#>> could and couldn't would or wouldn't (i mean guess which one is more convenient) do something wrong in every scenario ever

[slimyenemy]

chat i love them sm

[angelsknifeprty]

couldn't fight to save your life (but you look so cool) ❀˖꩜˚࿔ - e.w

loser!ellie x popular!reader | 3.2k words

a/n: guess who rewatched bottoms for the billionth time (me. it was me.) :p loser!ellie won't leave my mind and neither will crush by ethel cain so here's somethin' random i came up with, enjoy!

cw: cursing, bullying, a little violence, mentions of blood, two idiots that are obviously infatuated with each other, mentions of reader wanting to punch ellie for being too cute cuz they’re strange like that

˖𓂃.☘︎ ݁˖

you're an angel, she's sure of it.

ellie watches with glassy eyes, practically in a trance, as you absentmindedly play with your hair. she drinks in the way your perfectly curated outfit adorns your body; you always look flawless to her. you were laughing at something your friend had said, ellie's ears straining to hear the saccharine sound over the chatter buzzing. she just heard it, and god, what she would do to have a recording of it to listen to over and over again.

the two of you weren't friends by any means, but she knew you.

most of ellie's time was spent staring at you during class or when you passed her in the hallway. her eyes would shy away every time they met yours, the intensity of your gaze leaving her a flustered mess within seconds. 

when she wasn't looking at you, her head was buried into her journal, pencil dragging fervently across the pages. her entries always had your name embedded somewhere within their sentences. it was like you were all she could think about. when she would draw, the lines and curves always morphed into you, capturing a moment of you daydreaming in class or whatever other snapshot her mind had taken of you that wouldn't stop plaguing her.

she'd listen to your conversations when she was close enough to hear - not to be a creep or anything! but how else was she supposed to learn more about you?

sure, the obvious answer would be to talk to you, but she was a nervous wreck from just seeing you. you'd only had a few brief interactions before, and she swears she almost fainted when you remembered her name when you asked her for a pen once.

while she believed the popularity contest that was high school to be ridiculous, her very low place in the school's hierarchy was a definite set-up for failure, she was certain. ellie kept to herself, mostly, aside from her few friends, but that didn't stop her from becoming the target of relentless bullying from some of the other students, the ones at the top of the food chain.

you were well-liked amongst your peers, but your popularity never merged you with those people. you were known for your sunny disposition, whereas they tormented their way to the top.

you'd seen it happen a couple of times, the sound of their jeering always catching your attention, especially when you heard them say ellie's name in that disgusting tone that made your heart ache for her. in fact, it's what snapped you out of your current conversation as an irritated, "what the fuck, williams?" sounds throughout the hallway.

in her lovestruck daze, ellie hadn't been looking where she was walking, which conveniently caused her to bump into one of them - a girl you didn't care much for, quinn was it? all you knew for sure was that she was trouble.

ellie winced and scrunched her face at the sound of her voice, internally cursing at herself because now she had to deal with her. she opened her eyes to see that everyone was looking, including you.

"shit, sorry. wasn't looking where i was going, won't happen again," ellie's tone is curt, trying to move past her and continue with her day before things got worse.

but of course, she wouldn't get let off the hook that easily; that was just her luck.

"where do you think you're going?" she probes, moving to block ellie's path. ellie has to restrain herself from rolling her eyes in her face, not wanting to escalate things if she could help it. how naive of her to think that nothing could ever be easy for her.

"c'mon, dude. i apologised. can we move on and-"

suddenly, it feels like the wind was knocked from ellie's lungs, and she's… falling?

a little stunned, she looks up from her newfound place on the floor after quinn has shoved her to the ground. all because of an accident that could have been easily brushed off and forgotten about. such a dumb fucking reason, and yet it has ellie seething.

"you should watch where you're going, williams. always lurking where nobody wants you to be." quinn spits, taunting ellie to get a rise out of her. 

it was likely that ellie's indifferent reactions to quinn's bullying irritated her, unable to fathom why ellie wouldn't buckle and submit like every other one of her unfortunate victims.

while the teasing and mean remarks were an unfortunate constant in her life, this never mellowed ellie. she was always quick-witted, her slight temper always having her ready to argue back and stand up for herself, and this time was no different.

ellie rises from the ground and delivers an equally hard shove, an irate, "what the fuck is your problem?" leaving her chapped lips. being the drama-obsessed hive mind that high schoolers were, it didn't take long for people to start crowding around the two once things intensified.

you had been watching the whole thing from afar before a wall of people began forming, not realising it'd evolve into this. you heard a pained groan rip from ellie's throat after what you presumed was the first punch being thrown. now you are only able to listen to the commotion but not see the situation, making your anxiety skyrocket. 

you liked to keep an attentive eye on ellie from a distance despite your paths rarely crossing, feeling some strange obligation to watch over her. you knew quinn and her posse of assholes always gave ellie a hard time, but she seemed to handle herself just fine, sometimes hearing one of her clever comebacks that made you giggle.

while the brawl entertained everyone else, you grew increasingly agitated. you were never one for drama and kept a relatively peaceful circle of friends, but the idea of just standing and doing nothing felt like a personal failure.

so, before you knew it, you were excusing yourself from your friends and pushing your way through the crowd to get to ellie.

once you breached the crowd, you found yourself in the eye of the storm, your eyes wide. after a while of their struggle against each other, quinn was now situated on top of ellie as she delivered a particularly hard punch to ellie's cheek. the wounded groan she let out was what urged you out of your frozen shock, rushing towards the tangle of violent limbs, grabbing quinn's shoulder and pulling her off of ellie with a hard tug.

"get the hell away from her!" you yell, trying hard to ignore the disappointed groans of the audience as you interrupt their entertainment. "assholes." you thought to yourself.��

wiping the blood from her nose, the sight of the trickling crimson more satisfying to you than it should be, quinn looks at you confused, clearly not expecting you of all people to come to ellie's rescue.

"the fuck are you doing?" she sneers, looking between you and ellie, who is still on the floor, propping herself up on her elbows with the nastiest glare you'd ever seen on her face. "don't tell me you actually give a shit about this loser-"

"back off, don't touch her," you snarled, pushing past her to kneel beside ellie on the ground.

you had this untouchable air about you, something that was a little lost on you but not to quinn. she knew you had people to back you up, her targets usually being the loner outcast types, being the coward she is. the same ruthlessness ellie received was not given to you, an irritated scoff being all you heard from quinn. she was the least of your worries right now.

"are you okay?" you ask, a little breathless from the adrenaline of putting yourself in the middle of a fight in front of an audience. your brows furrowed at how quickly deep purples and blues had already started blooming around ellie's eye and her freckled cheek. 

ellie looked at you blankly, her mouth opening and closing like a fish, and she tried desperately to find any words to say to you. how was she supposed to think straight? the rush from the fight and now having her crush come to her aid rendered her speechless. her lack of answer only worried you more, pinning her silence on being stunned from the fight still.

"ellie, i need you to answer-"

you were cut off by the sound of the principal pushing his way through the mass, his stern voice demanding that the two battered girls follow him to his office.

you watch doe-eyed and nervous as ellie pushes herself off the floor with a wince, looking at you with eyes that have so much to say yet a mouth that cannot quite verbalise it. but she couldn't stay, so without a word, she reluctantly trudged behind the principal with her head hanging low, utterly fed up, and man, that one punch hurt.

˖𓂃.☘︎ ݁˖

you peered around the corner to the row of chairs lined up outside the principal's office, eyes fixated on ellie's slumped figure occupying one of them. you had been watching for at least a minute or two now despite there being the opportunity to approach her like any other normal person. but this was comfortable for you, familiar. if ellie believed she was the only person with a staring problem, and she did, then she was painfully wrong.

it felt routine for you to watch her like this from afar, a look in your eyes brimming with so much more than just innocent curiosity.

it was like you could sense her presence in a room, your gaze always finding her so easily amongst the hoard of other students. your eyes would rake up and down as you shamelessly drank her in, that camo jacket of hers that she wore like a safety blanket hanging loosely from her frame. she wore it infuriatingly well, paired with her unbothered demeanour that looked oh so good on her. a witty remark was always ready on the tip of her tongue when one of her tormentors dared to speak to her, her scarred brow furrowing into a scowl that made your stomach flutter.

you knew what cuteness aggression was, but that surely couldn't be what you felt now. but it made you mad how badly ellie affected you even from a distance, what was once just a silly hallway crush twisting into a near-violent obsession. you spied her fresh bruises, almost filling you with a little satisfaction. serves her right, your voice whispers quietly inside your head, as if you were scared someone could hear you. you almost wished you had been the one to give her the bruises only so you could plant two gentle kisses over the skin to soothe the sting afterwards. the deep plum colour blooming across her skin still somehow made her look pretty, and you had to take a moment to ask yourself if that was a fucked up thing to think. probably. 

suddenly becoming aware of how much of a creep you must look, lingering but not daring to approach, you decided to finally go check on her. it wouldn't feel right for you not to ensure she was okay.

ellie wonders how hard she was punched when she looks up to see you, a concerned and bashful smile on your face.

"hey, ellie. i just wanted to check on you after what happened with… y'know." 

ellie spends a moment in silence as she processes what's happening. you're fidgeting with your hands, rocking back and forth on your heels like you don't know what to do with yourself. she could have scoffed in bewilderment, as if you had any right to look so nervous standing in front of her, effortlessly beautiful and so sweet.

"ellie?" you repeat her name again, softer this time. ellie almost wants to stay silent just to hear you repeat it. but she needs to respond, fuck think, think, think-

"o-oh, hey. i uh- yeah, i'm okay. nothing i can't handle," ellie finally manages to get out. you nod in acknowledgement, tearing your eyes away for just a moment to compose yourself.

"do you mind if i sit?" you gesture to the empty chair beside her, which has her perking up almost immediately. ellie nods, a simple "sure," leaving her lips in a tone that sounded far more curt than nonchalant like she intended. really, she was just trying to focus on not bursting at the seams. you were so close to her, and now she had to keep her cool.

"thanks for stepping in earlier and pulling her off of me. you didn't have to do that."

"i wasn't just gonna stand there and watch it happen," you say it like that wasn't what anyone else would have done, what they did do. all more than happy to watch her get her ass beat just to spice up what otherwise would have been another boring school day.

"i'd say i held my own somewhat well," ellie quips, her tone a little lighter than before. you giggle softly, deciding not to remind her that she had been floored by the time you got to her. she had definitely lost the fight, and in her defence, that girl was notoriously scrappy, but fortunately for you, she made losing look so good. holding herself up on her elbows, the meanest look on her dishevelled face as she stared up at the girl with an unwavering glare.

"and what did the principal have to say about that?" you press for details, head tilting curiously. you looked like a puppy, sitting all cute and pretty next to her. ellie swore you were trying to kill her; such a simple movement made her heart rate spike. 

"got a firm slap on the wrist and the usual 'you're better than this' speech." you hum in acknowledgement, a breath of a laugh exhaling through your nose.

"well, for what it's worth, i think you gave her what she deserved." your statement caught her off guard, and she was not expecting you to condone any of what went down earlier.

"oh, you think?"

"oh definitely. the only time i see her is when she's making some poor person's life hell. i'm glad to see her get a taste of her own medicine."

ellie couldn't argue with that, shrugging in agreement as she tried to keep the pride bubbling up in her chest at bay.

"i am a little surprised, though. i wasn't expecting you to entertain a fight with her." this makes ellie raise her eyebrow inquisitively. did she not look tough enough to be in a fight or something? she knew she was nerdy, but surely she didn't look utterly defenceless, right?

"how come?" she questions, leaning back more comfortably in her chair, legs settling into her usual manspread that had you reeling just from seeing it from a distance, never mind being right next to her. your eyes darted around the hallway, desperately trying to focus on the conversation.

"well, y'know, i see you around, and you're usually so…" you trail off as you wave your hands in soft, fluid motions, whimsical and a little silly as you try to explain the softer side of her you had always noticed in what looked like some strange interpretive dance. 

"but back there, you were all like-" you're swinging your arms a little more frantically now, a poor recreation of some generic karate moves. you would feel like a total idiot and you very much do if it wasn't for the cheesy smile spreading across ellie's face at the sight of you.

"yeah?" she feels like she's getting lightheaded from how giddy she feels.

"yeah." you parrot back sheepishly, twiddling your thumbs to ground yourself. so cute.  

all ellie seemed to be good for was being riled up by the other students, so hearing that you had acknowledged her enough to make up your own mind about her made her feel like she was short circuiting. she was quickly snapped out of her temporary high when she felt a sharp sting on the side of her face, her sappy smile irritating her bruises.

"shit, are you okay?" you ask worriedly as she tries to brush it off with a wave of her hand.

"yeah yeah, i'm fine; this could've been way worse. you don't need to worry." her thoughts didn't quite match up with her words, though, silently begging that you'd keep doting on her. she was basking in having your undivided attention.

"ellie, these bruises are pretty big, i'm allowed to worry after i watched you get your ass handed to you," you ramble, ignoring her dismissal. 

"hey! she didn't have that much of an upper hand against me-"

you don’t reply, your hand absentmindedly reaches out to cup her jaw, being careful not to press into where it hurts as you inspect her injuries.

"has anybody checked over you yet?"

she feels like she's on fire, palms sweaty as she silently lets you examine her. she barely managed to respond to your question with a simple "no." she swore she could feel everywhere your eyes landed on her face, and fuck, your hand is so warm. the mess of a girl was surprised that steam wasn't radiating from where your skin met. 

as you give her face a final once over, you catch that frazzled deer-in-headlights look in her eyes and realise what you were doing, immediately removing your hand. if ellie wasn't frozen in place, she would have chased your touch, already missing the feeling of you on her skin.

"s-sorry, i just- i didn't mean to touch you out of nowhere. i was checking for my own peace of mind and got carried away-"

"no!" ellie interrupts a little louder than she meant to. "i mean, it's totally fine," her voice is shaking, "thank you for caring. you don't even really know me, and you're doing all this for me, so thank you."

her abruptness halts your apologetic rambling. you look at her wide-eyed for a moment before letting a soft little smile tug up the corner of your lips. if only she knew just how well you'd come to know her from all of your stolen glances, committing her to memory like she would disappear.

"don't mention it."

silence falls over you, both fidgeting shyly as you struggle to find something else to say. but that was okay. the giddy smiles you were both biting back said everything they needed to.

"i should probably get back to class, i've been holding this hall pass hostage for a while so i could come to check on you." you huff out a little disappointed sigh, reluctant to leave now that you'd finally been able to talk to ellie after so long spent longingly glancing in her direction.

"oh right, sorry. don't let me keep you, like i said i'm fine, really." ellie felt herself deflate a little now that she knew you had to go. the word pathetic came to mind when she realised how silly she must have looked, sulking like a kicked dog.

"i'm glad you're okay, ellie. i'll um… i'll see you around, yeah?" you couldn't help the hopefulness seeping through your words, and ellie noticed. the slight lilt in your sweet voice, your awkward shifting as you stood up, ready to leave.

"yeah, i'll see you around." ellie smiled up at you, ignoring the sharp twinge where her bruises were. maybe she should get beat up more often if it meant getting your attention.

[streets-in-paradise]

Tormented Longing - Maximus Decimus Meridius x Empress!Reader

Gladiator (2000) Oneshot

Warnings: Reader is in love in a devoted, frankly delulu way ( not exactly like Commodus, but you will see.). This may not make sense with the movie, in the sense that it doesn't follow the events strictly, but I love drama lol. It's one of those " doesn't make much sense, but wanted to see it written. " scenarios @wildsaltair and I were talking about.

