#to be clear: my friend absolutely knows more about the actual game than I did and I was not acting like a know-it-all

[socialjust-ish]

Over the last few months my friends and I have been playing a D&D game. It was my first time playing and I really enjoyed it. It was nice to have a friend with experience acting as DM, and a lot of fun. But I knew basically nothing and had to often pull up wikis to figure out how to do things.

Between our last session and our most recent one, I played and beat (twice) Baldur's Gate 3. And I learned... a lot.

So in our most recent session one of our characters got a potion of growth. The player who received it (also a first-timer) asks what it does.

Our DM says "well it increases your size and does something to modify your attack but I'm not sure - give me a second to look it up"

And without missing a beat I immediately go "it increases your character from medium to large and lets you deal 1d4 extra damage each attack."

I felt like a supergenius

[mywritersmind]

I KNEW IT - KA12 🕸️🗽💋🤘🏼

kimi antonelli spiderman au

summary : kimi antonelli doesn’t do parties. until his best friend dino drags him to one for some wing man action does he find himself abandoning his duties and attempting to find a quiet place. he does just that, but the quiet place happens to come with a nosy blonde girl who knows far too much.

listen up : talk about blood/cuts! ahhh i love this! enjoy!

words : 3663

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I don’t know why I'm here.

I really don’t think I should be here.

I really want to leave but I'm reminded of my ‘importance’ as soon as my friend Dino grabs my wrist and pulls me over to the drink area.

I’ve been dragged here because Ollie is out of town and Dino needs my help with some girl. ‘Help’ as in to make it known that he has friends even if I'm- and I quote… ‘a loser’. As if he’s any less loser than me.

The party consists of many drunk teenagers in an abandoned bottom floor of some old apartment building. Someone hung up lights that are barely working (even for my extra eyesight), threw a speaker into the mix, and set up two drink stations. This mess is apparently called the biggest highschool party of the year.

I’ve seen multiple kids from all different highschools and absolutely not one of them has noticed me.

I turn my attention back to Dino, who’s arm is wrapped around his girl who’s blushing. Sorry, did I travel to a different dimension where Dino has game.

The girl is pretty and blonde, just his type. He introduces me but I don’t really listen because he takes over the conversation, shoving a drink at me and leaning in closer to the girl.

I’m even more confused as to why I'm here because they're all lovey dovey and I'm just standing, feeling like an incredibly out of place third wheel.

I manage to slip away, hoping to find some back alley or secluded area where I can at least practice web shooting. I walk up the first flight of stairs, finding the floor completely demolished, then I move on to the second, then the third.

I keep walking up the staircase, losing track of what floor I'm on and getting flashed far too many times. Who hooks up in the dirty old staircase? I finally make it to the end, pushing open the door and getting a drug-like hit of the New York city night air.

I decided to actually try my suspicious concoction of alcohol in the red solo cup I've been using as an accessory. I quickly remember that I hate alcohol, and promptly spit it back onto the roof.

“Elvira make that?” The voice makes me jump, my guard down due to what tasted like toxic waste, “She’s pretty heavy handed.”

I turn to face the girl, her voice soft as she takes a drag of her cigarette. I almost forget to respond, too distracted by… her. She’s stunning. Blonde hair, icy blue eyes, and freckles that are clear even in the dark.

She’s wearing all black except for her low waisted light blue jeans that look worn in and loved. She eyes me curiously, removing the cigarette from her lips and blowing out slowly. The second she quirks her brow, I remember that I’m not dreaming and that she’s expecting a response.

“Uh… yeah. I shouldn’t have taken it anyway, I don’t drink.” I shrug, sliding a hand into my pocket just so I have something to do with my arm.

She nods, walking closer. “Same.” I eye her cigarette again, her lipgloss is smudged against it, something any regular person wouldn’t be able to see. Something that stands out to me.

She reaches her hand out, like she’s offering it to me. I quickly shake my head, “No thanks.”

She definitely recognizes my tight movement, tossing the cigarette onto the ground and stomping on it with her combat boot. “Bad habit, anyway.”

She walks past me and onto the roof's edge. She climbs onto the parapet as if there isn’t a huge drop. I’m scared she’s going to jump for a second, “Hey! Careful!”

She looks back at me curiously, saying nothing, just patting the place next to her. I don’t know why I do it, for all I know she could be plotting to throw me off this roof. But I sit next to her without saying a word.

“You’re Dino’s friend… Kimi Antonelli, right?” I’m surprised at her words. Not many people know who I am, especially pretty girls that I don’t know.

“Uh yeah… How’d you know?”

“Dino hangs with us sometimes- I’m E’s friend.” I actually scoff at this, I don’t mean to sound rude but she raises her brow at me immediately, “Got a problem?”

“No!” I scramble to say, “No! Shit… sorry. I just- Dino dragged me here because he was all nervous but if I knew he hung out with you guys then I would have known that he does not need me here.” I scratch the back of my neck, looking away from her.

And then, she laughs. She pushes my arm playfully, “Relax. Dino mentioned bringing you under some false pretenses.” She smiles and holy shit- even in the dark she’s like complete sunshine. “I’m Y/n, by the way.”

I laugh awkwardly, “Kimi.” I cringe instantly, “But you already knew that…”

She apparently finds this funny, turning her head to look at the New York cityscape and laughing. “Why’d you come up here, Kimi?” She says my name like I'm something to be questioned.

I fiddle with the sleeve of my hoodie, shrugging, “Don’t really like parties.” She smells like cigarettes and vanilla.

“You know you can leave, right? I doubt Dino and Elvira will be separated tonight.”

“Uh…” How do I tell her that I'm incredibly interested in her and would be a genuine idiot if I left to go finish my lego set.? “I think i’m okay here.” She smiles, nodding at me, “Why are you up here?”

“Got bored.” She shrugs, sighing and flipping her hair over her shoulder, “Watching my best friend make out with her…” She thinks for a second, “Dino? It gets boring. Plus, up here I can work on my aim.”

I frown at the last bit, “Your aim?”

She nods and swings her legs around so she’s back standing on the floor, bending down, she picks up two broken glass bottles. “Kids get drunk and slingshot shit up here, I throw them back just to hear them scream.”

My eyes widen, “Isn’t that like- really dangerous?” Aren’t I supposed to stop things like this? Isn’t my job literally to stop neighborhood kids from getting hurt.

“That’s where my aim comes in…” She grins wildly, throwing the bottle up and catching it with ease, “I throw it just close enough for a little scare… but I don’t hit them.” She looks over the edge, “They’re starting.”

Like clockwork, something starts flying towards us, followed by laughs and screams. I do my best to not grab it out of the air, watching the shoe fall at my feet.

I pick it up and look at Y/n who’s laughing. “Idiots.” She throws the glass bottle without hesitation, her aim is good. It lands just before the group of screaming teens. “Any item of clothing or something they want back, wait a little to throw it. Messing with them is part of the gig.”

I pick up an old beer bottle, every part of me screaming to not throw it. But then a tiny devil lands on my shoulder in the shape of a pretty blonde, she’s reminding me who I am and what exactly I can do.

I blink and she’s gone, the real pretty blonde in front of me still throwing things off the roof. “What’re you waiting for, Antonelli?”

I’m a coward. I’m a coward. I’m a coward.

I drop the bottle, “I don’t know… I don’t wanna hurt anyone- I’m not very athletic.” Technically, I'm not lying. I am still horrible at sports.

“You’ll be okay, Antonelli.” she tosses a bottle to me which I catch with ease. “But if you hit one of them, I do not know you.” She smiles as I adjust the bottle in my hand.

“Yeah alright…” It didn’t take me much to give in, her icy eyes watching my every movement would have been enough.

I toss the bottle, shooting it straight at the person in a neon green shirt. Easy target, I think. It lands on the wall behind him, an inch above his head.

Okay maybe I should have tried a little harder to make myself look like my old self. Y/n is staring at me. She doesn’t say anything for a second, just picks the shoe up and throws it back, the shoe stops short and far from them.

“Making me look bad over here…”

“Beginner's luck.” I shrug, taking my old position back on the parapet, my legs swinging over the edge and my head ducking even though the things being thrown were always way higher than me.

“So Antonelli… You gonna make me do all the talking here? Tell me about yourself.” Her words surprise me, making me wonder if my comfortable silence was her uncomfortable silence.

“Uh, what do you want to know?” I scratch the back of my neck, “I like science.”

She snorts. I mean, actually snorts! “Of course you do.”

“Hey, what does that mean!?”

She shakes her head, joining me again. “Nothing… It just-” she sits across from me, one leg crossed under the other and her body facing me. “It makes sense.”

“Okay, well what do you like? Art?”

She snickers, “Well… yeah.”

“So we’re both complete stereotypes.”

She nods, “Do you like chem? Because I absolutely failed that class and would have done anything for an actual good tutor!”

I shrug, knowing I got an A+, “It’s okay. I’m more into engineering right now.”

“That’s more my vibe!” She smiles, “I like being hands on. What’s the coolest thing you’ve made? God you’re totally in the robotics club, aren’t you!”

I blush, “Maybe…” I think back to the coolest thing I've made. I mean, my suit is by far my favorite but I can’t tell her that. “I made my own alarm clock… sounds stupid, I know-”

“No, it sounds cool.” She reassures me, “I mean, tell me you’ve made anything and I'll think it’s cool, unless you’re secretly a villain or something.”

I laugh awkwardly at this. She doesn’t know. She doesn’t know. She doesn’t know. Only Dino and Ollie know about my little spider quirk but I'm still crazy paranoid.

“What about you? What kind of art do you like?”

She leans back on her hands, “I use acrylic mostly but hate working on normal canvases.” I nod as if I know what that means, “I dabble in spray paint… And I make my own jewelry!” She sits up quickly when she says it, her smile enchanting as she rolls up her sleeves.

I watch her chipped manicure as her fingers drift over each piece, explaining how or why she made it. She’s got multiple rings, some made of wire, some made of spoons. Then there’s her bracelets, all silver and insanely impressive.

I might not be an artist but I know how much detail and time she must have put into them. I don’t know what possesses me, but I grab her hand when she’s talking about one of her bracelets. I flip her hand around so I can see the back.

It’s crafted all around one piece of sea glass, she explains how she welded it together without giving my touch a second thought.

At least, that’s what I thought. As I run my fingers over the glass, I accidentally zero in on her heartbeat. It’s strong and definitely not usually this fast.

I pull my hand away in a second, “You’re really talented.” She smiles at me softly, as if she’s never been complimented before.

“Thank you. Now I'll just need to see your clock and I can decide if it’s worthy of my praise.” God she’s beautiful.

I smile, looking down at her shoes. They’ve got little drawings on them. She breathes out, looking up at the sky. Even with the light pollution, the stars are visible.

Then there’s that feeling again… I can’t really explain it, the closest I'll get is comparing it to being so close to a girl you really like.

My hand goes up instinctively, catching something just before it has the chance to hit the side of Y/n’s face. She gasps a bit, looking at the broken bottle in my hand, then to me.

I drop my hand and the bottle goes with it, my eyes meet hers as I swallow. “They’ve got terrible aim.” I play it off, my hand now bleeding from how the bottle landed.

She laughs, her voice a bit shaky, “I’m starting to think you’re gonna come in handy, Antonelli.”

“You okay?” Is the only thing I can think of to say.

She scoffs, “Are you?” grabbing my hand, she holds it up to inspect the damage, thoroughly twisting my wrist in the process.

“It’s fine…” I try to ignore her touch but I don’t pull my hand away as she eyes the blood. It really isn’t bad, just a small cut, but she takes the corner of her jacket and wipes my hand gently.

“Now don’t go dying tonight because now I have your blood on me.” She smiles at me, pulling out what looks like a scrap of fabric from her pocket and pushing it into my hand, “I meant to test the fabric but this seems more pressing.”

“Oh uh…” I would give it back but now it’s dirty from my blood so… “You’re really nice.” I don’t know why I say it. I regret it almost immediately because she doesn’t say anything back quickly.

But then, thankfully, she does say something. “You’re interesting, Antonelli…” Okay so it wasn’t what I expected her to say but still, it’s something. “In a good way.”

⋆༺

your pov

I was serious when I said that Kimi Antonelli is interesting. Maybe a tad bit too interesting for me. I shouldn’t be so intrigued by the kid but here I am, listening to him yap about his robotics and lego stuff.

He’s devastatingly cute too.

I’m trying to see past his cute face but when he gets hot and takes off his hoodie… the hem rides up a bit. Then his arms are on full display in a black shirt that he has definitely grown out of! What the hell is happening to me!?

I zone back in and focus on his lips which doesn’t help me! But then I actually hear him again because he mentions one of my special interests, “My homecoming sort of got ruined though because of my date and then spiderman was there and I lost my friends and-”

“Wait!” I stop him, “You were at that dance?”

He stops, nodding slowly, “Yeah. You weren’t?”

“No… I transferred this year.”

“Oh! Well, yeah… I was.”

“So like, have you seen Spiderman anywhere else? I mean, you guys are way too chill about a fucking superhero just living in your neighborhood!”

“He was at a party I was at once… But I don’t think he lives in our neighborhood-”

“Dude!” I slap his arm and he looks minorly offended, “Did you like- talk to him?”

“Um… no.” He shakes his head. “But he saved Dino once actually- the idiot got his bike stolen.”

I laugh, “That’s so cool! I mean- sucks for him but insane that he got spiderman to help him!”

He laughs, “You a big fan?”

“More like a very interested viewer.” I shrug, “Plus he’s kinda hot so it helps.”

He laughs really hard this time, “He wears a mask!”

“Doesn’t make him any less hot! In fact, I'd argue it makes him more attractive.”

“You like guys in bodysuits?” He raises a brow.

“I like superheroes, in bodysuits.” I stick my nose up, “Don’t tell me you were him for halloween or something! Because then I'd get infinite teasing rights and I’d demand the photos.”

He smiles, wow he’s got a cute smile, “No… I’m more into reading about them, not dressing up.”

“If you could have a superpower, what would it be?” I sit up straighter, watching his hands tug at the hem of his shirt now.

“Super speed.” He says it fast which makes me raise a brow, “You?”

“Time travel.”

“Why?”

“I want to fix some things… as well as check out how hot I am in the future.”

“What about the butterfly effect? That doesn’t scare you?”

I shrug, “Maybe it’ll butterfly for the better. Why superspeed?”

“I wanna be fast.” He mumbles it in such a childlike way that it makes me laugh. “Oh shut up.”

“It’s cute!” I say, still laughing. “I’m serious!”

He shakes his head, definitely blushing now. When he turns, I see a cut on his bicep, “What happened there?”

“Hm? Oh, nothing… I’m clumsy.”

“Right.” I stand, resorting back to throwing items at the people below.

They shout curses and sometimes my name, but they always laugh. I can’t stop thinking about the quiet boy who’s wandering around the roof. He looks curious as he picks up abandoned objects just to toss them closer to me so I can throw them.

His first throw was, well… insane.

Like serious baseball material, even though he swore he’s unathletic.

One thing I am familiar about is men lying.

Especially cute men.

I don’t think before I act a lot. It’s a bad habit and one that sometimes gets me hurt.

Now I'm the one who could potentially hurt someone else.

I throw the glass bottle at the back of Kimis head.

⋆༺

kimis pov

She’s staring at me.

She’s staring at me and she’s silent for once.

She’s staring at me because there’s a bottle in my hand, one that was aimed at the back of my head exactly one second ago.

She knows. How the fuck does she know!?

“So you’d want superspeed because you’ve already got the spidey powers?” Fuck. my. life.

I knew she was trouble. I knew something about her was different and I've known her for an hour.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” I drop the bottle.

She laughs. Actually laughs! Shit maybe I deserve it. “Okay sure…” She hops onto the parapet, her hands on her hips, “So if I fall off right now, you won’t save me?”

“I don’t know what type of game you’re playing, but I don’t want to watch you die.”

Her eyebrow quirks, and then she steps backwards. “Come on, Kimi… Let me have a little fun with this.” She steps back again, her heels aren’t on anything.

“Y/n this isn’t funny-” And then she takes another step and my wrist goes out, flinging a web out of my skin and onto hers.

