#waterproof overalls

[ares857]

internet find

If you want this project to continue, you can use the Paypal donation button on the web page of the blog. Any donation is welcome.

[waterpoofs]

[armandposting]

man today was a WET ass boat day

[blood-loving-leech]

teaching at a summer sailing camp where you imagine sunshine and a nice breeze hits different when it’s august and raining and there’s NO wind whatsoever

[monty-glasses-roxy]

Thinking again about New Management AU and it just occured to me

If I go the blorbo route and stick to Roxy as being the first one because she's one of the biggest pains in the ass they have to keep making compromises for, then wouldn't she kinda go mad with power

Like, there's no way she'd believe she was given any power out of nowhere like that! Wouldn't she test this by making the stupidest demands possible just to be like "Ha! I told you I had no power!"

The question is, what would she do to test it? Something very much against the rules probably.

[seo-expert0012]

Coveralls: Everything You Need to Know

Coveralls are a type of protective clothing worn by workers in various industries to safeguard themselves from workplace hazards. They are designed to cover the entire body, providing protection from dirt, chemicals, heat, and other potential risks. In this comprehensive guide, we'll delve into the world of coveralls, discussing their uses, differences from overalls, and popular types available in the market.

What are Coveralls?

Coveralls, also known as boiler suits or overalls in some regions, are one-piece garments that cover the torso, arms, and legs. They are typically made from durable materials such as cotton, polyester, or a blend of both, providing comfort and protection in demanding work environments. Coveralls come in various styles, including insulated, waterproof, flame-resistant, and high-visibility options, catering to the specific needs of different industries and job roles.

Difference Between Overalls and Coveralls

While the terms "overalls" and "coveralls" are often used interchangeably, there is a subtle difference between the two. Overalls traditionally refer to garments that cover the torso and have straps passing over the shoulders, attaching to the trousers. Coveralls, on the other hand, are one-piece garments that cover the entire body from the neck down, including the arms and legs. Both serve the purpose of protecting clothing and providing additional safety features, but coveralls offer more comprehensive coverage.

Why are Coveralls Used?

Coveralls are used across a wide range of industries for several reasons:

1. Protection: They provide protection against dirt, chemicals, abrasions, and other workplace hazards, reducing the risk of injuries and contamination.

2. Comfort: Designed for durability and comfort, coveralls allow workers to move freely without restriction, enhancing productivity and overall well-being.

3. Safety: Certain types of coveralls, such as flame-resistant and high-visibility options, are specifically designed to meet safety standards and regulations, ensuring workers remain visible and protected in hazardous environments.

4. Uniformity: Coveralls contribute to a sense of unity and professionalism within a workforce by providing a standardized appearance for employees.

Popular Types of Coveralls

- Insulated Coveralls: Ideal for cold weather conditions, insulated coveralls feature added insulation to keep workers warm and comfortable during outdoor activities or in cold environments.

- Waterproof Coveralls: Waterproof coveralls are designed to repel water and other liquids, keeping workers dry and protected in wet or rainy conditions.

- Flame-Resistant Coveralls: Made from flame-resistant materials, these coveralls are essential for workers in industries where exposure to fire or sparks is a risk, such as welding or oil refining.

- High-Visibility Coveralls: Featuring reflective strips or bright colors, high-visibility coveralls enhance worker visibility in low-light conditions or areas with heavy traffic, reducing the risk of accidents.

Coveralls in English and Around the World

In English-speaking countries, coveralls are widely referred to as "coveralls." However, in some regions, they may be known by different names such as boiler suits (UK), jumpsuits (Australia), or overalls (North America). Despite these regional variations in terminology, the functionality and purpose of coveralls remain consistent across borders.

Coveralls in Pakistan

In Pakistan, coveralls are commonly used in industries such as manufacturing, construction, and agriculture to protect workers from workplace hazards. They are available in various styles and materials to suit different job requirements and environmental conditions.

Coveralls in the Tech World

In the tech industry, "coveralls" also refers to a popular code coverage tool used by software developers to measure the effectiveness of their tests and identify areas of code that require additional testing. Coveralls, along with other tools like GitHub and Codecov, play a crucial role in ensuring the quality and reliability of software applications.

Conclusion

Coveralls are essential protective garments worn by workers across diverse industries to ensure their safety, comfort, and productivity. With various types available to suit different work environments and requirements, coveralls play a vital role in maintaining workplace safety standards and protecting workers from potential hazards. Whether it's for insulation against the cold, resistance to flames, or visibility in low-light conditions, there's a coverall designed to meet the needs of every worker, ensuring they can perform their duties safely and effectively.

[livlaughloveluke]

underwater moments w/ Poseidon!reader x Luke

ᡣ𐭩 𝘀𝗮𝘁𝘂𝗿𝗻

daughter of poseidon! reader x luke castellan 🪸

IN WHICH.. you’re dating the famous hermes boy 💘

warnings! this fic contains- no betrayal luke 🥳 // percy is a lil bro // fem reader // not all of these are underwater moments

🎧- saturn by sza

[headcannons]

sneaking out for starlit swims !!

you and luke spend your nights secretly swimming under the dark waters of camp half-blood, while the moon grazes the surface and turns the black depths glittery. you and him try to remain quiet, but how could you resist laughter when he almost accidentally drowned, twice?!

the famous underwater kisses <3

with little privacy at the kid-filled camp, you and luke rarely found moments alone. all you had time for were sneaky, quick kisses in between planned activities. as a child of poseidon, you found a way to solve this intimate problem—underwater kisses. creating an air bubble under the lake allowed for a moment with no curious glances—at least from most. (the fishies and a certain pesky brother often interrupt)

going pearl diving!

luke likes to sunbathe in the gleaming sun, resting on the docks while you splash around in the blue lake. you dive down deep, searching for the prettiest pearls underwater and placing him on the wood surface next to him. this could go on for hours, you entertained by the adventure and luke just happy to be in your presence. the next day, luke graciously gifted you a gorgeous necklace made with the pearls you excavated.

surfing and paddle boarding 🏄‍♀️

while the calm waters don’t offer many waves, every once in a while you like to manipulate the liquid so you can surf. not to mention, you love to instruct luke, too. he’s not the best, but he’s willing to give anything a try. (if we’re being honest, he hates it. he hates constantly falling off the board and sharply coming into contact with the water, but he’d do anything if it meant you were happy.)

in contrast, he loves to paddle board with you. it’s more gentle, and he can actually talk to you while in the water.

the olive theory! (but with cherries)

definitelyyyy the type of guy to pretend he doesn’t like cherries just because he knows you love them more. every morning at breakfast, he slides you his small fruit cup with only the cherries remaining, and you eat it up every time. unbeknownst to you, he’s only doing this to see you smile. he loves the way your lips curl up into a smile when you eat them, the juices staining your lips with a shade of red. he would give up anything to see you smile like that. 

carrying a waterproof digital camera around 📸

he loves loves LOVES to take photos of you! whether your swimming in the lake or picking strawberries in the fields, he’s by your side with the camera directed towards you. he’s the number one candid picture taker! and when you ask why, he usually presents you with some dumb excuse or pickup line to conceal the fact that he’s totally whipped for you. 

“ew, stoppp! i look so bad right now! why do you like taking so many photos anyway?”

“dunno. you’re the subject of all my dreams, sweetheart.”

late night beach bonfires

singing, laughing, and cuddling by the warmth of a campfire with all your friends is a weekly occurrence for you and luke. it feels like you’re both just normal teens, living life with no fear of monsters attacking or angry greek gods. plus, he makes BOMB s’mores. 

CHAOTIC game nights with percy 

attempting to play charades with your little brother, but overall he just gets mad and rage quits because you couldn’t guess the word. oh, and we can’t forget the craziest uno nights. you and percy arguing over the rules while luke just stands awkwardly in the corner.

“you can’t place a draw two on a draw four! it doesn’t work that way!”

“yes you can!! suck it up and draw your six cards!”

