#this took me a while to write because the edible finally

[shinsoku]

Ōetsu Nimaiya the God of the Sword

Ōetsu is nearly at least 5,000+ years old with all information within the Can't Fear Your Own World novel pointing towards this. Which in fact I whole heartedly believe due to the simple fact, Ōetsu had already seemingly established the Zanpakutō / Asauchi prior to saving a younger Yammamoto. Which either meant Ōetsu was a young adult ( as a soul mind you ) or he's simply been existing that much longer before Yammamoto was born.

Zanpakutō / Asauchi seem to be a finished product which still seemingly pre-dates the Gotei 13 by a considerable amount of time. Until at least the Gotei 13 is formed which by this point the Royal Guard was long standing. Whether it was it's own living embodiment prior to the formation, or if when the Gotei 13 was founded it was added as ' Squad Zero ' . The idea of Zanpakutō / Asauchi was at least 2,000 years in the making. The original version were far more destructive in the times of a majority of Japan being spiritually more aware. Within customs and the way of life, when wielded by anyone with a keen aptitude with spiritual powers. They could lightly manipulate the spiritual energy all around the. The wind to cut things? Literal lightning? This is my way of saying that some Japanese Mythology were literal mortals and or souls with high spiritual control. ( This is one aspect of Ōetsu's canon which in turn becomes my own canon across the board between all of my characters )

Ōetsu like a majority of the current make-up of the Gotei 13 was one that was simply born. With the exception that he has no parents. That he appeared within the Rukongai one day, and eventually is taken in by Ichibē. The Monk was the one who taught Ōetsu most of what he could know, but only because the rest came with experiencing life for yourself. It's his key importance within his upbringing as to why he joins ' Squad Zero '. To his becoming a Soul Reaper at a level no one could ever truly start at.

Ōetsu is the first person to ever master both the Shikai and the Bankai. While Ichibē is the first Shinigami to master them.

The Squad Zero are disturbingly mind shattering powerful to the point that they could destabilize the worlds. To this extent the Royal Squad are effectively immortal ( of course this doesn't need to be acknowledged by me of course ) being fitted with a literal essence of the Soul King. In which they live within at least decent proximity of him. Their immortality is all but assured even within the Royal Palace ( but it isn't assured at a set time with it being possibly minutes, hours, days? being completely mutilated certainly will take days ) even outside the Royal Palace. In canon it's tied to their names being used. Or it was tied to the Mad Monk? (Note: This doesn't mean any of you need to acknowledge this is as it essentially means. That my interpretation of Ōetsu is essentially on god mode. Which is partially true but he can still feel physical pain, emotional pain, and every other pain that can cripple a normal man! )

Ōetsu believes that their is one person that can change his mind on the bonds between, Soul Reaper and Zanpakuto, but he has a lot to learning to do first. That person is none other then: Ichigo Kurosaki. It's a biased one as they're are other could be better examples of a proper bond between their user and themselves. Except it doesn't matter as view of the entirety of the Gotei 13 is mixed at best. My own standing with my Ichigo and Ōetsu is shared only due to the relevance of my own headcanons. The relationship and ideals he sees carried in Ichigo will be primarily explored with other writers.

Ōetsu may or may not have taught or influenced the famous sword smiths of Japan. It's a rumor that he have been Yasuke. Neither anyone within the Royal Squad will conform, nor will Ōetsu, and that's because the God of the Sword hardly talks about his personal past.

Their is a living connection between every Zanpakutō it's not like the one normally shared between a shinigami and their spiritual partner. It's a higher bond. There is a feeling within his very existence when he is near one: he can tell when they are sad, angry, grief stricken, or are being neglected. It's almost as if they are talking to him. (Note: In development as to what else he might be able to understand from them. Whether he knows which one or whose along with anything else. )

Ōetsu was likely the second official member brought to the Soul Palace. Due to the significance of his invention and when it most likely had occurred from my breakdown of the timeline.

As a member of the Royal Squad ( or Squad Zero ) his power outside them is still formidable on par with the combined strength of the Gotei 13. It's only when it's un-sealed that it exceeds anyones perception. Ōetsu has been known to not utilize his raw power in the start of a fight and instead using his raw skill to toy with his enemy or try to reason with the enemy.

Note: These are my own personal headcanons so this goes without saying. Do not steal any of the writings here upon this page!

[colourstreakgryffin]

Teen!Reader finding Alastor all beaten and bruised after the finale and getting worried, insisting in patching him up, etc, while Alastor during the entire time is having a moment of realization like "oh, this kid ACTUALLY cares about me"

(This is platonic obviously, reader sees him like a weird older brother/father figure and looks up to him idk)

I love it. Simple, enjoyable and to be honest, we’ll just pretend Alastor had his sick solo in the finale before we showed up and I suppose Al will be quite unhinged and aggressive in this state so goddamn. Also, my second time writing about the finale

Platonic! Alastor- Reaching Out

“You son of a bitch, I am trying to help you!” You growl out, now half-wrestling with the Radio Demon himself, after his lose battle against Adam. Whilst Adam has been finally defeated at Lucifer’s hand then killed at Niffty’s knife. It’s clear as crystal that Alastor isn’t taking his own defeat well at all. He’s aggressive, completely lost his usual charismatic, well-mannered demeanour, he’s breaking down and barking at you to back off as you’re still trying to pry his own hands off the visible red bleeding wound over his chest

You’ve found this retreating deer out of pure luck and now, you’re acting on your compassion for him to try make the process of healing less painful for him

You’re the only Hazbin Hotel staff member that actually treated Alastor more than an annoyance standing there. He isn’t the best guy at there, never. No, but he isn’t as bad as Vaggie or Husk claim he is. However, right now, he’s boiling your blood with how much he is refusing to let you even touch him, despite the fact he needs to be patched up. He’s low on power, his cane is snapped in half, he’s limited and requires help

“I don’t need your help, Leitora!” Alastor barks back in possibly the most unhinged way you’ve ever seen, basically backing into a wall. He can’t even notice how worried you actually are, how you’re getting frustrated because you’re worried and you’re the only one who has been looking for and have found Alastor whilst everybody else is celebrating the victory over Adam. You’re the one looking for and now looking out for the man you actually find quite nice. He isn’t as patronising to you, for whatever reason, Alastor’s decent and it’s almost like he wants to be some type of figure in your life with how he behaves

“Stay still before you bleed yourself to unconsciousness, you narcissistic edible piece of shit!” You only say this so cruelly, sharp and half loud as to put Alastor into his place, prove to him you’re not backing down whilst you finally win the half wrestling session you have with the weakened and distressed Overlord, already beginning to check around for the entire length of the wound and use what little excess fabric your current clothing has to make a makeshift bandage for this wound

This is surprising, you’re possibly two times his age. A teenager, if not 15-16 at the oldest upon your human death and you’re acting more mature than the biologically 34 year old. Alastor just stayed quiet, tall fluffy deer-like ears still pinned back and suffering through the intense pain. He wouldn’t admit that he is quite grateful that somebody is around but at the same time, he doesn’t want to get attached to any soul

It took him a proper glance at the cute young sinner he found it fun to playfully tease, mock and behave like a clingy overprotective big brother to piss off, that they genuinely care for him. That they aren’t lying or pretending as to get something out of him like he suspects everybody in the Hotel, including Charlie, is

This is so much different than he suspected, he was believing he’d be going back to his radio tower to vent out his rage at being smacked in the face of such a pathetic opponent

Ending up being the pathetic opponent. He hates showing his weakness and he can barely keep himself from snapping but he also can feel his racking nerves ease up a bit at this strong, confident yet sweet and compassionate kid trying to take care of him when they have no actual requirement to do so

Alastor takes a few more seconds to think and speak, not even realising he was sat down by you as he was thinking frantically about how his own mischievous and mocking behaviour as some type of surrogate brother for you was more than just something down to see your reactions for his own amusement, he does feel some type of family-based affections for you

Now, that affection has been bumped up even more. He definitely owes you a lot for caring about him like some surrogate little sibling when all he does for you is annoy you. He doesn’t even know that you actually look up to him like some type of family figure… so, the familiar feelings are mutual

“Fuck… can you just be careful with the coat? This is my treasure”

(A/N: Real quick. Leitora means ‘Reader’ in Portuguese, this’ll be our name for any none anime posts. There’s two versions; Leitora as the feminine version and Leitor as the masculine version. You can use either for us! I got this from Google Translate)

[mehiwilldoitlater]

Oh authorrrrr,I'm baaaacckk~!

May we have more of the destined one being picked on more about his crush? 🙏 or have us being picked on instead? We hunger,oh merciful one,for a food only one such as yourself can provide. (AlsodontfeelpressuredtokeepupwithmyfuckerypleasetakeasmuchtimeasyouneedILY)

((and i Will anyway because YOU'RE FEED MY EGO AND MY WILL OF WRITE STUFF!!!))

"How long does it take to wear a dress?! We don't have al night!"

"I'm following the instructions, now sucking it up and leave me be."

Bajie gave a scruff to the tree where you were currently wearing a highly complicated Hanfu. The ribbons, the layers, everything seemed hard to put together! At least the shopkeeper was kind enough to make some draws to help you out during the dressing; you still had some dignity to try to preserve your personal privacy with your companions.

"Well, if you need help, I was pretty versetile in taking off those dresses!"

"Hold up, Uncle." Yuán Fèn staff slightly touched the old pig belly from his spot near the lanterna, your only source of light. "Leave her be. I thought you were a pious monk."

Now, why the need for such a thing like dolling you up? Well, Bajie found out that not only that the relic was in the spiders yaoguais clutches, but they were preparing some kind of feast of some sort!

The old shapeshift trick would be enough to pass through, but there was a small problem, you.

It seems like the Biàn huà Power created some kind of shield against those staff, and you would surely stand out between some Yaoguais. So the idea was to send yourself as a gift for the old lady! A midnight snack! 

 "Ah! She's far too young for me, boy! I'll leave her to you!"

The old Bajie was able to avoid the smack from the tail of the young monkeys, chucklings, while Yuán Fèn fighited a blush that reached even his own ears. It was like the entire world was now united. Just assume that he had feelings for you!

Old sages?! Those ladies that love to gossip around! He kept on mumbling some imprecation when you finally leave the security of the trees, fixing an earring on you.

"I think I'm done! So ? Edible enough?"

Yuán Fèn didn't speak; how could he?The silk followed the curves of your body like a stream, creating some effect almost as if you were floating. The bright colors make you more like One of Seven fairies, emanating an aura of pure beauty and purity. The jewels that decorated your neck and hairy shined like stars on you, but never like your eyes. 

Edible? Damn, he wanted to swallow you whole.

"Yooo? Earth tò Yuán fèn? Are you here?"

Your hands waved in front of him, trying to get his attention towards you. Saying that you found this state of him cute was an understatement. Your mighty protector, always ready for a fight, concentrated, never losing a step, is in fact easily flustered by a simple, elegant dress.

You giggled when he suddenly shaken his head.

"You look...uh...fine. Yes, fine, snackable, I would say!"

"Thanks... I technically need help with this... The shopkeeper said something about some symbols on the forhead that make you prettier. We lack mirrors here... "

You showed him a small bottle with some red color and a brush. He took it, analizing it a little.

"The huadian? Shure, no problem. Stay still okay?"

You hummed; you weren't sure. of the result, but you just needed something pretty on your forhead, right? 

Yuán Fèn learned closer...very closer. His eyes sherpened to get the right angle. It was a simple thing, but somehow you felt strange. That damn

Damn magic bond, it was still making you feel strange around him. He was so close that trying to hold your hands would just then reduce in a low blow on him, so you stayed still. But still, his vicinity was making you dizzy, so you closed your eyes. It made you feel better—not good, but better...

You wondered, he smelled always so good? It was peaches, of course, but he smelled like...pines, trees...he smelled like the fresh earth in the morning... You were so concentrated over him, even with your eyes closed, that you didn't even feel the brush leave your forehead.

He admired his work. He admired you.

You put a light make-up on yourself���something easy to do alone. Your cheeks were rosy like a plum flower, and the powder smelled like fresh parfume. They must have put some pearls in the mortar because the moonlight made you shine a little. You were beautiful in every possible way.

"Have you done?"

He woke up, hummed in response, and gave you back the red paste and the brush.

"There...uh...I need to go and check a few things! We'll move after that; be ready, okay?"

He was panicking, to the point of tripping on a few roots on the nearby tree. You giggled. Was he always this cute?

"Carefull, girl..." Bajie finally spoke, "You may have broken him. We still need him!"

You laughed, scoffing away those words with your hand. "Oh, please!"

"And...what about you?" He got closer, cleaning a spot from his pants. "Aren't you a little broken? Not even a bit?"

Your eyes changed size in a mere second. You started to stutter, looking around, trying to avoid Yuán Fèn from listening to the conversation.

"What?! Of course not! What...me and him...no! He's...he's great! Don't get me wrong, I like him! He's brave, he cares so much for me, and he's devoted to his cause! And..i'm just...i'm just me...he deserves someone better."

"Are you implying that you're not good enough for him?"

You sighed, kicking a few rocks from your way. It has always been like this; you always thought of yourself so low. The world around you didn't help either. You were always the second choice, always misunderstood by everyone. Even now with this new title that some misteryous wntity had put on you, you couldn't shake the idea there was some mistake.

And the Destined One—you couldn't think straight with him. He was just... so good, so perfect in your eyes. You didn't want to get hurt, especially since you weren't planning to stay there longer.

"Girl," the old one spoke again. "You must fight this voice in your head! If you love him, then go and take him!"

"Uncle Bajie...it's not so simple." You sighed again, looking in the direction that your friend disappeared. "I cherish him; even like this, I'm content. Really. No need to worry!"

You strain a laugh from you; even if the hurt was clear on your face, it was clear as the day. And with that, you reached your simian friend, maybe to avoid the discussion.

Bajie looked in your direction, cursing the destiny that had decided to put those obstacles on you both! He remembered his older brother, Wukong. The pain in his heart, hurting his love to protect the monk—maybe, with the freedom that he obtained, the old sage hoped for a new beginning and, maybe, to heal his heart from the loss. And now there they were, still unable to fix two hearts that clearly longed for each other but couldn't stay together.

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[maidragoste]

Chapter One: The Reaping

The Hunger Games AU

Katniss!Jacaerys x Peeta!Reader (I labeled it that even though Jace's backstory is different from Katniss's but he and Reader will be the star-crossed lovers of district 12)

Chapter Two Chapter Three

I really hope you like it because I'm so excited to write this au!

Please let me know what you think in the comments, as always, likes and reblogs are appreciated too 💖💖

My inbox is open so I'm always willing to read your headcanons, opinions and answer your questions.

Disclaimer: English is not my first language so I apologize for any mistakes.

Jacaerys entered the Victors' Village, not that he was a victor. In fact, his name had never come up in the reaping. But he and his brothers lived there since his uncle Larys took care of them after his father died in the middle of an explosion in the mines while working.

The teenager quickly quickened his pace while adjusting his grip on the only two squirrels he had brought from all the ones he had hunted during the morning with Baela, his best friend. He may not have needed to hunt for food anymore but he was one of the few people in District 12 who knew how to hunt. Some people had depended on bartering with his father to bring a plate of food to his table. His father would not have wanted him to leave those people abandoned, so every day he sneaks into the forest with Baela to look for deer, rabbits, squirrels, birds, fish, or any type of edible vegetable or fruit. He always gave the best goods to Baela, after all, she had more mouths to feed with her mother, her twin sister, and her two little brothers. But the rest he exchanged with the merchants or even sometimes he practically ended up giving away his merchandise due to the low price that he was willing to accept from the families that he knew did not have enough to eat to prevent them from ending up asking for more tesserae. Uncle Larys had never told him but Jacaerys knew that he thought he was a fool for doing that.

Jacaerys hated the silence in the village but it was no surprise considering that of the twelve houses there, the only house that was being inhabited was his uncle's. Of the seventy-three Hunger Games that have been held so far, there have only been two victors from District 12 and the only one still alive is Larys Strong.

Jace hurried into the house trying to ignore the heaviness in his stomach.

“I told you Luke would throw up again this year! You owe me!” was the first thing Joffrey, his youngest brother, said when he saw him.

Lucerys, or Luke as his dad had nicknamed him, was the middle brother, and every year he had the worst time during Repairing; which was the moment when the District escort went up to the podium and then took a random piece of paper from each glass urn, one containing the names of all the boys between twelve and eighteen years old and another with the names of the girls. This was how the tributes were chosen for each Hunger Games. Like any coherent person in District 12 Luke feared being chosen as a tribute and unlike Jacaerys he could not hide his fear.

“Take this to the kitchen,” the oldest of the brothers asked, handing the squirrels to Joffrey before running to the bathroom.

When Jacaerys entered he found Luke hunched over, holding the toilet bowl. Ignoring the smell of vomit he hurried to his brother's side and with one hand began to rub soothing circles on Luke's back while the other brushed the hair from his face. He doesn't know how many minutes they stayed like this until the youngest finally stopped vomiting.

"I'm sorry, Jace" Luke apologized with a broken voice and tears on his cheeks, clearly feeling ashamed for being in the same position for another year. "I really tried."

"Hey, you have nothing to apologize for," Jacaerys denied as he helped him up from the floor. "It's okay to be afraid. Only an idiot wouldn't be afraid."

"Joffrey is not afraid," the youngest murmured after cleaning his face.

