#transformers viewfinder | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

sunsafewriting · 2 years

Text

AU. Chapter 4

Ava starts a dumb YouTube channel where she makes complicated recipes badly. Maybe people show up for that, but they kind of stick around for her conversations with her roommate — who stays off-screen. Mostly.

chapter 4 excerpt:

The new camera is so fucking shiny. Ava holds it, enjoys the newness of it, the sleekness, while Beatrice flips through the manual. This is how it goes, whenever they get a new thing; Ava wants to touch it, and Beatrice wants to read about it.

Ava, as she does every time, takes the opportunity to say, "It’s probably super intuitive. We don’t need instructions."

Deriding guides, lists, textbooks, and other itemised sets of information is always a worthwhile investment: Beatrice, very predictably, gets this expression that suggests they may as well walk into traffic if all the structure of the world can be so easily jettisoned.

"This is a very precise and multifunctional piece of equipment," Beatrice replies. "A thorough understanding of —"

Ava just lets the rest of it wash over her. The essence of the speech is more or less that Beatrice would like Ava to get the absolute most out of her camera, which necessitates an inventory of every single function and feature, so that she fully appreciates her options.

Ava, by contrast, is of the opinion that the knobs and dials are things she can fuck around with and figure out as she goes, and that the way to get the absolute most of out of her camera is to point it at Beatrice.

She appreciates her options just fine.

Beatrice reads the manual in English and then in German; every time, for every appliance, Beatrice checks a minimum of two languages, to account for any lapses in translation.

While she's doing that, Ava has managed to pop the batteries in and figure out the memory card.

She spins off the lens cap and brings the camera up to her eye, peering through the viewfinder. It's the first camera she's ever owned in her life, and she likes the feeling of it much better than her phone: the weight of it, how the zoom requires twisting and fiddling rather than swiping her fingers, the delightful tactility of the button under her finger.

And yes, it’s supposed to be for her channel, for making better quality videos, but there’s a reason she got this model instead of a lameass camcorder. She also wants to take four hundred million photographs of literally everything in existence — okay, some things more than others — and conveniently, she wants to push this button four hundred million times, so everything is going to work out terrifically.

"This is going to consume my entire life and brain, I can just feel it," Ava murmurs, adjusting the zoom again, listening to the faint whirring sound it makes.

She pans the camera across to the actual expert in consuming Ava's life and brain for comment, but Beatrice is frowning down at the warranty information and has very likely not noticed that Ava is talking at all.

"Bea?"

"Hmm?"

"Can I take a photograph of you?"

"Now?"

"Yeah."

"How about we go for a walk?" Beatrice suggests. "I'm sure there are plenty of photographable things outside that you’ll be able to experiment on."

The opportunity to make an experimenting joke is right there, but if Ava goes down that road, they'll never make it back.

"Just a super quick snap of you, and then we can go on a walk," she bargains.

Beatrice makes a vague gesture that Ava recognises as a yes before her gaze drops back to the instruction booklet, her finger curling the edge of one of the pages. "I suppose. What do you —"

"Got it!"

It took Ava an age to get Beatrice to smile in photographs without looking somewhat wary and pained — the pictures she has from the first few months of their friendship seem to suggest that Beatrice had a mild headache for all of it — but now, Beatrice smiles like Beatrice, even when there's a camera.

[cont. on ao3]

#more nonsense from the nonsense conference #but at this point i feel like you all know what you're getting from me #avatrice #ava x beatrice #avatrice fic #avatrice fanfic #sunsafewriting

182 notes · View notes

therealraeweber · 1 year

Text

So, the other night I was introducing some of my friends to What We Do In The Shadows, and one of them said something that will not get out of my brain now... this comment has been plaguing my mind for a couple days:

She said "Hmm... interesting that the vampires show up in the documentary video but not in reflections".

And at first, I was like... well, of course they do! The reason that vampires don't show up in mirrors has to do with the silver in the mirror itself, rather than the reflection. The reason that, historically, vampires wouldn't show up in photos either is due to the silver emulsion that is in film. So, yeah. This is a documentary being shot digitally rather than on film. No problem.

(Side tangent: If you were to take a picture of the vampires on digital, specifically a DSLR, you would not see them in the viewfinder because of the mirrors in the camera, but they would show up in the final image. At least... as far as I know, they would. I don't think there would be silver in the image sensor of a DSLR... So it would be best to get a mirrorless digital camera if you wanted to take well composed pictures of your vampire friends :) End of tangent.)

