#use that imagination and think beyond what's presented

[angelseraphines]

ೃ⁀➷ shades of cool ˗ˏˋ꒰ 🦢 ꒱

╰┈➤ hwang in-ho x player!reader imagine

a/n: i would like to give a special thank you to @lumillsie for the layout of this post and for the filter used on the header! there is also a part one to this imagine, playing dangerous, a part two, do you think you’d kill for me, one day? and a part three, ultraviolence.

˚ ���♡ you stirred, the weight of consciousness creeping back in like a slow, unwelcome sensation. the first thing you noticed was the pain, not sharp, but dull and ever-present, pulsing from your leg in as a painful remnant of what had happened. your eyes fluttered open, and the room before you swam into view, blurred and unfamiliar.

˚ ༘♡ soft, warm light illuminated the bedroom, the golden glow radiating off polished wood and gilded accents. the room was lavish beyond imagination. silk curtains hung in folds along the high windows, their rich, deep hue a stark contrast to the sterile white sheets covering you. the bed beneath you was impossibly soft, its headboard ornate and meticulously carved.

˚ ༘♡ it didn’t feel real.

˚ ༘♡ your gaze dropped to your leg, your breath hitching at the sight of thick, pristine bandages wrapped around your injured knee. the ache was dulled, numbed, and for a minute you thought it was a dream, until the frigid tug of an iv in your arm brought you fully into reality. clear tubing snaked its way from the crook of your elbow to a stand beside the bed, the consistent drip of fluid into your veins the only sound in the unnerving quiet.

˚ ༘♡ panic set in as you scanned the room for answers. sleek medical monitors blinked softly in the corner, their digital hum an eerie companion to the slow rhythm of your heartbeat displayed on the screen. the pure cleanliness of it all, no blood, no chaos, no grimy stairwells, was jarring.

˚ ༘♡ the door creaked open.

˚ ༘♡ your body tensed instantly, your hands gripping the sheets as you turned toward the sound. standing in the doorway was young-il, but something about him was different. he was dressed head to toe in onyx-black now, the sharp lines of his attire immaculate, his presence nearly unrecognizable.

˚ ༘♡ your breath caught in your throat as a sensation of horror surged through your body. you struggled to push yourself up, wincing as the motion sent a jolt of pain through your leg. “you bastard,” you spat, your voice hoarse and trembling with both fury and anguish. “what the hell is this? what did you do?”

˚ ༘♡ his expression was undisturbed, his face composed, as though he hadn’t betrayed you, shot you, and left you to bleed out. his voice was soft when he spoke, almost gentle. “you’re safe now.”

˚ ༘♡ safe? the word felt like an insult, a mockery of everything he had done. “safe?” you snapped, your voice rising despite the weakness in your body. “you shot me! you killed them! where are jung-bae and gi-hun? what happened to them?”

˚ ༘♡ he hesitated, the pause heavy with unspoken truths. “their fate… isn’t yours to worry about,” he said at last, his tone measured, deliberately vague. the non-answer only stoked the fire of your anger, your hands clenching into fists.

˚ ༘♡ “don’t give me that nonsense,” you grimaced. “tell me what happened to them!”

˚ ༘♡ his gaze softened, as if he pitied you. it made your stomach twist. “you’ll have your answers in time,” he said evenly. “but for now, there’s something more important you need to understand.”

˚ ༘♡ your chest heaved with ragged breaths as you glared at him, the venom in your gaze meeting his unnervingly tranquil demeanor. “and what’s that?”

˚ ༘♡ he stepped closer, his shadow stretching across the floor, enveloping you in its reach. “my name isn’t young-il,” he said, his voice steady but carrying an undertone that made your pallid skin crawl. “it’s hwang in-ho. i am the front man, the overseer of these games.”

˚ ༘♡ his words hit you as though it was a physical blow, the weight of their meaning sinking in too slowly, too horribly. your jaw slackened as confusion, revulsion, and fear collided within you. you shook your head, as if denying the truth could erase it.

˚ ༘♡ “no,” you whispered, your voice barely audible. “no, that can’t be…”

˚ ༘♡ “it is,” he interrupted, his tone kind, almost soothing, as though he were breaking news to a child. “i know it’s a lot to process, but it’s the truth. everything you’ve been through, everything you’ve seen, it all leads back to me.”

˚ ༘♡ his serenity, his gentleness, only made it worse. you stared at him, horrified, unable to reconcile the man before you with the one who had saved your life, who had stood by your side, who you thought you could trust. your heart pounded in your chest, a desperate beating of denial as his revelation sent cracks through your already fragile world.

˚ ༘♡ you couldn’t tear your eyes away from him, your mind frantically trying to stitch together some coherent explanation for what he was saying. every word felt like a jagged shard, cutting into what little remained of your trust. the man you thought you knew had unraveled into someone monstrous, someone you couldn’t even begin to understand.

˚ ༘♡ “you want answers,” he said quietly, moving to stand at the foot of the bed. his hands rested at his sides, his posture unnervingly relaxed. “then let me give them to you.”

˚ ༘♡ you didn’t reply, your throat too tight to push out words. the tremor in your hands betrayed the dread coursing through you, though you tried to mask it with a glare that had lost its edge.

˚ ༘♡ he let out a desolate breath, his gaze dropping briefly before returning to yours. “a long time ago, i was no different from you or any other contestant for these games. i was desperate, clinging to whatever hope i could find. my wife…” his voice caught, for a split second, but he quickly recovered, his expression hardening. “she was pregnant, but she was sick. we didn’t have the money for the treatments she needed. i tried everything, loans, work, begging. nothing was enough.”

˚ ༘♡ you felt a pang of unease, the words pulling at a part of you that didn’t want to empathize, didn’t want to understand.

˚ ༘♡ “when i heard about the games, i saw no other choice,” he continued. “i thought… if i could win, i could save her. i convinced myself it was worth it. the blood, the horror, it would all be justified if it meant saving her.” his eyes grew distant, as though he were watching memories play out before him, each one dragging him deeper into a place he didn’t want to go.

˚ ༘♡ “and you won,” you said bitterly, though your voice lacked strength. the image of him standing victorious in those games twisted your stomach, making you sick. “so why are you here? why are you doing this to other people?”

˚ ༘♡ his lips pressed into a thin line, his jaw tightening. “i won,” he admitted, his tone heavy with something you couldn’t name. “despite my efforts, my win and the prize money came too late. she died, and so did the baby… our baby. nothing i had done mattered, not the lives i’d taken, not the suffering i endured. it was all for nothing.”

˚ ༘♡ the bitterness in his voice was unmistakable, but it was the coldness in his eyes that terrified you. it was as though the memory of that loss had hollowed him out, leaving behind only shards of the man he once was.

˚ ༘♡ “after she died,” he said, “i had nothing. no one. those behind the games saw that. they saw what i had become, angry, empty, ready to do whatever it took to escape the emptiness. they offered me purpose, a chance to rebuild myself in their ideology. and i took it.”

˚ ༘♡ his admission hung in the air, suffocating and heavy. you wanted to scream at him, to ask how he could justify becoming the very thing that destroyed him, but the words wouldn’t leave your lips.

˚ ༘♡ “and you…” his voice mellowed, and for the first time, his mask of stability cracked only slightly. “you remind me of her. not simply for how you look, but… the way you care. the way you fight, even when everything is against you. there’s a tender beauty in you that i haven’t seen in any soul for years.”

˚ ༘♡ his words sent a chill down your spine. notion idea that he saw any part of his late wife in you was unbearable. you stared at him, horrified, searching his face for any sign of deception, but all you saw was the unsettling truth of his sincerity.

˚ ༘♡ “don’t,” you whispered, your voice quivering with rage. “don’t you dare compare me to your dead wife. don’t you dare use her memory to excuse what you’ve done.”

˚ ༘♡ he didn’t flinch, though something appeared in his expression, regret, perhaps, or something deeper. “i’m not excusing it,” he said quietly. “i know what i’ve become. but it doesn’t change what i see.”

˚ ༘♡ you shook your head, tears threatening to spill as the weight of his words pressed down on you. the man standing before you wasn’t just a stranger, he was a nightmare, a ghost of the person he once was, and you couldn’t decide which was worse.

˚ ༘♡ you couldn’t reconcile the man before you with the one who had pulled you out of the fire so many times before. the one who had shielded you, consoled you when you were hurt, and risked his life to save yours. even as he revealed the truth, this sinister, unfathomable truth, a part of you couldn’t forget the way his hands had steadied you in instances of chaos or the way he had spoken to you with warmth when everything else had been so cold.

˚ ༘♡ yet that part of you, small as it was, waged a bitter war with your anger and disgust. you couldn’t ignore what he’d done, what he was. you had seen him kill without hesitation, betray without remorse. yet somehow, despite everything, the memory of his quiet acts of care gnawed at your resolve, complicating the clarity of your rage.

˚ ༘♡ “why?” you demanded, your voice cracking under the weight of everything. “why did you save me if you were just going to do this? why did you act like you cared?”

˚ ༘♡ his expression softened, and for a second, the cold, calculating overseer seemed to fade. in his place was the man who had once held your hand, who had spoken with a gentleness that felt so real you couldn’t dismiss it entirely. “because i do care,” he said, his voice low, almost pleading. “more than you know.”

˚ ༘♡ you shook your head, tears threatening to spill. “you don’t get to say that,” you whispered, your voice quivering with misery and despair. “not after everything you’ve done. you don’t get to care.”

˚ ༘♡ he stepped closer, the weight of his presence filling the space between you. you wanted to recoil, to push him away, but your body betrayed you, frozen in place. “i know what i am,” he said softly, his tone stable yet tinged with something raw. “i know what i’ve done. but that doesn’t make what i feel for you any less real.”

˚ ༘♡ “don’t,” you murmured, though the word came out weak, your anger faltering under the intensity of his dark gaze. “don’t try to make this about me. you’re just trying to justify…”

˚ ༘♡ “i’m not,” he interrupted, his voice firm but quiet. “i’m not trying to justify anything. i… i couldn’t lose you.”

˚ ༘♡ the confession hung in the air, heavy and morose. you wanted to lash out, to shout at him, to tell him that his words didn’t change anything. but instead, you found yourself searching his face, looking for the lie, the manipulation. and you didn’t find it.

˚ ༘♡ you hated him, but you couldn’t deny that you had trusted him, even cared for him, before the truth came crashing down. those memories, tainted by what you knew now, lingered like ghosts, haunting you in ways you couldn’t escape.

˚ ༘♡ “you don’t get to feel that way about me,” you said, though your voice wavered, lacking the conviction you wanted it to carry.

˚ ༘♡ “i know,” he murmured, his gaze unwavering, his closeness almost unbearable. “but i do.”

˚ ༘♡ before you could think, before you could stop it, he leaned in. the world seemed to still as his face drew closer, his presence overwhelming. you hated him, you loathed him, but the confusion, the anger, the lingering warmth of the man you thought you knew muddled everything.

˚ ༘♡ when his lips met yours, it wasn’t soft or careful. it was desperate, a confession in itself, and against your better judgment, against every screaming thought in your head, you didn’t pull away. instead, you let the infatuation consume you, the bitterness, the anger, the ache of betrayal melding together into something raw and inescapable.

˚ ༘♡ when it broke, you were left shaking, your breaths uneven as you stared at him, your heart pounding with emotions you couldn’t even begin to name. you hated him, but lord, you hated how much you wanted to understand him even more.

a/n: you all asked for another part so i had to write part four!! i had a cosmetic procedure that requires me to stay home for a few days so if you have any requests, this is the time!! i hope you all loved reading!! 🤍

[starwrittenfates]

𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐒𝐮𝐛𝐣𝐞𝐜𝐭 𝐨𝐟 𝐒𝐧𝐚𝐩𝐞'𝐬 𝐏𝐡𝐲𝐬𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐥 𝐀𝐩𝐩𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐞

*steps up onto my podium and taps the microphone*

Sorry for the reminder---but everything that's presented to us in "canon" is all coming from Harry's POV, and this means that while Harry may think of Snape as being ugly and unattractive, that doesn't actually mean it's the truth! Who knows? He could be attractive, even with his hooked nose and sallow skin. It all depends on the eye of the beholder (and in this case, Harry is an unreliable narrator for this one.) (But please, don't get on others for casting Snape with an "Attractive FC" when you say that canon says he is supposed to be "ugly." That's all Harry's perspective, not the golden truth. Thanks for coming to the TED talk.)

[unproduciblesmackdown]

also it's only just occurring to me that like, i presume and enjoy how Unfixed In Time (or at least without peak specific precision) gtmpota is, while based on a book published in & set in the '90s, and here i am noticing how there being a Leave A Message For Brooke Specifically recording in understudy buddy is Not ['90s] when like, even if a middle schooler had a phone in their room it'd be a landline that shares its number with that of the whole household, but it's also decidedly '90s esque in being like an answering machine recording with the Beep tone / sound quality and all, as well as of course definitely being a message left via phonecalls rather than tina ostensibly reading out a text or something

[drchucktingle]

THE TEXAS LIBRARY ASSOCIATION HAVE ISSUED AN APOLOGY AND A RE-INVITATION. HERE IS MY STATEMENT

hello buckaroos. the TEXAS LIBRARY ASSOCIATION have issued a formal statement and apology which you can read at the attached link.

while i find the language used to discuss what was done a little unsatisfying, i would like to start by saying i appreciate anyone taking steps to prove love is real and make things right. the genuine feeling of ‘realizing you have made a mistake and hurt someone else’ is a terrible one, and i have so much empathy for this group as they reckon with their choices causing harm. i appreciate their apology.

i also think more good than bad has come from this situation. i am so thankful this happened to me (someone with a large social media presence) and not a smaller buckaroo author without the means to stand up for themselves. i think the next time someone comes to the TXLA with an accommodation need, they will hopefully be taken more seriously

lets trot down to business about specifics now. the TXLA has re-invited chuck to the original panel and even offered to take a moment at the top of the panel to talk about what happened. this is very kind of them and i will say THANK YOU. 

unfortunately i will also have to decline.

the fact that it took this much effort, social media backlash, and discussion to let me simply EXIST PHYSICALLY in a way that is authentic to myself is not a good sign. if this organization immediately questions an authors chosen presentation in this manner, i cannot imagine what my other accommodations would be met with.

sometimes i am at an event and i very quickly need extra space to breathe. sometimes i am at an event and i need special guides to help me along from place to place. these are not ‘big asks’ and every other conference has gladly provided them, but if the TXLA had this kind of initial reaction to my physical appearance, i cannot imagine them readily helping with my other needs without ‘proof’.

this is clearly not a safe place to trot for those who require additional accommodations. regardless of any apology, their ACTIONS have shown that people who appear unusual or unique are not welcome at this event on a subconscious level. i believe the TXLA have some serious inner work to do beyond this apology, and i believe this inner work will involve actions more than words.

but even more importantly i would like to make this very important point: IT DOES NOT MATTER IF MY MASK IS A DISABILITY AID OR NOT. i appreciate the way this discussion has allowed us to trot out some deep talks on autism and proved love in this way, but i think there is a much more important point at hand.

regardless of WHAT someone looks like, it is not the job of an event or conference to pick apart WHY. physical presentation can be a part of someones neurodivergence, or gender, or sexuality, but i can also just exist as a nebulous undefined part of their inner self. it can be a piece they are not ready to openly discuss yet. the guests at TXLA are authors (aka ARTISTS) and the idea that a conference dedicated to an ART is going to deny people with unique and unusual presentations for ANY reason is absurd. since when are we applying a ‘dress code’ to our artists?

without knowing it, i personally believe there is an element of the ‘good queer, bad queer’ phenomenon going on here. there is a push to say ‘LOOK we accept these marginalized groups and cultures’ but behind the scenes that means ‘we accept these marginalized groups and cultures who are quiet and speak in turn and wear the metaphorical suit and tie’. it is easy to show diversity when you only take on the voices that arent too ‘strange’.

to prove my point i ask you this: do you think orville peck would have FOR ONE SECOND been asked to perform at the texas library association event without his mask?

so with that i say ‘very sincerely, thank you, but i will have to decline the re-invitation. maybe next year’

[clockwayswrites]

Birb in a box Part 14

masterpost

By Thursday Danny was feeling much more human, or at least closer to human as he ever felt. Had tonight been anything more active than sitting in a seat and watching a ballet, Danny would have had to beg off. He figured this much he could manage. Besides, pushing it a little so not as to disappoint Cass on her big night was worth it. She was a sweet girl and Danny had the feeling that she could use more people celebrating her.

Not that Danny expected to actually see Cass that night beyond her time on the stage.

Still, Danny figured he should at least look the part of a ballet patron and dug the cobalt blue suit that he had gotten for Jazz’s wedding out of its bag in the back of his closet. He might as well be presentable, even if his hair never quite behaved. He kept it much shorter now, mostly so that it was out of the way, and hoped that tonight a shower and some hair gel would be enough. At least the little start shaped sapphire studs Tucker and Sam had gotten him for passing his dissertation looked good. (Bless his piercings never seeming to close fully up.)

A quick pat of his coat pockets to make sure he had everything and Danny was off. Gotham was thankfully quiet that night— or as quiet as Gotham ever was— and Danny even managed to catch an earlier connecting train. It left him enough time for a leisurely walk to the the opera house.

The lobby of the grand building was buzzing with excited patrons that Danny did his best to slip through. He really just wanted to find his seat. Which was apparently was upstairs and all the way down a hall that became narrower than expected as he continued. There was another ticket check, which Danny thought as odd until he realized as he passed by an open curtain that these were the theater’s box seats.

Which was odd.

Danny glanced down at his phone. Was he in the wrong place?

“Ah, Danny, I see you found us alright.”

Apparently not, because that was definitely Bruce Wayne’s voice. Yep, and that was Bruce Wayne himself, looking far too handsome in a deep grey suit. Danny really hoped he wasn’t blushing because damn did the man cut a dashing figure. A little part of Danny wanted to reach out and run his fingers across one of those impressively broad shoulders.

“I did,” Danny said, head ducked down slightly as he rubbed at the back of his neck. “Though honestly, I didn’t expect this to be what you meant when you offered to get the ticket for me. I don’t mean to intrude on your family.”

Bruce chuckled and Danny felt he might melt a little. “Nonsense. It will be a relief to have another adult around.”

“Hey, some of us are adults!” Someone from in the booth said. A moment later Dick Grayson appeared with a large smile and wearing a suit that was the brightest magenta that Danny had ever seen.

“That remains to be seen,” Bruce said dryly, though his mouth was quirked in a smile.

His son ignored him.

“Hi, I’m Dick Grayson, Bruce’s oldest and totally an adult,” Dick said, offering his hand. “Bruce was practically a teen dad when he adopted me.”

“Please don’t spread rumors like that,” Bruce said with the long suffering sigh of a tired father.

“Luckily, I think it’s all pretty easy to fact check,” Danny said before he thought better of it and shook the offered hand. “Nice to meet you Dick, I’m Danny Fenton.”

“It’s good to meet you. I think Cass really liked meeting someone who could sign with her just out in the wild.”

“I just wish I wasn’t so rusty,” Danny said, feeling mildly embarrassed at the praise over his poor skills. “I’ll have to brush up on some things.”

“I’m sure that would mean a lot to her,” Bruce replied. “The family knows how to sign, of course, but sadly she isn’t so lucky mostly places. It’s nice for her to have others to talk to on days where her voice isn’t around.”

