#Put all that together and you have an abomination from hell lmao

[clover-the-awesomest]

Giving you my reactions to these sweet baby boys because I found it downright hilarious

Raph: Big boi has cool eye 🤩

Leo: OMFG HE SO GODDAMN UGLY EWWWW OH MY GOD (not referring to the art style lmao)

Donnie: 😦🫢🫣🤭 OHHHHHH MY GOSH HE’S SO CUTE AND FUZZYYYYYY LOOK AT HIS WIIIINGSSSSSSSS 🤩🤩❤️💖💞🥰😍🥳😊☺️

Mikey: Cool hair

AAAGGHHH I CAN FINALLY SHOW THESE GUYS TO TUMBLR,,,

everyone welcome the newest addition to my au catalogue,

FLYING TURTLES AU !!

aka, what if Draxum woke up one day and was like, "okay but what if my super soldiers could fly? "

Their DNA was quite unstable so uh.... Some of them came out not fully like Draxum wanted them to. But they make it work!

Bonus early Donnie sketches: (you can see I haven't figured out how I wanted to draw Mikey in the first one yet,)

Not much changes with the plot they can just fly now.

[raharaco]

OC "Couple" Questions - OVDW Edition

For a quick introduction, the left one (brunette) is Oliver, an archdemon who works as a general officer with anxiety issues and one child. The right one (blonde) is Dewangga, a cherub and a priest, yet he acts like the Devil himself (i.e., killing demons and all). Their dynamic is like mutual pining between "awkward big guy" x "violent smaller guy", though personally I like simply calling them police x (whore) ustaz or crocodile x eagle or DEEP AND HOLIC

Also, the child is actually THEIR secret daughter together, but only Oliver takes care of her cuz Dewangga abandoned his responsibilities as a father by force. Though, he's still at fault here.

Questions are made by Hershel Deercliff. I'll put the image below the cut. Original thread on Twitter (in Indonesian), dated 3rd February 2024.

1. "What were their first impressions of each other?"

Oliver thinks Dewangga is weird and too extreme because he believes himself to be the most "rightful" one and that his actions of massacring demons can be justified just because he's an angel. While Dewangga himself mocks the demon for holding himself back against him or that he's not that serious about catching his ass for committing crimes, and being so meek despite being of a high rank. The cherub doesn't just hate demons, he DESPISES all demons, including Oliver, even if he looks handsome!!

But they had actually met earlier, right before finally running up to each other again and fighting after Dewangga committed his act. The point is, Oliver was confused as to how an angel could be stumbling onto the bushes on the border of the Underworld and Overworld 😂 He was just patrolling around the area, minding his own business, until he found someone falling upside down with his ass upwards.

Dewangga was, of course, embarrassed as HELL because he was caught trespassing and even got his ass stared at by a 1 RANK AND FIVE STARS ARCHDEMON, definitely not the demon he expected to meet right off the bat, whereas his position was very promising right. They bickered for a moment before Dewangga finally ran away (or maybe more accurately, flew away) lmao

2. "Is it a casual relationship or true love? Or somewhere in between?"

Unlabeled relationship????? They started out as enemies THEN turned into enemies with benefits tho... I don't know I'm not an expert at love??

3. "What was each of them's 'oh shit I have feelings for them' moment?"

Do they even realize? At least they realized it after they got separated for good. But what's more to do because they're an angel and a demon, so naturally they can't be together...

4. "Did either of them fight their feelings, or was it easy to accept?"

Dewangga hates himself and doesn't want to accept that he has let himself be carried away by lust, even to the point of throwing away his precious daughter (because she's still an illegitimate child and a literal abomination no matter how you view it). He's an angel, he should've dismissed his strange affection towards Oliver and returned to the right path, but in the end, he really regrets everything like why did he let this happen, why that, etc. He's afraid of what Agares, the other angels, or even Oliver himself would say if they found out that he... uhhh laid a fertilized egg? Besically he's in denial

On the other hand, Oliver is also aware that their relationship is taboo and that it won't be possible because they're from different species (?). Not only that, he's afraid that Dewangga's chastity would be "tainted" if a demon like him keeps hanging around with an angel, and even though he actually loves (and is curious about) him, Oliver feels that they're better off apart for good… even though he knows that they should talk about everything that has happened, like their child and all.

5. "When was their first "I love you"? What prompted it? If neither has said it yet, why?"

Nope. Both of them are afraid of what their relationship will be like in the future and what others will say about them, plus Dewangga doesn't want to be unfaithful to Agares just because he loves a demon but what I want to say is FUC—

6. "WHO'S THE BIG SPOON WHO'S THE LITTLE SPOON TELL ME NOW!!!!!"

Dewangga is the big spoon, Oliver's the little spoon cuz it fits their personality more 😂

7. "What was the biggest obstacle to their relationship?"

Their own selves, of course. They are a pair of an angel and a demon, their goals are different, and their natures are also different. It just goes against God's "teachings", apparently.

I think it's interesting how they're always on different grounds, no matter how much they yearn for each other and no matter how many universes they've passed through... by that I also mean in AUs. They are cursed with the star-crossed lovers trope 😭

8. "What drew them to each other the most?"

Oliver is attracted by Dewangga's fortitude in carrying out his duties even though he is a huge fanatic and his method of execution is very questionable. While Dewangga likes his touch (iykwim), plus Oliver is handsome. Of course he didn't like it at first, but after a while he thinks that Oliver is not like the other demons ahahay

Basically they're just like magnets, attracted to each other yet they can never be together simply because they're from opposing sides and of the same sex, although being gay doesn't really matter in this universe. My man god made the afterlife world gay because the original human world didn't allow him to be gay

Oh, and they are actually drawn to each other because they feel a strange sense of familiarity, as if they have encountered each other before. Oliver realizes who Dewangga is sooner or later, but Dewangga doesn't recall who Oliver is. Spoiler alert: turns out that Dewangga is actually Oliver's long-dead ex-crush (Eda) who got the chance for redemption and to live again but as an angel. As a result, he doesn't remember or even know that he had a life in the Underworld and met Oliver before. Reincarnation? Maybe? But even though Dewangga doesn't consciously remember anything, his body still remembers Oliver's touch AND YES you may take it however you want

It's not like Dewangga's memories are wiped or anything. Those memories of him as Eda in the past belong to Eda only. Basically Dewangga is like a new creature but made with Eda's traumas or core or something, Idk. Does he still count as Eda? But still, Dewangga is Dewangga, Eda is Eda and he's only a being from the distant past...

9. "How long did they know each other before developing feelings?"

IDK????? I NEVER COUNTED IT???? 😭😭😭

Maybe at least 1~3 years (on Earth or the universe's Human World's date)? But if you count it from when Oliver first met Eda, well it was long ago man, don't ask me this I don't even know

10. "What's each other's favorite quality about the other?"

Oliver likes Dewangga who always stands up to his beliefs, has an unwavering will to fulfill his duties in the name of God, and is confident.

Dewangga likes how kind and understanding Oliver is, even though he is a demon, capslock ARCHDEMON even, yet he is a soft boy. He also thinks that Oliver's behavior is like a puppy. He really likes dogs. Do crocodiles count as dogs?

[autisticandroids]

yknow those episodes where a character's whole personality gets split into 3-5 different distinct separate bodies? what bodies would cas have? I feel like it'd just be a mess tbh, imagine 5 different castiels all of them loving dean to a certain extent but showing it VASTLY differently. one cas would literally want to murder the others lmao

okay so i don’t actually think this trope would be an effective tool for analyzing cas? he’s not conflicted enough in himself. he’s too impulsive, too singleminded, too uninhibited. like, in the end, cas always ends up doing whatever he wants. there aren’t multiple discrete voices vying for control, really, or rather, if there are, one is always significantly stronger than the others. like in the end cas will always end up eating raw meat off the floor, you know? he’ll do what he wants. if i was going to do personality splitting i’d do it to someone intensely internally conflicted, like dean.

however, because i’m in an essay writing mood today, i’ll answer a question slightly to the left of the one you asked. cas may not be internally conflicted, but he is intensely changeable. these two things are related, actually; the same impulsivity and singlemindedness that mean he doesn’t have a ton of internal conflict at any given time mean that different ideas sound good to him at different times, because he isn’t really thinking about, say, what future-him will think of them. and he’s not really trying to maintain an image or identity. he’s just doing what feels right at the time, which is very different at different times and in different situations.

anyway, that in mind, i think a lot about ways to bring together many alternate versions of cas which sort of correspond to different times in the show.

i have a fic in my head about a bunch of cas-es pulled from alternate timelines by some kind of spell. so this would be set during the widower arc because the basic impulse here is to show dean a very bad time. just absolutely put him through hell. also, all the alternate timelines are different because different stuff happened, not because cas made different choices, because if we’re torturing dean it has to be like 5x04, the changes in cas can’t be cas’ fault. they have to be dean’s or just like, the universe’s (which makes them dean’s).

so dean is trying to bring cas back, and he finds some kind of spell that can bring someone “from another world.” and he tries it because hey. can’t hurt to try. anyway i’ve thought a long time about different versions of cas i would put in this and here is what i have. in order of when the timeline split off.

- a cas who never raised dean from hell. think 14x13 “lebanon.” this one i’m not too sure about, like, this could be fun, but i don’t know if it’s different enough from the next one. like this castiel would have lived through the averted apocalypse and subsequent general fuckery that happened as an angelic footsoldier, which would actually be pretty interesting now that i think about it, especially since all that stuff would have gone down soooooooo differently without cas specifically for your average angel footsoldier. like cas has PERSONALLY caused more upheaval in heaven in twelve years of spn than there seems to have been in millennia. so he would be the point of view of a normal footsoldier from a totally other world.

- a cas who died mid season four, and is pulled out of the empty in 2017 by this spell. i’m not sure when this cas died. my thoughts are (1) killed in on the head of a pin by alistair, (2) killed during his torture in the rapture, or (3) simply never resurrected after lucifer rising. (3) makes the most sense, but that cas has already thrown away everything for dean. i prefer the idea of a cas who loves dean, is already on the brink of disobedience for him, but has not yet taken the plunge. both on the head of a pin and the rapture are great places for this, and they both have strengths and weaknesses. if he died in the rapture, he was killed by heaven, which is fundamentally more fun, but he was also really very much over the edge already. if he died in on the head of a pin, he wasn’t killed by heaven, but he is perfectly teetering on the brink of falling for dean. regardless of when he died, the purpose of this cas is to be horrified at all the various and myriad ways he has destroyed and corrupted himself for dean in the other timelines.

- possibly endverse cas, who would have died in 2014, but like s4 cas, would have been pulled from the afterlife by the spell. i’m not so sure on this one. we as a society love endverse cas but i dunno what purpose he would serve. maybe endverse cas didn’t die in 2014, and instead was imprisoned by lucifer, because, you know. he’s the only brother lucifer has left. so he is very excited to see dean alive and well, since his dean is dead, and, not being an angel, cas can’t bring him back. the purpose of this cas would be to horrify dean that cas loves him and needs him so much, and to disgust the other cas-es with his neediness.

- a cas who was in some way on better terms with dean during s6. maybe dean and cas ride off into the sunset together after swan song instead of dean going to live with lisa, maybe dean prayed to cas while he was with lisa because he missed him, who knows. either way, cas has dean’s help with the angel revolution in season six from the start, and never goes to crowley. the plan cas and dean come up with to beat raphael includes breaking into the cage and stealing the grace of michael and lucifer, freeing sam and adam in the process. incidentally, it also involves cas possessing dean, because if cas is gonna eat archangel grace to become more powerful, he’s going to need a stronger vessel. so cas and dean have a whole like. midam situation happening. they’re a double archangel together, and godstiel never happened so none of the other terrible apocalypses that stemmed from that happened, and everything is pretty cool where they’re from, and also they’re obviously uhhhhhh SOME kind of together. the purpose of this cas is to upset dean because this cas shows how much better everything could have been and how much better his and cas’ relationship could have been if dean had simply been more considerate of cas in s6, and also freak dean out with how uh. close. this dean and cas are.

- a godstiel who managed to swallow purgatory without swallowing the leviathans and remained god. he’s probably soooomewhat less scary and murdery than canonverse godstiel because no leviathans, so you know, not as many angel purges or massacres on earth. and he probably went and fixed sam’s wall within about three days because cas is prideful but he does NOT like it when dean is mad at him. so they did kiss and make up, and so this cas would have had dean to act as his morality chain. but he’s still very scary and godstiel. and also he refers to dean as “The Beloved” you know. his purpose is to freak everyone out, because he’s scary, but also, for the past cas-es, because he is a terrifying abomination that they could never imagine becoming, for the future cas-es, because he is a reminder of their worst selves, and for dean, because he is a reminder of how dangerous cas is, but also because he uh. obviously has some feelings about his dean. unclear if they are consummated or not.

- a cas who naomi never rescued from purgatory, and who stayed there. hasn't spoken to another being in half a decade, has not recovered from his emotionally destroyed state in purgatory in s8. believes at first that the spell is his dean rescuing him, and is crushed when he realizes he was wrong. like endverse cas, his purpose is to show dean how much cas needs him and depends on him emotionally, and how he (dean) is capable of destroying cas, as well as his guilt for leaving him in purgatory and how lucky he is that his cas got out. this is especially noteworthy since the guilt for leaving cas in purgatory is part of the reason dean is trying to get cas back.

- a cas who stayed human after season nine, and has built himself a small human life over the next four years. he has a job and an apartment and friends outside the winchesters and yes, he still goes hunting after work sometimes, and he's still in contact with dean, but he is also independent in a way no other version of cas has ever been. he exists to freak out dean because dean has never seen cas independent of him. he is also fairly bitter at dean since dean did kind of stop spending time with him when he was no longer useful, and our dean feels guilty for that.

- a cas who showed up twenty minutes later in 10x03, finding sam dead and dean gone, and had to chase down demon dean, and has now spent three years following demon dean around as his tragically adoring stalker, because he hasn't found a way to resurrect sam yet and he doesn't want to put dean through the demon cure until he can save sam because he doesn't want dean to experience that guilt, but he also adores dean and wants to keep an eye on him and keep him safe and also keep him from doing anything too heinous, so he just covertly follows him around the country and watches from a distance as he commits various murders and fucks his way through every local bar scene. and occasionally cas finds dean something to kill, when the mark gets hungry, and drops it in his path. his purpose is to freak dean out with the lengths cas would go for him, and the depths cas would sink to.

anyway. lebanon cas and season four cas are horrified and perhaps disgusted (lebanon cas more than s4 cas) by ALL of the later cas-es, and how far they’re fallen, all of it for dean. godstiel and archangel cas being abominations, endverse cas and s9 cas being fallen, even purgatory cas and demon dean’s cas for their total dependence on dean.

purgatory cas and endverse cas are just happy to see a dean, even if it’s not their dean. demon dean’s cas, too, in a way. he’s happy to see a dean who is still human, who he can still have as a friend.

human cas is pissed to see that he was right, that dean would have stuck by him if he’d still had his powers, that this version of dean is doing spells to try and bring his cas, who is still an angel, back, whereas he and his dean only see each other once every couple months.

everyone is terrified and disgusted by godstiel, as i said before.

they’re mostly kind of thrown by archangel cas. a lot of them are jealous. godstiel is furious because how dare anyone, even an alternate version of himself, take dean as a vessel (even if dean likes it). godstiel isn’t really there, though, he resisted the summoning and just sort of popped his head through to see what was going on, and he goes back to his own reality pretty fast without murdering anyone.

also to be clear dean has not at this point examined or acknowledged any feelings he may have about his cas besides “friendship,” nor has he wondered what feelings his cas may have for him. given how many of the cas-es were clearly in some kind of relationship with their dean (endverse cas, archangel cas) or just openly in love with their dean (godstiel, purgatory cas, demon dean’s cas), dean is forced to reevaluate the nature of his and cas’ relationship.

[wtf-amiru]

here you go

Okay you little shits I guess I'm posting my incredibly self indulgent little fic here now so here it is. It references a lot of other writing i've done for myself before this that i'm real hesitant to post bc it's just a lot of ancient smut, i'm not even sorry. This one's mostly fluff and I'm removing the smut from it bc it's so little, the other one is mostly smut with some fluff sprinkled through and i won't apologize for it lmao but i'm not going to post it either, just pretend you understand the references or ask if you really can't figure it out, I can quote most of the references made, but the majority is heckin PRIVATE lmao

also fair warning that this is fully not even what i would consider first draft material, this is rougher than rough draft lol there's a ton of repetition and the like.

