the tall silhouette of the walls loomed, and beyond them, darkness. But soon enough, that darkness would reveal a sea bristling with warships, the combined might of the entire world. He felt his chest tighten at the thought, but he also felt an odd calm. This was the moment he had been preparing for. He closed his eyes briefly, thinking of Aurora, of the child she carried, of the cabin they had once shared. He remembered the warmth of her laughter, the glow in her eyes whenever she spoke of a future free from fear. It was a dream he wanted so desperately to grant them, no matter the price.

Footsteps approached from behind. Eren didn’t turn around. He already knew who it was by the measured pace of boots on stone.

“Figured I’d find you here,” Levi said, halting a few steps away. His tone was steady, but tension lay just beneath its surface.

Eren took a slow breath before speaking. “I needed a moment,” he replied. “Any news?”

Levi folded his arms. “The Jaegerists finished deploying the Inferno Blades. They’re placing them in strategic points around the main gate, the side streets, and near the rooftops. If the enemy tries to breach anywhere, we’ll torch them. It’ll be chaos, but it’s our best chance.”

A grim smile touched Eren’s lips. “Good. We’re not letting them pass.”

Levi’s eyes flicked toward the moonlit sky. “You realize we might burn half of Shiganshina to ash in the process.”

Eren’s jaw tightened. “It won’t be the first time I’ve watched this district burn. Besides, I’m not letting them set foot beyond these walls. No matter what.”

Levi nodded. He understood Eren’s resolve, even if it weighed on him. Their conversation stilled for a moment, replaced by the faint clamor of Jaegerists below. They were adjusting gear, testing the readiness of their horses, or softly exchanging words of encouragement. The tension in the air felt palpable, like a living force pressing down on everyone.

A slender figure dropped down from the rooftop overhead, landing soundlessly nearby. Mikasa glanced between Eren and Levi, reading their expressions. She sensed the same tension that had pulled her here.

“Everything’s set,” she said quietly. “Hange wants to do a final sweep of the southern perimeter.”

Levi gave a sharp nod. “Good. We should join her soon.” He turned to Eren once more, his voice dropping to a lower register. “I’ve told the soldiers to be prepared for anything. We still don’t know which direction they’ll strike from first, or if they’ll try a full-scale encirclement. You see anything suspicious, you don’t hesitate.”

Eren’s gaze hardened. “I won’t.”

Levi and Mikasa exchanged a look, then left Eren to gather his thoughts. Eren stayed a moment longer on the balcony, listening to their footsteps fade. The still night hung over him like a dark shroud. In a few hours, it would be shattered by the roar of cannons, the screams of men, and the thunder of battle. He wondered briefly if Aurora had arrived safely at the palace. He pictured her expression, the worry that never quite left her eyes, and it pained him that he couldn’t be by her side. But the child she carried was his reason to fight. He would carve a path of blood and fire if that’s what it took to give them peace.

Below, Connie and Jean paced through the courtyard, double-checking their squad assignments. Sasha leaned against the outer gate, fiddling with her equipment, her face set in determined lines. Jean’s loud whisper carried across the open space.

“Still no sign of the fleet?” he asked Connie.

“Nothing,” Connie replied. “They might be approaching under the cover of darkness, or maybe they’re delaying to catch us off guard. Either way, we won’t be sleeping tonight.”

Sasha wandered closer to them, her brow knit with concern. “I can’t help thinking about all the civilians we evacuated. At least they’re safe underground, but… how many of us will be left by the time this is over?”

Jean’s shoulders sagged a little. “We do what we have to, Sasha. I’d rather the people stay alive to rebuild, even if we don’t make it.”

Connie reached out, placing a hand on Sasha’s shoulder. “Hey, we’ll all make it. We’ve been through worse, right?”

Sasha managed a small grin. “Guess you’re right. The trouble is, the world hates us so much. This might be our final stand.”

Jean rolled his eyes in exasperation. “Oh, great. Now you’ve got me thinking about how easy it’d be to just toss in the towel and—”

“Don’t even joke,” Connie cut him off, though his tone was lighter than the words suggested. “We’re in this together.”

Nearby, Armin and Hange were in deep discussion, hunched over a makeshift table strewn with maps and notes. Reiner, Pieck, and Porco observed from a short distance, not wanting to intrude but still very much a part of the plan. Armin ran a hand through his hair, his voice earnest.

“If they come by sea, they’ll likely use their naval cannons to shell the coast first. But we have vantage points set up. As soon as they come into range, we can ignite the Inferno Blades in the shallows, turning the coastline into a trap.”

Hange tapped a finger on the map. “Right, we also suspect they might deploy airships. That’s where the risk is highest. If they bombard us from above, the walls of Shiganshina could crumble in minutes.”

Porco’s arms were crossed, his brow furrowed. “Then we’ll need the Titans to intercept any airships that come too close. My Jaw titan’s speed can handle that. Pieck’s Cart Titan can provide covering fire, but it’s Reiner who’ll probably do the heavy lifting if they drop bombs.”

Reiner stood with his arms at his sides, no expression on his face. He still struggled with a maelstrom of guilt and regret, but he was here, prepared to fight for the island that had once been his enemy. “I’ll do what needs to be done,” he said quietly.

Pieck cast him a sympathetic look, though she said nothing. She understood that Reiner’s heart was torn. They all were torn in some way, forced into a war that none of them wanted yet none of them could avoid. The best they could do was fight to protect what they could.

Hange gestured to the sky, her eyes glittering with a mix of apprehension and excitement. “When it begins, everything will happen fast. We’ll be in constant communication via flare signals. If the first wave hits Shiganshina, we detonate. If they try a flanking maneuver, squads will rotate. Remember, these new weapons can create widespread fires, so watch for the wind direction.”

Armin sighed, nodding. “There’s no perfect plan. We’ll adapt as we go. That’s all we can do.”

Reiner closed his eyes for a moment, thinking of Gabi and Falco. Would they be on the other side of the line? His chest tightened at the possibility. He remembered the day he left for Paradis all those years ago, the naive resolve he had as a child soldier, and how it had slowly crumbled under the weight of reality. Now, ironically, he stood on Paradis’s side, wanting to protect it. Wanting to keep Gabi safe from the same cruelty that shaped him.

Porco shifted, noticing Reiner’s turmoil. “If you see them out there… Gabi, Falco, or  any of the others… you do what you have to,” Porco said. “ We know Magath well enough to know he’s brainwashed them more propaganda and told them how we’re all traitors. The don’t have any shifters left besides Zeke so you can bet they’re planning on using those kids as new vessels for our titans.”

Reiner lowered his gaze. “I know. But I can’t imagine… them turning into Titans and devouring us. It’s too cruel.”

Pieck placed a hand on Reiner’s arm, her voice gentle. “Marley is cruel. We’ve known that our whole lives.”

The wind carried the sound of a distant horn, a signal from one of the watchtowers. It was a reminder that dawn drew near, that the hours were slipping away. Everyone was alert, shoulders tensed as they imagined the approaching fleet just beyond their sight.

Levi appeared next to them, seemingly out of nowhere. “We’re doing a final briefing in five minutes,” he said. “Join us by the main gate.”

Pieck and Porco followed Reiner’s lead as they walked across the courtyard, weaving between rows of Jaegerists checking their gear. Some of the younger recruits looked up at the Titan shifters with a mix of awe and wariness. They’d heard the stories of how Reiner, Pieck, and Porco had once fought for Marley, but they’d also heard about how they’d betrayed Marley to help Paradis. Trust was still a fragile thing here.

Jean and Connie approached Eren, who was standing near a broken stretch of wall. Mikasa was with them, her arms folded, worry etched into her features.

Jean cleared his throat. “We’re ready when you are, Eren.”

Connie nodded in agreement. “Just say the word.”

Mikasa glanced at Eren, studying his face. “You’re sure we can handle this many enemies at once? Marley’s not alone this time. The entire world is coming.”

Eren’s jaw muscles worked as he clenched his teeth, but when he spoke, his tone was resolute. “We stop them here. They’ve all come to kill us anyway. Let them try.”

Jean sighed softly. “I guess that’s all there is to it, huh?”

Connie forced a grin, though fear flickered in his eyes. “We’ll give them hell.”

As they walked toward the main gate, a hush fell over the gathered soldiers. Levi and Hange stood waiting with Armin. Reiner, Pieck, and Porco took positions to one side, separate but included. The tension thickened, like an invisible weight pressing down on every single person.

Levi’s voice carried across the courtyard, surprisingly steady. “You all know what’s at stake. If the intelligence is true, the fleet is massive. They have advanced artillery, bombs, and airships. We have the advantage of home ground, the walls, and the new Inferno Blades. That might not seem like much against the entire world, but it’s better than nothing. We just have to hang on until Eren can make contact with Zeke.”

Hange clasped their hands behind their back, scanning the faces of the soldiers. “Remember your training. Keep calm, stick to your squads, and follow the signal flares. The first sign of an airship, and we shift to long-range defense. The first sign of battleships, we detonate the coastline. Should they try to breach the land, we fall back to the inner lines and lure them into a ring of fire.”

Armin glanced at Eren, who gave him a slight nod. Swallowing the lump in his throat, Armin spoke, “This battle will be unlike anything we’ve faced. But we have one another. We have a plan. We have the will to live. So fight for your friends, for your families hidden underground, for the future we want to create.”

Mikasa listened, her expression calm, though her eyes revealed the storm within. She couldn’t stop imagining the horrors about to unfold. Still, she squared her shoulders. This was the choice they had made.

As the meeting dispersed, the soldiers dispersed too, each squad returning to their assigned positions with hushed determination. Eren lingered near the gate, gazing up at the night sky. The starry expanse reminded him too much of Aurora. He recalled the nights they spent together in the cabin, how she would hum softly while stargazing, how she’d lean into him and share her wild dreams of a world without war. He closed his eyes and silently prayed that his unborn child would know a life free from the same chains that had bound him.

Levi halted beside him, glancing up at the stars. “You’re thinking about her,” he said, not really asking.

Eren let out a hollow chuckle. “Am I that obvious?”

Levi sighed. “We both know you’d rather be with her, but we have a job to do.”

Eren nodded. “I won’t fail her. Or any of you.”

Without another word, Levi left him, going to check on the newest recruits one last time. Eren stood alone for a moment, one hand curled into a fist, the other resting on the hilt of his blade. If the Founding Titan’s true power was what he needed to set them free, then he would claim it. He would find Zeke, make contact, and end this cursed cycle of hate forever.

Reiner, who had been watching from a short distance, approached slowly. He paused, unsure if he was welcome. Eren noticed him but didn’t speak at first.

Eventually, Reiner cleared his throat. “I don’t ever expect forgiveness, but if we’re going to fight side by side tomorrow, I just want to say… I won’t betray you.”

Eren’s eyes flicked to him, unreadable. “I never asked for your word.”

Reiner swallowed. “I know.” He hesitated. “I’m doing this for my family…for Gabi. She’s all I have left.”

Eren said nothing, only gave a slight nod, and Reiner turned away, heading for his own vantage point. The sense of finality weighed on them both.

Across the district, Jean and Connie were finalizing the placement of Inferno Blades. Sasha stood by with a small group of Jaegerists, instructing them on how to handle the smaller explosives. When Connie rushed to check on something near the eastern wall, Jean stepped closer to Sasha.

“You good?” Jean asked quietly.

She offered a tight smile. “Ask me again when this is over.”

He huffed a small laugh. “Fair enough.” His gaze shifted to the horizon. “Tomorrow, everything changes.”

Sasha’s smile faded. “One way or another.”

Nearby, Armin was quietly going over strategies with a cluster of recruits who looked pale but determined. Hange swept by, triple-checking flares, gear, and any other detail that caught their notice. Levi, as usual, oversaw it all with an ever-present scowl.

Above them, the moon slid slowly across the sky, each passing minute bringing them closer to dawn. The calm remained, but it felt more like a held breath before the universe exhaled.

Time felt strange now, stretched thin by anticipation. Some squads found small corners to rest, lying awake beneath the stars, their eyes flickering with fear and hope. Others patrolled the perimeter, nerves thrumming at every shadow. The quiet almost mocked them, as though the world were waiting to unleash its fury in a single, punishing moment.

At last, the faintest glow on the eastern horizon hinted that night was nearly over. Eren stood once more on the wall, gazing out at the sea of darkness. He couldn’t see the ships yet, but he could almost sense them. The entire world had set its sights on Paradis.

