#I spent unacceptably too much time drawing them

[lingrimmart]

Updated tier icons on our Patreon this summer and boy, I still love them.

The Parba Traveller • The Jeweler • The Melalo • The Fire Worshiper

[la-undercover-latina]

Christmas Creations (Armin Arlert fluff)

This is for my girl @arlerts-angel

Just a little holiday fluff with our favorite blonde babe

Taglist:

@arlerts-angel @arlertwitch @leviismybby @humanitys-strongest-bamf sorry if I forgot anyone

“Angel? Y/D/N? Are you guys home?” Armin asked as he stepped through the door, shrugging off his puffy winter coat that your daughter insisted that he wore this morning because ‘You’ll get sick daddy’.

And there’s one thing that everyone who knew Armin Arlert knew without a shadow of a doubt: there were 2 people on this planet that are completely spoiled rotten.

You and your daughter.

Armin followed the sound of sudden giggles to see the two most important people in his life sitting on the floor with colored pencils in their hands.

Armin leaned against the door, his heart full as he watched the love of his life play with their daughter that they made out of love. A daughter that was Armin’s carbon copy, much to your dismay.

“I spent 9 months growing her and then birthing her and she has the nerve to be a carbon copy of you,”

“What can I say, I’ve got strong genetics,” He had leaned down and pressed a gentle kiss to your lips as you and your newborn spent quality time getting skin to skin contact.

“Daddy!” Your four year old smiled beamingly at Armin and you looked behind you to see your husband gazing at you both with the most loving look that you’d seen in his oceanic eyes.

“What did you draw?” Armin asked, picking his little princess up in his arms.

“Mama made Santa and I made the reindeer,” she smiled, while you grabbed the drawings.

“Are you ready to show daddy?” You asked, pressing a quick kiss to your husband’s lips.

“Eww! Mommy you’re gonna catch cooties,”

“So daddy has cooties?” You gasped in mock surprise.

“Yeah, Rosie told me,” Jean and Mikasa’s daughter was ever so slightly older than your daughter, and always fills your daughter in on the ways to survive being a big girl. Apparently the most chief lesson recently has been about how boys have cooties.

“Did Rosie say if the doctor can get rid of it?” Armin asked.

“Nope. All boys have them. It’s why boys have to stand up to use the potty,” That had earned a snicker from Armin and you.

You, unlike your husband, we’re better at hiding it with a cough.

“Well dang, looks like my littlest princess can’t have any goodnight kisses after her bedtime story,” Armin said in a singsong voice.

“Rosie’s wrong,” your daughter said with the most sincere look on her face. The prospect of no more goodnight daddy kisses was unacceptable.

“No I can’t have my princess getting cooties,” Armin had to bite back a laugh.

“I don’t care. Daddy cooties are okay,”

“Yeah daddy cooties are fine. It’s those other boy cooties you need to watch out for,” you smiled, brushing some loose blonde hairs from her forehead.

“Hey, so since you and mommy got to draw, how about we all go see Christmas lights tonight after dinner,”

“Can we?” The four year old suddenly became extremely hard to hold from her bouncing at the prospects of Christmas lights.

“Only if you finish all of your dinner,”

“Veggie too?” Your daughter asked and you nodded.

“Yeap, veggies have to be in your tummy before we go,” you told her, tickling her tummy.

“You and mommy clean up while I make dinner, how’s that?” Armin asked and your daughter nodded before grabbing her colored pencils and putting them back in the box.

“Hey Angel, did you ever think when we met that our lives would be like this?” Armin asked, his crystal eyes on his mini me.

“No, but I love every second of it,” you smiled softly at the man you got to call your husband for the rest of your lives.

“Good, because you’re stuck with me,” Armin teased and pressed another kiss to your lips. It was one of those kisses that, while you were a great mother and never forgot about your kid, made you forget the world around you existed. It was as if time stopped in that moment. The only thing that mattered to you was Armin’s lips against yours and strong hands holding you.

“Good. Wouldn’t want it any other way,” you smiled and Armin pulled you in for another kiss.

“Mommy… Daddy… Can you stop kissing so we can go see lights faster?” Your daughter asked innocently, getting a laugh from you both.

[rriavian]

Hello! I saw your December prompts post, so may I suggest "reunions" for Corinthiel? Would love to see more of them in your style <3

Thank you! I'm glad you enjoy how I write them because they are still a very new pairing for me so I'm slightly nervous. Sorry this took a while - I had an idea for what I wanted to write but it only really came together today, so I frantically wrote this on my lunch break haha. Please enjoy! <3

-

A first kiss; yet not that at all, not even close, novelty and familiarity combining sweet and decadent. The dessert one serves to a god, a full flavoured taste Daniel doesn’t need to chase to find.

He still does.

Daniel still licks greedily at his Corinthian’s mouth—will chase what is abundant, will hunt what isn’t rare—still takes and takes and takes.

There are golden white strands soft under his hands, fingers running through the Corinthian’s hair on a loop. It is something of a compulsion, though there is no accident in Daniel’s surrendering to it, no trap here but his own.

The Corinthian surrenders too.

He is a smirking, sauntering thing; laughing into Daniel’s mouth, pushing back with the same claim he’s held with, hands clamping down tightly on slim hips. The wish to bruise is the Corinthian’s own trap; to anchor, to tie them tightly together past the ability of a vow made only with words. No air moves between their skin, even if his fingers could speak the Corinthian doesn’t allow the distance that’s needed to make a sound. They both know drawing back to say sweet words is still withdrawing, is still a parting, time spent separate before reuniting still an unacceptable goodbye.

This is a greeting, a joining, the Corinthian keeps Daniel like this to make it last. He’s slipped his hands beneath the clothes to lay fingerprints on Daniel’s skin, to show the place his hands should always be. Indents to make him incomplete unless he’s being touched.

Daniel very much approves of that.

Hello, he thinks, hello my protector, my guardian, my Corinthian.

It seems they both know how to hunger like a human, have taken that for their own, a concept that serves their own ends. A human appetite compliments an endless one. The greed of wanting every moment—of knowing you will have it—is such to devour infinity while leaving room to spare, but the greed for just one moment makes the now its own banquet. A singular event no crumb. He’d always been so unhurried, is still that same thing making a marathon out of eternity, but occasionally there is an urge to sprint that Daniel doesn’t hesitate to indulge.

The sea may repeat a pattern but that doesn’t mean it’s steady.

The tide can rush in too, frenzied within the structure of its own pattern, can crash wild against a shore lined with cliffs. Even Dream of the Endless can run; wind whipping through his hair, pounding heart and burning lungs, chest rising and falling with rapid, heaving breaths.

This is one second that will never be had again. And that means it must be taken now, must be claimed because it will pass and never ever come back.

It will be lost.

The thought strikes. Daniel curls fingers in the Corinthian’s shirt collar, bites, remembers—aspects always interlocking, he is what he was, and now Morpheus chuckles, murmurs, has waited until desperation hit its height and oh that is so very Dream—aha, it can be kept. Sand can only fall through Daniel's fingers if he lets it go. This can come again; it will, it's already been promised, and oh Daniel can relive whatever he wants within a dream.

He will have this moment a thousand times again. 

Daniel tastes blood from that sharp bite, soothes with a greedy suck at the Corinthian’s lower lip, swallows the moan like taking a breath. It’s a sound made without the sacrifice of distance, another thing to remember, the truth of how that’s a possibility another thing that calms. Yes. Daniel has this. An eternity just like it; his mouth on the Corinthian’s until the world ends, Daniel has the greed to ignore it all as it burns, can spend forever touching him and having him.

He smiles because he knows he will.

A balm for all that distance, all those centuries apart, all those moments where role and duty lies between a kiss. There is space for this instead, no crumb in a moment—

A dream where every second they reunite.

[virgilsjourney]

Logan in denial: analysis & season finale predictions

Or: why I think Logan is going to try (and fail) to deal with the Orange Side on his own.

I really loved this little hint towards Future Things in an otherwise fluffy episode. “Sometimes passion makes you act a little silly,” Patton says light-heartedly, but Logan might have made another Connection…

…and I think it’s about his strategy for how to suppress the Orange Side’s influence.

Firstly, let’s go back to the iconic “Stop ignoring me!” moment.

We can see that Logan’s own reaction almost immediately breaks through Orange’s amplification of his frustration, anger, bitterness etc: even before the orange eyes have faded away, Logan displays shock, fear, and remorse. So, Orange’s influence has (for now…) gone as quickly as it came; when Logan speaks to Thomas, the anger from a moment ago has evaporated, replaced instead with a subtle hurt. He’s non-confrontational, softly-spoken—as if hesitant to raise his voice too much after what has just happened.

This behaviour continues into the end card. While he still makes his irritation known when speaking to Roman, he does so in a much more reserved, subdued way than we’re used to. His body language is also closed-off; he mainly has his arms folded defensively. I think that’s a significant choice when we’ve just seen his perturbed realisation that he’s been pointing aggressively after, “Stop ignoring me!”

I think Logan is quietly mortified about his loss of control and is on guard to try and keep it from never happening again… so with that goal in mind, he avoids raising his voice, he keeps his arms and hands close to his body.

“If only Apollo had more influence today,” he murmurs—and while Roman interprets that as a reference to the Greek God, I think Logan is more referring to the psychological and philosophical definition, specifically the ability to ‘maintain emotional distance.’ (x) And just like, “Stop ignoring me!” has layers—it can refer to the Orange Side wanting to be recognised; Logan wanting to be listened to; and Thomas wanting a reply from Nico, all at the same time—so does Logan’s forlorn Apollo mention.

On the one hand, this concerns Thomas impulsively deciding to spend time with Nico, choosing to only act on what might make him feel emotionally better in the short-term, while also still feeding into his insecurities without addressing them.

On the other hand, Logan is also referring to his previous outburst—he, even while trying to perform his role as Logic, was unable to remain emotionally distant.

And this is why I think it’s important that the very first clear reveal of Logan’s ‘orange eyes’ happened in an ‘Asides’ episode—that scene specifically is a literal ‘aside’ between Logan and Remus. And apart from a pointed question about who Logan ‘really’ wants to scream, “Stop ignoring me!” at, Remus doesn’t really force Logan to confront the matter then and there—he leaves without escalating the situation, even though he’s spent the whole episode setting up chain reactions.

So, the ball is left in Logan’s court. And, as we’ve seen, instead of drawing any more attention to the outburst, Logan withdraws and keeps the troubling knowledge to himself.

Which brings me to denial.

I love the symbolism of Janus showing up right after the shot lingers on Logan (perhaps the camera’s following tree roots because neither Thomas or Logan are dealing with the ‘root’ of the problem? *bad dum tsh*). Janus biting into the apple before saying, “Everything is just fine,” sums up the conflict in his role: he has to be aware of the ‘forbidden knowledge’ in order to then deny its existence.

With regard to psychology, denial is the ‘refusal to acknowledge an unacceptable truth or emotion or to admit it into consciousness, used as a defence mechanism.’ (Oxford Dictionary of English). Sounds very much like the way in which Thomas has previously tried to ignore the existence of the Dark Sides.

And, again, denial is at work on more levels than one: Thomas is also defensive about the state of his apartment, which partly represents his emotional state (“It’s not that bad!”); Janus as self-preservation echoes Thomas lying to himself, and Logan… is also pretending that “everything is just fine.” His ‘unacceptable truth’ is that he is affected by emotions—even though he has experienced overwhelming evidence proving it to be so… which, right now, he is choosing to keep from the other sides.

Logan’s reaction to Patton’s joyful line about passion making you act ‘a little silly,’ briefly reveals, in my opinion, a subtext: what he thinks about his loss of control. He has linked his behaviour during the orange eyes scene to being ruled by emotions… and if he avoids ‘passion’—read as feelings entirely—he plans to never have such a thing happen again. The possible connection he’s made also suggests that he’s placed a value judgement on his reactions as well, dismissing them as ‘silly’, rather than something to be openly discussed.

When it comes to the other sides, specifically Patton, Roman and Virgil, the tension isn’t coming from whether or not Logan has feelings—they (and the audience) all know that he cares deeply, that he isn’t infallible, that he doesn’t represent logic and logic alone, with no capacity for any emotion. Instead, the tension is arising from what they don’t know, and what is being hidden from them. (For some related observations, see Thoughts on the tension in the end card (WTIT).)

Looking ahead, I think that compared to the suddenness of the scene in WTIT, there’ll be a slow build-up to another Logan with orange eyes reveal. Logan will be extremely wary about becoming emotionally involved. He’ll do his utmost to stay calm, to avoid adding any fuel to the ‘fire’, but I think that strategy in itself will be his downfall: by suppressing and trying to avoid another outburst, he will inevitably cause one. (I’m predicting eyes flickering between brown and orange before the dramatic climax, just before the others notice…)

Logan’s denial will result in him trying to conceal his own feelings and the Orange Side’s influence on him… but him trying to do so alone will bring about his failure. The only way this will be solved is when all parties are in the know—but I think they’ll only fully realise when the knowledge is brought out against Logan’s will.

Because if he ever brought up all of this himself, then he would have to break the illusion that denial gave him; to acknowledge the problem would mean needing to accept that it exists in the first place. He would have to admit to that he needs help, that he doesn’t have all the answers, that they will need to ask, ‘What happens when logic is compromised?’

He hasn’t done so—I think because he is deeply ashamed by the fact that that question may need to be answered.

[amistytown]

Paradise

Genre: smut, fluff, & comfort

Pairing: Leviathan & MC

Warnings: afab reader, roleplaying (Levi as the Lord of Shadow and reader as Henry), finishing inside, Levi is slightly possessive, he only has one dick to make it easier on myself, his tail makes a brief appearance, cringe worthy dialogue, top Levi, bottom reader (a subtle switch in dynamics at the end), honestly I just see them as two lovers who simply enjoy taking care of each other, MDNI. Please let me know if I missed anything!

I never thought I’d write smut, but here we are! I didn’t intend to share it or write as much I did; will probably be my first and last time lol. Thanks to @bibliosophist​ for reading it over, providing feedback, and giving me the courage to post it!  As always, I apologize for any spelling or grammatical errors that may have gone unnoticed. Thank you to those who take the time to read and comment on my work; it’s greatly appreciated ♥

Peace and quiet greets the Avatar of Envy, welcome after a day spent in lines and crowds, the din of the convention hall wearing on his nerves despite his excitement. Leviathan misses his room, Henry’s tank and dim lighting, the familiarity a comfort he can seldom find elsewhere. Though the hotel suffices, the otherwise bleak and too empty room home with you there to accompany him. Your presence is bright and soothing, his human quelling his anxieties with a loving smile as you shrug off your cloak, unlacing your tunic and allowing the finely crafted fabric to slip down your shoulder. The mere sight of your skin sends his heart aflutter, igniting a fire that spreads from his head to the tips of his toes.

