#this won't be the next thing i post

[adozentothedawn]

What if both Daud and Corvo were just a bit more tired of everything in chapter 7

"A drink?"

"Last time I accepted a drink I puked blood and some asshole stole my gear."

"Fair enough." Pulls out a cigarette. "It's not mine anyway. Pilfered it from Thomas." Takes a draft. "And that's the big irony isn't it. You, the martyr, the innocent man seeking to right wrongs and spare those in your path, betrayed over and over by those you thought your allies. And me, the monster who did this all to you, to everyone, with the loyalty of so many people that I don't deserve."

"Are you done waxing?"

"...Yeah." pulls out the key "I'm assuming this is what you're here for." silence. "Now what?"

"Now I'm taking this key and you are going to come along to fix at least a fragment of what you fucked up."

"I am?"

"Yes."

"You sound very certain."

"I've been listening to your Whalers practice your eulogy and very unsubtly try to convince me of your virtues for a week. I also stole your damn diary. I am very certain and very livid, so I suggest we finish this conversation and get going before I change my mind and drive your own sword through your throat."

[seventeendeer]

this isn't at all meant to be condescending or finger-waggy because 100% we all have blind spots like this, but I'm really, really hoping that the people who never found Gaiman's approach to his own fandom concerning in any way will take this all as a learning moment.

he was an older, hyper-famous author engaging directly and frequently with an online audience of largely vulnerable young marginalized people. he presented himself as cultured and worldly, and made himself approachable as someone to go to for advice, encouragement and "wisdom." his manner of speech was extremely pathos-heavy and clearly intended to be comforting and encouraging in exactly the way his target demographic needed it to be to swallow every word. the way he spoke about stories and creativity was designed to make young creative hopefuls feel special and important, while sweeping real analytical techniques under the rug - in hindsight, likely so no one would think too critically about the disturbing amount of patriarchal abuse played for cheap shock value and voyerism in his own body of works.

Gaiman saw a target demographic that was desperate for an older creative role model to tell them they were worth something, and he exploited that pain to twist a narrative around himself where he was king and any critique leveled at him or his works were the enemy.

to be clear, he could have been innocent. he could totally have been just an out-of-touch old man saying nice things to people because he wanted to be kind and he thought he was a lot smarter than he really was. red flags are warning signs, not a surefire way to tell if someone is actually "secretly shitty."

but if you used to look up to him, PLEASE take this moment to revisit the ideas you absorbed from him. did you take his words to heart because they seemed to have objective merit? or did you take them to heart because it felt good to believe what he said? do you still hold these values? does knowing he was intentionally manipulating his online audience make you less certain? do you need more information from a different source before deciding one way or another?

again, I'm just really, really hoping people on here will take a moment to reevaluate the ideas and opinions he's injected into tumblr fandom culture, because his reach is immense and he has absolutely been manipulating popular perception of relevant topics to gain further influence and control the narrative around both his own and Pratchett's legacy. please, please take this moment to notice what he's been doing - and next time someone tries to pull the same shit, hopefully we'll be able to apply what we've learned from experience.

[forgettable-au]

Okay so...

Alshwkeuek apparently I didn't fully heal and now I'm sick again, I hate it when that happens

So, I feel like I'll have to postpone this week's pages :[

Aughh I really don't want to but it's probably better to focus on healing fully

[cacaocheri]

we both deserve to be happy

in case anyone is wondering, it gets easier. it gets so so much easier and i hope you find the love you're looking for

[minty364]

DPXDC Prompt 58 Part 7

The long dining room that held the ornate old dining table that seated way too many people already held  most of the family. Bruce was missing and Damian informed them he was at work, the only other person missing was Jason but it was typical for him to skip out as he didn’t live there and didn’t have the best track record with the rest of the family. That left Damian, Tim, Cass, Duke, and Dick seated.

Damian sat next to the chair that Bruce normally sat in at the head of the table. Tim sat across from Damian followed by Dick, Duke, and Cass. Danny sat next to Damian and Jazz sat next to Danny. 

“So, how was school?” Dick asked his elbows on the table with his head on his hands and a smile. He was the only adult in their life besides Bruce that actually cared about their schooling. 

