#Ratchet would be driven up the fucking wall

[witchofthesouls]

I don’t know what’s a better premise for a Humans-to-Cybertronians!Darbys in a Other!AU:

A world where the ‘bots and ‘cons are trying and failing to figure where the hell the random Cybertronian signal is coming from: it pops all over the place as if it can teleport or the disguise is so well hidden that no can tell what’s the alt-mode.

It’s Jack. And his “alt-mode” is a human teenager disguise. That’s why the ‘bots and ‘cons can’t fully triangulate on his position. His actual form is the Cybertronian equivalent of 10 year-old child. He’s an honest-to-Primus sparkling and it’ll drive everyone nuts since sparkling!Jack has no chill- 

Jack literally tore up Ratchet’s ambulance alt-mode when he was lured into a trap. Sure, the medic could withstand the damage from his naturally reinforced frame, but doesn’t mean it was an enjoyable experience getting clawed up.

Ratchet’s alt-mode was shaking at the base. He was literally bouncing on his tires from the sheer force, so the rest of ‘bots were prepared for a spooked child. When Ratchet unlocked his doors. Nothing. Until one brave soul approached to open the door and Jack came at them swinging with bladed extensions. He managed to cut a wrist and disable an arm before someone grabbed him by the scruffbar.  

Several hundred years ago, a Foundation site was working to contain an Artifact, which reacted extremely with several measures, so it induced a transformation within the personnel of the established perimeter.

Metamorphosis via scientific, magical, or alien measures is an occupational hazard. It was ruled that the new metal forms were a cross of Clockwork and the automata by Hephaestus, especially now they are sustained by fae-derived foodstuffs.

The Fair Folk had long since cultivated their crops and livestock by utilizing energon mines…

The personnel kept doing their jobs. Some managed to figure out T-cogs and transformative sequences far faster than others. Many opted to stay in a particular space in Elsewhere to take advantage of the strange time flow to get their new bodies under control to a degree they could return to mundane Earth. Sure, they can still go to the Night Markets as a 25-feet metal giant, but it would be nice to able to condense down and slap on an enchantment to go to the movie theater or the pick up the kids from a mundane school.

The Autobots are absolutely lucky that June is the one that fetched her son and not Grandma Darby because she would rain hellfire and brimstone.

This Jack has learned different lessons and is willing to stab and set people on fire. Much to Miko’s amazement and the ‘bots’ collective horror.

When Jack isn’t in his human form, he’s taller than an full-grown adult human, so he can actually give Miko and Raf piggy-backs if he needs to travel fast.

Then there’s a world where the Autobots stumble on the Other side because Raf calls Bumblebee on how to care for a robot baby that’s crying in his house -his sister’s room to be exact.

Raf, by sheer chance, came home to pick up things for a sleep over at the base because he needed to catch up the science project Of course, Bumblebee thinks it’s a weird toy or an advanced experiment because his sister just came home for a break-

And then Raf opens the window to the room and Bumblebee shits a brick because oh Primus, oh fuck, it’s a newspark-

Holomatter!Bumblebee and Raf carefully blanket-carry the infant to the black and yellow Urbana as Bumblebee is frantically hailing Ratchet over what to do.

Raf is riding with the baby in the back and has no idea that Cybertronians could be soft and kinda jiggling since his fingers leave smudges and the baby’s metal shudders and slightly warps while wailing and flailing rounded, short limbs.

Ratchet didn’t think it was funny and was chewing out the scout’s tailpipe until Bumblebee, after breaking so many traffic laws, hit the base and practically shifted with the newspark and Raf in his arms.

Autobots at the base: Bluescreen

Ratchet is trying to stabilize a premie infant when the intruders in the form of June’s friends (one former human and one hybrid) gets into a standoff with the Autobots over “kidnapping.” Pilar is there trying to diffuse the situation. June’s friends immediately nab Ratchet (and newspark!Jack) since he’s a well-trained medic that’s blowing a gasket over the baby and June really needs help from traumatic injuries from a breech containment.

Ratchet is spirited away. Pilar has to guide the others to the Other Half of Jasper Hospital where a fistfight almost breaks out.

June recovers. Grandma Darby is very grateful for the extra help, and hassles Ratchet about becoming a consultant since Ratchet is a treasure trove of necessary medical information with the new Cybertronians in the personnel.

Grandma also hassles June and Jack into the base because she’s utterly worried about their health and she’s flying blind about their new frames.

Grandma Darby, no matter the iteration, she’s the embodiment of “Do wanna start a fight? Do wanna catch these hands?”

Like if Airachnid tried to target the remains of her family, Grandma would pantomime the itsy bitsy spider using her fingers, shadow-stitching, precise weather manipulation, and Airachnid’s unwilling body.

Miko and Raf would be absolutely enamored by her since she’s willing to indulge their curiosity about the Other side as well as their heritage and how to tap into that potential should they want to utilize it.

[bettyfrommars]

Betty, I love you. This is gunna be a rant about a man, not our man Eddie, but my selfish husband. Guuurl. Ive been with this dude 20 yrs, 2 kids, great fucking provider where i can stay home in so cali. Hes funny, loving, caring, all those good things people want in a husband but damn the sex suuuuuuuccckkkksss. Hes the only man ive been with ( biiig mistake on my part 🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️) anyway 20 yrs, and hes never made me O. 😭😭😭maybe it was a lack in my part cuz i never really liked when hed go down on me. In our youth we'd have sex like 11 times a day and now that i want more as im older (late 30's 🫣) he can only go once and im still O less. Ive tried diff things with him but hes very vanilla. To him our sex life is amazing cuz he cums every fucking time while im just a hole. Slowly starting to resent him but how can I when he does all these other thinga for me ya know. All that to say i fucking loooove the way you write Eddie in all your fics but especially the smutty ones. The way you describe him brings me to my fucking knees. When its just me and my toy i imagine its the Eddie you've written. Girl give yourself a pat on the back.😘

I love you too 🥹

So, first of all, let me say it is the biggest compliment ever to a smut writer that anyone would think of their character and/or scenes in their head when they have alone time, so thank you for that. I will cherish that like you have no idea.

The Eddie's I write are absolutely obsessed with you, so you will always have that. Continued....

As someone who has had my fair share of relationships and dated too many people to count---great providers who are also funny, loving and caring are hard to come by, and I'm really glad you have someone who is good to you. But also, I deeply understand your frustration. Especially if you are a very sexually driven or physical person, not getting the satisfaction from your partner can start to make you feel crazy, like you just want to climb the walls and go fuck everything to get some new experiences.

Does he know you are always going without the big O? Because if he loves you and cares about you, he will want to make sure the kitty purrs. If he knows that you are never getting off, but he doesn't care---that is not very loving.

There is a lot of bad sex out there, sad to say. I dated a guy in his thirties once who had no idea where the clitoris was or that most women needed it to be stimulated to cum. But he was eager to learn, and he got really good at it. I remember thinking his next gf should send me a gift card or something for ratcheting up his skill levels.

I have a lot of friends around your age, in similar situations, so you are definitely not alone in this, if that helps at all. All of that chemistry and those sparks you feel with someone in the beginning have a shelf life, so I have found, and need constant work. But like, yeah, we all get so tired of "working" on things...why can't it just come easy for once 🙃

[bots-and-cons]

Hello love! Remember the Demon Slayer anon? It's me again (I LOVED reading your opinion)! Thank you for your recommendation by the way, I haven't had time to watch it because ew school, BUT I really am planning on watching it!

As for my request, I thought of this right after I sent the ask and decided to wait till your requests were open again.

