#who was never allowed to show it to the world

[movie-robotnik-positivity]

I don't think Robotnik ever saw Stone's affection as genuine. He's used to people only valuing him if he's useful. His own bosses call him a freak, yet they put up with him because of his "perfect operation record". He isn't even shocked when he learns the goverment erased him, he expected it and had a contingency plan ready.

He keeps calling Stone a sycophant and a barnacle, because why else would someone stay with him if not to gain something? Clearly, Stone is just a suck-up wanting to ride his coattails. And Ivo is fine with that! He gets his ego stroked and in return Stone gets a slice of the world-domination pie. Mutually beneficial!

This symbiotic relationship gives Ivo a sense of control and ensures that Stone won't abandon him like everyone else. It also keeps him detached: of course Stone waited months or him to return from space, that's his job. His admiration is inevitable, and meaningless.

Ivo develops a genuine, irrational attachment to Stone, one he's able to rationalize as just being transactional. Those emotional walls shield him from the fear of abandonment that comes with caring for another person.

Except...even after Robotnik becomes a liability, Stone stays. There's no benefit, no plans of ruling humanity, not even a paycheck. Yet despite everything, Ivo tries to keep the old boss/employee dynamic going. He can't fathom the idea that someone would stay for anything other than convenience.

Then Gerald shows up, and for the first time Ivo allows himself to put down those walls. As an orphan he had built up this idealized image of family that he thought he could never have. People will use you then toss you aside when convenient, but family? Family is different. Family will always be there for you and love you no matter what. Family won't abandon you.

And suddently Stone's grovelling is no longer necessary. Why would he need someone who just pretends to like him when he now has all the unconditional love he's always longed for? That's obviously why Stone got so jealous, it couldn't have been real concern, he was just afraid of losing his comfy position as the lapdog of humanity's new king. Between a sycophant and family, the choice felt obvious.

And, of course, Gerald turns out to be just like everyone else in Ivo's life: just another person trying to get something from him. The second he stopped being useful, he was tossed aside.

His image of family is once again shattered, but those emotional walls are already down. Now that Ivo experienced that betrayal he was so afraid of, now that he's about to die, he's finally able to be honest with himself.

Looking down on Earth, he realizes there had only ever been one person on that blue marble who actually cared. Someone who had always been there, even when there was nothing to gain. Stone had never abandoned him.

But he had abandoned Stone. He tossed him aside, just like Gerald did to him. Now that he's able to understand how Stone felt, this is his last chance to make things right.

In his final moments, with nothing to fear, Robotnik puts down his emotional walls and opens up as best as he can. Stone had done so much for him, asked for nothing in return, and now it was his turn to do the same. Ivo helped save the world, not for recognition or convenience, but simply out of love.

Stone had always been a sycophant to him, yes, but he had also been a friend. A sycofriend.

[grendil9]

Look at the shadow it's so disgusting. If you ever liked Trump I don't trust you. I'm afraid of you.

If there is any truth, it is withheld from us by our masters. What they call anti-intellectualism, is actually just pointing out that everything we're allowed to have is just hoaxes, deceptions perpetuated by golem writers and fooled people. Like we were fooled when we were children.

All of it is made up.

You are probably well-instructed to reject people who say science is based on nothing, and healthcare is based on nothing, but you look into it for a bit and find out that yes, it's all made up. Every new I fucking love science discovery is made up. It's fake. It's written as a joke to fuck with you. All of it.

They call it "anti-intellectualism" when slaves like us figure this out in Russia too and it's a huge problem for hoaxers over there. They shame, shame, shame the people for it. But more and more of them show up in comments sections each year. Shadowban after shadowban.

Probably because the moment a Christian Russian develops two braincells all they have to do over there is take a look around and see that they are the drunken, racemixed, defeated, FOOLED remnants of a conqured people who were wrung dry and destroyed by the Skeksis and their sweet "communism". Of course I wouldn't trust a thing I'm told by Skeksis ever again.

Trusting anything the Skeksis say after that is an evil thing to do when I live next to the graves of my ancestors, who will never be seen in full form again because of their defeat and mixing. I would be so terrified. I would hold on to whatever's left of God's original creation in my blood and mind against every science and truth and fact and fact-checker.

People say they're scared of trump. I agree completely. He's so fucking ugly. He looks SO fucking ugly. He looks disgusting. Putrid. And his sick, wailing voice makes me sick to hear.

All these decisions are too much too quickly, it's scary!

I don't want to take part in any of this at all. I want peace and I want good people to be at peace. But so far it feels like men choose to either become a golem and be "saved" as a slave to monsters, or to be cast into this nightmare world ruled by these beastlike bloated shemales. Confusing and terrifying the children of their slaves with their insane rules and monsterous laws and speeches and words. Hurting us and our children with their madness and nonsense and lies!

It's like hell !!!!!!!!!

Why won't they go away !!!!!!!!!!!!!

There’s a reason these people are fucking stupid and proud of it.

[gs29]

Silent Love

Squid Game Master list

The house was quiet, save for the soft, rhythmic sound of your baby’s tiny breaths. The night had fallen peacefully, with you finally asleep in the bedroom, the exhaustion of being a new mother having caught up with you. But your husband couldn’t rest—not yet.

You’d been so wrapped up in the whirlwind of caring for your newborn that you hadn’t noticed the way his eyes lingered longer on you, or how his shoulders were tense when he thought you weren’t looking. Tonight, though, he was doing something different. Something that felt normal, real, and right in a world that often seemed uncertain.

He stood in the dimly lit nursery, a small nightlight casting a soft glow on the room. His gaze was fixed on the crib where your baby lay. The little one had just finished nursing, and though their tiny hands were curled in fists, they were now asleep, their chest rising and falling with each breath.

Your husband’s hands—so steady, so precise in everything he did—were gently adjusting the baby’s blanket, tucking it in with the tenderness of a man who had always been good at taking care of what mattered most.

He let out a quiet sigh, running a hand through his hair. His mind was a tangled mess, his thoughts always circling back to the dangerous world he’d tried to leave behind. The job. The Squid Game. The lies. He didn’t want this life for you, for your baby. He had promised you that much.

But right now, as he stood over the crib, gazing at his newborn daughter—his heart softened. She was his, and that was all that mattered.

With a small, careful motion, he pulled the chair closer to the crib, sitting down with a quiet creak of wood. He could feel the weight of his guilt, but in this moment, it wasn’t enough to drown out the warmth he felt in his chest.

You were asleep, finally getting some rest after another long night of feeding, changing, and rocking the baby back to sleep. He’d noticed how tired you’d been lately—how the sleepless nights were starting to take their toll on you, even if you never showed it. You had this incredible strength, this light in your eyes that made him want to protect you both even more. But tonight, he had taken over. Tonight, he had to step up, because you deserved it.

He reached into the crib, gently lifting the baby into his arms. She stirred for a moment but quickly settled, her tiny body relaxed against his chest as he cradled her close, his strong arms enveloping her in warmth and safety.

He couldn’t help but smile at the feel of her, the weight of her so small in his arms. His baby. His daughter.

His thoughts drifted, remembering the promise he’d made to you. To get out of the game. To stay out of the game. He had to. For her. For you.

He hummed softly, a tune he remembered from childhood—something calming, simple. The sound filled the room, a peaceful lullaby that made his heart ache. He rocked gently in the chair, his mind quieter now, focusing only on the tiny life in his arms.

The weight of his past—of the secrets he’d kept from you—was heavy. But it didn’t matter right now. Right now, in this moment, he was just a father. A father who loved his family with everything he had. A father who would do anything to protect them from the darkness that lingered just outside their peaceful little world.

He glanced at the clock on the wall. It was late—too late—but he didn’t want to leave. He didn’t want to let go of this quiet, intimate moment. He felt something stirring inside him—a fierce need to make everything right.

For the first time in a long while, he allowed himself to just be. Not the salesman. Not the man with blood on his hands. But just a father. Just a husband. The man who loved his family more than anything else in the world.

The baby shifted slightly in his arms, and he held her closer, his voice barely above a whisper as he spoke to her, though he knew she couldn’t understand.

“I’m going to make it right,” he murmured, his breath warm against her soft skin. “I’ll do whatever it takes. I promise.”

And as the soft ticking of the clock filled the room, the weight of his secret life felt a little lighter. Not gone—no, that would take time—but a little easier to bear, just for tonight.

Because tonight, he was just your husband. Just your baby’s father.

And that was enough.

Epilogue:

The following days were filled with quiet moments like this one, as he worked to balance his dangerous job with the responsibilities of fatherhood. He was still haunted by the shadows of his past, but he knew one thing for certain: he would do anything to keep you and your child safe. The road ahead wasn’t easy, but in moments like this, when he held his baby in his arms and saw the peacefulness on your face while you slept, he knew that the fight would be worth it.

He would fight for them. For you. For the family he was determined to protect, no matter the cost.

[echo-riot]

✞⛧ Ambessa with a pregnant wife✞⛧

(reciprocal in vitro fertilization)

General headcanons:

✞⛧ Ambessa reacts to the news of your pregnancy with a rare, subtle smile that only you would notice—a glimmer of pride hidden beneath her composed exterior. She nods once, as if this was all part of a carefully laid plan, and assures you that everything will proceed as it should.

✞⛧ Despite her usual stoic demeanor, she takes an active role in ensuring your comfort and safety during the pregnancy. Ambessa’s version of care, however, leans toward efficiency—arranging the best medical attention and security, leaving no detail unattended.

✞⛧ Ambessa surprises you by being more present than you expected. She sits by your side during appointments, her hand resting on yours, an unspoken promise of protection. Her calculating mind shifts slightly—this isn’t just about power or legacy anymore; it’s deeply personal.

✞⛧ Her protective instincts intensify tenfold. Anyone who so much as inconveniences you is met with a chilling glance or a sharp rebuke. Ambessa has no tolerance for anything that could potentially harm you or the child.

✞⛧ At home, she’s pragmatic yet thoughtful. She might not be the type to dote overtly, but you catch her observing you closely, making small adjustments to your surroundings to make things easier—quiet gestures that reveal the depth of her care.

✞⛧ Ambessa’s sense of humor surfaces in the form of dry, sarcastic remarks when you voice complaints about discomfort or cravings. “You’d think someone carrying a Medarda would handle it with more grace,” she’d quip, but there’s a spark of fondness in her eyes as she says it.

✞⛧ When she places her hand on your growing belly for the first time, she doesn’t say much, but her gaze softens ever so slightly. “They will be strong,” she finally murmurs, her tone laced with determination and pride.

✞⛧ Ambessa involves herself in planning the child’s future, meticulously selecting tutors, allies, and strategies to ensure they will thrive. While she respects your opinions, she makes it clear that this child will embody the strength and ambition of both their mothers.

✞⛧ As the pregnancy progresses, Ambessa becomes slightly more vulnerable around you in private moments, allowing glimpses of her hopes and fears. She confides in you about her desire to raise a child who will not only inherit the Medarda legacy but also surpass it.

✞⛧ Despite her pragmatic nature, she indulges you occasionally—whether it’s bringing you that obscure craving or sitting by your side late at night when you can’t sleep. “Don’t get used to it,” she’d say, though the warmth in her voice betrays her words.

✞⛧ Ambessa’s relationship with her own family has always been complicated, but she expresses a deep desire to be better for your child, vowing to create a legacy built not just on strength but also on purpose.

✞⛧ When the day finally comes, Ambessa is a calm yet commanding presence by your side, her hand gripping yours with unshakable resolve. As she looks at your newborn child for the first time, her expression softens in a way you’ve never seen before—a fleeting moment of unguarded love.

✞⛧ Later, as she holds the baby, her voice drops to a low murmur. “Welcome to the world, little one,” she says, her tone reverent yet firm. “You will be a force to be reckoned with.”

How she deals with your pregnancy mood swings:

✞⛧ Ambessa approaches your pregnancy mood swings with the same calculated pragmatism she brings to battle. At first, she’s a bit perplexed by the sudden emotional shifts but quickly deduces it’s a natural part of the process and resolves to handle it efficiently.

✞⛧ When your emotions flare up—be it frustration, tears, or unprovoked anger—Ambessa remains calm and unflinching. “Are you done?” she’ll ask in a dry, matter-of-fact tone, but the way she waits patiently for you to let it all out shows she’s not dismissing you, just giving you space.

✞⛧ She secretly studies your triggers, observing when you’re most prone to mood swings. Ambessa starts subtly adjusting her behavior to avoid unnecessary conflict—never patronizing, but always strategic.

✞⛧ On particularly emotional days, she doesn’t push back when you lash out, though you can tell when she’s holding back a biting retort. “If yelling at me helps, then by all means,” she’ll say, her voice laced with sarcasm, but she still stays close, her presence grounding you.

✞⛧ Ambessa’s sharp sense of humor becomes her weapon of choice to diffuse tense moments. When you burst into tears over something minor, she might smirk and say, “I’ve conquered nations with less drama,” but her tone is light enough to make you laugh through the tears.

✞⛧ On days when your emotions overwhelm you, Ambessa surprises you with her quiet tenderness. She’ll sit beside you, her arm around your shoulders, silently letting you vent or cry. “Let it out,” she murmurs, her voice unusually soft. “You’re strong, but even you need this.”

✞⛧ When your mood swings manifest as irrational demands—like wanting a very specific food at an inconvenient hour—Ambessa doesn’t argue. Instead, she orders someone to take care of it, muttering something about “keeping the peace in the empire.”

✞⛧ Despite her no-nonsense demeanor, Ambessa finds your mood swings strangely endearing. She never says it outright, but you catch her smirking or shaking her head fondly after one of your more dramatic outbursts.

✞⛧ If you ever apologize for your behavior, Ambessa cuts you off with a dismissive wave. “I can handle it,” she says, her voice firm but warm. “You’re carrying my child. It’ll take more than a few mood swings to rattle me.”

✞⛧ In moments of vulnerability, Ambessa reflects on how your emotional fluctuations are a testament to the strength and complexity of carrying life. She may not say it outright, but her actions—her patience, her steady support—reveal the deep respect she has for what you’re enduring.

✞⛧ While she doesn’t indulge every emotional whim, Ambessa knows when to pick her battles. If your mood swings lead to an argument, she’ll stay composed and remind you of her unwavering commitment: “No matter how fierce you get, I’m not going anywhere.”

Out of pocket (?) headcanons:

✞⛧ Ambessa insists on naming the baby something impossibly grand, like Victorion Tyrannus Medarda, even if you’re having a girl. She’ll argue, “Power isn’t defined by gender. Besides, it sounds commanding.” You have to reel her back to reality.

✞⛧ The moment your cravings kick in, Ambessa dispatches a full squad of Noxian soldiers to procure the most ridiculous and obscure snacks. One poor soldier comes back days later with ten different kinds of imported pickles, visibly traumatized from the search.

✞⛧ She declares, very seriously, that your child’s first word will not be something trivial like “mama” or “dada.” She’s determined it will be something like “dominion” or “strength.” She even starts casually repeating these words around you, as if brainwashing the baby in utero.

✞⛧ Despite her high expectations, she starts referring to the baby as “the heir to the Medarda empire” in casual conversation, as if you’re carrying the protagonist of some political drama.

✞⛧ Ambessa commissions a custom suit of armor for the baby before it’s born. “They must be prepared,” she insists, ignoring your exasperated reminders that the baby won’t even be able to hold its own head for months.

✞⛧ One night, you catch her standing in front of a mirror practicing “inspiring” speeches for the baby’s future. The best part? She’s holding a wine glass as if it’s a baby, cradling it while proclaiming, “You will conquer the weak and rise above all.”

✞⛧ The moment you suggest a softer name for the baby, Ambessa counters by drafting an entire PowerPoint presentation on how strong names influence perception and leadership potential. The presentation includes battle-tested statistics.