“I can only imagine. I wish that it was taught in schools. You’d think with all the advancement and proof of concept with baby sign language they would—” He cut himself off with a flustered little laugh. “Sorry, my sister is a behavioral psychiatrist with a two year old daughter. I get to hear a lot about things like baby sign language and color perception and the stages of personality growth.”

Luckily Bruce just laughed and motioned for Danny to enter the box. “A stage I’ve sadly missed with all my children. So your sister is another doctor Fenton in the family?”

“Fourth, actually. Both my parents are also Doctor Fentons. It’s five if you count my sister-in-law, but she kept her last name for publication reasons. I guess you looked me up if you know about my phd?” Danny wasn’t offended at that. If he had a daughter who befriended a random older man at work, he would sure as hell look them up too.

Bruce, however, smiled apologetically. “I asked Lucius about you. You’ve made quite an impression on him. He’s promised to have my head on a platter if I, or my horde of children, do anything to drive you away.”

Danny laughed at that and gratefully sunk into the seat that Bruce indicated. He was starting to feel the walk here now. “Knowing Lucius, he’d get it too. I think he always gets his way eventually, at least if my work-life balance has anything to say about it.”

“Not good at that?” Dick asked.

He sat down catty-corner to Danny. Danny turned carefully to look at him, ignoring the twinge in his back as best as he could. Danny would have shrugged if he thought he could have.

“Classic engineer with ADHD problems. I can lose track of time a little too easily.” Danny glanced to Bruce with a wry little smile. “Apparently WE is big on us not spending all our time at work.”

“Not really,” Bruce said with a little quirked smile. “You all work hard, but work shouldn’t be everything. It’s something that I’ve had to learn myself.”

“No kidding,” Dick said.

Bruce gave a little snort. “As if you aren’t as bad as I am.”

Dick just smiled serenely at his father before turning back to Danny. “No one for you to go home to then? No partner or pets?”

“Just too many plants,” Danny admitted. “One of my oldest friends is a botanist doing medical research and every time I see her I end up with another one. They’ve sort of taken over my apartment now that I’ve been in one place for a few years. Some of them are drama queens about getting watered, but I have a little system rigged up for the really thirsty ones. It helps if I need to be away for more than a day or two. And that is probably way more about my plants than you needed or wanted to know. Sorry.”

Bruce’s low rumble of a chuckle felt like it settled warmly in Danny’s chest. There was no way that he wasn’t blushing a least a bit now.

Why was Bruce affecting him so much? Yes, it had been a rather long time since Danny had been on a date much less more. Yes, Bruce was Gotham’s eternal most handsome bachelor, which wow does the city have that right. Yes, other than a handshake, Danny hadn’t touched another human since waking up in the still so weird cuddle pile of superheroes. Yes to all that, but really, Danny should not be blushing like a he was still in his twenties at a chuckle.

“It sounds to me like your friend picked the right person to give plants to. It’s obvious that you care for them,” Bruce said with a soft smile that Danny tried not to look at.

Danny glanced out over the edge of the balcony and down into the crowd. “Ah, well, I try. They’re living things, you know? They deserve the best chance I can reasonably give them.”

“A very nice way to look at it. I—”

“Shit,” Dick said suddenly, softly, and with conviction.

Danny twisted around quickly to look back at Dick, wincing as his back vehemently protested the motion.

“Sorry,” Dick said quickly. “It’s just that it seems the elevator is down so Babs won’t be able to make it up here.”

“It’s down?” Bruce asked with a confused frown.

“Apparently. I’m going to go sit down on the ground floor with her,” Dick said. He tucked his phone into his coat as he stood. “Sorry for bailing on you, Danny. It was nice to meet you.”

“No, go, spare yourself anymore plant talk,” Danny joked at his own expense.

“If any of the others aren’t too settled, I’ll send them up,” Dick said to his father. “But you know how they are.”

“All too well,” Bruce said dryly.

Dick squeezed Bruce’s shoulder and vanished back through the curtain.

---

AN: This part had me real caught up for some reason, but hopefully it's all good (enough) now!

[yeyinde]

the soft blue of a pale moon | Yautja x f!Reader

He keeps his claws fixed against the scruff of your neck. Forcing you down, bowed on your knees with your face tucked tight against his massive thigh, breathing in the stale scent of him. Even through the foreignness of it—the sharp burn of oxidising iron, rusted metal, and old, rotting blood—he smells good. Intoxicating. It makes you dizzy. Makes you greedy. For something. Survival, maybe. That instinctual drive, self-preservation, needling in your hindbrain to keep you alive.  Despite your reticence, you angle your chin up, glaring at this creature, this beast. This Cimmerian god of old. Stygian king in his throne of bones, his pretty pet, his plaything, supplicant by his side. You won't ever submit. Ever. 

warnings: noncon/dubcon. captive reader. predator/prey. forced submission. noncon D/s dynamics. forced mating. rough sex/violent sex. broken bones. belly bulge. biting. size difference. mentions of violence. scent kink (slight). marking/scarring (territorially, possessively). alien biology. alien genitalia. female presenting reader (female anatomy).

Yautja terms:Kainde Amedha — hard meat (refers primarily to xenomorphs)

Ooman — human

this is basically a Dark (from the 2010 avp video game lmao) x Reader fic. Yautja is not an OC. but you don't need to know anything at all from the game to read this.

lore:

comics, novels. divine wisdom.

The bed of furs is soft beneath you.

It's an odd juxtaposition compared to the uncanny harshness of the room you've been left in (held captive for days, weeks, months—) with its severe lines and its stark, unfamiliar geometry. The walls stained a strange, unearthly colour of brownish-gold, towering high into a domed ceiling etched with symbols and runes you've yet to decode. Ones you know you never will.

This whole place is otherworldly. Seemingly beyond the scope of science fiction, or what your meagre imagination can dream up. Reality. Fantasy. The two blend together to form this archaic, rustic interior that's somehow far too futuristic for your mind to understand, and yet shaded in use, in age. Space dust. Caught between old and new—new: unknown, unknowable—and utterly mesmerising despite the garishness of what lies outside beyond the edge of the pelts you rest on. 

Adorning the walls are an uncountable number of skulls and bleached white bones. Weaving spines strung up. Spindly, alien vertebrae. Fantastical creatures. Mythological beasts. It's something only the most inspired minds can conjure—

And yet, it all sits within reach. 

(The human skull on the wall, still attached to its spine, is perched over your head like an omen—)

You tear your gaze away from it, sliding over the trophies immortalised in a shrine dedicated to the prowess of the being who took you. An alien. Yautja, you’ve come to learn. Predatory hunters who roam the galaxies in search of the best prey. A race made of warriors with a strict honour code. 

Though—

You don’t know how honourable keeping captives are to their society, but none of the other massive beings had tried to intervene when he had taken you on the ship, hauled over his shoulder like a conquest, beating furious fists into his broad back. They stood back, chittering to themselves in what you know is laughter. Mocking clicks. Low trills. They thought it all so funny, outlandishly so, to see him stalk through the thick haze of fog that blanketed the ground with a yowling ooman clawing futilely at his back. 

(As if your weak, feeble fists could ever hope to maim, to hurt—)

You don't know why he decided to take you. Even now, aeons later as you pass by an unfathomable number of solar systems, all glimmering like crushed gems just beyond the domed window above your bed, you have no idea what brought this on. What made him look at you, and think—

Pet (mine). 

And it's not for a lack of trying, either. But trying to prise anything out of him is near impossible. Chiselling for gold with a plastic spoon. 

It leaves you with only one other villain in this story, and you very readily blame Weyland-Yutani for this mess—dig deeper, explore faster, mine harder—but yourself, more so, for signing your name on the dotted line in the first place. You knew it was a terrible idea from the beginning. Not too many planets are truly desolate these days. Not with those things, xenomorphs, roaming the solar system unhindered. 

Nothing good ever comes from meeting them. Death, inevitably, follows. 

Though, comparatively, you'd rather be sprawled out—naked, collared—on a bed of strange, soft fur than being used as a breeding sow for a race of parasitic monsters hellbent on devouring the galaxy. 

Panic is white hot, electric. The thought alone makes you lash out, a paroxysm of pure adrenaline, fear. Your hand flies to your chest instantly. Fingers knotting between your heaving breasts, feeling around for any movement under your skin. A beat. Several. All erratic. Thumping harshly against your ribcage. And—

Nothing. Just the erratic flutter of your heart, bragging senselessly in your chest. 

(stupid thing—)

Of course. Of course. 

Out of everyone on the ill-fated expedition, somehow only you survived. Holed up in the armoury, listening to those serpentine creatures tear into the flimsy metal of your ship. Taking out the ones who managed to sneak in with a well-placed shot to their domed heads. Hiding in a corner waiting for them to find you, wondering if the last few bullets should be used on them or yourself. 

It was days of that. Of piling these awful monsters high, and hoping the corrosive blood didn't ruin the hull to make an opening wide enough for them all to pour in, overwhelming you with your dwindling ammo. 

Breathing in ragged breaths, all the while listening to the hisses skirting across metal, grazing talons down your skull. They liked to taunt you, a fact that nearly drove you to the brink when all the meandering words uttered around about their hive-like simplicity, their insectoid stupidity, fell apart. These creatures are deadly, cunning. 

And smart.

They adapted easily to your patterns, overcoming your bullets and your patchwork ingenuity with ease. The only thing that kept them at bay was the metal being too thick to penetrate with their claws. 

(And you watched, helplessly, as they realised this after the second week, and sacrificed the smaller drones to splash their corrosive blood across the thickened alloy, melting it slowly down to nothing—)

They would have gotten you soon enough. 

Had to, really. Because the Queen was waiting. You heard her hisses in your head. Felt her in the air, disturbed and agitated, around you. Pulsing like a heartbeat. Hammering against your resolve with each nightmare she pressed into the folds of your subconsciousness. Luring you to her. Showing you the wonders of giving in, granting her access. 

Coming home—

You don’t know how anyone could withstand her influence. The siren’s call from down the hall, showing you image after image of her children curling protectively over you. Nestled in a tight embrace. Safe and sound from the howling winds and the scorching sun, from the awful hisses outside, and the horrific sound of metal giving way, melting into a puddle on the floor. 

It was madness. One you wanted nothing more than to give into—

And then they came. 

Appearing out of thin air just as your bullet pierced her jaw when she finally came for you, her child—

She fell, taking out several of the others with her—ones not on your list of alien species to look out for—and left behind nothing but a passel of intimidating creatures and you. 

He, their leader, was the first to find you. Grabbing you by the scruff of your neck like a misbehaving kitten, and pulling you close. Taking stock, you think, of the bodies behind you and the holes in the Queen made from your gun. 

An uneasy, stifling silence fell, broken by a series of drawn-out, low clicks. 

You realised then, right as he bent down and tore the claw off of a dead xenomorph, what these beings were. Hunters. Predators. It was rare to see them on earth, but you’d heard of several run-ins with these creatures whenever humans decided to mettle with their preferred prey. 

It was even rarer that any human survived the encounter. 

He cocked his head to the side before pressing the bloody tip to your cheek, branding you with the mark of the blooded. One that matched his own. Purposefully done, of course. 

His crest on your skin, unique as a thumbprint, is the loudest proclamation of his claim. Anyone from any number of clans that roam the heavens in search of prey, of hard meat, know, immediately, that you belong to him. That you bear his mark, branded with the scar of his respect. 

(Respect—such a weighty thing to carry across your shoulders, too. Something you'd been eager to obtain, hungering for it all your life. And now—

The blunt, almost suffocating heft of it feels permanent in a way you can't even begin to unravel.)

He'd taken you, then. Despite thinking of humans as soft meat, cattle, he'd thrown you over his shoulder and marched you to his quarters where he stripped the xenomorphs of their skin, and hung their bones on the wall—your trophies. Sat next to his own. A bold display. A show of respect, however rare—and unwanted. 

And then he'd stared at you through the black slits in his horned mask. Just watching. Studying. It took a great deal of composure not to weep. To beg for—

For something. 

Leniency, maybe. For whatever crimes you inadvertently perpetrated against them. For being here, of all places, because of the insatiable greed of Weyland-Yutani. 

For believing in them in the first place, maybe. Following, desperately, in the footsteps of your fallen idol. 

It never mattered much in the end, though. After a careful, blank scrutinisation, he'd simply reached down, talons digging painfully into your skin, and tossed you into the softest bed of furs—of pure, hedonistic luxury you'd ever felt—and followed you down with an inhuman growl that rattled through your bones. That seemed to echo throughout the ship, shaking the walls, and trembling through the floors.

The kicking and screaming never happened. Futility paints a desperate picture, doesn't it? And in those moments, now lost to time, you knew, somehow, that it was useless. Is useless. 

He wanted you. Him, the captain of this ship you've been left to rot inside of. The one who knows your language, but refuses to speak it. Preferring, instead, to let the guttural clicks and the chirring of his foreign, unspeakable mother tongue take precedence. 

The one who hunts, viciously, and wears his trophies around his neck. Strung up for all to see as they dangle across his broad, mottled chest. Black. Endlessly so. His colouring is shades darker than your own galactic canvas where midnight itself spills across satin, but the comparison itches in your chest, rotting along with your sickening heartbeat. 

And you think he knows this. Because despite his fury as he slashes his way through the oddest assortment of extraterrestrial creatures you've ever laid eyes upon, he's cunning. Smart. Adaptable. 

It's this, the strange, almost preternatural patience he exudes which keeps you where you lay now. The innate knowledge that he's a primal hunter, one who uses both instinct and a keen, calculative sense of awareness to ensnare his victims wholly, unquestionably. One who'd undoubtedly hunt you down to the very edges of the star system you escape into until you're bent down on both knees, supplicant to his prowess.

His little pet. 

And oh, how he luxuriates in it. This little moniker given to you by his clanmates seems to make him preen each time you hear the familiar, rasping click of their scornful mockery. 

Soft ooman. His ugly little trophy. 

He snaps his mandibles at them in response, but keeps his claws fixed against the scruff of your neck. Forcing you down, bowed on your knees with your face tucked tight against his massive thigh, breathing in the stale scent of him—ozone, leather, spice, and a potent musk of mildew and loam, humus; the stagnant waters of a swamp teeming with algae blooms. Even through the foreignness of it—the sharp burn of oxidising iron, rusted metal, and old, rotting blood—he smells good. Intoxicating. It makes you dizzy. Makes you greedy. For something. Survival, maybe. That instinctual drive, self-preservation, needling in your hindbrain to keep you alive. 

Despite your reticence, you angle your chin up, glaring at the creature, the beast. This Cimmerian god of old. Stygian king in his throne of bones. 

You won't ever submit. Ever.

But you can play the part—if only until he eases his grip, allowing you to slip away again. 

With a glower, you lay open kisses along the hard, leathery ridges of his black scute, chasing the oily tang of his musk on your tongue. 

The feel of your soft mouth makes his thighs tense—all firm, corded muscle; raw, primal power sheathed in a thick, aggregate pelt of marbled colours. It feels like warm stone under your fingers. Oiled leather. Crocodilian. 

His maw opens, and the sound that tumbles out is full of fractured syllables and inhuman chirrs, gutteral crepitate. It's not something your human tongue could ever expect to replicate, and your lips tug downward in a sharp frown, your displeasure at this game of his growing by the minute. His staunch refusal to speak your language despite clearly knowing it—and knowing it well—is aggrevating, if only for the sole reason that he kidnapped you. That you being here, listening to him, is not of your own free will. 

The scorn is thick on your tongue, the vitriolic rebuttal taking shape already, but he silences you when his thumb grazes your jaw. The air in your lungs tumbles out in a shudder when you feel the unnaturally soft, yet firm, skin of his palm slide around the back of your nape. 

The fight in you is numbed by the realisation that his hand alone spans the entire length of your shoulders, now curled possessively around your neck. Fingers overlapping, folding over each other easily into a perfect collar. 

His hand closing over your throat draws your eye to the ringed gorget he wears around his neck. 

The comparison makes you sick. 

The talons on his fingers are warm, powder-soft like the beak of a bird, when they tap against your throat as you swallow, thumb still stroking along the ridge of your jaw. It's shockingly intimate, and the humanness of it settles in your stomach like a sinking stone. Granite needling against soft tissue. Mercury bleeding into your guts. You hate it. 

Hate how much you don't hate it. 

The juxtaposition fills you with a fit of vicious anger. You don't want to seek comfort from this beast. 

Your gaze drops, resting churlishly on the thick skin of his belly. Despite the raw, indomitable strength that coils through his muscles, malleable obsidian, when he sits, the softness of his belly pudges out, jutting over the brass-coloured belt of his loincloth. 

It's—

Another marker of his uncanny likeness to the human form. 

But where you might have expected to see coarse hair, his lower belly is sparsely covered by a dense, thick cropping of quills trailing along his abdomen. They feel like softened polymer under your fingertips, but catch on your skin if you're not careful, the sharpened edge digging in. It's not as painful as the press of his nails, but itches like a thorn. Needles of a cactus. 

They stretch upward. Arching along in a perfect mockery of a happy trail that stretches to form a heavy bushel on his chest, small whiskers on his chin, his brow, dotted along the crest of his crown where his tresses fall. 

Dragging your gaze up this path leads you back to piercing amber set deep inside the bracket of his skull. They seem to glow, an unnatural light spilling out of their sockets, highlighting the rigid lines of his bones. 

He's watching you. Always. 

(You blame the rapid thud of your heart on fear.)

Knowing he has your attention now, he makes the noise again. Lower this time. A snarling rasp breaking apart between his flexing mandibles. The sound akin to the rumble of an avalanche; the roaring screams of a forest on fire. 

You have no hope of ever mimicking it—not without drinking down acid to corrode your vocal cords first. The anger that lashes through you is a whipcord cutting its tip against your resolve. 

“What are you saying? I don’t understand—”

His massive crown dips, mandibles clicking. His thumb presses into your skin. Intentional. Pointed. 

It's then you piece together that what he's saying isn't a command or a taunt, but rather his name. One you have no hope of ever repeating unless you want to turn your vocal cords into tatters, strips of unusable tissue. Wasting your words on his name is not something you think you would ever want to do. 

And so, you don't. 

Maybe it's to spite him. Or to put some semblance of distance between yourself and the alien holding you hostage, touching the skin of your neck with a soft sort of reverence you hadn't known he was capable of. Whatever the reason, you twist the ugliness inside of your chest, the rage and sorrow, into a brutal knife, wedging it into the scant space between your bodies, prying them apart in a shallow victory. 

He's a hideous thing, isn't he? This brute. 

Raw power. Untameable malice. All hidden under this pantomime of honour. How laughable, really, to think these beings know anything of the sort. Or maybe it's just him in particular. The outlier of the lot. One with a confounding obsession with ooman pets. 

Ugly, you think, staring up at him. With his sunken eyes, and his mane-like crown. His tusks clicking together in quiet pleasure, smug in his throne of metal and bone. 

Ugly, like the mossy green surface of a still swamp. Stagnant waters. A black lake. Shrouded by a dense, impenetrable cropping of weeping willows and mangroves. Shading the water so much that the algae blooms turn black like tar. 

Dark, like him. 

And so, you whisper it. Not his name, but this vindictive moniker you pieced together thinking of the lingering swamplands covered in moss and peat.

“Dark.”

