#Basil is here who doesn’t miss him every day

[coconut530]

mARTch 2: Inspirations

[h4amarch]

Hi I’m on my OMORI (read: Kel) brainrot bullshit again so here we go.

Goes without saying, but SPOILERS FOR THE ENTIRETY OF OMORI.

Nothing in the game is directly about Kel. The main plot revolves around resolving the misunderstanding between Aubrey and Basil, and every heavy moment regarding the effects of Mari’s death we see revolves around Hero (the nighttime piano scene, bringing Hero to the graveyard for his first ever visit, etc).

You know that scene where Kel talks to Sunny at the graveyard when they’re by themselves? When he talks about that fight between Hero and him, that’s the only in-game, overtly-stated evidence we get regarding how Kel grappled with the loss. As a result, a lot of fan-created content that deals with Kel’s grief mainly focuses on that fight, because it’s the only thing we’re given without digging under the plainly stated or shown. And you know what?

It’s still not about Kel. That entire scene, Kel is talking about how Hero became despondent, and how Hero reacted, and how Hero lashed out, and how Hero cried afterwards and apologized. Kel’s mention of himself in the equation, the part about his parents ignoring him in favor of comforting his older brother... that’s added almost as an unintentional afterthought. Immediately after it, Kel re-directs the topic back to Hero by saying he hugged and apologized to him, and talking about how he got back to school.

So in light of that, here’s some other evidence that people might miss, because Kel doesn’t talk about it.

Kel’s birthday: A lot of people have caught onto this one; the recital (and therefore Mari’s death) was in October, and Kel’s birthday, not shown in-game, is November. OMOCAT’s official art showing present-day Kel forcing past-Kel into a smile, both wearing party hats in front of a birthday cake, is most likely a reference to this.

Kel’s new friends: This one is a bit subjective, but; when Kel introduces Sunny to a few of his friends from school that he knows (Jay and Cris; Jay being a fellow sports kid and Cris being a swimmer), there’s a visible disconnect between them. For instance, Cris has been away to a different school for a while... and one of Jay’s first words to Kel is that he didn’t know he lived around here. This doesn’t mean they aren’t friends, of course! But from my experience of high school, you may not know where all your friends live... but you usually know where your close friends live.

Kel’s visits to Mari: Kel visits Mari’s grave a few times, as stated while the group goes to see her. But every time we visit her, whether it’s with Sunny or with the group, he’s always visibly uncomfortable or upset. He’s still grieving, still disheartened by it, just like everyone else. He probably isn’t any happier in the times he visits alone.

“Mari wouldn’t want this” + variants: Here’s a big one.

Kel says this to Hero, and also to Aubrey when he sees her bullying Basil. But the thing is... what about him? Sure, if Mari were around, she would probably hate to see Hero trapped in his bed, or Aubrey hurting Basil... but in the end, it’s Kel who’s around to see these things happening, and it’s Kel who finds issue with them. Instead of saying that he doesn’t want Hero to rot away, or that it hurts him to see his friends fighting, he brings up Mari. Why not just say what he feels? Well... it’s probably because it’s never worked before.

Think about it; I’m sure Kel has talked about how much he wants Hero to get out of bed, and how much he doesn’t want Aubrey to go down her destructive path. But we see evidence of this not working, in the form of Hero staying in bed for almost a year anyway, and in the form of Aubrey brushing him off. Talking about Mari gets an emotional reaction out of them; talking about himself doesn’t. And I don’t know if he consciously knows this, but he’s definitely internalized it.

I just think that’s really depressing.

[cloudspaintedblue]

Season Of The Witch

Alucard/Adrien Tepes x GN!Reader

Warnings/Notes: Reader is a witch/engages in spiritual practices for no specific religion, reader lives with Alucard. It’s a pretty short piece be warned

The warm sun covered the ground which you laid upon, any exposed skin becoming tight as the heat soaked into your body. You had been meditating for around twenty minutes now, despite the laundry your laziness would bring you, laying in the grass dressed in pajamas was indeed comfortable. Fingers rubbing and pulling at the taller blades beneath you, breathing in the life that the earth brought forth. The animals of the surrounding forest had already been up for a few hours, each noise from them was another reminder of how alive you were; what you had overcome to be here now. Soft sighs of the light wind brushed over you, a paintbrush sliding across the grooves of a canvas.

Shuffling and a slight thud had you turning your head and opening your eyes, Alucard had laid down beside you. “Oh–apologies.” He looked up, reaching out to the sky as if his fingers were woven in the threads of the clouds. “You looked peaceful, I wondered if I could feel it too.” Following suit you looked up, the direct sun was blocked out by the castle from this angle, leaving its rays to spring out. “Can you?” Your hand drifted along the grass towards him, finding his fingers and interlocking with them. “It comes easy now, the overwhelming sense of.. everything.. seems to slow these days. It’s odd not having certain death awaiting you every second, it makes me feel lonely sometimes.” You hummed, it had been a good while since anything adrenaline inducing was taking place.

“Do you miss it?” His fingers closed into a a loose fist, those gentle fingers which had caressed your cheek and brushed through your hair, beautiful. “I miss the original peace I felt. Not the violence that came next.” You closed your eyes again, taking another deep breath. “Everywhere I look a new reminder of that violence appears.” Alucard turned his head to the side, gazing at you through half lidded eyes full of adoration, using both hands to grasp one of yours. “Is that the worst thing?” He chuckled, muttering an apology. “Do you not see it as that? A reminder of pain?” Those gentle fingers traced along your arm; admiring each bump, divot, and mark along the skin.

“It’s a reminder of how we got here, how you moved past the violence and once again achieved peace. A constant reminder of pain yes, but a medal of victory all the same.” You opened your eyes once more, sitting up and brushing the grass and dirt out of your hair; he moved with you, laying his head in your lap. Your own hands now moving slowly, scratching along his scalp and combing through his hair. “Everything about me is a reminder, I’m the embodiment of both the violence of my father and peace of my mother.” The grass had gotten stuck in his hair, maybe it was time for a trim. “Then you can be considered a medal, I would wear you with pride.” He looked up at you with a smile, fangs showing as he held back a laugh. “I know what you get up to in that room of yours, promise not to turn me into a jewel..” You frowned, softly hitting him on the forehead with the back of your hand. “No promises. Oh speaking of which I need some herbs.” Alucard stood, brushing off his pants and extending a hand to you, helping you to your feet. “We have plenty.” Hand grasping yours the two of you started walking to the castle. “Basil?” “..no” “Who doesn’t keep basil?” “You and I so it seems.”

[uncreativeocs]

i omor 💀

Ok OMORI au time!! It doesn’t actually have a name yet lmao (OMORI spoilers obv, also gets really dark so if you don’t like self-mutilation kinda stuff don’t read pls :3)

Basically, instead of just Basil witnessing the accident, Kel and Aubrey do too. They want to call someone of course, but Basil panics and says that then the police will take Sunny away and then they’ll never see Mari or him ever again. (Keep in mind the squad is 12, they don’t exactly have the clearest idea of how the emergency services and stuff work.) So then Basil eventually comes up with the idea to frame the death as a suicide, but Aubrey speaks up and says that it won’t work because nobody would be fooled. Kel and Sunny don’t say anything really, Sunny is already disconnecting himself from everything and Kel is just staring at the body, unblinking.

 Aub and Basil come up with the idea to bury her instead, and so they all carry Maris body out to the forest and Basil gets his grandma’s gardening spade. A big thing about this au is that the recital was going to happen in winter (it was super snowy and the ground was really tough with ice) so the spade breaks before the hole could be big enough, and they eventually have to use the spade to chop Mari up a bit so they could throw all of her limbs into the hole. They do this by putting her on the picnic blankie so no blood gets in the snow. So they wrap her up in the blanket and put her in the hole, and fill it up halfway. 

I have this hc that the reason Basil thought to hang Mari was because he was really into these crime books at the time, so in the au he read in one of them about a killer who buried a dead animal on top of a human grave so any police dogs which smelled the body would lead people to dig up the dead animal and leave the human alone. So Aubrey, who’s been sobbing into Kel’s shoulder, hears this and remembers that one of her rabbit friends (other headcanon that Aubrey talks to wild bunnies a lot) had died recently, so they put it in the shallower hole above Mari and filled it all in. Hero never got involved, and the kids just said Mari went missing.

In the au, Headspace is all snowy, and all of the characters are black and white and wear clothes for cold weather except for Basil, Aubrey, and Kel. They wear their normal headspace clothes, and are their favourite colour. (This is because of Stranger ‘painting’ them one by one trying to make Sunny realise there’s something off about them and remember the truth, and the au has lots of Stranger paintbrush imagery. [Stranger’s purple.]) But HS Basil doesn’t have a mouth (he came up with most of the coverup ideas), HS Aubrey doesn’t have ears (she had to hear everything) and HS Kel doesn’t have eyes (all he did was stare). Also, Omori’s name is December because the calendar on the wall of Mari’s piano room was on December for months in preparation of the recital (which, yeah, was in December) so Sunny had to look at it like every day. Hero and Mari go on adventures with December, and the other three stay behind (near the end I imagine the three kids would be enemies themselves). One of the items December gets is a purple ‘hand-knitted scarf’ that Mari made for him because of the cold weather, otherwise he looks like normal.

In Faraway Town, Sunny is pretty much the same as in canon (Sunny and Omori/December don’t change much here lol). The other trio went a bit crazy though, understandably. The hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil theme is in play here as well, but a lot more messed up than in Headspace.

Basil stays away from everyone and always wears a face mask, never talking to anyone and spending all of his time painting in isolated places in the park and around town (it turns out that he sewed his mouth shut, not sure how nobody noticed that).

Kel starts wearing his hair in a fringe covering his eyes so he doesn’t have to look at the people he knows he’s lying to about Mari, and Aubrey starts hearing things and eventually stabs herself in both ears before cutting them off, deafening her. She also tries to commit suicide by slitting her wrists, but Kel saves her. She is sent to a mental hospital so they can keep an eye on her, and never really meets the Hooligans so she doesn’t have any escape for her anger, kind of just letting it simmer and isolating herself. Kel, feeling really lonely and starting to lose it too, stabs his eyes out so he can go join Aubrey. 

After a few years, Kel and Aubrey escape and just go off on an adventure together. They are really close in this au (I ship kelbrey, cactiflower, suntan, sunflower, sunburn, and swordflower, but in this the only ships that would really work are kelbrey and sunflower. I’m not going to add sunflower because December dislikes stranger a lot more here as Stranger is actively ‘ruining’ December’s friends [they were black and white like everyone else before Stranger painted them] so that dislike seeps into how Sunny subconsciously feels about Basil), and Kel is the only person Aubrey feels like she can let her emotions out with. Kel feels the same, putting up a cheerful front around everyone else. They do property damage together.

Hero doesn’t change much? He didn’t snap at Kel, but was extremely upset obviously when Kel y’know. Blinded himself (not at Kel ofc he just wants the best for his little bro). But other than that added trauma he’s doing pretty well

There should be more probably about the truth coming out or the different routes and stuff but without Kel and Aubrey I’m not really sure where to go so- that’s all I have so far, ik the squad is quite out of character but I have been thinking about this au nonstop for WEEKS now so I had to write it down somewhere 😭

[sunbunzie]

Hot Take: Hero would not forgive Sunny and Basil. (MAJOR SPOILERS!)

Last warning for spoilers :3 Also longevity warning. This thing is 1118 words total. lmao. Also if you’re expierencing thoughts about suicide, please reach out. (TRIGGER WARNING: Suicide, A POV of depression, Omori stuff man this game makes me want to sob) The truth about Mari is that Mari didn’t take her own life- Sunny pushed her down the stairs accidentally. Witnessing this, a panicked Basil decides to “help” Sunny by framing Mari’s death as suicide, hanging our dearest Mari on a tree bu a jumprope, making everyone believe she committed suicide. 

Little, innocent Aubrey thought she committed suicide. Our rau of sunshine Kel thought she committed suicide. And Mari’s dear lover, our Hero, thought she committed suicide. 

Lets talk about Hero’s grief for a bit.

-HEROS GRIEF-

As stated by KEL in the game, Hero refused to get out of bed, go to school, eat, and other important things because of Mari’s death. This lasted for about a year.

Kel then continues on to say that he tried to get Hero out of bed one day, saying how everyone misses him and such. Hero responds negatively to this, still stuck in a abyss of depression. The more Kel tried to encourage him, the more and more upset Hero gets, until the point where he snaps at his on brother. 

“He suddenly got up and started screaming and yelling at me about a bunch of stuff. Some of it eas pretty hurtful too..” 

-KEL

We all know, under any other circumstance, Hero would never say anything mean or hurtful to Kel. Even sibling-to-sibling “bullying” doesn’t apply to these two. They care for each other enough to never say anything mean.

But under this circumstance, Mari is gone. Hero loved Mari. And now she was gone. But Hero was still alive. (/ref lmao.) He became so overcome with grief and sadness that he just unpiled it onto young Kel, who was only trying to help. Luckily, after their parents be literal bitches and ignore Kel crying and comfort Hero, Hero comes to his senses and apologizes to Kel over and over. Hero seems to get better after this.

“Eventually, mom and mom ran to our room and rushed over to hug him to calm him down. 

-(cut part because this isnt a kel analysis post. sorry buddy you gotta wait your turn)

“I think that’s when HERO got his senses back, because he ran to me and hugged me right away. 

“Just kept apologizing over and over..

”But.. at least HERO got a lot better after that. He started taking care of himself again..”

BUT OF COURSE we know he really didn’t get better. When Hero joins your party, at first he doesn’t want to go to Mari’s grave. Whenever Sunny tried to go there, Hero stops him by saying he isn’t ready yet.

When we do get there however, its then revealed that Hero never realky visited Mari’s grave. Probably because it hurt to think about her. Every day, every waking moment he was reminded of her, and he couldn’t stop her from leaving him. Four yeare, four years he blamed himself for Mari’s suicide, thinking and forcing himself to believe that it was all his fault because he didn’t see the signs to stop her from leaving…

Except there were no signs.

