#to someone who is able to let go of that desperation and act to save humanity while retaining her love for Eren

[clfixationstation]

I like this parallel drawn by this twt user

[not-neverland06]

Hey! Your writing is amazing! I’ve been checking daily for new fics lmao

I was wondering if your requests were open would you be able to write some angst with a happy ending w/ Peanut?

Perhaps a Shy!Reader who has flirty banter with Logan. They’re on a mission and Logan has to make a quick decision on who to save — Reader or Jean and he saves Jean without thinking. Reader ends up surviving with a few injuries but her and Logan’s relationship starts to deteriorate. Logan’s not good with verbal apologies so he does acts of service — bringing reader food/drinks etc. reader is stubborn and Logan starts to get frustrated. He eventually proves himself to reader.

I’m sorry if this is confusing!! I’m not creative enough to write it myself and you’re really really skilled. Love your work x

a/n: I read this request and then read them together and my brain imploded because I loved it so much, no smut in this one Summary: Logan saves Jean on a mission and it's the wake-up call you desperately needed to understand that you will never be her. You can't stand to look at him anymore and he doesn't understand why you've stopped talking to him.

“What’re you thinking of doing after this?”

You shrug, leaning back on the uncomfortable bench seats and looking over at Logan. “Not sure, got any plans?”

Logan smirks and you immediately know whatever he’s about to say is going to send you spiraling. “Yeah, whatever you’re doing, sweetheart.”

Oh. My. God!

You know you’ve got it bad when something as simple as that has you swooning. It’s so easy to fall into this routine with him, to pretend you’re more suave than you actually are. Despite your usual tendency to fade into the background, you find it nearly impossible to do with him. 

Where someone else might let you stay quiet and go ignored, he seeks you out. He makes you feel seen and heard. Some days you don’t know if you appreciate it or despise it. You laugh a little, trying to hide just how affected by him you are. “Sounds good, Lo.”

He smiles and leans back on the seat, his arm coming around the back to rest lightly over your shoulders. You can tell from the look on Storm’s face that she’s trying not to laugh at you. You can’t blame her, you’re sure your eyes have tripled in size and you look absolutely stunned. 

Flirting isn’t out of the usual for you and him. Lately, though, he’s upped the game. Touching you more than usual, spending more one-on-one time together. You can feel it all building up to something. You’re shy, not stupid, you know when a guy’s going to ask you out. 

But it feels like he’s dragging it out longer than necessary like he’s enjoying teasing you a little too much.  “Alright,” Scott stands up and moves towards the back of the jet. “We’re almost there, get ready.”

You, very reluctantly, pull away from Logan and get to your feet. He walks past you, briefly squeezing your hand before joining Scott by the ramp. You grin, flexing your hand by your side and trying to memorize the feeling. 

The ramp lowers to the ground and Scott and Logan lead the way out. You’re expecting this to be simple. Stake out the area, find some information about the people running the warehouse, and figure out what exactly it is that they’ve been doing. 

The air is bursting with moisture. It’s suffocating, how humid it is, how it makes the material of your suit cling to your skin. You know the rest of the team can feel it. That it’s irritating them just as much. 

None of you want to be out here in the peak of summer, trying to be stealthy in these ridiculous costumes. Your thighs squeak every time they rub together. It’s beyond embarrassing. You know that that’s what has you all distracted. 

You’re struggling through ankle-deep mud and sweating buckets. So none of you are paying any particular attention to the area around you. Technically, you shouldn’t have to, you’re still about a mile out from where you need to be. 

You duck, hands coming up to cover your ears as Charles’ voice screams through your mind. It’s a trap!

Even with the warning, there’s no time to prepare. The ground around you explodes, grass and dirt flying through the air. Logan grabs your arm, he shoves himself in front of you and takes the brunt of the bullets. Splatters of blood hits your cheeks and he runs you both behind a tree for cover. 

The other three have all found their own cover and they’re struggling to figure out where the shots are coming from. You spot something in the underbrush and scream, “Behind you!”

It’s more of a warning to duck than it is to move. You throw your hands up, shoving the man away from them and sending him flying into the trunk of a tree. You swear you can hear the snap of his spine as it hits the bark. 

You look to Jean and nod towards the small clearing of trees. “Don’t,” Logan warns. But you’re already slipping out of his grip and solidifying the air in front of you. It provides enough of a cover, absorbing the bullets, and giving you all time to figure out a plan of attack. 

Jean moves beside you, eyes narrowing on the perimeter of your cover. “There are too many of them, more than I can count.” 

“How did they know we were coming?” Scott snaps, keeping an eye on the area behind you. 

Your arms struggle under the weight of your power. The more bullets they shoot into your cover, the harder it is to keep up. You’re forced to absorb their energy, push it out tenfold to try and keep the blockage solidified. 

“Guys,” you snap, “we need a plan. I can’t hold it much longer.” You grit your teeth, taking a step forward to try and push against the strain. It does nothing but make your bones ache. Logan shoots you a concerned glance, coming up behind you like he wants to take the weight off your shoulders. But there’s nothing he can do. 

There’s movement behind you, a boot snapping a twig in two. You can’t risk looking back but you can hear the worry in Jean’s voice. “Ten of them-”

You can tell by the sounds of their movement that the others don’t give her much of a chance to finish. Ororo, Scott, and Logan all shoot forward to deal with the threat. Ten isn’t much to worry about. But that doesn’t change the fact that the men in front of you haven’t let up and you’re about to weep from the weight of keeping the wall up. 

Jean stays beside you, brows furrowed in concern. She places her hand on your shoulder and closes her eyes. A second later you feel something like a cool blanket laid over you. The tension in your arms and core eases just enough for you to stop clenching your jaw so hard. Some of the strain eases away and you know she’s sharing it with you. 

But just as quickly as the relief was given, it’s yanked away. Jean jumps back with a gasp, “Flux, we need to move!”

“I can’t,” you shout, fighting to be heard over the sound of bloodshed and gunshots going off in front of and behind you. The others are steadily moving through the people surrounding you, but their numbers are still overwhelming. “It’ll all come crashing down,” you tell her. 

She glances towards the bullets, finally spotting the way they’re slowly, but steadily, moving through the thickened air. The second you let go you’ll be riddled with holes. “Shit,” she hisses. “Look, we can’t stay here much longer-”

She’s cut off by a loud bang. You’re so disoriented by the noise your hands drop to your sides. At the same moment, you hear wood splintering and cracking beside you. What has to be the largest tree in the forest creaks before it begins its descent down towards you both. 

You don’t what happened, or what they used, but it doesn’t matter. The wall in front of you is fading. You have seconds to get out of the way of the bullets and the tree, you’re not sure either of you is going to make it. 

“Jean!” There’s a flash of brown hair and Jean’s being tackled to the ground, safely out of the way of the tree and bullets. You feel something stinging against your shoulder and know the first bullet’s made its way through. 

You also see the tree is almost over top of you. You’ve always been a fight response in flight or fight scenarios. But when there’s nothing to fight, when you have nothing to go up against, you freeze. It’s horrible, you know it, but there’s nothing you can do about it. 

Even as you’re desperately screaming at yourself to just fucking move, all you can do is watch as the tree topples down on top of you. “Flux, duck!” The words trigger something in your brain just soon enough to drop to the ground. 

Scott releases a red beam, blasting through the tree and knocking it off course. You don’t even register the smell of burning flesh as you lay in the mud. Your blood is rushing so fast in your veins, there’s so much adrenaline pumping through you, you can’t focus on anything except the sound of your heartbeat. 

You let out a breath of relief, slowly lifting yourself up to your knees. You don’t hear any more fighting and you figure whoever they hadn’t taken down before, the beam took care of the rest. 

You look down, checking yourself for any bullet holes or serious damage but you can’t find anything. Something warm trickles down your shoulder, it drips across your arm and down your hand. 

You look at the blood curiously, it seems to steady a flow from the simple bullet graze you’d had earlier. “Oh my god,” Jean whispers your name and you turn around with a concerned look. 

You want to ask her what’s wrong but your eyes are trained on the way Logan’s arms are bracketing her. He’s practically on top of her, only now getting up to check on you. You get it, it was a stressful situation, he acted fast. 

But that doesn’t make it any easier to swallow the lump in your throat. It doesn’t ease the burn of betrayal. He saved her, not you. He chose her even though she doesn’t want him. The anger you’re feeling only makes it harder to be aware of your surroundings. 

It’s not until Scott kneels behind you a presses a gentle hand against your back that you lurch forward with a loud cry. The pain slams down on you all at once. The wind blowing gently against your back feels like someone’s dug razor blades in your skin and ripped. 

Feet rush towards you, someone kneeling beside you and grabbing your shoulders. Logan forces you up and makes you look at him before his gaze turns to your back. “What the fuck did you do?” He practically growls, lunging towards Scott. 

He grabs him by the collar and shoves him into the dirt. Ororo and Jean leap forward, trying unsuccessfully to rip him off. You try and keep your eyes open, try and stay focused. The pain is too much, you don’t want to be awake for this anymore. Every nerve on your back feels like it’s being forcefully exposed and plucked at. 

Your brain forces a shutdown and you slump into the mud, the world going black. 

When you wake up, you’re on your stomach. You’re a little dazed, not fully remembering how you got here. You try and sit up but there’s a steady grip around your wrists stopping you. “Don’t move,” Jean warns from somewhere behind you. 

You try and look for her but you can’t move much. Your head feels like it weighs a hundred pounds, stuck to the pillow beneath you. “What happened? Why can’t I move?”

Her shoes appear in front of you and then she’s kneeling down, a slightly worried look on her face. “We needed to make sure you didn’t roll over in your sleep.” Her brows crinkle and she frowns, “You don’t remember?” You shake your head minutely. She sighs, lifting her hand to your face and pressing her chilled fingers to your temple. 

The images rush towards you. You see it all from her eyes. The way Logan had grabbed her and thrown her to the ground, checking over her and not once looking at you. How Scott had tried to stop the tree from breaking your spine. His beam had just barely grazed your back as you had ducked. But it was enough for there to be serious damage. 

Through her view, you can see the way your skin had bubbled up and blistered. How horribly damaged it was. You have limited healing abilities, but it was enough to stop the nerves from being permanently damaged. 

She lets you go and you groan, the pain slowly registering in your brain. It’s dulled and you don’t know if they’ve given you drugs or if your abilities are still working to help you. “How’s Scott?” 

She chuckles and shakes her head while she undoes the restraints around your wrist. “He feels awful. He keeps coming by to check on you.”

The thought of him sitting beside you while you were strapped down to the bed makes you feel a little bad. It wasn’t his fault, he’d helped you. It was more than Logan had done for you. 

You frown, hating yourself for being bitter. If he hadn’t helped, Jean might not be here next to you. He had saved your friend. The thought didn’t bring much comfort, though. “I’m not mad at him.”

Jean eases you onto your knees and slowly helps you sit up. It causes minimal pain, but it’s still uncomfortable enough to grit your teeth and dig your nails into your palms. “I know, but he’ll probably be coming down here a lot to check on you.”

You almost ask her if anyone else has visited. If Logan had, but you don’t think her answer would make you feel any better. “He did,” she tells you and you click your tongue in irritation. 

“Out of my head,” you warn. She releases you with a small grin. “I don’t care,” you tell her, trying to appear nonchalant. 

She tilts her head, eyes narrowing on you. “Yes, you do. And I don’t need telepathy to know.” She walks towards your IV bag, fiddling around with something on the line. “He was here whenever he could be, practically lived beside you.”

“Don’t care,” you tell her again, but there’s less conviction this time. 

Jean frowns and you hate how guilty she looks. It’s not her fault he’s desperately in love with her and not you. You can’t force someone to love you or choose you. And you don’t want to. You want someone to love you for who you are, not because they couldn’t have their first choice. 

“Don’t,” you say lowly. “Don’t apologize, it’s not your fault.”

She doesn’t get a chance to say anything before the door bursts open, both Logan and Scott sliding into your room. Scott lets out a relieved breath when he sees you. He breathes out your name and approaches with a guilty smile, “You’re awake.”

“Charles told us,” Logan informs. You offer him a brief glance before diverting your attention to Scott. 

Petty, you’re aware. But you don’t want to see Logan right now. You’d put so much effort and time into your friendship with him. It doesn’t even matter if he doesn’t feel the same way about you. You two are best friends, and he didn’t even try to help you when you needed him the most. 

So, you smile at Scott. You forgive him and you tell him you're fine. You chat with him and Jean while Logan just stares at you from the other side of your bed. You can’t make yourself face him. You don’t want to look at him, it makes you sick to your stomach.

Eventually, Scott’s guilt is slightly assuaged and he and Jean leave for the night. Logan is a heavy presence beside you, one you no longer can ignore. You shift around, pretending to fluff your pillows until he grabs your hand. 

“What’re you doing?”

You look at his hand and then at him. Whatever look is on your face is enough for him to release you and back off. “Getting comfortable,” you spit out, more venom in your voice than necessary. Something clicks for him, you can see it as it happens. 

