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wielderofmysteries · 2 years

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Self-Made Man: Jace Beleren and Representation for Transgender Men in MTG

INTRO:

A few days before I started writing this, I received a message on Tumblr asking me to talk about my personal interpretation of Jace Beleren as a trans man. Not an unusual request, since Jace Beleren is my favorite character and I mention that I think he's trans all the time. I thought my response would be easy to write, but I started typing and couldn't stop. I realized I couldn't keep it short and simple. My thoughts grew into something much bigger, and much more meaningful to me. (Word count: ~9260)

In this post, I'll explore my analysis of Jace Beleren as a transgender man, why I think it enriches Jace as a character, and how it relates to the topic of transgender representation in Magic.

Disclaimer 1: As far as I know, WOTC and the authors who wrote Jace's lore did not originally set out with the intention of portraying a transgender character in Jace. Everything I'm presenting as evidence that Jace is trans is just part of my analysis. The purpose of this post is not to prove that Jace was always intended to be trans, but to show how my personal interpretation of Jace as a trans man is inspired by and supported by the text.

Disclaimer 2: All transgender people are different and have unique lives and feelings and experiences, so the things I say in this post won't apply to every single trans person. The examples I give here are mainly based on my own experience, as well as those of other trans men I know personally.

(General content warning for discussions of bullying and transphobia.)

PART 1: ORIGINS

There's an inherent transness about Jace Beleren.

Insecurity is one of Jace's most visible and defining traits. From Origins to Ixalan, his long-term character arc is all about his struggle to let go of his insecurities in order to become a better version of himself. There are parallels to the experiences of transgender men in the way those insecurities came about, how he expresses them, and how he eventually overcomes them.

It's easy to see why Jace would be insecure. As a telepath, he can hear all the negative thoughts other people have about him.

=========

Sure enough, there was his father, sitting at the kitchen table, frowning. Gav Beleren, grubby and balding, regarded Jace with little more than weariness.

I wish he was normal.

His father’s thoughts traced a familiar path.

[Jace's Origin: Absent Minds - Kelly Digges]

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Lack-witted idiot.

A big lug shoved past him from behind.

Jace couldn’t help but agree with the sentiment.

I swear, that Beleren kid…

[Jace's Origin: Absent Minds - Kelly Digges]

=========

There’s the freak.

The biting thought was the only warning Jace got.

He scrambled to his feet and spun, but he was too late. Three of his schoolmates stood between him and the access hatch.

[Jace's Origin: Absent Minds - Kelly Digges]

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Jace's own father, despite caring for his son and wanting a better life for him, felt little warmth for him. He wished Jace were "normal" and often became frustrated with him. Jace was a victim of brutal bullying that started in early childhood and continued all through his school years. Even complete strangers disliked Jace, and they made it known.

It was difficult for Jace to tell which thoughts were or weren't his own. Jace's constant awareness of others disliking him caused him to internalize that negativity, and as a result, he developed a sense of insecurity at an early age.

Jace's insecurity manifests as self-hatred, feelings of inadequacy, and discomfort in his body and physical appearance. I think his insecurities manifested in these specific ways because one of his most significant personal struggles was gender dysphoria. In an R&D video about Jace's story in Origins, Kelly Digges spoke about Jace's insecurity, and unintentionally gave the most transgender-sounding response possible.

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"Not everybody likes Jace. They see the arrogant self-assured kid wearing the hoodie, and something about that doesn't sit well with them. But I think you've got to have sympathy for the guy. I mean, imagine being a teenager with all the awkwardness that comes with that, and actually knowing that the person behind you thinks your hair looks stupid! You'd put on a hood too!"

[Kelly Digges - Magic: The Gathering - Inside R&D Magic Origins: Jace]

=========

The thing is, I don't have to imagine that situation. That was literally my lived experience as a trans teenager.

I had known I was trans since I was very little, but I didn't decide to start living life as an openly transgender boy until I was 13 years old– right before I started high school. The day before my freshman orientation, my mom took me to a hair salon and I asked the stylist to give me a typical boy's haircut. My hair was waist-length, and the stylist was shocked that a 'girl' could ask her to cut off that much hair. She was scared to ruin my appearance by making me "look like a boy" (even though that's exactly what I wanted.)

My freshman photo was the ugliest school picture I've ever taken. My friends jokingly called me 'Gohan' (from Dragon Ball Z). I started wearing jackets with my hood up, even though I never liked to before, and I wore hats despite it being against the school dress code. I knew other people thought my hair looked stupid, and I knew this without having telepathic abilities like Jace.

But my troubles didn't start with that haircut. Long before I started openly living as a boy, I was told I was a 'tomboy' and that I didn't act like other little girls did. Even in early childhood, I was very aware of the fact that some people hated me for who I was and how I expressed myself. I was just like Jace in that way– knowing who was judging me; knowing they didn't respect me; and knowing that in their eyes I was ugly, a weirdo, or worse.

I had always known I was different, and Jace had always known he was different, too. But it's not for the reason you would think. People mistreated Jace long before anyone knew or even began to suspect his true nature as a telepath. Nobody knew Jace was a mage, but everyone knew something was weird about him. There was something outwardly unusual about Jace that people noticed and thought was strange and undesirable.

Something interesting I noticed while re-reading Jace's origin story is that he appears to be wearing girls' clothing in the art. He and the girl, Jill, are both wearing the same long tunic / dress and shawl; while the two other boys are wearing vests and tucked-in shirts.

I know that wasn't necessarily the intention with this art, but it got me thinking about other aspects of Jace's origin story that just felt trans to me.

Interestingly, nobody in Jace's origin story actually calls him "Jace" except for his mother, the only person who truly loved and accepted him for who he was; and Alhammarret, another telepath and therefore the only person who could see Jace the way Jace saw himself. Everyone else refers to him as "Beleren" or "that Beleren kid" or "freak". His own dad doesn't call him anything at all.

It reminded me of the way my family never got into the habit of calling me my chosen name, even after I came out. They would call me my childhood nickname, "BooBoo", to avoid saying my chosen name or my birth name. To them, I was boyish enough it was weird to call me a girl's name, but not loved or respected enough to be called what I wanted.

Being a trans teenager is hard. It's hard to control your style when you're dependent on your parents to buy clothing. It's hard to control your identity when other people constantly call you the wrong name. And it's pretty much impossible to control your body.

Puberty is a source of insecurity for all teenagers, but it's the ultimate hell for trans teenagers. When the effects of hormones become visible and you see how your body has changed compared to your peers, the difference can be emotionally devastating.

While puberty made me wider and heavier; my male friends, who were going through the other puberty, got taller and more muscular. They got bigger and stronger every year while I was doomed to stay 5'0 (152cm) forever. It felt like I could never catch up– they looked the way I wanted to without even trying. Sure, I could pass for a boy, but they were going to grow up to be men. It infuriated me.

Similarly, Jace's lack of stereotypically masculine physical characteristics was a major source of self-hatred.

=========

“Hey, Beleren,” said the largest of the three, his booming voice overpowering the wind. His name was Tuck. At fourteen, he was a year older than Jace, a head taller, and built like a loading dock.

[Jace's Origin: Absent Minds - Kelly Digges]

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How small he looked, hanging desperately above the crackling stream of mana. How vulnerable he looked. He hated it.

[Jace's Origin: Absent Minds - Kelly Digges]

=========

Jace's male peers are described as being significantly taller and more muscular than him. This difference in size and strength made it easy for other boys to bully and physically abuse Jace, which caused him to associate their masculinity with the power they held over him. In Jace's mind, being a victim meant he was weak, and being weak meant he was less of a man. Hating yourself for things you can't control is extraordinarily painful.

When Jace discovered his true nature as a telepath, he realized it was the one way he held power over others. He tried to feel tougher and more masculine by emulating the way his bullies demonstrated their power over him– through intimidation, cruelty, and threats of violence.

=========

He looked Tuck in the eyes. “And if you harm my family, I’ll take your mind apart, one squalid little memory at a time.”

Tuck flinched.

[Jace's Origin: Absent Minds - Kelly Digges]

=========

Having grown up without any positive male role models in his life, Jace's idea of masculinity was primarily influenced by the mistreatment he endured. He simply imitated what he saw and he didn't have the emotional support or life experience needed to grow out of that mindset.

As a young trans man reading Jace's origin story, I found the way he resented his bullies and retaliated against them to be very relatable. It's scary how easily gender dysphoria can turn into toxic masculinity. When you need to try a million times harder than your cisgender peers to be acknowledged as a man, taking masculinity to a harmful extreme can seem like the logical thing to do, especially if you're a younger trans man.

Despite expressing myself exactly the same as any other little boy would (wearing the same clothes, liking the same cartoons, playing the same sports), I was bullied by both kids and adults for daring to think I could be a boy. Once, when I was 8 years old, I stepped up to bat for my Little League baseball team. When the announcer said my feminine name and everyone noticed the long hair sticking out from underneath my helmet, the opposing team's volunteer coaches (the fathers of kids my age!) shouted from their dugout: "There's no way they'll win! They have a girl on their team!" Their players laughed and cheered in response.

That absolutely broke me. Their words taught me that being myself wasn't enough. And if being the same as other boys wasn't enough, then I needed to be more than them. I intentionally became a bully. Picking every fight I could was my way of proving I was more masculine than people thought.

Intentional toxic masculinity in pursuit of gender-affirmation is a very common experience for young trans men. Jace and my younger self acted the way we did because we were trying to mask our insecurity. We wanted to kill the weakness we saw in ourselves, so we lashed out in an attempt to feel stronger than the people who hurt us.

Starting middle school let me get away from most of the people who bullied me. It was the fresh start I needed to stop being such a terror. But a clean slate wouldn't prove to be so helpful for young Jace.

PART 2: PLANESWALKER

At age 15, Jace's Planeswalker spark ignited. He arrived on Ravnica with no memories of his life on Vryn.

In theory, Jace's amnesia would have allowed him to start becoming the person he wanted to be, but he couldn't begin to heal because the scars on his subconscious mind were immediately opened. Being lost and alone made Jace feel vulnerable– the feeling he hated most.

=========

Came out of nowhere. Some poor Izzet experimental subject, probably.

He scrambled to his feet. People were staring at him. He looked as bad as he felt, sweaty and pale and filthy. He pulled his scarf up around his face and dashed to the side of the road.

I’m not an experimental subject. I’m…I’m…

I’m in trouble.

Fine. Table that.

He walked as fast as he could without seeming to hurry. He reached out, carefully, into the minds around him. It was a cacophony, a mad tangle of voices, and half of them weren’t even human.

Vagrant. Thief. Poor kid. Wretch.

His headache was getting worse.

[Jace's Origin: Absent Minds - Kelly Digges]

=========

On Ravnica, Jace had no idea where he was or who he was, and he was suddenly surrounded by more people than he'd ever been near before. After losing the ability to control his telepathy, he was overwhelmed with their thoughts. He didn't know any of the people around him, but he knew they thought he was strange and pitiful.

When Jace noticed people staring at him, he hid his face with his scarf and ran away from them. Jace's first instinctual concern was not that he was possibly in danger, but that people were perceiving him in a way that made him feel embarrassed about himself. Even without memories of being bullied, a part of Jace's mind was still constantly worried about his appearance.

Jace's anxiety in public reminded me of the extreme paranoia I suffered from as a trans teenager. Being seen and perceived was so unbearable to me that I went to extremes to avoid people. I'd stay home or hide whenever possible, and sometimes I became so anxious I would literally run away if I noticed someone looking at me. I've gotten a lot better in the past few years, but I still worry when I'm out in public. I often notice strangers staring at me, and I hate knowing when people are questioning my gender. In certain situations, I'm even worried that someone might hurt me if they notice I'm trans. When you're trans and you've been bullied, just being perceived is dangerous.

That initial experience on Ravnica did instant damage to his self esteem. Jace's discomfort in his body and physical appearance was such a pressing issue that he immediately sought gender-affirming body modifications.

=========

The Jace in front of her was pathetically young.

[...]

The teenage Jace seated in the chair had the look about him of someone who wanted to disappear and wish someone more imposing into his place. His outfit was disheveled, the cut of it unfamiliar. Vraska sensed in the fabric of the memory that this version of Jace had arrived in Ravnica for the first time only days before.

The Gruul shaman's hand was glowing brilliant white. "This your first?" he grunted.

It took Jace a moment too long to answer. "Yes," he said timidly.

Vraska couldn't help but smile at this memory. He was the wimpiest teenager she had ever seen—no wonder he wanted a cool tattoo.

[...]

The shaman leaned over the teenager and drew a line with his finger down Jace's cheek, leaving a brilliant white tattoo in its place. He continued on his chin and arm, and Vraska watched as the shaman diligently painted a braver face on the nervous teenager's own.

[The Flood - Alison Luhrs]

=========

Tattoos probably aren't the first thing that comes to mind when you think of gender-affirming body modifications, but that was the purpose they served for Jace. Getting tattoos made him feel braver and more grown up, and they made him look cooler and more intimidating to others. All of these were stereotypically masculine traits he desired in the way he presented himself.

In addition to the way they changed him outwardly, Jace's tattoos were a personal declaration of his identity. His tattoos were drawn from one of the few things he could remember after arriving on Ravnica: a set of mysterious shapes and symbols. He didn't know what meaning they held, if any at all, but he decided that they were important to him because they were his.The decision to have them permanently inked on his skin gave him a sense of control and ownership over his body and appearance, which is one of the most important aspects of forming an identity as a trans person.

In his young adult years on Ravnica, Jace made a living as a criminal extorting the rich and famous. For the first time in his life, he could afford to choose his own wardrobe instead of depending on a guardian to provide clothes for him. Jace used this opportunity to exercise more control over his appearance, having clothing designed and tailored specifically to his desires.

The patterns Jace had tattooed on his body would be incorporated into his signature blue cloak. Jace's cloak is the most iconic element of his visual design, and it's important to this interpretation of his character because it's his dysphoria hoodie.

A dysphoria hoodie is a hooded clothing item intended to relieve gender dysphoria by obscuring the shape of a person's body. They're oversized, loose, and usually black or another dark color. Wearing a dysphoria hoodie hides a person's body from others' judging eyes, and allows them to forget about the parts of their body that they don't like.

It's undeniable that Jace's cloak fits this description perfectly.

Jace was extremely attached to his blue cloak. It didn't matter how hot the weather was, or how dirty or damaged his cloak had gotten– he always wore it anyway. And judging by the fact that he canonically had numerous duplicates made, he didn't want to ever stop wearing it. The ability to look and feel mysterious was very comforting to him.

Jace tried to hide his insecurities for as long as he could, but as he grew into adulthood, his problems would grow and change with him.

The novel Agents of Artifice follows Jace's life on Ravnica from ages 19 to 22. Growing up meant the gender role Jace desired to fill evolved from 'boy' to 'man', but Jace had no positive male role models or examples in this formative time.

As Jace's employer and teacher, Tezzeret forced him to use his powers for violence by psychologically abusing him. Tezzeret had an explosive temper and brutally tortured Jace when he failed assignments or hesitated to comply.

Jace's best friend / partner, Kallist Rhoka, showed a sense of entitlement after the two met Liliana Vess. Kallist felt like Liliana owed him attention and sex, despite the fact that she wasn't interested in him because she was already dating Jace.

=========

“You’re a hypocrite, Jace. It’s fine. My own fault, really. I should’ve known better than to take you at your word, when it came to getting something you wanted—the one thing I might’ve found to make this damned place a little better!”

“She was never yours!” Jace shot to his feet, fists clenched. “Never!”

“Because you wouldn’t give us the chance!” Kallist shot back. “It’s not enough that you took away everything I had?”

“Took away … Damn it, Kallist, I saved your life!”

[Agents of Artifice - Ari Marmell]

=========

Kallist wasn't the only man who felt this way. Throughout the book, several complete strangers made it clear that they thought Jace was inferior and undeserving of Liliana's affection, and that Liliana should be with them instead. Other men openly insulted Jace because they didn't see him as a "real man".

=========

“I couldn’t help but notice,” he slurred in a voice heavy with beer, “that you finally sent your scrawny friend packing. That mean you interested in spending some time with a real man?”

[Agents of Artifice - Ari Marmell]

=========

At that point in his life, Jace was still surrounded by men who had very toxic expressions of masculinity, but unlike his teenage self, he had no desire to imitate them. Jace feared and resisted Tezzeret's violent teachings, he disapproved of Kallist's misogyny towards Liliana, and he avoided confrontation with the random strangers who threatened him.

I think Jace's distaste for their attitudes and behaviors shows that his insecurity is truly gender dysphoria and not just toxic masculinity. If Jace disapproved of their toxic masculinity and didn't want to express himself that way, why would he care if he wasn't a "real man" to them? Why did he still feel incomplete as a man? What does being a man mean to Jace Beleren?

Jace wanted to do all the things typically expected of adult men. He wanted to be self-reliant, to be a protector and leader to others. He made himself a protector and financial provider to his romantic partners. He wanted to protect Ravnica and accepted his duty as the Living Guildpact when the role was magically forced upon him. He worked with the Gatewatch to defend other planes and invited them to live in his home. Despite all his efforts, nobody seemed to see that Jace was trying his best.

One of the most common difficulties trans men experience is being infantilized because they're perceived as younger. Trans men often look younger than their cisgender male peers of the same age due to the difference in hormones. Less testosterone means trans men tend to be shorter, less muscular, and have less body hair (not accounting for individual genetic factors).

When trans men lack stereotypically masculine physical characteristics, especially those associated with age and maturity, such as facial hair, they don't get treated with the same respect as other men. (For example, adult trans men are often referred to as 'boys' no matter how old they actually are.)

When Jace's appearance is described in stories, his lack of stereotypically masculine physical characteristics is always noted. He's always described as being smaller and less muscular than other men, and it's repeatedly remarked upon that he's unable to grow a beard.

=========

Rulan was clad much like Jace himself, though he preferred deep reds and purples to Jace’s unrelenting blue and black. And unlike Jace, Rulan boasted a full, tidily trimmed beard.

[Agents of Artifice - Ari Marmell]

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She cast a critical eye up and down his form. Firm, fit, alert, hair combed. She mentally called bull on it. "You can drop the glamour, dear. No one cares."

He sighed, and shimmered as his illusion dropped. There was the real Jace; paler, hair rumpled, eyes sunken from late nights, and his chin tinted by the adorable peach fuzz that almost counted as a someday-maybe beard.

[Homesick - Chris L'Etoile]

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The text shows that Jace experienced infantilization as a trans man. His sparse facial hair is enough to visibly darken his face, but it's referred to as "adorable peach fuzz" rather than a more mature-sounding alternative. In the story Catching Up, Liliana tells Jace that him looking older is "an unambiguous compliment."

=========

"You look older," she said.

"I'm not sure how to take that."