Mari never chose to leave them.

She never chose to take her life.

She didnt take her own life.

Instead, the one who took her life..

Was her brother, Sunny.

-THE TRUTH-

While we have absolutely no idea what happens after the good ending/any of the endings (well we know Sunny moved and left Basil to pick up the scraps 💀 we’ll save that for another post), since this fandom is so goddamn immersed we do have enough to make a theory about each friend. 

A lot of people say they would all forgive Sunny and Basil eventually, but I think the case is different with Hero. Which is probably what you’re here for actually, so let’s just set the claim:

Hero will NOT be able to forgive Sunny and Basil, and he might never be able to forgive them.

This is because of Hero’s Grief.

Imagine that you loved someone dearly (could be platonic for all you aromantic besties) and they committed suicide. 

Imagine you spent four years blaming yourself, grieving, asking yourself “why” every single day, because there was nothinf you could do to stop them, you didnt see the signs, you thought everything was fine with them, but you were wrong, and you failed them. You’d call yourself the worst lover/best friend to ever exist, beating yourself into a mindset that they never loved you, or if they did, they didnt love you enough to stick around, and that impacted your life so badly that you almost starved yourself and starting saying mean things to your family/those who are trying to help.

Now imagine that..

And then crumple it up and throw it away.

Everything was a lie. You thought they killed themselves, but in the end someone else was responsible for their death. Someone else took their life. Someone else made you believe that they hung themselves and that you failed and that you’re a failure and that you don’t deserve to live while they’re gone.

Sure, the whole thing was an acccident, but either way that grief was all for NOTHING. Ever bad thought, every remark, every meal skipped, every day spent in bed was a waste. You never had anything to blame yourself for. It was never your fault. And the two people reponsible had hidden it for four years.

Hell, screw what I said before about it beibg an accident. The pushing was accidental, but the hanging wasnt. Of course, Basil was a scared kid, but why wasnt the ambulance the first thing in mind? Why did they frame her? Why did Sunny let him do it?

Some people argue that Hero forgave Aubrey for pushing Basil in the lake, but that was different. Yes, they were both impulses of anger, but Basil had time to survive. People were there. You can get water out of people’s lungs. You can’t fix a broken neck. 

And also, Aubrey had more witnesses. She wouldn’t have been able to frame it as anything, because the whole town would probably know about it within a few days (Gossiptown fr💀). If Basil died in the lake, there wouldn’t have been a hidden truth. There wouldnt have been lies. No four years of thinking Basil drowned himself. Because they already knew.

Now I’d suspect if Basil did actually die, the forgiveness wouldnt be so quick. (Someone better make a fanfic of that scenario /nf)

AND SO THE TL;DR IS: Hero would not forgive Sunny and Basil, because what it did to him was too mentally draining, and the lies were too much. No matter how much he would think about how it affected them, he would only ever be able to think about his grief and the consequences.

Again, this is my personal theory, but feel free to peacefully argue with me! Or give more details :0

Thanks for reading all of this, if you did! If y’all want to suggest things for me to analyze just use the asks thingy :3 or get me to talk about headcannons. I love headcannons.

[sixpossumsinatrenchcoat]

Four More Years (ch 4/5)

Just posted the very emotional culmination of my sweet & silly lil Omori timeskip and now I am unraveled, incapacitated, generally bereft. If you enjoy dopamine please consider swinging by. Text preview below, story link below that!

At 10:34 PM, there’s a friendly patter on the door. Sunny wrenches it open with relief.

Kel looks tired, his smile a little faded. But he still brightens when he sees Sunny. “Hey, buddy! What’s going on? You miss me?”

“Yes. A lot.” 

Kel looks surprised, and then pleased. “Pfft, well. Hey. Back at you.” He peers over Sunny’s shoulder. “...Where is everyone?”

“Gone. Having a nice night.”

“Aw,” Kel laughs, not unsympathetic. “And they left you all alone?”

Sunny nods grimly.

“Aw, Sunny!!! I woulda come sooner if I knew you were all on your lonesome!”

“It’s okay,” sighs Sunny, who’s being extremely brave. “I’m glad you’re here.” 

When Kel grins, the fatigue washes off him a little. He smells a little like a sports bar and a lot like the YMCA, sweat and bleach and rubber. His hair is tied in a scruffy half-ponytail but a few locks have pulled loose, curling around his chin. He makes the whole room feel warmer. 

But he also looks tired. Or… not tired exactly. He feels muted, his natural glow slightly dimmed. More than you’d expect from just getting worn out on the court. His smile isn’t lying, but it’s only about 80% honest. Maybe he’s taking the loss harder than usual? 

Sunny grabs Kel by the wrist, yanks him toward one of the kitchen stools. “Are you okay?”

“Huh? Yeah, for sure! Why wouldn’t I be?”

Sunny shrugs. You tell me.

“It is all good, dude! I’m just, uh…” Kel’s left hand finds the back of his neck. “...I dunno. Probably a little tired. Sorry! I didn’t mean to kill the mood.”

Sunny has been having a neutral-to-poor night. If any mood could be flushed out of the brush, it deserved to be shot. “Don’t worry about it.” 

Kel grins sheepishly, still rubbing the back of his neck. 

Sunny’s frown deepens. Kel isn’t as obvious as Basil, but he’s nowhere near as sly as Hero. He’s obviously feeling down about something. But of course he’ll never bring it up. 

That’s fine. Talking isn’t what either of them does best. Sunny gives Kel’s wrist a last squeeze and pads over to the French press. 

“Sunny?? It’s—” Kel glances at the clock on the wall, a cracked wheel of oxidized copper that shouts a different birdcall every hour. “—10:40 at night???” 

“It’s okay,” Sunny tells him. “It’s decaf.” 

Kel watches, looking increasingly delighted, as Sunny brews a half a pot of decaf and then pulls out a carton of orange juice. He pours half of one and half of the other into his thermos, a tall black mug with a screw-on lid. But he doesn’t hand it over. He takes one sip and grimaces, mostly to make Kel laugh. Then he slips it into Basil’s backup backpack. 

“Are we going on an adventure?” Kel really must be tired. He sounds almost as wary as he does excited. 

“Just a small one.”

Sunny’s been saving this caper for a rainy day. Ideally, he would have scoped out the roof of his complex months ago. But Basil’s anxiety can be very occasionally inconvenient when exposed to even mildly life-threatening peril. The route Sunny scouted isn’t an escalator with a guardrail, but it’s not a particularly tricky climb. Basil just isn’t in the demographic.

Taking a page from Basil’s book, Sunny dumps a few more treats into the backpack, more or less at random. Then he hooks his keys onto his belt loop and looks at Kel. 

“Are your motor skills impaired?” he asks seriously. 

“Haha, whaaat! No way! Or, I mean… not… a lot? No more than if you didn’t get enough sleep.”

Sunny never gets enough sleep. “Cool.”

To get onto the roof, all you have to do is slip out the window onto the fire escape and climb a few ladders, till you hit the one that’s gated shut. Then just swing over the railing, scramble up the outside of the scaffolding, and hoist yourself over the gutter. 

Sunny leads the way. He makes Kel hang back while he tests his weight, making sure he’s not leading them into a meat grinder. But the rusted metal holds. The only hitch comes in the form of a flurry of pigeons that explodes out from under the gutter, pelting Sunny with feathers and dust. 

“Sunny!!!” Kel gasps. 

But it’s fine. These days, when Sunny is overwhelmed, he doesn’t lash out or flinch away. If you don’t move, you can’t hurt anyone. He closes his eyes and tightens his hold and then the birds are gone. 

He looks down at Kel. “Should be safe now,” he says calmly.

Kel’s eyes widen and he grins—a real one this time, wide and wild. “Right behind you!!”

The roof is everything Sunny hoped for. It's dusty and empty and high-up enough that when you look to the north, you can see a little sliver of the sea peeking between the high rises. There’s a big white trapezoid right in the middle, presumably the service entrance to the roof. The door is welded shut and the backside is a sloping plane of rough tile, but the sides are all empty white. 

Sunny’s eye widens. A whole empty wall… A great white canvas pressed up against the sky, off anyone’s radar, and high above the cop cars wailing on the streets below. The possibilities are almost paralyzing. 

Kel studies his face and then shakes his head, grinning crookedly. “Man, you are like, the coolest, you know that?”

Sunny gives him a baffled look. He hasn’t even done anything.

“I’m serious!! You’re just… It's like there's so much in your head that it all comes spilling out. Like you take all the bullshit, all this horrible pointless suffering and make it so everyone can see it, and so everyone who sees it can feel it. It’s—” Kel’s smile wilts at the edges. “I can’t even imagine, seeing like you.” 

“I’m supposed to be cheering you up,” Sunny points out.

“Huh? Who says I need cheering up?”

Sunny’s frown deepens. No one said. Kel is just… muted. Like the light inside him needs a change of batteries. But he’s not sure that he knows how to say it. 

“You’re just. Not as… bright? Still very bright,” he reassures him, when Kel’s eyes widen. “But, it’s—” He grimaces. “I don’t want you to lie.”

“Wh— I would never!!!”

“Not with words,” Sunny says, frustrated. “With—” He gestures at Kel’s stance, his easy smile. “Just. It’s okay if you’re not happy.” 

He stops. Kel is looking at him with that ache in his eyes, even worse than when he first arrived. He looks lonely. But that doesn’t make any sense. Sunny is right here. 

Sunny huffs impatiently. He’s not sure why he even tried doing this with words. That’s never been how he and Kel talked. He turns on his heel and wanders toward the northern edge of the roof, where you can see the fog rolling up the hill. Then he plunks himself down on the edge and flaps a hand at Kel. 

“Come drink your horrible drink.” No one else is going to.

Kel chuckles and goes where Sunny wants him. “...I guess I maybe am a little off tonight, huh.”

Sunny gives him a look. Do you want to talk about it doesn’t work on Kel, because Kel never wants to talk about anything that might bum anyone out. “Talk about it.”

Kel snickers. “Aw, it’s nothing really. Or, I guess it’s a lot of little things?”

“Like what.”

“Man, you’re persistent tonight, huh?” 

Sunny reaches into his borrowed backpack, silent, and hands Kel a slice of dried mango. 

“...Are those just loose in there?”

Sunny nods. 

Kel sputters a laugh and takes it. “Aw, I dunno, Sunny. It’s really pretty stupid.”

“Okay.” Feelings usually are. 

Kel snickers, gnawing on the edge of his mango. If it were daytime, he could see clear to the ocean. But at night it’s lost to fog. 

“I guess it’s just… It kinda feels like… everyone’s growing up? Like, figuring out what you want, and how you wanna live and stuff. And I’m the only one who’s just... not.”

“Aubrey is legally homeless,” Sunny points out.

“Yeah, cause she wants to, like… fuck the establishment, and blow up the IRS and shit!! Every day she looks more like herself! And Basil, hah, he’s—” Again, there’s that strange flash of hurt. “You know. Getting… everything he ever wanted, probably. And you!!!” He turns to Sunny with stars in his eyes. “God, you’re, like… taking all the cool shit in your head and pushing it out into the world and it is so exciting to watch, Sunny! Really!! It’s—I can’t believe how exciting it is, just watching you go around and look at things and make them important, just by seeing them.” 

Kel drums his heels against the side of the building, his sparkle dimming a little. 

“...You’re all so fun to watch, and I’m just kinda the same dumb kid as always. Like everyone’s running ahead, and I’m stuck trying to catch up.”

“But you’re the one who ran ahead.”

Kel blinks. “Huh?”

“When we were all—” Sunny gestures toward dissociative fugues, waking nightmares, drownings and stabbings and eyes gouged out. “You’re the only one who figured out how to live with yourself. On your own, without anyone’s help. And then you pulled us out after. It’s just that we’re finally catching up.”

“Yeah, but— No. Come on. That’s different. And anyway, it’s not like I was—” Kel hesitates. “Hey. When you were still… inside. Did you ever… Could you even hear me?”

Sunny’s head tilts. He heard Kel all night long, in Headspace. But that’s probably not what he means.

Kel looks out over the sleeping city. In the Glittering Harbor, you can only ever see the stars at twilight, after the sun’s slipped behind the world but before the fog has dragged its way onto the shore. But at night, you can see the city lights reflected in the clouds. 

“...I used to talk to your door all the time, Sunny. All the time. For years, like maybe one day you were just gonna answer. It’s like— Even if I know something’s never gonna happen, I still can’t get over it.”

“But it did happen,” Sunny says, confused. “You brought me back.” 

Kel laughs, but it's not a happy sound. It makes Sunny feel all upside-down and sideways. “Yeah. Yeah, maybe. Or—I don’t know. Maybe it just would’ve been some other—”

“No,” Sunny tells him firmly. “No one else could have done it. I would have died instead.” He doesn’t want to upset anyone, but it’s true. He was dying in that house. He was dying so slowly all the time, all the time he was awake. Every day he was a little less alive. He would have drowned in the bath, or got so confused and afraid that he would slide a knife between his ribs to make the nightmare stop. Or you’d fall down the stairs, Omori chimes in. You’d break your neck so you couldn’t move or call for help and then you’d starve down there, on the floor where it happened, and it would be weeks before anyone knew. “And—I didn’t hear you, at the door. Sorry. I was… not very awake. But I heard you in my dreams all the time. Sometimes even when I couldn’t find anyone else. So maybe some of it did get through. I don’t know. I don’t think about it very much.” 

Kel is looking at him with surprise. Sunny feels a little surprised, too. It’s probably the most he’s said all at once in… He’s not sure how long. 

“You saved me,” Sunny reminds him. “And brought us all back. And you’re doing fine, anyway.”

Kel sputters a laugh. “Aw, geez, Sunny. You always know just what to say.”

Sunny famously does not, but whatever. He studies Kel’s face and frowns. That laugh was honest, but Kel’s smile is lying again. “Are you sure there isn’t something else?” 

“H-Huh?? I—” Kel looks away, toward the horizon. “Aw, I dunno. I mean. I guess I… don’t really wanna talk about it.”

