#I have to deal with this in two series now

[not-neverland06]

How About A Nuke?

Part I / Part II / Part III / Part IV

The ghoul x fem!reader A/N: I’ve received more love and interaction with this series than I have with any of my other works, so thank you all so much for that ♥️ That being said, I’ve also had a lot of comments talking about how excited readers are for Cooper eventually finding his humanity. This is not going to be that chapter, so strap in and good luck. I’m anticipating there to be about two chapter of this story (most likely.) Summary: The surface sucks. There’s nothing else to it, you’re affronted by violence and brutality every minute you’re up here. The one thing that’s kept you going has been Cooper slowly easing up, you should have known better. Warnings: Themes of SA but none is actually committed.

“Up,” you jumped, jolted harshly out of your restless sleep. You weren’t sure when you’d passed out last night but it was a long while after you’d struck your deal with Cooper. A glance through one of the holes in the wall told you it was still slightly dark outside. 

He strode to the door, throwing it open and not bothering to see if you were following. You scrambled up to your feet, rubbing the sleep out of your eyes while you hurried to catch up with him. You trailed slightly behind him for a while, not willing to risk pissing him off by getting too close. 

He’d always been an even tempered man, at least when you’d known him, this brutality was something completely foreign to you. Left you feeling like you were walking on glass every time you even looked at him. 

After about an hour and a half of walking without speaking, you felt yourself starting to go a little crazy. You rushed up to his side, glaring under the harsh beams of sunlight. “Where are we headed?” He didn’t bother looking at you or even acknowledging that you spoke. 

He simply kept his eyes ahead and kept going. You huffed and let yourself fall back again. He clearly wasn’t in the mood for conversation today. Another hour and you felt yourself starting to slow down. You didn’t have a handy little canteen like Cooper did, you certainly didn’t have any fucking sunscreen. You could already feel yourself starting to pour sweat and your lips were peeling again. 

Any rest you’d gotten from last night was zapped out of you. You’d barely started the day’s journey and already you felt like you were going to keel over. You stopped for a moment, not thinking he’d pay attention, and leaned over to try and catch your breath. 

“Come on!” You glanced up. He’d stopped a few yards up ahead, he was glaring at you, impatiently waiting for you to get a move on. You groaned, taking in a deep breath and forcing your feet to move again. 

“Please, can I just have a sip of water?”

He grinned and pulled out the canteen. You felt the briefest amount of energy shooting back through you at the prospect of water. Your hands reached for it but he snatched it away and took a deep gulp. You licked your lips, mouth feeling even dryer while you watched him guzzle the last of his water down. 

You felt yourself deflate again, too tired to even get properly mad at him. He was just being a dick now. “Fuck you,” you muttered, brushing past him and continuing ahead. 

“Come on, darlin’,” he caught up with you. Not like it was hard, you were going the pace of a turtle right now. 

You felt like a panting dog under the summer sun, practically drooling in an attempt to keep your throat moistened. You pulled the zipper of the vault suit down and tied the sleeves around your waist. 

“I’d keep that zipped if I were you.” You knew he was talking about, the black slip you had on underneath the suit. Probably not smart to go advertising your assets like this, you had no idea had bad the people out here were. But so far you hadn’t seen anyone for miles and you needed a few minutes to try and dry the sweat on your back. 

You didn’t bother responding to him, it was a waste of breath at this point. “You ignoring me now?” You grunted, reaching up to wipe off your forehead and slick the hairs off your skin. “You wouldn’t want the water anyway, unless you got a purifier everything you’ll find out here is radiated to all hell.”

“You were still an asshole,” you muttered. 

He scoffed, glancing over at you before looking back out at the horizon. “We’ll be coming up on an old town, see if you can find yourself some supplies while we’re passing through.” You glanced over at him but he was walking ahead of you again. 

You wondered if this was his attempt at an apology or if he was just heading there because he needed something. Either way, it would provide you a break at least. 

“This is pathetic.”

You glared up at Cooper from where you sit curled up on the floor of an old house. “I’ll remind you that as of yesterday, to me, the most physical labor I had to do was switch out with a stunt double.”

He scoffed and shook his head, not bothering to respond. He walked past you and started rummaging around in drawers. From the abandoned bed rolls on the ground it was clear that somebody used to use this place as their base. You just wondered what sent them running. 

“Hey,” he barked, “we’re not staying here forever. Get a fucking move on.”

You groaned and slowly got to your feet, you stumbled to the other side of the house, rummaging around for anything you could change into or something to eat. You could hear Cooper moving around in the back of the house. He kept slamming drawers and cussing up a storm. 

You’re not sure what crawled up his ass and died but you figure it’s smart to just stay out of the way while he’s like this. 

She made his skin crawl. Being around her was just a constant reminder of what he’d had, who he’d been, and what he was now. Everytime she looked at him with those hurt eyes of hers he just wanted to shoot something. 

He hated feeling like this, almost like he was out of control. He knew what he was, he knew what he had to do to survive in a world like this. But she didn’t. She was naive to the way the Wastelands worked and innocent to the brutality she’d soon find herself in the middle of. 

He should have left her dying in the sand. He should have left her to choke to death in her pod. He was itching to get to Filly, the longer he stayed around her the more on edge he felt. He didn’t need someone slowing him down, she was a weakness and the Ghoul didn’t do weaknesses. 

His hands twitched towards the holster at his side and for a moment he really thought about it. Just sneaking up behind her and burying a bullet in her skull. He’d be getting rid of his problem and saving her from a lot of trouble in the future. She’d never do well in this new world, she was still someone from the old world. 

It would be a mercy to just put her out of her misery now. 

The button of the holster clicked as he popped it open. Slowly, he made his way towards the room she was in, the leather of his gloves creaking as he wrapped his hand around the handle of his gun. Quick, in and out. She wouldn’t even know what was happening before it was too late and the light in her eyes was out. 

Her back was to him, rummaging around in the wreckage of the room. She was completely vulnerable and exposed. Like she didn’t understand how easy it would be for someone to sneak up on her or she stupidly expected him to defend her. 

“Hey! I think I found something!”

His hand jolted away from his gun and he shook his head. What the fuck was he thinking? He still technically needed her for his business in Filly. “What?” He snapped. 

She let out a yelp and jumped. She whirled around on him, hand clutching her chest and stared at him with wide, frightened eyes. It really would be easy to just take her out now. 

“Jesus,” he could tell when she was about to say his name. She’d bite her lip real hard and frown, she was doing it now. For a moment he was thinking about how they used to scare each other. They would make a stupid game of it and she would always hit him and yell, Jesus, Coop! 

He used to think it was hilarious. Now he was just resisting the urge to draw his gun on her. 

“What,” he enunciated each word, speaking to her like she was a child, “did you find?”

She glared at him and moved aside, showing him the stash of shit she’d uncovered. There were a lot of good supplies here, nothing he could use, but enough to stick in a pack for her. Only problem was nobody would leave all this here. Either they were coming back for it or whatever had killed them off was coming for it. 

“Hurry and pack this shit up, we need to get out of here.” When she didn’t move fast enough he snapped, “Now!” She knelt down, hurriedly scooping all the supplies into the ratty old bag on the ground next to them. 

He walked back towards the front of the house, pulling his gun out and surveying the destroyed houses. He didn’t see anybody but that didn’t mean shit anymore. Ever since Muldaver started bringing people into her cult the raiders seemed to have been getting smarter. They needed to get the fuck out and quick. 

“Alright, let's go!” He leaned back in the doorway, peering back into the house and waiting for her to pop out. There was a moment of silence and he frowned, slowly heading back into the house. 

