#windows 11 launch date

[merchelsea]

Could you write something really fluffy about Lando Norris x reader? Maybe something were their relationship is fairly new and it’s only like the 2nd or 3rd race week the reader has been to and she starts to get sick. She doesn’t feel well at all and try’s to hide it from lando so he can focus on the race but he eventually finds out and is all worried and cuteee

worried sick — lando norris

pairing: lando norris x girlfriend!reader

summary: it’s her first time attending a grand prix and also flying and she doesn’t want anything to ruin her boyfriend’s race, but she gets sick in the process.

author’s note: sorry for taking so long to get to the heart of your request (fluff) but i needed to give context to his worriess

word count: 3k

warnings: curse words

masterlist | requests (open)

you sat on the dinner table, unable to speak. the fork fell from your hand the moment you heard lando's proposal and your eyes followed it's trail.

lando genuinely thought this would be a good idea, but seeing your reaction, with his eyebrows lifted, he may have changed his mind.

you had been dating for quite some time, four months and sixteen days, to be precise, but you were still a little aprehensive about the attention.

from the start, he warned you and gave you an easy way out of his life, but your love overpowered your fears.

even in a relationship, you and lando did everything you could to keep you out of the public eye, and it was working. no one knew about you and him and you liked that. but you were aware that he wanted you by his side while facing the adventures that his job provided him, and that he didn't want to keep you as a secret forever.

so when he made the invitation, it didn't surprise you, but you had to think about it.

you looked at him, he was wearing some jeans and a white hoodie that made him adorable in your eyes. he was looking at you, and you could notice him telling you it was okay to say no with his look.

but there was still a glimpse of hope in his beautiful green eyes, and in your mind you took another look at the pros and cons.

you could scratch out a couple of cons... like the fact that you liked being private. it was true, but you didn't mind not being a secret, and you would never like the idea of having famous and stunning women thinking that your boyfriend was available.

so with a soft look, in that modernly decorated dinning room in his home, you nodded your head.

"i think we could go to china together, yeah." he gave you a confused glance, but refrained from questioning you, afraid you would change your mind.

"great!" he stood up and walked over to you, "i love you," he whispered, pecking your lips before taking his empty plate to the sink.

you watched him come back and sit with you while you finished your own plate. you couldn't say you were hungry anymore, a hundred and one scenarios of what could go wrong in the hard launch of your relationship played in your mind.

lando's presence made it a little easier for you, though. you could only be thankful.

you had never traveled by plane before, so you were pretty nervous.

china was really far from monaco, and your boyfriend told you that the flight would take 11 hours minimum, so you couldn't help feeling anxious.

he held your hand when he noticed your strange behaviour and you immediately intertwined your fingers together.

"it's going to be okay, love." norris kissed the back of your hand and you walked inside of the plane, hand in hand.

of course lando booked the first class seats. he knew about this fear of yours, so whatever he could do to help you out, he would.

you sat down and lando closed the little blind on the window by his side, so you didn't see how far from the ground you were.

you had your headphones on and lando held you close as the plane started moving. you were still not off the ground but the plane shaking scared the fuck out of you. you closed your eyes and tried to focus on the music. it wasn't easy. it was only when the plain stabilized in the air that you could open your eyes again.

"do you want water, food, anything?" your boyfriend asked as he noticed you were a little more calm now.

"water, maybe." you answered, still not feeling completely safe. "and can you open the blind please, i want to see."

"'you sure?" he asked, his hand already on the end of the blind.

"yup."

lando opened up the blind and you peeked through the window. you were already far from the ground and instead of feeling anxiety, that view actually made you a little more calm.

"it's beautiful." you whispered, body leaning towards lando so you could see it better.

the british boy's eyes were on you when he whispered back. "it really is." with a smile.

eventually you sat properly in your seat again and talked to lando as time passed.

you fell asleep with and lando carefully laid your chair back, took out your headphones and covered you with a blanket. he laid his chair back as well and watched you as you slept peacefully. you still had nine hours left and he knew you would be awake for the landing, which he didn't want.

you could only manage to sleep for 2 hours and when you woke up, you noticed your boyfriend sleeping. so the next hours were spent playing games in your mobile phone while you listened to taylor swift.

it wasn't as painful as you thought it would be, and it was only when landing that you felt the uneasy feeling come back. lando held you close through it, as he was used to it.

"it's okay, baby." he whispered. "i'm right here." his reassurence meant more to you than he imagined, and it helped as well.

everything went better than expected and you left the airport hand in hand just half an hour after getting out of the plane.

you felt tired, but it was still morning in china. lando seemed okay, he was already used to all the time changes, since he did this for a living.

"what d'you think about breakfast?" he asked as you passed a coffee shop.

lando was driving to the hotel you two would be staying in, and you honestly just wanted to rest. but you could'nt say no to a good breakfast.

"oh, great idea. i'm starving." you said and he chuckled.

"me too." he stated as his hand found place in your thigh. it stayed there until he needed to use it, to change gear.

he parked the car in front of the cute shop and you both walked in.

you both ordered and sat down talking to eachother until the food came. the driver explained the goods and the bads of the race here. and told you what he liked most about china.

you had done some research about the place yourself because you wanted to take profit of your time here.

as lando would probably have some meetings with the team and you would be alone, you decided to visit some interesting places of the city and even near cities.

you ate in a comfortable silence and left for the hotel as soon as you could. his team took care of the check in so you and him were able to just go straight to your room.

you felt yourself a little too soft, but never said anything because you didn't think it was anything serious and worrying him was something you were not going to do.

deciding to take a nap before doing anything, lando wrapped his arms around you and pulled the blanket over your bodies.

"i love the feeling of having you here." he murmured to your ear.

"i love being here with you." you told him honestly, falling asleep some moments later.

lando though it was weird, since you normally took some time to get to sleep, specially in new places.

when you first stayed the night at his place it took you two hours and a really boring movie.

he remembered it could've been caused by the flight or the time difference. the british was now used to it, but it was your first time, and it was a long flight.

he fell asleep thinking about it because, being honest, you were both more than exhausted.

you woke up just a couple of hours later, coughing, and imediately realized you had gotten sick, and were just in the first stages. you got up from the bed and went to the bathroom so you didn't disturb lando's sleep.

"this can't be happening" you whispered to your reflection in the mirror.

'it can be just a cold, everything will be okay in time for the race' you thought to yourself, trying to calm down.

it was frustrating, to be fair. you had been avoiding coming to his races for months, and when you finally decided to come you got sick.

however, you did not want that to get in the way of lando's weekend, so through the next two days, in which your boyfriend had free practices and qualifying, you pretended to be okay. it was not so easy because norris made every effort to make you feel okay there. that means he talked to every one of his mates and asked them to talk to their own girlfriends, to see if they were interested in meeting you, for his delight but not so yours, they all said yes.

so you were not only busy with pretending to be healthy but also trying to be nice to everyone and making people like you.

it wasn't that hard, you all just found something in common, that was your love for fashion and animals, and talked about it. you were pretty satisfied with the outcome of saturday, and so was lando, managing to get himself on fourth position, with two cars ahead he knew he could get out of his way.

he was starting to find your behaviour a little weird, as soon as you got home you took a really quick shower and got yourself comfortable in bed. he asked you if you were not going to get dinner with him and you told him you would just take a little nap, and asked him to wake you up once the food arrived.

the brit did as you said and tried to wake you up, but you told him you were not hungry in the moment. he made you eat anyways, because tomorrow was a big day and you didn't really have the energy to argue with him.

you both had a good dinner and what was his surprise when you got back to your bed and immediately fell asleep.

he tried to push his suspicions away but he was seriously getting worried. he laid next to you and held you close with one arm, the other resting behind his head as he thought. not only about you and your strange sleeping schedule but also about the circuit.

there was this one curve that he just couldn't get right, and he needed to get it tomorrow. or else he'd lose his chance of a podium or even a win.

he would never want to lose a podium, but with you here, the pressure was different. he wanted to do better for you. he needed to, after dragging you all the way to a new country and making you face your fear of planes.

he eventually fell asleep, your body so close to his comforting him and calming his mind that was going probably faster than his car.

you woke up first, in the morning. but, unlike the other two days, where you managed to get it together and pretend you were okay, today you had a huge headache along with an unbearable malaise.

immediately realizing you were not okay, you decided to not go to the track with lando. you were still planing to go, yes, but later on, after you took some medicine and felt better.

he was a little reluctant in letting you all by yourself because something inside him still thought that something was off. sleeping a lot, not feeling hungry, avoiding his touch and kisses (you did that once, but he still took note), it all felt a little weird.

but you convinved him, telling him that he no longer had time to wait for you and you still needed to get dressed and do your makeup.

"i'm going. but message me as soon as you get to the track, please. i want to see your pretty face before getting in the car." he asked you, his beautiful green eyes focused on yours.

you nodded your head and he pecked your lips. smiling, he turned around and left the hotel room. you decided to take a shower to see if it helped in any way.

it didn't.

you grabbed your phone and searched for lando's personal assistant's contact. someone needed to be informed about this, but you didn't want to alarm your boyfriend just before the big moment of the weekend.

he was really sweet to you, and suggested you stayed in bed and watched the race from the hotel. you were a little apprehensive about how lando would feel about this but he tried to calm you down as best as he could, telling you he knew the driver would understand and probably even be more worried than anything else.

he also promised to only tell lando once he couldn't do anything about it. of course you had asked.

was he going to be pissed? probably. did he love you more than anything and would he forget about all the rest in order to check up on you? absolutely.

once he was told about it, the only thing he could do was text you, so he ran to his phone and quickly wrote a message to you.

'baby i was just informed. i'm so sorry for not noticing.'

your heart clenched in your chest as you read his text. it was not his fault and you felt bad for making him believe that it was.

'it's not your fault, lan. and i'm okay'

you added a little heart at the end and sent it, automatically seeing the 'read' under the blue text baloon.

'you sure?? i can get someone to get you to a doctor'

you smiled at the screen, behind that smile was the way he didn't even hesitate to show you he cared and he worried.

'there's no need, i took some medicine and i'm better now. but good luck on the race. i'll be rooting for you.'

on the other side of the screen, lando sighed, he hated that he couldn't do anything about it but knowing you were okay comforted him a little. so he smiled and typed to you.

'thanks babe! i will be coming back to you as soon as i can, promise you.'

you simply liked his message, letting him focus before the race.

on the bed, you watched the entire race, as you always did. and you were so genuinely happy and proud of him for finishing second, that for a couple of minutes you even forgot you were sick.

you watched the podium celebrations and couldn't help but notice that your boyfriend wasn't as happy as he should be. of course he smiled receiving the trophy, and sprayed champagne on the other podium sitters, which were max and checo, but you knew him, and his smile wasn't as wide as usual.

you sat through and watched the interviews on sky sports. it seemed that you were not the only one who noticed his under-excitement, because that was the first thing the journalist questioned.

"so, lando norris. you just came second here in china. first of all, congratulations. second of all i have got to tell you that all of us were expecting a different reaction from you. you don't seem very excited."

he looked at the woman behind the camera atentively, but anyone with functional eyes could see that his mind was elsewhere. he smiled briefly at the end of her statement.

"well, thank you. and yeah, i'm not in the best mood but that has nothing to do with the race. i know i did my best out there and gave everything i could. unfortunately, max was still there, but we'll keep working, as a team, to get to him."

he smiled and the interview continued, as usual he discussed some technical stuff and gave his perspective on some bits of the race.

"right now i just want to go back to the hotel, to my girlfriend, who isn't here because she got sick, and give her all the love she deserves."

he smiled to the camera and left, leaving the space for others. you saw him walking with oscar behind alonso, who was now giving his own interview.

it didn't take long before you got a message from him, telling you he managed to escape some media duties to go back to you.

you smiled to yourself before answering, and then distracted yourself until you heard the door being unlocked.

jumping from the bed, you rushed towards your boyfriend when he arrived.

"easy there, baby." lando pulled you into a hug, one of his hands in your hair while the other circled your body.

"amazing race, my love." you whispered into his neck. he smiled and when his grip loosened, his lips met yours in a quick but lovely kiss.

"you've got me worried sick, you muppet." he smiled, but looking into his green iris you knew he was serious.

"didn't mean to worry you, i'm sorry," he shook his head and softy kissed your temple.

"don't be sorry. but nex time it happens, let me know. i wouldn't have made you go to practices and quali, and you could've rested."

his fingers caressed your hair and he pulled you to lay your head in his chest. you would never know how worried he got, and how he could only rest his mind after having you in his arms.

"i just didn't want you to worry unnecessarily. i thought i could go through it." your eyes made it possible for him to know that you were being honest. he let out a sigh.

"it's not unnecessarily, you stubborn thing. i love you and i care about you, and i wanted to be here for you." you pull your head back and lock eyes with him.

"i love you too. and thank you."

he kissed you again, all smiley.

you both decided to just lay in bed and do nothing for the rest of the day. you ordered dinner hours earlier, so you didn't have to worry about it later.

lando told you all about his race. from the lights out to the checkered flag he talked you through his decisions and his process of thinking in the moment.

he also kept asking you from time to time how you were feeling and if you needed anything.

you realized just how much you loved him and appreciated the way he cared for you.

once he fell asleep, you smiled out of pure happiness for having him by your side. no matter how much you had liked being kept a secret for a while, in that moment all you wanted was for people to know you loved him.

cause you did, more than you thought you could.

© merchelsea

if you'd like to be tagged in any of my future works, let me know ;)

[wokealqaeda]

Denis Muravyov (August 14, 2001 – November 14, 2016) and Katya Vlasova (September 10, 2001 – November 14, 2016) were two 15-year-old teenagers from Pskov, Russia who barricaded themselves in a private house in Strugi Krasnye on the afternoon of November 14, 2016 and opened fire on police officers before committing suicide. They showed the whole event on their social media pages, broadcasting on Periscope and calling themselves the Russian Bonnie and Clyde. The case caused a wide resonance and discussion online.

Denis Muravyev and Katya Vlasova met at school in the spring of 2016. After meeting, Muravyev and Vlasova added each other in VKontakte. The two continued to meet in person and soon began dating.

His mother found out that Denis had a lover by accident. During spring break, her son went to spend the night at a friend's house. It turned out that that evening Denis had gone to Katerina's house for a walk. After that incident, his mother forbade Denis to communicate with Katerina.

On the morning of 11 November, Muravyev took his mother's bank card from her bag, which he used to withdraw money for two tickets for a shuttle bus to Strug Krasnye.

Muravyev and Vlasova ran away from home following a quarrel with their parents. The parents started searching for them and called the police.

On the afternoon of 14 November, the teenagers were found in a dacha house 80 kilometers from Pskov, belonging to the Vlasova's stepfather. There the schoolchildren had been hiding from their parents for three days and planned to “sit out".

The teenagers barricaded themselves in the room, opened the stepfather's safe, which contained weapons. Shortly before that, Denis wounded the girl's mother who had come to the address to look for them.

On Monday, a police car pulled up to the house on Kudryavtsev Street. The teenagers opened fire at her from the second floor window, the police tried to negotiate with the teenagers for several hours, eventually deciding to launch an assault.

Before the suicide, the teenagers posted identical farewell messages to their relatives on their VKontakte pages, accusing them of “destroying their psyche and lives".

[maincharactermuse]

The one where there is overthinking. (9)

(Find my masterlist here)

Y/N woke to the smell of espresso that wasn’t hers. Which was odd, because she lived alone.

Her mind blinked awake slowly - just the sounds of the city through her open window, the dull ache in her shoulders from too much time hunched over a baking bench yesterday. No stranger brewing in the kitchen. Just muscle memory: a phantom scent, a thought that had wandered in from a dream of Harry’s house - warm wood, colder marble, and that stupidly beautiful La Marzocco machine that probably cost more than her rent.

She sat up slowly, duvet tangled at her waist, and blinked toward the light slanting through the curtains.

At what point does someone become your boyfriend?

Was it something you earned? Asked for? Grew into like a new pair of jeans - slow, unnoticed, until one day someone says that fits you? Or was there a moment, a spark, a declaration? A knock on the door, maybe. Hi there. Just here to let you know: congratulations, you have a boyfriend now. Terms and conditions apply.

She snorted softly at herself and padded into the kitchen. Turned on the kettle. Stirred honey into her yogurt with more intensity than was probably necessary.

It wasn’t that she needed the label, exactly. It was just… she liked knowing where she stood. Always had. In a relationship, in her work, in a bakery queue. And lately, things with Harry felt like standing on one of those moving walkways at the airport - things were going forward whether she walked or not. She just wasn’t sure where they were headed.

The kettle screamed. She poured the water, let the tea steep, and grabbed her phone.

Harry

Farmer’s Market at 11?

Will trade you peaches for my company.

She stared at it for a second. Smiled. And then, because she couldn’t help herself, copied and pasted the message straight into her group chat.

group chat: the coven 🔮

Y/N

He just texted

“Farmer’s market at 10? Will trade you peaches for your company.”

Is that a date or… a produce-related errand with benefits?

Noor

It’s a fruit-forward soft launch 💅

Go. Wear something vaguely effortless and make him carry everything.

Grace

That’s at least a date-adjacent activity.

Did he use a peach emoji tho

That would push it into horny territory.

Y/N

No peach. No winky face.

Just… sincerity.

Noor

Omg the intimacy 😭

Grace

You realise you’re already dating, right?

You’re just too emotionally stunted to say it out loud ����

Y/N

OK rude but not inaccurate

Do people still have like… “the talk”?

Like when does it become a thing? Is there a ceremony?

Noor

The Ceremony of the Boyfriending™

A council appears. Rings are exchanged. You delete Hinge.

Grace

He seems like the “acts like your boyfriend for 6 months before saying it out loud” type tbh

Good hair. Terrible communication.

Y/N

Wow

Seen

Attacked

Buying jam anyway.

She laughed into her tea. But underneath it - underneath the ease, the teasing - there was still that quiet hum in her chest.

Do you see me like that?

Is this where we’re going?

Would you say yes if I asked?

———————————————————————————

Parliament Hill Markets were already buzzing when she spotted him. Gray shirt, dark trousers, sunglasses, carrying two canvas bags like he did this every weekend.

He hadn’t seen her yet. She stood still for a second and just… watched.

This was becoming a pattern - her life folding into his, quietly, one scene at a time. Not big, sweeping gestures. Just stolen mornings. Coffee that tasted like something else. Late-night texts about nothing and everything. Peach invites.

“Hi,” she said, stepping beside him.

He looked up. Smiled that slow, slightly surprised smile - like he wasn’t quite used to her showing up yet, but liked it every time.

“You came,” he said.

“I wanted peaches.”

He handed her one of the bags. “And good company?”

She shrugged. “Jury’s still out.”

They walked side by side, easy rhythm. But there was no contact - not even a brush of shoulders. Too many eyes. She understood. Still, she felt it - that space between them, measured and deliberate. Not unfriendly. Just… intentional.

They wandered between stalls, weaving through crowds. He picked out nectarines while she haggled over berries. Argued passionately over jam flavours — he said raspberry was king; she called it a coward’s choice.

“Strawberry’s basic,” he insisted. “Raspberry’s got edge.”

“Raspberry seeds are a war crime,” she muttered.

He grinned, handing her a sample from a vendor. “Here. Try this and tell me I’m wrong.”

She tasted it. Paused. Licked her lip.

“I hate that you’re right.”

He beamed. “Victory is sweet.”

At one point, a woman at a flower stall called out, “You again! Where’s your mum this time?”

Harry smiled politely, then gestured to Y/N. “She’s back up north. This is Y/N.”

Just that. This is Y/N. No qualifier.

The woman looked at her and smiled. “He always buys tulips for someone. You must be lucky.”

“Oh-” she started, but Harry jumped in, buying the flowers quickly, nudging her away.

Y/N walked quietly for a minute, tulips dangling from her fingers.