Behind him, a soldier approached quietly, offering a curt salute. “Sir, it’s almost time. Captain Levi says we should get to our positions.”

Eren took a last look at the murky expanse. He felt his heart pound, a mix of dread and fierce resolve flooding his veins. There was no going back. He turned, stepping past the soldier to rejoin his comrades.

Every footstep echoed in the cold, silent district. As Eren reached the main gathering area, he saw them all waiting: Mikasa, Armin, Levi, Jean, Connie, Sasha, Hange, Reiner, Pieck, and Porco. Hundreds of Jaegerists surrounded them, eyes gleaming with adrenaline. Together, they formed the heart of this final defense.

Eren let his gaze sweep over them, thinking of Aurora’s face, the warmth in her eyes. He let that memory fill him with strength. Then, in a voice that carried across the plaza, he addressed everyone one last time.

“We stand between the world and our freedom. They want to destroy us, to erase us from history. We won’t let them.”

Silence held for a moment, and then, quietly at first, the Jaegerists began to chant.: “If we win, we live. If we lose, we die. If you don't fight, we can't win. Fight. Fight”

It grew louder and louder, echoing off the stone walls and the battered buildings. Their courage rose like a tidal wave, each voice calling out in unison.

Eren felt his own heart thunder in his chest. He didn’t know if any of them would see tomorrow’s sunrise, but for Aurora, for their child, for the men and women who had chosen to fight—he would become the devil they needed him to be.

In the distance, a horn blasted, carrying through the crisp air. Dawn was breaking. The wait was over. Eren’s eyes flicked to the horizon one last time, his resolve set, his soul hardened. Let the world come. Let them bring their armies, their bombs, their hatred. He would meet it head-on.

He whispered to himself, though no one else could hear, “Aurora… wait for me. I’ll come back to you.”

And with that final vow, the defenders of Paradis scattered to their posts, prepared to face the storm.

…

Aurora rested in a plush chair within one of the palace’s grand halls, gazing at the ornate murals on the ceiling. Beautiful patterns of gold leaf and swirling designs told stories of ancient kings and battles long past, but none of that captured her attention. Her thoughts drifted inevitably toward the distant walls of Shiganshina, where Eren and the others prepared for war. Every now and then, she closed her eyes and inhaled a trembling breath, wishing she could somehow stand beside them. Yet here she was, in what many would consider the safest place in all of Paradis.

Historia noticed the faraway look in Aurora’s eyes and approached with soft footsteps. She placed a hand on Aurora’s shoulder, her tone as gentle as her expression. “Try not to worry too much. I know it’s impossible, but you’ll drive yourself mad if you keep imagining the worst.”

Aurora lifted her gaze to meet Historia’s. “I can’t help it,” she murmured, her ice-blue eyes brimming with concern. “All I can think about is Eren out there, preparing for a fight that may leave him…” She trailed off, not wanting to finish the sentence.

Historia gave her shoulder a reassuring squeeze. “He’s strong. They all are. Sometimes I think they’re all unstoppable when they’re together, especially with CaptainLevi commanding the Jaegerists now. I’m sure they’ll do everything they can to come back alive.”

A tight smile flickered across Aurora’s face. She folded her hands over her belly, feeling the weight of her pregnancy as a constant reminder of the precious life she carried. “I know. I just wish I didn’t feel so… helpless,” she admitted. “If I weren’t so far along, if I wasn’t constantly on the brink of going into labor, maybe I could’ve stayed closer. Maybe I could have done something.”

Historia sat down beside her and let out a quiet sigh. “We all have a place in this fight. Yours is to ensure that your baby comes into a world that’s even slightly safer than the one we’ve known. Mine is to do what I can for the people, protect them, and manage the politics if needed. But I’d be lying if I said I’m not worried sick about Porco.” She paused, her cheeks taking on a faint pink hue at the mention of his name. “I still can’t quite believe how close we’ve become. It seems surreal.”

Aurora tilted her head. “You’ve grown so fond of him, haven’t you?”

A self-conscious laugh escaped Historia. “Yes, and it’s so complicated. He ate Ymir and yet somehow, I can’t help falling for him. Maybe it’s because I sense that, deep down, he feels a sliver of Ymir’s memories. Or maybe it’s just the person he’s become. I don’t know. But the love is there, and it’s strong.”

A distant clamor echoed from outside the palace walls, prompting Aurora’s spine to tense for a moment. The noise was only the Jaegerists changing guard. She exhaled shakily, relieved it wasn’t an alarm or anything more dire. The palace was a vision of tranquility on the surface. Stained-glass windows caught the afternoon sunlight, casting vibrant colors across the floor, and beautifully trimmed hedges lined the garden paths. But the tension in the air felt tangible; it was the hush before a tempest.

Soon after, a pair of children from Historia’s orphanage raced down the hallway, one of them being Noah. Their laughter briefly lighting up the solemn space. Trailing behind them were two older Jaegerist recruits, assigned to keep an eye on the little ones. The children paused when they saw Historia and Aurora, offering clumsy salutes and wide grins.

“Is Reiner going to come back soon?” Noah asked, his eyes wide with hope. “He promised to teach us how to do push-ups properly!”

Historia patted the top of his head. “He’ll try his hardest, I promise. You know Reiner—he’s very determined.”

The other child, younger, looked anxiously at Aurora’s belly and then up at her. “And the baby… when are they coming?”

Aurora forced a reassuring smile. “Any day now, I suppose. But don’t you worry about me. I’m just fine here.” She tried to inject confidence into her words, though her heart pounded at the thought of Eren missing the birth.

The children beamed as they ran off once more, the clatter of their small footsteps echoing against the marble tiles. But their innocent questions lingered like echoes in Aurora’s mind, reminding her how deeply everyone was tied to this war, even the youngest among them. These children looked at Reiner as a hero, not knowing the guilt and sorrow that plagued him, not realizing the heartbreak that tore him apart every time he thought about his actions. Aurora swallowed hard, wishing she could shield them from the harsh truths outside these palace walls.

A voice interrupted her train of thought. “Your Majesty, Mrs. Jaeger,” called a gray-haired physician, stepping into the corridor with polite urgency. He gave a small bow to Historia, then turned to Aurora. “I was hoping to check on you again. Given how close you are to your due date, it would be wise to monitor you frequently.”

“Yes, of course,” Aurora said, struggling to her feet as Historia offered her an arm. “I can’t say I’m particularly comfortable with all these constant examinations, but if it eases everyone’s minds, I’ll do it.”

The physician led them down a quiet hallway, where sunlight spilled in through tall windows. On either side of the corridor were grand paintings of past monarchs, each wearing opulent crowns and robes. Aurora followed him into a small chamber that had been converted into a makeshift clinic, complete with a narrow bed and several locked cabinets holding medical supplies. The doctor gestured for her to sit on the bed, then began his routine examination: checking her pulse, listening to her breathing, and gently placing his hands on her belly to feel the baby’s position.

“You’re measuring as expected,” he said in a reassuring tone. “Likely no more than another few days before labor starts, maybe a week at most. But it could also be tonight. Babies have a mind of their own.”

Aurora released a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding. “That soon?” she whispered. “I hoped the baby would wait a little longer, until Eren…” Her voice faltered, the sorrow creeping in again.

The physician patted her hand. “You’re in good hands here. I’ll make sure you and the baby come through this healthy. Please trust me.”

Historia, who stood to the side, offered a supportive nod. “And I’ll be right here if you need anything. You can use my bedroom for as long as you want. I know it’s big and a little over the top, but it’s comfortable, and you shouldn’t be alone.”

A flicker of warmth spread through Aurora’s heart. “Thank you,” she replied softly. “I appreciate everything you’re doing.” She gently pressed a hand against the side of her belly, feeling a small movement from the baby. The thought that she might deliver in the next day or two weighed heavily on her. The father of her child was about to enter the greatest battle of their time, miles away with no guarantee he’d ever set eyes on their son or daughter.

After the brief checkup, Aurora and Historia made their way to the second floor of the palace, weaving through corridors adorned with tapestries of old family crests. Squads of Jaegerists stationed themselves at every possible entrance, their faces grim with duty. These were men and women Eren personally assigned, ready to defend Aurora and Historia at the cost of their own lives. Though Aurora was grateful, she couldn’t help but feel a pang of guilt that others might die for her sake.

Reaching Historia’s lavish bedroom, Aurora settled onto the bed. It was enormous, draped with fine linens and pillows embroidered with the royal crest. Candles flickered on the bedside table, lending a gentle glow to the wide chamber. Historia paced near the tall window, occasionally peering out at the manicured palace gardens.

“It’s so quiet,” Historia remarked, her voice subdued. “Too quiet. I keep imagining the chaos that must be happening in Shiganshina right now, or if not yet, then soon. Makes it hard to breathe.”

Aurora nodded, trying to calm her nerves. “I know. It feels wrong to be safe in this beautiful place while they risk everything out there. But you and I… we both have our roles, even if they aren’t on the front lines anymore.” She offered a small smile of encouragement, attempting to reassure herself as much as Historia.

Historia moved closer, placing a gentle hand on Aurora’s shoulder. “I wish Porco was here,” she said, her voice cracking slightly. “But wishing doesn’t change anything.” She inhaled deeply, forcing her composure to hold. “Anyway, we should get some rest. The doctor said you need it more than ever, and your mind needs a break from worrying.”

Aurora let out a tense laugh. “That’s easier said than done.”

She shifted on the bed, adjusting the blankets around her. She felt a wave of exhaustion, though she doubted she could truly relax. Outside, the sun began its late afternoon descent, painting the sky in gradients of orange and pink.

She glanced at Historia. “Do you mind if I stay here for a while? I don’t want to be alone.”

Historia smiled, albeit with a touch of sadness in her gaze. “Not at all. Stay as long as you like. I don’t really feel like being alone either.”

Aurora closed her eyes, yearning for a moment of peace. Yet, every time she tried to imagine something calm—like the lake near that cabin she once shared with Eren—her thoughts circled back to the war. She pictured the towering walls of Shiganshina, the Jaegerists standing ready, and the monstrous grin of a titan lurking just beyond the horizon. She also remembered the Founder's presence, how Ymir had seemingly come to her in the darkest moments. Aurora whispered a silent prayer, her lips barely moving:

“Please, Ymir… or whatever you are. If you’re listening, keep Eren safe. Bring him back to me. Don’t let our baby grow up without a father. I’m begging you.”

She felt a strange sensation, as though a chill wind brushed across her skin, but she dismissed it as a product of her imagination. Ymir’s nature remained a mystery—an all-powerful presence, or a victim trapped in a realm of endless servitude. Aurora couldn’t know. Nonetheless, she hoped the Founder might grant her prayer.

As Aurora drifted into a light sleep, Historia drew the curtains half-closed, allowing only a soft glow of the sunset to fill the room. The hush that settled over them held an air of uneasy expectation.

Outside the palace walls, the kingdom’s capital bustled, but nowhere near as it once did. Many had already been moved underground. Still, the clatter of distant carts and the chatter of soldiers mingled in the corridors, permeating the serene hush with hints of underlying tension. The world beyond these fortress walls prepared for the cataclysmic struggle that would decide the island’s fate.

All the while, far across the sea, the Global Allied Fleet loomed closer to Paradis. Warships stretched in a vast formation, an intimidating labyrinth of naval might. Cannons jutted from every hull, and overhead soared a battalion of airships brimming with bombs. Countries from every corner of the globe had united under Marley’s insistence. Their objective: annihilate the devil island, reduce it to rubble, and rid the world of its monstrous threat. Soldiers stood at attention on each deck, many gazing grimly at the horizon. Some believed wholeheartedly in their mission, others felt uneasy about the scale of slaughter. But none dared to speak against the plan.

Marley’s officers barked orders in clipped tones, ensuring no detail was overlooked. Among them was a quiet presence that many found unnerving: Zeke. He stood near the bow of a battleship, arms folded, expression distant. When he closed his eyes, he still saw glimpses of that fleeting vision of the Founder, that silent girl with impassive eyes. He couldn’t shake the memory, wondering why she would reveal herself in such a place, at such a time.

On one of the airships trailing slightly behind the main force, Gabi clenched her rifle in white-knuckled hands, eyes blazing with fury. Falco sat beside her, less certain, his gaze flickering to the stormy clouds rolling over the sea.

