#well technically i could teach editing. maybe?

[her-canine-teeth]

idek why but I always want to reach things?? everytime sbs like 'damn I wish I could play guitar' im like. do u want me to teach u EVEN THIUGH i dont think id be like good at it bc I dont know anymore how it is to start and I dont think id be a good teacher. also I dont have that many teachable hobbies. like I did help my friends make their dnd character and like. gave tips in how to do it buttt i dont think thats teaching not rlly and HOW do you teach sb to write. or to edit. and I dont have anything else i like do. at least not rn

[atrwriting]

on the road again — sam winchester x fem!reader

as always, warnings: smut, rough, choking, dom sam, mean sam, friends with benefits sex, car sex, p in v penetration, one night stand

summary: sam finds out you’ve never had an orgasm

barely edited we die like men

———

usual scene after cracking a case — dive bar, everyone buys a round, greasy food, and a game or two of pool. usually a round consisted of a beer… but tonight? after the case you had? tonight was whisky. and it flowed. and flowed. and flowed.

“i’ve only been doing this for a few years — i don’t know how you and dean can still get up every day and do this,” you spoke, setting your shot glass down.

“dean loves nothing more than work all day, and crawling into someone else’s bed at night —“ sam laughed, taking his shot. “keeps him sane. and him getting laid and not cranky keeps me sane.”

“is sex what keeps you sane?” you asked with a laugh, motioning the bartender over for another round.

“sometimes — not really,” he shook his head.

“same,” you spoke. “casual sex is so hard to enjoy — i don’t care what dean says.”

“why do you say that?” sam chuckled.

“it’s hard enough teaching someone what you like — now you have to tell and expect a stranger to understand, and leave satisfied? that’s a lot of trust in someone i don’t know.”

he laughed again. “fair, but also — you might just have to advocate for what you want more. clear and explicit directions are the way to go.”

you stayed silent, wishing your glass was full once more to do something — anything — to tear away from the awkwardness of the situation. the whiskey had already began to dull your senses, but nothing ever seemed to dull sam’s. you knew he knew with barely a glance in his direction.

“unless you’re not able to convey clear and explicit directions…” he stated.

fuck.

“ok, lawyer,” you scoffed, taking your shot as you tried to hide your embarrassment.

“maybe that’s why you can’t perfect the ‘dean method’,” he spoke, fighting back a laugh, before awkwardness struck his face. “i’m sorry — i shouldn’t — i’m just messing around, is all.”

“you’re good, i know,” you smiled, waving your hand in the air. “but who’s got the time? i swear — it’s so much easier for guys.”

“definitely,” he spoke, and continued in a very technical manner. “i mean, i’ve heard that some women really struggle with even achieving orgasms by themselves.”

“i forgot you were a scholar, winchester,” you spoke, trying to not draw attention to the way your cheeks were reddening.

but with the way he stared at you, his eyes narrowing… you knew he knew your secret.

“you’ve never… before?” he questioned.

“no,” you spoke softly, holding his gaze. awkward topic, sure, but, hey — if he’s bringing it up, he’s got to deal with it.

“wow,” he spoke, letting out a sigh of disbelief. he did that weird thing with his eyes that he usually does when he’s surprised: they go wide, and they blink a few times — as if he could blink away the conversation he definitely regretted starting like an eyelash. “like… ever?”

“never,” you responded, shaking your head.

“wow,” he spoke, taking a swig of his beer. “that’s… that’s…”

“sam, i didn’t break my leg,” you spoke, trying to laugh it off. “i’ve never had an orgasm, but i’m not dead.”

“dean would think you might as well be,” sam quipped.

“agreed,” you chuckled, flagging down the bartender for another drink. “i’ve turned dean down a few times — lil too old for me — but if i get really curious, maybe i’ll —“

“don’t,” he suddenly spoke, shaking his head.

“…hey, you brought up dean and my sex life — this was bound to get uncomfortable,” you giggled.

“i can talk about either when they’re mutually exclusive,” he replied, now keeping his gaze on his beer bottle.

“and you’re also the one that brought up me needing casual sex,” you quipped.

“not with him.”

you rolled your eyes then, but the smile on your lips remained. “dare i ask — who, pray tell?”

you watched as sam took his time answering. he leaned over the bar with both elbows on the counter, letting both muscles strain against the sleeves of his shirt. his skin, lightly tanned, reflected the light from above to show off just how much sam put into working out. you watched the veins in his arms ripple, along with the one in his neck as he swallowed. once he took a final swig of his beer, he stared at you then. and when he finally spoke? well, he only spoke one word: “me.”

a half hour later, you were in the back of the impala. sam had you in his lap, manspreading his strong, long legs. it was hard to be insecure about anything about yourself with sam — he could pick anyone up and throw them if he wanted, so you felt like a goddess in your tight black jeans, grinding your core down onto him.

he had his large hands on your hips — pads of his fingers digging into your flesh. they would push and pull with every roll of your hips you gave. he wanted you as much as you wanted him, and he couldn’t help but want to control and mold it. the way you keened for him? sat so nicely in his lap? ran your hands all over his chest, up and down his neck, and through his hair? the pretty way you pressed your chest into him? oh, he was done for — but sam’s selfish side would be taking over.

“take off your pants and lay back against the door,” he ordered, pressing one last firm kiss to your lips.

you scrambled off of him, pushing your jeans down your legs as sam tried to pull the fabric off. there was nothing but confidence, determination, and hunger in his movements, leaving you with no room for awkwardness.

“your hands feel so good on me,” you rasped. “can you touch me… there?”

you shouldn’t have even had to ask, he thought. he liked to hear your voice, though — especially when it was full of want and need. there was nothing shy about your requests, and there was nothing shy about his response. the pads of sam’s fingers had immediately found your most sensitive bud, drawing rough circles. he had to test the waters, after all — you didn’t know what you liked, but sam winchester would find out. you sucked in a soft breath at the feeling, but all that came out of you was a whine. a whine for sam’s hands. his arms. his chest. his muscles. everything that held him above you and shielded you from the world — hiding you from everything dangerous, while keeping you all to himself.

sam’s lips immediately connected with the soft, sensitive skin of your neck. you hated hickeys, but the way he sucked at your neck? drawing blood to the surface? keeping your attention and thoughts on him, and only him? it was intoxicating, the way it felt. sam drew primal feelings from you — there was no shame, nor insecurity. he wanted you to feel everything he felt for you, and he wanted you to crave it.

he wanted you to crave the way skin prickles when it’s excited and scared and sensitive. he wanted you to crave the perfect amount of friction and moisture on your clit. he wanted you to crave the smell of his cologne on his flannel, the whisky on his breath, and the hungry look he had in his eyes when he saw your nipples peak underneath your shirt.

“please, sam…” you whined, cheeks beginning to burn with pink.

“nah — not like that, baby,” he spoke. “gonna make you work for it.”

you detested him for that as he climbed off of you, settling against the back of the seat. he shoved his pants and boxers down. you situated yourself into his lap once more, letting out a huff of frustration.

“you’re pissed?” sam quipped with a cocky smile, smacking your ass before swallowing you into a kiss. “good. show me.”

immediately, you forgot how angry you were. how deprived you were. how frustrated with him you were. you grabbed him by the base, and sank down onto him.

sam filled you to the brim. a man of his size and stature would do nothing but. you could feel your walls squeezing him, holding him in place as you struggled to adjust to his size. but sam? the cocky bastard? sam could only stare at you with a knowing smirk on his face, hunger for a challenge brewing in his chest.

“you’re so mean,” you whimpered, rolling your hips down onto him.

“i know, sweetheart,” he spoke. he wrapped one arm around your hips, and used his other hand to push you back in between the front seats. “lay back for me, yeah? trust me — i’ll make it right.”

you threw your hands behind you, holding yourself up by balancing on the console. and when you felt sam thrust inside of you for the first time? oh, fuck… you knew exactly what he meant.

what they don’t tell you in romance novels is that it’s incredibly difficult to find those sweet spots that make you sing. they make it seem so easy to “come undone” with one finger or one thrust, but anyone left unsatisfied knows the truth. you know the truth, and that’s exactly how you got yourself in the back of the impala. but sam? oh, sam… sam was the one they wrote those stories about.

it’s like sam could tell what you were starving for. you needed a man to see everything you were deprived of, and wanted to give it to you tenfold. sam was selfish in the way that he was selfless — he wanted you to see stars. he wanted your cheeks and the back of your neck to blush. he wanted you to whimper. he wanted you messy and beautiful and full of life. but sam wanted all of that for himself.

sam forcibly kept you bent at the angle you were, but he didn’t have to. the head of his cock pistoned into that spot behind your lower stomach, and immediately you recognized that this is what they meant by that special spot inside. his tight grip on your hips forced you take every bit of his strength against the neglected wall that craved sam and all of his talent so, so badly.

“oh my god —“ you whimpered, throwing your head back. “i didn’t — how did you —“

“yeah — that’s right, baby. never had this before, huh?”

“n-nothin’ like this, sam,” you spat through bitten lips, trying not to cry. “it-it feels...”

you tried to keep up with his speed and aggression. you wanted to show him you were good too and that you could make him feel good too, but it was all so much. too much. putty in his fucking hands, you were, and you had never felt so safe nor so good.

“you fuckin’ tease me on every hunt —“ he rasped, taking one hand off of one hip. “flirting with everyone, when i’m right there.” he spat on your clit, making you shiver. “wasting your time, and mine.” his thumb found your clit, making circles. “any of them make you feel like this?”

“never,” you were starting to stutter, words and movements. the pressure building in your womb was building, and building, and building. it was all getting too much. “i should’ve — please —“

he grabbed you by the back of your head then, forcing you upright and close to him. your chest was pressed against him, and warmth spread throughout you once more. you rolled your hips against his like you were chasing him, afraid you would lose him.

“fuck —“ he rasped in your ear.

“sam…” you weeped. “i’m so close. don’t stop — please —“

he grabbed you by the throat then, putting space between your faces. he held you in place and your gaze, scolding you when you tried to drift off with your eyes closed. each thrust combined with the circles he drew was drawing you closer and closer to your demise.

“so fucking worked up, aren’t you?” he spat. “yeah, yeah — i can see it. face all red, and tears? so frustrated.”

you couldn’t do anything besides nod and try to wipe your tears away, forcing back whimpers. something snapped inside you when you saw the dark, feral look in his eyes. he wanted your orgasm as much as you wanted him to give it to you. and when it hit? when it consumed you? when it made you so weak you couldn’t do anything besides lean against him?

all he could do? fucking laugh.

laugh at your demise. laugh at how it overtook you. laugh at how it crashed over you and swallowed you whole. laughed at how it filled you to the brim and then some. but most of all? sam winchester laughed in triumph at the fact that the badass, independent spitfire he knew was coming apart and making a mess in his laugh.

“that’s right, doll —“

“act so tough, and this was all you needed —“

“fuck, you’re so pretty when you cry for me.”

the swell of pride in his chest was felt by both you and him. he was pushing, pulling, nipping, biting, and kissing you every which way. your mind bent each movement of his, completely pliant in his hands as you came undone. your climax — it was so powerful, you fell against him as he chased his own. he bit down on your shoulder as he came, fucking his load into you.

the collapse was felt by both of you. he held you against him as you both came down from your highs, rubbing your back with his thumb. when he sighed in relief against your cheek, leaving a kiss on the still blushed skin… you knew you weren’t the only one satisfied.

————

lmk what u think xoxo

love u sammy <3

[jestersprivilegee]

Hey, roomie! ch. 6

thomas j. x reader

Word count: 4k

Alex and Eliza’s wedding leaves you questioning your poor decision making.

Warnings: John Lauresds bro. Swearing per usual. Me being too lazy to edit/proofread/add italics 😜

Notes: bro this is the most I’ve written for a chapter I’m so proud. Took me only two days as well (which might explain if it’s shitty but ignore that)

“Thomas?” Your voice rings out in the quiet apartment. “I need a favor.”

You gingerly shut the door behind you, setting your bag on the counter. There’s some shuffling in his room, and he walks out a few moments later.

“What’s up?” He sniffles. His eyes had a hint of red puffiness.

“So you know the w— are you okay?” You stop yourself abruptly upon noticing his eyes.

“Yeah, I got something in my eye so I was rinsin’ ‘em out,” he says. You narrow your eyes at him, but ultimately buy into his story.

“Alright…anyway, you know how Alex and Eliza’s wedding is coming up?” You say and he nods. “Well, I’m one of the bridesmaids and I—wow, this is harder to ask than I thought.”

He gives you a confused look. “Is it somethin’ bad?”

“No! Just kind of..awkward? Almost?” Your voice goes higher at the last part. Now he’s interested, his body language said so. He crosses his arms and leans against the counter, curiosity peaked in him.

“Spit it out,” he urges. You huff and roll your eyes.

“I need you to teach me how to dance. Slow dance, to be exact.” You rush.

He blinks, like the gears are turning in his head. When they finally do, a wide grin spreads across his face. Your breath hitched as he took a step closer.

“I can do that. I’m a real fine dancer, sweetheart, and an even better teacher,” he winks. “Who you plannin’ to dance with?”