So, what would happen if we had a demon slayer S/O stumble upon the autobots and protect the children from a demon? Do whatever you would like and choose who ever you want to write about! You have full reign :3

Don't be harsh on yourself and take breaks if you need to! That's all I ask for, thank you! ❤️

I haven't started the entertainment district arc yet, since I'm kinda saving the episodes so I can watch them all at once. I've been seeing a lot of clips and spoilers though, since I haven't been actively avoiding them, and it looks freaking great. I kinda added my own twist to this I guess, but at the same time it’s a crossover? Also it’s just reader and not an S/O (significant other). I did some of the bots, but not all, and I just kinda mashed them together

•Sure, there is weird stuff going on among the humans all the time, but since the demons can’t get any use out of giant robots, none had ever crossed his path before this, at least not so he had noticed

•The demons had just decided to stay away from the bots, since they know so little about them and they could possible get killed

•Though I’m sure someone who loves fighting (like Akaza), would try to take on a giant robot

•Anyway, you were passing through town on your hunt for demons and happened to find one, that was trying to eat some kids

•You were about to cut the demons neck, when you got pushed aside by something big

•You had jumped above the trouble trio and Bee just kinda got freaked out by some sword wielding crazy person near his friends so he pretty much smacked you to a wall

•You’re like, “What the hell was that?” because you were pretty sure the demon didn’t do that and when you look up the demon is gone and you’re left standing there with a giant robot and three cheering kids

•You put your sword away, because you don’t get a dangerous vibe from the situation and obviously you have a lot of questions, but you don’t really have time for that then

•You have a demon to slay and you need to find it before it does anymore damage

•So you give them a brief explanation on what just happened and what’s going on

•You also give your phone number to the girl of the group and off you go

•You’ve seen some weird crap in your time, but aliens? No fucking way

•When you get a call from the odd group you encountered, it’s a couple of days later

•You’re pretty on guard when you get picked up by a yellow and black car and you’re just driven to some place

•You have your sword with you, but you’re not really sure if you can stand against some alien robots with it, but that isn’t gonna stop you from trying if worse comes to worst

•You get the talk from the one that introduced himself as Optimus Prime and you’re like “good for you?”

•You also give quite a lengthy explanation to what’s going on with you and the whole demon thing

•Ratchet goes, “no, nope, not dealing with this” in his head, and he honestly looks like he’s about to pass out from the information you just dumped on them

•Arcee is pretty much the same, but she’s ready to throw hands with anyone who threatens her friends

•Bulk is also ready to throw down, but he would also like to know more about these demons

•You’re not really 100% sure if their blasters could kill demons, but you encourage them to try if the bots cross paths with one

•You continue on your way eventually, but that was also a lot of information to wrap your head around

[tyrannosaurus-trainwreck]

I propose a new rule for action film franchises.  Let’s call it the Settle Down There, Edgelord Rule.

Say you have a franchise--let’s use the Bond films as an example--where every single film, the fate of the entire fucking world hangs in the balance.  No matter what got accomplished in the last film, they’re right back at it in this film, having to save the entire world again.  But somehow, the stakes have to be higher than the last time, or it starts getting harder to get audiences back for more of the same, because it starts feeling really repetitive.

“Why’ve you dragged me back in from my life of sordid semi-retirement, M?” asks James fucking Bond. “Is it yet another doomsday device in the hands of a madman?”

“We should be so lucky, 007,” says Q, handing James Bond a fountain pen that is also a doomsday device. “This time it’s a doomsday device in the hands of two madmen, both of whom have extremely personal scores to settle with you.”

“Well in that case, I suppose I can hardly say no,” James Bond sighs wearily, already longing for the days when it was only a single madman with perhaps a nuclear warhead or two who harbored a vague and academic disapproval of spies in general.

The problem with the ever-rising stakes is that eventually it does become a bit ridiculous.  Remember when Fast and the Furious was about stealing consumer electronics for money?  And now barely eight movies later they’re stealing nukes and driving to space and somehow John Cena is involved?  Another two movies and they’ll be doing donuts on the moon to save earth from being blown up by previously-unmentioned alien conquerors.

So every so often, let’s say every third movie, writers should have to hit a reset button.  Not on the action or the mayhem or the actors’ intensity or whatever it is that gets eyes on screens and butts in seats.  Just, you know.  The stakes.

“Why’ve you dragged me back in from my life of sordid semi-retirement, M?” asks James fucking Bond. “Is it yet another doomsday device in the hands of a madman?”

“We should be so lucky, 007,” says Q, handing James Bond a fountain pen that is also a doomsday device. “This time the madman’s made off with one of the Queen’s corgis.”

“What?” James Bond demands, aghast. “How could you let this happen?”

“Their dog grooming credentials were impeccable. They passed every security check.  They’d have been allowed to groom Her Majesty herself,” M tells him grimly. “There’s something you should know, Bond.  It was... it was Trixie.”

“Not Trixie,” Bond gasps.  The look on his face is that of a man having a flashback to ‘Nam. “What do they want for her safe return?”

“That’s the sticky wicket, Bond,” Q volunteers, waving vaguely at a wall that begins playing a video.

On the wall, Willem Dafoe cuddles a corgi and stares dead-eyed at the camera.  When he speaks, it’s in an accent that’s vaguely Germanic but not like, enough to make any trade partners really mad about it.

“Trixie is such a good dog.  Such a good girl!” He looks at the dog, face becoming animated and warm. “Who’s a good girl?  Is it you?  It is you!  You’re a good girl!”

He looks back at the camera, eyes once again blank as a shark’s.

“I think, my friends, that Trixie is too good a dog for the rotting corpse of an empire that she was whelped into.  I shall take her with me, and together we shall venture into a brave new world of grassy farms with plenty of room to run and many, many children with which to play.  If you redeem yourselves, perhaps you shall live to see this world that I shall make.  Perhaps you shall live to go... to the dogs!”

The video cuts as he rubs the corgi’s ears and gives her a treat.

“That absolute bastard!” Bond snarls, hurling the fountain pen doomsday device across the room. “Tell me you have something to go on!”

And then we’re off to the races, with typical Bond-level shenanigans, fights, and body counts. 

It’s only that instead of having to come up with a scenario which is somehow more important or more dangerous than the last movie, which was already threatening to kill a billion people or knock the planet off its axis or whatever, it’s just a scenario in which everyone is really, really emotionally invested.

And before anyone starts up with the “these sorts of action-movie shenanigans are only reasonable with incredibly high stakes” argument, let me remind you that by the time they need this proposed intervention, we have already hit patently unreasonable situations and behavior.  Like, these are not reasonable people who are just in it for a boatload of money and somehow fell ass-backwards into a Bond villain scheme for making it.  They didn’t join the rotary club and oops their way into a series of flamboyantly homicidal consultation gigs.

If we can buy somebody going completely balls-to-the-wall, conspiracy-of-thousands, weirdo-cult-aesthetics, murdered-my-own-parents all-in on *checks notes* basically being the CEO of a slightly more criminal than usual international conglomerate that required precisely none of that? If we can buy the iron-jawed goons fist-fighting a guy who’s essentially at this point the goddamned terminator for a generous hourly wage?

Then I think we can buy a weirdo-cult-aesthetics conspiracy-of-thousands megalomaniac who just really, really likes that goddamn dog, or hates the protagonist, or wants to share the daguerreotype of Abraham Lincoln’s penis with the world as the Great Emancipator would have wanted, and the shadowy government-bankrolled action-hero forces driven by fate to stand in their way.

It’s not any less reasonable, anyway, and then when the next movie comes out you can go back to saving New York City from a nuke or Paris from a weather-control device or whatever and no one will be like "well this is a step down from the pageantry of the previous installment.”

I should add that there’s no reason the Settle Down There, Edgelord Rule can’t be applied to any sort of serial media.

Your doom-and-gloom tv show just keeps fighting worse and worse villains every single season?  Why not take a break next season and fight a homeowner’s association instead of an artistic serial killer?  Go on a hard-fought, poorly-lit, grim-and-gritty slog through the byzantine process of figuring out which impound lot the Impala got towed to after a bullshit parking ticket. 

Instead of having your teenage characters grapple with Even Worse Demons, they can just, like, egg their principal’s house when it turns out he’s a normal human-level petty tyrant and not a master vampire.  Your nemesis figured out your secret identity, and instead of trying to kill your family or whatever, they hacked your facebook account and friended all your obnoxious relatives/coworkers/friends-of-friends and are embarrassing you in public, and now you have to go on a ridiculously convoluted and dystopian spirit quest to get The Zuck Himself to reset your password.

The possibilities are endless!  Unless you keep ratcheting things up, anyway, in which case you’re eventually and inevitably going to wind up fighting Satan, then God, then Worse God, then Satan’s Dad, Which Is Somehow Not God? Don’t @ Us, Our Mythological Research Prior to Writing This Was Confined to Metal Albums and American Horror Films.

[unfolded73]

How Do We Get Back (4/16) - schitt’s creek ff

Summary: In a literal alternate universe where the Roses escaped financial ruin, David and Patrick struggle with loneliness and a sense that something isn’t right. A chance meeting in New York and a terrible tragedy drive them to question whether the timeline they are on is the right one.

This chapter is explicit. 3.7k words.   (ao3)

Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3

_____________________________________

Chapter 4

Kissing David made Patrick Brewer feel like he was teetering on the edge of a cliff.

