#I fear there's a hole the shape of the main story in my work

[canisalbus]

I say this in the best way, but your characters feel like they're from an obscure but really good piece of media, and you feel like the artist who always draws the two main characters as ghay lovers

.

[dailydemonspotlight]

Day 16 - Queen Mab

Race: Night

Alignment: Neutral

April 11th, 2024

Irish folklore is a strange rabbit hole to plunge down, filled with legendary heroes and strange villains, but the story of Cu Chulainn, the protagonist of the Ulster Cycle, is one that has always caught my interest. This story was the originator of many a trope, many a book series, and its main antagonist, the menacing Queen Medb, is an incredibly fun example of a femme fatale and a warrior queen.

Medb was the queen of the kingdom Connacht, a woman who had many lovers and was famous for her promiscuity... and trickiness. Cunning and ruthless, and with a propensity for manipulation, she served as the ultimate enemy of Chulainn, at first trying to seduce him with her daughters until eventually realizing that the plan wouldn't work, likely due to Chulainn's fealty towards his wife (or, alternatively, his asexual swag.) According to irish folklore, Medb could also be very, very similar, if not the same as Medb Lethderg, goddess of sovereignty in the irish Kingship of Tara.

Medb came to power in the story 'Cath Bóinde,' wherein she was born under the care of High King Eochaid Feidlech, a man who was purported as having killed the former king to take his place. Medb was married off to the king of Ulster, Conchobar mac Nessa, and in spite of them having a daughter, the marriage soon fell apart. They left, yet Medb held a grudge, and seeing that Eochaid had given Conchobar another one of his daughters, Medb went ballistic. She slaughtered her while still pregnant, leaving the child to be born via a medieval C-section. The king of Connacht was also desposed of around this time, and Eochid put Medb back in her rightful spot, now as Queen of Connacht.

After all of this, several marriages and kids, and a rise to power, Medb felt on top of the world. In her bloodlust with all of the power she gained, she soon grew jealous of her husband being richer than her... albeit only by one bull's price. Since the person who held onto this bull, Dáire mac Fiancha, rejected her offer, she went to take it by force, landing her in her first major conflict with the wandering teenaged warrior Cú Chulainn.

Ever since this very first conflict, their storied rivalry encompasses many a tale, eventually ending in Cú Chulainn's death, in which the warrior ties himself to a stone to keep fighting, even as his life comes to an end. I'll go more into this in the future during my Sentana/Cú Chulainn analysis, but needless to say, Medb's involvement in the Ulster Cycle makes for a fascinating deep-dive into Irish folklore.

As far as her design goes, the epithetical Warrior Queen has a rather strange appearance in the SMT series, almost appearing like a punk rocker such as a member of KISS- albeit with much more color. However, I have a personal theory as to why this may be- and it all has to do with cultural perceptions.

Queen Medb was seen as deviant, a cruel woman who rose to power with her own overwhelming strength, and while she was a bastard, a bit of the hatred felt towards her could be due to a sort of misogyny common in the middle ages. This is all purely conjecture, of course, but a controlling and domineering woman could've been something seen to be feared...

Much like how punk-rockers were seen as satanic in the 90's. During the satanic panic, a lot of people outside of regular circles were ostracized as being demonic in some way, shape, or form. Metal bands were especially targeted by this moral crusade, and it may just be where the influence for her design came from!

Past my own pet-theory, though, the rest of her design is rock-solid. A helmet-esque mask, steel breastplate, and long blade all play well into the 'Warrior Queen' quality she's well known for, and her gloves appear as snakeskin or even latex at first glance, playing into her domineering and controlling role. All in all, while Queen Mab wasn't my favorite demon at first, the research into her folklore has led me to finding an all new appreciation for the Ulster Cycle's main antagonist.

[dranna]

contents: description of body horror(?) how you call it, description of mutated creature (aka Voldemort), Writing exercise: Voldemort

a/n: I haven’t read all the books and I’m not planning to do so. I got through till order of the phoenix and it was already a battle on my side. I hate the books and Harry’s character, I’m sorry. So if there is something not making sense canon vise here or any of my future writings, that’s why.

One of the things that always strikes me as odd, that Voldy isn’t that scary(?) or gruesome as the main villain of the story. Based on the things we learn about him, we never see much of his actions. I think his character would’ve been more interesting if we see more horror fuel stuff from him … or just him to do anything .I also imagine him looking more reptile like and terrifying.

English is still not my first language

drawing is by me :D

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An eerie feeling froze the blood in the participants' veins, as they heard the sound of naked feet tapping on the dark, marble floors. The patting was mixed with the sound of skales flowing on the shiny surface, omitting a low hissing ring.

The Malfoy manor was silent, even more so than usual. An unnatural stillness covered the building from top to bottom. It felt like the house was sick to its bone, trying to sweat its uninvited guests out.

This stillness was thick like fog, and was silently screaming into their ears.

The halls were dark, only illuminated by flowing candles, which lended the naked legged creature an even more haunted look. It was a stretch to call that being a man, because he wasn’t. Not anymore. He tossed away his humanity long ago, when the first part of his soul got torn out from his chest and shoved into an object.

Killing, consuming, ruling.

More power, more fear in hearts, more torment in minds.

The Dark Lord was walking slowly towards his ‘throne’ at the end of the long, gloomy table.

His cold figure casted a long shadow on the dark void of the floor, making it look even more ghostly.

He appeared as a mutated skeleton in the huge chair, swallowed by the fabric of his long, inky cape. His spider-leg-fingers lacked any meat or muscle, there was only paper thin stretched skin on the bones. As their gaze anxiously traveled up on skinny arms and on clothing, they saw a wretched neck first, not leaving anything to imagination. Every artery was bulging out, mercilessly working to keep the creature amongst the living, fueled by dark magic. The veins created an uneven surface of his porcelain skin, sticking out then diving back into bones.

When their eyes got used to the view of their horrific embroidery, they met with The Eyes. They sat deep in the dark holes of the reptile skull. They were glowing with a reddish light and burning with an icy flame. They lacked any kind of warmth that illuminated the orbs of men, they rather hid well contained violence and the enjoyment of other’s pain. His pupils were two lines as if a snake, cutting the red irises in half. Their look was hard and cruel, expanding in a cat-like manner when seeing something innocent breaking.

The shape of his skull tossed away the resemblance of a human’s, it borrowed the build of a reptile. If possible, the skin became even whiter and thinner than on the hands, in some places forming skale like growth around the eyes and mouth. The flesh of his nose has rotted away, leaving two empty holes in its place. The jaw extended, became longer and wider, bearing many shark-like teeth, with 4 huge fangs. The tongue became long and V shaped, having the ability to smell for prey.

There he sat at the long table, Nagini twirling around his neck and hissing something into his elf-like ears, smiling spine chillingly at his audience.

“Malfoy, why don’t you introduce me to your son?”

The voice that broke the silence was low, almost a whisper, but ran through the hall clearly. It was a strict sound, not tolerating anything but full obey of its orders.

The scarlet irises turned towards a young man, with shiny blond hair, pale face and big, gray eyes. He was wearing nothing but black which made his nervous paleness sickly.

“Perfect” - hissed the Lord while rotted away lips twitched into a terrifying smile, showing his huge sharp teeth.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Tagging: @giosnape

[eyndr-stories]

THE SQUEAKUEL (Epilogue)

So!!! I wound up writing the epilogue to 'I Think I Smell A Rat' out nice and proper after all lol here it is! And I'm making this a little series because I would be happy to write more of these silly robots if yall have requests! Yall seem to enjoy being a nifty little robot rat doing rat tasks and making exceptionally tall friends ^_^

Send requests / prompts to me here on Tumblr or yell at me on Ao3 (LINK TO THIS EPILOGUE ON AO3 RIGHT HERE BTW). Consider this epilogue a little intro into the 'after the story' mini stories i'm hoping this will be??

If i do get any requests (or if I ever get an idea of my own i'd like to write :P), I'd write and post them each as their own standalone in-universe chapter! The idea is to have it so none of the chapters are required reading for any other chapters, so each chapter is sort of its own standalone little scenario, and I'll write up a brief little description of the chapter in the summery or beginning notes or some such hooplah, so yall know what each little story is about. Does this makes sense??? I sure hope so lmao

That's all if I even get requests :P either way, enjoy this silly and super chill little epilogue! <3

Things To Know:

Not a lot lmao this is all chill fluff. You and your rat friends play board games with Sun and Moon ^_^

Also if you don't know how to play checkers. Now you do lmao

Friendly teasing between you and Moon

This is an epilogue so a few things and bits of dialogue might not make sense if you haven't read the main story. I'll do my darndest to have potential request chapters be standalone stories but still in-universe!

I am so so sleepy please tell me if I am missing important things here I will amend as soon as I wake up dfhkjghkf

Epilogue

     "TINY FRIEND!!!"

     The mouse hole shaped wall port had barely closed behind you before you were spotted. Sun was barreling across the daycare towards you, although this time around you were not fearful, but actually very happy to see him.

     Before you could even blink out a 'hello' from your tail light, you'd been scooped up and now the world was rushing by as Sun twirled. He finally paused to press you to his face plate.

     "Muah! Muah!!" Sun said, bumping his ever constant grin against your noggin a few times. "Moon told me everything!! I can't believe it, you really fixed everyone and found your friends and saved the day and OHHH I'm SO sorry if I caused you any trouble when I had that virus! I can't even remember what happened after I went in for repairs… I wasn't mean to you was I?! I'm so sorry tiny friend I didn't mean it!!"

     You quickly waved your tail light directly in front of Sun's eye, finally cutting off his rambling before he could get too upset. "Do not worry. Nothing too bad happened, and I'm not upset with you."

     "That's good!!! I'm so relieved!" Sun let out a massive sigh and plopped down onto the padded daycare floor. He cradled you in his hands, holding you up at eye level. "I hope Moony wasn't too mean to you either, he's such a grump sometimes!"

     You quirked your head to the side in amusement. "Oh, he wasn't so bad."

     "Good!! So what brings you back here so soon, tiny friend??"

     Sun flattened his palms out a little, and suddenly your pathfinding program was working again, deciding that Sun's hands were a decent enough surface to read. While you'd gotten pretty used to hanging out in hands, having your pathfinding working properly was something of a relief. You relaxed into Sun's hands and explained.

     "Well, if you recall, I did promise to play a game with you once everything else was taken care of. I also told Moon I'd play a game with him as well. I'm not sure how much time we have until your daycare opens…"

     "OHHHHHHH!!!" Sun's whole frame rattled and his slippered feet tapped excitedly on the padded floor. His sun says sprang in and out. "YOU WANT TO PLAY GAMES WITH US?!"

     You didn't have a chance to reply before Sun had sprang to his feet again, already twirling before he'd even stood all the way up.

     "That's SO GREAT tiny friend because!! The whole building including the daycare is closed for the day!!! So that means we can play games ALL DAY LONG if you want!!!"

     "The building is closed?" You did your best to focus on Sun instead of the world spinning madly around you.

     "Yeah! The staff said that they have to clean some things up, and management wants them done by the end of the day so we can open back up again tomorrow. So that means we have the whole day to play games!! You could even invite your friends if you want!!!" Sun finally stopped spinning, though his sun rays kept swaying from side to side.

     You thought about trying to convince at least your nest mates to come and play games with Sun. Might as well give it a shot, right?

     "Okay, I'll send a few of my friends a ping. They might be busy though. Is there a game we can play just the two of us in the meantime?" you asked.

     "Oh boy oh boy there sure is!! I'll take you to the game shelf!" Sun dashed back across the daycare, still holding you carefully. He rounded the edge of a play structure and weaved between child-sized tables with their chairs neatly tucked under them. He stopped at the wall, where one very long shelf spanned the length of this little back area. There were several cubbies and boxes of toys lined up along the wall below the shelf as well.

     "There's lots here we could play with two people! Hmm but what would be okay for a tiny friend to play…? Maybe a board game with small enough pieces? Cards might be too big for you to handle…" Sun mumbled mostly to himself as he paced along the length of the shelf, eyes scanning over colorful boxes.

     You were a little intimidated by the amount of games here. You'd never played any of them before of course, and didn't have the first clue as to how they worked. "Is there something simple we could play?"

     "Something simple… oh, would you like to play checkers??" Sun held you carefully in one hand and grabbed a smaller box from the shelf with the other.

     Encouraged by the more manageable size of this game's box, you agreed.

     Sun happily carried you to the nearest table, letting you hop off his hand so he could set up the game. "Usually I would discourage a friend from standing on the table, but I think I'll give you an exception!" Sun joked.

     You watched as Sun unfolded a colorful square board with a black and red checker pattern painted on its smooth surface. He explained the rules as he placed twenty-four plastic disks one by one in the board's squares.

     "So we each get twelve pieces, you see how half are black and the other half are red? We each get all of one color. Black gets to go first, and since its your very first time, you can be black!" Sun finished setting all the black disks in their proper places along your half of the board, then started setting the red disks on his side. "We take turns making moves until one of us wins the game! You win the game when your opponent can't make any more moves. This usually happens by capturing all of the other player's pieces."

     "All I have to do to win is take your pieces?" You eyed the disks. They seemed like they wouldn't be difficult for you to lift, and they had groves along their rims that you suspected would make them fit very neatly on top of each other for easier carrying.

     "Yes, but there's more rules!" Sun went on. "In order to capture an opponent's piece, one of your pieces has to leap over the opponent's piece and land in a straight diagonal line on the other side. The square you land in has to be empty. Like this!" Sun took two pieces to demonstrate, one of yours and one of his. He carried his piece over yours, setting it down in a black square on the other side of your piece, then placed your piece on the table next to the board. "See, and now I've captured your piece! The pieces must always move diagonally, and forwards. Unless the piece you move is a king!"

     "Wait, what's a king?"

     Sun set the pieces back in their proper places and explained that any piece that reached the other end of the board would become a king, and a captured piece would be placed on top so that the piece was twice as high as a single piece. Kings could move both forward and backward.

     Sun explained a few more rules, like jumping over more than one piece at a time, winning by blocking in all of an opponent's pieces, and pieces making a non-capturing move only being able to move one square. When you were ready, the game began in earnest.

     You eyed the board and all its neatly positioned pieces. There were only a few pieces you could move right at the start, so you stepped carefully between disks and picked one at random, sliding it to the diagonal square up and to the left of it with a paw.

     Sun took his turn, mirroring your move, then looked back up at you. You moved the same piece again, sliding it up and to the right. Sun tapped the bottom of his face plate thoughtfully, then moved a piece at the end of his first row forwards.

     Back and forth you went, moving pieces around for a while before you managed to capture the first piece. You'd been so excited to take the first piece that you didn't realize you'd hopped your little disk right into trouble, and Sun captured it immediately after.

     "Whoops." You thought more carefully about your next move while Sun swayed happily from side to side.

     As the game went on, you wondered if beating Sun was even possible. Sun probably had the right programming to calculate the best possible move, to plan several moves ahead. Sun had been built to play games with kids all day, whereas you'd been built to execute tasks with immediate response. You were struggling to plan more than a single move ahead.

     All your life it had been 'go here, complete task'. 'Get part, repair item'. Simple, straightforward, not much planning beyond making sure you didn't make your way too far out of your designated repair zone. If there was any sort of 'planning ahead' needed, usually you'd ping your shared network with the other rats and work together to work out a plan. Like with the new charging shifts to prevent another 'virus' fiasco from occurring, the network was buzzing in the back of your mind with discussion of who would get what shift, if rats all in the same nest should have different shifts or the same shifts.

     You got an idea as Sun captured another one of your pieces. You pinged your network with a low priority message, drafting up a somewhat complicated question.

     "You sure are thinking hard over there! Are you still having fun, tiny friend?" Sun asked.

     You turned your attention back to him, realizing you'd been staring down at the board for a while now, processors whirring hard. "Oh, yes! Apologies." You received a few pings back in response to your message. You excitedly moved a piece forward into position.

     "No worries! I'm glad you're having fun, I'm having fun too!" Sun made his next move without much delay, skirting one of his disks further along the edge of the board.

     You put a second piece into position, sliding it into danger. Sun took the bait, capturing your piece and unknowingly creating the perfect opening. Gleefully, you used the piece you'd set up earlier to hop over three of Sun's pieces in a row.

     "Woah!! What a good move!" Sun gasped.

     You happily hopped in place, being mindful not to bump any pieces on the board. With that move you'd evened the playing field between you and Sun.

     You informed the network of the success and sent another message, asking for further assistance. More rats replied this time. Gradually, as the game went on, you had nearly every rat on the network strategizing with you, and you were giving Sun a run for his money.

     "Gosh, you really picked this game up fast!" Sun scratched at his forehead with a finger, staring down at the board. "Oh boy, looks like I'm in trouble…"

     It only took a few more moves for you to win the game, with the help of the other rats. There was delighted chatter all across the network as you made the winning move, capturing Sun's final piece.

     "Wow!! You won, great job tiny friend! That was really fun!" Sun exclaimed, clapping happily.

     "Thank you!" You pranced in a little circle on the board, then climbed atop a king piece. "We won!! That was fun!"

     "We?" Sun tilted his face plate curiously.

     "Me and the other rats. I asked them to help me with planning ahead."

     "You mean I was playing against all your friends too??" Sun put his hands on his hips. "If I'd known that I would have adjusted my difficulty setting!"

     You looked at him blankly for a moment. "You mean to tell me that you weren't even trying very hard??"

     "I always set my difficulty setting lower when I play a game with someone for the first time! That way the game is fair, because people don't have as much fun when the game isn't fair," Sun explained.

     "Oh." You thought about that for a moment. "Was it unfair of me to ask all the other rats for help?"

     Sun answered with a kind and patient tone. "You can always ask for help from your friends! But not telling me made the game a little unfair. If you like to play that way then that's okay with me! There are lots of kids who have fun playing that way, and I don't mind! I just like to play. It's always good to ask first though if the other players want to play that way too!"

     "I see. Okay." You nodded in understanding. "I would like to play fair. I apologize for not telling you I had help winning."

     "That's okay, tiny friend! No hard feelings!" Sun lightly tapped you on the head between your little ears. "Would you like to play again??"

     "Yes," you answered immediately. The onslaught of low priority messages from the network asking you for more strategy questions ceased as you informed everyone you were playing again, and you were met with a new onslaught of delighted messages. "My friends are all excited to play again too."

     "Really?! That's great!!" Sun bounced excitedly as he made quick work of resetting the board. "Tell them they can come play with us anytime!! I've got lots of games, you know. OH, and speaking of excited friends… Moon really wants a turn, if that's okay??"

     "He does? Sure!"