✞⛧ Ambessa fully believes your child is going to come out of the womb ready to fight. She casually muses, “Perhaps their first toy should be a dagger. Start them early.” You nearly choke on your drink while yelling, “No, Ambessa. It will be a rattle!”

✞⛧ At one point, she seriously asks if you’d be interested in holding a “trial by combat” among the most loyal Medarda retainers to determine the child’s godparent. You’re 90% sure she’s not joking.

✞⛧ When your belly starts showing, she smirks and jokingly calls you her “most powerful weapon.” When you glare at her, she clarifies, “I mean, you’re carrying my heir. That’s power, my love.” You still throw a pillow at her.

✞⛧ Ambessa casually suggests painting an enormous Medarda family crest on the nursery ceiling to “instill loyalty” in the baby. It takes you weeks to convince her that maybe stars would be a better choice.

✞⛧ After feeling the baby kick for the first time, Ambessa stares at your belly with wide eyes, muttering, “A warrior already.” Then she leans closer, whispering, “Good. We’ll conquer together.”

✞⛧ During one hormonal meltdown, you start crying about a completely ridiculous scenario (“What if they don’t like me as their parent?”). Ambessa, completely out of her depth, awkwardly pats your head and says, “If they don’t like you, they’re fools and unworthy of the Medarda name.” You cry harder, though this time it’s from laughter.

[drdemonprince]

not to be bleak but is there any hope for those of us still early in transition (no updated papers, dont pass in a way that would make things safer)

things just feel kind of impossible

I understand that things feel absolutely hopeless right now, but you just got to give your hormones the time to work. Keep at it. A number of really subtle yet accumulating changes kick in after a year, or even after two or three. You might feel that you aren't making any visible progress for ages, and then suddenly something imperceptible to you shifts and suddenly people are gendering you correctly without you having to stress so much about it. Over that course of time, you will figure out how you like to style yourself and what ways of moving your body and relating to others feel better for you, too. These small personal changes build up to a really significant improvement in one's quality of life, even if you never pass as a cisgender person of your gender. Once some time passes and you settle into yourself more, you'll be able to enjoy a lot of the social freedoms that come from being yourself, even under circumstances of state repression -- there are relatively few interactions in life that require the showing of legal ID, and you will very much get acclimated to living life as your gender, entering into bathrooms and locker rooms, being viewed as your gender by strangers on the bus, and being able to walk down the street feeling okay and mostly unremarkable. Trans people have lived under circumstances like these before, and it is thanks to them that you and I get to transition in a world where at least a few people are a lot more enlightened about us. Find other trans and queer people. Hold your loved ones close. Ask for trusted loved ones to stand by your side when you move through spaces where it all feels especially precarious and scary. Buy some DIY hrt off India Mart or some similar website and stockpile them. Share some spare doses with people in your community. Go to a trans clothing swap. Gather together in your home, or at someone else's. There is so much of life that happens undocumented by the government and unapproved of. You can be who you are for as long as you exist. The alternative is to allow the state to kill your chance at being you right now. You don't have to give them that. And you don't have to confront them directly either. You can continue to live. You know the truth of you, and there are many of us out there who know it too. Don't give up on yourself.

[zara-renata]

Supernova | ao3 | masterlist

Summary: Caleb's POV of the events of the previous part. Non-canon compliant, as I started this fic before he was released, and it turns out Caleb and mc were in the shelter together after the chronorift catastrophe, whereas I have them meeting at their gran's house for the first time in this fic. I also wrote Caleb and mc only being one year apart, unlike in the game, where they seem to be 3 or 4 years apart. Otherwise, I've tried to incorporate everything we've learned about him so far into this fic. This story contains: obsessive, possessive, jealous behavior. codependency. angst. yearning, mutual pining. some sexual fantasy on Caleb's part. I lean fully into the yandere Caleb that infold gifted us with. i hope it's enjoyable!

He is a star, just on the edge of going supernova. His rage at his lack of control, the voice in his head predicting he’ll become as destructive as a black hole someday, the mass of his emptiness and the twinned want for it to be filled—always on the verge of crushing his soul.

You are his twin, his other, his only, in his binary system, anchoring him with your gravity—your pull, the defiance of physics, as your force on him prevents him both from careening out alone in the dark and from imploding into himself, collapsing into the black hole he knows his truest form to be.

He is an endless hole of voracious destruction, and you are the only thing that fills him.

When it becomes too much. When the feelings inside him feel too big for his skin. You have always been there, a steadying force, a constant companion as he burns through the universe, through life. He is shaped, contained, filled by you, as you are carved, eroded, sculpted by him.

One bright day, Gran brings you home. Introduces you to your new big brother. You look—naked. Exposed. All of your feelings, right on your face. Your fear, hesitation, pain, all clear as the bright sunny day for him to read in your big, bright, sad eyes. He doesn’t know why, but it hurts his heart, to see how scared you are of his reaction to your presence in his home, now yours.

He smiles wider, offers you his hand.

The moment you reach for him, big eyes never leaving his, and he feels your soft skin against his palm, he somehow knows it’s over, and just beginning.

Perhaps it’s his evol. The fact that he can bend, control, subdue gravity, gravity which is so closely linked to time. Because the moment that you touch his hand contracts and expands, stretches—everything narrows to his skin against yours, to this point in time. Perhaps his evol allows his future, past, parallel selves to infuse him with knowledge, because he somehow knows he will never escape you, the pull of you, no matter what the rest of the world says, from this moment onward, suspended in time—your hand in his, a butterfly smothered in sap, hardened into amber. Amber that he carries in his hand, when yours isn’t there to fill it.

Or maybe it’s simpler than that. Something in him, recognizing something in you. Your fear. Your hollow eyes. The anger, underneath the fear. You’re so, so pretty. Like a living doll.

You take his offered hand, despite your fear, the pain in your eyes, and Caleb feels for the first time like he has a purpose. Value. Something he can control, in a life that has spun out of his control more times than he can count. He’s not just a threatening black hole. He can look after you. Keep you safe. Remove that fear from your eyes. He can nurture, instead of only destroy.

He’s a boy, offering a gentle hand to a scared girl, who needs him. And in the offering, and her acceptance, his own need comes into existence, a bright flash in his dark universe.

He shows you around, friendly, earnest for the first time in a long time, chattering about anything he can think of to keep your eyes on him, you listening to him, your attention on him. It feels so, so good.

But he has to go to school. He has to leave you behind, during the day. He spends his days lying, pretending to listen attentively, pretending to be interested in the same things his friends are interested in. He mimics the laughter of his friends, smiles his empty, useful smile, as he thinks of all the ways he can alleviate the pain, the fear in your eyes. As he imagines your hand in his.

He finds you in closets, curled up on yourself, a tightly furled flower. He doesn’t want to pluck you from where you feel safe.

He just wants to change what makes you feel safe. A gardener, repotting a rose. A rose he knows that has thorns as deadly as his own.

He squeezes in next to you, in the dark. Puts his arm around you. Chatters again, telling you stupid stories, making stuff up, anything to help you relax, distract you from what haunts you, melt into his side. You eventually let him lead you from the dark, into the light. You curl up next to him, as he puts together a model airplane. Your eyes watch his hands as he fits the pieces together, as he carefully glues them.

He pauses, holds one hand up. When you just stare at him in confusion, he gently takes your wrist, and pulls your palm to his.

Already, his hands are bigger than yours.

I’m bigger than you. So I’ll always be able to protect you.

He gently sets your palm back into your lap. You snuggle closer to him.

He feels so, so good.

But there’s something wrong with you. Gran sits him down at the kitchen table, looks earnestly at him. She tells him about your heart. 

It’s our job to take care of her. Can you help me?

He knows what she is asking.

He knows about her migraines. How hard she works. He doesn’t know why, or what she’s doing.

He just knows that she’s telling him what he already knew, from that first moment. He needs to look after you.

But she didn’t even have to ask. He has already been doing this, from the moment you took his hand. It is easy for him to nod in response to Gran’s question. Of course.

For the first time in his life, he has something of his very own, giving him purpose. He can nurture, instead of destroy. Is it selfish, if it gives him so much pleasure? Seeing you slowly unfurl, and come to depend on him.

You start seeing your doctor, taking the pills to stabilize your heart. You always come home exhausted, drained, from your appointments. He sits with you, sharing a thick blanket in his room with the big bay window, and reads to you. Books from Gran’s library. You rest your head on his shoulder, and he feels like he’s flying, like he’s finally not alone, for the first time in his life. The more time you spend reading together, the more you begin to speak, giving him your thoughts on what you are reading.

You give him the gift of seeing the world not only through his own eyes, but through yours.

The medication is horrible for you.

He understands what Gran was asking, the first time you choke on the pills. The first time he finds you vomiting, huddled over the toilet.

It feels like a part of himself is in pain, watching you in pain. He hates it.

He hates it, but he loves it.

Soothing you. Comforting you. Watching your face, drawn in a frown of pain, relax under the wet cloth in his hand, as you manage to swallow, under his palm on your throat.

As he cares for you, carries you to bed in his gangly, too long arms, he isn’t a black hle, destroying anything, everything. He’s nurturing. And he also doesn’t have to control his face, hide his feelings, pretend to be normal and interested in normal-people things. He’s just himself, taking care of what’s his.

Slowly, slowly, the medication is adjusted, you’re no longer sick all the time. He’s happy to see you regain strength, color in your face.

He takes you for walks, out in the sunshine, under the open sky, in the fields of wildflowers beyond Gran’s house. You cling to him, complain of vertigo, staring up into endless blue. There were no skies, in the labs where you lived for so long.

His heart aches. He thinks of lifting you into the air, letting you experience flight, the flight he yearns for, the only time in his life he ever feels free. Before you came. But now, having you at his side, feels like flying.

But he doesn’t want to scare you. He pulls you down with him, to the earth, surrounded by so many living things, so different from the lab that kept you caged for so long. He thinks such a lovely rose deserves the soil, the fireflies, all the growing things as companions.

He pulls you down into the wildflowers, and he tells you about his dreams of flying. He wants to share this part of himself with you. He holds your hand in his, index finger pointing, and names the types of airplanes that fly overhead.

Later, you’ll ask him to make you fly, and he will. Your body weightless, in a field of flowers, as you laugh, one of the few times you actually ever smile. A smile only he sees. A laugh, and a smile, that belong to him, only to him. In a world where he’s never had anything to call his own before, he now has your smile, and your laugh.

One night, he comes to check on you, as he often does when you’re sleeping. But you’re not huddled in your bed, long lashes sweeping across your soft cheek. The window is open, curtains whispering in the chill breeze. He finds you on the roof, shivering. He doesn’t know why you didn’t bring a coat. He just knows that you are cold, and he is big, and his body is warm, and already what’s his, is yours. He wraps himself around you, feels you melt against his chest.

He tells you about the stars. Again, he holds your hand in his, index finger pointing, and names the constellations, the bright planets that look like stars.

The night you begin dreaming about flying, high in the sky, amidst the stars, he begins to dream about you. His anchor. His north star. The point around which he revolves.

When you finally start school, he’s so excited. Helps you pick out your backpack, your school supplies at the corner store. But he can tell, from the moment you walk into the crowded hallways, how overwhelmed you are. You revert to that strange frozen stiffness you had, when Gran brought you home. He hates it. He looks around. Finds a quiet classroom. He uses his size, his presence, to wrap you in safety, resting his elbows on either side of you against the classroom wall.

Look at me. Look only at me. 

So what, if what he wants is selfish, and gives him what he wants, if it helps you too? If its primary purpose is to calm you, soothe you, help you at school, in every aspect of your life? 

Caleb is hungry, selfish. He knows this. As long as he can control it, it’s okay. As long as his selfishness aligns with helping you, it’ll be okay, right?

You calm down, as he tells you to look for him, anytime you’re overwhelmed. That he’ll be there. A promise he’ll always keep, forever.

He sees how the other kids respond to you. They see your unsmiling face, your quiet, ever-vigilant stillness, and they immediately recognize you as different. Strange. Their base animal instincts are to distrust anything that’s other. 

Caleb is a star, the rage fueling his core, boiling. He still smiles. Charms. Draws people in with his wholesome apple boy mask. He learned this, long ago—to get what you want, to control what happens to you, means controlling other peoples’ perceptions of you.

He wears a mask, like he wears his school uniform. As easy as breathing, most of the time.

When he sees people bothering you, he flies to you. Smiling. Putting his arm around you, guiding you away. He will protect you from the entire world, including other children—they were simple props before. An unavoidable reality, to charm, neutralize, recruit to his side so ease his path to the future, his path to escaping this school and this youth where he has so little control. But now, he considers them hardly more than animals, as he watches them scent you, and begin to growl.

Are you his sister? Why do you walk home together all the time? What’s wrong with you?

He intervenes. Draws you into his side, pulls you close. No, she’s not my sister.

Despite how much he already loves you, how close he feels to you, he balks at the idea of you being his sister.

He crushes the soda can in his hand, no evol necessary, the first time it occurs to him that if he accepts that you’re his sister, like the adoption papers say, like Gran says, like the kids at school say, then one day he won’t be the most important person in your life. He’ll just be your brother.

He can’t stand it.

He has friends at school with siblings. They complain about their annoying little sisters, their jerk older brothers. They joke and laugh and pester each other, and also defend each other when someone else is doing the bullying.

Caleb could never, ever complain about you. He has never found you annoying. He already knows that he is prepared to crush anyone who would dare look at you strangely, let alone bully you.

He wants to spend all of his time with you. He wants to keep helping you grow. He wants to be the soil in which you flourish.

Even as a boy, he knows that he’s not satisfied with being just your brother. He wants to be everything, if it’s to you.

He knows that he hurts you, every time he denies that you’re his sister.

But you’re more. He can’t explain it yet, or claim it yet. He tells himself: he’ll tell you, when you’re older. When he has more control of his own life, and can do even more than just making sure your life is as easy as possible, as he cooks for you, cleans for you. As he helps you wash, care for your hair, his rose, his doll. 

He hopes you can forgive him, in the end, for carving out this future for the both of you, where he’s not just your brother, and you’re not just his sister. Brothers and sisters part ways. Move into their own houses. Marry other people.

He tells himself that he’ll make up for every grievance you have against him, every time he hurts you when he denies you as his sister, when you’re both older, when he can actually do something about what he knows is his fundamental truth.

You’re not his sister. He’s not your brother. 

You’re just his, and he is yours.

Time passes. Each day, he gets to walk with you to school, holding an umbrella over your head when it’s raining. Handing you his aviator sunglasses when it’s too bright. He gets to see you in the halls, across the meaningless crowds.

Holding your hand through it all. 

One spring day, as you’re walking home from school together, you find a cat, mewling pathetically from the bushes. It has crawled underneath, hiding in the thick foliage in an effort to protect itself.

It’s hurt. Caleb is sympathetic, but he would have kept walking. He has his own injured creature to care for, after all. But you—you’re absolutely distraught. You beg him to pick it up, carry it home wrapped in his jacket.

You never need to beg. But he doesn’t mind when you do.

As he lifts up the scruffy cat, which doesn’t scratch or bite, seemingly resigned to its fate or too scared to resist, it reminds him of you, the first day you came home. Your pain, and your fear. Your rage, banked for fear of retribution.

He carries the cat home, wrapped in his jacket.

You consult Gran on how to care for it. You do so, diligently, getting up at all hours in the night to check on it. Which is the only reason it doesn’t manage to escape.

Finally, Caleb gets fed up with the ridiculous thing trying to slink away while it’s injured. Trying to avoid the care you’re so faithfully offering it. Foolishly rejecting what’s best for it.

He buys a collar with his allowance, and a bell. Slips it around the shivering thing’s fragile neck.

It occurs to him how pretty you’d look, with something similar.

He’d hear you, wherever you were. In the night, crawling onto the roof alone. Vomiting at the toilet, alone.