"At your age, dear, it's an unambiguous compliment." She cocked her head. "Have you started combing your hair?"

He smoothed his hair self-consciously, just for a moment, then withdrew his hand. He had, in fact, started combing it. Not that his hair was any of her business. He scowled.

[Catching Up - Kelly Digges]

=========

This aspect of Jace's trans experience caused him to be disrespected in several areas of his adult life. As an adult navigating dating and relationships, people saw him as unattractive and less desirable. As the Living Guildpact, people saw him as unqualified and irresponsible. As a member of the Gatewatch, people saw him as weak and incapable of leadership. Because he was infantilized as a trans man, he was perceived as inherently less masculine, less competent, and less mature. This negative perception reinforced his feelings of inadequacy.

For this reason, Jace was more self-conscious about his appearance as an adult than he'd ever been as a youth. In order for people to treat him with more respect, Jace found it necessary to hide his body with his cloak and to change his appearance with illusions. Jace felt the need to 'pass', and thought being himself was unsatisfactory, especially after he met Gideon.

Meeting Gideon was a major turning point in Jace's emotional development as a trans man.

Gideon was a great example of stereotypical but positive masculinity. He was self-reliant but not afraid to ask for help. He was a leader but tried to uplift others. He fought as a defender, not an aggressor.

Jace saw Gideon as an upstanding person and a good friend. For the first time in his life, Jace had a positive male role model to look up to. It made him furious.

=========

"I'd rather stand," said Gideon.

Jace stood up. It was an error. He still had to crane his neck to look Gideon in the eye, and now the size difference between them was glaringly obvious. He hated feeling small. Hated it.

[Catching Up - Kelly Digges]

=========

Gideon made Jace feel hopelessly insecure about himself.

He was everything Jace wanted to be, and seemed to be perfect in all the ways Jace wasn't. Gideon was super tall while Jace was average height. Gideon was athletic and muscular while Jace was thin and out-of-shape. Gideon was charismatic and a natural leader while people tended to automatically distrust Jace.

Jace both admired and envied Gideon. He tried his best to emulate Gideon's positive qualities, but found it difficult because it was clear to himself and others that it didn't come naturally to him. Jace's presence just didn't inspire others or make them feel safe like Gideon's presence did.

=========

What would Gideon say?

Jace smiled. Of course.

"For Zendikar," he said, raising one fist in the air. It felt thin to him, lacking Gideon's armored fist, his baritone war cry, his iron conviction.

[Brink of Extinction - Kelly Digges]

=========

"Vanity?" she said. "That's not like you."

He raked a hand back through his hair, which did nothing to calm its random angles. "I should be at my best for team meetings. Project leadership. Confidence. The idea that I know what the hell I'm doing. And why am I telling you this?" He looked annoyed at himself.

She raised one ivory shoulder in a careless shrug. "Who else knows you well enough to understand?"

[Homesick - Chris L'Etoile]

=========

Seeing the differences between himself and Gideon aggravated his gender dysphoria and reinforced all the manifestations of his insecurity– self-hatred, feelings of inadequacy, and discomfort in his body and physical appearance.

In his time with the Gatewatch, Jace's vision of masculinity had changed to be much more positive, but he was still miserable because he kept measuring his self-worth against an ideal he couldn't seem to reach.

This stage in socially transitioning is emotionally difficult for trans people. It takes time and effort to overcome.

PART 3: CASTAWAY

At age 26, after the Gatewatch's defeat on Amonkhet, Jace involuntarily planeswalked to Ixalan. He awoke on a tropical island with no recollection of who he was or where he came from.

For the second time in his life, Jace had complete amnesia. Just like when he sparked at age 15, his insecurities lingered despite being unable to remember what caused them. He hallucinated illusions of people from his past life, and his subconscious mind projected his insecurities through them.

=========

"You've really done it this time, haven't you?"

This vision appeared whenever the man was struggling at a task.

His shoulders were broad, and his olive skin had a sheen of sweat underneath the shine of his armor. The hallucination was looking over the man's shoulder as he tried to carve a fishing hook.

"Listen, you aren't really suited to this task. Let me handle it." The vision's voice was gruff but friendly.

It came off as condescending.

The man was annoyed.

"I can do it myself."

The hallucination sighed. "You and I both know you're not suited to this. Let me handle it, you go philosophize on the other end of the beach."

"I said I can do it myself." The man let his irritation reach his voice.

"No, you can't. I call the shots and execute, you stand to the side. That's how this works."

The man responded by throwing his hook at the hallucination. It went straight through the figure's eye and landed behind him on the sand.

[Jace, Alone - Alison Luhrs]

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An illusion of Gideon represented Jace's frustration due to low confidence in his skills and abilities. No one ever seemed to think Jace was good enough. His intellect, social skills, and physical dexterity were all constantly questioned throughout his entire life. As a result, Jace never got the chance to prove to the people around him what he was truly capable of.

On Useless Island, Jace was utterly alone and could rely only on himself. Jace succeeded in teaching himself to hunt, fish, and build in order to survive. He was not inept at stereotypically masculine tasks, as people had believed him to be. Over time, he grew a thick beard and gained a significant amount of muscle mass.

=========

"You look terrible," purred a voice from above.

The man moved his hands. An illusion of a woman stood above him. She had raven hair, tired eyes, and a disdainful expression. Her arms were gloved in violet satin and crossed in front of her.

"The muscles are a nice change, but you look awful with facial hair." Her lips curled in a disdainful sneer.

The man shook his head, tears building in the corner of his eyes.

"I don't know who you are."

"Of course you don't, boy."

She looked him over. "You didn't know who I was then, and you don't now. Hard to build trust when neither of us trusts each other."

The man decided to stop caring that this illusion wasn't real. He desperately needed someone to talk to.

"Who was I, before here?"

"You weren't who you thought you were, that's for sure. No one else saw through you, but I did. You were never a leader or a detective or a scholar; you were a frightened child playing pretend."

The man swallowed a lump in his throat.

"You can fool the rest of the world with your magic and illusions, but you could never fool me."

The man wanted to sob. Wanted to go back and sleep. Wanted to starve until all of this went away.

[Jace, Alone - Alison Luhrs]

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An illusion of Liliana represented Jace's gender dysphoria and impostor syndrome.

Despite everything he had achieved so far on Useless Island, his subconscious mind still held feelings of self-doubt. Part of Jace's mind wondered whether or not he was ever truly suited to being a man, telling himself he "looks terrible" and "awful with facial hair". Again, Jace's maturity and experience are denied when the illusion infantilizes him by calling him a "boy" and "a frightened child playing pretend". This vision was an expression of Jace's fear that he was inherently unfit for masculinity and the roles he wanted to fill as a man.

Unlike the first time Jace had amnesia, though, there were no real people around to reinforce his insecurities. Being alone meant Jace had no one to compare himself to. This gave him the opportunity to truly have faith in himself. Rather than trying to copy someone else's example of masculinity, he was creating his own.

=========

The man opened his eyes, and saw a vision of himself standing on top of the water in front of him.

The image had a blank expression on its face, but was otherwise identical to the man himself, standing calmly—impossibly—on the surface of the water.

The man's jaw fell open in shock.

The illusion appeared solid as flesh, and its detail was astonishingly accurate. The man was amused he did not remember his name but remembered the exact details of his own body: muscles toned, stubble on its face, blistered sunburn on its bare shoulders. He even saw its scars—his scars—the little bookmarks of a life well-lived.

[Jace, Alone - Alison Luhrs]

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All the effort he had taken to change himself showed outwardly on his body, and it was very gender-affirming. He was happy to see his muscles and facial hair and sunburn. I don't know how else to say this, but Jace being proud of "his scars" just has super transgender connotations. When Jace saw his scars, he appreciated them as proof of his ability to change and adapt– proof of his survival.

One of the most meaningful and symbolic moments in Jace's story is his decision to leave Useless Island. He built a raft and sailed away, uncertain of his future but determined and unafraid. Among the items he packed for his journey was his old blue cloak, unaware of the meaning it previously held for him. Jace encountered a storm soon after leaving, and all the items he brought with him were lost or destroyed, including his cloak. But he wasn't upset. He didn't miss it. To the Jace of Useless Island, it was nothing more than a piece of fabric. The Jace of Useless Island was comfortable in his body, and had no need for a dysphoria hoodie to hide from himself or anyone else. By letting his cloak be destroyed, Jace let go of his insecurities.

Vraska found Jace washed up on a rocky island and accepted him into her pirate crew. Jace was eager to help, using his tinkering ability to fix telescopes and compasses. He also used his illusion magic to make The Belligerent invisible during a raid, and even fought vampires with the crew.

People need to have loved ones in their lives who make them feel accepted and respected. It's absolutely critical for a person's emotional health, and especially for trans people, whose close support networks are often insufficiently small or entirely absent. When you feel ashamed of yourself because you're constantly being criticized, when you live in fear of the world around you because you're hated, it's difficult even to simply exist. Having just one person who truly makes you feel safe makes a world of difference.

This is why it was so important that Vraska, the only person on Ixalan who knew Jace before his amnesia, didn't judge him based on his past. She didn't try to tell Jace who he used to be or who he should be. The crew of The Belligerent allowed Jace to be himself, and they cared about the qualities he had, not the ones he lacked. This key difference in how people treated Jace on Ixalan is what allowed him to thrive.

In The Flood, Jace fell down a waterfall and hit his head on a rock. The injury triggered a reversal of his amnesia. After Jace got his memories back, he reflected on the difference between his past and present selves.

=========

"I wouldn't have had the strength to climb this a year ago," Jace said with a little bit of pride. "Or if I did, I probably would have passed out halfway up."

"You weren't that out of shape when I last saw you," Vraska teased.

"You're ignoring how often I used to use illusions to make myself look like I was in shape."

Her brows shot up. "Seriously?"

"Oh yeah," Jace acknowledged. His expression was unguarded, eyes still red from emotion, a lighthearted tilt to his lips. Unapologetically human. He grinned. "I used to be a coward."

He let Not anymore hang unspoken in the air between them, and Vraska caught his smile as he turned to ascend the golden staircase toward Orazca, one strong step after another.

[The Flood - Alison Luhrs]

=========

The old Jace was always being compared to others. That Jace hated himself because he could only see himself as an inferior version of other men. He wanted to hide because he felt like he would never be enough. He wanted to be anyone but Jace.

The new Jace unlearned that mindset. He realized the only 'right' way to be a man was to try to be the best Jace he could be. Having room to improve meant he had the opportunity to find joy in growing and changing. He was proud of himself for taking control of his identity and putting in all the effort necessary to transition. On Ixalan, Jace cultivated the strongest body he ever had. That new body made him braver and more confident than ever before. And that new confidence made him happier than he'd ever felt in his entire life.

The resolution of Jace's arc came from his transition. All his life, Jace had wanted people to understand and accept his true self. For people to see his true self, he needed to be able to show them. Jace was able to start healing from his trauma on Ixalan because for the first time in his life, he felt like it was safe and good to be himself, so he lost his fear of judgment and embarrassment. Through that acceptance, he learned to be himself, and to love himself, and to love his transness. On Ixalan, Jace finally became the man he wanted to be.

=========

Jace looked down at himself.

The tan was real. The scrapes, the newly callused hands, the muscles (the muscles!) were all his. Jace felt proud of his body for the first time in his life. He must not lose track of it now.

[Wool Over the Eyes - Alison Luhrs]

=========

PART 4: DEEP BLUE

Jace being a transgender man is not just a headcanon to me. It's a textual interpretation that I believe adds meaning to the story and enriches Jace as a character.

My interpretation of Jace as a trans man is rooted in the way his personal philosophy guides him as a Blue character.

Blue's central theme is "Perfection through knowledge." Blue sees the world and everything in it as a blank slate waiting to be transformed. With the right knowledge, all possibilities can become reality. Jace's expression of "Perfection through knowledge" is his journey to become a better person by understanding himself.

=========

Jace chose his words carefully.

"Existence is adaptation to changing circumstances. The self is an accumulation of what one has learned from those changing circumstances . . . Our agency gives us the means to alter our own path. You are who you decide to be. And who you will become depends only on how you choose to adapt."

[Something Else Entirely - Alison Luhrs]

=========

Jace's personal philosophy as a Blue character is "You are who you choose to be''. He believes that people are defined by the choices they make with their free will, and rejects the idea that the self has immutable qualities. To Jace, there is no pre-determined path or destiny for him to follow. Rather, he continually seeks to cultivate his own identity through change.

In my interpretation of Jace as a trans man, Jace holds these beliefs because they're lessons he's had to learn in order to overcome his struggles and accept himself.

As a Blue character, Jace's core struggle is his desire to understand himself. Jace's life has been a constant quest to figure out who he is. Above all, Jace's thirst for knowledge is a need to understand his potential and his place in the Multiverse.

=========

Jace.

My name is Jace Beleren.

So there was something in there, waiting for him to dig it out.

And who is Jace Beleren? Is he a good man? Is he kind?

He willed away the shape and sat, alone, farther from home than he’d even known was possible.

He’d have to wait and see.

[Jace's Origin: Absent Minds - Kelly Digges]

=========

Having lost so much of his life to amnesia, Jace has often been unsure of who he is or who he should be.

I've always seen the divide in Jace's life caused by his amnesia as a parallel to the 'before' and 'after' periods in my life as a trans person.

When I decided to start openly living as a trans boy in high school, it was like I was being haunted by my own ghost. I didn't know who I was or how to act anymore because everyone around me seemed to see and speak to a version of myself that no longer existed. But I hadn't died, I was just different. I wanted people to see that I was alive and well. I wanted to make myself feel real again.

Like Jace, I was a teenage boy with no past. I needed to rebuild myself, and I had to start from scratch. I wasn't sure what to do with myself, but the one thing I was sure of was that I couldn't look back. I didn't want to. And neither did Jace.

Jace is known for his love of investigation, puzzles, and research, but his past seems to be the one thing he's not curious about. While he does occasionally wonder what his life used to be like, he's never shown a desire to return to that past. He's never put any time or energy into re-discovering old memories or trying to restore some previous state.

When Jace asks himself, "Who am I?", he's not asking who he was before. He's asking who he can be. What matters to Jace is not who you were, but who you can become.

The past is unimportant to Jace, and this belief gives him strength. He expressed this on Ixalan when he vowed the illusions of his past would no longer bother him.

=========

"No more involuntary illusions!" he said, and something in the back of his mind rung with magical affirmation. It would not happen again.

He had control over his mind. He was the wielder of his talents.

[...]

Then a thought occurred to the man.

"Who I was doesn't matter . . . because I get to learn who I am now."

Saying it out loud made it feel real.

"Whoever I was is irrelevant, for I will become whoever I want to become."

He believed that with all his heart.

The man realized what he must do.

He was going to prove to himself that he deserved to live.

The man got to work.

[Jace, Alone - Alison Luhrs]

=========

Jace understood that in order to progress, he had to keep moving forward. Letting go of the past is what allowed Jace to live in the present and to have hope for his future.

This aspect of Jace's philosophy is also an important aspect of trans acceptance. Many trans people struggle with making the decision to transition because they fear it's too late. They may feel that way because of their age, because of their circumstances in life, or because other people will remember them differently. But Jace believes that the person you were yesterday doesn't have to be the person you are today, or will be tomorrow. When you understand this, you understand that it is never too late for anyone to change.

It's in our nature as thinking, feeling beings to want to explore and discover new things about ourselves, but transphobes want us to repress our curiosity. My whole life, I've had to fight back against people who disrespect my identity and want me to submit to their idea of who I should be. Jace shares this experience.

=========

Baan regarded him coolly. "You were bullied as a child."

Jace coughed on his first mouthful of food and struggled to swallow. "I, uh, don't remember my childhood." A dozen unvoiced thoughts flickered behind his eyes.

The Kaladeshi raised his brows. "One need not consciously recollect an event to fall into habitual behaviors determined by the experience. It is not inconceivable that one could forget their entire life. I would safely wager that were that the case, the subject would still tend to make similar lapses of judgement, and would be drawn to associate with the same sorts of people." He waved a hand, the swish of an ox's tail dismissing flies. "The nature of mortals is not so malleable as some would naively suppose. A person of religious inclination will always find something greater than themselves to place their faith in. A criminal will forever remain a criminal."

Jace put his fork down. "That's a very...deterministic point of view, Minister."

[Homesick - Chris L'Etoile]

=========

Dovin Baan expressed beliefs about identity and human nature similar to those of the transphobes I've dealt with. People like them think, "You were born a certain way and you will always be that way. You will never be anything else. No matter what you do, you can never truly change."

But Jace lives in defiance of that idea. Jace knows he's capable of change because he actively chose to become someone new. What he once was, he no longer is. Jace's disagreement with Dovin Baan isn't just a difference in opinion; it's a defense of his existence. When transphobes deny our identities, they deny our reality.

If Dovin believes our identities are set in stone, Jace believes we each hold a sculptor's tools. Whether or not you will change is your choice. But you alone have the power to make that choice, and no one can take that away from you.

=========

She sighed. "I don't know how the Golgari will see me when I return."

Jace shrugged. "You get to decide how they see you."

She looked at him with uncertainty. Jace continued. "How we engage with the world is dependent on how we present ourselves to it. We are continuously adjusting to change because if we fail to change, we fail to survive. By nature of you surviving the hell you did, you have changed into someone wiser than before. By nature of you commanding this ship, you've transformed yourself into the leader you always knew you could be.

"What makes you you isn't your circumstance or your past, but the choices you make in the future. Your ability to learn and adapt is what makes you who you are today, and that is what dictates who you will continue to become."

[Something Else Entirely - Alison Luhrs]

=========

Jace's focus on adaptation and self-improvement reminds me of the theory of gender euphoria; the idea that gender identity is defined by positive feelings and what feels right to a person, not negative feelings and what feels wrong (gender dysphoria). You can't be happy if you only focus on things that cause you discomfort and pain. You need to find things that give you comfort and bring joy to your life.

As a teenager, Jace hated himself for his weakness. He felt like being tough would make him more masculine. But when he grew up and gained more life experience and new role models, he realized that was no longer what he wanted. It may take some time to figure out what you want, and you may even find that what you want will change, but the end goal will always be to become the best version of you.

This process of trial-and-error is integral to Jace's philosophy.

We ourselves must constantly change in order to survive in an ever-changing world. Jace believes we are defined by the lessons we choose to absorb from these experiences. Every time you change, you have the opportunity to learn something new about yourself. You have the opportunity to see how you've become stronger and see what inspires you to live. That is adaptation. That is growth.

Even if you feel like you're not where you want to be yet, in Jace's eyes, you have already proven your identity just by choosing to walk that path. You can't just wish to love yourself. You have to choose to see yourself as someone worthy of love.