     Sun laughed. "He says to tell you that he's definitely NOT excited, it's just that you did tell him you wanted to play a game with him and he just doesn't want you to be sad."

     "Right, of course." You watched as Sun stood up from the table and took a step back. "Maybe you two could take turns throughout the day?"

     "Yeah, that’s a great idea!!" Sun paused, then went on. "Moon agrees! Okay, here we go, lights off!"

     Immediately, all the lights in the daycare turned off. The darkness fell in a comforting blanket over the room, and your eyes immediately clicked over to a lower light setting. You watched with interest as Sun and Moon made a much more dramatic adjustment. A few yellow panels slid back to reveal blue waiting underneath, and small hatches opened to change out Sun's scarf with Moon's capelet, storing the spare costume piece away in a little compartment on their chest. Their face plate spun, latching onto Moon's nightcap as a smaller compartment closer to their neck opened, little magnets snapping into place and holding the cap to Moon's head, pulling it out of the compartment. You weren't sure what happened exactly to their pants. The fabric seemed light sensitive, the low light causing a different pattern to become visible, long bright stripes vanishing to make way for a starry pattern that matched Moon's nightcap.

     The whole transformation took only two seconds, and then you were faced with Moon, who focused on you at once.

     "Tiny terror," Moon greeted.

     You waved your tail at him in greeting. "Tall terror."

     Moon's face plate spun as he crouched down on the other side of the table. "Did your friends help you come up with that little nickname?"

     "That one was all me," you assured.

     "Good. Because unlike Sun, I have far less tolerance for cheaters." Moon waggled his finger disapprovingly at you.

     "I didn't mean to cheat!" you insisted.

     Moon 'tsk'ed at you and folded his arms. "Mhmm. Sure.”

     Moon chuckled quietly, and you had a feeling he was just messing with you. “Are you going to antagonize me all day or would you like to play a game?”

     “Who says I can’t do both?” Moon reached across the table and gave you a poke. He picked up one of the game disks and idly spun it over his knuckles, plastic ‘tik-tik-tik’ing over metal. “I’ll tell you what… since you’ve got your entire little rat crew backing you up, why don’t we try a game with a tad bit more strategy?” Moon flipped the disk into the box, then started picking up the other pieces.

     “What game?” You tilted your head at Moon, both cautious and curious.

     Moon reached into the box and took out a a taller game piece maybe half your height, carved to resemble a horse.

     “Chess,” Moon said, setting the piece in front of you. You had a feeling he’d be grinning even if he could have altered his expression beyond his eternal grin.

     Turns out, chess was a lot more complex than checkers, although it’s still played on the same board. Moon explained all the rules in detail, and then preceded to obliterate you in the first match, even with your friends helping you out. As you’d feared, he was very good at this game. Now you and the other rats were all getting the hang of it though, and the next game was more evenly matched as you all learned quickly.

     You were still struggling because relaying the state of the board and possible options each turn was taking a lot of processing power. The other rats were having a hard time keeping up as well, though everyone seemed to want to help out regardless.

     All of a sudden, you found a large number of rats ceased responding in the middle of the game. Figuring they’d finally gotten tired, you resolved to just do your best to finish out the game.

     “What’s the matter? You seem worried i’ll win by a landslide once again…” Moon moved his remaining tower only one space, and you peered suspiciously around the board, trying to see what kind of trap he was setting.

     “Hush you, i’m trying to concentrate.” You paced around the board, eying all the pieces. You had to admit, you were in trouble. Moon had a few more pieces in play than you, and both his king and queen were still well protected.

     You didn’t realize Moon’s face plate had been spinning until it stopped abruptly.

     “What is that… noise…” Moon straightened up, lifting his face plate up high to peer around the darkened daycare.

     A moment later, you heard it too. You immediately knew what it was. It was the sound your tiny metal paws made when you scurried over the padded floor of the daycare, only multiplied by fifty.

     No sooner had you placed the noise did you see its source. Rounding the edge of the play structure behind you was a small wave of metal rats, scurrying in a group towards you and Moon.

     “What the-?” Moon got to his feet, eying the rats warily.

     You were happy to see your friends, and a few quick back and forth pings dispelled your confusion at seeing them here. “They say they are here to play the game!”

     “Ah, they want to play in person? I suppose that doesn’t make much difference to me.” Moon shrugged. “You won’t all fit on the table, though…” Moon gently lifted the board, keeping all the pieces on its surface steady. He moved it to the floor beside the table, and all the rats immediately gathered around and started chatting excitedly back and forth in your shared network.

     You hopped from the table to one of the chairs tucked in around it, then dropped to the ground. Once you joined your friends, you shifted your attention to the strategy unfolding in the network.

     With your friends able to see the board and all its pieces, strategy discussion was much smoother and quicker, not to mention easier on your processors. In just a few moves you’d managed to turn the game around, and now you had Moon on the ropes.

     There were no more quips and jabs as Moon focused, puzzling intently over the game. He made some very good moves, but in the end you and your friends won the game. You toppled Moon’s king with a paw, declaring checkmate.

     Moon huffed and grumbled as you and your friends cheered and danced around the board.

     “What a fun game! That was great!” you told Moon.

     “I suppose I did have fun. Even if I lost to a bunch of rats.” Moon sighed. “Well, since you’re all here, would you all like to play a different game or would you like to keep playing chess?”

     The rats all chatted excitedly. More games?? What other games could there be??

     At your request, Moon listed off a great number of games, none of which you’d played before. You weren’t sure what games would be best for a whole group of you to play.

     “We could all play tag?” Moon offered.

     The rats all sounded interested, still excited from the previous games. Moon explained the rules, and everyone agreed to give it a try. You looked around at your group of friends and noted there were several more than there had been at first. You checked the network and found a low priority location ping with a unique task type labeled ‘GAMES’. The range request was set to ask every rat in the plex to come help with this ‘task’.

     “I will be it first, just to show you all how it’s done. Now, i’m going to count for thirty seconds! Remember, no hiding in the walls or outside of the daycare. I’d also stay out of the ball pit if I were you, I don’t think any of you would be able to get yourselves out of there and it’d be a pain to have to fish you out.” Moon swept his gaze over the assorted rats, hands on his hips. “Ready?”

     You spoke for everyone, stating you were all ready. Moon sat down and folded his legs, then slapped his hands over his optics and started to loudly count.

     You and the other rats scattered, creating a sound almost like soft rain against the outermost wall as dozens of tiny paws scurried over the padded floor.

     There were so many places to hide, you weren’t sure where would be best. You’d be well hidden in a pile of plushies or amidst those big colorful foam blocks, or you could try and climb up into one of the play structures… but you had no doubt Moon would look in any and all of these places. You needed somewhere he wouldn’t think to look…

     You paused in your tracks, swiveling your head back to Moon. He’d just reached fifteen seconds. All your friends had made themselves scarce; you spotted ends of tails dashing around the edges of slides or under toys. You turned back around and ran right back to Moon.

     Moon was sitting hunched over in his typical looming fashion. The end of his nightcap just barely reached the floor.

     You reached Moon with five seconds to spare. Carefully, as gently as you could, you grabbed hold of the end of Moon’s cap and pulled yourself up until you were around halfway up the cap. You managed not to jostle the bell, and Moon seemed none the wiser. He finished counting, and stood up.

     “Ready or not, here I come!”

     The world rushed by in a blur, and you found yourself way high up off the ground, clinging to the backside of Moon’s cap. It occurred to you then that this might not have been the safest idea you’d ever had, but it was far too late to back out now.

     Moon chuckled quietly as he started to stalk around the daycare, tiptoeing around and sweeping his gaze back and forth. He really hadn’t noticed you…

      Absolutely delighted with your success, you watched on as Moon started to track down your friends. He plucked them from toy piles and cubbies and slowly amassed a collection of rat friends in the middle of the room.

     Moon paused after a few minutes to study the found rats. “For some reason there seem to be more rats here than what we started with…”

     One of the rats informed Moon how many rats were left to find. You did some quick math and realized nearly three fourths of the entire rat crew was here in the daycare playing games. With the plex closed for the day, there must not be that many tasks to do.

     Rat by rat, Moon combed his way through the daycare. Soon he only had a small handful of rats left to locate. He eyed the rats congregated in the center of the daycare, all of them watching him stalk around with amusement.

     “Hm. Still haven’t found tiny terror yet…” Moon swiveled his head back and forth.

     You swung with his cap, glad you didn’t have a voice box because if you did you were sure you’d be giggling.

     A minute later, Moon had found every rat in the daycare besides you.

     “Only one left!” one of the rats helpfully supplied.

     “Yes, i’m aware.” Moon tapped at his chin thoughtfully. “There’s not many places left to hide…”

     Moon stalked the length of the daycare once more. You held tight to his night cap, little paws locked firmly in place in the fabric.

     “Where in the world…” Moon muttered.

     “Only forty-three seconds left!” another rat flashed.

     Moon grumbled to himself. You responded to a few amused pings. The other rats could see you very well and were commending you on your hiding place.

     Moon scaled up a play structure and cast one last desperate look around, hoping his vantage point overlooking the whole daycare would grant him some insight as to your whereabouts. He was unsuccessful.

     Several rats started flashing their tail lights. “Time’s up!”

     Moon heaved a sigh and climbed back down. He put his hands on his hips and looked around. “Alright tiny terror, where could you have possibly been hiding?!”

     You swing your tail around and tap it against the back of Moon’s head. Moon jumped and spun around as his sensors picked up the touch. You flew with his cap, remaining out of sight behind his head.

     Carefully, you climbed down Moon’s cap just far enough to kick the bell at the end. Moon straightened at the noise, pausing for a moment. Then, slowly, he spun his face plate around until you were dangling in front of his chest. He tilted his face at an angle and rotated it the rest of the full 360 degrees, causing his hat to dangle in front of his face. You found yourself suddenly very close to Moon’s eyes, which were studying you intently.

     “…I’m mad because I can’t even say this is cheating,” Moon grumbled.

     You tapped your tail against his pointed nose, amused at his despair.

     “You’re very lucky you’re cute, tiny terror.”

     “This means I win, right??”

     Moon sighed. “I’ll let it slide just this once. Yes, you win.”

     Delighted at your success, you found yourself not minding at all when Moon plucked you disdainfully from his hat and deposited you on the ground with your friends.

     Moon crouched down in front of the crowd of rats. “Okay, Sun is demanding a turn. Try not to miss me too much while I’m gone.”

     The rats all chatted excitedly. Very few of them had ever even seen Sun before. Everyone knew Moon of course, but not his more cheerful other.

     You bid temporary farewell to Moon, and he took a step back before declaring ‘lights on’.

     Before you knew it, Sun was back, and he was beyond delighted to be greeted with an army of tiny friends to play games with. He won over the good graces of your friends nearly instantly with his endless optimism and promise of more games.

     The day went on, and Sun and Moon taught you and your rat friends all kinds of fun games. A few of your friends came and went, some sticking around for some games and leaving for others. You stayed the whole day, only leaving briefly to charge before hurrying right back. You knew you’d eventually have to return to your tasks, but for now you were free to play games with all your friends and have fun.

     You found yourself marveling at how wonderful your life had become. Not that it was even bad before, you do still enjoy your tasks! You just never knew how absolutely wonderful it was to be surrounded by all of your friends, everyone safe and happy and having fun together. Despite the stress of last night, everything really had turned out alright, and it seemed to you that this outcome was more than worth it.

     You pulled yourself from your happy musings. Another game was about to begin, and you weren’t about to miss it for the world.

[uwuwriting]

Kids getting their quirks w/ Todoroki, Deku and Bakugou

Request: *cracks knuckles* uH may i pls have a headcanon for half half bastard, deku, and king explosive murder when their child’s quirk manifests? have a great day (or night lol) iajsmsjsnsk :D 💕- anonymous 

Okay my baby fever isn’t over but now I know the main factor. Apart from my new obsession with dad Nanami, my period is also here so yay. I’m in pain. SO let’s feed my baby fever even more with some pro hero dads bc I love them and cherish them. Nanami is still ruling my heart though. Love ya💖💖💖

masterlist II rules

warnings: babies!!!!, domestic au, dad au, fluffy, no warnings really, unless it causes you baby fever so beware of the baby fluffs.

Todoroki Shoto

-Baby was called from the daycare because the twins teacher couldn’t control their quirk manifesting. 

-Daycares are ready for quirk manifestation but someone hurt Rei and Ren kinda exploded and they couldn’t control the fire. 

-Rei got startled and her ice blocked both toddlers from the outside world as they were now existing in their own little igloo. 

-He panics because he fears that they hurt themselves or each other by using their quirks. 

-Scenarios of them attempting to hug each other, a habit they’ve had since they were wittle babies, and burning their skin or causing frostbite. 

-He rushed to their daycare, paperwork long forgotten on his agency’s desk as he stormed inside the classroom the small ice barrier splitting the room in two making his heart skip a beat. 

-Motioning to the teacher to leave he approached the block of ice, touching it with his left hand watching the ice melt as he finally spotted his two little girls, huddled together in the furthest spot of their igloo, trembling in each other’s arms. 

-Shoto ducked inside, slowly approaching them as they untangled from each other and rushed to him, meeting him half way in a crushing hug. 

-They both sobbed in his chest as he rubbed their backs. 

-Shushing them he tried to get a coherent story out of them but the only answer he managed to pry from them was a jumble of sorries and sobs.

-Picking them up, he asked them where their stuff was and after getting everything he excused all three of them and left the daycare, leaving a now melting igloo for the staff to clean up. 

-Back at home he managed to get them to calm down completely and made them something to eat. 

- “It’s alright, you protected each other like we’ve taught you. Your quirk activating is not your fault so stop blaming yourselves.” 

-They didn’t seem very convinced and they reminded him of himself back in high school, when he wouldn’t accept his left side as part of himself. 

-Hugging them close once again he left a kiss on each of their little heads, blowing a raspberry on their cheeks making them giggle at the feeling. 

-He loves the sound of their laugh. 

- “You have no control over your powers and that’s okay. Me and mommy will help you with that.” 

-Deep down he was proud of his girls. 

-They didn’t lose complete control and Rei managed to minimize her ice from coating the whole classroom. 

-He was so happy to have these two little things as his kids. 

-They truly were his world. 

- “I’m so proud of you my little snowflakes.”

Midoriya Izuku/ Deku

-He thought his son was quirkless. 

-You were quirkless, he used to be quirkless so the logical thing was for your kid to also be quirkless. 

-Nope you were wrong. 

-Turns out he took after his grandma and he has a form of telekinesis. 

-Nothing really strong since both of his parents are biologically quirkless. 

-It was triggered while you were all chillin in your living room. 

-Izuku was scribbling something in one of his notebooks while your son was playing with his hero figurines on the floor. 

-You were watching kitchen wars. 

-Izuku’s phone started ringing and he shot up to get it, sending the notebook and pen flying across the room. 

-You were ready for the inevitable crash but it never came. 

-Looking up you saw both the notebook and the pen, levitating a few inches from the floor a slight green glow surrounding them.

-You were shocked looking back and forth from your four year old to the levitating objects. 

-Izuku was still talking on the phone and hadn’t realized the revelation that was being displayed in the living room. 

-Finally the call was over and he stepped back in, letting out a fucking SQUEAK when he saw his son using his quirk. 

-That was enough to break his concentration and the items clattered to the floor, your toddler looking back at his father with huge green eyes, chubby hands reaching out for him. 

-In a flash Izuku was on his knees next to the little boy, hugging him so close you thought he couldn’t breath. 

-He peppered his chubby face with kisses, praise pouring from his lips like rain as he raised the four year old into the air, baby giggles filling the room. 

-You joined them on the floor taking your fill of baby Midoriya pampering before looking at your husband, tears flowing down his cheeks. 

-You hadn’t seen him cry ever since your son said his first words. 

-And even then you couldn’t blame him, his first word was dada who wouldn’t cry? 

- “He has a quirk! Oh my god he has a quirk!” 

-Izuku brought both of you into a hug, crushing you to his chest as he kissed both of your foreheads. 

- “Thank you thank you thank you.” 

-It hit him like a truck how lucky he was to have you both. 

-A beautiful wife who loves him for who he is and not for his fame *like many other pros had warned him about* and a son who adores him and asks for daddy every second of the day. 

-He didn’t care about a quirk.

-He was scared that his son would also get bullied if he didn’t have one. 

-Right now everything was perfect. 

Bakugou Katsuki

-If you asked him he didn’t want your son to get his quirk yet. 

-If he did that meant that he grew and he wasn’t his wittle baby anymore. 

-Your son was playing with his uncles outside while Katsuki was setting up the barbeque. 

-He was simultaneously holding your one year old and you were having a heart attack seeing your baby so close to a fire but you trusted him. 

-Your son was laughing his ass off as he was chased around the table by four grown ass adults. 

- “Be careful around the table.” 

-The fact that all five individuals said yes mom terrified you. 

-Heading back into the kitchen you only managed to reach the sink before a scream pierced the air and in a flash you were back outside, scanning the yard for who got hurt and where. 

-Then your eyes landed on your son who had a hand outstretched in front of him, smoke leaving his small palm while Kaminari was laying face down a few feet away from him, a groan leaving the pro hero as a palm shaped hole was etched on his shirt. 

-Everyone was silent as they stared at your four year old, eyes wide in awe at the sheer force of a singular explosion. 

-The person who broke the silence was Kirishima who let out a loud woah snapping all of you out of your stupor .

-Bakugou looked at you, pure disbelief in his gaze as his son turned to him. 

- “Dad I’m just like you!!” 

-You swear in his daze he almost yeeted your baby over his shoulder. 

-In one swift motion your son was in his other arm being swung around as their laughs synced into one. 

- “Hell yeah you are.” 

-Joining them you ruffled your son’s hair as you kissed his cheeks, a deep scarlet blush painting his plush cheeks as he hid his face in his dad’s shoulder. 

- “Bravo bud!” 

-Sero was next with the praise followed by Mina and Kaminari who also whined about his Hawaiian shirt being ruined. 

-For the next hours Katsuki didn’t let him go. 

-Didn’t want to let either of his kids go but it got kinda hard with the whole barbeque being his responsibility. 

- “We can train together, and work at the agency and go on patrols and…” 

-As your son rambled on about the things they could do now that he has his quirk, you looked at your husband, a soft smile plastered on his features. 

- “He will never stop needing you Katsu.” 

-You whispered as you kissed him softly on the cheek, catching a glimpse of a single teardrop leaving his eye before he quickly rubbed his face on your shoulder. 

- “I know.”