Summary: Fate grants you a reunion with the great love you believed lost when you consult the school of gladiators searching to buy protection from the schemes of the loathed husband it enforced on you.

Note: Somewhere I can't remember, because my browser is a mess of history entries, I read of someone who wanted to have gladiators as personal guard and that triggered in my mind this concept.

As it would be expected, your visit to the school of gladiators could potentially cause a scandall. Following the disorganised style of the ruling of your husband, you guessed one more excentricity could not make more harm. After all, he was shaking the values of Rome from their very own foundations. No one escaped him, and the need for appearances between you was running out.

As the wife that Marcus Aurelius had once chosen for him, Commodus accepted your marriage of convenience with the hope of pleasing him. Your wedding was the only moment in which he recalled any kindness from his father, his approbation of you feeling his by extention. ironically, the moment that ruined your life was the logical consecuence of the failure of one of his masterplans. Scheming against the lover of his sister, your friend, he digged his own grave when the crave to get him out of her way brought you closer to his.

He knew of your tormented love for Maximus and tried to encourage you of betraying Lucilla to keep him for yourself. That brief instant of temptation was paid with the highest price, some curse from the gods unleashed a chain of events punishing you equally with your enforced union. Not long into the marriage you found out that your sacrifice had been in vain, given neither you or the emperor's daughter got to keep the man you wanted. You also discovered with horror what kind of feelings pushed Commodus to that unfortunate alliance with you.

Depraved desires, not the logical concern of a brother.

In his sick mind, he believed to experience the same kind of longing you did, and the only reward of your marriage for him was dragging you down to share his misery. If he would never have Lucilla, you would never have Maximus. Promise that he accomplished to the cruelest extent as soon as he got rid of his father. Your noble general, faithfull as he was to the murdered emperor, refused an alliance with his killer and paid with his life.

Knowing that you would mourn him like a widow, Commodus taunted you with the news as soon as he got the chance. With the grudges of the past long forgotten, Lucilla was your only comfort. Touched by grief as you both were, she still managed to remind you of your priorities. With his brother in power having no more need to cather the opinions of their father, your life on itself could be in danger.

Of course, you still were a working facade for the most morally deplorable aspect on the disgusting side of him, but power could make him question your uses. You believed Commodus wouldn't be foolish enough to make of executing his wife one of his first commands of his rule in Rome, but that didn't mean you couldn't expect some unfortunate accident to happen.

What you needed was protection, and his praetorians weren't going to grant it. There was nothing the Senate could do for you, so you had to act on yourself. With the announcement of the games in honor of the deceased emperor, a demeaning joke made in private towards your husband that slipped from you as product of your ragefull grief for Maximus making you momentarily careless of death brought you the solution.

You told Commodus that watching the matches would show him a bit of what a real man was, as if you played to replace him with one of the gladiators, and that gave you the idea of buying your own commitive of protectors. Unusual, maybe, but desperate times needed of desperate meassures.

If you wouldn't be the Empress of Rome, Proximo would have laughed in your face when you explained yourself to him.

" Lady, this men aren't guards. They are entertainers. Doing business with your husband will make me rich, ... why would I risk that? "

" I'm only asking for a handfull of them and I'm not even demanding your best." You argued in return. " I need a protective escort that would answer to me, for safety measures. "

He was terminant to deny your excentricity.

" That is not of my concern. "

" Can I at least take a look at them? It's all I ask, for now. "

With reluctance, your wish was granted. Guided towards the cages you advanced in pridefull strunt and the slaves raised following your eyes. Only one remained in his place, careless or perhaps resentfull of your attention. For him you stopped, intrigued by his attitude and perhaps something more.

" That one is off limits, empress. " His owner warned you, noticing the sparkling interest he had awakened in you. " The Spaniard is the most expected novelty I have to offer. "

His words fell on deaf ears, marvelled as you were with the resemblance with your first and only lost love. An authentic ghost of the past haunting you. Could the gods have made two men so identical, or were they fooling you? Was that man like the phantom Helen made of cloud that some said had followed Paris to Troy while the real remained in hidding? Or had the men of Commodus killed a phantom?

" Forget our deal, I will give you whatever you ask for a moment to speak with him. "

The gladiator kept his cold demeanour, refusing to engage in eye contact with you, untill your almost broken whispers towards him forced the situation.

" ... A man I once knew was from Spain. He never knew, but he was the love of my life. "

Only then, he stopped staring angrily at the ground so he could show his face to you.

" Go back to your husband, Empress. "

The utterance of your rank felt as a spit of disdain landing in your face, but the surprise overcame everything. You were smiling with tearfull eyes, ready to jump over him as a wife that welcomes her brave husband home from war.

Maximus lived and fate had brought him back to you.

His attitude was understandable, even if it was a bit unfair to you. Not only you have played no part in the complot against him, you remained pointlessly faithfull to his memory like a pathetic lapdog. Lucilla had once married a good man that left her with a son after passing, but you were entrusted to a monster you could never love. You were still his in spirit, even if you accepted long ago he could never be for you.

" He doesn't command in my heart, he never will. "

In respect of your rank, the meeting was allowed in the most comfortable settling the place could grant you. By your specifical request, and ignoring the safety hazard that a very angry Maximus implied, you tried to keep him free from chains.

" Claiming my life is not a suitable vengeance, you would be doing his work for him." You warned him as soon as you were allowed enough privacy. " He doesn't have the slightest care for me, I am only the facade of his sinister desires, but if it would please your rage I would gladly give my life for you. "

You exposed your neck, awaiting for some imaginary sword to slit your throat or his hand to squeeze your air out, but the confusion that your willingness to die upon him produced him was enough to make him desist of anything.

" How can you say such things so lightly, when so much between us has changed? You are not that sweet friend of Lucilla giving me lovely glances full of sorrow before I would follow her. My wife and son were tortured and murdered by command of your husband! "

His recriminations hurted you, but how could he had he reacted otherwise? He had no idea of what happened with you after life separated you.

" Can't you see it? Time stopped for me the day I married Commodus without facing your rejection for respect to my friend. The one thing we have in common is obsessive devotion, only never for each other ... I never stopped loving you, I would do anything in my power to make your suffering stop. I can't give back what he took from you, just as no one can return me the youthfull years of misery standing him, but before rushing into conclussions there is something you need to know. "

Falling on your knees before him, you exposed yourself completely in a heartfelt speech.

" You are my sun, the happy corner where my thoughts go hidding from the horrors of my life. Commodus lives frustrated on the impossibility to fullfill his horrendous wants, but all this time I had the comfort of knowing my love is pure. If i daydreamed of being your wife, I never wished any wrongs for the woman you have once chosen. "

The raw honesty left him with very little space for doubts. Fragility you have saved for years was tenderly left on sight for him to judge if your feelings for him were real.

Little did it matter to him at the moment, but that didn't mean it didn't give him new thoughts and couldn't yet inspire him any pitty.

" What am I supposed to say? Do you expect me to be myself or perform for your delusion now that I have no other choice? "

Having your ways get mistaken with Commodus' offended you, but you endured it.

" I want you to understand that all I ever wanted was your happiness. Nothing more, and nothing else. I want you to stop seeing me as your enemy, but can't find a proof of my sincere devotion to satisfy you. If of something I can be blamed, is of loving you more desperately than Lucilla ever did. She survived without you, but I made you a part of me. "

The part of him that felt your sorrow finally won. Lifting your chin delicately with a caress of his thumb, he granted you a first calm approach making you stare into his eyes.

" Keep this meeting as a secret and your loyalty will be proven. I need nothing else of you. "

It made you smile, hopefull to the small victory.

" That was already granted, my love. Nothing greater would you ask from me? If your presence in the arena wouldn't be so required due to the excellent fame you adquired, I would be already trying to buy you in order to find some way to release you. "

The extreme measure to save his honor was a considerable risk that would end bad for you, so a question wandering his mind came out of him without second thoughts.

" Is there anything you wouldn't do for me? "

The mockfull callout made you raise up, regaining only glimpses of your dignity.

" Do you want to escape? I would gladly run away with you. Do you want the head of Commodus, detached from his body? I have no idea of how that could happen, but I will find the way of getting it for you. I don't even need you to love me back, only to let me fill you with the affection I have kept for so long reserved for you."

He remained strictly indiferent to your provocations, but you left him few space for choice. Your hands were cuping his cheeks when you dragged him close enough to barely sense your lips against his. He kept his mouth closed, forbbiding you entrance for a full mouth kiss, but after three carefull pecks he realized you were about to cover his face with those short kisses and stopped you inmediately.

" What do you want us to be? The legendary tale of the gladiator that turned an empress into a slave? "

You wouldn't admit it, but you liked the implied epicity in his reprobatory replication.

" I endure Commodus the same way his father did: ignoring him and pretending you are mine. He wanted you for a son and I want you for a husband. Indulge me as you did for your emperor. "

[blossomthepinkbunny]

I'll probably just go on a rant after starting with this topic, but Helluva Boss really failed at showing us that Stolas doesn't look down on Imps. Or that he doesn't treat Blitzø as an exception, while not caring for Imps as a whole and the struggles they face. The only Imps/other lower-class Hellborns we see Stolas interact with are ones he:

-dislikes and shoves in Blitzø's face to make him feel guilty (Striker)

-abuses physically (his Butler)

-is indifferent to because they're on his side with being mad at Blitzø (Verosika, Tex)

-gets something out of (Blitzø, the guy at Verosikas party)

-ignores (Millie, Moxxie, Loona)

He gives Imps nicknames like: "little ones", uses the word "impish" as if Blitzø being an Imp implies anything about his behaviour (specifically his behaviour in bed). He tells Blitzø that his "friend", Striker tried to kill him, which either means that he believes every Imp knows/is friends with eachother or, that he said that to make Blitzø feel like he and Striker are like-minded (basically putting someone who was reasonably mad at him and tried to discuss their issues on the same side as someone who tried to assassinated him twice), which is manipulative as hell. He also ignores the fact that Blitzø couldn't come to save him because he had to take his daughter to the doctor (as if Loonas safety is less important than his, even though Blitzø has more of a reason to care for Loona than for him) and, that he sent Millie and Moxxie to save him (without them he literally wouldn't have survived). Stolas ignored Millie and Moxxie helping him in "LooLoo Land" as well, he only asked where Blitzø is because he is his "knight in shining armour", because he gets something out of him, which means he can just ignore the other Imps, who have no obligation/interest to sleep with him. Stolas being rich is never something he uses for the greater good. He could easily help Blitzø and his employees out financially, though I get that that might not be something Blitzø would want. But other than that as well, him seemingly having authority as royalty is completely useless. He only gets recognized in public when it's plot convenient (he has assassins trying to kill him as soon as he leaves the house in "LooLoo Land" and "Harvest Moon Festival", but going to a party with atleast 50 people or so is completely fine and no one seems to recognize him). We don't really see any of the duties he has as royalty. Apart from organizing the Harvest Moon festival, there really seems to be nothing he does (unless i'm forgetting something). The fact that he has to repress his sexuality also feels a little less impactful when you remember that Andrealphus and Vasago are also Gay. Though I guess we don't really know the connection they'll have to the story yet. The fact that he is super wealthy isn't really brought to focus either. He lives in a mansion and wears fancier clothes than the Imps, but that's just sorta it. Him being royal just makes the power imbalance much more apparent. Something that (from how I see it) was done intentionally, because Blitzø and Stolas were never ment to be endgame from the very start. At first it seems like Stolas is mostly just a running gag character, who got some depth in "LooLoo Land" but was never ment to be that important to Blitzø's story. He was more of a device that the I.M.P need to keep save, not because they actually cared for him (as he doesn't really care for them either), but because he is the only way they'll get to the human world. Characters that seemed like they'd be much more important to Blitzø's personal journey were:

-Moxxie (who probably gets used the best out of pretty much every character in HB, atleast in his relationship with Blitzø. Though they also didn't have real interactions for a while now)

-Loona (who hasn't changed her abusive behaviour towards him, because the show fails to give her meaningful screentime with Blitzø)

-Millie (who sorta has no real relationship to Blitzø aside from not really being dismissive of his actions. Though the Ghost episode might focus on how they met, etc.)

-Verosika (who they could've gotten more out of with the actually interesting relation she has to Blitzø, with a seemingly genuine and happy relationship they had, had they not sidelined her for the other, more uninteresting ship)

-Fizzarolli (who is utilized pretty well, though he and Blitzø got over their issues really fast and now they're just best buddies again with no complications and interesting moments whatsoever)

-Barbie Wire (Ya know, his sister who literally got nothing at all in terms of screentime, even though she should arguably be one of, if not the most important relationship Blitzø would need to be confronted with)

-Striker (who, from my understanding presented not only a threat to Stolas, but also a possible temptation for Blitzø to go against the system they live in. It was clear that he and Blitzø shared atleast some common ground, judging by the fact that he nearly became a new member of I.M.P because Blitzø liked him. They had chemistry and what Striker says about the system of hell is true and seemed like it would present a new option for Blitzø. A way to break free from oppression, which he might have never considered but is considering now that someone gave him a chance for things to change. But Striker got turned into a villian who completely lost the connection he shared with Blitzø. To become just another way the show could coddle Stolas by saying: "Oh no, Striker is saying that the upper class takes advantage of the lower classes?! But Stolas would never look down on Blitzø! He must be really aggressive and also, he was just hired by the evil Stella who wants Stolas dead for no good reason! So let's just ignore all the good reasons Striker has for wanting Stolas dead one way or another! Striker doesn't know what he's talking about, he was only an Imp suppressed by the upper class his whole life, how would he know what's best for Imp's?! Afterall Stolas is in love with Blitzø for real!!! That means that there is no problem with the royalty whatsoever and Striker and anyone like him should just shut up and stop complaining UwU..." <- definitely exaggerated)

(can you tell i'm really upset about what they did with Striker)

Some of these characters got dropped in order to make space for more screentime for Stolas, who is now considered the most important relationship for Blitzøs development, even though he should most definitely heal in other places, with other people before immediately deciding wether he wants to be in a romantic and sexual relationship or not. Blitzø has lots of issues and hurt a lot of people, there should be a lot of room to explore these relationships and to make Blitzø heal by sorting out his stuff, but the one he has with Stolas is not the one they should focus on first and foremost. If the way they've been writing Stolas for season two isn't going to change for the better, then I think he should've just stayed as an edgy joke. Atleast then he would've added context to the Imp's lower class status without taking away screentime from them and leaving way more interesting characters to be ingnored.

[queenshelby]

Our Little Secret (Part Four)

Pairing: Dark! Cillian Murphy x Virgin! Reader

Warning: Smut, Age-Gap, Daddy Issues

Notes: This will not be a love story. It will be dark, twisted and kinky. Cillian is portrayed as totally off cannon.

About fifteen minutes later, you reached the elegant hotel restaurant and bar on the top floor of the Four Seasons.

The dimly lit room was adorned with an elegant floral arrangement, candles creating a romantic ambience.

Cillian had ordered some wine for you and the conversation flowed easily, filling the silence with tales of past adventures and shared desires and you could not help but bring up his wife again, knowing very well that you may be overstepping a line. 

"How long have you been married for?" you asked casually, trying to gauge the depth of his unhappiness. Cillian sighed heavily, a look of resignation crossing his face.