But, then I was thinking, and in the title sequence we see lots of pictures of the vampires throughout history. Those would have had to be shot on film, since some of them appear to be really old. This ruined my little theory. So... then perhaps we are operating under the assumption that it is not, in fact, the silver that is preventing their reflections/likenesses to be captures. Meaning they can be seen in all cameras.

But then... why would their reflections not show up in the mirrors? I mean... to be fair... mirrors aren't usually made with the same layer of silver anymore, so the silver theory doesn't entirely hold up anymore either.... but still?

A very quick google search told me this: "The old superstition was that vampires, being undead, had no souls, and that was what a reflection was believed to be: a person's soul." But I'm not sure if this is something that applies to WWDITS?

I mean... Guillermo (after being turned), slowly lost his reflection in the mirror. Would this mean he was slowly losing his soul? And would that imply that Derek being killed somehow just... brought it back? Do our main group of vampires not have souls? Does Colin Robinson? Would the "souls" of the main vampires technically be their ghosts? Does this mean Nadja has technically been carrying around her soul with her in the form of the doll? Did Guillermo leave a ghost when he was turned? Was his ghost slowly being formed as his transformation slowly occurred?

This one question has broken me. Perhaps I'm reading too much into non-existent lore in the silly vampire show. But perhaps I'm not. I need answers.

#what we do in the shadows #wwdits #wwdits season 5

28 notes · View notes

maxattax · 10 months

Text

Look Away - Epilogue

Jazz clicked through the slides of the viewfinder, looking at all the pictures Danny had taken over the past month. As she expected (and gloated about), Wes stayed true to his word and hadn’t told anybody Danny’s secret. With his mind free from worrying about Wes, Danny had taken the time to discover who he really was through photography.

“Danny, these are great!” Jazz said. “I can really see the journey you’ve gone through to discover yourself. You seem much more sure of yourself, now. And you’ve come so far since we’ve started working on your anger. I knew meditation and talking through your feelings would be good for you. I’m proud of you, little bro.”

Danny cringed at Jazz’s praise but smiled despite himself. “Yeah, yeah. Thanks Jazz.”

“You know who would love to see these? Mom and Dad.”

Danny raised his eyebrows. “Uh, Jazz, you know they don’t know I’m half ghost, right?”

“Maybe they should. You’ve grown so much. I think they’d take it well.” Jazz broke into a grin. “And I was right about Wes, so… Between these pictures and my scrapbook, I think we can convince them that you’re a good person. In both of your forms.”

That night, Danny sat on the roof of his home, his feet dangling off the edge. He glanced over at the window. His mom was inside, looking at a note taped to the viewfinder. “Look at this. We’ll talk later. -Danny”

For the second time, Danny couldn’t believe he was listening to Jazz’s advice to share his secret. But when he transformed and met his mom’s eyes, he thought, maybe this was a good idea after all.

#danny phantom #ectoimplosion2023 #my writing #look away

10 notes · View notes

swivelbot · 5 months

Text

Reflector Box Art Recreation

#don’t mind the yellow bricks they are necessary #transformers #toy photography #reflector #box art #toy photoshoot #pose #spectro #spyglass #viewfinder

2 notes · View notes

thegatesofsilverandbone · 2 days

Text

Samantha had always loved exploring her grandmother’s attic. It was a quiet sanctuary, full of forgotten relics and dusty memories. On this particular rainy afternoon, as she rummaged through old boxes, something different caught her eye: a vintage camera, worn from age but still in good condition. Alongside it lay a faded photograph of a shirtless man, his chest thick with dark hair, holding the very same camera. His eyes seemed to gleam with some private joke, as if he knew something she didn’t.

She stared at the man for a moment, puzzled. He was handsome, his body strong and muscular, his beard neatly trimmed. But who was he? And why was this photograph tucked away in her grandmother’s attic?

Samantha shook off her curiosity and lifted the camera, admiring its heft. The idea of taking a few pictures with this old relic struck her as amusing. She figured it wouldn’t even work properly, but something about it drew her in. Carefully, she wound the film that was still inside and brought the viewfinder to her eye.

Her first shot was of her grandmother’s garden, the roses shimmering with rain. Click.