He backs up and narrows his eyes down at you. “Right.” He frowns and sucks on his teeth, nodding his head silently. “I’ll come back when you’re feeling a little better.” You don’t miss the hidden dig underneath it all, the way he’s calling out you’re unusual behavior. 

“I think that’d be best.”

He scoffs and shakes his head, slamming the door behind him as he leaves. You jump at the noise and it makes you hiss as a twinge of pain shoots down your spine. You feel slightly guilty about the whole interaction. Then, you remember the way he’d been cradling Jean and you feel slightly vindicated. 

You’re sure he doesn’t even give a shit. He’s probably pouting in his room, wishing Jean was in bed beside him. 

What the fuck?

It’s all that’s been playing through Logan’s head since he returned from your room in the medbay. He’s waited days for you to wake up, so he can finally take a breath and let go of the anxiety that’s been plaguing him. 

He’d thought that he’d lost you in that forest. When he’d gone for Jean, he’d assumed you’d just be able to use your powers to knock the tree out of your path. Or make it melt around you. 

Honestly, he can’t put a finger on what exactly he was thinking. But he knew that you could protect yourself and that would be your priority. So he’d moved without really thinking and grabbed the person who would be collateral damage if your powers went haywire. 

And then you hadn’t saved yourself and all he could smell was your burning flesh. The smell has been stuck in his nose since you were brought back to the mansion. He can’t escape it. Everywhere he goes, he sees you burning and hears your screams. 

He’d thought that you were dead and there was a moment where he genuinely was so lost he could do nothing but watch as the others swarmed you. He couldn’t move, couldn’t help you. He could only stare at your still body and pray to anybody who could hear him that you weren’t dead. 

He didn’t know what he would do if he lost you before he ever got a chance to love you. 

He’d, irritatingly, imagined all the different ways he would finally tell you how he felt when you woke up. He’d prepared himself for every possible reaction, except this one. He hadn’t expected you to reject him before he ever got the chance to confess. 

Anger stews within him as he paces through his room. He knows that it’s unfair to be upset with you. You’d gone through something horrific and there had been doubts about your recovery. Of course, you’d act off. 

Except, you only seemed to be directing that at him. Had you been just as dismissive to Scott, the person who actually hurt you, he would have looked past it. He’s tempted to go back down and see you again, maybe try and make you see some sense. 

Instead, he decides to give you both some time to calm down. He doesn’t want to do anything he might regret while he’s pissed off. He’ll see you tomorrow and, hopefully, you’ll be back to normal. 

You’d thought Logan might have gotten the hint with how you behaved earlier. That was not the case. He’s back today and you can smell the breakfast food he’s brought you. The smell is wafting deliciously from an inconspicuous brown bag. 

But you know it’s from the restaurant that’s twenty minutes out of his way. You’re not petty enough that you can’t appreciate the forty-minute round trip he’d taken for you, but you still aren’t excited to see him. 

“Hey, sweetheart,” he smiles at you despite your clearly hostile energy. He tugs the chair towards your bed, ripping open the bag and pulling out enough food for the both of you. 

You think it should be considered a form of manipulation to call you that while you’re pissed at him. He has such a clear effect on you. You know he’s aware of it. He knows that when he calls you something sweet like that it makes your heart race and stomach flip. 

You turn your gaze towards your blanket. You pretend the thread pattern is the most interesting thing in the world so you don’t have to look at him. You’re sick of giving your all to men who couldn’t care less about you. 

You’re tired of being the second, third, fourth choice. You want someone to choose you first for once. And you genuinely thought Logan would be the man to do that. But he’d chosen Jean. You should have known. 

“Alright,” he huffs, crossing his arms and glaring at you. You’re pissed off that he’s acting like he’s the one who was hurt. “What the hell is your problem? You’ve never been this mad at me before.”

It’s his tone of voice that really grates on you. He genuinely does not understand what he’s done wrong. He doesn’t even comprehend the possibility that you might be mad he left you to die. Have you really become such a doormat?

Yes, you’re shy and generally reserved with the people you meet. But he is so different. You two met and it was an instant connection that you thought was reciprocated. You hadn't realized that you'd become so complacent in the relationship he thought he could get away with something like this with no repercussions. 

“You left me to die,” you snap at him, voice taking a pitch it never has before. You’ve never truly gotten angry at him. Pissed off sometimes when he teased you a little too much. But you’d never plainly shown anger at him. “You fucking left me behind and expect me to, what,” you scoff and shove the food back towards him. 

“You think some shitty breakfast is going to fix this?” His face contorts. It screws up into something like hurt and you worry you might have been too harsh. He doesn’t know how you feel about him. He doesn’t know that this would hurt you so bad. 

But, it doesn’t matter. You’re still his friend. You should have at least warranted a little concern. 

Just as quickly as it appeared, the hurt is washed away by his own anger. “I thought you could take care of yourself. Isn’t that what you’re always bitching at us about?”

If you weren’t so upset you might find it funny how quickly the two of you turned on each other. Clearly, there was something repressed between the two of you. Some brewing resentment that neither of you had ever acknowledged. The words are coming quickly now, without thought.

“Fuck you, Logan,” you snap back at him. “You didn’t give a shit whether I lived or died. You only cared about your precious Jean.” You spit out her name with so much venom it stings as it leaves your tongue. 

He laughs, getting out of his chair. He shakes his head and glares at you. His anger is always a physical thing. You know he’s pacing so he doesn’t do something worse, like destroy the entirety of the room. 

“That’s what this is, you’re jealous? Don’t blame your fucking incompetence on me.” You hate the way he’s speaking to you. Like you’re a little girl who's incapable of understanding even the most basic of concepts. He has such a patronizing look on his face, you want nothing more than to wipe it off. 

The tables beside you tremble, the vases of flowers rattling against the wood. “I’m your friend, Logan. You could at least pretend like you cared about me.”

He leans against the end of the bed, tilting himself forward until he’s aggressively imposing your space. You shrink back against the pillows, narrowing your eyes in disdain. “Don’t fucking pull that shit with me. I knew that your priority would be to save yourself and I acted accordingly. This wasn’t some goddamn ploy to get into Jean’s pants. Grow the fuck up, Flux!”

You flinch back at the volume of his voice. Unwillingly, tears pool in the corners of your eyes. It’s an involuntary response. Sometimes you just get so enraged that you have no other way to get rid of it than to cry. It’s infuriating to see the moment someone stops taking you seriously and starts to think you’re nothing more than a crybaby. 

Logan’s face pales and he winces, backing away from you. “I didn’t-”

“Enough,” you stop him, voice thick with unshed tears. He never calls you by your X-men name, it’s an unspoken agreement between the two of you. That’s a formality reserved for the other members. To each other, you’re nothing more than two people who care deeply for one another. 

Or, you had been. Before this one moment had blown your life and your back up. 

“I appreciate how much faith you have in my abilities, but the fact that your first instinct wasn’t even to protect me says a lot.” You take in a deep breath and shake your head. “Thanks for the breakfast, but can you please just leave?”

He looks like he doesn’t want to. You know he doesn’t want to leave. You two never fight like this. Even if there wasn’t a lot said, it’s still not normal for you. Maybe that should have been your first hint that things weren’t what you thought. 

It’s healthy to fight, to a certain extent. Sometimes it's needed. You two never have before and you know it’s just been brewing for a while, waiting to blow up. “I-”

“Get out,” you shout, and the tables beside you finally crumble under the weight of your emotions. They drip to the ground in an inorganic form of liquid wood. “Shit,” you hiss, glancing over at them. You wave your hand and they return to their normal state, but it doesn’t matter. You shouldn’t have lost control at all. 

The door slams and you look up to find the room empty. You sink back against your bed and run your hands over your face. You ignore the way the skin of your back screams in protest. 

You embrace the pain, the fiery shocks running up your nerves as the bandages chafe against the wounds. You focus on that instead of how things have ended with Logan. You always had such high hopes that he might be the one you finally man up and confess to. 

You should have known you were wrong. You should have known that it would never have ended with him picking you over her. 

You’re permitted to leave the medbay the next day. You don’t see or hear from Logan for the following week. You can’t confirm if he’s purposefully avoiding you or not but you have to believe he is. You both live in the same hall. You don’t know how it’s possible to have gone this long without even catching a slight glimpse of him. 

You force yourself to suffocate the part of you that misses him. You picture the side of yourself that longs for his presence and imagine shoving a pillow over her face. You don’t want to ache and cry over someone who doesn’t give two shits about you. 

You keep reminding yourself over and over again that when things got rough he showed you his true colors. But it’s more difficult than you imagined to just completely disregard so much history with him. 

Besides, you hadn’t realized just how little you interacted with the others until Logan was out of your daily life. It’s so difficult for you to bond with people that when you’d connected with Logan you’d latched onto him. 

It’s a little pathetic, honestly. Being grown and eating lunch alone because you only had one friend. You wonder if your feelings for him were genuine or born from a desperation not to be alone. You don’t let yourself linger on the question for long. 

It’s as your training with the students that you finally see him again. 

“Has he made much progress yet?”

Jean shakes her head and purses her lips. She watches as Billy, one of the newer students, struggles with the logs in front of him. He was a firestarter, a very inexperienced one who had only ever set his curtains on fire. 

His powers were more focused on the mental aspect of things rather than the physical. Which is why you and Jean were in charge of helping him. He couldn’t start anything on his own, he only really seemed to be able to activate the ability when he was emotionally stimulated. 

That meant whenever he was mad or sad, or anything in between, everyone in a fifty-foot radius was in danger. He was a risk to the other students and you were both trying to be gentle with him. But you’d been working with him for so long and there was so little progress. It felt like he wasn’t trying sometimes. 

He’d asked Rogue out a week ago and when she’d said no, her hair had caught on fire. You know he could have been hurt and lashed out without thought or malice behind it. But you’d seen the look in his eye. 

You’re fifty percent sure he knows exactly what he’s doing. This little act he puts on is just to get himself out of trouble. You hadn’t brought the issue to Charles yet because you’re trying to give him the benefit of the doubt. 

“Billy,” you call out. His head whips up and he sends you a vicious glare. You can’t help the sneer on your lips. “Just take a deep breath and try again. There’s nothing wrong with struggling, we all did.”

You put on your normal teacher voice, calm and collected. Assuring. But the little shit in front of you isn’t buying it for a second. He gives you a sarcastic little grin, “Right. Sorry, I forgot you’re a fuck-up just like me.”

“Billy!” Jean snaps, taking a step forward to reprimand him. She doesn’t get far before there’s a fireball shooting out of his palms and hurtling towards the both of you. 

There’s no chance to react before something slams into your side and is tossing you to the ground. Your head nearly snaps against the grass but there’s a hand underneath your skull softening the blow. 

You smell something smoking and look up to see a large scorch mark right where you’d just been. Jean’s standing over it, palm outstretched as she keeps the fire subdued. She gives you a worried look, “Are you okay?”

Surprisingly, yes. You glance up to see Logan hovering over you. He backs off when he notices you’re okay, getting to his knees and offering you a hand. Wordlessly, you slip your palm into his and let him help you into a sitting position. 

“You alright,” his hand hovers over your shoulder like he wants to pull you closer. But he resists, backing off and waiting for your answer. You nod your head, still a little dazed from the failed assassination attempt. 

He narrows his eyes, searching your face for any sign of head trauma. When he’s properly assured you’re okay he jumps to his feet. “Billy!” His voice booms across the courtyard and it’s the first time you’ve ever seen that little asshole scared. 

He’s barely on his feet before Logan is stalking towards him, jerking him forward by the scruff of his neck and dragging him towards the mansion. “We need to have a little talk,” the tone of his voice has you a little scared and you’re not even the one he’s mad at. 

Jean walks towards you and helps you to your feet. “Is your back okay?”

“Yeah,” you nod and brush your clothes off. You have to physically shake the shock of what happened off. “Yeah, I’m fine. I can’t believe he did that.”

Jean scoffs and glares towards Billy’s back. Your eyes widen in shock when you see the large scorch mark across his arm. “Jean! He got you, are you okay?”

She glances down at her shirt and frowns. “Yeah, practically a sunburn.” She gives you a reassuring smile, “I’ll be fine.”

As shitty as this sounds, you’re not concerned for her. You can only focus on the fact that she was in just as much danger as you and Logan had tackled you to the ground. You glance back towards the mansion, more fucking confused than ever. 

You’re not sure what compels you to follow Logan, but you’re running after him before Jean can stop you. He’s barely got a minute headstart on you, you’re not sure why you can’t find him. You’d gone through every inch of the first floor. 

You don’t know where he would have dragged Billy, but it’s nowhere you can find. After about ten minutes of looking for him, you give up on the hope that you’re ever going to figure out what’s happening inside his brain. 

You let out a defeated sigh, running a hand over your face and trying to shake off the funk of the day. You can’t believe that little shit tried to roast you. You’re not comfortable with the fact that he’s just roaming around inside the mansion somewhere. 