A scream ripped out of the room, echoing into the empty streets of the neighborhood. He rushed back into the house and slowed down once he reached the hall. He could hear her talking to someone, yelling at them more like. He only heard two other voices, wouldn’t be too bad if he didn’t hear more approaching the front of the house. 

“Fuck,” he muttered. He flipped open the chamber of his gun, counting his bullets and trying to decide whether or not she was actually worth helping. 

“Well, ain’t you pretty?”

“Back the fuck off,” you clutched the backpack to your chest, gaze darting between the two men before you. Men was being generous, you’re sure they’d been men once but now they were just twisted freaks capable of nothing but violence. 

The one on the left smiled, blackened teeth making an appearance and the boils around his mouth shifting. You stumbled further back, nearly tripping over a toppled over couch. You only had so much room to move, you were gonna be backed into a corner soon and you didn’t want to think about what they would do to you then. 

The scalpel in your pocket could slit one of their throats but the other one would be on you before you could blink. Still, you kept your hand firmly wrapped around it while you glared at them. 

“You know,” the one on the right started. You could practically smell him from here, his hair so greasy it looked soaking wet. “You’re being awfully rude for someone who just helped herself to our supplies.”

“Pay the price pretty lady and we’ll let you go,” he leered and it didn’t take a genius to figure out what the “price” was. You’d sooner slit your own throat then spread your legs for them. But you also weren’t about to give up the supplies in the bag you were holding. You may be new to this whole Wastelands thing, but you figured Cooper wasn’t going to share. If you didn’t get this bag out of here, you weren’t going to make it another day. 

“You got a working right hand, go fuck yourself.”

They laughed and moved in closer. “We got a fighter, Bart!”

“Sure do, Jed.”

You yelped, tripping over a loose plank of wood and falling on your ass, the scalpel flew out of your hand and skittered across the floor. You barely even breathed before they were pouncing on you. Rough hands gripped your ankles and dragged you across the splintered floor. They were more wild animals than men. 

You tried to kick out, screaming for help and flailing your fists wildly. You felt your hand connect with something hard and then there was a low groan of pain before your arms were being pinned. “No! Let me go!”

They started laughing, one of them tugging the sleeves of your suit off your waist and whistling at the slip underneath. You brought your knee up into his gut but it barely phased him. He just swatted your leg to the side like you were nothing to him. 

You could feel a visceral type of panic brewing in you. There were a lot of things worse than death. The prospect of these men actually getting their hands on you had you kicking out again. You tugged on your arms until you were sure you were doing more damage to yourself than to them. But you didn’t care, you couldn’t think, you were working on the base instinct to protect yourself. 

The sound of spurs echoed down the hallway before Cooper was turning the corner. He had his gun raised and was pointing it right at them. “I do believe the lady said no.”

“We found her first,” one of them let go of your suit to crouch in front of you. He looked like an animal guarding his territory. The other chuckled, barely sparing Cooper a glance. 

“Actually,” he cocked the hammer of his gun back, “you didn’t.”

You processed your ears ringing before you got to the gunshot. You couldn’t hear anything, a high pitched whining making your jaw clench in pain. Your arms went slack and you quickly pulled your pants back up, zipping the suit all the way to your throat. You rolled onto your hands and knees, barely cognizant of the puddle of blood you were dragging yourself through. 

Two arms wrapped around your waist and you acted without thought. You swung out blindly, yelling and clawing like a wild cat. “-nough! That’s enough, come on!” Cooper’s voice broke through the haze and you went limp with relief. 

He tightened his arms around you and dragged you to your feet. You glanced down at yourself, finally feeling the warmth seeping through your clothes. You were doused head-to-toe in those men’s blood. Your face was completely covered. 

You glanced to the right and had to suppress a gag. Brains and skull were mashed together in a disgusting puddle of gore, nothing left of the men who’d grabbed you. “Hey,” Cooper shook you slightly and your eyes shot back to his. “We need to leave now, they’ll be more coming.”

You nodded dumbly, not really sure you were processing what was actually going on. Half of you was still stuck thinking you had to keep fighting, the other half wanted to be back in the cryogenic pod. He wrapped a hand around your arm and shoved the bag into your arms. 

Then you felt something heavy being pressed into the palm of your hand. You glanced down, surprised to find one of his guns in your hand. “What’re-”

“Clearly, you need something to defend yourself. You still remember how to shoot, don't you?” You nodded, of course you did, he’s the one that taught you. “Good, now move your ass.” He gave you a rough shove and you stumbled over the bodies. 

One thing you were learning was that you didn’t get a whole lot of time to process things in the Wastelands. One minute you were on the floor being stripped and the next you were ducking behind an old house to avoid raiders. You didn’t linger on what happened, you tried to keep your mind firmly gripped in the present. You couldn’t give it too much thought or you’d shut down. 

Cooper moved ahead of you, slinking around the back of the neighborhood to make sure the coast was clear. You slid the straps of the bag over your shoulders and followed quietly after him. You made it to the border of the houses and figured you could relax a bit now. 

Clearly, they weren’t coming after you. They might have heard the gunshots but they had no clue where you were. Cooper wasn’t going to risk it though, he wrapped his hand around your arm again and roughly dragged you behind him. 

“Keep up, I’m not gonna come back for you if you fall behind.”

But he already had. He could have left you to those raiders. He came back for you, even he couldn’t deny that. 

“Do you think we’ll be safe here?” He glanced up at you and nodded wordlessly. You stacked the last piece of wood for the fire and sat back. He leaned forward, striking his knife against a rock and waiting for the sparks to catch. 

You watched without thought, mind lingering on the feeling of blood sticking to your skin and clothes. Everytime you moved bits of it flaked off or crusted further onto your skin. You were nearly ready to just claw your skin off to get rid of the feeling. 

“Here,” you glanced up, surprised to find him holding up a wet cloth. “Wipe your face off, you look fucking insane.”

You grabbed it, scrubbing at your face and hands until your skin was raw. “Thanks,” you muttered, tossing the cloth back to him. He caught it and tucked it in his pocket. It felt strange between you. You’re not sure what it was exactly. Maybe you were just projecting, still worked up from what happened earlier. 

It wasn’t a bad strange, per say, just odd. “Take first watch,” he ordered. You just nodded, watching as he leaned against the wall of the old house you were camped in. He pulled his hat over his eyes and stilled. You weren’t sure he was asleep until you heard a few light snores coming from him. 

You glanced down at the gun in your hands. You opened the chamber and counted the bullets before closing it again. It wasn’t like the guns he used to teach you with, that’s for sure. It was bigger, bulkier, probably had a bitch of a recoil too. But you could point and aim well enough, hopefully you wouldn’t need to fire off more than one shot if someone did bother you tonight. 

You’re not sure when you fell asleep, you know you shouldn’t. It’s up to you to make sure no one tries to slit your throat in your sleep. But the events of the day caught up to you faster than you thought they would and before you knew it you were slumping back against the wall and dead to the world. 

Your eyes snap open at the sound of wood creaking. There’s a man, he looks like the ones from today, standing over Cooper. He’s got his knife hovering above his throat. You’re pulling the trigger before you can even think about what you’re doing. 

He lets out a howl of pain and slumps onto the floor. Cooper’s eyes shoot open and he jumps up, he pulls out his own gun but the man is already dead before he can pull the trigger. You stare at the body in shock, mind running so fast you can’t even process what you’re thinking. 

“I killed him,” you muttered. You can feel the gun slipping out of your grasp, hands shaking too badly to keep a good grip on it. “I killed him.”

Cooper walks over and picks the gun back up. He sticks it into the pocket of your backpack and grabs your face. You wince slightly as his fingers push against the bruises on your cheeks but don’t complain. He’s not being rough like you’ve come to expect. 