“I don’t know, it might be written on cards for us, but my hope is Laurens or Hercules.” You shrug. He thinks to himself for a moment.

“Sure, sure, I know them. Both hate me I think?”

You laugh, and the smile he previously wore brightened again. You know Thomas wouldn’t be invited to the wedding or able to go anywhere near it since him and Alex are mortal enemies. That fact didn’t bother you, you knew Thomas could be an arrogant asshole majority of the time, but at least he was willing to help you.

“Maybe a little,” you grin. He shakes his head, still adorning the smile you’ve grown so fond of.

“Y’all been talking about me or somethin’?” He quirks an eyebrow. You feel your face flush red, and you hoped he wouldn’t notice the hot embarrassment radiating from your skin.

“Well—not exactly, you just happen to come up in conversation sometimes.” You say. Not technically a lie, just choosing your words as carefully as possible to make it seem like he’s not all you talk about.

“Oh yeah? And what do these conversations entail?” He tilts his head.

“Just how much of a dickhead you are. Nothing new,” you sigh. He sputters out a laugh and shakes his head, uncrossing his arms. Another smile finds your lips, more confident this time.

“I don’t doubt that,” he chuckles, “but do you seriously not know how to dance?”

“No, I’ve never really needed to.” You shrug, internally grateful he changed the subject back to the original topic.

“Damn shame. Dancing is fun, ‘specially line dancin’.” He gives you a big toothy grin.

“Where’d you learn to dance?”

“Sugar, I’m southern, you don’t just learn. You’re born with it.”

You sometimes forget Thomas originated from Virginia. Born and raised, he told you. His parents raised him on a farm surrounded by forest, taught him how to tend to crops, and he was enrolled in the highest quality school they could find. It ended up being a private school, where he excelled in academics and lived in books the moment he could read. It would explain his love for agriculture and science.

“Fair enough. I suppose all rednecks prioritize slow dancing with their cousins to ensure a great marriage,” you tease.

“Hey you watch yourself, not all southerners are in incestual relationships.” He glares at you.

“The fact you had to defend not all says a lot.”

—

You decided that the following day, he would teach you all you need to know. He claimed it won’t be hard for you to pick up since you’re smart and dancing is straightforward. Just follow the other person's lead, which in this case it would be Thomas.

When the next night rolled around, you were suited lazily in pajamas and socks while dinner cooked. No point in being dressed up since it was just practice.

“Alright, so the first thing is positions.” He says. You both stood in the kitchen, your meal baking in the oven for the next 20 minutes. He started a playlist of slow dancing country songs, playing them softly in the background.

He pulls you closer to him, causing a light gasp to escape you. He chuckles, muttering for you to relax, and you eventually do. His hands were planted firmly on your waist, standing so close to you that you could smell the familiar cologne.

“You’ll have your hands on my shoulders while I keep mine on your waist.” He explains. You bring your hands to his shoulders, holding onto them as if your life depended on it. “Not so tight,” he chuckles. You loosen up your grip and take a breath in.

“Now let’s step to the rhythm. Forward left, right, step together, then step back with right, back with left, step together. Easy enough?”

“None of that made sense, but I’ll try my best.”

“You’ll do fine,” he reassured. “Just follow my lead, you’ll pick up on it real nicely.” He gave your waist a gentle squeeze and started stepping to the beat. He leads you, patience in his eyes and with every step.

You fumble over your feet a couple times and take some wrong turns, but he doesn’t belittle you or stop. Instead, he redirects you and keeps it moving. It was hard to ignore how intimate this was. Your arms wrapped around each other, him staring down at you and you fixated on your feet. It would’ve been way scarier had you been gazing into his dark brown eyes, admiring the smooth skin and black curls that framed his face.

“You’re doing great,” his low voice met your ears, his lips almost grazing the side of your face from how close he was. Your heart leapt in your throat, your movement stuttered and he tightened his hands to instruct you where to step.

After a few more runs of the same pattern, you grew confident, finally tearing your eyes away from your feet and up to him. His heavy stare was already fixed on you, a look of adoration and softness in his eyes. Just as you imagined, your palms grew sweaty and you grew increasingly nervous, yet he remained calm.

His demeanor soothed you. He was so cool and collected, like this was all natural, like you’d done this a thousand times before. Before you knew it the song came to a close and his movement slowed. When you came to a complete stop, you were so immersed in the story behind his eyes. The way the light shone upon him, the way it seemed like time stopped and you were the only people left in the world.

The way his eyes flickered down to your lips, and the way yours did the same. The way you were leaning in subconsciously, hands moving to the back of his neck to tangle in his hair.

Your eyes fluttered closed as you met him in the middle, in a gentle kiss. It sent electric shocks through your entire body—months of pining poured into one kiss. He immediately pulled you closer, not breaking the softness behind your lips against each others. His hands dipped to your lower back, and you stiffened.

That’s when you realized what you were doing.

You pushed off of him, a shocked look on your face.

“I…I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have done that.” You curse, untangling yourself from him and taking many steps back. He opened his mouth to speak, but no words came out. “That was a mistake.”

A pang of disappointment stabbed him, strangled his heart, and completely shot down any idea he had of pursuing you. It hurt to hear you consider kissing him a mistake.

It hurt you, too. To say it out loud, even if you weren’t entirely sure you meant it. You pivoted, a regretful expression consuming your features. His eyes lingered on you a moment more, and silently, he brought his fingers up to gently touch his lips where you had kissed him.

Dinner was awkward. The rest of the night was quiet, actually. You decided to bring your dinner to your room, eating in there and regretting every action in the past couple hours. It was just now settling what had happened.

You shared a kiss with the man you deemed ignorant and annoying, and the worst part is you liked it.

When you exited your room to set your dish in the sink, he was sitting at the table. Alone. Eating in silence, save for the clinking of metal against metal. It sent another pang of sorrow through your heart, and your eyes met his. He held eye contact, refusing to back down. It was you who gave in and looked away, shamefully retreating to your bedroom.

—

“I now pronounce you husband and wife. You may kiss the bride, Alexander.”

Cheers erupt as Alex swiftly pulls Eliza in for a loving kiss. You fought back the tears that swelled in your eyes as you clapped for them. When they pulled apart, they seemed in their own little world. So infatuated with one another that nothing could break the intense gaze they had fixed.

The week leading up to the wedding was agonizingly slow. It was quiet. Always quiet. You would speak to Thomas when necessary, but this time it was you avoiding him. The guilt you felt was too much, it gnawed away at your stomach until there was nothing left. The memory of that night replayed over and over and over like a broken record. When Alex and Eliza kissed, it flashed in your mind again.

You couldn’t help it. Thomas Jefferson occupied 90% of your thoughts, and the other 10% were spent thinking how horrible you were.

The wedding reception was better than you anticipated. Sure, anytime you danced you thought back to Thomas, but hopefully speaking to the groom or John would lift your spirits.

When it did come time to the slow-waltz you had prepared for on that faithfully awkward night with Thomas, everything he taught stuck because you breezed through the dance floor with John easily. You shared a few laughs for the poor soul that was forced to dance with Lafayette, watching the man stumble over his partner's feet and mutter a string of apologies.

You did exactly what Thomas instructed. Hold onto his shoulders while he holds your waist, and step in sync, forward back forward back. It was incredibly simple. You glided through the floor until the song came to an end, and you separated from Laurens.

The first dance started, and you retreated off to the side, a glass of half-drunken champagne in your hands. You bore your eyes into the glass, so consumed in your own thoughts you hadn’t noticed the man approaching your side.

“I almost didn’t recognize you, Y/n,” a silky voice spoke. You whipped your head up to the call of your name to be met with deep chocolate eyes.

“Aaron Burr,” you grinned. “How long has it been?”

“Since college, I presume. How are you?” He joins next to you, leaning against the wall as you did.

“Pretty alright. A little tired, but that’s nothing new. How’s Theodosia?”

Theodosia was Burr’s, everyone knew it. Even when she was dating an exchange student, you would see them lingering behind the staircase, his hand in hers. You weren’t sure if they had officially started dating or if they were still playing the charade, but it wouldn’t be long until they did.

“She’s well, thanks for asking. Would you like me to buy you a drink?” He asked.

Aaron Burr, always so punctual and well-mannered. You became affiliated with him through connections with Alexander. It wasn’t until you met the man yourself you became quick friends. He was a quiet man, but easy to talk to. He hadn’t much personality, but he was kind, and you could sense behind the walls he put up there was a flame of passion ignited in him. That flame was visible when he talked of Theodosia.

A couple sips in, you found yourself immersed in conversation about educational reforms. His eyes light up and he sat up straighter as he talked about the statistics of kids who aren’t able to read, and how he hopes to change that by suggesting a new curriculum for schools. Aaron Burr was one for deep, long talks, usually about politics or the economy. You respect him for it.

“I’m a little surprised to see you here. I know you and Alexander are more frenemies than anything, and you’ve had your…disputes,” you say.

Burr goes quiet for a moment, nodding and averting his gaze.

“Indeed. But he invited me, and it wouldn’t be proper of me to turn it down because of a few arguments.”

Proper, he says. If a few months ago your enemy (Thomas Jefferson cough cough) invited you anywhere, you would snarl at him and flip him off. It was honorable how Burr would put all of that aside to support his colleague on his day of union.

“Well, if it isn’t Aaron Burr with the lovely bridesmaid!” A drunken voice stumbles behind you. You don’t even have to turn around to know who it is.

“You flatter me too much, Laurens,” you glance at Burr before swiveling around. “Been a while. Since fifty minutes ago, to be exact.”

A wide grin spreads across his face as he carelessly throws his arms around you, pulling you into a hug. “We haven’t hung out enough!” You pat his back in a friendly manner, and watch as the rest of the gang pulls up. Hercules Mulligan, Marquis de Lafayette, and the groom himself. The alcohol must’ve been settling into his system for him to not count the dance you shared earlier as enough.

“Alright, John, pull yourself together.” Alex chuckles, putting a hand on his dear friend's shoulder. Laurens pushes off of you, still wearing a tipsy grin.

“Congratulations, Alexander,” you say. He gives you a nod of courtesy, his eyes shifting to the man next to you.

“Burr, I didn’t think you’d be able to make it.” He says, a genuine shock in his voice with a hint of amusement.

“I wanted to say congratulations and drop off my gift. And maybe catch up with Y/n here.” He gives you a grin. You smile back.

Feeling the tension, Laurens speaks up again. “Burr, are you still seein’ Theodosia on the side? Real nice girl,” he stumbles over to him, wrapping an arm around his shoulder and leaning in closer than he should be. Aaron grimaced but didn’t push him off.

“I should go,” Aaron stands up, glancing at you as an apology.

“No, stay! Ignore how they’re acting, John is just drunk,” Alex rolls his eyes.

“Don’t group me in with zem, I ‘ave done no wrong,” Lafayette laughs.

You take Alexander’s pleading glance as your hint to leave and take the rest of the boys with you. He wanted his time to converse with Burr himself, so you had no choice but to respect that and give them space. You suggest going to dance since Laurens won’t stop complaining about how you’ve been ignoring him all night, when you literally haven’t.

“I don’t think that’s how you dance, John,” Hercules snorted as he watched the laughing stock fumble over his own feet.

“Dancing is expressive! There is no right or wrong way!” John retorts, his Carolina accent slipping through. Hercules sighed and left him to his own devices and turned back to you.

”He’s hopeless. This is just like Angelica’s wedding.”

You share a laugh as he twirls you, his hand resting on your waist as you step together. Lafayette saw John making a fool of himself and decided to join him, since he knew he had horrible rhythm and would embarrass himself if he was the only one dancing funny. But Laurens had enough liquor to not care what others thought.

“The dresses you made for us are really beautiful. And comfortable, too,” you compliment, glancing down at the blue dress you wore. It was professionally made by Hercules himself, considering his line of work being fashion design.

“Thank you. It looks even better on you,” he beams, brightening at your praise.

“Oh, stop,” you waved him off. “Are you still into powerlifting? I’ve been meaning to lift more but I don’t have a gym buddy—“

“Y/n! Mon ami! We ‘aven’t talked all night, what is zat about?” Lafayette cuts you off, stealing you away from Mulligan. You give Herc an apologetic smile and let Lafayette whisk you away from the larger man.

“We haven’t. Do you want to get another drink?” You offer. He nods eagerly and follows you to the bar.

Not long after, the other men made their way over to join you. They seemed to have calmed down, a light chatter amongst the group. The topic had changed rapidly from one to another.

“Y/n, have you ever actually been in a long term relationship with anyone? I don’t think I’ve ever met any of your boyfriends,” Hercules asks, his brows furrowed.

“Eh. Not anything super serious,” you shrugged. For some reason, you couldn’t help but think about—

“I thought you were with Thomas, non? Especially after you kissed him,” Lafayette spoke up. Your stomach dropped.

“How did you know about that?” You pale. His eyes flew wide open and he realized he said too much.

“Wait wait—what?! You kissed Jefferson?” John shouted out as if there wasn’t a room full of people, some of whom hated the man in question.

“Shh! Not so loud, asshole!” You shushed him frantically.

Both Hercules‘ and Laurens’ jaws were hung wide open, genuine shock plastered on their faces. You shot daggers at Lafayette, who winced and bowed his head in guilt.