Anyway, here you go, it starts after Elpis, rambles on and on and doesn't fucking end bc i'm actually the worst :)

Returning home after Elpis was harder than she expected, doubly so having to see the first final days and those friends she was instantly so close to ripped away. It left her with that familiar feeling of empty helplessness that had plagued her when she were in Ishgard, she knew this time she had people to help but that didn't stop the pain.

Being shipped off to Garlemald to help fight abominations was a welcome distraction but the flight home was too long and too quiet. Her hands start to shake and her jaw clenches, she just had to make it back to the annex she reminds herself.

G'raha's keen eye notices her shaking hands and stiff back, "hey, are you okay?" He whispers as he wraps an arm around her and pulls her close. She shifts so that her ear is pressed against his chest as she shakes her head; his heart beating loudly in her ear helped calm and ground her but did nothing to ease the pain in her heart. He kisses the top of her head and holds her close as he gently coos to her. He knew the middle of the airship with 25 loporrits and the rest of the scions was probably not the place to help her with whatever had her so rattled and instead just..."let me help.....hold your mess together" Hades' voice echoes through her head and knowing he ended that day not knowing who she even was felt like getting shot. Tears stream down her face as she tries to hold the tide back and G'raha gently rocks her.

Nearly despondent, she lets him lead her back to their room in the annex once they arrive in Old Sharlayan. He gingerly removes her winter clothes and armor and puts her in one of his bigger t-shirts as she sits and sobs in bed, finally letting herself feel all the things she had to witness on her way home through time. He gently crawls in behind her and pulls her into his chest as she chokes out the events of the last few days. All the bad stuff first, the last day, Hermes wiping their memories, the meteia twisting into creatures of nihility, having to see those people walk out of that building not knowing who she was in the slightest and everything she saw on her journey home. Hythlodaeus walking away from Hades for the final time looking so sad and resigned, a people scared and running, unable to accept or acknowledge the growing discontent they were feeding meteion, and Venat, strong and tall, trudging through time and hell to prove that mankind, despite all of his shortcomings and faults, deserved to live.

He blinks back the tears that well in his eyes as he holds her tight, it was so much more than he had expected. Knowing the truth of the final days and the truth of the villains they had faced since, the truth of the ascians and the truth of Emet-Selch. "You are not alone or helpless, you know that right?" His voice was gentle but grounded and firm, there was no wiggling out and trying to carry this alone despite that being her first reaction. She nods and tries to take a deep breath but it hitches and only serves to drag out another sob. "She loved them so much, it hurts so bad, it feels like Ishgard all over again" she pulls at G'raha, pulls him around her, letting his warmth and scent flood her senses and remind her that she's herself again as she tells him of the better things. Meeting Hythlodaeus and Hades, feeling that love so strongly for the first time, really feeling Azem show up as a separate and distinct set of feelings in that place and he's fascinated. The only person in the world right now with any knowledge of how it felt to have two souls who maybe had separate thought processes and urges. He's proud of her for letting herself follow Azem's instincts to the end, knowing it was quite literally the only chance she'd have to see those people again for some long while. She struggles to comprehend and reconcile all of her feelings for Hades and Hythlodaeus and words fail her for a moment as she slips into her head, but he catches her and pulls her back out, "you don't have to figure them out right now, you have time, you have time."

He gently rocks her like Thancred used to when she had the shakes so bad in Ishgard and she notices the similarity. "...have you been hanging out with Thancred?" She asks quietly and hears the soft burst of a laugh in response, "you're sharp, we got sent off to help Corvos together with Estinien". With everything out of her she felt empty, hollow, the storm having raged through her. "You said he and Estinien helped you the most during....my time away, so he's been filling in the gaps while you've been gone and we've been traveling. I hope that's alright," and she is quick to nod her assurances before he can continue, "of course it is." Thancred was probably the best source of information when it came to her, probably better than she was herself.

Time came and went as she laid there in G'raha's arms but the cold ache in her stomach didn't lessen and the gnawing at the back of her mind wouldn't stop. "I'll be right back, I need to talk to him." She finally says and pushes up off his chest, or tries to, but his arms push her back down "he can come here, you're not going anywhere right now." He touches his ear and says a few words and she has to just let him care for her this time. She'd gotten so used to caring for him in the first as his body slowly turned to crystal, and helping him recover once he was back in the source. More than a few times he'd had to remind her that he's fine here, that's not going to happen to him here.

There's a soft knock at the door and Thancred's head pops through. He seems surprised to see her looking so devastated and she remembers that he wasn't there on her flight home, this was the first time she'd seen him since she got back and he manages to gently stride over and crouch in front of her at the edge of the bed. "Hey, is everything okay? You look like shit." She snorts as G'raha lets her off his chest to hug Thancred and she explains the familiar creeping chill in her chest, that too familiar pain. "Okay, well no more drinking of course, we should all try to refrain. I'll let the others know. Thank you for being so quick to catch this, we'll see you get through this like always." His words are soft and gentle as he ruffles her hair and she closes her eyes a moment. He stands back up and she lets herself fall back onto G'raha again as Thancred gives him a nod and leaves again. 

Now she could actually relax, wrapped in G'raha's arms as a quiet purr shakes out of her intermittently. "He means a lot to you," she nods her head, he did. "He's known me since I was a ratty little teenager" and she feels G'raha's chest shake with laughter behind her head, "I'll have to ask him about that, I have a hard time imagining you as ratty ever" he says, "you should, I was a little shit head" she smiles thinking about the several times she had tried to take a swing at Thancred in anger and how when she was a teenager he could literally just palm her fist away.  "Do you love him?" The question was honest and not the least bit accusatory and the smile falls off her face as she's forced to actually contemplate it. The silence that falls over the room is one without pressure or expectation. "In a way, I think I do" it comes out of her as almost a question. She'd absolutely be lying if she said she didn't, of that she's sure.

It's quiet and she shifts to look up at G'raha to see him smirking, hand moving to his ear, "you owe me 20 Gil" he whispers quietly with growing concern and panic as her eyebrows furrow and her mouth falls open in shock. "Raha Tia of the Gryphon tribe, what is the meaning of this?!" She feigns anger and shock but it was nice to see him giggling in a fit if she was being completely honest, "I'm sorry! I'm sorry! Ah! Hey!" He laughs as she pushes him into the bed under her. "I told you we had been travelling together! I wanted to know more about Ishgard and the more he told me, the more he spoke in general honestly, the more I couldn't shake the feeling that you had to have some feelings for him, the way you trust him to know what's best. He insisted no, because of course he did, but I knew you wouldn't hide it from me if I just asked you." His eyes stare up at her in sincerity and she lets herself deflate onto his chest once again. Today had been a lot, but she couldn't deny she felt lighter for it. "I really have to stop thinking I can hide anything from anyone ever, even if I don't even know it yet." She hears a soft chuckle as G'raha's arms wrap tight around her, "you sure have gotten bad at it, that's for certain. I remember not knowing a damn thing that was going on in your head when we first met." She snorts and lets her face squish against his chest, "I was a different person back then," "we both were."

She thinks back to those crystal tower days, to being so frustrated by her distracting emerging feelings and taking it out on G'raha in response, to listening to him tell her tall tales of Allagan history, and to falling asleep against him in the ruins as he spoke. "G'raha?" She keeps her head down but feels his lift to look at her, "I'm hungry" she replies quietly and holds her laughter in until after G'raha had burst out laughing. "Fair enough, let's head over to the last stand then."  She whines at the thought of putting clothes on to go outside but pulls shorts and sandals on, keeping G'raha's soft t-shirt on; she wishes she had Thancred's jacket but she doesn't have it in her to figure out those feelings right in this moment, she just wanted something to eat and to rest.

Over their visit to the Last Stand both Urianger and Y'shtola stop by, to check on her she suspects; Urianger brings a thermos of tea and one of his worn cardigans, her favorite, and she slips into it immediately.  When they're done eating and visiting, G'raha walks back to the annex with her but sends her into their room alone, he was going to talk to Thancred, who they both agreed was probably loosing his mind after G'raha's cryptic message from earlier trying to figure out what it meant. She kisses him before he goes and retires into their room, flopping into bed and staring at the ceiling. A lot had happened in the handful of hours she had been back and she goes over it again in her head.

Thancred and her feelings for him. They're not the same as the feelings she has for G'raha. If G'raha was her calm point in the storm, Thancred was her mooring line keeping from straying too far into the storm. He reminded her of Hades that last morning she was in Elpis, strong walls to keep her safe.

She crosses her arms over her face and groans, the world was ending and she was wondering what it'd be like to kiss her friend. "Hey, none of that now." She hears G'raha's voice from the door and just groans louder, curling up on her side as he laughs at the spectacle. She peaks out from her crossed arms and checks the door, no Thancred; probably good, she just wanted to rest tonight, not sort the mess in her head. "He needed time to process, you do too. No thinking, the doctor is prescribing only rest." He kicks his pants off into the corner and slips out of his shirt before dimming the lights to only the lamps within reach of bed. He crawls into bed and pulls her with him, curling her into his arms. "I missed you," she says quietly into his chest and already her eyes felt heavy. She feels soft lips on her forehead and reaches up to sleepily kiss G'raha, hand on his cheek.

Kissing him was like following a path back to herself, reminded her that she was herself, not Azem; she was in control of this body and mind. She lingers in the kiss, lips barely touching as her eyes drift close. "Get some sleep A'miru, I'll be here when you wake." He whispers as he pulls her in. "Tell me stories, like you used to in The Find" She says quietly and hears the sound of a soft chuckle, "of course..."

Sleep takes her almost immediately as G'raha starts talking and as a mercy she doesn't dream at all that night. For once sleep is peaceful and restful. She wakes the next morning fully sprawled out across G'raha who's already awake but just barely. She loved seeing him sleepy, it was one of her favorite things, it was so cute but she was never up early enough to see it. She reaches up to touch his face and his hand holds hers against his cheek as he purrs under her. "Did you sleep well?" He croaks, voice thick with sleep still. She nods and gives him a small kiss before snuggling back into his chest, "hey now, no no no, we're waking up, not going back to sleep." He's laughing as she groans and wraps the blankets tight around herself, refusing to let go as he tries to uncover her. "Come on," he grunts as he pushes her up to sit and she lets out a huff as she admits defeat. "Fine..." She yawns, stretches and seriously gives thought to just laying back down now that he was up and out of bed. "Coffee and breakfast will be waiting in common room." He reminds and she perks up, "coffee...they didn't have coffee in Elpis" G'raha laughs, "that must've been rough."

He's already clothed with his hair combed and braided by the time she finally gets up off the bed, not bothering to get dressed before being half pushed out of the room in her pajamas by G'raha, his hand on the small of her back.

Breakfast that morning was just coffee, warm and creamy and sweet. She leaves the common room feeling more awake and mostly herself again. Back to work. Back to figuring out these feelings of hers. Speaking of, Thancred was suspiciously absent from breakfast and she wonders if he's ok or if yesterday really has him rattled today. She should check on him. She stares at his door just a few down from hers, building up the courage to go knock on it, what would she even say? She contemplates it as she stares at the door, which opens, snapping her out of her inner monologue. She groans maybe a little too loudly and rushes into her room as Thancred steps out of his. Stupid feelings making her stupid and spacy again, why couldn't she just say it? She never was good with words though, picking the right ones took more time than she'd like and it was frustrating.

Thancred stands in the hall just outside of his room slightly stunned and very confused. He could've sworn he just heard a cranky A'miru rush into her room as he stepped out and wonders what that might be about. He shrugs it off though and continues down the hallway and outside. Once outside he wanders off down the path to quietly figure out how he felt about the information G'raha had so casually given him.

He felt....conflicted in a way, caught between his feelings and his responsibilities in a way that was not unfamiliar to him.

He thinks back to when he first met her. "Met" wasn't exactly the right word, more like caught. A frantic chase through the streets of Ul'dah as she ran from him after pick-pocketing someone's coin purse right out from under their nose without anyone but him even noticing. He'd chased her into a corner in a back ally and grabbed her as she was attempting to literally climb up the side of the building onto the roof. Reminded him of himself.

He'd pushed her against the wall with one hand as he took the coin purse from her and she'd kicked and growled at him. He'd noticed how rail thin and dirty she'd been and unpocketed the coin purse, giving her a handful of coins from it. "Get something to eat, visit the baths and save the rest. I catch you doing this again and it's going to be bad for you, don't make me regret this." He'd growled at her before walking off again.

Except she did. More than a handful of times over the next few months he repeated much the same chase through the alleys of Ul'dah, each time getting longer and longer as she corrected her mistakes and found faster routes out of sight and up high. Until finally he caught her stealing the most garish hat and dragged her kicking and screaming to the rogue's guild leader in Limsa; that was not a fun flight. "Jacke, she's making my life hell but she's good. Please, for the sake of my sanity help me out here."

He wasn't sure it was an improvement but at least in the guild she was given a reason to use those skills, and it seemed to work. When she came back to Ul'dah he spent less time looking for that little shit head thief and more time spotting her actively at work.

The day he saw her hit the bricks because of the echo he was surprised and also not at all surprised; she'd had all that natural skill since day one, of course it was her.

And the rest was history, sort of. She became part of the scion family so to speak, never really attached to anyone closely, like this was just another job for her. And so that's how he treated her, like a new co-worker, showing her the ropes.

Thancred wanders aimlessly away from the annex vaguely towards Neumenon and finds himself on a bench under a tree overlooking Sharlayan's harbour, cool sea breeze on his face.

When did it start? If he could pinpoint when he started feeling the way he did about her he could figure out the why of it, or at least that's what he told himself. He pulls his hands over his face and groans, admitting that they'd festered there for too long to know. At some point she had attached herself to him so firmly, he was her best friend and she was his. He'd grown to know her so well as to be able to read her emotions and troubles from across the room.

He'd watched her fall in love for the first time with G'raha in Mor Dhona, proud that she had finally found her person. And he had watched her fall apart in Ishgard, helped her pull herself back from the depths of pain and heartbreak. Was that it? The adamant refusal to sit and let her wallow and stay in that place, the refusal to see her hurt that bad again. Was that when it started?

He sighs and looks up at boughs above him. It had hurt his heart so much last night to walk into that room and see her drifting back to that place; whatever she had seen in the first, or wherever she had gone this time, must've been bad if it sent her back there but he was glad G'raha was there to catch her.

But she called him. She had called for him as soon as she felt it creeping back in; it was him that she trusted her weaknesses with, to know what the right thing to do for her wellbeing was. That had to mean something; he had to admit the paths were there if he had a mind to look for them.

All the time he spent regretting staying behind so she could escape, leaving her lost and alone in Ishgard. What would have happened if he'd been there to help her and keep her out of the bottle? But then would she be here calling on him at the first sign of trouble, would she trust him as much as she does? Did she need to break to be the vibrant shock of life she is now?

The questions piled up in his mind under that tree until he heard footsteps approaching. Turning, he spots G'raha walking up, two to go cups in his hands. "In the famous words of...well you, you look like shit." G'raha sits next to him, handing him one of the cups. "Nice view," he comments taking in the view of the harbour. "I hadn't noticed" Thancred quietly replies as he leans forward , resting his elbows on his knees. G'raha sighs and takes a long sip of his coffee before speaking, "you're thinking about it too much." "That's rich coming from you" Thancred snorts in reply and G'raha laughs wholeheartedly. "Yeah, that's fair, but learn from my mistakes, don't make it complicated. If you love her, and she loves you that's all the information you need, isn't it? We can figure the rest out as we go." Thancred sits back on the bench and turns to G'raha, "how are you so blasé about this?"  G'raha laughs and looks into his coffee, "being over 300 years old and dating, well, a chaotic gremlin, I'm learning to roll with the punches." He contemplates for a second, eyes still down in his coffee, "plus it's not like you're hard on the eyes so what am I complaining about." He says it so calmly, you'd never know his stomach was doing summersaults. G'raha takes a drink of his coffee and stands before Thancred can say anything, "well, I'm off, think about it. Or rather don't, we don't know what we're doing either and it's not like we're going to be afforded a surplus of time these days ."

And off he walked, just like that. That hadn't helped at all, he thinks as he sinks down into the bench. He did make one good point though, with an event literally called the final days actually happening right now this may be one of the last few times they had the opportunity to admit their feelings. If not now, when?

Time and time again life had proven that good things do not always come to those who wait and wonder, they come to those who act.

Maybe just once, he could let himself have this one thing.

With quiet resignation and no small amount of fear and trepidation Thancred sighs and gets up from the bench. This was not going to be resolved by waxing poetic on a park bench, or over analyzing every tiny detail.