You turn out of the living room and nearly slam into someone. His hands shoot out, grabbing your shoulders and gently stopping you. “Logan,” you give him a strained smile. “I was looking for you.” You glance over his shoulder and frown. “Where’s Billy?”

Logan sighs, his hands linger on your arms for a moment before he takes a step back. “Wheels got to him before I could do anything.”

You laugh a little, the noise involuntary. “What were you planning on doing with the sixteen-year-old?”

He doesn’t find the question amusing if his expression is anything to go by. “He was really trying to hurt you.”

His words sober you up slightly and you drop the flippant attitude. “Yeah, I wanted to,” god, it feels like you could choke on the words. Just last week you were screaming at him for not helping you. Now, you could barely thank him because he had. 

“You’re always my priority.” He tells you before you can struggle any longer. Your head shoots up and you stare at him with confusion. He groans, the noise tired and resigned. “Saving Jean was a mistake. I mean it, kid, I just thought you could handle yourself.”

You open your mouth but he stops you before you can argue. “I know, that’s not the point. I should have saved you, no matter what I thought you could or couldn't handle.”

“No,” you stop him and shake your head. “No, Logan, I shouldn’t. I,” your mouth opens and he stares at you expectantly. What you were going to say gets stuck in your throat. This is a horrible idea. 

“I liked you in a way you didn’t like me and it was unfair of me to push my expectations onto you.” You wanted it to sound better, and more intelligent. Instead, it came out in one rushed breath and you’re not sure he even understood half of what you said. 

His brows furrow in confusion for a moment before a smile breaks out on his face. You’re not sure if it’s a good or bad thing that he’s smiling. You can’t tell if he’s mocking you or about to profess his undying love. 

You don’t have to wonder for long. He moves closer towards you, leaning forward until you’re practically sharing the same breaths. Unconsciously, you’re drawn into him, hands braced gently on his chest as you chase after him. 

“What are you doing?” Your whispered words brush against his lips and he gives you a small smile. His hands travel up your waist. He tugs you closer, his other hand looping around your neck and craning you up. 

“I’m gonna choose you every fucking time, kid.” His lips brush across your own and it’s like a switch is flipped in you both. Your arms twine around his neck, pulling him down until you’re practically melting into him. 

It’s everything you’ve ever wanted and so different at the same time. You always thought your first kiss would be after some cheesy first date. He would have taken you out to dinner. Something would have inevitably gone wrong, you spilled something on your dress or the waiter brought the wrong order. 

You would both worry that it was a sign that nothing would work out between you. And then, at the end of the night, he’d tug you into his arms and kiss you like you were the most precious thing he’d ever held. 

That would be nice, but this is better. He’s not holding you like you’re something fragile or something too precious for this world. He’s kissing you like you’re the very air he needs to survive. He’s greedy with his affections and demanding with his wants. 

You’re being consumed and devoured. And you never want to stop. This is all you’ve ever wanted with him, from him. 

Sadly, you do have to breathe. You’re the one that forces the stop, you’re sure he would have happily suffocated if it meant he could keep touching you like this. You pull back, the air coming in short pants between your parted lips. 

You can already feel them swelling, the slight irritation on your cheeks from his stubble. You don’t mind, you quite like the feeling. He speaks before you can, a pleased smile on his face. “Forgive me yet?”

You chuckle, a little impressed by how cheeky he is, still slightly pissed off. “Why don’t you do that again and I’ll think about it?”

He rolls his eyes but you can see the smile fighting against his firm glare. “You’re really gonna make me work for it, huh?”

You smile and nod, leaning into him again. “You’re never gonna hear the end of it,” you whisper before dipping down and kissing him again. You can’t believe you ever doubted just how much he cares for you. 

He didn’t choose Jean over you. He’s just a dumbass. 

a/n: I had to resist putting in a “pick me, choose me, love me” line in there bc that would have just been too much lol

end. — I do not own the characters or the comics/movies Wolverine/X-Men, but this writing is my own all rights reserved © not-neverland06 2024. do not copy, repost, translate & recommend elsewhere.

General Taglist: @evasmlp

Logan Taglist:  @nonamevenus @smexy-bucky-waifu @wh1sp @peony-always @corvusmorte  

@mrs-ephemeral  @wolviesgirl ♡ 

[wingedjellyfishflight]

Big Dick Brother Energy

When you join Task Force 141, you fully expect to have to fend off aggressive, testosterone-fueled men who think anything with a cunt should service them just for existing. Instead, you get a team who welcomes you heartily and truly embrace the idea of brothers in arms. They see you as an extension of themselves, one who deserves their protection and care.

This is amazing on the battlefield. Saving each other is only second to completing a mission objective, and sometimes, it comes first. The problem is when you try to socialize with others outside the team and off the battlefield. The One-Four-One are complete and total cockblocks. So overprotective that no man gets a chance to do more than make eyes at you or maybe say "hi" before a giant wall is sliding between you and that man, physically pushing them away if necessary.

When you first joined the team, they excitedly added you to their phone tracking plan. It allowed the team to track each other at any time while at home, just in case. It was very useful when your car broke down and they were able to come to your rescue within minutes instead of waiting hours for a tow. Now, though, it makes it impossible for you to sneak off or to try a different bar or a club.

A club. That was a disaster. You tried to go to a club to dance, figuring that the team would either brood over drinks at a table in a corner or find girls to dance with. No. They followed you like lost puppies, and the second a guy tried to dance with you, formed a ring around you like bodyguards. Opening your eyes and seeing a wall of brothers glaring at everyone around was embarrassing, to say the least.

After that, you sat them down as a group and told them they needed to stop the big brother act, because you desperately needed to burn off some energy. They nodded as though they understood. Then, they scheduled you for extra PT sessions. When you complained about that, they signed you up for yoga classes and water aerobics. You were excited for those, hoping that you'll find a guy looking to hook up. Only, when you walked into yoga, Ghost was there, laying out his mat next to yours, ignoring your glare with a smirk on his face. And water aerobics had Gaz climbing in the pool with you, telling you about his weekend plans and the newest gadget he picked up.

Hell, you even tried to schedule your own class when the rest of the team was busy in the hopes of meeting a man. Leaving your phone at home, you slipped away to a dance studio across town in a taxi. You saw Alejandro walk in at the last minute and shoved your way past him, stomping outside in frustration. He followed and offered a ride back to base with a lopsided grin, calling you mi Hermana, in case you forgot the team's consideration of you as a sister.

You tried to explain again, and they threw their hands up in frustration. They tried to help you burn off energy in a constructive way. No man would be good enough for you, anyway. They were just heading off the heartbreak. When you storm off in frustration, they shrug it off. No way they would let some idiot hurt you, even if you pouted over it.

Eventually, you decide that you'll have to secretly date someone on base. Maybe a friend's with benefits situation. Just as you make that decision, you look up, your eyes locking with a man's across the room. The look he directs your way makes a delicious shiver go down your spine. That'll do, you think with a smile back at him.

[thesmollestsnek]

Death echoes

So a while ago, i found this dp x dc post that had a really interesting lore headcanon for Danny’s ghostly wail. Idk if I’ll be able to find it again, I’ll link it here if I do, but essentially it posited that every ghost has something called a “death echo”, which is an ability unique to them based heavily on their deaths. These echoes are the most powerful move in a ghost’s moveset, but they’re also extremely volatile and draining, typically damaging the ghost in some way when used, with Danny’s being his Wail because he died screaming. The original post then went on to some really cool halfa!Jason ideas based on these death echoes, but for this lil snippet with an extremely long intro I’d like to focus on Danny a bit more.

Edit: Apparently I may have extrapolated a lot of the actual lore behind these death echos myself? The inspiration post was a lot longer in my memories. Or I might've mushed multiple posts into one mental box and then forgot lol. So a lot of the actual detail from this point on is seemingly mostly original material? I think? Idk man, sometimes my brain spits out information without giving me any clues as to where it got that information. Anyway, this post got kinda long and since I'm... decently sure this is where I shifted from summarizing @ailithnight's post to writing all my own thoughts I figured here would be a good place to throw the cut lol.

So! with all of the context-for-the-context out of the way, let’s move on to the actual context for what I’m writing cause I can’t be bothered with writing an intro XD

Essentially, this is an au where Danny is an established member of the Justice League, or maybe one of the teen hero teams? I’m a slut for eternal teenager Danny, but maybe he’s enough of a powerhouse to be on the main team despite him both looking and acting like the dumbass fourteen year old he died as. Either way, he’s on a League/League-sanctioned mission and things go bad. Like, everyone-almost-dies bad. And so as a final desperation attack, Danny uses his Wail, a power he’s never told anyone on the league he even has. And it works, and they make it out, but after the fact everyone has. Questions. And because in this au death echoes are deeply personal, Danny dodges those questions, but the league coughbatmancough isn’t satisfied with that. So they push for answers. Answers Danny’s not willing to give, because. In my mind death echoes aren’t just based on how a person died, but also their experience of that death. What their last thoughts were. When Danny died the only thing that he could process beyond just an all-encompassing painpainpainpainpain was the sound of someone screaming. His screaming. And so his death echo is the sound of a fourteen year old child screaming in deathly pain and terror weaponized, which definitely gave the league Even More Questions than they would’ve had already. Which finally brings us to the actual snippet, which is a conversation between John Constantine, who was brought in for his experience with the supernatural once it became clear Danny wasn’t going to talk, and Danny himself. 

~~~~~~~

“So, kid. Batsy tells me you’ve been hiding some of your abilities, wanna tell me what's up with that? Call it an occultist's intuition, but somethin’ tells me you’re not just being stubborn for the hell of it.”

“It’s... complicated. And not anyone’s business, either!”

“Kid...”

“Why does it even matter?! It’s not something I want to or am even able to do on a regular basis! I saved the mission, can’t they just accept that and move on???”

Sighing, Constantine reached up to start massaging his brow. “Kid, you and I both know that ain’t gonna be enough. Now I know that some things are better left alone, but the rest of these idiots? They can’t accept that, Batsy especially. That man’s never left bloody well enough alone in his life”

He looked up just in time to see the otherworldly teen shrink into himself, looking every bit the child he was. “I know but... why? Why do they need to keep asking questions? And why do they only ask the ones that hurt to answer?”

A sharp glance. “The fuck kinda questions are they asking? Batman was speaking in more grunt than word, so I didn’t really catch all the details of what this power you’re supposedly hiding even is.”

Phantom shrinks even more into himself at that, and responds in a voice so small it’s more sigh than speech. “I... I can scream. And it breaks things and pushes people back. But it, it sounds. Bad. And it brings up bad memories and I don’t like to do it or listentoitoreventhinkaboutitandtheywon’tletmeforgetand-”

“Breathe kid. I know you don’t need to but just take a deep breath with me. Don’t you go getting lost in your own head on me now., Constantine reassured the kid automatically, the sheer hopelessness prompting action long before the words themselves could be understood. Then the rest of him caught up, and he had to pause. Looked up at the kid, saw just how distressed he was. A picture was starting to form in the back of his head, and Constantine didn’t like what he saw one bit. A last-resort power that the normally open Phantom was strangely reticent about. A scream so horrible sounding the rest of the league would not to stop asking questions about it. Terrible memories to match said scream. And one truly miserable child who couldn’t bear to even think about any of it. 

“Phantom... is that your Echo? Screaming?”

A miserable nod is his only response, the tears that had been welling up in the kid’s eyes finally starting to fall. Cursing softly to himself, Constantine stood to leave, bracing himself for the Bat’s inevitable questioning. “Well then you just take all the time you need love, and leave the rest to me. I’ll make sure the rest of those idiots know not to ask you about this ever again.”  And with that Constantine turned and strode towards the door, leaving the quietly sobbing child to collect himself in privacy.

~~~~~

I had a whole-ass lore dump conversation between Constantine and Batman planned here, explaining how death echoes are deeply personal, and asking about one is a taboo on par with, potentially even worse than, asking a ghost about their death outright. Because they are formed from an amalgamation of how a ghost died, their last thoughts, and their final emotions, in some ways asking a ghost about their Echo is like asking them to describe their death in painstaking detail. But uhhh... inspiration bug left. So yea. Side note, I’d like to apologize if my depiction of Constantine’s accent was Bad, I’m but a lowly USAmerican whose only exposure to British accents is through tv ^-^’

[wraithdance]

Do you have any advice when it comes to dating straight men?

Short answer? Don’t. Long answer, under le cut we go for Calvary’s survival guide to dating men🙄

Actually curious why you want advice from my emotionally bereft ass but lmaooo. I’ll give you the advice I give my male dating family members and friends

1. Do not go into dating men desperate

you need to have at least the barest amount of confidence in who you are and what you want before dating a singular man.

Like I mean that shit, I’m not kidding. You don’t have to be self confident enough to write a self help book, but you need to be able to feel as if you can walk away when you are disrespected. no matter what fantasy you have of love, you WILL be disrespected babe. Learn early how to identify it when it happens and walk the fuck away with your self respect when it’s too much for you to ignore.