He stares at you for a long moment, eyes boring into yours with an unreadable expression. “I just killed him,” you whisper again. You’re still trying to reconcile with that fact. You knew it would happen eventually, today had taught you that much. But you hadn’t expected it to shock you as much as it had. 

Maybe it’s because you didn’t manage to blow his head off with one shot. You watched as the light left his eyes. 

“You did a good job, we need to move now, sweetheart. Let’s go.”

And despite what you’d just done, you could really only focus on the fact that was the first time he’d called you that without sounding cruel. 

You were getting closer to Filly, you could see a large forest a couple miles ahead of you. Being closer to the trees, even by such a little amount, was doing wonders in improving your mood. You found you didn’t mind the sun and heat as much when you just kept reminding yourself that soon you could find some shade. 

You passed by an old sunken billboard, Filly spray painted across it with an arrow pointing the way. You found yourself pushing Cooper further ahead today, more and more excited to find somewhere with halfway civilized people. 

You made it to the edge of the forest before Cooper stopped you. He threw his bag down next to a fallen log and pointed up towards the sky. “Sun’s setting, trust me, you don’t want to be exploring these woods after dark.”

The ominous tone had chills raising along your arms, you frowned and glanced towards the dense grove of trees. Something within them trilled out towards the night sky. You found yourself scooting a little closer to him, wary of what was waiting in there for you. 

He huffed out a laugh and started building a fire. You dug through your bag, pulling out the few rations you’d gleaned from the raiders. You held one out to him but he shook his head and pulled out his odd looking jerky instead. 

You’re not really sure what that shit is made of, but you know you don’t want to know. You were too afraid to ask him. Especially after you tried a bite the other day, it didn’t taste like any meat you recognized. 

You ate in a comfortable silence, the sound of your chewing drowned out by the insects flitting around in the trees above you. But he kept glancing at you, giving you odd looks that had you on edge. “What?” You finally snapped, sick of him looking at you weird. 

You hadn’t felt clean since you’d crossed the desert, but after what happened yesterday your skin was crawling with shame and disgust. You felt like you needed to scrape the skin off until you felt clean. He was making you feel even worse. 

“So,” he leaned back against the log. He took his time getting comfortable, letting you squirm before he deigned to finish his sentence. “You really didn’t leave for Vault-Tec?”

You glared at him and shook your head. Why did he still think that? How could he think that? It pissed you off to no end. “Why in God’s name would I do that?” Your tone was indignant. But there was a slightly desperate undertone to it as well. You hated the thought of Cooper genuinely thinking that you had just up and left him one day without a word. 

“Well, I don’t know. I looked for you for a while. Eventually I gave up, figured you’d just found someone else to shack up with.”

You were pained that he would think that of you. “How could you say that?”

He chuckled but it wasn’t kind, it was that cruel laugh that made you feel small, like something to be squashed under his boot. “Well, not like we meant a whole lot to each other.”

Your voice was barely above a whisper. Not fully processing what he was trying to say to you. “What?”

It took you by surprise, the hatred in his eyes when he glared at you. “What do you think happened, sweetheart?” You hated the way your old nickname rolled off his tongue. It sounded tainted now, twisted by his cruelty. 

“You were at the peak of your career, the sexiest actress of your generation,” he sneered at you, yellowed teeth flashing in the firelight. Your fingers curled into your palms, broken nails digging dully into your cracked skin. His eyes ticked up in interest at your minute shift in behavior. He had always been good at reading people. Except he didn’t used to use that skill so horribly. 

He didn’t let up, digging further into you when he noticed your discomfort. “You were a sex symbol, darlin’ and I was freshly divorced. Did you really think any of that was love?” He scoffed and you felt tears pricking at your eyes. “No,” he shook his head and ripped off another piece of jerky, scoffing at you. “You really think I was gonna say no to a pretty young thing like you? You were just a hole to fill, honey. That’s all.”

You felt like you’d been punched in the gut, actually, you’d think you’d prefer that to how you feel right now. It was getting hard to get the air down your throat, you felt like you were suffocating on the smoke from the fire. Winded and you hadn’t even done anything. 

Everything, everything, he was saying was perfectly concocted to hurt you as much as fucking possible. He knew how you felt about your place in the world, how desperately you had crawled your way into being seen as something human. You’re sure he’s just saying this to hurt you, to keep you away. 

If you were more mature you might even just let it go, realize it was a childish attempt at hurting you and keep going. But this was a man you’d opened up to completely. To take those parts of yourself that he knew were vulnerable and wield them like a weapon against you was something you just couldn’t look past. Especially not after what happened yesterday. 

You clenched your eyes shut, trying to keep the tears at bay and weakly nodded your head. “Alright. You’ve said your piece. You done?”

He nearly frowned, eyes lowering as he gave you an odd look over the fire. He seemed to be expecting something else. Maybe for you to fight back. Well, if that’s what he wanted he was going to be sorely disappointed. He’d just drained the fight out of you with a few measly insults. 

After a tense moment of silence he nodded. “Great,” you refused to look at him as you got up and grabbed your pack. 

“Where are you going?” he questioned, tone souring as you continued to avoid looking at him. 

“Far away from you as I can get,” you muttered, stalking off into the dead trees. You weren’t a complete idiot, you stayed in sight of the fire, but you couldn’t bear to lay so close to him tonight. Not after what he just said to you. Not after you thought you had finally been making progress and he threw that in your face. 

“Fine, pout all you want sweetheart, give the radroaches a nice meal!” He shouted at your retreating back. You still kept your head down, hand clutched over your stomach while you tried not to cry. You threw your bag down on the ground, a choked sob slipping through your lips while you sank against a tree. 

You felt so stupid! To actually believe that any of the man you loved was left in him had been a fool’s hope. You wiped your eyes harshly, pissed at yourself for crying again. This was the apocalypse, there wasn’t time to cry and moan because the man you loved didn’t love you back. 

You’d dealt with that feeling for years when you pined after Cooper. You could deal with it again. 

Only, the last time you’d pined like this, you hadn’t actually had a taste of what being with him was really like. Knowing that the whole time you were with him he just saw you as something to pass the time hurt you more than you wanted to admit. 

You glanced over your shoulder, watching as he packed away the rest of his food and sank back against the log. He tilted his hat over his eyes and settled in for the night. You turned back around, using the dwindling light of the fire to scope out the forest before you. 

Cooper had said it was only a day’s walk to Filly. Go a mile north into the trees and you’d find the signs pointing the way. His cruel words festered bitterly in your stomach and you found yourself on your feet before you could really think about what you were doing. 

You crept your way towards the campfire and grabbed one of the burning sticks. Cooper shifted and you stilled, wincing as you waited for him to wake up and question what you were doing. But he just shifted onto his side. You ran back towards your bag and threw it over your shoulder. 

You only spared Cooper one last look before you made your way further into the woods. He’d made it clear enough that he wasn’t looking for companionship or friendship. You could respect that, but you weren’t going to tolerate him being a fucking dick to you at every opportunity he got. 

If he wanted to see how far he could push you until you reached the edge, he’d done it. You were done trying to cater to his temper. You could make it a day on your own. After that, you’d find something for yourself in Filly, but you were sure as hell done with Cooper Howard. 

He was a ghost that should have stayed fucking dead. 

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end. — I do not own the characters or the game/show Fallout, but this writing is my own all rights reserved © not-neverland06 2024. do not copy, repost, translate & recommend elsewhere.

