#Cw cesspool

[stupidheadwisp]

shtumblr and shtwt is truly disgusting. I originally thought that it's good for people to have a community, but then I learned about the absurd "quirkiness" that these people have brought to cutting.

people dont use it to vent or help eachother, but they use it to see who can be the most "quirky" self harmer. instead of it being a safe space, its people posting stuff like "haha cut to beans :p" "blood on the floor :3" with photos and stolen anime art.

its terrifying to me that kids too are active in these spaces probably getting worse because of the competitive and almost fetishistic nature. just because a community isnt talking bad about sh, doesnt mean that it's a safe space. it can be a disgusting, shocking space that is used for only evil.

image by bulbaasaur on twt

[coulsonlives]

And people still fall for these.

I almost want the sick pet scams back, because at least then you won't get called names and threatened by keyboard activists for being skeptical.

[coolryptid]

I think being trip sat in nature by a group of people who love me would fix me

[griffonsgrove]

omg hello!! I saw you post those vox headcanons and wow I was literally kicking my feet and giggling LOL. I also saw you take requests right now! (at least that’s what it said in your rules) and I wanted to request something : D

could I request general alastor headcanons with a GN! Reader please ? :D

Thank you!

General Dating Headcanons | Alastor

a/n: Of course my dear!! I love how Alastor is portrayed in the series, he’s easily one of my favorite characters! I’ve been wanting to do these for quite a bit, so thank you for the request!

Fandom: Hazbin Hotel

Wordcount: 1991

Cw: Hazbin Spoilers, minor violence, mentions of death, murder

(PLATONIC):

Ah so you managed to capture the attention of the infamous Radio Demon? You should be honored he even considers you worth his time! Not most demons have that luxury, they never live long enough to see.

Al strikes me as the kind of guy who knows everyone, he’s very observant and has eyes everywhere (his shadow friends extend throughout the entirety of the pride ring). He’s got connections in just about anything. He’s bound to have at least seen you once.

That being said, he views other sinners as inferior to him, if you don't have any power, he doesn't really see you as much of a threat (let’s be honest even if you did, he still wouldn't feel threatened)

He’s quite intrigued when he sees a frail little thing like you walk through the hotel doors. You're here on your own free will, seeking redemption? Oh, this will be quite entertaining.

You’re well aware of who he is, having been in hell for quite some time, even before his 7 yearlong disappearance, you knew to be wary in his presence.

It often left you being timid or skittish around him at first.

The deer demon had a knack for popping up at the most inconvenient of times, out of nowhere it seems (perks of being able to shadow travel). He would scare the daylights out of you nearly every time. Whether it was intentional or not, it always got a good laugh out of him.

And that smile…He was always smiling, you can't ever recall a moment where he wasn't, not even a falter. It's definitely an intimidation tactic you think. After all, you're never fully dressed without one!~

Despite this, he’s a charmer. He has this flare about him that oozes confidence whenever he speaks with you, to anyone really. He’s able to talk his way into and out of anything. One of the many perks of being a showman. Alastor is witty, charming and entertaining to say the least. Life is never dull with him around.

And if you happen to be from the same time period?? It’ll only want him to be around you even more! Finally, someone he can relate to in this cesspool.

This man is quite the chatterbox. He looooves to reminisce about the good ol’ days, always talking about how things were in his radio days. He could talk for literal hours and not break a sweat. You’ll often have to politely interject when he rambles on for too long, not that he minds.

Did I mention he can cook too?? Really well, surprisingly. He claims he learned from his dearest mother. He had to put a name to her famous Jambalaya recipe! When you tried it for the first time your socks were nearly blown right off from how much cayenne pepper he put into it. He likes a little spice.

He's!! Always!! Humming!! The man loves to sing, he often finds himself absentmindedly humming old tunes from the 20’s as he goes about his day. Whether he’s out for a stroll, enjoying a nice cup of tea, or running around the hotel, he’s humming.

This has been stated before, but Alastor is not big on physical touch from others unless he's the one initiating it. There have been many times where he’s pulled you into a little dance or twirl while he explains something. It never fails to surprise you each time.

He’ll often use his microphone staff to push or touch something, more specifically someone. He doesn't like to touch sinners that often, God knows where they’ve been. You’ve seen him whack Angel upside the head with it before, the spider tried getting a little too close for comfort. But for you he’ll make an exception.

Very well groomed!! He puts a lot of effort into his appearance, and cares about how he projects himself to the public eye. His hair is always neatly styled to perfection, shoes shined, and is always dressed to the nines. I mean did you see how mad he got when Pentious ripped a part of his coat off?

As the two of you begin to spend some more time together, you find yourself often having little meetups, the both of you would chat, share a cup of tea and just enjoy each other’s company. He liked to sit on the patio, he had a little table, and everything set up for you two.

Alastor makes sure to keep an eye on you regularly. He may have his shadow sneak around and stalk you while you're out. He’ll use the excuse that ‘Hell is a dangerous place!’, He can't have some low-life sinner trying to harm you, that would make him a terrible friend!

Undeniably has a soft spot for you that he’ll never admit aloud, he genuinely enjoys your company and likes having someone around that will humor him and listen to his stories. Grandpa.

Overall, Al is quite a good friend to have, you feel like you can confide in him at any point, he’s surprisingly a wonderful listener. The more time you spend together only strengthens your little friendship. Even to the point where you both will grow to have a mutual respect for each other. He initially scared you at first, given his reputation, but underneath all the ruthless chaos is a true gentleman.

(ROMANTIC):

My man is sooo conflicted at first, He’ll spend hours in his den thinking about his feelings. (We’ve all seen the inside of his room, literally half of it is a swamp). The scenery can only soothe him so much as he contemplates on what to do.

This is probably where you will begin to less and less of him for a time being as he works out his inner turmoil.

But, once he finally comes to terms with these undeniable feelings, he decides to confront you privately, away from any prying eyes. Ahem Angel…

Very old-fashioned, this is where he will properly ask to court you. 

You’ll never know this but he was actually kind of nervous, he was worried you’d reject his offer, but imagine to his surprise when you said yes!! He kind of felt giddy.

Congratulations! You now have a cannibalistic deer overlord as your boyfriend

He’s such a gentleman, I literally cannot say it enough, the man was raised right and he respects you! 

You literally never have to open a door with him around. He holds your chair out for you, always walks on the outer side of the sidewalk, pays for every meal and is constantly giving you compliments left and right. And they say chivalry is dead.

Alastor loves to gift flowers to you. Every few weeks or so he’ll give you a new bouquet. They're different each time, some have a meaning while others he simply thought you’d enjoy. You have a special place in your room where you keep them.

Now that you’re in a relationship, the two of you are basically joined at the hip. Wherever you are, Alastor is not far behind. He doesn't want to admit it but the overlord is kind of clingy. He doesn't like being too far from you.

If there’s ever a reason he has to be away from you, he’ll often have a few of his little imp dolls watch after you. You always thought they were cute little fellas anyways.

The both of you aren't exactly private about your relationship, but at the same time you’re not screaming it out from the rooftops either. Alastor is well aware of the dangers you could possibly face due to his status. He’s made a lot of enemies in his time, and doesn't want to see you get hurt on his behalf.

That being said though, no demon in their right mind would try to threaten you.

God forbid they touch you either. They’d be ripped in half before they could even get another word out. 

He's fiercely protective over you. He tries to play it off as nonchalantly as possible, but you know he cares about you immensely, it’s rather sweet really.

Now about physical affection. Things will go very slowly in the beginning, as said before he's fine with things as long as he's the one initiating it. If you two are out for a stroll you’ll have your arm gently looped with his as you walk down the chipped sidewalks. You’ll have to be extremely patient with him, he’s not used to this “love” and “affection”

If you’re ever having a bad day however, he’ll slip out of his comfort zone for you, and allow you to hold onto him for as long as you please, in the privacy of your own room of course.

One of his favorite things to do with you, is to slow dance. There's something so intimate and special about it. It could be late into the evening, when everyone else had gone to their respective rooms for the night, If you listen closely though, you’ll hear the soft hum of music coming from Alastor’s den, he has you in his arms, the both of you gently sway in a slow waltz across the room to the quiet love songs emitting from his radio. It’s here that you truly savor these private moments with him.

Speaking of music, Al loves to sing to you. Oftentimes it may be a ballad or love song, and if you join in with him? He’ll fall for you even more. 

Cooking! He loves to whip up all his favorite dishes just for you, oftentimes you’ll help him in the kitchen, even if it’s the smallest thing. It's become an annual thing you two like to do together. He makes sure that you get only the best meat that this side of hell can provide.

He’ll often call you a mix of different pet names, here's a few of his favorites: Cher, Darling, Beloved, Dearest, Love, Mon Amour, Doll

Which btw on the topic of meat, Al is canonically a cannibal, he’ll often eat demon meat in his meals, and will have you try it at least once.

Admittedly has gotten slightly jealous of his own shadow. The mischievous thing was always trying to steal your attention away from him, oftentimes it would work, you would always give in and humor him, saying that ‘Even his shadow needed some loving too!’. With a strained smile, Alastor shoots a glare at the inky mass of himself, who just looks at him with a smug grin.

Will have you meet Rosie at least once. She’s one of his other closest friends, and a real sweetheart. At first she comes off as really scary and intimidating. but the more you get to know her, and she's for certain that you wont hurt her friend, she’s much more friendlier. 

You two actually bond together somewhat, having little chats about Alastor occasionally, or about her business.

It’s safe to say that this man would kill hundreds if not thousands for you. You have him wrapped around your little finger. If you ever have someone bothering you, they might as well already be dead, because this man will hunt them down like prey. And eat them too.

Honestly, Alastor as a lover is nothing short of wholesome. He’s so attentive and caring when it comes to you. Which is so refreshing to see, especially coming from one of hell’s most feared overlords. Things will most likely start of slow, but if you’re patient with him, all the hard work will be rewarded tenfold. He had initially thought the Princess of Hell’s Hotel was one of the biggest jokes of the century, but what he wasn't expecting was you to be one of the best things to come out of it. You both were cast down to suffer an eternal damnation in hell, but at least now you can endure it together <3.

[rocknrollsalad]

rating: t cw: hook up, mentions of sex, nothing on camera but it's implied, steve Harrington has bad parents tags: no upside au, reconnecting later in life, rockstar eddie, regular guy steve word count: 779

written for @steddieholidaydrabbles prompt "star gazing"

Eddie had come back to Hawkins for the only reason that could ever possibly drag him back to this cesspool of a town; his uncle. The unspoken assumption was that it'd be for Wayne’s death, but Eddie was fine with being wrong about that. Even if it meant one more trip back than he wanted.

A cut and dry visit to look at houses turned to drinking and, in the biggest surprise of all, going home with the king of Hawkins High. Something Eddie had always dreamt of, he was secure enough in who he was now to admit it.

They were, oddly, both in town for similar reasons. Eddie was getting Wayne a new place and Steve was selling his parents' old place. Leaving them both to revisit things they hadn’t for the better part of a decade. Even better, it granted Eddie the chance to see Steve’s high school bedroom, to play like they were sixteen again.

Drunk enough to not make it weird, they fooled around on the twin bed. Nothing more than a bit of fun and quick orgasms but healing all the same. Something helped by them squeezing together on a mattress meant for one, in just their underwear, after cleaning up. Not quite cuddling but a closeness Eddie wasn’t used to from his hook ups…or maybe conquests was a better word here.

Everything was silent, no hum of machines or buzz of lights, just a vacant house Steve had slept in last night and was looking to wipe his hands of. Wayne would never go for a place like this or they could kill two birds with one stone.

Still, the quiet was nice. Far better than talking about how they’d changed or Eddie admitting all those gym classes he spent staring. All they had was each other’s body heat and the familiar glow of neon green from the ceiling.

The longer Eddie looked, the more he recognized in the layout of stars until quiet wasn’t an option. “Is…is that Orion’s belt?” he asked, pointing to three stars in a row.

“Well, I mean, it’s the whole thing,” Steve answered, tracing the path of neighboring stars.

He was so much more subdued than the version of him in Eddie’s head, that one perpetually in high school. The calm voice, almost shy, had Eddie wanting to curl up on top of him. Stake a claim for more than a night.

“Okay, so did you do that?”

“Yeah,” Steve said with a grimace Eddie could hear. “It’s like how people were really obsessed with Egypt and the pyramids? It was stars for me.”

“Apparently, those things are connected,” Eddie joked.

“My grandpa gave me this book and it was like I couldn’t read enough. I spent a whole winter break up here mapping this out. Mom loved it, I’d never been so quiet, but, I don’t know, probably a waste of time.”

“No!” Eddie fought the urge to pounce on Steve and scream that this was the hottest thing he’d ever learned about him. A bold statement given the short shorts and that time he watched Steve tell off a teacher for picking on a kid. “But it’s me talking. I made a career out of really, really loving weird shit.”

“You did it even when it didn’t pay.”

“Hey!” With a half-assed swing in Steve’s direction, Eddie didn’t make contact but feigned annoyance. “So how much do you still remember?”

“Well, it’s a good party trick to pull out when you can see the real stars. It’s…”

“Oh my god, you can even use the stars to get laid?” Eddie whined like it wasn’t totally working on him.

Steve shrugged hard enough to shake the bed.

“Alright then Magellan, what do you got?”

“So Orion is this way, right? The shoulders, the bow, all that. If you follow the other hand, in that area is Gemini. See the two bodies?”

Eddie followed Steve’s finger across the ceiling and stopped fighting the urge to pull closer. He already knew how to identify Gemini but that didn’t matter right now. Possibly ever. With a nod, he told Steve he followed. Eddie gave the man the floor and let him talk.

And talk he did. For hours, Steve pointed out constellations gave explanations, and told stories. He’d retained the information and not just to get laid. Which was good because, in a secret that couldn’t be tortured out of Eddie, this was way better than the sex.

As he dozed in and out, Steve ran his fingers through Eddie’s hair and told him about how hard it was to get some of the more line-like constellations right.

[teruuu]

First of all, I love your art.

Second of all: is Narinder big spoon or little spoon? I know him and the lamb usually eat each other instead of kissing, but do they share moment of tenderness?

Also wich part of the lamb does Narinder enjoy eating the most?

How’d you know they usually cannibalize more than being romantic? I hadn’t posted that info explicitly yet!!! …I think.

You’re so smart & silly. Go drown in a cesspool of joy /loving

CW: …obviously. Mentions of Cannibalism.

Yall I was listening to Desire by Meg Myers while drawing this on repeat and I’m just like IT’S THEM!! IT’S LITERALLY THEMM

Also if you want an actual answer to the last question, it’s the Lamb’s heart lol

[going-to-ikea-for-the-fries]

Riding a Vaquero. || Alejandro Vargas

Rating: E Words: 2.4K~ Pairing: Alejandro x F!Reader CW: DEAD DOVE DO NOT EAT. crack + smut, piv (protected), oral sex (m!receiving), throat fucking, cumming (f! and m!), swallowing cum, praise? ('that's it'), Spanish terms of endearment (nena, mamacita, vaquerita + caballito). other tags: crack, one night stand, dating app, flirting, roasting/mockery/slander of Alejandro. summary: You meet Alejandro on a dating app. Despite roasting the crap out of him he still lets you ride him :) a/n: Inspired by my "It's a Match!" fic... but very loosely and also it's so much fucking worse. + Thank you to @loveandplanet for helping me write this because I was struggling, my goodness.