"A very long time," he replied, his voice devoid of emotion. "It started as a marriage of convenience when she fell pregnant, but it turned into something more." He took a sip of his wine, his eyes avoiding yours as he spoke. "But then, years later, we've grown apart, both personally and sexually." He hesitated for a moment, searching for the right words.

"It's complicated," he finally admitted, his voice rough with emotion before seeking to change the topic.

"So what about you? Why don't you have a boyfriend?" Cillian inquired curiously, leaning closer to you across the table. His gaze roamed your face, seemingly seeking answers to questions unspoken. You couldn't help but notice the way his eyes lingered on your lips, an unmistakable desire evident in them.

"Well, you know, life has just been busy for me," you tried to explain lightly, hoping to deflect attention away from your lack of romantic experiences.

"And you haven't found anyone who interests you?" Cillian pressed further, his voice laced with concern.

"No. Most of the guys I am interested in are much older than me and some are married," you said, blushing, seeing that Cillian too was more than twice your age.

"I can see a common theme here," Cillian chuckled before running his fingers over your hand suggestively. 

"And why would that be?" you questioned, teasing him. 

"Well, I am older, and I am married," Cillian smiled before pointing out something quite substantial. "I suppose you just wanted someone experienced, huh? Or maybe you just enjoy indulging in illicit affairs which, can be quite dangerous as you know," he answered, his eyes twinkling with humour. 

"Oh, I wouldn't say it's necessarily dangerous, just a bit naughty," you giggled, feeling your cheeks heat up under his gaze. 

"True, it might not be inherently dangerous," Cillian conceded, his fingers playing with your wrist seductively. "But, sometimes these secrets can lead to situations you didn't intend or expect," Cillian pointed out, reaching for another glass of wine. 

"Have you ever gotten caught cheating?" you asked, knowing very well that you were not the only one Cillian had ever been involved with outside his marriage. There were rumors in the paper, circulating with respect to at least two actresses as well as his assistant, Siobhan. 

"No," Cillian confessed. "I never cheated, not until now at least," Cillian pointed out, and your chin dropped.

"Really?" you asked with surprise, taking another sip of your drink.

"Really," Cillian told you, running his finger around the rim of his wine glass.

"Although, it did cross my mind before, I admit that," he confessed, his expression turning serious.

"Why?" you asked.

"I guess I was curious about the thrill of doing something forbidden, even though I know that it would ultimately destroy my marriage," he explained and, as the conversation continued, you found yourself drawn to Cillian's dark and mysterious persona.

"Well, that is kind of what you are doing now, with your brother's stepdaughter out of all people," you chuckled, feeling the alcohol loosen your tongue. "So, I mean, I guess we both share a twisted sense of morality," you continued, raising your glass playfully.

"Maybe," Cillian smirked, his eyes glinting with mischief. "I suppose I just no longer care about my marriage, and I really enjoy myself with you, which makes it hard to stop now," he said, running his fingers idly along your thigh. Your heart raced, sensing the raw power beneath his seemingly gentle exterior.

Despite his obvious flaws, there was an undeniable allure about him that made you feel like you were standing on the edge of a precipice – eager to plunge into the unknown.

"Now tell me, why me? I am only nineteen, I am your step-niece and I have absolutely no experience when it comes to sex," you admitted, feeling a little self-conscious about your lack of knowledge and inexperience.

"Your innocence intrigued me. It is not something I have encountered before, and the fact that you are my step-niece doesn't bother me. We only just met," Cillian said gently, running his finger along your thigh still.

"I think you are beautiful," he told you softly, staring into your eyes with such intensity that it sent shivers down your spine. You felt your heart race, sensing the raw power beneath his seemingly gentle exterior.

"Do you like teaching me and training me new things?" you teased and Cillian nodded playfully, his eyes dancing with mischief.

"Yes, I like teaching you, and I like how you respond to me when I touch you and show you things," he continued, his fingers tracing your skin.

"You make me feel young again," he whispered huskily, leaning in close enough to taste the sweetness of your lips.

You couldn't help but feel a sudden surge of confidence at his words, finding solace in the fact that you were making him feel younger and more alive. Perhaps this relationship, despite its inauspicious beginnings, was giving you both the thrill you sought, offering a mutual escape from the monotony of your respective lives.

"Should we go back to the room?" Cillian then asked,

his voice a low rumble in your ear. You couldn't help but agree, as your body seemed to hum with a familiar, yet unfulfilled energy.

Without a word, you stood up and grabbed your coat, leaving a generous tip for the waiter before walking out of the restaurant with Cillian. 

***

When you arrived back at the hotel room an hour later and with the buttplug still inside of you, your mind was flooded with the idea of the night ahead. The sexual tension between you two was palpable and as you prepared for another round of passionate lovemaking, you couldn't help but imagine all the ways Cillian would tease and torture you tonight.

In the room, Cillian removed his jacket and undid his shirt, revealing his freckled torso. The sight sent a wave of desire coursing through your veins, heightening your arousal.

"I am so ready to fuck you again," Cillian told you assertively, his dominant tone causing a mix of fear and excitement within you. With practised ease, he moved his body against yours, expertly positioning you both on the bed.

As you lay side by side, Cillian slowly began exploring your body with his hands, tracing the outline of your breasts and circling your nipples, making you squirm with anticipation. He then gently pulled you onto his lap, allowing you to straddle him. Your hips met his with a gentle swaying motion, eliciting moans from both of you.

Cillian reached between your legs, finding the base of the butt plug and gently pressing his thumb against it, triggering a surge of sensation through your entire body. Your breath caught in your throat, and your entire being trembled with anticipation.

"What do you do with the other women, in bed?" you dared to ask, your curiosity piqued. Cillian smirked slightly, a knowing look in his eyes.

"It depends on who they are," he responded evasively. "Some want it rough, others prefer something sweet and tender." Cillian lowered his head, brushing his lips against yours. Your body tensed with anticipation as you felt his warm breath on your face. "But, ultimately, what they all have in common is that they want to please me," he whispered hoarsely, his voice filled with confidence.

You nodded silently, understanding his ego. He placed his hands on either side of your face, his fingers gently massaging your temples.

"Do you trust me?" he whispered intimately, his eyes searching yours intensely. Your heart raced at the prospect of submitting completely to his will. "Yes," you whispered back, unable to hide the tremble in your voice.

With that, Cillian leaned in, kissing you deeply, his tongue exploring your mouth hungrily. You moaned into his mouth, driven by the raw passion emanating from him.

"Good," Cillian murmured approvingly, his hands gripping your waist firmly. His thumb traced over your ass, sending a delicious shiver through your core. "Because I can't wait to see how far we can take this," he whispered, his breath hot against your ear. "I love it when a woman gives herself fully to me," he confided in a low voice, causing a blush to rise on your cheeks.

Cillian released you from his grasp, sliding his hands up your thighs to caress your hips and the small of your back.

"I give myself to you, Cillian. Do with me what you want," you whispered, your voice trembling with anticipation. Hearing those words sent a surge of power coursing through Cillian's veins. He felt like he held the reins of an untamed stallion, one he was determined to break and tame.

"Good girl," he whispered, gently guiding your hands to his own hard cock.

Your heart skipped a beat as you tentatively wrapped your fingers around his length, feeling its heat and size.

Cillian groaned softly, his gaze fixed on you as you explored him.

"Look at me," he commanded, his voice a low rumble. You met his eyes, finding them filled with hunger and lust.

Cillian's fingers roamed your body, lightly touching your skin as if committing every inch to memory before ordering you get on to the bed.

"I want you on all fours," he instructed firmly, making you feel even more submissive under his control.

As you moved into position, your skin prickled with anticipation, your breathing growing shallow.

With you now on all fours, Cillian stood behind you, gently guiding your hips with his hands. The weight of his body pressed against your back, making you feel both safe and vulnerable at the same time. His hands roamed over your body, stopping momentarily to stroke your buttocks before moving on.

"That buttplug suits your ass," he growled appreciatively, causing your body to shudder involuntarily.

"Now, do you think you can take the next size up?" he whispered, his voice husky with desire.

His fingers trailed across your back, causing your flesh to quiver with anticipation. 

"Another buttplug?" you queried with nervousness, causing Cillian to smirk.

"Yes. This one is wider and will stretch you even further," Cillian told you. "Trust me, it won't hurt much, and you'll be glad you did it afterwards," he said confidently, giving you the impression that he had done this many times before. You hesitated, unsure if you could really allow him to insert yet another object into your rear end. Cillian saw your reluctance and decided to be more persuasive. He gently grabbed your chin, forcing you to meet his gaze.

"I want you to trust me," he growled, his eyes full of authority. Your pulse quickened at the thought of submitting entirely to his whims.

"Okay," you answered, your voice barely audible.

Cillian smiled confidently, reaching for the bag containing various sex toys. He picked out a new buttplug – slightly larger than the first one. His hand reached behind you and he pulled out the first plug which was now completly covered in his cum.

As he discarded it, you gasped at the sudden feeling of openness in your backside. Cillian grinned at your reaction, and quickly inserted the new, wider plug. He worked it into your tight hole slowly, gauging your response as he went. Your breath hitched at the invasion, but you fought the urge to squirm away from the foreign object. It took some force, but eventually the plug was securely lodged inside you.

The sense of fullness sent shivers down your spine.

With the added size of the buttplug, your muscles clenched around it, making you gasp at the sensation. Cillian noticed your discomfort and reassured you that it would feel better soon. He stepped closer, reaching for your breast with one hand, and your chin with the other.

"I promise you'll enjoy this," he whispered gently, his eyes boring into yours. "Just relax and let go," he coaxed, encouraging you to submit entirely to his desires.

As he held you in place, Cillian began exploring your wetness with his fingers, gently probing your opening. He took in the sounds of your breathing, the way your body trembled under his touch, and your increasing arousal. His fingers circled your entrance, getting it wetter and more inviting for his erection.

Soon, you heard the zipper of his jeans being lowered. His cock sprang free, already erect and eager.

"This might hurt a little, but I know that you will be a good girl for me and take it," Cillian said before he knelt behind you, between your legs, as he positioned himself at your entrance. With one powerful thrust, he penetrated you deeply, making you gasp at the intensity of the sensation.

Between the buttplug stretching your anus and his cock stretching your pussy, you felt a strange mix of pain and pleasure coursing through your body.

"You're so tight," Cillian whispered, his voice hoarse with desire. "Just right for my cock." His hands reached for your hips, guiding you deeper onto his cock with each thrust.

He began a steady rhythm, pushing deep into you with each plunge, then retreating just enough to let you catch your breath before pulling you back into him again.

The sound of flesh slapping against flesh echoed throughout the room, punctuated by your gasps and moans.

"I love fucking you raw and I can't wait to fill your pussy with my cum," Cillian panted, his face etched with passion. The intensity of his lustful gaze sent a shiver down your spine.

You couldn't help but match his energy, your hands gripping the sheets tightly as your hips bucked instinctively with each powerful thrust.

"Take my cock. That's it," Cillian demanded harshly, causing you to gasp and obey. 

The sensation of being thoroughly claimed and owned sent waves of arousal coursing through your body.

Cillian's rough hands gripped your hips tightly, pulling you deeper onto his cock with each thrust. His raw, animalistic nature only heightened the experience, leaving you craving more of his dominant presence.

You cried out in ecstasy as Cillian continued to pound into you, his fingers digging into your hips with each powerful stroke. The sound of your moans filling the room fueled his lust further, as he took his cock out, only to plunge back into you once more.

"Such a good girl," he growled, pushing his cock deeper inside you.

Your hands clutched at his shoulders, holding onto him as he pounded into you, his hips thrusting wildly.

"Fuck, yes!" you screamed, matching his fervor.

Your orgasm built, an intense wave of pleasure coursing through your body, mirroring his own.

"Cum with me," Cillian ordered roughly, his voice hoarse with desire as your movements became frantic, your passionate frenzy reaching its peak.

Cillian's rough hands gripped your hips tightly, pushing you down on his cock with each thrust. His raw, animalistic nature only heightened the experience, leaving you craving more of his dominant presence.

The room was filled with the rhythmic sounds of flesh colliding together, accompanied by your moans and cries of ecstasy. Cillian's possessive gaze left no doubt about his dominance over you. With each thrust, you felt yourself surrendering completely to his lustful desires.

"You will be leaking my cum all night long, fuck..." Cillian growled, driving into you with a renewed ferocity. His hands gripped your hips tightly, keeping you in place as he took you to the edge.

You reached your peak with him, crying out in ecstasy as your body shook with orgasmic pleasure.

Cillian followed close behind, his slender frame tensing as he allowed himself to succumb to the release. His powerful orgasm pulsed through him, his eyes meeting yours as he let out a feral groan.

He filled you with his seed and you felt it spurt, warm and thick, deep inside you. 

"Take it out," you then told him, referring to the buttplug which was still embedded within you. "I need it removed."

Cillian nodded, understanding that your body needed relief after such an intense encounter. He gently caressed your cheek with the back of his hand, kissing your forehead softly.

"You did well," he murmured, taking out the buttplug. Your sphincter contracted reflexively around the cold object, making you wince as it slipped out of you.

"And maybe in a few days, I can put my cock into your tight hole instead," Cillian smirked, leaning down to press a tender kiss on your forehead. 

You blushed, both embarrassed and flattered by his words. "That will hurt though, won't it?" you asked while Cillian's fingers stroked your hair gently, his lips brushing against your earlobe.

He spoke softly, his voice almost a whisper. "It will, but remember, I want you to trust me." He nibbled at your neck lightly, sending shivers down your spine.

You nodded, trying to hide your growing excitement beneath the covers. "I do," you whispered back, your heart racing in anticipation.

"Good," Cillian smiled before getting up from the bed and walking towards the spa bath, which was conveniently located on the large balcony of the hotel room.

He invited you to join him there. He poured a bottle of champagne into two glasses, then popped the cork, letting it fly high into the air. As the foam settled back into the glass, Cillian handed you one and raised his own.

"To more sexy encounters to come" he toasted, his eyes sparkling with mischief. You hesitated, unsure if you were ready to commit to something like this. However, curiosity got the best of you, and you raised your glass as well.

"To us," you said, your voice wavering slightly. You took a sip of the champagne, feeling the effervescent liquid dance across your tongue. The bubbles tickled your throat, sending shivers down your spine.

Cillian smiled, pleased with your willingness to engage in this illicit adventure. He lifted his glass, clinking it against yours. "Cheers," he replied, his deep voice rumbling seductively.

"Let's make sure we have more meetings like this," he teased, running his fingers along your exposed arm. The sensation sent shivers down your spine, and you could feel your nipples hardening immediately again. 

Without saying anything, you both climbed into the warm water, embracing each other, their bodies pressed against each other. Cillian's hand wandered up your thigh, gently stroking the inside, causing your knee to jerk involuntarily.

"You taste so sweet," he breathed, his mouth finding yours once more.

Your tongues danced with each other, seeking dominance, yet both giving way to the others lead. You kissed passionately, hands roaming restlessly over each other's bodies. 

Cillian's fingers drifted to your breast, pinching the nipple gently before teasing it with his tongue. Your nipples hardened, poking through your clothes, drawing his attention.

Cillian gently bit down on one, causing you to squirm in delight. He released it, leaving a faint red mark on your pale skin. "You turn me on so much," he whispered, his hand cupping your breast.