Sunny can understand that. There are lots of things he doesn’t want to talk about. “Okay. Then… tell me what to paint up here.”

“Woah!!!” Kel yelps. “For real?”

He nods.

“Sunny??? That’s too much responsibility!! I don’t know the first thing about art!!”

Sunny rolls his eye. “Everyone knows about art." Art is just whatever makes you feel things. "Anyway, I’m the one who’ll paint it.” 

“You’ve got me there,” Kel concedes. “Hmm… You could paint… a t-rex… that’s also a cyborg. A whole ranger squad of cyborg dinos!!” 

“Were they recreated by science?” Sunny asks seriously. “Or did they survive the extinction event, and now they’re the dominant species?” 

“Definitely the second one. Oh, oh, or you could paint Hector! Hector would be a great muse!”

“Hector has always been my muse.”

“Mine too!!” Kel is starting to sound more like himself. “What about a big ole garden? I bet Basil would like that.”

“Basil is never going to see it.” When Kel looks taken aback, Sunny clarifies, “He doesn’t like… danger.”

“It’s just a mural though?”

Sunny snickers. “He wouldn’t want me climbing up here.” 

Kel looks surprised, and then guilty. “Oh! Ohhh. Okay, yeah, I can totally see that. But then—is it okay that we’re up here?”

“He can’t tell me what to do,” Sunny sniffs. Anyway, Basil wouldn’t actually try to stop him. He would just clamp his jaw shut and swallow his misgivings and proceed to spend the night vibrating in terror. “It’s just nicer to come up here when he doesn’t have to know.”

“Hey, whatever works.” Kel darts another glance at him. “Okay, I have a real idea, but it’s stupid.”

“Those weren’t real ideas?”

“I have another real idea, but it’s stupid. And super not original. But if I really get to pick, then… I think you should paint us.”

“All of us, or the two of us?”

Kel shrugs vaguely. “I guess it wouldn’t be very smart, though, huh. I mean. It’d be pretty obvious who did it.”

“Not necessarily.” There are lots of ways to paint something without painting it. Abstraction has always felt more real than realism, anyway. The eye isn’t a camera. Every image is passed through a hundred different filters, how you’re feeling and what’s on your mind and whether you’ve had anything to eat. Overly literal representation is just a shadow on the wall of the cave. To say something true, you need to tell a few lies. 

It's like with Basil's photos. No matter how much you paid for your equipment, a photo of a sunset will always pale in comparison to the genuine article. You have to spend a while fucking around with the contrast and the color to make an image that feels even close to true. 

Sometimes the real world feels like Headspace. All of these layers stacked on top of each other, all of them accurate, no one of them true. Sunny could paint a perfect replica of Kel Rodriguez—messy curls, easy smile—and it would be accurate, but not honest. Or he could paint a blurred, warped animation smear, and it would be honest, but not true. Or he could paint a living sun, lurid orange and yellow and brilliant blue-white, and it would be true, but definitely not accurate. But all of them would be real. 

“Can you already see it?” 

Sunny startles. Kel is watching him fondly. “Sorry.” 

“Don’t be!! I told you, I love seeing you think.” Kel stops short, his fingers tapping an anxious beat against the gutter.. “...It’s late, huh? I should probably get going.”

Sunny sags. He’d been hoping to talk to Kel about everything they’ve been talking around: Kel acting weird, and Sunny feeling weird about it; Basil’s advice, and what Aubrey thinks that Kel might think. But he can’t unload that whole complicated tangle of feelings when Kel already looks so low. Paying attention to what other people want is tiresome, but important. Sunny wants to be good to the people he loves. 

“Okay,” he sighs. “Just stay behind me. I have to check for pigeons.” 

[mikkokomori]

Hey uh here’s some more info about the delinquent duo Au (that’s what I’ve decided to call it)

For an unexplained reason, sunny is moving away later than the original world, and the first day starts when hero comes home from college. 

Hero is the one who invites sunny out in this au, kel is aware of this because hero told him that he was going to, and he does plan on hanging out with him later (he was forced to do errands).

At faraway park It’s the same as the original game mostly, but like basil is begging aubrey to give his photo album back and aubrey says that she isn’t going to, and to just leave her alone. It goes to the point where she’s yelling. Hero and sunny show up around this time

When hero and sunny arrive at faraway park. Aubrey is tense around both of them, but especially she’s conflicted between wanting to either beat the shit out of sunny or tell him how much she missed him. But like hero Is more shocked about how cold she’s being to basil.

Hero tries to understand what’s happening with her and basil, why she’s being rude, why basil is on the verge of tears. Basil is really nervous around hero, and is trying to explain it to him sort of while Aubrey is just really distant about it. 

It gets to the point where this activates the Aubrey fight sorta of ??? (At this point basil is just a witness again) It’s more like oh we’re gonna fight and then kel walks up to the park and sees sunny pull out a fucking knife and immediately goes to stop the fight.

Aubrey is like really upset right now, and she’s freaking out and so kel goes over to calm her down and ask what happened. (By this time man basil has faded into the background, trying to decide whether to walk away or not, like what are you supposed to do dude???) 

Kel sort of finds out hero was sort of badgering her? (He kind of was but also he wasn’t? Like she didn’t want to explain but also hero just didn’t understand what was happening idk I’m dumb) and he’s just sort of gives him this awkward tense sort of welcome back from college hero, and he tells sunny it’s good to see him and that they’ll hang out by ourselves later (I’m not saying he eyes hero sorta but I’m saying he sort of eyes hero sorta) 

and then here’s some random hc stuff

When Aubrey tried putting the nails inside her bat, kel spent like half an hour taking them out (she put like 50 in there he swears)

Most of the hooligans really like kel, except for the maverick and Kim. Mikhael finds it very annoying that he refuses to call him the maverick and kel sort of treats him like how he does in the original game, and Kim just thinks kel’s sort of a weirdo, but she tries to be nice to him because Aubrey’s her friend (she is the worst wingwoman I swear)

They usually hang out at their lake hangout at night together. It’s mostly somber when they go there by themselves, sometimes they’ll bring a picnic blanket and some snacks and they’ll reminisce.

Every week after Aubrey goes to church they go to Mari’s grave together and leave fresh flowers. 

Kel usually feels guilty when he’s upset at hero, like it’s sort of wrong of him to be upset at all when hero’s his older brother who’s trying to be better after the death of Yk the love of his life. And it sort of just plagues him a bunch because hero will say or do something that made kel upset and he’ll like think in his head oh I hate that he did that but then he’ll feel like this gut-wrenching guilt about it. So it’s sort of a feedback loop of they don’t talk about how they feel to eachother, hero does something that makes kel upset, kel feels upset and then kel get upset at hero, hero feels upset and then kel feels guilty about it, kel doesn’t want to talk to hero about it because of what happened last time they talked.

Sometimes Aubrey is really sad for a while. Aubrey will sort of just hole herself up in her room and just go through the photo album, after her father left she wouldn’t come out and kel tried to throw rocks at her window. She came downstairs and asked what he wanted and sort of blew up at him, but kel didn’t say anything until she got it out of her system and then they just sat down and talked for a while. He comforted her and he asked if he could do anything to make her feel better and she couldn’t really come up with something at the time, she was really tired and her voice hurt after all the screaming and yelling and crying and stuff. 

if you have opinions on any of this I’d love to hear lol

I’m sorta bad at explaining

I never have opinions on anything but you know what I do have. That's right, I got art to express myself hell yeah I love it

[incaensio]

@fatefought ( cont. from this )

katniss listens attentively, more than she has ever at school — because at school, learning about things you had to export from the capitol was not seen as necessary, while learning about coal was paramount. to learn of the things that actually grew around twelve, katniss had to follow her father, read from his book, actually pick at the roots that grow around the meadow and beyond it; they could be useful when you're in a pinch (like bark from trees, dandelions and katniss roots) and they could also be used in food, even in bread, as peeta has showed her, making aromatic loafs with rosemary, basil, dill. if they had oranges — or clementines, as annie explains — peeta could make a pastry just as nice as this one; they already had the honey, and that boy could do marvels with dough. "do you grow them at four, too? do you need special greenhouses for it?" katniss thought only eleven or maybe nine grew fruit, but that's silly, isn't it? even twelve had some wild berries and the mellarks had an apple tree in their backyard. and if four can grow citrics, then so could them; her eyes twinkle with the thought of the possibility, fetching one of the clementine tarts herself.

it is sweet, tooth aching sweet yes, but katniss doesn't mind. she hasn't had the opportunity to have many sweets — especially artificial ones like this — before the games, before having a baker for a neighbor and then husband. she picks another one for peeta, then, concealing it within the napkin. she doesn't linger, though, and despite the (comfortable) company, she plucks another tart, a chocolate one this time, which is always safe because katniss knows she loves chocolate (and the boxes she hoards at the ice box back home would tell). she's gobbled it down when annie speaks next, and maybe it's because she's happy to be munching on sweets, or because annie sounds genuine — in a manner you don't really get much around this city — or because even though the words are subintended, they pair well with what katniss thought, she gives the other victor a nod that is almost too enthused. she has the thought not to snort, however. "oh yeah. that's an understatement. though in here, happy and sad doesn’t have much difference when they dress it all in gold and frills, don't they? as long as it shimmers…" she's said too much, but the distaste for capitol opulence is like a fresh wound that will never heal because she keeps poking at it, because while people at twelve keep taking on tesserae not to starve, people here can have drinks to throw up and eat more. and this, this party, is nothing of consequence, is it? who cares if these tributes will all be dead by next month? katniss' appetite stills for a moment, and she puts the napkin inside her bag.

"oh." her eyes follow annie's, and katniss' heart leaps, as it has become accustomed to doing whenever she's particularly concerned, especially about peeta. she likes having him in sight, feel his warmth to remind her he is all right, but it's a party and they're under orders to get sponsors, and peeta would never come into harm's way under the president's own roof — that would be too obvious. right? right, she tells herself. "it's okay." she decides, though the shrug she offers is not as effective when her body still holds tension. "we have a way of finding each other, even if it takes a little while." this is more reassuring, because it's true. she can't run away from peeta, and she hasn't wanted to for a while now — if anything, she's become rather eager to seek him out, more and more by the day. "and you're better company than juventus sickle." whom she had abandoned, claiming the need to search for peeta (which was true, too) because she missed him so bad (not untrue, either).

the mention of haymitch does bring a furrow to her brows. katniss had never considered not coming to every game because with her being the only female victor of her district, she couldn't just abstain, like others could. and it came without saying that peeta would follow her, and she him. the furrow dies, as she thinks that the president would never allow them to stay away; he needs them to be compliant and love-sick in front of the cameras, always sticking to the script. katniss hopes her features are not as despondent as she feels. "it's not so bad, i guess. at least it's something to do." with the fence wired on, she didn't have much to do at all so the options were to be driven mad by boredom or by seeing her helpless tributes die in front of her — it's not like she has a choice, anyways. she stifles a sigh.

"i think people hopes we will retire haymitch soon, actually." at that, she allows herself a small grimace, half playful, half at the oddity of the thought. haymitch, not a mentor for twelve? impossible. he can share the job with peeta for the rest of their miserable lives — the three of them, side by side in that train every year, just like they do at the village. "i don't think he'd pass on the free booze, though." she snickers. "you're friends? with haymitch? you don't mentor much, though, do you?" she remembers — faintly — the senior lady. and finnick, but katniss supposes his reasons to come to the capitol are not at all involved with the games, even if peeta had told her finnick would mentor this year, too.

[acacia-may]

But I Always Thought That I'd See You Again (OMORI Fanfiction): CHAPTER 3 [Final Chapter]

CHAPTER 3: HOW CAN YOU MEND A BROKEN HEART [Final Chapter]

Description: When Hero inexplicably locks himself in his room, Kel, Sunny, and Basil turn to Aubrey for help insisting that she is "the best at this kind of thing." She doesn't have the slightest idea when or how she earned that reputation, but Hero has always been there for her and for all of them really, so she knows she will do her best to be there for him too. Step one is, of course, getting him out of the house and away from everyone else so he isn't tempted to help with their problems rather than take care of himself, but that's easier said than done... Getting him to actually open up to her about whatever it is that's troubling him will likely be even harder, but along the way, Aubrey might discover they actually have a lot more in common than she thought...

Relationships: Hero & Aubrey Friendship, Extremely Functional Kelbrey (Romantic Kel/Aubrey), Hero & Kel Sibling Relationship, Past Romantic Hero/Mari, Past Aubrey & Mari Friendship. Some Hero & Aubrey & Kel & Basil & Sunny Friendship. Mentions (Potential) Hero finding love again with someone else (but the story does not specify who she is so choose your own adventure).

Characters: Aubrey (POV Character), Hero, Kel, & Mari's Memory. Mentioned Sunny and Basil.

Genre: Hurt/Comfort, Friendship, Slice of Life. Some Angst. Some Past Hero/Mari Fluff & Current Angst, Some Extremely Functional Established Relationship Kelbrey. Hopeful Ending. Hero Deserves to Be Happy. Multi-Chapter. COMPLETE.

Word Count: 4478 (Chapter 3)

Rating: T for some heavy themes and thematic elements (i.e. grief & healing from grief and trauma. Implied/Referenced Canonical Character Death & Implied/Referenced Mental Health Issues including depression & suicide).

Warnings: Major Spoilers for OMORI! Heavy themes and thematic elements (i.e. grief & healing from grief and trauma. Implied/Referenced Canonical Character Death & Implied/Referenced Mental Health Issues including depression & suicide).

Link to original post on AO3. Please do not repost to another website. All other interaction (likes, reblogs ect.) appreciated!

This story is now COMPLETE. Link to Chapter 2.

Link to Story Masterlist.

A/N: This story's title was taken from the song "Fire and Rain" by James Taylor and this chapter's title was taken from "How Can You Mend A Broken Heart" both of which heavily inspired this work. Here's the link to this story's playlist if anyone is curious.