Joffrey must have been the only thirteen-year-old in District 12 who wasn't horrified at the thought of his name coming up in the Reaping. Jacaerys believed it was because Joff thought he would be able to win the games just by being a relative of a victor. Also, of the three, Joff seemed to want Uncle Larys's validation and attention the most. In these three years living with him he had never told them that he loved them but Jace thought that he should at least care a little about them because otherwise he could have let the authorities take them to the community orphanage instead of taking care of them.

"I told you, an idiot," Jace said, managing to get a small laugh out of Lucerys. "Listen, Luke. Everything will be fine. You never asked for a tessera so your name is only on four pieces of paper."

In the first year when you started to be part of the Reaping, they put your name only once in the bowl. But every time you have a birthday they add another paper with your name on it. If you do not ask for any tessera then it is assumed that you will reach the age of eighteen with only seven papers.

Jacaerys always tried to reassure his brother, and also himself, saying that the chances of his name coming up were low compared to all the people who had to ask for tesserae to be able to eat.

"Lucerys, Jacaerys, start getting ready for the Reaping" Larys ordered from below. There was no need for him to shout as the house was silent.

"Take a bath, you stink" Jacaerys mocked, ruffling Lucerys's hair before leaving him in the bathroom.

"Happy Hunger Games! and may the odds be ever in your favor!" greeted Effie Trinket, the District 12 companion, with the same excitement as in previous years.

While Effie gives a speech about what an honor it is for her to be there as a companion, Jacaerys's eyes meet Baela's. She smiles at him and he struggles to return it. Baela is so brave, he doesn't know how she isn't trembling with fear knowing that her name is at least twenty times. Maybe in recent years she was no longer asking for tesserae but before Jacaerys moved in with his uncle she had.

"Ladies first!" said Effie announcing that it was time for the drawing. She approaches the urn with the girls' names and then reaches deep inside and takes out a piece of paper. You can feel the tension in the air and for a moment everyone seems to hold their breath until Effie opens the paper and I read it "Y/n Y/l!"

Shit. Jacaerys knew you. He had seen you more than once at the bakery when he went to buy or exchange his merchandise with your father. Not only that but you two share classes together at school. You weren't friends. But you were still there for his brothers when he was too devastated by the death of his father to care about anyone else. You were the one who stopped some idiots from bothering Luke at school, you were the one who helped Joffrey with his homework to prevent him from repeating a grade, and you, in the only conversation you ever shared, reminded him that he was important to the District, that his brothers needed him, that he could not abandon them, that his father would not have wanted to see him as a ghost in life, that he would have wanted him to help the people of the District.

Jace had to go say goodbye to you, his gratitude may be three years late but he needed to thank you for taking care of his brothers when he had failed them and remind him that he had a purpose.

Jacaerys watches you move towards the stage. Your posture is straight, your chin up and your steps are firm but he can see the uncertainty in your eyes. You still look pretty in your pink dress, it wasn't glamorous at all—no one in the district wears glamorous clothes—but in his eyes, you stood out. It's probably because, unlike other girls in the district, your clothes didn't hang off and your bones didn't show, you didn't look like someone who was malnourished.

Maybe with your beauty and if you had a good interview you could get lucky and captivate a sponsor, he thought. He hoped that this year his uncle would try even harder to bring home a winner.

Once you are on stage Effie asks for volunteers. Of course, no one offers.

“Now it's time to meet our male tribute!” Effie announces, rushing to the boys' urn and pulling out the first piece of paper she sees, “Lucerys Strong!”

This must be a nightmare, Jacaerys thought. They were supposed to be safe, they had never asked for tesserae. He was snapped out of his stupor by hearing Joffrey's desperate cries calling for Luke as his brother began to walk with fear and tears in his eyes to the stage. Jace didn't even think about it, he broke out of his formation and started running after Lucerys.

“I'm a volunteer!” he shouted when the peacekeepers grabbed him, wanting to take him away from Lucerys. “I volunteered as a tribute!” he repeated, standing up straight, once they released him.

"Magnificent!" Effie exclaimed, happy because there was finally some action in the District. "But you are supposed to present the winner of the reaping first and then ask for volunteers…"

"Just let him up," the mayor interrupted her sharply, clearly upset by the situation. He knew Jacaerys because he always bought strawberries from him and Baela.

“No, Jace!” Lucerys said with a trembling voice, still shaking her head. “You can't!”

“Go to Joffrey” the eldest brother ordered firmly, he wanted to hug Luke but he was afraid that if he did he would also start crying and he couldn't do it knowing that the cameras were filming everything. He couldn't appear weak. “Go,” he repeated, pushing him aside and heading to the stage without looking back.

Jacaerys' brown eyes meet yours and the heaviness in his stomach increases. He would have to kill you if he wanted to come home, you, the person who pushed him to move forward after her father's death. He had never thanked you and much less would he do so now knowing that in a few days, he may be the one who ended up killing you. Obviously, luck was not on his side but if you died he really hoped that it would be another of the tributes who would end up taking your life. If it became him and he managed to win the games, Jacaerys was sure that there would not be a day in which he would not think of you.

"Wonderful!" Effie exclaimed once the young man finished climbing the stairs. "What's your name?"

"Jacaerys Strong," he answered.

"I'll bet my shoes he was your brother. You didn't want him to steal your glory, did you?" The companion's smile disappeared before the furious looks of the victor and the tributes. "Good! Let's give a big round of applause to our new tribute!"

But no one applauds. The entire District demonstrates its disagreement with its silence. Not only that, but many people begin to bring the three middle fingers of their left hand to their lips and then point them at Jacaerys. He looks shocked as they give him that gesture. It was not a common thing to be used in the District but every once in a while, someone would do it during funerals. It was a gesture of giving thanks, of admiration, of farewell to a loved one. The same gesture they had made at his father's funeral. Jacaerys feels a lump form in his throat. He can't help but look at you, this was thanks to you, if you hadn't reminded him that the District needed him like they needed his dad then maybe he would have continued in silence staring into nothingness, living mechanically instead of starting to help people like his dad used to do.

The mayor begins to read the Treaty of Treason. Once he finishes he instructs you and Jace to shake hands. Jacaerys notices that your hand is a little smaller than his and he feels warm against hiss. You catch him off guard when you squeeze his hand as if to encourage him. He returns the gesture even though he knows he shouldn't, it wasn't the time to become friends.

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[weirdgenetic-fuckup]

No Nut November - Steven

A/n: I had no motivation to write this but I'm happy it's finally done and I can add to this short series that people seem to be enjoying, oddly enough I don't expect this one to get the same love as the others just because it's Steven BUT I LOVE POPCORN

Warnings: Smut, oral sex, Steven being sad, reader admits to getting off on Steven in the middle of the night, if you think I missed something let me know otherwise enjoy :3

Intro

No nut November was a stupid idea, he never should’ve brought it up. The month hadn’t even started yet and he was pissed.

He left the studio with a headache just thinking about what would happen when he eventually lost. Even after moving in with you he’s woken up multiple times with stains on his underwear, all while you were sound asleep beside him.

He blasted the radio on his way home. Once he got to your shared apartment he couldn’t bring himself to get out and just sat there listening to Aerosmith’s “Crazy”, and a whole lot of their other sad songs. How did the radio know what he needed? And why was it all one of his favourite bands? He didn’t know, but he took it as a sign anyway and sat in his self-pity.

Eventually you came out and knocked on his window. He rolled it down and looked up at you with sad eyes and pouty lips.

“Did something happen?” You asked, reaching out for him and holding his face in your hand. He shook his head. “Then why are you sad?” He took a deep breath and rolled the window up, turned the car off and got out.

“Let’s just go inside.” He mumbled, an arm going over your shoulder as he walked you back inside.

Steven went straight for the couch and turned the TV on to distract himself. You went to the kitchen and got dinner, the dinner you made before he got home. It was a little cold but edible nonetheless.

“You wanna talk about it?” You asked as you sat beside him. Steven poked at his food and slumped back on the couch.

“The guys and I have a bet going to see who can go a whole month without-” He stopped abruptly, not wanting to say it in front of your home cooked chicken.

“Without..?” You repeated softly, wanting him to finish what he was saying, though you had a pretty good idea on what he meant. “We can’t do anything for a month?” You finally asked, the drummer solemnly shook his head.

“It sucks ‘cause I know I’m gonna lose, I mean, I can’t even count the amount of wet dreams I get from just sleeping beside you.” You froze for a second. Steven must have seen that because he groaned. “Shit, sorry, I guess you didn’t know.”

“Guess I’ll have to stop doing that...” You muttered under your breath.

“You’ll stop doing what?” He looked at you with a smile, wanting to hear this dirty little secret you’ve been keeping from him.

“Well, it’s just,” you started, cheeks starting to heat up, “sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night and-and you just look so pretty beside me...” You trail off, now it’s your turn to poke your food.

“Do you fuck me in my sleep?” He asked, sounding more proud than anything. You drop your fork with a huff.

“I don’t do that, I just- I may or may not...” You trail off again, poking your food once more.

“Do you get off on me in the middle of the night?” Steven asked with a big smile and bright eyes. You huffed again and that was all the confirmation he needed. “Oh, sweetheart, you could’ve just woken me up, I would’ve loved to help you out!”

“I know, but I don’t want to wake you up for something that simple when I know you won’t wake up if I just do it.” I look up at him with a small pout that quickly fades to a grin. “You sleep like a dead log, by the way.” You added with a chuckle. Steven scoffed and threw a cooked cut of carrot at you.

After that conversation Steven had more hope in this bet. Then he heard that Duff was out and he thought it would be even easier! The cherry on top was Axl getting out before him, oh he was teasing the ginger about it the rest of the day. Axl almost killed him for it, but he had no regrets.

He came home to you, hoping to tell you about it because he was so proud of himself for lasting longer than Axl, the man who started it. Kind of, it was mostly the drummer's fault for bringing up NNN in the first place. However, when he got home he found you already asleep on the couch.

Steven thought you were adorable, all curled up in your blankets with the TV on. God, he loved you so much.

He picked you up and carried you to bed, helping you out of your jeans and into something a little comfier before crawling into bed with you and falling asleep with his head on your chest, his favourite sleeping position.

“Stevie.” You whispered in his ear. “Come on, Stevie.” You gave him a little shake, trying to wake him up. When he didn’t stir you moved to sit on his lap, hovering over his limp dick with your hands planted on his fluffy chest. “Stevie~” You purred. “Stevie I need you~” You leaned forward and started kissing his neck, nipping at the sensitive skin and biting his earlobe.

Finally the man began to wake up. “What are you- Oh~” He hummed when he put two and two together. “Couldn’t wait till morning?” You shook your head and rolled over beside him.

“I know you can’t do anything but...” You trailed off, tracing shapes on his bare chest.

“But..?” He prompted. You looked up at him with pleading eyes and a pout you know he just can’t say no to.

“Please..?”

“Please what?” His hand trailed up your arm and down your side before landing on your waist, giving it soft squeezes.

“What if you just fingered me or something?” You asked, thinking of other alternatives. Steven thought about it for a moment before crawling over you, slowly lowering himself further down the bed.

“I’ve got a better idea.” He mused as he tugged on the waistband of your shorts. His shorts, really, he got you into them because he thought they’d be more comfortable while you slept.

He pulled them off of you, as well as your underwear, and stayed like that for a moment just admiring your slick folds before delving into them. His tongue worked wonders on your sensitive parts, dipping into your cunt and circling your clit, sucking on the nub and making you go cross eyed with moans spilling out of you like a second language.

You had barely noticed that Steven had started grinding himself against the bed. His only thought was pleasuring you, though usually when he ate you out he’d do this, it was instinctual to get himself off on getting you off. He couldn’t help it, his drooling cock was bright red and ready to burst the same way you were, the knot in your gut quickly coming undone.

You screamed out his name, your hands pulling his hair as your thighs clamped down on his head. You often did that and he never complained once, rather loving the feeling of being locked to you.

You felt him moaning around you and when you looked down you could see he was twitching, he looked ready to cry.

“Oh, baby, what’s wrong?” You cooed, leaning forward a bit to get a better look at him. Steven got up and looked down to see a huge wet spot on his sweats, right where his cock was bulging through.

“I-I didn’t mean to-” He sputtered, clearly not over his high. You weren’t nearly as pent up as he’d been, getting yourself off whenever the need came about, the only difference was that Steven wasn’t the one getting you off. You hadn’t thought about how pent up he must’ve been, hell he probably didn’t put too much thought into it either.

“Well,” you started, still staring at his crotch, “if you’re out now there’s nothing keeping us from continuing... right?” You asked, looking  up at him.

“Yeah, but...” Steven trailed off.

“But..?”

“I’m tired.” He said and crawled back to the top of the bed so he could lay down. “Can you top?” He asked with a big grin. You returned the expression and happily climbed on top of him.

[byooregard]

iwtv fanfic Friday: devils minion era (or close enough)

on display by thisisthefamilybuisness aka @officialclaricestarling; E, 3k.

Armand leans back in her chair and smirks. “There’s nobody here to notice if you absolutely must rut yourself against the seam of your slacks, Daniel; this is a private dining room. Given the sorry state of your thoughts, though, perhaps you’d prefer if I took a seat at the bar and sat you in my lap instead. It would only be fair, of course, every patron deserves a chance to see why I spend millions of dollars and so much of my time indulging you.”

i know a place we can go luminoussbeings aka @gaysie; M, 3k.

“—come out with me,” Daniel’s saying, and Armand blinks. “I know a place—better than this one, I’m telling you. Okay, fine, the drinks are terrible, but if you want to go out dancing—you’ll see. You’ll love it. Guarantee ya.” He smiles winningly, holds out his hand. No, Armand thinks. or: Daniel sees Armand with blood on his face from a kill, thinks he's just some poor abused twink, and decides he needs to show him a good time

cranefucker island circa ‘82 by katplanet; E, 22k

“You doing all right?” Daniel asks him. Armand blinks. “No,” he says. “Most honest you've been with me since I got here,” Daniel says. And then, because it seems like the thing to do, “I can clear out, if you need the place to yourself.” “Whatever you prefer.” Armand's lips look chapped. Dehydration? He ate the kid with the sunglasses, but the smear he left took a lot of bleach to scrub away. Maybe Daniel should - “You won't be harmed,” Armand says, “regardless of your decision.” “You got served divorce papers so hard it left a crater,” Daniel says, “and you're still poking around in people's heads.”

little kidnaps in the dark | End OTW Racism by gaypiratedivorce; M, 150k

The first memory is only the first memory, the first crack —after the dam finally breaks, Daniel tries to make sense of the past unraveling itself in his mind. While continuing to thread the story of Louis's life, he attempts to untangle the questions of his own. But Armand offers no answers, and Louis gives him no straightforward ones. As their histories weave together and the line between journalism and personal chronicle disappears from sight, Daniel struggles to figure out who they were then, what they've become, and why exactly he's been summoned to Dubai.

it's a rollercoaster kinda rush by exastris_scientia aka @keepoffthetardis; E, 5k

He writes more over the next three months than he has in the last year, and he even gets paid for some of it. Not as much as before, but, y’know. He can keep his apartment, so it’s not like he’s complaining. He goes to bed early, gets up late, and actually learns how to cook something edible for once in his life. He’s not even using. It’s normal. It sucks so bad and he’s so fucking lonely. Daniel gets fired from the San Francisco Chronicle and discovers all roads lead not to Rome, but to Armand.

couldn't trust myself to proceed with caution by extrasis_scientia aka @keepoffthetardis; E, 6k.

When he opens the door, Daniel looks up from his drink. Almost every feature on his face has been changed by the twenty years between them and their last goodbye. Every one, that is, except for his eyes. They’re shielded by handsome-looking wire-frame glasses now, but they’re still as blue and sharp as they were the night they met. Their eyes lock, and Armand is astonished to discover all at once that he’s still angry. “You must be Mr. Molloy,” he manages through lips nearly numb. As if he feels nothing at all, Daniel holds out a hand. “Mr. Molloy’s my father. Call me Daniel.” Armand seeks Daniel out in 2003 and gets quite a bit more than he bargained for.

[mika-no-sekai-blog]

Word count: 1700+

Warnings: some swearing, but otherwise a dripping sugar

Really, in this chapter nothing happens, yet I got overheated just writing it and had to refill sugar bc this sucked all the sweetness from my system. It's too much fluff for me🤯😵‍💫

Part XXIV | Part XXVI

After both of you calmed down, Tamlin insisted on carrying you back, claiming that it was too dark and you could get hurt. You were in awe of his strength. It was quite a long walk yet he wasn't panting, not even broke in sweat. It seemed as if he was carrying a feather, easily jumping over fallen trees and shallow holes you didn't see. He seemed to be unmoved by what just happened between you.

However, you were a different case. Only mere minutes passed since you basically told him you loved him, despite the mess in your head and heart, not fully comprehending the weight of such words and what it would do to you. Every nerve in your body was tense, sensation of his body touching yours leaving you breathless. Your heartbeats were too loud even to your own ears, your palms were sweating. You clenched them into fists where they were resting on Tamlin's shoulders, praying you wouldn't sweat through his shirt. You were so nervous that you couldn't enjoy this moment at all and when he finally put you down at the threshold of your cottage, you were happy it was over.

Too embarrassed to look him in eye, you swiftly walked in, washed your hands and once again picked up the knife to finish the cutting. You were relieved to find out that he made sure to remove the pot from the fire and cleaned the blood before he ran after you.

Tamlin watched every your move so intensely that the tingling sensation on the back of your neck was almost unbearable. You took in a deep breath, readying to get back to work.

Tamlin's long fingers wrapped around your hand, gently taking the knife from you.