“I thought zey knew…” he mumbles an apology. You sigh, pinching the bridge of your nose.

“Explain, elaborate, expand on this please,” John begged, leaning across the table.

“I—it was a mistake, I didn’t mean to…” you swallowed thickly. “He was teaching me how to dance, and I guess I got so caught up in the moment I wasn’t thinking, so I leaned in and kissed him.”

“Well, did he kiss back?” Hercules snorts.

You open your mouth, narrowing your eyes at him slightly. Thomas did kiss back. With more passion than anyone had kissed you before, that was the second worst part. Is the possibility that he wanted it and you shut it down, calling it a mistake.

“I’m not answering that.”

“He did! Jesus Christ—y/n, he is the enemy! Just wait til Alexander finds out you kissed Jeffer-shit!” John hops up, slamming his glass against the table. Lafayette hurriedly stood with him, pulling him back.

“Non, non, Alexander does not need to know. Ze lady does not want him to,” he urges.

John narrows his eyes bitterly, muttering some incoherent drunken thoughts under his breath. You huffed and told him to calm down, to which he retorted when Jefferson was publicly shamed for his heinous crimes against women he would. How that made sense to you, you didn’t know.

“Lafayette, can I talk to you? Alone?” You grit your teeth together. He winced once more, already knowing what it would be about.

“Of course, chérie,” he nods.

You find a secluded area outside of the reception where no one would bother you or overhear your conversation.

“Why the fuck would you tell them that!” You hissed.

“I apologize, madamoiselle, it must ‘ave been the alcohol.” He dips his head.

“Why do you even know about that anyway? What has Jefferson been saying?”

“Well…I’m not sure ‘ow much I can say.” He scratches the back of his neck.

“You’ve already spit my business to them, what more can you say?!” You scoff.

“Alright, alright, he never said anything bad.” He motions his hands in a way for hopes of mitigating your uproar. “He called me the other night, freaking out because he told me you kissed him. He said he wasn’t sure ’ow you felt about him but he—“ he suddenly cut himself off.

“He what? C’mon, Laf, this is serious.” You bit the inside of your cheek, impatiently tapping your heel on the concrete.

“—he…said he was upset because you called it a mistake. Said it felt hurtful.” His voice was lowered, solemn and scanning your reaction.

Your eyes softened. “Oh.” That was all you could manage. You didn’t enjoy the feeling of knowing you hurt someone; quite the opposite. It just made you feel like a bigger piece of shit for avoiding him, but in all fairness, what you did was completely out of character and it’s been tough sifting through your emotions.

“He said he wished you would talk to him.”

Silence. Deafening silence.

“Y/n, you need to talk to him.”

You stare at the ground, a swirl of negativity churning from your stomach to your brain. Guilt, shame, resentment all muddled into one.

“Let’s go back inside,” you mutter softly. He nods, the windows to his soul filled with worry.

—

“When were you gonna tell me you kissed Thomas?” Peggy found you at the bar, a sincere hurt in her words.

“I…was going to, eventually,” you muttered, taking another absent-minded swig of beer. “Not on Liza’s wedding date, but here we are.”

It was true you didn’t want to distract from Alex and Eliza’s wedding by your own romances taking the spotlight. It wouldn’t be fair to them, so up until Lafayette blurted it out, you planned on keeping it secret. Just a little longer, you told yourself.

“Well you haven’t! I had to find out from John Laurens pulling me aside and gossiping about your affair with Thomas!”

“Jesus, who else knows?” You stammer over your movements, almost spilling the beer in hand.

“Almost everyone. Word spreads around fast.”

“Fuck. Are you serious?” Your hands fly up to your head, gripping any hair you could. “I need to go. I’ll tell you everything later, I promise I’ll make it up to you.” You stress, hugging her tight. She sighs, melting into you and patting your back.

“You’d better explain yourself. I think it’s best if you resolve things with Thomas. Lafayette filled me in on the details.” She explains.

“Y-yeah, I’m gonna talk to him. Promise.”

You rush to find Eliza and Alex, hugging them both and wishing them congratulations. You knew they both knew about the kiss, but thankfully they didn’t bring it up, although you could see Alex almost did. He physically had to fight back whatever words played on his lips, and Eliza must’ve sensed it too, because she lightly smacked his side. After finding the rest of the crew and wishing them a goodnight, and telling Laurens in particular to suck every dick ever, you called an Uber.

The ride home was quiet, as the driver wasn't much of a talker, but neither were you so it wasn’t a bother.

Stumbling up the stairs (the elevator never got fixed), fumbling your keys in the door and creaking it open, you called out into the empty apartment.

“Thomas! I—can we talk?”

Stillness, quiet, nothingness. You opened your ears, shuffling near his room, and that’s when you finally heard some movement.

“Thomas? If you’re indecent or with a girl tell me now because I’m coming in,” you exclaim, waiting two seconds to no reply and then pushing the door open.

Thomas sat at the edge of his bed, his head in his hands. He sniffled, bringing his eyes up to meet yours. That’s when you realized it.

Thomas was crying.

[infinityinakiss]

arcane incorrect quotes: act 1 fam edition

vi: we need to distract these guys.

claggor : leave it to me.

claggor : centaurs have six limbs and are therefore insects. discuss.

mylo & powder: *immediately begin arguing*

//

powder: what the hell was that?

mylo: *picks up a flashlight* only one way to find out!

claggor : wait a minute! you don’t go TOWARDS the spooky scary banging!

vi: yes we do, claggor. we always do.

//

vi: i give up. i am so tired.

mylo: get the emergency supply!

claggor : *carries powder and places them in front of vi*

powder: *smiles*

vi: AND I AM BACK BABY, LET’S GOOO

//

vi: A SPIDER!

mylo: KILL IT! SMASH IT!

claggor : BURN IT!

vi: STAB IT! WITH A KNIFE! GET ME THE SHOTGUN!

powder: aw, it’s so cute! look at it!

//

powder: and here we see vi and mylo in their natural habitat. texting each other variations of the word "garlic bread" to try to make each other laugh.

vi: gaelic bread.

mylo: grueling brad.

vi: ha ha, glamorous beans.

//

mylo: FUCK THE CHAIR. PARDON ME FOR MAKING MYSELF COMFORTABLE DURING A SINCERE HEART TO HEART DISCUSSION WITH A DEAR FRIEND IN NEED!

mylo: BUT THE TIME HAS COME FOR ME TO CEASE STRADDLING THIS DEEPLY OFFENSIVE PIECE OF FURNITURE! AWAY WITH YE, FOUR LEGGED TEMPTRESS! DISTRACT US NO MORE WITH THE MOST BASIC AND UTILITARIAN FORM OF COMFORT YOU SUPPLY!

powder: mylo just threw a tantrum about a chair.

powder: i just won mylo tantrum bingo.

//

claggor: trouble at 2 o'clock!

mylo: *looks down at their watch*

mylo: now, how do you know that?

//

powder: we need a way to lure in new customers?

claggor: maybe we could have some fun, interactive events!

vi: mylo bath water.

mylo: ABSOLUTELY NOT!

//

powder: you know, when I first met you i thought you were a real bitch.

mylo: what changed your mind?

powder: oh, now i know that you’re a fake bitch. why do you ask?

//

claggor: do you support gay rights?

vi: i’m literally gay.

mylo: they’re avoiding the question!

//

mylo: would you take a bullet for me?

claggor: …yes?

*vi angrily burst into the room*

mylo: *running away* great, thanks!

//

mylo: hey, do you know anyone who can teach me to play the trumpet?

claggor: why?

mylo: i want to wander around playing it to annoy powder.

claggor: technically, you don’t actually need to know how to play the trumpet well for that.

mylo: claggor, you have opened my eyes.

//

mylo: *sharpens knife* we've got ways of making people talk.

mylo: *cuts piece of cake*

powder: …can i have some?

mylo: cake is for talkers.

//

vi: sorry i'm late, i was doing stuff.

mylo: YOU PUSHED ME DOWN THE FUCKING STAIRS!

//

mylo: i think we should have glow stick juice injected in our bones when we're born, so if we break our bones, we get a fun little surprise.

powder: what's the surprise?

vi: blood poisoning.

[angelwishess]

Rambling time !!

“Prom” edition, brain worms from this post!!

I’ve actually had an idea similar to this for awhile now!! Buut it is a little different, I thought since In canon NRC is an all boys school— and in my AU it still is mostly, with it only having exceptions for some students— but I thought maybe they could start doing this event with another school. Maybe another sister school that NRC is on better terms with.

Unsure how that’d work, but let me be SILLY

Its similar to prom, maybe a teeny bit more formal as I imagine its reminiscent of a ball, but at its core its. Basically prom. The students do have the option to bring a date, but I’d guess it isn’t mandatory. Buut, once you’re at the venue and its time for free dance THEN its mandatory and you’d have to ask someone to dance anyways LMFAO

Floyd & Kyra

Kyra and Floyd... Wouldn't ask eachother out LMFAOOO

Well, technically, they did. But, not in a romantic way. At all. They both think the entire event is a little annoying to deal with, Kyra having absolute WAR FLASHBACKS to her old world at the mere mention of it being similar to a ball, and Floyd having his own experiences with boring, fancy "parties".

It was more like they agreed to go together just for the sake of it. They didn't think it was a big deal really, it was just them agreeing to go to an event as a duo. Who cares? It isn't a big deal.

“Hey do u wanna go together” “Yah sure”

At the event itself they... They'd ditch it entirely.

See, neither would be really into the whole thing. The idea of it was just so boring, who would like attending something as "stupid" as this? And so they just decided to leave. To walk around the venue instead, roaming the halls and exploring the places within.

Eventually they'd wander into the gardens - an area rather closeby the actual vanue wherein the party was being held. And just then, the free dance began,

A slow melody echoed all the way from the party room. It was beautiful, magical. Almost romantic.

Kyra would invite Floyd to dance with a laugh. If they were gonna be at this party, then might as well get atleast one dance in, right? But its probably only because they were alone that she was okay with it. Yeah, thats all.

Floyd would accept— though it would become increasingly obvious that he didn’t… Exactly know how to slow dance. His movements were a little wonky, and his other hand was just… Hovering awkwardly at her side.

Kyra laughs and teases him, but before he can pull away she intertwines her fingers with his to keep him from moving any further away.

And so, Kyra teaches him how to slow dance properly. And just like that they’d get lost in the moment, in the faint music filling the air between them and in the way the moonlight painted the other so beautifully.

…Maybe these kind of parties aren’t so stupid after all.

(^^ I have the fic version of this in my drafts already HEHE)

Jamil & Elena

Neither of them looked forward to the event. At all.

Jamil could already feel a headache at the thought of the event. Great, juust great. Kill him now.

Elena was groaning at the whole situation. She’d already have a lot of different students come up to her to try and ask her out before she was even informed properly of what was happening. Not like that made it any better, though. If anything, that just made her more annoyed.

She turned down every request, claiming that it’ll be more trouble than its worth. And definetly not because theres only one guy she’d ever want to go with as a date.

In the end, the two of them ended up without a date at the event. Which was fine, Elena already expected he wouldn’t ask anyways. Still doesn’t make her any less disappointed, though.

Until… It was time for the free dance.

Eventually, by some miracle, Jamil did ask Elena to dance. They just happened to be sitting closeby to eachother, and since it was mandatory for every student to participate… Well, they had no choice. Thats all it was. Definetly.

It did feel nice to be able to be that close to eachother without having to worry though.

Riddle & Jester

Riddle was somewhat neutral on the whole thing. Sure it was an event he wasn’t exactly looking forward to, per se, but it was a mandatory school event. Plus, it was a Night Raven tradition. As a student he has to do his part and honor it.

Jester on the other hand?? Oh, shes so SO excited. Like, SO EXCITED.

Jester is already planning all the different ways she can ask out Riddle! Something flashy? No— wait.. No, this can’t be like any of her silly ‘confessions’ shes done before. Maybe she should be a little more serious, maybe…..

The ever imaginative Jester decided to just go with Plan C. All of the Above!

She tried all sorts of ways to ask Riddle out! From silly banners and contraptions, to a more quiet, private one with just them two.

Of course, none of them worked. Riddle was as dense as a rock, and Jester had an inconvenient reputation for always joking around.

Jester isn’t too disappointed. She expected it as much, after all he’s already brushed off more of her love confessions than she can count because he thought it was just another one of her silly pranks to mess with him. Its ok Jester… You’ll get him one day…

At the event itself, she was having a pretty good time! And when it was time for free dance, she immediately bolted to find Riddle and—!

….Why. Why was there another girl there.

Oh my sevens. Shes asking him. OH MY SEVENS SHES ASKING RIDDLE TO DANCE WITH HER OHNOOHGODJESTERDONTTWEAKOUT—

In an INSTANT Jester is there. Not so subtly pushing her away, acting like a barrier between Riddle and the girl.

“ErrrMMMM!!! Sorry!!!!! But he already agreed to dance with ME!!!!!!!!!!!!! Haha!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” “Oh… okay??”

“Arlene?? What in the—“ “HA HA LETS GO DANCE NOW RIRI!!!!!!!!!”