No qualifier.Just Y/N.

She hated how much she noticed.

———————————————————————————

“Okay, random question,” she said instead, tugging the tote higher on her shoulder. “What’s your most controversial food opinion?”

Harry’s brow lifted. “Besides the strawberry-thyme jam being elite?”

She gave him a dry look. “Besides that.”

He thought for a second. “Alright. I don’t think avocados are that good.”

She stopped walking and turned to stare at him. “You’re joking.”

“I’m not.”

“Harry.”

“They’re bland. Weird texture. And you all act like they’re some kind of edible gold.”

“Okay, wow. I don’t even know who you are anymore.”

“You just accused me of jam treason. Let’s not pretend we’re not both food criminals.”

She narrowed her eyes, pretending to be deeply offended. “I can’t believe I’m possibly not-dating someone who slanders avocados.”

His lips twitched. “Possibly not-dating?”

Shit. That slipped out.

“Hypothetically,” she amended quickly, brushing a bit of hair behind her ear. “If I were not not-dating you. I’d be concerned.”

He didn’t say anything for a beat. Just looked at her - really looked - and she could feel the air shift slightly. That thrum of something unnamed between them, hovering.

Then he smiled. “Well, hypothetically. I’ll allow it.”

They started walking again, side by side, his hand swinging just close enough to hers to make her fingers ache with wanting to reach for him.

But they didn’t. Not yet.

They reached the edge of the canal, where the path split off toward the little cafés and vintage shops. Boats bobbed gently nearby, flowers spilling from their windows like they belonged in a painting.

Harry slowed. “Wanna grab a coffee?”

Y/N opened her mouth to say yes. She wanted to. She wanted to spend more time with him, to sit across from him and pretend they were just a normal couple doing normal couple things.

But something tightened in her chest. It wasn’t him. It wasn’t anything he’d done. It was just… the weight of not knowing. Of feeling so much and not knowing where to put it. She tucked a piece of hair behind her ear. “Actually… I might head home. I’ve got some stuff to do before tomorrow.”

He didn’t press. Just nodded once. “Alright. You sure you’re okay?”

She smiled. It wasn’t a lie. Just a version of the truth. “Yeah. Just tired.”

He looked at her like he could see through it, but didn’t say anything. “Text me when you get back?”

“Of course.”

They stood there a beat longer, and she felt that pull again. The one that made her want to reach for his hand, to kiss him, to say what are we, actually?

Instead, she just smiled.

He leaned in like he might kiss her, but pulled back at the last second—his gaze flicking toward the people nearby. Cameras or not, there was always someone looking.

So he just squeezed her shoulder gently. “Later, then.”

“Later.”

She turned and walked away, the tote bag still heavy on her shoulder, heart heavier. She didn’t look back, but she could feel him watching her go.

———————————————————————————

group chat: the coven 🔮

Y/N

Okay. I think I’m not NOT dating Harry. I’m also dating him.

Idk what I’m saying

Noor

men just assume you’re dating them when you remember how they take their coffee

Grace

Lmfaooo Noor

Y/N seriously though, what happened?

Y/N

Nothing. I mean, we hung out. It was nice.

We walked. Argued about jam.

He looked really good in a stupid cardigan

I almost said something but then I got in my head and left like I had a dentist appointment

Noor

Noooo babe 😂

Jam walk cardigan angst???

Grace

The rarest kind of emotional spiral

Y/N

I just… I really like him

And I don’t want to ruin it by being like “sooo are you my boyfriend?”

But I also don’t want to accidentally become a situationship because I was trying to be chill

I’m not chill. I’m warm. I’m room temperature. I bake things when I’m anxious

Grace

Okay but he likes warm

He literally goes to your café just to look at you over banana bread

Noor

You don’t have to figure it all out today

You can just… tell him when it feels right

You’re allowed to want clarity, babe. That’s not needy

Y/N

God you’re both so emotionally stable it’s disgusting

Okay

Okay. I’ll chill. For now.

But if he pulls out that jam again I’m walking into the Thames

Grace

Pls do

We’ll come with prosecco

———————————————————————————

Nana

Hi, baby. Just checking in — how’s your heart today?

Y/N

A bit noisy

I’m fine

Just… wondering when you’re supposed to say something

Like… how do you ask someone what this is without sounding like you’re trying to trap them in a net?

Nana

What happened?

Y/N

Nothing, really

Harry and I had a nice day

But I left early because I was overthinking every second of it

I want to seem cool and calm and unbothered but also like…

Can someone just tell me what’s going on 😭

Nana

You want to know if you are safe to hope

That’s not silly. That’s human.

Y/N

Yes exactly

That!!

Like how do I know it’s going somewhere

Do I need to wait until he says something? Or am I allowed to go first?

Nana

Labels are lovely, but they don’t build the relationship.

The daily kindness does. The showing up. . The way you feel when he looks at you.

If you still need clarity after that, you’re in your right to ask for it, lovie

Y/N

God why are you the wise one

I thought I was supposed to be the modern one here

Nana

I’ve just lived longer.

And made more of a mess of things 😌

Y/N

Nan.

You literally got married after two weeks

Nana

Exactly.

That’s why I know it’s okay to ask the questions

Y/N

You’re ridiculous

Thank you

Love you

Nana

Always.

Now go drink water and stop overwatering your thoughts

———————————————————————————

Harry

Hey

Don’t wanna overthink it but

Felt like you left a bit fast today

Everything alright?

Y/N

Yeah 😅

Sorry

I was just… in my head a bit

But I’m okay

I always like hanging out with you

Harry

Okay

Wasn’t trying to push, just wanted to check

You sure?

Y/N

Yeah

I mean, I like hanging out with you

Like kissing you

Love doing… other things with you 🍆🔥

Harry

Oh my god

You’re unhinged

Can we ever have a serious conversation

Y/N

You started it by asking if I was okay!!

I’m trying to answer in a mature and deeply honest way

Harry

Mature and deeply honest

With an aubergine moji

Y/N

Balance is key 🤷‍♀️

Harry

You’re ridiculous

But

I like all that too

(Especially the other things)

Y/N

I figured

Sorry again about today

Just got in my own way for a second

Harry

It happens

I’m glad you told me

Y/N

I’m free tomorrow after work

If you want company

I could bring over dinner

And by dinner I mean just me and maybe half a chocolate cake that’s been left over from the café

Harry

Perfect

You and half a cake is all I need

Text me when you’re close?

Y/N

Will do x

[plussizefantasia]

CozyTober Day 10: Unsanctioned Halloween Party

Tony Stark x wife!reader, with a healthy dose of Iron dad thrown in

WC: 1.1k

a/n: This one kind of got away from me and I left the end kinda open in case I want to come back someday but I like how it turned out. Reblog if you liked it and Day 11 should be out in a little bit (i'm working on it as we speak)!

You used to think that couples' costumes were cheesy and unoriginal. Then you started dating Tony, who could sell a hair dryer to a bald man and suddenly you were wearing couple’s costumes every year. You two had gotten to the point that you felt the need to one-up your own costumes every year because literally nobody else was on your level. This Halloween you had gone to the ‘Stark Spook Spectular’ together as Beetlejuice and Lydia, you in the poofy red dress and Tony in the classic black and white suit and crazy wig.

You had partied the night away with your friends, danced, drank, and did some truly epic karaoke. When the clock struck 1:00 am you bid your goodbyes and had a car drive the two of you to your brownstone home a couple blocks away. 

“Wonder what Pete’s up to?” Tony spoke into your hair as the two of you leaned into each other in the backseat.

“He said he was gonna go to Ned’s and watch some scary movies while eating his body weight in candy.” You think back to the conversation you had had with your non-quite son earlier that day when he had stopped by after school.

“Good. Normal kid stuff.” Tony replied pulling out his phone. He had a habit of doing that when the two of you were on the way home. He would check in on the security system from his phone, you supposed it was so he could be ready for any situation he might walk into.

You weren’t expecting his shout of “What the shit.” and the way he suddenly sat up and more-or-less launched you up into the air. 

His small mutter of apology was quickly overshadowed by Tony shoving his phone in your face, the live feed of your living room displayed on the screen.

There, in plain view of the camera was Peter Parker, frantically trying to keep the nearly 200 hundred teenagers that filled your house from destroying the place. It would be adorable the way he threw coasters down and pushed shoes off your coffee table if you weren’t so pissed that the kid had thrown a party in your absence.

It wasn’t long before you turned the corner onto your street and could see and hear the damage for yourself. Lights strobed out of your windows and you could hear the music that was blaring even in the car with the windows rolled up and down the street. 

The car slowed to a stop in front of your house and you jumped out of the back, not even waiting until the wheels stopped rolling. Tony paid the driver and raced after you entering the front door only seconds after you did.

The music while appropriately themed for a Halloween was about 15 dB too loud and drowned out whatever your husband was trying to tell you.

You wove through the throngs of teens, glaring at any who dared to make eye contact with you and tried to make your way to the access panel in the kitchen. The only physical interface for FRIDAY is on the first floor. A few buttons later the music stopped. 

Shouts of confusion and anger were heard but none really registered in your mind. A frantic Spider-boy slid around the corner and into view, his arms laden with empty bottles and glasses.

“Hey, who touched-” He stopped. His face drained of color and he froze right where he was. 

You cocked your hip out and put on your strongest don’t you dare face. You ran your tongue across your front teeth and tsked at him which was enough to startle him from the “freeze” state he had succumbed to.

‘Mr and Mrs. Stark!” You didn’t even notice Tony was standing behind you, his own dad-face activated and in full force. “I-I can explain.”

“Don’t.” You put your hand up. “Even bother.”

You took the deepest breath in the history of deep breaths. “If you do not live here you have ten seconds to get out.” Nobody moved. 

“Ten. Nine.” Tony started counting behind you and every single person in the house jumped into motion. 

Teens spilled out into your front yard and you’re even sure you say some start to climb out of windows, too afraid that they would still be within the walls when Iron Man reached zero.

You waited for the house to empty, dead-eyeing kids as they walked past you, before turning back to a pale-looking Peter. Still standing in the same spot and with arms still full of trash. 

“Here is what is going to happen. We-” you motion at Tony and yourself “are going to go upstairs and change out of our costumes. You are going to clean however much you can during that time and then we are going to talk about this.” 

“Don’t leave, I know where you live.” Tony tossed his way before ushering you up the stairs and into your room. He helped you unzip your dress and you took his wig off for him.

“Is it bad that I’m kind of happy?” He spoke up.

“Only if it’s bad that I am too.” You responded. “Why are you happy?” You ask him.

“I just get so worried about the kid, I mean he’s so smart and he’s got the whole world on his shoulders. I just wish he’d loosed up sometimes.” Tony spoke with a rare vulnerability in his voice. “What about you?” he asked back, “Why are you happy.”

“Well, I know that we’re not his parents, I know that. But it’s kinda nice to have these normal moments ya know? It feels like tonight, we’re not owners of a multi-billion dollar cooperation and celebrities and spies and superheroes and all of the million things we are every other day. It just feels like we’re Mr. and Mrs. Stark, and our son has just thrown an illicit party while we were gone and it’s all just so very… normal.” 

During your rant, you slowly walked across the room so that you were standing behind Tony. You wrapped your arms around his middle and rested your forehead on his back. 

“I think-” you paused, “I think it’s okay that we’re happy, as long as we don’t tell Peter.”

Tony’s frame shook as he laughed and you could feel the slight tension he was carrying bleed out of him.

“We better get down there, kid’s probably freaking himself out way more than we ever could.”  Tony moved you in front of him and kissed you softly. “Ready to go be the most normal non-parent parents in the world?” 

“I’ve been waiting my whole life for this moment.” You nodded and said deadpanned. Breaking moments after into a small fit of giggles that had your husband smiling at you with love in his eyes.

[evol-astraea]

Desperate PC Tenno calling for help!

Calling all the tech-savvy players here on Tumblr who may hopefully lend me and tech support a hand. Yes, the situation is that bad. More under the cut to spare a lengthy wall of text!

I've been experiencing totally random and sudden crashes with WF since a month and half, by now.

The game first freezes for less than a minute, then crashes to desktop bringing up the window to report crashes. This happens literally anywhere and anytime in the game. During mission, at the end of the mission, while idling in the Orbiter/base of operations, sitting in the pause menu, checking the settings menu. All kind of possible scenarios. Ah, and DX11 or DX12 make no difference either.

It's driving me - and tech support - insane. Because it is so HARD to pinpoint the root cause! Every log file so far has reported some kind of General Protection Failure (GPF) error followed by different numbers.

I'm running the game on a brand new, pre-built computer from Megaport. Which I moved to from my old potato of a PC back in late November. Specs are the following: Windows 11 Home (build 24H2) Intel Core I7-12700KF, 8x 3.60 Ghz + 4x 2.70 Ghz ASUS Prime Z790-A Wifi DDR5 NVidia GeForce RTX 4070 Dual Palit 12GB 2x 32GB Corsair Vengeance RGB DDR5-6000 1 TB SSD 1000 Watt PSU

I have done everything tech support has suggested me to do and: - Uninstalled and re-installed the game, - Update drivers. Being a new computer, everything is pretty much up to date. I had to do a clean install for the GPU drivers only using DDU, though, - Verified game files, - Emptied the shader cache on the drive game is saved to, - Repaired Steam library, - Lowered graphic settings, - Attempted to launch and run Warframe in Clean Boot mode to exclude background programs/services <- unsuccessfully; Steam didn't work at all (which I kind of figured would happen) and trying to launch the game straight from the launcher...triggered a download of the game files in the App Data folder on main (C) drive. O_o The random crashes don't even appear in the Windows Event Viewer. Nowhere to be found. And believe me, I have looked into every single category. I've been keeping track of the time(s) of the crashes but, alas, found nothing that could possibly be related to those. (also, I'm not a computer expert so perhaps I'm doing things wrong)

So far, the only weird thing I've noticed is...Most of the times there seemingly is a "break" in between each series of crashes. A few days at worst, 10-12 days at best. Yes, I checked even the Task Scheduler utility on Windows. Found no program/app that runs automatically that matches with the timing/days when the crashes have occurred so far.

Really losing my mind to this. It's frustrating, it's unnerving, it's making me genuinely terrified of playing the game. And the reason I got this PC in the first place was being finally able to play my favorite game without worrying about being unable to because of my old (and obsolete) machine! Because I don't know when the next crash shall decide to happen and oh boy it's gonna be so fun losing progress. Or having a couple of players reasonably angry at me for suddenly poofing as host. I'm really sorry about that, folks.

I'm already considering the option of total formatting this computer, should there be no other way. But not before entirely giving up. And maybe make things a little less complicated for tech support team.

I can't thank these guys enough for their help and most importantly patience over the past month and half. This mess has been handed to three different people already and a solution hasn't been found yet.

So, if there are fellow Tenno on Tumblr who have either experienced something like this before and found a fix or are just more knowledgeable about computers and whatnot, your help would be GREATLY appreciated. ;.;

EDIT: I forgot to mention a few important things! - Hardware temperatures are within optimal range while in game (CPU never above 65°C, GPU has been running ice cold and has rarely exceeded 50°C so far, RAM is chilling at 45°C average). - GPU memory usage averages around at max (peak) 77% on HWInfo. - CPU usage I honestly need to check! D: - Ran disk cleanup, scans with sfc, chkdsk and DISM (all through command prompts ran as admin) and no issues were found. - Checked RAM health as well with Windows' memory diagnostic tool. However, it seems to give many false positives even on perfectly functional RAM banks. Looking for a more reliable alternative. - Warframe is the only game that keeps crashing on this PC. I haven't been getting any with other games/programs (Hades II; need to test how Ultrakill performs) or any warning signs (BSODs, freezes, sluggish PC, etc) that could suggest hardware failure.

[waywardmillennial]

SPOILERS FOR PH 7x04

there will be MAJOR spoilers under the cut -- so DO NOT click through if you don't want to see Lore spoilers for the Watcher TV episode from Jan 31, 2025!

okay, if you're buckled up then let's crack in!

After several episodes where the Professor and Ryan have been taking Phorgedytol regularly (given to them by Elmer Walter Williams) Ryan convinces the Professor to skip their dose at the end of 7x04 and they start to remember what happened at the end of season six

and that's when we learn the sad news that Estranged Producer Shane Madej (EPSM) died during the season six wrap party

beautiful memorial video here from @trashworldblog - RIP to a real one

now in the trailer and previous episodes we see EPSM walking down this alleyway but here we also see that he stops and turns to face his unknown assailant - so he knows who did this! (I think this will be important - more on this in a minute)

we see Ryan and the Professor both stunned at what they remember

then we pan over to the memorial for Shane and there are lots of easter eggs that I wanted to point out

first, lmao at Shane's lanky body needing a second urn - and also Boo Buddy!

in the next shot, there's a note from someone (Shawn?) that says "I don't really know what you did at Watcher anyway but we'll miss you. PS [your mom] follows me on IG"

and Lizzie's pink note that reads "To my fellow long white Midwestern Producer. I will never phorget u. ♡ Lizzie" and she spelled forget with the "ph"

OMG! "PH" masks the true name of Phorgedytol (instead of Forget-it-all) but also PH is Puppet History!

(ahem, sorry for that random train of thought interruption - where were we?)

also scattered in the notes are at least two references to Shane owing people money with, "Shane I can't believe that you never paid me back for that In-N-Out WTF Sam" (not 100% on the name) and another that says "This man still owes me $20… with condolences"

and a note with a drawing of the Spirit Box from Ghost Files that reads "You can still star in Ghost Files if you want (but as a ghost)"

(I definitely feel like the Spirit Box will make an appearance again soon)

and I really wanted to point out the note that's presumably from Ryan that says "Haunt me bitch" signed with a heart (!) and the note in front of the newspaper article that reads "Do Not Haunt Ryan"

another note that could also be from Ryan reads "No for real please haunt me. I -"

(and I'm probably glad the end of this note is cut-off or I'd launch myself out a window -- if Ryan was this sad about EPSM and he made himself forget it -- I am crying in the club T_T)

finally we get a look at this newspaper article dated Saturday, August 12, 2023, one day after the PH season six finale, which aired on August 11, 2023

I've transcribed the article below as best I could:

Estranged Puppet History Producer Murdered in the Street Like Dog Los Angeles, CA - In a shocking and tragic turn of events, Shane Madej, the estranged producer of the popular web series Puppet History, was found dead in an alleyway late Saturday night following the show's sixth season wrap party. The discovery has sent shockwaves through Hollywood, with fans and industry insiders reeling from the sudden and mysterious loss of the lanky ghost hunter. A Night of Celebration Turns to Tragedy The evening started out in high spirits as cast, crews, and friends of Puppet History gathered to celebrate the completion of another successful season --2nd column-- remain murky, and the Los Angeles Police Department has yet to release any official statements regarding potential suspects or motives. The investigation is ongoing, and the case has quickly become one of Hollywood's most talked-about unsolved mysteries. Madej's death has rattled the entertainment industry, where he was known not only for his work on Puppet History but also for his contributions to other popular culture at large, such as [hidden] BuzzFeed video "Dogs Watch Television for the First Time.

(it's so funny the article refers to him as a lanky ghost hunter and how this is the most unsolved mystery and that meme dog photo that looks like him hahahaha)

the episode ends with Ryan calling Dorothy Ruth to discover she married Elmer and the Professor wishing they could talk to EPSM, but he's dead, and Ryan says "hypothetically, what if we could"

[ROLL CREDITS]

theory: I think the Spirit Box is going to make an appearance (even better if they used Boo Buddy after all Shane has bullied him imo) to try to contact EPSM, and they'll find out he's in Purgatory with all the puppets that have been sent there and they'll finally be able to rescue them!