"You do too, Cillian. Although I am not sure how much more I can take without being intensely sore tomorrow," you confessed, your body still quivering from the previous encounters. 

Cillian chuckled softly, taking another sip of his champagne before replying, "Oh, trust me, you'll be fine. Besides, I have some things planned to make sure you're nice and relaxed before I fuck you again," Cillian said as he moved closer to you, pressing his hardened member against your leg, making you shudder in anticipation.

As the hot water bubbled around them, you held onto Cillian, enjoying the intimacy shared between the two of you. The sensuality of the moment enveloped you, and you could feel the heat radiating off Cillian's body as it touched yours.

The night continued like this, filled with passionate and kinky sex until, at around 3 o'clock, you decided to get some sleep.

You both knew you had school the next day, and you did not want to show up exhausted.

***

Eventually, the morning sun filtered through the window as you rose from the comfortable hotel bed, your body aching in the most delicious ways. You glanced over at Cillian, who lay beside you, his tousled hair framing his face. He stretched lazily, his freckled shoulders and arms flexing as he yawned.

You stepped into the bathroom to freshen up. You had to make your way to school

soon, and there was no time to waste. While brushing your teeth, you looked at yourself in the mirror, marvelling at how much the past week had changed you. Your eyes seemed darker, more mysterious, with shadows cast from the early morning sunlight streaming through the window.

In the midst of your thoughts, you heard Cillian enter the bathroom. He stood behind you, wrapping his arms around your waist. "Morning," he whispered softly in your ear, nuzzling your neck gently.

"Do you have everything you need? Your bag, keys, wallet?" he asked, seeing that you were almost ready for school, before giving you yet another of many hickeys, all of which were covering your neck. 

You nodded, reaching into your backpack again to retrieve them. 

Cillian pulled you closer, his arms tightening around you. "Alright, then." He gave you a small peck on the lips, a gentle gesture of affection. 

"This was fun," he said with a grin, running his hand down your back. 

You nodded, reluctantly. "It was, but I better get going. I am already late," you told him before asking when you could see him again.

 "How about this Saturday if I can get away from Danielle?" he suggested and you considered his proposal, knowing that Saturday would be your day off from school.

"Okay, sounds good," you agreed, excitement building within you. "Where should we meet?" you wanted to know.

"Here. I will book a room again, but I won't be able to stay overnight," he told you with a smile, his dimples showing through. "We can just use it for our afternoon rendezvous."

You smiled back, feeling excited about the prospect of continuing this passionate affair. "That sounds great, Cillian."

"Well, then, see you on Saturday." He leaned in to give you a final kiss on the lips, lingering just long enough to leave you wanting more.

One hour later….

An hour later, and with only ten minutes to spare, you arrived at school and looked at your schedule.

Due to the renovations on site, you still had to find your classroom for today and, luckily for you, it was on the first floor.

"Good Morning Y/N," Emma smiled as she saw you walking into class, clearly happy to see you.

"Morning, Emma," you replied cheerfully, trying to ignore the lingering effect of the night before as the soreness of your encounter with Cillian lingered in your core and so did his seed.

Emma looked at you closely, a curious expression crossing her face. "So, how was your night, with your secret lover?" she then asked, still not knowing who the man was who you were seeing.

She had noticed your dishevelled appearance and the smell of sex on you, but you did not want to reveal too many details about your encounter.

"It was great. I didn't get much sleep, though," you replied casually, trying to downplay the intensity of the previous night.

"Well, I guess you'll have plenty of opportunities to catch up on your sleep later," Emma teased, her eyes sparkling with mischief. "Why do you say that?" you asked, slightly confused by her comment.

"Well, the art class have been cancelled, so we finish early today," Emma continued, her tone light-hearted.

"Good, I am glad," you smiled before Emma leaned in and asked you for particulars.

"Now tell me, what did you do with your married man? I want specifics," Emma pressed, her curiosity piqued. You hesitated momentarily, weighing whether to divulge the details of your secret rendezvous. Ultimately, you decided to share some highlights while leaving out the explicit details.

"We stayed at the Four Seasons. We had a lovely meal, and we had lots of sex. He bought some toys, which was fun, and there was this big jacuzzi overlooking Dublin," you said, carefully choosing your words to give her a taste of the events without going into graphic detail.

"What kind of toys?" Emma giggled; her curiosity piqued.

"Toys that don't go where you would expect them to go," you replied, wanting to keep things vague.

“Anal toys?” Emma wanted to know and you quietened her quickly.

“Yes. Shh,” you whispered before cutting her off.

"Well, if you ever want to talk about it in more detail, just let me know," Emma offered, her eyes twinkling with excitement. "Maybe sometime, after I am drunk enough" you agreed, knowing that it would be better to not delve into the explicit details of your experience with Cillian, but she wouldn't let off. After all, she had covered for you, giving you an alibi, and now she wanted to know more.

“I need you to tell me more. I want to know everything,” she thus said but you shook your head.

“Another day, when we are not at school, I will give you specifics, alright?” you said and Emma agreed to your proposal.

"Anyway, for now, let's change the subject," you then suggested, eager to discuss something less salacious. "How are your driving lessons going for you?" you asked, causing Emma to sigh.

"Well, my dad thinks he's teaching me how to drive but mostly I end up driving him crazy," she laughed, her eyes dancing with mischief. "No, he's really helping me. I appreciate it," she said, appreciating her father's efforts to teach her.

"That's nice" you commented just as a girl named Lindsay approached you from behind, tapping you on the shoulder.

"Hi Y/N! How's it going?" she greeted, her smile bright and genuine. She was a tall, slender girl with wavy brown hair and striking green eyes. "Oh, hi Lindsay," you replied, returning her smile warmly. "Just talking with Emma."

Lindsay nodded, glancing at Emma briefly before turning back to you. "So, my sister saw you at the Four Seasons last night, with a rather famous and rather handsome actor," she said, causing your heart to race. "Is that true?" she asked, her eyes boring into yours.

"Yes, it's true, I guess" you answered honestly, not wanting to lie about it. "Did she say anything else?" you asked, hoping to get more information from Lindsay.

"Only that you two seemed very close," Lindsay replied, her eyes holding a mix of jealousy and curiosity. 

"A famous actor?" Emma asked, her eyebrows raised in surprise. "Oh, really? And what was his name?" she pressed while you tried hard to come up with an excuse for your secret interactions with Cillian.

"Cillian Murphy," Lindsay confirmed, drawing out his name with a mixture of admiration and envy, causing Emma's chin to drop.

"The ‘Cillian Murphy’?" she repeated, causing Lindsay to nod, waiting for an explanation.

"Cillian is my step-father's brother. We ran into each other at the hotel last night and quickly grabbed a bite to eat. That's all. He was just being nice, paying for my meal" you lied to Lindsay whereas Emma knew that Cillian must have been the married man you were sleeping with.

“Cillian Murphy is your uncle?” Lindsay asked, shocked and confused. “Shut the fuck up. Can you introduce me?” she then wanted to know and you quickly shook your head.

“Firstly, he is not my uncle. He is my step-father’s brother. And secondly, he is married to Danielle Murray. She too is a famous actress,” you explained, causing Emma to furrow her eyebrows.

Her mind reeled with thoughts and questions, but she decided to hold them off for now. "That's interesting," she commented nonchalantly, pretending she wasn't shocked before, eventually, pulling you aside to speak with you in private.

***

"You are sleeping with Cillian Murphy?" Emma exclaimed, her eyes wide with disbelief. “This is fucking insane, you know!”  Emma exclaimed, her eyes wide with shock.

"I know. It just happened one night, at our house," you replied, shrugging casually, trying to play it cool.

“At your house?” Emma asked, not having known the specific of your first encounter.

“Yes. He stayed over after a fight with his wife and one thing let to another,” you explained cautiously and her reaction to this revelation was fuelled with both, amusement and concern.

“So you just let him pop your cherry huh?” she laughed, recalling you telling her that, several weeks ago, Cillian came over for the first time and you had been crushing on him ever since.

“I can’t say I blame you. I rewatched Peaky Blinders last week and he is rather fine, even for his age,” Emma told you before continuing on with a lecture. "

"But he is basically family, and you have to be careful. What is if the press gets wind of this? Or his wife? His kids?" Emma worried, her brows furrowing in concern.

"They won't. I will be careful, okay?" you told her just as the school bell rang.

Meanwhile, at Cillian’s house…

Danielle stormed through the door of their luxurious Dublin home, her eyes ablaze with anger. Her hands shook as she clenched and unclenched them as she waited to confront Cillian in respect to his whereabouts.

Cillian stood in the kitchen, pouring himself a glass of water. He paused when he heard the footsteps approaching and turned around slowly, anticipating his wife's reaction.

"Where have you been?" Danielle demanded, her voice shrill and accusatory.

"In London, for work," he lied, furrowing his eyebrows and putting on the perfect act. "You knew that," he fired back with annoyance.

"Bullshit. I checked your schedule. You never even left the country," Danielle accused, her eyes narrowing dangerously.

"It was an interview that came up last minute, Danielle. You need to relax," countered calmly, his voice neutral, yet carrying a slight undertone of irritation.

"Relax? Really?" scoffed Danielle, her fury growing stronger. "And how should I relax knowing that you're cheating on me?"

"Calm down, Danielle," Cillian instructed, trying to placate her. "I haven't cheated on you," Cillian tried to claim but Danielle shook her head.

"No? Then the fact that you paid 678 Euro for a room at the Four Seasons is just a coincidence?" Danielle probed, her suspicion heightened.

"Absolutely," Cillian responded indignantly, raising his eyebrows. "I booked a room, for a friend who stayed there with his wife," he added, feigning ignorance.

"And who may that be?" Danielle snapped, her voice trembling with rage. 

The air was thick with tension, and Cillian felt his pulse quicken.

"What does it matter?" he asked under his breath, rubbing his forehead as he watched his wife fume with anger. He knew that he needed to handle this situation carefully, but his conscience wasn't letting him sleep soundly. 

"Just tell me who she is Cillian. It wouldn't be the first time you cheated on me," Danielle continued, her voice shaking with frustration and betrayal.

"There is no one else, Danielle," Cillian lied again, knowing that it was pointless to confess at this stage. "Please trust me," he implored, trying to maintain eye contact despite the tension in the room.

"Trust you? You lie every time I ask you about your 'work trips'," Danielle spat, her voice filled with bitterness.

"Who is she?" she insisted, her voice trembling with uncontrollable emotion.

"Stop it, Danielle. Enough already," Cillian snapped, losing patience with her constant questions. 

"No, you stop it! Stop fucking cheating on me. You slept with someone in a hotel room while you were supposed to be home, with me," Danielle roared, angered and confused.

"I told you I am not fucking cheating," Cillian said, his tone cold and defensive.

"Okay. Fine. I give you the benefit of the doubt, but...," Danielle began to say before Cillian could find the strength to counter her.

"But, what Danielle?" he asked. "But, if you ever find out that I did cheat on you, then you would leave me and take Max with you?  Cillian barked, knowing very well that this would be the thread she was going to make next.

"He is not your son, Cillian!" Danielle reminded him, causing Cillian to shake his head.

"That's not the point, and you know that," he told her before walking away from the conversation. 

“Stop seeing her, Cillian, and I will forget about it for now,” Danielle told him more calmly now, but Cillian simply sighed.

“Alright,” he then said, nodding just as Max walked through the door, not having overheard the conversation.

“Hey, dad,” he said, greeting Cillian before asking him whether they could go to the movies on the weekend to watch the new Marvel movie.

Tag List Insert

@sunbeamseas @saint-ackerman @oatmealisweird @naxxsstuff @amanda08319 @r-m-cidnah @elysiannook @cillshot @infireddabdab @tastycakee @harrysbestiee @lilybabe22 @adalynlowell @henrywintersdearestgirl @ietss @thatgirlthatreadswattpad @ryiamarie @axionn

@heidimoreton @nela-cutie @futurecorps3 @delishen @nosebleeds-247 @thirteenis-myluckynumber @gills-lounge @hjmalmed @lost-fantasy @tiredkitten @sidechrisporn @smallsoulunknown @charqing-qing @hopefulinlove @aporiasposts @shycrybaby @me-and-your-husband @hjmalmed @lacontroller1991 @galxydefender @aporiasposts

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[savethegrishaverse]

Here is the Transcript to the Questions Answered by Eric Heisserer!

Recently, we were very fortunate that Shadow and Bone showrunner Eric Heisserer agreed to answer some fan questions! Below is the transcript of the screenshots that have been previously shared—not an entirely new interview. The transcript in this format should be much more accessible and convenient, particularly for anyone using a screen reader.

To make it easier to read through Eric’s responses, we’ve nested his answers below coordinating questions.

Okay, taking these one at a time -- because some of these will have very long answers, and I may have to return at later intervals to answer them: (note: questions will be in bold)

"I'd like to know if there's a way to liberate the pre-written scripts if Netflix doesn't plan on using them" - Asked by Christian Thalmann, the creator of the Fjerdan language.

"There is a way to liberate the Crows scripts from Netflix, yes, and in fact that would be part of the buyout for another streamer when acquiring the rights to Leigh's novels. It would be a package deal."

"In my view, "The Crows" have the potential to revitalize the Grishaverse. Unlike "Shadow And Bone," this new show could rely less on elaborate visual effects and offer a fresh narrative angle. Heist-themed shows are currently in high demand, adding to its appeal. Am I mistaken in thinking that our focus should primarily be on "The Crows"? The likelihood of "Shadow And Bone" returning seems slim, but l've always believed that "The Crows" had a greater chance of success." - asked by fellow fan Joleen

The focus on the Crows is helpful in two ways -- first, those scripts are written, which lets us get a running start at production, and second, just from casual analysis of book sales, it's far more popular worldwide than other Grishaverse titles. So it will be a bigger draw for viewers.

The trap though is the cost. It's more grounded than S&B, sure, but the Ice Court is a unique location that either requires a really costly set build, or set extensions and VFX work to make it look authentic, which means nearly every shot of the heist once our crew gets there could be a VFX shot.

My guess is the budget would be on par with S2 of S&B.

"If/when the spinoff is back (finger crossed) was there anything he had planned that would completely surprised, for good reasons obviously, the audience. And we should hold our breath for that twist/turn?" - asked by fellow fan Rti

​​Yes, there is a surprise or two in the Crows spinoff season, but overall it's as close to the novel as we could make it. And Leigh's novel is such an amazing story with natural cliffhangers that work as episode "out" moments, etc. I think the biggest move we made was to feature every single Crow's backstory to go with their episode. So that was fun/sad/exciting.

"What was the difficulties you mentioned about filming Season 2 in that Reddit comment? Don't want to sound negative but what went wrong?!" - asked by fellow fan Mitra

S2 kept throwing challenges at us, and it started long before we got to production. Like months earlier, when we learned the location we used for the Little Palace in S1 was closed to us due to the pandemic. So right there we lost out on a ton of S&S scenes, because it wouldn't be a match. But we also had written a compelling side arc for Ivan and Fedyor in S2, these two Grisha trapped on either side of the civil war. Each of them played a big role in the story, but Simon (Ivan) had a feature film that overlapped with our schedule and couldn't move, which meant we lost him. So Daegan worked to revise the season keeping Fedyor and leaving Ivan as most likely dead from the end of S1. He was Kirigan's right-hand man for the season. But poor Julian caught COVID just when we were to shoot out most of his scenes, and after trying to make the schedule work, we had to come to the brutal truth that there wasn't a way to keep Fedyor in the story. Our only option was to bring him in at like episode 8, which would've been too little, too late.