After a long day at his tax seminar, Patrick had been tempted to go back to the hotel, crawl under the covers. and turn on the TV. It was shame that had driven him to buy a ferry ticket to Manhattan — the future shame of telling his coworkers that he’d gotten so close to New York but hadn’t actually visited. Of course, he’d lacked any kind of real plan so when he had disembarked, he’d checked his phone and started walking in the general direction of Rockefeller Center. But it was a long walk and he got tired and thirsty, and so Patrick had stopped in for a beer at the first decent-looking bar he saw.

At first, David had just seemed like a flamboyant curiosity, the sort of fashionable person you’d expect to meet in New York City, with his unusual black and white shirt designed to draw attention, four silver rings on the fingers of one hand flashing as he gesticulated. Talking to him had made Patrick feel giddy, like he’d boarded a roller coaster and was hanging onto the metal bar for dear life as David took him around curve after curve. He had mentioned that the person who stood him up for a date was a man in the off-hand way of someone who’d forgotten to be self-conscious about the fact that he was gay, if he ever had been.

Patrick hadn’t examined his reasons for wanting to stay at the bar talking to David, or the reason his heart had been racing for a lot of that time. He hadn’t thought about the fact that he couldn’t take his eyes off of David’s expressive face, or when he could it was only to be distracted by David’s hands. It probably hadn’t been until David caught himself with a hand on Patrick’s thigh — a move that sent Patrick’s heart rate ratcheting up so high that he’d certainly have set off an alarm had he been hooked up to one — that Patrick started to ponder exactly what was happening between them.

He’d known the responsible thing to do would be to say no to David’s offer of a place to sleep. All other things aside, sleeping in a strange man’s apartment in New York City was an objectively risky thing to do. He could get robbed. He could get roofied. It was madness. But when David swept on his jacket, the scent of expensive cologne and leather surrounding him, Patrick had followed like a child under the thrall of the Pied Piper. He should have known then where things were leading. Perhaps he had known.

Now they sat next to each other on David’s sofa, mouths meeting over and over, and Patrick honestly couldn’t remember a time when kissing had been this thrilling. As he let his jaw drop, opening his mouth to admit David’s tongue, he felt the scrape of the other man’s stubble against his own. He reached out with his hand to cup David’s face, wanting more of that sensation on his skin. David was taller than him, and he held Patrick in his arms in a way that made him feel enveloped in the best possible way. Patrick balanced on a knife’s edge, a breath away from losing complete control of his ability to make a rational decision. He’d never wanted anyone this way, not ever.

“Listen, David,” he said as soon as they parted to breathe, unable to resist the temptation to keep planting small kisses on David’s lips as he talked. “I need to tell you, I’m…”

David pulled away, putting some space between them. “Tell me.”

Patrick blushed. “I’m not ready for... Not that I don’t want… Suddenly I want a lot of things that I’ve never wanted, or never let myself want, but I…” He huffed, frustrated with his inability to construct a coherent sentence. “I’m not ready for sex. I hope that’s okay.”

David smiled at him, a smile that was maybe sweet but also maybe patronizing. “Anything you want is okay. But I do want to clarify exactly what you mean by sex? Because some people, especially — no offense — people whose experience has been limited to vanilla, straight sex, when they say ‘sex’ about two men they mean anal.”

Just the sound of that word coming out of David’s mouth made Patrick suppress a shudder. It was terrifying, but also a little bit thrilling, and a hundred pornographic images starring David Rose collided in his head all at once.

“So I actually don’t do anal on the first date? And some queer men don’t ever do it. Being into anal isn’t a requirement for liking sex with men,” David said.

Patrick let out a slow breath. “Okay.”

“But sex can mean other things, and I need a little more guidance as to what you’re not ready for.”

Panic set in again, and Patrick clutched the arm of the sofa hard enough to leave marks in the leather. “I don’t know if I can articulate it. Out loud.”

“Okay, well I’m gonna need a little more than that. Unless you want to stop now?” David picked Patrick’s hand up and traced his fingertips along his knuckles. Patrick shivered and shook his head.

David leaned in close then, using his hand to tilt Patrick’s head back so that he could plant a row of kisses along his neck. Patrick stifled a groan.

“Your responsiveness is very sexy,” David murmured against his neck, “and if you’re willing, I’d like to touch you and see if I can make you come. Would that be okay?”

Patrick gasped, his head spinning. “Fuck.”

“Is that a yes?” David kissed his way up to his chin and then to his lips.

“Yes,” Patrick whispered into David’s open mouth. He felt dangerously close to saying yes to anything if David would just keep kissing him like that.

“Let’s go to the bedroom.”

Patrick tensed up at that, pulling back far enough to bring David into focus. “Oh. Umm…”

He felt David’s hand sort of petting his hair. “Just so we’ll be more comfortable. I promise, nothing is going to happen without your enthusiastic consent.”

Snorting, Patrick moved to stand up, keenly aware of the way his erection was pressing against his jeans. “You sound like an instructional video for horny teens.”

“I’m just trying to put you at ease because you seemed nervous about the bedroom.”

Patrick gave him a grateful smile. “Thank you,” he said honestly.

David led the way to a good-sized bedroom of stark contrasts: white walls and black bedding and similarly monochrome modern art adorning the walls. The lighting was warm, though, and not too bright, and Patrick tried to slow his breathing to calm himself down.

“You can take off your own shoes and socks and… anything else you feel like taking off,” David said with an elaborate wave of his hand. “I’m just going to freshen up a little bit.”

Sitting down on the bed, Patrick began unlacing his sensible walking shoes and tried not to think about the fact that he was committing adultery. It was a heavy word, and one he’d never imagined could be ascribed to him. I shouldn’t do this, he thought, even as he was tucking his socks inside his shoes. I should get my coat and apologize to David and leave. But he had to know. If the reason his relationship with Rachel had never seemed right was because he was gay, then he had to know for sure.

A more immediate concern occurred to him as he looked down at his clothes. What exactly should he take off? His jeans was a good start, he supposed. If David was going to do… what he’d said (and just thinking around the edge of it sent a surge of desire through him), then his pants were going to get in the way. With shaking hands, Patrick unbuckled his belt and stood to pull his jeans off by the cuffs. He sat back down, nervously twisting his ring. Then with a guilty cringe, Patrick pulled his wedding ring off and reached over to tuck it into his jeans pocket.

He wasn’t sure why, but Patrick trusted David instinctively. If he was nervous about being half dressed in a strange man’s bedroom in a strange city, it was more at the abstract concept of it than at the actual situation.

David emerged then, wearing a black t-shirt and black sweatpants, and Patrick took a moment to be amused that apparently making out on the bed required a full wardrobe change if you were David Rose. Then David sat at his side, close enough that their legs were touching, and Patrick’s brain sort of shorted out.

There was more kissing — deep, messy kisses that got more frantic as they gradually moved into a horizontal position across the carefully made bed. David hovered over him, holding himself up on his elbow, and Patrick could feel the unmistakable press of the other man’s erection against his thigh. Thoughts of the wrongness of what he was doing disappeared. In that moment, nothing had ever felt less wrong in his life.

David’s hand trailed down from Patrick’s cheek to the collar of his shirt. “May I…” David asked, his fingers hovering over the buttons. His breath coming quick, Patrick nodded.

As he unbuttoned Patrick’s shirt, David made a cringey face. “I’m trying not to think too much about this being, like, a critical moment in the evolution of your sexuality and how very badly I do not want to mess it up. It’s a lot of responsibility.”

David’s fretting weirdly calmed Patrick down, and he tried to suppress a smile. “You know I’m not literally a virgin, right? I’ve had sex with women.”

“And how has that been working out for you?” David parted the two sides of Patrick’s shirt, and Patrick sat up long enough to shuck the thing and toss it aside.

“Not great.”

David’s face contorted into what might have been a suppressed smile of his own. “Okay, well your chest is working out well for me, so I suggest we focus on that.”

Patrick moved to kiss David, trying to show through a little bit of forcefulness that he was fully on board. Based on the moan that came from David when Patrick scraped his teeth across David’s lower lip, it was a good tactic. They collapsed back onto the pillows again, one of David’s legs between Patrick’s now, and fuck, he couldn’t stop himself from thrusting up, seeking friction. He didn’t think he’d ever been as turned on as this. And then David scratched his fingernails over Patrick’s chest and he had to revise his assessment. This was as turned on has he’d ever been.

“Can I touch your cock, Patrick?” David asked, hand settling heavy and warm on Patrick’s belly.

“Jesus,” Patrick gasped, then remembering that David would want to hear his consent, added. “Yeah. I’m… I might be embarrassingly quick.”

