#words of j/c

[umblrspectrum]

Can we get more of the murder drone x rain world au?

ok

[bleue-flora]

What would it be like in the finale if c!sap or c!quackity confronted c!dream instead of c!tommy. Do you think we would have seen that “you just want friends” moment. I feel like c!sapnap possibly would understand reach that moment with c!Dream maybe better than c!tommy did but as for c!quackity I see no chance of that happening

The quick answer is no. I talked about it I think somewhere before, but it had to be Tommy. Tommy was the only one who could have brought that vulnerability out of Dream. And Tommy had to die and experience limbo from Dream’s pov for that all to happen. In other words, it was the ideal situation.

But let’s say it was Sapnap or Quackity. Let’s say they sent Q to stall Dream and let’s say Dream and Punz didn’t just kill him off the bat, but they allowed him to talk and then killed him and brought him back. What would have been Quackity’s reaction to Dream’s pov limbo?… honestly, I’m not entirely sure. I wouldn’t say I’m an expert on Quackity but here are my thoughts…

Well I don’t think he would be the selfless character to put himself in that situation in the first place, and Tommy also had an upper hand in the fact that his method of stalling was asking Dream why and for his pov. I imagine Quackity wouldn’t ask that though so wouldn’t experience the same limbo. So I imagine, Quackity’s likely method of stalling would be to accuse Dream and justify his own actions, maybe under the guise for Dream’s forgiveness, knowing that if he pissed off Dream then he’d just died and it wouldn’t really be a very good stalling tactic, would it? In other words, it likely wouldn’t be far off from his encounter in the Las Nevadas Finale or perhaps it would be similar to how he interacts with Wilbur.

Now let’s say regardless, Quackity experienced Dream’s pov limbo, then I don’t know, he’d probably use it in his manipulation and stalling tactics, maybe use it to mock Dream or turn Punz against Dream. Perhaps he uses the “you just want friends” to make fun of him - *read in condescending voice* “you say you want all this power and knowledge but really poor little Dream, just want friends” *theatric pout* … Whatever his reaction is it wouldn’t be to reach the understanding Dream and Tommy did, not just because Quackity is well… Quackity, but also because only Tommy could fix what he broke. Only Tommy had the power to change Dream, because it was him that ruined him in the first place, Q and Sam only got the leftovers of what Tommy had down by turning everyone against Dream, triggering that fundemental fear of being alone. It was Tommy and Wilbur that made Dream wonder how the freak did they show up and ruin everything, spurring his yearn for answers. Sapnap and Awesamdude were already in the server and Quackity is just the later infection taking over the wound Tommy left behind…

Having said that, it would have been interesting to see what Sapnap’s reaction would have been. I think like Quackity he wouldn’t be asking the questions of why like Tommy was to stall, because part of his problem is his assumption that he knows. His tactic probably would have been pulling Dream into a long fight and perhaps playing at Dream’s ego. Accusation and nostialga used as weapons - “remember me and you and George built the community house, and then you blew it up, Dream!”- If Sapnap experienced the same limbo, I wonder if it would have done anything more than remind Sapnap what he lost. Unlike Tommy, Sapnap did see Dream as good in the beginning so seeing his perspective at the beginning would not shatter any huge misconception for him. It probably would have just left him feeling angry. making the situation actually worse.

In other words, in order for Sapnap and Dream to reach a similar point as discduo, Sapnap needed a pov of more recent Dream to highlight his poor misconceptions, whether that’s of seeing Punz and Dream setting up the staged vault room, Dream learning about how everyone is trying to kill him, Dream being tortured in prison, or something especially something that highlighted an emotional part of Dream. But as for Q, though an argument could be made against it, I don’t think he wanted to make amends with Dream and unlike Sapnap and Tommy, I don’t think he was as oblivious to his actions of how they hurt people. I feel like he already saw Dream as a person and didn’t give a damn anyways. He did what he had to do, but he isn’t naive to how Dream feels. So there was no limbo that could change that. Perhaps more circumstances and character’s involvement could do something to change Q, but not just between him and Dream. (I think the situation with Purpled and Q would have been more the opportunity to reach that understanding like that of disc duo, but we already know how that turned out.)

