#Nash {The Wandering Entertainer}

[litirxcaractar]

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Independent Multimuse DnD OC RP

Potential Trigger Warning / 18+ content

10+ years of writing experience, 7+ years of Tumblr rp experience

semi-selective

follows back from @piecesofacrow

Please Read rules and Bio before interaction

[therealityhelix]

Shards of the Nexus: Capital Vices

Nobody was normal about this kid, and this was not a normal kid.

Song: You’re Gonna Go Far, Kid-The Offspring

@cardwrecks​ @captainbaddecisions​

Kaleidoscopic colors, pixels wandering a hundred vintage screens, a midi chorus of conflicting cricket song. Cars, creatures, adventurers and brawlers stared out from the sides of time worn arcade coin slot machines, a maze of classic console entertainment that had never risen on her lost world, but were old news here.

It was a maze, she realized after the first few twists and turns, low lights casting deep shadows on the muffling moleskin of the lively retro carpet. Despite the incessant beeps and blips, the world was still, air stifling but chilly.

Holes in the walls of the console labyrinth, filled with makeshift malice. A normal kitchen chair, clumsily furnished with wrist and ankle bindings. An altered puzzle cube on a plinth, next to a digital timer.  An old dance game pad repurposed into something far more dangerous, tangled wires trailing off into the dark.

Baby's First Deathtraps?

All the information she'd been given indicated that this one was a child, still in school. Yet he was already cutting his teeth on deadly constructions?

She didn't understand. Why didn't the Detective do something about this? Why didn't Swag or YJ step in? Why was a child being allowed to live alone, to take their life in this direction?

Each Riddler she had met so far wielded personal individualism like a sacred icon, a faith unassailable, and maybe they were simply incapable of entertaining the notion of removing that choice from another of their number.

Helix did not believe in fate, but there might have been some kind of indelible current of probability that swept the various Edwards Nashton down this deleterious path. Some unseen reason that every Nexus reality-each a living thing in its own right-needed a Riddler to exist within it, if only briefly.

He was the Minotaur in the center of the maze, working on a rat king of winding wires, and he leapt to his feet at the unexpected sight of her; smooth jaw, jade and mahogany. He glared from under a department store fedora, a thin scar on his cheek, oversized green hoodie nearly hiding his hands, one clutching a pair of pliers, the other, a screwdriver.

“You weren't invited.” he said, his voice a cracking mock growl, an imitation of intimidation. “Why did you come in here? Who are you and what do you want?”

Helix held up her hands.

“I'm not an enemy. I'm friends with some of your friends. You're Nash, right? I'm Helix.”

He held the screwdriver in front of him, angling its tip at her face.

“Puzzles mentioned you. He said you were some idiot who was going around antagonizing your betters.”

“Oh, did he?” she said, her voice ironed with sarcasm. “A real charmer, isn't he?”

Nash gestured threateningly with the screwdriver.

“You still didn't tell me what you want.” he pointed out. “Why did you come here? I'm busy!”

“Curiosity.” she stated simply. “Puzzles' phrasing could definitely use some work, but he's right in that I am traveling around to meet all of you. I'm curious about how this series of worlds work.”

“So you can move around the worlds too?” he lowered the screwdriver. “How do you-Lust, wait!”

A quick darting of shadow, an impression of azure, and some thing hit her. Not physical, but a blossoming of warm air, a dionaea trap closing around its unsuspecting prey.

And she was no longer in the arcade, its eight bit lights and midi music fading out, twining vines drawing her back into the sensual craving hidden in her own mind. Secret desires made manifest, strong, thin hands holding her flush against a lean body. She glanced up in expectation of emerald green eyes, and coffee-dark hair...

But it wasn't Puzzles gear oil and oakmoss that filled her senses, dragged her away from the here and now. It was the alcohol sting, the refreshing pine and lime of the Question Mark and it's peacock inhabitant. It was lapis and amber, an irreverent, permissive grin. When had this happened?

A long time ago, if she were to be honest with herself. She clung to her memory of love through Puzzles, expected him to occupy her thoughts, but...Puzzles was not Edwin, never would be. Edwin never would be again.

And that was all right.

Puzzles did not want her. So great was his disinterest, that he hadn't even known of her attraction to him. It was for the best. That attraction had been false, driven by the memories of a man long dead, a potential life destroyed.

Puzzles, with his razor tongue, cut those expectations to ribbons, slashed the bindings on her, wove a barbed fence of lines not to cross. She was thankful. That chapter of her life had ended years ago, but she had clung to that last page for so long the ink had smudged onto her hands. Puzzles thoughtless rudeness had shown her it was past time to finally close the book, and begin a new one.

It had already happened. In her spirit, she had already opened a new chapter. Same genera perhaps, but a different story.

A story involving skilled hands and a bold personality, a quick mind that treated the English language like the malleable ball of clay that it was, using it all to drive her pleasantly mad.

Maybe he even knew. Maybe he didn't, not yet. This had been waiting deep down inside her, some thing was reaching deep down inside her, pulling it all out. A deep rootbound ball of tangled desire that wanted nothing more than to succumb to those gentle hands, to feel the hot breath on her face and let it steal her own away, to open wide and welcome intrusion, deep down inside some thing was intruding. Teeth on her lips, hips on her hips, the scratch of facial hair against her skin. That dancing tenor sculpting words, promising her every pleasure, and she wanted nothing more than to let him fulfill those promises, to bury her in all his hedonistic potential, she wanted nothing more...

No, that wasn't true. She did want more than that. She wanted more than she felt he was willing to give, that was why she continued to hesitate. This was all just a fantasy she didn't want to admit to herself for fear of his rejection. Some thing was dredging it up before she was ready to accept it.

Some thing.

Some

Thing

This wasn't a fantasy, this was violation.

Force erupted from her body, throwing back everything close to her, including the dark being that had her wrapped in a cocoon of probing tendrils. The blast knocked her free of its grip, and it reformed itself from writhing strips of shadow; a humanoid creature of black and azure, smoke and razors, contained in a glassy skin.

“What are you?” she demanded, having never seen such a being before. “What were you doing to me?”

“~Aw, and just as I was getting to the creamy center~” the thing teased in a breathy voice. It retreated to Nash's side, who was staring in startled concern. “~Be careful, darling. She may be utterly delectable, but she holds power!~ I know what you are, morsel. Witch. Devil's bride~”

It draped itself over Nashton's back like a cloak, sinking in. To her horror, it disappeared inside him entirely.

“Sorry! Sorry!” he gasped. “He doesn't usually do that!”

“Hold still.” Helix said, grasping the boy by his thin shoulders. “I think I can cast it out of you.”

His soft, youthful face twisted.

“~I am here by invitation, witch~” the creature snarled, using Nash's mouth. “~you are the trespasser here. Be gone, interloper! We don't need you~”

“Keep talking, violator.” Helix snapped. “You'll be nothing soon.”

Nash shook his head hard, throwing her hands off.

“Everybody shut up!” he demanded.

Helix stepped back. Black, sickle-clawed arms sprouted from his sides and wrapped around him, consoling.

“~I apologize. I thought she was an enemy. Also, she's practically dripping with desire. It's altogether too tempting~”

Nash recoiled in fearful disgust.

“~Not for you dearest~” the creature clarified. “~She's delicious, not deplorable~”

“Thanks.” Helix said flatly.

“Look, don't tell me things like that, I don't want to know.” Nash said, sitting back down to work with his wires. “Okay. Okay, fine. You aren't an enemy, but you're not a friend either. I don't care who you know, I don't know you. Don't just come in here like you own the place. It's mine. Okay?”

“Okay.” Helix agreed. He was the only one so far to make that demand of her, so she would acquiesce. But only to this one.

“Also, I would like to head something off at the pass.” His wary eyes swept up her, sweet pistachio ice cream, as indirect as an asp strike. “You look like a...nice lady. You should know that I don't need or want another mother. Or a big sister, or a nanny, or a guardian angel. I have everyone I need. Don't try to adopt me, don't try to change me, don't get in my way, and maybe we can get along. And don't be mean to Lust either. He's not a monster. Or, well...hes my friend, so don't mess with him, or I'll mess with you. Is that clear?”

He was a child trying to speak with authority to a power he didn't comprehend. She didn't have to abide by any of it. And yet...

“Master of your own kingdom.” she sat down next to him, her pomegranate colored skirt fluffing around her ankles. “Very well. I agree.”

He'd come to understand the boon eventually.

“And Lust; as long as she plays by my rules, don't try to feed off her again, okay?”

“~Oh, all right~”

“Now, as long as we are all playing nice, is there anything else you wanted, Miss Helix? Do you want to try out one of my puzzles?”

She liked these various Riddlers, but after Arkham, she was loathe to step into any more of their convoluted contraptions.

“Actually, I'd like to know what you're working on right now.”

“Really?” an electric spark lit within him. “Well, it starts with this connector right here...”

Artist: Me

Artist: Unknown

Artist: @miasmacaron​

[msclaritea]

The entertainment mogul has given $1.2 billion to institutions around the nation, including the New York Philharmonic’s transformed Lincoln Center home.

In Los Angeles, you can wander through Judy Baca murals at the cavernous Geffen Contemporary at MOCA, view “Beetlejuice” at the sphere-like David Geffen Theater at the Academy Museum, watch “The Inheritance” at the Geffen Playhouse, and follow the progress of the new David Geffen Galleries, a striking work of architecture that will span Wilshire Boulevard, at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

New York now has not one but two David Geffen Halls: an academic building at Columbia Business School and the remake of the Lincoln Center home of the New York Philharmonic, which reopened this month after a $550 million renovation that he jump-started with a $100 million gift.

At 79, Geffen, the entertainment magnate, has planted himself into the pantheon of leading American philanthropists. He has handed out $1.2 billion over the past 25 years to museums, theaters, concert halls, universities and medical centers, according to the Geffen Foundation, and pledged to “give every nickel away” of a fortune estimated to be $7.7 billion. As a result, Geffen has become avidly sought by culture and education leaders looking to finance a wave of new construction that is enlivening cities as the nation emerges from the coronavirus pandemic.

“When you need a gift of this scale, there aren’t many people who are doing what David is doing, which is investing big-time in the cultural infrastructure of major cities — New York, Los Angeles,” said Michael Govan, the head of LACMA, who spent a year convincing Geffen to give $150 million toward the galleries there that will bear his name.

Geffen’s gifts are often contingent upon naming rights. When Avery Fisher Hall was renamed for him in 2015, 61 signs and maps around Lincoln Center were changed.

Geffen’s gifts are often contingent upon naming rights. When Avery Fisher Hall was renamed for him in 2015, 61 signs and maps around Lincoln Center were changed. Credit...Brian Harkin for The New York Times

Geffen is hardly some modern-day version of Andrew Carnegie, who made his fortune from steel and financed one of the great waves of philanthropy in the nation’s history. He is an openly gay entertainment mogul whose life, romances, yacht, mansions, art acquisitions, business deals, celebrity adventures and political engagement with, in particular, the Clintons and Barack Obama make him as engrossing a character as anyone in Hollywood.

The Reopening of David Geffen Hall

The New York Philharmonic’s notoriously jinxed auditorium at Lincoln Center has undergone a $550 million renovation.

Reborn, Again: The renovation of the star-crossed hall aims to break its acoustic curse — and add a dash of glamour.

‘Unfinished Business’: After a 17-year run in Los Angeles, Deborah Borda returned to the New York Philharmonic, which she led in the 1990s, to help usher it into its new home.

San Juan Hill: Etienne Charles’s composition for the reopening of the hall honors the Afro-diasporic musical heritage of the neighborhood razed to build Lincoln Center.

Expert Assessment: Right after the reopening our critic wrote that the renovation had a mightily improved sound. In the weeks that followed his feelings became more complicated.

It’s hard to imagine, for instance, Carnegie dating Cher or Marlo Thomas when he was young, which Geffen did; comforting Yoko Ono at the hospital the night that John Lennon was assassinated, which Geffen did; watching Joni Mitchell in his apartment when she wrote “Woodstock,” which Geffen did; or managing the early careers of Janis Joplin, the Doors and Peter, Paul and Mary, which Geffen did.

His skill at spotting up-and-coming musical talent (Jackson Browne; Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young; Guns N’ Roses), producing hit movies (“Risky Business” and “Beetlejuice”) and backing Broadway shows (“Dreamgirls” and “Cats”), and his work building record labels and movie studios has made him one of the wealthiest people in America. He has homes in New York, Los Angeles and East Hampton for when he is not entertaining boldfaced friends (think Tom Hanks and Oprah Winfrey) on his yacht, the Rising Sun. He once startled a dinner of journalists in Washington by disclosing that he had not flown on a commercial airplane since the late 1970s; that night he took a private jet back to Beverly Hills.

Geffen is hardly shy about his philanthropy, as can be seen by the growing list of institutions bearing his name, including the David Geffen School of Medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles, and the David Geffen School of Drama at Yale, which his gift made tuition-free. (“I don’t agree that the best giving is anonymous,” Geffen once told Fortune. “We should be examples to our friends and communities. I should be an example to young, gay kids.”) But he is, in his own way, low key about it — he declined an invitation to speak at the gala celebrating the opening of Geffen Hall this past week, and seemed reluctant to stand when he was acknowledged from the stage.

And he is not like other wealthy donors, who can range from hands-on to micromanaging when it comes to projects bearing their names. “They want to check the carpet designs,” said Deborah Borda, the head of the New York Philharmonic. By contrast, the gala was the first time Geffen saw the redone hall bearing his name; he never joined the hard-hat construction tours that Lincoln Center gave to dignitaries over these past two years.

“David said, ‘I want to leave this in your hands: I don’t need any input on the selection of the architect and driving the design,’” said Katherine G. Farley, the chair of the board of Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, recounting her conversation with Geffen when she asked him for money to rebuild what was then called Avery Fisher Hall. “He kept repeating, ‘Make sure you do something great.’”