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[thesehauntedhills]

I feel sorry for ghosts. They are us. I see them on the sides of the roads where their car accidents were. I see them at corners of buildings trying to scare people who cannot see them. I hear them crying, screaming, hollering their words of desperation. Ghosts are people who decided they will go no further, the reasons are real to them. One person will not cross over because he killed someone, he believes hell is waiting. Another did not believe in a higher power, he thinks he will become nothing. A woman was ran over at a party, she is still there running back and forth trying to get someone to drive the nonexistent car off her nonexistent body. After the body is buried we walk away leaving the deceased to figure it out. They scramble from loved one to loved one trying to get them to see them, to acknowledge that they still live. I see them losing their shape, without a body to conform to the ghost cannot keep track of their image. First thing to go are facial features and finger nails. Ghosts do not see their reflections in mirrors anymore so their eyes become too large or their mouths become a hole. The ghost realizing it is dead will stop being active and just stand and watch the world go on. Some will have family members come for them and they will leave. I have seen others surrounded by family trying to get them to realize their new state holding their hands over their ears saying "NO, your not real I'm imagining this, I will wake up soon". The way you approach the thought of death determines whether your transition is smooth. Older people accept and cross quickly. Young people that died by alcohol or drugs will be still wasted not comprehending they have passed. In the end a ghost only has so much energy to work with. Haunting starts by the ghost who finds out humans give off energy that can be sucked away. While we sleep energy pours off us ghosts use it to recharge. Ghosts can be hurt or disrupted by us. We have the ability to shatter a ghost and make them reform slowly over years. A house over the years catches the energy of the inhabits that live inside it, a ghost uses the energy to build itself. There are entities that prey on ghosts using them as batteries to further their needs. Guilt and fear are the main reasons a person will not cross over. We as humans do not talk about what happens after we pass. We are more than we can imagine. We are eternal. Thank you for reading my stories and theories. I hope to give hope to those suffering through this type of activity. More to come.

B

[niqhtlord01]

Humans are weird: Boarding enemy ships

( Don’t forget to come see my on my new patreon and support me for early access to stories and personal story requests :D https://www.patreon.com/NiqhtLord )

“Repair teams to deck gamma, reports of coolant leak.” The intercom blared as Vistesh sprinted down the corridors. A sudden shudder through the ship sent him and his repair team sprawling into the wall and knocked several off their feet while the warning klaxons sounded off. “The Avalon cannon is offline until it is repaired!”

“Hull breaches on decks beta and sigma!” A new voice cut in over the captain.

As Vistesh stood once more to his feet he could note the subtle note of fear in the announcer. He turned to see his team still sprawled out along the corridor like discarded dolls.

“Get up now!” Vistesh shouted as he grabbed the nearest team member, Yarvin if he remembered right, and hauled him to their feet. “We were meant to be on deck gamma five minutes ago!”

“But the hull breach-“ Yarvin began before Vistesh cut him off and grabbed his repair kit. “One job at a time Yarvin; we will worry about the breaches later.” Before Yarvin could reply Vistesh was already off running again to deck gamma.

It was hard to believe that a mere thirty minutes ago he had been calmly sitting in the mess hall when the enemy fleet had seemingly dropped out of sub space right in front of them. He still wasn’t sure who they were fighting but the shatter impacts he felt after the battle calls rang out across the ship told them that whoever they were they had enough firepower to put up a decent fight against a Goliath cruiser.

Rounding the final corner Vistesh near went head first into the subzero coolant pooling around the floor. He looked up to see the coolant pipe had ruptured above the corridors ceiling and had spilled out, catching two crew members in it and freezing them into horrifying statues. The coolant was fed into the main energy guns after discharge and meant to instantly dissipate the thermal energy.

As the rest of the repair crew arrived Vistesh had donned his energy gauntlets. He planned to activate them to project an energy barrier that would stop the flow of coolant and allow the team to reseal the pipes. He was just about to activate the gauntlets when the intercom cried out again.

“All hands, all hands, brace for impact!”

No sooner had the words left the intercom did the entire ship jolt sideways violently. Vistesh was quick enough to grab hold of the corridor wall for support but several others from his team were not as lucky and went flying into the coolant pools. He looked away as their gut wrenching screams of pain were cut short by their body’s flash freeze.

It was in that moment he saw Yarvin being tumbling over into the coolant and Vistesh lashed out with his free hand. Grabbing hold of his work uniform he hauled backwards with all his strength and pulled Yarvin away from the freezing liquid just in time.

The shaking subsided and the two straightened themselves. Yarvin was about to say something when he stopped and looked down the passageway they had entered from.

“Do you hear that?”

Vistesh lifted his pointed ears and listened carefully. At first there was nothing but the sounds of warning klaxons ringing out from farther down. Yet as he listened closer he could hear something different; the sound of scraping metal on metal.

“It sounds like a cobax drill.” Yarvin remarked as he took several steps back to listen more clearly.

“Must be the other repair teams,” Vistesh said as he finally activated the energy gauntlets and stopped the flow of coolant, “they must be repairing one of the breaches nearby.”

Yarvin turned to him with an uncertain look upon his face. “Would you use a drill to fix a hole?”

Before either could further ponder the drilling sounds continued to grow louder and closer, until finally the noise was right on top of them. Vistesh put his hand against the wall to feel the vibrations just as the corridor exploded outward and his world went black.  

For what felt like an eternity Vistesh was lost in a void; fully aware of his surroundings and yet at the same time incapable of making heads or tails of anything. He slowly blinked his eyes open and saw a world of swirling colors and shapes. As the corridor stopped spinning he noticed that there was no longer a corridor at all.

The way they had come in was now blocked off by a large boring like device that filled the width of the passageway.  Coated in the blackest metal, the strange machine hissed as several smaller openings appeared around the perimeter of the machine. From these openings shot thick foam like substances that coated the walls around the machine and Vistesh watched as the foam rapidly expanded to form a thick seal. Once the foam ceased being shot out a portal opened at the front of the machine and a pillar of light emerged from it.

Vistesh covered his eyes and saw several similarly black clad figures come sprinting out of the machine.

He barely had time to see the glint of their helmets before the figures brought up their weapons and fired.

“Decks gamma through sigma are reporting hull breaches from the last volley.” The communications officer called out to his captain as she continued to monitor the tactical display.

“Deploy energy barriers to seal the breaches at once!”  

It was the voice of the second in command who spoke up, striding across the bridge from one terminal to another; all the while Captain Obra sat in her command throne and watched the unfolding battle outside her view screen.

The human ship had pulled alongside them and unleashed a seemingly devastating broadside before peeling off to evade Obra’s circling escorts. Yet as the damage reports filtered in from the decks painted only minor hull breaches that could easily be sealed off with internal barrier systems. She was just about to order her ship to come about and chase down the human vessel when the communication officer was shouting again to her.

“We’ve just lost communication with repair teams one and three.”

“Where were they located?”

“They were responding to hull breaches on gamma deck.”

“Have teams four and six report to-“ Obra was cut before she could relay her orders as more reports began filtering in

“Repair teams four and six on are not responding to hails; last known location deck delta.”

“Deck delta?” Obra queried. “I’ve not heard any damage reports for that deck.” She turned to her internal security officer. “Bring up the video feeds for deck delta.”

The security officer nodded and quickly typed in several keys before a mini monitor appeared along the main screen. Several of the bridge crew who glanced at the screen audibly gasped while even the captain herself stood up.

The feed was coming from a security camera of delta deck showing entire hallways littered with the broken bodies of repair crewmen. Gaping holes in their chests, limbs blown clean off, and walls stained with a thick series of purple blood stains.

“What could have caused that?”

She heard her second in command utter the words and yet in the back of her mind Obra had a dark suspicion growing. Having served in her planets militia forces for her early military career, she was all too familiar with close range weapons damage.

“Show me Charlie and Beta decks now.” She ordered her security officer who quickly responded with more key inputs. The camera feeds cycle through various corridors, rooms, and junctions on the decks until Obra found what she had dreaded.

The camera feed showed a repair team working on power junctions on deck Charlie. One of the crew turned their head to look at something off screen before recoiling in horror. Shortly afterwards their head exploded in a shower of blood and gore and off screen several bright flashes could be seen as the remaining repair crew tried to flee but were gunned down.

Moments later several black armored figures came sprinting down the corridor. None of them broke their stride as they casually turned their weapons on the injured repair crew and opened fired. One of the figures paused and looked upwards at the camera. They were covered in some form of armor from head to toe with a series of optical sensors covering their face giving them an almost insect like appearance. Before Obra could get any more details the armored figured raised their weapon and shot out the camera.

“Energize all barriers and seal off Beta and Charlie decks now!” Obra shouted as the camera feed went silent. “I want all dispatched repair teams to decks gamma through sigma to halt and seal off their areas as well!”

She pulled out the communicator from her command throne and switched it to ship wide broadcast. “All hands, all hands! Remain where you are and seal bulk heads to your sections. Enemy forces have boarded our ship. I repeat; enemy forces have boarded our ship.”

Nearly slamming the communicator back down Obra entered several keys herself and brought up the video feeds from the decks surrounding the breach points. Many were offline but the ones that still we retransmitting painted a grim picture.

The human boarding teams had breached several decks and were spreading out quickly; killing anyone they came across without hesitation.

As the feed continued to cycle Obra spied a group of boarders making their way to engineering.

“Seal of section Q-37 now!”

At her command the security officer activated the energy barriers and sealed the corridor; trapping the human borders inside.

“Yes, we got them!” the officer cheered.

“That is only one group,” Obra’s second counter, “who knows how many more are onboard.”

While the two were talking the captain leaned forward and inspected the humans. The lead one brought up their weapon and shot at the barrier. It was a primitive weapon that fired metallic cylinders while harmless to the energy barriers entrapping them could easily cut through the exposed crew.

When the weapon fire did not free them the seeming leader of the group motion forward another and pointed to either side of the corridor where the energy barrier met the wall. The new human rushed forward and placed two strange rectangular objects on each side and then all of them took several steps backwards when the screen lit up and the feed went dead.

“Energy barriers have been disabled at Q-37!” the security officer confirmed. “Enemy is nearly at engineering.”

“Ma’am!” Obra turned to see her second seemingly petrified. “We have reports of fire fights breaking out along the gunnery decks and at the entrance to life support!”

“Damnit!” Obra’s rage could barely be contained. “They’re targeting key systems of my ship!”

“By that logic wouldn’t their next target be-“

Her second was cut off by the sounds of weapons fire from outside the bridge.

[comehomeducklings]

Present [Part 1] (Obsession)

A/N: Please don't copy, redistribute, and/or post my work on this site or any others. This has taken my time and creativity to come up with the story's characters and plot.

Also, I swear my writing gets better. It's a little rough right now but I'm planning on rewriting them.

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6

Tom Riddle's Moodboard

Main Character's Moodboard

~////////////////𓆙////////////////~

1943 ~ 6th year

No sound above whispers could be heard throughout the great hall. The food on the table hasn't been touched by a single hand. The very thought of eating churning all our stomachs. Not during these times. Our heads turn every now and then, afraid of what might sneak up behind us. The death of Myrtle and others has shaken the entire school. A murderer is among us, trust is such a foreign concept now.

Dark purple eye-bags lay beneath every single student's eyes. No one is allowed to go home for the holidays. They aren't allowing us to leave, we are stuck in this cloud of darkness and uncertainty. No owls are supposed to be sent out. As the head girl, I'm responsible for every student's life and responsibilities. I have to know where everyone is at all times. It gets tiring at times, but necessary nonetheless.

A nightly routine consisted of all my dormmates huddling around each other. No sleep would come to us all night. We wouldn't move from the same spot until light shown from the windows. Our beds are all pressed together in the farthest corner of the room from the door. Our wands never leaving our hands in case of danger. Every little sound made from the outside provoking us. Even to the point of going mad. Potions used to stay awake, slowly wearing off as the morning arose. No sleep, we can't afford that luxury anymore.

I would leave the dorm to wait at the portrait for our assigned house professor to come. They would tell me it was safe for everyone to head to the great hall to get breakfast. As soon as they were done I quickly went to everyone's dormitory to wake them up, if they even slept at all. I would then inform them that it was safe to step out of their dorms. After everyone got situated I would have the students form a line and lead them towards the great hall. 1st-3rd years would occasionally hold the folds of my robes. Fearing that when they blink I would be gone. Leaving them alone to deal with the dangers that lurk in the school.

Not once have I lied about how they are going to be all right. That would be cruel. These students don't seek pathetic nurturing words, they want a protective force watching over them. So many clubs and activities have been canceled. Hogsmede and quidditch proving as a prime example. No one complained though, quidditch players too afraid to even step out of the castle's walls even if they were allowed.

Back to the present, I hold my good friend's hand as she slightly shakes from anxiety. I can see it in her eyes, the doubt of making it alive eating away at her brain. The spark once present in her shiny green eyes being blown out. Amelia, her name being. She's been biting her nails again, to the point where it had bled. This can be backed by the dried-up blood that is present at the tip of her finger's nail.

A booming voice can be heard, "You are now being dismissed to head to class, your houses head girl and boy will be assigning the group you'll be heading off with."

First period has been removed from every perfect and head's schedule. During this time we search the whole castle for any wanders. We make sure everyone is where they are supposed to be. If someone got lost or went to the wrong class we escort them to where they need to be.

After every class, students have a limited amount of time to get to their next lesson. Although, perfects and heads get more time to make sure everyone is where they are needed quickly. Then we hurry to our class after scanning the halls swiftly.

The once safest school of the wizarding world giving birth to the dark ages. More bodies have been found littering the schools. Most of them not found until their ghosts appear before us. Every single one not knowing how they died. Like the murderer is invisible upon meeting the victim. I originally suggested it could have been done by poison. When the bodies were checked, no traces of poison had been traced.

Professors have been waiting for the person who is responsible to slip up, to give us a clue. I don't think that will happen though. The process of these killings has been too thought out and well planned. I wouldn't be surprised if these mass killings have been planned months before, even maybe years. I've been talking to the ghosts to try and gather all details, even the potentially useless ones. When our headmaster made us heads keep tabs on everyone, the killings stopped for a short amount of time. It was like the mastermind was creating a way to best us, to get past the "little inconvenience." It didn't take long for them to find the weak parts in the plan.

What we have got though, is that every single student killed has been a muggle-born. A classic case of an unfair stigma around the poor wizards and witches. They never were able to catch a break. Amelia, one of my close friends in the friend group. She's a muggle-born, hence the shaking of her hands. I've been keeping a closer eye on her, she doesn't leave my side. She comes on my patrols so I can keep her in my sights, with of course the permission of the teachers. There are only two times that I can not watch over her. Those two times are covered by my other friend Devyn, a pure-blood. She also helps keep her safe, not letting her go anywhere by herself. The two times are because she's in two different classes than I am. One of them being a study hall.

~////////////////𓆙////////////////~

"Professor, how will this class help us now? Reading teacups for predictions should be the least of our worries right now," a student at the back of the room exclaims.

"The said predictions could lead us to the future before it happens. Our worries lay exactly what will happen in the future. If anything, this is one of the most important classes we'll take this year," I say, continuing to read the teacup.

"Precisely, thank you. Now go back to studying, I'll be coming around to view your interpretations."

My tea leaves look more like a blob with a cross going through them. A weirdly shaped blob. I already know there is a cross, but what about the blob? I tried shaking it a little, looking at the leaves from different angles. I already crossed off a club, falcon, and the sun. It could be an acorn, but I see a slight hole in the blob.

Could it be...

"A skull that is." I jump at the sudden voice near my ear. My teacup almost falling from my grasp.

"Pardon, a what?"

She points towards two holes in the blob, one of them I just mentioned, "I saw you already found one hole, there's the other. How it's shaped could be a little difficult to see since the cross is through it, but it's there."

The professor takes the cup from my hand and lays it on her desk. Some of my classmates look at me in curiosity, but they soon lose interest and go back to their own tea leaves.

A cross and a skull, that sounds about right to how my school year is going so far. I scan my book to see exactly what they mean.

A skull, danger in your path.

A cross, trials and suffering.

"What d-did you find?" A Hufflepuff boy to my right asks.

I don't want to scare the poor boy, he's already frightened enough as it is. If my future got around to the school, everyone would start being concerned about me. I'll barely get any of my duties done if I didn't already get it taken away for my safety. Last thing I need right now is even more panic.

"Nothing much, the future is still a little foggy."

"That's, um, good. I couldn't really read mine either," he chuckles lightly, almost seemingly forced.

Our professor claps her hands together, "Class is dismissed, read up about your predictions if you haven't already. No homework today."

I gather my books and push in my chair. Right before I could reach the door where other students are waiting, the teacher stops me.

"I'll have to tell the headmaster about this, I shouldn't keep it a secret."

"No, please don't. If you must, only tell Albus. I can't have this messing anything up, I'll become vulnerable."

The professor looks around the room, her eyes wandering franticly. I'm sure I am asking a lot from her. I really need her to keep this a secret.

"Oh alright, you're my best student. I just would hate to see anything happen to you. I'm informing only Albus to see if he can keep an eye on you."

"Thank you so much, I swear I'll be careful." A huge weight is lifted off my shoulders. I can't be worrying about my future when I have to worry about everyone else's.

I leave the classroom and start heading to my next class. Potions have always been one of my favorite classes. Mixing a bunch of toxins into a pot is a specialty of mine. I'm quickly scanning the halls for any wanderers, making sure everyone is at class. My feet take me to Potions in a hurry. I don't want to miss much, trying to make the class as informational as possible.

"You shouldn't be running, you still have 3 minutes of checking the school."

It's always him, I even tried changing routes to avoid him. His idiotic smirk, thinking he actually did something. All he did is waste my time and train of thought.

"I'm allowed to run Riddle, it's not a rule. I already checked the halls I was assigned, did you?" I really have no energy for this.

Tom peers down at me, somehow still wearing that infamous smile. Eyes bright, filled with mischief and knowledge.

"I have, double-checked as well. I'm sure you only checked once. Such irresponsible actions, I still wonder how you nabbed the head-girl spot."

I choose not to answer, not giving in to his baiting. Does he think I'm that stupid? That easily bothered by a simple test of my patience.

"You could have just said you wanted to walk me to class Riddle. No need to be shy with me."

"Shy, a concept I would not know of. Might as well bring you to class, since I'm heading there myself. Wouldn't want you to be in danger, since you consistently prove you can't handle a simple check of the hallways."

"I told you Tom-"

"Once is not enough, you should know that by now," he interrupts me, feigning a sudden serious facade on.