In response, his nails rake over the back of your neck in both a warning, a reprimand; the same harsh touch used on an unruly cub by its mother. The comparison makes you bristle, hissing out a series of cruel jeers at him, but he barely pays it any mind, too busy chittering to himself now, humoured instead of insulted by this tangentially human name you've bestowed upon him. 

The juxtaposition, the humanness of it all, is almost too much. 

How can a creature that ripped a xenomorph’s jaw apart with his bare hands have these soft rolls along his midsection. Feel humour the same way your friends back home might have at your taunting barbs? 

The contrast is nearly comical. Sour. 

You don't like it when he's too human. When he scratches his warm talons along your nape absently. Thoughtless. A little twitch of his hand offering threadbare comfort in an unconscious whim. When he's tactile with you. Tensile. Gentle. Touching your skin with an exploratory sense of curiosity, of fondness. Laying you down on the furs with a tenderness that is at complete odds to the rough, demanding way he'll inevitably mate with you. 

Mate. Because your coupling is always animalistic. Brutal. There's no tenderness to be found when he presses you into the furs, rutting into you like a beast. Growling, snarling. Making you take, and take, and take until he's satiated—

But you think you like it that way. 

Especially when he's fresh off of a hunt. 

When he fucks you into the mattress with nothing but harrowing, inhuman roars spilling from deep within his heaving, blood-drenched chest. Guttural snarls. Harsh, demanding. Moulding your body to his liking. Grasping you in a crushing clutch, and drawing your aching hips back to swallow down the intense thickness of his cock as it buries deep—impossibly so—inside of you. 

You like him angry. Like him rough. It rents the moments when he's docile with you; bifurcating the peculiar sheen in his beady eyes when he lifts his mask off, placing it on the metal mantle with all the others, content to just stare at you. Looking, watching. Assessing. 

It's the unnatural stillness of his gaze that sets you on edge. The heavy, unerring way he takes you apart with nothing but deep amber drilling through your skin. 

Through because you've pieced enough together to know he can't see you the same way you can see him. That all the sharp angles of your features are hidden. The infinitesimal detailing lost to some wavelength your human eyes can't begin to take apart. 

He hides this weakness by touching you endlessly. Long, sharp talons dragging over the bridge of your nose. The dip in your chin, the angles of your jaw. The plumpness of your cheeks. 

He buries himself inside of you, and plays an exploratory game of committing your topography to memory with the soft, thick palms of his hands. Lets his long, rubbery tresses brush across your face as he sets a maddening pace that promises to one day snap your pelvis in half again, eyes glued to the centre of you where you burn the hottest. 

Between these moments is where you linger the longest. Oscillating between a pet or a mockery of a queen; supplicant to its owner, it's King. Head resting on a terribly massive thigh as he commandeers a ship that makes all the technological advancements of your home world seem rudimentary and crude. A child's rendition of a spaceship brought to life with broken crayons. Left there to bask in his prowess, his glory. Surrounded by artefacts and trophies of all his kills—but considerably lesser than the vastness of his quarters where he keeps his most prized possessions. 

Yourself included. Polished diamond perched on a satin pillow. 

One he keeps dressed up in armour, in plating; decorated in the traditional fabrics of his own kind—mesh netting that keeps you perfectly comfortable, acclimated to the unbearable swelter of their ship, the temperature almost too much for your fragile skin to handle; breastplates over your chest; a bronze loincloth with intricate webbing and a heavy belt to keep it in place. 

Adorned with pretty gems and metal bands around your neck, your arms. His mark on your skin. 

Belly bare, and offered no shoes. But this fact is not a pointed statement about your imprisonment or your status amongst them—it's just for the simple fact that he doesn't wear them, and so: neither should you. The axiom is so irrefutable, that the bare, gnomic revelation is almost obvious in hindsight. 

Obvious. In the same way a lightning strike is. Being torn to pieces for getting between a mother bear and her cubs. Falling off a cliff after dancing too close to the edge. Trying to swim in aerated water. 

Obvious. It's all so obvious, isn't it? 

You spend most of your days in this liminal labyrinth. Lost in your own mind as space flickers past the large window in front of you. Pinpricks of light in the distance of an endless, unfathomable black nothingness. Perched on the precipice of complacency and dread. Never knowing when he'll grow bored of this game, and turn you from a living emblem to a skull on his mantle like all the rest. 

If, of course, you're even worthy enough of a place there.

You just don't know. And that's the crux of it all. Not knowing. Kept on the brink. Shrouded in uncertainty. 

You'd think it intentional if you hadn't seen the way he preens under your stare sometimes. Flexing in his metal throne, showing off his array of scars; the trinkets he picked up on worlds unknown. The open, wanting way he regards you—this little human, barely a scrap of thing compared to him, to the sheer vastitude of his bulk. Hungry. Possessive. Always snapping his mandibles at the other Yautja who get too close, claws raking down flesh, spilling luminescent green blood across the floor. Injuring his own kind for attempting to touch you—

The King’s conquest. 

But his ire doesn't abate for you, either. You've learned the hard way what it means to try and flee from his grasp, and while it wasn't nearly as bloodied, as brutal, as it was for his kin, it was terrifying. 

You thought you were toeing the line before when you'd dig your human deep into his thickened hide as he kept you tucked to his side, on your knees for him; or when you tug so harshly at his tresses that green blood leaks from his skull and he howls in pain, but you realised then that you were wrong. That those little moments of mutiny were akin to foreplay to him. Small, inconsequential. Spilling his blood earned you marginal amounts of his respect, and he showed it by dumping you on his bed, and burying himself inside of you until you'd passed out into the furs. Overwhelmed. Punished. But it wasn't. You weren't being taught obedience by his hand, but rather getting a playful slap for your antics. 

He'd snatched you by your throat in an instant. His warm, soft palm enclosing over the fragile length of your neck with too much to spare for you to ever be comfortable. Long fingers overlapped across your nape, and he'd heaved you forward, slamming you into the hard plains of his body with a growl. Talons prickling into your skin, spilling blood down your back. He'd snarled so loud that the ship seemed to quiver, quaking under the sheer weight of his anger. 

Amber eyes drilled into you, widened with the fever of his fury, burying deep into your being. Your head wrenched side to side in a slow, agonising jolt as he assessed you. Taking stock of the silly pest that tried to run from him. That had the gall to slink off like an insect scurrying over his feet. Dishonourable.

This, though. 

Running from him—

Well.

In that moment, the air wrought with the metallic tang of his indomitable rage, you had thought: this was it. He was going to kill you. Flay your skin from muscle, and hang you in the rafters for the rest to gawk at. Easy prey. A fickle kill. 

And with everything you'd gleaned about this strange tribe and their odd customs, it would have been a mercy. 

But he didn't. 

Doesn't. 

His mandibles flare open, stretching out wide across his boxy jaw. The pinpricks of his teeth gleam in the hazy, saturated light of the ship; white, jagged peaks against fluttering, angry red. It shudders as he growls. The decibels pitched low, unfathomably so. You catch the spear of it rattling through his body, the rasping snark bellowing from the depths of his chest, and shaking the air around you. You can feel it reverberate from his flesh, the tight grip he has on you a conduit funnelling his anger straight into the middle of your throat. 

It reminds you of a territorial crocodile bellowing in the shallow water, making it vibrate and splash around him as the shattering frequency ripples outward. 

It's terrifying. Electric.

You feel it rattle through your bones. Feel the ripples trembling through your flesh. 

It's primal, this fear. Animal. 

But in the end, he doesn't kill you. 

You're simply tossed over his shoulder like a rowdy, misbehaving pest, and taken back to his room, much to the amusement of his gathering tribemates peeking out of their room to see their leader tend to his wilful, misbehaving pet. He strips you of your armour with a careless, almost cruel disregard before pushing you back on the bed. There's a rigid line to his shoulders you'd never seen before; a damning flex to his jaws that make you shake, quivering in fear. 

You know better than to speak, to beg. All it gets you in the end is a mocking series of clicks that you know enough to recognise as laughter. Instead, you take your punishment with your chin in the air, unwilling to submit the way he so clearly wants you to. 

Your supercilious scorn has his mandibles widening in anger once again, and he exercises his control by shoving you face-first into the bed, and burying his tusks into the meat of your shoulder, keeping you still under him. 

It's a clear warning. Move, it says, and his tusks will catch on your spine and rip it clean from your back. You still. Quiet. A prey animal lying prone, unmoving, at the feet of a chuffing predator as he mounts you from behind, rutting into you with a savagery that renders you into nothing more than a ruined heap under his bulk. 

For your attempted escape, you end up with more of his scars on your body, indents in the shape of his flared mandibles on your shoulders, and a fractured pelvis. It could be worse. You could've died. 

Should have, maybe. 

(is that a plea? an orison? 

and if so, why is it drenched in misery?)

And there is something vicious about the way he tends to your broken bones after, plunging the needle into your skin despite your howling, or the way you thrash. It's pure agony. The sensation how you imagine it must feel to be burned alive from the inside out. 

That, you think, is why he has no qualms about leaving you alone now. Wandering off, chasing trophies and honour on a planet just outside of the domed window above your bed. A vicious, red world tidally locked around a small dwarf. One half shrouded endlessly in black while the other burns, charred from the intensity of its star. In the middle, you know, is a small strip. A habitable zone, if only just. 

It's a place where a large, lumbering predator roams. One with towering antlers akin to the moose on earth, and jagged, spiked teeth protruding from its maw. The length is too much like a Sabre-toothed tiger for you to ever want to meet it face-to-face in the dark. 

Proper prey. A worthy trophy, they consider it. 

And, from the chittering you picked up, it seems that xenomorphs—kainde amedha—have found this place as well. 

The thought of them down there—spreading, growing, infecting—fills you with a potent sense of dread, one that gnaws on your insides with serrated teeth. Vicious and ugly, it lingers in crevasses where it pokes and prods at your fear, and your worries, until they split open, leaking putrid rot all over. 

It’s not that you’re worried about him. Not at all. 

(despite the nagging in your chest that whispers you’re a liar when you press your face into his side of the lavish bed of furs, greedily inhaling as much of his lingering musk as you can—)

He's gone off on hunts many times since you've been taken, and most of them end up on worlds already broken apart, infested, by those parasites. 

The notable difference is that brushes with them in the past never incurred much worry from you. If anything, you think you rather preferred it. Enjoyed the respite that came when he was gone, giving you a meagre ounce of freedom to think about all the (futile) ways you could escape. 

And mostly waiting. Waiting for someone at Weyland-Yutani to notice the glaring absence of one of their engineers. 

How laughable, really. Its echo is a false prophet whispering poison into your head, telling you that things will be over soon, that the higher-ups care less about profit margins than a whole fleet that went missing under garish circumstances on a planet you're soon beginning to think you never should have been sent to at all. 

Saves money on wages, you suppose. And the expense of sending a rescue fleet in to investigate costs more than your yearly salary. 

The bold, unignorable truth in that is a cruel, twisting knife to your agency. To the lingering remnants of your humanity, and worst of all, your hope. 

No one is coming. You've known this for a while now. The toxic hisses are part of the reason why you decided to try your luck on a massive, earth-like planet the first (and only) time you've tried to run. Because without that, without this fraudulent hope, what else are you left with if not him?

And now—

It's been an uncountable number of days. Weeks. 

Time in interstellar orbit is inconsequential. The beings themselves—yautja, you remember him hissing; garbled words mangled in his throat, and feel the burn in yours when you try to echo it in his tongue—have no reason to keep time, it seems. And even if they did, it's doubtful you would be able to interpret its abstract meaning. 

But even without traditional clocks or human measures and scales of time, you know that he's been gone much longer than before. Agitation seems to simmer in the air. The yautja—unblooded younglings; juveniles in their comparably archaic youth—that come to deliver your food seem—

Restless. 

Their maskless faces whisked in agitation. Shoulders set in a tense line. Eyes skewed toward the vast windows of the mothership, fraught with an eager sort of intensity. 

You know, first-hand, how brutal their hierarchy tends to be, and have seen Dark use a brute, savage dominance over the younger, disrespectful, ones who ignored his warning in the past. The amalgamation, then, of their excitement and their uncertainty screams one thing: 

he should have been back by now. 

And it—

It does something to you. 

Changes things, maybe. Skews your perspective. 

Because the reality is this: 

As much as you hate your circumstances, you're under no compunction that Dark isn't the sole reason you've been left, untouched, for so long. Why you're allowed to stay alive; to linger in his shadow, trailing after him like a lost dog. And you're barely certain that Dark won't turn around and kill you when the whim strikes him, much less his compatriots. His clanmates. 

It leaves two brutal truisms for you to contend with: that you need him; and that without him, you're dead. 

In that, you find there's almost too much to think about. 

So—

You lean back, staring up at the pale blue moons outside of your prison, and think of nothing because if you can't see the pendulum, if you don't stare down into the maw of the pit, then you can pretend neither are really there at all. 

You wake from a restless slumber to the door opening with a mechanised whirr, the rasp of heavy metals sliding against each other filling the air. A plume of thick fog billows up in response, shrouding the entrance in dense white. 

The cloud conceals their identity, but it doesn't matter much. No one has access to these chambers. No one but him. 

The long, sharpened talons on his toes clink against the floor as he approaches. Each footfall makes your heart jump, scattering in a strange, off-kilter rhythm. 

Through the fog, he appears. Battleworn, and filthy. Splotches of dulled green blood cover his body from head (where you note a few tresses have been ripped off, some at the crown where a pock gapes open, deep forest green, and others at the ends) to toe. The majority of it is covered in the low, angry light of the glowing metal, the colour of molten rock. It's shielded from your prying eyes as he moves forward, strides purposeful as he lugs his wares over the threshold. 

He comes to a stop at the foot of the bed, broad chest heaving with each breath he takes through the mask still on his face. You take stock of him as he stills, cataloguing each change to his appearance now—a new scar down the length of his chest, blistered and scabbed over from the healing salve they carry on their hunts. Part of it is hidden under a thick patch of burnt skin. The splatter whipping over his lower belly, and raising the toughened skin up half an inch. 

The infliction of both are immediately recognizable in their unmistakable pattern. 

The slash of a xenomorph’s claw ripping through skin, shredding through it like paper; and the jagged, rough burn of their blood as it rained down, unhinged, on bare flesh. 

He fought quite the battle, you note, and pretend the rapidness of your breath doesn't reek of relief. 

His hard-earned victory sits in his hands. 

The skull of a queen. 

The sickly white already polished and primed, ready for its place on his mantle. It should be there already. Should have been his first stop. Per tradition. 

But he breaks it by standing before you now, covered in grime and dried blood. Reeking of stale sweat. Of rot. And holding his wares in his hand for you to see. To take note of. He waits even though you know it costs him a great deal of effort to stand here, beaten, bruised, scarred, burnt as he is. Half of it is the same, undeniable stubbornness that they all seem to inherit; a weaponised sense of pride. The other—

Well.

The significance of this moment, of this break in a sacred routine, isn't lost on you, despite your best efforts to pretend otherwise. As much as you want to ignore it, it itches behind your ribs, pulsing like an infectious wound. 

It's only when he sways slightly in exhaustion, the movement almost indiscernible if you hadn't been watching him so intently, do you release him from this strange moment. Bowing your head down in quiet, muted submission; a reverent surrender to his indomitable prowess. 

This gentle, almost desultory yielding doesn't seem to click at first. He tilts his head down slightly, gazing at you through the black slits in his mask, seemingly uncomprehending as he takes in the sight of you—this errant little human who caused him nothing but trouble, offered nothing but mocking respect—bowing down to him after an indefinite time fighting to free yourself from under his thumb. 

Until—

It does. 

The massive, bleached skull of the queen is shoved in the air in a sudden chirr, pitched to the ceiling as he stomps his feet on the ground in an effort to widen his stance. Knees bent, he throws his head back, and lets out a ravenous, blood-curdling roar of victory. 

It bludgeons into you. The force of it winding when it hits, bruising along your skin in a throbbing ache. 

This doesn't so much as feel like toppling over the precipice, but already being caught in an unstoppable freefall. 

(one you're not sure will be an indefinite fall to the stagnation, stasis; or will send you crashing down to the jagged rock at the bottom of this vertiginous drop. 

the one thing you are certain of is this:

it's much too late to go back when you've already lept off the edge.)

—and so, the pit it is.

His thumbs pitch under the board curve of his mask, grazing the soft underside of his boxed chin. Carefully, he lays down a single finger at a time, resting it against the smooth surface before slowly lifting it off his face. 

When the humid air hits his flesh, his mandibles flare out. Flexing. An unconscious response, you now know, after being folded against his mouth to fit inside the helmet for so long. Joints aching. Muscles hinged with disuse. 

It's with this motion that you notice the absence of his left, lower mandible. The stump a mangled mess of cauterised flesh. It's ugly. Atrocious, even. The scars crisscrossing against moulted skin of pale amber and black are a harrowing emerald smear, an awful amalgamation of dried blood and gnarled tissue. 

The shock of it is dulled under the weight of his success, and it's then that you know you're too far gone to ever go back. Where there should be pity, and—shamefully—disgust, all you feel is an overwhelming sense of borrowed pride. Chiselled from the staunch set of his shoulders, the flex of his muscles, as he openly preens under your stare. Angling his chin downward, giving you a better glimpse of his battle scars. A hard-earned victory. 

A queen is no easy feat, after all. 

His eyes find yours in blood-red gloom. Burning amber, chiselled into the canyons of his unique, unmistakable topography, seems to drill, intensely, into you. They stray, travelling down the length of your nude body, barely covered by the pelts of his conquests. 

You spare a thought to the idea that seeing you this way, wearing nothing at all but his kills, is what makes his broad chest expand suddenly, shoulders pulling back as he preens. Puffing his plumage in a heady pride, a deep satisfaction that runs bone deep. 

Waiting for him, you think. Dressed only in the hide he skinned with his bare hands. 

He rumbles suddenly. Bellowing out a low, steady growl between his sharpened teeth. This noise is unlike anything you'd ever heard before—deep, unfathomably so; but hollow. It echoes, reverberating from his chest in a timorous pitch. 

You could almost mistake it for a leonine pur. 

He stalks towards you, and each step ignites a war within you. The urge to flee from this predator is fierce. Instinctual. It burns through you with a vicious force, but in that rippling intensity, kindling burns in the scorch marks left behind. 

Just as potent as the urge to run is, the want, the desire, to roll over and submit to this massive, powerful creature rages, blistering through you. 

But you force yourself to stay still. To wait as he moves, seamlessly, to you. Lighter now that he's stripped himself of the wrist gauntlets, the cannon mounted to his shoulder, his trophies, his kills—the dangling skulls from around his neck, and waist. The belt and loincloth were the first to go, freeing himself to display his immodesty, completely at ease in his own nudity. The thermal netting peeled off next, and dropped into a pile by his mantle. The chill—if a near-constant swelter could ever be considered such a thing—made his jaws flare out in the only sign of discomfort he would ever give, flexing under the slow acclimation to this balmy heat that clings to air. 

The heat, though—

Such a relentless thing. 

You feel the humidity burn through you as he walks, unashamedly bare, to you. An incredible length of skin unveiled for your prying eyes, glinting a devastating obsidian in the pale luminescence of the locked moons just outside the window. 

In this sparse light that trickles in, you let yourself grow bold, greedy, for the fill of him, and let your gaze trail down the pockets of quills dropping down his chest, his belly, until you meet the thick thatch on his groin. It's here where your breath catches. Hitching loudly in your throat as he comes to a standstill within your reach. 