Geffen, who declined a request for an interview, looks for transformative cultural projects that are struggling for credibility and financing, according to friends and associates. His contributions cover just a portion of the total cost — $100 million toward the $550 million Geffen Hall at Lincoln Center; $150 million toward the $750 million Geffen Galleries at LACMA — and are designed to goad other donors, while establishing Geffen as the primary patron.

“He’s making big bets,” said Marie-Josée Kravis, the chairwoman of the Museum of Modern Art in New York, to which he donated $100 million toward a three-floor David Geffen Wing in 2016. “They’re transformative. It’s not incremental.”

His gifts are usually contingent on naming rights. Lincoln Center agreed to a $15 million payment to the Fisher family to relinquish its naming rights so the center could promise Geffen that his name would remain on the hall in perpetuity. Although some argued that the naming rights should have commanded a higher price, Farley said, “Without his gift, there is no question that would not have happened.”

By contrast, when David H. Koch, the oil-and-gas billionaire, gave $100 million in 2008 to renovate what had been called the New York State Theater at Lincoln Center, it came with the provision that the theater could be renamed for a new donor after 50 years.

Arianna Huffington, the founder of The Huffington Post and a longtime friend of Geffen’s, said that “the arts have basically dominated his life,” and that they are what motivated his philanthropy.

“I personally have very little patience for people who question why anybody gives — as long as they give,” she said.

Geffen took a hands-off approach to the renovation, and never stopped by for a hard-hat tour when it was a construction site.

Geffen took a hands-off approach to the renovation, and never stopped by for a hard-hat tour when it was a construction site.Credit...Todd Heisler/The New York Times

Geffen has become more reclusive in recent years, first visiting the Geffen Theater at the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures in Los Angeles this month — a year after its red-carpet opening. He temporarily shut down his Instagram account at the start of the pandemic after he came under fire for posting a photo of his yacht floating in safe seclusion. “Isolated in the Grenadines avoiding the virus,” he wrote. “I’m hoping everybody is staying safe.”

Geffen is a college dropout who grew up in Brooklyn, where he attended New Utrecht High School. After creating Asylum Records — where he signed Joni Mitchell and Bob Dylan — in 1971, he sold it two years later to Warner Communications for $7 million. He founded Geffen Records in 1980; he would sell that a decade later to MCA for $550 million in stock, which increased in value significantly when Matsushita then bought MCA. He co-founded, with Steven Spielberg and Jeffrey Katzenberg, DreamWorks SKG in 1994, and left the company in 2008.

Geffen can be combative in his business dealings, and he lamented the “shameful” lack of support by New York donors in 2017 when Lincoln Center and the Philharmonic went back to the drawing board with plans to rebuild the hall, in part because it was growing too costly. Just after the move to rethink the New York project was announced, LACMA announced Geffen’s $150 million gift — timing that appeared to send a message, though officials said the gift had long been in the works.

Associates said that Geffen’s background in business and culture, and particularly music, drives his philanthropic choices.

“He comes from the music business,” said David Bohnett, another philanthropist based in New York and Los Angeles. “You grow up around music, you grow up around entertainment, it just seems logical that you are going to put your name on theaters and music halls and museums.”

Some say it helps explain his hands-off approach to the projects he supports. “He’s made a career out of respecting artists and understanding what artists need,” said Henry Timms, the president of Lincoln Center. “And I think that’s the same context for this — he’s not assuming he can do this job better than the architects.”

Geffen is intimately involved in deciding what projects to support. “He is a very engaged philanthropist and is involved in every funding decision made at the foundation,” said Dallas Dishman, the executive director of the Geffen Foundation, to which Geffen is the sole contributor.

As he approaches his 80th birthday, and with over $7 billion left, Geffen is contemplating his mortality and his legacy, his friends say. Yet on Wednesday night in New York, when he finally rose from his chair at the gala marking the opening of the latest building bearing his name, he seemed taken aback by the intensity of the applause. He just smiled slightly and sat down, without saying a word.

“He doesn’t reveal himself very much,” said Kravis, of the Museum of Modern Art. “He just gives. I respect his search for privacy and I’ve never pushed him on it.”

Adam Nagourney covers West Coast cultural affairs for The Times. He was previously the Los Angeles bureau chief and served eight years as the chief national political correspondent. He is the co-author of “Out for Good,” a history of the modern gay rights movement. @adamnagourney • Facebook

So much of the money these people are throwing at elitist passion projects while people suffer from the Tax Scam and other right-wing bullshit. How much do I get for guessing rightly that Sherlock of The Opera would have been put on in one of these facilities? Go ahead. Buy as many boons as you think you need for heaven. All bets are off once you're gone. The truth always has a way of coming out.

[kitsapmarketing]

Living the Kitsap Life: Your Ultimate Guide to Local Hotspots

Discover the Best of Kitsap Life

Are you ready to embrace the Kitsap Life? Nestled between the beautiful Puget Sound and the majestic Olympic Mountains, Kitsap County, Washington, offers a unique blend of natural beauty, vibrant communities, and rich local culture. This comprehensive guide will immerse you in the best experiences Kitsap Life has to offer, from outdoor adventures to charming local businesses. If you're looking to explore what makes Kitsap Life special, read on to uncover the ultimate hotspots and activities that define this beautiful region.

Explore Outdoor Adventures in Kitsap Life

Scenic Trails and Parks

One of the cornerstones of Kitsap Life is its abundance of outdoor recreational opportunities. The Kitsap Peninsula is dotted with scenic trails and lush parks perfect for hiking, biking, and exploring nature. Start your journey at Bloedel Reserve in Bainbridge Island, where you can wander through meticulously landscaped gardens and serene woodlands. For a more rugged adventure, head to Olympic National Forest, which offers a range of trails from easy walks to challenging hikes with stunning views of the surrounding wilderness.

Water Activities and Beaches

Water plays a central role in Kitsap Life, and there are countless ways to enjoy it. Silverdale Waterfront Park provides a family-friendly spot for picnicking, kayaking, and beachcombing. For a more secluded experience, visit Rhododendron Beach Park on Bainbridge Island, where you can relax on the shore, explore tide pools, or enjoy a peaceful sunset.

Immerse Yourself in Local Culture

Farmers' Markets and Local Shops

A true representation of Kitsap Life can be found in its local markets and shops. The Port Orchard Farmers Market offers a delightful selection of fresh produce, artisanal goods, and homemade treats. Dive into the local food scene by visiting The Bread and Rose, a cozy bakery in Bremerton that’s a favorite among residents. Additionally, the Bainbridge Island Museum of Art showcases regional artists and provides a glimpse into the creative spirit of Kitsap Life.

Historic Landmarks and Museums

Kitsap Life also encompasses a rich historical heritage. The Kitsap Historical Society Museum in Bremerton is a great place to learn about the area's past through engaging exhibits and artifacts. Another must-visit is the Puget Sound Navy Museum, where you can explore the history of the U.S. Navy’s presence in the region.

Savor the Flavors of Kitsap Life

Local Dining Spots

Food is an integral part of Kitsap Life, and there are many exceptional dining options to explore. For a memorable meal, visit The Loft, a Bremerton restaurant known for its creative dishes and waterfront views. Another excellent choice is Mora Ice Cream, which offers a delightful range of flavors made from local ingredients.

Craft Breweries and Wineries

Kitsap Life also offers a vibrant craft beverage scene. Snoqualmie Falls Brewery in Bremerton provides a variety of locally brewed beers that reflect the region’s unique flavors. If you prefer wine, check out Nash’s Organic Produce, which hosts wine tastings and sells a selection of locally-produced wines.

Engage with the Community

Annual Events and Festivals

Living the Kitsap Life means participating in community events and festivals. The Kitsap County Fair is a highlight of the year, featuring carnival rides, live entertainment, and exhibits showcasing local talent. Another annual event, Bainbridge Island Film Festival, offers film enthusiasts the chance to enjoy independent films in a picturesque setting.

Community Groups and Activities

For those who want to become more involved in Kitsap Life, there are numerous community groups and activities to join. Engage with the local community through Kitsap Humane Society’s volunteer opportunities or participate in Kitsap Regional Library events and programs for all ages.

In Understanding This…

In understanding this ultimate guide to living the Kitsap Life, it becomes clear that this region offers a diverse array of experiences and opportunities for every type of resident or visitor. From its stunning outdoor landscapes to its rich cultural scene and welcoming community, Kitsap Life represents a unique and fulfilling way of living. Embrace the local hotspots, savor the flavors, and dive into the activities that define Kitsap Life. Whether you’re a lifelong resident or a new visitor, there’s always something new to discover in this enchanting part of Washington State.

By exploring these local gems and embracing the opportunities available, you can truly experience the best of what Kitsap Life has to offer.

Discover our exciting blog series, 'Unveiling Kitsap Life: Discover the Hidden Gems of PNW.' Learn revolutionary techniques, refine your design expertise, and gather essential perspectives to create stunning digital solutions that define excellence.

[drawing-way-outside-the-lines]

Emmet Riley *Supporting Character

Partner(s): None Parents: Alberta & Cornelius Riley. Kids: None. Siblings: None. Age: 54 Birthday: May 1st. Height: 183cm Body type: Slim but toned. Eye color: Brown

About: ~ Adaptable, Friendly, Helpful, Fair, Creative, Honest, Energetic, Passionate, Organized, Logical, Contemplating, Great sense of humor, Sarcastic, Playful, Down to earth, Confident, Outgoing, Intelligent, Cheerful, Tolerant, Mature, Calm and Flirtatious.  ~ Acrobat. ~ Bisexual. ~ Has long chocolate brown hair. ~ Very limber. ~ Has a taste for finer things in life, but is a very grounded individual. ~ Reads whenever he has time off, or tends to his garden. ~ Fast learner. ~ Very good cook. ~ Likes attention. ~ Dislikes rain. ~ Plant daddy. ~ Smells like Sage or Pine notes mixed with Whiskey. ~ Drinks a glass of Whiskey every night after dinner. ~ Okay maybe 2. ~ 3, it really is more like 3. ~ Cat daddy too. ~ Very good at Math. ~ Part time magician. ~ Often works at the hospital as entertainment for the patients. ~ Lives by a small creek he likes to sit and observe for hours. ~ Loves bowling, nature, gardening, his jacuzzi, vintage music, vintage vibes, pin up fashion, Whiskey, cooking, long bubble baths, plants, cats, chocolate, peanuts, dark green shades, journaling, card games and coffee. ~ Goes to the cinema often. ~ Dresses a bit formal, often in earthy tones or in sharp contrasting white/black. ~ Feeds stray animals. Emmet’s tag Emmet’s house/home Emmet’s moodboard Handwriting/ask answer pic:

One song to describe him: Robert Nash - Take Me Up With You Dearie                                                        

Personal play list: 1. Lucas Pittman - Swagger Stagger 2. Florrie Forde - How'd You Like To Spoon With Me? 3. Dave Harman & His Orchestra - Somebody Like You 4. Sam Stern - You Take Da Steamboat, I Take Da Train 5. Billy Murray - Arrah Wanna 6. Jules Gaia - Jump Jive Roar 7. The Columbians - Just Like A Rainbow 8. Odd Chap - Fooling 9. All-Star Trio - Oh! By Jingo! 10. Victor Dance Orchestra - The Great One Step 11. Magnus Ringblom - Step On It 4 12. James Morrison The Lark In The Morning / The Wandering Minstrel 13. Odd Chap - The Swingin' Moustache 14. Collins and Harlan - Everybody's Jazzin' It 15. Jules Gaia - Let's Bounce

[salamanderpie]

All of my Fallout characters, in one single location. Descriptions under the readmore.

Gavine Belmonte- young adult Boomer teen wanting to learn about the rest of the world and maybe get away from his family. Trans and gay.

Jasper Shi- mean lesbian Great Khan who’s grappling with her heritage and what the Khans mean to her.

Wendy Shi- the mean lesbian’s mother. Trying to be there for her adult daughter but it’s a mixed bag.

Lou Carver- a former field medic exposed to many terrible things on the front, he suffered a “fast” ghoulification and then wandered the continent before settling down in Louisiana. About 260 years old.

Leo- ghoulified Chinese Sole Survivor here to smoke cigarettes and meditate on the nature of the apocalypse.

Robin Yu- art thief based on the East Coast, somewhere between a counterfeiter and cat burglar. Loves to sell garbage to rich idiots who don’t know better and can spin yarns very quickly and easily.

Tierra Fontana- a mechanical mind who considers the Kings to be extended family, she works with the Followers to repair water spigots, piping, vehicles, robots, and the occasional musical instrument. An older Latina trans butch lesbian with a good to strained relationship with her siblings.

Josue Fontana- a caravaner and traveling merchant by trade, who likes to make friends in each town. A little flighty. A little bit of a charmer. Very bisexual.

Mack Fontana- a bisexual biracial bigender Chairman entertainer who moonlights as an assassin. Loyal to Benny and his plan to take the Strip from House. Might even start out a little hostile to the courier.

Charlotte “Charlie” Nash- granddaughter of Ruby and Johnson Nash in Primm. She is in the process of becoming a doctor and hopes to open an office in Primm, since the closest is Doc Mitchell in Goodsprings.

Magnolia “Magpie” Pines- a young thief born in the Central Wastes (Kansas), who joined a group that rebuilt a train system, explored a crashed space station, and might have stopped a faction of supermutants kidnapping ghouls. After a long time, they have all gone their separate ways, and Magpie’s way was a floating city with her girlfriend.

Beans- beans.

Isabella- Railroad associated Sole Survivor. Before the war, she was hellbent on taking Robert House down. After the war... who knows?