Except when I brace myself for the weight of her body, nothing comes. She’s smirking at me with one leg behind her, the other is completely steady on the wall. “Can I say, I'm impressed you’re so good at hiding it.”

I pull the web off her as she sits down. I start pacing, “How the fuck- How can you say i’m good at hiding it when you found out in less than an hour?”

She shrugs, running a hand through her blonde locks, “The way you talk- I wouldn’t have guessed if I were blind. But the first throw, when you caught the bottle, your reaction to the cut… it gave it away.”

“Fuck I don’t even deserve it.”

“Relax. I know I'm pretty catty but I'm not a villain. What really sold it was the cut on your arm…” I had seen her eyes watching my arm but I hoped she was just checking out my bicep! “I watched you save that girl.”

‘That girl’ in question was a six year old stuck in a tree. She was trying to get her cat but broke a branch and started falling, fast. She was lucky that someone had already told me about the cat, I was lucky to get there in time.

Unfortunately, I'm not invincible. Especially from cat scratches.

I walk over, a bit ashamed, and sit next to her.

“Don’t feel bad. I’m really smart.”

This makes me laugh, “You are never going to stop bragging about this, are you?”

She grins wider, “Only to you. I promise I won’t tell anyone.”

“So I'm stuck with you now?”

She shrugs, laying back on the concrete, “Deal with it.” She turns her head to me, whispering, “Spiderman.”

I smile to myself. So maybe i’m not the best secret keeper… but maybe I just made a really cool girl actually want to be with me.

“So when do I get to swing around with you?”

“Never! You’re just like Dino.” I shake my head, as if I would carry Dino around the city!

“Dino knows!? Oh I am so gonna get him!” She scoffs, turning towards me, my head still facing the stars, scared at our proximity. “You do like your bodysuits!”

“They're comfortable!” I argue, “And this doesn’t mean you can say hi to spiderman on the street now- it puts everyone in danger and I don’t want that to happen to you even if it gets you bragging rights.”

“Kimi.” She says my name softly, carefully, “I don’t want to say hi to you for bragging rights. I would like to say hi to the real you even though it’s probably going to tank my reputation-”

“You are such a-”

“A what?” she sits up as I lean against my elbows, “Say it to my face, Kimi!”

“A nerd.”

She gasps dramatically, “Antonelli!” then she smirks, stepping closer, “You flirt.”

I shake my head, amazed at this girl who so quickly has become a genuine friend. I reach my hand up again, my fingers grasping the shoe that was hurled at us.

Y/n’s eyes are wide as I sit up straighter, “We should get off this roof.”

[venmondiese]

This party is boring... wanna leave?

✧ masterlist ✧ taglist ✧

Summary: The party you are in is boring, so you ask a cute nerd guy to leave with you... that is, until you find out this is his birthday party.  Maybe a gift and a happy birthday will fix his sad evening.

✧Pairing: Michael Gavey x Fem!Reader

✧Warnings: MDNI 18+, p in v, virginity loss, oral (m receiving), overall sweet, michael being a total nerd virgin.

✧Word Count: 7.8k

✧AO3 link: here

note: so i saw this tweet in my 2020 ig histories and i said... michael gavey coded, and here we are. Here is the original tweet (wendy and joy from red velvet haha) and AGAIN this is infinite i swear i am allergic to write things under 5k

Michael couldn’t be more excited. He looks proudly at the poster indicating the date and place of his birthday. 

Nothing too glamorous, he rented one of the halls for hire in Oxford, the same one that they used for the Christmas party that (to no one’s surprise) he wasn’t invited. But he intended to do something fun about it, with the pool table and maybe some game algebraic beer pong. Who knows? It was his birthday, so he did the rules.

And he had a few friends he could invite, of course, renting a whole hall seems…. exaggerated, but truly, he couldn’t get a pool table in his room. He paid for this only for the pool table. Besides, he liked his Norman no mates friends. Friends if you could call them that; they were as friend to him as Oliver Quick once was. Just that this once… he won’t get too attached.

Well, ‘friends’ would actually be mates from the chess club, so they weren’t exactly popular these days. They barely had a girl in the group, so they weren’t great with girls either. Besides, the only other girl that he knew had agoraphobia so… it wasn’t happening. 

His mum made some little biscuits and cupcakes for his day, since she came to have a little celebration just for him and her in a near-by cafe at college. He could skip a few classes to be with his mum on his birthday, after all. 

The night started interestingly. The space was obviously much larger than what he thought it could be, so they hung around the couch and the pool table. He felt the victory as he won two chess matches and a pool game. Maybe it was birthday luck, since everything was coming up as great.

As they talked about which opening was their favourite, Michael heard a little knock. Once he approached the crystal door, he saw Oliver with Felix by his side, with some liquor bottles. 

Michael frowned a bit, as he was pretty sure he rented the room, he did it with a lot of anticipation and made sure no one else did before him. And it was crystal clear that he didn’t invite Oliver. Sure, in their friendship, he once or twice talked about doing something about his birthday, but he never invited Oliver. 

“Hey Mikey” Oliver says, with an shit eating grin, and Michael has to roll his eyes, by how smug and prideful he looked. An absolute jerk, if you asked him. Oliver didn’t even wear his glasses anymore, and was all parties and relevancy thanks to Felix. “Come on”

Before Michael could stop them, Oliver passes by his side, as Felix follows him patting Michael’s shoulder with a smirk (he could swear it was in a patronising way) and people follow from behind as Oliver looks in the room for the music speaker of the rented room.

Michael walked as the crowd quickly dispersed, and he grabbed the few gifts he received, and looked at his distressed mates. 

��Oliver you cannot be here, I rented the room” Michael screams as the room noise is quick to appear, so different from the silence of their small reunion. 

“I saw your pamphlet” Oliver says nonchalantly as he successfully manages to get the aux cable. “Birthday, eh?” He says mockingly

“I rented it! You have to get out” He says almost screaming, as the same way he did once they met, when he asked Oliver to say a sum for him to say.

“If you can get all of us out, mate… sure” Oliver shrugs, clearly not minding.

Michael looks defeated. Even if he stands there, angry, with the few gift bags on his hands, he feels embarrassed. He wanted to do one nice thing for himself, just once. It wasn’t as cheap to rent a hall for his birthday (he couldn’t do it anywhere else, truly, but he thinks that maybe the pub would have been nice even if few of his mates didn’t drink beer)

The room fills very quickly, sitting on the couches and talking as they get vases with something to drink, or beer cans.

“Michael” two of his friends approach him, and he looks at them “We could rescue the biscuits and the cake” They say proudly as they have it in his hands. 

He couldn’t fake to look at least smug, so he nods a bit numbly. “Yeah, sure.” He says a bit disoriented, looking around “The rest left?”

“This was not a party, we assumed…” 

“Not really our thing. Though Tim and Steve stayed to see if they could get any girls” 

Michael hums, and he doesn’t know what to exactly think, since he didn’t expect this. He was organised, he liked things to be as he already planned. It made him secure, and it was only logical. But this interruption made him anxious.

“I gotta save the pool balls” He says to his friends “They are going to fine me if I lose one of them” 

“What… we do with this?” His friend asks about the food.

“Uhm… take the biscuits with you…” Michael says. “And the cake… leave it on the library next to the pool table, and hide it… please” 

As he collects the pool balls, and walks upstairs to return them, he is very downhearted. He remembers the time that he invited his friends from school and only his cousins and his neighbour appeared to his party; very embarrassing and he hated celebrating his birthday with a party ever since. It was mostly his mum and granny, with his dog and cat. Nothing else, nothing too fancy.

He comes back for the cake as he tries to explain the situation to the people that manage the rented halls, there was not much for them to do, and he is suspicious that maybe Oliver or Felix paid them to keep the room. At least they promised not to charge if anything broke, and he was happy with that.

So, money wasted, party ruined and they couldn’t even sing to him happy birthday. 

He walks from between the crowd as he steals a beer. Fuck it, it wasn’t eve stealing since they ruined his party. He takes a break, since he feels really discouraged. He knows his mates are not really social butterflies, but more leaning to being socially anxious. He might need to apologise, and even face the idea that they might be annoyed at him, and maybe they’ll kick him out from the chess team.

He drinks his beer, looking at how Oliver and Felix hyped the whole thing out, people sitting on the pool table… He hopes his cake is intact. He looks at his beer can as he move it a little to stir the liquid (he totally doesn’t want to look miserable AND like an imbecile)

“Hey” A voice calls him as he drinks from his beer. He has to look up to the prettiest girl that has ever approached him, probably. You wear a pink pleated mini skirt, with a short baby pink hoodie that he could see your bright pink bra underneath. God, it was a lot of pink in one person. 

You look at him as he blinks a bit, and you look at him with an alluring smile as if waiting for him to say something, and once he doesn’t, you continue.

“This party is kinda boring” you start saying, with a soft smile and a bright in your eyes as you look at him, doing all your best efforts to flirt with him “Do you wanna leave together?”

Michael blinks a bit as he looks at you, trying to process the words in his head but he fails. “Uh… this is my birthday party” he admits embarrassed and awkwardly, as he looks away to not face the shame, and he adjusts his glasses on the bridge of his nose.

“Oh” you say looking at him, your smile fading a bit, a bit worried about your comment. “Oh, I’m sorry” you say, grabbing his forearm. “Didn’t mean to be rude”

“No problem” he says, looking at how your hand rests on his forearm, almost caressing it slowly. 

“I suppose you didn’t invite all these people, did you? It was kind of a last minute call” you say looking at him, actually interested in him. “You seem pretty out of place for that”

“No… It was for me and my mates” 

“Ohh…” You say looking around, and you feel a bit of pity, which he doesn’t want nor needs. “Well, I would have brought a gift.” You say, trying to cheer him up “What is your name?”

Did they send you to make fun of him? Must be.

“Michael Gavey” He says, and he refuses to look at you, not to give you or them the satisfaction.

“Michael” you repeat, and you tell him your name too. “You are cute” you add.

He blushes and looks at you as if you just insulted him, his eyes open and he frowns a bit. He turns his head away in shame.

“Thank you” he murmurs, not sure of what to think. 

“So… your birthday is today.” You say tapping your thighs a bit. “How… randomly, I didn’t know”

“I like my birthday” He murmurs, drinking his beer hesitantly “Tis’ the day of Pi” 

“Day of Pie?” You ask frowning, your arms in your back as you lean in the wall. 

“Of Pi” he repeats “Like the pi from maths”

“Ohh, the circle thing” You say nodding and smiling, as you now understand. “Why is it the day of pi..? Ohh, it is because today it’s fourteen of March”

“Yeah” He says, as he looks at his shoes a bit embarrassed. He usually would think you were stupid, who the fuck confuses Pi with Pie? But you were the only one caring enough. 

“You seem to like maths, like your.. Your shirt” you say pointing it out at his maths pun, and he becomes aware that he has been, in fact, wearing that shirt all the time. 

Fuck, did he really fought with Oliver and with the rental people with a Math pun shirt? No wonder no one took him seriously.

“Ah, yeah…” He says awkwardly. You were very much engaging in the conversation, scooping on his interests little by little. 

“Do you know that I am flirting with you, right?” You say looking at him in the eyes and he looks from his shoes to your face, a bit surprised and panicked.

“Ehm… me? What for?”

“Because you are cute, like I said” you repeat “And it is your birthday”

“You don’t have to pity me because of that…”

“I am not pitying you. It is not why I like you. Come on, do you think I am pretty at least?” You ask as you change your body weight from one foot to the other while looking at him with the most alluring smile he has ever seen. 

God, the question sounds stupid, because you are not only pretty, but you are the hottest girl ever, looking at him as he freezes in place. Your eyes could trap him, as enchanting as they were, and your diminutive clothing was driving him insane. 

“Eh… yes” he murmurs. “Very pretty…”

He seems perplexed about the straightforwardness of this whole thing, and he is very confused. Where has this night taken him?

“I meant what I said. The party… is meh. You and I could leave together, if you want” 

He blinks, as his tongue wets his lips as he suddenly feels frozen in place. His eyes look at your expression as if you were joking, and he is unsure what to think.

“Uh… well, I have to get my cake, really, m-my mates saved it on the back of the library in hopes nobody would find it..:” He starts saying, not really sure why he is telling you this.

“Okay, we’ll search it” you say without any problem about it. “I could sing happy birthday to you and you can blow the candles”

That’s how you are now following him like a puppy, as he takes out the cake from behind some decorations that weren't hiding the cake very well, but it is mostly intact. 

You two walk together, to leave and Michael thinks that never felt so ashamed. He felt like doing the shame walk, as he passed through the people with a fucking birthday cake and a pretty girl following him.

“Let’s go to your dorm!” You tell him with a happy smile, your hand on his shoulder as you lean closer to tell him that as you both walk together.

He is confused how you’ll give him a gift if they weren’t in your room, but he accepts, as his dorm isn’t actually so far away from the rented halls, so he guides you upstairs, and upstairs, at the point where he hears you whine because of your heels.

You look a bit amazed as he enters his dorm, leaving the cake on his desk and moving to turn on the bedside lamp. He looks around, and you are taking off your heels and being just in socks. He blinks as he looks at you. Doing that means she’s comfortable here, he thinks. 

“Ah, eh…. Have a seat in the…” You sit on the edge of his bed, next to his pillows and he blinks. He wanted to say ‘in the desk chair’ but he guessed it was too late.

“Your bed is comfortable” You say smiling as you pat your right side for him to sit by your side. “Come, sit!”

Michael blinks. He dries his sweat palm by rubbing his hands on his thighs a bit awkwardly, as he takes a seat on the edge of his bed by your side. Your legs were tucked under your body, already comfortable, while he is rigid and tense, all awkwardness in comparison.

“And your mates are still at the party?” You ask looking at him, batting your eyelashes at him with a sweet smile as you lean your body weight to your hand, right beside him.

“Uhm… eh, well, they told me they left, so it was a bit rushed… I don’t know, I could call them if you.. Want to sing to me happy birthday and that…” he says a bit hesitant, and he is a bit unsure of his words when you chuckle a bit, if you knew a secret “B-Because we couldn’t… I mean we didn’t have the time for that, and my mum bought that cake because it is my favourite..:” he rambles as his cheeks are pink with embarrassment.

You were divine. In more than one way, you were the prettiest girl that he had ever talked to. And you were also the first girl in his dorm. And this close to him. And the first one to be interested in him. 

“Ah, of course… I bet it is tasty, it is sweet that your mum bought it for your party” You say smiling, as you look at him “Well, I don’t think we should call them here”

“Uh… Why not? We aren’t many, we are just seven, and with you we would be a pair number, so we could play a chess match since we are a pair. If you don’t know I could teach you” He offers. God, why did he accept this? Because you were pretty and all smiles with him, but he didn’t know what women like you liked…

“It’s not that, Mikey” you say softly, looking at him with an alluring smile, leaning slightly closer to him, which is dangerous, because it is the moment he has to decide if to look at your face or your tits. “It is because I wanna give you a gift”

Michael blinks. “Oh.”

“Yeah… It would be awkward if they were here”

His mind is numb, and he looks at you a bit confused “... Because they already gave me a gift?”

You have to suppress a laugh, as you shake your head and look down a bit. He takes the opportunity to look at your tits briefly.

“No…” You say again, with that damn tone that he can’t decipher. “You are not really good at hints, are you?”

He stays silent, looking at you as he tries to get it. “Eh… no, but I am really good at maths…”

You chuckle a bit, as you look at his face with a look he (again) cannot decipher. 

“Of course you are” you say sitting slightly closer, and he stays still as he looks at you and your tits coming closer to him “Your birthday it is in the day of Pi” you made sure to say the last word correctly, emphasising on it, and he nods a bit. 

“Yeah…” he murmurs looking at you as he licks his lips, and his glasses slide ever so slightly on his nose as he has to look down at your face

“I wanna give you a gift…” you repeat, and it is now that he feels your hand slide to his thigh and closer to his crotch. And his breath freezes on his throat as he feels your hand move slowly to rub his dick from above his clothes, and the traitor practically gets hard instantly at something that isn't his own hand. 