As the camera’s shutter snapped, a strange warmth rushed through her. She lowered the camera and frowned at her hands. They looked… different. Her fingers, once slim and delicate, seemed longer, rougher, as though they belonged to someone who had spent years working with them. It wasn’t just her imagination. She flexed her fingers and felt the strength in them—a strength that hadn’t been there before.

A little unnerved, she moved to the edge of the yard and took another photo, this time of the old garden shed. Click.

The changes were faster this time. The shed, once dilapidated and covered in peeling paint, shimmered and blurred. Samantha blinked, her vision struggling to keep up as the shed transformed. The paint became new, the wood polished and sturdy. A faint glow emanated from within, and she realized it was no longer a garden shed—it was now a darkroom. She could feel the pull of memory that wasn’t hers, the sensation of spending long hours developing photographs inside.

She stumbled backward, her body feeling strange. Her shirt tightened across her chest, her shoulders broadening, her muscles growing beneath the fabric. She touched her chest and gasped. Dark hair was sprouting across her skin, rough and thick. The panic inside her grew, but alongside it, something else—a strange curiosity, a pull to continue.

She couldn’t stop. She didn’t want to stop.

Her heart pounded as she made her way to the street in front of the house. Her legs felt heavier, longer, as though they were carrying her differently. She lifted the camera once more, aiming it down the road where her neighborhood stretched out into familiar territory. Click.

With that snap, the world tilted. The cracked sidewalks and weathered houses began to shift, twisting like a dream reshaping itself. Samantha rubbed her eyes as the scene before her morphed into something new. The quiet suburban street faded, replaced by tall brick buildings, the hum of a busy city taking its place. Art galleries and cafés stood where simple homes once lined the block. People moved through the streets, walking briskly past her as if this city had always existed.

Her reflection caught in a storefront window, and she gasped. She wasn’t Samantha anymore. Not fully. Her hair, once blonde and soft, had darkened to a deep brown, curling thickly at the roots. Her jawline was more pronounced, her face more angular, and her shoulders… they were broad, strong. She was transforming into the man from the photograph.

And yet, something deep inside her no longer feared this change. With each shift, with each new photo, it felt right.

Click.

She turned the camera toward the park across the street, where she had once played on the swings as a child. But as soon as the shutter closed, the park transformed. The playground equipment vanished, replaced by neat benches and sculptures. The swings and slides gave way to art installations, reflecting the lives of people who now strolled casually through the space. Couples—two men, two women, all kinds—walked hand-in-hand.

But one man in particular caught her attention. He stood at the entrance to the park, waiting, his familiar smile and kind eyes making Samuel’s heart skip a beat. He knew this man.

It was Evan.

The name was clear in his mind, accompanied by a rush of memories—memories that weren’t Samantha’s, but Samuel’s. They had been together for years, sharing a life filled with love and laughter. He wasn’t just seeing Evan for the first time. He had always known him. They had met on this very street, years ago, before Samuel’s photography had taken off. Evan had been with him through everything—his career, his ups and downs, his quiet nights in the darkroom developing his photos. And now, as Samuel felt his transformation nearing completion, it was Evan he wanted to be with.

Evan waved, his smile easy and full of affection. “Hey Sam, ready for dinner?”

Samuel blinked, momentarily confused, but the words spilled from his lips naturally. “Yeah, I’ll be right there.” His voice was deep, comfortable. His.

The world continued to shift as Samuel walked through the park. The last remnants of Samantha’s life were fading, blending seamlessly into Samuel’s world. He glanced around, seeing everything with new eyes—the city was his city, the gallery his work, the people his friends.

Click.

Another picture, this time of a nearby bench. It shimmered in the evening light, shifting just as the rest of the world had. This bench wasn’t just a place to sit. It was the bench where Samuel and Evan had shared their first kiss, years ago under the soft glow of the city lights. The memory played out in Samuel’s mind as if it had just happened—the nervous laughter, the shared glances, the certainty that they wanted to be together.

With only one photo left in the camera, Samuel turned to a window, catching his own reflection. A tall, handsome man with a broad chest and thick, dark hair stared back at him. He ran a hand through his beard, smiling at the life he saw reflected in his face. This was who he was. Who he had always been.

Click.

The final picture snapped, and the world settled. The changes were complete.