Danny had actually forgotten that all of this had happened in just one day. The thought was a little jarring if Danny was being honest with himself. He wasn’t sure what to tell Dick, on one hand he was just asking about school on the other… no he wasn’t going to think about what happened right now. Just the thought caused phantom volts to go through his body like he was reliving the accident. He felt a nudge to his foot from the right and looked up to see Damian giving him a quizzical look. He cleared his throat and looked back over to Dick who was giving him the same kind of look. 

“I-I’m, uh… school was fine, didn’t learn much since school just started,” He eventually decided to say after stumbling on his words a little. 

“Dash isn’t picking on you again this year is he?” Dick asked with a concerned look on his face. 

Danny wished it was just Dash, the pain he felt from the portal was a thousand times worse than anything the bullying blond could pull. If it was just Dash, Danny could have just laughed it off and forgotten it probably, but it wasn’t just Dash and Danny couldn’t help but take a deep breath trying to gather his thoughts and calm himself.

He startled as he felt a hand on his knee, he looked to his left to see Jazz giving him a look of sympathy as she rubs her thumb comfortingly on his knee. She then spoke, “Danny you don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to, Okay?”

Danny gave her a small nod, a small smile on his face. 

Before a new topic could be discussed Alfred arrived with their food and began serving them. Danny loved the food the old butler cooked especially since he was able to do so in a kitchen that wasn’t contaminated. Alfred did his best to make sure everyone was served food to their liking, as long as it was a balanced meal at the end of the day the elderly butler would serve just about anything you’d request.

Danny picked up his fork to begin on his salad, however when he tried to push the fork into the lettuce his hand felt a cooling sensation with pins and needles and his fork went through his hand. He stared at his hand for a moment wondering what just happened. He then picked up his fork to try again and was able to get a mouth full, but when he went for a second bite it happened again, his fork clanging against the bowl again.

“Something wrong Danny? You're staring at your hand weird,” Danny heard Dick speaking and looked up to see Dick staring at him giving him an odd look. 

Danny couldn’t help but rub his neck nervously with his other hand, he hoped to get ahold of whatever this was so no one noticed. Though knowing his luck everyone probably did notice, over the years he and Jazz both noticed that the Wayne family was much more observant than their media persona’s showed. 

Dinner continued and Danny struggled to eat anything as anything he tried to hold fell through his hand frustratingly and Danny couldn’t help but get agitated. 

Eventually his glass he was holding slipped through his hand and tumbled onto the floor shattering into a thousand pieces. Danny let out a frustrated sigh as he stared at the mess he made. 

Before he could stand to clean up Alfred appeared by his side with a dustpan and broom and began cleaning it up, “are you still feeling unwell Master Daniel? Perhaps you should retire for the evening, I will attend to this mess.” Danny begrudgingly nodded his head and made his way out of the room.

He wasn’t alone for long as Damian and Jazz tailed him out of the room. 

“What was that? It looked like your spoon was going through your hand,” Jazz asked after they were a ways from the dinning room.

“Jazz, honestly I don’t know, it felt cold and then anything I tried holding fell through my hand.” Danny brushed his bangs away from his forehead and they dropped back into his face as he dropped his hands back down to his side.

The walk went silent after that, although it didn’t stay for long as Danny felt the cooling sensation again but this time through his whole body, he let out a yelp as he felt his body sink into the floor.

Damian and Jazz looked at him with panic but as they grabbed at his arms or his hands to pull him back up they went through him just as the spoon and apparently the ground now. 

He let out a panicked yell as the floor swallowed him whole, so now he was sinking further down further into the earth. What was going to happen to him? Would he ever find his way back up?

Thankfully he didn’t have to wait long as the cooling sensation left and as gravity took hold of him again he fell. Apparently there was a cave under the manor and he was able to turn back into solid as he felt air again. There was no way he was surviving this, even with new weird powers now was when he’d get impaled by spikes right?

The cave was too dark to make out much but Danny thought he might have seen a computer with several monitors. That didn’t matter now as he finally landed, and he grunted as he landed on a person who also grunted as having a teen land on you couldn’t be the most comfortable.

He knew he was in big trouble when he realized who he landed on, “Batman??”