We start heading towards Slughorn's room. I'm a little behind his figure. Mostly looking down to make sure I don't step over his feet and fall. He sometimes walks with me, very confusing if I may say. Hating my skills, probably still hates me. You can often find us arguing if we are ever partners in class together. The usual game we play, how many questions can we get right by the end of class. Last time he won by one point, my sour mood not helping the atmosphere.

"You look rested, more than me at least," I smile tiredly. My whole body slightly sagging forward from exhaustion. He looks as proper as someone could be. His skin is a little pale though, brighter than usual. Almost like he was sick, his eyes look darker too. More sunken in, the shape of his skull more prominent. His looks still annoyingly well presented.

"Yes, you do look rather tired. I see other things have prioritized above your looks."

This man, the audacity of this man. The only reason I'm not at the top of every class. Our number 1 student count being evenly split. I have to bite down on my tongue forcefully to not say anything back. I'm too tired to truly come back with anything witty, so I choose to save myself from the embarrassment. Instead, I slightly step on his robe on the ground causing him to trip up a little.

He quickly sends a warning glare my way and then continues walking. I smile slightly, knowing even if it was petty, it was worth it.

Riddle doesn't even hold the door for me when we walk in. Causing it to slam dangerously close to my face.

"There you two are, I was afraid you weren't going to make it," Slughorn exclaims excitedly. "Turn your textbooks to page 246, we are going to learn how to make a Polyjuice potion!"

I glance at Tom, his eyes only focus on the words before him not realizing my gaze is on him. I wonder if he'll make this a competition as well. Knowing him, as well as me, anything but competition is out of our character. He looks up catching my eyes, I tilt my head. Trying to silently communicate from afar.

His head turns to Slughorn, then back to me. He nods his head and that's all it takes for both of us to come to an understanding. Whoever can answer the most questions, and create the best potion gets bragging rights.

I don't intend to lose.

[forasecondtherewedwon]

Only in a Sitcom

Fandom: WandaVision Pairing: Darcy Lewis/Jimmy Woo Rating: T

Summary: Darcy has no idea what the hell’s going on with this WandaVision thing, but neither does Jimmy. It’s kinda fun to have somebody to binge-watch alternate reality TV with.

read ch. 1 one / 2 two / 3 three / 4 four / 5 five 6 six / 7 seven / 8 eight / 9 nine / 10 ten 11 eleven / 12 twelve / 13 thirteen / 14 fourteen 15 fifteen / 16 sixteen / 17 seventeen / 18 eighteen

this fic is now complete!

Darcy, Jimmy, and Monica have been working their way across Westview in as straight a line as possible, knocking on every door in every cute little cul-de-sac in their path. It was Jimmy who asserted they should never put their backs to a dangerous situation, but Monica who overruled that statement, pointing out that they were more likely to stay focused if they didn’t keep staring at the fight in the sky.

Darcy thinks they were both right. There’s a tingle rippling up and down the back of her neck, like she gets when she’s up in the middle of the night, spooked by shadows her anxious, overtired mind is too eager to turn into monsters, but the heebie-jeebies give her the energy to work quickly. She takes on an entire crescent on her own, readying people for a departure she’s certain they’ve been longing for. As she’s coming out the crescent’s other end, she realizes the Hex is getting brighter; the red storm clouds are being sucked back into themselves to leave a thin daylight.

Standing at the corner, she watches Jimmy and Monica emerge from the street opposite. Darcy jogs over, wincing. Wanda could’ve put orthotics in these Escape Artist boots. They’re blistering her feet.

“This has to be a good sign, right?” she asks, motioning to the calm skies.

“Look,” Monica instructs. She jerks her chin and Darcy and Jimmy follow her line of sight to see Wanda, Vision, and the twins coming up the main road.

Darcy gasps.

Wanda’s gone from bumming-around-the-house sweats to battle-ready chic. With her armour-like bodice, gloves that leave those magic fingers free, and an usually-shaped tiara framing her forehead, she’s both intimidating and otherworldly. But she’s smiling. Darcy would call it a sad smile and it hurts her heart to see it, even though she doesn’t understand.

As Wanda passes them with her hand held fast in Vision’s, she turns her head to nod at Monica. It’s in her eyes too, the same thing that’s in her smile. Something tired but present. Gone are the comedically darting glances of her persona as the bumbling new girl in town and the frazzled energy of a mom trying to corral a couple of superkids. It looks like she’s finally letting go of the illusion/delusion.

“Can we do anything for her?” Jimmy asks as the family continues on down the middle of the street.

“No,” Monica says. “The rest is for Wanda to do on her own.”

“We might as well head back towards the center of town,” Darcy says. “We don’t need to waste time at the edges. They’ll be the first to wake up.”

She points to where the Hex is shimmering on the horizon. The seconds pass and the shimmer looks messier, a weave of overlapping wires fritzing with energy. The edge is coming closer, but unlike when Wanda pushed the boundary farther, closing it around Darcy and her S.W.O.R.D. nemeses, this isn’t menacing. Wanda’s powers are no longer looking to consume more territory, they’re contracting. Faster than the incoming wave of the walls, the Hex goes dark. The red glow is intensely magical in the sudden night.

The three of them fan out, hitting the houses in their new route, and make their way back to the town square. They’ve been telling everyone to remain in their homes until they receive further instructions to evacuate, but Darcy spots a figure on the sidewalk by the department story. It’s Agnes, except… not as they saw her lately. No wild hair or billowing, layered outfit. No levitation. Darcy’s wary in the face of the woman who appears so much like her former self, the one supposedly under Wanda’s control. This Agnes has a damn Peter Pan collar poking out of her sweater! She couldn’t look much less threatening.

“What do you think?” she asks Monica when she joins her.

“I don’t know.” Monica peers across the street at Agnes in the dark and when Agnes notices, she flashes a wide smile.

“Well, maybe we should— Hey, no, wait!”

But the Captain strides across to meet Agnes. Darcy almost follows in her idol’s wake, but she quickly remembers that Monica has powers to protect herself that far exceed the right hook Darcy used to drop Agent Handcuffs. Whatever Agnes’s deal is, Darcy knows she’s an entirely different kind of beast from an asshole S.W.O.R.D. agent.

“What’s going on there?” Jimmy wonders, coming up beside her.

Thanks to the stress of trying to speak to as many citizens as possible in a short amount of time, including looking dozens of people still under mind control in the eye and aching for their lack of agency, the fear of and for Wanda as she witnessed that clash in the sky, and, really, the car crash that’s still pretty recent, Darcy reacts to her boyfriend’s presence by wrapping her arms around him tightly. With his tie pressed to her cheek, she feels him hug her back.

“I don’t know,” she says, carrying on the conversation without pulling away an inch, “but Monica’s finding out.”

“Agnes looks like an average Westviewer again. It’s disconcerting.”

“She must’ve been faking right up until she went head-to-head with Wanda.”

“And now she’s one of them for real.”

“Seems like,” Darcy agrees.

When Monica returns to confirm Agnes’s newly mind-controlled status, Darcy peels herself most of the way away from Jimmy, leaving her arm around his back, beneath his FBI jacket. He rests his arm around her shoulders.

“I don’t know what we do with her,” Monica says, hands on her hips. “We can’t undo what Wanda did, but do we leave Agnes here in Westview, trusting that she isn’t able to hurt anyone? Do we bring her in?”

“If it’s beyond our power to help her, maybe we just leave her here,” Jimmy suggests. “Wanda knows where she is, so we let Agnes stay in a place she can be found when or if Wanda decides to release her.”

“It’s tricky,” Darcy says slowly. “Agnes is capable of doing so much damage, and I’m sure she’s going to get good and angry while Wanda has her trapped inside herself. You and I know how that feels,” she says to Monica. “But that Agnes is secure—as far as we know—inside Sitcom Agnes, like little Agnes nesting dolls. I don’t know if this is the kind of punishment she deserves for pushing Wanda to the brink, but I do know it’s not going to be pretty if that inner Agnes is unleashed with nobody around to mitigate the consequences.”

“Sentient Weapon Observation and Response Division,” Monica says softly.

“Hmm?”

“S.W.O.R.D. That’s what we’re supposed to stand for. I think, without Tyler Hayward around, it’s high time S.W.O.R.D. went back to its roots of trying to understand exceptional people, circumstances, and technology instead of just attacking them.”

“Sounds as though you might have a plan, Captain,” Jimmy says. Darcy glances at his face and catches his small, knowing smile.

Monica beams back.

“The former Director may have kicked me off the base, but I’m still S.W.O.R.D. and I still believe in my mother’s original goals for the organization.”

“Hey, it’s your legacy,” Darcy says. “You have my vote for Director.”

“You want to put Agnes under S.W.O.R.D. observation?” Jimmy asks.

“Not just Agnes. Not if Wanda’s willing to listen.”

With the sky rapidly lightening, Monica roughs out a plan that involves a partnership between S.W.O.R.D. and Wanda Maximoff. A partnership because any other dynamic would surely fail. After what they all witnessed today, it’s obvious that someone as powerful as Wanda can’t be held against her will. In exchange for Wanda making reparations to the people and town of Westview (not the least of which will be repairing all physical damage, which Monica knows Wanda’s capable of, since there’s no longer a Monica-sized hole in her living room wall) and an agreement to be held in the custody of S.W.O.R.D., under the leadership of Director Monica Rambeau, Monica thinks she has plenty to offer Wanda.

“You think she’ll do that deal?” Jimmy asks.

“That’s my question too,” Darcy says. “I mean, without the deal, Wanda can go where she pleases, right?”

“But she’ll be alone,” Monica counters. “We know what her loved ones mean to her. That’s what all this has been about—Wanda doing whatever it takes in order to go through life less alone.”

“What can you give her?”

“Vision,” Jimmy says abruptly. “The other one, the one who left. You think he’ll be back.”

“I think he’ll want answers,” Monica agrees. “Whatever Hayward did to him, he did at S.W.O.R.D. and I’m betting that Wanda will see that’s her best chance to reunite with Vision.”

“Vision will come back,” Darcy says, putting it together, “and Wanda will be there waiting.”

“And in the meantime, we use her expertise as we continue our work in a… more transparent vein. Give her access, keep her busy.”

“Keep her happy,” Jimmy cuts in. Monica nods her acknowledgement.

“Yes. Show her what it’s like to help people again. What better way to remind her there’s more to the world than her artificial paradise than to have her consult on the work we’re doing in space?”

“If you need somebody to sell Wanda on the space angle, I’m your girl,” Darcy volunteers.

“I’ve already had some ideas about that,” Monica promises with a smile.

Her eyes focus beyond Darcy and Jimmy and they turn to see what she’s looking at. Black hood drawn up over her head, Wanda’s walking back into the downtown. Alone. Darcy hopes that the fact that she’s black-hatted doesn’t mean she’s already decided against working to redeem herself to rejoin the good guys.

“You better stay in touch too,” Monica tells Jimmy, shifting as she prepares to intercept Wanda.

“If you reach out to Darcy, I’m sure I won’t be far,” he says. Darcy’s heart performs quick, happy thumps.

With that, Monica walks purposely towards Wanda. Darcy watches her cautious body language and Wanda’s tension in response to being accosted, but there isn’t any visible escalation. When FBI vehicles and the team Darcy assumes belongs to Major Goodner roll up the street, Wanda doesn’t flee. Darcy looks to Jimmy.

“You better go take charge,” she suggests.

He gives her a bashful smile.

“I will in a minute. The evacuation should run like clockwork after all the prep we did. With the Hex removed, everyone’s free.”

“They’re free, I’m free…”

“Are you free Saturday?” The smile’s a little slyer now.

“After all this, I don’t even know what day of the week it is,” Darcy admits, “but yes.”

He laughs.

“What are you thinking?” she asks, twisting to face him as his hand moves from her shoulder to her waist. “Quiet night in watching TV?”

“You know, I think I need a break from TV for a while. How about a movie?”

Darcy grins.

“You buy the tickets, I’ll buy the snacks?”

“Deal,” Jimmy says, and smiles against her mouth when he ducks his head to kiss her.

[acid-vanir]

Ok, Theory

Ok so in the webcomic Aurora, the “main” character Kendal is an entirely new uncategoriseable entity, a god’s incarnation that survived the god leaving it and developed its own mind and personality. 

Now the god that this happens to is the hero god of the city Vash and, like the Ancient Greek Eros or Nike is named after his domain. So what we know about Vash is that he cut his teeth in this god business by defending his city from and defeating the storm god Tynan, the way he does this is explained here with an in universe telling of the story. What we know is that an alien metal and jewel was worked into an incarnation of Vash at a thematically appropriate moment and became an extremely effective power up, enabling Vash to defeat the hitherto undefeated Tynan. 

Now how this works in the world built magic system of Aurora is really interesting. So in Aurora it appears they're are two (or eight depending on how you count it) fundamental substances of magic, the elements and soul energy, now we know where elemental magic comes from as a central piece of lore in the main storyline so far has been about the ancient war between the elementals and a Void Dragon and how the elementals died defeating this Void Dragon and their bodies meshed together supplying the materials as the world, but the elements still count, and can be persuaded to act, as one body essentially unique to the other elements and so because they belonged to a living entity with a soul can exist in two states, the material element and a sort of potential/soul element held in other materials or channeled by mages to enact elemental effects.

 Now soul energy is something very different and despite the excessive amount of time I've spent explaining the elements, is what we’re focusing on here. Soul  energy is what living things are “made of” being literally the material of souls, now I could be wrong but from I can figure out everything alive contains and in someway uses soul energy, and soul energy has a connection with other soul constructs allowing for an in any capacity uniform group of living things to develop a larger social soul that becomes a god. Vash for instance is a city of people and so through the interaction of their soul energy, construction of early incarnations, and people assigning these incarnations personality or motivations became the hero god the city imagined, as the god itself is made up of the whole cities population who once saw incarnation interpreted them a certain way and influenced some of their aspect. Basically, because the god is their domain how they are viewed by the creatures in their domain effects their personality and most comfortable form. 

So what does this really have to do with Kendal. Well if Vash’s sword was constructed from an alien metal, a solid substance, which issomething almost impossible to make without an elemental, after Vash worked his soul energy into like soul shaper monks do with human prosthetics, which would more than likely work some of this starmetal soul energy into his own soul lattice. Then its likely that Kendal’s soul is made of what little of soul star metal was in the solid material of the meteor. And it’s not just background lore magic systems backing this up.

In the series of pages telling the mythical story of Vash’s Sword we find out that it’s being told through the framing device of the smith god who forged it, to a similar style god to Vash of the Fire influenced race of Ignans. Now while why they're talking and what this incredibly effective smith who uses the arcs and emotional journeys of the wielders of his weapons in his smithing process is doing with a god of fire and fire people directly related to one of our adventuring party is incredibly plot important and personally intriguing, there is something else I wanted to focus on here.

In these panels Tahraim appears to be talking about Dainix, a character Kendal is currently imprisoned with and who are jelling suspiciously well. Now we can see that Tahraim is using his Xanatos gambit forging technique of social engineering to forge out a weapon and fighter for Caliban (probably to fight the fire demon from Dainix’s backstory (who is probably another elemental emissary for Fire (like two other characters currently being heavily associated star metal soul Kendall (I see you Red, with each subsequent layer of brackets I get closer to the truth, witness as my bracketry grows)))) and describing some of the forging fires he’s using fo this weapon (who is probably Dainix, if not definitely)calls one of them “the divine blade”, referring to Vash’s starmetal sword currently held by Kendal, but the blade its self is isnt world shaking, its been around for millennia and everyone is very familiar with its power and prowess as a sword because Vash is an incredibly well known god. But that’s only as a sword, and we know Kendal is world shaking after his discussion with Ilia here where he is told explicitly that the gods fear what he represents but respect the fact that he is an incredibly powerful being with all the strength and ability of a godly incarnation but with no responsibilities of upholding a domain or the limits of staying within they’re domains range. And so the theoretical soul that is Kendal in this incarnation must be made of whatever remainder of star metal soul is left from the solid  star metal in the sword. That had been given the shape and properties of a human/incarnation soul by being weaved into and by Vash and then had the Vash soul ripped apart from they’re shared incarnation leaving the star metal soul to have to develop as its own being in this body

And if all you wanted is proof of this theory you can honestly stop reading here. So far this is dense and a lot and I wanna run through some stuff with this head cannon to nerd out. So if you don't wanna have to read anymore, my argument for this theory is basically through

Kendal being the star metal soul can provide a reason for, guess plot dent instead of plot hole? when Vash takes Kendal to where he is being held by the Collector. The reason this could be a plot dent is that one of the working theories for why Kendal exists can be found in the Sentinels. Essentially building sized stone statues animated by a god semi incarnating in them, its hard to explain so if your interested read here (Also read the comic, it’s really, really good. Like really good. If you get into the extra lore on the website and then scroll through Red’s Aurora Tumblr answers you get to appreciate how truly spectacular her worldbuilding and magic systems are. I mean clearly they’re cohesive and well thought out enough that just off of the magic system you could make a (if I don't say so myself) well reasoned prediction for a major character reveal.) the theory being that because these Sentinels can develop these echoes after being un-possessed by a god over time, the unique way Vash was taken out of his incarnation without dis-corporating it that the body developed a similar echo and is now ambient soul energy drawn into the empty body. However, this wouldn't make sense with Vash taking Kendal to the Collector’s hideaway in his sleep, as if Kendal is made of ambient soul energy he has no actual connection with Vash’s soul and so Vash shouldn't be able to bring him to the crystal he is being held in. But, if Kendal is in fact the star metal soul then he would still have that connection with Vash, as they are the same soul but different parts made of different materials, and so ca operate separately whilst still being so intricately connected.

On one final note, there is one character that already seems to know all this, Tahraim. That Kendal in everyway is the weapon he forged, that they're is a capacity for new elements and therefore different soul energies, that Erin has been possessed by the Void Dragon, and that the Collector has revived life, who has taken Alinua as an emissary, and is using this information not for his own divine or dastardly machinations but on commission. Which is A) a potential threat if Tahraim turns out to be a tad more amoral than he first appears, working as effectively for the next customer instead of esoterically guiding events for the cause of good and B) show cases an incredible mesh of world building and character work with gods being influenced by how their perceived and a god perceived and heralded as an unachievably proficient smith knowing more than any other character or entity we’ve ever seen before and doing exactly what is necessary to forge his commissioned weapons into the most powerful and effective instruments they can be almost only because of how in the magic system some gods are made from ideals and interpretations instead of groups of living things and actually fits the way they are most commonly perceived

[pixieungerstories]

Quarantine - 2

There was no sign the house had any other occupants for days.  I hadn’t been able to drag the mattress out of the room where he had put it.  It was heavy and I couldn’t compress it enough to get it through the door.

