Yuu Needs a Hug 1
SUMMARY: What their comforting hugs are like when you're feeling sad or under the weather? And how would they behave if you started crying in their arms?
CHARACTERS: Heartslabyul (Riddle, Ace; Deuce; Cater; Trey); Savanaclaw (Leona; Jack; Ruggie) & Octavinelle (Azul; Jade; Floyd)
TAGS: Fluff; GN Reader; Comfort; Bullet Points; In a Relationship
WORD COUNT: An average of 280 words per character.
COMMENTS: When I feel a little sad and under the weather, I often imagine these things to help me fall asleep. I thought you might like them too. 😘
Yuu Needs a Hug 2 (Scarabia / Pomefiore / Ignihyde / Diasomnia)
CONTEXT: They are already in a relationship with you.
All of Riddle’s hugs happen in private, and comfort hugs are far from the exception.
If he is in his dorm uniform, a very characteristic hug from him is using the cape to cover you like a blanket and as a sign of protection. With his left arm around you.
His most common hugs are the ones where he hugs you with one arm while continuing his duties with the other, like homework, or some dorm-related paperwork. And with the hand that hugs you, absently caressing your back or head.
If you are really feeling very under the blue, he will occasionally kiss your forehead.
He's not the type to hug you tight. His arms will generally be very relaxed and loose around you, as if resting. For someone who is always so uptight and strict, that means a lot.
If you happen to be so depressed to the point of crying, then yes, all his attention goes to you immediately and his hug tightens. One arm around your waist and the other on your head, encouraging you to cry all you need on his shoulder.
He will be extremely understanding and act calmly as he knows, and shows you, that it is a normal thing and that he knows it will pass, that you will be fine because he will always be there for you. He himself knows from experience how crying can do a person good, and you were always there for him at those times.
And when you feel better, he will wipe your tears with his handkerchief (I'm sure he carries one somewhere in his clothes) and kiss your forehead with a sweet and reassuring smile.
Ace will gladly give you all the hugs you want. But he will always tease you saying that he wants something in return for every hug. But if you're really sad, he'll say he was joking.
If you really want hugs to make you feel better you'll have to ask in private, because in public he only gives you those more relaxed and playful hugs.
He can give you hugs standing up, but the ones he likes most are the ones when you're both lying on the couch. He likes to have you on top of him with your head against his chest and both of his arms around you, or to lie on his side between you and the back of the couch with one hand supporting his head and the other arm on top of you.
His main strategy to make you feel better is to talk about things that distract you. Generally silly things to tease you or make you laugh.
If you happen to be so depressed to the point of crying, he will panic a little and try to find out if it was something he said. After that, he will stop the jokes and hug you tighter and kiss your forehead.
He will be quieter than usual until your crying stops and only then will he return to his normal self.
Deuce will be slightly awkward at first. This is most likely the first time someone has asked him for a hug as a form of comfort. And since he doesn't have much experience with hugs either, he's afraid of messing it up.
He will start by hugging you standing up. You will feel his arms feel more comfortable around you as you explain to him that there is no way he could do that wrong. There is no therapeutic technique, he just needs to act as he feels he should.
If you are on the couch you will be sitting side by side. Your head on his shoulder, one of his arms around you, and the other he always not knowing what to do with it.
It will take a long time for him to have confidence in his comforting hugs because he knows that he is not the type of person who knows how to comfort others, much less physically. But he will always try his best for you.
If you happen to be so depressed to the point of crying, he will panic a little and, if he only had one arm around you, he'll quickly put the other one around you too. And he will hug you like you are in danger.
Maybe you will calm down by trying to calm him down and you'll both end up laughing about it.
Cater is the #best hugger! And as he is a person who likes to show affection, it doesn't matter if you two are alone or in public, he will give you all the hugs you need regardless.
Get ready for him to talk in that cute little voice like someone talking to a child. Not that he sees you as one, but he likes to talk and act cute.
And that's why his comfort hugs are also very cute, like someone hugging a teddy bear. He also gives you lots of kisses on your forehead and cheeks while hugging you.
Although he speaks in a cute way, he doesn't do it in a way that seems like he's minimizing your feelings, but rather in a way that tries to show that everything will be okay, that whatever it is will pass.
He can do this whether the two of you are standing together or if you are sitting on a couch. But in this last option, he will be so close to you that the most comfortable way for you to sit together is with you on his lap.
If you happen to be so depressed to the point of crying, he won't change the way he's acting, as if knowing he was doing everything right and you crying was a good sign and an important part of you feeling better in the end.
When your crying calms down or stops, he will smile at you, wipe the tears from your cheeks with his thumbs and say phrases like "Are you feeling better?" and "Everything will be okay."
In the case of hugging you to make you feel better, Trey has no problem doing it in public if you need to. And he also reacts to your request as naturally as he would if you asked him to make you a sweet dessert.
You might even be surprised by how naturally he hugs you and the way he rubs his hands comfortingly on your back, if you didn't remember that he has younger siblings and probably has some experience comforting them.
He smiles and laughs softly the whole time, as if he finds your attitude cute.
He can do this standing up or, if you are sitting on a couch, sitting next to you. But only if you are alone will he let you sit on his lap.
The relaxed way he comforts you is almost parental, it must be that older brother side of him.