“As if that would be anything other than flattering,” David said as he was carefully lifting the waistband of Patrick’s boxers clear of his erection. Patrick reached down to help get them off, and then he was naked — in a man’s bed, in bed with a man, and it should have been shocking, it should have been a bucket of cold water over the whole proceeding, but it wasn’t. He just felt warm and right and desperate to be touched.

David lay on his side next to him, watching Patrick’s face as he reached down and ran a single finger up the base of his cock. Patrick’s eyes snapped shut and a loud, guttural moan came out of his mouth.

“Fuck, you’re so hot like this,” David said, his fist closing around Patrick’s shaft and beginning a slow rhythm. “Spread out and aching to be touched.” He gathered precome on his fingers, spreading it as his hand moved, and Patrick couldn’t help but thrust into David’s fist. He felt like the entire world had disappeared, that all his other senses had bled away, leaving him with only the sensation of David’s hand on his cock and David’s mouth on his shoulder.

“I’m… God, I’m gonna come,” Patrick gritted out after just a few strokes, wishing he could hold out and last longer, enjoy this feeling forever, but he needed to come so badly, needed it to be David who did that for him.

“That’s it. Just like that,” David coaxed, and those words were what sent him plummeting down, a hoarse shout on his lips as he came all over David’s hand and his own stomach. Only when his last aftershock had shuddered through him did David move away from his side. Patrick was dimly aware of a drawer opening and closing, and then he was being cleaned up, efficient swipes by a practiced hand.

Reality crashed in suddenly, and Patrick felt incredibly exposed, again struck by the fact that he’d just engaged in this intimate act with a near stranger, with a man he’d never met before and after tonight, might never see again. Some might find that freeing, but at the moment it made Patrick feel very empty. He shivered.

“Here, let’s get under the covers,” David suggested.

Once they’d arranged themselves, Patrick returned to kissing David, pressing body to body until he could feel David’s erection through his sweatpants, evidence that David really had enjoyed touching him, that it hadn’t been an act of charity. Or pity.

“Can I return the favor?” Patrick asked. He pictured it, touching another man’s — touching David’s — cock, and miraculously felt another surge of want shoot through him.

“You don’t have to.”

“I want to… if you want me to.” Maybe he didn’t, Patrick thought suddenly. And that would make sense, wouldn’t it? Why would a glamorous man like David want him?

“I definitely want you to,” David whispered.

“Thank fuck,” Patrick said, which made David giggle. They fumbled together with David’s sweatpants until they were kicked somewhere near the bottom of the bed.

Patrick started to reach for him but hesitated, worrying that he wouldn’t be good. That he wouldn’t be able to give David the kind of pleasure David had just given him. “Can you lie on your back?” Patrick asked. “So it’ll be more like doing it to myself? I’ve never done this to another person before.”

David rolled his eyes and shifted onto his back. “Yeah, I assumed that, although it’s not impossible for you to have never kissed a boy but to have engaged furtive handjobs under the bleachers with the captain of the football team.”

Patrick chuckled. “Is that a fantasy of yours?”

“It could become one,” David shot back. “Here, hang on.” He reached for the same drawer that had produced the wet wipes and pulled out a bottle of lube. Patrick held out his hand, and David depressed the pump a few times into his open palm. Then he threw off the covers, exposing himself to the room. David still had his t-shirt on but that was it, and Patrick took a second to admire the sight of another man’s cock. A cock he was going to touch.

It was a little awkward at first, spreading the lube and finding the right rhythm, but then things seemed to click as David groaned and clutched at his bicep.

“Harder.” David’s voice was high and breathy, and Patrick followed instructions, squeezing tighter. Patrick felt David’s hand move to the back of his head and then he was pulling him in for a kiss, open-mouthed and dirty. David’s hips pistoned and Patrick held his arm steady and let him fuck his fist. David became less coherent, less able to actively kiss Patrick back, panting into his mouth and it was sexy, it was beautiful, and in that moment Patrick had the wild and errant thought that he belonged here, that he’d belonged here for a long time and had just gotten lost somehow, but now he was found, now he was home.

“Fuck, Patrick, yes,” David gasped, continuing to say ‘yes’ over and over until Patrick felt the pulses of his orgasm. I did this for him, Patrick thought giddily. I made him come.

When David relaxed, Patrick gently let him go, collapsing on the pillows at his side. David was already reaching for the wipes again, grabbing Patrick by the wrist and cleaning him up before he did the same to himself, pulling his dirty t-shirt off and tossing it toward the hamper.

Patrick lay back and looked at David’s chest and how hairy it was compared to his own. He regretted that he was only just seeing it now.

“That was very nice,” David said as he pulled the covers over himself. “Thank you.”

Turning on his side, Patrick met David’s gaze. “I’m the one who should be saying ‘thank you.’”

David yawned, and then reached over and picked up his phone, doing something to turn off the lights. “Oh, are you okay sleeping here? If you’d rather go to the guest room, you can do that.”

“Are you okay with me sleeping here?” Patrick asked into the dark void. Uncertain what he’d do if David said no.

“It’s fine. Unless you snore.”

“I don’t,” Patrick said with a laugh.

“Okay, then.” David turned over, and Patrick could just make out the line of his bare back as his eyes adjusted to the darkness. He felt the sudden urge to press himself against David, but even Patrick with his lack of one-night-stand experience knew that probably wouldn’t be welcome. He was just feeling vulnerable because such a momentous thing had happened, cracking him open in the bed of this stranger. Well, not stranger. Near-stranger who he’d seen naked and exchanged handjobs with.

As he drifted off to sleep, Patrick remembered the weird feeling of belonging he’d had a little while ago. Get a grip, Brewer, was his last conscious thought.

~*~

Patrick awoke still in darkness, and it took several seconds to remember where he was. What he’d done struck with renewed shock: meeting David, talking to him for hours at the bar, going home with him, kissing him, going to bed with him. Was this some temporary insanity, the kind of travel-inspired loneliness that made it easy to cry on airplanes? He rolled out of bed and stumbled to the bathroom, closing the door quietly and flipping on the light.

He looked at his own naked body, trying to see if it betrayed any sign of what he’d done. If he was a gay man, shouldn’t he look different somehow?

After relieving himself, he crept back out to the bedroom and gathered up his clothes and shoes from the floor, carrying them out to the living room where the windows let in more light. He pulled his clothes on quickly, checking the time on his phone. 6:23. Hopefully the ferries were running and it wouldn’t take too long to cross back over the river to Jersey.

He wanted to leave David a note, even started to look around for some paper and a pen, but what could he say that wouldn’t sound too flippant or too emotional about what had happened? For David, surely this was one of a hundred such hookups. A few months from now, Patrick would barely be a blip on his memory. Whereas for Patrick, it had been everything: a terrible betrayal, a rapturous awakening. A cataclysm in his life. He knew that no matter what happened, he’d never forget David Rose for as long as he lived.

Which is exactly what you don’t want to write in a note, he thought. Instead, he pulled out his wallet, took out one of the business cards, and left it on the kitchen island before he bundled up in his coat and walked out of the apartment.

Down on the sidewalk, Patrick looked up and down the street and then checked the map on his phone. Neither of the nearest ferry terminals were within walking distance so he needed a taxi, but there didn’t seem to be any on David’s street. He smirked, cursing all the movies he’d ever seen that made it seem like a New York taxi would be waiting wherever you needed one. There wasn’t any reason to have a ride-sharing app on his phone in Oak Grove, so he couldn’t summon an Uber.

A noise made him turn around. A woman was pushing a cart down the sidewalk toward him, and he assumed by the blankets and clothes he could see in the cart that she was homeless. He didn’t have any coins, but he thought he might have gotten a couple of American dollars when he’d bought a pretzel at the ferry terminal yesterday, so he reached for his wallet.

“You,” she said, stopping short.

“Hang on, I might have a dollar,” he said, shuffling past the Canadian bills in his wallet. “You wouldn’t happen to know where I can catch a cab, would you?”

“You found him,” she said urgently, stepping away from her cart to come close to Patrick. He tried not to recoil. “Does that mean you feel it too? That this world is wrong?”

Oh, she had mental health problems, he thought, feeling a surge of sympathy. “You don’t know the half of it,” he tried to joke.

“So how do we get back?” She grabbed his arm, fingers clutching at the fabric of his shirt.

“Whoa, okay,” Patrick said, pulling his arm away and holding out the dollar bill. “I just need to know where to find a taxi.”

She squinted at him, took the dollar, and then jerked her thumb over her shoulder. “There’s usually a taxi near the bodega at the corner.”

“Thanks.” He walked quickly in that direction, but when he looked back a couple of times, she was still standing there and staring at him.

