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brixbraxium · 1 month ago

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The Significance of Susie, Rude Buster, and The Prophecy.

(This has spoilers for 3-4)

This is a bit of a long post, but it's an important one, I think. Let's talk about Susie's signature spell, Rude Buster. I genuinely think there is thematic significance to this spell. To get to why, though, I want to go over everything.

Rude Buster is a spell that Susie knows from the moment we meet her in Chapter 1. It costs 50% TP, and, as the description tells us, it inflicts moderate "rude" element damage to one foe, and uses both Attack and Magic in its calculation. It considers defense in its calculation, and it scales better with Attack than it does Magic.

I want to compare this spell to another spell, Iceshock.

Iceshock inflicts "magical ICE damage" to one enemy, and costs 16% TP. It scales purely with the Magic stat, and is unaffected by her Attack stat. It also cuts through defense. On the surface, Iceshock is generally the better spell, it would seem. It might not deal as much damage at first, but it's significantly cheaper than Rude Buster, ignores defense, and scales like crazy when Noelle becomes Stronger.

While this is speculative, it almost comes off as if Iceshock is being more 'properly' cast. It's described as 'magical', it seemingly instantly surrounds an enemy rather than needing to be aimed, it ignores defense entirely. But... I think there's a bit more to it than that. Noelle's magic is kind of distinct from Noelle herself in a way. There's some level of detachment. There's distance. This is (partially) why we're able to manipulate her so easily into getting stronger. It's easy to not think about it. They're just enemies. Etc. But Rude Buster? It's a direct extension of Susie herself. She might not be directly naturally talented with Magic, but hell if that'll stop her. She channels everything she has into her axe and sends it out as a bolt of rude energy.

My point is this.

Iceshock deals perfect, magical damage to an enemy, piercing defense. It's better than a Susie crit at first, and it scales drastically. It's simple, and it's cost efficient.

Rude Buster is a direct extension of Susie herself. It's her raw emotion channeled into a single attack. It's her willpower, her resolve, her hope, all imbued into one little spell. Rude Buster as a spell is, either symbolically or literally, Susie's resolve.

This is why it is a "Rude" buster. What does it mean to be Rude? To be impolite. To not follow the rules, the expectations. And, if there's one thing Susie excels at, it's breaking every single expectation anyone might have for her. Is it truly by chance that, out of everyone in the party, it is Susie who talks back to the Roaring Knight? Is it truly by chance that the only party member who can actually do anything of substance against The Knight is Susie, with Rude Buster? Kris is (in most circumstances) holding back. Susie and Ralsei are able to deal chip damage. But Rude Buster, through sheer force alone, overcomes the Knight's defense, not by being magic or anything like that, but simply because it's that good.

Consider also The Titan. Everything seems bleak, the Titan can regenerate, and there's nothing we can do. So what do we do? We call upon Rude Buster. Technically it's "Dual Buster", but...

Susie and Gerson are both clearly casting variations of Rude Buster here.

And it works. And, lets think on that for a moment. Gerson also knows a version of Rude Buster. ...Why?

It's not like Gerson doesn't have his own magical attacks he could have used here, right? They could've easily done something else for this. But... No. Gerson casts his own Rude Buster. Why? Well, think about what Gerson stands for. He believes, in the same way Susie does, that the Prophecy isn't all it's cracked up to be. He believes that it can blind you, that it's better to read between the lines. As a Secret Boss, his philosophy is "I don't care".

So, to me, at least, it makes perfect sense that he would also know Rude Buster. Because, just like Susie, when confronted with the fate of the universe in bold text, he simply laughs it off.

This is also, I believe, why Gerson is the only character who can outright reflect Rude Buster.

Because while Gerson might not have the same resolve to change fate as Susie does, he is driven in a similar way.

The Devilsknife reduces Rude Buster's TP Cost. Why? Is it just because logically a jevil-turned-scythe would be good at channeling Magic? No. Think about what Jevil stands for. He believes that because his choices do not matter, he is free of consequence. He can "do anything", because his choices are irrelevant. If he could somehow be punished, then, well, his choices would've mattered, then, wouldn't they? And he knows that's not true. So he does whatever he damn well pleases. Obviously, Jevil and Susie are not really comparable- Jevil fully accepts that Fate is unbreakable, and Susie very much seems to think The Prophecy is bogus by the end of Chapter 4.

But, I think the throughline is there. Devilsknife makes Rude Buster easier to cast, because by nature, Jevil is already used to doing whatever he wants and ignoring the 'rules'. I hope I've made my case clear. But there's even more.

This may well be where I lose you, to be clear, so I hope you take everything I've said about Rude Buster as its own thing, and consider the rest of what I have to say as an extension of that. If you don't believe what I'm about to say, that's totally fine. Without further ado... Let us consider... The Prophecy.

The Second Hero of the Prophecy is "The Girl, with Hope crossed on her heart." As many before me have pointed out, this depiction... does not quite look like Susie. The weapon is wrong. This is a much longer discussion and I don't think I can quite fit it into this post, but, in essence, I believe that this was supposed to be Noelle Holiday. Noelle actually can equip a few swords as of Chapters 3-4, surprisingly. She can equip the Jingleblade and the Blackshard. However, I don't believe that Susie is "not" the second hero. I believe that The Prophecy has been tampered with. Or, at least, reinterpretted. Think back to what Gerson said. Stories can be changed. They can be retold.

Cat Petterz the RPG is a ripoff of Dragon Blazers, which is a retelling of Lord of the Hammer, which is a retelling of The Prophecy, which is a retelling of DELTARUNE.

I believe that this sort of thing is happening to the prophecy itself. I believe that Gaster, for one reason or another, changed the prophecy, replacing "The Second Hero, The Girl" with Susie. This sort of rules lawyering is possible because Susie is also referred to later in the prophecy:

We know that this is Susie because Rude Buster is being used to identify her. This image is even called "Rude Buster" internally. I believe the original prophecy was introducing Susie as a different "The Girl". However, because it technically uses the same term to refer both to Noelle and Susie, their roles can be altered. And so, Susie, through Gaster's intervention, became the Second Hero.

But why? Why was it important to make Susie involved? I believe it's simply because of who Susie is. When confronted with fate, Susie laughs it off. She won't let it happen. Wheras someone like Noelle would try and accept it for what it is, most likely, Susie outright refuses to play by the rules. And this gets us back into Rude Buster. Rude Buster is important. It's important enough to be the name of the battle theme, it's important enough to be what symbolizes Susie most directly in the prophecy. I believe that Rude Buster, and what it represents, is why Gaster chose Susie. Noelle might, in some sense, have "hope crossed on her heart". But it'd be passive hope. Wistful hope. Susie has active hope. With every fiber of her being, she has that hope. She inspires that hope in others. It is, as Ralsei puts it, infectious. She infects herself with hope, and grows it.

She infects Ralsei with hope.

She gives Tenna hope.

And, though this is more of a stretch, she even, indirectly, infects Seam with hope.

Remember that the only reason we could even potentially defeat The Knight is through Susie's perseverance, and Susie has to defeat Gerson, (who Seam is talking about here) on her own. Remember what Gerson told us.

Susie has the White Pen, that can draw over the dark pages of fate, known as Hope.

I believe that Gaster picked up his own pen, to transform Deltarune into his deltarune, one where Susie steps up to bat as the second hero of prophecy...

...So that Susie could, in turn, pick up her own white pen, and write a new ending. Chapter 7. A retelling of a retelling. The words on the wall called her a hero. Maybe that's not what they were ""supposed"" to mean. But, does it even matter? Through her grit and determination, it won't make a difference. She may not have been intended to be the second hero, but, she is, angel damnit, and the universe is just going to have to accept it. She may not have been chosen by The Angel, or whatever the hell wrote that prophecy, but she was chosen by one Wing Gaster, who considers her Very, Very Wonderful. She wields the White Pen to draw all over fate. And, of course, that white pen has a name. "Rude Buster". When the hands of fate draw near, you can always count on a good ol' Susie Rude Buster to persevere through anything.

#deltarune #deltarune chapter 4 #deltarune theory #longpost #utdr #susie deltarune #rude buster #susie #deltarune susie #susie dr #noelle holiday #ralsei #ralsei deltarune #gaster #wd gaster #deltarune gaster #toby fox

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evening-desire · 1 month ago

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cw : yandere, bullying, reader is gn but i wrote it in fem reader in mind. part two here, part three, part four, part five

thinking about yandere! popular mean femboy that's also your childhood friend. he's all in skirts, pastel cardigans, and cute accessories. he dresses all pretty and cutesy, but his personality? far from what you can call "cute"

he's so mean, judgy, he doesn't like to filter his words, he will put regina george from mean girls into shame just by staring at her. people doesn't want to anger him, let alone getting on his bad side, including you.

but somehow, he always have his way to pick on you, calling you "boring" and other mean stuff, making you carry his bag and hold his umbrella, he would point out your "lame" sense of fashion saying his dog dressed better.

but he never really msant the things he said (only to you atleast) and never actually hurts your feelings bcs he knows the lines when talking to you and only you, other people? he could care less about picking his words.

he actually cares alot about those people that are genuienly kind to her including you, born in a wealthy family who's always been absent in his entire life, he found solice in you.

you’ve known him since kindergarten, the boy who used to hide behind your back when kids teased him for wearing bows in his hair or when his voice trembled as he asked if it was “okay” to like pink. you were the only one who ever told him yes. | the only one who stood by his side when he first wore a skirt to school. the only one who fought for his right to be who he was before he even found the confidence to do it himself. you were his protector. his safe place.

but high school changed everything.

now, he walks the halls like royalty. pastel skirts swaying, soft cardigans draped delicately over his shoulders, glitter lip gloss catching the light as he rolls his eyes at the crowd that parts for him.

his name used to be whispered out of curiosity. now it’s uttered with reverence and fear. he’s the kind of pretty that makes people nervous. the kind of pretty that ruins you if you look for too long. with perfectly manicured nails and a heart-shaped compact mirror always in hand, he’s not sweet. he’s venom in a sugar-pink bedazzled bottle.

he’s cruel. unfiltered. brutally honest and painfully aware of the power he holds over people. one sideways glance and someone’s social standing crumbles. he doesn't even need to speak, though when he does, it’s sharp, laced with sarcasm and wrapped in mockery.

everyone knows not to get on his bad side.

except, for some reason, you seem to have a permanent reservation there.

but you know, beneath the judgment and cruelty, he still cares. he doesn’t show it with kindness. he shows it by letting you close when everyone else is kept at a distance. he shows it by trusting you with the version of him no one else is allowed to see.

still, something’s changed lately.

there’s a look in his eyes now, one that lingers too long when you talk to someone else, one that sharpens when you laugh at someone else's joke. he’s gotten possessive, in a quiet way. subtle, but dangerous.

you catch him staring when he thinks you’re not looking. his teasing has gotten more biting, more meaner and possessive. he makes you sit next to him. makes sure you’re always around. and god forbid you don’t answer his texts immediately, he’ll corner you at your locker with a smile so sweet it feels threatening.

he’s beautiful, terrifying, and a little unhinged when it comes to you.

divider by @.adornedwithlight & @.cafekitsune

#tw yandere #tw bullying #yandere x reader #yandere x darling #yandere femboy #yandere original character

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sunderwight · 5 months ago

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Shen Qingqiu gets hit by a rare wife plot.

And it actually is a rare one because Airplane didn't even write this one down! He toyed with the idea before ultimately dismissing it as being too controversial for the tastes of his readers, and adapting only a few of the same elements for a subsequent chapter of PIDW.

But apparently the System can pull inspiration even from the author's thoughts, especially when there's nothing to contradict the concept and even a few threads of it still to be found in the original, and somehow Shen Qingqiu runs afoul of this previously-unwritten plot bunny.

The core concept was a cuck scenario, of all things. One of the Luo Binghe's wives gets afflicted by a poison that can only be cured by dual cultivation, but specifically can't be cured by by dual cultivation with anyone who has mastery over demonic qi. Something something conflicting energies, something bullshit something. Peerless Cucumber would have ripped the chapter to shreds if it had actually made it to publication, not just for the insult of implying that Luo Binghe should let one of his wives sleep with someone else, but also because why would Luo Binghe -- able to use both kinds of cultivation -- somehow not be able to keep his demonic energies from influencing the situation just in this one case?

Well it turns out that in his specific case it's because sex gets him too worked up to keep things strictly separate, and the degree of control required to treat the affliction whilst dual cultivating is extensive enough that even a little slip-up would be fatal.

Of course, in the actual chapter of PIDW, this same plot device was altered and used to create a harem orgy where Luo Binghe oversaw several of his wives "treating" one another's "afflictions", but Shen Qingqiu just had to go and get a fatal of dose of the more severe version (he didn't realize the risk, because again, this version didn't even make it into the novel).

Anyway, of course this ends up with Shen Qingqiu trying to figure out another way to cheat death, while Luo Binghe goes through the five stages of grief before accepting that he's just going to have to let someone else fuck his husband. This leads to an argument because of course Shen Qingqiu's not going to cheat on Luo Binghe, and he's especially not going to force one of his martial siblings to sleep with him, come on now, and Luo Binghe trying not to cry tears of blood while bringing himself to explain that a fair few of Shen Qingqiu's sect siblings would be happy volunteers for this task.

Shen Qingqiu's just like, well of course you think that, for some bizarre reason you think everyone wants to sleep with me. Bias is what it is. Really it's flattering Binghe but obviously every other person we know is straight, that's just statistics, and everyone in the entire cultivation world knows that Qi Qingqi would sooner chew glass than have sex with a man!

Luo Binghe, weeping now: Shizun please. This is serious. I need you speak words that make sense in the order you're saying them.

They argue, they reach an impasse, the clock is ticking. So Luo Binghe reluctantly turns to the most reliable source of information (outside of himself) on Manipulating Shen Qingqiu to Do Things That Are in His Own Best Interests -- Shang Qinghua.

At first Shang Qinghua is like, well I'm flattered Junshang but I don't think I could shoulder the baggage of fucking Cucumber-bro for you. But then Luo Binghe is like no I need someone who is way hotter and more capable than you, if Shizun is going to fuck someone else at my behest they're going to be TOP TIER so that when I fuck him better afterwards he's really impressed with me. Liu Qingge, obviously.

Not Yue Qingyuan, Shang Qinghua asks? (He'd take the insult a little more personally but honestly he's just relieved that he's not being asked to navigate this social minefield.)

No, Luo Binghe says. He's not 100% sure he could beat Yue Qingyuan in a fight even to this day, which in his mind also translates to not being 100% sure he could do sex better than him either, so Yue Qingyuan is an emergency last resort. He's way more likely to cry on Shizun too and Shen Qingqiu is into that shit, it's too risky.

Alright, says Shang Qinghua, and he thinks about it, and then he comes up with the beautifully simple solution:

Luo Binghe has to fuck Liu Qingge first.

Because of course the crux of the issue is that even with permission, Shen Qingqiu doesn't want to cheat on Luo Binghe. But in the twisted annals of his mind, Luo Binghe himself is still entitled to a harem, even if Luo Binghe is also happily monogamous in this life. So if he shacks up with Liu Qingge first then Liu Qingge essentially joins Luo Binghe's harem, at which point if Shen Qingqiu sleeps with him it's not an affair, it's the gay version of those fanservice-y 3P scenes that the wives in PIDW did. Shang Qinghua translates the concept as best as he can to Luo Binghe, who -- though slightly dubious -- must accept that so far Shang Qinghua's wisdom hasn't steered him wrong with regards to his shizun's eccentricities.

Luo Binghe's mission: seduce Liu Qingge, or at least convince him to have sex, or possibly to lie and (convincingly!) tell Shen Qingqiu that they had sex. That last one is the longest shot so he's probably going to have to just fuck him (Luo Binghe still underestimates how willing his husband is to believe that just about anyone would have sex with him).

Shang Qinghua's mission: convince Shen Qingqiu that he owes his husband steamy threeway gay sex or something so that this plan he pulled out of his ass doesn't backfire and get him killed.

#svsss #bingliushen #scum villain #scum villain's self saving system #mobei jun comes over at some point to ask what his husband is doing #and shang qinghua is just like oh just solving love life problems for our mutual overlord again #and mobei jun is like I thought he was fucking your weird cucumber guy I thought that was it #so shang qinghua has to explain and mobei jun is just like oh I see we're finally getting him a respectable harem okay that makes sense #mobei jun has also been contemplating expanding his own harem #although in his case he views it more like picking out live prey to put in shang qinghua's enclosure to see if he eats it or what #just arranging some political matches he has zero intention of consummating and waiting for how long it takes them to get poisoned #or fall into lava pits or whatever #the idea amuses him #shang qinghua: my king pls don't do that I have enough headaches as it is

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tizeline · 3 months ago

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TSAU Season 1 Finale - Part 1

It's about damn time I go over the TSAU's version of the remaining season 1 finale, as well as episode 1 of season 2, so HERE WE ARE! I am too lazy to adapt the entire thing into a proper comic, especially considering several plot points remain rather unchanged from canon, so we're doing whatever this format is instead.