As human as he sometimes appears—usually in the most inopportune times—you can't deny the obviousness in his extraterrestrial anatomy compared to yours, to human morphology. Birdbeak warm claws, tusk tips on mandibles, leathery skin connected through a series of irregular polygonal shapes in mossy black and blazing amber, baleen teeth sharpened to needlepoints—you would be remiss to think him human in anything other than silhouette. 

But arguably, the biggest shock (outside of his maw) is, of course, his cock. 

Softened, it's kept tucked away inside of a slightly bulging cloaca shaded in the same dark green hue as his outer arms, back, and legs. A dense cluster of quills sit in a thatch around it, protruding near his black, pebbled scute. It's firmer than you'd expected it to be, but softens near the opening where his cock emerges, intimidatingly long, thick. The fattened length of him, too, is foreign. 

The end tapers into a fleshy point. Along his shaft are barbs, small ridges that resemble the scute covering his body, if only softer. The reminder of them makes you tremble, skin heating. Feverish. It's indescribable, really. The way they drag along your sensitive flesh on the outstroke, the sensation dizzying. 

Covering his flesh is an oily, slick substance, and it's really only this natural lubricant that even allows taking the full length of him inside of you possible. The sheen of it glints in the light when he flexes his muscles, and steps closer to the bed, smearing slick against his thighs. Your mouth waters, flooding with the veracity of your insatiable want.  

(You hate him. Hate him. Want so him so badly that it feels like you're burning from the inside out—)

The push-pull of your submission, still at war with your innate sense of self, dims, quieting when he reaches the edge of the bed, cock in full view. The jut of it, now fully extended from his sheath, hangs, heavy and thick, between his legs, bobbing with his movements, twitching in his growing excitement. Prespend, slightly more watery in texture compared to a human man, gathers at the opening, dripping down to the floor beneath his feet. A long, pearlescent strand clings from his weeping slit, dropping to land on the flesh near his knee. 

The sight of it shouldn't be as sinful as it is—you’ve yet to find god amongst the stars and you doubt, very much, you ever will—but seeing the thick glob of his desire spill, leaking steadily from his twitching cock, fills you with a heady sense of want. Desire. 

He hasn't touched himself at all. Content, almost, to stare at you, head cocking to the side as his beady amber eyes drill into your lower belly, fixed on the spot where you burn the hottest. The heat signature you give off, blistering; red-hot, is probably the biggest appeal to a creature like him who sees in shades of yellows and reds. The mismatch of your complexion, the nude state of your body, is inconsequential to him when at your core, you're molten. And all for him. 

He knows this, too. Knows your body well enough to see the unmistakable burn of your desire. Your desperation. The slick growing between your parted thighs turns into a heavy, hot flood; pulsing full of electricity. The depth of your need grows increasingly uncomfortable the longer he waits, watching. You want him. Want this massive beast who stole you away, who held you down and made you take him, made you submit. 

And he wants you back. This Stygian king cut from ashlar, limned in shadows, wants you just as much—if not more. Went out of his way to burrow past your pitiful defences to bury himself as deeply as he could, rearranging your humanity into a likeness of his image; branding you with his mark, dressing you in clothes tailor-made to fit. Giving you the gift of his prowess—bones, skulls: trophies from the most fearsome predators in the galaxy left at your altar—in this mating dance, this outré ritual. 

His desire for you is overwhelming. Dangerous. Your hips twinge at the reminder of when he exercised his punishment, exiguous as it was compared to his sheer strength, smarting with the phantom burn of fractured bones as he gave in, infinitesimally, to this voracious yearning that smoulders, a constant ember, in the sunken depths of his eyes. 

Something surges through you at the thought of him holding back as much as he has, at the way he thickens just at the sight of your blood red need. It's a strange amalgamating of animalism (pure, unquantifiable primalism, bestial in its savagery; feral), and a heightened degree of pride—the sort that leaves you feeling godlike, peerless: transcendent, in the very essence of the word. 

He wants you. You. 

And in that, the vestiges of your control cessate. 

Submission, you find, feels too much like finding sanctuary amidst a raging wildfire.

In response, he trills. The thundering bellow vibrates through the air. An unmistakable pur of a beast successfully conquering its mate. 

He moves—soundless and surprisingly agile for such a mountainous creature; prodigious down to his every atom—and makes a slow, aching crawl to meet you on the bed. His knees, the size of your skull, press down first, making the basin of fur dip under the enormity of his heft. Encompassed in his shadow even with him kneeling before you, it makes the absurdity in your sizes more pronounced. Thighs thicker than the trunks of fir trees. Arms the width of your legs. His chest is the span of your own, just duplicated thrice. 

Dark is a beastly thing up close. 

There's a thrum in your throat; a heady pulse, throbbing with adrenaline cut by dormant fear. As if sensing death so close by, an atavistic caterwaul begins in your hindbrain, screaming at you to run, roll over, submit, play dead—the flickering of these prey responses an instinctual deluge that you quell, half-heartedly, with the knowledge that there's nowhere to go. Nowhere to run. 

He'll find you. Even if he has to hear the star system apart to do it. 

As if omnipotent to these weeping tendrils of animal fear, his broad chest trembles as he lets out a shallow pur. A softened bellow. The growl of a prowling cat on the Savannah. 

You shiver, fisting the fur in your slick palms until it bulges up between whitening knuckles. 

“Please,” is all you say, and you don't even know if this particular word registers to him at all. He never responded in the past to it (or stop, don't, no) outside of the rare occasion when he kept his helmet on, and mocked you with the garbled mimicry as he buried himself as deep inside of you as he could go. 

This time, though, his mandibles twitch. His maw gapes open, displaying an egregious set of terrifying teeth, and the flutter of his throat grows, undulating in jerking pulses of flesh, sliding over each other until—

Puh–le’e–suh—

It's butchered beyond recognition. Maimed in the flex of his corded, baleen throat. But the intention is there, and the implication more so. 

He spoke. 

And it's a broken, devastating mockery of your mother tongue, but the force of it all is a blow, a bludgeon unlike anything you'd ever felt. 

A whirlwind of emotions rage through you, all congealing into a muddled, indiscernible mess. It slips through your fingers, featherlight, but he doesn’t give you a moment to gather them together between your fists. 

His tresses fall over his broad shoulders as he prowls forward, tiring of this epoch already. The long, tubular strands frame you in a serried curtain of black as he looms—gargantuan, mythical—above you, head dipped down. The massive crown lists to the side when you lean back, instinctively, spine meeting the furs in tandem with his slow advance. 

The absence of his lower mandible when he flexes the others is novice in the liminal light that spills through the bulk of his body. You're not used to seeing him hurt like this. Ragged scars. Scorch marks tearing across his flesh. 

Reflexively, you reach up. The tips of your fingers are feather-soft against the dry tresses just behind the missing cluster. The ends of them are cauterised—a thick, metallic clump glued to the bottoms to keep him from bleeding. Another anatomical anomaly. 

Filled with veins and nerve endings, his tresses are far more sensitive to touch than the coarse hair of primates—the integument is different, too; rubbery to the touch, reminding you of polymer pipes or rubber bands, almost. 

At your gentle touch, he makes a noise, a shallow churr in the back of his throat; mandibles soon folding over his mouth after. Reactive, you find, and endlessly endearing for such a monstrous creature. Cute. 

A smile blooms at the notion of his sudden shyness. Such an outlandish thing for someone whose entire existence is narrowed down to honour and death. The pinch of his tusks elapsing over his maw fills you with a misplaced affection, a foreign growth metastasizing between your ribs. 

You're not sure what it is—survival instinct, maybe. The urge, the drive, to keep living despite yourself; a blot against the harsh reality of your predicament. It feels like the most likely one considering the other is genuine adoration. Unthinkable even now in spite of your willing submission. 

But thinking about this is a jagged dagger cutting through your insides. You shove it aside, hide it away. 

The soft touch—a mere whisper of your fingertips gliding along the surface of his tresses—takes on a more intentional drag, purposeful. You curl your index finger around a corded forelock, giving a small, impish tug just to make him jutter above you. 

His jaws flex, mandibles spreading slowly apart with a quiet, humid hiss. The heat brimming up once more as he curves his long mane over you, chin dipping down to encompass the entirety of your body under his. 

You can't help wondering if this is what it feels like to be devoured. 

And when he reaches the apex, eclipsing everything in your sight with the full, dark heft of him, hands fixed against the soft furs above your head, you think of a sanctum instead of a cage. 

(a swinging pendulum—)

The heat is unbearable with him over you like this. Made worse, somehow, when his hand lifts, falls to your waist. The width of it covers you entirely. Swallowed whole by palm. You tremble, and he eats your anticipation with a distinctive, preening click, turning you on your belly with an ease that knocks the air from your lungs. Barely a featherweight to him. The notion is scorching. 

The name he's given you is full rasping, mangled syllables your fleshy tongue could never begin to wrap around. In the absence of knowing how to speak it, you've begun to call him by your own human version of his namesake. It's this, the shortened, paltry whisper that rolls off your tongue when he presses the tapered tip of his cock against you. 

“Please, Dark—”

At the soft utterance of it, he snaps his hips harshly in retaliation, burrowing his cock inside of you in a quick, jarring thrust. 

It rents you in two, splits you down the middle. Your breaking point is surpassed in an instant; mettle fracturing, shattering on impact. It takes every ounce of willpower to cling to cognisance when he snarls through the last few inches of impaling you entirely. 

In the static tatters of your consciousness, the realisation—a startling polyphony of fear, trepidation, and awe—that this is him holding back lingers on the periphery. That, in itself, is the rekindling of your appetite; hunger gnaws on shallow need, unsatiated by the threadbare scraps it's been given to chew on. 

You say his name again. The whisper of it raw, wounded; scraping against your lacerated vocal cords, torn by the vicious howl, the shriek, that ripped through your chest when he seated himself deep inside of you. 

He responds by snapping his hips into yours, the barbed ridges on his cock licking across your nerve endings in the almost perfect zenith of pleasure and pain. It's nirvana, you think. With hell nipping sharply at its heels. 

The stretch—unlike anything you've ever felt before; incomparable outside of too much—burns furiously. The only thing keeping it from being impossible is the thick oil coating the length of him. The makeup of it must have analgesic properties, or some paralytic agent mixed in, because with each stroke, it soothes your raw flesh, erasing the pain of him inside of you, and leaving nothing but pure, unfettered sensation behind. It's just the thick, unrelenting press of him. The heaviness. The girth. 

It's good. Too good. Overwhelmingly so. 

A series of low clicks spilling out from his broad chest, the chirr of a rattlesnake. He must see it, the way your body floods with endorphins, with heat. The room, kept at an uncomfortable swelter, glues to your skin. Balmy, and achingly hot. The blister of it burrows deep, massing together into a molten core at the very apex of where he's buried inside of you. 

Drawn there, moth to a flame, your hand slides between the damp fur, now drenched in your sweat, and comes to rest on the prominent bulge shifting through your abdomen. His cock. 

Behind you, Dark lets out a susurrus hiss, and pauses the ruinous cants of his hips just long enough to let you feel for yourself how perfectly he changes your shape to fit himself inside. It's unmistakable, of course; but everything outside of raw feeling is liquified. Rendered numb. You know, somewhere, distantly, that this—feeling him through your muscle, your skin so distinctly that you can touch each ridge on his cock—is something that ought to break you, shatter you into pieces. The anatomical anomaly of having him stretch you like this, to this extent, is unfathomable. 

And yet—

He drags his cock out, and you whimper, mindless, stupid, at the sudden loss of him. 

You don't feel complete unless he's buried within you. 

And despite yourself, the somnolence lapping at you, a part of you wonders if this is a symptom of that paralytic agent—musk, pheromones, miasma, poison—blotting out all logic, and inducing a soporific desperation, a vacuous need for him and him alone. One that makes wholeness out of the heavy press of his cock. 

If it is, it doesn't matter much anymore. 

You're too far gone, lost to the throes of it, to care about anything else. 

A good thing, perhaps, because with Dark, it's always a selfish coupling. He pays no real heed to your pleasure, fully under the belief that his cock splitting you apart is enough. 

And damn you—damn your treacherous body—it is. 

Each brutal cant of his powerful hips slamming into you sends waves of pleasure roaring down your spine. To be pried apart, stuffed full of the overwhelming surplus of his girth notches against something inside of you that makes your bones liquid, your marrow running molten. Burning you up from the inside out. 

You clench around him desperately, fingers knotting into the furs below, squeezing it tight in a vice. Trying, futilely, to cling to some sense of cognisance despite the vicious way he takes you apart. Atom by atom. Synapses bloating, crackling under the strain. 

He fucks you like beast. All vicious snarls, guttural rasps; blood is drawn when his claws catch your skin, tearing it open like tissue paper. The sting is buried under the layers of sensation tunnelling through your body. 

Pleasure, pain: equilibrium met on the cusp. Aided, in large part, by the frenzied way he ruts you; fractured, careless. Bullying himself into you until the tapered tip of his cock bruises your cervix—more battering ram than flesh; eager to wrench you open, spill himself inside of your womb. 

You can't imagine what this must be like when he isn't holding back. Horrific, maybe. Blood, bruises. Torn skin. No wonder their hide is so thick. 

But even this—tamed, as it might be—feels like a battle. A war. He spears you open, chirring the whole time as he curls over you, protective and awful, the motion forcing the last few inches of him into you. Bruised, aching, you whimper at the feeling of his sheath, white-hot and soaked with your slick, cupping your drenched cunt. He holds himself there, as deep as he can possibly go—tip a bludgeon against your cervix, stretched wide around the thick of him—and lets out another long, low pur that rumbles through you. Teeth chatter from the vibrations, delirious and bordering on the equinox of absolute damnation, your pussy clenches around his cock, each ridge and divot more pronounced than before. 

Overwrought with bliss, with a nauseating pain, you keen in response to his deep bellow, feeling more animal than ever before. 

Driven purely by instinct, you push back into him, thighs slapping against his own. The power in his muscles, the contrast between your supple, soft body and his, iron wrapped in thick, crocodilian skin, is flint striking steel. 

A mere tinderbox, your body erupts in a devastating heat. 

The burst of molten red makes him reel back, barbs catching on your sensitive skin. It's too much, too much—

He thrusts back into your spasming cunt with a shuddering roar, the sound alone—the lewd, drenched squelch of him splitting you apart—tugs the knot inside of you past its breaking point. As his claws rip through the pretty fawn fur, shredding them to pieces as he grips tight in an effort to piston his cock as fast as he can into your aching pussy, you find yourself tipping over the precipice in a stumbling fall. The force of it, the suddenness, is agonising, edging immediately into overstimulation when the deep, heavy jut of his cock head burrowing into your fluttering walls doesn't cease. It's—

White noise. Static. Your head is galvanised into slush, slurried into liquid pleasure that thrashes and writhes in your core, nerve endings set aflame in a wet, hot inferno under his bulk. 

You puddle under him, burning with the aftershocks. Body melting, useless and spent, into the sheets as he drives into you with the single-minded purpose of reaching his own cataclysmic end. Numbed now, all you feel is an intense, dizzying pressure pulsing molten inside of you. 

Dark braces himself over you, content to just rut deep into you, barely pulling the full, heavy length of himself out of your aching sex. With anyone else, it might be considered sloppy—a messy, desperate coupling, but even this much with him is devastating. Ruinous. 

It's a maelstrom. A bleak, calamitous fall to the bottom of a blackened pit. 

And with a savage, brutal plunge, he buries himself inside of you again, prising the soft plug of your womb open with a brutish roar—deep, broken; bellowed at the heavens—and you feel the steady pulse of him inside of you, filling you. It's too much—his fat, heavy girth, and the copious amounts of his spent stretch you past your limit, teeth raking across your mettle, and the bulge in your lower abdomen grows taut as he floods you with his release. 

The end of the pit looms, and from the chasm, a jagged maw gapes open, gnashing its teeth at you in rapacious anticipation as you careen toward its empty gullet. Falling, falling, falling—

And in the midst of it all, you think this might be what dying feels like.

Your cognisance is drawn together in pieces, inchmeal. 

A slow, gradual crawl out of slumber, the tugging threads of hypnagogia clinging to your rheum-heavy eyes. 

Furs stick to your damp body, some pulling loose when you shift away from the uncomfortable, sweat-soaked puddle of heat beneath you. 

Nausea roils through your belly, pulsing with dreadful synchronicity to the throbbing ache in your pelvis. In an effort to quell the feeling of your insides folding over themselves in a damning knot, you gingerly press the tips of your fingers to the spot that aches the most, feeling the raised indent of a contusion under your pads. 

It makes you blink up at the domed ceiling, head lifting to catch a glimpse of soft flesh near your hip. 

Through the midnight spill of your skin, you can see the tumid ridge bubbling up slightly higher than the rest of your flesh. In the middle is a small dot. An injection sight. 

You realise, with a huff, that he must have broken your pelvis again. Unintentionally, this time. Caught up in your feverish coupling. 

It makes sense. Your bones feel shattered beyond repair, but you know that they're knitted back together, suffused with the medicinal magic their healing injections have. 

The thought should scare you. Be it the ease in which he can break your bones, snapping them into pieces; or whatever it is he's pumping into your body to heal it, but it slips, diaphanous and ephemeral, from your tangled thoughts. Untouchable now, slowly fading into the background. 

The marbled quiet of your mind is broken when you feel him move beside you. His massive paw falls on your crown, covering the entirety of your head with an ease that you can't imagine ever not leaving you a little breathless at the scale, the vastness in your differing sizes. It rests there for a moment, leaching the warmth from your cap like a satiated, languorous reptile. A sluggish snake still digesting its oversized meat. 

A series of clicks spill when you lull your head over to meet the burning yellow of his gaze, everything awash under the heavy scent of sex and loam. Stale sweat, iron. You breathe it in, blinking in the soft blue light of the pale moons spilling in from the window of the ship. 

He lounges like a satiated cat. His legs spread akimbo; his other hand resting on his chest. The narrowing of his eyes, too, reminds you of a well-fed feline, squinting into a dewy oblivion. 

With a deftness you can't keep up with, his hands shift, reaching out to take hold of you when the sleep drips from your eyes. It takes no real effort at all for him to drag you to rest between his spread thighs, head pillowed on the tuffs of quills covering his lower belly. 

There's a twinge in your hips, but it's numbed by the palliative magic of the injection, pulsing like the soft beat of a headache through your bones. It'll hurt something awful later on when it begins to wear off, leaving you feeling more like a massive contusion than a person. But that's later. Much later. And as he rests his palm, warmed by your heat, against your nape, you find you don't mind the tenderness much at all, content to bask in the evidence of your coupling simmering, electric, between you, distinct in the air. An ozoneous tang. Heady. A sour, earthy miasma. 

You breathe it in. Breathe him in. 

And in the slow, soporific spool of your weaving thoughts, you can't help but wonder what he thinks of this, of you, as he reclines in the fur. Nothing at all, perhaps. 

Or maybe something. Something you can't even begin to unravel. An archaic, primordial sort of want—animalistic, alien. The kind that would make him scar his own kind for gnashing their claws at you in anger, indignant over your mere presence in their leader's nest. Who would take a creature not of the same species, and parade them around as they bared his mark for all to see. A mate. A conquest. A queen. A pet. The fickleness of it is not lost on you, but there's something about the knowledge that this is as taboo, as unprecedented for him, for his kind, as it is for you. 