***

(PLEASE PRETEND THE ROOMS HAVE A SMALL BATH AND A LIL HEARTH PLEASE THANK YOU)

The door squeaks as G'raha pushes through it and slips in while she's in the bath, "oop, I'm so sorry! I'll give you the room." He still got flustered and panicked sometimes and it was very endearing. "Don't even think about it, I'm almost done anyway." She sinks down in the water as he comes to sit beside the tub. She was done and had been for a while now but the water was warm and quiet and still and helped her sort through your mind. "How are you feeling today?" His voice is quiet and soft like a cloud as he sits on the floor next to the tub and rests his head next to hers. "Good, tired but better. Like I poured my entire self out last night and am slowly filling back up. Still trying figure out what to say." She stares at a tiny spot on the ceiling, if she could figure out the right thing to say to Thancred she could relax and just tell him how she felt. But what were the right words, they never come to her like they do G'raha, they require careful planning. "God's you two are exactly the same. YOU taught me to follow my heart, to speak up and reach for the things I want, yet neither one of you can get out your head enough to do it yourself." She pouts and opens her mouth to protest "that's -" "RICH COMING FROM ME, I KNOW." He's almost shouting in frustration and something about it makes her smile. "I was going to say mean, but you're not wrong." She laughs and gives him a peck on his forehead.

"Do you remember back in the Find? All those times I'd have to leave to go be the champion of Eorzea" G'raha makes a face, like he doesn't understand what this has to do with anything. "Of course, you'd always come back grouchier than you left" he laughs, remembering all the harmless terror she had inflicted upon him those days. "I'd always come back after I had rationalized my feelings away, convinced myself that they were anomalous, or just plainly not real. I'd come back and all that work I spent convincing myself would shatter as soon as I was back and it pissed me off." She smiles, the memories were fond now, no longer painful reminders. "All of that to say you're right, I know, I should talk to him." His face is soft as he watches her blink up at the ceiling. "You always say choosing the right words is hard, but I think you are very good at communicating how you feel. You just did now, you did last night when you got home and when I called Thancred in for you. Why is it you can tell him about that cold clawing in your stomach but not the feelings in your heart?" She groans and lets herself slip below the water, he reminded her of Hythlodaeus that first day. "I wish to understand your hesitation" it echoes through her mind and stills her for a moment. Just be honest, like she had been in Elpis, like she had been last night and every other time she'd leaned on Thancred to stay okay, it didn't have to be any more complicated than that.

She bursts out of the water, startling G'raha, and only splashes a little bit of water on him as she leans over to kiss him quickly before grabbing her towel and standing, wrapping it around herself. "As usual, you're right, I should go talk to him. Thank you." She kisses him one more time before striding towards the door. "I don't think having that conversation naked is going to end the way you think it will," she hears from behind her and without breaking stride she wheels around back towards the bed; right, clothes first then courage. G'raha laughs from the table as she quickly dresses and throws on her boots before turning to look at him "go" he urges with a smile and shoos her out of the room.

She can't stop moving, if she stopped she'd never get herself going again. The problem was it was already mid-morning and she had exactly 0 idea where Thancred would be. She manages to ask Ojika if they've seen him on her way by and only gets that he'd left quite a bit earlier and hadn't been back since; must've been when she had seen him in the hallway. Well shit. She picks up the pace, jogging towards the door to swing it open. Except it's already moving and she slams into Thancred's chest as he walks in from outside. "I found Thancred," she hears Ojika announce with a laugh from behind her, "mhmm, thanks Ojika" she grumbles weakly as she peels herself off of Thancred's armor. "Looking for me?" He says with only about half of his usual cockiness. "Yeah, actually. Can we..." She points outside and he nods, "yeah" and follows her out.

He lets her lead him through town to a tiny ledge overlooking one of the rivers without question or hesitation and a silence falls over them as they sit listening to the water.  "I don't know how to start this," she whispers quietly in defeat and Thancred snorts, "don't look at me because I don't either." A soft chuckle escapes her, "at least we're on the same page there....are you okay?" She stares up at the one whisp of a cloud in the sky as it drifts, "Am I okay? Really? You just got back from time traveling and you're asking if I'm okay?" She laughs out loudly, point taken, "shut up and answer the question already." She pushes his shoulder and leans back against the cliff behind her. "Yes, yes, I'm okay if a little taken aback is all. I didn't believe G'raha when he posited the theory, I couldn't. But he was so calm and clinical about it, no jealousy or anger, just an astute observation in your pattern of behavior...he loves you a lot you know?" It wasn't often Thancred spoke like this, even to her so she stays quiet and listens, only blushing and nodding when he speaks of G'raha's love for her. She pulls her knees up to her chest and leans her head against them, looking at Thancred. "When? How?..Why?!" He's exasperated trying to figure it all out. "Thancred I just spent 5 days in a place where there are no rules around relationships because they lived so long. Azem had two partners there and I met them both, felt their love for her. That kind of carefree love that comes easy because there are no expectations. It kind of forces things into perspective when you leave that to return to something so finite and on the edge that you don't know if you'll even see tomorrow. These feelings had been there a while, I never thought to look for them until G'raha brought it up and I had to admit I'd be lying if I said no. When is the better time when time is not guaranteed?"

G'raha had pretty thoroughly gone over what she had been through in the first, in Elpis, last night but hearing her say it made it true, real. He wanted to kiss her so bad, to fold her into his arms and keep her safe. She did too much, gave too much too easily, but he swallows it down, tucks it away from sight like he was so used to doing with everything he wanted. "G'raha said much the same thing when I saw him this morning, and I can't deny the truth in it. Even now tomorrow is not guaranteed, we could wake up to the sky on fire." He's quiet, pensive, like he's arguing with himself and she's only seeing half of it. She reaches out and touches his wrist, gentle, like he'd do to her those nights she got so lost in herself, and his head snaps up to her. "It's okay to not know Thancred, there doesn't always have to be an answer to all the questions. I'm telling you, it's okay."

He turns to her, brows furrowed and eyes soft, and his hand touches her cheek, guides her up to him like he was finally going to kiss her but he pauses. He lingers there, breathing...thinking "Thancred...if you have feelings for me at all you better kiss me right now or I'm-" his lips press against hers tentatively and softly like he wasn't sure he was doing it correctly or...like it was important, like he didn't want to mess it up. It makes her smile, "I didn't expect you'd be so shy, mister ladies man." She smiles against his lips as he fully deflates in an instant. "Don't, I hate that coming from you" he groans and she laughs, leaning her head against his shoulder. "I'm going to be honest, I fully don't know what I'm doing." He leans back against the cliff, taking her with him. "I never know what I'm doing, especially when it comes to this stuff," she says quietly "I'm not sure that's a comfort." And she can finally hear him smile again as she gives him a shove and he lets out a small chuckle.  "I do know that I don't want to do this without you and G'raha with me, and I'm trying really hard not feel selfish." There's a beat of silence, "I think he called me hot this morning," Thancred says quietly and she bursts out laughing, "aww I'm so proud, he must've been dying inside." She'd spotted the affection in his words as he explained himself under her the night before and had wondered if maybe she'd had been imagining it. Guess not. "I don't know, he was pretty calm about it."

"did he leave immediately afterwards?"

"pretty much"

"dying inside"

Thancred finally let's himself laugh and she enjoys it, he needed to relax more. "It doesn't bother you?" She knew it didn't, she just wanted to hear him say it. "You know the answer to that already...in fact....didn't we talk about this one time after you first met him? When we were really drunk?" She snorts and laughs as she recalls the night in a Limsa pub he's talking about. Both trashed after a job and dishing on her new crush and how frustratingly attractive he was. She retreats into herself a moment and like a trained professional Thancred immediately spots it. "Oh, hey, I'm sorry, I shouldn't be bringing that up right now" but she shakes her head, "no it's fine, it was just...it all seemed so big back then and now look at us. Literally at the end of things....with rabbits from the moon....", "I still can't believe it, especially the rabbits part." He wraps an arm around her and pulls her closer. "We can figure this out as we go..." he quietly confirms and she laces her fingers through his as they sit there listening to the water rushing below.

G'raha was off at the library today, in the parts she was not allowed to go and Krile had ensured that her schedule was remarkably empty so she 'settled' for following Thancred and Urianger around, sprinkled with intermittent naps against Thancred as he went about his day. Time travel really knocked it out of her, she hadn't felt this tired since she came back from the first, at least that's what she told herself. So she takes the time she's been given and lets herself rest while tagging along. It was nice to get out and also rest and also get to spend time with Thancred without any pressure.

By the end of the day she'd stolen Thancred's jacket and a cardigan from Urianger and was lounging around in her gown of warm comfort in the main hall of the annex. "You look comfy," G'raha was back from the library and she makes her way over to him. She wraps her arms around his waist and lets her forehead thud against his chest as Thancred watches from the other side of the room. "I'm so tired, never make me time travel again," and a laugh bubbles out of both G'raha and Thancred. "I wouldn't dare," he laughs and ruffles her hair. "Have you had dinner?" The question isn't directed at her, she looks up to see it's directed at Thancred and he shakes his head at the same time she does.

The decision is made to pick up food for dinner instead of going out and Urianger and Y'shtola decide to join, then the twins and Krile, and finally Alphinaud drags Estinien in against his will, making it a crowded and full night in with the scions in their room.  She falls asleep surrounded and comforted by her closest friends, against Estinien's arm as Y'shtola talks about something that she was researching. 

No one notices at first, she'd been quiet since she had gotten back and often was anyways. Estinien gently places her into bed and the rest of the scions finish their food a few decibels quieter and take their leave, leaving just G'raha and Thancred.

"I take it you talked finally?" G'raha was contented, if a bit worried at how tired and sleepy she appeared to be today. Thancred nods and glances at the sleeping body wrapped up in his coat, it'd been such a strange start to an otherwise normal day. So many things ran through his head, all of the information he'd processed today and it was actually allowing himself to have this thing he'd wanted for so long that rattled him so hard. He'd tucked those feelings away for so long he'd almost forgotten they existed.

Thancred blinks and pulls himself out of his own head to look at G'raha again, he notices the peaked furrowed brow and look of concern being cast toward her. "What's got you troubled?" He asks and G'raha glances back at him. "Should we be worried about how much she's sleeping? It seems an awful lot..." Thancred hadn't expected such an honest answer, though he wasn't sure why. "No..." He starts, he places a hand on G'raha's back, "it's how she processes grief," he feels G'raha's shoulders slump, "she would have been much worse had you not been there for her, G'raha. We can't protect her from feeling." It was a lesson he'd struggled to learn himself over the years and seemed pertinent now especially. "She'll be okay, just wait, she'll be kicking my ass soon enough." G'raha snorts. The words made sense in his head but he couldn't help but worry a small amount. He was glad Thancred had agreed to be pulled in to this, he knew so much about her, had known her so long that if he said she'd be okay G'raha could trust that. Thancred had been there before and while he had been away, he'd seen her at probably her worst. He was someone G'raha could trust to know when she was and wasn't okay and it was comforting to have him around since G'raha had to admit he was prone to worrying. "We should get her out of that coat..." And Thancred snorts, "honestly not sure how she's sleeping it, it's kind of a lot." Together they manage to get Thancred's coat off of her without waking her and decide she can keep the long cardigan from Urianger on.

G'raha's in bed before Thancred, leaving him to crawl in against the wall, almost feeling like an intruder. He lays there with his back against the wall looking at her barely lit by the moon through the open window, with G'raha's broad shoulders behind her and his arm over her waist. He had a certain...reputation, he'd earned it over the years and had never regretted any of his decisions but he'd developed certain habits; staying the night wasn't usually one of them, not sober at least. He didn't want this to be like that, she was important, he couldn't just run away from her in the middle of the night. "Thancred get out of your head and c'mere." Her eyes are still closed but her arms are outstretched towards him so he slides over, lets her pull him close and rest her head on his chest.  "We'll be here when you wake" he hears G'raha whisper quietly before a purr rumbles out of her followed shortly by a deeper rumble from behind her and together the white noise pulls Thancred to sleep as well as he contemplates how quickly all of this had happened.

When he wakes next the room is much lighter and G'raha is slipping out of bed, rolling A'miru onto him as he does. Thancred makes a sleepy, half awake noise as he pulls her closer and looks up at G'raha and he had to admit, Thancred was adorable when he was sleepy like this, "I'm just going for a shower, if someone's not here when she wakes she'll panic." Thancred nods and quickly goes back to sleep holding her close as G'raha slips out of the room.

Thancred is awoken again some time later by a stirring in his arms as A'miru barely wakes and pushes against his chest. "Mmmm, where's..." She groggily pushes away from him and looks around. "He went for a shower, he's fine," and he has to smile as she nods and is back to sleep before she's even laying down again. "Should be waking up," he coaxes and she whines into his chest her disagreement. He can't help it, he can't argue with her like this, sleepy and curled up and adorable. It was too new, too cute, it felt like a gift just for him, so he pulls her close and holds her tight as they drift back to sleep. For a moment at least, until he remembers that today the forum was finally taking them underground. He groans, they have to get up. "Hey, hey we have to get up" her face scrunches up and she pulls the blankets up around her. Thancred laughs and peels the blankets back off of her, "come on, they're taking us underground today, we can't be late." He pulls her face out from her arms, he wants to kiss her, slow and soft until she's awake, but he's not there yet, he's not used to letting himself have this thing he wanted yet. So he settles for kissing her forehead, having to push her bangs out of the way. "Your hair is....wild." he laughs and glances at the mess as she stirs, "oooh I fell asleep before I could braid it" she whines and finally blinks open her eyes to look at him. "Good morning," she smiles at him, smiles because of him, and doesn't hesitate as she pulls him in for a kiss and he follows her. Let's her lead him down that path before she pulls away, smiling with his face in her hands. "I could get used to this," he says quietly against her lips and she laughs. "Did you sleep okay?" She sits up, rubbing her eyes and stretches as he follows close behind, pulling himself to sit beside her on the edge of the bed. "Yeah, once you and G'raha were purring the drone knocked me right out." She rests her hand on his leg next to hers and Thancred rests his hand over top. "It's a lot for you isn't it," her words are quiet, almost ashamed. "Yes, it is" he admits and she looks up at him concerned. "but none of this is new to me," he smiles at her comfortingly and wraps an arm around her. "I am fine, I'll be fine. None of this is new, just unpracticed." He kisses the top of her head before getting up and finding his clothes.

Unabashedly, she watches him dress. This wasn't the first time she'd slept in the same bed with Thancred. During the dragonsong war and in Ishgard she used to slip into his bed in the middle of the night when she couldn't sleep. It kept her home, out of the pubs and taverns. She had needed another body to feel okay, someone to keep her accountable. It wasn't romantic, or sexual, she'd sneak into his bed so that he'd stop her from going out or when she hurt too much to sleep and needed to know she wasn't alone.

She's up on her feet, striding over to him before she knows it and is wrapping her arms around his waist. "Whoa, hey, hey...." Thancred softens as she hugs him with her head on his chest and he let's himself reciprocate. "Everything alright?" He chuckles down at her and she nods, "I'm really happy" she admits so plainly it almost catches him off guard and he lets himself smile, "hey," he hooks a finger under her chin and pulls her face to look at his, "I am too," he says quietly before kissing her.

Thinking of the actions was different than actually doing them himself. He'd spent the last day wanting to make the move to kiss her and hesitating, so used to not being allowed to act on those feelings that this one small kiss felt like a type of victory he'd yet to taste. It felt right.

"Well at least one of you is dressed," G'raha's in the door with damp hair and a tray of to go cups. "Coffeeeee" A'miru excitedly groans and hurries over as both Thancred and G'raha laugh. "Gmorning babe," she presses onto the balls of her feet to kiss G'raha's cheek as he hands her the coffee that likely has "too much cream and too much sugar" according to other people. "Sleep well?" He asks her as he hands Thancred the third cup, setting the tray down on the table, and she nods with a small "mhmm" into her coffee. "And you?" He looks to Thancred who seems only slightly surprised, "oh, yes" he nods as A'miru hurries off to get dressed and G'raha gives him a quick smile. 

"Sorry to leave you with the hardest job first thing in the morning," G'raha laughs as they move to sit down at the table and Thancred shakes his head. "Oh, she wasn't that bad this morning, really." There's laughter from behind the changing partition, "don't listen to him, if he hadn't remembered where we were going today we'd absolutely still be sleeping," Thancred slumps at the table with a sigh, "she's not wrong..." He admits and G'raha bursts out laughing. "Yes, that sounds about right." He agrees with a laugh as she emerges from behind the screen dragging a brush through her hair before tying it up.