I went back to working from home.  The conference calls helped me feel sane.  After a while it was easy to pretend the whole thing was some fever dream.  I was pretending, though.  I still hadn’t tried to open the closet.  Grocery delivery was set on a rotation so that once a week they arrived at the gate.  My neighbours had theirs brought right up to the house.  Mine were always left at the gate of the picket fence that surrounded the front yard.

I used the hedge trimmers to shape the lilac bushes that the neighbours on each side had planted to obscure their view of my house.  I weeded and mowed the lawn wishing for grass seed before just giving up and calling it a meadow.  Some of the flowers were even pretty.  I chuckled with my friends about how much drywall I was going to need when this was over.  We laughed about how it was lucky I was alone instead of having a roommate watching me through the holes in the walls.

Well, they laughed.  I sort of more chuckled nervously.

I kept an eye on my laptop battery and there weren’t any unexplained power outages.  Everything seemed normal.

Until I was cleaning out the basement and found the wine room.  I don’t know wine, but there was a lot of it and the newest bottle that I could find was pre world war two.

I wasn’t expecting it to still be good.  It was.  It felt ridiculous drinking a hundred year old bottle of red wine with a frozen dinner. I did it anyway.

“Are you still here?” I demanded as I was getting ready for bed.

There was no answer.

I found the box that had my vibrator in it and fell asleep in a sweaty puddle.

I woke up a little hung over and found my vibe squeaky clean on the bathroom sink when I went to brush my teeth.  My stomach dropped.

“Were you watching me?” I hissed.  I don’t know what sort of reply I was expecting, but I didn’t get one.

Once again, I tried to move the mattress to another room.  Once again, I failed.  I spent the night wrapped in a blanket, sitting on the floor in the other bedroom, with my laptop plugged in and netflix running to keep me company.

I screamed and stood up when he said from the doorway, “I get lonely too.”

“Jesus Christ!”

He chuckled, “Not even close.”  There was a moment of silence as I strained my eyes to see something, anything, in the dark.  “I can’t leave either,” he whispered.  I stood there shaking in the light from my laptop screen. “Sleep in the bed.  I will not bother you.”

I didn’t move.  He had just sounded sad when he said it.  

“Why can’t I ever see you?”  I asked.

“I live in the shadows, you can only see me in darkness.”

I blinked at that.  “But you are always here.”

“Yes.”

“And I can’t see in the dark,” I pointed out.

“I know.”

I didn’t know how to respond to that, so I changed the subject.  “What do you want from me?”

“When you first arrived, you slept in the garden.  If you had started by sleeping in the house, I would have run you off.  But you were fixing things, so I let you stay.  I got used to you being around.  Then you got sick and it would have been so easy to just let you die.  I would have gone back to being on my own.  I no longer want to be on my own but I hadn’t considered the weight of you being unable to leave.  I do not like the idea of you being scared of me and trapped here.”

“But I am,” I mumbled.

“Yes.  So take care of yourself.  Sleep in the bed.  Care for the house.  I will stay out of your way.”

I licked my lips.  I didn’t want to ask but I had to know.  “What were you doing with my vibrator?”

There was no answer.  I waited for what felt like an eternity before I continued.  “Look, it isn’t a good idea to share sex toys, so depending on where it’s been, I might need to throw it out.  I can’t exactly get a new one just now.  Please just tell me.”

It was the barest whisper, “I wanted to taste you.”

I froze feeling like a deer in the headlights, completely unsure how to respond to that.

“I have not touched you since you asked me not to,” he argued.  

Except for when I almost fell, I thought.  You caught me then.  And my laptop.  I wouldn’t have been able to get a new one of those either.  I wondered if soap and water would do it or if I was going to end up with some shadow monster disease.  How do you even ask that?

“Ok,” I mumbled.  I stood there in the dark and silence.  The house was silent.  I realized I hadn’t heard rattles or banging or hissing since I learned he was here.  “Nyctophobia,” I blurted out.

“I don’t understand,” he replied.

I shifted awkwardly.  “Can I call you Nick?”

The silence continued.  Then, “Why?”

“Nameless things are more scary.  It isn’t as bad having a roommate named Nick.”

He never did answer.  Eventually, I sat back down on the floor and wrapped the blanket more tightly around myself.  I wasn’t brave enough to walk through a pitch dark house, past a staircase, to get to the room where there was a monster in the closet.  

----

There was coffee waiting for me when I got up, and the smell of cinnamon buns baking in the oven.   The oven timer said there was 10 minutes left.  I peeked inside to find the tiniest pan of monkey bread baking.  I recognized the recipe and pulled out the cookbook it came from.  Sure enough, in Nick’s careful handwriting was notations about scaling the recipe down to one sixth of how it had been published.

He had used pencil.

“Is this a peace offering?” I asked.

I didn’t get a response, but he did the dishes while I had my bath that morning.

When my groceries were delivered, popcorn had been added to my order.

I didn’t see him.  Well, I mean, I never see him, but the only signs of him were things being done and left obviously done while I was bathing or getting dressed.  Aside from how nice it was to not do the dishes I appreciated the signs that he was not watching me.

It came as a surprise when I went to put the popcorn in the microwave and the power went out.  

“Nick?  What are you doing?”

“This isn’t me,” he hissed.

I was lifted and carried squirming through the dark before being pushed into a space and having the door locked behind me.  I panicked as I thought I might be in his closet before I realized I was in the wine cellar.  Flashes of Edgar Allen Poe stories ran through my mind.

I have no idea how long I was in there, in the dark with my heart pounding as I tried to get the door to open.  Eventually, it did.

“All better now,” he assured me, breathing down the back of my neck.

There were a lot of cop cars outside on the street.

“What happened?” I asked.  There wasn’t any answer.

A uniformed officer rang my bell, then politely stepped back from my door the requisite six feet.

“Did you hear or see anything unusual last night, Ma’am?” he asked after identifying himself.

Yeah, all the time, I thought.  There was still no way to say that and sound sane.  I went with a modified version of the truth.  “The power went out around 10pm and I ended up stuck in the basement since I couldn’t see the stairs.”

He frowned at me.  “Have you noticed anything missing?  Any signs of a break in?”

“No?  Should I have?”

He appeared to consider this, then stepped further back to look at the state of my house.  “There were break-ins all down this street last night.  This place might not have been a target.”

“Is everyone OK?” I asked.

“It’s an ongoing investigation,” replied walking towards me again.  “I can not disclose anything further, ma’am.”

I swallowed, “That sounds like a no.”

“Do you mind if I come in and have a look around?”

I considered this, “Do you generally advise that women living alone let strange men into their houses?  If you are coming to search, I want my lawyer here as a witness.”

He was already peering in around me.  The house isn’t that big and the walls were all gone.  He could see the whole main floor whether he came in or not.

“Doing some renovations I see.”

No shit Sherlock.  “My building permit is posted in my window.  I haven’t been able to get trades people out in months but-”

“I'm sure everything is in order with that.  Good day.”   Then he left.  Standing on the porch I could hear him telling the other officers what a shit hole my house was.  He thought it should be condemned.

I mean, he was right, still you never like to hear that.  And it didn’t need to be condemned.  I had the structural engineer’s report to prove it.

I went to work while keeping an eye on the news sites.

It wasn’t break ins.  It was looters.  The house next to me and the four next to it, all the way to the corner, had been hit.  The owners had been found tied up at best and dead at worst with a variety of options in between.

It has escalated all the way down the street.

Then stopped before my house.

“Nick?  What did you do?”

He wasn’t talking to me yet.

----

I sat on my bed and waited for the sun to go down.  My laptop was in the kitchen.  My phone was next to me but set to do not disturb.   I waited, straining my ears for any noise.

“Are you there?”

Nothing was said but I was sure I could feel him watching me.

“Please tell me what happened.”

“No one comes into my house,” he snarled.

I swallowed and fought down my fear.  “I did.”

“You are different.  You are helping.”

I considered that.  He had walls before I got here, now he didn’t.

“Am I safe from you?”

“Yes.”  It would have been more comforting if he hadn’t growled it.

That was the point where I started to cry.  I had made it through everything life had thrown at me without turning into a weepy woman, but that did it.  I’m going to blame it on a night of panicking in the wine cellar combined with news reports detailing what had happened to my neighbours.

“Please don’t,” he whispered.

I sniffled.  “Fuck.  Why don’t I have kleenex?”

A roll of toilet paper was pressed into my hands.  I ripped off a length and blew my nose in a way that women in the movies never do, then I jumped as he stroked my cheek with a cool finger, catching my tears.  His hand was gone an instant later.

“What if they come back tonight?”

“They won’t,” he said firmly.  I don’t think he was talking about the ongoing police presence on the street. 

“What did you do?” I sniffled.

“I defended my home.  That includes you now.”

I didn’t know how to respond to that.  I wasn’t sure that I couldn’t catch glimpses of him as the lights on the street kept flashing.  Red, blue, huge black shadow.

“I don’t want to be alone right now,” I whispered.

The bed dipped but when I reached my arm out in that direction all I could find was a long fingered hand to hold mine.  “You won’t be.”

I felt him tug at the blankets underneath me and I slid over so he could turn them back.  Even in the dark I could find my sleep shirt under my pillow.  I stood up next to the bed, stripped and pulled it over my head.  Under the covers looking at the ceiling.  Red, blue, shadow, red, blue shadow.

“Are you .. human shaped?”

“I can be.”

I snorted, “What kind of answer is that?” 

“An honest one.”

I rolled on to my side so that my back was to him, or at least to where I thought he was.

“I can go.”

“Can you stay?”

The weight on the bed changed.  “Don’t try to look at me, you will only give yourself nightmares.”

“You said you’ve read Blue Beard?”

“Yes.”

“Have you read Cupid and Psyche?”

He just snickered.

“I’ll take that as a yes.  Does any of that apply here?”

“Are you going to try to burn me with an oil lamp?” he teased.

“Are you going to get me pregnant then cast me out into the wilds?”  I countered.

He hissed at that, “Never.”

“Never get me pregnant or -”

“I’m not human.  We can’t procreate.  I can’t make you sick.  You can’t make me sick.  We can drive each other insane and you will be able to escape someday.  I can not leave.”

“Why not?”

“You need to rest.  Don’t ask questions with scary answers.”

“How am I supposed to know they are scary?”

“Because you are asking a monster.  Now, go to sleep.”

That was the most ridiculous thing but I wasn’t up to arguing about it.  Not while there was still an active crime scene next door.

I fell asleep to the feeling of him stroking my back.

----

The only furniture in the bed room was the bed and a few boxes of random stuff I had moved in.  I woke to find one of them had been used as a table and was holding breakfast for me.  Or at least a travel mug of coffee and a plate of toast.  I sat in bed, drank my coffee, ate my toast and read the thirty seven emails from everyone I knew asking what the fuck happened next door.

I ended up posting a blanket statement on facebook that I was fine.  I was still in my house.  I had no idea what had happened other than what I had seen on the news.  Then I posted a picture of the three squad cars I could still see out my bedroom window.  

My boss emailed me to ask when he could expect the report I had been assigned, so that took up the rest of my day.  It was getting dark when I realized I hadn’t eaten all day.  Another freezer meal, some salad and I was raiding the wine cellar again, god damn it!

As I was pouring wine into a coffee mug, he asked me, “Are you drinking alone?”

I got up, took another mug out of the cupboard, poured a second drink and turned off the kitchen light.  “Nope.  I’m not alone.  You’re here.”

He didn’t answer, as I ate my dinner by the light of the street lights outside.  The porch light was outside the kitchen window, so I turned it on to wash the dishes then turned it off to go upstairs.  It would have been better if I hadn’t stubbed my toe on the bottom step.  I swore.  Nick picked me up and carried me up the stairs.

“I didn’t have that much to drink!” I protested.

“No, but you can’t see in the dark.”  He tucked me safely into bed.

“Did you change the sheets?”  I asked.  He didn’t answer.  “You did, didn’t you?”

My laptop opened and his body blocked the screen for a few moments.  Then Brooklyn 99 came on and it was set next to me.

“Why are you doing this?”

“We need a distraction.  Call Penny.”

“We need a distraction?  We?”

“Yes.”

I hesitated.  “Do you need me to move out and camp in the backyard for a few days?”

His reply was a nonverbal roar that rattled the windows and set off a car alarm outside.  

There was a commotion then the cops were knocking on my door.  I sighed and turned on the lights.  I decided to be proactive this time.  I flung open the door and demanded “What the hell are you doing out here?”

The cops on my porch blinked.  

“I’m trying to sleep!  Can you keep the noise down?  Please?  I know whatever you are doing is important but can you just do it a little quieter?”

“That wasn’t us!” the youngest protested.

“Then can you find out who it was and make them stop?”

To my delight, they left.

I closed the door, smiled to myself and bounced off a wall of darkness that caught me before I rebounded against the door.

“I do not want you sleeping outside!” he growled in my ear.

There were one set of arms around my shoulders and another holding my hips and back.  I tried to think of a ‘what big arms you have Mr Wolf’ quip but it died on my lips and the touch was gone in an instant.

“Nick?  Can you help me not trip on things on my way to the stairs?”

Hands on my hips, pushing me gently forward and steering me around boxes. Another hand guiding mine to the banister.  Then nothing.  I carefully inched my way upstairs.  I did that awkward thing at the top where you think there is still one more step but there isn’t so your leg falls through nothing and you stumble.  To my right was the bedroom, still lit by the flickering screen of my computer.

I climbed into bed and closed it.

Then I opened it, stared at the browser for a moment, then closed it again.

“What’s wrong?”

I considered this.  I really had no secrets from him anymore.  “I’m anxious and keyed up.  I need … some ‘alone time’ but it’s weird if you are watching.”

“Would it be better if I was helping?” he teased.

“I don’t know,” I admitted.  “I don’t know what you are working with.  But I feel lonely.”

Gentle fingers took my hand and raised it.  The lips that kissed and the tongue that laved were not human.  I turned my hand to stroke his face but he leaned away.

That stung.  I let my hand fall to the bed.  “It isn’t fair that you get to touch me but I can’t touch you.”

He didn’t say anything to that.  A car drove past and the headlights lit the room for an instant.  Long enough for me to see four glittering eyes watching me, two forward facing and two further to the sides.  Not human, I reminded myself.  In the darkness, a hand cupped my face, thick lips caught mine and as I kissed him a tentacle like tongue licked at my lips before darting briefly down my throat.

“I can do better than that toy,” he promised, “but you can not see me.”

I nodded.  Four hands stroking me over my clothes.  A mouth kissing and licking at my neck. I was expecting him to peel me out of my clothes, instead his touch was so feathery gentle.  Hands cupped my face as he nuzzled my hair.  I strained my eyes trying to see him, but I could catch only the faintest outline.  Any time I reached out for him he pulled away.  Finally, he got frustrated with that and pinned my hands over my head.

I panicked and pulled my hands away and just like that he was gone.

“Nick?”

I don’t know why I was expecting an answer.  I groaned and pressed both palms to my face covering my eyes.  I jumped when he caressed my calf, but I didn’t move my hands.

“What are you doing, little girl?”

“Damned if I know,” I admitted.  “It’s been … I don’t even know anymore… how long have I been stuck in this house?  Weeks?  Months?  None of this seems real anymore.  Sometimes I don’t know if I’m real anymore either.  I just need …  something.”

“Someone,” he whispered.

“Yeah.  Someone to make me feel like I’m real.  Just to make me feel.”

“Humans need other humans to be human,” he muttered. “You should have just called your friend.”

My eyes prickled again and tears splashed against my hands.  “How long have you been here?”

“There was an accident shortly after the house was built.  I came because of that.”

That raised a lot of questions, but my immediate one was, “How long have you been here alone?”

“On and off since then.  Most people don’t last much more than a month or two.  Normally, construction crews are the advance party before they move in.  It’s easy enough to get rid of the new owners.  You were just too stupid to leave.”

I snorted, “Were you really trying to make me go?  Because living here was creepy but not anywhere close to the scariest place I’ve ever lived.”

“My heart wasn’t in it.  I need you to finish fixing the place first.  Sooner or later someone would have built one of those ridiculous houses on the lot.”  He started to massage my calf as he spoke.

“The house is more than a hundred years old.  That’s a long time to be alone,” I pointed out.

“Enough time to get good at it,” he countered.

I moved my hands then and sat up to look at him.  I thought I could see a pool of shifting darkness.  “What are you?  Are you a ghost?  Did someone die here and -”

“Many people have died here. I am not one of them.”

I thought about that for a moment.  “Am I?”

“What?”

“Am I some dead woman who is all alone here making excuses for why I can’t leave?”

He laughed at me then, not a jolly laugh, an odd howling laugh.  “How did you come up with that ridiculous idea?”

It stung a little, “It’s a popular plot point in a number of movies.  And I can’t help but notice you didn’t answer the question.”

He stopped laughing when he realized I was serious and said flatly, “You aren’t dead.”

[steve0discusses]

Yugioh S5 Ep 19: Yugi and the Only Neck Accessory He Didn’t Really Want to Wear

Been busy! Hopefully stuff will open up soon as I’m taking a hiatus on a different quarantine project and will be finishing painting the entire roof of my car this week? One can hope. Sanding the rust off the whole top of a car takes a long time it turns out?

Also, fun Yugioh fact, I recently painted a book cover for an author who is older so she’s never seen the show, and she looked at my tumblr, saw my Duke Devlin fanart and was like “That’s him. That’s my main character. OMG. You captured him perfectly!” and I was like “Ma’am that is Duke Devlin, hence the single dice earring on his lobes there, but we can work with this.” and now a spiritual Duke Devlin is on the cover of a Wuxia-style fantasy trilogy on the Vella. Had to give him a top knot and delete the eyeliner for Wuxia reasons but uh, that’s just Duke.

So long story short, fanart can get you work, don’t even worry about posting that stuff online because most people don’t even know it’s fanart anyway and older ladies freakin love it.

Back in Yugioh, the team was doing their best to navigate a map through the woods and they do about as well as they normally do.

And inside Tristan lifted up the floorboards and was like “I found the only way out, this is it, this is the only way.”

And they ended up in something that has a color scheme I would actually associate with a jungle. Finally. We have finally left California (in order to go to another Hell.)

Youknow, when we went to California, we visited Hell, and when we went to India, we also took a stop at the nearest death destination. There’s just so much death on this show and sometimes I forget because there’s been a ghost in our party for so freakin long it’s been normalized.

(read more death imagery under the cut)

Joey freaks out at a flock of crows and reveals in this episode something I never realized about him before.