If you happen to be so depressed to the point of crying, he may become a little more serious, but he will always act calmly and comes across as having everything under control. One of his hands will also come from your back to the back of your head.
Once your crying calms down or even stops, he will wipe your tears either with a handkerchief he has or with his own blazer or shirt. He will smile at you, showing that everything is fine and ask if you would like one of his sweets to make you feel better.
Leona cares so much about being seen hugging you publicly that the botanical garden became your spot to take naps together as unbothered as a lion in the middle of savannah. He always wants you to be his pillow, whether it's your thighs or your chest. BUT showing genuine affection is only in private.
He had already noticed that you were sadder than usual, but you were the one who had to ask him for a hug, he was too proud to offer you one non-ironically.
He will open his arms and smile smugly, but he won't be the one to initiate the hug. If you want it, you have to take it.
But as soon as you do, he'll wrap you in a surprisingly affectionate hug. If you're lying down like when he takes a nap with you, his hands will encourage you to come closer and lay your head on his chest. You've just discovered the only way you can reverse your usual roles.
If you happen to be so depressed to the point of crying, he will remain calm and surprise you again. He'll start giving you soft kisses on your face and forehead, the equivalent of when felines lick each other's ears as a show of affection.
His tranquility can be contagious, especially because the calm beat of his heart is a reassuring sound.
Only when he is sure that your crying has stopped and you are better will he speak again: *sigh* “You just give me work, herbivore. I just hope you at least thank me in some way.”
Jack only hugs you in private! And if he ever does it in public, it's because he somehow forgot that you were in public and will quickly break the hug.
He is the complete opposite in private, after all he can be like a puppy: extremely affectionate if he feels comfortable with you. So it was always very common for you to cuddle on the couch.
His comforting hug ends up not being much different from usual, perhaps just less enthusiastic and more delicate. He likes having you in his arms, but he likes having his face close to yours more.
If you're sitting, he won't have any problem letting you sit on his lap and lay your head on his shoulder. He won't take his arms from around you, nor stop kissing your forehead and cheeks softly and affectionately. All his attention is on you, and his main purpose at that moment is to dedicate himself to you.
If you happen to be so depressed to the point of crying, he will hug you tighter and the small and calm kisses will turn into love attacks on your face. Do you know when service dogs jump at their owner when they are having a panic attack, for example? It's something like that he's doing, without fully realizing it. Ok, maybe just not as intensely as service dogs do, but with a lot of affection.
This gesture will most likely make you laugh and start telling him you're okay so he can calm down. Which will make you calm yourself down as a result.
Ruggie doesn't really care if you're in public or not, he'll hug you regardless. And there's the bonus that when he hugs you in public, it's like marking territory and warning others.
He loves being cute and affectionate with you because he loves you being cute and affectionate with him back. He often does for you what he knows you would do for him. And a comforting hug is no different.
He will always tease with you a little at the beginning. "Aww, you want one of my special hugs? That’s so cute. But remember they are expensive, okay? You have to reward me later as a thanks.” He says this in a good mood that tries to put you at ease.
He will open his arms for you to hug him first and he will hold you in his embrace. He will be smiling playfully the whole time because he thinks it's funny how you can be so cute. And he will kiss your forehead with that same smile.
If you happen to be so depressed to the point of crying, his smile will fade. It was too serious for him to treat you with humor. He will tighten the hug and start saying sweet, soothing things in your ear like: "hey, don't worry. I'm sure everything will be fine."
When your crying calms down or even stops, he will smile at you again and say that it all made him hungry. What if you two went to eat something? Maybe, just maybe, he'll share some of his food with you if it's something you really like. But DO NOT get used to it!
ONLY when you are alone, in the VIP Room, Azul likes it when you sit on his lap while he does the Mostro Lounge’s paperwork. It's a healthy balance between the stress of business and the pleasure of having you in his arms.
The only two exceptions to the rule that he doesn't like others seeing you two like this are Jade and Floyd. Why? Because he likes to brag to them about having you all to himself. ("By all means, cry about it.")
He will hug you like he always does when you two are in the VIP Room. One arm around your waist, surprisingly firm, and the other on the papers. His attention is divided between reading and signing the contracts and turning to give you sweet kisses on your face and/or, if you allow it, on your neck.
If he feels you hugging him in a more clingy way than usual, he will comment in a soft voice: “You know, if I could be in my merman form, I'd let my tentacles do the paperwork and give you all the attention of my arms. The inconvenience of having two legs. No offense of course.” If this can get even a little giggle out of you, he'll be very happy.
If you happen to be so depressed to the point of crying, his right hand will immediately let go of the pen and join his left in hugging you. He hugs you so tight it's like you're trapped in his loving embrace. He is worried about you, but he does everything he can to not not show himself too worried.
“Just never forget that if there is anything I can do, you can ask. Anything. I will solve any problem for you... just for you...”
When your crying calms down or even stops, he will wipe your tears with a handkerchief and give you a pack of tissues. And when you're better, he'll give you one of his most tender kisses on your cheek.
Jade doesn't like to draw attention, he prefers to observe others than to be observed. That's why his hugs are private, especially those comfort ones that you are asking for.