I do feel like Elmer has to be behind Shane's murder, even if he's not the one who pulled the trigger, but I don't quite know his motive? we've only been shown he wants to marry Dorothy Ruth but how does that involve EPSM?

and Elmer was really only dosing the Professor and Ryan with Phorgedytol, and maybe some of the other Watcher staff? but Shane's murder was in the news and being investigated by the police?? unless Elmer was really trying to cover it up by pushing the pills on all of Los Angeles and that's why they have the billboards all over town ...

fyi, there was a new billboard spotted in the PH s7 poster that Watcher put on IG yesterday that reads "Phorgedytol - Make Brain go 'MMMMBZZT!'"

maybe the PH buzzer sound?

that's all I have for now! thanks for reading and drop your thoughts and comments in the notes below!

[homestuckreplay]

Pagecount: Over 900

(page 886-902)

With 17 pages, 11/22/2009 is the longest Homestuck update by number of pages to date. It contains not one but TWO huge story developments: the ominous planet and the Peregrine Mendicant.

Ominous Planet

Just as WV told us, the ominous planet is bright purple and lies ‘beyond an impenetrable veil of darkness’ (p.704/886).

Dad is here!! I think a lot of the sudden character transitions in Homestuck actually make sense – we went from John thinking about going into his dad’s room, over to Dad himself. He barely appeared in Act 2, getting kidnapped by the imps at the start and breaking out of his trick handcuffs at the end, and now he easily bests them. Clowning is a physically demanding pursuit so Dad must be well in shape beneath the business clothes, because he launches one imp right through the wall.

We also meet an imp security guard (?) who’s wearing similar but more intricate harlequin gear.

They’re watching Dad fight the imps and somehow also watching John battle the ogres, through a pair of windows similar in design to ‘one of [Jade’s] GRANDPA'S more mysterious inventions’ (p.790), the freestanding window on Jade’s gadget table. There is apparently no end to the number of people watching John.

He looks kind of familiar. On page 833, we’re introduced to the full Midnight Crew as the sky switches from blue to bright purple. And comparing these face shapes and designs side by side, these two characters feel like they could have something to do with each other. They’re both really angry, as Spades Slick’s answer to everything is violence, and this new guy refers to the other imps, John and Dad, or both as ‘graveyard stuffers’ (p.891). It’s the only text we get in relation to the character. The narrator apparently has nothing to add and no witty comment on that thought of theirs. There’s then a quick cut where seeing the next page title ‘You are now…’ suggests that we’re about to become this guy, but we instead suddenly become-

Peregrine Mendicant

THE MAIL HAS ARRIVED. Mail, packages and deliveries are a recurring motif – there have been several important colorful packages, several envelopes containing discs, and now there is a letter to Dr. David Brinner, ATTN: SERIOUS BUSINESS. Serious Business is of course the messaging client that Dad uses to keep in touch with his troupe, and we just returned to Dad in the story, so is this finally the moment that wellPressedAttire or officeurchin1280 take their starring role in the narrative? It’s definitely a person in John’s neighborhood but not Dad himself, as we’ve seen the insides of the Egbert mailbox.

PM’s mail based tirade (p.894-896) is of course reminiscent of WV’s mayoral calling (p.686) and PM’s adoption of the hat is just like WV making their sash. So there’s something to say about these chess pieces arriving at these Skaian bunkers and immediately adopting an institution of society as critically important. Both PM and WV’s monologues read as very idealistic, imagining these overly simplistic societies that function like textbook diagrams, as though they know about these things from books similar to WV’s Human Etiquette tome and have never been part of an actual human society. Comparing the two, WV’s monologue feels more peaceful, as it’s focused on everyone getting along, mutual respect, civility and a kind leader. PM talks of soldiers, a crusade, defenders and hope among the ashes; it’s far more violent and adventurous, and feels more grounded in harsh realities even while it maybe overestimates the mail’s capability.

Which is not to criticize the mail or PM’s speech, because I think they’re both great. I agree that mail is very important, highly underappreciated, and I think it’s beautiful to explore an empty wasteland and to think ‘if there are any people left here, I need to make sure they can communicate with each other’.

Looking stylish in their new hat, PM loads their terminal and tries to greet Jade the same way WV commanded John. Jade is already covered by a lot of green static, but it appears to be snowing where she is, with flakes and drifts behind her. Which is weird in itself, because Jade is close enough to the equator that a quick search suggests it wouldn’t snow in her area no matter the time of year, especially not with the geothermal power near her house. But it gets weirder, because when John resisted a command he just felt frustrated and got a headache as he tried to ignore a weird voice in his head. When Jade resists a command, she apparently blows up the command station with lightning that she transmits through time and space. Yet another way that Jade is weirder and more powerful than the other characters.

> PM: Sacrifice yourself to save the mail.

[emisprocrastinatingbywriting]

Alone and Forsaken

Chapter 11 Summary:

After leaving Cooper back at the house, Paul takes you back to the one place you hoped to never return to. Hoping to persuade you, he takes you on a trip down memory lane but you aren't the woman Paul thinks you are anymore. Instead of a docile wife, he gets Joel fucking Miller's mate. (Good fucking luck pal) With Joel racing to get to the abandoned camp, can you keep Paul from doing anything brash before the love of your life can get to you? More importantly, can you keep your own anger from getting the best of you?

Warnings: Past Trauma Came Back to Be a Current Trauma, Reader Faces a Toxic Ass Ex, Violence, Threat of SA, Reader Needs a Fucking Hug, Joel Needs a Hug, Panicked and then Happier Reunions, Bits of Joel's Past Trauma Make Him Lose His Shit, Read with Caution

A/N:

Hey y'all! Aaaaand, we back! Hope everyone's week has been good. It is 4am and I have to get on a plane to Spain today at like 7, so let's jump right in.

So, this week is heavy on the violence. Reader is back at her old camp with Paul and they have a bit of a throwdown. Also trigger warning for, because it's Paul and he fucking sucks, threat of SA. Except this time it is definitly realer so, watch it if that is a problem for you. As always, take care of yourselves. Either way, reader and Joel DO reunite in this chapter. It just isn't... how you hope they will. And that is all I will say about that! Enjoy!

Chapter 11/20

Chapter 11: The Breaking Point

When you were five years old, the world had been turned upside down. That day haunted you for many reasons as it changed the trajectory of not only your life, but of the lives of the entire human race as well. However, that wasn’t what kept the day consistently fresh in your mind. Selfishly, it was the afternoon before the shit hit the fan that stayed with you even twenty years later. 

The day had been warm. It was your first year in kindergarten and you loved every moment of it. Learning new things and playing with other kids was everything you could’ve dreamed of. Being an only child, sometimes it felt that the only friends you had were your parents. Despite the usual worries about fitting in, you were quickly taken in by fellow classmates and were beginning to get comfortable in the new environment. 

Nevertheless, you had immediately ditched the group of new friends when your father had rolled up to the curb during recess in his beaten up Nissan. Running and shouting for him, you launched yourself face first into the driver’s side window and were met with boisterous laughter. After settling you in the front seat beside him, a treat that he had made you promise not to tell your mother about, he had taken you for an impromptu ice cream date. 

Even as a fully grown woman, when you remembered that day you could still taste the sweetness of the bubblegum ice cream that had made your hands sticky. Your father had listened to you babble about toys, games, the other kids in your class, and everything that a child’s brain experienced in the run of a day. Never once did he interrupt, other than to comment on the side characters or to agree with some point you had made. For a five year old girl, the day was perfect. 

That was until the sound of a slap had drawn your attention away from the tasty treat that dripped down your hands. Peering over from the picnic bench, you watched as an alpha gripped his mate’s arm hard and berated him in front of the ice cream truck. The omega looked a little afraid but mostly, you noticed that the poor guy just looked exhausted. If anything, you had been more afraid than he. 

In your five years of life, not once had you ever seen an alpha act like that. Your father was a sweet man who spent his time designing the layout of people’s dream homes in his office. When he wasn’t doing that, you had vague memories of him cooking and slow dancing with your mother when she got home from work. Not once had he hit her, nor anyone else, which meant that the sight of another alpha doing so was terrifying. 

“Stay here metuka, I’ll be back in a second,”he mumbled to you, rising from the table to diffuse the situation. 

An argument had broken out between your father and the frightening man, leading to the cops being called and the alpha being taken away in handcuffs. Your father had stayed with the shaken omega, comforting him until an older woman came to pick him up. The entire time, you watched the situation unfold. Half in awe, half in terror, the ice cream in your hand had melted entirely by the time your father returned. 

The vibrant pink treat was stuck to nearly every inch of your skin and clothes. Your father wasn’t mad, he never was. Instead, he had made a joke about it and brought you home for a bath. You remembered how the air was filled with your father’s words as he washed the stickiness from your skin, with him trying desperately to change your mood. It was only when he had moved to wash the suds from your hair that you finally piped up. 

“Why would he hit his mate like that papa?,” you whispered. 

His hands paused before they resumed their work. The shampoo he used was your favorite, boasting no tears for the kids that used it. However, anytime you tried to wash it out yourself, your parents would have to comfort their crying child as it burned your retinas. It was for that reason that you weren’t allowed to use it by yourself yet. Shielding your eyes from the watermelon scented suds, your father gently rinsed it from your hair as he pondered the question. 

“Sometimes alphas can be… Well, they can be mean. It isn’t right but they think they can act like that because they think omegas aren’t as good as them,” your father explained carefully. 

The notion of a world where one was above the other, where omegas were somehow lesser than, was new to you. Growing up, it had been your mother with the high paying job as a lawyer, while your father stayed home with you in lieu of daycare. It was only once you were enrolled in kindergarten that he had returned to his job as an architect. Although, he still only did it part time. With the money your mother was making, there was no need for him to jump back in right away and he preferred to spend time with you anyways. 

“But why?,” you pushed him, still not understanding why an alpha would hurt their mate. 

He hummed as the water finally ran clear, urging you to sit up so that he could wring the errant drops of water out of your hair. After pausing to think for a moment, your father had answered you in a voice so soft that you barely heard him. 

“People are only mean to other people to make themselves feel better. Alphas like that, they feel like they have to be scary or else they won’t be seen as strong. It has nothing to do with anyone but themselves.” 

You had blinked at that, unsure of what to make of such a statement. It was too big of a topic for a five year old. The idea of someone pretending to be anyone other than themselves was too large for the mind of someone who didn’t even know who they were yet. Still, you tried to understand as your father toweled you off, straining against the confines of a child’s mind to grasp the concept. 

“But…,” you paused before trying again, “But you aren’t mean papa.”  

He had laughed at that, looking up at you as he dried off your feet. Watching as his curls bounced against his forehead with his laughter, you felt as though you might start laughing alongside him. He always had that effect on people. As an adult, even as the lesser memories faded, you always remembered how talented the man was at drawing people out of their shells and making them smile. 

“Well thank you bubs but that’s how it’s supposed to be,” he chuckled. 

Reaching behind himself to grab the clothes on the sink, he continued to speak as he clothed you. 

“Promise me one thing, okay? I don’t know who you’re going to be when you get older, alpha, omega, beta, whatever, but just promise me you won’t be that guy. Or, if you present as an omega like mommy, promise me that you won’t be with someone like him. Okay?” 

His eyes had looked at you hopefully, hands pausing their efforts to roll your Little Mermaid socks on. You smiled at him. 

“I promise papa.” 

He nodded, “Good. Kindness isn’t something that I ever want you to opt out of. Whether that be how you act towards someone else or how someone acts towards you. Choose to be kind and choose to surround yourself with people who are kind to you. Do you understand?” 

You had nodded at his request and he smiled, leaning forward to blow a raspberry on your cheek until you giggled. 

“Papa! Stop it!,” you squealed. 

His smile had widened. The look on his face turned mischievous as he proposed, “Come on, let’s see if we can find any of mommy’s sweets before she gets home hm?” 

You remembered the excitement you had felt at that, racing after your father to raid the not-so-secret, secret hiding place where your mother hid Reese’s Pieces and Kit Kats from her family. The next few hours had been perfect, binging snacks and playing with your dad until the world quite literally ended later that evening. 

Even then, it was still okay for a while. Sure, you had been scared at times but your father always held his head high, which made everyone else around him feel like everything would eventually be okay. Despite the impossible odds and grueling circumstances, your father was still making his family laugh well into the first few months of the apocalypse. It was too bad that he had only lasted about half a year before getting bit. 

Unbeknownst to him, even as other memories of him had faded away, the advice he gave you that day remained clear and unaltered. Perhaps it was the gravity of the day, it being the final moments of civilization, but you didn’t think so. No, it was the lesson itself. Through every moment of your fucked up life, the people in it had been judged to that standard. 

Sometimes it was easy, with people like Josiah or Paul being clearly placed on one side of the spectrum, but other times it was harder. It had been hard for you to judge Joel at first, with his crankiness and inability to open up. Nevertheless after a few days with the man, you placed him easily on the opposite end as them. 

Joel might have been hard to get to know, but the wait was worth it. He was soft underneath it all and actually put in a real effort to make you happy. It was everything you could’ve wanted and you knew your father would have approved of the match, despite the age difference. However, somewhere along the line you had begun to wonder whether he would have approved of you. 

Sitting in the passenger seat of the shitty car, next to the man you hated most in this world, you couldn’t see yourself in any of those people. The alpha who had hit his mate did so out of a need for dominance but that wasn’t you. And the omega who had taken the abuse had done so out of duty but you didn’t feel like that was you either. Maybe it had been at one point, when Josiah and his crew had scared you into obedience, but not now. 

Even your father, the standard for what it meant to be kind, was not someone you saw yourself in anymore either. He had been too tender for a world like this one, having literally thrown himself in front of infected for a woman that he didn’t even know. Meanwhile, you had slaughtered the majority of a town to regain someone that had been taken from you. You tried to imagine a world where your father would do that but couldn’t. Acts of violence simply weren't in his wheelhouse. 

That meant that you were something else entirely. An elusive fourth category that you couldn’t quite grasp, despite your attempts at identifying it as the car turned off the road just before the I-80. It was not for dominance, or duty, or for the desire to be good that you had slashed through Paul’s men. None of those reasons held any value to you. 

The fierce protectiveness over the man you loved had propelled you into action back at the cabin. Yet it was an inherited rage that trickled down to you from generations of people who had been taken for granted that kept you going. How dare anyone take him. And how dare they assume that you would lay down and let it happen because of some bullshit myth about biological inferiority. 

Rumbling down the snow covered road, you held your breath, trying to calm the rage that still burned within as Paul carefully followed the tire tracks that led to the old camp. Returning to the place you had spent a good portion of your life in was strange. The homecoming fell flat, with nothing but ghosts to greet the two of you as the car neared the gate. 

“Why here?,” you wondered aloud. 

The question seemed to catch him off guard, you having been silent since the squabble that had taken place just an hour before. 

“Because it’s where this all began, angel.” 

You rolled your eyes at him, “Wouldn’t just shooting me be easier? Why take me to a place filled with infected? Kinda overkill if you ask me.” 

“Don’t worry, I’ve already cleared them out. Knew I’d get my sweet little wife back here at some point. Thought that a nice trip down memory lane might be what she needs to remember her place,” he said pointedly. 

You tried not to gag, staring at the bruise along his jaw before you turned back to the window with a huff. 

Tried as you might to fight Paul, he had tripped you up at the very last moment and managed to tie your hands together. Rather than kill you, as you had hoped he might, the man decided he wanted to go on what he called “an adventure”. It frustrated you. The thought of dying was way more preferable than having to take an impromptu road trip with Paul. 

As the trees receded, you watched as the skeleton of your old camp was revealed. The gate was wide open, beckoning the vehicle onto the empty streets. After passing through the first few homes, you tried not to cry as you passed Jake’s aunt's house. The tiny home where the two of you had swapped contraband books and chattered about teenage crushes was ruined. The majority of the building had been destroyed in the flames. 

“You weren’t there when the dumbasses brought out the molotovs huh? Fucking mess, half of them missed the horde and it ended up destroying most of the town,” Paul commented as he followed your gaze towards the wreckage. 

You looked away from the scenery as the car neared your old home. There was no part of you that wanted any more memories of that place. You had escaped. It didn’t matter that you were at the camp again, it would never have the same hold on you. And neither would Paul. For the remainder of the drive you kept silent, locked within your own mind as he neared the edge of camp. 

“Okay, we’re here,” Paul announced as he parked in front of the old chapel. 

One side of it had been blackened by the flames but besides that, the place where Josiah had preached his poison remained entirely untouched. 

Shame , you thought. If there was one place that deserved to burn, it was the chapel that had sponsored nothing but hatred for years. 

The steeple still held the cross that loomed over visitors, making you feel uneasy as the shadow of it slid across the side of the car. The shutters on all of the windows were shut, though a few of them rattled against the window panes with the breeze. With the snow shoveled off the steps, it looked just as it always had on the evenings when you were forced into prayer circles or grueling all night confessionals. 

Paul wrenched the door to the driver’s side open, pulling you from the chilling thoughts as he stomped around the front of the car. An involuntary yelp fell from your lips as he opened the passenger side with such force that it shook the car. Before you could think to resist, he yanked you from the seat. Fingers pressing into the blackened indents he had left days earlier, your already damaged wrist creaked under the pressure of his grasp. 

“Fucking watch it,” you hissed.  

Paul smirked but ignored your protests, tugging you alongside him as he climbed the stairs. His long strides made it impossible for you to catch up. Stumbling behind him, you fought against the zip ties to free your hands. The plastic restraints left reddened indents on your skin but barely budged despite your struggle.  

The smell of the dusty building made you sneeze and it echoed off the vaulted ceiling. Stone floors gave way to a huge wooden cross hung near the altar. An emaciated man looked down at you from it, wincing at the nails driven into his hands as he hung there. You had always found the display jarring. If people loved this guy so much, you never understood why they thought it was a good idea to depict his death in nearly every place of worship or even with the jewelry they wore. If Paul stabbed you to death today, you didn’t expect Joel to start wearing a blade around his neck tomorrow. 

You laughed at the morbid thought, drawing a confused look from Paul that you ignored. 

No, that would be weird. If anything, you hoped that when Paul killed you that Joel would simply take care of himself. That he would continue to eat, sleep, play his guitar, carve things, and above all, for him to not close himself off again. Maybe Joel would even go live with his brother in Jackson, rather than resigning himself to solitude again. It was a pipe dream and you knew it, but it didn’t stop you from manifesting it into existence. 

Paul stepped before you and swung the basement door open, nudging you towards the dimly lit steps until you haphazardly stumbled down them. The space was as you remembered it, with discarded boxes and books everywhere. You half expected to come across Cooper tucked away in his corner, twiddling his thumbs in the quiet room while the rest of camp busied themselves elsewhere. But Cooper was nowhere to be found, leaving you alone with his terrifying brother. 

The only new edition to the space was the candles that covered nearly every inch of the floor. Some were even placed upon the stacked books. Melted wax stained the paperbacks before it dripped down to the awful carpet below. Half of them were scented, leading to a cacophony of smells that sparked a dull ache in the base of your skull. The only consolation was that the stifling mix of fragrances almost covered Paul’s sickly sweet stench entirely.  

Stepping around a row of bookshelves, you noticed that two chairs and a table were placed in the middle of the room. Wine glasses were set out, accompanied by what looked to be one of the treasured bottles of whiskey that Josiah used to hide amongst the clutter. It seemed that you weren’t the only one who had figured out where he had stashed the liquor before the place fell. 

“I thought I was the only one who knew where he hid it,” you blurted out. 

Paul smiled at you. His eyes were flat despite the expression on his face and the wink he gave you made your stomach drop.  

“I thought a nice night was in order. This is going to be our first night together as man and wife after all,” he sighed dreamily.  

Scoffing at the implication as he led you towards the table, you glared at him while he tucked you into one of the seats. Paul leaned forward and you grimaced as he flicked open his pocket knife. He grabbed your hands, making you hold your breath until he slipped the blade against the zip tie and snapped the plastic. 