Friday night. 5:30 PM.

You just got home from work and threw yourself on the couch before even making yourself dinner.

You're tired and bored and sort of... lonely.

The perfect cocktail of emotions to make you dip a toe back into the dark, cesspool of a lake that is the only dating app you keep on your phone: Tinder.

Slowly, you begin swiping away on the pictures of men on your screen.

Most of them are gym bros, there's a few nerds... You're pretty sure they're great, they seem it, you're sure they'd offer wonderful company and conversation over a quick meal...

But for the sake of what you're looking for, they might as well have a sign stamped on their face reading "[ Boring ]".

Boring. Boring. Boring.

That's when you see him.

Alejandro.

A handsome man, older, with crow's feet, and deep laugh lines, and a broad nose, and a bit of grey already creeping onto his beard... or maybe it's just the lighting? Either way, he looks... delicious.

So, you scroll down to read what his bio has to say.

A soldier, originally from Las Almas... 6ft tall... And a good cook... Looks like you've just caught yourself a two-in-one... A dinner and... if his bio is anything to go off of, a one night stand.

Although that bio...

You find yourself swiping right and in an instant, your phone displays a 'It's a Match!' screen, signalling that he liked you back.

You open your DM with him and carefully type a message:

you:

"Do you know your bio has a typo? You wrote horse twice."

His reply was surprisingly quick, almost like he was already in the DM screen as well, waiting for you to reply:

Alejandro:

"I know. I did it on purpose so people would DM me to correct me." "Pretty sure it increased the amount of women reaching out to me." "Women like you."

Cocking a brow, you can't help but scoff. Of course, he uses that typo as an ice-breaker!

No wonder he answered so quick! He was already anticipating you'd call his attention to his typo...

Sitting up on the couch again, you shift your weight and sit into a more focused position, leaning forward, before you type out an answer.

It has to be witty. It has to be funny. It has to catch him off guard...

...

you:

"That explains it." "And now that I got that out of the way..." "Is your forehead really that big or is it just the angle?"

You set your phone down on the coffee table in front of you and bite your lip, hoping that your comment wouldn't have pushed him too far...

A couple of new messages pop onto the left side of the screen in a row, causing you to lean forward to read them.

Alejandro:

"Excuse me?" "I bet you wouldn't say that to my face."

Trying not to giggle, you carefully grab the phone and type another reply:

you:

"More like say it to your forehead you mean?"

You wonder if you're going too far.

He's the first and only interesting guy you've found on Tinder today, the only one that you didn't deem boring upon one glance of their face and bio...

What are you even doing, making fun of him like this?

What if that just causes him to unmatch and block you?

What if-

Alejandro:

"I've never in my entire life been spoken to like this." "Other than when I was a boy pissing off my sisters." "And I hate to say that I sort of like it."

Your eyebrows raise and your eyes widen, feeling like you somehow just caught the biggest fish in the lake by blindly throwing in the lure and reeling it back out when you decided you should.

Sheer fucking luck.

you:

"I have more of those if you'd like." "Can keep going all night just making fun of you."

He paused again for a moment before replying with:

Alejandro:

"And you wouldn't run out of things to say?"

you:

"I'm sure I wouldn't."

Alejandro:

"And what would I have to give you in return for this to happen?"

you:

"Cook me dinner?"

Alejandro:

"Sounds like this was all a ploy to taste my food."

Taking a deep breath, you look around your room aimlessly, trying to hold back from saying the first thought that popped into your mind at reading that message...

But you can't help it.

And, hey, nothing ventured, nothing gained, right?

you:

"Maybe it's not just the food I'm planning on tasting."

Alejandro:

"Oh." "Maybe I'd like that."

you:

"Doesn't scare you?"

You almost patted yourself on the back for making a joke about his profile's stupid little 'if you think you're into something that scares me' line.

Alejandro:

"I'm an army colonel. Of course it doesn't scare me." "It just intrigues me." "You sure do look like you're starving. Who am I to deny you?"

Stifling a scoff and a bit of a groan, you reply with:

you:

"That line sounded straight out of a porno."

Alejandro:

"Haven't even cooked you dinner and you're beginning with the insults?" "You don't waste any time, huh?"

you:

"No and neither should you."

Alejandro:

"Then how about you let me cook you dinner right now?" "No stalling or wasting any more time."

Biting back a smirk, you shake your head in amusement.

you:

"Sounds good to me." "Address?"

-

"I was right, wasn't I, nena [babygirl]?" Alejandro asks as he looks down at you as you crouch before him in his kitchen.

You look up at him through heavy-lidded eyes, muffled sounds escaping your lips as you keep your mouth stuffed with his cock.

"That's right... You really were starving..." He cooed as he looked down at you, his voice carrying a pleasant growl and gravel to it.

Your head is pressed nicely against the cupboards of his kitchen, as he carefully prepares pico de gallo for the tacos he's making the two of you for dinner.

You hadn't expected to end up in this position so soon after driving up to his house, a small 1-store casita with wooden frames and details and a wonderful little tiled patio out back.

You had expected some flirting, some jokes, you roasting him...

Instead, you had somehow ended up pressed against the kitchen counter with his tongue deep in your mouth and his hand up your shirt, fondling one of your breasts...

And now, here you were, perched on your own heels, with his big cock slowly and repeatedly bruising the back of your throat as you moaned softly around it... While he cooks dinner for the both of you like nothing's happening.

It's almost infuriating, how calm he seems, how he looks down at you with those stunning brown eyes of his, and a smug little smirk on his lips...

And yet, he also looks absolutely breathtaking, standing there in a charcoal grey button-up, the first few buttons popped open to reveal a generous speckling of chest hair and a golden crucifix and a few other chains resting over his pecs…

And the way the sweat pools on his brow, and slips down the side of his robust neck, and disappears under his collar…

The light of the setting sun, warm and orange toned, filters through the windows and illuminates his small home, warming it, and reflecting off his sweat, and shining so bright on him.

It almost doesn't get better than this... letting him fuck your throat against the cupboard while he cooks you a meal which, by the scent, will be delicious, proving he wasn't lying about being a good cook...

Setting your hand on his hip, you tap your fingers on his lower back, gesturing him to go deeper into your mouth.

He picks up on the signal and thrusts harder into your mouth, causing you to choke and gurgle around his large shaft, some saliva slowly slipping down the length and disappearing in the generous bush of hair at the base.

"Mmmm, you like when I make you choke, huh?" He coos as he wipes one of his hands on a tea towel and then grips your hair, protecting your head from bouncing back on the hard wood of the cabinet.

Then, his other hand holds onto the edge of the counter, fingers curling and tightening around it, to keep him upright, before he starts thrusting more decisively into your mouth.

Your eyes roll in delight as he bullies his way deep into your mouth in a more consistent and violent pace, his own head falling back and allowing him to grunt and groan as your throat tightens and constricts around him.

"¡Ay carajo! [Ah, fuck!]" Alejandro groans as he pulls your head closer to his crotch, burying your nose in the coarse hair at the base of his cock, keeping the tip buried deep inside your mouth.

Sputtering and gurgling around him, your hands find a perch on his hip, on either side, but, rather than pulling him off, you hold onto him, close and against you, your nails digging into the muscles of his ass cheeks through the fabric of his jeans.

Your tongue laps up at the underside of his cock just as it begins to throb, Alejandro groans above you, leaning his head on the upper cabinets as he slowly floods your mouth with his tangy cum, which slowly slides down your throat as you make an effort to swallow around him.

With a long exhale, Alejandro licks his lips and looks down at you as he slowly pulls his softening cock from your mouth, letting you finally catch a proper breath too.

"Your mouth is very talented, mamacita." He compliments you, a smirk already forming on his lips again, his hand reaching down to help you wipe some drool off your chin.

"Thank you." You reply with a chuckle and push yourself up to your feet, side stepping him as he tucks himself back into his jeans and resumes making you dinner.

"So... What were you saying about having a lot more insults to tell me?" He quips and smirks at you.

"Well, first of all, I could still see your forehead from all the way down there,"

-

You break the kiss in favor of carefully rocking back and forth on his dick, buried balls deep within your slick cunt.

His large hands grip onto your hip and thighs to continue moving you atop him, making your clit grinding against his pubic hair in a way that made you squirm and whine.

His head is leaning back on the back of his couch as he watches you make yourself feel good, overstimulating your sensitive clit with the help of the coarse hair on his pelvis, and feeling the tip of his slightly curved cock rub against your g-spot.

"You like that, hm, vaquerita [little cowgirl]?" He coos at you, as your head dips back and you moan softly, before bouncing up on his cock for a moment and sinking all the way down, drawing louder groans out of you both.

It's a surprisingly slow fucking session, probably because of your bellies are full and warm with the recent meal, and you just sort of stumbled your way onto the couch afterward, for a make-out session that turned to slow, lazy sex.

Leaning against Alejandro in the low sunlight as the afternoon turns into evening and the sun sets through the window, you rock your hips against his again and again.

Your lips find his for what must be the 50th time tonight. Your tongues intertwine as you huff and moan into his mouth, his fingers digging your thighs as he squeezes you down and rubs you onto him, back and forth.

Breaking the kiss, you set your head down on his shoulder. It's almost too intimate for a first time, but it's strangely nice. His skin feels nice and warm against you, albeit a bit dewy with sweat.

Your eyes look up at him as he relaxes his head back and grunts softly, continuing to guide your hip back and forth on his, to seek out extra friction for you both, and murmuring incoherent Spanish curses and words of praise.

Slowly, you find yourself leaning forward and lick a stripe up his neck toward his stubble-speckled jawline, feeling the saltiness of his sweat on your tongue, as, even now, he's still producing more and more little droplets that slide tantalizingly slowly down his tan skin.

Then, you lick across the bottom of his jaw and around to the back of it, then, your head lowers and you lick another stripe up his neck. Alejandro reacts the same every single time, with a soft shudder and a grunt, throwing his hips up into yours.

"Oh you like that, huh, vaquero [cowboy]?" You tease him this time, using his own words against him.

The look Alejandro shoots you at that quip makes it clear he didn't appreciate your sarcasm... What a shame.

You lean back, your hands coming to rest on his thighs behind you, before you start bouncing in fervor. It drives a groan out of him, his eyebrows raising in surprise.

His left hand goes to your waist to steady you while he brings his other hand up to your lower stomach, pressing down onto it and allowing him to feel himself through your walls.

His thumb finds its way to your clit, rubbing it side to side, as you continue carefully and steadily bouncing off his lap, his own thighs having stiffened and raised to allow you and easier time.

The slaps of your ass and his thighs meeting echos throughout the living room, along with the sounds of your and Alejandro's moans.

It's a slow build-up, the both of you too lazy to actually put in too much effort into chasing your orgasm, but, steadily, and with Alejandro's thumb consistently rubbing against your clit, you find yourself reaching your peak.

Alejandro watches you with heavy-lidded eyes, leaning back against the couch and a stupid smirk painted on his lips, seeming so smug over the fact he got you to fall apart on his cock...

Only to watch you dismount from him and take a seat beside him on the couch, your body feeling too hot and tired to even remain in touch with any part of his.

His smirk vanishes and he cocks a brow, giving you a silent, judgmental look, as if asking 'What are you doing? Get back here.'.

And his face downright settles into a scowl when you mirror him by raising your own brow and ask him "You're a colonel, you've got this, right? You don't need my help.".

And, with an extra little impish smile you add, "Don't be scared, I believe in you, caballito [horsie]!"

for @lyralein , so you stop fucking bullying me because I "never write Alejandro" or whatever 🫶

[evilfrogcereal29]

Pizza guy!Nikto - Chapter 1

(ok... This is going to be like, maybe one of the most weirdly specific fanfics you've ever read. For context: I work at a pizza place IRL. Thats it. Thats the only context. I was at work and. Thought about Nikto working there too. That's all you need to know. Enjoy :]!!!

This is going to be a Nikto x GN!customer!reader, but reader is NOT introduced in this chapter.

Cw/tws: mentions of violence- including towards an animal! I think thats all? Enjoy :)!!

NOTE: all text in red & italics are Nikto's voices

Nikto was bored.

Retirement was miserable, and Nikto found himself restless day in, and day out. Unable to find peace while wasting away at home. Sure, he had lot's of retirement money, but he had this urge to work, to kill. He would give anything to be on a plane to another mission right about now, but he was too 'broken'. That's what they basically told him. Too mentally unwell to keep working. A hazard to his own team.

Heh.

What the fuck do they know? They don't know what goes on in his head. So what he broke that recruit's arm? They touched him when he warned them of the consequences. Or who cares that he hit one of his higher-up's service dogs with the buggy? It should've been servicing it's owner, not under the damn vehicle! He's not a danger, the other voices are!

Speaking of voices, they aren't reacting well either, metaphorically biting away at Nikto's psyche each day he did fucking nothing. He felt useless, and they reminded him of that. You idiot, you deserve your suffering for being the way you are. Broken. Broken little solider.

He still gets calls from his mates in the service, especially Krueger, who always makes sure to call as often as possible to keep the man updated on missions, even if they didn't concern him anymore. He suggested that Nikto pick up a part-time job, not for the money, but the work. God (and Krueger) only knows what Nikto's mind gets upto when left to its own devices.

Nikto scoffed at first, he didn't like the idea of working at some measley fast food job, he was above that. He crawled through the fucking trenches and ripped out the throats of women and men, and would be reduced to... What? Cleaning a fucking stove? Heating up processed foods for weak civilians? No. He wouldn't. The voices mocked him, this is what we've been reduced to? Patheic.

And then the rot set in.

Krueger had been very insistant on a visit the second he had time away from work, flying out to see Nikto even as the man ignored his texts and calls. He wasn't dead, Krueger knew that, but he also wasn't in a good place. He couldn't let his companion live like this pathetic slob. Cause that's exactly what he was becoming.

Water and alcohol bottles littered the floor, stacks on stacks of old, half eaten take-out. Junk that should’ve been tossed long ago created walled barriers throughout the house. It was a scene out of horders, and the smell was awful. Christ. Krueger was no clean freak, but this? He'd rather sleep next to corpses than this cesspool of rotting filfth, and in the middle of it all, sat his balaclava-ed, smelly friend on the sofa. Krueger grimmaced, taking careful steps. He nearly stepped on poor Sputnik, who had become content with spending her days lazying about, peeing in places without Nikto's knowledge, and eating off his leftover scraps of food, growing just as lethargic as her owner.