(You should read Cell Talk and Gearing Up before this if you haven't already)

But a quick recap, the Gearing Up comic ended with Draxum in the Dark Armour going up to the surface with Mikey to start with the whole conquering humanity thing. Raph and Leo have offically joined Team Good Guys and they, alongside Donnie, Splinter, April, Shelldon and Mayhem went after Draxum to stop his evil plans.

When they make surface, Draxum and Mikey have already started their rampage and are just kinda wrecking the baseball stadium. The Foot are also at the stadium, clearly still expecting The Shredder to show up or something. Team Good Guys (yes that's their name now) figure it's probably good to try to get whatever info about the Dark Armour they can so April and Mayhem teleport to where The Foot are to try to gather some intel that might help them in the fight against Draxum.

Meanwhile, the others start fighting Draxum and Mikey. Draxum is low-key kinda baffled that Raph just straight up switched teams lmao. Leo is one thing, but Raph has always been so loyal and responsible so it's real suprising that he's completely disobeying orders. None of the Draxum family members are really enthusiastic about fighting each other (except maybe Mikey he's kinda pissed at this point) but they engage in battle anyway. Donnie, Shelldon and Splinter are less hesitant about kicking Draxum's ass and don't really hold their punches lmao. Despite that they're kinda struggling considering both Drax and Mikey are so strong, but that's when April and Mayhem teleport back with that useful intel!

What April learned from her intel-gathering is that The Foot think there is some kind of flaw with the armour, like in canon, you know the deal. What differs from canon is exactly how that flaw occured. Turns out that Donnie when he was younger got a little bit carried away with giving Shelldon cool powerful weapons and Shelldon enced up accidentally shooting up the teapot to smithereens, oopsie! Donnie managed to reassembe it before Splinter saw, but with one of the pieces having gone missing he had to sacrifice his Atomic Lass figurine to plug up the final hole (he's still upset about that to this day btw). BUT POINT IS, like in canon this means that the armour has a obvious weakpoint and if they hit that it might be enough to knock Draxum out of the armour!

You know what happens next, they resume the fighting with this new strategy in mind and eventually they manage to get a lucky hit in and as predicted knocking out the Atomic Lass toy causes Draxum to get knocked out as well. Except YOU KNOW WHAT HAPPENS and you know it's not quite that easy. Lo and behold, the Atomic Lass figurine was the last thing keeping The Shredder from being resurrected, so now that it's gone? Yeah, the Dark Armour is finally completed, it slurps Draxum's life-force or whatever and then spits him out.

The Shredder is back.

... Except not entirely of course, like in canon he's acting like a wild animal attacking anything that moves, but regardless it's still a new threat they have to deal with. With Draxum being so hurt, Leo makes the decision to portal him back home, and to also send Mikey with him. Both because Draxum probably needs someone to look after him and also Leo doesn't really wanna deal with Mikey's attitude at the moment with everything else going on lmao.

From here on out the battle against Shredder begins. This too goes mostly the same way as in canon, Shredder kinda kicks all of their asses before suddenly teleporting away, and then that song and dance repeats a couple of times before Team Good Guys figure they need a better strategy. Splinter brings up how Big Mama would probably have a way to subdue Shredder, only problem is that it's BIG MAMA and he does NOT wanna go anywhere close to her. In canon Leo brought Splinter with him to BM anyway, but in the AU he kinda respects Splinter, or rather Lou Jitsu, too much to force him to come along. Instead Leo decides he and Raph will go to BM for help, while the others keep Shredder from completely wrecking New York.

The rest of the finale continues in Part 2!

#tiz sep au #tizel art #my art #digital art #tmnt #rottmnt #teenage mutant ninja turtles #rise of the teenage mutant ninja turtles #rottmnt au #rottmnt donnie #rottmnt raph #rottmnt leo #rottmnt mikey #rottmnt april #rottmnt splinter #rottmnt draxum #rottmnt shredder #rottmnt shelldon

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starl1ght444 · 3 months ago

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jason todd x fem!reader

── .✦ angst

[jason’s hurtful words lead you to leave for a couple days]

long story — [7k word count]

second person writing / edited-ish

*.ੈ✩‧₊˚༺☆༻*ੈ✩‧₊˚

you don’t even remember what started it.

maybe it was the late nights. the blood on his knuckles. the way he shut you out like a slammed door every time something bothered him. maybe it was the way you kept asking, over and over, “are you okay?” and getting that practiced silence in return. or maybe it was you. wanting too much. needing answers he wasn’t ready to give.

It starts with the quiet. the kind that creeps in before the thunder hits. jason walks in, his jacket soaked with rain and something darker. his eyes avoid yours. you’re used to it, but tonight something in you snaps. “did you kill anyone yet?” you ask. not because you want to accuse him. but because you have to know.

he stiffens. “what the hell kind of question is that?”

you don’t back down. “a serious one. because I can’t keep pretending I don’t know what you’re doing out there.”

jason tosses his helmet on the counter with a loud clatter. “don’t start this.”

“no, you don’t get to tell me when I start. you come home covered in blood, you don’t talk to me, you shut me out—”

“because it’s none of your business!” he snaps.

that stings. you feel it in your chest, sharp and immediate.

“I am your business, jason. or am I just something you keep around to feel normal?”

he laughs—bitter, cold. “don’t flatter yourself.” —silence.

you blink. his words hit you like a slap, and he knows it. he flinches for a second. just one. but he doesn’t take it back. you try to keep your voice steady. “so that’s what I am? just… convenient?”

he doesn’t answer. you’re waiting for him to say no. to soften. to say he didn’t mean it. instead, he mutters, “you knew what this was. don’t act like you didn’t sign up for it.”

that’s the thing. you did know. you knew loving jason todd would mean long nights, fear gnawing at your ribs, and blood on his knuckles when he kissed you goodnight. but what you didn’t sign up for was being invisible.

“I didn’t sign up to be treated like an afterthought,” you say, standing now, voice rising. “I didn’t sign up for being ignored, for being lied to. you don’t talk to me, jason. you just disappear.”

jason scoffs. “and what, I should be reporting in every five minutes? you want a boyfriend or a lapdog?”

your heart aches, but you don’t back down. “i want you. the version of you that lets me in. the one that doesn’t shut down and push me away every time something gets hard.”

“I don’t need you to fix me!” he shouts, voice suddenly cutting through the air like a whip. “I don’t need your sympathy or your constant hovering. you think loving me gives you the right to pry into every dark corner of my life?”

you stare at him, stunned. “It’s not prying when I’m trying to help jay..”

“I didn’t ask for your help!” he barks. “god, you’re so damn exhausting. always needing something. always complaining. maybe I’d be better off without you dragging me down all the time.”

you stare at him like you’re seeing someone else entirely. “you’re a coward.” — wrong thing to say.

jason steps forward, eyes burning. “you think I’m the coward? you sit here in your nice little apartment, judging me like you’re above it all. you don’t know what it’s like out there. you couldn’t last a week in my world.”

“and yet I’ve been trying for months!” you shout, your voice breaking. “but you don’t care. you never really let me in. you just wanted someone to come home to—someone who didn’t ask too many questions.”

“you think you’re some kind of savior?” he sneers. “you’re not. you’re just another person who thought they could fix me.”

you stop. you feel it crack right there—something fragile and important inside you. “i didn’t want to fix you,” you whisper. “ i just wanted you to let me in.”

he scoffs. “then you wanted too much.” and that’s it. a finial look into jason’s eyes of any hint of regret— nothing. just pure frustration and anger. a weight in your heart dragging you towards the door. no dramatic exit. no final scream. just you walking past him, grabbing your bag, and shutting the door behind you.

at first, jason doesn’t move he doesn’t feel much of anything, honestly. just numb. tired. angry in that hollow way that doesn’t have a target anymore. he just stands there, staring at the door like it’s going to swing open again. It always does.

you always come back. — he grabs a beer from the fridge. sits on the couch. flips on the TV. something violent and loud, because silence feels like guilt.

hours pass. no call. no message.

he scrolls through his phone. no unread texts. he opens your thread—nothing. his fingers hover over the keyboard, then stop. he locks the phone and throws it on the table.

then he starts thinking about what he said. really thinking.

“you’re just another person who thought they could fix me.”

the way your face changed. he remembers the silence right before you walked out, how final it felt. and something cold settles in his chest. it’s been almost 4 hours since you left.

he starts pacing. that tight feeling in his chest creeps in like smoke under a door. his palms feel clammy. he’s sweating. his vision is narrowing. he can’t think. — you didn’t come back.

you always come back. “shit,” he whispers, running a hand through his hair. “shit, shit—”

the room feels like it’s closing in. the walls are too close, the ceiling too low, like everything’s pressing down on him at once. he can’t breathe. his knees buckle, and he slides down against the wall, gasping for air, chest heaving like he’s drowning. his hands shake. his throat burning.

he didn’t mean it. — of course he didn’t mean it. you’re not convenient..you’re the only thing that’s kept him afloat. you’re the light he pretends he doesn’t need but clings to in the dark.

and now you’re gone. the words he threw at you, the venom he spit out just to win a fight, ring louder than the silence you left behind. he says your name into the empty apartment. once. then again. then louder. like if he says it enough, you’ll hear him. — but you don’t. and now the silence is unbearable.

he can’t breathe. now It’s been five hours since you left, and jason’s chest is on fire. not the kind that comes from bruised ribs or a bullet wound—he knows that pain. he’s good with that pain. this is worse. this is panic. helplessness.—this was worse kind of hurt because it doesn’t bleed.

his phone is clutched so tight in his hand, his knuckles have gone white. he stares at the screen, thumb hovering over your name in his contacts again. he’s already called five times.

no answer. — just the sound of your dumb voicemail message, cheerful and playful and now completely soul-crushing. “haii! Its (y/n), im sorry i missed your call! im not home right now! but i can take a message… let me grab a pencil…hm okay! what would you like me to tell me?” it used to make him smile. now it makes him sick. he hits redial.

one ring.

two.

three.

voicemail. — again. again. again.

he runs both hands through his hair, dragging his fingers hard through the strands like maybe pain will wake him up. like maybe this isn’t real. like maybe you’re still coming home, keys jingling, saying his name like you do when you’re trying not to smile. but the apartment is dead quiet. and it smells like rain and blood and something fading.

“pick up,” he mumbles to no one. “please (y/n).. please just pick up.” he calls again. and again.

his hands are shaking now, so bad he nearly drops the phone. his mind is running circles around itself—what if something happened? what if she didn’t look crossing the street? what if someone followed her? what if she’s hurt?—and he can’t shut it off. his heart is pounding too loud in his ears, drowning out reason. he stands up fast, then stumbles forward, grabbing the edge of the counter to steady himself. everything’s spinning.

he opens your location on his phone. nothing.

either you turned it off or the battery’s dead. or worse. his brain fills in the blanks faster than he can stop it. “goddammit,” he breathes, slamming his hand down on the counter. the sound echoes in the empty room.

this wasn’t supposed to happen. you were supposed to yell, slam a door, crash on the couch, and by morning everything would be fine. that’s how it’s always gone. you fight, you cool off, you come back. you always come back.

but not tonight. tonight, you left like you meant it.

and jason realizes—too late—that he pushed you harder than he ever had. too far. past the point of no return. past the point where an “I’m sorry” could fix it. he scrolls to your name again.

calls. again. “haii it’s (y/n)! im sorry i mi—” he shuts his eyes and grips the phone like he could tear it in half. your voice is soft, light, untouched by the mess he made. It makes him want to scream. It makes him want to curl in on himself and disappear.

you’re gone. and you’re ignoring him. that’s what finally breaks something inside him.

because jason todd—red hood, vigilante, killer, survivor—can handle almost anything. bullets. torture. death. — but he could not handle being ignored by the one person who made him feel human.

he sinks down against the wall again, chest heaving, lungs burning. his phone slips out of his hand, landing face-up on the floor, screen still lit up with your contact. a tiny, cruel reminder: your not picking up. you don’t want to talk to him.

his mouth is dry. he tries to swallow, tries to breathe, but every inhale feels like it’s too shallow. like he’s not getting enough air. his arms wrap around his knees. he’s shaking. his thoughts are racing.

‘she’s not coming back. you blew it. you pushed too hard. you said too much. she hates you. she should hate you. why would she come back after that?’ he doesn’t know how long he sits there like that—maybe twenty minutes, maybe an hour. All he knows is the silence. and your stupid voicemail. and the gnawing, tearing fear that he might’ve lost the only good thing left in his life.

“I didn’t mean it,” he says aloud, as if the room cares. as if his regrets can travel through walls and streetlights and find their way to wherever you are. “I didn’t mean any of it.” but the universe doesn’t answer.

he pulls himself off the ground. head still spinning, he can’t keep sitting around for you. he needs to find you. the air outside hits him sharp and cold, but it doesn’t clear his head. the city is still dark, the streets damp with leftover rain. his helmet is in his bag. he doesn’t wear it. doesn’t need it. he’s not red hood right now— he’s just jason. — and jason’s falling apart.

he makes his way through the city on his motorcycle, his mind endlessly searching for you. stopping when he even sees a glimpse of someone with your same hairstyle. everything reminding him of you. he feels hopeless knowing how huge gotham is, even more so how dangerous it is.

he ultimately decides to stop at some of your favorite places, maybe to soothe him with precious memories. he knows it’s to early in the morning for most of these places to be open, but he needs to check. needs to try anyways.

his first stop was a café. your favorite locally owned coffee shop, where you two became regulars. it was a small business, on a strip walk between a laundromat and boutique. — the coffee’s always too strong and the chairs wobble if you don’t sit just right. you loved that place.

he memorized your order. it was always the same thing everytime you came here— your order barely changed. — the smell of coffee, occasionally tea on ur breath, he was craving to kiss your lips just to taste your order again.

jason stands across the street for a second. the lights are off. homemade “closed” sign hangs crooked in the window.

he still walks up. presses his hand to the door like it might open. It doesn’t. he presses his palms to the glass, looking in

your spot is empty. the corner table by the window where you used to sit and steal sips of his coffee when you swore you didn’t want one. where your eyes would crinkle when you laughed, lips covered in foam you never noticed until he wiped it away. he stands there, remembering the time you convinced him to try that stupid seasonal drink with cinnamon and syrup and something else sweet that he pretended to hate—but secretly liked, because you liked it.

he thought if he came here, maybe you’d be sitting there again. your beautiful eyes locked in a book he’d recommend while eating a pastry. but there’s nothing. only cold glass and silence and now an emotional memory.

he sits on the bench outside and closes his eyes, trying to summon your laugh. where you are the happiest, and he remembers your smile when he took you to his favorite library.

it became a sacred place for you to. both calm and quiet while enjoying each-others company. so that was his next stop.

the library.

not a big, fancy one. no marble columns or quiet rules. this one’s cramped, unknown, smelling of dust and secondhand pages. you loved it for its charm—for the creaky floors and mismatched chairs and the old man behind the desk who always smiled when he saw you.

jason picks the lock with trembling fingers. slides through the back door like a ghost. third floor. far left corner. your nook.

he stares at the armchair you always claimed, the stack of dog-eared romance novels that you teased him with—the window seat you used when the weather was just right and the sun poured in like liquid gold. he walks through the aisle, trailing his fingers along the spines of books you once handed him. he can almost hear your voice echo in the stillness.

walking around until he was in the aisle where he first met you. making his eyes burn, to many memories flooding in his head— where he tried so desperately to be cool in front of you, and staring at you from afar admiring how divine your presence felt. — jason reading all the books he thought you’d like before even knowing you and putting his name in the checkout card. and watching your face light up from seeing his name once again. giving him the courage to go and talk to you.

a tear burning his cheek, he puts his head down feeling ashamed of pushing you away when memories like these made him feel alive again.

jason left the library, riding off having the city district him. he rides for a while thinking of any more possibilities. he was about to run out of gas and just decides he needs to take a walk anyways— and when he gets off his bike, he notices he’s at a familiar park — It’s further out, away from the main drag, quiet enough that the chaos of gotham doesn’t touch it. you both used to go there when things got loud—inside his head, inside the world.