And yet. 

He still picked you. Of all the humans in the galaxy, crawling around like lost, queenless ants, he decided to shun the staples of his culture and take you with him. 

That alone, you think, is enough. 

And so—

You relax. Melting into the wrought iron strength of his frame, liquifying under the raze of his nails grazing your skin, pulling you deeper into this sense of complacency. Where else do you belong, after all? 

You turn your head, nuzzling your nose into his quills. Into his skin. The potency of his smell is stronger here, so close to his groin, and you groan a little at the twinge in your cunt at the heady, briny weight of it settling on the back of your tongue when you breathe in deep. 

He chuffs a bit, quietly pleased by your obvious scenting. The way you bury your nose into the crease where his inner thighs bend, drawing in the pungence of his unwashed flesh. It drags your attention away from his heavy musk, head lifting to catch his blistering, intent gaze. It darkens slightly at the sheen smearing across your chin and nose, covered in the natural oils of his pelt. 

It's unlike yourself, but you find the depth of his intrigue deeply arousing, and slowly lick your stained lips, chasing the taste of him with your tongue. 

A rumble reverberates from his broad chest, shaking the bed with his quiet growl. It's the only warning you get, the only one he'll give, before the other hand folds over your lower back, pushing your belly into his sheath where he swells, hot and thick, between you. 

His eyes glow in the absence of light. Pale amber flickers when you arch into his chest, needy for him, and it unveils a catacomb desire much too primordial for you to ever dream of mapping. The deep pool of it unspools you, and you fall, weightless, to the bottom. 

Ensnared. 

[hoe4sports]

Harm

Leah Williamson x reader ft Sam Kerr

A/n: Been battling this huge writes block for a month now. If you have any tips on out to get rid of it, send help. You need to use your imagination on this bby

Warning: Angry Sam

Summary: You and your ex-wife struggle co-parenting

-

You look at your watch.

18.53.

It’s now 1 long hour and 53 whole minutes since your ex wife, Sam, was supposed to come pick up your daughter for the weekend.

You don’t really know why you thought it would be different this time, it’s always been like this. From the moment you found her tangled up in her best-friends arms at your home, she’s been someone else. Someone you don’t recognise.

It’s none of your business anymore. You know that she parties and drinks, probably more than what’s healthy. And you know that it’s always a new girl. It’s always the same type of girl too, partygirls.

It’s the same never ending cycle. She gets a girlfriend, then she cheats on her with some random girl that she eventually ends up dating before the cycle repeats itself.

A part of you wants to take your daughter away from her. To never let her see her again. You’re her mom, you are supposed to protect her from harm. But, what do you do when the harm is her own ma?

“Still not heard from her?” Leah hums, her voice coming from behind your back.

You sigh at her while closing the blinds again, letting the last bit of hope disappear. The tears are now pressing in your eyes. You feel defeated. Leah immediately wraps you in her arms.

“Shh, it’s okay, we’ll sort this out” she reassures you. You nod while sniffing into her shirt, standing it with tears.

Your daughter coos from her little bouncer, kicking her feet with excitement. Her toothless grin spreading on her face. You can’t help it, but to turn your head to look at her. She brings a smile to your face. Her similarities to Sam aren’t there anymore. She’s growing into her own person. She has copied down Leah’s smile, just like babies does. Your hair, and your eyes. Not a single piece of Sam left in her. It eases your heart, it makes you feel less sad about your cheating ex-wife.

She cheated when you were just 1 week into your first attempt at getting pregnant. You didn’t leave at first, you did everything you could to salvage it. There wasn’t a single solution that you hadn’t tried. But she didn’t even try. The reality of the situation was that it fell through your hands like sand.

You don’t really understand why it happened. Why she chose her newfound best-friend over her wife and her daughter. It’s something you was forced come to terms with, but that you will never find in your heart to understand or forgive. Perhaps, it’s more that you have accepted the situation without being able to fully grasp the aspects of it.

Leah pulls away from the hug after giving you a kiss on the head. She moves towards your daughter, Ella, and scoops her up in her arms. Ella lets out a big yawn when she feels the comfort of Leah’s arms, settling in comfortably.

“I think that someone is up way beyond her bedtime, isn’t she?” She coos at the little baby in her arms. The sight of them makes your gaze soften, and your body relax. You can’t help it, but smile. They share something special, you just know it. Their bond is unique.

“Should we go upstairs to go night-night, huh Ellabear?” Leah asks as she leans down to kiss your daughter‘s forehead.

“Would you mind putting her down, baby? I think I need a minute..” you excuse to Leah, offering a sad smile.

You know that she’s more than happy to put her down. In fact, she’s been more than happy to put her down since even before she was born. Always excited for all the milestones you reached. Always there, always present.

Leah nods at you before taking Ella’s little hand to wave at you, you smile sadly back at them before they disappear up the staircase of your home.

You look at your watch again. 19.06. It’s been over two hours. That’s where you decide that she has missed her shot for the weekend. You move to the kitchen to find your backpack with your pencils. You reach for your notes before writing down the details around the yet again, missed agreement.

The divorce was messy. Sam wanted the baby. You refused. She pushed for visitation, and time with her daughter in court. You refused. But, Sam somehow ended up winning the case. Of course she did. She hired the best lawyers money could buy. It made your blood boil. Your lawyer recommended that you would write down every time she didn’t pick up Ella, and the details around missed visits.

Leah’s footsteps were soon to be heard coming down the staircase. Her hands eventually placed on your shoulders, lightly providing you with a gentle massage.

“How are you feeling, darling?” Leah’s voice hums. Her soft tone makes your body relax towards her frame.

“I’m just, hm, I think I feel disappointed for Ella. I know she won’t remember this, but the guilt is eating me alive.”

Leah wraps her arms around your waist before turning you to face her. Your eyes meets her, and you share a moment of silence while embracing each other.

“Ella is safe, she’s fed, she’s warm, she’s dry and she has a mommy and a Leah that loves her so much” Leah whispers in your ear.

The statement makes you feel safe, like you are the luckiest girl in the world to have Leah to lean on. To have someone step up to the responsibility when Sam failed. Leah didn’t have to, she had absolutely no obligations. But she still stayed.

“She has a mommy and a mama” you mumble into her arms, “you and me”.

Leah hums in response before your hands intertwine. Your heartbeat slows down, and your breathing softens. It feels safe. It’s feels warm. It’s like your mind unconsciously knows that you and Leah are building the foundation of a future marriage.

Her sincerity and warmth has you drawn to her. How she’s fair, how she never lets anyone get away with anything and how she is protective of what’s hers. You know that she will defend you to the end of the world, even if that means defending you when you are wrong. It’s one of her core values, to never embarrass you infront of others by arguing or correcting you.

Then, there is a knock on the door. The moment fades, and the memory is ruined by the continuous hammering on your door. Your heartbeat fastens again, and your breathing feels quicker and shallow.

You look over at Leah, and see that her fists are turning white. It’s only fair. You would feel that way too if you had something to outpower Sam. But you don’t. She’s taller, stronger, faster and more assertive than what you are.

The banging doesn’t stop, and soon enough you hear Ella’s scared cries in her bedroom through the baby-call hanging around Leah’s neck.

Leah looks at you and urges her head towards the door.

Normally you handle moments like this. But you are just so tired of it. Of Sam showing up drunk or hangover, demanding her daughter to be brought to her. It always scares you. Sometimes, you have nightmares about it. That someday, she’ll drive over drunk and get away with your baby. The kind of nightmares that only can be calmed by seeing that Ella is safe and having Leah holding you while softly stroking your back.

Leah looks at you again while nodding towards the door. The banging is still loud. This time, you can hear Sam’s voice through the door.

“For fucks same, give me my daughter. It’s my weekend! I know that you are awake”

You shake your head violently before tears swell in your eyes. You cannot find it in you to deal with Sam tonight.

“Go” Leah whispers while pointing upstairs. Your eyes widen.

“But what if she hurt-“

“I’m stronger and taller, I’m gonna be fine. Go calm Ella down, and I’ll be there soon, okay?” Leah urges moving towards the door.

You nod rapidly before going for a beeline up the stairs. You hear the door open up as you move upwards.

“Leah? Get me my kid will you” Sam commands.

Leah crosses her arms while looking firmly into her eyes.

“No, it’s past bedtime. She’s sleeping, or was before you scared her”.

“Nah, listen mate, this doesn’t involve you” Sam laughs before pushing towards the door.

Leah pushes Sam away from the entrance before grabbing the handle.

“I pay for the diapers, the clothes, the food. I put her to bed, I wake up with her at night and I wake up with her in the morning. I give her kisses and hugs, and I give her baths. What do you do?”

Sam looks at Leah with a gaze in shock.

“I, uh, I.. This is ridiculous, can I come and get her? It’ll be quick”

Leah grabs the door handle, and closes the door. But before she completely closes it, she looks Sam straight in her eyes.

“No, I suggest you leave before I call the police on trespassing.”

[lxkeee]

TWO SIDES OF THE SAME COIN

-PART FIVE

Pairing: Lucifer Morningstar x Seraphim Angel! Fem! Reader

Fandom: Hazbin Hotel

Genre: Angst (for now)

Warnings: Depression and mentions of self h*rm.

Notes: Heads-up, this chapter is filled with the Caeles Family trauma/lore lmao.

PART ONE | PART FOUR | PART SIX | NAVIGATION

Two angelic beings—currently in their human forms, sat across each other outside their garden, early morning sunlight streaming past the leaves of the large wisteria, they sat underneath the tree, a tea table in the middle with of course, a steaming and freshly brewed lavender tea and a platter of tea sandwiches to go with. The smell of roses and lavender is present around the garden as the sun rises through the horizon, calm and gentle cool breeze caressing their skins as they enjoy this peace and quiet. They are in the mortal realm at the moment, they didn't want heaven's ears to listen.

Xavier can be seen talking animatedly to his mother, his eyebrows furrowed as he did so, his hands moving around comically as he explained something to the older woman. [Y/n] sighs and nodded, bringing back the teacup into the table.

“So you're saying that Sera approved of this cleansing without the other's knowledge?” [y/n] asked with a small hum, bringing the teacup to her lips once more, pinky extended, she sipped her tea slowly before bringing the teacup back down to the table, making sure to use her pinky as a cushion to avoid making unnecessary noise.

She was awestruck, in disbelief by the information Xavier told her. Unacceptable. Sera's decision mocks the heavenly hierarchy, who is she to play God? Sure, God left her in charge as the higher being is off to who knows where but the reason God chose Sera is because the Seven Virtues were busy with work in the mortal realm. To think she made a major decision such as this without consulting the Seven virtues is unacceptable.

[Y/n] was bubbling in fury inside, as the angel of kindness, she can't imagine what the sinners are going through with the cleansing. Sera's decision is truly unacceptable. It felt like Sera didn't respect the status of the seven virtues and that is something she cannot allow. She worked so hard to be here, to where she is now. After Lucifer messed up and left an empty spot with the seven, she worked herself to the bone to fill that spot and is now one of the strongest and Sera couldn't even consult one single virtue to this decision. Blasphemy.

Xavier looked worried as he could tell that his mother is beyond pissed despite the gentle and calm look on her face, but he knows her. He could tell just by how tense her shoulders are, how deep the exhale she let out or the way her left eye twitched.

“I am glad you told me, I'll request a meeting with the others soon but I doubt it'll happen immediately as everyone is busy here on earth.” [y/n] sighs, picking up a small tuna sandwich and taking a bite of it. Xavier nodded as he took a sip of his own tea, nodding at her.

“I couldn't let Sera get away with this, after all.” He answered, looking away from his mother and to gaze at the garden. [Y/n] chuckles, her eyes darkened a bit as she follows where Xavier is looking—at the mini pond of the garden, two ducks and two swans swimming around. Surprisingly, a duck and swan were playing with each other. It brought a smile to [y/n]'s face, remembering the times she and Lucifer would play together in the skies, laughing and giggling. Times were easy and peaceful before. Oh how she wished she could turn back time.

Xavier's eyes narrowed slightly as he watches the two birds swimming around. A sigh escaping his lips before turning back to look at his mother once more.

“What do you want me to do for the time being?” He asked, crossing his arms over his chest, [y/n] smiled as she looked at her son, he grew up so fast. Proud of how far he came in life, though, she still felt a little guilt and sadness within her as she remembers how she neglected him during his toddler years, she was far too depressed that just one look at her son she would spiral into depression as Xavier bears so much resemblance to Lucifer. Her negligence to Xavier caused the boy to hate his looks so much to the point he tried to carve out his face with his weapon, thankfully Azrael was there to stop him and it served as a wake up call to her and realized how her actions affected Xavier so much. It took awhile and lots of therapy for her to finally face her son without having a mental breakdown and she apologized to the boy over and over again for the horrible things she had done and it took some serious therapy for Xavier too to accept his face—though, he hasn't fully accepted it but it isn't as worse as before.

[Y/n] sighs softly, shaking away the depressing memories. She's healing now and finally getting better, she doesn't need to look back at the negative memories. She smiled at Xavier, a look of adoration in her eyes, proud of her son for all the things he did for her. Her pride and joy.

Placing her hands on her lap, she gave him a small nod, “Just continue doing your duties, I'll take care of the rest, hmm?” she suggested with a smile and Xavier nodded, “Alright, I'll leave you to deal with it mother.” he says and [y/n] hummed in agreement.

[Y/n] took out her phone, typing something. Her fingers danced across the screen as she pressed the letters.

You: @everyone, when will you guys be available for a meeting? Seen by Michael, Azrael, Gabriel, Uriel

Michael: I won't be available for a couple days, I am unsure about the others. Why? Did something happen? Seen by [Y/n], Azrael, Gabriel, Camuel

Azrael: Did someone mess up? lmao Seen by Michael, [Y/n], Gabriel, Camuel, Uriel, Jophiel

Camuel: It's rare for you to actually summon us for once @Y/n Seen by Michael, Azrael, Gabriel, Camuel, Jophiel, [Y/n]

You: I am requesting for a meeting as a certain Seraphim left in charge is currently playing God. Seen by Michael, Gabriel, Camuel, Uriel, Jophiel, Azrael

Gabriel: What the fuck? Seen by Michael, [Y/n], Camuel, Uriel, Jophiel, Azrael

Azrael: Hey, watch your fucking language ಠ⁠_⁠ಠ Seen by Michael, Gabriel, [Y/n], Camuel, Uriel, Jophiel

Uriel: Well... That is certainly news.. Seen by Michael, Gabriel, Camuel, [Y/n], Jophiel, Azrael

Jophiel: Indeed. Seen by Michael, Gabriel, Camuel, [Y/n], Uriel, Azrael

Michael: We'll have a meeting in a week, all of us are far too busy at the moment. Thank you for telling us, [n/n]. Seen by Gabriel, [Y/n], Uriel, Camuel, Jophiel, Azrael

Michael: Is the schedule fine with you guys? @everyone Seen by Gabriel, [Y/n], Uriel, Camuel, Jophiel, Azrael

Jophiel: The schedule is fine, I guess I'll meet you guys soon. Seen by Michael, Gabriel, [Y/n], Uriel, Camuel, Azrael and everyone heart reacted to his message

[Y/n] turns off her phone and slips it back to her pocket, Xavier looks at her with a raised eyebrow, “So...?”

[Y/n] chuckles a bit, “I already told them and we'll have a meeting in a week or so. We'll handle it, don't worry.” she says, sipping her tea. “I am sure Michael will do something about it.”

“That meeting certainly didn't go well for me.” [y/n] muttered in annoyance as she left the office of the Seven. They just finished holding the meeting and Michael thought it was a good idea to make her take care of it, Azrael offered to help her but he has his own plate of responsibilities to finish, he is the angel of death after all. “Why did I have to lose the rock-paper-scissors?!” she whined to herself, pouting slightly.

She looked down upon her hands to see it shaking and pale, she's scared of going down there, she's afraid of what'll happen to her if she ever sees Lucifer again.

Contrary to popular beliefs, [y/n] doesn't consider Lucifer her ex-husband, no divorce ever happened and even after all the pain she went through, she remained loyal and always acted upon her vows to him even if he wasn't here in heaven with her.

Her eyes landed on the gold metal band around her ring finger, the very ring that Lucifer slipped into her hand when they got married. She didn't have the power or the courage to remove it.

She won't remove it unless Lucifer actually tells her to, unless Lucifer says it to her face that he no longer loves her or needs her.

She'll let him go willingly once he tells her all those things. But for now, she'll hold on. No matter how bruised and wounded her hands are, she'll hold on. She hopes that they will be a complete family one day, heck, even Charlotte can join. She'll treat the girl like her own daughter. She just wants her family complete, is that too much to ask for?

She dreams to give her son the father he deserves, Xavier didn't say it but as his mother she can tell how envious the boy is when he looks at other families. The longing look in his eyes, he's jealous that Charlie had the father—the very same father that left him for another family.

Her steps faltered as she finally arrived at her own office, opening the door and quickly got inside and locking it. Her back pressed against the door, her body getting heavier as she slid down to the floor.

Looking up at the ceiling, the ceiling of her office, the chandelier with apple and duck crystals hanging from it—she commissioned it in memory of Lucifer.

“Some people long for a life that is simple and planned”

She softly sang, standing up from the floor, her eyes softening as she gazed outside the window of her office.

“Tied with a ribbon

Some people won't sail the sea 'cause they're safer on land

To follow what's written”

She sang softly, her feet gracefully bringing her across the room, reaching to her desk. Her hand opened the cabinet of her desk, grabbing a small black box. Opening it to see a gold necklace with a pink crystal heart pendant. Sighing before closing the box once more and returning it back to the drawer.

“But I'd follow you to the great unknown

Off to a world we call our own”

She says softly, her eyes downcast as her voice became significantly lower. [Y/n] remembers Lucifer giving her the necklace for their first anniversary.

“Hand in my hand

And we promised to never let go”

A tear streamed down her cheek, remembering the promises they've made for each other. The room was tinted pink from the rays of the setting sun, shadows casting into her dull office.

“We're walking a tightrope

High in the sky

We can see the whole world down below”

The memories of them flying together in the skies, laughing and joking with each other.

“We're walking a tightrope

Never sure, never know how far we could fall”

Lucifer catching her when her wings gave out.

“But it's all an adventure

That comes with a breathtaking view

Walking a tightrope

With you, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh

With you, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh

With you”

Despite fearing for her life, she trusted him to catch her always when she falls.

[Y/n] sighs softly, her steps light as a feather, graceful as she dances as if Lucifer is there with her. Slow dancing in her office like he's with her.

“Mountains and valleys, and all that will come in between

Desert and ocean”

They promised to never let go of each other regardless of what comes in-between them.

“You pulled me in and together we're lost in a dream

Always in motion”

She listened to all of his hopes and dreams of the future, future of the world and his future with her.

“So I risk it all just to be with you

And I risk it all for this life we choose”

She knew what she was getting into when she dated him, he was the most beautiful angel of all of creation. Many wanted him but she trusted him to only want her.

“Hand in my hand

And you promised to never let go

We're walking a tightrope

High in the sky

We can see the whole world down below”

With a flex of her wrists, golden dusts of her power came of her hands, forming a faux Lucifer. She still remembers what he looked like. The Lucifer made of golden dust smiled at her, holding her body close as they waltzed across the room.