“Be good and maybe I’ll keep these off, got it?,” he said, pressing the knife to your throat for emphasis. 

The blade was cool against your skin and goosebumps formed around it. Despite the desire to grab at the hilt of it and drive it into his chest, you refrained. Swallowing your pride, you nodded. Paul pressed it harder for a moment, making you tense up before he finally set it down. Chuckling as he walked to the other side of the table, you watched as he took his seat. 

Silence filled the air as the two of you stared at each other. Paul’s gaze was sinister, while yours was pointed with rage. With you sat in front of him, he looked like a beast that had finally caught its prey. It made you even more annoyed. 

“Well this is… something,” you mumbled cheekily. 

Paul laughed, showing off his crooked teeth as he threw his head back. You recoiled at the sound, the last thing you wanted to do was give this man any bit of joy. 

“My, my, how you’ve changed angel,” he chuckled, “Knew you were a bit disobedient before; the preacher’s sweet stepdaughter who pressed the line when nobody was looking. It was cute, sexy even. But now, you’re downright insolent.” 

You cocked your head. Paul had no idea what kind of insolence you were capable of. 

“You’re goddamn right I am,” you agreed. 

The air was thick with tension. A darkness settled across Paul’s features and you sat back against your seat, waiting for the inevitable torment that he planned to inflict. His eyes raked over your form before they landed on your neck. The mark that adorned it was uncovered, standing proudly against your skin despite Paul’s attempts to sear it off with his gaze. 

“I always knew that your kind were desperate little things but I genuinely thought you were different. That was my mistake, thinking that you understood the rules. I let you prance around until I decide that you’re ready, then you were supposed to be mine for the taking.” 

The words lit a spark in your chest and heat radiated out into your limbs, making your fingers twitch with frustration as you listened to him speak. What Paul was telling you was sick. There was no prancing around the camp, and you certainly didn’t feel the need to apologize for not knowing the rules to some twisted game he had envisioned. You were a child when you arrived at the camp, not some prize for him to win once you reached a suitable age. 

Paul hummed, cocking his head at your silence, “Nothing to say? That’s alright, we’ve got all night for confessions.” 

Rolling your eyes, you sighed, “What do you want from me Paul?” 

He ignored the question and reached forward to uncork the bottle. Despite the strained silence, his hands were steady as he poured the amber liquid and pushed one of the glasses towards you. A bit of it sloshed over the side, staining the perfectly white tablecloth below. Paul huffed and covered the spot with a napkin. He dabbed at it for a moment before he nodded at you to take a sip. The casualness of his actions annoyed you to no end. 

“It doesn’t matter what you do to me. I hope you know that.” 

Paul grinned, “Doesn’t it?” 

“No. Joel is mine and I am his. You can hurt me. You can kill me. Shit, you can even do the same to him but it won’t matter. You. Lost. Nothing can change that,” you snapped at him. 

The words irked him, hardening the lines in his face as you leaned in for emphasis. You laughed and it filled the air, making him flinch despite his attempts to keep his face schooled. 

“Joel is the one who gets to have me. He gets to take care of me, touch me, fuck me, anything he wants and fuck, is he good at it. See, my mate doesn’t need to overcompensate for anything,” you sneered, flicking your eyes up and down Paul’s body as he fumed under the scrutiny.

Paul leaned forward, smelling of rotted candies and sweat as the air crackled with energy. The proximity made you nauseous but you refused to pull back first. 

As if his soul sensed your discomfort, Joel’s presence on the planet made itself known when the mark on your neck throbbed almost painfully. It was unlike any of the other times, when he had been unwittingly calling out for you from his imprisonment. This was sharper and unrelenting, with a deep ache sending jolts of agony all the way to your jaw as you tried to keep your cool. 

Joel was somewhere and he was scared. No, not scared. Joel Miller was fucking terrified. Instincts going wild from the unseen threat poised towards your mate, the muscles in your back tensed as your body readied itself for a fight. It was pointless. There was nothing you could do for him from here. That was all you could think of as Paul stood from his seat.

He grabbed his glass, lifting it in the air as his malicious scowl pierced through you. 

“A toast then, to Joel Miller! The man who turned my perfect, pure wife into a fucking stupid slut. May he rest easy,” Paul chuckled darkly. 

You shifted in your seat, hand cupping where Joel had staked his claim. The corners of your vision blurred as your heart pounded in your chest. Beads of sweat formed along your hairline, the droplets rolling down your face as he smiled down at you. 

“So you do feel each other? I’ve always wondered if that was a myth or not,” he mused, words half muffled as he leaned in to sip his drink.  

That got your attention. Dread hooked into your heart, pulling you back down into a darkness that you had only recently discovered in yourself. With the bond thrumming with Joel’s despair and your adversary leering at you from behind a whiskey glass, you let it take hold of you. It calmed the shivers that racked your frame, slowing your shallow breaths until you were calm enough to grab the glass Paul had poured for you. 

He watched as you downed it in one go and slammed it back down. It burned the entire way down but soothed the hunger pangs that you had been ignoring for days. You hummed at the taste of it, smacking your lips at the notes of caramel and spice. 

“That bothers you, doesn’t it?,” Paul teased, “Bet he’s dead before I even get done breaking you open on my knot. The old man looked pretty banged up when I saw him earlier. I think-” 

“Is this bourbon? I thought it was single malt but no, it’s too sweet to be that. What is it? Woodford Reserve? I bet it is, Josiah loved that shit,” you cut in, dampening the twisted smile on his face. 

Paul blinked, “Is it - What? Did you hear what I just said?” 

You nodded and reached forward, pouring yourself another glass as he sputtered before you. The second glass slid down easier and warmth flooded your face. Emboldened at his surprise, you poured another but left the glass on the table, letting it breathe as you leaned back and stared at the alpha. Paul was furious. A vein popped out of the side of his head as he clenched his fists together tight. 

“He’s going to fucking die, do you hear me?! That fucking prick is dead and you are going to do as I say!,” Paul roared as he launched his glass against the wall behind you. 

It smashed somewhere amongst the candles and papers but you gritted your teeth, remaining steady as warning bells went off in your head. Taking a subtle breath, you simply cocked your head at him as he fumed from across the table. 

“You know, you’re right Paul, I can feel him. Which means that I know that he’s still alive. So threats aren’t really going to cut it unfortunately,” you said. 

Nostrils flaring, Paul rounded the table. Stomping towards you angrily, you gulped as he pulled your chair sideways to face him. Looming over you, his eyes desperately tried to penetrate the barrier you had formed around yourself since the day Joel was taken. You didn’t blame Paul for trying, it used to be so easy to make you scared. 

You sucked in a breath as his thumb dragged along your lower lip, pressing down against the pillowy skin before he let his hand drop. The grotesque mixture of sweat, blood, and dirt caked his fingers, leaving behind a smear of filth that made you gag. 

“What are you thinking, angel? That you can beat me and then go get him all by yourself?,” Paul chuckled and shook his head, “Little superhero are we? Be reasonable.” 

Instead of answering his taunt, you plucked your drink from the table. Taking a long draw from the glass, you sucked back half of it before you looked back at Paul. Splotches of red crept up along his neck, discoloring the already bruised skin with rage. It made you smile. 

“Is this fucking funny to you?,” Paul hissed. 

You nodded, grinning wider at the way his face scrunched up even further. Nevertheless, the amusement was short lived as one of Paul’s hands reached down to his belt and worked it open menacingly. His gaze was fixed on you when your eyes snapped to his face. There was nothing behind his eyes as he ripped the leather from his belt loops and it was terrifying. With his belt flung somewhere behind him, Paul twiddled with the top button to his jeans. 

“Think it’s time for a lesson, wife.” 

It was now or never. 

“Couldn’t have said it better myself, husband,” you agreed. 

Before Paul had a moment to register your words, the half emptied drink in your hand was slammed against his head. He cried out in pain as the glass tore open the skin of his forehead. The amber liquid dripped down his face, burning his eyes despite his discoordinated attempts to wipe them clean. 

With Paul occupied, you launched off the chair. The force of your body knocked him over an errant box and sent the both of you tumbling to the floor. The impact of the fall was lessened by Paul’s body but your head knocked against his harshly. The both of you grunted at the collision but it was him that managed to right himself first. 

He flipped you over, slamming you back against the cold floor as his fingers crept up your torso and squeezed your trachea. You tried desperately to pry his hands off. A cough wiggled up from your burning chest but it was halted by the brutal grip. Panic set in as his fingers expertly pushed into the blood vessels, cutting off the supply of oxygen to your brain. Dizzied and weak from his hold, it began to feel like you were fighting against air. 

“Aw, my sweet angel, can’t believe it’s to come to this,” Paul squeezed harder, “Thought it could be like it was before but no, you need some harsher lessons for this to work.” 

Fingernails scrabbling against his arms, neck, and face, you fought as hard as you could. Tears blurred your vision, making it impossible for you to track his movements as he moved one of his hands down to fight with the zipper of his jeans. Paul bared nearly the entirety of his weight against your neck as he worked himself out of his pants until it felt like something inside of it might burst. Crushed beneath him, you could barely react at the feeling of his hardness poking your thigh. 

“Been waiting years for this, since the first day I met you. Such a sweet little fucking tease, can’t wait to fuck any trace of him out of you,” Paul rambled.  

He spoke only to himself. You weren’t even in the room. Floating somewhere between life and death, your head lolled to the side as he released himself from the confines of his boxers. This was it. There was nothing you could do. You blinked deeply, slowly letting the dark edges bleed into your vision. It would be easier this way. Unconscious or dead, at least you wouldn’t have to feel what Paul was about to do. 

A palm cracked down against your cheek and your face snapped in the opposite direction. You coughed as the pressure on your neck ceased. The air was acrid as you sputtered and wheezed beneath Paul. The thickness of the scent coated the back of your throat and tickled your lungs. Despite the grogginess, you worked against the fog to pinpoint the smell but it was nearly impossible as another round of smacks were rained down against your face. 

“Oh no angel, you don’t get to check out for this. I want you to remember everything,” he laughed. 

While the breaths were difficult, with your throat swelling and aching from the abuse, you greedily sucked in the putrid air. There was something off about it but soon your vision cleared and you managed to get your bearings. It only took five seconds after that for your eyes to land on the source of the smell. 

Flames grew from one side of the room, spreading out from where Paul had thrown his glass against the wall. The liquor had acted as an enabler for the flame to tear through the disorganized mess of candles, paper and cardboard. The fire spread at an alarming rate, eating up anything in its path as you slapped Paul’s chest with a renewed sense of vigor. 

“F-fire,” you wheezed, barely intelligible. 

With his length bobbing menacingly between his legs as he worked to pry open your jeans, Paul only hummed at your attempts to warn him. 

“Hm? What’s that? Let me guess, you were trying to say fuck you. Is that it?,” he jeered. 

Shaking your head wildly, you slapped at his shoulders harder as smoke began to force water from your eyes. With the fire slowly taking up chunks of the basement, it seemed the alpha was only focused on one thing. 

The broken, “N-no,”you called out was lost in another round of hacking as Paul ripped the pants clean off of your legs. 

You silently thanked every force in the universe that you had not forgotten underwear. The thought of him seeing a part of you that you had only ever felt comfortable showing one specific person was too much. He reached for the frilly fabric, dodging your legs as you kicked at him.  

“F-fucking idiot,” you gritted out. 

That halted his assault. Reaching down, Paul pinched your face in one of his hands and you winced at the fresh bruises that formed from the grip. 

“What was that slut? Any last quips before I take back what’s mine?” 

You cleared your throat, fighting against the smoke that threatened to clog your lungs to spit out a raggedy gasp of, “Fire.” 

With his hard cock in his hand as he surveyed the room, you watched as the realization dawned on him. Paul’s mouth opened and closed at the sight. The majority of the room was covered with flames. You could tell that he was awestruck at his own blindness and it angered you. This moment of weakness was due to his own sick need to dominate you, and for what? 

Using all the strength you had left to flip him over, you were sobered at the realization that this rage was not new. It had not been born out of your mate being taken from you. For years it had simmered under the surface until it finally boiled over following Joel’s abduction. The anger you felt was more than anger, it was a purely feminine wrath that had been building since you were old enough to understand the incident at the ice cream truck 20 years earlier. 

With your mouth filled with blood and your lungs burning, you snatched the knife from Paul’s belt and slammed it into his shoulder. He screamed in pain and you twisted it around before yanking it out. Obscenities poured from his mouth as you slashed at his cheeks but you ignored them. Blood splattered against your face, covering you in red as you pushed the blade into the other shoulder. Paul choked on his breaths as the blade sunk deeper, his hands trying to slap you away as you ruthlessly sawed it back and forth before pulling it from him. 

This wasn’t just about you or even Paul. It was about the omega who had been slapped that day years before. It was about your mother, the law firm partner who ruled the courts and came home to a loving husband who was morphed into an obedient housewife. It was about Jake and Cooper who, despite their apparent relatively decent bond, had been forced into their roles nonetheless. It was about the generations of people - alpha, beta, or omega - who had been made to obey someone else’s word, regardless of how they felt about it.  

You screamed out, letting years of bottled up rage explode in Paul’s face as the room around you began to collapse. He coughed, eyes unfocused and rolling in their sockets as he twitched at the blood loss. The wounds on his body spurted out short jolts of blood, turning the carpet below him crimson. 

“Please,” he begged pitifully. 

Disgust was all you felt at the state of him as you dropped the knife. It clattered to the floor near his head but he didn’t reach to grab it. You weren’t entirely sure that he was able to anyways. Standing from the floor, you sucked your teeth at him. Paul’s head was split open from the glass, cheeks slashed and bubbling with red as his cock laid pitifully against the outside of his jeans. The wounds on his neck and shoulder gaped and pulsed rivulets of blood that added to the stains on the floor. His desperate attempts to staunch the flow were mediocre at best, he was much too weak to cover the holes in his skin effectively. 

You looked down at him with tired eyes as the room burned around the both of you. The ice in Paul’s gaze melted, making him look like nothing more than a scared little boy as you glowered at him. 

“I don’t know what happened to you that made you this way, but fuck you. You will die here and I am going to keep living. Do you understand me? I am fucking done with all of this shit,” you said coolly. 

A loud crack broke through the moment and you looked up, watching as the ceiling began to concave with the flames licking at the foundation of the building. You needed to get out of here, lest you burn to death in the god forsaken chapel alongside Paul. Sparing him one last look, you shook your head at the pleading look in his eyes. 

“You. Lose. Goodbye Paul.” 

With the last word uttered, you scurried off towards the stairs. The flames roared at you from all angles, closing in as you ran as fast as your damaged body would allow. Just as you reached the bottom step, the building itself started to shift. You froze as the structure groaned. 

“Oh shit,” you swore. 

Flying up the steps, you took them two at a time until you launched yourself through the basement door. The air on the ground level was worse, with the entirety of the sanctuary cloaked in thick smoke that irritated your throat. You gagged, dropping down to your knees as you choked on the poison. Retching against the stones, sweat and tears tracked through the soot that covered your face as all of the whiskey in your stomach was purged. 

You groaned at the way your abdominal muscles ached, trying to force out vomit that didn’t exist. With nothing left to purge and no end to the endless smoke inhalation, exhaustion wormed its way into your body. The comfort of the end beckoned you, luring you in with its promise of rest but you ignored it. Crawling on all fours to get to the door as you hacked up black, you were shocked at your own will to live. 

Despite the lack of evidence, you knew you needed to get outside. There was no reasoning behind this incessant need to get to freedom. It would be easier to give up. Less painful for sure, given the state of your body. The reason for your determination was unfathomable but it pushed you the last few inches.

Fresh air shocked your system, launching you into a fit of forceful coughs that knocked you off balance. You cursed Paul as every ice covered bit of concrete jammed into your ribs on the way down. However, the embrace of the snow was welcoming as you landed in a heap at the bottom. The cold bled into your legs, soothing the burns that you didn’t even realize that you had acquired. 

A voice called to you from far away. It was deep and honeyed with a familiar southern twang. The voice beckoned you to stay with him. You smiled at his request, burrowing yourself deeper into the darkness. Joel was calling to you from the other side, you were sure of it. He sounded so desperate, sobbing as he screamed your name and pleaded. It would’ve made you cry too, had you not already begun to heed his request. 

It was funny. Before today, you had never believed in an afterlife. It was too big of a question and you refused to let it rule your life, preferring to find out when the time came like everyone else. But as Joel Miller begged desperately for you to come back to him, you comforted yourself with the belief that this was your afterlife. You would be with him forever. It didn’t matter that it was through death that the two of you would see eachother again. You would follow Joel anywhere. 

Sinking further into the black, you sighed and let yourself be carried off into the wind. 

 - Joel - 

Joel had screamed. 

The volume of it alone forced the birds from their nests in the surrounding trees. It was a desperate and strangled cry, something that he didn’t even know he was capable of until it left his mouth. 

Joel had raced down the poorly shoveled road, tearing through town after he spied the smoke blackening the air from the gate. It was only when he reached the burning chapel that he realized just how bad it was. The building looked to be on the verge of collapse, swaying as the fire tore through every bit of material holding it in place. 

Ripping himself from the car, Joel sprinted towards the door. Before he could reach the steps, he was met with the sight of you stumbling from the building in a fit of painful sounding coughs. The sight of you had comforted him for a moment, seeing you alive despite the odds stacked against you. 

Joel rushed forward as you fell back against the snow, skidding to a stop and reaching down to gather you in his arms. Your breathing was strained and he begged you to follow his breaths. A sigh was all you responded with. Joel felt it as your body stilled against him and his soul broke open. A hoarse cry reverberated in the open air, heard but nobody except himself. 

He felt like a wild animal as he tore through his mind for any medical miracles he could think of. Suddenly, it dawned on him. The act would probably not work, he knew that, but he had to try. With hot tears streaming down his face, Joel tore your sweatshirt down the middle with his bare hands. 

He started the compressions, choking on anguish as forced life back into your body. Heart pounding in his chest, Joel called for you endlessly.

“Come on baby, come back to me. It’s okay, we’ll b-be okay. Please, please, please…”

Joel felt his hands crack through your ribs and he could’ve sworn his chest ached alongside you. It hurt him to do this, to break open your ribcage in order to get to your stilled heart, but he kept going.  He tilted your head back, pinching the soft part of your nose as he blew two lungfuls of air into your mouth. 

For some reason, he had hoped that the oxygen would miraculously rouse you and he cried out when your body didn’t respond. Restarting the compressions again, more panic seared through his every nerve ending. The rest of the world faded away and it was only your lifeless body, him, and flashes of the other people in his life that he failed to save. 

You couldn’t die. Not like this, not now. It felt like the world had ended again, only this time it felt even worse. It was like one of his limbs had been chopped off. The mark on his neck burned as he pushed into your chest and Joel’s heart sputtered at the feeling. The presence you had on this earth was stored somewhere in his instincts, making him feel you everyday despite the distance but now, he felt it no longer. 

“Please darling, please, please, please! I can’t do this again, I need you. D-don’t go, you said you wouldn’t go…,” Joel sobbed. 

No response. 

Another round of breaths and he was back to cracking your ribs under his hands. He felt like he was going to puke. It was all too much. Joel needed you to live but the longer you remained still, the further away that possibility seemed to be. What was there left for him to do? Even the most avidly trained medical staff before the outbreak would have been hard pressed to bring you back. 

The realization that this was it, this was the end for you,  slowed his compressions. Tears welled up in his eyes at the sight of your lifeless body as he stopped altogether. How could this happen to him… again? What was the point of it all, if this was how it was going to end? Rage bubbled up from deep within his heart and he exploded. 

“FUCK!,” Joel roared, slamming his fist down hard against something solid yet squishy. 