Like I’m not always the perfect observer as I’m sure you’ve noticed, but I love that this is canon for probably only this episode, but I will never forget it for the entirety of this series.

You go on hating birds, Joey.

Bro was like “Maybe it’s a deep cut about Mai Valentine because she’s a harpy lady” but eh...pretty sure we spent like an entire season of Joey telling us that Mai was a good experience? Would be incredibly funny if immediately after all of S4, Joey was like “You know what? Screw Mai, guys.”

So my thoughts...it’s probably just a literal bird experience. Like I had a friend who hated deer because once she went to a petting zoo, got some pellets to feed the deer, but her finger was sticking up, so when the deer came over to nibble on some pellets her finger went up it’s nose by accident. She was so disgusted by this event that was entirely her fault, that she brought up how much she hated deer basically whenever we saw one.

So like...maybe Joey fed a bird wrong at a petting zoo. I can see him getting bit by a parrot because he was too Joey Wheeler.

But now that we’re in a graveyard neighborhood, Pharaoh decides to hop out because there’s a lot of ghosts here and he needs to practice socializing with his peers.

So that’s just a Yugioh monster doing the ostrich dance, right? Like this is a meme from like 2010 but on Yugioh in 2003(4?)

Good to see the Ostrich dance here in the land before Vine.

So they pull out their Pokemon to do some antics, Tea looked like she was about to do something useful, and Yami does a yump across time and space to get her as far away from playing (not)cards as quickly as possible and y’all...sure was a position these animators animated.

Holy crap.

And I was going off about that scene last season where they woke up in the same bed like...

...have these two been together this entire time? Like together together?

They’re like...way more comfortable than you’d figure they’d be considering Yugi nearly passes out every time he gets a hug. But Yami just like....How long has this been going on? As long as Joey’s fear of birds?

Like obviously this show would never cover what the hell Yugi may be thinking about this overreaching move here, because we’re gonna gloss right over that, and just run away up a flight of stairs. No one mentions this ever again. Which is mind blowing for an anime to do. I think in most anime I watch, the kids would be like “ahh ahhhh I bumped into a booooob!” like it does for I want to say every other episode of My Hero Academia. But in Yugioh, they saw that low hanging fruit and they were like “we expect a higher level of maturity out of our audience. Now here’s a fleet of ostrich dancing tree monsters with faces for crotches.”

They decided to sprint up this flight of stairs, and it enough of a slope to deter the monsters who are only unbalanced weird legs.

I want us to take a moment and admire this background painting. I can’t unsee the rocks that are all the same size, just piled on top of eachother. Did Alexander the Great just plop rocks here--or was the mountain made up of tons of similarly shaped boulders?

Like there’s a lot of nice bg’s in this arc, don’t get me wrong, but this one...I’m just trying to wrap my head around the logic of it.

At the top, they meet a pantheon, that is immediately blocked by this wall, because if this arc had a tagline, it’s “Yugi gets inconvenienced every 4 seconds.”

Bro was like “Clearly they would have pushed it over if Tea wasn’t slacking off” and like...she is actually. Look at her. Only used one hand? Slacker.

Joey was disappointed he couldn’t push over a massive wall, and the team decided not to analyze how much Joey Wheeler thinks of his own strength and instead fixate on these statues.

Usually in anthro characters they kinda look birdlike but act human. But what about an anthro that’s just a bird? Like human torso, but can turn his head 180 degrees? Yugioh made me ask this question.

And then Joey was like “wait, there may be a solution that isn’t just to use brute strength!”

Youknow it is a bummer that Kaiba couldn’t witness Joey own a dragon while he himself only has a robot jet dragon. Although, the jet is probably faster, stronger and overall...better than this baby dragon. It would have been great for Kaiba to witness Joey under-utilize this dragon and forget he has it for like huge swatches of the episode.

And then Grandpa pulled some body horror out of nowhere.

Wow.

I mean that is really gross.

I guess Grandpa can’t use Blue eyes, because Kaiba ripped it up, Grandpa can’t use Exodia because Weevil tossed it off a boat, and grandpa can’t use the card that’s just a building because...it’s a building.

So instead Grandpa has a bunch of meat and bones that look like something out of Doom. It’s probably from a more obscure Konami property, but I forget which.

I’ve seen Tristan hold back Joey in this hold, first time it’s been Tea.

So much shipping in this episode, it’s wild.

It’s also wild how low my standards are for what could possibly be shipping when it comes to Yugioh because of how freakin tepid all of these characters are, which as I’ve brought up before, I really don’t mind.

So Yugi decides that because Grandpa was folding his arms like one monster and it made a gem light up or something, to just do the video game thing and use the giant ass statues as clues.

Why was this arc not a video game? Like parts of it really feel like it was meant to be.

So Yugi falls down a hole, where the walls cave in like it’s that dumpster in Star Wars but like...it barely phases him.

Also...Yugi might be able to see in the dark. It’s never been brought up but like...the more I think about it...has Yugi ever struggled to see without the lights on?

After Joey disappoints everyone, he confronts death.

And Pharaoh and Yugi decide to solve the puzzle of “how do I get out of this trap dungeon room” which, honestly, is probably what they’re doing every time they hang out in the brain pyramid.

So they summon their mascot monster, and surprisingly the show decided its ability to fly cannot help them out here.

Kuriboh manages to become enough of a doormat to push Yami up to the stone and they end up in a set of weird cuts that ended in this?

Like seriously it was like flashes of light and then they were just...up here like this.

Hey like...

Alexander the Great, my man...

Were you planning to put that stone in the middle of a exhaust vent hoping someone would touch it? Because there’s no way anyone would rationally have done that. You would need to fly to do it. This is the world’s worst DM.

Like Yugioh pulls a lot of fantasy nonsense but this arc is a lot more like a “it’s a kid’s show, just go with it.” arc than most of them. It’s not a bad vibe, necessarily, it’s just not the vibe I’m used to.

So once I witnessed maybe the most boring conversation I’ve ever witnessed about corn (this was on a twitch stream, by the way, a guy was playing an interesting game, and then a guest came on and started talking about corn and plants for 2 hours) and they would not shut up about how all taxonomy is wrong because there are no such thing as trees and how all animals are labelled incorrectly, and then they started comparing it to like all sorts of mushrooms and phytoplankton as you would if you clearly got a little bit high before dumping your corn knowledge on a twitch stream.

Anyway, after that bizarre experience I suffered so I could learn how to play an obscure video game, I think I can safely say, that while I know everyone here thinks a bird can’t be a dog. If you’re a high biologist: a bird is absolutely a dog. Apparently you can just do that if you’re the most boring biologist alive and no one will argue with you because to do that would involve talking to you. We’ll just say a bird is a dog and no one can fight me or I will talk about the corn book that this guest on this twitch chat was thinking about renting from the library about the different types of corn mutations inherent in freakin Indiana. Therefore, Joey’s fear of birds and dogs is same.

So they use Dark Magician to save them from the statues, and Yugi busts into the pantheon again because they got to open this casket before a time limit that I kind of forgot about, tbh.

And inside the casket, is...this thing!

(enjoy this line on the bottom of the image I don’t feel like fixing it)

And you may say to yourself...it looks like it’s just floating in mid-air, that’s silly, and so I want to introduce you to the next panel where you can see that it is...quite literally...just floating in the air like a video game.

and it just slurps itself onto Yugi before he can be like “nonono.”

Wasn’t there some horror movie where you were stuck in some sort of body brace that slowly tortures you (was that Saw?) This has that vibes. Like man that looks uncomfortable to wear over a jacket and two belts and a collar that is another belt.

That and I...I gotta appreciate that Yugi popped his collar while wearing body armor and chunky necklace. What 00′s fashion appreciation right there.

Bit like...this isn’t breathable, right? Like Yugi’s gonna finally take this thing off and his jacket will just be completely soaked in sweat?

Anyway, that’s it for this post, next week we’ll see if Yugi can walk through a doorway in that thing.

Also, I can’t bring up the ostrich dance without sharing the vines of my generation

[miyamorana]

2021 Fic Recs (Part 1)

Here are the fics that I’ve really enjoyed this year. All of these are complete. Enjoy!

Fandoms: Avatar the Last Airbender (1), Hades (Video Game) (1), Haikyuu!! (15), Harry Potter (1), Julie and the Phantoms/Rise of the Guardians (1), Sk8 the Infinity (3), Teen Wolf (3), Voltron Legendary Defender (4)

BNHA recs have been done separately because there are... a lot.

Fandom: Avatar the Last Airbender Title: you make a really good girl (as girls go) Author: suzukiblu Pairing: Azula/Yue Rating: Teen Word Count: 38,991 Summary:  “Oh spirits,” Azula says, grinning widely. The Water Tribe is full of idiots. “You don’t want to marry Zuko, he’s useless. Also, he’s already engaged.”

“He is?” Yue blinks at her.

“Of course he is, he’s going to be the Fire Lord, he’s been engaged since he was twelve,” Azula says. A useless Fire Lord who she’s going to have to prop up, if not outright usurp, but Fire Lord all the same.

The things she does for this family, she swears.

---

Fandom: Hades (Video Game) Title: A Snowball's Chance in Hell Author: tsukinofaerii Pairing: Minor Than/Zagreus Rating: Teen Word Count: 42,353 Summary:  Zagreus, grandson of Lady Demeter, has a plan to end the long winter brought on by his grandmother's grief. All he has to do is break into the Underworld and free his mother. How hard could it be?

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Fandom: Haikyuu!! Title: I like the way your clothes smell Author: Mysecretfanmoments Pairing: Shouyou/Tobio Rating: Mature (Part 2 is Explicit) Word Count: 75,278 Series: Part 1 of iltwycs (Words: 78,979 - Works: 2) Summary:  Power outages, ghost stories, and the presence of a certain orange-haired boy lead to bad decision-making on Tobio's part. He'd planned to keep his crush a secret; the universe has other plans.

---

Fandom: Haikyuu!! Title: ampersand Author: infantblue Pairing: Shouyou/Atsumu Rating: Mature Word Count: 37,085 Summary:  Atsumu confesses to Hinata on a dare and everything falls apart.

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Fandom: Haikyuu!! Title: And they were Roommates! Author: boomturkey Pairing: Shouyou/Atsumu Rating: Explicit Word Count: 43,542 Summary:  When the quarantine hits Japan, Hinata fears he might just go feral if he has to stay in his tiny apartment for the duration. Enter Atsumu, offering Hinata a place to stay with a yard and a home gym. Can they tolerate each other as roommates? And will they find love in the time of quarantine? (Yes.)

Or,

That quarantine fanfic every ship in every fandom needs right now.

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Fandom: Haikyuu!! Title: have my sympathy Author: pissedofsandwich Pairing: Shouyou/Atsumu, Akaashi/Bokuto Rating: Teen Word Count: 16,083  Series: Part 1 of second leading man / supporting role (Words: 52,692 - Works: 3) Summary:  Osamu told him once that he had the second leading man curse.

"You know," he said, shaping steaming hot rice into a neat triangle. At this point in his career, Osamu told him he was immune to the pain. "You got the viewers rooting for you, but in the end, the main girl wasn't for you."

---

Fandom: Haikyuu!! Title: i'm wearing my heart like a crown Author: caniculeo Pairing: Shouyou/Atsumu Rating: Mature Word Count: 10,925 Summary:  Within two months of joining the MSBY Black Jackals, Hinata Shouyou has effectively become Atsumu’s new best friend. 

---

Fandom: Haikyuu!! Title: Fox in the Hole Author: boomturkey Pairing: Shouyou/Atsumu Rating: Teen Word Count: 48,315 Series: Part 1 of Inarizaki!Hinata (Words: 234,790 - Works: 4) Summary:  Hinata Shouyou moves to Hyougo and loses his first and last middle school volleyball game. In the process he somehow manages to gain two somewhat mean and confusing new friends: Miya Atsumu and Miya Osamu.

Their goal: Get Hinata to Inarizaki so he can play volleyball with them.

---

Fandom: Haikyuu!! Title: Of Sand, Author: mortalatte Pairing: Shouyou/Oikawa Rating: Explicit Word Count: 14,483 Summary: 

All those years ago, Shouyou proclaimed he was of those who sprouted from the concrete. Once he arrived in Rio, he wondered if exchanging the hard cracks of concrete with the dry, dense bed of sand was worth it.

But then he sees the lines of palm trees taking roots on the golden sprawling beach, and the tiny particles of sand—wet by the waves that reach the shoreline—clinging to the wiry muscles of his toned calves, and he thinks, perhaps it’s never been about the land.

The unmaking of one Hinata Shouyou, and the making of one Oikawa Tooru, together.

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Fandom: Haikyuu!! Title: Foals Unsteady on Their Feet Author: erioel Pairing: Shouyou/Atsumu Rating: Mature Word Count: 15,835 Summary:  Atsumu and Shouyou meet as children. It's not love, not at first. That'll come later.

---

Fandom: Haikyuu!! Title: astronomy in reverse (love's muse) Author: WisteriaReads Pairing: Shouyou/Atsumu Rating: Teen Word Count: 41,100 Summary: 

"There's no easy way to say this-" Atsumu starts, scratching the back of his neck. Shouyou smiles in that ever dazzling way of his.

"Take your time. But perhaps sometime this century." He quips back with a cheeky smile before bringing his drink to his mouth, "How about start at the beg-"

"Shouyou-kun, please fake date me!" Atsumu all but whisper-yells, interrupting with a desperate intensity and surging forwards to grip the table with a white knuckled force.

Shouyou's tea shoots out of his nose.

When a botched red carpet interview goes viral, Atsumu is left with no other choice but to fake date his fellow co-star Hinata Shouyou. It's the perfect plan - all he needs to do is get Osamu off his back, please his grandmother and get over his crush on Kita. Should be simple enough.

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Fandom: Haikyuu!! Title: Honest Mistake  Author: scher_hq Pairing: Shouyou/Tobio Rating: Teen Word Count: 10,339 Summary:  Japan’s freak duo plays ‘how well do you know your teammate’

[Or; Hinata didn’t exactly plan on outing his relationship with Kageyama. It sort of happened.]

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Fandom: Haikyuu!! Title: stan twitter, meet hinata shoyou Author: ichweissnichtauch Pairing: Shouyou/Tobio/Atsumu Rating: Teen Word Count: 13,089 Series: Part 1 of v-twt expanded universe (and you thought hockey twitter was bad) (Words: 14,604 - Works: 2) Summary: 

meiji milk pls sponsor me @kageyamatobiosee you on the court @ninjashoyou 6.5k Retweets 31.6k Likes 2.0k Comments

here comes the sun @ninjashoyoulets do it baby i know the law 3.6k Retweets 27.3k Likes 1.8k Comments

or, hinata shoyou's v-league debut, as seen on twitter (ft. snapshots of v-twt).

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Fandom: Haikyuu!! Title: something more Author: celestialshellfish Pairing: Shouyou/Tobio/Oikawa Rating: Explicit Word Count: 6,991 Summary:  Shouyou takes a determined breath. “I want us to have a threesome.”

Tooru blinks. “What.” Then Shouyou’s words complete their trainwreck through the language center of his brain. “I’m sorry, what?”

Tobio says nothing, just flushes furiously red and gapes like Shouyou just told him that the entire sport of volleyball was canceled, forever.

-- An oikagehina threesome with feelings.

---

Fandom: Haikyuu!! Title: and an orange slice to garnish Author: celestialshellfish Pairing: Shouyou/Oikawa Rating: Explicit Word Count: 13,992 Summary:  “Sure,” Oikawa says, long eyelashes casting a shadow over half-lidded eyes. “It’s pretty hot.”

And maybe it’s because the humid air is making everything warm and cozy, or maybe it’s because Shouyou’s finally ready to admit that Oikawa’s been flirting with him for three days straight, or maybe it’s just the liquid courage in his bloodstream, but Shouyou looks Oikawa dead in the eyes as he counters in Portuguese, “You’re hot.”

-- No angst, no pining, no strings. Nothing but Oikawa and Hinata gettin' it on. :)

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Fandom: Haikyuu!! Title: we'd light up again Author: submersive Pairing: Tobio/Oikawa Rating: Explicit Word Count: 47,511 Series: Part 1 of hallelujah junction (Words: 65,660 - Works: 8) Summary:  His name is Kageyama Tobio and he is twenty six years old and he fell in love with the same man twice.

Or: The Italy fic.

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Fandom: Haikyuu!! Title: i wanna know everything you do Author: anavkour Pairing: Kenma/Kuroo Rating: Explicit Word Count: 7,806 Summary:  Contrary to popular belief, Kuroo Tetsurou is not a sex god.

Kenma knows this better than most. Mostly because Kuroo bemoans the fact that he’s a twenty-two-year-old virgin at least once a week, usually when he’s over at Kenma’s place for dinner and drinks on Wednesday nights, but sometimes through texts late at night that Kenma only sees when he wakes up the next morning. He’s lonely and horny, apparently, and Kenma’s the one who gets to hear about it.

Lucky him.

---

Fandom: Harry Potter Title: A Study in Choices and Second Chances  Author: queerofthedagger Pairing: Regulus/Harry Rating: Mature Word Count: 90,315 Summary:  When Sirius runs away in 1976, Regulus starts writing him letters he never intends to send. They're simply a way to talk about all the things he can't say out loud to anyone - a chronicle of his descent into the Death Eaters, and the eventual realisation that he made all the wrong choices.

In 1997, Harry is searching for the Locket-Horcrux at Grimmauld Place. Instead, he finds a stack of yellowed parchment that not only tells a tale that's more captivating than it has any right to, but might also hold the key to information on the remaining Horcruxes. Regulus Black installed a failsafe.

Though neither Regulus, nor Harry, Hermione, Ron, and Sirius expected the result of the ritual to be quite this literal. With an Ex-Death Eater who was assumed to be dead in their midst, the Horcrux-hunt goes a bit differently. Regulus is mostly conflicted if his unexpected second chance is really worth all the trouble his company keeps putting him in.  

Spoiler: It is. He just likes to complain.

---

Fandoms: Julie and the Phantoms/Rise of the Guardians Title: On a Lightning Strike Author: breakaway71 Pairing: Reggie/Jack Rating: Teen Word Count: 53,208 Summary:  The Man in the Moon decides it's time to bring a new spirit into the fold. After all, it's not just the youngest children who need protecting, and it's not only joy and hope and wonder and memories and dreams that need to be Guarded.

Too bad nobody thought to ask Reggie what he thought of this idea. With two of his friends gone and the rest no longer able to see him, Reggie will square off with the Guardians of childhood, the Man in the Moon himself, and personal demons as he battles for the right to choose his own path.

There's been a storm brewing inside Reggie since long before the day he died, and it's about to be let loose.