“We're walking a tightrope

Never sure, will you catch me if I should fall?”

[Y/n] was crying softly, Lucifer wipes away her tears with his thumb, leaving specks of golden dust in her cheeks. Lucifer twirls her and dips her, effortlessly catching her. He pulls her up to allow her to stand.

With a sad smile, [y/n] waves her hand and the Lucifer made of golden dust gently disappears like a dust in the wind. [Y/n] extending her hand, as if to stop the love of her life from disappearing once more. Even if it was just something she conjured up with her powers.

“Well, it's all an adventure

That comes with a breathtaking view

Walking a tightrope

With you, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh

Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh

With you

With you, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh

With you, ooh, ooh, ooh

With you.”

[Y/n] grabbed her handkerchief from her pocket, dabbing the fabric onto her eyes. No matter how much she tries to dry her eyes, tears never seem to stop falling.

“After all these years, I am still a mess without you.” she whispers, eyes gazing outside the window of her office, the sunlight shining down on her like the universe is listening to her anguish. She grips the fabric of her dress, on where her heart is beating and aching.

“What happened to death do us apart? Why did you leave me Lucifer? WAS I NOT ENOUGH?!” She asked, screaming in anguish and as always, no answer to her questions.

“I need you, Lucifer... I still do...” she whispers, defeated as she dragged her emotionally heavy body to her office chair, slumping down with a loud and choked out sob.

With shaky breaths and trembling hands. She calms herself down, calming herself down. She still has work to do.

TAGLIST I:

@valerie-36 @blackbleedingrose @adaizel @xx-all-purpose-nerd-xx @thedarkkitten @selvyyr @froggybich @brithedemonspawn @kottenox @totallymitya @many-fandoms-lover @dou-dou @mezzyb0nb0n @n1chxyaaenthusiast @cherry-4200 @koirb @galaxyj3lly @crystalplays28 @luleck @scootinonyourmom @rory-cakes @mixplara @crescent-z @bitchyzombienacho @kalisha2004 @altervex @nehy019 @napbatata @kouyoumarryme @sxgacxbe @kooidoom @ok-boke @random-3455 @izzieg3987 @snoozewritezz @dreamzaremyrealityy @hcneyiced @witchbunny1210 @ghostdoodlen @aikobakugou @just-here-reading @dzhanett-blog @des-deswain5621 @cocomollo @haleypearce @onyxstarhigh06 @nirvana5874 @shaebutter-baby

[unconventional-lawnchair]

" But daddy, I love him "

Mattheo Riddle x Fem!Potter!Reader

Masterlist

Part 2

Summary: Harry finds out his sister is dating Mattheo Riddle Ft. James, Lily, Remus, Sirius - No war au }

Wc- 5178

Cw: Use of {Y/N}, a lot of people saying a lot of mean things, sexual themes cussing}

A/n: Possible part 2 later

Mattheo Riddle had a reputation for himself. Everyone knew him bloodied before they'd seen him presentable. A Hotwire, fizzling and popping, just waiting for the next person to cross him in a way he deemed punishable, ‘the muggle way.’

He never truly had a distaste for muggles or muggleborns, but they stayed clear of him regardless. Voldemort's son was like a cautionary tale told through the halls, of just how ruthless and unhinged death eaters could be. His mother, Beatrix Lestrange, in Azkaban for life for such cruelties, his father had a name no one dared to say. That left very little to the imagination, or maybe just too much? 

Another thing about Mattheo Riddle, he never said what he was thinking, he only acted. So no one knew the true boy outside of his blinding rage, insatiable flirting and the horrid legacy his parents so carefully wove for him. No one, aside from you.

It wasn't supposed to be this way, truly, it was just an assignment.

“I have a student, he is failing in my class, but I know he has so much potential to do better.” McGonagall began. “If you tutor him, I will give you credits towards one of your less favorable classes.”

Was it bribery? Yes, was it technically against school policy? Most definitely. Were you going to say no to free credits for the history of magic? Absolutely not.

You should have been clued in, when she didn't tell you who you were tutoring, but like your father and brother, your eye was on the prize. Instead of a snitch, however, yours were the new napping opportunities in your least favorite subject. 

You were told by the professor that the study sessions would take place during dinner, and you were allowed to request food from the house elves before or after the meetings. You had to wonder; why was this student getting all these special treatments? And what did you have to do with it?  Imagine your surprise when you walked into the library when dinner was taking place, only for your eyes to land on the candle lit silhouette of Mattheo Riddle himself.

You knew him, of course you did, his father had tried to kill your entire family, while you didn't endure the worst of it, Merlin, you were still in your mothers stomach at the time, your fathers horror stories of the DeathEaters and the recounting of the night was so etched into your brain you could likely recall it as if you stood in that room. The day your father saved the wizarding world, by simply, picking up his wand from the couch when he opened the door. 

Despite it all, you tried not to judge him by the actions of his father, so that the only thing you had left were the numerous bloodied fights he'd been a part of since he walked through the doors of Hogwarts. Not to mention the amount of broken hearted witches that clung to his heels.

Though, now, as you stared at him across the empty Library, he seemed so… peaceful. Calm and reserved, maybe it was the yellow light, or maybe it was the way he seemed to be genuinely enraptured by whatever he was reading. Sitting patiently, just waiting. Waiting for you. You quickly snapped out of your daze, walking forward to stand in front of him.

Mattheo lazily glanced up before his eyes widened slightly and his mouth opened a bit in slack shock. “Potter.”

“Riddle.” You acknowledged him. He didn't seem offended or bothered by your presence, more, confused. There was an easy silence between you two before you gestured to the seat beside him. “May I?”

“... be my guest.” 

That's where it all started. Mattheo was nothing like who you thought he'd be. He was respectful, kind, studious and incredibly clever. You had to admit, Minerva was right, he had incredible potential beyond what he seemed to think of himself. He just needed time to sit down and work, instead of his usual activities, and whatever impression he was trying to make for himself.

Your meetings were frequent, and his grades started to improve. As you got closer, the change in his behavior in class was the first thing you noticed. He began to actually work in potions, probably the only class you shared being a year younger and a Griffondor. You heard from Harry that he had actually scored higher than most of their shared class in Transfiguration. Though, it was a comment out of malice, you couldn't deny how it made you preen with pride.

In the halls you were strangers, but in your personal nook of the library, you were a deadly dynamic. He was a flirt, you knew that before, but he never said the raunchy things he'd say to the girls in the halls he'd flirt with, to you. The occasional comment on your eyes or your calligraphy, maybe some that toed the line of platonic study buddies. You figured that was how he showed affection, but you had no real reference point for it. 

If it was another thing that you knew about Mattheo that not many others knew, it was that he adored praise. All forms of it. He would get bashful and try to hide away from it, but you would see how much harder he tried to impress you everytime. You found it amusing, you would hear the teachers praise him and he'd simply shrug it off, trying to play it cool. But in those private moments between.. friends, when you were revising his essay, with mutters of, “That's a spectacular way to look at it, Riddle.”

And 

“That's brilliant. You're brilliant.”

He would turn as red as a tomato. It made you smile. This was the version of him no one else could or ever would have. It made you cocky, it made you want more of the secret Mattheo, the one he only showed to the closest people.

~~

You had gotten so used to Mattheo’s presence. He had stayed out of trouble, been doing wonderfully in his classes, and he still insisted on your study dates. Said they were the only thing keeping him interested in the classes he took. Ever the flirt.

You guessed being used to Mattheo Riddle of all people was the first part to an awful downward spiral. You had fallen for him. Hard. 

You first noticed when he had to cancel one of your meetings. He was passing you in the hall, two Prefects had him by his forearms, and Snape was rattling on about a proper punishment for him. He had a cut lip and a gnarly battered nose. You were on your way to the library to meet, but when you made eye contact with him you visibly deflated. He had that stupid cocky look on his face, teeth stained red as he winked at a few girls he passed, focusing on anything but Snape’s words.

When his eyes met yours, however, his lips twitched and his eyes lost their twinkle. Like a puppy being told no. Or properly, a boy ashamed. And he should feel ashamed.

You had forgotten who he was when you weren't buried in your books. So for the first time in weeks, you were at the Gryffindor dining table, across from Ginny and Seamus, poking at your food in disinterest. Surrounded by friends and family, and yet so incredibly lonely. Ginny eventually caved to your moping, looking over with a loud click of her tongue. 

“{Y/N}?” She called over and your eyes flicked up and an easy smile took over your face. “Ginny?”

“It's good to see you, you've been avoiding the dining hall for a while now.” She teased and leaned her legs forward to lock her ankles around one of yours to keep you in place. You couldn't help but give a cheeky grin at this.

“Well, I would argue anything is better than being forced to watch you make heart eyes at my brother.” You shot back and Harry looked up from his plate curious, met with the view of you being smacked in the face with a bun. 

“Hey!” You challenged and grabbed your own bun before you heard your head of house clear her throat behind you. Slowly, you set down the bread and looked back at her as she gave you a quizzing look. Clearly confused by you being there, asking with her eyes. Not even having noticed the gluten assault.

“Rain check.” You remarked and shrugged before she let out a simple ‘ah’ and walked off. This just set off Ginny’s and now Harry’s curiosity. 

“What was all that? Thought you were meeting a boy, if I'm honest, now I'm not sure.” Ron mumbled and Harry tilted his head at you. 

“Ew, don't say that, that's my baby sister.” Harry huffed and looked over at you. His expression said it all. “What have you been getting up to?”

You stared at him before slowly smirking, leaning your chin on your palm. “Huh, well, me and Ginny are the same age-”

Then, another bun, to your face, courtesy of your brother. “That's enough out of you.” He huffed.

~~

That's how you got here. Sitting in the forbidden woods, trying to demonstrate to Mattheo how to use a patronus, something your parents showed you when you were younger. Your study rendezvous has long since become time to study more than just your core classes. No one else was around, just you two, while everyone else was hidden away in the grand hall eating. 

“So, firstly, this is a spell that most wizards and witches cannot use. So don't be afraid if you never come to pass.” You explained and he rolled his eyes playfully.

“Right, if I'm not past the level you were at as a toddler, end my misery early.” He teased and you gave a playful scoff and crossed your arms. “Not a toddler, just 12.”

He rolled his eyes with his own smirk playing on his lips. You found yourself staring at the peak of his teeth, threw his lips, you felt your entire body respond in kind. “To be fair, you don't need to feel self conscious, I mean, I am leagues above you, even now.”

He gave an offended gasp and put his hand on his chest. His smirk turned wolfish as he walked up to your side. “Is that a challenge, Potter?”

“Define a challenge, I usually just call it confidence.” You quipped and he gave you a once over, you rolled your eyes fondly. 

“Okay, minx, I get three tries. If I summon my patronus, you have to go to Hogsmeade with me this Sunday.” He mused and leaned into your space. You smirked and stood taller, wetting your lips before you glanced from his eyes to his lips then back. “Let's hope you prove me wrong then, Riddle.”

He did not. Prove you wrong, that is. 

Once you told Riddle about the happy memory clause, he seemed less confident. He wasn't even able to produce sparks, and got increasingly agitated with each failure. Usually, he would pull out a smoke and take a break, and you were curious as to why he didn't.

Every other day before you grew close, you would spy him smoking with his friends in the courtyard, but when you mentioned you hated the smell in the library, he started to hold off until after to smoke.

At least, that's what he told you. He would not tell you the truth, that the moment you told him you hated the smell he chucked the last box he had into the black lake.

Mattheo went through his life without any real care. He only ever experienced fear, anger, and disappointment directed at him. He had his friends, Draco, Theodore, Pansy, even Blaise but none of them were particularly affectionate. Past his playful flirting with Pansy, that he now used as a reference for your friendship, he didn't truly have positive influences on his emotions.

Usually, that would result in him using a poor girl or two to get over whatever he was hung up on. Then, he met you. 

Out of everyone, he figured you had reason to hate him most. His father tried to kill your family, his mother killed your parents' friends, his current friends bullied your brother, and he was assumed a death eater before proven one. But that night, he was proven wrong for the first time, when you sat down next to him and smiled. He had never seen something so breathtaking, something that was meant for him.

He had felt for women before, physical and emotional, but never had he experienced you. In all honesty, he never truly looked at you before. You were Harry Potter’s sister, that was enough reason to stay away. Merlin, did he fuck up.

Being friends with you was hardly acceptable, but falling for you? It made him feel all the more pathetic. Knowing he was falling for someone who would never think of dating him. Here he was, making the worst mistakes of his life over and over again.

“Don't get in your head about it.” Your voice called him from his thoughts. He snapped out of it and looked at you. You tilted your head and smiled, hands on your hips in determination. You had taken off your robe, as if to say you meant business. Sleeves rolled up to your elbows and wand brandished. “Just think about something that makes you happy. Happy enough to smile at nothing.” 

“Smile at nothing?” He muttered in an amused tone. Breathing you in like fresh air.

“At. Nothing.” You insisted and waved your wand. “My memory is when my dad took me to visit my grandparents' graves.” You hummed and he gave a startled laugh. 

“Morbid, darling.”

“Oh, not like that.” You laughed. “I listened to my dad talk about them, like, all the time. Mum too.”

You gestured to the pond and his eyes followed yours. “My dad made it easy, it felt like I was really meeting them, ya know? He talked about me and Harry like we were the most important things in his life. I think I felt his love for them in me too, but towards him. I just felt so lucky.” 

Mattheo stared at your awe filled eyes and he gave a small sigh through his nose. It was out of fondness, of course, but he couldn't deny the bit of jealousy that perked up in his chest when she said that. “Yeah.. lucky.” He mumbled.

You looked back at him and your face fell a bit. You had just spent the last two minutes rubbing your fathers love in his face- Merlin. You slowly gave a cautious smile, considering he was still staring at you like you hung the stars. It maked your ears grow hot and your nerves light up.

You reached over to graze his hand, and he seemed to snap out of his trance, slowly, he wrapped his hand around yours, his calloused fingers covering your hand fully. You guys sat like that for a moment, before you raised your wand higher and stepped closer. Leaning your head against his chest and waving it. 

Your patronus whipped out of your wand, the fox wiggling its nose in greeting before she ran around you two in circles. You began to laugh at her enthusiasm, and Mattheo even gave a chuckle. Your eyes on your patronus, his eyes on you. How was he going to win anyway? He was making his happiest memories now.

“I think I can try again.” He whispered and you looked up at him, your patronus vanishing behind you as you lost your focus. He was giving you a look you had never seen before, it was almost dangerous, how easy it was for him to make a mess of you. 

“You think?” You couldn’t bring yourself to say anything above a whisper. He pulled you flush against him, taking the dazed look you were giving him as confirmation. You wanted him too. He could have fainted. 

“Want to help me?”

“How?” 

You got your answer, in the form of his lips pressing so gently against yours. It was electric, your entire face grew hot and you forgot how to breathe for a moment. His hands found a firmer grip on your waist and you slowly wrapped your arms around his neck. You lost yourself in the kiss, letting him lead as he clearly had more experience.

Mattheo couldn't help it, maybe this wouldn't be a mistake. Maybe it was only fair. Being with you made him feel human, like just another boy falling for just another girl. He wanted to feel like this forever. Normal, with you.

He did not try again that night, far too distracted.

~~ 

You met him like that several more times, dinner study bled into evenings, innocent touches became intimate, and bold teases became hushed whispers in his dorm room. The very dorm room you were coming back from now. Walking back just after curfew. 

When you made it back to the common room the first thing you noticed was your own reflection, your hair was frazzled and your uniform was creased. You found yourself wondering how all of that could happen from just a kiss. Followed by a few more. And then some more,, you could completely understand how it happened, actually. You’ll remember it forever.

Once you fixed your appearance, the second thing  you noticed was Harry sitting on the couch with a parchment on his lap, next to him was a nervous Ron and a shockingly ridgid Hermione. Harry’s eyes were on you, Ron’s was on his hands, and Hermione was faking reading a book. You pause before you made it to the stairs, slowly walking over to the three. “Hey you guys! What are we up to?”

“Nothing, just been waiting a few hours.” Harry snarked and you narrowed your eyes in confusion. Suddenly you remembered, you had agreed to meet the trio out for Quidditch practice, they had managed to just get enough people for two full teams, guilt filled your chest. 

“Shoot, Harry I am so-” Before you could even start to grovel he stood up and Hermione sighed, Ron quickly speaking up.

“Where were you?” Harry demanded.

“Come on, Harry.” Ron tried to interrupt. “At least not in the common room.”

“What?” You whispered and Harry shoved the parchment in your hands. It wasn't just any piece of paper, it was the map. Your fathers map. 

Your jaw went slack and you looked up at Harry, Your guilt was quickly overturned by anger. “Were you stalking me!?” You exclaimed and thanked Merlin the common room was empty this late.

“I thought something had happened! Don't deflect! Where were you?!”

“None of your business you slime!”

“You come out of the Slytherin dorms with Voldemort’s son and it's none of my business?” He whisper hissed, You scoffed. 

“Yes, none of your business!” You snapped back and threw the map on the ground. “I don't have to answer to you! And his name is Mattheo!” You hissed back and stepped on the charmed paper, dragging it under your heel. “You’d do best to remember that. I'm not a bloody kid, Harry!”

“You're my sister!” He challenged and you scoffed.

“He's a monster! A Slytherin, his parents are horrid, and our-”

“Do not say another word, Harry.” You threatened as you began to stomp off to your dorm and he huffed. Kneeling down to pick up the parchment and dust it off. 

“I’ll make it easy for you.” He called over and you turned to face him with a glare. “You break up with him, or I’ll tell father over the summer.”

Your face fell and your heart stopped. Harry had this look about him, like he didn't want to be doing this, but yet, he was. 

“You wouldn’t-” You spoke slowly and Harry sighed. 

“Two days.”

~~ 

Those two days were blissful hell. You weren't going to break up with Mattheo, there was no way in muggle hell you were going to willingly give him up.

You did try to talk to him about it, however, several times. At least to warn him why he may have a war hero Auror setting a bounty on his head soon. Your father was protective, far more than you thought was necessary, but he treated everyone as black or white. Usually, everyone was allowed his love and care, that being said, Voldemort was a sore subject.

You would say you were trying your best, but Mattheo was so… Mattheo. He was hard to talk to. A very… physical person? He would complain about how you would be leaving the school in mere days for summer, followed by you being drowned in kisses and wandering hands.

Merlin two days was not enough. Next thing you knew, you were home, in your room, counting the minutes until your mother called you down for dinner.

You began to bite your nails, scrunching up your face when you bit down too far. You sighed as you heard Lily call you and Harry down.

You walked into the hall to see Harry waiting at the top of the staircase for you. He looked regretful, but stern. “Harry-”

“I’ll give you the chance. To tell them yourself.” He mumbled before he walked down the stairs. You mentally prepared yourself and walked as slow as you could down the stairs. Not noticing as Harry glanced at your neck.  

When you walked into the dinning room, your heart dropped. Your mother, father, Uncle Moony, and Uncle Padfoot were all at the table. You cursed and clenched your jaw, Harry stared down at his plate and you sat beside him by Remus. You gave your mom a small thank you as she served you. Sirius and your father were making jokes about their Quidditch days after Harry bragged about their most recent win. You relished in the moment, before all hell broke loose.