Grace- Minuteman Sole Survivor, more focused on moving on from the prewar era and rebuilding than looking back.

Mx. Stitches- independent courier with a penchant for explosives. Slowly ghoulifying and is trying to make the best of having most of their skin.

Sweet Caroline- a crawrad rancher who has stayed in the same multigenerational farm her entire life and has only recently been meddling in the affairs of others.

Ginko- a problematic fave lone wanderer courier who buckles psychologically at the wrong moment. A poor decision for her and for everyone on the continent, being a primary tool in the NCR’s expansion eastward. Her ‘adventures’ continue into Wasteland 2 and 3. In the end, her agency is denied at every level.

C6-38- later known as Courier-6, a synth in the far future after the NCR finds the Institute’s tech and starts building its own synth coursers based on the brainscans made of Ginko herself. She is tasked with the same kind of horrid work that Ginko was made to do, a diplomatic first contact in most cases.

Daisuke Kubo- a nuclear physicist from before the war, who, after the war, has decided to become a land steward. Hated by the Brotherhood of Steel. Gay.

Zoe Nicolazzo- a Follower botanist and environmental scientist who learns about Vault 22 and gets extremely pissed about it.

???- what if Y-17 Trauma Harnesses were just a little more fucked up than they are in the base game? What then?

Washington Richardson- an evil bastard. Originally a Legion playthrough courier but it’s a little up in the air. Grew up so hateful of the NCR for what it did that he would give anything to see its ruin. Imagine Wile E. Coyote but so much worse. His singular humanizing trait: he likes dogs.

[anotherbeingsworld]

vegas adventures

Pairing: Bryce x F!MC (Casey Valentine) , a pinch of Ash Tanaka x MC (Melanie)

Book: (BP x Open Heart crossover, rewrites of Chp 15 Book 2)

Summary: The rewrite of their trip to Vegas with an extra helping hand.

A/N: this is a belated birthday gift to the one and only @robintora ! We talked about this fic before, and this is my best attempt at bringing it to life. It was a tough one, but I'm satisfied with it! And Tanu, happy (belated) birthday, and I hope you enjoy this! Love you! <3 // I did manage to add some bryce x mc fluff along the way, which I hope again you enjoy!

-

The workload has been released upon her shoulders, as she arrives at Donahue where the others have been seated. She took a seat besides Bryce, as he placed his arms around her in the booth.

“Okay, so what’s going on here…” Her eyes made its way to Jackie’s somehow questioned about the text that was sent earlier.

“It is something important -..”

“But, don’t worry – we got some good loaded fries to entertain us through the briefing right Jackie?” Bryce interrupts as he take a piece of it with a happiness planted on his face.

Aurora breaks the silence, ‘Since we are all here – so spill.”

Jackie took a deep breath explaining the whole situation on Declan trying to leech onto some doctors from Mass Kenmore, followed by the partnership to push Panacea drugs onto MK’s patients as well.

Realization dawn to her face,

“Hence, the perks that made the others join then.”

Jackie nods, with an angry expression on her face.

“That’s why we need to stop them.”

Elijah looked at her with shock, “Wait…I thought you were in with the perks. What changed?”

Casey’s eyes, meet with hers somehow both knowing what happened the other day at the gas station has somehow a connection with her sudden revelation.

Jackie clears her throat suddenly upon the awkward silence that follows, clasping her hands together.

“I guess – it's not worth it anymore if it costs others misery. I don’t think I want to be part of it anymore.”

A surprising look was painted on Casey’s face which disappears in a second as Elijah interrupts with a resolute nod.

“So, how are we gonna bring the monster down? Technically Declan Nash is the kind of person who can get away with anything.”

Jackie looks resolute, as she lays out the plan which involved a company retreat in Vegas which will be happening during the weekend.

“…They have extended the invitation to doctors they’ve worked with…including me.”

Casey nods, “I am officially intrigued, count me in.”

“The situation is gonna be sticky, but a few drinks in and we can stop them. As a fact that he and his scumbag friends will be bragging about the ways they are scamming the system – all we gotta do is a tape and we can catch them.” Her tone is commanding.

The whole table went silent, as Bryce replies.

“And then what…blackmail one of the biggest pharmaceutical companies in the world?”

There was silence, as the others were contemplating the pros and cons of the situation but, in the end, they decided to stick together.

“If something happens to me while I’m gone, I at least wanted you all to know where I am.”

The others looked at her in surprise before Bryce breaks the silence,

“You mean – what happens to us.”

Casey nods,

“You don’t think we will let you go alone right? We are with you all the way Jackie, the group who heist together, stays together as we are should.” Casey said before Jackie can protest. The night ended with possibilities of the implication as Casey gets on the phone with a friend from afar that could help her with the situation.

-

A few days later.

The bright lights of Vegas were the reason for their wide smiles – as they stepped into the suite that was provided by Mass Kenmore. All of their jaws dropped in an instant – as the lights of the strip sparkle outside of the panoramic windows.

“This is the single coolest room I’ve ever been in, like legit.” His eyes wander in awe along with the others.

Jackie snickers, “Just remember that this luxury is from blood money.”

They all nod in agreement as they started to form a plan, as Casey finds herself texting a mysterious friend.

“Let’s get dressed shall we,” Bryce stated as the others get ready to dazzle for their night at Vegas.

As the others get ready, Casey finds a message from Rafael – wishing them good luck. She smiles at the message, as she took the phone call from the familiar number.

-

“Hey! We are in Vegas already – getting ourselves ready for the night.” Her voice is slow, as she stood facing the strip.

“That’s good! My friends and I had arrived yesterday, and we will meet you at the lobby! I brought a very special helper for you.” A knowing smile occurs on the caller’s face through the phone.

“Let me guess – it's your famous magician boyfriend Mel?” Casey raised an eyebrow at the statement – disbelieving but kinda curious as well.

“That’s right! He decided to join us tonight – plus, he is actually a vegas master. All of you will be lost without him.” Melanie replies from the other line.

Casey just shakes her head, but the smile remains.

“I’ll see you soon, say hi to the girls for me!” Casey ends the call, to be met with Bryce looking dashing in his suit.

-

“You look nice Lahela.” Her eyes are equivalent to the heart-eyed emoji as he models in front of her, making her chuckle happily at him.

“I always look nice, Casey! It's my specialty, but – why aren’t you dressed?” He asked as he loops his arm around her, eyes falling upon the Vegas scenery.

“I was making a phone call, but you definitely look stunning. You are gonna beat everyone here Bryce.”

He laughs at the comment, but somewhat smiles – “Thank you, now get yourself ready – we shall be the good-looking couple here shall we?” She looked at him in shock but brushed it away. The word ‘couple’ caught her somewhat off-guard but she somehow adores it.

“I will” She replies placing a kiss on his cheek before moving on to change.

Moments later, she walked out to a room, as all of their eyes fall onto her.

“You look…beautiful.” Bryce walks in front of them, as he pulls her in her arms – as she blushes furiously by the compliment.

“The lovebirds are at it again, let's move on before they hog the spotlight with their PDA,” Jackie said sarcastically as they walked out of the room – meeting with a specific group in the lobby.

-

The lobby was filled with people, yet the familiar pink hair caught her eye.

“Guys, I brought us some help – and, they have an expert for it.” She said as the others follow her, meeting a group of friends.

“Casey!!!! HI!” Melanie a.k.a the woman with the pink hair, pull her into a hug – as they were finally reunited.

“Hii, have you been waiting long?” She asked gesturing to the other familiar faces, Aisha, Courtney, Diana, and a mysterious guy who she assumes as the one and only infamous Ash Tanaka, the guy Melanie won’t stop gushing about to her.

“Casey! We have just arrived earlier – it's good to see you again!” Diana pulls her into a hug, as Courtney and Aisha did the same.

“Also, this is my friends! Bryce, Jackie, Elijah, Sienna and Aurora.” Casey introduces them to the group, as they all exchange introductions.

“Nice to meet you all, this is the men of the hour – Ash Tanaka, he will be a huge help as he knows the deep unknowns of Vegas itself.” Melanie introduces him to the gang, as he and Bryce ended up bro-hugging one another.

The reunion was cut short as they began to devise a plan, which went out smoothly, as Ash leads Declan to a game where he was surrounded by the group. They went in randomly, as it would avoid any alarms from Declan himself, and with the help from Melanie’s buddies – they were undetectable.

The information that was received, was priceless – as they found out upon that Solomon Health is making moves into vertical integration – however, it didn’t help their issue at the moment as they regroup once more to create another plan.

In the end, it went well, as Declan Nash was confronted – and he was captured on tape. The group manages to bring their best together – and the satisfied look on Jackie’s face is a very good sight to see.

“Payback’s a bitch, isn’t it?” it erupts the cheers of victory, as the air from the rooftop makes the winning of the night felt much satisfying. Sienna, Aurora, Elijah, Aisha, Diana, and Courtney were found socializing at the dance floor, as they recapped the whole situation again – somewhat like a televised situation that made Casey smile.

Jackie stood there, letting out a breath – somewhat feeling the calmness in her lungs again.

“How are you feeling Jackie?”

She met her eyes, and somehow – she was met with a hug. Jackie hugged her, and it feels like they did something incredible at the moment.

“Thank you…I feel like, tonight – I think I can sleep really well tonight.” She said happily, as Jackie joined the others.

Casey felt her heart in happiness – somehow, seeing Jackie in peace is such a sight. Her thoughts were interrupted by a familiar presence, Melanie who smiled at her.

“You did this tonight – and, I couldn’t even be more proud.”

“Hey, all of your friends and ehem…your boyfriend helped as well.” She gestures at Ash and Bryce who are having a conversation that follows a series of laughter.

“We love to be here – and, it's actually where I met him.”

“I remember the story. It involves mobs, a missing suitcase and a lot of chaotic stuff am I right?” Casey recalls their meeting before, as Melanie laughs in agreement.

“Yeah, that’s about right. It's an adventure, and being here with my girls – meeting Ash; it doesn’t feel real sometimes. But, I’m grateful for it.”

Casey nods, as they took a sip upon the drink they were holding.

“Thank you again for coming – I know it's such short notice.”

Melanie shakes her head, with a wide smile.

“It's okay, you helped us years ago – it's our turn to repay back. A silver lining too, I got to see Ash for the weekend.”

At the mention of his name, Ash appears at the scene.

“I heard a mention of the magician here?”

Both of them let out a hearty laugh, as he placed an arm around Melanie.

“I wanna thank you – it means a lot for your help,” Casey said, as he smiles at her.

“It's no problem at all, and if all of you ever hit vegas again – just give me a call; I can show you some of the best-secret locations here.” He winked as Melanie nods in agreement.

“It's true – he knows this place in its depth and, you will not regret it.”

Casey nods, excitedly as the others join them – somewhat looking panic suddenly.

“We don’t want to end this party yet, but the flight back home is in 4 hours.” A panic Diana stated, as the widening of Melanie’s eyes brought her back to reality.

“Oh crap, we have to get going.” She stated as all of them walked out of the club.

It’s a farewell with the whole gang, as they left for the airport.

“I’ll call you when we land? But, it's definitely a good time seeing you again Cas.” Melanie stated as they hugged once more, along with the group.

“Definitely, I’ll see you guys soon.” It was somehow an emotional farewell in a short amount of time.

The car vanished in a second, as they decided to make their way back to the suite after the success of the day.

-

The suite was quiet – as it was past midnight. However, the bright lights of Vegas are still shining brightly as ever. The room was dimmed, as the others had fallen onto slumber, leaving the pair to be awake.

She was dressed in her pyjamas as she settled down upon the squishy couch from the hotel. With a cup of coffee in her hand, as there was someone who decided to join her. She smiles at his sight, as she filled the gap as Bryce pulled her into his arms, both of their gazes fall upon the neon lights of the city that filled the dimmed room.

“What are you thinking about?”

He smiles softly before answering,

“Jackie. She did an incredible job tonight – but the grudge she held against Declan on what he did. It felt like someone else that we were seeing tonight.” He paused biting his lip, a pinch of anxiousness can be sensed from him.

“I just – I cant help to think about all the anger I am carrying around for my parents. I wonder – what its done for me?” His gaze falls onto her, somewhat pleading for an answer.

It was followed by silence for a few moments – before she spoke again.

“Are you ready to let it go?”

He shrugs, somewhat confused upon his decision too.

“I honestly have no idea, I don’t like to see them in myself – especially the times of arguing with Keiki. It feels like the past has repeated itself.”

“So, are you ready to forgive them?”

His stare falls upon the view in front of them – as he stares wistfully as his mind is filled with thoughts.

“Forgive feels like a huge action – but, maybe for now…I’m ready to let go and, start a new book with those who actually love me.” A smile appeared on his face, as he kissed her on top of the head.

“That sounds very healthy, for you and Keiki.”

He laughs as he nods in agreement, “I hope so too.”

They sat together in silence, as she stayed in his arms closing her eyes against the bright lights of Vegas, a beautiful ending of the day.

“Bryce, I’m proud of you.” She said as they lay upon the bed, her eyes looking at him in wonder.

He looks sleepy, yet the smile didn’t leave his face – today was a good day. A start of new beginnings for all of them – as he replies before both of them fall into another slumber once more.

“I’m proud of you too.”