Chapter 5

[winedwords]

Pete| Lingerie |Dunne

Title; Lingerie

Pairing; Pete Dunne/Reader

Words; 2669

Summary; The way you’re wrapping around me is a problem.

Warnings; NSFW. Smut. Public sex. Lingerie. Latex free. Choking. Smut for smut’s sake. liiiggghhhtttt dom/sub.

A/N: repost from the old blog

“They sell this shit online now.”

I turned at my boyfriend’s grumbled words, a wide and playful grin on my face. Pete had been shuffling behind me in the lingerie boutique, his hands stuffed into the pockets of his hoody and his eyes firmly on the ground. The only hint of his discomfort was how bright the tips of his ears were.

Pete… had a thing for lingerie. Especially when it was me, in said lingerie. He wasn’t picky either. Stockings paired with garters, teddies, corsets, crotchless panties, it didn’t matter. He loved to see me wearing lingerie.

It was getting to be an expensive habit too. Pete had a tendency to get a little carried away, always seeming to tear the delicate undergarments to shreds. Satin stood no chance under his eager hands, practically disintegrating at the seams. Delicate lace was shredded by his tightly clenched teeth and torn from my body. There were days where I pondered if his taste for destroying my lingerie was just an excuse for me to go and purchase new pieces.

I moved languidly from table to table, Pete following me the entire time like a shadow. He hovered as I sifted through the neat spreads of every cut of panty imaginable, the man behind me shifting uneasily from foot to foot. I had an inkling as to why he was shifting, as my hand was gliding over different cuts of panties. His decision to wear the gray sweatpants out shopping with me today was not his wisest decision, but the store was practically empty, except for the bored woman popping her gum and texting at the register.

“Grab the white ones.”

My hand paused over the white lace boy shorts at the low, rumbled words.

“And those red ones next to them.”

I bit my lower lip, lust coursing through my veins, and grabbed the two specified panties. When Pete got bossy like this, it was practically my kryptonite.

“How do you feel about these black ones?”

I picked up the black satin French cut thong and let it dangle from my index finger as I turned to Pete. His tongue flicked out to wet his lips, eyes dark and intent, clearly imagining what each would look like being worn.

“Yeah… Get those too. I owe you a couple pairs anyway.”

I giggled coquettishly.

“A couple? I’m down to one pair, Pete. One last pretty pair and then I’m left commando.”

Air rushed out of him audibly and a half feral smirk tore across his face. The next thing I knew, he was crowding into my space, with his hands on my hips and the hard ridge of his cock pressing into the small of my back.

“That’s the exact opposite of a problem, luv.”

His growled words in my ear and the insistent press of his hips had me squirming from the lightning bolt of arousal to my core that left me close to panting and weak.

“Pete… I have to try these on and then I promise we can get out of here.”

He huffed, clearly disappointment in my answer. I shuffled over to another table, Pete’s hands still on my hips and his body stayed close to mine, every step causing his hips to bump against me suggestively.

“Are you finding everything alright?” The young woman at the register called disinterestedly, never once looking up from her phone.

“I’m doing great, thank you!”

My voice was a little too breathy to have been inconspicuous but the cashier didn’t look up from her phone.

“The blue ones to your left,” Pete growled as his hips ground into mine, the ache between my thighs ratcheting up to exquisite, almost painful levels. His hot breath against my ear made me shiver.

“Then the pink ones below that. Grab two pairs of those red ones there.”

The rawness and edge to his voice made my panties uncomfortably wet, coupled with the fact that his fingers had slipped just underneath the waistband of my jeans, stroking at the soft and delicate skin there robbed me of my breath. My hands flipped through the slips of fabric shakily to grab the requested items as Pete’s head dropped down to press kisses along my neck and shoulder.

He whirled me around, his lips still gliding along the sensitive flesh of my neck. There in front of us were a series of colorful teddies and corsets on racks and matching garters and stockings on a nearby table.

“The dark green thing there. The red corset and grab the matching stockings.”

His words vibrated along my skin and I shakily moved to grab the emerald colored teddy and the under bust fire red corset with attached garter belt.

“Now, kitten, go try them on. Make it fuckin’ quick too. I need to take you home and fuck you through the mattress.”

He pushed me towards the dressing rooms with a firm slap to my ass. I turned to give a weak glare at him, only for my knees to threaten to give out at the heated look on his face. It was on shaky legs that I entered the dressing rooms, entering the one the farthest down the small hallway, and locking the door behind me.

I tossed the pile of underwear onto the plush zebra print chair that was inside the dressing room and hung Pete’s selections from the chrome hook on the wall. I slipped my clothes off, down to my last pair of decent and pretty panties and I thought about Pete, who I knew was waiting for me outside sporting a major erection.

My phone buzzed as I slipped on the dark green teddy.

Pete: Do you need a hand?

A wicked grin tugged at my lips as I snapped a selfie in the mirror and sent it back in response to Pete.

Pete: For fucks sake woman.

I peeled off the dark green satin garment and laced up the red corset, the attached garters tapping against my thighs, and snapped another selfie.

Pete: You fuckin’ tease.

I unlaced the corset, before sliding on a navy form fitting, sheer chiffon and lace slip before sending another selfie.

Not twenty seconds later, there was a knock on the door.

“I’m doing fine!”

The knocks continued, more insistent. I sighed heavily and opened the door.

“I said I’m ok- oomph!”

Pete pushed the door in, grasped my head firmly with his hands, and pulled me in for a mind melting kiss while he kicked the dressing room door shut with his foot.

“You’re not supposed to be in here!” My words were mumbled, my mind still recovering from the kiss and his sudden appearance, as he dropped down to his knees to slide my panties down to my ankles.

"That’s what’s gonna make this so good.“

I steadied myself against his broad shoulders, gazing down at him with half lidded eyes as he helped me step out of my underwear.

"Y'better hold onto these.”

He pressed my panties into the palm of my left hand, with a self satisfied smirk on his face. I clasped them tightly in my hand as he slipped the navy silk number over my head and flung it to the corner of the dressing room. Pete took a moment to admire all of my exposed skin in the mirrors that lined the walls of the dressing room. Not to be outdone, I palmed the bulge in the front of his sweatpants.

He jerked at the touch, his blue gray eyes hooded and staring at me hungrily as he peeled off his t-shirt. As soon as it was thrown to the floor, Pete backed me against the wall, pressing himself into my hand.

“This is not a good idea Pete. What if someone comes to see what’s going on?”

He rumbled his pleasure as he ground himself into the palm of my hand even harder.

“Then you’ll just have to be quiet, because I’m gonna fuck you right here right now. Bet you thought you were bein’ cute with those texts.”

My arms twined behind his neck as I pulled him into a filthy kiss, the throbbing between my legs growing slicker as he nibbled at my lower lip and I felt his sweatpants slide down. His hands reached for the back of my thigh, then he lifted me up against his solid body. I gripped him tighter as he pressed me against the cool surface of the wall mirror, the combination of the shiver of the sudden cold and the roll of his hips causing my nipples to pebble into stiff peaks.

A growl rumbled through him as I reached a hand down between us to carefully guide the head of his length between the slick lips of my core. He drove himself into me so forcefully that I was concerned, at the back of my mind, that the mirror behind me would crack as the breath was being driven from my lungs.

Then, there was only Pete. The grumpy, surly champion who’s now sole focus was getting me off. The man with a hidden gentleness to him, that I was realizing a little bit more every day that I couldn’t live without. And right now, he was a wall of twitching muscle, caging me in, filling me to the absolute brim.

“I never get tired of the way you fuckin’ feel.”

His words were breathed against my lips as his hips grinded against mine. My fingers were beginning to tingle, as my wrist was caught between our bodies, and I tried to get it free.

“Touch yourself.”

The words were a rumbled command, as Pete leaned back slightly to take in oour reflections from the corner of his eye. I reacted almost instantaneously to the order, my fingers moving to the taught bundle of nerves and rubbing in quick circles as he continued to drive himself into me at a punishing pace. My jaw dropped at the combined sensations and Pete rumbled his appreciation as I writhed against him.

“So damn pretty when I fuck you. You like this, don’t you?”

Words were evading me, my hips moving of their own accord, and I only could nod rapidly in response to his question. He snapped his hips again in rapid succession, smothering my cries with his mouth. The clever work of his tongue against mine only made my fingers work faster.

“Oh, fuck, yes,” she loudly gasped as he snapped his hips. He smothered her cries with the soft warmth of his mouth, kissing her senseless and her fingers moved faster as he continued to thrust himself into her, chasing his release.