[deiaiko]

#23 - Kiss

Masterlist

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Let me know your thoughts in the reblogs <3

☕ Buy me coffee ☕

[platihbm]

trying out clip studio paint's animation tools! Look at her go!!!

[ohitslen]

BREAKING NEWS 🎉Ch. 5 of The neighbor from 311 is up!🎉

[crescentfool]

ryomina for the splatoon plaza! they are listening to music ☺💗

[yannig]

Koisenu Futari’s Kazu-kun: one step further into the amato-normativity discussion

So. What’s up with Kazu-kun. Why does he deserve his own post.

Kazu-kun starts as a background character, and then progressively becomes the third main character of the show.

And I love him. Which is not a small feat because I started out hating him. And all of it was very much on purpose.

Kazu-kun, I believe, exists as a vessel for the allo audience.

He’s there to asks all the questions the allo viewers are asking themselves, and then to learn and grow from the answers, and become both a friend to our protagonists and an ally to aroace people in general.

He exemplifies the arc the allo viewer would ideally go through while watching the show.

The thing about Koisenu Futari is, it’s a show made from the perspective of aroace characters, for aroace viewers. It’s about our fears, our insecurities, our experience with amato- and allo-normativity, our lives.

And it’s good thing! It’s a significant part of why I love it so much!

But it also means that it’s risking loosing it’s allo audience a bit. (I’d be curious to know how many allo people have watched this show at all tbh). Almost all the other allo characters in the show exist so our protagonists can experience being faced with yet another form of amatonormativity. Kazu-kun exist so an allo character can experience being faced with aromanticism and asexuality.

And it impacts his entire character, including and especially the flaws that made me hate him at the beginning.

Part of it is, of course, because a character needs flaws to grow out of, as the most basic way to write a character arc.

For example, he begins as the most Straight Man™ ever. He thinks Sakuko belongs to him because they dated in the past (are kinda technically on a break the situation wasn’t clear the expectations were very different), thinks cooking is easy and a woman’s job and of course doesn’t know how and thinks it’s perfectly normal because he’s a man, absolutely cannot fathom how a man could not be sexually attracted to a woman he’s even somewhat close to.

All those traits are flaws he will overcome as he grows and becomes a better man.

But part of it is also traits he needs to play his role well.

He is, for one, a very nosy character, with a strong sens of entitlement that means he’ll stop at little to get his answers. Which of course makes him absolutely insufferable at the beginning! I spent almost all of episode 4 wanting to slap him! But it’s a necessary character trait for him to actually ask out loud the questions the allo audience is quietly wondering about. If he was a proper and polite Japanese man, he wouldn’t be asking those questions, and therefore wouldn’t be fulfilling his role in the story.

And then he learns. All his questions and indiscretions get him somewhere, which is a much better understanding of aroace people. And with some luck, the allo audience learned with him, without needing to invade actual aroace people’s privacy!

(yes I’m still salty about ep4, why do you ask. just because it was narratively necessary doesn’t make it any less hard to watch)

To be perfectly honest, from a pure character development perspective, I think he changes a bit too quickly. But, well. The show is only 8 episodes. Also that’s my only complaint about this show.

He first learns how to cook, and most importantly, instantly apologizes to Sakuko for asking her to cook like it was nothing. This ability to 1) recognize when he was wrong and 2) apologize for it, is key in his whole development and one of the main reasons I’m ready to accept that he did a 180 so quickly.

Cooking, of course, if a synecdoche for every gendered expectation about couples. He’s not just learning how to cook, he’s learning that the things he was taught to expect from his future wife actually take work and are very much doable and enjoyable as a man.

Most importantly, he learns that romance is not the only register he can use to interact with women; in this case especially Sakuko. In fact, at the end of episode 4, he offers that since she is aroace, they could have a QPR together.

(the show doesn’t call it a QPR, doesn’t use the word at all, but that’s exactly what it is, both the actual arrangement between Sakuko and Takahashi, and what Kazu-kun offers to Sakuko)

So, big points for getting what Minori can’t seem to grasp in ep 6: QPR are not reserved to aromantics! Really important lesson that a lot of allies never learn.