THE END.

tags: @bitchloveskcbaseball , @mvalentine , @storyofmychoices , @princess-geek , @lahellacute ,   @annekebbphotography , @mrsbhandari , @dcbbw , @choicessa , @fantasyoverreality98 , @baltersome , @ofpixelsandscribbles , @thundergom @starrystarrytrouble ,  @kelseaaa  , @choicesficwriterscreations  , @lalizah , @drethanramslay , @eleanorbloom , @openheartfanfics , @brycessgirl  ,  @freckles-spangledvampire , @agentnolastname , @robintora , @adriansbiss , @appiomofchoice  , @ariondevereux , @natureblooms24 (comment if you want to be tagged or removed 💜💜)

[austarus]

Harry Wells x Reader Crisis of Infinite Wells (Part 3 of 5)

**A/N: The picture/edit/gif does not belong to me. It belongs to @countlesswells

Part 1    Part 2    Part 4    Part 5

*Yes, I know this is super late, but I had so many exams and deadlines shifted due to the transition online. Didn’t help that finals were around the corner either. But I’m back, and hopefully I can make things right with my fics, especially with the fact that we’re not going to get the Alls Wells That Ends Wells episode this season thanks to Ms. Rona (Please don’t come after me T.T). Anywho, this ended up being super, SUPER, long and I have no regrets. I feel that we need this series more than ever. If you already haven’t make sure to check out Part 1 and 2. Don’t forget to reblog and leave a comment, I read them all!

Word Count: 6601

You took in a deep breath, simultaneously opening your eyes to find yourself being hovered over by Caitlin and Cisco

“There’s our sleeping beauty,” Cisco jokes, grinning at you before running back over to the monitors to get a screwdriver.

“Mm, it’s too bright here.” You winced and blinked a few times as your brain had finally registered the bright lights of the Speed Lab. Rubbing your face a few times, you moved slowly to sit up. Stretching your aching body, you cracked a few bones and let out a little noise in contentment. Eyes looking around for a bit, you saw that the Mindscape Machine was still out, and that Cisco had hooked you and Nash onto it. Nash was still knocked out on another bed though because of the sedation. He looked peacefully asleep, as if the weight of his expeditions and the murmurings at the back of his head were gone. He should be coming back soon, I hope.

Cisco noticed where your gaze had gone before grabbing your attention, “Cecile had to go back home to feed a fussy little baby Jenna and Joe, so we ended up resorting to the Mindscape Machine. Went smooth sailing, thanks to our very own resident genius engineer, no thanks needed. All in a good day’s work.”

“I figured when you chimed in saying that we needed to go to the Nexus of Nash’s mind to get out.” You pointed out.

“Nash should be waking up in an hour or so, he’ll be fine I promise. How are you feeling?” Caitlin asked softly as she checked you over for any sign of abnormalities before removing the wires from your head.

“Cold,” goosebumps were already breaking out through your body as a shiver goes down your spine. “Really cold, Caity. Can’t you STAR Labs techies afford heat or something?” You joked, watching a look of fake hurt cross Ciscito’s face, a hand automatically over his heart.

“Dude, it’s like beautiful outside and what am I doing? I was stuck in here babysitting Princess Aurora and Pebble Brain over there until you guys came back to reality. You’re welcome for that, by the way,” Cisco made a face, pointing towards the direction of Nash’s unconscious body with a screw driver before walking back to where you sat, “while fixing these bad boys up,” the mechanical genius gestures dramatically to the tech in the room. “Meanwhile, Barry and Not-Mirror-Iris are on a picnic date in Central City Park enjoying the sunny weather. One which I wanted to do with Not-Mirror-Kamilla first.”

You and Caitlin just giggled at Cisco’s dramatics. Caitlin gave you the ‘all clear’ that your neural functions were still working and that you should be coordinated within your own body.

“So, Persephone,” You rolled your eyes at the nickname and shook your head at the two. Cisco had basically dubbed you and Harry that even before you had gotten together. In secret of course, or else Harry would start throwing things at him for dropping obvious hints of his feelings towards you. It’s at least so much better than Romeo and Juliet because in all honesty, they had a tragic love story and that is something that my love life does not need. More tragedy, internal pain, and suffering. “Did you see your Hades again?”

“I did, yeah.” A soft smile crossed your lips as your mind replays the interaction, your cheeks dusting the lightest color of pink. Your gaze dropped down a bit as Cisco and Caitlin started going “Ooooooo” as if high school gossip girls wanting you to spill the beans while giving you that one look you know all too well. You didn’t have the heart to tell them to stop.

“How is he?” Caitlin asked while Cisco nodded, wanting to know if his friend’s okay.

“He’s good,” you responded with a smitten grin, and then made a little sheepish face. “They’re all good.”

“They?-” Caitlin frowned as she slowly asked with a raised eyebrow.

“-Excuse me? They?” Cisco had a look mixed with dumbfoundedness and disbelief. His mouth slightly open as you saw his mind comprehending that simple sentence. You just nodded with a slightly sheepish grimaced expression. “You-”

“-had to meet the entire Council of Wells and propose to them the Multi-Dimensional idea that could possibly save them all because my boyfriend and a select few of his pals convinced me to since apparently the Wells men tend to have lots of arguments and so they also tend to never get things done sometimes. Yeah. That happened.” You quickly rambling how you met the infinite Council of Wells and then slowed down at the latter sentence with a nod. Cisco and Caitlin were stunned in place as they had tried to keep up with every single word that you said. Before they could even say anything, you spoke up once again as you got off the bed to stand on wobbly legs. “Did I mention that Harry, Sherloque, and Wolfgang are the triumvirate lead of the Council and that Sonny’s their hype man, apparently? I did not ever see that happening.” You ran a hand through your hair, “I have seen things. Standing in a huge lecture-ish mental room in Nash’s mind filled with doppelgangers of Harrison Wells is something I just cannot unsee.”

“No, you can’t.” Cisco added in agreement, his arms crossed. “You met all of them?”

“I mean, sorta. I mainly just stood at the front where the Wells triumvirate take their spots to start their meetings. Ok, so like you know the Galactic Senate from Star Wars where Palpatine and Padme were in?”

“Hell yeah, I do. What do you take me for an uncultured swine?”

“So, like, the layout of the room was sorta styled like that.” Cisco looked slightly mind blown because Star Wars obviously. You located your leather jacket and put it on to have some layer against the cool wind of the AC. “How’s everything coming with the modifications?”

Cisco and Caitlin look at each other before Frost took over for a bit, “I think this is the part where we tell you that they’ve sorta hit a roadblock.”

“Perfect,” you deadpanned, with a slight pain reverberating at the back of your head. I need some coffee, you thought before collecting your things and giving Nash one last glance.

***

I jinxed myself when I told Cisco that I could handle this. Handle them and their stupidity. A frown plastered itself onto Nash’s face, his head throbbing at the legit argument going on at the back of his head. What about? Who the hell knows or cares? Rubbing his face then his temples when the headache started to radiate to the front, the dark-haired explorer let out another annoyed groan as a doppelganger started yelling to contribute to the argument. I have never been more annoyed at the sound of my voice. Nash’s been trying to mentally block them so he himself can think things out, but collectively it hasn’t been succeeding. His heavy footsteps carried him to the Med Bay, thankful that no one was here at this ungodly hour to see him like this. I need an icepack and multiple pills of aspirin. Nash snorted when a mental image of you scolding him for the number of pills he might take to ease the pain was conjured in his mind. You entertained him, is what he told himself, just like the rest of them.

As he entered the Med Bay, the door creaked and the dim lights from the labs allowed him to see a faint silhouette on the bed. Nash raised an eyebrow as he crept slowly towards the bed, gauntlet at the ready.

“Well, speak of the devil,” he whispered to no one in a low voice, forgetting about the throbbing and disgruntled voices in his head. Nash disengaged his gauntlet. On the bed, you were curled up with a thin blanket, clearly still cold, but sound asleep at this hour. Curled up like a kitten and cuddled up to a pillow. Nash’s blue eyes wandered to what’s beside you, seeing multiple papers messily put together and various binders littering the bed. Due to the dimness, he couldn’t really make out any of the writings on the paper at this angle, but the Wells doppelganger can only assume that they’re medical files for Barry and the others.

Nash’s blue  gaze snapped back to you when you emitted a small noise as you shuddered. He didn’t know why, but he made a beeline for the cabinets and closets, finding another thin blanket hidden in them. At least two are better than one. He pulled the thin cloth over you, ensuring that you would be a little warmer than before. Nash’s gaze softened slightly at your tired expression that you carried even while asleep. Shutting his eyes for a bit only to reopen them, Nash curled his hand into a fist then uncurled it. He let out an inaudible sigh, his right hand reaching out to gingerly tuck a strand of hair behind your ear-

“-Don’t you dare touch her.”

Nash felt as if he was shocked on the spot, retracting his hand rapidly as he turned around, coming face to face with the source of the voice. Harry stood with his hands in his pants pockets, a glare present on his face as he watched his doppelganger with angry eyes. Clearly unamused that Nash was getting close to you. Harry’s words, precise and cold, had cut through the air like a sharpened knife, but you couldn’t hear him.

Nash swallowed, sending Harry a smile of mockery. “Don’t worry, I’m not trying to steal her away from you. Unless-” Nash spoke with a raspy voice.

“-You can’t even if you tried,” Harry retorted without hesitation. Nash rolled his eyes taking a few steps closer to his doppelganger. Both men exuded confidence and intimidation towards one another. “Watch yourself, Nash. I have her heart, just as she has mine.”

“You can keep the little lady, for all I care. She’s just good company, you would know that all too well, wouldn’t you Harry? And what do you know, she still owes me a favor. A favor in exchange for my help. I could have easily said no and kept the both of you separated because why would I care if her little heart remains broken and she loses sleep every night over it?” Nash bit down on the inside of his cheek, ignoring that mental image.

Harry glowered at Nash’s cocky words. “When I get back, I’m going to make you regret those words.”

“Look, I’m not interested in her, Harry. Get over yourself and keep her, she’s not that special anyway.” The tension and malice were intoxicating, hanging heavy in the room.

“Are you kidding me? I’m literally in your mi-”

“-Zhe petit fluer ‘as been overworking ‘erself again.” Nash jumped slightly at the new voice, letting out a frustrated breath before turning his gaze towards the French-accented voice. “And you two are ‘ere arguing over ‘er like ‘igh school boys.” Sherloque stood on the other side of the bed as he examined the papers from his height. He was clearly annoyed at both Nash and Harry, narrowing his eyes with an icy look on his face. “Merde, if you want to ‘ash it out, at least ‘ave zhe decency to do it outside,” Sherloque pointedly spoke, crossing his arms.

Harry and Nash briefly looked at each other before moving their gazes back to Sherloque only to find an empty space beside you. Sherloque had retreated back into Nash’s mind in order to sort things out with Wolfgang and the others. J'ai parlé de mes deux cents à ces deux-là. Sherloque took off his fedora and weaved a hand through his dark locks, glancing at the Nexus of Nash’s mind. “Et ce n'est pas bon de se mentir à toi-même, Nash,” the Frenchmen whispered with a knowing glint in his eyes, a stoic smile on his face.

You scrunched your nose and shuffled into a different position on the bed, almost knocking off a binder stack. Harry ignored Nash’s existence, taking a seat on the chair beside your sleeping form and noticing something that anyone else would have missed if they had not been together with you. Nash watched his Earth-2 doppelganger, seeing a certain look cross through Harry’s eyes. Harry slowly reached a hand out only to drop it knowing that he wouldn’t be able to touch you in this state. His hand formed into a tight fist as he dropped it by his side. Harry heavily sighed, shutting his eyes and running a hand through his hair. Nash raked his teeth over his bottom lip, feeling a tiny shred of guilt at Harry’s inability to be here with you. Reopening his azure irises, Harry’s heart stung, and it reverberated throughout his entire being. Oh, how he yearned to hold you again. To be able to wrap his arms around you and pull you close for warmth.

“She’s still cold,” Harry commented his observation, a slightly sullen expression creeping on his face. He readjusted his glasses. Nash raised an eyebrow at Harry’s words. “Just remember what I said. She’s not a prize. After everything you’ve done, she’d never willingly choose you in any lifetime.”

Nash blinked and Harry was gone, the explorer immediately regained composure of himself and his surroundings. Nash felt the tension leave his body, stretching a bit to relieve his muscles. I swear if I roll my eyes hard enough, they’ll fall out of their sockets. With a sigh, Nash gave you one last look before reluctantly shedding off his jacket and pulling it over you. The dark-haired man left the room without sparing you another glance.

What is even considered a prize anymore?

***

It’s been a couple weeks since you had entered Nash’s mind and spoken to the Wells men. Since then they had collectively collaborated with Barry, Cisco, and Chester via Nash to make necessary modifications and electro-/neuro-magnetic adjustments. “I present to you attempt #29,” Cisco announces, sliding out from behind the machinery, with a tool in hand, “which coincidently is the same number of one of my favorite Pokémon from the original 151 of the benevolent Kanto region.”

“Female Nidoran?” You and Barry both questioned the looked at each other. Nidoran is a pretty decent Pokémon, not gonna lie. Poison capabilities that are deadly with a combination of ground-type moves can really have opponents running for the hills without the proper Pokémon to counter its abilities and possible move-sets.

“What? She’s literally a freaking queen in battle and her move-set has been improving tremendously with every generation.”

“To be honest, Cisco, you always struck me for a Poliwag kind of guy when I first met you,” you quipped up. “But I got to say (Insert Favorite Pokémon Type)-types are more my style.

“Nerds,” Nash snickered to himself lowly. You whipped your head back to him, not clearly hearing his exact murmured words, but hearing his voice. The others didn’t hear anything. Nash dropped his gaze away avoiding your look, but not before narrowing his eyes at you. You just continued on with a questioning look, this time your thoughts circulating on if you’d done anything to offend this Wells doppelganger.

He’s been avoiding you since you had entered his mind, which at first you respected because having someone else enter your mind and intrude is weird enough, so you gave him his space. But then it started to turn into him throwing annoyed looks at you when you spoke, gradually and fully ignoring your existence in the Labs as the days went by. Even to the point of not seeking you for medical attention like he normally did when he injured himself in some way. Instead, Nash went to see Caitlin.  