I yelped at a particularly deep thrust, breaking the kiss and turning to press my cheek against the cool glass.

“Shhh, gotta be quiet,” he chuckled, his cock still pistoning out of me at a ruthless pace. “If you can’t be quiet, your panties are going into your mouth.”

“Oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck!” I panted helplessly as the white hot knot of tension that had been building inside of me coiled so tightly that I thought for sure that my brain might start leaking out of my ears.

“Fuckin’ put them in your mouth. Do as you’re told. Now.”

I bit into my lower lip as I struggled to remain silent. Pete drew back, his face growing increasingly impatient with me. My eyes met his dark blue eyes as my head rolled back to the smooth mirror and I swallowed heavily, trying to remain silent and ignore the loud rush of blood in my ears. His jaw clenched and the muscle to the left side jumped as I brought my hand up to my mouth and I pushed the black scrap of satin into my mouth, an erotic slip of fabric peaking just beyond my lips. Pete’s eyes widened, the pupils blown out completely at the sight, and he ground out a rather impressive series of curses under his breath.

He pulled out completely and I  made a muffled noise of protest at the loss of his touch. I blinked and then he had tossed me onto the zebra print chair, maneuvering me so that I was on all fours. I grasped the back of the chair with a squeal as he dragged the chair into the center of the dressing room.

Then his hands were back on me, one on my breasts and the other on my hip, and he was filling me again.

“Right where I want you. Hang on tight.”

I ground back into him, to dare him to do his worst. His hand on my hip tightened to the point I know I was going to have fingerprint shaped bruises. Pete draped himself across my back, his words and breath soft against my ear, “Mine.”

His other hand traveled from cupping my breast to lightly grasping at my throat. He stood straight up and brought me up with him, using the pressure against my airways to guide me. One of my hands went to grasp his wrist at my throat and the other went back to touching myself, the combination of my restricted airflow and the sight of ourselves fucking in the mirror almost too much.

I leaned against him, letting him take over completely. Our eyes met in the mirror and I was caught in his possessive and adoring stare. “Mine.”

He tilted his head down, never breaking eye contact, to press his teeth into the skin at the juncture of my shoulder and neck. I gasped, my fingers picking up speed at the pleasure-pain of his teeth on my skin. He hummed appreciatively, and I lifted my hand up to him, in an offering.

“Mine.”

His soft mouth closed around my slick fingers and he sucked at them with a groan, his hips continuing to drive himself into me.

The room was filled with the lewd and wet sound of skin slapping against skin, as he lit into me without mercy. The knot that was the herald of my orgasm was tightening in my lower abdomen and my internal muscles fluttered around Pete.

I withdrew my fingers from his mouth to start touching myself again, chasing my release. His hand around my throat tightened, his eyes desperately boring into mine as his pace picked up into something wild and frenetic.

“Cum for me,” his words were growled before his teeth began to bite into my flesh again. “Not gonna last much longer.”

My vision was getting a little fuzzy at the edges and I was so, oh so close.

“Do as you’re fucking told.”

I bit down on the panties in my mouth and my eyes screwed shut as the tension released, ecstasy filling my body. Pete buried himself deeply, releasing his grip on my throat and holding onto me tightly as I let out a long muffled shriek. The trembling of my body was uncontrollable as I writhed against him, my veins filled with white hot pleasure. He continued to fuck into me, my orgasm being drawn out, before he himself groaned and gasped my name, heat filling me.

I opened my eyes just in time to watch him come undone in the mirror. It was a good thing that he was supporting my weight, because the look of pure and unbridled pleasure on his face would have made me swoon. His hips jerked against mine, once then twice, before stilling and his forehead was resting against my shoulder. I could see the barest hint of a dreamy, content smile on his face in the mirror.

“Are you still doin’ okay hun?”

Our bodies both went rigid, the soft haziness of our afterglow breaking. I quickly pulled out the black panties from my mouth and I could feel the snarl on Pete’s face from our post-coital moment being interrupted.

“Yeah, I-I’m fine! I loved everything!”

I could practically hear the retail worker’s shrug as she walked away. Pete pressed a kiss against my shoulder, before withdrawing. I shuddered as his cock left me and he smirked.

“Get dressed. I want to see you in the green at home.”

[ravenmorganleigh]

25 THINGS YOU SHOULD KNOW ABOUT PLOT

Previous iterations of the “25 Things” series:

25 Things Every Writer Should Know

25 Things You Should Know About Storytelling

25 Things You Should Know About Character

And now…

1. WHAT THE FIDDLY FUCK IS “PLOT,” ANYWAY?

A plot is the sequence of narrative events as witnessed by the audience.

2. THE WRONG QUESTION

Some folks will ask, incorrectly, “What’s the plot?” which, were you to answer them strictly, you would begin to recite for them a litany of events, each separated by a deep breath and the words, “And then…” They probably don’t want that. What they mean to ask is, “What’s the story?” or, “What’s this about?” Otherwise you’re just telling them what happened, start to finish. In other words: snore.

3. A GOOD PLOT IS LIKE A SKELETON: CRITICAL, YET INVISIBLE

A plot functions like a skeleton: it is both structural and supportive. Further, it isn’t entirely linear. A plot has many moving parts (sub-plots and pivot points) that act as limbs and joints. The best plots are plots we don’t see, or rather, that the audience never has to think about. As soon as we think about it, it’s like a needle manifests out of thin air and pops the balloon or lances that blister. Remember, we don’t walk around with our skeletons on the outside of our body, which is good because, ew. What are we, ants? So don’t show off your plot. Let the plot remain hidden, invisible.

4. SHIT’S GOTTA MAKE SENSE, SON

The biggest plot crime of them all is a plot that doesn’t make a lick of goddamn sense. That’s a one way ticket to plot jail. Do not pass GO. Do not collect $200 dollars. Do not drop the soap. The elegance of a great plot is that, when the events are all strung together, there exists a natural order as if this was the only way they could fit together. It’s like dominoes tumbling. Your plot is not a chimera: random parts mashed together because you didn’t think it through. Test the plot. Show people. Pull the pieces apart and ask, “Is there a better way?” Nonsense plots betray the potency of story.

5. THE QUINTESSENTIAL PLOT

The simplest motherfucker of a plot is this: things get worse until they get better. A straight-up escalation of conflict. It goes from “Uh-oh, that’s bad,” to, “Uh-oh, it’s getting worse,” to “Oh, holy shit, it can’t get any worse,” to, “I think I maybe maybe fixed it, or at least stopped it from being so totally and completely fucked.” When in doubt, just know that your next step as a storyteller is to bring the pain, amp the misery, and escalate the conflict. That’s what they mean by the advice, “Have a man with a gun walk through the door.” You can take that literally, sure, but what it means is: the bad news just got worse.

6. IN LIFE WE AVOID CONFLICT, IN FICTION WE SEEK IT

Fiction is driven by characters in conflict, or, put differently, the flame of fiction grows brighter through friction. A match-tip lights only when struck; so too is the mechanism by which a gun fires a bullet. Impact. Tension. Fear. Danger. Need to know what impels your plot forward? Look to the theme of Man Versus [fill-in-the-blank]. Man versus his fellow man. Woman versus nature. Man versus himself. Woman versus an angry badger riding a unicorn. Find the essential conflict and look for events that are emblematic to that.

7. WANT VERSUS FEAR

Of course, the essence of the essential conflict — the one below all that Wo/Man versus stuff — is a character’s wants versus a character’s fears. Plot grows from this fecund garden. The character wants life, revenge, children, a pony — and that which he fears must stand in his way. John McClane must battle terrorists to return to his wife. Indiana Jones must put up with snakes and irritating sidekicks to uncover the artifact. I must put up with walking downstairs to make myself a gin-and-tonic. Everything that stands in a character’s way — the speedbumps, roadblocks, knife-wielding monkeys, ninja clones, tornadoes, and sentient Krispy Kreme donuts sent from the future to destroy man via morbid obesity — are events in the greater narrative sequence: they are pieces of the plot.

8. GROW THE PLOT, DON’T BUILD IT

A plot grows within the story you’re telling. A story is all the important parts swirling together: world, character, theme, mood, and of course, plot. An artificial plot is something you have to wrestle into place, a structure you have to bend and mutilate and duct tape to get it to work — it is a square peg headbutted into a circle hole, and you’re the poor bastard doing all the headbutting.