Joel had aimed for the ground but missed, instead slamming his fist against your chest. He reeled back in shock, feeling absolutely disgusted with himself for disrespecting your body like that. Even in death, the thought of ever hurting you was too much to bear and he suddenly wanted to walk backwards into the burning building. However, the guilt was soon replaced with shock as you twitched. 

Eyes rolling in their sockets, Joel watched as began to fight for air as you gagged helplessly on your back. He swore, flipping you so that you faced him on your side. With him petting your knotted hair and whispering encouragement, you puked up a pitiful amount of blackened bile. 

Joel waited until you were done before he peeked into your mouth to ensure that there was nothing left to choke on. Despite the clear airway, uneasiness seeped into his chest as your body remained still. Joel moved his head down to press his ear to your chest, leaning in close to listen. After a second of readjustment, having to switch to his good ear to listen properly, he sighed as he heard the steady thump of your heart. 

A sob of relief tore from his lips. He pressed his face into your chest, kissing the spot where he heard your pulse in thanks. Tears dripped from Joel’s face, landing on your face, neck, and chest as he hovered over you. As life rattled through your body once more, he tried his best not to shatter under the weight of your near death experience. He allowed himself another moment of anguish before he swallowed it down. Gathering you up in his arms, Joel hugged you to his chest and lifted you from the ground. 

He was still crying as he walked towards the car, legs trembling as he slid into the backseat with you in his arms. For a moment Joel thought about driving off, but he knew that he wouldn’t be able to get far. Not with the way his hands shook, his heart pounding in his chest as he held you tighter. That was close, way too close. Your lifeless body, the way your ribs cracked from the pressure of his hands, it was all too much for him. 

The second that the door was shut behind him, Joel ripped his coat off and covered you in the bulky material as best as he could. The bruises, cuts, and burns that covered your body were a lot to take in. You had stumbled from the burning chapel in nothing but a sweatshirt and underwear. Finger shaped bruises covered your body, making a pit form in his stomach. Multiple alphas had tried to hurt you in the days since he had seen you last. He wanted to kill them all but, it seemed you had already beaten him to it. 

Looking at the marks on your thighs, dread descended over him. Joel felt absolutely helpless. He had no idea where he was, where any medical supplies were, what had happened in the chapel, or when you’d wake. Powerless to the situation, Joel rambled incoherent apologies and desperate pleas as he brushed soot from your body. 

“Oh darling, I’m so sorry. I - fuck - I should’ve been better. Should’ve protected you, been there for you. Oh my god, fuck, this is my fault. I love you. Please, please, please,” he cried. 

He didn’t even know what he was asking you for. Was it forgiveness? Joel kicked himself for letting this happen. The thought of it made him want to rip off his own skin and maybe he would’ve, had he not heard the softest whisper of his name. 

Joel snapped his gaze back up to your face and gasped. Your eyes were red rimmed and glossy, but they were open. It was one of the most beautiful things that he had ever seen. 

“Oh baby,” he cried out as he pulled you up in his lap. 

You went willingly, completely pliant as he arranged you in his lap. Joel heard you hiss as he pressed you into a tight hug and he pulled back quickly. A pinched brow from the sting of his embrace formed a lump in his throat. Settling on holding your face in his hands, Joel watched as you slowly blinked your eyes open again. 

“Ow,” you croaked. 

The noise that came from his mouth was half a laugh and half a sob of relief but he smiled through it. His throat was thick as he pushed errant hairs away, kissing every inch of your face as he fought against the emotions that overwhelmed him. There were no words for what he felt in that moment and even if there were, you were in no shape to hear them. 

The corners of your mouth quirked up when Joel finally landed a kiss on your lips and he did it again. Despite the blood and dirt that covered every inch of the both of you, the sight of your soft smile soothed every ache in his body. He knew that his headache was still there. The bruise on the back of his head was tender to the touch but at that moment, he didn’t feel it one bit. 

Your eyes were open. 

You were alive. 

Nothing else mattered. 

“M’tired,” you murmured and coughed, wincing at the effort before your eyelids drooped again. 

Joel tightened his jaw as your face burrowed itself in his neck, huffing at him until you relaxed. He could tell that you were in a great deal of pain, his instincts sensing every bit of tension in your body. He needed to fix this, to care for you. 

The problem was that Joel had no idea where he was, or where to get medical supplies in the half destroyed ghost town. Even if he could focus his mind enough to drive to the next town, there was no telling what he would find there. 

He thought about going back to where he had left the group but he quickly discarded the idea. Your friends and family were nearly an hour away, IF they were still there, and likely didn’t have much more medical experience than him. 

The cabin was too far and didn’t have half the shit you would need. And Jackson, with the time it would take for Joel to drive his injured mate there, was out of the question. That left only one option for him. 

“Baby, baby wake up,” he called. 

Joel spoke with the softest urgency he could muster, jostling you gently until you roused. Another groan accompanied the glare you flashed at him. In a different situation, he might’ve laughed at it. The exasperation on your face was painfully obvious. He didn't need to ask to know what you thought about him waking you. Are you fucking serious , was written all over your face. 

“I know, I know honey, m’real sorry. I’ll let you sleep but first, you need to tell me where the camp kept their medical stuff. Pills, bandages, water, fuck - anything,” Joel urged.

You hummed, sighing as you scrunched your face up in thought. He knew it was a lot. Asking you questions about a camp you hadn’t lived in for sometime was ridiculous. Especially after he had literally just brought you back from the dead, but he didn’t have the time to tear through half of the homes to find what he needed. There was so much blood covering you and Joel was nervous to find out how much of it was yours. If it was all you, he needed to find the wound and stitch it up fast. 

“Home, probably,” you guessed, “He kept it all at our house so nobody could get into it. If the stuff hasn’t been snatched up by raiders, it’d be there.” 

Joel nodded desperately, “And where’s that baby?”

You whined at his incessant line of questioning and he hushed you, smoothing his thumbs over your cheekbones until you settled. 

 “Shhh, I know you want to sleep but you need to tell me darling. Where’s home? What does it look like?” 

“Green house with yellow shutters. Fucking awful colors, worse than our kitchen,” you murmured. 

The comparison made him huff a laugh as you slumped against him again. As your body stilled once more, Joel couldn’t help himself. Despite the fact that you had just spoken to him, he subtly brushed two fingers up your spine until they landed on your neck. Careful not to aggravate the bruising, Joel pressed his fingers into the side of your neck so that he could feel the steady beats there. She’s just asleep , he told himself over and over again as he readied himself to leave. 

A green house with yellow shutters, he could work with that. Joel had been in too much of a rush to save you when he sped through town, but he was confident that he could find the ugly house. He needed to, so he would. The fear of what might happen if he didn’t spurred him into action. 

As carefully as he could, Joel slid out of the backseat with you still in his grasp. He could have left you laid out in the back. It probably would have been less cramped in the driver’s seat, but he refused to let you go. With what had just happened, he wasn’t sure he would be able to ever let you go again. As he slid behind the wheel, Joel decided that he was perfectly okay with carrying you around in his arms until the day he died.  

After spending an extra few seconds situating you so that you were comfortably cradled in his arms, he pulled out and drove through the quiet streets. Keeping one hand on your chest to feel the rise and fall of it, he kept his ears focused on your soft breaths. The sound of your breathing was the only thing keeping him sane. 

Joel wanted to tear someone’s face off. He wanted to rain hellfire down on any surviving alpha he could find but that wasn’t what you needed. You needed caring Joel, not the Joel that had single handedly destroyed the fireflies. He swallowed all of the things that threatened to cloud his judgment; the desire to pull away, the fury he had for Paul and the other alphas, the guilt he felt for your injured state, all of it was inconsequential.  

He pushed his own feelings away as he swerved around the corner, skidding a few inches before he managed to right the wheel. Letting out a cuss as he pumped the brakes, he held you close as the car drifted toward the poorly cleared driveway to your former home. 

You were right, the paint was awful. It was chipped in many places, yet still somehow managed to be much too bright against the snow covered landscape. Aside from the paint, the roof itself was rotted in multiple places. There was simply no way that it sufficed during the rainier months and he grimaced at the black mold he knew likely lined the inside of the walls. 

The front door flapped in the wind, making him uneasy as he gently tried to unwrap the limbs that were welded around him. He didn’t want to leave you here, but the potential dangers that could lurk inside left him with no choice. There was no way he was putting you in the line of fire again. 

Joel sighed and doubled down on his efforts but it was no use, you were like an octopus. Everytime he managed to pry off one limb, another wrapped around him and pulled him even closer. You kept your eyes closed but he knew that you were awake. With no other option, Joel pulled your head from its place in the crook of his neck. The whine you let out was pained, only deepening the guilt he felt for leaving as he hushed your cries. 

“I need to go check inside before I bring you in, baby. I’ll be right back, I swear,” he cooed. 

He cupped your cheeks, stroking them until the line between your eyebrows disappeared. 

“No,” you answered with a scratchy voice. 

“But I need t-”

A soft pinch was all you gave him in response. With all the strength in your body depleted, it was nothing more than a tug on his side but he got the hint nonetheless. Joel sighed louder at your stubbornness but relented. Although your safety was his top priority, the thought of leaving you for a second was just as painful for him. 

He bit his tongue as he lifted you from the car and trudged towards the entrance. Despite his efforts to shield your body from the wintry breeze with his jacket, goosebumps climbed up your legs and you shivered violently. Hastening his pace, Joel reached the front door and rushed inside. Frenzied from the prospect of cold seeping into your body, he knocked the door closed with his hip. The bang echoed throughout the house and he froze. 

Joel held you closer as he held his breath, straining to hear for any indication of life. He clenched his jaw painfully tight, trying to calm himself as he imagined a horde infected sprinting from a hiding place somewhere within the home. When nothing came, he could have collapsed with the relief he felt. 

With the threat gone, Joel worked quickly. Methodically sweeping through the quaint home, he raided the bathroom and storage closets for any supplies he could use. After finding the stash of supplies in the closet nearest to the master bedroom, Joel moved towards the door before he paused. 

The scents of its original occupants were mostly gone, dimmed with the time that had passed, but notes of your mother and stepfather’s unhappy union remained. He shook his head, turning on his heel to find a more comforting place for you to rest. After pulling open an office and yet another room filled with camp supplies, he finally stumbled upon your old room. 

Even if the walls hadn’t been soaked in the delicious aroma that was solely you, he could have guessed it was yours based on the decor alone. The walls were painted a bland beige but Joel noticed that you had gotten around this by covering them with pictures cut from old magazines, dried flowers, and colorful thread murals. Aside from that, there was a pile of clothes still unfolded on an armchair and pages of notes covering nearly every open surface. 

As Joel carried you towards the unmade twin bed, he prepared himself for another round against his octopus of a mate but you relaxed against the sheets. Perhaps it was the exhaustion that finally eased your half conscious mind or perhaps it was the familiarity of your old home but either way, he could finally untangle himself. Soft as ever, he pressed a kiss onto your forehead and pulled the sheets up to your chin before he tiptoed out of the room. 

Joel backtracked towards the medical supplies and tore through the boxes for everything he would need. He was impressed at the stash, yet slightly uncomfortable at the knowledge that these supplies had likely been kept from those that needed it by religious zealots. The upside was that he didn’t have to go far to find exactly what he was looking for. 

Armed with the supplies, he hurried back to your room. You were laid in the same position he had left you, yet he didn’t miss the way your body sunk deeper into the mattress at his return. Joel knelt by the bed, murmuring sweet words as he pulled the blanket back. 

The coat was open, revealing your beaten body to his eyes completely. Carefully, he peeled the sweater from your abdomen and it was hard for him not to scream at the bruises that stuck out against your ribs. Despite the damage to your ribs, he was relieved to find there was no broken skin anywhere. 

The fingerprints embedded into your thighs and throat threatened to break him but were also not in need of stitching. Given the dark bruising around your eyes and the swelling along the bridge of your nose, there was no doubt in Joel’s mind that your nose had been broken. He ghosted a finger along the swollen bump, pulling it back when your face twitched at the soft pressure. 

Joel shook his head and grabbed a cloth. After soaking the white fabric with the water, he carefully wiped the blood and grime from your body. The more that was revealed, the worst he felt. The darkened patches of bruised skin made his chest burn. You twitched when he dabbed carefully at your neck and he eased up, staying as gentle as possible while the filth was cleared from the top half of your body. 

Steeling himself, Joel moved down to your legs. He sucked in a deep breath as he moved upwards, stomach clenched as he wiped the soot off of your thighs. Despite the bruising along your hips and thighs, he was relieved to find that the damage did not reach your most vulnerable areas. The relief was bittersweet, as it was clear that although they were unsuccessful, someone had clearly tried to harm you in that way. 

Fucking Paul. 

Joel pushed the disgusting man from his thoughts. He needed to focus on you. After delicately pulling the coat from your body, he was surprised to find a bone glaring at him from your wrist. Given the reddened skin, Joel knew it had been dislocated for days. The skin around the bone was taut and his stomach roiled at the pain it had undoubtedly caused you. How the hell were you doing anything with an injury like this? 

Sighing, Joel scratched at his beard as he tried to make a game plan. He knew that the joint needed to be put back in place as soon as possible, lest the entire wrist remain damaged for the rest of your life. However, the pain that the process would involve tore at his heart strings. He wasn’t sure he had the strength to cause you any more pain. But, there was no other option. 

With shaking hands, Joel dug through the pile of goods and pulled out the morphine. He stared at the syringe for a moment, debating again before he ripped open the package and stuck the needle into the vial. The needle sucked up the clear liquid, filling the barrel slowly but surely until a small squirt of it spurted from the tip. Joel tested the plunger and he sighed when it worked. He knew that he couldn’t hold it off any longer.

“This is gonna help honey, just relax,” Joel mumbled, mostly to himself as you were fast asleep. 

You gave no sign of discomfort as the needle slid into muscle. The plunger was pressed down, administering what Joel hoped would numb the process. He waited a few minutes, letting it fully take hold of your nervous system as he continued to remove bits of debris and grime from your limbs. He knew you were ready when your head lolled to the side, with all of the aches in your body soothed by the morphine. 

With the drug clouding your senses, Joel grasped your wrist with both hands. He breathed in deeply, calming his own nerves before he expertly snapped the joint back into place. A sick crack tensed his jaw as your wrist regained its shape and he waited patiently for your response. Aside from a slight shiver, you remained oblivious. 

“That’s it baby, so brave,” Joel whispered as he wrapped the area in a makeshift splint. 

Leaning forward to kiss your face, he murmured sweet words as he pulled the sheets up around you. He stayed in his place at your bedside, kneeled against the wooden floor as you slept peacefully beside him. 

Suddenly, exhaustion pulled at Joel and he laid his head next to yours on the pillow. From this close, he felt every puff of air that left your mouth. Your even breathing was like the ocean, slowly pulling him into a meditative state. There was no possibility of him sleeping, not with a deep seated panic still lurking somewhere in his brain, but he let the obvious signs of life lull him into a false sense of security. You were right in front of him. 

After days of being without you, he had started to think that the morning he was taken would be his last time ever seeing you. With you laid in front of him alive, there was no way Joel was taking his eyes off of you for a second. 

Instead, Joel slid one of his hands into yours and focused on counting your eyelashes as you drifted in a sea of opium. He knew that there were so many things to do. There were antibiotics to be given. There was food likely stashed somewhere in this house that he needed to find for you. There were plans to be made regarding where the two of you would go. All of that needed to be addressed as soon as possible, yet Joel couldn’t bring himself to stand. 

As the day turned to night, moonlight blanketing the room and dulling the hues of purple along your face, Joel remained at your bedside. His eyes were still fixed on you well into the early hours of the morning, continuing to trace over every mark until he was satisfied that you weren’t going to stop breathing. 

- You -

Dreams bled into one another as you slumbered. They were warm, like the smell that carried you through each encounter along the way. The scent was familiar and you chased after it in your disjointed mind but it was always just out of reach. Plus, the scenery kept switching too fast. 

First, you were lying against the soft ground near the lake at home. It was summertime and when you looked over, you noticed Miriam. It took you a moment to hear what she was saying but you realized that she was trying to teach you the melody of some forgotten song. You wanted to listen, it was nearly impossible to pay attention to her with the spiciness of Joel wafting through the air. His scent was everywhere, but he was nowhere to be found. 

“Hey - Did you hear what I said or are we daydreaming today?,” Miriam jested. 

Your head whipped towards her, “Uh yeah, no, for sure, I just… Do you - Do you smell that? Is that - Is Joel here?” 

Miriam laughed but it was off. 

“No, he’s not. Joel won’t be here for some time, surprisingly,” she chuckled. 

Confusion struck you and you moved to get up, only for your wrist to pang as you tried to push up off of the ground. The day shifted, a soft breeze making you shiver as you tried to understand what was happening. When you looked back, Miriam was still smiling and before you could ask her, she was gone. 

The wine that was poured into your mouth was bitter and you choked as it slid down your throat. The communion had always tasted tart but this was way off. It was like the sacred drink had been replaced with a mix of medicine. The bitter sweetness glued your tongue to the roof of your mouth. 

As the cup was ripped away, you were met with the scathing glare of your former stepfather. You wiped the wine from the corners of your mouth and Josiah rolled his eyes. He looked just as he had the last time you saw him, with half of his face hanging off from the clicker that killed him. Blood oozed from the slashes in his face, dripping directly into the glass in his hands and you gagged. 

“What did I tell you? If you would have stayed with the man I chose, maybe none of this would have happened,” Josiah sighed. 

You blinked at his words, unsure of what to say.

“Paul was a fine young man but no, no you have to go and cause all of that trouble. And for what? For love? HA!”

Josiah cackled and you watched as it creased every inch of his face. A fear struck you. If Joel was here but you couldn’t see him, perhaps your stepfather had done something. You wanted to tackle him but it felt like you were chained. As you struggled against an invisible hold, Josiah lifted the cup back up to your lips. 

“Where the fuck is he?,” you hissed into the glass. 

The dangerous tone you used only made Josiah laugh. He shook his head and placed the wine glass down before he turned towards the rest of the congregation. Looking back, a sea of semi-familiar people lined the benches but their faces were blurred. If you squinted, you could guess who some of the former camp members were but most of them remained nameless. 

Without giving you another look, Josiah began his sermon. As he preached to them, his words got more warped until you felt the ground shift beneath you. The sanctuary shook and you desperately tried to get anyone’s attention but your voice was gone. Bracing yourself for the worst, you squeezed your eyes shut as the world collapsed in on itself. 

Instead of the death you had expected, when your eyes opened once more you were sitting in between your parents on the porch swing back home. The two of them had their bodies pressed into you and a children’s book was placed in your lap. You couldn’t see either of their faces as they read aloud from the page but you could hear them. They were both giving awful renditions of the characters, using silly voices until they broke into peals of laughter. 

It was only when the breeze had brushed against your face that you smelled him again. Sandalwood and bergamot tickled your nostrils, pulling you from the memory. The scent shifted your dream and suddenly, you were a fully grown woman squashed between two other adults. 

“Mom, Papa, did you see him? Is Joel here? Where is he?,” you questioned, voice desperate as the panic rose up from your chest. 

Your mother’s face was blurred when you looked at her, just as the congregants had been. The sight of her warped features was just as terrifying as seeing her in person and you jumped back in your seat, only to be met with the solid expanse of your father. Scared at what you might find, you refused to look at him at first but fingers soon grasped your face and whipped your head around. Facing him finally, you were relieved to find that his face remained unscathed. In fact, he grinned easily at you. 

“So grown up now bubs, I hardly recognized you,” he chuckled. 

Moisture gathered along your lash line, threatening to spill over as you smiled back. A silent moment passed as you both examined one another. It had been so long since you had seen him in a dream, years probably, yet somehow you remembered every detail. 