COVID continued to be a monster all through production, requiring us to juggle schedules and miss out on days, and it was madness for the cast, who had to pivot with almost no notice whenever someone was ill and quarantined. This isn't unique to our show of course -- it happened with everyone. It's just a challenge.

Beyond that, we had been given the go to write a special standalone story, The Demon in the Wood. This would have been released on its own around Christmas, like a BBC special but for Netflix, and would help bridge seasons 1 and 2 by showing a little of what Kirigan was doing before we see him in 52, and also provide more character context, etc. Christina Strain wrote that and did great work adapting Leigh's short story. But it never went the distance.

There was a lot more to 52 as well, scenes and side stories and little interactions that were lost due to budget or time restrictions. Again, not unique to our show, but agonizing all the same, since what you get is not what we had written, or in some cases even shot.

I'm incredibly proud of the cast and the team, and Daegan did the heaviest lifting while I was off finishing the Crows writing room. But we had a lot more thrown at us.

"How long was the sizzle reel ready to go but he had to keep it secret?" - Asked by members of the Discord Team

That sizzle reel was put together about four months before the second season dropped.

"I would love to know his perspective on the impact of streaming on storytelling. Would we have had to launch a campaign like this 10-15 years ago for a show like this? What are the main pain points when it comes to streaming models & telling unique, diverse stories?" - asked by fellow fan Acorn_Bri

Streaming is a challenge to serialized storytelling in that it looks at 'content often with a different agenda and uses metrics that can take a creative issue and exacerbate it. Like in broadcast, if viewership and thus ad revenue has slightly declined, the show will need to find a way to make their 22 or 13 episodes on a proportionally smaller budget. What is not done is reduce episode order. But if a streaming series underperforms or doesn't meet expectations, and the streamer doesn't cancel it outright, the go-to budget reduction idea is to reduce episode order for the next season.

When you just have 8 episodes and continue to deal with notes to compress, pace up, or omit for what you'd scripted for a longer season, reducing further to six or four episodes is exhausting.

This happens due to a slide in autonomy from what the showrunner position had been. What the chatter on the picket lines revealed to us is that most showrunners today don't get to see their own show's budget, and thus don't get the freedom to make budgetary decisions that could better protect the story they're telling. More and more, showrunners not at a legacy network aren't the final say or at times even involved in hiring key roles. I don't have any ideas that aren't already in a contract language, I just see how the job on this side has gotten harder and there isn't much of a way for us to make it easier for each other like we could with having writers on set or in post production, because the streaming model has made that impossible.

—

Once again, we would like to give a big thank you to everyone who asked their questions, and an even BIGGER thank you to Eric Heisserer for answering them!

[rad4learning]

I've complained about people on radblr making causal claims about transgender health but reading some of the stuff in the literature...

I started reading https://doi.org/10.1080/26895269.2024.2366881 Very early on came across "Research has consistently shown that gender affirmation promotes positive mental health outcomes for trans people of any age (Olson-Kennedy et al., 2018; Russell et al., 2018)." Ok so let's take a look at those that first one shall we? (post got too long)

Olson-Kennedy et al. https://doi.org/10.1001/jamapediatrics.2017.5440

"Findings  In this cohort study, chest dysphoria was significantly higher in the nonsurgical vs postsurgical cohort. Among the nonsurgical cohort, 94% perceived chest surgery as very important; among the postsurgical cohort, serious complications were rare, and 67 of 68 reported an absence of regret."

Hmm ok let's look some more at the results from a convenience sample recruited by The Center for Transyouth Health and Development at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles.

So first of all we aren't doing measures of positive mental health outcomes - who needs to actually measure an improvement in mental health to claim a mental health benefit though am I right? "Main Outcomes and Measures  Outcomes were chest dysphoria composite score (range 0-51, with higher scores indicating greater distress) in all participants; desire for chest surgery in patients who had not had surgery; and regret about surgery and complications of surgery in patients who were postsurgical."

Let's look at that result now:

"Chest dysphoria composite score mean (SD) was 29.6 (10.0) for participants who had not undergone chest reconstruction, which was significantly higher than mean (SD) scores in those who had undergone this procedure (3.3 [3.8]; P < .001)"

If you look at the scale it includes things like "I feel like my life hasn't started because of my chest" "I get gendered as female because of my chest". Let's say someone was like "yep I'm a trans man, I want chest surgery" gets the surgery and didn't experience an improvement in mental health, couldn't we still expect her to go from "agree" to "disagree" on this item? If you were still unhappy wouldn't you then have to go "well I guess it wasn't the chest after all" and therefore score lower on the chest dysphoria scale despite not having anything alleviated? Surely statements that attribute not getting what you want in life to your chest are inappropriate here.

"Among the nonsurgical cohort, 64 (94%) perceived chest surgery as very important, and chest dysphoria increased by 0.33 points each month that passed between a youth initiating testosterone therapy and undergoing surgery."

Hang on, so is the implication here that the positive effect on relieving chest dysphoria of surgery is offset by how bad testosterone therapy is?* Almost like the above attribution error discussion could be in play... \* Note: completely offset would take a long time, years. I had earlier misinterpreted a result and had the wrong timeframe provided.

If the citing and original authors are implying that association between surgery and mildly lowered dysphoria shows that surgery improves dysphoria, surely in the interest of consistency you need to say that testosterone without surgery worsens it for this cohort.

Instead we get "This finding should not be construed as an endorsement to withhold or delay testosterone initiation to avoid chest dysphoria intensity." and "Given the numerous complications associated with chest binding, the negative emotional and mental effects of chest dysphoria, and the positive outcome of chest surgery demonstrated in this study, changes in clinical practice and in insurance plans’ requirements for youth with gender dysphoria who are seeking surgery seem essential."

We are however told that "The increasing chest dysphoria after testosterone treatment begins does reflect a common clinical phenomenon: a honeymoon period after testosterone initiation that quickly becomes eclipsed by the greater disparity between a more masculine presentation and a female chest contour. Clinicians should advise patients and families that chest dysphoria may increase over time after starting hormone therapy." I guess increasing chest dysphoria just isn't a very important factor after all? Not important enough to delay testosterone therapy, but important enough to undergo surgery. I will grant that effect sizes are different but we are given no reasoning about what a meaningful effect size would be; I assume because that would be to admit that there could be a low enough dysphoria relieving effect that even if dysphoria is relieved, it's not worth it for most.

"Among the postsurgical cohort, the most common complication of surgery was loss of nipple sensation, whether temporary (59%) or permanent (41%). Serious complications were rare and included postoperative hematoma (10%) and complications of anesthesia (7%). Self-reported regret was near 0."

Most of the sample (58%) btw it had been a year or less since surgery.

[innerchorus]

Looking at some Team Zahhak blades today! First up is Arzhang's. Images from Chapters 24 and 30. Maybe the handle is made of bone?

Closeup of the snake detailing on the blade.

Now for Pulad.

Images from Chapters 55 and 64.

Again, this weapon features two snake heads with their fangs bared (obviously evoking Zahhak's two shoulder snakes). If I were to design a crest for Team Zahhak, this would definitely be included! Team Zahhak are... not subtle.

And that brings to mind a question; why hasn't anyone picked up on this? And by 'anyone' I mainly mean Narsus, because he encountered both Arzhang and Pulad, and would have had a chance to inspect their weapons if he chose to. Wouldn't he have looked at anything that might have given a clue to the identity of these sorcerers and their aims? Pulad's face was rendered unrecognisable from his fall in Chapter 64, but Isfan had been trying to capture him and Narsus lamented the fact that there was no way to identify him.

Which is why it would be very convenient if Guiscard handed Team Arslan a captured Gurgin in the next chapter.

But the weapons are a clue, quite a big one, I think. Because in Pars there must be a very strong association of snakes with Zahhak. And especially with there being two snakes featured on the blade, it could be enough to raise some suspicions.

Also, Narsus isn't the only one who may have noticed some snaky hints:

Here's Montferrat in Chapter 81, looking at the blade wielded by Innocentis. Innocentis picked it out of a lineup of weapons, but he was clearly under the influence of Team Zahhak, and they left their mark on this poisoned sword.

Now, that alone isn't enough for Montferrat to have drawn any sort of conclusion, but we know he's heard rumours of magic users and is suspicious about the unnatural mist at Atropatene and the incidents of 'hands sprouting from the ground and killing people,' and he also distrusts Hilmes and suspects his involvement.

As a Lusitanian, Montferrat was probably unaware of Zahhak, so at this point couldn't have made a guess at the existence of the Team Zahhak faction or their aims. But if, after Guiscard's encounter with Gurgin in Chapter 109, he had talked to Montferrat about what happened and about what Gurgin said, perhaps he could have put a bit more of it together. Or else perhaps he voiced his suspicions to Guiscard earlier, and now Guiscard is the one starting to understand. I'm very curious to see whether we get a flashback or whether the conversation in the next chapter brings up some of these points.

And of course I am still enjoying the idea of a captured mage Gurgin featuring in the proceedings and later being used as a guide to Team Zahhak's lair.

A small blorbo to finish this post.

[kawaii-leilei54]

EP.1 : Don't talk to strangers

A/n: haloo! This is my first book/ series! Please let me know what you guys think, thank you so much for everyone's support! uwu

You sighed.

Finally.

You shut down your computer for the day, having worked a full 5 hours without breaks. Which was a big deal considering you had been itching to read your new manga book instead that had been sitting on your nightstand for a few days.

You get up and take a bathroom break and look around for your cigarette pack. You deserved it.

There they are!...and they're empty.

Great.

You sigh deeply and rub your eyebrows trying not to make a big deal out of it, you had a long day of work after all, why was it hard to just at least one cigarette waiting for you if not a man or woman?

Putting on your hoodie and not even bothering to change out of your sweats, you make your way to the door and grab your keys and wallet.

You loved night time, it was your favorite, your most productive time, your most lit and active hours. Daytime couldn't compare to the joy night time brought you.

You look around at the lights, the vapes shops and cafes, the ramen shops and internet cafes.

You even saw a cat in an alley way and something else you wish you didn't see.

Drunks.

More like jealousy that you weren't them right about now.

You walk about farther, the air hitting just right, it was summer after all and everyone was out and ready to have an active nightlife just like you used to.

You had just been too busy lately, is what you keep telling yourself.

The truth was that you really were to awkward and introverted.

Every guy that tried to converse with you was either brushed off or you didn't recognize their efforts.

Wasn't your fault they weren't- okay yes it was.

But with that point aside, you make it to the 7/11.

This one was your favorite and not to mention convenient because it wasn't too far from your apartment.

They had all your favorite snacks, and of course what you came here for: cigarettes. You stopped buying lottery tickets years ago since you wouldn't win and it was eating up what could've been put to something else like.. Manga and Hello Kitty- I mean the rent.

You walk in and enjoy the cool air since it was about humid outside but not as bad as daytime.

That's why you stayed home, but then again it doesn't matter what season you will always argue that it's better to stay home than socialize.

"Hey y/n." The cashier says, you were sort of known here since you came embarrassingly more often than you thought.

"Hey." You say as you go to the counter.

"Same pack as before?" You nod.

You didn't buy cigarettes often, you would only smoke when you were anxious or stressed.

And boy was work stressing you the fuck out.

The cashier rings up the pack and look around the store, you see some snacks and couldn't help yourself.

When was the last time you ate?

You decide to go down the snack aisle and get you some snacks.

You hear the door ring as someone else walks in.

"Hello." The cashier greets.

"Hey, let me have a pack and some scratch offs."

You scoff to yourself.

The scratch offs are hopeless.

"Oh, and some of these." He says as he picks something else.

His voice was low and you could tell he had a satori accent, you just couldn't recognize from where exactly.

You pick up your snacks and go to the front.

You see him and stare.

His long hair, standing an inch taller than you, his black boots and rings on his long fingers.

His tiny hoop earrings and his necklace, one of them a guitar pick and another a kitty, which made you automatically not take him seriously.

He had sunglasses on his head which pushed his hair back, his cologne a bit strong but also mixed in with some other smell, you guessed alcohol.

You look down at what he bought, some scratch offs, a pack of cigarettes, some gum and tangerines.

You snort and look away.

"What?" He says as he looks at you while the cashier bags his stuff.

"Nothin'" you mumble as I try not to laugh.

Oranges? Seriously?

Though you couldn't laugh too much considering you were badgering junk food and a sausage stick.

He raises an eyebrow suspiciously before grabbing his bag and getting his change.

He walks out and you watch, forgetting momentarily that it was your turn.

You couldn't get over the fact that he really was stupid enough to get scratch offs and not mention tangerines. You couldn't get that at a regular grocery store??

"Y/n?" The cashier asks hesitantly as you stare off.

"Huh?" You say as you come back to reality.

"Sorry, what's the amount?" You say as you pull out your wallet.

"15.75." She says as you hand her a 20, waiting on your change.

You get your change and walk out, what you didn't notice is him standing there, smoking a cigarette.

You get startled slightly.

"Can you not stand so close?" You say as you hold your chest and your snacks close.

He scoffs as you puffs out some smoke.

"Or you could watch where you're going." He says with sarcasm.

You scoff back.

"Fine, but don't be mad when you get smacked with the door."

"Oh shut up I wasn't even standing that close."

You huff.

You take out your own pack of cigarettes and open it, getting a cigarette out and lighting it.

"Hm, you don't look like a smoker." He mumbles as he takes another puff.

"And you don't look like an orange addict."

"They are tangerines." He hums as he puts out his cigarettes.

"Whatever."

You watch him check his phone as you smoke your cigarette, you take a puff and look around, watching people pass by.

"Shit.." he mumbles as he puts his phone in his back pocket.

"Have somewhere to be?" You hum as you exhale.

"Maybe." He mumbles and gets a piece of gum out.

"You know that won't make up for the cigarette smell right?" You say as you raise an eyebrow.

"It's not for that smart ass."

You blush slightly, feeling embarrassed that your even in his business.

"I'm trying to quit." He announced as he puts the pack away.

You fight to say something else smart but you could tell he was being serious with you.

"I don't smoke as much, just when I'm stressed or anxious.. just to keep busy." You admit.

You had only started a year ago since the pills you were prescribed weren't working.

He sighs and leans against the brick wall.

"Same but I had a serious problem, I tried to switch to snacking but it didn't work."

Snacks..maybe I should try..

"How long have you been smoking?"

"A few years, you?"

"A year."

He smirks and you raise an eyebrow.

"What?"

"Nothing." "See ya around."

"See ya orange." You joke as you put out your cigarette.

He scoffs. "Later, vanilla."

I gasp and scoff with disbelief as he walks away his hand in his pockets with a cool demeanor, which somehow pissed you off.

Vanilla?

You look down at your bag and see the vanilla ice cream dripping from your bag.

"Damn it!" You huff.

🫧✨

You walk home and set your bag down.

Now, you usually don't talk to strangers.

So you were a bit surprised at your actions, you were awkward so what made him talk to you?

With his cool attitude and laid back demeanor, his satori accident and his voice dropping with a smooth and relaxing tone-

What are you thinking?

You shake off the thought and put away your snacks.

You sit on the couch eating your melted ice cream that you were stubborn about wasting even though it spilled.

You decide to settle in for the night and watch your favorite anime, silently hoping to see the tangerine lover again.