2. Do not let being ‘nice’ keep you from finding your dream partner

Start off with a working list of what kind of man you want and be as detailed and insane about it as possible. I mean everything down to what color underwear he wears if that’s something that might be a point of contention with you.

After you have that list write some hard rules for how a man is allowed to speak/act towards you and use that as a litmus test for if you continue a relationship. It is a privilege to be near you not a guaranteed right, so reinforce that or get walked over

3. Masturbate frequently and have your options open

Legit work out any hang ups surrounding sex and consider dating more than one person at a time so you don’t get stuck romanticizing one man.

No, that doesn’t mean you have to fuck all of them, but getting used to going on dates helps with nerves and prevents you from making the mistake of thinking you found ‘the one’ because you’re seeing the same dude. Please invest in a sex toy or 3. Being horny will get you into trouble!!

4. Do not trust a man’s word over your own senses

People lie. Don’t believe shit a man says unless he backs it up with receipts. He says he has a condo in France? ask to see the deed. He got his std labs done last week? Ask him to go with you to your regular doctor for a new screening.

Protect yourself always and if he gets mad that’s a red flag. Do not pass go because it’s life or death out here, babes. Which leads me to

5. Be a bitch. Be the biggest bitch you can be

Legit fuck every single thing anyone ever told you about being nice to a man. Work on getting comfortable with being an asshole and calling them out or you will be pushed over. This honestly goes for any gender like be a literal cunt when the time warrants it.

Someone pushy about you not letting them back to your place? Be loud and tell them they’re making you uncomfortable. Someone negging you? Look them in their eye and lean close, tell them “you know, when I first met you I thought you were a lot smarter. I guess not, since you had the nerve to say that to me without any regrets.”

Don’t like the date? Leave. That simple. It’ll save you heart ache and sometimes save your life.

Uh if you have more specific questions you can follow up but those are my top five rules. Men aren’t some scary mythical creature or hard science experiment. It’s all about setting yourself up to get what kind of love story you want. Good luck babes you’re gonna need it!!

MWAHH 💋💖

[factual-fantasy]

Okay so I did some research on Seam and realized that it would be a crime to not add him to my AU in someway where him and Jevil reconcile and they escape to the multiverse together and are free and they're best friends and- 😭😭😭

I had a dark story all thought up for this but half way through drawing I changed the story so this isn't really canon anymore?? Or it might be idk- my Deltarune AU is only a few days into development so its constantly changing <XDD Sorry-

If anyone's interested in the story I've got it below the Keep reading :}} (Fair warning, its rather dark and disturbing..)

TLDR: This story is super dark and interesting to me but it might not be canon XD

ANYWAYS! The story behind this was Jevil and Seam come from a very dark and corrupt AU. Ruled by an even darker and wicked King (Lancers dad). In this AU they were Kings royal Magician and Jester as per usual. They were best friends though and preformed these beautiful displays of magic together. Side by side, hand in hand. They were best friends for years and always dreamed of one day running away together and finding a safe place to live.

Eventually Jevil met someone. Someone who spoke of a way to leave this place. They spoke of walking through your own reflection. And if done right, one could leave their AU entirely.. Jevil believed them out of desperation and tried to tell Seam about it. Seam thought Jevil was losing his mind. Walking through your own reflection? That makes no sense..

King caught wind of them plotting to escape. And as punishment to both of them he commanded Seam to lock Jevil away using his own magic.

In Seams eyes, Jevil was his best friend. His brother, the only thing in this world that he could trust. But he was more afraid of what King would do to him or Jevil for disobeying him, then he was willing to stand up against him. So while believing Jevil was sick in the head and needed help, he acted out of cowardice and sealed Jevil away..

I'm thinking that eventually sometime later, Jevil is able to escape through his own reflection. A mirror. And either he goes back and sees Seam dressed in these beautiful robes and thinks "well the king must be treating him well. Guess I'll just leave him to reap the benefits of betraying me.. >:(" And leaves with a bitter heart. THAT, or he just left. Never going back to check on Seam or see if King was treating him well or not.

So the AU continues. With Jevil traveling from world to world, meeting new people and learning new things.. When eventually he's with the whole gang and they're all sitting in a restaurant or something.

When Jevil suddenly feels this overwhelming sense of doom. Something horrible is about to happen to Seam. He just knows it, its in his bones. Deep within his soul he can feel it. He knows- he needs to save him.

He falls back out of his chair into a mirror and heads straight for his old AU. Showing up just in time to stop Seam from.. well..

They end up talking. Turns out that after Jevil was imprisoned, Seam tried to sneak down to the basement and visit him. He wanted to apologize for imprisoning him and explain himself- but he was caught by King.

"I just wanted to see him!"

"For that I will take your eye."

"NO! Please don't take my eye!!"

"For talking back, I will take your voice too."

King took Seams eye and stitched his mouth shut. He could still talk but not very well. To make things worse, when Jevil escaped? Seam thought he had died. Why wouldn't he? His magical barrier was never broken and Jevil was gone. Surly he must have died somehow.. Meanwhile everyone else was under the impression that Seam let Jevil escape because they were friends.

Seam then suffered greatly for years as punishment for "letting Jevil escape". He was bound by these magical chains made by King. He was abused for years and at this point he had enough. But before he could do anything rash.. Jevil returned.

Jevil then felt the sinking horror realizing that he left Seam alone in this world to be abused by King. He abandoned him. After all those years of promising to one day run away together..

Seam betrayed Jevil, and Jevil abandoned Seam.