The wind kicked up again and you looked away, scanning the neighborhood for any sign of the cranky man you loved so much. Bits of the street were clear, like the sidewalk you used to play hopscotch on and the doghouse that held the sweet pitbull next door, but the majority of it had been blurred with time. 

You wanted to get up and look for the source of the smell in the house but you had the feeling like moving wasn’t an option. It made you uneasy, to be so close to Joel without the ability to actually see him. 

As if sensing the growing fear, your father grabbed your face. He pressed his palms into your cheeks and breathed in deeply, only letting go once you did the same. You smiled at the gesture, not realizing you even remembered him doing it until you released the breath. It was just like he used to do when he was alive. 

He sighed, “My beautiful girl, it’s been so nice to see you. But he’s waiting for you, bubs. It’s time to wake up now.” 

“What?,” you asked in confusion. 

He leaned forward, brushing his lips over your forehead before he pulled back again. Your father’s eyes twinkled with a familiar mirth as he grinned at you. 

“Alright, now get out of here. I don’t want to see you again for at least another fifty years, do you understand me?,” he jokingly commanded. 

Despite your hesitation, you nodded at his request. Your father smiled widely and pressed his forehead against yours as the world shifted again. Your vision was blurred once more, making you feel slightly nauseous as you tried to hold to the man in front of you. He said something but it was muffled as you were ripped from his embrace. 

-

Opening your eyes was harder than you thought it would be. It felt like the lids had been weighed down with bricks. Nevertheless, you could hear everything around you. There was snow persistently pelting against the window and howling wind made the structure groan before it settled again. However, it was the sound of someone speaking softly in the quiet of the space that lifted the fog from your mind. 

“… Tommy was so mad. His hair was always HIS THING back in the day. Fuck, it still is. Took him ‘bout a week to figure out that it was me that put Nair in his shampoo bottle.” 

The laugh he ended the story with was forced, making your heart pang as you slowly regained feeling in your limbs. The heat of his body was close but he wasn’t holding you like he normally would. It was annoying but you were too weak to voice any complaint. 

As more and more of your senses came back, so did the pain. Joel’s hand coasted over your back, as if he sensed the deep ache that had settled there. Despite the stiffness there, you were forced to hold in a sob at the feeling of his rough hand on your body. It had only been a few days, but it felt like a lifetime. You hoped desperately that it wasn’t a dream. 

No, you thought, it couldn’t be. Not when your throat was on fire. You tried to swallow but the muscles in your airway were tight. To make matters worse, the act of trying to suck in deep breaths not only aggravated your trachea but also the battered skin stretched across your ribcage. Each breath in and out was torture. 

At least with the swollen airway and crushed ribs, you could barely feel the ball of fire that encapsulated your wrist. The fact that it laid still against the sheets made no difference, pain still skittered up your arm and wrapped around your right shoulder. As the agony wrenched you from sleep, you focused on the sound of your mate’s syrupy drawl. 

“... I can’t think of what else to tell ya honey, m’real sorry. I don’t even know if me talking is doing anything but I just…”

Joel took a deep breath, his hand leaving your body to push his fingers through his undoubtedly unruly curls. The two of you were so attuned to one another that there was no need to open your eyes to know what he was doing. If you could’ve, you would have smiled at his exasperation. Contrary to Joel’s own worries about you not being able to handle his moods, the grumpiness was one of the things that made you love him in the first place. 

He sniffed and your heart dropped. 

“I don’t know if I was - fuck - if I was too late, just… Please darling. Please just open your eyes. I’m…,” Joel grunted, pausing to gather himself before he whispered, “I’m scared baby, okay? Please.”

The fear in his voice was evident, his usually even tone getting progressively shakier before it dropped off entirely at the end. With your stomach clenched at his distress, the need to soothe Joel breathed life back into your heavy limbs. The pain was brutal, but it was worth it to ease the mind of someone who had been haunted by loss for years. With sleep gluing your eyes shut, it took three tries before you managed to pry them open. 

The world was bright, so bright that it burned your retinas. The sun poured in from the windows, making your head pound as the light flooded every inch of the space. Sun spots danced in your eyes and you blinked them away, sighing as the room unfolded itself to you. 

A quiet gasp came from your mouth. The bedroom that had aided in your isolation during the most formative years, in the home you hoped never to return to, was where you found yourself. Echoes of thinly veiled threats and constant disparagement rang in your ears as your eyes wheeled around the small room. A shiver racked your body as phantom fingers pinched at the softer parts of your body and gripped at your throat. 

From the rickety bed, you saw that all of the decorations were still hung on the walls and the laundry was still stuffed in a forgotten chair. It was just as you had left it. For some reason, that made you hate being in it even more. It was like you had never left. Like finding your person, finding Joel Miller, had actually been the delusional daydream of the sad little girl that once lived in this house, but you knew that wasn’t true. Joel was yours, that part you were biologically incapable of forgetting, but you couldn’t remember why he had been absent for some time. 

The past few days were a blur. All the blood, the fighting, the adrenaline, the fear, had numbed you to reality. If you kept fighting, there was no time to think about what you were doing. The only thing you were focused on was getting Joel back, no matter the price. He was the only person you absolutely couldn’t lose. The thought of his death was too much. After struggling for years, there was no way you were going to live in a world without him. 

It was only when his teary face clouded your view that you were forced to remember. 

The cabin, Joel being taken, the blood you had spilt, Allie and Cooper, and finally, the encounter with Paul. All of it came rushing back as Joel held your face in his hands. You could barely focus on the words, still too groggy and weighed down with chilling memories to fully listen as he rambled about how worried he was. 

Joel gently caressed your face, looking down at you with so much love as he continued to speak earnestly. It was so sweet that you wanted to try for him, but the aching in your throat reminded you of how Paul’s fingers had dug into the skin. His rapid words were becoming more and more overstimulating as nausea crept up from your gut. 

“... and I knew you needed rest but shit, you’ve been out for days. I didn’t know what to do and I-I’m not a doctor and I-”

Shakily, you reached up and pressed your hand against his mouth. Joel’s eyes widened, looking like a kid caught with his hand in the cookie jar before a deeper look of understanding spread out on his face. He nodded, lifting your hand to press a kiss to the bruised knuckles before he placed it back on the bed. 

He reached out, his hands swallowing your left hand in a firm grasp as his big brown eyes looked down at you hopefully. A silence fell in the room but you were okay with it, taking a moment to take in the beast of a man that you had missed so badly. At first, all you noticed was his usual features. The strong nose with the scar across the bridge of it, the plush lips, the scruff on his cheeks, the bald spot on his beard that you loved to kiss, they were exactly where you had left them. However, after a few seconds reality seeped in. 

Joel’s eyes were bloodshot and glossy as they analyzed every emotion on your face. His face was puffy, bruised in so many places that they seemed to run together. Some darkened his skin with a deep purple, while others had already started to fade into a light green. 

“How-,” you stopped to clear your swollen throat, “How long have I been asleep?” 

He sniffed again, hastily wiping at his puffy eyes before he said, “Four days.” 

Four days? At first, your mind rebelled against the idea. There was no way you could’ve been asleep for that long. However, with the stiffness in your limbs and the fog over your thoughts, four days seemed likely. Your mouth was parched, lips cracked as you smacked them together unceremoniously. That flipped a switch in Joel and you started as he jumped up suddenly. He mumbled something about water, giving you a soft kiss before he jogged out of the room. 

His heavy footfalls receded down the hall and you sighed. With Joel out of the room, the walls felt like they were closing in. The thought of being in this place had been bad enough, but with him gone it felt like a nightmare. Any bravery that had strengthened your resolve during the past few days was long gone, leaving you powerless as you awaited his return. 

You waited a few seconds until he had turned into one of the rooms and was out of earshot. The last thing you wanted was to be in this room alone. With nervousness twisting your stomach,  you mustered the strength to pull yourself up. 

Black spots dotted your eyes as you heaved yourself up. Pain erupted from your neck, shooting bolts of electricity down your spine and you hissed. Clenching your jaw, you pushed against the mattress with your right hand. More lightning bolts erupted from your shattered wrist, making you let out a groan. The splint on your wrist did little to help with the pressure as you pulled yourself up against the headboard. 

Despite the brief triumph of sitting up in bed, bile rose from the depths of your stomach and threatened to spew from your mouth. The thirst didn’t matter anymore, not with the way every muscle in your body screamed in agony. The corners of your vision were darkened and you focused hard on breathing. The room had just begun to stop spinning when Joel walked back in. 

“Okay, so I’ve got - Shit! What the hell are ya doing?!,” he exclaimed. 

You smiled weakly, knowing that this wasn’t a good look. A sickly sheen of sweat glimmered in the sun, illuminating the injuries that covered your body. Joel grimaced and marched forward, reaching to lay you back down the moment he got to the bed. 

“What? No! I’m fine Joel, cut it out,” you grumbled, swatting at his insistent hands as he tried to pull you down by the legs. 

He stopped, eyes ablaze as he sucked his teeth in annoyance. Crossing his arms over his chest, you tried not to laugh at how bitchy he looked with his knee cocked out and his eyebrow raised. Laughing at him when he was this angry would only make him more upset. Regardless of the fact that you found it amusing, you didn’t want to put him in any more distress. Slowly, you reached out for him. The weakness in your limbs still lingered, making you drop it back down to the sheets in an instant. 

“Joel,” you sighed, “I’ve been asleep for days, I need to sit up.” 

Joel looked at you for a while, mouth twisted to the side before he finally sighed and nodded. You smiled, noticing how the corner of his mouth twitched at the sight of it. He took the hand you had reached out to him, kissing the back of it as he sat down on the bed. The both of you let out quiet groans, the movement aggravating every ache that burned through your bodies.  His eyes snapped up to yours and he frowned, looking heartbroken as he passed you a glass of water.

The cup was heavier than you expected and you fumbled it immediately. You tried to lift it up to reach your lips but the hefty drop of water that landed on the bed was the last straw for the alpha. Joel swiftly snatched the glass from your shaky hands, glaring at you when you tried to protest his coddling. 

Gently, Joel tipped the glass into your mouth. Tepid water slid down your throat, soothing a bit of the scratchiness that burned so badly. Swallowing was still a harrowing task, but the drink still alleviated some of the pain. You drank a few more times, nodding to him once you were finished. 

Joel placed the glass on the bedside table before grabbing your hand once more. Thumb brushing over the skin, his eyes were full of sadness and longing. He looked like a ghost of himself, with the light in his eyes faded from looking at the state of you. A lump formed in your throat and you fought hard to swallow any tears that threatened to wet your lash line. 

You squeezed his hand, “Baby, I’m fine.” 

He looked away, shaking his head aggressively as he mumbled something to himself. Joel caught your eye once more and underneath all the injuries, you saw a man who was terrified. The corners of his nose were reddened and raw from days filled with tears. You frowned at that, chest tightening at the knowledge that Joel had been crying over you. 

“Thing is darling, you weren’t fine. I should’ve…” he paused and swallowed hard, “When you came out, you were bleeding and wheezing. And I was so happy and then you just stopped breathing.” 

You barely remembered that. All you could remember was hearing Joel call your name through the fog of the pain and smoke. Guilt seeped in from the corners of your mind, making you gasp as you remembered the willingness you had to follow him into the dark. Believing that he was already dead, you had decided to give up, and now Joel was hurt because of it. 

“Joel I-,” you stopped, unsure of what to say to him. 

What was there to say? Sacrificing yourself to save him had come naturally. It was as easy as breathing when the other option was a life without him. Of course if he died, you would let yourself go on the chapel steps. What did he expect? But you couldn’t say that, not to him, not ever. He wouldn’t have it. 

Joel closed his eyes and breathed in from his nose. The anguish he felt pinched all the lines in his forehead together and it pulled a sympathetic noise from you. His eyes snapped open at the sound of your whine, flashing with anger once more as he mashed his teeth together. 

“They took me and you just… went after me? They told me you were killing most of their guards, is that true?” he asked cooly. 

There was no point in lying, you knew Joel would see through it. 

You nodded solemnly, “They took you from me. What would you have done?” 

That shocked him. So much so that he dropped your hand on the bed and raked his fingers through his unkempt curls. The tension in the air grew as Joel tried to find a way to argue against your point. His jaw clicked from the pressure of his teeth grinding but he ignored, too focused on finding a solid argument against your point. The thought of bickering with him was so mundane that it almost made you smile but you held back in light of the circumstance. Instead, you decided to keep going. 

“Alpha, look at me,” you whined. 

It took a second for him to heed your request. Joel fought against his own instincts, looking away for as long as possible before the alpha in him took over. When his gaze finally landed on yours, Joel’s eyes softened and you weakly made grabby hands at him. 

Joel sighed at your request, his anger melting away as he scooted into your space. The lines in his face smoothed out, making him look years younger despite the growing patches of gray in his beard and curls. As always, his body was warm and you hummed at the proximity. A wave of calm rushed over you, his presence making you more level headed instantly. 

“Listen, we’re mates and they took you. I didn’t… Well, if I’m being honest, I didn’t know I had that in me but I’m not sorry. Those guys fucking sucked and they took the love of my life from me, okay? There’s no regrets,” you explained. 

He winced at your words and you tried not to feel embarrassed. It was what he would have done, so why was this any different? 

“What about putting yourself in real danger by getting that close to him? What about telling Cooper not to tell me where you ran off to? It’s like you were trying to die or something,” he spat. 

The tone of his voice made you wince. It was true, you had told Cooper that, but the problem had been yours to finish. Paul coming after everyone was your mess, meaning that it was your job to clean it up. 

The pelting of the snow against the window picked up and you dropped the smile from your face. Suddenly, the sound of a fire crackling and the smell of smoke pulled you from the conversation. Blinking once, then twice, you gulped audibly as you tried to forget the feeling of hands wrapped around your throat. 

“I-I, uh-” 

Joel continued, getting more worked up as he went on, “It’s supposed to be me and you, ain’t it? Me and you, nobody else. Sacrificing yourself is not a part of the deal sweetheart, that’s betrayal.” 

You blinked, throat tightening for a whole other reason. His words stung but you understood his anger. If Joel had done what you did, you would have been pissed. However, the way he looked at you was too much. It was never your intention to hurt him. 

“I c-couldn’t have you dying for me, or anyone else. It’s just - oh fuck - Joel, it didn’t matter what he did to me. I just couldn’t let him hurt any of the people I love, can’t you see that?” you cried out. 

“HURT PEOPLE YOU LOVE?!,” Joel exploded, “DO YOU KNOW WHAT WOULD HURT ME?! IF YOU DIED! THAT WOULD FUCKING KILL ME! DON’T YOU FUCKING GET THAT?!”

A soft whimper was all you gave in response as tears poured down your face. You were tired, so tired of everything and he was being so mean. Sobs racked your body. The bruises on your ribs protested, aching with each breath, but you couldn’t stop. Not with Joel sat there in silence, biting his lip as he watched you break apart in front of him. That stung. You wanted him to hold you in arms, to kiss your face and rub your hip with his thumb like he usually did, but he was completely still. 

“Joel, please,” you whispered pitifully. 

He sighed and rubbed his face. Although Joel was inches away, it felt like miles as you waited for him to touch you. Looking down at the state of your body, you suddenly felt a wave of self consciousness. He had changed you into one of your old shirts, the formerly baggy material now taut against your chest and hips, but the rest of your bruises were clear in the light of day. More tears dripped down your face, splattering against the soft cotton as you chewed on the inside of your mouth in contemplation. 

“He didn’t… I mean, he tried, but um… It’s still only you, if that’s what you are uh, worried about,” you mumbled as more tears fell onto the comforter. 

You closed your eyes, not wanting to see if he looked at you differently with the admission. Alphas were territorial, you knew that, so you guessed it was that he was worried about. With your eyes still shut, you heard Joel move to get up from the bed. The sound of him leaving the bedside made your heart fall to the floor and shatter. The air in the room was suddenly stifling, making you breathe in sharply as the holes that had formed over the years in your heart widened. You wanted to sink into the earth, to let the cold dirt cover you until it silenced every thought or feeling. 

As you spiraled further into misery, you were surprised to feel Joel move onto the bed behind you. His strong arms pulled you down onto your side, careful to rearrange you so that his face was inches from yours on the pillow. Despite the tears, his blurred face didn’t look angry, just sad. Joel stroked the side of your head thoughtfully before he leaned forward to kiss your forehead. With him seemingly not upset, you tried again. 

“Please, I’m sorry. I just… I love you. I couldn’t let you die and he was going to kill not just you, but others. I didn’t want to go with him, I just-”

Joel cut you off, pressing his chapped lips to yours softly. You stopped, shocked at the contact at first but quickly melting into him. He allowed it to go on for a few seconds, softly pouring his love and devotion into the kiss before he pulled back. As his lips left yours, your dampened eyes fluttered open to see that his had softened. 

“S’okay baby, don’t cry. M’not mad at ya for going with him. Well… Maybe I am a little but it’s not cus of that. You’re lucky you got out but if ya hadn’t, you know that wouldn’t have been your fault right? I woulda been madder than hell, but not at you. Never at you, darling. ”

You sniffed and nodded, scooching closer to him in search of reassurance. He welcomed your proximity, lifting one of his hands to scratch softly at the tangled strands on your head. It spooked you at first, the feeling of someone being so soft with you after days of all out war, but Joel whispered sweet words until you finally relaxed. As if on cue, his scent started to grow stronger to soothe the omega in need and it numbed the edges of the despair. 

Joel nodded back and sighed, squeezing you closer as he mumbled, “I love you, okay? That ain’t ever gonna stop but I just… You can’t sacrifice yourself like that again, okay? Ever. I don’t care whose life is on the line, you ain’t allowed. This - I can’t - fuck… You can’t just do that.” 

“I’m not allowed?,” you rolled your eyes, “Really?” 

He cocked an eyebrow as you laughed at his request. You were about to roast his attempt at direction, but karma got to you first. Instead, the laugh made your throat burn so badly that Joel had to reach over for the glass of water. After a few sips, the coughing stopped and he set it back down. With the hacking at bay, the room grew silent. 

“I wasn’t kidding,” he said quietly. 

“I know,” you answered back softly. 

Joel’s gaze was soft but there was a hint of desperation to it as he brushed his fingers over every inch of your body. It felt good, having him soften for you again. It was like seeing the skies open up with a downpour during a fierce drought. You tried to think of a compromise, anything to get him to back off but you knew he wouldn’t buy it. Joel needed you to say that you would let him die, if it came to it. 

As the relationship between Joel and you had changed back in the cabin, you decided never to lie to him. There was no point, not when the man spent every waking second trying to make you happy and only ever wanted to be around you. Plus, he was a good listener, despite the fact that he forgot people’s names sometimes. However, the broken look on his face persuaded you to break the no lying streak. There was no way you were ever going to let him die for you, but he didn’t need to know that. 

“Fine, no sacrificing. Scouts honor,” you agreed. 

“You were in the scouts?” he scoffed, smiling wryly at the notion. 

“In all honesty, I don’t know what the scouts are. It’s just something I’ve heard people say in books and movies. Is it something from one of those shows you’re talking about? Is that the MASH thing you’re always talking about?,” you guessed. 

It was Joel’s turn to laugh this time and it was beautiful. You didn’t even mind the way it jostled the bed, making a few of your injuries smart with the movement. He looked years younger when he laughed and you smiled at him as boisterous laughter turned to muted chuckles. Carefully, you reached over and rubbed over the mark on his neck with your thumb. 

He sighed at the feeling, “Fuck, I’m old.”

“Distinguished,” you giggled. 

Joel snorted and kissed the palm of your hand. He moved closer towards you, resting his forehead against yours as he sighed. The feeling of him being so close was intoxicating. You basked in his scent, allowing it to draw you into an almost meditative state as you looked into each other’s eyes. 

“M’not strong enough to go on without you darling. That’s not… I can’t do that again, alright? I can’t lose someone that I love again. Please, just… You can’t do that to me,” he whispered against your lips. 