Seeing her emerge and grab her coffee, Thancred and G'raha open the door and head out. They make it a few steps before they notice that A'miru had stopped in the doorway, passing her coffee cup slowly from one hand to the other as her tail swishes back and forth quickly. "Miru?" G'raha calls and using her short name snaps her out of it but she looks concerned. "What's wrong?" Thancred's quick to follow up. She looks back down at her hands, and the others do as well. "I don't have enough.." she says quietly, staring into her coffee to hide the flush from her face and the two males look at each other in confusion, "enough what?" G'raha asks gently, moving to put a hand on her back but she just bristles and glares up at him, "I don't have enough hands!" She blurts out in frustration and it takes a second before Thancred bursts out laughing. "Can't hold your coffee and both of our hands, can you?" He's answered by a glare, which only makes him laugh harder as G'raha giggles and solves the problem by throwing his arm around her shoulders and Thancred grabs her free hand. "Problem solved." G'raha says and kisses the top of her head and she huffs as they make their way down the hallway and towards what was sure to be an exciting day of discovery down below the actual city.

And boy what a day was, when A'miru got back to the annex her whole body was tired and she was starving. "I need foooooood," she complains as she drags Thancred back out of the annex toward the Last Stand and he smiles.

Kokkol had kept G'raha fairly busy at the forge so he had decided to stay in a room down there so he could finish what he needed to quicker, the lifts did take a while to traverse. Normally she would have just stayed down there as well but G'raha had encouraged her to spend the night at home, he hadn't wanted to risk waking anyone with any odd hours, he wanted her to get good rest right now and after she had told him what Thancred had said that morning he figured it would be a good opportunity to have some quality time with him, make sure he was handling things okay and she'd agreed; he'd seemed overwhelmed.

At the last stand they find a quiet table in the back corner, order their food and, as always, Thancred is surprised at how much A'miru can pack away.

"Can we go for a walk or something? The sun is still out."  She's looking out over the water at the sun that's lazily making its way through the early evening sky and Thancred nods his head, "yeah, I've got an idea, come on." He says with a mischievous smile as she slips her hand into his on the way out.

He leads her away from the last stand and back towards the annex, past it towards Neumenon but past that too, to a fence.  With a quick glance around to make sure no one was looking he hops up and over the fence, "come on, before someone sees" he and with a grin she hops the fence, making it look easier than he had. "Where are we going?" She asks quietly as they walk away from the fence, "somewhere I used to sneak away to when I was younger," he smiles. A'miru had forgotten he had all but grown up here in Sharlayan, she'd met him in Ul'dah and found him again in Ul'dah when she'd returned from Limsa, he was so transitory and good at settling in she forgot he wasn't actually from Ul'dah at all.

Thancred leads her around some buildings, through an overgrown meadow and a ridge of trees to what looked like an abandoned yard. They jump over another fence, stone this time and wind their way back along the edge of what appeared to actually be some sort of abandoned park, or garden. She could see the vague outline of a fountain under all the brush and there were paving stones peaking out here and there. "Thancred, what is this place?" Her steps slow a moment as she takes in her surroundings. "It's an old public park that was closed...gods, a while before master Louisoix brought me back here. Someone purchased the land and closed it for work or something, but never did anything with it for whatever reason, but come, this isn't our destination." He cracks another mischievous smile before turning and pulling her along with him.

Finally, he pushes through a small opening in the brush and holds the branches out of the way so that she can follow. "Admittedly, it was a lot easier to get out here when I was smaller..." He trails off as he watches her emerge and take in her surroundings.

What A'miru sees is remarkable. Her mouth drops open slightly as she steps away from Thancred. "Thancred this is..." She hadn't realized how far up they had gone. Stepping out from the walls of the garden she had emerged next to a beautifully overgrown gazebo on a grassy cliff looking out over the ocean as the sun set. She couldn't see or hear the city anymore, only the wind and the ocean below.

"I used to come here when I was younger and needed to clear my head...which happened to be frequently." He chuckles softly as he follows her out into the sun again. He touches the small of her back and she turns to him, eyes wide like this had been a surprise he'd been planning for days. "It's beautiful..." She moves away from him, slipping her hand back into his and pulling him with her towards the vine covered gazebo with a broken roof.

"Here..." he lets go of her hand and slips his jacket off, placing it on the warm sunny patch of the gazebo floor before sitting down and pulling her with him. She settles in between his legs and leans back against him as he wraps his arms around her.

They sit in silence like that, watching the sun gradually dip in the sky before she speaks again, "I know I keep asking you this but," and Thancred exhales with a sigh, knowing what was coming, "are you actually okay?" She shifts to look up at him as he gazes out over the cliff. "I don't know how to explain my....apprehension isn't quite the right word...a good portion of my life has been spent around you." He glances down at her in his arms, kisses her forehead, "It's funny how you can have feelings for someone and not really realize it until someone asks you if they exist." "Tell me about it," she says with a wistful smile, intimately familiar with that feeling right now as well. "I'm okay, I promise you, I am. But you know me, you know I've not been one for real relationships for...well...not really ever." He glances down at her blinking up at him, no judgement or prejudice directed his way. "Never?" She asks quietly, "once, it didn't end well, it was my fault." Of course he'd say it was his fault, she thought to herself, he had always blamed everything on himself, too loyal to see fault in anyone else in those situations. She shifts and turns in his arms so she's facing his right and he doesn't even need to shift to support her back against his arm. "I'm not accustomed to..." He pauses trying to figure out the words but A'miru continues for him, "having what you want?" and the look that Thancred gives her is both confirmation and confusion, "I've known you for some few years too, Thancred. I've watched you do nothing but turn away from the things you actually want since I met you." Hearing someone he cared about point it out so plainly hurt, but in a way that almost felt good, like if he admitted it now he could finally move past it. He nods, "I had a job to do and relationships were...complicated, more complicated than I had the time for. No, than I would give time for. It was really easy to explain away at the time." He trails off as he stares at a slowly drifting cloud.

Thancred reminded A'miru of herself before she met G'raha. Before he broke away the exterior and found her, showed her passion for life and people. Except Thancred wasn't aloof and closed in like she had been, he was outgoing and had been with partners before, he wasn't shy about it either, she'd watched him wander off with tavern goers on several occasions. She'd watched him with Minfilia, unsure if there was love or obligation there, perhaps both. Whatever it was or wasn't she'd watched Thancred torture himself over it, even more so after she had gone and he was left to look after Ryne before she was Ryne in a completely different world.

They had both been very practiced at explaining away their feelings.

"I think at some point I just stopped trying, not sure you could say I ever was trying. It became too big a thing to consider, too much effort, so I just kept on doing what I knew and what was easy until that banquet in Ul'dah. That kind of..." He trails off as his eyes close and he exhales. "Yeah, I know" Her voice is quiet, almost a whisper as she rests her head on his shoulder and her hand on his chest. That night was bad for both of them, for all of them. The night Minfilia was truly plucked from them and scions were scattered to the winds. "I'm so sorry I sent you off on your own..." She's already shaking her head and pushing off his chest before he can finish, "Thancred don't. Don't you blame that on yourself, no one had a plan for that situation, no one knew the right thing to do. You don't get to put that on you. Hey," She touches the side of his face, directs it towards her so he has to look at her. "That wasn't your fault, you saved my life that day, and Alphinaud's. What happened after was not your doing." His eyes are sad as they look into hers, as she pulls him in to kiss him. "Please don't blame yourself for what happened to me, no one could have done any better." She lays back on his shoulder, one arm behind him. "I'm not proud of my actions in Ishgard, it's a mercy Estinien is as stoic as he is that he doesn't ever mention any of it. That being said, I'm glad, no, that time doesn't make me glad, but I'm not sure I could have survived the first if I hadn't gone through that. I knew that was G'raha as soon as I saw him, he's a really terrible liar." That makes Thancred chuckle, "He really is." "But watching him get shot, everything that came after, watching him turn to crystal, even the liberation before that, I don't think I could have done it had I not been through that shit in Ishgard with you guys. You saved my life so many times over that day." He holds her close and rocks her as the sun sets, setting the ocean on fire with yellow and orange reflections. "You saved my life in Ul'dah too. You've been saving my ass since day one." She lets out a laugh as she realizes the truth in her words. "You were a little shit in Ul'dah," He doesn't look at her but she can hear him smiling. "I know, G'raha doesn't believe me." He looks down at her, smiling, and she takes the opportunity to steal a kiss. "You made my life a living hell in Ul'dah you know." She laughs and looks at him sheepishly, "I did it on purpose so...yeah." Thancred can't help but laugh as he rolls his eyes, "of course you did, why am I even surprised." She giggles and cuddles into his chest. "You were the first person to show me any sort of kindness that first day you let me go and...I don't know how to explain it, I had to keep seeing if you'd keep doing it, if you'd keep letting me go or finally take me in....plus you were cute." He snorts, "Were? You wound me." And she can't help but laugh, there he was again, the Thancred she was used to. "Oh no, now you are very handsome, not cute at all." With a smile she reaches a hand up to pull him down to kiss her, long and slow.

When he finally pulls away, just barely, he's panting; he doesn't want to do this here, not yet. Not while he was still getting used to giving himself permission just to have her, it still felt like stealing. "Not now, I can't -" She presses her lips against his softly one last time before letting him go to look up at him. "Take the time you need, Thancred. I'm not going anywhere any time soon, unless you want me to?" His arms tighten around her and she smiles as she lays against his chest, "I'll take that as a no." She could hear his heart racing, could practically feel it against her arm, but it slows to it's regular pace over time as the moon rises behind them.

"We should head back," A'miru pipes up finally after almost nodding off while they pointed out made up constellations to each other, she'd forgotten how tired she still was. "Yeah, it's getting late, c'mon." He helps push her up onto her feet and stands up after her, slipping back into his coat.

Together they make their way back to town, only he leads her not to the annex but past it. "I-...but-....okay" She doesn't put much effort into her protest despite her growing exhaustion. He leads her through the dark town and to a building she'd never been in before. Warm, humid air hits her at the door, "Oh I am going to fall asleep in here, we should have come back way earlier for this." she smiles up at him. She was going to have a bath back in the annex, she needed one after today's busywork, but the baths there were admittedly very small. "At least try not to, we'd hate to lose the vaunted Warrior of Light to a bath incident"

The one attendant still working lets them through to the back change rooms with a look that clearly communicated that she didn't care who they were, there were to be no shenanigans in the baths. A'miru was too tired for any sort of shenanigans anyway. Thancred had to keep her from dozing off more than a couple of times before she got herself washed and rinsed, they really should have come back earlier he thinks. She swats at his hands as he catches her leaning a little too far to the side and he laughs, "I'm awake, stop it." He can't help but just watch her and smile, always so stubborn. "Are you going to be able to stay awake long enough to get yourself dressed?" He asks as she wraps her towel around herself and shoots him a glare, "I'll. Be. Fine." She declares before she stomps off into the changing rooms. A short while later they both emerge from the changerooms. She'd left her hair down, too tired to bother tying it up just to go home to bed.

He pulls her in under his arm and she slips hers under his coat as he practically has to guide her back to the annex and into her room. He offers a piggyback or to carry her but she insists she fine walking. Once inside she sleepily pulls a large t-shirt out and throws it past Thancred to the bed as he kicks his boots and pants off with a "Hey!" as the shirt whizzes past his head. On her way from the dresser to the bed she pulls her dirty clothes off, tossing them wherever they land, and pulls the t-shirt on before flopping nearly face first into the bed...sideways. Thancred's surprised laugh makes her smile, "That's not going to be comfortable for either of us, you're supposed to face the other way." At this she whines and flips onto her back, "Nope, not like that either, c'mon you." He laughs so genuine as he pulls her back up to her feet so he can slip in before her that it makes her stop for a fraction of a second, that was a nice sound. He holds the blanket back for her as she crawls in and then very quickly crawls out, runs to turn off the lights, and slips back in, only running into the table once in the dark.

"Oh your hair..." Thancred whispers, remembering her lamentations from the previous morning as his fingers get tangled in it, "roll" he whispers as he rolls her so that she's facing away from him and she whines. "Lift" she does as he says and he pulls her hair out from under her to quickly braid it, albeit a bit messily. "I didn't know you knew how to braid," her voice is already heavy and sleepy as she rolls back over. "Ryne," taught me, was what he had intended to say but she pulls him down and kisses him before he can finish. "Sorry, I just like kissing you," he can see her sleepy smile and her eyes blink so slow he's not sure they're going to open again as she drags a thumb across his bottom lip. "I'll stop...nope, one more," she kisses him again slower than before and he smiles against her lips. "Get some rest."

He remembers what G'raha had said when he'd told him he was staying down by the forge; "I think she sleeps better when I say it." He looks down at her head on his shoulder, tilted slightly up towards him. Her eyes were closed already but for reasons unknown he was hesitant; it wasn't any sort of declaration of love or anything big like that, but something about taking over this part of her routine felt important. Like it was another thing that grounded it reality; like he was fully and actually agreeing to this relationship, like this was the point of no return. If he said he'd be there when next she woke that was it, he'd be there when next she woke every day that he could be from then on. She shifts and curls into his side, arm across abdomen. "I'll be here when you wake," He finally says quietly, more to himself than to her. He was certain she was asleep already anyhow, but her soft purrs kicks up shortly after like it had the night before, and like the night before the white noise of it pulls him to sleep as well.

When he wakes next she's not in bed. The shutters had been closed when they went to bed but even without opening his eyes he could sense a light source in the room that shouldn't be there. His fingers curl around the small knife he'd stashed under the pillows against the head board as he slowly opens his eyes.

But all he sees is A'miru sitting on the floor in front of a small fire in the hearth. He furrows his brows, "A'miru?" He calls out quietly and her head snaps around to face him. "Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't want to wake you." He slips out of bed to join her in front of the small fire and the kettle that hung over it. "Everything okay?" He asks wrapping an arm around her. She had on Urianger's cardigan, he noticed. "I'm okay, I'm just not used to...." She takes a deep, laboured breath before continuing. "I woke up and G'raha wasn't there and I didn't realize it was you quick enough to stop myself from getting freaked out." G'raha had told Thancred about the nightmares she'd had after he got back to the source as they had been travelling together. That she had been terrified she'd wake up and find it all a dream, that he wasn't really back and she'd dreamt it all. He rubs her back and pulls her against him. "I'm sorry," her voice is sad and he knows she's upset because he's there and she'd freaked out because G'raha wasn't, like she doesn't want him to think he's not enough.

Thancred shakes his head, "no need, I understand completely," he kisses the top of her head and smooths down her hair. "I just wanted some tea before I went back to bed," she sniffles, she'd been crying. "A'miru, you're allowed to wake me up when these things happen, I'm not going to be upset at the reasons. I know how important G'raha is to you. I know about your fears and nightmares. Hey," he pulls her chin to look up at him. "We're different people, G'raha and I, but we both care about you greatly, okay?" She nods, closes her eyes and leans into his palm.

"I guess I don't handle change all that well." She says quietly and Thancred fully laughs, "welcome to my world." She leans forward out of his arm and grabs the teapot out from the hearth but stops as she looks down at the one mug she had prepared, "I only have one mug..." Thancred snickers, "it's fine, I don't want any. Tea's not for me."

She pours herself a mug of tea and snuggles back against Thancred with it in her hands. "We okay now, though?" He asks folding her into him and she nods. "Yeah I'm okay now, it was just a momentary panic before I remembered what was real." She confirms as she sips at her tea. Thancred didn't get to see this part of her often anymore, not for a long time had he woken up to her distressed. He'd forgotten that she wasn't always okay, even with G'raha back. "If anything happens again and I don't wake up, can you please wake me?" He pulls her chin up to look at him again and she nods with watery eyes and peaked brows. "Hey, none of that, now." He wipes the tears that hadn't fallen yet from her eyes and kisses her forehead, and then her nose and he pauses for a split second before kissing her lips. This was allowed, he could let himself have this much. She follows this time as he kisses her softly, like his lips were a lantern in the dark leading her home, and she tasted like warm tea.

He pulls away slowly, reluctantly, and kisses her forehead before tucking her back into his arms while she finished her tea. The past three days had been chaotic to say the least, but when he got down to the bottom line of it all, it really wasn't much different than before. Except he was allowed to acknowledge those feelings and act on them. That was the biggest change, daily life wasn't much different than it had been before. His whole world felt like it had been flipped but in actuality it hadn't changed much, most of the change was mental. He could get used to this.