The compliments his costumes received never ceased to amaze him, chest swelling with pride as people flocked to admire his handiwork, long days and sleepless nights proving their worth. Each stitch held his blood, sweat, and tears, a testament of his love and dedication to The Tale of the Seven Lords. He ensured every detail captured Christopher Peugeot’s vision, anything less than perfect unacceptable, especially for the biggest TSL fan in all three realms. He marveled at his creation, an outfit truly befitting a hero such as Henry, but you brought his fantasies to life. His eyes followed you, blind to everyone except his human, watching how your cloak fell around your shoulders and pooled at your ankles. Even now he stares while you remove your gloves, another wave of desire crashing over him.

“Levi?” you call, and he swallows, throat unbearably dry when he finally meets your gaze.

“Lord of Shadow,” he corrects, otherwise he might lose his composure.

A pretty blush dusts your cheeks, giving him the confidence to close the distance between you and pull you into his embrace, hiding his face in the crook of your neck. You smell and feel heavenly, and he swears he falls in love with you once again, deeper and harder than the day before. If only he could put his love and adoration into words, but even if he found his voice there are few that come near to expressing the intensity of his emotions, his affections for you greater than anything he’s experienced in his long life.

“Lord of Shadow,” you breathe, fanning the flames further and lending him the strength to slip his hands under your shirt to delight in the warmth and softness of your skin, drawing a gasp that causes his heart to skip a beat. They tremble as they slide up the gentle planes of your stomach to caress your breasts, squeezing and kneading them between his fingers, nipples pebbling at the contact. How can he of all demons evoke such a response, someone as disgusting as him drawing pretty cries from your lips at the simplest touch? It drives him mad.

“You garnered the attention of many today. Lustful gazes following your every move. How dare they entertain the mere thought of glancing your way,” he growls, envy flaring. The ridiculous amount of Lord of Corruption cosplayers that arrogantly smirked in your direction and asked for photos made his blood boil. As did the Lord of Fools who seemed so greedy for your attention, and the Lord of Flies who looked absolutely ravenous, eyes shining when they spotted you in the crowd. You deserve the praise, however, their blatant flirting and disregard of boundaries quickly wore his patience thin. You’re his Henry—you demand respect. “Though I cannot deny I don’t understand the temptation.”

“Even so, I swore my loyalty to you, my lord.”

“And I’m forever grateful. You’re so special, Henry.” Already his chest heaves, and he pants loudly against your shoulder, cock twitching painfully in his trousers. Only you make him this desperate, head spinning at the slightest brush of your fingers and the way your body leans into his, wanting all this shut-in has to offer. “Sometimes I wish I could keep you all to myself.”

“I’m yours,” you choke out, inhaling sharply as he continues to play with your tits, enjoying how they fill and rest in the palms of his hands. “No matter the time apart or distance between us my heart belongs to you.”

“I know. I could never doubt you. A-and I am yours if you’ll have me.” Although you yearn for him like he does you, he still becomes bashful, face completely red and eyes downcast; he’s an absolute mess and you’re to blame.

“With each day that passes I want you more than the last,” you reply sweetly, and he about loses himself right then and there.

“My Henry,” he sighs with a frantic roll of his hips. “You’re so cute.”

In the heat of the moment, he practically tears your shirt from your body, no longer concerned about the time and effort he put into its creation with you laid bare before him. Taking care to admire the slope of your shoulders and arch of your back, a delightful shiver runs the length of your spine as he maps out every dip and curve, placing a chaste kiss to the nape of your neck. His breath catches in his throat the instant you turn to him, the demon’s pupils blown wide and drool shamelessly collecting at the corner of his mouth at your disheveled appearance; hair mussed, face flushed, and lips parted in longing. A necklace hangs between your breasts, a rustic silver engraved with the Lord of Shadow’s emblem, marking you his.

“Can I?”

Leviathan fails to realize he’s lost in his thoughts until he hears you, soul returning to his body. He nods, hoping he can remember how to breathe lest he dies where he stands.

Shuddering at your touch, he wills himself to relax, the tension easing from his muscles as you lovingly massage his neck and shoulders and work at unfastening his belt and cloak. He wears many layers, yet you patiently remove each one, worshiping what lays underneath. You smile, and he returns the gesture albeit shyly, his heart pounding faster and harder the closer you come to disrobing him. A dark blush blooms across his chest, and your hands follow the path it creates over his pecs and down his abs, stroking the fine line of hair there. He can’t stop the moan that rips through him, enveloping you in his arms to keep you from wandering lower, fearing he’ll fall apart at any second if you do.

Time comes to a standstill, your skin seeming to burn away at his own, and he selfishly wishes for more, unafraid to let the fire consume him—begging for it even. You’re hot, your heart leaping from your chest to rattle his bones as your arms wrap around his neck, tongue tracing the bob of his Adam’s apple to place featherlight kisses along his jaw. Eagerly capturing your lips, he whines into your mouth, and you shiver, breath hitching at the drag of his fangs across delicate flesh. You taste wonderful, better than Heaven. He can’t believe that you’re his and he’s yours; he’d fight the entire Celestial army again if it meant he could have you like this, ending up here and never looking back.

“My lord’s love is unrivaled,” you murmur. “I’m honored to be chosen by you. Someone so caring, understanding, and passionate. You deserve the world, my friend.”

All he can do is groan, kissing down your chest and guiding you onto the bed, the mattress dipping below you. The atmosphere is stifling, pleasantly so, and he’s almost ashamed of the precum leaking from his tip and soaking his boxers. His cock continues to strain against his pants, bulge perfectly outlined by the thin material, drawing your attention; your darkened gaze electrifying him. Is he dreaming, he wonders, nudging a knee between your quivering thighs, studying your blissful expression and the rapid rise and fall of your chest. He considers himself nothing more than a disgusting reclusive otaku, unworthy of your time and affections, but you love him, accepting him without hesitation.

“Let me take care of you,” you say, rubbing calming circles into his thigh; he grabs your wrist as you tug on his pants.

“Ah, w-wait!” he stammers, quickly stealing himself. “A-allow me to reward you for your services, hero.” You reach up to cup his face in your hands, and he presses a kiss to your palm. “I want to show you how much I value your friendship, H-Henry. May I?”

“Yes.” Your reply is barely above a whisper, his entire body throbbing with need.

Where does he start? He wants all of you.

Leaning forward to kiss you far too eagerly, he leaves a trail of kisses to your breasts, serpentine tongue circling a nipple and eliciting a lovely moan. Fingers tangle in his hair as he listens to your breaths, noticing how they grow faster and heavier, body arching up into every lick and suck of his mouth. The other does not go untouched, your cute tits swollen and glistening once he pulls away, leaving you whimpering for more.

“My lord . . .”

“Trust me, Henry,” he assures, hooking his fingers in the waistband of your pants and tugging them over your hips. “Your lord will prove to you that your bravery is appreciated. Far, far more than you’ll ever know.” Slowly, he pulls your bottoms down your legs, shaking uncontrollably as he uncovers more and more skin. He worships every inch of you along the way, kissing your thighs, admiring your calves and how your muscles ripple in response. You’re breathtaking.

He aches, that fire simmering beneath the surface threatening to set him alight, but is determined to love you thoroughly before giving in to his desires. Knowing you this intimately is a dream come true, and he will never pass up the opportunity to ravage your mind, body, and soul, hoping you feel completely and utterly loved once he’s finished. You entrust yourself to him, believing in him entirely, thighs parting to allow him into your delicious heat. Not a single anime or video game could prepare him for this—a love he couldn’t begin to fathom until he met you. Years ago he never imagined being here, softly kissing your knee, skin erupting in gooseflesh, as he marvels at how wet you are, underwear damp and clinging to your pussy. Your heady scent encircles him, his mouth watering while he slides them off with trembling hands.

“Oh, Henry,” he nearly chokes. “You’ll be the death of me.”

Slipping his fingers between your folds, they become shiny and slick with your juices, making obscene sounds as he teases your slit—so sticky, sweet, and beautiful. He paces himself, memorizing the puffiness of your lips and the softness of your clit pulsing beneath his fingertips, stroking the bundle of nerves until you’re gasping, frantically chasing his movements. This is absolutely sinful, an angel as lovely as you being tainted by someone so vile, coming undone before he’s had the chance to sheath himself deep inside you. All too quickly you cry out, pretty hole fluttering and leaking onto the sheets, slight tremors wracking your body. He peppers your face in kisses, easing you down from your high.

“Please—”

“I’m not done with you yet, Henry,” he promises. Gathering your wetness on his fingers, he circles your hole, watching you quiver in anticipation. Your eyes widen, head thrown back as he sinks them into your core, steadily pumping them in and out, stretching you carefully. The sudden curl of his fingers has you crying, hips pushing down in desperation, and he worries he’ll combust at any minute. Reluctantly, he draws himself from your warmth although you try to keep him there, walls so tight and soft. He considers apologizing, despising your heartbroken expression, but he’s sure you’ll enjoy what comes next.

“Worry not,” he shushes. “I’ll take care of you, hero. You’re so cute like this. At your lord’s mercy.” He leans back, cold without you close, but promptly pulls his cock from his pants, precum coating his hands. Jumping at your moan, he wonders if he’ll last long enough, afraid the slightest touch will send him over the edge.

“Levi . . .”

“Lord of Shadow,” he practically whines.

“Ah, Lord of Shadow.”

“Patience.” He swallows, collecting himself. You’re so cute, looking at him so lovingly, wanting him to fill you to the brim and stretch you until you’re at your limits. “You’re insatiable,” he hums, lining himself with your entrance. “Such a,” he gasps as he pushes into you, deliberate and slow in spite of his need to have you around him fully. “Such a troublesome human. Nevertheless, I love you so.”

He’s definitely burning alive, breathless and whimpering with drool dribbling down his chin, too far gone to mind; enchanted by you, your love and the way you wrap your legs around his waist, forcing him deeper. You envelop him perfectly. Perhaps, he muses, you truly are made for each other, two pieces of the same puzzle, unable to envision a life without you—you are special, the only one for him, the only one who makes his heart burst and consumes his thoughts day after day. This is not the first time, yet you’re always tighter, wetter, and softer than he remembers, bringing him to the brink of insanity and absolute bliss.

Building a rhythm, gradual and precise, he savors the feel of you—like velvet—being split open with each thrust of his hips, your hands roaming over his shoulders and chest, taking his breath away. You’re gorgeous whether you’re straddling him—bouncing cutely in his lap—crushing his head between your legs, or writhing beneath him, body covered in a thin sheen of sweat. Regardless, he’s making love to his human, fingers digging into the meat of your thighs as you guide him into another kiss, licking into his mouth and devouring his moans. Heat rises, surging at the base of his spine. He can’t hold back much longer.

“My lord is most gracious. The greatest in all the realms. I’m proud to serve you,” you sob, tears spilling down your cheeks. “I love you. I swear—I swear it.”

Overcome with emotion, he quickens his pace, tears clouding his vision. They fall, wetting your face, and he can taste them on his tongue when he kisses you, resting his forehead against your own.

“Levi, Levi, Levi. . .” You sing, gripping him tightly. “Leviathan. . . !”

“My human. My Henry. Mine.”

The necklace catches the light, swinging from your neck in tandem with his thrusts, which have become rough and sloppy in his haste. Grabbing your hand, he threads your fingers together, the erratic creak of the bed growing louder, headboard hammering against the wall. He sees how taut your body is, hips slamming up into his, squeezing his hand for dear life as you clench around him, stomach muscles rippling with the force of your orgasm. You look and feel divine in the throes of passion, your hold on him causing Leviathan to spiral, pushing him to the point of no return.

“I love you. I love you. I love you, MC!” he cries in abandon, his release overwhelming him; hips stuttering and dick pulsing as his fangs sink into your shoulder.

Collapsing on top of you, head on your chest and an arm around your waist, he holds you close. His ears are ringing, heart racing, and the feel of your fingers running gently through his hair grounds him. You stay like that for a while. Hot and sweaty but in love, and he’s never been more at peace in his life than when he’s beside you.

“Are you okay?” you speak quietly, brushing away the last of his tears.

“Omg, t-that was amazing,” he sniffles. “You’re amazing.” Absentmindedly, he raises his hand for a high five, instantly regretting how horribly weird and downright cringe he is, but you immediately return the sentiment.

“You make me feel amazing.” You clap his hand, interlocking your fingers. “I love you.” The hair on his neck stands up as you kiss his knuckles and the back of his hand down to his wrist where your lips linger over the frenzied pounding of his pulse.

The embers glow in the aftermath, smoldering and rekindling the flames, blazing through his body. “I-I-I l-l-love you too!” he shouts, dizzy and still intoxicated by your love. Dark horns, glittering and twisting, sit like a thorny crown upon his head, the smooth scales of his tail running across your skin to wind around your leg. In between your thighs is warm, the tip of his tail swirling in his cum that drips from your hole to tease your entrance, making you sigh.

“C-can we stay like this a little bit longer?” he blurts out, hiding his face behind his hand. “I t-totally understand if—”

“I’d like that.”

Crawling onto his lap, you trace the sharp edges of his horns, gently massaging from the tips to the base. Your touch is calming, his eyes fluttering shut at the contact, basking in your affections. Every day he counts his blessings, grateful for you and all you do for him, the confidence he’s found thanks to your love and unwavering support. You really are an angel in every sense of the word, his light in the darkness, your mouth paradise as it sucks at the scales on his neck, stoking the fire in his gut. The Lord of Shadow is a fantastic character, his story and bond with Henry inspiring, but this time Leviathan wants to be himself; after all, you help him believe he’s more than enough.

Tag list ♥ @eternallydaydreaming2015​

[translations-dark-matter]

Living as an Extra in an Omegaverse novel

Chapter 11

Yoo Jin-hyeon couldn't deny that among alphas, even lies about pheromones were unacceptable. So, he understood what Tae-oh was trying to say, but...

"If you're going to treat someone else's precious pheromones so lightly, then leave. Get out of my precious studio."

Yoo Jin-hyeon remained unfazed by Tae-oh's outburst as he held the bottle of alcohol in his hand. He had grabbed it as if he were about to drink it, but suddenly he showed no sign of movement and weakly leaned against the bar.