In this specific case, I don’t think it would have worked, and it can very well be interpreted as him refusing to let go. I don’t think a QPR with the woman he’s still very much in love with is a good idea. And while he has learned a lot, he’s still pretty new to the whole thing, and I think he’d still have too many expectations that would end up hurting Sakuko.

And once Sakuko has taken the time to think about it and tells him no, not only does he listen, not only doesn’t he get upset, but he immediately reassure her that they are still friends and will keep being friends.

In that way, this whole journey of his allows Kazu-kun and Sakuko to get back the easy and joyous friendship they seemed to have lost when they broke up. Which is both the biggest and final proof of maturity on his part and the best thing he got from the whole adventure.

Once he understand that Sakuko and Takahashi are aroace and quite happy with it, he also becomes their first defender. He tells Minori off twice when she steps out of line, and is ready to correct one of their colleagues when he assumes that he and Sakuko are a couple. Good example of how to be an ally.

Faced with micro-aggression (or even overt and intentional aggression), minorities:

might get overwhelmed by emotions and are almost certainly more sensitive to it than allies

are less likely to be listened to if they correct the person, because they are a minority

often cannot afford to be angry or aggressive or anything other than incredibly diplomatic about it without being told off, a problem allies face a lot less

Hence why a big part of allies' job is correcting other privileged people. Great ally-ship, take notes everyone.

In conclusion, I said last time that Minori and Haruka exemplify how amatonormativity also harms allo people. I’d argue that, with all this:

Kazu-kun shows what allo people have to gain from getting rid of it.

(his best friend back, at least one new friend, a new vital skill, and a lot less expectations)

[dkettchen]

[jayswing101]

Fill for G1 - Black Cloaked Envoy on my Guardian Bingo Card!

The base pattern is taken from this daxiushan (大袖衫) pattern. To make this daxiushan (Heipaoshi's Version), I shortened the sleeves a bit, added extra length to the body, added a hood, and added the weird gauzy bits on the back. I also added some cording on the shoulders and the sides of the hood, following the design from the show as closely as I could. You'll also notice a couple decorative bands of black ribbon on the chest and at the waist, as well as a square of skightly different black fabric on the back — these are also embellishments added to follow the model in the drama.

Fabric: raw silk noil, cotton lining in the hood, a silk habotai square, silk gauze, silk ribbons, cotton cording. Entirely handsewn using waxed black linen thread.

[fdelopera]

Antisemites are going mask-off. And we Jews see you.

So some shit for brains antisemite sent me this message the other day. This is one of several antisemitic Anons I've gotten recently, but this one is the most blatant.

My first response was to taunt them. I thought of writing something like this:

"Hey, you fucking loser, you forgot the part of your Nazi script where you try to deny that the Holocaust happened. Lame ass motherfucker, you can't even get your own lies right. Next time you try harassing a Jew online, at least try to tow the Nazi party line, you white supremacist. Also, you fucking COWARD, how dare you come to my inbox on Anonymous. If you’re going to tell me you wish I would die in a Nazi gas chamber, at least have the common courtesy to tell me your username so I know who I am blocking."

But then, I thought: No. That's not how to respond. Because that's not what this is about.

I mean, don’t get me wrong. Making fun of a stupid a Nazi by telling them that they forgot to deny the Holocaust when they decided to harass me for being a Jew — that is gallows humor of the darkest kind. But a morbidly glib zinger of a reply doesn’t actually address the real issue here.

The real issue is that a lot of you with antisemitic tendencies have been going completely mask-off the last few weeks, and you have been diving headfirst into Jew-hatred.

You are finally feeling liberated to speak the Jew-hating words that you have been dying to say.

You have been practically champing at the bit to tell a Jew that you wished there would be another Holocaust so you could get rid of all those millions of "bad Jews" that you don’t like, and now you feel liberated to scream those words from the rooftops.

Over the last few weeks, we Jews have been watching you, some of you that we considered to be friends, and we’ve seen many of you turn on us and spit out the most vile, hateful things about us.

And we know exactly what you will be doing when the next Nazi craze spreads like wildfire from country to country, throughout cities and towns.