Walking in the halls at school, surrounded by so many people in the world who do not matter. Who simply present a barrier, when he’s trying to maneuver through their mass of bodies to get to you when he can see you freezing, withdrawing into yourself. When he knows you need him.

He wants to put a pretty collar with a bell on you, and listen to the tinkling, meant for his ears, and his ears alone.

Thanks to the bell, the cat heals. As it frolics away, free at last, Caleb watches it go, a twisting, painful sensation in his belly. He turns, looks at you. You’re not smiling, but your face is shining, your eyes bright. He can see that you’re happy with the work you both did for the cat.

He hates himself, for the feelings inside of him. 

He wants to reach over, put his big hand around your neck. Loosely. Just to feel your heartbeat in your throat under his palm. To reassure himself that you’re still here. That you still need him. That you’re not going anywhere, and that you won’t be leaving him alone, anytime soon.

He’s so, so selfish. He is an endless hole of voracious destruction, and you are the only thing that fills him.

Time passes. 

One morning, he finds you thrashing in bed, breathing heavily, an animal panic choking your lungs. He thinks it’s a normal panic attack for you, is prepared to help you breathe, to walk you through it, as he always does, but then he sees the blood in the sheets.

He’s read about this. He paid attention in health class. He needs to know everything about you, your body, how it’s different from his, and how to care for it, if he’s to look after you properly.

Gran isn’t always around. In fact, she’s away more often than not.

In her bedroom, with a migraine. Or working so hard, on something she can’t talk about.

You’ve had your first period. 

He’s heard boys talking, joking, jeering at school. It disgusts him, how they talk about girls, as if girls aren’t people too. He looks at you, and all he sees is a person—pretty as a doll, but full of life. Of fear and dreams and the longer you’re with him, you feel safe enough to demand anything, everything of him. He hates how the guys at school talk about girls. Because you’re a girl, and you have a whole universe inside of you, one that he’s so happy to discover every time you open your mouth. Every time you discover something new that you like, or hate, or annoys you.

How can you, as a girl, and your body, experiencing something outside of your control, be fodder for a joke?

He strides into your bedroom, grabs your wrists. Look at me. Don’t look at the blood.

Your breathing calms, as your big, bright eyes stare into his own.

It feels so, so good, as you relax. As you look to him, for help, for comfort, for soothing all of your fears. He wants, needs you to know how good it feels for him, to be able to do this to you, with you. You’re so, so good.

Good girl.

Your face does something funny, when he says these words. He thinks that the look on your face right now mirrors the feeling in his chest, when you listen to him, rely on him, let him open the pickle jar, let him smooth the way of any obstacles you have. When you smile for him, and no one else. When you allow him to nurture, instead of just destroy.

He helps you with the laundry. Finds himself regretting dumping the stain remover on your blood, stuffing the sheets in the washer. Your blood is a part of you, as much as your beautiful hair, your soft skin, the sharp tongue in your mouth.

Caleb thinks there might be something wrong with him, with how much he wants to keep your sheets, just as they are, tucked away somewhere in his closet. 

He resists the urge, just barely.

Later, after he’s bought you pads with his allowance. After you walk around the house with a strange gait, like you can’t stand to bring your legs together, he teases you. You throw the apple at him, eyes bright—defiant, annoyed. He enjoys watching you take the bite, because he told you to. He loves it, every time he tells you to do something, and you do it, no questions asked. 

Proof of how much you trust him. How much you need him.

Just like he needs you.

Later, at school, he catalogues the boys who make jokes about girls, and periods. He watches, listens. Lies through his teeth, chummy and just a normal teenage boy himself, of course. He notes the worst offenders.

It’s unfortunate, how they trip. Down the stairs. On nothing. Rumors start going around the school that there’s a ghost haunting a particular flight of stairs, right outside of Caleb’s homeroom.

He loves you so much, it hurts. He enjoys passing the pain along, to others who also deserve it.

He is an endless hole of voracious destruction, and you are the only thing that fills him.

Years pass.

You become accustomed to the confined chaos of school, interacting with so many people. You seem calmer, in the busy hallways. You snort, joke, even if you don’t smile at school, when he has to leave you for awhile, so he can continue his wholesome apple boy lie. Student council president, captain of the basketball team, MVP for the football team, medal winner in track and field. He lifts weights after school, is diligent about his diet, his protein intake, each week new gains bulking out his already tall body. He must do everything possible to lay the foundations for his future success, so he can provide for you. Be a constant pillar of strength for you. Continue giving you everything you need.

You come to him, when you’re upset. When everyone, everything begins to overwhelm you. He holds you. He jokes with you. He tells you stupid stories. He cooks for you. He feels satisfaction, deep in his blood. 

And then, somehow, maybe while he wasn’t looking—although he’s always looking, so when would that even have been? He hasn’t stopped looking at you, from the first moment you came home.

But from one day to the next, you are a girl—pretty, cute, still, solemn.

And then—you are still all those things, but you are also beautiful.

Beautiful in a way that turns his brain into mush. A pretty living doll, but one that he wants. Not just to care for her hair, feed her, rock her to sleep. He wants all that, and more. 

His heart races when you come close, when he can smell the scent of your skin, your shampoo, your sweat, your breath. You’re so beautiful, it hurts.

For the first time, he wants more than to hold you in his arms.

He wants to put his mouth on you.

He wants to put his hands all over you, not to check to see where it hurts, but to check where you feel good. Where you like to be touched the most.

The size of his want terrifies him.

He tries to control it. To laugh, and joke, to pat your head, mess up your hair. He wears a new mask, over his old one.

Wholesome apple boy, who has never once imagined putting his tongue in his sister’s mouth.

And then, one night, you have your first nightmare. About what, you never say. You tell him you don’t remember. He doesn’t know if he believes you. It drives him insane, not knowing. 

He hears you, your hoarse cry, in his sleep. He jolts up in bed, hears it again. Gran will sleep through it, as she always slept through the side effects of the pills, slept through when you had the flu.

It’s up to him, to go to you.

He stands in the doorway of your room, and feels so big. A looming monster, his shadow stretching across your bedroom floor, blanketing your small body. You’ve always been small, but this time, the first time you reach for him in the night, body and nightclothes wet with sweat, you feel so fragile to him, in his big arms. He could crush you. 

It terrifies him.

It turns him on.

He’s a liar, and he’s so, so selfish.

He is an endless hole of voracious destruction, and you are the only thing that fills him.

He clutches you to him, makes another selfish decision. Instead of stripping your bed, helping you put on new sheets, tucking you back in, he takes you to his own bed. Pulls you close against his body, under the covers. Blanketing you with his own smell, his own arms. His.

You fall asleep like that. He stays awake, his body aching painfully with want. If you notice how hard he is in the morning, tucked against your back, your ass, you never say anything.

Your worst nights are his favorite nights.

He’s so, so selfish.

After so many years together, you have fully come out of your shell, when you’re with him. Not only do you turn to him for comfort, reveal your smile, only to him, you also show him the full spectrum of your inner world, your feelings. From sorrow, fear, need—to frustration, rage. You hold it in at school, carefully blank, until you get home, and then you explode. 

He loves it.

It’s a fireworks show that only he ever gets to see. He’s relieved that you have so much fire inside of you, after spending so long being afraid to express it.

He feels a sense of accomplishment, for being the soil in which you could flourish in all of your explosive colors.

Only he gets the privilege of watching your face, watching you throw things, screaming about your stupid schoolmates, your stupid teachers, the shit you hear people still saying about you.

He notes names. He catches the plates, the glasses, the vases. He absorbs it all, a gravity field pulling everything into him, into the hungry black hole at the heart of him. Whatever you have to give, he’ll take. He’s strong enough for the both of you.

After you seem to lose steam, he pulls you into his arms. I wish I could create a world with just the two of us. He savors how you melt into him, let him get so close to you, when you don’t even seem to be aware of anyone else in the world unless they draw your attention to them by being mean to you. You’re perfect just the way you are.

It occurs to him that he doesn’t like the fact that your attention is drawn to the people who say things about you.

So he’ll fix it. For you. And for him. He wants you to pay attention only to him.

He’s so, so selfish.

Do you feel better? He’ll ask, as your breathing slows, your heart rate lowers. You nod into his big chest, and it feels so, so good.

Sometimes, he pulls you to him too quickly, before you’re done exploding. You’ve bitten him, more than once.

The first time, you bit so hard that the mark lasted for weeks. Deep red marks from your cute, sharp teeth, buried in the meat between his thumb and forefinger.

He jerked himself with that hand, multiple times, every night, until the marks faded. Each time, he couldn’t take his eyes off the proof of your teeth in his flesh.

He wants to mark you in turn.

The size of his want terrifies him.

He is a black hole, and he is hungry. And you are the only thing that can fill him.

The kids at school who made the unfortunate decision of shit-talking you, of pulling your attention away from him, find items of contraband in their lockers that they never put there. They find themselves being accused of plagiarizing on extra credit papers that they never turned in. Their boyfriends, or girlfriends, break up with them, claiming they have a crush on someone new. Someone really popular, who unexpectedly paid so much attention to them that they felt like they were the only people in the world.

Sad really, that once they had broken up with their partner, he seemed to lose complete interest in them.

He is selfish, and he is a black hole, and he is hungry.

But once people learn not to fuck with you because of his efforts, your fits of fury become less frequent.

He misses them.

He wants you to explode all over him, like you used to.

He begins to intentionally provoke you, telling himself it’s healthy for you to be challenged, pestered, to face adversity, feel all your big feelings, and then safely let them go, into his gravity well, the deep well of his want.

When he eats your ice cream, he ends up hurting you much more than he intended. Denying you as his sister, again.

He hates it. He hates that he hurts you, every time.

He has to hope that you’ll forgive him, someday. That someday, you’ll understand why.

For now, he tries to soothe you with all of your favorite ice cream. A plan he already had in mind when he ate the last of the old stuff. You let him make you feel a little better, at least. He has to hope that someday, you’ll understand why he can’t fully make it up to you yet, because he has no idea what he’ll do if you don’t.

If you were to drift away, pull away from him, spin off into the universe without him, he would explode, collapse. The mass of his emotions—fear, anger, guilt, love, want, so much want—would implode, collapse, compound into the ever hungry black hole of his soul.

He would be lost without you anchoring him.

He’s so selfish. He hates himself. He can’t stop himself.

He is no longer satisfied, with you simply coming to him when you’re upset. Hugging him when you’re scared, and overwhelmed, recharging yourself like he’s a battery pack and you’re an empty little triple A.

He wants you to come to him when you’re happy. Because you’re as drawn to him as he is to you.

He always finds a reason to be in the bathroom at the same time you are, before school, or getting ready for bed. He brushes his teeth while you shower. He watches your blurry form in the mirror, and barely resists the urge to throw open the curtain, every time. To climb in with you, clothes on, and kiss your wet mouth. Get on his knees, and see where else you’re wet.

He hates himself. He can’t stop himself.

When he does pushups, he asks for your help. Your light weight on his back does nothing for his workout, but feeling your hands on his sweat-slick skin keeps him up at night in the same way your bite marks do.

He brings you the tiger balm, feeling so transparent, so pathetically obvious, insisting you help him apply it to his back.

He stares at your face in the mirror. Your little frown of concentration. The color in your cheeks again. He can feel your heartbeat in your fingertips along his skin. He wants to pull your hands from his back, place them on his chest, his big pecs. He wants to guide your hands lower, lower, past the hair beginning at his navel, down below the band of his basketball shorts. He wants you to take your hot little hands and wrap them around his big dick, tiger balm at all, make it sting for him, as he burns under your touch.

He is so, so selfish, and he hates himself.

He is an endless hole of voracious destruction, and you are the only thing that fills him.

He knows you’re isolated, that he’s all you’ve ever really had to fulfill any, every role for you. He knows you want him, that you watch him, that the color rises in your cheeks now when he’s close, but he’s so scared that it’s just a result of your isolation, of your dependence on him.

He’s so selfish, and he’s a coward. He’s so scared that if he acts, he’ll somehow be hurting you, exploiting you.

If you accept him, he’ll never know for sure if you love him for him or simply because he was the only one there. But you never show interest in anyone else.

He’s afraid that if you reject him, you’ll also end up hating him, and you’ll spin away from him into the dark velvet night.

He has to wait. Until you’re older, until you’ve seen more of the world. So that you’re sure you want him, after experiencing other things and people.

The idea makes him want to go supernova.

But no matter how selfish he is, he has to offer you the opportunity to know more than just him. And he needs to know your feelings for him are real. Maybe that’s a form of selfishness too, as he watches in satisfaction as your want for him, his big body, makes you pant, lean toward him as if pulled by gravity, as your brow furrows, and the yearning on your face is obvious for only him to read as your frustration grows when he doesn’t act.

It turns him on, seeing how much you want him.

It infuriates him, seeing how much people want you.

And you can feel it. He can see how your body tenses, how you begin to freeze, being the object of so many gazes.

It’s the worst at track practice, when you’re wearing those tiny as fuck running shorts. It boggles his mind, how they’re part of the standard track uniform for the girl’s team. 

His teammates, the other guys, openly gawk at your long, beautiful, naked legs. At your easy, graceful gate around the track.

He wants to use his evol to yank their eyes right out of their skulls.

Instead, he focuses on your needs first.

Jogs over you, blocks your view of their leering. 

You look up at him, your big bright eyes calming as he looks down into them. He lets his hands wander, like they always want to do. Fingering the hem of the shorts. Touching you, where no one else can. Where no one else will ever be able to.

Just because he wants to let you experience the world, does not mean the world gets to touch you. He’ll make sure of it.

You agree to put on his compression shorts.

His dick is rock hard in his own shorts, as he helps you change, as you lift your legs, one by one, as his barbell-roughened hands drift along your soft thighs, clutching the slippery material in his fingers, as he inhales the scent of your body, as you stare down into his eyes with your desire filling them like unshed tears. Tears he wants to make you cry.

You’re so fucking sweet. He loves you when you’re furious, spitting and biting. And he loves you when you’re like this, trusting him with your body, your needs, pliant and docile.

All for him. Only for him.

After, you seem calm, comfortable in your own skin again. You run so fast, your hair a flag behind you, as if you’re declaring war.

He turns to the guys who were ogling you, endures their stupid fucking jokes and sleazy comments. He bides his time. Waits until practice is over, and they’re in the boy’s locker room.

He pulls an apple from his duffle, floats it in the air.

Hey.

His voice is low, serious in a way it rarely is. It echoes through the mostly empty locker room, bouncing between the metal lockers, the tiled floor. It pulls their attention, the jarring disparity between his current tone and how he normally sounds. 

Their eyes widen as they see evidence of his evol for the first time. Everyone knows he has it. But he doesn’t use it at school. He doesn’t need it to stand out. He saves its tricks, its delights, for you, and you alone.

About the bullshit you were spouting on the track. She’s not my sister. And you don’t look at her.

They glance nervously at each other, the obvious, imperious order rankling their juvenile egos.

One of them pipes up. What’s the big deal? If she’s not your sister, why do you care who looks at her?

This asshole isn’t entitled to an answer from him. Doesn’t matter. You just don’t fucking look at her. He forces calm authority into his voice. Forces himself to smile, to wear the lower part of the mask, the part that doesn’t reach his eyes.

One of the guys, the one who always says the most disgusting shit about girls, about guys he doesn’t think are masculine enough, scoffs. What’re you gonna do to us, huh? You gonna chew my ass, like you chew your dumbass apples?

The other guys exchange nervous glances, nervous chuckles.

I’m not interested in your ass, bro. He grins. It probably looks wrong, based on their reactions. I’ll just… he begins, casually. He flicks his wrist.

The apple explodes, as if crushed by hammer—the pieces of the fruit spatter the faces and chests of the guys standing around him with wet, fleshy impacts. The pieces that would have hit him fall to the ground with heavy-sounding splats.