At this moment, Tae-oh felt no impact from Yoo Jin-hyeon's coercion. He had no room to accept anything else due to one person occupying his mind completely.

Tae-oh clenched his fists in frustration and ran his fingers down his own neck, tilting it from side to side.

"That's why I don't do one-night stands."

"What? Did you have a one-night stand? Don't tell me it was that time?"

Despite Yoo Jin-hyeon's voice growing louder in surprise, Tae-oh remained silent, only tousling his hair in response.

"What on earth happened?"

Yoo Jin-hyeon urged Tae-oh to speak, feeling a sense of frustration, but Tae-oh absentmindedly toyed with the bottle, leaving his half-undone necktie hanging loosely.

"Say something."

"...We spent the night together. I saw their sleeping face and watched them tossing and turning. It was surprising to see a side of them I hadn't seen during the day..."

The problem was that Tae-oh couldn't take his eyes off them. And it wasn't like they had no connection at all. It's just that he couldn't speak about it to Yoo Jin-hyeon, so he kept his mouth shut. He would never be able to utter the words that briefly eased his excitement by touching himself.

"What? So, you're saying it wasn't a relationship, just a one-night stand? If I express it like that, will you really kick me out?"

"Stop getting people's hopes up for no reason." Yoo Jin-hyeon snatched the bottle from Tae-oh and took a drink. He felt frustrated and thought he needed a drink to alleviate it. As he contemplated their recent conversation, he tilted his head.

"You smelled their pheromones too. But nothing happened?"

Something doesn't add up. Yoo Jin-hyeon squinted his eyes and scanned Tae-oh's face.

Among his friends, Tae-oh was the most unpredictable. He used to act like he would live alone forever, but suddenly he claimed to like Jin-ha and engaged in all sorts of flirting. He appeared messy and unreliable, but surprisingly, he was a romantic at heart. Even if his heart was pure, if his body didn't follow suit, it would be futile. But this was unexpected. His mental strength was impressive, and his body followed his will.

That's why Yoo Jin-hyeon thought Tae-oh was much better than the bastard who was messing with Jin-ha's feelings. Seeing Tae-oh's current state, it seemed there was more to the person he slept with for a day.

And that person, most likely...

"What's going on between you and Se-hyeon?"

Since Tae-oh mentioned Se-hyeon as an excuse for the scent, there was no reason to doubt it.

"You had a one-night stand with Se-hyeon? But... nothing happened?"

"I was thinking about my strengths."

"Suddenly? What strengths do you have?"

Yoo Jin-hyeon had no intention of complimenting a friend as a friend.

"You're straightforward."

"You should take detours sometimes and look around. Just going straight ahead is boring and not that great."

He had no intention of praising his friend's strengths either.

"Let's wait and see. Carefully and cautiously."

"What's there to be cautious about?"

Yoo Jin-hyeon urged Tae-oh to open up, but Tae-oh shook his head.

"It's right to approach it carefully and slowly. Especially now, it's the best approach for me. By taking one step at a time, we might find a way to synchronize without surprises."

"What are you doing now? You didn't even tell me what happened, and now you're drawing conclusions on your own?"

Yoo Jin-hyeon was speechless, contemplating what to do with his friend, but Tae-oh changed the subject.

"Did you wait for Jin-ha that day?"

"Yeah."

So, that's the purpose of his visit.

Yoo Jin-hyeon crossed his arms and recalled that day.

"After you left that place... I was a bit taken aback, but I just ended up having a drink. After all, my intention was to coincidentally run into you. We sat there for a few hours..."

Yoo Jin-hyeon wondered what happened and raised his head.

"A phone call came, and I went to meet someone."

That person is probably their current quarrelsome partner.

"Nothing special happened."

"During the time you were with me?"

Upon Tae-oh's somewhat evasive response, he looked away without saying a word and stood up.

"Leaving?"

"Oh."

Since he had heard everything he needed to, there was no need to stay any longer.

Since he had heard everything he needed to, Yoo Jin-hyeon thought there was no need to stay any longer. But Tae-oh pressed his shoulder heavily.

"I'll come again."

Yoo Jin-hyeon looked at Tae-oh, who was leaving without even listening to him, as if he had lost his mind.

"You can't leave after making people curious like this. You should say everything before you go."

Do you want to drive people crazy?

Yoo Jin-hyeon muttered discontentedly, but then he paused.

"Pheromones?"

He mentioned Se-hyeon's pheromones, right?

"That person was an Omega?"

***

Se-hyeon got out of the driver's seat and adjusted his tie while looking at his reflection in the window. He had to wake up early in the morning, but having a car made the journey much more comfortable.

"Hello, Secretary."

"Yes, sir."

Se-hyeon quickly turned around and called out to the voice coming from behind. Although there was a brief pause in the conversation, he pretended as if nothing was amiss.

With the dawn breeze, Se-hyeon's body language exuded an indescribable sense of ease and urgency at the same time. It seemed impossible to receive such contrasting feelings at once, but Se-hyeon realized the reason behind it. It was due to the sense of emptiness that seemed to accompany his leisurely steps, in contrast to the feeling of being somewhere else.

"There has been a change in the schedule. Let's head to the SR headquarters."

"Understood, sir."

Se-hyeon hesitated, tilting his head curiously, without opening the door to the back seat for some reason.

"Why? Should I sit in the passenger seat again today?"

"That's not it."

He didn't want to feel uncomfortable like yesterday, and he didn't want to repeat it today.

"In that case, it seems like there's another reason..."

"No, there isn't."

As Se-hyeon was about to open the car door, Tae-oh's words came out in a distant tone.

"Do you know the two things that frustrate people the most? One is starting to say something and then stopping halfway..."

Yesterday, Tae-oh had driven Yoo Jin-hyeon to the point of madness.

"The other is looking at someone with eyes full of things to say, but never actually saying them."

"I apologize. I just thought I should mention that you didn't have your tie on."

The original plan was to go to the office and handle some approval tasks, but suddenly they were heading towards the SR headquarters. That's why Se-hyeon felt the need to maintain formality.

"Oh, right. I must be scatterbrained."

Tae-oh gently rubbed his empty throat and slowly withdrew his hand. Se-hyeon, who was adjusting his casual collar without a tie, turned his gaze towards Tae-oh's house.

"Just wait a moment. I'll go get it."

"Ah, it's fine."

"It's my fault for not preparing in advance. So if you give me a moment..."

"I hate waiting more."

Tae-oh abruptly cut off Se-hyeon's words. Although taking the elevator to go back and forth shouldn't take much time, Tae-oh had an unwilling expression.

In this situation, Se-hyeon couldn't ask Tae-oh to wait. He thought there was only one way, even if Tae-oh wouldn't like it...

"Well, then please wait for a moment."

"No, you keep bringing up the tie..."

Tae-oh seemed as if he was about to say that Se-hyeon could stop, but he stopped abruptly, surprised. He froze in place as he suddenly saw Se-hyeon pulling down his own tie.

"If you have to go to the headquarters..."

Se-hyeon said apologetically as he adjusted Tae-oh's tie around his neck. It felt a bit awkward since he was usually the one having it put on, but he carefully adjusted it.

"Well, that's true…"

Tae-oh looked at Se-hyeon's face, which was very close to his own. Within that small face that defied proportions, his sharp jawline was undeniably handsome.

The eyebrows, neither thick nor thin, sat beneath beautifully shaped eyes, giving off a refreshing aura. The features of his eyes were exquisitely refined. The high bridge of his nose, which defined the centre of his face, was perfectly natural, and his lips seemed to be enticing just by looking at them. None of these features resembled each other, yet they harmonized without any sense of discord.

Tae-oh wanted to see him up close, even closer than now.

As Tae-oh looked into Se-hyeon's face, his gaze became deeper and deeper.

"It's done."

Se-hyeon was taken aback as he lifted his head, his hand leaving the tie. It was because Tae-oh's face was unexpectedly close. If Se-hyeon tilted his head just a little, their lips could touch, and this realization made Se-hyeon freeze in place.

"Boss?"

"Hello, Secretary."

Tae-oh's mouth hung open, his face showing a somewhat absentminded expression. Se-hyeon belatedly scolded himself for unintentionally staring at Tae-oh's lips, but Tae-oh spoke before he could react.

"Choose one."

Surely he wasn't asking Se-hyeon to match his mouth or to close his eyes. Tae-oh seemed embarrassed, and the current atmosphere was becoming dangerous.

"Release your pheromones or hit me hard on the head."

Se-hyeon was taken aback by the unexpected words, feeling both flustered and uneasy about the content. Why suddenly bring up pheromones...? And what's with the other condition? Why is it so extreme?

"Of course, if you're my secretary, you wouldn't hit my head."

Why would he assume that Se-hyeon couldn't hit him?

"You're such a calm and quiet person. I've never seen you display any violent behavior, or even laugh out loud. How could you hit me?"

I want to hit you.

Nevertheless, since it was appropriate to maintain a clear boundary between work and personal matters, Se-hyeon took a step back from Tae-oh. At that moment, Tae-oh stuck out his tongue, pretending not to see as it grazed his lips.

"I apologize."

It was a response that conveyed the inability to entertain any of it.

"Is that so?"

Tae-oh nodded as if he understood. In response to his endless reactions, Se-hyeon smiled as if relieved. Indeed, his boss was attentive to his subordinates' words.

Just as Se-hyeon was feeling relieved, Tae-oh spoke up.

"Well, what about a kiss?"

Prev / Next

[jojaqualityheadcanons]

SDV's 1.5 update contains content that plays into racist, colonialist, and imperialist myths and beliefs.

Disclaimer: I loved SDV (which is a given, considering I have an SDV sideblog lol?), and I'm not writing this post to get people to boycott the game or stop liking it or whatever. I just want people to understand why this content is harmful, how it might be affecting your biases and beliefs, and think of how they can engage with this media without exacerbating the harm that it does. I'm Filipino, and I don't speak for all POC or all brown people, but I felt deeply hurt and betrayed by the content update. Please keep that in mind before you interact with this post. Explanation under the cut because of 1.5 spoilers (obviously) and because this got long.

(I will block people who clown on this post. Keep your opinions to yourself unless you also have firsthand experience with the issues I describe.)

Background

I was already wary of the 1.5 content update because of how the previews featured ~tropical~ and ~exotic~ stuff, but I decided to give it a shot because maybe I was being too hasty with my judgment.

I wasn't. I made a new save to play with the 1.5 content update, and at first, I was having a great time! The new special orders made gameplay more exciting and varied! I could finally get rid of the nursery from my house without mods! The remixed junimo bundles made me change my usual game strategy. And then, I finally unlocked Ginger Island.

It seemed cool at first, but I had a sinking feeling growing in the pit of my stomach as I kept playing. It got to the point that I started nursing a stomach ache and lots of anger that took me days to shake off. I know SDV has never been a shining example of racial/ethnic diversity and sensitivity (I mean... there's a reason why mods like Diverse Stardew Valley and a bunch of other diversity mods exist lol). But while the lack of diversity in the pre-1.5 content is more of a missed opportunity, the 1.5 content is just... actively harmful and hurtful, imo. Here's a breakdown of the issues with the setting and the characters:

The Setting

Ginger Island, along with the Fern Islands in general, is a tropical island that is clearly based on islands in the Pacific. Its features include fertile soil and an abundance of natural, foragable resources. And for some unknown reason, it has no native human population.

Many islands in the world are uninhabited by humans, and there's always a good reason why. The island's environment may be too hostile, it could be too small to sustain human life, it could be sacred or otherwise culturally unacceptable to live there, or some disaster may have occurred to wipe out the local population or cause them to flee. Some uninhabited islands are nature reserves or privately owned. The point is that if an island is habitable, people are bound to call it home.

Writing Ginger Island as an uninhabited "tropical paradise" feels like a copout. It's as if the game is saying, "don't worry, you're not colonizing this land because no one really lives here! You're not stealing this land or anything because it's up for grabs and is just waiting for the right person to come along to develop it and turn it into a resort for other people who don't live here!" But that claim rings hollow when there are so many signs of civilization there, such as literal computers and ancient structures. And the canon reason for the existence of these things is that dwarves, non-human creatures, lived there once. I just think it's ridiculous and harmful that the game completely ignores and erases the existence of the people who lived and still live in the places that Ginger Island is based on and goes even further to use non-human creatures as stand-ins. I don’t think I have to explain why this isn’t good, considering that people of color have been compared to animals and treated like animals to dehumanize us and justify our oppression for ages.

To really hammer in my point about whitewashing and erasure, all the human labor on the island is done by a flock of parrots that you pay with golden walnuts (i. e., resources that you get for free from the island they live on). There's even an anthropomorphized bird who's a shopkeep! I get that creating a whole cast of human NPCs to fill a town would have been way too much work for a content update, but CA didn't need to use a bunch of animals as stand-ins for non-white human characters. There’s a troubling trend of creators prioritizing animal characters over characters of color, and CA plays right into it. He seriously chose to create more anthro characters instead of adding characters of color to the game in a setting that in real life has populations that are primarily made up of brown people. The game includes brown people's land and cultures, but it draws the line at brown people themselves.

The erasure of brown people and the portrayal of our lands as wild and untamed have been used to sanitize the narrative of colonialism for centuries. Pretending that our lands were wild tropical paradises that were ripe for the taking is pretending that colonizing forces didn't use violent, dehumanizing means to subjugate or wipe out countless peoples and cultures in order to make these lands available. Ginger Island's erasure of brown people just perpetuates this colonialist myth, and the context in which it does so disgusts me: the farmer, who already runs a successful farm that was inherited from their grandfather, goes off to a tropical island they have no personal connection to and uses its natural resources to expand their business further. They also open up a resort on the island for the enjoyment of other privileged people from their homeland, and going there is treated as a luxury. This is a classic colonizer narrative, and I cannot believe the game forces players to colonize an island in order to win.

The Characters

I'm honestly amazed that the amount of feedback about the lack of diversity in SDV didn't prompt CA to create characters of color. I'm amazed that he chose the setting he did and still didn't bother to create any characters of color. The fact that all three of the new human characters who live on this tropical island are white makes me go a little apeshit, to be honest! I hate all three of them for a variety of reasons, so I'll go over them one by one:

Birdie

My reasons for not liking Birdie are primarily related to misogyny (lady spent literal decades in isolation on this island moping over her dead husband?) and ageism (if you tell her to live her own life, she tells you that she's too old to???). Sooo they're not really related to the rest of my discussion here, and I won't get into them further. Moving on!