[girlmartok]

post canon ds9 fic i won't write for real, in bullet points:

story starts with jake sisko, pondering and writing. he got a commission from some federation news service to do a fluff piece on "the soul of the klingon people" now that the war is over and they have a new chancellor, essentially a "look federation people, klingons are still chill. maybe chiller, even. so everybody be cool" deal (i'm imagining they have to do an article like this for every group of aliens that were a major combatant in the war) but jake takes it seriously and refuses to phone it in.

first he goes to alexander, who's visiting the station while between KDF assignments or something idk. but he says look buddy i wanna know what's up with klingons, you get me? alexander does not get him and also would like to know what's up with klingons, so he says hell yeah human friend let's figure this out.

then it becomes a series of vignettes of these two kind of out of touch young people learning about the klingon spirit and also themselves as they seek out someone who can tell them the secrets of life and honor etc etc. jake has a warped sense of normal from growing up on ds9 and alexander has never felt right in solely klingon or human spaces, so they have some gaps in their knowledge to fill.

i'm thinking they start with worf and martok, who are busy on qo'nos building their credibility and new government. worf isn't great at talking about feelings and martok's being pulled in a lot of different directions, so they're not much help. hanging around on qo'nos is interesting, but ultimately not what jake and alexander are looking for either.

then they start thinking outside the box. order isn't important but they start hitting up all relevant klingons and klingon adjacent folk: darok, sirella, ezri, nikolai, kurn, maybe a duras sisters cameo for equal representation of shitty klingons.

last we saw of kurn of course he had lost his memory but since this is my fic i'm not writing i'm gonna say bashir's not as great at brain reconfiguration as he thinks he is and it didn't take fully. so he's a little confused but getting the hang of it. a lot of "which one of you is my nephew again? i can't tell humans apart" kind of deal even though alexander is 3/4 klingon. he tells them what he's re-learned about klingons since he's been rebuilding his own identity.

nikolai also was essentially exiled but it's fine. he's got a gaggle of kids now and alexander and jake have to do the fake forehead thing to blend in while they talk to him. nikolai's got a lot of insight into worf as a brother but not much on klingons as a whole. alexander brings him some pierogi helena made.

alexander: "wow my foster uncle's wife looks a lot like your stepmom, isn't that funny?" jake: "nah i don't see the resemblance"

maybe at this point nog joins them because he's having his own identity crisis as the only ferengi in starfleet so he decides to just hop on board for jake and alexander's identity crisis.

they go see jeremy aster too, the kid from tng who became worf's brother through a whole thing, and he's got a pretty interesting view of klingons and the klingon spirit from an outsider/insider perspective.

sirella and darok are probably the least helpful but i think sirella baby-ing alexander would be fun. they're both trying to deny it and deny how much they like the attention (sirella at having a new-ish nephew-ish and one who wasn't raised klingon so she can do all the classic klingon things with him fresh, and alexander at having a(nother) mother figure to love him). jake is studiously taking notes in the corner while sirella tries to teach him how to skin a fresh kill or something like that.

anyway this whole journey ends with them finding kahless 2 (the clone of kahless) whose only occupation is thinking about the klingon spirit. but his wisdom boils down to "everyone's different and everyone has to figure shit out on their own, but together we can strive to be greater than yesterday" etc etc and jake gets his article. alexander reaffirms his grasp on his cultural identity and also gets to see a lot of his family so he's reminded that he's loved, even if everyone is doing their own thing. and nog develops a huge crush on sirella. everybody's happy.

[dudeitiskarev]

Maybe Someday | Ch. 7

A Spencer Reid mini-series

Pairing: Spencer Reid x female reader

Chapter summary: you visit Spencer. And Henry.

Tags/warnings: food consumption.

Word count: 1.6k

Author’s note: can you tell I’m bad at summaries

Neither of you mentioned it—the almost-kiss. 

It didn’t make things awkward either, which could only mean it wasn’t that big of a deal. Even when it became all Spencer thought about. 

Day and night he craved having that close to you again; to hold you tight, smell your hair, and inhale you until you became a part of him. 

He missed you, and you didn’t mention the almost kiss, so why would he? Everything was as normal as it ever was. 

Except… that it wasn’t. 

Two weeks went by since the most wonderful moment, a few texts here and there, but he needed to see you. So when he couldn’t handle your silence anymore, he showed up at ‘Moramor’. Your face lit up the same way it did the first time but all you said was ‘Hi, what can I get for you?’ as if he was any other customer. He asked for a cup of coffee with a donut, as usual, and after you placed his order on the counter, he sat at a table for one, as usual. He was the only customer that morning while he was there but you didn’t go sit with him for a few minutes, as you usually did during slow mornings. You only glanced at him every once in a while and tore your eyes off him when you made eye contact. That wasn’t like you, he admitted, and part of him wanted to walk up to you and talk to you about it. But he didn’t. He left the cafe with a tight-lipped smile, a wave of a hand, and an empty chest yet full of things he needed to say. 

That night, the only person he had to talk to was a two-year-old toddler. 

“I probably shouldn’t tell you all this,” Spencer said to Henry. 

He’d agreed to babysit Henry for the night while JJ and Will went out for a very much-needed date. Henry was an easy kid to look after, so once Spencer gave him his dinner—sweet potato puree—they sat on the floor over the playmat JJ brought.

“I’m sorry I don’t have a TV for you, but I got you this chessboard the other day.” Spencer opened a small box. “It has flat cardboard pieces for your safety but this way you can familiarize yourself with the game until you’re old enough to play with actual pieces,” he explained, displaying the game. 

It seemed boring now that he had opened it. Still, Henry showed interest and immediately brought one piece to his mouth.

“Okay.” Spencer gently took the piece from him.

“Uh-oh,” Henry babbled. 

“Yeah, uh-oh,” Spencer chuckled. 

His house phone rang, making him stretch his body just enough to reach it while still sitting down. “Hello?” 

“Hey, you’re home.” That was your voice on the other line. His heart began to race.

“Y-yeah, I’m home.” He played with the cord. 

“Good because I’m outside your door. Open up.”

His mouth was left open as you hung up before Spencer could reply. 

“Looks like we have a visitor, Henry.” Spencer stood up rather quickly but gathered himself so he wouldn’t look too excited. He put the long front pieces of his hair behind his ears and adjusted the tie around his neck. He walked to the door, never losing sight of Henry, and opened the door for you. “Hey.”

You opened your mouth to greet him back, and your eyes went past his shoulder, widening. “Hey, there’s… a kid in your living room.” 

“I’m babysitting for the night.”

You quirked a brow. “You have a side job?” 

“No?” he laughed, stepping aside for you to walk in. “I don’t think I need a side job. And even if I did, I doubt I’d choose babysitting. That’s Henry, my godson.”

“Oh.” You took a step back. “ I should’ve called earlier. I’m so sorry. I can go.”

You had a take-out bag in one hand from your favorite Chinese food restaurant.

“No! No, come in, please.” He opened the door all the way. “We uh, we were just playing some chess. We— we would love your company, actually.” 

And by we he meant himself, of course. Henry had no idea who you were but once he met you, Spencer was sure he’d love your company too. 

“Are you sure? Because I can go.” You insisted, your eyes darting from Henry to Spencer. “We can hang out some other day when you’re not too busy.”

“Not busy. Just… with a toddler.” Spencer chuckled.

“Oh, okay.” You walked in hesitantly but made yourself comfortable anyway, taking off your shoes by the door. “Have you eaten? I brought some Chinese.”

“I was starving, actually. I don’t know why I didn’t think of making myself some food before JJ dropped him off.” 

You made your way to his kitchen, Spencer right behind you.

“I’ve got it.” You smiled. 

Okay, Spencer nodded and picked up Henry to sit with him on the couch.