"Nikto... Scheiße..” he would almost be outraged at the man’s carelessness if he didn’t understand how the other functioned, without a job, without a purpose, Nikto was truly a nobody. He lifted the man’s head with a gentleness, an action only someone like Krueger could get away with, looking into those glazed-over icy blues.

“This is… this is bad Nikto..” he mutters, eyes filled with..love? Concern? Something Nikto wasn’t used to often. Nikto finally shows evidence of life as his eyes flicker up in wordless understanding. Krueger continues,

"I can't stand to see you like this. You can't stand being like this. I'm going to help you."

Krueger lifts his friend up, albiet with mild arguing and growling from the disguntled bear of a man that Nikto is. He sets Nikto's cheap laptop on his lap and types in job sites, which already has Nikto tense.

"Krueger- чёрт побери! you're acting like my fucking mother-"

"good, about time someone comes in and wipes your ass, if not yourself." Krueger grumbles, scrolling through the job offers, "what's your SNILS...?"

After a painstaking back and forth, and Krueger prying for all of Nikto's personal info, he sent in a few applications on his friend's behalf. Patting the other on the back as Nikto's thumbs rubbed at his temples, fighting back the urge to pulverize his only real friend. You really should, he's a nuisance...

"this is... Not ideal.." Nikto finally grumbles, finishing the last of some lukewarm whisky from the bottle.

"none of this is, meine freund, but this...Is worse." Noone has ever seen them like this, so...domestic. In reality, this was as hard for Krueger as it was for Nikto, The Alligence wasn't the same without the Russian, fighting wasn't the same. Krueger rested a hand on his shoulder.

"everything is going to change, can you try to change a little with it?"

Change? Krueger wanted him to change? Was that even possible? He'd been so set in his ways ever since the incident. But the look in Krueger eyes let Nikto know that there wasn't really a choice.

What are you kidding? You could change as far as you could throw a boulder! Never!

He sighed, deeply. His shoulders slumping miserably as he exhaled.

"fine. But If we don't like the job-"

"ja, ja, you don't have to stay. I get it. I can't make you." He interupted, waving his hand dismissively, "but don't just give up right away. Can you promise me that?"

Nikto hated making promises, he hated feeling like he owed anyone anything, he didn't take on debts or deals. Go ahead, make more promises you can't keep. We know the truth.

Yet here he was, being interviewed by an elderly couple, who pitied him for his past as a solider.

"me and Martha are going to see how you fair in the kitchen, and if that's turns out to be too overwhelming we can move you to a more simple job like delivery. Just bring the customers their pizzas." The eldery man said with an acknowledging smile.

He nodded to the man, Michael, reaching across the table to shake his hand, thanking him begrudgingly for this... 'Opportunity'. Thats damn well what it was, but Nikto didn't quite see it that way yet. As he left with a work shirt displaying the place's name and logo, he felt his heart drop. And a shrill, annoying voice invading his mind.

You are truely a fucking Развалюха. Good luck ever trying to live a normal life!

And now Nikto was worried.

------------------------------------------------------

Hai :3 I hope you enjoyed this first chapter, I wanted to introduce reader in this first part but it was getting long and I also just wanted to get something out. There will be more chapters for this, but they might be kind of slow to come out😭 work takes up a LOT of my time tbh, but also working inspires me cause...yk pizza place setting so- its a double edged sword. But if you enjoyed pls like and reblog it means sm♥️♥️ ty for reading!!

And to the person who sent me an ask in my inbox about the relationship dynamics between NiktoKrueger + criminal!reader, I see u and ur creative vision, I started writing something today in response ;) just gimme some time!!!

Also an @ list for some mooties who I think would like to see this :3

@simp4konig @lizzy019 @fishsinsareacknowledged @zoloftwithdrawalnausea sorry If I missed anyone, lmk if you'd like to be tagged (or not tagged) in future chapters!!

[sertralinegremlin]

I have given this ask way too much thought and have decided to block this individual. If, by any chance, you (person behind this account) find this via another account or when logged out, I suggest you heavily reconsider the people in your life and how you treat them, considering you definitely found me via Instagram almost a year ago - haven’t said a word until now which makes me think you only remember me when you’re horny.

Just so you know, you are giving the impression of a stalker right now - I don’t fuck with that shit. I also do not exist to pleasure randoms.

would you ever consider selling content again?

Who tf is this lol

I assume you found me via Insta when I posted my link about a year ago now.. considering you’re a Melbourne user and around my age bracket. To be blunt as I was already in a shit mood before opening this message? Nope. I’m done with that work. I fully support those who do, but I cannot myself anymore. I despise the fact I was born with this body and whenever I get reminded of this part of my past, I spiral back into gender dysphoria. So.. please don’t ask anything like this to me again, and I suggest if you’re here for that content from me, to unfollow me. Thank you.

[gunnrblze]

Reunion

Silly little unserious fic about the guys finding you in No Man’s Land. Had to get this sit-com bs out of my head lol.

CW: slight suggestiveness, general talk of death ‘n stuff like that.

One probably wouldn’t assume that every day during a war would be the same, unpredictability and all. But that wasn’t quite your experience, considering you did the same thing every day. Every, single, day.

You wake up, curse men for being so stupid, for starting wars and killing one another for material things…scrounge for food and water, mourn your losses around noon, work on securing a shelter again for the impending nightfall, and tend to your more physical wounds, lest you get infected and all your hard work goes down the drain.

No Man’s Land was shitty, but you’d stumbled right into the cesspool itself, somehow. Your family passing away from whatever the fuck started falling out of the sky however many years ago was shitty too. Being left behind when you should’ve died already wasn’t sunshine and rainbows either. But you couldn’t focus on that too much when every turn you made could, literally, get you killed.

Armed fuckers everywhere, you were thankful you played too much hide and seek as a kid, cause you’d surely be dead if you didn’t somehow blend in with your bland surroundings. Unable to understand what anyone was even saying -doomed with trying to be quirky in Highschool and taking French instead of Spanish like everyone else wasn’t paying off, apparently-all you could understand from these dictator puppets was sí, nada, and rojo? You weren’t too keen on trying to understand why you kept hearing about stuff being red, maybe ignorance was bliss after all.

You’re not entirely sure though, it’s hard to pick up on spoken words when the blood rushing in your ears is the only sound you can hear, second to the gunshots and explosions booming everywhere. What were you even doing at this point? Surviving just so they didn’t give you a merciless ending? Was it worth it to live like this? You didn’t know that either, but you’d be damned if you simply gave up just because the going got tough. What is it that America’s so proud of? Freedom and bravery and what not?

Navigating abandoned and destroyed land for mere survival wasn’t on your lifelong bucket list, but here you were, sweating half to death behind a chunk of some random rubble in a desolated office building.

Shoveling the scraps of food you managed to find down your sore throat, eyes that had permanently grown in the back of your head always scanning for any lone beret who could knock your head off with a single bullet.

It wasn’t peachy or anything, but the sound of a whining dog made you forget all about it.

Shoving yourself as far behind the rubble as humanly possible, backpack squishing against the wall, you prayed -or talked, something like that, whatever- to whoever may be listening, that whatever Fed dog was sniffling around wouldn’t pick up your scent.

Unfortunately, your luck seemed to dwindle these days, as a massive German shepherd decided to knock over a nearby half broken-in door.

You took that time to suck down a breath, before figuring an escape route. You had no idea where your nationalist friends loomed, so like always, you hoped that crawling from post to post would keep you hidden for long enough.

As quietly as you could on broken chunks of tile, you crawled out from behind said chunk of rubble, to an adjacent one a few feet away. The sound of footsteps and distant voices ripped through any ounce of self confidence you’d gained, and you went back to the blinding fear for a moment. White hot and, confusing? Why weren’t they speaking Spanish?

“Shouldn’t be anybody round, place is trashed, boys” a deep, older sounding voice echoed. No, no, you don’t like the sound of that at all. You hoped maybe whoever this guy was talking to would agree, but alas, it seemed there was always a voice of bigger reason.

“I dunno, dad…Riley’s picking something up I think” his friend, or son apparently, shot back.

Riley? The furry battering ram? Maybe that was good…? These guys didn’t seem to be of Federation influence, perhaps they’d hear you out at least before splattering the insides of your skull onto the grimy tile.

The little pitter patter of dog paws got closer in range, and it made all the random joint aches and pains in your body more pronounced, bones vibrating with fear once you realized you couldn’t get out of this building. The knife you pulled from your bag only shook pathetically in your hand, more of a damn fidget toy than anything you could defend yourself with at this point.

Shoved back into a near corner, you already clocked the two voices, and there had to be more ‘boys’ with them, unless of course the older voice was including their door toppling canine in that group address.

“What is it, Riley? Go get it” the second guy spoke again, his distant words sending an even bigger pang of fear through your chest. Go get it. Go get you.

Apparently, Riley’s a good boy, because moments later the dog was sneaking right in front of your makeshift hideout. Barking ensued and it made you flinch on instinct, eyes wide as you heard all sorts of footsteps jogging your way. You could only sit there, backing yourself further into the corner, crouched behind the rubble as you stared into the canines beady eyes.

No Federation symbol on his little vest, though. Not that you could really process that, before a large man with a stupid little green beanie on came into view. The rifle in his grip didn’t phase you much anymore, only the fact that he was pointing it in your vicinity and that he donned a certain look on his face did.

You didn’t have much access to mirrors these days, but you knew being stuck in this desecrated, excuse for a city left you looking rather…gross. But this wasn’t that kind of look, of course.

“What the hell?” Beanie said a little louder than you preferred. “Who are you?” He followed up with, lowering his little killing machine when he seemed to deny your presence as an immediate threat.

If that broad ass statement wasn’t enough, the near geriatric sounding man you heard first ran up right next to him, followed by a blonder man that looked a little bit younger than Beanie himself.

You didn’t respond, naturally, what the fuck do you say to three armed men and their yapping German shepherd? They stared at you like a science experiment, before dad, you presume, spoke directly.

“What are you doing here? Where’d ya come from, kid?” His voice was sharper and more harsh than you typically enjoyed, but they didn’t seem to want to turn you to dust just yet.

It appeared they clocked the way your eyes flitted from corner to corner, wall to wall and door to door, your body screaming at you to run, but paralyzed with fear, and the harsh reality that you couldn’t escape these three.

“Relax, we won’t hurt you” Beanie so kindly assisted, seeming to understand your predicament a bit more. You didn’t trust your sore throat to speak, so you gulped instead, shaking like a leaf with that hunting knife in your grip while you picked up on more voices through their radio chatter.

They weren’t Federation, thank god, but that was almost just as scary. Because you didn’t know who they were yet, and they seemed to be quite interested in figuring you out. Dressed to the nines in tactical gear, obviously soldiers with the massive guns and all. American, with the west coast lilt that didn’t actually quell your fear, just create another problem for you to solve with the little resources you had.

You didn’t like the tone of the Geriatrics voice too much, he was understandably suspicious of you as he told you to put the knife down. Your body moved on its own accord, sheathing it in your backpack as you fully came to the realization that these people decided what happened now. Beanie asked more cursory questions, arms crossed like the brutes they seemed to be, and you feebly explained you were lost.

Lost. An idiotic answer. Stranded in No Man’s Land, you were obviously out of your element, due to the simple fact you were still alive and kicking it, disheveled as you were.

You weren’t keen on giving them your name, and Blondie seemed to understand that before you went silent at the question, nudging Beanie and sending some kind of telepathic message to him.

“Dad, they’re obviously not supposed to be here, we’ll just take them back to base, get them outta here at least?” Beanie said, his own uncertainty making the empty pit in your stomach blossom. Dad seemed to agree, but gave you a side eye that your own mother couldn’t even dole out that well.

You relented more quickly than any of you thought you would, including yourself. You knew it was game over the moment Riley The Dog spotted you. They seemed to hash out a plan rather immediately, and the idea of being helped, even by strangers, did seem a bit deserving on your end.

Your creaky knees burned as you stood up, tentative and unsure about this arrangement, despite your desperate need for assistance. You weren’t deciding to go back to this ‘base’ with them, you were being led back to this base with them. Beanie explained that they’re Army, and it still didn’t quite help. You shuffled along the split flooring of your abandoned little office shelter, checking every exit again, wondering about that escape shot one more time.

Blondie clocked you again though, apparently the silent and observant type, because he nudged his old man, who swiftly turned to you, his eyes expressing an unspoken knowledge. The knowledge that you were beyond outnumbered.

“We’ll get you back to our base, get you squared away from there” he said as if it were that simple, clearly trying not to bug out at the knowledge that someone survived all this. You wanted to explain there was no where to square you off to. That you were alone, but they seemed to already know that. They didn’t ask nearly enough questions, you thought. But then again, you didn’t have much to expand on.

The three of them moved like a unit. Water flowing through oil, smooth and sure, despite your awkward presence lingering shortly behind Geriatric, his offspring nearing either side of you. Caging you in. Riley The Dog seemed to skip ahead, content with scoping things out for them first.

Apparently, three -four- isn’t quite a party yet though, because two other sets of heavy footsteps sounded outside the building, the chatter on their radios picking up more. You hadn’t really listened to what Geriatric muttered into said radio when they’d first found you, too busy trying to tame your nervous system.

But apparently they valued a buddy system.

Two men, just as large and brutish, rounded the corner as soon as the four of you walked out of that broken down door, courtesy of the shepherd that trotted off to god knows where.

They seemed both surprised and unsurprised to see you. Expecting your tagging along back to base, from what you could tell, but still unprepared to witness a living civilian in No Man’s Land.

“What’s their name?” The bald one asked, a gruff in his voice that shouldn’t have been as attractive as it was. That’s how you knew your brain was scrambled, finding these square ass men attractive even in the slightest, when all they were offering was a little ‘help’ during arguably the worst time of your life, was a bit insane.

But you’d gone a little insane, so maybe it was understandable.

After Geriatric stepped off to the side with Baldy and the dude in the mask, whatever that get up was about, you only heard his more hushed voice. Discussing the pertinent problem you seemed to create just by existing.

The twin towers idled next to you, sharing silent looks as they combed over your appearance. Your hair ratty and clothes dirty, covering your battered up skin well enough, some stray cuts and scrapes that you weren’t able to take nearly good enough care of made you look straight out of a survivalist horror film. Donning a suspicious blood stain on the waistband of your cargo shorts, something everyone seemed to be thankfully ignoring.

Until now, at least.

“Are you hurt?” Beanie asked with some kind of concern, motioning to your blood stained pants that’d given you away long before you could even stand up and flaunt your crooked gait.

Your blank stare made everyone fall flat for a moment, all five men standing like robots, looks being shared and eyebrows being raised. Obviously you were fucking hurt, but not enough to mention it, in your opinion.

Your mere head shake didn’t extinguish Beanie and Blondies curiosity though, but their father seemed to want to get the show on the road, so long as you could actually walk down said road.

You trudged behind the five of them, making off putting eye contact with the masked one for a moment, his eyes lighting a path of unease down your spine, whether he meant to or not.