So to summarize - Sapnap already knew Dream’s pov in the beginning so seeing it would not have radically changed anything. What he would need is an experience of something more recent Dream that shows Dream has emotions (maybe even specifically feelings for missing Sapnap) and isn’t some just crazy control freak. Then it would more so be feasible for a similar unfolding as Dream and Tommy had to happen. Quackity on the other hand, I don’t get the feeling had a misconception about Dream that needed to be changed so there was no Limbo that would matter. Maybe that’s wrong of me to say and judge Quackity so harshly, but I honestly don’t get the impression he sees Dream as less than human in a way that resulted in what we got in the disc duo finale…

Hopefully that answers your question or at least lays out my 2 cents. I think @elmhat has also talked similarly about alternative finale options so I recommend looking at what they had to say if you haven’t already.

[askarsjustsoswedish]

Alexander Skarsgård - Marrakech International Film Festival - 24 November 2023. Thanks SwedishDelish

[dearduende]

I’m writing a love poem

I’m writing a love poem

to celebrate the union of two friends

and what a joy it is to draw from these feelings

of never wanting our budding love to ever end

I know it’s new

but it feels like something true

and timeless the same way

old poems and songs still resonate today

I’m writing a love poem

and I want it to be a classic

that sparks awe and tears

and breaths held—and then cheers

with toasts to the bride and the groom

and beaming faces lit up across the room

I’m writing a love poem

but I don’t know where to start

I’ve got the pieces and the feelings

and the blessings from the heart

so I trace it back and go from the beginning

and write what I know of love beyond endings

I’m writing a love poem

when all I want is to lay in the sun with you

but you’re three thousand miles away

texting me you miss me at the end of your day

and I’m calling to say I miss you too

(and almost ready to say I love you)

when I’m writing a love poem

and all I can think

is how I could keep writing

and writing until I ran out of ink

and still that wouldn’t do

to bring me closer to you

I’m writing a love poem

in my head and in my sleep

and between meetings I can barely focus

yearning for Friday when in your arms I leap

but what is desire without a little distance,

a little bit of struggle, a little bit of missing

I’m writing a love poem

for two people choosing each other forever

and I hope we keep choosing

and finding our way back to each other

for now and for the future

and maybe for ever after

I’m writing a love poem

that’s not some sappy happy ending

but a glimmer of hope in the weary face of life

like a boring Tuesday afternoon

made shiny and joyful anew

we gather here today

to cheer on the brave lovers

as they embark on the journey

of navigating all the seasons together

I’m writing a love poem

or rather another poem while I marinate

on the half scattered poem I started earlier today

so “take this as you will”

and take the rest of my heart

because it has been yours

from the very start.

[filo-academia]

Filipino poet and feminist critic Lilia Quindoza Santiago has pointed out that the word for grammatical gender in the Philippines is kasarian, and already it semantically affords a little more flexibility than its Western counterpart, which is clearly and hopelessly bifurcated. Sari, repeated in Tagalog-Filipino, is sari-sari, or "all and sundry". Thus, there may well be a kind of diversity to gender that may be allowed by certain if not most cultures in the Philippines.

J. Neil C. Garcia, Performing the Self: Occasional Prose

[doctahchang]

i love seven but it is also very annoying how media overall is more willing to sympathise with characters who committed countless atrocities and talk at length about their redemption arks particularly in comparison to oppressed characters whose fight against status quo is always being framed as terrorism :-)

[biitchcakes]

BLACK WIDOW: VENOMOUS vol. 1 issue 1

@mastcrmarksman / @manandmachines

( personals DNI . )

[scuddle-bubble101]

So... Um, this man wasn't suppose to show up but- WELLLLLLL-

Too late for that.

Color was done by my other braincell @rushin-safire

[mewkwota]

Castlevania: Crazy Overdramatic Dudes “This is the story of an angry man in hooker boots seeking revenge against another angry man in hooker boots all the while being annoyed by yet another angry man in hooker boots.”

Curse of Darkness is a game, I remember when I first saw it through a DDR music video and I was like "wow that guy with the red hair has a very sexy walk". Now that I've gotten familiarized, I'm still amazed by the cutscenes and all, and hope this title is released again someday.