You felt every syllable, both from his soft lifts brushing against yours and in the burn that settled in your chest. Joel had been through so much, all he wanted from you was to stay alive. Of course you would try, but you needed him to live too. 

“I understand Joel. Just… You can’t do it to me either, alright? I know that you’re gonna say that you’ve lived longer or something about being the alpha, but I don’t care. I couldn’t go on either baby. I wouldn’t want to,” you sighed, brushing the curls from his forehead. 

His mouth twisted up and you heard his teeth clack together from the pressure. Joel squinted at you in annoyance, a red flush forming on his cheeks as he tried to work his way out the deal. 

“Honey, I know you love me. It’s not that, I just - I’m 56 years old. I can’t just let you -”

“I’m not telling you to let me die Joel. Save me, but don’t you dare die. I don’t want you to die for me, I need you to live.”

During your time alone, you had missed life with Joel. It wasn’t just the rose he carved, or the meals he made, or the way he fucked you into the mattress, it was the mundane things. You missed the way he looked in the mornings, the way he let you hug him from behind as he cooked something on the stuff, the way he was constantly absent mindedly covering you with layers of blankets or sweaters. The life the two of you had together was short, but you needed more of it. The oasis you found in one another was a once in a lifetime thing, you felt it deep in your bones. 

“No dying for each other, just… Just living,” Joel mumbled. 

You nodded, giving him a small smile. Leaning forward, you gently kissed the side of his mouth. He sighed and pressed his nose into your neck, huffing at the skin there as you played with his hair. It hurt a little, with the area so bruised and tender, but you allowed him to scent you as he wished. Joel had clearly washed your skin the best he could as you slept, but it wasn’t enough to completely block out HIS scent. With your own alpha’s smell overtaking the sour stench that lingered before, a sense of calm filled you and opened the floodgates. 

“I don’t think I want to talk about it yet. Not all of it at least,” you whispered, scared he might ask more about the slaughter or Paul. 

He kissed the flesh below your ear, right over the indents he made with his teeth and you closed your eyes. 

“S’okay darling, whenever you’re ready.”

Joel continued kissing over the bruises delicately as you cycled through your emotions. The smile at his sweetness quickly morphed into distressed cries but he continued. Your shaky hands grasped at the back of his head as he continued his tenderness, pushing him into your skin harder until his nose was squashed. If it bothered Joel, he didn’t say anything, clearly rathering to continue brushing his lips against every inch of your neck. He circled back to your mark every now and again, almost like a reminder each time the crying got louder again. 

Grief, pain, disgust, fear, sadness, and love all brewed beneath the surface. So many conflicting emotions made your head spin as you tried to calm yourself. They were released in the quiet cries, until only the feeling of Joel’s scruffy cheeks tickling your skin remained. Although you went through the full wheelhouse of emotions, love was what you felt at him being near and your throat grew thick with it. 

“I’ve missed you so much baby,” you choked out. 

Joel pulled back, eyes shining as he pressed a longer kiss to your lips. It was still tame, the both of you too injured and traumatized for it to go anywhere, but it was passionate. You poured every ounce of love you had for him in it and in turn, he did the same. When Joel broke away, your face was flushed and he smiled at the way your lips mindlessly followed his. 

He sighed, “I’ve missed you too honey, more than you could ever know. Never stopped thinking about ya.” 

A grin split your face in two, making your cheeks burn as you snuggled into his chest. The thought of him thinking of you, in any context, immediately made you giddy. Without any prompting, Joel wrapped his arms around you and placed his chin on top of your head. Like a practiced dance, the two of you were tangled in each other in seconds. You pressed your face into the expanse of his chest, breathing in his spiciness until it was the only thing you could think of. 

While you were slowly drifting off, lulled by his presence and smell, Joel was still wide awake. You could feel him gearing up to say something, despite the fact that you were slipping back into sleep. 

“We’ve gotta get some food in ya baby, it’s been awhile since you’ve been awake. There isn’t much but some applesauce could be okay on your stomach, I don’t know if -” 

Just like you had before, you reached up and covered his mouth to cut off his rambling. Joel made an indignant noise, trying to shake you off before he settled on licking your hand. The feeling of his tongue against your palm was ticklish and you chuckled, ignoring the jolts of pain that rattled in your chest as you kept your hand in place. 

“Nice try, but you’ve literally spat in my mouth before. Pretty sure I can handle a licked hand,” you sassed, voice muffled by his chest. 

Joel shook his head at your words, his chin brushing against the crown of your head with the movement. You smiled, knowing that his face was undoubtedly twisted into his signature scowl at your wording. 

“Jesus darling, the mouth of yours is as crass as ever,” he huffed in amusement. 

The nod you answered with knocked your forehead against Joel’s chin. The force of the collision was hard and you groaned in unison, which in turn made you both chuckle. He pulled back, looking lighter than ever as he studied your face. 

“You need to eat,” Joel pressed. 

You sighed and ignored him, pressing your face against his chest to ignore him. When he tried to extradite himself from the bed, you quickly buried your fingers into his hair. A loud, almost pornographic groan left Joel’s mouth at the circles you rubbed, making him ease himself back down again. He was a sucker for scalp massages and you knew it, having been crushed by his body multiple times after rubbing his head in bed. 

Begrudgingly, Joel wrapped himself around you again and you smiled at the victory. Although he grumbled to himself, you could tell he was only half as exasperated as he let on to be. It was hard for him to act tough with your fingers working magic on the rubber band he found wrapped around his skull every day. 

“I’ll eat,” you sighed dreamily, “Just hold me some more.” 

How could he say no to that? Joel softened, pressing his nose into your hair to breathe in some of your scent as you burrowed deeper into him. The warmth of his body was intense. You had forgotten how much heat the alpha emitted and it was a relief to finally have your personal space heater back. For days, you had barely slept. When you had, it was brief and the truck didn’t hold heat long enough for it to be comfortable. Without Joel quite literally warming your bed, you weren’t sure you would ever have a good night’s sleep ever again. 

“Feel like I’ve heard that one before,” he argued but there was no bite to it. 

There couldn’t be, not when the two of you fit together so perfectly, despite everything. The bruises on both of your bodies hadn’t healed and there were definitely loads to talk about, but the feeling of Joel against you was enough for now. If he was with you, you were home. That was all you needed.  

“I love you,” you whispered. 

You waited, and almost said it again in case he hadn’t picked up on it, but all you got back from him was the start of a loud snore. Looking back up, Joel was out cold. His mouth was wide open, drool threatening to drip down the side of his face as he slumbered hard. He must’ve been awake since he found you, which would have been about four days. And who knows how well he had slept at Paul’s camp? 

The realization hit you hard as you watched him sleep. Imagining Joel awake, fearful to sleep in case something happened to you was devastating. Leaning forward, you pressed your lips to his throat in thanks. His face twitched at the contact, arms drawing you even closer, but he remained asleep. With Joel’s body surrounding your own, peace washed over you. There was no confusion or fear or grieving, as it had been as of late, just complete tranquility in the silence of the afternoon. 

As the day passed, you laid there and allowed him to rest while watching the shadows change on his face. Originally, you had promised yourself that you would stay alert for the sake of your slumbering mate. Knowing Joel, he probably made some promise to himself to never rest again in an insane plan to keep you safe. It was unreasonable obviously, but completely on brand. Nevertheless, as the day passed, you felt yourself drifting away as you saw the beginnings of a reddened sunset in the golden hue of his skin. 

You called out to him quietly, bidding Joel goodnight as you slipped further into sleep with his arms still holding you. The simple act of bidding him goodnight, of pressing yourself against as he slept, forced a soft smile on your face that you knew would linger well into the night. 

Joel was here.

You were with him. 

You were home.

[gyu-dloml]

Flower 🌸

Summary : A certain pretty boy comes running to you.

Pairing : Hong Joshua x Gn! reader

Genre : Idiots (fwb) to lovers, angst, fluff

Word count : 724

Warnings : Implied smut, language

It's become a routine. Every night you spend with Joshua ends up like this. You laying on top of him, both of you guys sweaty and panting. If you looked closely you could probably see fog on the windows. And you're going to wake up with sore legs and unfortunately (fortunately?) a Joshua missing by your side.

Well, atleast he's decent enough to wait while you're asleep whilst leaving. Many would argue that it's better watching your fuck buddy leave rather than them sneaking out. But it's easy for your heart and eyes to cry out when it's been hours since he's left.

But how come it all seems perfect for those hours. Why does he look at you the way you look at him? Because you're very sure you look at him with hearts in your eyes. And why does he call you all those sweet names and treat you so well when it's all probably a lie.

As every one of these nights passes, you get more and more anxious. Everytime it ends, you think to yourself 'tonight's the night, no more Shua'. Oh but like a moth to a flame, you go running back to him on every beck and call of his, expecting to not get burnt; atleast not this time please.

He's like a forbidden fruit, sweeter than honey that you apparently can taste but not have. If it was all business you wouldn't be having trouble leaving all this behind. That's why you wish he was meaner to you at work.

You wish he'd just let you be when you didn't want to eat but he comes with food in his hand, ready to force feed you if needed. You wish he didn't notice every mood swing you had and try to make it all better. You wish he didn't pluck his neighbors flowers for you on every one of him 'visit'.

And if he really does all that, you really wish he wouldn't jokingly dismiss all of your confessions.

-

"Shua."

"Yes pretty?"

"I like you."

"And I like you too."

"No, I really like you. Let me take you out for coffee."

"We take each other out on coffee almost every day!" He chuckles and gets back to his phone.

-

There's things he doesn't tell you. Things like how infatuated he is with everything about you and related to you. You like him? That's just too good to be true. He can't fathom that he could have you anymore than he has right now.

"God you're really dumb." Jeonghan says, not even sparing a glance at Joshua.

"Shut up."

"Look Joshuji, she trusts you with her body, how much more could you want? All you need to do is make it official. And trust me when I say she likes you as much as you like her. Stop being a pussy and ask her out. NOW. Or else I'm launching my Lego set at you."

Joshua scoffs, "You could never." That's just how precious Hannies Lego set is.

"Watch me." Wow, he really picked it up.

-

As you stare out of your window, spiraling with all these thoughts, your phone buzzes.

"Hello?"

"Hey." It's Joshua.

"Why are you panting? Are you alright?"

"Yeah yeah, running from Han's Lego set."

"Okay..?" That friend of Shua really surprises you everytime.

"I was wondering if I could take you up on that coffee offer?"

Your heart started beating erratically while you try to think of a response, "But it's almost 11 right now, how about later?"

"Oh no, not any longer. How about we make some? At your house, I'm on my way."

"Wow okay what's gotten into you."

"It's a date then. Do you want me to ask you out romantically?"

"What the fuck are you on Hong?"

"Do you really want me to do this on the phone?"

And you've seen all kinds of Joshua - delirious Shua, drunk Shua and hangry Shua and you know for a fact that he'd never joke about this. But you still need time to process that it's all finally happening.

"No, just come over quick."

"I'm running to you princess, two minutes more."

You can hear him running when all of a sudden he adds,

"Wait fuck, I forgot to pluck Mr. Yang's flowers!!"

"That's called stealing, Joshua Hong."

"Anything for you."

yet, another one on a whim 🥰 tumblr on mobile will make me crazy, I'll change a few things when i come back 😠😭

[starstruckzine]

Alright, everyone! Today, the Star Struck tour is back in full swing, preparing to hit the road for this world-wide adventure. We have lots of fun stuff planned along with a second round of applications for anyone who'd like to join as a member of the tour staff. There will be a few moderator positions available as well as spaces for contributors (artists and writers). The application window will open on April 1 (no joke 😂) and end on May 15, 2025.

April 1 is also the launch of the Star Struck Fantasy Ribbon Game! For those who missed the post on March 10, the rules are as follows...

1. We'll be sharing a variety of activities for everyone to have fun with. This will include things such as word searches, guessing games, and a scavenger hunt.

2. Participating in these activities will earn you virtual ribbons.

3. We'll provide other opportunities to earn ribbons as well, so you'll want to keep your eye out.

4. Create a post to show off your ribbons. Give us a mention @starstruckzine and use #MHArockparty to tag it. This is very important to help keep track of how many ribbons each participant has.

5. The game will run until 11:59 p.m. on May 30.

6. May 31, we'll check the posts to find out who collected the most ribbons.

7. On June 1, the winner will be announced. In the case of a tie, we'll have a drawing to decide the winner.

The top prize will be a free V.I.P. physical bundle for the zine as well as one mini pack specific to your favorite band! Second place is a free regular physical bundle, and third place will be a V.I.P. digital bundle.

Over the next couple of weeks, we'll be giving you more insight on what each bundle will contain along with some other glimpses behind the curtain. Stay tuned for more!

For those who are already with us, this is your chance to get your first ribbon. From now until April, if you reblog this post with @starstruckzine and tag it #mha rock party, we will DM you a special early bird ribbon!

Reblogs dated after April 1, 2025, will not be counted. 💙🩵

[lonestarflight]

"KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, FLA. – After leaving the Orbiter Processing Facility, Atlantis makes its way to the Vehicle Assembly Building atop an orbiter transporter. In the VAB, the orbiter will be lifted into high bay 3 for mating to the external fuel tank and solid rocket boosters. Atlantis's launch window begins Aug. 28. During its 11-day mission to the International Space Station, the STS-115 crew of six astronauts will install the Port 3/4 truss segment with its two large solar arrays."

Date: July 24, 2006

NASA ID: KSC-06PD-1639

[mariacallous]

In April, U.S. President Joe Biden signed into law a trio of emergency supplemental spending bills, including one focused on the Indo-Pacific that is commonly referred to as the Taiwan aid bill. The new legislation seeks in part to address Taiwan’s roughly $19.7 billion backlog of arms sales from the United States—a hot-button issue given China’s increasingly provocative military activities around Taiwan and the perception among some U.S. analysts that Taiwan is not as much of a priority as Washington claims.

Taiwan relies on the Foreign Military Sales (FMS) program for most of its U.S. weapons acquisitions, which typically requires manufacturing major weapons systems from scratch. All FMS sales above a certain threshold—$14 million in Taiwan’s case—must be notified to Congress, which can vote to block the sale, though it has never successfully done so. The bureaucratic FMS process is relatively slow by design, and some delay between congressional notification and delivery is to be expected. Yet Taiwan often finds itself waiting longer than other countries for the same U.S. weapons.

In June 2017, for example, Congress received notification of a sale to Taiwan of 56 AGM-154C joint standoff weapons—guided bombs that use onboard wings to glide to their targets. The contract to produce the bomb was awarded this February, nearly seven years after the congressional notification. By the time the bombs are expected to be delivered, in March 2028, it will have taken almost 11 years for Taiwan to receive the weapons that it purchased.

Delays such as this may not seem important in peacetime, but they could become dire in the not-so-distant future. The so-called Davidson window, when the U.S. Defense Department believes that China’s military will be ready to attack Taiwan, begins in 2027. Perhaps no munition will be more critical to Taiwan’s self-defense in this scenario than the anti-ship missile, which Taipei would need in large numbers to attack Chinese warships and civilian vessels that could bring an invasion force ashore. Ground-based anti-ship missiles carried by trucks are particularly valuable for Taiwan given their mobility, which makes it harder for China to target them.

In October 2020, Congress received notification of an FMS case for nearly $2.4 billion to deliver 100 truck-mounted Harpoon launchers and 400 missiles to Taiwan, which was followed by a September 2022 deal worth an estimated $355 million for 60 air-launched Harpoons. But it took two and a half years from the initial notification for Washington to award the first contracts for this work. Taiwan will likely receive these Harpoon missiles in tranches, but the weapons won’t be delivered in full until 2030—well after the Davidson window begins.

It is difficult to pinpoint the root cause of Taiwan’s weapons backlog with available data. Congressional notifications of arms sales are easy to find, but other steps in the FMS process are not consistently made public. Simply knowing the dates of the signed Letter and Offer of Acceptance (LOA), contract award, and the initial and final delivery of a particular FMS purchase would provide a more accurate picture of why delays occur. Any future reforms to the process should include transparency measures to help researchers and policymakers identify the sources of backlogs for FMS recipients.

U.S. bureaucracy alone cannot explain why Taiwan waits so much longer than other countries for the same weapons. It’s possible that Taiwan’s internal process for payment could be gumming up the works. Purchases of foreign military equipment must be approved by Taiwan’s Legislative Yuan before an LOA can be signed, meaning that legislative delays could create a ripple effect when finalizing contracts with U.S. companies.

Stress on the U.S. defense industrial base probably exacerbates the backlog, too. The COVID-19 pandemic and Russia’s war in Ukraine shed light on bottlenecks and capacity shortcomings in the industry. This has already played out with Taiwan, which reportedly canceled an FMS case for Paladin self-propelled howitzers in 2022 due to production delays. The problem isn’t going away anytime soon, since many of the munitions in Taiwan’s arms backlog are in high demand from Ukraine and other FMS customers.

However, the recent Taiwan aid bill will make it easier to use the presidential drawdown authority (PDA), which allows Washington to take weapons out of its own military stockpiles and immediately transfer them to a foreign country. Because PDA transfers draw from existing stocks, there is no manufacturing wait time, allowing the United States to deliver more rapid support in times of need.

At first glance, PDA transfers seem to be an attractive option for reducing the size of Taiwan’s backlog. It’s clear that the U.S. government also sees them as such: In late 2022, Congress amended the Foreign Assistance Act to authorize $1 billion per fiscal year for PDA transfers to Taiwan, and the supplemental legislation passed in April allocates $1.9 billion for the Defense Department to replenish any stockpiles of weapons that it sends to Taiwan through PDA for fiscal 2024 and 2025.

But the impact of the new legislation will likely be limited, primarily because PDA does not allow Biden to transfer equipment that the U.S. military does not already have in its stockpiles. The three largest backlogged arms sales by dollar value—all done by the Trump administration and representing $12.4 billion, almost two-thirds of the backlog—consist of equipment that the U.S. military does not possess on hand. The largest of these is for 66 F-16 Block 70/72 aircraft, valued at $8 billion. The U.S. Air Force operates more than 1,000 F-16s, but this fleet does not include the variant that Taiwan purchased.

Similarly, the United States does not have any Harpoon coastal defense systems in its stockpile. When Washington announced in June 2022 that it was sending truck-mounted Harpoons to Ukraine, it did so via the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative instead of PDA because there were no systems available for drawdown. (The United States has also used PDA to aid Ukraine, sending an estimated $23.8 billion of equipment through this method since August 2021.)

Washington might have better luck with Abrams tanks, which make up Taiwan’s third-largest backlogged arms sale at $2 billion. The United States has plenty of Abrams on hand, but the model sold to Taiwan—the M1A2T—has unique subsystems. Taiwan could receive less capable tanks sooner through PDA, but the first tranche of its newly built Abrams tanks are supposed to arrive later this year, so waiting a few more months is probably preferable.

The United States could use PDA transfers to reduce other parts of Taiwan’s arms backlog, but in many instances, Washington would find that its defense industry already has contracts to produce the weapons in question, as is the case for HIMARS rocket artillery launchers, MQ-9B drones, and multiple types of missiles and munitions. If Washington could use PDA to transfer these weapons to Taiwan now instead of waiting for defense industry to finish making new systems, it would raise difficult questions about what happens to those contracts. Would the U.S. military receive the contracted weapons instead of Taiwan? Or would the contracts be canceled?

Theoretically, Taiwan could benefit by double-dipping—getting weapons via PDA transfers in the near term while maintaining contracts to get more of the same weapons in the long term. This would be good for building up its military stockpiles, especially munitions. However, if Taiwan is still waiting for FMS cases to be fulfilled, the size of the arms backlog would not change.