Jace wants us to see and appreciate ourselves for who we are and who we want to be, not what we aren't. You're a glass half full, not a glass half empty. Your potential is infinite, not wasted. If you learn to see yourself this way, it's easier to be a happier, more authentic self.

Jace's philosophy is what makes his character development a beautifully resonant trans story worthy of being true trans representation in my eyes.

=========

In that moment, Jace noticed a change within himself. The Jace of Zendikar and Innistrad and Ravnica had a nervous energy about him, persistently bored and disastrously introspective, constantly aware of the chasm of absent memory that was always on his mind's horizon. The Jace without a past was present, alert, comfortable no matter the circumstance and ready to face whatever might come his way. He remembered what it was like to be both, but recognized how much more natural it was to be the latter. In the span of a moment, Jace was surprised at himself, and then realized his earnestness of late, of Ixalan, was not manufactured, nor was his mindfulness something he could only access in a state of amnesia. That was who he had always been. He had just forgotten.

[Glimpse the Far Side of the Sun - Alison Luhrs]

=========

PART 5: REPRESENTATION FOR TRANS MEN IN MAGIC

If that all seems like an excessive amount of explaining for why I believe Jace is trans, that's because it is.

My interpretation of Jace as a trans man means so much to me because there is no actual representation for trans men in Magic. Which is, frankly, really wack.

In 2015, Magic's first ever transgender character, a trans woman named Alesha, was introduced in the beloved Khans of Tarkir story, "The Truth of Names."

In 2018, a nonbinary elf Legend named Hallar was printed in Dominaria.

In 2020, a nonbinary human Legend named Alharu was printed in Commander Legends.

The introduction of trans characters in Magic really ramped up in 2021. Kaldheim introduced an angel who uses Xe/Xer pronouns in the story Know Which Way the Wind Blows; as well as Niko Aris, Magic's first nonbinary Planeswalker. Strixhaven introduced Dean Nassari of Prismari College, a nonbinary efreet Legend. And Strixhaven: A Curriculum of Chaos, the set's accompanying Dungeons & Dragons book, introduced a nonbinary loxodon NPC named Bhedum 'Rampart' Soovij, and a human NPC named Nora Ann Wu, a transgender girl who counsels other transgender students at Strixhaven. The Innistrad: Midnight Hunt story His Eyes, All of Them featured an elderly transgender woman named Malynn.

Early 2022 saw the printing of another nonbinary character, an elf chef named Rocco, in Streets of New Capenna. And a nonbinary soldier named Myrel was printed in The Brothers' War.

Seven years after the introduction of Alesha, Magic acknowledged that trans men exist for the first time ever in May 2022, when the 'Pride Across the Multiverse' Secret Lair Drop was announced, just a few days after I began writing this article.

This Secret Lair Drop had eight cards featuring art, all by LGBTQ+ artists, that showcase the strength of the LGBTQ+ community in the Magic Multiverse. This celebration of diversity was beautiful, heartwarming, and inspiring in its entirety. Notably, it also featured two trans men in its art. In the new art for "Bearscape'', one of the men is depicted with scars from top surgery (gender-affirming surgery to flatten his chest). And in the new art for "Alesha, Who Smiles at Death", Alesha reaches out to support a young transgender man wearing a chest binder.

As a transgender man myself, I'd been waiting forever to see representation for trans men in Magic. I was happy… and then I wasn't. Two nameless transgender men with no lore appearing in the art for a Secret Lair Drop is just not meaningful representation.

The first named trans man to ever appear on a Magic card was Klement, a tiefling introduced in the summer 2022 set, Alchemy Horizons: Baldur's Gate. Don't get me wrong, I like Klement a lot– he's a very cute character and I'm glad he exists. But it's frustrating that he doesn't even exist in the Magic Multiverse because he's a Baldur's Gate character, and you can't actually own a real Klement card because he's a digital Alchemy card exclusive to Magic Arena.

Now that we're in early 2023, Magic is set to have been around for 30 years without ever featuring a named trans man character on a printed card or in a story.

Trans men have remained painfully invisible in popular media, even as the mainstream has gotten a lot better about representing a wide variety of people in the past few years. Magic in particular has done a very good job of increasing representation for marginalized groups. Magic clearly isn't afraid of including trans characters, which is why the lack of representation for trans men is so disappointing and so baffling to me.

Not having any representation for trans men in Magic hurts because meaningful representation for marginalized groups helps tremendously to promote inclusion in the community. Magic has a wonderful community and I feel like its members genuinely try to welcome all kinds of people, but others can't learn to become more accepting of you if they don't even know you exist.

When people talk about making the community welcoming for people of marginalized genders, trans men are often forgotten and left out of the conversation. When I see people discussing matters of marginalized genders in the community, they don't acknowledge that trans men are just as affected by gender discrimination as other marginalized genders. And I often see people (even other trans people) use the phrase "women and nonbinary" when talking about creating safe community spaces, seemingly not realizing that phrase categorically excludes trans men.

If the intention is to be inclusive, I don't know why we'd be excluded. It hurts to think that people say these things because they either don't know we exist or actually don't want to be friends with us.

I'm genuinely glad I've seen so many other trans people and allies connect with each other through the Magic fandom. But it's sad to not feel that same sense of solidarity and friendship. When I talk with other trans men in the Magic fandom, we're often lamenting the fact that there are no canon characters or prominent Magic creators / community members who are trans men. We have nothing to celebrate.

I think Magic's story and characters should reflect its diverse fanbase. The trans men in the Magic community deserve to have our stories told. Not only so others will understand our struggles, but so they can learn to share our joy. I want to show others who I am, and that I'm happy to be me.

Jace's character shows that people are receptive to these stories, and that in some cases, we have secretly been there all along. I'm just hoping for the day we can step proudly into the spotlight.

#MTG #jace beleren #gwunky #analysis

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oniraki · 2 months

Text

Broken into fractures

Pairing : Simon "Ghost" Riley x Reader

TW : Mental health, Psych ward, mentions of : self harm, suicide wishes/attempts , severe trauma (both Simon and reader), dark themes , angst, hurt/comfort , swearing , nicotine and psychiatric medication/sedation use - maybe too much tagging but it's better safe than sorry I guess?

AN : inspired by all the fantastic artists and writers here I gathered the courage to try and write something up myself. Hope I don't mess shit up .. please have patience with me for I really don't know what I am doing right now (and English is not my first language..)

"you're in time out Mr.Riley.." his psychiatrist says in a hushed tone, making Simon's head throb painfully. He does not like that bawbag of a man with his silly round glasses and his pathetic attempts to comb his hair in a way, that would hide his growing baldness. Simon tries to focus on Doc.Hershal's words but instead his eyes are glued to a coffee stain on the man's button down.

"Mr.Riley do you even pay attention?" A grunt is the only response that so called doctor gets out of him. The man sighs. "You hurt another patient, Mr.Riley.." he tries again and Simon chuckles hoarsely. "I'm well aware of that. He had it coming for some time .." - "You broke his nose." The doctor states more urgently, observing Simon's features as far as possible, since half of his face is hidden behind a black scarf.

"Fucking hell..should've broken his neck instead." Dr.Hershal shakes his head. "We have talked about this plenty of times, didn't we, Mr.Riley? This is no healthy way of coping with your feelings. This is unacceptable behavior above all of it. Every patient has a right to be here, to heal and to be safe while doing so"

Simon could feel his blood boil, hear it rushing through his whole body. Safety? He was talking about safety after all, that happened earlier that day? "Where was her right of safety when that fucker had his hands all over her...?!" The psychiatrist nods "I have heard about the incident. But that does not justify your aggressive behavior. That was something to be dealt with by the hospitals staff, Mr.Riley."

Incident. The nurses should've handled this. "And still nobody showed up fast enough to put her out of her misery, for fucks sake!"

His heart was beating way too fast, his bruised hands shaking in his lap. Knuckles cut open from that other man's broken teeth. He felt no shame, no regret. He'd do it all over again. Do anything to keep you safe, to protect you from harm. Even if it ment that he had to be locked up here longer than he had anticipated.

He'd do it for you.

Anything..

_______

The light was nearly blinding you as you crossed the threshold of the door, leading to the cage on the hospitals rooftop. You've never been entitled to garden privileges, going out alone and wandering around the paths between old trees and decorative bushes. You couldn't be trusted, the nurses always explained with that sorry, kinda pittying smile on their faces. You'd be a danger to yourself, they'd argue. Couldn't risk you hurting yourself, fulfilling your death wish..

The cage was just a sorry excuse of a garden. An area with fake grass and plants, some benches, secured by a Chain-link fence.. but it was your only escape from the sterile and sad gray walls of the ward, crushing you between them until you couldn't breathe. Closing you in, never letting you go. The flickering of the neon lights, the squeaking of the linoleum floor. Cold,blood sucking fingers that had a hold of you. Everything designed to torture and torment you furthermore.

The only way for you to leave that place was in a body bag. That much you were sure of.

"Hey scare-bear.." you whispered as you let yourself slump down on the fake grass next to Simon. He didn't even flinch or look at you at your sudden intrusion of his space. Not even when your head was leaning against his biceps. No words or sounds left his lips as he fetched a cigarette out of the box, lighting it up on the one he was smoking and then offering it to you. You stayed in comfortable silence for a smoke or two. Simon could feel the tension leaving his body, how his shoulders relaxed more and more with every passing minute. You were here. With him. Not in the observation room with that big window, directly connected to the nurses office. Not sedated and fixated. Not alone.. never alone, as long as he could impede it.

You sneaked your arm around his, your hand engulfing his with featherlight touches. The nurses patched him up properly after his emergency session with Hershal.

"'m sorry, love." You could feel the vibration of Simon's voice. Calming and soothing as a lullaby. He still didn't look at you, instead he kept his gaze on the sundown, throwing another cigarette butt off of the roof. "nothing to be sorry for, Si. It's my fault they relieved you of all of your privileges.." you murmured kinda dejected, petting his hand ever so lovingly.

Simon huffed, shaking his head eagerly, nearly making his hood fall down. "I'd trade every fucking, meaningless privelege if that's what it takes to keep you safe. Stop acting like it was your fault. You didn't ask him to touch you.. should've killed that bastard the second he tried to get close to you the first time."

Your movements stilled for a long moment until you released a breath you didn't know you were holding.

"they all told you to stay away from me, didn't they...?" Your voice was merely anything above a whisper. Simon only grunted in response. "As if that's ever going to happen. Nothing can stop me from being near you, little gremlin."

"but what, if they're right, scare-bear?" You ask, now avoiding his gaze that lingers on your face. "What if.. I'm no good for you? Making your condition worse..?" You thought intensely about it for the last couple of weeks. Simon used to make progress, used to get better.. at least until you came along. Certainly it hast to be your fault. "Is that what they believe or what you believe?" He snapped at you, hating himself for the harshness in his voice immediately.

You heard the night nurses whisper about you and Simon. About you being a liability to him. Stopping his progress, pulling him down into your dark abyss.

Your mind began spiraling again.

"I need words, love. Talk to me.. don't shut me out. Not again.." he demanded softly, freeing his arm out of your grasp. He'd leave you, right ? Because he realized how much of a burden you were.

But instead of getting up and leaving he placed his arm around your shoulders, pulling you into him gently, as if he might break you.

But by now your thoughts and emotions were cutting too deep, pulling you into a kind of headspace where'd you go nonverbal ..

Burden. Threat. Liability. Rotten heart and soul inside a useless, broken body. Not good enough. Not loveable.

Why can't you finally die?

" 'm here, lovie. I got you." He whispered into the crown of your head. "It's okay not to be okay right now. We'll get through it, together."

Oh how you just wanted to believe him..

#ghost simon riley #ghost cod #cod x reader #simon riley x female reader #ghost x reader #cod fic #cod ghost #simon ghost riley #simon ghost riley x reader #simon ghost riley x you #simon riley #simon riley imagine #simon riley x you #call of duty

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turbulentscrawl · 10 months

Text

Identity(V) Headcanons: Frederick Kreiburg

Frederick's headcanons got a little more...medical than some of the others I've done so far. I'm no expert in this stuff, but I do my best to be comprehensible and respectful where certain disorders have to be mentioned. As always, hope you guys like it!

-Ashes of Memory states that Frederick was diagnosed with ‘psychasthenia’ at some point in his childhood, but this isn’t used as a diagnosis in modern medicine. Instead, it’s a term used to describe a collection of symptoms commonly associated with disorders like OCD. It includes anxiety, obsession, compulsions, depersonalization, nervous ticks, and can even affect one’s memory.

-Personally, I also think he has synesthesia. Frederick mentions colors in relation to music a lot (especially gold), and while this could just be something relating to his other condition, I prefer to take it as literal. It’s part of the reason he was enamored after hearing his father play, why he obsessed with music. Frederick grew up in an onslaught of overwhelming chaos, colors bursting and fading wildly across his senses incomprehensible in his day to day, enhancing his anxiety…but when the recital started there was only the song. One symphony of sound and color, appearing before him in a long, unbroken stream. It was peaceful. And he became obsessed with that peace.

-This also explains his “un-Kreiburg-like skills.” His music is not like what the rest of his family composes because he’s writing it to suit both sound and color. He can perfectly identify pitch and can play most songs entirely “by ear” after hearing them only once or twice, but he’s obsessed with the stream of colors keeping a certain rhythm to them, which doesn’t always lend itself to “traditional” Kreiburg music.

-Frederick’s personality is very affected by the above struggles/disorders. He’s a very kind person at his core, as well as very earnest, but he is plagued by fear, anxiety, and extreme self-criticism. He becomes overwhelmed easily. He is entirely aware of all his struggles, his failures, and wrestles every day with the knowledge that he’s a disappointment to his family. Sometimes his situation brings him to tears, sometimes to destructive wrath.

-Frederick has come to accept his need for appearances, that people mostly like him because of his looks and his familial relations. But on his worst days he can’t even rely on that much because his communication begins to break down. His speech becomes disjointed and frantic, he’s tense and twitchy, a look of horror sinks deep into his face. To protect what remains of his reputation, he hides away during these times.

-When he is with people, he behaves as a gentleman should, albeit a reclusive one. He’s terrified of being judged further, but craves understanding and praise, so he maintains personal distance while remaining remarkably enthusiastic about musical discussion. He’s never told anyone but his family about his diagnosis or his synesthesia. They are both sources of shame for him.

-When at his most anxious, he has a tendency to pull at his hair. Whole clumps of his long hair have been lost to the worst of his fits. He’s not particularly sensitive about any resulting bald spots on his scalp, but he does try to cover them with his normal ponytail style because he knows they would affect people’s attraction to him.

-He despises the sound of dogs barking. Which is a shame, because he does like dogs. Their barking is just burry, red fireworks right in the middle of his vision. It always startles him and makes it impossible to do or focus on anything.

-His love language is Gift Giving, and the “gifts” he gives are, predictably, usually songs. It’s his primary skill, of course, so as far as Frederick is concerned, he has nothing else worth offering besides music made in the name of his loved one. He’d be devastated if these musical gifts weren’t appreciated; Frederick can’t take much more rejection. His favorites Love Languages to receive are Word of Affirmation and Acts of Service. He’s secretly a bit desperate for praise, and any actions you take to support his work or help improve his reputation as a musician are better than gold.

-He likes to match his clothes to the primary colors he sees in the songs he’s performing. During his recitals, he changes coats often.

-He’s a picky eater with a powerful sweet tooth. If he could have it his way, he’d subsist mostly on desserts.

#idv x reader #identity v x reader #frederick kreiburg x reader #idv composer #turbulentscrawl

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xiefuyu · 1 year

Text

Brother, I'm here.

-- Kurokawa Izana x little sister reader

🖤 — Tokyo Revengers

📝 — implication of domestic abuse, hurt/comfort, FLUFF (fawking finally), thinking of murder (its valid i swear), your relationship with everyone is platonic!, not proofread

:a/n — guys, i love the kurokawa siblings /sighs fondly (wc: 2.8k)

— PT. 1 / PT. 2/PT.3/PT.4/PT.5

You woke up to another day where you’re being wrapped by warm arms and blankets. It never fails to put a small smile on you as you register. It's just your brother being clingy again.

When he first took you to his home and you woke up from exhaustion, tears and apologies were thrown to each other as you talked about things that are long overdue. Tears mostly belonging to you and apologies from him.

Despite wanting to prepare food for the both of you, your brother insisted on making meals and was just happy to let you watch because he’s right in the fact that you don’t know anything about Japanese cuisine.

Nevertheless, he made you promise him that you’ll cook him Filipino cuisine in the near future. For now, he’s like an excited kid about to show his parents something as he insisted on cooking homemade meals for you.

Today, you were promised to meet some of his close friends because he wanted you to interact with another being despite his unsurprisingly growing protectiveness over you.

So far, the only people who had the privilege to visit and see you were Kakucho, Mikey and Emma, albeit hesitantly because they didn’t know how you’ll react after what happened, Draken, the gentle almost bald boy, Takemichi and his girlfriend, Hinata.

You were curious about the tall braided man and the man who was in a ponytail and inquired about them to your brother but you saw how he frowned, clearly contemplating something before sighing and telling you that he’ll introduce them to you soon.

“Kuya, kuya.” you call out to his sleeping form, grinning when he grunted. “Kuya.” you call out again and just like any other day, you could hear gears turning in his head as he slowly opens his eyes and looks at you with slightly wide eyes.

It was as if he’s still not believing that you’re real and that he indeed has a blood-related family.

“Good morning! You promised me today that you’ll introduce me to your friends!” you excitedly said, shaking him with your grip on his arm. He sighs, nodding. “I know, Y/N, I know. Good morning to you, too.”

You hop off the bed, stretching, already feeling happy for the day.

Your doorbell rings and before you could even take a step to answer the door, you’re being pulled behind by Izana, him smiling down at you.

“I’ll take it.”

You know it’s because he doesn’t trust anyone beyond the safe comfort of your house until he knows who it is.

“Oh, Kakucho.” you hear him faintly before standing outside from your bedroom.

“Kuya Kaku, hello.” you softly greeted with a bow. Everyone older than you had grown accustomed to the word Kuya. “Don’t be so formal, Y/N-chan.” he says, his tone just as soft as yours as he reaches for you to ruffle your hair.

But along the action, you flinched, closing your eyes a bit and stepping back, hands coming to protect your head.

Silence surrounded you as your face paled at what you did. It was on instinct, you swear, but that’s not the problem. You just protected yourself from a man who was nothing but nice to you and they will know that about the abuse! You don’t want that!

However, instead of questions, all you got was a soft pat in the head.

You didn’t miss the look your brother and Kuya Kaku shared, though.

Izana wholeheartedly believed that your hands aren't aware of what violence is. He believed that you're just an innocent girl with her big doe eyes.

But as he watches you interact with the four heavenly kings plus Sanzu, he's hyper aware of your flinches every now and then whenever they make big gestures to accompany their stories.