[kits-ships]

my husband ranks my f/os.png

things i love about this:

he has watched moon knight, yet didn't recognize jake lockley or marc spector

he does NOT know who rex is. he said he just likes that picture of dt hgfsdfhh

wtf did din do to him

i love who he put in 'my wife needs help.' it's everyone i expected him to put there

i thought 🪓❄�� would be in the last category tbh

WTF DID POE DO TO HIM

[fountainpenguin]

Immortalizing one of the funniest comments I've ever gotten (courtesy of @bookworm-2692 - Dog's Life - Chapter 20)

sldkfjlsdfjs... I'm crying. That's exactly what this is.

Grian watching Cleo eat bread without using their hands: I don't even go here but this is the hottest thing I've ever seen in my life.

I love playing my goofy allofeeding culture straight. It's so silly...

[francy-sketches]

´lol you think incest in asoiaf is meant to be bad? cope and seethe haterz' - i'm sorry, but this is literally the f&b/hotd fandom, not asoiaf/got

yeah mostly but I've definitely seen people say that for asoiaf/got. especially show watchers lol

[bearded-enby]

[anonymous-dentist]

late christmas present for @anonymous-jey my beloved!! :D

On the surface, the mission is simple. Find the Time Devil, and bring it under contract by any means necessary. It’s a routine mission, the kind that Quackity has been doing pretty well for basically his entire life. Even Sapnap can do it, and Sapnap’s only two real abilities are punching and burning things in that order. There’s just one problem, and it’s that nobody has seen the Time Devil in two hundred years. 

“He’s insane,” Quackity groans. 

He slumps against Sapnap, burying his face in his boyfriend’s warm, comfortable chest. Quackity lets out a slightly more content groan as he puts his arm around him and holds him close. Together in Quackity’s tiny-ass twin bed, there’s barely enough room for them plus the files plus the cat. But, well, it beats Sapnap’s bed (because he doesn’t have a bed, because the boss has decided to stop giving Sapnap new beds if he’s just going to burn them in his sleep, because the boss is a bitch, but that’s getting off topic.)

“Insane!” Quackity emphasizes. 

Sapnap rubs his back and lets out a pacifying, “There, there.”

“No, you don’t get it.”

“No, I do. He’s insane.”

“He’s insane!”

“But, really, it’ll be good for us, won’t it? The Time Devil was, like, super powerful the last time I saw it. Everyone was terrified of it.”

Which bodes well. It bodes really well. Quackity isn’t the most powerful devil hunter on the force. No, that title goes to the boss, but Dream doesn’t do his job. He makes people do his job for him. The actual most powerful devil hunter is the fiend sharing Quackity’s bed, for better or for worse. 

Today, Sapnap is shirtless. It’s his and Quackity’s day off (because if Quackity has the day off, Sapnap refuses to go into work, and trying to force him into doing anything results in more property damage than it’s worth), so he’s shirtless, and Quackity is pantsless, and it’s two in the afternoon and they’ve only been awake for half an hour. But in that half an hour, Dream has not only sent over paperwork to do, but he’s also sent over a thick manilla folder full of ancient-looking documents describing a devil that nobody is sure is actually still in the human realm. Dream thinks it is. Quackity hopes it isn’t. 

The more powerful a devil is, the more work it is to get it to cooperate. That’s just how it works, and Quackity knows all too well how annoying it is to try and get a bitchy devil to work with you and not, like, devour your soul. Quackity is a good negotiator, but he isn’t that good. He’s just a dude; how can he possibly get time itself to cooperate with him? 

So Quackity sighs, and he lets himself sink into Sapnap’s embrace. Tomorrow, he and Sapnap get back to work. Today is their day off, and he won’t let Dream ruin that. 

-

The Time Devil is a mysterious one. Reports describe it looking like anything from a small girl with a big pink plastic Hello Kitty wrist watch to an old man with a cane with a clock carved into the handle to a woman dressed like a librarian to a man with sunglasses bigger than his face. It depends on the person describing it, and it’s always different. 

Time is fluid, the top page of the file says in Dream’s scratchy handwriting. You can’t expect it to be the same to every person. 

Sapnap met the Time Devil once, apparently. It was during the plague, the big one that wiped out half of Europe. He was in London, and he ran into a man stealing a loaf of bread from a dead woman’s hands. 