After realizing all of this and having a long emotional talk. Seam and Jevil deeply apologized to the other, and forgave each other. Marking the beginning of their new friendship. And despite Seam feeling like he doesn't deserve freedom, he agreed to run away with Jevil and finally be free with him.

~~~~

Now this story is super cool and morbid and all but now I'm questioning the story and wether or not I want it to be canon <XD

I have some other ideas that I really like too and this one is just a biiiiit dark... ish. I mean I've made worse- but idk I guess this one just has a bad taste to it..

I also like the idea that Seam has been with Jevil this whole time and was the first person he saved. Which motivated him to try and save other people and give them the same freedom that he gave to Seam. But then that would change the Grillby fight and Spamton situation a bit and also maybe effect the Goner kid situation- GAH!! I'll figure it out eventually- <XDD

I hope this wasn't too hard to stomach and if you read all the way through I thank you :}} 💖

[d4yd4iry]

You

-pt.2 of Crush

Parings: Pham Hanni x fem!reader

Synopsis: you like her, just her…

Genre: Idol au, fluff

“Okay, so unnie listen carefully okay?” Hanni grinned as she nodded at your serious face. Gosh if she weren’t on face time she would be rolling off her bed. You were so cute.

“You know how my schedule has been really packed so I don’t really have time to hangout at the company and like socialize with other idols right?” You waited until Hanni nodded before continuing. “Yeah so, I decided to chill there for a while with my members because we had a free schedule the whole morning…” you continued to rambled but Hanni wasn’t listening, she was only looking at you.

Looking at how your eyes furrowed when you acted confused, or how you slightly pouted when you noticed she wasn’t listening. “Unnie, are you even listening?” Hanni shook her head. “I’m listening, go on.” You raised your eyebrows at her, totally not convinced but chose to continue anyways.

“Okay, so you know that time when I accidentally said that I had a few crushes on a few idols on live right?” Hanni suddenly felt like not listening anymore. She remembered that era of time when you would come to their dorm just to gush to her about your crushes. Let’s say Hanni wasn’t very happy about that.

“They approached me…” You paused to look if she was paying attention, she was.

“And suddenly said that they liked me at the same tim-“ You didn’t get to finish as Hanni interrupted, furrowing her eyebrows she tilted her head. “Like? As in Like-Like?” The bitter taste of jealousy hits her tongue after you nodded.

“And? What did you say?” Hanni felt stiff throughout her whole body, she did not like it one bit but she needed to know more.

“Well…nothing I just stared at them and then my manager came in and saved the day. It’s the reason why I called you, I want advice!” You twirled your hair, giggling like a school girl in love.

“Advice for what?” Hanni asked as her lips grew a pout. Why’d you have to tell her that.

“For what I should do?” You asked, frowning a bit when you noticed that she looked like a child whose lollipop was snatched away.

“I don’t know…” Hanni’s voice trailed off as she glanced away from your pretty face to her freshly painted nails. “Do you like them like that? Any of them?”

“I’m not sure of my feelings…I guess it felt good when they told me they like me? Yeah, I just felt nice…whatever, I like someone else now but it’s not like I’m allowed to even if I wanted to” You shrugged carelessly, leaning back onto your pillow.

But Hanni wasn’t able to care less at all, she cared a lot. If you stopped liking them then who do you like now? Was it one of your members? Or that actress whom you’ve been hanging out with way too much lately. Hanni immediately felt even more bitter after thinking about that actress.

Okay, who ever it is, Hanni Pham desperately needed to know. “Who do you like?!” looking at you with desperate eyes.

“You.”

Hanni jaw dropped as she blinked rapidly, unsure that what she heard was what it was. Even you were surprised by your own words but before any of you could utter a word, you could see from Hanni’s phone that your sister had just entered her room.

As they always say, life is full of interruptions.

“What are you doing?” Minji’s head appeared behind her door. “On video call with my baby sis again?”

Minji raised her brows when no one replied, she then swung the door fully open and walked inside of Hanni’s room, staring at her friend who was frozen in time. “Bro, we need to get to the company now.” then she faced your face through the iPhone screen, you too were quite.

Minji flickered her eyes between the two who were both still and faces were redder than the tomatoes Danielle ate daily. “These two…”Minji shook her head before picking up Hanni’s phone from the desk and bid goodbye to you before leaving the call.

“Han, get it together before I release those love songs you wrote to my baby sis.” Seeing as Hanni won’t respond Minji sighed before punching her arm and then left, leaving Hanni alone.

“She likes me…” Hanni said in a low voice as she held her burning cheeks with both hands. “Yn likes me.” her cheeks hurts from smiling to hard.

[sejanusarchive]

“Your own father used to say those people only drank water because it didn’t rain blood” vs two district boys who are assumed to be murder machines, yet prove that statement wrong multiple times: Reaper and Marcus.

PART ONE: REAPER

When Reaper is first introduced to us, we learn he’s rangy but muscular; we read about him wrapping his hands around Coriolanus’s throat on the truck headed to the zoo and about Dill, his District partner, saying he has killed a Peacekeeper before in District 11, without ever getting caught. 

Our first impression of him is that of a dangerous person, one who’s even clever in his lethality, and because of that we know he’s a presumed possible victor.

Lucy Gray mentions him more than once as one of the biggest threats, when talking about how she’s going to try as hard as she can to win the Games.

She also tells Coriolanus how Reaper apologized to the other tributes for having to kill them and told them he is going to make it up to them after, by taking revenge on the Capitol. Everyone takes this as him meaning it maliciously and with arrogance, ‘cause how else could he possibly mean it, right? Coriolanus thinks that he’s not only powerful, but good at mind games too. 

But the truth is that Reaper meant that genuinely, even with a certain innocence, and naivety to how it could have been misinterpreted. There was no malice or arrogance in his statement, but there was guilt and regret and grief, because of being forced into taking lives. He went into the arena fully prepared and resigned to kill the others to save himself, but not without obvious dissent.

When the Games start, he arms himself and heads to the stands. Coriolanus thinks he does so to begin his hunt, even if everyone else had fled in other directions and he had made no move to go after them.

Right after this we read about how Tanner, someone who’s also a presumed possible victor, is able to climb up to the first row of the stands and sit in the sun for a while, completely unbothered and unharmed. Reaper doesn’t try to fight him, even if it would have only been to his advantage, since he could have easily taken out his strongest opponent now that the Games had just begun and he wasn’t exhausted and starving.

His first interaction with another tribute in the arena is with a dying Dill, carrying her out of the tunnels, placing her in the sun and talking to her in the last moments of her life. 

His first act with another tribute, is comforting a dying child. 

This is when the “murder machine” image starts to crumble. Coriolanus’s classmates talk about how he doesn’t look so tough, doesn't look like the person who “promised to kill all the others”, which he never actually did.

But still, after all this, Coriolanus sees his distressed pacing around Dill, as him possibly being “eager to get back to the hunt”, a hunt he never even began, and not just him feeling pained and powerless at Dill’s condition. 

When Coriolanus is sent into the arena to get Sejanus out, Bobbin, Mizzen, Tanner and Coral are the tributes who go after them to try to kill them. No sign of Reaper at any point.

When Lucy Gray gets out of the tunnels with a rabid Jessup after her, he makes no move to kill them either. Coriolanus points out how he lets Lucy Gray go and only walks up to the bottles of water on the ground.

Again and again and again, he has a chance to easily take a life to save his own, or take a small revenge against the Capitol, but he doesn’t. 

His second interaction with a tribute is with Lamina. He walks up to her, they negotiate an exchange of something both of them desperately need and that forms a bond between the two of them.

Then Coral, Mizzen and Tanner appear and he leaves, he goes behind the barricade and he falls asleep.

When he comes back out, he’s shocked to see Lamina and Tanner dead on the ground. And this is when he starts to make true his promise of avenging the tributes after their death. 

He lifts Lamina up in his arms and places her next to Marcus’s and Bobbin’s corpses and then collects Tanner, Dill and Sol as well, and covers them all with the flag of Panem. And he keeps doing this with all the tributes for the rest of the Games, right until his death. 

This is the best form of revenge he could take. Not only because he disrespects the flag, causing great disdain among Capitol citizens, but most importantly because he humanizes the tributes and gives them dignity, two things the Capitol has tried in every way to take away from them. He gives them as proper a burial as he can manage in those circumstances, makes it so now they can finally rest, tucked in a corner and covered, their corpses no longer on display for a bunch of sick people’s amusement. He honors them. He could have left them all scattered out on the dusty arena ground, but he didn’t. He took care of them.

Even when it’s just him and Lucy Gray left and he’s one step away from winning, he shows no signs of wanting to attack her. Doesn’t matter that he could easily take her out, save himself and finally go home. No, even then his main concern is that the tributes can properly rest with their corpses concealed. 

Everyone expected him to kill the most people, but he died in that arena killing no one and without ever even attempting to. He died holding strong to his humanity and making sure the fallen tributes could hold strong to theirs as well even in death.

Contrary to what we and the Capitol are made to believe initially, Reaper turns out to be pretty innocuous. He’s not a naturally violent or aggressive person, not a natural born killer and he refuses to be as well. This was a life or death situation and yet he didn’t even harm anyone. He has killed before, he is capable of it, but if he didn’t even do it in this case, even when all it would have taken for him to save himself was killing a girl smaller and younger than him, then imagine how dire and desperate the situation must have been when he had to resort to it.

He defied the Capitol by not participating in the Games, by not letting them turn him into the murder machine they wanted and expected him to be, and by honoring the corpses of the children whose lives have been so cruelly and unjustly cut short.

(Before moving on to Marcus, I wanna clarify some things in case anyone who’s reading this has only seen the movie. Reaper snapping at Clemensia during the one-on-one mentor-tribute interviews never happens in the book, neither does him looking angrily into the camera in the arena and challenging the Capitol to punish him arrogantly. Like we’ve just seen, this perceived arrogance and aggression in Reaper is a very surface level misconception of the people around him, that’s easily debunkable, that who made the movie took and ran with wrongfully. 

And actually there’s a few heartbreaking scenes in the book that contrast heavily with the image the movie created of him, like him tying a piece of the flag around his shoulders like a cape and spinning around, watching it fly behind him, and then running in the sun with his arms spread wide; and him rocking gently back and forth on himself for comfort, after the snake attacks, which is not when he dies in the book. He’s not the threatening, angry guy who tests the Capitol that they made him in the movie, he’s just a severely traumatized kid. Nothing more than a kid.

The movie made tons of stupid changes like this, that completely miss and disregard the whole point of both characters and story. Trust me when I say 99% of the characters are portrayed very wrongfully in it. So please keep that in mind.)

PART TWO: MARCUS

Marcus, like Reaper, was initially seen as a probable winner in the Games, before being murdered. Coriolanous makes note of his size multiple times, describing him as “towering”, as having a “colossal frame”, as “dwarfing the other tributes” and comparing him to a grizzly bear. 

It’s exactly because of his size that people think of him as a sure winner, as capable of taking down everyone else, as threatening and deadly.

But then we hear Sejanus, the only person who actually got to know him at some point, talk about him, and the first and one thing he mentions about Marcus is his kindness. 

He tells Coriolanus how when they were still classmates in Two, he hurt his finger really badly and Marcus helped him by bringing him a cup of snow he scooped from the windowsill. He says he did it without being prompted by anyone, without consulting anyone, not even the teacher, and without even being friends with Sejanus. 

That’s actually the very first thing Sejanus tells us about him. They weren’t enemies, but they weren’t friends either. Marcus had no real reason to do it, especially considering how the Plinths were, and still are, deeply despised in Two, for having helped the Capitol win the war. He did it almost as a reflex, because that’s who he is as a person. 

And this pure, unconditional kindness, told by the one person who actually knew him, goes against the image of him everyone formed by just looking at him, against what everyone assumed because he’s district, he’s a tribute, and he’s tall and strong and broad, so he has to be dangerous and lethal, he will brutally kill everyone to save himself, he’s capable of it anyway.

As I already said, the Plinths are deeply despised in Two, Sejanus is a filthy traitor in his eyes, one who’s benefiting from a luxurious, safe life in the Capitol, thanks to blood money; blood of thousands of what were supposed to be his people, blood whose spillage made them lose the war and caused the realization of the Games, bringing Marcus to that very situation.

Sejanus doesn’t have to worry about whether or not he’s going to be able to fill his stomach everyday; whether he’ll be able to finish his studies or will have to drop out of school early to go work to help sustain his family; whether the dangerous working conditions will be the cause of his early demise or being sent to an arena to kill or be killed by a bunch of other children for amusement will be, and what will happen to his family once he’ll be gone. All of this thanks to his family’s betrayal.

No doubt he resents Sejanus and is angry at him, a part of him maybe even faults him a bit for everything, but he never takes it out on him. It would be easy to single him out, pick him and make him pay for this situation, since he can’t make the whole Capitol pay; take some sort of revenge on Strabo Plinth in the name of Two and Thirteen and all other Districts, by harming his son. 

Sweet Sejanus, who brings the tributes food when no one else thought about it, who keeps pleading with him to accept it, who tries to help them however he can, would probably let him do it. He would take the hit, metaphorical or not, because it’s clear he has guilt gnawing at him and would feel like he deserves it. And Marcus is definitely aware of it. 

But he never gets violent, physically nor verbally, never tries to attack him or spit insults or hate at him. Instead he just ignores him.

He had many chances to do harm, even to kill Capitol citizens and Peacekeepers as revenge, a small and trivial one, but still a revenge, and he had many chances to let his frustration and anger out on Sejanus and use him as a punching bag, but he never did, because despite what everyone assumed about him, that’s not the type of person he is.

PART THREE: SEJANUS 

Sejanus, whom I’ve already mentioned several times in this post, is another District boy with the ability to take lives, but who’s repulsed and disturbed by the mere idea of it. 

With Marcus and Reaper, it’s a matter of first impressions and then getting to actually know them and learn they’re not like they seemed. With Sejanus it’s the opposite. 

First thing we learn about him in the book is his background: born in District 2, his father made fortune during the war and was able to buy his family a life in the Capitol. 

But the first thing we learn about him as a person is that he’s shy and sensitive. 

Throughout the entirety of the book, over and over and over again, we see that he’s good, and kind, and gentle, and sweet and takes things so to heart. It’s constantly pointed out by the people around him. 

And it’s constantly shown to us by him as well, with the passion he puts into standing up against the dehumanization and mistreatment of District people; with how affected he is by these aspects and by the Games; with how he tries in every way he can to help the tributes; with how he made it his life mission to make things better for the Districts; with how he’s never mean or spiteful to people who bully and disrespect him.

Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes is at its very center a discussion on human nature. He (alongside Dr. Gaul) is the main character who explicitly talks about it, and he believes in the inherent goodness of humans and constantly advocates in favor of it. All the injustice and atrocities he witnessed, never made him change his mind or his actions, never made it so compassion and love weren’t his driving forces.

His heart is big, and kind, and pure. And he wears it on his sleeve all the time. He’s referred to as “emotional” and “compassionate”, his eyes are soulful, his face is incredibly expressive, and there’s so many instances in which he’s described as speaking with a voice so full of sentiment, so many instances of his eyes filling with tears, of him wiping his face cause they spilled out. 

It’s well established how good and uncorrupted he is, how devoted to humanity he is, how much he values life.

And then in the third part of the book, we learn he’s an excellent marksman, a natural one even, who has been training in shooting every week since he was tiny.

He’s so good, that the sergeant in Twelve, as to not lose someone with Sejanus’s ability, refuses to give him the recommendation he needs in order to train to become a medic, even when Sejanus purposefully shoots much worse than he’s capable of, to hide his talent. 

The boy who values life more than anything in the world, has the ability to take one even with his eyes closed.

When he arrived in Twelve, wearing on his body the signs of the toll the Capitol, the Games and what happened to Marcus had taken on his mental health, with the prospect of building a new life for himself in which he could help the world become a better place, of training to be a medic and save lives, Coriolanus noted he had a much lighter air to himself, as if a heavy weight had been lifted off of him.

But when he is confronted with the reality that he is now a soldier and is expected to kill, Coriolanus says that his expression goes back to being as gloomy as it had been in the Capitol, the heavy weight now back on his shoulders. 

At dinner he doesn’t take a single bite of food, which is a behavior we’ve seen from him before, one he falls into when his mental health gets concerningly bad. And the reason is that he is terrified by the idea of having to kill someone, or someone dying because he can’t bring himself to shoot first. Because to him, every life is precious and none is disposable, and the possibility of being the cause of one being taken away, is an unbearable thought.

Reaper and Marcus had many chances and what could be considered reasons to kill, but they refused to. Sejanus, who is expected to kill because he’s a soldier and the best shooter, who would be punished, possibly even with execution, if he didn’t, refuses to. 

All three of them have the power to take lives with little effort but choose to cherish and honor them instead, choose kindness, choose humanity even over their own self preservation, proving both the Capitol and Crassus Snow’s statement about District people being bloodthirsty, wrong, by simply being their honest, uncorrupted selves until the end, by being truthful to who they are no matter what.

[l-in-the-light]

The most embarrassing series of posts about Lawlu you will ever read: edition Dressrosa (part 9)

The last Lawlu randezvous in Dressrosa, country of love, let's go!

Law did it! And Luffy is just standing there and watching. Kinda reflects their Amazon Lily dynamics, doesn't it? Back then it was Luffy making ruckus and Law just sitting there quietly and waiting for him to calm down. Wait, why do I call it a ruckus? It's a big moment for Law, it's his revenge! Well, I actually don't believe Doflamingo and I'm on Law's side here: he called it "wanting to fullfill Cora-san's wish", not taking revenge. Whatever this here was, was a mix of a rampage and desperation. Luffy's witnessing Law on his lowest. To be fair, Law deserved to give Doflamingo a payback. He freaking severed his arm.

I feel like Luffy just understands. Their support for each other so far was always rather quiet and from a distance, after all.

Luffy is saving Law again. It's second time already (or third even, since he stops Mingo twice here!). Law's spirit meanwhile just broke into tiny pieces, he has "nothing left in him" anymore, not even his unyielding will from mere moments ago. It even takes him a moment to realize Luffy stepped up to protect him here and it kinda shocks him (it really shouldn't by this point but oh well). This all feels extremely emotional and personal.

Also correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't it the Very First Time Luffy uses conqueror's haki like this? Like yeah, he can knock people unconscious but nothing else at this point. To even "coat" himself or "punch" someone with conqueror's he had to learn how to use Ryuo in Wano. But here? Here he does something special with his conqueror's that we never saw him do before that. And of course he was able to do it because he wanted to protect Law. Must be unconscious thing, just like I suspect he had a tiny moment of future sight in this arc. Both times for Law heh.

Getting out of the way so Luffy can go all out (anime suggests both him and Trebol got swept away by the gust, but for me it always looked like Law just rolled himself away). Just moment ago Law didn't even have the tiniest will in him, but now he has it again thanks to Luffy. Must have been a confusing feeling, perhaps despair mixed with gratitude, but bottom line is: it pushed him to keep going on.

Also Law already suspected Luffy has conqueror's haki despite never seeing him use it before. He says "yappari" here which translates to "as expected". He's very doting for Luffy, isn't he.

Time for reflection. Do you all remember Wano? Everyone called Kaido and Big Mom monsters who can't die. Everyone except Monkey D. Luffy. He said they're humans and if they're humans they can be beaten down and defeated. Here, we have Trebol's narration going on presenting to us Doflamingo as a literal demon. You really think Luffy buys this here and thinks Mingo is a demon or a monster? If he didn't think this way about emperors, there's no way he would think that about Mingo. But he doesn't deny because he thinks this matters a lot to Law and he's on Law's side here. But I guarantee you Luffy thinks this is bullshit and Mingo is just a human, as in: he wouldn't villainize him, he wouldn't deny him his humanity either. That's just not a Luffy thing to do.

Which leads us to this conclusion: Luffy is acting differently because he still is doing everything here for Law. Law called Mingo a devil just moments ago, Luffy is not gonna say anything to contradict that, no matter what he personally thinks on the matter. Luffy will always be on Law's side.

"Torao can't even move an inch!" Luffy's very protective and worried, tries to make Mingo focus on him instead, but all he can do is talk because Trebol caught him. Law meanwhile is indeed in a very bad spot.

Law: I will lose my face if I leave both of you to Mugiwara-ya. There's no way Trafalgar Law is gonna listen to Luffy saying "Torao can't move an inch and defend himself" (and not just once but twice!), he just had to prove him wrong, right? Petty bastard. Still, it was thanks to Luffy that fire and will to fight even ignited inside of him again here.

Luffy tries to free himself from Trebol and Law says a curious line (that guy's an empty marionette is how this line was translated in my native language), which is a hint for Luffy about Trebol's trick. Luffy doesn't get it though and realizes it only after Law takes care of Trebol himself (seems he doesn't even hold it against Luffy that he couldn't figure it out). Turns out Law doesn't even have to move an inch. All he needs is a finger.

Luffy is just so impressed beyond belief. Law managed to defeat an enemy while not even being able to get up. No wonder Luffy is always in awe about Law.

Sadly he couldn't make Trebol fall unconscious so the latter did his last deed to try to explode Law. Luffy reacted fast to rescue him (we can see him escaping the explosion just in time, Mingo as well). His concerned face when he looks at passed out Law hits right in the feels. He even remembered to grab Kikoku and Law's severed arm!

Also when did Law became "Lawland", because that's so hilarious to me for some reason. He didn't even meet the tontattas. Must be the result of some of Usopp's tales, I guess? Though it's noteworthy that Law was super close to meeting tontattas on Green Bit, I wonder how the plot would have developed if he did end up talking to them back then.

Curious wording from Luffy here. "Torao did his part to put pressure on Mingo". Not "he fought well", not "I will finish what he started". It's almost like Luffy is aware that Law was only there to stall Mingo, to buy time for Luffy to fight him. Hmmm. Also bonus miraculous intuition from Luffy here: telling Cavendish he counts on him. Because that will lead directly to Cavendish making sure Torao doesn't do anything stupid and will end up protecting him for a while. It's kinda thanks to Luffy again.

Standing in-between Mingo and Law again, with his body, words and resolution.

Here we go again, Luffy's motivation for this final stage of the fight. He's not gonna let Law's efforts go to waste. But he still doesn't admit that he does it only for Law, he claims "Mingo's cage is in his way". It's not entirely true.

And again, Luffy's withholding himself from stating his true reason of why he wants to beat up Mingo. "You made my friends cry, my crewmates mad! And you won't go down!" And yet none of those include Law who didn't cry or wasn't mad (he did have a rampage moment tho). Luffy's still holding himself back, because before he can do what he wants to do the most, he needs to "take it all on himself" and do stuff for Law first.

Law's biggest love confession. I mean, this is the moment when I finally thought "Damn, I was so wrong about Trafalgar Law, he cares so much it's overwhelming". We had him super cold all the time, and suddenly this emotional bomb drops. It hit me like a truck. I never doubted Law's caring heart from this moment ever again.

One important thing to note here. I think Law got inspired here by what Robin said earlier when defending Luffy, she said it's worth dying for Luffy's sake and that Luffy is always their trump card. This is Law's version of it. But he can't bring himself to say "die for him", probably for many reasons, but the most important one I believe to be this: both Law and Luffy had someone dear to them sacrifice their life so they can live. Law knows how's it's like to be the one left behind and he knows Luffy knows that feeling as well. He wouldn't want to force Luffy to go through that again, especially not now that he knows Luffy does think of him as his friend (he had his shocking realization about that when Luffy ran to rescue him from the Heart Throne). That's why "we either live or die together" is the only option he can give here. It's because they both understand the pain.

Law's words "I dragged him into this" hold a lot of weight as well. He was in that situation before, he believed Cora-san got beaten up by Vergo because of Law. He would do anything to avoid a similar situation happening ever again, and yet here he is, having to face it again. No wonder his reaction is so big and emotional that he even says to Cavendish "he's counting on him" to respect his choice. (thankfully Cavendish acted like a chad who said "no suicides on my watch" and stayed with him instead).

There's again an Ace parallel going on here. At Marineford Ace told Luffy to go away and mind his own business because he couldn't bear "dragging Luffy down with himself". Both Law and Ace had to face this situation turning out to be true. This time around, Law made sure to take the most consequences on himself to the very end, didn't he? I swear it feels almost like Ace is watching over those two.

Again, everyone's reactions to G4: "is that really Luffy??" "what is that bouncing ball??" "I heard he's a 25 feet tall monster!!"

Law's reaction to G4: "Oh great, he still had an ace up his sleeve (casual compliment). But he's using too much haki"

He can't just be impressed without also noticing *immediately* the biggest weakness of G4, right? Of course it's out of concern, but still, Law, come on... He's also one of the few if not The Only Person not weirded out (though my bet is Sabo also wouldn't be fazed heh).

Still, it shows how much attention Law pays to Luffy and his fights. He would know of so many ways to help him improve his techniques, wouldn't he? He just cares so much and I wish he just allowed himself to, you know, live a little, and do the things he probably yearns to do, like the thing I just mentioned: help him improve. Enough of keeping the artificial distance all the time!

They both notice the most important thing at the same time: birdcage is still up, the fight isn't over. Same mind, two bodies.

Luffy lost his G4 and people around him just run away, quite a sad sight. He's practically the only hope for them to survive but they instead ditch him in fear. Meanwhile Law is making another important decision, the fire to fight slowly burning back again. He's still not done with his "fight" in Dressrosa.

This happens in chapter titled "My Fight". But Law's not fighting anymore. Yeah, not against Doflamingo. But there's still one more fight he can't afford to lose. It's the fight to not let Luffy die. That's why he shambled himself all the way here, risking losing his arm for good (it's excessively bleeding again because of all the strain he put on himself just now!). Law saved a life back at Marineford, he's not gonna just lie down there and watch that life vanish again.

It's exactly because of this moment that I believe Law's always fighting to save lives ever since he lost Flevance and Cora-san. That's why him ready to give up on kids in Punk Hazard or on people of Dressrosa is huge, he was basically giving away something that mattered the most for him, just to keep Luffy safe. That's how much Luffy matters to him, which is More Than Anything Else, apparently.

Guarding him as Luffy is recovering. He positioned himself between Luffy and Mingo's position on the street below, he's literally protecting him with his body, just the same way Luffy did before when he dragged cuffed Law all over Dressrosa. They don't even have to communicate, one look, "go!" (said already after shambling him, mind you) and Luffy's back in the game. But Law still didn't finish doing his part, he's still keeping guard, shambling Rebecca and Viola out of the way and risking Mingo finding out his hiding spot. Doflamingo is still taunting him "watch me kill all your hope again by getting rid of Luffy".

Finally Luffy tells Mingo what he wanted to do for the whole arc. "You're suffocating me with your attempts at controlling everything and everyone!". Luffy's no longer fighting for Law, now he's finally doing it for himself (and he even has Law's support in this!). And he expressed it only before his very final punch. All the other ones? Those were all for Law.

It doesn't mean he didn't care about his crewmates wishes or Rebecca, but those flew all out of the window the moment Luffy almost believed for a moment Law is dead. Perhaps seeing Law there coming to his rescue really calmed down Luffy so he could actually think of something else. Dressrosa is indeed a country of passion and this fight was also full of it. Emotions constantly got in the way.

Law's still keeping guard, almost like he knows Luffy won't be able to get down from there on his own. The moment he notices him lose G4 he's ready to save him, despite the fact he's wheezing and his lungs are probably collapsing on him.

He saved Luffy, but look at what cost. Law himself is looking like not only his lungs but his heart are giving up on him there. Few moments later we can barely see him in the background, but he's lying there, most likely passed out just like Luffy. Also that extra huge room he did there to save Luffy from all the way up in the sky. How big was it? Was it as big as the one he did before to trick Mingo in the palace? Or even bigger? It was said it cut down on his lifespan significantly, but seems Law didn't cut down on his lifespan just once, but twice, and in Dressrosa alone. Again just to save Luffy's life.

Resting finally. They both freaking sleep in the same way with opened mouth. Law's also extremely injured and in bad shape, but it's Usopp together on the bed with Luffy, not Law. Maybe because of his touch trauma. But also maybe Law just didn't think he should be on that bed; we know that in Zou he will tell his crew that Mingo was defeated by Luffy, not giving any credit to himself. It might be the same here.

I wonder who patched them up. The only doctor around was Law himself...

I know this isn't Luffy-Law, this is Sabo-Luffy. but did any of you notice what Sabo is thanking Luffy for? "Staying alive" and "not leaving him alone for good". But that wasn't Luffy's achievement. That was actually literally thanks to Law, who dragged Luffy's dying unconscious body inside his submarine and operated on him for probably like hours, and then monitored his situation for a while. And the first thing Luffy did after waking up, having his life miraculously saved, was go on a self-punishing rampage. No, that feat Sabo is talking about, isn't thanks to Luffy.