You like to claim that you would have been punching Nazis in the face during World War II. You like to claim that you would have protected us. Some of you even like to claim that you would have sheltered us, like the heroes who hid Anne Frank.

But we know better.

No. That’s all just romantic bullshit that some of you like to tell yourselves to make yourselves feel important.

In reality, you would have been deciding who is a "good Jew" and who is a "bad Jew." You would have been deciding who you should rat out to the police for a reward. You wouldn’t be protecting us! You would be saying, "I really don't like that Jew. I’m going to go tell the Gestapo about them." Or worse, you would be saying, "Oh, that Jew over there, they’re just an animal. They’re barely human. The Nazis can kill them, I don’t care."

Most of the people who turned against their Jewish neighbors in Nazi occupied Europe weren't monstrous, inhuman beasts. Most of them were people, just like you, who had been conditioned to hate Jews by nearly two thousand years of Christian antisemitism coupled with a targeted campaign of white supremacist propaganda. This widespread antisemitism allowed the Nazis to transform an irrational and enculturated feeling of distrust towards Jews into a feeling of intense hatred, where gentiles demonized Jewish people and blamed "those Jews" for all the bad things that were happening in the world.

And the white supremacists are doing it again. And YOU are falling for their trap. Again!

Don't you get it? This is the oldest trick in the book! Periods of antisemitic violence usually erupt every 70-100 years or so, after most of the Jewish elders who hold the living memory of the last genocide have all passed away. And the Holocaust was 80 years ago. And here we are. Again.

And just like the Christians in Europe who turned on their Jewish neighbors, you are starting to turn on us.

You buy into antisemitic conspiracy theories, just like the white supremacists do.

You stand in the streets, screaming "gas the Jews" and "die Jews die."

You sound like the Proud Boys. You sound like Nazis. Do you even hear yourselves???

You pretend that all Jews are all a monolith and a hive mind, and you try to convince yourselves that we are all a proxy for the fucking Israeli government, which the vast majority of Jews fucking despise. If we could, trust me, most of us would strangle Netanyahu with our bare hands.

You celebrate Jewish deaths because you have convinced yourselves that killing a random Jewish civilian is "just the same" as killing Netanyahu, because you have manipulated yourselves into believing that all Jews are the Israeli government.

And you don't see how fucking STUPID that is!!

Jewish people are no more the Israeli government than YOU are YOUR government.

A people are NOT their government.

According to Tumblr statistics, nearly half of you reading this will be from the US. Shall I blame YOU personally for the actions of the US government? Of course fucking not! And you'd better fucking not blame random Jews for Netanyahu!

And some of you Jew-haters, in pretending that Jews are all a monolith and a hive mind, even say vile, antisemitic shit like, "Looks like the Jews are becoming the Nazis."

You choose those words carefully, twisting the Shoah, our greatest tragedy, into a knife. You try to weaponize the slaughter of our people against us. You try to reduce the 6 million of us who were murdered into a white supremacist meme.

YOU SOUND LIKE THE FUCKERS AT A TRUMP RALLY, FOR FUCKS SAKE. DO YOU EVEN HEAR YOURSELVES???

And you do that to dehumanize us. You do that to feel morally superior. You do that to feel less uncomfortable when you laugh at our deaths.

But we know that WE are not becoming Nazis. But YOU are. The reason you say that shit about us is because YOU are projecting YOUR insecurities onto us.

Because you know that you are slowly, insidiously being coopted by the Nazi ideology of David Duke and Richard Spencer.

And perhaps somewhere deep down, you feel uneasy about it. So you accuse Jews of being a monolith, a hive mind, and then you say stupid antisemitic shit like, "Maybe the Jews are the Nazis after all."

And you say that to yourselves so that you can turn off your empathy and celebrate as you watch us die.

What a disgusting way to try to absolve yourselves of YOUR guilt.

And we Jews are watching you. We’re watching you very carefully. And when the dust settles, you will have found that we have vanished from your life.

Very soon, you won’t see us again.

And no, that won't be because we'll be walking into the gas chambers, as much as you'd like us to, like some historical movie about the Holocaust that you watched when you were a child but turned off halfway through because you just didn't care.

NEVER AGAIN MEANS NEVER AGAIN.