Something ugly bubbles in him. Something familiar.

Rage.

He doesn't want to think about the reason behind your little actions that you're clearly trying to not act out.

He doesn't want to think about you crying helplessly as you beg the person to stop hurting you.

He doesn't want to think about the times you cried for his help.

But he knows that the truth always finds its way to shine despite being buried where the light doesn't reach. He knows he'll have a conversation with you.

Knows that he'll need to dig up painful memories for you to let it all out.

However, for now, he'll let you enjoy and let you take your time even though he'll surely drop hints for you to take and know that he wants to know everything about your life when he was still not present.

"Kuya Rin, can you tie my hair?" He hears you ask and sees the way Rindou blinks at you in confusion before pointing at himself. "Yes, you." you say, tilting your head.

Rindou looks at Ran who raises an eyebrow at him. "You don't want him to braid your hair instead?" You shake your head and laugh a little when Ran pouts.

"Kuya Ran can braid my hair next time. I want to have a matching hairstyle with Kuya Rin today."

At that moment, the Haitani brothers shared the same sentiment.

"Should we snatch this little sister from Izana and make her our little sister instead?" (fondly)

But one feeling of Izana's murderous gaze on them was enough to throw the thought away. Not completely off the table, though.

"All right, come here."

Despite your brother's hesitance, one that you don't understand why, to let you meet the Haitani brothers, he's happy to know that you're enjoying their presence.

Aside from being instantly comfortable with Kakucho, the Haitani brothers' presence was enough to make you feel comfortable, too. Maybe it's because Ran knows how to deal with younger kids but he got close with you rather quickly.

As for Rindou, he was afraid that you'll fear him because he doesn't know how to be expressive but you didn't hesitate calling him Kuya and smiling at him.

If Ran is kind to you, you were so sure that Rindou will be kind, too, and you were right.

The others were big and looked strong but they all smiled softly at you albeit awkwardly when Izana introduced them.

However, the masked person, Sanzu, hasn't spoken a word towards you and you think that he's not comfortable around your presence.

You slowly made your way towards Izana and tugs on his arm, interrupting his conversation with Kakucho and Shion.

"What is it? Are you hungry? Tired?" you shook your head with a smile. "Does that person ever talk?" you whispered to him after pointing at Sanzu. "I want to talk to him but he might not be comfortable interacting with others…"

Izana looks at Sanzu who's talking with Mucho and hums. It's not like he doesn't trust Sanzu but the guy only talks to Mucho and he's afraid he'll ignore you and hurt your feelings by doing so.

"Why don't you try talking to him?" he suggests, watching you purse your lips before nodding with a soft okay.

He doesn't get back to talking to Kakucho and Shion, opting to watch you make your way towards the long-haired boy.

"You're Kuya Haru, right?" you softly asked. You watch as Sanzu looks at you, glancing at Mucho for a bit before nodding. "You need something?" he asks, making you smile and you could see the confusion in his furrowed eyebrows.

"I'm sorry, it's just, it's my first time hearing you talk so I'm happy, I guess." you ranted, sitting besides him, eyes practically shining at him.

He gulps. It's been a while since he interacted with someone else lest a girl younger than him. You reminded him of Senju, for some reason.

"Your hair looks so healthy." you absentmindedly said, racking your gaze on his hair. "Thank you? Yours look fine." he says with a nod.

"Hey, Kuya Haru, I'm sorry if I'm being nosy but why do you wear a mask?" the question was whispered as if it's just meant for him to hear.

Maybe it's because of that fact that he's aware of your efforts for your brother. Maybe it's because he also notices your subtle flinches whenever someone raises their hand.

But Sanzu found himself a little comfortable around you. Maybe he could let loose and trust you despite knowing your existence just days ago.

"I have scars." he says, the word 'ugly' wanting to bubble its way out of his mouth to accompany the word 'scars' but he stops them, popping said bubbles. He doesn't need you to know about his insecurities.

"Oh." he hears you say while nodding. "I have scars, too." you whisper to him and he knows that it's just a secret between you and him.

For now.

"Can I see them?" you gesture towards his face, smiling softly even though you're biting the inside of your cheek, afraid that you're stepping over a line.

However, Sanzu hooks his fingers on his mask and pulls it down for you to see.

You stare at two diamonds staring back at you that you didn't notice seconds had passed and your silence made Sanzu fidgety, opting to put his mask back on which pulled you out of your trance.

"I'm-I'm sorry for staring and I know this might sound insensitive or-or something along the line but they're so…mesmerising. You look so cool with them, Kuya."

Your voice was laced with genuine admiration that Sanzu doesn't know what to do with it. "Aren't they…scary?" he asked after a few seconds of silence. You blinked rapidly at him, frowning.

"In what way? They're diamonds! They're treasures! Treasures aren't scary." you pout, "they're beautiful." you added, seemingly so full of positive things at how your perspective of things is different from his.

Your brother who's observing you smiles at your pout, thinking about how you're still just a child. With a sigh, he gets back to his conversation with the others and lets you be.

Meanwhile, your words echo in Sanzu's mind.

"They're treasures. They're beautiful."

Never in his life did he think that way about his scars but your child-like innocence and your view about things was enough to calm his fear.

Why was he even feeling fear at the thought of you finding his scars ugly? At the thought of you being scared of him after seeing them?

Maybe it's because he, too, is longing for familial love. For acceptance from someone blood-related. And despite you not being one, you managed to give him what he was longing for.

Izana is lucky, he thinks. He has a little sister who did her everything just to meet him. A little sister so full of love despite the things that happened to her these past days.

While he had siblings; an older brother and a little sister who blamed him for every mistake and who was the cause of mistakes, respectively.

"Y/N, we're going." you hear your brother say and you nod, standing up from where you are beside Sanzu. "Thank you for showing your diamonds, Kuya Haru!" you say, waving goodbye at him.

Underneath the mask, he smiles, the phantom pain of his scars dulling.

"Kuya, do you know any job around here that accepts kids my age?" you questioned. You and your Kuya are currently walking through the streets with you clinging on to his arm.

"I don't and even if I do, why would I tell you?"

"Kuya, I just want to work."

"How funny." that made you pout, punching him with your free hand. "I'm serious!" you protest.

"You don't have to work, Y/N. What made you think I'll let you? Enrol in school instead." you contemplate his suggestion with how serious he sounded.

"You know what, I'll enrol you whether you like it or not."

"Hey! I'm still thinking! And besides, I can work instead to help wi-"

"None of that." When you look down, he sighs silently and stops walking, turning his body to you as much as he can because of you clinging to his arm.

"Y/N, I am aware that you got used to working and that you want to help with finances but let me tell you that I am more than capable enough to handle it. You don't have to sacrifice your youth for the both of us, yeah?" he softly says.

"And let you sacrifice yours, instead?" you pettily asked back. He just chuckles at your tone.

"What are you talking about? If my youth meant looking after you then it's not a sacrifice. I'm your brother, your Kuya, Y/N, don't forget that."

You're not sure when you started to cry but you just became aware of it when your brother chuckles and wipes your cheeks. "Well, aren't you a crybaby?" he teases.

"Shut up, Kuya." you whine, pushing him away despite you still clinging to his arm. He just hums, smiling. He knows he won when you sigh and he felt more victorious compared to when he and his gang won a battle.

You’re not sure how it came to this. All you know is that things escalated quickly and now you’re sitting in front of your brother who’s holding your hands, calming you down with his soft tone and shushes.

With apologies that’s not supposed to come out from his mouth because he did nothing wrong.

Again, it was just instinct.

The both of you were at the kitchen earlier, helping each other to cook. You briefly remember his instructions to get something from the fridge but for some reason, your hand decided to be clumsy and drop whatever you were holding.

Fear immediately made its way to you as you looked at your brother with pure horror in your eyes, his image becoming that of your mother, your memories playing with you. The next thing you know, you’re sitting on the ground, crying and shaking your head, apologies nonstop coming out of your mouth as you slink away from Izana.

His voice went static in your brain as you closed your eyes when he walked closely without hesitation and all of the sudden, you’re getting lifted up for a few seconds before you feel the soft mattress underneath you. Your trembling hands are now being cradled by rough yet soft ones.

“Shh, it’s okay, you’re okay, bubs.” you hear him saying, thumb caressing the back of your hands. “Breathe with me, please. You’re doing great.” your breath stutters as you try to breathe with him but his encouragement did its wonders to help you calm down.

With your vision now clear, you realise it’s not your stepmother in front of you but your brother who’s looking at you with worry and love.

Without hesitation, you lunged yourself at him, hugging him tightly as you sob in his chest quietly. He lets you wet his clothes with your tears and snot, reassurance falling from his lips like waterfalls; nonstop.

After a while, you stop and comfortable silence drapes its own on the both of you. “Take your time. We can talk about it like this.” you knew it’s him softly demanding you to tell him about everything. Days have passed with you flinching now and then and he’s nothing but patient with you.

With a shaky breath, you start your story.

Izana sat there with you in his arms, closing his eyes now and then to calm himself from the rage bubbling in him. He wants to go to the Philippines and commit another murder but he has you now and he doesn’t want you to be alone once again.

When you finish, he squeezes you and kisses the crown of your head. “You did so great holding on. Thank you for holding on. As selfish as it sounds, I’m happy you endured all of that and looked for me.” he sounded like he’s about to cry but you didn’t look at him to confirm.

“Kuya became my purpose and reason for living after I heard that you exist…” you confess. He was rendered speechless. While he was busy planning to take away someone’s purpose and reason, someone’s sanity and light, you were out there making him your raison d'etre.

Indeed, he’s too lucky and never in his life did he felt so grateful to the world for giving him this life other than this moment.

He knows you still have a long way to get over your traumas but he promises that he’ll be there along the way, holding you tight against the safety of his arms.

He had been a big brother to people who were not his real siblings. But right now, he’s a big brother once again. This time, to a blood-related sister.

More importantly, he’s your big brother.

He could never ask for more.

The door to his apartment opens, causing Izana to whip his head in its direction. A smile made its way to his lips, ignoring his friends' greeting to you as he looked at you fondly. You were smiling widely back at him with all your glory, your school uniform adoring you as he waits patiently for the phrase he’s always looking forward to hear,

“Kuya, I’m here!”

A/N: I ain't putting "the end" because i'm sure i'll still add headcanons for this but at the same time, this is kinda the "ending" of this series! thank you so much for reading :'>

@bontensbabygirl

#tokyo revengers #tokyo revengers platonic #tokyo revengers spoiler #kurokawa izana x sister reader #kurokawa izana x y/n #haitani brothers #haruchiyo sanzu x reader #xiefuyu's

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dronebiscuitbat · 1 month

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Give me a Reason: Chapter 11 - "Tea Party"

N was… nervous.

He was standing in front of Mrs. Elliots study. One of the servants was at attention to his left, who knocked on the door for him. He gulped, touching his bandaged face lightly as if trying to will away the phantom pain of her stinging nails.

“Come in.” Her shrill voice prattled off from behind the heavy door, and the servant opened it for him before bowing out. N hated that. He could knock and open doors by himself just fine.

“Ma’am.” He greeted, giving her a stiff and proper bow that was done more out of fear then genuine respect. He refused to meet her eyes, like he was trying to reason with some feral animal that would take eye contact as a threat.

“What do you want, Nathaniel?” Her words spoke his name with venom, like she was referencing a rat that had been caught in the kitchen, he gulped again.

“I was assigned a group project at school, it requires me to meet up with my partner at Bunker P-Park.” He stammered during his bald face lie, he was never very good at it to begin with, it didn't help that now he was nervous. “I want to ask your permission.”

“You know how I feel about you being outside unsupervised.” Her tone turned threatening, sending him into immediate and instinctual appeasement mode.

“I-I'm well aware. Ma’am. It's the o-only assignment for the class, if I don't do well then I w-will fail. I wouldn't be asking for any other reason.” He needed to stop shaking, he had to, lest she accuse him of-

“Are you lying to me Nathaniel?”

He supressed the urge to tense up or to let out the sound of surprise that accompanied it, he took a deep breath, come on N, Uzi can't do this project on her own.

“Of course not. If you would prefer conformation, I'm sure my teacher would be glad to provide it.” His voice shifted slightly, refusing to buckle under pressure even though he still felt his knees threatening to give out, he stood up straighter, and looked her directly in the eye- or tried.

He realized Mrs. Elliot wasn't even looking at him, and probably hadn't been this whole time. She was looking at her desk, jotting something down. How would she even catch his body language if she wasn't even looking?

“Ugh, I'd rather not.” She hummed with distain, as if talking to a teacher was far beneath her. “ Very well. Tessa will take you, I need her to fetch something for me this weekend anyway.”

He also supressed the urge to jump for joy.

“Thank you, Ma'am.”

“Dismissed.” She responded dryly, looking up at him for the first time the entire conversation, and he nodded briskly before hurrying out the door as fast as he could without it being suspicious.

The second he was out of earshot though, he jumped a full foot in the air and pumped his fist. “YES!”

He rushed up to his room, locked the door and pulled his phone out of the recesseses of his bookbag to text Uzi that he got permission, diving into his bed.

They'd been texting some during the week, not a lot, and it was mostly him initiating, asking her what she was doing or just idle chatting. But she always responded pretty quickly, which somewhat surprised him. He figured she had better things to do then reply to a random, meaningless text.

N: They said yes to this wknd!

Uzi: Great! Meet up at Bunker Park Saturday right? How long u got until the warden gets sus?

N laughed a little, Uzi had taken to calling his parents, or the idea of them, “the warden” or “the jailors”. All he'd told her is that they were pretty strict, wanting him supervised always. But she already seemed to dislike them.

Or maybe she just had a problem with authority, that seemed more apt.

N: 10pm? 11 is curfew.

Uzi: That's just when things get good! Ur parents suck.

N: They just care about my safety.

Uzi: Oh no, the park is so scary. OoOOoo

N had quickly learned, though probably should have suspected, that Uzi was a sarcastic little shit, and anytime it was an option it was the option she chose, and he could almost hear her voice making the ghost noises.

N: But that's not where we're going! Spooky Haunted Mineshaft Forest!

Uzi: They don't know that.

That was fair, but so was the 11pm curfew, he figured, Mr. And Mrs. Elliot didn't know exactly where he was going, and why would he need to stay out late in a park working on a group project?

They would just have to work around it.

“Big Brother?” Cyn called from her room, making him look up from his phone with a small smile.

“Yeah?” He replied back, not moving to get up off the bed just yet.

“Come?”

N: Sis needs me, ttyl

Uzi: She a baby or something? U say that a lot.

N: Six.

Uzi: Gotcha. see u Saturday.

N re-stashed his phone away, hiding it in a pencil case before creaking open Cyn’s room gently, she was sitting on the floor, a tea party with her plushies and dolls in progress.

“Join me for tea, Nathan?” She cocked her head at him, smiling hopefully and gesturing in front of her, N chuckled and sat down criss cross applesauce, bowing exaggerated to a comical degree.

“Thank you for the invitation, Miss Cynthia.” He replied, raising his voice to be a few octaves higher then it usually was, creating cheerful giggles, out of his little sister. N was slightly concerned on how she'd gotten on the floor though.

“How'd you get on the floor?”

“Did it myself, just slid off the bed.” She gestured behind her to her small bed, which explained why her legs were in an odd angle. He furrowed his brow slightly.

“You shouldn't do that, what if you get hurt?”

“I am not fragile.” She replied back, an upset look on her face, and he wanted to say that yes, by definition, she was fragile. But kept his mouth shut, Cyn rarely felt good enough to do anything by herself, so he wouldn't scold her for it, she wasn't hurt.

“No, you're tough as nails, but you are my little sister, it's my job to help.” He grinned a booped her nose gently. The frown on her face turning upwards into a smile as she handed N a very small teacup.

“Would you like some tea?” She asked, holding a teacup full of imagination in both her hands, he held out his very small teacup.

“Of course.”

The tea party went on for a small while, usually, they were an excuse for Cyn to vent her frustrations or ask questions she wanted answers to but wanted an excuse to ask them. She was doing a bunch of the first, asking one of her stuffed animals why he yelled all the time. Probably referencing J.

“Who have you been talking to, Big Brother?” She asked him after a breif pause, looking up at him curiously as she poured another cup of imagination out for a doll.

“Oh uh, group project partner, just getting an outline for our project.” He replied, being only slightly awkward about it. It wasn't like he didn't trust Cyn, but he knew if he answered, ‘that cool goth girl I told you about’ she would ask five billion questions that he probably couldn't answer.

“Is it a funny project? I heard you laughing a lot.” She asked again, probing.

It wasn't his fault Uzi's dry sense of humor was funny.

“Uh, nah, just my partner is. S-They’re cool.” He stammered slightly, slipping up on the pronoun, hoping he wouldn't give himself away.

“Oh! Is it that girl you met? You got her to give you your number?”

Drat.

“It is. Yeah, just for the project though.”

As if he could've gotten it any other way, he imagined if he did hit on her, she'd probably kick his ass into next week. Not that he wanted to! She just… didn't seem like the type to appreciate that kind of attention.

“Can I help? I know lots of things. I would like to meet purple haired lady.” She smiled, cocking her head once more, he swore she did it to look more adorable.

“Her name is Uzi. And I don't know… not sure we're allowed outside help.” He shrugged, trying to get her off this topic. While he was sure Cyn would like Uzi if they ever met, it would almost definitely require Uzi to come here, to the manor.

Something he absolutely did not ever want, Uzi dressed and acted like his parents worst nightmare, and he'd rather not be punished for it, thank you.

“I don't need credit, I just want to help.”

“How about I talk to her? Hmm?” He suggested, and Cyn furiously nodded her head in agreement, beaming.

“Yay!”

#murder drones #uzi doorman #serial designation n #nuzi #biscuitbites #n and uzi #give me a reason #trying to write this as if it was an episode of a tv show #so hey #time moves forward more then a day #Cyn is so fun to write #she might be becoming my favorite #N gets a smidgin of confidence

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gayofthefae · 2 months

Text

I never even thought of the words themselves as a lie but rewatching this scene, this is the most bald-faced, least convincing lie he has told on the show. I literally have to think about what about the words are false, because all I know is that that motherfucker is lying.

I was jealous at first. And angry 😠. And that's why I said all that stupid stuff 😔.

Now that he's delivered so much as a lie that it prompted me to think on a line I previously believed before I noticed he fucking said it like that, it's making me think more on self-aware Mike.

Especially the line "I wanted you all to myself". Something about what he's going for is what Hopper thinks he is. "I was too overbearing, making out with you all the time, and I'm so sorry that my love became just too much and I couldn't help myself that I became protective and territorial" while he's taking her hands off of him while kissing and making faces when Lucas suggests getting back together.