"c'mon you..." He says quietly, noticing her head start to droop. He slips an arm under her knees and picks her up as he stands. She doesn't squirm, or make any comments as he does, just leans against his chest quietly. "I'm just going to put the fire out," he whispers as he places her into bed, her hand reaches out for him as he turns away from the bed to douse the fire.

He returns and even in the dark he can see her open eyes as he slips in next to the wall. She rolls away from him and scoots back against him, pulling the arm slung over her waist up and hugging it to her chest like it was a stuffed animal. Except she doesn't like looking out over the dark room whenever her eyes open, despite the warmth behind her it made her feel alone. With a small whine she rolls back over and makes herself as small as she can as she buries herself in Thancred's chest. She can feel the quiet chuckle from him, "comfortable now?" And she nods, nearly fully under the blankets. "Goodnight" he hears from the small ball of a person in his arms and it feels like he has to go digging to find her chin and tilt her face up to him once more as he kisses her again, no hesitation this time. "Goodnight," he whispers as he pulls away and she snuggles back into his chest. "I'll be here when-" "did G'raha tell you to say that?" She interrupts looking up at him, "well, not in so many words. He just said you sleep better when he does." She nods, she did, it helped remind her he was real before she fell asleep which helped keep the nightmares at bay. "Do you not want me to?" She shakes her head and shrugs, "not that it's not comforting, but G'raha started saying it because I was scared I would wake up and he'd be gone, not left, but gone." Thancred nods and squeezes her tight, "I understand," he presses a kiss against her forehead, "I'll leave that for him."

There's a long silence before he hears "goodnight" again against his chest, much quieter and heavy with sleep this time. "Goodnight, I'm here, you're safe" he replies in a quiet whisper, testing out the words, and the purr that pours out of her is loud this time in it's approval.

She'd defeated gods and dragons, saved the world countless times but still needed to be reminded she was safe at home, maybe because she had defeated gods and dragons and had to save the world. It hurt his heart but it was a relief to know exactly what she needed from him, outside of just his love. G'raha had his own set of fears and worries to calm, Thancred could handle making her feel safe, that was well within his abilities and it relaxed him to know that. He holds her tight as he lets the loud drone of her purr pull him back to sleep.

HERE BE SMUT, but like, light, soft smut. Use your imagination, or don't and carry on, I'm not your mom.

"C'mere," she sits up and pulls him back into bed with her. "No, hey-" he fakes a scowl at her, "we should be getting up," but it dissolves into a smile as she laughs and curls up on his chest. "Did you sleep okay after you got back to sleep?" He asks as he pushes his fingers into her soft hair and gives her ear a rub. She nods and tilts her head into his hand, "like the dead, sorry again for waking you." At this he gives her ear a playful tug, "did I not specifically ask you to please wake me up next time? No apologies." "Ah! Hey!" She swats at his hand and laughs. "I wasn't aware you struggled with any of that still," he says softly letting her nuzzle into his hand and running a thumb across her cheek as she nods. "It's not as bad anymore, I can usually calm myself down if anything does happen. Routine helps a lot, which is...well-" "not your strong suit?" He interrupts with a knowing smile, she smirks and shakes her head, "never has been, no." "It'd be absolutely terrible if Alphinaud were to find out that's what helps..." The implication clear in his voice, "Don't you dare! He'll schedule my entire life!" She pushes up onto his chest to look at him, "Then you should probably get out of bed and get dressed," his eyebrows raise and he's unsure if she'll enact physical violence upon him for his threat as her face goes from pleading, to shocked, to glaring at him through squinted eyes. "You win this round, Mr Waters" she scowls at him through squinted eyes as she pushes up off his chest to sit up. He can't help but laugh as he follows behind her, pulls her chin up and kisses her again. "I thought you were trying to get me out of bed," she says breathlessly against his lips as he lingers in it just a little bit longer, "sorry, I just like kissing you," he repeats her words from the night before, a soft smirk on his lips as he finally pulls away.

Something had clicked for him last night. Their talk in the gazebo and in the middle of night had made him acknowledge some things he hadn't yet, and finding the words that put her at ease, his special words for her, had given him a sort of purpose he hadn't felt in a long time. He wouldn't be there every time she woke, he was often out on recon or stealth missions, being there and being real, calming those fears was for G'raha. Making her feel safe and protecting her when she wasn't protecting the world? Well, he'd been doing that for years already, he was old hand at that, that was easy. Everything else just kind of fell into place and clicked. Now he just wanted to kiss her all the time, wanted to have her on every flat surface he could find, wanted to make up for all his lost time holding back and denying his feelings. It didn't feel like stealing anymore, like he was taking something so big and important to the world for himself. She was still just his best friend, that little punk that'd made his life a nightmare before all this hero business had started. She could be his and they save the world, together, it didn't have to be one or the other.

They get dressed and ready for their day, albeit slower than usual since Thancred can't keep his hands to himself now that the pieces of the puzzle had clicked into place and he had reckoned with his own hesitation.

He presses her up against the door of the room before she can open it to leave as he kisses her again and she gropes behind herself for the handle. She finds it and they tumble out into the hall, almost taking out Y'shtola in the process  "You two sure are lively this morning," she comments on her way by without stopping. A'miru's face immediately turns red. She nods, smooths out her clothing and finds her composure, resisting the urge to devolve into giggles. "I can't believe you had the audacity to blackmail me out of bed this morning," she scolds Thancred under her breath as they follow a ways behind Y'shtola. "What happened between last night and this morning, hey!" She swats Thancred's more inappropriate touches away and gives him a look that says she'd gladly kick his ass right there in the hallway if he doesn't cut it out. He laughs and gives in, slipping his hand into hers instead of the cut out sides of her shirt like he had been thinking of doing. "Last night happened. You helped me figure some things out." He pulls her in under his arm and kisses her one last time, "thank you," he says quietly against her lips. "Oh, come on! Get a room!" They hear from behind them, "We just left our room!" Thancred shouts back without looking as Alisaie stomps past them, "then stop making out in the hallway!" The young Elezen is walking backwards as she continues walking so that she can scowl at Thancred, "honestly your going to ruin everyone's appetite before they even get to breakfast." She grumbles under her breath as she turns and continues down the hallway. A'miru and Thancred watch her go in silence before looking back at each other and bursting into laughter.

 They continue walking as she speaks again, "well good, I'm glad, I think" she shoots a look up at him, "G'raha was worried about you." They don't stop in the common room on their way out of the annex and A'miru was secretly glad for it, Y'shtola and Alisaie would have told everyone by now and neither would let her escape without a decent amount of teasing. "Yeah? Maybe I should talk to him today then."  They quickly pick up coffee for themselves and G'raha at the last stand before heading towards the lifts underground. "You should, I probably should too. Two partners in your first relationship is a lot." She's musing to herself mostly, thinking out loud, but Thancred almost spit takes into his coffee, "first?!"

If A'miru thought about it, she could see how no one else would have had that information about G'raha, but she'd honestly never thought too hard about it before.

She looks up at Thancred as they ride the slow lift down into the ground, "uh...yes?" She raises an apologetic eyebrow at him. "God's be good A'miru, that poor boy. You as his first girlfriend?" She slaps his stomach with a playful scowl, "hey!" and he laughs.

He and G'raha had spent no small amount of time together. Thancred had been the first one called to the first by him, and G'raha had approached Thancred on A'miru's advice after finding out about her struggle with alcoholism. He'd helped him set his guilt aside and stop blaming himself for it, A'miru had found this highly ironic since that was typically what Thancred did to himself. He'd helped him understand a lot of the things that had happened to her while he'd been gone, helped him take the information in without letting it hurt him and helped him learn how to best help A'miru when or if she stumbled while they were dispatched to Corvos most recently.

It was no secret they had grown close since G'raha had been back. Now it was Thancred who was worried for G'raha. Two partners in your first relationship was a lot. Rolling with the punches was one thing, not getting trampled by them was another.

"He handles you well for it being his first relationship,"   Thancred teases gently and A'miru can't even muster a scowl because he was right, he did. A'miru's own words from her time in Elpis echo in her head, "I am not easy to love...". She hadn't meant it in a self deprecating way, really, but her job as Warrior of Light alone made her life chaotic, let alone being prone to chaos on her own. Mix in all the trauma and nightmares and what have you and it was just a big job for anyone to handle and G'raha managed it with grace. "He was my first, too....back then." She leans her head against Thancred and feels his hand on her back. "I remember, you used to get so mad."

[radiance1]

Okay now hear me out on the scientist. What if instead of them immediately going to work for someone else they instead just float on buy in life with the assumption that the GIW would crawl back to them begging for them to come back and give them a high position and so they could explain the utter genius behind the shield and so they could be showered in apologies and praise because that was what they deserved.

Except, only for that to just... not happen?

The existence of the Hydra has been exposed to the greater public, and their ghost shield by extension. But, instead of their assumption of the GIW tracking them down, begging them to come back and use their intellect to do something that could solve this problem they just.

Claim their masterpiece as their own.

You could say that the scientist was beyond pissed at this information. They were the one who came up with the idea, they were the one who was denied the funding to actually go through with it and they had they had to do under the radar and had a difficult time to get the materials needed to built the damn thing, they were the one who slaved aware hours-days! Of their life to make damn sure that it would work and be able to stop that Hydra in its tracks and shove a fuck you in the GIW's face.

Only for all of that effort? All that time, sweat, delirious nights, hallucinations from lack of sleep, and missed meals? To be claimed by a group who fired for an idea that worked and so well at that that they say they made it? They've decided to give one, very, very big fuck you by going to someone else and spilling.

Everything.

The experiments on ghosts, where some of the GIW facilities were stationed, what materials they used in ghost shields and weaponry and going so far as leaking the identities of a few of the upper crust that they knew about. They're petty and hurt and just overall pissed that everything they worked so hard for, every calculation and hopes and dreams they had been all for nothing.

(You could even say that said scientist would even entertain the thought of turning off said shield and letting said Hydra out)

Anywhooo.

I love what you said about the core and it made me thINK. Danny being a space core and that's why all of the elements didn't become unstable and could co-exist in harmony, let along that the ennead are just very compatible with each other and love each other lmao. Using the space core as a base and adding in everything else it just came together to form a galaxy to balance everything while simultaneously being separate.

Mind readers try to peer into their mind and then they just enter a hivemind basically. So many thoughts and emotions and personalities all mashed together into one and having to put significant effort into only having a link with one of them.

Yea, they are NOT beating the probably taboo abomination theories.

The ennead is no longer attacking the barrier much, but everyone isn't calmed by that at all. Instead of indiscriminately attacking the Hydra instead took a step back, staring at the shield consideringly, sharpening part of their body, displaying intelligence.

And that, is undeniably worse.

The government finds a new reason to flip now. Because they were told that ghosts aren't sentient and only act on emotion. Then what in the hell is that huh?! It's obviously looking for something, some kind of weakness that it could exploit. It obviously has intelligence.

How much has the head of the GIW and the entire branch as a whole have been hiding under their noses the entire time?

Prompt 203

Another Hydra prompt! Because I am enjoying the designs I’ve made lol. And perhaps it’s a bit inspired by @radiance1 ‘s different dragon prompts too. 

So they’ve succeeded! They’ve managed to combine their powers- with a bit of shapeshifting helped along by so many ghost allies- and become a giant duck-you dragon! Well, originally they were going to do something else, but they couldn’t agree on an animal, so dragon it was! 

And how mighty they are! They’re giant, absolutely massive- dwarfing the couple of skyscrapers still in Amity. Damages via ghost attacks and general sparring made it where people really didn’t want to rebuild those types of buildings. 

But anyway, dragon! Them! They’re absolutely stunning! And did they mention powerful? Because boy oh boy, are they powerful. The GIW’s guns do practically nothing against their combined might, and barriers shatter before them! 

The uh, issue is that they erm… can’t turn back. Which is fine, they’ve all sort of outlived most of their generation- thank you possessions and ecto-contamination, it’s just a tiny bit of an adjustment. But really it’s not too bad, and someone needs to stop the GIW from trying to poke their heads into Amity. Like it’s been a solid couple of generations, it’s time to stop, thanks. 

Actually they’ve been a bit quiet. Meh, that surely isn’t a problem. Probably. Honestly they’re all going to use the opportunity to sprawl out where the school yard once was, their favorite place to sun their scales. Huh. Usually more people are around now that they think about it- or really, as Paulina points out, sharpening her fangs on one of the rocks. 

…

How long had they been sleeping, because it couldn’t have been that long. One of them was always awake, they slept in shifts after all! Yet there are things missing now as they patrol the skies, both Wes and Tucker pointing out specific buildings that the others didn’t particularly notice usually that now lay empty. 

Hm. 

Oh. That is a… strong barrier there. A really strong barrier actually. Pfft, they can take it! They’ve shredded every barrier together before- Ow. 

…

Okay this might be a bit of a problem. Shit. 

You want a general size reference? :P

[theartofimaginaryfriends]

Hey! Would you be willing to do a story with Percy and his S/O working through their trauma together? And this can be trauma related to the gods or before he found out about being a demigod. If not I totally understand! I love you’re writing and think you are amazing!

A Long Road

Premise: Percy and Y/N decide to go to therapy together, to help them work through domestic trauma

CONTENT WARNINGS PLEASE READ: this one-shot deals with descriptions trauma, rape/sexual assault, physical abuse, emotional abuse, verbal abuse, and domestic violence.

Masterlist

A/N (ALSO PLEASE READ): I am so sorry this took so long! Between the ProServe course and it being August (I moved back home for the year and my friends did not lmao), it took me some time to write this. As well, I know I stated the CW above but I gotta say that this got really heavy. It also kind of turned into a focus on Percy’s trauma rather than the readers, but I tried to balance it out. So this is just a warning on how heavy it gets. I have a fun Percy fic planned to post next, though, and I’m going to try to write that and get it up in the next day or so as a compensation. Also thank you so much for enjoying my works! Quarantine has been hell and this has helped a lot.

It had been two years since Y/N and Percy got married, and nine years since they moved to New Rome. Now, they were nervously waiting in the lounge of New Rome psychology. The demigods began with separate sessions, working through their own traumas surrounding the events during each quest. As they got better, and those nightmares became less frequent, they decided to begin sessions together.

Percy struggled to open up about the abuse Gabe put him and his mother through. Y/N had a tough time bringing up their abusive parent but was a little more open about it than Percy was. Both adults wanted kids, they always felt that way. Percy was the first one to bring it up. Unfortunately, the two of them were terrified of that prospect, and it was their friends that suggested they see a therapist to get passed that speedbump.  

Y/N squeezed Percy's hand lightly as they made their way to the psychologist's office. This was their first session, and Y/N could tell how nervous Percy was. He told them a few things that Gabe had done, but never in detail and skirted around any parts that led to the moments that were particularly traumatizing. All they could hope for was a successful first session, and at least get a crack into the barrier.  

The couch they sat on was comfy, and the two demigods sat close together. They went through the confidentiality agreement, and the goals they want to achieve by going to these continuous sessions. Once the basics were out of the way, the atmosphere shifted. Percy interlocked his fingers with Y/N's, the nerves hitting him hard. The only person he told the full story to was his best friend, Annabeth, and that wasn't easy after over a decade of being friends with her.  

He started with bits that Y/N already knew. Gabe's abuse of the home, using Percy's room as his "office" when he was gone to boarding school, and playing poker with his buddies in the kitchen while treating Sally like a servant. He talked more about how he had treated his mother and him, using physical abuse more frequently when it was just the three of them in the small apartment. Percy often would get into his mother's foundation to conceal the bruises and scars Gabe gave him.  

Just like every time it was brought up, Percy focused more on his mother. He talked more in detail about his ex-stepdad treating her like a servant, and how he would have to hear Sally being beaten by Gabe almost every day. Just like every time he brought Gabe up, he stopped abruptly when a particularly difficult memory resurfaced.

The therapist gave Percy ideas on healthy coping mechanisms, as a way to stop the panic attacks and nightmares. They promised to get back to Percy's trauma in the next session, noting that he will not be forced to talk about any of it until he was ready.  

When they got to Y/N, they got into how they grew up practically having to raise themself. Their parent was an addict, and never really gave Y/N the time of day. When they did, however, it was to yell at them for being an abomination and not being good enough. Deep down, they knew it was because they were a demigod. There was physical abuse when they got attention from their parent, but the trauma was mostly mental and emotional.  

They received similar ideas for coping mechanisms like Percy, and the couple promised to try it together. Due to an already heavy session, the therapist had them close their eyes and take a collective deep breath for a few counts, before scheduling the next session and getting them to pay.  