Chapter 3 under the cut! Thank you for reading!! 💕

“Oh…Hero…” Aubrey tripped over her words, unsure what she should say—what she even could say to that. She merely blinked at him wondering how it was that even now, over a decade after Mari’s death, she still had had no idea that this was such a significant day for him. To be fair, it wasn’t just her. None of them had known—not even Kel. Hero was so private about his grief.

“It’s okay,” he reassured her with a sigh and a slight smile. “I’m usually okay, even today. It’s just been…especially hard this year I guess…” 

“Do you want to talk about it?” she gently encouraged, and Hero’s face flushed as he twisted his hands. 

“I’m…honestly kind of embarrassed…” he mumbled. 

“It’s nothing to be embarrassed about. There are always going to be hard days. I know I still have them.” She sighed. “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to—I just…want you to know that I’m here for you if you need someone and I’m never going to judge you. Honestly, there’s nothing to judge here—you have every right to be sad.”

“I guess I just…wasn’t expecting it to hurt as much anymore. It’s been almost thirteen years now…”

Aubrey shrugged. “That’s just a number, Hero. It doesn’t matter how many years it’s been—it’s okay to still miss her. I know I do”—her voice hitched—“and I didn’t even love her as much as you did.”

She paused—suddenly thinking about Kel, about what she would do if he… She stopped abruptly, overwhelmed by an ache in her chest and a burning sensation behind her eyes. She wanted to reach out and hug Hero just thinking about it—about how painful that must be, but she thought it might be a little awkward to try to hold him over the center console of her parked car so she reached out her hand and patted his shoulder instead. “I think you’re a much stronger person than me, Hero. If someone deserves to be broken up about it, it’s you, and you should take as much time as you need. No one would blame you if you just…never moved on.” 

Hero took a long, shaky breath then pressed his lips together. “That’s…that’s the thing, Aubrey. I…” His voice was so quiet she could barely hear him. He stared intently at his hands—twisting them together, refusing to look at her. It was almost like he couldn’t. “I had actually been thinking…”—he swallowed hard—“That is I…I actually wondered if maybe…I might be…ready…to...um...” 

Aubrey tried her best to stifle a gasp. Of all the things she could’ve expected…she would have never even entertained this as a possibility. Hero had never expressed any interest in pursuing a relationship with anyone after Mari. They all respected it and never pried, just quietly resigned themselves to the fact that Hero might never love again, so to hear that he was actually, seriously considering moving on... She just couldn’t hold back the smile that tugged at her mouth as her eyes started to grow misty. “Really?”

Hero blushed, and Aubrey’s breath caught in her throat. The expression on his face was so flustered but so warm, so affectionate—she never thought she’d ever see him make that face again. “Yeah…uh…I was actually…kind of thinking that I might ask someone out.”

Aubrey’s jaw fell slack. Here she had been worried that Hero was listening to sad music and still pining after Mari when actually he was thinking about moving on. A flabbergasted but excited chuckle escaped her lips, and she threw her arms around his neck and hugged him—center console be damned. “Hero, that’s wonderful! I…you have no idea how excited everyone is going to be to hear that, especially Kel.”

“Just…Just for coffee…” he stumbled quickly, awkwardly patting her on the back. “Nothing too big or dramatic or anything…”

“This is big, Hero,” said Aubrey pulling away from him with a wide, bright smile. “You…you’ve met someone…” It wasn’t really a question.  

His blush deepened. “I think it’s more like I finally saw someone who had been there for a long time.”

“So it’s someone you know well?” Aubrey repeated wracking her brain trying to think of Hero’s closest friends and who this could possibly be. She supposed it was really none of her business, but she was curious. Hero nodded and hummed.

“For a long time. We became close friends in college and we’re in this wedding together now so we’ve been seeing a lot of each other and…I guess I’ve just been thinking…realizing that…when I’m with her, I—I don’t know, Aubrey—I…feel things that I didn’t know I could feel anymore…” His voice trailed—quiet, distant as if he had forgotten himself, but his cheeks flushed a bright red. Aubrey’s eyes widened, but she could only blink at him in shock. Was Hero…? Was he really… in love?

The question felt somewhat silly and juvenile, especially seeing as he had never even been on a date with this woman, but…Aubrey couldn’t help but wonder. There was something so incredibly gentle and sincere in his face—something so warm and wistful, almost pining in his dark eyes as he sighed with a certain love-struck helplessness that Aubrey honestly didn’t think she would ever see from him again.

“Honestly,” he shyly admitted. “I…I think I’ve felt this way for a long time but…I just…wasn’t ready to see it.”

Aubrey’s chest ached as she watched his face light with so much ardent affection. She couldn’t help but think of how he had once looked this way when he talked about Mari, but she couldn’t stop smiling, couldn’t be anything but completely and unequivocally happy for him. At least, she was…until his face fell, and he sighed heavily with a shake of his head. “But it doesn’t matter anymore. I can’t pursue that.”

“What do you mean? Why not?”

With another heavy sigh, Hero shrugged his shoulders, evaded her question. “It was probably stupid of me to even consider it…to even think that I could—” He stopped, swallowed hard. “I don’t know who I’m kidding, Aubrey… I still miss Mari and no matter how much I thought I might be over it and ready to move on, I was miserable today—not just because I still miss her but because I realized that I am always going to miss her. No matter how much I might be sitting around wondering if I might be ready to love someone else, I can’t just forget about her. There will probably always be part of me that still loves her and that’s just not fair: not to Mari and not to—”

He stopped abruptly, seemingly unwilling or perhaps unable to say the name of whoever it was that had him actually thinking about love again. Hero took a long, shaky breath. “I just feel so guilty about the whole thing. If I really loved Mari, I wouldn’t feel this way about anyone else, but if really cared about someone else, I wouldn’t still feel so broken up about Mari. The truth is I… I just don’t have my whole heart to give away anymore—it’s too broken, and she deserves more than that, deserves to be someone’s one and only.”

“Hero, I…” she sighed with a long exhale. She had no idea what to say—what could she possibly say to that? She suddenly had a newfound appreciation for Kel’s fears of saying the wrong thing to Hero and hurting him–making him feel even worse than he already did.

“I’m sorry,” he quickly apologized—eyes widening with horror and realization as if he hadn’t meant to say any of that. “I shouldn’t have dumped all of that on you.”

“No, Hero, I—I’m your friend. If there’s anything I can do to help, I…I’ll do it, no questions asked. I’m always here for you, and it means a lot that you felt you could share that with me. It couldn’t have been easy.”

Flushing, Hero managed a quick nod, and Aubrey patted his shoulder, taking a deep breath and praying that the next words that came out of her mouth wouldn’t make everything worse.

“I can’t imagine how hard this all is for you, and I know that this probably doesn’t mean a lot coming from me but…feeling guilty about this is actually really normal, even if you haven’t done anything to feel guilty about.” Her face softened, and she met his eyes. “And you haven’t, Hero. You’ve done nothing wrong. You don’t have to forget about Mari ever —even if you do fall in love again. And anyone who really loves you wouldn’t want you to. You just have to find someone who isn’t threatened by that or jealous—someone who really understands that just because you loved Mari and lost her doesn’t mean that there isn’t room in your heart for someone else. Missing her doesn’t mean you need to feel guilty for wanting to be happy. I know Mari wouldn’t want that. She really loved you and would want you to be happy. And I know that your happiness doesn’t necessarily have to involve a new relationship and maybe it doesn’t—that’s okay, but don’t close the door to it just because you’re scared that you’re not enough. Even if your heart is broken and pieced back together, it’s still yours, and if you find someone who loves you, that’s all that’s going to matter.” 

Her mouth twitched in the corners as she added with a somewhat sheepish dryness, “Believe me, I speak from experience…” She sighed as her cheeks grew suddenly warm. “I know that’s probably awkward for me to say seeing as I’m dating your brother but…putting that aside for just a second,”—she chuckled breathily, sheepishly—“I do know how it feels to worry you’re not enough for someone you love—to think that if you really loved this person, you’d tell them to find someone better. I know that that seems like a selfless thing, but it’s actually kind of selfish—because it’s really just protecting yourself from the day that they realize they’ve made a huge mistake and could have— should have done better. It’s really just pushing them away before they can leave, before you might get hurt.”

She paused and sighed heavily, staring out the windshield. “I know it feels like the strong thing to do is to keep the door shut and resign yourself to being alone forever, but you actually have to be a lot stronger to open it up again. It takes a very strong person not to be afraid to accept the love someone wants to give you—even when you feel like you don’t deserve it.”

After a long, heavy pause, Hero finally mumbled with wide, dark eyes, “Wow…that’s really deep…” 

A smile twitched in the corners of Aubrey’s mouth. “I just saved you years of therapy,” she quipped. “You’re welcome.”

“Does that really work?” 

Aubrey shrugged. “Maybe…I don’t know…Sometimes. I think it's an ongoing struggle. There’s part of me that’s still terrified every time I think about Kel looking at rings.” She stopped. She hadn’t meant to say that part aloud. “Sorry... I didn’t mean to make this about me.” 

“No, I’d really rather you did.” 

Aubrey stifled a laugh. “Yeah I’m sure you would, but like it or not, this is about you, Hero”—she pointedly tilted her head at him—“and your life and your future…even if you don’t know what that looks like right now or even what you want it to look like. I’m sorry to say that’s just something you’ll have to figure out on your own, but even if your life isn’t the one you planned and sometimes maybe even isn’t the life you thought you wanted, that doesn’t mean it can’t still be a happy one.”

She sighed, shaking her head at her hands. “It’s probably not really my place to say this, but I don’t think you have to force yourself to forget about Mari or feel guilty when you still miss her in order to be happy, even if you do find love again. You probably have the biggest heart of anyone I know, so there’s no doubt in my mind that even if there’s a part of you that will always miss her, there is more than enough room in your heart for someone else too. And no matter how broken you might think that you are, that person, the one that you choose…not to replace Mari but to open your heart to again, whoever she is—she’s not going to feel slighted or less than. All she’s going to feel is so, so lucky.”

As she met his eyes, the hard, weary lines of Hero’s face softened, and he leaned across the center console of the car and hugged her. As her eyes widened in surprise, her shoulders stiffened, but after the shock wore off, she relaxed, wrapping her arms around his back and pressing her chin to his shoulder. She wasn’t sure how long they held each other before he finally pulled away saying, “Thank you. I…I really needed that.”

Aubrey sighed in relief but shrugged her shoulders with a slight smile. “Glad I could help.”

“And I’m not sure if it means anything coming from me but”—he paused, met her eyes—“Kel really loves you.”

A blush flushed in her flaming cheeks, but a smile tugged at her mouth. “I don’t know what he sees in me,” she bantered shakily, with a twitch of her shoulders.

Hero smiled kindly at her. “I do.”

 Aubrey’s face burned as her blush deepened. She turned away from him abruptly, and he stumbled over his words. “I don’t mean that in a weird way. Just in a…you’re really great kind of way. And Kel knows that—thinks you’re amazing. I mean…he’s my brother so I’ve known him his whole life, and I’ve never seen him like this—this happy and just…besotted,” he added dryly with a breathy chuckle before he tilted his head with a warm, gentle expression in his eyes. “You know I was just thinking earlier that it's kind of funny but…Kel also really likes love ballads from the 1970s—pretty sure his favorite is one called ‘Aubrey.’”

Aubrey's face flushed, and her cheeks burned. Biting her lip, she stared at her trembling hands, unable to find her words—find a way to shrug it off or banter something and change the subject to anything else, but Hero just hummed thoughtfully and continued, “Back before the two of you were dating, I kind of picked up on the fact that Kel was lovesick and seriously pining after somebody. I didn’t know who and I didn’t feel right asking or prying into his business, but I wanted to help so I lent him a whole stack of records just filled with all those great pining love songs.” 

He paused, a secret smile twitching in his mouth as he let out a dry chuckle. “Imagine my surprise when he practically begs me to let him keep Guitar Man of all things. When I asked why, he said he just couldn’t get enough of one of the songs, and, of course, I was kind of thinking well maybe it was ‘Sweet Surrender’ and he was planning to confess but…when I asked him, he got all flustered and was just bright red. Finally, he kind of shyly admitted, ‘Well…it’s…it’s “Aubrey”’…”

His eyes grew distant, wistful, but he paused, shrugged his shoulders. “To be fair, ‘Aubrey’ is a beautiful song of longing and unrequited love just universally, but you know Kel, he just…doesn’t read that deeply into things, and I knew what he heard was a song about a man who was helplessly, desperately in love with an incredible girl ‘ and Aubrey was her name ,’ and I felt so stupid for not realizing it before,” chuckled Hero. “But when I saw that look on his face when he said he just couldn’t stop listening to that song—I just…I knew he loved you, even if he didn’t know it yet.”

“I…I didn’t…” Aubrey’s voice trailed off as her face blushed a bright red. “He never told me about that.”

“I’m sorry you had to hear it from me then,” shrugged Hero with a light laugh and a slight flush in his cheeks.

Aubrey smiled—twisting her mouth to one side. “Do you have a song like that you’ve been listening to recently?”

“‘How Can You Mend A Broken Heart?’” Hero replied so dry and deadpan that Aubrey couldn’t be sure if he was being facetious or serious. Still, she gave him a sympathetic smile before she sighed.

“I meant about your mystery lady…Is there a song that always makes you think of her when you listen to it?”

Hero’s face turned crimson. “Well…uh…I…” He paused and stared down at his hands before shyly, quietly admitting, “‘She’s Got A Way...’”

Despite his flaming cheeks, Hero chuckled lightly and dryly added, “Another 70s ballad, what do you know?”

“Fits with the theme of the evening,” bantered Aubrey before she shrugged her shoulders. “But I actually don’t think I’ve ever heard that song.”

“Oh uh…well you should someday. It’s a good one.” Though his face was still particularly red, he tilted his head towards her with the twitch of a dry smile. “You should listen to ‘Aubrey’ too. It has your name in it—several times.”

“Maybe I’ll ask Kel to play it for me,” she teased, trying her best to ignore that blush that burned in her cheeks when she thought of him listening to a love song about an ‘Aubrey’ over and over, pining after her.