"Let me do this," he murmured near your ear. His rich deep voice combined with tickling of his breath on a sensitive skin of your neck made your heart miss several beats.

You blinked, trying to get over the fog of your hazy mind. Whatever you felt around him before, grew suddenly more stronger. It wasn't the first time you were in love, but this was so different from what you'd experienced in the past. Could it be because he accepted your feelings but didn't share them? He said he needed you, yet needing someone wasn't the same as loving them. And he didn't say he loved you.

You just speechlessly nodded, gazing up at him. He chuckled. Another wave of heat climbed up your neck, settling down on your cheeks. It was a long time since you heard him laughed like this. It was hard to believe that just mere minutes ago he was broken and full of self loathing. This situation, it was so..confusing.

High Lord watched you with eyes full of mischief, corners of his mouth twitched in amusement.

You quickly stepped aside and putting the pot back on fire you pretended to be too engaged in mixing and adding seasoning.

"That colour suits you," Tamlin cooed while cutting carrots. You even forgot how to stir the contents of the pot.

"Carefully. Don't burn our dinner," he teased you.

This was the Tamlin who danced with you on Solstice, who liked to tease you and laughed happily and often. Although his smile still carried a hint of shadows and caution was present in his bright gaze, he seemed to be really back. On one side you were happy for that, but on the other hand, it was too nerve-wrenching.

You didn't know how you managed to finish cooking the soup. Not remembering what you actually put in you sceptically took a spoon to taste it, expecting the worst. You were pleasantly surprised that despite your absent-mindedness it was edible even delicious.

"May I taste it too?" Tamlin suddenly stood next to you with bowls.

"Sure," you stuttered, offering him the spoon, but he didn't take it. He just stood there waiting with half-open mouth.

Shakily exhaling you filled the spoon again, cooled the hot liquid and offered it to him. Without breaking the gaze he leaned in. Your sight fell to his perfectly shaped lips, the way they closed around and smoothly slid down the spoon leaving it clean.

"Delicious," he licked a droplet from his bottom lip.

"Yeah," you sighed still gazing at his mouth. He grinned. Realizing how it sounded, you blushed fiercely.

"Would you set the table? I'll bring bowls," he purred playfully.

Welcoming the offered way out, you took spoons and glasses and put the distance between your bodies. Room suddenly felt too hot, so you opened window and looked out.

Cool night breeze caressed your burning face and you closed your eyes, enjoying the feeling. What was wrong with you? Why your heart couldn't calm down? It was just Tamlin, the very same person you had spent months with before your life turned upside down. The very same person you held when he felt bad and needed help. The same male who held you at night after nightmares haunted you, who smiled at you, caressed you, hugged, danced with you... You hid face in your palms, scolding your mind.

"Everything alright there?" Tamlin asked softly, watching you.

"Yes, I just need fresh air," you called back over your shoulder.

For the rest of the evening he didn't tease you anymore. He helped you clean up after the dinner and then you two spent some time sitting in your separate armchairs, sipping the tea and reading. It was so relaxing moment that you wondered whether you were only imagining all the things before.

However when the time to go to bed came, Tamlin didn't bid you goodnight. He stood up and trailed after you to the stairs. You were too tired and noticed it only once you were halfway up the stairs. You spun to face him and found him hesitating with hand on railing and one foot on the step.

"What's wrong?" you asked him, wondering why he didn't go to his bed as usual.

His eyes looked you up and down and then wandered behind you to the door of your bedroom.

"I-.." he bit on his lower lip. Your brows rose, you blinked waiting. "I wonder if I could sleep with you tonight."

"Sleep with me?" you repeated, your mind already giving you all kinds of ideas, one more embarrassing than the other. You felt warmth pooling between your legs and you shifted uncomfortably.

Tamlin probably felt the change in your scent. His eyes widened and he..blushed. It was very adorable sight. It was just a slight pink tint of his cheeks, but it caused your body heat rose even more. You again shifted and looked down suddenly finding your feet to be very interesting.

"I-.. I didn't want to imply anything inappropriate," he stuttered, ashamed. His scent grew stronger now.

"I meant to sleep together like sleep together. Fuck," he swore under his breath, stumbling over the words. He ran fingers through his long golden strands in frustration and inhaled deeply.

"What I meant is," he started slowly, taking time with his next words, "to sleep next to each other, with space in between us if it makes you more comfortable."

"Or as until now," he added in a smaller voice.

Tight embrace, enveloped in his pleasant scent, his hands on you, warmth of his body seeping into yours. Yes, that's what you wanted. You didn't even need to think about that.

Your mind brought out the imagine of his lips. How would they taste like? What would they feel like? You shook your head, convincing yourself that that wasn't what you really wanted.

"Fine," you whispered to the empty space between you and ran up the rest of the steps. "But give me a moment."

You'd never been this nervous. After changing into the nightgown which was already quite challenging because your hands wouldn't stop shaking, you brushed your hair and then again and again.

You were going to just sleep, nothing else would happen. You had to repeat this words in your mind at least thousands time, but it didn't work. With wildly beating heart you climbed to the bed, covered yourself with blanket and called to the too silent house.

The door opened and closed, mattress dipped under his weight. Slowly he slid under the blanket next to you. Your bed was too narrow for two people, so whether you wanted or no, your bodies were touching. Tamlin was lying on his side facing you, you were facing the window, your back to him.

Even without seeing him, you were aware of his every breath, his broad chest brushing your back. You felt his eyes on you, heard his every swallow and his heart racing just as fast as yours.

You were certain you wouldn't be able to fall asleep like this and wondered how you could sleep so soundly every previous night.

Sheets rustled when he moved, lightly touching your shoulder.

"May I?" His deep but soft voice vibrated through your body, your eyes closed with delight on its own accord.

You just nodded. He so slowly wrapped his arm around your middle, pulling you closer to his front. You had to bite down on your lip to stop the moan that threatened to escape you.

His other arm slid under your head, replacing the pillow.

"This way it should be more comfortable." His breath fanned over your hair to your face. It smelled of tea you drank before going to bed.

He started humming a soothing melody, his hand lightly running up and down your stomach in lazy small circles. It worked wonders and you finally relaxed.

"What you said back in the forest, did you really mean it?" he asked when your eyelids became heavier, sleep slowly overcoming you.

"Yes, each word," you mumbled sleepily.

You could feel his face in the crook of your neck, gently rubbing against your skin. You chuckled when his breath tickled you.

"Thank you," he whispered to your hair, now both arms embracing you firmly. "I.. like you, too."

Those were the last words you heard before drifting into a dreamless sleep, smiling happily. Tamlin followed you soon after.

Taglist:

@impossibelle @sevikas-whore @b0xerdancer @ladylizzieofdarbyshire @tele86 @mybestfriendmademe @nocasdatsgay @yunloyal @nebarious @isabiss @st0rmyt @lilah-asteria @ubigaia @paleidiot @acourtofimagines @harahettania @talesofadragon @ceoofyearning

[halsinsheart]

a/n: welcome to kinkmas day 1 aka me delving back into writing.

summary: halsin & reader get distracted while mushroom foraging.

tags: NSFW MDNI, size difference, gn!reader, pet names (love, little one, songbird)

wc: ~1.8k

kinkmas masterlist || reblogs > likes

“Woah, look at that one there!” You pointed to a unique shape poking out from the rotting wood of a felled birch, garnering the attention of your large companion who chuckled softly at your childlike fascination.

“Some Purple Jellydisc; inedible but interesting to look at nonetheless.” Halsin crouched down next to you, his expression equally as captivated by the fungi as yours was.

Food rations in the camp were stable at the moment, but considering how your party seemed to grow and with inclement weather looming on the horizon, you coaxed Halsin into foraging with you. However, coaxing might have been an overstatement because the druid all but jumped up from his spot where he was whittling in favor of joining you on your excursion. You were a decent distance into the forest now with a basket on your arm that was slow to fill, but in your defense, you were understandably distracted.

Halsin stood sturdy against the incoming storm’s wind, a pleasant buffer between you and the elements. It was also the most opportune moment for you to admire just how broad he was while your mind wandered with thoughts of him. The irony of the man built like a tree worshipping the Oak Father wasn’t lost on you, although you wondered exactly what type of oak he would be. Perhaps a Southen Live, with its wide expanse and evergreen foliage? Or maybe the Bur with its massive heights and impressive longevity?

“Ah, here we are- Lion’s Mane! Edible and full of flavor.” Halsin’s deep voice shook you from your rambling thoughts and as you took in the mushroom he was slicing, it was your turn to laugh.

“They really know how to appropriately name these guys. Shame that Turkey Tail isn't edible, it’d be funny to serve it with actual turkey. Hey, wait, there’s Old-Man-of-the-Woods!” You scrambled over one of the broken trunks in front of you to squat down in front of the fungi and cut the fruiting body off before placing it into the basket with the others.

“I’ve been here the entire time, little one, ripe for your harvesting.” The joke was delivered with his usual charming smile as he held his arms out in a gesturing manner towards himself.

Thoughts faltered within your head for a moment as you processed his words and tried to grapple for a response that didn’t make you sound like an immature teenager. “Ripe for my harvesting, yeah? If we don’t find too many more edible things I might have to take you up on that offer.”

“Of course, I'd hate to see you starve. By all means, consume me, little songbird.” His voice lowered at the same time he leaned in closer while his stance widened and his chest puffed outwards, only making him appear larger.

Swallowing the air stuck in your throat, you braced yourself on the tree behind you and looked up into the hazel irises of the druid. The pet name nearly made you whimper as he loomed over you, but his words gave you confidence. You would consume him wholly and entirely. Lips met in a fevered kiss and your hands cupped his face gently while his own covered a wide expanse over your hips, squeezing ever so slightly. Again and again, you kissed until you were gasping for air, leaning your head back to obtain some oxygen, yet Halsin persisted with kisses along your exposed neck.

“Breathtaking.” He whispered against your skin while his hands massaged your ass before he plucked you off the ground.

A surprised squeal of excitement left you as you clamored to hold onto him while you were lifted several feet off the ground. Finally, at eye level, you took advantage and kissed him again, reveling in the decadent noise that left his lips when your hands tugged at his hair. After a couple more tugs, his hair fell from its half-bun to frame his face and tickle at your cheeks. Your legs wrapped around his thick torso, though you didn’t have a chance of crossing your ankles around his back, your legs simply too short and his body far too wide. 

Traveling your hands down his neck to his torso, you pulled at his tunic until the front laces came loose. Halsin shuffled you around in his arms like a mere burlap sack so he could shrug his shirt off, while you were left to ogle at his combined balance and strength until he brought you back to him. His warm chest was now bared to you and his hands made quick work of your shirt, being mindful not to tear it while he discarded it. When your bare skin met, it felt like a jolt of electricity coursed through you and ultimately ended as a pulse to your core.

“Please,” your voice wavered as you pleaded with him, tugging at his hair to no avail in an attempt to remove him from the sensitive part of your neck, only earning a breathy chuckle before he responded.

“Please what, my love? Share with me your fantasies and I’ll make them a reality,” his breath fanned across your neck as he relished in your scent, hands caressing up and down your back while his eyes closed.

A desperate whine left you when you realized he was making you voice your desires out loud, still, you were desperate enough to obey the demand, “Please, touch me more. I want all of you.”

“I’d love nothing more,” his last words were nearly a growl, reverberating down through your bones and back.

In one swift motion, you were laid in a soft patch of white clover that embraced you as gently as the druid hovering over you did. Your limbs splayed out as they welcomed the caresses from both plant and druid, the latter of which ever so slowly slid your bottoms off until they were discarded to the side. Halsin sat back on his haunches, fingertips still ghosting your skin while he simply admired the view of you splayed out just for him.

A shiver ran down your spine at the teasing sensation and you parted your legs in a silent beckon for him. Never one to ignore the call of nature’s desires, especially ones that concern your desires, Halsin obeyed. His movements were skilled and experienced, much more than that, he listened. Every movement, every noise, and every twitch you gave told him everything he needed to know about how you were feeling and what you needed from him. 

So much so, that it didn’t take long for you to be drowned in ecstasy not just once or twice, but until your body movements were beyond your control and any attempt you made to quiet your noises was futile. Only by the grace of the gods were you finally able to beg for him to stop, and even then he took you over the edge one more time.

“You always taste divine, I can’t quite help myself,” he chuckled under his breath as he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, “but now you’re more than ready for me, little one. And I intend to give you all of me.”

“Ha, I’d expect nothing less,” you responded breathlessly, still recovering from the praise his mouth and fingers gave you, trying to ignore the way he used your words from earlier against you now. 

Sweet kisses were peppered across your face as Halsin slowly slid inside of you, making sure to pause every time one of your small hands squeezed at his bicep. Your mind melted as he pushed deeper inside of you, each additional inch making your eyes roll back. The stretch burned yet the way his heavy hands massaged your hips emboldened you to take more.

Once his tip reached the deepest part of you, he pulled away from leaning over you to down at where you were joined and back up at you, “Well, not quite all of me, though I’m sure we can improve that.”

“Sh-Shut up,” you mumbled while your face heated with embarrassment at his words and your lower half relaxed in anticipation of what was to come.

“Fair enough. So long as you sing for me, my love,” his lips pressed kisses into your hands before holding them to his heart and leaning down once more to shield your smaller form from the rest of the world, his forearms resting in the clovers next to your head.

Nodding, you both agreed to his request and gave him the okay to start moving. He kissed you one more time before giving a testing thrust, after seeing you adjusted to that alright, he slowly picked up a rhythm as smooth as the flowing river. You weren’t new to this, weren’t new to him, you knew what to expect. And yet, when he put his efforts into chasing your high, you found yourself gasping and hands flying to hold onto his shoulders for stability.

The sounds of the daily nature activities didn’t stand a chance at drowning out the noises that resulted from your coupling. You only hoped you were far enough away from camp to avoid the walk of shame, though shame was far from any emotion you had over this. The number of times your pleasure crested was impossible to count while in your current mind state, with some ebbing right into another high.

Halsin was familiar with your body inside and out, and he could see the focus leaving your eyes as your mind went white from the overload of pleasure. His words of praise and sweet promises kept you grounded long enough for you both to worship and relish in the other’s body for one last, deliciously sweet high.

Heavy breaths mingled as your foreheads rested against each other and Halsin’s movements ceased except for the adoring caress of his hands that rubbed back and forth over your thighs. As your lucid thoughts returned to you, a smile spread across your face and your own hands reached out to brush a piece of hair from his eyes.

Decadent bliss filled the small clearing that you shared as pure unfiltered adoration radiated off of one of you flowing into the other and returned tenfold. Within this solace, where the forest surrounded you and hid your tryst away from the rest of the world, you longed for an eternity more of sharing your life with the large druid, whatever may come.

Whatever may come. Including the vampire elf’s near-tantrum when you returned to camp after many hours with less than adequate storage provisions.

©halsinsheart ~{2024}~ you do not have permission modify, copy, repost, or enter works into AI.

[seiya234]

i can't believe this is a series now any way thanks @dril-cipher for making me write about the meow meow and @marypsue for creating the meow meow

----

Ian looked around.

The colors of the landscape that surrounded him were unbelievably vivid, unlike anything he had ever seen before. There was a single, perfectly asymmetrical hill of rolling green grass, underneath a perfectly blue sky, with just enough clouds to produce interesting shadows on the ground below.

He turned around in every direction and yet he was always staring at the same hill, the same sky, the same unmoving clouds.

It was very disconcerting and Ian was enjoying it immensely.

Next to him, Henry was intently studying the world around him.

"You realize there's still inherent meaning in this, right?"

"Oh fuck off," Ian muttered, but his heart wasn't in it.

This Henry was... older than he had ever seen before, hair shot with grey, and antlers filled with fruit both edible and... not. He was still in all black, still barefoot, but now he had on a faded blue flannel shirt on top of it all.

And he burned. Not literally, no, but Ian could feel the heat radiating off of Henry from several feet away.

"You're... different this time," Ian said, awkwardly.

(what did Henry see of him? here in the Mindscape? Ian wanted to know. Ian did not want to know.)

"I think this me is... about sixty or so? Ish. I have... had grandkids at this point."

"And this you has rediscovered the joy of colors and patterns?"

"I can't really say anything about that- I'm wearing sweatpants and one of Hank's college shirts myself. However, I have relaxed a bit, if I don't say so myself."

Ian looked at Henry's antlers again. Some of the hands were dripping with fresh blood.

Relaxed. Sure.

Without warning, the landscape around them changed. Now they were in what looked like a maze of brick walls... though the brick was unlike any he had ever seen before- oversized and blood red and granular in a way that textures were not like in real life. The ceiling was those weird, industrial white soundproof tiles and the ground was brown... static.

Oh, and there was a floating, semitransparent rectangle that read 'start' but Ian's brain was still stuck on the floor, so he and Henry walked through it without a thought.

"Which way?" Henry asked.

"Hand on the wall, start going right," Ian automatically said. This was kind of his wheelhouse.

They walked in silence for a few minutes, and while it wasn't exactly companionable, neither was it awkward.

"What troubles your mind this time?" Henry finally asked, breaking the silence.

"Why does something have to be wrong?" Ian retorted, but he was being contrary and he knew it.

"Because you drew me here to talk."

Ian scowled. His sub-subconscious was such a traitor.

They turned right, then right again. Ian opened his mouth, then closed it again, for once unsure how to start, what to say.

Sheesh. If he wasn't the smart guy, then who was he, really?

"It took me awhile, to learn how to let go," Henry finally offered, breaking the ice.

"Of what? Your murderous impulses?" Ian snarled, and not just because he was wiping off some blood that had dripped from the antlers onto his hand.