Riddle might not understand Jester’s feelings, but she’d be damned to let anyone steal him away. Not tonight, not ever.

Can you tell she was PISSED during The Phantom Bride event LMFAO

Other than that— they had a pretty good night! Could’ve gone better though, but Riddle is still very confused about why Jester got so… Defensive.

Yes this is how I reveal that Jester is pretty jealous LMFAOO😭😭

[tiredoflifelol]

XO Kitty Watch Notes: S1 Ep. 9 & 10

So. I liked this WAY more than I thought I would. Maybe it’s my lack of exposure to cute rom-com dramas exposing itself. Idk the script could def have been better, and the acting wasn’t always the strongest, but it wasn’t bad either. Kind of have enough thoughts for a full coherent analysis post, but I’m also thinking I wanna wait till I’ve watched season 2 and then do the whole show together. Honestly doing this has reminded me how much I love talking about media and it’s made me wanna start a reaction yt channel. (but I won’t bc I don’t rly have the time or the camera or the editing skills and no one would watch it anyways lol).

But yeah overall pleasantly surprised by this show and excited to watch season two!

Ep 9:

- Interesting emphasis on “reason, season, and a lifetime” is the show gonna follow that formula for Kitty w/ Dae, Minho, and Yuri? No clue who would be what yet. Unfortunately keep getting the feeling her and Dae aren’t endgame though. That’d be too drama fee. And as unfortunate as it is (and as much as I hate it being applied to real life) in shows like this the sweet, first love, “nice guy” is never the one that makes the final cut 😭

- Ok yeah these cuties are way too happy to last. But it’s okay, Kitty can send him my way bc that back hug with the coffee mugs?!?!

- “What a coincidence” “actually I followed u here” my guy😭

- Mrs Principal u need to divorce ur husband. He’s horrible. But I’ve actually grown to like her so much more than I thought I would.

- Yeah idk I just rly feel for her rn

- “Yuri was just a shiny thing that caught my attention” hmmm idk how I feel abt that

- And now there’s gonna be issues that Kitty knew abt Alex being her brother and didn’t tell Yuri….

- Ahaha them being fit together like a little jigsaw puzzle studying on the couch.

- Honestly if Yuri wasn’t gay I would 1000% say they should be a throuple

- although….Dae: this is my girlfriend Kitty and her girlfriend Yuri who’s my best friend (do we see the vision)

- Interesting Minho being this upset over Dae lying when technically none of it affected him? I mean it did but not in a major way? And the expression on Dae’s face as he’s looking at Minho talking…..

- Kitty: this is my girlfriend Yuri, and this is my boyfriend Dae, and his boyfriend Minho, my mortal enemy

- Dae with the sleeves rolled again! I’m so intrigued as to why they chose that as a contestant style choice for him

- YES MINHO AND DAE SCENE

- oh no no no. Pls don’t tell me they’re setting up a bff betrayal. “How could you do that to Kitty” “why are you so concerned about Kitty” WITH NO ANSWER. I’m gonna be so pissed do we not already have enough dramaaaaa. Why must romance shows always ruin friendships

- Not Minho calling the guy Florian is talking to “Biceps”. Dae coming in with the common sense of not sending it bc they don’t know details

- oh and not the jealous girlfriend now too😭

- “What if you have not done well all semester…?” “Probable doom” pls why is this show so funny sometimes

- Not the Dae and Minho tag team interrogation. But don’t show Q the morning before finals?? Dude has to focus on tests?

- THE DAMN SPARKLE MUSIC AGAIN WHEN YURI TOUCHES KITTY IM CACKLING

- Damn declining Juliana to keep teaching Kitty…I’m impressed by the messiness the writers are coming up with. (I mean irl that wouldn’t be a big deal but in a show everything is foreshadowing/building) (Also Madison coming in with her friends was cute - she’s my fav side character fs)

- I’m more invested in the Alex’s parents stuff than the relationship drama

- Random but Mrs Principal is so hot

- Ew not the husband calling his wife spoiled. That’s so gross on so many levels

- Crazy to talk abt cheating on finals in the middle of a packed audience

- Well there goes the performance. Nothing like the classic lore drop before an important moment😭

- Hsjska not them talking abt it on stage

- Ok the trip into the fireworks, dress on fire, Minho running to the rescue is so cringe I wanna scream

- wtf why are we having a weird fight over who got there first. I will be so upset if this ruins the Dae Minho friendship

- Omg Jina crying it’s gonna make me sob for her. That scene where she grabs both her kids? The “Danial follow me”? The tone with which she said “I have no idea”? Total chills. She’s giving baddie taking back her like and I’m here for it

- KITTY IF U DONT TELL DAE ITS NOT MINHO

- her crying and the fear as she told Dae made me sad for her, but imma need that girl to keep Minho from getting his face caved in.

- The look on Dae’s face though…he was so resigned and sad😭

Ep. 10:

- lowkey the tension when Dae pinned Minho against the wall though…(I jest…unless any of u agree with me. But mostly I jest)

- They were also both weirdly calm? The acting so far has been pretty good even if I didn’t like the script, but that moment for sure could have been better

- DAE IS CRYING EVERYBODY STOP

- his absolute befuddlement over it being Yuri is sending me

- Him walking away is very fair because I wouldn’t be like “oh yeah lets keep dating” if my partner said they had a crush on someone else the whole time we were (back) together, but it is heartbreaking to see her sobbing alone

- Everyone else in the family on the verge of tears and Alex just smiling in the corner💀

- Not Kitty’s dad hearing “I’m crushing on someone else (a girl) while dating my longtime bf” and going “it’s great that you’re confused, it’s how we grow!” 😭

- Noooo now she’s fighting with Q and he took the night-night tea?? Pure evil

- Mrs Principal is redeemed and making her own choices!!

- I’m dying all the other rando guys realizing Kitty lives in the boys dorm

- And I get what Q is saying about him taking Dae’s spot but there’s no guarantee Dae would have been first? Unless he was second and then yeah I could understand that…although the difference btwn 1 and 2 shouldn’t matter w/ his scholarships?

- Well damn. Her being expelled would solve a lot of this drama😭. I understand where they’re coming from though. Like you cant randomly have one person decide they want to secretly live in the opposite genders dorms for SO many dif. reasons. She really should have brought evidence of the webcam and the state of the room foreword and done a second appeal for a roommate change

- WHY IS SHE ON THE TABLE. I *cannot* handle the second hand embarrassment she gives me like GIRL PLS

- I just realized she’s had the same nails all semester. Girl is dedicated.

- “Daniel was my first love, and no matter how much time passes that stays the same” “I think I can understand that” oof. Yeah so Dae and Kitty are done. Which like I knew but…

- BRO HOW CRAZY IS A SCHOLARSHIP THAT YOU HAVE TO BE FIRST EVERY TIME. Like the dif. btwn first and second is generally very small this is INSANE

- Dae was gonna fight for her but she left the necklace omg they’re making me insane

- Look at his dad pulling out those fast and furious skills. Way to come through my guy

- STOP THEYRE MAKING ME SO SAD RN

- Not the goodbye kiss and the classic “you’ll always be important to me” spiel

- This is horrible

- Rip out my heart and stomp on it why don’t you

- Oh no. She’s gonna confess to Yuri.

- Oh no. Now Julianna is here

- They’re def setting up jealousy btwn those three for the next season which is blegh bc if there’s one thing I hate more than miscommunication tropes it’s jealousy tropes (especially when what’s presented as “unreasonable” from one partner ends up being right)

- Oh no. A Minho confession? Straight into love?? MY GUY

- she JUST said she broke up with your best friend??? What abt the bro code??? Or just timing in general???

- Crazy way to end

[the-w0nderlands]

Incorrect interactions, chaotic pairs. Conner and Evan edition:

Conner walked into the living room, believing he was alone while everyone was asleep or too busy to be messing around at this hour.

Oh, just how wrong he was...

He gazed down and found him. That "gremlin" (as Artemis had called him before) staring at him while building something.

"Hey, what are ya doing up?" the raven haired kid dared to ask, as if he wasn't drinking a mix of three energy drinks and a sandwich

"What are YOU doing up? Don't humans have tighter sleep schedules or whatever?" Superboy huffed as he looked at what Evan was doing.

The boy was building something, and while normally Superboy would just walk away, he was curious about it.

"Well, technically I'm not completely human. Besides, I gotta check everything's ready for us to travel back to our world. Or well, maybe we'll get stuck in another universe? It's complicated" Evan shrugged before turning back to work on the core of the machine.

"Not completely human? What does that mean?"

"The lab gave me some animal genes, kind of a cocktail of various bat DNAs. I don't recommend it, the noises are too loud sometimes when I'm in tight places"

The clone's mind reeled with questions, multiple possibility coming together: was the kid some kind of subject from CADMUS? Did even CADMUS exist in other universes? Was maybe this kid a weaker version of him?

Just when he was about to ask, the inventor interrupted him

"Before you ask, no, probably I don't come from the same project as you. As far as I'm aware, I don't have connections to CADMUS" he clarified as he hit the core and it started to light up until it turned off again

"What are you then? A lab rat?" Superboy snarled back

Evan chuckled, an amused smile decorated his face

"Technically? Yes, but we're more alike than you would like to think"

"What... do you mean by that?"

"Well, it's a secret you have to promise not to tell anyone! Because it puts D--- ROBIN'S identity at risk, ok? Pinkie promise you won't tell anyone?"

The super stared in confusion

"... what's that?"

Awkward silence filled the room for a couple of seconds

"... I am personally going to murder the person who gave you memories and knowledge, what do YOU MEAN THEY DIDN'T TEACH YOU THIS?!" Evan huffed, apparently offended as he stood up and looked up at him as he raised his pinky finger

"A pinkie promise is a way to say and swear you'll never break your promise, that you swear you'll keep it close to your heart and will follow it" Evan explained with his finger still up.

"... How do you make sure the other person follows the promise?" the super tilted his head

"You trust their word, of course!"

"... But you don't know me, why do you trust me?"

"Do I have any reasons not to?"

Evan stared at the taller teen with a smile, the older one just stared back.

He slowly raised a finger as Evan excitedly intertwined their fingers.

"I trust you to not tell anyone my secret. Will you keep it for me?"

The clone doubted for a moment, thinking about the peculiar ritual before nodding.

"It's hard to believe, but I'm Batman's clone" Evan revealed as Superboy froze

If Evan wasn't created by CADMUS, does that mean that there could be more clones out there? There were more people like him out there?

"But you're so..." what was the correct word for it? Batman had this serious vibe, serious, brooding and all of that. And Evan? Evan was... Chaos. Incarnated chaos. Everytime Superboy saw him, he was always smiling, cracking jokes, messing around...

He was the opposite of the dark knight, yet somehow came out from him

"Different? Crazy? Short? Unserious?" Evan tilted his head

"... Talkative"

"Pfff- fair enough, the old man is not known for chatting all the way through a mission, right?" Evan smirked innocently, as if he didn't chat away for about two hours the only time the team decided to take the younger heroes into a mission.

He almost felt like a separate person, not a mere clone of the world's best detective. He didn't struggle. He didn't have issues with it

"... Howdoyoudoit?" Superboy murmured without thinking before Evan tilted his head gently to the side in confusion

"Being different from him, I mean. How did you separate yourself from him?"

"Ah, well..." Evan began again, grabbing the core again as he started to rewire some stuff "I guess I technically try to treat him like an absent parent rather than the original, you know? I mean, we're different from each other. He's a detective and I like making weapons better, he's probably as pale as snow with how little he gets out of the cave while I have burns from experiments and obviously I can't see batshit without glasses while he has perfect vision" he jokingly explained the last bit with a smile

Superboy just stared at him for a moment as the core lit up.

"... I know it's hard to accept that you're your own person, but think about clones as... Family of their original DNA donors. We are not them, just related to them, it's kinda complicated to explain. Though, I heard Superman's kinda an ass in here and judging from your expression I think I'm right"

They just sat in silence until the technically youngest spoke up.

"... Wanna play a prank on him? Like fricking him into thinking I'm his clone?"

"... You wanna prank Superman??"

"Hey, technically speaking your old hag and mine are basically doppelgangers, we can pull this off! It'll be fun, I promise! It's just a little revenge on him"

"... Fine, but don't expect this to actually work" the super huffed as Evan chucked.

And that's how, ladies and gentlemen, two clones somehow pranked the mighty Superman without proof.

Truly a peculiar pair.

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

OOC: I have in fact not watched this show in ages, I'm not sure if Superboy is ooc or not and I'm sorry if I didn't depict him well.

Thanks for reading!

[tmnt-obsessed-ace]

Hey if you could do a crossover with each of your AUs with another AU what would you pick

owo?

Ok!

Well technically I already did a crossover for When The World Crumbles with Sunset Linings with Burb in discord dms that were supposed to be written into a oneshot. A oneshot that I haven entirely given up on because as it turns out my ADHD brain cant handle pulling text from close to TWO HUNDRED SCREENSHOTS (not to mention all the screenshots were taking up space in my phone so I just gave up) so...technically already did but no one else will ever know about it ._.

Skipping Sunshine of The Woods because I still have absolutely no ideas for that au and its in the void indefinitely ._.