Once they got home, Percy went into the bedroom to lie down. It took him a long time to recover after his trauma was brought up, especially after getting close to talking about the story he never spoke about. Y/N didn't expect a breakthrough right away, and they remained patient with their husband. Not wanting him to be alone, they climbed into bed and held Percy as he cried.  

"Y/N?" Percy wiped the tears off his face with the sleeve of his hoodie.  

"Hm?" Y/N shifted so that they were looking at Percy from a more comfortable angle, and listened as he spoke.  

"I-" he took a deep breath. "I think I'm ready to tell you what I've been avoiding talking about."

"You don't want to save it for the next session?" Y/N asked kindly.  

"I don't know when I'll feel confident enough to talk about it again, and you need to know." Y/N nodded their head, encouraging Percy to continue. "When I was a kid... just old enough to finally understand what Gabe was doing, I heard Mom screaming and crying in the middle of the night. Worried, I went to go see what was happening, and I- uh..."

"You don't need to say it if you don't want to," Y/N whispered after a few beats of silence. Percy nodded, and buried his face into their chest, beginning to cry again. They stroked his hair and held him close as he let it out, thinking about what their parent had done to them.  

It had taken a long time for either of them to get comfortable intimately. It was assumed by Y/N, who had been raped before, that Percy was a victim as well. They couldn't imagine how hard it was for Percy to have seen it at such a young age. It didn't help that they could tell by the history, Percy had heard it happening more times than he cared to admit.  

The two demigods were broken, but they hoped that it was repairable. They wanted to have a family, to prove to themselves that they weren't like the abusers they were raised by. It was going to be a long road, and they were determined to get there.

[saltys-writings]

okay so what about a u10t reaction when their s/o wants them to kill a spider for them 💖