“uh, guys…? 🧍‍��️”

the annual cabin decoration contest ! (yes, i made this up)

when that time rolls around, you and percy are DETERMINED to have the best cabin. you hang up seashells, scatter around the prettiest dried coral on shelves, and buy fairy lights for a cozy atmosphere. luke watches from afar as you and percy playfully argue whether a lana del rey poster would “fit the theme.” to be fair, it was a tunnel under OCEAN blvd poster.

୨୧

MASTERLISTS 𓏲𝄢 REQUEST / TALK TO ME 𓏲𝄢 RULES

[ltwilliammowett]

Cable and Hawser

Ordinary rope is not waterproof. When a ship anchors in relatively deep water (greater than about 35 metres or 20 fathoms), the anchor and rope that is let down becomes drenched with water, becoming prohibitively difficult to raise again, even with a mechanism like a capstan. This ultimately limits the depths available with ordinary rope to within the weight bearing capacity of the rope. The rope will become so heavy with water it will break.

Anchor cable of HMS Victory

The traditional instructions, according to the British Royal Navy in the age of sail, are: Three large strands of tightly woven rope of about 200 metres (110 fathoms) in length are themselves tightly woven in a direction counter to the weave, or twist, of the rope and clamped together over intervals to provide one strong length of rope that is effectively waterproof. The three ropes are so tightly wound counter to the weave of the constituent ropes that the fibers are compressed and the individual weaves stressed, sealing out the water and resulting in a length of about 180 metres (100 fathoms), the UK traditional definition of cable length. Using a cable, the raising of the anchor, or any activity involving submerging the cable, is not more strenuous than lowering.

Modern hawsers

Hawsers are not cables ,they are ropes (since the 13th century) of arbitrary length woven together to increase the strength of the overall line, but are not considered waterproof as the weave of the hawser goes with the weave of the constituent ropes. This has been come to be known as "hawser laid" and "cable laid". Confusion between cables and hawsers is rampant because both cables and hawsers can be used through the hawsehole.

[writella]

More Negan x reader pllsss😔😔😔

pls the emojis are sending me hahahah! let me know how you like it!

Thinking of Negan who daydreams about the reader who always has the cutest outfits when she comes to visit— ♡

cw: negan x fem!reader, smut— masturbation (m) and descriptive allusions to sexual situations, very desperate and depraved Negan because he is in jail, and reader being cute and nice and just too irresistible :) + I wrote this with a little bit of Negan’s crude humor in mind. wc: 2.1k. slightly proofread.

Negan never thought he would stoop so low.

Not like some 20 year old guy living in his mom’s basement; the type he’d talk shit to then completely demolish on a game; one who drinks monsters and watches porn on the daily back in the old B.W. (Before Walkers— for those of you who are uncultured) era.

That was beneath him.

If he needed it, there was his wife of course, or some chic he could hook up with at the bar, but— let’s not remind him of that. That is a wound that needs no further reopening. He was ashamed of it and everything else he’s done enough as it is. Not to mention, it sure doesn’t help that he was reminded of every single heinous act he has ever committed in the A.W. years by the grand total 5 patrons that have visited his cell every- single-god-damn- day.

But now, there was a new thing to cause him great shame.

A girl.

You.

You who gives him his meals on Fridays—Gabriel’s day off. You who just can’t help but stay 5, 10, sometimes even 30 minutes after you give him his food because he always makes you laugh. You, one of the town’s gardeners, who throws in fresh strawberries during breakfast and an extra cob of corn during dinner when you know you shouldn’t. You who didn’t eat your cookie from Carol’s monthly batch she brought from the Kingdom because you gave it to him instead. You with your three sets of overalls and far too many sundresses, yet you only had one sunhat, one pair of gardening gloves, and one pair of waterproof boots.

You were way too generous with him and a little too passionate about your clothing to the point he thinks you must forget you’re living in the zombie apocalypse, but you were skilled, kind-hearted, and you liked to smile; you actually had conversations with him instead of that kumbaya shit Gabriel’s always on; and he’d be damned say you weren’t really pretty. Because you are. You’re real fuckin’ pretty.

And Negan was obsessed.

He thought about you constantly.

Like how he knew you must have always picked off the strawberries stems for him before you put them on his plate. And how he definitely knew you must have offered to give him his lunch and dinners on Fridays: He remembers that Gabriel told him that this would only be a morning thing, that the council advised him to have one day off because he was a new father. But, as dutiful as he is (and as weary as he was to bring someone else around Negan), he agreed only to breakfast. That way, he could sleep in, eat with Rosita and the kids, and not feel like he completely burdened someone else with a responsibility that was only meant to be his. Negan figured you were just that kind, that you must have been the one to offer up your Friday mornings to Gabriel. How you must have been the one to ask to come back two more times throughout the day, you must have. For Gabriel, of course, to help. But maybe you just liked him. He liked imagining that. In fact, he believed it.

He also liked to imagine that maybe you were dressing up for him. He sure loved your little outfits. Your overalls were your work clothes but still, you always looked so darn cute, always finding small ways to accessorize or make it feel more like your personality. It was all so innocent really, but he couldn’t help but find it incredibly sexy— how pretty and oblivious you were to how you looked, how your clothes fit you. He often daydreamed of fucking you in every single one.

The first, the overalls you wore most often for work, was full length and completely baggy on you— he figured it must have been for a man. It was old, the hem was fraying in some areas, and it did nothing for your figure really but it was soft, durable, had many pockets and you typically put scraps of ribbon or lace you found on the straps, right on the shoulder. And his favorite part, you were often wearing a crop top with it. He could always see the side of your breast, your waist, sometimes even a tiny bit more depending on how you turned. Sometimes he thought of you in that tight little floral tank of yours. How one day maybe he’d tell you to, “take it off,” and you’d obediently drop the overalls to the floor; or maybe it would be you, while you’re on your way out: you turn around, gathering up enough courage after all this time to look him in the eye as you take off your boots and unclip the straps and let the denim fall, leaving you in only that tank and your panties. He imagines how you’d push yourself into the corner where the door was, look out the small window to see if anyone was coming, and then you’d face him again, keeping eye contact as you slipped your fingers inside your underwear and started to rub your clit, fast. Wordlessly, his jumpsuit would come off too and his hand would go straight to pumping his cock. Mesmerized by the sight of you being so unlike yourself because you wanted him just that bad, so bad neither you, nor he, could speak. Only pants and moans and grunts and “fucks,” to be heard in the room.

The second and the third was an overall dress and one with shorts. The first time you wore the dress, he remembers it was a Friday that a lot of people had left town. Unfortunately a kid got lost so many people went out to search with the family. Thankfully for Negan though, this included Gabriel, Michonne, and the two other people who tended towards Negan. Gabriel had assigned you to keep a closer watch on him that day, that the days like this where the regular schedule is thrown off is the time he might try something— Gabriel is still angry at himself for the time Negan escaped— so you took it upon yourself to bring an activity: cards. After you won a second time, Negan had playfully thrown his cards on the floor, two of them slipping past the bars and past you. You had turned to see where they went and reached forward on your knees, arm extending to get them. You weren’t directly turned but Negan sure did take the small chance he got to move more towards his right and catch a closer glimpse of your exposed thighs and color of your underwear. After you left that day he imagined that right at that moment he grabs you by the hips, pushed your ass up against the bars and pushed your panties down so he could slide into you, fucking you through the bars as much as he could, probably giving the bottom of your ass red marks every time he bangs into you against the steel.

With the shorts, he thought of scenarios more or less the same as with your full length ones. The difference is that your ass looked great in those shorts and sometimes he imagined you pushing your back against the cell bars so he could push his front against it, giving him some friction. Him telling you that it’s been years, but you’re shy and scared and you don’t want to get caught so you just do that, allow him to rub against you as you look out the window to make sure no one is coming. He imagines that you can't help but start sighing, squeezing your thighs together, moaning when he wraps his arms around your waist through the bars. One hand snaking up to grope your breast while the other cups your mound over your overalls and you rock into his hand as he presses in on you hard. You almost lose your breath, taking a sharp inhale that freezes to a halt. Finally, you'd whisper, “That feels so good,” followed by a whine. And he’d respond to you in your ear, “I know, baby.” A big wet spot is slowly appearing on your jeans and you’re not even looking out the window, your eyes are rolling back until they closed and you’re just making these tiny pathetic sounds because you can’t believe how incredible his touch is, even when you’re given so little, and how bad you’ve wanted him even though you’ve tried to deny it. “No one else makes me feel like this,” you’d tell him, to which he repeats, deep, dark, and sultry as he kisses the back of your head, “I know, baby. I know.”