Professor Snail

White historians, archaeologists, and paleontologists have been stealing and plundering artifacts, relics, and fossils from colonized lands for centuries. These white scientists would send their “discoveries” back to their homelands with little regard for the people they stole from. I’ll acknowledge that Professor Snail doesn’t bring the bones and fossils off the island, so his character isn’t as awful as it could be, but he still canonically has this line:

I really just don’t understand why it was necessary to make this character white when making him a character of color could have easily prevented the uncomfortable real-world implications of a white man coming to a foreign land to plunder fossils without asking anybody for permission. If he he’d been created as someone who traced his ancestry to Ginger Island and wanted to study the island’s biological history, his character could have been so sympathetic and even admirable to me! But his character as it is just makes me think of this meme:

Here are some links for further reading about colonialism in paleontology and other social sciences: 1, 2, 3, 4.

Leo

I had a hard time figuring out how to write about this character because the way CA wrote him is arguably one of the most racist parts of SDV. So many aspects of his character left me speechless and appalled because I cannot believe people are still writing shit like this in the 2020s.

I’ll start off with his storyline: this white child gets stranded on an island and is raised by animals. When the farmer meets him, he speaks in broken English to show how “wild” he is:

As the farmer continues to interact with him, he begins to speak more “proper” English:

Wow... he’s becoming more “civilized” because of the farmer’s influence!

As his story progresses, he reveals that he’s lonely because he doesn’t fit in among the other birds. Eventually, he leaves behind his non-human family and assimilates into a primarily white, Western-coded society because that’s supposedly where he belongs.

This whole storyline is made possible by the problems with the setting that I mentioned earlier. Leo wouldn’t feel so lonely and out of place if there were people on the island. He wouldn’t be depicted as wild and animal-like if he had an adoptive family made up of humans instead of parrots. But because CA chose not to have native human characters on this island, Leo can only be around other people if he leaves his home and family behind. As a result, Leo’s story has very uncomfortable parallels with how colonizers have historically separated indigenous children from their families and cultures and forced them to assimilate into the dominant colonizer culture because they considered indigenous cultures to be savage and barbaric (1) (2).

Leo’s whole narrative unintentionally implies that a good life in a good community can only be had in civilized white Western societies. I’m honestly having trouble with further explaining why Leo’s whole character makes me feel so gross, so just read up on the White Man’s Burden, The Jungle Book and other works by Rudyard Kipling (1) (2) (3) (4) (5, PDF download link), and even Tarzan (1) (2).

Leo’s character is also used to further whitewash non-white cultures: 

Poi is a Polynesian dish. Mango sticky rice, which is also a recipe that Leo teaches you in-game, is a Thai dish. In the letter, Leo says that the dish is from his home and enjoyed by his non-human family. Considering that he probably learned these recipes on Ginger Island, and that the only “people” who could have taught him this recipe are literal animals, including these recipes in the game in this way just reinforces the equation of brown people to animals. I’m not Polynesian or Thai, but I know that if CA had included a Filipino recipe in the game and not only had it taught to players by a white character, but also passed off as something from the white character’s culture, I’d be angry. I’ll repeat myself: The game features brown people's food and cultures, but it draws the line at brown people themselves.

I don’t think there’s any way to tweak or edit Leo’s character to fix the issues I described. No matter how we change things, he’s still an orphan raised by animals coded as indigenous people, and he assimilates into the dominant white Western culture. The only way to address these issues is to completely redo his character and even the setting of Ginger Island. Here are some options that I’ve thought of:

Leo is related to someone in the Valley and stays with them for part of the year.

Leo lives with his human family and community on Ginger Island.

Leo’s parents are specifically from Stardew Valley/Pelican Town and he wants to visit in order to reconnect with his heritage.

This list isn’t comprehensive, but it does show that there are so many alternatives to having yet another Mowgli story in Stardew Valley.

Conclusion

I don’t think that CA had bad intentions when he made this content, but the fact is that he did create this content. I’m not calling him a bad person. However, he does have a lot of racist, imperialist, and colonialist biases that he has yet to unlearn. Considering the setting and subject matter of the new 1.5 content, he really should have hired some sensitivity readers to avoid creating harmful content. The man’s sold over ten million copies of his game, and he certainly has the resources to put together a sensitivity team.

I can’t look at Stardew Valley the same way I did before 1.5, but I’m not going to condemn the game as a whole. I might play the game again someday, but I absolutely won’t be going back to Ginger Island. If you’ve enjoyed the Ginger Island content, then good for you! Please just keep all that I’ve written here in mind and accept that that content hurts some people like me.

If you’re a content creator, I urge you to get sensitivity readers if you’re featuring  cultures that you’re not a part of to avoid making the same mistakes that I’ve discussed here. Creating from a place of understanding and respect can only make your work better and more accessible to a wider audience, especially to the people whose culture you’re borrowing.

[lil-tachyon]

Another year- and a big one at that. Surprisingly, I actually feel like I met most of my art goals from last year. Coelum got released after several years of work. Burzok's got done too, and I should finally have my grimy fingers on a print copy in the next couple weeks. Biggest of all, I quit my engineering job to do art for a living (which has pretty much been my goal since my first week of having a job). Big stuff.

Goals for 2022:

-Come up with a framework for making money. The cruel reality I must face. Not actually that bad, everybody's got to do something for a living. Right now I have ample commission work and I actually quite enjoy doing it, but per hour it really doesn't pay that much. I will probably be revising pricing soon once I catch up on the commissions I owe people. Will also be trying to cultivate alternative revenue streams (hey did you know I have a Patreon where I post sketches and previews and unreleased art?). This is going to involve experimentation. I think the best thing, long term, will be to release more books. Not all of them will be successful but ultimately for financial independence, having something I can sell is probably the way to go. Plus I love doing books.

-Get a website and a mailing list up and running. I don't want to be dependent on social media to get my stuff out there. I'd like to have more control over how my drawings are presented. Very long term, (years down the line) I'd like to get off social media entirely. I don't want to be a father with children and still be checking twitter, that's embarrassing. Plus it'd be helpful to direct people to a gallery instead of typing in my stupid username on instagram whenever people ask to see my stuff. I think I can get a basic website up by end of January, that's the goal at least

-Experiment more! The upside of doing so much client work this year is it helped me cultivate a reproducible, recognizable style that I'm proud of. The downside is I haven't been able to mess around with different media, tools, workflows, etc. What is real art if not experimentation? I am glad that I'm finally working towards consistently painting stuff I'm proud of, but I only finished 3 paintings in 2021. Unacceptable! However, already since I've been doing this full time I've been messing around with new stuff daily, so I hope to see the fruits of that by the end of 2022.

-3D. I'm not really into 3D art super much but I've recently found some artists I really like and want to emulate, plus talking with some professionals they recommended I pick it up as a skill. On that note, I've been teaching myself Blender for the last couple weeks. This one's slow going and I probably won't be able to lean into it for a few months, so don't expect renders from me any time soon.

-Burzok's sequel. Not necessarily a direct sequel to Burzok's Mercenary Handbook, but myself and the rest of the Burzok's editorial team are already in early talks to do another book together. Don't expect news until at least spring, though.

-Not art related, but I barely got to play music in 2021. More time spent playing guitar and banjo is a must for 2022.

That's about it. I should note that none of this would be possible without my wife working insanely hard to support us and I love her for that and so should you. Peace out, Happy New Year you dweebs. Thanks for sticking around.

[wallspikes]

hi i know this is a new blog and none of you really know me yet but i have definitely been around the block in the g/t community MANY times and we’ve got way more issues rooted deeper than “oh i’m mad that there isn’t more angsty giant content 😡😡😡” so. while i’m here, you all need to take a step back and consider your actions while making ocs in this community, and that is definitely not excluding myself — with a dynamic so wrought with power imbalances, or alienation of characters, you really have to think about the type of character you’re about to put into that role.

i tend to see this issue with putting a character in an… iffy role with characters of color a lot. frankly, i’ve seen far too many “white savior” tropes, or “mean/aggressive giant is a person of color”, or “uncivilized giant/tiny is a person of color” and i don’t think i need to tell you why those are all Absolutely Unacceptable. there is either an extreme lack of poc representation in the g/t community, or those characters that are poc are often misrepresented with stereotypes (side note: i’ve also seen instances of skin lightening of characters of color, and excusing it by saying it is part of a persons artstyle, though this extends past the g/t community. resources at the bottom for that) find a way to make a character of color without making them a blatant stereotype, or don’t make them a character at all.

also, there is a HUGE issue with portraying and respecting fat people/characters as well. let’s be honest here: from what i’ve seen, art in the g/t community tends to land on two ends of the spectrum, “fat” (average) people that can fit in size 8 jeans, and extreme fatfetish art made by creepy people on deviantart. this isn’t the only problem. i’ve seen countless comments on art of fat characters containing things along the lines of “i want to squish them!” or “they look so soft” or “they look like a marshmallow :)” These Are Not Acceptable Things To Comment On Art Of Fat People. it’s dehumanizing. i’m sorry, but if that is all you can think of fat people, you need to rethink the last 10-20 years of your life until now. fat people are not your cushions, they are not your stress balls, they are not your pets.

there is a bit of a lack of lgbt stuff in the g/t community, though there isn’t much to criticize or bring up about the representation of said existing characters besides the obvious “uwu babies” treatment that most gay characters usually get, though fat characters tend to get that here too.

END ALL BE ALL. i know this is a comfort thing for most of us, but that doesn’t excuse or give the right to anyone to exacerbate racist stereotypes or fatphobic ideals. fix it, or throw it out.

(drawing/coloring poc:)

https://twitter.com/maambalam/status/1383247300827381768/photo/3

(drawing fat bodies:)

[cipheress-to-k-pop]

📓

Oooo I thought abt which fandom I should do this on for like 5 minutes

But since most of my readers from the DC fandom lemme tell you about part 2 of Long Time, No See

The reader has a realllyyyyy cool power that I've mentioned in a few of my what have we done hcs

She can teleport by drawing runes or a pentagram or something on a surface and the catch is that the pentagram has to drawn the place you need to go

So there's a high speed chase and the team is getting chased down and she remembers that there's a pentagram drawn in her bedroom so when they get caught in a dead end, she takes Dick's batarang and cuts her hand open before drawing the pentagram with her own blood!! idky but i just loveddddd envisioning this but i never completed writing it

I did start writing it though before I gave up and I was able to dig this up from the bottom of my drafts

When Rachel came out of her room for some breakfast, she didn't expect to be grabbed suddenly by Gar and hauled into Jason's room. They were both crouching on the floor, peeking through the crack in his door at what seemed to be Dick's room.

"What's going on?" She asked, surprised when they both turned around to shush her.

"Dick has a girl in his room."

Her brows furrowed, "What?"

"Dick has a girl in his room!" They repeated in heated whispers and she practically jumped on Jason's back while trying to peek at his door.

"I heard them last night. He snuck her up after midnight and they went straight to the bedroom." Gar replied and Rachel's face scrunched up in disgust.

She was kind of disappointed if she was being honest. When it was just Dick and her, before they met Kori and Gar and Jason, the two of them had spent a couple nights with (Y/N) and she really thought they were in a committed relationship.

You and Dick looked so good together and you both were clearly madly in love. It would only take a phone call to get you here to San Francisco and honestly, Rachel really did miss you.

She missed your motherly antics. How you gently chastised her about drinking too much coffee and having too much sugar. How you always made sure she was warm and her belly was full and she was drinking enough water. How you checked on her in the night to make sure her blanket hadn't fallen in her sleep.

You thought she hadn't noticed that she ended up waking with the blanket tucked tightly around her but she did.

Ever since her mother died, and her birth mother had betrayed her, she looked at you in a new light. The only person who had ever taken care of her aside from Dick and she longed for you to take care of her once again.

But Dick brought a girl to the tower.

Probably someone who was much uglier and ruder and meaner and couldn't hold a candle to you.

And before she even met the woman who had spent the night, she already hated her.

When Dick came out of his room, looking deliriously happy, she just scowled at her soggy bowl of cereal. The boys had no idea what had caused her sudden change in mood, choosing not to say much, lest they face her wrath.

"Have a fun night, Dicky boy?" Jason smirked, noticing just how mussed his hair was and how Dick kept rolling his shoulder like there was a crick. The three of them would find out later that it was because he spent the night cushioning his partner's head on his shoulder and woke up with his arm numb.

"I thought we weren't allowed to bring strangers to the tower." Rachel commented. She looked unbothered but really she was burning from the inside with loyalty to you. You both were so in love and he brings a one night stand to their safe haven?

Unacceptable.

Dick spared her a smile, pouring a second cup of coffee, "Actually she's no stranger."

"Hey, Rach."

Rachel nearly fell out of her chair at the sound of your voice, whipping around to find you smiling gently at her and before everyone could even process it, she was tackling you into a hug. You giggled gleefully, petting her hair and when you glanced over her head, Dick was giving you a loving smile.

"When did you get here!?"

"Last night. I wanted to see you but you were already asleep and I didn't want to wake you."

"You guys know each other?" Came from Jason and when you turned to greet both the boys, Gar gasped very loudly.

"Holy shit! You're Zatanna!" He exclaimed and you chuckled, reaching over to ruffle his hair playfully, "Yes but I prefer to be called (Y/N)."

You left Rachel's arms to stand behind the kitchen counter with Dick, smiling gently at him.

The three of them shared a glance as they watched the two of you move in sync while trying to get breakfast ready. It was weird, you both might as well have had sunshine emitting from you with cartoon hearts raining in the background.

"Who exactly is this chick?"

"Her superhero alias is Zatanna! She's a super powerful sorcerer! She can casts spells by speaking backwards! She can speak backwards! She was one of the most powerful members of the team! She even got offered to join the Justice League!" Rushed out Garfield, so excited to be in your presence but he kept his voice low enough so you wouldn't realize he was a second away from having a fanboy induced heart attack.

Not that it mattered, you and Dick looked like you were in your own world.

Jason merely nodded, not really interested in your abilities or powers and more concerned with why his brother looks like a simp.

"She's Dick's ex-fiance." Rachel said promptly, only to watch both their necks snap toward her, shock evident on their faces.

"WHAT?!"

[chaoticpuff17]

When the Chips are Down

part 13

masterlist

Namjoon calmed down, if only by a  little now that both mom and baby were confirmed to be healthy and safe. He was still nervous about every ache and pain she had, but he hovered a little less. He was also more affectionate after their night together and the revelations the following morning. It was as though she’d given him the greenlight for him to smother her in every bit of affection he’d been holding himself back from. In a way it was like the first weeks of their marriage all over again. He brought her flowers, spent his evenings home with her. He ate breakfast with her every morning as if they were a normal happy couple. It was oddly idyllic.