I didn't even doubt this line. But if he knows - then yeah. The "stupid stuff" he's referring to is what she heard him saying with Lucas about being a 'different species'. Now, with his delivery like this, I'm thinking he knows damn well the real answer is "sorry, you weren't there to hear it so I went a little too hard on pretending to be straight. I was just trying to riff off of what Lucas was saying but I didn't really get it because I'm not straight and I went too far. That's on me, won't happen again," and he knew he couldn't say that.

So instead he went with "sorry, El, I just loved you too much I guess (romantically) and it came out in angry ways" (meanwhile he was initiating a burping contest).

#elmike details #byler #mike wheeler #gay mike wheeler #elmike season 3 #mike knows #reworking around if this is a lie because i thought he believed himself on this one but now i don't know #maybe he knew it HAD been true but thought that NOW he really did love her and then realized at the kiss he was WRONG #idk man he just be actin weird #blank makes you crazy

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ryuichirou · 2 months

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Replies

A lot of replies! A bunch about a Florid Prison Warden AU comic from yesterday, a couple about other fandoms, one about antis, a bunch of shippy stuff (Falena/Leona, Lilia/Silver), some spicy stuff etc.

Anonymous asked:

Prison Warden au is back!

Yes!! After almost a year... I am amazed that so many people remember this AU. Thank you...

Anonymous asked:

How long can Floyd possibly hide Riddle in his cell? Also, how did he knock him out to begin with?

Riddle is currently far away from the prison, he was knocked out pretty much for the entirety of Floyd’s escape and has no idea where he is. He is technically in a cell right now... but in a different kind of cell.

Knocking him out wasn’t that difficult, Floyd just went ahead and squeezed him very tightly~ Until Goldfishie fell asleep...

Anonymous asked:

So what will they do to Riddle now?

Anonymous asked:

So Riddle got kidnapped after Floyd escape? Now I wonder what happened.

Well, for now Riddle will stay at an undisclosed location in the middle of nowhere in some dark room, and Floyd will have to take care of him. How the turns have tabled, eh? Now Goldfishie is the one being locked up <3 These two will have a lot of fun during Riddle’s stay! And Riddle is going to end up being traumatised for sure...

But they probably won’t be able to keep him there forever, so who knows what will happen next?

Anonymous asked:

You have made Sukufushi art before??? Omg why was I not aware of this

Hehe yes!! It was ages ago, but I used to draw these two a lot. We didn’t post the majority of my jjk sketches though because we didn’t really post very often back then + didn’t think anyone really wanted to see them, which was kind of true lol

Anonymous asked:

I'm the one who asked about Bobobo. It's a very silly, nonsensical, random show. An evil empire is trying to make everyone bald and a man fights them with his armpit and nose hair. There's also a guy who fights with farts. It's been awhile since I watched it but I think there were a few serious, dark moments, though most of it's a lead up to a joke. I wondered if you and Katsu would like it cause the reason I watched Gintama was cause it reminded me of it and iirc you've Gintama

Oh god, so it’s this kind of show (in a good way)!

Dark and heavy moments that are a lead up to a joke is honestly one of my favourite ways to treat comedy+drama, this is why we love Gintama so much (and also Osomatsu-san and also South Park lol). Bobobo really does sound like it has this same vibe.

I don’t know if we’ll watch it anytime soon, but I’ll definitely keep it in mind. Thank you, Anon!

Anonymous asked:

Regarding the sneezing HCs, do you think Malleus will spit fire and roast everything in front of him when he sneezes? Bro has pretty bad control over his magic after all LMAO

YES. THIS IS SUCH A GOOD POINT AND I DIDN’T EVEN THINK ABOUT IT.

Hoo boy, just imagine Malleus feeling like he is about to sneeze and Lilia running from the other side of the dorm to grab his nose because he knows it never ends well.

Anonymous asked:

About the response talking about antis, yeah it's hard for me to look for fics and fanart because I'll often run into antis...

I feel like part of it might be that they don't look at who a game is for or what genre it is apart from RPG/visual novel/ect, I don't think they know what joseimuke is (and I'm a still lil confused on the target audience of those as well, but I think it's mainly women with a disposable income?) and they think the target audience's age = casts' age, so since the cast is teens, then it's for teens by their logic...even though shows like South Park exist and I ain't showing that to a young kid.

I'd like to give them the benefit of the doubt that they genuinely think they're helping people/doing good things/ect since a lot of them aren't adults, but I can't. I just can't get that impression from them at all. The "nicest" I can be towards them is that they're young and dumb and will hopefully grow out of it or they need therapy but can't get it for some reason and this a kind of cry for help

Let’s be honest: if they weren’t dicks about it, no one would even care. We all understand that people don’t like some things, and all of us don’t like certain categories of people in our own fandoms, this is just a human experience. Minding your own business is what matters, and this is what they can’t do.

The majority of them are young and dumb, and a lot of them will grow out of it (or switch their aggression elsewhere because they’ll lost interest in fandom stuff) though. Some won’t, but there always are immature people that are much older... this is where they’re coming from lol

Maybe some of them really do believe that they’re doing the right thing and genuinely don’t know better, but I think for a lot of them finding a convincing enough reason to shit on others is the entire point of fandom experience. So even knowing what joseimuke is won’t stop them, only them losing interest and moving away from these spaces will.

All we can do is shrug and wait... and block people left and right lol

Anonymous asked:

What kind of hentais does Idia read or know of? Does he play eroges? If so what kind?

I think Idia knows every single hentai there is, even if he hadn’t read/watched/played all of them. Alright, maybe not every single one, but quite a lot lol But at the same time, he strikes me as someone who would be into it art-wise and would legit watch porn for the plot. So his favourite eroges are the ones with engaging stories and good character writing... I guess asking for that from a hentai game is a tall order, but Idia would argue and rant about some of his favourite titles if he was told “it’s just porn”. It’s not just porn, it’s an entire experience, the buildup that makes the porn good!

I know a part of me wants to say that he would play “oniichan” kinds of games, but I think he would ironically stay away from those... it feels weird to him somehow... too embarrassing.

He also doesn’t mind really fucked up tropes and scenarios. He could look at a tentacle hypnosis scene or a scene where someone is pushing out an alien egg and say “heh classic”. Truly, the greatest enjoyer of art.

Anonymous asked:

Hello! So I’ve been wondering of all the TWST tops, who’s winning the girth-and-length off?

Personally it could go either for Jack, Rook or Sebek. the Octatrio kind of cheats tho? their merform could pull these off easily.

anyway very curious to hear your thoughts!

Anon, this is such a good answer and I agree with you, even though I did write a post about peen sizes at some point, and I had a bit of a different top3 lol

To us, the winner is Lilia both because we are very committed to this joke + apparently for bats dick-to-body proportions are insane, so I guess there is some meat (heh) to this joke after all.

The second one was Floyd, and I still think the Tweels are one of the hugest, but... Jack and Sebek are absolutely up there, and I think they’ll grow bigger and girthier. They’ll become the biggest ones in a year or two.

I agree that Rook is big, but I think Trey is longer than Rook while still being quite girthy.

I am also 100% sure Yana has a list for this that we will never see...

Anonymous asked:

Firstly, I’m new to your blog and I LOVE YOUR ART AND HCS SO MUCH! They’re beautiful and amazing and it’s incredible seeing a blog being so unabashedly problematic with no shame!

That aside, I’m not sure if you ever talked about him before, but what do you think about Falena. Specifically for Falena/Leona?

I’ve seen some works (all super incredible, of course) of Faleleo stuff in Leona’s perspective, so I was wondering how do you think Falena would be like in the situation he’s loving his little brother a bit too much? We all know Leona’s gonna be a tsun about it but what about niisan?

Anon! First of all, welcome and I hope you enjoy your stay. Second of all, thank you so much for appreciating our stuff and being supportive of our self-indulgent selves! lol

We love Falena/Leona in theory; we haven’t dived into them because we haven’t seen much of Falena + don’t care much for Leona. Still, we are 100% supportive of this ship! Every time we rewatch The Lion King, I get more and more into Mufasa/Scar...

Regarding your question, it’s interesting because I think the default really is to think that it’s Leona who is obsessive over Falena, and Falena might not even have a clue about it (or have a clue but still choose to be a proper future king instead of fooling around with Leona). But it’s entirely possible for him to also be very into Leona, it could even be more fun this way.

I feel like Falena has always been an adoring brother and Leona greatly underestimates just how much Falena loves him. Not only he worries about his future and cares about him (that’s a given), he also is genuinely impressed by his wit and intelligence; I wouldn’t be surprised if Falena talks about Leona all the time lol Maybe he gets as excited as Cheka sometimes, which is endearing at first, but then feels like Falena is um... a bit too much into him...

Falena also feels like someone who would rationalise his feeling by thinking that him being a king and having a wife and a son is one thing, but being with Leona is another thing, their private special thing that could actually still improve things for the entire Kingdom: if Leona is by his side and works together with him, they will be unstoppable. This is something that Falena wants the most... even if it’s just a way to justify his desire to have access to Leona (and his body) all the time. He needs to give Leona some attention, right? He wasn’t able to do it lately, right? This has to change.

I also wouldn’t be surprised if they had a bunch of “iffy” moments when they were younger. A sudden closeness during sparring, a hug that lasted longer than anticipated, a bite that was meant to be playfully teasing but ended up being too sensual and dominating. That tension existed for a very long time, and it only gets stronger with time.

Anonymous asked:

God... I am enraptured by Them. Completely obsessed with those first days Lilia started playing with Silver. You think he went slow with touches and inappropriate kisses, or just one day told him they're doing something new and put his whole dick inside him at once??? Silver couldn't have gotten so good at handling anything without trial and error... Have there been times Lilia overestimated him and left him overwhelmed and SOBBING sobbing, like he had to stop immediately or his kid wouldn't be the same person again kind of overwhelmed. Ughhhh I'm obsessed with them and their awful history

Anon, I am so happy you like these two this much. I feel like this awful history is such an obvious but tasty and amazingly working trope for them, it just works.

I guess it’s fair to say that Lilia went slow with his inappropriate behaviour, I honestly think that Silver didn’t even notice the switch, as if it was never there. He’s always been his father’s cute boy. Of course it’s just the way he remembers things... But he does remember the first time he had Lilia’s whole dick inside him!

But also yes, of course there had been a bunch of times when Lilia got too excited and overdid it with Silver. Even though Lilia did try to pace himself, I think he completely broke Silver all over like 10 times; and sometimes he is amazed that he turned out okay with what he went through. But he got better very fast! A miracle of true love <3

#replies #prison warden au #lilisil

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gashu-satou-daily · 8 months

Text

DAY 71:

been thinking about satou family resemblance a lot lately. all of the words transcribed + also some extra thoughts below the cut

regarding: gashu

i keep saying that more people would like him if he had longer hair. i stand by this statement.

if i drew him realistically, gashu's hair would be akin to a very dark brown. i will never draw him realistically though so this means nothing.

gashu wouldn't grow thick body hair. the crabstache is a culmination of years of hard work.

regarding: kai

kai has thicker lips and thicker eyebrows. has absolutely no intentions of growing facial hair of any kind. eyes are softer. has a wider face

has some wrinkles and grey hair. he's what, 30? i think he deserves it.

is fully aware how much he looks and stands and walks like his father. tries very hard to disconnect himself from this.

regarding: both:

both have rather long, slim faces + pronounced cheekbones.

hair type is very similar, i think that they both have wavy hair but gashu greases his down enough so that nothing shows.

have similar noses; gashu's is more bony from age. on a similar note, gashu is more bony overall, looks somewhat... shrunken. Empty?

eyes are very similar.

have the same front hair part. forgot the word.

have very similar body frames

extra thoughts: i think both of them are approximately the same height. both have an inclination towards eyebags. gashu's are far more pronounced. i might talk about them more and possibly even sei whenever i next get the energy to draw anything. they both have strangely thick hair. gashu's has thinned over time. he might have a bald spot on the back of his head but i'm not sure. i'll need to replay yttd to say this but their speaking mannerisms are VERY similar. they have an interesting cadence and order of words. autism, perhaps? they both also hold their hands in front of or behind them... very similar!

#gashu satou #daily yttd #yttd #kai satou #once again sorry for lack of posts. mental health and physical health have been killing me for the past (checks watch) month.

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criticallyacclaimedstranger · 1 year

Text

When It All Falls Down [a Frankie/Joel x f!reader fic]

Read on Ao3

Fandom: The Last of Us / Triple Frontier

Ship: Joel Miller x you/reader, Frankie Morales x you/reader (cishet f reader)

Tags/warnings: Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, major angst, Canon-Typical Violence, Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Drug Use, Grief/Mourning, Death of a loved one, Assault, Blood and Injury, executions, Implied Suicide Attempt, Miscarriage, Loss, frankie and joel are both soft but in very different ways, cunnilingus, fellatio, piv sex, bad sex good sex all is sex, choking, pls tell me if I missed anything this one is a lot.

Summary: You live in the Boston QZ, trying to get by, when you become involved with a certain Joel Miller.

Words: 14,098 (oops)

A/N: Holy cow I started writing this almost six months ago when the show started! It was meant to be a very different kind of story but as it dragged on, it changed. Now I'm just happy to have finished it. I don't know if this fic is a dead dove but I just want you guys to be safe. Be aware that it's pretty heavy and there is definitely not a super comforting happy ending. But there is a certain kind of closure. Read at your own risk and let me know if I missed a warning.

Darkness lies thick around you when you stumble into the tiny apartment that is your so-called home. Exhausted yet wired, you take your time washing, and having a drink, knowing you can't fall asleep anyway until you take the two pills you got from the dealer with the salt-and-pepper hair and beard. He has an aura of danger around him, but you've never felt afraid so far. You carry an assault rifle, after all. He's surely armed as well but yours is fully visible, and your fatigues and ravaged face will let surely let him know that you are a force to be reckoned with.

Eventually, you find yourself drawn towards the narrow bed. You pick up the bottle of liquor that was no doubt made in a toilet, shake out the precious pills from a small plastic bag in your breast pocket, and down them with some generous gulps of the piss-colored liquid. It burns its way down your throat, warms your belly, and with a deep sigh, your collapse on the bed. As you look up at the ceiling, you see the flaking paint dance before your eyes, not from the drugs and the alcohol, but from sheer exhaustion. You turn onto your side and press your eyes shut and make your brain go blank.

Almost asleep, you hear the front door open and close. Too groggy to care about making sure it's not an intruder, you immediately recognize the footsteps anyway. They echo the tiredness you feel in your body, and the mattress dips heavily when your husband lies down next to you. You scoot back clumsily, longing to see him. His face is lined with the same hard years as yours is, but he has managed to preserve a glow of humanity in his kind eyes. You love that for him, and now you find yourself smiling.

"Hi," he smiles back, touching your cheek with calloused fingers.

"Hi."

"I missed you."

"Are you okay?"

You nod, and a sad kind of mirth flashes by in Frankie's eyes.

"Liar."

"I feel better now that you're here."

"Me too."

You raise your hand to his cheek, mirroring his gentle caressing of your skin. His scratchy beard is growing long enough to almost cover the bald spots along his jawline, but your thumb finds them nevertheless.

"Will you shave tomorrow?" you ask, feeling an inexplicable desire to see those spots, kiss them like you used to back when the world was normal and he kept his facial hair a little tidier.

"Just so that you can point out to me that I'm unable to grow a beard?"

"That's not it at all..."

"We'll see, sweetheart. Now sleep."

You touch your forehead to his, and only then can you let yourself be dragged under by the pills.

///

The sun is beating down from a clear blue sky. Your mouth is filled with cotton, and it doesn't make it any better that the smoke from the burning bodies is somehow finding its way to your tower. The smell of burning flesh should make you gag, but it doesn't, not anymore. The smoke, however, irritates your lungs.

"Goddammit," you hear Peters, your guard partner for the day, cough behind you. "We need a big fucking fan."

"Rain would be better," you reply, looking around you, seeing nothing but blue skies.

"Rain just impregnates the smell into the clothes."

He's right, of course, but you still wouldn't mind rain. Looking around you in the guard tower, you stop when you notice movement some distance away. Frowning, you stop still and wait to see it again.

"You got something?" Peters asks, having noticed the change in your posture.

"I got something," you confirm in a mumble. He lifts his rifle to look through the scope, searching for a moment before finding it.

"That's a goner," he shakes his head as he lowers the weapon. You grab the walkie at your belt and call it in. Soon after, a trio of soldiers appear on the other side of the wall. They close in on the wandering figure and shot rings out. You watch indifferently as the figure drops where it stands. Shortly after, your walkie crackles, and the kill is confirmed.

Peters coughs again, and the day continues in the same manner.

When you're relieved of your watch, your closest superior wants to speak to you.

"FEDRA HQ is sending us more soldiers," he tells you, ”So we won't be needing you at the moment. Report at the job office."

You merely nod. There is nothing to say, and you know that you were on watch duty by necessity only. You were never a soldier, Frankie was. When the world went to shit, he taught you everything he knew, and he knew a lot. You went from never having touched a gun to a weapons expert in six months. Your sinister competence was probably the only reason you were still alive.

You relinquish your rifle, missing the heavy weight of it in your hands, and change into civilian clothes. There is no hurry to take a new job, nobody is keeping tabs on you, but you are used to keeping busy. The alternative is going back to your so-called home and spend the rest of the day doing nothing by yourself. And that is not an option.

You draw the worst number imaginable: arrival clinic. The place where new arrivals either get checked for infectious diseases, or receive a lethal injection that kills them immediately. You'd much rather be burning bodies. At least those are covered, and already dead. It's a lot worse trying to avoid looking a person in their despairing eyes right before you stick a deadly needle into their arm.

It's just a job, you remind yourself as you're changing into medical scrubs and a face mask. You've done it before, so you just nod at the medical officer and start to make yourself useful. The uninfected ones have to undergo tests that you find intrusive, but you don't think about that.

A new patient is rolled in on a gurney: a young woman. She's softly sobbing, a sound which does not affect you, but then you hear the quiet whimper and realize that she's holding a swaddled baby in her arms. You stop still, stomach dropping and filling with ice.

"The baby is sick," the medical officer explains briefly, and you know what that means: there's something else ailing it, not infection. You see the officer prepare a syringe, and know what it means: the mother is infected, and must be disposed of. Despite how revolting you find your actions, you still take the baby from the protesting mother.

"No, please, I have to hold her, she's sick, please, don't take her from me..."

You swallow hard, unwanted images flashing through your head. It becomes a little difficult to breathe as you take the baby out of the room, ignoring the mother's pleas that are turning louder and more desperate. You look down at the baby and see from its dull eyes that it is not well. Unswaddling it, you find that it is looking malnourished, and is burning up with fever. The thermometer reveals a temperature of 103.

It's a miracle this baby is still alive, but you can tell it won't be for long.