“They need to pay,” Gabi spat, nearly trembling with anger. “All of them… especially Eren Jaeger. Especially that devil who killed so many in Liberio, who turned Reiner into a traitor, who manipulated Pieck and Porco… I’ll make them pay.”

Falco parted his lips, unsure how to respond. He recalled the look on Reiner’s face whenever he spoke about the people on Paradis, the guilt that mixed with a strange fondness. “Gabi,” Falco said gently, “maybe we don’t know everything about what happened. Are we absolutely sure they betrayed us, or could there be more—”

“Shut up,” Gabi snapped. Her voice trembled with bitterness. “They betrayed Marley, Falco. They got all those Eldian refugees on that ship, only to hand them over to the devils. And then those devils turned them into titans. How else could that have happened? They never came back to Marley. They’re traitors.”

She took a shaky breath, forcing the tears away. “Reiner… he used to be so strong. So determined. Now he’s nothing more than a coward who ran off to cozy up to the island devils.”

Falco reached for her shoulder, but Gabi shrugged him off. The tension in the air felt thick, as though it threatened to choke them. Every soldier on the airship braced themselves for the dawn of the final assault. The entire world behind them stood united in hatred, convinced that wiping Paradis off the map was the only path to peace.

High above, the sun was nearing the end of its daily arc, painting the ocean with bands of orange and red. The Global Allied Fleet pressed onward, sails and steel at the ready, guided by the unwavering conviction that this mission would save humanity from the devils. Ships glided in perfect formation, airships poised overhead for an aerial bombardment. The operation was as well-coordinated as any in recorded history.

Marley had set the standard. They commanded the forces, orchestrating each movement, and the rest followed. Magath oversaw the grand plan, barking instructions that echoed across the decks. The tension on every vessel mounted, hearts pounding as each soldier envisioned what lay ahead.

Zeke, for his part, remained silent, a statue of thought. A single word from him could summon towers of dust and transform Eldians into mindless titans. Marley had decided instead of simply slaughtering the rest of the adult Eldians left in the internment zone… they secretly brought them along, packed in a lone airship and all of them already having Zeke’s spinal fluid running through their veins.

The titans are and alwayys have been a dangerous weapon… more so than any gun, cannon or airship. And Marley intended to use those filthy Subjects of Ymirs down to every last man, woman and child.

But his mission remained paramount. He had to ensure Eren never reached him. He couldn’t allow the Founder’s power to be unleashed through Eren’s will. Regardless of what the Founder had shown him or might attempt to do, he was bound by Marley’s orders and by his own twisted vision of salvation. The euthanization plan demanded it. 

Night began to settle over the water, and the stars shimmered faintly above the assembled fleets. In the distance, the jagged cliffs of Paradis loomed, just visible as dark shapes against the sky. The entire force braced for the final approach, adrenaline coursing through the veins of thousands upon thousands of soldiers.

Yet, on the opposite shore, Shiganshina stood equally ready. Eren, Levi, Hange, Mikasa, Armin, Jean, Connie, Sasha, Reiner, Pieck, Porco, and every last Jaegerist readied themselves, hearts pounding at the prospect of what morning would bring. The stage was set for a battle that would shape history—or end it.

Back at the palace in Mitras, Aurora leaned against the cushions of Historia’s massive bed. Her eyes fluttered open for a moment as an unfamiliar sensation pulled her from the edge of slumber. It wasn’t quite pain, but a tightness that made her heart skip. She inhaled, eyes flicking around the dimly lit room. The gentle glow of the bedside lamp revealed Historia reading a book in a chair nearby, too restless to sleep.

���Historia,” Aurora whispered, her voice wavering with a hint of nervousness. “I just felt something. Maybe it’s nothing, but… it felt different from the usual aches.”

Historia rose at once, setting the book aside. “Should I get the doctor?”

Aurora swallowed hard, pressing a hand against her belly. “Not yet. Let’s… let’s wait and see. It might just be nerves. I don’t want to bother him if it’s a false alarm.”

Outside, the night sky stretched vast and silent, but Aurora felt the weight of countless destinies converging. She thought of Eren again. She prayed that, by the time this baby truly wanted to come into the world, Eren would be alive to hold them.

She closed her eyes, ignoring the persistent knot of worry in her chest. For now, all she could do was rest and hope that come sunrise, life would still offer them a chance at a future. And across the ocean, the Global Allied Fleet prepared to unleash its wrath, convinced they were bringing justice, while Eren and the scouts prepared to defend the island with fire and steel.

The storm was mere hours away from crashing upon them all.

A/N: Buckle up you guys because it will only be chaos from now on.

~

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[darkfluffydragon]

Operation Abundance: About Golden Cheese Cookie

Note: Golden Cheese will be referred to as Aureate, as that is her AU name.

Why would Aureate allow Shadow Milk into her body? She can very well force him out of it, the Light of Abundance is not compatible whatsoever with the weakened Light of Deceit. Yet, he still controls her, using her as a host. Her story isn't all that different either, there is no grand tragedy that leaves her kingdom in an unfixable shamble. Sure, there were more glitches and errors in canon. and a bit more horror, but the conclusion was still the idea of her becoming more greedy, to become more powerful. Enough that she would be able to bring not just their souls, but their dough as well. To bring back her Golden Kingdom in its entirety.

One important detail that did change though was that she didn't follow Gingerbrave and the others, Instead, she told them that she would go to the Vanilla Kingdom later (never getting the closure of seeing her friends again after assuming Pure Vanilla died, and waking up as the only one to try and dig his body out of the Vanilla Kingdom rubble after Dark Enchantress’ bannishment), instead wishing to spend some time with the Cheesebirds she had originally forgotten and neglected for so long. To bathe in the sunlight of her real kingdom.

Then Shadow Milk came and dragged her into the false paradise of her dreams. She would fight, knowing none of the people there had souls, not like her kingdom. That they were not real, not what she desired. Not even when the other ancients were there, not when the dream was far grander, far more perfect than her own reality.

The real reason why she eventually relented, was when Shadow Milk, Charcoal Cheese, would reveal information about the other beasts. Specifically about Burning Spice.

The Souljam of Change. The other half of her Light of Abundance.

...

Surely, it was rightfully hers, was it not? If it had been stripped away from the injured Beast by the witches, then surely, the other half was justifiably, meant to be under her ownership? They had, after all, deemed her worthy of Abundance. Was this not the world giving her a sign? An opportunity, like so many centuries ago when she first found her Souljam? She would take the power, she would become more than simply Abundance, she would become Change. She would return all that had been taken from her, back into the golden sunlight so that her treasure, her temples, her streets, her cookies, they may all bathe in her radiant glory once more.

Having her closest friends there really only made the offer even more enticing...so she took it. She would bide her time, she would wait. And when the moment came, she would make her soul whole.

After all, Aureate had always been a greedy, selfish cookie.

To explain what I meant by her never getting closure, Aureate never got to see Pure Vanilla alive. Sure, she got the message from Gingerbrave, but she never saw him and the others with her own eyes. The last she saw of him was at the hall with Dark Enchantress, and the explosion. Before she would wake up in the ruins, alone. She’d have panicked, thinking that the others had died when in reality, they got separated and woke up at different times. She was the last one, and would start digging through the remains of the vanilla castle trying to find her friends. For hours, perhaps the entire day despite her wounds. She would come across a message left behind by Hollyberry, telling anyone who found it that she was returning to her kingdom. Then a message from Dark Cacao. She would find traces of White Lily’s magic, and she would find Pure Vanilla’s flower staff. The one he never left behind, unless with one of them because he trusted them dearly. That could only mean one thing

‘How could they leave so readily? How could they not even leave a memorial for our Treasure?

How could they leave me?’

They didn’t leave her and Pure Vanilla, they searched as well. They repeated the same cycle she did and had assumed that she, too, perished in that battle. Each grieved and mourned in their own way. They were simply not fortunate…unfortunate? Enough to find the staff.

She would leave the staff behind, a memorial, where the flower would always be able to see the sunrise. And then, she would leave, to find her fallen empire. She never got to properly see Pure Vanilla be alive, nor did she get to have a talk with the others to sort out their misunderstandings. Yet still, in her false dreams, they are what she desired the most.

The staff would also be how Pure Vanilla knew she was alive. Unlike Hollyberry and Dark Cacao, who were still known, had traces of their existence, Golden Cheese vanished. But it hadn’t been Hollyberry or Dark Cacao who placed his staff in such a place in such a fond way. There was only one other person he knew who would do such a thing.

[wizardrousactivity]

They Promise. Part I

Next>>>>

Synopsis: After the break up with your two partners, you find out you're pregnant. Causing you to fall into a depression and bankruptcy, a month after you give birth they show up at your door. Pleading for you. CW: Pregnancy, depression, break-ups, reader is fairly young. (early twenties) so [age gap] hurt/comfort It’s been about 10 months since König and Simon had left you, knocked up and depressed. You were breastfeeding your month old while sitting in your kitchen, eating up the last of some spaghetti you made. - everything felt empty, sultry and lazy. Spending most of your time weeping in your room until the baby screamed, rushing over to soothe it whenever you could. You needed to care for this baby, he’s all that you have. Your fingers trace over his small hands, rubbing them softly, it gave you comfort that you had another breathing - living human besides yourself in this house. Kissing his forehead you gently lowered him into the crib, looming over the wooden bed before making your way back to the kitchen. Till you hear a knock at your door, stopping you in your tracks. Staying cautious at who could be there at such an hour, you turn on your heel and peek through the blinds. A man the size of a grizzly bear and another man roughly his height. You can’t recognize the both of them till you see the familiar sniper hood and skull mask. Anger boils in you, a slight pang of guilt whirling in your stomach when you think of them seeing the baby. - Wrapping your hands around the handle, a lump growing in your throat once you open it to meet their eyes. Both of them are almost at their knees when you appear at the door, still the same. So perfect, so pretty for them. But they can’t forget they left you, sad and depressed for the entirety of 10 months.

 - Then suddenly you’re back to the first 5 months, trying to stay content with your situation so as to not stress out. You cried almost every day, rubbing your belly and thinking of what was growing in there. The shock was too much for you, causing you to nap through the day just to escape everything. It took a while to realize that it wasn’t the answer to anything, you accepted the baby. But you couldn’t accept the break-up yet. The sound of Ghost’s voice breaks you out of your thoughts, a deep gruff voice almost full of guilt. “We need to talk.” “What the fuck is there to talk about?” You retort, you were surprised they even came back. Leaving you deserted so coldly, with a baby they didn’t even know about. Tears build up in your eyes, dripping down your face immediately.   "Liebling- please.." König  interrupts, his hand reaching out to rest on your shoulder till you swat it away. Voice weak and dry. "Don't fuckin' touch me!" His heart pangs with guilt, he needed you. They needed you. The months they spent without you were cruel, half of the girls they met only being hookups to fuck and leave. Crack whores showing up at their shared flat almost every week. Everything goes chaotic until the baby begins to shrill, crying out for his mama upon hearing the noise. Cursing under your breath in panic - rushing upstairs to soothe him once again. König  and Ghost follow you upstairs, stopping in their tracks to stare at the tiny child you are holding in your arms. Patting it's back to calm it down. "Y\n?" König  begins to speak, dumbfounded by the baby. "Where did he come from?" You scowl, look at him with utter disgust. "Its my baby. You guys left me when I got pregnant." Memories begin to flood with your first 3 months, throwing up every morning, nobody was there for you. The food was the hardest part, you barely had any money to spare during that time. You still don't. Guilt boils in their stomachs, watching you care for it with such gentleness. Gentleness they'll never experience again, only touch starved and lonely again.

"Can I hold m'?" Ghost asks, making his voice more gentler around the premise of this now sleeping baby - holding his hands out. Swallowing, you hand him the baby. "What's his name?" He says as he gently engulfs the baby, holding it with ease and security.

"____, that's his name." You dryly respond, licking your lips and putting your hands together. He notices your nervous gesture and hands it back to you. Sighing heavily Ghost puts his hands on your shoulders, rubbing circles in them softly with his thumb. The action making warmth grow in your stomach. Finally speaking amongst the silence, your voice comes out deprived and quiet. "You guys know I can't forgive you after..." Your voice comes to a stop, tears beginning to trickle down again.

"We'll prove it to you then, give us some time baby. We promise." König  makes a grunt at that, putting his hand on your jaw and making you look at him. "Sounds good, nicht?"