It’s mostly empty, just a jogger in the distance and birds rustling in the trees. jason walks the winding path slowly, like a man retracing his own history — here—this is where you tripped over your own feet and he caught you, both of you laughing like kids. over there is the tree you climbed and got stuck in, yelling at him between laughs while he pretended he wouldn’t help you down. there’s a bench under the big oak tree. you kissed him there for the first time. real, honest, vulnerable. no masks, no walls. just lips and nerves and something too tender to say out loud.

he passes through more bench where you sat one night, eyes puffy, telling him things you hadn’t told anyone else. and he’d wrapped his jacket around you and promised—promised—he’d never be the one to hurt you.

he sits down there now, gripping the edge of the bench so hard his knuckles go white. — “i lied,” he whispers to no one, his voice strained. becoming angry with himself.

but there was still no sign of you.. and so he knew despite it all he had a couple more places to check. his mind became desperate. he heads where he should’nt, hoping you’re not there. he still had to check— ‘the narrows’ — ‘ park row ‘ — ‘crime ally ‘

he checks alleyways where addicts linger and criminals circle like vultures. every step, he begs he won’t find you there. But he has to check. has to know. he’s on a rampage now, eyes wild, heart racing. he gets in a guy’s face just for looking at him too long. knocks someone out cold when they make a comment about “that girl he used to walk with.”

he checks rooftops. alleys. places you shouldn’t be, but maybe are. places where bad things happen. — places he belongs, not you. he asks around. no one’s seen you. and those who know who he is don’t dare lie. — still nothing. jason’s a mess—bloodshot eyes, raw knuckles, unshaven. he looks like he hasn’t slept in years instead of just a night.

and then — “jason?”

jason turns around. it’s dick.

“jason?” dick calls, landing on the fire escape in full nightwing gear. “what the hell are you doing back in this part of town?”

jason doesn’t answer at first.

dick jumps down in front of him, blocking his path. “jay—hey. talk to me.” — “I messed up,” jason says hoarsely.

dick blinks. “with…?”

jason swallows hard. “(y/n)... she left. and she’s not answering. It’s been hours. I’ve checked everywhere. the café, the library, that damn park. nothing. I don’t even know if she’s okay. I just—I said too much. I said shit I didn’t mean and now she’s just… gone.— dick, i can’t breathe.”

dick moves quickly, placing a hand on jason’s shoulder. “hey. breathe. look at me.” jason meets his eyes, jaw clenched so tight it hurts.

dick doesn’t say anything for a moment. then: “alright. sit down.” dick says guiding him to sit on a nearby stoop.

jason does. because for once, he has nothing left to fight with.

“you love her?” dick asks, voice low. jason nods without thinking, like it’s a reflex. “then tell her. find her and tell her. but not like this. you’re spiraling.”

“I can’t stop,” jason whispers. “every second she’s not answering, I keep thinking she’s hurt. that it’s my fault. that I broke her. I can’t even hear her voice without thinking of what I did.”

dick sighs and puts a hand on his shoulder. “you didn’t break her. you pushed her away. that’s different. and maybe you don’t get to fix it. but you sure as hell don’t stop trying. not until she tells you to.” jason looks at him. “and if she never does?” — “then you mourn. but not until you know for sure.”

jason’s quiet for a long time. watching gotham pass by with his brother “never give up jay, i believe in you” and jason stands up, continuing his search.

but he doesn’t find you.

he checks safehouses. rooftops. he climbs halfway up wayne tower before turning around because he knows you wouldn’t go there.— by the time the sun rises, his hands are shaking.

his head is pounding. his legs feel like lead. and you’re still gone.

he stumbles home like a ghost. kicks off his boots. sinks to the floor. doesn’t even make it to the couch. just sits there.

and stares at the door. It never opens.

three days pass.

no texts. no calls. not even a read receipt.

jason doesn’t eat. doesn’t sleep. barely moves. the apartment is dead quiet except for the occasional replay of your voicemail, like he’s torturing himself on purpose. by the fourth morning, he can’t take it anymore.

he grabs his bag and heads to wayne manor.

bruce meets him at the batcomputer. he doesn’t ask why jason’s there. just takes one look at him—pale, tired, shaking, blood shot eyes — and knows. “use whatever you need,” bruce says softly, walking away.

jason nods, throat tight. while the system loads, alfred appears at his side with a quiet sigh and a fresh mug of coffee and a blanket. he doesn’t speak right away.

then, gently, “would you like to talk about it, master jason?”

jason’s jaw clenches. he shakes his head, but then his voice breaks. “I ruined it.” a lump in his throat, looking at alfred.

alfred sets the coffee and blanket down and pulls him into a hug without a word. just strong, steady arms and that grounding kind of warmth jason hasn’t let himself feel in years. “i don’t know how to fix this,” he whispers.

alfred holds him tighter. “you start with the truth. then you wait. and if she’s worth it—and I suspect she is—you never stop.” jason nods against his shoulder

and for the first time in days, he lets himself cry. sobbing into the older man’s shoulder releasing all the pent up sadness and anger he kept inside for days. “I’ve cleaned blood off your boots, patched holes in your uniform, and stayed up more nights than I can count wondering if you’d make it back. but what worries me most… is how quick you are to believe you don’t deserve good things.. ” he said rubbing jason’s back soothing him, letting himself cry. “i love her so much, alfred— I don’t know how to hold on to good things without breaking them.” jason hiccups “it hurts how much i love her”

and they stay like that for a while, talking about jason’s feelings and what happened causing you to walk away. alfred listening and making him eat and drink to get something in his system. jason slowly getting tired, the comfort he craved slowing his brain down. alfred replacing you for a little while.

you always comforted jason, your touch melted him into a different man. you were his safe place and made him feel completely loved. the unconditional love he never felt before, ‘she’ll come back..’ - ‘ she’s okay, she’s safe’ — he kept repeating to himself, trying any possible way to soothe himself — jason became tried once again, but this time he was willing to sleep. he slept next to the computer, with the blankets alfred placed over him. he got a couple hours in until he woke up, a reminder of what happened.

now five days have gone by—

the coordinates come in just after midnight.

a quiet ping from the batcomputer—courtesy of a city-wide search bruce helped set up. jason had loaded every street cam, signal ping, and facial recognition tool he could, but deep down, he hadn’t really believed he’d find anything.

until now. a small rental apartment in the east end. under a friend’s name. you hadn’t left the city—you’d just gone off the grid. he finally found what he was looking for.

the screen flickered, and your image appeared in the facial recognition software. jason’s heart dropped as he studied the image that was pulled from surveillance footage. your face, usually full of life and fire, looked hollow. the light in your eyes were dimmer than he remembered, like you’d been carrying an unbearable weight for far too long.

your skin was pale, darker circles under your eyes indicating sleepless nights and too many tears shed. lips, once always curled into a small, knowing smile, were now pressed into a thin line. the fight had drained you, and he could see it in every inch of your face.

the camera hadn’t caught the vulnerability posture, but jason knew. you weren’t just physically tired—you were emotionally worn out. the woman he loved wasn’t the same one who had walked out five days ago. this woman, this (y/n), looked like someone who had been pushing through the world alone, all the weight of her pain carried on her shoulders.

he gripped the edge of the desk, eyes locked on the screen, his chest tightening. guilt, sorrow, and a deep sense of regret clawed at him. he had to find her. he had to make things right before it was too late.

he reads the address three times to be sure, then grabs his helmet and jacket and is out the manor doors before bruce can say a word. he jumps on his motorcycle and starts the engine, the loud sound of his tires screeching in the cave as he raced out to find you. he was lighting on the road, dangerously weaving in and out of cars, adrenaline of seeing you alive making him rush even more.

then he makes it to your location. his feet on the pavement, one flight of stairs, then two. his heart is a riot in his chest. his hands are sweating, shaking, cold. an a rush of anxiety washes over him.

what if you slam the door in his face?

what if you don’t even open it?

what if you’re gone again?

what if you don’t want to see him?

but he still knocks. soft at first. then harder.

he hears the lock click. the door creaks open a few inches. you stand there in sweats your friend let you have, eyes puffy, hair lazily in your face like you stopped caring how you looked days ago. and you’re the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen.

your eyes widen when you see him. and that’s all it takes. jason breaks down.

his legs give out. he drops to his knees like something inside him finally caved in. and before he can even stop himself, he wraps his arms around your waist and presses his face into your stomach, sobbing. not the angry kind. not the kind that comes with yelling and fists through walls.

the kind that’s quiet and raw and scared. the kind that says thank god you’re alive and I’m sorry and I missed you all at once. he was relieved.

“I’m sorry,” he chokes out. “I’m so fucking sorry—please, I didn’t mean it, I was angry, I didn’t know how to say it right, I—god, I thought I lost you—” you freeze. shock, sadness and joy all overwhelming your head. your hands hover for a second, unsure, still hurt, wondering if this is a dream or not.

but then they come down gently, slowly, fingers threading through his hair as you hold him against you. your voice is quiet. “jason…” a melody to his ears.

he can barely speak. “I looked everywhere. I thought something happened. I thought—god, I thought maybe I deserved it. maybe you were better off without me. — I’ve never been this scared in my life.” you listen to him, his words muffled into your stomach. as he plants small kisses in between each sentence— his words rambling and gasping in-between for breaths. “baby.. come here.”

you helped him stand up and stared at his face. “I was angry,” you admit. “you hurt me.” — “i know.. i never wanted to hurt you.”

he leans into you like he needs your heartbeat to breathe.

“I don’t know how to do this,” he whispers. “I keep ruining everything good in my life. I say the wrong thing. I push too hard. I scare people off. and then when I finally realize what I’ve done, it’s too late.” you pull back just enough to make him look at you. — his eyes are red. wet. desperate.

“you didn’t scare me off,” you whisper. “you hurt me. but I left because I didn’t want to say something I’d regret. I needed time.”

jason swallows. “you should’ve. said something worse. hit me. I deserved it.” — “you don’t get to decide what you deserve, jason. I do.”

a beat. “and I still choose you.” he exhales a breath that sounds like a sob.

his eyes are rimmed red, exhausted, glassy with the tears he’s still trying to keep at bay.

“I went everywhere. the café, the library—the park,” he continues, his arms tightening like he thinks you might slip away again. “every place we made a memory. every place that still smells like you. I kept thinking, maybe I could find one more piece of us that wasn’t broken yet.— I needed to find you. I was losing it, sweetheart. I checked alleys. dangerous places. I—fuck, I was hoping I didn’t find you there but I had to check. I couldn’t sleep, couldn’t sit still. I just wanted to see you. to say I’m sorry. to fix it.”

you nod slowly, listening to him. watching the way he talked.

“I knew I took it too far, even when I said it,” jason continues, clutching you tighter. “I was mad at the world, not you. but I threw it all at you because I knew you’d still love me, and that makes me the worst kind of person.”

you press your hand to his cheek, and he leans into it like it’s the only thing keeping him together. “I didn’t mean it,” he whispers. “not a single word. I was angry and afraid and so fucking overwhelmed that I—” his voice cracks. “I lashed out. at the one person who loves me the most. and when you left, I knew. I knew I deserved it.”

you stare at him for a moment. because your silence isn’t punishment—it’s your own unraveling. choosing your next words — “you said I was just a distraction,” you whisper finally, voice shaking despite how hard you try to steady it. “that I make things worse for you. that I don’t understand you, and maybe never will.”

jason flinches. physically recoils at the words he remembers far too well. the words that have been haunting him for the past few days.

you swallow, continuing. “you didn’t just lash out, jason. you hit where you knew it would hurt. you said things I’ve been afraid of ever since we met.”

“I didn’t mean any of it,” he whispers again, desperate. “god, if I could tear the words out of the air and bury them, I would. I would’ve rather taken a bullet than see you walk out that door. I just—” he breathes in deep. “I’m not good with… emotions. with fear. and losing you? that’s the scariest thing in the world to me...”

you nod slowly. “you self-destruct.”— he presses his forehead to yours, eyes shut. “yeah. and I took you down with me.”

silence stretches again, but it’s different now. heavy, but not hostile. like the fog after a storm. “I wasn’t leaving forever,” you whisper. “I just needed time. space. I needed to remember who I was outside of what you said.”

running your fingers through his hair. “I love you, jason. that didn’t change. but you hurt me. bad. I will never stop loving you. i will always come back to you— I needed to know I could still choose to come back on my terms. not because you begged. not because you were falling apart. but because I wanted to.”

his arms tighten around you again, and for the first time since last night, his tears start to fall freely. once again. no restraint. no pride. just a man drowning in his own grief, relieved to be seen, still loved despite everything.

“I don’t deserve you,” he whispers into your shoulder, his voice small and shaky.

“no,” you say gently. “but you have me. and that means doing better.” and you both stand there for a while. two exhausted people wrapped around each other like maybe the world will stop spinning if you just stay still long enough.

after a while, you hold out your hand. “come inside.” and he does.

the apartment is small, quiet. the kind of place that smells like lavender and old books and something that’s just you. jason steps inside like he’s walking on glass—like the walls might collapse if he breathes too hard.

you close the door behind him. lock it gently. like you’re not locking him out, but keeping the world away.

neither of you says much as you move to the small couch in the living room. he follows you, slow, cautious. sits on the edge like he doesn’t deserve the whole cushion. like if he gets too comfortable, you might change your mind and tell him to leave.

you notice the way he keeps stealing glances at you from the corner of his eye. the way his knee’s bouncing, nervous. his shoulders are curled in, defensive, like he’s ready to run the second you flinch.

finally, you break the quiet. “why are you sitting like you’re afraid I’m gonna hit you?” jason freezes.

you don’t say it to hurt him. you say it softly. genuinely. because you see it—the hesitation, the fear, the way he’s pulling away without moving an inch.

he exhales. “because I don’t wanna fuck this up again.”

“you think being quiet is safer?”

he shrugs. “I don’t know. I don’t know what’s safe with you anymore. I keep playing every version of this in my head—if I say too much, if I touch you too soon, if I breathe the wrong way—maybe you’ll walk out again.”

you shift toward him slowly. “I didn’t leave to scare you.”

“I know.” he finally meets your gaze. “but it scared me anyway.”

you nod. “and now you’re trying not to want anything.” he doesn’t answer. “jason, you’re allowed to want me.”

his breath catches. you reach out, gently covering his hand with yours. he looks at the contact like it might vanish.

“you’re not scaring me off,” you say, voice soft but sure. “you’re hurting. and so am I. but I didn’t stop loving you. I didn’t forget all the good just because of one night.”

jason’s voice is raw when he answers. “It was more than one night. I’ve been shutting you out for weeks. I didn’t let you in when you were trying. I turned everything into a war when you just wanted peace.”

“yeah. you did.” he flinches. “but,” you continue, tightening your grip on his hand, “you came back. you searched for me. you let yourself fall apart. that means something to me, and im sorry too. i didn’t intend on being away this long. i just felt so lost” he closes his eyes, jaw clenching.

“i’ve never felt this afraid,” he murmurs. “not even when I died.” you squeeze his hand.

“I’m not good at soft,” he admits. “I can be violent, I can be angry, I can be the guy who kicks in doors and breaks bones. but being… gentle? I don’t know how to do that without thinking I’ll screw it up.” you lean forward, pressing your forehead to his.

“you’re being gentle right now.” he nods, barely. and for the first time since that fight, he lets his hand curl into yours. not tight. just enough.

enough to say I want this.

enough to say I still love you.

he presses his lips to your temple, hesitant at first, then lingering. not hungry. not desperate. just present.

“i love you eternally jason, im sorry too, i’m truly sorry for walking away.”

“i love you so much (y/n), so.. so much it’s a unbearable pain i never want to let go of. you are my heart.. my soul.. my person”

he pressed kisses on your hand inbetween words. whispering softly to you, sweet nothings. just wanting to cherish you. “i cried to alfred, cried like some damn kid and I was just—gone. full-on sobbing in his arms like I was ten again.”

(y/n)’s eyes softened, reaching out but letting him keep going.

“I told him everything. told him I screwed up. told him I was scared you’d leave for good. and he just… held me, made me miss your touch.— i’m still sorry,” he whispers

“I know,” you say. “i am too jay”

the two of you sit there, wrapped in the silence that used to hurt—but now, maybe, it’s just healing in disguise. you pulled jason in to cuddle him. he wraps his hands around your body. feeling fortunate to have you, to touch you, to kiss you. he hasn’t been able to breathe normally since you left, but now his chest feels lifted. he’s calmer and exhausted. he can tell you were too. he rubs your body while kissing all over you until he knows your asleep in his arms. watching you sleep so peacefully puts him at ease, helping him drift off into a wonderful slumber he’s been dreaming about for the past five days.