“Are you looking after him all night?” Spencer could get a glimpse of you from there, moving around the kitchen as if it were your own. The sounds of plates and silverware being placed over the counter brought an odd warmth to his place, making it seem like it wasn’t made for someone to live alone.

His stomach rumbled. “I don’t think so, no. They dropped him off two hours ago. They’re usually gone for four hours,” he explained. “I also usually go to their place but this time JJ asked if she could bring him here. I don’t know why.”

You walked to him with the plates, placing them over the coffee table. “Probably because they intend to make another baby after their date,” you casually said, licking the tip of your finger clean.

“Oh.” Spencer's lips turned downward. “Didn’t think of it that way. Now we’re… traumatized.” He looked at Henry whose blinks were slowing down while looking at you.

“Sorry,” you laughed, taking your first bite. “He’s sleepy,” you smiled, looking back at Henry. 

“Yeah, it’s past his bedtime.”

Yet he fought hard not to fall asleep. Henry was too entertained watching you eat.

It didn’t feel as awkward as Spencer thought it’d be. Maybe because he didn’t allow it by talking nonstop about every little thing that made Henry… Henry.

“You’re a natural,” you commented.

“I don’t know why but kids love me,” and just he said that, Henry stretched his arms towards you. 

“Well, they love me, too.” You put your empty plate over the table. “C’mere big boy.” You were gentle to take him from Spencer and sat the kid on your lap. He stretched his little arm and caressed your cheek. “Oh, thank you, you’re so gentle,” you said, using a subtle baby voice.

Spencer’s chest swelled at the sight, and just like Henry, he stayed looking at you. 

“What?” You frowned at him.

“Nothing,” he merely said, shaking his head. “It’s just… you’re a natural, too.”

“I think he’s gonna fall asleep in my arms.” You made yourself comfortable, sitting further back on the couch, and adjusted Henry so he’d be lying down. “I might fall asleep, too.”

He could assume by your work clothes and the subtle undereye bags that you’d picked an extra shift. “That’s okay.” Spencer glanced at his watch and then back at you. You rested your head back and closed your eyes. “JJ should be back in about thirty minutes, so you can sleep if you want.”

You shook your head, glancing back at him, weary-eyed. He wanted to scoot over and hold you and Henry while he stroked your hair and fell asleep in his arms. He almost did, but he held his urges and just gave you a soft scratch on the top of your head and stood up. 

“I… I’m gonna clean this little guy’s mess,” he said. He picked up every toy, packed Henry’s bag, and did the dishes all in eleven minutes, and soon, JJ was knocking at his door.

“Hey, Spence.” She walked in and as soon as she saw you she gave Spencer a knowing look, subtly widening her eyes. 

You were on your way to her already with Henry in your arms. “Hey, I… he just fell asleep on me and I didn’t want to wake him to put him in the stroller.” You sort of apologized, looking down at him. “He seems so cozy.” And there was your subtle baby voice again. 

“It’s perfect. It’s the only way he falls asleep, actually.” JJ reached for Henry and you gently peeled off him until he was gone from your arms. You crossed them over your chest right away. “Will’s waiting for us.” JJ looked up at Spencer. 

“Yeah, I’ll go with you.” Spencer went to get Henry’s bag and hung it over his shoulder. “Hey,” he said to you. “I’ll be right back.”

You only smiled at him and wiggled your fingers goodbye. 

JJ wasted no time while going downstairs. “You’ve never mentioned how pretty she is,” she commented.

“I haven't?”

“I’ve never seen you that nervous around a girl either.”

“Yeah, she’s not any girl.” He was quick to reply. 

It was JJ, and she knew about you. To a certain level.

“Oh?” she raised her brows. 

“What?” he asked without a clue.

“You really like her.”

“Of course I like her.” 

“Does she know you like her?” 

“I think she does.”

JJ stopped in her tracks. “So, what’s stopping you?”

“Stopping me from what?” Spencer frowned. 

“Spence,” she said in an isn’t-it-obvious tone and nudged his arm. “From making her your girlfriend.” That was a question he’d been asking himself, too. And the only answer he came up with as he made it back to his apartment was you.

I hope you liked this chapter!!!! 💖

[blairrwaldorfs]

Midnight Rain

Joseph Quinn x Fem!Reader

Summary: The glitz and glamour of Hollywood isn't always what it seems. When Joe had started working with you in a movie, he had started wondering as to why you, the famous Hollywood starlet, has been acting out lately. Was there some dark secret behind all the angry spoiled façade? And why was he so fascinated about it?

Author's Note: Hello! I'm back with another Joe series! There will be dark triggering factors in this series, so I'm warning you all this right now. I won't put a disclaimer on this chapter because it hasn't been mentioned, but it will be in the future chapters. I have been working on this plot for a month and a half so hopefully, it will satisfy you all! This might end up being more than five parts, so we'll see. Comments are always welcome, of course! :)

Disclaimer: 18+

Wordcount: 2.7K

part one - part two - part three - part four - part five

“Okay, okay!” You laughed. “You win, Jimmy!”

Your eyes sparkled in happiness as Jimmy Fallon put down the headphones on his desk. The both of you were playing a game on national television. You were called to promote your current movie, and an interview with Jimmy Fallon was one of the promotions that you needed to do. He had challenged you to put on the headphones and play the music on a high volume, while he said random words in front of you. You had to figure out what he was saying, but your answers were always so far off. 

“Well, that interview went well.”

Joe jolted in surprise as soon as he heard his manager, Alex, enter his dressing room. He paused the video of you with Jimmy Fallon and looked over his shoulder to see Alex, shaking his head and letting out a deep sigh. 

“What’s that?” Alex tilted his head towards Joe’s tablet and saw that he was watching one of your interviews. 

“I don’t believe that the woman out there is the same person as this woman in this video.” Joe said.

Joe pressed play again and saw how right at the end of the show, your eyes were literally watering from laughing so hard. Your smile and eyes were sparkling in joy. It was almost like you were a whole different person. You were full of light, and you laughed at just about everything. He wasn’t going to lie, your laugh was infectious and he couldn’t help but chuckle when he was watching the whole interview. You were very interactive, and your answers to Jimmy were so detailed and fun. You even would joke a little to make Jimmy laugh during the interview. 

The video was three years old, and Joe couldn’t wrap his mind around the fact that he just sat for an hour and a half with you this morning for an interview for the movie that you two have done together, and you were almost lifeless. Almost so disinterested about everything around you. 

“Well, it’s not your problem.” Alex sat across from Joe. “Your priority is to focus on promoting this movie. She has her own publicist that could deal with whatever that is going on with her.”

Joe’s eyes shifted towards the paused Youtube video on his tablet again. See, that was the problem. He knew working with you on set wasn’t really that difficult. You came to set everyday—even if you were late most of the time—and did your job well. You were an amazing actress, and he knew how big your fanbase was. You didn’t exactly spend time with him too much on set nor with the rest of the cast, but he thought maybe because you weren’t that social. Now that he has seen some of your old interviews, he realized how extroverted and outgoing you were. But what happened? Joe couldn’t seem to let it go. 

“Ten minutes.” Alex patted him on the shoulder before walking out of the dressing room. 

Joe exhaled a sharp breath and leaned back on his chair. You were late this morning too, and you were already having an argument with your publicist as you walked down the hall and passed by Joe’s dressing room. Sitting on the chair, Joe and the interviewer gave each other an awkward smile as they waited for the both of you to arrive. Fixing your hair, you whispered something at your publicist before sitting next to Joe. 

“Hi.” Joe smiled at you.

“Let’s get this over with.” You mumbled under your breath, fixing your hair. 