[haikyuulovercompany]

Permanent Words ~ Akaashi Keiji x Reader

In this world, it's easy to know who is your soulmate, but how you find it, it's a complete surprise. One day you'll speak to someone and the very first words they direct at you will appear on your right wrist. Well... meeting your own soulmate was not only in a very premature moment in your life, but it came with a very awkward price. 'Poor Akaashi Keiji' is a thought you would spend your entire life repeating in your head.

Genre: Fluff. Soulmate!AU High School.

Warnings: None.

Words: 2.1K

Notes: No link to the 'original post' here because I took the premise of the original one and literally changed everything about it.

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You were having one of those days where it seemed the universe was on a personal mission to make things worse and worse for you. You had been the chosen joke of whatever superior force ruled the world.

You had stayed up very late into the night since it was a Friday. You had zero plans scheduled for the rest of the weekend and you had found a new television series that had ended two years ago and its six seasons were all available. You would have the entirety of your Saturday for yourself anyway. Or well… you had thought.

What had happened instead was your best friend calling you continuously at nine in the morning, to the point the sole buzzing of the phone successfully woke you up. You were quick to point out the day and the hour, cursing her for running your plans of waking up until after noon and staying in your pajamas for half the day. However, she didn’t apologize.

“Did you seriously forget about the Fukurodani Open Day?” your friend questioned, almost offended.

“That is till next week,” you reminded her, dropping your head back on your pillow hoping you could end the call and try to sleep a couple more hours.

“Uhh, no. It’s today.”

“What? It was till the sixteenth,” you insisted.

“Today is the sixteenth.”

You had blinked twice and removed the phone from your ear to look at the date and time. It turned out your friend was completely right. You gasped and jumped out of bed, showering your friend with apologies. The plan you had made was to get breakfast together and then head to Fukurodani together. Your friend had a crush with a guy from the basketball team. She had seen him a couple months back during a tournament game. She had been there to support his younger cousin and left the place furiously investigating everything about the school and team. As she had landed her eyes on the Open Day event, she had made you promise you would go there with her. And still, you had completely forgotten.

The plan was to go there, find the guy and have your friend talk to him and try to find out if the ‘hello there’ she planned on saying appeared on his right wrist. Neither of you had an indication if he could be ‘the one’, but your friend was so infatuated, she had sworn it was an important lead.

You took a quick shower and rushed to your closet with your hair wrapped in a towel. You didn’t have time to meticulously choose your outfit for the day, so you went for a safe option. Comfortable denim shorts and a flowy t-shirt tucked inside together with your favorite pair of sneakers. You didn’t have time to even put a bit more effort in your appearance, so you relied on your sunscreen and mascara. You always had a lip balm with you and that would have to do. You left your house and rushed through the streets. At that point, you didn’t have time to wait for the bus. You only had your legs and your will to make it up to your friend. But it seemed you couldn’t trust your body either because the tip of your sneaker got stuck on the edge of the sidewalk as you finished crossing the street and fell forward. Thankfully, your left leg managed to keep you steady but your right leg wasn’t so lucky, and so, your right knee met with the harsh concrete and got scraped. You hissed in pain as two older guys tried to check on you. You lifted a hand at them, silently letting them know you were okay. Truth was… you hated being late. You hated being in a hurry. Nothing went well when one was in a hurry and that day was proving it. Your wet hair had managed to wet the back of your t-shirt and you had forgotten your sweater, so now you were kind of cold and with nothing to help. Also, your sneaker had a dirt mark on the front and your knee hurt and was bleeding.

You couldn’t run anymore, but you could hop very fast… and you did that for the next five minutes as the initial recoil on your knee went away and you could properly step on your foot. You still couldn’t pick up the pace, but striding was possible and you kept the rhythm. Instead of meeting your friend at the little diner where you were supposed to have breakfast together, you met her at the entrance of Fukurodani. She had sustained a stony expression on you, trying to emphasize she was still not over you forgetting your plans together, but as soon as her eyes drifted down to your knee, she gasped.

“What happened?”

“My feet betrayed me,” you sighed. “It doesn’t hurt that much anymore.”

“We need to clean it, though. It looks bad.” Your friend suddenly stretched her hand to you, handing you a small paper bag. “Also, got you an egg sandwich.”

You simply raised your arms and dropped them around her in a thankful hug. You could really sit down, go silent for five minutes, and have some food. Tired of waiting, your friend grabbed your arm and you two went inside. You allowed your friend to scan the board where all the activities were written down so you two could finally try to make the fateful encounter happen. Your stomach grumbled, then. The smell of the egg sandwich was alluring and you decided to not wait anymore. While your friend searched for the basketball demonstration, you could start munching down on some breakfast. But life was not done with you yet. As you opened the paper bag, a sturdy body crashed lightly against yours, but with your knee in a weak state, it was all it took for you to lose your balance. With two clumsy steps forward, the paper bag slipped your hands and crashed on the floor. You watched as a stranger who had been mindlessly walking through the hallway kicked it.

That was it. You couldn’t take it anymore. Throwing any patience or manners out the window, you turned to see the guy who had crashed onto you. He was tall with short, messy black hair. He looked worried and was about to speak, but you didn’t let him.

“My egg sandwich, dude,” you snarled, and stomping your feet you went to get your food. You picked up the paper bag and looked inside, afraid of finding it in a complete mess. However, the sandwich had been perfectly wrapped up in aluminum paper. Maybe it would be a little mangled, but everything would be in place and ready for you to eat.

You stood up and found the same guy still staring at you with both eyes wide opened, his right hand lifted. You frowned at him, unfairly taking your anger in what was an obvious accident. As you stepped closer, meditating about apologizing for your attitude or not, you finally saw it. On his wrist, the words ‘my egg sandwich, dude’ were marked like a tattoo.

Your brain registered what that meant in a heartbeat. All the air in you slipped through your lips. The guy in front of you... the one with the same startled expression as yours was your soulmate… and you had forever marked his wrist with the stupidest phrase you had ever uttered in your entire life till that point.

Your soulmate. Right there. In front of you.

In a hurricane of uncomfortable emotions, you covered your face with both hands as a strong, overwhelming wave of heat struck your neck and it painfully crawled up to your ears and cheeks. Your whole face was beyond warm with embarrassment. You heard the steps of someone approaching you and you just knew it wasn’t your friend by the sensation of a tall presence looming over you. Your friend wasn't that tall. By then your friend had most probably taken notice of what was unfolding.

“Pleasure to meet you,” he said, using what you could only describe as the gentlest voice you had heard. And he also smelled nice. It was a mix between mint and soap. Clean and soft.

You couldn’t cover your eyes till he got tired and left. You assume he wouldn’t. Well, if he did, it would be disappointing. Your soulmate couldn’t give up on you… and neither could you. It would be equally horrifying if you decided to ignore him to the point he decided to leave you alone. One couldn’t choose how they were going to meet their soulmate, and yours happened to be a tad unfortunate. Nothing to do about it anymore.

You slowly moved your hands away from your face and lifted your eyes as you felt a tingling on your own right wrist. You finally got a good look at him—he had thin features and was fondly smiling at you. Why wasn’t he annoyed even in the slightest? He would live with a horrible sentence on his skin forever.

You turned your eyes to your wrist, seeing the words ‘Pleasure to meet you’ on it. It was so nice and so polite. It was obvious he had picked his words carefully once realizing the situation, making sure the words meant to be on your skin forever were something good.

He had been cautions enough to say the perfect thing. 

“Uhm, I’m going to go ahead,” your friend said, a cheeky edge on her words. “Don’t leave without me, okay?”

“No, of course not!” you hurriedly assured her. “I’ll text you.”

She gave you a thumbs up and did as she said, leaving you alone with your soulmate—a soulmate you still didn’t know their name.

“Your knee is bleeding,” he said before you could ask for his name. “Let’s get that fixed. Follow me.”

You nodded, holding your stupid egg sandwich against your chest. Your hunger had dimmed but that paper bag was the only thing helping you find stability for the time being. Your legs wobbled with every step you took. You had never been one to feel confident about love—you had even stopped thinking when or how you would find your soulmate, afraid it would take your entire life to do so—and now everything was happening in the snap of a finger, in the quickness of a breath.

He signaled you to wait for him as he approached a table with two older ladies. He pointed at you and continued talking. You were right. He was incredibly polite. His stance didn’t shy away, but just by the way he stood and the tone he used, he was respectful. That was nice. Your mother would like him a lot. Your cheeks burned again at your thoughts. That had to be the next, right? You had to start dating. Or well, maybe you could know each other first. Was it possible to not like your soulmate? You had never thought about it. You felt the urge to take out your phone and quickly search for all those answers but by then, he was already coming back at you with a first-aid kit hanging from one of his hands.

“You can sit there,” he said, pointing at the benches lined up against the walls. Again, you could only nod and obey.

You thought you would sit down and he would maybe sit beside you and hand you what you needed for your knee. Instead, he placed the first-aid kit next to you and he knelt. You panicked, quickly muttering ‘no’ over and over again, motioning with your hands for him to stand up. He completely ignored you and got a gauze and rubbing alcohol, and proceeded to clean your scrape. You slightly hissed at the first touch and he apologized, which you found endearing. The wound was no way his fault and he was being beyond nice for getting on the ground and taking care of it. You could already see yourself gloating to others about the gentleman the universe had chosen for you.

In no time there was no more blood on your skin and you could see the scrape wasn’t as bad as the bleeding had made it seem. It would form a scab for sure, but nothing more.

“Thank you so much…” you said, lingering there for a minute. “I still don’t know your name.”

He smiled as he put the bottle of rubbing alcohol back into the box. “Akaashi Keiji. What’s yours?”

You told him yours and repeated his name a couple times in your head. Your eyes went back to his right wrist and a chuckle escaped you, still in disbelief. “I will have these nice words on me, but, I… I just ruined your wrist forever.”

He took a look himself at his own skin and brushed a thumb over it, pale skin stretching but the words not going anywhere. He smiled again. Or had the smile ever left his face? You couldn't tell.

“No, it will be a funny story to tell,” he calmly stated. You smiled back at him, allowing yourself for the first time to relax around him. 

Needless to say, that egg sandwich was left untouched and forgotten to the side.  

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ♡ Thanks for reading! ♡

[phantasmatoucan]

I WAS TRYING TO PICK WHO IS MY FAVORITE VOICE BUT FAILED MISERABLY... RAMBLINGS UNDER HERE

I CANT FOR THE LIFE OF ME PICK A FAVORITE VOICE THEYRE ALL SO GOOD, EVEN THE 4 ONES I PICKED THAT I LIKED MOST ARE THERE LIKE BY A SMIDGE OF HOW MUCH I LOVE THEM AND CARE THEM

SMITTEN HAS BEEN MY FAVORITE VOICE SINCE BEFORE PRISTINE CUT CAME OUT WHEN I FIRST SAW THE GAME LIKE A YEAR AGO, I JUST LOVE CHARACTERS WHO ARE ASSOCIATED WITH LOVE IN A DETRIMENTAL WAY, HIS CODEPENDANCY WITH THE PRINCESS IS JUST SO GOOD, HE CAN NOT STOP LOVING HER EVEN IF SHE HURTS HIM, MANS BLINDED BY LOVE AND ALSO THE FACT THAT HES SO POWERFUL? LIKE THROUGHT THE POWER OF LOVE HES ABLE TO MANIFEST WHATEVER HE HAS IN MIND EVEN TO THE POINT OF CREATING A PLACE OF HIS OWN ACCORD WITHOUT TLQ'S INFLUENCE [to a point], HE NEEDS THERAPY SEVERLY BUT FOR NOW I WILL HOLD HIM IN PURSE

I ALWAYS HAD A SOFT SPOT FOR BROKEN, NOT BECAUSE OF HOW PATHETIC HE COULD BE SOMETIMES WHICH MOST OF MY FRIENDS FIND KIND OF ANNOYING BUT I MOSTLY THINK ITS FUNNY [also a fair stance i too would fold if a goddess told me to do whatever she tells me] BUT BECAUSE HE COULD BE SO SASSY AND BITTER TOWARDS THE OTHER VOICES WHICH OFTEN MADE ME SO INTERESTED IN HIM, HE WAS BROUGHT UPON BY TLQ BASICALLY GIVING UP ON STANDING UP TO THE PRINCESS OF COURSE HES GONNA LET HER TAKE THE REINGS SINCE TLQ BASICALLY GAVE UP HER POWER OVER HIM TO HER AND WITHT HE PRISTINE CUT HE GOT SO MUCH MORE FOR HIMSELF AS WELL, HIS EMPATHY IS SO POWERFUL THAT HE CAN USE IT TO HIS ADVANTAGE AND FOR BETTER UNDERSTANDING OF THE PRINCESS

I HAVE A THING FOR CHARACTERS WHO TRY TO COVER UP THEMSELVES FOR THEIR OWN PROTECTION AND OPPORTUNIST FITS THE BILL, HES A SURVIVALIST FIRST AND MOST OF ALL, HE WILL DO ANYTHING IN HIS POWER TO SURVIVE BE IT BY GIVING HIS CHOICES TO THE MOST POWERFUL PERSON IN THE ROOM OR USING WHATEVER CARD HE HAS IN STORE TO ONE UP WHOEVER IS WITH HIM FOR HIS OWN SAFETY, AFTER ALL HE CAN ONLY TRUST HIMSELF TO KEEP HIMSELF SAFE, HE LIKES TO BE PRAISED AND THE ATTENTION AND I THINK HE DOES WANT CONNECTION BE IT THE OTHER VOICES OR THE PRINCESS BUT HE HAS TO PUT UP A FRONT NO MATTER WHAT SO THAT HE CAN ALWAYS HAVE SOMETHING UP HIS SLEEVE, ALSO HIS GRIN IN PRINCESS AND THE DRAGON IS SO GOOD...