You leave it in the plastic bassinet and re-enter the procedure room, where the mother is dozing off. Her face is shining with tears. She's younger than you, maybe the same age you were when...

"The baby?" the officer asks without looking up.

"High fever. Dehydrated and malnourished," you tell him bluntly. He nods.

"Better to let it go to sleep. We don't have the resources anyway."

You don't question it, you just prepare the injection and administer it yourself. More fuel for the fire that's stinking up someone else's lungs now.

///

It's dark when you're let off your shift. On heavy feet, you drag yourself home. No interest in food or hygiene, you plop down on the threadbare couch and start to drink. For every time you raise the bottle to your lips, the sound of the crying mother is turned down a little in your head. You decide to not stop drinking until either the bottle is empty, or Frankie comes home. Luckily for your liver, Frankie arrives not long after.

Blearily, you look up at him, expecting scorn but receiving sympathy. How does he do it, how does he remain so humane?

"Rough day?" he asks quietly. You rub your neck with a joyless bark.

"Every day is rough now."

"I'll get you your pills."

He comes back with two of them, but you shake your head.

"Three," you mumble throatily. You crave oblivion tonight.

"Not with liquor."

You grunt in dissatisfaction but accept the two pills, down them with yet another gulp of toilet booze, and relinquish the bottle to Frankie. He puts it to the side table and offers you his hand.

"Come on, let's go to bed."

He holds you as the world dances, kisses your clammy forehead as he lays you down on the bed.

"I'm not up for this anymore, Frankie," you tell him quietly, speaking words that you can barely allow yourself to even think. "I'm not strong enough."

"Of course you are," your husband tells you gently, stroking the hair out of your face. "You are way stronger than I ever was. You were always the backbone of our family, my love. You suffered through all those years when I was overseas. You held everything together when I was on my coke adventure. You found the strength to forgive me and take me back."

You giggle drunkenly.

"That sounds like a kids' movie. Francisco's great coke adventure."

He scoffs. "Not a movie I'd let my kids watch."

Your mirth disappears just as fast as it came, and now your eyes fill with tears. Being reminded of kids with Frankie breaks your already shattered heart.

"She would have been fifteen now..." you start to sob, hiding your face in the lumpy pillow. Frankie sighs deeply.

"I know. I miss her too. I think about her every day."

Your body starts to shake as you remember the lifeless weight of your baby in your arms.

"I don't want to do this anymore," you break down, shaking and crying into the pillow as your hands fist into the sheets. "I'm done, I can't do it!"

Frankie watches you patiently as he softly caresses your back, letting you cry it out without saying anything. It's not your first time and it won't be your last.

When you finally fall asleep, your head aches from both the crying and the beginning of a hangover, and you have lost your voice from screaming into the pillow.

///

The days keep coming, one after the other, with never-ending relentlessness. You go to your designation at the clinic, put your work in, return home, sometimes by way of the rations office. When you run out of pills, you seek out the man who resembles a graying yet still fierce watchdog. Meeting him in a secluded backyard, you ask for the usual amount but find out that he's all out.

"When are you getting more?" you ask, fingertips tapping together in your pocket at the thought of the sleepless nights you are sure to have until you can get your hands on more drugs.

"Unclear at the moment."

"When will there be clarity?" you bark, annoyed at the non-answer. He towers above you, as if reminding you of his size.

"Do we have a problem?"

"No," you mutter, in no mood to start a fight despite your desperation. He nods in agreement.

"Good." He pauses, before adding: "Check back in a few days."

Abruptly, you spin around on your heel, and leave. On your way back to your apartment building you notice after a while that you are being followed. Slinking into a narrow passage between two buildings, you hide behind a couple of trash cans, crouching low as you pull a knife from your boot. You don't have your gun; bringing it with you to work is too risky, you would be arrested if a FEDRA agent found it on you.

The sounds of voices and heavily booted feet come closer. At least three men are talking amongst themselves about you. One voice sounds familiar: it belongs to an absolute asshole who has been on you before for working for FEDRA.

Shit. You press yourself against the cold wall, hoping they'll pass by. You have no chance of fighting them all, and you don't want to know what they'd do to you if they got their hands on you.

You are about to find out. The steps come closer, and then one of them is standing right in front of you. You slash at his legs, feeling the impact before he kicks at you, his boot hitting your arm that you managed to raise to shield your face, but the momentum brings your arm up to your face, and you're knocked down on the ground. The knife clatters somewhere next to you but you don't know where, and in the next second you're curling up on your side, gasping for air from the kick you received to your stomach.

"You fucking cunt!"

The pain is blinding but when the second kick comes, you manage to wrap your arms around the foot. Twisting your aching body, you pull your attacker down. Next thing you know, you are being battered with kicks from several feet, and you make yourself as small as possible, try to protect your head.

You are pulled up and slammed into the wall. Spitting blood, you try to focus your gaze on your assailants, but your vision is blurry and impaired by a quickly swelling eye.

"You'll regret this."

Hands close around your neck, cutting off your air supply. Panic rises in you, floods your limbs, making you kick and flail with your last ounces of strength, choked protests pressing out between your lips.

Your salvation comes not from your fighting, but the chain around your neck.

"What's this?" The grip loosens a little, fingers pluck at the chain.

"There's someone coming." Another voice warns. "Finish her off."

The rings on the chain around your neck get pulled out from underneath your shirt and you start kicking again.

"Is this gold?"

A snap, and the chain breaks. The familiar clink of the two rings in the palm of someone else's hand makes you furious.

"Give them back!" you scream, but the words only come out as hoarse whispers. You throw yourself at the shape closest to you but only fall to the hard, cold ground as the assailant side-steps your pitiful attack. You receive one last kick to your ribs before the sound of heavy boots running away thunders in your ears.

"Fuckers," you croak, fumbling to get up, but failing as your ribs and stomach hurt too much.

New footsteps close in, the accompanying crackle of walkie-talkies telling you it's probably FEDRA. You think you recognize one of the voices but by the time the agents are with you, you have lost consciousness.

///

Ten minutes is the total amount of time that you were willing to spend in the clinic after you woke up. A fractured rib and countless bruises as well as an eye swollen shut and a bleeding lip is not enough to keep you in one of the sad hospital beds. The physician shrugs and dismisses you, and when you stumble out onto the street, Peters from guard duty is waiting for you.

"Figured you wouldn't stay," he shakes his head and starts to walk alongside you.

"You don't need to escort me."

"No, I don't. But I choose to do it."

You walk in silence for a few blocks before glancing at him.

"Did you catch them?"

"Do we ever?"

You grunt, your aching head already trying to plan for how to find them yourself. You need those rings back. Gold has no worth today, not like it used to, and the rings mean nothing to anyone but you. The loss of them is like a void in your chest, and your neck feels naked without the chain.

"You okay?" Peters asks.

"Sure."

"I saw the medical officer. You don't have to come in for a couple of days."

"That was unnecessary. I need to work."

"You can barely stay on your feet."

He's right, but you're not going to give him that. Reaching your apartment building, you just tell him bye before slipping through the front door. Almost succumbing to the three flights of stairs, you eventually reach your front door. Not until you are on the other side, locking the door and sliding the deadbolt, do you allow your body to sag, the tears to rise.

The physician gave you pain pills, and you down them with alcohol, all at once. Then you drink until you pass out on the bed.

It's late morning when you wake up, head throbbing, body immovable in its soreness. You blink at the sunlight, groan and turn your face away from it.

"My poor girl."

Frankie's voice is soothing right next to your ear.

"I lost them, Frankie," you whisper, unable to open your eyes and look at him. "Our rings."

"It doesn't matter. You're alive, that's what matters."

"It matters to me."

"They're just items."

"Symbols of our love."

"I loved you before I put a ring on your finger, and I love you after it's gone."

You start to sob, each one tearing through your body like a bullet through flesh.

"I know you're hurting, baby, but you gotta keep going." Frankie's encouragement is quiet and sad: he knows how hard it is for you, how unbearably tired you are.

"You can do it." He wraps his arm around you, very gently so as not to hurt you, and his lips are wonderfully cool against your hot forehead. "I know you can."

Sleep returns to temporarily release you from your pain.

///

"Frankie, she's not breathing!"

"Lemme see."

You cradle the still baby against your chest: the chest in which your heart has stopped beating. You're barely breathing yourself anymore, at least it doesn't feel like you are. If your baby is no longer breathing, how can you?

Frankie checks your child for a pulse, his grim face slowly falling apart when he realizes that which you don't want to acknowledge: that the fever has finally taken your daughter away from this burning world.

Halfway to the nearest town in which you had hoped to find a doctor, he turns the pickup around and return to the Millers' ranch, where you had taken refuge as soon as the cities started to empty because of spreading infection. You hug your baby to you the whole way. When you come back, William and Benjamin step out on the porch. They know how far it is to the nearest town, and that your early return only means one thing.

Frankie starts to dig a grave in the backyard that very same evening. You stand next to him in the twilight, still holding your child. When it's time to put her in the ground, the tears finally come.

///

The empty hollow in your chest is a stark contrast to the mind-numbing soreness of your body. How you manage to get out of bed and use the bathroom is beyond you. Returning to bed with an unopened bottle of moonshine - your last one - you force yourself to remember the dreamed memory of how you lost your daughter. In dark moments, such as this one, you think that it was for the best. What kind of a world is this to raise a child in? A fever is a lot less dramatic than getting bitten, infected, shot, burned. At least now she got to go to sleep peacefully in your arms. You buried her. Benny played a song on his old guitar and sang with a quivering voice. It meant so much to you.

The following year was hell. Frankie was just as heartbroken as you were, but he was the one who kept the marriage alive. Every time you pushed him away, he held you tighter. When you finally appeared from the tarry, stinking hole of grief, you discovered that you loved him more than ever. Loss makes some couples grow apart, but you had grown together. It was your salvation.

You take a swig from the bottle and grimace. Your head is pounding, and you can't remember the last time you ate anything. Alcohol poisoning is starting to feel very real, but you find it hard to give a shit. What more is there to live for, really?

Hunting down and killing those assholes who took your rings.

The thought sobers you up enough to put the bottle away. Sniffling from the pain, you heave yourself up from the bed, drag yourself to the bathroom where you vomit almost neatly, like it was planned all along. Avoiding your reflection in the mirror, you turn on the water in the shower, undress, and step into the cold, slow drizzle. You stand there until the shower runs out of water and you are shaking. Slowly, wincing with pain every time you move a muscle, you dry yourself, put on clean clothes, and leave your apartment.

The heat of the afternoon sun feels good, but you don't reflect on it as you limp with purpose through the crowd moving on streets of the QZ. Your stomach complains of hunger, and you're dehydrated, but the mission at hand is more important right now.

You find the drug dealer at work, burning bodies. The lower half of his face is covered by a kerchief against the smoke and smell, but you'd recognize those shoulders anywhere. Without hesitation, you walk up to him as he makes his way from the pyre to the back of a truck. You can see the dead bodies stacked there, like logs. Or spoilt meat.

"I need to talk to you."

He recognizes you, and there is a split second of dismay when he sees your beat-up face before he squares his shoulders and looks at you with disinterest.

"I don't have anything to sell."

"It's not that." You step in front of him when he tries to get past you. "You know where I can find the people who did this to me."

Even with his mouth covered, you can see the tightness in his lips.

"Why would I help you?" He pushes past you, and you glance towards the armed FEDRA guard further away. He's not paying you any attention, so you follow the man to the truck and watch him lift another body from it.

"I have no idea," you confess, stubbornly refusing to acknowledge the dead weight in his arms. It's easier to just think of the bodies as firewood, not the physical home of a once living person.

"I'd be in your debt," you try. He barely even looks at you.

"There's nothing I want from you."

"I can get you drugs," you tell him quickly. It's not a good idea, you're fully aware of that: every supply and every pill in the medical center is zealously accounted for, and you don't even have access to anything worthwhile. But he doesn't need to know that.

"I work at the clinic," you explain, now in a lower voice so that not one word will carry over to the FEDRA guard. The man stops, now eyeing you up and down.

"Why would you risk it?" he wants to know.

"I really need to get my hands on the men. They took something from me."

He grunts, leaning his weight on one leg and hooking his thumbs through the belt hoops of his jeans as he considers your offer. Eventually, he nods.

"What did they look like?"

///

Two days later, you're working in the clinic when FEDRA brings in man they found wandering outside the quarantine zone. He's middle-aged and a little malnourished but seems to be in otherwise good condition. He's brought in in handcuffs, and the agent leading him in gives you a little headshake.

The man's infected. You purse your lips, annoyed at the agents for not just shooting the man on the spot. Why do they have to bring them in here, where you have to pretend like they're not just about to die?

"How do you feel?" you ask lightly. "Any fever? Nausea?"

"I'm tired and hungry, I've walked for days - "

"You'll receive a meal and a bed shortly," you interrupt, grabbing the scanner so that you can check the man's status for yourself. The field agents sometimes bang up their scanners, so you don't trust them to give a correct reading.

The scanner's red light seals his fate. You hold the device away from him so he won't see it. Not that it matters: he must himself know that he's been bitten.

"I'll just give you a little shot of antibiotics," you tell him, turning your back to him as you prepare a syringe. "It's standard procedure for new arrivals."

You hear a shuffle and a broken gasp, and swing around to find him on his knees, looking up at you with fear in his eyes.

"Please," he implores you, "please don't kill me, I beg you, please!"

You swallow hard and nod at the FEDRA agent, who steps up and secures the patient so that you can administer the injection.

"I don't want to die."

Your hand starts to shake as his words start to move the sharp pieces of your broken heart around in your chest.

"I'm not ready to die."

Your throat feels constricted, but you manage to pump the entire dose into a vein, and the man grunts. You watch his eyes get sluggish, and take a step back when he slumps forward. His body twitches a couple of times before it lies still.

You tear off the mask and hurry out of the room, hurry down the dwindling corridors until you reach the back door. You burst through it and take a deep breath of the fresh air in the mid-morning sunshine. Your heart is chafing in your chest, which feels smaller than normal.

I'm not ready to die.

Leaning against the wall, you press your eyes shut and try to focus on your breathing. In, out. Calmly. Frankie's voice haunts your memories. You can do it, baby, I believe in you.

Someone is approaching, so you snap your head up, your fist closing and ready to swing.

It's the drug dealer.

"I found them," he informs you without preamble. "Are you free tonight?"

"I'm free now," you tell him, desperate to get away from the clinic. He nods, and you ask him to wait fifteen minutes. Returning inside, you tell your supervisor that your injuries are bothering you. Once you receive a permission slip for the rest of the day, you change your clothes and leave.

Your guide is still waiting for you outside, arms crossed in front of his chest, face set grimly.

"Did you get the drugs?" he asks you when you come out. You shake your head.

"It needs planning."

"You've had two days of planning."

"I'll get to it, okay?" you snap, and he yields. It is a little strange to you that he would help you without any guarantee of payment, but you don't dwell on it. What matters is that you're on the move towards justice.

You follow the smuggler, who introduces himself as Joel, through the busy streets towards the blocks out of reach for FEDRA's concern. The crowd thins out, leaving only individuals of questionable intent and suspicious gazes. You don't feel unsafe, though: there is something very reassuring about having Joel walk in front of you, like his broad shoulders serve as a barrier between you and the bad things surrounding you. He moves with confident wariness, staring down anyone who dares to throw an unfriendly glance at the two of you. Finally, he stops outside what looks like a former bodega, and turns to you.

"There's three of them," he informs you shortly. "In the back room. Not very bright, but armed. You carrying?"

You pull out your handgun from the waistband of your pants. You've carried it since the attack, damned be the consequences if it were discovered on you. Joel nods, produces his own gun, and clicks the safety off. You do the same and follow him into the building. He moves surprisingly silently for his size and heavy boots, and you do your best to match him as he leads you through the derelict space to the back door. He gestures for you to cover him from the side, then counts down by holding up first three fingers, then two, and finally one.

Then he kicks down the door and fires a warning shot as he enters the back room, where three startled men scramble for their weapons. You crash in, immediately shooting one of them in the knee.

"Don't fucking move!"

"On your knees," Joel commands them. The one that you shot is already writhing on the floor, and the two others raise their hands as they kneel. You recognize the leader immediately, and his features tell you that he knows that the day of reckoning has come.

"Where are they?" you demand, pointing the gun at him.

"What?" He has the audacity to even ask you: he and his companions took nothing from you but two rings on a chain. Everything else you ever had, including love, your sense of security, your sense of self, were taken years ago.

"The rings!" you roar, coming close enough for the barrel of the gun to touch his forehead. "The rings you fucking took from me, where the fuck are they?"

"I sold them!" His voice is growing panicked.

"To whom?"

"I don't fucking know, it was just some guy!"

"The QZ isn't big enough for you to not know every single fucking lowlife that crawls these streets," you point out. The guy starts to shake.

"I promise, I don't know!"

You don't even think: your trigger finger makes the decision for you. The shot rings out as your hand jerks back a little with the recoil. Warm blood stains your fingers, and you point the gun at the next guy.

"What about you? You don't know either?"

"I don't know, I swear!"

You shoot him too. The last one is the one with only one good knee. Putting him down is an act of mercy, but he holds out his hand as you turn to him.

"No, wait, wait!"

You fix him with your gaze as well as the gun, and let him speak.

"I don't know his name, but I think he's FEDRA. Thin guy, around six feet, light hair, blue eyes."

Your nostrils flare as you recognize the description. Lowering your gun, you turn away from the man bleeding on the floor.

"What are we doin'?" Joel demands, but you click the safety back on, a new purpose forming in your mind.

"We are not doing anything," you tell him. "I don't need you."

You walk out of the building. A gun goes off behind you, telling you that Joel put the last assailant out of his misery.

///

Peters is on a smoke break outside the FEDRA headquarters. He nods when he sees you, and without wasting any time, you march straight up to him. You push him roughly, sending him back two steps.

"Where are my rings?" you demand, resisting the urge to reach for your gun. Peters' eyes narrow.

"If you want them back, I need something from you."

"What?"

"Meds. Drugs. You work at the clinic."

You stare at him, your hatred spilling into your features, letting him know just how much you despise him.

"You must know I can't just waltz in there and fill a shopping bag."

"That's your problem," Peters shrugs. "Get me pills, or you won't see the rings again. Moreover, I'll report you for killing the men that attacked you."

"How do you know I killed them?"

"You just told me."

You bite your jaws together as you realize that you've been had. Peters smirks.

"I thought you were smarter than that."

You can't stand to look at him one more second, so you turn around and leave.

///

The night is long when pain keeps sleep away. You toss and turn, your brain working feverishly overtime in trying to figure out how to get out of this mess. You remember how Frankie wanted both of you to stay clear of any kind of organized attempts to keep the new status quo, or the opposite. He was a contender for becoming a FEDRA agent because of his military background but refused to serve a government that shackled and killed people. Yourself, you could have joined the Fireflies, but he didn't want that either. It's just best to mind our own business.