omg I’m finally getting round to writing this, I can’t believe I kept you waiting for so long aklsdjfösa pls forgive me

~~~

[Up10tion] When their S/O wants them to kill a spider for them

Jinhoo:

you come hysterically running to him one day, tears in your eyes

he’ll immediately ask you what’s wrong and take care of you

he’ll hold you close until you’ve calmed down enough to speak, and the only word you manage to get out is “spider”

“aigoo, in your room?”

you nod and together with you, still holding you close, he walks over and finds a medium sized spider sitting on your ceiling

“It’s not a big deal, I’ll remove it for you.”

he sends you to get the vacuum while he stays in your room to watch it and you swear you’ve never ran to get a vacuum cleaner that fast

in the end he kills it successfully and then hugs you tightly again to make sure you’ve calmed down properly before going on with your day

Kuhn:

it better not be you who’s afraid of spiders in this case, because this guy will not be helpful AT ALL

he will most likely be the one who’ll come running to you to remove it

he’ll try to stay calm and hide his inner panic, but you know how scared he is of bugs, so you’ll be able to tell that he’s actually dying inside

however if you are afraid of them as well, then everytime you find a spider or a bug in your apartment, killing it will become its very own adventure

like you’ll both be so scared, but you also know that one of you has to kill it eventually or it’ll disappear somewhere and as we all know the only thing worse than seeing a spider is not seeing the spider anymore

so you’re both going on a hunt, taking turns in trying to give the other some words of courage

in the end you manage to kill it with united forces and screaming in unison

Kogyeol:

will probably be scared, depending on the size of the spider

if it’s a really smol one he’ll probably deal and may not take you seriously at first when you come to him, hysterically screeching

will still remove it in the end though

but if it’s big he too will have a bad feeling in his guts

“how am I supposed to get rid of this???”

“WELL YOU TELL ME!!!” you yell back

he’ll be thinking about it until the spider suddenly starts running and he sees no other way but to step on it

throws off the shoe that half the spider minus like 5 and a half legs is now sticking on

will calm himself down though and clean up in the end, while you try to get your heartbeat to return to a normal pace

Jinhyuk:

“there’s a spider you want me to kill?”

“aahh, how bad can it be?”

“…oh so it’s… THIS big you say…?”

walks into the room the spider’s in bravely, but loses courage when he actually sees the thing

“those legs are too long for a normal spider”

“isn’t it a little big??”

and so on…

you have to remind him that you’re actually scared of them for his brain to actually start working

he’ll probably get over the fact that he thinks it’s disgusting pretty fast when he sees just how scared you are

will capture it and put it outside, away from you

will then try to tell you that they won’t hurt you anyway and that you’re safe now

Bitto:

you’ll probably be walking through your place when you see the spider and let out a screech

he’ll immediately come rushing to you in case you got hurt or smth

upon seeing the spider he too will let out a similar screech

you’re both clinging to each other now, watching the spider with wide eyes, panicking because what if it moves????

you realize one of you will have to kill it rather sooner than later, or it’ll run away

so you make an agreement that one person kills it and the other cleans up

in the end he sacrifices himself and steps on it, screaming so neither of you hear the cracking sound it makes, and then you get to clean it off the floor and his shoe with some extra layers of tissue

you promise that the next time you see a spider in your home, you’ll switch roles and you’ll be the one to kill it, while he cleans up

Wooshin:

“lmao kill it yourself”

isn’t interested in a minor inconvenience such as a little spider

realizes you’re actually terrified when you keep yelling about it from the other room

that’s when he gets moving and seeing the spider he finds out it actually isn’t even that little

“Come on, I’ll kill it, don’t worry.”

removes it quickly and effectively

then immediately turns to you to help you calm down from the shock

explains that spiders don’t hurt you, even though they’re kinda scary

and you know that, but in the moment you see one it doesn’t help, so he just holds you for a while and distracts you

Sunyoul:

if you ever wanna test how high of a note he can reach, show him a spider

honestly he seems like the type to find bugs cute

but only little bugs!!!

and spiders aren’t bugs, they’re abominations

so you call him over to you when you spot one in the corner of your room and you beg him to remove it

fortunately it’s only a small thin spider hanging out in its nest

so even though he will be very vocal about the whole process, he’ll catch it and kill it in the end

however, he’ll flush it down the toilet to make sure it really is gone

just in case, you never know…

Gyujin:

“THERE’S A SPIDER IN THE BATHROOM!!!” you yell at him and he immediately comes running towards you

however, seeing the monster sitting on the floor next to your shower he just freezes up

you urge him on to do something before it runs away (because a spider is bad, but when the spider disappears that’s when hell is loose)

to which he slooowly but steadily backs away

you fight about who gets to kill it until at some point it starts moving

this time you both watch, petrified, as it crawls away and under the nearest shelf you both can’t reach underneath

you consider burning your house down for the next 5 hours and refuse to set foot into the bathroom for the next few days unless it’s absolutely necessary

the spider never shows up again and after about two weeks your lives return back to normal

Hwanhee:

you’re in your living room together when suddenly a small spider shows up on the wall

when you point it out nervously he turns towards it too and screams

you yell at him to please remove it

to which he tells you to do it instead

you argue about it back and forth for a while until it moves, but stays in sight

still, you both grab your stuff and nyoom up into your room within seconds

there you collapse on the floor together and start laughing

“Well, it won’t follow us up here, will it?” he jokes and you shake your head

feeling somewhat safe again and forgetting all about your fear while still laughing, you return to what you were doing originally

Xiao:

will either scream with you in unison or not be bothered at all, there is no inbetween

most likely wants to protect you though and show that he’s a man™

if the spider’s not too big he’ll probably try to catch it with a cup and a sheet of paper or smth

wants to prove to you that it won’t hurt you, so he makes you watch as he sets it outside and it crawls away peacefully

but if that thing is any bigger and can therefore legally be classified a monster, then get ready to burn your house down with him lmao

you’re both just gonna stare at it and hope it doesn’t crawl away, which it inevitably will at some point

he’ll throw his shoe at it and probably miss, the spider disappearing

you consider moving house after that

[prokitty101]

002 Iceberg because why not uwu

Hohooo! My number 2 RWBY OTP! Alright, strap in boys and girls, mama gonna tell you why I love this ship.

When I started shipping them/My thoughts/What makes me happy about them: (I’ve clumped these bullet points together to make it easier and sound less repetitive) I’m gonna be honest with ya’ll. I couldn’t stand Neptune the first time around, because he came off as another “The cooler Daniel” meme. However, what truly sold me to the ship was Weiss’s feelings towards Neptune. 

She is known as the Ice Queen amongst her companions (And Roman lol) and it is expected of her to act like that from time to time. Neptune’s appearance was the beginning of the trope subversion. She doesn’t just harrumph at Neptune because he slightly did a better job at flirting than Jaune, no, she downright falls for him, HARD. And that is NOT a bad thing for her character. 

I am all for character subversions because it adds another palette dynamic to their personality. Yes yes, we see her tone her tsundereness down a notch towards Ruby earlier, but that’s different. It was so damn refreshing to see Weiss openly express her attraction to Neptune; someone who didn’t utter anything about her background being an Heiress to the Schnee Dust Company during their initial meeting. He saw her for her, not her money or title. (like Henry Marigold did.) 

I enjoyed watching the build-up between Weiss and Neptune. It’s small but their mutual attraction had always been around. It was natural and (free to tell me if I’m wrong) Neptune was the first person she met who was actually nice to her. Granted he also didn’t say anything to piss her off.

Weiss crushing on Neptune is great because it is one of the very few things she has complete control over without her family’s interference, especially father. It is something Weiss wants and can do, not what her daddy told her to do. Her mustering up the courage to ask Neptune out was so freaking rewarding to me. Weiss is incredibly sweet and cute, and it warms my heart knowing there was that special someone she could just completely gush over. 

After watching RWBY the second time around, Neptune’s character grew more and more to the point he is my #1 favourite character now. He’s balsy, a tease, flirtatious and get’s straight to the point with his words, but he’s also hilariously unaware of how stupid he sounds sometimes. I LOVE dumbasses like that. Although, Neptune is quite similar to Weiss in regards of having to mask his true self for arguably the entertainment of others. Weiss is known as the Ice Queen so she begrudgingly sticks with it. Neptune is the cool dude and he keeps it up.

You can probably argue I’m giving the ship too much credit or thinking to deep into it and you’re probably right. This is not me saying there were some stupid “coding” or subtleties you need to dive in and search for, it’s just me having this thought about Iceberg makes me really happy that it could’ve been more. (If that makes sense.)

What makes me sad about them: The refusal to develop the ship and Neptune as a whole. It really cuts me deep because there is clear potential in Neptune to be a valuable secondary member of the RWBY gang. Like how Sun is to Blake, Neptune could’ve been that to Weiss. BUT NO. It feels like the backlash Neptune had gotten after V2 - 3 stunted the idea of making the ship work.

I’ve been told there were a lot of Neptune/SSSN scenes cut out for team CFVY and that saddens me. Even the Neptune & Sun vs Pyrrha & Nora fight was cut. Apparently, there was going to be a part in the fight where Neptune had to take off his jacket and reveal his inflatable armbands, then Weiss would go into a laughing fit. COME ON THAT WOULD’VE BEEN SO FUNNY AND CUTE.

Also, people saying Neptune didn’t care for Weiss, especially because he was teasing Team NDGO. C’mon man, the dude was clearly joking. Y'all saw how the crowd reacted when team SSSN entered the grounds. What would’ve been damn disrespectful if Neptune had continuously teased the girls throughout the match, spouting a lot of sexist comments. Despite his obvious distraction during the match, he does take his fights seriously.

Yes, Weiss’s reaction was slightly justified but it’s just the typical “I wanna beat my crush’s his ass because he’s stupid and useless” gag in anime. He’s basically a blend of Yuu Kashima and Mikoto Mikoshiba from Nozaki-kun.

Then there’s the whole Dance conversation with Jaune and Neptune. Some of y’all are so quick to assume Neptune was objectifying Weiss with the “She’s all yours.” line while conveniently ignoring “I don’t want to get in your way.” line that immediately followed up. Look, he knows Jaune likes Weiss too and was willing to back out believing it was the right thing to do, but Jaune is the one encouraging Neptune to keep going after his blunder, understanding how much Neptune indeed likes Weiss. Brofist.

Neptune reappearing in V6 and contributing nothing again got on my nerves. That was a great moment for the writers to put in a small moment between him and Weiss after the Beacon incident, BUT NO. The fuckers only remembered he’s Sun’s friend. Seriously what the hell man. Are they trying to bury the fact the ship happened in the first place? Mean.

And to make things worse, you make him talk to Ilia? For gods sake WHY.

Another is saying Weiss is better off with Sun or Jaune because Neptune doesn’t deserve her. If that ain't the definition of objectification then I don’t know what is. Also, that weird reasoning of Weiss isn’t interested anymore because she had a gay awakening IS SUCH A DAMN REAAACH LMAO BITCH WHEREEE?

Iceberg is truly underrated.

Things done in fanfic that annoys me: You’ll be surprised to hear I don’t read a lot of Iceberg fanfiction. Just not in the mood right now. But I do hate the idea of fanfic writers amping up Neptune’s personality to make him seem like a complete douchebag. Yo, that title belongs to Henry Marigold. Quit mixing the two up, please.

Things I look in a fanfic: NEPTUNE AND WEISS BEING HAPPY WITH EACH OTHER, PLEASE. Or Weiss being a cute tsundere to Neptune. Just cute things!

My wishlist: Oh boy do I have whole buncha posts about that already.

Who I’d be comfortable them ending up with, if not each other: Okay, this is a little tricky. I don’t like Whiteknight BUT I can’t ignore there was some potential between them. Especially after the abomination that is volume 5. Weiss and Jaune could’ve easily had a meaningful conversation about her injury and how he saved her. It’s never brought up again and it baffles me.

As for Neptune? I don’t know. Seamonkeys is my top OTP of all time but holy fuck am I against it becoming a thing. So maybe like during the Vacuo collaboration of SSSN and CFVY, Velvet genuinely stars crushing on Nep and he is adorably oblivious to it.

My happily ever after for them: Ahhh you know what I didn’t really get that far lol, get back to me on that.

[crystalkleure]

Which Beyblade Burst bey avatar do you think is the coolest?

Ohh man, my heart says Wyvern just because that’s my favourite and it looks so sleek tbh, but it’s actually a tough draw between Wild Wyvern, Lost Longinus, Ark Bahamut, and Hell Salamander, bahaha. I’d probably have a different answer out of those four depending on which day you ask me lmao

I love so many of the bey spirits that it’s ridiculously hard to pick an absolute favourite tbh xdcfvcfdcfhb almost all of them have like, SOMETHING Weird and Unique about them that’s A+++

Like:

Wild Wyvern has a flame pattern on its wing membrane, and the cone-shaped thing in the middle of it’s head that’s spraying fire out looks almost mechanical instead of organic somehow? idk what that shape is reminding me of specifically, maybe some kind of engine or exhaust vent

Lost Longinus has a flaming blue mohawk that matches Lui’s hair and that was like the best thing ever, also there are those glowing blue stripes/indentations on its legs and between the scales of its neck/chest that may or may not indicate that the insides of this dragon are glowing bright blue like it’s full of that fire, and just. Name origin. “Longinus” is the name of the guy who stabbed Jesus with a spear. Hence Lost Longinus’s tail spear. Lost Longinus is like, a dragon-ified biblical weapon. Does this imply that Shuu is Beyblade Jesus??

Ark Bahamut’s wings – aside from the membranes being weird iridescent scaly things that may be entirely illusory and made of light rather than actual flesh, which is Fucking Cool by itself – sort of…twist open in a grotesque way? Like, the wing fingers are twirled together like twizzlers before they open up, and they look briefly almost like DNA helixes while they’re peeling open, before the shiny membrane things materialize. You can see the flesh pulling apart like putty. I was going frame-by-frame through the animation for Art Reasons when I noticed it and I was like yooooooo

Hell Salamander just looks really cool. It’s made of hot pink fire/lava and its black scales/armor/whatever look almost like leather biker gear or something [not to mention, they match Suoh’s coat, which also seems to be leather sxdcfdcf], and the white scales/armor/whatever look like they’re made out of bone [its got claws and horns that are the same colour, made of the same stuff]. So, like…Ghost Rider Dragon. Also I appreciate how Salamander came to exist in the anime, and how it promptly burned a scribble into Suoh’s face as thanks for being created hgfdssdffghgf She’s So Dramatic

Screencaps to show what I’m talking about bc I’m bad at words:

Wyvern’s fire tattoos [last section of wing, near the edge]:

Bahamut’s wings:

And many Honorable Mentions under the cut because All Bey Spirits Are Cool:

Valkyrie has six eyes for no reason at all except to look cool, and is also two bey spirits in one bey because horse dcfvcfvhgb [gee Valt, how come your mom lets you have TWO bitbeasts??]

Storm Spriggan has Wolverine claws on the gauntlets on its arms, also for no reason at all except to look cool bc Spriggan already has Actual Claws too dfgcdfggh

Legend Spriggan looks Especially Cool when it does the thing where the black spiky parts of its wings are interlocked together, and then they open up

Spriggan Requiem has an AXE

Ragnaruk looks a little like Baphomet

Deathscyther has BATS. It summons a swarm of BATS when it comes out. Also just, everything else is cool too lmao it’s the grim reaper except dressed for a blacklight rave party

Kaiser Kerbeus has SCALES like a DRAGON and also wears an eyepatch. A Good Boy all around.

Hazard Kerbeus is uhhhhhhh some kind of radioactive mutated creature and he is also a Good Boy sxdcfvdfh

Multiple parts of Zeus’s body are made of what look like plasma balls. Y'know, those desktop toys that put on a cool light show and react to your fingertips when you touch em.

Unicorn would not look out of place in Robot Unicorn Attack

Yggdrasil has fucking plasma cannons

Quetzalcoatl has what appear to be stitches on the sides of its mouth [again, I was going through the animation frame-by-frame for Art Reasons lmao] and KNIVES ON THE TIPS OF ITS WINGS. Also it’s got a hood like a cobra but its body is flat like a Chrysopelea flying snake [they flatten their bodies out to catch air and “glide” around up in the trees] and if that was an intentional design choice then it’s a Really Nice Touch bc Quetzalcoatl is Quite Literally A Flying Snake lmao

Jormungand has TWO HEADS and NO EYES and that is amazing

Kreis Satan is SATAN, TRAPPED IN A PLASTIC TOP. He has claws on his wings, and carries a bright blue-and-yellow plastic fork. Lucifer is on vacation from Hell and decided this was more interesting than screwing around in Los Angeles or playing the fiddle in Georgia and he was right and I respect him.

Drain Fafnir has TWELVE EYES. TWELVE OF THEM. Three sets on its face, three sets on its chest. Faf, donate some of those eyes to Jormungand. ALSO I need to say I really love Fafnir even if it’s not quite one of my favourite designs because Requiem Nightmare Faf tried to fucking vore Shuu once and that was the funniest goddamn thing ever asxdcfcxdf

Geist Fafnir has a bright purple mouth. Love it.

Deep Chaos is made out of gnarled, twisted flesh and is evidently hollow inside, judging by its weird tentacle hands. Clio and his pet eldritch abomination needed VASTLY more screentime tbh.

Alter Chronos exists precisely at the crossroads of steampunk and technopunk and if that’s not one of the Best Aesthetics Ever then idk what is

Beat Kukulcan is made of plasma compressed into the vague shape of a bird, and then dressed up for the circus. All hail Clown King Kurz and his majestic bitbeast that will summon an instant blue-lighting thunderstorm if you piss him off. Easily one of the best tbh – if Wild Wyvern, Lost Longinus, Ark Bahamut, and Hell Salamander are my Top 4, then Beat Kukulcan is in the Top 5.

Twin Nemesis has a hammer that appears to be made out of raw flesh and teeth.

Z Achilles’ looks like one of those action figures made out of cheap bright plastic and his helmet looks like a pompadour shaped like an upside-down A. Somebody make me a Z Achilles action figure and take my fucking money.

Emperor Forneus is a SHARK MADE OUT OF KNIVES. KNIFESHARK. HOLY FUCK.

Bloody Longinus just looks Good, idk. Took a page from Salamander’s book and seems to be wearing BONE ARMOR, also trying to compete with Drain Fafnir for Number Of Eyeballs On Body. Got two sets of eyes on face. Got a set of eyes on each wing, set in weird bird-skull-looking things. Got a set of eyes on each arm, set in DRAGON-SKULL-SHAPED ARMOR PLATES. Now Longinus, too, has TWELVE EYBALLS. TWELVE OF THEM.

Leopard is a dragoncat made out of knives and teeth and it will shoot ball lightning at you

Revive Phoenix is a Giant Fucking Fireball compressed into the vague shape of a bird, and that Extra Intense Bright Light in the middle of its body is Concerning because it makes it look like rP is building up to Literally Fucking Explode At Any Moment. Also the Bird-Shaped Fireball turns an evil pretty purple colour sometimes and that’s great.

Dead Hades is just COOL. YOOOOOO it’s some kind of insectoid creature judging by the six segmented bug legs, and that billowy brown cloak thing it’s wearing might actually be a couple of sets of tattered leathery wings. This fantastically horrifying creature was taken from us too soon, rip.

Orb Egis is a floating scorpion-tailed hydra with necks made out of rainbow holo plasma ig. It’s…*single tear* so beautiful………

Dead Phoenix makes me SO MAD because it SHOULD NOT EXIST but it looks SO FUCKING BADASS. It’s everything rP was except 500% more Goth and Metal now. hhhhhhhh

[blakelywintersfield]

for the ask thing: Lantern, Bonfire, Maize

Lantern - how did you meet your best friend? What were your first impressions of each other?I actually have 3 best friends! So I guess I'll do them all one at a time, in order from first person met to last.1. Evelyn -- we met in after school while I was in like, 2nd grade and and she was in 4th. We used to play together but around the end of the 5th grade her girlfriend wanted me to stop being friends with her and so at the time she listened because y'know, you're always supposed to put your partner first kind of bullshit. Later in high school we ended up having a web design class together and reconnected, and over that year we became really close. We helped each other through a lot. My very first impression way back in the day was that she was really cool -- we played Pokémon together. Then in high school I wasn't very happy with her because I felt betrayed, so first impression then was not that favorable. Obviously that changed though, and for the better!2. Cassie -- Cas and I also met in school, but high school; I was a sophomore an she was a freshmen, and we met through Evelyn's girlfriend at the time since they were best friends. My first impression was that she was a weeb, but like. Not a gross weeb. More like what I was like. And she's still a weeb to this day and I love her and all her weeby goodness. Of course, she's an educated weeb. Love you, overthegaybow ❤3. Kayla -- This abomination of a website has one saving grace, and that's that it brought me and Kayla together. I saw her posts circulating around since she was popular in the MCR bandom back then (kobrapartyghoul). After looking at her blog I saw she lived in St. Louis and I thought she was a different Kayla, one I went to school with and did NOT get along with. Though she ended up not being that person, I started talking to her through anon, and eventually something happened, I got her number, and we started texting. My first impression was that she was (1) extremely pretty, (2) popular and rad af, and (3) completely out of my league. Now... it's basically the same looooooolBonfire - describe your dream house.Tbh I don't even know if I'll ever have a house? If I did it'd probably be a 2 bedroom, so I could have guests stay over, with living room, nice sized kitchen since I'm a to-be chef, a living room, an office for all my incense and candles (it'd be more of a prayer / relaxation room tbh), and a decently sized bathroom. And some sort of porch space for a grill. Realistically I'll probably live in a studio apartment. Which is fine, too. So long as I can fit a decently sized couch or two couches in there, I'll be good to go, I don't need a huge room. I'd prefer first or second floor to avoid the heat though.Maize - share the weirdest encounter you’ve had with a stranger on the street.I think the weirdest encounter is actually back during the naked bike run -- I talked with this really rad guy who was 100% naked, dick out and all. I don't remember what we talked about, I was already pretty drunk, but it was fun as hell lmao.

[academyofbrokenhearts]

1. I am sorry, but I am in literal awe of The Ditcher, banging her fiance’s cousin in a carriage in public the night before her wedding. My hero! Even if she has to marry the abominable egg man, she got to bang that incredible hotness not once but twice.

As you should, tbh. I do not ship them, never will, but it takes incredible guts to do what she did, especially since, as the narrative already showed us, if they get caught, she'll be the one judged and treated like dirt. So, from the bottom of my heart: four for you, Dilruba, you go, Dilruba!

2. Also, mmmm Aziz, but I wonder how much of his desperate “ILY let’s be together forever instead” is motivated by not wanting to lose (same for egg man tbh) and the fact that he loved her for so long. The thing is, I agree with @academyofbrokenhearts​ - he may still love her but he does not respect her or trust her - even if fate didn’t intervene and she called off the egg wedding and married Aziz, I think he’d always hold a grudge - she fell off the pedestal he built. But also, clearly she will marry egg man and at that point - after she left him twice and second time knowing he’s alive and loves her and told her how much he still loves her and cried at her (proud, proud Aziz crying at her), that’s finito.

I think that both Kenan and Adem's words really made him reflect of his own behaviour, and I believe it's truly amazing and a solid proof of his love that he managed to leave aside all that hurt pride, and lay his soul bare in front of Dilruba. He's being so honest and open with her during these scenes, that there is no wonder that her choosing to get married to his cousin (even if for his sake) will close the door on this particular relationship forever. Dilruba getting engaged to his cousin after believing him dead was bad enough in his eyes; her getting married after he basically begged her not to, and confessed his undying love will be the last nail in the coffin.