"I used to fear the beast inside of me," Henry went on, adroitly ignoring the snark. "It was useful, but there was so much I didn't know about him. He was... unplanned, the first unplanned thing in my life since I had met my wife." Henry paused. "Though it should go without saying that my wife was a beautiful blessing and there should be no negative connotations attached to that comparison."

"You know, for a guy talking to me about letting go of control, you're still doing a whole lot of explaining."

Henry's lips tightened, but he went on.

"It is still something I am working on, but I have learned that while there are many things that I can control, there are some I cannot, and that's okay."

"Alright, but what if it's not?"

"We can't know that for certain."

Ian snorted. "We have had prophetic dreams for millennia now."

"And seers aren't seeing everything, everywhere, all at once. My point remains the same."

They reached the end of the maze, a doorway into a black void that both instantly stepped into. For a second there was nothing then-

"Are... are those tubes?" Henry finally asked.

'I think they're more like pipes."

"I don't remember pipes coming in every color of the rainbow." Henry paused. "Or being able to move like that," he finished weakly.

Ian looked over and it was a good thing that this was a dream and that Henry was dead and no longer had things like a stomach or an endocrine system because he very much looked like a man who wanted to barf.

Personally, Ian found the tubes to be realxing to watch. It felt like his brain was turning off which was... nice.

They watched for a bit.

"Lydia is a month old now."

Henry smiled. "Congratulations. How is fatherhood treating you?"

"I was not prepared for the amount of efflua a small human could make but otherwise things are well."

"Well."

Ian watched as a purple tube and a red tube gently snaked around each other in an intricate dance.

"I... I spend a lot of time looking at her. She's easy, right now. I mean, she's destroying our mental health through sleep deprivation and sonic warfare, but like, I knew to expect that, she's a baby. She... she makes sense, right now.

The red tube turned into a yellow one. "Right now, she's safe because she can't do anything. But what happens when she starts crawling? Talking? Meeting people?"

"You can't control that-"

"Yeah, no shit I can't! I look at Lydia, and all I can think about is all the ways she can die, all the ways I can fail her or do the wrong thing and what if she learns to drive and then crashes on the way to school, or gets addicted to something or-"

Ian ran his fingers through his hair. "She's... she's everything to me. She makes me want to be better, to do better."

"And not Mira?" but there wasn't criticism in that question, more leading-

"Nah. I strive to be better for her too... but Mira is... I know she can take care of her self, I know-"

that Mira would be just fine if Ian went, but a world without Mira in it was

no

no dont

"Mira is an adult," Ian finished lamely.

"Fair enough. It's always different, with kids."

"Does it ever go away?"

"It doesn't. And it does. The days are long, but the years are short."

Ian felt his face pickle, and Henry clapped him on the shoulder.

"Apologies, I'm not trying to be condescending. The fear is always there. But it gets outweighed by the joy of watching them grow, and the minutia of day to day life. Also respectfully, you are deeply sleep deprived right now."

"Okay, but that still doesn't ease the overwhelming existential dread I feel looking at my child and imagining every single way she could die."

"Friend, you could die at any moment yourself- of a collision, of a blood vessel popping, of god knows what. You can run on for a long time, but sooner or later, God will cut you down."

"That is ridiculously folksy."

"Please don't change the subject. What makes you different from Lydia?"

"Because I can control myself! It's different when it's me! I can't control Lydia. I can't control her, I can't plan for her, she's not my PUPPET-"

Ian paused. "I cant control her. And it feels like I can't control myself. And you tell me that I need to relax? To relinquish even more control? When I have him inside of me."

Henry opened his mouth- then paused.

"My apologies, this may be a 'shock'"

Then, before Ian could react, Henry plunged his hand deep inside Ian's chest. For the briefest second it felt... it felt... it felt like his soul was tearing into two-

(was this what it felt like for Paloma for Henry for in between when a demon lifted them to his lips and BIT)

-and just as quickly the sensation was gone and Henry was pulling his hand out of Ian's chest, along with

"Oh. You."

"He was camping at the surface of your consciousness, normally he lies dormant," Henry explained with an apologetic tone.

Around them the room had changed once again. The floor was now a black and white zig-zag patter, and all around the walls were now hung with blood red curtains.

Ian was sitting in a comfortable black love seat next to Henry who also had a comfortable black love seat and next to him was

"Seriously, what are you doing here?"

"DREAM DEMON PAL- I DO WHAT I WANT."

"Yeah, I know, it's deeply annoying. Doesn't answer my question. You're dead."

"DEAD DOESN'T MEAN ANYTHING HERE. JUST ASK ANTLERS OVER THERE."

Bill leaned in to whisper in Ian's ear. "HE SHOULDN'T BE HERE EITHER, BUT THOSE DEMON GERMS, THEY HAVE A HABIT OF STICKING. AND SPREADING."

Ian looked at Henry, legs crossed and sitting statue still. He could smell the iron tang of blood from his antlers.

"Yeah, I can see that. Why are you here this time?"

"OL' AXEY HERE HAS BEEN POPPING UP MORE AND MORE. P-R-E-TT-Y IMPRESSIVE FOR A MAN WHOSE SOUL IS GETTING DIGESTED."

"So you're going to..what? Evil plan him? Though I can't even imagine how or why?"

"WHY? YOU SHOULD TAKE A BITE OF THIS GUY YOURSELF, YOU'D REALLY GO FAR!"

Henry wasn't saying or doing anything- why not? For that matter, it made no sense for Bill to be here, not really.

(it really was Bill. That Ian knew, just as he knew that Henry was real, that this dream was real, that if he opened his eye lid to look at both of them he would See-)

Ian blinked. Bill had continued monologing, probably very impressed by how clever and witty he was. But there was no reason for Bill to be here. Bill didn't know why he was here, not really.

But Ian did.

Casually, Ian leaned over, and grabbed Bill by the hand.

"HEY WATCH THE LIMBS, THEY'RE FRESHLY CREATED FROM THE ETHER-"

Ian stood up, and like he was pitching a baseball, began to swing Bill around.

"HEY, YOU CAN'T DO THIS-"

"But I can," Ian muttered under his breath. He twirled and threw Bill as hard as he could at the ceiling.

"A-X-"

"-bsolutely not, not for something this petty and stupid," Ian snapped.

Bill disappeared, along with his little edgelord room. In its place was a black expanse, with floating squares that had smaller squares in them, almost like windows, but they were all different colors and just... floating.

That being settled, Ian whirled around to face Henry.

"What. The fuck. Was that?"

Henry shrugged. "Some lessons work better being shown, not told."

"I... Stars, I am not a child. I cannot even begin to tell you how incredibly dangerous that was." Ian paused. "And fucked up! Super, super fucked up!"

"You needed to know you could do that. You're... I think the phrase is 'in your own head too much'? At least I think that's what Willow would have said."

"That's... okay, fair. I get in my own way more often than not." Ian hufed out a breath. "Cool. My control issues have magically been solved by throwing a tortilla chip from my brain. Whoo-hoo."

Henry frowned. "Why the sarcasm?"

He didn't get it? Seriously?

Ian pinched his nose, and felt his eye burn. "You're trying to... I guess talk me off the ledge? I'm still not entirely sure why you brought Bill out- for once I wasn't worried about him and it was nice! You want to know why I freak out about things beyond my control? Maybe because the last few years have been an absolute convocade or people ignoring my boundaries over and over AND OVER again."

The squares all flashed yellow for a second. "Every time it feels like things are getting back to normal, my feet are swept out from under me all over again. How can I plan for anything, how can-"

how could he feel safe, ever, truly?

The blood drained from Henry's face, leaving it bone white. Unceremoniously, he thunked to the ground, sitting down hard on the void.

(the tips of his antlers were still at the height of Ian's eyes)

His mouth opened once, twice, apologies clearly dying on his lips.

Finally, Henry managed to croak out, "I... remember. What it was like to feel... small. To be small. It's not a good feeling. I tried to not think about it. To not talk about it. Ever. And then Dipper happened to me and-" Henry waved a hand at his antlers. "All of this happened."

"Was it your choice?"

Henry nodded. "It was the only way I could save my daughter. But there were unforseen consequences."

Ian just looked at Henry. That was the understatement of the millennium.

"I guess what I am trying to say is that... I forget, that I am not small any more. That I have power, power over others. And tonight I exercised it in a way that was absolutely inexcusable."

oh.

okay.

"And did you get mad at Dipper? For what he did to you?"

Where did that question come from? Almost like there was another beat in this story that needed to get spelled out and okay that was uncomfortably too meta, even for Ian.

Henry looked perplexed. "No, never."

"Wait, seriously?"

"I asked for it-"

"Oh I do NOT like that turn of phrase-"

"-and as a youngish demon, he had no idea of what would actually happen. I don't think he still knows, actually."

"When did you die?"

"In my 80s."

"And," Ian followed his gut, "when did your wife die?"

"149."

"So. You get turned into a weird monster thing that irrevocably changed the shape of your soul and caused your early death and you aren't mad about that? Even in the slightest?"

While it was still inexcusable, this did explain some of Henry's actions tonight.

Henry said nothing.

Henry was focusing on his breathing.

Finally, he gritted out, "It. wasn't. his. fault."

"It still hurt you though."

Henry nodded.

"And... you're allowed to be mad. You can understand and you can still be pissed, that... that's allowed. Stars did you really not go to therapy when you were alive? Because uh, big yikes."

Henry was still silent. Still still. Finally, he managed "I don't... I can't get mad. I can't allow myself to be mad."

"Respectfully, what's the worse that can happen? Because the worse has already happened to you. Maybe get mad, as a treat?"

"I... oh."

Even after decades of therapy, Ian was still fucked up. He probably always would be fucked up. But he could at least articulate his feelings and knew what he had to work on and yikes yikes yikes.

Henry shook his head and looked at Ian. "My apologies remain, but I know that an apology is meaningless without action. How can I best make amends?"

Ian thought about it for a minute.

"I don't want to see you-" he almost said 'never again' but... but that wasn't entirely true.

"-for a while. Maybe a long while. If I need you, I'll call."

Henry nodded. "And if I show up before then, you know how to kick me out."

"No, I don't?"

Henry grabbed Ian's hand. "Yes. You do. You can."

Oh. Oh.

Standing up, he swung Henry around with one hand- how? this man was literally the size of a moose- and begun to turn, swinging Henry faster and faster and Ian was laughing, laughing and crying and it felt like relief as he pitched Henry through one of the floating windows and out out OUT-

---

Ian showed up to his next therapy appointment with the largest box of chocolates that he and Mira were able to find at the store.

"What's this for?" Dr. Alexis asked.

Ian smiled. "Just a thank you."

[beetled-juice]

Do you have any sfw fluff hc's for MusicalJuice? Maybe even light nsfw like kissing, making out, Beej being pretty handy with reader, etc?

I love your writing so much, I wish I was able to write and share my writing like you and others in this fandom!

Hello! I really appreciate that you like my writing, thank you so much! I've honestly never been one to really create and share content outside of little circles of friends, but this fandom has just been so incredible and full of so many amazing people that inspire me every day!

I've always believed that any writing is better than no writing, especially when it comes to fandom. Not all of us have the skill or capacity to be full-fledged fic writers, but that doesn't mean we can't share our little bullet lists and notes app drabbles! You and everyone else can absolutely share anything, and I guarantee that myself and many others will love it.

Now, onto the hc's! I'm gonna throw it under the cut since it's a longer read, and as always I'm using a gender neutral reader ♡

Fluff HC's For Musicaljuice:

Right off the bat, it needs to be said that this guy loves whenever you treat him like a living person. Whether this means serving him his own plate at dinner or offering him a blanket during movie night, he absolutely adores it. At first he thought it was just you forgetting that he wasn't actually alive, but after a while he realized it was just how you showed people you cared about them!

He refuses to admit it, but it took him a ridiculously long time to figure out why every meal or drink you made for him was so much better than anything he or anyone else made. You'd patiently walked him through the steps of making tea just the way he liked it multiple times, but no matter what he did it just didn't taste the same. He'd complained about it to you, and without hesitating you'd offered to always make it for him. That was the moment he realized he was in love with you.

Unfortunately for your kitchen, this revelation was immediately followed up with him making several attempts to return the favor by cooking for you. Attempt is the key word, because nothing he made was edible, he somehow caught your electric kettle on fire, and mysteriously all of your dishcloths have vanished into the ether. The final straw was him putting a metal bowl into your (now deceased) microwave, and electrocuting himself when he reached into the still-powered device to pull the bowl out through the closed door. Once he'd stopped throwing sparks, you'd carefully pulled him into a standing position while informing him that he was forever banned from using your kitchen ever again. Before he could get too upset, however, you'd placed a kiss on his scruffy cheek and thanked him for the effort. His hair didn't lose its pink hue for the rest of the evening.

SPEAKING OF PINK - this guy will start having pink pop up in his hair at the most seemingly random times, and this ratchets up to a 10 once y'all start dating. A simple touch or smile has pink settling into his patches of moss. A kiss or hug sends it up through his beard and into the roots of his hair. The most surefire way to get him to turn completely pink, though, is to use his name - you're the only person he lets call him Lawrence, and it gets an instant reaction every time you do. For so long he'd hated the way his name sounded in the mouths of others, mostly because the only person who ever used it was his mother. But when you say it, it's gentle, warming, like coming home. You don't say it often, preferring to use it only when the moment is right, but when you do it'll result in an immediate hug (and probably more).

Now his hugs? Simply the best. You could be having the shittiest day possible and one long hug from him makes it all better. He loves getting to hug you, no matter the circumstances, and if he can get away with it then he'll be hugging you whenever possible. He also has several preferred hugging methods, that way he can adapt to any situation. He loves to hug you from behind while you're cooking or working on the computer, especially if he can wrap his arms around your waist and bury his face against your neck. Bear hugs where his large frame seems to envelope you completely? He does them daily (oftentimes more than once). Side hugs where he pulls you close and wraps an arm around you are always fair game, especially if you're around others or just chilling on the couch. He loves having you close by and tucked against him, no matter what's going on - any excuse to pull you in for a hug, he'll take it.

Hopefully you don't mind sharing a bed with an octopus, because he'll do his best impression of one every. damn. night. Good luck getting up to use the bathroom at 3am, because this guy isn't gonna let you go easily. Sometimes a kiss to wake him up is enough, but other times you have to elbow him in the ribs or kick him in the shins to finally be released from his grip.

And oh man you better invest in some ear plugs - this guy snores like a freight train, only this freight train has a penchant for settling in right against your damn ear. When he first started sharing a bed with you (long before you guys were dating, completely uninvited) he was silent, hardly daring to breathe lest you decide to kick him out. Eventually, after you'd agreed to let him stay, he started actually sleeping at night. He doesn't really need to, and you suspect he does it because it feels more human, but he insists he gets the "best" dreams about you when he sleeps pressed up against you. You interpret this as sex dreams, especially since he would waggle his eyebrows and make honking noises when he said it, but what he actually had were more like daydreams about being with you and his family for the rest of time. Okay, and also sex dreams. He's a highly sexual being after all, and he does love an orgy.

Once you'd agreed to (read: "given up fighting him on") his sharing your bed, hands would absolutely wander if given half a chance. Whether this is an arm slung a little low around your waist or a leg sticking between your own just a little too much, he'll take what he can get. If you established a hard boundary, however, he was pretty good about not pushing it. As soon as you guys started seeing each other, however, all bets were off - any chance he got, he'd have a hand up your shirt or in between your thighs. He wasn't necessarily trying to start something every time, he just genuinely enjoyed being able to touch you in such an intimate way. It's also not his fault that breathers are warmest at their cores - if your crotch wasn't so damn toasty he wouldn't be putting his hands there! (<- he's lying, that's a lie, he totally would be)

Finally, the thing he's least likely to admit to is that he loves when you're holding him. He loves laying with his head on your lap, or with his back pressed to your front and your arms wrapped securely around his middle. He also loves when you hug him close and let him press his face into your throat - yes he usually has to contort himself to do it, but it feels so nice to simply be held and listen to your heartbeat while ignoring the rest of the world. On his worst days he can always go to you for comfort, and even if he won't necessarily ask you for it directly, it's the one thing he craves most.

[itzjustmonikas]

A Joyous Discovery

(Jade x reader with no specified gender)

-Due to Jades love for different unique plants, and him being apart of the mountain appreciation club, he often encounters many rare herbs, fruits, and vegetables growing in the areas he searches for different types of mushrooms. If he ever feels like it, he would sometimes bring home some of the side discoveries he makes and show it to you and Floyd. He would usually try to search it up and learn more about the plant, jotting key things he needs to remember such as the leaf shape and it's properties to remind himself of it's uses and learn to identify it if he ever comes across it again. If he finds out it's edible he would try to look for a recipe including the ingredient and make it, inviting you to join him from time to time and sharing the end product with you, Floyd, and Azul. As time goes on he begins to find joy in foraging for wild edible plants and begins creatively incorporating it into different recipes of his, branching out from following others's recipes. He finds it amusing to see the reaction of people being suspicious of him while trying out his original creations and end up loving it and wanting more. This one time he invited you over to the dorm and wanted to try out making a pastry out of Ramps and Ramsons (wild onion and garlic), it took a lot of trial and error to get the right ratio of ingredients and temperature for perfect flakiness and ideal flavor but you guys did it in the end. It was a hit with the others and Azul suggested on putting it as a seasonal item on the Mostro Lounge menu. You all thought it was a good idea as it was pretty cost efficient with the fact that the main ingredients are free and there is a surplus amount of it each year left unharvested. You guys all work together and harvested lots of Ramps and Ramsons and started prepping all of them for cooking while freezing out the extras that might not last long enough for the next restock. The pastry was an instant hit on campus, almost everyone rushed to the Mostro Lounge during lunch and there was barely anyone at the school cafeteria. The lines were so long that you guys could barely keep up so some students offered to help just to get a taste of the delicacy. It was so good to the point that even NRC staff members tried getting their hands on it. In the end, it made a lot of money and has become a staple item that students all know about and aims to have the next time it is available. After a longgggg day of working, all the other staff has already left and went to bed while you and Jade find yourselves sitting and enjoying dinner together. You guys finally get time to relax and chat together, talking about funny instances that happened throughout the day and sharing a laugh at some extra outrageous things. You both seem to have neverending topics to talk about together, ranging from schoolwork to close friends to future recipes and looking back on how you guys spend hours in the kitchen working together. Even though you were both physically and mentally tired, it was still a joyous moment that brought happiness and pulled you guys closer. Jade would definitely not mind working extra hard and being tired, as long as he gets to do it with you and enjoy moments like these to cherish forever.