The first few questions were easy. Joe was able to answer most of it, and you put on a fake smile and nodded your head. However, as time passed, Joe noticed the bored expression on your face as you played with your rings on your fingers. His eyes shifted on your lap as you spun the ring on your middle finger and then played with the fabric of your dress. He wasn’t sure if that was you being nervous or that was just a habit that you did. 

“So, what made the both of you interested in the role?” The interviewer asked.

“It was outside of my comfort zone, and I wanted to try something new. So, I hope I did the character justice.” Joe laughed softly.

Then, the interviewer’s eyes shifted to you and so did Joe’s. You bit your lower lip and was silent for a moment. Then, Joe saw the sparkle that twinkled in your eyes as you smiled.

“The paycheck was good.” You laughed at your own little joke. 

Joe saw the awkward expression on the interviewer’s face as she tried to just laugh off your answer. Joe couldn’t help but feel the blood rushed to his cheeks. He didn’t understand why you were acting like this. Were you just bored? Or were you doing this on purpose to piss off your team? 

The interviewer proceeded with more questions and at one point, you yawned in the middle of it and quickly apologized. Although, Joe knew you weren’t being genuine at all. You just said that because you knew you were on camera. 

“Are you guys excited to see the movie?” The interviewer asked. “You know… To see how it was all put together.”

“Yeah, actually—”

“No,” You shook your head, cutting Joe off. “I’ll probably just go home and order takeout after the red carpet.”

Joe started to feel uncomfortable, and he could see it all over the interviewer’s face that she was about done with you. He took a deep breath and gave the interviewer a smile as she asked more questions, but you kept trying to just make jokes and be sarcastic over it. Not once had Joe heard you answer the question with a serious answer.

“Do you think we will get a sequel?” She asked.

“Absolutely not.” You replied to the question immediately, your eyes widened looking horrified. 

“Can we take a break?” Joe asked, clearing his throat. 

“Um… yeah.” The interviewer smiled, getting up from her chair. “I think that’s a good idea.”

Joe immediately found himself in his dressing room, and he didn’t know why but he couldn’t help but google you. He wanted to know if there was some article that could tell him as to why you were acting like this. Then, that was when he found the Jimmy Fallon interview. It stunned him. Your hair was different too. Longer, dark brown and wavy. Now, you have it dyed in a platinum blonde and your roots are showing halfway on your head. It was only styled because you had your stylist for the day. 

“Ready?” Alex interrupted his thoughts as Joe set his tablet on the table and nodded his head. 

Following Alex out of the dressing room, Joe sat back on the chair and waited for you to arrive. Looking over his shoulder, he could hear your voice whispering at your publicist angrily. He watched as your publicist gave you instructions, her brows all furrowed and pointed her fingers towards the empty seat next to him. Joe couldn’t help but eavesdrop on the conversation. He knew he shouldn’t because just like Alex said, it was none of their business. However, Joe couldn’t understand why he was so interested in you. Why have you gotten his attention so much? It wasn’t like you were nice to him or gave him attention. In fact, you didn’t even bother learning his name. 

Hearing you sigh, you sat next to him and gave him and the interviewer a fake smile as you fixed your dress and hair. Joe could see the interviewer was intimidated by you, while she gave you a cold smile. At this point, Joe wouldn’t be surprised if she lashed out at you.

“So, how is it like working on set?” She asked. 

“Fun.” You shrugged. “Though, no one really talks to me nor I talk to any of them.”

Joe’s eyes shifted towards you and just answered the woman that he had an enjoyable time with his co-stars. However, he couldn’t help but think about what you told the interviewer because that was actually true. You have never had a full on conversation with him on set nor with your other co-stars. You always locked yourself inside your trailer during down time or would only talk if it’s about the movie. In fact, you never even tried to learn his name. You had been calling Joe by his character’s name all this time. He just never corrected you because he thought you were on some kind of method acting but now that you both were doing promos, he just now realized that you were still calling him by his character’s name. 

After a few more questions, the dreadful interview was finally over, and Joe was sort of relieved that it was done. Even though he probably would have to do more interviews with you for the next few weeks, he was just glad that the day was over, and he was able to go back to his hotel. Walking down the hall with you, Joe tried to find every ounce of courage to talk to you before you entered into your dressing room. 

“Have a good night.” Joe gave you a small genuine smile. 

“You too, John.” You smiled before entering your dressing room. 

Stunned, Joe stood in the middle of the hall alone as he tried to process if you really just said that. 

Did you really just call him John? Again?

Taking a deep breath, Joe walked over to where his dressing room was and found Alex sitting on the sofa with his tablet in hand. He looked a bit overwhelmed but when was Alex ever not overwhelmed with anything? 

“What is it?” Joe asked. 

“Nothing, just going over your schedule.” Alex said. “We’ll be flying to Paris tomorrow for the premiere, so I suggest to get some rest.”

Joe nodded his head. “Okay, anything else before I go?”

Alex shook his head. “No, the car is waiting for you outside.”

Joe thanked Alex one more time before grabbing his things. He was ready to just go back to London at this point. He has been in unfamiliar cities the last few weeks that he truly missed his own bed. 

In your dressing room, you sat on your chair, your thumbs scrolling away through social media as your publicist nagged you over the things you have said in the interview today. You have been tuning her out for the last few minutes that you barely understood what she was saying. 

“Seriously?” Lily grabbed the phone from your hand.

“Hey!” You gazed up at her with a death glare. “That’s my stuff. You can’t touch my things. It’s an invasion of privacy.”

“Have you been listening?” Lily’s voice was full of frustration. “This movie is the only thing that’s keeping your career from not falling apart and you’re acting like this?” 

You let out a frustrated sigh, settling back on your chair and stared at yourself in the mirror. You were giving Lily a death glare through the reflection of the mirror as she paced back and forth behind you. 

“I didn’t lie.” You argued. “The script sucked! I thought I, at least, owe my fans the truth.”

“Please.” Lily rolled her eyes. “You know you weren’t thinking about your fans.”

You bit your lower lip and didn’t say anything for a moment. There was an uncomfortable silence surrounding the both of you before Lily let out a deep breath and slammed your phone on the table in front of you, making you flinch a little.

“You know what, good luck with your fake honesty because I quit.”

You froze in your chair as you heard the dressing door open. Through the mirror, you saw your manager, Skyler, walked in and just in time heard what Lily just said as she stormed out of the dressing room. You grabbed your phone from the table and continued scrolling through social media again, ignoring the fact that your heart was beating a thousand times per second. 

“That is the third publicist that walked out on you in under three months.” Skyler said, setting her tablet down on the coffee table behind you. 

“Whatever.” You said, nonchalant. “She didn’t know what she was doing anyway.” 

Skyler watched as you focused your attention on your phone before walking up to you and grabbed it from your hands. You took a deep breath and rubbed your forehead in frustration. 

“Stop scrolling through social media and reading stupid articles on the internet.” Skyler barked. “It’s messing with your mind.”

You sighed and slumped on your chair as Skyler stood in front of you, her arms crossed in front of her chest. “You have a flight to Paris tomorrow night, so can you please get your act together before the premiere?”

You got up from your chair and gave her a sarcastic salute before grabbing your purse from the sofa. “Yes, ma’am.”

“Go straight home and get some rest.” Skyler called out as you walked out of the door. 

You knew all too well that she was making that clear because if she didn’t, you would go straight to the bar and get drunk then, she would have to deal with your hangover the next morning. As you walked out of the building, a crowd of fans behind the barricade were screaming and waving at you. Flashes of the cameras blinded you as you quickly walked towards the van that was waiting for you. Looking out the window, you watched the people waving at you before slumping down on your seat, letting out a sharp breath. 