*ੈ✩‧₊˚༺☆༻*ੈ✩‧₊˚

ahhh :3 i couldn’t do a sad ending— i was going to!!, but he’s been out through to much already!! haha

hope u enjoyed!! im trying out different writing, angst is one im not the best ask but i like trying! it feels repetitive sometimes :p

have a good day / night!! xx

1K notes · View notes

rebelscums · 1 year ago

Text

Little Flower (Qimir x Padawan reader)

Rating: Fluff | Kissing | Light grinding | A pillow is thrown

Summary: You are the padawan to a masked man you had no name of. You have been by his side for years, training and mastering the arts of what he refers to as the dark side of the force. However, with Mae entering your life as his new favorite, you are beginning to question whether you belong there anymore. Something that you run to your closet fiend to talk about. Who knew confessing to Qimir about your trouble would bring a life changing moment.

“I’m not strong enough for him.” That was the first thing you said to Qirmir as you entered his shop. Borrowed shop? You didn’t care.

The defeat in your tone was enough to alert him of your dismay.

“That’s it. I’m officially useless to him. He doesn’t need me.” You blurted out all of your frustrations to the only person you have ever been able to call a friend, “All he cares about is his new acolyte Mae.”

You were both stationed here with Mae as she completed the next part of her trial which was to kill Master Torbin… Without a weapon.

“What makes you say that?” Qimir popped his head up from behind his counter.

“He’s been making me run these needless errands lately that literally anyone else in the galaxy can do.” You set a bag of powdered gold leaves onto the counter, “This took me an entire day to find and when I go back to the spot I left him, he was gone! Gone! Didn’t tell me where either.” You said frustratingly, “So I figured you might know what to do with this.”

Qimir took the bag and peered inside, a please look on his face as he hummed, “Actually I do. It’s the leaves I need to make a poison Mae requested.”

“Of course it is.” You rolled your eyes at the mention of her name.

Mae seemed to be taking the eyes of your master and Qimir lately. Something that made your eyes turn green with the overpowering feeling of jealousy… Of being abandoned.

“Look, I love Mae and she has become very dear to me, but… I was here first.” You felt like a child for saying that, “I know that sounds selfish, but it feels like he just tossed me aside for a better version.” You looked up at Qimir showing him the hurt and betrayal in your eyes before looking away to try and suppress your feelings, “And maybe… Maybe she is better than me… Maybe I should just take my loss and go.” You spoke in a near whisper, your throat tightening at the thought.

“No!” The way he quickly voiced his answer had you looking up at him waiting for him to continue, “You are strong with the force and an extremely skilled assassin.” He shook his head, “You don’t have to leave.”

You sighed and moved past him and the counter, “But what if he wants me to leave Qi? You don’t understand. It’s like he doesn’t even see me or the power I possess. All he ever says to me is that I’m not ready to become his acolyte and that I need to help Mae ascend yet…” You slumped into the cot that he called a bed with a huff, “I’m older than she is! I’ve been with him longer might I add. I’ve never questioned him, I’ve followed him loyally and this is what I am granted with? To be a baby sitter?”

“One useful skill may come out of that job.” He noted and you missed the blush in his face at whatever he was thinking about…

“And what might that be?” You muttered tiredly as you stared up at the ceiling contemplating your life and how you could just be better.

“You would make a good mother?” Qimir shrugged his shoulders as he tried to had the small smirk on his lips.

You launched one of the pillows on the bed the moment those words left his mouth. It was going straight for his head to which he surprisingly dodged with ease, but that didn’t stop the surprised look appear on his face as he raised his hands in surrender.

“Not funny.” You grumbled and crossed your arms, turning to face the wall with a pout.

“Okay okay. I’m sorry.” Qimir said as he walked over to where you were. When you didn’t turn to face him, he decided to take a seat on the edge of the bed beside you. There was a thoughtful look on his face before he spoke again, “Maybe… Maybe he is looking out for you.”

That got your attention. You sat up, your shoulders brushing against his as you peered up at him with confusion, “What do you mean?”

A nervous blush creeped up his face as you leaned closer to him, “Well I mean… I…” He trailed off nervously, “I just mean that maybe you just might be more important to him than you realize. He could be looking after you to take on a more important role.”

“What’s more important than being his acolyte?” You huffed in confusion as you look towards your fiddling hands, “I remember what he said to me all those years ago when we first met. He promised he would make me a powerful force weirder and that I would stand by his side as his acolyte and now… Now I’m starting to question if he really meant it.”

Qimir’s hand found yours and gave it a comforting squeeze, “He meant it and… You are powerful. Just as you are brave and unlawfully kind.” He assured and it was your turn to blush.

It seemed like he always knew what to say to you in ways that made your heart flutter and your cheeks burn, “Qi…” You breathed out as you glanced at his lips.

He was quick to copy your movements leaning in closer to you as he did so, “Maybe he sees too much good in you to turn you into something your not.” He whispered, his breath caressing your skin.

“You seem to know a lot about what he may think.” You whispered, suddenly lost in his darkening gaze, “Why is that?”

“What can I say? I’m good at reading people.” He smirked slightly as he looked down at your lips again, “I’m also extremely possessive over what I care about. Knowing him means knowing you.”

“Okay…” You hummed accepting his answer, “Alright then mister possessive, what am I thinking about right now?” You mused, a mischievous glint sparkling in your eyes.

It was something the Qimir couldn’t get enough of. It was your playfulness towards him that was like a breath of fresh air against the darkness he was met with daily.

“I would say…” His speech was slow as he traced your face with his eyes, “That you really want to kiss me.” He teased lowly. There was a small grin on his face in knowing that he was right.

He was always right.

“Do I now?” You didn’t try to deny it as you leaned in closer to him, “And you? What do you want to do?”

A low noise emanated from his throat, almost like a pleading sound as his lips brushed against yours, “I want to kiss you...” He said in a way that made your heart yearn for him.

“Then what are you waiting for? Kiss me.” You breathed out, your heart racing wildly in excitement.

That was all he needed to hear as he leaned down to press his lips against yours. Your eyes fluttered closed at the soft sensation in the way that he kissed you. It was delicate and gentle as if he was afraid to push you too far, but the way your arms circled around his neck, pulling him closer to you, was all he needed to know.

He felt like light between your fingertips as you ran your hands through his hair and he was gentle with his movements in guiding you back against the bed. “Beautiful…” He breathed out, fitting himself snugly between your legs.

“Qi…” You breathed his name against his lips, arching your back as he tugged your bottom lips between his teeth. He held himself back, letting go of your lip to really look at you. You couldn’t help but look at him with awe as he gazed at you with so much love and devotion shining in his eyes.

“You are just… Breathtaking.” He admired you with every part of his being, “Utterly breathtaking…” He seemed mesmerized as his right hand traced along your curves.

You blushed, a small smile playing on your lips as you looked away from him embarrassed by his loving words, “Who knew you were such a flatterer.”

He chuckled lowly as he leaned back down to kiss your lips. All too quickly he left and began leaving a trail of kisses down to your neck. You couldn’t help your eyes fluttering closed at the feeling.

“You deserve to be flattered.” He continued losing himself in everything that was you. He rocked himself against you as he held back the urge to devour you entirely. He wanted too so desperately now that he knew you were his, body, soul, and mind. He would never let you go, not now… Not until his last dying breath. “You deserve the galaxy, my little flower.” He muttered softly against your skin.

You have much to learn little flower.

You moaned lightly at the pleasure he filled you with almost kissing his last words, but you heard them. Your mind took a moment to register the deeper meaning behind his endearment, but when you did your eyes opened in realization. It was him. Qimir was him. No one knew about that little nickname except for…

“Master?” You whispered running your fingers through his hair in a gentle manner, but your heart beat widely in your chest as he stopped kissing you.

“Hm…” He hummed a small smirk gracing his lips as he breathed against your neck, “You finally figured it out.”

You placed your right hand on his cheek and gentle lifted his head to face you, “He’s you?” You said in awe as you pieced together every moment up until now, “You’re him?”

“I am.” He searched your eyes for any fear or resistance, but his shoulders relaxed as he saw none.

“So… That is why you were never around when he— I mean when you were training me? Because you were already there.” Your brows furrowed, “Does Mae know?” A small pang filled your chest at the possibility of her knowing your masters identity before you.

He shook his head, “No.”

The pang quickly left, filling your chest with relief as you let out a small sigh, “So… That’s how you were so sure about how he was feeling because that’s what you truly felt…” A blush filled your cheeks at the kind words he said to you earlier.

However, you realized something else as well. He was the one who kept you from becoming his acolyte. You gasped as you smacked his chest causing him to groan and you would have cared for the old Qimir if you didn’t already know how strong he truly was as your master.

“Why won’t you make me your acolyte?” You huffed slightly embarrassed now that you know you spilled your guts to him, “This entire time I have told you how I felt. I am devoted only to you master so why will you not let me become your acolyte?”

“I thought you would have figured that out by now.” He chuckled shaking his head.

Your brows furrowed in confusion, “What do you mean? That is why you train me, it is why you let me stay with you, is it not?”

Strands of his hair fell into his eyes from the way he shook his head. You couldn’t help, but reach up to brush them away, something that had his heart flutter and his lips curl up into a soft smile. He leaned into your touch, his eyes closed as he spoke softly, “I don’t want you to become my acolyte anymore because I couldn’t bear the thought of something ever happening to you.” His gaze darkened, “I would burn the galaxy before that ever happens.”

You smiled softly and brushed away the creases from his brow, “I know.”

“I want you to be mine.” He nuzzled his nose into your wrist before placing a gentle kiss upon in, “I want you to be my equal… Not as someone who does my bidding, not as my padawan or my acolyte, but someone who stands by me.”

“I want you my little flower because you are everything I wish the world to be.” He finished, a soft look in his eyes.

Love swelled up in your chest at the confession he conveyed so deeply to you. His love sealed your fate to him as you leaned up towards him. You brushed your lips against his, the both of you conveying your strong emotions to one another with the look of your eyes.

“You have my heart Qimir and I will stand by your side, always.” You agreed softly.

It was a promise that the two of you would keep without any doubt. He was yours and you were his until the end of time.

#star wars #star wars imagine #starwars #star wars x reader #qimir the acolyte #qimir x reader #qimir #star wars qimir #qimir fluff

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kyra45 · 1 year ago

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Scammer pretending to be Palestinian v4

This list has been remade.

The purpose of this post is to compile a quick list of accounts confirmed to be stealing their information off of legitimate fundraisers or otherwise are shown to be taking their posts off Facebook and using it themselves. This list is intended to be a quick access point so if searched someone will see info explaining why the blog they shared from is a scam. Before asking if a blog is a scam, please refer to this post for better details regarding these particular scams:

Please keep in mind this post isn’t to say all Palestinian blogs needing aid are scammers; Rather, the purpose of this post is just to keep track of the accounts that scammers are using. As it goes on for months on end, this post may update accordingly with new urls so please make sure you’re checking the original post if viewing a reblog. You can see a few sources here for commonly used content stolen by scammers. You can find the third version of this list here. For a list of other fundraisers to support, refer to this post.

Please refer to the new list.

—

Names below are associated with these scammers, and may appear across multiple accounts. This is an entirely new list as the other one may have names that no longer are used. These names often are from real people being impersonated. They are not linked,related to, or associated to the person they may claim to be.

Laura mae Noro (Name associated with a scam account) | Maureen jane Aloot (Name associated with a scam account)/ Omar Mensom - OMensom (Name associated with a scam account)

—

To report scam accounts: Report -> Something Else -> Unlawful use or Content -> Phishing (If possible)

What else to do: Alert anyone sharing the scam posts and show them it’s a scam by linking to any post that explains how.

Additionally, blogs with GoFundMe links are highly likely to be legitimate accounts who may already be verified if you check the notes of their posts. A blog with a linktree link claiming to be a GoFundMe link is not a legitimate account. Also search the username if a day old blog says their vetted/verified and don’t have a GoFundMe link.

#scam #Palestine #longpost #long post #psa

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crazziforazzi · 1 month ago

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Fighting for the love (of the game) - Chapter 1

Chapter 1: Draft night

Pairing: Paige Bueckers x Azzi Fudd

Trope: Second chance

A/N: Hi guys, I literally got into basketball a month ago and it took me approximately 5 seconds until I found my gays. Disclaimer, I am still learning to understand the game. I hope you enjoy it!

Word Count: 7.7k words

Masterlist

Azzi POV – Draft Night, Brooklyn, NY

Azzi Fudd sat beneath the white-hot lights with her back straight and her legs crossed, the slit of her white dress slicing clean across her thigh. Sharp, elegant, a little sexy — the kind of dress you wear when you want to be remembered. When you want to say I belong here before anyone else can ask if you do.

Her fingers, polished in soft nude and curled tightly around the edge of her chair, stayed hidden beneath the table’s starched linen. She felt weightless. Not in a euphoric way, but in the way a balloon might feel just before the string slips from a hand. Untethered. Like the floor beneath her might dissolve if she dared to look down.

Beside her, Coach Geno sat with his arms folded and a slight smirk tugging at his mouth — the same one he always wore when he was pretending not to be proud. Azzi could feel his steadiness radiating like heat. He didn’t need to say anything but Azzi felt it. He had been the one who believed in her long before anyone else did, besides her family and her. Back when she had been mostly promise and pressure. Back when she had doubted whether the glittering version of herself, the one people wrote about and projected her onto, could ever be real. Geno had known better.

Her mom sat on her other side, smiling with the kind of pride that barely disguised the nerves beneath it. One hand rested gently on her dad's, their fingers laced, grounding each other. Her dad kept fidgeting with the knot of his tie like it had a mind of its own, like maybe if he adjusted it enough, it would undo the lump in his throat. He looked proud too, proud and overwhelmed in that way dads get when they realize their daughters are no longer little girls, and the world is watching them become something else entirely.

Azzi’s gaze drifted past them, down to the last chair at the end of the table.

Empty.

She had left it that way on purpose.

Her agent hadn’t loved the idea. You can’t just leave a chair empty on the WNBA draft, Azzi. Pick someone. But she hadn’t. She couldn’t.

Because that seat wasn’t for just anyone. It was for the one person who should have been here. The only person she had ever imagined beside her when this moment finally came. The one who had brought her to this very ballroom, exactly one year ago, when Azzi had sat on that chair, her palms stinging from clapping too hard, her heart thudding as the cameras flashed and her name was called.

She could still feel the soft press of a kiss against her neck in that hotel suite. It was not for the cameras, not for show. Just a moment between them. Familiar. Safe. Them.

She hadn’t even been the one in the spotlight then. But it had felt like a shared beginning anyway. Like they were both on the edge of something, the start of parallel dreams, yes, but dreams braided together in the quietest, surest ways.

She remembered how it had all looked. The suite had been warm with lamplight and the soft rustle of fabric as her stylist darted between garment racks, holding up dress after dress that Azzi barely registered. She had been in a black satin robe, her arms crossed, her nerves sharp, when a low voice had called to her from the bed.

"Azz," she’d said, stretching it out with a smile after finishing her Cane’s, "you could wear the gift bag they gave us and you’d still be the hottest one here."

Azzi had tried to glare at her, but the laugh betrayed her. She always betrayed herself around her.

They’d picked the dress together. A shiny black one with a plunging neckline and a back that dipped scandalously low. She remembered stepping out from behind the divider and seeing the expression shift on her face — that slow-blinking awe, the open-mouthed pause, like she was witnessing something sacred. Azzi had felt heat rise to her cheeks. But she hadn’t looked away.

And then there was the way she looked that night. Jet-black custom Coach pantsuit, tailored like it had been stitched onto her skin, every rhinestone catching the light. Her blonde hair had fallen in soft waves, glossy and perfect. She had looked like a storm in motion. Like the kind of person the world wanted to follow.

But when she looked at Azzi, really looked at her, she softened. Always.

Somehow, in all the chaos of the night, they’d found five minutes alone. No cameras, no stylists, no interruptions. Just the mirror, and the quiet. Azzi remembered the feeling of warm fingers wrapping around hers, the gentle tug that pulled her closer.

"Jesus," she’d whispered, her voice barely more than breath. "You are trying to kill me tonight looking like that."

Azzi had rolled her eyes, laughing, but her body had leaned in instinctively. Needing. Wanting. When their lips met, it had been soft. Not rushed, not performative. Just a long, slow inhale of everything they didn’t say out loud. A kiss like a promise. Like a map.

"This is the closest to my prom night outfit I could give you."

There had been plans. Not just whispered ones. Real ones. Apartments they’d toured in cities they hadn’t yet moved to. Lists on their phones titled "someday." Grocery store habits. Dog names. A playlist titled our kitchen mornings. She used to tuck her head into Azzi’s shoulder at night and say, "We’re going to do this. All of it. We are gonna be the ones who make it."

Azzi had believed her. Azzi had let herself believe in it. In them. A quiet, fearless kind of belief. Until that night 9 months ago.

The host’s voice sliced through her memories, too bright, too smooth. Scripted. A video reel flickered onto the giant screen behind them.