I think this fic can also work with characters like Trey and Ruggie as Trey is good at baking and Ruggie knows a lot about foraging loll

I really hope you guys like this �� please let me know if there are any ways in which I could improve!My next post will be an Azul fic that I hope will be to you guys's liking :)

I chose to write about Jade because he is usually stationed in Mostro Lounges kitchen and most likely is tasked with finding new recipes, combining that with his special interest is this imagine~

[devildom-moss]

Since you menioned Simeon and Barbatos in the same sentence, its my time to rant about how much i love Simbarb!!

I AM LITERALLY ON MY KNEES FOR THAT SHIP. EVERY SCRAP OF SIMBARB CONTENT I CAN FIND, I WILL DEVOUR IT LIKE THERES NO TOMORROW. DOESNT MATTER IF ITS FLUFF, ANGST, OR HECK EVEN SMUT. I LIVE FOR SIMBARB. THERES NOTHING ELSE THAT WILL SATISFY ME MORE THAN SIMBARB. LIKE THE SHIP IS JUST PERFECT IN EVERY WAY POSSIBLE. AND BOTH BARBATOS AND SIMEON ARE PERFECT AS WELL. I WANT TO LIKE, SQUEEZE THE LIFE OUT OF THE TWO OF THEM, AFFECTIONATELY.

I think i went a little off course.. oh and i read this simbarb fanfiction once and now ive created a whole au with lore and backstory with Simeon and someone else (which can technically be MC but the actual MC also exists in this au). And i really wanna talk about it to someone, but there's no one who wants to listen, but you're now back, and im happy so maybe ill talk about it to you if youre interested!

Anyways have a nice day! Remember to eat, sleep and dont do drugs <33

Sincerely, 💜

You are so right for this. Those two are not only my favorites, but they are probably my favorite ship (I don't know if I've made that clear in my writing, but I feel like there have at least been hints). We are on the same boat here (I apologize for the pun, but I'm sending it out into the world anyway). I am right there with you. They are precious individually and together. I generally am not a touchy/hugging person, so I wouldn't want to squeeze them, but I would make them a delicious bowl of soup, give them pats on the head, and tell them that they're both good boys.

Especially as a fellow SimBarb lover, you are welcome talk about your AU here! Also, in general, I love reading about how people view character relationships (romantic, platonic - in any form, really).

While I'm here, I would like to fuel the SimBarb love with a few thoughts of my own it won't be too much because I'm going to head to bed soon, so my brain is in wind down mode.

Okay, so I lied to myself about the "a few" and rambled for 10 bullet points, so more under the cut:

Canonically, Barbatos and Simeon just often find themselves on outings together. Barbatos phrases it like it's unintentional; it just happens; they just have accidental dates. Well, considering that Barbatos seems to always have good luck, maybe there's a reason he keeps finding himself on outings with Simeon. Wouldn't it be lucky if he happened to run into a certain handsome angel while he was out?

I think it took Simeon longer to realize he liked being around Barbatos than it took Barbatos to notice how much he enjoyed spending time with Simeon. Simeon probably used Luke as a kind of affection proxy for a long time. A lot of "Luke really likes Barbatos," and "Barbatos is so sweet to Luke. It really warms my heart." Really? Is it just Luke who likes Barbatos?

They probably pick up groceries a lot together, and they both like to menu plan as they browse the markets, so they end up taking ideas from each other. Sometimes they'll plan to cook the same dish on the same night. It makes them kind of giddy. Even though they don't share meals often, when they cook the same thing on the same night, it almost feels like they're getting to eat together.

Whenever Luke goes to Barbatos for cooking/baking lessons, Barbatos tries to ensure they have leftovers for Luke to take back to Simeon. Additionally, Barbatos is especially motivated to help the final product turn out good (outside of just wanting Luke to learn and succeed) because he knows it's a reflection of his own skills and he wants to impress Simeon.

Also, I could see Barbatos sending Luke back home with two bouquets of flowers (especially edible flowers and sometimes herbs) from his garden. One is for Luke, but the other one, Barbatos will casually suggest that Luke "give it to Simeon, if you'd like."

These two both love taking care of others. Can you imagine how often they just try to out-spoil the other? I think it would occasionally end up in arguments that are basically just "sit down, and let me take care of you for a change."

Barbatos would be the least comfortable being taken care of because he's a demon. Being doted on by an angel. That's weird, right? He feels incredibly unworthy.

These two could flirt back and forth so well.

Barbatos would get extremely flustered if Diavolo commented on how wonderful it is to see a respectable demon such as Barbatos and a regarded angel like Simeon getting along so well, and that it gives him hope for the future between the Devildom and the Celestial Realm.

This is kind of angsty, and I don't remember if Barbatos and Simeon actually met before the war, but I have this thought (maybe a future story idea if I decide to lean into ships or something) that while Diavolo was enamored with Lucifer, Barbatos took a liking to Simeon. Actually, it was initially just an interest in the angel whose cooking skills could almost compare with his own. Then he realized how similar they were and how well they would get along. I just imagine younger Barbatos thinking hoping that when the war came around, Simeon would fall with Lucifer. Selfishly, he wanted the opportunity to even just be around Simeon. When that didn't happen, Barbatos was silently crushed but he carried on. He held his excitement the entire time when he first heard that Simeon would be one of the exchange students, and he was even more delighted when Simeon treated him with kindness.

[thisismysecondrodeo]

Just finished episode 2 & I just know that Jason loves hallmark movies just like Theodore is it too much to smoke a bit and chill on the couch watching cheesy Christmas rom coms nowhere near Christmas with him?

AN: I really wanted to write today but it took me two hours to update my masterlist and its probably still broken 😭 so baby blurb because I saw this prompt and it made me feel better

Rating: Teen

Tags: Drug use

Fic masterlist

-

"I'm not even that high!"

"Uh huh," Ted chuckled at you. He flopped next to you on the couch with a fresh bowl of popcorn that he insisted on making on the stove and watched as you grabbed a handful of the kernels in one hand and a fistful of shredded cheese in the other. You side-eyed him, feeling his amused gaze.

You finished your handful of snacks and reached for the remote, scrolling until you found what you were looking for.

"THAT'S what you want to watch? It's literally August," Ted exclaimed as he read the title Road to Christmas. You burst into nearly uncontrollable giggles, your red-rimmed eyes tearing up, the edible you took making everything downright hilarious.

Despite your ridiculous behavior, Ted was beaming at you as you cracked yourself up, rolling against the back of the couch and slapping your hand against his thigh. "How come you're not as high as I am then, huh," you demanded as you finally caught your breath, already a couple minutes into the movie you'd picked.

"Well one of us had their first edible last month, while the other one has been getting high since they were 16," Ted laughed as he kissed your temple and tucked you into his side. "Now watch your terrible Christmas movie, I'm sure it's great."

[simulation-machine]

PROOF THAT I AM ALIVE

Look! I re-did the Kibo apartment! I also made Parker (unpictured) join the Computer Club and got them Bo-Bae, the adorable princess that is by @pugownedplaysthesims-blog (the Birman kitty made in May 2023).

The Kibo apartment is the first of five lots I'm completely re-decorating for teen years, and while I'm kind of excited because each place is going to have very different vibes, and vibes that I don't plan on utilizing in my legacy home at all, it's going to take roughly a billion years.

So, the next week or so is going to be screenies of that process, and once that's done, I'll be back to playing the Orsons.

Health + mom + life update (all positive!) behind the cut:

I'm basically totally fine. I get winded very easily and wake up congested af but that also might be being late-30s and living in a state that is the always-winter version of Narnia

My mom was finally allowed to return home this afternoon! It took so long to figure out what was causing her to have allergic reactions and heart freakouts, but they did it, and she's feeling better! Once I'm totally okay, I'll be visiting her probably next week

Also, on Thursday, I'm turning 37 years old (!!!). At this point in life, birthdays are little more than an excuse to eat Cocoa Pebbles for breakfast and the longest bubble bath ever, but my partner did get me a bunch of edibles and will be making me butter chicken as a birthday meal (!!!!! he's so good at cooking btw)

School so far has genuinely been rad as heck, one of the classes I'm taking is basically just taking a bunch of cognitive tests, submitting the results, and writing papers? EASY. So glad to be done with generals tbqh

[countessofravenclaw]

Puede la ondulación cambiar una marea? part nine

Have you ever imagined what would happen if instead of of making Ambar Sol, Sharon would have aproached her problem with more level-headedness? What if, instead of throwing her daughter's life into a curve she just fires the Valentes, in hopes that they go back to Mexico and never find out the truth? Well, it was never going to be that easy, "everything you want you can achieve" being the family motto and all the for the Valentes after all. Monica and Miguel, could easily find another job, and so they do, with another family. A family that ends up being a bit of a surprise for Luna and all her friends.

“Jazmin, honestly, I don’t know.” Ambar shook her head while speaking on her phone. “Pack what you need so you don’t need to waltz around naked. I honestly don’t care otherwise. You aren’t even skating.”

“Ambar!!!” She stopped on her tracks on the stairs as she heard the voice of her godmother. “Dinner is ready!”

“Sorry Jazmin, I need to go,” She said to the phone, “I don’t know, Madrina is calling me, ask Delfi. See you tomorrow.”

“Ambar, you were late.” Sharon said as Ambar took her seat at the dinner table. 

“Sorry, I was on the phone.” Ambar said shortly, she didn’t want to start anything with her godmother. Things had been, say the least, tense between them ever since the fire had happened. Ambar had maybe hoped that Sharon would have actually shown at least some concern for her, but almost nothing that changed. 

Ambar started to honestly get sick of it. Luna’s parents were in the literal jail and still she was getting shown care, love and concern, by people who were complete strangers to her eight months ago. 

Ambar's own mother couldn’t do that to her apparently. Sharon really didn’t care, especially as she was so obsessive over the whole legal battle. Ambar hadn’t even told her about the acceptance letter to the UCA, which she had applied to after the fire.

“Talking on the phone when you know there are other things is very disrespectful.” Sharon said coldly. 

“Sharon, don’t be so uptight.” Alfredo appeared at the table. “Let the girl live. Who were you talking to?”

“Just Jazmin,” Ambar answered as Amanda brough the food to the table. Their new cook was terrible, but what could you do? They couldn’t starve and the food was edible. “We were talking about tomorrow. There are a lot of things to organize so we can leave.” 

“Leave where?” Sharon raised her head. 

“To Cancun.” Ambar answered, “The team is competing in the Roda Fest final. We’re leaving tommorrow.”

“Why was I not informed about this?” Sharon stared. “I haven’t given permission.”

“I did tell you, Madrina.” Ambar sighed, “And I don’t need permission. I am not a minor.”

Ambar had never shown Sharon any of the forms related to the Cancun trip—because she hadn’t needed to… She was 18 now, and tomorrow they would be boarding the plane, exactly like Juliana had required. She had written down Amanda as the emergency contact, because Sharon would have had her head if Ambar had started writing down her personal information, especially without asking. 

She wanted this to go as smoothly as possible, because Ambar was really looking forward to actually going to Cancun. She wanted to flatten out the Sliders as much as everyone else, especially that obnoxious goth girl, but she also was just looking forward to some time away. Away from everything back home. Cancun also was a super pretty place, Simon had told her about super beautiful sunsets. 

“You still should have asked.” Sharon continued. 

“No, I didn’t need to.” Ambar decided to protest. “I won’t be going alone. We’re going as a team, and our coach will be with us.”

“So, Luna is going too?” Alfredo interjected. 

“Yes, the whole team will be there.” 

“I am still so glad that Valentes found such a balanced place of employment.” Alfredo continued and Ambar stared at her plate. How was he still so blissfully unaware that Sharon had gotten the Valentes in JAIL, and that Luna was cosplaying as a daughter of one of Buenos Aires’s most promising upcoming dynasties. Well, Ambar wasn’t going to be one to tell him that and deal with the fallout. 

“Can we not talk about that family?” Sharon sighed, “We are at the dinner table.” 

“I do not understand what you have against Valentes' new employers?” Alfredo—against his better judgment, at least in Ambar’s mind—continued. “Young and attractive people like them who are hard workers will go far for a reason. They seem like very nice people, and quite a couple.” 

“Por favor Papa,” Sharon scoffed, “There is nothing more unprofessional than public shows of affection. But not surprising, considering where they are from. They don’t know how to act or control—”

“Well, Sharon, you can’t blame them for being in love,” Alfredo continued. Ambar tried really hard not to sigh. She agreed with him, but this wasn’t wise to aggravate Madrina. “Only rare people possess that true spark that lasts, and absolutely should let that show. Reminds me of Lili and Bernie. Oh, they were always such a joy to watch—”

“How many times do I have to say that we don’t talk about the past in this house!” 

This time Ambar sighed almost audibly. Thank god she got out of here tomorrow. She had already agreed with Delfi that she would give her a ride, given that Delfi now had a fresh driver's license. Maybe Ambar should get one for herself as well. 

***

“Rey!” Sharon called as the dining room became empty.

“What can I do for you Senora?” Rey walked in. “The solicitor called. They want to meet with you tomorrow to discuss—”

“I don’t care,” Sharon waved a hand to silence him. “You tell him that he needs to do his job.”

“Okay,” Rey nodded, “But I think it would be beneficiary… The case is sitting on a standstill Senora Benson and I don’t think we can move it on our favor if we don’t—”

“Like I said, I don’t care,” Sharon shook her head, “Now do as you’re told.”

“Well, what do you wish for me to do?” 

“I need you to contact the Ministro Pistarini International Airport… Anonymously.”

***

“Okay, Isla and I know that you know Cancun, but don’t go wandering off. Also have your phone on all the time, so we can reach you. Are you sure you have everything you need?”

“Yeah, I got it. Thanks Marco.” Luna nodded toward him, who had driven her and Gastón to the Roller, as she pulled the handle of her suitcase up. “I made triple sure I have everything.”

“Good. I would give this same spiel to Gastón, but apparently, he’s an adult now, so he can handle it.” 

“Hey!” Gastón, who had been pulling his own bags from the car, protested. “What is that supposed to mean?”

“Nothing,” Marco laughed, “Just some friendly advice: don’t do anything stupid.”

“Why would I?”

“Hopefully neither of us has to find that out.” Marco squeezed his shoulder briefly. “Have fun, both of you. Good luck for the competition.” 

“Finally!” Matteo grabbed Gastón by the shoulder as he and Luna walked into Roller. “What took you so long?” 

“Dad wanted to give a lecture,” he rolled his eyes. “I should have driven us here myself.” 

“Then you would have needed to leave the car here for two weeks,” Nina, who had also joined them as they reached the cafeteria, noted after kissing him on the cheek, “You’re not late anyway, Jazmin is still not here either.” 

“Nor is Simon…” Luna looked around. 

“Oh, you can’t count on those three to ever be on time.” Juliana shook her head, “Simon, Pedro and Nico forgot a drumstick and went to get it. I didn’t want to ask why. Now, I can mark you two: Luna and Gastón, off my list. No one is allowed to leave this building until we leave for the airport!” 

“I’m here, I’m here!!!” Jazmin suddenly dashed through the door. 

“Good.” Juliana gave her a tight smile. “Now… I almost wanna leave those three stranded, if they don’t—”

“Never fear, the Roller Band is here!” Simon, Nico and Pedro crashed through the door like a three-headed dog. 

“I wish your brains would also be,” Juliana sighed. “Okay, now, everyone! Make a circle. We don’t have much time.”

“We’re doing this as fast as we can,” Ramiro remarked, “Are we chased by fire…?”

The room fell dead silent for a moment. 

“I realize that that was extremely insensitive. Sorry about that.” Ramiro quickly looked at Luna, Ambar and Gastón. “But, Juliana, what’s the rush?”

“I was informed this morning that many airlines in Mexico, specifically the ones operating in Cancun, are on strike this week, starting today.” Juliana sighed. 

“Wait…?” Luna’s face grew worried. “Are we not able to go? The competition…?”

“You didn’t let me finish,” Juliana looked at her. “Most of the flights are canceled starting tomorrow, but thankfully, ours were booked enough ahead of time that this doesn’t affect us directly. Our flight is the only one to Cancun for this week. But if we miss it, because, I don’t know, someone does something stupid and we’ll be late, then there are no guarantees.” 

“Well, in that case we won’t miss it,” Ambar crossed her arms and addressed everyone. “Right guys?”

“Oh, of course not,” Jazmin started blabbing, “I can’t miss my chance to be the chicest Argentinian in Mexico.”