(“He was beautiful,” Sapnap sighs, and Quackity tries not to be too offended.)

The way Sapnap described it, the Time Devil was a real looker. Brown hair, fluffy, big eyes, soft lips. (Quackity chooses not to think about that party.) ‘Cute’, in Sapnap’s words. But it’s also been centuries and a near-death experience since then, and Quackity isn’t sure how reliable Sapnap’s memory is. 

But what’s interesting about Sapnap’s account is that it matches several others. The Time Devil, no matter the form it's taken, has golden eyes. 

(“Literally gorgeous,” Sapnap confirms, and he breaks into a laugh as Quackity annoyedly throws his eraser at him.)

According to Sapnap, the Time Devil is powerful. But Sapnap also isn’t the best with abstract concepts. He’s the Fire Fiend, formerly the Fire Devil, he doesn’t really need to think to do his job. When Sapnap says that everyone is scared of time, Quackity thinks that maybe he means that everyone is scared of the end of time. The End isn’t really under Time’s jurisdiction, that would be the Death Devil (and the End Devil, fucking duh), and that is so far above Quackity’s pay grade that he doesn’t even consider thinking about it. Everyone is scared of time running out, but they aren’t scared of time itself. 

Still, Dream wants it. Quackity doesn’t know what exactly the Time Devil can offer, but it has to be good if Dream has him looking for it. These days, Quackity is reserved for negotiations only… and babysitting, but he has been promoted from hunter to contractor. The last time he went out on an actual hunt, he came home with Sapnap clinging to him like a particularly-handsome leach, and Dream doesn’t want to risk any more devils getting attached to Quackity. He already works with three. Any more, and he’d be an actual threat.

(Quackity closes the file, and he slides it across the table to Sapnap for him to look through.

“If I fail this, I think he’ll kill me,” Quackity says. 

The tips of Sapnap’s horns start smoking. 

“I’ll kill him first,” Sapnap swears, face downcast and eyes glowing faintly red.

Quackity doesn’t have the heart to tell him that Dream would beat his ass again. Instead, he smiles fondly, and tiredly, and he reaches across the table to take one of Sapnap’s hands in his own to hold. It’s warm.)

-

The Time Devil is an enigma, and yet, as Luck would have it, Quackity finds it within three hours of his first search of the city, Sapnap stuck back at the office doing an HR training. It’s in the row next to him scribbling in a notebook with a pink glitter pen, tongue stuck out and eyebrows furrowed in concentration. Honestly, it isn’t anything special to look at. Cute, but not exactly Quackity’s type (he’s into muscles and people who could stab him these days.) He wouldn’t glance twice at it if it wasn’t for the gold eyes. In the dim light, they’re almost like headlights. Enthralling, almost. Almost. 

And then it looks at him with a smile. 

“Hey,” it says. “You good over there?”

Quackity shrugs. “Eh.”

The Time Devil nods sagely in response to that brilliant statement. 

“Yeah,” it agrees, “I get that. You’ve just been looking over here for a while, and I wasn’t sure if you were, like, okay or if you were just checking me out.”

It winks, and this is Quackity’s opportunity to stick a foot in the door. 

He shifts in his seat so he’s fully facing the Time Devil, already reaching into the interior pocket of his suit jacket to pull out his business card. 

“Actually, no, I was wondering if-”

He’s cut off by the Time Devil: “‘Cause I wouldn’t be opposed if you were checking me out.”

Quackity blinks, momentarily freezing. “Uh, no?”

“I mean, I was definitely checking you out this whole time. Like, that’s probably a little forward of me to say, but I don’t see the point of beating around the bush with this sort of thing,” the Time Devil continues, ignoring Quackity’s attempts to correct it. “Life’s too short to get caught up on maybes, y’know?”

“Uh,” Quackity says, thinking about the solid two weeks he spent ignoring the flowers piling up on his desk and the fiend giving him said flowers. “Yeah, no, I get it. I absolutely get it. But-”

“Great! Is that your phone number?”

Quackity only mildly protests as the Time Devil plucks the business card right out of his hand. It looks the card over, a pleased pink blush spreading across its cheeks. 

“Quackity, huh?” it asks. It looks from the card up at him. “You’re a devil hunter? That’s cool. I’ve always wanted to do that, but I’m not exactly built for it.”