Lastly, there were those sundresses. Sometimes he’d see you in them when you brought him dinner. If you could, you would freshen up before your own dinner because you got off from work early and didn’t want to be in your work clothes anymore or maybe you were having dinner with friends or Gabriel and Rosita— he often treated you because of your care for Negan on Fridays. Most people liked to pretend Negan doesn't exist, or unsolicitedly proclaimed to you and Gabriel with disgust how they would never dare go anywhere near the jailhouse, that you two must be saints, so he finds what you’re doing to be a big sacrifice. Therefore, he often invites you for meals and he and Rosita are either on the look out or ask savangers to bring back any dresses in your size. But it was a time that Negan least expected to see you that he saw you in what became his favorite dress.

It was on a Wednesday. Certainly after 12am or close to it. People were asleep, but you were sneaking towards his cell. Apparently someone from work had ground some chocolate from her wife that worked as a savager. She gave you a few pieces but you never ate them and forgot about them until you were doing some late night cleaning on your day off, so you came to treat Negan. The dress you were wearing was the tiniest thing he’d seen you in. As in, it could have been a mid-length dress on Judith. It was a deep pink color, almost purple, with small flowers in a different shade of the same family all around it. It had these very short, very slightly puffed sleeves. He could tell that it was a dress that flowed out, but that didn’t stop the material from showing your curves. He knew for a fact that if you bent over you would be giving anyone behind you a show, but honestly with how much your legs were exposed, you walking around in that must have been enough to make anyone’s head turn. Immediately he started thinking about him outside of this cell, as your man, seeing you strut around town in it, how he’d push you to the side behind a house, ask you if you wore it for him, if you were trying to make him jealous, and then fuck you hard. Then he remembers that you’re offering him chocolate, and saying that you know you shouldn’t be here, so he saves those thoughts for after you leave. You start tugging on your dress, trying to make it longer and he thanks you. Truly, that was your house dress. It was always a little snug on the top so you could never wear a bra with it regardless and you had accidently washed in your sink with hot water— you had a knack for not reading clothing labels— and it shrank. You only remember how short it is now after not wearing it outside for so long and seeing how Negan’s eyes widened at you as you came in. Did you do it on purpose? you both now question. You decide it doesn’t matter, telling yourself you were just doing something nice and you run off to bed quickly. As for him, he cares as much as he doesn’t: of course he wants you to like him and he still has a big ego enough to assume you do, especially after tonight, but most importantly you just gave him more fuel for his imagination while he’s stuck here which is enough for now.

After fucking himself when you left, he still woke up rock hard the next morning. Waking up late, he had to act quick before Gabriel came with his breakfast. He used one of his favorite methods of pushing his bed to the side, and placing himself in the darkest corner of his cell, his figure facing the wall. He’d take himself out and as always, start to pump. He places his hand on the wall for leverage and he pretends he’s fucking you against the wall. He imagines that one night you say you can’t sleep and ask if you can sleep with him in his bed. How he would be such a gentleman and say that a lady wasn’t good enough to sleep in his crappy cell, but that instead he knew another way to tire you out. One the two of you could do fast so you wouldn’t get caught. That one always got him to his climax so fast— the thought of you needing him so much that you would come inside his cell, stay on his bed until morning, get in trouble for him. It would make him come like a bullet, hard and fast.

Safe to say, Negan loves Fridays.

[ares857]

internet find

[waterpoofs]

I've been stuck inside with covid for a week, which gave me an opportunity to top up the queue for this blog again, so it won't run out for many months.

I also couldn't resist doing a few "properly". I wrote before that the creations here are very lazy: I do not usually put any effort into adding detail or inpainting over dodgy bits, I just let the computer generate thousands of images and pick the best ones to img2img upscale. But for most prompts that results in images with very similar looking guys. Lots of boyfriend twins on this blog.

So here's one where I put in the effort to make it tell more of a story: the new trainee getting some guidance from an old hand.

Here's the original 512x512 txt2img, and the 1024x1024 img2img that you would normally get when I don't bother doing all this fine tuning:

The dog collar was an unprompted fluke, but obviously it made this txt2img stand out and brought the concept to mind.

Don't expect many more of these, it has reminded me how much extra effort it is.

[varpusvaras]

I stumbled upon a discussion on tiktok (sorry I am using that) about how...people outside of the Nordics don't really use waterproof outdoorwear with their kids? Like mudpants and stuff? You know, outdoor clothes like pants, jackets, overalls, gloves made of material that's resistant to everything from water to meteorites?

There were A LOT of parents saying things like "they're kids, let them be dirty and wet every once in a while, we can just wash the clothes" and like???? These clothes are made solely so the kids can roll around in glass and peat and be perfectly dry and warm while doing so. Do...do you guys not have these?

Anyway here's a picture of me and my brother absolutely banging the drip. I can still hear the swooshing of the pants

[would-this-pokemon-be-a-friend]

Snom?

Snom! While there isn’t a wide breadth of data about this relatively recently discovered species, there is little indication that they would be a bad pet. On the contrary, so long as you are able to provide them with a fresh supply of snow, they are pretty easy to care for!

Like many bug-type pokémon, snoms are a great size for a house pet. While the body of a happy and healthy snom is constantly coated in spikes made of ice (Shield), these spikes don’t appear to make handling them dangerous as they are rather dull. That being said, I hope any potential snom adopters don’t mind the cold! You might want to wear mittens when handling this species.

Snom care is not exceptionally difficult, but in most peoples’ contexts it may take a hefty initial investment. You see, snoms’ diets are made up primarily by snow that they scavenge off of the ground in frigid environments (Shield, Scarlet). Snoms can be picky about the snow they consume, preferring freshly fallen and pure snow (Scarlet). As a snom owner, there are two main ways you can provide your pet with this much-needed food. First and foremost, if you live somewhere where it snows regularly all-year, you could easily allow your snom to graze on snow outside (under supervision for their safety of course). If, like most people, you don’t live in such a place, a snow machine or even a shaved ice machine may suffice. I would consult with a veterinarian about what consistency of snow is best for snoms, but their main food source essentially being water makes their ease of care pretty great in the long run. Like mentioned earlier, their icy coating of spikes is a great health indicator: the bigger the spikes, the better feed the snom (Shield). As far as housing needs, there isn’t much of an indication about whether or not snoms need to live in places that are generally cold. They like to sleep in tree branches by suspending themselves in the air with sticky thread (Sword), so I would recommend providing your snom with lot of places to climb and rest, but so long as they are provided with sufficient snow to eat they should be okay. You’ll likely need to create a waterproofed eating spot for your snom, perhaps with a tarp, if you intend to feed them inside.

Snoms use the snow they eat for more than just subsistence: using specialize internal organs, snoms can extract frigid energy from the snow they consume and use it for self-defense (Violet). Their icy coat, generated from the snow they consume, acts as a disguise when they sleep, making them appear like an icicle (Sword, Violet). They can also use this energy to use the move Powder Snow to fend of predators, a mid-power move that has a 10% chance of freezing a target solid. This is by no means a harmless move, but it is the only threatening move that snoms know instinctually, so it doesn’t do much to harm their overall score. Generally, snoms aren’t that dangerous, let alone aggressive. As far as ice-types go, that makes them a great beginner pet.

As long as you have the means to provide your snom with a consistent supply of snow, they would be a reasonably easy pet to care for. They’re also pretty cute!

[little-orange-bastard]

Chapter 4: One For The Road...