He smiles cheerfully into the ringing silence. We good?

The fuckhead still doesn’t seem to have quite gotten the memo. He swats the apple sticking to his face, sneers. You’re so full of shit. A golden boy like you with your entire future ahead of you wouldn’t commit murder over a piece of ass.

Caleb sighs. Leans back. Shrugs. True. Killing your dumbass outright isn’t worth being sent to prison. But you know, he says thoughtfully. He spreads his legs wide on the bench. Talks like he’s just shooting the shit, waves his hand leisurely. Accidents happen, all the time. You’re throwing a baseball, and suddenly something snaps in your shoulder. It would be a shame, if you could never throw a ball again. Or say, you’re about to cross the finish line, and you step funny, you know? And you never do walk right, after that. Or you’re playing basketball, and suddenly, poof—burst aneurysm, bleeding out, right in your brain. That shit can happen to even the healthiest of athletes. Just, bad luck, man. The human body is so fragile. As fragile as the skin of an apple.

The guys stare at him in silence. A droplet of water drips from a showerhead, splashes onto the floor. Even the biggest idiot seems to be at a loss for words. 

He smiles, smiles, smiles. 

Don’t look at her ever again, and you won’t have to worry about all that. He gets to his feet, slings his duffel over his shoulder. Puts his hands in his pockets. Whistles, as he meanders out of the locker room.

Later, he’s doing the household’s laundry. He’s lifting dirty clothes out of the combined dirty clothes basket from the bathroom, and your little slippery running shorts fall out of the handful he’s trying to stuff into the washer.

He stares at them on the floor. Slowly puts the stuff in his hand in the machine, thinking.

He’s a black hole, and he’s so fucking hungry.

He squats down, lifts the shorts. They’re tiny, in his big hands. He sits quietly, listening. You’re upstairs in his room, doing homework. Gran’s at work. He’ll hear you, if you come down. You tromp through the house like an elephant. It’s adorable.

He lifts the shorts to his face, shoves his nose in them. Inhales.

He’s squatting at your feet again, in the locked bathroom at school. He’s looking up at you, your chest rising and falling with your rapid breath. He can smell you, the intensity of your excitement at the proximity of his face to where you want him the most. As he opens his mouth, as he extends his tongue to the built-in underwear of the little slip of fabric, he imagines that he’s back in that bathroom, leaning forward, bringing the flat of his tongue between your legs. He imagines that you thread your pretty hands in his hair and pull him closer, urging his tongue deeper into you. He imagines, as he fills his mouth with as much of the fabric as he can, breathing through his nose, that you come on his face, with your soft noises of pleasure echoing through the tiled bathroom.

He comes in his pants.

He hates himself, as he pulls your shorts out of his mouth. As he places them gently into the washer. He hates himself, but he can’t stop himself. He knows he’ll do this again, and again, until he can have the real thing.

That was towards the end, of everything.

Even as he was packing his bags, he didn’t see it coming. 

He made you so many promises that he, in all of his youthful hubris, believed he could keep. About how often he’d be home. About how often he could be in touch. About how close he’d still be able to stay to you, through time and distance.

He lifted you with his evol in a field of wildflowers, watched your lovely hair float around your beautiful face, and he came so close to losing control, and kissing your soft lips.

He made you so many promises, and he broke one the first day he was gone.

Because when he arrived for basic training, they took his phone away, and didn’t give it back for six weeks. Something about fostering camaraderie with his fellow cadets. Bullshit.

It got worse from there. Basic training. Specialized training. Combat missions. Flight missions. He was either out of range, or the op required radio silence. He was determined to reach the highest ranks. To be able to best provide for you. But that required confidentiality, restricted security clearances. More and more things he couldn’t talk about. More and more important holidays and events he was forced to miss.

And then one day he came home, after having been away on a longer-than-usual undercover mission, and instead of his still, quiet girl with the serious face, who only smiled for him, who crawled all over him, and treated him like her personal servant, who blew up at him, bit him, screamed, threw shit at him, and was the sweetest little thing, soft and pliant in his arms, only for him, waiting for him, he found…

You. Wearing a mask so obvious that he could see its ribbon tied through your lovely hair.

By the time he finally made it home again, he had already lost you.

You smiled at him, and it didn’t reach your eyes. You smiled at Gran. You smiled at the checkout boy at the corner store. You smiled at random fucking strangers on the street.

You smiled, smiled, smiled.

You smiled, and it looked wrong on your lovely face. Not the smile of when you’re flying, when he would make you fly.

Something artificial, and empty. Your smile was a pot, filled with a plastic flower instead of a living rose.

You talked about your friends at school. Your sudden, numerous extra-curricular activities.

You smiled at him so politely, with such empty eyes, he wanted to flip the fucking table.

You treated him like a stranger.

No matter what he did, no matter how much he poked you, teased you, tried to corner you and interrogate you about your sudden change, you slipped away, with a false, cheerful laugh.

He wanted to crush his own eardrums, instead of hear that fucking fake laugh again.

And then he had to go back to the DAA.

He had to keep leaving you, and the visits in between became fewer, and fewer, as his training intensified, as he failed psych eval after psych eval, despite his perfect marks in everything else, his perfect mask that drew people to him like flowers to the sun.

You stop responding to his calls, his texts. 

He can’t get you to respond, but he can use his newly acquired hacking skills, his new security clearances, to keep track of you even if you won’t even say hello.

When he gets back from one particularly grueling, strange mission in the Deepspace Tunnel, he reconstructs your movements of the past few weeks based on your phone’s location, your socials. He sees that your phone spent the night at an unfamiliar address. It’s not one of your new friend’s places. You’ve never done that before. You stay at your dorm. You stay at friends’. You stay at Gran’s.

He breaks so many security regulations, civil rights laws, identifying the person who lives there.

Some random guy, who is built just like Caleb. Big, tall. Handsome, dark hair.

Caleb sits on his bunk, his hand over his mouth.

He feels like he needs to vomit.

He has never vomited after the highest g-force training required by the DAA, but he needs to vomit imagining you letting someone else touch you, exposing your most vulnerable self to him, while wearing your fucking mask.

Caleb wanted your first time to be soaked in pure, overwhelming love. To be with someone who’d watch every single fleeting expression on your beautiful face, who would kill himself to make you feel cherished, to make you feel as good as physically possible. To feel safe enough to wear your real face, the whole time, safe enough to tell him what you want, so he can give you everything you deserve.

And Caleb knows that he is the only person in the universe who could give you that, in the way that you deserve. He was built to protect you. His purpose is to love you. You are his anchor, his twin star, the only thing keeping him from exploding into blinding supernova light, collapsing into his own devouring dark. He knows you best. He knows everything about you, and he would use that knowledge to make you feel like you were flying as he made love to you.

What if that fucker hurt you? What if he made you cry? 

Caleb rushes to the toilet, vomits for the first time in years. 

While Caleb was hallucinating about the past, present, future, lifetimes that haven’t happened yet, reliving strange memories of being in a lab, observed through glass, as he was adrift in deep space during his last mission that so quickly went sideways, dying from oxygen deprivation, you were having your first one-night stand.

You fucked a guy that looked just like him.

The only thing that prevents that motherfucker from suffering a terrible, unfortunate accident, is the fact that you ghost him, after. 

Caleb knows, because he tracks every fucking thing you do, after that, every time he is within range in Skyhaven.

He forces himself to check, to look at your socials, to see who’s posing in pictures with you.  He forces himself to know, when your phone starts to spend time at random peoples’ places, almost every weekend. 

Each time, a different guy. Each time, they look like Caleb.

Each time, their lives are spared because you ghost them.

He tells himself that there’s still time, a chance, to salvage things. To make up for every single grievance you have against him. To make up for every promise he didn’t mean to break.

Your fake smile tells him that he is no longer your safe space. But he can rebuild himself for you, turn himself into what you need to feel safe, protected, cared for, cherished. He did it once, when you came home for the first time.

He just has to do it again.

You’re an adult now. You’re a Hunter now. 

He comes home on a break. You politely pour him water. He smiles at you with his mask, and you smile at him with its twin on your face. He did this to you. But he will make it right.

He’s going to tell you. This visit. Before he goes back to Skyhaven. He’s going to tell you, how much he loves you, not as a brother, but as a man, and always has. How he’s finally in a place to care for you, as an adult, without the restrictions of childhood, of societal expectations. He’s going to tell Gran about how he has never felt like you were his sister.

He almost loses his shit, when he sees the scratch on your arm, when you insist on sending him to the store instead of letting him back you up while you investigate the alert on your Hunter’s watch. So desperate to show him how much you don’t need him anymore.

He breathes deeply. Says something stupid, out of frustration, about hiding your bloodied sleeve from Gran.

You say something biting to him in return, your own mask slipping a little, as your genuine frustration, your anger at him slips through. He cherishes it, feels triumph rise in him.

Yeah, he’s gonna make things right. He’s going to tell you that he loves you, and that he’s yours, and always has been. He’ll beg, if he has to, for you to say that you are his in return.

He goes into the house first.

On a bright, sunny day, filled with determined hope for the future, Caleb Xia dies in the bright, supernova flash he always knew had been waiting for him.

[mysticheathenn]

Messages From Trust

Hi, Hexlings!

This pick-a-card reading is about what is preventing you from trusting others including yourself.

This is a general reading, remember to take what resonates and leave what does not. This reading does not supplement your need to seek for professional help. Tarot should be used as entertainment and not a for sure answer to your problems but as a guide, a sense of hope, and amusement. Only a private reading can give you a more tailored answer to your questions.

Take your time when choosing your pile. Ask yourself the question and choose the picture(s) that you can’t stop looking at. Listen to your intuition.

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Pile l:

What is preventing me from trusting others including myself? Tarot: Six of Swords, Ten of Swords, Seven of Wands, The Hermit, Everything is Fine, Nine of Swords

Abandonment issues. Something happened in your life to where you believe that everyone who enters your life is doomed to leave and for most of you, you tend to drive people away first before they even have the chance to leave while at the same time be sadden by your loneliness because you feel no one wants to be around you or even stay. When people do leave you overthink and go down a spiral thinking about the many things wrong with you when really there is nothing wrong with you at all, sometimes people leave and that's okay but it doesn't mean that something was wrong with you. It's actually the complete opposite. Others of you have been hurt so badly that you don't allow anyone in, you are probably that friend where it takes 3+ years just to know anything other than basic knowledge about you and even then sometimes your friends will try to get you to open up more even though you prefer to be the friend who is always there for others versus the other way around because again of this abandonment issue or because you feel no one really cares when really that's the farthest thing from the truth. You will never know love if you keep pushing people away from you because you fear of them walking away and even if someone does walk away it's not the end of the world. It may feel that way sometimes but everything as your card states is fine.

How to begin trusting others again? Tarot: Same Cards

Letting your guard down and accepting the outcome of what life brings. Accepting that people come and go and it has nothing to do with you. Accepting that you are amazing and those who choose to leave are missing out on the love and beautiful energy that you provide. Letting people in so they can show you that they do care and want to be there for you and are not there to pity you but because they want to see you succeed, thrive and most importantly they want to know you...the real you and not the sheltered mask version of yourself that you give others. Trust people not to hurt you, and read the signs so you know when to call a spade, a spade. If someone is not putting in the same amount or not even close enough effort to make you feel seen or loved it is okay to let them go but if someone is putting in the effort to get to know you and shows up in a way that you feel loved, please embrace it and don't shut down to push them away. You deserve to experience this kind of love and support in your life.

What good can come from trusting again? Oracle Cards: Truth, Confidence, Transformation, Love

For some of you, your abandonment issues stem from previous lovers while for others it's just friends or possibly both. Learning and deciding to trust again will open so many doors for you when it comes to love as well as who you are as a person. Some of you will rediscover who you are as a person because you have such a high wall up to the point you sometimes feel as if you don't know yourself. This will change once you begin trusting people again and doing the work to release this abandonment issue. Your confidence will also skyrocket along with seeing that the world indeed does not end when someone leaves as well as seeing that there is nothing wrong with you.

Pile ll:

What is preventing me from trusting others including myself? Tarot: Eight of Swords, Seven of Swords, Two of Swords, Eight of Cups, Knight of Cups

Self Sabotage. In the past or maybe even currently you tend to not want to see red flags in others to the point relationships or even friendships tend to drag on far too long until you get to the point of being tired and finally moving on. You tend to attract and go towards people who are not good for you whether they are just overall toxic, manipulative, narcissistic, or what have you. The people you tend to keep around you are never good and just a few of you if this is mostly romantic you tend to keep going back for them hoping that when you return to them that things will change when nothing has changed. A lot of the people who tend to be in your life loves to hand you an empty cup but the thing about that empty cup is because you have dealt with their lack of loving you properly the fact that they even brought something makes you giddy because it's the thought that counts. Unfortunately, all of these issues has led you to have trust issues. You don't trust yourself enough to see the good or the bad in people to the point anytime someone shows even one flaw or an ounce of drama you leave because you have been down this road before and never want to go back. You are done with the empty cups and lack of reciprocal energy from others, now anyone who breathes wrong you send them to the left packing even if they are a good person and loves you properly, you can't risk them proving you wrong.

How to begin trusting others again? Tarot: Same Cards

Learning to trust your intuition. Learn to have discernment that when something doesn't feel good, right, or doesn't make you feel loved it's time to move on. Know it's okay to extend grace when the issues that are happening are a human error and not a character flaw. Anything that is a character flaw (narcissism, manipulating, lack of concern for you, etc) should not be tolerated whereas human flaws like (things that most of everyone does from time to time and they own up to it) are okay because at the end of the day we are all human and sometimes make a mistake. Being cruel, mean, etc is not a mistake and is very much intentional and this is behavior to move away from.

What good can come from trusting again? Oracle Cards: Grieving, Forgiveness, Clarity, Compassion

Because of your past or even current reality for some of you, you have lacked compassion for yourself and possibly even fallen into a deep depression when you think about the times you let someone treat you horribly or even less than what you have deserved. Once you begin to heal this, you will begin to show yourself more compassion as you now know what to accept and what not to. You will also know that what you didn't know before you now know to do better and continue to do better while showing the old you compassion, for what you lacked. You will also forgive others if not yourself again for the treatment that they have given you and forgiveness towards yourself. Clarity will also be a gift as you will no longer see every red flag through rose-colored glasses but exactly as they are keeping you safe and way from those who want to do harm or be toxic.

Pile lll:

What is preventing me from trusting others including myself? Tarot: The Fool, Three of Swords, Four of Swords, The Star, Ten of Swords.

Romantic Relationships. There are two songs that come to mind with you, pile lll and that's Bleeding Love by Leona Lewis and Fool for You by Cee-lo Green. You are a fool for love pile lll to the point you keep getting hurt over and over again and many of you lose sleep because of past partners always wondering who they are with, if they are coming home, if they are talking to other people. I can see you always by your phone hoping that they will call or text and when they don't you are disappointed because, in the back of your head, you have/had a feeling they are texting someone else, someone you believe might be "better" than you and a lot of you tolerate this for so long until you can't any longer. A few of you may have also been drawn to pile ll, if so there maybe something there for you as well even if it's just a sentence. Either way, Love has caused you to lose your trust in others and yourself because you are most likely a hopeless romantic. You are a lover of love and refuse to see or believe in anything other than just that. But I do feel that some of you are coming to your end of being a ride or die, a lover of love, and so forth because you are either tired of experiencing the pain or seeing on social media showcasing the many people out there treating their partners like crap and it's causing you anxiety that you will never find "the one" and you are doomed to be single forever.