9. THE TENSION AND RECOIL OF CHOICE AND CONSEQUENCE

An organic plot grows like this: characters make decisions — sometimes bad decisions, other times decisions whose risks outweigh the rewards, and other times still decisions that are just plain uncertain in their outcome — and then characters must deal with the consequences of those decisions. A character gives up a baby. Or buys a gun. Or enters the dark forest to slay Lady Gaga. Anytime a character makes a choice, the narrative branches. Events unfold because she chose a path. That’s it. That’s plot. Choice and consequence tighten together, ratcheting tension, creating suspense. Choice begets event.

10. PLOT IS PROMISE

Plot offers the promise of Chekov and his gun, of Hitchcock and his bomb under the table. An event here leads to a choice there which spawns another event over there. Foreshadowing isn’t just a literary technique used sparingly: it lurks in the shadow of every plot turn. Plot promises pay-off. A good plot often betrays this promise and does something different than the audience expects. That’s not a bad thing. You don’t owe the audience anything but your best story. But a plot can also make hay by doing exactly what you expect: show them the gun and now they want to see it fire.

11. LET CHARACTERS DO THEY HEAVY LIFTING

Characters will tell you your plot. Even better: let them run and they’ll goddamn give it to you on a platter. Certainly plot can happen from an external locus of control — but you’re not charting the extinction of the dinosaurs or the lifecycle of the slow loris. Plot is like Soylent Green: it’s made of people. Characters say things, do things, and that creates plot. It really can be that simple. Authentic plot comes from internal emotions, not external mechanics.

12. CHART THE SHORTEST POINT BETWEEN BEGINNING AND END

One way to be shut of the nonsensical, untenable plot is to cut through all the knots. If we are to assume that a plot is motivated by the choices and actions of characters — and we must assume that, because who else acts as prime mover? — then we can also assume that characters will take the most direct path through the story as they can. That’s not to say it’ll be the smartest path, but it will be forthright as the character sees it. No character creates for himself a convoluted path. Complex, perhaps. Convoluted? Never. Characters want what they want and that means they will cut as clear a path to that goal as they can. A convoluted, needlessly complex plot is just the storyteller showing off how clever he is. And no audience wants that. Around these parts, we hunt and kill the preening peacocks and wear their tail-feathers as a headdress.

13. ON THE SUBJECT OF “PLOT HOLES”

Plot holes — where logic and good sense and comprehensible sequence fall into a sinking story-pit — happen for a handful of reasons. One, you weren’t paying attention. Two, your plot is too convoluted and its untenable nature cannot sustain itself. Three, you don’t know what the fuck is happening, and maybe also, you’re drunk. Four, the plot is artificial, not organic, and isn’t coming out naturally from what the characters need and want to do. Five, you offended Plot Jesus by not sacrificing a goat. You can’t just fix a plot hole by spackling it over. It’s like a busted pipe in a wall. You need to do some demo. Get in there. Rip out more than what’s broken. Fill in more than what’s missing.

13. IF THE CHARACTERS HAVE TO PLAN, SO DO YOU

Many writers don’t like to outline. Here’s how you know if you should, though: if your characters are required to plan and plot something — a heist, an attack on a moon bunker, a corporate take-over — then you’re a fool if you think these imaginary people have to plan but you don’t. This is doubly true of genre material. A murder mystery for example lives and dies by a compelling, sensible plot. So plan the plot, for Chrissakes. This isn’t improvisational dance. Take some fucking notes, will you?

14. SET UP YOUR TENTPOLES

A big tent is propped up by tentpoles. So too is your plot. Easy way to plan without getting crazy: find those events in your plot that are critical, that must happen for the whole story to come together. “Mary Meets Gordon. Belial Betrays Satan. An Earthquake Swallows Snooki.” Chart these half-dozen events. Know that you must get to them somehow.

15. THE HERKY JERKY PLOT SHUFFLE PIVOT POINT BOOGIE

You’ve seen Freytag’s Triangle. It’s fine. But it doesn’t tell the whole story. This is the Internet. This is the future. We have CGI. We have 3-D. Gaze upon the plot from the top-down. It isn’t a linear stomp up a steep mountain. It’s a zig-zagging quad ride through dunes and jungles, over rivers and across gulleys. You’re a hawk over the quad-rider’s shoulder — watch it jerk left, pull right, jump a log, squash a frog. More obstacles. Greater danger. Faster and faster. Every turn is a pivot point. A point when the narrative shifts, when the audience goes right and the story feints left.

16. PLOT IS THE BEAT THAT SETS THE STORY’S RHYTHM

Plot comprises beats. Each action, a new beat, a new bullet point in the sequence of events. These establish rhythm. Stories are paced according to the emotions and moods they are presently attempting to evoke. Plot is the drummer. Plot keeps the sizzling beat. Like Enrique “Kiki” Garcia, of Miami Sound Machine.

17. EVERY NIGHT NEEDS A SLOW DANCE

I know I said that plot, at its core, is how everything gets worse and worse and worse until it gets better. Overall, that’s true. But you need to pull back from that. Release the tension. Soften the recoil. Not constantly, but periodically. Learn to embrace the false victories, the fun & games, the momentary lapses of danger. If only to mess with the heads of the audience. Which, after all, is your totally awesome job.

18. THE NAME OF MY NEW BAND IS “BEAT SHEET MANIFESTO”

You can move well beyond the tentpoles. You can free-fall from the 30,000 foot view, smash into the earth, and get a macro-level micro-view of all the ants and the pill-bugs and the sprouts from seeds. What I mean is, you can track every single beat — every tiny action — that pops up in your plot. You don’t need to do this before you write, but you can and should do it after. You’ll see where stuff doesn’t make sense. You’ll see where plot holes occur. Also: wow. A Meat Beat Manifesto joke?

19. BEATS BECOME SCENES BECOME SEQUENCES BECOME ACTS

Plot is narrative, and narrative has units of measurement: momentary beats become scenes of a single place, scenes glom together to form whole sequences of action and event, and sequences elbow one another in the giant elevator known as an “act,” where the story manifests a single direction before zig-zagging to another (at which point, another act shifts). Think first in acts. Then sequences. Then scenes. And finally, beats. Again, take that 30,000 foot view, but then jump out of the plane and watch the ground come to meet you.

20. YOUR SEXY MISTRESS, THE SUBPLOT

In real life, don’t cheat on your spouse or lover. Not cool, man. Not cool. As a writer, you don’t cheat on your manuscript, either: while working on one script or novel, don’t go porking another one behind the shed. But inside the narrative? The laws change. You need to cheat on your primary plot. Have dalliances with sub-plots — this is a side-story, or the “B-story.” Lighter impact. Smaller significance. Highlights supporting characters. But the sub-plot always has the DNA of the larger plot and supports or runs parallel to the themes present. Better still is when the sub-plot affects, influences or dovetails with the larger plot.

21. BENEATH SUBPLOT, A NOUGATY LAYER OF MICRO-PLOT

Every little component of your story threatens — in a good way, like how storms threaten to give way to sun, or how a woman threatens to dress up as your favorite Farscape puppet and sex you down to galaxy-town — to spin off into its own plot. Your tale is unwittingly composed of tiny micro-plots: filaments woven together. A character needs to buy a gun but can’t pass the legal check. His dog runs away. He hasn’t paid his power bill. Small inciting incidents. Itty-bitty conflicts. They don’t overwhelm the story, but they exist just the same, enriching the whole. A big plot is in some ways just a lot of little plots lashed together and moving in a singular direction. Like a herd of stampeding marmots.

22. EXPOSITION IS SAND IN THE STORY’S PANTIES

Look at plot construction advice and you’ll see a portion set aside for “exposition.” Consider exposition a dirty word. It is a synonym for “info-dump,” and an info-dump is when you, the storyteller, squat over the audience’s mouth and expel your narrative waste into their open maw. Take the section reserved for exposition and fold it gently into the rest of the work as if you were baking a light and fluffy cake. Let information come out through action. Even better: withhold exposition as long as you can. Tantric storytelling, ladies and germs: deny the audience’s expectation ejaculation until you can do so no longer.

23. ON THE SUBJECT OF THE “PLOT TWIST”

A plot twist is the kid who’s too cool for school — ultimately shallow, without substance, and a total tool. It’s a gimmick. Let your story be magic, not a magic trick. Not to say plot twists can’t work, but they only work when they function as the only way the story could go from the get-go. Again: organic, not artificial.

24. THE ENDING IS THE ANSWER TO A VERY LONG EQUATION

Plot is math, except instead of numbers and variables it’s characters, events, themes, and yes, variables. The ending is one such variable. An ending should feel like it’s the only answer one can get when he adds up all parts of the plot. This actually isn’t true: you can try on any number of endings and you likely have a whole host that can work. But there’s one ending that works for you, and when it works for you, it works for them. And by “them” I don’t mean the men in the flower delivery van who are watching your every move. I mean “them” as in, the audience. P.S., don’t forget to wear your tinfoil hat because the flowers are listening.