Lost But Never Found...eh idk maybe Like Father Like Son. Green and Indigo becoming the amnesia murder duo for Draxum. That would be fun but idk

Same Story Different Font. Either Ghost In The Shell (@bluepeachstudios )or Shellshocked (@lieutenantbiscute )are absolutely awesome for ssdf crossovers for different reasons. Ghost In The Shell because Ghost and Leo would be friends. They both got separated from their families for YEARS and sent to different dimensions. And they both are raising very energetic teenagers (and they both have enough mental health issues to require MULTIPLE therapists) they would be instant friends because they both UNDERSTAND they both went through the same thing (and it will be incredibly tragic for both of them because that's an alternate version of their brother that was isolated for twenty years/forced to become a single parent at 17. They would both adopt each other and try to mother hen each other)

Shellshocked on the other hand would be fun because it would be absolutely DEVASTATING for Leo. He tried so hard and he thought he finally managed to get back home to his brothers, only to see Shellshock Leo and realize that he DIDNT get back home and he probably never WILL. It would DESTROY him. (There is a reason that I would title that hypothetical crossover as "Mental Breakdown: Speed Run edition") peak angst and hurt/comfort material right there

Fractured (Lost) Hamato Clan (aka the 2012 turtles get brain wormed au) this one would be absolutely HILARIOUS with The Last Ronin Becomes A Discord Admin (@melonpalooza) The brain wormed 2012 turtles get added to the server, they seem pretty normal at first and all hell breaks loose the SECOND they start saying "Master Shredder" considering that everyone except the rugrats have SEVERE trauma relating to Shredder and the Footclan. Especially the copes and Ronin who lost their Splinter/family to the footclan. It would be chaos. Very entertaining chaos (bonus points footclan Donnie trying to teach Shredder how to use the internet/understand memes for some extra chaos)

Hollow Shell, Before The Summer's End and TMNT: Solar Flare are getting skipped because they arent developed enough for an au crossover or involve non tmnt franchises and thats kinda hard to make au crossover list :/ (plus TMNT: Solar Flare could crossover with ANY other original tmnt iteration and it would work so idk)

[suremonty]

i. "the tide is turning" - roger waters // ii. "two suns in the sunset" - pink floyd // iii. "four minutes" - roger waters

( lucien laviscount, 32, cis man, he/him ) — Look who it is! If you take a look at our database, you’ll find that MONTY ROMANO  is a FACTORY WORKER that works in SECTOR 8. According to the file, they’re a mutant with the power of TIME TRAVEL + ELECTRONIC COMMUNICATION. That must be why they’re DEDICATED and OBSESSIVE. If you ask me, they remind me of morse code desperately tip-tip-tapping, the sole with no eyes, the desolate confines of a busy wasteland. They are affiliated with NOBODY. 

prior warning that the grand majority of this intro has been copy + pasted with just a few tweaks fhlaks

QUICK FACTS:

full name: montgomery “monty” romano

date of birth: december 5th, 2143

zodiac big three: sagittarius sun, scorpio moon, libra rising

gender & pronouns: cis man & he/him

sexual + romantic orientation: straight gay bi queer

ethnicity: 1/2 black, 1/2 white

nationality: he was born in 'australia,' but he spent most of his life in the usa, so... probably usamerican

religion: christian (protestant, very loose in his practice), starting to lean agnostic

languages spoken: english (5), asl (5), morse code - technically an alphabet (5)

enneagram: 3w2

mbti: enfp

temperament: sanguine

alignment: chaotic good

ability: time travel + electronic communication

affiliation: n/a

task: mutation breakdown

BACKSTORY:

triggers: war, nuclear wasteland, nuclear tensions, institutionalization ( very brief mention ), VERY brief mention of suicide

Monty was born in Sol City to two loving parents. When his mother held him in her arms for the first time, she knew that she would never let anything bad happen to him.

-> And then he was yanked away, literally the second he was put in her arms, to 1930s USA.

If Monty could say nothing else about Time, he could say: 'well, at least she literally dropped me off in an orphanage' -- because she literally dropped him off in an orphanage. We're going to ignore logistics for the sake of humor (you know, being born and immediately vanishing). Just pretend that that makes sense and maybe May will edit it later to make it a little more realistic (said in a setting where polar bears and tigers talk). Anyway, also just assume it's realistic that he was very quickly taken in <3 Okay, onwards we go. The rest of this intro is largely going to be copy + pasted from Monty's first verse with just a few tweaked details!

Monty’s world was silent from the moment he entered it. He would never know it any other way. Teachers tried to force him into the mold, Deaf educators in the dime-a-dozen oralist schools teaching him English, speech, and as-good-as-it-could-be lipreading, all while restricting the usage of ASL at best, forbidding it at worst. 

And, though it made socializing with his peers, understanding his lessons, and connecting with his family much more difficult... in the end, maybe it’s for the best. There would be so many disastrous things to see and smell and feel -- adding one more sensation would tip him over the edge.

Despite his parents and hoard of siblings, his eldest brother, Jack, was the only one who put time and effort into learning ASL with Monty. For that reason, they connected well. His brother would go on to have his first and only child at eighteen, leaving Monty an uncle at only six. But it was absolutely poor timing...

Because the USA could no longer just sit on the sidelines in silent support of the Allied powers. In 1941, his eldest brother enlisted to join the army in the war effort, leaving his wife and family with the baby -- but promising he’d be back.

Monty spent much of the time his eldest brother was gone connecting with his brother’s girlfriend, Mary, who let Monty teach her ASL. So those next three years were spent with her, with baby, and keeping up with the news.

1944, Jack was sent to the frontlines in the Normandy Landings. The story went that he went out blazing, that he at least had that much to his legacy, but who could tell any of the thousands of D-Day bodies apart ?

Monty didn’t need to hear to know that silence fell over his family. He could feel it, even when they were talking at dinner. Life only returned in 1945 as a broadcast celebrating two nuclear bombings played! And Monty... he didn’t know what to feel. This meant the war was over, right? Finally, a sigh of relief! But how many innocent people had died in the fallout of it? How long would those effects last?

He did not wake up in his bedroom the next morning. He woke up when a piece of rubble blew against his forehead. And he was surrounded by complete and utter waste. It was hot -- no, it was cold. He assumed it was loud -- no, he assumed it was quiet. There were a few fires burning in the snow, and there was plenty of rubble to spare. Nothing was standing. It was completely empty, completely desolate. 

He didn’t know where he was or how he got there. The more he explored, a terrified young boy trying to get home, the more he wondered when he was. 

A few weeks in, unsure of how he was still alive -- but not questioning it -- he came across a tunnel that led underground. Already figuring he was going to die if he didn’t find something fast, this was the first sign he’d seen of any life since he’d woken up -- he kept going, past extra doors until he reached one that was bolted shut and looked to serve as some kind of vacuum. 

He did not know it. He could not know it. But, on the other side of that wall, a radio picked up the first broadcast it had heard in ages -- some sort of morse code. A few hours of sitting against that final door that he could not even begin to open, it opened with a gust of air. He dragged himself in. It was shut with that same gust of air.

A man peered through a slit and, after hours of trying to communicate when all Monty could see were his eyes, a sentence of 1s and 0s... he stripped himself of his clothes, scrubbed himself with the water and sponge that sat in the corner, and was swiftly let into that final room and tossed a pair of clothes that were a few sizes too big for him. But he wore them, of course.

He was given half a can of uncooked sweet beans, half a bottle of water, and half of some... futuristic chip that he was prompted to sit on his tongue. and half of his nutrient requirements were met.

The man would point viciously to the radio, tap on it... all sorts of insanity that meant nothing to Monty until he took a sheet of paper and wrote out a cipher: morse code and the related letters. He, the man, couldn’t risk losing paper to the amount of letters in a word -- a few dots and lines were a quicker solution, and, as he told Monty, he could hear him over the radio... which would be cause for concern later.

what year is it ? ive stopped counting. i thought every1 was ded. where am i ? used 2 b canada. what happened ? the east. the east ? yes. what do you mean, the east ? ur not from here. no. where? illinois. america.  u dont know? i don’t. do u know what yr it is? it was 1945, last i checked.

He and the man spent the next four months together underground, the man eventually coming up with a way to express morse code without the paper. Tap Monty on the shoulder, make him watch him tap the wall in morse code. But it was far from paradise, and, more than that? Their supplies were running out faster than expected, what with the man only having prepared supplies for himself.

He volunteered to go look for supplies aboveground, but Monty realized that he was the one who was communicating through the radio. If something happened to the man, Monty would have no way to know; if something happened to Monty, however? So he left with a walkie-talkie, an extra coat, and half a canteen of water.

It grew colder and the conditions grew worse. By the time he finally found a few non-perishables locked away in a safe, he didn’t know where he was. He couldn’t find his way back to the man. And the signal only worked one way. So he had two options of what to tell the man: he was going to stay where he was, or he was going to keep moving and hope for the best.

If he did the former, there was a good chance the man would have to leave and try to find him. If he did the latter, he was diving further into the possibility that he’d never see that shelter again... but there was also that slim possibility that he’d be saving them both if he could find him... So he sent a signal that he was lost, but he was going to keep moving and hope for the best. The walkie-talkie wave seemed to tap against his mind, to offer the only description possible:  ‘goodbye, ed.’ ‘goodbye, monty.’

He was thirteen when he hopped again, this time quick as a flash. Hopped just far back enough to watch the missiles fall from the sky, cars ‘screeching’ to a halt, mothers holding their children close, and pulled forward just in time to survive the blast. This time, a different country. This time, closer to the fallout. 

There was no one for him this time, though. He was on his own. He sent out frequencies, but saw nothing. Felt nothing. 

Certain his streak of good bad luck had finally run out, turned to simple bad luck, he was only days away from succumbing to his hunger or his dehydration or the elements or all three... but, instead of dying, he woke up in his bed. In 1949. Four years after he went missing.

His family had been certain he, too, had died. Perhaps ran away first, gotten lost, then gotten himself killed. It had been four years after they woke up and didn’t find him in his bed, after all? Was it a miracle? Yes! Did it also feel like some kind of abomination, like something ungodly? Yes!

After the initial many-a-hug, they grew... frightened!He connected to the house radio and morse code played, explaining his unbelievable absence... but no one there knew morse code?! And no one there knew ASL?! And speaking took more effort than he’d like to put in, especially after all those years completely shut up?! Where was Mary to translate for him? Where was baby?

That much, he could express. Chicago. as Ed taught him how to say in morse code: what a goddamn shithole!

But, only moments later, everyone’s attention snapped to the radio. They understood what he was trying to say. After the initial shock, they were mouthing: we can hear you. With vicious points: the radio. we hear you.

-> Keep in mind, this is before mutants were a thing.

The story he told was completely unbelievable. But so was being able to hear his speech through the radio, so... live and let live...?

They did take note of how he began to draw more into himself. He became obsessed with this nuclear apocalypse he claimed to have witnessed, he drew a strange man with dots and lines underneath and hung it up in his room. He couldn’t focus in school and his grades suffered terribly. At 17, seeing he was still as distant as ever, still writing in morse code, still drawing that man 'Ed Gorrister' and trying to tell everyone who it was and what was going to happen and no he didn’t know the year or the details or- they had him institutionalized.

Before he could undergo more than two rounds of electroshock therapy, he was an 18y/o in 1962. Just in time for the Cuban Missile Crisis. And this time? Not only had he seen the after effects of nuclear bombings, he understood the magnitude of this threat. And this time? They were not fighting to free concentration camps and prisoners of war, they were fighting just to prove who was more powerful. They were building walls and sending dogs into space because they had to prove one was better than the other... and if they had to press the button to really show who was who, then they had to press the button. 

Was this the wasteland monty had witnessed? He didn’t know. He didn’t want to find out. He could put a stop to it somehow, right? He was the only person who’d seen both, as far as he was aware...

Traveling to the 70s, the country was still together -- and tensions were still high. Without any other ideas, he began doing what only idealists would think would work: sending false reports over radios and broadcasts. But instead of bringing people together through shared fear -- and shared gratitude that they were still alive when they learned that the report had been a hoax -- he just scared them, then brought them back to their regular lives (those who didn’t kill themselves or run to their shelters, that is).

He continued moving back and forth within the timeline of the Cold War, relentlessly trying to stop the crisis... but he only had so much he could do without making it even worse. He could activate it. If he wanted to, he could activate it.

In 1991, when the announcement that the Cold War was over was made, something in his timeline glitched. He spent three days in WWII, the first two being... entirely random to him, the final one being right there in D-Day... where he got to see that Jack didn’t go out blazing. And he was pulled just in time -- but this time, to three days in the trenches of the Vietnam War, a useless side effect of the Cold War. About to be taken prisoner, he was pulled forward into the year 1999 in the middle of a countdown to a new kind of apocalypse, just to be pulled SO FUCKING FAR forward into 2173... and he finally had reprieve.

But if WWII wasn’t the cause of the nuclear apocalypse, and if the Cold War wasn’t the cause of the nuclear apocalypse, then it still had yet to come. And the doomsday clock was moving fast.