Michael practically freezes at your touch, as your hand slowly rubs his jeans where his erection was forming. Your eyes look at him as you smile, god, you were so provocative it made his brain go off. He couldn't take his eyes out of your face as he opened his mouth to pant a bit, a bit unsure of if to stop this or make it keep going.  It is not like he doesn’t want to do… this, but a little part of him still thinks you are just mocking him and probably there were popular jerks waiting outside to make fun of him for falling for someone so out of his league. 

But you were so pretty, lookin at him with tender eyes. As he seems so hesitant about it all. It wasn’t like he didn’t want this, but he just… wasn’t sure what to do, because this was confusing all his thoughts. How could he even impress you? 

It is you who leans to capture his lips. On yours with a kiss, slow and calm, since he was so inexperienced. It was his first kiss, as a girl rubs his cock. He surely was dreaming. 

“Do you want it?”

He blinks confused, his lips briefly open and all flustered as your hands keep on hardening his cock. “Um… yes” He swallows hard as his eyes are closed due to how good (and strange) it feels. To have a girl doing this with him.

“You’ve done this before?” You ask looking at his eyes, and his glasses are sliding on his nose and he doesn’ even notice, and your hand pat his cock which makes him whimper a bit. 

“Eh… yes, but with myself. I mean, b-by myself, like with my hand, that is…”

You giggle at his naiveness, and you add “I meant if you have ever had sex”

Michael looks at you surprised, and he adjusts his glasses on the bridge of his nose again. You were so direct, and this was unlike anything that had happened in his life. You confused him, with your plays and teases, he was more simple, and more straightforward. “No…” He whispers in reply, breathing a little heavily now as you squeeze him through his pants. 

Your smile is confusing, since he doesn’t know what it means. Well, he doesn’t get the clue to. Most things you do anyways. “It is your birthday” you repeat “My treat, I’ll make you feel so good, Mikey”

He looks down at his pants as you unbuckle his belt. There was something about you, so seductive and sensual as you did all torturously slow. You weren’t rushed, and even did it for his sake, as he looked so frozen by it all. 

You turn your head to look up to him as you also zip down his pants. He tried to think about anything else, because he felt on fire.

“Can you take these off?” You ask him kindly, and he looks. Briefly confused. “I really wanna suck you off”

Oh god. He almost cums on his pants. Oh god.  He repeats on his mind as he moves a bit to take off his pants, at least to his knees. Oh god, oh god. His mind tried to remain sane, he tried to think about some maths, the comfort of simple logic tries to centre himself. 

You look pleasantly surprised by his size, and you hummed in delight and he saw how you bite your lower lip. His cocks spring free, fully hard and the precum leaking out from the tip. He looked nervously at you, as his cock practically begged your attention and affections, and he could feel a turmoil form on his stomach as he pleaded with his eyes for you to do something about it. 

“So big…” you praise him with a smirk, and he looks away in shame as he blushes. It was a good thing, he thinks, but he cannot help but feel hesitant.

You gently grab the base as your left hand rests on his left thigh, helping you as you lean down to capture the tip on your mouth, and he leans slightly back as if trying to squirm away. He looks at you, overwhelmed at the warm and moist sensation around his cock, ever so slightly, but so intense at the same time. He pants as if he just ran a marathon, looking down at you as his balls tighten and feel so ready to cum. But he forces himself not to.

“Oh… A-Ah, fuck…” he says as you take his dick out of your mouth to lick it, from his balls to his tip. God, no one really prepares you to know how easy it is to cum when a girl sucks you off.

He tries to think of equations, some diagrams or anything, anything to not cum so fast. You have his cock again in your mouth, sucking on his tip and your tongue moves to tease him as well. He was going insane.

He looks at you, with your bright eyes full of delight and mischief looking up back at him, as his cock was deeper and deeper on your throat, making its way through your warm mouth. 

And you didn’t seem to mind how the drool was spilling out from your mouth, wettening your chin and how you gagged slightly the more deep you swallowed him. He was amazed, truly, looking down at you as you sucked him off. 

It was different from how he imagined. He thought that at his first time, he would lead the way, he would be confident (because he knew about porn and how these things worked) and he would be dominant enough. Yet now, he feels unsure, trembling as his balls shaked in need to release, because you were amazing and so hot. 

Maybe he didn’t know a thing about this all. He thinks, as his shoulders tense from how good the head of his cock feels in your warm throat. It sends shivers on his spine and he has to whimper pathetically. 

“You are so perfect…, I swear” He mumbles without breath, whimpering pathetically. You would have giggled, because he didn’t need to swear, but he was cute to do so.

You move your hand to take the hair out of his face, and you grab his right hand, and he doesnt get at first what you mean, until you let his hand on your hair, it is when he understands that you want him to guide you and move his hips. 

His own hips hesitate at the beginning , strange at how he is supposed to move without looking ridiculous or being uncomfortable. Instead, he takes your hair carefully, with both hands as he leaves a deep breath out. 

His little whimpers are amazing, and so hot, you love to hear it. It was almost quiet, very low, but it was a delight to hear how he whimpers as his cock twitches in your mouth.

He moves your hair up and down on his body, fucking your face slowly. He didn’t want to be reckless, and when you needed to, he allowed you to have air from time to time. 

His balls were on fire, and his dick was so hard and it felt so good as you deepthroated him that he was at the verge of cumming. 

“I’m… oh, I'm going to cum, m’sorry…” he whimpers, moving your head onto his cock more harshly, but still careful not to make a mess and make you choke on his cock. He would feel bad if he hurt you like that, especially when you do him a favour.

His hips hesitate as he starts cumming, and he releases your head because he guesses it could be overwhelming. But you do not back away, rather swallow all of his spending in your mouth, savouring it delighted as you looked up to him, and he opened his mouth in awe. 

You were his wettest dream come true.

What are the chances, the possibility that a pretty girl like you, just looked at him and decided to do this? To give him the best head ever? To help him lose his virginity, thinking he is worth the chance when you are out of his league? 

He is a man of mathematics and logic. And even being good at probability, he knew the chances were almost zero. Almost.

And you looked so brightly at him as you cleaned some of his cum dripping down from your chin and licking it, not to waste a bit. 

“It… it was good?”

“Yeah” you say without a breath, as you smile. “I love your dick, it is so… amazing” He can almost cum again when he sees you lick your lips.

“Oh.” He says a bit flustered, his mind almost numb from his orgasm. “T-Thank you…” 

It is your smile who makes him smile a bit, awkwardly and with his cheeks red. He cannot believe this is luck. He is dumb struck, looking at your lovely face with still red cheeks and a wide smile. And you just sucked him off.

He is guilty, and he looks down at your tits for a brief moment, but looks quickly at your face, as if ashamed of doing that. But you still have that alluring smile, looking at him. He still doesn’t get what it means, but he goes along with the flow. 

“You wanna see my tits?” You ask with a sweet tone, as if it was the normalest question ever. You have seen his eyes drop to your breasts and then to your face, it was cute.

Oh my god. He will likely cum immediately at the sight. He knows it, and his cheeks are red as he thinks of your question.

“Yeah, please…” He asks without breath, as he accommodates in bed trying for his cock not to give him away. 

“I would have worn something way cuter if I knew this was going to happen” You explain taking out your jacket, and to his no-surprise, you didn’t wear a shirt underneath, just the bright pink bra that poked out of your jacket. 

“You look beautiful” he murmurs looking at your still clothed breasts, and he then looks up to your face. “You… If this is your less fancy outfit, then god damn me” 

You giggle at his words, he surely was odd from all the guys you knew. Perhaps his lack of experience, perhaps his nerdy personality. You don’t know, but you find yourself wanting to do all filthy and kinky things with this nerdy man.

You take off your bra, with quickness, as he looks at you completely mesmerised by your nakedness in front of him. He blinks at your perky nipples completely to his sight, and his mind just goes off. He is pretty sure that if you asked him what 1 plus 1 was, he’d say a pair of fine tits.

“You can touch me, Mikey” you say with a teasing tone, that makes him look at your expression for a brief moment. “Like you can grope my tits and all…”

The boldness of her offer makes him salivate, he is sure, and the desire within him is just intense and he knows he has to. His left hand reaches out cautiously and grasps your right breast. 

Your soft sigh is enough for him to do it slightly more confidently, but still not too harsh. He doesn’t actually know how hard it hurts if someone gropes too aggressively, and so he prefers to be gentle with you, because you deserve all of it. 

“Here. Give me your other hand” You say, and before you can extend your hand to grab his, his right hand goes to your other breasts, as if he was waiting for it.

Your breath hitches before you giggle a bit, as he doesn’t understand you. His face is red, from embarrassment, from touching a girl, a very much real girl that desires him too, and from awkwardness in him.

“I meant, give me your hand” You say taking his right hand from your breast and he doesn’t wanna let go, but he does anyway. “I wanna… Mm. I wanna to show you something”

Again with coded words, he was unaware of its meaning. But he waited for you to tell him, as you looked at him with a smile as you waited for him to say it.

“Oh, uh…” Michael mutters as his brain finally took notice it was his turn to say something. “Eh… okay? Show me…” he says unsure what to say.

You guide his left hand down, under your skirt. He just noticed that you had not taken off your skirt yet, as he was still clothed and with his pants down. But he didn’t mind it so much as you pressed his hand against your clothed pussy. 

“You.. Y-You are really wet” he says slightly amazed, and you nod with a smile as he just leaves his hand there, a bit amazed as his fingers do the slightest move to spread the wetness on his fingers. You hum in delight as you feel how bold he might be becoming. 

“Yeah, I am” you nod to him with a smile, and he looks at you flustered, as he leaves an awkward chuckle. “And your cock is hard again”

He looked down at his dick, and in fact, he was getting hard again. He looked back at you, and he smiled a bit embarrassed. You were also smiling, and that was the only clue he got to know that you were having the time of your life.

“It’s because you are so hot…” he says in a weak attempt to justify himself. “and so pretty”

You laugh, as you kneel slightly to take off your skirt and kick it somewhere in his bedroom. You were only wearing your panties now, and he felt like a salivating dog wagging his tail at the sight. God he was pathetic.

He looked at you, and before he could try to do anything, you say.

“It will be better if you sit properly in the bed, not the edge. So you can lean back in the pillows”

He has no idea why he should lean back in the pillows, but again, he is not the one doing demands in this. In his eyes, you are doing him a favour, this was his wettest dream, and you surely got nothing from it.

He takes off his pants and he crawls to sit in the bed, his back against the pillows (he used at least three, he found it more comfortable) and so he watched at you with a smile, as you kneel up again, now to take off your panties.

“I swear that if i knew, I would have worn a prettier pair of underwear” you start teasingly, as you move your hands to the sides of your panties to take them off.

Oh god, he thinks once again, as the image of a naked woman is enough to send him into numbness again. He was just gaining confidence to take some part in this, but he was just so inexperienced, he had to decide on either cum desperately or trying to last longer, and he didn’t know that the last took all of his brain energy.

“Here” You say, grabbing his hand and leaving your panties in his hand. He looks at you, and you add “Another gift. You can keep it” 

He looks at you, slightly amazed by it. He holds your panties in his hand, and he can feel the wetness of it, knowing that you were (and are) so wet right now drives him insane. He looks at you and he blinks a bit surprised, and honestly, much more aroused. 

“Thank you..” he says as he appreciates this odd gift. He has no idea what use it may have apart from the sentimental one, but maybe it is like his own trophy? 

You get comfortable, still kneeling on the bed, you crawl to be atop of his lap. Each knee on the side of his thighs, and he has to look up to see you. Maybe his favourite part about this is how your tits are in front of his face. He loves it.

“Your hand” She asks, and when she extends her hand he is clever enough not to make the same mistake twice. He passes her his hand, and she guides it to her pussy once again.

Now he knows. Why men went to war for women. Why Troy was destroyed, for stealing one woman. Why men went insane for the touch of a woman. He gets it now. 

Your pussy drips wet as he touches it; bare and warm. He is surprised, in all honesty, as his fingers are rigidly moving forward and back. It is not rough; but it is rigid enough to let know his inexperience in the matter.

“I wanna make you feel good” He says looking at you, almost begging for you to teach him how. He wants to know the secrets that could have you squirm and moan crazily over him, as he was over you. 

“This is about you” You say, your hands moving to the edge of his shirt, to take it off from him. He helps you in it, and he leaves a breath as now both of you were naked in front of each other.

Your soft hand caresses his chest. He is no muscular guy; yet you caress him so tenderly that he has to look at you with that puppy look. He really wants to make you feel good.

“Tell me what to do.” He asks again, he looks pathetically needy to you; eager to make you cum on his fingers, and eager to learn how to please you.  His fingers linger hesitantly around your pussy, and he does his best guiding himself from little experience and instinct. 

You smirk as you bite your lower lip as you let a little whimper out. He was cute and hot, more than most guys you knew from before. Maybe getting with the nerd was a fantastic idea.

“I want you to fuck me” You say instead, smiling at him “I want your cock, not your fingers- for now. Besides, this is about you. You are the birthday boy”

As your hips lower on his lap, he takes off his fingers and looks at you sitting above his cock. You grind slightly as he opens his mouth agape slightly, the mere thought of fucking you has him all excited, and aroused.

“I do wanna.. Do that” Michael says with a longing smile, as you nod to him. The feeling of your pussy rubbing against his own dick. He can’t take it anymore, he longs for you too much. 

He is clumsy as he moves his hips, the head of his cock passing eagerly through your folds in search of your entrance, and he looks up at you as you moan at the feeling. He got something right. 

His puppy eyes catch your attention as his tip presses on your centre, and you look down at him a bit breathlessly. “You can’t cum so fast, Mikey. I want you to enjoy it” He nods when you tell him that, and he leaves a shaky breath at the feeling. 

“I… I’ll try…” He says looking at you, trying his best to hold back. But your body is too tempting for him. He is going to pass out, surely.

You move to search for something in your clothes, and you take a condom from somewhere. He isn’t too sure. He is looking at the ceiling waiting for you as he thinks on some hard equation from class, and he tries for the burning turmoil on his belly, full of lust and desire to calm down even a bit. He wants to have you moaning on his cock so hard, he will need strength.

Your movement is fluid when you put the condom on his length, and he is sure you have done this so many times. On other occasions, he’ll think something witty about it, but now he is rather intimidated. How is he supposed to compete with your experiences?

You move your hips slightly, as you start to sit down on his cock from one move. Slow and soft, he is sure you make sure it isn’t so intense for him, as your walls have a tight grip on his hard cock, and the feeling of finally being inside of a woman is incredibly intimate. His cock pulsates on your insides, and he has to look down, enjoying the sight of his thick cock stretching your pussy.

“Fuck…” You say breathlessly as you throw your head back, moaning in delight as you move your hips slightly.

“You’re so warm… and thigh..” he pants, his hands go to your hips as you ride him. 

“It feels nice?”

“More than that” He says looking up to you, and he whimpers as you move your hips. 

“I’ll let you get used to it.” You tell him softly “I think it could be a bit overwhelming, I guess”

“Yeah. A bit” he says with an awkward smile which makes you smile too, and you grab his cheeks as you lean a bit to kiss him softly. 

His enthusiasm is endearing, as he tries to passionately kiss you, but you are sticking with the slowness of it all. He whimpers a bit on your mouth as he can feel how your cunt tightens around him. 

Once you are apart, his glasses are again slowly sliding down on the bridge of his nose and you bite your lower lip as you hold a moan. God, what a hot nerd you are fucking.

“You are so amazing” He murmurs, looking up to you “And you feel so good…”

“Uh huh…” You hum as you whimper a bit, and so does he. 

“And I have… I have never done this before…” He mutters looking at where your pussy swallows his dick.

“I know” You say, giving him a peck. “But you make me so aroused, so hot…”

Michael blinks a bit confused, but he gains slight confidence in this. He nods at you and he lets his hands fall by the side of your legs, and he can only focus on the way that you ride him. You squeeze him, in all the way he can think of. Your cunt is squeezing his shaft. Your knees are squeezing his legs. All of your existence squeezes him, and he loves the feeling. 

He looks up at your face, you are moaning openly and you have your eyes closed as your hands rest on his biceps, helping you bounce on his cock. You look amazing. 

And your tits, God, your tits. Bouncing on his face as you ride him, all perky and perfect for him, and the sight of your tits make him leak more precum in the condom, as he tilts his hips slightly up so he gets deeper in the warmth of your cunt.