As much as we know that you ENJOY watching our deaths (sanitized, of course, with a blur filter over the video so that you don’t have to feel too guilty about watching us being tortured and murdered), that’s not the reason you won’t be seeing us again.

The reason you won’t be seeing us again is because we will be walking out of YOUR life.

You have lost us as friends, and you might not even know it yet.

We are gone from your life, because we know that we can’t trust you.

We know that when the Nazis come to our community and march down the street hoisting their swastikas and doing their Sieg Heils (I've seen it with my own eyes) … when the Nazis harass us Jews in the street (I've seen it with my own eyes) … when the Nazis SHOOT US DEAD (it happened at a synagogue a block away from my synagogue, and many of those who saw it will never open their eyes again) — we know you won’t help us.

You will shove us into the line of fire.

And we know that you’ll absolve your conscience, so you won’t feel too bad about our deaths. You’ll tell yourselves, “It’s okay. Why should I have protected that one? That one was a bad Jew.”

We Jews see you. We see your hypocrisy on full display.

And we are telling you this:

If you see Jewish civilians being tortured and murdered, no matter what country they are from, and your first response is to CELEBRATE … if your first response is to post memes that say shit like, "The Jews fucked around and found out" … if your first response is to say that mass murdering Jews is "brutal but justified" … if your first response is to behave like a Q-Anon believer or a MAGA-hat wearing Republican and treat all Jews like we're a monolith, a hive mind…

When THAT is your response to seeing a tragedy unfolding, you are a FAILED ally, and a FAILED advocate.

You are an antisemite.

But mostly, you are just a really horrible, shitty person.

And we don’t want you in our life.

[lovesodeepandwideandwell]

My great-uncle runs grocery stores and he told me about having to close down the one by the university because the students never bought fresh perishable foods there and (though I haven't been a college student these 6 years) I still am very proud of myself whenever my grocery list is just perishables

[pokemonranch]

Hi! I hope that those sort of negative anons don't get you down! Your adoption events are really cool and cute and I think it's really awesome of you to do so much work for fun/for community enrichment! I appreciate all the thought and time you put into it! (no need to respond- just wanted to send some positivity your way!)

<3!

[jadewritesficshere]

Presenting

Alpha!Steve Harrington x reader

Synopsis: You present for first time as an omega

A/N: hello all! So I know there are many different types of A/B/O fics out there. Some people say ruts/heats happen once a year, once a month, twice a year, etc. There is some discussion on the exact private parts omegas vs alphas have.

Well, what I envision may be similar or completely different. This is my take. This is my fic. I have a whole lil world for this, and have a few mini blurbs/oneshots planned. This is the first, which I've struggled to have the courage to post since March. Also: reader and Steve are over 21 in this.

Enjoy.

Contents: mostly a bit of backstory on a/b/o dynamics, fluff, first presentation. Gender of Reader is not specified but Steve does call them Honey.

Steve opened the door to the house, grumbling as he juggled the groceries in his arms. He should have taken more then one trip, but with the light rain falling, he didn't want to stay out in the cold more then he had to. The door swung open into the unlit hallway. Steve wasn't surprised. Eddie was at work, and Robin had plans with Vickie. The only person he was unsure of was you, but you had been working nights and it wasn't unusual for you to be asleep at noon. What was unusual was the smell that hit Steve's nose. His nose twitched and he frowned as he tried to identify it, before shrugging it off and heading to the kitchen to put groceries away.

Steve grimaced as he looked in the fridge and saw the plastic container holding Eddie's lunch from last week. The lime green jello Robin had made wiggled as Steve reached past and grabbed the container. Without a second glance, Steve tossed it in the trash can and continued to empty the fridge of old food and replace it with the groceries he had bought. Steve hummed to himself as he thought about what he could make for supper.

A noise from the other room made Steve pause. It had sounded like one of the closet doors had come off their track again. You must have woken up and were getting changed. Steve's heart thumped a little extra at the thought of you, causing Steve to curse himself. He had tried to hide his feelings for you, not wanting to make the living situation awkward if you didn't reciprocate. Eddie gave him shit about how strong his scent was when you came near. Of course it wasn't intentional, biology and all that, but Steve couldn't be mad when it had deterred other Alphas from you. Steve just didn't want you to feel awkward, especially when he glared and growled. He didn't want you to think he was upset because of you. Steve wanted to shower you in love and affection, but you weren't his. You weren't anyone's. You were just you. Amazing, beautiful, talented you.