You have been doing this career for years and until now, you couldn’t seem to get used to all of this craziness. At one point, you would just tune it out. This whole industry was full of fake people, and you could never just trust anyone at all. Sometimes you didn’t even know if you could trust your own team, especially with the way they were always frustrated with you. 

You couldn’t blame them. 

They have every right to since you have been acting out for the past year or so. They would just never understand what goes through your head. They could never understand all of it. 

The moment you entered your house, it was dark, quiet and eerie. You hated every corner of this house. You flipped all the lights on and you were greeted by just empty nothingness in front of you. Just furnitures, the AC immediately turning on, and the skyline of Los Angeles from the distance through your glass windows. You walked up the stairs and went to freshen up, taking all the makeup off and draining all the hairspray that was in your hair. 

You hated all of this. You hated every part of this career of yours. 

If only you could go back and change everything, you would. You could feel the anger swirling inside of you as you stared at yourself in the mirror. Dark circles under your eyes, your eyes looked tired, and you looked so miserable. You could barely recognize the woman in the mirror. You didn’t know who she was anymore. She was just a skeleton with skin but there was nothing left inside her. She had a beating heart, but it wasn’t beating for anything at all. 

A tear rolled down your cheeks as you quickly wiped it with the back of your hand and turned away from the mirror. You changed into your pajamas and slid under your bed covers. Picking up your phone, you scrolled through Twitter again until you could hear Skyler’s voice echoing in your mind. 

“Stop scrolling through social media and reading stupid articles on the internet. It’s messing with your mind.” 

You sat on your bed, reading through tweets until you felt the anger brewed inside of you. Every single thing they were saying was all negative. You weren't enough. You couldn't do enough. You weren't anything good at all.

Nothing was ever enough.

Throwing your phone across the room, you screamed in anger and slid under your covers. Tears streamed down your face as you pulled your pillow against your chest and sobbed quietly.

Everything was just dark and miserable. 

*********

Taglist:

@palomahasenteredthechat @sunvick @eddies-acousticguitar @demonsanddemogorgons @joesquinns @mmunson86 @ghostinthebackofyourhead @corrodedcoffincumslut @figmentofquinn @tlclick73 @browneyes8288 @bylermaxmayfield @ali-r3n @ficsbypix @capricornrisingsstuff @missonlypost @ali-in-w0nderland @amberolivia666 @lalalala-melmosworld @niallersfreckles @nanas-lasagna @emma77645 @indulgence-be-thy-name @readergf @ladamari68 @1paire2vans @d4rk4ng3l86 @paleidiot @josephquinnsfreckles @readergf

[a-reader-and-a-writer]

I love no words! Love the twist! Would you mind writing a follow up where the reader meets the daggers, and Jake has to explain how he has a soulmate without having a soulmate tattoo? Takes rooster and fanboy little extra time to understand.

Thank you so much anon!!! No Words is absolutely one of my favorite things I have ever written and it brings me such joy anytime someone new discovers it! 🥰💞

I'm not sure if you just read the fic or the Extended Version but I did go into a bit of what happens afterwards with Jake and Reader in a series of reblogs.

I'm sort of on a writing hiatus at the moment, but I did come up with some HCs for your request because I do really like it and it inspired me. I hope you like them:

Jake still can't fully believe he has found his soulmate after so many years without hope so it takes him some time before he's ready to introduce you to the Daggers (you understand and allow him to take as much time as he needs). However, they all notice something has changed and that Jake will disappear more and more often, to the point he is almost never at The Hard Deck anymore. But whatever is going on, he seems happy so they don't push it.

When Jake finally feels ready to introduce you, he makes a big deal about it. Penny was the only one at the bar the night you two met who knew Jake, so she's been in on the secret the whole time and helps him plan a special beach barbeque for the big announcement.

Jake told you to get there a little later so he could share the news with everyone first. When he tells everyone he finally found his soulmate, he is met with mixed reactions: Payback, Fanboy, and Phoenix seem completely supportive and happy for him, Coyote congratulates him but Jake can tell he is a little unsure about things (Coyote has known Jake the longest and knows how much this not having a soulmate thing has hurt Jake in the past so he's happy but also doesn't want to see his friend get crushed if he is wrong), but Rooster and Bob just share an uneasy look and hang back. When Jake confronts them, Bob tries to brush it off and says he's happy for him, but Rooster doesn't pull any punches. He knows that Jake has been getting more depressed and hopeless about his lack of soulmate tattoo lately and he thinks Jake is just fooling himself because he wants it so badly. Rooster tells Jake he needs to face the fact that he doesn't have a tattoo because he doesn't have a soulmate and this charade is just going to destroy him once he comes to his senses.

Before Jake can respond, you arrive and immediately link arms with Jake as you plant a big kiss on his mouth. You point to Bob and Rooster questioningly, and Jake has the biggest shit-eating grin as he drapes his arm over your shoulder and introduces them. He then tells them your name, and you pull out a marker and scribble something onto Jake's arm. When you hold it out to show them--flashing them your own soulmate tattoo in the process (a familiar phrase they've heard Jake use before) --and they read "I'm Jake's soulmate". You sign something to Jake and as he struggles to figure it out (but gets there eventually due to the online classes he's been taking), all the pieces click and Rooster and Bob sheepishly shake your hand. Rooster then pulls Jake aside and apologizes for what he said, but Jake just shrugs it off because he knows Rooster was just trying to have his back. Rooster is amazed by that reaction, but as Jake turns back to you, Rooster can see how Jake has already become a better man in the short time he has known you.

The rest of the barbeque is a lot of fun and you get along great with everyone (Phoenix even reveals to you that she can sign but you both decide to keep that from Jake for now which Phoenix will use against him later). Jake rarely leaves your side and when he does, he can't take his eyes off of you. All the Daggers recognize that indescribable pull between two people and any last lingering doubts that the two of you aren't soulmates fade away.

[the-somwthing]

Welcome to my little meta analysis essay called

Why do we misremember Flower Husbands as being “nicer” than it was?

Disclaimer: I’m not here to talk about whether or not FH is “toxic” or anything like that. It’s just a fact that many old fans rewatching FH POV and new fans who are watching it for the first time after seeing fan content tend to be surprised at how they actually behaved in the series compared to how everyone remembered them being back in the day. This will NOT go over whether or not I think FH is unhealthy or whatever and instead just discuss why I believe this phenomenon has happened.

So, if I try to make this a fancy well written essay, I’ll be here all day, so I’ll just get to the point. 3rd Life came out during the DSMP era of mcyt. MCRP has been around for ages, but the DSMP style of RP (which I’ll be calling “smp rp”) was pretty much popularized by DSMP, mostly towards the end of 2020. For reference, 3rd Life started early 2021, so there’s about a half a year between these two events, and DSMP kept going for years so 3rd Life was absolutely happening during the golden era of DSMP.

But what does DSMP have to do with this? Well, it sort of created this idea of “lore” and only specific things being “canon”. You can make fun of me for the way I worded that, but you know what I mean, DSMP was weird about that stuff. I don’t really blame them as it was kind of a new style of RP they accidentally spawned, but still, it was a confusing time for SMPs.

3rd Life was actually less like DSMP and more like the modern SMP RPs, where there’s no (known, lol) scripted events and the fandom itself deciphers what is or isn’t “canon” rather than it being told to them, with mostly everything being considered canon. HOWEVER, I do believe that DSMP’s style did still affect the fandom, specifically with the topic of this essay, Flower Husbands.