It’s clear that PDA transfers may not be the most effective way to reduce the arms backlog. If deployed smartly, however, they can play a valuable role in moving Taiwan toward an asymmetric defense posture and improving its self-defense capabilities. Asymmetric defense, also known as a so-called porcupine strategy, uses large numbers of smaller, less complex capabilities to counter a stronger opponent. For Taiwan, less costly capabilities such as drones, anti-ship missiles, and surface-to-air missiles could prevent China from achieving the air and sea superiority that it would need to invade the island.

To that end, the United States should emphasize PDA transfers for certain categories of weapons. Taiwan needs more munitions and missiles of all types, but especially ground-based anti-air and anti-ship weapons. It is waiting on several types of missiles, including Patriot interceptors, Harpoons, and Stingers. Munitions are another contender for double-dipping, because Taiwan will inevitably need many reloads, and resupply would be difficult after a conflict begins.

But Taiwan has been hesitant to fully embrace an asymmetric defense strategy, and the balance of the arms backlog favors traditional capabilities. Washington can use PDA transfers to signal the importance of asymmetric defense to Taipei and send relevant capabilities that are not currently sold through the FMS system. Good candidates for such transfers include sea mines; the remote-controlled Navy Marine expeditionary ship interdiction system; and small uncrewed aerial vehicles, such as the RQ-7, RQ-20, and the Switchblade loitering munition.

The PDA funding in the Taiwan aid bill is not a silver bullet for Taiwan’s arms sale woes. Instead of viewing PDA transfers as a tool for reducing the backlog, policymakers should see them as an instrument for building up stockpiles of munitions and pushing Taiwan toward a more effective and sustainable defense strategy. Presidential drawdown authority could be a good Band-Aid for getting weapons to Taiwan, but fixing the long wait times that Taipei faces will require other solutions.

[sanjaypuri]

How to Customize Windows 11 for Better Performance

Windows 11 comes with a sleek, modern design, but if you're aiming for better performance, customizing it to suit your workflow is essential. Whether you're looking to speed up processes, reduce lag, or simply optimize your user experience, there are several ways to adjust the system for top performance.

Streamline the Startup Process

One of the easiest ways to improve performance on Windows 11 is to manage your startup programs. Too many programs launching at startup can slow down your system considerably. Head to the Task Manager, go to the “Startup” tab, and disable unnecessary programs. This ensures your PC focuses only on the essential tasks when you boot up.

Tweak Visual Effects

Windows 11 is packed with beautiful visual effects, but these can take a toll on system performance, especially on older machines. You can tweak or disable these effects by going to “Advanced system settings” and adjusting for best performance. This will simplify animations and effects, giving your system a noticeable speed boost without compromising on usability.

Optimize Power Settings

Your power plan has a direct impact on performance. By default, Windows 11 may be set to “Balanced,” which is great for energy saving but not always for performance. Switch to “High Performance” under the Power & sleep settings, ensuring that your machine is using its full potential for demanding tasks.

Keep Your Browser in Check

A browser that uses too much memory can slow everything down. To get the most out of your Windows 11 experience, opt for the best browser for Windows 11 that is lightweight and efficient. Not only will this improve your browsing speed, but it will also help reduce the strain on your system, allowing for faster multitasking and smoother performance.

Remove Unnecessary Background Apps

Windows 11 tends to run several background apps by default. These can quietly consume both memory and CPU power, which impacts overall system performance. You can manage which apps are allowed to run in the background by going to the Settings > Apps > Apps & features, and then adjusting permissions or turning off unnecessary apps.

Keep Your System Updated

For optimal performance, keeping your system up-to-date is essential. Regular Windows updates often include performance enhancements, security patches, and bug fixes that make a noticeable difference. Make sure you have the latest drivers and software updates, as these can directly improve system efficiency.

Conclusion

Customizing Windows 11 for better performance doesn’t have to be overwhelming. By adjusting startup processes, tweaking visual effects, optimizing power settings, and using the best browser for Windows 11, you can experience a smoother, faster computing experience. These small changes will allow you to maximize your system's potential, whether you’re working, gaming, or streaming.

[spacenutspod]

A Falcon 9 stands ready for a Starlink mission at Cape Canaveral’s pad 40. File photo: Adam Bernstein/Spaceflight Now. SpaceX is preparing to launch its first Starlink mission from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in more than two weeks. The last time the company attempted to launch the Starlink 10-2 mission, it encountered a rare scrub as the Falcon 9’s first stage Merlin engines began firing. Liftoff of the rescheduled flight is set for 1:15 p.m. EDT (1715 UTC) from Space Launch Complex 40. Spaceflight Now will have live coverage beginning about an hour prior to liftoff. Activity in the tropics creates some uncertainty for the launch from a meteorological perspective. On Saturday, June 22, the 45th Weather Squadron issued a launch weather forecast that suggests just 50 percent odds of favorable launch weather at the opening of the launch window. That deteriorates to just 20 percent by the close of the window. Meteorologists are tracking cumulus clouds, anvil clouds and lightning probability as primary concerns. “Deep tropical moisture will remain entrenched across the Florida peninsula into early next week, and as a result, scattered to numerous showers and thunderstorms can be expected each day, largely favoring the afternoon and evening hours,” the forecast stated. “While atmospheric flow will remain weak enough to allow daily seabreeze development, an incoming trough will likely result in delayed formation and westward progression by Monday and Tuesday, with initial storm development closer to the coast on those days.” The 24-hour back-up launch opportunity is generally the same, but the opening of the launch window is 60 percent favorable for liftoff. The Falcon 9 first stage booster supporting this mission, B1078, will be launching for an 11th time. It previously launched the astronauts and cosmonaut of the Crew-6 mission, the USSF-124 mission and seven previous Starlink flights. A little more than eight minutes after liftoff, B1078 will land on the SpaceX droneship, ‘A Shortfall of Gravitas.’ This will be the 75th booster landing for ASOG and the 321st booster landing to date. However, B1078 wasn’t always the intended booster for this mission though. The original flight plan had B1073 as the first stage booster. However, the booster was swapped out following a last-second scrub on June 14. SpaceX hasn’t elaborated on the issue or issues that caused the scrub during engine ignition, but in a June 15 post on X (formerly Twitter), Kiko Dontchev, the vice president of Launch at SpaceX said: “Tough week dealing with production challenges and then a rare scrub at engine startup yesterday on 10-2. “Unfortunately there is a real issue so we need to go inspect the hardware in detail on this vehicle… Painful, but safety and reliability are the priority.” Here are moments leading up to engine ignition and the ultimate abort of the Starlink 10-2 at the moment of T-0. Watch: pic.twitter.com/a8wVmKFr9x — Spaceflight Now (@SpaceflightNow) June 14, 2024 This will be the 45th launch of Starlink satellites so far in 2024 with another planned for Sunday evening, which is set to launch from Vandenberg Space Force Base at 8:45 p.m. PDT (11:45 p.m. EDT, 0345 UTC). Starlink 10-2 will add another 22 satellites to the growing megaconstellation. Following the launch, SpaceX will have launched 1,007 Starlink satellites this year alone. According to expert orbital tracker and astronomer, Jonathan McDowell, there are more than 6,000 active Starlink satellites on orbit. Falcon Heavy prepares to fly again While SpaceX is preparing to launch a pair of Falcon 9 rockets on both sides of the country, in Florida, it’s also working with NASA and the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to launch a new weather satellite on June 25 at 5:16 p.m. EDT (2116 UTC). NASA’s Launch Services Program (LSP) contracted SpaceX to launch the final satellite in the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellites-R (GOES-R) series. NOAA describes these as “the Western Hemisphere’s most sophisticated weather-observing and environmental-monitoring system.” Crews transport NOAA’s (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES-U) from the Astrotech Space Operations facility to the SpaceX hangar at Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida beginning on Friday, June 14, 2024, with the operation finishing early Saturday, June 15, 2024. Image: NASA In an interview with Spaceflight Now on Friday NASA’s launch director, Dr. Denton Gibson, said the launch team will be monitoring the weather over the next few days. “We have some planning to do or decisions to make in terms of when we roll the vehicle out and before we do all of our final preps for launch,” Gibson said. He said they would make a determination on whether a rollout of the Falcon Heavy rocket from the hangar to the pad would make more sense on Sunday or Monday. The Falcon Heavy has a backup launch date of June 26, but if it slips beyond that, Gibson said there would need to be discussions with the Eastern Range before a new date could be booked. Watch live views of the Falcon Heavy launch pad.

[lazyrants]

Surprise Santa (prod 125)

Chris Crow (https://www.youtube.com/@handle6324) gave GetLazy an .iso of the ninth LazyTown DVD intended for promotional use only. To finally put the .iso to use, I decided to take all the screenshots in this episode myself. I also watched it using VLC.

Original airdate: October 11, 2005 (DVD) December 9, 2005 (TV)

Story by Magnus Scheving

Written by Noah Zachary, Cole Louie, Magnus Scheving

Directed by Magnus Scheving, Jonathan Judge

Executive producers - Magnus Scheving, Ragnheidur Melsted, Raymond P. Le Gue, Mark Read, Brown Johnson, Kay Wilson Stallings

Starring Magnus Scheving, Stefan Karl Steffanson, Julianna Rose Mauriello

Puppeteers - Gudmondor Thor Karason, Jodi Eichelberger, David Matthew Feldman, Julie Westwood, Sarah Burgess

The longest LazyTown episode clocking in at twenty-seven minutes. I am a bit annoyed because I should've waited until Christmas Time, but it's May so that'd be far too long of a hiatus.

It turns out the person who made Sportacus' calendar is a complete goddamn idiot, because it doesn't have any fricking dates on any page at all. It also turns out Mayor Milford Meanswell is a complete goddamn idiot (not that shocking) because while he rips off the YESTER DAY piece, we see a glimpse of 'FESTIVAL DAY'. Could be a hint to 'Sportscandy Festival', or Milford is just a goddamn idiot. Sportacus has HUNDREDS of balls..

..in the airship. He decides to decorate his airship in the most ridiculous but kinda cool way. He rides hid airship, making it go tipsy turny, so that all the Christmas ornaments go into this hole in the floor that has NEVER been there before.

So, he flips out of the skutla, and all the ornaments come flying out of one of the holes that Sportacus' football pops out of some time, and he hits them onto the walls with a ping pong racket. It also turns out that Sportacus is a complete goddamn idiot because he must've put glue on all the ornaments. There's no way they'd stick onto the walls in real life! Anyways, in the intro, unlike the normal title card, there is a Christmas version of the town instead! This is the third time the intro has been modified - Night time in 'Sleepless', and the paper plane flying near the airship and off the camera in 'Sportacus Who'.

So, Ziggy is so shocked by the snow he assumes it's present time, and annoys everyone. Milford is showing the kids the present he got for Bessie. Stingy is looking at the stockings full of presents. All this present talk aught to annoy someone, y'know?

Knew it. Anyways, he shows great annoyance about not being invited, but he says he doesn't care and wouldn't go if he wasn't invited. Ziggy is still asking if it's present time and Stephanie tells him to calm down (those damn presents ain't goin nowhere!.. unless stingy takes em), but french fry hair boy pops in with some trivia. Apparently Ziggy's eaten 162 pieces of candy in the past sixty minutes. Fatty. Robbie is still peeping in the lair when he has a great idea - to potentially kill everyone of frostbite.

At every Christmas party, Sportacus is the special guest of honor and he sits on the fancy chair. But he is going to make a GIANT snowball and launch it through the mayor's window so it hits Sportacus at exactly 6:00.

He has an invention for everything. So some gadget thingy majingy blows snow all around the lair, and he makes a giant snowball. In satisfaction of his work.. he kisses the snowball.

If there were different scriptwriters, at least ONE would make the snowball come to life, open it's eyes and say 'Ew!' and roll away from him. It'd be better that way. He carries it (isn't he the laziest dude in the town?) all the way to the cannon (which should be near his lair, Robbie, you goddamn idiot). Anyways, Stingy is being a selfish little jerk, writing a present 'To Me, From Me', the little moron. He needs to learn what Christmas is really about. Ziggy interrupts his jerkiness by going crazy about snow angels. Instead of JUST GOING TO DO IT, he keeps on yapping about it. Meanwhile, Robbie is reminded about the presents, but he doesn't know how to go there without being recognized. Then he has it - to dress up as a fat cookie (food) loving man - CaseOh.

Uh- I mean, Santa. Who stuffed up my 'Make fun of Robbie' paper with the 'Make fun of CaseOh' one?? Anyways, he performs Good to Be Bad. Meanwhile, Milford is putting up decorations ON A STRING, and he is ON A LADDER. Disaster is bound to strike, so Sportacus comes seconds before he even is in trouble! But if he WAS in trouble.. the crystal'd beep. And he saves him using a bowling ball.. and a skateboard. So that just when he trips and he is about to come falling down with the ladder.. he doesn't.

But Bessie tells him to come down because they still need to put nametags on the gifts (rat). So, Stingy is looking outside to see what happened and asks Bessie for her input on GIVING out gifts. Then he shows a disgusted face when she says it's better to give then recieve.

So he looks at all the gifts saying they belong to him and only him. Meanwhile, the kids perform 'I love Christmas' while Santa is sneaking around the town. When the song ends, Ziggy and Trixie start making snow angels, but Ziggy freaks out when he thinks he's lost his lollipops.

His lollipops aren't the only thing he may have lost.. Anyways, with the guidance of Sportacus, Stephanie starts building a giant snowman. Maybe to get in the Guinness Book of World Records? Ziggy walks up to the snowman and Stephanie questions him holding two lollipops. He lies that they're ears for the snowman (nobody puts ears on a SNOWMAN, but what'd I know, I live in AUS) and runs up to it and it all comes tumbling down. To the ground. So does Ziggy.

Stephanie is annoyed at him (when she JUST put the head back on in like, two seconds..), and Ziggy runs away of shame. Sportacus goes after him, where Ziggy reveals that at Christmas he gets so excited he eats a ton of candy, then he gets more excited and eats more candy, and gets more exci- you get me. And the remedy to his hyperness?

Why is it the carrots in this show look like a carrot I'd want to eat? The real life carrots taste horrible and are super hard to bite in! Deceiving us with sneaky little tricks.. So Sportacus throws the carrot (he wants some candy too.. JK) and uses it as the snowman's nose. Then he goes back to his ship. Meanwhile Stingy is hovering over some presents and he shakes gifts to guess what is in them. And in the progress, he breaks a glass one!

Meanwhile, Robbie's still sneaking around, and lucky him, because he's been caught by Ziggy. Robbie tries bribing him to go home with candy but Sporty already told him to not eat that stuff.. so Robbie gives him more, he eats it, goes wild, and tells him what he wants for Christmas.

That was the second scene I found funny in this episode. Try harder, whoever wrote this episode. Meanwhile, Bessie notices they have no Christmas tree, so everyone goes out to find one. Ziggy is still going on about what he wants for Christmas.

But the annoyance hasn't stopped there. Stingy comes with a big book of ALL HIS presents, which seems to have more then 300 pages. Clown. Anyways, everyone has gone away which is the perfect time for Robbie to sneak in, take the presents, and get out! Wouldn't take that long, heh?

Really? Couldn't he just go from the CLEARLY OPEN WINDOW?? DOES ANYONE IN THIS GODDAMN SHOW THINK? I love this show. But the characters are just brain-dead sometimes. Anyways, he takes the gifts and finds one with HIS name on it, literally.

He decides he can't steal their gifts and wants to go back, feeling remorse. Softie. So he goes back by the window and just sneaks back to the lair, right?

Oh my lord. So, Sportacus has to save him (crystal beeps). He flips over the table (he coulda just walked.), and pulls him out the chimney. Everyone discovers it's Robbie. Then they sing Bing- oh, yeah, 5 more minutes because holiday special. Anyways, he decides to go back, but being super kind, Stingy (normally an annoying, selfish unfunny rat) & Stephanie (always kind unless she's kinda annoyed) say he can stay. Robbie wants to start with the presents, but the others want to start with Bessie's turkey. Priorities, Robbie. Anyways, it turns out a bit better as since it is his first time, he gets to be the guest of honor.

Meanwhile, Ziggy is getting a taste of his own medicine when Robbie asks 'Twinky' if it's time for the presents. But he is not as hyper or loud.

This is so far kinda heartwarming. Robbie doesn't take as much candy as usual, he starts smiling, and he even says he is gonna have a big dinner. Nothing can go wrong!

Boom! The snowball comes flying out, and unlike the villian he is, Robbie actually warns everyone about the snowball. Sportacus starts cartwheeling on the table (he would have stepped on at least two pieces of food, come on), grabs a piece of mistletoe (Not in that way), wraps it around Robbie, then swings on the rope so Robbie dodges the snowball.

It looks like the chair came with Robbie, so either he grasped onto it with his butt REALLY tight, or Trixie put lots of super glue on his seat because comedy. Either way, if this was realistic, that chair would fall off and be in pieces right now. Anyways, the snowball hits the walls, and Sportacus grabs it and does a frontflip. While the flip was cool, it was cooler to know Magnus himself did it.

Sportacus thanks Robbie for warning everyone, who himself is questioning who'd do such a thing! Sportacus shrugs it off. Anyways, NOW they get into the presents, singing 'Bing Bang'. Apparently, Robbie knows what the present is before even opening it. And as Stephanie says it's a.. 'PAIR OF SOCKS?!'

He says he likes being bad and somehow the snowman smiles, so he takes off its head, throws it away (into the cannon on accident so the timer starts but shorter), and goes back to the lair. And he has a visitor.

The snowman's head falls on Robbie's head, and he's cold, and he can't breath, so he dies quickly. But this is a kids show and he sneezes because comedy.

5/10: Would be good as a regular episode, dull in some places, but didn't feel Christmasy enough.

[satoshi-mochida]

Visual Novel ‘Lilja and Natsuka Painting Lies’ Gets June Release Date on PC

From Noisy Pixel

Frontwing announced that their visual novel Lilja and Natsuka Painting Lies will launch on PC via Steam on June 6, 2024.

In a world where art transcends mere aesthetics, a uniquely talented painter, known for their whimsical and selective nature, only takes on commissions that spark their interest. This reclusive artist is accompanied by Lilja, a figure of ethereal beauty with long, silvery hair and eyes that gleam like precious stones. Despite her blindness and reliance on a wheelchair, Lilja’s creative spirit remains unbridled, her talent undisputed among those fortunate enough to witness her work.

Enter Natsuka, Lilja’s vibrant and dedicated assistant, who embodies the roles of both sight and mobility for the gifted artist. With an infectious energy, Natsuka navigates the world on behalf of Lilja, gathering the elusive inspirations and secrets necessary for the painter’s next masterpiece. Together, they explore the depths of human emotion and perception, turning each commission into an unparalleled depiction of beauty as perceived through Lilja’s unique perspective. Through their collaboration, they not only create art that surpasses expectations but also embark on a journey of healing and discovery, piecing together a future filled with hope and newfound purpose.

Product Description:

Title: Lilja and Natsuka: Painting Lies

Brand: Frontwing

Genre: Visual Novel

Operating System: Windows 10/11 (*Windows RT/Windows 10 Mobile not supported)

Platform: Steam and others

Languages: Japanese, English, Chinese (Simplified)

Planning/Story: Asou Ei

Denno Tenshi Djibril (Online Game, Frontwing)

Sakura no Uta – Toritani Makoto Route (PC Game, Makura)

Natsu no Kusari (PC Game, CLOCKUP)

Character Design/Art: Kippu

No-Rin (Light Novel, GA Bunko): Illustrations

Fire Emblem Heroes (Mobile Game App, Nintendo): Character Illustrations

Production: Frontwing

The Fruit of Grisaia (PC Game)

Grisaia: Phantom Trigger (PC Game Series)

Grisaia Phantom Trigger: THE ANIMATION (OVA Series)

ISLAND (PC Game and TV Anime)

GINKA (PC Game)