[touchtranscendslanguage]

What gives Remy a higher standing in Seelie court, that he's Roman's claimed or that he's Thomas' godson? Or are they of equal value? (I mean, I'm guessing that the claim came first but if it was only one or the other, which would make him more 'important'?)

The claim gives him higher standing. Without it, he'd just be a guy who happens to be the king's godson. Don't get me wrong, being Thomas's godson would definitely have an impact on his life, but he wouldn't be living in the royal quarters and probably wouldn't know the royal family's names. He'd still be royal adjacent but he'd primarily have the status he got from his adoptive parents.

Btw I don't think I've ever mentioned his adoptive parents. I want to in the story but there's just never a convenient place to bring them up. It's Joan, Talyn, and Marco (the name of Joan's beanie).

Joan and Talyn are married and both work as Thomas's royal advisors. Marco is Joan's queer-platonic partner who works as one of the royal servants. Marco lives separately from the others in the royal servants' quarters but was just as involved in raising Remy so they get the title of parent. Marco had the advantage of being able to go into the royal quarters to get Remy or check on him when he was spending time with Roman without having to ask the king for permission and could talk to Remy about things the royal family kept secret that Remy couldn't share with his other parents.

Thomas asked Joan and Talyn to raise Remy after Roman claimed him and Thomas found out he was an orphan. He needed someone he could trust to raise his son's claimed and it had to be someone who would genuinely care about Remy despite him being part drider. They were a good match, even if Remy did grow up to be a bit bitchy and entitled (though that may have been inevitable).

Joan and Talyn asked Thomas to be Remy's godfather and it all worked out.

[ffxivaltaholic]

Prompt #3: Interruptions & Lessons

FFxivWrite2023

"Please... For the love of Vritra please stop touching everything!!!" Rarely did the Viera get annoyed, but his sisters simply knew exactly which buttons to push to annoy the docile man. Today was simply one of those days where the twins, barely sixteen summers, had found themselves bored and ultimately decided that harassing their older brother while he was writing his thesis was prime entertainment. "Why can't I touch it? It's a pretty flower?" "It's poisonous..." "You brought a poisonous plant inside? Mom is going to throw a sandal at you again..." His left lower eyelid twitched and Dia placed the quill back in the inkpot, giving a frustrated sigh as the girls continued to bomb him with question about the flower. Why is it poisonous? Why do you have it? Does is smell good? The questions were a tsunami of words and with both of them talking in tandem, he couldn't even get a word in himself to answer. "Sofina... Helina.. Please..." Diarmune went for his coffee. It was empty. Today was truly testing his patience. "Perhaps if you are so bored... You could go help father with the silkworms?" That was met with a look of disgust from the twins and they huffed a little at the audacity of him to even suggest it! How dare he? "So what'cha writing about? More of those Morbol things I assume..." Sofina wrinkled her nose and shook her head. "They're so weird, why bother studying them so much... Why not study pretty things?" Helina added her opinion. A valid question considering the risk to life and limb when dealing with the territorial and aggressive creatures. As much as he wanted to tell them to leave, this was a chance to educate and it might prevent further harassment later when he was working.

"Because all plant and plan-animal hybrids deserve to exist, regardless if they are 'pretty' or not. They all bring a benefit to the world, and there are lots of people who study the pretty and delicate flowers, but few who have interest in the strange or unpleasant ones, but they have much to teach us. They are the apex creature in their habitats and if we are to coexist with nature, we must understand even the most vile and smelly of them." Clearly the man had experienced one or two bad breaths in his life. This would be a vital teachable moment for the girls, especially as they were reaching a age where they could better understand it. "Just like with people, you cannot judge simply on appearance alone. Everyone and everything has it's own intrinsic value, and while some more than others do not put that value to use, it does not mean you can judge them on the basis of looks." Glancing between them, Dia was satisfied that his mild scolding was enough, and he offered a smile. "If you would... Can I send you on an important task?"

The twins lit up at the aspect of a super special important job. "I am running low on some supplies, if you would be willing to go to the market for me, I'll get you another trinket from Kugane when I go there in a few days." It only took a moment for them to consider before nodding, won over by the offering of gifts. He only hoped they wouldn't grow out of that convenient bribe. With a list written and the twins eagerly racing off to their task, he was finally left to his work.

Once again, there was peace in his room and Dia reached for his coffee again... It was still empty. Absolute disappointment etched on his freckled face. A low sigh left his lips. "I guess a break would be alright..."

[nattousan]

ok but imagine being the fursuit artist that he contracts to make his costume tho

He contacts you via an anonymous email and is very exacting and precise in his request. Money is no object, which isn't uncommon in your line of business, you're a professional and more than a few customers have been in the 1% range.

So you ask if he's local so you can meet and take measurements and he says no but he will meet you at (conveniently close local craft store) tomorrow after work (you did not mention where you live)

You're a little shaken but you meet him anyways because daddy needs to pay rent, and he's probably not a serial killer, right?

Right?

You had no idea what kind of person to expect, but a 6'2 bald white guy built like a fucken shit-brickhouse with a "FurCon2023" shirt wrapped around his brolic frame was rather on the shorter end of your list. His cargo shorts and pure white sneakers looked like they'd just been picked up off of the shelf and his glasses looked too small for his massive head.

You jump because you don't even notice him until he's tapping you on the shoulder and introducing himself. How did he know it was you?? Alarm bells are going off everywhere but there's cameras all over, he wouldn't try something in public right?? You take his measurements and look at fabrics together.

You ask about his fursona and he very seriously produces a laminated folder with several crudely drawn pictures of a polar bear suit. Well, you guess you shouldn't be mean, they were clearly drawn from references but you could tell this was someone who did not draw often. It didn't even have any accessories, it was just a normal polar bear... But the notes surrounding them were so neat they looked printed! And so in depth! There was one page solely dedicated to the visibility needs, with advanced notes on the camera and display system he wanted in the head. You'd only seen this sort of thing at the national cons, just who the hell was this guy??

You haltingly ask him if he was sure. You tell him this is really advanced stuff and he was looking at at LEAST 10k with all the specific modifications on it. When you first started making suits you would have never been this firm on pricing, lowballing and trying to make up the difference so as not to upset the customer with a hefty price, but you'd learned eventually that undervaluing your work was a waste of your time and effort so even though you couldn't gauge his reaction, you figured being upfront about the price would at least be a test to see how serious the guy was.

He nodded silently and reached into the fanny pack around his waist to produce the cleanest stack of hundreds you'd ever seen in your life, like straight printed from the treasury mint. He places it in your palm and you almost drop it out of shock.

"Will this be enough to get you started? I included some extra to compensate for lost wages as I do need this suit fairly quickly" he says, tone unreadable.

You stammer and try to look professional thumbing through the crisply banded notes and would you look at that, you think this will do just fine!

He nods again, shakes your hand and leaves without another word.

You exit the store, just trying to comprehend what in the hell you'd just gotten yourself into, zoning out so hard that you didn't even realize someone was yelling at you until the word "-fuckin furry faggot" pierced through your thoughts. You were looking at your phone so you didn't notice the band of truck bros creeping up behind you in their suped up pickup truck. There were three or four in the bed of the truck, dangling out over the side in between giant "TRUMP 2024" and "Lets Go Brandon" flags. They have their phones out, recording you and shouting slurs.

You raise double birds at them and turn to walk quickly in the opposite way, hoping you wouldn't see them as you walked home. You'd heard of a couple beatings happening locally and you didn't want to be around if that's what they had in mind.

So when you hear tires screeching and and engine roaring behind you, you break out into a run, hoping to make it to the bus terminal across the parking lot.

But they catch up to you before you'd made it halfway. They all get out and one grabs your phone that you held out to record with. He smashes it on the ground and shoves you into the pavement. Hard.

They all stand over you, jeering and laughing and you try to escape but your limbs won't listen to you. You always figured if something like this happened you'd stand your ground, maybe get in a couple of hits yourself, but in reality you could barely breathe and your chest felt like it was collapsing in on itself, so your attempts to scream for help end up coming out as breathy wheezes. One of them levels a crowbar at you and thats when the screaming starts.

You curl up into a ball to protect your face but the pain never comes. You hear screaming and sneakers skidding across asphalt and oh god, wet crunchy impacts followed by something warm and wet being splattered across your arms and legs.

Its suddenly silent except for the drone of the truck engine but eventually you crack open an eye to get a look around, and for the second time that day you almost lose your lunch.

Its straight up something out of a video game, just absolute carnage surrounds you. All of the tall frat bros are out cold in varying stages of fucked up. You do actually start to hurl a little when you see one with his nose completely sideways like a gory Picasso.

And in the center of the carnage is -no fucking way- your fucking fursuit client, calmly wiping his hands of the blood with some baby wipes from his fannypack.

He looks over at you when he sees you're up and for a second there you see something, a slip in the mask, something angry, something violent. You flinch as you realize it, but oh fuck, this guys like.. killed people before. like, for fucken sure.

He walks towards you and you suddenly feel like a very small animal being stalked by a tiger. You try to stumble away but the mask is back on and he just looks down at you and offers you a babywipe.

"You alright?" He asks plainly.

Turns out the guy is "ex-military" and he hurt himself so he's back in the states and bored out of his mind. His daughter is a furry and wanted him to go with her to FurCon and insisted he get a suit as well. You keep on glancing at all the deep scars running up and down his arms and wondering how the hell you didn't see it before.

He's saying something to you but you only snap out of it when a phone is being placed into your hands. You look up and suddenly you're standing outside your apartment building (did you tell him where you lived???)

"This is a secure line, if anything happens to you or you have questions, I'll answer immediately." He says, pale blue eyes drilling into your skull with their intensity.

The tears start bubbling up in your eyes before you can stop them and you just lean forward, bumping your head into his chest and choking out a thank you as you clutch the phone to your chest like an amulet.

As you figured, his body is make out of steel and he stiffens at the contact, unsure of what to do.

He just lets you cry it out for a bit before eventually placing a heavy hand on your shoulder, pulling you off but he keeps the hand gentle.

He's not looking at you this time but he clears his throat and murmurs a quick "Take care" before turning around and disappearing into the night. You unlock your door and collapse into bed.

"What the fuck" you murmur to yourself as you pull out your tablet, and you start to sketch...

They’ll never do a Hitman level set in a Furry Convention because gamers would absolutely ruin it but imagine. like the target isn’t a furry he just owns a hotel that happens to have one every year but you can disguise yourself in a fursuit and some guy will ask you “what species is your sona” and 47 would be like “a wolf. i always felt a connection with…hunters.” and then diana would be like “let’s see if you can sniff out some information, furrty-seven” and then he comes to my house and kills me for writing this

[a-mag-a-day]

MAG 92 - baking apple pie

HOLD ON! Is that operator and Chief Inspector Hannah "Laura Popham/Jane Prentiss/Rosie Zampano" Brankin and the officer on the phone Alexander J"ared Hopworth/Martin Blackwood" Newall??? The operator sounds fairly clearly and the officer just sounds like Alex disguising his voice to sound deeper (or it's just edited like with Jared). Not so sure about the Chief Inspector. It lists both of them as additional voices, so it's possible?

"My dear Jonah" - ¬‿¬

"I know that what is done by those I cannot see might be felt here" - clever, using a place of Beholding to uncover those turned invisible by the fog. So… Did Barnabas know what the Institute was? What Jonah could do?

ELIAS "No, it was because he was curious. Because he had to know, to watch and see it all. That’s what this place is, John, never forget it. You may believe yourself to have friends, to have confidantes, but in the end, all they are is something for you to watch, to know, and ultimately to discard. This, at least, Gertrude understood." - Jon did better! Jon tried to help and save every single one of them! And in the end, exactly this was his doom to become the Archive. Gertrude did let all her assistants die, let others do the dirty and deadly work, which prevented her to get marked be all the fears.

MARTIN "Uh, sorry to interrupt, er, J-Jon’s here!" - Awww, he sounds so happy about this!

ELIAS "Goodness, Jon. Whatever happened to your hand? And your neck?" - Letting us know that the blunt knife did actually do some damage. Also Elias sounds so bored here. I mean, of course he Knew what happened, but usually he puts in a bit more effort to sound surprised or concerned.

JON [Chuckles] "I’ve had a hell of a week." - Yeah you did. On this day Jon got marked by the Vast and the Hunt. And just 4 days ago he got marked by the Desolation. (It is a Friday btw. and he met Jude on Monday.)

DAISY "Before I strangle the grinning bastard." - Letting us know, that Elias finds this whole situation amusing…

Oh yes, the static's pretty loud when Jon consciously compels someone.

Even though Elias sounds amused about the feeling of the compulsion, he also sounds like it takes a bit of effort to resist it.

ELIAS "There’s so much of this place, of ourselves, twisted by forces far beyond us. I just wanted you to know –" - Okay, was he about to talk about the Web? Since he wanted the others to know that he was not controlled and acted of his own free will. And conveniently in this moment Martin retrieved the others and interrupts him! Another Web!Martin moment!

BASIRA "Ah… Oh, god! And you killed him? You sure we shouldn’t be giving him a medal?" - Lol. Nobody liked Leitner xD At least his reputation.

God, the others finding out what really happened to Sasha… Martin and Tim I mean, I guess Jon already told Melanie.

ELIAS "Precisely. It finally tried to kill John. Then Leitner killed it. Then I killed Leitner." - THIS is a huge clue that Elias can't see what happens inside the tunnels! He couldn't see what actually happened to the Not!Them and he also couldn't hear Leitner (because of his A Disapprearance tho) when he told Jon that he entombed it.

Ben makes such a good villain! That chuckle when he phone rings!

ELIAS "No, there are plenty of other rabid dogs out there, mad with the hunt." - Smirke'ian name of the Hunt first time drop!

Martin doubting the police would do something like this reminds me of that The Fresh Prince of Bel Air's episode where Carlton thinks the police was only "doing their job" when they stopped him and Will and threw them in jail. That naiveté of disbelief that people wouldn't take advantage of their power.

ELIAS "Basira is now tied to the Institute. All of you are. Like fingers on a hand. And I am the beating heart of it. Should I, or the Institute, be destroyed, you will all, unfortunately, follow suit." - When I was first listening to this I stormed out of the kitchen to the group of friends staying at our place (because we would go on vacation together the next day) and babbled something incoherent to them about OMG THEY CAN'T LEAVE OR THEY'LL ALL DIE!!!

ELIAS "To offer some congratulations. You’re doing a lot better than I expected." JON "Feels like all I’ve managed to do is… not die." ELIAS "And believe me, that is a remarkably rare skill." - It's kind of true. All Elias needed was for Jon not to die. Yet.

ELIAS "The easily-digestible sort that wipe away any doubt and fear, and neatly organise your new world into happy little" - DOORBELLS!

ELIAS "These are things you must discover on your own." - This and with his explanation of Leitner "Telling Jon too much too soon!!!" I thought was a bad excuse. Turns out later, it was and it was intended! It was just an excuse to get Jon marked. Something I first considered lazy writing suddenly turned into brilliant writing!

ELIAS "Precisely. It is your job to chronicle these things, to experience them, whether first-hand or through the eyes of others" - Jon theater-kid explanation.