“He still has the record, I think. I told him he could just keep it—it meant a lot more to him than me,” Hero chuckled, and Aubrey twisted her mouth—trying and failing to frown at the knowing, teasing expression on his face. “We can ask him when we get back.”

She tilted her head at him. “Are you ready to go home already?”

“Yeah…I—” Hero was cut off by another weary yawn. He rubbed his tired eyes. “I obviously need a nap.”

Aubrey chuckled lightly, but she tilted her head at him. “You’re sure you’re feeling, okay? We can hang out here for as long as you want…or if there was somewhere else you wanted to go…”

“No, uh…thank you, but that’s okay.” Hero’s expression softened, and he smiled at her. “I…uh…I feel a lot better now. Thanks, Aubrey.”

He gently patted her head like he had used to do when she was a kid and just like back then, her face felt a bit warm—a bit embarrassed by the friendly, almost-familial affection. Her family had never been affectionate with each other in this way so she couldn’t be sure but she liked to imagine that if she had really had an older brother, he would have patted her head just like this. A smile tugged at Aubrey’s mouth at the thought. She had always wanted a brother.

When she turned the key in the ignition to start the car again, Hero stopped her with a blustering, confused, “Wait, we need to get those batteries first.”

“Hero…” she sighed, shaking her head. “Kel just made that up.”

“No, we actually are out of D Batteries. I put them on the shopping list on our refrigerator.” He wearily rubbed his hand across his forehead. “Come to think of it, I should have grabbed that list since we were coming to Other Mart anyway…I really am out of it.”

“It’s fine,” she reassured him. “If you think of something you want or that you guys need, we can pick it up while we’re here, but otherwise, Kel and I can go out shopping later. Don’t worry about it.” She paused, sighed. “Honestly, we don’t even really have to go in. We can just head home if you’re tired.”

“I didn’t have you drive all the way here just so we could have a heart-to-heart chat in the parking lot,” laughed Hero. “It was nice, but…I still don’t think we should head back empty handed.”

Aubrey shrugged but conceded, “Fair enough.”

*-*-*

With D batteries, a gallon of milk, laundry detergent, and two canisters of cocktail peanuts in hand, Aubrey finally drove Hero home where they were shocked to find Basil, Sunny, and Kel sitting in the living room folding laundry.

“What…what is this?” asked Hero as a touched smile tugged at his mouth.

“We decided to do your laundry for you, surprise!” exclaimed Kel with a beaming smile. “Well…uh…Basil did actually. He’s way better at dividing the colors and knowing which cycle to use and everything, but Sunny and I helped with the folding.”

Basil’s face flushed, and he mumbled, “Um…it was nothing. Just wanted to help…” as Sunny nodded in emphatic agreement.

Hero sniffled before he hugged Kel tightly. “Thank you so much. You really didn’t have to do this.”

Kel’s eyes widened as he glanced in confusion at Aubrey over his brother’s shoulder. Aubrey just shrugged and Kel did the same before wrapping his arms around Hero. “Are you feeling better?” he asked as Hero gave him a final pat on the back then turned to hug both Sunny and Basil as well.

“Yes, I…um…I’m feeling a lot better. Sorry for worrying everyone.”

“It’s okay,” said Basil who was already looking a bit misty-eyed again. “We’re just glad you’re alright.”

Sunny nodded in agreement, and Kel turned to Aubrey with a twitch of his eyebrows that seemed to ask, ‘ Is he really going be okay ?’

Aubrey’s face softened, and a gentle smile tugged at her lips as she nodded at him. She hoped her expression conveyed the hope that she felt that the worst was over and they didn’t have to worry about Hero anymore. He was going to be okay. No , she thought, remembering back to their conversation in the Other Mart parking lot. He was going to be more than okay.

As Hero took a seat on the sofa and insisted on folding the rest of the laundry himself, Kel slipped his hand into Aubrey’s and gave it a tight squeeze.

“Are you okay?” he asked, and she nodded, meeting his kind eyes.

“Yeah…just thinking…”

“About what?”

She hummed, taking a seat beside him. “This song Hero told me about. It’s called ‘Aubrey.’”

Kel’s face flushed just barely, but he smiled at her with a look in his eyes that was so warm, so sincere. “I love that song.” He paused, but his face lit up. “You want to hear it?”

Aubrey nodded, and Kel turned to his brother. “Hey, Hero, can I borrow your iPod?”

“Sure, but wouldn’t you rather just use the record?” he chuckled with a furrowed brow.

Kel shrugged. “Too much work, and what if we want to listen to other music too. Hero has great taste.”

“Yes, he does,” she said with a smile, and this was only solidified in the next hour of what was probably the world’s best music beginning with the one and only ‘Aubrey.’ Hero was right; it was a beautiful song of longing and unrequited love. She tried not to blush too much thinking about it, thinking about Kel listening to its pining words over and over, but she couldn’t stop her eyes from growing misty. She could scarcely believe it was true that anyone could listen to such a beautiful and emotionally raw love song, listen to lines like “I'd go a 1000 times around the world, just to be closer to her than to me…”  when thinking of her. But…maybe that was just Kel. Hero’s words rang in her head, Kel really loves you … She reached out and squeezed Kel’s hand—causing him to turn to her with surprise, but as the final note sounded, he intertwined their fingers and smiled at her.

The conversation quickly turned to what to have for dinner and everyone’s plans for the upcoming weekend, and the music faded into the background. In the midst of Basil’s anecdote about the caterpillar problem he was having at the greenhouse, Aubrey’s ears perked up at a line in the background music: “She’s got a way about her…”

She froze and glanced over at Hero wondering if this was the song he had mentioned earlier. The pink blush of his cheeks told her everything she needed to know, but he nodded at her with a slight smile and shrug of his shoulders. She tried her best to listen to the song—catching phrases that made her chest ache like, “She's got a smile that heals me…I don't know why it is, but I have to laugh when she reveals me …” 

Her breath got caught in her throat and tears prickled in the back of her eyes. When the music swelled, her jaw fell slack as she listened to the crystal clear: “She's got a way of showin' h ow I make her feel , and I find the strength to keep on goin' . She's got a light around her, and everywhere she goes a million dreams of love surround her.”

“Hey, I recognize this song now,” said Kel with a blissfully unaware smile. “You’ve been listening to this one a lot, Hero.”

Hero’s face flushed, and he shrugged—turning away abruptly when he met Aubrey knowing but misty expression. She almost wanted to practically lunge over the coffee table, throw her arms around Hero and hold him—tell him how happy she was for him, but she thought that might embarrass him and lead to too many questions he wasn’t ready to answer. After all, he hadn’t even told her who this ‘She’ was.  

“Yeah…um…it’s a good one,” he said with a sheepish smile. “What do you think, Aubrey?”

Aubrey sniffled but cleared her throat. “I think it’s beautiful”—her voice hitched, and she smiled kindly at Hero hoping her words meant infinitely more than what she said—“I really hope things work out for them.”

“Me too,” said Basil, wiping his eyes.

“I’m pretty sure Billy Joel has been divorced three times,” mumbled Sunny, completely deadpan, and Basil sniffled.

“That’s so sad.”

“Oh man, that’s rough,” sighed Kel. “It’s a beautiful love song though.”

Aubrey watched as a smile tugged at Hero’s mouth. She wasn’t sure if the others noticed it—that warm, wistful look in his eyes that they hadn’t seen in over a decade, the way his face lit up, the way he looked… happy again as he sighed and said, “Yes. It is.”

*-*-*

Nearly two weeks later, Aubrey received a package in the mail. In the box was a James Taylor record—the same one her father had once given her but that she had broken—tied with a bright pink bow. There was a pink sticky note on the cover that read:

Aubrey,

You’re right. We shouldn’t have to forget.

Thanks again for everything.

-Hero

As she pulled off the sticky note with a smile, she noticed the small arrow drawn in the bottom right corner. Her brow furrowed curiously as she flipped over the note, and she practically squealed at the post-script, startling her roommates Kim and Charlie:

P.S. I’m taking her out for coffee on Saturday.

[ratsoh-writes]

What are all the boys weapons? (I know we've had a few reveals... but I can't remember who it was).

Ooo let’s do this one!

So a little background: every monster has their own magical weapon. The first form of magic all monsters learn are pellets (think the little balls flowey uses to attack the player at the beginning of the game). As the kids grow older, they’re taught to shape and change these pellets to their own design. In order to be considered in control of their magic, each monster must be able to create their own weapon and summon it at will. So every monster has at least one special weapon by the time they’re in their teens (not that they use it much).

I’ll reveal all the guys go to weapons here

Sans/Oak: he made his weapon back in the day when he was into school and wasn’t a lazy slob. It’s a full on laser canon modeled after his gaster blasters. Sans only brings that baby out to scare people since it can’t stack damage like his blasters can

Papyrus/Willow: it’s a giant catapult made of bones!! Papyrus wanted that engineering extra credit! 

Star/Lilac: it’s a shooting star that he can increase the size on to either ride or use as a ninja star. He’s very good with it

Honey/Basil: he’s not the most powerful so he didn’t make anything big or flashy. It’s a spoon ladle, with spikes lol

Red/Rust: spiked baseball bat. He’s a simple guy

Edge/Noir: the first thing he created and learned to summon at will was a rapier of course. Edge got into fencing real young.

Mal: his is technically a switchblade, but he’s made changes over the years. Nowadays mals blade will cover over his fingertips to make much longer and sharper claws

Cash: his magic weapon is very basic looking, a rope, but it’s damage is ingenious. It has tiny pinpoint needles on the rope that slowly sap HP from the target. Low damage on first strike, so low it’s easy to miss that the damage is increasing every turn, whether he’s hitting you or not.

Charm: his is a whistle that’s designed more to stun than actually hurt. It does cause some damage though so charm never uses it except in emergencies

Sugar: he can’t bear the thought of hurting anyone, so his “weapon” is a shield. A very pretty lacy looking shield, but it does it’s job.

Lord: his weapon is an extremely large hammer. The sucker is practically the same size as him. It takes a lot of energy to make, but the damage it causes is worth it.

Mutt: he copied his brother and also went the hammer route, but his is more hatchet sized, and mutt makes two of them. One for each hand.

Wine: a beautiful terrifyingly sharp looking reapers scythe. The weapon is a piece of art, and wine wields it like a master. If you see it, you’re already dead

Coffee: he makes a large snipers gun. It takes a massive amount of energy for him to make, but that’s because it’s designed to take out an enemy in one shot. Coffee needs to make sure that shot is worth it

Pop: it’s a soccer ball!! But it moves like a bouncing rubber ball. And pop is pretty good with his aim when he kicks

Rhythm: his weapon is his shoes. You only see a thin orange sheet surround his shoes, but when he swings his legs, waves of magic pour out like the waves of the ocean. However it’s more show than damage and doesn’t do much. It does have good push back though

Pluto: the best offense is a good defense! Plutos is a light looking suit of armor. He can take a few hits in that, long enough to get away hopefully. Pluto was never a fighter

Jupiter: it’s a heavy looking great sword, and the thing can really pack a punch. Jupiter has his family tree inscribed on it which gave him a nice chunk of extra credit in high school

G: he has two magic weapons, a backpack with two arms acting as tentacles, and a single claw on his right hand. The tentacles are just a distraction meant to keep his enemy busy, all the damage is in the claw

Green: his is a fancy looking pistol. The “bullets” spread out in a small wave blast wherever they land

Peaches: his is a familiar looking shotgun. If you ever saw ranchers room, you’d realize peaches magic weapon looks exactly like the shotgun above ranchers bed, minus the color of course

Rancher: his is also a giant hammer, the damage is pretty minuscule, but his strength behind the swing makes all the difference. Nobody expects the skeleton monster to have the strength of a golem. Ranchers case is not common

Snipe: surprising no one, his weapons are twin pistols, one for each hand. They do have an automatic function though so the sheer amounts of bullets he can rain down is pretty impressive

Bruiser: his is also a spiked baseball bat. Bruiser isn’t fancy and likes something he can use in almost any situation

Butch: his weapon is a large wicked looking battle axe. The blade alone reaches his shoulder when it’s resting on the ground. Butch rarely uses it

Boss: he uses a beautiful long sword one handedly. It’s a bit on the thin side and works as both a rapier and a normal sword.

Ace: twin switchblades, one for each hand naturally. Ace is very good at throwing them too

Slim: his is a small frisbee looking thing. He throws it, and it sends out a shockwave designed to freeze anyone near. It’s a weapon for escape, not killing

Sparks: he throws out firecrackers! They’re more show than damage, but because they’re small, they’re very easy to re-make so sparks can chuck loads of them at the same time

Salt: his is a chainsaw lol. He was inspired by a horror film he found in the dumps.

Lush: some wicket spiked gloves naturally. They’re meant more to cause pain than kill. Lush wants his opponent throughly punished before he finally ends them

Pepper: he has a rather dainty looking whip. Don’t let it fool you, the end of it has small holes where needles can appear. He uses it both in battle and for fun ;) (no needles during fun time of course)

And for gears and compass, they actually don’t have magic weapons as they can’t produce magic pellets, but they do have a favorite tool they use. It should be in their descriptions somewhere in masterlist 17

[ushitenevent]

Be Still My Heart Thief (pickpocket AU) (G, 765 words)

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Satori's got a favorite target.

Maybe that's a little weird to say. He’s a thief, after all, and thieves aren’t supposed to have regulars. But it's hard not to pick favorites among the masses: the excitable little Tsutomu, who always has friends over at his place so he’s not keeping an eye on the balcony when Satori scales it; Eita and his cool clothes and room full of guitars, always patting his pockets during rehearsals looking for his spare picks that Satori’s already stolen; even Reon who he’s cased for years, watching his spare room fill with baby supplies, and breaking protocol to slip a soft little doll into the mix, a gift for his daughter who stole his brown eyes.

Of them all, though, Wakatoshi’s his absolute favorite. He’s a sweetheart. A businessman with a windowsill full of herbs and flowers, who commutes on the same train every morning and evening, and waters his plants on a rigid schedule that would make the sun weep. Satori loves to pluck a sprig of basil for his pasta, thanking Wakatoshi for the flavor. In the spring, he steals a few spare seeds that Wakatoshi wouldn’t miss and plants them carefully at his apartment, so their flowers grow in tandem.