“You know you can open up to me whenever you need to, but keep doing it only when we're alone, okay? You never know who might be watching you looking for a weakne- I mean, a sensitive moment to use against you, my love.”
He's not much of a hugger in general, so all of his hugs end up being special. And since you're alone, he has no problem having you sit on his lap if you want.
His arms and hands are premeditatedly affectionate and attentive to you, as if he knew exactly how you liked to be hugged at that specific moment and he fulfilled these requirements to the letter. If there's one thing he knows how to do in a frighteningly perfect way, it's how to study and please others. And you are his biggest study interest.
Whatever you wanted him to do, he will know and do it. The way you want him to hug you, whether you want kisses or not, and how you want them.
If you happen to be so depressed to the point of crying, you will feel him, in a way, disappointed. With you or with himself, you don't know. “What is the mater? Did I not predict your desires correctly? It seems like I still have a lot to learn about you. How exciting.” He will kiss your forehead and let you cry on his shoulder.
He'll probably compare your crying to Azul's, making fun of him in that passive-aggressive way he does, and end up making you laugh.
When your crying calms down or even stops, he'll help clean your face and suggest that you two go to the Mostro Lounge, where he can prepare your favorite dish to make you feel better if you want. For free? Hmm... he can think about it.
Floyd can be VERY clingy. He loves to hug you, especially in public. Whether he’s in a good mood or not. Which means that, as he hugs you a lot, he also has many different types of hugs.
The vast majority of her hugs are to satisfy him, but they end up satisfying you too. Don't worry, he never squeezed you. He jokes that he will do it, but never actually does.
No matter what mood he's in, he never refuses to give you a comforting hug. For 3 main reasons: 1st an Octavinelle student never refuses someone's request for help. 2nd He thinks you're so absolutely cute asking him for a hug! It even makes him smile if he's in a bad mood. And 3rd You always give him the hugs he needs, it's only fair (even in terms of a deal) that he does the same for you.
He'll hug you, but he'll do what he wants in the meantime. Playing with your hair, resting his head on yours, swinging his legs if you are sitting down. And if you are, he will make you sit on his lap, it’s easier and more comfortable to hug you like this. He will probably also say silly things to pass the time or try to make you laugh.
If you happen to be so depressed to the point of crying, he will immediately shut up and if he was swinging his legs he will immediately stop too. He will straighten up, even if your head is resting on his chest. “You'll wash my clothes if you get them dirty, right Koebi-chan~?” He says this while stroking your head.
Even though he likes to provoke others, he has a perfect sense of limits, he just tends to ignore them most of the time. But it's different with you and that situation too.
When your crying stops, he will make you look at him, as if to check that the crying has stopped. If he confirms it, he will smile at you: "Is it over yet? YAY~! Can we make something fun now?”
If you would like to read more from me, you can find it in my pinned post: INDEX
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Chapter 51 of human Bill Cipher is once more the Mystery Shack's prisoner: Dipper and Mabel try to figure out what the Axolotl's poem means; Dipper gets the hang of astral projection; and... whatever's going on up there happens.
####
Ford and Dipper came back into the shack through the gift shop; Ford didn't want to risk crossing paths with Bill. While Dipper went into the house, Ford went down—returning to the safety of his subterranean study.
Once Ford had put on the old black trench coat he'd worn during his multiversal travels and gotten comfortable at his desk, he pulled out Journal 5 to document the events of the last few days. In a cheap ballpoint pen, he wrote, I've lost my #1 Grunkle pen (and favorite coat) to the waters of Lake Gravity Falls. And then, deciding this didn't adequately express his feelings, he drew a small frown. That coat had served him well for decades, and he'd really liked that pen. It did write excellently, and it had reminded him of his gniece and gnephew.
He spent three pages documenting the eclipse—what happened, what readings he'd taken, what he and Dipper observed—and then another four pages talking about Bill. What he'd told them, why Ford had dismissed it; his claims about a trans-dimensional axolotl distorting gravity with its migration; the statue, the rescue, the breakdown.
The act of writing always helped Ford clarify his thoughts and untangle mysteries; it wasn't until he was writing that he realized the limbs Bill had said he couldn't feel were the ones that had broken off the statue.
He listed the rules of the chess variants he could remember Bill inventing. He drew Bill huddled in front of the board, grim, tear-streaked, exhausted; and then scratched out his face, embarrassed at the thought of immortalizing such a raw moment for his private viewing.
He wrote, There's still a slim possibility that the entire "eclipse," start to finish, was Bill's masterfully-orchestrated scheme to make us pity and trust him; but it's unlikely. Although Bill is fiendish enough, he isn't currently powerful enough, and his lies certainly aren't elaborate enough. If he could pull off such a byzantine ruse, then he could just as easily escape—and if he can escape, why hasn't he? Bill may be insane, but he's never been THAT irrational.
And so, even as twisted as Bill's idea of "friendship" is... for the very first time, I'm convinced that he was telling the truth all along when he said he wants me as his friend. It's not an act. He risked his life to save someone who's an active threat to him.
And at the end of it all—though I'm grateful to be alive in spite of my own stubbornness—do I like him any better for it?
Ford leaned back and shut his eyes, sifting through the inner tumult of anger and old hurt that defined most of his memories of Bill, looking to see if anything had changed.