"And of course, last year, the Dallas Wings selected Paige Bueckers…"

The name cracked through Azzi like glass under pressure. She turned instinctively, eyes flicking toward the screen already knowing which clip was coming.

There she was. One year ago. Confident and beautiful. Her mouth parted in a polite smile, her shoulders trembling slightly under the weight of the moment. They had rehearsed what she needed to do; hug her mom first, then her dad, and then she is allowed to give one to Azzi.

But when they called her name, she didn’t follow the script.

She turned straight to Azzi. Wrapped her up like she couldn’t help it. Like there wasn’t another choice in the world.

There had been cameras. Reporters. Other players and coaches.

But all Azzi had felt was the anchor of her arms. The press of her breath against Azzi’s cheek. In that moment, under all the lights and noise, it had felt like the start of something unshakable. A choice. Not for the cameras. For them.

Azzi had whispered it into her hair, voice breaking: I love you.

And the reply had come as soft as breath, as certain as thunder.

I love you too.

It had felt like a forever kind of night. But forever is fragile when the world keeps pulling you in opposite directions.

Now, Azzi sat in the same room. Same lights. Same stakes. But alone.

But there was no hand to reach for. No crooked smile across the table. No five minutes of softness carved from chaos. Just an empty chair. Silent, unyielding, echoing with all that was supposed to be.

She swallowed hard. Straightened her shoulders. Coach Geno leaned in slightly, gave her a look. Warm, knowing, proud.

The crowd quieted as the host adjusted her mic after the video ended, voice rising just enough to cut through the low hum of anticipation. "And now," the host said with practiced drama, "after months of speculation and scouting reports, it’s finally time."

Azzi smiled gently, the corners of her mouth lifting in a quiet, thoughtful way. This moment wasn’t hers yet. At least, not in the way she had once imagined.

She had accepted that, and more importantly, she had found peace in it.

Everyone in the room, and really, everyone watching, expected Lauren Betts to go first. That was no secret. The analysts had said it. The former pros had agreed. The fans had assumed it. And Azzi herself had believed it. Lauren had earned it. She had led fearlessly, played with dominance and control, and carried herself with the quiet power of someone who didn’t need to prove anything. Throughout the season, Lauren had risen to every challenge and delivered every time until UConn stopped her as a team in the semi-finals. Azzi had admired her, not with envy, but with genuine respect.

There was no bitterness in her heart.

Azzi knew what it meant to be the one people doubted. She had lived with that for years — not in the form of loud criticism, but in the subtler, more painful way doubt creeps in when people stop asking about your future and start talking about your past. Injuries had stolen more than just playing time from her; they had taken away the certainty she used to feel when people said she was destined for greatness.

There had been days, long, quiet days in empty gyms, where she had wondered if she would ever feel whole again. Days when the ache in her knees matched the ache in her heart. When people spoke her name with caution, as if they didn’t want to jinx her.

But this year had been different.

This year, she had felt free. Not just physically, though playing without pain had been a revelation, but emotionally, too. She had run without fear. Laughed during practice. Shot with joy, not desperation. The game had returned to her like an old friend, and she had welcomed it back with open arms. For the first time in a long while, she wasn’t chasing anyone else’s expectations. She was simply playing because she loved it.

That, she had decided, was enough.

So she sat now with an open heart, quietly anticipating the moment when Lauren’s name would be called. Maybe she, Azzi, would go second. Or third. Maybe she would be headed to the Sky, or to the young team in the Bay, the Valkyries, who were already being described as bold, bright, and full of possibility. She could imagine herself there, not as the headline act, but as something even more important: a cornerstone. A player to build around.

The host continued speaking, her voice confident and steady, drawing out the announcement with a practiced kind of suspense. The air in the room shimmered with tension.

Then, something changed.

Azzi noticed it before anyone else. The cameras began to move. One operator shifted to her left. Another crouched in front of her. A third one came in from the side, adjusting focus, zooming in. It was a subtle flurry, but unmistakable.

She felt a jolt of adrenaline. Her heart quickened.

She looked around, searching for something to anchor her. Her eyes landed on Geno.

He was watching her with that same knowing look he had always given her when she was about to do something extraordinary. His smile was soft, steady, filled with the kind of love and pride that needed no explanation.

Her breath caught in her throat.

"Coach…" she whispered, not quite a question, but not yet a belief.

He didn’t say anything. He just nodded, slow and certain.

And then the world seemed to still. The noise of the crowd, the flashing lights, the nervous chatter, it all fell away. She could hear nothing but the sound of her own heart.

"With the first pick in the 2026 WNBA Draft," the host finally said, her voice ringing like a bell, "the Los Angeles Sparks select… Azzi Fudd."

Everything stopped. Azzi didn’t move.

The room erupted, cheers, gasps, applause, but she sat frozen, her body locked in place as her mind tried to catch up with what she had just heard.

Her name. First.

She looked toward her parents. Her mother’s hands were clasped over her mouth, eyes wide and already filled with tears. Her father repeated, “Oh my God,” over and over, his voice full of disbelief and awe.

Still, Azzi remained still.

Because in that moment, she wasn’t just hearing her name. She was hearing all the years of work. All the hours spent rebuilding. All the nights spent wondering if this dream had quietly slipped away while she wasn’t looking.

She had let go of the need to be number one. She had finally, fully accepted that her worth wasn’t tied to any ranking or headline. She had come into this year with a lightness, with joy, and with nothing to prove.

And somehow, that had brought her here. To the top. Not as a gamble. Not as a question mark.

As the answer.

Geno was on his feet now, clapping with quiet pride. There were tears in his eyes too. Beside him, Tim wiped at his own face, beaming with joy. Kate was already crying openly, one hand pressed to her chest as if she could hold the emotion in.

Azzi felt something rise inside her — not shock, not pride, but something deeper. Something gentler.

Gratitude.

She was grateful for every moment that had led her here. Grateful for the people who had believed in her when she didn’t believe in herself. Grateful for the girl who never stopped showing up, even when her body begged her to give up.

Her body moved before her mind could catch up. Slowly, she rose to her feet. Her dress floated around her legs, and her heels clicked softly against the floor as she turned to hug her mother. They held each other tightly. Her father kissed her forehead and whispered something she would only remember later.

When she turned to Geno, he embraced her fully, holding her like a second father.

"You earned this," he said, his voice thick. "Every damn bit of it, Azzi."

Azzi nodded against his shoulder, eyes closed, letting the truth of that statement settle into her bones.

When she stepped away, she glanced to the chair beside her. It was still empty.

But Azzi didn’t linger there.

She turned toward the stage, toward the light, toward everything that waited for her on the other side of this moment.

Azzi Fudd. Number one overall pick in the 2026 WNBA draft.

The noise never really stopped.

Not during the photos, not during the on-stage interview, not even while she was trying to catch her breath behind the curtain with someone from the Sparks' PR team asking if she wanted water or soda or a second to sit. It was all a blur. Reporters leaning in with questions, UConn teammates pulling her into tight hugs, everyone smiling so wide it almost felt choreographed. She was dizzy with it. Dizzy in the best possible way.

The rest of the draft was still unfolding in real time. The screens overhead kept announcing new picks, cameras swivelling, more applause erupting every few minutes from different corners of the room. But to Azzi, it all sounded underwater. Like her name had been called and now the volume of everything else had been dialled down, as if the night was making room for her moment.

Azzi could barely catch her breath before someone grabbed her wrist again and yelled, "UP! One more time!" and suddenly she was airborne, her feet kicking helplessly above a sea of navy-blue blazers and glittery eyeshadow and open-mouthed joy.

"Okay, okay, stop—" she laughed, flailing as they tossed her higher, her curls nearly smacking Jana in the face. "You are gonna drop me!"

But they didn’t care. Nobody did. This was her night. Ice was yelling something about a champagne spray. KK was already trying to start a TikTok live. Azzi’s cheeks hurt from smiling, her voice gone from screaming, and her dress was dangerously close to flying up the more they tossed her. She managed to wriggle her way down on the third throw, breathless and flushed and laughing so hard her abs hurt.

And then she heard it.

A laugh.

Not one of her teammates screaming her name. It came from deeper back. Farther behind the cameras and the velvet ropes and the backstage staff holding clipboards and headsets. It was sharp, bright, and familiar enough to freeze her in place mid-grin.

She scanned the crowd. Not with panic, with purpose. She knew that sound. That rhythm. It wasn't the kind of laugh you forgot, not when it used to belong to the person who knew every version of you, who had cracked open your ribs and seen what was inside.

The crowd was a blur, camera flashes, tall shadows, a security guard in the middle of moving someone along, but between two shoulders, just for half a second, she caught a flicker of blonde hair.

Tied back in a messy low bun. Head angled like she was looking away. A sliver of cheek, maybe.

Azzi blinked. The crowd shifted. Gone.

No way. Paige wasn’t here. She would’ve known. Right?

But for a moment, the noise disappeared. Azzi stood perfectly still in the center of it all, one foot in the past, one foot in everything she’d worked her whole life for.

A part of her wanted to chase it. Just to be sure. But she didn’t move. She couldn’t. Because her name was still being said over and over again by reporters, by her coaches, by kids in the crowd.

She breathed. And let the possibility stay just that, a maybe.

Maybe she was imagining things. Maybe Paige was never there at all.

Still, as she was ushered from one interview to the next, as she took photos holding up the Sparks jersey, as her teammates pulled her in for a group selfie, Azzi couldn’t shake the feeling. Like someone had slipped into the back of the room for just a minute. Like someone had come to see her, silently. She kept glancing back toward that same stretch of crowd for the rest of the night.

But she never saw her again.

The night stretched long after the last pick was called. The team swept her away to a lounge downtown, something the Sparks organisation had organized. Velvet couches, open bar, soft lighting, a private celebration tucked above the city.

There was music, and champagne, and shouting. Someone had a karaoke mic, and Jana wouldn’t stop singing "Eye of the Tiger" in an exaggerated Southern accent. Ice stood on a chair and delivered a fake speech. Azzi ended up dancing barefoot with her arms around KK and chicken fingers in her other hand.

It was everything. And still, the moment haunted her. That laugh. That flash of blonde hair. That impossible maybe.

She didn’t tell anyone about it.

The morning came slow.

Azzi woke in a hotel bed tangled in white sheets, wearing only boxers and a tank, one false eyelash still clinging to her cheek. The Sparks jersey from the draft crumpled on the chair beside the bed like proof she hadn’t dreamed any of it.

Her phone was face-down on the nightstand, its buzz long silenced. Her head throbbed lightly, not from drinking, but from feeling too much too fast.

She didn’t reach for it right away.

She just lay there, eyes on the ceiling, listening to the hum of the AC and the distant clink of room service trays being wheeled past in the hall. Her body ached in a good way. Eventually, she rolled over, arm heavy, and grabbed her phone.

Notifications swarmed the screen. Mentions. Group chats. Draft clips. DMs from old teammates, trainers, that one camp coach she hadn’t heard from in four years.

And then—

Her thumb froze.

PAIGE 0.22 a.m.

Congrats, Azz. I’m so damn proud of you. Go make them remember your name. They have no idea what’s coming.

Azzi stared. The room spun a little, but this time it wasn’t from champagne or adrenaline.

She read it again. And again.

She didn’t know if Paige had been there last night. If that laugh had been real, or if it had just been a phantom stitched into her memory. She didn’t know if that flicker of blonde hair was coincidence or wishful thinking.

But she knew this: Paige had seen her.

And somehow, that made her chest ache and swell all at once. She read it twice. Then once more. Then she closed her eyes and let herself feel it. All of it.

Paige POV - Draft Night, Brooklyn, NY

She had promised herself she wouldn’t come.

She told her agent, her friends, even her own reflection in the mirror that she was going to stay home. That she didn’t want to make it about her. That the last thing Azzi needed on her night was a ghost hovering in the rafters, reminding everyone, reminding her, of what used to be.

But the truth was, Paige had made that decision too many times before. To stay away. To pretend that silence was kindness. And when the lights went up, and the music swelled, and the draft began to breathe with the electricity of dreams about to come true, Paige knew she couldn’t sit on her hotel room’s couch a few blocks away and pretend she didn’t care.

She needed to be in the room. Even if no one else knew she was there.

So she came. Quietly. Wrapped in a tailored black suit that swallowed her broad shoulders. Her hair was pulled back in tight, low bun. She arrived long after the press had moved on, after the carpet had been cleared, when the cameras were already all inside.

Her seat was arranged discreetly, a favour from someone at the league, who didn’t ask why. Tucked into a dim corner near the back, out of frame. A pillar blocked the view, but if she leaned a bit to the left, she could see Azzi's table. And anyway, the monitors were visible. The sound carried. She was here.

And that, she kept telling herself, was enough.

She tried not to stare too hard at the screen when it cut to Azzi’s table. Tried not to flinch when she saw her, radiant in a breathtaking white dress, curls soft around her face, eyes bright with nerves and wonder. Her parents were beside her. Geno too, steady and warm.

But there was a fifth seat at the table. Empty.

That was supposed to be hers.

Her throat tightened, thick with guilt.

She was supposed to be the plus-one this time. The support system. The calm touch under the table, the whisper in her ear: You are ready. You have always been ready. She was supposed to be the one zipping Azzi into that dress, brushing her curls to the side, kissing her shoulder in the mirror and saying, They have no idea what’s coming.

Instead, she watched from the dark.

God, she missed Azzi.

Paige had convinced herself she was doing the right thing when she let it end, or more accurately, when she let it fall apart without fighting. She had let the pressure and the pain and the headlines swallow her, convinced herself that love was a luxury she couldn’t afford, not while everything else in her life was slipping out of her hands already.

She had been wrong. So wrong.

She should have said it back then: I will give up anything but you.

But she didn’t.

And now she watched the best night of Azzi’s life play out from the shadows. A ghost with a perfect view of everything she had lost.

The room shifted.

Paige realised it before the crowd did, the way producers moved toward Azzi’s table like magnets. That silent ripple of realization. That sharp, expectant energy.

On-screen, Azzi turned toward Geno, brows furrowed like she was asking a question. Geno smiled and nodded once.

Then the host stepped to the mic.

"With the first pick in the 2026 WNBA Draft… the Los Angeles Sparks select Azzi Fudd."

For a heartbeat, the room held its breath. The silence was total, not the absence of sound, but the stunned, collective stillness of disbelief catching fire. A second of suspended time.

And then Paige was on her feet.

Clapping.

Before anyone else. Before the cameras cut to the right angle. Before the broadcasters found their words. Her hands moved on instinct, fast, hard, unrelenting, the kind of applause that wasn’t for the crowd, wasn’t for the cameras, wasn’t for show. It was for her. Because Azzi Fudd just went first overall. And Paige fucking believed she would.

She was crying and didn’t even realize it until the tears slipped past her jaw, hot and constant, soaking into the collar of her suit. Her shoulders shook, barely, but she stayed standing. Stayed clapping. Stayed locked in, eyes trained on the screen as the people around her finally caught up — gasps, cheers, whistles all crashing into the air like fireworks. But Paige was already gone, already in the swell of it, swept under by something deeper.

She was so damn proud. Proud in a way that felt like breaking.

Azzi stood slowly at the table, one trembling hand to her chest, her curls catching the lights like something divine. Her face crumpled, joy, disbelief, tears she wasn’t trying to hid, and Paige could feel it like it was happening to her, like her own chest had split open to make room for it all. That radiant, stunned smile. The way Geno’s hand landed on her back like an anchor. Her parents enveloping her in that long, aching hug.

And the empty seat. Right beside them.

Paige’s hands finally stilled, but her tears didn’t. They just kept coming, quiet and relentless, carving lines down her cheeks while her heart screamed behind her ribs.

She should have been there. God, she should have been there. To squeeze her hand. To whisper, "I knew it. I never doubted it for a second." To pull her into her arms and kiss her forehead and tell her, "You deserve all of this. You always did."

But she wasn’t. And she had no one to blame but herself.

Still, even from the shadows, Paige clung to the sight of her, the way Azzi’s eyes shone through the blur of emotion, the way she waved softly at the crowd, still stunned, still her. The love in Paige’s chest ached like a bruise, tender and deep, and all-consuming.

She didn’t even bother to wipe her tears. Let them fall. Let them testify. Because if this wasn’t love, she didn’t know what was.

Azzi Fudd just went number one overall.

And Paige Bueckers had never been more devastated, or more proud, in her entire life.

She knew she should have left.

The cameras had moved on. The spotlight was dimming, the draft winding down. The night was officially over, at least the part she cared about. But her legs wouldn’t move. Her body wouldn’t listen. She stood rooted in place like a ghost trapped between rooms, unable to cross over.