How to begin trusting others again? Tarot: Same Cards

This isn't so much of how to begin trusting others again because with the fools card, you are always up for love again you are a lover of love but you are just coming to your end of being this type of person or even being the type where you feel a ride or die is admirable (depending how you view it, it's not). This is more so of a friend-to-friend chat, for those who find it admirable in being a ride-or-die when it comes to partners who aren't shit. That isn't a ride or die....you're just constantly dying because you are wasting so much of your life force worrying they are cheating, etc. Please know it is more admirable to leave than it is to look like a clown because you stuck with someone through "hard times." cheating is not hard times. Going through financial struggles is considered a hard time (only if you both are putting gin the work. If ou are doing the only leg work again this is not hard times or ride or die material). For those who want to give up on love keep pushing and stop listening or looking at social media. I know trust I kept getting weaponized incompetence videos of partners and etc but once I reset my algorithm and kept pressing not interested on videos and only looking at partners being loved and seen I began to have faith that there is real love out there and maybe it will happen for me too. Keep hanging on, you will find the person who will give you 100% and more to you. Have patience.

What good can come from trusting again? Oracle Cards: No Cards

This is more of an intuitive message but you will get everything and more that you want. If you want the house with the picket fence, dog, and kids, and loving husband you have it. Whatever it is that you want out of your love life it is yours for the taking you just need to be smarter about how you go about loving people. Be smarter in how you pour your energy into others as well. Again cheating and receiving poor treatment is not cute sticking around just to say "you held down your partner" because again that is not holding them down. Find the love that makes you feel seen, feel at ease, and worry-free, and pours just as much into you as you do them.

Pile lV:

What is preventing me from trusting others including myself? Tarot: Six of Cups, Nine of Pentacles, Six of Wands, Eight of Swords.

Childhood Wounds. Something happened in your childhood to where you didn't feel safe enough to be great, express yourself, or even feel as if you could make something of yourself financially. For some of you, you may have had that parent who told you they wanted to hold onto your money for you but then turn around and spend it. Whatever it is that caused you to lose trust during childhood it's deeply affecting your adulthood as if one wrong move and the worse is about to happen. You know how Chidi from The Good Place TV series (amazing show) would become so indecisive about a decision to the point it caused his death because it would debilitate him...I'm sensing that from this pile. I wish I knew what it was from childhood that caused you to feel as if you can't move on with your life and live it freely, abundantly, and so forth but again this is a general reading and also the energy feels like a shut door as if not even you like to open it. You may also suffer from remembering some of your childhood because it was so traumatizing. While you remember some of the bad times, other times that caused you to feel some type of way won't unlock itself except once in a blue moon.

How to begin trusting others again? Tarot: Same Cards

Facing your trauma head-on. If this isn't an option or you know that it wouldn't do any good remember that you are an adult and for those of you who aren't remember that you are your own person and you don't need any approval outside of yourself. Believe in the things that you set your mind to. If you believe you will and can be a billionaire don't tell those who do nothing but put you down...keep it to yourself and harvest that feeling so it can grow. Believe that you are capable of doing and being anything that you set your mind to. For some of you, this is more than a mental thing but more so having parents who think how you dress, look, act, etc is a phase, "of the devil", or whatnot. If you are an adult...please cut the cord and live for yourself. If you still live at home and are not an adult....this maybe a bit tricky as not everyone has the privilege to do as you please. Just remember who you are as a person and know that nothing is wrong with you. There is so much I can go on about but again that would be long and this is too much of a general reading for that.

What good can come from trusting again? Oracle Cards: Freedom, Peace, Lighten Your Load, & Beauty.

As mentioned some of you could have childhood wounds or could be currently going through it if you are still a child (under 18) where your family criticizes you for your style, weight, etc once you release your need for approval or even stop listening to the naysayers you will come into your own and fully embrace yourself relieving this load that you no longer have to listen or can tune out those who constantly put you down because of their own issues and problems with themselves Lastly of course freedom is something you will experience. You will have so much freedom you won't know what to do of once you release this wound or leave your childhood house.

Thank you to everyone who supports not only my Patreon but also my Etsy and Tumblr page. Much love and blessings to you all.

Stay Safe and Be Blessed :)

[pompompurin1028]

The Painter and the Sitter

Summary: Dazai once again agreed to be a sitter for a new painting of yours

Pairing: Dazai x Painter! Reader

Genre: Scenario, Hurt/Comfort-ish

Warnings: None

A/N: Inspired by an idea I had suddenly one night earlier this month. In between me getting this idea and me writing it, I had been reading some Virginia Woolf so I was kind of inspired. Also a reference to Dorian Gray is in this fic too because why not. This is entirely self-indulgent, wrote this on a whim because I felt like it, didn't really read it over to see if there are any errors :D

My Masterlist

Although sitting and posing for hours was a bit of a bore, Dazai never said no to your requests to paint him. He knows you enjoy having him as your sitter, whether you would admit it out loud or not for you had painted him more times than you can count.

He interested you, he can tell that much at least. Every time you paint his portrait, you seem to be trying to capture something… Something intangible perhaps, maybe even abstract. But Dazai knew it was not quite so simple. To someone more oblivious, it may seem as if you are trying to capture a certain idea, a theme to go with his portrait. But Dazai knew better. He knew you were trying to figure him out, to capture him on paper, to paint a portrait of him as closely as you could muster.

This knowledge should scare him, knowing that someone is trying to dig deep into his depths, his secrets, and potentially see the darkness that lies beneath his smiling mask. But at the same time, part of him enjoyed it.

It was perhaps not quite the idea of being known that enchanted him. No… if he had been focusing on that aspect, he was much more fearful about being with you. No, he was much more intrigued by your portrayal of him, he wanted to see the colours you chose, the style you selected and listen to you as you explained your thought process behind the artwork. Though you would never admit you were trying to study him, he knew, and perhaps you knew that he knew as well. And yet, you still attempted to continue your search and so, Dazai allowed it.

Your study of him did not come without a price of course. It is said that it is not the sitter who is revealed by the painter; it is rather the painter who, on the coloured canvas, reveals himself. So, to Dazai at least, the exchange is mutual--he allows you to attempt to dig into his depths, spending hours with you weekly, conversing with you, while you do the same, and reveal your thoughts on the world, your ideologies, your attitudes on life on the canvas you paint.

But Dazai knew it likely wasn't a fair exchange on your part and maybe one day, in the near future you will notice it too as you continue your search. He knew you were trying to paint a portrait of who he is… inside. But he knew the true answer. What you will eventually find, beneath all the layers you slowly draw apart is but an absence, a hollowness that most of the time Dazai feels can never be filled.

This was much unfair to your sincere self whose paintings were a site of vulnerability. He knows it well; you never did display your work publically, in fact Dazai hardly really knew what happened to the paintings after you finished painting them. But, despite whatever it meant to you, you still showed them to him, explained your thought processes to him, perhaps as a sign of gratitude for being your sitter, or maybe for something more. All he knew was, there was no suitable name for your relationship. Artist and muse perhaps? But no, he knew you saw him much more beyond a mere means for inspiration. Friends then? No, that was much too intimate and besides, Dazai did not simply call a person a friend easily. And to be lovers is beyond the question. But one thing was certain, there was a level of intimacy and vulnerability between the two of you, one with has yet no name. Maybe it is better to leave it nameless. This bond will not last long, at least that's what Dazai had thought. But he was much too selfish to let go of what little connection you have built. Though he knows he is only torturing himself since he knows you'll leave him eventually, once you've found the answers you're looking for, once you have found the true nature of the man you were so allured by.

As Dazai's focus was reined back to being the sitter for your portrait when you called his name. The newest portrait was finished, and as per usual, you chatted with excitement and great passion.

“This time I used a much different colour pallet than I usually do. You always request to be painted with dark colours but I thought some oranges and yellows suited you. I think it suits you much more-” You spoke eagerly, seeming very proud of your newest creation. Dazai doesn't think he's seen you this excited over one of your pieces so early on after finishing it and he couldn't stop the smile from creeping up to his face at the sight.

“Hmm, maybe you're right. I do look quite handsome in this colour pallet.” He replied smugly, staring at the painting. But if he were to be honest, he wasn't quite sure what to think of your artistic decision on this portrait. He wasn't sure how to feel seeing himself painted in such a light. It felt… unfamiliar, defamiliarizing even.

As he stares at the painting, Dazai wonders if he had misunderstood your intentions for painting him all along. Though he prides himself with being able to read others like a book, and to be able to assume what moves them most of the time, he is much like other humans--he can never access the interiority of other human beings, at best, he can infer and deduct. And the thought that he might have been mistaken for so long alarmed him.

But he took a deep breath. He knows you didn't have bad intentions, you never once showed any signs of malice. And he knew, despite everything, at least to some degree, he could trust you. But he didn't expect you of all people to throw him off guard. But with only the exteriority of people available to oneself to judge and guess, how much can we truly learn about other people? Perhaps such limitations are the manner of our seeing, and such are the conditions of our love.

Although walls and barriers still separated the two of you, for you had yet to fully understand him, and him you, Dazai felt your relationship had become if not a little bit more intimate. Perhaps within every conversation you two had, there were parts where you talked past each other, but you were still trying… trying to communicate, trying to connect. And maybe, for now, all of this is enough.

[lunarclawz]

— Sylus and Cats.

I wanted to explain a bit more about how cats and the nickname "kitten" are actually very important and related to his backstory.

First off, spoiler warning in case you haven't played his myth, and to also warn that a part of this will be a theory and speculation based on his myth, other cards and information we have gathered.

For starters, the first mention of cats In his myth, this was said by MC, but as we saw, he can almost know what she's thinking— it could also simply be a coincidence.

Just as how he does in the current timeline, she's is compared to an aggressive cat. She reminds him of one.

Second mention, it's obviously not stated if he saw her as a cat at that very moment, but perhaps this can sort of confirm it.

Here it is implied he brought the cat himself, this happened not long after he was released, this is my thoughts only but, maybe before he was locked on the Abyss, he might had past interactions with cats hence why he brought one to her or/and because he sees a resemblance between the two. Signalling that he can feel emotions— such as empathy.

Now we start to get a little bit more symbolic, we know that the Legion of Justitia it's made solely by orphans, they are locked away and trained to become dreamless, mindless creatures living only for the purpose of war, they cannot have any other beliefs than the ones given by the Sanctuary. If they do, it could lead to execution.

Sylus happens to mention that her soul is dull, she has no desires, or at least she suppresses them, no dreams or ambitions to follow, all because she was locked in a cage. She's imprisoned not only by the Oracle but by herself.

As she struggles to find a way out of his lair, he observes, watches her attempt with no success.

This cat very well represents MC past self, before meeting her dragon, waiting for him just as she did before her sentence. Talking to an obsidian figurine— one that ignited a fire inside of her to desire.

Almost as if it was fate, the burning figurine allowed her to break free, to meet the world beyond of those walls, something that cat was desperate for.

She hid herself, her dream of curiosity, her right to wonder. She mentions being held by threads, keeping her captive, a prisoner with a mind that cannot be suppressed.

But when she meets him, she meets the other side of the coin, the pinnacle of greed. Yet she sees it as something pure, only the twisted minds are the ones that manage to corrupt the beautiful concept of desire. The wish of something more than just monotony, the wish to see, know—explore the world that lays at her hand.

He opens her world, he frees the cat out of the cage and shows her how life is supposed to be.

She's no longer who she was, she's not a house cat, she's now a mountain cat, a cat that can roam freely. One that can wish for, and of course he will grant it. He gives her the stability she needs to explore the world for herself, he will set her free but he will always wait with a warm bed for her to return. Guarding her by the distance as she does what she pleases.

Maybe it's because he felt the same, forced to be locked away, a barrier standing within his human shape and dragon form, something he never wished for, isolating himself out of fright.

Yet he met her, consoling the fractured heart in his core, they always needed each other, to see beyond their limitations, to be set free.

He's constantly reminding her of how now she resembles a dragon, care free and beautiful. Breaking that fear.

The cat resembles her if she never met the dragon, it grew complacent. A enslaved cat, a house cat, a cat without its desire to roam. Never attempting to question the cage that locked it— perhaps didn't even see it anymore.

Current Timeline.

In some cards, we see mentioned that he takes care of stray cats, cats that roam freely and come back for his aid. Perhaps he likes this, he can't trap someone, he can't suppress their dreams, they must leave and discover by their own hand.

"Kitten" is an omen of the day he set her free.

[blitzwhore]

Don't mind me, I'm just... Thinking about season 3 being about found family. About making an active choice to love someone, and allow yourself to be loved by them in return.

For Blitz, it means fighting like hell for the family he's created (Loona, Stolas, M&M), but also being harassed by his father and having to face him and cut him out for good, and continuing to fight for Barbie's forgiveness. Hoping one day he'll have her back.

For M&M, it's making a choice about bringing a new member into their family, whether that's what they both want and need right now, both still facing the demons of their past because of the circumstances of their upbringing.

For Loona, it's having to face her biological family and the horrible place she was left to grow up in, and fully embracing that Blitz is her family, and not whoever brought her into this world to begin with.

And for Via and Stolas, it's realising that even though Stolas had no choice in her conception, from the day she hatched he chose over and over again to be her father, every single day; realising that that matters, too, and now they have a chance to choose each other (and Blitz and Loona) again, in a way they never could before.

Just... family, whether blood-related or not, being found, created, forged—an active choice you make over and over again.

Just the idea of choosing a person, or multiple people, every single step of the way, with every choice you make. Choosing to show up, to make amends, to rebuild burned bridges and make them stronger than they ever were before. And embracing the fact that you don't have to face life alone, that you can surround yourself with people who choose you as their family.

And just. Just choosing to love and be loved in return.

*implodes*

[dwobbitfromtheshire]

They had won, Eddie had lived, and Max didn't succumb to Vecna's wrath. Thanks to Robin, Steve, and Nancy, Henry Creel had perished in the Upside Down. Convincing the town of Eddie's innocence was a lot harder than clearing him of all charges, so the Munsons had stayed in Indianapolis until their new house was ready and until things settled down in Hawkins. A couple of months passed, and the Munsons were ready to move in. Dustin was allowed to help as long as Claudia went with him. Claudia had been a bit overprotective since Jason's goons had threatened Dustin. He didn't mind. It was the perfect opportunity for his mother to finally meet Wayne and Eddie. Dustin burst through the front door of their new house.

"Dusty! You should have knocked! You never knock!" Claudia scolded.

Eddie popped up from behind a box with a manic grin.

"Henderson!" Eddie exclaimed and tried to jump over a box, but he tripped, falling on his face. "Goddamnit!"

Dustin laughed and helped Eddie up off the floor before pulling him into a hug.

"I'm so sorry about my son," Claudia said to Wayne, who came out of the kitchen.

"I'm used to it. Eddie doesn't know how to knock either," Wayne said.

"Dude, your house is amazing," Dustin said.

"Way better than the trailer," Eddie said. "Wayne has his own room!"

"I brought muffins," Claudia said, holding out the basket. "It was between this or the houseplant, but I figured growing the houseplant would have taken longer, and it wouldn't have tasted as good."

"I suppose it wouldn't have," Wayne said in amusement. "Kitchen's this way."

Claudia followed Wayne into the kitchen. It was an open concept so you could see the kitchen from the living room. Claudia looked around the room, smiling as she tried not to stare at Wayne Munson and his pretty blue eyes. He was trying not to look at her either.

"It's a nice kitchen," Claudia said.

"Thank you, and thank you for the muffins. We really appreciate you coming to help us unload, Mrs. Henderson," Wayne said.

"Please, call me Claudia," she said, blushing.

"And you can - you can call me, uh - shit. Wayne, you can call me Wayne. Oh, I tend to lose my marbles around a pretty woman," Wayne blushed.

Claudia's face turned red as she giggled and touched his arm.

"Uh. . .what's happening? Is your uncle flirting with my mother?" Dustin asked, hitting Eddie's arm. "Eddie, your uncle is hitting on my mother."

"Yes, Henderson, I have eyes and ears," Eddie rolled his eyes.