It flexes a noodly arm, any and all potential muscles hidden beneath its baggy hoodie. 

“Yeah,” Quackity says, “I’m a- yeah.” He nods. “I’m a devil hunter.”

“And that’s cool! I really don’t care, even if you guys are, like, cops.” Its nose wrinkles, and Quackity can’t even find it in himself to be offended. “Like, I get it, but half the devils don’t even do anything. Blood sacrifices and stuff aside, most of them just, like, chill, y’know?”

Quackity knows. Dream heard about a so-called Man Devil a couple months ago and has been hot on its trail since despite not knowing a thing about it, not even its human disguise. Quackity suspects that’s why he wants the Time Devil on his side; he’s been pooling an awful lot of resources lately looking for what Quackity is pretty sure is just a dude. 

But then there are devils and fiends like Sapnap, who may be a big ol’ panda bear on the outside, but he also eats people and is the literal physical incarnation of the fear of fire. And even Sapnap, who Quackity first met as he was burning down an orphanage for fun, is scared of the Nightmare Devil. 

The Time Devil looks like the kind of guy that would think that ketchup is spicy. There is an account from 1975 of a school bus full of kids on a field trip rapidly aging until they all died of old age. A news article from 2004 has a picture of a woman who’s been stuck in time since 1765, trapped in her own body as time moves on around her. 

The Time Devil scribbles something down on a fresh page in its notebook, tears out the page, and hands it to Quackity, who is too caught up in his own thoughts to protest. 

“I’ll call you tonight,” the Time Devil says, and Quackity doesn’t doubt it. “Eight.”

Quackity looks down at the paper in his hands. Karl Jacobs, the ‘J’ written with a big swirl in the top, and a phone number. 

When he looks up, the Time Devil is gone. 

-

Sapnap thinks it’s funny. It isn’t funny. Sapnap thinks it is, though, and he apparently thinks it’s funny enough to bring up constantly. He’s lucky that Quackity loves him, because he’s really starting to push it with the comments. 

“Wow, can’t believe you’re going on a date with the Time Devil without me,” Sapnap whines. 

“It’s not a date,” Quackity flatly replies. 

He’s pretty sure it is a date, but he can’t just admit that. Not to his boyfriend, anyway, he doesn’t know how Sapnap would react if he actually came out and said, yeah, he’s going on a date with the Time Devil. If there’s one thing that Sapnap is loyal to, it’s Dream. Really, it means that Sapnap is loyal to making sure that Quackity doesn’t get himself killed pissing Dream off. He’s sweet. 

It’s been a month since he found the Time Devil. Or, rather, it’s been a month since he found Karl Jacobs, who just so happens to also be the Time Devil. Not that Karl has admitted that; he seems pretty content with playing human, and he doesn’t seem to realize that Quackity has been onto him this whole time. Maybe it’s cruel, calling every night and talking for hours on end and pretending that Quackity’s boss doesn’t want Karl under his control or dead, whichever ends up being easier to pull off. But, well. Quackity likes his company. He’s nice, for a devil. Not that Quackity would actually admit that. That’s a surefire way to get himself fucking murdered. 

They’re in the bathroom as Quackity finishes getting ready, Quackity looking himself in the mirror and touching up the makeup covering his scar, and Sapnap draped over his shoulders like a cat. Sapnap looks smug. Quackity doesn’t know why he looks smug, but it can’t be anything good (it rarely is.) Still, he has plans tonight, and dealing with whatever Sapnap is up to is not part of them. 

“Dude, it’s a date,” Sapnap says. He rolls his eyes and presses a light kiss to the skin below Quackity’s ear, smirking at the way Quackity shudders in response. “It’s fine. Free love and shit.”

“It’s not a date,” Quackity repeats. 

“I don’t care if it’s a date.”

“Which is nice, but it isn’t a date.”

“Suuuuure it isn’t.”

Maybe Sapnap is smug because he knows that it is a date. He and Quackity basically share an apartment these days, he’s been around for every phone call that Quackity has had with Karl. Every. Call. He’s heard the way Quackity talks to Karl, how his voice started going soft a week in, how it only took the first call for Quackity to ask if they can call nightly. He saw how Quackity started sitting by the phone waiting for Karl to call. And, yeah, Sapnap had been jealous in the beginning, but when Quackity had clarified that it was the Time Devil and how this was a work thing, nothing personal, Sapnap had cheered right up. (Possessive little shit.)