He stays looking at you, while his balls are tightening at how wet your pussy is. He is mesmerised by you, he cannot even find himself letting any sound out of his mouth. He is almost numb, looking at you as he makes you moan like this. 

He is making you moan desperately as you ride him. He is the one responsible to see how aroused he truly has you. You lean your body closer to his chest, moaning as you ride him, and he bites his lip desperate to cum. 

His own hips rut back to yours, thrusting clumsily as you sink down on his cock. Your pussy clenches around his cock, and he’s fully engrossed in the sensation.

Michael wants to cum so bad. He doesn’t think he has ever been in such a need to cum.It’s all his foggy mind can think of, cumming and you. And cumming in you, those two subjects interrelationate. 

“Tell me” He pleads, which makes you look at him again “Please, tell me how to make you cum”

His puppy eyes, how his glasses are slightly off on him, makes you moan almost on his face. 

“Your hand” You say, and he got the clue now. He is a quick learner, and instead of letting you hold his hand, he moves it down to your pussy. 

You moan at the feeling of his hesitant hand there, and he laughs a bit breathlessly, growing slightly bolder and he loves how desperate you seem. “Teach me”

“Fine, fine, wait..” You say stopping your movements, as reluctant you both may be to that.

You lean slightly back, your hand goes to grab his knee to help you not fall. He can see more of your pussy like that, and you sigh as if trying to think clearly.

“Here” You say, grabbing his wrist and moving it slightly up. He has no idea what you mean, but he is learning, so he follows your lead. “This is my clit, so you rub it… Not harshly, not too aggressive. It can be intense, but… you have to do it gently. Firm, but gently” 

He has no idea how to do both, but he’ll try. Before he can start, you grab his wrist again, and he is confused. What else is there that you take so long to say?!

You take his hand up, and your mouth is quick to engulf his index and middle finger inside, wettening them  with your own saliva before letting them go; not without leaving a provocative lick beforehand. 

“Now” You say with a slight smile “Just gently.” You repeat, and he nods.

He is so going to cum just from seeing you lick his fingers so lustfully. 

Michael tries his best, he does. His fingers find the little thing, so small, and he is unsure what response something so tiny could do. But anyways, he does as told. His fingers hesitate before rubbing slightly there, left to right at the beginning, and then up and down.

“F-Fuck!” You say almost closing your legs around his hand and dick, but you force yourself to remain open. Your other hand goes to hold you onto the mattress of the bed, so you don’t fall. You are leaning backwards now, and he can see your body in all it’s glory. 

It does have an amazing effect, he realises, as he rubs circles on your clit and you moan even higher, your legs tremble as you force them open, and you start lowering on his cock again. Unlike the last time, you don’t take the time to make sure his cock enters and comes out fully, but you just grind against it, and when you move up and down, it is barely just in the base of his cock. But the tip? It never leaves your wetness.

He wishes he could see the bump of his cock on your belly. He looks at your abdomen, and he can practically imagine how the shape of his cock would poke out from your abdomen.  

“I want to cum” He says, panting as his brain is overwhelmed. He is overdoing things, he tries to rationalise this, but between rubbing your clit, your cunt wrapping around his cock and his moans leaving his mouth, he feels like he will pass out any moment now.

“M-Me too” You whine, desperate as your hips rut more desperate on his cock, and that turns him even more. 

He has made a girl desperate for him. And he’ll make a girl cum on his cock.

Michael makes sure to rub your clit in a delicious manner. Or what he guesses is a delicious manner. And since you almost sob your moans, he’d say he is doing a fucking amazing job. 

“FUCK” He says as he feels your cunt squeeze him so much, that his mind practically goes blank “I-I’m cumming” He barely gets the words out as he feels himself spent on the condom inside.

He moans, loudly, it could be embarrassing if it wasn’t so pleasurable, and he has to throw his head back from the pleasure on how his shoulders tense up.

You grab his wrist, and he gets the clue that he has to keep his touch on your clit. Your cheeks are red from stimulation, and as he pants and whimpers from his orgasm, as he rubs your clit. It doesn’t take long, as you practically cum all over his cock, milking his dick and making sure his balls go empty. 

Even if he orgasmed first, your peak leaves him dry, and spent in more than one way. He doesn’t think he will ever hear a girl moan so loud and pleased as you when you cum thanks to him. 

When you fall to his side, he takes off the condom, leaving it on his bedside table. He looks at you, panting hard on his side, and he feels the same, as he looks at you, still mesmerised by you. 

He searches for your hand, awkwardly, and he moves you slightly closer to him. 

You both remain breathlessly, pants as you two face the ceiling. 

“So” You start saying, and he turns his head to yours, and you have another of your mischievous, alluring smiles on your face. “Have you blown the candles?”

[jewish-vents]

I have family in New York who are terrorized every single day by the Hamasniks from Columbia. I really don't think people who don't live there and don't have family there understand just how bad it really is. These people who everyone for some reason keeps calling "protestors" stalk Jews, scream slurs at them, try to storm synagogues, smash windows, assault people. One of them literally tried to snatch my cousin's baby out of her arms.

So all of you self-flagellating pick mes clutching your pearls about how people care too much about "some college kids protesting" need to shut the fuck up. You clearly have not been paying attention to what's actually happening there, or you're so steeped in internalized antisemitism that you think Jews in NY are lying about what they're being subjected to on a daily fucking basis.

"Oh but Trump isn't our friend and he's not doing this for the right reasons" shut the fuck up, you condescending assholes. We fucking know he doesn't care about Jews. Neither did Biden, but we all know damn well that if he'd done something about these fucking terrorist wannabes you wouldn't be nearly this upset about it. Because all this is to you is a game. You want your "team" to "win" more "points" and you will gladly sacrifice other Jews in order for that to happen. You are perfectly fine with Jews spending the next four years under constant threat. You would've been fine with it if that freak actually had kidnapped my cousin's kid and done g-d knows what to her as long as it meant the wrong political party couldn't have something they could try and spin as a win for themselves.

You all care more about nebulous ideas of "optics" than about actual people. That much is fucking clear. Go fuck yourselves, you absolute fucking shandes.

.

[zyk1ng]

I was gonna make this post way way earlier but I forgot lol but Uhm

I have played through the splatoon 2 story fully and am replaying it (for a future post bc a lot of the dialogue is rlly funny) and honestly while I absolutely loved it it makes me even sadder that splat 2’s story mode was kinda tossed aside (for valid reasons ofc) because it’s so Cool.

Excluding the gameplay, I think they did marie so well, because she sells the desperation of someone who’s got nobody she knows by her side. While she of course keeps the sassy attitude of sneak dissing her best friends (agent 3) and also telekinetically telling you to fuck off if you talk to her too much it’s very clear she genuinely cares so much about agent 4 and is so grateful they’re doing what they do.

these are only two screenshots of 8(?) of Marie randomly being really sentimental to 4 because this stranger chose to help her in her time of need rather than just ignore this GROWN WOMAN hanging out on a sewer drain

It’s like heavily emphasized multiple times that Marie could not be more grateful for 4’s help in retrieving not just the zapfish but also her cousin.

But then revealing that 4 knew about Callie the WHOLE TIME (I have a lot to say about this part but it’s mostly hc so) which is so KIND OF THEM???? this random woman recruits them into a secret military agency and hides the fact she rlly misses her cousin but they help anyway bc they WANT TO. (They didn’t even know either of them were famous btw) Marie shows a lot of gratitude toward 4 ESPECIALLY after the big reveal.

(You could make arguments for 3 being similar bc an old kook made them do it but this isn’t about them..)

And it’s not just being grateful for the one time, she genuinely enjoys 4’s company and wants to be better friends with them and chat after the zapfish and Callie are saved 😭😭😭

It’s so cute too, because 100%ing the game and even just being a little nosy is something that Marie picks up on, and remembers way later in the game. (More abt this later)

god I love this socially inept squid woman and her adopted child soldier that likes finding pieces of paper

Speaking of said soldier! I think the way they characterized 4 via the actual gameplay rather than art/statements/whatever is so cool

4 doesn’t have many illustrations besides the chaos splatfest and that one group photo where they’re being funky in the corner (and the apartment) but I feel like the reason for that is the fact that a lot of Marie’s dialogue as well as how splatoon 2’s hero mode is structured/designed speaks a lot about how they wanted to represent 4.

From a realistic standpoint, of course splatoon 2’s story mode has to be more creative both prompt wise and secret wise. But it feels like the reason its that way is because both 4 and Marie are separate types of people from Craig and 3.

The bosses help a lot with this too, being more gimmicky and weird (subtracting stamp.) Octo shower and samurai being bosses where you have to either react well or change your positioning to effectively beat them. (Octo shower is my fave btw I loved fighting it the first time)

The level design also shines in this aspect because if I’m honest I remember none of the splat 1 levels significantly besides the few octoling ones. Splatoon 2’s levels are very detailed (and also insanely pretty) and have some rlly fun puzzles in a handful of them and even the more fast ones are a blast to play through

And then all the little extras (sardiniums and scrolls alike) are hidden so well and you usually have to go out of your way to find them and even the secrets that aren’t either of those things have substance

Small note, a lot of extras are also made so that it flows well with the levels design (like the first dualie request mission) which is also extremely fucking cool.

the way marie touches on those little discoveries is so smart too because it (as I said before) characterizes 4 as someone who loves to look for things even if it’s on a whim especially since the sunken scrolls in the game are so much harder to find than in splat1.

And the fact that unlike splat 1, you can (technically) 800% the game by playing EVERY SINGLE LEVEL WITH EVER SINGLE WEAPON TYPE. to me it feels like it deepens the fact that 4 likes to be really thorough. marie goes “you have a problem.” When you break like two hidden egg crates in this one level and it’s so great.

I love what they’ve done with 4, whether it was intentional or I’m over-analytical.

Nothing gets past them, looking in every nook and cranny whether or not there’s secrets to be found. They’re too nosy and thorough and they like to be around marie after completing missions, they don’t know who the squid sisters are, hate balloons, may or may not be ok, have impulsive secret finding, partake in many extracurriculars, can be needy at times, go with the flow and they apparently smell better than agent 3.

Agent four, of the New Squidbeak Splatoon.

[saixria]

The ICHBW live stream animatic is hitting me hard hours after the fact I’m not a crier but I’m actually tearing up. Now I can fully articulate what I love about Athena’s part. Athena’s character came together so well I love it and I think the visuals combined with a day more of thinking + discussing with friends really helped me better understand everything. Those last 90 seconds of ICHBW was the BEST PART OF THE ENTIRE SHOW. Ridiculously long Athena character analysis under the cut which quickly devolves into thematic discussion lmao

First of all, the expressions they have on the animatic makes it abundantly clear that ody and Athena weren’t separated. HER SMILE!! HER LIGHTNING SCAR!! ODYSSEUS’ EXPRESSION SOFTENED TO A SMILE AFTER GETTING OUT OF QUICK THOUGHT!! Odysseus definitely pieced together what she did for her right then, there’s no other reason for Jorge to show Athena showing Odysseus that scar otherwise. It’s like they immediately slid back into place like puzzles pieces even after 10 years. They’ve been changed in completely opposite ways. Odysseus the mortal has been turned to be less human, more ruthless, while Athena the immortal goddess has been turned to be more human, more empathetic. The latter partially because of Odysseus. Tbh Athena ever showing her face to Odysseus after My Goodbye and saying “I can’t help but feel like I’ve led you astray” is as close to an apology as it’s gonna get LMAO. The unresolved WOTM melody in the end is actually because their story together hasn’t ended, it’s because Odysseus doesn’t have to be her warrior of the mind anymore.

I once said that open arms is more than mercy, but treating the world kindly to lead to kinder souls down the road, to change the world for the better, and it holds true even more now. Odysseus is too tired for this. He’s just a man, he knows a better world is possible but he can no longer be a part of it. He can’t witness the better world in his short mortal lifetime, he just wants his happy ending with his wife. He doesn’t want to be Athena’s warrior of the mind anymore, and that’s ok. And yet, and yet he knows it is possible. He needs it to be possible, and he needs Athena to make it possible. Athena accepts it with a soft “very well”. That doesn’t mean they won’t ever see each other again, just that they no longer have that obligation of mentor-student, they’re just two old friends. They can rebuild their relationship slowly but surely with what they have.

Telemachus is the Warrior of the Mind now (AHHHHHH HIS ATHENA CAPE AND HELMET I LOVE HIS UPGRADE). From here, Telemachus and Athena are gonna truly fulfill Athena’s mission of “making a greater tomorrow” except it isn’t to turn the world more logical and ruthless like she once thought, but to make the world more empathetic and kind — she’s finally found what she was fighting for. Perhaps this is why the WOTM melody in God Games ended with Legendary — Telemachus is the new warrior of the mind. Odysseus fought for a world where his son can be safe and grow up kind and he succeeded in that. Far from war, Telemachus grew up able to afford kindness and empathy while also retaining the ability to be ruthless in face of obstacles — and now he can use this to change the world to Athena’s new ideal — where people held each other with more empathy — as Athena’s new Warrior of the Mind.

Athena’s verse existing is a sign of her reconciliation with Odysseus (in character might I add! I don’t think they’re the type to express their affection so easily, they know each other so we’ll that they just know), so instead her verse is there to expand on the show’s theme as I will be talking about next.

I absolutely adore the depth Athena’s ICHBW verse adds to the thesis of the show. I’ve always thought of epic as mostly being about how it was best to strive for a balance between ruthlessness and open arms, but circumstances only allowed Odysseus to become ruthless which was tragic, while different circumstances allowed Telemachus to be both. But it’s not just that. Sure it’s good to have a balance between the two ideaologies but what if we could make a world where ruthlessness wasn’t needed at all? What if we could be unconditionally kind and be treated with kindness in return instead of taken advantage of or hurt? Where, when given the choice between open arms and ruthlessness, people would choose open arms? It wasn’t possible for these characters, but it could happen someday in the future. If Athena and Telemachus can work towards that future so can we. So should we, considering we’re in a much better place compared to them. A friend of mine said this was a call to action to us in the present and I just. Have not been able to stop thinking about it.

Athena has always thought in “maybes” about her purpose. from WOTM to My Goodbye we’ll be fine to ICHBW. “Maybe one day…” -> “One day you’ll…” -> “maybe if I…” -> “what if…” it’s like she’s representing the future, the “greater tomorrow” of what could be, because as Odysseus said, she’s immortal and she will live to see it and change it. Circe saga has something similar — “Maybe showing one act of kindness leads to kinder souls down the road”, “maybe one day the world will need a puppeteer no more, or maybe one day the world will need a puppeteer more”. The connection of these hypotheticals “maybe one day” with a future world that could possibly be changed for the better by spreading kindness and open arms extends from Athena’s songs to There are Other Ways, one of the only times in the musical where, when Circe could choose between ruthlessness and mercy, she chose to show mercy and help them in hopes of spreading kindness to the world and making the world a slightly better place — aka a scenario that showed how unconditional kindness, “open arms”, could work, for kindness isn’t the inability to be cruel but choosing kindness even when you have the choice not to be. “Kindness is brave”, like Polites said.

Because of her immortality, Athena is the character who’s most connected to “time” in the musical with her time-related abilities like “time dive”, making people think quicker, having a domain essentially outside of time and space… She doesn’t just have a connection with the future but also the past. As someone who lives forever, she is the one who can connect the past, learning from past mistakes, to change the future: “To fall is to learn one way”.

Speaking of her connection to time, You can almost see that at one point Athena was the narrator of the story (see cut songs: full speed ahead demo and Ismarus) like Hamilton’s Burr: simultaneously an observer and a participant of the story. In the animatic of ICHBW she’s overseeing everything happening from her hour glass, wondering out loud from a meta perspective about the themes of the show, hypotheticals of what a different story, a different world could have looked like, and bringing everything to a close. It really feels like Athena is who’s gonna “live and tell their story” as per Hamilton, as always has been the case from burrthena narration days of Old Epic. She’s not just the bridge between the past and future but also between the story and the audience, by bringing up these themes on a meta level to directly tell the audience to make the world a kinder place, because we have the choice, unlike Odysseus who can only choose to accept his actions and move forward. Because she lives forever she can carry on their memories forever. She can keep telling their story over and over again to remind herself and others to change the world by showing empathy and open arms, and she will keep telling this story to us until ruthlessness is no longer needed in the world. The world where this is possible is not theirs but OURS. It is WE who have the chance to choose between ruthlessness and open arms and the show is telling us that, when we have this choice and aren’t forced to be ruthless, to always choose kindness and empathy. Like Circe, like Telemachus. So that we may impart some kindness unto the world and make it a better place.