Who cares if it’s strange? Satori’s a thief! It’s an atypical profession, and from his favorites he only steals the littlest things, stuff his targets would barely miss. A pint of ice cream, a can of cola, maybe one or two spare notecards. He makes his money through bigger targets; he’s banned from every museum in Tokyo, but that’s never stopped him.

It’s odd, but no one is in the business of calling Satori normal, anyway.

Things take a turn one fall morning, though. The season’s just beginning to turn, and Satori warms his hands around a can of coffee he’s not drinking while he waits for the train. Disguised in a soft, green beanie and a patchwork coat, he’s got half an eye on his target, patiently waiting a few meters away.

Wakatoshi, in a navy suit and scarf, staring blankly as he waits for the train.

Satori loves pickpocketing Wakatoshi. He can’t do it all that often, lest he get suspicious, but he always has something fun to show for it. A business card for a doctor in Miyagi, a spare stick of strawberry gum that seemed too sweet for him. Once, even, a handwritten recipe; Satori felt so bad about that one that he took a risk and slipped it back under his door later that day so he would think he’d just forgotten it at home.

He has to be careful, though, and disguise himself, so Wakatoshi doesn’t recognize his wide eyes or fiery hair or the lean arc of his body slipping past him.

There’s a rumble, and Wakatoshi’s head rises; his train slowing down to reach their stop, Satori’s signal.

With his coffee in one hand, he steps backward before walking behind Wakatoshi, barely brushing against him as the man moves to slip onto the train after the passengers exit. In a cacophony of touches, it shouldn’t even register. The doors close behind him, and then Satori pretends he’s been waiting for a train heading in the opposite direction this whole time.

His reward is in his hand: a small slip of paper that he stuffs into his own pocket while he boards the next train, and he waits two stops before he finally lets himself examine it.

What could it be? What part of Wakatoshi’s life will he be gifted with, this time? A spare ticket from a night at the symphony, or a receipt for a new book? A stub for his post-work ramen, the wrapper to a drink he liked, or a piece of wrapping paper?

He falls in love with all his sweet targets through these quiet glimpses of their lives, the ephemera and moments of distraction that make them (and him) all the richer.

“Oh,” he says, mouth falling open as he finally looks at the paper, a handwritten note in dark green ink on heavy cream, “Wakatoshi, you rascal!” Blush fills his cheeks, and that’s the glimpse of him the other strangers on the train are allowed to steal.

Your green hat is nice, the note reads, but I like your red hair better. I want to see it tonight. Come to mine? I trust you know where that is.

Regards, Wakatoshi P.S. I have a pot of basil for you, so you don’t have to keep stealing mine.

[icarusthelunarguard]

This Week’s Horrible-Scopes

It’s time for this week’s Horrible-Scopes! So for those of you that know your Astrological Signs, cool! If not, just pick one, roll a D12, or just make it up as you go along. It really doesn’t matter.

And, since it’s the lead-up to Gift Giving, let’s remind you all how to be nicer and kinder this week.

Aries 

If you want to buy something for your office Christmas Gift Pool that’ll be well received… buy some small containers of hot sauce. Not just ANY hot sauces, but the sampler pack from the nice folks over there at Dark Bunny Sauces in Ontario! You can get the “Six Sauce Sampler” in various burn levels, including dessert! Remember, that’s “Dark Bunny dot C-A”. Dark Bunny… because they have a product called “Oops!” and it is DELICIOUS! [The Horrible-Scopes is neither endorsed by, not receives any remuneration from Dark Bunny Sauces, although Shujin REALLY deserves something for helping them name “Puckering Perch.”] 

Taurus 

We know this season is tough on you, but we’re here for you; we’ll help your mood every chance we can. So how about we start the season reminding you how much better you have it. In the mid-80’s there were three old nuns walking along the West Side of Central Park approached by a flasher. The first little old lady had a stroke. The SECOND little old lady had a stroke. The THIRD little old lady couldn’t reach. (*Pause*) –and if you’re laughing at those poor old women’s plight you’re gettin’ nuthin’ for Christmas! 

Gemini  

This year, don’t leave out milk and cookies for Santa. Convince your little ones that leaving PIZZA & WINGS out for him is the way to go. It’ll be hot food for Santa and celery sticks for the reindeer. Or, you know.. For YOU! Bonus Points if you can get Sicillian instead of traditional “flat”.  

Cancer Moon-Child 

There’s nothing wrong with getting or giving Gift Cards. But please remember to do generic ones, not to specific stores. Your tastes aren’t always in line with other folks; you might be more Target while they’re more Williams-Sonoma. But if you DO get the chance to visit a Williams-Sonoma… Don’t Break Anything!

Leo 

Being older means your seasonal gifts can be more practical, but with whimsey! You hated socks as a kid, but now? Socks with prints on them to make you look like you have the legs and feet of animals? Those are GREAT! Even if you buy some for yourself and you’re gifted a dupe, that just means you can stretch out your clothes washing days.  

Virgo 

You get the BEST celebration this year: HAPPY SATURNALIA! What could possibly go wrong with a week of wine, debauchery, and song? Consider this… being deeply pregnant in the middle of summer. Guys, if you’ve never considered just how uncomfortable that might be, trust us… it’s BAD. It might be extreme, but have you ever considered hinting that you want a Snip-and-Clip this holliday?

Libra 

Yes, the last two week’s ‘Scopes have been a direct reference to a musical-comedy movie called, “The Court Jester” from 1955 starring Danny Kaye, Glynis Johns, Basil Rathbone, Angela Lansbury. See if you can find this one and gift it to yourself for your collection; it’ll be worth it. 

Scorpio 

With luck you’ll get the chance to visit folks for the Holidays this year. We know it’s been difficult the last few years, but at least you’re all trying to keep safe. This year buy yourself a bread maker machine… and spend the time together sharing the warm, squishy love they produce. And remember this ratio: 1 Tablespoon Cinnamon to a 1/2 Cup Sugar!     

Sagittarius 

Your friends miss you. Things have been tight, sure, but they’d rather have you visit without a gift you can’t really afford than not show up at all. How about making that signature dish of yours and bringing it to share? Butter Chicken and Lamb Vindaloo aren’t your typical holiday dinners, but who cares?! Make your OWN traditions and enjoy it.   

Capricorn 

Visiting your local mall isn’t the best of ideas if you’re shopping right now. Alternatively if you’re planning on getting writing inspiration, you’ll be headed to the right place. Sit in the food court and just people watch while writing down ideas for personalities as they come into your head. It’ll help stir your creative juices and get you characters that are grudgingly believable.  

Aquarius 

Late-night fireside snacks are the way to enjoy the long nights. And if you have a fireplace, see if you can find a popcorn box for it! It’s literally a metal box with a slide cover on top so you can make fresh popcorn in your fireplace. It’s not as efficient as a wok and requires some fire mittens to keep your hands safe, but it’ll be fun just the same.

Pisces  

Someone is going to gift you what looks like a long tube. Almost like someone gift-wrapped a gift-wrap paper tube. Do NOT be cute and try shaking it! It’ll be a liquor sampler case! Even if you don’t like these spirits directly, you can at least use them in cooking in the near future. Just remember two things. First, you can’t just open them all and drop them into a fruit cake recipe. And second, as cool as it might be, do NOT try doing the whole Flambe thing with the stuff. You look better with eyebrows. 

And THOSE are your Hobble-Scopes for this week! Remember if you liked what you got, we’re obviously not working hard enough at these. BUT! If you want a better or nastier one for your own sign or someone else’s, all you need to do to bribe me is just Let Me Know! These will be posted online at the end of each week via Tumblr, Twitter, Facebook and Discord.

[cleaning-has-its-benefits]

Like any other omori fan, I often think about the game and here are 3 thoughts I’ve had recently. I could have made a post for each of them but I decided to put them together in one because… I just felt like it. (note, this is rambly af)

1- how different are the real world events during the omori route?

For the longest time I’ve kind of assumed that the real world events could go mostly the same in the hikikomori route since Sunny doesn’t participate that much. But now that I actually stopped to think about it, I’ve found myself entertained in thinking about the different scenarios, mostly following what Kel could or couldn’t do on his own, since it’s true he carries the real world events lol. Btw I am working from memory so there are some details I will miss surely.

Starting with the first day, the first to do is to buy Hero’s present. Kel can go do this perfectly on his own, but he probably wouldn’t get the book, since he forgot his wallet and Sunny isn’t there to lend some money. Then he would have to go home to get the money and that would be a good reason to see the scene at the park. Aubrey would probably give him a beat up without Sunny to scare her off but otherwise I think it would mostly go the same.

Here could be a major difference though. Is possible that Basil could feel guilty Kel got beaten up trying to defend him and when he walks him home, Basil doesn’t ask him to recover his album since he doesn’t want to cause him more trouble? I’m not the best at characterization so I don’t know how plausible this is but, like I said, it’s an entertaining scenario. In this case, most of the rest of the first day wouldn’t happen and, more relevant for the second day, Kel wouldn’t have a reason to met Polly or let Basil know Sunny is moving away. Unless he tried to spend more time with Basil, but Basil would probably invent an excuse. Idk.

Anyways, let’s say Basil ask for his album. Kel can search for it on his own, even if he would get beat up in every fight, until reaching the church. I once read someone (don’t remember who) point out Sunny is the one who enters, so alone maybe Kel would choose to wait outside, then the confrontation with Aubrey would be not as bad. Maybe. But if it doesn’t go as badly as in the sunny route, would Aubrey decide to throw away the album? Maybe Kel doesn’t manage to get the album back. although he can be pretty stubborn, but after so many beat ups that could drain away his will and so he decides too give up for the day and try again tomorrow. Eh… dunno how in character that last is.

Well, whatever, let’s say he recovers the album. Most of the next scene at Basil’s could go the same, although Basil would keep his album, without Sunny to give it. Unless he gives it to Kel?

On the second day Kel got to run some errands. Yeah, he can do that. I think the second day can go mostly as it is… well, I admit I don’t remember much of this day.

Once at his house, he would have to invent a new excuse to not get scolded, since Sunny isn’t there for distraction. This excuse could be to give the things to his mom and then ran outside once again. Maybe. I mention this because of the next plot-point of the second day. If Kel isn’t home or hasn’t met Polly on the first day, then she can’t ask him for help to look for Basil, and then he wouldn’t go to the scene at the lake.

Without any intervention, once again things wouldn’t go as badly. Probably the hooligans would simply kick Basil out and that’s it. This would cause that the next day Aubrey wouldn’t have a reason to be sulking at her house.

But if Kel has met Polly, then the scene at the lake can mostly go the same, but Kel himself would save Basil. If the scene last less than normally, then is possible that Hero doesn’t get to see it and thus never learning it was Aubrey who did that… but I also don’t think that Kel wouldn’t complain about it, he’s pretty pissed off at her at this point so I feel it would be weird if he never mentions it.

With all these changes, I kinda think Hero’s motivation wouldn’t change much once learning about what Aubrey has been up to. I don’t remember the exact words he uses when saying he wants to talk with Aubrey, like his reasoning and all, but I think regardless he would want to fix the problem. But this is more relevant in the last day.

Next, a clear difference would be that Hero and Kel wouldn’t spend the night at Sunny’s. They would spend the night with their family and probably their mother would speak non-stop about Hero spending time with her. This is more relevant for the next day. Maybe.

The last day in the Sunny route starts with Kim going to Sunny’s house to ask for help since Aubrey isn’t leaving her house and she knows they have something to do with this. This gives them a reason to go to her house then speak a little, have her to say she will apologize to Basil and etc.

If the scene at the lake doesn’t end as badly then I don’t think this plot-point would happen. The lake scene makes Aubrey realize how harmful her actions are being, so without it, I think she wouldn’t listen to Hero if he tried to talk to her at any point of the day, let’s say if he wants to talk to her asap and the brothers spend the last day looking for her. Things wouldn’t resolve and Aubrey and Kel are still angry at each other. No one knows Basil’s grandma is at the hospital.

(as a side note, many say the scene at the lake is a parallel of the day of the recital, just less tragic, but I noticed the parallelism with this can go a bit further, with seemingly Aubrey getting pushed emotionally until she pushes back (in the sunny route at least.) From the first day her former friends cause her stress, first sunny slashes her, then he and Kel provoke her in the middle of a sermon, until it culminates in Aubrey pushing Basil into the lake.)

I mentioned the thing about Hero and Kel’s mother because this could make Hero not prioritize for now fixing the problem, maybe deciding to give some space to Aubrey and spend time with his mom. He has no idea they’re on a time limit here.

Now that I think about it, maybe Sunny’s presence motivates him to fix the problem, since Sunny is moving away but he’s gotten out of his house and there’s an actual chance for the friend group to be together again if things are fixed quick. Can’t really say because, again, I don’t remember the exact wording he uses.

Anyways, let’s say the scene at the lake happens so the last day starts the same. Can they talk and be on better terms? Ehh… maybe? Here either Aubrey still has the album or Basil has it, but either way they won’t be able to complete it, since the last photo is at the treehouse and they don’t have access to it. Since they can’t spend time with Sunny and thus don’t have to be with him on his last day, maybe they don’t have much reason to spend the day together. The brother go back to their house and Aubrey goes with the hooligans, promising to apologize to Basil later.

Although once learning about Basil’s grandma and him staying in his room, Aubrey could tell the brothers and they could still have the sleepover there. Things would still be kinda awkward, since they have’t spend that much time together amending, but I could see they saying they could spend the next days at least not antagonizing each other. Sunny isn’t there to stop Basil, so you know how that goes.

Anyways, even if they spend the day together, some scenes would be missing, namely the one at the tree-house and the one at the stump, which I think that’s the actual scene where they’re supposed to reconciliate for real, since they talk about how Mari’s death affected them and promise to be there for each other now, not committing the same mistake.