PARANOID! I ALWAYS LIKED HIM AND HOW FUNNY HE CAN BE WITH HIS BLUNTNESS, HE ALWAYS IS TRYING TO KEEP TLQ SAFE BUT WITH THAT COMES HIS LACK OF ACTION, AS IN USUALLY DUE TO THE CIRCUMSTANCES OF THE ROUTES HE CANNOT FIND A GOOD OUTCOME OF ANY OF THE CHOICES U HAVE, HE HAS A GOOD GRASP OF HOW THE SITUATION IN THE CONSTRUCT WORKS AKA BELIEVING AND THINKING IN SOMETHING CAN HAPPEN WILL HAPPEN, BUT THAT ALSO COMES WITH CONSEQUENCES OF BELIEVING BAD THINGS CAN HAPPEN DO HAPPEN [the nightmare in its entirety], HES ONE OF THE BEST VOICES IN TERMS OF SURVIVAL THO BUT WHEN IT COMES TO UNDERSTANDING OTHERS LIKE THE PRINCESS HES THE WORST AT SINCE HE ALWAYS WILL PUT HIS SAFETY FIRST AND WONT TRY TO TAKE A LEAP OF FAITH, his stress laugh in the cage is also very cute [heart]

I DONT WANT THIS TO BE TOO LONG SO I WILL SAY WITH THE OTHER VOICES I CARE THEM A LOT, HERO COULD ALSO BE IN THE TIER ABOVE SINCE HES THE BEST BUT HE GOTS HIS FLAWS [his lack of desicion making dont want to get into it this is long enough as is help] BUT FOR NOW THATS THAT

THE NARRATOR MOSTLY MAKES ME SAD SINCE WE SEE SO MUCH ABOUT HIM AND HOW BITTER AND AFRAID HE CAN BE ABOUT TRYING TO SAVE HIS WORLD AND HOW EVEN IF HE DOES HAVE A CHANGE OF HEART OR SOME UNDERSTANDING WITH THE PRINCESS IT WILL NEVER STICK AROUND BECAUSE HES JUST AN ECHO AND HE CAN NEVER GROW FROM THAT

AND THATS ALL I HAVE TALKED LONG ENOUGH THAT THIS TOOK ME LIKE HALF AN HOUR TO WRITE JESUS CHRIST 23ÑLRKMOPR21

[melanatedkink]

Good Job

Pairing: Y/N x Mirio

Pro Hero AU

A/N: The "infamous" Mirio rewrite that I meant to write earlier, but the words weren't doing the thing. Hopefully this is a better send up to dom Mirio.

Warnings: friends to lovers, domxsub, soft dom, praise kink, aftercare

Jealousy was an ugly thing. Living up to other people's expectations was a war in its own right. But, if reaching that magical "potential" that others decided for you was the goal, then jealousy was the ever moving goal post. You didn't know why you felt this emotion so deeply. So, you sat at your desk and backtracked to the moment you moved here.

Weirdly enough, you moved due to your jealousy. You had barely graduated with a bachelor's degree after a long hiatus from school. A break year that felt more like a reminder of how close you were to getting to your intended goal. You were an only child growing up, but that didn't stop your parents from finding new objects for their praise. They never seemed to shut up about every other achievement that your cousins seemed to make. And if they thought to bring you up in conversation, it was always laced with ideas of potential, never acknowledging your interests. So you warped your own hobbies, and took up after school activities that won you significant points on your resume before you even left for college. You even started school during the summer just to get a head start. You studied. You pulled all-nighters. You worked hard to get the best grades. Although, in all your efforts, your body just couldn't keep up. You were hellbent on at least one compliment. Hell, a second of recognition was more than enough motivation to get you through two and a half years of school until your finals week came up.

On your way to class, you passed out at the wheel. You woke up in alone in a hospital. It didn't dawn on you until you were filling out a police report that A.) Your recovery would postpone your finals. B.) Your parents would be pissed if you came home without anything good to say about school. So, as soon as you were discharged, you moved from your dorm to a nearby apartment complex. You took up a job at a hero's agency in the mail room. The hero in question was a new graduate of U.A. by the name of Suneater. Before the end of the year, the agency had gained a co-owner. Mirio Togata, a close friend of Suneater.

On the surface, Mirio made you uncomfortable. He just seemed unrealistically joyful and friendly. Qualities that you often wrote off as manipulative or just disingenuous. It wasn't his fault he was happy. But, it wasn't your fault that you felt that way. You'd learned enough lessons in dealing with people that making that assumption often helped you avoid getting hurt. So, you dug your nose deeper into your work until you finally made enough to leave the agency.

Upon sending in your resignation, Mirio walked into the office. You flinched as he came up to you, his usual blinding smile turning your stomach in knots. It did not help that he was handsome in his hero costume. You quickly handed him the notice. He held up a hand, keeping you from making your speedy get away. His blue eyes scanned the note in its entirety, making you wish you had kept it short instead of oversharing. He raised a brow as he read over your accomplishments, even commented on your major. You attempted to keep it surface level as you explained it, until he gestured for more context. You two spent nearly an hour talking about everything that led up to you working in the mailroom. The only thing that broke this rare conversation was Suneater peeking his head in to usher Mirio to a public appearance. Two things stuck with you as he parted. One, he made sure you were looking in his eyes. Two, he said: "I'm proud of you."

Alarmed, you floated around him, silently bowing as you took your leave. You spent the next few days in a haze as you slowly got reacclimated to the hustle of gunning for your degree. You nearly forgot that you had exchanged your number with Mirio somewhere in your conversation. Had he not called you in the middle of you studying one night, you certainly would have let that be a chance encounter. As you pushed yourself through your academic efforts, Mirio kept up with your physical health. If he couldn't get you to put the laptop away, he at least drug you to an outdoor restaurant to get you to touch grass while you ate. And he made you eat. To the point where your tummy instinctively growled upon meeting up with him. He kept you mini fridge filled with water, accompanied you on your chore days, and even drilled you with your studies. And you let him, all in the hopes that he'd keep saying those four sacred words to you.

Finally, your work paid off. You made salutatorian, with a GPA of 4.3 to boast about. On the morning of graduation, Mirio sent you a congratulations message. He wouldn't be there to see you walk the stage, but he promised to catch up afterward to properly celebrate you. A sentiment you held close, but not as close as the idea that your family would be there. You ensured that they knew that you were graduating today. And you were so excited. You just knew they would be there. But, as your name was called, you couldn't hear any cheers in the background. As you accepted your diploma, you couldn't recognize anyone in the crowd. You plastered a smile on your face as the dean shook your hand. You stumbled off stage utterly embarrassed and confused. As your peers lifted their caps to the air, you checked your phone to make sure your message had sent. Your chest tightened as it seemed you weren't the topic anymore. Instead, a family friend had graduated on the same day. Pictures of your parents with this random kid flooded the chat. Nothing but praise surrounded this person whom they never even introduced to you. You figured if they were so important, you would have at least heard about them...

Mirio caught up to you in the stadium, sitting in the same spot. The crowd was thin as he made his way to you. He peered over your shoulder. He tapped your cheek with a bouquet he'd purchased for you. As you tilted your head up, his heart dropped. He quickly dropped to his knees, and held your face with both hands.

"Hey, hey I'm sorry. I'm sorry I couldn't see you," he stuttered.

You let out a choked sob as you tried to explain, "It's- it's not you I...I'm not mad at you it's just... I- they didn't show up."

"They?" he repeated. He slowly took your phone from you. He scrolled through the messages until he reached your message about your graduation. His lips thinned. Not a single word about your accomplishment. There was a time lapse between those messages and yours. And he couldn't see your name anywhere. He let out a frustrated sigh, and returned his palms to your face.

"Today is about you, not them. In fact, this phone is mine until tomorrow,"

You shake your head, reaching out for the device, "I just need to send one more thing-"

"No!" he doubled down by shoving your phone in his pocket. He gently placed your flowers into your hand, "Come on. Let me celebrate you. It's not easy to graduate, and you... you're going to be pampered today,"

With that, Mirio ushered you out of the stadium and fixated his attention on you. After you changed out of your robe, you spent the day in the city. Any whim you voiced was answered immediately. If it was a meal you wanted, you were sure to finish you plate without a bill to think of. If it was a movie you wanted to watch, you had tickets and a bowl of popcorn in your lap. And if you just wanted to hear his voice as you walked the city streets, he gave you an encore of stories to listen to.

You two made it back to Mirio's "humble" abode after cleaning out your dorm. He suggested that you live with him until you could renew your lease at your old apartment. As you looked around, you almost suggested staying there. It was a spacious home in a wealthy neighborhood. A place you could definitely see yourself stretching out and thriving in. An idea interrupted your grandiose thoughts.

"We forgot to take pictures!"

You snatched your clothing bag from the couch and quickly unzipped it. Mirio smiled as you hastily donned your robe. It was rare to see you excited over anything aside from a good grade in class. All he wanted was more of you.

You scooped your bundle of flowers and posed under the lighting. He picked up his phone and stepped a couple paces back.

"Put your tassle to the other side for me," he pointed the camera at you, "Alright, three two one..."

With his help, you created a small album of pictures to look back at later. You scrolled through the photos at his side, too excited to sit down after that. Meanwhile, Mirio ventured to ask, "Who's Jaqueline?"

You froze, trying to pinpoint the name until, "Oh you mean the girl who graduated today? I have no idea. But, she's not me so that's probably why my family is with her today."

Mirio blinked. You realized how cold you sounded and laughed it off.

"Damn, that sounds horrible out of context,"

Mirio shrugged, "I mean, I can see why you could think that. Especially if this is normal for you,"

You rolled your eyes, "I shouldn't get mad about it,"

"I think you should," He pocketed his phone and tipped your face up with a finger to your chin, "Today is about you, after all,"

You folded your arms as you tried to think of a way to word it all. Mirio had essentially become your personal diary through school. It was pretty easy to think about why you were so angry. It was the same reason why you went back to school in the first place. Because you were tired of being overlooked. Nothing you did earned you any praise. You practically begged to be regarded as a success with every single goal you achieved. And nothing was good enough.

"...And I'm just left feeling so fucking jealous of everyone who does better than me. Not because they have what I want, but because they always get recognized for it. They get to hear how proud people are of them and I swear if I could figure out what to do to get that I'd never stop. And here I am with a fucking degree and no one fucking cares,"

Mirio squeezed your shoulder as you caught your breath. You scoffed.

"You know what really pisses me off? I could have stayed at your agency if I knew that this still wasn't gonna work,"

"You would have stayed?"

"Yeah, especially after that first time we met... I almost took back my resignation cause you actually seemed to care. I'm surprised you even stuck around all through school. I'm sure I was just a stick in the mud the whole time,"

Mirio shook his head, "I think you're mispronouncing "determined". But continue,"

You narrowed your eyes at his quip. You gripped the collar of his dress shirt and pulled him into you. Mirio's eyes flew open as you kissed him out of the blue. You pulled away with a smile. It seemed you weren't done making requests. And, quite frankly, he wasn't going to stop pampering you. He placed his hands on either side of your face and pressed his lips into yours. He backed you up into a wall. You wrapped your arms behind his neck.