Though that didn’t last long as her due date creeped closer and closer until it finally came and went setting everyone on edge again. 

Miss In was convinced that it was a bad omen and was doing everything in her power to try to induce labor. She tried everything from encouraging her to take more walks or serving spicy foods in the hope that they would help bring on labor. Y/N herself was no less anxious for the pregnancy to be over. Her back ached. Her ankles were swollen, and her little girl had taken to sitting very low and uncomfortably in her belly. The more uncomfortable she was, the crankier she became, and the crankier she was, the more on edge Namjoon became. 

The pair were sitting in the library simply waiting for any sign of the baby coming when Namjoon received a call on his cell. 

“What?” he barked, drawing Y/N’s attention from her book. She didn’t normally pay too much attention to his phone calls, but then again, they very rarely provoked such a strong reaction from him. Namjoon liked to keep most of his business out of the house and way from her. “Take him to the clinic. Is the girl secured? Good. Keep her there and make sure she doesn’t leave.” there was a pause as whoever was on the other side of the line spoke. “I don’t care if you have to put him in a headlock and force him to go. He needs to get checked out.” 

The call ended abruptly, and it was clear that whatever had happened had put Namjoon in a foul mood. 

“What’s wrong?” she asked, setting her book aside. 

“Taehyung’s been stabbed.” 

“Stabbed?” 

“Aerie, his fiancee, managed to stab him in the thigh. Jimin is getting him to the clinic to get it looked at.” 

“She stabbed him?” she asked, pleasantly surprised by the news. From what she had heard. The poor girl didn’t get much freedom under Taehyung’s care. She hadn’t met the woman herself, but she liked her more and more by the second. 

“You stabbed me.” Namjoon reminded her grumpily, running a hand through his hair in frustration. 

“I wasn’t aiming for you.” she shot back, rolling her eyes. “Do you need to go take care of that?” she asked, noticing how antsy he seemed.

“No.” he sighed, leaning back in his chair with a groan. “You could go into labor at any time now.” 

“I’m a week past due.” she huffed, glaring down at her belly. Their baby girl refused to make this easy on either of them, and it was incredibly frustrating. “I don’t think this little girl is going to decide to come within the hour it’s going to take you to check on Taehyung.” 

“She could.” he responded with a wry but tired smile. “She’s stubborn like her mother.”

“Yes, because it’s completely possible for me to go into labor and have the baby all within an hour.” she was clearly unimpressed, but Namjoon grinned. 

“She could. She could take after you and keep us both on our toes, and you haven’t been feeling well.”  

“Go.” she leaned back with a groan. “It’s better than you hovering. Your presence is not magical. She’s going to come when she’s going to come, and I’ll be in just as much discomfort when you get back.” she raised a brow waiting for Namjoon to move or say something, but he didn’t. “If there’s any hint of a possibility of labor, I’m sure Miss In or whatever babysitter you have on duty will call you.”  

Namjoon was going to protest, but his phone rang again drawing both of their attention. Everyone knew that Namjoon had taken time off for the baby. Getting two calls within a span of five minutes couldn’t be good.

 “What?” he growled, already on edge from Taehyung’s call. “What!” he barked, shooting upright, clenching the phone in his hand so hard that Y/N was almost afraid that he would break it. “What do you mean she’s gone?” 

“Namjoon?” 

“Of course.” he sighed, standing up. “I’ll be right there. Is her tracker online?” 

“Namjoon?” she asked again, growing more concerned. She knew from personal experience that running did not have pleasant consequences here. 

“We’ll get her back, Hobi. Don’t worry.” 

That sent a cold bolt of fear down her spine. She had assumed that it was Aerie that had run. It would make sense after just having stabbed Taehyung, but hearing Hoseok’s name changed everything. If Hoseok was calling about a runaway, then Iyla was probably involved. She’d told her sister to run. She was proud of her sister for trying, but she hated to think of what would happen if she was caught. 

“Namjoon!” she demanded, voice rising shrilly as he hung up the phone. “What’s going on?” 

“Your sister is just as foolish and stubborn as you.” he growled, striding toward the door. 

“Is she alright?” 

“She dug the chip from her arm and ran off.” he laughed, the sound harsh and grating with no real humor to it. His gaze on her was dark and brooding a clear indicator that he was positively fuming. “So no, I don’t think she’s alright. She certainly won’t be when Hoseok gets his hands on her.” 

“Namjoon!” she gasped, standing from her own chair. “You promised she wouldn’t be hurt. You promised.” 

“I won’t be held responsible for the consequences of your brat of a sister’s actions. Whatever Hoseok has planned as a punishment, I stand behind it.” she opened her mouth to protest, but Namjoon was swift to cut her off. “I won’t allow my brothers to go through what you put me through, even if the woman in question is your sister.” 

He wasn’t blind. He could see how upset this had made her, but there were rules in his kingdom that not even she could be an exception too. Her sister certainly wasn’t going to be an exception even if it upset her. 

With a sigh, Namjoon crossed the room back to her, pressing a kiss to her hair before leaning his forehead against hers. “I’ll be home soon. Try not to worry.” 

“How can I not worry? You’re hunting down my little sister like an animal.” 

“I have Tae to check on, your sister to find, and Hoseok to calm down. I don’t need anything to happen to you.” She took a step back, refusing to look at him, her jaw clenched. “I’ll call Jungkook to stay with you.” 

“If anything happens to Iya…” 

“She’ll be safe and sound at home where she belongs soon enough.” 

He turned to leave again only to be stopped in his tracks by what she said next. “Did you really think she wouldn’t try?” she called after him. “Can you blame her? None of us asked for this.” 

“Whether you asked for it or not, jagi, this is your home, your family, and abandoning your family is unacceptable.” 

He strode off leaving Y/N alone in the library her mind whirling with the possibilities. If there was any deity watching over them, Iyla would be able to get away safely, but their family seemed to be particularly forsaken in recent years. She could hope that Iyla would be able to get, to stay away, and if that wasn’t going to be possible, she at least hoped that her sister would be alright when they caught her. She knew full well though that no one was going to update her on what was going on. No one ever kept her updated on Namjoon’s business, and she had a hunch that this would qualify as Namjoon’s business. 

“Miran!” she called striding out of the library. 

Almost immediately the shy maid popped up as if from nowhere. She was her silent shadow in the estate running to get her whatever she needed and reporting on her to Miss In and by extension Namjoon.

“Yes, buin?” 

“I need you to tell me the moment that Namjoon comes back home.” 

The maid nodded quickly. She was a mousy girl, but she was endearing and very eager to please. “Is there anything else I can do for you, buin? Miss In says you should take a walk today.” 

“She’s said that every day for the past week.” 

“Well we can’t argue with Miss In.” a new voice chimed in bringing their attention to Jungkook who stood at the other end of the hall with a wide smile.

“Kookie.” she breathed out a sigh of relief. If there were any of Namjoon’s people she could get to tell her what was going on, it was Jungkook. She moved as quickly as she could, practically throwing herself into the younger man’s arms. This was the first time she’d seen him since she’d been back, something about him being out on assignment, and it was good to see him. “I missed you.” 

“I missed you too, noona.” he laughed, tightening his arms around her. “It’s good to have you home.” He pulled back observing her bump. “You got big, noona.” 

“It’s rude to comment on a lady’s size, Kookie.”  she playfully scolded, but took his hand and pressed it to her belly where the baby was moving. “That’s your niece, who refuses to come out.” 

“A niece?” his eyes were wide, excited. “Hyung doesn’t tell me anything.” he whined.

“He doesn’t tell me anything either.” she scoffed bitterly. “Have you heard anything? Do you know what’s happening with Iyla?” 

Jungkook shook his head. “I know that Taehyung hyung is fine. He’ll recover, but Aerie is going to be in serious trouble when he gets home. But Namjoon and Hobi hyung are looking for Iyla now.” 

She sighed disappointedly. “You’ll tell me if you hear anything else?” 

“I don’t think hyung wants you to know.” he shook his head sadly. “She’ll be okay, noona. Iyla is tough, like you.” 

“She shouldn’t have to be like me.” 

“I’m sorry, noona.” there was a moment of awkward silence as neither of them quite knew what to say now. Jungkook couldn’t tell her anything, and even if he could, there was no new information to share. “Why don’t we take a walk?” 

“Alright.” she sighed, taking the arm that Jungkook offered. Everyone had been very careful with her especially for the past week. She was having trouble moving because of the swollen ankles and the discomfort they caused, so she was appreciative of the extra support even if it was frustrating. 

They walked for a while, catching up, asking and answering questions about the baby, but there was an unspoken tension. Neither of them knew what was going on outside of the estate. It had her worried, and no matter what Jungkook tried, he couldn’t get her mind off of it. It seemed like nothing would, until the first pain hit. 

“Noona?” Jungkook asked frantically hovering over her has she hissed in pain half bent over. “Noona, what’s wrong?” 

Another pain hit, sending Jungkook into a frenzy as she cried out. “Get Miran. Get Miss In.” she demanded, clutching her belly. 

“Noona?” 

“Jungkook.” She snapped, looking at him with wide nervous eyes. “The baby’s coming. I need you to get help.” 

He nodded resolutely, helping her to the patio so she could sit before dashing into the house to get help followed by the sound of Y/N crying out in pain. 

part 14

[forzalando]

royally screwed | fw | pt. two

pairing: prince!fred x princess!reader word count: 2.4k warnings: cursing, mentions of meals/food, arranged marriage, enemies to lovers a/n: hello friends! happy valentine’s day!!💛the long awaited part two is here and i hope you all enjoy!😊bonus points if you catch the subtle hp references in this chapter hahaha thank you to @spacexcowgirl​ for beta reading, i love you dearly!! you can read part one here

summary: Prince Frederick Weasley of Burrow was a twin, but unfortunately, at least in his mind, he was born the eldest twin, meaning it was his duty to inherit the kingdom. Since the young age of ten, Fred knew that he was to marry Princess Y/N Y/L/N of Diagon, and over the years they’ve both come to dread the day. With the eve of their wedding closely approaching, their disdain for each other begins to worry their respective families. However, there is a very fine line between love and hate.

Y/N awoke the next morning and immediately recounted the previous day’s events; she could feel the puffiness in her face and eyes from the tears shed after her Mother left her room. She had hoped that their conversation would go differently, but it was done and there was nothing left she could say regarding the matter.

A sharp knock on Y/N’s chamber door had her jumping up and crossing the room faster than her feet would carry her. She stumbled a bit, almost crashing into the door before pulling it open, only to see the most peculiar sight.

Frederick Weasley, with his siblings stood behind him, although George was standing rather close so that he could pinch his brother’s ear.

“Well,” Ginny goaded, “go on then, you arse.”

Fred turned swiftly to shoot his sister a glare, but George’s grip on his ear had him wincing in pain.

“You better get going or I swear I’ll rip it off,” George grumbled, struggling to hide the jesting smile creeping on his face.

“Fine, fine,” Fred huffed. “Princess Y/N, I would like to apologize for my behavior last night. It was entirely unacceptable and I hope that you can find it in your impossibly sma-”

Ginny quickly stomped on Fred’s foot, interrupting what Y/N was sure would be an insult.

“Pardon me, your impossibly large heart, to forgive me. I was also wondering if you would care to join me for breakfast in the drawing room.”

George promptly let go of Fred’s ear, but not without one final yank, and the entire clan of Weasley siblings looked at Y/N expectantly, awaiting her answer with fervor.

“You must be absolutely mad, Frederick Weasley,” she scoffed, folding her arms across her chest in defiance. “After your attitude last night, which you had for no reason, I might add, and you come knocking on my door to ask if I want to have breakfast with you? I don’t want to see your face unless I have to!”

“I’m trying, Y/N! You said that the least I could was try, so here I am, offering to spend time with you when I’d rather lick the floor in the foyer.”

“Well, then, feel free to go scrub the floors with your tongue because I will not join you for a meal today or any other day!”

Fred stalked away with no objections from his siblings, who were all laughing at Y/N’s quip. She had a satisfied smile on her face as well, but it quickly fell when she averted her gaze to the three other Weasley siblings.

“Now what exactly did you think that was going to accomplish?” Y/N spoke with a, mostly, playful glare to the three standing before her.

“Honestly, we were hoping a bit that you wouldn’t answer the door. Mum made us drag him down here,” George answered with a shrug of his shoulders.

“But, now that we are here,” Ginny said excitedly, “will you have breakfast with us?”

Y/N smiled softly; she could never say no to spending time with her only friends.

“Let me get dressed and I’ll meet you…where should I meet you?”

“The drawing room…” Ron mumbled, hoping Y/N wouldn’t recall that Fred wanted to take his breakfast there as well.

“You three are insufferable,” Y/N laughed, “however, I’ll be there in ten. Hopefully he will be gone by then.”

Y/N gently shut her door and quickly threw on a dress and her day slippers; her mother would absolutely have a fit if she saw the disheveled state she was in, but Y/N simply couldn’t care.

After a quick glance in the mirror, Y/N hurried through the castle corridors that she had come to know so well and made it to the drawing room in record time. To her delight, Frederick was nowhere to be seen.

“Good Morning, dear,” Queen Molly said warmly from her seat. “Have you by chance seen Fred this morning?”

Y/N heard the quiet snickering of Ron and George and then a hushed “shut it” that could only have come from Ginny.

“Oh, yes, Queen Molly, he stopped by my chambers to apologize. Very out of character for him, I wonder if someone slipped something into his morning tea.”

Molly Weasley hummed lightly, taking the slightly sarcastic tone of Y/N’s voice to mean that things hadn’t gone as she directed.

“That’s lovely, dear, maybe you’ll actually have a civil conversation in the gardens.”

Y/N set down her tea slowly, trying not to act shocked because she had no knowledge of a walk in the gardens.

“The gardens? I didn’t know anything about the gardens,” Y/N mused inquisitively.

“That’s where Fred is right now, I told him you’d be along in a few minutes. He even looked a bit excited,” Molly teased.

Y/N snorted inelegantly and immediately covered it with a cough; she rose from the table and looked pleadingly at George, hoping he could come up with some form of an excuse that would save her from time spent with Frederick, but George refused to look at her and continued eating his breakfast unbothered.

“I’ll go meet him now, Queen Molly. I’m sure he’s awfully busy so we can make this short,” Y/N said with a smile.