Robin and you were both Betas. As such, you could smell the scents from Omegas and Alphas, but it was no stronger then if you got close to a flower and sniffed or the spritz of cologne or perfume. Eddie was another alpha, but took suppressants (which he forgot to take half the time, causing his ruts to be a little more unpredictable...). Eddie confided in the group that he was going to stop taking suppressants after this next rut, but he had taken them for so long because he hadn't wanted to seem like an aggressive alpha like his father (who was currently facing life in prison). Steve's parents were both alphas, so it wasn't a surprise Steve was.

Presenting as an alpha or omega was strongly linked to genetics. Regardless of the parent presentation of alpha or omega, if one parent was and the other was a beta there was a possiblity. If both parents had presented, then it was extremely likely for the pup to present as well. There were, of course, cases of the pup not presenting and being a beta, but it was unlikely. Thanks to more modern technology, betas could reproduce with another beta. These pups had low chances of presenting, but was not impossible.

However with presenting were the stereotypes. Steve couldn't care less, agreeing with Robin that a lot of the archetypes were heavily influenced by societal norms of feminine versus masculine, and that there was nothing "wrong" with an alpha that wanted to be a housewife or an omega that wanted to be a CEO. Since the four of you living together, Steve has embraced the more "omega" traits he has, feeling more settled and free than when he had to live up to his parents expectations.

Steve remembers the day he presented, hearing his parent's praise. He then remembers being left to his own devices to try and figure it out by himself. At least they handed him a pamphlet and had stocked the kitchen. Steve learned a lot from that stupid pamphlet. You could present as young as 12 all the way to 25. The first day of your presentation, the genitalia would shape more to your presentation and your scent glands would come in. By the end of the second day, the genitalia would be formed to handle and work with the opposite presentation. By the third day, you would endure a typical rut or heat like you would for the rest of your life. Your first rut or heat would be unable to produce pups. The entire presentation would only last from 3-5 days.

Steve shook his head, wondering why thoughts of that stupid pamphlet had come to mind. Steve stretched as he closed the door to the fridge, the calendar catching his eye. Steve's plain black misspelled scrawl at the end of the month noted his rut would arrive. Robin's green handwriting beneath simply said "sucker" to which Eddie had replied "suck her amiright". Steve shook his head as a grin spread across his lips. Eddie's red haphazard scrawl was written on the next weekend with question marks, indicating his rut if he had taken the suppressants correctly. Your blue "good luck" beneath reminded Steve that Eddie was going to come off the suppressants (did he get a cake for that? Beer?).

Steve left the kitchen making an extra note to grab snacks that had higher nutrients and protein for their upcoming ruts. Steve paused in the hallway as the smell from earlier hit Steve again. It smelled like that honey body wash Robin and you were obsessed with, but also had a hint of something that was more familiar. It grew stronger as Steve walked further down the hall. Steve paused outside your open door and inhaled; the scent being extremely strong here. Steve's eyes widened as he realized that familiar scent was you. He had never smelled you this strongly before, what with Betas not really producing a strong scent.

Steve peered into the room, concerned something was wrong. He was wracking his brain trying to think of what could cause your scent to be this strong. Your walls were filled with Polaroids of your friends, posters of your favorite bands, and some paintings Robin had created. It wasn't as covered as Eddie's, but it showed your personality. The carpet had some clothes haphazardly strewn about, but overall you kept the room clean. Your bed, were Steve had expected to find you after your shift, was empty. Your pillow was gone, which was odd, but maybe it had fallen off from your tossing and turning. Steve blinked a few times before pushing the door open more and leaning in. Your room was definitely empty. Your closet was open, stuffed to the brim with clothes. He could see your desk in the far corner of the room was not being sat at.