You did that for a long time, and you still lost your daughter. You took every precaution when leaving the Millers' farm to make it on your own with Frankie, and still...

He comes to you in the small hours of the night when your brain can no longer tell the difference between reality and delusion. His familiar smell invades your nose and comforts you, and his strong arms gather you to him, to his steadily beating heart.

"You went and got yourself in quite a pickle now, corazon."

"I know, I know. You told me so."

"I did. Still, for what it's worth, I'm sorry."

You sigh deeply. "Me too."

"You'll figure it out," he states matter-of-factly. Of course you will. You have to.

You sigh again and reach your hands into his hair, those soft curls that you have loved since day one.

"I want you, Frankie," you mumble. He kisses your forehead.

"You know we can't. We can't risk it."

He was always the careful one. You were on the pill when society collapsed, and you didn't exactly think to pack them when you had to flee your home. Whenever you raided a grocery store, Frankie would always check for condoms. When there were no more to be had, you had to resort to other ways to pleasure each other. The world may have gone to shit, but you still wanted each other. What you and Frankie had was a once in a lifetime thing. You could not not want each other.

"Just use your fingers?" you suggest throatily. "Your mouth. Like you used to."

"Why don't you do it to yourself, sweetheart," he coaxes you with equal amounts of honey dripping from his voice. "Let me watch."

He kisses you, teasingly, longingly. It has been ages.

"Let me watch you, baby..."

"It's not the same."

It was that objection, spoken years ago, that led to the penetration that resulted in a pregnancy. Your daughter had been dead for three years and the need to be with Frankie, really be with him, had grown too great. Your cycle was unreliable, and you figured that the risk was low.

Low risk, your ass. You got pregnant on the spot. And lost the baby only a few weeks later, the day you had to put a gun to your husband's head and pull the trigger.

I'm not ready to die.

That's what he said, as if you were any more ready to lose him. To lose him was unfathomable. But he had been bitten and had to beg you to put him out of his misery.

I'm sorry, baby. I'm sorry I'm making you do this. But someone has to. God, I'm not ready to die.

Tears begin to fall, and your body starts to shake. You roll over onto your back and sob out loud. Frankie is no longer with you, and all you have is a battered body, a broken heart, and a huge problem to solve.

You have to survive.

///

The medicine storage room is only accessible by key card and code. Only Craig, the physician at the arrival clinic, has both. You track his movements for the next two days, hoping to find some fault in his routine. When none presents itself after those two days, and you know that time is short, you try something new. Complaining of lingering pain, you earn a prescription of painkillers, but he won't release more than a couple at a time to you.

When you get ready to leave for the night, you throw a glance through the open door to Craig's office. He's sitting there; a middle-aged, bearded man, in a circle of light cast by the desk lamp, deep in paperwork. It's funny that medical staff should have paperwork even now.

"Good night," you say tentatively. He looks up, nods at you.

"Good night. Lock the door behind you. I sent the guards home."

You nod, and when the door clicks shut behind you, you have a plan. But for that you need Joel.

Still limping, you look for him in the deserted back alleys where the light faded already before the sunset. When you finally find him, he gives you a look that could almost be described as a smirk.

"You have my drugs?"

"Almost," you answer, squaring your shoulders that are dwarfed by the sheer wall of deadly that constitutes Joel's upper body. "I need your help."

"You're racking up quite a debt."

"I need your help to break into the clinic and beat the physician into giving us the drugs."

You state your business with the confidence of someone who has planned this to the very last detail, but the truth is that you don't really have any idea of how to do this. You're out of options, and you can't burst in there on your own, guns blazing. You need help, and you don't have anyone, not even Joel, but you have to convince him somehow.

He crosses his arms in front of his chest and raises an eyebrow at your bold proposition. "Are you on some kind of suicide mission?"

"I'm in trouble. I need those drugs, not just for you."

"I don't associate with desperate people. They get sloppy."

You purse your lips, angry at yourself for letting your despair shine through.

"If I don't get help, there will be no drugs."

He looks at you with narrowing eyes and for the first time you feel small next to him. You are at his mercy, and he knows it, and you don't like it one bit.

"It's not just about the drugs," he finally says, "there's something more. It has to do with those guys that we killed."

His eyes see right through you. "You know who they sold your rings to."

Fine. "He's a FEDRA agent, and he threatened me. If I don't get him drugs, he'll turn me in."

"Fuck." The curse comes out as a sigh.

"So if you don’t help me, they're going to kill me, and you won't get anything at all," you point out. Joel shakes his head.

"I need more than that. What are these rings? Why are they important?"

Now it's your time to cross your arms and glare at him. However, there is no beating that stone cold face. You could stand here until the end of time and you wouldn't win a staring contest with Joel.

"Me and my husband's wedding bands," you finally admit, defeated. "I wear them in a chain around my neck. They matter to me."

You expect him to scoff but to your surprise, you are instead served the hint of a crack in his grim facade. He looks down, seemingly at his left wrist right in front of his chest. The edge of a wristwatch peeks out from underneath the fraying cuff of his jacket.

"Okay," he finally nods. "Let's go."

///

The plan is simple. You will wear masks, get in with your key, surprise Craig, and force him to use his key card and code to open the storage room. A knock on the head and he hopefully won't remember much the next day.

"Can you walk without limping?" Joel asks as you pull the FEDRA-made balaclava over your head. Not surprising to you, he had managed to produce two of them very quickly. He doesn't explain and you don't ask.

"Don't worry," you tell him curtly and take out your gun. "Come on."

The clinic corridors are dark and silent, but you know that Craig will be in his office. His sleep deprivation manifests in dark circles under his eyes each morning, as well as in the way he cherishes his big mug of surrogate coffee every day, like it was a delicious Guatemalan roast. He has no family, barely any conscience either, but he has always shown a weary patience with you when you started working at the clinic. Not a chatty type, but then neither you.

The light spilling out the open office door tells you that he's still working. You gesture towards the door and Joel shows with a nod that he's understood. Quietly but quickly, with your heart thumping in your throat, you make it to the door. Joel makes himself known first, his tall and broad form claiming the entire doorway.

"Let me see your hands. And stand up."

Slowly, Craig obeys, but when Joel tells him what he wants, the physician is not moving.

"Did you not hear me?" Joel growls, but Craig doesn't move a muscle.

"I'm not giving you drugs."

Shit. You didn't count on him being a hero. Not knowing what to do, you hold back a gasp when Joel walks around the desk and smacks Craig in the face with his gun.

"How about now?"

Spitting blood and trembling from the shock of the sudden assault, Craig nevertheless shakes his head.

"No."

Joel growls again, and grabs Craig by the collar. Dragging the man after him to the corridor, he looks in both directions. "Which way?"

Craig doesn't answer, so you nod to the right. Joel sets off, pulling Craig with him. A tearing sound is heard when a piece of his shirt fabric breaks from Joel's rough handling, but Joel doesn't blink an eye. You follow, cursing under your breath. Just fucking give him what he wants, Craig!

Joel stops at the door to the storage room and shoves Craig against it. "Open it."

"No." The word is spoken in a small voice, but it is a no nonetheless. Joel cocks his gun and puts it to the older man's forehead.

"Open it."

You suddenly feel sick. This isn't right. This isn't how you wanted to do it. You push your hand down his pockets, finding the key card, and you immediately scan it by the door, but without the code, the door doesn't open.

"The code," you ask him, but he only shakes his head. You shove the gun under his chin.

"Don't be a hero."

"I'll die before I give you the code."

"Let me oblige you," Joel growls. "I'm counting to three."

You look into the physician's eyes. You may not know him, but you can see that this is a man who has made up his mind. What traumas does he carry that makes him so eager to part with his life? Maybe this end comes as a blessing to him?

"Fuck!" you exclaim and slam the gun against the side of his head. With a heavy huff, Craig sinks into a heap on the floor, blood seeping out of a cut on his head. Joel looks down at him, then turns his dark face to you.

"What is wrong with you?"

"All of this!" you hiss before turning around promptly and starting a brisk march down the hallway, away from the situation, out and as far as you can get. You don't know if Joel follows you, and you don't stop, except to dispose of your balaclava into a trash can halfway home.

Frankie is nowhere to be found as you pace your small apartment all night, waiting for FEDRA agents to come and arrest you. When the first rays of morning light come in through the window and nobody has been at your door, you collapse on top of your bed, and sleep restlessly for three hours.

Showered and with clean clothes, yet still looking half dead, you venture out of your apartment. You don't really want to but know that you have to make an appearance at the clinic, see how Craig is doing, what the consequences of your break-in are. You have a lie to serve about why you're late and are ready to serve it with a straight face. When you arrive at the clinic, however, nobody is interested in questioning you. There is blood at the entrance, and extra guards who check your credentials before letting you in. You walk through the halls towards Craig's office, fearing what you'll learn, what more lies you'll have to come up with to explain why you didn't come to work in the morning.

It turns out that nobody cares about your absence: everyone is more concerned with the assault and subsequent death at the clinic last night. Slowly, you begin to understand the picture, even if you can't understand it.

Around midnight last night, a man and a woman broke in, threatened the physician, then rendered him unconscious with a nasty blow to the head. He woke up by a gunshot, traced it to the back door, and found a dead man holding the gun he recognized as belonging to the masked man who threatened him. This dead man has been identified as Jeffrey Peters, a FEDRA agent.

Peters. Discreetly, you make sure that there's a wall behind you, and lean on it to make sure you'll stay on your feet.

"You okay?" Craig asks you, and the FEDRA agents all turn to you. Shit.

"Yeah..." You make a show of rubbing your forehead and sighing deeply. "I did guard duty with Peters."

"How well did you know him?" one of the agents ask, and you shrug.

"Not that well. We didn't talk much about ourselves. He seemed nice enough, though."

"Was he punctual? Reliable?"

You hesitate. "He... sometimes, a couple of times, he'd ask me to cover for him, and he'd disappear for a few minutes or so."

"While on duty?" another agent prompts. You nod.

"I always assumed he went to piss or something."

"Would you have thought him capable of something like this?"

You swallow, your hesitation real as you try to navigate these tricky waters. How do you raise suspicions about Peters without expressing a dislike for FEDRA?

"I think that his training made him capable of many things," you finally saw, eyes cast down.

They buy it, and you're let off the hook together with Craig. You apologize again for being late, blaming headaches and pains, and get the rest of the week off.

You immediately start to look for Joel. When darkness brings another night over the QZ, you still haven't found him. Instead, you find your local bootlegger and trade in a ration coupon for two bottles of something not-quite-clear that you're positive has a high enough alcohol level to kill off whatever germs it most probably contains.

The liquor tastes vile, and you long for the carefree emptiness that the pills provide, but at least you pass out soon enough. The nightmares you have are of Frankie and the bullet you put in his head, again and again and again you're forced to relive the terror, the guilt, the absolute devastation of having to first kill your husband, then live without him.

When you wake up the next morning, your anguish is only trumped by your hangover. It takes you half the day to get out of bed, shower, dress, and eat without getting sick. When you finally venture out it's late afternoon, and you are on a mission to find Joel. A nagging suspicion about him is making you uneasy, and you need confirmation, even if you have no idea what to do with the knowledge.

You finally find him hanging around the usual alley where you know that he deals. He's performing a quick transaction with a young, haggard-looking woman, and you wait at a respectful distance until she's gone. Joel's gaze follows her before fixating on you, and you see his hand quickly stuff some coupons into his pocket.

"You're dealing?" you demand at once. "Where did you get the stuff from?"

"Another source came through."

"So we beat Craig up just for fun last night?"

Joel gives you an almost disdainful look. "It was your idea."

Your head is pounding, and you feel the bile rise. Fighting to keep it together, you turn away from Joel and rub your palms over your face.

"Did you kill Peters?" you ask, your voice subdued beneath your hands.

"Yes."

"Why?"

"He complicated things."

That's for sure. You take a deep breath, will your stomach to settle, your head to cease spinning. Slowly, you raise your gaze to Joel.

"How did you do it?"

He folds his strong arms in front of his chest and dips his chin a little as he regards you.

"You sure you want to know?"

You nod. Yes, you're sure. You need to know.

"I told him your plan and said I needed his help to execute it. He jumped on it at once. As soon as we had broken in, I took his gun and shot him. I left my gun in his hand and put my balaclava on him, then left the scene. The doc soon raised the alarm."

Joel tells you this matter-of-factly, like he was talking about a walk on the beach. But there is still one issue he hasn't addressed, and now you have to.

"The rings," you remind him. "My rings. Did he have them on him?"

"Yes."

Your heart almost stops. "Yes?"

Joel sticks his hand in his pocket and fishes out the gold chain. The two rings clink softly when he places them in your trembling hand. They feel warm from his body heat, and for a moment you can almost feel Frankie's touch on you.

"Thank you," you whisper throatily, closing your hand to keep the rings safe. "Appreciate it."

Joel only grunts.

"I'll get you the drugs," you promise. "Somehow."

"Forget about it. You don't have to."

You look up at him, surprised and wary. Nothing is free in this world, and Joel is a smuggler. There is no way he wouldn't want anything for his troubles. You're indebted to him, no matter what he says, and you hate that feeling of him having something on you.

Joel's dark gaze offers no answers. You pocket the rings and don't know what to say. Lingering in front of him, you almost feel like you did when you were 12 years old and finally had the opportunity of talking to your crush. The feeling mixed badly with the relief of having your wedding bands returned to you, and before you know it, your lips are pressed against Joel's.

Joel is completely unresponsive, so you step back almost as quickly as you advanced. He's like a statue, cold and still, and you suddenly just want to cry from how much you miss normal human interaction, even just a hint of goddamn kindness.

"Sorry," you mutter before slinking away, neck bent in shame and confusion. You head towards the small apartment that was never a home but that you call home because what else would you call it? Sometimes you think that it must be easier for young people who know of nothing else but this world. At least they don't know the loss of, say, sunny Sunday morning breakfasts, exchanging relaxed, loving smiles across the table before leaving the coffee cups and hurrying back to bed...

The heartache is physical, intolerable, and makes you hurry. You need to get away from people, hide between the four walls with peeling wallpapers that surround your designated living area. If you're going to break, you have to do so privately.

As soon as you've locked the door behind you, you reach into your pocket and take out the chain. The rings look as familiar as ever: you know every scratch in the gold as well as the little indentation in Frankie's from that time when he caught his hand in the car door. His ring finger was saved by you still had a hard time getting it off his finger as it started to swell. The rest of his fingers required a visit to the ER. He never wanted his ring fixed. Frankie believed in letting things age as they were, with scars intact.

You slide your ring on your finger, finding it doesn't fit anymore, not only in size, but it also looks foreign on your finger. You sigh deeply and fasten the chain around your neck instead. The liquor bottle comforts you when the pain becomes too much to bear. You drink slowly, mindfully, because you know that drinking yourself into a stupor only makes you pass out. You need the in-between, that special place where you're awake but lost to substance. That's where Frankie is.

He comes before long, sighing deeply as he stands by the bed and watches you in the dusk.

"Missed you," you mumble, reaching for him. Frankie, however, doesn't move.

"You need to snap yourself out of this," he tells you gently. "Baby, you need to - "

"I need to survive, I know," you cut him off. "You always tell me that. I'm surviving."

"Survival isn't just about not dying," he reminds you. "You need to move on, my love. You have to move on."

You blink slowly, trying to focus on him. Has he always been this hazy?

"What're you talking about?"

"I think we should stop doing this."

You jerk up into a sitting position. The room spins, as does your stomach.

"No! Frankie, no, I can't do this without you!" Tears begin to run down your cheeks. Frankie shakes his head and looks at you in the same way as the first time he worked up the courage to ask you out: chin down, warm brown eyes shyly peeking at you. Now, however, he just looks infinitely sad. The trembling smile he gives you rips your guts out.

"You've been doing this without me for years. You can do it. You're strong, baby, you're so strong."

"I don't want to," you weep now, snot mixing with tears on your upper lip. "Frankie, don't make me do this."

"I don't want you to live in the past."

"There is no future to be had."

"There is always life."

He sits down next to you and lets you cling to him. He kisses your hair, caresses your back, lets you cry it out against his threadbare flannel, soft and worn down.

"I loved you since I first saw you," he tells you with longing and regret in his deep voice, "and I loved you until the end."

You want to tell him that you love him too, beg him to stay for his love for you, but your throat is too constricted for words. You cling to him, desperate for one last embrace, to smell his skin, thread your fingers through his soft locks, feel the scrape of his mustache on your lips.

"Let me go," he implores you. "You need to let me go, sweetheart."

"No..." you keen helplessly, pathetically, "please, don't make me do this...!"

"It's okay, baby."

"No..."

"It's okay. You'll be okay."

You don't know when he leaves. The next time you open your eyes to look through a curtain of tears at the room, he just isn't there anymore.

///

Joel's observant eyes follow you when you hurry away from the alley where he deals. Normally, he doesn't pay his customers too much attention, but there's something up with you.

He hasn't seen you in a week, and you look like you've been on a bender for the entirety of that time, and only now woke up, cleaned yourself enough to show yourself in public without attracting too much attention, and then went out to get more shit to fuck you up. Your eyes are bloodshot and unfocused, and he can smell alcohol on you. Your body language is so different: you are hunched up, neck bent, and your eyes fastened on the ground.

You want more pills than usual. When he lies about not having any more, you pull out even more ration coupons. He should say no. He has a terrible feeling about what you're about to do with those pills. Even if he's wrong, he knows approximately how many coupons you get each week and month, and you're giving him pretty much everything you have.

He should say no, but he doesn't. It's business, and those coupons are worth a lot.

Still, he watches you leave, then starts to follow you through the crowded streets of the Boston QZ. He keeps a distance but realizes soon that you have no idea - or don't care - if you are being followed. You bump into people, dig your hands even deeper into your pockets, and let yourself be pushed to the side by an angry passer-by. Still, you walk with a sad kind of purpose until you reach a run-down brownstone and disappear inside. He enters not long behind you and stands still in the foyer, hearing your heavy steps work their way upstairs. Finally, steps along the floor, then a door.

He stands in the foyer for a while, wondering if he should find out which apartment is yours, and see that you're okay. In the end, however, he decides against it.

You're not his problem. Now that all the unpleasantries with the clinic are over, and both of you seem safe from suspicions, he's definitely not getting entangled with you again.

Still, he lingers in the foyer, shifts his weight from one foot to the other while scowling at himself. Finally, he leaves the building and marches away. He has shit to do. He has his own survival to think about.

One block down, he turns around.

///

The rapping on your door makes you jump, and you pull out your gun as you go to look through the peep hole. Seeing Joel, your first thought is that he's coming to kill you and take back his pills, the pills that are waiting on your bed.