@pepperonyscience @authortobenamedlater @thefinaljediknight @p0tat0-g0ddess @ionlymadethissoicouldleaveanask @helix-enterprises117 @purple-purple-pink-purple (Out of character, just real quick I appreciate everyone's patience with the delay to the campaign. The bug that blew through the ToBeNamedLater household had myself an ATBNL down pretty hard. We are doing much better, so back to it!) STORY CONTINUES BELOW: Picking up where our story left off, and advancing the story timeline slightly, all of you have evacuated your dead bunker and are on a dusty remain of a highway. Your group is a motley collection of fangirls @authortobenamedlater @thefinaljediknight @p0tat0-g0ddess. You also have one cattle wrangler @ionlymadethissoicouldleaveanask, a pilot (latecomer @purple-purple-pink-purple who was sleeping in the back room of the bunker for the last six months because that's just how much naps moms need to catch up) and a human survivor @helix-enterprises117 with an overpowered cybernetic fist that makes him look a bit like a fiddler crab. Despite the time being high noon, the sky has an orange haze on account of the extra particulates in the atmosphere, the telltale signs that a nuclear winter could be coming. Off in the distance you can see the burnt out remains of a city with the barely legible roadsigns indicating it is the town of Pueblo, Colorado.

Very little seems to be moving on the surface. You've seen a few scavengers, mostly crows, vultures and carrion eaters but nothing else of significance. You have heard a few rustles of *something* that seems to be following you, but haven't been able to make it out. The roadway is littered with the remains of burned out cars, the bodies now just skeletons or ash. The air is cold and dry on account of the reduced solar gain, lack of precipitation, and shortened days for October. You are all wearing matching desert camouflage uniforms (DCU's) surplus from the Desert Storm era. They blend in fairly well to the environment. For equipment you each have a matching pack in the same camouflage pattern. Inside each pack is the following: a bedroll, a poncho tarp for shelter, some waterproof matches, some water purification straws, a change of clothes and extra underwear/socks, a hand crank emergency AM/FM radio receiver and flashlight combo, a first aid kit, compass, map, spare boot laces, some fishing equipment and some paracord. You each also have a few quarts of water apiece along with some survival lifeboat rations, enough to last a week or so with careful use. For weapons, you each at a minimum are equipped with a survival knife and sheath. You all managed to scavenge a few other weapons in the bunker. For firearms there are two Glock handguns of mismatched calibers (9mm and .45 automatic respectively) and limited ammunition for each of just three preloaded magazines apiece due to weight and size limits. There is a singular AR-pattern rifle with iron sights and two magazines. The rest are carrying either a baseball bat, crowbar or tire iron as they choose to do so. These arms are distributed among the group to those that are best trained in their use. Overall, you aren't in the worst condition weapon-wise, but it's clear that scavenging ammunition and being selective with your engagements is going to be critical for now. An extended firefight could draw a lot of attention and burn through your at-present limited ammunition needlessly. Your orange avatar is riding in @authortobenamedlater's pocket. He hasn't said much lately other than the direction to go is northwest. The town of Pueblo is presently to your due north and you are just on the outskirts around the dried remains of Lake Minnequa. Your little group also has a fold-up DeLorme topographical map with the words "Candy Mountain" written in purple crayon and an X crudely drawn over the Almagre Mountain range approximately 50 miles to your north. This would seem to be your destination. The question is, how are you going to get there? It's 50 miles of mostly desert with not much there between Pueblo and the base of the mountain. That's a long way on foot with limited supplies. There appear to be three obvious possible avenues. One is the BNSF railyard in the middle of the bombed out remains of Pueblo which is filled with who knows what. Maybe transportation. Maybe looters. Maybe monsters. There's also the Pueblo airport out east which may offer some options but is in the opposite direction for travel to your destination. You might find something there, or then again it could be a red herring. Circling around Pueblo to the rest there's the aptly named suburb of Pueblo West. Doesn't seem like there's much in the way of transportation choice there, but they do have a number of shops that may yield important supplies. You're sure that you wouldn't be the only survivors thinking the same thing.

There may be other options yet open to you but there’s a problem. Your group is split on which direction to go. The limited weapons and deciding who got what proved to be incredibly unpopular and onerous in the extreme. It's clear that leadership is going to have to be decided on before following whichever path.

[apas-95]

I think people forget that the Foundation has, if not a budget (such a thing being, honestly, somewhat ridiculous), then 'just' a finite number of employees, buildings, cement mixers, and *time*. For a given object there has to be a genuine reason why it is overall worth it to be performing tests and long-term containment on it rather than just launching it into the Oort cloud inside of a shipping container. They'll try to decommission the lizard because it's cheaper than the alternative, so what's so... *useful* to them about a given item is, I find, much of the hook of an article. It got completely overdone in the whole Omega 7 lolfoundation era, but it was what made so much of the roughly 2K-4K era so effective, if in a more subtle way - the megaprojects and incomprehensible lateral-thinking plots were all, ultimately, the product of an organisation with a logistical chain going all the way down into the mud a human being dressed in reflective, waterproof pants and polyurethane boots has to carry a checklist through. Ultimately, it was a fantasy world where there was still a need for international shipping label standards to make sure your warehouse attendant can receive nuclear test components from a blacksite they aren't aware of, for a researcher who thinks there are like, five anomalous items in existence total. When it doesn't have that, and just makes the foundation omnipotent... it really loses its charm for me.

[a-killer-obsession]

Wavelengths [Killer x Reader, Heat x Reader]

🔞 Minors DNI 🔞

A search for a rumored Vegapunk weapon leads the Kid Pirates to an unexpected new crewmate, with a bloodlust that rivals their own and an incredible power.

CW: Please check AO3 for all current warnings, but general warning for smut, slow burn, serious gore, and really dark themes. AFAB reader, she/her pronouns.

Masterlist || AO3 || Chapter 1

Chapter 11 - Trial and Error

You try something new, and Kid makes a big mistake.

WC: ~8k

Taglist: @h0n3y-l3m0n05 @tremendoushorsepatrolgoth

You stared awkwardly at the wide range of brightly coloured vibrators and dildos on display in the store. You had no fucking clue what you were looking at or what you were supposed to pick out. Heat had somewhat temporarily abandoned you to peruse the porn selection, and you looked over your shoulder for him anxiously, wondering if you should just give up and go bug him for help.

“Doing okay darlin’?” an older woman with bright pink hair approached you. She had a nametag, indicating she worked here, but otherwise wore casual looking clothing. The smile on her face was gentle and soothing, you felt immediately more comfortable with her there.

“Yeah um.. I think I need some help,” you admitted, “I'm not really sure what I'm looking for”

“Of course baby,” the woman cooed, “we've got all the features written out under the price tags, do any of them sound interesting? I could show ya how they work on your hand if you'd like”

“I um… I can't read,” you told her anxiously, feeling defeated. A room full of dildos and porn, and this was what made you embarrassed. She didn't seem like the kind of woman who would taunt you about it though.

“Oh that's no problem sweetheart!” The woman said, “I'm happy to help. What sort of things do you like? Clitoral stimulation? Penetration? Nipple play?”

“She's still figuring things out,” Heat told the woman, appearing like a saviour beside you, a handful of porn mags in hand, “she only just got out of a bad situation recently so she's not had much opportunity to learn what she enjoys”

“You the boyfriend?” the woman asked curiously.

“Uh, just a friend helping her figure herself out,” Heat answered with a nervous laugh, “she likes clit stimulation, and she recently discovered she likes receiving oral, so I'm thinking one of those suction toys that simulate it might work good for her, but something for her to explore penetration on her own wouldn't go amiss either. Give your what you'd consider an exploration starter kit, money isn't a issue”

“Very good, I have just the toys!” she picked up a small, purple dildo, tapered at the end and with a very slight bulge to the top. The overall shape was smooth and elegant, wide enough to be pleasurable but slimmer than the average penis, something ideal for a virgin to experiment with. Of course, you had been penetrated before, but there was no need to worry this woman with the horrific details of your past sexual encounters. She held down the button on the end and it started to vibrate, and she held it gently against the back of your hand so you could feel it. Your eyes widened as the woman clicked the button a few more times, making the vibrations more intense, before handing it to you for you to explore the settings on your own. You had the sudden realisation that your vibrating abilities thanks to your devil fruit were maybe far more useful than you'd initially thought, but it wouldn't hurt to have something to replicate the ideal levels. You didn't want to accidentally overdo it and hurt yourself after all.