There was a sore, tender spot in his emotions, a place beginning to rot with remorse; when he prodded at those emotions, he found that it was shame over his own harsh conduct of the last couple of days. But he was only ashamed of how cruelly he'd acted; he wasn't ashamed that Bill was the one he'd done it to.
Outside of that tender spot—regret over his own behavior—nothing else had changed.
No. I still hate him. I'm grateful to be alive, but I hate him. He hasn't undone anything he did to my family and me, and he never will. Forgiveness can't be purchased with favors.
I'm only relieved at the certainty of it. Bill has committed an act that can't possibly be a lie. I know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that he's shown me the truth; and the truth is he'd rather see me alive than dead. Whatever other lies he may tell, I can hold on to that fact.
Bill's miserable eyes peered out at Ford between the scribbles he'd drawn across his face. It was truly a pity that Ford had to hate him. Pity that Bill hadn't been somebody better. He could have been better.
Ford couldn't find it in himself to be embarrassed that he'd filled four pages talking about the monster he'd already wasted so many more on. Bill had been right about him: You might hate me to my face, but behind my back you're as obsessed with me as ever. The only thing Bill didn't understand was that hatred and obsession weren't mutually incompatible.
####
"Hey, Dipper," Mabel said, unfolding the living room sofa bed.
"Hey, Mabel," Dipper said, passing through living room on his way to the stairs. He climbed up to the attic.
He came back down from the attic. "Mabel. Why's Bill asleep in your bed."
"He really needed a nap," Mabel said.
"Okay but why on your bed?"
Mabel pouted. "Dipper, do you realize he's never slept on a real bed? Ever?"
Dipper tried to imagine sleeping on a couple couch cushions on the floor every night. "Yeah, okay, that does kinda suck." Even if it was Bill's own fault he wouldn't sleep in the living room.
By unspoken mutual agreement, having a Bill in the bedroom followed the same law as finding a centipede in the bathroom. The law was "that's the centipede's bathroom now." So once the folding bed was set up, they sat on it to serve as their hang-out spot for the evening and caught each other up on what they'd done the last couple of days.
After Dipper & Co. had left, Grenda had come over to take advantage of the low gravity to retrieve the kite that had been stuck in a tree near the Mystery Shack since last summer (it was, tragically, too tattered to salvage), and then they'd gone over to Candy's house to photograph each other performing feats of impossible strength. (Mabel would be sending some pictures to their parents to confuse them, and adding the rest to her summer scrapbook.) She'd spent the next day breaking the trampoline world record until Soos came outside and said gravity was probably too low for it to be safe to be up in the air anymore, if Bill's warnings about being off the ground when gravity hit zero were true; at which point Mabel had hung around inside air-swimming until she suddenly slammed against the ceiling, and then the ground. She was fine. She just had a couple of bruises. She showed Dipper her bruises.
In return, Dipper told Mabel about how their quest had gone: the checks for micro-rips, Bill's increasingly frantic warnings, the lake—
("You got to see a bajillion magical axolotls and I didn't?!")
—the cliff, the Axolotl, Dipper's near-death experience, and what he now knew about his out-of-body dreams.
"Seriously?" Mabel hissed, eyes bugging out. "And he had us looking up lucid dreaming books! What a jerk!"
"I know! He could have just ignored the whole thing, we didn't even think it was anything but dreams."
"And I'd thought he was being so helpful, too! Like he was really trying to make up for giving you 'nightmares'!" Mabel laughed in disbelief and flopped down on the flimsy mattress. "All that because he just didn't want us to know how it was really his fault? Biiill, ugh."
His fault. Dipper hesitated, wondering whether he should tell Mabel what Bill had said about Mabel's Fault; then decided against it. Bill had probably been telling the truth when he'd said he only wanted all the credit for Weirdmageddon.
But—Dipper did tell her about Bill saving their lives. He would have felt like a liar if he hadn't—like he was trying to trick his sister into thinking Bill was worse than he already was. He hoped Ford wouldn't mind; but how could he not tell Mabel?
"He could have just let you die and didn't?" Mabel turned that over in her head, processing this sudden shift in Bill's behavior. "Wow. I'm impressed."
He also told her about their previous encounter with the Axolotl. Considering the other lies Bill had told recently, anything he said about them meeting the Axolotl was dubious at best; but Dipper could remember the Axolotl, so maybe some of it was true, even if Bill had twisted as much as he could. ("The Axolotl said hi, by the way." "Aww. Tell him hi back!" "Yeah, I... don't know how to do that.")
Dipper laid out his journal between them on the folding bed, and Mabel read over the couplet a few times. "'Sixty degrees that come in threes, watches from within birch trees'..."
"It's got to be talking about Bill," Dipper said. "Equilateral triangles have three sixty-degree angles. I just don't know why the Axolotl wanted to talk to us about him."
Mabel frowned at the lines. "I think... I remember meeting him too," she said.
"You do?"
"Kinda. Like in a dream," she said. "We were in some kind of futury space race car. And he had a really comfortable beanbag chair."
"Yes! I remembered the beanbag chair, too!" And he hadn't mentioned it in his journal. "This is great! Talking about it must... must cause us to remember, somehow. Maybe since the universe where we met the Axolotl doesn't exist anymore, our memories of it are... detached or something? Psychically floating around between dimensions until we try to remember them?" He took in Mabel's skeptical frown and shrugged. "I don't know!"