At first you thought nothing of it, Nash probably had his reasons for not wanting to speak to you and you had done nothing wrong in reality that you could recall. But then your anxiety continued to climb as one day passed after another. I’m not a bad physician, am I? I mean, I hope I not. I’ve been doing my best to suture and isolate every variable in order to make correct diagnostics. Nash even ignored you when you asked him if he wanted any coffee when you went on coffee runs. Was it the coffee pun I made? Everyone laughed at it.

“How are the modifications to the dimensional extrapolator coming along?” You asked turning your gaze back to the boys. You sort of regretted asking because you know that they’re going to start talking all quantum physics and math at you.

“Well, after analyzing the multiverse extrapolator and running diagnostics it’s… actually not fit to be modified,” Chester explained, holding up the piece of tech.

“Is that the bad news?” You raised an eyebrow at them, glancing back at Nash for any input, but were greeted with silence.

“I mean, this little baby over here may not be as functional as before, but it does still hold a variety of multiversal coordinates. In which we could cross reference those numbers with any pocket dimension coordinates that we happen to stumble across. Which I’ve got to say is so friggen cool! My world just keeps exploding, first there were multiple universes and doppelgangers, then black holes- but I created that on accident- my bad, by the way-” Chester continued in a quick ramble with a huge and excited grin on his face. If you didn’t know better, he seemed as eccentric as the energizer bunny, you just nodded along politely. “-And now we’ve got pocket dimensions! We really are breaking all the rules of physics-”

“-Chester, grab me the-”

Barry leaned in close, cutting off your focus from Chester’s hyper rant and Cisco’s shout, “We basically need to develop a new extrapolator.”

“That makes much more sense, but I was following Chester’s rant, thank-you-very-much. Sort of. ” you nodded sheepishly at your friend before sending him a teasing smile. Barry held his hands up in defeat. Barry let out a laugh. “How’s Iris?”

The speedster nodded, directing his gaze to the side so you two can side bar. “She’s doing ok, keeping an eye on Eva while running the Citizen. The headaches have receded, but she’s a bit disoriented at times. I’ve had Cisco and Chester install different meta security measures in case Black Hole decides to make a guest appearance.”

“But is she ok? Mentally?”

“She’s… jumpy at times. Iris told me she trusted Eva when she entered Joseph’s hidden lab. That Eva was the reason that she doubted herself in seeing the truth and her instinct that Iris’s always trusted. She told Kamilla the same thing. We’re trying to work through it.”

You patted Barry’s back, “Just let me know if I can do anything to help. If it means anything, Harry taught me how to use his pulse rifle for a worst-case scenario.” You grinned up at him, secretly always wanted to have a reason to put your sessions with Harry to the test.

Barry chuckled and shook his head, knowing that Harry would kill him if he had allowed you to be put in harm’s way. “I think we’ll be good, but thanks for the tip.” You pouted at your best friend before a small laugh leaves your lips.

Nash took a glimpse of you over his shoulder as you giggled at your best friend. He thanked the stars that he was able to reuse the tech from an older MAD produced by Harry and synthesized it to become a mental block between him and the other Wells so that they wouldn’t interfere with his thoughts or pop up randomly. Nash called it Psyche Block. All he had to was to make sure it was on whenever he was in the labs. She hasn’t been sleeping well. He could oddly tell with one look. That small moment of weakness allowed the sharpened tool in his hand to slip his grip and pierce the skin through his entire palm. The dark-haired Wells let out a sudden gasp, blood oozed out profusely. A few droplets had fallen onto the hard drive of the Neural Splicer, short-circuiting it. Your ears caught the noise somehow, frowning your eyes caught Nash leaving with quick steps.

“I-I gotta go…” you whipped your head back to Barry, who had watched the glances that you had thrown at the Wells doppelganger since you entered the room. You pointed to the Speed Lab’s exit, “Do this… this thing.” Barry nodded with a teasing grin at your awkward attempt to excuse yourself, gesturing towards to door.

You were already leaving as you spoke to the speedster. Entering the corridor with swift feet you slightly managed to catch up to Nash. Damn him and his long legs.

“Nash!”

Nash’s blood ran cold at the sound of your voice. He willed himself to not look back, instead to carry on his way to the Med Bay. You saw that he clearly ignored you, which caused an ache to echo throughout your body. With every fiber of your being, you sprinted forward as fast as you could to come to a stop right in front of him causing the geological myth-buster to stop as well, midway to the medical room with an irritated façade on his features. Nash remained silent as you caught your breath, he held a cautious hand out to put up distance between you both, to not have you come any closer.

You opened your mouth to question him instantly at his gesture, but your eyes quickly caught sight of his bloodied hand. Sharp instincts assessing that the wound had been the cause of his escape from the Speed Lab. “You’re hurt.” You ignored his eye roll, taking a step forward and snatching his hand gingerly to examine it. He hadn’t realized that he stopped you with his bloodied hand. The droplets of red had splattered onto the concrete floor, creating a puddled mess of crimson. “Nash this needs stitches. Immediately.” Looking up at him, Nash exhaled roughly side-glancing away in frustration before meeting you with cold eyes. But you did not yield under the coldness. “I can suture this. All we nee-”

“-I don’t need your help,” was his rapid and frosty response. He blinked at you, holding his ground.

“Then who’s help are you going to need, huh!? Caitlin? Last time I checked she was at her mother’s facility because of the bullet-light-energy shot that Black Hole gave her,” You frowned deeply at him with fiery eyes, you had never combusted like this in a really long time. “Can you suture this by yourself?” You asked rhetorically. “This cut is too deep to just put a band aid on it and call it a day.” Nash opened his mouth to retaliate, but you cut him off in a softer voice. “I know that you hate me,” Nash narrowed his eyes at those words, “but let me help you.”

Nash pursed his lips, looking into your pleading eyes and inwardly cursed himself. With a sigh, the older man followed you to the Med Bay, where you proceeded to stitch him up and fully sterilize the wound from the blood and bacteria/bacteriophages that could enter the cut.

“You’re only looking after me because of Harry.” You heart stopped at the sudden words, slicing the air of the room. “What? Nash, that’s not true.”

Nash let out a mirthless laugh. “Isn’t it?”

“It’s not, I can’t believe you would even think that.” You berated him with a serious look, but he just waved you off. You pursed your lips at the silence. “Why do you hate me?” You looked up as you finished your work, eyes meeting his light blue colored ones that you had stared into before. Nash licked his lips, eyes darting to anything else, avoiding the kicked puppy look on your face.

“I don’t hate you.”

“Was it the coffee pun?”

“No”

“The Pokémon nerd talk?”

“Unfortunately, no”

“Then, what is it?”

“It’s- I…” He started, taking a breath in. “Quae dicunt, facite vobis cor eius. Quod pertinet ad eum. Nusquam potuerunt alium, qui non pertinent ad quis enim concupíscit.” The dark-haired man raked an uninjured hand through his hair as he fisted his wounded one, feeling its stitching.

“What?” You raised an eyebrow in confusion. Nash stubbornly shook his head, not wanting to repeat his words.

“Nash, I don’t understand what foreign, dead language you just spoke, but you’re my friend. I’m always going to care for my friends, even and especially when I’m involved with Harry. They’ll always be in my heart, no matter what. And that includes you too, you stubborn idiot.” You grinned at him with sincere intention, placing a hand gently on his clenched fist. A reluctant smile pulled at the corners of his mouth. “Now, you need to let that heal. So, no tech tinkering or spontaneous adventures in the middle of the day until the stitches come off, doctor’s orders.” You winked, smiling widely at him. You moved to leave the room, throwing one last look back at him.

Don’t- Don’t fucking do that, Nash bittersweetly thought to himself as he rubbed his face when you left the room. Don’t give me that… that smile, saying things like that. He sighed for the nth time that day, unfurling his hand to observe your handiwork.

***

You entered Nash’s mindscape once more, searching for Harry to spend some time with him. Nash had opted to stay behind until you were ready to leave his mind, particularly moody about not wanting to see his doppelgangers because he sees enough of them. He had upgraded the MAD 2.0 so that Cecile’s presence and powers wouldn’t be required for today. Nash, the Wells, and the Team Flash boys have been working closely the past couple of days to ensure that the Psyche Segregator (that’s the current name for all the machines interwoven together) would be fully functional. The extrapolator was essentially finished, it just needed the proper orientation for dimensional coordinates that the Wells doppelgangers would need to report.

You walked down the rocky caves of Nash’s mind before hitting a modern looking corridor that similarly belonged to a level in STAR Labs. With a questioning look, your feet continued on as you decided the top floor would be the place that Harry should reside in with Sherloque and Wolfgang. Entering the vacant elevator and ascended each level, you soon found yourself in front of what looks to be Harry’s office from Earth-2.I guess you can change the layout of things if you’re the Mindscape’s master. You pushed the door open, the lights automatically illuminating the room before scanning the area to find it vacant. Your shoulders sagged a bit. Where is he? I thought Nash told Harry that I was coming. Glancing around a bit, you took a seat at the main desk, finding Harry’s glasses. You made the mistake of putting them on as Harry entered the room with a coffee mug in hand. Harry froze at the door as your gaze instantly locked onto his, glasses still on his face. You blinked at one another. It didn’t take long from a wicked grin to cross his handsomely rugged features at the sight of you.

“Don’t you know you shouldn’t take what’s not yours?” Harry shut the door and came around the desk. So he decided not to show up this time. Harry quickly dismissed the thought from his mind, shifting his focus more to you. He noted your exhaustion and would berate you regarding it later.

“Who said they couldn’t be mine?” You teased back as you stood up, slipping the black frames off you and folding them to clip the glasses onto the collar of your top. Harry let out a deep chuckle, a giggle leaving your own. Your boyfriend set down his cup of java on the upper corner of the desk and dipped down to kiss you. He nipped at your lips when you responded to his sweet kiss before pulling away. Harry enjoyed the slight flush on your cheeks, a reaction only he could elicit with his existence. “What was that for?”

“What? I can’t give my lady a kiss?”

This smooth fucker. The heat in your heart intensified at his words and adoring gaze. You were going to unclip his glasses and hand them to him, but his hand stopped you. To anyone observing the scene, they can literally see heart eyes happening between the two of you. “Your lady may want more than just a simple kiss,” You giggled, your voice lowly enticing before pulling him back in, cupping his face with steady hands as your lips collided. Harry let out a laugh against your mouth, bracing his arms around your waist only to maneuver you to sit atop the cool desk.

Gasping at the sudden movement, Harry pushed his tongue into your mouth. You allowed him to slot himself between your legs, pulling him closer and running feather-light touches through his untamed hair. He groaned against you at your touch. God, you missed this closeness! Every time his lips met yours in fervor his grip on your hips would tighten slightly, sending a small shiver to run down your spine. How is it that this all feels so real?

His name escaped your swollen lips when Harry decided to head south, nipping at the nape of your neck before sucking on your sweet spots. How could he forget where you’re most vulnerable to his touch? Your hands gripped onto his shirt. A small noise left your lips, tilting your head more to the side to give the Harry more access to continue his conquest. The room felt hot, your body on fire at every one of Harry’s kisses as he marked your skin. You breathed his name again and Harry could not think straight. One of his strong hands left your side and cradled your face as his lips re-connected with yours once more in a searing kiss. His thumb gently stroked your cheek. How can the way you simply utter his name allow Harrison Wells to abandon all self-control?

Sherloque strode into the room with his cup of tea only to almost drop it at the scandalous scene in front of him. “Mon Dieu! Ayez de la décence!” You and Harry had ripping apart from each other at the sudden outburst, both of your heads snapping towards him. Harry sent a glare at Sherloque, who responded with an annoyed eyeroll at the couple. “At least lock zhe door if you’re going to get all ‘andsy wizh each ozher,” the detective grumbled before leaving the room and shutting the door. Your cheeks were on fire at this point, opting to look at your folded hands that rest on your lap. But Harry did not look ashamed in the slightest, instead a smirk on his face at your sudden bashfulness. You soon snapped out of your embarrassment when a thought had crossed your mind.

“Harry?”

“Hm?”

“Did you say anything to Nash?”

“No,” he lied, glancing up towards the ceiling.

“Uh huh,” you looked at him dubiously with narrowed eyes, “you know that I can tell when you’re lying, right?” You spoke with crossed arms.

“…” Harry’s eyes met yours and you raised a questioning eyebrow at him for an answer. He briefly shut his eyes before reopening them, “I may have… warned him not to come near you and such.”

“Warned or seriously threatened to utterly destroy?”

“… maybe a bit of both…”

“Harry!”

“What?! Do you not see the way he looks at you?”

“The way he what!? Harry, he’s my friend. Just like Sherloque and HR.” You sighed as he pouted sheepishly at you. “Honestly, you know I only have eyes for you.”

“I know, it’s just…” Harry trailed off.

“It’s just?”

“I’m not here. Physically here, to be by your side. To go home with you at the end of the day. Especially at the labs when other versions of myself show up out of nowhere and seem to try to get all chummy with you.”

You blinked at Harry a few times. “Are you… jealous?” Harry didn’t respond, grumpily frowning at your words as he attempted to avoid your gaze. He didn’t like that word. “You are, aren’t you?” The butterflies in your stomach fluttered as you teased him, knowing that his silence was proof enough. Harry sighed, pulling you in a close hug and you felt his head nod in dejection. Harry didn’t want to admit it out loud, that’s just how he is. You rubbed his back, “You know it’s ok to be jealous, right?” Harry let out a sarcastic exhale, resting his chin on your shoulder. You kissed the side of his head, “How do you think I felt every time a young bachelorette sauntered her way towards you at all those galas that we attended? All those thirst cubes you kept receiving? I swear Jesse had to hold me back before I was about to throw some hands, verbally and politely, but effectively scathing.”