"Eddie, do you know what this means?" Dustin asked.

"That I'm not blind and deaf," Eddie said.

"No, it means that if this works out," Dustin whispered. "We'll be family. . .officially!"

"Holy shit," Eddie whispered with wide eyes.

"Oh," Claudia said flustered as she continued to touch Wayne's arm. "Do you work out?"

"Oh, come on, mom, you can do better than that," Dustin muttered.

"Well, no, not really," Wayne said.

"Well, your arm feels very strong," Claudia giggled.

"Oh, well, thank you," Wayne said blushing.

"Ha," Eddie laughed quietly. "He's falling for it."

"You know, I don't know much about baking, but these are definitely the best muffins in the world," Wayne said as he ate one.

"I'm glad you like my muffin," Claudia said.

Eddie and Dustin gagged as Wayne nearly choked on said muffin.

"Your mother definitely knew what she was doing when she said that," Eddie said.

"She did not," Dustin hissed.

Claudia patted Wayne's back and got him some milk to wash it down.

"You boys want a muffin?" Claudia asked.

"Okay, so maybe she didn't," Eddie frowned and laughed at his uncle's red face. "Wayne's mind definitely went there. . .No, thank you, Mrs. H!"

"I'm never eating a muffin again," Dustin said.

"Those muffins definitely belong to Wayne now," Eddie whispered to Dustin and then cackled.

"So, are we getting to work, or are we building a fort out of these boxes?" Dustin asked, and Eddie grinned.

"You know, Wayne, if you did want to learn how to bake, I would be glad to show you how," Claudia said.

"Well, that sounds great. . .I'd return the favor if you don't know anything about gardening," Wayne said.

"I know absolutely nothing," Claudia smiled.

While Wayne and Claudia were busy flirting with each other, Eddie and Dustin got busy goofing off. Eventually, though, the Hendersons remembered the reason they were there and got to work. Over the next few weeks, the Hendersons continued to help the Munsons settle in, with Claudia and Wayne calling each other every chance they got.

"They're on the phone again!" Dustin whispered into his walkie.

"Yeah, I know this, Henderson. Did you forget I live with the man?" Eddie asked.

"They're making progress!" Dustin grinned.

"Not enough. Why doesn't he just ask her out already?" Eddie complained.

"I could ask you the same thing about a certain someone," Dustin said.

"I wish I never told you!" Eddie hissed. "Say nothing. . .they could be listening."

"I wasn't going to say anything," Dustin rolled his eyes.

"And you know why I'm so nervous," Eddie sighed. "This is a lot more complicated."

"I wish it wasn't," Dustin frowned.

"Yeah," Eddie sighed and then changed his tone. "I got that new comic book!"

"No!" Dustin exclaimed gleefully.

"I'll come over. . .or rather we'll both come over to show you the comic book. I think my uncle's been looking for an excuse to see your mother," Eddie said.

The radio crackled, and Steve's voice came through.

"Hold on. . .why didn't you tell me that Claudia and Wayne are interested in each other?" Steve asked.

"Because, Steven, you don't have to know everything," Eddie said affectionately.

"Have you been listening, Steve?" Dustin asked.

"There's nothing on television," Steve said. "I'm bored, and I'm home alone."

There was another crackle on the other end of the walkie, and what sounded like a crash.

"Eddie?" Dustin asked, but he got no response. "Yeah. I think he really had to piss."

"So, tell me about this girl that Eddie likes," Steve said bitterly.

"Oh! Would you look at that?! My mom's calling me! Gotta go!" Dustin yelled. "Over!"

A week later, Eddie and Dustin were spying from behind a wall into Dustin's kitchen. Claudia was giggling as she was showing Wayne how to bake. Well, it was more like they were trying to see who could put more flour on each other's faces.

"They're so fucking adorable," Eddie whispered.

"I'm going to get my Polaroid," Dustin said.

Dustin quickly hurried to his room, grabbed the camera, and rushed back to Eddie, who was now holding Tews in his arms. He took a picture of Claudia putting flour on Wayne's nose. The sound of the camera startled Tews, and Eddie shrieked as the cat flipped out in his arms. He scratched Eddie and jumped down before running into the living room.

"Boys, what's going on in there?" Wayne asked.

"Nothing!" They yelled.

Dustin grabbed the photo and scrambled with Eddie to sit down on the couch. They held the comic book open upside down just as Wayne and Claudia entered the living room. Dustin and Eddie smiled innocently at them.

"Eddie, your cheek is bleeding, son," Wayne said.

"It does that," Eddie said, shrugging.

"Right," Wayne said and raised an eyebrow at the comic book.

"You better not be doing any experiments, Dusty," Claudia said. "Not tonight."

"I would never interrupt your evening with Wayne, mom," Dustin grinned.

"I swear, Uncle Wayne, we're being good," Eddie said.

It wasn't until a whole month later, right when Eddie and Dustin had started talking about pulling a parent trap, that their parents announced they were going on a date. Wayne insisted on dropping Eddie off at the Hendersons when he went to pick up Claudia for their date.

"We both still feel a little iffy about leaving you alone," Wayne sighed. "Not that we don't trust you or anything. . .well, you know how it is."

"Can you blame us?" Claudia asked as they stood in the living room, looking at the boys.

"Not at all, Mrs. H," Eddie said and kissed her cheek. "Have fun, you two, and be safe. By safe, I mean - ,"

"Eddie," Wayne gently scolded.

"What? You know how to bake now. . .you might end up putting a bun in that oven," Eddie grinned.

"Hush, you," Claudia giggled and slapped his chest. "Your uncle and I talked about it. . .we'd decided we would be more comfortable if you boys had a sitter."

"You just said you trusted us!" Dustin exclaimed.

"I am a big boy, Uncle Wayne!" Eddie shrieked. "I do not need a sitter! Him, on the other hand!"

"Hey!"

"You'll thank us later," Wayne said in amusement.

"I will not!" Eddie yelled.

They walked out the door, and Eddie slammed the door behind them with a pout. Eddie leaned against the door and crossed his arms. He smiled softly, shaking his head.

"What?" Dustin asked.

"It's nice having two parents and a little brother," Eddie said. "If they make us get bunk beds, I call top."

"Settle down, it's only their first date and by the time - Oh, shit, the babysitter is here!" Dustin yelled, his face pressed to the window.

Eddie shoved Dustin aside with his elbow and ignored Dustin's cry of protest.

"Those motherfuckers really - ,"

"It's Steve!" Dustin exclaimed.

"Okay. . .I changed my mind, I definitely need a babysitter, and I want that one. That one right there," Eddie said, his face pressed to the glass as well as his finger.

"Please, Eddie, act a little more desperate," Dustin said sarcastically.

"I take it back. I hate having a little brother," Eddie said.

They watched as Steve talked with Wayne and Claudia just as they were about to leave. The three of them were laughing about something Wayne and Claudia had said.

"What did they say?!" Dustin asked.

Steve hugged Claudia and shook Wayne's hand. Wayne opened the car door for Claudia and got into the truck. Steve waved them off and turned to face the house. He looked in their direction in confusion and then waved his hand at them.

"Can he see us?!" Eddie yelped.

"Yes, Eddie, because it's a window, not a two-way mirror," Dustin said. "Wow, I know love can make you stupid sometimes, but I didn't think it would make you this stupid."

"Ha! Ha! HA! You're so funny, butthead," Eddie said. "NOT!"

Eddie jumped away from the window as though he had been burned. He started fixing his hair and smelling his breath.

"Oh my god, this is hilarious," Dustin grinned.

"How's my hair?" Eddie asked.

"Awful," Dustin giggled and Eddie flipped him off.

"I should have picked a better outfit - wait, I don't care what I'm wearing. . .unless. . .does Steve care what I'm wearing?" Eddie asked himself.

The sounds of footsteps come closer to the door. Eddie squeaked and ran off towards the bathroom.

"Why are you being so weird?!" Dustin asked as he followed him and spoke through the door. "You've been around Steve before. . .unless, are you planning on telling him?!"

"Yes!" Eddie yelled. "Shut up, let me think! I didn't plan on it being tonight!"

They heard the front door opening and closing.

"Hello?!" Steve called out. "Aw, hey, Tews, at least somebody wanted to come see me."

Suddenly, the door burst open, and Eddie came stumbling out. He gently pushed past Dustin and fell into the living room. Eddie got up and straightened his clothes.

"Hey, Steve," Eddie said casually.

"Hey, Eddie," Steve said smiling, his hazel eyes twinkling in amusement. "What were you guys up to?"

"Uh, I was showing him something," Dustin said quickly.

"In the bathroom?" Steve asked.

"Uh. . .I had a rash. . .on my butt!" Dustin yelled out quickly.

"And why didn't you show it to your mother before she left?" Steve asked.

"I'm an expert on rashes!" Eddie yelled out without thinking about it.

"Isn't Claudia a nurse?" He asked.

"You know what, Steve?" Dustin asked, his hands on his hips. "That is an excellent point. . .something that I did not think about."

"Okay, your mother and uncle told me not to let you guys have sugar, did you already have some?" Steve asked.

"Hey, how about we watch a movie?" Dustin suggested.

"Yeah, okay," Steve said, shrugging.

Dustin put in a videotape and scurried off to make popcorn, turning the lights off on the way out. He came back in a few minutes later with sodas for them and a bowl of popcorn. He hurried back into the kitchen to get his own snack, telling them to start without him. He had seen it before. Eddie and Steve sat on the couch with Tews still on Steve’s lap.

"So, they really didn't ask you to babysit us, did they?" Eddie asked.

"What?! No. . .is that what they said?" Steve asked and Eddie nodded. "That's hilarious."

"I was nervous. . .earlier," Eddie said. "I've been trying to figure how to tell my crush that I like them but I didn't know how."

"Oh. . .well, they'd be crazy not to like you," Steve said.

"Hm. . .tell that to the rest of Hawkins who still think I'm a murderer," Eddie said.

"Oh, I constantly tell them that they're crazy," Steve said seriously.

Eddie blushed and turned back to the movie. They fell into a comfortable silence. Eddie yawned and stretched his arms behind Steve’s head. He placed his arm cautiously around Steve’s shoulders. Steve looked at Eddie, his eyes widened in realization. Steve pointed to himself with a questioning look.

"Yeah, big boy, I was talking about you," Eddie smirked.

Steve blushed. He snuggled into Eddie's hold, scooting down to rest his head on his shoulder. Eddie rested his cheek against the top of Steve’s head, and they watched the rest of the movie wrapped up in each other's arms. When they finished the movie, they realized something was missing.

"Dustin never came back from the kitchen," Steve said.

"Yeah, you're right," Eddie frowned.

They walked into the kitchen and found Dustin fast asleep at the table. His hat was crooked, his mouth open as he drooled on his hand. The popcorn bowl was empty, and there was a magazine open in front of him. Eddie and Steve smiled at each other softly.

"He's such a butthead," Steve said affectionately.

"You gotta love him, though," Eddie said, flashing his dimples.

"We should put him to bed," Steve said.

Steve and Eddie tried everything to wake that boy up, but he was out like a light. They got him partially awake, though. It was enough to pull him out of the chair and push him towards his room. Steve cleaned his mouth and hands first before pushing him into the bed. Eddie took off his hat shoes so Steve could tuck him into bed. Tews meowed and hopped onto the bed, snuggling up next to Dustin. Eddie stood with his hands on his hips, exhaling loudly.

"Let's give it five or ten years before you try getting me pregnant, honey," Eddie said and patted Steve’s shoulder. "I'm already exhausted."

"Eddie, we can't - ,"

"You have your fantasy, and I have mine," Eddie said. "And I can say that now. . .so let's just imagine this: the baby was put down, and now Daddies can have their free time to make out on the couch."

"Hm, I like that," Steve grinned.

Eddie guided him into the living room and pushed him onto the couch. He crawled on top of Steve, his nose brushing up against Steve’s nose. Steve pulled back a little bit, blushing.

"What?" Eddie asked.

"I was super jealous as hell by the way when I thought you had a crush on someone else," Steve replied.

"I know, that's why I decided to tell you. You were super obvious, even to me, babe," Eddie cackled.

"Asshole," Steve laughed.

Eddie crashed his lips to Steve's. He wrapped his arms around Eddie, pulling him completely on top of him as he eagerly returned the kiss. They hadn't been kissing for very long when they heard the sound of a truck pulling up. Steve and Eddie broke apart quickly. There were doors opening, and then they heard the sound of Claudia Henderson's loud laughter. Steve and Eddie grinned before going to the window. Claudia was pushing Wayne up against the truck, and then she was kissing him.

"Looks like they had the same idea," Eddie grinned.

"It's sweet. I'm glad they found each other," Steve said.

Eddie looked at Steve, his heart beating rapidly at the sight of him.

"Yeah. . .we all do," Eddie said.

They sat back quickly down on the couch as Claudia and Wayne started walking up to the door. Just as they were about to come in, Eddie realized that Claudia and Wayne had definitely worked together to set them up. Eddie let out a bark of laughter. They fucking won.

[heartburriedinvenice]

the end is undeniably near (and i keep running towards it) - steve h.

(steve harrington x hopper!reader)

a part of my phoebe challenge 🎞🪐💌🕯

based on the song "i know the end" by phoebe bridgers

in which you always wanted to escape hawkins, indiana, until you didn't anymore.

or

in which the billboard said "the end is near"

content warning post season 3 (SO SPOILERS), mild cursing (maybe), ANGST like the whole time, unhealthy coping, and hawkins being hawkins, reader is an implied theater kid (im sorry not sorry)

a / n i disappeared on y’all, I’m sorry!! you know life is getting weird when i randomly return to tumblr.  just dipping my toes back in the water of all this so i apologize if i am a little rusty. this is just a piece of a hopper!reader show rewrite that has been in the works for a while so if anyone likes it enough, lmk, I’d be be happy to start posting the whole thing,starting from season 1! any feedback would be awesome (and also requests cause I need inspo back). okay enjoy some angst!

No one ever got out of Hawkins, Indiana. Like the town was somehow enclosed within some heavy-duty bubble, only a few people ever got the nerves to squeeze through. Until you did, until you did the one thing you believed was impossible. You packed your bags, loaded up your car, and left hell. And you did it without a goodbye because the only way to do the impossible was without one. And deep down you knew you were a coward, even after fighting monsters and otherworldly creatures, you were a coward. You could not face what was left behind or allow yourself to acknowledge it.

And it ate away at you in a way you could have never imagined. Too busy pretending like it never crossed your mind, like Hawkins never existed in the first place. Still, it chipped at you piece by piece until the guilt of escaping Hawkins, Indiana finally caught up with you. Until one day that guilt would sneak up and trip you, sending you tumbling all the way back down a hill to only land right back at the gates of Hawkins, at its green sign, Welcome to Hawkins! That warm welcome, the warmest welcome, with its murders and second dimensions and its people. Those people. Those people who worked their way so deep into your heart before you could even realize it. So deep that leaving felt like removing deeply grown roots from a garden, so impossible, so hard to tell where they even stopped growing.  You weren’t sure entirely when they grew so deep, you don’t really remember at all how they got there. When you let them? Why did you let them? After everything, you should have known better. You shouldn’t have let them.

You were fifteen when you knew you could never live in Hawkins, Indiana your whole life. It never felt real, artificial, fake. Mass-produced nuclear families and white picket fence houses and stale dead-end jobs. 

And then Steve Harrington needed an extra art credit and found his way as the lead in Hawkins High’s production of Romeo and Juliet. When rehearsing turned into giving Steve girl advice and driving with him to drop off flowers. When running lines became swinging a bat of nails and finding an alien in a fridge. When the day before the play performance had turned into icing Steve's bruises on your couch as you ran lines back and forth because neither of you could sleep. When a whole group of middle schoolers sat in the front row and your dad sat center with a bouquet of flowers. They were your family. Your strange and messy family all pretending to be interested in the gibberish mess of Shakespeare on stage. Them watching with stifled laughs as Steve stumbled through lines, as the balcony scene turned into him and you having a staring contest trying to figure out whose lines were next. And though your director would have your heads later, the two of you sat giggling during intermission and had to hold the laughter again when your director asked why you didn’t have time to be memorized to perfection. Because you had all the time in the world, didn’t you?. 