“This one is what I recommend for newbies,” she explained, “its cable rechargeable, waterproof, easy to clean, and has 15 different settings ranging from gentle vibrations to more intense pulsing. It's ideal for both clitoral stimulation and penetration”

You handed the toy back to the woman who turned it off and returned it to its display holder, before selecting another toy. “Now, in terms of suction toys, you can't beat this model. It has ten power settings, waterproof, cable rechargeable, near silent, and the slim profile makes it ideal for using in tandem with penetrative sex. Paired with a good lubricant it offers orgasms that will truly blow you away with very little effort on your part”

“She'll take both,” Heat answered for you.

“Very good, now I'm assuming she also requires cleaning supplies and lubricants?” The woman asked.

“Yeah, get her whatever you recommend,” Heat said, “and these too, please” he continued, holding out the magazines for the woman.

“Very good, I'll get everything collected and rung up for you at the counter, let me know if you need my help with anything else” the woman smiled, taking the mags from Heat and collecting several boxes from the shelves under the displays, before walking away to collect a few other things. She met you at the counter and began to scan and bag the items. “Your friend must care about you a lot, this is quite the kind gesture” she noted to you as she scanned the last item and slid it into a discreet, unmarked bag.

“She deserves it, after the shit she's been through,” Heat told her. The woman smiled sadly in response, and you got the sense that maybe she had an inclination of what you'd been through. Given you still looked pretty boney even after a few weeks of eating well, it was probably clear that you'd been abused quite badly, you still had the clear physical appearance of someone who had been starved for a long time.

Heat paid for the items with a generous tip and thanked her for her help, leading your excited but nervous self out of the store before you could burn a hole with your eyes into the massive dragon themed dildo you'd been staring at curiously that stood proudly on display behind the counter.

Heat followed you back to your room at the inn after running errands together, still carrying your shopping bag like the gentleman he was. The two of you had already left most of what he'd bought with a couple of henchmen to be taken back to the ship. It was late afternoon now, soon the others would be gathering at a nearby pub that Killer had picked out for dinner. Kid wasn't a fan of fancy restaurants, but pubs had a much more casual atmosphere, more suited to his tastes.

“You gonna try out your new stuff?” Heat smirked as he pulled your things out of the paper bag that hid the adult store items, leaving just his mags inside to bring back to his own room later.

“I was gonna have a shower, actually,” you replied, sliding off your shoes and pulling your toiletries from your duffle bag, “did you want to join me?” you added with a coy smile on your face. There'd been dirty thoughts in your head all day since Heat had explained oral to you, and the trip to the adult store certainly hadn't helped the situation.

Heat squinted at you, trying to decide if you were serious. Sure you'd fooled around plenty, but you'd never been below the belt with him, he'd been holding off till he felt like you were ready. He wanted you to learn how you liked to be pleased before you focused on anyone else. To be fair though, you had slept with Delilah last night, so maybe you were ready to experiment on other people. And if pleasing others was what made you feel good, who was he to deny you? Lord knew he got off making you feel good.

“What's that face for?” You mused, already half undressed and on your way to the door of the attached bathroom, mask discarded and seastone in hand.

“Are you sure you're ready for that?” Heat asked you with genuine concern.

“Yeah, I'm sure,” you smiled, tugging on his hand to pull him to the bathroom, “to be honest I really liked pleasing Delilah last night, I wanna please you too”

“You don't have to do that,” he said softly, while you tugged at the lacing on his corset to loosen it.

“But I want to,” you purred. Your genuine smile made his heart flutter and his dick twitch. Fuck you were hard to say no to.

You finished undressing and turned the shower on, adjusting the temperature before stepping in. You stood under the stream for a moment, letting the warm water wash over you, before giving him an almost tender, inviting glance. He sighed in defeat and finished undressing, sliding in behind you. It was a reasonably sized shower, big enough to fit Heat's large frame beside you, but small enough that you were forced to stand somewhat close. You let out a contented sigh as he wrapped his arms around your waist, pulling your back against his front and pressing kisses along your collarbone. You twisted in his arms to face him, pulling him down with arms around his neck so you could kiss him, he was so goddamn tall.

The water spilled over you both as you smoothed your tongue against his, and you pressed hard against his front, rubbing your soft abdomen against his growing erection. You could feel the cool metal of the piercings on the underside pressing against your skin. Out of curiosity you pulled away from the kiss, wanting to see better, and he gave you space to look, proud of his size and not at all uncomfortable with your staring.

“You can touch it, if you want,” he told you reassuringly. Your eyes flicked to his quickly before returning to his dick, a hesitant hand coming up and running along the underside, admiring the weight of it, before wrapping your fingers as much as you could around the base and stroking it gently. The skin there was surprisingly smooth, like velvet in your palm, and you ran your hand carefully over the piercings, scared you might hurt him. His hand wrapped around yours as he groaned at the first feeling of your warm touch on him, and he encouraged you to squeeze a little firmer, guiding your hand to stroke up and down near the base the way he liked. He let go as you got the gist of it, your eyes shifting between watching yourself stroke him, and his face as he groaned quietly and supported himself against the wall behind you.

“That's it- hnng- good girl,” Heat groaned, “just like that”

The pleasurable sounds he was making made arousal pool between your legs and you found yourself rubbing your thighs together to get friction. You only had one free hand, since you needed the other for your seastone, and unfortunately for you it was currently in use.

“Heat, can you hold my seastone against me?” You asked, holding it out for him. He nodded and took it from you, careful to make sure it stayed against your skin as he slid the small pebble up your arm, resting it against your shoulder. You held his hand to your shoulder as you started to kneel, his eyes growing wide in surprise.

“Yin, you don't have to do that, just your hand is enough,” he told you.

“But I want to,” you said, squatting in front of him, still pumping him while your other newly freed hand ran over his thigh. Your mouth was centimetres away from his tip now, and you looked up at him with eyes that were dark with lust. “I want to taste you so fucking bad,” you purred, running your nose against the side of his cock. He grunted and gave in immediately to your dirty words.

“Fuck, okay,” he moaned, “just- don't push yourself too far. If you don't like it we can stop, I won't be angry”

You smiled at your victory and gave him an experimental kitten lick against the side you'd been nuzzling, before making more kitten licks all over. Precum started to leak from the tip as he watched you, and you observed it curiously before lapping it up and humming contently. You weren't sure what you were supposed to do, so you just kept swirling your tongue around the head, looking up at him with innocent eyes as he grunted.

“Put it in your mouth baby, suck on it,” he purred, sensing your were in need of some guidance and petting the top of your head, “just watch out for your teeth”

You hesitantly did as you were instructed, sucking him into your mouth maybe a little too harshly. His hips bucked forward and forced himself further in, making you gag a little in surprise. “Fuck, sorry baby,” he pulled away from you, “you just felt so fucking good”

To his surprise, you weren't at all fazed, instead unbelievably turned on by the idea of him being deeper inside you. After all, you'd only ever had his fingers. It felt dirty having him in your mouth, and you suddenly wanted him to fill you. You ran your tongue back over the head of his cock before swallowing him again, concentrating on suppressing the need to gag as you took him as far as you could down your throat, nestling your nose against his pubes and looking up at him with doe eyes. His eyes were wide as you paused with him deep down your throat, your eyes watering a little but determined to keep him inside you as you swallowed around him.

“Fuck, Yin,” he groaned, “fuck”

You let him go, keeping your hand on the base of his dick and stroking more as you caught your breath. “Did I do good? Should I do it again?” You cooed, looking up at him for praise.