Harry snickered at how you’ve dubbed the cubes he’s received from various women ‘thirst cubes’. “Every night, you were the only thing that I would see.” You gave him a tight squeeze before pulling away to give him a soft kiss.

“And you’re the only Wells that my heart wants to be with.” You smiled up at him before it suddenly dropped.

“What?” Fear grappled Harry’s heart. “What is it?”

You swallowed your own fear that had climbed into your throat. “It’s just… this is the last time that I’ll see you before… we have the systems go online to-” You trailed off as you directed your gaze to the ground, gesturing to your theory going into action as you did so. Harry pursed his lips, tilting your head up to look at him. Your eyes glistened in the calm lighting of the office, your voice cracking, “I’m not going to be there when you wake up, Harry.” The realization struck him as well, his eyes glancing down for a split second before meeting yours again.

“I’ll still find you. I’ll still come for you on Earth-Prime.”

There was a sudden knock at the door that snapped yours and Harry’s attention towards it, followed by a clearing of the throat and a thick German accent. “If you bozh are done in zhere, I’d like for eine kleine assembly to ‘appen.”

***

Diese beiden schwöre ich. “I don’t… even vant to know vhat you two vere doing.” Wolfgang deadpanned, holding blueprints in one hand and adjusting his glasses. Sherloque stood beside him with a new cup of tea in hand, this time without a fedora.

“We would never-”

“-We were having fun.”

You stumbled over your own words while Harry had owned up to his. You failed to realize the light hickies still on your neck until Wolfgang narrowed his eyes at you and Sherloque rolled his eyes as he watched the exchange. Harry knew they were there; he just didn’t point out that they were visible arm’s length away. Damn it, Harry! Your cheeks heated up and now you’re wondering if your real body now has hickies on them because there’s about to be some words thrown your way by two or three particular members of Team Flash.

“Ah ah ah ah, nein. None of zhat,” the German waved you two off with his hand, “just keep your ‘ormones at a decent level until ve get our bodies back. Zhen you two idiotenliebhaber can do whatever it is you two do when not in a crisis.” You dipped your head down shyly, but that didn’t stop your boyfriend from nudging your side and giving you a smug-ass grin. You glowered at him as he wiggled his eyebrows at you before Wolfgang caught your attention again. “Anyvay, ve need to discuss somezhing else vizh you. Sherloque und I vill also be coming to Earzh-Eins.”

“Why?”

“In case,” Harry started, “I don’t make it in time to recalibrate the Multiversal Communications Projector before all the others. Earth-Prime will essentially give the green light to the others in the multiverse to send in their coordinates.”

“We’ve already figured out Earzh-Prime’s dimensionale coordinates,” Sherloque added in. “Une sécurité intégrée vaut mieux que rien.”

You nodded at their words. I mean it makes sense, but… Wolfgang took out a couple sheets of paper that had been rolled up and hidden in the rolled-up blueprint file, handing it to you. “What’s this?”

“Ein liste of names of all the present Vells who’s neurological vavelengths are entangled vith Nash’s,” Wolfgang stated nonchalantly. “It seems zhat some Earzh are either permanently vacant or do not ‘ave ein Vells.”

“Like Kara’s Earth, old Earth I guess,” You responded, holding the sheets. “She’s Supergirl, used to live on Earth-38. Barry had accidentally multiverse jumped to Earth-38, thanks to Harry. He said that no one from Team Flash’s doppelgangers were on Earth-38, unlike Earth-2 and Earth-19.” Earth-19 Your eyes scanned the list; Wolfgang had done you a great favor in numbering it in Earth order. Could he..? The thought was soon shut out as you looked through the list.

Harry watched as your shoulders sagged, knowing who you were looking for. He pocketed his hands as a fake smile plastered itself onto your face.

***

The day had finally come. It’s time for the boys to come back home. Everyone had gathered in the Speed Lab. The machinery interconnected to one another as if interwoven into one mechanical creature. Your heart pounded in your chest and those dubious thoughts returned, but you willed them back. You needed to believe that this can work. Chester and Cisco were calibrating the tablets and satellites, running newer and improved diagnostics for this moment.

“That favor, that you owe me,” Nash’s voice caught your attention, snapping you out of your trance. You looked up at him with a quizzical look.

“Yeah?”

“I’m cashing it in,” Nash’s voice rasped as he took your hand. You humored the geological explorer. “Protect Allegra,” he whispered, his eyes glancing in her direction as her was turned because she was added the finishing touches with Cisco. The simple wish had surprised you, yet at the same time it didn’t in the slightest. “Please.” He sounded like a dying man marching to his death. And in a way he was if this doesn’t work.

“Always,” you nodded at him. Leaning up, you kissed his forehead softly before placing the Psyche Segregator on his head. “Thank you.” Nash remained silent and only closed his eyes as he sat back down. Releasing a breath, he reopening those piercing blue eyes filled with determination, but you can see that behind it there was a form of fear. He nodded. You nodded back at him, taking a step backwards before looking at the others. It’s time. Cisco handed you the tablet that held the ignition keys. You took in a breath, the weight of the tablet seemingly heavier than ever before. A multiverse of lives held within the tips of your fingers, only fate will decide if they live or die.

Your eyes met Nash’s one last time. Doubt choked your heart, but there was no going back. “Here we go,” you spoke each word slowly before pressing the button to ignite the Psyche Segregator.

Translations (Via Google Translate):

French

J'ai parlé de mes deux cents à ces deux-là - I've spoken my two cents to those two

Et ce n'est pas bon de se mentir à toi-même, Nash - And it's not good to lie to yourself, Nash.

Mon Dieu! Ayez de la décence! - My god! Have some decency!

Une sécurité intégrée vaut mieux que rien - A failsafe is better than nothing

Latin

Quae dicunt, facite vobis cor eius - Your heart is its own treasure

Quod pertinet ad eum - It belongs to him

Nusquam potuerunt alium, qui non pertinent ad quis enim concupíscit. - It could never belong to anyone else who yearns for you.

German

Idiotenliebhaber - idiot lovers

Diese beiden schwöre ich - These two, I swear

[stylesnews]

People as famous as Harry Styles are almost never alone. From the cadre of security guards, stylists, publicists, managers, and hangers-on, a small army necessarily follows wherever they go. As irony dictates, though, fame, especially on the level that Styles has experienced since One Direction became the only thing young girls cared about in 2010, is curiously isolating. And while the 25-year-old often appears remarkably at ease with his surroundings—his dimpled smile never falters, not even at the apex of 1D’s fandemonium—a poignant fear of loneliness courses through Styles's magnificent second album, Fine Line, out now.

“I don’t wanna be alone,” the singer admits on the shimmying album-opener “Golden.” Belying the warm tones of the accompanying slide-guitar, glockenspiel, and summery da-da-da backing vocals, he continues: “Don’t wanna let you know,” he sings, comfortable and in the center of his range, “I don’t wanna be alone/But I can feel it take a hold.” On “To Be So Lonely,” driven by a toe-tapping double cello bass rhythm, he’s drunk and desperate to fill the void. “Don’t blame the drunk caller,” he begs an ex-lover. “I wasn’t ready for it all.” Later, on the same cut, he explains. “It’s hard for me to go home/And be so lonely." It’s a startling one-two punch of vulnerability from the 21st century's emergent rock god. In an age of highly curated Instagram feeds and meticulously managed celebrity images, he’s dedicated the LP to “all that I’ve done. The good and the bad.” “That is life,” he writes in the collection’s liner notes. Styles may be talking about the mixed bag of experiences that define reality, but the same could be said of Fine Line. A candid autobiography written in technicolor rock n’ roll, it’s an album about Becoming and across its 12 songs, bears remarkable witness to a young man in the middle of self-reckoning. The singer landed his first surprise back in 2017 with his self-titled solo debut. The easy-rolling set bucked the very established path set by Justin Timberlake and boybanders going solo, like Nick Jonas and Styles’ former group groupmate, Zayn Malik: embrace R&B and hip-hop, immediately assert that yes, you have sex. Lots of it. Instead, Styles dressed his introspective musings in the trappings of 1970s soft-rock. The results were enthralling, as he confidently toyed with “Blackbird”-era Beatles and Bowie. Fine Line is less concerned about honoring Styles's idols, though, and more interested in experimenting with the furthest corners of his curiosity. Save for an appearance from Greg Kurstin (Beck, Adele), who lends a hand to the transcendent “Sunflower, Vol. 6,” many of his cohorts are familiar from Harry Styles: super-producer Jeff Bhasker, one of the main architects of the Hot 100’s current sound via his work with Bruno Mars, Kanye West, Katy Perry, and a wide swath of others; songwriter-producer (and Bhasker acolyte) Tyler Johnson (Taylor Swift, Cam); and Kid Harpoon (Florence + the Machine, Maggie Rogers). Together they find a thrilling new sonic terrain—one where gooey Fleetwood Mac-style melodies get wrapped in mille-feuille-esque layers of synth, Crosby, Stills, & Nash-reminiscent acoustic strummers get sandwiched between psychedelic trips to fantasy land, and electric-sitar solos scream of yesterday and tomorrow. It’s also full of tantalizing lyrical Easter eggs, for those (many!) fans who crave them. He follows with the regret-soaked “Falling,” a moving lullaby of self-realization. “And there’s no one to blame but the drink and my wandering hands,” he confides early about his break-up. “What am I now?/What if I'm someone I don't want around?” he sings repeatedly throughout the chorus. “What if I’m someone you won't talk about?,” he adds, his voice reaching its desperate edge as the song peaks. It’s an almost impossible insecurity to consider, as all we want is more.

[kirisaki-daichi-scenarios]

perks of dating the assholes you write about? i mean, their S/O gotta stay for Something(TM),,

what makes you think their s/o gets to choose when to leave (and i take it you mean, their s/o s/o, and not just the s/o they’re messing with)

(have partially done this in relationship pros + cons posts, so will add a link below for that too)

Hara Kazuya

radiates a lotta body heat, which is very convenient for cuddles in winter

if you get anxious about ordering at restaurants or talking to people in public, hara’s always happy to do it for you (unless he’s tryna tease you)

he doesn’t get embarassed easily which makes for a lotta entertaining dares

down for pda, if that’s your thing 

more

Hanamiya Makoto

good at sounding intellectual for when he meets your family

people at school won’t bother you once they know you’re with him

(also he’s on the disciplinary committee: you won’t get into trouble when you’ve got him backing you up)

down with chill reading dates, or pretty much just low pressure dates in general

more

Furuhashi Kojiro

like hanamiya, no one dares mess with you, but x10

strikes me as the kind of person to be able to find the book they’ looking for, in a library, in seconds - a handy skill for a boyfriend

will discuss books with you; strikes me as someone good with character/plot analyses

calm in stressful/serious situations

more

Yamazaki Hiroshi

maybe he’s not the best chef in the world but, the dishes he can make, he makes v well

and by ^^ i mean, he’ll learn to cook your favourite food

the kind of guy that’s up for a date at any hour, anywhere (as long as it’s not crime)

kinda irrelevant but quick to bail you out of jail if need be

more

Seto Kentaro

nights sleep next to him are proven to get you well needed 10/10 rest

interesting/intellectual/deep conversations, about any topic really

has a calming vibe around him, which is useful if you feel yourself getting anxious

can be That instagram boyfriend if needed (takes p good photos)

more

Haizaki Shougo

likes to wrap his arm around your waist + pull you close

another good bodyguard bf for when you’re wandering around town late at night (tbh he’s the kind of person people tend to be afraid of)

knows a lotta pick up lines, for any situation, which can make for some fun times

knows his first aid (though there’ll be no first aid for the person that hurt you)

more

Nash Gold Jr

teaches you self defence - a surprisingly good coach, who knows a variety of martial art styles

like pretty much every other character here, he’ll always protect you as long as he still likes you

and no one - and i mean no one - will even look at you in the wrong way when you’re hanging with jabberwock

touchy in a good way: has his arm over your shoulders, or a hand on your thigh, doesn’t mind you resting your head on him

attractively possessive (if that’s your thing)

Imayoshi Shouichi

butterfly kisses (though not in public)

a good advisor on which horse to bet on, if you’re also into racing

if you’re into spontaneous dates, he’s happy to provide (a Hasty lad)

 a good tutor (especially for maths) if you really need the help

more

[amer-ainu]

In 1973, three young activists in New York City recorded A Grain of Sand: Music for the Struggle by Asians in America. Singing of their direct lineage to immigrant workers as well as their affinity with freedom fighters everywhere, Chris Kando Iijima, Nobuko JoAnne Miyamoto, and William “Charlie” Chin recorded the experiences of the first generation to identify with the term and concept Asian American—a pan-ethnic association formulated upon a shared history of discrimination. They sought a connection to their cultural heritage; to claim their historical presence in the United States; to resist their marginalization; and to mobilize solidarity across class, ethnic, racial, and national differences. Music provided a powerful means for expressing their aspiration to reshape a society reeling from a prolonged war, ongoing struggles against racial inequity, and revelations of the Watergate cover-up. As writer and activist Phil Tajitsu Nash would state many decades later, A Grain of Sand was “more than just grooves on a piece of vinyl,” it was “the soundtrack for the political and personal awareness taking place in their lives.” Equal parts political manifesto, collaborative art project, and organizing tool, it is widely recognized as the first album of Asian American music.

A Grain of Sand was produced by Paredon Records. Over the course of 15 years, Paredon founders Irwin Silber and Barbara Dane amassed a catalog of 50 titles reflecting their commitment to the music of peace and social justice movements. In 1991, to ensure its ongoing accessibility, Silber and Dane donated the Paredon catalog to the Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections at the Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage, through which these recordings and their original liner notes remain available to the public.