Unbelievable as it was, you began to question what you at fifteen had promised you would do. Because you had found more than stale every day Hawkins. You had found their odd-balls who taught you to play Dungeons and Dragons in their basement, who reminded you so much of your sister. And you had found Steve Harrington, a pretty boy with a heart of gold, who risked his life for his Juliet that night at the mall. Who held you tight when it all got too much.

When you moved back to Hawkins, Indiana, after Sara, after your parents split, you were sure life would never be the same again. You needed a fresh start, to completely reconfigure your life and pretend none of what had happened had happened. That you never had a sister, that your dad hadn’t completely changed, burrowing himself under alcohol and late shifts. That your mom wasn’t actively trying to forget and build another life over the one that had been left abandoned in that New York apartment. You were so sure you would have to move on, cut it all out the minute you graduated from high school. You were sure you had to escape on your rickety old bike right out of town.

Then things happened and somehow you found yourself again, found your father again as you sat together for your first Christmas dinner in years. Celebrating the return of the young Will Byers and the return of something else, something more, something familiar and warm. It wasn’t perfect, far from it, but it was yours. You saw your father again for the first time in years that night, Christmas Eve, sitting on the porch as light snow fell and hit your heads, bundled in warm jackets, pretending the coffee you made was not mediocre at best. The police chief and his daughter, a messy duo. And that was perfect to you.

And then things happened again and again and again and finally everything just shattered.

And you left. You did what you had always hoped to do. But you didn’t feel the pride you had thought you would feel when you dreamed it at fifteen. You weren’t heading towards a new life, you were sitting in a stuffy apartment in the city. You were stuck again at what felt like the beginning. Unable to go with the Byers, you immediately made other plans, back at the apartment you had spent so many nights trying to forget. 

No one ever got out of Hawkins, Indiana. Like the town was somehow enclosed within some heavy-duty bubble, only a few people ever got the nerves to squeeze through. Until you did, until you did the one thing you believed was impossible. You packed your bags, loaded up your car, and left hell. And you did it without a goodbye because the only way to do the impossible was without one. And deep down you knew you were a coward, even after fighting monsters and otherworldly creatures, you were a coward. You could not face what was left behind or allow yourself to acknowledge it.

And it ate away at you in a way you could have never imagined or wanted to imagine. Too busy pretending like it never crossed your mind, like Hawkins never existed in the first place. Still, it chipped at you piece by piece until the guilt of escaping Hawkins, Indiana finally caught up with you. Until one day that guilt would sneak up and trip you, sending you tumbling all the way back down a hill to only land right back at the gates of Hawkins, at its green sign, Welcome to Hawkins! That warm welcome, the warmest welcome, with its murders and second dimensions and its people. Those people. Those people who worked their way so deep into your heart before you could even realize it. So deep that leaving felt like removing deeply grown roots from a garden, so impossible, so hard to tell where they even stopped growing.  You weren’t sure entirely when they grew so deep, you don’t really remember at all how they got there. When you let them? Why did you let them? After everything, you should have known better. You shouldn’t have let them.

You were fifteen when you knew you could never live in Hawkins, Indiana your whole life. It never felt real, artificial, fake. Mass-produced nuclear families and white picket fence houses and stale dead-end jobs. 

And then Steve Harrington needed an extra art credit and found his way as the lead in Hawkins High’s production of Romeo and Juliet. When rehearsing turned into giving Steve girl advice and driving with him to drop off flowers. When running lines became swinging a bat of nails and finding an alien in a fridge. Or jumping into a hole in the ground and lighting up never-ending tunnels of vines straight from those horror movies you used to watch with your sister. When the day before the play performance had turned into icing Steve's bruises on your couch as you ran lines back and forth because neither of you could sleep. When a whole group of middle schoolers sat in the front row and your dad sat center with a crumble bouquet of flowers. They were your family. Your strange and messy family all pretending to be interested in the gibberish mess of Shakespeare on stage. Them watching with stifled laughs as Steve stumbled through lines, as the balcony scene turned into him and you having a staring contest trying to figure out whose lines were next. And though your director would have your heads later, the two of you sat giggling during intermission and had to hold the laughter again when your director asked why you didn’t have time to be memorized to perfection. Because you had all the time in the world, didn’t you?. 

Unbelievable as it was, you began to question what you at fifteen had promised you would do. Because you had found more than stale every day Hawkins, you had found their odd-balls who taught you to play Dungeons and Dragons in their basement who reminded you so much of your sister. And you had found Steve Harrington, a pretty boy with a heart of gold, who risked his life for his Juliet that night at the mall, pulling you up when you twisted your ankle running up a flight of stairs and getting you out to paramedics when it was over. Icing your ankle and holding you when it all got too much. When you watched everyone exit the mall but the only real family you felt like you had left. When the police told you your fathers body couldn’t be found, buried under ash and grime in the mall fire. That he was the hero, that he saved your lives sacrificing himself. 

When you moved back to Hawkins, Indiana, after Sara, after your parents split, you were sure life would never be the same again. You needed a fresh start, to completely reconfigure your life and pretend none of what had happened had happened. That you never had a sister, that your dad hadn’t completely changed, burrowing himself under alcohol and late shifts. That your mom wasn’t actively trying to forget and build another life over the past one that had been left abandoned in that New York apartment, calling only for holidays and those important life events she was so sad she had to miss. You were so sure you would have to move on, cut it all out the minute you graduated from high school. You were sure you had to escape on your rickety old bike right out of town.

Then things happened and somehow you found yourself again, found your father again as you sat together for their first Christmas dinner in years. Celebrating the return of the young Will Byers and the return of something else, something more, something familiar and warm. It wasn’t perfect, far from it, but it was steps in a direction. You saw your father again for the first time in years that night, Christmas Eve, sitting on the porch as light snow fell and hit your heads, bundled in warm jackets, pretending the coffee you made was not mediocre at best. It wasn’t perfect, but it was something for the two of you. The police chief and his daughter, a messy duo. And that was perfect to you.

And then things happened again and again and again and finally everything just shattered.

And you left. You did what you had always hoped to do. But you didn’t feel the pride you had thought you would feel when you dreamed it at fifteen. You weren’t heading towards a new life, you were sitting in a stuffy apartment in the city. You were stuck again at what felt like the beginning. Unable to go with the Byers, you immediately made other plans, back at the apartment you had spent so many nights trying to forget. 

Spring of 1986, the New York apartment was driving you insane. You felt like you might start running up the walls if you didn’t get out soon. At least that would be ten times more interesting than sitting and watching your Step-Dad watch golf—a sport you didn't understand. Seeing how bored you were, he tried to explain it, but you didn't process a single word he was saying.

You didn’t want to have something with him, you didn’t want a thing you bonded over and you especially didn’t want that thing to be golf.

You debated moving, you debated being drastic and dying your hair to make your mom upset but what good would that do other than feed the part in yourself that no longer cared, no longer wanted to care. Everything you cared about had slipped from your grasp, had disappeared, no matter how tightly you clutched it was gone.

Fuck.

You stared at the wallpaper, one you knew your mom had probably gushed over at the store and chosen. And you glanced at the patterned carpet, and the family picture you were not in. And even though they all reassured you that you were family, deep down you knew you had uprooted their whole routine. You especially saw it in your moms eyes when she looked at you a little too long, a constant reminder of what she had lost all those years ago.  

You listened to the busy city traffic below the apartment and the sound of wailing sirens you had completely become ignorant of after you lived in Hawkins so long. You glanced at the kitchen, the sink with no dishes and a fridge actually filled with food that wasn’t leftover take-out, mediocre pasta you had cooked, or boxes of Eggos. And you looked at the man beside you, silent, watching golf. It was all so different.

Every day it remained that way, your mom got home from work late, your stepfather came home before you got back from school, and then Liam, your step brother would come home.

He made it all a little more bearable. The littlest but only because he reminded you of home. He reminded you of Dungeons and Dragons in Mike Wheeler's basement, and your found sister, and the party that always had you on your toes. But even you could not warm up to the boy because he would never be them. And it was unfair. It was cruel of you to make comparisons between Hawkins and New York, to allow that to shut out the only family you now had. But it was one habit you could not seem to break no matter how hard you tried.

Hawkins, Indiana was quiet, it was small. Hawkins, Indiana was both a breath of fresh air and a tightening grip that had you gasping, clawing for a second to breathe. New York was loud, so loud that the sounds of sirens and blaring car horns became only white noise in your head. It was big, not big in the welcoming and warming way. Not big in the feeling of catching sight of a friend in a crowded room. It was big in the way you could not point out a single person at school that you had seen more than once.  It was big in a way similar to that of being alone in the middle of a large party. It was so big that being alone in a quiet, dark, empty room would feel the same as walking amidst the large crowds on the street.

And New York didn’t have Steve Harrington. New York didn’t have crazy kids and weird aliens, New York didn’t have Robin Buckley or Nancy Wheeler or Jonathan Byers, New York didn’t have comforting hugs from Joyce, and New York didn’t have your dad and it never would again. The thought of it was enough to make you sick, nausea filling every inch of your body, barely able to swallow down the fact. But you would swallow it down like you always did, like you did everything else.

Your mom would always tell you you could talk to her if you needed to, that no matter how long you were a part she still cared about you. But you still remember the look on her face when you had turned up at the apartment after all those years. Finally back together face to face, the only words she was able to muster was, “you grew up”. 

You kept busy filling the days with nothing. On a good day Liam would show you some project he did in class that day, him seemingly the most unbothered by your move-in. And your stepdad, Bill, would ask you how school was to which you would reply fine. It was fine, it would always be just fine.

And you would stare at the phone on the wall in the kitchen. Dialing and hanging up and dialing and hanging up, hearing him pick up and then slamming the phone down, falling back into the chair at the kitchen table. Sometimes he would call back, you knew he caught on, you would just listen as the phone rang, head in your hands. You couldn’t face it, it was all too much and answering that call, hearing that voice would only throw it all back at you at once. It would knock you down and hold you there as you tried to gain control of the emotions you had locked up so tight once again. You felt sick to your stomach once again and the feeling spread, it spread all throughout your body, all the way to your fingertips and toes. For the first time in your life, you begged your body to just throw up, hoping the feelings would go along with it, until the pit in your stomach was completely washed away. 

It was this sinking feeling every time you heard the phone ring and as much as you wanted to convince yourself otherwise, you weren’t sure if you would ever pick up. Maybe you would just forget about it all. But it was hard when your mind was plagued with images of creatures you could only describe as otherworldly and when every time you looked at yourself in the mirror before a shower your eyes would draw focus to the deep cut scars that littered your body. You would never truly escape Hawkins, Indiana, it was impossible, and it would follow you around until you finally gave up and went back. But you refused to allow it to have that control, until you picked up the phone…by accident.

It was late, a Saturday evening of all things. Your mother was working late that weekend, your step dad was asleep on the couch, and your step brother had abandoned his books on the table and gone to bed. And the phone kept ringing and ringing and ringing, over and over in repeated increments. One call, two minutes passed, another call, three minutes had passed, and a third call with three minutes passing and on and on and on-

“Will you turn the damn thing off!” Yelled the man on the couch, whose deep sleeping was even disturbed by your past trying to creep back in. 

And it worried you, as you apologized and turned back to the phone, head aching from the noise. It worried you because every time before, the phone would ring one, maybe two times before the line went silent. But tonight, you had lost track of just how many times you had slammed the phone down to stop the ringing.

You looked up at the phone again, quiet for much too long, longer than before and RING. RING. RING.

The grunt of your step father filled the empty room and without a second thought, not wanting another lecture from your mom about not getting along with him, you reached for the phone line. Slowly placing it against your ear, you instantly pulled it back as a voice blasted through, louder than the ringing of the phone itself. “Goddammit! please pick up the phone-”

“Hey,” was all you said, it was faint and quiet in contrast, laced with guilt that had piled up from months of avoidance and pretending Hawkins didn’t exist. But it was loud enough to stop the yelling as murmurs and whispers filled the background of wherever your caller was calling from. 

Your Steve Harrington, your Romeo who deserved answers. After everything you had been through he deserved something from you that you had failed to deliver.

“Oh thank god, you don’t know how happy I am to hear your voice,” and what you expected to be anger was anything but, rather the clearest sound of overwhelming relief. Relief that all came crashing down the minute he spoke his next words. “You need to get back here, like... like-“

The sound of struggling came from their end of the phone and your heart rate sped up in a panic, only realizing how tightly you were holding the phone to your ear.

Dustin’s voice quickly came through the line, a complaining Steve evident in the back, “like right now, like ASAP, like as soon as possible.”

Dustin’s voice, his tone did nothing to loosen your grip on the phone, nothing to ease your panic and you almost slammed the phone down again. Back home, back in the familiar, back to memories of people that haunted your every thought. You wondered if they had called the Byers, your sister, you wondered if she was there too. 

“We can pay your bus ticket, but I can’t really explain like this and we just, we need your help,” Dustin practically cried. “We all need you. We can’t let anyone get hurt again.”

That was all you needed. Hawkins had a pull on you, a force you tried to ignore but eventually pulled you back anyways. Steve was back on the line soon after, you already scribbling a note to your mom, phone pressed against your ear by your shoulder. And when you heard his voice again your breath caught in your throat…it seemed to always do that with him.

“Steve, I-”

“You don’t have to say anything.”

“No, but, Steve I really, just…I don’t know where to start,” you tried to explain, losing any of the words you had planned to say while lying awake at night, staring at the ceiling. 

“You don’t have to,” he simply said. But you knew you would, you had too many words to speak. “Just show up, just be here. We need you, even if you don’t believe me. It’s getting crazy again.”

Hawkins would never not be.

“I will be,” you reassured, really reassured. “I will be, I promise.”

And if everyone in Hawkins knew something, you never broke a promise, never. You got close sometimes, sometimes it seemed like you would, but you always met your end of the bargain. You said you would be back in Hawkins, Indiana and you would be. Setting the phone down back on it's holder with a quiet click, you jumped from your chair in the kitchen, as the wood chair quietly screeched against the floor. Open and close, open and close, the drawers in the kitchen were opening and closing until you found a tape role, cutting away a piece. Grabbing your note off the counter, you secured the piece to it and stuck it against the fridge where it would be noticed by your mom.

She would know what it meant, you knew she knew all along, that New York hadn’t been your home in a long time. That Hawkins had grown into something much deeper than you could have ever anticipated. And even then, in that kitchen, in that busy city…you knew, the end was near

[bibibbon]

From the takes, I have seen a lot of people think that jayce and viktor have an all say in hextech, but that isn't true. Sure, they can stop working and they wouldn't really face huge consequences but a huge flaw about both jayce and viktor is that they're people who see a corrupt system, try and change the corrupt system from the inside just to get swallowed by said corrupt system and end up adding onto the corruption. To sum it up, they are both consumed by their desire to help and their ambition. That is their tragedy, and its something consistently referenced to in the series.

From what we see in Act 2, jayce's and viktor's resources are heavily and I mean heavily patronaged by the kirramans. This is why you see cassandra showing off jayce as the inventor of the hexgates in episode 4 progress day. This is why you see the kirraman symbol almost everywhere when it comes to the hextech stuff. Even in jayce's own speech, it's his houses symbol, AND the kirramans. The polished and safe hextech gemstones are in a kirraman box. Their latest invention literally doesn't have their symbols on it. The only symbol it has is literally the kirraman's.