"What do you want?" you want to know.

"Just open the goddamn door or I'll break it."

You doubt he'd do something like that, but you still open the door. Joel fills the entire doorway with his broad frame, looking past you into the room. He doesn't even seem to care about the gun you're holding. When he sees the pills on your bed, he takes a step in, and that's when you point the gun at him.

"Don't take another step."

"I need those back." His voice is nearly toneless but you can hear a warning in it.

"I'll shoot."

"I've seen you pull a trigger, you would've shot me already if you wanted to."

He walks past you as if you were but a child who didn't want their toys taken away. When he reaches your bed, you realize that you're really going to lose your way out.

You throw yourself on him, pushing him down onto the bed, and start beating his broad back with a knuckle and the gun. For a moment, he grunts and curls up, but then he seems to find himself, and turns around and grabs your wrists with an ease that's nothing but frightening. He twists your wrists, and you drop the gun, your face distorting into a grimace until you keen from the pain. That's when he releases you, takes your gun, and releases the clip as well as the one in the chamber.

You lie on the bed, panting from lingering pain, your aching hands pressed against your chest, and watch him gather the pills. He doesn't look at you, barely even acknowledges you, except for when he leaves your coupons on the sheets. You feel cheap, used, discarded. Shame burns in your throat, and you just want him to leave, go and let you be alone with your misery.

Instead, he sits down on the couch, grimacing a little when his back hits the backrest. You got in some good hits.

You glare at him. "You got what you came here for, now get the fuck out."

He regards you with a slightly tilted head, even puts his arm up on the backrest, claiming his space with spread legs and a comfortable recline. You think in that moment that you hate him fervently.

"Are you a good shot?"

"What?"

"I said, are you a good shot?"

You stare incredulously at him as you slowly sit up. "Why?"

"Just answer the question," he barks. You shrug.

"Not a great one, but I get by, I guess."

"Rifle?"

"Yeah."

"I could use you on an expedition."

"Are you offering me a job?"

He leans forward, forearms on his knees. "I need a lookout. You interested?"

You chew on your lower lip, still suspicious and frankly, a bit confused. He waits patiently for you to come to a decision.

"Okay."

///

There is something about being outside the walls of the QZ. The air is fresher there, more breathable, more oxygenized. There's greenery, the whole city of Boston is swallowed up by nature. It's heart-breakingly beautiful how when a civilization falls, another takes over. The civilization of trees, animals, plants. Some part of you applauds the reclamation, roots for the trees, so to speak.

Liberating though it may feel, the world outside of the QC is also incredibly dangerous. But with Joel on your side and your former experience of traveling with Frankie, you learn how to navigate the overgrown streets and decrepit buildings.

Coming back from the first run - a shorter one to look for an alternate way through a particularly nasty block - he asks you if you've had military training. You just shake your head, but you can tell that he still is curious about your use of hand signals, how you handle the rifle, your military abbreviations.

"My husband was," you finally offer, not taking your eyes off the road. "Special forces."

Joel grunts in acknowledgement, but neither one of you speak any more until you reach the QZ at nightfall.

"I might need you again," Joel says once you're back inside the city walls.

"You know where I live."

He holds out a small, crinkled slide lock bag with pills, but you shake your head.

"I'd rather not have those around," you tell him quietly. Even if you long for the oblivion the pills can provide, you have decided - for the time being - that you don't need them.

Joel immediately pockets the pills, like he's afraid you'll change your mind. He then nods at you before disappearing into the shadows. You go home, and you sleep better than you have in ages. Still, the lumpy pillow is wet with tears when you wake up in the morning.

///

On the fourth run, you save Joel's life. You're his lookout, perched on top of a smaller building, while he clears out debris in an alleyway. The sun is high and sweat runs down your forehead. You wipe it away and then you see him: a man holding a baseball bat, slowly creeping up on Joel from behind. Mechanically, you take aim and shoot. Joel jumps at the sharp sound of the shot, and the subsequent groan from the man who slumps down onto the street makes him turn around. The man's head is blown to bits, and Joel quickly looks through his backpack and pockets for anything useful. He then looks up at you, gestures for you to keep looking - the gunshot could attract unwanted attention - and goes back to what he was doing, confident that you'll have his back.

You realize that in a very short time, you've become somewhat synced with him. You noticed early on that Joel has impaired hearing on his right ear and therefor wants his right flank covered in dangerous areas. He has bad knees, so you help out with heavy lifting from the ground. He doesn't talk much, but he gives you the last piece of jerky when your stomach growls at the end of your break.

He reminds you of Frankie in that sense. Frankie would also wordlessly see to it that you were comfortable, both before and after the outbreak. He would give you the best couch corner and get you your favorite snacks. He would have you take the last sip of water and stay awake all night so that you could sleep. And he never expected anything from you in return.

The comparison hurts, but you didn't use to think about Frankie at all during the day. He was a bittersweet pleasure saved for the night, for the pills and the alcohol. Now you're thinking about him in the harsh light of day, whenever your gaze rests on Joel's broad shoulders a second too long.

And yet, Joel is nothing like Frankie. You late husband kept his softness, his humanity, even after the loss of your daughter. You don't know what Joel has lost, what he has done, but you can tell he's been through shit. Well, so did Frankie, and Frankie never changed.

Joel is a cold hard killer. You find yourself wondering if he was always that. He has a military background, that much you know now, but what did his hands do when they didn't hold a gun?

Joel has made his way through the clutter in the alleyway, and you climb down to continue forward with him. He grabs you by the upper arm and when you startle, he releases you with his hand sliding down your arm, surprisingly softly.

"Thanks," he says gruffly, and you nod. So that's what his hands can do when not busy beating the life out of someone.

The two of you walk on, attentive of your surroundings, and very aware of the other's presence.

When you return to the QZ with the first light of the morning Joel stops you just a you're about to part ways. His hand rests heavily on your shoulder as he seems to look for something to say.

"You did good," he finally says. You search his face in the hopes of finding something more, but he is as closed off as ever. You finally put your hand on top of his. His fingers flex at the contact but stay where they are. A few moments pass by with the two of you just staring at each other and when Joel doesn't make the first move, you finally do. Your lips are on his, seeking a response that takes some time. When your lips part to let out the tip of your tongue against his pressed-together lips, his hand moves to the back of your neck, his big palm cupping you there roughly. You didn't expect him to be so rough from the way he had caressed your arm before, but it feels right. His tongue meets yours, forces it back into your mouth as he devours you, dry, chapped lips that taste of sweat stealing your breath away with the kiss that never ends, or maybe it's just one kiss after another that picks up before the previous one is over.

When he finally lets you draw breath, you're almost light-headed. He's still holding you by the back of your head, but now his fingers are gently stroking over your scalp. A tremor runs down your spine, and you make up your mind.

"My place is not far away," you tell him quietly. He just nods, then follows you through the empty streets to your apartment and into your bed.

///

He's not there when you wake up. You didn't expect him to, and you feel nothing but relief.

Last night, this morning, was a disaster.

You get up and step into the shower, the cold water making you shiver as you scrub yourself with a rough piece of soap. The events of the early morning replay before your inner eye, and your cheeks burn with chagrin.

He was rough. You welcomed that. Tenderness would have reminded you too much of Frankie, and you couldn't think about him. You ripped each other's clothes off, and Joel did his best to get you off, using his fingers and mouth. But he was in too much of a hurry, and you were stuck in your head. Eventually you just pushed him away and asked him to fuck you. You even turned around so he could take you from behind. So neither one of you had to look at the other, in case you suddenly found yourself wondering what you were doing there.

Muffling yourself by hiding your face in the sheets, you took the backshot as silently as you could, enduring it rather than enjoying. You wanted it, but you found yourself distracted by thoughts of unwanted pregnancies, and found yourself unable to relax. Your tension led to greater friction, his big cock struggling to fit in, and after having assaulted your clenching pussy for a few minutes, you sucked him off.

Neither one of you were satisfied, and you fell asleep by sheer force of will, because it was the only way for you to escape the situation.

Stepping out of the shower, you dry yourself off before wrapping the threadbare towel around you. Your fridge is empty because you haven't been to collect your rations, and you slam shut the fridge door with a frustrated sigh. Your last remaining liquor bottle stands on the shelf. You haven't touched it in a while, but now you grab it and unscrew the cork. A deep line between your eyebrows, you drink deeply, savoring the heat of the drink going down smoothly into your belly. Leaning against the countertop, you rub your forehead and sigh deeply.

This went to shit faster than green grass through a goose.

It was only supposed to help you release some tension. It was only because he touched you like that. It was only because he gave you the rings back. It was only because when you shot that would-be assailant, you imagined for a split second what life would be like if you hadn’t seen that assailant in time, and Joel would have died.

It was only because you missed the touch of another human being.

Inhaling deeply, you will yourself into facing yet another day. It doesn’t matter. Joel doesn’t matter. You’ll survive.

You go to the clinic, you perform your tasks, you return home with rations, but the bottle is more interesting than food. You eat dutifully, however, before emptying the bottle and cursing the fact that it was your last one. Just as you’ve decided to try to get hold of more alcohol, there is a knock on the door. Sober in just a second, you grab your gun and approach the door, craning your neck to look through the peephole.

It's Joel. Frowning, you open, letting him see you’re holding your gun.

He barely raises a brow. “You can put that down.”

You do, but keep the door ajar, staring at him with distrust.

“What do you want?”

He shrugs. “Wanted to see if you were alright.”

“I’m fine.”

He nods, then looks down the hall before fastening his gaze on you again.

“Can I come in?”

“What for?”

He pulls out a flask from his pocket and shakes it seductively. It’s full. You consider this for a second, then open the door and walk back into the apartment. Joel follows, closing and locking the door behind him. You take one corner of the worn down couch, he takes the other.

He brings not only the bottle, but also pills. You accept one – a lot less than your usual dose – and down it with the real bourbon from his flask.

“That’s good,” you nod when passing the flask back to him. Joel nods and takes a swig.

“I know a guy.”

“You know a lot of them, don’t you?”

He grunts, unwilling to admit the extent of his network. You’ve met a handful of people during your runs together. None of them ever introduce themselves, and neither do you.

“What about girls?” you ask boldly, the substances starting to mellow you out. Joel raises one brow quizzically.

“I know where the FEDRA agents go when they want to let off some steam,” you continue. “Do you go there as well?”

He shakes his head. “Not my thing.”

“Don’t you fuck at all?” you ask, the booze and drugs slurring your words slightly. “Maybe that’s why your pity fuck last night was so miserable.”

He bristles a little at that. “I’d be inclined to say that it wasn’t all on me.”

“No,” you sigh, “it was me as well.”

Silence descends with the two of you staring at the ceiling, at your own hands, at anything but each other. When you reach your hand across the couch, Joel gives you the flask. You take a large swig, and Joel glares at you.

“That stuff’s hard to come by.”

“I’m sure you have your ways.”

“At some point my ways won’t be enough anymore.”

The conversation is stilted, unnatural. You lean back and sigh deeply, your eyes closing.

“Why are you here, Joel?”

He takes the flask from you, and you hear the cork screwed shut. He then shifts closer, his body heat radiates towards you. You keep your eyes firmly closed and startle when you feel his fingers brush over your cheek. Next, his lips. They slowly cover your skin to your lips, which separate so that he can close his lips around your lower one when he kisses you. Bourbon mixes with bourbon and the intimate flavors of the self when the kiss deepens. Joel slides his tongue in, intimate as if it were finding its way into your slick cunt, not your mouth. It’s met by your tongue, eager and shy at the same time, unable to decide whether to wait or advance. With a calm confidence, Joel takes control, kisses his fill of you, peels raw the sensitive skin around your mouth with his sharp bristles.

His hand comes to a rest on your thigh, fingers loosely spread over the flesh until you put your hand on his and press down. He breaks the kiss, and you feel his shallow breaths right in front of you.

“Look at me,” he demands in a low voice. Your eyes flutter open to meet his: dark as the night but not frightening in any way except in intensely they seem to yearn for love and affection, if only for one fuck.

“You’re drunk,” he states.

“Yes,” you confirm, “but that doesn’t mean I don’t know what I want.”

“What do you want?” His hand burns on your thigh.

“I want… I need you to fuck me, Joel.”

He makes some kind of noise, a guttural croak, maybe a growl, and presses his lips to yours again. Now you let yourself react more, your tongue meets his in a powerful dance, your hands run up the sides of his waist, ribcage, and back to pull him in. Your eyes are closed again, you don’t want to see anything, you only want to feel. He pulls his mouth from yours to instead bite and lick your tits, hands cupping and discovering and pinching. When he attaches himself to one nipple and sucks hard, you keen loudly, your head lolling back to meet the wall behind the couch. You find his hand on your breast and redirect it to the base of your throat. Joel only pauses his ministrations briefly before continuing, his fingers closing around your throat for a gentle but firm squeeze. You whimper encouragingly as the light pressure on your windpipe cuts off all intrusive thoughts, allowing you to focus on the pleasure instead.

When your breasts are dappled with marks left by Joel’s lips and teeth, he releases your throat and stands up. You blink up at him, worried for a moment that he grew tired already, but your eyes catch the thick outline of his cock at the front of his jeans, and then he offers you his hand. You take it, and he pulls you up, crashing you into him, back against his lips, and as you kiss you unbutton his denim shirt, rid him off it unceremoniously, then take his t-shirt off. You make no time to admire his chest and stomach, don’t allow yourself any musings on the physique of a middle-aged, hard-working man. You simply duck your head to bite his nipples, suck and nibble just as he did to you. Joel grunts, his fingers slipping through the hair at the back of your neck before taking a hold and pulling your lips off him. You cast a wondering glance up at him, but he’s already maneuvering you to the bed. Not unkindly but with a demand that you appreciate, he pushes you down on the bed, then locks your gaze as he unbuckles his belt. You mirror him, unbutton your jeans and push them down your hips as he does it, and then you’re naked before him, and he before you. Your eyes flicker down to his stout cock fighting gravity as it strives upward. Involuntarily, you start to salivate, your mouth remembering the challenge of fitting as much as possible of that thick cock in it. Your cunt is dripping in the same recollection, and you swallow, your legs separating as you show Joel what you have, your fingers trailing down to part your lips and rub your clit. He inhales sharply before leaning over you to roughly turn you around. He then gets onto the bed, gives you a surprising smack on your ass, and then you feel his bristles and lips against your sex, from behind, as his hands knead your ass cheeks. You yelp in surprise and instant gratification before muffling yourself against the mattress as your whimpers turn into moans, rising in volume the tighter your core winds itself. Lick after slurping lick, you let go of everything but the sensation, your ass in his hands, your cunt pressed up against his face, your clit throbbing from his constant rough care.

Joel’s name is on your lips when your climax breaks free, but you press your lips together, press your eyes shut, press your hand over your mouth as your legs kick and your body trembles. Your walls have barely stopped fluttering around empty when Joel shifts and moves up your body, positioning himself. Your cunt is wet, but his cock still sears through you as he pushes himself in, balls deep with one thrust. Your breath gets stuck in the back of your throat, your scream stops before it’s even out, and then your lungs compress when he lays his entire weight on you. You expect him to pound you into the mattress but instead, Joel starts a slow, deep grind, and it's almost more brutal because he’s deep, so thick, so heavy, and you don’t want him to stop. Your mewls are pitiful, the sheet are half inside your mouth, there is no room to move and when Joel grips your throat again, there is barely any room for breathing, either.

And yet, you want more of it. You want him to choke the life out of you, want him to crush you with that broad, heavy frame of his. You want him to blow you apart, tear you up, fuck you so deep that all there is left for you to do is survive. Survive this slow, all-consuming fuck, the one you wanted last night but couldn’t have because you were thinking too much. Now you’re not thinking at all, but you still have two braincells that cooperate enough to tell you that he’s about to bust when his breaths turn quicker and huffier against your cheek.

“Don’t come inside!” you squeak, and Joel heeds your wish. He pulls out just as quickly as he entered, and you feel him spill on your ass cheeks, hot and sticky.

You feel empty and cold when he climbs off you. Moving your extremities gingerly, as if expecting them to fall off, you slowly curl up on your side. Joel pulls the covers over you and you’re too dazed to dwell on it. Instead, you let sleep take you away.

///

“You talk in your sleep.”

Your head snaps around to find Joel still in your bed. You have just woken up, stretched, and noted that it’s still dark outside, so you decided to sleep some more, if nothing else then to try to suppress the beginning hangover that you feel just behind your frontal lobe.

“What do I say?” you ask, not sure if you want to know. Joel waits until you’ve settled, then turns onto his side, facing you.

“You talk to someone you call Frankie.”

The name hits you like a sledgehammer in the face, and you feel shattered. Murdered. You haven’t heard that name said out loud in so many years…

“He was my husband,” you whisper, like you were afraid that if you talk about Frankie to anyone, he could turn out to be nothing but a figment of your imagination.

But he’s not. You still wear the rings around your neck to prove that Frankie was real, very real. But his touch has faded from your skin, even if your love for him hasn’t left your heart.

Joel doesn’t say anything, but you can sense the grief in him, burdensome and harsh. You wonder what dead loved ones he carries with him, but you don’t ask. Instead, you inch closer, find his shoulder, and rest your head on it. Your head is heavy, a headache waiting just around the corner to break out, but you feel strangely safe like this. You don’t know anything about Joel, but you trust him.

“Go back to sleep,” you tell him, as if you were old lovers, used to sharing a bed, of falling asleep in each other’s arms. You’re not, however, you’re very new lovers indeed, and Joel is hungry for more. He kisses sleep away from you before mounting you and fucking you with the same slow, steady devastation as earlier. Except for moaning, it is a silent affair with no other communication than the direction of limbs into their right places. He has your legs on his shoulders, hands on the back of your thighs, pressing your legs impossibly down so that you’re almost bent double, trapping you between his rock-hard cock and a sharp spring in the worn-down mattress. Each profound thrust pushes the breath out of you, along with a moan, and shoves the bed against the wall with a low knock that you somehow want the neighbors to hear.

You’re furiously rubbing your clit and when the orgasm rises as a dark shadow to swallow you whole, Joel releases your legs and curls his fingers around your throat instead. You cum hard, mouth open in a silent scream, and in the next second Joel pulls out and paints your pussy and hand with strings of hot cum.

He goes back to sleep with one arm around you. It is not the soft embrace of a lover but the possessive shackle of a broken person who has found someone equally broken to take away their pain, tiny moments at a time.

You raise your hand to your neck, and press at the skin. There’s a bruise forming there, you know. You press it softly, feeling your pulse in the tenderness. Right next to it, the rings are softly clinking against each other.

You don’t think you’ll ever take them off. But you also think that it’s time to stop taking those pills.

#joel miller #frankie morales #joel miller x reader #frankie morales x reader #joel miller x you #frankie morales x you #my fic

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