They cut off into the woods shortly after exiting the blown-to-bits plaza you’d wandered into. Beanie seemed to be concerned with your health, asking another time if you were sure you could walk. You’d be annoyed if it weren’t for the obvious hobbling and coughing you were doing with every step.

You insisted though, what was the alternative? One of the avengers would just haul you over their shoulder until you arrived on the scene where this ‘Kick’ fucker was apparently waiting for you all?

Yes, apparently so.

“Hesh, help them, son” the Geriatric called out without even turning around. First you noticed the name that was finally given up. Hesh didn’t sound any less silly than Beanie in your head, but you were forced to digress when said man stopped and turned to you, pointing to his back.

Apparently the grimace on your face was noticeable, a smirk cracking on his lips as he slung his backpack off, handing it to Blondie whose arm was already outstretched, standing to the other side of you.

“Familiar with the piggy back ride? We’ll be walking for a while, and you’ve clearly got something wrong under that bloodstain” he added as he motioned to your stained waistband, as if his knowing look wasn’t enough.

You felt silly, felt even sillier when your knee jerk reaction was the most petulant eye roll you’d ever given. But you found yourself digressing again. The large cut on your hipbone hurt too much to keep going like this. So you stepped closer as he squatted down, and climbed on his back like a monkey.

It wasn’t really funny, nothing about the situation was, but the absurdity made you roll your eyes again, earning a smirk from Blondie who picked right back up with the trek. In any other circumstance, you’d probably feel a stir down south with the way this man held onto you. Hands cupped under the backs of your knees to hold you up, was as innocent as innocent could be.

But again, you’d gone a little off your rocker the last several months, so being chest to back with a hot sweaty soldier who carried you like you were a sack of flour almost did something to you.

The three musketeers up ahead seemed to be chatting more, Baldy with a near permanent scowl on his face as the six of you moved through this too warm thatch of forestry. The masked one was quiet as he spoke to their Ringmaster, but not as quiet as Blondie was, who hadn’t even so much as muttered anything yet.

You willfully ignored all the aches and pains in your body up until now. The reprieve of being carried piggy back took pressure off your brittled bones and squeaky ass joints. Hesh didn’t seem to sweat having your weight on his back until the terrain got a bit more hilly.

Your insistence that you could walk again on your own was shut up very quickly by a shush from grumpy dwarf up ahead, everyone stopping at once. You peeked above Hesh’s head some more, only to see a group of berets in the distance. That not so funny feeling returning to your stomach, gut wrenching and definitely ruining the more pleasant one that’d somehow bloomed.

Your head shot down on instinct, wrapping yourself more around the green giant you were hanging off of, who seemed to have the same idea, securing your legs further around his waist as he crouched down.

Everything was a bit of a blur from then on, yelling and guns going off, your last view being the sunlight shining through the tree tops before you and Hesh fell over as a unit.

Not even cognizant enough to feel the intense ache on the back of your head, fortunately. Just a hand around your scraggly wrist and another somewhere near your waist.

And that goddamned dog barking.

[wishcamper]

Nessian Week Day 6 - Legends & Destiny

Happy second to last day of @nessianweek! I have for you a Witcher!Cassian and sorceress!Nesta AU.

You can read here or on ao3!

Out of the Fog, Into the Mist

CW: consensual sexual content, reference to underage marriage and sex trafficking.

In the town of Mulbrydale, just north of the river near Hanged Man’s Tree, whispers rode the chill autumn air like restless ghosts. For weeks, the townsfolk held their breath as a dark shadow loomed over them: girls had begun to vanish. Four in total, all last seen in the gnarled woods at the fringes of their fields. And so a notice was put out on boards around Velen, that anyone who could find the girls (or the culprit) would eat and sleep well in any house, and could lay claim to a hefty sum.

It smelled like trouble, the sickly sweet of a body left long to rot, but Cassian needed the coin. And after four nights sleeping on the hard-ass ground of this war-ravaged cesspool, he wasn’t picky about how he got it.

“They go over the ridge to let the goats feed in the scrubs. Come sundown the goats come back, but not the girls,” the local innkeep explained, and Cassian saw the ripple of fear pass through him as he said it, the curl of his stooped shoulders.

“Right.” He rubbed the back of his neck, trying to ignore the stink wafting off his new employer, though maybe he’d ceased to be nose-blind to himself. “So you want me to find what’s killing them.”

“Not killin’, Master Witcher - snatchin’.” The man’s voice was grave despite the lilting accent. “We’ve searched these wood a dozen times and found naught, not a bone. Tweren’t even no blood. Must be a fearsome thing to take them without a trace.”

He gave Cassian a look he’d seen a thousand times then, the furtive dart of a gaze that lingered on the cat-like yellow of his mutated eyes, the two swords at his back: steel for men, silver for monsters. He tried to ignore it, along with the rage that bubbled up at how common folk saw him, a beast barely better than those he slayed.

“And it’s only girls? No boys, too?”

The innkeep shook his head, leaned in to whisper, “The boys come home all dazed-like, remember nothin’. Except for Young Ian, but he were half mad already.”

Cassian sighed and considered the possibilities. There were the tragic but mundane - the girls got lost, or else ran off, ending up for the wolves either way. Then the tragic and unjust, that someone or something was abducting them: slavers, traffickers. It seemed less likely the cause was supernatural, though hags were known to have a penchant for young females, maybe a lesser vampire.

He didn’t relish any of the outcomes, if he was honest with himself. But he’d seen the lavish church at the end of the high street and knew there could be no drought of money in this town, despite the dilapidated dwellings. Crisis had a habit of making converts of even the most secular, and the people of Mulbrydale shed their coin for the Church of the Eternal Fire like the yellow birch leaves now littering their street.

“What did this Young Ian claim to see?” he asked, and the innkeep shrugged where he’d turned to wipe a grimy mug. Whether beast or bastard, Cassian figured the snatcher must have a stash spot nearby since none of the bodies had been found, or else there’d be tracks from a caravan or band of outlaws. 

“He says he saw a lady in the wood, the same day the last girl disappeared. Said she spoke to him day afore yesterday when he went lookin’ for his own sister, Abby. Didn’t find no trace of her, but came back babblin’ like a loon about how he met some Gray Lady. Blue eyes and hair spun of gold, he says.”

Instincts prickling, Cassian leaned closer across the grubby counter, trying to hide his voice below the din of other midday patrons who apparently had nothing better to do than drink. “Did he seem.. Out of it? Acted strange ever since?”

“Well he’s never been quite right, but he did turn down a sympathy romp with Marna over there when he came to tell the tale. Never afore he done that.” 

The aforementioned must’ve heard her name, for a dull-eyed woman rose her head from where it had been plastered to a scrubbed wood table and offered him a watery smile. The innkeep gave him a significant look, eyebrows raised.

The pieces were beginning to fall into place, an artist’s first pass of paint over a canvas. It definitely wasn’t wolves, and while he hadn’t ruled out some other creature it was clear this being was intelligent, enough to cover his own tracks. That left fewer options, all of them dangerous.

Cassian straightened, confident he’d wrung every bit of useful information out of the man, tossed his last few coppers on the counter before draining his ale.

“Thank you. Tell me where to find this Young Ian, and the families of the girls, and I’ll be on my way. And as for my fee..”

They haggled for a moment, and he managed to get the innkeep up a few more crowns, enough to see him through until he reached Oxenfurt. Once there he could rest a bit easier, in more comfort with the dearth of contracts in the city. Maybe even spring for a sympathy romp himself.

Cassian left his horse tethered outside the inn and made his way to the main street. Townsfolk froze in their churning and smithing and general idling to gawk at him, some spitting in his path or crossing themselves and mumbling prayers to the Eternal Fire. Even the reedy looking man in the pillory had the gall to sneer at him, but they were all reactions he’d endured for many years, and Cassian only sent his well-practiced curse to his parents for selling him off so young.

For it was a witcher’s lot in life to be both needed and reviled, a freak mutated with poisons to be stronger, faster, with keener senses and quicker healing. His kind were made, not born, though he might as well have been for all the choice he had in it. 

At the first three girls’ houses Cassian found similar scenes - weeping mothers, dull-eyed siblings, fathers crackling with impotent rage. And the same story thrice over: that their daughter walked over the ridge to the forest like she always did, and at sundown only the goats came home, no trace to be found. 

The tale was simple enough, but something snagged in the back of Cassian’s mind as he trudged up the lane toward the last house. Maybe it was that all the girls were near age thirteen, all described as both comely and disobedient by their fathers. The way the mothers cringed away from their husbands, the young boys in each house better nourished than their sisters.

Abby was the third girl who’d gone missing, who also happened to be the sister of the young man who’d claimed to see the phantom in the forest. Her former house was a sad little cottage of pitch and straw at the end of the lane, leaning drunkenly to one side from time and shoddy construction. Its owner leaned in much the same manner where he sat out front, propped up on a stool with a jug between his feet, dirt and sweat caked along his hairline.

Cassian cleared his throat and the man jolted upright at the sound, somehow startled even though Cassian was big enough to cast a shadow across him from several feet away.

“I hear your daughter’s gone missing,” Cassian bit out, already expecting no useful information. “And your son saw a woman in the woods. What can you tell me?”

The man hiccoughed and blinked up at him, weaving slightly though he was sitting still. “My Abby. She’s gone. The Gray Lady took ‘er.”

“What Gray Lady?”

“Ian seent her, my - hic - son. When he went lookin’ for his sister.” He gestured toward the forest and belched wetly, making Cassian take a step back. “Said he saw a figure in the woods before passing out, and when he woke this was - hic - in his pocket along with one of Abby’s hair - hic - ribbons.”   

The man nodded downward. Cassian looked closer now at the jug between his feet and saw a small flower sticking from the opening, an ordinary celandine. But the yellow petals shimmered in the light, strange, unearthly, and he felt his witcher’s medallion hum against his chest at the presence of magic.

“What does that have to do with anything?”

“It won’t die. The priest says it’s an omen from the Eternal Fire, that it marks the unnatural has - hic - taken ahold of her. That I gotta pay to have my home cleansed so the blight don’t spread to my others. But I think she sent it as a sign she’s still out there, that she needs me to come save her. Somethin’s not right in those woods, I’m tellin’ you. Somethin’ wicked snatched my girl, I feel it.”

Zealots and swindlers, all priests of that bloodthirsty religion, but Cassian couldn’t deny the wrongness that radiated from the flower, a clumsiness in how the magic wavered he couldn’t quite place. The girl’s father burst into pitiful tears then, and Cassian almost felt sorry for him, as much as he was capable of, anyway. 

“And it would take her of course, my Abby. Most beautiful girl in Velen. She was supposed to be - hic - married next month, you know. I knew one day some important man would come through and see her and have to take her for a wife. Offered a handsome sum, too. My girl. Knew she couldn’t have been born so pretty for - hic - nothin’.” He dissolved once more into weeping, mumbling to himself, a man lost in his own head.

Yet despite the way his voice trembled, something about his grief left a bad taste in Cassian’s mouth, like beer gone slightly off. And not because of the myth that witcher mutations robbed one of normal human emotions - he had more of those than this man was having coherent thoughts at present - but he seemed much sadder about the lost coin than his own flesh and blood.

After a few additional questions that got him nowhere, Cassian left the man cradling the flower, stroking it with one delicate finger and muttering about farm equipment that needed repairing. 

The mystery was starting to come together more clearly, though parts still felt obscured, a thick bank of fog blocking the places where it all connected. The flower was strange, the magic rudimentary, but Abby at least had reasons to run away, or perhaps a suitor uninterested in paying her father what he thought she was worth.

He trudged back up the lane, stomach growling.

With information from a street urchin he cajoled by letting her hold his sword, he soon found Young Ian hiding in the community stables. He could’ve been no older than twenty, sprawled in a pile of straw with one hand tugging hard at his fluffy hair, a ragged feather quill in the other. There was a piece of grubby parchment stretched over his knee, and Cassian wondered if the innkeep was right about his sanity when he saw line after line written and crossed out, fitful scribblings of an unsound mind. 

“Wanted to ask you some questions about the missing girls,” Cassian said gruffly, and the sandy-haired head whipped upwards, startled.

“I didn’t see nothin’,” he grumbled, muddy green eyes hazy. “Now git on with ye, I’m in the middle of somethin’.”

“Yes I can see that. Mind taking a break so we can both get on with our business?”

Ian bared his teeth to retort but seemed to catch himself, spotting Cassian’s leather armor, his twin swords. “Aye, you’re one o’ them witcher’s, ye are. I heard stories about ye. No feelings, none at all.”

“Thanks for your input. Now tell me about the woman you saw.”

“N-no, I didn’t see no-” Ian stammered, but Cassian felt his patience growing short. His belly was empty and so was his coin purse, and none of that would be remedied by debating his own emotional capacity.

“I don’t fucking care what you were doing out there, just tell me what you saw.”

“She told me not to tell.”

Beyond aggravated, Cassian felt his hand moving up to cast Axii before deciding to do so. Ian’s eyes instantly went glassy, his own will dampened, and he glanced out the stable door before leaning in close.

“I saw her,” he said, voice wavy with delight. The reverence that broke across his face crinkled the dirt at the corners of his eyes. “The Gray Lady. She was there in the woods, in naught but a robe, and she was the most beautiful -”

“This was a human woman?”

“Tweren’t nothing human about her, Sir Witcher, sir. She was - She -”

A faint buzzing sounded, and Cassian felt his medallion hum against his chest again. Something was preventing the young man from telling what he’d seen despite Axii’s influence, perhaps from remembering it altogether. He could read now the scribbled lines on the parchment - poetry, declarations of love to a golden-haired goddess. The gifts he’d lavish upon her, where he’d lick - 

With a groan, Cassian lumbered away from the young man, who returned moony-eyed to his musings with hardly a second glance. This job just kept getting worse.

It was too late to back out now, he reasoned, and he returned to the inn to wait for nightfall. And to stew over what the fuck he was going to do.

For this was no common trafficker or hag or even an incubus that took those girls, any of which would be preferable to what it probably was. It was most likely a creature more formidable than all others, against which he had a particular weakness. Cassian sharpened his silver sword while the townspeople descended into drunkenness that evening, trying to ignore the dread that had begun to coil in his stomach, wondering if the blade would even make a difference.

When the moon was a pale wisp on the horizon, he slipped out of the tavern and proceeded into the woods on foot, not trusting his horse to resist whatever tricks may lay in wait. The forest was dense and silent, quieter than it had any right to be, and he met none of the usual night creatures as he wound further between the trees. Cassian found himself holding his breath at intervals, the creeping feeling that he was treading somewhere he ought not go, pressing ahead in defiance. Perhaps in foolishness, too. 

Water sounded close by, the smell of wet earth and something sweeter, trunks thinning to indicate a glade ahead. The ground was softer here, and with his witcher’s sight he noticed a crisscross of small footprints in the mud, a scrap of flowery fabric snagged on a branch. A twist of magic drifted on the air, sharp and metallic, making his lip curl and his medallion shudder.