JON "I never chose this." ELIAS "You never wanted this, no. But I’m afraid you absolutely did choose it. In a hundred ways, at a hundred thresholds, you pressed on. You sought knowledge relentlessly, and you always chose to see. Our world is made of choices, John, and very rarely do we truly know what any of them mean, but we make them nonetheless." - Elias kinda gaslighting Jon here? How can it be choice if we don't know, what it means. When we don't even know there was a choice. That's kind of a philosophical question here that everyone can see differently… Also door motif!

ELIAS "I could. But I believe that if I did so, you would fail. The Stranger is antithetical to us. We thrive on ceaseless watching, on knowing too much. What we face is the hidden, the uncanny, and the unknown. If you are to stop them, you need to get better at seeing." - Ok that one actually does make sense. But I believe that in this instance Elias was also genuine and not making excuses to get Jon marked. Not directly at least. He needs him to survive death.

The explanation of the Unknowing, what it is and does was also pretty mind-blowing for me the first time listening.

Jon lingering to ask if he's still human is so sad…

Even though Elias does sound like an absolute villain, grooming Jon into horrible things, I was still not entirely convinced Elias is the super bad when I was first listening. He does want to stop the Unknowing after all.

Elias' ambiguous villainy and obvious asshole-ness was performed so well in this episode

[werewolfetone]

I wish to be the recipient of an info dump. Tell me about something you know too much about

Alright!!! The first thing that comes to mind to infodump about is the Romantics, so I am going to tell you about. hm. the story about the writing of Kubla Khan.

Kubla Khan is a poem by Coleridge named after the real life 13th century Mongolian emperor. This, along with the text of the poem, is... basically all that's concrete about it. It's generally accepted that it was probably written in October 1797, but given that Coleridge didn't really date his poems after he wrote them and also really really loved lying and all forms of embellishment, that's mostly just the best educated guess there is, not a hard and fast fact. I've heard summer 1797, winter 1797, even spring 1798, but in general October 1797 is the most likely and accepted date of composition.

And now for how it was written. oh boy.

Let's go over Coleridge's story first. According to him, the night that it was written he was staying in a farmhouse in the southwest of England, due to an illness he needed to recover from before he could travel back to his house. He was reading the book Purchas his Pilgrimes by Samuel Purchas, which is. uh. I think it's about Chinese history? idk I've never read it. Anyway, Coleridge had also taken an amount of opium to help him sleep, and fell asleep reading about Kublai Khan. He then had a wonderful dream in which he composed 200-300 lines of poetry about Kublai Khan, and when he woke he hurried to write them down--but was interrupted! by someone who is only credited as a "person from Porlock." And therefore what we have of Kubla Khan is unfinished, because he forgot what he needed to write as he was trying to get the visitor to leave.

So that's Coleridge's side of things, and the story has become quite well known, enough that it's almost part of the poem. However, there are several gaping holes in this story:

The biggest one is probably the book he claimed to have been reading. It was a very rare book even back then, which made it unlikely that he would have found a copy at some random farmhouse, and it was almost 1000 pages long, meaning that you probably wouldn't carry it around while hiking across England. It's been suggested that maybe he was just thinking about the book and claimed to have been reading it for a better story (this absolutely sounds like something he would have done tbh) but idk.

Coleridge later changed multiple details about the writing of it, especially the details of the drug he had been taking when he wrote it. This could just come down to the fact that he didn't want to have to deal with 18thc ableism against drug users, but I guess what I'm saying is that if he was willing to change one detail for publication there's a good chance he was willing to change others.

Speaking of drugs, given some later events (particularly the time that he thought he saw Wordsworth and Sara Hutchison ah. up to something. but that's it's own post) Coleridge definitely wasn't at his most reliable when sleep deprived and on opium. Which, I mean, no one is, but with Coleridge in particular there's other documented instances of events happening to him after he had taken a bunch of opium and him not being quite sure if what was happening was really real.

It's a very ah. convenient story. Coleridge couldn't finish this poem but oh it wasn't his fault! it was the fellow on business from Porlock! It's also very similar to other stories he would tell about other poems he couldn't finish (usually for mental illness reasons), which were more blatantly made up, which makes me doubt a little bit that it's real. With Coleridge, it's frankly much more likely that he just couldn't figure out how to finish it or couldn't force himself to finish it, leading to him going "oh making up an outlandish story about why it's unfinished would be more fun than actually finishing this." To be fair though "the vibes are off" isn't a very good reason to doubt it but also. the vibes are definitely off.

To be honest we'll probably never know if Coleridge was telling the truth about the whole story or if he just made it up but y'know. it's fun to think about. Also the poem we got out of it is pretty good, you should go and read it.

[helloalycia]

overstepping [one] // jane banner (Wind River)

summary: after getting several voicemails from your colleague and best friend with her asking for your backup, you attempt to call her back, only to get no answer.

warning/s: mentions of rape, murder and injuries.

author’s note: this is a two parter because i finally watched Wind River and it broke my heart but also lizzie was v cute and i felt the need to write this, hope you like it x

part two | masterlist | wattpad

"C'mon, work you stupid phone," I complained for the millionth time, before standing on the chair to get a better signal.

When I saw the bars in the corner of the screen increase, a grin appeared on my lips. I loved my parents, but the fact that they lived in a remote cabin in Tennessee with zero signal was not my favourite thing.

When the bars remained, my phone decided to actually be helpful and receive all the messages, calls and voicemails I missed. I did a brief flick through, noticing nothing was too important that couldn't wait for me to return to work. As an FBI agent, I rarely got time off. And now that I had taken a two month vacation to spend with my parents, I was adamant on enjoying it, even if I was missing work a smidge.

Next were the calls, which I noticed were mostly from my colleague and close friend, Jane Banner. I furrowed my brows, realising she'd left me several voicemails, too, which was strange since she knew I was on a break from work. What could be so important?

I sighed, glancing down at my uncomfortable position standing on the chair and leaning above the wardrobe. It was the only place in the house with decent signal and the only other place that wasn’t in the middle of nowhere was twenty minutes out. Telling myself I'd just listen to one voicemail to make sure everything was okay, I played the earliest message.

"Hey, Y/N. I'm sorry, I know you're on a break, but I just had to talk to you," it began, and Jane sounded troubled. "I was in Vegas, as you know, but I've been called out to a reservation in Wyoming where this poor girl was–" She paused, releasing a shaky breath. "She was raped and left to die out in the cold. I thought I could send in another team to take a look – y'know, usual protocol. But the coroner won't rule it a homicide and you know what that means."

I swallowed hard, knowing exactly what that meant. If it wasn't ruled a homicide, no backup would come and we had to move onto the next case. But if this girl was raped and left to die, the rapist was still out there and wasn't getting caught by the FBI.

"I can't just leave it and go," Jane continued quietly, with that recognisable passion for her job evident in her voice. "I have to do what I can. But I... I can't do this alone. It's not like other cases, Y/N. It's different out here. And there's only so much their police department can do. I know you're on a break, but I was hoping that, maybe, you could come out here and help me? It's the Wind River Indian Reservation. That's it, I guess. Bye."

The message ended and I found myself chewing on my lower lip anxiously, unable to think about anything other than Jane now. She'd worried me with that one voicemail alone – I couldn't imagine what the others said.

She was usually so good at dealing with cases, but this seemed different. She sounded shaken up, attempting to put on a brave face by the sounds of it. What was so different about this case? She didn't need me. She was capable.

Curiosity got the better of me and I played the second message, ignoring the discomfort in my arms as I stretched to maintain the signal. It was left a day after the first one.

"Hey, so I just remembered that you said you don't get much signal up there with your parents," she began apologetically. "I don't mean to– shit, it's so cold..." There was a pause, a noise in the background, then she continued, "Sorry, just turning up the heating. Anyway, I was saying. I don't mean to intrude on your break. I just– I'm hoping you'll find signal and hear this because I could really use your help. I think we've got a lead on who may have done it. It was hectic today. Really could've used that backup."

She chuckled dryly at her attempt at a joke, but all I felt was guilt. She sounded exhausted within a day of being there.

"I hope you get this," she finished with a sigh. "I should go. Got a busy day tomorrow. Hope you're doing okay. Bye."

I wasted no time in playing the next message. Three days into her case.

"I don't know why I keep sending these," she began with a hoarse voice, and my heart clenched at the sound of it. "You clearly aren't getting them in time. But it's easier talking to you like this than not at all."

It went quiet, so quiet that I thought she may have finished and forgot to hang up. But then she spoke up again, a whimper escaping her lips.

"It's so hard," she admitted. "We've covered worse cases, but this one... everything about it makes me uncomfortable. Something doesn't feel right. I've got a lead – we think it might be the boyfriend who did it and we're gonna see him tomorrow. But I don't know."

I frowned, squeezing my phone tightly because I didn't recognise the girl speaking as my friend. This girl sounded broken and I wondered what she could have discovered that made her like this.

"I've got the police department with me for backup," she said with a sniffle. "And Cory, he's a hunter whose been helping me with the case. They're all gonna be with me tomorrow. But I wish you were here, too. You always make things easier."

The lump in my throat wouldn't disappear no matter how many times I swallowed it. She made things easier, too. Always. And all I wanted to was be by her side and be there for her like she always was for me.

"Sorry about this," she said with a watery laugh, and I could imagine the embarrassed smile on her face as she did. "I sound like such an idiot. Never mind these messages. Just enjoy your break. I shouldn't be worrying you like this. See you when you get back."

The message ended and I checked to see if there were anymore, but to my disappointment, there wasn't. That message was from a few days ago and she hadn't sent anything since which was concerning in itself.

Trying not to panic for no reason, I called Jane. Hopefully everything was okay and I was being stupid. She was a fully-trained FBI agent. She could take care of herself. Right?

The call rang and rang, but nobody picked up. One missed call. No biggie. She probably heard it and couldn't find her phone or something. So, I tried again.

More ringing and no answer. Okay, no big deal. Just try again.

Another call and no answer. The chewing on my lip became more intense. Why the hell wasn't she picking up? Was she still working the case?

I waited an hour, trying again at ten minute intervals, unable to fight my concern. But there was no answer every time and I realised that I couldn't sit and wait for her to call back. Not after how she sounded in those voicemails.

No, I had to go there. She needed backup.

—

Wyoming was way colder than I could have prepared for.

I mean, technically, I prepared for nothing. I bid my parents a goodbye, threw some random clothes in a bag and caught the next plane over there. I tried for Jane's phone constantly, knowing she was never one to ignore me for this long, but there was no point. She wasn't answering, which could only mean so much.

When I reached the reservation, I had no idea where anything was or what I was looking for exactly. I just knew that as soon as the taxi dropped me off in the centre of town, I didn't know where to go.

There were a lot of locals hanging around, so my first port of call was to ask them if they'd seen Jane around – or Agent Banner, as she may have introduced herself. I showed them a picture of her on my phone, described her with vivid detail, but they just stared at me like I was crazy. I was starting to believe I was at one point, until I stopped by the convenience store.

As worried as I was for Jane's whereabouts, the chill in my bones was real. Especially my hands, which I was certain would fall off any minute. So, I decided to buy some gloves and also ask the cashier if he'd seen Jane around or heard anything of her. Whilst I was doing that, a customer caught my attention, probably having overheard my conversation.

"Did you say Jane Banner?" he asked with a quirked brow, interrupting my purchase. "The FBI lady, right?"

I nodded quickly, facing him. "Yes, that's her! D'you know where she is?"

He nodded casually. "Yeah, she's in the hospital. That big shootout that happened a few days ago, right?"

My stomach dropped. "The what?"

"The shootout," he repeated, not aware of the concern in my face. "At the drill site. A bunch of officers were killed and the FBI lady was one of the only one left standing." He tutted as he shook his head. "Very lucky that one."

A shootout? The hospital? Only one left standing? No wonder she hadn't been answering her calls.

"Can you– do you–" I stopped, clearing my throat and trying to stop freaking out. "Which hospital?"

After getting the address from him, I caught a taxi to the only hospital in town and prayed to God that Jane was okay. The one thing she'd asked for was backup and I couldn't even give her that. If I'd just looked at my messages sooner... fuck.

Getting past the front desk and to Jane's room was no issue at all. A quick flash of my FBI badge was enough for the receptionist to give me the details and wave me through. My heart was constricting in my chest the longer it took. What if it was really bad? What if that customer's intel was outdated and Jane was– no. I couldn't afford to think like that.

Upon finding Jane's room, I spotted an older man leaving through the door, being careful to close it behind him. I didn't recognise him at all.

"Excuse me," I called, earning his attention. "Is that Jane Banner's room you just came from?"

He seemed surprised, glancing over his shoulder to make sure I was speaking to him, before nodding. "Yes. Sorry, who are you?"

I pulled my badge from my pocket and showed him, though I doubted anyone would take me seriously when my eyes were watering at thought of Jane being severely injured.

"I'm her friend," I said, swallowing down the lump in my throat before lowering my badge.

"Oh, you're the backup that didn't come," he said with realisation.

My eyes flickered to the floor guiltily. He wasn't exactly wrong.

"I didn't mean it like that," he added quickly. "Sorry, I didn't mean to upset you."

I shook my head, lifting my eyes to meet his. "It's okay. I should've... I should've been here." It went quiet as he didn't know what to say, so I looked to him halfheartedly. "I assume you're from the police department, one of the ones who helped Jane."

"Not exactly," he said, before putting out his hand for me to shake. "Name's Cory. I'm a hunter by trade."

Returning his handshake, I recalled Jane's voicemail. "Oh, yeah, she mentioned you... thank you for helping her out."

When I couldn’t, I added in my head.

He offered me a small smile and I couldn't find it in myself to return it. I must have looked like shit, since he gave me a pitiful gaze.

"You want me to catch you up before you go in?" he asked, nodding to Jane's door. "She's okay by the way."

I nodded, sucking up a breath. My nerves were eating away at me the longer I didn't see Jane – half of me was terrified of what I'd find, and the other half was afraid she'd be upset or angry because I left her to it, even when she pleaded for my help.

Cory and I took a seat down the hall and he proceeded to explain about the case and how they found the guy who raped that poor girl. The shootout was the worst bit, making me shiver with discomfort. Apparently, Jane had gotten blasted with a shotgun, puncturing her torso and neck despite the vest she wore. All of the officers with her were killed and by the sounds of it, Jane almost was, too. But Cory managed to take out the criminals and the rapist himself. When he was finished telling me, I had no words.

"She's a bit shaken up, but her surgery went well," Cory reassured with a short nod. "Does she know you're coming?"

I shook my head, voice thick with emotion. "She wouldn't answer her phone. I guess I know why now."

Cory nodded, rubbing the back of his neck before sparing me a consoling glance. "She talked about you a lot. I think it'll cheer her up seeing you. You should go."

My eyes met his, teary and stinging with unshed tears. "Thank you so much."

He shrugged bashfully, but he didn't realise all that he'd done. I gave him a small, tight smile before standing up with a sigh. No point dwelling anymore – I had to see her.

Pushing my selfish feelings aside, I sucked it up and approached Jane's room. She would either want to punch me or not, but either way, I had to see if she was okay. And so, when I opened the door slightly, heart racing in my chest, said heart jumped in my throat at the sight of her.

She was laying on the bed with wires stuck in her and, only from what I could see, bandages were covering the side of her neck. I thought she was sleeping at first, but then her head tilted towards the door curiously, and bright blue eyes widened with disbelief.

"Y/N?" she asked, raising her eyebrows. "What are you– how did you get here?"