“Maybe one day we’ll reach them and we’ll make a greater tomorrow then they’ll see I know we’ll change the world cuz we are the warriors of the mind!” — yes, they have reached us. We are all also warriors of the mind, doing our part to change the world for the better, to be kinder.

To me, one part of Athena’s character that’s never clicked for me was her motivation in WOTM. “Make a greater tomorrow” “we’ll change the world” why? How? What’s the point of including this in her song when it’s never come back up again? Now with the ICHBW verse, everything is tied up with a beautiful ribbon. She has always wanted to change the world for the better, and now she’s finally found out how — to spread empathy and Open Arms — and it’s inspired by the desire to help her friends, to prevent what happened to Odysseus from happening again, honoring him, just as how Odysseus tried to embrace Open Arms to honor his dead friends’ memories.

All in all, I’ve grown to genuinely really really like Athena’s verse in ICHBW. It’s so short but so effective at conveying so much. I hope that made sense bc it’s more a compilation of thoughts I had rather than a structured essay. Perhaps one day I will restructure this into a proper essay but not today for after all I’m- *gets shot

[solarmorrigan]

Bats, and What to Do With Them

For the @steddie-spooktober day 14 prompt: Bats Rated: T | Words: 756 | CW: None | Tags: established relationship, Steve Harrington has absent parents, at the very least, Steve Harrington deserves nice things, and Eddie will give them to him Divider credit: @saradika

The first time Steve holds a bat, he is four years old, and his dad has signed him up for tee ball.

To be perfectly honest, Steve isn’t entirely sure what’s going on. It’s bright, there are a lot of other kids milling around, everyone seems to be shouting about something, and Steve is apparently supposed to be doing something with the bat in his hands.

When he finally does figure it out—when he hits the ball and it actually goes somewhere—his dad whoops from his spot in the crowd, and Steve glows. His dad isn’t around much, doesn’t have much time to play with Steve, but he’s here now, and Steve wants to make him to stick around. He runs when they tell him, and hits the ball when he’s supposed to, and he does his best to make his dad proud.

Tee ball becomes Little League, becomes the Hawkins Middle School team, becomes junior varsity in high school, but by the time he’s sixteen, Steve has given up on baseball. His dad had stopped coming to his games a long time ago, and Steve’s realized it will take a lot more than hitting a ball to make his dad proud.

Still, the feel of a bat is familiar in his hands when he swipes it up off the floor of the Byers’ living room. The weight is a little different, a little off-kilter with all the nails hammered into it, but Steve can adapt. He’s hit smaller targets than the thing he’s aiming for, but it’s never mattered as much that he lands a swing as it does right now.

He doesn’t even have to think about it; muscle memory takes over as he winds up, aims for the flower-petal head full of teeth that’s about to kill his friends, and swings for the fucking fences.

Later, even though the bat had been Nancy’s, and it had been Jonathan who’d filled the thing with nails, it stays in Steve’s possession. They both think that it’s best in his hands, and Steve doesn’t disagree. It comes in handy, after all, less than a year later when Dustin comes barreling into his life, bringing demodogs in his wake.

And a couple of years after that, when Steve actually has a moment to consider it, he almost wants to laugh. He’d had a bat in his hands again, and he hadn’t even had to think; he’d simply gathered all his strength and swung.

The fact that the bat had been a monster, rather than of the baseball variety, had apparently been irrelevant. Steve is well-trained by now; he knows what to do with bats.

At least, he’d thought he did.

But now, there’s a bat sitting on his pillow, and he’s at a loss.

It’s purple and black and fuzzy and stuffed – a little plush toy. Steve picks it up carefully, looking it over, and it looks back through green plastic eyes, giving Steve a little fang-toothed smile.

“Hey, Steve, have you– oh, you found him,” Eddie says, walking into the bedroom breaking into a grin has he finds Steve standing by the bed, still staring down at the bat.

“Yeah.” Steve says, looking up at Eddie with furrowed brows. “What’s it doing on my pillow, though?”

“He’s for you. Obviously,” Eddie teases. “Saw him at the store and it made me think of you, so I brought him home.”

This is clearing absolutely nothing up for Steve. “Why would this make you think of me?”

“Well,” Eddie says slowly, coming up beside Steve to sling an arm around his waist and pull him close, “you’re the man who handles the bats, right? So: a bat. For you. I thought he was cute.”

It is cute. Steve likes it, but he feels like maybe he shouldn’t. He hasn’t had a stuffed animal since he was maybe six or seven, when his dad had said that he was too old for them.

“What am I supposed to do with it?” Steve asks, the toy still cupped carefully between his palms.

“Hold him. Cherish him. Raise him as your own,” Eddie says, holding an entirely straight face for about five seconds before he’s smiling again, teasing Steve. “It’s a plushie, Steve, you don’t have to do anything with it. Just… enjoy having it.”

“Oh,” Steve says.

It’s a bat. Just for him to have. Something soft and sweet with no expectations attached.

And Steve guesses he can learn something new, when it comes to dealing with bats.

[flor4de4amor]

aviator!abby you say…👀

i did say aviator!abby… screamed it from the rooftops even 🤭 she stays heavvyyy on my mind.

click for palestine!

read before engaging with my works and acc

warnings: slight nsfw/smut at the end.

aviator!abby who has a deep-rooted one-sided rivalry w ellie, who literallyyyyy just wants to be her friend. she comes home and grumbles in your arms about her. "she's just so annoying baby!" she whines for the hundredth time about her coworker.

aviator!abby who's a dog person, but puts up with your evil cat just cause she loves you.

 aviator!abby who can do more pushups than anyone on her squad. three fingers. two fingers. one finger even. she’s got them outranked without a doubt. 

aviator!abby who always comes home exhausted. heart heavy, hands dirty, boots half unlaced by the time she’s in the door. she's eager to lay in bed with you.

you greet her at the door. she always kisses your temple first, slides to your warm cheeks, and kisses you softly on the lips. you know she’s had a long day.

“cooked your favorite,” you muse softly against the side of her mouth.

“how do you know me so well mrs.anderson?” she grins, dominant hand coming up to the nape of your neck.

you shrug, giggling against her chest, “years of practice maybe.”

“yeah, my baby’s the real mvp.” she smiles into another kiss.

aviator!abby who always has her hair in the most ridiculously tight braids and buns. she’s quite creative with her hair, and is always eager to try a new style on you for practice. but, her craft works against her towards the end of a long shift. deep migraine settling in her skull, and she knows it’s not gonna feel better until she’s sprawled in your lap while you undo her hair. your fingertips scratching at her scalp while she sighs and mewls at your lighthearted touch.

aviator!abby who’s totally obsessed with you. she's has got pictures of you in: her wallet, dashboard, phone case, on her locker mirror, even has her phone wallpaper. she’s got your kiss print on her helmet. made sure it stuck with some clear tape and lots of loving. 

aviator!abby who’s somewhat quiet, but incredibly cocky. forget cocky, she’s so competitive. a calm game of monopoly between the two of you turns into to her cackling as she bulldozes you into debt. you roll your eyes at her antics cause it’s literally just monopoly, with her wife, but she treats it like war. 

aviator!abby who loves taking care of her little wife. goes absolutely out of her way to make your life easier. problem with the car? actually, the oil hadn’t been changed in like forever and a half. don’t worry though, abby’s fixed it! you want a new dresser built? abby’s done it in half an hour. she made sure you timed her for proof. someone’s giving you a hard time? yeah, don’t let abs find out she’s gonna rip them a fucking new one. you call her an american bully like the dog breed, for how she’s always by your side. going out of her way to be overprotective.

aviator!abby who’s insecure. she’s in a male dominated field, constantly undervalued, and disregarded. she’s built up a thick layer of protection and ego to protect herself. she spends all day being: mean captain abigail anderson who chews out her inferiors and can kill with looks alone. but when she comes home, all the sudden it’s like a flip switch. it’s “pretty abby,” “baby,” “darling don’t trip on the cat toys on the stairs!” “come to bed i’m tired,” abby. 

aviator!abby who likes being in control during sex. she likes how each action pulls out a very needy reaction from you. if she pulls on your nipples with her calloused finger pads, you’ll whine and arch your back into her chest, as her bicep curls around your waist. if she presses kisses into your neck, and sucks on the skin leaving bruises, she knows it’ll make you cry her name. your nails finding their way to her shoulder blades while she tortures your neck, littering it with love marks. abby knows, that if she hits that sweet spot deep in you w her strap, you almost always cum. sweet cream coating the silicone right around the base, abby can’t help but lick her lips as she pulls out of you, eliciting a string of cursed complaints. she’d suck the member off to taste you herself. but it’s more exciting to pull you to your knees and tap your eager tongue with her tip, groaning as you swallow yourself. not because it feels good, but god you’re so pretty. 

aviator!abby who loves praise so bad. she gets so wet when you call her pretty. she’ll rut against your palm as you whisper in her ear. telling her that she’s your only girl. that you want her. no, you need her. she melts at the way you kiss her biceps, bite her bottom lip gently, and look up at her with big doe eyes when you eat her out. she tries extra hard to be gentle with you. you’re her princess, she doesn’t wanna hurt you. but she can’t help herself when her hips rut into your tongue and her hands come to grip the base of your neck and the roots of your hair roughly. but she can’t help and darkly chuckle as you moan into her mound at the action. “my baby’s a dirty girl huh?” when you don’t reply she tugs your hair again, smirking as you lick feverishly at her clit. she removes her hand from the back of your neck and taps her pointer and middle finger against your cheek, “don’t you remember the rules babe? speak when spoken to. thought you were a good girl?” when you attempt to pull off her, she clicks her tongue snd uses her hold on your hair to keep you in place. “god you’re so bratty today.” she smiles to herself. 

sigh, aviator!abby please i need you. need you so so so so bad. 

im so stuck on what her callsign would be, what do yall think?

divider by: @ohdearlucifer

[oopsiedaisiesbaby]

If you're up for it, I would actually love to prompt you a fic based off of the "Steve and Billy are element teachers" idea.

I'm thinking, what if you did a fic about them falling for each other but only set in the teachers lounge? Like one of those 5 +1 style fics?

Ask and ye shall receive (sometimes) 😄 Terribly unedited and sloppy but here you go 😘

Five

“Harrington!”

Steve fought the urge to faceplant against the table. Dropping his sandwich back into its bag, Steve tensed in preparation for whatever Hargrove decided to light him up about that day.

Robin didn’t bother to look sympathetic and Jason looked positively gleeful. He needed new friends.

“What?” Steve sighed, turning around in his seat to watch Billy stomp to the middle of the teacher’s lounge and blanched.

It should be a criminal offense to wear shorts that short. There were children in the building. Hargrove taught said children. In those shorts?

“Your class has been late to PE all three days this week,” Hargrove stated, arms crossed over his chest, brow furrowed in fury.

There was a long awkward pause as Steve waited for him to get to the point. Steve flushed when he realized that was the point. He fish mouthed when Munson cleared his throat, interrupting the oppressive silence.

“And?” Steve hedged, unsure of where this was going.

His class had been late to specials every day that week. Munson and Robin hadn’t complained though. Just Hargrove.

“And? Do I return your little gremlins to you late?” Steve opened his mouth to answer but Hargrove barreled on. “No! Because I have the common decency to respect people’s time.”

Steve cringed in his seat, words failing him as he pressed back against the edge of the table to get away from the absolute aggravation radiating off of Hargrove. He wasn’t doing it on purpose. He had made up a new game for the kids to help them memorize dates and they loved it so much it was easy to lose track of time.

“Don’t let it happen again,” Hargrove snapped before storming back out.

“Phew,” Robin exhaled before going back to her own lunch. “He really needs to unclench.”

Holloway’s snicker across the room did not help Steve’s guilt one bit.

Four

“Harrington!”

Steve clenched his jaw resolutely, turning in his chair and facing Hargrove head on this time. Steve had been caught off guard last time. Not today.

“Hargrove,” Steve replied coolly.

Hargrove paused his march into the teachers lounge, frowning. He narrowed his eyes before continuing his war path.

He was in those stupid little shorts again.

“I thought we established you were going to respect my time last week,” Hargrove told him, arching an eyebrow at Steve’s pinched expression.

“I didn’t agree to anything,” Steve shrugged, arching an eyebrow right back at Hargrove. “They were only late two out of three days this week anyways.”

Hargrove’s nostrils flared like an angry bull, “that’s two days too many.”

“Maybe make your subject more interesting and they won’t want to stay extra learning history facts,” Steve said, inflecting his tone with as much derision as possible.

He always told the kids to ignore bullies but Steve wasn’t one to back down from a fight.

Hargrove scoffed but a corner of his lips quirked in the hint of a smirk.

“Don’t let it happen again, Harrington,” Hargrove warned him, pointing a finger in his direction.

Steve rolled his eye and watched Hargrove turn on his heel before stomping off.

“He wants to fuck you so bad he’s about to catch a public indeceny charge in those shorts,” Jason remarked casually, smiling small and pleased to himself when Munson choked on his lunch across the room.

Steve might just catch a public indecency charge because of those shorts too.

Three

“Harrington.”

Hargrove didn’t so much as snap it that time as sighed it like a disappointed parent.

“I know, I know,” Steve groaned, already rolling his eyes. “They were late today, can we get the yelling over with in less than 5 minutes today? I’ve got a headache.”

Hargrove stopped short, mouth open as he frowned down at Steve. His hands were by his sides rather than crossed over his chest and it framed his awful little shorts way too well for Steve’s sanity.

“Well?” Steve prompted when Hargrove didn’t immediately tear into him.

“One day out of three’s an improvement, but I still expect better next week,” Hargrove told him, tone entirely too serious for an elementary school teacher’s lounge. And those stupid shorts.

“Whatever,” Steve scoffed, too tired and head pounding to truly engage with Hargrove’s bull shit that day.

The silence dragged on while everyone shifted awkwardly in their seats.

“Eat a cookie, your blood sugar’s probably low,” Hargrove told him, eyes roving over Steve’s face before he nodded to himself and stalked out of the room.

When Steve got back to his classroom after lunch, there was a homemade chocolate chip cookie on his desk. It was the best cookie he had ever eaten in his entire life.

He was grateful Claudia wasn’t there to see him be such a traitor as he nearly swooned biting into it.

Two

“Harrington?”

“What?” Steve drawled, slumping in his seat and fighting the itch of annoyance creeping up his spine. “The kids were on time every day this week, even to art and music.”

“Thank you for that,” Billy replied, shockingly earnest. “But your favorite little gremlin complained the whole time that you cut jeopardy short to do it.”

Steve sighed, raising his eyebrows expectantly at Billy, “you think I can control what comes out of Dustin’s mouth?”

Munson snickered from his newest seat next to Jason.

“No,” Billy admitted with a wry smirk. “That would take an act of congress, maybe not even then, but I do expect you to have a conversation with him about taking me seriously. Seems the lack of respect is a family trait.”

Steve and Dustin weren’t even actually related.

He rolled his eyes and gave Billy an assessing look, “you expect him to respect you in those shorts?”

Billy grinned, wide and sharklike, “I expect him standing at attention and saluting next week.”

With that, Billy departed with a resolute nod.

“Oh my god, save all of us the pain and just suck his dick already,” Holloway muttered across the room.

Robin cackled like the traitor she was.

Steve would be doing none of that.

He couldn’t fight the grin when he got back to his classroom and saw a homemade peanut butter cookie on his desk.

One

“Steve.”

Steve couldn’t stop the wild grin that tore across his face as he turned and watched Billy hesitantly enter the teacher’s lounge. His face was pinched with utter confusion.

“I almost sent your gremlin to the office today,” he told Steve, voice halting like he wasn’t sure of his reality just yet.