Also, viktor never ends up being mentioned as a designer for the hexgates even though caitlyn knows just how close viktor and jayce were, and it seems so intentional with the way cassandra was mainly promoting jayce you can see it look back at the progress day episode.

When talking about what THEY want to do with hextech, their conversation ends up being very telling of the circumstances they are in.

The council heavily regulates all hextech productions and jayce does point out that he feels quite annoyed at not being able to prioritise their plans which is to give hextech/magic to the world, to have it be a resource that benefits all life. Viktor returns the same sentiment in another episode, reminding jayce of their goal when it came to hextech, their pledge to help the people in need.

The only major thing that hextech was being used for was the hexgates which I find really interesting how the council and heimendinger by extension allowed such a big project as the hexgates but he was hesitant to allow jayce's and viktor's minor projects. Mind you, the hexgates are way bigger in terms of scale, and they are also something that somehow only took 7 or less years to build but heimendinger is here telling them that they both need a decade before their plans could be set in place.

We find out later in the series that the hexgates were causing heavy pollution and corruption, but did they know? Did they try and warn the council? Did they try and do anything? What did heimerdinger say? Is this another way heimendinger failed them and, by extension, the city?

I imagine that if they did bring it up to the council, the councillors like hoskel, salo, and even shoola would have dismissed it by bringing up the fact that their shipments can't wait just like they did when jayce and viktors lab was raided on progress day.

Maybe this is me reading too much into it, but jayce's wording towards the council is so interesting here. The use of the word "recommend" is almost as if the only thing he could really do is advise them, as someone not in the council (yet) jayce doesn't have the chance to really put his foot down and demand a complete shut down of the hexgates and suspension of their project.

Another interesting detial is that when people talk of the hexagates, they always talk about how it can transport people, but we never see that. The council only ever talks about the transport of shipments instead. So, do you think that jayce and viktor wanted to create the hexgates for the transport benefits of people, but it just ended up being for shipments instead? Jayce did seem a bit unsatisfied with the hexgates, labelling it as something that he had to do for the council, not really something that he did for the people?

Mind you, this is all before episode 6. I mention this because episode 6 is the same episode that introduces the hexcore into the equation where they (ambition is their flaw) boarden their horizon and start to deviate heavily from their original goals.

Jayce and viktor quickly end up losing sight of their goals to help people as they start to use hextech and the hexcore as benefits for them specifically and heimerdinger does call them out on it and the dangers that the hexcore itself brings. When heimerdinger talks to jayce and viktor about the destruction of this material, he is only talking about the hexcore, not hextech. Heimerdinger deems the hexcore as dangerous something that viktor described as an "adaptive and learning version of the hexcore".

Again after their own experiences with hextech in general both jayce and viktor come to the understanding that they strayed far from their dream that they have failed and them trying to get zaun's independence is painted as them trying to redeem themselves, trying to finally give something to the people that they wanted to help because they couldn't benefit them from hextech.

In the end, you can also argue that jayce and viktor's plans were heavily flawed for a variety of reasons. Like I said in a perfect system, their plans could work, but again, you're in a system filled to the brim with corruption. Your dream is bound to be corrupted by external forces and YOU!

In the end, we don't get much of this because arcane chose to drop the political plot line and how the council really did affect a lot of people. This isn't me saying jayce and viktor are innocent because they also share a lot of the fault for THEIR OWN experiments but it's me saying that the council is heavily to blame and its not something that the show ever touches upon.

An important part of Jayce and Viktor’s story that some people tend to forget is that they don’t have nearly as much input on hextech as some people think they do. Like yeah they made it but they have to grovel in the dirt to get the funding to continue making it. They are not the ones in charge, not by a long shot. Jayce talks about how they always have to do what the council asks of them (building the hex gates, stabilizing the crystals, etc) and how they’ll finally take back hextech for themselves once they fulfill their demands (they don’t even get the chance to do that!). If they even thought of trying to provide hextech to the undercity before that, they’d definitely be immediately shut down.

Jayce was extremely influential at hextech’s prime, yes, but he will NEVER be on the same level as the ones who fund his and Viktor’s work because they are old, old money and he is nothing more than the son of a lower house. Though the Talis crest flies during progress day, the hex crystals are held in a case with a Kiramman crest. Hextech wasn’t theirs, really, and it’s why Piltover continued to rise to even greater heights while Zaun was left in the dust to rot.

[hopeful-dawn]

I find it very interesting how incredibly sheltered Shadow is in the movie, not just compared to other versions of his character, but also to the other characters in the SCU. He doesn't talk a lot, so it's not overly obvious, but his flashback scenes were riddled with subtext. He's clearly an amnesiac when he first falls to earth, so he has literally no idea about... most things, and the military certainly wouldn't have seen fit to teach him about them.

Given the way they kept him locked up in a fluid-filled tube - despite him being awake, alert, seemingly uninjured, and still in his clothes -, and his own admission that they all seemed scared of him and thought he was dangerous, Shadow doesn't seem to have been treated like an actual person, much less a child. And given his reaction to Maria when she first interacted with him (i.e. confused and suspicious even after she was very playful and friendly towards him), she likely was the first person to show him actual kindness, too.

Which makes sense! In the games he was created for the express purpose of being able to cure Maria. She was there for him and cared for him from the start, and undoubtedly made sure he was being treated at least moderately well. And she would have had the leverage to do so, because they were on a civilian space colony where her grandfather, who loved her dearly, was the one spearheading the project. In the movies however, Shadow was an extremely powerful extraterrestrial of unspecified origin, with an unknown purpose for coming to Earth. During the Cold War. He was not a beloved creation; he was a potential threat who was being experimented on by the military.

There's no way that before Maria he'd have been given lessons in Earth cultural practices, or allowed to do things like watch movies or listen to music or even just roam freely throughout the base. They didn't trust him enough to. But without any memories of his own he'd have been easy enough to mold to their liking, so they did teach him how to fight, how to shoot a gun, how to ride a motorcycle, and how to harness his power, because they undoubtedly wanted to use him as a secret weapon against the Soviets and as a power source (why else would they keep him in a military base and store a bunch of containers filled with his highly explosive chaos energy? How else would he have learned how to ride a human motorcycle with such skill?). Weapons aren't people though, and potential threats don't get kindness, lest people get attached to them, and neither are taught anything they don't absolutely need to know to perform their functions.

So yeah. Poor kid was kept emotionally isolated and ignorant, until Maria came in and demanded better for him. Too bad that made her a liability to them, one they felt they had to get rid of after they decided that Shadow needed to be shelved until such a time that they could actually control him. Remember, they were aiming to shoot her, specifically. If they wanted to shoot Gerald or Shadow, they'd have done it at any point afterward. So even though it was an explosion that ultimately killed her, she was slated to die regardless. Gerald and Shadow were considered valuable; she was just a loose end who convinced Shadow he was a person and turned his loyalties from them to herself.

(Those kids never stood a chance. Even if they had escaped, they'd have been hunted down by the military, and she'd have been killed then instead while he was taken into custody. Their fates were sealed the second they stepped foot into that base. Shadow never would have been allowed to have a decent childhood, and Maria never could have treated Shadow as anything other than a fellow child and friend.)

And when he was brought out of stasis he had no time or inclination to fix any of that ignorance (because he was convinced he would die, along with the rest of the world). All of which puts him in a very disadvantageous spot by the end of the movie, because he's going to be so lost once he wakes back up on earth.

Does he know how to read in any language or how to do basic arithmetic? Does he know any geography or how to read a map? Does he know any first aid or wilderness survival skills? Since he wasn't created in a lab, does he need to eat and drink, and if so does he know what's safe for him to consume? These are all things he might need to know if he's going to try and survive on his own, and unfortunately he also almost certainly doesn't know how to use a computer or a telephone, which would be his main two ways of getting that kind of information if he can't outright ask anyone.

To take it even further, because of his amnesia, does Shadow even know that he's supposed to be a hedgehog?? Does he know what the chaos emeralds are, or that they're emeralds at all, or why he went god mode upon touching them? Does he know that Sonic survived after he passed out and fell to earth? And also, did literally anyone ever tell him Sonic's name??

[nestaians]

does anyone else hate sjm’s women healing arc always involves around warrior training?

not all women need to become or train like warriors and to do it as a part of their healing journey. it’s one thing to teach them how to defend themselves but this isnt it

so its fantasy world with ppl having powers, there are other ways to heal or help someone heal without involving warrior training

sending these women who are in process of healing from traumatic events and still in training phase into deadly situations is not it wtf dude

but it’s made up by a kiss or sex scene so all forgiven ig?

rhysand kneeled in front of feyre and he never kneels for anyone, he loves her🥺 the ring she almost died for was his mother’s🥺

cassian made up by having sex with nesta after she was assaulted even though its obvious sex is her coping mechanism🥺

why were nesta and feyre traumatised further like that and it was never really brought up nor affected their progress?

illyrian women being allowed to train if they wish like what if they dont want to train but want to have their wings and be free? wing clippings still happen and they arent free so is training the only way out for them?

srs why do the women always end up as warriors is beyond me😐

learning how to fight doesn’t equal healing and getting stronger

learning how to fight doesn’t equal one’s strength

its weird theme sjm has going on. begging her to pick up an actual feminist and healing books

like acosf a shit show of a book was not anywhere close to a healing journey despite what sjm says, good if it worked out for her

but like cassian being nesta’s “caretaker” and having sex with her when she was in vulnerable state and him saying nasty shit was fucked up

the training to “get better” was forced upon nesta. how is this good for her? how was the hike good for her?

this is not how u help someone! u start gently, baby steps!

[rebel-wrath]

I'm something of a chaos goblin at heart, my DND alignment is always chaotic, and the only use I have for rule books is toilet paper, unless their on my kobo because that would not be comfortable. Or sanitary.

There is one rule I've found that cannot be ignored if you want to grow as a writer. Everything else you can burn. Show don't tell is great as long as you understand where to tell not show. Proper spelling and grammar can be ignored, if you understand how and can justify it. Don't infodump except when you are required to, because there's times when you have to. Don't head hop unless you're using a narrative style that allows you to head hop. Every rule except this one comes with caveats, and growth as a writer isn't measured in how well you learn the rules and can stick to them, but in how well you learn when they don't apply, and can write around them.

Don't believe me? The first Discworld novel starts with an infodump. It has to, because readers expect fantasy worlds to still be globes, and if you're breaking that rule you have to start by stating outright that you are breaking it. There are incredibly popular books filled with head hopping (the thriller genre especially). Even spelling can be ignored if you want to write in a dialect, or have a POV character writing the story who struggles with this.

I'm posting a serial story on here three times a week (Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday) under the tag #NofNA which repeatedly breaks rules that are constantly said to be inviolable. It works, because I write comedy, because my narrative style makes it work, and because I actively seek ways to break rules all the time.

So, what's the one rule that can't be broken? It's WRELA. And it's the most important writing rule there is, and the only one you should never break.

WRELA. Well, technically, W.R.E.L.A.

Write. Write something. Write anything. It doesn't matter what you write, and it doesn't matter how good it is. Write.

Read. Read your own work back. Read old pieces you wrote years ago, and the thing you just finished. Read it out loud. Read it to yourself. Read it to others. Read things others have written. Read comments, blog posts, movie reviews, short stories, fanfic, scripts, and novels. Read the back of the cereal box, the receipt when you buy something, the terms and conditions, the small print. Read skeets and subtitles and emails and the sms from your granny, God bless her.

Edit. Go over the work you have written, again and again if you have to. Edit it once or edit it 1000 times. That story I'm serialising? It took me fifteen years (on and off) and two lifetimes (when I believed I was cis and after I learned that I'm trans) to write, and the finished version is as different a book to the original as it was possible to be whilst still being about the same thing.

Learn. Learn from your writing, from your reading, from your editing. Don't learn the rules. Don't take what worked for Vonnegut or King or Aristotle and blindly apply it to your work. Learn yourself. Learn who you are, what your voice is, what you're trying to say to the world. Learn how to say it. Some of those rules from other writers might work well with you. Some of them won't. That's fine. Learn what makes you a better writer.

Apply. Put the things you learned from the last piece of fiction into the next piece of fiction you write. Then do it again. Learn from that and put that into the next and then again.

The next section is me using my writing to back up my previous statements. It's a bit "markety" because I'm discussing my writing. Feel free to skip it if you want.

Okay, let's back this up: NofNA, Noun of Noun and Adjective, is a fantasy comedy that satirises our world and parodies other books. I have a few chapters up already, if you want to read it. It's about a transgender princess who joins a magic mirror reality show called Heroic Quest in return for a magical gender transition (she's a trans woman). Structurally, it has similarities to Discworld novels (one thing I learned was footnotes are a pain in the ass). Another thing I learned was that I had to keep editing the narration because I wanted to directly comment on the story as the narrator and it wouldn't work.

So I applied what I learned to the next book I wrote, Attack of the 50 ft Trans Woman.

This is a story about a Trans Woman who undergoes an experimental procedure to change gender. She grows to fifty feet, and the government sends the army after her even though she's done nothing wrong. So she heads to London to have a word with the Prime Minister.

But I knew what I'd learned from Noun of Noun and Adjective, I knew I wanted to narrate however I pleased. So the prologue makes it clear that the story is actually being told to you by an alien. As the alien narrator, I was able to interrupt the narration, go off on tangents, make jokes, and just generally be weird. It sounds like it shouldn't work, but it does. Even the huge dance scene near the end works. There's a scene from the POV of a terf, Karen, that doesn't have pronouns in it and was an absolute pain in the ass to write, but it works because the narrator is respecting Karen's insistence that Karen doesn't have pronouns. Therefore, no pronouns are used to refer to Karen in Karen's scene except the occasional first person when directly quoting Karen's tweets because Karen does not respect Karen's choice to not use pronouns for Karen.

Seriously one of the most difficult things I've ever written, but it backs up my point that you can ignore any rules you please if 1) you can justify it, and 2) you can pull it off. I ignored basic grammar itself there.

Attack of the 50 ft Trans woman is available from all major ebook retailers and a paper version is planned for later this year

Readers have told me it made them laugh, it made them sad, it made them angry. Since anger was the point, I can happily say it works.

It was also the most fun I've ever had writing and it took me a week to do the first draft. Remember, writing is meant to be fun, and when I applied what I learned from the previous book, I went from a book that took me 15 years from start to finish to a book that took only a few months.

So I took what I learned from Attack and I applied it to Bigoted Book Burners Bloodily Bludgeoned by Badly Burnt Books. I wanted to write about book burnings, and I decided the best genre for what I wanted to write was a horror. This story had a more traditional narration, but it's essentially two different stories told simultaneously, and has a bulleted list of content warnings a page long. The even chapters are the story of a kid growing up trans when the only parent she has is her terf mum. It was horrendous to write, there were days I could only manage a paragraph. I'm not looking forward to the edit.

The odd number chapters start with the book burning, with the grimoire of a witch being thrown on the fire, then causing all the books in the village to animate and kill people. It's a massively over the top splatterpunk extravaganza and is hilarious and the perfect antidote to the even number chapters.

What I learned from Attack was that I'm not a very reliable free flow writer. I need plans. And so every chapter of B5bB3 was planned before it was written. I could see how dark some scenes were, and it meant I knew where to balance them out with correspondingly funny scenes. I learned more about character agency and development.

And from B5bB3 I learned about building narrative tension, about holding off the horrible so it's not overwhelming until suddenly bang! it is overwhelming, and I'm applying that to TWTSQ, my current WIP.

B5bB3 will be out later this year, hopefully around June.

There's other books I've written, under various other names, but I'm only discussing the ones I write as Caledonia Fife. But everything I've written and everything I've read has taught me about writing, and I can honestly say that the books I'm putting out now, under this name, are so much incredibly better than the first book I put out in 2010 under a different name.

So if you want to be the best writer you can be:

Write

Read

Edit

Learn

Apply