“Fred is free all day, I cleared his schedule, dear.”

“Brilliant,” she grimaced.

With a half-hearted wave, she left the drawing room and begrudgingly walked towards the gardens, smiling politely at each person she passed. Even if her future husband did not care for her, Y/N took comfort in knowing that his family and the people in the castle did; she hoped it would make the rest of her life tolerable.

All too soon, Y/N felt the sunshine on her face as she stepped into the magnificent palace gardens. She could spot Prince Frederick’s fiery hair a mile away; he was standing near the rose bushes twirling a yellow one between his long fingers.

The rustling of the grass between Y/N’s feet caused Fred to turn around to find the source of the noise.

He stalled a bit; even though he despised the Princess of Diagon, he could never deny that she was breathtakingly beautiful. Her hair was unkempt, a soft pink, cotton gown swished around her legs as she stalked toward him, and her face was set in a scowl but even the worst grimace could not distract from her captivating eyes.

It was entirely infuriating, and it made Fred want to hate her even more, but some intrinsic force wouldn’t allow him.

“What are you staring at?” Y/N asked, her eyebrow raising.

“Nothing,” Fred replied with a shake of his head. “I’m just thinking of all the ways I’d rather spend my morning.”

“Well, it seemed like you were staring at me. Do it again and I’ll push you into the rose bushes, I don’t care if you are the future King.”

Fred turned his head and tried not to crack a smile, but failed miserably as the corner of his mouth quirked up involuntarily.

“Let’s get this over with, Y/N, can your stubby legs keep up?”

“It’s not my fault you shot up like a bloody bean pole; you went from stumpy to looking like someone sewed tree limbs together and animated them.”

“Most women like tall men.”

“I like tall men, Frederick, I just don’t like you.”

A stunned silence fell over the two royals, only the sounds of the rustling leaves and nearby animals could be heard.

“I suppose that’s why you like Prince Cedric, then?”

“Beg your pardon?” Y/N’s eyes widened, confused at the sudden interrogation.

“Your conversation with your Mother last night, how you begged her to marry him instead. Or my brother. Or that horrid Malfoy.”

“You had no right – that was a private conversation. How dare you eavesdrop on my personal business? Every time I think you have a shred of decency you prove me wrong, Frederick Weasley.”

Fred stepped in front of the Princess, blocking her path and preventing her from walking on.

“Prove you wrong? I had come to your room to apologize when I heard you plotting with your Mother to run off with someone else and disrespect my family.”

“I would never disrespect your family. They’ve never been anything but good and kind to me, the last thing I would ever want to do is hurt them. I haven’t the slightest idea how you’re related to any of them.”

“Oh, I know, you have them all wrapped around your little finger,” Fred scoffed.

“I’m not going to stand here and fight with you, Frederick, I don’t have the energy. Can we please just keep moving and we can tell your Mother we had a wonderful time and learned so much about each other.”

Y/N stepped around Fred, lightly grabbing his wrist to pull him along through the endless rows of flowers.

“She’ll probably quiz us and you don’t even know my favorite color,” Fred griped.

“It’s purple, I think,” Y/N blurted. “I overheard you telling your Mum years ago that you wanted purple frosting on some dessert. I figured that meant it was your favorite.”

“And you remembered?”

“There aren’t a lot of things I forget about the people in my life, Frederick. If it’s important to you, I’ll remember.”

“But you don’t care about me, why did you even bother?”

Y/N sighed and shook her head before turning to look at Fred, shielding her eyes from the sun.

“Contrary to popular belief, I don’t hate you. I don’t particularly like you, maybe in a different life we’d actually be friends, but I don’t hate you. I don’t hate anyone.”

Fred realized this was the longest they’d gone without arguing in years, and it was barely one tenth of a conversation. He turned his head slightly to watch Y/N, taking in the way she gazed lovingly at the surrounding flora, and noticed her eyes linger a bit longer every so often.

“Yellow,” Fred mumbled.

“What was that?” Y/N asked.

“You look longer at the yellow flowers. Yellow is your favorite color.”

Y/N smiled softly, the same smile she’d given Fred when she had arrived the day before but it was infinitely more sincere.

“If you were like this all the time, you wouldn’t be so bad Frederick.”

“Who says I’m not?”

Y/N rolled her eyes and this time Fred could not contain himself; he laughed loudly, and the sound triggered a fluttering of sorts in the Princess’s chest. They continued their walk, chattering idly and the Prince even picked a blooming yellow rose and delicately handed it to his Princess.

“I really did want to apologize last night, you know,” Fred assured. “I didn’t have any reason to be so rude when you arrived, I guess it was just…habit. We have a way of getting under each other’s skin.”

“Apology accepted, for your rudeness yesterday, of course. But, you owe me another.”

“Another?”

“Yes, for eavesdropping on me and my Mother.”

“That conversation involved me, I hardly think it’s one I shouldn’t be aware of if you’re trying to finagle your way out of our betrothal.”

“It may involve you, but it was a private conversation.”

“That involved me.”

“My God, I’ve said it before but truly every time I think you can redeem yourself, you do or say something completely asinine. Do you have any manners?”

“You were talking about me, I felt I had a right to listen!”

Y/N groaned loudly in annoyance, drawing the attention of the nearby guards.

“I don’t even believe you wanted to apologize, you had the chance this morning and just insulted me like you always do! Every decent part of you is nothing but an act!”

“You don’t even know me,” Fred seethed.

“No, I don’t, but it’s because you won’t let me!”

“You’ve never even tried, don’t attempt to play me for a fool, Y/N.”

“Well, I’m trying now. I’m trying now and still all we can do is fight.”

The two stood toe to toe, breathing heavily and staring into each other’s eyes. After a few moments, Y/N looked away and sighed deeply. It sounded almost dejected, Fred realized, rather than the anger he had expected.

“Go ahead of me back to the castle, please, I’d like to actually enjoy the rest of the walk.”

“I don’t have to take orders from – ”

“You’ll do as I say, Frederick Weasley,” Y/N snapped.

Fred wanted to argue; God, did he want to argue with her until he was blue in the face, but something about the tone of her voice frightened him a bit. So, he scoffed and stalked back to the castle, swinging his fists by his sides and gritting his teeth.

He passed by his twin, giving George a half-hearted wave before entering the castle. It wasn’t hard to sense the tone of what had transpired, and George shook his head and took off running towards the gardens to find Y/N.

“Oi! What did he do this time?” George shouted as he slowed to a stop in front of Y/N.

“Just the usual. Acting like a pompous prick that can do no wrong. He was nice for two minutes and then refused to apologize for eavesdropping last night on a conversation between me and my Mother!”

George rolled his eyes and raked a hand down his face, massaging his temples in preparation for the headache that his brother always managed to give him.

“Y/N, you know he’s not malicious, he’s just an idiot sometimes,” George offered.

“I appreciate you defending him but at the moment it’s going in one ear and out the other, Georgie.”

He laughed and slung an arm around the Princess’s shoulders, joining her on the remainder of her walk through the gardens. He noticed Y/N twirling a yellow rose around and every so often lifting it to inhale its sweet scent.

“Stealing flowers from our gardens, eh?” George jested, bumping his hip into Y/N.

“Frederick picked it for me, actually,” she mumbled.

“Well, that’s sweet. You two can get along, is what I’m seeing and hearing.”

“It was a momentary lapse of judgment,” Y/N sighed, before throwing the perfect rose to the ground and ensuring her slipper crushed the delicate petals.

When they were good and flattened into the Earth, she swore she felt an ache in her chest.

taglist: @theweasleyslut @vivacesole @weasleyclaw @nuttytani-reblogs @theweasleysredhair @hufflepuffbaby9 @wildfire-whizbangs @gcdricreads @amhyeah @62442-am @letsgotothehop @emrysts @fuckoffthanos @uponashelf @justalittleweirdoo @evermoreweasley @feminafatales @pxroxide-prinxcesss @lumosandnoxwriting @weelittleweasley @darthwheezely @lovecroftreads @whizboingies @love-peachh @harrysweasleys @wand3ringr0s3 @gredmforge @vogueweasley @gryffindcrghost @adrianpuceyishot @spacexcowgirl @freds-slut @phoenixes-and-wizards @parseltongueswriting @geostarr @snoopydoop1 @lana-isabelle @kaye-lantern @aworldinsideaperson @starlightweasley @emeraldbears20 @lupinsclassroom @barnesjamcs @thisuserlovesyouandyouandyou @dracosgoodgirl @expectoevans @scoobiessnacks @crissdanvers @itsbebeyyy @ovrwd @satellitespidey @softlyqoos @dandyylions @anxxi0s @raiaurii @gloryekaterina @godricsswords @wischief @amourtentiaa @lmaoitsmebro @legitlaughingflamingo @rodrickmalfoy @listenhereyousupernova 

[winslctrg]

I Love You, With A Touch Of Tragedy And Quite Madly. (Mildred Ratched x Reader)

summary: a regular day at work turns out to be not so regular

a/n: this is for @sassicaismysupreme surpriseeee i was ur secret fic writer. Not important, but this is my first fic ever so i hope it is any good!

warnings: slapping, angst!

Your relationship with Mildred was a fairytale. You were all sunshine and blue skies. Though some clouds might be there with the occasional rainy day, there were rarely thunderstorms.

Mildred only added to your sunshine. She has been like some sort of rainbow hanging above your little heart island, making it a happier place. Rainbows are rare and special, and that’s also how you looked at Mildred.

It had always been happy. You were used to it like that, and you liked it that way. No complications, no anxiety, no fears, no anger. Mildred was some sort of safe haven where you just never had any problems. That's probably why the situation affected you so much.

It was one of those blue sky, happy sunny days. You opened your eyes, closed them again against the rays that fell right through your curtains. You couldn't be annoyed for long though, because your head immediately met your sleeping girlfriend's.

Your mouth fell into a soft smile upon seeing her. She always seemed to have that effect on you, no matter where you guys were. It once even happened at a funeral, and Mildred had to give u a soft warning glare. Not that that helped though, it only made you smile more. She made you smile. At home, at work, in the grocery store, on the street, at parties, anywhere at anytime. She was quite simply everything to you.

You pressed a soft kiss on her temple “Wake up darling, we’ll be late.” You whispered, before running your hand softly through her hair. The sun made her features even more gorgeous than they usually were, accentuating her sharp cheekbones and her beautiful big lips. Your hand left her hair and ran softly from the forming frown between her eyebrows all the way down to her nose before putting it on her now blushing cheeks.

“Goodmorning sunshine.” You giggled. A soft smile spread on Mildred’s face as she finally opened her eyes. Her brown eyes looked nearly gold because of the sun. You begged. Wished to stay like this forever, but the alarm went off, pulling you both out of your trances. You grinned at her before you sat up and grabbed her wrist. She positioned herself right in your arms. You let your nose slip into her beautiful reddish-brown hair, smelling her expensive shampoo.

You never got used to moments like these. They made your heart race, and you were sure it also grew 3 times bigger. “I love you” you whispered into her hair, as if making a promise to yourself that your heart would forever beat for her. “I love you too honey.” She said before yawning. “Aww are you sleepy baby?” you teased. “Did i wear you out last night?” your said, and you winked at her. Mildred glared at you, but you could see the pink tones covering her ears and cheeks. You kissed her softly, before pulling away again but resting your forehead against hers, noses touching. “We have to get ready.” You whispered. “I know.” She replied. She put her soft hands on your cheeks, as her long slender thumbs started stroking the area right beside your nose. “I love you.” You said again, just for the sake of reassuring your promise to her. She knew, because she smiled and when you looked deep into her warm brown eyes you saw that same promise. “I love you too, lets get dressed.”

You were in the car to work, both of you working at the hospital. Mildred drove, always. You did try once, but then nearly hit a car because you were too busy staring at her. You didn’t mind not driving, it meant you could stare at her without the posibillity of killing an entire family and their dog.

As you both arrived on the parking lot, you made sure your hat was on right and straightened Mildred’s too. You glanced around, saw nobody and kissed her. It always cleared your mind, kissing her. It seemed to draw out any negative feelings and fill your head with love, much like a love potion.

You both stepped out of the car and went to your respective entrances. You gave Mildred a small smile before parting.

Work went slowly, but good. You were good friends with Huck, and he made time speed up just a little faster, plus seeing Mildred at lunch really made you optimistic again.

After lunch, Mildred called you and Huck to a treatment room. There was a girl there, around your age, and she looked frightened.

“Nurse Finnigan, nurse y/l/n, this is miss Ruth Davis. She’s here because of unexplainable feelings towards women, which is simply unacceptable, don’t you guys think?” You pushed up an eyebrow and looked at Huck, who also had a confused expression on his face. “Well?” Mildred asked, a slight tinge to her tone now. Huck cleared his throat. “Yeah uh sure, unacceptable.”

You, however shook your head. “I don’t think she should be tortured simply for liking women. I don’t see a problem with it honestly.” You said as calmly as you could. You met Hucks gaze, saw his shocked eyes but also his slight grin. You averted your gaze to meet Mildreds eyes, saw a flash of panic. Panic? No, now it was definitely anger. “Nurse y/l/n thats incredibly inappropriate. I suggest you find another job if you think that way.” She said, her voice sounded a little too forced for your liking. “I’d gladly do, but um I know you don’t have a problem with it either.” You said and moved your head to look at the girl. “She doesn’t,” you told her. “I’d know-“

Before you had the time to finish your sentence, you felt a hard burning on your cheek and you stumbled tot he ground. She had hit you. Your mind was running 800 miles per second. You stared back up at her with tears threatening to come out of your eyes.

“I should’ve known it wasn’t real, right? That this was all a big game to you. That you didn’t actually care about me.” You whispered and you tried to lean on your shakey hands. “I’m sorry for believing you didn’t actually hate me, I’m sorry you had to keep your act up for so long. I just thought-“ your voice broke mid sentence. “I thought we were happy.” You blinked. Didn’t, couldn’t look at her. You opened your mouth to speak again, but instead a sob made it’s way out. You shook your head feverently and ran past her. “Don’t come after me.” You murmered as your shoulders touched. Away. Away. Away.

You didn’t know how long you had ran for, you wondered how you had even kept on going that far. Breathing was becoming, air scraping it’s way through your lungs, making them bleed. Doesn’t matter, you told yourself. It definitley wasn’t bleeding as badly as your heart

You only ever wanted to be hers. To watch the sunset with her ever night in the summer, and sit by the ocean just because you could. To give her hugs for warmth when she had underestimated the cool sting of the autumn air. To hold her hand on walks during the snow in the winter, and buy her the perfect christmas presents. To pick her some blooming daisies and lavender and violets in the spring and make a bouqet, just for her. You wanted to make her feel wanted.