“For what?” Steve prodded, clicking his tongue on the “t” and doing nothing to hide how giddy he felt.

“Well,” Billy drawled, arching an eyebrow. “For calling me a fascist pig when I told him he had to play dodgeball or get an F for the day.”

Steve’s grin dampened a little bit at the words. He had definitely not told Dustin to call Billy that. That was so far beyond ‘butt head’ it surpassed comical into terrifying. He was seven.

“I am actually so sorry,” Steve whispered, grimacing as Billy’s face grew stormy. “I told him to call you a butt head not a - a -”

“Fascist pig?” Jason supplied way too gleefully.

“That,” Steve conceded, sending his most pleading look up at Billy.

Billy sucked on his teeth frowning at Steve for a moment before deflating with a sigh, “I believe you. Kid’s too smart for his own good.”

Steve exhaled deeply in relief at Billy not blaming him. In his relaxation he let his eyes drift down to the stupid little shorts Billy was sporting yet again. They were a nice dark green that day.

When his eyes drifted back up to Billy’s face, he was absolutely leering at Steve. Steve flushed and bit back a grin, peeking up at Billy through his lashes. He wondered what type of cookie would be on his desk that day when he got back to his classroom.

“Later, Steve,” Billy drawled, voice smooth and sticky like honey.

Steve’s flush spread down his neck.

“I don’t even like dick and I think I just got pregnant, those shorts are a crime,” Robin hissed.

Steve was pretty sure he just got pregnant too. The white chocolate chip macadamia nut cookie on his desk solidified exactly what he knew he needed to do.

Plus One

“Billy.”

Billy’s head whipped up, eyes wide as he took in Steve standing in his office doorway.

“Am I dreaming or is that you Harrington?” Billy asked, a lewd grin stretching across his face as he sat back in his chair spreading his legs.

His stupid little shorts pulled obscenely against his thighs.

“Yeah it’s me,” Steve vollied back, biting his lip, fingers tightening around a Tupperware container of Claudia’s famous homemade sugar cookies. “Don’t cream your pants.”

“I just might,” Billy quipped back easily, tongue coming out to lave at his bottom lip.

“There’s children in this building,” Steve warned him, zero bite to his voice.

“Not that I can see,” Billy replied, quirking an eyebrow.

Steve cleared his throat and set the container of cookies on Billy’s desk.

“We have dinner reservations at Enzo’s at 8:00,” Steve told him. “Wear something nice.”

Billy nodded, opening the container and pulling a cookie out. Steve’s knees nearly gave out as Billy took a bite in the most disturbingly sensual way as possible.

“I’ll bring the shorts for afterwards.”

If Steve choked on his next breath, it was okay. No one was around to see it and Billy definitely wasn’t judging.

Dustin cried when they told him they were engaged three months later.

[bossuary]

There's no universe where I accept that Lucanis knows anything about seduction. Sorry.

He recognizes flirting. That's it.

No innuendos, no natural smiles, no mirroring of gestures. He simply doesn't have the range, darling. And how could he? When would he have spent un-structured, non-training time with his peer group in a social setting? What peers? What friends?

To develop comfort and ease with this sort of thing it can't be a single interaction, it has to be repeated, sustained. It has to be iterated upon. There's just...no fucking way Caterina (or anyone in her employ) let Lucanis wander around making friends outside the Crows, or pursuing any of the dumb shit that people naturally pursue to fulfill themselves and be a part of society.

The fledglings probably steal time away to rebel, to goof off and get in trouble. But not Lucanis. Not the First Talon's demon of a grandson. All the knowledge he has, his skills of observation, his contacts...that's work shit. He never went to school with someone who became an accountant or a bricklayer. Never traded silly stories about pets or vacations. His socialization was limited to whatever served the role Caterina assigned to him.

The only reason Lucanis developed 'cooking' as a hobby is because he has to eat anyway, and so does everyone else. You can't get beaten for learning how to feed yourself. His only other hobby is knives. Because he doesn't understand hobbies. He didn't 'train to be an assassin,' he was forced to be THE ASSASSIN. Like, the platonic ideal of an assassin. The wiki entry.

He makes it clear that his life did not allow for personal pursuits. He says it in a lot of ways, sometimes literally but often just in how he reacts to Rook and the others. There wasn't purpose in becoming interested in things just for the fun of it, for self-actualization. Without that, he lost out on the development of interpersonal skills most of us would take for granted.

A non-comprehensive list of things most people learned to do while Lucanis was sweating and starving and not crying out at the impact of Caterina's cane:

how to work with a diverse group of people

how to resolve conflict

how to process failure

how to identify needs and boundaries...and express them

how to engage in social conversation

how to daydream

how to play

how to love

Stuff you would pick up without even realizing it, from your friends and schoolmates, your co-workers...your parents. I don't want to make it seem like I think Lucanis' life was wall-to-wall shit. He is wealthy in a way that is beyond the reach of every companion (save Dorian) we've ever had, across all four DA games. He has a support system. His kindness, humor, and ability to make a place for himself at the Lighthouse post-Ossuary mark him as a man of unimaginable resiliency. So, he must have carved out some goodness in his life.

My point is that the good moments were the exception, and in my view, they wouldn't have given him a foundation on which to build any kind of meaningful experience in terms of desire, seduction, romance, and sex.

He reads a lot! That's helpful. And I credit Lucanis' training for likely giving him a sharp insight on body language and facial expressions. But knowing HOW to read doesn't mean you've understood WHAT you read. Romance novels aren't primers for physical relationships any more than sci-fi books are manuals for technology you just haven't encountered yet.

He's 36 and he's never been on vacation, gone ice-skating, raised a pet companion, or had a relationship. He doesn't know how to send flowers, dress provocatively, or plan a romantic weekend in the countryside. He KNOWS that he doesn't know how. The Lighthouse is full of people who have done these things, and more. Rook included.

HERE, in the pantry, Lucanis moves forward without a single piece of lived experience to guide him. The man who plans his every move six weeks advance, and has a knife for every occasion is absolutely flying blind. What he knows is that he wants Rook (a thing as deep as it is new) and Rook has been so clear about wanting him that even if this goes Wrong, Rook will make it okay, somehow. And I just can't reckon that any version of him as secretly suave and confident is preferable or more alluring than this one: the weird little guy who, deSpite all of the above factors, still fucking Goes For It.

That guy can get it.

[queenlua]

hey lua what decks do phoenix aceattorney and miles aceattorney play in magic

PHOENIX WRIGHT

once upon a time, a friend bullied me into going to a Pro Tour Qualifier, which was probably the largest Magic tournament i’d ever been to at that time, right?

i was happy to be bullied, to be clear, but the problem was… i hadn’t played standard-format Magic competitively in about 2-3 years.  so my knowledge of the current metagame, what deck archetypes were popular, and what the current cards even were, was staggeringly limited.

“it will be fine,” said my friend.  “here, take this spare deck i built.  it’s super-straightforward and easy,” he lied.

he said this to me approx. 8 seconds before the first round began, so uhhhhh, i sure was playing a game of magical cards without ever having even looked at the damn deck before!

so, lo, literally in the course of playing the deck, i was learning how this shit was supposed to work.  “oh!” i’d exclaim with delight, halfway through my turn.  “THAT’S how those two cards are supposed to interact.  oh that’s super clever.  what a neat combo.”  and then i’d proceed to shiftily look at my opponent over my cards, riffle those cards a lil bit, and then say “pass” with as much of an enigmatic vibe as i could muster.

meanwhile, my opponent was Actually Prepared, and they were Trying To Win, and they were pissed.  they threatened to call Slow Play on me because i was taking so fucking long reading all the cards.  as in, he literally called a judge over, who stood there watching me the whole time, in order to determine if i was being Criminally Bad At Magic versus just A Regular Amount Of Bad At Magic, and i was sweating bullets the whole time because i didn’t know this deck or their deck or any of those cards and AHHHH why is the judge staring at me!!!

….which only served to make it EXTRA-humiliating for this poor fuck when i proceeded to eviscerate them 2-0.  hahahah get dunked onnnnnnnn nerd!!!

and then i also proceeded to eviscerate my next opponent???

sheer dumb luck.  i cannot overstate how ill-prepared i was for this tournament.  i absolutely did not deserve these wins.

meanwhile the friend who gave me the deck was having a much worse time with their deck, and they were like “what the fuck. you weren’t supposed to win. how are you winning with that shit, my deck’s so much better than yours”

anyway.  i think that’s the kind of scenario Phoenix would get into if he were an MtG player.  dude Gets Himself Into Situations And Then Uses Cleverness + Bullshit + Luck To Get Out Again.

(AA4-era Phoenix seems like he’s doing the same thing… but, in reality, he’s actually been meticulously crafting his deck in secret for the past six months.  he’s not even aiming to win the tournament, he’s just exploiting a known weakness in the opponent-matching system that lets him know with certainty who he’s going to get matched up against (spoiler: first round is Kristoph), and he’s hyper-optimizing his deck to beat Literally Only Those People.  meanwhile, Apollo, who built a tryhard hyper-optimized variant of Red Deck Wins, is lowkey annoyed that Phoenix's seemingly-random pile keeps vaulting him just one table above him in the standings, because Apollo knows his deck is better. he knows it!!!! just let him go 1v1 and prove it aaaaughhhh!!!)

((also, in case you want Actual Concrete Cards And Colors And Stuff: in general i think Phoenix prefers limited play (draft, sealed, "anything where you open booster packs on the spot & throw a deck together") to constructed play, because he doesn't like being tied down to any one game plan. when he does play constructed, i think he's less attached to a specific colors and more attached to specific mechanics. in particular: he's not a combo player exactly, but he likes mechanics that feel like bullshit. dude saw Madness for the first time & his eyes lit up & he was in LOVE, "you mean i'm discarding the card but then i can cast it for free??? hell YES." he absolutely ran a poison counter deck during New Phyrexia. ah fuck i just realized he was probably a huge stan for noted awful expansion Battle for Zendikar, i think i gotta cancel him now, sorry))

((and i think Phoenix also has a touch of Timmy in him! like, i went to a huge state tournament once with a bunch of really skilled players, and there was this one dude in our car who had a really solid deck, clearly adhered to a lot of the trends in the meta at the time... but his win condition was a Shivan Dragon. which wasn't a bad card at the time, it was a reasonable win condition, but it was... slightly suboptimal? not at all the obvious pick? sort of random? and multiple people asked him "why is that your win condition" & he shrugged and said "i like dragons." so the dragon stayed & that dude ended up getting second place in the whole tournament so FUCK optimal play, bring a dragon. i think Phoenix would sneak in a dragon now and again. just 'cause))

MILES EDGEWORTH

this one is trickier!!!

young!Miles is just going to play Whatever The Meta Deems To Be The Best Deck, right. the von Karma perfection thing and all. it's all very boring & micro-optimized to be the Best Deck Of Its Kind & he pours over the results of the big name tournaments week after week & does some math or whatever to hyper-optimize his own build of the Obviously Correct Deck. there is no soul in any of this, purely Executing On A Formula.

...but then he experiences Character Growth & has his big gay crisis & now he has to pick up the game again. he opens the latest tournament results... clicks around some win % stats for various cards in a desultory kinda way, and... his heart's just not in it, right?

enter 2-4 era Miles. 2-4 era Miles is playing some utterly unhinged Five Color Good Stuff thing. there's a lot of Planar Chaos cards in there, because that whole set was about Weird Shit & cards doing Stuff You're Familiar With (But In The Utterly Wrong Color!!!) & all that is resonating with Miles more than he'd care to admit. he cannot possibly talk about his unnecessary feelings but he can make a weird noise rock album about them. and by noise rock album i mean this fucking Magic deck.

and he's playing this deck with a 100% straight face, as though this is the exact same behavior that won him the Junior Super Series five years in a row & not a desperate cry for help from a madman. everyone else is like Miles... are you playing fucking singletons... in a fucking standard deck... you know your deck will be more consistent with four-ofs right... and then he gives a cool fish-eyed stare & taps out to cast some arcane bullshit legendary creature & gives a single rap of his knuckles against the table to indicate that he's passing the turn.

and it works, is the thing! all those years of training to be the Spikiest Spike Ever have paid off; this Five Color Good Stuff thing relies on some pretty clever insights to make the mana base work, and parts of what he's doing eventually get adopted by the larger metagame to become an Actual Serious Deck. but, like. it's still a monstrosity. any skilled players watching are still definitely wondering Are You Okay, Dude.

after 2-4, i think Miles settles back into playing something more normal. he still cares about winning, but he's going to do it with a touch of class. he wants a game that involves dialogue, some actual back-and-forth, because just trying to combo off is lame coward behavior.

aw yeah baby we're talking counterspells!!!

he's a blue player at heart & he's happiest when he's updating the autopsy report shutting down whatever his opponent's plan is. he'll splash other colors as the occasion calls for it, but he'd be happy running mono-blue the rest of his life. like, i ran a pretty fun Legacy deck back in the day which consisted of:

every kind of counterspell i could get my hands on,

propaganda because FUCK creatures,

thieving magpies for the card draw,

and a few silver wyverns to, y'know, actually win the game

...and i think Miles would appreciate that deck. just play counterspells until the opponent runs out of steam & then cruise your way to victory with a couple birds. simple. elegant. classic. doesn't involve any of this modern Planeswalker bullshit (Miles regards most developments that happened to MtG post-Time Spiral block or so as affronts to game design).

(i do think Miles has a secret fondness for sagas as a card type, however. they remind him of all that Character Growth, but in an abstract/subconscious/nonthreatening way. too bad most of them are a bit of poor match for the kinds of decks he likes to play)

FINALLY: i think Miles hates playing Commander with every fiber of his being & Phoenix loves it & this is a pretty serious point of contention in their relationship. poor dudes

[writtenbymisunderstoodnerds]

You hate each other, right? (Tierna Davidson x Reader)

This wasn't requested or something I actually planned to write, but writers block is a bitch. Titles are hard, this isn't edited and I don't think this is very good, but here it is. Hope you enjoy :)

I'm going to try work on my actual wips so we'll see how that goes.

Warnings: None that I can think of, but let me know if I need to add anything.

Words: 4k

Tierna and I had always had a strained relationship. By that I meant we absolutely hated each other for years. Honestly, seeing as many many years had passed, we could barely remember what had caused the problem in the first place. Something to do with an injury or something.

Everything between us had changed one day when our argument ended in making out instead of shouting like normal. It seemed that over the years the hatred had turned to romantic feelings on both sides. After the kiss, there was lots of awkwardness and avoiding each other until I finally just asked her out one day when we were alone in the elevator. We had decided to keep everything on the downlow as first so we could learn how to have a relationship that didn't involve fighting or hatred. It wasn't actually that difficult because I quickly became addicted to everything Tierna. If her clinginess was anything to go off, then it was safe to say that Tierna felt the same.  

To keep everyone from getting suspicious, the last couple of months we had kept our outside relationship the same. There were glares, not talking to each other, and scoffs when the other spoke. The mean comments we used to make had pretty much stopped now. I couldn't bring myself to say anything bad about her, not when I was falling for her faster than I could keep up. If anyone ever asked, I just couldn't be bothered with it anymore. 

We had just gotten back from training. Tierna and I were glaring at each other as always while Emily stood between us as a kind of buffer. Tierna and I were sharing a room like we had been for the most part of the year. It was the teams way of trying to get us to get along. Little did they know how well that actually worked.

The glares lasted until the door closed behind us, finally away from the prying eyes of our team mates. Tierna turned, soft smile replacing the scowl as she fell into my arms. My hand slipped under her shirt, nails scratching along her back as she sighed, kissing my neck softly. 

"You okay love?"

"Just tired and I missed you today."

"I was with you the whole day."

"Well yeah, but I couldn't touch you let alone look at you nicely. I was craving cuddles all day."

"I'm sorry, we have the rest of the evening to cuddle."

"We have team bonding tonight though." Tierna pouted, moving to find comfy clothes. I groaned at the lack of contact, moving to wrap my arms around her waist. She gently shrugged me off, moving away from me. It was a clear sign she was upset about something. I lay on the bed, allowing her space to change and decide if she wanted to come to me or not.