Left in actual civilization and... no immediate peril in 2173 Sol City (it took him a while to figure everything out... didn't really understand why he'd been pulled so far forward, but there had to be a reason), he spent the next two years starting to cultivate a life. Every now and again, he would glitch to a different year for a few days, but the power he had never been able to tame... seemed to be beginning to tame itself as he spent more time in a calm, but focused, state of mind.

He took on a job as a factory worker, reminded of the few times he had spent working in factories as a boy! It was easier that way, too -- if/when Time threw him around, he was expendable. He began using the walkie-talkie he’d always held onto to transmit his thoughts across the microphone. A very standard American voice.

Suffice it to say, he's still... very confused as to why he is where he is and why he is when he is when. There has to be a reason, right? He's just waiting for the other shoe to drop, especially with how the world looks now... it'll drop at any moment, right? This is totally pre-apocalyptic and not post-apocalyptic!

TIMELINE:

yeah, things will just get confusing if we use years for this.

BORN - In late 2143... but was immediately yanked to Chicago, IL, USA, 1934. Completely deaf. Adopted pretty quickly. Already had three siblings... would have even more later on.

GENERAL EARLY SCHOOL YEARS?: Was discouraged from, sometimes punished for, using ASL at school due to oral education being at its peak. He was taught English, speech, and lip-reading, but that only extends so far. His eldest brother, Jack, learned sign to communicate and connect with him. The rest of his family was a little bit busy with the amount of kids...

AGE 6: At eighteen, his brother has a child with his first wife, Mary. Monty becomes an uncle.

AGE 7: Jack goes off to fight in WWII. Mary takes up his torch when it comes to providing Monty with company. 

AGE 10: Word is sent that Jack died fighting in the frontlines in the Normandy Landings.

AGE 11-12: Atomic bombs fall on Hiroshima & Nagasaki and everyone is celebrating. This is something that Monty both does and does not understand... Wakes up in the fallout of a nuclear apocalypse. It’s not 1945 anymore, it’s not Illinois anymore. He hopelessly travels around for weeks, unsure of how he’s alive! And, right as he’s sure he’ll be succumbing to the elements, he finds the passage to an underground bunker. After a whole series of events, he manages to get inside a safe place with a man named Ed Gorrister. Ed manages to communicate to Monty that he had sent morse over the radio. And when Monty doesn’t understand, Ed creates a morse-code-to-english-alphabet cipher and begins speaking to him using that as Monty communicates over the radio. Monty learns he’s in Canada, but Ed doesn’t know what year it is anymore. The cause of the 'atomic bomb' that had hit was ‘the east.’ They eventually devise a strategy that’ll use no paper at all: Ed taps Monty on the shoulder and has him watch him tap the wall.

AGE 13: They start running out of supplies. Ed volunteers to brave the elements, but, ultimately, Monty figures that he’s the one who can communicate through technology. If Ed tried to send word to him over the radio, he wouldn’t hear it, but the same couldn’t be said when it came to Monty. Monty took a walkie-talkie with him and traveled out. When he finally came across non-perishables, he realized he was completely lost. He decided to tell Ed that he was going to keep walking and hope for the best. They exchanged goodbyes. Monty felt Ed’s morse coming through the walkie-talkie. He hops back in time, just a few years, and watches as the missiles head right towards him -- whatever new country he’s in. Disaster occurs all around him as women hug their children and cars come to a sudden halt and the timeline saves him by mere milliseconds, jumping him forward a few months. He spends the next year trapped in this side of the wasteland with no one to talk to.

AGE 14: He wakes up in his home, just barely making it out alive. But it’s 1949. after a few mistrials, he communicates with his family over the radio. And they cannot believe their eyes or ears: first of all, he’d just literally spoken through the radio? Second of all, he... had been in a nuclear apocalypse? Not just missing? Hmm...

AGES 14-17: He is constantly preoccupied with this ‘fallout.’ He’s drawn into himself. he talks about it, he draws pictures of some guy with some symbols underneath... wtf?

AGE 17: His family decides to institutionalize him.

AGE 18: After going through two rounds of electroshock therapy, he is transported to 1962, just in time for the Cuban Missile Crisis.

AGES 18-28: The timeline decides it wants him right in the middle of the Cold War. He’s certain that this is what will bring the nuclear apocalypse if he can’t stop it. He goes about it by sending false broadcasts, hoping to unite people under gratitude when they come out with their lives... or maybe fear... or maybe love... but nothing seems to work. Everything he tries tends to just make things worse. He could activate it if he wanted to.

AGE 29: He’s in 1991 and the Cold War is over. With that news, the timeline fritzed. He was in WWII for a few days. The final day, he was by his brother and saw that he did not go out blazing. Then he was in the Vietnam War for a few days. About to be taken as prisoner, the timeline yanked him to a party he was not invited to on December 31st, 1999. It was in a bunker with a group of people counting down to the end of civilization. When the clock was one second away from hitting January 1st, 2000, he was pulled forward all the way to 2173. Aside from all of the weird technology and mutations, nothing seemed to be immediately off, unlike his past three destinations...

AGES 30-32: He begins building a life in Sol City. He still travels every now and again, but he hasn’t spent more than two days in a different time in years. Although he still can’t quite tame his power, it seems to be taming itself. He becomes a factory worker -- he needs an expendable position in case Time takes him away again, but he actually doesn't hate it! It's like when he was a boy! This is in the headcanons section, but it’s important to note that he also uses his walkie-talkie to talk to other people. Ever since it started translating morse into direct words, he doesn’t have to rely on sign, and what they say gets translated in his mind through the walkie-talkie. 

HEADCANONS:

He is completely deaf (his original FC was Nyle DiMarco, but... then it turned out he was a zionist :/). He is familiar with and fluent in ASL, but carries a walkie-talkie to communicate his thoughts and translate the words of others into morse code to ensure the general ability to communicate with anyone he comes across. (Yes, it would probably work with other devices. No, he is not going to give his walkie-talkie up to experiment with that.)

The walkie-talkie's VC is Norm from Phineas & Ferb alfjksad

Identified as straight until he was 15 (...i mean, the 1940s-50s + four years spent without other people, save for a few months with a guy closer to a father figure than anything else...). Identified as bi until he was 20. Identified as gay until he was 25. Identified as bi until he was 27... Has always really relied on the decade... Doesn’t fully know what to label himself as, simply uses queer.

Moving back and forth in the timestream has its pros and its cons. One pro? He can survive for weeks, even months, after traveling forward without food and water. Traveling backwards? He better get to some water damn fast.

His father had some sort of mutation related to bad luck, hence why Monty only seemed to travel to shitty historical events.

Has kept the clothes that Gorrister gave him to change into. Is not an artist, but does have a picture of a poorly-drawn ed hanging in his apartment with morse code for ‘goodbye’ beneath it.

Uses 30s-80s slang like any of it is still applicable. But with most of his childhood spent in the 30s/40s and most of his early adult years spent in the 60s-80s... Look at that tubular dish! She sure is groovy!

CONNECTION IDEAS:

mom or dad or sibling! How funny would it be... if you're holding your son... and then he just vanishes FLASJD I mean, it'd be tragic, but also! Anyway, I've actually sent this in as a WC because I think it would be so funny. Now idk how they would figure it out, what considering they would have no clue what the other looked like (Monty having been an infant when he disappeared, and Monty having no memories of his biological parents) + their surnames would be different, but... we can figure that out lFKJSD

all the regulars! i am brainstorming ideas but just general. yk. buddies, neighbors, interests, etc etc etc. i am tired <3

people whose relatives he knew! sure would've been from a while back, but the 1940s-1990s were a wild time !

[ilightmytorch]

Writing Goals: September 2024

Writing goals for the month, posting publicly because I think it encourages accountability:

Prepping: It's a month ending in -ember, which means I'm suddenly panicking thinking about NaNoWriMo. I don't have outlines for either of the novels I've started, but I could finish act 1 of both novels based on what I know now, so maybe I'll do that? But Season 3 needs work, too if I'm going to start releasing that in December. So, I need to give that some thought. Also, I should really finish the Scrivener tutorial and start using it so that I'm used to it by November. I will read a romance or two--I'm halfway through Jimenez's Just for the Summer and I'm in the queue for 5 books at the library, so the second will probably be whatever becomes available next. I also want to read Romancing the Beat, because I desperately need something to teach me some structure. Also, I bought a craft lesson because it was on sale, something like the 20 Minute Hero Makeover, so I need to actually work through that.

Writing: I technically have an apartment now, but no bed (until tomorrow, maybe), and for the first 10 days after signing my lease there was constant beeping from a smoke alarm with dead batteries so I haven't spent much time there. I'm going to need to devote some time to unpacking there as well as packing up my remaining stuff and helping dad clear out the house so that he can get it on the market. So, I think September is going to be another month where writing takes a back seat to other issues, but we shall see. I just checked, and I haven't finished a scene since 6/29. Almost 2 months, y'all. No wonder I feel like I'm not making any progress. I think the goal for the month is to pick a scene and stick with it until it's done instead of flitting from scene to scene like I've been doing.

Editing and Publishing:   I've wanted to have all of season 2 posted before NaNo, which means I have 2 months to post 12 scenes. That means I need to edit and publish The Emancipation, The Possession, The Headache, The Prom, The Chart, and The Guardian Angel. This month. And of course, I've edited the Emancipation on paper and I'm not happy with it, so that's going to slow everything up.

[science-lings]

Summaries of the AU's below the cut bc I know I'm going to be annoying about it

1- Set in a world that's just a bit more magical than we're used to, Trucy has actual magic, Edgeworth is a vampire, that type of thing, the first fic in this au is about 7k words in. Another important part of this AU is that Ryunosuke was Phoenix's previous form so there could potentially be fics in the TGAA era in this AU. Slow build on the lore aspect but the parallels with Edgeworth and Phoenix are going to be insane.

2- Fem!Phoenix (and Edgeworth and Larry) where a big part of the AU is that Phoenix has a stronger connection to the dead and is haunted by the ghosts of Ryunosuke and Kazuma, her spiritual abilities vary and the Magatama helps her see the ghosts around her. She's not really a Fey, her spiritual sensitivity is not due to her blood but the Fey's kind of adopted her, multiple times. The fic for this au is 18k words in and features some incredibly sapphic moments between her and Edgeworth. There was also a fic published for this au for Wright Family week.

3- Hear me out, Yatagarasu but it's Kay, Ema, and Phoenix, all working to end the dark age of the law. Big spy movie vibes. Ema is the tech guy who works as a detective for the LAPD and gets all the inside information, Kay is a full-on vigilante who sneaks into the computers and files of big important corrupt people, she narrowly escapes any confrontation with the police and is so fun about it. Phoenix is their connection to the criminal underworld through the less-than-legal happenings at the Hydeout and his accidental friendship with Viola Cadverdini.

I also think it's funny to bend his skills to make him a surprisingly good underground spy type. He's a good actor who can detect lies and can talk out of his ass for hours, he's also well known as the guy who got some of the scariest people locked away so he's got a reputation. And I want to come up with any sort of scenario where he has to act like Kay's dad for some mission and they run into Edgeworth specifically because I think I would be so funny. Anyway, badass beanix who totally sees that the girls in their early 20s that he works with are crushing on each other and is having too much fun being the distraction for their schemes.

Technically the fic I wrote where Trucy teaches Phoenix how to throw knives is part of this au. anyway, I could talk about them for hours let's move on.

4-Exactly what it says on the tin, Phoenix gets poisoned in college and loses his sight, maybe he grew up in a catholic orphanage so I can give him some classic catholic guilt, this one isn't as well thought out it's just a general vibe at this point. I just want to see Phoenix with some blue glasses who gets aided by Maya during cases and who kicks ass on the side because he doesn't completely trust the law to do what's right. He has that thing where he's so good at getting beat up. Also, poor defense attorney swag, keeps having a soft heart and taking cases pro bono. Idk I just think superhero-style AU's are fun to play with and this one made some sense.

[shrimpjuice]

Remember My Name

severus snape x reader chapter TWO

cw I didn't edit this or read over it even once so if it doesn't make any sense that's why

enjoy <3

Y/N came back to class just as the lesson was ending, so she silently crept back to Snape's desk, quietly writing down notes as he concluded the lesson. As she watched him pace around the front of the room, Y/N couldn't help but admire the way he practically glided around the room, the soft swoosh of his black robes could be heard every so often when he turned abruptly. 

His voice was wholly ensnaring, absolutely disarming, and probably the thing she liked most about her ex-professor. Every time he spoke, it was like a rush of adrenaline was injected into her veins, like magic, possibly. There were more than a few times Y/N suspected someone had slipped her a love potion. 

Not that this was love, no way, but everything about this man absolutely captivated her. But that did come with a downside, that being that she’d forgotten to take any notes until all the students were picking up their books and quills and chatting excitedly, obviously ready to leave class. 

Y/N cursed to herself for getting so distracted. She sighed and looked around at the students, all packed up and gathering by the class’s exit, which Snape was ushering them away from, since class wasn’t technically over. One student caught her eye, the boy from the hallway, handing a piece of parchment to Snape. The boy looked quite proud of himself, and said something that made Snape roll his eyes and mutter something to himself.