“Don’t worry Juliana,” Luna nodded as well, “We are not gonna miss our chance to show the Sliders. So, are we gonna win or what?”

“Jam & Roller!!”

“Okay, now, let's settle down,” Juliana started speaking, “Now, you all need to get yourselves and your things into the bus that’s waiting outside. Everyone needs to have their passports on hand when we enter the airport. I presume all of you have flown before, so you all know how you need to behave while going through security and everything. Otherwise, I will leave you in the terminal”

“Woohoo, lets go!!” Simon yelled as the team grabbed their bags and started filing out of the Roller and toward the bus. 

“Simon, can you believe it!!” Luna grabbed his arm. “We are going to Mexico!! Home!!”

“I honestly can’t wait,” Simon hugged her. “I get to see my family. We’re going home!”

“I’m so happy we’re doing this.” Luna jumped on the first step while getting on the bus and dropped her backpack. “Uuups!”

“Well, your trip’s gonna end really fast if you lose your passport.” Simon handed Luna her folder of important papers. “You have a lot of papers.”

“I know,” Luna laughed as she took the folder from Simon, “All the immigration stuff, visas, passport, custody agreement what nots… I can’t believe it honestly.” 

“Me either,” Simon shook his head as they climbed onto the bus. “You are terrible at paperwork.”

“Okay, is everyone here?” Juliana climbed onto the bus. “Lets do this quickly, say here when I say the letter of your first name. A!”

“Here!” Ambar spoke. 

“B! C! D!”

“Here.”

“E! F! G!”

“Here!” 

“H! I! J!”

“I’m here!”

“Ready!!” 

“K! L!

“Ready for Mexico!!” Luna yelled.

 M!”

“Here!”

“N!”

“Here.”

“Here as well!”

“O! P!” 

“Here!” 

“Q! R! S!”

“Here!”

“T! U! V! X! Y!”

“Here!” Yam was the last one to speak. 

“Okay, and I know that no one here is named after Z so we can go.” Juliana said to the bus driver and the vehicle finally started moving. 

“Simon.” Luna said as the bus was driving on a freeway. 

“What?” Simon looked at her concerned. 

“I just, I just realized that I have never flown alone.” Luna continued. “What do we do when we go there?”

“Well, I mean I have an idea, but I don’t know how to explain it,” Simon scratched his head. “Uh, Nina!”

“What?” Nina raised her head, from the other side of the bus’s aisle where she was sitting with Gastón, about two rows ahead of Simon and Luna.

“Everything okay?” Gastón also turned his head. 

“What do you exactly do at an airport?” Luna asked. 

“We’ll do the check in at a counter, and then go through security.” Nina explained, “Then we board at the gate after they call us. Pretty simple.”

“That’s if you're traveling economy, which we are.” Gastón mentioned. “The other classes are actually usually more complicated, if you…but like it’s not important because we won’t be facing any trouble.”

“Everyone keep track of your bags!!” Juliana yelled from the front. “We’ll be there shortly.”

Luna held the handle of her bag tightly as everyone filed into the parking lot and then inside of the airport. She was going to Mexico!!! She was so excited. 

Right now it felt like nothing could stop her. Everything was going to be okay.

“Luna, it is your turn.” Someone tapped her on the shoulder. Luna looked up and saw Juliana gesture toward the check-in desk. 

“Oh, yeah,” Luna nodded and walked up to the desk. “Hi!”

“Passport?” The agent in the window asked.

“Oh here.” Luna handed the booklet to the woman.

“Valente, Luna?” The official asked. She opened and then looked at Luna and then the passport again. This happened a few times more, which kind of weirded Luna out. 

“Yeah.” Luna nodded. “Everything okay?”

“Yes,” the official tapped something on the computer, looked at Luna again, but then gave her boarding pass and her passport. “Have a pleasant journey.” 

Luna just shrugged and started walking back to the others. 

“What took you so long?” Jim asked as Luna caught up with everyone at the TSA queue entrance.

“I don’t know,” Luna shook her head. “It doesn’t matter. So do we go there next?”

“Yep,” Juliana nodded, “Try to make this as nicely as you are able. We are on…”

“Yeah, yeah, we know,” Ramiro remarked, “We are on a time crunch.”

The TSA checkpoint went on without a hitch… Although Luna kind of felt like the agents were again kind of looking at her, but that was probably just completely normal. Weren’t these people supposed to look for anything suspicious. 

They probably weren’t even looking at her specifically, 

“Okay, we have about 40 minutes until we board.” Juliana said as the team got to their gate. 

“Then what was with the rush?” Nico asked, while sitting down on a chair. 

“I have had to factor in a margin of error with you lot.” Juliana sighed. “Okay, now, you can go see around the airport, but be here in 30 minutes, AND no one goes anywhere alone.”

“Simon, let's go grab some juice,” Luna pulled Simon by the arm after the group scattered. “I saw one booth not far away from here.”

“Okay, let's go.” Simon nodded. 

“Wow, this is super good,” Luna exclaimed as she slurped her strawberry lime juice with a straw. “Honestly, I’d drink this every daa—Oh sorry.”

Luna had twirled around and almost crashed into some sort of person who clearly was an official of some sort of the airport. At least it looked like it according to the man's uniform. 

“Excuse me.” To Luna’s surprise the official addressed her. “Are you Luna Valente?”

“Uh, yes.” Luna answered confused. “Can I help you?”

The official didn’t answer anything, but instead made some sort of hand gesture. Suddenly two big security guards appeared on either side of Luna, took her by the arm, and started dragging her following the official. 

“Hey!!” Luna tried to protest, panic rising in her. “What are you doing?” 

The guards released Luna as they got into an emptier area from the shops, into some sort of security desk. 

“We need to check that you have the correct authorization to travel internationally, as an unaccompanied minor.” The official read something off his laptop. 

“Oh, well I have permission.” Luna had zero idea what all what the official had just said to her had meant, but she most certainly knew that she had permission. She quickly pulled the plastic folder from her backpack and handed the appropriate paper to the official guy. It should settle things pretty easily—

“You really think we’re gonna believe this?” Luna's face fell when the official said those words.

***

“So, I asked Simon what time the best sunsets can be seen,” Gastón squeezed Nina's hand as they were walking toward their gate. “So, I thought we’d sneak out in the evening and go get some pictures.”

“That sounds amazing,” Nina responded, “I didn’t take the better camera with me though, I should have…”

“Don't worry about it,” Gastón stopped and brushed a lock of her hair behind her ear, “I took the DSLR with us. Dad gave me permission. Apparently, with the right settings, the picture can glow almost like it’s magic. ”

Nina was about to respond something, when Simon suddenly ran past them. “Juliana!!”

“What?” Juliana looked up annoyed at Simon from her papers. “Do I want to know?”

“Luna got grabbed.”

“What are you talking about?” Juliana sighed. “What did she grab? The last thing I need is dealing with one of you getting caught for shoplifting…”

“No, she got grabbed.” Simon repeated. “Some security people just took her.”

“What?” Juliana stared and Gastón and Nina exchanged glances. “Why?”

“I don’t know, but you need to do something.”

“Okay, where did they go?”

“There are some people gathered on that security station,” Nina pointed toward left of their gate. 

“I’ll go see,” Juliana got up from her chair. “This is probably a mistake.”

“What happened?” Nina asked Simon after, while tightening her grip on Gastón’s arm. 

“I don’t know,” He shook his head, “We were just having juice and then just some official looking guy came to us and asked if she was Luna Valente and then they took her away.”

“What’s going on?” Jim, Yam and Matteo had appeared at the gate. “Is Luna in trouble?”

“Hopefully not,” Nina looked at Gastón, “This could be a misunderstanding, right?” 

“Maybe she mismarked her luggage somehow. Hopefully anyway, we don’t have much time.”

Nothing happened for almost 15 minutes, during which everyone had arrived at the gate. 

“The boarding will start soon,” Ambar noted, “What’s taking so long?”

“Maybe we should go and see,” Matteo suggested. Everyone in the group nodded and they started walking closer to the security checkpoint. 

When they got there, Juliana saw them and walked to meet them. “What are you doing here?”

“We want to know what’s going on,” Simon stated. 

“Still trying to figure that out,” Juliana sighed. 

“What are we gonna do?” Ambar asked, “We’ll soon miss our flight if this takes any longer.”

“You won’t,” Juliana looked at everyone sternly. “Okay, here’s what we will do. I will text our schedule, the hotel information, training rink’s booking and the competition forms to…to Delfi. Ambar, Delfi, Gastón, Jazmin, Matteo, Nico, Pedro and Simon, you will board the plane no matter what. Nina, Jim and Yam, try to get your parents to write you some sort of statement that you're allowed to travel as unaccompanied minors. Do it now.”

“What will you and Luna do?” Jim asked while holding her phone on her other ear for a phone call. “You said that there were no other flights due to the strike.”

“We’ll figure it out. We can possibly go to Mexico City and come by road, but we will lose time…”

“I am not leaving without Luna.” Simon stated.

“Simon, we need as full of a team as possible.” Juliana shook her head, “We don’t have time for this.”

“But what are they holding Luna for?” Nina asked again, “This doesn’t make any sense.”

“I don’t know if I am at liberty to disclose this to you.” Juliana looked very frustrated. “With her situation—”

“You need to tell!” Simon insisted.

“Simon, insistence doesn’t get you anywhere with this.”

“Juliana, I am the closest family member she has right now here,” Gastón suddenly spoke again. “I need to know, especially given the situation.” 

“Okay,” Juliana nodded, “They are claiming that Luna does not have proper permissions to travel out of the country. 

“What?” Nina stared, before looking at Gastón again “That doesn’t even make sense. She shouldn’t need any and she has a written statement of consent. I was there when your mother gave it to her.” 

“Yeah, I know.” He said while looking at her, “They mentioned it to me too.”

“Then why on earth are these people questioning her?” Matteo joined the conversation. “There is no way the papers don’t hold up.”

“There is no way,” Gastón stared out of the window, “Unless…”

“Unless what?” Nina asked him. 

“Unless the problem is not that the papers don’t hold up, but the fact that these people think that it is forged or something…” Gastón sighed. 

“What do you mean?” Simon asked, confused. 

“Well, my parents seem very childfree for the outside world,” Gastón shook his head, “So, to outsiders, it might seem very strange that some random girl is claiming that they are her guardians, especially given that we are talking about legal custody agreements. They wouldn’t be questioning my birth certificate…but I don’t know why they are questioning her in the first place.”

“Can you call your parents? So, they can clear this up?” Nina suggested. 

“I mean I can, but if they are questioning their signatures, it won’t be solved over the phone. They need to come here, and that will take too long, and the flight will be missed.” Gastón shook his head again, super annoyed, “Dad is gonna hate this…” 

“What? What are you thinking?” Nina asked as Gastón’s voice trailed off. 

“There is something I can do.” Gastón nodded and started walking toward where the people were standing. He could identify the official, who had been running the whole “arresting” show, very easily, given the uniform. So that would be the one he would need to target. “Luna’s papers are completely legitimate.”

“I’m sorry, but who are you…?” The official, whose name tag read Simsom, and he was apparently some sort of passenger affairs manager, turned toward Gastón. As soon as he saw him, his face flushed at least three shades of purple and blue. 

Good. The effect had already been achieved.

“Hi.” Gastón continued. “Gastón, Perida. I think you know my dad, or actually I know that you do.”

“Uh… I’m sorry, but…” The official staggered something. 

“I don’t care, honestly.” Gastón interrupted him. “I can tell you though, that my father, Marco Perida—but you know that—won’t appreciate one bit that you are over here questioning the official document that he and his wife have signed about Luna, their daughter. Nor will he like that you’re wasting our time, making us miss our flight.”

Gastón knew that everyone, from the guards and the official to Luna and the team, were staring at him, but he did not care. 

“I—I am so sorry…” The official staggered again, now flushed completely pale. “We had no idea… This…this has been a huge misunderstanding and I apologize profusely.”

“You better,” Gastón nodded, “We need to get going.”

“Of course, of course,” It was a good thing that the official didn’t bow. “I am sorry. Please have a pleasant journey.”

“Come on,” Gastón grabbed Luna—who had been staring with a confused expression the whole time the exchange had gone on—by the arm and started walking away.

“What was that?” Luna stopped on her tracks.

“Honestly I don't know either.” Gastón shook his head, “Dad has always said that people working here are a bunch of idiot snobs. They still would never risk destroying their reputation to their boss—”

“What are you talking about?” Luna still seemed really confused. “How did you come up with that?”

“With what?” Now it was Gastón’s turn to be confused for a sec…before he realized. “Dad’s part of the administrator board of this airport.”

“What? You weren’t bluffing?”

“Has that seriously never come up?” 

“No,” Luna shook her head, “I thought he did something with finance. ”

“Oh, he does. Mom and Dad both work like a trillion different jobs, for other people and their own companies, individually and together. I stopped keeping track a long time ago.” 

“Okay…” Luna stared blankly as they kept walking. 

“Luna! You okay?” Simon reached them. 

“Yeah, I’m fine.” Luna nodded before she hugged Gastón, “Thank you.”

“I never thought I would get to see you pull “Do you know who I am?” at someone.” Matteo laughed as he patted Gastón on the back. “But that…was worth it.” 

“My intention was never to do that, but we can’t miss our flight.” He shook his head, “But I had no choice. We look out for our family.”

“That was very good thinking.” Nina also hugged him.

“Well, now I need to write a very lengthy text to Mom and Dad about this before we board,” Gastón sighed, “So they don’t think our house is bugged or something.” 

“Okay, everyone!!!” Juliana demanded everyone's attention. “Now that all the excitement is over, can we form a neat line so we can start boarding.”

Everyone lined up at the gate. Gastón stayed at the end of it, because he needed time to type some sort of an explanation to his parents before taking off. If they heard about this and he was unreachable, they would get worried sick. 

“I am not sure what you did, but thank you,” Juliana appeared on his side. 

“They can question official papers, but they can’t question my face,” He looked at her, “I look like my dad, a lot. Our last name is not exactly common, I think we are the only ones who have it. We couldn’t possibly go and win the Roda Fest without our captain.” 

***

Luna was floating in the air. It was almost like she was in the middle of space. 

“Sun will always come out.” It was the same voice that had been in her dreams before. “You know the way. Follow the path…”

“But what is the path?” Luna asked, even though she didn’t know from whom. 

There was no answer. 

Suddenly a moon, that looked exactly like her necklace, appeared in front of her. Then something golden flew past her and settled in the middle of the moon’s crescent. It was a bright sun. 

“Your answer is in front of you, you just need to find it. It is near, it is far. The sun will show you the truth”. 

“Luna, Luna!!!” Luna shook awake from Simon’s voice. 

“What?” She blinked a few times to get her eyes accustomed to the bright lights inside the airplane cabin. 

“We are landing soon.” Simon explained from next to her. “You were pretty dead asleep.”

“Oh yeah,” Luna tugged on the end of her braid. Her hair was on two pigtails—Isla had said it was more practical for long journeys. “I guess I fell asleep.”

“You okay?” Simon asked, looking at her a little more concerned, “You were tossing and mumbling something.”

“I just had a weird dream.” Luna shook her head, “I don’t understand.”

“What was it about?” Simon asked while tapping Nina, who was sitting on front of him, on the shoulder. 

“It was super weird.” Luna continued. “I was like in space, and all the sudden there was a moon in front of me and in the middle of it was a sun.”

“So, like your necklace?” Nina questioned. 

“Yeah,” Luna nodded, “but like that was not the weird part. There was some voice, a woman…she sounded like familiar, but I can’t figure out from where. She said that I have to follow a path and that the sun will show me the truth. I don’t get what that means.”

“Well, maybe I do,” Nina continued, “You said that the sun appeared with the moon and there should be a sun charm in your necklace as well. It is about your biological family. You are the moon and the sun represents them.”

“Oh yeah, that makes sense…” Luna pondered, “So they have something with a sun?”

“Well, that doesn’t help us a lot,” Simon laughed, “Unless there is a family somewhere called the Sunshines. Luna, I know this is really important to you, but I don’t think there is a lot we can do about it right now.”

“I agree with Simon,” Nina nodded. “You need to focus on the competition, enjoy Cancun and have fun. Luna, you out of everyone, with everything you’ve been through. You deserve a vacation. We’ll look really into this when we get back, I promise.”

“Thank you,” Luna smiled, “You’re right. I just wish I could just record my dreams and show you, like create a video or something. So, we could rewind and everything.”

“It would be useful.”

***

“Okay. After you have checked yourself off the list, all of you can go check-in independently and you’ll be given your keys. Luna, Nina, Jim and Yam, you need to come with me.” Juliana spoke as the team had gathered in the lobby of the hotel. “Otherwise, we will go visit the rink today at 7 pm, otherwise today is free. Always tell me if you leave the hotel.”

“Okay,” Gastón said while taking the two keycards from the check-in desk. He turned toward Matteo, “Don’t lose this.”

“Hermano, since when have I been losing keys?” Matteo rolled his eyes at him. 

“I don’t know, you’ve kind of been prone to making stupid decisions lately,” Gastón shook his head. 

“Just give me a key.” Matteo huffed, “Matteo Balsano doesn’t lose things.”

“Oh, you wanna bet?” They heard laughter coming from behind them. Luna and Nina appeared on their side. “Chico Fresa surely has lost something.”

“I swear, never.” Matteo rolled his eyes. 

“I don’t think we have time to have this argument.” Nina and Gastón shared a look. “Where is your room?”

“The hallway B,” Gastón looked at the keycard. ‘

“Ours too.” Nina responded. “I think we’re the only ones there.”