3. Poor Efnan but I confess I giggled at the thought that while he bought her candy on a stick, she got to see Dilruba getting the true Aziz-brand sweet stick heee sorry

You are so going to hell for this, lmao.

I felt so sorry for her. Knowing that Aziz loves/loved Dilruba was one thing; seeing them together with her own eyes is a whole different scenario. No wonder she's devastated.

4. Even during their post-coital bliss and agreement to be together, you actually see their basic incompatibility - she wants to run off from town, she is not happy he plans to defend that kid and if needed to go to jail for it - you always put others first ahead of me! she complains and she’s not wrong but Aziz is a stubborn, idealistic causehead who protects. That is who he is. Efnan loves that about him, Dilruba finds it bad. If they did get married, long term they’d not have a happy marriage - it would be like Lydgate x Rosamond in Middlemarch. Whatever evil French and egg machinations prevent this, he should be grateful. Ironically, she needs a dude like pathetic obsessive egg man who has no principles except wanting her. If only he were hotter and more alpha a la Aziz. But alas he’s from the omelet family.

Exactly! Once again, and even while confessing their mutual feelings, and making plans for their future, they are incredibly out of sync.

Also, excellent point re: Adem.

1. I am sorry, but I am in literal awe of The Ditcher, banging her fiance’s cousin in a carriage in public the night before her wedding. My hero! Even if she has to marry the abominable egg man, she got to bang that incredible hotness not once but twice.

2. Also, mmmm Aziz, but I wonder how much of his desperate “ILY let’s be together forever instead” is motivated by not wanting to lose (same for egg man tbh) and the fact that he loved her for so long. The thing is, I agree with @academyofbrokenhearts​ - he may still love her but he does not respect her or trust her - even if fate didn’t intervene and she called off the egg wedding and married Aziz, I think he’d always hold a grudge - she fell off the pedestal he built. But also, clearly she will marry egg man and at that point - after she left him twice and second time knowing he’s alive and loves her and told her how much he still loves her and cried at her (proud, proud Aziz crying at her), that’s finito.

3. Poor Efnan but I confess I giggled at the thought that while he bought her candy on a stick, she got to see Dilruba getting the true Aziz-brand sweet stick heee sorry

4. Even during their post-coital bliss and agreement to be together, you actually see their basic incompatibility - she wants to run off from town, she is not happy he plans to defend that kid and if needed to go to jail for it - you always put others first ahead of me! she complains and she’s not wrong but Aziz is a stubborn, idealistic causehead who protects. That is who he is. Efnan loves that about him, Dilruba finds it bad. If they did get married, long term they’d not have a happy marriage - it would be like Lydgate x Rosamond in Middlemarch. Whatever evil French and egg machinations prevent this, he should be grateful. Ironically, she needs a dude like pathetic obsessive egg man who has no principles except wanting her. If only he were hotter and more alpha a la Aziz. But alas he’s from the omelet family.

[lady-thor-foster]

Run To You // Sam Wilson x Reader P3

Pairing: Sam Wilson x POC Reader Word Count: 2k+ Warning: fluff, language, angst, abuse mentions, violence (justice) , FEELINGS

Summary: Andrew finally gets what he deserves. Steve makes a mistake. Healing from psychological trauma is always a lot easier said than done, but your newfound family makes sure you know you’re not alone. 

A/N: Holy hell! You guys are absolutely fantastic with your feedback! I can’t believe you like this so much!  This is probably going to end up have way more than 4 parts lmao. I cannae be stopped.

Inspiration: “In Repair” ~ John Mayer

“Too many corners in my mind, So much to do to set my heart right. Oh, it’s taking so long, I could be wrong, I could be ready. Oh, but if I take my heart’s advice, I should assume it’s still unsteady. I am in repair…I’m not together but I’m getting there…”

PREVIOUS CHAPTER // NEXT CHAPTER

Andrew got the surprise of his life when two Avengers showed up at his front door. He’d never felt so lucky or terrified.

“Can I help you gentlemen?”

“We’re here for [Y/N]’s things,” Bucky all but snarled. Andrew dropped his façade immediately.

“Is she fucking both of you too? You should probably get yourselves checked she’s always been a who—.” Andrew didn’t have a chance to finish his vile sentence before Bucky sucker punched him square in the jaw. Stumbling backwards in shock, Andrew balled up his fists to retaliate but the murderous glint in not just Bucky’s eyes made him reconsider.

“What the hell was that for, you fucking psycho?!” he screamed. Bucky moved to punch him again but Steve stepped in, grabbing the appalling man by the throat and slamming him into the wall.

“Listen here and listen well, asshole,” Steve hissed, “You’re not to ever call [Y/N] or any other woman that word again. In fact, you’re not allowed to even breath in [Y/N]’s general fucking direction. If she gets so much as a papercut in your vicinity I will hunt you down and put you in the ground myself. I won’t even need a metal arm to do it. Is that clear?” Andrew didn’t even have the dignity to keep from wetting himself out of fear. Steve released the atrocious man with disgust.

“Where are [Y/N]’s belongings?” Bucky demanded. Andrew pointed to a pile of three messily packed boxes next to the front door.  Steve and Bucky grabbed them hastily, not wanting to stand in the same room as this cowardly reject of man any longer than necessary. On the way out the door, Bucky turned around and leveled Andrew with his gaze.

“You better pray I don’t ever hear your name again or I’ll find you and show you exactly how HYDRA turned me into the Winter Soldier.” Andrew’s eyes widened in absolute terror as he wet himself even further; Bucky rolled his eyes in revulsion and stalked out of the house. Absolutely pathetic, he thought to himself.

You woke up exceptionally warm. Your face was smushed into a familiar broad chest which made breathing just a tad difficult. Sam had always been a full body snuggler and last night was no exception.

“Oof, Sammy!” you whined into his chest while simultaneously trying to separate your limbs from his.

“Wha-What?” Sam mumbled, still half asleep, “[Y/N], what’s wrong?” Your determined movements pulled him into consciousness.

“I can’t breathe!” you complained.

“Oh shit. Sorry, Tink,” he laughed. Rolling your eyes, you rubbed feeling back into your aching limbs. You’d never get used to just how heavy he was.

This was the first time Sam had woken up next to you in his own room. He always loved how adorable you looked with sleep mussed hair and a cranky disposition. You disappeared into the bathroom. Despite everything that transpired yesterday, last night was the best night’s sleep he could ever remember having. A plume of hope flared in his chest at the idea of being able to wake up next to you for the rest of his life. He shook that thought from his head immediately; you weren’t his. You were never his.

You still couldn’t bring yourself to meet your reflection. Seeing your hands clearly for the first time terrified the hell out of you. You turned your back on the mirror; some things you just weren’t ready for yet. Peeling off your shirt, you forced yourself to look at the finger shaped bruised that angrily decorated your harms. Anger boiled inside of you. How dare he?! How dare he think himself so mighty that you were a plaything for him to toss around? Looking down at your protruding ribs, your anger melted into shame. How dare you allow yourself to become this way just to please someone else? Hot tears spilled from your eyes as you wrenched your shirt back on. How would anyone be able to love you now?

A soft knock came at the door. Sam groaned inwardly; he had hoped he’d get you all to himself just for a little while longer. Apparently life had other plans. Pushing himself to leave the warmth and comfort of his bed, he stalked grumpily to answer the door. It was a a bit of a shock to find Natasha and Wanda standing on the other side.

“Uh…hey... What’s up?” Natasha revealed a small bundle of clothing, she’d been concealing behind her back. Wanda held up hair supplies. Sam couldn’t help but grin at them, one of these days he’d finally be used to the never ending kindness of his teammates.

“Is she here?” Natasha whispered gently. Sam nodded and stepped backwards, allowing the women to enter his room. You heard faint voices and poked your head out of the bathroom in curiosity.

“Hey, Tink?” Sam called. Rolling your eyes, you stepped back into the room.  Gesturing to the unfamiliar women, Sam introduced you.

“Nat, Wanda, this is [Y/N]. Or as I like to call her: TinkerBell.”

“Saaaaaam,” you whined, “you know how much I hate that nickname.”

“I can’t help it; you’re as cute as a Disney fairy.” You rolled your eyes and stuck out your tongue; you would never admit it but you actually really loved it when Sam called you that. It was something sweet shared just between the two of you. Both Wanda and Natasha snorted at the two of you. Suddenly you remembered your manners.

“Oh gosh, I’m so sorry! It’s really lovely to meet the both of you! I promise I’m not usually this rude. Life has a way of demanding my full attention 10 minutes after I wake up,” you babbled.

Natasha waved your apologies away, “It’s perfectly okay. You should see Bucky or Barton in the morning. They’re real assholes before coffee.” You giggled.

“You laugh but she’s being completely serious, Tink. I’d face a thousand Chitauri armies before I faced Barton or Barnes without coffee in the morning,” Sam said.

“So,” Wanda interjected, “Nat and I thought you might be in dire need of some fresh clothes and maybe a hairbrush or two?”

Their sudden kindness stunned the hell out of you. Truth be told, you weren’t sure how the other Avengers would take to your presence on the Compound, especially after they found out what you’d been through. You’d never tell Sam, but you were absolutely terrified that Earth’s Mightiest Heroes would turn you away to deal with your own problems. Your self-worth had dwindled so much that you wouldn’t have even blamed them if they did. You were overwhelmed with their unprecedented compassion that you couldn’t help but burst into tears. That wasn’t the reaction anyone was expecting.

“Hey, hey sweetheart, please don’t cry,” Wanda rushed to you, doing her best to soothe you with her soft words. Natasha and Sam were close behind. Wanda wasn’t sure if you’d be okay with her touch so used her powers to send feelings of calm to you. The pain of your broken psyche was so severe that her gentle attempt to soothe you had no effect. Her eyes widened in shock; there’s only been one other person whose pain was so horrific that Wanda’s first attempts to soothe them failed. Bucky.

The exquisitely mammoth pain you carried around was enough to nearly bring Wanda to her knees. She was impressed you even had the strength to still stand upright. Wanda was no stranger to pain herself; she understood the mask you wore. She didn’t need her powers to see through you were now and who you had the capacity to be. The two of you had just met but Wanda already loved you. You were hers now; no one else would hurt you so long as she loved you.

“Nat,” Wanda pushed into the older woman’s mind while Sam pulled you into a bear hug. Natasha’s eyes narrowed at the mental intrusion.

“Yes?” she pushed back.

“She’s just like Bucky. I tried to calm her down and it didn’t work,” Wanda admitted ashamedly. Natasha’s eyes narrowed even further. It took every ounce of self-control she could muster not to leave the Compound, hunt down that abomination of a man and rip him to shreds. It was one thing to be abused and trained into a weapon for use; it took a special kind of civilian monster to do this just because they could.

“She’s under our protection. No matter what the cost.” Natasha pushed into Wanda’s mind. She didn’t have to be a telepath to know Wanda felt the same. No one else would hurt you as long as they had a say about it. Never again.

Sam and the women were more than understanding through your outburst. It was such a foreign feeling, having someone look at you with care instead of malice in their eyes. You kept waiting for the other shoe to drop. You kept waiting for the tables to turn.

Natasha and Wanda were right about how good a fresh change of clothes would feel on your battered body. They even managed to scare up cleansing conditioner and helped you return some life to your once bouncy curls. Two pairs of gentle fingers gently massaged your scalp, carefully working out the knots and kinks of your thick hair. The three of you bonded easily over everything; you found yourself becoming enamored with them. Two strong and fierce women that life snatched nearly everything from stood before you just as loving and empathetic as you could have ever dreamed. It gave you hope. You weren’t together yet, you probably wouldn’t be for a long time but with the love and care of your newfound family, you’d get there.

Sam stood in the doorway of the kitchen watched contentedly as Natasha and Wanda coaxed you into eating. Seeing two of the women he had become so fond of caring for the one he loved most in the world was a sight to behold. He wasn’t sure what he did to deserve this kind of love in his life but he damn sure wouldn’t question it. He was so enraptured with the sight he almost didn’t notice when Bucky and Steve walked up behind him.

“Hey Sam,” they greeted him. He grinned in response. Steve beckoned them to the living room. Sam and Bucky followed close behind and made themselves comfortable in nearby chairs.

“What’s up, Steve?” asked Sam.

“We’ve retrieved all of her belongings,” Steve said firmly. Sam looked back and forth between Steve and Bucky. He wasn’t sure how to properly react to the fact that his teammates had stepped up in such a monumental way. His shoulders sagged as he exhaled in relief.

“You—you don’t know what this means to me guys. Thank you, seriously.”

“She won’t ever have to worry about him bothering her or anyone else again,” Bucky growled.

“Wait—you didn’t…?”

“No,” Steve reassured Sam, “but you don’t know just how close I came. How anyone could treat someone they claimed to love with such abhorrence is beyond me.”

“He doesn’t deserve to live,” Bucky stated. His metal fist clenched and unclenched as he fought to keep his rage under control.

“We don’t get to make that choice, Buck.”

“But he—!”

“No!” Steve half shouted. Your head snapped up at the sound of Steve’s raised voice. Cowering into yourself, you pushed away the soup Nat and Wanda had spent the last 30 minutes trying to convince you to eat. Suddenly the prospect of food was no longer appealing. Wanda pulled you into a gentle hug and pressed a soft kiss into your hair. Patting your shoulder gently, Natasha stood up from the table and stalked into the living room where the men were currently residing.

“I don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about in here but that girl in there is terrified for her life and she doesn’t need you three assholes going and making things worse for her. You make one more wrong move and I will end you myself, is that clear?” she hissed venomously.

“I’m sorry for shouting, you’re right. She doesn’t deserve this, she deserves so much more.”

“It’s not me you need to apologize to, Rogers.” Nodding, Steve took steadying breath. He couldn’t believe he allowed himself to lose his temper like that with you in the next room. Natasha was right; he owed you an apology. Standing up and straightening his slacks, he made his way to the kitchen humbly.

“[Y/N]?” he called. Wanda’s grip around you tightened at Steve’s cautious approach. You lifted your head from her shoulder to meet his sorrowful gaze.

“Hello, Captain,” you murmured. He winced at your distinctly formal greeting. He owed you so much more than a simple apology.

“Call me Steve, please,” he implored you. You gave him a small smile at his request.

“I need to apologize for my actions, [Y/N]. I should not have lost my temper like that; I should have been more considerate of your feelings. I am sincerely sorry and if you would allow me to, I would be more than happy to make it up to you.”

Steve’s genuine apology was absolutely foreign to you. You’d been so conditioned by Andrew that you were half expecting Steve to force you apologize for making him yell. Logically you knew it wasn’t your fault and there was no reason for you to apologize but there’s nothing logical about an abused psyche.

“…make it up to me? Why would you want to make it up to me?” you asked. Both Steve and Wanda’s eyes widened in sheer confusion. Just when they thought their hearts couldn’t break for you anymore, you go and prove them wrong.

“That’s what you do when you apologize to someone,” Wanda said into your hair, “you apologize with your actions as well as your words.”

“Oh.” It only took one word for Steve and the rest of the Avengers to realize they had their work cut out for them when it came to helping you undo all the damage Andrew had done to you. Just one word.

“Will you allow me to make it up to you, [Y/N]?” Steve asked softly. You had to give him credit; he was trying. That was more than Andrew had ever done. He stood there in front of you radiating such pure honesty and goodness that you couldn’t help but smile. Pulling yourself from Wanda’s loving arms, you stood up and offered your hand to Steve.

“Tell you what, Steve. You introduce me to Thor and Doctor Banner and convince Mr. Stark to show me his lab and I’ll consider us even,” you said with a grin. Steve’s answering grin was brighter than sunshine.

You weren’t together yet but you were getting there.

PREVIOUS CHAPTER // NEXT CHAPTER 

Tags

@emilyevanston @lancefuckrr @bellamyblakesgun @sweet-honey15 @amour-quinn @wildestdreamsrps @marvel-lucy 

[mycasandstarrs]

SPN 8x22: “Clip Show”

THEN: Crowley shot Cas in the gut. The Winchesters meet Metatron. Metatron saves Kevin from Crowley. Kevin’s figured out the third trial: cure a demon. Abaddon, a Knight of Hell.

Lost Creek, Colorado.

“I can't believe you finally came up here with me.”

“Why wouldn’t I?”

Because of your traumatic experience.

Hello again, Tommy Collins.

His experience really stuck with him.

RIP Tommy Collins. His brother and sister will be devastated.

“You see, the Men of Letters kept files on every demonic possession for the last 300 years, I mean, we've got Borden, Lizzy, all the way to Crane, Ichabod.” Cool.

“Dean, the only thing that's gonna make me feel better is finishing this.” More like make you feel dead-er.

DEAN YOU JERK.

“I like this bunker. It's orderly.”

“Oh, give us a few months. Dean wants to get a ping-pong table.”

Dean’s gonna have his own little man-cave in a couple of years.

(Oh, it just occurred to me that this is Cas’ first time at the Bunker!)

“And the final test, do you – you know what it is?”

“I have to cure a demon.”

“Of what?”

lol

“Soup’s on. There we go. I think this is, uh... Oh, it's still good.”

“Yeah, we're – we're running a little low. I'll make a run.”

“Dean, I can go with you...Dean, I’m sorry.”

“For what?”

“For everything.”

“Everything? Like, uh... Like ignoring us?”

“Yes.”

“Or like bolting off with the Angel Tablet, then losing it 'cause you didn't trust me? You didn't trust me.”

“Yes.”

“Yeah. Nah, that's not gonna cut it. Not this time.”

“Dean, I thought I was doing the right thing.”

“Yeah, you always do.”

Dean, I can punch you.

“Hey, uh, do we have a room 7B?” Thanks for interjecting, Sam.

And thanks for defending Cas.

“Dude, if anybody else – I mean anybody – pulled that kind of crap, I would stab them in their neck on principle. Why should I give him a free pass?”

“Because it’s Cas.”

Exactly!

Case 1138. “It was a class 5 infernal event – St. Louis, March 8, 1957.”

“One of the files just had a note written in the margin about room 7B and the word "weird" with three exclamation points.” “Weird!!!”

The discovery of the torture dungeon!

Ok, but who made popcorn if Cas is the only one eating it...and he can’t even taste anything??

Josie. Pre-Abaddon days.

“Hey, those chains look exactly like the ones in our dungeon.”

“In your what?”

lmao

“That wasn't a normal exorcism. They changed the words.”

“I believe ‘lustra’ is Latin for wash or cleanse.”

“Oh, yeah, 'cause that was the most freaky thing was the vocabulary.”

He’s TRYING TO HELP. 

“All right. Let's roll. Not you.”

“Sam is more damaged than I am.”

“Yeah, well, you know, even banged up, Sammy comes through.”

“Dean, I just want to help.”

“We don't need your help. Just stay here and – and get better.”

I SWEAR TO GOD I CAN RIP DEAN’S HEAD OFF.

Talking with Father Simon.

“A demon is a human soul, twisted and corrupted by its time in Hell. Father Thompson believed that you could wash that taint away and restore their humanity.”

Sam’s off to cough his lungs out, but Cas couldn’t help.

“Sammy there is gonna take whatever shredded your friend and every other black-eyed bitch out there, and he's gonna get rid of them for good.”

“He is? In his condition?”

“Father, over the past couple of months, I've seen him do crap that I didn't even think was possible. I mean, sure, he's miserable and he's hurting, but you know what? There's not a doubt in my mind that he's gonna cross that finish line – not one.”

I’m sure Sam would’ve appreciated that.

Ooohhh, Cas is shopping for the Winchesters. (But mainly for Dean, let’s face it.)

I love how all of Cas’ money is crumpled up into balls.

“I think we're out.”

“You don’t understand. I need pie!”

His boyfriend’s mad at him, he’s trying to make it up to him!

“Put the virgin down, Castiel. We need to talk.”

Cas, meet Metatron.

Ha, Cas left with all his purchases.

“Kevin Tran told me about you.”

“He did?”

“Yeah. According to him, you and I have a lot in common. We're both free thinkers. We're both on heaven's most wanted list. I thought we could socialize, maybe grab a bite.”

I don’t trust youuu.

“Just – just picture it. We ride to the rescue, save the day – make a great story.”

Ugh Cas, this is how Crowley got to you. :(

“I can't find Cas. You think he blew town?”

“Sounds like him.”

*angry screeching* D e a n.

Father Thompson’s last exorcism, two days before he died.

“When you crawled into Mr. Kent and ate his children, how did it feel?”

“Orgasmic!”

There’s the change.

“When you ate his children, how did it feel?”

“They were screaming...and I laughed. Why did I laugh? I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. God, I was a monster.”

“But now you are a man again. And you have been saved.”  

The son of a gun did it. He cured a demon.

“Do we still have dad's old army field surgeon's kit?” Was John a field surgeon? Or did he take it from someone??

“I think it's time we put humpty dumpty back together again.”

“Coffee, please.”

“Sure. Cool coat.”

“No, it's actually quite warm.”

“Cute and funny – okay.”

Same.

“I've got the plan. You've got the muscle. We can do this. Heaven needs your help, Castiel.” Again, this is how Crowley got to Cas.

“I am the one that caused these problems. I should be the one to fix them.”  Samandriel’s right. Cas’ heart is in the right place, but he cares too much.

A nephilim before Jack: the waitress.

That’s kinda cool actually, how Sam and Dean sewed Abaddon back together.

“We figured kitty didn't need her claws.”

“Then I'll stump you to death. It'll be swell.”

Alright, Black Knight.

“Father Max Thompson, born October 12, 1910. Died August 5, 1958. Who do you think ripped him apart? Word got back to home office that Maxie was messing with things, so we made an example.It wasn't my most artful kill, but it was effective. And bonus – before he died, he told me all about Josie Sands. I found her, and I rode her into the Men of Letters.” Ah, that’s how Abaddon found her.

“666″ aka Crowley.

Abaddon controlling the disembodied hand is pretty cool.

“What the hell – I'm sexting you an address. Check it out. Then we'll talk. Cheerio.” omg, shut up.

She pulled a bullet out with a disembodied hand. Metal af.

Plan A (for Abaddon) is gone.

Prosperity, Indiana.

The case from “Shut Up, Dr. Phil”

RIP Jenny Klein. Killed by Crowley.

So wait, she either never moved or moved back even after the brothers told her to get out and away.

What I don’t get, is that if Crowley is going off the books...how did he know to go after Jenny? She was way after the books.

“I'm gonna gut one person every 12 hours until you bring me the Demon Tablet and stop this whole trials nonsense.”

Crowley was a good villain. I love him, but I also want to cut his tongue out so I don’t have to hear him deliver evil villain-y monologues.

“Indianapolis, the Ivy Motel, room 116. You have 57 minutes.”

MY GIRL SARAH BLAKE!!!

(Why couldn’t Sam have gone back to her during his year off?)

“I know what you are. I could see your halos.” What do they look like?

“You want an abomination? I'll show you an abomination.” Nephilim’s last words.

RIP nephilim. Killed by Cas.

“No. No, he's not.”

I wish I could say he’s right.

Sarah still works with her father, she got married, and she has a daughter. A young, cool mom about to be taken too soon.

“What about you?”

“Me? Pretty much the same, I guess.” 

“No, you're not. You're not the same. Look, it's been years, and I can't even imagine the things you've been through. But I don't know. You just seem...more focused, confident, like... ...like you know what you want. You grew up, Sam.”

Sam and Sarah are still cute together.

“I do miss the old haircut, though.” I kinda do too. (I also resent that these were Sarah’s last words.)

Hell, she had a gun!

“Son of a witch, actually.”

I can’t bear to watch the brothers frantically look for the hexbag or even hear Crowley monologue.

Oh I really want Crowley dead right now, even tho I’ll be sad when he actually goes.

“They're your life's work, and I'm going to rip it apart piece by piece because I can, because you can't stop me, and because when they're all gone, what will you have left?”

RIP Sarah Blake. Killed by Crowley. You deserved better.

Nothing crushed me more with dread than when Dean threw the phone at the wall to reveal the hexbag had been in there the whole time. I wanted to throw my laptop on first viewing.

“Maybe this isn't one we can win. Maybe we should just take the deal.” Sam’s halfway right.

“We'll figure this out. We will. Man, we'll get it done. We'll kick it in the ass like we always do.” Dean’s 100% right.