I point out this because of the actual question that led me to thinking this mess. In the Omori route, do Kel, Aubrey and Hero reconciliate? But at the end I didn’t reach a definitive conclusion, this is more rambling than analysis, so.

(btw has anyone done an actual analysis of this? I have no idea but I would like to read it. I sadly don’t have the energy to write a researched one myself.)

2- do Sunny’s parents know the full truth?

There’s lot of talk about Sunn’s parents getting to know the truth, through the autopsy of smth, and even participating in covering it, leading to the father leaving and all.

The other day I was thinking about how to write the father, and then I wondered if the parents would have a way of knowing Basil’s involvement. Like, if they only get to know the suicide was staged, maybe they would believe that Sunny did it all by himself, and this belief is what led the father to disown Sunny. Like, he could forgive an accident with horrible consequences, but he can’t forgive the cowardice leading “sunny” to do that to Mari’s corpse just to get away. The mother would argue it wasn’t cowardice, Sunny was scared and confuse, but the father would argue what kind of child had he been rising to think of that, and later decide he wants none of it. I guess this is going into headcanon territory rather than having much evidence in favor.

3- what the fuck kel?

I was procrastinating and decided the best way of doing that was to compare the rw stats of the gang. For that I put them in excel and then I played around a bit with the stuff and etc, the wonders of procrastination, and I soon realized

Basil has more health than Kel, an athlete.

What the fuck.

How??

I would say secretly buff basil canon but its not like he has that much more heart than him.

what the fuck kel how can basil have more health???

unless health in rw counts as, like, pain tolerance or how much will the character has to continue the fight??

Well, that’s all.

[2-fast-2-curious]

I Know You Wanna Go to Heaven But You’re Human Tonight

Pairing: Matt Murdock x Female Reader

Summary: Your husband and forever Valentine, Matt Murdock is working too much. You surprise him at the office but you’re the one who’s going to be in for a surprise.

Warnings: Office sex, Breeding kink, Matt talks a lot and it’s dirty, unprotected sex, pregnancy talk, discussion of contraceptives, discussions of fertility struggles, barely any clothes are taken off, IDK anything about Catholicism and that might show with the way they talk about the wedding and birth control. 

A/N: For all my lovely readers, you’re all my valentines today. I feel like I haven’t written something this filthy in a while but I had to try super hard since it’s for @princessphilly​ breeding kink challenge. Also usually I write a whole thing at once but I kept getting too turned on and had to take so many breaks because I was getting too worked up. I was an idiot and starting writing this without even checking if it was eligible but it is because its Marvel and that’s the ship I will be dying on. Also I doubt I’ll be able to finish the series before Netflix takes it off.

You had been running errands around town for most of the day but you really missed Matt and wanted to check in on him. You knew how sometimes he forgot to take care of himself when he got wrapped up in a case.

“Hey, babe. Just wanted to drop by and keep you company.” You leaned over the desk to give Matt a kiss and it still made your heart race every time he rested his fingers on your jaw.

You described each item as you unpacked your bag. “Here’s an order of pasta from our favourite place, tomato basil arancini, a salad with burrata, figs and prosciutto. I also got us some San Pellegrino. I would’ve gotten us wine but it’s a bit early for that.”

“How many people were you planning to feed?” Matt asked as you filled his entire desk with food.

“Okay, I admit, I originally had gone to Eataly in Flatiron to pick up some accoutrements for our meal and I got carried away.”

“We also have a new set of ravioli stamps so that’s what we’re doing next weekend.”

“Thank you very much, Mrs. Murdock.” Matt loved calling you that and you loved it when he did. You loved belonging to him in every sense.

“I promise I’ll try not to distract you too much, I just wanted to be close to you.” You took out a thick binder from your bag and sat down on one of the chairs on the opposite side of Matt’s large wooden desk. You had picked it up this morning by your friend, Stella. She was tired of waiting for the ‘right’ partner and decided she wanted to have a child by herself.

Matt’s ears picked up on the sound of you putting the binder down on his desk. It was too heavy to be a novel or a notebook. “What is that?”

“Stella gave it to me, she’s in the final stages of choosing a sperm donor and she wants a second opinion.” You now had Matt’s full attention.

“Well, you do have excellent taste in men.” Matt punctuated his statement with a smirk.

“You think you’re joking but you should consider selling your sperm if this whole lawyer thing doesn’t work or if we never need extra money.” Who were you kidding, you lived in New York City, you always needed extra money. “I feel like every person in the book is just you but described by a different person.”

“Care to elaborate?” Matt seeming to have forgotten about the case he was working on.

“Smart”

“Ridiculously fast reflexes”

“Funny”

“Ivy-league educated”

“Good physique”

“Beautiful eyes”

“Strong moral compass”

“Athletic”

“Honest”

“Good mouth shape”

“Owns his own business”

“Very observant”

“Tidy”

With each trait, you leaned closer to Matt, you could go on forever but your lips landed on him, silencing your list of compliments.

You broke away before the kiss could get more heated. “Matt when I came in here I promised I wouldn’t be a distraction. Now you’ve got me all worked up.”

“Some of those I don’t think are on the profiles and some of them are redundant.” Matt took off his glasses stashing them inside a drawer of his desk. “But you know a compliment is never wasted on me so I’ll allow it, babe.”

“Regardless, I think you’re excellent baby daddy material.” Your heart was fluttering as you admired your husband sitting on the other side of the desk. Is it weird to have a crush on the person you’re married to?

Matt closed his laptop and moved it off his desk. “That’s just your uterus talking.���

“What do you know about my uterus?” You were puzzled, wondering if you had said something to Matt.

“Since we’ve been together this is the first time that your body has been ovulating.” Matt paused, unsure if he should continue. “I can…um smell it”

The type of birth control you were on previously had prevented pregnancy by stopping your body from releasing eggs but you were thinking about switching to something else. Therefore, this was the first time your body was naturally ovulating in a very long time.

You felt embarrassed despite it being something you couldn’t control. Plus Matt wasn’t the type of guy who would purposely bring something like that up to shame you. “Oh, is that weird for you?”

Matt held your hand reassuringly. “Only in the sense of how badly I want to take you over every flat surface in this office.”

“I have an appointment with my gynecologist next week to try to get on something different.”

“What if you didn’t?” You almost didn’t understand what Matt was implying. “This case should be wrapped up six months from now and the publicity it could bring could mean a more flexible workload for us. It would give me plenty of time to dote on my pregnant wife and help out with the kid.”

You and Matt both wanted to have kids. You knew how heartbreaking and lengthy the struggle could be to conceive. Seeing your friends going through their various fertility journeys had you thinking about bringing it up to Matt soon but you weren’t excepting it to come up this soon. “Yes.”

“Yes, what, Mrs. Murdock?” Even though you knew Matt couldn’t see you, the intensity of his words made you shift in your seat.

“I want you to get me pregnant, Matthew Murdock.” Finally saying the words out loud felt so right and gave you the boost of confidence you needed. “Right now, here in your office on your desk and any other flat surface you can think of.”

“C’mere, babe.” Matt patted his lap. You had stopped protesting about being too heavy or big to sit on Matt like his long ago instead choosing to focus your energy on other arguments that you actually had a chance of winning. 

“I love feeling your weight on me like this.” Matt pulled you closer by your thighs and rested his head on your bosom to hear your heartbeat. His hands slipped between your legs and you lifted your hips to give him the space he needed. “You’re so desperate, turned on, and ready for me and I barely even touched you yet.” 

“You’ve just been turning yourself on thinking about me, haven’t you?” He smiled when he felt the silky feeling of your pantyhose on his rough hands. His fingers danced up your thighs until he reached your pussy.

Matt just rested his hand there feeling how hot and wet you were getting. You whimpered, bucking your hips trying to get more of his touch. “I think you need to share. Tell me what you’ve been thinking about in that pretty little brain of yours.”

You thought about last night when it was just you and your vibrator while Matt stayed late at the office. It might have been a cliche but the fantasy never failed to get you off. “I think about when you’re all sweaty from the gym, all those grunts you make. Makes me wish you would just take me on the floor. You take the wraps off your hands to shove you in my mouth to gag me, reminding me to keep quiet since someone could walk in at any moment.”

“I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of how amazing that mouth of yours is.” Matt continued to cup your pussy, his hand the perfect size to hold you like this. You loved feeling how well the two of you fit together. 

He pulled off your silky pantyhose and pushed your skirt higher above your hips. Matt’s fingers pressed against your panty-clad crotch, chuckling at the wet spot. “Such a good girl getting yourself so wet and ready for my cock. You want me to fuck you on the floor like an animal? Is that what you want? Answer me.”

Matt’s fingers dipped underneath the lace of your panties and into your wetness, rubbing you just the way you liked. “Yes, I want that. I want you to want me so badly you don’t care about the consequences and how wrong it might be.”

Matt pulled his well-coated fingers out of you, wrapping his tongue around the digits. “How the fuck do you always taste so good?”

Matt returned his fingers to your warmth. “Sorry I haven’t been home much last week. You have no idea how irresistible you are when your body is doing everything in it’s power, making you oh so fuckable. I knew once I sunk in that sweet cunt I wouldn’t be able to pull out.”

“I would’ve had to fill you up and breed you.” You didn’t realize you had been grinding yourself on Matt’s fingers until he used his free hand to stop the movement of your hips. “Probably over and over again just to make sure it takes.”

You were so touch starved it didn’t take long for you to get close but Matt pulled his fingers away from you before you could get any closer. While still in the chair, Matt cleared his desk, making space for you. He hitched one of your legs to rest of the top of solid wood desk. Matt pushed his chair away and you were preparing to feel nudge of his cock. Instead, Matt got on his knees pulling your panties completely off, taking a deep inhale of the damp fabric before putting it in the breast pocket of his jacket.

His tongue swiped languidly across your folds, moaning at your taste. “You know I adore how you taste but it’s different when you’re ovulating.”

Your nails dig into the edge of Matt’s desk as you cry out Matt’s name. “Please Matt, I’m so close.”

“C’mon baby, come for me. Gotta make sure this pussy’s nice and relaxed before I impail you with my cock.” Matt flicks his tongue against your clit, making your body shake and thrash before going limp.

Matt gets off his knees, unbuttoning his pants and pulling them down to free his erection. “You look so pretty all spread out on my desk.”

Matt’s fingers swipe some of the wetness that was dripping from your pussy to the edge of the desk. “Look at the mess you’ve made, baby.”

You heard the wet sounds as Matt used the fluid to fist the shaft of his cock. His hand goes back to your still-sensitive pussy shushing your whimpers as he gathers more of your wetness to coat his dick.

Matt comes up behind you, pressing his throbbing cock against your plush ass. “Matt, please, I need your hard cock inside me.”

Matt leans over you, adjusting himself so his hardness slides between your folds. “You just came and you’re already begging for more.” Matt whispers, in your ear as he plays with your hair. “Such a desperate cock-hungry slut.”

“I’ve thought about this every day since the last time I was inside you. Matt sunk into you slowly, allowing you to feel every inch as he kisses the side of your face.

As Matt went deeper, you whimpered, every time you thought it might be finished Matt had more for you. “I know, baby, I know it’s a stretch.”

“You’re like this every time it’s been a while.” Matt chuckles as you wiggle on the desk, wanting him to start moving. “Stay still, baby, just let me feel this pulsing cunt squeezing me so well.”

“It just can’t wait to milk my cock and take every single drop of my cum.” Matt’s thursts start slowly, his hips slapping against the flush of your ass. “You’re being such a good girl for me. Letting me inside this pussy unprotected when you’re at your most fertile.”

“I’ve been thinking about this ever since we got married.” Matt admitted. “Your dress was beautiful. I know you’re going to say that how would I know since I couldn’t see it. But I just know it was.”

Despite Matt describing one of the sweetest moments in your relationship, he started to go faster.You and Matt had a winter wedding. Your dress was white velvet, long-sleeved, off the shoulder, fitted with lace detail around the neckline and sleeves. When you chose it you made sure to pay attention to the texture and feel of all the different materials. Matt was so appreciative of this when you guided his hand over your body before the reception so he could feel everything.

You could hear the smile in Matt’s voice as he recounted that day. “I could feel the warmth radiating from your bare shoulders and neck. The way you threw your velvet sleeves around my neck when we shared our first kiss as husband and wife. I loved how the fabric clung to your hips. You were almost too beautiful, almost had to have you right there in the church.”

Matt hiked the leg that was on the desk to wrap around his hips, allowing him to go deeper. “Oh fuck, I’m going to get you pregnant.” 

Matt’s movements got more frantic, stimulating your clit on the edge of the desk. “My perfect little wife is going to look so cute with a swollen belly and tits.”

The thought caused your pussy to momentarily tighten around him and there was no way the cheeky bastard didn’t pick that up. “You like that didn’t you? You like the idea of walking around and everyone knowing what I did to you. Complete strangers knowing that I’ve claimed you and you’re mine.”

Matt’s words pushed you over the edge. “Oh fuck. Matt, I’m going to come.”

“Yeah, gorgeous? I’m close too.” Matt grunted as your cunt fluttered around him. He released inside you kissing your neck as warmth overfilled your sensitive cunt. 

Matt hugged you from behind, snuggling his head in your neck. “You did such a good job, taking me so well. I’m so lucky to have you.”

You made noises of agreement and hissed when he pulled out of you. Words felt like they took too much energy right now.

“Did I tire you out?” Matt asked as he helped you off his desk. “I guess I’ll just have to work on building up your stamina again.”

“I’ve been neglecting you and I’m sorry that I haven’t been taking care of you properly.” Matt’s snuggles continued in his chair. “I might have been gotten a bit carried away. If you want me to, I can run down to the pharmacy and pick up the plan B pill.”

“I can’t wait to have your child.” Matt fixed your clothes, wrapped you up in a throw, and helped you into an oversized armchair in the corner of his office. The quiet sounds of Matt working lulling you into an afternoon nap.