Yet at the same time his better sense begged to turn back, a thread tugged low in his gut, pulling him forward. With the blessing of vision in the dark, Cassian crept through the trees until he came at last to a starlit clearing.

A gray-robed figure stood in the pool of a silver waterfall, hood shrouding the details of her heart-shaped face. He could tell it was a woman from the contours of her body, from the long, golden-brown hair that swayed like reeds in the updrafts from the falls. Though he’d approached on silent footsteps, she turned in greeting like he’d come crashing through the brush, her full mouth bracketed with annoyance as if he’d kept her waiting.

Slender hands reached up to remove the hood, and the woman beneath was unlike he’d ever seen, tall and willowy, her face glowing like the moon. And those eyes - he could see why Ian was trying to put his passion to paper. They were the blue-gray of a winter sky reflected in his sword, smoldering like white-hot embers in the night. His empty stomach fell out then, for such unnatural beauty only graced one kind of creature.

A sorceress.

All around him plants rustled in a phantom breeze, giant tropical flowers, willows with branches that trailed in the clear pool at his feet. He could see silver-scaled fish flashing in the water, chiming where they brushed against one another, against her shapely legs. Legs he’d die to have wrapped around his waist, or crushing his head as he -

A tendril of magic wrapped about his throat, choking off his breath before he could shield himself. Cassian saw one elegant eyebrow raise when he didn’t pass out immediately, knew it was a trap but oh, what a trap to die in.

Fucking sorceresses.

“You seek the missing girls.”

Her voice was like liquid starlight, and he tried to stammer out an explanation but found only a dumb groan pouring from his throat. “Do you mind toning down your glamour?” he managed once he’d collected himself enough. “It’s giving me a headache.”

The woman’s brow furrowed, and he wondered if she expected him to fall to her feet as the village boy had. As many others had before, he suspected. 

But she relented, the intense aura around her dimming somewhat to reveal a woman more earthly, yet somehow more beautiful still. She had a severe look about her, her face all angles, and he couldn’t help how his eyes traced her lush body, more gorgeous than he’d seen in many long years. Not that it meant anything about her potential to rip him in half, though it certainly was an.. Obstacle.

“You know where they are,” he choked out.

She smiled, cloying, and the wind brought the scent of lilacs drifting toward him once more. “I take it you’ve come to rescue them from evil, brave knight.”

Her countenance was soft and inviting, but Cassian knew what wolves could live in pretty clothing. Knew the dangers in taking her kind’s word, drilled into him through experiences both vicarious and personal.

Don’t ever trust a fucking sorceress.

He should be better at learning from his mistakes by now.

“Where are they?”

“Safe.”

“And I’m supposed to take your word for it.”

He’d heard of crooked mages snatching girls to sell to the academies, earning commissions based on each student’s aptitude. In a dream world the law would put a stop to it, a fool’s dream given Velen had a skewed view of justice these days. But something about the woman before him gave him pause, a crispness in her manner that belied a stronger moral code. Mostly the fact she hadn’t killed him yet.

“What other choice do you have?” she said in her silvery voice, and a shudder threatened to steal through him.

“I could kill you.The families think some evil creature stole them. Want me to bring back its head.”

He knew it was a gamble, but he wanted to gauge her power, how much of a threat he posed to her. Her moonbright eyes darted toward his weapons - he saw genuine fear there, and Cassian wondered if he’d misjudged her before her expression melted back into smugness.

“Two swords. I should’ve known.” She wrinkled her delicate nose and gods, he wanted to kiss where the skin crinkled. “They’ve hired you to dispatch the monster, and here you are.”

“Tell me where the girls are and there’ll be none to kill.”

“Those zealots wouldn’t know a real monster if it were clawing at their hollow legs,” she muttered to herself before straightening. “Then it seems I must plead my case. Come. Let’s see if I can’t convince you to spare me.” 

She flashed that sensual, terrifying smile again and Cassian was half tempted to turn around and sprint away. Sorceresses were of a duplicitous ilk at best, abjectly cruel at worst, and whatever this one was doing out here on her own, the whole thing spelled trouble. He got the distinct impression she was concealing something, though what it was difficult to say. But when she extended a hand out toward him, Cassian couldn’t find it in himself to deny her, to think anything but whether its owner would let him press his lips to it, among other places. 

“Well?” she asked. “Are you coming in, or must we do this in the cold?”

She beckoned him forward before turning and walking straight through the waterfall. Cassian  followed dumbly on leaden legs, braced himself for the rush of chill water but was met with only a whisper of warm air, the scent of lilac and parchment dancing on the wind.

They emerged into a circular courtyard, surrounded on three sides by a stone villa tucked into a mountainside, archways leading to various chambers beyond. The remaining side stood open to the night air, the steep drop beyond, shadows shifting in the light of several braziers along the perimeter. His hostess looked different, too, her roughspun cloak transformed into a high-collared gown, the deep plum fabric spotless where it swept against the polished stone floor. A lush banquet was laid out before them, and even as his stomach growled Cassian knew this was a mistake, knew she already had her hooks in him and was just waiting for the right moment to pounce.

“Let’s have dinner before you decide to kill me.” Her smile was luminous and terrifying, and he swallowed in spite of himself. She gestured to a plush-cushioned seat at one end of the long table, draping herself in the one opposite. “Well, witcher. Have you the courage to drink for a sorceress’ cup?”

Along with her clothing, she’d transformed into an even smoother, more self-assured woman now they were in her bower, a spider biding time at the edge of her web. A goblet appeared before him when he eased into the chair, as if dropped out of thin air. The wine within was blood-red, and Cassian felt himself overcome with a thirst that he tried to resist.

“Depends.”

“On what?” She quirked her head to the side, amused.

“Whether I can be of some use to you.”

Her eyes flashed, and he thought saw something like his own hunger mirrored there, but it might’ve been a trick of the light.

“Oh I’m sure you can be very useful, Lord of Bloodshed.”

He balked when she used his nickname, the one he’d earned on the battlefield in the last Temerian rebellion. Her smile widened. 

“Let’s negotiate. You believe I’m involved in the girl’s disappearance. The villagers have asked you to come kill me, and offered you a certain amount of coin to do so.”

“That’s right.”

Cassian eased his swords off his back and set them against the table beside them. That she’d let him keep them would’ve been comforting to a novice, but he knew enough now to tell she wasn’t foolish. Just secure enough in her own power not to worry.

“So it would stand to reason that if I offer you the same amount of coin, you’d happily be on your way.”

It might not be an empty promise - along with the fine dishware on the table, all manner of gemstones and arcane artifacts cluttered the high shelves between the archways, any one of which would’ve doubled his commission.

“That would be true if I didn’t have a reputation to uphold. A witcher doesn’t skip out on a job without good reason.”

“Am I not a good enough reason?” she asked, fluttering her lashes. 

His eyes were immediately drawn to the supple curves of her breasts visible above the table. With great effort Cassian managed to keep his expression stony and shake his head. 

She huffed. 

“You’re a harder nut to crack than the rest. I don’t imagine threatening you out of it would work either. Oh, don’t get twisted about yourself,” she added when his hand moved automatically toward the hilt of his silver blade. “All that would happen is you’d break a lot of my things and then I’d have a great bloody mess to clean up. Truthfully I can’t be bothered.”

“You’re wasting my time, sweetheart,” he growled, patience waning. “Where are the girls?”

“Don’t be beastly,” she scoffed, disgusted, and Cassian bristled at her offense, at the accusation in her eyes. Here she was trying to lure him into a trap, bribe him from his duty, yet acted like she saw nothing but a brute across from her, just like the townspeople.

“Snatching children from their homes, I could argue you’re the beast. No better than a bog hag, bathing in blood to stay young.”

It was a low blow but he didn’t care, wanted to see her face twist with fury, relished the silver fire that sparked at her pale fingertips.

“Of the two of us at this table, who was crafted to kill?” she snarled, jumping to her feet to lean toward him, an accusing finger pointed at his heart. Rage pounded harder through his skull, and Cassian found himself on his feet too, fuming at her across the banquet table.

“Tell the truth for once in your crooked life, sweetheart. All this is an illusion. At the end of the day, you’re just like me. Blood and guts, bones and coin. Only you like to pretend the dirt doesn’t cling to your skirts.”

“The girls are never going home.” Her skirts whipped up in a sudden wind, a whirl of violet, lighting crackling overhead. “Tell the families they’re dead, bring back my head if you must. It will not change the facts.”

“Then you’re every inch the fucking monster you pretend not to be.”

He braced himself for her wrath, the wave of magic coming to steal his breath. But to his surprise she stilled, watched him for a moment, that same evaluating stare from the clearing. Something sad passed across her face, and Cassian felt like he could see through a chink in her armor, just a peek at the scared girl she’d likely once been.

“You think I look at you and see a brute. But I know you and I both have curses to bear. Doomed to live on the outskirts, worth just what we offer to others. I only wish for my freedom.”

An understanding passed between them, of two people stranded in an eternal no man’s land. For himself, Cassian had surrendered long ago to his fate straddling the fringes of society, helping people who smiled in his face and spat at his back. He’d tried living away from civilization altogether for a few decades but found it brutally lonely.

There were respites, of course, when he found favor with a noble or a woman who could tolerate him for more than a night, but he aged so much slower that eventually everything permanent proved it was not.

They both sat back down in unison, a truce. Cassian took a sip of wine, and her stormy blue eyes tracked the movement, a blush creeping across her chest.

“You could have both,” he observed, and she wrinkled that perfect nose again. “A sorceress like you could easily find home in a court. Why hide out in this shithole?”

“A boring, sad question with a boring, sad answer. You and I have more interesting things to discuss, I think.”

The hunger rose in her eyes once more, and he saw them rove over his body, pink tongue coming out to wet her lips. He chuckled. So this was the trap at the web’s center.

“You must be wanting for bed partners if you’ll have me, sweetheart.” An understatement given he’d been sleeping outside for a week, but his hostess stood after downing her own glass, waving a bored hand.

“Nothing a little water can’t fix.” 

She crossed to one of the archways and opened the door to a lush bathing chamber, the sunken pool steaming with fragrant water, lilac and sage. Cassian rose and followed, but he caught her arm on the threshold, heard her breath hitch when he pulled her body flush to his.

“I don’t make a habit of bedding women whose names I don’t know.”

“It’s Nesta,” she said, smiling, and the wind echoed her: Nesta Nesta Nesta.

He let her have her way with him the first time, knowing from experience she wouldn’t be satisfied until he was on his knees before her, where he belonged. She combed his hair while he recovered, and atop her silk sheets had her way with him again, only allowing him to explore her once she was wrung out and purring. Squeezed those lovely legs around his head and ceded the high ground at last, crying out beneath him as he took her as he’d wanted to from the beginning, hard and fast and desperate. Whimpered so sweetly when he kissed a line down her back and claimed her from behind, though they both knew who was in charge. He thought he might die from it, from her pressing back into him just as eagerly, the roundness of her hip in one of his hands, her pleasure in the other.

He brushed the hair from her forehead where she lay against his chest after, skin glistening under the soft blanket of the moon. Her bedchamber was cluttered with books, piles of them on the dresser, the small desk. A portrait of her and two other young women hung over the hearth, all with the same gold-brown hair.

Nesta flinched when he bent to kiss her soft cheek, just the smallest amount, that mortal eyes would likely miss. There was something heartbroken about her he couldn’t quite place, a loneliness even their coupling hadn’t remedied. Like she still expected to have to kill him.

Then light shifted in one of the archways, the air rippling, and he knew.

“They’re here.”

She hummed in annoyance and kept her eyes closed. “Don’t speak yet. You’re ruining this for me.”

“Tell me where they are.”

She pulled back and regarded him for a long moment, evaluating, and he tried to be whatever it was she was looking for, if only so she would keep looking.

Nesta nodded, having found it, and strode toward one of the archways wrapped in the blanket, drew back a curtain of air with a graceful sweep of her arm. A portal.

Inside lay a stone chamber filled with moonlight, a round table in the center carved with runes and littered with herbs and gemstones. Beyond a door on the far wall he could see rows of bunks built into the stone, the forms of children sleeping, their gentle snores carried to him on a lilac-scented wind.

“Are they here of their own will?”

“Somewhat.”

“So, no.”

“They are my pupils.”

“Some would call them hostages.”

She clenched her fists, incensed, and he saw the waves of power gather about her, Chaos begging for her touch. “What shall I do, leave them to be used as pawns by their families? Sold to wretched old men or wasting away in that cesspool? I’m giving them a way out.”

“And condemning them to walk alone in the process.”

“They deserve to decide their own fate.”

“And be like you? Hiding in the woods?”

“Do you pity me, witcher?” She was so close he could see the veins of magic in her eyes, as if her very blood was luminescent. “I may not have the splendor nor the influence of a court mage, but I am shackled to nothing but my own desires. Do you not seek the same?”

I seek nothing but a warm bed and a hot meal, he thought. But when he tried to say it, Cassian bit his tongue so hard he drew blood, and her eyes blazed brighter. He tried again and bit down even harder, the spell preventing the lie from passing his teeth.

“Do you not?” she repeated, and he heard the broken edge there, the plea. “When you sleep on the ground, do you not do so with a glad heart because it is ground you have chosen?”

“We’re all shackled to our fate, sweetheart. Trying to defy it only makes it come faster.”

Before Nesta could respond, there was a small cry from the bunk room and she rushed to attend to it, exposing her back to him without a second thought. Guilt leapt in his stomach, and Cassian couldn’t tear his eyes away as she comforted the girl, pulled the quilts back up over her and stroked her hair.

Feeling intrusive, he moved to don his trousers, and was just reaching for his shirt when she reappeared. “Where are you going?”

“Don’t want to overstay my welcome.”

“You weren’t wrong. About the solitude. Though it does help to have visitors, to pass the time.”

She trailed over to kiss him again and her mouth was sweet as Toussaint wine. They tumbled back to bed once more, slower this time, and he pretended not to see the shine of her tears in the starlight.

“One of your pupils sent something to her family. An everlasting flower. Gave them hope she’s still alive,” he panted when they were spent, having somehow ended up on the rug before the fire.

“Foolish girl. Her father was preparing to sell her to a traveling merchant. Thirteen years old.”

“One of them will go back one day. Bonds of family are strong. ”

“Not for us though, right?”

Cassian swallowed, knew it wasn’t worth bothering to refute her. His own family was likely long dead by now, and he didn’t even know where they were buried.

“You put yourself at risk doing this,” he warned, not wanting to touch that tender spot any longer. “You’ll have to stop or move on soon.”

“I don’t recall asking for advice.”

“Not advice. Concern.”

“I can take care of myself, witcher.” Nesta looked down from where she sat astride him now, smirking. “Haven’t you learned that by now?”