"Can we continue?" he asked. You nodded furiously. "Can I call you baby?" You nodded again, offering a tiny please on top.

Mirio unzipped you robe, removed your clothes and underwear. He smoothed his hands over your skin, taking in the sight of your body. He pressed your front against the wall after he got his fill, removing his clothes behind you.

"No fair. Why can't I see you?" you whined.

He smoothed his hands over your backside, "Because, you don't need anything distracting you from how this is gonna feel. Besides, if you wanna see me in the future, we can definitely make that possible."

The warmth of his chest slowly departed as he go to his knees behind you. He parted your cheeks with his thumbs. A low groan rumbled from his throat as he gazed at your nethers. He kissed his way from your anus down to your most sensitive areas. You whimpered and gripped the wall. His lips teased at your entrance.

"You did such a good job, you know," he moaned.

You stiffened up, barely taking in his words before his mouth descended in full. He gripped one of you cheeks, keeping you nice and exposed to him. Your knees quivered as you listened to the mess he was making of you. It was getting hard to dissect what he was saying. You just knew that his words felt good. You didn't want him to stop. As your eyes began to lose focus, you felt his thumb at your anus.

"Mirio!" you squeeked.

He chuckled, "Don't worry. I just needed your attention. Do you want me?" He got to his feet, and unbuckled his trousers with a snap. You nodded. He pressed a kiss on your shoulder, "Then push back. On to me. Just like that,"

You did as he said, a little shocked that his dick was right behind you. You split yourself open on his length. He helped you out at the very end, making sure you were filled with all of him.

After you had gotten used to him, you gave him the okay to start moving.

"No no, baby. I need you to take what you want," He joined hands with yours against the wall. His hips kissed your ass as he remained stationary behind you. You planted your feet and rocked your hips until you found a speed that made your jaw drop. Luckily, his height set him at the perfect angle to hit you right where you needed him. One of his hands left yours to play with you outside. You cried out. You dropped your head between your arms. You couldn't tell if you were chasing his hand or his dick anymore. You couldn't take it anymore. You needed him to move.

"Mirio. Please. I'm so f-fucking close. Just a little- Ah!"

His hips snapped forward before you could fully get out your request. He kept your pace, adding more pent up force to drive you into madness. You cried out his name back to back until your knees shook and you shivered uncontrollably. Mirio wrapped his forearm under your tummy, inadvertently sending more pressure through your loins and adding to your orgasm. He slowed his pace, teasing out whimpers of sensitivity. You tapped his hand in a feeble attempt to tell him that it was enough.

After a mandatory shower (He was adamant to wash you down) you two curled up on his couch: you in his lap, and Mirio holding you to his chest.

"Question," you piped up.

"Answer," he answered.

"Why...when we first talked and I handed in my resignation, why did you say you were proud of me?"

Mirio sank deeper into the couch. He rested his finger beneath your chin, bringing your gaze to his, "Because I was proud of you."

"Yeah but like, what did I do?" you pressed.

He shook his head, "It's nothing you can do that makes me proud. It's simply you doing things that makes me proud. Anything between simply breathing to coming back to my agency,"

You blinked, "Wait I never said I was coming ba-"

He cut you off with a kiss, "Not yet."

[perfectsunlight]

(𝟔𝟒) - 𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫

𝗐𝖺𝗋𝗇𝗂𝗇𝗀𝗌: 𝗂𝗇𝗌𝖾𝖼𝗎𝗋𝗂𝗍𝗂𝖾𝗌 (?)

𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐭 𝐨𝐟 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐬𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐬: 𝐚𝐛𝐨𝐮𝐭 𝐲𝐨𝐮

sakura always wondered why she could never do anything to comfort you. 

the first time she met you, she picked up on the way your smile never seemed to reach your eyes. she had always been the observant type, even though her former group loved to paint her as the “oblivious japanese girl.”

but sakura saw through those stereotypes, and she genuinely cared about people's well-being. as she spent more time with you, she noticed the subtle signs that something weighed heavily on your heart. 

it pained her to see you burdened by invisible sorrows.

she tried different approaches to bring you comfort, from kind words to small gestures of affection. sakura would offer a listening ear whenever you spoke, hoping that you’d share your feelings and lighten your load. but deep down, she felt frustrated, wondering why her efforts seemed to fall short.

perhaps it was because she couldn't see the entirety of your pain, the intricate tapestry of emotions that you kept hidden. were you sad because you couldn’t debut under sm? did you miss your old group? or perhaps you were lonely here without friends?

regardless of your reasons for your subtle signs of sadness, sakura yearned to understand you on a deeper level, to unravel the intricacies of your heart. she believed that only then could she offer the comfort you needed.

however she soon realized that you were not lonely. you were simply just heartbroken.

you were carrying the weight of a past relationship that left deep scars on your soul. the older girl realized that your pain stemmed from a love lost, and it wasn't something she could heal with a simple act of comfort.

she knew that heartbreak took time to heal, and it required patience, understanding, and a safe space for you to process your emotions. perhaps that’s why she just let you grieve, giving you the space to let your grief run its course.

sakura knew you weren’t getting any better. you were barely eating, the circles under your eyes telling you were hardly sleeping as well. everything about you was screaming for help, but sakura didn’t know what else to do.

she wasn’t the only one who was feeling the same way either. chaewon was feeling just as worried and concerned.

chaewon always heard your sniffles at the twilight hours and the break of dawn. still to this day she wonders why she never could bring herself to get up and comfort you.

maybe it was because she didn’t know how.

despite being the leader, she was inept in providing emotional support.  

she carried the weight of her own insecurities, feeling inadequate and unsure of how to offer you the solace you desperately needed. it wasn't a reflection of her lack of care or concern, but rather a result of her own limitations and self-doubt.

chaewon often found herself at a loss for words when faced with your pain. she questioned her ability to provide the right kind of support and feared saying the wrong thing, inadvertently causing more harm than good. it weighed heavily on her heart, knowing that you were suffering, but feeling helpless in her own inability to alleviate your pain.

deep down, she cared deeply for you. but chaewon wished she could magically possess the wisdom and comforting presence that would bring you solace. 

she wished she could be even half of the leader eunbi was.

maybe that’s why she and sakura let yunjin do her thing with you? of course, they both did not approve of you and a fellow member sleeping together. it would make things complicated, and there was a huge risk that it would make dynamics weird.

but all that was thrown out the window when they realized that it was working.

chaewon wrestled with conflicting emotions as she witnessed the unexpected but effective approach yunjin took in bringing solace to your life. while she couldn't ignore the potential complications and risks that came with your involvement with a fellow member, she couldn't deny the positive impact it had on your well-being.

she understood that healing and finding comfort often required thinking outside the box and challenging the norms. chaewon and sakura both observed the positive changes in you, the light returning to your eyes, and it gave them a sense of relief. 

they knew that yunjin's presence in your life, while unconventional, provided the comfort and support you needed during this difficult time. you needed jimin, but if yunjin could be a temporary solution, then so be it.

it wasn't about following a set of rules but rather finding what truly worked for you, even if it defied expectations. your well-being and healing were paramount, and if this unorthodox approach brought you solace and happiness, chaewon couldn't help but be grateful for the positive impact it had on your life.

in their support for yunjin's role in your life, chaewon and sakura also embraced the importance of open-mindedness and acceptance. they recognized that relationships could be complex, and they prioritized your happiness and emotional well-being above all else.

you were happy. that’s all that mattered to them.

when you walked inside the dorm, you weren’t expecting to be met with the glaring eyes of chaewon. your leader’s anger issues were a well known feature, but you didn’t know if knowing how upset she was brought you any comfort.

behind her on the couch, sakura sat with her arms folded. the eldest member looked stoic, but you could tell from the twitch in her eyebrow and the emotion in her eyes that she was definitely just as upset as chaewon.

“sit.” 

you never wanted to disappoint sakura or chaewon. they were everything to you when everything meant nothing.

you gave a small nod and slowly moved to sit down on the floor in front of the couch, facing them. silence loomed and the tension was palpable, but you knew this was the consequences of your own actions.

“where were you?”

chaewon's voice was sharp as she demanded an explanation. sakura remained silent, her gaze fixed on you, awaiting your response. the weight of their disappointment pressed down on you, making it difficult to find the right words to explain your absence.

"i'm sorry," you stammered, feeling the heaviness of regret. "i got caught up in something important.”

chaewon's glare intensified, her frustration evident. "important? more important than our rehearsals and commitments? we depend on each other, and your absence affects us all."

sakura's expression softened slightly, but her voice still carried disappointment. "we're a team, and when one member is absent without communication, it jeopardizes us as a whole."

guilt washed over you, knowing that you had let them down. you hated disappointing your unnies. it was something you’d always done your best to avoid.

“i was with jimin.”

your voice was soft, and your head hung slightly. as you mentioned jimin's name, a mix of surprise and curiosity flashed across chaewon and sakura's faces. 

the japanese girl’s thoughtful gaze shifted to you, and you could feel her assessing your demeanor, searching for any hidden emotions or lingering concerns. it was as if she could see through you.

sakura had a way of understanding without needing many words, her intuition guiding her towards a deeper comprehension of the situation at hand. she had seen your remorse and sincerity, but now she was looking for signs of growth and learning.

finally, she spoke up, her voice calm and measured. 

“does yunjin know?”

a small sigh escaped your lips as you thought about the american. you two were not on good terms, and you knew that a conversation with her was needed as well. but for now, you needed to get through this one.

“no.”

sakura's brows furrowed slightly as she processed your response. she exchanged a glance with chaewon, and it was clear they were contemplating the best course of action.

chaewon spoke up, her tone stern yet tinged with concern. "yunjin needs to know. we can't keep this hidden within the group."

your lack of an answer made the room silent. it was obvious that you felt very uncomfortable about this.

the older girl spoke after your silence. she shifted and leaned forward to look at you closer. “you’re back with jimin, aren’t you?”

you hesitated, feeling a mix of vulnerability and apprehension. it was clear that sakura and chaewon had picked up on something, and the truth was difficult to conceal any longer.

with a heavy sigh, you nodded, unable to meet their gaze. the admission hung in the air, the weight of it causing your heart to race. you knew the potential consequences of your decision, the risks it posed to the dynamics within the group. even the oldest members knew that yunjin would not be happy with the news.

sakura's voice was gentle, tinged with concern. "are you sure about this, y/n?” chaewon began pacing back and forth, shaking her head in disapproval.

“why? after everything she did to you, why would you go back?” the leader asked as she looked down at you. you could see the look of disappointment on her face. 

you took a deep breath, trying to find the right words to explain your decision. the memories of the past, the pain and the longing, resurfaced, making it difficult to articulate your emotions clearly. but you still let your truth be told.

"i know it may be hard to understand, but there's something between us, something that's difficult to let go of," you replied, your voice filled with a mix of sadness and determination. “even after all this time, i can’t forget about her.”

sakura's gaze softened, her understanding evident. "it's not always easy to rationalize. but we're concerned about the impact this might have on the group dynamics, especially considering your history with yunjin."

"y/n,”  chaewon's frustration seemed to intensify as she shook her head. “i made a promise to both your sister and myself. i promised to take care of you.”

you met your leader’s gaze, your voice trembling slightly. "i understand your concerns, and i don't take them lightly. but i can't ignore the feelings i have for jimin. it's complicated, and i wish i had all the answers, but i know she’s different now.”

“how do you know that?” her eyes widened as she spoke to you. “how do you know for sure she won’t leave you in shambles like the last time?”

your heart ached at chaewon's questions, the echoes of doubt and fear mirroring your own inner turmoil. you understood where she was coming from, her protective instincts kicking in, but you also believed in the power of growth and change.

"i can't know for sure," you admitted, your voice laced with vulnerability. "but i've seen glimpses of it in jimin, moments where she's shown remorse and a genuine desire to make amends. i can just feel it. things are different this time."

“she ruined you,” chaewon shouted, her voice loud but her tone filled with despair. “i don’t want her to use you the same way…” the leader paused and stopped herself, staring at the ceiling to avoid tears from falling.

sakura poked the inside of her cheek as she looked at your visible confusion, eyes glancing towards chaewon who was now putting her hands over her face out of frustration.