When the clock on the wall finally reached dismissal time, the students filed out hurriedly, to their next classes, maybe to their dorms. Snape went around to the desks with scraps of paper and other things left on them, picking up the messes left behind. Standard after every class, Y/N had noticed.

Y/N stood up and walked over to where Snape was standing, by the chalkboard up at the front of the class. 

“Did I miss much?” She asked with a grin, leaning on the wooden frame of the board. It tilted slightly as he settled on it, and she quickly stood up, rightly embarrassed. Snape paid no mind to this and silently handed Y/N a piece of paper, scribbled with teaching notes and the such. She looked over it in awe, looking up at the professor. 

“When did you have time for this?” 

Snape walked over to his desk and settled in his chair, reordering the papers on his desk, placing a quill back in its well.

“You asked for notes.”

“Yes, I appreciate it, but how,” She insisted, sitting in the seat at the end of the professor’s desk. “This is probably the entire lesson! There's no way you had that much time on your hands.”

“I had a student keeping track for you.”

“The Ravenclaw?” Snape nodded. “He's got nice handwriting,”

“Quite.”

“Well, thank you anyways, the Ministry is on my ass about everything these past few weeks.” 

“What a surprise.”

“Exactly.” She paused, then leant in with a sly smile on her face. “Speaking of…” Snape arched his brow, waiting for Y/N to continue. She deflated and rested her head on the desk, dropping the parchment to the floor and sighing. 

“I'm so behind,” she complained, gesturing to her folders upon folders of whatever. She peeked up at Snape, a pleading look on her face. “Flitwick won't help me, so I was hoping you could,” 

“And why won't he help you?” Snape said, pulling out a fresh sheet of parchment. 

“He said I'm responsible for my own work,” She groaned. “But it's not like the Ministry will know if you just gave me a bit of advice, right?” She pleaded, reaching out to pat his free hand. Snape ever so slowly pulled his hand from hers and sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose.

“I see you haven’t changed.” He sighed in exasperation. 

“But that’s a yes.” Y/N said matter-of-the-factly, hopeful. Snape nodded. “Okay, great so basically…”

—

As Y/N finished up her report, Snape sat back in his chair, reading over the curriculum book for Charms. Y/N hadn’t asked him for any help the whole time, she probably just needed the company. He set the book down, looking over at Y/N, who was furiously scribbling something down. 

“Which year are you assisting Flitwick with, Miss Elms?” He said in a flat voice, so much so it barely sounded like a question. Y/N looked up from her work, a smudge of ink on her face.

“Hm? Oh, mainly sixth years I think, whatever class that Harry Potter is in, why do you ask?”

“Out of curiosity.” 

“Glad to know you’re interested in my endeavors,” She joked dryly, accidentally smudging the words she just wrote. The misfortune of being left-handed I guess. “Speaking of Harry Potter,” She continued, setting down her quill and leaning in. “Have you gotten any news of… well, anything?” 

“This is not the time to discuss such matters, Miss Elms.” Snape scolded through his teeth, glaring at her with those captivating inky-black eyes. He flipped the textbook closed and stood up with a start, tucking his wand into his robe pocket. Y/N looked over at the clock.

“Study hall already?” He didn’t answer, so she picked up all her things and quickly followed him out the door, trailing behind him like a puppy. Y/N really did feel like one sometimes, despite how much he dismissed her or downright ignored her, there’s not much she’d refuse him. Not in that way, not really, but there were many other ways.

The pair walked down the corridors silently, the only sound being the shuffle of mice and the occasional flutter of an owl outside the window. Y/N’s eyes followed the way Snape brushed the long hair from his eyes, readily ignoring her gaze. She felt greedy, gluttonous even, watching this man go about his business, and here she was, eating up all that wondrous glory that was her ex-professor. She didn’t even particularly like the way he looked, just the way he carried himself, his aura maybe. She’d have to ask Trelawney about that at some point.

Finally, they made it to the Great Hall, where students had gathered to have lunch and chat with their friends, much like every other day at Hogwarts. Well, there was less chatting than usual, but it’d been like that since the start of the school year with the introduction of the new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, Professor Umbridge. She was sent by the Ministry, as was Y/N, but the two couldn’t be more different. 

First of all, in Y/N’s opinion, Umbridge (might as well call her Dolores, they’re coworkers after all) was much more… uptight. She was very rule following, rule enforcing. What a joy she must have been as a student. Well anyways, this rule obsession didn’t change when Dolores came to Hogwarts, as she was there to enforce them. 

The Great Hall, usually cheerful with the pleasant background noise of students chatting away, was dull and gloomy, conversations hushed and guarded. Some students, especially the first years, glanced around to make sure they weren’t overheard. 

“I’m so glad I graduated before she got hired,” Y/N whispered behind her hand, bumping against Snape’s shoulder. Well, more against his arm, he had to be almost a foot taller than her at least. He scoffed, strolling up and down the rows of tables.

“I can’t imagine working with the woman is much better.” 

“I can’t really pick and choose here, Professor.” 

“Obviously.” Snape answered flatly. Y/N turned to glare at him.

“Obviously–” She mocked. “Yes, I know, but I was just trying to make conversation, you know?” She argued, albeit playfully. She didn’t want to seem butthurt or anything. 

“We've got quite the magpie over here, now don’t we?” A shrill voice came from behind the pair. Y/N turned to see none other than her mortal enemy, Professor Umridge, clad in a baby pink ensemble, as usual. The tiny woman set her hand on Y/N's shoulder with a stiff smile. “Now, you should hurry back to your friends and stop bothering your Professor, alright?” She said sweetly. 

Y/N pulled her arm from Umbridge’s grasp, making a show of dusting it off with a grimace on her face. “We’re coworkers, Dolores,” She said with an exasperated sigh. “And I think he’ll be just fine, thank you. I find I’m quite a joy to talk to,"

“I’d say the contrary–” Snape interrupted, earning a sharp look from Y/N. He paid no mind to her glare, simply kind of just stood there. 

“Regardless, Dolores, I’m not a student,” Y/N continued.

“We wouldn’t want you being a bad influence on students though, now would we Miss Elms? especially with you being so young, such impressionable minds just tend to follow someone closer to their maturity.” Umbridge said, gesturing to the students that had stopped their quiet conversations to listen into Y/N and Umridge’s. Great.

Y/N huffed and rolled her eyes. She really didn’t want to embarrass herself anymore, and arguing with Dolores was always a losing battle. Snape had already walked away from the squabbling women, so she turned up her nose and went to look for him, ignoring the whispers of the eavesdropping students.

‘Back to your work, children, classes start soon–’ Umbridge said to the students as Y/N finally caught up with Snape, who was at the other end of the hall, scolding a couple Gryffindors for getting off topic. One boy, who looked rather disheveled, and rather familiar, was glaring at Snape. The other, a redheaded boy who was missing his tie, was scribbling something down with vigor, and turned to the boy glaring at Snape. 

“Harry, it’s just not… yeah I know… it’s just that…” Oh, Harry Potter. The green eyes, the black hair, the round glasses, no wonder he looked so familiar. He was the Harry Potter, the Harry Potter Y/N had the honor to meet at the graveyard the night that Cedric boy died.

link to prev chapter (one)

[passionmaterial]

Chapter 2 and The Bareahard field study is my favorite for a multitude of reasons, but I think most of it can be chalked up to it being a primarily Jusis and Machias-centered Chapter.

Screenshots and Insight under the cut ,and of course, Cold Steel 2-4 Spoilers as well.

Technically, this is a bonding event before the field study, but i always love vauge lines like this in different media, because it like..gets you thinking. Like, who told Jusis this? Considering what we learn later in the chapter, it doesn't sound like something his father would say, because his father would likely not give this level of advice. And his maternal uncle runs a restaurant Nobles frequent, but is likely a commoner, so it could be he heard that from someone and passed it to Jusis after he was taken in to the Albarea Household. My money is on that it was Rufus, though. It seems like something he would say, and considering how close Jusis is to Rufus, it would seem like Jusis would take things he had said to heart. And also, considering that Jusis never fully mentioned anything about his family aside from his father before now, it would make sense that he put it that way. And also, as seen below, this is the chapter where Rufus debuts.

Anyway, just my thoughts on it.

Anyway, Reason 1 for this being my favorite chapter: Rufus Albarea.

I laugh at how it says young noble, he's like 27, though that is somewhat young.

I guess after CSIV, it's just sometimes hard to believe that he started..like this. He's one of my favorites too, sure. But I don't ignore that what he has done, is not excusable. He has his reasons, but they don't justify his actions. Trails is really good at "villains aren't born, they're made. " I can't list a Trails characters that I loathe or hate. Sure, there are ones I don't like, like Irina, but I don't hate her. Sorry, I just have a habit of getting caught up when talking about Rufus. He's one of my favorites and I tend to have a lot of thoughts about my favorites.

Additional note : I love Rufus's outfit in this and CS2, The "Jade Rook" outfit as I call it. I think this one and his "Knight of Blood and Iron" outfit are my two favorites. I like the "Governor General" Outfit because it is kind of iconic, but there is a level of charm and simplicity to this one. Though, maybe its just the older animation style too.

Still on that topic, though, I do love Jusis and Rufus's relationship right now, but it makes them in cold steel 3 and 4 so much sadder because they used to be so close and its just..augh. i have expressed a love of complex sibling relationships, so that's probably just me. And also, that last line is just one of my favorites too. And Fie's line about Jusis being effortlessly thrust into the role of "cute little brother" afterwards.

Reason 2: Bleublanc

I mean this affectionately, Bleublanc is a little shit. But he reminds me of Vlad from Danny Phantom for some reason. Never truly been able to unsee that for some reason, especially when he has the mask. Maybe its the "Phantom Thief" thing. And the Sky Reference later was nicely placed.

Reason 3 : This scene in general. Good Jusis lore and just a generally nice scene.

Reason 4: Machias getting arrested. Important to the plot, and the reactions to it are hilarious. Such as Fie being revealed to carry smoke grenades with her, as well as being a former Jaeger, and then Jusis only wanting to rescue him to see his "tear-stained face"

Reason 5: I am still unsure if I want to think about the implications with this line. what do you mean, "thanks to your brother" WHY WAS RUFUS TEACHING YOU THE SEWERS.

Reason 6: The Rock Count

I have an image of it I might add later, but there is a required quest where you have to find a gem called a Dryad's Tear, and when you return you have to give it to this Count, who proceeds to consume the rock. Its weird and absolutely hilarious at the same time.

Edit: here's the image

[thegunssawyerstole]

BOOK 10: ELYSIAN SIGN UPS

ALRIGHT! I HAVE ENOUGH INTEREST, IT IS TIME!

First off, the outline of everything we will be using in our creation of book 10, or Elysian (Endgame is a great name, but Marvel), as I call it.

Next, everything I'm using in Elysian.

I am also tagging everyone who has helped me come up with ideas, as well as edited, since we share one braincell, and have a lot of similar things.

Sorry for cut it's LONG

@moonlarked

Marellinh

Council gets overthrown

Sophie gets to kill Mr Forkle

Alvar dies in Fitz’s arms

Sophie starts an human outreach program

Jensi remains Talentless and helps other Talentless

Exillium gets to be relevant

Tiertice adopt Tam and Linh and Rayni

Fedex

Ruy appears and does something idk

Trix joins up with the gang

@the-great-gullon-incident

Biana, Stina, and Dex team up

Biana has a sword

Sophie teaches the rest of the keeper gang about lgbtq+ people

Crazy fights

Gethen and Ruy show up to do stuff

They/them Elysian

All the mysteries are finally revealed

@stopstealingtomatoes

Lady Gisela to die

Amy to have a bigger role

Lord Cassius to either formally apologize to Keefe or else shove a stick in it

T h e r a p y

Ships to finally sail

@amandayetagain

Elysian’s big naturals

frognate rings

explicit language

vertina pagetime

more void lore

Sophie strikes out on her own and forms her own group

we learn about Keefe’s human friends

Details on some of the parents top secret missions (mentioned in their unlocked files)

Embarrassing middle name for keefe

foot power

Sophie channels someone’s heart/skull, or uses telekinesis on someone’s neck (it’s them or her friends. And she’s already lost enough.)

Biana and Sophie commit arson again (Neverseen)

@you-have-been-frizzled

JENSI PAGE TIME

the triplets

Kesline

Elwin officially adopting Keefe

Biana kills somebody (can we just bring Vespra back so she can kill her)

Tam gets hurt and Linh goes batshit

Bronte with curly hair

Sophie eats sweet and sour chicken to everyone’s horror

MORE ARSON

Alina redemption arc (literally wouldn’t suggest this but Ciara is the one running it and they’re part of the Alina deserves redemption club)

Dex losing an arm (his name means right handed it’s ironic oaky!)

Tiergan punches Quan song when he tries to say something to the twins

Sandor and Giselle scenes

KESLER AND GRADY BROMANCE I CANT BELIEVE I FORGOT ABOUT THEM

Juline and Edaline being sisters

Keefe and Grady bonding

Alvar isn’t dead and gets redemption

Caprice is relevant other than just being the crazy lady

@official-kenralie-fanbase

Sophie loses it during a battle to fulfill the whole "the moonlark could tear this whole place down" thing

Sandor finally has to dance in sparkly pants

Someone punches Alden

Or Cassius

Or both. At the same time.