“Yes baby, you're being such a good girl for me,” he cooed. It was becoming quite apparent to him that you had a praise kink, even if you didn't realise it so he made sure to play into it. “You're doing so good, make it go in and out of your mouth baby”

You took him back in your mouth and bobbed your head back and forth, rubbing your tongue against the piercings on the underside as you moved. You were determined to please him, practically suckling on him as you moved. He was leaning against the wall holding on for dear life while you went down on him, trying to keep it together enough to keep the seastone pressed to your shoulder. One of your hands returned to his shaft, stroking him at a pace to match your mouth, while the other slid between your legs, where your pussy was spread wide open as you squatted in front of him. You felt so in control and knowing that it was you making him moan was making you unbearably horny, so you fingered yourself furiously. He could hear the lewd sounds of your fingers pumping in and out of you, and it made him lose control, the coil in his stomach ready to spring at any second.

“Fuck, Yin, I'm gonna-” he pulled out with the intention of cumming on the shower floor, so you wouldn't be surprised by it in your mouth, but he'd reacted too late and instead spurted hot white threads of cum over your face, forcing you to close one eye. “Sorry, fuck, sorry Yin”

You wiped the cum off your eye and looked at the sticky substance on your hand, before licking it off curiously. You found yourself liking the salty taste, aroused by the fact that it had come out of him, and that you had made it come out, so you wiped the rest from your face, pushing it into your mouth and licking it off your fingers, humming contently while he looked down at you with astonishment. On top of the praise kink, he was starting to think you had a thing for fluids, especially considering how you'd spoken about your time with Delilah, having gotten the more graphic details over lunch. When there was nothing on your face, you grabbed him again, forcing his over sensitive cock back into your mouth to milk him clean of anything left.

“Hnng- fuck- Yin,” he panted hard as he pressed his head against the cool tile wall, the water from the still running shower trickling down his back. You kissed your way up his chest as you stood, and nipped at his neck, humming contently at how utterly lewd and powerful you felt. You took the seastone from his weak hand and tilted his chin down towards you, forcing him to look at you, overcome with that feeling of power and desire.

“Heat, get on your fucking knees,” you growled.

His cock twitched back to life at your sudden confidence, and he dropped down in front of you immediately, draping your knee over his shoulder and immediately diving between your legs like a man starved. He’d wanted to do this for so long, having only ever tasted you off his fingers, wanting so badly to drink from the source. You pulled his hair tight as you leaned back against the shower wall, forcing his head to stay between your legs while he ate you out with fervour. You were slick with arousal and he moaned into you, holding your hips tight as he slid his thick tongue inside you and pumped you with it. You weren't the only one who enjoyed going down on a hot, wet pussy. He felt so fucking good inside you and you rolled your hips in time, letting him fuck you with his greedy tongue while his thumb worked away at your clit, till you felt your muscles tighten and you came suddenly with a shout on his face. Heat lapped up your release with a groan, both of your eyes closed in bliss as he worked you through the heavy orgasm.

Finally sated you let his hair go, and he carefully slid your leg off his shoulder, standing back up and pulling you close. You hugged each other tight while you came down from your high, and sighed contently at how warm and safe you felt with your naked body pressed against his under the running water. You leaned up on your tip toes and kissed him tenderly, tasting yourself on his lips, and pushing stray hair out of his face as you lowered yourself back into the hug.

“You're so incredible,” Heat mumbled into your shoulder, his face buried in the crook of your neck.

“Thank you, Heat, for letting me try that,” you purred happily, “it was fun,” you giggled.

“Any fucking time,” he laughed, “I don't think I'm gonna even bother to go find a woman tonight anymore, that was too fucking good”

You giggled again, filled with pride, and nuzzled into him, “me neither, I was going to go see Delilah again but, do you think maybe you'd want to stay with me tonight instead, Heat?” you looked up at him with warm, adoring eyes as he stood properly upright, his hands still on the small of your back, “this is nice, just being close to you”

“Yeah, it is,” he agreed, “I'll stay, but we have to go to dinner first. We can hang out after”

“That sounds good,” you mumbled, half asleep between his warm body and the warm water.

“Are we gonna actually wash while we're in here?” Heat laughed.

“Mmm… nah,” you replied, pressing your face in to his chest, “let's just stay like this”

“Okay sweetheart, that's fine by me,” he cooed, running a hand through your pretty purple hair.

The next day passed with not much of note. Heat woke up in your bed after more fooling around, and you helped him with the last of his errands before wandering aimlessly around the town together. There wasn't much to do if you weren't into winter sports, so you just hung out and got high in your inn room, while Heat happily let you explore his body further. You both decided to head back to the bar that night though, meeting up with the other commanders who already had women slung over their laps. Delilah seemed excited to see you again, and happily followed your back to your room once more, this time taking full advantage of your devil fruit, as well as your new toys and newfound confidence. She left as you were waking the next morning, promising to see you later at the bar.

It was evening again, and the men were all taking full advantage of their last night on shore, the bar now filled with Kid Pirates all hoping to get laid one last time before setting sail tomorrow morning. You were one of the last to arrive, having decided to take an afternoon nap which had accidentally gone a little long, and grabbing a quick bite in the restaurant next door to the inn before heading to the brothel where you knew the others would be. Delilah was already in the booth, and you were surprised to see her fawning over Kid. You didn't feel a pang of jealousy though, you knew Delilah was a working woman who had already sacrificed two nights of potential income to sleep with you, and considering how late you were she probably thought you weren't coming at all, so she'd no doubt decided to make some cash with a paying customer instead.

“Yin!” she exclaimed as soon as she saw you, “I thought I wasn't going to have the pleasure of your company tonight!”

The booth was full, so you decided to just slide on to Heat's currently empty lap, who graciously wrapped his arms around your waist and indicated to a passing waitress to bring another drink.

“Yeah sorry, nap ran long,” you yawned, “did I miss anything?”

“Delilah was just telling me about your fun little vibrating trick,” Kid laughed, “sounds like the two of you had fun last night. Our sweet Delilah missed you the other night, but I took real good care of her for you”

You were unphased by Kid's attempt at teasing, thinking that you would at least have some inclination to be jealous or petty about Kid stealing ‘your’ woman. Unfortunately for him, you couldn't care less, especially not when you'd spent that time with Heat instead, so it's not like you were missing out. Kid scowled at the lack of reaction, more interested in the drink the waitress had just dropped off for you, and picked up his own drink with a heavy frown.

“I didn't know you and the blue haired one were an item,” Delilah noted, observing the casual way you sat on Heat's lap, “kind of him to let you play with me”

“Well, they do say sharing is caring,” you winked at Kid who almost choked on his drink, “Heat and I are just friends though”

“Friends with significant benefits,” Wire laughed.

“They're very good benefits,” you smirked. Heat started to go pink behind you and cleared his throat.

Delilah gave Kid a knowing look before sliding closer to you, pulling your thigh so it rested on her lap instead of Heat's. It left your legs spread wide open under the table as Delilah's hand ran up your inner thigh teasingly. “Maybe you'd like to join our little party with the captain then?”

You froze and Heat could feel your muscles tensing, you were definitely uncomfortable at the suggestion. “Yin doesn't fuck around with the captain,” Killer interrupted before Heat could come to your defense. He felt sorry for you, looking just as scared as you had when Kid had pinned you to the table, and he had no doubt you were remembering that exact moment.

‘Oh? How come?” Delilah purred, still determined to sway you into a threesome.

“None of your business,” Killer snapped. You gave him a look that, even with most of your face obscured by your mask, still read as a silent thank you. His protectiveness was unexpected, but welcomed.

Delilah let the topic go, sensing there was something she was missing here, and slid back over to Kid. “Well, maybe I'll just come say hello later,” she added, “after your captain is done with me”

“If you can walk by the time I'm done with you,” Kid smirked. Killer groaned at the cocky remark and rolled his eyes under the mask.

You felt strange, suddenly feeling like a burden, and slipped off Heat's lap to stand. Once again you were being dropped for someone who would do more, it made you feel insecure and insignificant. “I think maybe I'll head to bed actually,” you said. There was a hint of sadness in your voice that the other commanders didn't miss, “I think maybe that nap wasn't quite enough, I'll see you guys tomorrow. It was nice meeting you, Delilah”

You walked away without another word, not really entirely sure in yourself why you were leaving. You just knew you felt like you didn't really belong here anymore, despite Killer's kind defence of you, and maybe you'd feel more comfortable spending the night alone for once.