Quackity puts down his foundation and turns around to look Sapnap in the eye. Sapnap grumbles slightly, dislodged and clearly unhappy about it.

“Sapnap,” he says, putting his hands on Sapnap’s shoulders. “This is not a date. This is a work engagement.”

“Right.” Sapnap nods, stone-faced. “Engagement.”

“I am going to propose a contract to the Time Devil, and we’ll work from there.”

“Right.” Sapnap nods. “Propose.”

Quackity sighs and hangs his head. “You aren’t listening at all, are you?”

“No, I am.” Sapnap puts his arms around Quackity’s waist and puts his forehead against his. “I’m just saying that I don’t care. Promise. I want you to have a good time, even if it is professional.”

“Sapnap, I’m bringing my sword.”

“But you aren’t bringing me.”

Quackity’s breath catches, and Sapnap chuckles. He’s right. Shit, he’s right. Even if this is a date, it’s still a date with a devil. A dangerous devil, if rumors are to be believed. A devil that Dream wants under his control. And Quackity isn’t even bringing his weapon, he’s just bringing his sword. 

“Oh, God,” Quackity breathes. 

Sapnap’s nose wrinkles. “Ew.”

“Sorry. Just-”

“I get it, Q. Promise. I’ll be there in a blink if you need me, but I don’t think you will.”

“How do you know?” Quackity asks. 

And there it is again, the smug look. Quackity doesn’t like it, whatever it is. Bad vibes. Weird vibes, mostly, but Sapnap’s vibes are rarely good. 

“Oh, I dunno,” Sapnap responds. “I just do.”

He kisses Quackity, then, pointed teeth digging into Quackity’s bottom lip just slightly and just ever so briefly before he pulls away, leaving Quackity wanting more. 

“Have a good time,” Sapnap says, a weird look in his eye. “And wear protection.”

He winks, and Quackity only halfway wants to smack him. 

-

Quackity has more than enough money left in the bank, but he takes Karl to McDonald’s, anyway. It’s close enough for Sapnap to be able to get there if Quackity is in danger, but it’s far enough away to keep Dream and his pet Punz from spying. 

Karl looks… nice. He looks nice. Quackity, fully aware that this is a date, feels himself blushing as he watches Karl order his food. Karl’s wearing a necklace tonight, a gold chain and a beautiful purple amethyst, and Quackity staring at that is enough of an excuse for him to stare at Karl’s neck. This is a date, he knows it’s a date, but it’s still weird. Sapnap is weird enough to get away with staring at; he may be the Fire Fiend, but he’s also Sapnap. Karl is something else entirely. Something dangerous. 

Something dangerous, but Quackity isn’t entirely convinced. He watches Karl trip over his own shoelace three separate times as he makes his way to the fountain drink dispenser against the wall. Tonight, Karl’s sweater is stained with what Quackity knows is blood but that Karl played off as ketchup stains from lunch. His jeans are ripped. The skin beneath is pale, inhumanly so. Karl is like a doll, his body is so perfectly made. 

Or, Quackity thinks, like an angel. 

By the time they sit down in a back booth, Quackity has decided to rip the bandaid off. 

“I would like to propose a contract,” he bluntly says. 

Karl hasn’t even finished unwrapping his hamburger. He freezes, burger half unwrapped. 

“Oh,” Karl softly says. 

He puts his burger down, throat bobbing, and Quackity… he feels bad. 

“Sorry,” he says. “I just-”

“No! No, I get it.”

Karl laughs lightly, looking right down at the table. He doesn’t see the tight, pained look on Quackity’s face, or the hesitant hand halfway reaching across the table to try and take his. 

“You knew all along, didn’t you?” Karl asks. 

“Yeah.” Quackity nods, voice tight. “I did. But-”

“No, it’s fine, Quackity, really. I don’t care. I don’t mind. I’d love to enter a contract with you, really. I just… can’t.”

It’s now that Quackity realizes that the restaurant is silent. Looking around, he sees that nobody else is moving. Outside, a dog crossing the road is frozen just seconds away from getting hit by a car. The light rain starting to fall has stopped, droplets hung in the air outside the window like tiny little Christmas lights. Frozen. 