“That is convenient, in an extremely nice way…” Gastón grabbed her hand. 

“And I don’t want any shenanigans!” Juliana’s voice boomed again, “Everyone needs to sleep in their own beds.” 

“And that was convenient in a very awkward way,” Matteo remarked, and then looked at his best friend. “Should we go up?”

“Luna, we need to drop our stuff really quickly, because we need to get going.” Simon showed up next to Luna. 

“Where are you going?” Gastón asked. 

“Oh, Juliana asked us to represent the Roller Team in an interview,” Luna explained, “Which is…very soon! We really do need to get going!”

“Try to keep out of trouble,” Gastón remarked jokingly, “I can’t really pull that airport stunt here again, to get you out.”

“I’ll try, but no promises.” Luna laughed, “But you know me.”

“Yep, sometimes unavoidable. At least remember to keep your phone on.”

“Yep, I will!!” Luna waved when she disappeared with Simon. 

“I’ll go drop my stuff off as well,” Nina squeezed Gastón’s hand, “See you later.”

“Yeah, let's go grab something to eat before we head to the rink.” Gastón kissed her on her forehead before Nina started following Luna toward their room. 

“So, I think we are gonna need a signal,” Matteo remarked as he dropped his suitcase on the bed in their room. 

“What are you talking about?” Gastón looked at him confused. 

“Well, a signal for when you want me out of here,” Matteo rolled his eyes. “I am not stupid, nor do I plan on standing in the way of you and Nina. I am not a cockblock and I don’t want to walk into anything. So, text me one of those Scandinavian letters?”

“That will take way too long,” Gastón shook his head, “The # would be easier.”

“Works for me, as long as I don’t need to walk into anything.” 

“You are always terrible to have this conversation—” Gastón started, but suddenly his phone rang. 

“Darling,” His parents showed up on the screen in the video call. “We caught you. We tried to approximate when your flight would have landed.”

“Yeah, we landed about an hour ago,” Gastón responded, “At the hotel now… You got my text?”

“We did,” his dad sighed. “I can’t believe it.”

“Us neither, and we were there.” Matteo remarked from behind Gastón.

“What happened?” He asked. “Did you figure it out?”

“Well,” Marco continued, shaking his head. Gastón watched his mother place her hand on his father’s nape, stroking her thumb in a soothing circular motion, like she always did when he was getting overwhelmed. “Apparently, there had been an anonymous tip the day before about an unaccompanied minor trying to travel out of the country without the appropriate permissions. It is absolutely ridiculous. The anonymous complaints need to always be taken with a grain of salt—unless it is a bomb threat—because anyone can make them. The personnel should know better. I’ve had some heavy words with Simsom and the whole department, although the head of that, Servane, is the worst, so I don’t wonder one bit why the personnel don’t know the policies.”

“But why was Luna identified out of everyone?”

“The tip was apparently about a teenage girl with brown hair.” 

“That must apply to like a thousand people in the airport alone.” Matteo questioned, “That makes zero sense.”

“Yep,” Gastón nodded, “By that criteria, Nina could have been tagged.”

“Or Delfi,” Matteo suggested while sitting next to Gastón, so he saw the call better, “which would have probably been the best option. She could have just proved them wrong, because she is not a minor.” 

“It is extremely hard to investigate where the intelligence for that even came from,” Marco started saying, “Especially as this is personal for me, it can’t be argued that looking into it would benefit the company, even if I think that it would.” 

“Well, the important thing is that you got there safely in the end.” Isla spoke.

“We did in the end, but it was close that Luna missed the flight.”

“He was a hero though.” Matteo grabbed Gastón on the shoulders. 

“I don’t know about that.” Gastón shook his head, before looking at his parents again. “It was the only thing that came into my mind that would solve it. The Simsom guy knows that you have a child now… So sorry about that.”

“It’s okay.” Isla nodded, “You did the right thing, and you're not exactly a child anymore. We have to get used to the fact that you don’t need as much protection.”

“I did tell Simsom that he better not go to any tabloids if he wants to keep his job.” Marco pointed out. 

“That is something I can agree with.” Gastón nodded, “Have you talked to Luna?”

“Not yet. We wanted to talk to you first. We’ll call her next.”

“You probably won’t be able to reach her for a while. Juliana asked her and Simon to do some interview.”

“We’ll ask her when she can talk. It was good to hear that you’re okay.”

“Yeah, I’m totally fine.” Gastón responded. 

“So, how can I get your parents to adopt me?” Matteo asked jokingly after the call ended. “I am getting even more jealous now.”

“Get your parents arrested.” Gastón suggested, “Although, it is too late for you.”

“You think I didn’t try to invent a hundred ways to get Dad arrested when we first moved here,” Matteo answered laughing. “I never succeeded.”

“How sad,” Gastón rolled his eyes, “This honestly shouldn’t be funny.”

“I know.” Matteo nodded, “I wish I could do something for Luna.”

“But there really isn’t anything,” Gaston shook his head, “Mom and Dad don’t tell me all the details either, but the courts drag during the summer even more. I think that Alexei is maybe trying to find a way to disprove the case’s existence entirely, but I don’t know. Only thing we can do is to support her… What is going on with you and Luna anymore? You don’t talk about her that much anymore.”

“I still love her, but she’s made it extremely clear on where we stand.” Matteo sighed, “She’s right… I’ve messed up pretty badly, and this isn’t the time to be selfish. I need to support her as a friend and maybe someday she’ll give me a chance again.”

“Is this self-reflection from Matteo Balsano?” Gastón looked at his friend amused. 

“I guess so,” Matteo smirked, “I guess, I need to be happy with what I got, her friendship. At least we get along well enough that we can handle the maid of honor and best man duties like the pros that we are, so you and Nina don’t need to worry about that.”

“What are you talking about?” Gastón raised an eyebrow. 

“You know what,” Matteo looked at him. “I don’t have any faith that you can hold on longer than maybe a few years at this point. Don’t tell you haven’t thought about it?”

“Of course I have.” Gastón smiled, “In a couple years. Nina needs to graduate, and I need to get out of my parents’ place…”

“You know we could go scour some jewelry stores while being here.” Matteo jokingly suggested. 

“You know Maria would kill me for it.” Gastón threw at Matteo with a pillow. “But back to you and Luna and the topic at hand… Maybe that’s for the best right now. I mean, If the worst happens, you wouldn’t be able to ask her hand from her dad as it is… Someone someday might need to ask my dad, but I don’t know. It’s gonna be Luna’s choice.

***

“We are so happy to be back in Cancun and we are ready for the competition.” Luna said to the microphone that the interviewer was holding for her. 

“We are gonna beat the Sliders,” Simon nodded, “but don’t tell them that.”

“Well, thank you guys.” The interviewer smiled after the camera had been shut off. “We will see you at the rink.”

“That was awesome!” Luna jumped into the air. “Okay, what do we do next? Beach? Tacos?”

“Both actually,” Simon grabbed her hand. “Mom texted me after we had just landed. We are “politely” forced to come for dinner.”

“OMG!!!” Luna looked at him, “Why didn't you say sooner?” 

“It was supposed to be a surprise.” Simon started pulling Luna along. “We are not in a hurry, so let's walk by the beach.”

“I have missed these views,” Luna sighed as she and Simon walked along the ocean shoreline of Cancun. “It’s beautiful.” Luna raised her phone up and snapped a few pictures, before starting to type some sort of message. 

“Who are you sending those to?” Simon asked, confused, because surely Luna wasn't able to send those to her parents, but it looked like she was writing a text message to some sort of group chat.

“Oh, Isla and Marco told me that they’ve never been to Cancun.” Luna raised her head from her phone. “So, I’m sending them pictures.”

“You text?” Simon looked at Luna’s phone, as she showed him the group chat. “Waiiiitt…what has happened to your phone? This is bigger…”

“Did I not tell you?” Luna scrunched her eyebrows, “Or did I only tell Nina? Mine stopped working and Marco though it was smoke damage—”

“They bought you a new phone?” Simon questioned while looking at the phone.

“I mean yeah.” Luna shrugged, “They said that I can’t just not have one that doesn’t work. What about it?”

“Nothing honestly…notes are expensive though.” Simon sighed, “It makes sense. I just didn’t realize you were that close, with them—Gastón’s parents, I mean.” 

“I don’t really get what you mean?” Luna looked at him a little confused. “I live with them… By the way, I probably never told you that they play the piano, both of them. They’re really good too.”

“Can we stop for a moment?” Simon stopped in front of a wooden dock.

“Oh, sure.” Luna nodded and sat down on the dock. “What’s up?”

“We just haven’t talked, just the two of us, in a while.” Simon sat down next to Luna, “You’ve seemed really happy lately. Obviously, since stuff has been really going down… I just don’t want you to feel like you need to pretend, when you don’t, not with me.”

“I know that I don’t and I am not pretending.” Luna looked up at him. “The thing is that… I have been happy. I mean, I miss Mom and Dad every day and I wish they’d be here cheering me on and that I could talk to them about how excited I am about this competition right now, instead of waiting on the hour on the phone or a meeting in a small room where I can’t even hug them…and I am so mad that they are being held against their will…but… I have to hope that everything will be okay, and the truth will always come out. I guess, besides that, I can’t stop living my life. I have to do that, for Mom and Dad and for myself. I guess I’m kind of in a good place. Isla and Marco, they’re really nice and they care about me. They have been really good to me, even since we got to that house.”

“I—I see that,” Simon nodded, “You know that, when you’re happy, I’m happy. It just seems such a different life, with these fancy people.”

“Fancy?” Luna started laughing. “Simon please, they aren’t fancy.”

Simon was about to say something when his phone rang. 

“Simon!!” A voice came from the phone. “Where are you?”

“Oh, sorry Mom.” Simon responded to the phone. “We are on our way.”

“Hi Carla!!” Luna yelled on the phone. 

“Get here! Food’s done soon.”

“We need to get going before Mom blows a casket.” Simon laughed and got up from the dock. 

“Simon!” Maria and Rika, Simon’s younger twin sisters ran to hug him as soon as he and Luna walked to the yard of Simon’s family house. 

“Hey!!” Simon hugged them. “I missed you.”

“Your fault because you ran off to Argentina.”

“Girls,” Simon’s sisters were shooed away by his father and mother, Diego and Carla Alvarez, “Let him breathe. Good to see you son.”

“Hi!” Simon hugged his father and his mother at the same time.

“It’s so good to see you,” Carled eyed his beanie, “Remember that no hats in the dinner table.”

“Yeah, sure.” Simon rolled his eyes affectionately.

“Luna!” Carla turned around and Luna was pulled into a crushing hug that only Simon’s mom could give. “So nice to see you as well. Now come in, you must be starving.” 

“Where is everyone?” Simon asked as they walked into the house. 

“Both Julio and Rico are out with friends.” Diego explained, “Apparently they forgot that you were coming today.”

“Of course they did.” Simon shook his head laughing. 

“They will be coming to the competition,” Carla noted, “We’ll make sure of that. But now we can talk in peace, so there is good in everything. Surely there are a lot of things you have to tell us.”

“Yeeeepp…” Simon said while glancing at Luna. 

“...and that’s how we convinced Juliana to take us back as the team.” Luna finished telling the story and dunked the glass of orange juice down her throat. 

“Then she made us work like slaves, but here we are.” Simon added. “Still working our butts off.”

“You don’t gain victory with no sweat,” Diego pointed out. “How’s the job?”

“I haven't gotten fired if that’s what you're asking, so I have improved from my last job.” Simon remarked, “We’re doing fine.” 

“That is good to hear,” Carla nodded, “We never know if what you tell over the phone is actually what is happening, knowing you.”

“Simon has been doing extremely well,” Luna nodded, “The Roller Band will be the hottest thing on this side of the Ocean.”

“It was great that you could come here too Luna—” Carla and Diego exchanged some sort of a look with each other “—because there has been something we’ve been wondering about.”

“Oh,” Luna looked at them, “What is it?”

“Honestly, it could be nothing,” Carla continued, “but it has kind of been strange how we’ve been absolutely unable to reach your parents lately. I’ve been trying to call Monica multiple times, but everything goes unanswered. Trying not to get too worried here, so has their contact information changed?”

“Uh…” Luna opened her mouth, but no words came out. 

“You don’t have to tell them.” Simon placed a hand on her shoulder. 

“Tell us what?” Carla and Diego looked really worried now. 

“It’s okay,” Luna shook her head and looked at Simon’s parents again. “It’s really complicated and really hard to explain.” 

“Start from the beginning.”

“Okay, well…” Luna started. “Uh, Mom and Dad got fired during the fall.”

“Fired?” Diego questioned, “You mean by the lady who owns the mansion here?”

“Yes, Senora Sharon” Luna nodded, “It was super unfair…”

“But they found new employment?” Carla asked on her turn. 

“Yeah, they did.” Luna continued. “It was actually quite funny—”

“Funny?”

“The funny part is that Monica and Miguels new employers’ son had been our friend for the past year and is in the team and everything,” Simon explained, “but no one had any idea about it.”

“Oh okay.” Simon’s parents nodded. “So are your parents under some sort of NDA, or their job is so confidential that they aren’t allowed to talk to people in different countries?”

“Oh no, they’re in jail.” 

“WHAT?!?!”

“I don’t think this was the best way to relay the news.” Simon whispered to Luna as they watched his parents' flabbergasted faces.

“You!” Carla turned toward Simon, “Simon, you should have told us!”

“This hasn’t been my thing to share, Mom.” 

“Okay, we understand that, but this is serious. What is going on? Why have Monica and Miguel been arrested?” 

“Well, you see,” Luna started, “Senora Sharon—”

“Their former employer?”

“Yes, her. She’s accusing them of something they haven’t done, but I guess it is not that easily disproved so… They’re in jail.”

“But…but…” Diego and Carla still looked confused. “This is serious. Luna, are you okay? What are you…? Are you safe and being fed? Who is looking after you? Don’t say you’ve been staying with Simon.”

“Hey!” Simon protested. 

“We really need to have a conversation about your living situation,” Carla looked at her son sharply. “Other time. Luna, this is serious. We need to contact the authorities if there isn’t someone taking care of you.”

“Oh, no no no,” Luna shook her head, “I am being taken care of.” 

“By whom?” 

“After Mom and Dad got arrested, their employers defended them and they signed some paper or something so I could stay with them. There was no one else who could have really done that.”

“The new employers of Monica and Miguel are your legal guardians?” Diego asked, “That is…little unusual. Have you been treated well?” 

“Yeah, absolutely.” Luna nodded. “They’re really nice and like we said, their son is literally in our team and my best friend's boyfriend. I had just never met his parents before the fall.”

Carla sighed in some sort of relief. “What are their names?”

“Isla and Marco Perida.”

When Luna had said that, Simon’s dad seemed to almost choke on his coffee. 

“Diego, what is it?” Carla turned to him confused. 

“Nothing, I’m okay. I think I just heard wrong.” Diego shook his head. “You didn’t say Perida, did you?”

“I did…” Luna repeated the names. 

“What are you talking about?” Carla looked at her husband confused. “Do you know them?”

“Of them.” Diego nodded. “Whenever me and my partners have talked about that Argentina expansion pipe dream for the restaurant, the advice we have gotten is that if you get in the favor of Marco Perida, you are gonna be set investment wise, but that’s impossible because he is busy and hard to reach. He and his wife are regarded as quite of icons in the business and real estate world of Argentina. Simon, what sort of circles have you ended up in?”

“I ask that of myself every day.” Simon shook his head laughing, “Trust me, Dad.”

“Well, Monica and Miguel are more than reputable as workers to attract millionaires like that to require their services.” Carla noted. “I would love to say that we are “happy for you”, but this still isn’t a great situation, but it is good to hear that you are safe. This is very gracious of them. Could you give us their phone numbers, so we could maybe talk to them. They could tell us more about the situation.”

“Uhm.” Luna hesitated for a moment. “I mean, I think it is a good idea, but I’m not sure…”

***

“Has anyone seen my lip gloss?” Jim dashed around the dressing room. 

There was approximately 30 minutes till the competition was to begin, so there was complete chaos in the midst of the Team of Jam & Roller. 

“It always surprises me that we actually always make it on the rink on time,” Gastón laughed. 

“We just have the talent.” Matteo shrugged as he slung his skates on his shoulder. “That’s if Juliana actually lets us get on the rink…there is still time.”

“She’s warmed up to us.” Gastón patted him on the back. 

“Hey!” Nina walked into the dressing room and straight to Gastón. “I was just heading to the audience but wanted to talk to you first.”

“Okay, sure.” He nodded. Nina grabbed his hand and pulled him away from the others, close to the door. 

And without saying anything, she kissed him. “For luck.”

“That was for luck?” Gastón smiled at her and pulled her closer and kissed her again, this time longer. “I think I need some more of that.”

“You’re gonna do just fine.” Nina continued, “You have all worked so hard for this. You especially—” She ran her fingers over his right forearm. The only sign of the burn was some discoloration and wrinkles on the skin. “—given what sort of condition you were two months ago.”

“Thank you. You have no idea how much that means to me to hear you say that.”

“Gastón!!!” Suddenly Jazmin appeared next to them. “Come on. We need to get that horror thing on your forehead covered up.”

“Do your worst.” Gastón grimaced slightly and let Jazmin drag him away while Nina laughed. 

“Nina! Good thing you’re here.” Luna suddenly appeared next to her. “I need your help!!” 

“Okay, with what?” She looked at her. “I’m not gonna be any help with makeup, but if you need me to hold bobby pins or something, I can do that.” 