Because how could she walk away when Azzi was right there?

For months, Paige had only seen her through other people’s eyes — sideline cameras, fan TikToks, grainy highlight reels she watched alone with the sound low, always in secret. Never liking. Never sharing. Never giving herself away. She had made it a habit, keeping her distance like a wound she refused to poke. But tonight?

Tonight, she couldn’t look away.

Azzi’s smile was radiant. Open and unguarded in a way Paige hadn’t seen since before everything broke between them. And it made something sharp twist deep in her gut. Not jealousy. Not quite. Just a longing so big it felt like grief.

Paige stayed. She stayed even when she told herself not to. Even when the voice in her head whispered you don’t belong here anymore. She stayed anyway, selfishly, hungry for one more glimpse, one more memory to take with her back to the quiet apartment and the echo of what-ifs she never dared name.

She laughed under her breath when she saw chaos erupt around the bar — Sarah, KK, Jana, Ice, Kayleigh — all of them crashing into Azzi like a hurricane of sequins and shrieks. Azzi disappeared in the crush of limbs and champagne-slicked hugs, her voice muffled but unmistakable: "Put me down, you’re going to drop me!"

God, her chest ached.

She should’ve been up there. She should’ve been the one smoothing Azzi’s dress, cracking some terrible joke to make her laugh right before the pick was announced. She should’ve been the grounding hand at the small of her back when the nerves hit. The first person Azzi looked at. The one she whispered, “I did it” to.

But she wasn’t. And that wasn’t on fate. That wasn’t bad luck or cruel timing. That was her. That was all on her.

She took a slow breath, blinking hard. Her eyes were stinging, but she barely registered it. Just one more minute, she told herself. Just one more second of looking at Azzi in the flesh. One more secret memory to carry back to the quiet.

And then—

A hand landed gently on her shoulder.

She tensed instantly, breath stalling in her chest. The noise of the crowd faded to a dull, distant hum. She turned her head slowly, heart in her throat.

Geno Auriemma. Coach.

Still impossibly composed, arms crossed, half in shadow. Wire-rimmed glasses. That same unreadable look that had once terrified her as a freshman, but now, at twenty-four, just made her feel seen. Exposed, even. Like he could see through the armour she’d pieced together for this one night.

He didn’t say anything at first. He just… looked at her. Like he was watching something play out inside her head and waiting for her to stop pretending it wasn’t.

Paige opened her mouth, but her voice caught.

"You’re not as invisible as you think," Geno said, his voice low, even. Not unkind.

She swallowed hard. "Coach."

He gave a tiny nod. Then his gaze flicked down, briefly, and Paige followed it, realizing for the first time that tears were falling freely down her cheeks.

She swiped at them quickly, clumsy and embarrassed, but he didn’t acknowledge it. He didn’t have to.

"You didn’t think I’d notice you?" he asked softly, not accusatory. Just… patient.

She gave a sheepish smile, looking down. "Tried not to be a distraction."

He didn’t smile, exactly. But his face softened. "You are not. Not to her. Not to me. Maybe just… to yourself."

That one hit. She looked down at her shoes. It felt like someone had slid a blade between her ribs.

He let the silence sit for a beat. Then, without ceremony, opened his arms. She stepped into them instantly.

And it wasn’t the kind of hug that made you cry harder. It was the kind that made you remember — the kind that reminded you that love didn’t always leave, that belief didn’t disappear when you walked off the court for the last time. That someone still saw you as whole.

He held her for a long moment. Then pulled back and studied her face.

"You still know how to fight."

Paige furrowed her brows. "What?"

"For whatever the hell matters. Playing again for the love of the game. Making peace. Telling the truth. Whatever you are scared of." He nodded toward Azzi. "That? That doesn’t have to be a memory."

Her throat tightened. "It’s not that simple."

"I know," Geno said. "Simple is for stat sheets. This? This is life. It’s messy. It hurts. But it’s not over."

He paused, glanced toward the crowd. Then added, quieter, "You let the wrong voices in. You shut yourself out. You let fear win. You let other people’s voices drown out your own. But the people who know you, the ones who love you, we never stopped listening. Azzi never stopped."

Paige inhaled sharply, like the words had knocked the air out of her.

He leaned closer, his voice gentler now. "She still looks for you in every room."

A pause. Then...

He gave her shoulder one last squeeze and started to step away. But then he paused, glancing back.

"If you are still in love with her," he added, "maybe stop trying so hard to pretend you are not. You fight like hell on the court. Do it for her too."

And just like that, he stepped back into the sea of people, leaving her standing there, heart wide open, skin buzzing, eyes locked on the girl who never stopped believing in her.

And this time, Paige didn’t look away. She let herself feel it. All of it. The pride. The ache. The love that had never gone anywhere.

She kept thinking about what Coach said.

The words didn’t hit her all at once, they didn’t echo like some clean, cinematic lesson. No, they dug in slow, like seeds planted in soil she hadn’t realized was still fertile.

You still know how to fight.

She kept hearing it, over and over, like he’d whispered it into the lining of her jacket, and now it wouldn’t stop clinging to her.

What did he really mean? Of course she knew how to fight. That’s all she had done since her own draft night.

Paige drove with her eyes fixed on the road, one hand loosely on the wheel, the other tapping against her thigh like her body couldn’t sit still. Her chest was tight. Not painful, not yet, just knotted, like her insides were still waiting for the whistle to blow.

She thought back to her rookie season.

Her rookie season felt like it had aged her a decade. Everyone had called it a solid start. The analysts, the talking heads on those sports shows she hated watching but still doom-scrolled through. They all said she was doing well. "Holding her own." "Showing promise." "The future of the franchise". But none of them knew her own standards. None of them knew what it felt like to be Paige Bueckers and feel behind. To feel ordinary.

Then the concussion hit. Then the flu that wouldn’t go away. She missed games. Too many. Her rhythm thrown off completely. And just when she was clawing her way back, Chris, their so-called head coach, started benching her more.

"To protect her," he’d said. "To manage her minutes."

But Paige knew what it really was. He didn’t trust her anymore.

The media had followed suit, like they always do. The same people who hyped her up as a generational pick now started questioning if she was a bust. They talked about her like she was a failed investment. Like she was some stat gone wrong.

So Paige did what she always did. She shut her mouth and showed up.

She buried herself in the training facility. If she wasn’t running drills with the team, she was shooting alone. Or with her personal trainer. Or watching film until her eyes burned. Every night she left long after the janitorial staff, and in the rare moments someone did catch her, usually a rookie assistant coach, she’d flash a tight smile and lie: "Just finishing up."

The gym became her whole world. She gave up the rest of it without even realizing. She stopped going out unless it was team-mandated. Let calls go unanswered. Texts turned to grey bubbles she meant to answer and never did.

And the worst part?

It actually worked.

By August, Chris couldn’t justify benching her. The team played better with her. She was dropping 20+ a night. She picked up three triple-doubles in under a month. She adapted. Stopped waiting for plays that didn’t exist. Took the game into her own hands. Selfish basketball, sure. But in a system with no structure, someone had to lead. She hated it, resented what it turned her into, but it was the only way to survive in Dallas.

And still, it wasn’t enough.

They didn’t make the playoffs. Her stats didn’t matter. Her effort didn’t matter. Not really. The franchise moved on like it always did. Rebuild year. Again.

And now here she was, parked under the flickering neon sign of some mid-range hotel, wondering what Geno had seen in her tonight that she couldn’t see in herself.

You still know how to fight.

For what?

She shut off the engine but didn’t move. Let her forehead fall against the steering wheel.

She was fighting. Every damn day. For minutes. For space. For recognition.

What else was there to fight for? Or… was he talking about something else? Her chest tightened.

Fighting for herself.

Not just for her place in the league, or her stats, or her name on a jersey. But for her. The girl who used to laugh while playing. The one who used to dream about more than just surviving the season. The one who didn’t see love as a distraction, but as fuel.

She hadn’t thought about that version of herself in a long time. The version who smiled after games. Who joked in the locker room. Who threw behind-the-back passes not for show, but for joy.

Maybe Geno meant that. Fighting to come back to life.

She closed her eyes, tired in a way that minutes and stat sheets couldn’t explain. Was there still something to fight for beyond basketball?

She missed being seen. Missed the girl whose smile could light her up from the inside out. Missed Azzi. Not just in the vague way you miss an ex. But in the way you miss home.

Paige let the thought land. Let it sit in her chest without trying to bury it.

If Geno was right, if there was still a fight in her, then maybe it was time to figure out where it should really go.

It was 11.11 p.m. when she made the call. The call that, in hindsight, changed everything.

She sat on the edge of the bed, hunched forward, remote dangling from her hand. The TV flickered through draft highlights. Azzi’s face had lit up like someone flipped a switch inside her chest. All joy, no apology. Paige had known that look once. Knew what it felt like to be lifted by a moment, surrounded by belief, kissed by legacy. UConn made you for that kind of stage. Or at least, it used to.

She muted the TV. Sat still.

And for the first time in a long time, let herself really think.

Not rehearse. Not compartmentalize. Not survive.

Think.

About what this last year in Dallas had really been.

She’d come in determined to make it work, to prove she could turn a broken system into something that functioned. That she could be the cornerstone, even when the foundation was already cracked. There had been flashes of brilliance, a 28-point game in Phoenix, a near triple-double against the Liberty, a couple of clutch blocks that turned heads.

But the flashes never turned into fire.

The coaching staff kept rotating lineups. There was no system, just chaos disguised as “development.” She wasn’t trusted with the ball late in games, wasn’t allowed to be the vocal leader they claimed they needed. And after Chris still did not get fired after 15 straight losses, the team stopped pretending they cared.

By then, she’d been playing through swelling in her right ankle for five games. No one checked in. No one noticed when she started icing it.

That silence had been the loudest thing of all.

She’d told herself it was a test. That she could outwork the noise. That if she kept grinding, kept putting her body on the line, something would shift. She’d earn the role she knew she could fill.

But it never came. Dallas never became hers.

And now? Now they were dangling promises again. Possible a new coach next year. A "fresh start." A culture reset.

They said they wanted to build around her. That she was part of the future.

But Paige had heard enough locker room speeches this year to know the difference between vision and lip service. They didn’t want her. They wanted the idea of her, the name, the brand, the press clippings. Not the player she was becoming. Not the woman who had clawed her way back from every injury, every setback, every whispered doubt.

She glanced at her Ipad remembering the file her agents sent months ago. She hadn’t opened it since July.

SPARKS OFFER — FINAL, expires 8/1

She’d told him not to bring it up again but she remembered the proposal.

L.A. had come calling when their guard rotation cracked midseason, made a trade offer for Paige that would’ve shifted both rosters. And she’d said no. She was loyal. Stubborn. Too proud to leave before finishing what she started.

But watching Azzi tonight, glowing, surrounded by love, stepping into her next with full ownership, something inside Paige shifted.

What exactly am I still holding onto?

The loyalty? It hadn’t been returned. The pride? It was fraying. The jersey? It felt heavier every game.

And then came the quiet voice she’d buried all season:

You deserve more than surviving.

She stood and crossed the room. Picked up her iPad. Pulled up the document with the Sparks logo on the corner.

Her hands didn’t tremble.

She already knew what it said. Salary. Minutes. A coach who actually called her by name in interviews. A real backcourt partnership with veterans and young platers she respected. A franchise looking for leadership, not just talent.

They wanted her. For real.

And, maybe more than anything , it was L.A. Where Azzi would be playing. Practicing. Living. Not that Paige would ever admit to anyone that this was what tipped her over. But maybe... maybe it mattered.

Maybe she was allowed to want proximity to something, someone, that reminded her what happiness looked like. What belief sounded like. What it felt like to be seen not for what you used to be, but for what you still could become.

But that offer was gone now. Dead paperwork. A door she had closed before it was even open.

And tonight, she wanted it back.

She exhaled slowly and hit the call button. It rang twice before he picked up. "Paige?" Her agent’s voice was hoarse with sleep. She didn’t care.

"I need you to call L.A.," she said. Straight, no hesitation.

A pause. "L.A.?"

"The Sparks."

"...Paige, that ship sailed months ago. They moved on. You told me not to push it."

"I need you to push it now," she said flatly.

"I don’t even know if they’d take the call."

"Then make it worth taking."

She stood and crossed to the window, the skyline blurred behind the heavy hotel glass. Her reflection stared back at her. A little older, a little quieter, and suddenly very clear.

"You told me back in July they saw me as a fit," she said. "That they liked my game, my court vision, the way I lead under pressure. You said the coach wanted another point guard who could take ownership of the floor."

Another beat. He exhaled slowly. "Look, I’m just being real with you. They drafted Azzi Fudd tonight. She is the future of that backcourt. I don’t know if there’s room now."

Paige’s jaw tightened, not at the name, but at the implication. And then, with startling clarity, she said:

"Then that’s exactly why they should take me."

He was quiet.

"No one has what Azzi and I have," she continued, voice low and steady. "Not in this league. Not coming out of college. You put us on the same floor and it’s instant. It’s instinct. We read each other without speaking. We cover each other’s blind spots. You don’t need to build chemistry from scratch when it already exists."

Pressing her palm against the cool glass, New York City sprawled beneath her.

"We would be unbeatable from day one," she said. "They want to build around Azzi? Fine. Then give her what she deserves, someone who knows her game better than anyone. Someone who will make her shine."

Her agent was quiet again, but this time it was the kind of silence she could feel leaning forward.

"You sure about this?"

She turned from the window, nodding before realizing he couldn’t see it. "I’m done waiting for things to work in Dallas. I want to be somewhere that sees me. That wants me. I’ll prove I’m worth whatever it takes."

He sighed, sharper this time. "I’ll make the call. But no promises, Paige. We’re starting from scratch now. And they’ve got leverage."

"Then get creative," she said. "Incentives, media push, whatever it takes. If they want a future dynasty, we are it. Together."

There was a pause. "Okay," he said finally. "I will get back to you by noon."

She hung up and let the silence settle again. The screen dimmed to black in her hand, her reflection faint and unfamiliar. She looked older than she felt, like a version of herself that had learned how to swallow every doubt and turn it into steel.

She opened her texts. Found Azzi’s name. No drafts. No overthinking.

PAIGE 0.22 a.m.

Congrats, Azz. I’m so damn proud of you. Go make them remember your name. They have no idea what’s coming.

She read it once. Twice. No emojis. No over explaining. Just truth, stripped down and clear.

Then, before she could second-guess it, before the ghosts in her head could snatch the phone from her hands again, she hit send.

The message flew off in silence, blue check marks appearing almost instantly. She stared at them, heart in her throat. But she didn’t wait for a reply. She didn’t need one. Not tonight.

Because tonight wasn’t about answers or second chances or knowing what would happen next.

It was about doing the damn thing anyway.

It was about showing up. For herself. For the game. For the girl she never stopped loving.

And for the first time in months, when she finally lay down and pulled the covers over her chest, Paige didn’t feel like she was running away. She felt like she had finally taken the first step back.

#paige x azzi #paige bueckers #pazzi #pazzi fics #azzi fudd #uconn wbb

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moonlit-tulip · 3 months ago

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It's often noted, in discussions of the Death Note anime, that it's much weaker than the manga in its rendition of post-timeskip events partly for pacing reasons: the pre-timeskip parts of the anime adapt ~6.5 manga-volumes in 25 episodes, while the post-timeskip parts adapt ~5.5 in 12 episodes, so a lot more important detail-work is lost and the whole thing ends up feeling kind of perfunctory.

Much less often noted as far as I've seen, but nonetheless also true, is that the Death Note anime removes some important characterization-nuance from Light, starting right near the beginning, whose presence elevates the manga to be substantially better than the anime even before the time-skip.

In particular: the Death Note manga is, at its core, a tragedy in classic "character who has everything falls into ruin due to a fatal personal flaw" style. Light is a brilliant student who, in the future ahead of him, has the potential to do practically whatever he wants. He's driven to ruin by the fatal flaw of unwillingness to admit, either to others or to himself, when he's made a mistake. This flaw is an essential piece of his characterization, in the manga. And the anime pretty much entirely skips over it.

As portrayed in the manga, Light's decision to become Kira—which ultimately leads to his downfall—is made in the following way. First, he finds the Death Note, and is led by morbid curiosity to write a name in it, killing someone. Then, still not really believing it, he kills a second person too. At which point it hits him that he's killed two people. And at that point, after a viscerally-horrified breakdown about what he's done, the inability to admit mistakes kicks in, and he proceeds to rewrite his own value-system such that it yields the result that killing those people was actually okay, and in fact morally good. Because the alternative would be for him to acknowledge himself as having made a terrible mistake, and that, more than anything else, is something he's unwilling to do if he can see any other option at all. And then, having convinced himself that those two murders were good, he proceeds to reason that, if they were good, then doing more like them is good; and thus he becomes Kira, leading eventually, far down the line, to his ruin. The anime, by contrast, substantially deemphasizes this flaw of his, portraying him as much more calmly put-together through that series of events and thus making him come across as having been tempted in becoming-Kira-ward directions all along.