---

Fandom: Sk8 the Infinity Title: he was a skater boy, he said—no, you know what, no, we're not calling it that Author: arahir Pairing: Langa/Reki Rating: Teen Word Count: 8,185 Summary:  Everyone knows Reki and Langa are dating. Everyone except Reki, that is.

“Is it someone from class?”

Langa pushes his board back and forth, the little rumble of the tires filling the late afternoon quiet between them as he takes a deep, audible breath, looks directly at Reki, and nods. “Yes.”

And that’s a surprise. Reki tries not to let it show. “Have you guys been on any dates?”

“Yeah. I mean, I thought they were dates.”

That’s… kind of sweet. Sweet in the way that feels like it's going to make Reki sick. “How have you even had time for that?” he mutters. “You spend all your time with me.”

---

Fandom: Sk8 the Infinity Title: definitely a level-headed reaction Author: MermaidMarie Pairing: Langa/Reki Rating: Teen Word Count: 8,000 Series: Part 1 of not temporary to me (Words: 16,266 - Works: 2) Summary:  “Oh shit,” Reki said, stumbling. “Play along.”

“What—” Before Langa could finish asking, Reki had leaned into his side and grabbed his hand, laughing like they’d been having a completely different conversation.

-

In which Langa and Reki run into Reki's ex, Reki asks Langa to pretend they're together, and Langa has some realizations.

---

Fandom: Sk8 the Infinity Title: Mission: Get Reki Laid  Author: TheLionessRoyal (otayuriistheliteralbest) Pairing: Reki/Joe/Cherry/Adam (Langa/Reki in the next parts) Rating: Explicit Word Count: 6,865 Series: Part 1 of Party Games With a Twist Series (Words: 16,954 - Works: 3) Summary:  Reki finds himself delightfully drunk at a post-S party held at a private club-slash-love hotel Adam owns, meandering through the multitude of rooms. The beat of the music thrums in his veins as he shifts with the flow of people from one room to the next. His nerves sizzle with energy that he needs to shake off, and the only thing that will do is to find someone to fuck.

---

Fandom: Teen Wolf (TV) Title: cocaine heart Author: 1001cranes Pairing: Peter/Stiles/Derek Rating: Explicit Word Count: 8,357 Series: Part 1 of Family Expectations (Words: 11,320 - Works: 2) Summary:  The One Where Peter Turned Stiles Instead of Scott.

---

Fandom: Teen Wolf (TV) Title: go home, or make a home Author: lady_ragnell Pairing: Derek/Stiles Rating: Teen Word Count: 7,437 Summary: In a world where Derek lets Scott kill the Alpha and get the cure, he has to figure out how to rebuild his life, with help from Stiles.

---

Fandom: Teen Wolf (TV) Title: Timshel  Author: jsea Pairing: Derek/Stiles Rating: Teen Word Count: 12,569  Summary:  Derek lets Scott kill Peter for the cure at the end of S1. This is the story of how that choice changes everyone's fate.

"Sir, you should know..." Derek starts to say, then snaps his mouth closed when the Sheriff takes one hand off the steering wheel, and holds it up in a halting gesture.

"You're not a bad kid, Derek."

"I'm a werewolf," Derek says, before he can think about it. For the first time in his life the word feels dirty, like something to be ashamed of. It makes him feel like a little kid again, using a curse word without understanding what it means.

---

Fandom: Voltron Legendary Defender Title: i can't help but want Author: aknightley Pairing: Keith/Lance Rating: Teen Word Count: 6,921 Summary:  Lance deals with the aftermath of being sucked into a black hole and stranded on an alien planet.

When Lance wakes up, all he can see is blue.

---

Fandom: Voltron Legendary Defender Title: what are you willing to do? Author: aknightley Pairing: Keith/Lance Rating: Explicit Word Count: 3,858 Summary:  "This is such a bad idea," Lance says, running his hands down Keith's sides and jerking his shirt out of his pants.

---

Fandom: Voltron Legendary Defender Title: Foreign Scenes Author: bwyn Pairing: Keith/Lance Rating: Teen Word Count: 110,581 Summary:  Lance has dreamed of travelling since the first time he heard stories from his family as a child. Now, having finally the time and money to do it, he goes on a trip to Europe to see some of the most culturally rich cities on the continent. Except he keeps bumping into the same guy over and over again, in random cities, doing stupid shit, and ultimately dragging Lance into his trouble, too.

Basically an AU in which Lance and Keith become impromptu travel buddies and get into trouble.

---

Fandom: Voltron Legendary Defender Title: Something Blue Author: starlightment Pairing: Keith/Lance Rating: Mature Word Count: 65,770 Summary:  When Lance gets dumped by his fiancée just days before his entire family is flying out to visit, he finds himself trapped in a monumental lie. Now, with no bride-to-be, and no guts to admit the truth, he’s in desperate need of a pseudo-sweetheart — and fast. And Keith just so happens to be in the wrong place, at the wrong time.

[randomsnakesimp]

As the last one seemed to actually be of interest to some people, I thought I might move on to another section of my theories on w.i.t.c.h. : Jonathan Ludmoore, Elias van Dahl and time travel.

So, this one is more of a "trying to warp around canon" kind of theory.

The main issues I am trying to solve here, which I stumbled upon while reading, are:

- how did Elias and Cedric get to 400 years in the past if Phobos is only five years older than Elyon?

- if both Cedric and Ludmoore worked for Phobos, and were seemingly close to him, why did neither of them acknowledge knowing the other in any way, shape or form?

- how did Ludmoore get a hundred years to the past to open holes in the veil if, again, he had to have interacted with Phobos?

- if there is a time travel option, why do neither Phobos nor Cedric nor any of the rebels ever try using it to their advantage?

- We know Elyon was brought to modern day earth, and that Phobos was about five at that point, so Meridianese time cannot run that much slower than earth time, unless there's a weird time warp involved, but...yeah, if I go there, my brain will probably implode. Feel free to if you're smarter than me, though, I'd love to hear thoughts on that.

- We also know that time travel will never be freely available, as otherwise, there'd be time travelers around somewhere during the comics time line for sure, but there has to be some way Cedric and Elias, who were definitely no born time travelers, did travel in time.

Now, I'm gonna offer up two different theories. The first one is the best I can come up with to explain all of the above is the following line of events:

Ludmoore is actually from future Meridian, likely Renaissance or something, so roughly equivalent to the time he ended up in on earth, as well.

He was a brilliant alchemist, and also apparently rather charming, so he managed to get a hold of the pathetic leftovers of the breath of time - remember, it was severely damaged during Phobos' attempt at reviving himself, and according to Yan Lin, only a few corns of the magical sand had remained inside. I assume Ludmoore took the remaining sand and managed to produce a potion or some other sort of product usable by anyone who got a hold of it.

Since this fatally destroyed the breath of time, and it's the only magical artifact with time altering abilities, the only option for more time travellers to exist would have been if Ludmoore got a hold of the old, complete breath of time, since he's the only one with the recipe for the potion and from his first time travel onward, no more sand of time is available, but since he never got there, this explains why no other time travellers exist.

So Ludmoore went back in time, to Phobos' reign just before Elyon returned to Meridian. Using a fake name, so he wouldn't be recognized in history books in his present, he approached Phobos to sell him his time traveling potions, and Phobos used the opportunity to ask Ludmoore to weaken the veil. Ludmoore agreed, and used his magic to travel to earth into a time he felt comfortable with. Since Cedric never saw Ludmoore, and Phobos never mentioned Cedric to him (likely on purpose, as I feel his childhood emotional trauma coupled with his love for Cedric would leave him prone to a never-ending fear Cedric might, one day, meet someone he prefers over Phobos), Cedric would only have heard Ludmoores fake name and since neither of them were aware that Ludmoore created the portals, instead expecting him to weaken the veil even further in their time, they just assumed he failed and kind off forgot about him.

It was only when Ludmoore got to earth that he realized HE was the one to create the holes in the veil in the first place. From there on, we know the rest of his story.

Meanwhile, in Meridian, Elias van Dahl decided that he, for some reason, really needed to paint a portrait of Phobos against his explicit wishes - like, dude, there are so many things you could have painted, why Phobos? - and got himself persecuted. He got a hold of one of the three time travel potions Phobos bought, and used it to escape.

Fearing he might use the extra years gained from this to create a massive rebellion scheme, Phobos sent Cedric after him, using up the remaining two potions for his back and forth travel. Rip Phobos' money.

Now, as promised, I have another take, which does not explain Elias van Dahl and Cedrics time travel, but I somehow just prefer? It came to me from the discussion with @sp1c3m0nst3r about multiple princes in the past being named Phobos.

This theory would be that Ludmoore did, indeed, live a hundred years from the present in the story, and was ordered to weaken the veil by a different prince Phobos, for whatever reason.

This theory builds more heavily on how I believe the book of elements to work. I might dedicate a post to this entirely in the future, but for now, it's enough to know that I think it works like a book for those in it, in that it displays what they would picture if reading the written words - think how the more of the girls are present, the more details we see, and how Ludmoore looks so different in chapter 2's flashback than in person. So, since they don't know it's a different prince Phobos Ludmoore talked to, the one they know is portrayed.

I just feel like this one takes less weird leaps and somehow fits the overall tone and story better? But this might be personal preference.

Last but not least, since this is kinda on the same topic: after some back and forth consideration, I do not think the dinosaurs in the book of elements are a product of Ludmoores time travels, as much as that would have been a great thing to include.

This is mainly due to two facts:

- if they were, the chapter should have been before the one where he's trapped in the book

- the dinosaurs are just so damn inaccurate, and he, being a scientist, would have likely described them in more detail, drawing attention to how they differed from popular belief during the early 20th century, so the girls would likely not just have imagined the stereotypical animals displayed

I believe that, since the chapter is called "Matt", this is the one Matt wrote, and likely Ludmoore was just like "create a highly dangerous environment that will stop my enemies and suit my new giant pet lizard" and Matt's controlled mind - remember, Cedric states he has a pounding headache that makes thinking difficult while Ludmoore controls him - did the best it could. (This should work since I don't think the island Matt stranded on is the same the girls go to, but including the reason for this would, I think, go too far off topic and take up a lot of space. I might touch on it in the aforementioned post on the book of elements, though)

Thank you for reading to the end!

This one was a bit convoluted, and I'm pretty sure I still missed some important points that likely render this theory useless, so again, feel free to agree, argue or add anything you like! I look forward to hearing your ideas on this

[megumisbimbo]

- Four -

megumi fushiguro x reader

genre: fluff, slight angst

summary: (y/n) was nothing special. A human being who had no idea that curses walked the same earth they walked. But then they locked eyes with Megumi Fushiguro. Can Fushiguro focus on the task ahead or will he be distracted by the king of curses and his new love interest?

series masterlist

©️ @megumisbimbo — all rights reserved. Please do not repost, modify or translate my work. Reblogs and likes appreciated!

Credit for the main storyline and characters goes to Gege Akutami.

tags: @xreemie @kitkozume @noyakura @vanilnya20​ @tobi--o​

the songs are indicated throughout the story at certain points!

songs used:

put your records on - ritt momney

who dat boy - tyler the creator

goodbye - billie eilish

— put your records on - ritt momney —

(y/n) pov:

It was early in the morning when you were woken up by the sound of rustling. You turn and see Fushiguro frantically getting himself together.

“New mission?” You ask, voice deep and scratchy.

“It was a bit of an emergency, sorry I can’t stay today. But the rest of the sashimi is in the fridge.”

“I’ll be fine Megumi, I promise. You shouldn’t worry so much you’ll get wrinkles.” You say, causing him to let out a small chuckle.

“Are you ready to leave yet?” You ask

“No not yet.”

“Then can I play with Kou?”

Megumi gives you a puzzled glare.

“Kou?..”

“Your white dog. I named it Kou! Isn’t it cute!?”

“You shouldn’t get so attached to them you know.”

“Yes yes I know. Now can I play with it?!”

Megumi smiles and summons his white dog, who he noticed has taken a special liking to you. As much as he knew it would be a bad idea for you to get so attached to his shikigami, he couldn’t help but feel all warm inside when he saw you laughing. He finished getting ready and him and his white dog make their way out the door bidding you goodbye. You stare out the window again, noticing that you tend to do that often. Well you didn’t want to sit around all day bored as hell, so you decide to watch a movie on Megumi’s television and finish the sushi from the day before.

Megumi pov:

They looked so cute playing with my divine dog, how could I say no to that face.

“Snap out of it Megumi.” Nobara says waving her hand in front of my face.

“Were you even paying attention?”

“Of course I was.” I respond, slightly irritated.

“Thinking about (y/n) again?”

“WHA- WHY- WHY WOULD YOU THINK THAT??” I say, startled by her question.

“I don’t know. Just a hunch I guess.”

Itadori walks outside and greets us with a smile. Reminds me of their smile...stop it Megumi you’re going insane.

Ijichi-san’s black car rolls up beside us and we step into the backseat. He drives us to the Juvenile Detention Center in West Tokyo. We step out of the car and walk towards building two.

“Our windows confirmed a curse womb approximately three hours ago. Five inmates are currently trapped inside along with the curse. Curse wombs that grow and change shape can be expected to become a curse close to that of a special grade. You are not to engage.”

I know that a curse of special grade ranking should be dealt with by a special grade sorcerer. Where is Gojo-sensei?

“Satoru is currently on a business trip.”

Of course.

A woman comes running towards us, stopped by the gate guards.

“Is Tadashi...my son. Is my son ok?!?”

I turn and see Itadori’s face turn pale. He needs to stop letting his feelings get involved.

“We cannot disclose any more information at this point.” One of the guards explains.

“Fushiguro, Kugisaki. We have to save him.” Itadori says.

“Of course.”

Ijichi-san lowers the curtain and I summon Kou.

“If it gets close, Ko-... my dog will let us know.”

“Let’s do this.”

— who dat boy - tyler the creator—

We walk into the building and are immediately caught off guard. The whole place is a maze. I turn around looking for the entrance.

“Damn. Where’s the door?”

Kugisaki and Itadori panic but I explain that Kou would be able to sniff it’s way out, since it remembered the scent of the entrance.

“You’re so reliable Fushiguro.” Itadori says with a smile, a familiar glint in his eyes.

He reacts the same way (y/n) does. They really must be close.

We walk deeper into the maze and find the work yard where the curse had first been seen. A mangled up body lay across from us. Itadori walks up to the body and pulls on the shirt he was wearing.

Tadashi Okazaki

“Is it that woman’s son?” Kugisaki asks.

“We’re bringing this body back. His face isn’t that messed up. She won’t be satisfied if we just tell her that her son is dead.” Itadori responds.

I grab onto his uniform and pull him away from the victim.

“Leave him. We have to confirm that the other two are dead.” I say, knowing exactly who this man is.

“Everytime we look back the path is different. How’re we gonna get back here?” Itadori responds.

“I said leave him. I never said we were coming back. He’s not even worth saving alive, why would I save his dead body.”

Itadori grabs onto the collar of my jacket.

“What’re you talking about?” He says, anger laced in his tone.

“This is a juvenile detention center. I read about what he did to get in here. He was driving without a license and hit a girl who was walking home from school, and that was the second infraction. I know you want to save everyone, so they can die a natural death, but who’s to say that someone you save won’t kill someone else in the future?”

Itadori looks at me with a blank stare. Anger festers within him. I can feel his energy shifting.

“THEN WHY DID YOU SAVE ME!?”

I...can’t answer that.

Kugisaki’s voice tears us away from each others stare.

“Knock it off you two! This isn’t the time or-“

Her body being sucked into a hole on the ground cuts her sentence off. We both stare blankly at the spot where she was standing.

No way.

“There’s no way...my divine dog would have-“

I turn around and see Kou’s head sticking out of the wall. Completely dead. My heart sinks. (y/n).

“Fushiguro!”

I turn towards Itadori, fear building up inside me.

“Run! We’ll find Kugisaki after we get away-“

My words are cut off by the immense amount of cursed energy I suddenly feel beside us. The special grade.

I can’t move. Neither can Itadori...I think.

Itadori suddenly swings his slaughter demon upwards in hopes of at least wounding the special grade. It proves absolutely futile when both the slaughter demon and his hand fly through the air landing a few feet away from us. I look back at Itadori and find his arm gushing with blood.

We’ve lost.

“Fushiguro. Run. Find Kugisaki. Let me know when you get out of here.”

“I’m not leaving you behind!”

“Fushiguro...Please...”

My heart sinks as I see Itadori’s pleading smile. I know he’s strong, but he’ll die if I leave him with this curse.

Wait.

I nod and find my will to move. I run as fast as I can through the building desperately searching for Kugisaki, my black divine dog leading the way. I finally reach her and, using my frog shikigami, pull her away from the curse that was holding her. We both manage to escape from the building. I drop her off with Ijichi-san, and my divine dog lets out a howl, signaling our escape.

Please let him make it out.

Ijichi-san explains that he’ll take Kugisaki to a doctor, and insists that I come along with him. I refuse and opt to wait for Itadori outside the building. I ask him if he could do his best to bring a sorcerer higher than a grade one when he returns. Although it isn’t likely he will, he agrees and drives away with Kugisaki safely tucked in the backseat.

I wait for what feels like ages. Suddenly, I notice the expanded dormitory has disappeared, which means the special grade curse has died.

Now if Itadori would just come back.

My thoughts are interrupted by a familiar sinister voice.

“If it’s about him, he’s not coming back.”

My whole body tenses up at the sound of that demon’s voice.

“Don’t worry, I’m in a good mood right now. Let’s talk.”

Where’s Itadori? He should have switched back by now.

“He seems to be having some trouble, but it’s only a matter of time before he’ll switch back. So I thought about what I could do in the meantime.” Sukuna says, an evil grin creeping across his face.

I watch as Sukuna buries his fist inside Itadori’s chest and rips out his heart. My eyes widen as I watch him hold Itadori’s still beating heart in his hand.

“I’m taking this brat hostage!”

He can live without the heart but...Itadori can’t. He’ll die if he switches back.

“Itadori will come back, even if his death is the result...that’s just the type of person he is.” I say, my heart racing.

“You think too highly of him. Just a while ago he was so scared while on the verge of death. He was a mess you know. Talking about (y/n) and why he’s sorry and how he’ll miss them. How pathetic.”

(y/n). Dammit.

My mind is racing as I stare at Itadori’s body, covered with tattoos and gushing red hot blood.

I’ll try and make him restore Itadori’s heart before he comes back by convincing him that he can’t win with a heartless body. I have to. But is that even possible? For someone who couldn’t even move in front of a special grade curse. Doesn’t matter. I’ll do it.