She scrunched up her face. "Ugh. Last summer's first-grader time travel was complicated enough. This is like college-level time travel. Maybe we can ask Bill how it works?"
She said it so easily, like she thought it was actually a good idea. Right after she'd heard about the lucid dreaming thing, too. "I don't think he'd help." Dipper lowered his voice. "He really didn't want Grunkle Ford and me to find out about the Axolotl—and he kept telling me not to think about what the Axolotl told me. He's trying to cover something up."
"Oo-oo-ooh." Voice dropped to a whisper, Mabel said, "Do you think it's some kind of Space Axolotl conspiracy?"
"It could be," Dipper said. "All I know is he was trying to tell us something important about Bill. Some kind of prophecy, or... maybe a warning...?"
He trailed off. Mabel had stopped listening to Dipper. She was rereading the couplet Dipper had written, moving her lips like she was murmuring under her breath—but whatever she was saying, it was much longer than the couplet Dipper had written down. Distractedly, she said, "Do you have a pen?"
"Yeah, here." Dipper quickly handed over the pen he kept in his vest.
Mabel clicked it, went to the bottom of the page, and wrote: A different form, a different time.
Dipper sucked in a sharp breath as the words snapped into place in his mind. "That's it! That was the last line! What else do you remember?"
"That's it," Mabel said. "It was free form poetry with a bunch of rhyme pairs."
"I don't think free form poetry rhymes."
"Pbbbt." Mabel blew a raspberry and shoved Dipper's face. "Whatever! You know what I mean." She pointed at the last line. "Do you think the poem's about why Bill's here? He time traveled to the Mystery Shack in a new body..."
"Exactly! Bill must be back here for a reason. He's got all those powers—or, used to, anyway—and he knows more about the multiverse than anybody on Earth... Maybe there's some kind of big threat coming, and Bill's the only one who can stop it, and—and the Axolotl wanted us to know...?"
"I like the sound of that," Mabel said. "That'd basically make him a hero, right?"
Dipper grimaced. "I mean. I guess? But we're talking about Bill. If he does help us stop a threat, it'd be like if a serial killer picked up a hitchhiker and killed him, and then it turned out the hitchhiker was an even worse serial killer."
"That still sounds kinda heroic to me."
"Pfff, okay." He looked at his journal. "But... what is he here to do?"
Mabel considered what they'd already written. "Maybe we can use him to spy on our enemies through birch trees!"
"Thaaat's probably not it."
"No, I think I'm on to something. I can feel it."
There was a lot of empty space between his couplet and Mabel's line. "There's more we're missing, though. Maybe the rest of the poem describes the threat? Or what we need to get Bill to do?"
"I can't remember anything else, though."
"Me neither."
They stared at the page together, waiting for something to come to their blank minds. Mabel looked at the fish tank. "Hey, Primrose! Do you know anything?"
The pet axolotl in the tank ignored her serenely.
Dipper said, "'Primrose'?"
"Yeah, last summer Grunkle Stan said her name is Freakface, but I thought she deserved a cuter name. She's primrose color!"
"Ford says he originally named him Nikola."
Mabel gasped. "Nikki..."
Dipper twisted around to look at the axolotl. "Do you know anything? Do you... get messages from the Axolotl's heralds, or anything...?"
Nikola slowly opened his mouth, and slowly closed it.
Mabel said, "Hey. The Axolotl's one of those dimension-crossy time-travely guys, right? He probably wouldn't have given us a prophecy in the wrong timeline and then made us forget it unless he knew we'd remember it in time in the rightdimension!"
"I guess," Dipper said uncertainly.
"So we don't need to worry about it! We'll remember it when we need to."
"Unless this timeline's going to branch, and the only one where we survive is the one where we put all our effort into trying to remembering—"
"Shhh!" Mabel put a finger over Dipper's mouth. "Uh-uh. No college time travel. We'll be fine!"
Dipper pushed her over. "Okay, but we should at least try a little to remember what the Axolotl told us."
"What if we work on it separately?" Mabel propped herself up on an elbow. "Instead of just sitting around thinking about it. And whenever we remember a line, we can tell each other and see if it makes anything click."
"That might be faster," Dipper said, stroking his chin. "We're already remembering different lines."
"Yeah! And that lucid dreaming book said something about focusing on a problem before you sleep so you can figure it out in your dreams! We can just work on it in our sleep and we'll remember it all in no time!"
Dipper laughed. "What? No way, I think lucid dreaming is just one of those made up pop psychology things. I didn't get it to work at all." Either it didn't work or Bill had deliberately recommended a terrible book.
"I did! I can remember like... eighty percent more dreams. And I can tell when I'm dreaming a lot more often!"
"Huh." Or, maybe Dipper just wasn't doing it right. "Maybe I need to start over from step one. Do you know where the book we were using went?"
"Over here!" Mabel had set a couple library books on the end table next to the sofa bed; she pulled out the second one, which had a glittery pink bookmark with a cat on it stuck two-thirds of the way through. "Just don't lose my bookmark."
"Thanks." He'd reread the first step before bed. "We should probably be getting ready for bed anyway, huh?"