25. PLOT IS ONLY MEANS TO AN END

Speaking of ends, plot is just a tool. A means to an end. Think of it as a character- and conflict-delivery-system. Plot is conveyance. It still needs to work, still needs to come together and make sense — but plot is rarely the reason someone cares about a story. They care about characters, about the way it makes them feel, about the thing you-as-storyteller are trying to say. Note, though, that the opposite is true: plot may not make them love a story, but it can damn sure make them hate it.

* * *

If you dig on the apeshit crazy-face no-holds-barred profanity-soaked writing advice found here at terribleminds, then you may want to take a wee bitty gander-peek at: CONFESSIONS OF A FREELANCE PENMONKEY, which is available now! Buy for Kindle (US), Kindle (UK), Nook, or PDF.

[witchofthesouls]

Do you have more "tfp!kids being other" content? Both on them as "humans" and as sparklings...

(You have no idea how much I think about them. They absolutely live rent-free in my head. Warning: some dark implications on child soldiers)

If June was ever caught by the artifact along with the kids, then she would be very Tall with grey-blue optics. Similar to Crosshairs from Bayverse, her armor is deceptively light and looks like a pale robe.

Unlike the kids, June retains her memory and has braided cords and hanging cables that act as her hair. Eventually, she figures out how to control them, but she prefers pulling them back into a low ponytail.

The Autobots are surprised that she has a heavy field, how it swallows the kids, the way it keeps them hidden away. Mine, it beats in a steady, protective chant. Mine, mine, mine.

Seems to have a second pair of optics behind her head, an incredible amount of sensors, or extrasensory perceptive abilities because no one can seek up at her, nor could the kids pass her.

The Autobots know that she worked at the local hospital. They didn't know which unit because she still goes to work without issues: "Quite the contrary, they'll be pleased by this outcome. It'll require fewer resources to put me on other units."

That doesn’t sound suspiciously ominous. At all.

Optimus and Agent Fowler had been in far less tense situations, including armed hostage crises, rather than dealing with the local hospital's Other Half. They're not letting June Darby go. For anything. Sudden species change is an occupational hazard. It's in the contract. As well as Acts of God(s). That includes aliens, too.

Agent Fowler was the chosen to be the Autobot Liasion due to his long history and exposure to the Other side. The kids were either very diluted or very well hidden, but as aliens, it's fairly obvious that the three freak out the standard aliens.

Fowler needs a moment to himself because now they got a damn dragon on their hands, so they need to touch base with the Esquivel family. Because Uncle Sam's moldy privates, the last thing they need is for the adult ones to rain hellfire upon them.

June is another worry, but one that doesn't need attention at the moment. Not with Jasper Hospital looming over as a ghastly shadow.

This Agent learns to carry extra supplies since the kids will raid his office and nothing is caught by the cameras. He knows. He checks.

Fowler also learns to pick up a McDonald's meal for Jack's birds because the kid will ask and June forwards him the amount in quiet, unsettling ways. Optimus just hands him cash and goes deaf whenever he tries to push it away.

Even with Optimus in possession of the Matrix which gives off vibes on the supernatural, otherworldly spectrum that the area is Not to be Fucked With, having three, little ones would turn heads to their empty corner. So small, so powerful, and so easy to lure away. Children often disappear for one reason or another. June, as a "human" or a Cybertronian, is often the last thing they see...

If the Autobots tickle Jack just right, not only do those dark wings beat rapidly but his mouth opens very wide and his throat is lined with rows and rows and rows of endless sharp denta.

But of course, it's not shown during Ratchet's checkups. Just a regular intake and very healthy sparkling.

The Autobots now need to look up whenever they cross rooms since Jack can magnetize to walls and ceilings or hook his claws to climb all over and Miko copies him because she absolutely loves jumping from high spaces. And it doesn't help their collective fuel pumps that Jack would give Miko a ride or boost her beyond their sightline.

Jack has a really active imagination and will chase after what caught his attention.

Miko doesn't like being left out and enjoys the small bits of flight she can catch.

Bulkhead and Ratchet had been driven to tears by their antics, especially when no one was able to catch Miko in time.

Due to the sheer amount of pink that's her natural armor, Miko is classified as a War-Forged. She can withstand a ridiculous amount of damage due to her aggressive nanite colonies and scattered pain receptors giving her an incredible pain tolerance even as a sparkling..

Arcee had joked that Miko was definitely under Bulkhead's purview because it wasn't far off from the truth.

Wreckers can not only trace their origins to the very beginning of Cybertron where the Thirteen Primes guided them, but the current rendition cemented their fearsome reputation by the very few, still living War-Forged that joined the Autobot cause.

Their very motto: Wreck and Rule is a callback to the War-Forged very own nature of no retreat. No surrender. Their combat-protocols and related systems are too engrained, hyperactive, and beyond anything state-of-art technology could touch.

The Decepticons pitched an immense amount of resources to bring down the War-Forged. They lost all the Phase Sixers and depleted all the elements to create another, but they managed to take down all the active War-Forged, including the ex-leader: Elita One.

Bulkhead loves Miko. And he's quietly thankful that Team Prime isn't like the rest of the forces, there's only talk about what-ifs on the injury side. He holds a caustic mix of guilt and shame to be relieved that they don't have enough resources. He understands Ratchet's worries, but it's a terrible comfort Miko won't be forcibly upgraded.

Since the Autobot mechs can easily transport the kids by darkening their windows (Sorry Arcee), they field trips to the nearby oasis. Perhaps it's overkill to have three out to sufficiently mask the kids with someone on standby with the bridge controls, but just in case.

Whoever takes Raf is having an easy time. The baby Predacon finds a very nice, very warm rock, and immediately conks out on it. Cute, stubby limbs all out as if to increase his own limited surface area to soak up the extra high-noon Nevada sun.

They thought it would be easy to coral sparklings in a limited pool. Wrong again. They severely underestimated Miko's love for water.

Since Miko will mainly listen to Optimus, it's a strange sight to see the Prime in waist-deep water, studiously assessing the surface to fish out their wayward, smoll Seeker.

Arcee has a lapful of snoozing Predacon and sleepy triple-changer as Optimus and Bulkhead have their hands full with a wildly thrashing and howling Miko.

Since Ratchet has a tendency to over-worry, the kids spend quite a bit of time in the medbay. On one hand, he has three sparklings. On the other hand, he has three sparklings.

Jack has a curious nature and Ratchet does answer his questions. The medic is far more careful about how he explains; otherwise, Jack will attempt to venture off to seek out materials.

Vaguely realizes that sometimes Jack will ask things in Neocybex -particularly a very formal Iaconic-style. Ratchet inwardly cringes as Jack will sometimes mash different dialects. No surprise, considering Optimus is giving the boy lessons and Jack is picking up the different cues from everyone else.

While he can measure and treat Miko and Jack, Ratchet is stumped about Raf with his Predacon frame.

June floors them all by coaxing the baby dragon to shift out of his alt-mode. Raf doesn't like it. At all.

Raf cries, frets, and screeches in his root-mode since Ratchet locked him to give him a proper checkup. He's already blind and made far more helpless with limited mobility, his sense jumbled and confused as they shift to accommodate his two-legged form.

This severely agitates Miko and Jack. June ignores the Seeker's adamant clawing into her armor as Miko refuses to stand down. The dark sparkling's worries are barely allayed by his mother's calm words, but even June is prodding the medic to hurry up as Raf restarts his wailing cycle.

Raf refuses to switch out of his alt-mode for a very long time.

The rest of the Autobots have mixed feelings about the campfires. Sure, Bumblebee and Smokescreen entertain the little ones for a while, but they got sparklings with budding arson tendencies that are being flamed by the youngest's ability to burp small flames.

Smokescreen is a cowboy of a storyteller. No rules will contain this mech. It may start out as a classic fairy tale, but it will end as a scifi rebellion of a zombie apopcalypse. Pirates are always involved in each story.

Bumblebee gets super frustrated because he's very limited with shadow puppets.

Someone has to hold onto Raf or the potato will try to dart into the fire and the mechs really don't want to test out a baby Predacon's armature. Ratchet would absolutely kill them. Even with June's reassurance that Raf can withstand the temperature as a dragon.

No campfire is complete without smores. Of course, Jack feeds the vying blackbirds, Miko sets her marshmallow on fire, and Raf gets to chew one lovingly made from scrap metal.