“i don’t want her to use you the same way yunjin did.”

chaewon’s fists clenched as she watched the american exit your room slowly, hair disheveled and hickeys on her neck. 

“yah,” she called out from the dim hallway, trying to get yunjin’s attention. “you need to stop doing this to her.”

yunjin raised an eyebrow at her leader, confusion on her features. “why? she doesn’t want me to stop.”

chaewon took a deep breath, her voice steady as she confronted yunjin. "this isn't just about what she wants in the moment, yunjin. it's about the long-term impact of your actions and the potential consequences they may have on her well-being."

yunjin crossed her arms, a defiant expression on her face. "she's a grown adult who can make her own decisions. if she wants to be with me, who are you to intervene?"

chaewon's gaze hardened, her voice laced with determination. "i'm her leader, and more importantly, yours as well. i care about her happiness and want what's best for her. and right now, i don't believe that what you're doing is in her best interest."

yunjin scoffed, her tone dripping with sarcasm. "oh, and you think you know what's best for her? just because you're the leader doesn't mean you have all the answers."

chaewon's eyes narrowed, her voice firm. "no, i don't have all the answers, but i have a responsibility to look out for the members of this group. and i won't stand by and watch her get hurt again."

you knew chaewon was right. you had always known yunjin’s actions were not what the appeared to be.

huh yunjin liked broken things to stay broken. it made her feel better about herself. it made her feel needed.

“yunjin isn’t jimin.”

as the words slipped from your lips, the room fell into a heavy silence. chaewon and sakura exchanged glances, their expressions a mix of surprise and curiosity. it was clear that your statement held a deeper meaning.

chaewon uncrossed her arms, her eyes remaining on you as she took a seat once again. "what do you mean?"

you took a deep breath, gathering your thoughts. "i think yunjin liked having me attached to her because it made her feel needed. but it always felt like i was indebted to her. jimin is different. she has never asked me for anything until now." you brushed a stray tear away from your eye and continued speaking. “the only thing she’s asking me for now is a second chance, and i’m giving it to her.”

sakura's gaze remained fixed on you, her intuition guiding her understanding. "do you trust that she’s not going to hurt you again?"

you nodded, a sense of conviction settling within you. "yes, that's what i believe. jimin sees the value in my healing, in our healing together. she doesn't want to use me; she just wants to rebuild something healthy and meaningful."

chaewon's eyes softened finally, her voice filled with a mixture of concern still. "look, i just want you to be happy, but i also want to make sure you're making the right choice for yourself.”

you nodded again, a small smile tugging at the corners of your lips. "we've talked about it extensively. we've acknowledged the mistakes of the past. we're willing to put in the work to build a healthy relationship."

sakura's thoughtful expression turned into a gentle smile. "then, if you truly believe in the growth and change within jimin, we'll support you. we'll be there for you every step of the way.”

chaewon's features softened, her gaze filled with a mix of understanding and acceptance. "i may not fully comprehend it right now, but i trust you, y/n. i trust your judgment and your ability to navigate your own path."

“you sound like my sister.” you chuckled softly, slowly rising to your feet. chaewon only gave you a quick smile as she took in the look on your face. you smiled, and she felt just a little bit relieved to see you actually were happy.

you threw your arms around sakura first, mumbling a strand of thank yous to her. the japanese girl chuckled as she patted your back gently.

once you let the oldest girl go, you moved to hug chaewon tightly. she was surprised at the sudden firmness, but it only brought a small smile to her face.

"thank you," you whispered, your voice filled with gratitude. "you’re the best leader ever.”

“you’re the best, eunbi!”

chaewon slowly wrapped her arms around you, ignoring the way her vision became watery. “of course, y/n.” she whispered, taking a glance at sakura, who only sent her a knowing smile. 

perhaps she hadn’t failed you after all?

as she held you in her embrace, a mix of emotions swirled within her. her earlier doubts and feelings of inadequacy now seemed distant as she realized the support and understanding.

the tears that welled up in her eyes were not just those of sadness but also of relief and gratitude.

with a gentle squeeze, chaewon whispered, "i'm sorry if i ever made you doubt my care for you. i'm here for you, and i'll do my best to support you in whatever makes you happy."

sakura's knowing smile widened as she watched the exchange between the two of you. she had seen the doubts and struggles chaewon had carried, the weight of the leader's responsibility often burdening her. she was glad the other girl could see for herself that she was in fact a good leader.

and if she couldn’t see it right then and there, your words definitely did a better job instead.

"you've never failed me, unnie," you murmured, your voice filled with sincerity. "you've been there for me, even when i couldn't see it. i love you."

┊┊┊┊⋆ ✧　 　 · 　 ✧　✵ ┊┊┊☆ *　　 * ⋆ ┊┊★ * ┊┊* . *　✦ ┊☆ ° ✧　 　 · ★*

you and jimin met as trainees before she debuted, and you two never felt more in love. however, once she breaks up with you before her debut, you completely leave SM entertainment under the notion of needing a fresh start. you eventually debuted a few years later in le sserafim, where you met huh yunjin and have slowly started developing feelings for the idol. much to karina's dismay, she hates to see you have moved on, but deep in your own heart, you still can't help but feel as if maybe she has forgotten about you.

𝐭𝐚𝐠𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭: @captivq , @wonyoluvr , @yunalvrrr , @spritin , @babycubchae , @vnschldd , @sserafimez , @chaersly , @rosiehrs , @baldd , @bwljules , @jenaissantesworld , @jennasluma , @dream-chasers-things , @lcv3lies , @elyds , @archerheejin , @vnschldd , @skisk1 , @cfvgbhndun-new-blog , @silantryoo , @phamminji , @bzeus28 , @writingficsblog , @strangegirlcode , @uzumakioden , @noiacha , @sserabey , @archerheejin , @pindoris , @yourstrulytrissmerigold , @jisooftme , @yacii , @ddrummie , @justalittledissociation

[ 𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐦𝐚𝐧𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐥𝐲 𝐜𝐥𝐨𝐬𝐞𝐝 ]

[electricbathsalt]

Hi! Fellow Overhaul enjoyer here! (Thank god I’ve found my people-)

I read about your ideas for a Herohaul! AU and a thought occurred to me-

What do you think would happen if Herohaul found out Shigaraki’s Decay is actually half of HIS Overhaul?

Hello! Sorry I did not get back to you sooner, I was. dead. But I’m back now!

That’s a really interesting idea! I never considered it! I completely forgot that in my Herohaul AU Shigaraki still would’ve gotten half of Chisaki’s quirk if we’re being accurate with the timeline…

So, let me contemplate this!

First things first, Chisaki would have to find out somehow. I imagine this would happen sometime in his hero career while he’s an adult. I’ll also say that Chisaki never knew why he was in Garaki’s orphanage as a kid, and to add some extra spice, it’s always been something that gnaws at the back of his mind. He’s well-familiar with the fact they were experimenting on him for his quirk—but why? What was their goal with it? Clearly, if they had one, they must’ve reached it since they let him escape. But he never could pinpoint it.

That is until he hits the age of, hm, let’s say 20 for now. Let’s speed up when Garaki gets found out and busted, and let’s say this happens due to Chisaki’s previous disclosures of what his time in the “mystery orphanage” was like and whatnot. It gave the police and heroes investigating the whole thing a significant enough lead that Garaki eventually gets got early.

Now, after the investigation is over and done and Garaki is imprisoned, Chisaki ends up giving into his urge to visit him to demand answers after a while.

The mere presence of the man makes Chisaki’s skin crawl. But the main thing about him that makes Chisaki have to suppress his tremors is the man’s voice—the thing he heard every time he was getting experimented on. He barely ever saw Garaki’s face and never in its entirety, but his voice was like running his ears down graters.

He manages to put up an unaffected front, though. Garaki laughs and praises Chisaki’s tenacity and resolution when he starts asking questions.

Garaki only gives unhelpful answers. Such as “Yes, we had a goal”, “Yes, we reached it”, and nothing but silence and a smile when Chisaki asks what the goal was. No matter how Chisaki tries to figure more out, Garaki remains a brick wall. It frustrates Chisaki and he ends up getting up to leave in anger. But, right before he slams the door behind him, Garaki calls out to him.

“Wait,” he says. “One last thing.” Chisaki looks at him over his shoulder. “There was another boy,” he states.

Chisaki presses him for more. Garaki very blatantly finds the whole thing amusing. “You’re toying with me,” Chisaki accuses. Garaki cackles.

It’s after hours of relentless interrogation that Garaki finally decides to let Chisaki catch a break. “We were extracting part of your quirk to copy it and give it to the boy. And…” Chisaki’s face morphs with horror at just that, and then, “You already know him,” Garaki says. Chisaki’s blood runs cold.

“What?”

“You already know him,” Garaki repeats. He wheezes before continuing, “May or may not be one of the kids you sent to that old recovery center you’re so fond of.”

Chisaki has found, rescued, and sent dozens of children to his past recovery center. He even checks up on all of them when he can. He knows every kid in there by heart.

“Who? Which one?” He demands. His heart is pounding in his ears. His vision is going blurry. This is bad. Everything about this is bad.

Garaki grins. “I feel like you already have an idea.”

Chisaki feels sick. Garaki’s right. Chisaki already knows who it is, doesn’t he?

The accidental murder, the urges to destroy, the touch rule, the disintegration, the scratching. The way he would describe the man who took him in.

Chisaki can’t hear what Garaki says over the hammering in his head, but he learned to read lips a long, long time ago.

—

Sorry, anyway. So after Chisaki finds out that their goal was to extract half of his quirk and give it to Shigaraki, which they succeeded with, he spirals slightly. Once he recovers a bit, he ends up adopting Shigaraki as his own. Chisaki personally handles Tomura’s recovery and rehabilitation from that point forward, realizing that he’s able to comprehend Tomura’s struggles in ways that others can’t. Tomura realizes this, as well. He finds a comfort and confidence in Chisaki that was never offered to him by any of his biological family or All For One. He ends up fully adopting the mindset that Chisaki is his one and only true family member, and they become extremely close. Brothers for realsies. Also, they’re both very protective of each-other, but Tomura somehow manages to be even more overprotective despite being the younger sibling.

I was trying to decide on all the merits on how it would all go. So here’s some explanation:

The reveal couldn’t have been the same one that happened in canon because Chisaki becoming a pro affects too much in this timeline for the war to have happened.

I was trying to decide between whether Chisaki finds/discovers Shigaraki after the reveal/by tracking him down or if he already knew him, and I found the “already knows him” route to be more interesting. Plus it’s closer to the original.

Also, Garaki gives up the information to Chisaki for two reasons. One: His and AFO’s operation was already done for. Two: He harbors a weird, almost-parental fondness for Chisaki and Shigaraki both. He wants to see his experiments collide and succeed.

And also, Chisaki has an irrational guilt complex about the whole ordeal. He feels like he’s somehow responsible for all the manipulation and suffering Tomura went through simply because he “provided the quirk that ruined his life”. He tries not to let Tomura become aware of this, but Tomura does and scolds Chisaki every time he can tell he’s feeling bad about it, calling him a “stupid old man who’s letting himself lose to an already-defeated boss”.

Although, that wasn’t always the case. Back in the beginning, Tomura did hold resentment towards Chisaki for exactly that reason. He has an extreme guilt complex about it now, which Chisaki scolds him for, saying “Of course, a thirteen-year-old would resent the person who made ruining their life possible!”.

And it goes without saying that when Eri comes into the picture later down the line, Tomura absolutely adores her. And Chisaki finds it freaky how similar the two are. Tomura finds it freaky how similar Eri and Chisaki are. Eri finds it freaky how similar Tomura and Chisaki are. It’s a real full-circle moment.

Anywayyy, sorry. This got long and lore-heavy lmao. I hope you’re satisfied with my answer, though…? 💀 Feel free to ask me anything else!! 🤧👍

[i520u]

star-crossed ✩°｡ ⋆⸜

twenty. different

warnings: mentions of domestic abuse, substance abuse, also it’s a little suggestive if you squint

You spent almost the entirety of the day with Ricky. You’ve visited the downtown, and even spent a couple of hours at the funfair that was in Santa Monica Pier. He wasn’t quite ready to send you back home, which is why the two of you were spending the rest of the night by the beach. You found comfort in the sound of the waves and the wind gently blowing as the two of you enjoyed each other’s companies.