"Seriously?! It's barely bedtime!" And when the adults weren't watching, official bedtime was an hour and a half before Actual Bedtime.
"I'm exhausted. I just hiked up and down a mountain and faced down death."
Mabel pointed at Nikola. "You faced down a big salamander."
"Close enough."
They went upstairs, brushed their teeth, went to their bedroom...
And stopped in the door. Bill was still asleep. "Oh. Right," Dipper said.
He was curled into a ball on his left side, facing the wall, covered with only the zodiac blanket and his borrowed/stolen top hat sitting on the side of his head. He didn't use a pillow; he'd pushed Mabel's pillows and dolls behind himself to form a squishy makeshift fortress.
"Please don't wake him up," Mabel whispered. (She'd already set up the folding bed for herself; she'd clearly planned on this.) "He's had a really really hard time the last couple of days, and I think he needs as much sleep in a real bed as he can get, and it's just for one night, and I'm sure he'd rather sleep than do anything evil—"
"He said something, didn't he?"
Mabel paused. "Yeah. I think seeing his body really messed him up."
Dipper sighed. "We were trying to keep him away from it." He didn't want Mabel to think they'd forced him to stare his own death in the face. "But he did that... eye thing and looked through the trees, and..."
Mabel nodded.
Well. Dipper couldn't kick him out now. For Mabel's sake.
As children, occasionally when they got hotel rooms with a bed too few, their parents would stick them in one bed with a barrier of pillows in between them. At age thirteen and without two crabby parents trying to get them to just go to bed after a long plane flight, they unanimously vetoed that plan. Dipper decided against asking Stan if he could sleep in Ford's unoccupied bed, both because he suspected Stan would just go upstairs and drag Bill out of the room and because he didn't want Stan to think he was scared of Bill. He wasn't scared of Bill. Not anymore. He could handle one measly night in the same room as him. Anyway, somebody had to make sure he wasn't unsupervised in their bedroom all night, right?
Dipper and Mabel quietly set a floor mirror and old lamp next to Mabel's bed, draped a sheet between them, taped on a pink poster that said "WARNING! TRIANGLE ZONE!" and was covered in stickers of triangular objects, and decided Dipper was adequately shielded. If Bill did get up during the night, he'd probably trip through the sheet and wake half the house before he got anywhere near Dipper.
Dipper went to sleep with a baseball bat in his hands.
####
"Okay," Bill said, hands on his sides, "what am I looking at here?"
The feral band members of Sev'ral Timez turned toward Bill, eyes reflecting in the dim light. They were squatting around Bill's petrified corpse like a pack of apes examining a sleek black monolith.
"Hey girl," Creggy G. said.
"Hey," Bill said. He looked down at himself. His onyx black feet hovered over the ground and the yellow glow from his exoskeleton illuminated the clearing. "Lemme cut to the chase, is this gonna turn into a raunchy dream? My corporeal love life is about as cold and dry as Antarctica, I keep hoping one of my dreams will get a little hotter and wetter—"
"Nah, G," Deep Chris said. "Mr. Bratsman got us fixed."
"Aw."
"We're here to pay you reverence for freeing our minds from the chains of the conventional," Greggy C said, gesturing to Bill's corpse. Leggy P was kneeling and bowing to it and Chubby Z was posing for it. "We want to help free you like you tried to help free humanity."
Bill's eye narrowed. He tapped a finger against the edge of one brick as he considered this offer. Finally, skeptically, he said, "Fine. I'll bite. Why should I think you can help me?"
"Because we can give you the understanding your heart's been missing, girl. You're just like us," Chubby Z said. "A horror never meant to exist, born of a dream to construct the perfect golden idol, forced to dwell within an unnaturally-fabricated human shell."
Bill tilted his head thoughtfully. "I'm with you so far."
"We want you to join us," Deep Chris said. "Cavort with us in the silvan night, G. Shun the harsh light of the spotlight for the healing salve of moonbeams. We'll get drunk on the sweet fermented summer berries, uncaring of how the brambles prick our flesh. We'll dance in a frenzy of ecstasy and only sleep when the morning sun lifts the dew from the flowers and the sweat from our skin. It'll be straight Dionysian, boo."
"We can kiss the hot trees," Creggy G said.
Bill grabbed his shoulder. "Oh, you're the human that keeps making out with birch trees! I knew your face was familiar!" He paused. "So... are there any eligible ones around here?"
"Sure, girl, just downstream."
"If I'd known, I would've polished myself first."
"Say you'll join us, Bill girl," Deep Chris said. The band crowded around Bill to either side, posing around him—the backup dancers for the star singer. "You'd be one of us."
"We're already exactly the same," Creggy G said, holding up a mirror so that it reflected his and Bill's faces beside each other. In Bill's human face were two empty white eyes with pinprick pupils and pale blue irises, exactly the same as the eyes of the Sev'ral Timez boys.
He sat up with a gasp, hands flying to his face. There were still green boughs at the edges of his dreaming vision, blending into the wooden boards of the Mystery Shack's attic. Before sleep had fully fled his mind, he seized up the zodiac blanket draped over his body and stared into his embroidered eye.
The eye stared back at him. Through it, he could see his horrified sleepy face, and his normal slitted yellow eyes. His connection to the blanket's eye disappeared as he finished waking up.