It was late when a knock came on your door. You groaned and dragged yourself out of bed. You hadn't really been asleep anyway, just laying in bed, thinking. You were surprised to find a very drunk Delilah leaning against the frame when you opened the door. She was half naked, her hair in disarray, the smell of sex and alcohol strong on her. She pushed her way into the room, closing the door behind her. You didn't try to stop her, welcoming the distraction.

It wasn't long before you were both falling asleep, naked and spent, after several rounds of messy fucking and some special use of your devil fruit. Or at least, that's how it looked at a glance. As soon as she heard the soft sounds of your snoring, Delilah gave up her masquerade and slipped out of the bed, hastily throwing on her clothes and grabbing your mask from the side table before leaving. She stopped at the door, throwing you one last guilty look, before quietly sliding out and heading back to Kid's room.

Not getting a rise out of you earlier had pissed him off, and a pissed off Kid, combined with alcohol, was never a good mix. He'd had a curiosity about your mask since you came on board, but Killer had always berated him for even thinking about touching it. But Killer wasn't here right now, and Kid was pissed off, so he'd paid Delilah handsomely to get the mask for him. She felt awful about it, but a berri was a berri - she had bills to pay, and she’d probably never see you again anyway. He probably could have gotten it himself, but Killer would have drowned him if he'd found out he'd gone to your room and scared you. At least this way you got a few orgasms out of the arrangement, he praised himself for being so kind.

Nothing seemed amiss when you woke up, stretching and yawning, wiping the sleep from your eyes. You flopped back down, not quite ready yet to open your eyes. With a groan you reached your hand over to the side table, dropping your seastone in favour of your mask. It clattered against the wooden floor as you missed the unfamiliar table, so used to the size and position of your table back on the ship. No worries, you'd just pick it up in a minute. You kept your eyes closed as you reached for your mask, it was easier to avoid being overwhelmed that way. It was a bad habit, really, letting go of the seastone before grabbing the mask, but if you did it this way you only needed one hand, and you were lazy. You found the surface with your hand, patting around blindly for it, and finding the surface empty. Maybe you knocked it down in your sleep? Not a problem, it was made of a metal shell, so you'd be able to make it out on the floor if you opened your eyes.

You could see far too much when you opened them, the wooden walls and furniture of the room becoming basically invisible as you saw right through them, save for the occasional pipe or wire or nail. You could see people in the other rooms, all Kid Pirates and a handful of working women, since the rest of the inn's residents had fled when the crew checked in. It was hard to tell who was who, just warm bodies scattered in a void of space, broken up by the occasional metal from a door handle, or weapon, or the small personal safes that each room featured. Most of them seemed to be doing something akin to packing, some of them still horizontal, sleeping you assumed. A few were a few interacting with other bodies, no doubt getting in last minute romps before they set off.

You shook your head and tried to focus, you knew from experience that you only had a few minutes before you became overwhelmed, it was important you found your mask before then. You set your sights on where the floor of your room should have been, and scowled when you found no sign of your mask. You looked around where you estimated the boundaries of your room to be, finding only your dagger and sword, and the metal inner workings of the toys Heat had bought you the other day. Your shoulders twitched as the buzzing noise around you started to creep in, becoming louder as you grew disoriented and your focus began to falter. Your last hope was the seastone, you would be able to see it if you looked, since it nullified your ability. Seastone created something of a void in your vision whenever you looked at it without your mask, not so much a physical object, more just a complete lack of anything.

You underestimated where the edge of the bed was and fell, landing face first on the hard floor. You raised yourself up on your hands, beginning to lose your hold on reality. You could see the seastone, but it seemed like it was under the bed. You felt for the edge of the bedframe and tried your best to reach under, but the bed was too low and your arm was too short, flapping around uselessly under the bed as your shoulder drove painfully into the bedframe. Panic was setting in as you felt yourself starting to slip away, so you turned desperately to where you had seen your katana, hoping you could slide it under the bed to free the stone.

You were crawling towards it on your hands and knees, twitching, when it finally became all too much. You curled into a ball and whimpered, you couldn't even make out your own voice over the deafening sound of everything, so you had no idea if you'd be able to yell for help. Would it be loud enough for anyone to hear? Would you even be saying anything coherent? You couldn't tell, and your heart rate was spiking as you began to hyperventilate, the twitching becoming more frequent as you became hyper aware of every molecule of air vibrating around you.

You pushed yourself up onto your knees and desperately looked around, too far gone to know what you were looking for or what you needed. That was when you spotted it. Your mask.

Or at least, what looked like parts of your mask. And in front of it, the unmistakable metal-armed body of Eustass Kid. An inhuman growl escaped you as you realised that he had your mask, and he was disassembling it. A bloodlust sparked in you, those feral instincts that had long since laid dormant taking over as your mind singled in on one goal - kill Kid. Kill Kid, kill Kid, KILL KID.

You rushed towards him, smashing into and bouncing off a wall you hadn't seen, or had forgotten existed, and you roared at it like it had personally offended you. You pressed your hand to it, vibrating the wood till the molecules broke apart and it scattered into dust, leaving a hole in the wall for you to pass through. You continued this way on a direct route to Kid - charging forward, crashing into a wall, destroying it, continuing. You passed through a room and a body approached you. You didn't recognise them, seeing only their blood and their organs and their bones, and went on the attack, in defence against someone you had no way of knowing was harmless. In your fury you liquified their insides, not even bothering to watch their lifeless body fall as you continued on your war path. It had been one of the henchmen, and the woman he had been with screamed, running panicked for her life. You did not hear it.

The body you were zeroing in on perked its head in the direction of the scream, about to stand, when you came barreling through the wall. Your eyes were lifeless and empty and you were breathing like a rabid animal, twitching like you were covered in fire ants as you approached Kid. He stood to defend himself, immediately realising he’d fucked up, and you charged, jumping at him and sinking your teeth deep into his neck till you tasted blood. You could have killed him quickly the same way you had the henchman, but you wanted to make his pain last longer, you didn't want to make it a quick kill. You wanted to feel him bleed out, feel his hot blood pooling while he cried out, hear and see his heart take its last weak pump. You coated your body in armament haki, making yourself a bullet proof leech as he fruitlessly punched and clawed at you, falling to the ground in his struggle.

Killer had been finishing the last of his packing when he heard the scream. Shrill, terrified, the sound of a woman who thought their life was in genuine danger. He could only assume a henchman had gone too far, and tutted as he left his room, preparing to scold whoever had made the poor woman scream. He caught the tail end of her as she raced down the hall, mostly naked, disappearing down a stairwell. Retracing to the open door she had come from, he cleared his throat in preparation for yelling, but stopped dead in his tracks as he noticed the hole in the wall. It was a perfect circle, a large pile of wood dust sitting under it, like someone had painstakingly sanded away at the wall layer by layer. He stepped through the hole and immediately regretted not bringing his weapons when he found the body of a henchman, lifeless on the floor, a pink goo and dark blood dripping from every orifice. His open eyelids revealed empty holes where his eyes should have been, a pool of liquid dripping from them instead. He almost gagged under the mask, it was a gruesome sight even for him.

He was about to investigate closer when Kid began to shout nearby, and his head snapped in the direction of the yelling to find two more perfect holes, Kid falling to the ground in a struggle on the other side of them. Killer ran, ready to destroy whoever or whatever had dared to attack his captain, weapons be damned he'd use his bare fists if he had to.

He panicked when what he found was you, your unmistakable purple hair swinging back and forth as Kid tried to roll to get you off him, revealing your teeth deep in his neck as he moved. He was smacking you with his metal arm, and you were entirely unphased, covered in the metal shimmer of strong armament haki. A quick glance around the room to look for a weapon or something he could use to subdue you and he spotted your mask, dismantled on the desk of the large room. He growled under his own mask in anger as he put two and two together.