Steve frowned to himself and looked at the shut door opposite your room, the bathroom. Oh...You must have gone to the bathroom. Steve went to knock before pausing, he didn't want to interrupt you if you were busy (he knows how much you and Robin hate getting interrupted when in the bathroom, regardless of what you are doing). Steve shrugs and continues leisurely to the next door, his room. He throws open the door without a care-

And nearly keels over. The scent was overpowering here, which confused Steve as he thought it had been you. A whimper from the closet made Steve's head snap in that direction. The closet was closed, but uneven; the door was off the track and barely hanging on. Steve crept to the door and opened it, gasping.

You were curled into the fetal position on his closet floor. On top of his clothes, hangers bare above you. You had pulled his jacket on top of you, and were laying in a pile. Your head laying on your "missing" pillow. The polo he had worn yesterday was clutched in your hands, held close to your face that was scrunched up in discomfort. Steve stood there, jaw wide open, as he tried to understand what his eyes were seeing. He cleared his throat, causing your eyes to snap open. "Stevie?" You whisper, peering up at him with glassy eyes. Steve crouched down to be on your level as you shift to sit up from laying down.

"What's going on?" Steve finally asks, feeling like the biggest idiot. His brain screaming the answer at him, but he couldn't believe it. His brain bringing that pamphlet back to his mind with fanfare. He had to hear you say it he-

"I dont know!" Your voice cracked and your chin wavered, tears filling your eyes. "I dont feel right and i couldnt get comfortable and all I could think of was you and i came in here and it felt right but everything was too much so the closet was perfect and i just i dont-" your rambling continued as you started crying, barely able to speak as sobs overcome you. The scent rolling off you shifted, indicating your distress. Steve's eyes widen and he drew you into his arms," hey, hey. It's okay. It'll be okay." You relax into his arms, nose tucked into the crook of his neck.

Steve feels your body shudder as your cries slow, inhaling slowly at his scent gland. The trill you let out shocking you and confirming Steve's thoughts. Steve hesitantly runs his hand up and down your spine in a comforting motion. "Honey...you're presenting. You're, " Steve clears his throat," you're an Omega." You shake your head "no" against his neck. "You can present until you're 25. Hell, I think the oldest person they know of was 40. It isn't an exact science-" Steve pauses, realizing Robin must be rubbing off on him as he's rambling.

Steve leans his back against the wall and shifts you around so you are between his legs. You are curled into his chest, nose still firmly pressed against his neck. Your tears have gone. Your scent is overpowering to Steve, completely entrancing him. A hint of spice, like nutmeg, mixed with that honey bodywash. Steve finds it ironic that he calls you Honey and here you are smelling so strong of it.

"I'm presenting," you mumble pulling back to look in Steve's eyes. "How will that work?" Steve hesitates, mouth opening slightly, before you cover his mouth with your hand," I don't mean like how omegas work. I get that. I guess...with like you and Eddie." You slowly lower your hand," I don't want to cause an issue."

"You won't." Steve says definitively, "Eddie always says he's married to rock and roll. We've never been the type to fight over territory. This is his house but it's also mine. We're all in a pack and we are all equal." "Even if I'm less tha-" "hey!" Steve's brow furrows and he holds your face in his hands," You are not less than. Anyone who thinks omegas are less than are idiots. You are not less than an alpha, and anyone who believes that bullshit needs some sense knocked into them."

You bite your lip but nod. "It's the first day right?" Steve asks, wondering if it's crossing a line. It is highly personal when an omega goes into heat. You don't seem to care, nodding your agreement. "Well, then today will be the easiest day. We can get a game plan set up tonight when Robin and Eddie come home. Get you some blankets and pillows. Get you snacks."

Steve shifts in his spot and your hands dart out and grab his biceps, "Don't leave!" Steve smiles softly at you," I won't. Not right now. Come here." Steve holds his arms open again for you. You slowly lean in and let him envelope you in his hold. Secure. Warm. Feeling entirely safe in his arms, you drift off to sleep. Steve can feel his heart bursting with love for you. A part of him knows that if you sought him out, you cared somewhat for him. But the other part screamed at him how he couldn't tell you his feelings yet. He didn't want you to feel like he was taking advantage of your new presentation.

So for now, he would be content with just sitting and holding you. Safe. Secure. Warm.