Cassian woke hours later at the edge of the waterfall’s pool, a spray of shimmering lilacs tucked in his pocket, sunrise just a few breaths off. Felt the ringing in his head as he plodded back through the woods, the fuzz of wine, the ghost of her fingers in his hair.

He didn’t bother thinking of a tall tale to appease the townsfolk, didn’t even consider stopping at the inn to finagle his commission. On the way out of town he passed Abby’s father sprawled stone drunk by his front gate. Clutched in his hand was the enchanted celadine, still glinting weakly.

Cassian made the sign for Igni and set the flower alight before kicking the man awake.

“Your daughter’s dead.”

He turned his back on the howls of despair, tucking his cloak tighter about him as he headed down the road toward Oxenfurt.

[magicalgirlagency]

The leak trailer for the cancelled cw live action powerpuff girls had been leaked and…..it’s like they wasn’t even trying to respect the ppgs. It was like watching a parody of the ppgs except it was made by an actual professionals

I've tried to look for it, but it seems that The CW has caught wind of it and is desperatedly trying to terminate any footage of it. All I could find was some random youtuber reacting to it, but the video had a huge watermark making it impossible for me to see anything, plus the sound quality was crap! From what I was able to see, it looked like some low-budget porn parody!

Plus, I don't have Twitter account anymore, 'cause it's an irredeemable cesspool of nazi propaganda, AI/bots and bigotry doomed to eventual obscurity and infamy.

Glad that show got cancelled, and McCracken is currently working on his own reboot, though I doubt it'll be as good as the original cartoon, but I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt, since he's one of the very few showrunners who actually KNOWS what he's doing...

[ardentpoop]

it is a bit hilariously sweet to me when I get anons going “there are too many layers here” given this is cw supernatural we are talking about. but at the same time that makes perfect sense bc everything can be meaningful and multi-dimensional if you care to read it closely and especially if you’re exploring the awful (sorry! this can be a compliment if you like) fandom as attentively and critically as you’re exploring the text.

if this show wasn’t built over a nasty cesspool of reactionary american politics it would not still be interesting to talk about today. it would not be highly relevant to the current Cultural Moment.

[quanticq]

Hey Q! Sorry for bothering you, but for some reason I can no longer find any of your tik tok accounts 😭 Did they get deleted or something?

Hi this is Q! I’m coming out of the woodwork to address this, since I did went radio silent out of the blue so it’s not a bother at all

The short answer is Yes, I deleted my tiktok

Yes delete not deactivate, I’m not coming back to That app or IG or Twt, I deleted my socials except here and YouTube, I honestly felt so overwhelmed with everything, I realized I’m not even posting for myself anymore there. A lots of people crossed my boundaries time and time again I felt so helpless, bitter with myself. I guess I was just overwhelmed with the attention I got; both positive and negatives ones.

Im done and I want to start over so that’s why I’m here and on YouTube, I already posted some of these on my community tab on YT but here’s what I have in mind for the future of the content I want to create: more detail under the cut, and also;

CW: very brief mention of spiraling, harm inflict oneself or others, paranoia, etc

•Long-form content: my attention span is a bit messed up from consuming and making short-form content to the point where I can’t focus in university. I want to create something meaningful. It’s not that my previous content was not meaningful, no. I had fun and no time is wasted when I have fun, it was warm… but as I mentioned earlier, I just felt this lingering bitterness the longer I stayed making those short-form content. It really felt like I was on the verge of losing it. Especially with how the bigger following I have the less people think of me as a person than just another content creator you see on the internet,

I want to create long-form content, I’m so tired of forcing myself to generate 15 second content. On tiktok it just feels like I’m just creating and not really connecting. I want to try something new, maybe create an open space for meaningful discussion in the comments. I don’t think I can stand another copy-paste tiktok comment anymore. You know what I meant if you’re frequent on that app.

•Art Content with Commentary: and don’t worry this won’t be those petty artist drama issue, but I will still cover anything serious

it could be love letters or video essays ranging from fan fictions, fandom culture, the art scene and so much more. I may even share a bit of my personal life, this will be self indulgent after all! I want to make it fun for myself and as well to those who comes across my channel. I really REALLY want to create a genuine following.

On tiktok it’s so easy to gain following but not so easy to retain them, it’s mostly because of the algorithm and the FYP feature there.

On Tiktok most content that would get featured as an artist there would be creative work has to be either; more than exceptional which is pressuring enough already to consistent posters, straight up suggestive content shown to minors (tiktok doesn’t really have a blocked keywords feature but it’s so disheartening to see these creators intentionally not using the sensitive warning since it could limit their reach significantly) oh yes we can’t forget the negativity surrounding beginner artists or “art lore”

All of this cesspool of negativity, it’s a whole can of worms but it will be one of my prominent topics that I wish to discuss in my future art commentaries. I hope you guys are looking forward to those! I might bring in a few people or so to talk about it with me

and finally;

•Streaming: I used to do a lot of streams during the weekends on the clock app and it was super fun! I want to bring that back but that would have to wait since I’m unfamiliar with some features on YouTube, and I’m aware that YT does not have a discoverable feature for stream but that’s alright, I want to start something small first.

In short; I’ll figure it out! just need some baby steps before I start streaming again.

.

I apologize for deleting everything out of the blue, if I’m gonna be honest it was partially planned because I’ve been thinking about deleting my tiktok, twitter and Instagram for a while now but how it happened? In my breakdown I realized that I don’t want anyone to see me spiral, especially now that I realized how young my audience are, I’m not sure how that happened but I guess posting fandom contents does attract the young ones somehow inevitably, even though my content is nowhere near as suggestive, but I do talk about serious topics from time to time… but I digress, its not fair for them to deal with me if they see me spiral publicly,

it is especially not fair to them to console me. When I was younger than 14, I’ve been in a position where I have to talk down someone who was older, maybe 4-5 years older than me, from harming themselves or anyone, it was traumatizing and unpleasant. I don’t wish for anyone to go through that, it’s very painful.

It’s been… hard for me to ground myself. Ive been seeing things through a kaleidoscope of emotions; I was trying to focus on everything but it’s just too overwhelming so eventually I cracked. But please don’t worry I’ve been doing better now, after some time away from my online persona, and of course spending time with my beloved girlfriend, I see things much more clearly now.

Thank you to anyone who read this and much so appreciate those who understand where I’m coming from

Also now that I think of it can my stuff be considered as lost media now? Amazing! But please don’t be sad the fun I had was genuine!

Thank you again to those who genuinely enjoyed my content on tiktok but it’s time for me to try my hand at something new, I will still be dwelling in my creative headspace just.. away from public for now,

if you’re looking forward for my future post, make sure to check out my YouTube! I still have a lot I need to cook hehe, this is one of the few!

More post soon, Bye bye! -Q

[goodomensafterdark]

Writers Guild Presents: Tethered - Chapters 4-5

Written by NegotiationReal6508, find them on Reddit and AO3

Chapters 4-5 of Work in Progress

TW/CW: Attempted suicide, mental breakdown, physical description of panic attack symptoms, implied character death (but not really)

Summary: Crowley wakes up in a mental hospital with no memory of how he got there. Without his demonic powers, neither the doctors, nor the people who claim to be his family will believe he is who he says he is. With the evidence against him mounting, his only lifeline to the real world is a cryptic note left by an unseen messenger. The longer he stays in this hospital, the harder it becomes to recall for sure, is Crowley really a demon of Hell? Or has his entire existence been nothing more than a delusion conjured by a grieving mind?

Excerpt:

Crowley’s eyes snapped open. “Aziraphale!” He spun on the mattress and there he was met with the most beautiful sight he'd ever seen: Aziraphale standing next to his bed.

“Hello, Crowley.” The angel knitted his fingers apprehensively.

“Oh, thank someone you're here!” Crowley threw the sheets off and clambered onto the cold floor. “I can't stand another second in this depressing cesspool!”

“Crowley,” Aziraphale said gently, holding his hands up in front of him.

“C'mon, let's get the hell out of here!” Crowley already had his hand on the doorknob when Aziraphale spoke.

“I can't,” the angel said. “Not yet, I mean.”

Crowley stared at him dumbfounded. “Wot?!”

“I can't get you out yet.”

Continue reading on AO3

Or start from chapter 1 - Dies Lunae

Thanks to my Beautiful Betas: u/blackjeans93, u/adverbian, u/lemon-tart-221 u/FuzzyGoblinoid

[officialfoxsquadron]

shiny happy people

7.2k words | my ao3

rating: mature

cw: discussions of starvation and eating disorders, vomiting and emetophobia, general bad coping mechanisms for trauma

summary: Cassian Andor does not know Pazima Reynard, except to know that they are one and the same; cold, cruel and calculating spies. When the asocial woman-and Cassian's sometime barber-returns to Rebel Base with a fourteen-year-old girl, he finds himself wrestling with the realities of being young during wartime.

“Would you like to hear the news?”

K-2SO’s clipped voice, typically so flat and emotionless, sparkled with a bit of excitement. Cassian Andor, Rebel spy, was sick to death of news. The Rebel droids were worse gossips than the organic beings. Besides, his whole damn job was news and gossip.

“I am going to hear it anyway,” Cassian grumbled, flipping the switches for the landing cycle. Crait, the home of the new Rebel base (and, Cassian supposed, his home), was a desolate, salty planet. The surface ran red as soon as you stepped on it. It made him uneasy.

K prattled on, some nonsense about the Senate and who was sleeping with who and who died. No one Cassian knew or cared about. But he let the droid talk as he watched the Rebel base grow larger, a bloody wound on Crait’s salt-white flesh. 

“Oh, and Pazima Reynard is back at base. She is married to Wedge Antilles and has a sister now.”

That caught his attention. Not necessarily Pazima Reynard’s personal life-frankly, he didn’t give a fuck-but it did remind Cassian he needed a haircut.

“What did we bring back to trade?” He looked over his shoulder, making a quick mental intake. Booze, cigarras, nudie holos, food from off-world–some combination of those would be enough to trade for a trim. He had not looked in the mirror since stitching up a blast wound back on Daiyu, but he knew that his hair had grown far too long. It fell sometimes, greasy and dark, in front of his eyes. 

A shame I cannot see the back of my own head, Cassian mused. Then I could just take care of it myself, and be done with it.

“Perhaps something for the girl,” K suggested, his voice surprisingly light. “She is fourteen.”

Fourteen . He sniffed. What madness had possessed Pazima to bring a teenager into an army base?

He shot K a dark look. “I don’t care,” he declared.

“As you say.” The droid paused. “Do not worry, Cassian. They will send you away again soon enough.”

He grunted, but said nothing. The voice of some traffic controllers crackled onto his comms, and Cassian responded in kind. He landed the ship without incident, and braced himself for the next few weeks in the cesspool of doomed young people he called home.

“I brought you something to trade.” He held up a holotape, something he had found stashed away.

Pazima Reynard, tall, stern and statuesque, stood blocking the doorway to her bunkroom. He had not seen her for more than a year. He had almost forgotten how beautiful she was. Almost. Pazima, who wore her black hair in tight knots, complementing her angular face and tattooed copper skin, was not the type of woman to let you forget.

She eyed him skeptically, lifting an eyebrow. “You said whisky.”

“This is better. Music from before the Empire,” he said, stepping forward. He knew music was her great weakness. She snatched the tape from him, examining it.

“Where’d you get it?”

“Don’t remember.”

She sniffed, looking over the tape, and then down at him. “Fine,” she said haughtily, waving her hand and turning her back, “but only because you look pathetic, like a wet runyip.”

Cassian allowed himself to laugh and followed her into the bunkroom.

The bunkrooms on Crait are small, claustrophobic, dreary things, more like the prison cells on Narkina 5 than comfortable homes. At the very least, they had windows into the cavernous hallway, the artificial light providing a facsimile of normal family life. There was barely enough space for a chair and table, smushed into the back of the room. One of their four bunks was overflowing with junk. Above it sat Pazima’s new sister, curled into a ball and staring at him.

The girl was fourteen, according to K, but hunger had stunted her growth. She looked healthy enough now, if a bit pale, but Cassian saw the signs of past malnourishment. Limbs too short, skin covered in scars and stretched too taut, bones jutting like knives beneath her skin, threatening to pop at any moment. He was probably close to her age when he saw them in his own reflection, older still when he truly understood what it meant.

Still, he had grown into his looks. He wondered if she ever would. She bore a scar on one eye, red and angry and unsettling, making the pupil cloudy and gray. A shock of curly orange hair erupted from her head, messy and unkempt, falling to her shoulders.

A one-eyed ginger. What a catastrophe.

“Lottie,” Pazima said, gentler than he ever imagined her speaking, her deep voice the comforting rumble of thunder. “This is a colleague of ours, Cassian Andor.”

“Hello.” It came out shorter than he expected. It’s not that he disliked children, he just didn’t know what to do around them.

She blinked at him, then tilted her head, sizing him up like a fighter in the ring. Then, quick and quiet as a ghost, she scurried down the ladder and out of the room.

Pazima sighed wearily, watching her sister flash by in a red blur, shutting the door. “She hasn’t been talking much,” she said absently. “We thought she made some progress, but-” She turned to him abruptly. “You don’t care. Sit.”

She was right, of course. He respected Pazima, which was kind of like caring for someone, when respect is all you are allowed to feel.

“Colleague?” he teased lightly.

“What would you call it?”

He pondered that. “Hunters who sometimes chase the same prey.”

She grinned with approval. “Sit,” she insisted, gesturing again to her chair.

He breathed in and out, steadying himself. As much as he needed to be on base, to check in and regroup with his allies, he hated it. It was too banal, too domestic, too structured.

Relax, Cassian. It’s just hair.

Maarva cut his hair once. She was very bad at it, chopping roughly and chiding him to sit still through gritted teeth. Eventually, she gave up and outsourced it to an old man down the road. His name was Jossam, and he always had a sweet for him.

He sat in the chair and allowed Pazima to wrap an old blanket around his shoulders.

“Where did you learn to do this?” he asked, something he is sure he has asked her before.

“I went to an all-girls school,” she replied, as if that explained everything.

“Is that true?”

She snorted. “Don’t ask stupid questions.”

The scissors snipped at his hair lightly. It was uncomfortable, yet somehow relaxing to have someone touch him so matter-of-factly. Not insistent or passionate, like a lover, nor rough and feral like an enemy. The kind of touch that just is , and it’s enough to lull Cassian into a kind of madness.

His eyes fixed on the empty bunk where Pazima’s sister once was. Was he ever so young?

How old were you when you first killed someone? Do you even remember?

“I didn’t take you for the type,” he said quietly.

Pazima groaned like a teenager. “Don’t.”

“Don’t what?”

“Judge.” Her eyes narrowed in warning when he turned to meet them.

“I’m not judging, I just thought-“ Thought you were too cold-hearted for that. That’s what we are, after all. Automatons made of stone and ice, sent to kill without thought, without question. He focused forward again, looking at the door. “Does she know what you are?”

“Of course she does, Cassian. Better than you .”

“And so what, so she will be-“

“Why do you care?”

It’s a sharp question, and a good one.