You asked your father a question about the story, just trying to seem engaged. He lit up at your interest, turning to face you fully. “Well! When you're a beater, there is this unspoken rule that everyone follows and.. what the bloody hell is that?” 

You narrowed your eyes at his sudden tone change. “What?” You whispered as you looked around the table, all eyes were on you. You took a shaken breath and bit your cheek. “I-”

“That's a hickey, dad.” Harry muttered and took a bite of his food. Your face fell and all the blood left it.

“A what!?” He exclaimed and fixed his glasses on his face, you quickly covered your collarbone. Sirius gripped his silverware, hard, taking a steady breath. “How old are ya, hun?” He asked and you snapped your attention to him. Stuttering and stammering for a moment.

“I think the better question is, who did that? It's bloody horrific.” Remus muttered and you stared up at him with wide, horrified eyes. “U-uncle Moony!”

“Boys, calm down. She's 16, and James, we talked about this. Our kids will be dating soon, I mean, Harry has that Ginny girl and you never fuss at him.” Lily tried to defend and James scoffed. 

“This is hardly the same! I raised him! I don't know a thing about this boy!”

“Or girl.” Remus smirked and James felt his face fall in shock and you groaned, slowly covering your face.

“Remus.” Lily hissed out. “James.” She warned before Sirius spoke up. 

“Fine, fine, it's all fine. I mean, what harm could he do? We've taught her everything she needs to know about the world. Probably some Hufflepuff boy.” He tried to dismiss, and Remus, ever the instigator tonight, spoke up again.

“I'd be shocked if a Hufflepuff did that to my nieces neck.” He mumbled and James began to breathe quicker and heavier.

“Right, right, fine. You're being safe, right?” He asked bluntly and you groaned, melting into your seat. “Please, anything but this conversation right now.”

Lily gave a small fond smile and tutted at the boys. “Well honey, you should invite him over this summer break. I'd love to meet him.” She offered and then Harry gave a laugh. You shot him a look. “Don't you dare.”

“Dare. Very much dare, Harry.” Sirius quipped and Harry looked at you with a pursed lip before he sighed and spoke up. “Don't think you'd want him here is all.”

“Harry.” You warned, Lily sighing. “Harry, you stop that right now.” 

“What? I'm just being honest, dad and padfoot hate Slytherins.” He mused plainly, and James dropped his silverware. 

Sirius gave a laugh, throwing his head back before it slowly died out as he saw your red face. “No-”

“Why does his house matter?” You scoffed. “Not all Slytherins are the same.”

“Yeah, just so happens that he's just the type dad hates.” Harry muttered before he took a sip of water. “Happens to be one he particularly-”

“Harry James Potter!” Lily shouted at him and he had enough sense to seem guilty. He looked down as you tried to sink deeper into your seat. 

“I had a feeling.” Remus spoke up and you looked at him in shock. He gave you a side eyed glance. “You had a quidditch jersey in your bag. You don't play and certainly not for Slytherin.”

You looked down at your hands on your lap as your father shouted. “Why didn't you tell us, Remus!”

“This,” He gestured with his fork towards his husband and best friend. “You're terrifying the poor girl. I saw the name, I have to agree with Harry, you'd lose it.”

“What?” James snapped and Lily slammed her hands on the table. “Will you cut it out? All three of you! Do you want her to hide things from us forever? She'll tell us in her own time.”

Sirius groaned and began to pick at his food. “Whatever. As long as it isn't Malfoy.” He huffed and you shyly shook your head. Sirius gave an exaggerated groan of relief. “Thank Merlin.” 

“Who did that, sweetheart?” James prodded with a warning glare from Lily. “James.” She whispered and they locked eyes. They held that look before he clicked his tongue. 

“I asked you a question, niffler.” James prodded, and Lily slowly closed her eyes, covering her face.

“Dad, I really think-”

“Your dad asked you something.” Remus suddenly spoke up and you looked over at him to meet his eyes. Then it hit you. What he had said moments ago. He knew. 

“I-”

“Y/N.” Sirius prodded and Lily gave you a sympathetic look. She could command your father on a lot of things. But never about you and Harry.

“Mattheo. Mattheo Riddle.” Harry suddenly spoke up, and your blood ran cold. You sunk as deep as you could into your seat and Lily gave a squeak of surprise, before covering her mouth. Remus thinned his lips and clenched his jaw. 

“No you aren't.” James said simply and you covered your face.

“{Y/N}. No you aren't.”

“Dad, please.” You sniffed, overwhelmed. You sat up and straightened yourself. “He isn't some, bad guy-”

Remus scoffed and Sirius slammed his fist on the table. “His father-!”

“He isn't his father!” You challenged, shooting up from your seat and glaring at your uncle. “You of all people should understand that!”

“Watch your mouth.” James hissed and stood up as well. You scoffed and threw your hands up. “I don't understand! He's done nothing wrong! Nothing to any of us! I get that he's not this image you had in your head of what you wanted for me-”

“Dorcas.. Marlene.” Your mother whispered and your body stiffened. You looked over at your mother and your heart broke at her distress. You reached out and she sniffled, dismissing herself. Your shoulders fell and you looked back to your father. 

He was staring at you with a look you've never seen.

“Dad-”

“Your room. Now.”

“Dad! That's not fair in the slightest I-”

“Room!” He boomed and you sniffled before running off. Slamming the dining room door behind you as you walked upstairs. 