Tierna sat on the other bed for a few minutes scrolling through her phone before she sighed, throwing it back on the bed and walking over to me. I opened my arms, letting her lay on top of me, head resting against my neck. "I don't want to pretend to hate you anymore. It's exhausting, I hate that I can't even smile at you when we're around them, I can't run to you during games or hold your hand or be close to you like I need when I'm tired, nervous or down."

"Okay. Well, we can start being friends in front of them."

Tierna looked up at me, "Yeah?"

"If that's what you want. I'm sorry that we haven't been able to do any of that stuff. It's not that I don't want to, trust me I hate it as much as you do if not more. All I ever want to do is be with you, my favourite thing in this world is your cuddles. I would prefer to keep our relationship to ourselves for a bit longer though."

I had always preferred to keep my relationships more private, but it was also in part because we constantly got roomed together in attempt to make us get along. I wasn't ready to have that change yet. Not just because I liked sleeping in the same bed with my girlfriend, but also because I hated change. It wouldn't be a big deal if my roommate changed pretty much every camp, that didn't happen so I had gotten used to Tierna and our routine. I dreaded that changing.

"Thank you. I'll just be happy with a smile or maybe a hug every now and then. There's no pressure to tell them about us, whenever you're ready I'm ready. I know you're scared about your routine changing and we'll protect that for as long as we can. And if or when it does, I've got you. Always."

I brushed a piece of hair out of her face, soft smile making it's way onto my face. We hadn't said the three big words yet, but I had known for a while that I was in love with her. Everything with her was warm, comforting, safe. "I love you T."

A grin made it's way onto her face before she kissed me deeply, "I love you Y/n."

---

It had been two weeks since we had agreed to be more friendly. We had decided to slowly start being more friendly so it wouldn't be suspicious. At first it was just stopping the glares and actually saying a few words that weren't mean or snarky. Now we had decided smiles and maybe some proper conversations were the next step.

We were at breakfast, Tierna sat at the table across the room while I sat with Emily and Rose. I hated that she was sat away from me, but unfortunately it had always been that way. Tierna sent a small smile my way. I sent a small smile back managing to stop the grin trying to escape. Emily and Rose followed my eyeline, confusion covering their faces when they noticed it was Tierna I was smiling at. I just shrugged going back to eating my breakfast. 

My peace only last a few minutes until Emily spoke up, "So have you and T have worked things out? There seems to be less glares, more smiles."

"I guess so. We actually talked a couple of weeks ago and could barely remember why we didn't like each other. We're trying to be friends."

"Finally. Maybe we'll all be able to be in the same room peacefully."

Over the rest of camp, the smiles and conversation became more frequent. The confusion or shock that covered the teams face for the first week was hilarious. Thankfully, after the initial shock, they seemed to back off their nosiness a bit. They seemed to realise we were more friendly without their prying eyes. It was nice though, being able to actually look at Tierna or be around her even if I couldn't touch her much.

---

Camps had always been one of my favourite things. I loved being around the girls, just getting to train and mess around. This time though, I almost wanted to just leave. Since Tierna and I were becoming 'friends', we had finally been roomed with different people. We had only been at camp for two days and my nerves were through the roof. They had been since I arrived. It wasn't what I was used to and I wasn't entirely sure how to cope with it. My whole routine had been disrupted without warning. The team knew I didn't like change, but I guess no one really thought this was something that would affect me too bad.

Training had finished an hour ago, dinner and team bonding weren't for a few hours and I was stuck on my bed fidgeting with my fingers. Alyssa sat down next to me, nudging my shoulder gently, "Are you okay Y/n?" 

"Yeah, yeah I'm okay."

"I call bullshit."

A sigh slipped out as my head rest against her shoulder. I didn't have the energy to pretend to be okay, "I love you Lys, really I do, but I hate this."

"Hate what?"

"Not rooming with Tierna. I know I used to not like it and we only just recently became friends, but that's what I was used to. For months, we had our routine, it didn't change much if at all. Just a bit of extra talking. Even then I knew what to expect. Now, it's all changed without warning and I don't think I'm coping very well with it."

"So, it's not just because you don't get to share with your girlfriend anymore?"

My head flew up, every muscle in my body tensing, "What?"

"Relax, I'm the only one that knows. I saw you guys making out in a hidden corner of the stadium when I took a wrong turn. You two are obviously pretending you're not great friends and hiding it for a reason. I haven't and won't tell anyone."

"Thank you Lys. I wish this was just because of that, but it's not. I don't deal with change very well at all. I like my routine and now it's completely different. If we hadn't been forced to room together for months, no routine would be formed and it wouldn't be this bad."

"I'm sorry that you were forced into a routine then forced out of it. We can see how you go for a couple of days and if it's not getting better then we can talk to coach and see if we can switch."

I smiled, accepting the hug she offered. It wasn't Tierna, but it was a close second. "I'm not mad at the forced rooming. I mean, T and I wouldn't be together without it. This is one of the reasons we haven't told anyone, to try hold onto my routine."

Much to my confusion, there was a light knock at the door. As far as I knew, everyone was hanging out in their rooms before dinner. My head buried in my hands, really not up for visitors as Alyssa went to open the door. Arms wrapped around me, my head resting against a stomach before the unmistakable smell of Tierna filled my senses. "Before you ask, Alyssa messaged saying you could use me so here I am."

"Thank you Lys."

"Always. I'm going to go for a walk, see you at dinner."

Tierna guided me to lie on the bed, cuddled up against her. It was probably the first time since camp started that I fully relaxed. "Love you T."

"I love you. I know this is difficult, but at least with Alyssa knowing we have more of a chance to see each other."

---

"Are you okay Y/n?" Christen asked as her and Alex sat on either side of me. I knew the team were getting concerned at how withdrawn I was and I appreciated they cared. However, getting asked multiple times a day if I was okay, was getting on my nerves.

"I'm fine." I snapped, retying my boots for the fourth time. 

I knew I was being grumpy, but I couldn't help it. This whole routine change had messed with everything, especially my sleep. I was tired and stressed, trying to adjust and create a new routine. It wasn't working very well, but I was trying not to show it much. I didn't want to seem childish or be judged for my lack of adaptability. Tierna was trying her best to help, there wasn't much she could do beside comfort me. Alyssa had also been understanding, not taking my discomfort personally. There wasn't much she could do either though.

Alex and Christen gave me a look before pulling me away from everyone else, "Talk to us."

I sighed, burying my face in my hands, everything that had been happening spilling out. They let me talk, not saying anything until they were sure I was done. Christen rest her hand on my shoulder, squeezing slightly. "We get you're trying to tough it out, to adapt, but you could have told us before it got this bad. It's well known you don't do well with change and I guess we didn't think much of this since you had different room mates in the past. We'll talk to coach and see if you can change rooms assuming it's okay with Tierna and Rose."

"I'll be fine, I'll get over it."

"No, we need you to be at your best. So we'll talk to coach after practice."

"Thank you. Before you say it, I know I will need to get over it at some point. I won't always be able to have Tierna as a roommate. I'm working on it, my therapist is helping. I just think the lack of warning and no time to mentally prepare didn't help."

"We'll never tell you to get over it Y/n/n, but we are glad you're trying. We hate seeing you like this, we just want you to be okay."

Later that night when I finally made it back to my room after being dragged to hangout with Emily, I found Tierna lying on my bed, book in hand. I straddled her waist, kissing her forehead then nose and lips. "Well hello."

"Hi."

"Alyssa is rooming with Rose. I think you need an early night, you look exhausted."

"I think you're right. Sleep hasn't been easy the last few days."

---

Tierna: I'm thinking it's time for a date day. Sneak out with me? 

Y/n: Don't have to ask me twice. I'm going to head back to the room to change, meet me there?

Tierna: Perfect, can't wait x

After making the excuse of planning to spend the day relaxing in the room, I slipped out of the meal room to get changed and meet Tierna. It wasn't unusual for me to spend a day or two at camp alone to recharge so I knew it wouldn't cause any concern aside from a text or two. 

Soft lips landed against mine as soon as Tierna entered the room. "Hello to you too."

Tierna pecked my lips, "There was not enough of that this morning."

"Well if you had woken up when I tried then there would have been more kissing time."

"It's an off day, what's the point in waking up early?"

"Make out time."

"Whatever. I was thinking, we shower and make out more, then check out that book shop you were talking about. I didn't think about what else, but we can get lunch and there is a beach not far from here." 

My arms wrapped around her waist, kissing her forehead. There hadn't been a lot of time to ourselves so I was very excited to spend the day with her. "Sounds incredible. I'm sure we can find some lowkey stuff to do. Could you imagine the shit we would get if the team found out about this from social media?"

"Shit, I didn't even think about that. Sneaky date day it is!"

As per Tiernas plan she dragged me into the shower, spending more time with her lips attached to me than actual shower activities. Not that I was complaining in the slightest. Tierna and I spent a lot more time in the room than originally planned, it being almost lunch time when I finally dragged Tierna out of the hotel. 

We spent a while exploring the little book shop, taking our time looking at the different books and stealing kisses behind the book shelves. It was risky, we both knew it, but at the same time I was having too much fun with her to care. Though we weren't doing anything overly exciting, just getting to spend some alone time with the girl I loved was enough for it to be the most fun I had in a while. Spending time with the team was always fun, but it didn't compare to spending time with Tierna. 

After finally dragging ourselves away from the book shop, we got sushi deciding to eat in the park. Thankfully, there weren't that many people and we managed to find a relatively secluded area. 

At the start of the day, we had very much intended on actually doing things. However, we ended up spending quite a while lying on the grass at the park just talking. Since the start of our relationship, most of our time would be spent talking. At first it was getting to know each other properly, then it was just something we enjoyed. Tierna was one of the only people besides Emily that I could spend hours talking and not get bored. I never was much of a talker, but I actually looked forward to our talking time. Between games, training, meetings, and spending time with the team, we hadn't had a lot of time to just talk. Despite rooming together, by time we fell into bed, we were just ready to sleep. 

Eventually we dragged ourselves up, making our way slowly to the beach, stopping at a few shops along the way. We walked along the beach, finding a hidden away part near the end. Tierna settled between my legs, back against my front as I nuzzled my face into her neck, "You're beautiful T. I've never been more grateful for our meddling teammates. I love you."

"I love you. This is something I never saw happening, but I would never want anything else. And I would never admit to them how thankful I am for their part in this."

"Oh never in a million years will I admit that to them. Thank you for today T, it's probably one of the best days I've had in a while."

"Really? We pretty much talked all day which is not what I planned."

"My love, any day I spend with you is amazing. Maybe it wasn't what you planned, but I don't care T. I love just talking to you and with how little time we've had together lately today was amazing. I love you, I loved today so please stop feeling bad like I know you are."

Tierna turned to look at me, not saying anything for a second while her eyes roamed my face. Probably making sure I was telling the truth. She pecked my cheek before whispering, "How did I get so lucky with you?" 

"You didn't hit me when I kissed you that night."

"Didn't even cross my mind. I think by that point I was starting to realise that maybe I didn't hate you like I thought."

"Looking back you were blushing a lot around me then. No different to now I guess. You're just better at hiding it around the team."

My forehead was pushed back, Tierna pouting while I tried to stifle my laugh. She was adorable when she pouted. "Shut up asshole. Speaking of the team, we should probably head back soon." 

Unfortunately for us, a few of the girls were lingering in the lobby and not at dinner like we had anticipated. The thought to hide was quickly pushed away when they all turned to look at us. "Where have you two been? We came to get you for dinner, but obviously you weren't there."

I had checked social media a few times just to make sure there wasn't any thing about us since a few people had stopped us for pictures. Thankfully, nothing had been posted yet and if it was the pictures were all innocent so I knew it was safe to make up a little lie. "We just went for a walk."

Emily pulled me into a headlock, normally I could get out of her hold pretty easily, but I was tired and not really in the mood. "Where was my invite? You know you're bestfriend incase you've forgotten."

My eyes rolled automatically, finally managing to push her away, "Em, stop being dramatic. It was a very last minute thing, not some conspiracy to leave you out. You are and will always be my bestfriend."

"Yeah whatever. I don't think you two willingly spending time together without killing each other will ever get old."

"Maybe not, but your comments already are. Now isn't there dinner then team bonding?"

---

The game was almost over when Tierna ended up on the ground due to a miss timed tackle. She didn't get up straight away and I saw red. Before I even fully realised what was happening, my hands were on the chest of the player who took Tierna down, pushing her back multiple times. 

"Are you fucking stupid? You could hav-" 

Arms gripped mine, pulling me back and finally snapped me out it. "Y/n, Y/n stop."

My arms went up in surrender, walking back to Tierna before I could do something stupid again. I knew I had gotten a yellow card, but the only thing that mattered was Tierna. I wanted so badly to hold her hand to comfort her properly, but I knew I couldn't. Instead I squeezed her shoulder gently, relief washing through me when she finally got up. 

Everyone stared at us as Tierna and I walked into the locker room. I knew it was coming, I had just hoped it would be a few of the older ones and not everyone. Christen gave me a pointed look, Alyssa and Alex joining in.  "What the hell was that Y/n?"

I shrugged, avoiding eye contact. I wouldn't say I regretted it because I wasn't sure I did. Though, I had likely disappointed them, something I hated doing. "I lost my temper."

"You never lose your temper Y/n. You don't even lose your temper when I go down and I'm your best friend. Yet you lose your temper when someone you're barely friends with gets tackled." Emily stated, arms crossed. There was no way they would let this go, it was definitely out of character for me. I had always been a calm person, never violent or short tempered. The look Tierna gave me told me she was thinking the same. This was it.

My arm wrapped around Tierna's shoulder, pressing a light kiss to her temple, "Well, become my girlfriend and apparently I will."

"You're what!?! You're fucking with us."

Questions and statements were fired our way, everyone shocked and confused how we were dating given the way we acted. "Shut up." Once everyone was quiet, I spoke again, "Yes we are together. We have been for about 9 months. We kept our same dislike or barely friend act so we could keep it between us for a while. We needed to work out how we worked together after actually not liking each other for a long time. It was nice in our little bubble. And before you ask, no I wasn't not coping with the different room assignments because of it, my routine changed suddenly and my brain didn't like that. That should answer your questions, can I shower now?"

They looked at us in disbelief before I just walked away knowing we would be hit with more questions later. Tierna pecked my lips before going to her own shower, "That was hot. Don't make a habit of it though, you don't need to be getting in trouble. Also thank you for answering all those questions. I do not have the energy right now." 

Before Tierna could actually get into the shower, I grabbed her arm, pulling her back into me. Now that she had taken her shirt off, I finally had the chance to make sure she was truly okay. My hands ran along her sides and up her back before hugging her tightly, "I've never done anything like that before. I just, I saw you go down and I snapped. Seeing you hurt, well it worried me in a way I've never felt before. You sure you're okay?"

"This side of you is adorable. I've never seen you so worried before. I'm okay, I promise. There might be a bruise or two, but I'm okay."

"What can I say? I've never been in love like this before. I always worry about you T, but seeing you down is a whole different type of worry. I love you."

"And I love you."

[lesabear]

Thoughts on Veilguard

TLDR: If empty calories were a video game it would be Dragon Age: The Veilguard. The game is a pleasant enough - if generic and unremarkable - action RPG that basically abandons the themes and feel of the previous games, resulting in a bland story that largely avoids dealing with anything that might remotely cause conflict in the party or force the player to consider anything other than surface level good-bad morality.

If this is the direction they're taking DA, then I think I'm done with the franchise. If I wanted a generic, thematically uninteresting, action RPG there are so many other games to play.

Spoilers in my detailed thoughts below

The good:

It looks very nice - I wish I could have spent even more time exploring the world areas.

Very few bugs or technical issues unlike Andromeda (or most new games in general). I had a few minor issues near the end but overall was very impressed.

Manfred and Assan are great secondary companions. If anyone knows where to find a skeleton and/or griffon friend please let me know.

I quite like Emmerich, Davrin and Bellara and romanced the latter two and (Generally) really liked both. Disclaimer: I tend to have different tastes than the majority of DA fandom when it comes to romances. I expected to have mixed feelings on Bellara because of my issues with Bioware and their cutesy awkward naive/inexperienced female characters but I thought they (mostly) got her right.