“No, this has nothing to do with the competition.” Luna said, and started whispering to Nina’s ear. 

“Oh, okay.” Nina nodded, “But, Luna, you could have asked that of him yourself days ago.”

“But they want to meet him.” Luna responded.

“But you still could have given him a heads up—” Nina countered, “—and get the answer beforehand.”

“Now that you’re saying it like that it makes sense,” Luna rolled her eyes, “But you know me. I can barely keep my head together as it is.”

“Okay, of course I’ll help, if that’s what you want.” Nina continued, “But seriously Luna, you can just talk to him, instead of making things this complicated. He’s basically your brother…something I never thought I’d say, but it sounds pretty nice.”

“I know.” Luna laughed again, “but I am Luna Valente and I complicate things.”

***

“Uuuff!” Ambar let the laces of her skates fall on the floor. What did her skates have against her today, because tying them had proved to be extremely difficult all the sudden. Reason for which she had no idea, because she knew how to tie the freaking skates. 

“Ambar? Everything okay?” Simon suddenly sat next to her at the couch. 

“Yes.” Ambar sighed again, “These stupid laces are refusing to cooperate.”

“Your left one is stuck on the wheel.”

“How did I not notice that?” Ambar shook her head about, “No wonder it was too short.”

“Here.” Simon pulled the lace from behind Ambar’s skate’s wheel and handed it to her. 

“Thanks.” Ambar smiled at him. 

“How have you liked Cancun?” Simon continued asking. “Did you ever go see that place you asked about?”

“Not yet.” She shook her head. “I will, after we win. Can you draw me a map or something so I can find it? Or come and show me?”

“Maybe…” Simon pondered.

“You know Simon, has something been bothering you lately?” Ambar decided to ask him… Not for any particular reason, but because he was her skating partner and if he was performing poorly, she would perform poorly. “You’ve been a little unfocused lately, and in 15 minutes, I need you sharp.”

“I’m good.” Simon nodded, “Just been worried about Luna.”

“She has plenty of people to worry about her,” Ambar responded, “Let Nina and Gastón…and I guess Matteo as well—I have zero idea what is going on with that honestly—do that for a while. You live for yourself for a while, like celebrating our victory in the evening.”

***

The Roller Team lost the RodaFest, because of course they did. There is no reason why this author would go and change that.

***

“Seriously, it had to be rigged or something.” Matteo complained as he and Gastón were taking their skates off.

They had lost the Roda Fest, so everyone was feeling really down at the moment. 

“This sucks.” Gastón shook his head as well, “We worked so hard.”

“Hey! I need you for a sec.” Nina suddenly walked into the dressing room again and addressed Gastón. 

“Okay…” Matteo made a few faces. “I know that we are all devastated, but like I have zero intentions to keep out of our room tonight so…”

“No, nothing…like that—” Nina looked at him with some sort of flush of disbelief and embarrassment.”—I just need to talk to him.”

“Sure.” Matteo rolled his eyes a little bit. 

“Ignore him.” Gastón got up. “What is it?”

“Come on.” Nina grabbed his hand and started pulling him along, down the hallway of the competition venue. 

“Hey! Wait!” Gastón tried to protest. “What are you doing here?”

“I’m doing a favor here. There are people who you should meet.”

“To who? And who?” Gastón was getting very confused. The confusion was not cleared up when Nina ended up pulling him into the lobby where Luna was apparently waiting for them with two people who Gastón had never seen in his life. A man and a woman probably in their 50s—they looked about 10 to 15 years older than his own parents. Simon was also there, looking kind of awkward. “Uh, hi?”

“Thanks Nina.” Luna was the first one to speak. 

“Let me guess, Luna was the one that the “favor” was for.” Gastón looked at Nina again, before looking at Luna. “What’s going on and why did my girlfriend have to drag me here?”

“We asked if we could meet you.” The woman started speaking.

“Me?” Gastón was still confused. “Okay, first of all, who are you?”

“Oh, right,” Luna seemed to pipe up, “These are Carla and Diego Alvarez.”

“Okay…” Gastón looked at them again before looking at Simon. He should have realized it sooner. “Your parents right? We should really be aware of the names of each other's parents at this point, it would really save us a lot of confusion.”

Simon just nodded. 

“Luna has told us about the situation with her parents.” The man, whose name apparently was Diego, said. “Monica and Miguel have been close friends of ours for years. Apparently, it is your parents who are looking after Luna now.”

“Yeah, that’s the case.” Gastón nodded, “They were their employers. It is a terrible situation. Uh, but like, I don’t know that much more about it than anyone else. I’m only 18, so Mom and Dad don’t exactly tell me everything or treat me as an adult yet.”

“We were wondering if they’d be willing to speak with us, but Isla and Marco Perida are probably pretty hard to reach.”

“Let me guess, you know who they are.” Gastón sighed slightly. “Of course you do. Who doesn’t? But yeah, they are hard to reach—”

“I wasn’t sure if I was allowed to give their personal phone numbers.” Luna mentioned, “Because like, aren’t those secret or something?”

“Yeah, they’re like operator protected.” Gastón clarified. “If they were public, they’d never get any peace. Mom and Dad can barely part with their handsfrees as it is. But for this sort of situation, I don’t see an issue. I know that they’d be more than happy to speak with anyone from Luna’s life… Nina, do you have paper?”

“Yeah, I do.” Nina pulled a page out of her notebook. 

“Thanks,” Gastón took it and started writing on it. “I can give you the phone numbers, but there is no guarantee that they will ever respond… So, here’s also their private emails that’s actually their preferred way of communication with people they don’t know.”

***

Luna followed Gastón as he opened the door to the house. No one had been able to pick them up, Luna was not sure how this exactly had worked, but Marco had arranged a car for them at the airport which Gastón had driven back. 

“You’re back?” Isla came to meet them as soon as they walked into the living room. 

“Were you in a meeting?” Gastón asked and Luna noticed too that Isla was wearing her earpiece. 

“In between two calls, so your timing was perfect.” She quickly hugged her son. “Don’t have that much time to talk though, so you can tell me everything in the evening.” 

“Okay.” Gastón just nodded and started dragging his suitcase upstairs. 

“Wait a moment,” Luna was about to do the same when Isla stopped her. 

“What?” 

“Gastón told us, when we spoke on the phone a few days ago, about… They were parents of that friends of yours right?” 

“Carla and Diego, yeah.” Luna nodded, “I told them about what has happened.”

“Thats what he said.”

“I hope it was okay that we gav—”

“Of course it was.” Isla smiled. “You could have just asked about that directly too.”

“Yeah, I know, but it just didn’t come to my mind then.” Luna laughed, “Oh, I almost forgot!” She pulled a letter from her bag that Carla had given her the day before they had left Cancun. “They wanted me to give you this.” 

“Okay,” Isla looked at the letter before glancing at her phone quickly, “You know what, is it okay if I won’t look at it now? Marco is in a seminar the whole evening, giving it to be precise, and I have at least two more calls I need to make today and one launch plan to review. How about you go and leave it in our room, we’ll look at it together later?”

“Yeah, that works.” Luna nodded, “In your room?”

“Not saying not would get lost, but there are a million papers all over the office right now, so let's not take our chances.” Isla responded. “Leave it on a nightstand for example.”

“Sure,” Luna nodded again before looking up toward the stairs, “You room was…?”

“You don’t know where it is?”

“This house is a maze.”

“It kind of is. Upstairs, the double doors. You’ll know it when you see it.”

“There are two upstairs in this house,” Luna kept pondering. 

“That is true too,” Isla laughed, “the second floor, not the highest. You got it?”

“Yeah. I think so.” Luna nodded and started climbing the stairs.

She looked around on the middle floor. Honestly, she hadn’t spent much time on the upstairs of this house, even though she had lived here for almost a year. Nina had said that the highest floor had like three bedrooms, but there probably were rooms on other floors as well. 

Isla had been right, Luna spotted the double doors on the other side of the hall, really quickly. The doors opened up to a giant room, with more of those big windows. The view opened up to the small forest behind the house. 

Luna walked in headed toward the bed to leave the letter on the nightstand when some picture frames on a chest of drawers drew her attention. Concrete pictures shouldn’t be that surprising anymore, it was clearly this family’s thing.

Luna walked closer and looked at the pictures. Two of them were of Gastón in various ages, Matteo featured in one of them…again. The third picture was a one that clearly was from Isla and Marco’s wedding. 

The fourth picture was the one that had drawn Luna’s attention. It had golden frames and in that one Isla and Marco looked really young, so it was probably from the time they had started dating. The picture was really cute…

Luna wasn’t the most detail-oriented person in the world, but this detail in the photo really drew her eye. There was an image of a sun drawn by black ink on Isla’s left wrist. Luna had never realized that she had a tattoo, but maybe it had just been covered by a watch or a bracelet since she wore a lot of those. 

“The sun will show you the truth.” The voice from Luna’s dream echoed in her mind suddenly, while she kept staring at the picture. 

Luna shook her head and placed the envelope that held Carla’s letter next to the picture frames. 

As she closed the door and walked back into the hall, she looked out of the window. The actual sun had come out from behind the clouds. 

If she wasn’t kind of feeling weird enough as it was, suddenly she noticed a golden glimmer shining from the middle of the carpet. Luna walked closer, and noticed that what was reflecting the light was a ring.

Luna held the golden ring, that got thicker in the middle, in her hand. She had seen ones like it in history class; they were called “signet” rings that were used to stamp wax seals in old times. 

There was only one person who this could belong to, and… What was even stranger was the fact that the design on top of the ring was another sun.

Could this truly be a coincidence anymore?

{}

Well, well, well... It though it would be a time for some good fashion cliffhanger again, because who doesn't love those. Coincedence? I think—yeah, yes, it actually is. This is not a spoiler, because we know what all the sun imagenery actually is standing for (that Luna is Sol), but Luna doesn't know that. So she comes to her own conclusions, which are... You really though I'd tell you? Nooo, way too early for that. That's what the cliffhanger is for. Leave your interpretations on what Luna is thinking right now in the comments. Also, if you are thinking right now how convinient the ring thing is and how I just came up with it in the fly, I did not. The golden signet ring that has a sun on it and it's accopanying lore has existed since December 2022 (You can go read Christmas is the time for joy and unexpected events for the extended lore). Same thing applies to the whole airport thing, because how has that not come up? Gastón's dad being an Airport Administrator was first brough up in 2021 (Chapter 13: Back Together of Memories of Time) in the same time as when Marco Perida was first brough up by name, so I didn't just make it up for the bit. All paths are coming together now. Okay, what else? Simon's parent finally got to be involved with plot, because I genuingly feel so bad for them on canon, because Simon probably doesn't tell them anything. Actually, Nina was originally supposed to be part of that scene where they go visit and she was supposed to be the one to point out for Luna that she might not be able to give out the phone number. I cut her out of the scene, because I just couldn't get it to flow right with her there. And I thought, I should give Luna some credit and have her herself realize that she wasn't sure if she was allowed to give out private information of two millionaires very much in public eye. It goes to show that Isla and Marco have become important to Luna, and she cares about them and values thier privacy enough to stop and think before acting, even if SHE trusts Simon's parents. I think I promised in the last A/N that we'd talk about Simon later, so lets talk about Simon shall we, because you probably have noticed that he hasn't seemed all that jazzed about the situation with Luna and Gastón's parents. Well, the thing is that Simon is a honest to good working class boy who has never been in a personal level with any millionares and I guess has some hard time seeing them as people he can trust, because he doesn't know them and is maybe having little hard time getting past of this preconcieved notion over what kind of people whealty white collar people are. He hasn't been excatly sitting down to eat dinner with them. So it is kind of odd from him that Luna is basically part of their family now, or is as far as the Peridas are concerned, because to him is such a different world that Luna kind if now belongs to. And maybe it also is a little bit of a harder pill to swallow, because after their failed pseudo romance Simon has been this borther figure for Luna, but she basically now has a legally appointed older brother in Gastón now and he is able to look out for her in ways Simon can't do. This is not to say that there is something wrong with Simon for feeling like this, this is just an unothodox situation.m In end he just loves Luna and wants the best for her. He just is unable to see that this is the best for her, because it is such a different world. Obviously, the best for Luna would be her own parents (nothing about this fic is supposed to be slander Monica and Miguel or thgem as Luna's parents), we can't have that at the moment. Obviously, Simon is the most untoxic person ever, and this won't change that, but I sometimes feel like Simon isn't that nuanced. He's just a good boy, which we love to see, but when it comes to conflicts, they're always about someone else: Daniela, Matteo, Ambar. It is never about just him, so here is some internal cionflict for our boy. Also, I feel like this is pretty good base for some Simbar, in a way that maybe they can help each other.

[bonefall]

Looking into a lot of plant species/fruits/any edible things for a cat group to eat for a non wc project and I was wondering how you go about searching for all the information you scrape up? Trying to find good sources while also not spending days on research is trouble for me atm

Especially for the ovens thing that a sentient cat species can realistically make. Did that come form just researching a ton of early ovens/cooking tools and finding what ones could cats realistically make themselves?

Unfortunately, my research does take me several hours over many days. One of the reasons I decided these guides would be free for all to use, is exactly in the hopes that I can help prevent others from falling down the "research rabbit hole" like I always do, so they can spend more time creating

General Flora and Fauna

But when it comes to good sources on flora and fauna, I narrowed myself down to a loose geographical area and I look for field guides and surveys in that space. Anything produced for Northern Wales, the Western Midlands, and Northwestern England can become a treasure trove of information for me.

The Mersey Forest network is really helpful specifically, they do a lot of work restoring English forests and I learn a lot of really interesting things about forest health from them

Working Backwards; Plants

There's also times I start with a spice, or chemical in mind and work backwards. I had a much longer list of HRT herbs but then cut it down by literally checking them off a list when they couldn't grow in the right environment. I don't have the notes anymore, but I remember clearly that Saw Palmetto was on that list. Then from there I simply google "Is X Safe For Cats?" and if it gives me a "NO! Upset belly :(" result, I try to isolate the specific chemical to see if it's deadly toxic or just a plant.

Cool example of that is potatoes. Mashed potatoes are actually fine for a cat to eat, but raw potatoes are deadly because they contain solanine, which has to be cooked to be neutralized. Yeast, also. Raw yeast will kill a cat, but the baking process kills yeast when cooking. This is why I decided if I ever use baked goods, it will be with unleavened dough. Peonies got axxed for any medicine ever because of the chemical paeonol.

Technology; Bushcraft

This actually takes the most time of anything, because it's quite intensive. Epilepsy so far has taken me the longest time because I, admittedly, knew a lot less about epilepsy than I thought I did, and realized that while writing the guide and took extra time to educate myself... but when something like that doesn't happen? Bushcraft takes the longest.

That's because things that seem simple are actually quite complicated, and I try to understand the process behind something before I adapt it to cat paws.

You may have noticed I keep mentioning flax but haven't made its entry yet, and this is why. I literally learned how to process flax from scratch; and every time I hit a tool that was too advanced for cats, I asked, "Is there a simpler way to do this?"

As an example, there's a step in flax processing where you soften the grass into a workable fiber, and it uses a tool called a Flax Break like this,

And, personally, I think that's a bit too advanced for the vibe I'm going for. So I said to myself, "Ok that's super-duper but CAN I just smash it with a rock"

So I dug deeper and tried to find someone who processed some flax from scratch, you know, like, just in their backyard or something. Went through some blogs and youtube channels focused on neolithic reconstructions of flax processing, and finally, I DID find a person who just. Beat the flax with a hammer, and was still able to scutch+heckle+spin the flax into linen.

But anyway, this process is actually why I'm so reluctant to cite sources in the posts... I already spend days, unpaid, doing this research and it's fun and I really enjoy it, but I can't also vet the social media of every Robert "I Live In The Woods" McGee to make sure they aren't a whackadoodle who thinks the Earth is flat before linking to one part of their blog in a tumblr post. And, knowing bushcrafters, it is probably a fair amount of them

Not even to mention how long the guides, which are meant to be straight-foward, would get if I infodumped every little neat tidbit I came across (I removed like 4 paragraphs of essay material from the flax post already and it's not even halfway done)

But, I do come across lots of really neat resources in my research, especially ones associated with some specific craft, like Ulster Linen who's been spinning flax for 4 generations and has a lot of great education about the history of linen on their site, and ThoughtCo who produces high-quality articles with education on... nearly every topic honestly, but I learned a lot about them for linen processing.

And lastly, when I'm researching bushcraft, I try to start with one of two "types" of searches. Ovens, as an example, "History of Ovens England, History of Ovens Wales" type searches, OR "Ancient Ovens England, Pre-Anglo Ovens Wales, Medieval Ovens, Anglo-Saxon Ovens, Celtic Ovens"

Basically: A "History of Region" search, or a "Timeframe" search to begin with

THEN I go on to "History of Ovens," or "Neolithic Ovens," or jump straight into "Bushcraft Ovens," or even end up following concepts from the first search I did. Personally, I find that first step extremely important because I have a specific region in mind. It gives me a "feeling" for what the early tech is going to look like, including the materials used, and even the sorts of resources they built their tech to process.

On that note, when I finally get around to describing WindClan's oven, you may be really interested to see how they set it up to handle the way they...... hmm. You know what I'll hold onto that one, as a surprise.

I'm going to be collaborating with @mokusai soon to make some instruments for Clan Cats, so I'm going to be looking at a lot of traditional instruments from the area with this method in mind

But anyway there's a walk down my process. I hope this is helpful in some way, I wish I had a Guide To Making Guides but my deep secret is just that I have a messy, curious brain that reads a lot