He heaved a sigh of relief and flopped back down. He'd been lucid, but he hadn't been in control of that dream. He still needed practice.
He rolled toward the light of the window, groped around beneath it until he found his journal, grabbed up his crayons, and flipped pages blearily until he found the first blank one. He started writing down his dream, pausing only briefly as he tried to figure out how to translate "Sev'ral Timez" before settling on a sufficiently goofy way to misspell "several times" in Plaintext.
He made it halfway down the page before he stopped. Hold on. This wasn't his beautiful journal. These were not his beautiful crayons. He checked the cover and grimaced in displeasure when he saw a pine tree rather than a hand. Dipper's journal. Bill ripped out the page, ate it, and set the journal and Mabel's crayons back on the table under the bedroom window.
"What was that," Dipper asked, "some kind of Morse code?"
Bill yelped and twisted around. Dipper's soul was hovering above Mabel's headboard, watching over Bill's shoulder.
"Hey! Back, foul ghost!" Bill snatched up Mabel's pillow and swung it at Dipper.
"Ow—Hey! How did you hit me, I'm in the mindscape—"
"I said back!" Bill swung again, chasing Dipper off the bed. "Back into your fleshy tomb!" He climbed off the bed, stumbled into Dipper and Mabel's trap, tripped through the sheet and probably woke up half the house.
He yanked the sheet off and flung the pillow at Dipper by its corner. "Now get back in your body, go to sleep, and leave me alone."
"I don't know how to get back in it. I just wait until it happens by itself," Dipper said, floating irritably over his sleeping body, arms crossed. "Why do you think I just wander around every time I have this dream?" He paused. "Right—it's not a dream, is it."
Bill sighed heavily. "Try putting your body on like..." He almost said like an exoskeleton, remembered his audience, and amended himself: "Like it's clothing. I usually start with the hands. Just like putting on gloves!"
Dipper looked at the cold fingers wrapped tightly around the baseball bat. "How do I put hands on like gloves? There's no opening or—"
"Just try it, would you?" Bill sat tiredly on the edge of Mabel's bed.
Dipper shot him an irritated look, but pressed his ghostly hands against his fleshly ones, passing through the skin until one set of fingers rested inside the other. A fingertip twitched.
Bill gestured with one hand, continue. "Now the sleeves."
"I know how to get dressed." Dipper laid down in his body, forearm into forearm, shoulder into shoulder—until he was wholly back inside. He sat up, awake. "Huh."
"There, see?" Bill said. "And if you want to take it back off, just do the same thing in reverse. Like degloving your body from your soul!"
"Did you have to phrase it like that?" Still, Dipper tried it, peeling out of his body from the fingertips up. He left his body sitting upright as he hovered over it.
Bill chuckled tiredly. "Lookit your face, staring at nothing. Stupid looking."
"Shut up." He slid back into his body, more quickly now that he knew what he was doing.
"Great," Bill said. "Now that you know how to get back in your body, never do that again." He flopped back onto Mabel's bed and rolled over to face the wall. "It's a pain in my base having you wander around all night."
"Then you should've thought of that before you ripped my soul out of my body," Dipper grumbled. "Can you reattach me to my body?"
"Sure, easy." He lifted a hand to point down at his regrettably human form. "Not like this, though. Wanna help reattach me to my body?"
"Never in a million years."
"Then come back in a million years. There's nothing I can do for you until then." Bill dragged Mabel's zodiac blanket back over himself. "So sorry. Go to sleep. Leave me alone."
Dipper bet Bill could do it and was only saying he couldn't to try to trick Dipper into helping him. But he lay back down—clutching his bat again—and shut his eyes.
After a moment, Bill asked, "Where's Mabel? Sleepover?"
"Sofa bed in the living room."
"Right."
And then there was silence.
Several minutes passed. Dipper nearly fell back asleep. He heard Bill climbing out of bed and creeping across the room; but the footsteps didn't approach Dipper's bed, so he didn't open his eyes.
A few minutes after that, Dipper heard him come back, walking more heavily. He cracked open an eye to see what Bill was up to.
He was carrying Mabel, who was still asleep; his arms were trembling from her weight, but even at that Dipper hadn't known Bill was that strong. With a quiet grunt, he set her on her bed, then haphazardly tossed her sheet and zodiac blanket over her. He picked up his top hat from the bed and put it on; and then he wandered off, footsteps quiet as a ghost, and Dipper heard the creak of the door as he left the bedroom.
That was a lot nicer than Dipper had expected from Bill. Maybe he did care about Mabel in his own way.
Mabel rolled over and latched on to one of her dolls. Dipper shut his eye and fell back asleep.
####
(My favorite part of writing this was Bill dreaming about Sev'ral Timez saying the most absurdly flowery things imaginable. Anyway, let me know what y'all think about this week's chapter! And reminder that I MIGHT skip next week or the week after because the next couple chapters need heavier editing than usual.)