“I was a soldier too young.”

“So was I. I gave her a choice. I didn’t just take her.”

He woke up on Maarva and Clem’s ship with a deathly ringing in his head. Their voices, speaking frantically in hushed tones, grated on his ear. Worse, he couldn’t understand a thing they were saying-Galactic Basic was still harsh, discordant gibberish to him then.

I didn’t have a choice. 

Then again, Maarva would always say she didn’t have a choice either.

Pazima, ever the observant spy, snipped the scissors decisively. She twisted her mouth into the idea of a smile. 

“Perhaps we’re just getting old, Cassian. Bail Organa has brought his daughter to base.”

Yes, he knew that too. It was hard to miss the stalwart column of a girl standing next to her father, going from meeting to meeting in a pristine white dress, large brown eyes observant and calculating. 

“She isn’t much older than Lottie,” she suggested. 

She is looking for absolution, Cassian realized. Absolution from me.

He was sure he had woken up in the underworld that day. It was like they always told the younger children on Kenari, when the sun fell and the flickers of the campfire elongated their fingers into long shadows. Wander too far from the group, and you’ll end up in the world below ours. The one the off-worlders found when they dug too deep.

“Will they be my new allies? This…flock of teenage girls?”

“Believe it or not, Cassian, I wasn’t thinking of you when I found her.”

“Then what were you thinking?” There it is, the kill shot, the question Cassian really wanted to ask. He wanted to grab her and scream it in her face. What is it, that compels you to rip a child away from their home, teach them a new language, force them to fight for the galaxy?l

Pazima stopped, taken aback by his fervor, before stepping in front of him. The sound of her boots echoed on the cave floor. She gripped the arms of his chair, one, then another, her pair of scissors balled into a fist. Cassian felt himself leaning back, and watched as that facsimile of a smile twisted into something uglier, meaner, as she leaned forward, filling the empty space with herself.

“You’re in my home, Cassian.” Her voice was soft, but sharp, a velvet glove concealing a steel fist. The muscles in her long tattooed arms twitched in anticipation, as if her body itself hungered for a fight. She lifted an eyebrow, brown eyes delighting in his physical disadvantage. She was stronger, taller, and had him practically trapped beneath her. 

In other words, he was prey, and she the predator, deciding if she would devour him. If it was anyone else, any time else, Cassian would have reached for his blaster.

But regret slowed his hand. What was he doing? He hardly knew this woman, only that she was dangerous, and he had questioned her, threatened her, pushed his own past into her present.

“Mind your tone.”

It was an order. He nodded.

Quickly, and as if nothing had happened, her hands left the chair and she walked back behind him, trimming his hair again.

They passed a few moments of silence, enough for Cassian to continue wallowing in remorse. She takes another strand of hair, and before cutting, decides to speak.

“Do you remember the Jedi?” she asked.

What a strange question. He had been alive when the Jedi were active-or so he thought. Kenari was far away from such things, and the idea that there was any sort of power in the galaxy besides the Empire was a distant fantasy. 

“No.”

“They took children away from their parents. There was a Jedi general in the Clone Wars who was twelve .”

“I didn’t know you were religious.” 

“I’m not. I just remember.” Pazima ran two of her fingers through Cassian’s hair, snipping away again. “This galaxy has always forced children to grow up too fast. With me, at least she will have steady meals and a bed.”

“She will be in a war.”

“She always was.”

The conversation lulls, and the monotonous sound betrays the electric charge in the air. Both of them knew what was happening; they were digging and digging, getting dangerously close to something honest.

Neither of them liked honesty. Honesty is what kills you. Lies kept you alive.

Yet honesty was irresistible, a gravitational pull. How many times had Cassian seen it–one truth spilled out, then another, then another, until you were weeping, telling your life story to someone you barely knew? How many times had he exploited it?

Pazima knew that too. They were liars, both of them.

When she spoke again, he wasn’t surprised to find the truth pouring out of her. Her voice was distant, quiet, as if it came from someplace far away.

“You and I won’t be alive to see the galaxy we hope to build. Surely you understand that.”

“Yes.” Wars were fought by teenagers, twenty-somethings. Pazima was in her thirties, Cassian not far behind. Young by peacetime standards, practically elderly in wartime. The clock had never ticked louder.

“What are we doing it all for, if not for them?”

That’s just love. Nothing you can do about that.

“I suppose you’re right,” Cassian admitted, his eyes on the empty bunk. “But I don’t remember ever being so young.”

Pazima sighed, long and weary, following Cassian’s gaze.

“Neither do I.”

A week goes by, maybe more, and the next time he passes the Reynards’ bunkroom, it’s a muffled roar of sound.

Cassian can’t help himself. Ever the spy, he slips into the shadows and looks through their window, curious at what he will find.

Wedge Antilles, Pazima Reynard’s husband, was the very model of a Rebellion pilot. Young, cocky, brash, and handsome. The type of man other men with too much adrenaline love to idolize. Not exactly who he thought Pazima would go for, but then again, he barely knew her.

He observed Wedge with an attempt at cool disinterest, though in truth, he found himself jealous at the easy way he flitted in and out of the window’s view, the winning smiles he gave the men gathered around him.

Laughter rose and fell, and then rose again, the sharp noise growing louder as Wedge opened and closed the door.

“Lottie! Where the hell have you-” Cassian made to scurry off, but it was too late. Wedge’s eyes locked onto his. “Oh, hello. Cassian Andor, right?” He stuck his hand out. “Wedge Antilles. Pazima said she cut your hair.”

“Yes, that’s correct,” he said, shaking his hand, searching quickly for an escape.

“This what you like to do?” Wedge said, flashing that smile and stepping forward, a bit of a sway in his walk. “You like to watch?”

Cassian snorted, the side of his mouth twitching despite himself. “I am an intelligence officer. It’s my job to be curious.”

“Well, you’re welcome to join us.” He gestured to the door with a beer bottle in his hand. “It’s a tight squeeze, but you’ll fit.”

“That’s alright,” he said. “Crowds make me uncomfortable.”

“Suit yourself,” Wedge said, shrugging. His manner was easy, but Cassian saw something in the young man’s eyes, a fierce intelligence. He knitted his thick black brows together, darting his eyes up and down the hallway. “Have you seen Pazima’s sister, by the way? Short, redheaded, one-eyed. Very hard to miss.”

“No.”

“Worth a shot.” He clapped Cassian on the shoulder, before pointing a finger at him. “Don’t be a stranger. I’m serious.”

Cassian wanted to curl up in a hole. This was exactly the type of social interaction he hated. What an embarrassing thing it was, to need people.

Still, he nodded. Wedge seemed to be a worthy ally. 

“Good night, Captain Antilles.”

“Night.”

The door closed, and Cassian walked away, determined to get back to his ship and sleep alone. He hated it here-all of them crammed into bunks carved into a cave, He longed to get a mission, any mission, fly with K2 somewhere shady and seedy and terrible, away from this prison of domesticity.

A sound from the shadows pricked at his ears, pulling him out of his reverie.

He knew the sound of drunken retching far too well, and someone was heaving, little gasps coming in between deep eruptions of sound.

He wanted to turn away, but something told him to stay. He should at least try to be a part of a community again.

“Hello?” he called, stepping towards the sound. “Do you need a medic?”

Two eyes peeked out from the shadows, the cold artificial light causing them to sparkle like stars.

Then Lottie Reynard stumbled forward, and promptly vomited onto Cassian’s shoes.

“What the fuck,” he groaned, shaking his foot and recoiling in disgust.

The girl blinked, scanning Cassian’s face as she wiped spittle from her mouth with the back of her hand. She looked truly pathetic, gripping the neck of a liquor bottle with white knuckles, chunks of vomit intertwined in her ragged red curls.

He almost pitied her, until he found himself slammed against the wall, a shriek ringing in his ears and a blade digging into his skin.

This is what you get for being kind, Cassian. Puke on your shoes and a knife at your throat.

He looked down at her, this tiny, savage animal.

“I could reach for my blaster and kill you,” he whispered. 

Her eyes flitted towards the weapon, then back to him, jutting her chin. “You would hesitate,” she reckoned, eyes narrowing as she scanned his face. Pazima said she didn’t talk, and perhaps it was better that way. Her voice was squeaky, so high-pitched it was almost grating, with a nearly indecipherable accent. “You are the type of man who hesitates to kill a child.”

“Am I?” He looked down at the weapon at his throat. Its wavy edges were sharp and fine, the blade decorated with etchings he could not quite see. “Your knife is very beautiful,” he said calmly. The tip pricked the skin of his neck, drawing blood. He groaned and held his hands in the air, a gesture of peace, but his irritation was clear. “I am only trying to get back to my ship.”

“You startled me,” she said in a much smaller voice, before withdrawing and sheathing the knife against her thigh.

“You shouldn’t draw a weapon on strangers here. Not everyone is as kind as me.”

“You kill children,” she hissed, closing the gap between them once again. He could smell her sickly-sweet breath, see how her mismatched eyes shook with nervous energy.

He leaned closer, keeping his voice even.

“So do you.”

That was enough to get her to back away, working her jaw, wiping her mouth again before taking a swig from her bottle. 

It was jarring to watch a teenager drink from a bottle like one born to it. His heart, stupid thing, spoke before his brain. “I was like you once.”

The girl scoffed, face twisting in disgust as she rolled her eyes, tossing her messy hair. “So what does that make you? My daddy?” She said the last two words with such mocking disdain, and he found himself laughing in spite of himself. 

“I am too young for that.” I hope. “I meant I was very hungry once. Did you eat something today?”

“I-” She blinked, shaking her head, turning into herself. “No. I forgot.”

“You should,” he said. He pulled a ration bar from his pocket. “Especially if you plan on drinking half a bottle of gin.”

She looked at the bottle in her hand, before taking the bar and devouring the way only starving children could, crumbs falling onto her shirt. “I shouldn’t, I know, I just…I don’t sleep so good anymore.”

“So well.”

“What?”

“So well. Basic wasn’t my first language either.”

“Oh, great. A Basic lesson as well as a fucking lecture.” Her words slurred together, and she slumped against the wall.

Cassian shook his head, getting up. “Good night. I’ll tell Wedge where you are.”

“No-wait, Cassian.” She reached out, trying to tug at his jacket, his leg, before falling and stumbling again. He turned around.

“I’m sorry,” she said, something startlingly honest and pleading in her eyes. “I shouldn’t have done that. I think I’ve forgotten how to trust people,” she added quietly, folding further into herself.

“That’s alright,” he said, as gently as he possibly could. “I have too.”

Quicker than lightning, she stood up and swiped at the blood on his neck, collecting it onto the tip of her finger. He watched her, stunned, as she observed it dripping on her fingers, illuminated by moonlight.

Then, she closed her eyes, swaying just a bit, before nodding.

“You will die on a beach, in the arms of the woman you love,” she said, quiet and assured. She opened her eyes and smiled, a sincere attempt at comfort. “Doesn’t that sound nice?”

She shook the blood off of her hands and disappeared. They never spoke again.

The years have changed them all.

Cassian is still sullen, but then there is Jyn Erso, all fiery hope and determination, and she pierces him straight to the core. She makes the world come alive again, and with her, Cassian feels that there might be a future. Not for him, maybe, but for someone.

Scarif is a beach planet, and there is very little time for goodbyes.

Pazima Reynard is not a part of the Scarif mission. Whoever she is off of base, on base she is a mechanic. Even with a welding mask over her face, she was easy to spot. Her hair was now dyed a bright greenish-blue, locs piled onto her head, adding even more height to her tall frame. Sparks flew around her as she worked, illuminating her tattooed skin.

He was not a loud man, but he called her name. She lifted the mask, running her sweat and oil-slick hands into a towel.

“Your hair is very bright,” he observed.

“Cassian.” Her face remained passive, but her voice was rich with warmth. “Got bored on a stakeout.”

“A stakeout? Funny place for a mechanic to be.”

“Yes, well,” She abandoned her thought, crossing her arms. “I hear you’ll be leaving soon.”

“Keep it quiet.” he said, voice dropping to a semi-serious, conspiratorial whisper. “If we need it, can we rely on you to rally the pilots?”

“Of course. I’ve roped Bail in as well. You’ve got people here rooting for you.”

He took a look around Rebel Base, maybe for the last time. This one, built out of an abandoned temple on Yavin IV, is much better than Crait. There’s something freeing about Yavin, like the Rebels have carved out a slice of the jungle, hidden away just for them. For a year or so, it felt like nothing could touch them.

Then Jyn Erso, and the Death Star. 

Time waits for no one. He won’t inherit the galaxy they’re building.

I’ll miss this, he thought, surprising himself. I’ll miss being on the outside of this, the great concentric circles of people, orbiting around each other. He had not had a home for a very long time, but Rebel Base was as close as he could get. 

A chorus of shrieking giggles interrupted his thoughts. He turned to see Lottie Reynard laughing with a Mirilan medic, the two child-women passing cards between them and the droid mechanic K loved, some teenage boy with thick glasses. 

Their eyes met, very briefly, before Lottie ducked her head down, hiding the bright pink blush creeping up her skin.

Her words have rattled around in his head. They were easy enough to pass off as the drunken, nonsense ramblings of a half-mad fourteen year old.

Then he met Jyn, and saw the Death Star’s destruction.

“Sorry,” Pazima said absently, putting a hand on her hip. “I have tried to tell her she laughs like a Kowakian monkey-lizard. You can imagine how that went.”

Cassian shook his head. Truthfully, he took some kind of comfort in the fact that despite everything, teenage girls will always giggle too loud.

Then it hits him. Lies require time. The truth is something immediate, something to do when there’s no time left.

“Don’t apologize,” he said. “You’ve done a good job with her.”

It was like watching a mask come off, seeing the confusion on Pazima’s features. Her brows knitted together, and then a smile. She had dimples when she smiled. He had never noticed before.

“I thought you didn’t care,” she said, after a moment.

“I don’t,” he said. “So you can trust me. A neutral observer. A former skeptic, even.”

She crossed her arms, shaking her head, looking at Lottie, then her boots, tapping her foot absently. “Well, glad you’re convinced,” she mumbled. “I’m still not.”

“I don’t think parents ever think they do a good job,” he said. “My mother thought I had too many women, too many secrets. She still loved me, though. And that was enough.”

Pazima hummed, and he watched as she looked over at her sister again, before turning to him, sighing deeply.

“I’m not good at this kind of talk,” she admitted.

He shook his head, trying to dismiss her worries. “Then I’ll let you get back to work. But…” He looked at her, really looked, noting the deep-set inner corners of her eyes, her flat, straight nose, her full lips, her high cheekbones, her square jaw, the freckles dotting her cheeks. He let himself take in the sight of a supernaturally beautiful woman, for no other reason than he could.

“Can I ask you for a favor? You’re the only one I can trust with it.” He reached for her hand, not caring about the oil and grease staining them, only caring for a desperate moment of connection.