It would be a long summer.

~~~

Mattheo was missing you. He had been missing you for days now. You said you would write to him, but he didn't get a single letter. He figured it was likely you were busy, you did have a family to distract you after all. 

So, he wrote you a letter instead. He didn't want to think about how desperate it sounded, how desperate he was for you. He didn't look over it more than once before he sent it.

Little did he know, the second James heard an owl outside, he shot to his feet and hurried to intercept it. You were ever oblivious, in your parents room as you and Lily shared one of many heartfelt conversations over the brief summer. Your mother was doing her best to understand, but it was trouble, trying to believe he wasn't doing this for some master plan down the line. You both went quiet when you heard your father call you both.

When you walked into the parlor room, you sat down on the couch, You looked at the table in front of you and grimaced, You'd know that parchment anywhere. 

There was a long pause, before James spoke up. “The last time I saw this parchment, it was a letter Beatrix Lestrange sent us in our third safe house. Telling us she knew where we were, and that she was coming. Coming to kill your family, {Y/N}.” He leaned forward and picked up the letter and you refused to look him in the eyes.

“It’s nostalgic, really. But these words? ‘I yearn for you. I look at my textbooks from over the years and I wonder what it would be like to have you read them to me’.” He declared. “ ‘You made even the most complex of spells doable. You made things doable’.”

Your mother couldnt help but smile a bit at his words. You grimaced.

“Charming, isnt it? If only the rest of the letter wasnt riddled with innuendo of what this fuck wants to do to my daughter.”

You winced and sighed, the grimace not leaving your face. Mattheo that.. Idiot.

Then,, your mother began to laugh, and James looked at her from the corner of his eyes. “What? Is this funny?”

“Quite.” She smirked. “Sounds like the letters you would send me in school. I used to burn them.” 

He scoffed and leaned back in his seat. “That makes me feel fantastic. He’s a bastard like I was in school.”

“Well.” Lily spoke slowly. “Look at us now.” 

Lily looked over at you just in time for you to glance up and meet her eyes. She smiled sweetly before she continued. “I think its sweet.”

[quintinh43]

3 Times Quinn Almost Proposed + 1 Time He Actually Did

The best decision Quinn ever made was you. From the second he stumbled into that Cafe with his parents, to moving in with you, to admitting he loved you and everything else in between. It was a no-brainer that he wanted to spend the rest of his life with you. And there was no doubt in his mind that you felt the same way.

"I can't believe you're proposing," Jack said, tapping his fingers against the center console of Quinn's car. He never could sit still, and sometimes it grated on Quinn's nerves.

"Why? Do you think it's too early?" Quinn asks anxiously, running his tongue against his lips.

Luke pitches forward from the back seat to share his input, "You've been dating for like what? Five?" He asks, doing some quick math on his fingers.

Quinn nods, "Since March,"

"Ya know, we still haven't forgiven you for not telling us immediately," Jack huffs, crossing his arms over his chest.

"If it's any consolation, you are the first people I wanted to tell," Quinn says placatingly.

"Quinner, go easy on our uneducated brother, he doesn't know what the word consolation means," Luke says seriously.

Quinn snorts a laugh as Jack turns around to swat Luke on the head. "I have a bigger vocabulary than you dumbass!"

Before the two of them can escalate into a full-blown bickering match, Quinn interrupts, "Back to my problem, guys! Do you think it's too early to propose?" His fingers tap nervously on the steering wheel as he navigates to the jewellery store.

"There's no proper timeline when it comes to proposing Quinny, it comes down to when you are ready and you feel like it's the right time in your relationship," Jack says.

"I mean, you already knew you wanted to spend the rest of your life with Y/n, so this is just taking the next step towards that, isn't it?" Luke adds, adjusting his Devils Hockey cap over his curls.

"When did you two become so wise?" Quinn grumbles as he pulls into the parking lot.

"We've always been wise beyond our years," Luke says puffing his chest out. Jack flicks his cap off his head, rolling his eyes.

"Sure Lukey," Quinn snorts, running a hand through his hair.

"Alright boys, let's get this done." Jack claps, practically jumping out of the car.

It wasn't hard at all. Quinn chose a shop where he could completely customize the ring, and with access to your Pinterest board and all the rings that you already own, he knew almost exactly how he wanted it to look. The only thing he was nervous about was whether or not you would like it.

"Don't overthink it too much Quinn, you know her better than you know yourself," Jack squeezes his shoulder comfortingly.

"You could propose with a ring pop, and she would treasure it for the rest of her life," Luke adds, with a roll of his eyes.

The three of them are in and out of the shop within an hour, and Quinn is smiling his ass off all the way home.

1.

A week later, Quinn picks up the ring. It's even better than he imagined it would be in real life. As his car pulls into the driveway of the lakehouse, he sees you out front with his mom, helping her tend to her garden.

You kneel in the dirt, sunglasses perched on your nose, and a canucks cap on your head. Smiling and laughing with Ellen as you both pull weeds from the ground. Quinn's heart beats out of his chest with happiness, and he's struck with the urge to kneel in the dirt next to you and present the ring to you right then.

When you notice that he arrived, you grin widely, giving him a wave. There's dirt smudged across your nose and under your nails, and Quinn thinks the ring would be a lovely accessory to your mud-stained hands.

The outline of the ring box feels warm in his pocket as he approaches you and his mom, "Hi babe," he greets, dropping a kiss to the top of your head, and it takes everything in his bones not to get down on one knee and pull out the ring right now.

"Hi Mom," he says with a quiet smile, giving her a kiss on the cheek. Her eyes twinkle knowingly.

"Jack and Luke are napping upstairs, and the two of us are going to start lunch as soon as we're done this."

Quinn nods, "Lemme change and I'll come help you two," he runs up the stairs, tucks the ring box safely at the top of his closet and changes into shorts and a t-shirt to help you and his mom in the garden.

2.

Quinn never expected to be the guy who obsessively walked around with his engagement ring in his pocket after he bought it. But here he was, on the boat, with the ring sitting in the glove compartment. Which you had complete access to.

Jack had called him an idiot, stating that a number of things could've happened, from you finding the ring accidentally, or it falling into the water. Or maybe even a shark eating it. Luke was quick to call Jack an idiot, saying that there were no sharks in Lake Erie. Jack rolled his eyes and flicked Luke in the forehead saying it was to emphasize how stupid Quinn was being by bringing the ring with him onto the boat.

Quinn is currently in the driver's seat, you're on the wakeboard, and the rest of the boys are littered around the boat, whooping and cheering as you throw the rope and tip backwards into the water with a salute.

Trevor whistles low with admiration, "Wow, Mrs. Huggy is a professional,"

"She's not Mrs. Huggy yet, but she will be soon," Quinn mutters under his breath just as you climb the ladder back onto the boat.

It takes a minute for the words to register, but as soon as they do Trevor's jaw is on the floor. He stares back and forth between you and Quinn.

Jack, Quinn, and Luke wear various degrees of alarm on their faces, hoping and praying that you didn't hear anything.

"Damn, guys, was I that bad?" You laugh nervously, and you take in the looks on their faces. You unzip your life jacket and squeeze as much water out of your hair as you can.

"He-" Trevor starts pointing at Quinn, but before any words can actually leave his mouth, Jack is tipping Trevor over the edge of the boat and into the water.

You burst into laughter, and the boys seemingly return to normal as a soaking-wet Trevor climbs back into the boat, muttering obscenities under his breath. "Alright, who's next?"

"Me," Quinn says, desperate to get away from Trevor's pointed smirk, "You're driving," he says, pushing you gently into the driver seat where he was previously seated.

"Are you sure you want me to drive?" You ask skeptically, brow raised.

"O'course babe, there's no one I'd trust more." Quinn punctuated his sentence with a kiss on your cheek. Jack makes an offended noise, that sounds like a dying bird of some kind and you laugh at him.

Quinn rolls his eyes at him as he zips his life jacket and gets into the water for his turn on the wakeboard. He gives you a thumbs up, and parrots the movement, before slowly accelerating. You stand at the wheel of the boat, half twisted towards the back, so you can keep an eye on Quinn.

Quinn stands easily, and you smile accelerating a bit more. You turn in patterns that aren't too sharp but still make nice big waves for Quinn to ride. He's grinning like a madman. You maneuver the boat in a manner that gives him a wave to jump off of if he wants to.

He takes the opportunity, sailing through the air and managing a half spin before he hits the water. You drive around him in a slow circle as he resurfaces.

"That was fucking amazing! Where did you learn to drive a boat like that?" Trevor asks admiringly.

You shrug, cheeks heating under the praise, "My dad taught me," you say, crawling to the back of the boat and offering Quinn a hand as he climbs the ladder, "Been driving watercraft since I was like, twelve or something," you grin, squeaking as Quinn shakes his wet hair out in your direction, "You should see what I can do on a jet ski."

Jack whistles heartily, "We might have to take you up on that one of these days,"

"Sure, Jack, if you think you can handle getting your ass beat by a girl," you smirk. Jack scoffs offendedly, and Luke cackles from where he lies at the front of the boat.

Quinn is smiling so hard, his eyes crinkling at the corners, "I think we have to upgrade you to Captain for the summer, that was the best boat driving out of all of us," Quinn praises, pressing his lips to your hair.

"Seriously!" Jack says excitedly, scrambling for a life jacket, "That looked so fucking fun, no one can ever make waves like that! I'm next." He says jumping in the water before anyone can protest.

"Don't let this one get away Quinner," Luke says, tipping his hat in your direction, "Or I'll take her from you," he throws an over-exaggerated wink in your direction, you giggle and Quinn rolls his eyes. As if the shithead wasn't with him when he bought the ring.

Quinn eyes the glove compartment, where the ring is stored, and thoroughly debates how proposing right now would play out. A sharp whistle from Jack pulls him from his thoughts, and he takes his spot at the back of the boat as Jack spotter.

You resume your place in the driver's seat, and for the rest of the evening, that's where you stay.

Quinn almost has a heart attack when he sees you reach for the glove compartment, but Luke manages to fake trip into you just in time so that Jack can sneakily snag the box and relocate it to one of the other boat compartments.

3.

The house is completely full, with a bunch of the boy's friends who are visiting. Everyone is camped out around the fire pit, nursing beers and laughing loudly. You are curled up in Quinn's lap, head pillowed on his chest while you listen to all of the boys talk about their fondest memories.

You play with the strings of Quinn's hoodie, while he absent-mindedly traces patterns on your arm. His chest rumbles with laughter and his arm tightens around you, as Jack tells a story from when they played together for Team USA. An overwhelming wave of gratitude washes over you. You're grateful for everything in life, and most of all Quinn.

"You're quiet tonight," His lips are pressed against the side of your head, and the comforting baritone of his voice soothes your soul, "doing ok?"

You nod, bringing your fingers up to trace his jaw, "just thinking,"

"Penny for your thoughts?" He speaks low, his words only for your ears, the crackling of the fire, and hearty laughter fade into the background and at this moment it's as if you and Quinn are the only two people who exist.

He was a way of doing that. Making everything else disappear and making you feel like you're the only girl in the world. "I'm so grateful for everything," you answer quietly, "especially for you. Getting to experience life with you, being able to support you, having you there to support me- and just everything that you do and have done for me. You know?"

Quinn's heart swells so wide he thinks it might burst out of his chest. Before he really knows what he's doing, he's slipping out of the chair and kneeling in front of you. You huff because you were enjoying being curled into him.

His hands are on your thighs, and your hands cup his cheeks, thumbs tracing over his cheekbones. Neither of you has noticed that the laughter has died out, and everyone is watching the two of you. Their faces are a mixture of disgust and confusion.

Jack and Luke look downright horrified, sharing a look and exchanging silent words with their eyes.

"Will you m-" Before Quinn can complete his question, Luke is scrambling out of the lawn chair that he and Duker are curled up in and tackling Quinn to the floor.

"BEE!" Jack screeches, adding to the dramatics as he stands on his chair and points in the direction of where Quinn and Luke lay in the grass, "THERE'S A FUCKING BEE!"

There was no bee.

At Jack's distressed yelling, half of the boys are out of their chairs, running around and swatting at the heads of the non-existent bee.

You hold your stomach, laughing at the general chaos. It shouldn't be as funny as it is, but the sight of almost twenty grown men screaming about a bee is pretty hilarious.

"You are welcome you fucking numbskull," Luke hisses in Quinn's ear, as he helps him back up. Quinn gives him a sheepish smile of thanks. Were it not for his brother's antics, he would've regretted that being how he proposed for the rest of his life.

Once the general chaos dies down and everyone is back in their chairs calmly, you speak up with a smirk on your face, "You guys do know Bees are not nocturnal right?"

Quinn looks pointedly at Jack like he's an idiot. As if Quinn has the right to call him an idiot when he almost proposed to the love of his life in front of twenty hockey boys around a campfire on a Tuesday night.

"How do you know that?" Jack asks, crossing his arms over his chest with a pout.

"Yeah," Trevor scoffs, "Seems untrue,"

You snort, taking a sip of your beer, "I'm an elementary school teacher, dumbass, the science unit about bugs is practically ingrained in my brain. Bees are definitely not nocturnal."

"Nope, there definitely was a bee," Luke chimes, "I literally saved Quinn's life."

"Yeah, I saw it too," Dylan adds with a nod.

"It was basically the size of Quinn's head," Cole adds, "really Y/n/n I don't know how you didn't see it," Cole says matter-of-factly.

"I can't believe you guys are trying to gaslight me about bees right now," you snort, nuzzling further into Quinn's warmth.

"I heard it buzzing in my ear, babe," Quinn says seriously.

You roll your eyes at him and tuck your head under his chin and he wraps his arms around you securely, pressing a kiss to your hair, while you argue with the guys about Bees for the next half-an-hour.

+ 1

Quinn slips out of the bedroom to let you finish changing, he pads down the stairs to where his family waits in the kitchen. Jack presents him the ring box, that he had decided to keep with him after the boat incident. Quinn tucks it into his pocket with a deep breath.

"You ready Quinner?" Luke asks, squeezing his shoulder comfortingly.

"Yeah," Quinn nods, breathing deeply.

"She's gonna say yes," Jack reassures, giving Quinn a pat on the back.

"I hope so," Quinn says nervously.

His dad chuckles, "Don't worry kid, you're doing great compared to how nervous I was when I was proposing to your mother,"

Ellen laughs fondly, "It's true, he was so nervous he forgot to pull out the ring, and then when he finally did, he dropped it."

Jim rolls his eyes, but the smile stays. Quinn laughs at that, then all his anxieties are bubbling to the surface and spilling past his lips before he can stop them.

"What if she doesn't like the ring? What if she says no, and she thinks it is too soon? What if I fall on my face? What if I lose the ring? What if-"

Jack squishes his cheeks together to keep him from talking. He tips his forehead against Quinn's staring deep into his eyes. "Breathe with me, Quinn,"

Jack takes exaggerated breaths, and Quinn follows his lead. Jim and Ellen quietly slip out of the room, leaving the brothers to themselves.

Once Quinn's breathing returns to normal, Jack lets him go. "She loves you with her whole heart, Quinn. You have nothing to worry about," Luke says, bonking his head against Quinn’s affectionately.

"Thanks, guys," he murmurs, running a hand through his hair with a sigh.

Everything goes smoothly in Quinn's opinion. Even when he practically forgot his whole speech. But if he had to do it again, he wouldn't change a thing.

-

Yeah so this ended up being like 2.9k words....

Anyways enjoy friends!

So it's basically a fic but lazy.

Part of This Universe

[rikichie]

Just don't ask me how that huge plush was thrown there

Under the cut, things I imagine in YOI pre-canon, with the ways my thoughts tie into canon to explain why I think them. These are personal headcanons and interpretations.

With Viktor, I imagine his family being high achieving, and Viktor having a lot of expectations on him. And he matches then successfully. But this means his parents think he's doing well, even in moments where emotionally he isn't. They look at achievements rather than looking at him. It's not intentional neglect, they just don't have the awareness of mental wellbeing. He has a bed and food and he's doing well in school and skating, so everything must be okay. It's fine when he's fine, it's lonely when he's not. And it's the first environment that teaches him to match himself to what's expected and wanted of him, fulfilling a role rather than just being.

When he's older, he quietly creates distance. Not cutting them off, but not reaching out. They don't mind. They follow news, and they can show off his success.

When he's young, Viktor loves having fans and being known and admired. Af first he doesn't see downsides to it. And then something happens, as simple as "did you see him throwing the flower at Christophe Giacometti? He was flirting, how cute" - and Viktor realizes his fans will draw their own conclusions and won't believe him if he tries to say they're wrong.

So he starts adjusting his approach. Building a persona, and building walls. Charming smiles that get him anything he wants. Practicing the skill of giving people what they expect. Being what they expect. And then flipping it on its head and surprising them.

If you're focusing on matching and subverting expectations, you're not necessarily being yourself. Any personal exploration of identity is hidden and alone. But on the ice, when he's performing, he can be honest. He can be seen. Because they're going to take it as fake. Think of how Minako reacted to Stammi Vicino - Viktor's earnest plea for someone to stay by his side, well, he's too charming for this to tug at the heartstrings. So he can play with stories that he won't share with anyone any other way, and he knows they'll take it as pretend.. The walls he builds don't allow him to be truly close to people. He has good relationships with other skaters, but emotionally keeps them at arm's length. He doesn't notice he's isolating. Chris and he have fun joke-flirting, but when Viktor steps away from the ice Chris doesn't seem to realize he needs this, isn't close enough to know what he's struggling with. He talks like Viktor is taking away the motivation he's entitled to by choosing to coach Yuuri. His rinkmates see him on good and bad days so they know when he struggles, and Yakov is the only person close to knowing him deeply, but even he doesn't take it seriously when Viktor burns out, so that is still limited.

For Yuri, I think his mother was going through a lot to let his grandfather take care of him. He has a lot of responsibility in that setting, and it all starts when he's so young.

I think, with Viktor being present in his life consistently from such a young age, Viktor is one of the people he sees as family. He absolutely looks up to him, just like he absolutely looks up to Yuuri. And I think he resents the emotional distance Viktor maintains.

He's not very attentive to people in general, but he's the one that explains to us how Viktor feels early in the show. When Viktor left to Japan so suddenly, I think Yura felt abandoned beyond just Viktor forgetting to choreograph a program for him. If it was just the program - he did end up getting Agape, he could have just asked for that, but he tried to get Viktor to go back. I feel like he hates that Viktor went to look for a way to get his spark back somewhere else, instead of staying and finding a way out of his slump with his rinkmates. If what Viktor needs is to coach someone, why isn't Yuri good enough? He's a talented skater and he sees himself as continuing Viktor's legacy, but Viktor chose someone else for that role.

And Viktor did choose Yuuri to continue his legacy. Because Yuuri skates so beautifully, because Yuuri has so much love for Viktor's skating, because Yuuri has drive and ambition and pride and skill and he finds joy in skating, and Viktor wants to nurture all of that into the performance Yuuri deserves to show.

And along the way, he learns how to connect with people as himself. His relationships with Yuuri and Yuuri's family open doors for him to better and deeper relationships with Yuri and Chris and anyone else he wants to be close to.

About Yuuri, there's very little I can say because we know so much. So I'll just share a lighthearted headcanon a few friends and I came up with as a story idea and I just adopted.

I don't share the fanon that Phichit got him into pole dancing. In my mind, he either started himself, or it was Chris - unintentionally. I think they're friends, because of how Yuuri reacted to him in the show, like he's used to him. And I like to think Chris kept saying things that made Yuuri feel competitive. Talking about how it's great for core strength, "but it's probably not your thing." Sent pictures of himself performing difficult moves, and got pictures back because Yuuri was trying to match him or do more difficult things than him. And meanwhile Chris thinks they're showing off to each other for fun. It's how Chris knew Yuuri can keep up with him at the banquet.

I still want to write something for that last bit.

[navilucky]

how do i ignore the 3d?

literally, it's just about choosing to ignore it. acknowledge that it doesn't hold any significance and your imagination, YOUR REALITY is the only thing that matters. focus on the feeling of having your desire; after all, everything is only a feeling. your 3d is the mirror of your thoughts and feelings, you only react to it. the 3D is simply a reflection of past thinking.

it's about remaining unfaced. for example, seeing only $2 on your account. persistence is key; just because you don't see it doesn't mean it's not happening. go beyond the 3d, accept that it already is present in your reality.

"This does not mean completely pretend the 3D does not exist, but don’t accept it as truth, as the final unchangeable reality."

this is WHY they don't recommend you checking the 3d. we humans naturally rely on the 3d and what is in front of us. just because it's not appearing in the 3d, does not mean it's not in the process. stop looking for signs, stop double checking, stop doubting, stop looking for validation. you recognize that it's there, but don't give it power.

[meo-eiru]

Hello!

Do you have any tips on making art for games?

I've tried my hand in making VNs before and i want to try again but i always get overwhelmed when it's time to make the sprites, backgrounds, and other artwork :(

Mostly because the sheer amount of art needed is intimidating.

The best way to overcome that overwhelming feeling is so start out small.

Remember that you are not a big company, work based on the workload you can handle. For a first vn usually focusing on 2-3 characters at most is more ideal, you don't have to make your job harder.

For the backgrounds there's an app called FotoSketcher (not sure if it's available on mobile), it basically places a filter over your art and makes it look painting like, and you can choose from various different styles. It's free and has nothing to do with AI so you can use it without worry.

While I drew the backgrounds in the cg, since we were running short on time FotoSketcher did help me a lot with the in game backgrounds. Though you might need to draw over some stuff to make them blend in better.

For the sprites, or well the character designs, don't go too overboard with details. More details doesn't mean better character design, in fact it can usually feel hard on the eyes. Try to keep it simple.

Be aware of your character's charm points and focus on those.

For the expressions, you don't have to draw each expression one by one. Something that really fastened the process for me was drawing different eyes, mouths and eyebrows, then combining those like puzzle pieces to form the expressions.

For example these two Starling expressions have the same eyes and eyebrow combination but I used different mouths.

And for the cgs, again keep your workload to a minimum. You don't have to illustrate every fun scene, remember that the players can imagine those themselves too. Focus on the scenes you think should absolutely get illustrated to support the story better. If after finishing those you still have time you can always add in more, but what is important is to make a presentable game, not going above and beyond with every single small detail.

[hannieehaee]

thoughts on perv!hoshi 👉👈

18+ / mdi

content: perv!hoshi, f2l!hoshi, he has a huge crush on you, he's a tiny bit pathetic, some second hand embarrassment, panty sniffing, afab reader, smut, penetrative sex, etc.

wc: 1310

a/n: finally a hoshi request!!!!! everyone cheered

masterlist

"o-oh fuck, fuck! it's so good, so fucking good ..."

all that could be heard in the dark room was the slapping of skin accompanied by soonyoung's pathetic whimpers as he yet again engaged in such a shameful act.

he was unable to help himself despite knowing how incredibly ashamed he would be if you were to catch him in what had now become a daily endeavor.

soonyoung groaned and whimpered as he jerked himself off with a pair of used panties he had swiped from your room during his last visit, all while his eyes focused on the latest thirst trap you had posted on your close friends stories on instagram – okay, maybe it wasnt a thirst trap in itself, but your tiny little dress allowed him to see just enough skin to get him going.

was he embarrassed? beyond so. but his carnal needs could not be helped when his best friend happened to be the prettiest girl he had ever laid eyes on. you were the softest and most beautiful thing soonyoung had ever seen, but being your friend was entirely torturous.

as your best friend, soonyoung had to constantly hold back from letting his eyes wander into places they didnt belong. he had to restrict himself in being as touchy with you as he was with other friends, not wanting to risk the inevitable boner that would arise. and the worst of all? he had to jack off in the darkness of his room any time you facetimed him late at night when you were bored, growing far too horny at the sight of you in your skimpy pajamas, laid in bed all pretty for him.

yes, maybe restricting himself in such ways was dumb. maybe not confessing to you years back when he first met you was one of his biggest regrets. but it was too late now for him to ever get you to be his in the ways he wanted you to.

in a perfect world, he liked to imagine the day he'd finally grow the balls to walk into your life and sweep you off your feet, but for now he was stuck finding satisfaction in the form of some lacy panties and the pretty pictures lighting up his screen.

thats how the following few minutes went by as soonyoung edged himself, picturing your pretty eyes staring up at him as you jerked him off, sadistic in the way you'd coo at him any time you'd rob him of his orgasm.

oh, how badly he wanted you to mock him and torment him as he begged you to give him his release. there was nothing in this world he wouldn't do to get you to use him like a toy and steal all pleasure from him for your own selfish benefit. his biggest desire was for you to claim your high on his cock time and time again as he-

"soonie?"

soonyoung's movements halted immediately, somehow not having noticed the new source of light coming from the door you had just opened, peaking into his room as you got the perfect view of his shameful act – him in his underwear, one hand digging into his boxers while the other held your panties to his face, phone lying in front of him at full brightness as it displayed a photo of you.

there was no good way to explain this situation without incriminating himself further.

"y/n, i- it's not what- it's not what you think!" he scrambled to get himself presentable, throwing the phone to the side in hopes it evaporated somehow and letting your panties fall to the side of the bed. unfortunately, his cock still remained tall and proud under his boxers as his hands attempted to cover the sight from you.

you hesitantly stepped further into the room, closing his door behind you as you stared intently at him, no readable expression in your face.

"i swear, this isnt as bad as it looks, i- i was just, uh, fuck. this is the first time i ever do this, okay? i wouldnt- i would never want to make you feel uncomfortable or disrespected or-"

his nonsensical rambles seemed to finally come to and end when you decidedly started marching towards him, putting your hands on his cheeks to press your lips against his own in a rather aggressive kiss.

soonyoung, still extremely horny and never one to turn down a good time, wrapped his arms around your waist and brought you onto the bed, causing you to naturally straddle him as the two of you made out.

his pathetic whimpers filled the room as your tongue invaded his mouth, fighting and suckling his own. your hips began moving against his own the moment you felt his boner pressing up against your crotch.

oh, fuck. how was he supposed to survive against you like this? how, when you were grinding against him so sensually and letting him get his fill of your body as his hands explored and squeezed at every delicious curve?

soonyoung was a gone man already, but he absolutely lost his mind when you disconnected from him, throwing off the boy shorts and tank too you had been wearing – had you come over in your pajamas? – before helping him rid himself of his boxers. without warning, you sat on him, throwing your head back as he filled you up.

wordlessly, you bounced on him, rendering soonyoung completely powerless under you as he did not dare question your sudden appearance nor your sudden thirst for him. he would take whatever you have him with no question.

"soo- soonie, fuck. so fucking pretty ... is this what you wanted? huh? wanted me bouncing on you like this, baby?"

you patronized him continuously as you rode him, knowing he was too drunk on bliss to form a coherent response. your hands explored his body, pulling at his nipples and scratching at his chest in order to optimize the cries he let out for you.

his orgasm came embarrassingly fast, but to be fair, he had had a head start before your sudden arrival. luckily for him, your hand had gone down to play with your clit halfway through your fucking, making your high arrive just on time with his own.

"s-so good, fuck. it's so good ... such a good pussy, fuck. always wanted this p-pussy ... my perfect fucking pussy ..." he whimpered, pressing his head against the bed as he writhed under you.

when it was all said and done, you laid yourself on his chest, not taking him out as you enjoyed the fullness be provided. your lips found his chest, pressing loving kisses against it as he sighed in contentment.

"does this mean-"

"you're far too obvious, soonie," you giggled, "you've stolen five pairs of panties and never given them back. plus, i got a notification when you took a screenshot of my story."

"oh, ah, i-"

"i didnt think id catch you in the act, but i thought id catch you off guard, and man, did i ever," you laughed (at him or with him, he wasnt sure).

"so ... you're not mad?", he turned the two of you around, making you lay beside him as he held you in his arms, dick still plunged inside you.

"no, soonie. i have to admit ... it was kinda hot how much you wanted me," a small blush made its way to your cheeks, not too noticeable for the naked eye, but soonyoung was an expert in all things you, so he caught sight of it.

"oh?", he grinned, "you know that means i'm just gonna keep stealing your panties, right?"

slapping his chest in jest, you leaned up to kiss his lips, whispering against them, "why steal my panties when you can have the real thing?"

oh, fuck.

thank god you arrived unannounced.

[ironladders]

"I circled half the globe searching for him, but he was gone."

Starscream ;_;

RIGHT?? IT'S SO SAD .

and i have sooo many thoughts about this whole situation with skyfire/starscream that's been presented to me, if you dont mind anon im gonna use your ask to ramble a little

(disclaimer im sure nothing i have to say here is particularly new & has been said by those who've been deep into TF longer than myself but i need to get this out my system anyways. and also im still watching through g1 so if im horribly mistaken about anything #oops)

unless i missed something, i don't think it's specified in "fire in the sky" how long starscream looked for skyfire?? but just thinking about that line.... he obviously didn't immediately go back to cybertron, he didn't just give up on skyfire. starscream cared about skyfire enough to look for him, only leaving after (i assume) he realized he didn't have the resources to conduct a proper search for his companion. and i mean can you imagine being starscream in that situation???? your partner just disappears into a storm, and no matter how far and long you look you're unable to find them????????

i get starscream, man. i'd also become awful if that happened to me.

and here's the thing: i stumbled upon this post which posits that the decepticons happening to stumble across skyfire in the ice was no incident, but starscream's own doing, and i LOVE this theory/headcanon so much. when i first watched the episode yesterday i was thinking that it was funny they just happen to be mining right where skyfire was frozen so it's nice to see my suspicions affirmed LMAO

i honestly love that episode so much because as i learn more about starscream and transformers as a whole i think little tidbits like that offer a deeper look into who he is (or was, idk) beyond just megatron's second-in-command. he was a scientist, an explorer, a friend. "was" isn't even the proper word here, because he still is all of those things, he just...... applies them differently, i suppose. which is the real tragedy in who he is as a character.

beyond starscream and his search for skyfire, you wanna know what i've REALLY been thinking about a lot with these two? when skyfire becomes a decepticon (for like a day lol but still), starscream immediately declares that when he overthrows megatron, skyfire will become his second-in-command. not any of the other seekers, not either of the waves, not literally anyone else who's been a decepticon for more than an hour, but skyfire. his long-lost science partner. on starscream's end, virtually nothing about his relationship with skyfire has changed. he still trusts him as much as he did millions of years ago, to the point he'd be willing to have him at his side as leader of the decepticons.

but on skyfire's end... the starscream in front of him is different from the one he knew. war and being a decepticon changed starscream for the worst, something that unveils itself very quickly to skyfire. one of the first things he asks starscream after becoming a decepticon is if starscream is genuinely happy about being a decepticon warrior over the scientist he used to be. skyfire can't believe that the person standing in front of him could be the starscream he once knew before being frozen. still, it's starscream, so skyfire ends up going along with things up until he can't ignore his morals and deny that he's on the wrong side anymore.

that is where the second tragedy happens for starscream: betrayl, by the man he'd waited to get back for so long. he finally got skyfire back, only to lose him all over again.

if skyfire had never crashed that day -- if they'd never gone closer to explore the earth in the first place -- would starscream had gone down such a dark path? would he have taken countless lives, and become the ruthless decepticon he is now? does it eat at skyfire, knowing that in his absence starscream lost who he once was? or perhaps he'd still be the same starscream, but skyfire would be at his side serving the decepticon cause. maybe they both would've been so drastically changed by the years of cybertron's war together.

skyfire is a living, formerly frozen relic of the past before everything went wrong. starscream has aged far beyond that, to the point of no return. as much as they surely both want it, and regardless of what happens to them, their bond can never go back to what it once was.

god i just. i need more!!! i need to watch more transformers and read more of the comics and see more of these two!! i watched tfp + some of the live action movies as a kid but this is my first time learning about skyfire and this thing he's got going on with starscream and it's fascinating to me i can't believe i didn't know about this before!!!!! but it's also so fucked up oh my god!!!!!

ok yeah ive gotten the brainworms out my system. idk how to end this here's screenshots i took that i found funny

[obesogen]

I care more about fat than anything else.

When I make excuses to not see people so I can spend my time just sitting in my room, thinking about obesity and looking at the fattest people ever to be alive, or drawings of people fatter than our present reality allows, I wonder–––

Everyone who knows me knows I'm a bit flaky. A few who know me very well know I am prone to using porn and fantasy to disappear from the world.

No one knows what I really do, though. No one knows how deep this goes, how old it is. No one understands how powerful, how uncontrollable, and how unlimited my lust for fat really is.

They don't know much time I spend every day just thinking about fat. How I spend hours and hours every day and every night looking at photos, videos, gifs, and artwork universally depicting bodies on the furthest, ragged extremes of obesity, and beyond.

They don't know how, if I could find them, I would devote the rest of my life to the care and further fattening of a nearly immobile partner. The thought of my mega obese love rolling down the aisle at our wedding towards me in their extra-wide power wheelchair, sporting enormous, bespoke attire because they are far too fat for any available clothing, immensely fat and soon to be only even more so with me at their side, fills me with such contentment to imagine.

I would cut ties with anyone in my life in a heartbeat for a life spent devoted to my massively obese partner. I see us hiding ourselves away from a world that doesn't understand our love. They swell bigger every day, with every drive-thru run, every pint of ice cream, every 2-liter of soda, hundreds and hundreds of grams of sugar every few hours, practically on a drip.

I care more about fat than anything else.