Luffy could meet Sabo again, who told him not to blame himself. And I'm sure Luffy is aware how much of that is thanks to Law, he was the one who kept him alive, fullfilling Ace's wish.

Luffy stuffing himself silly and doing some stupid shanenigans. Law is just sitting a bit away from the table, but has a good view on him. I wonder what is he thinking about right now when witnessing Luffy acting all silly, heh. He for sure doesn't turn his eyes away even for a moment.

Also he's staying right next to the door, almost like he's guarding them all from danger, because he would be the first one to react and the closest to potential enemy arriving!

Both making the same decision: escape be damned, they have important business! And then they will make others wait for them heh. They're both as insufferable lol.

Rebecca "thank you!" Luffy "Shup up! I don't want to hear that!"

Yeah, I wonder why. Usually Luffy has no problem with hearing people thank him. Or at least wouldn't mind it, even if he doesn't care much about it. But telling Rebecca to shut up and not even letting her finish saying the thanks? I wonder why. Oh, maybe because he did not do it for Rebecca. He didn't beat up Mingo or save Dressrosa for her. Actually, he did it for someone else.

Meanwhile now making sure Rebecca's actual wish is fullfilled (staying with her father) is Luffy ultimately repaying his debt. And after she thanks him for it he just says "no problem". Completely different reaction all of sudden :)

Unexpected parallel that I will be surprised if any of you ever noticed. Remember how Luffy felt bad fighting against Fujitora because Fujitora can't see so he was shouting his moves outloud before making them? Yeah, turns out Law pulled off a Luffy long before Luffy himself did that. He called out to Fujitora that he's about to escape, lol.

And so we won't think it's just a coincidence, Law earlier confirmed to us that Fujitora's lack of eyesight/handicap was weighing actually on his mind heh. Law is smarter about that, but it's adorable they both acted basically in same way.

Let's talk about the grand fleet for a second. They all magically got along and decided to form a grand fleet dedicated to Strawhats. Their explanation for it is super vague, it's basically "so we stayed at the palace all together when recovering for two days and we got along". Like I bet you *anything* that's probably not what happened and there ain't no way they just blabbled together happily and conveniently arrived at this conclusion by themselves. We saw how they were, competing with each other and Luffy on who will beat Mingo. If they had the grand fleet idea it's only because someone planted it in their heads. Bartolomeo? If it was him he would brag about it. Cavendish? I highly doubt it since he's a narcisstic ego-maniac. Don Chinjao? Maybe, but last time he tried to voice his wish to give Luffy his fleet, he couldn't even said it outloud, too full of emotions. So my bet's here also on "no".

So here's my crazy take, run with it or leave it:

It was Law's initiative. He saw all those people feeling indebted to Luffy (he was forced to tag along, dragged all over Dressrosa after all). The only reason they ever did anything together was because of the said debt to Luffy and the heat of a crisis, but that never prevented them from fighting over it, even with Luffy himself. But if he approached them, for example through Bartolomeo (who constantly visited Kyros's hut where Strawhats and Law were hiding) and told him there is a way that they all can repay their debt and also that would fullfill Bartolomeo's own deepest wish (to be Luffy's subordinate), then now we're talking.

But why would Law do that? Because he also is grateful to Luffy, duh. He wanted to repay the favour and make up for dragging Luffy into his personal matters. Also do you remember what Cavendish told Law? "What you did here in Dressrosa is huge. Taking care of Doflamingo will put you two in the eye of the storm". Later Fujitora also says something similar: "Your life will be in peril from the Yonko now that you've eliminated Joker. Your future is hell!" which is exactly what was the main subject of Law's quarrel with Luffy in this arc: bringing Kaido's wrath on them. Obviously it was all still on Law's mind. And the consequences will go way beyond just Kaido. Ensuring that Luffy has a grand fleet (always ready to help) is the first step of Law's plan of keeping Luffy away from the said consequences. Law will be in the eye of the storm for sure, but he is already taking measures to make sure Luffy is not, pushing him away from the centre, giving him extra power and protection.

But if that's the case why didn't Oda just tells us, the readers, that this is the case? Well, it wouldn't be the first or last time Oda hides things from us. And I hope it will all have a payoff in the final arc!

Law's surprised and maybe even slightly disgusted impression here is so hilarious. He clearly expected Luffy to be thrilled, but surprise surprise, Luffy doesn't want subordinates. What Luffy wants is freedom. I'm sure Law will remember that from now on.

Law actually takes part in this feast. This is the first and the only feast so far he was part of (he didn't celebrate with others in Punk Hazard, Zou nor Wano. Wano's especially strange because it was the success of their alliance and yet Law decided not to celebrate, but he does here, hm. Dressrosa is so different somehow. Is it the passion?!). He's smiling and I bet you anything his eyes dart to Strawhat Luffy here.

And with that we mark the end of Dressrosa. Zou's next (as well as the trip to it), but we might take a fast post stop elsewhere before or after that :D still contemplating to include Wano's anime once we do reach Wano's arc in this series!

[hifugoro]

Picturing Ren eventually distancing himself from Akechi after accepting Maruki’s deal.. Picturing him weighing the idea of them not being friends anymore in his head the night of 2/2—since he figures that Akechi wouldn’t want to—and slowly becoming more resolute to do it himself after seeing Akechi back to detective prince mode….

“Have your regrets begun?” is a scalding line in it’s own context of Akechi being gone but I think it applies twice as much in this scenario. Is Akechi really happy here? Was his TV persona drawing upon a place of real joy, or is this Maruki’s vision of a Happy Goro Akechi? Or, worse, Akechi had an OkumuraMadarame™ pulled on him. Ren’s wish was granted before he spent any time with the “real” Akechi (in quotes because I have other unrelated thoughts on his behavior during 3rd semester) in a way that didn’t end with one of them dying. Therefore it’s an admittedly reasonable assumption that those feelings of closeness came solely from Akechi’s other personality. There’s also the Vey Important dialogue with Maruki where Ren can say his heart aches when he gets betrayed. And I mean. You know.

So, let’s switch him back to the polite Akechi who would never betray anyone. He’s alive because Maruki wants him to live a good life as well, sure, but him being here was Ren’s wish. As messed up as it is it’s pretty obvious who comes first and foremost. Maruki thinks all happiness is real, even if it means entirely destroying who you are, anyway.

And I don’t think Ren would be able to come to terms with that. He’d try to reason it with himself for the first few weeks (maybe Akechi didn’t really think he was too unlovable to show any real parts of himself to the public. maybe this is genuine) but it wouldn’t work in the end. It doesn’t help that Akechi hadn’t even been angry when he said their deal was off, he just looked hurt. Acting like nothing is wrong after betraying someone like that, whether they remember or not, just isn’t something Ren could do forever.

So he doesn’t. He stops going to see him. Stops returning Akechi’s texts. Doesn’t reply to the follow up texts of Akechi being confused as to why they suddenly aren’t speaking anymore. He can’t even imagine going to the jazz club, the real Akechi’s safe haven, after everything is finished. The other thieves may talk about Akechi from time to time since they’re all friends now, which hurts him to hear, but guilt can’t be outweighed that easily.

Damning the entire world to save one person who didn’t even want to be saved is a selfish action born entirely of Ren’s own feelings towards letting Akechi die again. Does following that up with a selfless one—letting him drift away even if he desperately wants to reach out, because Ren knows Akechi wouldn’t realistically forgive him for taking the deal—cancel it out? Does it make anything better? Does it matter?

And at the end of the day, Akechi’s pain over losing the closest relationship he has likely wouldn’t even last. Sadness doesn’t mean anything here. After a while, Ren probably won’t even be missed. Maybe he realizes that this is the case and commits to it anyway. A roundabout apology for something Akechi doesn’t even know he did

[1425fivefive]

19-choscar(oscar/charles), and maybe you will write a whole fic about them someday? 🥺

Choscar anon, how I adore you!

19. kiss passionately - choscar

The hotel rooftop in Baku is empty save for one person: Charles.

He’s floating in the pool, arms resting on the edge, chin propped on his forearms as he looks out over the city.

Oscar considers turning around. Heading back to the elevator and going to his room, taking a long shower or texting Lando to ask what club he ended up at.

But Oscar had wanted to take a nighttime swim after the race, unwind after the intensity of the day, bask in his victory under the soft glow of the moon. He’s not going to let Charles scare him off. Even if he hasn’t been alone with Charles like this since the night after Monaco, when Charles had found Oscar at the club and invited Oscar back to his flat.

In the months since, Oscar’s wondered whether maybe he hallucinated that night. His fingers in Charles’s soft hair, Charles’s gorgeous green eyes blinking up at him, Charles’s tongue dragging over the crease of his hip.

Charles hasn’t acted any differently since. Still polite, friendly, vaguely flirty—exactly the same way he acts with Pierre or Carlos. Oscar can’t help but wonder whether maybe it meant nothing to Charles.

All Oscar knows is it meant something to him.

As Oscar peels off his shirt, he wonders whether maybe he’s hoping to force an answer out of Charles. Force Charles to reveal something real, behind all the layers of Ferrari media training.

When Oscar slips into the pool, sending ripples across the surface, Charles looks over at him. His expression is smooth, placid, revealing nothing, as if Oscar could be anyone and not someone who’s come Charles had tasted only a few months earlier.

It stings.

“Nice night,” Charles says casually, still floating with his arms propped on the lip of the pool.

“It is.”

The pool’s relatively shallow and Oscar stands in the middle, trying to figure out what Charles is thinking.

“You were fast today,” Charles says. He doesn’t reveal how he feels about that, just says it as if he’s stating a fact.

Oscar hums. “You were too.”

Charles laughs, short and harsh. “Not fast enough.”

And—there. A tiny crack in Charles’s facade of cool detachment.

Oscar pounces. “You were faster than me in Monaco.”

“Ah, Monaco,” Charles says, a hint of pink coloring his cheeks. “That was—a good weekend.” He meets Oscar’s eyes and there’s something there, his gaze hot, heavy.

Oscar swallows, his mouth suddenly dry. “Yeah,” he agrees. He thinks for a moment before— “What did you like about it?”

Oscar means for it to come out seductive, confident, but his voice is choked and needy.

Charles smirks. “What was there not to like?” Charles asks. “Winning my home race, of course.” His eyes flash, and he adds, “You fucking me was quite nice, as well.”

Oscar flushes, knocked off balance. “I thought you—maybe regretted that.”

“Maybe,” Charles says, shrugging. Oscar’s heart sinks, but Charles continues, “We are practically coworkers, no? It is—complicated.”

“Yeah, but—” Oscar pauses, considering his next move. 

He wants Charles again, desperately, even more after racing him today. Having Charles in his mirrors for almost the entire race, pulling off the overtake and keeping it, all the way to the end. They’ve been racing each other all year, circling each other at track after track.

Oscar takes a deep breath and admits, “I haven’t been able to stop thinking about that night.”

Charles’s breath hitches.

It’s an opening, however small, and Oscar forces himself to say, “I want to. Again.”

Charles pushes away from the wall, and walks slowly toward Oscar through the water.

“You want me?” Charles breathes, his expression open, almost scared.

And that’s not quite what Oscar said, but it’s exactly what he meant, and he nods, reaching a hand out to Charles. Charles takes it and Oscar pulls him through the water toward him.

Charles ends up wrapping his legs around Oscar’s waist, slinging his arms around Oscar’s neck. Oscar’s holding his breath, his hands gripping Charles’s ass, holding Charles up.

“Tell me again,” Charles murmurs, his nose brushing Oscar’s, eyes trained on Oscar’s lips. “Tell me you want me.”

Oscar laughs, soft and breathless. “I want you, Charles.”

Charles moans at that, a desperate, low sound, and leans forward, capturing Oscar’s lips in a searing kiss.

It’s just as good as Oscar remembers. Better, maybe, now that they know what the other likes.

Oscar licks into Charles’s mouth, groaning at the feeling of Charles’s tongue against his. Charles whines into the kiss and Oscar tightens his grip on Charles’s ass, pulling Charles flush against him. When Oscar uses his hold on Charles’s ass to drag Charles against him in a slow, smooth grind, Charles pants desperately against his mouth and whispers, “Your hotel room or mine?”

“As long as this ends with you in bed with me,” Oscar says, grinning. “I really don’t care.”

Charles laughs breathily and pulls Oscar back in for a kiss. When he pulls back, he murmurs, “Yours, then. I do not want my sheets getting dirty.”

Oscar rolls his eyes, fondly. “You’re such a princess.”

“Am I?” Charles asks, eyes sparking, a small smirk on his lips. “Perhaps you should treat me like one, then.”

Oscar wants to do nothing more. “Reckon that can be arranged,” Oscar says, grinning, before pulling Charles in for another desperate kiss.

[acaptainbyanyothername]

Jonas and Phineas made me think about a piece of writing advice I read once—that a character’s flaws are their strengths in the right context, and vice versa (ex. a selfless character can be a pushover, a overthinker character can be a brilliant analyst, etc). Both Jonas and Phineas demonstrated their primary “flaws” they’ve struggled with in the finale fight, but after all the self-understanding they’ve gone through they were finally able to harness them for the right situation to the point where they became assets.

Phineas tapped into his violent anger issues—but the source of the anger this time wasn’t fear, it was love. Look at how similar these two descriptions are:

(S1 E18: A Good Man)

(S3 E19: Balance)

Both times, Phineas is spurred into this rage by Spahr’s presence. In S1E18, it’s a violent action against a nonviolent man to prove his worth, his VALOR to Spahr. But in S3E19, it’s a violent action against a wildly dangerous monster to protect Spahr. Phineas’ initiative still comes from desperation. The determining factor is what he is so desperate for, and that’s what turns his anger from ugly to righteous. This rage of Phineas ends up saving him, making an ordinary man able to go toe to toe with Weepe’s souped-up tearror-puppeteered final form.

Phineas’ monster versus Weepe’s monster. It takes a monster to fight a monster, but this time Phineas is doing it expressly to not let it hurt anyone else. Phineas stays right in control— contrasted against Weepe, nothing but a puppet now.

Then we have Jonas Spahr. Jonas Spahr, whose primary trait has been being a passive observer, the instigator of problems being unable to step in at key moments. Watched Magdalyne Fleit get murdered by Costigan. Watched Phineas beat Sherman to a pulp. Watched the Trust subsequently abandon Phineas. Watched Imelda torture Weepe. He is a character whose largest flaw is doing nothing to the detriment of the people around him.

But in the finale, he takes action! He saves Phineas’ life multiple times (sniping the guy who shot him, diverting a spear from hitting him) until Spahr is rendered physically incapable of acting anymore, and all he can do is watch as Phineas and Lark take down Weepe.

Once again, Phineas tells him that he can handle this. And this time, Spahr BELIEVES him. It’s not like the Ginsberg arrest where he sweeps in at the last minute, this time Spahr fully trusts (hah) Phineas to handle himself. The ex-Prime Consector himself lets someone else—his ADSECLA—take the lead, and Spahr lets himself settle into the watcher he has always been. Spahr, Phineas Thatch’s designated protector, allows Phineas Thatch to protect HIM for once. That’s what makes this time different: now Spahr makes the active CHOICE to watch, listening to someone who loves him and has his best interests in mind. For the first time, this isn’t an involuntary response on his part, it’s an active choice. A success rather than a failure. And, well, he’s not quite just watching, is he?

Nope, Jonas Spahr is DEFENDING. The way he didn’t defend Magdalyne, or Sherman, or Phineas, or Weepe. Spahr has learned to take action, yes, but in this fight he finds value and defense in knowing WHEN to step in and take action versus when to trust others, step back into defensive formation, and just watch. He made the right call this time around.