I closed the door behind me and hesitantly approached her bedside, unable to stop my eyes from soaking in the sight of her. She looked so feeble and vulnerable and unlike how I saw her last. Then, Cory's words came back to me and I began to imagine the worst scenario of her getting shot, blood seeping from her wounds, the life draining from her eyes...

"Y/N," she called, and I looked to her startlingly, hoping I didn't look as troubled as I felt.

"Sorry," I said, clearing my throat. "I, er– the messages. Voicemail. I heard them and tried calling you back, but..."

She pursed her lips, exhaling with a wince and looking up at the ceiling, as if suddenly remembering she left messages in the first place.

"I'm sorry I didn't come sooner," I said quietly, guilt seeping back in.

"No, no, don't be," she said, and I just about noticed the pink dusting her cheeks. "It's not your fault. I shouldn't have interrupted your vacation like that. I know you said you wanted a break and–"

"Jane, no, don't even say that," I cut her off, reaching for her hand in an instant. She looked my way, eyes flickering between mine nervously. I squeezed her hand gently and said, "I should have been here. You needed me and I– I didn't come. Maybe if I had, this could have ended differently."

She tried to smile, but I could see the discomfort in her eyes. "It's not that bad, honestly. It just looks bad."

I pressed my lips together, eyes falling to the bandage on her neck. Even though it was big and covered her wound, I could still make out the bruising around it from the impact of the shell. I didn't imagine the torso wound looking any different, and that thought alone made me regret leaving her alone. It was very much as bad as it looked; I knew that and she knew that.

Her lips trembled as she avoided my eyes, her own tearing up. I pushed away my guilt momentarily and changed the subject.

"So, I met Cory. He seems like a great guy."

She didn't say anything as she seemed lost in thought. Either that or she was trying not to cry in front of me. I hoped it wasn't the latter, since the last thing I wanted was to make her feel uncomfortable.

"You know," I said, when she wouldn't speak, "I'm pretty sure I told you to stay safe before I left for my vacation."

At my poor attempt to lighten the mood, she cracked a small, tight smile, but a smile nonetheless, and my racing heart slowed down momentarily.

"I'm glad you're okay," I said, now that I had her attention again, and she looked my way with a softened expression. "Kind of okay. But you know... okay."

Thankfully, she knew what I meant and her hand tightened around mine.

"I'm glad you came," she returned, and I couldn't look away even if I tried. She was always able to trap me with a single gaze.

With a tug of her hand, she motioned for me to sit on the edge of her bed, so I did. And then she began to ask me about my vacation, what I'd been up to this past month, how my parents were... basically anything and everything except for the case. And it was understandable, since she was reminded of it all the time. If I could be a form of escapism for her, so be it. It was the least I could do.

We spoke for hours until the nurse came in to let me know visiting hours were over and I'd have to come back tomorrow. With a regretful sigh, I got up from my seat on her bedside and stretched my limbs.

"Where are you staying?" she asked, a slight frown on her lips.

I smiled awkwardly, realising I didn't think that far ahead. "I'm not gonna lie, I don't know. I came straight here. There's gotta be a hotel or something in this town, right?"

She nodded and flicked her hand to the shelves on the other side of the room. "You should stay in my room in the inn. Key's in my bag over there."

"Oh, I don't have to do that–"

"Y/N, it's not like I'm going to be staying there anytime soon," she cut me off, smiling halfheartedly. "Please."

I chewed on my lip and nodded, giving in. When I grabbed her keys from her bag, I stopped by her bedside and gave her a supportive smile.

"I'll back first thing in the morning, if you don't mind," I said, and she finally gave me a smile that reached her eyes.

"I'd like that."

I nodded, resting a hand on hers and squeezing comfortingly. "Goodnight."

—

Though I knew Jane was okay, I still couldn't stop myself from thinking about her all night. The sight of her wounds and the broken expression on her face was enough to keep me awake. And the guilt that came with it all... why couldn't I have just picked up my damn phone?

As promised, I returned to Jane's hospital room the next morning, this time bringing some breakfast snacks from the hospital cafeteria since I knew the food would be much better than whatever they were serving her. Judging by the content expression on her face when I gave it to her, I was right.

When she finished eating, she was able to sit up slightly and move over on her bed, urging for me to join her and watch some TV with her. There was no way I was going to turn down that offer, so I slid next to her and kept a packet of sliced apples between us as we watched whatever was playing on the TV.

About halfway through watching, she spoke up randomly, taking me by surprise.

"When are you leaving?"

I tore my gaze from the screen and realised she was staring at me with intense green eyes.

"When you're well enough to," I answered truthfully.

She looked down to her hands. "You don't have to stay with me. You can go."

I studied her profile, knowing it was the wrong time to appreciate how stunning she looked even when she was makeup-free, sporting a bed head and tired.

"Do you want me to go?" I asked softly, afraid I may have overstepped.

She was quick to shake her head slightly, finally lifting her gaze to meet mine with glossy ones. "No."

I nodded, trying very hard not to smile, cleared my throat and grabbed her hand. "Then I'm not leaving. I'll be right here until you get better and I can take you home."

A ragged breath escaped her lips as she nodded in response. We both looked back to the TV and I noticed she didn't let go of my hand, her fingers warm to the touch and giving me goosebumps at the contact. But I wouldn't have had it any other way.

[nomsugayoongi]

Recurring

Pairing: Jungkook X OC female

Warnings: None yet.

Synopsis: Jungkook meets the girl of his dreams...but the problem is exactly that. She's in his dreams.

Note: So I had this really bizarre idea for a fluff fest (and eventual smut fest because it's JK and I can't help myself) It's written and edited on a phone so forgive any mistakes and don't be afraid to let me know what you think.

"Huh?"

Jungkook looked around. He didn't know this street. Nothing looked familiar. Not the tall, grey buildings, not the neon lights casting colourful shadows on the dark pavement, nothing. He frowned, eyes scanning the signs on the building right beside him. It was one of those 24 hour convenience stores. The lights were on but he couldn't see anybody inside. No cashier behind the counter. No customers. He had no idea what time it was. Come to think of it, he didn't actually have any idea about anything. He felt a splash of water hit his face and glanced up at the dark sky. No stars. No moon. Just....black. The glow from the street lights cast faint beams and highlighted the beginning drops of rain. He looked down at the pavement. He didn't have shoes on. His bare feet looked strange against the concrete but he couldn't feel the cold ground. His frown deepened as he scraped his foot lightly against the path, expecting to feel the rough texture but feeling nothing. The rain started coming faster, droplets hitting the back of his neck as he stared down at his feet. He wasn't afraid. Even in this strange situation, with not a soul in sight, there was no fear. Just curiosity. He looked either side of him then down the dark street ahead. There was something glowing at the end of the street that piqued his interest. A soft, warm ball of light that flickered slightly even though there was no wind.

He started walking, the rain coming down harder, huge splotches soaking through his t shirt yet he didn't feel particularly cold. He looked in the windows of the closed shops as he walked past, the silhoutte of the items in the window seeming even darker against the faint light bouncing off the glass. It was so quiet. No traffic sounds, no voices. Just the sound of the rain hammering against the pavement. As he approached the end of the street, he squinted at where the light now seemed bigger and brighter. Pure darkness spanned out in front of him, but it was moving, shimmering and rippling as the rain hit the surface. Water. A lake or something. He couldn't tell how big it was. The darkness of the water sort of blending into the darkness of the night and made one big horizon of black. As he approached the edge of the water, he noticed that the ball of light that had caught his attention was a gently swinging lamp hung inside a gazebo. A rickety looking wooden Jetty connected the floating gazebo to the embankment and he quickened his pace to get to it, mainly because the rain was now hammering down so hard that he was drenched from head to toe but also because the soft glow of light against the stark backdrop of darkness was very inviting. He made his way up the jetty, hearing the wooden slats creak and groan under his feet then smiling as he reached the gazebo. It was cute. It seemed....out of place. An octagonal, wooden structure with a slate roof and half open sides. Benches ran around each edge, padded with thick, comfy looking cushions. A lantern hung from the center of the roof, swaying slightly above a small table. It really was out of place. It looked brand new, like something you'd see in the garden section of an IKEA catalogue. He wondered whether he was ok to sit since he was wet through but it was literally the middle of the night and there wasnt a soul around, so he sat, picking the edge closest to the open water and facing out so he could watch the rain bounce off the water's surface. He liked the overlapping circular ripples it created, like an intricate pattern on the glassy surface. It was nice. Absolute silence apart from the rain and the sound of his own steady breathing. He felt calm. Peaceful. Content even. Happy to just sit in the darkness and listen to the rain. He closed his eyes, inhaling deeply, the smell of the water and fresh rain causing a small smile to play around his lips.

"Hey. Soggy boy. What you doing in my dream?"

His eyes snapped open and he looked around wildly. "What the hell?" He muttered, confused. Stood at the entrance to the gazebo was a girl, her arms folded across her chest as she surveyed him. There was no way she could have snuck up. He would have heard her footsteps on the crappy old jetty. "Where did you come from?" He frowned, looking around with bemusement. "What do you mean where did I come from? It's my dream. Where did you come from?" She retorted. He looked back towards the street where everything was still exactly the same. No people. No sound. "I was over there." He muttered, pointing. "Wait...dream?" He questioned, completely confused. She nodded. "Yeah. This is my dream spot. I've been here loads of times. Want to tell me why you're crashing my dream? And why you're dripping on my cushions?" She said, arms still folded expectantly. "It's raining." He said stupidly. "I got caught in it. Wait...why aren't you wet?" He asked, suddenly noticing that she was stood among the falling rain but was bone dry. "It's my dream." She repeated slower, as though he was kind of dumb. "I decide what happens. I didn't decide on you though. Why are you here?" She asked, a frown creeping between her brow. He shrugged, still looking around curiously. "Dunno. Are you sure it's your dream? I think it might be mine." He reasoned. That would make sense. Not knowing where he was, the bare feet, the body temperature rain, the entire lack of life signs. "It's definitely mine." He muttered, more to himself than to her. "Yeah, cause I went to bed after practise and woke up here...except I didn't wake up. I must still be asleep. Huh! That's pretty cool." He said, a slow grin spreading across his face at the idea of being aware of his own dream. "Excuse me. Soggy boy. If it's your dream then why am I in it and why are you having it in my dream space?" She asked. He shrugged again, finally looking at her. She had long dark hair that was poker straight and impossibly shiny, it fell around a cute face, huge, sparkly eyes, button nose, pouty lips. Good cheekbones. She was short but curvy. Her expression displaying her curiosity. Definitely his dream. She looked like a strange Mish mash of all the things he liked in a girl. She was cute. Very cute. "Does it matter if it's your dream or my dream? Either way, it isn't real. Whoever is dreaming will wake up at some point and it'll end anyway. Why waste it trying to figure out whose head were in?" He reasoned. She nodded slowly, thoughtfully. "Yeah I guess. I'm just...not used to anyone being here." She shrugged. "Well I'm not here technically." He mused. "Neither are you." She hummed, studying him curiously. She'd dropped her folded arms and had taken a seat on the bench opposite his. She was staring at him intently. "You got a name or should I just keep calling you soggy boy?" She asked. "Jungkook" he smiled. "Huh?" She said, eyebrow raised. "Jungkook" he repeated. "Why the face?" She shook her head, still looking a little bemused. "That's not an English name." She muttered. He chuckled, now also looking bemused. "Why would it be? I'm not English." He replied. "But you've lived here a while? Your accent." She muttered. "Lived where? What accent?" He frowned. "In England." She stated. He chuckled again. "What are you talking about? I don't live in England. I've never lived in England. I barely know how to speak English although I've been learning for years. English is hard." He mused. "But you're speaking English now." She exclaimed. He frowned, laughing. "No. I'm speaking Korean." He said slowly. She looked like her head was about to explode. "No. You're definitely speaking English. I understand you. How would I understand you if you were speaking Korean?" She said, puzzled. "YOU'RE speaking Korean." He frowned. "EH? I'm speaking English. I wouldn't be able to speak Korean if my life depended on it, let alone carry out a whole ass conversation with some soaked stranger in my dream gazebo." She said defensively. He couldn't help but laugh. As far as dreams went, this was by far one of his most

interesting. "Ok. So you're speaking English. I'm speaking Korean...yet we understand each other. Cool." He smiled. She continued to look confused. "Ok so....Jungkook right?" She asked. He nodded. "Are you from Korea?" Again he nodded. "And to you it sounds like I'm speaking Korean?" Another nod. "Hmmphhh. I've had some pretty weird dreams before but this one takes the cake."

It felt like hours passed as they talked. He found out her name, that she was 2 years older than him and English. She worked in a hospital during the night and slept during the day. He told her about himself, the band, his band mates, he touched on what his life was like but didn't go into it much. It was nice to just talk to someone, even if he had to dream them up to do it. Without him even realising, the darkness surrounding them had begun to melt away, the sky lightening into colourful purples and eventually soft pinks as the sun came up. He didn't notice when the rain stopped or the silence gradually giving way to the sound of chirping birds. He was too engrossed in conversation to pay attention to his surroundings. He'd liked the sense of solitude when he first got here but quickly preferred having someone to talk to. She was attentive and interested, listening and asking questions, laughing when he made a joke. He felt...normal, which was nice. He was almost disappointed when she pointed out that time was almost up. He looked around, surprised. "When did daytime happen?" He frowned. She chuckled, rolling her eyes. "Somewhere between your pressures as an idol and my frustrations at work." She shrugged. He gazed at the water, now noticing the lush green trees that surrounded the embankment, the colour of the sky, the sparkly surface of the water. "Wow. This place is beautiful." He muttered, eyes skimming his surroundings in awe. She smiled, nodding slowly. "It's my favourite place." She said softly. "Where is it? Is it real?" He questioned. Nothing about it was familiar to him. "I don't know. I've never actually been. I just...dreamed it once and liked it so I kept coming back. A lot of my dreams happen here." She sighed. He nodded thoughtfully. "I hope I come back." He whispered. "Yeah, you didn't get to try any of the cool dream stuff." She chuckled. He raised an eyebrow, pulling his eyes from the beautiful scenery to look at her. "What cool dream stuff?" She rolled her eyes again, making him feel like a rookie. "Y'know. The stuff you can't do when you're awake. Flying, floating, changing stuff, making yourself different. It's your head. Your dream. You control it. Once you realise you're dreaming, the laws of the universe become more flexible. Dreams don't care about gravity or continuity. Your head. Your rules." She explained. He looked at her wide eyed. "Really?" He muttered. She laughed, her laugh was musical and made him feel warm. "Mmm hmm. The trick is to realise you're dreaming quickly, gives you more time to play." Her smile was childlike, eyes twinkling with excitement. It was infectious, provoking his own giddy smile. "Is there time now? Quickly?" He asked. She hummed, looking at the sky. "Don't think so. Look." She pointed upward, his eyes followed. The sky seemed to be fading. He blinked a couple of times, trying to focus but everything was blurring. "No. I'm not ready yet." He frowned. He gripped the cushion in his fists, trying to hold on. "I want to stay." He heard her light, musical laughter but it sounded further away. "I hope you're here next time. See you, soggy boy."

Jungkook awoke, blinking rapidly as he looked around. He was in his bedroom. He sat up, frowning, his stomach still churning. He rubbed his eyes with a sigh. Of course he was in his bedroom. Where else would he be. Still, that was some dream. He looked at the familiar surroundings feeling almost a pang of sadness. "That was a good dream." He whispered to himself, feeling almost silly that a small part of him was already hoping to go back.