Samuel pocketed the camera and walked toward Evan, who stood waiting at the entrance to their favorite restaurant. The warmth of the evening wrapped around them as they fell into step together, Samuel’s arm slipping around his husband’s waist, as if it had always been there.

As they walked inside, everything felt perfect. Samantha was gone, but she hadn’t been erased. Her life had simply been part of the story that led to this—to Samuel, the man he was meant to be.

And in the end, it was Samuel’s life that continued, each photograph another moment, another memory of the life he had built, full of love, art, and the world that now belonged to him.

#transformation #ai art

5 notes · View notes

thunderstroked · 10 months

Text

Boudoir & Business || Mona & Siobhan

TIMING: current. LOCATION: amity road photos. PARTIES: @banisheed & @thunderstroked SUMMARY: siobhan wants photos taken of her and she wants them now! mona obliges. CONTENT: allusions to domestic abuse (fae related).

Mona hadn’t anticipated the woman ahead of her actually showing up, especially not in the nude. Then again, she should have taken her words at face value regardless of whether or not she thought she would– she seemed the type to hold her word, even if her word was more on the eccentric side. Then again, who was she to judge? Before Esther had left, she had shown Mona the ins and outs of her studio– had shown her how to shoot, and how to edit. Whether or not Mona actually retained any of that was left to be seen.

The gumiho stood across from her subject, not bothered at all by the lack of clothes. They were just bodies to one another, after all. Mona pointed in the direction of the props, which ranged from feathery cupid’s wings, a giant heart, to dog ears and more. “You can help yourself to those, if you’d like.” There was even a skeleton, special for Halloween. She’d gone out and gotten that herself, along with a few rubber spiders. “But go ahead and pose however you’d like, and I’ll snap the photo.” She was behind the camera now, gaze setting over the viewfinder. At least she’d retained that information.

Siobhan was beautiful, she’d grown into it; gangly, pale child into curvy, still pale, adult who understood the length of her limbs and the fullness of her lips. Her beauty, inherited from her mother but diverged in its soft edges to her mother’s hard corners, was solely hers. Her beauty, striking and undeniable, was taken from her. Her face remained unmarred as a reminder of what had been taken; a bow tied at the end of a piece of rotting fruit. She had no use for a nude photo of herself, she hardly enjoyed looking at herself but did so anyway, poking and prodding at her scarred flesh as if it might transform—stitching memories of what it had been. There was no point to her visit other than the obvious: there was some idea to maintain and some sense of cruel enjoyment. So she came with a thin robe worn under a long brown coat and marched into the studio as if nude photos were the sort of thing she had taken all the time. Then she sucked in a breath, glamored her skin to flawlessness, and took it all off.

“Fates, no,” she hissed. “Do you want me to look ridiculous? With that skeleton? Who do you think I am? The sort of person that lays a plastic--anatomically insulting--skeleton on herself?” Siobhan stared at the other props. She ran her finger along the fake feathers on the wings. She twisted the plastic, sneering at how easily they cracked under her fingers. “These,” she rasped, pulling them on. The pressure against her back burned and soothed. They were nothing like hers, an insult to the beauty that once graced her back--but she’d wanted them in some way she could hardly explain. “Just these. No…” She pulled a few spiders. “These too.” She settled back down on her seat. “Fates,” she rolled her eyes, “if all you were going to do was press a button on a camera I could have done this myself.” But she hadn’t and now she was here.

Siobhan readied herself; one leg thrown over the other, back arched, hand steadied on the edge of her stool, small, feathery wings on display, brown hair pulled down one shoulder. “Go ahead.”

“No.” Mona stared ahead at Siobhan, eyebrow raised, “I think you’re somebody who has come looking for nude photographs of yourself, and it’s just a prop.” But even though the skeleton hadn’t been something she was keen on, it seemed as though the other objects Mona had brought in were something that caught the woman’s eye. The wings were pulled over her shoulders, see-through plastic straps tight against her shoulders. Some of the feathers fell to the floor with the movement. Maybe Mona would need to invest in higher quality props. She knew that Esther had some laying around, too. Maybe in the attic. She’d need to go and look. Most things had been cleaned out prior to her departure.

If you need to find something, go up.

Whatever that meant. Mona sucked in a breath as she watched Siobhan delicately place the spiders onto herself. Again, it was just a body– the woman in front of her, however, was not bad to look at. There was a sense of knowing from her, too. It was confidence, Mona realized. Of course it had to have been. Who would suggest nude photos if they weren’t confident in themselves?