If Pazima was confused before, she was even more so now, shocked at his sudden display of emotion.

“Cassian-“

“There is a woman, her name is Kerri. She’s from Kenari. She’d be twenty-nine, maybe thirty by now. If…if you hear about her doing whatever it is you do, look into it for me, okay? She’s probably dead, but someone has to.”

Pazima squeezed his hand, nodding like one taking a solemn vow. “I will.”

Lottie has always been an awful sailor, which is one of her more irritating qualities.

Pazima had thought, when she first found her, that she would take to it. She had hoped the ocean could be a mother to Lottie, the way it is to her. But she didn’t-her fingers so deft with a blade were clumsy with a knot, and she couldn’t remember half of the things she needed to.

Just follow the wind, Pazima. Chart your course, but follow the wind.

It was a rare opportunity for them, this trip to Ethamaia. One day, Wedge and Jax had announced proudly that they had swindled Wedge’s own parents out of the place. One of their ridiculous schemes, but it had paid off. Like so many times before, the Rebellion splintered after the battle of Yavin, scattering and hiding until a new, safer base could be found.

But for the first time in many years, this didn’t feel like hiding. It felt like resting. It felt like exhaling.

They needed this, fuck , did they need it. The battle of Scarif was a bloodbath, a litany of dead allies, dead friends. Alderaan was worse. And then the battle of Yavin, a desperate last stand against total annihilation…

Bail Organa used to tell her this was a war of a thousand cuts. Well, Bail, she wanted to ask him, do you still think that will work? Because we’ve all been cut a thousand times, and yet here we are, bleeding out.

Of course, Bail was dead now, blown up by a superweapon, and she could hardly rage against his nineteen-year-old daughter, showing up to command armies in her soiled white dress.

She exhaled and looked out at the sea, bundling rope in her hands. This was the last part of her past she allowed in her life. She was someone else once, someone with parents and brothers, and the sea was a part of her very blood. No matter how much she tried to forget–and she did–the sea still remembered. It still called to her, the vast expanses of blue, broken up only by white, sparkling sands. She looked over at her sister. She perched on the rail of the ship, swinging her legs absently as she smoked. Did she pick up that habit on Coruscant, or from Pazima? She couldn’t remember, and had never cared to stop it. You had to deal with the war somehow, and it was either that or the bottle or bad, weird sex. Pazima had tried all three, and found a cigarra the least destructive.

There was something striking about Lottie-not always the best quality in an assassin, Pazima would admit, but it drew her in. Her face was that of a brutalized doll. It was heart shaped and sweet, with something bullish about it too—a missing eye, a crooked, broken nose, round cheeks that went from cute to jowly depending on her mood. The sun was setting, which made her orange-red hair more brilliant. A bit of fire amongst the endless waves. It was her one truly beautiful feature, and Pazima watched as it twisted, blown by the salty sea air.

She is a woman now, Pazima lamented. Lottie has been for a while, but sentiment-stupid thing-stopped her from seeing clearly.

Cassian Andor once asked her why she had taken Lottie in. The answer still eluded her. There were some ready made ones, of course. Lottie was a sad young girl who Pazima helped to safety; the sob story she gave the Rebellion. Lottie was prodigiously talented at killing with a finely tuned survival instinct, able to move between man and woman, innocent and cunning in an instant; the reasons she gave Wedge, and the reasons why Lottie made such a good assassin.

But none of them sufficed. None of them were right.

There was an idea the Creidye had, the lower-level Coruscanti cult that had spawned Charlotte Reynard into the galaxy. They thought families could be forged, built by durasteel knives and blood bonds. Pazima despised most of their ideology, their fanaticism, their slavish devotion. But the Creidye had helped her when she needed it. She owed them a debt, like it or not.

So when she found herself in the lower levels, after a decade away from the planet that raised her, and found it filled with feral children, what choice did she have?

“Stop looking at me.” Lottie had eyes in the back of her head sometimes–something Pazima had trained her to have, an acute awareness of her surroundings. She felt a blush of pride at her sister’s perception.  “Or at least tell me what you’re thinking about.”

“Just thinking we’re the same, you and I.”

“Oh?” She turned to her, exhaling smoke out of the corner of her mouth. “Well, I would think so, we’re sisters.”

Pazima snorted out a laugh. A secret smile passed between them.

Lottie spoke again, hopping onto the deck with a dancer’s flair. “Cassian Andor said the same thing once.”

She crossed her arms. “That you’re sisters?”

“That he and I were the same.”

“Huh.” She was fairly sure Cassian held a personal grudge against Lottie for existing. The things you learn after people die. She took the cigarra from her sister’s delicate fingers and inhaled, before croaking out a response. “I didn’t know you talked to him.”

“I didn’t. I put a knife to his throat once.”

“ Charlotte! ”

“I was drunk, it wasn’t a good decision,” Lottie shrugged, as if that was an excuse.

Pazima pinched the bridge of her nose, inhaling the cigarra again, feeling the smoke choke at her lungs. “Please tell me this was an isolated incident.”

“If it wasn’t, one of us would’ve died a lot earlier,” Lottie pointed out.

“That-” Pazima exhaled, in and out, attempting to find patience. It was a hard thing to find around Lottie, even harder when she was right about something. “You are aggravating.”

“Yes.” She paused, blinking. “But you have to admit it’s kind of funny.”

“I once was under Imperial torture nonstop for a week. Guess what I admitted?” She bent over, curling her lip in triumph. “Nothing, little sister.”

Lottie blinked, taking the cigarra from her. “Only you could find a way brag about surviving Imperial torture.”

Do you know why I chose you, Pazima? His voice, the Fox assassin that had taught and trained her, the one she had held in her arms as he died, rose from the whirlpool of memory. Because you, dear one, can endure.

“Just trying to impart some wisdom. A lesson for you.”

“I’m bored with lessons.” Lottie slouched onto the side of the railing, tossing her hair. She could be quite glamorous when she wanted, curls of red hair and curls of smoke intertwining, a budding femme fatale.

She could also be supremely annoying.

How many times had Pazima heard that particular complaint? Trying to teach her to read was the worst. It’s so booooo-ring, Pazzy. All the letters switch up and dance in my mind.

“You will be the only Fox left after I die,” Pazima said. The Fox, an ancient line of assassins, reduced now to two women on a boat. The history of whatever they were was gone. “Someday, you’ll miss my boring lessons.”

“No, that’s not right,” Lottie said, scrunching her nose and shaking her head. “We’re both meant to bear witness.”

There she was, the priestess, spouting inane prophecies. Lottie saw time differently. They all did, the Creidye, giving up individual Force sensitivity for something different, something communal. Something borne of a world with no moon and no sun and no seasons. Something kept hidden and locked away. Something even the Jedi feared. Something that it took an entire city-planet to bury.

How does one stop the tide , Pazima wondered. How does one stop the rain?

“You have to stop saying odd shit, Lottie. Especially when you’re not around me.”

“Luke says odd shit,” Lottie pouted, tossing the stubbed cigarra with deadly accuracy to a trash can.

Pazima groaned, throwing her head back. Luke this and Luke that. He was Lottie’s most recent obsession, the Jedi descended from the very heavens to save them all. 

“Luke blew up the Death Star.” And he’s a man and a fucking Skywalker, she wanted to add. Two advantages we both lack.

“Everyone remembers the Jedi more than the Coruscanti,” Lottie said.

“He’s as green as they come,” she countered. Greener . “He’s from the Outer Rim, things are different there. And you’re not just Coruscanti.” Pazima smirked. “I’m sure you tell him quite a story about your homeworld.”

“And what of it?” Lottie hissed. “Am I forbidden from even speaking of them now?”

Pazima scoffed, but shook her head. This was the hardest thing to articulate to her, the kind of  wisdom that only came with age. Pazima was old by Rebel standards-thirty-five-but so damn young compared to real people. 

The things Lottie had survived created only two things. Cynic, and zealot. Lottie had latched onto religion, despite Pazima’s objections. Now this kid, this son of Skywalker…

This is a war for the zealots now, fought by idealistic, traumatized teenagers. She looked up at the stars, just beginning to wink at her as the sun dipped below the horizon line. She found the light of Alderaan, still blazing bright, a beacon from a better time.

Endure, Pazima, endure.

“You are still dreaming of a world that does not exist.” Or maybe it did once. Perhaps the brilliant under-levels of Coruscant, with its boundless love and fiery magic and theatrical trickery, the one Pazima knew filled Lottie’s head, perhaps it still existed, burning alongside Alderaan.

“You don’t like Luke,” she observed, tilting her head.

“My personal feelings have nothing to do with it,” Pazima said, grateful for the change in topic. “He’s dangerous, we’d all do well to remember that.”

“Yeah, but he’s kind,” Lottie insisted. “Like Cassian.”

“Yes,” Pazima admitted. Which made him all the more unpredictable. What happens when the kindness burns away, and only the ashes and his raw power remain? He’s already killed millions, they just happened to be on the wrong side. 

Perhaps someday I will be done with grief , she thought. She could have all the time in the galaxy, and it still wouldn’t be enough to list those she had lost. It’s hardest to mourn someone like Cassian, someone who she barely knew yet knew better than anyone. They were too similar, the two of them, too intense and brooding.

Cassian was giddy when he smiled, like a little boy. It was so rare and it always made Pazima’s heart stop for a very brief moment. She did not love him, she hardly knew him. Yet it was enough to remind her of all she had lost.

“Why did Cassian say you were the same?”

“I dunno,” Lottie shrugged, voice quiet. “Something about being hungry.”

“Hm.” Lottie had been hungry, that was true enough. The Creidye were rich in revolutionary ideas and dusty legends, but very poor in any real resources. She hadn’t known Cassian was hungry. But then again, she never asked. Pazima had long ago learned to live with regrets, to let them wash over her like waves.

“Everyone always sees what they want in me,” Lottie muttered. “No one ever sees me for me.”

Her brow furrowed. Her sister was as prone to fits of melancholy as she was to vague prophecies. As far as Pazima was concerned, one had as little value as the other. She couldn’t have Lottie fall into despair, any less than she could have her go mad.

“I see you.” She petted a hand over her sister’s hair. Pazima knew she was bad at this. She was too direct, too cold, all of the warmth burnt out of her long ago. 

It’s a wonder Lottie’s only a chain-smoker.

“No,” Lottie said, tracing a finger over a scar on her arm. “No, you don’t.” 

A small crack formed in Pazima’s heart. I’m sorry, I’m sorry , she wanted to say. I hope I gave you enough time to be young.

Then Lottie shrugged, easy and languid, so much like Wedge–the warm brother and father Pazima never quite could be, the one Lottie so desperately needed. “That’s okay. I don’t think I see you clearly either.”

Pazima huffed out a laugh, relieved that the gloomy spell seemed to have passed. 

“By design,” she said. “A blank, beautiful slate, for idiots to see what they want.”

“Are you saying I’m an idiot?”

She wrapped an arm around her sister, pulled her to her, and kissed the top of her head.

“Yes.”

She stood up, walking over to where she had set up a little holotape player. Pazima was done talking. How foolish she had been, so many years ago, thinking spycraft would be all blasters and fast ships and fabulous dresses. It was mostly just talking, navigating the asteroid fields of wit and words and agendas. 

At the very least , she thought, looking over at Lottie, she’s better at that than I am.

She thumbed through her box of tapes, finding the one she was searching for.

Cassian had swindled her out of a haircut for it. She had high rates–after all, along with being the best mechanic and the best shot in the Rebellion, she was the best, and for a while the only, hairdresser. Still, she had let him pay with just this one little holotape, big brown eyes, and a sob story. 

Your enemies must think you are strong. Only you, Pazima, can know you are weak.

“Cassian gave me this,” she said, looking over her shoulder at Lottie, holding the tape between two fingers. “On Crait, after we got back to the Rebellion from Laakteen.”

Lottie scrambled to her feet, snatching the tape from Pazima’s hands, wrinkling her nose as she read the title. “Chaos Theory by Senators of Rhythm. What is this, jizz? Gonkrock?”

“Nah, more…electro-twang, I’d call it, but a little funkier than that. I never thought this would’ve been Cassian’s thing.”

“The kind of music you used to sing?”

Pazima smiled, allowing herself a bit of wistfulness. “No, little sister. But a good kind of music nonetheless.”

“Won’t the neighbors hear?” Lottie asked. They had docked on a little inlet, far enough from any real trouble, but still close enough to see the tops of the shell-white mansions peeking over the horizon line

She smirked. On Ethamaia, their neighbors were arms dealers and Imperial swine.

“Fuck ‘em.” she declared, and Lottie giggled giddily. 

Pazima could’ve admonished Lottie for the laugh-it was loud and wild, much like her, and certainly too attention-drawing for any assassin-but how could she? If there was anything that drew the sisters together, that drew all Coruscanti together, it was music. 

Pazima wasn’t a Coruscanti in the way her sister was. She wasn’t born under the city, nor even in one of the skyscrapers of the wealthy. Her home planet, Xuhiri, was vast and blue and sparse in a way someone like Lottie could only imagine. But like all of the female scions of great noble houses, Pazima was shipped off to Coruscant to learn how to smile and please, to host dinner parties and flatter the egos of wealthy men. It was in that great orchestra of a city, a symphony of speeder horns and conversation, that she first knew what love was.

Love was the sound of a Bith soprano at the Galaxies Opera House. A street busker strumming their double viol on the streets of Uscru Entertainment district, nodding and smiling as Pazima tossed a credit their way. And love, well, of course it was the Creidye performance troupes, emerging from the lower levels, soaking up the meager sun as they beat their heavy drums, their long hair swaying in time with the music and their dancers twirling their swords, the blades running over scarred skin and somehow never drawing blood.

She pressed play on the holotape and closed her eyes. She heard the familiar beat of a song long forgotten, a drum kit cuing in the singer and the backing band.

Her sister was already fidgeting in time with the music when Pazima reached out her hand, as if the music coursed through her very blood.

She took her hand gladly, and Pazima spun her sister around, watching her beautiful red hair twirl around her.

Dancing with her, on the deck of this ship that was somehow theirs, feet remembering steps she had learned long ago on Coruscant, to the music given to them by a dead man, Pazima couldn’t help but feel like this was all a dream. It was too nice, too sweet. The laughter came to her unbidden, flowing like a stream from her belly to her breath.

She watched Lottie, seventeen and hopelessly alive. Their two bodies moved in time as they danced, one scarred, one tattooed, both wearing their histories on their skin.

She felt again that prick of guilt, the one that threatened to consume her, the one Cassian had found so long ago, when Lottie was still half-mute. She was dancing now, and Cassian was dead.

There was no room for guilt, not anymore. The cause was still a hopeless one when Pazima brought Lottie to base. That had all changed now, thanks to the sandy-haired Jedi’s son from Tatooine.

He could win them the war. And Lottie, well…

Pazima sent a silent prayer to the waves.

If she dies, let her die young. Let her become a martyr and stay young and wild and beautiful forever.

And please, please, please, let me die before her.