“I’m finally outside, Let’s make use of this space!”

I quickly summon Nue to fight Sukuna. Although I’m using my shikigami, I’ll fight him myself as well. I think I manage to land a blow, but it’s quickly blocked.

“Put some more curse behind your blows!” Sukuna says before punching me in the face.

I summon my Serpent and with the help of Nue, I manage to restrain Sukuna.

“Don’t give him a chance!” I yell to my shikigami, hoping that I’d be able to hold him long enough to land a critical blow.

I watch in shock as Sukuna rips my Serpent apart, freeing himself. Without a second to think, I find him grabbing onto the back of my shirt, flinging me into the air. He follows me up into the sky and hits me hard against the back of my head. I fly aimlessly through the air, but Nue scoops me into its wings and softens the blow of the landing. I turn and pet it’s head.

Nue is at its limit. I have to undo the spell before it’s destroyed. I carelessly used my shikigami and now my Serpent and Kou are both destroyed.

Sukuna lands in front of me.

“Your shikigami use shadow as a medium, don’t they?” He asks.

“So what?”

“Hmmm, you don’t get it do you?

I give him a questioning look, still disoriented from the beating I just received.

“What a waste of talent...in any case, I’m not going to heal the brat. He’s not even worth fighting for.”

“Well I save people...unfairly.”

I let out all of my curse, allowing the blue tinted energy to flow through and around me.

“You’re going to get fired up now? That’s good! Well then. Entertain me Fushiguro Megumi!!”

I begin reciting a chant usually done by shinto priests that is believed to summon the dead. Also known as “The ten sacred treasures.” My thoughts are spinning, disorienting me more.

(y/n). What would they think of me? How could I face them if I lose Itadori.

— goodbye - billie eilish —

I stop, realizing the only way to win is to pull Itadori out of his own head, no matter the cost.

“Itadori, I know you can hear me. I didn’t have any logical reason to save you and (y/n) back then. Even if it was dangerous, even if they are a liability, I couldn’t watch good people die. I had some doubts but... ultimately I made a selfish choice driven by my emotions. But that’s fine. So to answer your question...I saved you because...because I’m not a hero. I’m a sorcerer. I never regretted saving you two. Not even once.”

The tattoos on his body begin to fade, and Itadori’s face resurfaces.

“I see...You’re smart Fushiguro and I think the way you live your truth is right. But I don’t think I’m wrong either.”

Itadori’s chest gushes blood and his body becomes limp.

“Ah, it’s almost time for me... Kugisaki and Gojo-sensei...I guess I don’t have to worry about them anymore. Live a long life Fushiguro, and tell (y/n)...I...love....the-“

His body hits the ground creating a puddle of blood. Tears form in my onyx eyes.

I have to go home to (y/n)...what will I tell them. I’m sorry (y/n). I couldn’t save him.

[chaseatinydream]

pirate king (44) || atz

“I still can’t believe they want to parley.” Yunho whispers to you in shock, standing next to you on the main deck as you watch the little rowboat grow closer and closer to you, bobbing on the surface of the deep blue sea. There’s a growing sense of trepidation in you as you watch it draw nearer, Mingi ordering a group of men to lower ropes into the water to pull the rowboat up.

From the bulwarks, you can see six people on the rowboat, a sign of neutrality and peace, Yunho had told you. Worried by how Yeosang might react to seeing his father, Hongjoong had sent the navigator to the galley and told him to stay there until someone called him up. Wooyoung had… well, gone with him. Your captain didn’t tell you why, but curious as you were, you had sort of resigned yourself to the fact that you would never know.

“You have to eat Wooyoung’s shoe now, you know?” You mumble out of the corner of your mouth, trying to distract yourself from the terror you feel. Yunho swallows nervously, eyes fixed on the rowboat as it stops next to the Treasure.

“Don’t tell him I said that.”

“...You also have to eat your own shoe.”

“I don’t recall any of that.”

“And you have to admit the mizzenmast is better.” You end off, fingers wrapping around his wrist. You’re shaking from nerves, but you don’t have to say it, Yunho can feel it in the way your hand is as clammy a dead fish around his.

You know Seonghwa is somewhere in the rigging with a loaded musket, ready to blow a hole in the head of any troublemaker, that the crew of the Treasure outnumber the people on the boat by several times, but part of you is still worried, a sinking feeling in your chest that borders on sheer paranoia.

“We should just kill them as soon as they step onto the ship.” Mingi mutters as he strides over to all of you, Hongjoong’s expression carefully smoothed into a neutral mask in preparation to meet the man in charge. From what Yunho has told you, the enemy captain is likely to be Commander Kang Yongsun, a prominent captain of the Royal Navy’s pirate hunter force, someone who specialises in hunting down pirates in exchange for monetary rewards offered by the Crown.

He’s also Yeosang’s biological father.

Your captain sighs, gripping his cutlass tight. “They did put up a parley flag, though.”

Snorting, the quartermaster jabs a thumb at the Black Crow floating just far off enough to not be considered a threat, its jet black shape looming against the bright blue sky like a blot of ink on paper. “Has the Royal Navy ever not want to kill us?”

“That was what I thought.” Yunho mumbles uneasily, his spear in hand as he fidgets with the shaft. Your own hand rests on the hilt of your cutlass, adrenaline already buzzing in your veins as you anticipate the fight that might probably come.

“They’re likely to be plotting something. And whatever it is, it’s not going to turn out well for us. It could be a trap. We should just blow them out of the water now. I’m sure Wooyoung could do it easily.” Mingi continues to reason insistently with his captain, probably feeling the same sinking sense of foreboding as you are. But your captain doesn’t respond to his quartermaster’s warnings, instead simply gazing at the rowboat silently with his single green eye.

When he speaks, his voice is solemn.

“I’m aware it could be a trap, Mingi. I’m not a fool. But I doubt the Commander would be foolish enough to come to us without an irrefusable bargain.” Hongjoong says as he looks straight ahead, not looking at any of you. “Besides, they did put up a parley flag, and I’m not going to be the one to break the vow.”

“We did it all the time in the past though.” Mingi reminds his captain softly, his voice reminiscing of those days of long ago that they had been a merciless pirate crew, from the stories he had told you about the last time. Your eyes widen. They had ignored the white flag? Preyed on ships that had been on the verge of surrender? Destroyed vessels that had put up the universal symbol of parley, massacring entire crews without mercy?

Yunho stiffens next to you, obviously remembering their sordid past as nothing more than despicable law breakers, and you feel your heart sinking. Exactly what kind of people had the crew of the Treasure been before you had come to the ship?

You glance at your captain for a moment, wondering how he would look like with a sadistic smirk in place of his usual, soft smile, whether his viridescent eye would gleam poisonously with corrosive venom instead of burning with the eager desire to live out his life like a blazing inferno that you know.

The thought scares you more than you dare to admit.

But now, there’s a contrite, almost sorrowful expression on his face, his green eye unfocused and lost in the past for a moment, and deep inside you, you feel your heart twist in sympathy for the man who has too many regrets to count.

“We’ve changed our ways.” Hongjoong finally answers honestly, watching as his crew work to haul the rowboat up the side of the ship. Yunho and Mingi remain silent in their guilt, but you can see their captain’s words lifting a burden they never knew they had off their chests. “We’re different now.”

The rowboat reaches the bulwarks on the port side and six people step out of the small watercraft.

With those final words, your captain steps forward to meet the infamous Commander Kang.

Your first impression of the commander is one of intimidation.

Kang Yongsun is not at all a tall man, in fact, he’s dwarfed in size by some of your taller crew mates on the Treasure. He’s lithe, slimly built with nothing too daunting about his stature, but the first time he looks upon you, even if it is merely a sweeping glance over the ship, sends a chill running down your spine.

You can, without a doubt, see Yeosang in him physically. They have the same razor sharp jawline and facial structure, similar noses, identical soft lips, but that’s where the resemblance ends. For all the similar features they share, their eyes are completely different. Not so much in the physical appearance of it, the deep brown hue of their gazes are nearly identical, but Yeosang’s eyes are infinitely kinder, softer, something that you can’t help feel grateful for.

Kang Yongsun’s eyes are as piercing as those of a bird of prey, staring down his next victim with a silent, lethal confidence that you have no wish to fall prey to. Even though he’s surrounded by hostile crew mates, all brandishing all manner of weapons at him, he doesn’t seem to be the least bothered by it, and perhaps that’s what scares you the most of all.

His escorts surround him immediately as soon as they step on board, cutlasses in hand and at the ready in case of any threat. One of them though, doesn’t seem to be wearing the same uniform as the rest of them do, a hood pulled low over his eyes, hiding his face in shadow. Instead of the customary cutlass that most seafaring men carry, there’s a massive longsword in his hands that looks like it could do some serious damage.

Your captain steps forward to meet him, Mingi and Jongho flanking him. The younger battlemaster is hefting a heavy iron bar mace over his shoulder, while Mingi holds onto his double sided battle axe, the edge glinting cruelly in the sunlight. Your captain hasn’t drawn any weapons, but his hand rests on the handle of his musket, ready to fire at the first sign of any danger.

“Kang Yongsun, captain of the Black Crow and vice-commander of the Royal Navy’s Red Rose pirate hunter fleet in service of her Majesty the Queen and the Crown. State your name, pirate.” One of his guards spits haughtily, as if he can’t believe that he’s actually speaking to what society considers the vermin of the seas. Mingi scowls, grip tightening on his weapon, but Jongho lays a hand on the quartermaster’s shoulder, a silent request for him to keep his cool.

Your captain merely sighs in exasperation, completely unruffled by the man’s imperious tone. “Kim Hongjoong, captain of the Treasure. What is your business with us?”

The guard who had addressed your captain earlier scowls furiously, beginning to brandish his cutlass at your captain. “You impertinent scum, speak with respect when addressing the vice-commander-”

But before he can get any further, there’s a razor sharp blade resting against his neck.

“Don’t test my patience.” Mingi growls, his deep voice a rumble in his chest that sends a frightened shiver down your spine. You’ve never seen a bear before except in books that San has showed you, but if you had to imagine one’s snarl, it would be something akin to Mingi’s voice now. He holds the weighty axe with so much ease it almost deceives you into thinking it weighs nothing more than a toothpick, but from experience you know that you can barely lift it with both hands, let alone hold it steady like Mingi is now.

The man squeaks in fear, pupils dilated as he eyes the blade so dangerously close to his neck. One second of tense silence passes, then another, then-

“Rumil, stand down.” The commander says smoothly, and the guard, though quivering in both terror and rage, sheathes his weapon. Hongjoong then turns around to speak quietly to Mingi, and with great reluctance, the quartermaster lowers his axe as well, although his eyes never leave the vice-commander. The man turns to look at your captain with cold, carefully neutral eyes.

His next words shock you out of your mind.

“Captain Kim, I have come to offer you a deal.”

You have to give it to your captain for not reacting in the least, because Yunho’s jaw practically smashes into the deck next to you. There’s the moment of stunned shock, the crew barely able to believe what has just left the commander’s mouth.

A deal? The Royal Navy wants to make a deal with pirates?

Maybe you haven’t heard them correctly, because you can’t have heard them correctly.

Your captain holds up a single hand in the air and the entire deck falls silent in response, waiting for their leader to speak. Hongjoong meets the commander’s steely gaze with a skeptical one of his own.

“Why would the Royal Navy want to make a deal with us?” It’s small, almost completely undetectable, but you can hear the tiny note of genuine curiosity in his voice.

“We need several things that are currently in your possession.” The commander states simply, as if the two of them are not mortal enemies who’ve been at loggerheads with each other since the very beginning. You can see Hongjoong stiffen slightly and you flinch, from Yeosang’s memories, he must be talking about the navigational charts that Hongjoong took from him.

But your captain keeps his cool, folding his arms as he looks at the commander seriously. “And what would you offer us, commander, in exchange for what you want? Our freedom?”

At his jibing words, the deck erupts into nervous, derisive laughter. You almost want to follow, but you’re too tense to do so. Even then, you recognise the absurdity of your captain’s words, there’s simply no way the Royal Navy would offer the most wanted pirate crew a pardon from all the crimes that they’ve already committed. You may not know the full extent of what they’ve done in the past, but your captain is the Pirate King of the Caribbean for a reason.

“That’s ridiculous.” You hear Yunho mutter under his breath and you can’t help but nod in response. “As if the Royal Navy would ever-”

“Exactly.” Commander Kang answers calmly.

For the second time that day, you feel like you’ve gotten slapped in the face with a dead pollack.

What.

The entire crew hushes in a split second, clearly as shocked as you are. The silence rushes through everyone on board, plunging the deck into eerie silence as that one, single word sinks into all of their minds.

Freedom?

Briefly, you imagine a peaceful life for them. Yeosang as a bookkeeper in an archive, being able to read all the books he desires to, gaining the knowledge he’s so hungry for, Yunho finally being able to put down his spear, never having to fight another day in his life ever again. Your master opening a small apothecary, venturing into the forest every morning with Shiber at his heels to search for rare herbs and plants, bringing back the occasional spice for Seonghwa, who’s opened his very own eatery and comes up with creative new dishes for Hwaseong to try every week.

You dream of Jongho being the fisherman he’s always wanted to be, taking after his father’s footsteps and sailing the sea in a tiny boat, humming to himself as he casts his nets. Hongjoong sitting on a beach, overlooking the sea as he writes tales of his times as the legendary Pirate King, Mingi pointing out his spelling errors and inaccuracies as Wooyoung comes up to the two of them with cups of hot tea in his hands and a bright grin on his face, his wrists finally free of the shackles that have bound him for so long.

For a moment, that yearning is so powerful, so strong, that you would give almost anything to let  them have that life. One of happiness, joy and peace, free from bloodshed and battles and running from the Navy. If anyone deserves it, you think, it’s them.

Next to you, you can hear Yunho’s sudden intake of breath. He must be as shocked as you are, because his spear nearly falls from his grasp as he stares at the commander. Even your captain’s facade seems to have cracked a little down the middle, his one green eye wide with surprise.

But then Hongjoong fights to keep his voice steady, fingers flexing on the handle of his cutlass as he eyes the commander with a dubious gaze. “And you would offer us what sort of freedom, exactly?”

“All previous charges held against you and your crew by the Crown will be completely cleared.” Kang Yongsun speaks without a trace of falsehood in his voice, as if what he’s saying is the complete and utter truth. It’s so silent you could hear a feather fall to the ground, the crew hanging on to his every word even if some part of them doesn’t dare to believe such good news. “As long as all of you do not commit any crimes against the Crown after receiving the pardon, you will be free men even in the territories of her Majesty the Queen.”

If it is possible, Yunho’s jaw crashes even more to the ground. At this point, it could probably break a hole in the deck.

Commander Kang turns to face your captain, whose mouth is hanging slightly agape in shock. “As the captain, her Majesty would like your service as one of her battle strategists against dealing with other piracy problems in the Caribbean waters. You will be paid in full for your work, with the prestige that comes with being a senior officer in the Queen’s own service.”

You almost can’t believe your ears. These words are too good to be true! This deal is almost irrefusable, and even your captain looks like he’s about to be swayed for a moment before he catches himself, rational mind whirring furiously.

“Freedom…” You hear Yunho whisper under his breath and you glance at him, only to see him with the broadest grin ever on his face, his eyes uncontrollably bright. “We’re going to be free people, Chin Hae!”

You can barely find the right frame of mind to answer him, the word freedom echoing over and over in your mind. All of you can be free! Make an honest living with your own hands and establish your own lives, normal lives, as free people, not as fugitives running from the law. But your captain’s word interrupts your train of thought.

“Wait.”

Glancing up, you see your captain’s face suddenly set in suspicion. He must feel like there’s something off, because there’s no way the Commander would offer them such a fair trade if he isn’t about to get something of bigger worth in return. Hongjoong’s jaw clenches as he looks at Commander Kang with slitted eyes.

“What exactly do you want from us, commander?”

Commander Kang shakes his head. “It’s very simple, Captain Kim. All I ask from you are four things; the maps you stole, which in the end you would have to return anyway as it is considered property of the Crown. Another thing I need is the knot around your neck with which contains the sorcery required to cause a hurricane.”

You gasp in shock. How would the commander know about this?

Your captain obviously feels the same way, because his fingers immediately tighten protectively around the short length of rope there. “How did you know of it?”

“Back in Nassau, the Head of Port Investigation, Leon Bastiville reported that his attempt of arresting one Kim Hongjoong and his crew was thwarted when you, the captain, undid a knot that caused a strong wind to blow your ship away from the harbour.”

A shiver goes down your spine at the mention of that man. You remember the heat of his breath as it ghosted over your ear, the coldness of the gun pressed to your temple, the cries of your captain as he had been flogged before your eyes. From the tightening of your captain’s mouth, he obviously remembers it too, one hand reaching up to touch his shoulder unconsciously.

San may have healed the wounds well, but his body recalls the agony of the whipping.

“I didn’t take the Royal Navy for one to believe in superstitions and sorcery.” Mingi hisses, clearly still quite unconvinced that the Royal Navy is here for an honest exchange and the mention of Leon doesn’t make him any friendlier. But Commander Kang turns to him, eyes narrowing.

“My superior commander has studied several ancient literary sources. They all state that the rope in your captain’s possession is a Legendary Treasure of the Sea, spoken about in many historical texts and containing enough power to rival that of a divine being.” Kang Yongsun then turns to look very deliberately at your captain, who is staring down at his rope necklace in shock, as if he can’t quite believe that this simple knot in his possession is capable of such damage. “However, if you do accept this pardon, there would be no need for you to have such a dangerous artefact, so you might as well give it up to me.”

You see your captain swallow. This knot is precious to him, you can tell. It’s his last link to the person who’d saved him so long ago on that deserted island when he’d been abandoned and shot in the eye by his father. But what is he to do? Exchanging it for the freedom of all his crew mates… is it worth it?

“You mentioned another two things.” Hongjoong fights to keep his voice steady, staring down the commander. “What else do you want from me?”

At that, something prickles at the back of your neck, a chill sweeping over you as the hairs on your arms raise uncomfortably. You don’t know how to describe this feeling, but the next best thing you can say is that you feel like someone has just walked right across your grave.

You soon find out why, because the Commander turns slowly, before raising a finger at the thing he needs from Hongjoong. Simultaneously, everyone’s mouth drops in sheer shock at the absurdity of his request, or they flare up in rage from the outrageous nature of his demand.

“He’s crazy.” Yunho whispers in a daze from next to you, his wide eyes meeting your own terrified ones.

“I want the woman you have on board.”

He’s pointing straight at you.