[woniepop]

feel special ༉‧₊˚✧

➜ the three times you didn’t want to be Karl’s best friend any more and the one time you weren’t

Pairing: Karl Jacob’s x Fem!Reader

Genre: fluff, best friends to lovers au, enemies to lovers au

Warnings: Mentions of bullying, cursing

Word Count: 2.0k words

a/n: hi everyone! this is my first time writing for a mcyt streamer, but unfortunately I will not be writing works for more streamers anytime soon. This is for my lovely friend basil Ly and losingvienna’s follower event, which you should definitely check out of you are in to mcyt streamers!!

I highly recommend checking @basilly and @losingvienna out if you haven’t already!!

Ever since you met Karl, you’ve hated everything about him. He was sweet, he was caring, he was everything you’ve ever wanted in anyone. From the moment he stepped foot in your kindergarten your life had become a living hell. He was great! You on the other hand, had never felt more miserable in your life. It had never occurred to you that being different was a bad thing, but apparently, to your whole kindergarten class of 26 kids, it was terrible. But, somehow, amidst the screaming kids and the poorly colored art projects, Karl only saw you.

Your fellow kindergarten classmates stared at you, perhaps a bit too judgingly, as you sat down in your seat. Feeling super excited to come to school today, your grandma has recently gotten you your very own pink sundress, equipped with a pink satin ribbon to tie a cute little bow in the back. You wanted your classmates to like you, so you had to be the prettiest you could ever be. 

“Why are you wearing a dress to school? Do you think you’re a princess?” one of the children say, rather, shout across the room. And with that, the whole class starts laughing, except you. 

“What? Are you trying to impress someone?”

“OOO Y/N HAS A CRUSH!”

“I bet it’s Karl”

“Of course it is. She just wants to daaaaaaate him, doesn’t she?”

With tears welling up in your eyes and boogers dripping down your nose, you quickly stand up just to take the hall pass and run to the nearest bathroom. It was humiliating, feeling like you had tried so hard to make friends just to get laughed at. It felt terrible. 

You were NOT excited for your first day of high school. Why would you be? It was just another year of “light hearted” jokes about you and how you were “so different.” Settling with a seat in the back, you tilt your head down only for the teacher to walk in right after. 

“Good morning, students! Welcome to your first day of Freshman Year! I’m sure you’re all very excited for these next four years, but before that why don’t we all introduce ourselves to each other!” The teacher says, in a high pitch, peppy voice. You had stopped listening to her after that. You already knew what was going to happen, you were going to be paired up with some immature male football player looking for a tall, hot, and blonde cheerleader girlfriend, then he was going to say something stupid like, “Girls like you aren’t really my type.” No shit you weren’t his type. It happened every year. Feeling a light tap on your shoulder, you force your head up, preparing yourself for the dreadful introduction. 

“Hi! I believe we’re partners for the All About Me project. May I sit here?” he says, pointing to the chair beside you. He, as in Karl Jacobs. The Karl Jacobs. The man, the myth, the legend, the boy that filled your entire life with “She just wants to date Karl. She’s such an attention whore.” With that, your eyes widen. You weren’t expecting him, nor were you ever this mad about anything in your life. You didn’t want to know anything about him, let alone do a whole project learning about him. 

“Yeah, you can sit there.” You answer through clenched teeth. 

“Thanks! I’m pretty sure we’re not going to be able to finish this within the period considering there are like 30 questions, so did you want to work on this in the library after school?” he asks.

“Sure.” You say promptly, not even bothering to make eye contact with him. 

“I believe we went to the same elementary school, but I haven’t really gotten the chance to talk to you, so I’m glad we got to be partners for this project. I’m excited to get to know you.” He says, a glint of hope in his eyes. You hated it. Was he actually being nice? To you? 

The rest of the period would have been answering all the questions on the list, but instead you guys had been side tracked, going off topic and talking about anything and everything. Putting aside your hatred for the boy, Karl seemed like a genuinely nice person. You had learned he loved gaming, which he was surprised you had a knack for as well. 

“Well, Y/n, I’m sorry we couldn’t get a lot done this period. But, I’ll see you at the library later, and maybe we can even try out that new game you talked about tonight.” He says, standing up out of his chair and leaving the classroom. Maybe today wouldn’t be too bad after all.

ONE “Move!” you say, playfully shoving Karl off of you. It was the summer before your senior year, and you would have never guessed that you, Y/n L/n, would be spending your whole high school career with the boy you loathed most, Karl Jacobs. If there was ever anything you'd ever looked forward to, it was spending every Friday night with Karl Jacobs. That fateful day at the library was the start of the best tradition ever known to man. 

“But we’re watching a movie!” Karl exclaims. 

“So? You don’t need to watch it while squishing me half to death.”

“What do you mean? Have you ever heard of CUDDLING?” 

“Cuddling has never consisted of MURDER.” 

It was always like this. Every Friday night Karl would come to your house, your mom would gush at how handsome he was while she set a plate down of whatever food he wanted, and him telling her that she was the best cook ever. This is what you’ve always wanted, right? You had a best friend, who accepted you as you were, and you him. Despite always having heartwarming and laughter filled moments with your best friend, your heart hurt. A lot. Maybe the moment was just too heartwarming, or maybe this was the universe telling you that you didn’t want to be his friend anymore. 

TWO “Hey, Karl!” she says. Ah, yes. Her. Karl’s childhood crush since what? Fourth grade? 

“Oh, um, Hi!” He replies. There it was. That dreadful pain in your chest that only grew bigger as she sat down right next to him, disregarding the fact that you were sitting right there. The way she twirled her long blonde hair, the way she leaned over to show all of her cleavage, the way she wore skirts so short you could almost see her underwear, and the way it made your blood boil and your heart hurt until you couldn’t handle it anymore. You wanted to walk away so bad, but as Karl’s best friend you should support him in his romantic interests, even if you didn’t like them. 

“So… I’m sure you’ve heard already. I broke up with my boyfriend.” she says, tracing her finger up and down his arm, making him noticeably very nervous.

“Oh, I’m so sorry to hear that. If you ever need anyone to talk to, I’m always here.” You hear him say. Of course he was always here. He was there for everyone, and he would never try to exclude anyone from his kindness. 

“I broke up with him because of you!”

“W-what”

“I want to be with you, silly!” she says. And with that, you felt your whole world go black and white. Did you hear her correctly? She wanted to be with him?

“I- I’m sorry, I can’t be with you.” 

“WHAT?!? BUT I BROKE UP WITH MY BOYFRIEND JUST TO BE WITH YOU!”

“Well I’m sorry, but I love someone else. You should’ve consulted me before you threw away your relationship.”

Did you hear HIM correctly? He loves someone? You couldn’t take it anymore and excused yourself. Yet again, you ran to the bathroom feeling the same pain in your chest only 10 times worse. You didn’t want to be Karl’s friend anymore. Not like this.

THREE “I can’t believe you’re moving to California, Y/n” Karl says as he pushes his hair back, sighing in disbelief. “You’re really going to leave me?” He continues, tears welling up in his eyes as he turns to look at you with his signature puppy eyes. 

“I have to! It’s always been my dream to go to college there!” You reply, feeling guilty for leaving behind everything for your dream. 

“But I’ll miss you!” he says, fully knowing facetime exists, and you would always visit him during breaks. 

“I’ll miss you too! But, I need to do this. Can you stay strong? For me?” you ask, cupping his face with your left hand. You had gone on one of your late night drives again, parking in an empty parking lot as you have deep late night conversations. Today’s topic happened to be college, and while it had been always known you were moving across the country after high school, the day was coming closer and it all felt too real.

 As Karl leans his face into your hand, he lets out a yawn. “I guess it’s time to go back then.” you say.

“No, I don’t want to. I have to spend every second with you until you leave.” he whines. You wanted to as well, but then, there it was. The stinging in the back of your heart. You were tired of it. You hated feeling this way. You didn’t want to be Karl’s friend anymore.

THE END The warm summer air blew past you as you and Karl sit atop your roof, staring into the distance in the comfortable silence that was there from the moment Karl got to your house. Neither of you had spoken a word but neither of you cared. You just wanted to be with him. What would’ve made the night perfect was if you weren’t getting on the plane the very next morning, moving across the country. 

Building up as much courage as you could, you said the three words you’ve been wanting to say ever since you had become friends. You were leaving, but before that you wanted more than anything else to let him know this. “I love you.” You say, causing his eyes to go wide. You… loved him? That was impossible. 

“Yeah, I love you too.” He says casually. 

“No. I love you more than in a friendly way.” You reply.

“Really? Why?” He asks in disbelief.

“I don’t know. Maybe it was because you were my first friend, but it’s definitely because you’re you. I’ve been bullied almost my whole life, and you know that. But, no matter how the world brings me down, and even when hurtful words stab me, I can smile again. Because you’re there.” You say, tears rolling down your face. You pause, before continuing on about how much he means to you. “I mean, my whole life, one moment I feel like I’m nothing at all. Like no one would notice if I were gone. But then you came! And I was so happy. Or maybe it’s cause you make me feel loved. But when I’m with you, I feel so special.” 

And with that, Karl makes no hesitation in cupping your cheeks, silently wiping away your tears. In that moment, he decides that he doesn't want to be your friend anymore either. Leaning in, he whispers, “I love you too.” before he crashes his lips onto yours.

[havenoffandoms]

After the events of TW3, Geralt feels like he doesn't have a purpose anymore. Witchers are a dying breed and Geralt is tired of roaming the Path in search for contracts. Ciri is being trained as the future Queen of Nilfgaard and barely has time to visit him anymore. His surprise daughter left the nest and Geralt doesn't know how to handle it. Jaskier suggests taking up a hobby, Yen suggests taking time off and spending quality time at Corvo Bianco. Yen is just as lost and disoriented as Geralt that Ciri is suddenly not a part of their lives anymore, but she can visit Ciri more easily and more often than Geralt.

Geralt decides to take a year off. Jaskier promises to meet him there as soon as his teaching duties in Oxenfurt come to an end. Geralt deserves some time off after all. And sunny Corvo Bianco is the ideal location for him.

Only three months into his sabbatical year, Geralt wakes up in the middle of the night at the sound of persistent knocking on his door. Loyal Barnabas-Basil is already at the door when Geralt emerges from the master bedroom, a dagger in hand just in case. To Geralt's surprise, it's Lambert standing in the doorway and what looks to be two kids hiding behind him and peeking around his legs curiously.

"Lambert, what the-"

"I have a favour to ask of you, pretty boy," Lambert announces before Geralt has a chance to speak, "found these two in Kaedwen. Their parents were killed in the war and they've been roaming the streets since. Miss Mischief here was trying to make off with my horse."

A young girl with dirty blonde hair and bright blue eyes cowered behind Lambert almost as if she worried Geralt would strike her for her actions. Geralt offers her what he hopes is a reassuring smile.

"And does Miss Mischief have a name?"

"Sophie," Lambert answers for them, before pointing to a scrawny boy with light brown curly hair and the same blue eyes as his sister, "and her younger brother Aaron. Can they stay here for a while?"

"You're leaving us?" Sophie asks with a wobbly lip which had Geralt's heart aching. Gods, he was growing soft in his old age. Lambert looks down at the girl and kneels down with a sigh. He gathers the kids closer and stares them straight in the eye as he speaks.

"I promise I'll come back for you, kids. I just need to get some supplies from Beauclair and meet a friend there. Geralt is my brother, he'll keep you safe. Right, Geralt?"

"You've nothing to worry about," Geralt promises as he steps outside and kneels behind Lambert to be at eye level with the two kids, "I promise I'll keep you safe."

Geralt ends up taking in Sophie and Aaron, and for the first time in months his heart feels full again. The kids take to him instantly. He teaches them some basic sword moves, lets them groom and briefly ride Roach and spends most day playing wit Sophie and Aaron. Lambert returns a week later with Aiden in tow, who turns out is not dead, and Geralt can finally meet the Cat witcher who seems every bit the good man Lambert made him out to be.

"What's the plan, Lambert?" Geralt asks his brother that evening when Aiden is tucking Sophie and Aaron into bed and telling them the story of how he got his eye-patch.

"We'll travel back to Kaer Morhen in the spring probably. It's safe there for them. Thought we could stay here for the winter? It's warmer and so much nicer than a dusty keep."

So Geralt ends up with Lambert, a Cat witcher and two kids at Corvo Bianco. He writes to Eskel explaining the situation and inviting his brother to join them at Corvo Bianco. Of course, the invitation doesn't fall on deaf ears. Eskel turns up at the start of winter with a young girl going by the name of Aurora trailing behind him. The first thing Geralt notices are the horrific burns on the girl's legs.

"House fire," Eskel explains as he tries to coax the very shy girl to step closer to Geralt, "She nearly died from her wounds but I took her to a healer and she survived. Wouldn't leave my side and, well-"

"Let me guess, she's got you wrapped around her little finger already?" Geralt finishes for Eskel, earning a sheepish smile from his brother.

"She's a sweet girl. Won't cause much trouble."

Aurora and Sophie become friends quickly after that and Geralt heart is even fuller wuth love for the stray children his brothers brought home. Since good things usually come in threes, it's Jaskier's turn to show up at the beginning of spring with a young boy in tow.

"Kye, this is my dear friend Geralt," Jaskier introduces without ceremony, "and dear heart, meet Kye. He ran away from the orphanage in Novigrad and the horrid matron chased him all the way to my house. I couldn't let this woman take him back, she was loud and shouty, and she reeked of cheap booze, Geralt. So I made Kye my apprentice, and-"

"Just come in, Jaskier," Geralt sighs but there's a fondness to his gaze when he winks conspiratorially at Kye.

"Oh, thank you dearest witcher, we shan't even be a bother I promise you."

Geralt fills Jaskier in while Kye gets acquainted with the other kids. Aaron is thrilled to finally have a brother to play with. The two boys are inseparable from the minute they meet each other.

And Geralt?

Geralt finally has a son. Kye. The witcher pulls Jaskier close and places a soft kiss on his lover's lips, his heart nearly bursting with love for his family. When Ciri and Yen return to Corvo Bianco some weeks before the start of summer, they both fit right into the domestic bliss that is Geralt's life and the white wolf couldn't be any happier if he tried.

Retirement wasn't so bad after all.