Phineas Thatch and Jonas Spahr are still the same characters. Phineas’ rage and Spahr’s inaction haven’t left them, they’ve just learned when and how to use them to benefit rather than detriment.

[slut4thebroken]

Hear me out: Dominant Neil Lewis saying this to his best friend “I don’t like people touching what’s mine.” Because Neil is so the type who hates it when someone’s attention isn’t on him like he’s possessive and desperate for it.

Barely proofread lol but enjoy <3

I’m trying to get better at being able to post fics that don’t have a difinitive start and end lol. That’s the main reason it takes me so long to write :,)

“Dude, you look like you’re gonna blow a blood vessel or something.” Lucian said, making Neil huff. 

“She’s letting some random dickhead feel her up!” He said defensively, throwing his arms around in a wild gesture at the appalling sight. 

“She’s a grown adult… She can do what she wants.” Jonathan spoke carefully, not wanting to set him off even more. “And he’s barely even touched her..” 

“You know what? If she’s gonna act so careless, it’s only right that I look out for her.” He said, now sounding more determined than angry. 

“Neil… don’t do something stupid.” Lucien’s warning fell on deaf ears though. 

“He’s definitely gonna do something stupid..” Jonathan said to the other man just as Neil started storming over. 

“Finding everything okay?” He gritted with a forced smile, practically glaring daggers at the douchebag who thought he could come into his store and touch his friend like some fucking pervert. 

“Yeah, man. Thanks…” He replied, sounding a little confused. You gave Neil a questioning look, but he ignored it and wrapped his arm around your waist, pulling you into him. “Oh.. Sorry, I didn’t know you had a boyfriend.” He said to you, his tone almost making Neil feel guilty because the man genuinely seemed like he felt bad about this whole thing. 

“I don’t.” You said in a low voice, looking up at Neil and glaring at him.

“Yeah well she’s not interested in dating right now anyway.” He said definitively, making your eyes narrow even more. 

“Yes I am.”

“You’re not even her type.” That made you scoff, even though.. he was technically correct. “If you’re not planning on renting a movie you can see yourself out.” Neil said sweetly, giving the man a saccharine smile. 

“Uh… okay then.” He said awkwardly, giving you another look before finally walking out. 

“What the fuck was that?” You hissed, gently elbowing him in the stomach to get him off of you. 

“Sexual harassment is not tolerated at Gumshoe Video.” You stared at him for a moment, trying to read his tone, but you quickly realized that he wasn’t joking. 

“You can’t be serious.” You scoffed, crossing your arms over your chest. 

“He’s not even your type anyway, I don’t get why you were talking to him in the first place.” 

“It’s called making a friend. If you tried that every once in a while, you might have more friends than just the three people in this room.” You were quickly getting more frustrated and annoyed with him. 

“That’s what friendship is? So I can start feeling you up then?” You rolled your eyes at his immature response. 

“God- Neil, you can’t keep doing this!”

“I don’t like people touching what’s mine.” He said in a low voice as he took a step closer, bringing a light blush to your cheeks.

“We’ve been over this,” You sighed. 

“Yeah, we have. And yet you seem to keep forgetting.” He snarked. Knowing this conversation wasn’t going to get you anywhere, you rolled your eyes and walked over to flop down onto the couch next to Jonathan. He gave you an apologetic smile and you laughed quietly in response. Honestly you were surprised Neil didn't have a problem with you interacting with his friends. Maybe he just knew that they wouldn’t be stupid enough to try and make a move on you. 

“You're welcome by the way, for saving you from that creep.” He called out, making you roll your eyes again with an exaggerated huff. You’re not going to ever admit it because he’d start using it as an excuse for acting like this, but you were a little uncomfortable with the way that guy was touching you. Sure it was a playful hand on your shoulder, but you felt embarrassed and awkward, especially because you could practically feel Neil’s eyes on you throughout the whole interaction. 

“I was fine.” You grumbled, sinking into the couch a little and sulking. Truthfully, you kind of liked his protective nature. It made you feel wanted. But the longer this went on, the stronger that feeling became, making him even more overbearing to the point where you wondered if you’d ever actually be able to get a boyfriend while you were still friends with Neil. 

[cartoonsinthemorning]

Ford and stan portal adventures

This is too vague for me to draw, BUT I can yap about it at length. Let's say this is an AU were, after their canonical fight, and activation of the portal, the diverge is that they BOTH get snatched inside. So we have a slowburn scenario were the 28yo twins end up in the multiverse together, having to rely on each other to survive in these bizarro worlds despite hating each other guts, but gradually mending their relationship. Best part of this scenario would be the sexual tension, at the beginning, when they keep have shouting matches but you can tell in good part it's to mask the frustration, because they missed each other and secretly want to make out. They would settle for more punching, turned wrestling match on the floor, turned wrestling with less clothes on. OH and you know what else would be fun, if this was a fanfic written by someone with crazy skills?? If, by the time they finally start to fuck regularly, the weird ass world they end up boning in is somehow integrated into the act. Idk idk, head empty, I can't come up with an example. But my imaginary Chad Writer would come up with something genius.

Now though. Funny coinky-dence that I'm answering to your message now, because just today I've seen a somewhat related fan art that really got my gears going:

So, dude58915 on twitter came up with this version, were 28yo Mullet Stan gets into the portal instead of Ford, but, once there, meets a much older Ford, from yet another dimension. NOW THAT'S what I want to see!! DAMN.

Imagine Stan seeing this masked dude- a suspicious bloke for sure- but still a HUMAN. He'd run after him, telling the mysterious man they should stick together, be a team! He's the only human he's ever seen in DAYS, since he ended up in this creepy shithole! And old!Ford just jerks his arm free from Stan's desperate grip, telling the younger man, coldly, that he's gonna have to make it on his own, before turning around to follow the coordinates on his multi-navigator, leaving Stan alone. Because Ford hates him. Ford hates Stan, even this one, even this Stan that evidently ended up in the portal, punished for his own stupid mistakes, for once. This Stan will die, and he deserves it, and Ford doesn't care. Expect that when he hears Stan scream, as he's getting attacked by some monster, Ford turns around and runs to save him.

And from that moment on, this Ford takes Stan under his wing, taking him to the next dimension with him. Ford's plan is to train this Stan decently enough- all the while keeping his own identity concealed- until the young man is able to fend for himself, and Ford will abandon him for real, this time.

Except that...this Stan doesn't know who Ford is, so he doesn't express any resentment or hate towards him. On the contrary: despite the old men being so cold and sometimes rude to him, resulting in /some/ shouting matches, Stan is grateful, and clearly fascinated by the cloaked man and his knowledge and fighting skills. Stan is like a clingy puppy...and Ford loves it. He would never EVER admit it to himself, but he does. He didn't feel this pleased, this important, in forever. And maybe, he's never seen Stann look at him with this level of adoration before, not even when they were kids. I'm gonna cut it short to the crass part: Stan has daddy issues, and gets incredibly attached to Ford, wants to please him. The "masked man" would inevitably get the hardest boner, feeling so needed, so special, the Sun itself that Stan gravitates around. They'd fuck. HELL, they'd end up making tender love, sometimes. And Ford would need to be extra careful, because he enjoys this docile, obedient Stan sucking his cock (figuratively and physically), and it would be a real shame if Stan was to find out it's just another version of his hated brother, he's ended up worshipping and taking inside him every night. Ford guesses the young man would be quite mad about the truth.

And with this ominous cliffhanger, I'll stop yapping, it's dinner time.

[haveyouseenthisskeleton]

lets say that the skeletons have a really close friend, best friends. And they often hang out in his room if he's up for it. But every time they leave his house everything in his room is moved half an inch. Its not noticeable until everything is off. If they don’t hang out in their room the friend will do it to their living room.

The classics, fells, swapfells, horrors, and horrorfells if you could?

Undertale Sans - He doesn't notice it before the mark of his bed clearly appears on the floor because of how dusty it is. He's a bit confused and simply moves it back thinking he probably did that when he threw himself like a walrus in his bed lol. It's only after it repeats several times that he starts to get suspicious. He swears his desk wasn't that much on the right because he tried to align it with the window when he put it there. Uh. It doesn't take long for him to notice it always happens after you come. We have a jokester, are we? You wake up one day and all your furniture has googly eyes. The war has started. He's never letting you go.

Undertale Papyrus - He doesn't understand how it keeps happening. He doesn't notice immediately, but now he can only see that. After three or four times, he puts some tape on the floor to mark where the furniture goes, to be sure it's not just him. But it's not him! All his things are moving every day and he's worried now. Is the house collapsing on one side? Should he call someone to check? Until he couldn't keep it to himself and came to see you to talk about this, accidentally catching you in the act. Papyrus gasps loudly, in shock. What is wrong with you? Do you think it's fun to watch him run everywhere like a headless chicken?! He's amused but also definitely a little angry as well lol. Stop stressing him like that, it's not funny!

Underfell Sans & Papyrus - Red never suspects you. However he for sure suspects his brother and one day you come to visit and witness the two brothers screaming at each other with Edge desperately trying to explain he did nothing wrong and Red continually antagonizing him asking if he thinks he's a frickin idiot. You struggle to not laugh. Red doesn't notice, he's way too angry for that. But Edge suddenly snaps his neck at you. You try to keep it cool but you can tell he already understands. Edge immediately tries to antagonize you but Red defends you and says he's just trying to save his butt. You say you saw Edge did it. Edge is mad at you for an entire week and won't even look at you lol.

Horrortale Sans - He's disturbed. Something is not right but he's not sure what. Oak has been standing at the entrance of his room for twenty minutes now, just staring blankly. Did someone enter his room? He's kinda unsure. It's stressing him out. It's actually stressing him out so much he's sleeping on the couch tonight. He doesn't feel safe in his bedroom. You decide to give up after noticing he's acting strange.

Horrortale Papyrus - He's very attentive and notices quite quickly. He has a good idea of who is doing that too. The next day, you notice all the curtains are closed so you're entirely in the dark. You notice the net trap on the floor is too late. The light switches on. Willow is in the corner, arms crossed. Busted. You can't escape the lecture to come and maybe you deserved it a little as well.

Horrorfell Sans - He has a bad eyesight so he doesn't notice for a very long time. Actually, he doesn't notice at all. All his things are against the wall at this point but he's way too lazy to put them back at their place. He understands you're doing that, but there's a point where you won't be able to push his things more so he simply waits for you to get bored and give up. He's not going to please you by noticing it if it's what you're waiting for.

Horrorfell Papyrus - He immediately notices because of his wheelchair. His house is not really adapted so he pretty much made sure his wheelchair could fit between his furniture. Except now he can't fit so obviously someone touched his furniture. And of course, since he's still a drama queen deep inside, he's immediately overreacting and starts to scream at his very confused brother who has genuinely no idea what's pissing him off. Since he's actually not really in an "it's a prank surprise" mood, you decide to retreat and let poor Copper take the blame for you.

Swapfell Sans - You can see him make a face, clearly suspicious. Nox can feel something is off. He asks Rus if he moved the furniture, but Rus says maybe a ghost did it. Nox knows his brother. If he did it, he would have rubbed his victory in his face, so it's not him. He stares at you suspiciously. You try really hard to look elsewhere, but when you look up again, Nox is two inches from your face. You're so busted. He's not fooled. Put everything where it was. Now.

Swapfell Papyrus - Oh, he knows it's you at first sight since Nox would never do that. But Rus likes chaos so he's going to snitch on you to his brother just to see what will happen. He then simply sits on the couch, smiles at you, and waits for his brother to stomp his way in to lecture you. He even had time to make himself some popcorn. All you can do is make angry eyes at him while his brother is tormenting you. Rus clearly doesn't care though.

[nebbyy]

Can you make more head canons for Baldwin? Like what would he do if you two got into an argument etc etc.

King Baldwin x reader - Arguing with you

A/N: Sure thing sweetie!! I must apologize though, I only did the argument part because I didn't really have much time left and I didn't know what else to add. Hope you'll still like it though!

As always, painting is King Lear, Act I, Scene I by Edwin Austin Abbey :))

Warning: none, literally. Should f!reader a warning? If yes then there's that

Firs of all, Baldwin does not argue with you. He's a pacifist at heart, he always prefers talking things through and negotiate to get out of hard situations. To him, that is a form of respect, the desire to talk as equals and not trying to impose his own will on the other

And since he does that with his enemies, how could he not give you the same treatment? You, who lighten his days darkened by his duties and his sickness, you who save him from the burden of his own thoughts

And even if you tended to be more on the aggressive/prone to arguments side, he still wouldn't budge, and just keep on talking but most of all LISTENING, Baldwin respects you more than anyone else, your thoughts are sacred to him and should be treated as such!

If the argument is about something that he did to upset you, be it an unpleasant comment or a forgotten appointment (only happened once and it was because he had been kept busy by his counselors), he will do anything to make you feel any better

If the argument is about his tendencies to neglect his own health, then good luck with that because his own moral code physically prevents him from letting go of his duties to favor resting and trying to better his condition. Still, he will reassure you with gentle touches and soft words that he understands your worries, and you are the sweetest angel to care so much about him

But he cannot let his kingdom to fend for itself just because of a bad day for his leper body, he will have to wait until the evening to be reunited with you and finally let himself rest, your own anger at his stubborness long gone as you cradle his head on your lap. You still appreciate his soft apologies as you caress his mangled face, though

Now, speaking about what he'll do to make it up to you for any argument- or mostly, things that he did that upset you since he doesn't really argue with you

First of all, he will excuse himself for having upset you in the first place, listening to your every word to understand precisely what exactly it is that he did that he will avoid making again

Then, he will try to get any form of physical contact with you. He needs it, desperately, having been so isolated from any human touch for years other than his physicians'

Hell, he might even kneel for you if it meant having your forgiveness, if it meant being able to hug your legs like the supplicants of the ancient books he read about

If you'll let him get close to you, he'll kiss you all over while he'll keep apologizing and openly reflect on the things that he will change to make it up properly. Kinda reminds me of Gomez and Morticia on that scene (hence the painting I chose)

And after you will have forgiven him, that night he'll hold you a little closer, whispering sweet apologies while you sleep soundly, unaware of how dedicated your husband is to learn from his mistakes

All in all, I really don't see Baldwin as someone you'd ever argue with, but that doesn't stop him from making up for his every mistake like he'd caused you the worst of wrongs

You're his Heaven, and he'll treat you as such