“It’s not just a button.” It was, sort of. She’d need to detect the lighting– something that Edith, no, Esther? She couldn’t remember now, had told her to do. She pulled out the light meter and extended a hand, before craning back to look at the camera. “I’m going to take a few test shots. These, of course, are without charge.” She’d provide them to the woman, anyway, if they looked good.

“Okay.” Mona looked up to meet Siobhan’s eyes, a smile pulling at the corners of her lips. “It will flash a bit, obviously. It’s a camera.” She pressed the button and light bloomed from where she stood, to just over Siobhan with the lighting kit. She took a few more photos, picking the camera up off of the tripod. She took a step back, peering through the lens. It wasn’t necessary due to the digital aspect of it all, but it felt right. Whether or not the woman ahead of her would be appreciative of the dramatic flair of it, she couldn’t be sure. “Would you like to try another pose?”

The skeleton was insulting, though she didn’t belabor the point. Instead, as Siobhan posed, her gaze drifted towards it. Fates, it was so hideous; birthed from disgusting plastic--a human invention--and lacking in any anatomical accuracy. She couldn’t stop looking at it. Why did the humans insist on this for their…what was the insipid holiday called? The one that correlated with Samhain? She closed her eyes as thoughts swirled in her head, manifested in pops of yellow and red in the darkness. Hollow…something? Hollow bones? Like birds?

“Huh?” Her eyes snapped open, blinking quickly to adjust to the sudden light. “I--uh--” She’d forgotten where she was. Siobhan rubbed her eyes. She pulled her arms up over her head and then she felt it. Something scraped along her shoulder blades. She paused, breath caught in her throat and arms frozen in the air. She gulped. It wasn’t…it couldn’t be… Siobhan turned her head. Over her shoulder, sticking out from her back, was the feathered edge of a set of plastic wings. The hope that swelled inside of her ruptured in a surprised gasp. She’d forgotten she’d taken them. She’d forgotten about her glamour. Scars of every variety, as if her skin was a testing sheet for violence, dissolved into reality across her flesh--from her toned calves up to the crest of her neck and, with special vicious consideration, painted on her wingless back. She could feel it dissipate with a sudden chill before she straightened out, clenched her jaw, and willed the magic back into place. She looked up at the photographer.

“I’ll try laying down now, I think,” Siobhan coughed; if she pretended like nothing was wrong, maybe the photographer would trick herself into thinking she’d seen nothing. Siobhan pushed the stool aside and stretched out on the ground like a cat. Her gaze returned to the cursed skeleton; it was that thing’s fault, somehow. “Ready again,” she grumbled.

Siobhan looked to be lost in thought and Mona made no move to interrupt whatever might be running through her mind. Since taking on temporary ownership of the photography studio, she had learned a lot about people. They liked to be told what to do when necessary, and left alone for the rest of it. Mona wasn’t sure where this woman fell into the mold, but she figured it was somewhere far, far out of reach. She wasn’t even really sure if she was allowed to be taking nude photographs of the woman, but who was she to deny somebody’s dream? Besides, it was just a body, just like the others that’d ventured through the door.

The individual ahead of her, however, slipped in and out of view, or at least, that’s what it felt like. What Mona had been approached with had been that of a woman with smooth skin– pale as the moon, and in a flash, it was prickled with evidence of torture– years of wear. Mona forced her gaze ahead, to not travel along the lines of those scars– of finding identifying moments within the ones that covered from her neck down to her shoulder. These were different, she realized. Insidious– on purpose. Somebody had meant to do that to her, and it occurred to her then that this was no regular human in front of her, not with the way the glamor pulled over like a sleeve within moments of recognition that it had slipped to begin with. Mona had seen that before, though it was different. Where there should have been something different was just a woman who had revealed the ache of her past instead of insect wings, scales, or goat legs.

Her subject spoke and Mona found her attention pulling back over to the woman, to her features– soft, but sharp in all the ways it should be. There was attention to detail there, in her entire appearance. Not just in actual looks, but in the set of her expression– in the carefulness of her gaze. Mona had seen that somewhere before– maybe in her own mother. Mona cleared her throat and nodded. She took a step back, taking another photo. A part of her thought the scars might appear on the screen, that they might be highlighted with notes dug into the skin this is what happened to me. “Perfect, but that’s no surprise.” Mona looked over the camera and nodded at her, “would you like to see?” She tried to run through the possibilities of what the woman before her was– surely a fae, but she wasn’t certain on what kind. Her own scars ached beneath the sweatshirt she wore, as if in some kind of solidarity with the woman before her.