You looked into the distance as you and Ricky talked about things that didn’t seem to matter, but you knew you would remember every little detail for years to come. Little details like how he used to wear braces as a kid, his birthday being on National Strawberry-Picking Day, and things like how many juice boxes he had drank today.

“Are you cold?” He asked, eyeing you. You shook your head, your gaze still remained on the beach waves. It wasn’t a chilly night, so the winds felt like a friendly welcome. “Is something bothering you? Should I send you home?” He asked again, a hint of worry laced between his words.

This time, you darted your eyes to look at the blonde boy. It hasn’t been long since the two of you had started officially dating — maybe it was around 6 days? A week? You wondered why it took you so long to tell him the truth about your feelings, because looking back, it was quite obvious that he felt the same way as you did. Maybe you were just too oblivious and busy asking yourself whether he liked you or not.

Ricky gently grabbed your face, squeezing your cheeks together to bring you out of your own train of thoughts. “Heeeey. Y/N.” He called out, watching your eyebrows furrowing as he continued playing with your cheeks. “Don’t think about anything other than me when we’re together,” he sulked, a small pout forming on his lips. You let out a giggle at the sight of him, giving him a nod as a response. “Sorry.” You added.

Ricky released your face from his hands, he leaned closer to you with one hand on the surface of the sand as support. Your lips parted as your mind tried arranging your words before speaking it out, although your hard work of battling bilingual issues were ruined as he abruptly leaned closer to you to envelope you into a kiss.

His intention was for the kiss to be a quick one, almost like a peck. He just wanted to tease you a little, buy Ricky had overestimated himself. Maybe it was due to the fact that he had been dreaming of this day for so long that each time he plans on giving you a peck on the lips, his plan always backfires.

What was supposed to be a peck turned into a prolonged kiss, his lips gently moving against yours as you matched his rhythm. You could feel the butterflies in your stomach as your hand slowly slid up from his waist to his chest, tracing the outline of his muscles underneath his black top.

Ricky’s free hand made its way to the side of your cheek, holding you gently, and pulling you closer. You could feel him smiling through the kiss after you leaned against his hand like an instinct. He tilted his head to the side so he could kiss you better, his body leaning forward into you. You wrapped your arms around his neck, your hand running through his hair as the kiss was turning heated.

Ricky pulled away for a second to catch his breath, eyeing you down through his half-lidded eyes. He let out a breathless chuckle before leaning in to kiss you again with the same level of intimacy as before, his hand wandering around your body the more the kiss deepened.

You eventually pulled away, your cheeks flushed and your lips swollen from how sensual the kiss turned out to be. Ricky seemed satisfied with himself, a smile plastered on his face as he stared at you.

“You’re pretty like this.” He complimented suddenly, giving you a wink. It only made you blush harder. YOU looked away almost immediately, breaking off the eye contact with him as you felt flustered. “Maybe you should get distracted more often so I could kiss you like that again.” He continued, followed by a soft giggle as he watched how shy you had become after a few teasing from him.

You pushed your body up to stand up from the sand, and Ricky followed suit. “Do you want to go home?” He asked, and you nodded your head, glancing at the time from your phone’s screen. It was getting super late into the night, and you didn’t want to reach home at the crack of dawn.

As the two of you began walking towards Ricky’s car, he didn’t hesitate to put an arm around your waist, keeping you close to him as you made small talk with him about the day, and what you had in plan for the day after.

The drive from the beach to your house was quite a long one, but it wasn’t a problem for Ricky. He didn’t mind even if he had to drive for hours as long as he’d get to spent the entire ride with you. He had one hand on the steering wheel, and the other was gently holding your hand, his fingers intertwined with yours while you softly drew circles on the back of his hand.

“By the way, Y/N,” Ricky paused, waiting for your response. You hummed, signalling for him to continue. “Did you and Yujin get into a fight? When the two of you bumped into each other at school sometimes, he never looked happy.” He asked, you pressed your lips together upon hearing his question as you didn’t think he would’ve noticed. Was it that obvious?

Yujin had been angry with you ever since you told him to stay away from Gyuvin a few days (or a week? You really couldn’t remember how long it has been since it happened) back. You were aware of their friendship, you knew that Gyuvin genuinely adores Yujin like his own brother, but you just couldn’t risk having Yujin around Gyuvin when he’s in that state. You’re okay with Yujin being angry at you and even hating you, as long as he was safe and sound.

Of course a part of you felt bad that you were generalising everyone who struggles with substance abuse to be just like your father, but you really couldn’t find it in you to be empathetic towards Gyuvin — even if he was (is?) your friend. You just couldn’t risk it.

Your mother struggled getting a divorce with your drunkard father and even moved to the other side of the world where the people are different, the cultures are different, and even the language is different just so her children could live freely without fear. You were not going to let that freedom be jeopardised, even if Gyuvin mattered to you a lot too.

Ricky noticed how silent you’ve become, he wondered if he had asked something that was private to you. “You don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to.” He reassured. If he could give you a kiss on the head, he would. You shook your head almost immediately, “no, no. Sorry, I just got distracted.” You admitted. You inhaled a deep breath before telling Ricky what had happened between you and your brother. How he had went to hang out with Gyuvin, the weird text that Gyuvin sent you, and how you immediately demanded Yujin to go home. You told him basically everything.

“I know I’m being unfair to Gyuvin, it’s not that I don’t trust him. It’s just that I can’t risk leaving Yujin unsupervised with someone who’s not sober.” You sighed, you bit your lower lip as you started second-guessing your decision. “To make things worse, I told our mom about it, and now she doesn’t allow Yujin to see Gyuvin anymore for the time being. He can’t tutor Yujin anymore either, so that’s why he kinda hates me now.” You finished your explanation as you didn’t want to digress.

Ricky hummed in response as he took in everything you had just told him. He knew Gyuvin better than both you and Yujin, so you trusted that he would give a good input. “You did the right thing. Sober Gyuvin wouldn’t have allowed Yujin to be with him either.” His words felt assuring to you, the guilt had honestly been eating you alive for the past few days. Of course you care about Gyuvin, he’s your first friend when you came here. It’s just that Yujin is your priority.

Ricky flashed you a smile as he gave you a quick glance. “You should appreciate Yujin more. He’s clearly still naive. It’s a beautiful thing that doesn’t last long.” You felt yourself relaxing a little more upon hearing what he had said. Ricky was right, you were so busy worrying about Yujin hating you for restricting him from something, you didn’t realise that these were probably one of the few last times Yujin would ever act rashly due to his naivety. You had forgotten that he was still just a kid at heart.

You returned the smile, leaning closer to Ricky to give him a quick kiss on the cheek. The kiss surprised Ricky, his cheeks immediately turning red. “You’re such a good listener,” you told him, followed by a giggle as you watched him all flustered from your compliment. Ricky had a toothy grin, his smile was wide as he couldn’t help but get a little shy from the cute gesture.

With a soft chuckle, he tried to act casual. “Anything for you.”

When you arrived at your front porch, Ricky didn’t actually want to part ways with you. He wasn’t sure what made him so clingy, maybe he just liked being with you so much. “Well, I’ll see you on Monday at school?” You asked him, and he nodded in response. A slight pout evident on his lips as you began to put your belongings back into your handbag.

“Don’t forget your lipgloss,” he mentioned, reaching for the product that was mysteriously left on his side of the car. He wasn’t sure how it ended up there, but he wasn’t going to question it.

You leaned in to him to kiss him on the cheek again, although it didn’t worked out as well as you wanted to as he turned his head to hand you your lipgloss a second before you could kiss him. It ended up being a quick peck on his lips instead, but Ricky didn’t mind it, bringing you in for one more kiss.

He giggled afterwards, handing you the lip product. He waved at you as you began to leave his car. You leaned down to look at him through the window, “drive home safely!” You mouthed. Ricky nodded at your words, giving you an ‘OK’ sign. “Goodnight Y/N!”

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synopsis ↯ in which you are paired up with ricky shen, who fully convinced himself that you purposely became his partner in order to date him.

𖤐 𖦹 ༘⋆⊹ nara’s note: next chapter is the last one + an epilogue I FEEL SOOOO SAD I LOVE THIS SERIES TOO MUCH

🏷️ ; @shiningstar-byulxx @jiaant11 @justemalove @okkomi @jeonghyeonsgf @blaycke @lvieee @softyminhee @starhyeon @rikislady @raeewe @se0ngmins @i-yeseo @aariiil @daydreamer5006 @ahnneyong @jayujus @girlokarina @aerxz @rikimylove @jisunglogy @pleasantgardendetective @mposkyje @ilovechanhee @livelaughlovelicky @igotkpoops @moonlightjungwon @imthewon @wycure @sunoosluvr @dumb-cxm-slxt @partiallyderived @sparklingsjy @jinkiseason @444yizhuo @wave2love @wtfhyuck

[rarespawnwrites]

WIP Wednesday

Early Access Afterlife (dpxdc)

Okay. What had been said about his situation so far? The most common term used for what was happening to him was “transmigration”. Which just meant… moved? Somewhere else?

The somewhere else could mean his new (used?) body. Or it could mean this unfamiliar city. But the goat and the girl had made it sound like he was going to be living in a story.

Huh. It kind of sounded like Ghost Writer was running this whole thing.

Okay, so he was moved to a story. He was supposed to start in an action scene. He’d woken up in a coffin.

Danny mentally shuddered, the memory of seeping mud and things that wriggled overwhelming. His body, unconcerned, rescued an uneaten, still wrapped-in-foil hot dog someone had just dumped in a trash can.

Gross. Well, at least it was covered. It was even still warm.

What else? He had a quest. This whole thing was trying to be some kind of video game. Ghost Writer collab with Technus? Anyway, what was the quest…

The screen obligingly displayed his current quests for him. Well, quest. He only had the one right now.

Active Quests Tutorial Quest (Main): What Resurrects You Makes You Stronger Achieve the “Peak Human” ranking in 10 skills by the end of the tutorial period. Reward: Unknown Failure: Nonstandard Ending

Ten skills in four years, huh? Danny wasn’t sure what “Peak Human” meant to the system. He had no idea how long getting a skill to that level would take, but it had to be plausibly doable in the allotted time frame, right?

What did it mean by a nonstandard ending, was another question. Would it boot him back out of this body? Was it just another path this life could take that didn’t result in the original story?

Well, he needed to make some assumptions if he was going to get anywhere with this. So… Jazz had once read a book she’d gone on about that claimed it took 10,000 hours of practice to master any skill. For right now, that was as good a guess as any.

One of his benefits allowed him to learn skills five times faster than normal. Say it takes him 2,000 hours to get to the required level for each skill. He needed to practice enough for ten skills. That’s 20,000 hours.

Uh… that sounded like a lot?

How many hours were in a year? In four years?

Danny thought really pointedly at his screen about a calculator app. After a pause, one actually opened on its display. Finally, a convenience. He plugged in a few numbers to find out how many hours were in four years.

He frowned.

Then he checked how many hours would be left when accounting for 8 hours of sleep at night. If his mental state could be reflected in his body, his eye would have twitched at the result.

If Danny did… 16 straight hours of training a day, he’d have enough time for sleep and roughly one day off per week.

What.

Wait, so the two days he was spending zombified… those were the ENTIRETY of the free time he was allotted for the next two weeks?!

There’s no way. Bring on the nonstandard ending. Danny had been a half-ghost and a ghost-ghost, what could this world even scare him with?

【System Message】 A new entry has been generated and added to your codex: Nonstandard Endings.

Did he really want to look?

The answer was no.

He looked.

【Codex】 Entry – Nonstandard Endings All Joker routes Amanda Waller route Black Mask route Cadmus route Court of Owls route Despair route Dollmaker route Gnomon route ...see more

Selecting a route displayed a blank, rectangular area with a title caption. The blank area seemed like it was obscuring an image he hadn't unlocked, but the title caption was visible. Below that was a section labeled “Summary” that was, like the images and unavailable sections of the System Store, locked.

Daniel looked through a few routes, then picked up speed as he scanned through more and more.

Even after the “see more” it seemed the title captions didn’t change in flavor: Brainwashed ending; Zealot ending; Mind-Controlled ending; Specimen ending…

【System Store】 Looking for the perfect ending? Want a little variety in your new life? Give yourself another chance! And another, and another! Buy the Regressor Package to do it all over again. Collect CGs from every route! Buy for 100 credits

Who would want that?! Every single ending implied mindless slavery!

Also, why does the system have pop-up ads? ...It was probably time to check out that options menu.