He leaned over the two of you and grabbed your face, sticking his fingers in the corners of your mouth to force your teeth out of Kid's bleeding neck, like you were a wild dog. You made a feral sound that made a shiver run down his spine as he attempted to pry open your jaw, but with more force than he would like he was able to loosen your bite enough to pull you away. Moving on pure instinct he ripped off his mask, jamming it on your head to muzzle you before pressing you to the floor, using his entire weight to pin you down. You roared and fought back, but after a few moments you began to settle, your armament haki dissipating and the feral growls turning to small sad whimpers as you calmed.

“Kid what the fuck did you do,” Killer growled, turning his uncovered face to look at Kid, who was trying his best to stop the bleeding on his neck with a discarded shirt. The unbridled rage was clear on Killer's face, his piercing blue eyes told Kid he was ready to kill him. A sight he hadn't seen since they were kids, it shook him to his core. “I told you, I fucking told you NOT TO FUCKING TOUCH HER MASK”

“BUT SHE PISSED ME OFF!” Kid snapped back, “I just wanted to have a look! She had her seastone! It was fine!”

“Evidently Kid, it was not fucking fine. What the fuck is wrong with you?” Killer snapped, “put it back together, NOW. I'm fucking serious Kid, I will fucking kill you myself if she doesn't do it first, there is nothing stopping her right now from liquifying both of us at any second”

“Fuck, okay, okay, I'm doing it,” Kid grumbled, immediately putting his devil fruit in to action to manipulate the mask pieces while he continued to hold the shirt to his neck. “Why is she calm now? Shouldn't she still be rabid?”

“She told me my mask is a blind spot for her, so I thought it might dull her senses,” he explained, “she gets like that because she's overwhelmed, so I was hoping blocking most shit out would help.”

You'd stopped fighting him entirely, and he wondered if it was okay to let you go now. He lifted himself off you slowly and you stayed where you were, but reached for him blindly. He figured you were probably terrified, so he stayed sitting cross legged on the floor next to you, and pulled you into his lap protectively, letting you burrow into him and use him as an anchor. The mask made it tricky, and you whimpered as you bumped awkwardly into his chest, but you managed to wrap yourself around him anyway, sitting in his lap facing him, with your legs and arms wrapped firmly around him while you made sad little sniffles. He did his best to comfort you, keeping you held tight against him and stroking your back. It was weird seeing you in his mask, he'd never let anyone wear it, but it'd been the first thing he'd thought of to sedate you. He didn't like however that there was currently a massive hole in the wall behind them where anyone could walk in at any time and see his unmasked face.

Kid stood over the two of you and cleared his throat, interrupting Killer who was apparently lost in his thoughts, idly rocking you back and forth. Kid was holding your mask out for him to take. “You good, Kil?”

“Yeah it's just.. weird to see someone in my mask..” he replied, taking your own mask from him. He sighed and removed his mask from you, quickly putting it back over his own head before putting yours on you. The second you felt the familiar pressure sliding on you grabbed it like a lifering, pulling it in to place and quickly switching it on.

When you finally opened your eyes you yelped, seeing Killer's mask so close to you, then looking down and realising you were in his lap. Not just in his lap, but effectively straddling him, your legs wrapped tight around his waist. You scrambled backwards out of it, backing up against the side of Kid's bed. “SORRY, SORRY!” you squeaked out as a visible blush spread down your face and neck.

“It's fine,” Killer assured you, hiding his own blush as he realised just how close you'd been, feeling the distinct absence of your weight and warmth. “Are you okay?”

You looked between Killer and Kid, who had a trail of blood down his chest as he held pressure on his neck, then you looked around and realised this was most definitely not your room.

“What- what happened?” You whispered, “did I- did I go feral?”

“You tried to take a fucking chunk out of me,” Kid growled. Killer shot him a dangerous look. It didn't matter that he had a mask back on, Kid knew the look well anyway. He quickly shut his mouth.

“Kid took your mask,” Killer explained, “and he's really fucking sorry, aren't you Kid?”

“I just wanted a look…” Kid replied like a scorned child.

“Kid,” Killer snapped.

“OKAY, FUCK, I'm sorry Yin, I didn't know you would actually go feral,” he mumbled, “what happened to your seastone?”

You scowled at him, doing your best to not just snap and kill him right then and there out of principle, “it fell on the floor when I was switching to my mask, which would usually be fine, if someone hadn't fucking taken it”

“I said I'm sorry okay!” He yelled.

“I don't fucking care what you say, you're fucking lucky I don't kill you right fucking now,” you spat, standing up and rushing at him, an accusatory finger poking him in the chest, “what the fuck is wrong with you Kid? Killer warned you what would happen, are you fucking stupid? I COULD HAVE KILLED YOU, YOU FUCKING IDIOT!”

Killer was standing behind you now, resting a calming hand on your shoulder, pulling you gently away from Kid, “That's enough, one life lost is enough for today”

You snapped your head towards Killer, “one life lost? Did I fucking kill someone? Oh my god tell me it wasn't Heat please”

“Heat is fine, I assume,” Killer assured you, “it was just a henchman. No big deal”

You let out a heavy sigh and looked at Kid with an apologetic expression, “Sorry, Captain”

“This ones on me,” Kid sighed. You took a few steps closer and gave him a hesitant look before delicately pulling his hand that held the shirt away from his neck to inspect it.

“Fuck,” you whispered, standing on your tippy toes to be able to see properly, “the bleeding looks like its stopped but you should probably see Mohawk about this, I went pretty deep. Sorry Kid. I've always did tend to go for the jugular when I'm feral, doesn't help that its one of the only things I can see”

“Don't worry about it,” he mumbled, “lesson learned, I won't touch your precious mask again”

You sighed again and took a few steps back, apologising again before turning to leave. That's when you spotted the series of perfectly circular holes that led directly to your room and pinched the bridge of your nose. “Well, that's new,” you sighed, walking through the holes back to your room, stopping to glance at the dead henchman on your way. You didn't even know his name, so you exhaled in relief, no love lost.

Killer gave Kid one more warning glance before following you back through the holes to check on you, not fully convinced that you were fine.

“You okay?” He asked as he stood in the eave of the last hole, watching you hurriedly pack your things. He couldn't help but notice the new toys as you shoved them unceremoniously into your duffle bag, but he tried his best to shake the dirty thoughts they brought up.

“I'm fucking peachy, Kil,” you muttered, before taking your katana and using it to retrieve your seastone from under the bed. “Stupid fucking rock,” you mumbled as you threw it in your duffle bag. You zipped the bag shut and paused, looking at it sadly as you stood beside the dresser it sat on. “I nearly killed him, I tasted his fucking blood, Kil. I can still taste it.” You shook your head with a frown and opened your duffle again, retrieving your toothbrush and toothpaste and making a beeline for the bathroom. You left the door open, so as not to be rude to Killer.

“Its not on you, this is his fuck up,” Killer told you. You turned back to him as you brushed your teeth and softened, seeing his mask and suddenly realising what he'd done for you.

“Your mask…” you said softly, lowering your brush.

“You said it blocks shit, I thought it might help,” he said nonchalantly, scratching the back of his neck.

“It was good thinking,” you told him, spitting your mouth full of toothpaste and rinsing your mouth and brush. You returned the brush and paste to your duffle, staring at the bag with a small blush, “It smells like you in there. It reminded me of the blanket you put over me during the storm. You have a calming scent”

His breath stuttered as you stood properly and looked directly at him, and there was a pregnant silence as you stared at each other. Your eyes couldn't meet because of the masks, but he felt like you were looking right into his soul. His heart skipped as you closed the distance between you and gently took one of his hands in your own.

“Thank you Kil,” you said softly, finally breaking the silence. Your voice was sweet and sincere, “that must have been hard for you to do, I won't forget what you did for me”

“It's nothing,” he mumbled, glad for the mask that was hiding his bright red cheeks, “I did it to protect Kid”

“Yeah, I know,” you sighed, staring forlorn at his hand as you ran your thumb over the scarred back of it, “but thank you anyway”

“Right,” he cleared his throat, pulling his hand away, “I need to finish packing…”

“Yeah, of course,” you replied, taking a few awkward steps back, “I'll uh.. I'll see you on the ship?”

“Yeah, sure,” he mumbled and quickly fled back to his own room.

[NEXT CHAPTER]