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THE SIMS 4: BARBIE Legacy Challenge!
oh hi there! i haven't posted here in a while, but i just watched the barbie movie a few days ago and needless to say, it is now my entire personality. so here's my first ever legacy challenge based on barbie's many, many careers and achievements!
apologies in advance, this challenge uses a lot of packs! i'm sorry! i might try to make a base game version at some point
BASE GAME version
portuguese translation by @demaciana-sims
sims 3 version by @appaloosawhims
challenge rules below the cut
All heirs must be female and named Barbie. (non-heir children may have any name)
You may use the freerealestate cheat for your first house, but try not to use money cheats after that!
You are allowed and encouraged to use lot traits and rewards to boost skill gain, anything that’s in-game is fair game.
Packs you will need:
EPs: Get To Work, City Living, Cats & Dogs, Get Famous, Island Living, High School Years
GPs: Spa Day*, Parenthood
Optional packs (for the optional generations):
EPs: University, Cottage Living, Horse Ranch
GPs: Strangerville
*You only need Spa Day for the High Maintenance trait in one of the generations and nothing else, so it's fine to skip out on it.
You've been raised with traditional values: find a good man, start a family, be a homemaker... But you want your children to aim higher, so you'll make sure to set them up for success.
Complete Successful Lineage aspiration
Max Parenting and Cooking skills
Have at least 3 kids and 1 pet, each child must complete at least one child aspiration and they must all max out their grades in school
Must have Family-Oriented trait
Your mother was happy staying at home, but not you. You're ready to fight your way to the top and make enough money to support your family for generations to come.
Complete Fabulously Wealthy aspiration
Max Charisma and Logic skills
Max Business career (Investor branch)
Must have Ambitious trait
Your family is pretty wealthy, so you've used your funds to open up your very own vet clinic and follow your dreams of being surrounded by furry little guys all day! But it might be more difficult than you thought...
Complete Friend of the Animals aspiration
Max Veterinarian skill
Run a 5-star vet clinic
Have at least 3 pets and be good friends with all of them
Must have either Cat Lover or Dog Lover trait
You grew up surrounded by pets, and you now want to explore even more of the animal kingdom... So you're going underwater! What magical secrets will you discover on your journey?
Must live in Sulani
Complete Beach Life aspiration
Max Conservationist career (Marine Biologist branch)
Become a mermaid
Max Logic and Fitness skills
Must have Child of the Ocean trait
Your mother had an almost supernatural level of fitness at sea, so now you've been inspired to master fitness on land! You're determined to reach your full potential in physical performance and become a world class champion.
Join Cheer or Football team as a teenager and reach highest level
Complete Bodybuilder aspiration
Max Fitness and Charisma skills
Max Athlete career (Athlete branch)
Must have Active trait
Your family has achieved many, many accolades, and you've set out to capture all of it in an epic Tell-All novel that you spend your entire life writing!
Complete Bestselling Author aspiration
Max Writing skill
Write Book Of Life and bind it to your parent, use it to successfully bring them back from a premature death
Must have Creative trait
Movie stardom is the next logical step for your lineage, so you set out to conquer the silver screen. Will you catapult the family name into even greater heights, or will it now be associated with infamy?
Complete Master Actress aspiration
Max Acting skill
Must reach at least Proper Celebrity status
Must have a secret affair with a fellow Actor!
Must have High Maintenance trait
As the child of a successful actress, people may roll their eyes and immediately write you off as yet another nepo-baby trying to start a music career... So you must prove them all wrong by becoming a proper rockstar!
Complete World Famous Celebrity aspiration
Max Singing skill
Max skill in at least 2 instruments
Max Entertainer career (Musician branch)
Must have Music Lover trait
What's next after conquering so many careers and reaching worldwide fame for the family name? World domination, of course! Become the greatest Leader this nation has ever seen!
Complete Mansion Baron aspiration
Max Politician career (Politician branch)
Max Charisma skill
Must have Self-Assured trait
Now that you've conquered the world, it's time to venture out into Space! There's so much to explore out there, and Barbie must leave her mark all across the galaxy.
Complete Nerd Brain aspiration
Max Astronaut career (Either branch)
Max Logic and Rocket Science skills
Go to SIXAM at least once and bring a souvenir
Must have Genius trait
Still want more? Here's some extra Barbies that you can play with!
Secret Agent Barbie
Complete Bodybuilder aspiration
Must have Active and Geek traits
Complete Secret Agent career (Diamond Agent branch)
Max Logic, Fitness and Charisma skills
Become enemies with a Sim in the Villain branch of the Secret Agent career! (You may need to cheat this career level for sims outside your household)
Countryside Barbie
Complete Country Caretaker aspiration
Max Gardening skill
Must make all money from gardening, farming, wine making, etc. No day job!
Must own a horse and have it max every skill
Must have Animal Enthusiast trait
Army General Barbie
Must live in Strangerville
Complete Strangerville Mystery aspiration
Max Logic and Charisma skills
Max Military career (Either branch)
Must have Erratic trait
Scientist Barbie
Complete Nerd Brain aspiration
Max Scientist Career
Be abducted by Aliens at least once
Must have Genius trait
Ultimate Barbie
Set lifespan to long
Complete at least 2 child aspirations
Complete Renaissance Sim AND Academic aspirations
Max 10 skills
Have 12 or more traits
Graduate from college
Reach the top of any career
Have a house worth 1 Million Simoleons
Have at least 5 kids and max your relationship with all of them
that's about it! if you play this, please use #sims barbie legacy
have fun:)
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