But why would it only really affect Flower Husbands? Now we get into a rough topic: shipping discourse. Back in those days, shipping in the mcyt fandom was heavily frowned upon. Moreso than it is today (I know it’s still around, but it was a lot worse the earlier we go lol). I’ve even seen old relics of ppl saying flower husbands should only be portrayed as platonic cuz it’s wrong to ship them, despite their team name literally being husbands. But more importantly, for A LOT of people, flower husbands was the One Ship people felt “allowed” to ship, BECAUSE it was canon. So they would allow FH and shun every other ship.

My point isn’t actually that, with it being the only “acceptable” ship everyone tried to make it more wholesome, though I suppose that could be a contributor. But my ACTUAL point is where all the things I laid out finally close in on each other:

Ships were a Dangerous territory in mcyt fandom, and ships being “canon” was something a lot of people weren’t prepared to deal with. People don’t want to get too close to RPF territory, but back in the day their ideas of c! vs cc! wasn’t as great, so they default to the DSMP Rule of “if it’s stated to be roleplay, then it’s canon to the characters, if not, it’s noncanon and just the CCs hanging out”.

You see where I’m going with this? When trying to follow this rule for a character relationship where they don’t explicitly state what is or isn’t RP, they hear “we’re married” and instantly mark that as canon to the characters since it clearly isn’t true to the CCs, and tend to block out anything else, otherwise you’re risking it not actually being true to the characters. Especially when it’s things like Scott saying something mean about Jimmy; that directly contradicts the “these characters are in love” thing, so it must not be canon, right?

But wouldn’t people still remember that these things happened, or did they actually straight up not process any of it? My answer to that is: of course everyone was paying attention, but with the context that it’s the CCs playing a video game, all of the teasing and other behavior seems WAY less serious. It just looks like average friends playing a hunger games smp together. And as I explained earlier, the fandom was ONLY processing this as a CC thing, so Scott’s treatment of Jimmy never stood out because that’s just how it is playing games.

Back to DSMP, I’m not active in that fandom anymore but I’ll see snippets sometimes, and I’ve seen the claim that beeduo was actually boring in canon and the fandom was the one that made it interesting. I feel like this is exactly what happened with FH. Nobody was actually expecting anyone to go hard into romantic roleplay, so the fans just take whichever pair says they’re getting married and fill in the blanks themselves. And that was normal back then, it wasn’t fans making stuff up for no reason, it was kind of expected of us.

So yeah, I personally believe that this whole confusion about FH is a result of its time. Whether you want to finally look at the actual substance of the relationship rather than following weird rules about what is or isn’t “canon”, or you believe that since FH was from a time where romantic RP was confusing and weird it would make the most sense to take into account the time period it came from and ignore the less appealing bits in favor of the fanon, I don’t really care honestly. But man isn’t this an interesting situation.

[oatflatwhite]

Once again, seeing your posts has got me reading in a fandom where I haven't even watched the show. I humbly request your reccomendations for Winnix and/or MOTA fic.

HELLO!!! this is incredible omg. first off i do highly recommend the shows BUT i get the urge to read fic first and foremost <3

(just a note here that the shows are based on real people/events but the fic is purely drawn from the actors' portrayals and isn't actually about the real soldiers/vets etc.!)

winnix has some LITERATURE let me tell you. here are the ones in my ao3 bookmarks (which i carefully curate so you know they're good):

What things we have heard together by jouissant

a 4-part, 100k+ wartime to post-war winnix magnum opus that i have dreamed about several times in my life, truly. perfection imo.

a single united body by leoandsnake

part one of a two part wartime to post-war winnix series that, particularly part two, deals with some really heavy themes for nix in particular. such an emotional but cathartic read and the characterisation is excellent

The 90-Day Wonder by ballantine

pre-canon/pre-war winnix. they're just kids falling in love in officer training school, you know!!!!!

Let nothing you dismay by dancinguniverse

my favourite winnix au of all time. hallmark christmas movie vibes but make it gay. post-war canon-era, but the au conceit is nix served in a different division than winters so they never met during the war.

and some rapid-fire one-shot recs:

Amuse-Bouche by ThrillingDetectiveTales

in coffee spoons by jouissant 

Freestyle by dancinguniverse

Women In Conversation by shiveringpinkala (aquachampagne)

now for mota, i actually have not read a lot for the fandom. (i know i'm terrible). but here are the ones i HAVE read and loved:

bomber’s moon by moonrocks (and everything by them tbh ping @ww2yaoi)

episode-au that's just such a beautiful getting together for clegan ;_; one of the first things i read in the fandom and it will always stay with me!

Things Unspoken by atlanticslide

canon era, just like such good characterisation. the author has written more mota fics too and has some really great bob fics from past in the day so i recommend their entire catalogue also!

take in the sweetness by Anonymous

this is literally just a 4k blowjob fic and yet it is literature. idk what else to say

also i trust @ifapromise's taste so much so i'm scraping her bookmarks for some more mota for you:

i looked for it on all fours by canimo

back home where you're from, that's the measure of a man by wolfhalls

Nocturne by Avonne

and of course i have a long catalogue of both band of brothers and masters of the air fic that isn't too shabby if i do say so myself. even if some of my bob fic is almost 10 years old ;_;

[amnesia-filled-gardens]

Jimmy: Look at this. Dude, I popped along, once or twice, cause I was shearing your sheep. You said I could.

Sausage: Yup. You did.

Jimmy: And it's beautiful, dude. This is beautiful.

Sausage: Thank you so much. Oh, bless your heart.(?)

Jimmy: This is - Give me one second.

Jimmy: (Confused gasp)

Sausage: I know what you're looking for.

Jimmy: WHERE DID IT-

Sausage: AND I HAVE IT RIGHT HERE FOR YOUU!

(Awful salmon noises)

Sausage: Oh, Jimmy, I love it when you slap my salmon like this.

Jimmy: STOPPP!! STOP, STOP, THAT IS IT(?)

Sausage: (Laughter)

[davinciae]

sandray + not special

[boasamishipper]

i can tolerate a lot of things from writers and showrunners but outright condescension and disdain for their fans is not one of them

[bluesadansey]

As a Kandreil enjoyer and known Kandrew lover, I think it’s weird and embarrassing as hell when Kandreil/Kevin stans who’s least favorite pairing in it is Andreil try to frame them prioritizing each other more and more as the series goes on as somehow insidious or toxic. Like, you can dislike the direction For Sure and wish it was written differently, but be honest that it’s because of Kevin being your favorite (perfectly valid, I also react disproportionately when my favorite character is hurt by something narratively vs when it’s other chars even if I like/love them) and has nothing to do with *problematic messages about romance* (BAH!) or whatever you are trying to frame it as being the concern instead. 

[hauntingblue]

No thoughts about red hood the hill. Jason just appears to say some stuff about how he is so happy now that he isn't obsessed with vigilantism without showing why and then getting some on panel for no reason

[immamapletreekid]

i am the most predictable person with the most predictably pathetic tastes in the history of predictable pathetic taste

[12freddofrogs]

Very weird to be in that stage where a show is grabbing hold of your brain, but you haven't finished the show so you cant interact with fandom because spoilers, and you're watching it with someone else so you can't even just keep watching until you finish

[shivasdarknight]

banging my head on the table

why do people have this urge to come onto other peoples' posts and make it about themselves.

the number of times ive talked about My Own Lore publicly and someones come onto My post to talk about their stuff while completely ignoring everything i said.

like do you not realize how shitty that feels. wouldnt you not want it to happen to you.

then why the FUCK do you do it to others.

[padfootastic]

being so obsessed with certain characters in extremely specific dynamics leads to me getting a fully body electric shock when i get out of my echo chamber lmao