More of Grady's mesmerizing please and thank you

Gradaline moments

Sophie's dad reveal (maybe do a poll on who people think that should be? I'm hoping for Fintan)

Oralie actually fights in a battle

Someone finds out about Oralie and there's a bunch of drama with all the people

@ever-blaze

more jensi, dex and rayni

jensi not manifesting an ability yet playing more roles in the story (eg. fighting the neverseen with a weapon or something)

keefe and fitz friendship moments/actually being best friends again

MORE OF THE TRIPLETS !!!

more backstories? tinkers maybe?

blur or wraith or tinkers identities

the return of the amazing amy foster

keefe’s human friends (hoping at least one is a celebrity) and human world adventures

------

Next, breaking this up. Anyone can join, I just need people to help organize this, and the plan is we sort it up by character/group, and eventually break it down into chapters, ordered by what would make sense in a basic plot structure. Then we will start figuring out technical things such as who is writing what.

Simply send me an ask or message if you're interested in helping me organize this!

And, if you have any and all suggestions, feel free to tell me!

REBLOGS >>>>>> LIKES

[ronearoundblindly]

U've been a literal trooper. All the drabbles are so intriguing, I could never. Can you write a fight and makeup for Steve? Since ure the angst queen this won't be in better hands with anyone else. Happy birthday, hope it's not belated yet?

Thank you for the bday wish, and it was not belated when this came in. My answer, however, is belated. Luckily, I think this is about the third- or second-to-last of the drabble asks...which rarely stayed drabbles. This is no different. >_<

Himbo (Warnings for angst, cursing, and not enough editing probably) ~1.3k

“I’m not stupid,” Steve shouts.

“I never said you were,” you push back without turning around at the sink.

“You called me a himbo.”

“It’s a joke, Steve.”

“Not to me, it’s not. Do you know how that makes me feel? I am all too aware that you have three advanced degrees and the last class I passed was in nineteen-thirty-seven. I don’t need to be reminded that you’re better than me.”

“Better than you?!” You finally round on him with a shriek two octaves too high. “You don’t get reminded every day by reporters and fans across the entire planet how lucky you are to be a complete package of cute little details that belongs to someone else. Thank god I got those three fucking degrees of lord knows I wouldn’t even deserve to be talked about much less date you!

“They go on and on about how I’m not good enough for you, but I make one completely and obviously inaccurate joke about you maybe—possibly—minutely not being good enough for me, and it’s call the fucking fire brigade?! Sorry, but welcome to my world, Rogers.”

“Yeah, but I never said those things to you. And you just said that about me in front of my friends.”

“Oh, so Natasha isn’t my friend, too? Good to know.”

“Keeps, you earned all this. You went to school. You built up your abilities and knowledge and all that.” Steve leans against the countertop, staring at the floor. “I just…didn’t die until some other, highly-intelligent, educated doctor came around and made me.”

“Horseshit, pity party.”

Steve doesn’t look up; he just crosses his arms across his chest.

“Well, the serum clearly didn’t make you better with women, so you’ve had to learn all that yourself—keep workin,’ bub. And the serum didn’t teach you military strategy. And it didn’t teach you empathy.” Your tone eases as you approach him. “It also didn’t magnify your sense of humor, so I’m gonna stick with my earlier statement of you are a himbo.”

You slowly approach and tuck your hand around one prominent and tense forearm. You can feel him breathe heavily. “And I love that about you. It’s one of the only things that makes me feel like we’re equals…because I technically stole Cap from the world. People don’t like to think you don’t belong to all of them, Steve, but if—I mean I take comfort in knowing you’re still like lots of men. I don’t feel like such a cheat then.”

“You’re not a cheat,” he moans, moving his hand to take yours.

“And you’re not dumb, Sketch. I shouldn’t have said it like that, but…I get torn down a lot. I don’t like feeling like I’m down here alone while you’re the Golden Boy on a pedestal because then I think…how can someone way up there think much of me.”

He’s soft, brushing his thumb down each of your fingers. “You know it’s not me though. I don’t say that stuff to you. It’s not true.”

“Steve. When was the last time you outright told a journalist they were wrong about me?” You let him think for a long moment. “Never.”

“Tony always advises us not to engage that kind—“

“You don’t openly defend your fiancé, but I’m supposed to grovel after saying a joke, in private, to one of your best friends who agreed with me and who—both of us—love you, as you damn well know?!”

How you got so riled up again, you’re not sure, but it feels like this is a long time coming. You’ve suppressed a lot of anger towards the media since day one of dating Captain America. You never meant to hurt his feeling or hijack his argument, but it just doesn’t feel fair to apologize for one word after being berated by thousands for months.

Steve returns to leaning against the counter. “I’ve been a media prop before. I’m not going to talk about my private life to make them a buck.”

“But they do make a buck, Steve, and they make it by saying I am the prop.” You want to scream, but instead you force the pressure far away so you can get your point across. “That’s not what I care about though. They’re gonna do or say whatever the hell they want. I can’t change that. You can’t change that. Tony is the only one who legitimately might know how, but still…

“I’m sorry. I was wrong to call you that. I didn’t mean to harm you. I meant—“ you hate admitting this is still something you need “—I only meant to build myself up a little. Just shouldn’t have done it by knocking you down, and I am sorry about that, Sketch.”

By this time, you’ve stepped back to the other side of the kitchen, hand waving to and fro to help fling off nervous energy.

Steve still doesn’t get—and has never really understood—how you can be so insecure. He sees you be confident one minute and then experiences your deflation as your energy fades. He’s gotten to know a much wider swath of humanity than most, and he struggles constantly with the right words to explain why you are so special to him.

Because it’s everything about you.

It’s anything about you that teaches him something new or shows him a different perspective or reminds him of the good and joy in life. It’s his most desperate wish that he show you what you mean to him, and with any luck he’ll succeed someday. He still doesn’t know how to do that, and it makes him feel like he never will when you call him that name.

People lash out. They aren’t perfect. You aren’t perfect, and he does know that. Hell, he just lashed out because he’s not perfect. He wants to be in your eyes though. He wants to see a magnificent reflection of himself so that he can believe it, too, and tonight, he saw the opposite. He felt small again, he felt rejected, and the worst part was that he felt rejected by you.

Except he’s learning something in the process. 

“I’m sorry, too,” Steve finally says, reaching for your waist. 

The more he thinks about what you’re saying, the more he recalls his own life in the ‘30s. He would watch girls at the dance hall while Bucky flirted. He saw them sit hopeful and ram-rod straight trying to catch the eye of a fella…but Steve’s now thinking about how so many girls didn’t look around at multiple guys. They focused on one, and when that particular fella didn’t make his way over, when each girl felt rejected, she deflated. She wasn’t really interested in just being nice to everyone who did approach for niceness’ sake. She just wanted to feel seen by the guy she was interested in letting see her.

It’s exactly the same thing he always sought out: the right partner. Steve may not have been as active searching for her, but they were all looking for something real.

No one wants to accept less.

No one wants to be less than what the right partner deserves.

“Call me whatever you want, doll. I can take it.” Steve relish how different it is to be around you versus everyone else. You make him so excited and so nervous and so calm. You’re just right for him, and he hates to think you don’t know that every second of every day. 

“Just please, Keeps, promise me something?”

He waits until you whine a little in acknowledgment.

“Tell me when you feel this way. I’ll talk you right back up to the sky.” He nudges you to raise your head and look at him. “I’ll do that all day…for you.”

And then Steve captures your lips for an oh-so-tender, bone-rattlingly passionate kiss that only a bimbo would mistake for anything short of true love.

[eponymous-rose]

Something I wanted to do in the New Year is be more aware of how I'm spending my time at work, so I think I'm gonna try to do little summaries here of what each day entails. Hopefully also kind of interesting/useful if anyone's interested in academia?

For reference: we're on the quarter system, classes started on the 3rd, and I currently teach one class per quarter (heavy research-focused department, so very light teaching load). I also currently supervise 1 PhD student, 2 Master's students and 2 undergraduate research interns.

Monday!

Checked email on the bus to work, which mainly consisted of me seeing a colleague had received an endowed professorship, me writing her an effusive congratulatory message, and then me editing back the message a bit so it was less embarrassingly over the top. Also sent my students a reminder about their homework due on Wednesday and our little field trip tomorrow morning and accidentally sent it to last quarter's class, whoops. Luckily a former student quickly notified me of my mistake and I got it fixed!

Class was great - lots of flipped-classroom stuff that worked well even with only two students in the room (it's a conference week, everyone's traveling). I knew from previous years that the students had really, really struggled with this one equation, so I had them do a couple of examples in class and after working through the first one together, they both nailed it on the second try. Had to cancel a meeting with one of my undergrad research interns after class because the other members of our research team are out of town this week. Where is everyone? Well, at a conference and doing a two-month-long field campaign on the east coast. Forgivable. She offered to send me some of the work she's done thus far, so that's handy!

Went to check email after class and found that apparently a new remote meeting had popped on my schedule for immediately after class with an old peer mentoring group of mine (fellow 4th-year assistant profs in tangentially-related fields - we all did a professional development course last year together). Luckily it was cameras off so I could snack and decompress a bit while we caught up and made some strategic plans for the quarter.

Okay, FINALLY time to check email in earnest before my next meeting. 36 new messages since I checked last. New software package I need to bookmark and keep in mind for later work. Updates from the conference I'm technically attending virtually this week. Reference letter request from an undergrad student; add to calendar! Title and abstract to get added to the website for a seminar I'm hosting in a couple weeks. Reminder that the Zoom recording of my class is available to put online (which I promptly did). Triple-check with our tech guy that we're good to go up on the roof tomorrow to set up instrumentation for my class's term projects (all good!). Time flies, so here's the email with research progress from my undergraduate research intern and a handful of questions, we'll answer those and see how she likes jumping into a new dataset. New grant opportunities, job listings, a bunch of easy stuff to mark off. An essay about allocating time each week into the categories of Teaching, Research, and Service and strictly adhering to the percentages laid out by your tenure/promotion committee. Got a few minutes before my next meeting so I'll try it this week? Ish? Maybe? Looked sidelong at the new schedule, sure, we'll try that this week. Sent an email to my collaborator who's on a field project to see if we can do a remote meeting tomorrow to chat about a couple research proposals. Queued an email for next week's seminar speaker to see if he can send me the title and abstract for his talk/PhD entrance exam next week - no sense freaking him out before Wednesday, so we'll do a scheduled send.

Next up, meeting remotely with my former postdoc advisor! We've set up these meetings to "work on research projects" together but honestly this week it was just listening to him tell a very entertaining story about his car breaking down in rural Missouri and also listening to him describe a truly tragic tale of his very fancy sandwich getting thrown out of the office fridge by accident. That's scientific collaboration, baybee. We did talk research for a bit and he mentioned wanting to collaborate on a paper (he offered to pay for it out of the much more substantial research funds that come with his 30 extra years in the field) so I'm gonna come up with something for that by our next meeting in two weeks. I like working with him - we've published a couple papers in some pretty high-impact journals and he's always let me take the lead and go for first authorship without butting in, only providing support - so this is a fun prospect! I do have to submit an abstract this week for a European conference that'll be happening this spring, so maybe I can go ahead and lean into that idea a little.

It's now getting a little dark and rainy and I'm flagging a bit but I still have an hour before the afternoon seminar, so probably time to do a little course prep. Did some "grading" (just checking completion certificates for an introductory module the students had to go through). Fixed a mistake in Wednesday's lecture (why is there an anemometer when I'm talking about thermometers???). Reviewed some of the more complicated topics in Wednesday's lecture to make sure I'm not totally lost (some thermodynamics I haven't looked at in a while, thermocouples, semiconductors). Replacement slides uploaded to our course management system.

Aha! Email back from collaborator, she's going to be on a research flight tomorrow and won't be able to meet. All good, I don't have much to report anyway. That frees up an hour tomorrow, woohoo.

Okay, students have a homework assignment due a week from Wednesday, so I'm gonna post it this Wednesday. I have a good homework assignment prepared, I just needed to go in and write up a nice answer key. Got that done (along with some sample Python code to provide them with) and the homework assignment is scheduled to be posted, so it's time to look at next week's lectures. I've inherited this class from someone whose course notes can be a little scattered, so this is usually a bit of a process. Only two lectures to prep for next week, though!

Took a break from lecture prep to go to today's seminar, which purported to be about a really dodgy geoengineering scheme (redundant descriptor, am I right?) but in fact just rigorously tested said scheme and demonstrated it would actually have the opposite effect. Super fun and interesting seminar!

Okay, back to working on lectures for next week. Somehow got both of next week's lectures done before the end of the day, so those should just need a little polish and they'll be ready to go! Uploaded them to the course management system but sneakily and they won't appear to students until I've checked them over.

Tomorrow: going to the roof with my students to set up their term projects, then tons of sweet, sweet, meeting-free office time carved out. Hope this doesn't come back to bite me with a million meetings on Wednesday (...it will).

Important: work is done by 5PM. I try very hard to adhere to "leave work at work", which is not as much of a pipe dream as it seems, even for R1 tenure-track.