THE MUSIC While the message of the album was by no means mainstream, the music through which Chris, Nobuko, and Charlie expressed their political and social convictions was reflective of the popular genres of the period. The 12 songs on A Grain of Sand were shaped by the American folk music revival, blues, soul, and jazz. For instance, “The Wandering Chinaman” is in the form of a traditional ballad. “We Are the Children” is more of a folk-rock anthem. “Divide and Conquer” and “Free the Land,” with their bass and percussion lines, are driven by a soul groove. “Something About Me Today” and “War of the Flea,” are instrumentally stark, emphasizing Nobuko’s voice against the counterpoint of Chris and Charlie’s guitar lines. All of their songs are notably written in the first person and directly encourage the listener to action: “Hold the banner high...”; “Will you answer...”; “Take a stand....”

Intending to take their music on the road, they kept their instrumentation simple—two guitars and three voices. For the album and in some performances, they were backed by conga and bass, and other instruments such as the di zi, a Chinese transverse flute that Charlie played.

A Grain of Sand was mostly compiled over a two-day period from first or second takes. Charlie compares their 4-track recording process to more technically sophisticated commercial productions as the difference between “a folding chair and a Maserati.” And perhaps because of these conditions, the recording is animated by the spontaneity and energy of a live performance. Arlan Huang, who created the artwork for the album jacket, remembers, “It was fresh as can be. There was nothing else like it. The power of their lyrics was aimed at people like me. They were saying things that I had thought about but hadn’t put into words or painting. And they were GOOD. It wasn’t like seeing your buddies at the neighborhood hootenanny strumming a guitar. Nobuko could actually sing.”

THE ARTISTS Chris, Nobuko, and Charlie, who were in their twenties and thirties in the early 1970s, arrived at their collaboration via routes that reflect the legacies of migration and exclusion.

Nobuko JoAnne Miyamoto (b. 1939). Nobuko’s mother was born in the United States, the daughter of Japanese immigrants; her father was the son of a Japanese immigrant father and a White Mormon mother from Idaho. The family was living in Los Angeles when World War II broke out and all people of Japanese ancestry on the West Coast were forcibly removed from their communities. To get his family out of the Santa Anita racetrack where they were initially confined, Nobuko’s father volunteered to harvest sugar beets in Montana. From there the family moved to Idaho and then to Utah before they were allowed to return to Los Angeles after the war. Despite this instability, Nobuko was encouraged by both parents in her study of music and dance. By the 1960s, she had been a scholarship student at the American School of Dance in Hollywood; performed with Alicia Alonso’s ballet company; and performed in the original Broadway production of Flower Drum Song, as well as in the film adaptation of West Side Story, where she was cast as one of Maria’s Puerto Rican dress-shop companions. She had also discovered the limitations of being an Asian in the mainstream entertainment industry. In 1968, she helped Italian filmmaker Antonello Branca to document the Black Panther Party for his film Seize the Time. Through this project, she met Yuri Kochiyama, a Harlem community activist and friend of the late Malcolm X, who subsequently introduced Nobuko to civil rights organizing in the local Asian and African American communities.

Chris Kando Iijima (1948–2005). Both of Chris’s parents, Americans of Japanese ancestry, were originally from California but raised their family in New York City, where they resettled after their World War II incarceration. Their example and consciousness significantly contributed to A Grain of Sand. Chris’s father was a musician and choirmaster, who took his children to the 1963 March on Washington. His mother—inspired by the educational and cultural activities integral to the Black Power movement—co-founded the organization Asian Americans for Action (Triple A) in 1969 to instill the same kind of pride in local Asian American youth. Chris attended the High School of Music and Art in Harlem, where he studied French horn, though he also played guitar.

Chris and Nobuko met in Triple A; and they wrote their first song and performed together in 1969 at a conference of the Japanese American Citizens League, where they joined other young people in urging the organization to oppose the war in Vietnam. Nobuko recalls, “We sang a song that was the collective expression of our Asian brothers and sisters to stop the killing of people who looked like us. The electricity of that moment, the realization that, until then, we had never heard songs about us, set the course of my journey.” When they returned to New York, Chris and Nobuko wrote more songs and began to perform locally and in California. A year later they met Charlie Chin.

William “Charlie” Chin (b. 1944). Charlie’s father came to New York City from Toisan, China; his mother, who was of mixed Chinese, Carib, and Venezuelan ancestry, was born in New York but raised in Trinidad. Growing up in Queens, Charlie’s musical upbringing was comprised of the Trinidadian forms played by his mother’s relatives and those emanating from the American folk music revival. Inspired by Pete Seeger, Charlie took up the banjo, but he also played cuatro, auto harp, and guitar. In the late 1960s, he toured the country with Cat Mother and the All Night News Boys. After he left the group, he returned to New York, where he worked as a bartender. In 1970, he ended up backing Chris and Nobuko by chance at a performance for a conference of new Asian American community groups, student organizations, and activists at Pace College. He recalls, “I’m at the conference, and all the things they are talking about—Asian Americans, how history impacts us, how we have been apologetic about being Asian. And there’s been this hanging question for me, ever since I had taught Appalachian 5-string banjo at a folk music camp, ‘Where is my history? Where is my culture?’ So I go on with them. And I’m listening—I have never heard this stuff before. This is amazing. So the first time I ever hear them play, I’m playing with them.”

For the next three years, the trio performed at Buddhist temples, churches, colleges, community centers, coffeehouses, rallies, prisons, and parks in New York and across the country. “We became like griots,” Nobuko says, “Moving like troubadours from community to community—we’d say, ‘This is what is going on in New York…and we have this Chinatown health program going on,’ and we would carry this news to Sacramento and L.A. and Stockton and San Francisco. And then we’d gather stories from there and carry it back to New York. We were like the YouTube of the times—spreading the news.”

THE MOVEMENT Coming of age during the civil rights and anti-war movements, the children and grandchildren of Asian immigrants unleashed a whirlwind of grassroots activism beginning in the late 1960s. Around the country, they protested the war. They demanded ethnic studies curricula. They organized against urban renewal projects that displaced the residents of old Chinatowns and Japantowns. They formed literary workshops, art collectives, and social service centers. A Grain of Sand was a direct extension of Chris, Nobuko, and Charlie’s collaboration in the Asian American Movement.

One important community that provided support and inspiration for A Grain of Sand was Basement Workshop, an Asian American collective in New York’s Chinatown. Formed in 1970, they ran a creative arts program, a resource center for community documentation, and a youth employment program; produced a magazine; and offered language and citizenship classes. In 1971, Basement Workshop undertook a project to illustrate and publish the music of Chris, Nobuko, and Charlie. Titled Yellow Pearl, after one of their songs, it grew into a larger compilation of writing, art, and music. Public artist Tomie Arai emphasizes the importance of Basement and A Grain of Sand during this period: “You have to understand. There wasn’t anything at all out there. There was no music. No published poetry, music, recordings. Nothing. It was through Basement that people began to refer to themselves as artists. I didn’t know any artists. I wanted to be one—but I didn’t know what that meant.”

Fay Chiang, who served as director of Basement for 12 years, recalls that for their programs and direct actions, they also looked to the examples of other communities: “We were influenced by what was happening in the Black and Puerto Rican communities. Why not us? Who are we? It was very basic: Who are we? There was a hunger, a need to figure that out, where we felt like it was a matter life and death. The second and third generation Japanese Americans had come from the camps—and this feeling of not belonging in the society, racism, and displacement was visceral.”

Chris, Nobuko, and Charlie’s association with activists in other communities was reflected in their music. For example, “Somos Asiaticos” was inspired by their involvement with squatters’ organizations Operation Move In and El Comité. These activists opened a coffee shop on Manhattan’s Upper West Side, the Dot, which was regularly visited by singers, performers, and poets from Cuba, Chile, Peru, Puerto Rico, and the Dominican Republic. The Asian Americans who had taken over a storefront for a drop-in center down the street also congregated here. Nobuko recalled, “We were all there—artists and poets—listening to and influencing each other. We had a whole set, five songs, that we did in Spanish. One year, I think it was 1973–1974, we did more gigs for Latino groups than for Asian groups.” In fact, their first recording was done for a Puerto Rican company, Discos Coqui. Invited by two Puerto Rican Movement singers, Pepe y Flora, they recorded “Venceremos” and “Somos Asiaticos,” which were released as a 45 disc in Puerto Rico. Later, they were invited to perform at Madison Square Garden for Puerto Rican Liberation Day.

“Free the Land,” another song on A Grain of Sand, was written by Chris for the Republic of New Africa. This organization, established by a group of Malcolm X’s associates after his 1965 assassination, was the first group to call for slavery reparations—in particular in the form of an all-Black homeland in the southern states of Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and South Carolina. Atallah Muhammad Ayubbi and Dr. Mutulu Shakur, both Republic of New Africa members, performed on A Grain of Sand. Atallah worked in the Black and Puerto Rican communities in the Bronx where he grew up. He was also a conguero and sometimes accompanied the group in live performances. Dr. Mutulu Shakur, who is the godfather of Nobuko and Atallah’s son, provided background vocals on the album. He often played the album at home, and his stepson, the late rapper Tupac Shakur, grew up listening and singing along to it.

Of this time in the early 1970s, Nobuko recalls, “It was like jumping into the pool of revolution…. Every day there was organizing going on at many different levels. It was powerful. You see something wrong, you have an idea how to fix it, you put it into practice.” And about this period living on the Upper West Side, she says, “that was the first time I ever felt like I was part of a community. You would walk down the street and see people you knew, and they would ask if you were going to be at such-and-such event and could you bring food or perform. It was a dynamic moment. We were crossing borderlines, and the music helped us to do that.”

THE LEGACY The intensity of purpose and activity during this period succeed in reshaping academic, cultural, and political institutions. It also gave rise to ideological conflicts and violence that sometimes destabilized organizations and efforts. For instance, Basement Workshop was shaken internally by the accusations and criticisms of members of the Communist Workers Party. And several months after A Grain of Sand was recorded, Atallah was killed in an ambush at a Brooklyn mosque.

Charlie remembers, “We were all moving so rapidly…. Everyone believed that things could be changed if you worked on it. We in our very young innocence thought that there actually would be a revolution in this country. I assured people it would happen. And when it didn’t, I felt bad: ‘Sorry, man’, ‘Sorry, dude.’”

By late 1973 when A Grain of Sand was released, Chris, Nobuko, and Charlie were beginning to hone their sense of purpose in ways that drew them in different directions. And the album marks, in effect, one of the group’s final collective efforts, though each in their own way continued the work they had started together.

Nobuko returned to southern California. In 1978, she established the organization Great Leap, Inc., through which she initiates multicultural community performing arts collaborations in Los Angeles, as well as nationally and internationally. She continues to perform, lecture, and provide workshops based on her new music as well as on reinterpretations of the songs from A Grain of Sand. In recent years her residencies and special projects have focused on facilitating dialog across spiritual differences and on environmental issues. Active in the Senshin Buddhist Temple, she has composed music and dances that are now a regular part of the annual Buddhist observance of obon (Festival of Lanterns) in temples from California’s Central Valley to San Diego and nationally.

Charlie focused his attention in New York’s Chinatown, becoming involved in the Chinatown History Project, which became the Museum of Chinese in the Americas. He later apprenticed to a master Chinese storyteller, learning the traditional teahouse style, which he has adapted and continues to perform throughout the country. In 1991, he moved to northern California, and he now works for the Chinese Historical Society of America in San Francisco, driven by the conviction that “we know that people can be whipped into hysteria and xenophobia—we’ve seen it happen before, and it could happen again. And the only thing you can do is be vigilant and educate, educate, educate.”

Chris directed his energies to New York’s Upper West Side, where he had grown up. After 10 years of classroom teaching at Manhattan Country School, he studied and practiced law, and later became a professor in Hawai`i, where he fought for Native Hawaiian rights and mentored a generation of social justice–minded law students. He passed away in 2005 at the age of 57.

In the years just before Chris’s passing, Tadashi Nakamura, a young fourth-generation Japanese American filmmaker, began producing a documentary about him, A Song for Ourselves: A Personal Journey into the Life and Music of Asian American Movement Troubadour Chris Iijima. His film is an inspiring and melancholy portrait of Chris, covering his participation in A Grain of Sand, his reflection on his life as he confronted terminal illness, and the impact he had on others. For the film’s premiere in 2009, Nakamura invited Nobuko and Charlie to perform—and he also enlisted several young hip-hop artists. He explains: “Grain of Sand paved the way for many progressive Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders [API] to not only become musicians but cultural workers—artists who use their creativity to further a political movement. I feel very much a part of a present-day movement of API artists that are trying to document, articulate, and tell the stories of their people through their work. A talented new set of artists—such as Geologic and Sabzi of Blue Scholars, Kiwi, Bambu and DJ Phatrick—are creating the soundtrack to my generation’s movement. They are continuing the work that Chris, Nobuko, and Charlie started back in the 1960s. So when I premiered my film, I invited them to perform. I wanted to show that the legacy of A Grain of Sand is very much alive today.”

[robinmoray]

Naughty Advent, Day Nineteen

Wordcount: 770 Pairing: MM, Jack/Channon, Channon & Ben Content Tags: contemporary, established relationship, toys (talking about them) Rating: Mature Summary: Advent snippet, day nineteen. Ben wants some advice.

The picture is of… he's not sure. It's like two black balls, sort of joined together, hanging off some kind of cord. There's no context for it, nothing for size. Channon squints at it for a good thirty seconds before doing a reverse image search.

Then he hits call.

"What the hell, man?"

"Hey! Chan-man! How you doing?"

"Why are you sending me pictures of kegel balls?"

Ben's laugh sounds like he's standing in a tunnel. "Oh, you got that? It's our anniversary!"

Channon scrubs a hand over his eyes. "What do you even mean?"

"I mean it's our three year anniversary. Me and Stacey. I figured I should get her something special."