Siobhan was never normal, if the idea of “normal” could be bundled up in a series of traits and actions. She wasn’t normal before her first scream and she wasn’t normal after it. As an adult, she had moved so far from “normal” that she constantly forgot that there was such a state in existence as normalcy; she couldn’t fathom what that felt like. It did not, she reasoned, feel like laying naked in some photography studio trying her best to appear sexy—which wasn’t hard—while trying not to ask herself exactly who these photos were for. For a moment she thought about plastering them around town but then remembered that her role as a teacher meant the action would be wholly inappropriate, far beyond anything fun. She looked at her photographer and wondered what she did, who she was. Was she normal? Curiosity shattered by Mona’s voice, Siobhan pushed herself off the ground and brushed her glamoured skin—as if one grain of dirt would ruin it. As if she were a normal person, with normal skin, who wanted normal things.

“I suppose I can give it a look.” Siobhan stretched, arms above her head. When she relaxed, she pulled the cheap wings off her back. “You don’t have much bedside manner, so to speak. As a photographer. You’re very clinical.” Not that Siobhan had ever been photographed by anyone else, but she had expected more compliments, more praise. She hoped it would have been shoveled on to her from the moment her tits graced the open air. She looked back at the stupid plastic skeleton, then towards the photos. She nearly screamed. There was almost an artistry in their amateur horror—the unfocus, the unflattering tilt, the blur, the comical lack of understanding for composition—almost. “Those are hideous,” she said flatly. “It’s a skill that you managed to take a subject like me and make it ugly. Is this what passes for art now? I feel nauseous just looking at it.” Siobhan tilted her head. “You get paid for this? I’m paying for this?” She tilted her head the other way. “Are you aware of that human adage? ‘Don’t quit your day job’? Except this is your day job.”

“I don’t know what bedside manner means.” Mona tried to think about what Siobhan could want with the comment. She thought to tell the woman ahead of her that this wasn’t exactly her forte, that it felt stiff because Mona was afraid of tearing down the business that Edith had created. That because she was just filling in for an old friend who had saved her life, she felt obligated to do her best, and by doing her best, it meant not being so much herself, and being a version that got shit done. She hated this version of herself, but she couldn’t exactly recoil from it now.

The photos were hideous, she knew that much. She stared down at the screen, glass no longer smoothing out the obvious discrepancies of the photo. Mona had thought she’d done an okay job. She figured Siobhan’s beauty would have saved the photos no matter what, but that didn’t seem to be the case. She felt a little frustrated by the onslaught of insults, but pushed the feeling down. They weren’t anything she hadn’t heard before. So maybe Edith’s company would fall apart. Oops. Then again, she had warned the fury.

“If you’re dissatisfied–” She cut herself off with a sigh, bringing the camera away from Siobhan. She held it close to her stomach, looking at the other woman. She was slightly peeved that there’d be the suggestion of her being human, but Mona hadn’t really said much else to explain that she wasn’t. “Look, I’m just doing this for a friend. I’m bad, I know that, but I’m trying, and I figured you were pretty enough that it wouldn’t matter.” She looked at the pictures again, frown deepening, “but these– yeah, you’re right, they can’t be saved.” Mona put the camera back onto the tripod and turned her attention back to Siobhan. “You don’t need to pay me, and I’ll throw in the wings for free. Nobody else uses them, anyway, and it looks like you liked them.” It looked like she hated them and was traumatized by them, but she still wore them. Mona moved to the side, grabbing the robe that Siobhan had come in with and extended it towards her, “as much as I love looking at naked bodies, you can put this back on.”

“You’re running a photography business for a friend?” Siobhan thought about her own friendships—largely nonexistent—and if she’d run a whole business for them—well, the answer for that was easy. Any kind of relationship that would make someone take hideous photos for a living was one she couldn’t fathom. “This isn’t one of those cases where you’ve killed the person in charge and now need to run the business as if their corpse weren't in the attic, is it? Because that’d be interesting and I’ve already decided you’re boring and changing my mind is so tiresome.” Siobhan grabbed her robe quickly, slipping it on. She’d also decided that the photographer didn’t deserve her tits.