Slowly, Quacity looks back at Karl. 

“I’m pretty strong, y’know?” Karl continues. He folds his hands together, thumbs awkwardly twiddling. “I’m the Time Devil. I’m probably one of the oldest devils out there. Maybe I’m the oldest. But just ‘cause I’m old doesn’t make me powerful. Like, I’m not weak, but I’m not as strong as I used to be. Nobody’s really scared of time anymore. It’s all guns and stuff these days, y’know?”

“Okay?” Quackity says. “That’s fine? Look, I’m not actually the one that wants to enter a contract with you, but that isn’t important right now. Can I hold your hand for a second?”

Karl glances up at him through his eyelashes, hesitant. But, eventually, he holds his hand out. Quackity takes it. 

It’s cold. 

“Karl, I’m a devil hunter,” Quackity says. “I have personally entered contracts with three separate devils, and two of them are weak as shit. I’m pretty sure my boss is a devil. My boyfriend is a fiend. I literally don’t care if you’re powerful or not, but that’s not what’s important here.”

“Your boyfriend?” Karl asks, mouth twisting slightly in… some way, Quackity can’t exactly tell what emotion that’s supposed to be, but he’s on a roll right now. 

Quackity shakes his head. “I told my boyfriend that this was a business meeting, but it’s a date, okay? Even if you weren’t the devil I’m supposed to be negotiating with right now, I’d want to be getting dinner right now with you because I like you.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah, ‘oh’. To be honest, I don’t even want you to enter a contract with my boss, but it’s kind of my job to offer one to you. He’s willing to pay the standard, but that isn’t what’s important right now.”

Karl’s mouth does its funny little thing again. “You keep talking about what’s important, but you still haven’t said what it is.”

Oh, good, he’s dumb. He and Sapnap would get along great. 

Quackity rolls his eyes fondly. “It’s you.”

Karl’s eyes widen dramatically. “Oh!”

“Yeah, ‘oh’.”

“But then… why did you even bring up a contract in the first place?” 

Karl tilts his head like a puppy, and it’s hard to imagine that this is probably the oldest devil on the planet right now. He has to be up there with Death. He’s killed millions upon millions over the millennia he’s been alive, the entire planet has frozen in time around the two of them, and he has freckles and the most kissable lips that Quackity has seen in his life. 

Quackity shrugs. “Wanted to get it out of the way early so we could enjoy ourselves. The boss doesn’t really like the idea of pleasure over business.”

“And I’m pleasure?” Karl asks, batting his eyelashes. 

Quackity smiles and brings Karl’s hand up to his lips for a delicate kiss that leaves Karl gasping in delight. 

“Of course,” Quackity says. 

“Oh,” Karl says. “Well. You’re my pleasure, too, Quackity.”

With that, he snatches Quackity’s hand across the table so he can kiss it, much more wet and exaggerated than Quackity’s kiss. 

Quackity is so caught up in the moment that he almost doesn’t catch Karl muttering, “Wow, Fire Devil was right, he is romantic.”

…But that’s something to think about later. That’s something to think about when Quackity is back home with said “Fire Devil”. Now? Now Quackity has a job to do. More importantly, he has a date to finish. 

“So…” he starts. 

“I’ll enter a contract with you,” Karl interjects. 

Quackity blinks. Uh oh. “What.”

It isn’t a question, but Karl treats it as such. 

“I’ll enter a contract with you,” he repeats. “Tell your boss he can shove it up his ass. I want you. You get my powers at your disposal, and I-”

Quackity’s voice is strangled in his throat as he interjects with a very intelligent, “Agh.”

Karl giggles, a light and beautiful sound, picking up right where he left off. “And Quackity, you know what I want from you, right?”

He licks his lips, and Quackity suddenly has a very good idea. He’s done this three times before, but, suddenly, he has a feeling that this is actually the right way to do it. Screw those other guys. 

He nods, and Karl beams, all sharp teeth and unholy terror. 

He leans across the table, and Quackity meets him halfway. 

[harebellpudding]

tifa x cloud x sephiroth poto au

cloud is christine, tifa is raoul and sephiroth is the phantom

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