Similarly, in the anime, when Light leaks a bunch of information to L about his identity by using non-public information acquired via police channels, he declares that actually this was deliberate as a means of baiting L out so he can kill him, and the anime presents this declaration pretty uncritically. The manga, by contrast, presents it as an extension of that same character-flaw: Light is unwilling to admit to having actually just straightforwardly messed up, and therefore makes up a new plan to view himself to have been following-all-along, thus leading him to take more risks in his game against L going forward and thus, once again, helping him along the path to ruin.

Et cetera.

Compared with the manga, then, the anime's version of Light's characterization ends up less interesting. And, moreover, it introduces a plot hole, when the Yotsuba arc comes around! It makes it much less clear why an amnesiac Light would be so straightforwardly aligned against Kira. In the manga, this is pretty clear: a Light who never killed anyone wouldn't have rewritten his values to consider killing people to be good, and therefore would look at Kira as straightforwardly evil. And, in fact, his amnesiac self has trouble taking the possibility of his having been Kira previously, even as the evidence starts building up, because becoming Kira would be a mistake according to his value-system of the moment, and this leaves him having a very hard time contemplating the possibility of its having in fact happened! Whereas the anime, by deemphasizing Light's big flaw, makes his amnesiac-self's differences from the way he is for most of the story up to that point come across as much more out-of-nowhere, much less narratively well-founded.

So, overall, the people who talk about the Death Note manga as superior to the anime specifically post-timeskip strike me as somewhat understating things. The manga is superior to the anime pre-timeskip, too, via that extra layer of characterization and a resulting improvement both in character-interestingness and in plot-coherence. And thus I consider the manga to be very much the definitive version of Death Note from start to finish, despite the anime's relatively-higher popularity.

#Archive #Death Note #Analysis #there was a gap of about a decade between when i first watched the death note anime and when i first read the death note manga #(the me of ~2011-2012 when i first watched the anime was bad at recognizing characters / following action / etc. in black-and-white comics #and thus impaired in her manga-reading abilities in general)#but i'm glad i finally got around to reading the manga eventually #even if it did take me a while #(to be clear: i read it in 2022; this post isn't downstream of having recently read the manga)#(just of having recently been thinking idly about it and thus remembering this as an infodump-possibly-worth-posting)

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asha-mage · 4 months ago

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The costuming of each of Rand's ancestors is ALSO insane, each iteration of the cadin'sor a step forward towards the one we recognize on Janduin and the modern Aiel, and each reflecting the moment that ancestor lived in:

Charn has simple but well made work clothes that reflect his upbringing as someone form a culture that still practices agrarian farming in a sci fi utopia. It's simple brown that looks more rough and rustic standing in contrast to Miren's sleek white lab outfit, but still contains the hints of modern amenity: his over the shoulder cape, the buttons on his coat and shirt. This is someone who lives in a society where he could be wearing something more clearly modern, but deliberately choose something humble and simple.

Then you have Rhodric in a much sleeker and darker version: the rustic agrarian element has been traded for a straight lines. Everything is imminently practical, from the thick soled work boots, to the leather vest with it's own clip and zippers, to the trousers that allow for range of motion. Rhodric was living through a time of war and now apocalypse. Even his people, sworn to peace, have been altered by the realities of the world they live in, and what their role as servants to Aes Sedai, leaders in that war, demanded.

Centuries later, the cadin'sor has been entirely lost, and Jonai is in what we can recognize now as Tuatha'an style clothing, which makes sense since this is where the two cultures split. Gone are the sleek uniform lines Rhodric was wearing but the deliberate rustic vibe Charn had has not returned. Instead everything is clearly (and messily) hand made. Threads are hanging off a poncho that is clearly hard used. Everything is ill fitting- on Jonai and every one else in this scene. Adan's shirt hangs askew because it's to large while Sulwin's skirt drags in the skirt because it's to long. Their are all these efforts at bright colors and patterning- but their irregular and imperfect. The breaking is taking it's hold and exacting it's price.

Two generations later, Jonai's great grandson, Lewin and his fellows have something that that is first step towards modern Aiel cadin'sor. Everyone has adopted browns and grey, brighter color has been dramatically scaled back, and while stuff still isn't fitting great, it's fitting better. Practicality is back as the main focus, and we see sharp lines return as well. Lewin is the ancestor that most resembles Rhodric, because like with Rhodric he has had to make concessions in himself for the realities of a violent world. The veil appears for the first time, and the colors are now locked in: brown and grey, to match their desert environment.

Jumping forward centuries again to the pre-Clan Aiel, we get Mandein, a sept chief from right before the Aiel cultural identity starts to codify. He is wearing a leather cuirass over a simple linen shirt- the colors are consistent now. and everything is well fitted. The biggest difference is how his rank as a chief is conveyed: he is slathered status symbols, from his cloak, to his sea shell necklace, to his spear with special inlay- all things that demonstrate his singular importance in a society grappling with scarcity. Their is also no uniformity when we see the other sept chiefs during the meeting- everyone is styled differently, draped in different kinds of status symbols. The modern Aiel as a culture now exists, but a common cultural identity is still in the process of forming and getting locked in.

And then finally Janduin- post that cultural identity being codified for two thousand years. He and all the other Aiel warriors are uniform with a clear vision- and being influenced by aesthetic sensibilities that incorporate every step backwards through time. A curiass that seems heavily based on the vest of Rhodric and the others during the war period but with the clear underpinning of being real armor like what Mandein wore, a metal buckler strapped to his back right where the Aiel work hats used to hang during Charn's day, and of course, Lewin's veil but also his same basic silhouette and linens. The only one not represented here is Jonai- which makes sense since that is the lowest point in the Aiel's history, reduced to refugees being preyed upon without anything but their oath and each other to sustain them. Most strikingly to me is the complete absence of any status symbol- Janduin leads many many more people then Mandein but his spears are the same as his soldiers, and nothing marks him out as their leader even in the thick of combat...because such symbols are unnecessary. His right to lead, we know, is carved into his arm.

#wot #wot on prime #wheel of time #wheel of time on prime #charn #rhodric #jonai #lewin #Manderin #Janduin #wot meta #wot s3 e4

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originalwinnerfanfish · 11 months ago

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Well, I did it

Megatron - I love his tfp design. Probably one of the best iteration of Megs. He is huge, heavy armoured, his face covered with scars… He doesn’t looks like an ordinary military leader who is only capable of giving orders, but like real warrior who can destroy any enemy with his bare hands.

So, in the WOF version, he definitely shares some features with Princess Burn, not only because of his might, but also because of his horns shape and dirty-dark scales (that absorbed blood of his enemies)

Starscream - Boy, I hate him so much 🤣… but in the good way, trust me! In my opinion, when the show's creators make you feel such strong negative emotions towards a villain, it means they've done a great job. Also, I think that his animation in the show was absolutely incredible, because even though he's a 3D model, he still manages to move like a 2D character, which is amazing!

I feel that in my design he still looks more like a skywing, than an icewing (which is kinda logical)

Soundwave - This one was tricky. I couldn't figure out what his mask would look like, so I just made his face a really dark color. I think Soundwave has both gifts of the nightwings, and he’s equally great at telepathy and a future vision. So he doesn't really need equipment to predict enemy movements, which makes him an ideal communicator in the WOF setting. His Laserbeak is part of the armor enchanted by Shockwave, and it might also allow him to open portals (but I'm not sure with this one)

Shockwave - My favourite evil genius. He would definitely have animus magic and mind reading. I think Shockwave is the only one who has advanced the study of magic so far, precisely because he combined it with scientific knowledge and created safer methods of using it, that don't damage the mind. It's like if a Mastermind got animus magic in books.

I also like to think that he didn't heal the damaged part of his face just so that his enemies would fear him more)

Dreadwing - This man deserved better! It's really a shame that he was removed from the show so quickly due to financial problems. It would be great if his arc got a proper conclusion in season 3.

Considering that I didn't want to make him a hybrid, it was difficult to choose a suitable color palette. So let’s just say, that I tried my best😅

I don’t think that he would have any nightwing powers, but honestly it doesn’t even matter - this guy can make a bombs, what else does he need to be cool

Arachnid - Did anyone even doubt that she would be a hivewing? Damn, she even got her own “Othermind” virus. Her design was the easiest to work with - just a little poisonous ass (suspiciously similar to Maleficent).

Just like Starscream, I hate her, but in a good way. She's one of the creepiest characters in the entire series, who’s acting like a fucking heartless monster, especially with Arcee, but even so, there's always was something mesmerizing about her. I just really like strong female villains

Knockout - Wery bright and charismatic guy, definitely one of my fav cons!

I tried to draw him as handsome as possible. Worked a lot on the face shape and coloring, and as for me it turned out pretty nice (finally).

Most decepticons think Knockout is as stupid and lazy as all the other rainwings. And it's not like he completely disagrees with that. Of course he’s not stupid and lazy, but if it’s means less dirty work on the battlefield, well, he’ll continue act like a tipical rainwing

(I also believe that Megatron keeps him as an “art”)

Breakdown - Fun fact: "Operation Breakdown" was the very first thing I saw in this series. And it was an interesting experience for 8 year old me. Maybe that's why I'm so scared of eye gouging scenes in movies now…

I think that he didn't have any siblings initially due to his parents nature, and even after meeting Bulkhead, he felt uncomfortable among the other mudwings. And this is why he later chose the side of the decepticons. And maaaaybe because of one cute rainwing influence)

P.s.

I think that, being mostly nightwings and icewings, the decepticons are much more concerned about purity of their blood and rarely accept half-breeds into their ranks.

During the war, there were many animus dragons among decepticons, which is why they have so many artifacts that allowed teleportation and communication at a distance. But, honestly, I still can't imagine what Nemesis would look like in this AU

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deusfoundry · 6 months ago

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popstar!reader x actor!sylus masterlist | lowkey based on this little drabble

a fan asks you a question during one of your surprise visits at the local theater of a small town as part of your movie's press tour.

"is sylus a good kisser?"

a grin makes its way to your lips, and you don't have to spare a glance to know that sylus is donning his signature smirk.

the squeals from the crowd grow louder.

he's great at more than just kissing is the thought that goes through your head, what would be your answer if you really wanted to respond in earnest. it'd be so funny, you think, so hilariously on brand with it's lewdness, something that will surely do numbers on social media.

but you remind yourself that you can't. not now. it isn't the time.

no one knows yet, and you've both done a damn good job at keeping your relationship a secret for the past three years to just have it all unravel under your need to crack a joke.

so you settle for the next best thing.

you lean back against your chair, allowing the fabric to support your entire weight as you cross one leg over the other. your movements are languid, lazy, elbow resting on the arm of the chair as you bring the microphone up to your lips.

"he's alright," you say with a hand casually carding through your hair. you want to come off as though you can't be bothered, entirely unmoved by the question. "could be better, though."

a lie.

sylus' lips have ruined you for anyone else.

his actions are always done with intention, and kissing you is no different. he takes his time with you, slow and deliberate movements that pour fuel down the flickering flame in the pits of your stomach. a palm flat against your lower back, traveling down the curve of your ass, the flesh of your thighs. little things done in the name of not just pulling whines and whimpers from your lips, but to remind you of his undying love and devotion.

he kisses you once he's satisfied with how the attention he's poured the rest of your body. and there's a way in which he captures your lips, heated and all-consuming, that makes you feel wanted.

desired.

not for the facade, the caricature you've made of yourself to entertain other people, but for you. the rawest, most true version of yourself that only a handful of people have access to.

sylus wants you. all of you, and he makes it clear with each slow drag of his lips against yours.

there's a slight tug on your lips that betrays your intentions as the fans go wild. they eagerly look to sylus for his response.

he turns in his seat. and this time, you take a second to meet his eyes. you find his pupils narrowed, covered in a layer of amusement that makes them shine under the dim lights of the movie theater.

"really, now? i seem to recall one of us refusing to break the kiss even after the director yelled cut," sylus leans far closer than what anyone would consider a professional distance. your breath catches, throat closing in as the tip of his nose nearly brushes against yours.

"and it certainly wasn't me."

you wonder, briefly, how the people in the crowd still had it in them to scream.

it's difficult to fight off the light shade of pink that tints your cheeks, but you manage, even gathering enough strength to shove him away with a hand on his chest.

"weren't you the one who had your hands practically glued to my face?" your scoff is accompanied by an eye roll.

sylus laughs, the sound low and deep. he decides to leave it at that. he gestures with a small wave of his hand for another question, and in an instant, arms shoot up from the crowd.

his hand falls to the chair's arm where it meets yours. you let a few seconds pass, allow yourself to relish in the contact of skin, part of his massive palm nearly covering the entirety of yours, before you pull back.

if anyone asks, it was just an accident.

a/n: so. im guessing i can speak for all of us when i say that absolutely no one expected me to pull this out of my ass.

#sylus love and deepspace #love and deepspace #sylus x reader #love and deepspace x reader #sylus fluff #love and deepspace fluff #lnds x reader #lads x reader #popstar!reader x actor!sylus

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illyrianbitch · 3 months ago

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Breathe

Pairing: Azriel x Reader

Summary: Azriel has a panic attack. You help him through it.

Warnings: panic attack pov, symptoms of anxiety (heavy breathing, dissociation, bad mean internal narration), lots of talks of fear, breathing exercises, comfort/care

Word Count: 3.6k

✹ ✶ 𖧷 ✶✹

Azriel didn’t notice it at first— not really.

But his shadows did.

They curled in close, drawn silent and taut, as if bracing for something, getting ready to soothe him like a newborn babe.

It always started quiet. Or, it used to, when it happened more often. Like pressure building— something soft at first, something creeping.

Azriel shifted in his seat at the end of the table, half in shadow as he often was.

He blinked once. Twice.

He realized, rather quickly, that he was too warm.

Not the kind of warm that settled into your bones on a sunny day. Not comfort. No, this was the kind of warmth that crawled across his skin. Under it. Sticky, stifling. His leathers suddenly felt too tight, like his chest couldn’t fully expand.

He shifted again, pushing himself to focus on Rhysand’s voice once more. On the words his brother, his High Lord, was speaking.

Nothing was wrong. Not really. He was seated where he always sat, in the same chair, in the same meeting room, listening to the same details about the same rotations and intelligence reports. Nothing was out of place. Everything was all as doomed, as dismal, and as hopeless as it had been recently.

They were losing a war. And Azriel knew it.

The conversation turned toward intelligence failures– intercepted reports, broken leads.

Azriel couldn’t stop his thoughts from growing louder. Faster. Those were another failure on him. On his abilities, his spies. He’d fucked up. Again, and again. The one thing he was good at, the one thing he was supposed to do— and he couldn’t.

No, no. Stop. He couldn’t afford to think like that. He’d been doing better. Azriel, deep in his rational mind, knew it wasn’t his fault. Not entirely, at least. Koschei was unpredictable. His devoted followers hadn’t been something anyone could’ve predicted — Children of the Blessed who had found another ruler to worship. Another god to bow to. That wasn’t on him.

But it was… wasn’t it? It felt like a failure.

His shadows stilled around him, began calling to him in the way only they could. But Azriel couldn’t pay attention. His mouth was dry now. His hands were cold.

And there was something curling in his chest. A pressure. A discomfort. A wrongness inside him, like something off-center. He was sure of it. A flaw, like some thread pulled too tight.

Az tried to anchor himself. Tried to focus on the sound of his brother’s voices, the crinkle of paper beneath his hand. But his thoughts were racing ahead — spiraling.

The room was too loud.

He gripped the edge of the table. Attempted to draw in a deep breath. When it resisted, when his lungs protested against the strain of his ribs— broken many times before, he opted for flexing his fingers. Uncurled them. Tried to breathe through it once more.

This was pathetic, Az thought bitterly, the sharpness of his own anger swallowing up all other thoughts. The soft voice that tried to tell him he wasn’t to blame for everything was drowned out. It sounded so much like a younger version of himself. And something else, too— a voice that sounded awfully like his mother.

Azriel had been fine this morning. Hadn’t he?

So why, now, was he in such pain? Why was his throat tight? Why couldn’t he breathe?

He needed to breathe.

None of this was real. It was all in his head. It would pass.

He was fine, he repeated in his mind, even as his wings twitched– betraying him before he could catch them. A subtle flex at first, a slight stiffening in his membrane. Defensive, instinctual.

He tucked them in closer to his back, as if he could subconsciously make himself smaller, less visible.