You came to a halt as you realized where you had run to. Her house. Because that was home. She was. Your face crumpled and you started sobbing. You rand to the nearest wall to steady yourself, before giving up and letting yourself slide down the wall. You let your head fall in your hands and buried your shaking fingers in your hair.

“Yes, I’m scared of you! You hit me!” you screamed out, voice breaking halfway through out of frustration, anger and love. That one was hard to admit, but you knew you were mad because you loved her. Because you had spent months making a flower garden with all of your memories, and all that you knew of her, and all of your feelings, and she had just set it on fire.

“Look y/n I’m sorry, I don’t know what to do.” She said. Her voice was soft and you tried to listen for any sign of a lie. You couldn’t find any. You whipped your head up, glaring at her with such passion that even you were scared of what you were capable of. “You should’ve thought about that before you put you whole palm on my face, don’t you think?” you snarled. You saw her chin tremble, but you couldn’t bring yourself to care. “You know, you always tell your patients not to be afraid, but i don’t think there’s anyone that’s more scared than you. I know you are, don’t even pretend you aren’t. I know you.” You paused for a second, took a shaky breath in, cursed at yourself internally. “You might not know it, but I do. 4 months don’t just go by, Mildred. Neither for you nor for me.”

You saw a tear slip out of her eye. “I’m so sorry y/n. I do know. I do care. I’m sorry.” She breathed, and you could practically hear your heart break. “I don’t know what to do, but I do care. I can’t-“ her sentence got broken up by a big intake of breath, before a loud sob escaped her mouth. “I was so scared.” She cried. Your eyebrow pushed up. You should've known she was afraid, should've known she never agreed to do the therapy, should’ve known you burnt your own flowers the minute you started talking. But you were confused, and you felt hurt and you reacted on that.

You didn't even think about her feelings, if you were going to be honest with yourself. You wanted to feel guilty, but deep down you knew you couldn’t blame yourself. She hurt you, she hit you and that wasn’t going to be forgotten in a heartbeat.

But you loved her. More than anything. And so you tried to pick up all of the broken pieces, yours and hers, and tried to glue all of it into one big love ball.

“I’m not gonna say that its okay, Mildred, because it’s not and you know that.” You started. You saw her eyes scarily looking up into yours. You took a deep breath in before continuing. “But this doesn’t mean I don’t love you anymore.” Her eyes watered again. “It doesn’t?” You shook your head. “No it doesn’t, but you try doing that again and I won’t give you another chance.” Mildred shook her head violently. “Alright, come on, we’ll go home.”

That night before you guys went to bed, you approached her.

“Mildred,” you said as she was going to the bathroom. She turned around, her beautiful curls falling just right over her shoulders. “Yeah?” she said. You smiled. “I love you.” She hid a small blush while turning back around. “I love you too darling.” She replied. You smiled to yourself. Though this was too big of an issue to just blow over, you knew you and Mildred would work through it. Because you loved her, even if it was tragedy sometimes.

[meimi-haneoka]

Akiho Shinomoto - a manifesto of love

Despite becoming one of my favorite characters in the whole Cardcaptor Sakura franchise (and I would’ve never expected to love a new character this much), I realized I’ve never spent a long post for her, like the ones I did for SyaoSaku or for Tomoyo and Syaoran long time ago.

And there’s a lot to say, because Akiho Shinomoto is actually the first character who has introduced the concepts of evil and child abuse in Cardcaptor Sakura.

Something that wasn’t even remotely conceivable until (almost) 5 years ago.

Often considered boring and weak from the CCS fandom, Akiho actually harbors an immense strength inside of her, which goes mostly unnoticed to everyone, in-story friends included. Let’s see why.

Sentenced to death, for lack of magical powers

Once upon a time, a baby girl was born in a clan of powerful magicians, the most ancient of Europe. Clan members seemed happy and curious about the new entry to the family. They had great expectations about what magic she would develop, as everyone else in that family. At the ripe old age of 1 year and a half / 2 years, the baby girl was expected to show some signs of magic, but she had none. But hey, maybe she would become powerful later, let's pat her head and wait patiently. At that time, the Clan still showed some kind of "attention" for her.

But by the time the girl was around 6/7 years old, no fragment of magic appeared in her. Unacceptable. She's the daughter of two top rank magicians, in a clan of magic prodigies. Yet, she showed none of those gifts. They kept comparing her with some boy, living in a far away country, part of another famous magical clan. The girl suddenly held no more interest for her Clan. They actually started seeing her as a stain on their Clan's pride. Suddenly, the focus was all on how they could surpass the other rival clan. The girl was left all alone. A magicless member of the family is a member who doesn't even deserve being talked to. An interrogatory, at most. Who cares if the little girl wants to socialize, if she wants to play, if she's the only young person in that Clan, already without her parents who died so early on? The only thing this girl was good at was reading books, so all that's she's allowed to do. Not even playing with stuffed animals. For some reason, she's allowed to keep only ONE plushie, which is basically everything to her. But books and dolls can't fill that sinkhole she's already feeling at such young age.

Obsessed with this "anomaly", when she was about 2 years old, the Clan had the baby girl examined by a member of a Magic Association in England, known to be the den of shady magicians. A 8/9 year old bored magic genius, named “Yuna D.”, was her examiner. The boy said "She's like a blank book". The girl grew up, and the situation was still the same. The disapproving stares of her relatives cut the little girl’s heart like a sharp knife. They called her “worthless”, “useless”. They even doubted she could really be the daughter of her powerful parents. So what should they have done? Let the little girl live her life like any other regular human being, or taking literally the words of a BORED, EMOTIONALLY UNDEVELOPED CHILD who literally spat out the first thing that came to his mind?

Although the choice should’ve come easily for any normal human being with a functioning brain, they actually went in the other direction, greedy for power. And so, they decided to treat the girl like a tool, using her to store all kinds of magic for them to use. If she couldn’t be of any help to her clan with her capabilities, they would give her a purpose.

On some kind of altar, halfway between a lab rat and the sacrificing ritual of a sect, the most ancient Magicians of Europe together with the Magic Association performed a dangerous magic on her, which afterwards would take its toll even on the casters: they turned her into a magical artifact, capable of engraving in herself all the magical books she would encounter, transforming her de facto into a book herself. As if this wasn’t horrifying enough, this spell will progressively try to crush her soul and conscience, until it gets destroyed completely. So when the artifact will reach its limit, it will be the death of her, as a human being. Only a shell of her will remain. And judging by what was said later on in the story, they actually hope for her to lose her consciousness completely, so they can make use of her more easily.

Afterwards, they burned the book they took the ritual from, so the procedure would remain in their knowledge only. Greedy till the very last drop.

Once their perfect magical tool was achieved, turning a little girl into some sort of artifact, both the Clan and their accomplices couldn't stop bragging about it. The only positive words Akiho has ever received in her life by her people were after she was turned into a tool.

With a newly found purpose for that stain on their clan’s pride, they sent her away into the world to collect all the magic books she could find and write their powers into her, even though she was still just a child. For reasons still unknown, Yuna D., the boy who involuntarily caused this horrible ritual to happen and basically condemned her to death, offers himself to accompany her. The very first decision he took in his own life. That decision will change forever the course of their life, for both of them.

Rising from the ashes, towards a future of hope

Rehashing Akiho’s past is important to understand her personality and behavior fully. CLAMP, in the Clear Card manga, have portrayed the story of her past in a very peculiar way: it starts as any other fairytale, with light tones and cute designs. But as the story progresses, and the horror ensues, the tone of the tale changes, and so the drawing style too. It becomes serious, and “realistic” (ad opposed to the initial cutesy style). What started as a possible generic fairytale, turned into a real nightmare.

On top of being deprived of the love of her parents ever since she was born, because apparently they died right after, Akiho spent her early childhood in complete solitude. Those magicians who were supposed to be her remaining family were too absorbed into their own greed for power, to consider the needs of a baby girl. Not to mention that they had some kind of disgust for her, for being magicless. She was denied attention, cuddles, conversations, play activities, toys. She was denied love and care. All basic things that contribute to shape the personality and psychology of a person. Akiho grew up with the conviction that she wasn’t worth any of that, because no one gave it to her. One of the complaints I have seen the most about her in the fandom, is how she’s always so apologetic, to the point of becoming obnoxious. If you think about it, one of the most prominent characteristics of her personality is how she continuously apologizes to people, thanks them for any smallest thing, and is always, constantly seeking validation. 

But if you stop for a second to think about her past, you’ll realize with dismay that those are none other than symptoms of the abuse she suffered in the past. She was called “good for nothing” and “useless” by her clan and the Magic Association, and those words carved themselves into her heart, forever scarring it. Akiho grew up believing that she was really worthless and good for nothing just because she couldn’t meet the expectations of her clan, and it’s apparent when we see her considering herself “extremely clumsy”, even though we have afterwards seen that she’s perfectly capable of cooking, sewing, even playing sports. She only needs the dedication of someone who would teach her that.

With a disastrous psychological situation like this, one would naturally wonder how this girl didn’t commit anything extreme yet. Completely alone in the world, deemed useless. Unloved.

Books, books were her first lifeline. The fictional, magical, wonderful worlds depicted in those stories saved her sanity, making her dream about a better life, about friendship, about love. They taught her everything. They gave her the hope that those things existed out there, and maybe one day she would be blessed with them too. The fantastical characters kept her company when no one was there for her (yet). And she loves them viscerally for that, to the point of seeing herself mending damaged books in the future, as a possible occupation. Just like they mended her lacerated heart.

The second lifeline was her meeting with Kaito. Uncharacteristically to him, Kaito showed immediately a kind and interested behavior towards her. This was so shocking, so incredible that Akiho’s first reaction to his introduction was to run away. No one ever addressed her with the intention of having a conversation. No one was ever interested in what she was reading. Even just by this you can get a glimpse of how miserable her life had been till then. Full of psychological issues himself, thanks to the human connection Kaito gradually turned his attentions towards Akiho from contrieved mannerism, to genuine and sincere gestures. Akiho can feel that affection, even if her self-criticism always pushes her to believe that she’s nothing more than “job” to him. It’s something small, but what she’s experiencing with Kaito is her everything, and more than she’s ever had.

The third lifeline is Momo: Akiho doesn’t know, nor remotely imagines she’s actually a living magical creature. But she has been her constant presence ever since she was born. Her connection to her is special, and you can see it in their daily (one-sided, for now) interactions. Akiho talks to Momo, she greets her when she comes back home, she constantly carries her around, she thinks about giving her a little dress as a present. Momo is Akiho’s strength. The love this girl pours into what she believes is just a stuffed animal is incredible. It goes to show Akiho’s immense capacity to love something/someone without expecting anything in return, but actually just enjoying the simple presence and courage they give to her. If you think about it, it’s the very opposite of what she experienced with the only human interactions she’s ever had before Kaito came into the picture. Her aptitude to selfless love is also remarked between the lines in chapter 49, when Akiho is telling Sakura about her relationship with Kaito. Despite all the ugliness she went through, she’s still able to find in herself the strength to overcome all of it, and change her life for the better.

This certainly hasn’t been an easy or quick process, because in the flashbacks of her journey with Kaito we always see her with a pensive/serious look. It must have been extremely hard to start trusting others, when she had no one she could count on in her own home.

Akiho’s capacity to love and rise from the ashes of her terrible past has been so contagious, that it has started to affect Kaito too.  As Momo said in chapter 51, once you’re given the reason to change, no person can ever stay the same. This must have been true for Kaito, but certainly for Akiho too.

I’m absolutely positive that Akiho (and possibly, Kaito too) will be the symbol for one of the most important, beautiful messages in the whole Clear Card Arc: even if your life isn’t perfect, even if your past scarred you in multiple ways, there’s always hope. Hope to turn over a new leaf and change yourself for the better too, in the process. Overcome everything that had you stuck in pain and grief. Achieve what you always wished for.

[sisterspooky1013]

Only One Choice, Chapter 16

Read it here on AO3 / Tagging @today-in-fic

She stands on the rain-soaked sidewalk, staring up at the silhouette of the steeple against the grey sky. Church has always been a place to come home to, and yet she’s dreading walking through these doors.

Ethan slips his hand into hers, all long fingers and soft palm, and she looks at him.

“Ready?” he asks softly, and she nods once.

They push through the imposing wooden doors and enter the anteroom, turning to the right to find Father O’Dowell’s office. Ethan raps thrice on the door frame and a gruff voice commands them to enter.

“Dana, Ethan, please sit down,” he directs as they enter the room, and they take the seats across from his desk. “You’re ready to begin your Pre-Cana, then?” he asks over his bifocals, and they nod in unison.

Ethan reaches across the armrest to take the hand in her lap and she holds it limply, her stomach twisting as though it’s attempting to turn itself inside out. She probably should have eaten breakfast.

“As you both know,” Father O’Dowell begins, “marriage between two baptized Catholics such as yourselves is a sacrament. Much as Jesus turned water into wine in Cana, your marriage will be a miracle, becoming something greater and more powerful than you are alone. Your marriage will be a symbol which reveals the Lord Jesus and through which his divine life and love are communicated.”

He pauses to consider them, and she works hard to keep her expression neutral, if not leaning ever so slightly towards pleased. She can’t let the panic in her belly find its way to her face in front of this priest.

“Have you discussed your sacramental marriage commitment to each other, under all circumstances? You are each entering into this union with the intention to die married to one another, forsaking all others?” he says, giving her a pointed look.

Is she imagining it, or is he directing all of this towards her and not Ethan? She swallows and then nods softly.

“Alright,” he continues, opening a folder and sifting through several sheets of paper, “let’s talk, then, about how to prepare for a successful marriage, so that you might spend eternity as man and wife.”

Eternity.

———

“You okay?,” Ethan asks, sitting down beside her on the couch and resting his hand on the back of her neck with a brief squeeze.

She nods. “That was just...a lot,” she replies with tired eyes.

Two hours spent talking to Father O’Dowell about how they’d raise their children, how they’d keep Christ present in their marriage daily, what holiday traditions they wanted to create for their family, how they will approach conflict resolution. As a private person, these conversations feel invasive and embarrassing, but even more than that she is shell shocked by how many times he used the word eternity. Of course she knows that what she is signing on for is the rest of her life with Ethan, but the hammering home of the eternity bit along with the fact that divorce is out of the question was a bit jarring.