She had resolved to hate her. Yes, she imagined herself saying, I will be taking these ugly plastic wings and leaving now. She imagined her foot lifting, and then the other, and a steady walk to the exit. Her legs ached with their eagerness to move. Siobhan wanted it. She thought about it. She— “I didn’t say they were unsaveable, only that they were hideous.” She threw the plastic wings aside and placed a gentle hand on the photographer’s shoulder. “Every artist starts somewhere. You, perhaps, are starting at much lower skill than most amateur photographers. In fact, it’s quite admirable that you were able to take such repulsive photos. It was as if you took every known fact of aesthetics and ruined it. That, itself, is a skill. No other photographer would be able to take such terrible photos. Why? Because they understand the medium even a little bit, unlike you. You don’t understand it at all. That, I think, is an art.” Her grip transformed into gentle pats. “There, there.”

Pulling her robe tighter around her body, Siobhan smiled. “I will pay you. You rendered services. You rendered them poorly but you did render them.” Thankful for robe pockets, she pulled out a tangled wad of cash and slapped it on to the prop table. “You may keep the photos, they might accompany you on lonely nights. Or, perhaps, you may submit them to an untalented photographer’s art show. You may even want to pretend like you are a child, and thus your obvious lack of skill will be forgiven. Though, it may raise suspicion as to why a child would be taking photos of a naked woman—perhaps not that, then.” Traveling the length of the prop table she grabbed the plastic skeleton and held it to her chest. Then she grabbed her coat and draped it over the anatomically inaccurate body. “I will be taking this, however. You are welcome.”

Sparing a look at the photographer, her gaze drifted to the wings she discarded. “You gave me something new. Something I haven’t felt in a long time.” Siobhan looked up. “That’s more valuable, don’t you agree?”

Mona arched her brow, “no, but that would be interesting.” It has already been confirmed that Siobhan is fae, or at least that she was using some kind of glamor. She wasn’t sure if any human spellcasters could do something of that caliber, and so Mona extends a part of herself, the part of her own kind that are devout to the favors in kind. “They helped me with something, so I agreed to help them, too.” Mona considered letting Siobhan think that she got herself into a promise bind before she added on, “I like to repay my favors, even without there being some… proverbial axe swinging over my head.” Maybe that’d be enough.

Her own expression devolved into something of amusement as Siobhan… was that comfort? No, nobody would comfort somebody in that way, but it almost seemed adjacent. Mona nodded, clearly agreeing with the woman across from her. It was obvious that this wasn’t something she should have agreed to, but lucky enough for her, most people were too polite to protest about how bad their photos had come out. On the other hand, Siobhan’s candidness was… nice, to say the least. Though, Mona wouldn’t have expected otherwise. Who else would’ve arrived at a photo studio naked than somebody who expelled the truth? “I’m going to take that as a compliment, because I’m sure that somewhere, there’s a competition for worst photos.” She was almost sure there wasn’t, but did that matter? Not really.

There was surprise, however, that Siobhan was still intending to pay her. Mona bit back the urge to tell her to keep the money, and she watched as the green bills were untangled from the wad in the woman’s pocket, and then set onto the table. She lifted her gaze to meet the brunette’s, tilting her head to the side. She opened her mouth to speak, but promptly closed it as Siobhan continued. “I could always pretend that it’s a new wave– a new era. Humans are stupid enough to believe in that.” She could have phrased it differently, but Mona had to admit, she didn’t want the fae to think that she was such a lowly thing as human. It probably wouldn’t bend her expectations, or even her thoughts surrounding the engagement, but at the very least, she wouldn’t be thought of as human, and that was enough for her. The skeleton was dipped under the coat and Mona found herself a little sad to see it go. “Take good care of him, like I took good care of you.” Had she, though? There was a certain comfort, at least; in vulnerability, and it showed in the words that Siobhan spoke next, though Mona wasn’t sure if there was a level of sarcasm there or not.

“You certainly gave me a lot to think about, Siobhan. I appreciate your business.” She picked up the wad of bills, half-considering using them for the means of lessons in photography, but remembered the animatronic robot she saw a few weeks ago in the window sill of a nearby shop. It’d look good in the apartment.

#para: boudoir & business #para: siobhan #domestic abuse tw #wickedswriting

11 notes · View notes