Some interesting lore stuff, though I quibble with how it was delivered at times. Still was fun to get a lot more info on the Evanuris, Solas, Mythal, the Titans, etc. And there's also some fun lore stuff in the codices, although again I question whether that's the best way to deliver them.

The final mission is a lot of fun and the clear standout quest other than Weisshaupt maybe. Both are a lot of fun and combine multiple story elements with good gameplay for a satisfying experience.

Combat is engaging although it does get repetitive once you "solve" it. I did a lot of grinding to complete content though so that might be my fault.

Solas is very Solas-y in the game and the highlight of the antagonists by far. I wish there had been more of him and I say that as someone who finds the Solas fandom somewhat exhausting at times. He was far more interesting and compelling than the "even-worse" gods and the fact he's a fuck up who keeps making things worse because he's an egotistical fuck-up who thinks he's the only one that can fix things was is both tragic and fun.

Neve-Lucanis and Taash-Harding are both very cute. I actually think they might be my favorite companion romances off the top of my head (Tali-Garrus does absolutely nothing for me, and I don't even romance either character with my Shepard).

The not good

Why is the Inquisitor wearing pajamas.

Bioware can fuck off for making me pop about a zillion blight pimples. It's really not that much fun after the first 1000

Extremely disappointed with how sanitized the narrative is. There's little attention paid to major facets of the DA universe that are directly relevant to the plot (religion, Tevinter slavery, racism toward elves etc.) and you also get stuff like the Crows now being far lighter of an organization than they were previously.

Just as an example - both Davrin and Bellara touch on what it means to have their gods be the villains but they're just topics for conversation and there's no meaningful impact (especially as the bad guys rely on Antaam and Venatori forces - oh and generic mercenaries). The Dalish are just there (or victims of the bad guys) for the most part. I've read comments from Bioware that confirm this but it seemed obvious Bioware wrote themselves into a corner with making Elven gods be the main antagonists, as you then run into the issue of having the elves not only already be a persecuted minority but also be worshipping evil gods - but instead of writing around it they just avoided dealing with it and acted like it's just the Dalish getting a big win by not joining them.

Speaking of enemies, lots of bland dialogue from the non-Solas big bads. And the Venatori/Antaam/mercenaries gave off major "Cerberus in ME3" vibes - nameless, faceless goons thrown at you in waves that got very boring very quickly.

The way a companion gets hardened because of a choice early in the game is mostly meaningless unless you wanted to romance them. People getting mad about that happening are being ridiculous - if anything the game is too afraid (as usual) to have it actual matter beyond them briefly being upset before moving on.

One of the big choices is to decide whether to protect Treviso or Minrathous when both are attacked by dragons, but it happens so early you might lock yourself out of quests without realizing it. Worse, the ensuing mission is incredibly short and boring (basically a couple of packs of generic enemies and then a very brief dragon fight)

Why is the Inqusitor wearing pajamas.

Why can't I be a mean/"bad" Rook? Even the jokey responses feel super tame compared to previous DAs (let alone the borderline assholish purple hawke). Basically you're only allowed to be slightly different variations of a heroic figure.

While the companions are all nice they all top out at "I like them", with none matching the story or emotional peaks of previous Bioware games. Emmerich comes closest (especially if you account for Manfred) but there's just enough meat to him.

Disappointing romances compared to previous Bioware games(especially but not limited to Lucanis.). Not a ton of depth dialogue wise and at times it feels like they put more time into the companion romance than the Rook version (this time I am definitely talking about Lucanis).

Speaking of which, Lucanis was the biggest disappointment of the companions. I didn't want a Zevran clone but you have a hardened assassin possessed by a demon who (if you choose not to save Treviso, which cuts off a lot of his content) just drinks coffee and likes Neve and uh....

Completely forgettable soundtrack which is a major bummer after previous installments. Also, while I didn't have many technical issues, the music not always playing was one of them (although maybe it doesn't really matter given the lack of quality!)

Bad to horrendous incorporation of previous DA story which was also incongruous with the general tone, especially with the handling of the Inquisitor and the treatment of southern Thedas (especially if you get the Emmerich and Harding picnic conversation at an awkward time like I did.)

Lots of disappointing cameos but especially from my Pirate Queen/Wife from DA2. Isabela's hat is indeed very nice but what is that outfit? And I get they didn't want to deal with too complex a world state but man was it a bummer to see her basically reset after everything her and Hawke went through in my main DA2 playthrough.

Why is the Inquisitor wearing pajamas.

What did they do with Harding? Why did she basically get Dagna's story, even if Titan lore is interesting? She's such a nothing character in this game which is such a weird choice given that she's clearly there because they know fans like her.

The "Actually Varric was dead all along" did nothing for me. He barely shows up in game anyway and the weird framing of every appearance and the fact no one other than Rook ever interacts with him gave it away (at least partially)

[a-legacy-not-to-be-forgotten]

Why Ceroba and the Feisty Four were right

Not bothering with any fancy opening, it's exactly what it says it is: Ceroba and the Feisty Four were right to call out Starlo.

Now before you crucify me, I love Starlo as a character. But I'm tired of people (not calling out anyone in particular) pretending that he's done absolutely nothing wrong and demonize Ceroba and the Feisty Four for snapping at him (largely Ceroba, but I see the Feisty Four get shat on every now and then). And this is not me calling Starlo a jerk. Typically, calling him a flat-out jerk would mean he did shit on purpose with malicious intent, and I don't think he acted out of spite. Rather, he did all those things because he just didn't think about it in the moment. I understand that, and I can 110% relate to that myself, honestly.

That being said, he did make some legit dick moves over the course of the game. Exhibit A: Having Moray walk around with a snake in their boot and giving them rashes.

IK some of Starlo's more wild fans would probably do anything he says and all that, but put yourself in Moray's shoes (or boots I guess would be more appropriate). If your friend made you walk around with a rubber toy in your footwear that gave you a nasty rash, I think you'd be reasonable at least a bit angry at them.

Exhibit B: The Boulder Droppers

They're literal goddam boulders. That shit could've killed someone. Setting them up at a busy mineshaft is reckless enough as it is but leaving them on after you're done using them just makes things even worse.

Exhibit C: Blaming Clover for everything that happened and shooting them over it.

What am I supposed to say? If you hate Ceroba for what she did to Kanako and Clover, keep in mind that Starlo basically did the same exact thing.

Again, this is not me calling Starlo an asshole overall. Yes, he is a good monster deep down and just made some legit mistakes. But my point is, he does have flaws nonetheless and I can't stand people who ignore them. Like, him accepting what he did was wrong and coming to terms with that is one of the best parts of his character! C'mon guys.

And yes, people treat Ceroba as a horrible friend because she wasn't into it and apparently 'hates that part of Starlo' or whatever. If Ceroba actually hated Starlo's obsession with Western culture, do you think she'd indulge in his ramblings on humans?

...or helped him set up all of those wanted posters for him?

...or helping his family search for him when he 'goes missing' during a neutral run?

*sarcastically* Wooooooow, what a horrible friend...

Yes, I understand Ceroba is a very blunt and sarcastic person, but I think because of that, she ends up coming off as harsher than she means to be. Trust me, I can relate to that.

To call her a heartless bitch is a disservice to her character. She does care deep down, even if she isn't that good at showing it.

And hey, she's a mourning widow and mother, I wouldn't blame her for not being good at showing positive emotions.

As for the Feisty Five, our favorite enby fish puts it best themself:

My point is, despite snapping at him, Ceroba and the Feisty Four did not hate Starlo. They understood that his obsession over Western Culture was really important with him. It's made clear that they know he's a good monster deep down, despite his transgressions and were very ready to forgive him.

They just wanted him to dial it back. And yeah, he needed to. Granted, this is targeted at the 'Starlo did nothing wrong' crowd. If you admit that he's pretty heavily flawed but that Ceroba's done worse, I can accept that. Hell, despite me being a Ceroba apologist, I might even agree with you to a degree. But I am a bit tired of the fandom putting him on a pedestal while overhating everyone who remotely criticizes him.

[captainumayan]

Hot Shot, Kazoo, and Me

All OuterWildsVenture pilots have musical instruments. So why does Hatchling not have a musical instrument? Who did not wonder about this? And let me tell you about my wonderful misunderstanding.

If you have not completed Hot Shots, you should not read on from here.Spoilers below, including all endings.

After finishing my first play, I was still challenging myself to hot shots, which I just couldn't seem to accomplish. Ten challenges a day at any given time. Of course there were days when 10 would not be enough, but I vowed to achieve it, even if I had to spend years doing it. In fact, I spent three years beating Sans in Undertale. I was not satisfied unless I did so. Once I made up my mind, I had the persistence and guts. There was no way I couldn't do it.At the same time, I cursed my clumsiness for foreseeing that I would have to spend that much time again.

Sometimes my motivation waned.One day, when I was skipping the 10 times a day rule, I heard a rumor from a friend who was also eager to achieve the hot shot that "if you succeed in the hot shot, you will have more conversations with Self. That was too good to be true. After all, I now had a reason why I had to achieve the hot shot at all costs. I finally decided to get serious.

As I was once again doing my 10 challenges a day, I suddenly witnessed the Outer Wilds:Collector's Edition for sale on Twitter. It is a set of many wonderful goodies. As my eyes lit up, a line "Bonus item from a doomed timeline" caught my eye. What is this?　I identified it by process of elimination, comparing the item list with the sample photos. A mysterious black-painted item remained. What is this???　

Having already cleared the game, I no longer had any spoilers left to regret, so I was no longer avoiding spoiler information. Then my signal scope was again on Twitter, where I picked up a tweet that said, "Isn't the blacked-out item in the Collector's Edition a kazoo, based on its shape?" What's a kazoo?　I did a Google search. It was an instrument I had never seen before. I listened to an actual performance on YouTube to see what it sounded like, and was reminded of the ending when I met Self. It sounded similar. Here, I think about the meaning of "Bonus item from a doomed timeline" again. Is that ending playing a kazoo?　In the face to face with Self?　Does it mean that Self is playing that kazoo?　Does that mean that Hatchling's instrument might be a kazoo?　I laughed out loud when I noticed that. Moreover, rather than playing it, it is a funny, silly instrument that just makes a voice. All I could do was laugh.

But why does Hatchling not possess the instrument in charge? Here I had a flash of inspiration.

・Self's instrument is probably the kazoo.

・Nevertheless, Hatchling does not have a kazoo.

・The conversation with Self increases with the achievement of the hot shot.

All the synapses were fully connected in my brain.

Maybe I can get a kazoo from Self if I achieve a hot shot ......?　

I was so excited. It had to be. I can only assume that the reason Hatchling doesn't have an instrument is because thay can get one at this event, right? What an interesting idea to get an instrument from myself! Digital Mobius at its best!　

I finally got real serious; I challenged myself to hotshots, which is more than 10 a day. I'm so close ...... I'm so close ......!

Then one day, a friend of mine achieved a hot shot first. Wow. And I got solid testimony that my conversations with Self really increased.

"By the way, do you want to know if you got the instrument?"

My friend asked me that. I honestly want to know. Even if I knew, it would certainly increase the conversation about Self, and I would not quit the challenge until I saw it with my own eyes. Unable to overcome my curiosity, I answered, "Tell me."

"They didn't give me the instruments."

My perfect theory fell apart.

"But it was a conversation that made me truly glad that I absolutely achieved the hot shot on my own. You absolutely have to achieve this on your own. You can't just give up and look at spoilers."

My friend said so.And that of course it was. So my hot shot challenge continued. And the day of my accomplishment came surprisingly quickly.

I safely exchanged a high three with Self, and instead of not getting an instrument, I got a really great memory. Thank you Digital Mobius!

Huh? But then, why is it that only Hatchling doesn't have an instrument ......?

The question was back to square one.

I have another episode to tell about this, but I hope we can talk about it some other time.

I know this is a long sentence, but I hope I got it right.

[thefaiao]

Do you remember what hooked you on the LISA series? It's a decently impactful set of games so I'm curious as to why you've created so many drawings from it

A great question. I don't think I can answer this with absolute precision, but I'll try. I'll begin explaining how exactly I first got into drawing LISA, and we'll work from there to the reason I believe I am still compelled to draw more of it.

I first played and finished LISA at the end of 2016. I was decently active at that point, but hadn't garnered much attention to my drawings. I had made a Hotline Miami post that had gotten decently popular, and a few Yogscast(1)(2)(3) drawings that also did decently well, but overall nothing super noteworthy. Most Yog fans at the time weren't into what I liked mainly, which was Shadow of Israphel.

I was immature at the time, so had a hard time connecting with people in fandoms. Not to mention, I was a Brasilian in a sea of Americans and Europeans. You'd be surprised how hard it was to relate with people in that setting, but I tried here and there.

I felt pretty strongly about the HM post though, since it felt like a great personal achievement. I felt a drawing I had a clear vision for had achieved what I set out to do with it. Seeing how much people liked it, it was pretty magical when you've never had a post "do well".

Anyway, people were hopping out of tumblr and onto twitter, and I did as well. Twitter, despite everything, sort of puts you way closer to other people. Your reply to someone important is very visible and hard to ignore. It was a type of equalizer. There I had gotten to get my drawings actually seen and shared by Austin, the guy who made the LISA games.

Having had my drawings shared and recognized that way had a strong impact on me, and I even got to talk with an artist I really looked up to at the time, Maren, who had also gotten into LISA. She had done art for SBFP and TF2, so it felt surreal to me to be acknowledged by someone like that. Up to that point I really felt like more of a passive observer to everything.

In 2014 I finished high-school, and 2015 I spent the whole year learning how to draw better. I tried so hard that I ended up dissociating, a very scary emotion, that I didn't even know was a thing at the time. It felt like all that time and effort was starting to pay off, and that there was a way forward here.

First I posted sketches, and the passion I had for the game and motivation from the recognition led me to put a lot more effort than usual into my drawings. I ended up making these, which got really popular, it was very validating.

So because of all that I kept drawing. I'll be honest, a lot of the time I just wanted to get even more of the attention of these weird new cool popular friends that were paying attention to me for some reason. I was very lonely at the time. I think I stayed lonely for a long time after too.

But eventually people move on, as is normal with fandoms. I didn't really feel my passion for drawing and LISA die out though. I had started a massive LISA art project at the time, that took me 5 long years, and also was more focused in college, where I did Game Design.

Drawing wise, eventually I branched out to other RPGmaker games, but LISA was very easy to draw. It was sort of a home-base for me. Something I could come back to when I was uncertain.

I think Urasawa put it quite well, with Billy Bat:

Drawing the same characters over and over is extremely rewarding, and a great way to reflect on your progress so far. I suppose it's meditative, but that's not quite the right word. It's very fun and constructive, and people can also keep track of your progress through that. I did the same with OFF characters, a game I had drawn way before all this.

Of course, I had a lot of issues because of how things developed. I related a lot of my self-worth with the validation I received from people online, and I still do, to an extent...

When I started taking the game I'm making, Meanderer, more seriously, and started living alone, posting anything felt awful. I didn't have the energy for bombastic posts, or the time spent developing the way I draw the characters like I did for LISA, that is, with ease and style. It felt very humiliating, but I understand it was a warped view of things.

It was a long and depressing time in my life, but it taught me a few important lessons, and made me sort of re-evaluate how I engage with "online" overall. But I still liked drawing LISA throughout all of this, I almost felt ashamed of it to a certain point.

All of this isn't to say I didn't love the game itself. It wasn't all just context. I really, really love LISA. It drove me to sobbing tears, which I don't think another game has gotten out of me. It's a fantastic game, that really showed what fresh things you could do with the medium. When I played it I'm not sure I fully understood how much I loved games.

I just grew up with the characters of LISA. Maybe not in my adolescence, but definitely in my adulthood, and with my art. These characters help me orient myself, understand my limits. And it's damn fun to get better at drawing them. Even just a character on an empty blank canvas, with only black and white lines. It's the most fun in the whole world.

To finish it off, I have a general philosophy of not republishing drawings. So whenever I want to do a LISA post I have to draw a LISA post. Just keep drawing and drawing. Don't get hung up on one drawing or idolize one thing you did. Keep making things. It doesn't have to make sense. Just keep drawing.

(There was a power outage while writing this and I had to retype this whole damn post by the way. Appreciate it!)