“You want me to stay?” Ethan asks with a concerned look. “I can cancel, it’s no big deal.”

“No,” she replies with a wave of her hand, “you should go, I think I’d actually benefit from some time alone.”

“Right, before we spend ETERNITY together,” he replies with a smirk, and she knows it’s supposed to make her laugh, but it only makes her want to run. “Okay. I’m gonna get going then, and I’ll see you tomorrow evening. I think maybe around 7, but it’ll depend on traffic. You don’t need to wait for me for dinner or anything.”

She sighs deeply. “Okay, have fun. Be safe.” She forces a weak smile.

He kisses her twice, whispers I love you into her ear, and leaves with a suitcase in hand for his college buddy’s bachelor party in Philly.

She flops to the side so that she’s laying on the couch, and spends a long while staring blankly at the ceiling.

Eternity.

That’s a very long time. The unequivocal unacceptability of divorce makes it feel longer. Realistically, of course catholic people get divorced, it happens. But how could she put her mother through that? And why is she moving forward with marrying a man if she’s considering the possibility of divorce before they’re even married?

Sitting up, she runs her hands over the skirt of her baby blue dress, the church-appropriate outfit she wore even on a day that is unseasonably cool and dreary. Always dressing for the occasion, doing what is expected of her. Always making the right choice.

She stands, grabbing her purse and keys, and leaves the apartment. She needs to be somewhere else, anywhere else. She needs to escape for a bit.

She’s been driving aimlessly for some time with the radio off when she finds herself parked in front of 2630 Hegal Place. She exits the car and walks around the block, letting the gentle rain soak her shoulders and seep into her heels. Three times. Four times. On the fifth trip, she approaches the front doors of the building.

She pauses with her hand on the door handle, too afraid to ask herself what she’s doing here. She just wants to stop thinking for a little bit. About Ethan, about marriage, about eternity. She just wants to exist for a little bit as Dana, just herself, without any of that baggage. She pulls the door open.

Mulder greets her with a dazed expression, wearing grey sweatpants and no shirt. He stares at her for a long moment, taking in the beads of water trailing off the ends of her soaked hair and her chattering jaw. He looks a little afraid, like a grenade with the pin pulled just appeared on his doorstep. All she has to do is let go and the explosion is inevitable, along with the destruction.

She opens her mouth to speak, but she can’t find words. She searches his face, looking for some reason to stay or to leave. Looking for an answer. His eyes darken a little and at that moment she lets go. She feels the tick tick tick of the timer; it’s already too late to stop. She moves one step beyond his threshold and drops her purse on the floor unceremoniously before threading her wet arms around the back of his neck, their mouths coming together like sea and shore. His lips are warm and pliant, hints of coffee and salt slick on his tongue as he slides it against her teeth. She sighs deeply, a silent moan, a giving over of control and higher reasoning, melting into the sturdy man before her as rays of sun into an oak tree.

She feels his hands warming her back, sliding down to her hips. Hips before hands, she thinks, and her pelvis bucks towards him. His hands slide down over her ass until they find the backs of her thighs, hoisting her up and onto him, carrying her like a wounded soldier into his bedroom. Her weight is dead against him, seeking only to be taken, to be had. She has nothing for him but she wants to give. Oh but she wants to give.

He sets her there on the bed, damp as a dish towel and quivering with the cold and the adrenaline. His hot lips transfer his heat to her neck, chest, face, arms. He breathes his life onto her skin, igniting her square by square until she feels like a checkerboard of warmth and chill. She’s pushed her legs wide open, welcomed the solid weight of his body to rest against her heat, and he is sending her dress higher up her thighs with eager but gentle hands.

They have not spoken a word.

As he kisses her, his fingers play tentatively at the hem of her panties, seeking permission or watching for objection. Finding none, he allows one index finger to slip behind the gusset that covers her soaked vulva, the flat of his fingernail brushing along her lips and sending shockwaves down her legs. He lets out a long, staggered breath and repeats the movement quickly a few times, groaning as her breath catches and she bucks into him. She has never wanted anyone more in her entire life. Has never needed anyone as much as she needs him now.

And then his head is between her legs, and he’s pulling her panties to the side as the rigid tip of his tongue flicks at her experimentally. She gasps audibly, a half-cry escaping her throat that catches as his finger delves inside of her, stealing the breath from her lungs. Her head lolls back, mouth agape and rapidly drying out as she struggles for air. His lips are sucking and nipping, his tongue prodding and stroking, while his fingers flutter against a place that she is only just now realizing exists. She feels a warm tingle in her toes, a flood of dopamine coursing through her, rendering her incapable of rational thought. She is high on sex and pleasure and Mulder and if this were a drug she could buy, she would go broke tomorrow.

Gathering, building, peaking, she is a swell on still waters, giving nothing away of the chaos that rages below. When she starts coming, she cries out “oh,” which is the first word either of them has said. Oh, and she’s exploding around him, and across his tongue. Oh, and he’s flexing his finger inside her, drawing it out. Oh, and as the tidal wave of release begins to recede, the awareness of what has just happened settles over her. Oh, oh, oh.

Oh, what has she done?

Oh, god.

Oh, no.

She recoils from him, pushing up into a sitting position on the bed as her hand comes to her mouth in horror.

“Scully?” he asks, reaching for her, and she pushes his hand off her knee.

She’s shaking her head, her eyes wild and unbelieving. She has to go. She has to get out. She slides off the bed and makes her way wordlessly to the foyer.

“Scully, what’s going on, are you okay?” He follows her, his fading erection still nudging the front of his sweatpants, his lips glistening with her wetness. She can’t look at him.

Her wet shoes are returned to her feet, her purse hanging haphazardly from her elbow. Mulder is looking at her with fear and confusion. She thinks he might try to stop her from leaving.

Swallowing hard to bring moisture to her throat, she forces out a strangled “I’m so sorry,” and then she goes, she runs. Down the stairwell because she can’t bear to wait for the elevator, out into the now pouring rain and behind the wheel of her car. She drives fast and recklessly, nothing left worth trying to protect.

Oh, what has she done?

[drowningbydegrees]

This is distinctly less fluffy than most of what I’ve been writing lately, but... it ends well? For the Music Prompt List:

16. Mosso (Italian: moved, agitated) more, with motion or animation~fighting, leaving

Read on AO3

He has a plan.

Okay, admittedly calling it a plan is somewhat of an exaggeration. What Geralt has is an overwhelming sense of grief that floods the empty spaces left behind as his temper ebbs, and the horrifying realization that while it all hurts, it’s Jaskier’s departure that leaves his heart aching. What he has is an urgent need to set things right, and only a nebulous idea of how to do so. For starters though, he needs to catch up to Jaskier. That’s a straightforward task to set his mind to, and Geralt assumes he’ll figure out the rest on the road.

It should be a reasonable assumption to make. It’s a long path down the mountain, and even though he’s moving briskly, trying to catch Jaskier before the bard reaches the bottom, there’s plenty of time to think.

Plenty of time is not enough, apparently, because he finds Jaskier just after dark, sitting miserably in front of a campfire, and… nothing. He stares at the evidence of what a mess he’s made without a single useful thought in his head.

The bard had been idly strumming some song Geralt thinks he’s heard bits and pieces of, but it cuts off in a discordant twang as Jaskier sees him. There’s a distinctly bitter edge to Jaskier’s greeting. “Geralt. Kind of hard for life to bless you with my absence if you’re going to insist on following me.”

“There’s only one way down the mountain,” Geralt points out, even though that has nothing to do with why he stopped. It’s a mistake judging from the stormy expression that settles upon Jaskier’s features.

“Well, no need to stop on my account.” Jaskier doesn’t look at him, but Geralt can hear the slight waver in the bard’s voice. He could go. Jaskier seems to want that, and maybe he even should. But Geralt finds himself quite certain that if he leaves there will be no repairing this, and he has to try.

He doesn’t ask, certain what the answer will be, but Geralt strays from the road, leaving no more room for ambiguity. The words might have come out wrong, but he’s here because he wants to make amends, not because he saw Jaskier in passing. The bard values words in a way Geralt rarely has much use for, but he tries. “What I said… wasn’t fair.”

“No. It wasn’t.” Jaskier scowls at the fire as if it has personally offended him. “But good to know what you really think. You might’ve just told me that, oh, a couple of decades ago and saved us both from this.”

“That’s not-” Geralt doesn’t know how to finish and Jaskier never gives him the chance to decide.

“Not what, Geralt? Because so help me, if you tell me that’s not what you meant I might scream.” Jaskier gets to his feet, seeming to decide being loomed over is an unacceptable state of being.

“I don’t think that. I meant it at the time, a bit, but not… It wasn’t true,” Geralt settles on. “I just wanted to be alone.”

“Right. So, what then? You know what things flay me right down to my bones because I’ve trusted you with my everything. But you fashioned them into a weapon just because my existence was inconvenient to your… your brooding.” Anger is a feeling Geralt recognizes, one he knows how to rise up to meet. But this isn’t anger. There’s agony under all Jaskier’s fury, and Geralt would be hard pressed to think of a time he’s hated himself more than he does in the moment where Jaskier’s voice cracks. “You don’t get to just change your mind and pretend we’re good as new.”

Geralt bows his head “I know that.”

Jaskier holds his lute like a wall between them. “And yet, here you are.”

It’s rare that they’ve ever really argued beyond annoyed squabbling, but Jaskier is no shrinking violet. Geralt doesn’t know what to do in the face of it that won’t make things worse, so he holds his hands up in something like surrender. “Jaskier. Give me a chance to explain. Please.”

By some miracle, Jaskier doesn’t say no. The bard glowers at him, his eyes seeming icy in the moonlight. It’s an unsettling contrast to the fire’s glow across the rest of him. “That might be the first time you’ve said that in twenty years.”

Much as he hates to admit it, that’s probably not far off the mark, and Geralt privately resolves to be better if Jaskier deigns to give him the chance. But later is not right now, and Jaskier looks about two heartbeats away from turning Geralt back out into the dark.

“Jaskier, I…” Geralt sucks in a breath and tries again. “It wasn’t about you.”

“I know.” It’s awful, the way Jaskier smiles. The brittle, mirthless thing pulls at the corners of his mouth, never reaching his eyes. “I know and that’s so much worse. Don’t you realize?”

Geralt doesn’t say anything, but his expression must give away his confusion, because Jaskier sighs at him and keeps talking. “If you'd run me off on my own merits, I'd deserve that. Well, not deserve it necessarily, because that was entirely uncalled for, but it would be... something.”

There’s some kind of disconnect, and Geralt is relatively sure Jaskier isn’t talking about his choice of words, but he’s equally sure he has no idea what Jaskier actually means. “You want me to have been upset with you?”

“No! I just wanted to matter!” Jaskier shouts at Geralt, but almost immediately deflates, huffing out a miserable, strained laugh. “I just wanted to be something more to you than the collateral damage in someone else's storm.”

Emotion would have Geralt shouting right back, but he quells the urge. He owes Jaskier that much. Only when Jaskier is finished, drawing in ragged breaths does Geralt allow himself to speak. “But you do. You are.”

Jaskier makes a wounded sort of sound and crumples a little where he stands, all the fight gone out of him with his last outburst. The way he lets his head fall forward, Geralt can’t see Jaskier’s expression, but the bard’s words are laced with anguish. “You can’t just say that. You don’t get to do that to me now.”

It comes together, a single rock dislodged only to bring a landslide. Decades, Jaskier has spent at his side, and it’s only now that the why of it all settles in. He’s been so blind and with no way to take it back, there is only forward.

Words aren’t enough. That much is clear, even if it leaves Geralt at a loss. The coast? They should have just gone, but he’d been a fool and it’s entirely out of reach now. Start smaller, he tells himself, and cautiously takes a step closer. Hushed, like Jaskier is a wild thing he’s trying not to spook, Geralt pulls together what he thinks he probably should’ve said from the beginning. “What I said before wasn’t about you, but this is.”

“What?” Jaskier’s head jerks up, but the bard looks like he’s bracing himself for a blow.

“I came here for you. Not a side effect of something or someone else. Just you.” Geralt lifts a hand to reach out, but never actually closes the distance. Jaskier is nothing if not tactile and Geralt had thought… but he has no right. Not when he’s driven such a wedge between them. Curling his fingers against his palm, the witcher forces himself to finish the thought. “I never meant to make you feel incidental.”

Jaskier looks at Geralt with something he can’t quite place, and he doesn’t dare ask for fear of shattering their fragile armistice. The seconds spread out into what feels like eternity, horrible in their silence. Geralt scarcely breathes.

”I really hate you sometimes.” Jaskier sighs like the whole world is resting on his shoulders, but he sets his lute aside in favor of dragging Geralt into a haphazard embrace. “For fuck’s sake.”

It’s really more like Jaskier drags himself to Geralt, who is pretty certain he hasn’t moved at all. Some part of him had been so certain Jaskier was going to turn him away that it takes a moment to parse what it means that the bard’s arms are wrapped around him instead. Little by little, Geralt returns the gesture, gingerly resting one hand between Jaskier’s shoulder blades and the other against the back of the bard’s head. Jaskier tucks his nose against the side of the witcher’s neck, and it’s not an intimacy he’s eared, but Geralt quietly accepts it.

“I’m sorry,” Geralt murmurs against Jaskier’s temple, and truly, he is. He closes his eyes against the night that crowds in around them. “Forgive me.”

“Idiot. Did that before I even left,” Jaskier replies, the words muffled against Geralt’s throat. “Forgiveness was never the problem.”

That only makes the whole thing ache more, that Jaskier was ready to forgive before Geralt even thought to regret what he’d done. It leaves him more than a little unmoored, unable to fathom how Jaskier can so easily let go after Geralt wounded him with his own insecurities. But perhaps that could mend in time. “Then let me prove it.”

“That you’re sorry?” Jaskier lifts his head enough to rest his chin on Geralt’s shoulder. “I don’t doubt that.”

“That you matter to me.” It’s not the confession Jaskier deserves, but it’s the only one Geralt dares give voice to. He fears even that is a step too far when Jaskier’s breath catches. Unable to see his face, Geralt can’t quite tell if that’s a pleased sound or an aggrieved one.

Jaskier doesn’t pull entirely out of Geralt’s arms, but enough to give the witcher a watery smile. “Well, I guess if you must.”

They’re not quite alright. But as Geralt lets himself be herded to sit down beside the dwindling fire, he allows himself to entertain the notion that they will be.

You can find the rest of my Witcher fanworks here. <3