He was losing it. Gods, he was losing it and he couldn’t even stand without drawing attention—without someone noticing, without Rhys or Cassian giving him that look.

His wings spasmed again—this time sharper, a visible shudder that raced down the spine between them. Panic, the primal kind, began to bleed into the edges of his breathing.

Not real. Not real. He clenched his teeth so hard his jaw ached.

He barely noticed when Rhysand’s voice faded into nothing, when the world outside of his own body dulled to a low hum. His vision blurred, not outwardly—no, that would’ve been merciful—but inside his mind. Thought tangled over thought until all that remained was one screaming, splintered thing: move.

Azriel refused to give in to that weaker, fearful side. He refused.

So, instead, he forced himself to lift his head– to act like he was still present. He gripped the edge of the table harder, forcing another breath through lungs that refused to expand. He forced his body to stay still even as every part of him screamed to run.

His eyes caught yours immediately.

You weren’t speaking. You hadn’t been speaking for a while—Az realized dimly that you’d fallen silent when he had.

You were staring at him, a brow furrowed in confusion, eyes darkened with worry. Real, devastating worry— written across your face like you’d felt his unraveling in your bones, like you knew exactly what he was fighting.

You always did that, Az thought briefly. Noticed things. Noticed him. Even when he tried to disappear, buried himself in shadows and distance and the anger only he knew how to hone, you still saw him.

And you were another thing he’d fucked up. Another thing, another person, he’d failed.

His panic hit him like a punch to the chest.

A wild, churning thing inside him lurched loose—sharp and wrong and too much.

He couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t think.

Not here. Not now.

Azriel tried to push to his feet smoothly, tried not to let the room tilt sideways around him. The scrape of his chair on the floor was deafening. His wings flared slightly behind him — a startled, instinctive reaction — before he forced them down again with trembling effort.

He didn’t meet anyone’s eyes. Couldn’t.

He just needed to get out. Get out.

By the time he stumbled into the hallway, the panic was a roaring thing in his chest. His wings kept twitching, muscles seizing like they couldn’t decide whether to shield or flee. His shadows seemed to pulse in time with his heartbeat, gathering in dark, frantic swirls at his feet, then dissipating and flickering against the walls, like they were trying—desperately—to anchor themselves, to pull him out of the fear gripping him.

The world narrowed to the thud of his boots and the pain in his chest. He was shaking now — his hands, his arms, his breath. He couldn’t get a full inhale. He couldn’t slow down. His mind was spiraling. He didn’t know where he was going.

Get out. Just get out. Get out get out get out.

He reached the end of the corridor, but his vision was still tunneling. He staggered sideways, shoulder slamming into the wall. They were getting closer. Tighter.

Get out.

He needed air. Real air.

Needed out.

He winnowed. All instinct, like a broken wild animal on the run from something it knew it couldn’t beat. And then—he landed. He didn’t even know where he was going until the cold hit him.

Dirt. Grass. Night air.

He fell to his knees in it.

Hard.

It knocked the breath out of him. He doubled over, fingers clawing into the earth. Trying to ground. Trying to focus. Trying to breathe.

Stupid. Stupid. This doesn’t happen. You’re fine. You’re not a child.

But he couldn’t breathe.

Couldn’t stop the rising panic clawing up his throat.

You’re a joke. You’re unraveling. You’re slipping and they’re going to see. You’re a liability. A fucking mess. You’re going to ruin everything—

He shouldn’t have been like this — he’d trained for worse, he’d handled worse. His shadows crowded him, trying to ground him, to pull him back, just as they did when he was three hundred and covered in blood. Twenty-two and angry. Eight and afraid.

It didn't work. They were just more noise. The pressure behind Azriel’s ribs sharpened. His skin itched. He couldn't tell if it was sweat or fear crawling over him.

A cold wind rushed over his skin, sudden and powerful. And for a second—just a second—it grounded him.

Then the panic surged again. Harder.

His fingernails dug further into dirt, the movement straining and pulling at the tight skin at his hands, the raw tendons and everything that was wrong with him.

He couldn’t fucking see anything. Couldn’t focus. Azriel was sure his heart was breaking itself against his ribs. He pressed his forehead to the ground, desperate to disappear into it. The skin between his shoulders was buzzing, crawling with invisible ants. The old, familiar impulse to tear his way free, to snap bone and tendon if it meant getting out—getting away—scratching out the thing inside him he couldn't reach.

Somewhere, deep in the marrow of him, the boy he'd once been was crying. Somewhere, even deeper, the soldier he'd become was roaring at him to stay still, stay quiet, get over it.

Azriel was vaguely aware of the wetness on his cheeks. Of a choked gasp that sounded too much like him. His shadows were scared now, concerned, louder as if they were trying to be louder than the voice in his head. But it was no use.

His body was too small and the panic was too big.

And then—

A sound. A shape.

His name, maybe.

But it didn’t sound right. Didn't sound like anything.

It felt, almost, as if Az was trying to hear underwater— trying to breathe it in and choke.

He jerked away from the voice, instinctual. He didn't want to be seen. Not like this.

But then it came again. Warm. Gentle. Familiar. His shadows darted towards it.

“Azriel?”

And for the first time, he felt it. Felt you.

His eyes blinked open—wild, unfocused—but the world began to sharpen.

Not all at once. Not clearly, at least. But enough. Enough to see you there, from the corner of his eye, approaching him slowly, breath white in the cold air.

He squeezed his eyes shut, shook his head, and pressed his palms flatter against the earth. His wings half-flared without permission.

Breathe. Breathe. Breathe.

It wasn’t working.

You’re weak. You’re not enough.

Your failures are going to get them all killed. Koschei. Koschei. Koschei. What if he kills them all?

A flutter of heat brushed against his shoulder. He briefly registered the movement, somehow coherent enough to piece together the fact that you were crouching beside him. He could only imagine how pathetic he looked, a warrior, a spy— a feared male brought to his knees by his own damaged mind.

For one harrowing moment, he wanted to snarl at you. To bare his teeth and tell you to go where you’re needed, to leave him alone— Because he didn’t want your pity. He didn’t want your help. He didn’t want to admit that he needed it. If he admitted it now, so vulnerable and exposed in front of you— embarrassingly so— you’d realize, for a second time, he wasn’t worth it.

But he would never do that. He didn’t want to push you away again.

A wave of shame hit him flat in the chest—flooding his system. Azriel forced his wings against his back until the muscles screamed. He gave a tight shake of his head, managed to say between jagged breaths, "I'm fine. Go home."

Your hand hovered at his back, near his wings. Gently pressed. He was shaking.

He turned his face away. “Please.”

“Azriel,” you said again. Closer.

Something crumbled in him when his shadows returned to his wrists, floating in soothing circles. He squeezed his eyes shut. Breathe. He just needed to breathe. Count, like his mother always taught him to. Trace the patterns of his shadows.

But gods, it wasn’t working.

“I can’t,” Azriel rasped. His voice was barely there.

A few seconds later, your hand was on his cheek, thumb brushing his jaw. You tilted his face toward yours.

“I’m right here,” you said. Your eyes were wide. Pleading, almost. Like he was lost and you were begging for him to find you again.

And he would, wouldn't he? Find you, that was. In every lifetime.

He blinked. It didn’t feel real. He didn’t deserve this tender touch.

“Az, can you look at me?”

“I can’t—I can’t—”

“Can’t what?”

You reached up, brushing a hand through the strands of his hair at the front — a soft, slow rake of your fingers like you were trying to soothe him back to himself. The touch startled him. His eyes opened wider, found yours again, even as his chest still heaved with shallow, broken breaths.

“I’m—” he sucked in a breath, but it hitched, harsh and shallow. “I’m not okay. I’m— I’m scared and I don’t know what I’m doing and I can’t keep pretending—”

He was unraveling. Words spilling out of him like blood from a wound.

“I’m not enough. I’m not—stable. I can’t help with Koschei. I can’t find anything. People are dying. I’m letting everyone down and—fuck—” he squeezed his eyes shut. “I can’t breathe—”

You shifted without hesitation, lowering yourself to your knees before him, so you could meet him at eye level. Gently, delicately, you reached for one of his hands — still clawed into the dirt like an animal — and began to uncurl his fingers from the earth. He shifted his position with the movement.

He blinked again at the sensation, disoriented, his brows furrowing as you guided his hand up and placed it over your chest. Over your heart. And covered it with your own.

“Feel that?” you whispered, taking an exaggerated deep breath. His hand rose with the motion. “All that air coming into my lungs. It’s really nice, Az. Refreshing. Don’t you think?”

He nodded. Or thought he did. It was hard to tell where his body was.

“I want you to breathe with me. Can you do that?”

He swallowed hard. His lungs still fought him. But he would try. Gods, for you — he would always try.

You inhaled again, slow and deep, and he followed — or tried to. Again. And again. Until something in his lungs finally loosened, like a muscle unclenching.

He closed his eyes.

The panic didn’t vanish. But it ebbed. Enough to come back into his body. Enough to feel the weight of the earth, the throb of his heart. The gentleness in your touch. His wings gradually relaxed. His other hand stopped trembling against the grass.

When he opened his eyes, he found yours already waiting.

And for the first time in what felt like hours, he could see you. Not through panic. Just… you.

His hand twitched under yours. You interlaced your fingers, pressing his palm against your skin even firmer. Finally, Azriel took a deep breath. A proper one. Felt the refreshing night air fill his lungs.

And when you smiled — soft and aching and full of something he couldn’t name — he felt the last of the panic slip out of his bones.

He realized, with excruciating clarity, exactly where he was now. Realized that he was touching you. That you were so close. That somehow, impossibly, despite everything he’d ruined, you were here.

He almost forgot to breathe again.

You shifted your free hand up slightly, brushing it back through his hair — a tender, absentminded thing, like it was instinct for you now.

“There we go,” you said softly. “You’re okay. I’ve got you.”

Azriel took advantage of his proximity to take you in— the curve of your mouth, the way the moonlight caught the shine of your hair. How close you were to him, how real it felt. It was almost enough to make him believe he had died after all— that this was some kind of fragile heaven he wasn’t meant to keep, a dream created by a brain deprived of oxygen.

He let out a breath. His body went lax, sinking into the earth. Into you.

You glanced back at him again, your hand still in his hair, and for a moment, neither of you moved. He studied your face like he could memorize it all over again — the faint crease between your brows, the tremble you were trying to hide in your jaw, the way your eyes softened when you caught him looking.

Something inside him cracked open wider.

His gaze dropped to your lips. Then to your eyes. And then his gaze dropped once more, landing on where his hand still rested over your heart, your smaller one covering his. Without thinking, Azriel brushed his thumb across your skin. A slow, reverent sweep. He felt it immediately— the sudden, sharp skip of your heartbeat under his hand.

“Your heart,” Azriel whispered, “It’s...beating really fast.”

You let out a small breath, almost a laugh. “Yeah,” you murmured, giving him a sheepish, crooked little smile.

“Why?”

Azriel swore he caught the faintest tint of pink at your cheeks.

“It tends to do that around you.”

Something inside him stumbled, caught on a beat he didn’t recognize. "Oh," he breathed out.

A few moments passed. And then, slowly, you shifted — separating just enough to ease down beside him. Azriel mourned the loss of your touch, of his hand on your skin. He settled into a similar position, watching as you tucked your knees to your chest and rested your head lightly atop them.

The silence that followed felt easy. Comforting. Azriel was grateful for it, despite his longing to touch you again. His breaths, now more regular, were still slowly coming back to him.

You turned to look at him, your cheek pressed against your knees. “What happened, Az?”

Azriel squeezed his eyes shut. Shook his head once, almost imperceptibly.

Out of everyone, you were the only one he'd ever truly opened up to about these episodes. These small attacks — flashes of terror, of helplessness — they'd started creeping back after the second war against Hybern. A strange, ugly pattern.

He hated them. Hated the way they made him feel: weak, broken, like he was still the trembling boy locked away in a lightless cell. But he’d been doing better. He had been. And now — this — it felt like a step backward. Like a fall from a cliff he'd barely managed to climb. He felt like a failure. Like a burden.

“I…I don’t know. I just…”

He looked at you then. Really looked. At the way your eyes urged him to go on. And somehow, his thoughts came easier. More honest.

The truth was — Azriel had spent most of his life benefiting from the image of someone fearless. The cold, steady blade in the dark. The one who didn’t flinch.

But Azriel was afraid all the time.

He moved through his fear like a second skin — worked off it, thrived off it. Fear of losing someone. Fear of being weak again. Fear of being proven wrong. Fear of being left behind. It sat in him like something feral, something sharp-toothed and restless, always on the edge of recognition.

He knew fear the way an animal knew the shift of the wind before a storm.

And lately, it was starting to take more than it gave.

He hated it. Hated that for all the years he'd spent learning to master it, it still had the power to master him.

“I hate this,” Azriel said finally. Barely audible. “I hate that I can’t control this panic. That it’s still in me. That I freeze. When I’m needed most.”

“You’re not frozen now,” you said. “You came back.”

He shook his head. “I’m supposed to protect people. I’m supposed to keep our court safe. That’s what I’m for. If I can’t do that... if I’m just afraid…then what am I?”

“You’re still you. Even when you’re afraid. Especially then.”

Azriel closed his eyes for a moment. Nodded, just barely. “I think you’re the only one who thinks that.”

“The fearless don't win wars, Az. They just die faster. The ones who love... the ones who are afraid — they're the ones who survive. They're the ones who save people."

He blinked, like you’d struck him, and a wave of relief ran through his body. Azriel let out a rough breath — almost a laugh. “Since when did you get so philosophical?”

You shrugged, a faint smile tugging at your mouth. “I used to date this guy…”

He arched his brow and you tilted your head, pretending to think. “Taught me a few things about war. About fear. About how important it is to find people worth being afraid for.”

Azriel’s mouth twitched upwards. “Sounds like a piece of work.”

You breathed a soft laugh and the quiet stretched again. He ran his fingers idly through a blade of grass, taking in the calm night surrounding him.

“How did you know where I went?” Az asked.

Your arms were wrapped around your knees, chin resting on them, eyes tracing his shadows dancing along the grass. “I made a lucky guess.”

“Well… thank you," he said, his heart glowing. "For finding me.”

You glanced at him, your eyes softening as you replied, “Always.”

Then you tucked your chin back onto your knees, looking up at the sky again. The stars spun lazy arcs overhead. Azriel watched you instead— for a few indulgent moments, at least.

Eventually, Azriel’s gaze drifted from you, scanning the patch of grass beneath you both. A soft smile tugged at his lips as the memory surfaced—of the first time he kissed you—here, in this exact spot.

✹ ✶ 𖧷 ✶✹

authors note: posting this randomly as i am...crawling...slowly....from the grave.... where uninspired writers.... and my abandoned wips.... go to rot...

as a girl who has suffered w panic attacks my whole life (thank u traumatic events!) i would rather die than have someone like...kiss me for example, but i cannot tell u how intimate those moments are after someone sees you so vulnerable and theyre just like so...casual abt it? so i simply had to write a lil something, idk anyways enjoy this random lazy ass work <3 onto my series i go!!!!

fun fact.... this is actually a scrapped scene from one of my drafted series (anatomy of dependence), that full exes to lovers, second chance romance, best friends to luvers goodnesssss!!!!

permanent tag list 🫶🏻 (im going to revamp this soon, so if you wanna stay on it, let me know!!)

@rhysandorian @itsswritten @lilah-asteria @georgiadixon @glam-targaryen

@cheneyq @darkbloodsly @yesiamthatwierd @azrielsbbg @evergreenlark

@marina468 @azriels-human @book-obsessed124 @bubybubsters @starswholistenanddreamsanswered

@feyretopia @azrielrot @justyouraveragekleemain @marigold-morelli @mrsjna

@anarchiii @alittlelostalittlefound @melissat1254 @secretsicanthideanymore

@m4tthewmurd0ck @beardburnsupersoldiers @isnotwhatyourethinking @tothestarsandwhateverend @raginghellfire

@angel-graces-world-of-chaos @acoazlove @paradisebabey @inkedinshadows @mellowmusings

@paankhaleyaaar @curiosandcourioser @thisrandombitch @casiiopea2 @w0nderw0manly

@rottenroyalebooks @jurdanpotter @casiiopea2 @gamarancianne @weesablackbeak

@booksaremyescapeworld @knoxic @wynintheclouds @dacrethehalls @louisa-harrier

#azriel x reader #azriel #azriel x you #azriel x y/n #azriel x reader angst #azriel x reader fluff #azriel angst #azriel fluff #azriel shadowsinger #azriel spymaster #azriel fanfiction #azriel fanfic #azriel acotar #acotar #acotar fanfic #a court of thorns and roses #acotar fanfiction

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