"I don't-- wait, you're getting her kegel balls?"

"Yeah! What do you think?"

Oh, for the love of God. Channon slumps down on the sofa, letting his head roll back against the cushions. "I think she's going to kick you in the nuts, dude. You're basically saying...I mean, I think you're implying she needs to do more kegels. That's kinda … whoa."

Ben makes a disappointed noise. "Fuck. Okay, what else do girls like?"

"The hell should I know?" Channon squeezes his eyes shut. "Do you remember the whole gay thing? We talked about that."

"Yeah, but Kim said--"

Channon sits up. "Kim said?"

"That you know stuff about … stuff."

"About sex toys?" Channon hears his own voice go up half an octave, and winces. Why would Kim say that? Why would she say that to Ben?

"Yeah. I asked her for advice and she said you were the man."

"Dude, she just wanted to get rid of you. I am not the man."

"She said," Ben goes on blithely, "that you got her an awesome vibrator."

"I just made a suggestion--"

"And some...sex gun."

"Bullet," Channon corrects him miserably. "No. I don't know anything about vaginas, I swear. I've never even touched a vagina. I--"

He breaks off at the pressure of a hand on his shoulder, and tilts his head back to look up into the downturn of Jack's face. Jack is smirking, as if this is all very entertaining for him.

Channon holds the phone to his chest. "Ben wants me to tell him what to get his girlfriend for their three year anniversary. I said no to kegel balls."

Jack's smirk breaks into a grin. He gestures for the phone.

Oh, shit. "Uh, Ben? I'm going to hand you to Jack."

"Jack who?"

"Jack my boyfriend."

"Dude, I don't think your twink boyfriend--"

But that's when Jack takes the phone from him, holding it up to his ear as he leans on the back of the sofa.

"Hi, Ben. This is Jack Nash. Nice to finally speak to you. Yeah, he has mentioned you. I understand you're working for your father? Right. And your girlfriend's name is… right. So, what's your budget for a present? Does that include dinner or extras? Okay." He winks at Channon, tugging Channon's tablet across the sofa and unlocking it, tapping something into the search bar. "What's her favourite thing in the world?" He snorts, rolling his eyes. "Apart from that. Okay. Hmm. Tell you what, there's a Disney on Ice show down your way in a month, I'll book you tickets. Sure, but how much do you want to get laid? I thought so. No, it's fine. Well, I have an ulterior motive--I want you to say nice things about me to Channon's mom. Yeah, it's definitely a bribe." He laughs. "Get Stacey flowers and take her somewhere nice for dinner. Wear a tie. Okay? Bye, Ben."

He hands the phone back to Channon, and kisses him on the head, before wandering back into his office with Channon's tablet.

"Hello?" Channon says, not sure exactly what just happened.

"Dude, your boyfriend is not a twink," Ben breathes.

"I told you that!"

"Yeah, but I didn't believe you." He pauses. "Is he really buying tickets to Disney on Ice for me?"

"I mean, yeah. It's the sort of thing he does."

"Why?"

"Because he wants you to say nice things about him to my mom," Channon says, grinning. "And probably so you stop asking me about sex toys for girls. Because I'm gay now and I have no idea what girls like."

"Yeah, whatever. Thanks, dude, talk to you later!"

He hangs up. Channon flops on his back, huffing out a breath. Well, at least Ben's happy.

He looks up through the open door to where Jack is standing in the middle of his office, tapping away at Channon's tablet.

Channon smiles. Yeah, he's pretty damn happy himself.

[cinnamayroll]

Romantic headcanons for Takao, Okumura, Nash, Tamaki, Kyoya, Kaoru, Mori, Nekozawa, Kasanoda and Aone with shy and quiet but kind and patient s/o please?

Starting with the second set! I hope you liked the last one ^^. I think this one is my favorite because it has Takao, Tamaki, Kyoya and Mori and they’re some of my all time favorites.

Please enjoy!

-May

Takao:

Takao definitely is a romantic at heart

he thinks up creative date ideas for the two of you, but if you don’t feel like it, he’s just as happy when you’re staying in and having a movie night

your quietness doesn’t matter to him as long as you don’t expect him to be quiet too because it’s literally the thing he’s worst at

brings you back little gifts like plushies from the Arcade

personally he likes PDA, but won’t do it when you’re too shy to

always asks for consent before he does something like kiss you in public

loves you so much for the fact that you’re patient enough to listen to him rant about his interests for hours

tells you everyday that he’s super lucky to have someone like you

encourages you to speak up, but isn’t annoying about it

“Hey, ____, you can tell me what you want!”

lots of little pecks on the lips

also lots of hugs from behind, he’s just a very affectionate guy

thinks it’s the cutest thing when you bush at his compliments and always promises that they’re all true

tries to make you laugh a lot

Okamura:

Okamura tries so hard to be romantic for you

hold doors open for you where ever you go

gives you his jacket every single opportunity he gets even if it isn’t that cold

extremely protective of you

this boy just feels so very blessed that you like him despite his height and looks, you’re perfect to him

sometimes is over the top attitude can be a little much too handle for you, but there’s no doubt he won’t do his very best to make up for it

takes you out to his favorite cafe’s and shares desserts with you

asks you if everything is okay very often when you’re quiet

also asks you if you’re okay with PDA cause he’d like the world to know you’re his s/o, but if you don’t want to that’s fine with him 

Nash:

surprisingly, Nash isn’t even that bad of guy off the court

he’s quite charming and can even be polite, it’s just his attitude on the court that is this foul

he doesn’t really mind that you’re as quiet as you are, he always has something to say

gets you lots of gifts

for dates, Nash likes to take you somewhere outside, like the beach

sometimes he gets a little aggressive when somebody is looking at you wrong and can get a bit loud, making you uncomfortable himself, but he does mean well

doesn’t give you little kisses on the forehead or cheek a lot, but when he kisses you he usually goes straight for your mouth

knows that seeing his matches would probably make you uncomfortable, he doesn’t ask to go to see them

generally speaking he isn’t the most romantic guy, but when he wants to be he can without a problem

for example he usually takes you out for fancy dinner on your birthday and then gives a party with  small number of people (even though personally, he prefers big parties)

afterwards he’ll have your home decorated with candles

don’t expect something like this on a daily base though

Tamaki:

Tamaki Suoh is quite literally the epitome of a romantic

thinks it the most adorable thing in the world tht you’re shy and quiet and made it his personal mission to protect you from all harm

while he basically lives for the drama and making a big event out of everything, he will try to tone it down a bit

is so good at reading every single one of your wishes from your eyes

when you’re down he does everything possible to make sure you have a good time

of course, your dates are extravagant and out of the ordinary

there will be a lot of flowers and fancy food

has a thing for taking you on carriage rides around his favorite places

sometimes he misinterpretes your quietness and thinks that you’re becoming annoyed with him, but he’s fine when you reassure him it’s ot his fault

loves to pick out clothes for you to wear that he thinks you’d look cute in

isn’t really a fan of PDA in the form of kissing in public either, so that’s not a issue, but when you’re alone he’s thirsty for kisses all the time

this guy is very fond of rose petals and decorates your place with them very often

on special ocasions, he takes you to France to show you around the places where he grew up

Kyoya:

to be frank, Kyoya doesn’t care if you’re shy or quiet, it is your personality and other defining traits that matter to him, like you patience and you kindness

he himself, doesn’t talk all too much when he isn’t needed to, so you two will spend a lot time just being with each other in comfortable silence

Kyoya knows exactly how to be romantic and a proper gentleman

in your everyday life, he does all the little things

holding doors open, pulling chairs back, kisses for parting, rose boquets

but he saves the really big things for special events

when christmas gets around, he takes you to another place eery ear, so you can look at the diffrent ways of celebrating christmas

Kyoya understands your boundaries better than Tamaki and would never take you silence personal

in fact, he likes it that you don’t talk about unneccessary stuff all the time and don’t get involved in drama

appreciates the kindess you show towards everyone since it’s something that doesn’t always come naturally for him

since he normally works late you usually fall asleep before he does, so he’ll cover you up properly and kiss your temple before he continues typing

Kaoru:

when he isn’t with his brother, Kaoru is usually quite calm, so he doesn’t mind that you’re more on the shy and quiet sid, he actually enjoys that kinda change of pace

as the son of a stylist, he loves to pick make up, clothes or hairstyles for you (though he always asks if you would like to wear them or if you thought they weren’t proper or something)

prefers to take you out to the city for dates to wander around and find something to do while you’re there

however, he also likes to just spend the day at home with you, talking and playing games

he understands very well if you don’t feel up to do something social, after all he spent a good part of his life only socializing with a single person

most of the time he’s the one who comes up with date ideas, but when you do happen to have one, he makes sure that you end up actually doing it

it’s kind of his way to show you it’s okay to speak your mind and that it’ll pay off when you do

gets you a lot of cute jewelery for gifts

Mori:

now, you’re just the perfect match for Mori

he is a man of few words, but talks quite a lot through his gestures and he likes it that the two of you can understand each other without talking

often takes you out for dates in the nature or invites you to come and watch his training and have lunch or dinner afterwards

he still gets you expensive gifts, but doesn’t make a show out of it, like Tamaki would

his gifts are also less flashy and more small and thoughtful

loves when you play together with his two pets

always brings you back souvenirs when he was on vacation or business trips with his family and couldn’t take you with him for some reason

checks on you every morning by texting or calling you

even though he doesn’t talk too much, he often compliments you either on your apperance or some achievement you made

also smiles and ruffles your hair often, when you’re not in public accompanied with a kiss on the the forehead or lips

has a habbit of picking the things he knows you like out of his food and giving them to you because he loves to see you smile about it  

Nekozawa:

Nekozawa might not ppear like it on first glance, but he knows very well how to be sensitive and considerate of your feelings

always tries to get you interested in the things he likes (black magic), but wouldn’t push you

still, a lot of the dates he takes you to have some kind of connection to that

is thankful that you’re so patient and understanding of the fact that you can’t go out during daylight that easily because of his illness

due to this, for most dates you just stay at his mansion and eat there, watch movies and then go out for entertainment in the evening

naturally, going around outside with Nekozawa is bound to pull some attention towards the you, but when you’re with him, Nekozawa at least won’t dvertise black magic or any kind of coursed items

just like Tamaki, Nekozawa likes to take you to his ancestors’ home russia for vacation

cuddles you a lot when you’re at home and likes it when you play with his (real) hair 

Kasanoda:

so, we know Kasanoda is somewhat awkward when it comes to romance

but the fact that you’re a little shy and quiet makes it easier for him to approach you

 blushes a lot when you’re on dates

likes to show you his plants and the flowers he grows to explain you their meanings

also gives you flowers and little potted plants with certain meanings

likes to take you to the zoo (or, for the matter of fact, to different countries) to looks at animals

sometimes he has days when he doesn’t want to talk much, so he understands when you ahve this kind of days as well

texts you all the time when you’re away from each other

can realte to your shyness on a very personal level, since he is kind of shy as well

it makes it a little easier for the both of you to cope with it around each other though

wouldn’t admit it, but he loves it when you do something with his hair, like playing with it or doing braids

Aone:

you and Aone are very similar to each other, quiet and shy, but very patient and kind at heart

while you two are pretty quiet in general, you feel more comfortable talking around each other

is very careful when he hugs you or gives you pats on the back cause he used to be bad at keeping his power at bay

sometimes does romantic things for you out of the blue

the gifts he gets you are very thoughtful, showing he always listens to you when you talk to him about the things you like

picks you up bridal style when he thinks you’re tired

is very content when you fall asleep on his chest or shoulder

mostly lets you decide what to do on dates and where to go, but if you tell him to choose, he’ll most likely want to watch some sort of game and then take you to a restaurant he knows you like

is very happy that finally someone genuinely likes him without being intimidated by his looks

when he hugs you, he usually wraps his arms around your entire torso, lifting you up while doing so

leans down when he wants to be kissed

[wildermouse]

heeey, how was kate nash?? 😱💕

sister where u BEEN i’ve been posting about it since the show!! but here’s the rundown:

- i was the first to show up and made friends with the next couple people who showed up

- a guy bought me a drink but said “i just don’t want to give off the wrong impression because i’m very taken” and i said “and i’m very gay!” and we high-fived

- the opener (miya folik) was incredible

- kate nash and her all-girl band came on stage and i DIED she’s so beautiful and exactly how I imagined her to be like in person and I can’t believe it all happened

- took shitty photos of the first three songs

- turns out the guy that bought me a drink (he was my concert buddy for the night) has been to a ton of kate’s shows and so she knows him and he handed her a drink and she took it and then recognized him and said “oh my god it’s you!!” and came over to us and grabbed his hand and said “sorry guys we need a minute. we got married in a record shop once!”

- she fell. a lot. and almost fell a lot more lmao

- they were all really fucking hilarious and talented an entertaining

- during “we get on” she came over to me and i reached out my hand and she grabbed it and i expected her to let go but she just held onto it and crouched down in front of me and looked me in the eyes and sang to me and she didn’t let go for the rest of the song 😭😭😭😭😭

- she sang “bitch” by meredith brooks for the final encore and it was fucking amazing

- my new friend and I stuck around outside in the freezing cold rain for an hour and she finally came out in a fuzzy leopard print coat and fuzzy bunny hat and came right over to us and chatted and we got photos and lots of hugs

- she told us to be safe getting home and i don’t her my new friend is walking me to my hostel and she made the cutest face

- also kate & I have been emailing directly (😱) about photographing her show etc. waiting for a reply now bc i just sent her the edited photos !!

so yeah easily the best night of my entire life

OH also that was my first trip to anywhere completely alone. I caught a ferry to the mainland and figured out busses and sky trains into the city and checked into a hostel and wandered the city all on my own and I did so with confidence and little anxiety and i’m damn proud 👊🏼